#I believe in a better future and know that these fascists are only digging their own graves by pushing people past their limit

[hometownrockstar]

i just dont get it why this oppression is the norm and is so commonplace that it is predictable at this point, I can watch history to see how it arises and propagates but its still so horrible to see the hypocrisy and how it is allowed to happen and continue over and over again. There have been so many successful revolutions and resistances and movements for justice in response and remembering those and seeing common people around the world speak out is what gives me hope, but it just feels so unfair that they have to work so hard against such forces. And seeing the endless repetition of news outlets and celebrities and politicians routinely supporting the wrong side of history without a mediocrum of reflection on the past because of colonialist and capitalist hegemony sickens me. The fall of america and all other colonial powers can't come soon enough

[halt-kun]

Hunter x Hunter Chapter 405 - Masquerade

At the end of this chapter, we'll probably be halfway up to the next hiatus

It's going to be fine most likely as Togashi has some chapters ready for the future. It'll be Shueisha's choice

So now we switch to the troupe and the mafia

I've been missing the Heil-yi plot though, I love their weird relationship to murder and nen. For them it feels like a videogame. They'll probably not have nice death (like Luini)

Cashew might survive for a long time though. AND she is most likely a specialist.

Is that Hisoka ?

it would fit him

IT IS

Very pretty chapter cover

look at him !

So will it be about Hisoka then ????

VANILLA ???? YOU !?!? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH

just ants ? I think you would have loved them my dude

I can understand Halkenburg too

Hisoka is vanilla in the sense that he isn't a monsterfucker then ? HAHAHA

And he likes simple one to one fights without too much covenants.

HAHAHAAHHA I love this chapter

WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Wait two Hisoka's ? I can only see Illumi masquerading but Illumi isn't the vanilla one. Unless he is trying to get in character ? Roleplay isn't vanilla my dude. THE NILE IS A RIVER IN EGYPT, YOUR HUSBAND IS GAY

So is the Hisoka hiding behind a pillar Illumi ? The one that talked with Hinrigh ? Noooooo, I'm thinking too much

We'll know soon enough

IT'S BONOLENOVVVVVVVV WHAAAAAT

HAHAHAHA

So the Hisoka that talked with Hinrigh was actually a fake as I supposed.

And it was a plan for Chrollo to let the troupe roam free

nice

he smort

CHACHACHA

Now he's Owl

did that guy see him transform ???? At least go to a toilet or somewhere private. Oh I forgot about Korutopi, maybe it's a bad idea too

Oh interesting, is it a time limit forever ? It doesn't get reset after each transformation ? Because how long did Bonolenov discuss with Owl

This Owl is fun looking too

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

YOU KILLED HER

YOU BITCH

SHE WAS COOL

At least the scrawny blood manipulator is alive

Lynch died

Zakura lives

Well, she did kind of dig her own grave there

SMART BONO

I'm actually enjoying spending some time with Bono

I hope he won't die

But he probably will then, bad match-up since Bungee gum can just cancel his dance moves and basically seal his nen. And now he's getting a focus chapter.

And he's alone near Hisoka

So smart to also disguise your murder,I guess Bono isn't an amateur at killing and hiding bodies

Well, everyone knows Chrollo's very saaaaaad

I'm scared

But this is going to be fine

Oh ! Who's ability then ? A zodiac's ? Beyond's ?

Was 9 Shal or Korutopi, Wasn't Shal 6 ? Or maybe it was Paku's

Oh noooooo I bet this guy was part of the snuff movies industries

"underprivileged chidren" were not properly taken care of I bet

Please Chrollo don't say sheeple because that will make you use like all your charisma. You're not a weird alt right incel or a trump voter. Media are mostly just neo liberal and capitalist since most journalist come from that class. It makes them very bad at handling information and makes them more prone to tolerating far right ideas and then want to censor left-wing ideas more critical of the actual problem that capitalism is.

I get what he meant though but also people won't believe undocumented claims. A forum isn't the best place to get informed dude. If that guy was actually influent and did such bad stuff, I bet you could have easily exposed him with your brain. Some actual field journalists or victim associations probably got wind of such things too.

Anyway, I'll say it here for the united statesians around, go VOTE. Sorry if this seems insensitive. Your country has a lot of reach in global geopolitics and if it became an autocratic fascist christian state based on lies. Then it will fuck up a lot of stuff. Your election system is fucked with two parties and single round elections. Don't make me begin on the supreme court. Voting isn't supporting someone, it's a tool to make the system suck less so you can politically organize at bettering it. It's just a paper with names. Also from what I understand you also vote for counties and state representatives who have also some form of power and maybe suck less. Not voting will just lead to you brooding that "everyone is the same, nothing ever changes". Not voting just leads to less people being involved in politics. If you can't put a name on paper, you won't do much more.

All of that just because Chrollo said Sheeple LMAO

Smart NOBU

they clearly are not really mafia anymore, they're more akin to the troupe

rogue killers that do as they want

Nobu will agree with me I bet,

he kinda likes them

I LOVE YOUUUUUUU NOBU

YESSSSSSSS

AND

they be real revolutionists. I kinda like them know

Guillotine the ruling class. Kings don't need their heads. Educate the people, let them become their own guiding lights.

Am I a french cliché ? MAYBEEEEEEEEE

They're just psychopaths though

so I doubt they've real ideas behind what they're doing. They're also killing passengers

and such people will just bring ruin to a country

They won't build anything out of the ruins they create.

And yes mafia are also bad because they just seek to maintain the "balance" in other words, the system in place. They just found an ecological niche where they can thrive and keep a priviledged role

Indeed what will you do my guys

Hahahaha, so the Heil-yi are already in the Char family

Did someone kill this guy and morph into him like Bono ? Or was this guy on their side the whole time.

OHHHHHHH

interesting enhancement ability

I know this guy is after the royal guards

to kidnap them so that they have someone close enough to kill a prince as a Heil-yi

And Tse's childhood friends were prime targets for that.

But now he's talking about nen. And if he snifs their head, he can identify what ? their nen ability ?

Ah yes, Sodom is a manipulator I think

Well they'll definitely bring back someone

Oh so they indeed want to have non nen users

then does it mean Dogman can identify the nen type and proficiency of people unable to use nen ?????

"Grinding" hahahaha

they're horrible

Hum

their names are Demon for the black haired guy I think

The blond guys fled Hinrigh did he not ?

I checked and Quorolle (black coat) is an emitter that indeed fled against Hinrigh

Tevelares did too and is an enhancer

did they change their fit too ?

Want to feel like they upgraded ?

Good luck Hinrigh

Ah just some teasing, I see you Togashi.

Well I've missed these plot lines

it was fun

[thecat-inthehat]

You know, one thing I don’t think I’ve seen almost anyone talk about is Fordola’s narrative role as the representation of Ala Mhigo’s stolen and indoctrinated youth.

This isn’t really a dissertation, or a hard thesis with cited sources, more just ... some musings. Garlemald is a near-textbook fascist nation (by design) that constantly expands itself via colonization and occupation. Expansionist fascist nations need more soldiers to do this, so they indoctrinate the youth of the nation to serve their own ends and dismantle the rebellion before it even really starts. Youth are promised the world if only they’ll believe everything they’re told, and fight for the overlords when needed and pulled away from their roots. Garlemald is, like most fascist nations, enthralling and able to pull people in and keep them in. There’s a strong sense of purpose, a chance to feel as though conscripts are making “a real difference”, and a charismatic leader at it’s head.

The most overt of this is the Crania Lupi, made by van Balesar -- a regimen filled with Ala Mhigan youth who are bitter and resentful that they’re still seen as “savages” and are willing to do anything to get the respect of the Garleans. They’re used as enforcers and rebellion-quellers, often by beating up their own kinsmen, who then ostracize them for their actions. It’s the perfect set up to drive a wedge between the younger and elder generations, and weaken any sort of uprising that might be brewing.

Fordola, being the commander of this unit, is more the symbol of what Gaius was trying to achieve than anyone else. She’s given enough power to feel important, but knows it comes with a cost, and dire consequences if she fails, much like her peers. She keeps digging herself (and the Lupi) deeper and deeper in a way to try and meet the moving goalposts, and hates herself and what she’s doing every step of the way. She knows that she’s betraying her people, her heritage, but she doesn’t see any other way out because she’s so thoroughly been pulled into this whirlpool of fascist ideology. Even her name is so overt about this -- it’s a Garlean last name: Lupis.

In terms of her character, she’s extremely unlikable. She’s angry, she’s brash, she pushes people away and tries to goad them into hating her, much like how she hates herself. She hates the world for putting her in the position she’s in, but also she hates the powers that left her where she is, and has no frame of reference to move past it beyond simply following Garlemald’s orders. She isn’t nice. At all. She’s marginalized and oppressed, but given just enough power (with very specific rules on who she can use that power on) to leave her unwilling to completely leave the place she’s built up.

The most recent short story highlights how she doesn’t feel Ala Mhigan or Garlean, and also how she knows she’ll have to sign up as a Garlean soldier in order to allay suspicion on her friends or her family. She’s being looked down upon by her elders for going along with the Garleans, but then also looked down on by the Garleans for being “barely better than a savage”. She’s desperate for a place to call her own, to be accepted, wanted, relied upon, like so many of her peers.

She’s only nineteen, and has been coerced and reeled in by the people above her into this horrible meat-grinder of a system. Of course she won’t be easily likable or understood, or even a good person. There is so much that she, and by extension her generation, have to unlearn and relearn. At the end of the day, yes, she’s responsible for her own choices and the places that she’s landed herself in. I’m not denying that. But the level of which she, and by extension her generation, have been taught to follow Garlemald’s footsteps is ... staggering. In a way, we never really need to see who her friends are, because she so thoroughly represents her entire generation of Ala Mhigan youth that never had the chance to leave, like Arenvald.

I’m not saying you have to like her. There’s plenty of reasons why not to do so. But... I dunno. It draws a little too close to home for me to just write her off as irredeemable or a complete failure of a person, because that’s essentially condemning an entire generation to doom and robbing Ala Mhigo of their future. The whole point of the Crania Lupi arc is that the kids that were supposed to be the future were stolen and pitted against their own people, and that means that they’re going to come out traumatized and ugly in how they react to things, which Fordola isn’t shy about showing.

[warm-starlight]

My thoughts regarding SnK chapter 139

Read at your own risk because my thoughts are all over the place and incoherent. 😅

So when the spoilers came out i innitially cringed a bit because of how cheesy the leakers made it sound due to the salt lol. After Korean raws came out, i liked the images. The art is phenomenal! After reading the official translation i am in love with it. ❤😭

It was so incredibly bittersweet, just like Isayama promised us.

The entire EreMin dialogue was heartwrenching and i said that if Eren pulls a Lelouch i will apologize for hating his character so much post TS. So i guess i have to apologize.

This dude was willing to turn himself into an absolute monster to ensure his friends have a bright future ahead of themselves. He believed that with him laying down the foundation and dirtying his hands to the point of being irredeemable they will be able to ceize their own future.

The story he told about Ymir and her motivation explains few things: Why she protected the king with her body, why she kept building the titans even after Eren seemingly freed her, why killing Zeke stopped the rumbling and why Eren told her "You're not a got nor a slave. Just a human being". He felt how strong her love for the king was and realized she is just a poor girl who was bound by her feelings.

Then we go to the talk about Mikasa and Eren reveals he has been in love with her that whole time, but kept it within because he knew their love is impossible, because he will have to die for their sakes. He completely bares his soul to Armin revealing his selfish, pathetic, Human side which i absolutely loved btw! But despite that he asks Armin not to tell her about it as he wants her to be happy, never wondering what if.. This also confirmed that the scene in 138 was in fact their shared dream and not "mikasa's delusion"..i hope antis die of embarassment now haha.

It is also revealed Mikasa's choice that time in 138 will lift the curse of the titans. Ymir was waiting for a girl who is deeply in love to show her how to break free and let go of her loved one.

This was what led Ymir to smile and finally free herself and remove the curse from the world.

It seems that everyone got their little talk with Eren, except Levi and Pieck. I think Eren was not sure what to tell Levi or maybe because Levi is an Ackerman, getting him to the paths was too much effort, considering he could only access Mikasa's mind only moments before his death.

In the end all their friends acknowledged his sacrifice (not the genocide!). Annie and Jean calling him suicidal blockhead for one last time made me sad and nostalgic. Annie showed she cared about him since trainee days... 🥲

Now we get to Levi's final goodbye and this was the moment i started crying. This man... He suffered so much, lost Everyone, destroyed his body just to make sure their deaths had meaning, but in the end it was all worth it, so he gave them a soft smile while shedding tears. Don't get me started on Hange being front and center ashdnkhdudjndnkxh

The warriors reunited with their loved ones, FaBi got to see each other again and their suffering also ended..

Armin's scene was such a great callback to trost arc.

It was sooo good. Also bonus Annie blushing at her husbando.

Three years later we see Queen historia with her beloved child who is now free from the titan curse, being happy and soft. She is probably much better mom than her own mother was

But she is also a Queen of the country who has become like a fascist dictatorship. 😬

Despite that, she retains her kindness for her friends, sheltering Jean's and Connie's families from the Yegerists. She is a strong, independent woman.

She writes her letter and tells Armin and co even if Eren was right about one side not being able to live in peace until the other is wiped out, he left Paradis in *their* hands, meaning Herself and The alliance. Which is why i believe the peace negotiations would go successfuly.

I am really digging Armin's speech here. Armin has been a chad this entire time heh.

And so we see Levi chilling in a wheelchair in Onyankopon's country, living the life, until a plane flies by and Onyankopon gives him that look. And he looks somewhat sad.

An anon pointed out that the bubble of "They'll want to know what we saw" being placed on Levi's panel is so poetic, because from 115 Levi only saw Hange and followed her lead to free humanity and i agree.

And finally we see Mikasa sitting by Eren's grave, waiting for everyone to join her. Her clothes and longer hair indicate she indeed became the same normal girl she was before she met Eren. She misses Eren, it's normal, but a bird comes by and wraps a scarf around her, making her smile and look happy which gives just the right amount of sweetness to the story.

My only complaint about the story comes from Bias. Yeah, Isayama killed Hange for seemingly no reason, but i think the reason was simple: He needed to portray two characters who love each other letting go of each other, of their dream to remain together forever for the sake of the world and create a parallel between Ymir and the king and Mikasa and Eren. As i said earlier, Hange didn't do it for fame or recognition, she did it so humanity could keep surviving and so Levi could see the world without walls that he talked about in front of her in uprising.

I think no matter what happens, Levi will Never forget them as long as he lives just like Mikasa will never forget Eren.

So i guess that's it.. I sincerely am grateful to Isayama for not letting me down with his story, for creating amazing, relatable, Human characters, for sending me on a rolercoaster of emotions every month and it was so many emotions from depression, to thrill, to happiness, to anger... 🥲

I think just like the editor said i will reread the story from the beginning and with the ending in mind. It should give me a whole new perspective!

Oof this got long. If you are still here, thanks for reading.

[anexplanationofunfortunateevents]

if the GOP could win for real, they would do a lot less cheating

Something you have to understand about recent American history is that the Republican party lost its shit in the 1960s. There are always plenty of reasons for decades-long historical trends, but arguably the core one is that Lyndon Johnson’s administration made a bunch of human rights advances known collectively as the Great Society, the cornerstone of which was a sincere and substantive effort to address the unfinished business of Reconstruction with the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act.

Racist white people who didn’t want to share democracy with everyone else became reliable Republican voters, but they’re nowhere near enough to win an election on their own. Republicans realized that their ideology is a miserable death cult that can’t win a fair fight. They could have gotten better ideas, but instead, they started sabotaging democracy.

I am not here to overwhelm you with a list of all the American right wing’s assaults on democracy. But there is a relatively narrow subset which forms a pattern that has become increasingly urgent: times Republicans have abused, usurped, or radically and unilaterally bastardized the power of American government in order to limit voters’ ability to hold them accountable in free and fair elections.

Because it only includes events backed up by reliable and freely available sources, it necessarily only includes the times times they were ham-fisted or sloppy enough to get caught. It has over two dozen entries and is almost certainly incomplete.

1968: Richard Nixon sabotages peace talks to end the Vietnam War because anger over the war is a winning campaign issue for him. Johnson catches him and calls him out, but doesn’t tell the public. Nixon wins and takes office.

1972: Nixon’s re-election campaign, the Committee to Re-Elect the President (or CREEP, because these people are fucking Bond villains) goes on a crime spree which includes multiple break-ins at Democratic National Committee headquarters in the Watergate Hotel.

1992: President George H.W. Bush asks British Prime Minister John Major’s government to dig through official archives for anything compromising on his rival Governor Bill Clinton from Clinton’s time at Oxford University.

1992: A political appointee at the Bush State Department has Governor Clinton’s passport files searched for potentially embarrassing information.

1992: Bush’s Attorney General William Barr pressures federal prosecutors in Arkansas to make some public movement on a white collar crime case tangentially associated with Governor Clinton.

2000: The Florida state board of elections does a racist voter purge, targeting largely Democratic communities of color.

2000: A mob, mostly Republican congressional aides, force election officials in Palm Beach County to shut down its recount.

2000: Five Supreme Court justices appointed by Republican presidents shut down the Florida recount in an unsigned opinion so specious and nakedly partisan that it irreparably damages the legitimacy of not only the Bush presidency but the Supreme Court itself.

2004: Republican election administrators in Florida attempt another racist voter purge, only abandoning it when they get caught.

2006: The Bush administration leans on federal prosecutors to influence the midterm elections with bogus investigations into Democratic politicians and prosecutions of non-existent “voter fraud” cases. After Republicans lose the midterms, several attorneys who resisted the pressure are fired.

2010: Five Supreme Court justices appointed by Republicans, in an existential fiat, reclassify money as speech, opening the floodgates to swamp every level of politics with dark money.

2013: The same five Republican Supreme Court justices gut the Voting Rights Act, specifically and explicitly because it has been relatively effective in preventing racist voter suppression.

2010s: Republicans in various state legislatures pass a bunch of laws to suppress the ability of voters to hold them accountable.

2016: Associates of Trump consigliere Rudy Giuliani loudly and unprofessionally conduct numerous bullshit investigations into Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton. They successfully pressure FBI director James Comey – himself a veteran of the corrupt and politicized Bush Justice Department – into several improper and decisive actions against Clinton.

2016: Donald Trump conspires with Russian intelligence and business interests to sabotage his opponent in a presidential election.

2016: Republican Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell blackmails the Obama administration out of explaining the Russian government’s sabotage of the presidential election, leaving state boards of elections and the general public vulnerable to the assault.

2017-18: The Republican administration sits on evidence that Russian military hackers have penetrated state voting equipment.

2018: Republican Georgia secretary of state Brian Kemp insists on overseeing the election in which he is running for governor. He squeaks out a “win” after purging thousands of voters, arbitrarily closing or refusing to equip polling places, and baselessly accusing his Democratic opponent of trying to hack the election.

2018: A Republican congressional campaign in North Carolina hires operatives to defraud local senior citizens who were attempting to cast absentee ballots.

2018: Republicans lose the governorships in Wisconsin and Michigan, but keep control of the state legislatures due to gross gerrymandering. Before the new governors can be sworn in, they cram through laws stripping power from the incoming Democratic governors.

2019: Trump administration officials try to warp the data which will be collected in the 2020 census in a way that will enable future gerrymandering by undercounting largely Democratic constituencies. When they get caught and stopped, they try to justify themselves by lying to the federal courts.

2019: Donald Trump privately tries to extort the president of Ukraine into announcing bullshit investigations into prominent Democrats during the 2020 election.

2019: Donald Trump publicly pressures the government of China into opening bullshit investigations into prominent Democrats during the 2020 election.

2019: All but one House Republican opposes impeaching Trump for his extortion of Ukraine – until that one guy is pushed out of the party. Therefore, no House Republicans vote to impeach Trump.

2020: With one exception, every Republican in the Senate validates Trump’s attempts to rig the 2020 election by voting to acquit him.

2020: Republicans dig in their heels and refuse to take easy and obvious steps to keep voters safe from COVID-19 at the polls.

This is just the list of things that I could remember off the top of my head and could find receipts for with relative ease. It doesn’t include things that are plausible but unproven, like the allegations that Reagan’s 1980 campaign staff tried to repeat Nixon’s first stunt by working to prolong the Iran hostage crisis because it was a winning campaign issue for him. It doesn’t include dirty, bigoted campaigns that you might call awful but lawful, like the racist “Willie Horton” ad campaign in 1988 or the repulsive homophobic ballot initiatives that were engineered to bolster George W. Bush’s 2004 reelection campaign. It doesn’t include the wide array of brutalizations of a constitutional small-d democratic system which aren’t specifically and concretely about elections – everything from eroding the credibility of scientists, experts, and reporters to packing the courts with proto-fascist hacks to lying the American people into war in Iraq.

It really doesn’t matter whether or not I think Republicans win elections legitimately. It’s extremely important that Republicans do not believe they can win elections legitimately.

Now think for a second about their cherished “voter fraud” trope. All this time, Republicans have been screeching that SOMEONE was out there trying to steal elections FROM THEM. It is absolutely correct to focus on and be upset about the racist history and intent of this particular conspiracy theory. I would simply argue that white supremacism is not the only unforgivable aspect of this nonsense trope. The other is the way those claims make it impossible to deal with actual threats against legitimate elections.

This is similar to what psychologists call projection, or the tactic domestic violence experts refer to as DARVO. It is not unrelated to “swiftboating” or the phenomenon students of genocide refer to as the “accusation in a mirror.” It is the axiom small children cite when they say “he who smelt it, dealt it.”

I don’t know the ONE WEIRD TRICK to make it not work. I just know that it – maddeningly – does work, not least on the Very Serious Experts whose ONE FUCKING JOB it is to know better.

So I’m sorry to disappoint if you were expecting a “many bad people on all sides” disclaimer about who does political dirty tricks, but “both sides” is not operative, no matter how desperate the hot-take-industrial-complex is to make fetch happen. It hasn’t been operative for twenty-five years, and it’s really not operative for the next six months. You can bury yourself deep in literature about asymmetric polarization, but you don’t have to do all that to understand what’s important here. Democrats support democracy and want to stop the plague, Republicans support the plague and want to stop democracy, and you should be extremely skeptical of anyone who claims not to know the difference.

[wonderlustxennial]

Thoughts on TFATWS Season 1, Episode 3

This shit has gotten ridiculous, so I’ve decided that I’m going to start doing reaction posts, rather than posting 20 individual observations. The following was written after my second viewing.

DISCLAIMER: Some of these are my observations, but others I didn’t notice until my favorite YouTube and Tumblr analysts pointed them out. I’ll try to drop credit where it’s due.

NOTE: There’s something I wish more people were talking about, and it’s down in the Madripoor section. If I’m reading this wrong, I would appreciate getting some help in seeing it. So, if you’re game, please check it out and let me know your thoughts. (#tw:racial bias)

[spoilers below the cut]

Walker Raiding the Flag Smasher Sanctuary

Here we get a further illustration that Walker not a defender; he’s working in the interest of fascists. Also, he’s on an invisible countdown to flip his shit. ALSO-also, dude just told the GRC cops not to give anyone “a second…to breathe.” (Marvel, what are you doing? I am not accustomed to relevance from you.) Did you notice the juxtaposition of Bucky asking the cops, “Don’t you know who he is?” to get the cops to stop harassing Sam, against Walker asking, “Do you know who I am?” while roughing up a refugee for not cooperating with him? Same asshole move, very different contexts. Anytime someone thinks it’s a good idea to say, “Do you know who I/this am/is?” they’ve already lost face.

Zemo in His Cell

Clearly, I’ll have to get better about zooming in on stuff, because this is the first time I’ve seen anyone catch that the book Zemo is reading in his prison cell is about Machiavelli AND Leonardo da Vinci; specifically, about how their friendship and exchange of ideas was highly influential on the future of the world. So, does Zemo think he’s Machiavelli or da Vinci, AND who is his “silent” partner? [I didn’t notice that, until The New Rockstars pointed it out (at 04:00 https://youtu.be/xHXhbw_EGL8) annnnnndddd now I’m going to have to read that fucking book (Fortune Is a River: Leonardo da Vinci & Niccolò Machiavelli’s Magnificent Dream to Change the Course the Florentine History by Roger D. Masters, and the bump in book sales is about to have Masters owing Marvel BIG TIME).]

Zemo Is “Royalty”

And here we have my first problem with this episode. BARONS ARE NOT ROYALTY. They’re nobles—low-ranking aristocracy. But do you know what does check out? Zemo and his butler’s thinly veiled distain at entertaining the two low-born Americans.

On the Plane

Look out, y’all: Satan just took the wheel.

THE NOTEBOOK/S

If Bucky has Steve’s notebook, what happened to the one he had in Romania? In CA:CW, I was stressing throughout that WHOLE fight and chase sequence that followed Bucky running from his apartment; not for his safety, but because I hated how vulnerable it left him to have to run without his notebook. I’m not even kidding. Because Steve picked up that notebook, right? Did he think to take it with him? Surely, an embassy or intelligence service swept Bucky’s living space afterward, so who has it now? THIS is the shit I obsess over. Who has that fucking notebook? WHO??!

TROUBLEMAN

There are at least three different things at play here. First, Sam’s enthusiasm and nostalgia for this relic made me tear up a little. He was so hopeful that Bucky would share Steve’s appreciation this classic piece of socially aware art. Second, we get more evidence that Bucky might be having a harder time adjusting to life as a white man in the 21st Century than we’re led to believe Steve did. Third, we know from Zemo’s interactions with his steward just seconds before that, when he praises Troubleman, what he’s actually doing is virtual signaling to build trust with Sam and put Bucky on the back foot. Fourth, I don’t think Sam knows for sure if Zemo appreciated it as much as it says, but he intuits enough about Zemo’s character to be aggravated at the inference they might have something in common; or, that Zemo might be manipulating him to empty rapport. (RIP, Marvin Gaye. You weren’t done.)

DAS OFFENE NEIN IN DER LIEBI

The New Rockstars win again. (Seriously, I have to start paying closer attention.) A book using mythology to explain the psychology of relationships, just before Zemo namechecks Red Skull. Oh shit, y’all.

ZEMO’S PHILOSOPHY ON SYMBOLS & POWER

The slipperiest thing about Zemo is that nearly everything he says has a kernel of truth; you just have to dig out what his true intentions are. Honestly, this is what makes him…I don’t know that he’s the most dangerous villain in the MCU, but it certainly sets him apart. He’s both educated AND smart (the latter doesn’t necessarily follow the former), and he’s particularly insightful in his ruminations on power and its potential to corrupt both the people who hold it and the people who admire them. Bucky and Sam both loved Steve deeply and believed wholeheartedly in the capacity he served as a defender; however, they have a tendency to over-romanticize both. Multiply that problem by the millions who never personally knew him and, when he’s gone, you get…fake!Cap.

More Relevance from Marvel

I read that Marvel had to do reshoots because a few of the themes in this show hit a little too close to home after the pandemic hit (also because the Black Widow movie was supposed to hit first, but again…global fuckery, so they had to shuffle a few plot points.) But also, refugees? “Displacement” camps? Hoarded resources? You don’t say?

Madripoor

Or “When Murder-Sugardaddy Goes Slumming with His Awkward Sugarbabies and Heinous Fuckery Most Foul Ensues”

AT THE CLUB

THE POWER BROKER. THE POWER BROKER. THE POWER… Soooooooo. Many. Name drops. At this point, I don’t even care to speculate on the identity of the mother-fucking Power Broker. Just surprise me already.

And here’s my (potential) second problem with this episode: The Black bartender doesn’t recognize the Black man he’s presumably seen before.

A CAVEAT TO START: I bartended very briefly in one of my many former lives. I was terrible at it. But here’s what’s relevant for the moment: when you work in the service industry, you meet a lot of fucking people, and you don’t necessarily remember them all. I would work giant events where I would serve 1,000+ people in a night, and people would complain all the time that I was carding them even though I’d served them previously. (1) I live in a state where alcohol is highly controlled, and the ABC Board is zealous about doing stake-outs to catch vendors serving to minors. The ABC Board enforcers would only see me serving someone without having carded them first—not all the times I served them previously. None of these people were EVER worth going to jail for over alcohol. Get your fucking card out—EVERY. GODDAMN. TIME. (2) Dude-man-bro, I’ll have served 1,000+ people by the end of the night. Get your fucking card out, EVERY. GODDAMN. TIME.

I’m not saying this bartender in a rogue nation should’ve carded all of his patrons; I’m only saying that when you work in the service industry, you can sometimes serve someone 20+ times before you finally recognize their face or learn their names, and the process can start all over again if they haven’t come in for a while.

Here’s the real issue with this scene, as I see it: In-group bias is an actual thing. There are disciplines of social psychologists and sociologists who specialize in studying it. We’re supposed to believe that the “Smiling Tiger” person Sam is posing as is well-known enough, both by reputation and in that establishment, that the bartender remembered his favorite drink but not Sam as an imposter? I can believe Selby, a Caucasian-European woman, didn’t recognize him on-sight. [Frankly, Whites can often (regrettably) get away with not making any effort to overcome cross-racial bias.] But what about this bartender not recognizing a notable local criminal’s face when they belong to the same racial group, when we’re led to believe he’s served him many times before? And how did he know Tiger-whatever’s favorite drink if the guy had never been in the club? Are we to infer this guy wasn’t high enough on the local criminal food chain to have merited an introduction to Selby?) Is this a plot hole, or am I reading too much into this? I just wonder, given how much this series has devoted to exploring racial relations.

Sam just saw Bucky the most vulnerable as I think he ever has. For the first time, very little was left to Sam’s imagination as to what it must’ve been like for Bucky and Isaiah to have been exploited. And Sam is so good, he can’t help but jeopardize the mission to check on the friend he can’t acknowledge to himself he’s found in Bucky. (He also has no guile, which is so very Steve of him! I’ve just loved Mackie’s performance this whole show.)

I don’t know what to think about how easily it came to Zemo to objectify and use Bucky, again—even if only to pretend.

Bucky is the MCU character I most identify with, but I don’t care to analyze the way the bar scene made me feel. I will say this much, though: THIS is how badly Bucky wants this whole thing resolved. He subjected himself willingly to the stuff of his nightmares, even if to just to perform in the world’s most dangerous live-action role play. As many people were taking pictures in the bar, it’s pretty safe to say that this charade is going to going to have long-term consequences.

People are talking about Bucky “suddenly losing his super-speed” when they had to hoof it away from the bar like it’s a lapse in characterization, but it’s not. Bucky could’ve taken off and left both Sam and Zemo sucking dirt, but he lagged to stay with them. He didn’t ghost them.

SHARON IS A BLACK-MARKET ART DEALER

Godammit. I despise the practice of the filthy rich removing fine art and cultural artifacts from the public view so they can use them for tax breaks and currency. Way to push my buttons, Marvel! And I’m so sure the National Art Gallery of Art and all other art museums worldwide will I mean WON’T appreciate Marvel calling into question the authenticity of their collections, seeing as museum funding and attendance is already anemic thanks to the pandemic. I know it’s bad priorities on my part, but that’s temporarily preempted how much I should probably sympathize with her after her abandonment.

EDIT: The person who gave Sharon the intelligence will figure she had something to do with his demise just a few hours later. I wonder if that will help/harm her ability to do business. Also: holding the barrel of that assault rifle while it fired off rounds should’ve burned her hand horribly.

ZEMO BREAKS THE INTERNET

Did anyone else think “Sprockets!” when Zemo started dancing??!

NAGEL

This is two references to Langley in one episode. For anyone not aware (especially non-Americans), “Langley” is commonly used to reference Langley, Virginia, which is where the most prominent institution is the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (C.I.A.) headquarters. Both Hoskins and Nagel name dropped them in the same episode. Shit.

The Sugars Roll Up to Zemo’s Latvian Bolthole

Bucky’s mission just got a helluva lot more complicated. Sam might have bought the “just going for a walk” bit, but I doubt Zemo did. Bucky owes the Wakandans, but he still needs Zemo. Oh, boy.

Wrap-Up

I’m going to keep coming back to how unexpected it’s been to me that Marvel has finally started to course correct, focusing on characterizations and bringing in themes that are relevant to current events. WandaVision’s explorations of Wanda’s mental health and Monica’s forging of her new identity and TFATWS trying to engage with the audience on topics like race, violence, exploitation, and identity is hugely compelling to me. It’s a fucking TV show, but at this point in popular cultural history, I can’t think of anyone/anything else better positioned to address all of this in an entertaining and accessible way.

[ryanmeft]

Ryan’s Favorite Films of 2019

A stuttering detective,

A top hat-wearing vamp

A forced-perspective war,

A bit of Blaxploitation camp

Prisoners on a space ship

Having sex with bears

A writer goes remembering

Whenever his pain flares

  A prancing, dancing Hitler

A gambler high on strife

Here will go cavorting with

A mom who becomes a wife

A family plot with many threads

Three men against their own

A stuntman and his actor

A mobster now quite alone

Doubles under the earth

Two men in a tall house

Are here to watch a woman who

Is battling with her spouse

A family’s plans for their strong son

Go awry one night

A man rejects his country

Which is spoiling for a fight

 A house built by his grandpa

(Maybe; we’re not sure)

Looks out upon three prisoners

Whose passions are a lure

  All these are on my list this year

It’s longer than before

Because picking only ten this time

Was too great of a chore

  What are limits anyway?

They’re just things we invented

I don’t really find them useful

So, this year, I’ve dissented

  You may have noticed this time out

That numbers, I did grant

Promise they’ll stay in this order, though?

Now that, I just can’t

  I’m always changing my mind

Because, after all, you see

Good film is about the heart

And mine’s rather finicky

  There are a lot more I could name

(And I’ll change my mind at any time)

For now, though, consider these

The ones I found sublime

 20. Motherless Brooklyn

I’ve got a (hard-boiled) soft spot for 90’s neo-noirs like L.A. Confidential, Red Rock West and Seven, and Edward Norton’s ‘50’s take on Jonathan Lethem’s 90’s -set novel can stand firmly in that company.

19. Doctor Sleep

There’s something about Stephen King’s best writing that transcends mere popularity; his work may not be fine literature, but it is immune to the fads of the moment. So, too, are the best movies based on that work. This one, an engaging adventure-horror, deserved better than it got from audiences.

18. Jojo Rabbit

There was a time when the anything-goes satire of Mel Brooks could produce a major box office hit.  Disney’s prudish refusal to market the film coupled with the dominance of franchises means that’s no longer the case. If you bothered to give Jojo a shot, though, you got the strange-but-rewarding experience of guffawing one moment and being horrified the next.

17. By The Grace of God

I’d venture this is the least-seen film on my list; even among us brie-eating, wine-sniffing art house snobs, I rarely hear it mentioned. Focusing on the perspectives of three men dealing with a particularly heinous and unrepentant abusive priest and the hierarchy that protects him, it’s every bit as disquieting and infuriating as 2015’s Oscar-winning Spotlight.

16. Waves

You think Trey Edward Shultz’s Waves will be one thing---a domestic drama about an affluent African-American family (and that in and of itself is a rarity). Then it becomes something else entirely. It addresses something movies often avoid: that as life goes on, the person telling the story will always change.

15. Transit

You’re better off not questioning exactly where and when the film is set (it is based on a book about Nazi Germany but has been changed to be a more generalized Fascist state). The central theme here is identity, as three people change theirs back and forth based on need and desire.

14. American Woman

Movies about regular, working class, small-town American usually focus on men. This one is about a much-too-young mother and grandmother, played brilliantly by Sierra Miller, dealing with unexpected loss and the attendant responsibilities she isn’t ready for. 

13. Marriage Story

There is an argument between a married couple in here that is as true a human moment as ever was on screen---free of trumped-up screenplay drama and accurate to how angry people really argue. The entire movie strives to be about the kind of realistic divorce you don’t see on-screen. It is oddly refreshing.

12. Once Upon a Time in Hollywood

Quentin Tarantino’s love letter to 70’s Tinseltown is essentially a question: What if the murder that changed the industry forever had gone down differently? Along the way, it also manages to be a clever and insightful study of fame and fulfillment, or lack thereof.

11. High Life

Claire Denis is damned determined not to be boring. Your reaction to her latest film will probably depend on how receptive you are to that as the driving force of a film. Myself, I’m very receptive. I want to see the personal struggles of convicts unwittingly shipped into space, told without Action-Adventure tropes, in a movie that sometimes misfires but is never dull.

 10. Dolemite Is My Name

And fuckin’ up motherfuckers is my game! Look, if you don’t like naughty words, you probably shouldn’t be reading my columns---and you definitely shouldn’t be watching this movie. Eddie Murphy plays Rudy Ray Moore, the ambitious, irrepressible and endlessly optimistic creator of Blaxpoitation character Dolemite. Have you seen the 1975 film? It’s either terrible and wonderful, or wonderful and terrible, and the jury’s still out. Either way, Moore in the film is a self-made comic who establishes himself by talking in a unique rhyming style that speaks to black Americans at a time when black pop culture (and not just the white rendition of it) was finally beginning to pierce the American consciousness. What The Disaster Artist did for The Room, this movie does for Dolemite---with the difference being I felt like I learned something I didn’t know here.

 9. 1917

Breathless, nerve-wracking and somehow intensely personal even though it almost never takes time to slow down, it is fair to call Sam Mendes’s film a thrill ride---but it’s one that enlightens us on a fading historical time, rather than simply being empty calories. Filmed in such a way as to make it seem like one continuous, two-hour take, for which some critics dismissed it as a gimmick, the technique is used to lock us in with the soldiers whose mission it is to save an entire division from disaster. We are given no information or perspective that the two central soldiers---merely two, in a countless multitude---do not have, and so we are with them at every moment, deprived of the relief of omniscience. I freely admit I tend to give anything about World War I the benefit of the doubt, but there’s no doubt that the movie earns my trust.

8. Ash Is Purest White

Known by the much less cool-sounding name Sons and Daughters of Jianghu in China, here is a story that starts off ostensibly about crime---a young woman and her boyfriend are powerful in the small-potatoes mob scene of a dying industrial town---but after the surprising first act becomes a meditation on life, perseverance and exactly how much power is worth, anyway, when it is so fleeting and so easily lost. What do you do when everything that defined you is gone? You go on living. This is my first exposure to writer-director Jia Zhangke, an oversight I must strive hard to correct in future.

7. Knives Out

The whodunit is a lost art, a standard genre belonging to a time when mass audiences could appreciate a picture even if someone didn’t run, yell or explode while running and yelling every ten minutes. Rian Johnson and an all-star cast rescued it from the brink of cinematic extinction and gave it just enough of a modern injection to keep it relevant. Every second of the film is engaging; Johnson even manages to have a character whose central trait is throwing up when asked to lie, and he makes it seem sympathetic rather than juvenile. The fantastic cast of characters is backed up with all the qualities of “true” cinema: perfect camerawork, an effective score, mesmerizing production design. As someone who didn’t much care for Johnson’s Star Wars outing, I’m honestly put out this didn’t do better at the box office than it did.

6. A Hidden Life

After a few questionable efforts and completely losing the thread with the execrable vanity project Song to Song, Terence Malick returns to his bread and butter: meditative dramas on the nature of faith, family, and being on the outside looking in, which encompass a healthy dose of nature, philosophy and people talking without moving their lips. That last is a little dig, but it’s true: Malick does Malick, and if you don’t like his thing, this true story about a German dissenter in World War II will not change your mind. For me, what Malick has done is that rarest of things: he had made a movie about faith, and about a character who is faithful, without proselytizing. That the closeness and repressiveness of the Nazi regime is characterized against Malick’s typical soaring backdrops is a masterstroke, and the best-ever use of his visual style.

5. The Lighthouse

Robert Eggers is a different kind of horror filmmaker. After redefining what was possible with traditional horror monsters in The Witch, he returned with something that couldn’t be more different: an exploration of madness more in the vein of European film than American. Robert Pattinson and Willem Dafoe are two men stranded in a lighthouse together slowly losing their minds, or what is left of them. The haunting score and stark, black-and-white photography evoke a nightmare caught on tape, something we’re not supposed to be seeing. It’s not satisfying in a traditional way, but for those craving something more cerebral from horror, Eggers has it covered.

4. Us

I have become slightly notorious in my own little circle for not thinking Get Out was the greatest film ever made, and now I’ve become rather known for thinking Us just might be. Ok, so that’s definite hyperbole: “greatest” is a tall claim for almost any horror movie. Yet here Jordan Peele shows that he can command an audience’s attention even when not benefiting from a popular cultural zeitgeist in terms of subject matter. It’s a movie with no easy or clear message, one that specializes in simply unsettling us with the idea that the world is fundamentally Not Right. I firmly believe that if Peele becomes a force in the genre, 50 years from now when he and all of us are gone, his first film will be remembered as a competent start, while this will be remembered as the beginning of his greatness.

3. The Last Black Man in San Francisco

Ostensibly about urban gentrification, this story of a young black man trying to save his ancestral home from the grasping reach of white encroachment is a flower with many petals to reveal. Don’t let my political-sounding description turn you off: the movie is not a polemic in the slightest, but rather a wry, sensitive look at people, their personalities and how those personalities are intertwined with the places they call home. Though the movie is the directorial debut of Joe Talbot, it is based loosely on the memories and feelings of his friend Jimmie Falls, who also plays one of the two central characters. If you’ve ever watched a place you love fall to the ravages of time and change, this movie may strike quite a chord with you.

2. Uncut Gems

When asked why this movie is great, I usually say that it was unbelievably stressful and caused me great anxiety. This description is not usually successful in selling it. The Safdie Brothers have essentially filmed chaos: a man self-destructing in slow-motion, if you can call it slow. Howard Ratner has probably been gradually exploding all his life; he strikes you as someone who came out of the womb throwing punches. He’s an addictive gambler who loves the risk much more than the reward, and can’t gain anything good in life without risking it on a proverbial roll of the dice. His behavior is destructive. His attitude is toxic. Why do we root for him? Perhaps because, as played by Adam Sandler, he never has any doubt as to who he is---something few of us can say. He’s an asshole, but he’s a genuine asshole, and somehow that’s appealing even when you’re in his line of fire.

1. Pain and Glory

When I realized I would, for the first time, have the chance to see a Pedro Almodovar film on the screen, I was overjoyed. His movies aren’t always great, but that was of little concern: he’s one of the handful of directors on the planet who can fairly call back to the avant-garde traditions of Bergman or Truffaut, making the movies he wants to make about the things he want to make them about, and I’d never seen one of his films when it was new and fresh, only months or years later on DVD.

It seems I picked right, as his latest has been almost universally hailed as one of the best of his long career. An aging, aching filmmaker spends his days in his apartment, ignoring the fans of his original hit film and most of his own acquaintances, alive or dead---he tries hard to put his memories away. Throughout the course of the movie, he re-engages with most of them in one way or another, coming to terms with who he is and where he’s been, though not in a Hallmark-movie-of-the-week way. Antonio Banderas plays him in the role that was always denied him by his stud status in Hollywood. It isn’t simply him, though: every person we meet is engaging and, we sense, has their own story outside of how they intersect with his. Most engaging is that of his deceased mother, who in her youth was played vivaciously by a sun-toughened Penelope Cruz. Perhaps Almodovar will tell us some of their stories some day. Perhaps not. I would read an entire book of short fiction all about them. This is the year’s best film.

[queeranarchism]

When the Right accepts the reality of Climate Change

This is going to be a long post and it's not a fun story. In fact, it might take away hope in an already difficult time. But I think it's an important thing to talk about:

When the political right fully accepts the reality of climate change, we're f*cked.

The common narrative is this: Scientists and climate activists on this left are facing the reality of climate change and have the solutions. To save us all, what they need to do is defeat the (mostly right wing) climate change deniers and convince everyone of the severity of the problem. If they convince enough people about the reality of climate change, they will also have enough people on their side to create the big changes necessary and climate collapse will be averted.

Now, to be honest, I don't think climate collapse can still be averted. We can do something to slow climate change but we are clearly nowhere close to achieving the radical changes that could prevent climate collapse (if that is even still possible) and I don't see a revolution on the short term horizon. It sucks but it's time we started facing that climate collapse is really coming. But that's not actually what I wanted to talk about. Here's a (kinda-democratic-law-and-order-blah) article with more on that: https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/what-if-we-stopped-pretending. If you disagree with me on that, do keep reading, the rest of this post will still be relevant.

Back to the topic: in the years to come we will see more and bigger climate disasters and at some point anyone still denying climate change will look absolutely ridiculous. The political right could dig themselves in deeper and lose all sense of reality and some might do that but at some point most on the right will turn around and accept that climate change and likely climate collapse is a real and urgent threat.

And here's the shitty thing: they will come up with different solutions than those that the political left is suggesting. Because they work by their own logic based on competition, authority and control. So here's the 4 most likely answers they would come up with:

1. More borders. Less refugees.   From a capitalist point of view, climate change is first and foremost a matter for resources. If oil and water and food and inhabitable ground are all running out, then the most important thing to do is to hang on to all you have. From a state's point of view, this is also what it needs to do to serve it's most basic interests: 'If most of the planet will die, we'll be the survivors'. This isn't hypothetical. "Expected water shortages leading to increased pressures on our southern borders, requiring more resources to secure border crossings" are the kind of sentences that have been in military planning documents for two decades now. Military strategists are already gearing up to make sure their state survives while the world dies.

2. More police. More prisons. More surveillance. If there are shortages of oil, water and food coming in even the wealthiest countries, then social unrest will surely follow. From a right-wing point of view, the best way to prepare for that is to make sure there are more camera's, more boots and more guns on the street and less civil rights getting in the way of maintaining order.

3. Less democracy, more dictatorship. If you're right wing and you've finally faced the reality of climate change, shit's getting urgent. Now you can choose a number of drastic solutions. Some are very expensive - the most expensive thing EVER - and require creating the kind of society that you (as a right wing person) consider 'unrealistic' or morally unacceptable. Other proposed solutions sound a lot more attractive. Like the idea to fill the atmosphere with sulfur to stop the heat of the sun (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stratospheric_aerosol_injection). This comes with a lot of risks and unknowns and doesn't actually remove any CO2 from the air, but hey, it's better than changing our whole society, right? If this is the road you go down, you will also realise that such a drastic and distopian sounding plan isn't likely to be embraced by the masses. Most don't like the idea of indefinitely filling our air with sulfur to block the sun. So the obvious answer is that a strong leader must declare a climate emergency, abolish 'democratic checks and balances' and take the necessary action. And since this plan would need to be maintained for a few decades, that leader's power should be pretty long term.... Other attempts on the right to science our way out of climate change without social change are likely to have similar results. 

4. Population control. This one even sneaks its way into some leftist discourse under the guise of 'having less children as a green consumer option'. Spoiler alert: this is never how population control actually works out. What we're likely to see under 'moderate' right wing governments is pressure on reproductive rights, particularily those of the poor and people of color, accompanied by secret draconian measures such as forced sterilisation imposed on the undocumented, the institutionalized, prisoners. The idea of sterilising those 'unfit to reproduce' has a long history in 'western civilisation' and is still here. It will manifest itself in the context of the ugly reality of climate collapse. The 'population control' option of the far-right politician is of course genocide. If there are too many people, too big a carbon footprint and not enough resources: better make sure the best people survive, right? This isn't hypothetical either. 'Eco-fascists' who believe that climate change demands mass murder (of everyone except white people) already exist. 

So yeah... when the political right accepts the reality of climate change, we're f*cked.

But I'm not writing this just to mess with your last bit of hope. I wanna face this reality because it allows us to ask the next question: So what do we do? Here's some answers I would give:

1. Stop trying to convince the climate deniers on the right. Let them bury themselves into their own ignorance. Let them reason themselves into insignificance. We don't actually want them on our side. The longer they stick to their bullshit the better. Instead, cut out their noise and let's focus our energy on far more relevant conversations like 'can we still prevent climate collapse?', 'how do we actually prepare for climate collapse?'. Those are the public conversations that should be taking place.

2. Reduce the power of the right wherever we can. Whether it's unionizing, elections of the streets: what we do to reduce the power of the political right now will be vital in the years to come. If they're as strong 10 years from now as they are today, they can put their own 'solutions' into action and we'll really be f*cked. Everything we can do to change the balance of power will make all of our survival more likely.

3. Resist any normalization of the 'population control' narrative. Make sure everyone knows that the richest 10% are responsible for 49% of CO2 emision while the poorest 50% are responsible for 10%. Make sure everyone knows that we could actually sustainably feed the planet if we distributed food better. If you see 'having less children' suggested as a green choice, have a serious conversation about where that line of thinking is most likely to take us. If you see someone romanticizing a future in which most of the world population is dead, don't give such a horrible notion an inch of space. Make it very very clear that the 'population control' narrative lays the foundations for genocide. Destroy those foundations wherever you find them.

4. Prepare to be (more) illegal. If we don't manage to create a big shift in power, it is very likely that we will soon see far more repression. The only way we can continue to resist and survive is if we're prepared. So things like increasing our ability to communicate and move undetected, and our ability to break the law and get away with it, are vital things to work on in the years to come. If we do end up with more fascist dictatorships, it'll be what keeps us alive.

5. Strengthen everything that keeps us alive and fight everything that kills us. In the coming crisis, everything we have will matter. Every reproductive right we protected. Every water source we protected. Every community we strengthened. Every step towards equality that we took together. And everything they don't have will matter. Every legal power the cops didn't get because we resisted. Every prison that didn't get build because we resisted. Every fascist group that didn't get off the ground because we resisted. The struggles we're already in against social inequalities are all going to matter more than ever. We can't put any of them on hold to 'focus on the climate first'. We fight economic inequality, racism, sexism, transphobia, ableism and more now because the progress we make in every one of those struggles is part of what will keep us alive.

[doktorpeace]

What would be 5 games you'd recommend to get a feel for who you are as a person

Oh, hmmmm, that’s a toughie! Just five huh? This is a bit different from just recommending my all time favorites but I think one or two will still be on the list. Lemme think... Persona 3, in spite of its flaws, is very important to me because the quality of the execution of its core themes and the through line of many character’s arcs actually helped me overcome the night terrors I used to have, believe or not. I know that’s cheesy but it’s true! Its themes resonated a lot with me and difficulties I, personally, had trouble coping with so that’s a good one. It’s also a good example of a game that actually knows how to let characters be flawed and not be completely fine or ‘better’ by the game’s end. Expanded content such as the Drama CDs add a lot to this, as well, especially for the other members of SEES. The New Wolfenstein games, either of The New Order or The New Colossus because as much as people say that these games have nothing more to say than ‘nazis bad’ they very much do. An incredibly core theme of these games is camaraderie against the oppressor, doing kindnesses to others for no reason other than simply to do so, and it does a good job showing in a fairly realistic way honestly in spite of being an alternate history game just how propaganda and nationalism work when applied in the way that fascists do. BJ Blazkowicz is a kind, good man who comes from an abusive background but still finds it within himself to do good for others because it is the right thing to do. Not for revenge, not for the sake of violence, but just because it’s right. Unlike most macho, jar headed, not too bright protagonists he’s also not snarky, he lets others speak over him and lets others lead when the situation best calls for it. I like him a lot and in a nutshell this game’s genuinely understands many things that are salient politically today: 1) If your political views and actions aren’t for the ultimate cause of making the world a better, kinder, more equitable place for others around you now and in the future then your views are worthless. The goals of leftists MUST be actionable and target systemic roots of problems so that the world can be sustainable, livable, and good at its base level. 2) Violence is the only language oppressors speak or will acknowledge. 3) Fascists will, because they must, turn on their own allies eventually. Anyone who is not of a completely ‘pure’ ingroup is temporary and no amount of appealing to them will make them see you as more human or worthwhile, simply less worth immediately killing. It is an ideology for losers and disgusting people. Xenoblade Chronicles X’s themes of a made community, transhumanism, and the concept of humanity itself also really resonate with me. The main story is serviceable and honestly undersells the game. The exploration, sense of discovery, and real impact it gives the player on the landscape of NLA, driven by overcoming cultural, racial, and other barriers to make a better shared future are, again, something I really love. The game is made by its exploration and side content, the main story is mostly an extended way to get your familiar with the world in broad strokes and with Elma as a character. God I love Elma. And then something like...Hollow Knight, Celeste, A Hat in Time, or some such. A cute, fun, game that while they are very good mechanically their charm also comes from other elements. They have something to say but it’s easy not to engage with it. Not that you shouldn’t I think people who just ignore the themes of games and their messages because ‘games should be about gameplay that’s all that matters’ are dumb. But these games could have their stories entirely removed and still be fun romps. I find a lot of indie games like this charming and I, personally, like searching every nook and cranny to get the whole story and all of the content the creators provided but even if you just Get Through The Game you’ll have had a good, fun, and memorable time. Sometimes something that’s easy to just cool off and veg with is what you need. And last find a game that’s mechanically deep that you enjoy. Be it a fighting game, an SRPG, an MMO, a card game, whatever, and really REALLY dig into those mechanics. Even if you aren’t a stellar player look into and research and explore why certain options are good, how a meta develops, and what tends to make something good or not within the context of that genre. For me I do this with fighting games all the time. I’m not stellar and most fighting games but I LOVE to dig into their mechanics. I think doing something like that would help you get me pretty well, even if the game itself isn’t one I’m into. Bonus - The Yakuza games but specifically 6 because I and my husband went to Kabuki-cho and stayed there for over a week during our honeymoon and WE WERE THERE, IT LOOKED JUST LIKE THAT, WE STAYED IN THAT APA HOTEL IN THEATER SQUARE HOLY SHIT!!!!!!!!

[nancywheelxr]

1 for the ways to say "I love you", with Winndox

Hey! Okay, this is by far my favorite prompt list, so thank you.

(  1 -  Holding their hands when they are shaking )

Winn knew from the moment he left that nothing would be the same when he came back. Like, he had no delusions thinking nothing would change.

But a country in the brink of a civil war is so not what he had expected.

Seriously, is no one worried about the whole Nazi vibe going on here?

And Supergirl being fired, what’s up with that?

There is so much going on, it’s terribly overwhelming in the worst possible way, and Winn feels like he’s always struggling to catch up before something bad happens. Except, it’s already kinda happening, isn’t it?

“As you all know, effective immediately, it will be tolerated nothing but full transparency from all government agencies,” Colonel Haley, or, as Winn prefers to call her, Colonel Umbridge, announces, and he sees Alex clenching her jaw beside her. “That being said, this is not a witch hunt. I do not want to fire any more agents, what happened with Supergirl is an exception, not the rule.”

Is she for real? Winn scoffs, rolling his eyes, because this is the definition of a witch hunt, okay? It doesn’t stop being one just because she went up there and said so, that’s not how this works. Alex glares at him, and fine, yeah, stay on the down low, he knows. But man, he saved the future, he fought Brainy’s evil family, okay, he should get more than a get back to work from Umbridge over there.

Talking about Brainy, Winn glances at him, standing stiffly beside him. He’s still using his personal image inducer, and his hands are clenched at his side like he’s trying very hard to keep them that way. Winn sort of gets why he decided to stay a little longer, why Brainy would want to see this through, Alex did tell him what happened at the pizza place, after all, but it doesn’t make it any easier to stand here and watch with worry nagging at him to do something.

( Something like maybe stay inside Winn’s apartment, locked safely inside with blankets and hot chocolate and anything else Brainy might possibly want, watching movies until the world goes back to normal. )

But that’s not the kind of thing Winn likes to dwell on.

Because here’s the thing, Winn doesn’t have exactly a great track with crushes. Or timing, for that matter. Look at this time around, he went to the future! While Brainy stayed in the past! Like some goddamn space odyssey, it’s ridiculous really.

“But,” Colonel Haley continues like she isn’t about to dig herself a deeper grave, “on the spirit of transparency and good faith, any and all alien employees must come forward until the end of the day. Your contract will not be terminated, you will only be required to wear this on your right shoulder,” she holds up a red patch for them all to see, “so the public can know what you are.”

Okay, this is just– they’re not even trying to hide it anymore! “Isn’t this dangerous?” And shit, right, he hadn’t meant to speak out loud, but now the Colonel is watching him like a particularly blood-thirsty hawk and the words are still spilling from his mouth because Winn has never been really good at being quiet. “For them, I mean. With this whole Agent of Liberty thing going on?”

Alex is fiercely glaring at him like never before, if looks could kill, Winn would be so, so dead by now. She glares some more, before turning to her superior, a not very good fake smile on her face. “What Agent Schott meant to ask, ma’am, is if we wouldn’t be encouraging extremist actions with things like this?”

That’s one way to put it, Winn supposes. Colonel Haley scoffs, dismissive, “not at all. With Agent of Liberty in custody, his organization is over. We cut off the head, now we let it bleed out on its own.” She smiles with a mouth full of sharp teeth that glint in the artificial light, “it’s a right of every citizen to know who is working on their government. Besides, it will be good press, won’t it? If they see an alien saving their life?”

The last sentence is said so flippantly that Winn can see Alex going through all five stages of grief and using up all her strength to stop herself from throttling their oh-so-dear superior officer.

“You’re all dismissed,” she waves them off, calling back before stalking to her office, “and remember– until the end of the day, agents.”

The door slams shut, echoing like a gunshot.

Everyone more or less scatters, going back to their stations like nothing’s wrong, and it makes Winn feel a tiny bit better when he glimpses Alex marching down after military Umbridge with hellfire in her eyes and brimstone on her steps.

A crashing sound beside him snaps Winn back to reality. “My apologies,” Brainy hastily throws his way, bending down to pick up a fallen– yeah, no, Winn has no idea what that is. He’s going with ‘random piece of tech’. “I seem to be a little clumsy today.”

Brainy isn’t very good at making up things on the spot, and even if his fingers hadn’t been shaking so noticeably as he places the cube-shaped thing back on his desk, his face would still be as see-through as glass. For someone who’s part-robot, Brainy has a terrible poker face.

Or maybe, Winn is just good at knowing him.

“Hey,” he says, sitting down heavily in the chair beside him, spinning until he can face Brainy and their knees are touching. “You okay, man?”

“What? Oh, yes. Yes, I am, thank you,” Brainy nods, but his eyes follow Winn’s gaze, darting quickly back up, and his hands wrap around the cube as if the anxiety wouldn’t exist as long as they didn’t see the shaking. “Now if you don’t mind, I have a few things I need to work on–”

“Brainy,” Winn starts, pausing to look around, check if anyone’s listening in, but no one’s paying attention to them. Still, he lowers his voice anyway. God knows these walls have freakishly good ears. “Look, I know things are scary right now, and Colonel Haley is really going for the whole fascist dictator thing, but you don’t have to be fine all the time, okay? No one’s gonna blame you for being freaked out.”

There’s a moment of silence where Brainy doesn’t say anything, looking down at the cube on his hands like it holds the answer for all of their questions. “I– thank you,” he finally says, clearing his throat before whispering back, “I will admit I have not decided yet on the best course of action, because, you see, I believe the Colonel got a hold of something to disrupt out personal image inducers. If this is true, then perhaps coming forward would be preferable.”

Shit. That’s– that’s fucked up on a whole new level. “What? Oh my– oh my god. Is that even legal? And didn’t Lena fix whatever bug it had to make it hacker-proof?”

“Yes,” Brainy nods, scanning the room again for eavesdroppers, and leans in closer, “she did, and we already went over the code twice since then. There is no way to bypass security. No, whatever this is, it must work in a different way.”

Winn frowns, ignoring the fluttering going on somewhere between his heart and his guts. “Maybe, if we figure out how this thing works, we can beat it, so you won’t have to out yourself. We let people know, so no one has to.”

Brainy blinks, looking at Winn with a surprise that would be kind of hurtful if it wasn’t so tinted with pride and adoration. It makes his heart go rabbit-quick and tastes a lot like hope. “Yes, why didn’t I– no matter, this could actually work. Winn, will you work with me on this? I cannot be trusted to act on the best of my abilities, I’m afraid the events of this morning have compromised me more than I’d initially expected.” A pause, “and moreover, I find that your presence is quite… enjoyable.”

His mouth dries in the time that it takes to process Brainy’s last words, and Winn can only nod in response. Around them, the room is nearly empty, as everyone leaves for lunch and the next agents haven’t arrived yet for the change of shifts, only a few scattered people still packing their things. Without the worry for evesdroppers, they could ease back a little, lean away from each other, but Brainy doesn’t seem to mind sharing his personal space in this case.

“It is settled, then,” he continues, “but we should do this somewhere else. The Colonel will already be on high alert until her deadline is over.”

“We could ask Lena, I’m sure L-Corp has a few labs to spare,” Winn grins, feeling victory drumming underneath his skin, “we have a little over six hours to figure this out,” and then, because Brainy still looks a little wavering on his certainty, Winn carefully extricates the tech cube from his white-knuckled hold, covering his hands with his own when they tremble without something to cling to. And then, because it’s so easy and Winn can’t think of a good enough reason not to, he entwines their fingers together, feeling the shaking echoing on his bones, his thumb brushing soothing circles on the back of Brainy’s hands. “Hey, don’t worry, okay? We will figure something out.”

Brainy nods, smiling a shaky sort of smile but with eyes shining with courage. He squeezes Winn’s hands back. “I know we will.”