#I had no idea it’s so geographically distinct

[linguenuvolose]

Recent youtube interests:

urban planning

history (especially early human evolution and the first civilisations and communities)

geography

[from-the-coffee-shop-in-edoras]

The debate that's older than I am.

That being; "Eowyn's cooking is awful enough to kill grown men, or is Rohan's cultural food that strange to foreners?"

So, I'm curious what you think a regular meal is like in Edoras for one. I live in Midwestern America, and a staple is plain but calorie rich food to keep you full longer and to deal with the cold better, and sometimes I wonder if Rohan could be the same way. Of course, making outsiders not used to such a "strange" diet.

But it could also go the other way that people in Edoras (especially Eowyn) do not know what a nice meal looks like, and will continue to cook horrors for generations to come.

Do you have any thoughts? :).

Ah, the Éowyn stew scene….one that I would have on my short list to “discuss” with Sir Peter if the opportunity ever came to pass!

I think if you accept that scene as canonical, then the only thing you can reasonably infer from it is that Éowyn never learned how to cook. (And why should she? From the time that she was 7, she was living in the king’s own household with only him, Théodred and Éomer as family. They had staff for cooking, and she probably would have been shooed out of the kitchens even if that was a place she wanted to be!) 

Anyone who wants to go from there to the idea that Rohirrim food is bad overall or that they’re making things that are so culturally distinct and unusual that their food is off-putting to outsiders is certainly welcome to make that their HC, though I don’t personally see it that way. And I think the books back me up — there are *several* scenes with large groups of people from across Middle Earth taking meals in Rohan, and nowhere in any of them is even a single whisper of a hint that there’s anything strange or unpleasant about the Rohirrim food.

Geographically speaking, a lot of Rohan does seem like the American midwest or central plains — lots of open, grassy land, a full four seasons of weather, landlocked but with rivers. They had wild boar and probably deer and rabbits, since those were in the surrounding lands. They raised “herds,” which probably meant horses but could have also been cows. They had lots of farms — Saruman’s troops burned a bunch on their way to Helm’s Deep! — and could have grown all kinds of grains and produce that are appropriate for that climate (Aragorn says parts of Rohan are only 60 leagues south of the Southfarthing, though much further east, so perhaps their growing options wouldn’t have been all that different from the Shire, at least outside of the mountainous areas!). They could have fished in the rivers. 

So they’d have had access to lots of different types of ingredients, none of which are especially unusual either here or in-universe. And I don’t see any reason why the cooks of Rohan would be uniquely inept or incapable of using those ingredients to make things that were good! I happen to agree with your characterization — a lot of Rohan isn’t *fancy* or *cosmopolitan* so they’re not making really elaborate, complicated cuisine with a capital C, but they’d have things that were hearty and filling and would keep you on your feet for long days of physical work. And that doesn’t have to mean lacking in flavor or skill! And then, of course, there are also plenty of royals and nobility in Rohan, and they could have easily had fancier, more sophisticated food since they’d have resources to get the best ingredients and full-time staff to handle just food preparation.

So that’s my thought! It seems like you and I are probably on the same page here, though certainly let me know if you’ve got other ideas and opinions — I am *always* happy to hear them! And thanks for asking!

[dailyanarchistposts]

Foundations

José Llanquileo is four years into a five year sentence for arson. For three years he was living in clandestinity with his partner, Angelica, and for a year was one of the Chilean state’s most wanted fugitives. In 2006, the two were finally captured. She was acquitted on charges of illegal association, under the antiterrorist law. He was convicted for burning pine trees on a forestry plantation belonging to a major logging company, as part of a land reclamation action. Now he gets work release during the day, and furloughs on the weekends, so he has time to take us around Temuco, introduce us to the hungerstrikers, and tell us his story.

We’ve come here as anarchists, to learn about the Mapuche struggle, to tell about our own struggles, to see where we have affinity, and begin creating a basis for long-term solidarity.

Fortunately, we can start on a good foundation. The leftists have had a patronizing attitude towards the Mapuche, says José, but “the anarchists have been very respectful, and shown lots of solidarity. I think we should be grateful for that.” He’s clear, however, that the Mapuche’s struggle is their own. Marxism was influential at a certain moment, but they are not Marxists. One could characterize the Mapuche way of thinking as environmentalist, but they are not environmentalists. They have affinity with anarchists, but they are not anarchists. “We are Mapuche. We are our own people, with our own history, and our struggle comes directly out of that.” Contrary to the assertions of the leftists, the Mapuche are not the marginalized lower class of Chilean society. They are not the proletariat, and the idea of class war does not correspond to their reality. Consequently, they may find some affinity with the revolutionary movements that developed in the context of class war in European society, but these movements do not adequately address their situation.

“The Left consider the Mapuche as just another sector of the oppressed, an opinion we don’t share. Our struggle is taking place in the context of the liberation of a people. Our people are distinct from Western society.” Moreover, the Mapuche people have a proud history of fighting invasion, resisting domination, and organizing themselves to meet their needs and live in freedom, so their own worldview and culture are more than sufficient as an ideological basis for their struggle.

This point is stressed by nearly everyone we meet, and I think our ability to become friends and compañeros rests directly on the fact that we respect their way of struggle rather than trying to incorporate them into our way of struggle.

I want to be upfront with the people I meet, with whom I want to build relationships of solidarity, so on the first day I tell him my motivations and assumptions. The comrades who put us in touch already told José I’m an anarchist, and informed him of the kind of work I do, so the fact that he invited us into his community and took time off to guide us around is a good sign. I let him know that many US anarchists already have a little familiar with the Mapuche struggle, and our understanding is that their culture is anti-authoritarian, and they organize horizontally. Is this correct?

José says it is, but I notice a little eurocentrism on my part, a difference in worldviews, when he automatically replaces my word, “horizontal,” with the word “circular,” to describe Mapuche society. There is no centralization of power among the Mapuche, who in fact are a nation of several different peoples, living in different geographic regions, and speaking different dialects of the same language. The land belongs to the community, and it is maintained collectively, as opposed to individually or communally. Each community has a lonko, a position generally translated as “chief,” but each family has a large degree of autonomy, and many decisions are made by the whole community in assemblies. Lonkos are usually men, but have been women as well. There are other traditional roles of influence: the machi is a religious figure and a healer. Men and women can become machis, but they are neither chosen nor self-appointed. Those who have certain dreams or get inexplicably sick as children, and who demonstrate a certain sensitivity, will become machis. Then there is the werken, the spokesperson, a role that has taken on explicitly political characteristics as Mapuche communities organize their resistance. Historically there were tokis, war leaders that different communities followed voluntarily, though currently no one plays this role, as the Mapuche have not gone to war since being occupied by the Chilean and Argentinean states in the 1880s.

I ask about gender relations and how the Mapuche view things like family structure and homosexuality, making clear my own feelings but also trying not to be judgmental. José says the Mapuche family structure is the same as in European society, and there is a great deal of conservatism, pressure to marry and have children, and disapproval of anything that falls outside of this format. He thinks that maybe it didn’t used to be like that, and perhaps the Catholic missionaries and conservative Chilean society have changed traditional values. In any case, the women we meet during our limited time in the communities are all strong, active, vocal, and involved, and in the homes we stay in there seem to be a sharing and a flexibility of roles. The people in our group, meanwhile, don’t try too hard to present as heterosexual or cis-gendered and don’t have any problems.

* * *

It’s an exciting time to be in Wallmapu. All the communities in resistance are united behind the hungerstriking prisoners, but behind the scenes, important debates are taking place. The hungerstrike, based directly on the ongoing struggle (all the Mapuche prisoners are accused or convicted of crimes related to land recovery actions, such as arsons targeting the forestry companies, or related to conflict with the Chilean state, such as the seizing of a municipal bus or a shooting that gave a good scare to a state’s attorney), has focused the Mapuche nation and captured the attention of the entire Chilean population. It has won a popular legitimacy for the Mapuche struggle, undermining the demonization of the direct tactics they use and weakening the government’s position in casting these tactics as terrorism. In this situation, the Mapuche can go beyond calls for greater autonomy or land reform within the Chilean state.

“The so-called Mapuche conflict doesn’t have a solution. The demands we have necessitate a break with the framework of the state. What we demand is sovereignty and Mapuche independence. We consciously propose the historical foundations of these demands [...] Our struggle is fundamentally opposed to capitalism and the state [...] I believe we have to open a space internationally to spread our demands. The Mapuche struggle has to be internationalist, as the struggle of a people. Many of the things that affect us, like capitalism and the states that represent it, the US, the EU, are an enemy to peoples, First Nations as much as oppressed classes around the world, and that’s a point of concordance.”

“The biggest problem is the advance of capitalism, in the form of investment on our lands. This is one of the principal threats that the Mapuche face because it means the exploitation of natural resources. These resources are on Mapuche lands, so investment means the expulsion of the inhabitants,” José explains. “Even while we’re recovering our lands, this investment is going on, which endangers everything we have achieved.”

* * *

After a few days, we leave Temuco and head for the hills, to the town of Cañete, and then to the first of a couple autonomous Mapuche communities in resistance we’ve been invited into, in the area of the lake Lleu Lleu, south of the city of Concepcion. Mapuche communities have two names, or rather, the place has a name, and the group of people has another name. José’s community, Juana Millahual, at Rucañanko, sits on a steep hill above one arm of the lake. It is a small community, with just a few dozen families. José’s brother is lonko. The houses are mostly small, rectangular, wooden buildings sitting atop low stilts. José explains that the traditional houses, the ruca, had thatched instead of tin roofs, but these have been mostly burned down over the decades of struggle.

The oldest knowledge they have of the community is in 1879, when José’s great grandmother had 10,000 hectares. Now the community only has 300 hectares, but they are in the process of recovering 1000 more hectares, 220 of which they have occupied. “In these territories there is a profound transformation where big capital has exploited natural resources and where the Mapuche are trying to recompose their spaces.” They’re recovering their traditions and parts of their culture that were nearly lost, and when they retake a plot of land, they take it out of the hands of Capital “which says it exists to serve man and must be exploited. When the Mapuche occupy it, there is a revolutionary change, a profound transformation to the social, cultural, religious, and economic fabric.” When they recover land, their machis come and the whole community performs a Ngillatun, a major ceremony, to purge it from its time as private property and to communalize it.

At his house, during his weekend furlough, José tells us more about the Mapuche history. The Mapuche territories used to extend from near the present locations of Santiago and Buenos Aires, Pacific coast to Atlantic coast, south to the island of Chiloe. Farther south, on the southern cone of the continent, other peoples lived. They were hardy nations that survived the extreme temperatures without problems, but were mostly exterminated when the Europeans came.

José explains that winka, the term the Mapuche have given to the European invaders, simply means “new Inca.” Before the arrival of the conquistadors, the Inca nation were already engaging in a sort of regional imperialism, which the Mapuche wanted no part in. The Inca armies got as far south as present-day Santiago, where they were defeated and consistently prevented from advancing any farther. When the Spanish arrived, the Mapuche treated them as just the most recent invaders, and defeated them as well. It’s a point of pride that the Inca, who had an advanced, centralized civilization, fell easily to the conquistadors, while the Mapuche, who were decentralized, never did. What the Spanish couldn’t understand was that there was no single Mapuche army. Each group of communities had their own toki, and if the Spanish won a battle against one group of warriors, as soon as they advanced a little farther they’d have to face another one.

During my time in Wallmapu, I think a lot about what it means to be a people. From the traditional anarchist standpoint, a people or a nation is an essentializing category, and thus a vehicle for domination. However, it becomes immediately clear that it would be impossible to support the Mapuche struggle while being dismissive of the idea of a people.

Hopefully by this point all Western anarchists realize that national liberation struggles aren’t inherently nationalist; that nationalism is a European mode of politics inseparable from the fact that all remaining European nations are artificial constructions of a central state, whereas in the rest of the world (excepting, say, China or Japan), this is usually only true of post-colonial states (like Chile or Algeria) that exist in direct opposition to non-state nations. Many other nations are not at all homogenizing or centrally organized.

Going beyond this, though, is it essentializing to talk about a Mapuche worldview or way of life? The more I listen, however, the more I doubt my accustomed standpoint. To a great extent, Mapuche is a chosen identity. Most “Chileans” have black hair, broad faces, and brown skin, while less than 10% of the population of the Chilean state identify as Mapuche. In a context of forced assimilation and a history of genocide, choosing to identify as Mapuche is, on some levels, a political statement, a willful inheritance of a cultural tradition and hundreds of years of struggle, and an engagement with an ongoing strategic debate that perhaps makes it legitimate to talk about what the Mapuche want, what they believe, in a more singular way. At one point, when we’re talking about mestizos, José makes it clear that someone is Mapuche if they identify as such, even if they have mixed parentage. In other words the Western notion of ethnicity, which leaves no room for choice because it is based on blood quanta, does not apply. Also, the fact that the Mapuche call the Europeans the “new Inca” show that they do not have an essentializing, generalizing view of sameness between all indigenous peoples. On the contrary, many people we met specified an interest in connecting specifically with other First Nations that were fighting back against their colonization, showing that what they cared about was not a racial category, but a struggle.

So if Mapuche is a chosen identity based on a very real shared history, shared culture, and ongoing collective debate of strategy, is it actually all that different from the identity of anarchist? Well, yes: it has a longer history, tied to a specific geographic territory and cultural-linguistic inheritance. Anarchism also contains a greater diversity of worldviews, but on the flipside no one I met tried to present the Mapuche as homogenous, even as they talked about a Mapuche worldview.

In sum, the concept of belonging to a people brings a great deal of strength to the Mapuche struggle. Because the state falls outside of and against that people and their history, I find some elements of the Mapuche reality, of their world, to be a more profound realization of anarchy than I have found among self-identified anarchists. And considering that those anarchist movements that have been able to maintain just 40 years of historical memory (Greece, Spain) are consistently stronger than anarchist movements that have a hard time even understanding the concept of historical memory (US, UK), it is no surprise that the Mapuche, who maintain over 500 years of historical memory, are so strongly rooted that they seem impervious to repression.

[justsasuke]

So I know in cannon all the countries are treated as if everyone speaks the same common language (I get it makes story telling easier) BUT lately I've had the brain worm of IF each country did have its own language to go with it's culture....what accents would Taka have?

This made me think about how Sasuke gets a lot of comments about how he's "clearly from Konoha" and in canon it's always because he's a softie or whatever (which, we've all seen how Konoha is, we know being soft isn't a trait that's from there) but what if it's actually because when he speaks he has a very distinct Konoha accent that he never really lost despite years away? And he could lose it, he has a good enough ear to pick up a different accent but what if it's not exactly a Konoha accents so much as it's the Uchiha accent. Because they lived in such a condensed environment there's no way they wouldn't have their own way of speaking that's similar enough to Konoha to get mistaken for it by those who don't know but still different. Sure, this means everyone who meets him will know where he came from but he refuses to lose the accent because it's the way his mother talked, his father talked, his aunts, uncles, and cousins talked. It's the way his brother talks, and it's another reason he's so easily recognizable as an Uchiha.

Suigetsu knows this and respects it (heck, he has a strong Kiri accent that he's not losing because it's where he's from and he wants people to know) but still definitely teases him about it sometimes. That one time he said "you really are from Konoha" wasn't actually commenting on Sasuke's no killing policy, he was saying "your accent is showing, dude" jkjk.

.

As for the rest of Taka, I'm not sure how their accents would compare to the ones we have in our world but I do think that Karin would have a southern accent. In my experience southern accents in the languages I know tend to be wider, have more tonal ups and downs, be more dynamic, and carry a lot of emotion which I think would be perfect for Karin. She usually speaks standard* but will slip into her native accent when she's emotionally charged. Only Sasuke and Juugo understand her when this happens, Suigetsu does not.

*Standard being what most people communicate with outside of small villages and in large cities with lots of import/export. It probably started in the Land of Fire and then was generally accepted across the rest of the major 5 nations. Other smaller nations don't use it that much but it is used in Otogakure because Orochimaru is from Konoha. Even though he probably uses old standard so no one understands him anyway.

Suigetsu has a Kiri accent which...probably sounds slightly sinister and a little slippery. It's a fairly well respected accent in the business world because Kiri is known for the quality of their assassins but is heavily associated with organized crime so if you have it civilians won't really trust you.

Juugo has a more rural, rough accent that comes from limited exposure to "modern" civilization and a lot of exposure to mountain villages and farmers (not helped by his time in the northern hideout where most everyone spoke the same except for the employees) He can't speak standard and is embarrassed about it and how rough his language sounds so he doesn't speak a lot at first. His accent is hard to understand for most people in the 5 great nations because it's so rural, but people from smaller countries like the land of birds get it. Sasuke understands it but only because he traveled to the northern hideout with Orochimaru a lot.

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I'm not sure if this correctly corresponds with where each member is from geographically and how the language would be there, tbh I feel like the linguistics of the elemental nations + other countries could be a whole study in and in of itself, but these are my current thoughts on the topic. It's such a fascinating idea and I'll definitely be thinking about it more.

[aheathen-conceivably]

What led you to taking the family from New Orleans to New Mexico?

Thanks for the question, my dear! It honestly hurt my heart to do so, since my own love and attachment to New Orleans is woven so strongly through the 1920s. But I knew from the get-go we’d be leaving the city for a couple reasons….

One, I simply can’t stay in the same sims world for too long. I’m like this in gameplay, but I learned in the 1900s-1910s that that instinct is even stronger in storytelling. Being able to find new angles, builds, lots, lighting, etc. is part of the fun and really makes me look forward to moving the story forward. Likewise, I really like the clear visual distinction of a new world every decade or so (because it won’t always be exactly every ten years), as it creates visual chapters and keeps things feeling fresh for me and I hope, y’all too!

But more specifically, I always knew that many of the end goals of the 1920s would require leaving New Orleans. One was Antoine’s toxic attachment to his past, and his need to let go of that in order to move forward. The other one, and arguably the biggest, was to end the decade with Antoine proposing to Zelda. As I discussed in detail here, this was not possible in New Orleans. Likewise, I did not want Violette’s formative years to be marked by legally mandated segregation (especially in school), so that she could have more freedom in her story and identity.

Now if you look at the map in the post linked above, you’ll see that the choices of where to move them is not exactly plentiful. The easiest choice would have been the Northeast, but I knew pretty early on that I wanted to have a desert backdrop for the 1930s. Thematically, I think it harkens to the images that we associate with this decade and also the concept of the American West, which by the 1930s is beginning to be exposed as a myth (this is a theme I find fascinating and y’all will see as the years go by). Its also meant to provide a heavy contrast to the warm, tropical air of New Orleans, and how that climate kind of intersects with the idea of decadence in the 1920s.

As far as sim-specifics, I try and look at all the worlds and see what can realistically be used for what decade and geographic location. From the get-go I was intrigued by Strangerville, since it’s a world I never really play in and the military base has some good story potential (oh? Is that a spoiler you say? 👀). I also don’t see it used that often, and I especially think the downtown is so cinematic. This really fell in line with the ideas I already had about leaving New Orleans and the themes of the West, so I referenced the map in the linked post, and ultimately decided on New Mexico. Then with subsequent research and studying Strangerville’s landscape (namely the rocks and the road and how I could incorporate that into the story), I finally placed the town in the Northwestern corner of the state, with easy road access both North and West for wherever the next decade takes us 😉

[ace-and-ranty]

I think it could be interesting if Animals in high-visibility positions such as academia were hit first to send a message, but maybe Animals in more rural areas are still relatively protected thanks to their anonymity and societal and geographical marginalization.

So maybe there would be some farmers in a better position to help feed a certain starving, isolated, resource-light renegade

I like the way you think, Nonnie. Much agreed.

I also wonder if the city/country distinction is hitting very hard here. Because, well, we know Animals were blamed for the food shortages, but we don't know exactly how. Like, for example, immigrants get blamed for "stealing jobs", so what were Animals doing "wrong", exactly...? Offending god with their existence? Taking too many resources? I'd guess the latter, because "Animals Should Be Seen And Not Heard" kinda implies to me they were blamed for taking food out of people's mouths. If only they were regular animals, not Animals, they could be left to starve and food could be redirect to good, hard working people.

So you'd imagine this hit really hard in rural areas where the food is coming from, and less so in more urban settings.

At the same time, I wonder what it was like for Animals in a setting where people have very different relationships to animals than city folk.

Moreover, Oz has a very "rapidly modernizing country" vibe. Like how the Emerald City is all powered by electricity, but the streets around Shiz are still lit by gas lamps. I wonder if the Wizard had very much to do with it, and with his trains and trinkets and road-building ideas, I'm guessing he did. A society's relationship to animals sure changes when it starts to industrify, right? Like how would it feel, say, for an ox Animal farmer, who until yesterday was specifically suited for his work, to be suddenly upstaged by modern tractors and machines?

All interesting food for thought.

[hxhhasmysoul]

"JJK really went from a loved manga to a mid-to-bad story with insufferable fans 🙏 may more of us hate it in the future. It snatches the spotlight from genuinely good shows and its another case of "general shonen fan will call any trash 'goat' if the fight is well animated".

I used to be a fan, until the start of the culling game. And after this controversial, inconsistent and inhumane adaptation of shibuya, im glad that I have no interest in both manga and show anymore.."

Thoughts on that statement? Do you think culling game really that hard to understand, cause I saw quite a lot start dislike JJK since that arc....?

If I had seen this in the wild I would've blocked the account that produced it. I block for very liberally and while I will block for obvious bigotry and shitty harassment behaviour, so like serious reasons,I will also block for general annoyance. Fandom is my hobby and I don't want it to be annoying and stress me out through unleashing my adhd and flood my brain with thoughts. And this qualifies as annoying.

But since you brought this to me I will actually explain why I find these kind of posts annoying and not worth engaging with.

While I would've blocked it before I got to the second paragraph on the "may more of us hate it in the future" alone, I will actually start analysing it from the second paragraph where op pretends to give an explanation for this turn in attitude towards JJK they experienced.

Reason 1:

"I used to be a fan, until the start of the culling game."

Op invokes the Culling Game arc as if it's an obvious reason to dislike JJK and hence your question at the end of the ask. And I will get to that but I need to set the stage first.

Reason 2:

"And after this controversial, inconsistent and inhumane adaptation of shibuya,(...)"

(Side note, I find it genuinely dodgy that Shibuya, an actual rl geographical location is not capitalised when the abbreviation of the manga's title is.)

What is controversial, inconsistent and inhumane about the adaptation of the Shibuya arc? The working conditions at Mappa are inhumane indeed, but it's an industry wide problem and with how JJK is a beloved title the animators actually could do a strike with a chance of the company making concessions. I don't think there would've been the same amount of fan support and pressure for animators of smaller titles. And the way the anime is produced isn't really the reason why JJK as a story should be hated because the story isn't responsible for industry exploitation that has been happening since long before JJK was even conceived by its author.

The word "controversial" honestly feels flippant when it's together with the far more appropriate "inhumane" and feels like it was added for the aesthetics of having 3 adjectives.

Now the word "inconsistent" actually makes me believe that the outrage in this sentence is not genuine and is typical posturing of "I'm critical of the media I consume so I'm a good person" crowd." This is the only adjective that actually describes the adaptation and not its creation process. And the inconsistency of the adaptation is in its animation quality. And that inconsistency stems from the inhumane working conditions. Pulling is out as a reason as to why op is "glad that I have no interest in both manga and show anymore." feels really callous and shows their hand, that they are upset that they can't consume the pretty moving pictures in peace anymore.

Huh...

"It snatches the spotlight from genuinely good shows and its another case of "general shonen fan will call any trash 'goat' if the fight is well animated"."

This is a typical example of trying to put on the guise of intellectualism through being against the popular thing. There's also this classist distinction between high art and pop culture with the idea that only a certain level of education and intelligence allows for interacting with high art thus it's only for the intellectual elite.

So there's a certain group of people who equates obscurity with quality because if they can claim liking things that others don't know about they feel like they are smarter than the rest. This way they can make an appeal to intellectualism even if they are not interacting with what would traditionally by the upper classes and social climbers be considered high art.

Popularity means that the unwashed masses like it and and the intellectuals will look down on them and their tastes, even if the intellectuals are leftists. The mob is defined by its stupidity and by liking primitive and simplistic things for vulgar reasons.

In this framing, the moment JJK became popular it lost any claim to quality. JJK is liked by the "general shounen" fans who only like pretty moving pictures. The shounen fan mob doesn't care about the "genuinely good shows" and because the mob is huge and loud those better shows suffer in obscurity. Of course no show gets specified by op because they are addressing this to those who are in the know - like those who are at their level will immediately conjure the image of those "genuinely good shows" and nod along.

And now we will circle back to the Culling Games arc. This arc feels like a HxH arc, especially Hakari and I love it. But not only for that. The arc is much slower than the previous ones and I actually hoped it would be a signal that the story will slow down like this, take more of its time to follow one or two characters and delve deeper into them. I love how that arc fleshes out the power system so much more. I hoped we would get more on the new and old characters, and we get it on same Yuuji, Megumi, Maki, Noritoshi, Hakari, Kahimo, Charles, Higuruma though not enough on Kirara, Uro, Remi, Ishigori or the Kyoto school characters or later on Hana and Angel, the time wasted on Yuuta could've been used much better. But alas then Gege cut the breaks and put their foot down on the acceleration pedal and it makes me sad.

The thing is that the Culling Games are disliked because of how slow they are and how much reading there is in them. You will read the chapters online and the comment section will be full of:

"wtf, i'm not reading that lol."

"what did i just read, i don't understand a thing"

"ugh, does anyone know what's even going on in this manga?"

So saying that JJK fans are "insufferable" "general shonen fans" who only like flashy animation and the bring up the Culling Games as a reason why JJK is bad, is very funny to me.

People also stop liking JJK at the Culling Games because the Shibuya arc removes or sidelines several favs of the western tumblr and twitter fandom. Sexyman Nanami gets killed, cute Inumaki gets sidelined, sexyman Gojou gets sealed, sexyman Chousou stays in the tomb with a woman and it's becoming very hard to be delusional that Kenjaku isn't a real important character of their own but actually sexyman Getou who will return soon.

There are many new characters introduced who aren't sexymen, apart from Higuruma and Kashimo (canonically Kashimo doesn't have a defined gender but when has that ever stopped the fandom).

And the western fandom does not like Yuuji and even among those who claim to like him there's a not insignificant subset that likes their head canon of him as a manic pixie dream himbo that they like as a background to their favs and not as someone the story concentrates on.

Basically the Culling Games are not fast and flashy enough, and the arc is really hard on those fans who were skipping dialogue when it delved into lore and power system in the previous arcs. Already Shibuya gets difficult at times if you didn't pay attention to the world building in the earlier chapters but with the Perfect Preparation and the Culling Games and anything after I imagine it must be a chore to read when all the concepts seem new but the plot and character arcs heavily rely on the previously established world building.

The truth is that if you delve into the fandom tags it quickly becomes perfectly clear how poorly the fans are acquainted with the text. How to many fans the characters exist mostly as their head canon versions and not as they are in the text. You will see fans complaining that the manga changed into something else from something they liked. But when you learn what they think the manga used to be it becomes apparent that they were ignoring huge portions of the text for one reason or another and just focused on the parts that interested them. That they blow out of proportion the significance of their favs and get disappointed when the story doesn't centre them.

It's okay not to want to follow a story when the character you liked dies or gets sidelined but that doesn't mean that the story is bad for it, that it's definite proof of bad writing or whatever. And it's not the story's fault that someone only liked one or two characters and didn't care about the rest, it happens.

And this is the crux of the issue. People who write opinion like the one above speak as if they represent some large group. The language of the post you cited suggests that there's some general consensus about the quality of JJK, about the Culling Games being the reason to dislike it. That the choice is exclusively between these two options:

thinking that JJK is "mid-to-bad" for some reasons that should be obvious to the reader

or being a part of the unwashed anime fan masses who like it only because of the animation.

You're either among the intellectuals who are in the know and also morally correct in their hatred for the story or you're an insufferable cretin.

People like the author of that post can't just dislike something, can't fathom that something can be not for them. For them it's not okay for something to exist in a neutral way and not be for them. Them not liking a thing means that there's something "objectively" wrong with the thing and the people who like it. And they can't fathom that a serialised story not going in the direction they like doesn't mean that it's "objectively" badly written. It's natural to feel disappointment when the story one used to like turns into something they don't enjoy anymore. But posts like this hint on the fact that the author believes that stories exist just to satisfy them personally and when it fails to do that it needs to be publicly denounced and anyone who dares to like it needs to be shamed and informed of their intellectual failures.

[dollmaidcrystal]

Mistress Aspyce Attempts to Find a Bull

For the past three years, Mistress Aspyce has been making an on-again-off-again effort to find a bull. She's not even particularly sure that she wants one, but the internet has been constantly bombarding her with messages about how great life is with a bull to cuckold your sissy maid with. That level of marketing is enough to make anyone curious!

Here's how that's worked out so far:

Mr. Money

Occupation: He'd be a competitor with Mistress's business, if they didn't stick to distinct geographic areas.

The Pitch: Successful, handsome, a reputation for being sexually available, and he has a lot in common with Mistress Aspyce's vanilla identity.

… But on the First Date: He couldn't comprehend the idea that I had consented to her being there. "Why would you tell your husband you're going behind his back? Doesn't that mean that he would know?"

What happened: Mistress recently had an opening to make a move into Mr. Money's turf. She's been forced to do some hard thinking about whether she's considering it because it's a good growth opportunity or because she's still holding a grudge over that date.

Baby Moo

Occupation: Beautician

The Pitch: He's gorgeous. Mistress's sissies all became low-key jealous over his effortless beauty and decided that he was too pretty to be called a "bull." After some debate, we started referring to him as "Baby Moo."

… But on the First Date: He and Mistress hit it off, and he was Mistress Aspyce's side piece for some time.

What happened: Baby Moo hung his entire sense of personal identity on the idea that he could get any woman he wanted whenever he wanted. Having Mistress as a sugar momma meant he wasn't in full control of that relationship. That kicked off a psychological breakdown followed by a journey of self-discovery. I'm not sure what he's up to now, but, wherever he is, I hope he's less full of himself.

The Jock

Occupation: Personal trainer, but he aspires to go pro at Call of Duty one day soon.

The Pitch: Big, strong, slightly dim, and a gamer.

… But on the First Date: "Yeah, I picked up Darktide. I've been playing the Space Marine."

"You mean you've been playing a Veteran. Space Marines are" (waving hand gestures) "taller."

"Naw, babe. Space Marines just look big 'cause you see them in power armor. They're just regular dudes when they're off the clock."

**What happened:** Mistress spent the rest of the date explaining, in great detail, the proud traditions of the Adeptus Astartes and the 22 extra organs needed to create a space marine. She hasn't heard from him since.

The Porn Star

Occupation: Porn Star

The Pitch: He's a porn star. You can download his credentials as video-on-demand, and his credentials are long.

… But on the First Date: One glass of wine in, he started talking about how he wished directors didn't only see him in topping roles.

Two glasses of wine in, he starts talking about how he's really more of a switch in real life.

Three glasses of wine in, he's showing Mistress pictures of the cute pink dress and panties he bought, but never had the nerve to wear for anyone.

What happened: Four glasses of wine in, he starts on how doctors only want to pump you full of poisons so they can make you sicker, and he's too smart to EVER let one of them stick a needle into him.

That's a deal breaker normally, but a porn star saying that is an emergency that you're ethically obliged to inform his coworkers about.

—

I suspect there may be a sequel to this post one day.

[lunchcase]

Pumpkin Soup with Ground Bacon

Location: International restaurant, Melia Jardines Del Rey

Somehow, with no bacon bits in sight, the orange stuffless soup has bacon flavour in it, mixed with a creamy pumpkin flavour. Texture wise it isn’t that creamy - more clear than cream, but it’s like you can taste the creamy thickness instead?

The cream cheese soup I forgot to take a photo of that I had two nights ago was similarly interesting, in that it was cheese soup that felt creamy and clear at the same time. This place has some wild textures. Vicosity.

This is the last of my drinks posts in Cuba, and it seems off to end on formless pumpkin and bacon soup, clash of two titans and specialty of nowhere, but all things end not bittersweet but savoury, I guess? So lets be sentimental with this faintly unappetizing photo of pumpkin soup.

This is what I've learned. When a Victorian-era doctor prescribes seaside habitation for feminine lassitude, that is incredibly valid (don't @ me). The sea and sun is unfortunately a privilege, which is criminal because it's rejuvenating. For me, at least. Past Casey scoffed at the idea of just sitting on a beach doing nothing. Certainly it must be boring after some time, she thought. Past Casey is naïve and a fool. A naive fool. A moron, if you will. Post-beach bask Casey knows better and understands the healing power of Doing Nothing, Basking Under the Sun, Sea Breeze and Ocean Waves Flowing through a body like wind through an ocarina making music. Appealing to all senses. I am calm.

Looking out into the ocean at night as indiscernible dark waves crash into each other and lap the shore, the picture of paradise abruptly and jarringly now an entrance to the underworld, I understood a second thing: the reverence and sheer fear the mass of water elicits from any kind of sailor. Even on the shore, the waves illuminated by the uninhibited moon, I felt a panic grab me. What's the word? Sublime terror? A leviathan, vast, drowning, deep set bone chill awe? To be lost in the complete darkness of a continental watery grave; I too would pray to all the gods and speak of the ocean as a lover I hope will be kind.

An observation: it's quite clear who is a tourist and who is not when we were at the city of Moron, the nearest city to the resort. Mostly, the general tourist is white, and they receive nary a glance from the locals except by the most entrepreneurial among them. The white gaze, in this case, treats everything as part of the vacation experience. For my friend and I, who are not white and therefore not the standard tourist but an emerging other breed who travel with less geographic reservations inherent in previous generations of our kind, we are a sight as exotic as they are to us. Their gaze followed us as we roamed, curious and unfamiliar as they were to us. A mutual touristing moment. People came up to us. Two separate unrelated individuals at two distinct times of day asked us where we were staying, that they worked at that resort, today was their day off, and their daughter was born just yesterday - "congratulations to all the new born daughters," - so have you got anything to give her? Money, preferably, but she'd also probably like chocolate. Can newborns eat chocolate, I asked, and they shrugged and said why not? I didn't have chocolate or anything really on my person, because I didn't come from the circles where such travelling tidbits were exchanged, so I didn't prepare anything, sorry. I heard an old-but-not-quite-elderly white couple mention how they brought their family to the resorts here every year, though, and now that their kids flown the nest they come themselves, so maybe try them, with the know-how. Good luck, with you and your daughter and again you and your daughter. We walked a little faster.

[museaumofnaturalhistory]

The Plant Hunter - by Kate Evans | The New Zealand Geographic Magazine - Profile | March - April 2025

For Jay Kuethe, There is Just Something Huge About Passiflora.

All his life, Jay Kuethe has been a collector. When he was growing up in 1990s Britain, his immigrant Dutch parents gave him an old-fashioned, outdoor childhood. From the age of around five, he grew sunflowers and cacti, and filled labelled cabinets with seeds, crystals, and minerals in his bedroom-turned-museum.

A passion for plants and adventure ran in the family. A great-aunt had collected epiphytic orchids in Indonesia, and grew a clutch of them from the legs of her oak dining table—right at young Kuethe’s eye level. “I was fascinated by them,” he says. But fate had a different flower in store for Kuethe. As a teenager, he did an internship at a large nursery outside London that specialised in Passiflora.

Comprising many hundreds of species, the genus includes passionfruit-style clambering vines, as well as shrubs and trees. Only around 150 have edible fruit. Many have distinctive, geometric flowers—beribboned ballgowns in white and magenta, scarlet and violet—that have been used as symbols of both the crucifixion of Jesus Christ and the Hindu epic the Mahābhārata. Most Passifloras hail from the Americas; New Zealand has just one native species, Passiflora tetandra, a vine with white flowers and deep-orange, teardrop-shaped fruit, known to Māori as kōhia.

Kuethe wanted them all. “There’s always one big question: how many species are there? When can you consider your collection complete? And what really fascinated me was that there was no answer to that. No-one had a clue.”

In 2009, Kuethe travelled to the annual meeting of Passiflora Society International. He was 17. “I brought the average age down a bit.” He excitedly pitched to the assembled grey-beards his idea for an updated Passiflora monograph—a complete encyclopaedia of the genus, describing every species and its distribution. Unlike the most recent Passiflora monograph, published in 1938, Kuethe’s would include photographs and ecological and conservation information for every species, he announced. While the botany professors liked his enthusiasm, they also tried to knock some sense into him: “You’re young, you’re foolish, you’re going to have to wake up to the fact that it’s almost impossible.” Kuethe was undeterred, and ever since, he’s been working on his monograph.

Alongside his day jobs—including pursuing the doctorate in geology at the University of Auckland that brought him to New Zealand four years ago—Kuethe started organising and self-funding expeditions to Passiflora heartlands around the world, to try to find and photograph species presumed extinct.

He calls himself an exploration ecologist, a play on exploration geologist. Unlike exploration geologists, however, who mostly hunt for minerals to extract so money can be made, Kuethe takes a much more collaborative and low-impact approach.

For instance, in 2023, Kuethe travelled to Samoa to look for Passiflora samoensis, a species last recorded by scientists in 1924 and therefore classed as extinct. He met with Samoan authorities, connected with local plant enthusiasts, and with their help found the “lost” species at a forest reserve on his first day in the country.

Its blooms were a glorious peach and apricot, with sprays of spiky corona filaments like scarlet eyelashes at their centre. The plant was rare—like the endemic miti tae bird (Lalage sharpei) that depends on it. Kuethe spent the rest of the trip helping to set up a nursery to propagate the plant, to ensure its survival and conservation.

In the past five years, Kuethe has also led Passiflora expeditions to Guatemala, Niue, Bolivia, Ecuador, Panama, Jamaica, El Salvador, Honduras, Australia, and Mexico—as side-trips from geological conferences, or supported by grants from universities and other organisations. In Papua New Guinea, he was shot at—breaking the tension when he managed to communicate he was interested in plants, not minerals. With his local collaborators, often students or non-governmental organisations, he has named at least 30 new species, with a dozen more currently in peer-review.

Often, the name references a nature reserve where the plant is found. With their intricate spirograph-shaped blooms, many Passiflora are keystone species— their life histories woven with pollinating and dispersing insects and birds—so protecting them and their habitats helps ecosystems more broadly, Kuethe says.

Two modern tools of connection are crucial to his process.

“I’m a massive contributor to iNaturalist,” he says, referring to a social network where people record and share observations of biodiversity. When he wakes up, he checks the website for any Passiflora photographs that have been uploaded overnight, and identifies them. “I can also see who are the local people that take photographs—and this has expanded my social network tremendously.” Then he connects with them over WhatsApp. In 2024, he went looking for Passifloras in Niue, and had no internet for four days. When he got back online, he had 416 messages—“and all but 20 of them were about Passifloras, all from the local people from Guatemala, Bolivia, Ecuador, Brazil, Guyana, you name it. It really sketches how lively the community is.”

Kuethe has now fully documented 695 Passifloras. He thinks just 16 elude him. Though they’ll probably be the most difficult to find, his collection is almost complete. It’s not, however, the at-home jungle he once dreamed of. At one point, he had them growing up his walls and ceiling, much to the amusement of his neighbours. But each plant is “a big commitment, like having a pet. You can’t leave it alone for too long.” Now, he leaves the specimens where they belong—to be cared for at herbariums and botanical gardens in their countries of origin—and accumulates only photographs.

[forgeofideas]

On the Ethnic Consciousness of Polities in Antiquity and the Middle Ages.

Dear Schwertpunk,

In these past few years or so I was astonished to learn about the concept of nation states and how they are primarily a product of the 19th century. The ancient and medieval era had polities which embodied religion, city states, and dynasties as the nucleus of their identity, rather than an ethnic one. In your scattered musings you seem to vehemently oppose nationalism, and even berate the idea that modern states are intrinsically entwined to an autochthonous population (a point of view shared by many Americans). On the other hand, you also reject the post-modernist idea that ancient cultures were colorblind, borderless societies with no ethnic consciousness. In your response to this email, please address the concept of ethnic consciousness in antiquity and the middle ages, and its relevance to state identity. Here are some examples to dissect (I understand that it can be difficult to address all these polities since they come from different cultures and time period, so avoid or address them as you please):

Achaemenid & Greek Dynasties of Iran: Some say that the Achaemenids never referred to their empire as "Persia" but rather as "The Land of All Nations," or "The World." Their kings carried the title Shāhanshāh which denotes universal rule and not merely a "King of Persians." The demographics of the Achaemenid Empire also ruled over a vast amount of different cultures and peoples, not to mention the majority of the urbanized world. It is therefore apparent that the Achaemenids did not view themselves as "A Civilization," but rather as "Civilization Itself" (A mentality later shared by the Romans and many others). Knowing all this, I am dumbfounded to realize that the Achaemenids actually conceptualized themselves as a universal polity as opposed to an Empire of Persians, thus calling them the "Persian Empire" feels woefully unfitting. With this in mind I often wonder, did the Persian people view this state as "their empire?" I would think not. Did non-Persians under this empire view it as a Persian state? And if it was so that the Achaemenids viewed their empire as something universal, why was it that the Greeks viewed it as something that was merely Persian? Was it fully understood by the Achaemenid dynasty that the Persians formed the ethnic core of their empire? Did Persians have distinct privileges from the average citizen? Finally, I would like to underscore a misconception of how many people often see Alexander the Great's conquest of Asia as a clash of civilizations, East vs West, Greek vs Persian etc. Correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems clear to me that Alexander viewed himself more so as an inheritor of the Achaemenid legacy, the head of an ecumenical order, as opposed to a purely Greek one. We see this demonstrated in the Susa Weddings, Alexanders adoption of Persian clothing, and the Proskynesis Controversy. With this being said, the process of Hellenization after Alexander did seem to place Greeks in higher standing, but did it guide them into a position of being seen as a new ethnic core? The Seleucid Empire under Antiochus IV Epiphanes seems to have exhibited a high degree of Greek identity, but how important was Greekness to their state really?

Ireland: This insulated island was divided into multiple kingdoms ruled by dynasties. Yet there were short lived eras where a High King of Ireland was crowned. Did this title imply that the ruling Irish understood themselves as a nation, or was it merely denoting lordship over a geographic area? Did the common people acknowledge the concept of an Irish nation?

Kingdom of France: Another nation which baffled me was France. A seemingly homogenous country today, but its history unveils a myriad of various cultures of which have mostly been erased. It is said that after the 100 years war France attainted a higher degree of national consciousness, but was this shared by the Occitanians of the south? Again, correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems to me that for the majority of French history there was a lack of national identity (or an abstract one if anything). The sole power that bound all the various cultures and polities was the dynasty alone.

The Islamic Caliphates: An intercontinental state which embodied Islam and certain exalted dynasties as its primary identity. Under the Rashidun and Umayyad Caliphate it is no question that a distinct Arab hegemony existed. Under the Abbasids however, they attempted to create a more inclusive empire which governed with equity. Did the early caliphate understand itself as an Arab nation? Or was it perceived as a universal polity from the beginning? How did Arab identity as a ruling class change during the transition of Umayyad and Abbasid rule?

Holy Roman Empire: As I understand it, the HRE was a Christian polity which considered itself to be a continuation of the Roman Empire, and thus the head of an ecumenical order. German ethnic consciousness was a tertiary identity to the state of which the religion, dynasty, and Romanity took precedence. Papal authority also seems to stress the HRE's religious identity as the embodiment of Christendom. It is odd then, how the HRE is seen only as a German Empire and is further mislead by its conceptualization as the First Reich. Despite everything that has been said, there seems to be an overarching German hegemony within the HRE. I've also heard that a prerequisite of being the Emperor required an individual to be the King of Germany. If true, I imagine this has to do with more of a political reason than an ethnic one. So compared to Burgundians, Slavs, and Italians, how influential were Germans in the HRE really? Were they equal among others? Or were they conceptualized as a definitive ethnic core? How important was Germaness in the identity of the HRE?

Regards,

Khan Kaiser and Tsar of all Tataria

[yamatossideboob]

ONE PIECE 1138 Spoilers!

This week's hellish weapons:

"He returned to the Holy Land once" so when DID Shanks do that? And what for hmmmm?

It's about time we got a DF weapon that's as terrifying as the concept suggests

"Even I can't handle getting run through by those!!!" Loki you're in One Piece you'll be fiiiiiiiiiiiine

'Molly-mére' is a stretch and a half 💀

"Aside from Buggy" LEAVE HIM ALONE

I really do hope we get an idea some day of roughly *when* Oda had the idea for the Twin Shanks. It's probable since when the Reverie was going on and we saw that obscured Shanks-alike, but idek how likely that is. The machinations of his mind are an enigma...

She's picking Franky up like an Action Man... jelly

Giants alive during the Void Century eh... I wonder why Oda wants us to have that period in mind 🤔

A different personality depending on who's telling it, eh? Aaah, just like the Gospels of the New Testament, gotcha

Robin's so beautiful here siiiiiiiiiiiiiiigh

finally Franky has something to do, and it's the reveal of what's about to be two of the most important pages in One Piece lol

Like for real, this is huge. In the mural we can see what's probably the Ancient Kingdom and pieces of the Mother Flame (referenced in the verses), the Ark Maxim and the forgotten Moon kingdom that Enel discovered (RETURN OF ENEL 2025 REAL??), battles between Sea Kings and maybe Ancient Weapons? The Adam tree, IMU???, and an alliance led by Nika/Joyboy featuring Merfolk, Fishmen, Lunarians, Ancient Giants, Minks, Wano and Tontatta warriors and regular Giants? and EMET HI EMET!! All seemingly about to do battle with a moon god and its forces?...

The verses meanwhile... the forbidden sun must surely be the Mother Flame. Slaves praying to Nika, and the arrival of Joyboy long ago... Vegapunk may have clued us on this back on Egghead, if his ideas on the origins of Devil Fruits hold water. An Earth God and hellfire serpent... All 3 verses mention distinct gods, as have previous arcs, come to think of it. Might there be gods roaming the world now, unseen, as Luffy himself did not too long ago? And was this serpent an Ancient Weapon? It's not hard to see the beam that destroyed Lulusia as a kind of hellish serpent... These 'gods' might just be what people understood the AWs as back centuries ago. Science sufficiently advanced is indistinguishable from magic, after all. Anyone who pushed the theory of the 'D' being a reference to the moon all along can pat themselves on the back, bc they might have cracked it lol. "Those of the half moon dreamed", how can you NOT associate that with the D clan and the Will of D? Especially with the "inconvenient remnants" from verse 3 lmao, that's the D lot for sure. "Man killed the sun and became god"... is this alluding to Joyboy's defeat and death? And then the last verse is clearly talking about the dawn of the world... There's a bunch of stuff that's unclear to me still though. The lines going "And they will never meet"... What exactly is *this* referring to? The distance of time between these eras? The geographical circumstances separating these worlds, such as most of the world's surface being underwater? Mysteries and mysteries... There's so much yet to speculate on, so many answers to be revealed. Theorists shall have a fat February indeed friends.

This has been such a heady chapter, and mostly all from the last two pages lmao. Oda has done it again! Much-earned break next week, but hopefully we'll see more about this soon. Stay safe nakama 💪✖️

[lordmartiya]

Many to this day speak of nationalism, their country, their people, and so on. Problem is, they have no idea how artificial many of these divisions are. Something I, as a history buff, am actually familiar, and can provide a little anecdote about.

The year is 1912, the Ottoman Empire just lost the battle for control of the island of Lesbos (yes, it exists. The ancient Greek homoerotic poetess Sappho was born there. Now you know the origins of two words, moving on) to Greece, that since its independence in 1822 had aimed to reclaim all territories historically and currently inhabited by Greeks, including this island close to the Anatolian coast. It's said that in a village the local children came to gawk at the newly arrived Greek troops, who asked what they were looking at. The children said they were looking at the Greeks, and when the troops pointed out they were Greeks themselves they replied "No, we're Romans". Because, to paraphrase what Clemens von Metternich said about Italy in his time, until the Greek War of Independence Greece was a geographical expression, just a place inhabited by Romans who happened to speak a language derived from Ancient Greek rather than Latin, and the ethnic identity of "Greeks" was revived PRECISELY for the war of independence, as it was easier to entice the Great Powers to help with the memory of Ancient Greece rather than using the name of Rome (that the West had arbitrarily denied them to both delegitimize the Eastern Roman Empire and legitimize the Holy Roman Empire). I'm also told that many in Greece still use Romioi and Romaic as secondary names for their people and their language (what the West calls "Modern Greek" or simply "Greek"), Greeks outside Greece often still maintain Roman identity if their community originated before Greek independence, and in Turkish the term "Rum" is currently used for Greeks outside the Greek state (and until relatively recently was the self-identification of many Turks, by right of conquest of the Eastern Roman Empire and of living in the lands formerly of said empire).

I am also aware that I myself tend to precise Italian-AMERICAN about US nationals that identify themselves as Italians. It's quite possibly another arbitrary distinction, but considering most of them don't speak the language, don't get much of Italian culture, and hold the descendance bit well above what most in Continental Europe generally do, they don't really look like the Italians I see in Italy beyond the names.

[twentyfivemiceinatrenchcoat]

Lovely, wonderful Ari,

I had the pleasure of reading your wonderful story yesterday. It was delightful; I had a particularly tough week this week, and so the thought that I would be ending my week by reading your story motivated me to get through it.

I have to say that I'm really fond of your imagery. There were several examples in your prose that I found to be absolutely delightful, and they really made me smile because I just thought that they were so beautifully constructed, and often they were, in a way, obscure but familiar enough to make them absolutely compelling. I really like, for instance, the way you introduce the appearance of knight Suguru in the story. I thought it was such a fantastic way of commencing the narrative and introducing such a key character in the narrative, and it's just set up the whole storyline in such a fantastic way.

I know you mentioned that your story is not bound in a concrete way to a specific historical period, time zone, or geographical region, but honestly, that thought really got me going and got me thinking for a long while. As someone who has studied Anglo-Saxon England before, I just found myself thinking that, in a way, almost that cultural, socio-political specificity, in your case, almost wasn't needed because for me your story, in my head, evoked the whole feeling of storytellers and orators reciting stories in mead halls to a widespread audience and how those stories, over time, evolved and changed and sometimes new specificities were added to them depending on the audience present and how new geographic locations and names were slightly changed but regardless of those changes that were made to suit the audience to whom the story was being told, the key essence of the story remained and, for me, your story has that essence and by retaining that essence almost, in a way, your story is kind of, in a way, true to the time period that I suspect you're sort of circling around which, in my opinion, is kind of around the era of Beowulf.

I'm sorry if this is not really making any sense, and perhaps it is not, and it's been a while since I've really truly delved into the period of Anglo-Saxon England, but I guess that was just a way of me almost saying that I really, really enjoyed the story. I enjoyed the experience of reading the story. I enjoyed the experience of falling in love with the characters. I thought it was great overall. The characters were distinct and had distinct personalities, and I thought the interactions worked extremely well. I just enjoyed the overall plot that you constructed. I don't think the fact that it is not bound and pinpointed to a specific historical period is a weakness, but rather, in a way, it is a strength of this story, in my humble opinion.

All in all, I just think you're a gifted writer. I enjoy your work. I've read your work before I read your stories that have to do with Suguru, and I thought that you had a great handle on his character and personality. I am incredibly fond of his character, and I can tell that you are too, and I'm glad that we are bound by our fondness for him.

I think that it is extremely commendable that you spent and evidently edited this work and just spent so much time with the story to produce such a beautiful result, which I thought was fantastic and grossing and just very compelling, so I wanted to thank you for sharing it with us.

HELLOOOOO LOVELY WONDERFUL ANON this ask was such a treat u have no idea 🥺🥺🥺🥺

FIRST OF ALL i’m soooo so so insanely happy that this fic could make ur week a lil better !! TAT that means the world to me !!!! good job getting through it, i’m giving u a big big warm hug <3333 and i hope next week is kinder to u!!!! pls take care of urself!!! spring is almosttttt here now 💐💐💐

gosh i’m so glad that u enjoyed this fic……. ur comments are all so thoughtful!!! I’M SO RELIEVED U LIKED THE IMAGERY it’s what i love writing most tbh so knowing that it hits is such a great feeling :’33 i def enjoy my imagery more obscure and “mismatched” hehe, it’s a huge relief to know u enjoyed those bits as well!!

AND ANON THE TIME PERIOD THING…. this was so interesting to read bc i am (shamefully) very unknowledgeable abt history in general, it’s one of my weakest subjects :’33 i’m so so so amazed with ppl who study certain historical periods like that’s so insanely cool to me…. and the fact that u took the time to think of one that fits w this fic!!! 🥺🥺 aaaaa i’m just so grateful to be able to get this perspective from u……. the anglo-saxon period huh!!!! i really wish i knew more abt it pshdhdh but i 100% trust u anon !! that’s so interesting !!! knowing that the lack of historical accuracy didn’t stop u from being immersed in the fic is such a great relief too…..

all ur comments were truly so thoughtful and attentive, it brought me soooo much joy to read this!!!!! the characters and interactions of this fic are very precious to me so my heart is just bursting w warmth knowing u fell in love w them a little too!! :’3 WE’RE BOUND BY OUR FONDNESS FOR SUGURU SO TRUEEE approval from another sugu stan always makes me happier than anything else!!! it’s an honour to me that u think i have a good grasp on his very complex character…. calling me a gifted writer is so unbelievably kind too 💔💔💔 sniffle..

this was just the sweetest thing anon… it genuinely does mean so much to hear this kind of thing, thank YOU so much for reading my novella of a fic and for writing this out!!! for sharing ur own insight on the historical period, and ur thoughts on the characters!!! i’m hugging u very very tightly and hoping that the coming week treats u as kindly as u deserve 🥺🥺🥺

[kokomeong]

The End of An Era - A Tribute to Milk! Records

How fast time passes us by, so why don’t you hold them - Remedy Waloni

I am writing this piece as I sip on a tall hot latte at a Starbucks inside a chain bookstore near my campus, a scene that I would have never imagined when my girlfriend took me to Seven Seeds in Carlton near her campus nine years ago. Her senpai took her there on her first week in Melbourne and she ordered hot chocolate, not convinced that the famous Melbourne coffee was different and would win her over. She used to not be able to stand the smell of second-wave coffee and coffee shops. In the early 2010’s, my brand new (and still alive) iPod video consisted of Alvvays, Bon Iver, Beirut, DCFC, Bombay Bicycle Club, and Wild Beasts. Teguh Wicaksono regularly made a super indie playlist for National Geographic Traveler. It was an exciting time. We went from spending our time going to Periplus Malioboro just to stare at Frankie to finding them at news kiosks everywhere in Australia. The third-wave was taking over in the peak of the hipster years, and we were relieved that the same trend had occupied Yogyakarta when we returned home a year later. Light roast direct trade coffee with manual brew and single origins were introduced perhaps not very successfully by snobbish male baristas as the market preferred cheap iced coffee with condensed milk as their go-to drink and young male smokers remained loyal to the dark roast americano with sugar added.   

I was reminded of all the buzz about the end of an era as Ronaldo and Messi left the European football scene when I heard that Milk! Records announced that they will close its doors in 2023. It was the heart of Melbourne independent music scene. I learned and took so many references from that music label and its community. It was the year Real Estate released Atlas, the year I was hooked by the brilliance of Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein’s Portlandia. Courtney Barnett released Sometimes I Sit and Think, and Sometimes I Just Sit, Methyl Ethel and Twerps completed their second album, and Dick Diver finished Melbourne, Florida, a staple of their distinctive Australiana sound.

Melbourne was a manifestation of an idea of how diverse the communities can be in a city. It could not be better: multiculturalism, the rising awareness of indigenous issues, Palestine, and animal rights debates, farm-to-table dining and direct trade sustainable produce, the tram lines, queer people kissing in front of old houses in Brunswick, the radical ideas of what a library is and can be, the New Year’s Eve fireworks in River Torrens, all the bookshops and empty wet streets, Papa Gino’s in Carlton, the A1 bakery in Sydney Road, Al-Alamy in Coburg, taking a book conservation training under the supervision of Karen Vidler, summertime bus ride along the majestic Adelaide coastlines, Adelaide Showground, the morning view from a room in Sturrock Street, a summer evening in St Kilda, my obsession with Steph Hughes’ illustrations, and the bitter smell of cheap morning to-go coffee in an unnamed stall in Adelaide station, introduced to me by a woman who worked in my apartment. They ground the beans and made the coffee in a proper espresso machine. There was always a long line of blue collar workers. The beans were dark roast, so bitter that you cannot drink it properly without sugar. I remained one of their regulars during those beautiful days in Adelaide because what is coffee even for if not to be romanticized.

That era in Australia changed (if not solidified) me, and I could not feel more fortunate to do my Master's there. I was a nobody, a 23 year-old working administrative-level job under a yearly contract dying to escape my routine and dysfunctional family dynamics. It was a small chance as the scholarship mainly goes to civil servants with a solid experience and career path. I didn’t have much to offer so I had to make it seem like I knew what I was doing somehow and they bought it. I spent all of my savings to give the best care to ten stray cats I rescued. My parents did not give me any money when I left for Australia, despite their ‘success’ in their respective career. I even gave mom my last 100,000 at the airport because I knew she needed the money.

When I rode my Tokyobike slowly for a morning commute to campus, I felt that it was surely the end of an era. The new young Indonesian bands I can no longer relate to, the fact that my hair is no longer perfectly straight and surrenders to my mom’s curly genetics, the way I managed to understand Japanese cashiers and their many questions before letting me pay for my order, reminiscing the Sefton Park suburb while indulging in the views of Zuibaiji river and the vast open rice fields everyday on the way to campus.

Australians enjoy a slow brunch, the Japanese eat a very effective breakfast. Australians spend a long summer holiday, the Japanese take a week-long summer break. Australians invented their perfectly balanced flat white, the Japanese preserved and perfected their simple drip coffee.

They are totally in contrast, yet from the life I have here and there I learn something in common: that you can be the kind of people who do not define yourself with your titles, job positions or external achievements. The kind of people who have a life outside their job. The people who are more interested in enriching their lives than pursuing the conventional idea of success. People who take seemingly trivial things seriously and deeply. They read, bike, walk, garden, bake, brew, ferment, cook, eat, drink, taste, feel, meet, see, write, watch, and listen consciously. They keep searching for something new and they are excited to learn.

Some people need to advance their career so much they are willing to do literally anything and sacrifice others when they realize they can’t do achieve anything just by relying on their skills and competence. They’re the type who might not appreciate walking to a green space, getting joy from looking at the ducks in the pond, being overly excited to see wild turtles in the river. But there’s no need to be so stressed out about going down if you can just choose to not go up.

Your titles and privileges can and will end, but ideas and knowledge go on. Rest in Peace, Milk! Records.

[relleytrots]

I'm so glad someone else cares.

Do we want to get into how V5 specifically has had – gotta count on my fingers here – five distinct development teams in six years?

There's the "White Wolf" imprint that Paradox briefly used to release the game, before multiple furores and brouhahas around distasteful content, bad actors, neo-Nazi dogwhistles and two out of three in hoise devs resigning brought that to an end. These books – V5 core, Camarilla, Anarchs and Fall of London (lol) were distributed by Modiphius because Paradox didn't have an established process for that (and I'm not sure they do now).

There's Onyx Path, who produced two big books and a raft of stretch goal PDFs as licensors.

There's the "safe pair of hands" era, where VtM's longest serving lead developer came back to Paradox and developed the antagonist supplements and Player's Guide.

And now there's... whatever's going on now. The World of Darkness, distributed by Renegade Games, and apparently developed by everyone who hasn't been fired or quit during the previous chain of events.

AND! White Wolf LARP split off into a whole separate company, By Night Studios, which developed parallel to Onyx Path and did things rather differently. They're printing the LARP rules for V5. They're still influential, because prestige LARP is a big showcase for the IP, and By Night staff – Jason Carl and Dhaunae DeVir especially – have ended up in core roles on the Paradox team.

Bottom line though: Paradox Interactive own it all, and the buck stops with them. The rest is licensing arrangements and shell branding.

To complicate matters still further, a lot of the same people are still around, with different levels of responsibility, because a lot of the actual development has been done on a freelance basis or by the same people in different capacities.

Rich Thomas was art director at White Wolf and is creative director at Onyx Path, and his current relationship with Paradox is unknown.

Jason Carl cut his teeth at By Night Studios, the LARP publication arm, before moving into his current role as WoD marketing manager for Paradox. Same with Dhaunae DeVir, partnerships manager.

Justin Achilli has been lead developer three times: at White Wolf (for Revised VtM and Requiem 1e), Onyx Path (for V20's core book) and Paradox (for V5 on the Player's Guide, Sabbat and I think Second Inquisition books).

Matthew Dawkins is a contributing writer to Paradox but a lead developer at Onyx Path (that's why Chicago By Night and Cults of the Blood Gods are so different from the V5 launch books – he had creative control there).

Mark Rein-Hagen created the game but was merely a contributing writer to V5. Exactly what he wrote is somewhat mysterious (if a chapter is badly received, don't admit which of your team wrote it), but he stepped back after the Chechnya chapter fiasco and he is pretty close, geographically...

Isn't it interesting that the trans women who led development on Requiem 2e at Onyx Path don't show up on the Paradox team, even though at least one of them had been contributing since the White Wolf era? Their ideas certainly appear, in decidedly crunked up form, but where's the credit for Rose Bailey and Olivia Hill?

(There's a lot of murky he-said she-said personal and industry politics attached to that last name, much of which would be outright libellous to repeat since I can't verify any of it, but still... credit where it's due. I can say that Hill's Hunter heartbreaker, iHunt, is a good game, and if she's gotten to release Savage Garden, her Vampire heartbreaker, we will get to see what V5 could have been.)

And isn't it interesting that the most safety-tool-focused book, Blood Stained Love, is also the only V5 book with a female lead developer? Juhanna Petterson, take a bow.

I am legitimately fascinated by production circumstances: because of the autism, but also because when you know who wrote what and you've heard enough scuttlebutt to suspect who wrote what isn't being copped to, the stylistic differences and creative choices start making sense.

Because it's a thing that pops up multiple times and I'm pedantic.

White Wolf publishing doesn't exist anymore and hasn't for a good while. V5 is made by Paradox.

For context: In 2006 White Wolf publishing has been merged with CCP. WW would handle traditional publishing while CCP would deal with some mmo stuff they wanted to do.

At one point in 2011 a shit ton of employees were laid off and the creative director then went off to create onyx path publishing which published White Wolf stuff on CCP's (and now Paradox) behalf.

In 2014 more staff was laid off and the mmo was canceled. Then Paradox bought White Wolf. Since 2018 White Wolf has been restructured directly into Paradox and hence doesn't exist.