#I actually think as a vet I have a lot of controversial opinions

[great-and-small]

I’m very sorry to hear that this dog’s handler received death threats, that is never acceptable. As someone who showed my dog as a minor I know that can be a really vulnerable position and I can’t imagine how difficult it was for their family.

As I said, I am biased here. My priority is on the wellbeing of the dog, and that can leave me a little less focused on historic breed standards. I’m just one person and certainly cannot speak for all vets! You and I might disagree on some things about French bulldogs or Cavaliers as well, and that is absolutely okay. My clinical experience with these animals likely gives me a different perspective from some other folks in the dog world. The fact that all of these dogs are competing at such a high level is proof enough that many people consider this form beautiful. My personal experience is such that if my dog’s tarsus hit the ground repeatedly even on a slick floor I’d be concerned. Even if these are unfortunate still photos, I don’t think it is coincidence that we keep seeing them in GSDs.

I know firsthand that these dogs are very well cared for and loved. I feel that we all want the same thing, and I understand that my singular opinion regarding the “betterment” of the breed may look different from other folks and from yours. It is always helpful to hear from other perspectives, so I do appreciate your input on what I know is a controversial issue within the world of dogs.

Speaking of breed standards, would you be able to give me some context on what the heck is up with the German Shepherd "stack"? I see a lot of GSD owners saying it's breed standard and therefore fine, but the slant looks so extreme in some dogs that I have some skepticism about it (and also because, of course, breed standards have nothing to do with animal health).

This is a pretty hot button issue and you’re right that there is a ton of bickering back and forth about it online. I’m happy to share my thoughts, but keep in mind that as a veterinarian I am biased towards function over form. I care way more about if a dog can do the things it wants/needs to do than how it looks. I won’t get into it here but I actually have real qualms with the distinction between “working line” and “show line” in some breeds.

My quick takeaway opinion- There are several orthopedic issues in the German Shepherd dog (specifically show lines) that have likely been exacerbated if not entirely caused by breeders striving for the classic “sloped back” look that is considered breed standard.

Now that being said, it is a fact that the three point stack (how a dog is positioned when standing) greatly exaggerates the angulation of the back and hind legs. You will often see comparison images like this one that show a dog in stack versus standing square and you can clearly see the top line looks more sloped when the dog is stacked. This image is from a GSD subreddit, a pretty dog here nicely demonstrating how the stance can change the appearance of the top line.

This phenomenon is what certain hardline GSD breed standard loyalists will point to when discussing this issue. They posit that the sloped back is essentially an optical illusion caused by aesthetic posing, and therefore a German Shepherd is no more prone to orthopedic problems than any other large breed dog. This is where I disagree.

You can easily find stark examples of a poorly put together dog in any breed or mixed breed out there, so when discussing my concerns with the GSD I will only use photos of titled dogs that are accomplished within the show ring. These are not random backyard bred shepherds, but champion dogs from acclaimed lines that will almost certainly be bred to pass on their genes. When breed clubs like the AKC award these dogs as exemplars of the breed, they tacitly endorse the conformation issues I’m about to discuss. So my beef is not with German shepherds or dog breeds in general, but specifically with breed clubs that refuse to examine whether their standard harms animals. An important disclaimer, not every breed club is like this and many take health concerns extremely seriously.

Dogs have a very different limb anatomy and gait to humans and a healthy dog is meant to walk on their paw pads. The “ankle” or hock should be upright and angled as you can see here in this nice-looking champion shepherd from 1902.

German shepherds can sometimes have a problem that is colloquially called “dropped hocks” where that joint is abnormally loose and in more serious cases can even be touching the ground, which is completely abnormal and something I would consider a serious physical flaw. A dog having dropped hocks/tarsal hyperflexion like this is proven to cause medical issues for these dog, but unfortunately the sinking joints also help to give the dog that “classic” sloping look that breed clubs love.

This dog “Ch Kysarah's Pot of Gold” won best of breed at the National dog show in 2015. You can see his hock is literally flat on the ground even when not stacked

And it’s not just one dog. Here is another champion dog (Cruaghaire Catoria), who got some controversy for winning best of breed at Crufts in 2016 despite an extremely abnormal gait.

Perhaps we could excuse the low hocks when the dog is standing as being the result of the stack, but it is glaringly obvious when she moves that this is no trick of her positioning. Her entire tarsus rests on the floor as she runs and in close ups you can even see bald patches there to suggest this is a “normal” gait for her. In this video, the announcers agree that this is the ideal gait for a shepherd. If I saw this gait in a friend’s dog I’d politely express my concerns for long term mobility issues and recommend an orthopedic consultation. To see it win best of breed is galling to say the least.

And lest you think the problem has been solved, here’s another from the National Dog Show in 2023

None of these dogs could charge athletically into a field and effectively herd sheep. If we are prioritizing aesthetic over function to the degree that a dog cannot do what it was bred to do, or more importantly that it cannot do the simple things that dogs love to do, then we have veered unforgivably off course. Not to put too fine a point on it but what the fuck is the point of a breed standard if it impedes the dog’s function in any way? We have no right. German shepherds are an incredible breed of dog that have stood by us humans in some of our darkest moments; I think the breeders and kennel clubs who claim to love them the most should work harder to ensure the “champion” dogs they are producing can live long pain-free lives. If we have to adjust our notion of what the breed is “supposed” to look like then so fucking be it.

This is too long already so I’m not getting into hip dysplasia, DM, carpal laxity, elbow dysplasia or other conditions that exist in the breed. If German shepherd clubs want to distance themselves from the notion that their breed standard is causing problems with canine health then they will need to stop publicly lavishing awards on dogs with medically concerning gait issues and start focusing on breeding dogs that can run around a ring without causing even the most casual of onlookers to realize “something’s not right there”

[why-animals-do-the-thing]

hi! can i ask what's ur opinion on giving pets away? not necessarily because u can't afford to care for em anymore but maybe incompatibility of personalities or maybe lifestyles. is it wrong to give ur pet for adoption if u know someone who's better suited for keeping a pet, like emotionally?

This is going to be controversial, but I support making that choice.

There’s a lot of rhetoric lately around how it’s evil and unethical to rehome your pet if you don’t “need to.” And what that does is prioritize human ideology over the actual animal’s well-being.

Pets that aren’t a good match for your home or pets that aren’t really wanted anymore frequently have lower welfare! When caring for an animal becomes a burden or is forced, people end up resenting them, and that means the animal often doesn’t get all of its needs fulfilled. Even if you’re still feeding it and providing appropriate vet care, how likely are you to provide affection or enrichment to an animal you’re tired of being stuck with?

Lifestyle and personality really matter to making sure a pet is a good fit for a home. A dog that alert-barks at every leaf that moves is probably a bad fit for someone who has a chronic migraine syndrome, and they might not know that until the dog has been in the home for weeks and started to open up. A really feisty kitten that requires a ton of play might not do best in the home of someone older who wanted a quiet lap cat. And while you can you do your best to plan to find a compatible animal, you won’t always know ahead of time what issues might arise.

“Forever home” rhetoric is really, really popular and I think it’s very unfair to the animals it is supposed to support. It started with the backlash of seeing animals abandoned inappropriately, and has been heavily reinforced in the public mind because it’s so frequently used to drive fundraising and support for legislation. The whole “forever home” concept communicates to people that getting an animal is an immutable commitment and that if you can’t keep an animal, it is a personal moral failing. It frames human priorities (we think people who get rid of animals are Evil and Bad and should be shunned) as more important than actual welfare needs for individual animals (are they getting the care they need where they are).

Obviously, I don’t support people dumping animals or just getting fad pets they’ll discard immediately, but there’s so many alternate situations that can arise. Even if it’s just “they got a pet and didn’t know what caring for it would take and didn’t want to care for it so they brought it back, how awful” like… okay, I’d like the person to have done more research before they got a pet, but isn’t it better that the animal now has a second chance to go to better home? Knowing what a commitment requires theoretically can be very different than having to actually follow through regularly, and I’d rather see someone maturely acknowledge that having an animal isn’t a good fit than keep it anyway!!

If animals being happy and with all their biological, veterinary, and social needs fulfilled is actually the goal, we need to prioritize their welfare over human opinion. I’d much rather see an animal rehomed responsibly to somewhere it will thrive and be welcomed than see people keep animals they can’t/don’t want to care for out of guilt or shame. 

[risingphoenix24601]

Why (stage) Nessa is Ableist: An Essay

Disclaimer: I am disabled, but not a wheelchair user. I am chronically ill (EDS + all the bs that comes with it) and neurodivergent (ADHD, SPD, awaiting an Autism eval).

I will start with my personal perspective. My gripe with Nessa is that she is spoiled, her father favors her, and she expects everything to be done for her and soaks up everyone's pity. I'm not saying this never happens, but I feel like a lot of people just assume our parents coddle us and that our lives are easier, as if being disabled is some sort of advantage, and I've even seen us represented as going around looking for people entrap into helping us. When I was in high school, some kids found out I had a 504, became jealous (bruh, I'm jealous that you were born with high-speed internet brains) immediately assumed I was an arrogant prick who thought I deserved "special treatment," and took it upon themselves to make sure I felt like a burden. Believe me, being born into a world that doesn't know you exist is NOT an advantage.

Getting into more specific stuff: the movie did a great job correcting this, but since I'm talking about the stage version, I'm just going to list it: Elphaba's going to school just to care for Nessa, but I don't think she's in a position where she would need a full-time care-taker, so there's the trope of us entrapping people to do our bidding and that we're burdens on others (movie made clear that the dad is the asshole here and not Nessa). Second, many characters, some of whom don't know her at all, wheel Nessa around. You NEVER touch a person's mobility aids without their permission. Again, move fixed this. Third, Nessa says to Elphaba "I'm about the first happy night of my life!" Don't get me wrong, having a disability can really suck, but it doesn't mean our only emotion is misery. Plenty of disabled people live meaningful, fulfilling lives. My uncle has commented to me that he'd never guess I'm sick because "those people usually go around with a scowl." My uncle is Vietnam war vet. I'm sure if I knew half of the hell he went through, I would be shocked that he doesn't walk around with a scowl either-- but life goes on.

I'm going to address the controversy of the cure in Act II. Let me make this clear: plenty of disabled people want to be cured, and portraying someone who wants to be cured is not problematic. What is problematic, however, is that this is a very complicated topic and the show presents it in a way that is very simple. I'll use myself as an example: I would cure my EDS in a heartbeat, but neurodivergence, I honestly don't know. I am now at a point where I don't hate myself and actually like the way I am, but there are still days that I wish I was normal. I don't view my neurodivergence as a "gift" or another way of being, it is a disability and my life is harder because of it. And yet, I would be a completely different person without it. And I'm not sure if that's a person who I'd want to be.

We must remember that Nessa has been disabled since birth, this is her normal. And more than that, it's part of who she is. Suddenly being able to walk would be a massive change, and not necessarily a welcome one-- I think she would have the same fears that I have regarding fixing my neurodivergence. I also don't think Nessa is in a significant amount of pain or discomfort. So, ultimately, she is not disabled by her physical condition, she is disabled by the world around her.

This is, is my opinion, the biggest problem with the Wicked Witch of the East scene. Nessa's life is undeniably harder, but the lyrics incorrectly ascribe her suffering to her disability, when her suffering is actually caused by ableism. Also, wheelchairs are tools of accessibility. They are not bad or shameful things.

So yeah. I'm sorry that was long, but I've been seeing a lot of people asking about why it's ableist and there's no way to explain in one or two sentences, because this a complicated topic with complicated feelings. I hope I covered all the bases.

[spacedustmantis]

here we go. originally we said we would not talk about this. we would not draw attention to it. we would wait for it to blow over. but a lot of misinformation has spread and a lot of us feel like it's getting to a critical point.

us being the members of the recently highly controversial anti-censorship jrwi discord server.

i would have reblogged this from @rantarang's most recent reblog but sadly further up the rb chain are screenshots with doxxed information about a lot of my friends and i, so i will not be reblogging that post. do not go looking for it. you can base your opinion off of what information has been given without rewarding a severe invasion and violation of privacy, regardless of what you think of us.

the events that have transpired are as following: a post is made criticizing and warning about the bitb zine (which has since been canceled). as a reaction to this a tumblr user decides to investigate into the people behind it, despite the original poster censoring the names and urls of the mods, and finds this server. they infiltrate it, lying to the mod to gain access, and then proceed to screenshot and post the entire members list (meaning display names and pfps of every single person who might or might not be active in this server) plus some further personal information about certain people and private conversations.

they do not care to find out if any of these people are minors before they expose parts of our private contact information and call us degenerates and accuse us of grooming, and then they ask the people to please tell them if anyone is a minor so they can be "protected".

this, btw, is illegal. spreading personal information and private conversations with the intent to harm (even if it's "just" defamation), especially on the internet, is very much illegal. what matters more of course is that it is incredibly dangerous, opening up a lot of people - whether you see them as gross perverts or not - to brutal harassment and at the very least, as was intended by the infiltrator, extreme alienation. i mention that it's illegal for reasons that will become apparent.

now. this could have been it. pretty catastrophic and dangerous but an isolated incident. but people do what they do best. they talk and converse and assume and things get lost in translation.

i decided to write this and talked about it with some people in this server after i read up on the conversation underneath that post by rantarang and @tigers1o1.

one of the first things to set straight is that the zine is not the same thing as the server and besides some of the same people being involved and existing in the same fandom actually has no connection to it whatsoever.

i do not know a lot about the zine. i will not be the one to talk about that.

next thing, none of our mods are underage. this was a misunderstanding due to the zine having an underage mod, who afaik explicitly doesn't engage with any nsfw content.

and now for the big one. we have been accused of grooming and harassing minors. we have been called criminals. we have been accused of illegal actions. this is all not true. i understand where that assumption can come from, but assumptions are not truth.

let me talk a bit about my experience on this server.

i joined mostly because it was a server one of my friends advertised. i was aware it was going to include topics that i wasn't entirely comfortable with so i was hesitant to join, but i did.

what i found was one of the most impressive discord servers i'd ever seen in regards to moderation. coming in at first you do not see anything beyond the rules section and some other administrative channels. you are required to read the rules and to react to the post so you can even just get to see the chatting channel.

furthermore, once you go through the vetting process (which is as noninvasive as possible since internet safety is a thing we are very conscious of), you can only view channels that are free of any potentially triggering content (nsfw, gore, underage, drugs and more) until you look through the roles available and choose which ones you would like to see. you have to actively click a labeled button and then find and enter the channel you chose to be able to actually see, before you get to any potentially dark and/or triggering content.

not only that, but any and all talk about ships, even the purely romantic/nonsexual kind, is relegated to their own personal threads, which require you to agree to see topics that might be relevant (for example, violence or gore and death for emizel/gabriel) and allow you to simply not have to see or engage with any ships that you might find bad, annoying, triggering, or whatever else.

so NO, we do not invite children into the server where they are immediately blasted with pedophilia or SA against their will.

i personally chose to be able to access some of these darker channels mostly out of curiosity. i don't really take part in them, i don't chat in them and i don't read every single message. but i still get a good feeling what these conversations are mostly about. fictional characters experiencing bad shit, or maybe fictional characters doing bad shit. or maybe, god forbid, someone engaging with a kink of their's in what is clearly labeled as a kink space.

i have been in this server from quite early on. i have seen a lot of stuff that has happened there. not once have i witnessed inappropriate behavior between two people. not once have i picked up on any behavior indicative of manipulation or grooming or SA.

the people in this server are mostly just... friends. people hanging out in a space that allows them to talk about topics that might upset some in a way that spares those who would be upset from seeing it. a space that allows you to see and read exactly what you want and nothing more. a space that is really really fucking well moderated. i am not kidding we are strict about putting warnings on stuff, about posting in the correct channels.

and finally the minor issue. that is the issue of minors. i mentioned earlier that our vetting system is intentionally noninvasive. we do not ask for any personal identification. we do not ask for any proof that you are well meaning (how would that even work?), and most importantly we do not ask for people's ages.

this is for two reasons.

a) DO NOT GIVE STRANGERS ON THE INTERNET THAT KIND OF INFORMATION JESUS CHRIST!! DO NOT ASK PEOPLE THAT KIND OF INFORMATION! STOP NORMALIZING MINORS OPENLY ADVERTISING THEMSELVES AS MINORS, THAT IS LITERALLY INTERNET SAFETY 101 OH MY GOD!!!

and with that out of the way, b) we could never enforce this anyways. you want us to ask for driver's licenses? fucking passports? people lie. children lie, teens lie, we know this. ask literally anyone who's ever tried to keep an online space free from people under any age. instagram is 13+, and do you know how many people i know who lied about their age to get access to that? too fucking many to count.

telling us to keep our space free of minors is a wasted effort. it's annoying but it's true.

all we can do is be explicit about what kind of content people could face and trust them to act accordingly to their own comfort levels.

and, to be quite honest, while i personally (and many other members) have expressed discomfort with the idea of sharing certain, more sexual parts of this server with minors, the truth is that it's not actually the end of the world if one stumbles across those parts, whether on purpose, by accident, or by stupid mistake. it might be uncomfortable and it might cause issues, but that's life.

life sometimes is uncomfortable, and there might sometimes be issues. again, to try and erase all those potential issues or discomforts from life is pointless. it will never work that way no matter how bad we want it.

ultimately i strongly believe that if a minor were to find themself in conversations about darker or more taboo topics, the people that frequent this server would never even think to bring them harm. i cannot reiterate enough that each and every single one of us is strongly against any kind of sexual violence outside of the fictional realm; in real life.

and that's where we are. in real life. which if you'll remember is actually different from playing pretend. no actual harm has been done to anyone. every single person who was confronted with these topics has volunteered for it. every single person who has read what was said in these channels gave their explicit consent.

that is, until our member list was leaked and the content we worked hard to keep safely separated and tagged was posted against our will on the internet and forced upon an absurd amount of strangers who never agreed to get involved.

we never once put anyone in harm's way, unlike you did.

and since it seems so important to you, we never once did anything illegal. unlike you did.

-----

i apologize that this got so long, but there was a lot to set straight. if you got to the end, thank you for indulging me.

again, do not seek out the person who leaked our info, and do not seek out the list itself. we sadly cannot unleak it but it would mean a lot if you didn't pass it around any more than people already have, even if you don't agree with me.

i would also like to say that while i did converse with some of the other members and am fairly confident that most of them would agree with me, all of this is my own opinion, do not make the mistake of extrapolating it to the server at large.

and if you saw the initial callout post and agreed with it, i don't blame you. the internet is a scary place and seeing these events framed in such a way is certainly frightening. but keep in mind that as long as you don't see hard proof, please do not "call out" anybody. and for god's sake do not post private information on tumblr! there could be real harm done here and i don't think anyone actually wants that.

thank you again for reading this, i hope it can settle some things.

love, monty

[olderthannetfic]

Controversial opinion, but I do think that people should be forced to learn how to use databases and find information online instead of being spoon-fed by an algorithm. It's about requiring people to think for themselves and make their own choices. I don't want a community of passive pawns. It's bad for fandom, and it's bad for all of society.

--

Controversial?

Dude, people should be forcibly taught that because it's a standard part of school.

I know I had a whole class period as a freshman in high school about how to use the card catalogue and the various digital searching methods of the day in our school library. I dimly remember various classes from grade school that explicitly taught us how to do research: how to seek out sources, how to evaluate them for reputability, how to cite them, etc.

No one is born with critical thinking or researching skills. They're something a decent school can easily teach, but you do have to teach them.

Just... a lot of schools are 1. crap and 2. way overloaded so people fall through the cracks a lot.

Should people here write up guides on how to do research or database searches? Sure. Link me and I'll reblog them. Someone in the reblogs even requested that kind of help within the last few days. The interest is there, even if not from everyone.

Actually, one of Tasting History's most recent episodes was all about this (vetting sources and realizing when you fell for bullshit because it's now deeply embedded in otherwise reputable sources). It's definitely a topic people still care about, and if school is falling down on the job, somebody else is going to have to step up.

So, yes, I agree with you, and I further think that the only reason this isn't already universally happening is that a lot of people were failed by their local educational systems.

[lizziedoesvetpath]

I read this article this week and I wanted to share it because I feel very strongly about the value of pathology as a profession and the struggles the profession as a whole and individual pathologists face. I also believe that autopsy/necropsy is a vital part of what we do as pathologists. As a warning, this post includes discussion of death, disease, and dissection of dead bodies. None of it is graphic, but make the best choice for yourself. These are also my opinions, and I don't know everything, so do with that what you will. This is going to be a long one, so my thoughts are all under the cut…

Two disclaimers: The letter linked above is a response to a previous editorial. Both are written by pathologists. Both are clearly written from a place of deep caring about pathology and a drive to see more medical professionals take up this vital specialty. I have deliberately chosen to link the rebuttal letter and not the original editorial because I feel very strongly that the editorial makes some controversial (and, in my mind, harmful) assertions about autopsy and as such it should not be read without the response. But I do think that there is value in reading both. Secondly, I am writing this from my perspective as a veterinary pathology resident. There are differences between human and veterinary pathology in how we are trained, the role we play in the health of our patients and the public, and what our day to day jobs look like. With this in mind, some of the misconceptions about pathology discussed in these pieces resonated with me, which is why I wanted to share my thoughts, and hopefully get some of you thinking about the same things.

I’m going to pull some key points and quotes from the articles to discuss but again, I highly recommend reading both pieces for yourself. This might be a long one folks, so settle in.

”There is a lack of understanding of our specialty among medical school classmates and eventual colleagues”

I 100% agree. Most of my classmates have next to no idea what I do with my day, or why I care so much about pathology. And this is reflected in the submissions I receive as well. I believe that a large part of why I receive so many cases with insufficient history or inappropriate samples for what the clinician needs. While I recognize that there is not the time in veterinary school to teach every element of every specialty (and I also have a lot of thoughts about the way we currently approach veterinary education in general), vet students get a much more “real-life” experience of the clinical specialties than they do of pathology. The clinical year pathology rotations at the school where I trained and the one where I now work and teach focus entirely on necropsy which, while extremely valuable in its own right, is only a very small proportion of what pathologists do on a daily basis. There are many pathologists who don’t do any necropsies in their role, and we do a disservice to all students by not accurately demonstrating what a pathologist actually does. For veterinarians, necropsy and sample collection are the only skills an anatomic pathologist might use that may also be used in the clinic. But in the same way that I benefit from understanding how the surgery which produces the sample I analyse is performed, I believe there is benefit in clinicians knowing the basics of what happens to that sample when it reaches the lab to generate the report they read.

“Pathology? Don’t you want to be a real doctor?”

This one… oof. I have so many thoughts because I have heard this so many times myself. I’ve been planning a separate post on this point alone, and some of those thoughts are in the point above, but I want to emphasize that pathologists are real doctors. Pathologists are essential to medical practice. We are expert diagnosticians, and that skill is vital to how doctors in other specialties function.

“An autopsy is not healthcare in any form”

The women of the response do an excellent job of rebutting this point, but I would like to emphasize how deeply I disagree with this. Autopsy is closure for a family. Autopsy is the last chance of a person or an animal to tell the story of what happened to them. Autopsy is education, autopsy is our protection against malpractice, autopsy is progress and solutions and knowledge. On the veterinary side, the necropsy of one animal can save the rest of the herd. Imaging can do a lot, but it is no substitute for holding an organ in your hand and being able to look at any piece of it under the microscope. Only necropsy can give you that.

This statement also feeds directly into the misconception that pathologists are not doctors because we do not directly “fix” anything. Diagnosis is essential and more emphasis on how what we do as pathologists influences treatment decisions would help in improving the perception of pathology held by the rest of the medical and veterinary professions.

“All physicians perform a prolonged autopsy during their freshman medical school anatomy class”

Prosection to learn anatomy is not autopsy/necropsy. The function and approach is different, and this is not an accurate representation of either the practice and intention of a true autopsy. The prosections performed by junior med and vet students are there to teach anatomy – the process is drawn out, performed on preserved cadavers, and focusses on minute detail. Autopsy/necropsy is a medical examination. There are specific questions to answer, and the approach is designed to fill that purpose. A student who has only experienced anatomy prosection has no true understanding of autopsy. The do not understand the care, the intention, the science of a necropsy performed by a pathologist. And the suggestion that anatomy dissection could or should be the only experience our medical and veterinary students have of autopsy/necropsy will only lead the profession further from a true understanding of what it is pathologists do and why we value necropsy so highly.

“The dismembering nature of the practice”… “It is dirty, malodorous, and dangerous. It carries infection risks for pathologists”

This is a medical exam, not dismemberment. Aspects of necropsy can be dirty, malodorous, dangerous, and carry an infection risk, but so does surgery. So does palliative care. So does pediatric medicine and large animal medicine and laboratory work. As medical professionals we cannot shy away from what is unpleasant to the detriment of the dignity and care of our patients and the progress of our science and our professions. Necropsy is not always a pleasant process, and not everyone will want to perform them, that is true. However, I personally found surgery distasteful and unpleasant, that does not mean I think we should stop performing it. With the appropriate safety measures in place, necropsy does not pose a significantly greater risk to those performing it than any other medical procedure. However, this is a reason why physicians and veterinarians should be the ones performing autopsies/necropsies, not lay people or unsupervised technicians. Our training in the recognition of disease allows us the unique capacity to read a history and quickly identify those cases that pose a greater risk, and require more specific PPE or safety measures. SOPs can help, but no checklist or protocol can outweigh deep medical knowledge for assessing and mitigating the risks of exposure to cadavers.

“Those rare physicians who want to perform autopsies can undertake a forensics fellowship – but, again, why must they be pathologists?”

Pathologists have the depth of understanding of how disease progresses and how gross and histologic changes correlate which is vital for interpreting the nuance and inter-relationships of the various changes you can see in a single body. No other professional is adequately prepared to interpret these findings, and it devalues the practice of autopsy to imply that this is merely a sample collection and recording exercise.

Overall, I strongly believe that autopsy/necropsy has intrinsic value to the practice of medicine, and should continue to be a part of the training of not just pathologists, but every medical and veterinary student. The path to improving the perception of pathologists and the work we do is not through eliminating anything which makes people uncomfortable, but through providing better education so that the purpose of what we do, and how it helps and supports the practice of medicine in every specialty is better understood by our non-pathologist colleagues. Pathologists deserve respect, and denigrating what we do from inside the profession does nothing but detract from that. What we do is valuable. What we do is vital. And we need to help others see that.

[thebreakfastgenie]

I watched the AfterMASH pilot

These are my thoughts.

The frustrating thing about this show isn't that it's bad. It's that it has so much potential. I've said I think AfterMASH was bad idea, because putting characters back together after Goodbye, Farewell, and Amen undermines the ending. I know the choice of characters simply came down to which actors were interested, but if you're going to do a MASH sequel with multiple characters, I can suspend disbelief that those three would end up together again. In particular, Potter helping Klinger get a job makes sense. For the most part, I like the set up of the actual VA hospital. I like the hospital administrator taking on the role of the brass in the original show. I mostly like how the patients are being handled so far. The WAC with VD (as it was called then) was a good storyline that pushed the envelope a little in a very MASH way. This storyline also reminded me that Dr. Walter Dishell, the medical advisor for MASH, came back for AfterMASH. If his interview is accurate, he often advocated for slightly progressive or controversial storylines on medical shows he worked on.

I think Potter's arc is handled quite well. It makes sense that he'd get antsy being semi-retired, and that possibility is even set up in GFA when he's reading Mildred's list of chores. It all happens a bit fast in the pilot, but that's to be expected. I think setting the show in September 1953 is an interesting choice, and the whole thing would work better if it was set even a few months later. I guess they went with September so it would match the television season (a lot of shows do this) but in that case I'd say the better thing to do is set it in September 1954 and show parts of the first fourteen months home in flashbacks, or else set the pilot later in 1953 or early in 1954 and get the show to September 1954 by the second episode.

So far, the way Klinger's arc has been handled doesn't thrill me, but it's okay. Klinger running into trouble readjusting to stateside life, especially when he's established as being a tough street kid before he was drafted, makes a lot of sense. Of course the treatment of veterans was a widespread issue, and this is a classic MASH storyline in that it's pretty clearly commentary about Vietnam vets too, and I imagine it was even harder for Klinger coming hope a couple of months after most of the other returning vets. I would also have liked to see some exploration of how Klinger being Lebanese-American and having a Korea refugee wife and the systemic racism they face play into his experiences with the justice system. I do love that courtroom scene, because that speech feels like the Big Hawkeye Speech, but it's Klinger, and he does it beautifully. Klinger absolutely should inherit the Hawkeye roll. It's strange that we haven't heard anything about his family, but I think that might come up later, so I'm withholding judgment on that.

Klinger and Soon Lee being back in the States within two months feels unrealistic and in my opinion really undermines their ending in GFA. I know they had to be back for the show to work, but this is another problem that would be solved by just setting the show a little bit later. I'm disappointed that Soon Lee's family is relegated to a throwaway line. Soon Lee wanting to come back to the States with Max makes sense (and she even implies in GFA she wants to, just not until she finds her family) and I can definitely believe her family might not want to come, so Max and Soon Lee getting them set up and sending them money is an acceptable direction to go, though I think it's a missed opportunity for supporting characters. Even if only Soon Lee's brother came with them, you could have the potential of him working at the hospital too, or other storylines. Bringing Soon Lee's family over later (possibly just her brother, for education) could also have a lot of potential. Basically, I'd just like more of how they got where they are and how they feel about it. Jamie Farr and Rosalind Chao have fantastic chemistry and could absolutely carry this show. Let the characters of color be leads, come on.

I am beyond pissed about Mulcahy's arc, in multiple ways. I'm giving this show the benefit of the doubt that his drinking problem will actually become a recurring theme over the next two seasons, but the way it's handled in the pilot is atrocious. That scene where he's just in bed drunk and helpless and his sister calls Colonel Potter?? His depression over his situation is understandable, but he literally ended GFA saying that while he would miss parish work, he wanted to work with the Deaf. I can totally see many ways that might not work out, but it's not even addressed at all. I don't exactly mind him regaining some hearing; he was never properly evaluated or treated in GFA. But it seems as if his deafness has been essentially cured and that's the coward's way out! Let him have an operation that restores partial hearing, leave him hard of hearing. Maybe that's why working with the Deaf doesn't work out, because he doesn't quite fit in there, but he doesn't quite fit in the hearing world either. The way I would handle his storyline is I'd have him have the operation at the VA, and while recovering bond with other disabled veterans as a fellow patient, making him want to stay. Maybe even have him meet another Catholic patient who's unable to attend services offsite, but hasn't bee able to attend them at the hospital either because there isn't a priest.

I can definitely see Larry Gelbart's fingerprints; some of the dialogue is very good. I have money on Alma and the hospital administrator sleeping together, like early seasons Frank and Margaret. I'm hoping for more Mildred and Soon Lee. Unexpectedly, I like the resident. I like his relationship with Klinger. Still, I want the MASH characters to get more focus and I suspect this guy is going to take more of it than than I'd like. The other secretary seems okay, I just hope they don't do anything too weird with her having a crush on Klinger.

References to other MASH characters: Hawkeye 1

[ask-a-vetblr]

Hi vets! Can you please give me a veterinary perspective on "factory farms" [and if they deserve the negative reputation they get]?

vet-and-wild here.

Yes and no. I mean, everyone may have different opinions but here’s mine as a former farm laborer and Animal Science grad. Sorry this will be long, I have a whole lot of thoughts on this. “Factory farm” is honestly kind of a scary buzzword people use to describe any large farm, but a lot of times it’s just used as a blanket term for large scale farming rather than being owned by a company. The overwhelming majority of US farms are still family owned. Some of the really big farms have the newest technology to decrease their environmental impact and increase animal welfare (i.e. methane digesters, robotic milkers, etc) and end up being more efficient per pound of product produced. Some small farms have a handful of messy, stinky cows that only get seen by a vet when they’re already super sick. I’ve seen both. I’ve also seen small hobby farms where animals are treated like royalty and large scale farms that are messy and inefficient. BUT, doing anything large scale tends to lead to welfare issues (for both humans and animals) and sustainability issues. The state of animal agriculture in this country is a hot mess. Farmers have to produce massive quantities of cheap product to make a living. The problem isn’t that farmers are some evil animal haters that want to poison the planet, it’s that they literally can’t make a living without mass scale production. That needs to change. It’s bad for the farmers, their animals, and the environment. So go after legislators and corporations that allow this to happen, not poor farm laborers.

Animal welfare, particularly for production animals, was a huge part of my degree focus so that’s the area I’m most familiar with. There are obviously a whole bunch of other comments that can be made about environmental impact and human welfare conditions, but I’ll let someone who knows more than me talk about it. As part of my degree, veterinary training, animal welfare studies, and job experience, I’ve been on a lot of farms. Swine, poultry, dairy, beef, meat goat, dairy goat, meat sheep, dairy sheep, mink (fur), and camelid. I’ve been to organic, backyard, research, feedlots, tie-stall, free-stall, large scale, petting zoos, heritage breed, and every kind of imaginable in between privately owned farm. Even vegan farm animal sanctuaries. I’ve been in meat processing plants and have seen first hand what the processes is. So I’ve seen a lot. And you know what? They all have pros and cons. Back when I was in undergrad we were using the Five Freedoms of animal welfare to assess animals. The Five Freedoms are freedom from hunger and thirst, freedom from fear and distress, freedom to express natural behaviors, freedom from pain/injury/disease, and freedom from discomfort. Farms of any scale can meet those requirements, or fail horribly. Personally, I think confinement housing fails horribly, and that’s a practice generally associated with large scale farming. There are actual benefits (i.e. less inter-animal aggression, tailored nutrition, easier monitoring), but you very much take away freedom to express natural behavior and I would argue freedom from discomfort as well. And you know what? I try to be objective, but my personal feelings are that an animal should have enough room to turn around and not stand in their own waste. I don’t think that should be controversial. Animal agriculture is (for the most part) failing horribly with enrichment and ability to express natural behaviors, and that happens to be very important to me as an animal owner so I know I project that onto agriculture. Some species industries are better than others (i.e. dairy), while some are so far behind (i.e. poultry and swine). I’m not vegan or vegetarian. I don’t have a problem with eating meat, but I think the system needs drastic improvements.

People honestly tend to focus on issues that are not really big issues because showing videos of an animal not being knocked insensible before slaughter is much more gut wrenching than a pig without enrichment. But you know what? There are multiple behavioral and welfare issues with pigs not being provided adequate stimulation, including increased tail chewing (which is why pigs are tail docked), aggression, and stereotypic behaviors. Whereas the rate of successful 1st time stunning in processing plants is actually extremely high, and needs to be to pass inspections. PETA shows a video of dead piglets and it makes people outraged, but the issue isn’t animal abuse, it’s poor biosecurity that caused an outbreak of porcine epidemic diarrhea virus that has a near 100% mortality rate for young pigs. That is a real example. People should be upset. They should be upset that biosecurity protocols weren’t followed. But again, a video of a transport truck not being properly sanitized doesn’t really make for a good animal rights video. Public pressure is of course important for change, but people need to actually take the time to learn about what’s really an issue. Y’all can debate whether or not eating meat is ethical, but that’s not the question here, and it ignores the bigger picture. The fact is, there are animals alive right now and that will be born in the future that are harmed by a shitty system. Personally I’d rather focus on relevant welfare issues to improve their lives rather than comparing factory farming to genocide or whatever scare tactics animal rights groups are using nowadays.

Ferox here.

Following on from that note, comparing animal agriculture to genocide is a particular pet hate of mine. Genocide aims to kill and therefore eliminate a specific group of people, which animal agriculture has caused the populations of domestic animals to boom in far greater numbers than their wild counterparts. The goals are literally opposite.

As vet-and-wild was saying, using a blanket term like ‘factory farm’ isn’t super helpful when discussing animal welfare as it’s specific practices within each enterprise that need to be considered, eg dry sow stalls, debeaking, etc. Generally it’s animal density which concerns me, as the more animals you pack in together the more stress behaviours you see and the less natural behaviours, and chickens and pigs get the worst of this. But it’s hard to make a choice as a consumer purchasing food as you can’t backtrack that food from the supermarket to its origin easily so I can see why the discussion is often boiled down to ‘factory farm vs free range’ even if it’s really more nuanced than that.

[shihalyfie]

Regarding Konaka’s influence on Tamers (or how much he actually didn’t have)

(Rest assured that if you’ve had a conversation with me recently about this issue, I’m not vaguing you; this conversation has come up a lot in the last few weeks, especially in my private chats, so this is just me deciding that I should write something about this for once since it’s been weighing on my head lately.)

I think, right now, with what happened regarding the DigiFes debacle, a lot of people are having complicated feelings about how to feel about Tamers, and this is completely understandable. I think there are also some things that may be inevitably unavoidable, such as starting to second-guess certain nuances in the series and what they might lead to. All of that is perfectly reasonable, and in the end, it’s going to be up to everyone to decide how they feel.

In light of this, a lot of people have been bringing up the fact that, while Konaka was the head writer, he was by no means the only person working on it. This is very much true, but I’d like to add something else to the equation: this is an issue that goes much deeper than the usual claiming death of the author for the sake of sanity. The full picture is that Konaka has always had much less influence on the series than the fanbase tends to attribute to him. Official statements have been very clear as to not attribute the entire series to him, and, among all the other controversial statements he’s made, Konaka himself has at least been very active about crediting the other staff members as far as their influence on the series! The idea that he was the only person who ever did anything substantial for Tamers is something I’ve been warning against since long before any of this happened (if you want proof, I have a post from April with this sentiment in it), and right now we just happen to be seeing what’s basically the worst possible outcome of the fanbase constantly worshipping him like the only real creative heart behind the series to borderline cult-like levels...when that’s never been true, and has resulted in unfairly taking credit away from people who deserved it.

I’ll go into detail below, and I hope this can help people understand the situation better and sort out how they feel about it.

Note that I make references to his infamous blog in this post, which I’m deliberately refraining from directly linking for obvious reasons, but all of the information is still there, so it should be verifiable if you decide to look for it yourself.

Personally, I’ve always found it really bizarre how there’s been this obsession with portraying Konaka as some kind of auteur whom the entirety of Tamers depended on. I’m not saying this out of spite towards him, because, again, even he himself was very insistent on disclaiming credit for things he wasn’t actually responsible for (he was quite humble in this respect, actually). Not to mention that I think it’s a mistake in general to constantly pin a single person in a multi-person production as the sole heart behind it, and the Digimon fanbase has historically had this strange double standard behind it when it comes to uplifting him as the only heart behind Tamers when nobody says that about any of the head writers for...anything else. (How many times has Nishizono’s name ever popped up when talking about Adventure? People are usually more obsessed with talking about Kakudou or Seki.) Konaka’s work is certainly distinctive, but Tamers had a lot more going on besides just that.

In fact, based on his own statements on the matter and all of the other official information we’ve gotten about Tamers production, while you can’t really quantify such things, it’s generally been estimated that Konaka was responsible for something like only a fourth of the series. Which is an incredibly low amount compared to what the fanbase would have told you before all of this happened, because of this fixation that he must be the genius mastermind behind the whole series. Not only that, this “brilliant auteur” image of him was so inflated that people were attributing way more of 02 to him than he deserved; 02 episode 13 was the only thing he contributed to the series and he was specifically brought on as a “guest writer”, and the overall plot of the episode was determined by the rest of the production staff and not him -- but ask the fanbase and they’ll tell you stories about how he invented some grand planned arc for 02 that got cancelled, or even that Tamers exists because of a “writer revolt” from him and other writers not being allowed to do what they wanted. (You know, as much as I understand 02′s a controversial series, it would be really nice if people didn’t make up completely baseless stories like this just to scapegoat it...)

I honestly cannot emphasize enough how much of the problem we’re in right now has been horribly enabled by the weird pedestal the fanbase has been putting him on. This is to the point where there’s even been a double standard where some of the more unpopular/criticized elements of Tamers must not have been the fault of a brilliant writer like him, and in fact was forced on him by the executives (this excuse had always been brought up anytime someone doesn’t like something about Tamers, just to make sure the image of him as a perfect writer was maintained). Turns out, as per his own admission on the infamous blog, while he wasn’t the one who initially had the idea of putting Ryou in, the part that rubbed the fanbase the wrong way -- that he came in as an accomplished senior who was better than everyone and played up by everyone in the cast -- was unabashedly his idea (he apparently was enamored with the idea of having someone like Tuttle from the movie Brazil). Again, this is a weird scenario where even Konaka himself has been more humble about this issue than the fanbase’s perception of him; he fully admitted whenever he had trouble writing certain parts. For instance, he doesn’t actually like writing about alternate worlds, felt they were out of his comfort zone, and only wrote in the Digital World because the franchise needs one; he’d stated that if he’d had his way, the Digital World arc wouldn’t have come in as early as it did, which might be a pretty shocking statement for a Digimon fan to hear.

If you want even more specifics, here are some extremely major parts of the series that Konaka was not actually the one behind:

The character backgrounds. Konaka stated on his blog that he wasn’t interested in going too much into character backstories because he felt it was too plot-limiting to say that a character is the way they are thanks to something in their past or background (basically, he cares more about plot than character for the most part), and that he’s also not into worldbuilding. Certain things like Ruki going to a girls’ school were supplied by Seki, who infamously loves worldbuilding, family backgrounds, and character settings.

Certain nuances of Ruki’s character, especially the part where she’s pigeonholed into uncomfortable places due to being a girl, were informed by Yoshimura Genki, writer from Adventure and one of the head writers of 02 (who eventually would go on to create an entire career out of feminist cinema).

According to the posts on his blog, Impmon’s character arc didn’t have much input from Konaka himself and was largely written in by Maekawa Atsushi (also a writer from Adventure and one of the head writers of 02).

The whole concept of Yamaki being redeemable in the first place was something Konaka didn’t originally plan for; he’d initially intended to make him a straightforward antagonist, but, of all things, his Christmas song, combined with the input of the other writers (especially Maekawa) humanizing him, led to the development where Yamaki eventually changed sides and became sympathetic. (This makes Konaka’s recent stunt revolving around Yamaki a bit painfully ironic.)

The director, Kaizawa Yukio, was deliberately picked because he didn’t have experience on the prior series, for the sake of changing things up, and he spent Tamers as a period of studying what Digimon should be like. Based on what he’s hinted, it seems Konaka's writing style and choices were able to have as much influence as they did because Kaizawa approved of them -- that is to say, Konaka’s detailed imagery and descriptions were extensive enough that Kaizawa could go “sure, let’s go with that.” But in the end, nothing Konaka did would have gone through unless Kaizawa and Seki (among many others) didn’t also approve of it or provide input. Moreover, Kakudou Hiroyuki (director of Adventure and 02) has also been stated many times to have been a valuable consultant on invoking Digimon so that the new staff could understand what to aim for and how to get the right feel (and also assisted with providing stuff for the mythos, such as the Devas). Nevertheless, Kaizawa also seems to have had his own strong opinions and input on the story; he especially seems to get passionate when it comes to the topic of making the story something the kids watching it could relate to and imagine. (He would eventually go on to direct Frontier and Hunters, along with several episodes of the Adventure: reboot.)

So in other words, looking at this, a lot of these things that people emotionally connected to and loved about Tamers are things that literally were not his personal creation, and were largely contributed by the other writers! Of course, Konaka’s “creator thumbprint” is very obvious -- he was the head writer, after all -- and all of this had to go through his own vetting to make sure he personally liked it as well -- but nevertheless, you can see that this very much was a collaborative effort from head to toe, with him being very open about this fact himself. Insisting on making sure that this fact is well-known isn’t just a coping mechanism to try and remove his presence in the series, but rather a desire to get people to seriously stop giving him credit that really should be going to others (especially since, again, even he himself was very diligent about assigning that credit).

In the end, I’ll leave you with another thing to keep in mind: Konaka doesn’t get paid anymore for Tamers work (unless they make something new like the DigiFes thing), so continuing to buy Tamers merch and supporting the series through fanart and such will probably end up going more towards the Digimon IP as a whole. Basically, if we’re just talking about Tamers specifically, what degree this is going to matter is only really relevant to the content in the original series, which is now twenty years old and remains unchanged. By Konaka’s own admission, he wasn’t into all of these conspiracy theories until 2010 at the earliest, so while it’s understandable to be a bit wary about the themes in Tamers having traces of the base sentiment, the original series itself does not seem to be an outlet for alt-right propaganda, and it’s probably forcing it a bit much to read into it that way. Konaka’s also repeatedly insisted that all of his attempts at a Tamers sequel have been rejected and that he’s been doing increasingly strange swerves to get around members of the original cast not entirely being available, and the Japanese audience has turned out to not be very fond of the contents of the 2018 drama CD and the stage reading for reasons entirely separate from the politics, so it’s also unlikely we’ll be getting a Tamers sequel from him or something in the near future.

So -- at least for the time being -- what’s done with him is done, and the remaining question is how all of us feel about Tamers. I think everyone will have differing feelings on it, and that’s perfectly understandable. Personally, given everything I just said above, I’m going to continue treating it as a series very important to me, and one that many people (including, as it seems, a very different Konaka from twenty years ago) worked on with a lot of effort and love, although you may see me getting a bit more willing to be critical about the series and its themes thanks to my concerns about some of the sentiments in it and what they imply. I also completely understand that there are probably people whose associations are going to be much more hurt and who will have a much harder time seeing the series the same way ever again, and I think that’s reasonable as well. But at the very least, going forward, I hope all of us can understand the depth of this situation, give credit where it’s due, and not force credit where it’s not due.

[the-dark-abyss]

Mafia 3

Okay so I’m gonna take the L and admit I’ve never played the other 2 games, I just watched the cut-scene movies on YouTube, and while I enjoyed the story and characters of the first 2, when I watched Mafia 3′s it DID something to me. So I actually went out and got the game so I can play it all myself.

First things first, I’m gonna wonder why people seem to hate this game so much until the day I die, sure it’s glitchy but not as bad as any Bethesda glitch I’ve seen and nothing game breaking, more or less just funny stuff like “lol that cop car exploded in the middle of the street. I’m gucci tho.”. I really like the time-period cause I actually like learning about the 60′s in American history because SO MUCH important stuff was set in motion back then. Others seem to not like how it’s nt focused on the Italian Mafia anymore and...sure?? I guess?? I mean they’re still there, you’re allied with some Italians while taking out the bigger Italian crime family (I think they’re mad that the protag is black and it’s an important part of the game tbh) And another complaint I see a lot is the games too repetitive, I think that’s the lamest excuse personally. I played this after I beat Far Cry 6, and honestly? It was NICE! I like being able to sneak and take people down, or just blow up everything!  Maybe it’s cause I’m autistic perhaps (ASD gang rise up!) but having a pattern was nice for me, I have a specific way of playing and it was fun. Hell, I’ve beat the game twice already cause it felt nice to play.

I know this game came out in 2016 and I’m way late to the party, I became aware of the Mafia series in 2021 and finally played Mafia 3 in March 2022. And I need to be physically restrained from playing it a third time lol.

Anyways onto the story and characters (SPOILERS BTW)

The story is so 😩👌💦💕 I love crime stories, I love historical fiction (sometimes...), I love seeing racists get CRUSHED, I love the time period, I love the music. It’s just AAHHHH so good!!!

Sure I guess a black Vietnam vet cruising around in 1960′s New Orleans isn't what you’d think when you imagine “American Mafia” but that’s a you problem at this rate, I’m having a great time.

I did like Tommy Angelo, and Vito Scaletta too, but Lincoln Clay is honestly my favorite of the 3 and I wish people looked at him and appreciated him more. Imma say something real controversial here: I know Vito is the fan favorite, he’s unofficially the face of the series now and while I DO LIKE HIM, I think... he makes a better side character in Mafia 3 (also low-key irritated Lincoln gets thrown to the wayside while everyone rushes to Vito). That’s just my personal opinion... also my man aged like milk, how is he 10 years younger than the Irish man dying of liver cancer and yet Burke has his hair color still while Vito looks so chewed up? lmao anyways yeah I do like Vito, when I pick up my kickback from him I always leave saying “Bye Peepaw!!”

Anyways, Lincoln comes back home from Vietnam and is ready to see his adopted family again, Sammy and Ellis Robinson (Father and Brother), Father James Ballard (Raised him in the orphanage before he got adopted and sticks around) and his other friends, Danny Burke and Giorgi Marcano. Without getting too much into it, Giorgi is the son of Sal Marcano, boss of the Marcano Crime Family (Which has power over Sammy Robinson and his Black Mob). Giorgi was friends with Lincoln, Ellis and Danny, but this whole time Sal had him playing the long game of eventually screwing them all over. It ends with Giorgi, Sal and an associate of the Dixie Mafia betraying them all after a job they did together (For Sammy to pay back Sal). Giorgi shoots Lincoln in the head, leaves him for dead, kills Danny, Richie Doucet (Dixie mafia) stabs Ellis to death and Sal shoots Sammy in the back. They burn down Sammy’s bar and in the flames Father James ran in looking for survivors and found Lincoln clinging onto life. Lincoln survives, but he lost his family, friends and was betrayed by someone he thought he could trust. And now he’s got the scar to prove it.

This ignites his revenge quest to wipe out the Marcano Crime family, and all the damage they’ve done to him, his community (Delray Hollow) and eventually the mess he’s made for his soon-to-be under bosses. And while he’s doing that he’s sworn to build up a crime family of his own and needs people he can fully trust.

When he’s recovering from the gunshot wound to the head, he tells Father James to call his old friend and contact from Vietnam, Donovan, who is currently working for the C.I.A. He drops everything and shows up willing to help Lincoln with his goal (btw their friendship is so great, it’s so sad Lincoln lost everyone but he’s got Donovan still and the writers did so great with their chemistry *chefs kiss*). While Lincoln’s recovering, Giorgi lets the Dixie Mafia move into Delray Hollow and turn it inside out. Donovan tracks down possible allies for Lincoln to get in touch with by the time he’s recovered.

The Under bosses:

Delray Hollow: Ran by Cassandra and her Haitian mob. (She’s also called the “Voodoo Queen” btw and she runs a Voodoo shop) You meet Cassandra  first and it’s a shaky start, Sammy’s Black Mob has been fighting with the Haitians beforehand so she has many reasons to not trust Lincoln, but since then now the Dixie Mafia took over, thanks to the Marcanos and is greatly harming the community with human trafficking and she wants them wiped out and she can’t do it alone. Cassandra has some painful history with the Dixie Mafia and she wants nothing more than to see them all dead.

River Row: Ran by Vito Scaletta and his Italian mob (that's loyal to him at least). After everything that happened in 2nd game, Vito found his way down here and had to work with Sal Marcano as one of his lieutenants, Vito’s miserable and Sal hates him but can;t do anything about it cause Leo Galante put him there. Sal did put Grecco, his nephew, into River Row to mess things up from the inside and make it look like Vito’s fault so Sal can finally have an excuse to put a hit out on him to not anger the Commission. Being screwed over and wanting to get back, Vito agrees to help Lincoln because this is personal for him too.

Point Verdun: Ran by Thomas Burke and his Irish mob. He did have a deal worked out with Marcanos prior, but at some point there was a failed shipment of Burke’s end and that made Sal insert someone else to take over his rackets, Barbieri, who brutally took over a crippled Burke’s leg. And after Danny, his son’s murder, Burke’s been spiraling into alcoholism and constant grief. He wants nothing more than to make Barbieri suffer for what he did to him and for the Marcanos to burn for murdering his son. Which makes him eventually side with Lincoln.

Thoughts and extra on the bosses: They all got folks that work under them as their own lieutenants, Cassandra has Emmanuel Lazare, Vito has Alma Diaz and Burke has his own daughter, Nicki Burke.  Unlike the other 2, Lincoln is actually friends with Nicki and they all used to hang out together. She’s mourning the loss of her younger brother and it’s clear there’s some tension between her and her father.

Nicki’s actually a lesbian and comes out to Lincoln, she even has a girlfriend. Burke already kind of knows somehow and does not approve of it, but they still have to work together, so it causes inner personal problems. ALSO SIDENOTE: It was kind of refreshing seeing gay characters in a crime based video game, Nicki is a lesbian, Lincoln is a supportive ally (may or may not be bi/pan himself cause of his response to Nicki after she asks him about his thoughts...) and in one of the DLC’s, there's a side character named Oscar who’s a gay Vietnam vet and Lincoln gives him a job at the renovated Sammy’s bar.

While they may be side characters, I still appreciated it, and because of that dialogue between him and Nicki, it does strongly suggest he might be bisexual, so I’m def taking it and running with it. You can play a bi protag at least and I love my bisexual headcanons.

The Main Antagonists:

Sal Marcano: Sal is the Don of The Marcano Crime family. He does have a pretty interesting history and how he got to where he is now. I won’t deny that, but he’s a master of fucking over people he works with just because they were deemed useless. He did it to Sammy, once Sammy was having problems with the Haitians and short on his kickback, that was his death sentence along with his sons. He was doing it to Burke, who had a shipment go missing and that was a sign he needed an immediate replacement. Working on Vito, who just hated him and was willing to mess up his whole rackets just so he can be allowed to put a hit on him. And let’s not forget his racism at all, he knowingly works with the Southern Union and the Dixie Mafia that do lynchings/hate crimes and specifically target the black folk in New Bordeaux. He keeps using slurs when talking about Lincoln. So...yeah. This dude sucks lol.

Giorgi Marcano: Sal’s only son and the Under boss of the Marcano Crime Family, unlike his dad, he was given his life on a silver platter and is a typical spoiled rich kid with a gun who thinks he owns everyone. Hey may have been Lincoln’s “friend” at one point, but either he was playing a long game or that friendship was truly one sided if he could be fine with shooting him in the head when the time came. (I’m looking at everyone sideways who stan him btw). He worked with Ritchie Doucet, the leader of the Dixie Mafia and let them take over Delray Hollow to abuse and traffic folks in the community there after he thought Lincoln was dead. Racist little spoiled brat with access to weapons and a Daddy’s boy. I hate this rat. In his dying breath, he could have tried to make peace with Lincoln and apologize or something, but it was clear he never saw Lincoln like that at all.

YES I AM LOOKING AT PEOPLE SIDEWAYS IF I SEE PEOPLE STAN GIORGI, SHIP HIM WITH LINCOLN OR TRY TO SOFTEN HIM UP IN ANYWAY. I’VE HAD IT, YOU’RE ALL ON A LIST NOW!...anyways. There’s a whole lot of Capos and Lieutenants that work under them but I’m not really gonna get into em all.

There’s other characters and the DLC’s now I can get to instead.

Father James Ballard: Ran the orphanage before it got shut down and has known Lincoln since he was a child. Kind of an Uncle figure. WW2 Vet and kept close to the Robinson’s. Now....why I understand why he doesn't want Lincoln to go down the path he does go down....cause seeing a loved one do that kind of stuff is painful... I also...REAALLLY...don’t like him.  A whole family got wiped out, Lincoln lost so much and is scarred from it, the people that did the killings are also ruining the Hollow and making it worse. If Lincoln did just, after healing, decide to listen to Father James and not do anything, things would have been WORSE. The Marcanos would have full control, the Dixie Mafia would have free reign, The Southern Union would have gotten stronger. AND IT’S DOUBLY INFURIATING IN ONE THE DLC’S: THE SIGN OF THE TIMES! Lincoln’s adopted family was killed, Father James knew them, sure they were a mob but they were still individual people who loved and cared for each other. And yet he wants Lincoln to let go of his revenge and just leave. BUT THEN THERE’S THIS CREEPY ASS WHITE SUPREMACIST CULT THAT FUCKS UP A WHITE GIRL WHO’S A COMPLETE STRANGER AND THE JAMES IS LIKE “Okay Lincoln, take them out.” AND IT’S JUST SO-...no diss to the white girl though, Anna, she was a victim and it’s tragic what happens in her story, but idk man. James bothers me.

John Donovan: I already talked about him a little bit, but him and Lincoln met in Vietnam where Lincoln was assigned to work with him on an ops mission for the C.I.A. Lincoln learned a lot, including psychological warfare which he uses against the Marcanos later. They eventually got really close, to the point that John dropped everything and ruined his C.I.A career to work with Lincoln in building his own crime empire. He’s a fun character, he’s very chaotic, and him and Lincoln bounce off each other really well, no wild card/straight man dynamic, they’re both wild cards in their own right. I think the game is trying to frame Father James and Donovan as the Angel and Devil on Lincoln’s shoulders and, like, sure, okay, Father James is like “Don’t do it!” while Donovan is like “LETS FUCKIN GOOO!” and neither character really likes each other. James is priest and John is an atheist so the usual clash there too. I’ve made my thoughts clear on James. Donovan though is just willing to do the most for Lincoln and in a DLC he asks him for his help with his own problems that’s started before they even met. And Lincoln gladly helps him. It’s a real “I’m here for you and I hope when the time comes you’re here for me” kinda friendship. Anyways, despite leaving the C.I.A and becomes involved in criminal organizations, John is dead-set to find out who really organized the JFK assassination and finds that Sal Marcano has ties to politicians and others in the country to he goes off on his own manhunt. It’s a fun time. Good time. Don’t watch live political hearings on TV at the time though cause you might see someone get blasted.

The DLC’s

Sign of the Times: A creepy cult called the “Ensanglante” infests the burned remains of Sammy’s bar and Lincoln and Father James discover this on their way to pay the old place a visit. A young girl runs out terrified and men chase after her. After James takes the girl to a safe place and Lincoln investigates what they were doing in the bar. The learn the girl is named Anna McGee and the cult was doing a ritual in the bar because of the past human suffering in there, the murder of Lincoln’s family. The Ensanglante preforms rituals in places where people have suffered, like old slave market areas, a middle school that burned down, a plantation house etc. It’s run by a woman named Bonnie Harless who indoctrinated Anna into the cult through manipulation and promising she’ll be loved. It just left Anna abused and out of her own mind and miserable. This side story isn't really crime orientated, but it’s taking down a creepy racist cult and it gets really trippy sometimes. In my Father James bit I said a little about this already. Bonnie is a creepy bitch and off her rocker, Anna’s story is so tragic what happens to her. The cult does get wiped out and after that Lincoln meets with his aunt Lily and they restore Sammy’s bar into a functioning club again and as a memorial to Sammy and Ellis. 

Faster, Baby!: You go to Sinclair Parish, a sun-down town outside of New Bordeaux that’s run by a corrupt Sheriff “Slim” Beaumont, who wants to keep the town white, even if that means making people who oppose him disappear. There’s civil rights activists who are ran by another of one of Lincoln’s allies in the main game, “The Voice” (Charles Laveau). One of their members who was carrying the evidence that they compiled against was murdered by the sheriff and they need to get it. The Voice’s daughter, Roxy joins and works alongside Lincoln to take down this entire corrupt police force with the help of her friend, M.J, another Vietnam vet who just wants to see his hometown become better. A pretty fun DLC, a lot of car chaos and destruction, brings ACAB to a whole new level. Lincoln and Roxy kinda got a thing going on (I think Lincoln likes girls who bully him lol), and it is pretty cute, especially near the end of the story, Lincoln hears something he really needed to hear to give him comfort and it’s pretty sweet (WELL IT WOULD BE SWEET IF ROXY DIDN'T IMMEDIATELY LEAVE BACK FOR GEORGIA RIGHT AFTER SHE GOT SOME DICK FROM HIM 😭). Not crime focused either, but a lot of fun and with M.J you can actually grow weed and make new strands to actually sell to the districts you take over in the main game. Roxy’s cool, even if it does kinda hurt if I think too much that she just said all the right things to get into Lincoln’s pants but....I’m not gonna judge her either cause he really...👀💦. She’s got a really cool car you get when you beat the story. M.J is cool, Vietnam vet, turned pot smoking/growing, racism fighting hippie. You also get a hippie van from him later when level up the grow operations, and I love me some hippie vans.

Stones Unturned: Donovan calls onto Lincoln for his help once someone from his past starts showing up in New Bordeaux and stirs up some shit. You meet one of Donovan’s old allies, a former C.I.A agent now turned bounty hunter Robert Marshall and he joins in the hunt down for Conner Aldridge. You learn more about John and Connor’s history, they used to work together and be friends but Connor turned his back on America and started feeding intel to the NVA. Eventually John found out and they had a violent falling out. Aldridge’s face got scarred and Donovan’s hand got really messed up. Aldridge’s main goal is to sell information on the U.S to all their enemies, from Vietnam to Cuba. There’s a lot of heavy weapons in this DLC and military grade vehicles. You even leave New Bordeaux to somewhere in Cuba to infiltrate a bunker to get the warhead and hunt down Aldridge. Very much more of a war/action plot than a crime plot, even though I guess John’s brand of shady is better than Connor’s brand of shady (??), still very fun to see more interactions with Lincoln and Donovan. Lincoln even forces him to open up more, that’s how we learn more about Aldridge (I still think he’s hiding more from Lincoln cause that anger felt more visceral...hmm). You first reach Cuba and it’s BEAAUUTTIFULLL, the water is so blue omg it’s so pretty. Robert Marshall is a weird guy, I see why him and John are friends. He’s a little unhinged but over all he’s friendly??in his own weird little way. You actually get bounty hunting missions from, only 3 though, once you’re back in town, and he offers this pretty handy sniping service. Connor as a villain is something alright, not saying he’s a bad character but I do wish there was more information you could have uncovered with Donovan. And he’s pretty nihilistic about the war and America and stuff and as someone who personally is pessimistic about how America is now...uhh...can’t say I blame him. Though selling weapons to people who wanna blast us to the Fallout Universe, that’s not cool. Nooo nope no sir, don’t like that. Anyways, the DLC is a good time. Less of a heavy story than the other 2 which is good cause I don’t wanna feel totally miserable lol

The order in which the DLC’s came out isn't an indicator of a timeline either, there’s no real set timeline in the game. Just the main plot begins during Mardi Gras in 1968, Lincoln needs his time to recover, and the only other indicator is on Anna’s gravestone so I’m assuming at least Sign of the Times is the first one and takes place when Lincoln’s trying to get his under bosses together. That’s a me thing tho, I’m a stickler for timelines and stuff like that.

BUT ANYWAYS I TYPED A LOT SO MUCH OMG I JUST WANTED TO GIVE MY THOUGHTS ON THE GAME AND THE BASIC RUN DOWN OF THE STORY AND CHARACTERS LOL

MAYBE I’LL SHARE MORE HEADCANONS LATER AND SHIZZ CAUSE IT’S SUCH A HYPERFIXATION RIGHT NOW AND EVEN ON MY ART BLOG I MADE SOME FANART K BYE

[docholligay]

Really odd question, but did you happen to have an opinion on the old controversy regarding pewdiepie's antisemitic jokes from like 2017

Because y'all lack reading comprehension: I'M JEWISH I'm JEWISH I'm JEWISH A JEW IS ME.

This is really odd, because my general opinion on antisemitic jokes is that they are ...bad? But they should at least be funny.

LIke I think it's not funny to have someone hold up a sign saying "Death to All Jews," not in an "oh my stars and garters way" but in a "this lacks humor" way. There are jokes that are GENUINELY offensive, and GENUINELY fucking funny, but this is not at all? I hesitate to even call it a joke.

A joke is when my oven shorts out for the 80th time and I yell, "Oh come on! You can get it together to cremate me but not cook a pie? YOU OWE ME." Now, there are plenty of people who might not think that is FUNNY--there are plenty of people at my temple who think my joking about my family being shot into a ditch is a touch ghoulish-- but the structure is clearly a JOKE.

What he does is what passes for joking in gamer culture, which I hate, which isn't joking, it's just...saying cruel things even though you don't mean them? Losing even the ring of sarcasm? I legit do not get why people think that kind of shit is funny, even on beyond it being offensive.

So yeah, I think pewdiepie is unfunny and antisemtism is a really easy crack because not a lot of people care about Jews in any kind of solid way, and I feel Some Kinda Way about Europe's Antisemitism and how everyone seems pretty down with it/glosses it over. I think pewdiepie doesn't give a shit and I hope he learns something, because I believe in the ability of human beings to change, and to espouse that belief I have to give them the opportunity to do so, but I don't know that I think he will.

But I'm going to Devil's Advocate myself for a minute!

So one thing that he was criticized for was for recommending an anime review he thought was good, and it turned out the channel he recommended it from was a hotbed of Antisemitic activity and racism.* I don't like this place we've gotten to where every time you reblog or quote or whatever someone, you have to go vet everything they've said and make sure they aren't an asshole. I believe INTENSELY in stopped clock theory. Donald Trump is a sonofabitch, but when he said the federal government had to do hiring based on competency and skills assessments rather than a fucking college degree? I agree! Needing a college degree for a secretary is the dumbest horseshit I've ever heard of! You can be a really, really terrible person and still sometimes be right!

I don;t know how we got to this place where saying "This statement is correct" was seen as "everything the person has ever said over their lifetime is Endorsed and Correct" but lord in heaven it's dumb as fuck.

Anywaaaayyysss, pewdiepie is not very funny, but I think he's mostly blind to his own antisemitism and likes making money, and so blends with larger gamer culture and rhetoric to continue making money, and that's weak, sad, and not something to brag about. I am not impressed.

*As it actually turned out, the review itself had racism like, in the description itself, so no points to pewdiepie.

[nightwingbb]

What jobs do you see the Bat family having in an ideal future?

THANK YOU for this question, anon, bc i have OPINIONS

im gonna start with dick, and this MIGHT be controversial, but i dont HATE dick as a cop. i mean ACAB but i rlly like the canon motivation behind him becoming a cop, wanting to free the bludhaven pd of corruption. plus cmon that one nightwing issue where dick is chasing after deathstroke in his police uniform and his partner is like what are you DOING is gold and i want more content like that lmaoo

okay so jason. this one’s a little trickier. if you’d asked me what i think jason would’ve majored in in college, i 100% would say english lit, but as for what he would do w that degree... i can’t reeeally see him becoming a professor, maybe he could work as a publisher?? so long as it involves books, i think it would be right up jason’s ally lol but ofc this is in an ideal world where jason todd isn’t legally dead

like jason, i think duke would end up studying english in school, but unlike jason, i actually could see him becoming an educator, though i see him more as a high school honors english teacher than a professor solely bc i think he would enjoy working w kids

tim is easy. wayne enterprises. in the r&d (research & development) department.

so damian. i read a lot of future fics where people have him working at wayne enterprises bUT GUYS damian as a vet!!! is so superior to damian as a business man!!! i mean he LOVES animals, and in the comics he’s shown to know a fair bit about human medicine. so in conclusion, damian as a vet.

now steph i see as a nurse. her mom was a nurse, and i could totally see steph wanting to follow in her footsteps. 

i could see cass working in dance some way or another. joining a dance company or maybe even working as a dance instructor?? she’s so in tune with her body and dance is such a passion of hers that i think she would enjoy working in that field.

and while i know in canon barbara works as a librarian and i think at one point even a professor?? i kinda like the idea of her becoming a professional hacker or working in some sort of computer science role

THAT WAS A LONG ASS RESPONSE, BUT THOSE, DEAR ANON, ARE THE JOBS I SEE THE BATS HAVING IN AN IDEAL FUTURE

[carriagelamp]

April l was apparently the month for me to revisit some children’s authors who are steeped in controversy at the moment. So here’s my hot (well, lukewarm) takes on issues that absolutely do not need a single other person talking about them. Also some actual good books that I read this month!

Badger in the Basement

The Animal Ark books are a childhood classic — though I recently found out that apparently there’s a difference between American and British publications, and the American versions didn’t include a lot of actual COOL animals which is… bizarre. As a Canadian stuck in the middle of this, this nonsense drives me nuts. This one was about the main character, the daughter of pair of vets, trying to protect a local badger sett from men wanting to participate in badger digging and baiting. These books are always feel-good, and it was a nice single-day-read while I waited for a library book to come in.

Chi’s Sweet Home

The cutest manga series about the misadventures of a little kitten, Chi, who has been adopted by a loving family. I’ve never bothered to read them in order, but apparently this time I stumbled across the last in the series -- whoops! Still, stood on it’s own pretty easily, and it was a fun read! Things get tense when the family realize that they may have found Chi’s original home… and may have to give up Chi forever.

Earth Before Us: Dinosaur Empire!

This was an odd graphic novel, I feel like I’m not sure who the target audience was exactly. It was a nonfiction comic done in a Magic School Bus style, with the purpose of teaching current, up-to-date facts about the animals that lived in the Mesozoic Era. If you’re into dinosaurs, you’ll probably enjoy this! The art is absolutely adorable, I love the dinosaur illustrations, and I learnt some really neat facts. That being said, the pages are really dense, and there’s a lot of info crammed in… some of it will probably go way over a child’s head without specific additional teaching or a very strong personal interest. But that being said, a dinosaur obsessed kid is still probably going to really dig this… as would a dinosaur obsessed adult. It wasn’t my cup of tea exactly but I’m sure it is someone’s.

assorted Dr Seuss Books

I love these types of controversies because it means getting to listen to every moron who has never had an opinion on Dr Seuss ever start generating a mile of them out of the aether. So many people are so mad about the six books that are getting retired and I bet most of them haven’t even read them. These are not the friggin Cat In The Hat or The Lorax or even the likes of Yertle The Turtle. I was raised by a grade one teacher, was a voracious reader who loved Dr Seuss, and wrote my university thesis on children’s literature, and I still only knew two of the six books on that list. So by all means, if you want to write an essay explaining why those specific books are worth clinging to, feel free, but if you haven’t even heard of them maybe it’s not a big deal. *grumble*

Anyway, my grousing aside, it gave me the urge to reread a bunch of Seuss books, including the two retiring books I personally knew: McElligot’s Pool and To Think That I Saw It On Mulberry Street. I do still enjoy both, especially McElligot’s Pool which always sparked my imagination, but it’s obvious why they’re being retired and I personally think it’s the right choice. There’s so much good kidlit out there, we can survive without these.

Goodbye, My Rose Garden

A f/f romance manga, fairly standard fair though cute if you’re looking for some historical angst, pretty dresses, and mutual pining. A young Japanese woman moves to England in the hopes of meeting a writer (Mr Frank) who she has long admired. Along the way she is employed by an enigmatic woman with plenty of money, rumours, and melancholy following her. I’ll be honest, uncut romance isn’t really my genre, but I’ll probably still try to the second book to see if the story picks up.

From The Holocaust to Hogan’s Heroes: The Autobiography of Robert Clary

It’s no secret that I’ve been on a Hogan’s Heroes kick. This is the autobiography of Roberty Clary, who plays my favourite character in the show, Louis Lebeau. And holy shit what a life this man has had. He was a Jew growing up in France before the start of the war, and who was one of many children taken away from his family and sent off to the concentration camps in Germany. This was an amazing, intense, inspiring, and heartbreaking read… it has Clary’s voice all over it, and it tells everything from the charming childhood he had, to the horrors of the concentration camps, the brutality of survival, and then about his exciting journey into the entertainment industry afterwards. It’s an experience, would recommend if you’re a fan of the show.

The Ickabog

The second controversial author I read this month. Originally I was going to give Rowling’s new book a miss, given everything that’s been going on over the past few years, but in the end my curiosity got the better of me. Politics aside, it was a fun read! Not groundbreaking, but enjoyable enough and written in an interesting style. It didn’t read the same as a lot of modern kidlit, it felt more like a cross between a classic fairytale and a Dahl book. Perhaps a bit like Despereaux. It tells the tale of how an idyllic country gradually falls into ruin through the ignorance, inaction, and greed, and how a supposedly fictional monster hides the very real, human monsters at the heart of the country. It was cute and pleasant and I’m glad I decided to get it from the library, though for anyone who is choosing not to engage for political reasons: you aren’t missing anything major.

Franklin In The Dark

A Canadian classic. I don’t think there’s a single person my age who hasn’t read or been read a pile of these books, and the nostalgia is so comforting. I found this on Youtube and listened to someone read it to me, and honestly 10/10 would recommend for a calm evening.

The big reason I decided to seek this one out though, was because I finally got to the M*A*S*H episode that inspired this entire series! In the episode C*A*V*E, in which Hawkeye is freaking out over his claustrophia while the camp is forced to take shelter in a nearby cave during some intense shelling, he mentions that if he had been born a turtle he would have been afraid of his own shell, and that the other turtles would make fun of him cause he’d be forced to walk around in his underwear. And so this first story about a young turtle who’s afraid to sleep in his own shell and drags it around behind him. So if you were ever curious, Franklin the Turtle is in fact named after Dr Benjamin Franklin Pierce. (this is also why the French version is named Benjamin!)

Wolves of the Beyond: Lone Wolf

I loved the Guardians of Ga’Hoole books as a kid but I never read the Wolves of the Beyond series. This first book was an interesting read, Lasky does a great job creating worlds and societies for the animals that inhabit them. Lone Wolf is about a deformed wolf cub who was abandoned in the wilderness to die. And he would have, if a desperate mother bear, who had recently had her only cub killed, hadn’t stumbled across him and saved him, vowing to raise him as her own...

Petals

A “silent” graphic novel. It has beautiful artwork and is told entirely through pictures, no text at all. It’s loves and heart-wrenching, though it left me feeling somewhat unsatisfied… I felt like there should have been more. Still, a neat story.

The Southern Book Club‘s Guide To Slaying Vampires

What a banger of a novel!! I can’t recommend this one enough. It’s about a group of suburban mothers in the ‘80s who form a book club out of a shared need for community and a love of grisly true crime novels. But when a strange drifter appears in town and starts setting down roots… and when children begin disappearing… these women need to band together to confront the horrors that have invaded their neighbourhood, and face down not only a terrifying monster among them but the patriarchal system that allows it to flourish. To quote the preface:

“Because vampires are the original serial killers, stripped of everything that makes us human — they have no friends, no family, no roots, no children. All they have is hunger. They eat and eat but they’re never full. With this book, I wanted to pit a man freed from all responsibilities but his appetites against women whose lives are shaped by their endless responsibilities. I wanted to pit Dracula against my mom.    As you’ll see, it’s not a fair fight.“

The Weirn Books: Be Wary of the Silent Woods

I love Chmakova’s graphic novels, though I’ve only ever read her slice-of-life middle grade series before. This one is pure fantasy and very fun. It’s about two cousin “weirns” — witches with demon familiars — who attend the local night school. Things get strange though when an ominous figure appears outside the old, abandoned school house deep in the Silent Woods, and begins tempting children down its path…

I’m very much looking forward to word of a second book and was honestly kind of surprised that I haven’t heard more about this book given how popular her other series is. This has all the same charm and quirks but for those of us who prefer stories based in fantasy rather than reality.

And A Bonus...

For some masochistic reason I got a Garfield book out of the library. Jeez, if I didn’t love these as a kid, I found them absolutely laugh out loud hilarious, and now I just don’t see it anymore. But here I will share the one strip in the book that actually made me laugh

[ladymostdeject]

I Use My Outside Voice (Because I Have No Choice) Chapter 1

Hamilton hurried into his office, Thomas right behind him. He flung his briefcase back onto his desk, heedless of the laptop inside.

Hamilton didn’t even flinch at the noise, and he doubled back to close the door.

“Why does Washington always send you when he wants something from me? It’s like he thinks he can irritate me into submission.”

“Nobody sent me this time.”

Thomas rolled his eyes so hard his neck popped. “What do you want, Hamilton?”

“I need this bill passed. It’s stalled right now, and I need it passed.” He moved Thomas’ briefcase to get at the papers he’d left on the desk. He clutched them to his chest, face earnest.

“You’re talking about the bank bill?” he asked. Hamilton nodded and shifted on his feet nervously. “Why are you this wound up about it? It’s just a weird little regulatory bill. Those die in committee all the time.”

Hamilton puffed up his chest. “I wrote it.”

Thomas sighed so hard it almost hurt. “Of course you did.”

“It needs your support. If you support it, the other moderates will fall in line. Madison, Woodhall-”

“No.” Jefferson leaned back on his desk and crossed his arms.

“Okay, while that’s a compelling argument, I was really hoping for a little bit more back and forth. Is that all you really have to say?”

Thomas rolled his eyes. “No, I will not support that bill.”

Hamilton huffed, “Why not?! It doesn’t violate any of the major Republican Party stances, it doesn’t threaten you or Virginia in any way, it’s reducing certain banking regulations. Look right here, where it says-” Hamilton thrust a couple of the pages towards Thomas, who took them and promptly dropped them in the garbage.

Hamilton squawked. The mean little thing in Thomas’ chest purred.

“I can’t support it. Word has come down from on high, we have to object to anything y’all want. Doesn’t matter what it is. You can’t come down here anymore looking for compromises from the moderates, the answer is going to be no.”

“And you’re okay with that are you? Total gridlock for the next two years ?” he cried. No actually. It made Thomas sick. “It’s not the way things are supposed to work! We’re supposed to be making the country better!”

He circled back around his desk to give himself a moment. “I don’t know what to tell-”

“I didn’t know you were a coward!”

Thomas thought his patience was at its end already, but apparently it could stretch even thinner. He clutched his desk to keep from leaping over it and throttling Hamilton. “Fine! Do you want to know what I think? Even if I could help you I wouldn’t. It’s a bad bill. It is way too long. It looks like you’re trying to hide something in all that circular language.”

“It is not circular! Or too long! It’s exactly as long as it needs to be! It’s thorough and precise!” He gestured wildly.

“It needs to be about fifty thousand words shorter.” Thomas was starting to get his second wind. He had forgotten how much fun it was to wind up the other man.

“Fifty-” he sputtered. “That’s half of it!”

“And another thing, it puts an outrageous demand on an already strained system.”

“No, it utilizes a system that’s already in place to-”

“Also, if you really want bipartisan support, you need to remove the clause about omegas.”

Hamilton looked thunderous before, but suddenly he looked downright deadly. “I will not,” he growled. “That clause removes a century old system of oppression.”

Thomas shrugged. “You wanted my opinion.”

“I want your vote.”

He threw up his hands in exasperation. “You can’t have it! Just wait until the next time you have a congressional majority. That’s apparently how it works now. My god, Hamilton, learn some tact! You stormed in here demanding my help, you’ve shouted at me, and you’ve argued with every one of my suggestions. You can’t just strong-arm everyone into doing whatever you want. You’ll never get elected if this is the most diplomatic you can be!”

Something he said struck Hamilton hard. He looked gutted, and sounded hollow when he said, “I’m never going to get elected. That’s why I need to pass this bill.”

Thomas grimaced. “Oh, for- I didn’t mean right now, obviously. I meant that in the future, you need a good lesson on how to talk to humans beings, not that-”

“No. I’m retiring,” he spat like it was the filthiest word he knew.

Thomas surprised himself by laughing. It was a deep, belly laugh. “Sure from the White House staff, but we all know you'll move on to something else. The House maybe? Hamilton, you and I both know you're never going to truly retire. You're going to die at age 97 on the Senate floor after thoroughly dressing down Congress.”

Hamilton collapsed into the chair by the desk like his strings had been cut. “No, I’ve got two years.” Thomas opened his mouth to refute such a blatant lie, but he plowed on, “I'll never be able to successfully win any election, because that requires people to like you. Nobody likes me. No. I am un-electable. If I’m going to make my mark, I’ve got to do it now, while I’ve still got Washington backing me. Even if all I can do is write a weird little bank bill.”

Thomas feels ice crawl down his back, and even though he's never even considered it before, he suddenly knows it’s true. There's a handful of omegas in congress, but every single one is cute. Wholesome. Quiet. Every single one has a wife or husband and a gaggle of children. Hamilton has none of those things. He has a loud mouth and huge opinions and an inability to keep those opinions to himself. Most damning of all in the court of public opinion, he has a list of ex-lovers as long as his arm. He's not the kind of omega people like to see on TV.

“Moreover, I have very few positive connections. There is no one else who would be willing to hire me after we’re done in the White House. I make enemies everywhere I go. I have what I have because Washington trusts me. Sees what I can do. I've worked for him for twenty years. And in the beginning, I even had to fight for him to give me my due. I've been clinging to his coattails. I may be able to get some bullshit job to pay the bills after our term ends but probably never in politics again and definitely never somewhere with as much influence as I have now. I have fought tooth and nail for every single thing I have, and I've reached the end. I've peaked, and there's nowhere else for me to go. No, when George retires, so do I.”

Thomas feels the world shift beneath his feet. He'd never even considered Hamilton's future. He's never given a thought to how his gender might affect his career. He just assumed he'd always be hanging around DC, stirring up trouble and bothering everyone within hearing range. And if he'd been a beta, or hell, an alpha, Jefferson was positive Hamilton would be a thorn in his side until his dying day. But omegas get married, they have children, and then they leave the workforce.

He racked his brain for an omega that's over 40 still working in DC. He comes up with that same tragically short list of senators and representatives he'd thought of earlier. He thinks about the secretaries and assistants and baristas he sees around town. Every single one is a cute young thing, flirty and sweet the second they catch on that he's an unbonded alpha. Where do all the omegas go?

Surely they're not all chained to their stoves. They run charities and volunteer at hospitals, but are never on the payroll. They hang demurely on the arms of the people he rubs elbows with. They are mothers, PTA members, and soccer team chauffeurs. His own mother had never worked a day in her life.

But what if she had wanted to? She was brilliant, always keeping his father on his toes with their lively dinner debates. Would she have been happier with a career? How is this never a question he'd asked her when she was alive? How is this not a question he'd asked himself?

He's suddenly ashamed that he's 45 years old, and he just learned something so new and so big. He doubts she could have just gone out and gotten a job, certainly not one worthy of her intellect. Not back then, but if what Hamilton is saying is true, then maybe not even now.

Things are supposed to be different. It’s illegal to fire an omega when they get married or pregnant. It's illegal to discriminate against them during the hiring or promotion process. And before this very moment Thomas had never once considered the omega population's lack of upward mobility might not be due to genetic temperament and lack of desire.

But Hamilton certainly doesn't seem inclined to find a mate and settle down. And it's not that Thomas forgets he's an omega, it's just that it’s a lot easier to lump him in with the betas and alphas he knows. He's irritatingly bursting with ambition and pride. And if Hamilton can't have the career he deserves, how many other omegas are trapped in lives they don't want?  Not everyone has the strength of will to fly in the face of hundreds of years of social conditioning, middle fingers held high, verbal abuse cocked and loaded. Not everyone has the fortitude to claw their way to the top. He has been blind. Worse than that, he's been stupid. He stumbled over to his desk chair and collapsed much like Hamilton had.

What was that clause in the bill about omegas? Something about removing the forty-eight hour wait period on omega’s requesting large withdrawals from their bank accounts without an alpha or beta’s co-signature? And removing the bank’s ability to vet the purpose of the withdrawal and deny the withdrawal if they deem it irresponsible.

Everyone knows that omegas are bad with money, and poor at resisting temptation. That law is there for their protection. To keep them from-

The scent of distressed omega finally registers through his haze of thoughts, a citrus-y tang overpowering his usual sweetness. Because Hamilton is an omega. The omega White House Communications Director wrote a comprehensive bill about bank regulations. And while the man himself is very controversial (and exhausting), with his fighting and his Twitter tangents and mile long list of exes, he has the ear and the unwavering trust of the leader of the free world. If the goddamn White House Communications Director wants to withdraw a substantial sum of his own money, he has to ask the bank nicely.

“Jesus, Jefferson.” Hamilton was smirking. Why was he smirking, didn’t he know Thomas’ whole system of beliefs is a lie? “I didn’t realize the thought of me retiring would be so upsetting. Are you gonna miss me?” Read the rest of Chapter One Here

[nightcoremoon]

here's some controversy that has nothing to do with social issues.

a lot of people hate the band five finger death punch. saying those words provoked a visceral response in half the people reading this, and a "who?" in the other half. they're a groove metal band; similar to slipknot, mudvayne, disturbed, all that remains, system of a down, korn, and killswitch engage. they're one of those really controversial bands that are hated because they're ~not real metal~ by dumbshits who think that NWOBHM is the only valid metal genre. even though england ruined metal and punk but that's a conbfetsation for another day.

now, if you just don't like metal, that's fine. I don't expect everyone to like every genre. so obviously you won't like them, or any band in the genre. obviously. and these are not the people who are being targeted with this post. no, this goes to those who love metallica, ozzy, megadeth, slayer, pantera, testament, opeth, tool, manowar, meshuggah, children of bodom, cannibal corpse, fear factory, mercyful fate: this is to the people who love metal. now, I say this as one of us, but metalheads are one of the most judgmental groups of people in history. and frequently I find that metalheads make the same remarks in regards to their opinions on five finger death punch.

they do nothing but covers. they just yell and cuss. forty year old men with teenage angst. bad musicianship. they look stupid. they fuck their sisters and daughters. they sold out to the military. they're gay. they do too many ballads. they're redneck bait. they're toxic masculinity and macho personified. they rely on guest stars to carry their songs. they're talentless hacks.

these are all complaints I've heard multiple times from multiple people. and frankly I'm sick of it. I'm sick of hearing the bullshit complaints rather than the ACTUAL REASONS why they aren't the best band in the world. which I'll go through now.

they have an overreliance on breakdowns as if they were a post-hardcore band but they're not. breaking benjamin also skirts the line between post-grunge metal and post-hardcore and have many breakdowns, but the difference is that BB's breakdowns have math rock roots and use different patterns that syncopate well. five finger's breakdowns are... eighth notes. it's the difference between, say, black veil brides- who have excellent syncopated breakdowns- and as I lay dying, who have shitty and boring breakdowns. the only difference is that AILD has blast beats (and is fronted by an abusive asshole), and five finger has... ivan growling threats or whatever because they think that it sounds cool to have metal blaring while he says shit like "you wanna disrespect me? I will slap you so fucking hard you'll feel like you kissed a freight train, fuck you," or "if there was ever a time for you to back the fuck up it's right fuckin here and right fuckin now" or "it's not the size of the dog in the fight it's the size of the fight in the dog," or "in the end we're all just chalk lines on the concrete, drawn only to be washed away; in the time that I've been given, I am what I am", etc, all preceding screams. and no these are not exaggerations, these are literally exact quotes. there's also one that plays radio chatter from the military while he goes "hut hut oorah", which is different slightly. and in any case, they have done nearly a hundred different solos over their career, there is NO REASON for them to have such a ridiculous amount of breakdowns. they rival memphis may fire in that regard, but MMF actually has great breakdowns. churko is a metal producer, NOT a hardcore producer, and they sound empty when you strip out the vocals.

sometimes they will overuse a chorus, and hit the pop music pitfalls of having a song that's over half chorus. I'm sure they did this so the label would be happy with singles because the music industry is a commercialized garbage fire and holding it against the artists would be so fucking stupid especially since tool (the best metal band in existence) fucking said it best, "all you know about me is what I sold you, I sold out long before you ever knew my name, I sold my soul to make a record, dipshit, then you bought one; I've got some advice for you little buddy, before you point your finger you should know that I'm the man and if I'm the man then he's he man and you're the man as well so you can take that fucking finger and shove it up your ass". translation; the fact that you know a band at all means that they sold out to even exist in the first place because that's what selling out is. so even this complaint I have that sometimes they have repeated chorus is more of a complaint about a music industry which dumbs things down to sell radioplay to the lowest common denominator, which EVERY SINGLE ARTIST IS GUILTY OF. so moving on.

sometimes they'll have songs which are fairly simple from a harmonic/mechanical standpoint. opening verse chorus verse chorus solo bridge chorus chorus ending. verse goes some mix of eighth and quarter notes and rests in 4:4, solo is just the vocal line of the chorus, bass and drums are nonexistent and only serve to be a melodic backbone, and the music only exists to serve the lyrics... oh wait I can make the exact same arguments about metallica, rage against the machine, pantera, disturbed, and a hundred other bands. those guys aren't hated as much as five finger. hmm. wonder why.

the lyrics are often angsty. namely that they deal with honor, government corruption, mental illness, we live in a society, religious corruption, abandonment issues, recovering from toxic relationships, hey wait a minute these are all just insanely common topics for metal songs!

they usually play in the same key- wait shit every band has a favored key.

they do a lot of covers- wait shit they have literally more ALBUMS than covers.

(yeah that's weird to me too, but they only did a new level by pantera, from out of nowhere by faith no more, bad company by bad company, mama said knock you out by LL cool J, house of the rising sun by the animals, gone away by offspring, and blue on black by kenny wayne shepard... that's 7. they have 8 albums now.)

so shut the fuck up forever about the cover songs. metallica and the deftones and a perfect circle all had fucking cover ALBUMS, van halen only has a career because of the kinks, and every single rock band in the world is just ripping off the beatles, pink floyd, black sabbath, the who, led zeppelin, and cream. pick a legitimate reason to hate on a band, hypocrite.

alright what else...

"they're gay"

I'm not gonna dignify that with a response.

"they suck"

so does your favorite band. boom roasted.

"they're bad at music"

I'd like to see you do better then.

"they sold out to the military"

no they support the veterans and the troops; they fucking hate the military if you pay any attention at all. they believe in the good parts of the military that the government pays half our taxes to make us believe. you're not better than anyone else just because you see through one specific piece of propaganda because odds are you're blinded by another dozen. they write songs about how war is hell and how when vets come home they should be treated better. and anyway when you're in the dog eat dog world of the music industry hey guess what you need a market to sell to or else it's back to baskin robbins. I don't blame them for one second. if I had the option of endorsing cops to pay my bills you bet your ass I'll fly a blue lives matter flag and sell my soul to make money, and then donate shit to the black lives matter movement. flying a flag is worthless if I can do actual good with the money that those dumbasses send in. and name better irony than fighting to abolish a group that pays me to do it go on I'll wait.

"you're just a fanboy"

a) it's fangirl but metal elitists don't give a shit about the LGBTQ and b) just because I like a band doesn't in any way diminish the validity of my statements and any bias I might have is easily countered by whatever bias you might have and c) they're not even my favorite band you idiot I just think there's way worse out there just like I think it's unfair to say nickelback is the worst band in existence when drunk mom rock like hinder buckcherry savingabel and kidrock exists, and limp bizkit is standing right there, and d) they're not even the worst groove metal band, just look at fucking lamb of god, and e) if I was a fangirl I wouldn't have pointed out the flaws you fucking brainless troglodyte, and f) even if they were my favorite band in the world it doesn't matter if you think they suck because music taste is subjective anyway you goddamn moron. those guys write their own music, play their own music, perform their own music, and they love their fanbase more than most other bands. andrew biersack and kellin quinn and pepper keenan and glenn danzig and liam gallagher and axl rose and van halen and ted nugent and kurt cobain HATE their fans, or at least are huge fucking assholes. but not five finger. jeremy played until he literally broke his back; he's as devoted as phil collins, and if he made like atreyu and sang while drumming he'd be singing from a wheelchair, or like dave grohl when he broke his leg right in the middle of a concert, went to the hospital and got set and put in a cast, THEN CAME RIGHT BACK TO THE FUCKING SHOW AND PLAYED GUITAR AND SANG IN A CAST AND WHEELCHAIR. oh but wait, people say phil collins and dave grohl suck too, and turn around and suck mustaine's dick even though he's the biggest asshole in thrash metal behind tom araya and drunk james hetfield. point being, just because x doesn't like y doesn't diminish z's opinion.

"the singer fucked his daughter lol lol his grandchild is his son too lol lol his daughter is his wife lol lol it's funny because rednecks and incest lol lol" he's from colorado not alabama you dumb motherfuckers, and all the lol incest in georgia jokes are rooted in good ol yankee classism. also the guitarist is hungarian so the american redneck jokes don't even fuckin work. shut the hell up, you have all of the intellectual capacity of a common bog leech.

you can dislike the band. you can say you don't like it. you can say that you'd rather listen to different music. that's fine! that's okay! listen to justin bieber if you like him, listen to taylor swift if you like her, listen to new kids on the block if you want! I don't care! but stop expressing your opinions that you stole from someone else as fact. all you're doing is meme bandwagoning so you can find a community because you don't have the social skills necessary to meet people through the things you love so instead you try to pull serotonin out of making other people feel as miserable as you do.

with that being said, fuck all of the annoying dudebro douchebags who listen to the band and show 5FDP next to the confederate flag, blue lives matter flag, don't tread on me flag, punisher skull, trump sticker, and the crossed assault rifles on the back of your truck. you're all shit for reasons other than your music taste.

[ballplayersxo]

do you have an unpopular opinion owner? yeahhh i’m calling you out lol

basketball related: you guys already know that melo & gelo are not really good looking at all. and i find it hard to even like melo cause all his young stans are crazy, weird, and annoying. a lot of people got into basketball just cause of them (which isn’t a problem itself) but they act like the ball brothers are some typa saviours while they undermine other players at the same time. i can’t stand it.

non basketball related: i agree with mostly everything anons have sent in about music & celebrities but ill also add that remaking classic movies/tv shows is unnecessary these days and annoying. i don’t find it empowering to recast white roles as black people because producers are race baiting bc they know controversy = viewers. yes i understand representation for little black kids, but i think original stories are better instead of fitting black people into a white person’s narrative. it often comes across as really disingenuous and out of touch with actual black experiences.

also when it comes to schooling i don’t think people should attend college/university unless they know what field they wanna go in after. they end up majoring in something useless and then blame the world that they can’t find a job & undermine the entire institution. yes it’s a scam to everyone, but everyone can take steps to mitigate the effects of this scam. connections are also very important and this arguably matters more than a degree these days anways.

lastly i think that women need to make better decisions with the type of men they date & procreate with because i feel like at least 80% of the hurt women go through in relationships could be avoided if they vetted men properly and stopped ignoring red flags. low self esteem is a woman’s worst enemy and is the root of choosing & putting up with awful men. you shouldn’t be dating until you have a relatively high or at least moderate self esteem. they put up with trash because they think they deserve it and i hate seeing women go through that. (this all excludes abuse victims because the manipulation there is on another level)

i lied this is my last one. people act like looks don’t matter in a relationship but they do. people are scared to seem shallow and instead say “it’s about personality” when in reality they even know themselves this isn’t only the case. i think both are important, maybe not equally, but important nonetheless. you can’t be with someone you’re not attracted to and anybody who says different is lying in an attempt to make themselves look like a morally better person. people date “ugly” people cause they think they make better partners and this isn’t the case, they’re just as awful. might as well date someone who’s attractive tbh.