#British Express German course

[britishexpresss]

Master German with the Best German Language Course in Delhi at British Express

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[mysticficti0n]

All my Attention part 2

warnings- swearing, fluffy/sext Tom, mentions of being cat called, romance (😏)

words- 2.7k

If you'd like to read the previous parts → All my attention series

a/n- so I am British and cannot speak any German, I speak a little French, Spanish and Italian but German- no. I also do not trust Google translate so this is gonna be like an avatar thing (if you've seen the newest one Jake says that their language just became normal or something along those lines) so in reality this is all in German, you as a reader know German but, its wrote in English... make sense? no... well. also thank you all so much for the response to the first part! I couldn't believe I woke up and saw that many likes, I was shocked, love you all 🤍

(p.s also sorry this is quite short! but I will right more soon because I am loving this so far ★)

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backstory- you are the 5th member of Tokio Hotel and you always thought the love was equally platonic between you and a certain guitarist... but what if that all changed?

"Ready?"

"yeah" I spoke again getting up and waving to the rest of the band, Tom with his newly cleaned hands held the door for me and a small smile pressed onto his face, he followed me behind and directed us out the building to the now mostly empty streets as it was around 9:30pm and not many people hung out in this area of town anyways, the feeling of night air whipping at my skin calmed me, it washed me of all my thoughts for a few seconds, we began to walk to our hotel it was around a twenty minuet walk and all on flat ground so if anything we'd make it in shorter time

"can I have a smoke?" Tom asked breaking the silence for the first time, I stopped walking to grab the packet out my bag and hand him one and get one for myself, I knew I shouldn't have really had another one but after the day I had, it was necessary "thanks" he spoke letting me light it

"no problem" we began our walk again under the flickering streetlights that pierced the night, a few cars ran by and lonely workers who were leaving the offices that surrounded the streets passed us by, my eyes found the profile of the boy next to me, still in his performance clothes and his hair tied in a cap, I was on the side where I couldn't see the lip piercing and without it he looked like a baby

"doing alright there?" his voice snatched me back as he followed his words by laugh

"I'm fine" I spoke back trying to look now anywhere but him "are you doing alright?" I spoke back

"of course, never been better!" a sarcastic tone laced his voice but I knew it wasn't intended at me "you know... I will always look out for you Y/n, especially from him- its cliche but" his steps halted, I turned myself to look at him again, our eyes locked together

"its not fair that you had to do it though Tom thats the point" i spoke, removing myself from his gaze with a serious expression "I am grateful, I am, but none of it should've happened! its bullshit" i felt myself getting angrier by the second but I couldn't stop myself

"but it's not your fault, its nobodies fault but his Y/n" Tom began following me as I picked up my pace "and plus were fine, we aren't the ones who have a broken nose and maybe a rib- who knows" I ignored his quips and kept going focusing on the mismatched patterns on the street "Y/n!" he called "slow down I can't go that fast" I stopped still not facing him, I felt if I looked at him all my emotions would spill out and it couldn't happen again. I felt Tom's hand press the small of my back and I turned around to face him, fighting back tears as I saw the look in his eyes that threatened to break me "please don't be upset"

"how can I not be upset, not fucking only did I have to see my ex in the audience but...his fucking face- and why the fuck did he look sad! . then you, Bill and Georg fucked him up and...and what if Felix is right- what if it gets out 'Tokio Hotel beats fan' and what story will he fucking tell?! and it is my fault- I should've never got with him, i don't know what to fucking do with myself. the media still think me and him are together, daily I get tagged or sent pictures of me and him saying 'Y/n and Brian are so cute' or 'Y/n and Brian are so that' and it kills me! I want to scream and yes you were right Tom, I do hide my feelings and that little fucking pathetic cry I had earlier was only fucking some of it!" my voice shook as I only got louder, Tom watched, eyes analysing everything I did

"Y/n you cannot blame this all on yourself! you didn't cause it, yes you did date Brian but that isn't your fault that dick came tonight!" Toms voice matched mine "you can't seriously think that-"

"You don't fucking understand Tom! fuck you get different girls every god damn night- fuck them and leave them and you're seen as this sexy guy! you haven't been in a relationship since Savour and that didn't go well did it? so you don't get it! You'll never understand the shit I feel right now!" I screamed shoving his body away from me, he looked shocked, eyes narrowing

"And what?! yes I fuck girls but I'm fucking looking out for you and trying to understand its not my fault you are to much of a fucking bitch to actually talk to us about it!" his words caught me off guard "I want you to be okay! but all you're doing is smoking like a fucking chimney and shoving me away literally!" with that I spun on my heal and walked away from him again, I couldn't get my head straight "don't fucking walk away!" I flipped him off and herd him groan "Y/n come on!"

after that I never looked back- keeping my head down and ignored the comments random people said on the streets about my clothes and my 'pretty little face'. I finally saw the flashy lights of our hotel and pushed the door open to a friendly looking desk women clicking away at a computer

"hiya darling what can I do you for?" she spoke glaring up at me with green glasses perched near the end of her nose

"I have a room under the name Y/l/n" she nodded and typed along the keyboard

"mhm.. okay yes your luggage was dropped earlier by a huge bus with like hundreds of other stuff..." she trailed off " here is your key number 486 on the 4th floor and if you need anything don't be afraid to give us a call" the ginger lady spoke passing me my key

"thank you..." I went to walk to the lift before I saw the door open again and a panting Tom fell through "fuck" I hummed going into the metal doors of the lift

"Y/n come on... shit" he growled "hold the door" I saw him jog toward me and I stuck my arm out before the doors could close "thanks" and all I did was raise my eyebrows, the ride up to the 4th floor felt like an eternity, stood in silence besides the slight clipping of the metal shaft

'floor number 4' the intercom spoke revealing a long corridor barren bar a few plants potted by doors, I walked out closely followed by Tom who had just caught his breath, I looked at the numbers passing by until I finally saw mine near the end, I slipped my key into the hole and turned it open, the room was small but large enough to keep me for the night, one double bed, a tv, small make up desk and a bathroom with a huge mirror

"you can go now" I spoke to Tom who was standing outside my room hands in his pockets staring at me

"no" is all he answered with "we need to talk, and I mean properly talk" I shook my head

"not tonight" I saw his face soften "I just... I can't Tom"

"okay... tomorrow?"

"maybe" I spoke back to which he breathed and opened his arms calling me in for a hug- even if we had the worst argument, wanted to murder each other, we'd always hug each other it was just one of those. I walked into his arms and they curled around my hip pulling me tightly, my forehead landed into his neck to which he rested his head on top

"I love you" Tom whispered pressing a light kiss to the top of my head

"love you too"

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RING RING RING

my heart stopped hearing my phone go off next to me in bed, I squinted trying to avoid the bright light that was now illuminating my room 'Mom' I sighed happily and picked the phone up holding it to my ear "hello" my voice was groggy and full of sleep but I tried to sound as awake as I could for 5:25am

"hi sunshine! how are you?" she spoke and I could feel the smile through the phone

"I'm okay, tired but all good here, how about you?"

"well we're missing you, your sister has been asking when her big sister will be home, oh darling- how are the boys? they doing good to I hope" hearing the mention of my sister warmed me, my mini me, my little Stella, she was only 2 and was just the best thing in the whole wide world to me, her cute little blonde curls that decorated her head and her bright green eyes, she was gorgeous

"ah I miss her so much, tell her soon I only have one more show and its a day show so I could try be home today to see her, and the guys are good, me and Tom walked back last night from the show- but nothing really interesting has happened since- how's home?"

"well, I've been spending a lot of my days cleaning, playing dress up with Stella and cooking dinner so not at all fun compared to what you're doing sweetie... but I did call you to ask something" her voice went serious, she never had these sorts of conversations with me unless something bad happened "so I was speaking to Tom last night-"

"Tom who?" my heart dropped "Kaulitz or not?"

"mhm, Kaulitz and he said to me-" my stomach dropped she doesn't know yet, I didn't have the mind to say to her that me and Brian broke up, she admired him... "well he asked if me, your father, Stella, his family, Georg and Gustav's family would like to come see your show today as it being a day show we can bring Stella and I think she'll love it, I mean you remember when she sat in the practise studio and clapped when you and Bill gave her the show of a life time" thank fuck

"OH! Oh my god yes that would be amazing! yes do come" I called, my sleepiness soon going into adrenaline realising I get to see my family again after a month "and of course I remember performing for Stella, she loved it, oh but please mom come" I herd her laugh and shift herself in whatever seat she was in

"okay darling we will- I'll best leave you for now and I'll see you tonight, love you sunshine!"

"love you mom see you later" the line ended and I did a lying down happy dance, I was ready to preform that second, I couldn't contain my excitement, I quickly got up running from my room to go to the room of the guitarist, my knuckles going red from hitting so hard

"fuck I'm coming my god-" as the door opened I ran into his arms "woah what the fuck!"

"thank you so much!" I chanted squeezing him tightly, I pulled away and his face went from looking scared shitless to a shy grin

"shit I thought you were a crazy fan or something Y/n, and why are you thanking me?" he wrapped his arms around me relaxing

"inviting mom and dad and Stella and everyone else, just... ahh I can't wait!" we pulled apart and I started jumping around "I get to see my Stella!"

"Oh no problem, I thought she'd love to see our show as were her favourites, obviously" he smiled, scratching his head- for the first time I actually looked at Tom properly, I realised he was in his boxers which fit in all the right places according to him and nothing else besides the necklace he wore every day... thats also when I realised I was still in my little black number with a sheer mesh top just about reaching my thighs

"I can't get over it!" I laughed perching myself on his bed

"scuff what I said yesterday, tonight will be the best show we ever do" he walked over to the other side of his bed and lay back down, one arm resting on his stomach and the other went behind my back and held my hip giving me a feeling I'd never had before from Tom- butterflies.

"oh absolutely" i huffed "I am like completely awake now"

"good, well I mean we've gotta go in like an hour ish for rehearsal" I nodded relaxing more into the spongy mattress, we sat there in comfortable silence, his hand still holding me ".....im sorry for last night- not for the fight- the way I spoke to you.. It wasn't right, I was so close to just knocking on your door and saying this all but I had a feeling you would beat me up if I tried" he laughed looking up to me causing me to do the same

"so you take back calling me a 'fucking bitch'?" he nodded

"yep- all of it. I think I was just... worried for you, you know how much I care about you and seeing you looking upset all day was just... ugh I don't even know"

"I know... I'm sorry I know you were trying but I am just.. a twat really" he rolled his eyes "what?"

"you've only just realised?" he spoke sarcastically, lifting his head from the pillow to look properly at me

"hey!" I shoved him and he nearly fell from the end of the bed, quickly I moved to grab him before he slipped and panic shot though his body

"Y/N!" he called reaching out for me before his body slammed into the floor with a thud "ow"

"Oh- Oh my god! are you okay!? I'm... fuck... I'm sorry" I spoke through stifled laughter as I held my chest, Tom sat back up and rubbed his back, I have no clue what made be laugh harder but I fell stomach first on to the bed and belted out another cackle hearing Tom join it with me

"you are such a fucking idiot!" he called scruffing my hair, I got back up leaning up on my elbows, he still on the floor, when we sat like this our faces were only a few inches away and the room fell quiet, smiles still spread across our faces. I watched his eyes, those brown eyes there is something bewitching about them. They can be warm and inviting, or mysterious and brooding, they flickered between my Y/C/E eyes and my lips giving me a nervous ache through my body "I meant what I said before that all though Y/n" my name coming from his pierced lips made me feel different then any other time "I care about you so fucking much it's crazy-" the tension between us grew, he leaned in closer to me, my heart racing with excitement. the only source of light emanating from a small lamp on the bedside table which just about illuminated his face but i could see the meaning in his movements as his hand reached to cup my jaw, he drew me closer, our foreheads knocking together "I want to kiss you right now" he spoke in a whisper, it was just loud enough for me to hear, our eyes flicked back together and though no words left me, he knew exactly what I wanted to say

As he pulled me closer, my heart was beating so quickly, it felt as if it could leap out of my chest at any moment. Our eyes met for a brief moment again before he leaned in and pressed his lips gently to mine. In that moment, time seemed to stand still as I melted into his touch. Every inch of my body was on fire, my mind could only think of Tom, Tom fucking Kaulitz.... who knew I need it so badly. Without breaking the kiss he stood back up and brought me to my knees, his hand holding my face to his, I tangled my arms around his neck trying to get him closer and closer "fuck" I spoke and it came more as a whimper as he tugged gently on my hair, I felt a smirk appear to his face. We pulled away and immediately I felt coldness but I soon melted as he brought my gaze to him

"you don't understand how long I've wanted to kiss you Y/n"

[kirasworldofwords]

13. Drunken/drugged/sleepy confessions princess cake or slagclaren

Have I ever said just how much I love the ship name princess cake for Jenson and Nico- Needless to say, I shall choose princess cake, lol.

Prompt 13: Drunken/drugged/sleepy confessions

Alcohol was never truly Jenson's world. He preferred to steer clear of it, despising the feeling a hangover had the potential of giving him. Instead, he'd often be seen sipping on a mocktail, a Virgin Sunrise, perhaps, or an alcohol free beer.

Thank God for alcohol free Köstritzer beer.

His good friend Nico - Rosberg, that is to say - however, didn't possess such inhibitions. He drank with a carefree mind, like most people did, leaving all coming problems regarding a possible hangover or whatnot for future-Nico to deal with.

Usually, Jenson was the one having to intervene and clean up Nico's messes, in a figurative sense.

Sometimes, the Brit would have to carry the poor bastard back to their lodgings, the barely fourty-year-old often drunkenly swearing up and down that he'd never drink this much again.

Empty promises. Every. Damn. Time.

Much like that one night in Singapore. Lewis had finally extended an olive branch of sorts for Nico to take and try going the first few meters on their road of going back to being friends, and of course Nico had accepted it once he heard where they'd be heading.

Once more, Jenson had to deal with the aftermath of that. It was about damn time he had a serious talk with the German about that.

Such, once he somehow managed to carry the blonde German back to their shared hotel room (Nico had insisted they share one), Jenson sighed deeply while he watched as Nico got comfortable on the bed, still fully dressed sans the shoes but he didn't seem to mind much. Jenson assumed he was too drunk to care by then.

His slightly pissed expression softened up into a more worried one instead, and he walked over to the side of the bed that Nico currently faced, crouching down and reaching out to rub the younger blond's hand.

"What are you doing, mate... You really should cut back on the alcohol, it doesn't do you any good."

Nico mumbled some incomprehensible things with his eyes closed before they opened, and he looked at Jenson as best as he could - given how his vision had doubled, if not tripled, by then due to the sheer amounts of alcohol the German had had.

He murmured something else whilst directly looking at Jenson, and the latter gave Nico a questioning look, tilting his head.

"Did you say something?"

It took Nico another minute or so before he could repeat himself, the alcohol making it hard to speak.

"Y'r pretty..."

Jenson sighed with a sad smile. Don't think too much of it, Jense, he's too drunk to register anything he's saying.

Instead, the British man chuckled somewhat sadly and repositioned his hand to careful thread his fingers through Nico's downright gorgeous blonde hair, pushing a few stray strands out of his face.

"Thank you but try to sleep a bit, Nico. You're much too drunk for your own good."

The younger man seemed offended at that, given the way he suddenly pouted at Jenson, who backtracked slightly at the sudden sight.

"Did I say anything wrong...?"

If he were sober, or at least just a little tipsy, Nico wouldn't have as many problems replying to Jenson's words as he had in reality. Because in reality, his mind worked rigorously, but slowly so, unable to quickly and effiently find the button it needed to press for clear speech.

"Are y' dense or sumthn...? Jus' gonna brush off m' c'nfess'n to ya..."

The retired driver did a double-take. Confession...? God, just how drunk was Nico??

"I'm... afraid I don't know what you mean...?"

The German groaned in drunken annoyance and sat up, wobbling a little as he did so. He then clumsily reached his hands out for Jenson and grabbed the latter man's cheeks, squeezing them a bit without realizing it.

"Means I like ya, y' dumb idiot. Use y'r brain, mate. 'ave fer a while."

The way he mockingly spat out the word "mate" despite his drunken state had Jenson flinching in surprise and... slight fear, dare he say. And as Nico moved closer to his face with his own, Jenson couldn't help but grimace as he pushed the German back.

"Oh hell to the fuck no, you reek of alcohol. We'll talk this out once you're sober again, okay?"

Nico grumbled at that but seemed to accept the verdict for the moment, allowing himself to fall sideways back into the bed - yet he didn't give up without one last try of defiance.

"... Cuddle."

The Brit smiled in exhaustion, clearly having given up by then. He wordlessly got up, only groaning once as he did so, and moved towards the other side of the bed, laying down and cuddling close to Nico, who turned in his arms and curled up into a ball.

"Whatever you want, princess. Now sleep, I'll get the aspirin tablet and water tomorrow. Too tired right now."

An almost inaudible mumble of the words "thank you" barely reached Jenson's ears - yet once they did, he smiled happily and buried his nose in Nico's hair.

They had a lot to talk about... But that was a problem for future-Jenson to deal with.

[kostantina]

HWS Female Holy Rome X England (Medieval Empire X Modern Empire)

AESTHETIC MOOD BOARD

❝Many German and English writers were fond of expressing a common Anglo-Saxon-Germanic heritage prior to 1914, but in fact this largely disappeared after the Saxon migrations of late antiquity. Important contacts remained, especially with the renewed missionary activity promoted by the Carolingians, who often relied on qualified monks from the British Isles, like St Boniface, but otherwise England and the Empire evolved separately. While a sense of Saxon heritage may have played a part, both countries were sufficiently distant not to be immediate competitors. Ironically, this opened possibilities for royal marriages which, like Byzantine-imperial matches, were intended mainly to impress a domestic audience and avoid antagonizing a king’s nobles by tying him to one local family. Otto I married Alfred the Great’s granddaughter, Edith of Wessex, while Henry III married Gunhild, daughter of Knut of Denmark-England. Edith’s and Knut’s deaths ended any chances of a lasting alliance in both cases.

❝By contrast, connections in the high Middle Ages were more significant, if less celebrated in the nineteenth century. Emperor Henry V married Matilda, daughter of Henry I of England, in 1114 as a deliberate attempt to forge an alliance with the Anglo-Norman dynasty ruling much of Britain since 1066. It was hoped this would outflank a Franco-papal alliance threatening the Empire towards the end of the Investiture Dispute.❞

-  Peter H. Wilson, Heart of Europe: A History of the Holy Roman Empire

❝On his mother's advice, Richard resigned the kingdom of England to Henry VI in order to receive it back as a fief of the empire. He was to pay his overlord £5,000 a year. Richard was now a vassal of Philip for his continental lands and a vassal of Henry VI for his island kingdom, but it seems that in England few, if any, were willing to acknowledge this, and that this part of the agreement was hushed up. At Henry's court, of course, it was regarded as the jewel in the crown.

❝On the day of his release, Henry VI and the princes of the empire had sent Philip and John a letter telling them that they would do all they could to help Richard if everything that had been taken while Richard was in captivity was not restored at once.❞

- John Gillingham, Richard I

❝On the morning of 6 August an imperial herald in full regalia rode through Vienna to the Jesuit church of the Nine Choirs of Angels. After climbing to the balcony, he summoned the inhabitants with a silver fanfare to announce the end of the Empire.

❝The Empire was certainly not dead by the late eighteenth century, and if it was sick, as Zedler and others suggested, it was not yet on life support. If revolutionary France had not intervened, the most likely prognosis was that the Empire’s socio-political order would have persisted further into the nineteenth century, but it is unlikely that this could have been sustained against the levelling and homogenizing forces unleashed by capitalism and industrialization around 1830.

❝By 1806, some leading intellectuals expressed the sense that the Empire had been sick for a long time and that its doctors had long given up hope. Goethe’s mother wrote two weeks after Francis II’s abdication that the news was not unexpected, ‘as when an old friend is very ill’. Later historians have expressed similar views that the Empire died ‘a “natural” death’ from old age, rather than having been murdered by Napoleon.❞

-  Peter H. Wilson, Heart of Europe: A History of the Holy Roman Empire

❞By the end of the Napoleonic Wars, French imperialism had been curbed in North America, the Caribbean, and parts of Asia, but soon much of North and West Africa would be brought under French political and cultural influence. Spain was no longer a major power, but after the demise of its empire in the 1830’s its cultural dominance in the countries of South America remained: their economies urban, their governments strictly centralized, and their peoples devoutly Catholic in the Spanish style (Fernandez-Armesto, 2003). The Dutch and Portuguese empires were also in decline, and yet survived, resistant to radical change because of the commercial benefits derived from their overseas possessions. However, none of these four imperial orders came close to matching the size and power and wealth of the British Empire.

❝Encompassing nearly a quarter of the Earth’s land mass and a quarter of its population, the British Empire in the 19th century grew into the most extensive empire the world has ever seen.❞

- Douglas M. Johnston, In The Historical Foundations of World Order: The Tower and the Arena

[thescottishalpaca]

What I learnt by BBC regarding the Blitz in London - 1941

Due to the fact that I'm not a UK citizen, I knew very little about the London Blitz. I was more familiar with the Blitzes in my own country.

Everything I know now about it derives from two specific TV shows produced by the BBC, which, of course, is a reliable source. It is the national broadcasting service, isn't it?

First of all, I'd like to talk about the military conditions in London. The technological advancements in WW2 were quite crucial for the war's resolution, as seen with the invention of sonar and the alleged attempt to use Daleks in the war. In fact, Churchill was supposedly preparing Daleks to win the war, exploiting the knowledge of these human-shaped robots sent by some very cruel aliens.

Nevertheless, they were hardly bothered by the presence of a mysterious time traveler who parked his spaceship in front of Big Ben (which sonars could not identify because it was hidden). Additionally, some German air bombers mysteriously changed direction towards a different London area, killing two Nazi spies and destroying a church. Nobody investigated this sudden plan shift, possibly due to the effectiveness, albeit chaotic nature, of the British secret service.

Regarding the social conditions, London's common folk lived miserably, with many orphans around. Health conditions were delicate, with rare and sparse evidence suggesting the presence of Nazi zombies walking in Soho. The cause of this illness remains unclear, but it is assumed that indigenous people were immune to it, while Germans were not.

Meanwhile, a virus spread around the town causing people to repetitively say, "Mooommy? Are you my moooommy?" A doctor was able to heal them all with nanogenes provided by the same mysterious time traveler parked in front of Big Ben. We lack evidence of the technology or scientific research used, although it was likely based on DNA recognition, officially discovered only years later. We can assume some experiments were ongoing.

The situation was not the same for the medium/high class. Common bookshop owners could be hired as spies or become alcohol smugglers to maintain their lifestyle, such as being well-dressed and driving old-fashioned cars. Their discontent manifested in partisan actions against the Hitler regime. This anti-germany feeling was expressed expecially with clothes, by refusing to wear black clothes or wearing the Union Jack.

Despite the war conditions, London's cultural life remained flourishing and lively. US GIs entertained themselves by watching ladies and magicians perform one of the most successful magic tricks in history: the bullet catch, with the best representation held by Fell the Marvellous and an unknown gunman.

Due to the social inequities, food was in short supply, while toy and magic trick shops ran their businesses proficiently. Rare book selling was also a profitable way to survive, due to the high demand for ancient books, especially those containing prophecies.

At the end of the Blitz, the number of victims remains unclear. However, a famous sentence by a (medical?) doctor is reported: "Everybody lives, Rose! Just this once!". This interpretation is supported by the evidence of a demon and an angel making a toast. So, it ended well.

Thank you for your attention.

Can't wait to send this to my former high school history teacher.

[the-garbanzo-annex-jr]

by Martin Kramer

So why did the Mufti fade into obscurity? (By 1951, he was on his way out.) Many mistakenly believe his collaboration with Hitler and the Nazis discredited him. It didn’t. Not only did the Arabs not care, but Western governments eyed the Mufti with self-interest. The general view in foreign ministries held that he had picked the wrong side in the war, but not more than that.

The above-quoted American report expressed this view perfectly: “While the Zionists consider him slightly worse than Mephistopheles and have used him as a symbol of Nazism, this is false. He cared nothing about Nazism and did not work well with Germans. He regarded them merely as instruments to be used for his own aims.” If so, why not open a discreet line to him and let him roam the world unimpeded?

Nakba stigma

What finally discredited the Mufti in Arab opinion, where it mattered most, was his role in the 1948 war. It was a war he wanted and believed his side would win. In late 1947, the British sent someone to see if there might be some behind-the-scenes flexibility in his stance on partition, which he had completely rejected. There wasn’t. He explained:

As regards the withdrawal of British troops from Palestine, we would not mind. We do not fear the Jews, their Stern, Irgun, Haganah. We might lose at first. We would have many losses, but in the end we must win. Remember Mussolini, who talked of 8,000,000 bayonets, who bluffed the world that he had turned the macaronis back into Romans. For 21 years he made this bluff, and what happened when his Romans were put to the test? They crumbled into nothing. So with the Zionists. They will eventually crumble into nothing, and we do not fear the result, unless of course Britain or America or some other Great Power intervenes. Even then we shall fight and the Arab world will be perpetually hostile. Nor do we want you to substitute American or United Nations troops for the British. That would be even worse. We want no foreign troops. Leave us to fight it out ourselves. 

This underestimation of the Zionists proved disastrous, even more so than his overestimation of the Axis. He later wrote his memoirs, blaming “imperialist” intervention, Arab internal divisions, and world Zionist mind-control for the 1948 defeat. To no avail: his name became inseparable from the Nakba, the loss of Arab Palestine to the Jews. His reputation hit rock bottom, along with that of the other failed Arab rulers of 1948.

Upon his death in 1974, he received a grand sendoff in Beirut from the PLO. In 1970, Arafat had transferred the PLO headquarters from Jordan to Lebanon, and the funeral finalized his status as the sole leader of the Palestinian people. Four months later, Arafat addressed the world from the podium of the UN General Assembly, achieving an international legitimacy that the Mufti could never have imagined.

[tanadrin]

I read your post about like reactionary politics and while I think I agree with you mostly I think it’s a bit of a stretch to equate “antis” to the current surge of anti transphobic rhetoric, esp when that term is so nebulous. Like are we talking about people being weird about kink at pride shit, or people being upset about the production of fictional csem? I think that while def the first person has an internalized reactionary view of sexuality, I don��t see how the second person does beyond like a generalized fear of child exploitation. There’s def like a middle ground between those two positions but I feel like this is not a great example compared to the very cut and dry “trans people are child abusers”

Well, part of the thesis I'm trying to stake out (more or less successfully, depending on how well I did it and whether or not you agree with me) is that there may be differences of degree but similarities in kind between mildly and more severely reactionary/censorious forms of affect-driven fear-based politics, and even socially acceptable forms (like true crime fandom) will tend to correlate with surprisingly vicious reactionary strains in people's otherwise progressive politics, if not even encourage the intensification of these strains over time.

I think it's risky to speak in straightforwardly causal terms, which is what the "pipeline" imagery does: if you hold views X and engage with other people with similar views, over time you will (or are overwhelmingly likely) to progress to certain other views. The Hertzsprung-Russel diagram from astronomy really is a useful metaphor here, I think. If you don't know, if you take all the stars in the sky we know about, and you plot them on a graph where one axis is their luminosity and the other axis is their color, you get an image that looks something like this:

It's hard to observe stellar evolution because it's rarely noticeable on human timescales (outside of the odd supernova), but you can notice patterns in the graph itself. Some of these, like the asymptotic giant branch or the Hayashi track, are reflective of diachronic relationships: how stars evolve over time. Others, like the main sequence, represent a synchronic relationship: stars at the opposite ends of the main sequence don't evolve to the other over the course of their lifetime (a large, bright O star at the top left of the main sequence will never become a red dwarf at the bottom right), but there is a real physical relationship here, about the relationship between mass, luminosity, and color of a star.

I think (to make the metaphor explicit) if you could chart people's tendency to indulge or even cultivate certain kinds of fear-driven ways of thinking, ones which are prone to dehumanizing the other, tickling our collective purity taboo, and exaggerating the threat to oneself and one's ingroup, against their political beliefs, a distinctive track or sequence would emerge: one not necessarily representing a full-blown evolutionary path all people with such tendencies are on, but nonetheless showing a useful relationship between the underlying thought process and the expressed opinions. I think this correlation is especially fertile in some quarters of American politics where it's often heightened by a racial dimension--witness what happens when you try to integrate school districts full of otherwise progressive, white, middle-class parents--but it's by no means solely an American phenomenon. British TERFs and the German anti-nuclear movement are both relevant here.

Now, to be clear, this is just a metaphor. I'm not sure you can give people's political beliefs an easily-agreed-upon Reactionariness Rating (though various dubious experiments in psychometry have tried) or Panickiness Rating. And similar instrumental beliefs can emerge from distinct frameworks about the world: to run with the trans example, person A has fearful and disgust-based responses to trans people bc they have their own hangups around gender and have cultivated an attitude of threat and disgust toward the outgroup; person B just has a cognitive tendency to sort the world into immutable categories, applies this to people also, and so has decided a priori trans people must be wrong about their self-reported experiences, and hasn't given it much thought since then. Both views are bad; but it requires something like the former to turn into Graham Linehan, a real obsessive asshole on a single issue, whereas the latter seems like the default starting position of most cis people before their beliefs are challenged in any way.

So I'm not positing the origin of all reactionary political beliefs here. Just one (I would argue) interesting trend. That said, yeah, I do think a lot of people's objection to (for example) the more fucked-up parts of AO3's archive stems from this impulse. It's hard, when society is increasingly converging on a roughly-though-not-entirely consequentialist understanding of the law and social mores, to make a purely deontological argument against the existence of pure fiction; thus, a lot of censorship regimes, or proponents of those regimes, work really hard to invent consequentialist reasons to support their censorship policies, and one of the only way I've seen these lines of argument really gain traction is by relying on our old friend, this kind of affective fear-driven reactionary politics I do not have a good concise name for. The relative popularity and perceived social acceptability of a particular flavor of affective fear-driven reactionary politics doesn't make it not an example of affective fear-driven reactionary politics.

I think you betray your own biases by your use of terminology: it seems to me that definitionally nothing that is fictional is CSEM. CSEM is used as a term for a very specific reason, because the common parlance, "child pornography," seems grossly inappopriate to, you know. Evidence of an actual crime, whose most central examples (i.e., not teens texting each other pictures of their butts) are records of acts of brutal violence. If I take to twitter and threaten the life of President Jack Ryan, it would be weird to classify those threats as an act of political terrorism, because Jack Ryan is a Tom Clancy character I just picked off a list of fictional U.S. presidents. And depictions of acts of political terrorism in the novels of Tom Clancy are not, themselves, political terrorism, just more schlocky political thriller that makes for decent beach reading. So "fictional CSEM" seems a contradiction in terms, at least in the sense that drives the reason for using the term in the first place.

Trying to censor things which only incidentally resemble other things because of that resemblance is usually bad, IMO! And some people seem to think that recognizing that something can be repellent and offensive to you while not meeting any reasonable criterion for censorship is the same as endorsing it--or, to be more accurate, they pretend to think that, hoping you will forget there are positions besides "think a thing is wholesome and good" and "think a thing should be made illegal."

More importantly, there is a more hard-nosed reason for us to go full "censorship is bad, eat my entire ass" in response to this kind of attitude, which is that censors lie about what they want to censor. "I only want to ban things we all can objectively agree are gross as hell" is a pretty popular position, historically. But then the Parents' Fanfiction Council or whatever gets involved, people try to shift the Overton window on what counts as gross as hell, and--as happened with Hollywood under the Hayes code--the space of acceptable expression contracts until the most vocally censorious are satisfied. The result is that eventually any kind of non-normative self-expression is considered objectionable (because someone somewhere can hammer out a Jesuitical logic whereby a theoretical innocent may come to harm)--and you're not going to protest that, are you? Because surely no decent person would want to read that disgusting filth, right? And you're a decent person.

[spoiledbooks]

In Memoriam

Author: Alice Winn

Characters: Henry Gaunt Sidney Ellwood

Synopsis: "It's 1914, and talk of war feels far away to Henry Gaunt, Sidney Ellwood and the rest of their classmates, safely ensconced in their idyllic boarding school in the English countryside. At seventeen, they're too young to enlist, and anyway, Gaunt is fighting his own private battle - an all-consuming infatuation with his best friend, the dreamy, poetic Ellwood - not having a clue that Ellwood is in love with him, always has been. When Gaunt's German mother asks him to enlist as an officer in the British army to protect the family from anti-German attacks, Gaunt signs up immediately, relieved to escape his overwhelming feelings for Ellwood.

The front is horrific, of course, and though Gaunt tries to dissuade Ellwood from joining him on the battlefield, Ellwood soon rushes to join him, spurred on by his love of Greek heroes and romantic poetry. Before long, their classmates have followed suit. Once in the trenches, Ellwood and Gaunt find fleeting moments of solace in one another, but their friends are all dying, right in front of them, and at any moment they could be next."

–

I have finished this book after staying up and three cups of tea at four in the morning. Gain and Elly's story is so absorbing and riveting. This book has left me with a lingering feeling that I myself cannot put into words. The detail in this book is magnificently written, though very dark and gruesome. Chapter Fifteen will be the most memorable chapter of all the books I have ever read. I have never shouted so loud on a pillow over my head. What I love about this book is how relatable it is to me somehow. The unrequited love between Elly and Gaunt at first - the shyness; the insecurity; the fear of rejection; the unspeakable tensions; the body languages. I have all experience this and the familiarity has very much left me with goosebumps. Oh the languages of love! I did not cry in this book but I remember how heightened my emotions while reading this book. And this is one of the books that I would probably forget the plot details but would still strongly recommend to everyone. The book ended with Elly and Gaunt living together in Brazil. They are only about in their 20's. 21 and 22 if Im not mistaken. Elly was greatly affected by war and probably is having PTSD and was having difficulty with expressing his words and he has been grumpy and has anger issues post-war. Gaunt says "I love you" in the end but Ellwood is unable to say it back replied with "I cannot heave my heart into my mouth." As Gaunt was staring into his eyes, Elly added, "Shakespeare, King Lear." (Elly loves poem in the early years). And to this Gain replied, "There. It's a start."

I have not read King Lear but the amazing Google has given me a bit of help. It says King Lear's moral of the story is, "a person's actions speak louder than words alone."

[honouredsnakeprincess]

Well, friendos, you probably didn't expect three notes in the course of an evening, even if the first was kind of nothing! Season 3 Episode 1 has given me a fair few things to say, though!

First, the pettiness and minutiae:

I like the new yorker fellow. Didn't quite catch his name, but I like his accent (is that a new york accent? don't rightly know).

This might be another 'seeing 3d models where none actually existed' incident, but I couldn't help but notice that ECorp was marked as "Evil Corp" when Mr Robot was going through that power plant search engine, which is something it isn't changed to when Elliot isn't present. I don't recall if Mr Robot does this too, but if he doesn't (and part of me suspects he does not) then Elliot might be more aware of things than immediately apparent.

It really seems like the calm relationship between Elliot and Mr Robot has gone away. :( That's pretty sad, I was happy they were getting on better for a while there, but I guess that wasn't set to last given how much of the show's core drama relies on that conflict.

Angela seems to have been largely stripped of her dynamism and pluckiness. Previously she has been a very active character, moving from one plan to the next and constantly adapting, but that seems to have ceased following the surrealism. We'll see where this goes.

Anyways, the main thing I want to talk is politics. Boo! The scary communist is going to be mildly critical of 2017-era American liberalism!

This show really is a product of its time, and I kind of adore it for that! I regard it almost as a work of fantastical historical fiction, even though I was obviously very much alive in 2017. Still, I think sometime in my coverage of late season 1, I expressed some hesitancy towards how the show portrayed revolutionary activity; obviously the actions of a small cadre of individuals will not be sufficient to usher in a revolution, and merely disrupting large financial institutions is unlikely to actually have a substantial destabilizing effect on capital-at-large. I think I expressed some hope that the show would grapple with this.

It seems to have sort of done so, but in a way I'm not sure I agree with entirely? The 5/9 attack did not meaningfully damage capitalism, or even destroy Evil Corp, it just caused what seems to be a depression and some infrastructural failure, and enabled economic meddling by the Scary Chinese. Mostly, it just made the lives of individual people kind of shittier by disrupting financial services and depriving them of their savings, mortgages, etc. The richest characters we meet in season 2 are largely unaffected in their personal holdings and comforts.

In this episode, Elliot decides to take the blames for every stress and strain caused by these events onto his own shoulders in a montage cutting between clips of Donald Trump, Angela Merkel (I think? Might've been her British counterpart, I've a bad habit of failing to differentiate between German Bundeskanzlers and British Prime Ministers and I don't care enough to check at this point), the construction of border walls, and scenes of abject poverty, and this speaks to a view of politics I don't specifically think is sound.

Certainly, economic instability is something that is latched onto by reactionary elements in government, but I think to contextualize this properly we have to situate Mr Robot as a historical text~! I am not a historian of 21st century Americana, nor do I much want to be, but I think I have the broad strokes down.

The Occupy Wall Street movement, from which this show takes a lot of its first season's politics, was fundamentally not a consciously proletarian movement. It was overwhelmingly white office workers, who tend to hold themselves apart from the wider proletariat (even when they ultimately share most of their interests with said class) by virtue of being "management", and lacked a strong political programme. Ultimately, these were liberals protesting against a liberal system that had mistreated them specifically, they were not protesting against the general predations of capital.

Many of the same people who were strongly supportive of the Occupy movement during its height were shocked and appalled when Donald Trump ran for public office, and even more upset when he won the Presidency despite projections that his opponent would easily best him. This was not inherently an unreasonable reaction, the man's a fucking reactionary and there isn't much to like about him or his policy!

The great difficulty is that many of these liberals took to exceptionalizing Trump as a far more significant figure than he actually was, likely due to his almost complete abandonment of euphemism and modesty when going about the horrid business of American governance. Border fascism had long been a bipartisan position (as we can see by recent criticisms of Trump during the 2024 elections not being for calling to build a wall, but for failing to deliver on said promise), but under Trump this took the form of loudly and belligerently calling to "build a wall and make the Mexicans pay for it". Similarly, travel restrictions on muslim-majority countries and on people with arabic-sounding names were not new by the time of the Trump administration, but calling such measures a "muslim ban" certainly was!

Essentially, Trump and his broader wave of reactionary politicians, while certainly a step in a rightward direction generally, were more significant in the respect that they raised the volume of what were already mainstream right-wing or bipartisan political beliefs! Courting white nationalists was not new; courting white nationalists as blatantly as this was new and outrageous!

This was scary! This was apocalyptic! Had fascism finally come to roost in its ancestral homeland? The astute commentators noted that in some respects it had lived in America for decades at that point, and still some elements of fascist politics had yet to arrive. At the end of the day, Trump was only a little bit outside of the norm in terms of actual policy, the horrors of "trumpism" were much the same horrors his immediate predecessors had carried out, and would be carried out by his successor in the presidency as well. Still, this shakeup in discourse if not in policy created a certain millenarian feeling in American and broader "Western" politics, a sense of doom that had long been impending but which now affected the specific type of white, "not rich but comfortable" liberal office-workers who had driven the Occupy movement.

So here is Mr Robot, which has spent two seasons criticizing corporate America, and whose viewpoint character must now absolve everyone from Adam Smith to money to the corporate structure and on and on of their guilt in the deterioration of conditions, in order to place the blame squarely on his own shoulders, and resolve that the current crisis must come to an end, and everything must return to some kind of status quo.

Mr Robot does not want to return to the status quo, for his part, but now he is in the company of a woman who has literally been brainwashed, a murderer/former corporate executive, a shady hacker circle with no ethical standing, and subversive foreign elements from China. I don't think he is meant to be right here!

I don't know where this is going, but the more I think about it the more apprehensive I get, frankly. I could be entirely wrong about this, too, and I'm still enjoying the show quite a lot, so I will keep watching in the future.

Angela's monologue at the end of the episode also had a certain millenarian quality to it, even more literally with talk of the birth of a new world and it being ended by the return of light to the city. I wanted to work this in somehow to my commentary on historical and political context, but I forgot how I was going to do that. Good song, too.

[bopinion]

2024 / 32

Aperçu of the week

“Live and let live.”

(This is the term used to describe the spontaneous emergence of non-aggressive behavior between troops facing each other as enemies at the front during the First World War. It is now used as a synonym for “to each his own” - as long as he doesn't step on anyone else's toes).

Bad News of the Week

The LGBTQ+ community is open, diverse, peaceful, colorful and inclusive. And stands for tolerance like no other. At the Christopher Street Day parades, which now take place in almost all major German cities throughout the summer, people are cheerful and exuberant. Many people are infected by the atmosphere. In cities such as Cologne, Berlin and Hamburg, hundreds of thousands come together and celebrate a festival of humanity and togetherness that excludes no one. That's nice.

Unfortunately, these events not only attract the attention of those with a positive attitude, but also those with a negative one. Hostility and even attacks on queer people at the events are becoming increasingly common. This happens primarily in the east of the republic and almost exclusively from the right-wing spectrum - neither of which is surprising. After all, the principle of free self-determination can easily be stylized as the antithesis of the conservative, traditional image of society.

The low point for the time being: the CSD in Bautzen in eastern Saxony took place under police protection and the closing party had to be canceled due to security concerns. Numerous disruptive actions were announced by right-wing organizations, including the far-right “Free Saxons” mobilizing on a grand scale, with a counter-event entitled “Against gender propaganda and identity confusion!!!”. In this way, a movement that not coincidentally has the same symbol as the peace movement, the rainbow flag, becomes the target of intolerance with violent tendencies.

Saxony's Justice Minister Katja Meier said that she was stunned that an event had to be cancelled due to the tense security situation and strong right-wing extremist mobilization. “Hatred and agitation against queer people are an expression of misanthropic ideologies that have no place in our society,” emphasized the Green politician. Unfortunately, it has to be said that this is not the case: this ideology has indeed found a place in society. In the state elections taking place this fall in Saxony, Thuringia and Brandenburg, the far-right AfD (Alternative for Germany) is expected to become the strongest party. And they have already polemicized against queer people with posters such as “Hands off our children!”. I'm starting to fear for our social peace...

Good News of the Week

I like this slightly rebellious attitude that the Scots like to display from time to time. Now Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland, is once again showing its stubbornness. A very positive one. It is rebelling against the public image of fossil fuels.

Specifically, this involves advertising, sponsorship, events etc. for a whole spectrum of companies, products or services. The list ranges from airlines and cruise ships to off-road vehicles and basically all oil and gas companies: “all companies and associated sub-brands or lobbying organizations that extract, refine, produce, supply, distribute or sell fossil fuels”.

In short: polluters should no longer be allowed to present themselves to the public. That makes sense. Because “carbon-intensive products and services undermine the council's commitment to tackling climate change”. Current example: In a report released this month, the International Energy Agency just found that if SUVs were a country, they would be the fifth largest CO2 emitter in the world.

Of course, this is only a symbolic step. But it is a step in the right direction. And is therefore being described by activists as a “historic” step in the fight against climate change. Which other British cities such as Cambridge, Liverpool and Norwich would like to follow. Thank you, dear Scots!

Personal happy moment of the week

My son has just gone on a bike ride with my father. He is 16 - and therefore 70 years younger than his grandpa. And yet the two of them can do something together that is “their thing”. For a whole week. Along the Elbe, from Dresden to Magdeburg. I particularly like the fact that this is also possible thanks to the sister and granddaughter. Because in the meantime, she looks after Granny at home. Because dad and son - of course - don't have time again. Thank you!

I couldn't care less...

...that the Republicans are calling Kamala Karris' new running mate Tim Walz a radical leftist and woke extremist. The “coach” is simply a successful, hands-on, people-oriented politician. He has a clear moral compass, his heart in the right place and his feet firmly planted on a democratic foundation. I like the guy. In whose shadow his political opponent J. D. Vance actually just looks weird. I'm looking forward to their debate in television.

It's fine with me...

...that freedom of speech exists. Because it is a valuable democratic asset. But in the age of social media, limits must be set - keywords hate speech and fake news. A prime example of this is a “free spirit” who happens to own his favorite platform: Elon Musk and Twitter (yes, I know he wants it called X). I don't mean that he has reopened this far-reaching mouthpiece to radicals. Or that he fired most of the team responsible for moderating and monitoring the posts. And not his interview with Donald Trump. But his own posts.

According to a study by the non-governmental organization Center for Digital Hate, Musk has spread 50 false or misleading messages on X since January about the upcoming presidential election in the USA alone. Musk's false messages have already been viewed almost 1.2 billion times this year, according to the center. False messages that could benefit Trump. And which are poisoning the political climate. According to his biographer Walter Isaacson, Musk wants to be seen as a “messiah”. He is convinced that he is right in everything he does and says. That makes him a loose gun. And that is dangerous.

As I write this...

...I'm still in a kind of Olympic spirit. For 16 days in Paris, you could watch ambitious athletes surpass themselves. With tears of joy and pain, with hope and adrenaline, despair and Covid - lots of great emotions. And a wonderfully motivating audience that not only cheered on their own, extremely successful athletes (“Allez les bleus!”), but actually rooted for everyone. Somehow this crisis-ridden time seemed to stand still a little, even and especially in France, which is currently in the midst of a full-blown government crisis. My personal discovery of these Summer Olympics is Breaking, this breathtaking mixture of athleticism, creativity, coordination, attitude and rhythm. Simply beautiful. See you in four years, Snoop Dogg!

Post Scriptum

That's what you call a roll backwards: the Liberals, who incidentally also provide the transport minister in the current government coalition, are seriously trying to score points with a clear “pro-car strategy” for city centers against the alleged “paternalism” of the Greens. With fewer pedestrian zones and cycle paths and more parking spaces - preferably with a flat rate, as an alternative to the Germany ticket for local public transport. I checked the calendar: no, it's not April 1st. So it must be serious. It rarely happens, but in this case I really am at a loss for words...

[arda-marred]

Tolkien challenged existing attitudes to the poem in a 1953 paper, “Ofermod”, published with his verse drama The Homecoming of Beorhtnoth Beorhthelm’s Son in Essays and Studies. “The Battle of Maldon” tells how Beorhtnoth, an Anglo-Saxon leader, led his men in a doomed defence against a Viking attack. The Vikings were on a tidal island in the river; but crucially Beorhtnoth decided to let this marauding force across a causeway (pictured above). Battle was joined, and the English were slaughtered. The poem seems to celebrate what has been called “Northern courage”, a spirit of dogged bravery even in the face of certain defeat. But the poet also describes Beorhtnoth’s decision as the product of ofermod, the meaning of which isn’t entirely clear. Tolkien argued that the Old English word means not simply “daring” but “overmastering pride”. This could be taken to reverse the sentiment of the poem, turning it into a critique of an irresponsible act of leadership. Stuart, whose book The Keys of Middle-earth (written with Elizabeth Solopova) provides a guide to Tolkien’s medieval sources, has been looking at Tolkien’s manuscript notes on the poem, from when he was an undergraduate onwards. And it turns out that Tolkien breathed not a word of criticism of Beorhtnoth for many years – not until around the start of the Second World War. This, Stuart suggests, undermines any supposition that Tolkien’s view of “The Battle of Maldon”, as expressed in his “Ofermod” essay, indicated a “lions led by donkeys” attitude shaped by First World War experiences. I’d agree that Tolkien’s view of the Great War military leaders wasn’t as black-and-white as all that. But I’d certainly argue that his trench experiences gave him some reason to feel very ambivalent about the leaders. As I said at the end of Stuart’s talk, there is the case of one company commander in Tolkien’s battalion who led a company on a night raid that overshot its goal – so when the sun rose, they were sitting ducks for the German machine-gunners and for the British artillery (unaware of their position), and most of the men were wiped out. This fatally over-extended advance by a military leader seems echoed in quite a few incidents in Middle-earth, including the charge by Théoden at the Battle of the Pelennor Fields. Tolkien’s writing displays a range of attitudes to the different incidents – implying, I think, that he felt deeply ambivalent about such acts of courage from leaders responsible for others’ lives. In a talk which also covered a number of other interesting points from the manuscripts at the Bodleian Library, Stuart cautioned against looking to Tolkien’s life or to contemporary events to explain the change in Tolkien’s views on “The Battle of Maldon”. The Second World War itself could have led to a shift in Tolkien’s view – perhaps because he saw ofermod at its worst in Hitler. And as I pointed out, his later view might have been coloured by the fact that two of his sons were in the forces, and facing mortal danger, whereas Tolkien himself had to sit on the sidelines powerlessly. However, Stuart‘s point was not about the creative writer but the rigorous scholar. As he said in a later email exchange, whatever Tolkien felt about the military leadership of 1914-18 (a debatable question), “he was entirely at liberty to overlay these views onto scenes or characters in his fiction, of course, and did so I believe; but he was too great a scholar to allow his own personal feelings and experiences in the 20th century to colour his views of the tenth.” That’s a persuasive argument.

[if-you-fan-a-fire]

Panic

"The start of the war in September, 1939, and the signing the month before of the Hilter-Stalin Non-aggression Pact provoked panic within the Canadian population. Among the first steps the King government undertook in response to this panic was harassing and arresting communists, who were charged with specific offences. The second, major panic occurred after the fall of France in June, 1940, and the ignominious escape of the British Army via Dunkirk, in France. Britain’s most important ally now was Canada. During the second panic, communist organizations proved useful targets, so they were made illegal, leading to the internment of communists and sympathizers. 

There were also more informal, expressions of panic that occurred across the country. Locally, for instance, on June 21, 1940, shortly after France surrendered to Germany, two Hull men received sentences under the Defence of Canada Regulations (DOCR). Roland Schryer, 18 years old, from Laurier Street, received a month in prison for having declared that he hoped for  German victory. Paul Séguin, 39 years old, from Saint-Rédempteur Street, also expressed  hope for a German victory, and characterized the English “… d’un terme particulièrement  vulgaire et méprisant,” (… with language that was particularly vulgar and hateful), for which he was sentenced to three months in prison. The two men were charged for having  made declarations that violated DOCR regulation 39.

The public panic also corresponded what came to be known as the ‘fifth-column’ issue, after Hitler’s easy victories in western Europe. ‘Fifth-column’ was a specific reference to the Spanish fascist dictator, Francisco Franco who, when successfully marching upon Madrid during the Spanish Civil War with four columns, claimed that he had the support of a fifth column within Madrid itself. Hitler’s blitzkrieg victories were achieved with the help of rightist elements within defeated countries, such as Quisling in Norway. Thus, fifth-columnists were dangerous elements within the country that had to be rooted out and suppressed. In Canada, there were mass meetings, often of veterans, in  the spring of 1940, aimed at enemy aliens, fifth-columnists, saboteurs (whatever these might be), fascists, and of course, communists. In Vancouver, two rallies in May of 7,000 and 5,000 people demanded that the federal government organize veterans to assist police in fighting espionage and sabotage. They also enjoined the government to bar enemy aliens from employment in government , municipal services, or key industries, and to fire enemy aliens already employed therein. In Calgary, 9,000 demanded internment of Germans and other measures aimed at fifth-columnists. In Windsor, Ontario, 3,000 veterans called for mass registration of all Canadians, and internment of all enemy aliens. In Toronto, 50,000 veterans on June 9 demanded that the government put the country on a total war footing. On May 27, 7,000 gathered in Montreal to hear that all potential suspects should be arrested.

Organizations qualified as ‘sixth-column’, aimed at suppressing fifth-columnists, popped up around the country. In Quebec, the Civilian Protection Committee, comprised of veterans, policemen, soldiers, and businessmen, started making vigilante-like anti-communist sounds. In Ontario, a similar group, the Legion of Frontiermen, benefited from support by right-wing Tories and by provincial Liberals in the Hepburn government. 

Canadian communists eventually proved to be among the sixth-columnists most annoying to authorities when they started identifying fascist elements active in Canada, as Fred Rose did when he exposed fascist currents in Quebec. A most amazing example of the sixth-column phenomenon occurred in Saskatchewan, where rioting veterans attacked German and Ukrainian facilities. Then, in a period of just three weeks, 7,500 World War I veterans and Canadian Legion members were organized in the Saskatchewan Veterans Civil Security Corps, to help the RCMP and municipal police forces fight subversion. The men were grouped into platoons, companies, and battalions, and regularly undertook shooting practice and military parades, including in some rural areas where there was no police presence. The mission of the ‘silent column’, as it was called, was to protect against subversive activities among the large German population of Saskatchewan, as well as among other Europeans. With such an objective, it is easy to understand that membership of the ‘silent column’ was mostly English-Canadian.

The para-military fever distressed the government and the RCMP, who were being  told by some of the Canadian people, in effect, that they were not doing their job in light of the war. The RCMP demurred; after all, they were the professionals who best knew the real enemies of Canada. Even though the targets of the sixth-columnists were amorphous and imprecise, sixth-columnists did represent a broad slice of Canadian society: right-wing Tories and Liberals, military veterans and policemen, businessmen and labour union leaders, CCFers and communists.

Although the RCMP and Justice were scarcely impressed with sixth-columnists, some officials did use their information, as when Norman Robertson, responsible for ensuring control of fascists in Canada, consulted with communists such as Fred Rose in order to learn about fascist operations in Canada. One of Robertson`s useful sources about fascism among Italians was an enterprising newspaper journalist, a leftist editor named Antonio Spada, who published Italian-language newspapers that were the focus of anti-fascist activity among Montreal  Italians. Nevertheless, J. F. MacNeil, deputy minister of Justice opined to Robertson with a rather surly and racist comment about the utility of Spada’s information about fascist activity among Italo-Canadians.

Spada, in my opinion, is not any more reliable than the other Italians who are imbued with the spirit of the vendetta.

The main target of the RCMP and Justice against the left was always clear. The activity of sixth-columnists aimed at the Germans greatly distressed Mackenzie King, who was the MP for Prince Albert, an important, German centre in Saskatchewan. Even more annoying was the  criticism by Hepburn Liberals and right-wing Tories in Ontario. In the War Cabinet  meeting of May 22, 1940, King complained that Canadian aid provided to Britain meant that Canada was no longer able to ensure the defence of the country’s shores, nor its internal social order, especially in light of the fifth-column and sixth-column agitation. It would be necessary to increase the size of police forces, and to create an internal, military force to defend Canadian territory. 

Finally, in June, 1940, the King government responded “by taking the assault on subversion under official, federal auspices.” On June 5, King’s government banned fascist and communist organizations. On June 18, it announced national registration as per the National Resources Mobilization Act; two months later, the registration was fait accompli. By March 1941, the RCMP and military  systems of fingerprinting and security screening had been greatly expanded to cover one Canadian out of five. The fifth-column crisis was over, and the King government appeared to be in control of the situation once again.

- Michael Martin, The Red Patch: Political Imprisonment in Hull, Quebec during World War 2. Self-published, 2007. p. 116-120

[stillunusual]

Who knew that Germans are such a bunch of sour krauts? On 18th May 1944, after months of bloody fighting between the Germans and allied forces from the USA, Britain, Poland and several other countries, the monastery of Monte Cassino was finally captured by soldiers of the Polish Second Corps under the command of General Władysław Anders.

They raised the Polish flag over the ruins of the monastery, after which Emil Czech, a Polish bugler, played the "Hejnał Mariacki" to announce the allied victory.

A few hours later, on the express order of General Anders, a British flag was placed next to the Polish flag.

However, according to a 1958 German film called "The Green Devils of Monte Cassino" (which you can now watch for free on YouTube), that never happened.

Instead, the film pretends that it was the French who raised their flag over Monte Cassino.

I can think of two possible reasons for this….

Perhaps France was involved in the production of the film and insisted on turning the French forces who also took part in the battle into the heroes, at the expense of the Polish Second Corps.

On the other hand, prior to the capture of Monte Cassino, about a hundred German paratroopers had escaped from the monastery in a southerly direction, preferring to surrender to the Brits than to the Polish Second Corps - and 14 years later, maybe the fact that it was Untermenschen from Poland who raised their flag over the monastery was too traumatising for the German public to deal with, so history was re-written to avoid hurting former-Nazi fee fees. That would be par for the course for a country in which David Hasselhoff has sold tens of millions of albums and no German I have ever spoken to will admit to owning one….

[blood-and-pizza]

Fazbear Estate's Funtime Freddy is multilingual. He was pre-programmed with a full grasp of American English, British English (thanks to William Afton) and Spanish. He later studied German and French independently, and became fluent in both. Yes, he actually studied-- while it would have been easier to simply program it into him, he wanted a challenge. Funtime Freddy is very aware of how smart he is, and he'll take any chance to flex that.

German is Funfred's favorite language. Melissa Pomene, who studied German in college years ago, purposefully brushed up on her knowledge to impress Funfred... it worked. While they can't hold full conversations in German yet, they're working on it. Funfred is a surprisingly good - and thankfully patient - teacher.

Currently, in his spare time, Funfred is studying Japanese. Other languages he's interested in are Italian and Chinese, though he's heard the latter is quite challenging for those learning it as a second language. He's confident in his abilities, though!

The only real challenge Funfred has with speaking any language is his vocal glitch, which manifests as a robotic stutter when he speaks. Originally, I'd stated this glitch originated due to lack of maintenance. However, thinking about it... maybe his glitch actually started because his circuits got shocked one time too many... either way, Funfred isn't ashamed of his stutter, and actually does have some control over it. It tends to disappear when he's feeling particularly focused. Anyone who expresses annoyance or disgust with his stutter causes him to PURPOSEFULLY glitch out even more just to piss them off!

Oh, and in case you're wondering about Bon Bon... since he can read Funfred's "mind" whenever he's plugged into his arm, any language Funfred has knowledge of, so does Bon Bon. His pronunciations are quite good, if a bit cutesy. While he and Funfred do have the option to silently ping each other, they'll sometimes converse in a non-English language in order to (A) have a private conversation in front of a non-speaker, and (B) annoy the person they're currently speaking in front of with the fact they can't understand them. Humans have given the duo grief for this before, demanding they stick to English. Funfred, who can perfectly mimic the voices of others, retaliates by copying that person's voice and making them say embarrassing/stupid things (in English, of course).

In fact, using vocal mimicry to mock people or make mischief is one of Funfred's favorite things to do... although, he's definitely also used it to make people say things he himself wants to hear from them. But that's a whole other topic for another day.

[enheriter]

[ jacob anderson, he/him, cisgender man ] — was that ALOYSIUS PONSONBY? the THIRTY-ONE year old is the DUKE of OXFORD, how exciting to see them this season! rumors have it they are EXPRESSIVE and PRODIGIOUS, but i’ve heard they are MELANCHOLIC and LETHARGIC as well — maybe that’s why they’ve been called the VIRTUOSO. I have even heard that HE PAYS OFF NEWSPAPERS TO WRITE ABOUT HIS WORKS — only time will tell.

QUICK FACTS.

NAME:  aloysius  weatherall  ponsonby  NICKNAME:  aloysius  AGE:  thirty-one  PLACE OF BIRTH:  oxford,  england    NATIONALITY:  british  GENDER:  cisgender  man  PRONOUNS:  he/him  ORIENTATION:  bisexual  RELIGION:  anglican  PARENTS:  erskine  st.  clair  ponsonby  (  duke  of  oxford  )  &  felicity  prudence    (  duchess  of  oxford  )   LANGUAGES:  english,  french  (  fluent  )  german,  italian  (  conversational  )  spanish  (  basic  )  EDUCATION:  oxford  university  OCCUPATION:  duke,    aka none,    aka  amateur composer  HOBBIES:  music,  opera,  travelling,  art,  being rich,  gambling   LABEL  the  virtuoso

PARALLELS  

asuka  langley  (  neon  genesis  evangelion  )    camille  preaker  (  sharp  objects  )    lestat  de  lioncourt  (  interview  with  the  vampire  )    sherlock  holmes  (  arthur  conan  doyle  )

HISTORY.

tl;dr  stage mom wreaks havoc on her child’s life and said child continues doing what he’s always been told to do because there is literally.  nothing else. 

aka  asuka  langley  if  she  was  an  industry  plant  tw   for  ableism,  mental health issues,  unhealthy  familial  dynamics,  parental  death

sometimes  life  unravels  in  but  a  moment;    sometimes  life  unravels  through  a  slow  decay  charted  over  the  course  of  a  lifetime.    your  father  was  the  first,    your  mother  the  second:    you  will  never  know  the  details,    but  you  slowly  come  to  learn    —    through  hints,    through  riddles,    through  something  that  beats  in  the  hollow  of  your  chest    —    that  there  is  a  sickness  running  thick  in  your  blood,    a  sickness  that  took  your  father  away  from  you  for  your  safety  and  made  your  mother  the  only  parental  figure  you’ve  ever  known,    a  sickness  that  will  one  day  rear  its  ugly  head    (  so  your  mother  says  )    and  ruin  everything  that  you’ve  come  to  know.

it  is  difficult  to  live  life  as  a  curse,    but  you  do.    it  is  difficult  to  live  life  as  something  closer  to  a  burden  than  an  heir,    but  you  do.    father  is  a  figure  who  convalesces  in  seaside  towns  where  the  air  might  do  him  some  good,    a  summertime  figure  whose  face  grows  stranger  with  every  passing  of  the  year,    until  one  day  you  come  to  him  in  his  chair    —    and  he  is  talking,    as  he  always  does,    about    THE  MUSIC  DO  YOU  HEAR  IT    —    and  you  realise  that  you  don’t  know  this  man  at  all.    that  perhaps  you  never  did.    that  perhaps  the  man  whom  your  mother  says  you  are  a  reflection  of  is  but  a  husk  of  flesh  covering  up  void.    and  if  you’re  his  reflection,    then  what  does  that  make  you?

your  mother  does  nothing  so  uncouth  as  to  ban    THE  MUSIC    in  your  house.    her  cruelty  runs  far  stronger,    far  wiser:    she  makes  you  learn  it  under  the  auspices  of  the  finest  tutors,    the  greatest  musicians.    you  cannot  help  but  think  perhaps  she  is  fixing  your  father  through  you,    but  you  do  not  mind  it.    maybe  you’d  try  to  fix  your  father  as  well,    but  all  you  really  want  to  do  is  to  sit  besides  him  while  he  looks  towards  the  shore  and  asks  you    DO  YOU  HEAR  IT    tells  you    IT  IS  EVERYWHERE    and  you  will  look  at  the  horizon.    you  will  feel  the  wind  in  your  hair.    you  will  come  to  think  that  maybe  your  mother’s  right,    that  your  father’s  sickness  is  in  you,    because  this  is  the  moment  you  will  realise:    IT  IS  EVERYWHERE.

(    you  just  don’t  know  what  it  is.  )

but  where  your  father  fears  its  presence  and  where  your  mother  ignores  it  and  pretends  everything  is  alright,    you  simply  let  it  dwell  where  it  dwells.    and  it  dwells  in  this:    when  you  hear  mozart’s  lacrimosa  for  the  first  time,    you  cry  a  little  because  you  think  nothing  could  ever  possibly  compare.    that  life  is  but  a  lead-up  to  this:    you,    sitting  in  your  darkly  lit  box,    listening  to  a  choir  of  singers  lament  for  a  guilty  man,    asking  begging  pleading    have  mercy  on  him  have  mercy  on  him  grant  him  eternal  rest.      and  then  there’s  a  message  the  very  next  morning  telling  you  and  your  mother  that  your  father  died  in  his  sleep,    the  very  same  moment  tears  were  flowing  down  your  cheeks  at  the  idea  of  absolution.    you  do  not  believe  as  he  did,    but  in  that  moment  you  send  out  a  thought.    a  prayer.    do  you  hear  it  now,    father?

this,    the  greatest  tragedy  of  your  life:    you  do  not  hear    THE    MUSIC    the  same  way  your  father  did    —    something  you  have  to  be  thankful  for,    according  to  your  mother,    and  you  do  as  your  mother  commands    —    but  you  do  not  hear  music  the  same  way  all  those  expensive  tutors  and  practitioners  and  helpful  assistants  ever  do.    this,    the  realisation  you  had  to  face  sometime  during  your  early  twenties,    when  your  mother  smiles  at  you  for  the  first  time  you  remember  her  doing,    and  it’s  because  she’s  finally  going  to  be  rid  of  you:    you  do  not  have  the  same  passion,    not  really.    and  when  i  say  passion,    i  mean  passion  for  just  about  everything.    not  just  music.    not  just  composing.    your  father.    his  life.    your  life.    life  itself.   

think  this  once,    and  then  never  again:    you  lack  a  passion  for  life.

still  the  conductor  motions  for  the  orchestra  to  play  on,    and  lack  of  passion  isn’t  really  a  reason  to  stop  doing  what  you’re  good  at.    and  what  is  important  here  is  that  you  absolutely  cannot  think  that  thought  again,    because  if  you  do  then  what  is  this  all  for?    a  stray  note  risks  losing  the  structure,    and  a  stray  thought  risks  the  collapse  of  everything:    your  personhood,    your  history,    your  entire  being.

you  are  good  at  what  you  do.    the  notes  swells  to  a  crescendo.    the  climax  is  coming.    it’s  just  right  around  the  corner.    you  cannot  stop.    if  you  stop,    then  you  are  lost.    if  you  are  lost,    then  you  are  just  like  your  father.    are  you  ready  to  face  the  music?

WANTED  CONNECTIONS.

fans  of  his  works  which  would  be  funny  as  hell  bc  he  couldn’t  possibly  care  less  about  it  but.  hey.  that’s  all  he  has  to  show  for  his  whole  entire  personhood  so.  thanks  for  your  appreciation!  and  in  complete  reverse  of  this:    people  who  know  he’s  an  industry  plant  and  like.    kinda  make  fun  of  him  for  it?    

broken  betrothals  aplenty.    i  think  he’s  developed  a  sort  of  reputation  as  being  a  tortured  artist  (ZZZZZ  BORING!)  over  the  years:    taciturn,    unpredictable.    these  broken  betrothals  have  definitely  helped  in  popularising  this  ‘image’    (read:  he’s  just  depressed  lmao)    but  have  also  definitely  Not  helped  his  reputation  as  being  a  dependable  ‘match’

fellow  patrons/appreciators/makers  of  the  arts,    both  performing  arts  and  like.    paintings  and  stuff  ig.    he  doesn’t  have  any  siblings  to  mind  the  financial  cares  of,    so  he  just  kinda  throws  his  money  at  art.    he  technically  has  a  growing  private  collection  of.  Stuff  at  home.  exact  details  tbd  but  it’s  probably  garish  as  HELLLLL

someone  he  went  on  a  grand  tour  of  europe  with!    or  maybe  not  even  that  but  people  he  just  kinda  bumps  shoulders  with  in  whatever  swiss  alpine  spa  towns  there  are  in  the  world.

fellow  ‘intellectuals’  ig??  he’s  oxford-educated  bc  duh  home  pride  lezzgo  but  also  gotta  be  real:    he  cares  less  abt  the  discussions  abt  ‘the  true,  the  good,  and  the  beautiful’  and  more  about  GAMBLING

people  he’s  currently  being  matched  with  in  the  gossip  rags  of  19c  england.    or  like  even  just  the  grapevine  lmfao.    could  be  as  grounded  in  truth  or  as  groundless  as  we  want  it  to  be,    but  it’ll  be  fun  to  play  out  a  sort  of  comedy  of  errors  for  this  whole  shebang.    bonus  points  if  this  actually  ends  up  with  them  being  actually  betrothed.    bonus  points  if  they’re  actually.    gasp.    in  love  w  each  other

people  he  offended  bc  he  is  Annoyingly  Rich  n  privileged  n  he’s  oxford  educated  so  he  thinks  he’s  automatically  the  Smartest  Person  in  any  given  room  (unless  that  room  is  filled  with  oxford  graduates  as  well)  and  he.    kinda  but  not  really.    doesn’t  have  a  filter?    mainly  bc  his  privilege  afforded  him  the  luxury  of  not  rlly  filtering  his  thoughts  lmao

[usafphantom2]

Rafales on the rise? French hunting seeks additional sales in the Middle East

Fernando Valduga By Fernando Valduga 09/10/2023 - 13:00 in Military

Rafale fighters of the Air Force of the Emirate of Qatar.

The dominance of the United States in the combat aeronautical industry could result in increased competition, as the French hope to increase their share of the cake. Qatar and Saudi Arabia are now looking at the Rafale fighters.

With the German veto blocking Eurofighter deliveries to Saudi Arabia, and amid Israel's persistent opposition to any sale of the F-35 to Qatar, this may be the opportunity for the French company Dassault to further boost its hunting in the region.

In July, the French Minister of the Armed Forces, Sébastien Lecornu, visited Qatar, where he met with the emir in the hope of strengthening his strategic partnership through operational and industrial cooperation.

After the trip, reports emerged that Qatar could choose to buy 24 additional Rafale from Dassault, which would raise the country's fleet to 60, having acquired an initial batch of 24 in 2015 and another 12 in 2017. Although the Qatar Ministry of Defense did not announce its decision, analysts said the sale seems likely.

"The fact that they return to the table in search of another order is not relatively surprising, considering that they already have the Rafale, as well as another type designed and built in France - the Mirage 2000-5 - in their fighter inventory," said Dan Darling, the director of military and defense markets at Forecast International.

Qatar would want a fleet of 60 Rafales for two reasons, Darling explained: for stronger deterrence capabilities and for political purposes. There is a political element associated with large defense purchases, he said, where Qatar "buys" influence with the exporting country and vice versa.

Richard Aboulafia, administrative director of Aerodynamic Advisory that has been following aircraft programs for more than 30 years, agrees that diplomatic benefits are fundamental.

“They [the government of Qatar] see fighter planes as an opportunity to acquire a strategic relationship and, given their recent history with Gulf neighbors, they are extremely important to Qatar,” he said, referring to a recent diplomatic crisis that saw several nations accuse Doha of funding terrorist groups. "It's not about [about] the Rafales."

Experts, however, differ on who could be Rafale's next customer in the Greater Middle East. For Aboulafia, Saudi Arabia seems to be the logical candidate, even if the U.S. agrees to sell F-35 to the kingdom.

“They [Saudi] already buy F-15 from the US and, of course, want F-35. But as they are eager to continue their dual source decision, they will want to buy another aircraft from another supplier. Installment 2 of Eurofighter is suspended. In fact, there is no one else but France," he said.

At the beginning of the year, while Germany relaxed arms restrictions on Saudi Arabia, it remained firm in blocking Eurofighter deliveries to the kingdom. The twin-engine jet is manufactured by a consortium formed by the French company Airbus, the British company BAE Systems and the Italian company Leonardo.

Germany's decision seems to have irritated the United Kingdom, since four years ago the British Foreign Secretary demanded that Germany lift the restrictions on arms transfers because they could harm the British defense industry. BAE Systems is one of the largest private sector employers in Saudi Arabia, where it employs 5,300 Saudis - 57% of its total workforce in the country.

Although the German veto to Eurofighter may benefit Dassault in the absence of other competition, Darling said that Saudi Arabia may not have an interest in the French jet because it recently purchased more than 80 American-made F-15 fighters, updated old versions and expressed interest in buying the F-35 and joining the Global Air Combat Program. The latter is a trilateral effort involving the United Kingdom, Japan and Italy to develop a sixth-generation fighter.

Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia and Iran are trying to improve diplomatic relations, with the latter's Foreign Minister visiting the kingdom on August 17. However, Gaspard Schnitzler, a researcher at the French Institute of International and Strategic Affairs, said that this is unlikely to hinder or prevent France from selling Rafale to Saudi Arabia.

It is possible that public pressure or potential monetary risks may interfere with such a sale, “but we have to keep in mind that for years the Gulf has been one of the main areas of French arms export,” he added.

Rafales of the Egyptian Air Force.

A more likely export opportunity for Rafale, in addition to Qatar, would be a complementary request from Egypt, in light of the failure of the agreement with Russia for Su-35 aircraft that failed due to U.S. sanctions, Darling said. Cairo placed an order for 30 additional Rafales for the last time in 2021, bringing its fleet number to 54.

But no matter how well placed the Rafale looks, an additional order from Qatar or its neighbors does not necessarily signal a decline in demand for fifth-generation fighters. Aboulafia and Darling agreed that the interest of the F-35 in the Middle East remains strong.

Several Arab states would actually buy the F-35 if it were not for the strict opposition of Israel. For example, Qatar in 2020 would have made a formal order for the Lockheed Martin jet, which was closely followed by Israel declaring that it would oppose any U.S. sale of F-35 to the Gulf country. A final agreement has not yet been reached.

"The main question is whether the US would be willing to sell the F-35 to Doha. He has been cautious about F-35 sales to Arab states, mainly because of his commitment to ensuring Israel's qualitative military advantage over its neighbors and rivals in the region," Darling said.

The same approach was applied to Saudi Arabia's interest in the F-35.

“Saudi Arabia would love the F-35s, but unless the Biden administration offers them as part of an agreement involving normalized relations with Israel, this will not happen for at least a few more years,” Aboulafia said. "None of these difficulties occur in Europe, so European countries can simply order F-35 without worrying about disapproval."

Source: Defense News

Tags: Military AviationDassault AviationDassault RafaleWar Zones - Middle East

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Fernando Valduga

Fernando Valduga

Aviation photographer and pilot since 1992, he has participated in several events and air operations, such as Cruzex, AirVenture, Daytona Airshow and FIDAE. He has work published in specialized aviation magazines in Brazil and abroad. Uses Canon equipment during his photographic work throughout the world of aviation.

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