#I fucking hate how trumps so fucking good at manipulating the media

[this-hopeless-war]

fuck. I really genuinely thought Kamala would win.

[female-malice]

Holy fuck if you search Griners name on Twitter there are people saying she deserves it because she hates America? Try being a black female lesbian in America you fuckers. So because she made a joke about not liking America and had a tiny bit of doctor prescribed cannabis she deserves nine years in prison?

In case you forgot, Russia sparked a social media base for Trump through social media ops. Russia is better at social media manipulation than anyone. It's simple for them to stir up the internet extremism they themselves created. As a result, this topic is a hotspot for right wing extremism.

And now, even you are reacting to this situation as if Brittney's a criminal instead of a political prisoner. Which is exactly what Russia wants. See how that works? Russia is very good at what they do. Invest in just a touch of social media ops and the world is your oyster.

I'm only answering this ask to address your reaction just in case other people share the same reaction.

I know it hurts to read hurtful things. But stop taking the bait. Posting and spreading their viewpoints only validates their tactics. Half those accounts were created last month. Learn to recognize when what you're reading is an extension of a social media op. Stop searching BG's name on twitter. Stop participating in the social media op. None of that helps BG get home faster.

Brittney's a political prisoner, not a criminal. Everything that is happening to her in Russia is politically motivated. If you're new to this issue, please understand that. Focusing on what she was charged with and what she had to plead guilty for does not help Brittney. Learn who Brittney actually is. If you want to post about this issue, that's what you need to post about. Tell people about Brittney's character and the loved ones she's been forcefully separated from.

If you take the bait and post in reaction to right wing extremism, you only embolden that extremism. And guess what? Then you're emboldening a social media wave that is directly harassing BG's loved ones.

If you're going to use twitter at all, there's only a few pages that are actually relevant.

Brittney's team: @phoenixmercury

Brittney's teammates: @_breezy_briii, @skydigg4, @sophaller

Brittney's agent: @kagawacolas

Brittney's union: @TheWNBPA

Journalists who specialize in relevant topics: @ksvarnon, @terrelljstarr, @TJQuinnESPN

[facepalming-since-chernobyl]

Katie this, Katie that yadayada. They can't acknowledge her faults the same way they can't acknowledge Lena's. I hate how people treat characters like a breeding ground for all that's evil because they might LGBTQIA+. Newsflash, morons. You can be a minority and still be evil, those aren't mutually exclusive

Sigh. Ok, gonna approach this topic for the last time (hopefully).

Quite normal that every person has flaws, KMcG included. I have never met a person in my life that didn't say some dumb, problematic, idiotic shit. That's being a human.

When I say she said something problematic in an interview or could have handled some situation/problem differently it doesn't immediatelly mean she is problematic for me. Or that I hate her.

I think it's a problem of modern social media and stan culture in general - one mistake, wrongly worded sentence etc. and someone is cancelled. It's fanatsim.

Do I hate her? Nope. Do I like her? Nope. That's why I seriously try to ignore anything related to her on social media, but it's impossible to avoid something in 100%. Plus, anons want to talk about her too and I undersatnd why.

Because the biggest probelm is her stans. Because you look at what they have been doing for past 6 years and you wonder why so many psychos worship this one specific person.

And it's irking when for the past 6 years they have said any disgusting thing to Chris, Melissa and other cast/writingroom members (death threats, accusing of being homophobes, bodyshaming, slut shaming, accusing of domestic violence, trashing the baby, making fun of mental illness, accusing of cheating, spreading gossips - the list goes on) and all you say is "McG said shit in the interview and never called her toxic fanbase out" and suddenly you are the biggest hater ever. I have to laugh.

Basically, I feel the smelties, tantrumcorpses and other fanatics from sc fandom are the same as Trump supportes - they are the same coin, just the other side of it. They make victims of themselves, while abusing other people who just think differently; they use the same way to discredit other people and make them scared and simply going away (the lies, manipulation, threats, harassment); they use the same techiques to brainwash people, they always don't answer your anguments, just simply throw some shit back.

Lastly, they simply just want to win. They want to be vicarious. They want their shitty ideas to be on top.

It's not about the ideals they scream about. It's not about what is right or what is wrong. It's about blindly winning a war, conflict, argument, whatever.

so, totally yes, you can be a part of any minority or part of the "good guys" and you still can be a fucking abuser. It's not about on what side you are, but what you DO.

[queenlua]

Ace Attorney case tier list

so, in the past year, i finished replaying games 1 through 5 for the first time in forever, and also played game 6 for the first time ever

so here’s where i ruthlessly rank each of the cases based on that most scientific metric of all, My Opinions:

OPENING CASES

S-tier: Turnabout Trump (4-1).  I already knew this case, and I still gasped with surprise when Phoenix showed up, and when Kristoph showed his true colors, and when Apollo realized OH SHIT OH FUCK I REALLY AM ACCUSING MY BOSS OF MURDER HUH... what a wonderful, splashy, shockingly concise case to open up the post-O.G. trilogy world.  Marvelous.

A-tier: Turnabout Memories (3-1).  Seeing Mia Fey (finally!) in action is a long-awaited delight; seeing Phoenix being a total dumbass was an unexpected-yet-perfect and fitting delight.

B-tier: The First Turnabout (1-1).  Solid lil’ case with some conventional-but-well-executed humor.  I’ve got a soft spot for Larry Butz.

C-tier: The Lost Turnabout (2-1), The Foreign Turnabout (6-1).  The former’s fine but a little forgettable; the latter has some fun gags (Payne’s ridiculous new outfit, dude absolutely shredding on the mandolin, etc) but is marred by how uh... kinda silly the game’s core conceit is, lol

E-tier: Turnabout Countdown (5-1).  The context surrounding this introduction is just sloppy (badly handled in media res + let’s lowkey retcon game 4 isn’t a great setup), and also the case itself is just. irksome. ted tonate is just fundamentally irritating to look at

FINALE CASES

S-tier: Bridge to the Turnabout (3-5), Turnabout Goodbyes (1-4).  No explanation needed.  God they fuck so hard

A-tier: The Cosmic Turnabout + Turnabout for Tomorrow (5-4 + 5-5), Turnabout Succession (4-4).

The former two cases are what makes AA5 worth it, and they make for a tremendously fun ride.  It fumbles the execution in some notable ways (Apollo’s sudden j’accuse moment feels a little forced/awkward/inadequately foreshadowed, and damn it sure would’ve been nice to know Clay Terran at all before he died, and also The Phantom’s final meltdown could’ve used a bit more emotional heft)... but okay let’s be real, I’m here for Simon Blackquill, and this case gives me so much of him so who gives a shit.  (And Aura!  Condescending obnoxious engineering queen!  I love her!)  

As for Turnabout Succession... while I earnestly wish the game had explored more of Klavier’s feelings about this whole setup, and some more emotional beats for Apollo, the case still makes for such a satisfyingly twisty and fun investigation overall (the poison stamp! what a ridiculous murder method! I love it!) that it’s a more-than-worthy finale.

B-tier: Turnabout Revolution (6-5), Farewell, My Turnabout (2-4).

The former does some cool stuff—I particularly like the opening half, where Apollo’s being real snippy and coping with Frankly Bizarre Dad Feelings, and giving Apollo a chance to finally throw down against Phoenix is a blast.  The latter half of the case starts feeling a little... ridiculous? cramped? idk? like, they didn’t do nearly enough foreshadowing about Nahyuta’s whole deal for me to care about his drama, this justice system is so obviously silly and the manner in which the revolution is playing out strains my already-suspended-sky-high disbelief... fun, and flashy, but more noise than signal in the last part, I guess.

As for Farewell, My Turnabout: of course I love Edgeworth rolling back into court goin’ through SOME kind of bizarre emotional arc of Hey I’m Totally Healed Now and obnoxiously preaching about Truth TM.  And it’s cool that the game set up a case where you want to lose.  But the net result is a bit strange tonally—it’s trying set up some kind of message about It’s Not Just About Winning, It’s About Pursuing The Truth, but it feels really muddled when that’s combined with Okay But Maya’s Literally Being Held Hostage Like Right Now, Surely A Reasonable Justice System Has A Process For Dealing With This Obviously Complicated Situation, Right?

but also Franziska takes a fucking bullet (how did I forget about that) and then gets to roll in like Ms. Save The Day so, really, lots of good shit here

FILLER CASES

S-tier: Reunion, and Turnabout (2-2), Turnabout Beginnings (3-4).  Look, the first one gives me all the Fey family drama a girl could ask for, and the latter gives me young Edgeworth being a total shit in an obnoxiously shimmery outfit.  The whole enchilada is here

A+ tier: The Magical Turnabout (6-2).  DELIGHTFUL!  MAGICIAN!  SHENANIGANS!  Like you get to guess the trick behind a magic act as part of the case, how fucking fun is that, and also the Apollo & Athena duo’s chemistry is perfect, the villain is a FANTASTIC bastard, and even the bit characters you meet during the investigation are total delights... Probably the best “standalone” case in the series, in that it doesn’t rely on any emotional connections to previous cases (unlike 2-2 and 3-4) to still totally and completely rule.

A tier: Turnabout Samurai (1-3), Turnabout Reclaimed (5-DLC).

For Turnabout Samurai, I remembered before this replay how delightful the TV SHOW STUDIO investigation and actor-fandom stuff was; I had TOTALLY forgotten Vasquez calling in her mob connections to try and wreck you.  What a fantastic villain; what a fun case.

Turnabout Reclaimed is just good solid goofy nonsense.  Probably receives a boost for me in particular because, yeah, Simon Blackquill.  But then again who isn’t giving cases a boost on that account; they are MISSING OUT

B tier: The Stolen Turnabout (3-2).  Ron and Desirée are so great sighs into hands

C tier: Listing roughly in order of preference: Turnabout Academy (5-3), Turnabout Serenade (4-3), Turnabout Sisters (1-2), Recipe for a Turnabout (3-3), Rite of the Turnabout (6-3), Rise from the Ashes (1-5).

Four of these (5-3, 4-3, 1-2, 3-3) are perfectly solid cases; I just don’t love them quite as much as “thievery hijinks” or “Hollywood hijinks” or other such particularly delightful flavors.  Everyone has a favorite flavor of Jolly Rancher and all that.

Rite of the Turnabout is interesting and connected with the larger themes of the game in a cool way, and makes good use of the divination mechanic.  However, the last bit gets twisty enough to actually be kind of confusing, and said larger themes of the game are... kinda hard for me to take seriously... which, yeah, leads to it feeling a little stilted when it really should be singing.

Rise from the Ashes landed awkwardly for me.  I know it was added well after the first game’s release, and it does a good job of continuing some of the cool stuff from that game—it’s neat, in isolation, to see Phoenix and Edgeworth working together (while still sniping at each other!), and some of the DS-specific mechanics are neat.  However, I just didn’t feel like I learned quite enough about Ema and Lana to care about them like I should, and retconning “(almost certainly true) rumors that Edgeworth was involved in Shady Shit TM” into “actually Edgeworth was totally ignorant of Shady Shit TM, like at worst his crime was willful ignorance / incuriosity, he was just been manipulated by the Police Chief”... makes Edgeworth less interesting to me!  Like, it’s cool to see Edgeworth caught off-guard and under pressure, but I wish the circumstances had been different?  Also Gant’s theme song is annoying as shit, which is petty but hey this is my blog post so

D tier: Turnabout Storyteller (6-4), Turnabout Corner (4-2), Turnabout Big Top (2-3), The Monstrous Turnabout (5-2).

Turnabout Storyteller has some fun gags with My Dude Simon and also Taka, but was heavily marred by Everyone Talking Down To Athena The Entire Fucking Case Oh My God Can You All Just Shut Up.

Turnabout Corner has... lots of fun elements but... look the fucking stolen-panties setup just grates ok

I don’t think I hate Turnabout Big Top the way most people seem to, but I did find the final murder setup more annoying that I remembered this playthrough—bro you were really sure the dude was going to conveniently stand right there and the heavy statue was definitely going to strike a killing blow and not just give the guy a concussion?  ok lol

The Monstrous Turnabout suffers mostly from poor puzzle/investigation design, being too hand-hold-y, and also having a core gimmick/setting that just wasn’t really my thing.  Alas!

[energyanon]

Hi EA! I've been hearing some members of the fandom say that Henry is racist. This because of him having dated Gina C and now dating NV. I obviously don't know him but I don't think he is...these fans say he should have said something when the blackface photo came out and because he didn't that's proof he *approves* ergo racist Henry. What do you think?

Controversial opinion, I don’t think he’s racist via association. You can have friends and partners that are absolute bullies and not have the backbone to do anything about it. I have friends that are - as far as anyone would know they hate them in private - friends with an absolute abusive asshole, and the thing is they don’t like the things that they do but depending on the situation sometimes have to remain with them to keep the peace OR are also just manipulating them to get something out of it.

Also a lot of people recently *this is more for Gina, have been switching sides as well, it could have been that she was always a bit more on the fence. But you have to remember that since 2016.. shit has changed. The media between absolute hatred and just a different version softcore of hatred through wokeness points is rife. It’s targeted. If you go down the wrong rabbit hole you can end up on pretty racist shit. There was a tiktok recently on just how quickly you can get to the HORRIFIC indoctrination side of tiktok and it only took one day before you’re entire FYP was full of it. Unless you’re actively changing your algorithm it’s hard to then get back out of. This is the issue with socials atm.

My point here being that, she could have not been racist while with HC. She also COULD have. And maybe he was also dumb and ignorant and didn’t have any poc around him that he could relate to and so he wasn’t educated on why certain things are bad. And he should in that case know better at 28 but I also doubt she was out there making holocaust jokes with him because it wasn’t the time of covid or trump in which she’s comparing this to. Ya know? People can hide themselves very well. Especially when you’ve only known them a year.

When it comes to NV. The photo sucks ass, right now it’s also the only evidence we have of racism as far as I know (still pretty big) and it could be said that she gave Henry the excuse she gave the daily mail and he said ok fine you know what it’s g if that’s what they genuinely told you, you’re dumb but that’s what they told you.

It could also be that he doesn’t care cause it was PR anyway. Could also be that he doesn’t care cause he gets something else out of her. Could also be that he is madly in love and he doesn’t care cause he loves her for her mistakes and all.

Tldr; you can love someone and not like what they say and do, you can like someone and have the same. It’s your job if you want to be a good person to call out that shit. It’s those peoples job to change if THEY want to do better. So then maybe she said to HC you’re right, I’ll never do it again and then she didn’t. Maybe she actively changed herself. We don’t know, the point is we know nothing it’s all speculation. He could have called her out, she said I don’t care and he said you know what fine just not in front of me or publicly and they continued on. He would have still called it out, he now just has a red flag in his pocket for later. We don’t know.

Do I think HC is a racist through association? No. Should he stop making a habit of it if he wants to be on the right side of history? Fuck yeah. Should he maybe talk more about black/poc rights other than a small little “hip hurray for a possible black superman” extremely yes. Does he make any comments about black rights on his own? (Aka, not apart of a huge black square movement on Instagram that he would have been destroyed for if he DIDNT do) yeah. If he’s anti racist it should be for every moment of his waking life not just the ones that are public and brought up *rarely*

I’m not sure if he’s racist. He hasn’t done much to prove he 1000% isn’t. He also hasn’t done much besides the general lack of what seems like genuine support to prove that he is. He has however shown that he doesn’t seem to want to have an opinion publicly. And that should be noted for what it is. Though association of GF’s though? There’s much more to that story, there’s alot of moving parts we’ll never know, and I don’t think it proves it.

[the-many-facets-of-folly]

Getting into discussions or arguments with people who think you supporting Trump is stupid because of A, B, C or D don't realize that we can see from a higher perspective. Let me give you an example.

Me: So have you been paying attention to the election?

Friend: Yeah, I've been trolling Trump supporters on Twitter and Facebook so hard.

Me: I'm a Trump supporter.

Friend: Sucks to be you.

Me: Why is that?

Friend: Because he's a liar and a racist and a sexist.

Here's where I shake my head and discontinue the discussion because their response has been conditioned by the media. ALL media. Not just the "news" but pop culture, magazines, movies, ads, newspapers etc and they all SAY THE SAME THING. So he was regurgitating whatever has been mass fed to him without having anything factual to back it up. Its always the same thing taken out of context. "Trump hates veterans!" "Trump called Mexicans animals, he's racist!" "Trump is a sexist". None of them want to hear about what he's actually done for this country. The list is overwhelmingly long, let me tell you. He may not be likable, but he's kicking ass ans taking names and he's not backing down from the fight, like every other career politician, because he's NOT a politician.

At the beginning of this year I was of the same mindset, except for me it was bias. I never liked the guy. From his days of The Apprentice I didn't like him. To me he stood for all that was terrible about corporate America, so I dismissed everything about him, good or bad because I didn't want to hear it. Then I actually started doing research and come to find out this old man has been fighting tirelessly, night and day for our freedoms. I know the Trump haters cannot even fathom thats the case, but its not even an opinion, its FUCKING FACT.

If people only knew how easy it was for media to gaslight and manipulate them their anger for Trump would easily be directed to the responsible parties.

Trump isn't the problem people. I know that's a hard one to swallow for some but I dont fucking care. Do some objective, non biased research before you start reacting emotionally from your ego when in reality you don't even understand your own psychology.

[theunvanquishedzims]

Calming my post-election anxiety with sweet sweet logic

So Trump is a wannabe dictator with crazy screaming fans who are headed toward violent armed meltdowns. What’s to stop him from going full dictator and refusing to leave office?

I’m glad you asked!

You see, the major difference between wannabe dictators and actual dictators is ALLIES. Dictators are surrounded with tight security, aided by the military, cheered on by media that they control, and are either helped, encouraged, or just ignored by other countries with the power to stop them.

Trump has charged the Secret Service money for the privilege of protecting him and his family since day one. You remember the first year, when his wife and son refused to move to the White House so the Secret Service had to RENT FLOORS in TRUMP’S BUILDING to be close to them? And how his extended family went globetrotting and the Secret Service had to accompany them? And when Trump himself insisted on hosting people at his golf club, he made the Secret Service RENT GOLF CARTS from TRUMP’S CLUB to follow him while he went golfing?

The end result was that halfway through the first year of his presidency, the Secret Service could not pay their own wages. Because half their yearly budget had gone straight to Trump’s pockets. And that’s just financially. I think we all remember how the White House came down with Covid and Trump still insisted on Secret Service agents driving him around to wave at people. He has not been kind to the people who are sworn to protect him. These people have had a front-row seat to his circus since 2016. When the time comes from Trump to leave the White House and Biden to take over, I doubt they’ll betray the country out of loyalty to Trump. If anything, they’ll be the ones to drag him out.

As for the military, Trump insulted and fired four generals from his administration staff. He said on multiple occasions that soldiers who get captured or killed are suckers and losers. He refused to visit a cemetery to honor the dead because it was raining. He tries to pander to the military by massive increases in defense spending, but that money goes to capitalists who make weapons and war technology, not the soldiers or veterans. (He also hypocritically accused military officials of being in bed with those same companies.) In a poll of 1000 service members 50% said they disliked Trump. Overall, he doesn’t act like a leader, and the way he skirts responsibility (like taking charge during the pandemic) doesn’t appeal to a group that functions on trust in their leadership.

A proper dictator would have spent the last four years cozying up to his generals and making sure they knew the financial and social benefits of answering to him personally, not the office of the President. And while Trump did adhere to the adage “find a foreign foe” to unite people against, he badly misjudged what most US citizens consider “foreign.” He hasn’t found a villain that we would root for the military taking down, and the people he targets (Latinx, Blacks, immigrants, and people in countries our military has already devastated) are not a minority he can turn the majority of the country against, especially with how many of the former two serve in the military themselves. When the time comes for him to leave office, the military might be the first to cut ties with the wannabe Dictator-in-Chief.

Now, the media. They’ve been treating him like a joke candidate since day one, but after he was actually elected and took office they’ve started to take him more seriously. He’s gotten his catchphrase “fake news!” to catch on, but that doesn’t change the fact that under his administration news reporters have been harassed, illegally arrested, and generally poorly treated by Trump, especially if they’re women. He’s trashed talked everyone, with Fox News being the last bastion of semi-legitimate news that openly supports him (and their credibility has taken a big hit over it.)

Despite this support, in recently months Trump has been increasingly dumping on Fox, even throwing the mediator they provided for the debate under the bus, and risking alienating them in the process. If his supporters listen to him and start considering Fox part of Big Fake News, it might possibly be the death of Fox, leaving most of his supporters adrift and isolated from their source of right-wing news, and sending the more extreme fringes into the arms of conspiracy theory websites. (I’m not saying this is bad, being cut off from Fox and its toxic stream of “information” can actually help rehabilitate the right.)

Honestly, I don’t think Trump ever had a shot at controlling the media like a dictator would, mainly because of social media. He’s in love with attention, and Twitter has provided him a nonstop stream of it. No other President has threatened, insulted, promoted, or hinted at war over social media the way Trump has, and he gets so much direct feedback and interaction with the public and the world as a result. He could have leveraged that by buying the company (through a shell corporation, obviously) and setting it up as The One True Source of Information, manipulating public perception of him and his administration by keeping a tight grip on what information he let out.

But he’s just. Not. That. Clever. He blurts out everything that crosses his mind, leaving his administration to play clean-up on his messes, put out fires he keeps pouring gasoline on, and claim he’s joking when everyone knows he’s testing the limits on what he can get away with saying. He took advantage of the direct communication with legions of supporters, but seemed to forget that his detractors had equal access and would absolutely call him out on things he definitely said, it’s right there on his Twitter account, they have the Tweet pulled up on their phone right now. Instead of operating a single state-run media outlet while crushing all free press and limiting internet access like other dictators, he’s mooned the world’s cameras and acted surprised when they put his saggy butt on tv. “Fake news! That’s not my butt! THIS is my butt! [image attached]” he tweets. “Twitter is so biased, they haven’t censored any of Sleepy Joe’s photos!” he later tweets.

And lastly. The key to a dictatorship’s success. To prevent outside intervention, the country a dictator runs must be unimportant and ignored, wealthy and well-connected, or scary and well-armed. Minor warlords are the former, Putin is the latter, Trump might have weaseled his way into being the middle. But at the end of the day, America’s whole thing is new leadership every four years. It was revolutionary to replace a lineage of kings and queens stretching generations with a non-royal elected leader who only held office for four to eight years, but we’ve stuck to that for 200 years and everyone’s used to it by now. It would take a charismatic and powerful person to move the American people towards abolishing such a basic tenant of our democracy, and despite the mob mentality that lead a small portion of his supporters to chant “sixteen more years!” in the heat of the moment, Trump is not that charismatic. He’s not that smart. He’s not that well-connected. He’s not that savvy. He’s not that good at politics. And he’s not that powerful.

(I was going to say something here about him being the laughingstock of the world’s leaders and shouldn’t expect any outsiders to help him stay in power, especially since his tax returns came out and showed he owes people a ton of money that he doesn’t have, but this post is long enough so let’s cut to the chase.)

Trump is a greedy, small-minded man that has clung to power by appealing to the worst in humanity and scraping away at the best. But he hasn’t succeeded. He’s a sad old man who will say anything to be loved, and I don’t think he even knows what love is, so he’ll settle for attention. He doesn’t have money, he doesn’t have an army, and the only allies he has are using him as a political pawn to further their own interests. They will cut him loose the minute he stops being useful.

Now, the bad part: crazy screaming fans. Fringe groups on the internet. Mobs chanting “sixteen more years!” Men with guns and bombs and kidnapping plots, men trying to get into voting centers to destroy the election, men driving trucks with black flags that say FUCK YOUR FEELINGS, TRUMP 2020 (available on Amazon for $11.99, I wish I was joking.) I have no idea how many people in this country genuinely love Trump. It is hopefully significantly less than voted for him. There are some big issues in this country that are make-or-break, and unfortunately by reason of running Republican Trump has aligned himself with some of them.

There are people who hate everything about Trump, but he put a pro-life judge on the Supreme Court so they’re voting for him. There are people who are uncomfortable with Trump, but they’ve forgiven their grandpa for saying worse at Thanksgiving dinner, so they’ll vote for him. There are people who don’t know a single thing about Donald Trump, but they see (Republican) next to his name on the ballot, so they vote for him. None of that means those people will side with him if he tries to make a move towards dictatorship.

Now there are people who love Trump. They’ve heard and seen the vile things he’s said and done, and are genuinely okay with it, because they are full of hate and rage and want to change the world to put themselves on top. I do not know how many of these people there are. I know they exist all over the country, not just in red states. I know some of them have guns and want a reason to use them, because they’ve been talking about it for decades. I don’t know if we can trust the police to side with us over them if fights start breaking out. (And I pray pray PRAY people de-escalate any fights, because monkey see monkey do, and one news report of a MAGA extremist shooting someone can inspire a hundred copycats can lead to full-on civil war like we've never seen.) I know we need to be careful the next few months, to take care of ourselves and watch out for the more vulnerable in our communities.

And above all, I know this: Trump is not going to keep this country. He got it through trickery and deceit and foreign influence and national indifference and people not taking him seriously. We’ve learned. We’ve grown. We’re taking him seriously now, and we will not let him take what we’ve already told him he can’t have. The election is over. He’s a loser. He’d better start packing his bags. Because he’s not staying in office.

[ty-talks-comics]

The Boys Season 1 Review and Comparison

This was so cathartic.

In an age where we’re inundated with superhero media on all fronts with their bright colors, cheery jokes and positive outlooks, it’s easy to slowly become sick of it, feel the “superhero fatigue” as it were. Where Marvel ruins some stories with far too many jokes (looking at you Thor: Ragnarok) and DC is far too dreary and serious for its own good with a lack of levity, where can one turn to for a GOOD happy medium?

Well, in comes Seth Rogan and Evan Gold, the brilliant minds behind the amazing adaptation of Preacher with yet another brutal and slightly more cynical series. The Boys absolutely stuns not only by being a genuinely compelling series, but also by being one of the few adaptations that improves on the original medium in a few aspects.

Story

The story centers around Hughie Campbell and the titular Boys as they work to expose the horrific deeds of The Seven, a collective of the world's greatest superheroes, and the company that sponsors them, Vought American.

In this world, superheroes are everywhere. They're on breakfast cereals, TV shows, movies, pretty much every piece of media and entertainment imaginable while also protecting America from crime. Sounds familiar, huh? The kicker here is that, much like every asshole celebrity that lets the fame and fortune go to their heads, these heroes are massive cunts. They take performance enhancing drugs, routinely cause accidents that hurt or kill people, sexually harass people left and right and just lie to their adoring public like they’re children.

Unlike the books, however, The Boys team isn’t the well oiled machine that’s been taking down and blackmailing superheroes for years and the first four episodes are spent introducing the different team members.This is likely due to wanting to give people time to care about them individually and the limited number of episodes in the season. This definitely works in also retooling the characters themselves for TV since they may not have seventy-two issues of character development ahead of them

For the most part, the show follows the initial story beats of the comics with a few select differences before splintering off in an entirely new direction. Hughie’s girlfriend still gets blown apart by A-Train, he denies Vought America’s hush money which draws the attention of Billy Butcher and Starlight joins the Seven after the “death” of the hero Lamplighter. 

This also means that there's less time to focus on smaller plotlines and teams that are referenced to in passing dialogue like the Teenage Kix, a pastiche on the Teen Titans, or Payback, the number two group of superheroes to The Seven. While seeing the team take these guys down on the small screen would have been fun, I like the idea of keeping the plot focused on just the core group of antagonists. This way, we don’t have to slog through three or four seasons of small fry and get the big bads in the last few.

After the first half, fans of the comic may start to feel a little bit of the familiar, but then things start to take a drastic turn when Billy's pride and the rest of the teams sloppiness gets them all burned and branded wanted criminals. This never happens in the books because The Boys are funded and protected by the CIA, but here they’re just another group of concerned citizens that are completely in over their heads, adding to the tension and keeping everyone guessing as to what will happen for the rest of the season and in Season 2.

Themes

The original series was written during the latter years of the Bush Administration. Tensions were high and America was still embroiled in the Iraq War. The president was a simpering fool and companies were fucking people over left and right in the name of patriotism. Reality TV and the awful personalities on our screens were on nearly every channel and all of this only fueled the anger that is Garth Ennis’ pen and Darick Robertson’s pencils. It was a product of its time and it was perfect.

We’re now in the Information Age where superheroes and social media are the only things that matter in everyone’s mind, where women’s empowerment is stronger than ever and our leaders speak bombastically with shit eating grins full of lies. Rogen and Goldberg have kept the series modern and take everything to task.

Media. Marvel and DC are everywhere nowadays with some indie companies managing to scrape up their own part of the pie. The Boys makes fun of the seemingly endless cycle of sequels and the goody-two-shoes images of America’s favorite heroes. Everything is carefully managed and curated by a media team, similar to how Disney micromanages even the smallest details of their properties to make everything so sickeningly squeaky clean. 

Not only do the heroes stop crime, but they star in their own movies about themselves as well, some have sponsorships for shoes and have to compete with each other for everything. Almost everything is done for the cameras, even intimate moments whenever Vought can find a way to make it work. The heroes are never too far from the spotlight even when they want to be and oftentimes their acts can go viral without them knowing.

Sexual Assault. In the comics, Starlight is sexually assaulted by Homelander, Black Noir and A-Train in a gross scene to establish that there’s nothing good in that world. It was good for its time in its own dark way, but today there are absolutely consequences to such things as there should have been back then. In the show, Starlight is assaulted by The Deep, her childhood crush, alone. 

It’s dark and makes use of the imbalance of power as The Deep threatens to have her kicked off of the team. Soon after, Starlight comes forward with what happens to her, not allowing herself to let what happened stand and unlike in the books, The Deep gets his comeuppance. Though this also unfortunately leading to him getting assaulted as well. It’s powerful and allows for Starlight to move what could have been an image of weakness, though Vought uses this to their advantage as well, painting her a feminist icon. Best for business right?

Politics. While not everything has to be an allegory for Trump, it’s hard to say that Homelander isn’t just that. He’s what the president thinks he is, a strong, blonde haired man that the entire country loves. Homelander has the people eating out of the palm of his hands and he’s only feeding them shit. He hates the common man and will just as easily let many die if it can somehow serve his interests. He’s not above a little sexual harassment himself and he is just an evil bastard.

There’s also a subplot of military application of superheroes that I feel mirrors the discussion on the use of drones in war. Drones are absolutely deadly and have caused the deaths of hundreds, even innocents when things have gone really wrong. Even President Obama was criticized for how reckless and dangerous their use could be. The world could only imagine the hell that would rain down if superheroes were allowed to duke it out over national security.

Characters

The Boys as a comic series was an unrepentantly cynical take on the superhero genre in an established universe of heroes. The creator, Garth Ennis, didn’t grow up with many superheroes and actually felt disrespected by a few of them, like Captain America. He brought on the amazing Darick Robertson and other artists to realize this horrid world of drugs, hardcore sex and brutal violence. Many of the stories are fun and hilarious, but with the unfortunate feeling of a lot of them feeling one note due to the one dimensional nature of a lot of the “heroes” and the ever escalating level of black humor to the point of being cartoonish.

Our main character cast is absolutely fantastic. Jack Quiad’s Hughie is much like his comic counterpart, aside from being like six feet tall and not Scottish. He’s surprisingly smart with a lot of awkwardness about him. He has a good heart and doesn’t see ALL superheroes as being evil, but does have a slight sense of justice that wants to see The Seven and Vought taken down. 

Karl Urban’s Butcher was the absolute perfect casting choice. He’s got that wry British wit, the fury to capture Butcher’s rage against supes and can play a manipulator like nobody's business. His character arc is one of the few regressions that I can actually appreciate for how it's done, especially as things become more fucked because of him and how he chooses to blame everyone else.

Everyone else is a slight bit of an improvement over the comics versions. The Frenchman, played by Tomer Capon, is similar to his comics counterpart, but we’re given reason to care about him and The Female. In the comics, Frenchie and the Female knew each other prior, but I don’t think it’s ever revealed how they met or became close. In the show Frenchie frees The Female, played by Karen Fukuhara, from thugs that had been keeping her prisoner and he slowly gains her trust over the course of the next few episodes after her introduction. We see their friendship grow, learn a little bit of her backstory and get a better understanding of what she wants versus just following Frenchie around and being terrifyingly adorable.

Annie January aka Starlight, played by Erin Moriarty, is probably the second best change in character in the series. She starts out as a bright eyed, bushy tailed hero looking to do good, but after being sexually assaulted on her first day in The Seven, decides that it will never happen again. In the comics, Annie stays around in The Seven and takes the abuse for a little while before speaking out and fighting back against the rest of them. What makes things even better, not only does she challenge her uber Christian beliefs during an event sponsored by Vought, but she does so while also getting Vought to force her abuser into giving a public apology at the mere thought of her causing their stock prices to crash.

Consequently, Mother’s Milk, portrayed by Laz Alonso, one of the most layered characters in the comics isn’t made better, but the more ridiculous aspects of is character have been toned down. We don’t hear of his disabled mother and his addiction to her breast milk that fuels his own superpowers, nor is his wife a crack addict that makes pornos with their daughter. He’s simply a reliable member of the team that loves his wife and will give Butcher the truth when he’s acting like an asshole.

The series actually brings a lot of grey to most of these characters. A-Train never once shows remorse for his actions in the books, but in the show he's painted as kind of sympathetic, while still being seen as a monster for what he does and the reasons behind them. The Deep could go either way after his actions with a redemption arc or a full turn to villain, but is shown to be knowingly aware of how little regard there is for him. He calls himself a "diversity hire" and acknowledges his own ineptitude, but he's still an absolutely terrible person.

Queen Maeve may be one of my favorite changes that manages to be even more sympathetic than her already pretty great comic counterpart. She, much like Starlight, did want to change the world, but she let the apathy and jaded nature of the job take her over. She's an alcoholic that sees a bit of herself in Starlight. The change comes in how she reacts to what I think might be Homelander's most heinous act in the show. She shows far more remorse and guilt over what happens than she does in the comic, showing us a side of her makes you want to root for her and to see her get better.

The best character… dear Lord, is Homelander, played by Anthony Starr. Homelander is a bastard. The worst thing imaginable because of his sheer strength and power. He’s a sociopath with all of the powers of Superman and none of the goodness. In the comics he’s simply just another asshole. 

He’s the most powerful of the Seven and absolutely revels in the hedonistic lifestyle that he’s accustomed to while also hating being under the rule of Vought. In the show, he’s shown as being supportive to Vought, especially it’s current Senior VP of Hero Management, Madelyn Stillwell. He has something of a mommy fetish as shown with his interactions with her and later in the series actually expresses emotions over learning of his own tragedies, but instead of trying to change for the better, he doubles down on his hatred and anger to become an even bigger monster than before. 

In the comic he just wants all of the superheroes to conquer the world, but here, he just wants to hurt everyone who hurts him. He plays games like a child, threatening and revealing secrets to toy with people before absolutely breaking them. He's horrible in a very personal way and his sneering smile only makes him so much more hateable. He knows there isn't a damn thing you can do to stop him and he revels in that fact, I love it.

Pacing and Direction

Coming in at an hour for each episode, the first two to three can feel a bit slow. Getting all of the story elements to sit just right can take time, especially as new things are introduced every few minutes. This slow burn approach easily helps to build the tension before things get really crazy by episode four. By that point, the story is unfolding at a perfect rhythm, the team is mostly together, they’ve made their plans of action and it’s all so smooth.

Thankfully each episode is directed by different people to avoid each feeling so similar. The common humor and tone is kept the same, but some episodes are very hopeful almost before being met with one that absolutely makes you hate certain characters and the actions that they take. In particular, the episode where Hughie and Butcher visit a group therapy session and Butcher flies off into a rage about the weakness of the attendees as they basically lick the balls of the heroes that have maimed them was amazing. The director pulls so much emotion out of that scene and continues on as the episode moves along in a far more dramatic fashion than some of the others.

Some others lean heavier on the debauchery such as the episode where Hughie and Butcher venture into a superhero sex club and watch as these guys do some pretty amazing feats with their abilities in some really gross ways. There’s a good balance of levity and drama that makes neither feel too overwhelming.

Overall

With a great cast, impeccable acting and an unpredictability that I actually enjoyed, The Boys absolutely blew me away. I was wholly prepared to rip it apart if I felt like it didn’t do the story justice, but Rogen and Goldberg are fans and knew what we all wanted. It’s unabashedly a comic book show, but still has enough to it that people who have never heard of the series will be floored by how much they can find to enjoy.

It’s for the nihilistic and jaded comic book fan. It’s for the casual watcher who’s gotten enough of Marvel’s colorful displays of happiness and it’s absolutely for the happy person who just wants to have some fun with what they watch. 

I thoroughly enjoyed this season of The Boys. So much so that I’m aching with anticipation to re-read the comic series in preparation for Season Two. It’s unlikely that it’ll follow the plot much, if at all after the ending, but with Stormfront (as a woman) being announced as the new Hero joining the Seven in the next season, I’m excited as to who else they might pull. This first season absolutely earns a high recommendation from me.

[sugarandspice-games]

I guess this is becoming a trend... I’m popping in before the actual intro to clarify-- if the text is in italic, it is me (Sugar) talking and regular is Spice. Alright? Cool. And so--

So, one night I’m going through youtube and I come upon this one shitposty video about some random anime that I’ve never even heard of. After doing some research, I discover that it’s actually based on a dating sim that I’ve also never heard of. As a joke I was like “Hey Sugar wanna watch this as a joke, it might be funny” and so we did. And uhm. Well.

Today we’re gonna be reviewing Brothers Conflict, aka Sweet Home Alabama 2: Electric Anime Boogaloo aka the anime that ruined our lives. [Again, disclaimer: neither Sugar nor I condone incest and/or pedophilia, two themes which are uh, very rampant in this anime which is why I cannot recommend it in good faith. It’s not good, don’t get me wrong. I can’t really say that I liked it even if watching it and ragging on it was kind of enjoyable, and I did get attached to some of the characters because that’s the kind of idiot I am. Also, we’re not shirking our duties to write I swear please don’t kill me--] Anyway, an obligatory SPOILER WARNING though this probably isn’t going in the main tag bc I do not want the fans to publicly stone me. Why are we reviewing this? Bc we need to talk about it somewhere. Though I say review lightly bc this... is really more of a critique.

ALSO we only watched the anime, idk if things are different in the game. There is no full english translation for the games and most of the LP channels have been copyright striked, so please don’t come at us for not knowing anything. I also know that otome games and dating sims don’t tend to translate well to anime, and I will be addressing this later.

So, dear god, where do I begin.

Where do we begin indeed? How about the fact that her name is Ema and I had to google to remember the heroine’s name? Also, she is seventeen.

Our plot, or well... what you COULD call a plot, I guess, if you REALLY wanted to give this anime that much credit, focuses on the aforementioned seventeen year old Hinata Ema, who has an absent father who apparently FOUND THE TIME TO FALL IN LOVE AND GET MARRIED BUT NEVER HAS A SECOND TO SPARE FOR HIS ONLY CHILD, RINTARO I SWEAR TO GOD I AM TAKING CUSTODY OF YOUR CHILD. HAND HER OVER-- Anyway. He’s getting married to a woman who has 13 sons (jesus christ ma’am have you ever heard of a condom?) and he decides to move her in with them because... I guess he has less braincells than I have balls, which is to say, zero. Hi, I’m trans.

So, Ema moves in with them... along with her talking grey squirrel, Juli. Juli is... interesting and by interesting, I mean-- ABSOLUTELY PUZZLING. He, apparently, has seen the majority of Ema’s life from babyhood to teenagerhood and can talk but is only understood by Ema (who he calls Chii) and Louis, the eighth son in the Asahina family. It is never explained why, or how Chii came across him or how in an episode, a single episode, he becomes human because why the hell not, I guess??? (Also, he is pretty. YES. I said it. Fight me.) [Quick Spice intervention, this squirrel can talk to people, transform into a human, enter dreams, and live way longer than a squirrel should since the average lifespan of a squirrel is like 6 years in the wild. Juli is apparently a god as none of this is EVER explained.]

And when she meets the Asahina family, it’s pretty much immediately chaos because these heterosexual (I guess? They look like a bunch of twinks to me but there goes anime trying to convince me that straight people are real and not a lie made up by Trump) men have NEVER and I mean NEVER known a woman in their entire lives, since they seem to want to bang their stepsister immediately. And most of them are GROWN ASS ADULTS. Only three of them are actually minors (though Iori is 18 and only one year older so I guess??? It’s okay??? But still weird) and one of them is a 13 year old who looks and acts like he’s 8.

Oh, and did I mention that out of these boys, only the adult triplets and the abusive asshole 16 year old get any kind of characterization AND character development? I mean, Subaru gets an “arc” if you can call it that, but really, they don’t give him much... personality. You could replace him with a cardboard cutout and it’d be the same. I feel bad for him (but not really because dude you are 20 and she is your sister, what the fuck--)

But if there’s anything good about this anime, it is the characters themselves. Several of the boys have redeeming qualities and interesting personalities and quirks, as well as interesting relationships and dynamics with each other. Yes, some of them are lacking in the plotline department while others may have decent plotlines and lack personality, and then some of them are just given absolutely nothing (COUGH Masaomi COUGH Ukyo COUGHCOUGHCOUGH Iori, and by the way, what the fuck is that game plotline bc I read the wiki since I wanted to know more about him. We don’t have time to unpack the mento illness luv. But you’re telling me they had all this meat to work with and they threw it in the trash and gave him nothing? What the hell?) And if anything, I feel as if the characters themselves are crippled by the plotline. If given a different story, perhaps, they may have room to shine, because a lot of them are compelling if not lovable (though some may not be... lovable. COUGHFuuto, at least not for me.) If you want to see our review on the characters, we’ll put out another post.

Iori... Iori has a hell of a plot in the game, according to the Wiki but I can’t blame the writers for not exploring all of it because whoa. It is dark and not in a good way. But back to the subject at hand... I agree with Spice. I do/did like quite a lot of the characters... provided the entire romantic plot is taken away but we will go into more of why the plot is problematic below. All I can really add is: There is a baby in this dumpster and canon has been taken out back to be shot like a lame horse.

This brings me to a point in which I would like to pause the character discussion and bring up a glaring flaw with this anime in general (aside from the... plot. Look, I’m not a huge fan of weird stepsibling stuff but I think that if you want to do something like that, there are ways to do it and ways not to do it. This was the way not to do it, which I’m getting to). The biggest thing that made this anime so uncomfortable was the imbalance of power dynamics. Why is the protagonist 17 when most of the love interests are 18 and older, and I mean much, much older? And she’s not any 17 year old... she’s a lonely, neglected girl who is starved for the love of a family. This makes her easily manipulated by the brothers, who clearly desire her for less than wholesome reasons, and that makes it skeevy. I’m not sure why there’s such a fetishization of nonconsent in media, as if it’s fine for as many men to lust after female protagonists as the writer desires BUT the woman can’t want a single one of them in return. It’s creepy, and quite frankly, I am very much over it. I also get that the age thing is probably a product of the protagonist of a teenager oriented dating sim not translating well to an anime (because really, all otome game MCs are meant to be a neat little pair of shoes for the player to imagine themselves in), but why are we fetishizing a teenager being groomed by adults anyway? Especially adults who have this much power over her to begin with? The power dynamics bring this plot from “Oh, this might be kinda trashy but it could be entertaining” to “This is extremely creepy and rapey and kind of a dumpster fire.”

This is also true. If we were to take age into consideration, Fuuto, Yusuke, and Iori would be the three candidates left for Chii. This is taking out the youngest as well, who is... thirteen, I think? But anyway, (I know I am probably going to get some hate for this but go for it), I am into stories that explore the stepsibling thing and it can make a good narrative-- but before everyone gets uppity: There is a line between FICTION and REALITY and I do not condone real life incest but a story is a story and there are ways to frame it that make it clear that it is not a romantic thing, or acceptable. This anime does not do that in it’s dynamics because some of the brothers do start off in that very firm caregiving, family role and it is a sharp turn into romance that makes you go, “?” or in Fuuto case, a blending that does lean into fetishization.

All in all I think the plot maybe could have been okay? I’m not saying it isn’t problematic, because we all know it is, who are we kidding? But I don’t think it’s wrong per se to explore family dynamics with romance and to understand where the line should be drawn, and maybe exploring the definition of family itself. I have seen fanfictions with similar tropes ask those questions and explore the concept beautifully without romanticizing or fetishizing incest and unhealthy power dynamics. It could have been good, and I get that perhaps I’m barking up the wrong tree by expecting mature themes in an anime based on an otome game, but it also could have been a lot less... creepy (I have used that word so much that it looks wrong now) even if it wasn’t the greatest thing ever. But again, what was I expecting? I watched this whole thing as a joke and ended up attached to the characters like a fool... That tends to be a trend here, and this is why we are so salty all the time. So anyway, stay tuned for our review of the characters! We may not cover all of them since some of them don’t really get anything, but we’ll cover what we found interesting.

[morningsound15]

I agree with you that the whole political system in the US is rotten to its core. I don't know what it is, but it's not a democracy. And yes, Biden won't bring the structural change that's needed. However, don't you think it'll be easier to get any change at all if after the election we get a blue house, senate and president? (Not to mention the supreme court seats won't fall into Republican's hands.) I mean, at least this way there's a chance progressives can get some of their causes through.

okay, so this is like the only ask i’m going to answer about this because i do NOT want this page to turn into this, this blog is the only part of the entire internet for me that isn’t entirely devoted to politics, organizing, radical education, theory, community-building, mutual aid, agitation, etc. i do that on literally every other social media platform and i do not want to do it here. that said i will answer this ask, i guess, though not exactly in the way you asked it i’m just gonna dump my thoughts on electoralism & this election here and i apologize in advance for how long this is going to be

to your general ask: yes, some people believe that. that is a reason many people are participating in this election (i go into that further down). my objection is not to the idea of participating in this election, the idea of voting, or the idea of voting for joe biden. it’s the entire framing of the situation & it’s the complete disregard for any people who have decided not to participate in this election, or who have decided to participate in this election & not vote for joe biden (i am NOT talking about republicans or trump supporters, that is a party of fascists & white supremacists & i am NOT talking about them, i’m talking about young people and the disaffected left). i’ll explain (under the cut so it doesn’t clutter y’alls feeds & so hopefully i won’t get as much hate because if there’s one thing i know it’s that no one on the internet reads)

what i object to is the framing of joe biden as anything less than an active enemy of the left & progressives. (the left & progressives are not the same thing, but they are both to the left of the dem party so i am putting them together for the sake of this argument but progressives are not leftists, though some leftists do describe themselves as progressives & vice versa, just want to put that out there to start.)

what i object to is the framing of joe biden as an ally. this kind of “at least he is willing to be pushed” “at least he’s already been pushed to the left by progressives” “at least he’s willing to listen & maybe with enough pressure we can get him where he needs to be!” “at least maybe a biden administration will support the policies we want them to!” because he’s not willing to learn, he’s not willing to help, he’s not willing to listen, he’s not willing to support progressive policies to tackle the healthcare/climate/war/imperialism crises or do any of that stuff. his policy goals, his entire campaign is basically to figure out what is the absolute bare MINIMUM thing he needs to do in order to say that he’s “moving the country in the right direction” so he can get elected & so he can get political cover from well-meaning but ultimately extremely sheltered dem figureheads while at the same time actively standing in the way of any real reform, progress, change, abolition, justice, etc. that’s his goal, he’s been very clear about that fact, i do not need to go into all the ways he’s already said & proved that! it’s obvious in his speeches, in the entire dnc (i watched every night of the dnc hoping for someone to lay out a good reason for me to vote for biden & i came up with 0 thanks democratic party), the people he has running his campaign, the donors he has, the lobbyists he hires to write his policy platform, the way he cozies up to billionaires, racists, segregationists, war criminals, and the way he always has in order to ‘maintain the order of politics’ & it’s gross & we don’t really need to go into it. he’s a capitalist, he’s a corporatist, he takes $$ from pharmaceutical companies and oil lobbyists and he is not a good person. BUT! many progressives know this and believe this, & still are voting for him. that is fine.

but we have to remember that joe biden is not our friend, he is not our ally, he is an enemy of the left, he is an active obstacle stopping us from achieving what we want to achieve (liberation, equality, justice, the dismantling of capitalism). so let’s not get it fucking twisted, like we need to be clear about that from the jump. we shouldn’t talk about him like he wants those things, like he’ll help us achieve those things, because he doesn’t, and he won’t, so we do not need to talk about him like he does. it is damaging to the progressive left of the democratic party to talk about biden like he’ll help us achieve any of our goals, because he won’t. we will need to fight just as hard if not HARDER under a biden administration to get the things we want, because we’ll be fighting with the people supposedly in our own party too, and they (along with the political machine they worship & kill themselves to support) are going to do everything they can to demonize and push out the young progressive diverse left, to break their spirits & destroy the political potential of the few politicians they actually do like, because that’s what they’ve always done, because the progressive left represents a threat to institutional capitalist white supremacist power. so our job would not be EASIER under a biden administration. it will just be different. we have to be very clear about that when we talk about what might happen in november.

now, that’s NOT TO SAY that there are not good reasons people have for voting for joe biden. i’m not telling people not to vote for joe biden and i am not telling people not to vote. that’s not what i’m saying. you just have to understand what this country is, what these politicians are, what they want, and what they are going to do to achieve what they want. just don’t lie about it. and only when you understand all of that can you make a truly informed decision about this upcoming election.

you can support joe biden for a lot of reasons. there are a lot of people whose politics don’t align with mine who want me to vote for joe biden, and there are people whose politics do align with mine who are making the choice to vote for joe biden. and the things that the latter group says, stuff that i find persuasive, is stuff like “joe biden is an enemy. donald trump is also an enemy. putting joe biden into office is better for the cause of liberation/leftists/revolution because he is a weaker enemy. he is a weaker opponent. we might be able to do things with him in office to help us tinker with the way our system is structured that will ultimately be for the benefit of the true left wing of this country, which will help future political actors survive in our rigged electoral system and maybe actually gain & maintain political power.” (stuff like abolishing the filibuster, getting rid of the electoral college, packing the courts, systemic changes that we need to make if we want to wrest control of this broken political system from the hands of fascists and white supremacists - many of whom sit inside the democratic party too, so let’s not get that twisted. all of these proposed changes, by the way, it’s important to note (unless i’m incorrect which i don’t think i am) joe biden doesn’t openly support or advocate for ANY of them, so let’s not get THAT twisted either.)

here’s the argument i think you’re making anon, from the mouth of comrade Angela Davis (libs love to weaponize angela davis’ words on biden without comprehending any of her politics or supporting her abolitionist policy positions, also there are other abolitionists who do not agree with davis here but i digress):

“In our electoral system as it exists, neither party represents the future that we need in this country. Both parties remain connected to corporate capitalism. But the election will not be so much about who gets to lead the country to a better future, but rather how we can support ourselves and our ability to continue to organize and place pressure on those in power. And I don’t think there’s a question about which candidate would allow that process to unfold… if we want to continue this work, we certainly need a person in office who will be more amenable to our mass pressure. And to me, that is the only thing that someone like Joe Biden represents.”

i don’t know if i fully agree with that argument per se! but i understand it, and i think it’s valid and valuable, and i understand arguments like that, and they are persuasive to me in many ways. because the republican party maintaining power is the way we slow-march into fascism, but also the democratic party getting/maintaining power is the way that we continue to slow-march to neoliberal destruction of the planet. so they’re both bad, obviously. but there are people who think (maybe they’re right! i’m swayed by this argument) that the biden administration would be easier to manipulate, easier to transform, than a trump administration.

(the counter-argument would maybe be that there are a lot of fucking liberals paying attention & even showing up in the streets right now because donald trump is the president, and if donald trump is no longer the president they’re gonna go home and be quiet and go back to brunch and close their eyes and plug their ears like they did with obama, just like they did during standing rock and ferguson and occupy, and be like “oh kamala harris wore CHUCKS on an AIRPLANE look at how COOL she is don’t you remember when there was a COOL war criminal in the white house?” there are people who are going to do that if biden/harris win, and that’s risky to me! like that is a risk we need to be talking about. i see that as dangerous. now, that’s not to say that’s more or less dangerous than what we currently have, it’s just a different kind of danger we need to be cognizant & wary of. and it’s people who post statuses like “fuck you all if you don’t vote for biden you privileged snowflake how dare you look at everything biden’s ever said done or promised he will do and decide that you don’t like that and you don’t want a part of it how dare you you fucking cuck you fucking idiot you support fucking fascists you fucking idiot” who make me lose my mind because like shut up! you don’t know what you’re talking about. there are people who know what they’re talking about who have decided they’re going to vote for joe biden and there’s people who know what they’re talking about who have decided they are not going to vote for joe biden, and you know what they don’t do? they don’t fucking fight each other, they don’t attack each other, they understand & support the reasons their comrades have for taking the action they are taking. and that is just what this is about. stop yelling at people that you don’t know who are making choices you don’t understand just because you don’t understand their choices.)

(this is even assuming biden will win, which is unlikely, or that trump will relinquish power, which is unlikely, or that there will be a peaceful transference of power and not a full-scale right-wing armed militia explosion of violence on american streets after november 3rd, so let’s all really be prepared for what might be coming in the next couple months!!!! all of these arguments mean next to nothing when we don’t even know what kind of violence awaits us in november)

it’s just psycho to think that joe biden is anything but an enemy. he is an enemy. and you can vote for an enemy and you can have your reasons for voting for an enemy, but don’t sell me shit and tell me it’s gourmet.

that’s mostly what i object to. the framing of this. and i’m not telling people not to vote for joe biden i’m not telling people not to vote. i think people should vote, because for those of us who are able & haven’t had that right stripped away from us or stolen from us by our own government, voting is easy, it’s literally the easiest thing that you can do because it’s also the LEAST politically effective thing that you can do. it’s like step fucking 1 because its impact is so low. that’s not a reason not to do it! that is not a reason not to do it. voting is important because any functioning society needs to have an engaged citizenry and an engaged electorate. now we don’t have that here, but you know what i’m saying. electoralism is a conditionally useful tool of enacting change and what we choose to do with that tool is an individual choice and there are people who are making different calculations than you, and they’re coming to different answers. and those people are often radicals, they’re often poor, they’re often black, or indigenous, or undocumented, or incarcerated. they’re often the most marginalized people in this society who are making these kinds of non-voting decisions, and it’s racist and misogynistic to assume that it’s all privileged white kids who are making that choice, because it isn’t, okay? it fucking isn’t.

and it’s so crazy because it’s always white cis libs who are talking about how important it is to get out and vote and to vote for people who aren’t like you and to vote for someone who isn’t you and it’s like, the black radicals i know are not voting for biden! they just aren’t. they do not see the electoral system or the fucking presidency as the thing that’s going to help & protect their communities. so instead they’re organizing on the ground, they’re distributing food & funds & housing comrades & fighting the police & helping elders shop and pick up medicine & making sure kids have internet access so they can go to school and that is what people are doing on the ground. they aren’t all up on instagram or tumblr sharing voting memes & telling people to hold their nose & “just vote for biden he’s the best choice we have” because they understand that for their communities, that’s not what liberation looks like. that’s y’all doing that goofy social media shit.

political power lies with the people always. the people collectively will prove whether or not the biden electoral strategy (of appealing to older, conservative/moderate, white voters in the midwest instead of young voters, poor voters, and voters of color all over the country, but i digress) is successful. whether or not his strategy is successful, the responsibility for the outcome of this election lies SOLELY with the biden campaign, capitalism, voter suppression, white supremacy, and our undemocratic election system — NOT the individual voters. know your enemy & know which system you need to fight. hint: it’s not apathetic or disengaged voters.

vote for whoever you want to vote for. don’t vote for trump, obviously, he’s a fascist do not vote for him. but for people who are not fascists or white supremacists, just try to understand what you’re doing and your position in the world & in this political system & act accordingly. not voting is not an excuse to do nothing; if you are choosing not to engage in electoral politics the expectation is you should be working twice as hard to make sustained impacts and improvements in your community. and if you ARE choosing to engage in electoral politics, the expectation is you should be working twice as hard to make sustained impacts and improvements in your community.

if what you think the liberation fight is is making sure you turn out at the ballot box on november 3rd, if that’s how you think you are being the most helpful, it isn’t and you’re not. you’re doing something, sure, and it’s not bad. like i did this, this was my job for a year, my job was to register voters and get young people to vote. i don’t have that job any more because i don’t believe that’s the solution. i just don’t believe it’s the solution. i don’t believe we should be talking about this upcoming election like it’s a solution, because it’s really just another problem we’re going to have to face and tackle, and we can’t talk about this election like anything is going to be solved if joe biden is president instead of trump because it’s not, and it won’t be, and these people are all our enemies, and we have to treat them like they are. that’s not to say don’t vote for them, if you understand all that & that is the decision you come to! just know what you’re voting for, and know what it means.

whatever, i’m not gonna keep going on this, rant over forever just had to spit that out somewhere and if i put that shit on my Facebook i would get unfriended by every white lib i went to high school with so fucking quick…

[andorerso]

For the anon who asked for more of the bodyguard AU with angst and pining, here it is! It’s a follow-up to this fic but you don’t have to read that in order to understand this. Enjoy!

Cassian has never been a fan of these parties. They’re crowded, phony, and way too extravagant. A charity ball, they call it, but it’s just an excuse for the rich to flaunt their money and feel important while wearing gowns and tuxedos worth thousands of dollars. They act like dearest friends and exchange cheek kisses and politely wonder “how’s the family?” then turn around and gossip behind their backs the next minute. It’s not an effort for Cassian to play along, it’s in his blood – but he hates it with a passion.

That being said, Jyn does look magnificent in her gradient blue gown that leaves her shoulders bare and shows a little more cleavage than usual, even if she clearly hates wearing it. It’s more practical for her to blend in with the other upper-class guests than openly pose as his bodyguard and Cassian is a bit grateful for that. He likes her presence, he really does, but he occasionally he feels like a child in need of protecting from the big bad world. A break is nice, sometimes.

And if his eyes linger on her a little longer than it should, well. That’s both an advantage and a drawback. He really needs to get over this stupid crush he has on his bodyguard, but he can use that attraction and channel the pent-up frustration into flirting with this lovely woman in front of him who’s attainable and clearly willing. Unlike Jyn, who’s his bodyguard, so they can’t, and who doesn’t see him that way, so they can’t.

The woman’s name is Melanie, she’s an heiress, and she’s a lot more tolerable than most of the guests here combined. Will it go anywhere? No, but at least he can distract himself for one night, and since he and Jyn are not supposed to be interacting much, he has to make do with the next best thing. Melanie is smart and Cassian finds himself laughing at some of her jokes (even if they’re gentle and not the dry sarcastic wit he’s used to) and he doesn’t absolutely hate it when she strokes a finger up his arm and sends him a flirty smile.

Jyn, apparently, does.

Cassian could feel her eyes on him all night – it’s part of her job description – but since he began talking to Melanie, it’s been less a watchful gaze, and more a persistent glare. He’s been trying to ignore it; if you ask him, she’s way too paranoid for her own good. Last week, she shouted at the mailman for Heaven’s sake, and he was only bending down to tie his shoelaces. Cassian can imagine the scenarios she’s probably dreaming up in her head about the thousand ways Melanie could kill him.

It’s all a little too grave for him; he’s not going to get attacked every time he crosses the street. But Jyn takes her job very seriously, and he’s grateful, really, but he wishes she’d give him some breathing room sometimes. Like now, when all he’s trying to do is talk to a pretty lady who has no intentions of murdering him in a quiet corner.

Most likely.

The arm touching seems to be the last straw and Jyn marches over, setting down the glass of champagne that she’s been pretending to drink.

“Darling,” she begins, and Cassian’s eyes grow huge. Before he could react, she slips an arm into his. “There you are, I’ve been looking for you. My mother held me up on the phone but I’m all yours now. And you are?”

She asks it so politely that it almost feels like an insult.

Melanie watches them with raised eyebrows, sending an incredulous glare in Cassian’s direction when he turns to look at her. At the question in her eyes, he just sighs. There’s really no point in trying to salvage this anymore.

“Melanie,” she answers with a tight-lipped smile when he doesn’t say anything. “I was just leaving.”

The look, before she goes, is one that says she thinks Cassian is just like the others; lying and manipulative. He watches her walk away with a twinge of regret then rounds on Jyn when she’s out of earshot.

“What the hell?” he glowers, voice low enough that only Jyn would hear.

She shrugs, absolutely unapologetic. “She was getting way too handsy. Didn’t trust her.”

Cassian looks around, feeling too exposed out in the open with all the guests milling around. They’re not even supposed to be talking. Taking Jyn’s arm, he steers them to a quiet corner next to the balcony doors.

“You’re acting crazy.”

“I’m your bodyguard,” she says like she says it every time. Like it trumps everything. Cassian is a little sick of it. Granted, she’s never chased away attractive women before, but she’s certainly chased away people. Friendly harmless people. The mailman was replaced after the incident last week. “It’s my job to protect you.”

He gives her a glare, half-frustrated, half-incredulous. 

“She was flirting with me,” he tells her, keeping his voice low so they don’t draw attention to themselves. The anger is still clear in his tone. “She wasn’t trying to slit my throat.”

“You don’t know that,” she snaps, just as annoyed. Like she has any right to be, after pulling that stunt. “Seduction is a common tactic.”

“Oh, really?” he says, his voice disbelieving to his own ears.

Jyn’s eyes darken. She steps closer. “Oh, really. You want me to show you?”

“Please, do,” he says on instinct, too angry to back down. His voice is a challenge and Jyn quirks an eyebrow at him, almost pleased.

When she takes a step forward, he’s still glaring. Then she touches his hand like Melanie had, teasingly running her fingers up his arm, and it occurs to him that he didn’t really think this through. The look she turns his way is coy, playful, her eyes unnervingly dark and wanting.

What –

Cassian is surprised by the fierce intensity of her gaze. It barely registers that she’s pretending as she leans in towards him, her lips grazing his neck, her breath hot on his skin. A shudder runs through him. She smells so good. Jyn tilts her head and their lips almost meet, close enough that he can nearly taste her. Her eyes are on him and he can’t look away; like a moth drawn to a flame, he’s sucked in by her mere presence.

“You’re really handsome, you know that?” she says, voice low and captivating. He pretty much loses all train of thought.

And just when he thinks she’s about to kiss him –

She has a knife against his throat.

“You’re dead,” she says, her tone now matter-of-fact and cold.

Cassian swallows. For God’s sake.

“Put that thing away before someone sees it,” he manages to get out, though his voice is raspy and deep. He clears his throat.

Jyn obeys with a shrug. She gives him a look, the same intensity from before but without the heated lust. He wonders if he imagined it – or worse, if it really was just pretend.

“You believe me now?”

Cassian looks away, taking a second to compose himself. He doesn’t want her to see how affected he is, by her, by her touch, by her gaze, by her closeness. It goes beyond her simply trying to seduce him; it’s not a physical thing, not completely. He refuses to admit it, even to himself, how deep his feelings for her run.

And a part of him wants to argue, wants to tell her that not every woman who flirts with him is going to want to stab him in the back – doesn’t she have any faith in him attracting people just because they find him interesting? – but he can’t bring himself to it. Can’t be around her right now.

“You made your point,” he allows her instead, nodding, trying not to sound too curt. It doesn’t quite work. “I think I should go mingle,” he says, noting the way other guests are beginning to glance their way in curiosity. The last thing he wants is to give these people reason to gossip about him.

He leaves Jyn with only the briefest look and doesn’t notice the way she turns to stare after him wistfully.

Cassian throws the newspaper on the table with an angry huff. Jyn stares at him, her arms crossed, slightly defensive. He wishes he wasn’t about to ruin her day too.

They’ve barely talked in the past two days since the ball and now this. This is going to set them back for at least another week.

“It’s all over the magazines,” he says, unable to keep the frustration out of his voice. “Who is Cassian Andor’s new secret girlfriend?”

He taps his finger against the picture taken of them. It’s far away, the zoom-in making the picture blurry, but Cassian’s face is still visible from this angle. Jyn has her back to the camera, practically wrapped around his body, deemed “the mysterious brunette” by tabloids. It’s likely one of the waiters noticed them snuggled up in the corner and took a quick snap with their phone, then contacted tabloids as soon as possible. Though it was taken out of context, Cassian has to admit they look quite cozy on the photo – the media is having a field day with it.

Jyn stares at the picture in horror, her arms falling from her chest as she leans closer to take a good look. Immediately, her defensive look is replaced by one of guilt.

“Fuck, I’m so sorry.” She shakes her head, looking up at him. “I wasn’t thinking.”

“I should have known better.” Cassian slumps down on the couch, rubbing a tired hand across his face. He’s silent for a second, trying to look on the bright side. He’s not sure there is any. “It’ll blow over in a while.”

Jyn shakes her head, lost in her own head.

“This isn’t like me,” she says, desperation sneaking into her voice. She seems to be talking to herself, rather than him. Cassian frowns, sitting up straighter as he sees her beginning to spiral.

“Will the agency be mad?” he asks, wondering if this puts her in trouble with her boss. Jyn doesn’t appear to hear him.

“This isn’t like me,” she repeats. Her eyes snap up to him and he sees fear and panic in her gaze. His stomach twists uncomfortably. “I can’t be your bodyguard anymore.”

“What?” Cassian cries, jumping up from his seat.

She stands too, taking a step backwards. “I’m sorry. I have to resign.”

“What are you talking about, why?”

“It’s for the best,” she says only, and before he knows it, she’s struggling in her hurry to put on her jacket. Cassian stares at her in horror and confusion.

“The hell it is – Jyn, you can’t seriously think that.”

He hears a twinge of anger creep into his voice, masking the fear squeezing at his heart. He has no idea what’s happening, why she’s acting this way, but he doesn’t particularly like the thought of her leaving. Leaving him. Without so much as an explanation.

Is this only because of the picture?

“Trust me, Cassian…” She finishes pulling on her jacket and stops to give him a look begging him to forgive her. “You don’t know what I really think. And that’s why I have to go.”

What?

“You’re not making any sense,” he says, voice rising in his desperation. She pays him no mind.

“I’m sorry,” she repeats, for the thousandth time, and are those tears shining in her eyes? Cassian is dumfounded. He’s never seen her cry, not once. The closest he thinks she got it was when he was shot and bleeding in her arms.

Somehow, that makes him feel a terror he’s never quite felt before. If she’s crying, it must really be bad. She really means this.

“I’ll make sure you get someone good,” she says, voice a whisper, before she turns around and heads for the door. Cassian has no time to wrap his head around it; he starts after her, driven by a primitive instinct to make her stay.

“Wait, Jyn.” He reaches out a hand but stops when she turns around, giving him a pleading look.

“Please, don’t follow me,” she says and Cassian stills. How could he disobey that? He can’t chase after her if she truly wants to go.

But his face remains pleading, one last look begging her to stay, before she turns around and walks out the door.

[trumplerlaw-blog]

Tomorrow’s Headline Today - President Trump's Coronavirus Initiatives Single-Handedly Saves Countless American Lives

Another evening, another White House Coronavirus Taskforce Briefing. As I have done twice before, I am going to write a thorough and detailed analysis of President Trump's, Tuesday, March 31, 2020, projection of the numbers and remarks. To his credit, the President finally said, to summarize, and put in layman's terms, what amounts to, "Whoopsie." In a rare moment of clarity, President Trump next deferred to the experts, Dr. Fauci and Dr. Birx, AKA Tony and Deborah, to explain how devastating of a tragedy this disease will be. In short, the dynamic duo explained that we must disregard all the insane nonsense, the President and his friends over at "Fox Fiction" have been telling us for weeks about the virus and finally get our shit together. Also, from what it appeared, someone somewhere finally had a conversation with the good Dr. Birx and explained to her what it looks like to have a hand up your ass when you speak on national television. On Tuesday, she spoke candidly for the first time about COVID-19 and did not limit her remarks to small data manipulations. Ultimately, the two doctors explained that even with blanket nationwide adoption of stringent mitigation efforts, between 100,000 and 240,000 Americans could die. These numbers were startling. At one point during their talk, Dr. Fauci, who much like Obi-Wan Kenobi was in "A New Hope," appears to be our only hope, showed a modicum of positivity in an otherwise dreary proceeding. During the number-crunching portion of his remarks, Dr. Fauci cautiously mentioned the promising effects that social distancing appears to be having on curbing the spread of the virus and urged Americans to soldier on. "Whenever you're having an effect, it's not time to take your foot off the accelerator," Dr. Fauci suggested. As the evening wore on, during a back and forth with the press, the President rambled nonsensically, "It's not the flu. It's vicious." Well, I'll be fucked and called Mary. Every credible scientist has been warning people that "It's not the flu" since this began you fucking nitwit. It was you, and your friends who were disseminating the whole comparing it to the flu and car crashes narrative. It was a jarring and sobering but needed about-face for the President. The President claimed on Tuesday that he always knew how grave the situation was and is. When a reporter pushed him and asked why he had been feeding us bullshit, seeing as he has known from the beginning that the crisis was so weighty, the President remarked that he was trying to be "optimistic." President Trump's dramatic change of course, however, is not without political purpose lest you think he suddenly woke up sober and alert. If you cannot "Reopen America" to save the stock market and your job numbers as previously planned because you are going to lose more than a quarter of a million American lives, what do you do? You change the narrative, of course. Most progressives, I know, do not take President Trump seriously. They refuse to endorse the idea that there is a cult of personality. They make excuses about why he won in 2016. "Everyone hated Hillary," they will say. "No one likes a political dynasty," I will hear. "Hillary did not know how to speak to the American people." "The Russians interfered and won it for him," is a favorite. "The Electoral College fucked us" is another. There are grains of truth in all of the comments above. The idea that President Trump has no clue what he is doing, however, is misguided. Moreover, the notion that he is not beloved by large swaths of the unwashed, and sometimes very washed, masses is also false. While seemingly erratic, there are discernable patterns and messaging in every public statement and each "Tweet" by the President. This messaging gets reinforced and promulgated by his friendlies, like luminaries, Presidential Medal of Freedom winner Rush Limbaugh, and those over at "Fox Fiction." Tomorrow's Headline Today was going to read, "President Trump's Upcoming Grand Reopening of America." It is now going to read, "President Trump's Coronavirus Initiatives Single-Handedly Saves Countless American Lives." Progressives need to take President Trump and his bid for a second term seriously. By ignoring his wild personal popularity among many Americans, because you hate him and everything he stands for, you have lost sight of what has won elections in this country since the advent of modern media. Ask dearly departed fellow Whittier Poet alumn, Richard Milhous Nixon ('34), how that went for him on September 26, 1960.

[tessatechaitea]

Dark Knight Returns: The Golden Child

Darkseid pees out of his eyes.

"It's 2020 and Frank Miller is still doing 'Not' jokes" is the only review of this comic book you probably need.

The Joker and Darkseid are cumming in their pants over the engagement in the election cycle. I guess people who want to stop terrible politicians from making the country a living hell for a vast number of the population are simply falling into their trap! Stupid people who want a better world! Can't they see that the only way to defeat The Joker and Darkseid is to disengage from the circus of election cycles and simply live their own life without any concern for others? Doesn't the electorate know the best life to live is the life that leads to Ayn Randian defenses of their own selfish needs? Just shut up and take what they give you, you dumb fucks. I should probably finish reading this story before I continue to jump from conclusion to conclusion about Frank Miller's point. His ultimate point might simply be that the children will save us all! Or that it doesn't matter if the children change the world or not because the adults will all be dead by then so who fucking cares? Supergirl Lara confronts Darkseid by blasting him with her heat vision. He dies multiple times or something but doesn't somehow. He applauds her rage the way bad guys always do and then calmly sits down to tell all of the children a story. He's going to be sensible and rational which means it will be the truth, I think. Obviously if you have any emotional attachment to your beliefs, they're garbage beliefs. Until you can squeeze all of the humanity out of yourself, the things you believe won't hold up in rational debate! So divest yourself of your rage, children! It will only make you more logical and intellectually stronger! But also divest yourself of your joy and your despair and your other emotions I can't think of! There must be more, right? While Darkseid is distracted regaling everybody with his tale of the anti-life equation, Superboy sneaks up behind him and takes over his Omega Effect. He turns it back on Darkseid and Darkseid disintegrates into non-existence. Unless he was transported back in time. I don't really know how his eyeball lasers work. Darkseid doesn't stay dead for long. He returns as the Omega God, as the end of everything, as the final death of everything on Earth.

But maybe later, I guess?

Batwoman beats up some Jokers and shuts down Trump's ability to broadcast to Gotham. It makes Darkseid angry enough to return for some reason. Probably a metaphorical reason. Or an analogical reason. I think maybe my attention span is seriously slipping! And right when I'm getting to the part that's probably going to explain what the fuck is going on in this comic book. Superboy destroys Darkseid by calling him an old fart. Also maybe a little bit by blasting him with a new super power: neutron vision! Darkseid has now had his powers stripped so far back that a human bouncing a rock off of his head makes him bleed. But still he thinks, "I will manipulate these fools with my lofty words!" But then Greta Thunberg clenches her fist at him and Batwoman says, "You have no power here! We're thinking for ourselves now!" And then that's the end somehow. Dark Knight Returns: The Golden Child Rating: I can't comprehend what I just read. Maybe the point was that we shouldn't comprehend what other people want us to comprehend? Maybe it was an anti-propaganda story? Maybe it was just terrible writing pretending to be art? It's so hard to tell because it's trying so hard to be complex! Is it's complexity real or a facade? I can't tell! Maybe I should stick to easier things to understand, like James Joyce's Finnegans Wake or Alan Moore's 1300 page novel, Jerusalem, which I finished. Maybe that's Frank Miller's problem. Maybe he just didn't have enough pages to really get to the point he was trying to make. But then if he did have more pages, how many would he waste by simply repeating the same things over and over again? For those of you who haven't read this (or Superman: Year One), he does that a lot. Not in the good way that Tom King and Gertrude Stein repeat themselves. Just in a way that makes you think, "I got it! Superboy is right in Darkseid's brain." Maybe that's a poor example from this comic book because repeating that over and over works to show how painful Superboy's presence in Darkseid's brain is. But I assure you there were many other examples that I can't make excuses for. I just can't be bothered to dig back through the comic book to find them.

[briannamarguerite]

i literally experienced gaslighting and sexual abuse as a child and the fact that y’all wanna compare that stuff to people telling you to please stay the fuck out of a celebrity’s private life and just believe the things he’s said (over and over again) because it’s not about you and you’re not entitled to know....i’m sick. i’m so sorry. please seek some kind of help bc this isn’t a normal or healthy comparison and its not healthy for YOU to spread this message to young impressionable girls.

Hi there, I’m very sorry you had that experience, and I’m sorry if this discussion has been triggering for you. 

But this ask presents a false and disingenuous take on the argument, perhaps without intending to, I won’t assume. Again, if this was about a celebrity essentially lying to protect their private lives, I wouldn’t give two shits. 

But people aren’t saying, stay out of his private life, they’re saying “If Louis says it’s true, then it’s true.” And then making young, impressionable girls question their own reality and lived experiences, and putting them in a position to either have their fave “hate them” or be ostracized from their in-groups if they don’t go along. 

Even that, I would shrug off especially if it was a one-off. 

But the people who are in charge of crafting Louis’ image have encouraged and fostered this culture of gaslighting (I’m sorry, but that is the correct definition for it, whether you agree with the severity of it or not). They are altering the reality of the past, and telling people who question it that they are crazy. They literally check almost all the signs of gaslighting tactics there are. And it’s gone on for years, this is just the most blatant attempt. 

Maybe you don’t see this as a serious thing because it’s in relationship to a boybander’s personal life, but it is crucially important to point out that in a fandom that is young and primarily female these are signs to watch out for. Stan culture already breeds a dangerous level of worship, to then have that power be abused is really important to talk about.

Please understand I’m not trivializing more extreme cases of gaslighting, but instead I’m encouraging people to recognize it for what it is. I have also had personal experience with it and it took me a while to identify the relationship as abusive, despite the fact that I’m fairly well-versed in the subject. For people who have little to no knowledge about the tactics, it’s even harder to recognize. 

This is a very blatant attempt at gaslighting in the media, and the fact that there is argument against that fact shows how effective it is. In this era of Trump, you need to realize that gaslighting doesn’t just happen on a personal level, it’s utilized by people across the spectrum (in this case the label/PR/whatever). Here’s a good quote about it:

“To say gaslighting was started by the Bushes, Lee Atwater, Karl Rove, Fox News, or any other extant group is not simply wrong, it also misses an important point. Gaslighting comes directly from blending modern communications, marketing, and advertising techniques with long-standing methods of propaganda. They were simply waiting to be discovered by those with sufficient ambition and psychological makeup to use them.”

It’s a go-to with Trump as well. He often times says something and that later vehemently insists, “I did not say that.” 

In this day in age, we NEED to call out this kind of emotional manipulation by people in power, especially when it’s being done to a primarily female fanbase. It’s gone on too long. 

Again, I’m very sorry for what you’ve been through.

[night-panda]

I agree with the other anon. It's like you pick and choose such small parts of the movie and blow them up until they ~symbolize~ something - often by taking them completely out of context. I think you just want to be mad. Which sucks for you because it's actually way more fun to just enjoy the movie.

Original Rant

Original Anon

Hey nonny, what I’m understanding of your message is that either, 

a) The material given should not be analyzed and taken at face value. Which does make the movie going experience much easier as it makes inconsistencies, plot holes and problematic themes get a pass as they become void of importance. I will admit, if no thought is given while watching a piece of media, most things are pretty satisfactory. However, that does not mean that problematic elements are not still there. Rather, what this says is that we should just take what is given, even if it’s bad, sit down, shut up, and perpetuate harmful stereotypes and tropes because really who the fuck cares?

Who the fuck cares about sexism? Racism? Anti- semitism? Victims of abuse? Who the fuck cares what happens in the subtext, it wasn’t in the text? If they didn’t explicitly say a thing, then surely it’s not there. If it wasn’t a major point of the movie then surely it doesn’t matter. What matters is that I, and I alone, was not harmed by anything that could possibly have a deeper meaning I’m not seeing, so I’m going to say anyone who thought too much about this is being ridiculous. It’s a movie, who the fuck cares, don’t think too hard about it and just enjoy yourself.

That’s one way I see this message. That critical thought should not be put into a piece of media, even if that media is vastly influential and reaches millions of people. That subtext actually has no meaning and symbolism that isn’t explicitly stated can not be found in anything by anybody. But it’s okay if the movie was fun.

or

b) That authorial intent trumps any and all other interpretations of a piece of media. That if the intention of something being there wasn’t in the creation of the piece than it’s not there. I’m not going to get into this debate. Here is a video about authorial intent, and specifically so in the case of JK Rowling by Sarah Z. However, the short of it is that because authorial intent is the only way a piece of art should be viewed no one can have their own interpretations of a piece of media. Anyone with differing life experiences, and therefore perspectives on a given work, are invalid because their interpretation is not what was considered when creating the work.

Further, in regards specifically to the movie, who is to say what is a small component of it? Just because you don’t think something is important, doesn’t mean that it isn’t to me. Just because your priority in the movie going experience may be overall plot (which in my opinion was rushed) or visuals or what have you, isn’t my priority in what makes a movie good for me. Don’t get me wrong, I still like visuals, I still want a good plot, but that’s not the be all end all. 

What makes a movie good for me are the characters, their dynamics, coherence with the larger universe. So when something happens to a character I care highly about, like a kind Jewish woman in a loving relationship, turns out to not only drug her boyfriend to entrap him in a marriage he said he didn’t want (perpetuating a long standing stereotype of Jewish woman, of which I am), and then have her join literal magic Hitler, it’s going to have a big impact on my viewing of this movie. It’s not just a small thing to me being blown out of context. It is a major component of the movie to me. You may not care about this character, you may not place importance on her well being as a contingent to your enjoyment of this film, but I do. Seeing characters being badly written and needlessly killed (Queenie and Leta respectively) have a major impact on how I view a film because that’s what I think about when I consider if I liked the movie.

This doesn’t even mention the myriad of other things that I am mad about. The pacing of this movie was bad. It was rushed and the transitions left me confused multiple times throughout the movie to the point it took me out of the world. Other things that were just bad include: ignoring universe lore/canon, ignoring the established timeline, having characters serve no purpose other than just being there, having plot lines that didn’t go anywhere, and so on.

Further my main points of contention that I mentioned are not out of context? Where did you even get that idea from? Here they are:

1. Queenie gave Jacob a love potion because he didn’t want to get married and she did. This is explicitly said to be the reason why she drugged him and is the issue of their marriage is a big argument between them through the whole movie.

2. Queenie voluntarily joined with Grindlewald at the end of the movie. I won’t believe she was drugged until we get proof. Manipulated, perhaps, but out right drugged? I won’t say until it is confirmed. The point is she joined him willingly. And I am mad about that be cause of what we do know about the wider universe. We know that Queenie is Jewish and we know that Grindlewald worked with his non-magic counter part (Hitler) during WW2. It is not blowing anything out of context when I say that I am mad that a Jewish woman joins magic Hitler.

3. Leta’s death was meant to allow the boys to escape. However, when I say it was pointless, it was because there were other ways this could have happened. As I’ve already said they could apparate out. We saw others do it, and therefore so could they. We know the actual purpose of her death was literally to push Newt to the “right” side  and fight against Grindlewald. We know this because he explicitly said he was not going to choose a side, he maintained this stance until Grindlewald killed a person he cared about in front of him and he confirmed he was only now against Grindlewald. However, his not choosing a side was iffy writing at best but could easily have been done in other ways. I think it was poor writing on Newt that didn’t have him already against the giant racist but, again, his picking a side against magic nazis was already kinda ensured by him working for Dumbledore. All this with the added bonus of man pain that’s almost guaranteed all over the next movie with that parting line of Leta’s. Her death has become his motivating factor and that’s just a bad trope that could have been avoided.

4. Leta’s mother being kidnapped, raped, and then dying. Me stating it as such and then being mad about that isn’t out of context. Literally, that is what the characters said happened to her and I don’t like it. It was meant to be horrifying, it is horrifying, and it did not have to be that way. The poem prophecy or whatever I hear people saying, what about that? People do know JK wrote that as well? She could have shifted it anyway she wanted. The mother could have left voluntarily with Lestrange, and there could still be that drama with the older half brother and the prophecy. She didn’t need to be raped and kidnapped to keep that plot point. However, that was made pointless with the reveal of Corvus actually being dead anyways. I’m just saying.

5. The house elf thing. This I think may be the smallest thing that I blew up, but I do so because it was gross, like really really gross. Like I found it mind bogglingly gross and when we learned she was half elf it took me out of the movie world for like a solid half minute just thinking of all the implications. However, in context we met the half elf lady as the maid to the Lestranges, who, as a wealthy pureblood family defo keep house elves (which are canonically literal slaves). Like, it’s not a leap to say she is the product of one of the Lestranges raping a house elf and then kept in servitude as actual children of slaves were in the past. That “maid” was just a nicer way of saying slave. This bit did not need to be in there but it was, and it’s gross.

6. I’m not going to touch the Credence backstory thing. In the film he joined Grindlewald because he wanted to “know who he was” or whatever. But everything leading up to it and the reveal after it makes no god damned sense. Grindlewald is still going to use him though, just like he planned to do through the first movie. Grindlewald literally just wants an obscurus to cause havoc and doesn’t give an actual shit about the actual person and Credence just goes along with it. Doesn’t matter that Credence didn’t want to be a monster, doesn’t matter that he just wants someone to love him, he’s gonna go become what everyone already feared him for because Grindlewald said he’s a Dumbledore, even though that’s impossible and makes no sense. Whatever, no big deal.

I believe I hit up all my main points of initial anger again. I hope that clarified.

TLDR: 

Nonny, I did not go into this movie wanting to hate it. I absolutely adore this universe and I was halfway in love with Newt Scamander for the longest time. I love this world and I love these characters. However, that does not stop me from critically thinking about a piece of media that is put in front of me. 

When I say that this movie was bad, it’s not because I actively wanted it to be bad. I did not waste my time, money, and cosplay effort so I could go bitch online after the fact. I say it’s bad because it was bad. I was deeply offended, disturbed and disappointed with how this movie was handled and the implications of many of the creative choices made. 

You and I may have different standards to what makes a good movie, we may have different triggers to what makes us mad, and you know what? That’s fine. You can enjoy this movie all you want, and I don’t hold that against you. You have the right to interpret this movie however you damned well please, but so do I and I think it’s trash.

[kmp78]

TAKE YOUR FUCKING MEDS!!

YOU FIRST SWEETS! 💊

Face it. FACT IS FACT.

You know nothing about their relationship. NOTHING. She stayed with him off and on for 8 years roughly. HER CHOICE. No one was holding her hostage. You trying to make JL out to Be some manipulating piece of 💩 P___ is absolutely grotesque.

You making assumptions (cause let's face it, thats all you do) about his life and hers frankly but your not privy to the inner workings. There are 3 sides here, hers, his AND THE TRUTH which you, My Dear LUNATIC are not involved in any aspect of, AT ALL. YOU CAN SIT HERE ALL DAY N NIGHT AND SPECULATE about how JL destroyed her as a woman, but I dare say the split was the end for good reasons, none of which INVOLVE ANY OF US. So for JFC sakes move on already.

You REALLY are the poster child for Mental Illness and why Mental Hospitals should still be a thing.

All you do on Social Media, (much like Donald Trump) is spread rumor and untruths to benefit yourself (Narcissist &SPD) as long as it hurts and causes harm to people you hate and wish to see rot. Because why?

Because you feel it will right a wrong you perceive was done to you. For which YOU are responsible for. YOU put them on that pedestal like God's and when they didn't live up to your preconceived notions of who they should be and how they should act, it enraged you so much you decided to "destroy the pedestal and them at whatever cost."

You're Not Right.

This is what angst looks like.