#Anti-Competition Issues

[bharatbriefs]

Big Tech Braces for Wave of Antitrust Rulings in 2024 

U.S. antitrust cases against tech giants Google and Meta Platforms are expected to come to a head in 2024, likely producing long-awaited rulings that could shape the legacies of top Biden administration regulators. Silicon Valley and its critics have seen their patience tested on some of these cases. A U.S. antitrust case brought against Alphabet’s Google unit in 2020 went to trial in 2023 and…

[reportwire]

Silicon Valley Confronts the End of Growth. It’s a New Era for Tech Stocks.

Silicon Valley could use a reboot. The biggest players aren’t growing, and more than a few are seeing sharp revenue declines. Regulators seem opposed to every proposed merger, while legislators push for new rules to crack down on the internet giants. The Justice Department just can’t stop filing antitrust suits against Google. The initial public offering market is closed. Venture-capital…

[sapphic-agent]

"If I was surprised at anything, it may have been that it seemed like people were less willing to let her make mistakes than they were with Aang."

I hate Bryke's guts, but the one thing I will agree with him (Bryan) on is this.

I've gotten heat from Aang stans for saying this, but for me Korra will always be a better written character for me. Not because Aang's childish and optimistic and naive or anything like that. That doesn't matter to me. Hell, it's not even for his actions during DOBS or EIP or Kataang. Sure, those things aren't great, but they aren't the issue with his character.

It's not about Aang's actions, it's about how Aang's actions are treated by the narrative.

This is nothing new obviously, I've said this before. Many times. Aang kissing Katara in EIP is treated as him messing up his chances with her, not because he forced something on her she didn't want. The kiss in DOBS doesn't even come up again in the show (and when it did in the comics, Aang blew up and nearly melted her face off so-). I've spoken enough about his holier-than-thou attitude in TSR too and how his message of forgiveness is perpetuated as the right one.

It's one thing that is 100% better in LOK; Korra is held accountable for her actions, by the narrative, the other characters, and herself. A big part of LOK is Korra acknowledging her actions and making the effort to change and be better.

A great counter to Aang repeatedly crossing boundaries with Katara is in Reunion when she warns Asami about trusting Hiroshi and Asami calls her out on giving unsolicited advice. Korra immediately backs off and tries to apologize when she sees that she upset her.

Now compare this to Aang's behavior in TSR or EIP.

And before anyone says it, I know Korra's older. I also know Asami reconnecting with her father is different than Katara wanting to kill Yon Rha. I get all of that.

But honestly? That doesn't matter to me. Because when you're talking about fictional characters- especially character progression and development for the protagonist- addressing flaws is important. Accountability is important. Especially when it comes to how they treat the people around them (love interests like Asami and Korra probably being the most important).

This is what solidifies Korra's character development as being better than Aang's for me.

However, I do think it's because of this framing (and the fact that she's a woman, but shh) that Korra gets more hate. Her flaws being addressed also means that they're constantly apparent. The audience is always aware of them. Whereas Aang's worse actions tended to be brushed over or excused. Or the context of those mistakes were maneuvered to make the audience feel bad for him instead of the one affected by his actions (EIP EIP EIP EIP).

So yes, Bryan, people were more willing to let Aang make mistakes because you and your bestie failed to actually address them

[ilynpilled]

i can fully understand the gripes with certain misogynistic tropes/writing issues that are present in the execution of some of cersei’s writing, but i will never understand the “she should have a redemption arc” or “she should be more likeable/less morally dark” perspective. that is not what her character is or has to be to make it great. wanting more female anti-heroes or “redemption arcs” with moral greyness and complexity of the level that asoiaf gives to primarily male characters is entirely understandable, but do some of you people even like cersei as a character, like at its core? like this is not about criticising the execution of certain things when it comes to this character, this is about taking issue with her as a villain fundamentally, which i just do not agree with at all

[skymantle]

sometimes i think people are a little ridiculous and fearmongery about ai on here and then i open twitter and see takes like "that image of a mouse in a suit is ai so im putting my painting commissions on indefinite hold because ai stole the joy from me" (...what about your existing clients??) and "this database uses art from consenting artists but it's still bad for some reason and if you contribute to it every Real Artist hates you" and I think okay maybe it's Not So Bad here after all

[sapphia]

radfem discourse (and other extreme/simplified radical discourse) infesting the internet did so much damage to modern conversation. the terf-y 'hierarchies of oppression' concept that holds that some people are more oppressed than others and you can get rankings or levels like it's some sort of global pvp contest.

what we've got now isn't that combatatitve on the surface but there's still this underlying principle that oppression is like a scoresheet you can tick off and add points up for to redeem on your carrd or whatever, rather a complex interweaving of factors of everything from race, sex, class, religion, upbringing, global location, etc etc.

[solvicrafts]

Seeing the reactions of the outside world (particularly people here in the USA) to Namibia's famine crisis is absolutely sickening. It's taking every bit of self control I have not to absolutely tell some people off whenever I see the subject come up.

"They should be pursuing long-term solutions instead of killing elephants and zebras."

Yeah, uh, no shit, asshole who has probably never missed a meal in their life. They do need long-term solutions. Duh. But in the meantime, people are starving.

"There's too many humans in the world, we need to de-populate."

Okay, and? So what? We're not talking about just numbers, we are talking about people that are already in existence and need help. You can whine and moan all your little edgelord self wants about how ~overpopulated~ humans are, it does not change the fact that these people EXIST. They are here, right now, alive and suffering.

"They brought this on themselves. Back in MY day, I saw commercials on the TV about donating to feed starving African kids. So what did they do with that money, huh?!"

Would you like some directions to the nearest active volcano? I hear humanity is overpopulated.

[fans4wga]

CALL TO ACTION to support WGA/SAG-AFTRA: Submit a comment about the corporate monopoly crisis.

August 18, 2023: You can personalize the template message included in the above link, or simply just add your name & email. Seems like it's US only; please boost if you can't sign yourself.

From the WGA:

"More than 100 days into our strike, as we continue to fight for the sustainability of our profession, events in Washington, D.C. provide an opportunity for writers to shine a light on one of the root causes of the strike: media consolidation. For decades, the WGA has advocated for stronger antitrust oversight, bringing attention to the ways that mergers and vertical integration in our industry – from AT&T-Time Warner to Warner Bros.-Discovery to Amazon-MGM to Disney-Fox – have consolidated the power of our employers and harmed writers as well as the diversity of content. In numerous reports and policy filings – including a new report called The New Gatekeepers: How Disney, Amazon and Netflix Will Take Over Media, released yesterday – the WGA has documented the threat to our industry from past and future consolidation and called for more aggressive antitrust enforcement. Our current strike highlights the urgency of the issue; studios gained power through anti-competitive consolidation and vertical integration and then used that power to push down wages and impose more precarious working conditions for writers while profiting off of their work, and currently – together – refuse to bargain a fair contract for writers to mitigate those harms. Last month, the FTC and DOJ jointly released proposed revisions to their Merger Guidelines, a policy document designed to guide law enforcement around consolidation. These new Draft Guidelines are part of an effort by these agencies to reinvigorate antitrust enforcement. Compared with prior versions of Merger Guidelines, they give significantly more weight to the ways that mergers can be harmful and, for the first time, explicitly direct agencies and courts to consider how mergers can hurt workers. The Draft Guidelines have been released for public comment, and the FTC and DOJ want to hear from people who have been affected by consolidation – people like you.”

The FTC and DOJ are accepting comments on their revisions of the Merger Guidelines until September 18.

[qqueenofhades]

The 2025 project seems to reflect that the Republican Party is becoming more and more fascism, but it actually reflects the growing number of extreme nationalists, misogynists, and racists among ordinary Americans. US is a democracy, and politicians rely on votes to stay in power. The fact that the Republicans dare to draft such a project shows that they are confident it will gain significant public support. Politicians aren’t fools; they wouldn’t pursue something that only a small group agrees with while the majority opposes it. The global rightward shift is evident, and though I’m not American, my country is also deteriorating in many ways. Why is this happening? Because the economic base determines the superstructure?and in recent years, the global economy has been in decline?

Mmmm, I'm gonna have to challenge you here.

First of all, it's just flatly not true that there's a "growing number of extreme nationalists, misogynists, and racists among ordinary Americans." That movement has become more vocal and visible in post-2016 America, but there's absolutely no evidence -- and indeed, a lot of evidence to the contrary -- that their numbers are growing instead of shrinking. The Republicans got lucky with Trump's win in 2016 thanks to a combination of decades of anti-Hillary smears, extensive Russian interference/psyops, the anti-democratic Electoral College, and general misplaced complacence that he was never going to win and people didn't need to bother voting for two disliked candidates. They've flatly lost every competitive nationwide election since then -- 2018, 2020, 2022, and very probably 2024. In between, their hand-picked Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade (guaranteeing the right to an abortion in all 50 states) and set off a titanic tidal wave of voter support for abortion rights, even in very dark red states like Kansas and Kentucky (which are not liberal by any stretch of the word). In fact, the Republicans' (flatly false) excuse that they just wanted to "return [abortion rights to the states]" has been unveiled as another lie due to their desperate attempts in this election cycle to ratfuck voter-approved abortion questions off the ballot in Arkansas, Missouri, Florida, and elsewhere. This is a badly losing issue for them, even in deep red states, and they don't want people to vote on it, because they hate democracy. We'll get to that.

Likewise, polls of "culture war" issues like LGBTQ+ rights, abortion rights, immigrants' rights, etc., consistently get much more support among ordinary Americans than not. The ordinary public is becoming more liberal, not less, even in the face of constant aggressive and reactionary attempts to undo the sum total of social and civil rights movements from the 20th century. Republicans' views are getting less popular, not more, and this is also driven by the ongoing demographic change in America. Within a generation or two, whites may be in the statistical minority, and that deeply terrifies people whose entire political and social identity is built on ethnostate white supremacism. The reason Republicans are getting so extreme and antidemocratic now is because the electorate is getting younger and younger, more diverse, more accepting, and less tolerant of their age-old bullshit. As such, there is a very visible window of time outside which the Republicans will not be able to win competitive nationwide elections, even despite all the advantages they're building into the system and have always had. That terrifies them. It is also why they have decided to destroy democracy.

Which leads us into your next assertion that "US is a democracy, and politicians rely on votes to stay in power. The fact that the Republicans dare to draft such a project shows that they are confident it will gain significant public support. Politicians aren’t fools; they wouldn’t pursue something that only a small group agrees with while the majority opposes it." Yes, maybe, in some exceedingly generic logic that doesn't take any account of the actual situation in the US and the fact that the Republicans have made their hatred for democratic free and fair elections very, very clear. This is why Trump pushed the "election fraud" Big Lie in 2020 and sent a mob to attack the Capitol in an attempt to prevent the certification of Biden's win. This is why states controlled by Republicans have frantically enacted as many voter suppression and voter-removal laws as possible and conducted constant purges to get voters (especially the mysteriously missing 1 million Democrats in Florida) off the rolls. This is why they talk approvingly about Trump being "a dictator on day one." This is why they have pursued a decades-long strategy to capture the federal judiciary (by installing extreme right-wing hacks to the bench and then funneling extreme-right legislation into their courts to get a favorable ruling and/or send it to the extreme-right Supreme Court). And on, and on, and on. The Republicans are explicitly aware that their ideas cannot win in a free and fair election, because their ideas are terrible, and as such have been taking massive, ongoing, and coordinated efforts to disenfranchise American voters, expose them to lakes of sordid Russian propaganda/psyops in favor of Trump, double down on the xenophobia and white nationalism to stoke Fear Of The Other, and everything else they possibly can to prevent voters from voting for their opponents. They hate democracy and they are not counting on democratic methods to implement Project 2025. They intend to do it by secretive oligarch methods funded by right-wing billionaire dark money and their Russian friends. That's the whole point.

Indeed, you can see that in the fact that as soon as Project 2025 became widely known and therefore widely hated, the Republicans were thrown into a panicked fluster of disavowing it and insisting that Trump didn't actually know about it (which is a lie, but that's all the day). Because it is electoral kryptonite, they are trying every single method they can to lie to voters long enough to get into power and do it anyway. Authoritarians can often come to power through democratic elections, but once there, they do their utmost to degrade, erode, or otherwise destroy the institutional safeguards that prevent them from keeping power forever. Trump is a literally textbook example of this and he has made his intentions very clear. He flat-out told a group of Republicans at an event earlier this year that "we'll fix it so you won't have to vote again." He already tried a coup and somehow the Republicans nominated him again, because of the deep corruption of the party on every level, but the Republicans are not doing Project 2025 because they think it will organically generate popular support (and they know it doesn't.) It's a blueprint for a tiny group of extreme right-wing theocrats and fascists to get their way regardless of what the broader public says about it, and represents the culmination of decades of far-right power-play strategies related to exploiting economic, racial, social, and cultural grievances. They're doing this now in order to lock in their power before long-term demographic changes make it impossible for them to win another democratic American election. So their solution is to get rid of democratic American elections, the end. This is explicitly a project for permanent minority rule. They know that and that's what's driving their strategic choices here.

As such, essentially saying that the Republicans aren't really fascist, and/or the real problem and/or are just giving an increasingly fascist American population what they want, removes any moral responsibility for their deliberate choices and legitimizes the populist claim to be acting "for the people" instead of a corrupt institutional system. Everyone knows the many, MANY problems with American politics and government; we don't need to go through them again. But even if they were "just giving the people what they want," which as noted above they're not, it still wouldn't make it okay or defensible. To use the obvious example, just because Hitler was popular and democratically elected in 1933 doesn't make what he did right, and the social forces that propelled him to power weren't just a passive "reflection" of The People's Will but were shaped by the larger fascist-curious interwar 1930s. In fact, America also had a burgeoning fascist movement in the 1930s, driven by WWI and Great Depression fallout, but Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal explicitly created extensive government mechanisms to support society, provide new jobs and welfare, and other integrative and restorative economic methods. This crucial difference in approaches -- the New Deal vs. the Nazis -- is why America remained democratic despite the challenges and Germany fell into autocratic genocidal fascism.

This is because populism and dissatisfaction with democracy rises when people feel that the government is not listening to them, is not responsive to their needs, is ignoring them, or otherwise not doing what they want. It is driven by multiple factors, primarily but not only economic, and it is stoked by powerful interest groups who have a vested interest in using the fissures to discredit democratic governments and movements. It is also by no means limited to America, as you note at the end. Think of the decades-long campaign by the British media against the EU, driven by British isolationism and exceptionalism and a sense that the petty bureaucrats in Brussels had no right to be telling the almighty British Empire what to do. This created and stoked existing social grievances which were often domestically caused (since as Margaret Thatcher destroying the British social-welfare state in the 1980s) and turned that grievance against an external opponent who was easier to blame. As such, as we know, it led to the country voting for Brexit in 2016 despite what a whopping, overwhelming, incredible own goal that was and continues to be for the UK, especially economically and socially. It was obviously dependent on many contextual factors from British history, politics, and culture, and there were certainly many people who actually thought it was the right thing to do (and not just about racism, which uh, hmmm), but it's very difficult to think that this organically or naturally came about without a direct and extensive popular-pressure campaign designed to do just that.

People often vote against their own interests because they have been convinced that democracy is corrupt or ineffective or "just as bad" as authoritarianism, which allows illiberal populists to rise to power. These populists often use racial, religious, or cultural grievances, especially against perceived "outsiders," to artificially stoke existing prejudice and justify crackdowns and/or consolidations of their own personal power and destruction of institutional systems and safeguards meant to stop them from doing that. That's how we got Erdogan in Turkey, Bolsonaro in Brazil, Orban in Hungary, and Trump in the US. Other authoritarian movements around the world are also driven implicitly or explicitly by the massive autocratic and antidemocratic global influence disinformation machine headed by Putin in Russia. As such, it's not accurate to insist that this just represents a simple passive "rightward shift" among the global population overall. It is happening because it has been designed and manipulated and pressed into happening. It can still be electorally resisted, which is also the most effective strategy for removing authoritarians, but if we fail to vote out Trump once and for all in 2024, it will be MUCH harder and much more deadly.

Overall, to simplistically claim that the Republican party is just giving the increasingly fascist Americans what they want and expect it to derive broad popular support is, as I have demonstrated above, a diametrically backward conception of the problem. The Republicans are deliberately and increasingly fascist because they realize that very soon, if allowed to continue operating in its accustomed fashion, the American democratic system and American public opinion is going to make them obsolete. They're racing the clock to cement permanent super-minority rule, and to change the rules overall, before America's shifting demographic composition and ideological mindset locks them out. That is why they are throwing so much misinformation, fearmongering, lies, Russian propaganda, and everything else that they can think of at this election, to get Trump and loyal Project 2025 footsoldier Vance into the door before the door slams shut for a long time. That is why this election is so fucking existentially important and why it is so crucial to accurately conceptualize and describe the problem, what it is, and how to respond to it. As such, while I otherwise don't do this much anymore because I no longer have the desire to argue with the people who are likewise brainwashed in the opposite direction and insist it's a Pure Leftist Moral Duty not to vote against fascist authoritarianism (as, uh, also happened with the fragmented and infighting German left-wing opposition in 1932 and good thing nothing bad happened next):

The end.

[absolutebl]

This Week in BL - Getting hot under the collar and in the kitchen and on the pool table and...

Organized, in each category, with ones I'm enjoying most at the top.

Aug 2024 Week 3

Ongoing Series - Thai

Monster Next Door (Thai Thurs Gaga ) eps 3-4 of 12 - one of the things I'm enjoying about this show is the fact that the introverted super shy uke is having hot fantasies, and the extroverted seme is having the sweet fantasies. It's another way this show is highlighting God being the world's greenest flagged seme BL has ever produced. (And he's being given stiff competition this year - trend alert.)

Anygay: God is so cute and so not cool and so in love and all the consent asking word salad coming out of this boy. I LOVE him. 

Diew: It’s ep 4 so I’ve decided we can talk face-to-face.  God: So how many children do you want? 

The teaching him to play basketball bit, where God politely asks to hold his hand, is so freaking adorable I can’t.

I'm thinking of calling this show the anti-Mame pill.

Blue pill? Red pill? GREEN pill!

My Love Mix-Up Th (Fri YT) ep 11 of 12 - We gotta talk. I do like this version, but it’s starting to feel lackluster. Perhaps it always was by comparison to the bright sparkle uniqueness of the original. Perhaps I didn't notice because I was distracted by G4. But now I gotta say it's become a bit disappointing and even my love for G4 can’t seem to bind me to this. Frankly, this show is making me want to watch either the Japanese version, or My School President. It’s never a good sign when a currently airing BL makes me want to stop that and go rewatch an old one I’ve already seen.

NO SINGING.

Meanwhile, the "locked on the rooftop" trope! I haven’t seen that one in years. Cool. Also cute kisses. They learning. 

This Love Doesn't Have Long Beans (Fri iQIYI) ep 7 of 8 - I can’t believe this is ending next week. But also I can. And I have thoughts.

I really love SailubPon. They might be one of my favorite newer pairs on the scene right now. But I just don’t believe in these characters or this couple. I don’t feel like they are going to have a lasting relationship. It feels like they’re just using each other for sex and distraction, and that’s how the script to set it up, and as a result they’re never gonna make it as a couple. As soon as the sexual fire between them burns out, what do they have to build a relationship on? Frankly? That would be fine if this were a modern love drama, and not a BL. But this IS a BL.

Putting the health code violators aside, I really do believe in the secondary pair, but they haven’t been given enough bandwidth to develop as a couple. There’s no way they’re going to adequately resolve Methas and JJ in the final episode.

At this juncture, I’m mostly finding this show annoying. Which in itself is annoying, because I wanted to love it.

Why is it that Thailand, the land of the best food in the world, king of BLs, struggles so hard to produce the restaurant set BL of my dreams? I’m really pissed about this.

That said, the Methas & JJ stuff is killer. Loved JJ running away. So good. Plus the age old decision - love or money? 

Battle of the Writers (Sun YT) ep 2-3 of 12 - The issue was me and I've managed to get hold of this show again. The story within the story is so ridiculously badly written I'm going spare. I’m not sure if the outside show is not ALSO badly written. That said, I do love how the 3 writer friends are all shipping our leads. It’s VERY silly. Meanwhile, cohabitation trope is a go. 

I like the side couple too. Stern Daddy + lost puppy is a very cute dynamic, I hope we get more than just crumbs. I actually am enjoying this show now. Ep 3 kinda derailed into this weird chimera novel that they’re all writing together and I’m finding that bit the least interesting, but I adore the domestic components which I think may turn out to be TutorYim's strength (if they're allowed to lean into it). 

Addicted Heroin (Thai Tues WeTV) ep 1 of 10 - Man I hope this gets some kind of distribution at some point. It was a pain to find and watch. But I enjoyed it. The focus is more on the seme in Thailand’s version. Which I don’t mind since that's rare in BL, and it’s more August on my screen. It’s all round softer than China’s version but still feels very familiar. I know some fans are struggling with it, but not me.

Sunset X Vibes (Sat iQIYI) ep 10 of 12 - I like that Sam’s crafty business espionage has paid off. Them teasing Sam & Yo really had me belly laughing. It was so funny.

Legitimate question. Would one put perfume on one’s cheeks in Thailand, as one does on wrist or sternum? Because of the sniff cheek thing? Scented face powders?

I do feel like with MosBank & SailubPon scorching up our screens, we’re being spoiled by some of Thailand‘s best high heat pairs at the moment.

I Saw You in My Dream (Weds Gaga) ep 5 of 12 - It remains kind of sweet and cute. It's also calm and slow moving. Oddly it reminds me of La Cuisine in its style and execution (if not content). I’m enjoying it more than I thought I would.

The Trainee (Sun YouTube) ep 7 of 12 - I don’t know. I’m getting bored.

Love Sea (Sun iQIYI) ep 10fin - Fort’s acting during the break-up was truly great. But I feel for Rak. It’s rough to learn that someone else is playing a long game with feelings while you were playing a short game with d**k.

Ultimately this is probably a solid 8/10 show but I’m mad I wasn’t madder at it, and I'm mad I was so bored throughout. So it gets a 7/10 and let us not speak of this again. I’d like to simply forget about it. Trash watch.

Ongoing Series - Not Thai

Sugar Dog Life (Japan Sun grey) ep 1-2 of 10 - OMG a uni student who looks young and a... COP! GAH. The subversion and kink of it all. I had to go grey to get it and I hate everything about what I had to do. But ya know what? Fucking worth every single repeated crash-causing advertisement.

I love it. The grumpy lonely little student cook and the cheerful mature police officer. What a fabulous dynamic. Is the cook looking for a boyfriend or a Daddy, and do we care if it has the same result? It is filmed VERY manga style camp. I’m a little nervous about that, but this means it’s also very fluffy and so damn sweet. It made me squeak with the cute. I’m gutted this didn’t get distribution.

Ironic that Tawada Hideya is in a new BL while Sunspot is re-airing.

Cosmetic Playlover (Japan Tues Gaga) eps 3-4 of 8 - Ah, the gays are doubting the bisexual again. How familiar. I like how this one is paced and moving through time, even if the relationship seems to be going comparatively slowly by contrast. I love the way Sahashi is always looking at Natsume, even when they’re in conversation with someone else. Ah yearning. I think the conflict was kind of inevitable, given the two personalities of the protagonists, and I like that. (No manufactured angst here.) But I still hope they can repair the breach and I’m still interested. Frankly this is so classically Japan - I don’t know what story beats it’s following and I’m not entirely sure where it’s going, but I kinda like that unpredictability. Makes me think it could go into "must you, Japan?" territory but fingers crossed.

I Hear the Sunspot AKA Hidamari ga Kikoeru (Japan Weds Gaga) ep 9 of 10 - I'm enjoying it very much. I could do without the girl character. I know she’s more interesting than most (this is Japan after all), but she’s not really for me. It’s the complexity of the connection between the leads (and why they like each other) that’s being executed so brilliantly in this show (and in the manga, FYI). Both actors are so on point with their roles and the nuanced emotions required of these characters that every time it’s only them interacting I'm riveted. I could do without the rest of the cast tho.

Seoul Blues (Korea Fri? YouTube) ep 1 of 8 - I have a confession to make, I’ve been watching this whole series as it goes along. But this is the pair I absolutely like the most. I’m not sure I would necessarily recommend any of the installments, and I’m not sure how this one is going to go, but I’m VERY invested in this particular couple. They are so pretty!!!! This is a true friends-to-lovers struggle. I like that a lot. (Reminds me of I Cannot Reach You but a different dynamic.) Did I mention how pretty they are? And we already know they gonna kiss well. I bet the uncut version is stellar.

Meet You at the Blossom (China) - It's no one's funeral, turns out! Reports are in - not only are there kisses but it ends happily with wedding plans. So I'm eating crow, binging the fucker, and live blogging. I'm enjoying it. Ya'll know I adored Chinese BL before censorship. It has a certain unhinged quality I very much apreciate (and is the reason I'm so tolerant of the Thai pulps) that I think will marry well with Wuxia's effervescent and ever-present tropes. Watch me suffer here.

First Note Of Love (Taiwan Mon Gaga) eps 1-2 of 12 - About a singer with stage fright and his timid fan starring Charles (H4 the puppy one) and Michael Chang (the youngster in My Tooth Your Love), plus side couple featuring a Thai actor Jame (Koh in Gen Y) and Liu Min Ting (of Guardian fame). What a damn team. With their powers combined they are...

fine.

This is a fine BL. The fight scene was fun and I like the meet cute. I’m not sure about the chemistry of the leads, but I think they’ll probably do okay. I admit I’m struggling a bit with a singing and the music. Are you surprised? I think I like it enough, but I’m not wowed.

Takara's Treasure AKA Takara No Vidro (Japan Mon Gaga) ep 7 of 10 - Oh! Out of the blue attack kiss. What IS this show? I don’t get it at all. Bah. I guess they’re dating now. It’s… so odd...

It's airing but...

4 Minutes (Thai Netflix/Grey) - A rich boy at uni suddenly gains the supernatural power to see four minutes into the future. I have a source, but I've decided to hold off and binge if it ends okay, since it's only 8 eps. I depend upon y'all to tell me if it's safe.

8/16 The Last Time (Thai Fri YT) ? eps - Convoluted story of loss and possible reincarnation or something. Again delayed? Not sure what's going on with this one but the continued push-backs do not bode well.

In case you missed it

The Time of Fever AKA Unintentional Love Story 2 (Korea movie) trailer IS COMING IN SEPTEMBER!!!! (Yeah this is gonna sit here until then).

Next Week Looks Like This:

Upcoming BLs for 2024 are listed here. This list is not kept updated, so please leave a comment if you know something new or RP with additions.

Still Coming This Month!

8/22 The On1y One (Taiwan Thurs Gaga) 12 eps - announced in 2023 this one has a high school set stepbrothers trope and is reputed to be high heat. From Taiwan! It's made for me. Based on a novel Mou Mou from the Your Name Engraved Herein folks, so it could go dark. Still, I'm very excited.

8/22 The Paradise of Thorns (Thai movie) theater release - Jeff Satur is back but this does not look like a BL (the gay lover's death is the inciting event). More in Goodbye Mother vein. Looks dark and dramatic. He opposite and extremely well known actor Toey Pongsakorn who has never done gay before.

THIS WEEK’S BEST MOMENTS

WHY IS HE SO FINE?

I truly belly laughed. Sam & Yo did not go in the direction I expected, but this scene alone made me not mind that they curtailed the suffering Sam was rightfully due. (SunsetXVibes)

Tall boyfriend armpit, anyone? (Monster Next Door)

The two extremes of BL in one show (Long Beans indeed).

(Last week)

Streaming services are listed by how I (usually) watch, which is with a USA based IP, and often offset by a day because time zones are a pain.

The tag BLigade: @doorajar @solitaryandwandering @my-rose-tinted-glasses @babymbbatinygirl @babymbbatinygirl @isisanna-blog @mmastertheone @pickletrip @aliceisathome @urikawa-miyuki @tokillamonger @sunflower-positiiivity @rocketturtle4 @blglplus @anythinggoesintheshire @everlightly @renafire @mestizashinrin @bl-bam-beyond @small-dark-and-delicious @saezurumurmurs

Sigh, Tumblr in its infinite wisdom doesn't like too many tags.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Worker misclassification is a competition issue

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/2024/02/02/upward-redistribution/#bedoya

The brains behind Trump's stolen Supreme Court have detailed plans: they didn't just scheme to pack the court with judges who weren't qualified for – or entitled to – a SCOTUS life-tenure, they also set up a series of cases for that radical court to hear.

Obviously, Dobbs was the big one, but it's only part of a whole procession of trumped-up cases designed to give the court a chance to overturn decades of settled law and create zones of impunity for America's oligarchs and the monopolies that provide them with wealth and power.

One of these cases is Jarkesy, a case designed to allow SCOTUS to euthanize every agency in the US government, stripping them of their powers to fight corporate crime:

https://www.americanprogress.org/article/sec-v-jarkesy-the-threat-to-congressional-and-agency-authority/

The argument goes, "Congress had the power to spell out every possible problem an agency might deal with and to create a list of everything they were allowed to do about these problems. If they didn't, then the agency isn't allowed to act."

This is an Objectively Very Stupid argument, and it takes a heroic act of motivated reasoning to buy it. The whole point of expert agencies is that they're experts and that they might discover new problems in American life, and come up with productive ways of fixing them. If the only way for an agency to address a problem is to wait for Congress to notice it and pass a law about it, then we don't even need agencies – Congress can just be the regulator, as well as the lawmaker.

If there was any doubt that Congress created the agencies as flexible and adaptive hedges against new threats and problems, then the legislative history of the FTC Act should dispel it.

Congress created the FTC through the FTCA because the courts kept misinterpreting its existing antitrust laws, like the Sherman Act. Companies would engage in the most obvious acts of naked, catastrophic fuckery, and judges would say, "Welp, because Congress didn't specifically ban this conduct, I guess it's OK."

So Congress created the FTC with an Act that included a broad authority to investigate and punish "unfair methods of competition." They didn't spell these out – instead, they explicitly said (in Section 5) that it was the FTC's job to determine whether something was unfair, and to act on it:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/01/10/the-courage-to-govern/#whos-in-charge

The job of the FTC is to investigate unfair conduct before it becomes such a problem that Congress takes action, and to head that conduct off so that it never rises to the level of needing Congressional intervention.

Now, it's true that since the Reagan years, the FTC has grown progressively less interested in using this power, but that's broadly true of all of America's corporate watchdogs. But as the public all over the world has grown ever more furious about corporate abuses and oligarchic wealth, governments everywhere have rediscovered their role as a public protector.

In America, the Biden administration altered the course of history with the appointment of new enforcers in the key anti-monopoly agencies: the FTC and the DOJ's antitrust division. But more importantly, the Biden admin created a detailed, technical plan to use every agency's powers to fight monopoly, in a "whole of government" approach:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/08/party-its-1979-og-antitrust-back-baby

Now, this can give rise to seeming redundancies. Take labor issues. The NLRB is a (potentially) powerful regulator that had been in a coma for decades, but has awoken and taken up labor rights with a fervor and cunning that is a delight to behold:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/06/goons-ginks-and-company-finks/#if-blood-be-the-price-of-your-cursed-wealth

At the same time, the FTC has also taken up labor rights, using its much broader powers to do things like ban noncompetes nationwide, unshackling workers from bosses who claim the right to veto who else they can work for:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/02/02/its-the-economy-stupid/#neofeudal

But the NLRB doesn't make the FTC redundant, or vice-versa. The NLRB's role is principally reactive, punishing wrongdoing after it occurs. But the FTC has the power to intervene in incipient harms, labor abuses that have not yet risen to the level of NLRB enforcement or new acts of Congress.

This case is made beautifully in Alvaro Bedoya's speech "'Overawed': Worker Misclassification as a Potential Unfair Method of Competition," delivered to the Law Leaders Global Summit in Miami today:

https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/ftc_gov/pdf/Overawed-Speech-02-02-2024.pdf

Bedoya describes why the FTC has turned its attention to the problem of "worker misclassification," in which employees are falsely claimed to be contractors, and thus deprived of the rights that workers are entitled to. Worker misclassification is rampant, and it transfers billions from workers to employers every year. As Bedoya says, 10-30% of employers engage in worker misclassification, allowing them to dodge payment for overtime, Social Security, workers' comp, unemployment insurance, healthcare, retirement and even a minimum wage. Each misclassified worker is between $6k-18k poorer thanks to this scam – a typical misclassified worker sees a one third decline in their earning power. And, of course, each misclassified worker's boss is $6k-$18k richer because of this scam.

It's not just wages, it's workplace safety. One of the most dangerous jobs in the country is construction worker, and worker misclassification is rampant in the sector. That means that construction workers are three times more likely than other workers to lack health insurance.

What's more, misclassified workers can't form unions, because their bosses' fiction treats them as independent contractors, not employees, which means that misclassified construction workers can't join trade unions and demand health-care, or safer workplaces.

Contrast this with, say, cops, who have powerful "unions" that afford them gold-plated health care and lavish compensation, even for imaginary ailments like "contact overdoses" from touching fentanyl – a medical impossibility that still entitles our nation's armed bureaucrats to handsome public compensation:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/01/27/extraordinary-popular-delusions/#onshore-havana-syndrome

Cops have far safer jobs than construction workers, but cops don't get misclassified, so they are able to collect benefits that no other worker – public or private – can hope for.

Not every employer wants to cheat and maim their employees, of course. In Bedoya's speech, he references Sandie Domando, an executive VP at a construction company in Palm Beach Gardens. Domando's company keeps its employees on its books, giving them health-care and other benefits. But when she started bidding against rival firms for jobs funded by the covid stimulus, she couldn't compete – two thirds of those jobs went to other firms that were able to put in cheaper bids. Those bids were cheaper because they were defrauding their workers by misclassifying them. Thus, publicly funded projects were overwhelmingly handed over to fraudulent companies. Fraud becomes a fitness-factor for winning jobs. It's a market for lemons – among employers.

Employee misclassification is a pure transfer from workers to bosses. Bedoya recounts the story of Samuel Talavera, Jr, a short-haul trucker who worked for decades in the Port of Los Angeles. For decades, his job paid well: enough to support his family and even take his kids to Disneyland now and again.

But in 2010, his employer reclassified him as a contractor. They ordered him to buy a new truck – which they financed on a lease-purchase basis – and put him to work for 16 hours stretches in shifts lasting as much as 20 hours per day. Talavera couldn't pick his own hours or pick his routes, but he was still treated as an independent contractor for payroll and labor protection purposes.

This lead to an terrible decline in Talavera's working conditions. He gave up going home between shifts, sleeping in his cab instead. His pay dropped through the floor, thanks to junk-fees that relied on the fiction that he was a contractor. For example, his boss started to charge him rent on the space his truck took up while he was standing by for a job at the port. Other truckers at the port saw paycheck deductions for the toilet-paper in the bathrooms!

Talavera's take-home pay dropped so low that he was bringing home a weekly wage of $112 or $33 (one week, his pay amounted to $0.67). His wife had to work three jobs, and they still had to declare bankruptcy to avoid losing their home. When Talavera's truck needed repairs he couldn't afford, his boss fired him and took back the truck, and Talavera was out the $78,000 he'd paid into it on the lease-purchase plan.

This story – and the many, many others like it from the Port of LA – paint a clear picture of the transfer of wealth from workers to their bosses that comes with worker misclassification. The work that Talavera did in the Port of LA didn't get less valuable when he was misclassified – but the share of that value that Talavera received dropped to as little as $0.67/week.

Worker misclassification is rampant across many sectors, but its handmaiden is technology. The fiction of independence is much easier to maintain when the fine-grained employer-employee control is mediated by an app (think of Uber):

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/12/algorithmic-wage-discrimination/#fishers-of-men

That's why those scare-stories that AI trucks were going to make truckers obsolete and create an employment crisis were such toxic nonsense. Not only are we unlikely to see self-driving trucks, but the same investors that back AI technology are making bank on companies that practice worker misclassification through the "it's not a crime if we do it with an app" gambit:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/11/robots-stole-my-jerb/#computer-says-no

By focusing our attention on a hypothetical employment crisis that will supposedly be caused by future AI developments, tech investors can distract us from the real employment crisis that's created by app-enabled worker misclassification, which is also the source of much of the capital they're plowing into AI.

That's why the FTC's work on misclassification is so urgent. Misclassification is a scam that hurts workers and creates oligarchic power – and it's also a mass-extinction event for good companies that don't cheat their workers, because those honest companies can't compete.

Worker misclassification is having a long-overdue and much needed moment. The revolutionary overthrow of the rotten old leadership at the Teamsters was caused, in part, by a radical wing that promised to focus the Teamsters' firepower on fighting worker misclassification:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/11/19/hoffa-jr-defeated/#teamsters-for-a-democratic-union

This has become a focus of labor organizers all around the world, as worker misclassification-via-smartphone has infected labor markets everywhere:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/09/22/kropotkin-graeber/#an-injury-to-one

Bedoya's speech is a banger, and it reminds us that labor rights and anti-monopoly have always been part of the same project: to rein in corporate power and protect workers from the insatiable greed of the capital class:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/14/aiming-at-dollars/#not-men

[dancermk]

I’m a little disappointed to see so much discourse, fandom competitiveness, and plain arguing going around at the moment in regards to queer film/TV. People complaining about too much sex, not enough sex, too cheesy, made for the hets, too happy, too sad, too realistic, too unrealistic, and a million other petty issues. I, for one, am a queer person in my 50s and I grew up with practically zero representation! Yes, we want to continue onwards and upwards with quality and varied shows BUT let’s be HAPPY we now have representation! Like, actual shows where the central characters are queer, not just a side character who gets f*cking murdered! There is room for all different types of representation - so enjoy the types you like, and let others enjoy what they like.

And on a side note: progress is progress and film/tv is a business that has to turn a profit! If some queer content is made to appeal to the straight community, and will also act as a means of reducing homophobia and increasing understanding, then that’s a good thing. That means in the future more and more content will include queer stories and representation. If only 10% (ish) of the population is the maximum target audience then shows won’t keep getting made!

There is a huge backlash all over the world right now - a “push back” by conservatives and religious groups that want to wind back the clock, and specifically the last decade of advances.

So stick together queers and LGBTQIA+ allies.

I’m super happy knowing I don’t have to wait years between content anymore. And I’ve loved all different types of shows over the last 5 years, for lots of different reasons!

Interview with the Vampire - is giving me the toxic, passionate gothic love affair I’ve always wanted. And addressing interracial relationships.

Heartstopper - is filling me up with pure joy and hopefulness for the future.

Shameless - gave me Ian and Mickey - unique, anti stereotypical gays with a tragic yet ultimately beautiful love story spanning 11 years

Lone Star 911 - is giving me TK and Carlos whose sexuality barely factors into the storyline! Yay!

Looking - gave me an authentic queer experience and an intoxicating love triangle.

Red, white and Royal Blue - gave me a sweet, cute romcom that allowed reality to be sidelined. Fun escapism!

Young Royals - had me captivated by first love and intense angst.

Fire Island - an underrated romcom that made me laugh so hard I cried.

Sex education - shoved the realities of sex in our faces and provided me with laughter and drama and a range of queer identities.

Gentlemen Jack -gave me historical lesbians with spectacular wit, and feminine power.

And that’s just the tip of the iceberg- because there’s SO SO SO many more shows I could mention! Don’t at me because I didn’t mention YOUR favourite. This is my point! There is SO much great content it would take all day for me to include everything. This is just a sample - and that’s f*cking brilliant!!

So maybe we could all start posting/tweeting etc about what WE DO LIKE / LOVE / MAKES US FEEL LOVED AND SEEN and put down the device if we’ve got nothing nice to say.

Sending everyone a love filled week! 💜

[pinkmoonastro]

Moon through the zodiac

Aries: Your blunt and it often comes across as insensitive. Yet at the same time people may think your too sensitive. Growing up your household was very busy and or very gossipy. People may question your intentions alot with this placement even if your not doing anything some may still assume your up to no good. Its almost like damn all that assuming you might as well actually do something. The way you express yourself is always being judged and people are always trying to ''correct'' it. Causing you to be anti social, very particular on who you share your personality with or a bully. The way you express yourself is very unique just like your sense of humor you be accidentally funny as hell and thats needed in this world dont give away your power to people and allow them to change you into a dolice version of yourself. Light fire under they ass the way you how to. Anyways I wouldnt be surprised if you daydream about your ideal life alot, careful not to be in your head too much and create unrealistic expectations for yourself or others to uphold. I want yall to stop being so hard on yourself. If nobody else tell yall ima tell you i love how passionately you express yourself. The purpose of your moon being here is for you to learn more about yourself and who you are and how your actions/reactions affect others. Step away from whats familiar and comfortable and dig deep. Listen to your intuition. Have some fucking fun.

Taurus: Its your way or the highway HUH? Your moon chose to be here becasue you are the defender. There will be times were you feel your back is against the wall and you face alot of scrutiny from the world. They may come down on you hard but if you can withstand the pressure you will be rewarded. Willpower and self discipline comes easier for you. You have the tendency to be arrogant, domineering and passive aggressive. A good leader keeps those emotions in check. Yall get stuck in yall ways fr i want yall to put more energy into leaving your comfort zone and taking risk. Slow down smell the roses and enjoy where you are. Dont be all work and no play.

Gemini: Yall love some drama. Somehow always ending up in the middle of some shit. Seeing others as competition even when them ppl not worried about you. You like being the center of attention and dont care if its in a postive or negative light. It works for yall though because popularity comes easy for you. This is one of the most social placements for the moon to be. Your reputation means alot to you and networking is high on your priority list. Its common for yall to feel like you always have to choose between something. It may be hard for you to balance your work life and home life. In friendships and relationships you choose to keep the blindfold on ignoring whats really in front of you, procrastinating to handle your problems just hoping theyll go away on there on. You end up in situations where people are betraying you. With the two sides to gemini its like a secret element to your life. Your no stranger to scandal. I feel for you, this isnt a easy place to have the moon be. You care so much about your relationships with people but yet often have issues with ppl. This couldve stemmed from feeling like you were a target growing up that people always chose to pick with you. Or that you were punished more extremely than others. With this placement you've probably seen or experienced things that really made you question humanity. Dont let those experiences shape the type of person you'll be. You gotta learn to let shit go and not be bitter or have a victim mentality. Be careful not to burn yourself out. Drowning yourself in work to ignore your feelings. You dont always have to do everything on your own... collaborating is just as rewarding i promise. It would be beneficial to learn how to except help, knowing when to back down and not being so critical of yourself.

Cancer: If they dont appreciate everything you do FCK EM. No but fr with moon here you may feel like people overlook the things you do for them. Cancer moons can be way to stubborn and stand in there on way because of the fear of change. Repeating the same lessons way more than they should have to. When your redirect your energy to new experiences and growth your determination and passion unmatched. This is type of person you want to have on your team they bring so much positive energy and comfort.

Leo: Main character syndrome AF lol Unnecessarily rebellious at times growing up you may have felt your parents were controlling on how you expressed your creativity or because of the way you grew up you express your creativity in a rebellious way in relation to your family. Your career could be taboo. I could see a lot of onlyfans stars having moon in leo. Success in career comes more natural for you because of your consistency and ambitious nature. Yall really find pleasure in chasing money. Dont get so carried away with fulfilling your material desires that you dont leave time for introspection and searching for who you really are away from the titles.

Virgo: How does it feel to be kids favorite? A happy home life is important for this placement. Theres an innate need to belong. You love parties, holidays and kids ofc. Hosting parties and having a full house will give you happiness. Where this placement gets stuck is not being able to let go of the past. Getting sucked into the loophole of self pity and regret. Focus your attention on what you can do and what you can change. You work better with other ppl there to bounce ideas off of. Let your gaurd down, Succuss is reached quicker for you when you collaborate. Having this placement is testing your ability to strengthen your willpower and resourcefulness. Once you can do that you'll manifest way easier. Careful not to live beyond your means. Dont let desires put you in debt. Trust your intution, take the first step and take the risk. You go be perfectly fine.

Libra: Your love language is def quality time and acts of service this is very important for this placement to feel loved. Yall thrive in group settings and really value friendships. Even if you dont talk that much it makes you feel better to be around others. If you want to get with a Libra moon the best way is to become their friend first. You may have a tendency to put yourself in drama and create chaos among your inner circle though lil messy ass. Always wanting to be right, when this placement is in its lower natures is a good example of the native american folklore of the hunter that stuck a blood coated blade in ice knowing the wolf couldnt resist. It licked the blade continuously not realizing it was slowing bleeding out. The only way for the wolf to survive is to acknowledge its self destructive behavior. Bottom line just because you can ignore something doesnt mean others are going to do the same. Just becasue it didnt effect you doesnt mean it didnt effect them. Make the effort to listen to understand not listen to respond. Your words matter use them responsibly and take breaks from people or things when you feel you need to, your mental health will thank you.

Scorpio: Transformation happens with this placement alot. Moments of feeling isolated or depressed may be brought on by extreme emotional shifts. Anxiety and fear is no stranger to the scorpio moon. It can be to the point of really debilitating you. You've experienced things you've kept to yourself or have repressed but the issue continues to reappear time after time like a broken record. If it hasnt been dealt with it way on you really heavy and appear in your dreams often. You've felt shame, not understanding how you couldve allowed yourself to be in that predicament in the first place but seriously bro shit happens. It can be hard to maintain emotional balance with moon in scorpio, so its essential to have methods to release your emotions in healthy ways. Careful not to become bitter or victimizing with things dont go the way your controlling ass intends. Vengeance doesnt work well for you it often backfires, you'll try to set somebody house on fire and you burn yourself in the process. You may feel that people often oppose for no reason that you have to go through power struggles to be heard or to get the things you want. You may second guess opening up and are critical of yourself and others but opening yourself up to the world will be one of the best things you can do for your relationships and career. Your maturity and originality is threatening. Express yourself in your full nature and make people adapt to you not the other way around. You have authoritarian energy and if your putting yourself out there which ik you are, yr often mistaken for the boss. That is if your not already the boss. Im sure your that your the boss. Mwahahaha. Your demeanor comes across as serious and strict. Ppl naturally think let me not play with them. Your standards are high for yourself and your partner. You wouldnt be with somebody who doesnt match up to your standard. You need to feel like the person you’re with is equally as respected as you in any room you walk in.

Sagittarius: Im sure you believe you were meant to be famous. Sagittarius moons are very charismatic and great negotiators with a very convincing personality they are great at creating solutions quickly. So ofc that makes its very easy for them to make friends. In relationships they attract and are attracted to more dominate personalities. Loving the idea of love but really being in denial about that. Def gives player vibes they have flirtatious ass whore ways lmao. If you cheating ik you not even finna try hard to hide it. Easily bored they will chase thrills lowkey in a running from your problems type of way. Where sag moons can grow is appreciating the value they bring and not feeling the need to always compare themselves to others. Don't attach your self worth to financial security. Be more secure in what you believe and don't back down so easily when others challenge your ideas.

Capricorn: The moon doesn't like being here. Its emotionally depressing actually lol. I'm sure you've already read enough depressing interpretations on cap moons tho so this one is not going to be that. This one is meant to empower you. Youve experienced alot of chaos anger and pain. You've experienced very intense situations that have completely emotional up rooted you. But the smoke always clears and its important for to spend time away from the people and places that have caused this. Take the steps needed to regroup to be by yourself to develop better understanding of your emotions and learn what it is that truly want from your life. If you are not following your intuition it is easy for you to end up in friendships and relationships that do not mean you well. Your not the type of person who can just hang with anyone you need to very intentional about who you allow into your life. Communicate your feelings stop keeping everything bottled in. That shit will drive yo ass crazy. You dont have to be the strong friend all the time your emotions are valid, open up to ppl and share that shit because you dont share often you open up and talk people listen. Use that power to help others that have been through similar experiences to you. When you succeed in whatever obstacles you overcome ppl cant do anything but respect it bc your road was slow and steady but you stayed with it. When it comes to relationships you are very black and white you'll commit yourself fast but if you feel you cant trust the person you may still deal with them but emotional you shut them out. You like being partnered up rather its a relationship or situtationship you deal with the person for a long time.

Aquarius: I want to give you a hug, you are too analytical for your own good. Baby you need to stop thinking so much and you need to feel, you need to experience, act on impulse, dont give yourself time to think about everything that could go wrong. You sabotage so much of your own happiness that way. But i understand people have disappointed you so many times you feel you must do everything on your own. Its like nobody understands you or that people are committed to misunderstanding you. But news flash your not that expressive with your feelings how is anybody going to know if you dont tell them. Yall are cute though with yall dry ass humor. Listen stop being such a fly on the wall you hold as much value as anyone else stop acting like your presence is a fuckn burden. You dont have be agreeable all the the time they will be O FUCKN K. You are very intelligent and more people need to know that. Believing in yourself and communicating is your lesson. Shine your light and stop playing like fr...

Pisces: Ok we’re gonna get the sad shit out the way first. Just how yall like. I really feel like yr parents just let yall cry it out as a baby and you took that personal lmao. No but fr i feel like you always came across like you can handle things so you weren’t really checked on everyone just assumes you'll be ok. You come across as very strong and resilient which is beautiful but everybody needs a shoulder to lean on. Okay now remember how i said yall took that personally ummhm you can be very vengeful never forgetting he littlest slight somebody done towards you. Yall resort to committing crimes rather easily if you need some money lmao im not mad at it though. Literally rationalizing damn near anything if that means youll get what you want. And another thing yall be lying fr. lol sometimes it really do be on accident though you just forgot what really happened and your imagination is very vivid you thought that was the truth. You can be too hard on yourself sometimes you see very clearly the person you want to be so you put so many time limits and expectations on yourself. Chill out enjoy the journey and flow through life the way you know how to. You have very high standards so anything you invest your energy too is executed properly. I honestly cant even imagine a Pisces moon not running their own business. Im sure you cant either. You naturally have very authoritarian energy. Theres not much push and pull when it comes to you getting your way people go with your flow pretty easily. Naturally you wouldnt assume a pisces to be practical but they actually are. Sure they dream big but if they didnt know how to practically implement that into this realm that would just be depressing as hell. When yall find something that works for you, you are very disciplined at seeing it through. Very protective over those you love yall def give stand up when i walk in the room vibes lol

[ray-winters]

we just wanna hear any hcs you have for our boy misch

Alright, y’all asked for it, buckle up:

Mischa makes most of his money from an apprenticeship he has at the only tattoo parlor in Uranium City. He gets paid a bit, and on top of that he gets free tattoos (which is where he got all of his from). Plus it keeps him out of the house and also pisses his very traditionally valued adoptive parents off. Win win.

My Mischa only has tattoos on his right arm bc I am left handed so HE is left handed- he does his own tattoos mostly. He was going to start a sleeve on his left arm after he got home from the fall fair.

Speaking of his tattoos; the first tattoo he gave himself was one that says “Bad Egg” w/devil horns and a devil tail. “Bad Egg” was something his adoptive dad would frequently call him, so it was his way of reclaiming the name for himself, and pissing off his adoptive parents bc they were viciously anti-tattoo

He has another tattoo of a crescent moon with a “ - T” next to it bc he asked Talia to draw him something to put on his body. She drew the moon because of the time difference between Kyiv & Uranium, any time she sees the moon she knows she’s going to hear from Mischa soon. So she began to associate Mischa with the moon.

My personal fav tattoo I gave Mischa is that stereotypical “S” where you draw 6 lines and connect them. This is brand fucking new to Mischa, he had never seen it before, and he thought it was dope af, so he tattooed it on himself immediately.

He has a tattoo of a pot leaf, but it’s not very good so everyone always thinks it’s a Canadian maple leaf. Which drives him up the wall.

Mischa has taken in a small black cat that would hang around the tattoo parlor and would occasionally follow him home. It lives with him in the basement, it comes and goes, and it is a well kept hidden secret.

Mischa hangs at Noel’s house…a lot. Noel’s mom lets him stay the night often bc she knows about his home life and thinks it’s disgraceful, so she takes care of him.

Mischa was class clown and relatively popular at his high school in Ukraine- which is the polar opposite of how he’s received at St. Cassian’s. People either are afraid of him, or they try to make fun of him, so either way he has found himself alone most of the time.

He’d never admit it, but Mischa does actually enjoy hanging with the kids in the choir. He gets to hang with his bestie, Noel. He admires Constance’s patience and kindness, he thinks she’s probably the best person in Uranium. While he and Ocean get on each other’s nerves, there’s a small part of him that secretly looks forward to their fights. But only a little bit. He doesn’t notice Ricky is there until after the accident, and then spends a large chunk of his time trying to rectify that by getting to know/encourage Ricky.

He and Noel became friends bc some of the boys who were trying to bully Mischa were also bullying Noel. When Mischa was about to start defending Noel, Noel ended up proving he can defend himself with his quick wit rather than fists. This is a trait that Mischa admires a lot, so they pretty much joined forces that day and they’ve been the dynamic duo of Uranium City ever since.

Mischa has pretty severe abandonment issues and it prone to panic attacks because of it. He’s more of a “suffer in silence” kind of guy, so it takes someone with patience and kindness like Constance to give him some tips on how to calm himself down. I.E. remembering a calming situation like “climbing back into your bed in the morning and feeling the heat left over from your body.”

Mischa had been kicked out of a few schools in Uranium, and his adoptive figures (they’re not really parents, barely guardians) gave him one last chance at St. Cassian’s. When he was caught stealing the communion wine, Father Marcus told him he HAD to join the choir and that he HAD to at the very least sing at the competition. Which is why he doesn’t do any choreo during the opening number.

Addendum- he does ONE move during the opening number. The finger wag on “oh no no” because Noel came up with that move, and after Ocean tried to cut it, Mischa said it was the only move he’d do even if it was cut. So he forced her to keep the move in via malicious compliance.

Over the course of the musical, there isn’t really a moment where he thinks he’s gonna win. His life wasn’t fair, why should his death be any different.

He thinks Jane is THE coolest and THE most metal thing he’s ever seen. After she finishes her number, his heart is effectively broken for her.

When Constance punches Ocean, Mischa doesn’t have the “FUCK YEAH” reaction that you’d expect. It’s actually met with some sadness. He’s always encouraging Constance to stick up for herself, and to not take Ocean’s shit. But, he respects that she has patience and kindness. When Constance punches Ocean, he almost sees it as a failure on his part.

The reason in my head why Mischa and Ocean feud so much is because they remind each other of one another’s parents. Ocean is the poster child of excellence in Uranium, Mischa’s adoptive parents have said more than once that they wish he could “be like that Ocean girl” - on the contrary, Ocean has caught Mischa smoking weed before. His incredibly radically liberal world view reminds her of her hippy parents. They get that anger out at them on each other. But at the end of the show, they both have a deeper respect for one another. Ocean for Mischa because she sees the real him, who is gentle & compassionate. Mischa for Ocean because she does the most selfless thing she could possibly do, which he respects infinitely.

I’m sure I have more but these are the HC’s that immediately came to mind. This is what makes Majestic Rep’s Mischa, Mischa.

[vavuska]

Imane Khelif.

In 2018 AIBA Women's World Boxing Championships, Khelif participated for the first time, where she ranked 17th after being eliminated from the first round.

In the 2019 AIBA Women's World Boxing Championships held in Russia, where she ranked 33rd after being eliminated from the first round against Natalia Shadrina.

Khelif represented Algeria in the lightweight event at the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo. She was defeated by Ireland's Kellie Harrington in the quarterfinals.

Khelif participated in the 2022 IBA Women's World Boxing Championships, she faced Ireland's Amy Broadhurst in the final and was defeated.

She is not a warmachine. Khelif is a biological woman. Khelif is NOT transgender or transsexual. In Algeria, the country that Khelif represents, transgender identity is prohibited, changing sex or gender is not allowed in official documents, nor are medical or hormonal treatments allowed to transition to another sex. If she was transgender, Khelif would not be able to rapresent her country at all nor travel with an official passport with a female identity!

However, pop up this rumor she was disqualified from 2023 IBA's Women's World Boxing Championships due to high levels of testosterone. Later this was debunked by the same organization. Potentially, could be doping and it was all covered up by sport industry.

Edit: This disqualification happened three days after Khelif defeated Azalia Amineva, a previously unbeaten Russian athlete. The disqualification restored the Russian boxer's undefeated record and IBA has huge ties with the Russian government: the president Kremlev is a Putin supporter and the International Olympic Committee (IOC) expressed concerns about the IBA under Kremlev's leadership. The IOC has also been alarmed by the fact that the IBA's only sponsor was a Russian state-owned energy company (Gazprom) that supports the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Imane Khelif is a UNICEF ambassador, which could again have been seen as a problem by Russian-led IBA, since UNICEF condemned Russian invasion of Ukraine. IBA's allegations that Khelif had failed unspecified eligibility tests are suspicious, expecially because no medical evidence that Khelif has XY chromosomes or elevated levels of testosterone has been published.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC), cleared Khelif to compete in the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris, confirming that she complied with all necessary eligibility and medical regulations for the event. The IOC noted that Khelif was a woman according to her passport and that this was not a "transgender issue".

She defeated Angela Carini in 42 seconds at the 2024 Olympics, after Carini decided to withdraw citing intense pain in her nose.

This remember me the 'Caster Semenya' case: after Semenya's victory at the 2009 World Championships, she was made to undergo sex testing, and cleared to return to competition the following year. The decision to perform sex testing sparked controversy in the sporting world and in Semenya's home country of South Africa. Later reports disclosed that Semenya has the intersex condition 5α-reductase 2 deficiency and natural testosterone levels in the typical male range.

In 2019, new World Athletics rules came into force preventing athletes like Semenya with certain disorders of sex development (DSDs) from participating in 400m, 800m, and 1500m events in the female classification, unless they take medication to suppress their testosterone levels. Semenya has filed a series of legal cases to restore her ability to compete in these events without testosterone suppression, arguing that the World Athletics rules are discriminatory.

As Khelif, Semenya is cis and has been accused by many people to be trans. Her story has, again, been used and abused to support the anti-trans agenda, claiming that two ciswomen are trans and are unfairly competing with women due to their superior "men strength".

I think Angela Carini was anxious and scared by days of reporter and far-right rumors about how Khelif is incredibly strong and unbeatable, even if Carini has better statistics and more victories in her career than Khelif herself (who was already a Olympics athlete), she was strumentalized by far-right propaganda and made a scene during the match due to anti-trans panic.

J. K. Rowling and Elon Musk, as always, had their small moment of shaming athletes. Most of people think that Carini has been strumentalized by anti-trans Italian propaganda and after being called out for harassing a cisgender woman, she claimed to be sorry for not having respected her adversary during the match.

Edit: more important thoughts on the matter in a detailed political perspective in Italy - A New York Times article develops more extensively what I wrote here.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/01/world/olympics/boxer-quits-gender-angela-carini-imane-khelif.html?smid=threads-nytimes

Edit 2: Imane Khelif spoke against cyberbullism.

Edit 3: Since in those past days we talked a lot about cis women being called men for not meeting western TERFs standard, I should resurface this old post about how a group of Chinese cis runners were wrongfully called "men" by TERFs.

Edit 4: Elon Musk and J.K. Rowling have been named in the cyberbullying lawsuit filed by Olympic champion Imane Khelif.

Edit 5 - 13th Sept. 2024: Imane Khelif interview

Edit 6 - 13th Sept. 2024: Imane Khelif won gold medal in boxing. Appreciation post.

[sywtwfs]

The Court of Arbitration for Sport has issued its decision in the Kamila Valieva case

• Ms Valieva is found to have committed an Anti-Doping Rule Violation (ADRV) under Clause 4.1 of the All-Russian Anti-Doping Rules of 24 June 2021 (the Russian ADR).

• A period of four (4) years ineligibility is imposed on Ms Valieva, starting on 25 December 2021.

• All competitive results of Ms Valieva from 25 December 2021 are disqualified, with all the resulting consequences (including forfeiture of any titles, awards, medals, profits, prizes, and appearance money).

[…]

The consequences linked to the retroactive disqualification of Ms Valieva from past events, including from the Olympic Winter Games Beijing 2022, were not within the scope of this arbitration procedure and will have to be examined by the sports organisations concerned.

Full CAS release

ETA: Full report of the case proceedings