#European Trade Mark

[ankurkkr91-blog]

Why You Need a European Union Trade Mark Attorney for Your Business

In the competitive global marketplace, an identity for your brand is paramount to swinging the business. Whether you are a newly established venture, a company with a more extended history, or an international company expanding into Europe, the road towards protecting your intellectual property through trade mark registration begins here. Difficulties of registering Your EU trademark However, navigating the nuances of the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) and securing your trademark can be arduous. And this is where a European Union Trade Mark Attorney provides the most value for your business.

Understanding the EU Trade Mark System The EU provides a unified system since businesses can now protect themselves in all 27 member states with only one application before the EUIPO. It is also a very efficient and inexpensive way of obtaining trade marks compared to lodging separate trade mark applications in each country. But there are stringent requirements, legal complexities, and obvious pitfalls that call for expert counsel all along the way. An European Union Trade Mark Attorney ensures that your application is drafted correctly and meets all the legal criteria outlined in the Trade Mark Regulation whilst steering clear of pitfalls that could result in a rejection.

Avoiding Costly Mistakes One of the most significant risks businesses face when applying for a trade mark is making

errors in their application. These can include:

Selection of a mark that lacks distinctiveness – The EUIPO may refuse marks that lack distinctive character.

Not performing a proper trademark search—If you don’t properly search to confirm ownership, you risk infringing on an existing trademark, which could lead to legal action.

Misclassifying goods and services– Trade marks must be filed and registered in a specific class or class, and incorrectly specifying these can greatly hinder or invalidate protection.

A European Union trademark attorney conducts a comprehensive trade mark search, advises on distinctiveness, and ensures that your application is correctly structured to maximize protection and reduce the risk of objections.

Handling Oppositions and Legal Disputes Following the acceptance of your trade mark, third parties will have an opportunity to oppose it during opposition proceedings if their rights conflict with yours.

Opposition to your application

Settle with the other party in the case.

Act for your business in trade mark actions and infringement matters. Without legal counsel, your brand might be attacked, requiring you to rebrand or even lose protection in important markets.

Trade Mark Monitoring and Enforcement You can not just register a trade mark and forget about it; you will need to monitor your registration in case someone else infringes upon your rights. A trademark attorney can provide watch services to monitor potential infringements and take the right actions when needed. They can send cease-and-desist letters, take legal action, and offer guidance on enforcement plans to help you protect your brand image.

Moreover, trademarks are only protected for 10 years before they must be renewed, so again , if not done, protection is lost. A trademark attorney handles renewals and provides counsel to widen the protection to new territories.

Conclusion Obtaining an EU trademark is essential for any business wishing to protect its brand in Europe. But let me tell you that the process entails legal technicalities that only professionals can deal with, such as obtaining the legal know-how, protection, and peace of mind when navigating the trademark system with the protection of a European Union Trade Mark Attorney.

Hiring specialists will ensure that your brand is protected, competitive and legally profitable for the long term. If you are considering trade mark registration concerning the EU, it is a well- thought-out decision to seek advice from a qualified attorney.

[apas-95]

As it apparently needs to be restated - race, ethnicity, and nationality are not themselves the basic drivers of history. Political-economic class is.

The European practice of placing African people into chattel slavery was not carried out on the basis of any innate characteristics of 'blackness' or 'whiteness' - those categories did not exist before the slave trade, they were created in support of it. Europe at the time found it would be beneficial to have a class of slave workers for its colonial projects, and it had the military, political, and economic might to subjugate Africa and African people to that end. Had you asked a Prussian and a Scotsman prior to the institution of African slavery if they were both members of a common 'race', they would have found the idea ridiculous - and yet, transport those two ahead in time, and perhaps to settlements in the Americas, and suddenly they were both Whites. Whiteness (and its necessary counterpart, blackness), then, is not some intrinsic quality based on the tone of someone's skin, but a political and economic category constructed to differentiate between those people that could be oppressed and made chattel by the slave trade, and those that could not.

This is true for all these systems of oppression - though they may be divided on supposed lines of biology or locality, they are not inherently based on biological factors, those are functionally coincidental, and are constructed as justifications for a system necessitated by purely political and economic reasons. Nazi oppression of Jewish, and Roma, and Slavic [and etc.] people was not fundamentally based on any inherent quality of e.g. Judaism, but on the economic needs of German capital under the burden of postwar reconstruction and 'war reparations' paid to the victorious powers. It was not blind hatred, but the inevitable result of a society built in pursuit of profit - one whose ruling class held a cold, calculated need to expropriate wealth, weaken worker organisation, and seize and depopulate land to strengthen the composition of capital. It was still necessary for this system to split the population into one group of 'legitimate targets' for victimisation, and one of reassured, protected accomplices, though there were no obvious physical, 'biological' features to base these on - so they were constructed, both through propaganda that exaggerated physiology, and through the appending of obvious badges and marks onto those targeted. Again, these were sets of features, and categories, created to support a system of oppression and exploitation, not the reasons it came into being in the first place.

Again, these are fundamentally political and economic categories, and can only be properly understood as such. If not properly understood as being based, first and foremost, on material interests of classes, then any analysis of them is unstable. For example: appeals to the supposed ancestral claim of zionists to the land of Palestine, and thereby to indigineity, can only be refuted with an understanding that indigeneity is a political and economic characteristic, of relation towards the oppression of a settler state, and not some characteristic of where one's ancestors were born. None of this is to say that race, nationality, etc don't function as axes of oppression - but that they must be understood as manifestations of the existing political and economic material interests of classes that drive the development of history, if they are to be fought against.

[reasonsforhope]

An illegal toxic dump site in Croatia, the theft of water from a major aquifer in southern Spain, illegal trading of ozone-depleting refrigerants in France: This is just a sampling of the environmental crimes that European countries are struggling to stop. The lack of accountability for these acts stems in part from the European Union’s legal code, which experts say is riddled with vague definitions and gaps in enforcement. That’s about to change. 

Last week, EU lawmakers voted in a new directive that criminalizes cases of environmental damage “comparable to ecocide,” a term broadly defined as the severe, widespread, and long-term destruction of the natural world. Advocates called the move “revolutionary,” both because it sets strict penalties for violators, including up to a decade in jail, and because it marks the first time that an international body has created a legal pathway for the prosecution of ecocide.

“This decision marks the end of impunity for environmental criminals and could usher in a new age of environmental litigation in Europe,” wrote Marie Toussaint, a French lawyer and EU parliamentarian for the Greens/European Free Alliance group, on X...

The new directive uses the term “ecocide” in its preamble, but does not criminalize the act by laying out a legal definition (the most widely accepted definition of ecocide was developed by an international panel of experts in 2021). Instead, it works by providing a list of “qualified offenses,” or crimes that fall within its purview. These include pollution from ships, the introduction of invasive species, and ozone depletion...

The new law holds people liable for environmental destruction if they acted with knowledge of the damage their actions would cause. This aspect of the law is important, experts said, because it means that a permit is no longer enough for a company to avoid culpability.  

“If new information shows that behavior is causing irreversible damage to health and nature – you will have to stop,” a member of the European Parliament from the Netherlands, Antonius Manders, told Euronews. 

Advocates like Mehta hope that the EU’s move will have influence beyond Europe’s borders. The principal goal of the Stop Ecocide campaign is for the International Criminal Court to designate ecocide as the fifth international crime that it prosecutes, after crimes against humanity, war crimes, crimes of aggression, and genocide. At the moment, environmental destruction can only be prosecuted as a war crime at the ICC, and limitations in the law make this extremely difficult to do...

Kate Mackintosh, the executive director of the Netherlands-based UCLA Law Promise Institute Europe, told Grist that the ICC is unlikely to adopt an ecocide law if other countries do not do so first. 

“It’s not something you can just pull out of thin air,” she said, adding that any international legal doctrine has to have a precedent on the national level. “That’s the way states are going to accept it.”

The EU’s 27 member states will have two years to adapt the new legislation into their penal codes. Afterwards, their implementation must be reviewed and updated at least once every five years using a “risk-analysis based approach,” to account for advancements in experts’ understanding of what might constitute an environmental crime. Mehta said that despite its omission of some important offenses, the law sets an important example for other countries. Several days before the EU vote, Belgium adapted its criminal code to include the directive, making it the first country in Europe to recognize ecocide as a crime.

The ruling “shows leadership and compassion,” Mehta said. “It will establish a clear moral as well as legal ‘red line’, creating an essential steer for European industry leaders and policy-makers going forward.”

-via Grist, March 6, 2024

[smugpugchimera]

Week of solidarity with Ukraine is about to start. There are different events around Europe around this occasion, and if you're in one of the following places you can participate!

Following announcements brought to you by Solidarity Collective Anti-authoritarian volunteer network from Ukraine You can support them on PayPal -suppliesforukrainenow@proton.me -humanitarian.aid.for.ukraine@proton.me ------------------------- Week of Solidarity With Ukraine Is About To Start In late January we called on our comradely initiatives and activist groups to hold events to mark the third anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. We are grateful to everyone who reacted to it or decided to organise events to support Ukrainian resistance independently. It is nice to see that, unlike volatile politicians, genuine solidarity between progressive powers remains still!

Therefore we’re pleased to invite you to join street demonstrations, film screenings and concerts organized by antiauthoritarians in solidarity, and they start tomorrow! The list turned out to be quite impressive.

21 February Zoom. Online discussion «Ukraine: LGBTQIA+ community in war», held by the European network in solidarity with Ukraine and against war (ENSU). Registration beforehand is required https://www.facebook.com/events/550415114687627

Zoom. Also, this Friday, Spanish leftists LIT-CI will hold an online discussion titled “Ukraine resists while protecting its freedom!” Ukrainian leftists and trade unionists Yurii Samoilov, Dionisii Vinohradiv, and Kateryna Hrytseva will participate.

22 February

Prague On 22 February a music festival Riot Over River, regularly organized by our friends from the Anarchist Federation of the Czech Republic (AFED), will take place. A night of music with tens of various artists, Food Not Bombs and a fundraiser for Solidarity Collectives – something worth not missing. https://www.facebook.com/events/566047495995031/

London. Same day noon starts demonstration Russian Troops Out! Solidarity with Ukraine! organized by the Ukraine Solidarity Campaign. All these three years they’re tirelessly filling the streets demanding reinforcement of military support of Ukraine. https://www.facebook.com/events/644631464700585?active_tab=about

Barcelona. At 11:00, Barcelona will host a screening of a film about the Taras Shevchenko Company, Ukrainian internationalist fighters who took part in the Spanish Civil War on the side of the Republic. https://www.ugt.cat/commemoracio-del-tercer-aniversari-de-la-guerra-a-ucraina-cineforum-sobre-la-solidaritat-obrera-internacional-en-temps-de-guerra/

At 19:00, the metal/punk concert Noise for Cause, organised by Barcelona anarchists, will start. The money raised at the concert will support the humanitarian missions of the Solidarity Collectives. https://www.instagram.com/antifaucrania.vlc/p/DFpmkJFNZma/

23 February

Barcelona. The culmination of the Barcelonian solidarity campaign will be an antifascist demonstration ‘Barcelona with Ukraine’, starting at 16:00 from Passeig de Gràcia 90.

‘When Musk and Trump joined Russia’s policies, supporting far-right parties in Europe and threatening freedom on the continent, supporting Ukraine becomes even more essential” the organizers write. https://t.me/taxanka_info/162

Amsterdam. Beyond a full week of various events (about them below), on 23 February Amsterdam will have a street demo to support Ukraine. Starts at 12:00. https://www.instagram.com/p/DGRRc2MIDpu/

24 February Berlin. On 24 February, the annual march to mark the anniversary of the full-scale invasion will take place in Berlin. The anarchist block will take part in it, and our friends from GNIP and RAF are calling to join them. The block gathers at 17:00 at Alexanderplatz, from where it will go to Berlin Cathedral to join the main part of the demonstration. If you are in Berlin, be sure to join! https://www.instagram.com/p/DGAUfEasK1A/?igsh=MWRkeDBodzZzb2RlNw%3D%3D

Dresden. Another march in solidarity with the Ukrainian resistance, organised by ABC Belarus and local anarchists, will take place in Dresden. It starts at 17:00 on Neumarkt square. https://www.instagram.com/p/DGFrRQKNaaG/?igsh=bjRidXhjaWI2NXQ0

Warsaw. On 24 February, a rally in support of Ukraine will begin at 18:00 in Warsaw. The anarchist block will take part in it. Like last year, it is organised by Belarusian and Polish comrades. ‘No one but ourselves: neither Trump, Putin, Zelensky, nor the European Union will stop the killings and terror – only a solidarity and self-organised people can do it,’ they said in a statement. https://pramen.io/ru/2025/02/demonstratsiya-v-podderzhku-ukrainy-fvarashava-ru-pl/

Prague. Czech comrades from Tábor Solidarity responded to the call of the Collectives. On Monday, 24 February, they invite you to the event Solidarity with the Ukrainian resistance. Three years of full-scale war. The programme includes a story about queer activists in the war, a presentation by GNIP and a conversation with Czech activist Jan Martinovský, who helps people in the South of Ukraine. The event starts at 18:00. https://www.instagram.com/p/DGRHCX9swm9/?igsh=MWx6aDMwcW04ZGZjMA%3D%3D

Brno. Another event to mark the 3rd anniversary will take place in Brno. Polina Davydenko and 𝗟𝘂𝗸𝗮́𝘀̌ 𝗗𝗼𝗯𝗲𝘀̌ will share about their travels to Eastern Ukraine, the discussion will be followed by a screening of short documentaries: Where Russia Ends by Oleksiy Radynski and Sashko Protyah’s My Favourite Job. https://www.instagram.com/p/DF-D215MKs_/

28 February

Prague. The Czechs continue to surprise us with the level of their support! Next Friday, Prague will host the event Empire Will Fall, Freedom Will Prevail, which will include a screening of the film Stop-Zemlia by Kateryna Gornostai. The funds raised at the event will also be donated to the Solidarity Collectives, for which we are extremely grateful. https://akce.nolog.cz/event/imperium-padne-svoboda-zvitezi-soliakce-a-promitani-k-vyroci-utoku-na-ukrajinu

Netherlands We’d like to highlight the anti-authoritarian community in Amsterdam, which actually organised a whole week of solidarity with Ukraine from 26 February to 3 March.

23 February - march in solidarity with Ukraine 26 February - screening of the documentary 20 Days in Mariupol. 27 February - screening of the documentary Intercepted. 28 February - punk/reggae concert 2 March - screening of the documentary film Donbas 3 March - screening of the documentary Where Russia Ends https://www.instagram.com/p/DGQscgUoW5Y/?igsh=MWYzeGc2Zm9qc2RnZg%3D%3D

[owlets-outlet]

this is a hill i will *fucking* die on.

people of color existed in medieval europe and therefore it is FUCKING realistic to have a poc character in your GODDAMN fantasy movie

the proof is going to be very czech-centric because *i* am czech.

1. okay, this one is cheating a little, but. saint maurice. he was a 3rd century knight and hes the first black person to be painted in czechia. (14th century paintings of patron saints to be displayed in the roman emperors private chapel)

he didnt live in europe, but i think its important to point out that the first depiction of a black man was a very positive one.

2. trade routes to the middle east and asia were one of the biggest pillars for the medieval european economy, culture and politics. i feel like the Silk road is really famous, yet people forget about it whenever poc people in medieval settings get brought up, which is so strange. do you think merchants on the silk road were all white 😭😭😭 you think the great emperors zhang qian looked like mark zuckerberg??

3. mongolian invasions. yes, plural. you think they all just. plundered and left??

4. roma population. do you think romani are white?? theyre ethnically indian. they arrived to europe as early as the 5th century.

5. this one is more of a personal anecdote, but my family recently did a family tree. and my mothers' side has persian ancestors that came to europe in the 15th century.

[democracyunderground]

THE AMERICAN CENTURY IS OVER

America Committed Suicide on November 5th, 2024

1. Canada: Fittingly, it was the Canadian prime minister, Mark Carney, who declared the official time of death.

"The global economy is fundamentally different today than it was yesterday. The system of global trade anchored on the United States, that Canada has relied on since the end of the 2nd World War—a system that, while not perfect, has helped to deliver prosperity for our country for decades—is over.

Our old relationship of steadily deepening integration with the United States is over.

The eighty-year period when the United States embraced the mantle of global economic leadership—when it forged alliances rooted in trust and mutual respect, and championed the free and open exchange of good and services—is over.

While this is a tragedy, it is also the new reality."

And just like that, the age of American empire, the great Pax Americana, ended.

We cannot overstate what has just happened. It took just 71 days for Donald Trump to wreck the American economy, mortally wound NATO, and destroy the American-led world order.

He did this with the enthusiastic support of the entire Republican party and conservative movement.

He did it with the support of a plurality of American voters.

He did not hide his intentions. He campaigned on them. He made them the central thrust of his election. He told Americans that he would betray our allies and give up our leadership position in the world.

There are only three possible explanations as to why Americans voted for this man:

they wanted what he promised;

they didn’t believe what he promised; or

they didn’t understand what he promised.

Pick whichever rationale you want, because it doesn’t matter. Whatever the reason was, it exposed half of the electorate—the 77 million people who voted for Trump—as either fundamentally unserious, decadent, or weak.

And no empire can survive the degeneration of its people.

2. No Going Back

Understand this: There is no going back.

If, tomorrow, Donald Trump revoked his entire regime of tariffs, it would not matter. It might temporarily delay some economic pain, but the rest of the world now understands that it must move forward without America.

If, tomorrow, Donald Trump abandoned his quest to annex Greenland and committed himself to the defense of Ukraine and the perpetuation of NATO, it would not matter. The free world now understands that its long-term security plans must be made with the understanding that America is a potential adversary, not an ally.

This realization may be painful for Americans. But we should know that the rest of the world understands us more clearly than we understand ourselves.

Vladimir Putin bet his life that American voters would be weak and decadent enough to return Donald Trump to the presidency. He was right.

Europeans are moving ahead with their own security plans because they realize, as a French minister put it, “We cannot leave the security of Europe in the hands of voters in Wisconsin every four years.” He was right.

The Canadian prime minister declared the age of American leadership over. He was right.

Instead of arguing with this reality, or denying it, we should face it.

It’s bad enough being a failing empire. Let’s not also be a delusional failing empire. Let’s at least have some dignity about our situation.

The world will move on without us.

Economically this means that international trade will reorganize without the United States as the central hub. Relationships will be forged without concern as to our preferences. The dollar may well be displaced as the world’s reserve currency. American innovation will depart for other shores as the best and brightest choose to make their lives in countries where the rule of law is solid, secret police do not disappear people from the streets, and the government does not discourage research and make economic war on universities.

There’s a reason why countries like Belarus and El Salvador aren’t tech hubs.

All of this will mean slower growth at home and declining economic mobility. The pie will shrink and people will become more desperate to hold on to their slices.

If you want a small preview, look at what has happened to the British economy since Brexit.

The drag we experience will be much greater, because we had much further to fall.

In the security space, Europe will organize apart from us. The Europeans will create a separate nuclear umbrella and will likely include Canada, Japan, and Australia in their alliance. The “free world” as we have understood it for the entirety of our lifetimes will no longer include America.

As a result, America will either drift, or find itself becoming more closely allied with the world’s authoritarians. We may become closer with Putin’s Russia or Xi’s China. We may find that we need them—Russia as a counterweight to democratic Europe and China as a source of cheap manufacturing to relieve some of the price pressure on American consumers.

The end of the American era doesn’t mean everything will become chaos overnight. We aren’t going to wake up tomorrow to the sound of the blaring war rig horn from Mad Max. We are still a rich country, with momentum carrying us forward. But in ways that will soon be perceptible and eventually be undeniable, things will get worse. And facts about America and the world that we have taken for granted since the end of the Second World War will no longer hold true.

3. Idiots

On the day that Trump’s tariffs collapsed America’s position in the world, Secretary of State Marco Rubio went to Brussels to demand that NATO allies increase defense spending to 5 percent of their budgets.

But here is how utterly stupid and unserious our government is:

Europe is going to rearm. And they are going to do so by building up their internal defense industries so that they do not have to rely on America, which is in the process of threatening military action against a NATO member.

And the American response to this has been to cry foul.

U.S. officials have told European allies they want them to keep buying American-made arms, amid recent moves by the European Union to limit U.S. manufacturers’ participation in weapons tenders, five sources familiar with the matter told Reuters.

The messages delivered by Washington in recent weeks come as the EU takes steps to boost Europe's weapons industry, while potentially limiting purchases of certain types of U.S. arms.

Our government thinks it can simultaneously:

demand that Europe re-arm;

threaten our European allies with territorial annexation; and

demand that Europe buy American weapons.

We have a deeply stupid government—from our economically illiterate president to our craven and foolish secretary of state, from the freelancing billionaire dilettante who is gutting American soft power to the vaccine-denying health secretary who is firing as much talent as he can. From the senior economics advisor who thinks comic books are good investments, to the senators who voted to confirm this cabinet of hacks, to the representatives who stumble over themselves justifying each new inane MAGA pronouncement.

But also, we have the government we deserve.

The American age is over. And it ended because the American people were no longer worthy of it."

[blackstarlineage]

Queen Nzinga (c. 1583–1663) was a powerful and influential ruler of the Kingdom of Ndongo and Matamba, located in present-day Angola. Born in the late 16th century, Nzinga is best known for her determined resistance to Portuguese colonial expansion and the transatlantic slave trade. She ruled as queen of Ndongo and later as regent of Matamba, two powerful African kingdoms that resisted Portuguese attempts to control the region.

Nzinga's rise to power began when she was appointed as an ambassador to the Portuguese in 1622. During a diplomatic meeting, she famously refused to sit on the floor while negotiating with the Portuguese governor, symbolizing her strength and defiance against colonial power. Her intelligence, strategic brilliance, and fierce independence soon made her a formidable adversary to the Portuguese.

Nzinga led military campaigns against the Portuguese, forming alliances with other African kingdoms and European powers such as the Dutch, in a fight to maintain her kingdoms' sovereignty. Her leadership and resilience made her a national heroine in Angola, and she was particularly known for her guerrilla warfare tactics and political cunning.

Despite her struggles, Nzinga's kingdoms were eventually overrun by Portuguese forces. She died in 1663, at around 80 years old, after having spent much of her life defending her people's freedom and sovereignty. Nzinga's death marked the end of her direct resistance to Portuguese colonialism, but her legacy endured. She is remembered as a symbol of African resistance, leadership, and the strength of women in the face of imperialism.

Her death was followed by the continued colonization of Angola by the Portuguese, but her story remains a cornerstone of Angolan national pride. Queen Nzinga's name is still celebrated today as a figure of resilience, power, and determination in the face of colonial oppression. 🇦🇴

[fatehbaz]

What it meant to "do geology" in Hutton's time was to apply lessons of textual hermeneutics usually reserved for scripture [...] to the landscape. Geology was itself textual. Rocks were marks made by invisible processes that could be deciphered. Doing geology was a kind of reading, then, which existed in a dialectical relationship with writing. In The Theory of the Earth from 1788, Hutton wrote a new history of the earth as a [...] system [...]. Only a few kilometers away from Hutton’s unconformity [the geological site at Isle of Arran in Scotland that inspired his writing], [...] stands the remains of the Shell bitumen refinery [closed since 1986] as it sinks into the Atlantic Ocean. [...] As Hutton thought, being in a place is a hermeneutic practice. [...] [T]he Shell refinery at Ardrossan is a ruin of that machine, one whose great material derangements have defined the world since Hutton. [...]

The Shell Transport and Trading Company [now the well-known global oil company] was created in the Netherlands East Indies in 1897. The company’s first oil wells and refineries were in east Borneo [...]. The oil was taken by puncturing wells into subterranean deposits of a Bornean or Sumatran landscape, and then transported into an ever-expanding global network of oil depots at ports [...] at Singapore, then Chennai, and through the Suez Canal and into the Mediterranean. [...] The oil in these networks were Bornean and Sumatran landscapes on the move. Combustion engines burnt those landscapes. Machinery was lubricated by them. They illuminated the night as candlelight. [...] The Dutch East Indies was the new land of untapped promise in that multi-polar world of capitalist competition. British and Dutch colonial prospectors scoured the forests, rivers, and coasts of Borneo [...]. Marcus Samuel, the British founder of the Shell Transport and Trading Company, as his biographer [...] put it, was “mesmerized by oil, and by the vision of commanding oil all along the line from production to distribution, from the bowels of the earth to the laps of the Orient.” [...]

---

Shell emerged from a Victorian era fascination with shells.

In the 1830s, Marcus Samuel Sr. created a seashell import business in Houndsditch, London. The shells were used for decorating the covers of curio boxes. Sometimes, the boxes also contained miniature sculptures, also made from shells, of food and foliage, hybridizing oceanic and terrestrial life forms. Wealthy shell enthusiasts would sometimes apply shells to grottos attached to their houses. As British merchant vessels expanded into east Asia after the dissolution of the East India Company’s monopoly on trade in 1833, and the establishment of ports at Singapore and Hong Kong in 1824 and 1842, the import of exotic shells expanded.

Seashells from east Asia represented the oceanic expanse of British imperialism and a way to bring distant places near, not only the horizontal networks of the empire but also its oceanic depths.

---

The fashion for shells was also about telling new histories. The presence of shells, the pecten, or scallop, was a familiar bivalve icon in cultures on the northern edge of the Mediterranean. Aphrodite, for example, was said to have emerged from a scallop shell. Minerva was associated with scallops. Niches in public buildings and fountains in the Roman empire often contained scallop motifs. St. James, the patron saint of Spain, was represented by a scallop shell [...]. The pecten motif circulated throughout medieval European coats of arms, even in Britain. In 1898, when the Gallery of Palaeontology, Comparative Anatomy, and Anthropology was opened in Paris’s Museum of Natural History - only two years after the first test well was drilled in Borneo at the Black Spot - the building’s architect, Ferdinand Dutert, ornamented the entrance with pecten shell reliefs. In effect, Dutert designed the building so that one entered through scallop shells and into the galleries where George Cuvier’s vision of the evolution of life forms was displayed [...]. But it was also a symbol for the transition between an aquatic form of life and terrestrial animals. Perhaps it is apposite that the scallop is structured by a hinge which allows its two valves to rotate. [...] Pectens also thrive in the between space of shallow coastal waters that connects land with the depths of the ocean. [...] They flourish in architectural imagery, in the mind, and as the logo of one of the largest ever fossil fuel companies. [...]

---

In the 1890s, Marcus Samuel Jr. transitioned from his father’s business selling imported seashells to petroleum.

When he adopted the name Shell Transport and Trading Company in 1897, Samuel would likely have known that the natural history of bivalves was entwined with the natural history of fossil fuels. Bivalves underwent an impressive period of diversification in the Carboniferous period, a period that was first named by William Conybeare and William Phillips in 1822 to identify coal bearing strata. In other words, the same period in earth’s history that produced the Black Spot that Samuel’s engineers were seeking to extract from Dayak land was also the period that produced the pecten shells that he named his company after. Even the black fossilized leaves that miners regularly encountered in coal seams sometimes contained fossilized bivalve shells.

The Shell logo was a materialized cosmology, or [...] a cosmogram.

Cosmograms are objects that attempt to represent the order of the cosmos; they are snapshots of what is. The pecten’s effectiveness as a cosmogram was its pivot, to hinge, between spaces and times: it brought the deep history of the earth into the present; the Black Spot with Mediterranean imaginaries of the bivalve; the subterranean space of liquid oil with the surface. The history of the earth was made legible as an energetic, even a pyrotechnical force. The pecten represented fire, illumination, and certainly, power. [...] If coal required tunnelling, smashing, and breaking the ground, petroleum was piped liquid that streamed through a drilled hole. [...] In 1899, Samuel presented a paper to the Society of Arts in which he outlined his vision of “liquid fuel.” [...] Ardrossan is a ruin of that fantasy of a free flowing fossil fuel world. [...] At Ardrossan, that liquid cosmology is disintegrating.

---

All text above by: Adam Bobbette. "Shells and Shell". e-flux Architecture (Accumulation series). November 2023. At: e-flux dot com slash architecture/accumulation/553455/shells-and-shell/ [Bold emphasis and some paragraph breaks/contractions added by me. Presented here for commentary, teaching, criticisms purposes.]

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

What a front cover...

* * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

March 6, 2025

Heather Cox Richardson

Mar 07, 2025

This morning, Ted Hesson and Kristina Cooke of Reuters reported that the Trump administration is preparing to deport the 240,000 Ukrainians who fled Russia’s attacks on Ukraine and have temporary legal status in the United States. Foreign affairs journalist Olga Nesterova reminded Americans that “these people had to be completely financially independent, pay tax, pay all fees (around $2K) and have an affidavit from an American person to even come here.”

“This has nothing to do with strategic necessity or geopolitics,” Russia specialist Tom Nichols posted. “This is just cruelty to show [Russian president Vladimir] Putin he has a new American ally.”

The Trump administration’s turn away from traditional European alliances and toward Russia will have profound effects on U.S. standing in the world. Edward Wong and Mark Mazzetti reported in the New York Times today that senior officials in the State Department are making plans to close a dozen consulates, mostly in Western Europe, including consulates in Florence, Italy; Strasbourg, France; Hamburg, Germany; and Ponta Delgada, Portugal, as well as a consulate in Brazil and another in Turkey.

In late February, Nahal Toosi reported in Politico that President Donald Trump wants to “radically shrink” the State Department and to change its mission from diplomacy and soft power initiatives that advance democracy and human rights to focusing on transactional agreements with other governments and promoting foreign investment in the U.S.

Elon Musk and the “Department of Government Efficiency” have taken on the process of cutting the State Department budget by as much as 20%, and cutting at least some of the department’s 80,000 employees. As part of that project, DOGE’s Edward Coristine, known publicly as “Big Balls,” is embedded at the State Department.

As the U.S. retreats from its engagement with the world, China has been working to forge greater ties. China now has more global diplomatic posts than the U.S. and plays a stronger role in international organizations. Already in 2025, about 700 employees, including 450 career diplomats, have resigned from the State Department, a number that normally would reflect a year’s resignations.

Shutting embassies will hamper not just the process of fostering goodwill, but also U.S. intelligence, as embassies house officers who monitor terrorism, infectious disease, trade, commerce, militaries, and government, including those from the intelligence community. U.S. intelligence has always been formidable, but the administration appears to be weakening it.

As predicted, Trump’s turn of the U.S. toward Russia also means that allies are concerned he or members of his administration will share classified intelligence with Russia, thus exposing the identities of their operatives. They are considering new protocols for sharing information with the United States. The Five Eyes alliance between Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the U.S. has been formidable since World War II and has been key to countering first the Soviet Union and then Russia. Allied governments are now considering withholding information about sources or analyses from the U.S.

Their concern is likely heightened by the return to Trump’s personal possession of the boxes of documents containing classified information the FBI recovered in August 2022 from Mar-a-Lago. Trump took those boxes back from the Department of Justice and flew them back to Mar-a-Lago on February 28.

A CBS News/YouGov poll from February 26–28 showed that only 4% of the American people sided with Russia in its ongoing war with Ukraine.

The unpopularity of the new administration's policies is starting to show. National Republican Congressional Committee chair Richard Hudson (R-NC) told House Republicans on Tuesday to stop holding town halls after several such events have turned raucous as attendees complained about the course of the Trump administration. Trump has blamed paid “troublemakers” for the agitation, and claimed the disruptions are part of the Democrats’ “game.” “[B]ut just like our big LANDSLIDE ELECTION,” he posted on social media, “it’s not going to work for them!”

More Americans voted for someone other than Trump than voted for him.

Even aside from the angry protests, DOGE is running into trouble. In his speech before a joint session of Congress on Tuesday, Trump referred to DOGE and said it “is headed by Elon Musk, who is in the gallery tonight.” In a filing in a lawsuit against DOGE and Musk, the White House declared that Musk is neither in charge of DOGE nor an employee of it. When pressed, the White House claimed on February 26 that the acting administrator of DOGE is staffer Amy Gleason. Immediately after Trump’s statement, the plaintiffs in that case asked permission to add Trump’s statement to their lawsuit.

Musk has claimed to have found billions of dollars of waste or fraud in the government, and Trump and the White House have touted those statements. But their claims to have found massive savings have been full of errors, and most of their claims have been disproved. DOGE has already had to retract five of its seven biggest claims. As for “savings,” the government spent about $710 billion in the first month of Trump’s term, compared with about $630 billion during the same timeframe last year.

Instead of showing great savings, DOGE’s claims reveal just how poorly Musk and his team understand the work of the federal government. After forcing employees out of their positions, they have had to hire back individuals who are, in fact, crucial to the nation, including the people guarding the U.S. nuclear stockpile. In his Tuesday speech, Trump claimed that the DOGE team had found “$8 million for making mice transgender,” and added: “This is real.”

Except it’s not. The mice in question were not “transgender”; they were “transgenic,” which means they are genetically altered for use in scientific experiments to learn more about human health. For comparison, S.V. Date noted in HuffPost that in just his first month in office, Trump spent about $10.7 million in taxpayer money playing golf.

Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo pointed out today that people reporting on the individual cuts to U.S. scientific and health-related grants are missing the larger picture: “DOGE and Donald Trump are trying to shut down advanced medical research, especially cancer research, in the United States…. They’re shutting down medicine/disease research in the federal government and the government-run and funded ecosystem of funding for most research throughout the United States. It’s not hyperbole. That’s happening.”

Republicans are starting to express some concern about Musk and DOGE. As soon as Trump took office, Musk and his DOGE team took over the Office of Personnel Management, and by February 14 they had begun a massive purge of federal workers. As protests of the cuts began, Trump urged Musk on February 22 to be “more aggressive” in cutting the government, prompting Musk to demand that all federal employees explain what they had accomplished in the past week under threat of firing. That request sparked a struggle in the executive branch as cabinet officers told the employees in their departments to ignore Musk. Then, on February 27, U.S. District Judge William Alsup found that the firings were likely illegal and temporarily halted them.

On Tuesday, Senate majority leader John Thune (R-SD) weighed in on the conflict when he told CNN that the power to hire and fire employees properly belongs to Cabinet secretaries.

Yesterday, Musk met with Republican— but no Democratic— members of Congress. Senators reportedly asked Musk—an unelected bureaucrat whose actions are likely illegal—to tell them more about what’s going on. According to Liz Goodwin, Marianna Sotomayor, and Theodoric Meyer of the Washington Post, Musk gave some of the senators his phone number and said he wanted to set up a direct line for them when they have questions, allowing them to get a near-instant response to their concerns.” Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) told reporters that Musk told the senators he would “create a system where members of Congress can call some central group” to get cuts they dislike reversed.

This whole exchange is bonkers. The Constitution gives Congress alone the power to make appropriations and pass the laws that decide how money is spent. Josh Marshall asks: “How on earth are we in this position where members of Congress, the ones who write the budget, appropriate and assign the money, now have to go hat in hand to beg for changes or even information from the guy who actually seems to be running the government?”

Later, Musk met with House Republicans and offered to set up a similar way for the members of the House Oversight DOGE Subcommittee to reach him. When representatives complained about the random cuts that were so upsetting constituents. Musk defended DOGE’s mistakes by saying that he “can’t bat a thousand all the time.”

This morning, U.S. District Judge John McConnell Jr. ruled in favor of a group of state attorneys general from 22 Democratic states and the District of Columbia, saying that Trump does not have the authority to freeze funding appropriated by Congress. McConnell wrote that the spending freeze "fundamentally undermines the distinct constitutional roles of each branch of our government." As Joyce White Vance explained in Civil Discourse, McConnell issued a preliminary injunction that will stay in place until the case, called New York v. Trump, works its way through the courts. The injunction applies only in the states that sued, though, leaving Republican-dominated states out in the cold.

Today, Trump convened his cabinet and, with Musk present, told the secretaries that they, and not Musk, are in charge of their departments. Dasha Burns and Kyle Cheney of Politico reported that Trump told the secretaries that Musk only has the power to make recommendations, not to make staffing or policy decisions.

Trump is also apparently feeling pressure over his tariffs of 25% on goods from Canada and Mexico and an additional 10% on imports from China that went into effect on Tuesday, which economists warned would create inflation and cut economic growth. Today, Trump first said he would exempt car and truck parts from the tariffs, then expanded exemptions to include goods covered by the U.S.-Mexico-Canada trade agreement (USMCA) Trump signed in his first term. Administration officials say other tariffs will go into effect at different times in the future.

The stock market has dropped dramatically over the past three days owing to both the tariffs and the uncertainty over their implementation. But Trump denied his abrupt change had anything to do with the stock market.

“I’m not even looking at the market,” Trump said, “because long term, the United States will be very strong with what’s happening.”

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[rotzaprachim]

Many have such little comprehension and empathy for what it was to be a refugee from a communist dictatorship in the kind of 30’s-90’s period in the U.S. and Western Europe. (They also have such little comprehension and empathy for what it was to be a refugee from a right wing capitalist us-backed dictatorship as well, but in some specials and other ways.)

like. These were people who were often working between multiple extremely dysfunctional, systematically unfair immigration regimes. The U.S. functionally shut immigration from everywhere but smallll portions of Western Europe and small groups of people from those areas at that in the 1920’s and things stayed, with fluctuations, roughly the same for decades - simple “economic migrants” from almost the entire world were simply banned. People had to come up with a political reason to flee, and it had to sound good to the authorities, especially when a lot of them were on the exact lists that U.S. immigration did not like - Southeast Asians, Muslims, Jews, central and Eastern Europeans, Latines. They often but not always had the exact professions and backgrounds that the U.S. did not like, especially in peak Cold War 50’s-70’s hysteria - intellectuals of all sorts, psychologists, professors, artists, scientists, researchers.

Or they were running from repercussions from political actions, which were often political actions the United States was not a particular fan of, such as attempts at independent trade unionization - because remember, you likely came from a country with (1) total trade union which was a government entity and the government was your employer, so there wasn’t a single way to raise a workers’ rights complaint - or attempts at non-aligned peace and demilitarization movements - because if you lived in Eastern Europe there was still a massive chance that your labour was going towards some kind of violence abroad - or towards academic intellectual freedom or just some way of tallying your figures to go hmmm something doesn’t add up here. all of these often ended up glossed as “bourgeois capitalism” where they were running from, but were considered kinda suspiciously red in the U.S. where they were trying to go. What do you do?

And then they got to the U.S., and due to the haphazard and brutal nature of U.S. immigration policy, they often came over as individuals and then were desperate to get the rest of their family over as well - keep in mind too that the exact regimes they were running from often punished the families of those who left or marked them as regime traitors who deserved punishment. So if you arrived in the US, not only were you on the ground begging for your own documentation or else keeping very very silent, you were also either desperately telling the authorities about the most dreadfullllll terribleeeee communist spectacle you were running from and how every day you prayed to mcdonalds and j edgar Hoover and our lord almighty Dwight d Eisenhower that you could bring your children to the cleansing light of capitalism.

or you were keeping very, very silent.

like, we need to appreciate that there are appreciable ways in which U.S. border policy has hardened since the, say, 1950’s (although there has been an awful and cyclical policy of border based deportations), anti immigrant hysteria and mass deportation and closed borders have been a feature of U.S. policy since at least the 1920’s in a very systematic way, and these were the Bad Ones. People were playing with multiple very very unfair systems.

It’s in this context I see extremely …. Extreme stuff about members of various exile groups in the U.S. let’s be clear - many of the people above who I mentioned became very publicly conservative. I don’t believe anyone’s particular background justifies conservatism in any way, or that conservatism is understandable when anyone supports it. But I do think it’s underrated how, while very certain figureheads became conservative, an unbelievable number of the people who went through this system just went silent. They voted quietly and worked quietly and did not become loudly or physically involved with that which might deport them again, might make them become again arrested. And many others became conflicting bitter about the whole thing, and never did really wave the flag and cheer because this land of Golden Arches had so much of what they were running from, and they saw it in other people. In Jewish and/or Eastern European and in Asian exilic communities I grew up with and knew all those people. All of them.

it’s a strange place to be in, at this moment in history. On the one hand, the U.S. memory of anti-communism never really includes the people who ran and had to sit at the American visa office. On the other, I see obsessive hatred of a lot of these groups from the American and Western European lefts as the like, ultimate evil capitalists or some such, their exilic culture as the ultimate in evil capitalism, to an extent that far outstrips how they see local and more wasp or nationally-majority oriented areas that are more conservative leaning. And I don’t think they’ve maybe sat down to think about why that is. The U.S. wanted the end of the communist threat to their particular capitalist and political system. That doesn’t ever mean they wanted the people.

[ankurkkr91-blog]

Getting A European Trademark Attorney Through The Confusing World Of Trademark Law

Trademarks are very useful for ensuring that a brand's identity is protected and sticks out in the global market. However, when you enter new areas like Europe, the laws about trademarks require more work and are complicated to understand. Hiring a European Trademark Attorney can be a good idea if your business wants to protect its brand and grow into the European market.

What You Need To Know About Why You Need A European Trademark Attorney

A lawyer in Europe who specializes in trademark law will know everything there is to know about EU trademark law and how the EUIPO works. They give you strategic advice on protecting your brand, walk you through the complicated process of registering your trademark, and ensure you follow all local rules.

What You Can Do With The Help Of A European Trademark Attorney

It Is Now Easier To Register Trademarks.

To successfully register a trademark in Europe, you must learn about the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) and the state trademark offices.

Streamlined Ways To Settle Disagreements

Brand name fights often cost a lot of time and money. European Trademark Attorneys can help you with opposition processes or infringement actions. Because they are experts in this field, businesses can quickly protect their trademarks and settle disagreements.

Using A Plan To Handle Trademarks It Is Easy To Look For Trademarks.

Before applying for a trademark, carefully looking for any rights already out there is essential. To get a trademark, a European trademark attorney will search the internet for any possible issues and advise on the best way forward.

Always Keeping An Eye On Trademarks

It takes steady attention to keep a trademark safe. European Trademark Attorneys give monitoring services around the clock to help you find any trademark infringement or illegal use cases. This precaution helps keep the trademark's validity and value over time.

To Sum Up A European trademark attorney can help you keep your name safe in a constantly changing market. It's a good investment for the growth of your business. You can learn more about the skilled trademark services a European trademark attorney offers and how they can help your business by visiting IP Consulting.

[whencyclopedia]

The Fabric of Civilization: How Textiles Made the World

In "The Fabric of Civilization," Virginia Postrel explores how the history of textiles is akin to the story of civilization as we know it. As evidenced throughout her book, Postrel treats each chapter as a standalone story of its production and journey, all the while masterfully weaving it together to show the story of human ingenuity. While academic in nature due to its incredibly well-researched methodology, the general reader will enjoy the book's unique style and approach to world history.

In The Fabric of Civilization: How Textiles Made the World, Virginia Postrel expertly demonstrates how the history of textiles is the story of human progress. Although textiles have shaped society in many ways, their central role in the development of technology and impact on socio-economics have been exceedingly overlooked. Attempting to remedy this issue, Postrel organizes her book into two distinct sections: one focusing on the different stages of textile production (fiber, thread, cloth, and dye) and the other on the consumers, traders, and future innovators of said textiles. To strengthen her argument, Postrel pulls from different primary sources across many regions and cultures, such as the works of people like entomologist Agostino Bassi and the accounts of disgruntled Assyrian merchants. However, Postrel goes beyond relying solely on books and peer-reviewed articles; she personally interviewed textile historians, scientists, businesspeople, and artisans who offered their own insight regarding the importance of textiles in the world. To help the reader envision the intricacies of textile manufacturing, the book is riddled with images that range from ancient spindle whorls and Andean textile patterns to nineteenth-century pamphlets raging over improved cotton seeds. It is quite a laborious task to explain the history of textiles, but Postrel’s way of organizing her chapters and style of writing does an excellent job of conveying her argument.

In Chapter One, Postrel illustrates the many uses of fibers and how their multipurpose functionality served its role in world economies. From the domestication of cotton in the Americas to sericulture in ancient China, such fibers left an indelible mark on trade and technology. Chapter Two looks at the use of thread's connection with social and gender roles as Postrel argues that dismissing fabric as feminine domesticity ignores its integral role in the social innovations that products like clothing and sails provided. Chapter Three connects mathematics with weaving through handwoven textiles by Andean artisans and in the notations written down in Marx Ziegler’s manual, The Weaver’s Art and Tie-Up Book (1677). Chapter Four explains how dyes not only contributed to the distinction between social classes, such as the use of Tyrian purple by Roman emperors but also the ingenuity of humans to ascribe meaning and beauty to a variety of colors. Furthermore, the increasing and competitive trading of dyes in the 16th and 17th centuries would eventually contribute to the discovery of synthetic dyes.

Textile traders and consumers also helped to foster cultural exchanges. Postrel then highlights how traders often also served as innovators. The implementation of the Fibonacci sequence in European trading not only helped traders with bookkeeping but also gave a new perspective to the practicality of learning math by helping traders understand profits and calculate prices. Readers explore in Chapter Six how the Mongol Empire expanded across many different lands for their desire for valuable woven textiles. Under the Pax Mongolica, the textile trade flourished as the Mongols protected the Silk Road, resulting in cross-cultural and technological exchange between Europe and Asia. Lastly, in Chapter Seven, Postrel introduces synthetic polymers like nylon and polyester, where the efforts made by scientists like Wallace Carothers, Rex Whinfield, and James Dickson have revolutionized the use of textiles. Companies like Under Armour use polyester to create water-repellent clothing. Despite synthetic polymers currently being used innovatively, many still seek to look into the future of textiles. As Postrel explains, imagine your pockets can charge your phone or your hat could give you directions. The future of textiles is incredibly exciting.

As an avid writer of socio-economics, Postrel expertly showcases her knowledge of the subject. Postrel’s previous books, such as The Future and its Enemies (1998) and The Power of Glamour: Longing and the Art of Visual Persuasion (2013), cover the interconnectedness between culture, technology, and the economy. Postrel has also worked as a columnist for several news sites, is the contributing editor for the magazine Works in Progress, and was a visiting fellow at the Smith Institute for Political Economy and Philosophy at Chapman University. This book is a wonderful intellectual contribution that feels like a documentary series, perfectly threading the reader through cultures and regions like a needle through fabric.

Continue reading...

[hrizantemy]

if you were to completely redesign the Illyrian, how would you do it, what would their culture be and what would they look like??

The real Illyrians were an Indo-European group who lived in the western Balkans, in what is now Albania, Montenegro, Kosovo, Bosnia, and parts of Croatia and Serbia. Their culture was tribal, warrior-based, highly spiritual, and deeply connected to land and kinship.

1. Name & Language Roots

First: reclaim the name “Illyrian.” Instead of being a shallow placeholder for “aggressive bat-wing men,” the name should reflect a proud, tribal confederation of clans—descended from ancient highland warriors. Their language would include roots from Albanian and Proto-Illyrian dialects, with oral poetry, songs of mourning, and epics sung around mountain fires.

2. Social Structure: Tribal Confederacies

Real Illyrians lived in tribal federations, each with its own chieftains and warrior aristocracy. I would bring this into canon: the Illyrians aren’t just “camps”—they’re sovereign tribes with loose allegiance to the Night Court, and their loyalty is bought, not owed. Each tribe has a Council of Elders and Chieftains, with some practicing elective rulership where war-leaders are chosen through ritual trial, not bloodline.

Matriarchal clans exist too—older than any patriarchal power, passed through the line of sky priestesses, who once clipped the wings of men as divine penance. The current system of oppression? A perversion of ancient tradition twisted by power-hungry warlords and Rhysand’s court, who exploit internal conflict to keep them divided and dependent.

3. Religion and Spiritual Practice

Historically, Illyrians worshipped nature spirits, serpent deities, and mountain gods. In this fantasy adaptation, Illyrians would revere the Sky-Father and the Stone-Mother—two ancient beings who gave them wings and stone to live between worlds.

Wings are sacred. Wing-clipping is not just mutilation—it’s sacrilege, and the resurgence of this practice under modern Night Court control is a political weapon to suppress rebellious bloodlines. Warrior-priestesses once guarded shrines on the highest peaks where only those who could fly were permitted to worship.

Death rites involve sky-funerals: the dead are burned on high plateaus so their spirits can ride the wind to the afterlife. The wingless are buried in tombs in the valleys—a mark of shame in some clans, a mercy in others.

4. Economy, Craft, and Innovation

Instead of being portrayed as “poor savages,” the redesigned Illyrians would be fierce highlanders with a rich barter-based economy. They trade obsidian, leather, mountain herbs, and metal alloys unique to their region. They have smiths who forge armor and alchemists.

Flight gear is advanced: aerodynamic cloaks, harnesses imbued with wind glyphs, and helmets carved to honor ancestral beasts. Wings are treated with reverence—oiled with sacred resins, decorated with clan paint before battle, bound in mourning when a loved one dies.

5. Gender & Power Dynamics

Gender in real Illyrian society wasn’t well-documented, but fantasy allows us to expand. In my version:

• Warrior women are common, especially in the tribes that still worship the Stone-Mother. In some clans, only women can lead raids; in others, daughters inherit land and wings.

• Wing-clipping is not universal. It’s a divisive cultural trauma, used by colonial forces (like Rhysand’s Night Court) to weaken female power within rebellious clans.

• Marriage customs involve bonding rituals and trials of endurance. Love matches are common, but political unions are sacred treaties.

6. Aesthetic and Visual Identity

Visually, these Illyrians would draw from traditional Balkan dress, war paint, and ritual tattoos:

• Heavy layered wool cloaks, silver-studded leather, and hand-stitched embroidery.

• Feather motifs, not batlike, dominate their wings and clothing—suggesting eagle or falcon heritage.

• Skin adorned with ancestral ink, marking clan history, flight achievements, and personal victories.

• Their wings are shaped more like a bird of prey—sleek, powerful, elegant—and more distinct from other fae for anatomical and symbolic reasons.

7. Language, Stories & Music

Real Illyrians were known for oral tradition—so these new Illyrians would sing their lineage, tell stories of queens and serpents, and compose elegies for daughters passed through generations.

Their music is haunting, polyphonic, and full of harmonies sung at mountaintop festivals during solstices or blood moons. Instruments would include stringed zithers, bone flutes, and drums carved from trees.

8. Relationship to the Night Court

Here’s where it gets juicy.

The Night Court uses the Illyrians as disposable soldiers, but in this version, the Illyrians are not passive. They remember their history, their gods, and the betrayals of past High Lords. There are Illyrian liberation movements, traitor lords secretly allied, and young war-chiefs dreaming of independence.

TL;DR:

The redesigned Illyrians are inspired by real-world Balkan highland warriors—fierce, proud, complex, deeply spiritual, and politically fractured. They are not a monolith of misogyny, but a tapestry of survival, resistance, and memory.

[thatsonemorbidcorvid]

“Unmasking an unutterable crime - How a newspaper exposé revealed a grisly trade in trafficked girls – and landed its editor in prison

In July 1885, the Pall Mall Gazette ran a series of articles on a scandal that was so explosive that they were preceded with a content warning. “Squeamish” and “prudish” readers who preferred to live in “selfish” ignorance were advised not to read the paper. Those who dared were promised “an authentic record of unimpeachable facts, abominable, unutterable, and worse than fables yet have feigned or fear conceived”.

The articles, collectively entitled ‘The Maiden Tribute of Modern Babylon’, was the product of a ‘Special and Secret Commission’ led by the magazine’s editor, William T Stead, on the trafficking of young girls into prostitution in London. Stead took readers on a tour of the capital’s brothels typically frequented by wealthy men in search of ‘maidenheads’ to deflower.

Through interviews with procurers and brothel-keepers, Stead reported how girls aged 11–15 were groomed, or purchased from parents, sent to collusive doctors or midwives to have their virginity certified, drugged with chloroform, and then raped in locked rooms. “In my house,” boasted one brothel-keeper, “you can enjoy the screams of the girl with the certainty that no one hears them but yourself.”

Stead even went so far as to purchase a child for himself. Thirteen-year-old Lily (later revealed to be Eliza Armstrong) was allegedly sold by her alcoholic mother for £5. Stead described the girl’s panic when she woke to find herself locked in a room with a man (ie Stead), emitting “a wild and piteous cry… a helpless startled scream like the bleat of a frightened lamb”.

The public response to the articles was overwhelming. As the newsagent WH Smith refused to sell it, large crowds gathered at the magazine’s office to obtain copies. The reports were reprinted in European and American newspapers. On 14 August, parliament passed a Criminal Law Amendment Act, which raised the age of consent for girls from 13 to 16 and gave the police greater powers to prosecute streetwalkers and brothel-keepers. Days later, 250,000 people gathered for a demonstration in Hyde Park to demand its enforcement.

Stead had succeeded in his aim – to use human-interest stories, sensation and scandal to galvanise support for social change. He had also overstepped the mark. For his role in the procurement of ‘Lily’, the editor was convicted of child abduction and sentenced to three months’ imprisonment with hard labour.”

- Rosalind Crone

[ladykailitha]

All the Way Home I'll Be Warm

Hello and welcome to my Christmas AUvent Calendar! Every day from now until the 24th I will be posting a ficlet that is 500-1500 from an AU I've done over the years.

All stories will be marked with the tag #12 aus of christmas so you can follow along as I will only be tagging my permanent list for this (it would get too confusing otherwise).

The next one on our list is: The Harrington Pattern. You can read the story here. All links will be to the first chapter, but the chapter itself will have links to the rest of the story.

Day 1 Day 2 Day 3 Day 4 Day 5

~

Christmas time in Hawkins was always a treat. They set up a Christmas village on the Fair Grounds, complete with Santa and his reindeer, shops, and food stalls that sold everything from traditional European treats, to hot chocolate and spiced apple cider, to cinnamon covered almonds and pecans, to full on turkey legs.

The air was filled with so many scents of Christmas and Steve couldn’t be happier. Katie had told him that she had a hard time keeping his bags in stock and would call once a month for more. She knew that it would keep him from the bigger things like shirts and tunics, but getting his name out there was important too.

She was the one who convinced him to open his own stall at the Christmas village as she always took December and January off.

So here he was freezing his buns off in the cold to see if anyone would buy the gloves, scarves, and hats he was selling. Some of the scarves and all of the hats were crocheted by Eddie, Karen getting him excited about it so that he could join the sewing circle too.

At first the Corroded Coffin boys protested the lost of some of their practice time on Sundays, but once Eddie started bringing him the fruits of his labor, all complaints turned into requests. Requests Eddie happily took.

The ladies took one look at the two of them Eddie’s first time at the meetup and immediately clocked them as a couple.

They were still pretending they didn’t know.

Just as Steve was sure his balls were going to just drop off from the cold, Eddie came bounding up to their little table with two large styroform cups filled with hot chocolate.

“How goes the sales?” Eddie asked, snuggling up close to Steve. “I traded one of my scarves for the hot chocolate, by the way.”

Steve nodded. It was something the sellers did around here apparently. Instead of taking money they would trade goods for equal value.

“It bought enough warm drinks to last this frozen hell until we close up, anyway,” he huffed, his breath clouding between them. He rubbed his hands together as he tried to get them to warm all the way and not just where they touched the cups.

Steve shook his head. “You ridiculous man.” He pulled up his bag that he used to cart around his supplies and pulled out a pair of mostly finished black leather gloves lined with fleece. “Wear those for now so Jeff doesn’t come after me if you lose your fingers.”

Eddie blushed, pulling on the warm gloves over his hands. He looked at what they had left and it wasn’t much, but while Eddie only had two more crocheted hats and a scarf, Steve had three hats, two pairs of gloves, and six scarves left.

“Why isn’t your stuff selling?” he asked, looking around at the other stalls. Even the hot drink girls preferred Eddie’s scarf to one of Steve’s nicer hats or even a pair of his gloves.

Steve shrugged, picking at the lip of his cup with his thumbnail. “I thought more people would be interested. Katie was for sure that I would sell out of everything the first day, too.”

Eddie looked at his misshapen objects that could barely be called scarves and hats and cocked his head to the side. “Maybe they think yours aren’t homemade like mine obviously are.”

Steve shrugged again. “Maybe I’ll do better tomorrow.” The unspoken ‘because yours won’t be there to be compared to’ lingering in the air.

Which was the last thing Eddie had wanted to do when he joined the sewing circle. He was just looking for a way to share more time with Steve. To give his hands something to do while Steve sewed. Most of his small things were still hand-stitched and every piece was more beautiful that the last. He looked down at the black leather gloves on his hands and suddenly got an idea.

He grabbed one of Steve’s hats and one of the scarves and put them on, Steve watching him with a frown. Then he dug around in his backpack and found a couple of markers. Cackling with glee he kissed Steve on the cheek and told him he’d be right back.

Steve stared blankly at his boyfriend’s retreating form. But before he could grouse about wanting to be coddled by his boyfriend, the menace was back. In his hands was a big sign that “Harrington’s Handcrafted Goods”. Which was strange enough considering that was what the sign above his booth said, but he wasn’t even standing in front of the booth.

But then he realized what was happening.

Eddie was going up and down the area they were in shouting about Steve’s booth. People were stopping by and Eddie was showing them his gloves and the craftsmanship.

Then like a Christmas miracle, Steve’s booth was flooded with buyers. For those that couldn’t find something they wanted, they made orders. And within an hour of Eddie’s antics, Steve was forced to close the booth because everything had sold out.

As Steve packed up their booth and put his stuff away, he murmured, “You didn’t have to do that...” He looked up at Eddie, “But thank you!”

Eddie wrapped him up in his arms. “Of course I did, Stevie. Because today was supposed to be all about you and your talent with a side of fun stuff from me. Only it didn’t turn out that way, so I had to fix it. You deserve the world, baby and I intend on giving it to you.”

Steve sunk further into Eddie’s embrace. “I’m going to need those gloves back so I can finish them.”

“Of course,” Eddie murmured. “They’re beautiful.”

“Good, ‘cause they’re your Christmas present.”

Eddie pulled Steve back enough to look him in the eye. “You are a such a sneak. Because I know you’re making something else, too. You don’t have to go all out for me. Your love is enough.”

Steve kissed him gently on the lips. “If I deserve the world, then you deserve the stars. Merry Christmas, sunshine.”

“Merry Christmas.”

They started walking to Steve’s car. “So you gonna to tell me something you got me?” Steve asked bumping their shoulders together.

“Nope!” Eddie said, popping the P.

“Not even a hint?”

“No!”

As Steve continued to tease Eddie about the present all the way home, he knew he was the luckiest man in the world. Because he had Eddie.

~

Day 7 Day 8 Day 9 Day 10 Day 11 Day 12

Tag List: CLOSED

1- @itsall-taken @redfreckledwolf @zerokrox-blog @sadisticaltarts @dolphincliffs

2- @gregre369 ​@a-little-unsteddie @chaosgremlinmunson @cryptid-system @kultiras

3- @maya-custodios-dionach @goodolefashionedloverboi @val-from-lawrence @carlyv @wonderland-girl143-blog

4- @bookbinderbitch @bookworm0690 @forgottenkanji @dreamercec @blondie1006

5- @yikes-a-bee @awkwardgravity1 @genderless-spoon @fearieshadow @thesecondfate

6- @dragonmama76 @ellietheasexylibrarian @thedragonsaunt @useless-nb-bisexual @disrespectedgoatman

7- @counting-dollars-counting-stars @tinyplanet95 @ravenfrog @swimmingbirdrunningrock @lingeringmirth

8- @gutterflower77 @a-lovely-craziness @just-a-tiny-void @w1ll0wtr33 @beelze-the-bubkiss

[darkmaga-returns]

Ruler Donald Trump’s 25% tariffs on autos from Canada and Mexico will take effect on April 2nd. The tariffs will undoubtedly drive up car prices for United States consumers and harm an already struggling domestic car-manufacturing industry.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney has already responded, denouncing the tariffs as representing a “direct attack” on his country’s workers and declared that further retaliatory tariffs are likely. He also said that the “ties of kinship” and “ties of commerce” between the US and Canada were “in the process of being broken”.

Tariffs Bring Pain Without Gain

“Canadian workers, Canadians as a whole across this country, have gotten over the shock of the betrayal and are learning lessons. We have to look out for ourselves, and we have to look out for each other and work together.”

On the social media platform X, White House Principal Deputy Press Secretary Harrison Fields indicated that auto parts that comply with the US- Mexico- Canada free trade agreement would not be subject to import duties for the time being, according to a report by Al Jazeera. 

“USMCA-compliant automobile parts will remain tariff-free until the Secretary of Commerce, in consultation with US Customs and Border Protection [CBP], establishes a process to apply tariffs to their non-US content,” Fields wrote.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has expressed disappointment over Trump’s announcement of auto tariffs. “I deeply regret the US decision to impose tariffs on EU automotive exports,” she said in a social media post. “Tariffs are taxes – bad for businesses, worse for consumers, in the US and the EU. The EU will continue to seek negotiated solutions, while safeguarding its economic interests.”