#I’m done with producers writing women terribly and then telling us it’s feminism

[sophiemariepl]

Don’t you guys have a feeling that House of the Dragon, for a series that officially and according to its own creators, is supposed to portray strong female characters and have a feminist message, terribly badly portrays female political figures?

Like, I’m sorry but main players in HotD are mostly men, not women 😞

[mst3kproject]

Kingdom of the Spiders

Yep, this is the one with William Shatner in it.  It was directed by John ‘you really undermine your authority when you put Bud in the middle of your name’ Cardos, who did the same job for The Day Time Ended and Outlaw.  It’s also available on Rifftrax, so I think we’re fully qualified for EtNW status… but if you need one more returning star, we have of course the much-maligned Mexican Red-Knee Tarantula.

The Shatmeister is Dr. Robert Hansen, the vet in these here parts. He’s not sure what caused Mr. Colby’s prize calf to suddenly fall sick and die, so he summons help that arrives in the form of Dr. Diane Ashley, an expert on venomous animals.  She quickly determines that the area is being invaded by huge, pissed-off tarantulas!  The over-use of pesticides has forced the spiders to evolve, and they’ve become social hunters with a more concentrated and deadly venom.  In large numbers they’re capable of taking down cattle, dogs… and maybe even humans.  The soundtrack consists of terrible country songs, all of them by the same guy you’ve never heard of.

As 70’s Nature’s Revenge movies go, Kingdom of the Spiders is… adequate.  It’s not remarkably bad, but there’s nothing particularly creative or interesting in it, either.  The direction is nondescript – none of the shots are visually striking, but anything artsy would be out-of-place in a film that’s intended to look as down-to-earth as the farmers and cowboys that populate it.  There’s a county fair that stands in for the Fourth of July Weekend from Jaws, and a ‘spider hill’ that serves as the Smaller Shark, but both of them are mentioned and then just kind of go away, rather than fulfilling any role in the plot.  They’re there for the same reason as the love triangle, because movies are supposed to have those.

The love triangle is what’ll make you hate Shatner’s character. Dr. Hansen seems dedicated to his work and he’s kind to his neighbours, but he’s an absolute ass to women. He seems to have a thing going on with his dead brother’s widow, Terri, which is very Claudius of him, but he rejects her almost violently when she accidentally calls him by her husband’s name. In one scene he teases that he might marry her himself, and then a day later he’s bringing Diane by to introduce her, which results in Terri fleeing to the kitchen to cry.  The impression we get is that he can read her signals, he just doesn’t give a shit.

He’s a jerk to Diane, too.  He asks her on a date moments after saying he has to go see ‘his girl’ that afternoon.  It turns out he’s referring to his four-year-old niece, but he didn’t clarify that until after he asked Diane out, which can only mean he deliberately led her to think he wants to cheat on somebody with her.  Later when he wants her attention, he runs her off the road and basically kidnaps her for dinner with him, and then he drives her car after she’s angrily told him not to.  He teases her about her feminism and makes her open beers for him… and of course this is supposed to be Twu Wuv.

Like a lot of useless love triangles in a lot of useless movies, this one is resolved when the third party dies.  Shatner therefore doesn’t have to choose – if Terri had lived and he’d chosen Diane instead, she might have decided to reduce Hansen’s time with her daughter Linda, whom he clearly adores.  With Terri dead, he gets Diane and the child all to himself.  Terri was nothing but an inconvenience, and is summarily disposed of.

I did like Diane, though.  She comes across as kind of a snotty bitch when we first meet her, but she warms up fast.  My favourite part of the movie is when she sees a gigantic tarantula crawling out of a drawer at her hotel room, and she immediately picks it up, pets it, and tells it it’s pretty!  How could I not like this lady?  Apparently actress Tiffany Bolling got the role mostly because she was willing to do that while their first choice, Barbara Hale (of The Giant Spider Invasion) was not. She deserved way better than to be William Shatner’s love interest.

The unfortunate thing about this sequence is it, and a couple more in which Diane happily handles the spiders without harm, rather undercuts the idea that they’re supposed to be aggressively seeking out human prey.  There are other scenes in which we watch humans run around madly, screaming and flailing, while the spiders merely sit there not doing very much.  Worst of all are two separate sequences in which a fatal accident seems to result not from spiders attacking people, but from people freaking out because a spider was in a vehicle!  It makes the whole movie feel like an over-reaction.

I do realize this may be my personal reaction, rather than the average one… somebody who’s actually scared of spiders might find this completely horrifying.  But… you know spiders move at like one mile an hour, right?  The Creeping Terror could catch them.  Just go get in your car, and drive away.  It would have worked for the sheriff if the crowd hadn’t slowed him down!

Moving along – the characters of the Colbys, a farming couple who’ve poured everything they have into their herd of cattle only to see their livelihood destroyed, are people we can pity but we know better than to get attached to them.  The opening scene is Mr. Colby bragging about how his calf is a shoe-in for first prize, and you know right away that he’s destined to lose everything.  The series of tragedies that ensue for the couple are all similarly telegraphed.

At the end we see a terrible matte painting depicting the entire town draped in spiderwebs.  This looks so bad it’s actually difficult to figure out what we’re seeing, and I’m not at all sure what it’s meant to tell us.  Diane had talked about the spiders ‘migrating’, implying that they’re just passing through.  So are we meant to think that now they’ve killed everyone else, the spiders have moved on and our so-called heroes can escape?  Because there are no actual spiders in the image, just their webs.  On the other hand, Diane also talked about spiders storing their food by wrapping it in webs.  So are they gonna come back to eat everybody later?  But it’s just a spiderweb… the humans can rip it apart and go.  Did the characters win, or lose?  Are they going to live or die?  The movie just runs out of ideas and ends.

This is a bit of a shame, because the core idea here is kind of neat.  The spiders have become monsters not because chemicals or radiation has mutated them, but because evolution did.  Diane explains that over-use of pesticides has done two things: one is to create DDT-resistant spiders in the same way as misuse of antibiotics creates drug-resistant bacteria.  The ones that can tough it out survive and produce similarly tough offspring.  Second, the pesticides have killed off the spiders’ usual prey, forcing them to turn to alternative sources of food.  Spiders with more potent venom are better able to kill large prey – as are those that work together.

I actually like this better than the idea of monsters made by pollution.  The toxic monster genre can’t really be about nature striking back because the creatures in it are truly un-natural.  When it is evolution that makes monsters, that is nature demonstrating that it is more powerful than we are.  It’s also more realistic, I guess, though only in a movie-science-y kind of way.  It’s not very plausible that the spiders could evolve so fast – the major changes in their behaviour would probably take many, many thousands of generations – but at least we know that evolution is a thing that happens, whereas exposure to radiation or toxic chemicals just kills stuff.  Too bad the concept seems to make for terrible movies.

Unfortunately, if the movie’s point is supposed to be that nature is tougher than us, the vague ending kind of undercuts it.  As I mentioned, we don’t really know if the protagonists are going to live to see another day.  Diane says that if insects turned on humanity we wouldn’t last long, but at the end the main characters are still alive.  There are movies in which an open ending is perfectly appropriate, but in this one it just feels incomplete.  If I were writing this, I would have the humans escape to another town or city, onto to find that the spiders have gotten there first.  That would be a little cliché, but it would make the point that while minor victories are possible, in the end the battle of man versus nature can only have one winner.

Kingdom of the Spiders is fairly well-known as a ‘bad movie’, and I expected I would either love it or hate it, but in the end I did neither.  I dislike Shatner’s characters rather strongly, but I’ve seen worse, and he’s not as stilted here as he is in some of his work.  The rest of them are okay.  The music sucks but it’s pretty forgettable, as opposed to things like The Sad Mushroom Ukelele Anthem that crawl inside your ear and nest there like a botfly larva (if you don’t know what that is, do not google it, I refuse to take responsibility for what you’ll learn).  I think a big part of the problem for both this and other spider movies like Tarantulas: the Deadly Cargo and Arachnophobia is just that live spiders don’t make good actors.  You can’t direct them.  It’s really hard to take something seriously as a threat when it’s just kinda wandering around.

Speaking of Arachnophobia, apparently producer Igo Kantor believed it was a deliberate ripoff of Kingdom of the Spiders.  He didn’t do anything about it because, and I quote, “you don’t go and sue Spielberg.” That’s a good enough excuse, I suppose, but I bet he and the makers of Parts: the Clonus Horror would have a lot to commiserate about.

[montagnarde1793]

Ribbons of Scarlet: A predictably terrible novel on the French Revolution (part 3)

Parts 1, 2, 4 and 5.

Style Issues

 Stylistically, there’s a great deal of “tell don’t show” in this book, especially as regards the actual politics. The only things that are really concrete are the characters’ romantic entanglements and scenes of violence. This is a flaw that runs so deep that correcting it would mean writing a completely different book.

 One thing that they could have done that would have made it somewhat more bearable, however, regards the use of language. In a book written in English but that takes place in France and where all the characters are French, please, I’m begging you, do not randomly (and often ungrammatically) insert whichever French words and phrases you half-remember from high school French class into descriptions and dialogue. It doesn’t give the characters a flavor of being French, it gives you a flavor of ignorance.

The key word here is “randomly”: note that I’m not talking about things like terms of address, exclamations, etc., for which there is an established convention, or terms for which there might not be an exact equivalent in English. No, I’m talking about this kind of thing: “[…] running a hand through his short-cropped noir hair” (p. 352). Please, resist the urge!

 Also, this isn’t strictly a style issue, as the grammar is the least of the problems with it, but I don’t really know where else to put it... Each of the six parts opens with an epigraph. Here’s the one for Émilie de Sainte-Amaranthe’s (p. 437) :

 “It was a sensual delight for l’homme rouge to see fall in the basket these charming heads and their ruby blood streaming under the hideous cleaver.”

—Archives Nationale [sic]

 I can’t believe I have to say this to a fellow historian, but just saying a quote is from the archives is bizarrely and baffling amateurish. It’s like saying a quote is from the library, or from a book or from the internet. Without further information, it’s about as useful a citation as saying it came to you in a dream. Why? Because it tells us nothing about the author or the date or any kind of context and therefore gives us no real way of evaluating it — though the lurid, sensationalist language doesn’t inspire confidence. Since the author of this section more than any other seems to take as a principle of novel-writing that whatever is the most over-the-top makes for the best fiction, I would say sure, why not, but as the authors also apparently want their depiction of “history” to be taken seriously… I mean, what is there to even say?

  Writing What You Want to Know

 There’s a problem throughout this book with characters talking about 18th France like it’s a place they’ve only read about in books rather than the only place they’ve ever lived and therefore the only reality *they* know firsthand. Now, obviously, the authors, like the rest of us, *have* only read about a 200+ year-old setting in books (or come to know it through various types of primary sources), but good historical fiction should be able to make you forget that, or at least come close.

I can’t entirely decide whether we’re looking at a failure of research here or of imagination — or just clumsy handling of exposition. I suspect it’s some mixture of all three.

 Allow me to explain. The clumsy exposition is a result of the aforementioned lack of trust in the reader as well, I suspect, of the few pages allotted to each author, which don’t allow for a more natural immersion of the reader into a world that is entirely alien to them but is made up of both new and familiar elements to the characters.

 The research vs imagination issue is more complex. I’m a firm believer in the updated adage ���write what you want to know,” but if you’re going to do that, the intermediate step between wanting and writing is inevitably research. And well, there’s research and there’s research. For a novel especially, you don’t just want to be researching what happened, the concrete material facts such as who was present for what event or what a given figure’s relationship was to the people around them, but also people’s mentalities/sensibilities. To plausibly write from their point of view, you also have to investigate the reasons they might have believed what they believed and to take that investigation seriously, whether or not you agree.

 This was achieved better with some characters than others and again, I’m not entirely sure whether it’s for lack of research or lack of ability to empathize with certain points of view. Ironically, the chapter on Mme Élisabeth is probably the best handled. The author of that section says she wanted to be “fair” (back matter, p. 12) to her subject and I think she succeeds better than her co-authors, while showing that Mme Élisabeth, convinced of the absolute validity of the divine right of her brother, advocates at every turn for violently repressing the Revolution. She’s allowed to articulate her (frankly pretty abhorrent) beliefs in a plausible manner.

 Perhaps the author of this section is just a better writer than her co-authors, but I think there’s more to it than that. I obviously can’t read minds, but from the text of the novel itself as well as from the authors’ notes, I get the impression that we’re dealing with a dual problem of epistemology (i.e. how do you know what you know?) and politics. In either case, it’s not a coincidence if Mme Élisabeth is the best drawn character… and Reine Audu and Pauline Léon are the worst.

 First, on the epistemology side: whether consciously or not, it seems to me as if the authors largely started out with the assumption that they already basically understood their protagonists. Sophie de Grouchy is so ahead of her time she might as well be a modern woman, got it, no problem… Reine Audu is an avatar of the “mob,” (the author of her section’s words, not mine, back matter, p. 8), pitiable because of her poverty but with no real politics beyond that of hunger and resentment… Pauline Léon is a “well-intentioned extremist” to use TV Tropes parlance — you would think that label would apply better to Charlotte Corday, but the latter ends up being so saintly she basically converts Pauline Léon (in what is quite possibly the most maddening moment in the whole damn book)… and so on. If I’m right, the authors’ assumptions about these archetypes made them not really feel the need to dig too deeply into the question of what made these women tick, either through research or empathy.

 We don’t know much about Reine Audu or Pauline Léon, but there has been a fair amount of research into the beliefs of the popular movement and revolutionary crowds from Georges Lefebvre onward (most of it tending to dispel the lazy stereotypes on display here). The authors either didn’t bother with it or made poor use of it (as is evidently the case with poor Dominique Godineau, who does figure in the bibliography).

 The book does Pauline Léon a disservice on both sides, mischaracterizing her beliefs for good and for ill. They make feminism as a contemporary audience would understand it her primary cause and her support for the rest of the popular movement’s program (in which we learn that women and people of color are to be included, but not actually what it consists of...) accessory and easily disposable so Charlotte Corday can be proved right and “radical” men can prove to be the real enemy.

 (Which… I could roll with it if the idea was just that men of all political flavors can be misogynists, but as usual, the message is all men are potential rapists (except Condorcet, Buzot, La Fayette and Louis XVI, of course) but the further left they are the rape-ier they get. That’s not how that works.)

 Anyway, the point is, these are characters the authors seem to have gone in assuming they understood, either because they found them relatable or because they thought they knew what archetype they corresponded to. The author of the section on Mme Élisabeth, on the other hand, writes that this was a character that it took some effort to understand because the character’s worldview was so different from the author’s and that of her presumed readers. This was also the case to some degree with the author of Manon Roland’s section, who writes about having to grapple with her protagonist’s not being a feminist (a position that this author bizarrely seems to think was rare at the time). Regardless, in both cases, the effort to understand, along with the existence of more sources produced by the character they were attempting to inhabit, produced better results.

 But again, I think there’s also a political element. Remember how I mentioned that this book’s main flaw is its feeling of artificiality? (I mean, to the point that the rest of this critique is really just about understanding why it feels so artificial.) One of the moments that felt the most authentic to me was Mme Élisabeth’s extravagant shoe-buying habit, her feeling bad about it and her confessor reassuring her that it’s fine because she hasn’t taken a vow of poverty, after all. And I don’t mean ‘authentic’ necessarily in the sense of ‘historically accurate’ — I don’t know enough about Mme Élisabeth off the top of my head to comment on her shoe collection. But I did think: there, consumerism and guilt about consumerism are in fact much more relatable to the middle class authors and their presumed middle class audience than hunger and privation — or activism relating to socio-economic issues, for that matter. Which is how we end up, here as in a lot of other media, with a relatable royal and revolutionary caricatures.

 This is also a good demonstration of how research and imagination or empathy play off each other. Marge Piercy didn’t have more information about Pauline Léon than the authors of this book. In fact, she had less: she writes in the preface of her book that she learned that Léon’s mother was in fact still alive at the time of the Revolution when it was too late to change what she had written. Credit where credit is due, once again, this new book corrects that error.

But in every other respect, Piercy’s version is far superior, because Pauline Léon’s views as well as her experience are taken seriously. This is no doubt due in large part because Piercy herself has been an activist for various left-wing causes. Her activism surely allowed her to relate to her characters, but far from writing a simple projection from her own experience, it allowed her, just as importantly, to entertain the notion that there was something there to be taken seriously. And therefore, that it was worth researching what precisely these figures were fighting for and not simply the question of why people get caught up in “extremism.” That’s why Pauline Léon and Claire Lacombe’s chapters are the best in City of Darkness, City of Light, while Pauline Léon and Reine Audu’s are the worst in this book.

Next time: inaccuracies big and small!

[janiedean]

serious talk but i’m honestly stumped as to why jcs are the ones sending hate. i’m not saying anyone should send or receive hate but in every other fandom i’ve been in the ‘problematic’ shippers are generally chill and stay in their lanes, while being the ones getting sent hate. i’m not saying jcs never get hate but i’ve never seen taboo shippers be the ones doing the harassing before.

*shrug*

I had an anon addressing that at length in june so if you want that entire discussion it’s here https://janiedean.tumblr.com/post/185642667908/hello-im-sorry-for-disturbing-you-but-im-quite

that said I’ve been considering it for years bc honest I never was in the situation where I argued with **problematic shippers and like you can ask anyone in the theon corner who’s also in th/ramsay fandom that I’ve defended them countless times regardless of the OMG YOU’RE SICK people coming from (sadly) my side because they got trashed to hell and back, and like… I have it on record that even if I’m not into badwrong stuff I will defend people who ship it bc everyone should ship what they want. and everywhere even within this fandom **problematic shippers usually stay in their lane - I mean ffs I don’t think I’ve ever ran into anyone shipping idk th/ramsay or sansa/lf or whichever other badwrong ship being like that. and jcs get way less hate than any of them and half of that is jb people telling them to can it after they crosstag hate on purpose and then pearl clutch that ohmygod we’re so hateful, but if you want my two cents, under the cut bc it’s long and is2g if someone shows up telling me this is me accusing jc shippers as a whole of whatever I’m blocking on sight:

that part of jc fandom has done that since I remember being in this fandom, and with that part I mean that there’s a bunch of jc people who either multiship or are like sane people who aren’t partaking in fandom or left bc they didn’t want to be associated with that attitude

that part of jc fandom has spun a narrative since 2011 that if you didn’t like c. or thought j. was a better person than she was (or tyrion too) you were a closeted misogynist and like… a lot of those people were bnfs back in the day so basically criticizing c. and/or saying that jaime isn’t a bad person now automatically means that you’re problematic/a misogynist/hate women and no one countered it bc apparently saying that grrm is not necessarily misogynist for writing c. as a villain is a controversial opinion which means that if they coat their analysis in performative feminism they have the upper hand *shrug*

in this context c. being the abuser/bad person is downplayed/turned over on its head and no one recognizes that jc is indeed an abusive rship where j. is the abused/wronged part and you can see that because 90% of the meta published in this fandom villainizes j. in nonsensical ways just so it’s an argument that he’s as bad as c. if not worse and jc is seen as codependent toxic but not as abusive with power imbalance which means that it’s not seen as necessarily *problematic* or badwrong which means they don’t get the shit that everyone else shipping badwrong gets which… good for them bc no one should get shit for shipping what they want but basically they never were on the side of receiving anon hate all day long and they actually were on the side of sending it all day long

and like sorry but that’s factual, some people in that side of fandom were making burned ground around jb before S2 and the moment jb became popular they were on us/the ship like woah because obviously if people shipped jb they should buy the narrative where j. is redeemable/not a terrible person, and the moment people buy that narrative then theirs is automatically put in question, and so they started painting us as the problematic straight women who are homophobic bc they don’t think brienne is lgbt and want her with j. bc we want to fuck him and we’re projecting, which at the same time makes us sound like we’re making shit up and have no textual analysis to base stuff on when in fact we do, but again in this climate where saying c. is terrible = you’re a misogynist you’re automatically discredited the moment you say that and that j. isn’t as horrible as she is

also, since the people enabling that shit in jc fandom were bnfs (like there’s… one bnf in jc fandom who’s an a+ person and didn’t engage in shitting over us at least but everyone else enabling it was a bnf) it meant that the ‘let’s shit on jb shippers’ behavior was always condoned/let slide, so basically if anyone wanted to get popularity points being asses to us was the best way to go at it, and that’s why 90% of what’s remained of them rn is more interested in sending anon hate to jb shippers than producing content, and every single time it’s turning things over on their head making it sound as if we started it or anything of the kind. too bad that I’ve been here since before jb was a show thing and I can 100% remember the times people asked me privately questions aimed into guilttripping me from having jb as a sideship in t/hrobb fic and I was terrified of what would happen when I put it as a sideship in sfbd which is btw one of the reasons I dropped it for a year the first time round *shrug* (yeah it’s been long enough that I think I can say that *shrug*)

basically: I think that those specific jc shippers have…. issues in the sense that they’re caught in some very unhealthy internet presence thing in which they’ve been doing this thing since like 2013 if not earlier and now they can’t stop and the new ones who fall in that crowd follow suit and no one ever told them to can it or that it wasn’t okay or whatever, and now it’s too late to do anything except waiting for grrm to publish wow, have c. die somewhere j. is not and have the entire ‘they’ll die together’ discourse die and maybe they’ll stop. but like… again: i made the blog private for three months, I put it back to public, before I could even make the post saying it like three minutes after I went public again I got a jc anon. within the first week I had twenty. and they showed up the moment I put it back to public. just that is a level of unhealthy that should be enough to state whoever’s doing this needs help like very much because it’s like basically stalking, but hey, it’s all my fault because I said jc is an abusive rship and he’s not the abuser. *shrug* like: at this point I’m legit worried for them because this isn’t healthy and I really hope they get help because there’s no reason why they should come at me like that when I’m in my lane all the damned time except for the single occasions pointed out in the first linked post. the only explanation is that they can’t handle the fact that I’m existing and expressing an opinion they disagree with when I don’t even know them so if it’s the problem………. I really hope they get a grip. because it’s not healthy. period.

[weareimprobable]

A open letter from Improbable’s D&D Producer to members of the Garrick Club. (It’s all a personal opinion, you understand..)

Since it’s International Women’s Day I thought I’d write a little post for the boys because you’re probably feeling a bit left out today and I’m a compassionate soul. This probably isn’t one of the most pressing issues around right now, but there’s something under the surface of it that feels important, and it’s something you can potentially take some action around - especially if you’re Stephen Fry or Hugh Bonneville or Benedict Cumberbatch*. So here goes.

A while back I was at a Devoted & Disgruntled event about commercial & subsidised producers. In one session about how to get more reviews and critical attention, a guy said: “If you really want critics to come see your shows, to be honest the best thing to do is take them out for dinner at the Garrick Club”.

Ouch. There it was, right there. The bullshit system at work. The problem that I’d long suspected but not really been able to prove. If you want critics to come to your show, be a man.

It wasn’t just rumour and myth either. The speaker was talking from experience, having worked for someone who did this regularly. This was the first time I’d heard someone articulate so bluntly what it was that went on at the Garrick, why it is such a problem; not just that it nurtures an exclusive, segregated, superior attitude or creates a space for one-sided argument, but that it keeps key tools for success unavailable to women**. It keeps the networks and handshakes and connections that oil the wheels of negotiations out of the reach of women.

Some months later, I can’t shake this conversation. I read the #MeToo accounts of systemic abuses of power, and about that other men’s club charity event*** that was all pretty disgusting and I think, yeah so the Garrick ain’t the frikkin' Bastille but there it is, squatting like persistent, heavy-breathing toad at the core of the theatre industry. Men in, women out, it croaks.

The Garrick Club website states that “No part of the clubhouse may be used for business purposes, which includes discussing business matters” which I suppose is their excuse. It’s all just a harmless bit of fun! Quality time for the lads! I’m also struck by how many of the articles following the last vote on accepting women describe it as being a place mostly inhabited by over-70s, an insistence that it’s just some harmless old fuddy-duddys sitting about reading Dickens, that we’re really not missing out on anything. “You don’t want to come in here ladies, it’s very very dull!” (turns gaslight down again). Other arguments put forward focus on the existence of women-only clubs. But there’s a fundamental difference here. Women-only spaces generally come into existence because women need a safe place to hang out where their drinks aren’t being spiked, where they aren’t getting talked over by manologuing**** mansplainers, where their arses aren’t being grabbed or they can just have a decent conversation without being interrupted by men who think the only possible reason women exist is to entertain men. Men’s clubs, on the other hand, exist to bolster power networks and do all that secret stuff that they all insist doesn’t exist. Until you find out that, if you want to get critics to come to your show, you take them for dinner at the Garrick. Looking beyond theatre, the Garrick is also very popular among the judiciary, which is everyone’s problem. *****

A few Garrick members said they’d resign after the last vote was unsuccessful in changing the policy, and I expect quite a lot more of the ~55% thought they’d done a good turn for feminism there and sorry it didn’t work out, we tried etc. So here’s my challenge to all you dudes who are still hanging on in there. If you really disagree with the policy, and if it really is just a bunch of harmless boring old conservatives, QUIT. If we’re not missing out on anything, RESIGN YOUR MEMBERSHIP. If it’s really not a place where useful conversations, deals and connections that further your career take place, STOP GOING THERE. Because frankly, looking at the fact that this vote passed in 2015 and there has been no move to admit women since and you are still a member, I don’t believe you. I don’t believe that it is just some jolly japes among the boys. I do not believe that you are not benefitting. If there was so little at stake, and if you really cared about equality, you would not have remained as a member, would you? Would you?

So either you are the kind of man-child who remains utterly terrified of women being better than him and thus have decided that women are all some sort of terrible mutant seagulls who literally cannot stop talking about “stuff” or you are basically a coward.

It’s International Women’s Day. Step up. Grasp the nettle of your own privilege. Share the power. Abandon this leaky, ancient, creaking ship and let’s find some better ways to make friends and influence people.

Happy IWD,

x Sarah

This post was extensively edited following a really nice conversation with the guy who made the comment that kicked it all off. In the first version he bore the brunt of my ire, unfairly it turns out as he’d made the comment ironically, which I’d missed at the time. Which all goes to show we should really all find time to have more proper conversations with each other when we get cross about stuff, and I think also proves once again that segregation is deeply unhealthy, so let’s not ever hang out in exclusive clubs with only People Like Us to talk to.

* Big fans of my work, absolutely.

** I definitely include trans and non-binary people in my definition of women here, because I bet the GC doesn’t. Please correct me if I’m wrong about that. It might turn out they have a great trans-inclusive policy created in consultation with some actual trans people but since they had a vote about women at which 0 women spoke, I reeeeeally doubt it.

*** Hey, you know who’s really good at charitable work without having to grope anyone in the process? Yes, that’s right, WOMEN!

**** Thanks, yeah you can have that for free.

*****Since the membership list is a closely guarded secret, I can’t tell you what this picture looks like from an intersectional point of view, but I’d bet my secret handshake they are not winning any awards for diversity. If anyone has any insight about this, I’d be grateful to hear it.

A little club-based disclaimer postscript. Personally I’m against private members clubs as a whole, whether divided along a gender-binary or mixed, because I’m not really into them as a concept. I was offered free membership of a new theatre club that opened in London last year and went along a couple of times out of curiosity. I came to the conclusion that it was just an expensive wine bar with added inconvenience. On learning that it was completely inaccessible to anyone with mobility issues, being up three flights with no lift, I decided I wasn’t up for giving my money to that kind of exclusivity and haven’t been back since. In fact I can’t really think of any kind of exclusivity that I’m ok with. Apart from toilet cubicles. My point is, if you disagree with the infrastructure, don’t support it. Find another place to hang out where everyone can join the conversation.

[newtinalover]

About Johnny Depp in Fantastic Beasts and what does this mean for me

Well, there is some time I want to comment about the case Johnny Depp in Fantastic Beasts and after these statements by David Yates and JK Rowling, I would first like to share this Claire Willett thread @clairewillett on twitter: https://twitter.com/clairewillett/status/938890109893591040

We all know the story of The Publishing House That Harry Potter Built, how everyone passed on her manuscript until Scholastic said "sure, what the hell, we'll buy it," and then she like singlehandedly turned the ship around with all those sweet sweet Potterbucks. Amazing.

I want to love J.K. Rowling. I truly love the Harry Potter books.  I truly love the world she created.  I truly believe that those books have transformed our culture in some ways that are really positive.  I am a proud Ravenclaw and Hermione Granger is my Patronus. 

But.

I've been trying to put my finger on what it is that makes me feel so disappointed in Rowling's words and behavior of late - not just the Depp thing, but also the Navajo skinwalkers thing from last year with Ilvermorny - and I think I've finally figured it out.

As a writer, I found her origin story so inspiring. She was a broke single mom on public assistance and, as Lin-Manuel Miranda says, she wrote her way out of her circumstances. The art of storytelling changed her life. That's beautiful to me.

So the story of J.K. Rowling the author is the story of someone who was given public assistance by the government, and was given a chance to succeed by a publishing house who believed in her. She was helped when she needed help. That's how she became who she became.

And the story that made her famous is the story of a kid in terrible circumstances - abuse, neglect, loneliness, danger, grief - who is helped when he needed help, and is willing to sacrifice for others.

I believe that the J.K. Rowling who first wrote those books espoused the values that the books stand for. But now she is the most recognizable author in the entire world and is a kabillionaire and suddenly I am no longer sure if her values are the same.

The Ilvermorny debacle was the first moment where I began to really see the defensiveness of Wealthy White Feminism seep into the way Rowling responded to critique of her work. There were so many better ways to handle it and she swung and missed SO BADLY.

See, and here's a place where as a writer I am fully 100% in sympathy with her, Rowling is now completely boxed in by the Potterverse. She's reached a level of fame where this is the only thing the world is ever going to let her write from now on.  Even if it's time to stop.

If she tries to write ANYTHING ELSE, even under an assumed name like she  did with "The Casual Vacancy," she'll get outed and it gets held up next to the Potterverse books anyway.  She can't escape it. So I get the desire to find a way to broaden the world.

What she SHOULD have done, in deciding that she wanted to expand the Potterverse to explore other cultures, is either A) partner with writers FROM those cultures to create and flesh out the backstory, or B) at MINIMUM do a fuckton more research into them than she did.

So when she released the story of Ilvermorny on Pottermore and everyone was like "girl no you cannot use things that are SACRED to Native culture like that," it was clear that no Native folks had been consulted by the white British lady about how this would make them feel.

It is . . . not difficult to imagine how Native peoples might feel like the rich white British lady showing up to appropriate stories and symbols she doesn't understand for her own personal financial gain might be, um . . . you know, an unpleasantly familiar sensation.

So, okay. There's backlash. People are frustrated. The old J.K. Rowling, who built a fantastical wizarding world on the framework of a set of progressive values that champion diversity? You'd think she would have heard that and listened, right? Maybe apologized? Yeah, no.

That's because the Potterverse is no longer just the story she poured out from her heart in that tiny apartment in the few hours she could carve out while her kids were sleeping, the story that saved her and turned her life around. Now it is a multi-million dollar business.

Which brings us back to the Johnny Depp question, and why her response today was so enormously frustrating.

The thing that is very very important to understand about writers whose books are made into movies or TV shows is that they have control over casting, writing, story structure and production approximately nothing percent of the time.  There are incredibly few exceptions.

People like Diana Gabaldon and George R.R. Martin are given a lot of creative control, compared to other writers, in the making of their shows, because they were big-ass stars already and they have agents who would have demanded that before signing anything.

But the vast majority of writers, when they're lucky enough to sell the rights to something, have no ability to affect the outcome after that.   Which includes casting.  99.99% of writers who find a problematic actor cast in their book's movie are stuck with him.

But the exception to this rule is people exactly like J.K. Rowling, and that's why I'm angry at her.

Rowling is a producer on the Potter movies.  Rowling has arguably more creative control over the film versions of her books than any other writer who has ever lived. If she wanted Johnny Depp out, she could have made it happen.  She did not.

Let's recall that the old Rowling, the one writing the first Potter book by hand on legal pads in her public assistance apartment, the brave and creative scrapper whose love for these characters saved her and kept her going, wrote a hero who ESCAPES A LIFE OF ABUSE.

Harry lives with a family that abuses, mistreats and neglects him, and then gaslights him about that abuse until it's all he knows and understands and he can't imagine a better life, but he's saved by people who tell him "you deserve better than this."

What makes it possible for Harry to return to the Dursleys' house every summer between school terms and no longer suffer psychological harm from their abuse is that now he understands that that treatment was not normal and not something he somehow deserved.

There are also too many incidents to count throughout all seven books where a major plot point hinges on a character saying "this is a terrible thing that happened to me" and whether or not they are believed about their own story: ´´Did that thing REALLY happen? Did you REALLY see the thing you thought you saw? Does such a being REALLY exist? Is Voldemort REALLY back? Is that REALLY true? That sounds implausible. I know that guy, he can't be a Death Eater. He comes from such a respectable family...´´

You see where I'm going here, yes?

The old J.K. Rowling we all fell in love with built a world where BELIEVING PEOPLE WHEN THEY TELL YOU ABOUT WHAT HAPPENED TO THEM, EVEN IF IT IS IMPLAUSIBLE OR TERRIFYING, is the most important thing you can do.

But the current J.K. Rowling is the CEO of a massive multinational corporation built on the backs of that story she first wrote by hand back before she had any wealth or power, and Johnny Depp is an actor who has been proven to be able to anchor a film franchise. So.

It was frustrating enough when she was merely silent.  Today's statement is so much worse than saying nothing.

Today's statement achieved the following things: --it confirmed that she would, in fact, have had the power to do something about casting Depp in that movie if she had chosen to exercise it, and that he continues to remain in this franchise with her enthusiastic consent.

--it confirmed that she had all the same information the rest of us had about Amber Heard's story and her allegations of abuse, including all the documentation and testimony from other witnesses, at an early enough point that there would have been time to recast.

--it gave us vague assurances that she did some degree of due diligence in looking into the story to assess whether or not it was true, but offered no specifics of any kind.   --it explained away that lack of specifics with some handwaving about confidentiality clauses.

--it declared that she, J.K. Rowling, now possessed information she was not at liberty to share which essentially exonerates poor Johnny Depp from these mean and unfair accusations of wrongdoing, and suggests that we should take her word at face value.

"I looked into it and I can't tell you what I found out but rest assured, Johnny Depp is innocent and we all love him and that gold digger Amber Heard made it all up" is so much worse than "no comment."   It's so, so, so much worse.

This is EXACTLY the kind of privileged white feminism we saw with Lena Dunham's statement last month: "yes, I believe women, I'm a feminist, I trust women when they come forward about their abuse .... unless I'm friends with the guy, then she's lying."

This is what you say when you've built your brand on being a progressive feminist and you want people to believe you still are - YOU want to believe you still are - but now there are huge amounts of money at stake and suddenly things are a lot more complicated.

Believe me, I get that she's in a tricky position.  It is easy to stick by your principles when it costs you nothing.  It is harder when big things are at stake.  I don't know what's in Depp's contract, or in hers. I can't fathom how much money we're talking about here.

But this is why this whole situation is so fucking depressing. 

Because J.K. Rowling is not the Harry Potter of her own life story anymore.

She's no longer the scrappy underdog who came from a world of no privilege and always took the side of the powerless. She's like one of those dudes from the Ministry of Magic who was too scared to take a stand because they didn't want to lose their comfortable position.

And it's so sad.  I'm so much more sad than angry.  I mean I'm angry too, but my overwhelming feeling is " . . . oh. okay. so as soon as you have a shitload of money you're just like every other rich person in the world."

It would have been so easy for her to release a statement that basically said "I stand by my values, I believe women, I believe abuse victims, I am the person you always believed me to be, but here are the limits of my authorial control on films."

But instead she confirmed that SHE HAD A CHOICE, SHE HAD THE POWER, SHE HAD THE ABILITY TO DO THE THING THAT A HEROIC PERSON WOULD DO and instead of being Hermione Granger she was like . . . Cornelius goddamn Fudge.

This is what White Feminism looks like. It means you stand with other women when you look good doing so (like roasting Trump on Twitter, which costs her nothing), but you won't stick your neck out and use your unfathomable privilege if it might negatively impact you.

For the life of me I don't know why she's doubling down on Johnny Depp, when Hollywood is full of dudes who would fall all over themselves to headline a Rowling film franchise and who have never abused anyone in their lives. But she is.

So, that's where we are. She's made her choice. She's said her piece. She's not the woman we wanted her to be.  I'd like to believe that she once was that person.  I'd like to keep believing in the woman who first sat down to write that story. But who knows.

I am not personally invested in the "Fantastic Beasts" 'verse, and haven't seen the first movie, though someday I probably will. There are good questions to be asked about boycotting vs. not boycotting. I think that's a personal decision, tbh.

I don't think it is morally bad or wrong to see these movies because Johnny Depp is in them.  I think if this story means something to you, you shouldn't let this take that away from you.  I think we're allowed to enjoy things that are problematic, as long as we're aware.

Go see it if you want to see it. Don't feel guilty for enjoying it. Don't apologize for loving the story. The story belongs to you. The world belongs to you. If you love it, it gets to be yours. But if @jk_rowling disappointed you today, let her know why.

Having said that, I would like to add just a few things about my vision of whoever accompanies the magical universe of Harry Potter there, no less than 16 years:

When I knew that this world would return to theaters in 2016, I was absurdly happy, since I had felt ''orphan an HP' 'since 2011, when the last film was released. I've always considered myself a feminist and sympathetic to the cause of marginalized groups, so imagine the impact when I knew that Johnny Depp would be in the franchise that not only taught me about these exact values ​​of empathy and love, but I grew up seeing JKR campaigning for these causes too. In a way, she was one of my biggest mirrors.

But until then, honestly, I've never been to follow JD's career, so I knew, by all accounts, about his case of aggression against his ex-wife Amber Heard. When I heard that he was in FB, I soon learned more about it. It should be considered that the information is inaccurate in this respect, but what we have in hand is that:

1) There is a historical legacy that shows us the oppression that women suffer, on a world scale. No matter how much a woman says that she has suffered any kind of aggression, if her word is questioned by a man, she will, in the vast majority of cases, go out as a lying prostitute, or as a mercenary, or as someone who only wants destroy the career of the 'innocent' man.

2) In everything I research about AH and JD, that's exactly what caught my attention: how much people are struggling to invalidate her word, even she PROVING that the assaults happened.

3) Yes, Evidences! First let's talk about the much-discussed video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EdmB2zoaiu4

Some claim that he was out of control, that he hit objects but that at no time does he hit him. If this is not concrete proof of an emotional uncontrolled that certainly falls into psychological and then physical aggressions (remember that domestic violence follows a cycle that begins with psychological violence that goes up to the physical), I do not know what else it can to mean. If I am close to a person uncontrolled in this way, even if she did not attack me, I would certainly be terrified.

´´Oh! But Amber certainly provoked him! He was drunk! Surely if he had been sober he would not have done it!´´

This is the most ridiculous excuse of all and it resembles when they try to blame the victim of a rapist because she was wearing "short clothes". It's also similar to when Kevin Spacey tried to justify his crime by saying that '' I did not remember, I was certainly drunk ''.

Some people also say that the video was edited and the man who appears there actually was not JD. I'm sorry, it's ridiculous too.

4) ´´But AH withdrew the accusations! So JD is innocent!´´

Oh really? Are you so blind so you can not see that she did it out of sheer pressure from all sides? We have recently discovered the rotten side of Hollywood, whose victims are mostly what? That's right, women! So it is more than obvious that Amber was pressured to withdraw the accusations through a series of agreements, such as those made explicit here: http://mashable.com/2016/08/16/johnny-depp-amber-heard-divorce-statement/#rz12DBHO3OqR

In the part that says:  "Neither party has made false accusations for financial gain. There was never any intent of physical or emotional harm." For me it is more than clear that JD himself assumes to have attacked Amber, you who do not want to accept.

5) '' Amber is an aggressor too! She hit your ex girlfriend! ''

As if that justified what JD did ... but come on: http://ego.globo.com/famosos/noticia/2016/06/tasya-van-ree-nega-que-ex-amber-heard-seja-violenta-diz-site.html

Tasya issued a statement defending the ex and would have told TMZ sources that Amber's domestic violence arrest would be ridiculous because she was never violent. Besides, Tasya and Amber remain good friends. If the aggression were true, the logic would be that Tasya kept away from Amber, would not it? And even if the aggression had happened, that would not erase the feat of JD

6) "But we must separate the staff from the professional! JD is a great actor! ''

Oh really? If you hired a gardener to work in your home, and later knew that when he comes home he hits the woman, would you continue to use his services quietly? If your answer is yes, forgive me, but you have a dubious character. Men are already privileged in a macho society just because they are men, imagine then a white and rich man.

7) '' Amber is a slut who just wanted to take money from him! ''

Honey, she's an actress, she's also rich. She does not need it. Oh, and for your information, all the money she got from the JD deal was donated to institutions that help victims of domestic violence. Your stupid argument falls.

8) '' Okay, the aggression may be real but that's no reason to boycott! We should not boycott and support JKR and the other actors that are in play ''

Okay, I agree in parts. In fact, the rest of the cast is not to blame for this whole situation. Do you think I'm happy to know that most likely I will not see my beautiful girl Katherine Waterston playing Tina Goldstein so beautifully? Am I happy not to see Eddie as fantastic as Newt? Am I happy not to see my beautiful Newtina couple getting together (and probably kissing) finally? That I will not see Jude Law as my dear Dumbledore ???

It's exactly this immense sadness that I carry after these statements that leads me to the imminent decision not to follow the Fantastic Beasts franchise. Everything JKR taught through Potter stories (which - he was a victim of abuse) falls to the ground when they not only hire someone like Johnny Depp, but put him as the protagonist! It's so contradictory and disappointing! 

I repeat: 16 years are loving and admiring a woman who today decided to simply say: 'Yes, we know that fans are not 100% satisfied with JD in our cast but we do not care, we want more visibility and, of course, money' '

After JKR's statement, an immense disgust swept over me and I said goodbye to the franchise, emphasizing, more than ever, my eternal love for Katherine Waterston and the ship Newtina, which were my greatest gifts from the first film. 

I remembered the farewell scene between Newt and Tina and I cried. I know they are not to blame, but JKR taught me: "The time will come when we will have to choose between what is right and what is easy.”

I make the right choice, according to my values ​​and principles, even though it hurts me. I decided not to follow the FB franchise anymore, and I would like to be respected in that regard. No, I AM NOT LESS HP FAN BY CAUSE OF THIS! I had the displeasure to read that those who boycot FB are not really fans. GET OUT OF YOUR CASUAL! YOU ARE NOT BETTER THAN NOBODY TO SAY THESE STUPID THINGS!

Respect my decision and my pain! Respect my decision to follow what my heart asks for at this moment! JKR is no longer the same woman who wrote the HP series to get away from her abusive reality, she has changed! Now she is a millionaire (thanks to us who consume her material, by the way) and obviously want to win more for it. I reiterate that I will continue, with all my might, loving Katherine and Newtina, accompanying future works of Katherine and the other cast members, but I keep only that of the woman who once inspired and loved me so much.

If one day you read this, JK Rowling, I wish you to be very happy, know that your story inspired me and changed my life in many aspects, but today you no longer have my support and I hope, from the bottom of my heart, that you never go through abuse again so that you need to prove that you are speaking the truth, like as happened to Amber, and it happens to all of us, every moment.

PS: Sorry if there are any terrible errors in writing, but I'm Brazilian and not accustomed to English.

Eloany Homobono.

[the-desolated-quill]

WHEEEEEEEEDON!!!! - Quill’s Scribbles

Yes. I’m back. I was aiming to stay away from Tumblr for at least a month so I could fully rejuvenate myself, but that was not to be thanks to Warner Bros. and DC’s latest kamikaze move. Joss Whedon is in talks to write, produce and direct a Batgirl movie.

For the record, I’m not happy about this.

So instead of the over the top, triumphant return I imagined in my head, I instead return to Tumblr like the grumpy caretaker who has to clean up the mess after a frat party.

Okay. Well I suppose the first question I have to ask is:

WHAT THE FUCK WERE YOU THINKING DC?!

Joss Whedon?!... JOSS WHEDON?!?! You can’t be serious!!!

But hold on, I can hear you saying. Joss Whedon is a self proclaimed feminist writer. Why would there be an issue? Well because there’s a world of fucking difference between saying you’re a feminist and actually being a feminist.

For what it’s worth, I don’t think Joss Whedon is a bad person. He seems to mean well and I’m sure his attempts at writing strong female characters and tackling women’s issues are well intentioned. I believe that he believes he’s a feminist. The problem is... well... his female characters.

We all remember Buffy The Vampire Slayer, right? It recently celebrated its 20th anniversary and at the time it was considered a massive step forward for women on television. Nowadays, while it still has a strong cult following, it isn’t held in quite as high regard. The reason for this is because there are elements to Buffy that were overlooked at the time, but are now considered extremely problematic or just downright offensive. Buffy does succumb to a lot of sexist tropes, most notably the women in refrigerator trope (where a woman’s suffering is used to progress the male character’s storyline), as well as the frequent ways sexual freedom or promiscuity is often punished in the show and the way Whedon’s writing seems to contribute to rape culture. There’s one instance where the gang-rape and murder of a minor character portrays two of its participants in a sympathetic light, and then there’s of course the notorious moment where Spike tries to rape Buffy, after having practically stalked her for two seasons, only for the act to bring them closer together and contribute to Spike’s redemption arc.

Criticism has also been extended to some of Whedon’s other projects. Firefly has been criticised for its casual racism and cultural appropriation, Dollhouse has been repeatedly criticised as being mysogonistic due to its frequent issues with consent and scenes of abuse and violence against women, and of course there’s Avengers: Age Of Ultron. After having done a surprisingly decent job in the previous Avengers movie to make Black Widow more than just a female love interest or femme fatale, in a bizarre turn Whedon decided to undo all of that by having Black Widow sporadically fall in love with the Hulk (despite the two not sharing any kind of romantic chemistry in previous instalments) in a narrative that ultimately removed any kind of independence or free agency the character once had.

For a more in-depth look into the problematic elements of Joss Whedon’s writing, check out this article from The Mary Sue entitled ‘Reconsidering the Feminism of Joss Whedon’. It’s a very good read :)

While Joss Whedon can produce some good work, his attitude regarding his female characters is questionable at best. Like I said, I believe that he believes he’s a feminist. The problem is his brand of feminism seems to be permanently stuck in the 90s. His stubborn refusal to accept fault and move with the times has drawn a lot of criticism, which becomes more and more vocal with every passing year. Just to be clear, those sexist elements have always been present in his writing. The only thing that’s changed is social attitudes. In the past, people were willing to overlook the problems with Buffy because it was rare to see a show with a kickass female lead back then. Nowadays people aren’t quite so willing to compromise anymore. There’s a demand for fully realised, three dimensional female leads that are treated with the same care and respect as the male protagonists. This is why Jessica Jones and Agent Carter were so heavily praised, why the upcoming Wonder Woman movie is being so heavily scrutinised, why people are so desperate to see a Black Widow movie and why everybody throws a hissy fit every time Marvel find yet another excuse to delay the Captain Marvel movie (seriously, who gives a fuck about an Ant-Man sequel?! I think we’ll survive without one). People want female characters and they want them done right.

So, considering the sexist elements that seem to keep reoccurring in Whedon’s writing, I think him helming a Batgirl movie is a downright terrible idea. Especially considering all the baggage and controversy that has surrounded the character for decades now. What’s this Batgirl movie going to entail? From The Killing Joke movie to The Lego Batman Movie, there seems to be a disturbing trend of romantically pairing up Batgirl with Batman (in the case of The Killing Joke in particular, to the detriment of her character. So Barbara Gordon didn’t become Batgirl because of her altruism or her desire to emulate her idol. It’s so she could have sex with Batman. Bite me). Look me in the eyes and tell me Joss Whedon wouldn’t follow that trend too (and in case you didn’t catch that, NOBODY wants to see Batman/Batgirl rumpy-pumpy. It’s never been canon and it’s fucking creepy. Stop it.). And then there’s the whole paralysis storyline. Can we trust Joss Whedon to treat that with respect? It’s not as if the comics did. The whole Oracle thing wasn’t exactly ideal. It was merely damage control after DC treated the character in such a disrespectful way in The Killing Joke (I believe the editor’s exact words were ‘Yeah, okay. Cripple the bitch.’). A strong female character reduced to a woman in a refrigerator for Batman, the male protagonist. Gee, doesn’t that sound familiar?

So why are WB and DC even considering Joss Whedon in the first place? I don’t know, but I can hazard a guess...

Yep. The almighty dollar.

I’ve already criticised the DCEU for shifting away from its original creator-controlled vision in favour of a more Marvel style business model, where you just churn out a bunch of films on an assembly line and see what sticks (in fact I’d go as far to say that DC’s current business model is actually worse than Marvel’s. Credit where it’s due, at least Marvel wait for the first movie to come out before announcing its ten trillion sequels and spin-offs), and it looks like Joss Whedon’s potential appointment could represent the final stage in the DCEU’s Marvel-fication. Its Marvel-lisation. Its Marvel-morphosis. (I’ve got pages of these. I could go on). Let’s not forget that Joss Whedon was originally supposed to write and direct the Wonder Woman movie before that fell through. Why the change of heart? 

Well the fact that he made a boatload of money for Marvel with his Avengers movies might have something to do with it. And that’s the problem. Whedon is being considered for Batgirl for the same reasons why Mel Gibson is/was(?) being considered for Suicide Squad 2 and why David Ayer has been chosen to direct a Gotham City Sirens movie. Despite Mel Gibson’s less than desirable personality traits, WB and DC have sensed a changing tide of opinion and decided to try and take advantage of it. And with David Ayer it’s because he’s already made them a shit-ton of money with Suicide Squad and reckon he can do it again, even though David Ayer is so obviously the wrong person to direct a Gotham City Sirens movie considering one of the many criticisms that people had with Suicide Squad is how abhorrently sexist it is. Whether Joss Whedon is right or wrong for the material he’s adapting doesn’t factor into it. At this point, it couldn’t be any clearer to me that any artistic integrity WB and DC once had has officially been chucked away in favour of box office earnings. Welcome to the MCU Mark II everyone!

You know it’s kind of ironic me talking about Joss Whedon and David Ayer, what with Wonder Woman coming out in a couple of months. Considering what a feminist icon Wonder Woman is, it’s funny that WB and DC don’t seem to be embracing the concept. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying men can’t write and direct female led movies. But considering how difficult it is for women to break into this industry, it would be nice if DC could at least consider them. Wonder Woman could and should be ushering in a new era for both superhero movies and women in film, both in front and behind the camera. But what with the potential appointment of Joss Whedon and the reappointment of David Ayer, it seems Wonder Woman is tragically just going to be a temporary blip.

[katiemcvay]

Men Not to Fuck in 2k17

It took me a long time to write this - as opposed to last year when the list came fast and furious in a Nyquil-fueled haze. I tried to write it in December, and then January, and then I promised myself it’d be done by the 20th.

But for a brief moment in time, fucking felt so beside the point. If the US had elected a fascist, all bets were off. Fuck a hole in the wall, for all I care.

But do I want you fucking a man without a bed frame? No, of course not! I want more for you. And, if you don’t have principles in your bed, no way you’ll have them in the streets.

So here it is - my heteronormative as fuck list of men not to fuck. (All laws from 2016 are still in effect.)

1. Dweebs - Dweebs are bad. Full stop. Dweebs watched a lot of movies in the 90s that lionized people who were bullied and took it way too much to heart. I had a lot of relatives die as a kid but you don’t see me bringing it up every time I’m a dick to someone. I get someone called you a gay slur as a kid (you must, in this moment, emphasize that you are straighttttt), but that doesn’t a hate crime make. Dweebs are one intense Reddit thread away from starting on their journey to neo-nazism. Do not fuck.

2. Men with a Certain Style - If men were able to transfer the curse of the high-heeled shoe exclusively to women by commodifying sex, common sense tells us that the commodification of sex can move mountains. If you want to get a haircut that could be called “fashy” feel free to go for it, but know that you’ll be doing it with your dick in your hand.

3. Liars - Since America decided to let their racism take the wheel in the voting booth and elect a man who is not even charming enough to be called a “grifter,” your life is full up on lies. You straight up don’t have room in your skull for another lie. Move on.

4. Men Who Talk Too Much - “Too much” is a metric that every woman must decide for herself, but it must be decided. For me, “too much” has been a hard-forged definition hammered out over countless, pussy-drying trivia nights. If a man leans over me to give another man a Simpsons reference, this girl is out. You’ll hear no end of men in 2017 talking too much nonsense about nothing. Value your voice and save his by saying “bye” when you meet.

5. Men Who Consume but Do Not Produce - Consumption is not an identity. You can watch as many corny movies as you want but this does not a personality make. We turn to the ancient proverb: “If a Stepbrothers quote falls in the woods and no one is around it to hear it, does it constitute a joke?” No, it doesn’t. People should produce and consume in equal measure. It doesn’t matter so much what he produces - a good scrambled egg, art about men who kiss hats,  a baseball blog - just produce SOMETHING.

6. Men without Unique Beliefs - I have three beliefs: 1. Everyone should join their local library, 2. Nicki Minaj is one of the best musical artists of my lifetime, and 3. If you can vote, you must vote. Now, some of these may be problematic or wrong, but they are my own. A man you fuck should have unique beliefs - not those he absorbed from his family or a football coach - but those he arrived at at his own. Whether or not you can live with said beliefs is up to you, but he should have some.

7. Irony Boys and Internet Men - Irony is the haven of the removed. Irony is the ultimate shelter - are you really saying something? We’ll never know. You could be kidding using a rhetorical device that shields you from ever taking a firm stance in anything, including a relationship! LOL.

8. Men Without an Emotional Vocabulary - The ultimate in adulthood accessories is the ability to say clearly and honestly, “This is how I feel and why.” We’re in a miasma of shit in 2017 and playing “what did he mean in this text” won’t be cute any longer. State your feelings upfront and, preferably, on the phone.

9. Men Who Don’t Read - Here, I am not talking about the illiterate, so don’t even try to be cute. Illiteracy is a complicated issue. Reading is not. Can you read? OK, do it. Pick up a book and pick it up fast. Every day you’ll face a president who has maaaybe skimmed a book. You want a man who reads books. A John Irving? Sure. A John Grisham? Fine. A Nora Roberts? Fuck him already.

10. La La Land Lovers and the Happily Ignorant - Who in the fuck is La La Land for in the year of our lord 2017? Probably someone who has avoided all news since 2015. You, as a woman who fucks men, cannot be ignorant. You’re buying an IUD, you’re lighting your phone on fire with calls to your representatives, and even your mom is worried about The World at Large. You do not have time! In 2015, sure, you might have had time to explain feminism in bars (I myself, took the bronze in “Patience with the Question ‘What About Men’s Rights?’”). But no longer. You have to get a man who is already up to speed.

11. Men without Plans - My mother told me to always have a backup plan. She has three different kinds of licenses to sell things - insurance, real estate, and a third thing. Mothers know. You have to be prepared for anything. In 2017, you find a man with one solid plan because you know you have 10.

12. The Proud/Never Wrongs - Pride goes before you don’t fall into my bed. Those too proud to be wrong will never be brave enough to be right. 2017 is a year to dare to be right and therefore risk being wrong. There are so many people who will be aggressive and insistent that they are right. Don’t fuck those without humility in 2017.

13. The Vain - A man who lives in a gold leaf place is going to be president. In 2017, I can’t give a shit about optics. (NOTE: Vanity is not the same as giving a fuck. A lack of hygiene and style does not a lack of vanity make.)

14. The Unlabeled - So many people in 2017 are going to face true strife due to the labels applied to them. If applying a label to your relationship is a bridge too far for the man you’re fucking, get the fuck away from him now.

15. The Conspiracy Theorist - No explanation. Video below.

This list will be ongoing, because men keep being alive in new and terrible ways.

[theliterateape]

Meghan Trainor is this Generation’s Andy Kaufman

By David Himmel

I never liked Meghan Trainor’s music, though my brain worked really, really hard to convince me that I did. Her brand of music is not too far out of line with much of the other silly, sugary pop music I am fond of: Teenage Dream Katy Perry, Carly Rae Jepsen, Ariana Grande, occasionally The Killers, Tommy Mottola Mariah Carey and horny Mariah Carey, The Archies, pre-British Madonna, all disco.

But I sensibly resisted the urge to embrace Trainor’s brand of pop because it felt too forced in musical production and lyrical content. Too forced for the quality of pop she was giving us. Trainor was swinging for the fences and landing doubles at best.

I hadn’t heard any of her hack girlie doo-wop in quite a while. It was nice having forgotten all about her. But then, while running an errand at the Bucktown Office Max the other day, her song Me Too played over the store speakers. (It’s important to note that the title of this song has nothing to do whatsoever with the #MeToo movement. It was released in May 2016 long before any of us seemed to actively care about what men did with their dicks at work.) The song was stuck in my head for the rest of the day and it got me thinking about Trainor’s entire cultural existence.

During my afternoon bathroom break with my iPad on my lap, I dove into a Meghan Trainor wormhole to sort out exactly what was so terrible about her music. I considered the shallow, braggadocios lyrics, the over-produced production, that white-collar-suburban-virgin-girl-imitating-a-black-street-thug accent she sings with, and the regurgitated and repurposed musical cues she uses in each song when it dawned on me. Meghan Trainor is not an annoying musician or a pop sensation; Meghan Trainor is this generation’s Andy Kaufman, and she’s fucking with us.

I know there are people who like her music. It resonates with the simpletons who can’t get past a memorable hook no matter how limp or wretched it is. On March 1, Trainor dropped another single, No Excuses, and it’s exactly what you’d expect from a Meghan Trainor pop song. 

But Trainor is not a pop musician. Trainor is a performance artist, a social satirist using pop music and YouTube videos to skewer our modern culture. There’s just no way the person who writes and performs the song Me Too isn’t making fun of something.

It is a misfortune that the song shares a title with the movement against sexual harassment because in so many ways, Trainor’s tune exists in a world where self-awareness and dignity do not, themselves, exist. Lyrically, the song is a clumsy brag about how Trainor is happy with who she is and with her life. All that positive self-image stuff is great. Then, three lines in, it takes a twisted turn when she demands that we respect her because of the gold necklace she wears, and then insists that everyone wants to be her because her life is a movie. Not like a movie, but an actual movie. Assuming that we want to be her because she has a gold necklace and an entourage is pretty shallow and assumes that we are equally shallow. And maybe we are. And I have come to believe that Trainor is churning out this kind of dreck to point out just how delusional and self-absorbed we’ve become.

Dear Future Husband, a single released in March 2015 off her first album, takes the hateful and foolish trope of “Happy wife, happy life” and turns it into a list of vengeful demands and paltry rewards. She lists exactly what she wants and requests that her husband must comply no matter how ridiculous the request. Furthermore, she promotes the stereotype of wives weaponizing sex against their husbands.

 “After every fight Just apologize And maybe then I'll let you try and rock my body right (right) Even if I was wrong [Laugh] You know I'm never wrong Why disagree? Why, why disagree?”

This song is obscenely anti-feminist, and in a unique way, entirely misogynist because of the way it promotes the negative stereotypes of wives and marriage. It’s the only thing unique about any Trainor song. If she’s not putting us on by showing us how absolutely stupid a marriage that she is describing is, then the song is nothing more than blubbering idiocy — the creation of a girl who learned about marriage through only King of Queens and Lockhorns cartoons.

Dear Future Husband wasn’t the first song of Trainor’s that brought accusations of anti-feminism. Her first hit, the big one, the one that actually out performed Michael Jackson’s Beat It on the charts, All About that Bass appeared to be an anthem for body confidence. It was aimed at heavier people, curvier people. All that is fine and well until she takes a shot at “them skinny bitches,” though she does quickly admit to “just playin’.” Still, the crux of the song rests on the pre-chorus, which describes how her mother tells Meghan to not worry about her size because “boys like a little more booty to hold at night.” In my case, she’s not wrong. But to place body positivity on how much sex you’ll have seems counterintuitive to everything reasonable feminists of all sizes and shapes have been working toward for decades.

There’s no way Trainor is that tone deaf. She’s no stranger to the entertainment industry having signed a publishing deal at age 17. Even those who deny the serious inequality and unfairness women face each day in entertainment — and everywhere else in our  culture — know that it exists. Thing is, they’ll deny it. Trainor blatantly promotes it. Therefore, she must be making a satirical, even farcical stance on the issues of the day.

No, which was released two years ago this month, is like Bass in that it seemed like an empowering anthem for anyone who’s ever had to face unwanted advances. The chorus is absolute and strong — lyrically, anyway. In typical Trainor fashion, it sounds like a privileged teenage white girl posing as a street-hardened black girl during a high school talent show, thus losing its credibility. And if that doesn’t do it, this verse will:

“Thank you in advance, I don’t wanna dance (nope) I don’t need your hands all over me If I want a man, Then I’mma get a man But it’s never my priority”

We know that’s bullshit. Bass and Husband are entirely about getting a man. Many of her songs are about boys and gettin' some. There's nothing wrong with that. Not at all. You don't have to write a song lying about it, unless, of course, you're fucking with us, which she must be. Like so many pop songs, the content revolves around gaining and losing love. When a pop songs takes itself too seriously, it loses its impact. See the most recent Taylor Swift and Katy Perry efforts.

As I stated, Trainor is not an overnight sensation. She’s been hustling professionally in this game for almost a decade. She has to know what she’s doing. A 17-year-old doesn’t get a publishing deal if she doesn’t understand the power of pop.

Andy Kaufman’s (and Bob Zmuda’s) Tony Clifton was everything horrible and outdated in show business. The Clifton character, and many other Kaufman performances were meant to confuse us, enrage us, make us laugh. Sometimes all three. Kaufman’s commitment to the Clifton character was so intense that Andy would completely disappear leaving Tony to take the wheel. They functioned as two completely separate individuals, and neither of them would offer even the slightest wink to the truth and the game.

Trainor has done this, too. She has created a pop star character that confuses us, enrages us and makes us laugh with lyrics that may as well have been penned by a coked up chimp with a leaky Bic pen, and musical production headed up by that same chimp with double the cocaine. What statement is she trying to make? I’m not totally sure. But I am damn sure that Meghan Trainor cannot be taken at face value, and we must recognize her twisted efforts even if it is just pop music.

[republicstandard]

The Standard Conversation - Ivan Throne & The Dark World

Ash Sharp Editor

I am pleased to tell you that no, I am not writing Young Adult fiction. Ivan Throne is a very real person, and, according to him, The Dark World is a real place- and we all live in it.

He is the bestselling author of THE NINE LAWS. Speaker, business manager and seasoned veteran of the financial industry, he's also a deaf ninja. literally, he can't hear anything but can make you eat your own legs with one hand.

Badass.  He has been gracious enough to answer some questions for us in this, the second installment of The Standard Conversation. We talked about the meaning of manhood, Islam, cataclysmic war and tiny Ben Shapiro. Read on for an illuminating glimpse into the Dark World.

RS: Ivan, tell me about the Dark World. I'm sitting here on my balcony overlooking some nice views, and life is pretty sweet for me. What's so dark about the world?

It ends, doesn’t it? And so will you.

You’re a finite consciousness, in a finite creation, and both of those things are integrally designed to sputter out and cease. Lots of people think I mean “dark” as in “bad” or “horrible” or “cruel”. The world certainly can be those things, and often is.

But the real lesson there - in the fact of not only your own death but that of the universe itself – is this:

Brother, this is not a dress rehearsal. There are no do-overs. And the inexorable slide of things is towards entropic heat death. The other critical aspect of this creation, this existence, is that the universe does not care.

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That is a terribly hard thing for most people to understand, let alone accept. The universe doesn’t care whether you’re having a good day, a bad day, a great life, or a short and brutal one. The universe does not perceive you; it doesn’t hear you scream.

It just keeps on spinning and dying.

Once your mind, and more importantly your heart, grasp and accept this truth – then action is freed up and the man abandons pity towards himself and transits through life unblinded.

That is where the immense work of Men is truly done.

Image: VixSwift Photography

RS: You're quite active in this growing scene of positive masculinity with guys like Hunter Drew of The Family Alpha and others. Why do you think there has been this growth in 'positive alpha-male' philosophy?

The accelerating return of masculinity to the West is a severe and fearsome process. It is severe for many reasons. It is severe because it is unapologetic, and as a movement, it rejects any infection of weakness or groveling supplication. We are men. We are not castrati. We did not ask for permission to build Greece and Rome or the empires of the West.

Nor do we ask for permission to restore men to their inherent, rightful place in the pantheon of human power. It’s our nature, and all pendulums swing. Men like Hunter, myself and many others are pushing hard and driving deeper momentum into that swing, making sure it takes deep and abiding root in our own generation and the next.

There are powerful signs of success, deeper than we had imagined. Generation Z is avowedly militaristic, utterly contemptuous of weak and feminized society, and openly seeks the strong hand of a Generation X that knows the time has come to teach the methods and truths that we have incubated for forty years as the West slid into degeneracy.

This return of authentic masculinity is also a lagging and leading indicator.

It is a lagging indicator of a foundational shift, rejection of cultural suicide, and decision by men to simply stop caring what those who want to destroy them may think or speak of them. This is profoundly important.

If hostile Islamists overtly declare they will kill me, take my women, and indoctrinate my children to hate me – what do I care for their insults when their very spears of war are aimed at the heart of my nation?

If hostile Marxists with a history of dumping scores of millions of naked, emaciated and gunshot bodies into pools of black blood and spattered fat at the bottom of killing pits, want to call me toxic – what do I care for their words, when their actions are where my arms and brothers must contend?

Thus the process is fearsome:

The return of authentic, powerful, unapologetic masculinity is a leading indicator of war.

Be very glad that Donald Trump is at the helm of the American nation as the age grows quickly hot.

RS: Ha! You're right on the money there. I can only imagine how monumentally screwed we would be with Clinton in power. I read from your site that you "don't care" about the Jewish Question -rightly so in my view.  This being the case, why does Ben Shapiro call you a White Supremacist?

Ben’s a darling muppet, isn’t he? The short takes and his inability to reach the truth on the top shelf are quite fun. Two things actually came to light immediately afterward. The first was the sheer number of people he calls a “white supremacist”, many of them bizarrely so. I had no idea. It seems to be a de rigueur fallback position of his, which I discovered with some amusement. I’m not a listener or reader of his, so I hadn’t been paying attention to what he thinks or doesn’t think of people.

The other was his timing. Vox Day had just released another philosophy bestseller, “SJWs Always Double Down” in which our darling Ben was eviscerated in rather blunt terms. I wrote the foreword to the book, and I was told by some industry insiders that Ben thought it would be safer to tangentially target someone, anyone, other than Vox Day.

Well, we all make errors, and Ben is no exception. No doubt we’ll meet someday and chat intensely about it.

RS: You know, I think if Ben could approach the talk in good faith without trying to pull rhetorical tricks that would be a fascinating debate.

In THE NINE LAWS you talk about utilizing our innate psychopathy, narcissism, and Machiavellianism to achieve goals. These are not considered by most to be desirable traits- though the book also contains lines such as;

"Do not fail to believe in possibilities. Do not fail to believe in yourself. It is how odds are ferociously defied. Even preposterous dreams can be made real, my brother. I am the living proof."

By any measure, this is a message of positive self-determination. What inspired this usage of the 'Dark Triad' to produce positive effects in men?

Men must play the cards they are dealt with. That means seeing clearly, understanding correctly, and acting decisively.

Thought, word, and deed are the foundations of the human being. Thought becomes vision. Words become plans. Deeds become competent. The dark triad of personality takes those a great step further, focuses those inherent human processes into sharper relief.

Vision becomes narcissism, faith, and belief in a future that you will personally shape into existence. Plans become Machiavellianism, the ability to shade and tumble and turn the world until it coalesces into actuality. Competence becomes psychopathy, where the ego dissolves and a man deploys raw, unfiltered, and unblinking execution of power in the world.

Where these things collide at a single point, you have what I call the detonation of fate: the human being bringing every capacity and venue to bear into the moment of realization, the determination of what will be.

This is a conscious and deliberate application of natural human traits, taken a radical step further, and each trait put into service of the others. It’s far more common than people realize.

Most simply never do it consciously and deliberately.

Any project manager worth his pay understands Machiavellianism. To realize enterprise vision with competent execution he must entangle and entwine men and resources, time and effort. He cannot hire and fire; he has total accountability but no authority. Thus, subtle alliances and relationships are how his success or failures pivot along the way.

Any world champion understands narcissism. He must focus his entire mind, heart, and body into the single-minded pursuit of a glittering and glorious vision with a ferocity that few can comprehend, let alone emulate. Not one champion ever lived who did not believe in himself, and I tell you that the vision of the champion seems deluded and extreme to the common man.

Any military leader grasps the necessity of psychopathy in determining objectives, issuing orders, and the planning of destruction and death. He coldly and pitilessly achieves political results on the battlefield. He will throw men like “clumps of earth” and accept the loss and suffering of the troops as an inherent part of that icy delivery of fate.

Like any power, capacity or tool, the dark triad traits can be turned in malevolent direction. A sword cares not who it cuts, after all. And men are fallen animals. Disordered, dysregulated traits are what happens when men do not adhere to discipline.

It is a dark world. Possession of extreme capacity has nothing whatsoever to do with moral elevation or spiritual advancement. That is not how the dark world works. As human beings, we have choices to make in the service of our sacred purpose, and those choices – why we envision the future, how we plan it, and where we execute on it – shapes what men later call history.

Weakness is not moral. Abdication of power is not spiritual advancement. To use pity as a strategy is obscene for the human being, who is formed in the image of God and bears the sacrosanct responsibility of serving as a vehicle for the will of Heaven.

The truth of the dark world is this: no one is coming to save you. You are personally responsible for your survival, and that of your culture and civilization.

Do not grovel and whine, seeking mercy from a universe that does not hear.

Stand as a man, build to the best of your capacity, and defend it and your loved ones with all the ferocity you possess.

Image: VixSwift Photography

RS: The Western world is under grave threat from migration- more people are on the move today than at any time in history. Pew Research indicates that Europe could be as much as 20% Muslim by the middle of the Century, with nations like France, Sweden and my own United Kingdom with far higher populations. This is, without doubt, an undesirable outcome for Europeans. Is there hope for the West?

There is hope for the West if it accepts the reality of war.

There is hope for the West if the men who inherited it, return to their true and inherent nature as warriors and priests.

There is hope for the West if leaders stand forth with the vision, plans, and competence that are so bitterly demanded.

But there are no guarantees.

Fate tumbles and turns in the dark world, and there is no question that the times are dangerous, full of shocks and fear.

Sweden is a degenerate, obsequious pit of unforgivable cuckery and the descent of that nation into insane, multicultural suicide will require serious blood and killing to return it to the fold of the West.

France may yet detach itself from that same trajectory, although again much blood will be required. The spirit of France has not yet been thrown down and murdered, but France will need other nations to lead it.

The United Kingdom is not finished. The long, stable rule of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth will soon pass away, and the tumult and resulting chaos of subsequent sovereigns will eventually settle. It will fall upon her loyal subjects to ensure that the Crown is preserved, for it is through the Crown that the spirit and ferocity of the United Kingdom has its best chance for survival and restoration during the existential wars that come.

RS: Do you have any specific ideas on how that scenario could be achieved? If existential war is inevitable, how does the West win it?

From the ground up, through the hearts of men of the West who see clearly, understand fully, and take direct action for the preservation of their lives, their families, their communities and countries, and culture.

The dark world does not do pity, but it does reward the bold and the decisive, for that is also the way of this dying creation.

The roaring return of authentic masculinity is not merely an indicator or pendulum but also a prerequisite for victory in an existential clash of civilizations.

I intend for us to win it, and I call brother the men who rise and march with me.

Be a bloody Man and fight for what is yours!

Live with sacred purpose and utter savage ferocity!

Anything less and your culture is going to die, and all your lineage with it.

RS:No time to mess around with video games then. While you don't appear to be a particularly political guy (beyond the support for Donald Trump) people seem quite keen to call you a Nazi or Alt-Right or whatever. I also know you like taunting leftists online- is that just for fun? Doesn't that make you a 'status-quo warrior'?

I’ve been called every epithet across the entire political spectrum. Marxists call me a Nazi, want me banned and my readers imprisoned. Nazis call me a race-traitor, want me beaten and gassed. It’s really quite delightful. And it is useful to see how antifragility works, which is part and parcel of dealing with haters and trolls both online and in real life.

RS: Antifragility?

Think about where your vulnerabilities are, and turn them into pits of overthrow for your adversary. Consider what your strengths are, and how your vulnerable brothers can benefit from their application.

There is very little difference between a general sustaining the morale of his army through declarations of spirit before the arrayed ranks of his troops, and a social media influencer proving antifragility for his followers against the emotional, writhing attacks of idiotic adversaries. It is simply a new age and a new medium, but the message is the same:

“We will have victory, and you will not. And we’re coming for you.”

Anything less than that is a disservice to the army, and a failure by the general to lead spiritual command in war.

RS: Who is your hero?

My late father, who by his example showed me how to think, how to live, and what mattered. It is in homage and fealty to him, and to the legacy of the culture, I am descended from, that I do the work I do.

RS: You have a piece of art/t-shirt on your website that depicts ISIS terrorists in front of the Eiffel Tower skewered on stakes in true Vlad the Impaler style. The tagline is Impalement Stops Invasion. Obviously, you don't care about people taking offense at your ideas- but what inspired this? Do you really think this should or could be done?

The Impalement Stops Invasion shirts grew out of some discussions I had with people about Islamic terror, and moreover how terror works. Terror is designed to freeze you, to cause fixation of the mind and heart, and prevent decisive action.

Islam has nearly redefined terror in the modern age, and they are absolutely hell-bent on it. People do not grasp that beheading videos are merely the tip of the iceberg. The dead in the Bataclan in Paris were disemboweled, castrated, their eyes gouged out. They were forced to crawl screaming over their own entrails before being finally butchered. Young girls at the school siege of Beslan in Russia were viciously gang-raped and sodomized to death with rifle barrels, and similarly, Islam has cruel intentions for the other nations of the West. Floor plans of America middle schools were found in Iraq, and the reasoning was quite simple: the girls are big enough to rape, and the boys are too small to fight back.

What stops terror?

I will tell you what stops terror, here in the dark world:

Ferocity.

It is not a question of whether ruthless and public impalement of jihadists could be done. Of course, it can; there is no insurmountable logistical or mechanical reality that prevents the physical hoisting of Islamic invaders on fatal stakes at the national borders of Europe.

Nor do I declare whether it should be done. That is a question for politicians, for State officials, and ultimately for the men who protect the women and children of the West. And it is, at the last resort, the decision of those men whether their politicians and State officials have failed in their duty to preserve, protect, and defend them.

The design does speak and communicate an absolutely uncontestable truth: if it were done, the jihadist invasion would stop.

Would you dare cross a border, where those who came before you were a grim and incontestable warning against your entry?

Would you dare to rape and behead a Western schoolgirl, if you knew a wooden stake would be driven into your anus and out your screaming mouth before your agonized carcass was hoisted to the sky?

Do Western cartoonists dare to draw Mohammed?

Jihadists dare to explode and butcher and rape and machine-gun and roar down our streets with trucks in bloody massacres.

I will simply say that all pendulums swing, and where Governments fail to protect Men… Men form new Governments.

It’s a dark world. It was dark before I got here, brother. It will be dark long after I am gone. A sword cares not who it cuts, and terror is a dreadful sword in any hand.

The shirt’s a great and impressive design by a very talented artist. And hope and pity aren’t strategies.

Vlad would say I’m right.

RS: I think he probably would. OK, tough question time. What does it mean to be a man?

That’s really the critical question the West faces, isn’t it?

What does it mean to be a Man?

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What does it mean to be a Man when failure means the death of a thousand years of heritage? What does it mean to be a Man who fights against the degenerate slaughter of his very identity?

The answer is the same one it always has been: the grave and linear process of manhood, war, and salvation.

Manhood is derived from the foundational layer of conscience, from the voice of God that works through the heart and informs the mind, and thence forms the decisions by which deeds are birthed. Manhood is conscience married to discipline, to the strength and habits of achievement and building and creating in this dark world those things that survive and outlast us.

Family, honor, country, culture, civilization. Great works of art, of construction, of ideas, of civilization itself and of the prerogative to detonate fate according to sacred purpose!

Men are designed for war. The very shape of Men is formed to serve our male burden of performance. That performance, that sacrifice, that ongoing painful and agonizing struggle, is an integral part and parcel of being a man.

It is difficult, and challenging, and often bitterly and continuously unappreciated.

Where is there rest from this?

The answer lies in the respite of performance, in the total and unrelenting savage ferocity that accompanies adherence to sacred purpose.

When you have given your work everything you have, with nothing held back, and you have burned your ships on the shore and thrown away the scabbard of your sword and walked into battle with nothing held back…

…life and death are both release in the aftermath.

Therein is the rest, albeit momentary, of the male burden of performance.

Then it begins again, and men return to the work that is their nature.

Sacred purpose, in the life of the individual man, is where all the infinite strength of honor and dignity and power arise.

How does one identify one’s sacred purpose, and lay bare the road of the Way that brings both immortal glory and the peace of life and death? What is the process by which one identifies and adheres to the discipline of the divine conscience?

That is, precisely, what I and my partner teach in the Immersion Forge.

Image: VixSwift Photography

Sacred purpose, savage ferocity, and adherence to the divine path of fulfilled conscience.

The first Immersion Forge in January at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas was sold out. The response has been incredible; testimony from the men who attended has been remarkable and explosively strong.

We spent a year creating the curriculum, refining it, testing it, and shaping the structure of delivery.

The results were phenomenal.

The next Immersion Forge is in New York in the Park View Suite of Trump International Hotel and Tower on February 24th.

There are eight seats left, but they go quickly.

We have tapped into what Men need in this dreadful age, and we build a brotherhood of sacred purpose and momentum.

There is a Way that can be learned, and the process of connecting divine conscience, sacred purpose, and total savage ferocity is driven by the esoteric teachings of the ninja and the dread combat experience of my partner Mr. Swift, a ruthless mercenary who has seen and done the unimaginable.

Men teach men, and men learn from men.

That, too, is the Way. And the Way of men is cruelly demanded more now than ever.

Men do not leave their brothers behind, and that is why Mr. Swift and I deliver the Immersion Forge.

Civilizations collide, brother. And collision comes fast.

We mean to win, and with everything we have.

Join us, and march with us as brothers.

RS: Thanks, Ivan!

There you have it folks. Intense ideas spoken plainly. I highly recommend that you follow Ivan Throne on Twitter because he is both hilarious and thought provoking- partcularly when he's trolling weak internet communists into oblivion. If you like the way Ivan's mind works you should buy The Nine Laws: Survival, Momentum, and Triumph and read it. It's a permanent fixture on my work table.

Ivan's philosophy is clearly written and explained, and he gives his ideas room to breathe. You need to put the work into his book not through wrapping your head around overly complex post-modernist sentence structure but in quiet reflection upon yourself. That's the greatness in his writing- it is a collaborative experience with the reader that encourages the discovery of your own anwers while providing the calm hand of a great teacher in guidance.

Coming this Autumn 2018 he releases The Three Gates: Manhood, War, and Salvation through Castalia House, and is the second in his triptych of philosophy books.

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