#Karuna of the kinda

[gaia-mix-nicolosi]

So Trakenites work on sheep lesbianism got it

Meanwhile tremas/Kassia existed bc of the master and acted like rivals

And Seron/Katura is a straight couple but it works on sheep lesbianism too bc seron is babygirl. Rip 🪦 John Woodnutt you would have loved coming out 💜🤎

Tremas/Lucina propably didn’t work on sheep lesbianism as we never saw it but Nyssa/Luvic would have. Because Luvic is a femboi ofc.

But Nysric doesn’t work on sheep lesbianism, yet Tyssa does.

Nyssa/Karuna I guess, but at least Nyssa/Chela, and even Nyssa/Damon a bit also work on sheep lesbianism, but Nyssa/Inga does not.

So it’s all over the place, and in some of those cases it might just be about the dominant partner (tremas, Adric, and kind of Damon and inga)

Yes I’m a multishipper

two sheep. standing still

[cleowho]

“How did it cross over?”

Kinda - season 19 - 1982

[officiallordvetinari]

Language and the Mind on Deva Loka

So we've reached the 5th Doctor in our watchthrough, and yesterday we finished Kinda. Lots of good stuff in this episode, but I was particularly interested in the Kinda's relationship to language. We first learn about the Kinda through the eyes of human colonists, who see them as "primitives" lacking a culture and incapable of communication (because of course they do). However, we soon find that they are an advanced culture of sapient beings, and that this went unnoticed by the humans because the Kinda communicate telepathically.

So far, pretty standard sci-fi material. It's the next thing we learn that piqued my interest: the Kinda are physically capable of speech, although only certain wise woman use it. We meet two, the Wise Woman Panna and her young apprentice Karuna. The obvious question - if the Kinda have language, why do most of them not use it? (it's said that men are mentally incapable of it, but that still leaves half the population who could be speaking but aren't.) The obvious answer is that they don't need to - they're telepathic, so language as a tool of communication has no use to them. But that opens up a second question - why do any of them use language? And why are those people given such high status?

On several occasions, Karuna telepathically "reads" other Kinda and reports the results to Panna. These communications take the form of emotions, basic concepts, and some simple sentences:

Fear. And hurting. And confusion. Where is my brother?

Darkness. Understanding nothing. Hurt. Heal me.

It's not just that most Kinda don't physically speak with the mouth - their mental communications are structured differently to Panna and Karuna's verbal communications. It's not "thought-speak", it's more impressionistic. It looks to me like the wise women's minds actually work differently to their fellows. I think this is the purpose of language in Kinda culture - not a tool for communication, but a tool for complex conceptualization.

Language serves this function on Earth too, of course. The psychologist Lev Vygotsky analyzed children's language acquisition in terms of tool use. Infants are born into a world full of tools they don't know how to use - physical tools like spoons, shoelaces, bicycles; and cultural tools like timekeeping, table manners, and language. Children learn to use these tools because their interactions with other people are mediated by them. In Vygotsky's view, children often narrate their actions out loud because they are practicing the skill of thought, and haven't mastered the tool of language well enough to use it internally yet.

For another, more sci-fi approach, consider the view of language as a memetic organism that engages in symbiosis with humans - we give it a place to live and a way to reproduce, and it gives us a new way of interacting with the world. (We could combine the two ideas to describe language as a parasitic tool - now that's pretty sci-fi.)

For humans, this process goes mostly unnoticed. By definition, it occurs before we're fully conscious. The conceptual world of language is just the water we swim in. For the Kinda, it would be strange and unusual! Their conceptual world would be alien to us, and the wise women's conceptual world is at least partly alien to them.

Back up for a second. We know that only a few Kinda use language. In humans, language is learned by immersion from birth. Young Kinda are born into a community with language users, and yet they don't learn to use it themselves. That's not something that happens with us! What's different for them? Maybe it's paucity of input - if there are only two language users, the baby won't interact with them enough. Maybe it's simply that telepathy is so useful, there's no pressure to use neurological resources on learning language. Or maybe - if you'll permit me to speculate wildly - a telepathic species would never evolve the capacity to learn by immersion. They lack the language instinct. Such a species would still be able to invent language, just like they can invent anything else, but they might require more intensive, formal instruction to learn it - more comparable to human mathematics or engineering than human language.

So how does your average Kinda think about language, then? It's a skill of wise women, much too complicated for a layman to understand. Sometimes a wise woman will select a young child as an apprentice and take her away for training. Nobody sees the child for a long time, maybe years, and when she reappears she's... different. When you reach out to her telepathically, her mind doesn't feel like your friends and neighbors. Still recognizably Kinda, but strange, full of concepts you don't understand and going in directions you can't follow. The skill/tool/memetic parasite has moved into her head and given her wisdom, and now she is a new kind of thing. A wise woman.

So at this point, I'm thinking that this is all a bit Faction Paradox. Memetic entities, conceptual realities, culture and technology are that series' bread and butter. The writers of Kinda may not have been thinking about it in those terms, but a FP reading of the episode would be very easy to do.

And then, in the last part of the episode, something else happens. Panna dies:

DOCTOR: Panna's dead. (Karuna takes Panna's staff.) KARUNA: Idiot. Don't you know anything? Of course I'm not dead. ... TODD: Ridiculous. I mean, if she is Panna, the wise woman, then where is Karuna? Answer me that. KARUNA: Well, Doctor? DOCTOR: Er, well, it's a good scientific question. Where are you? KARUNA: I am her. DOCTOR: Both of you. KARUNA: We are one. DOCTOR: So, when Panna died, her knowledge and experience were passed over to you. TODD: But how? KARUNA: It is our way.

So, did Panna literally transfer her consciousness into Karuna's brain? Maybe. They are psychic. This raises some questions - did Panna have two consciousnesses as well? Did her mentor's mind make the trip to Karuna's head, or did it die in Panna's? Is this a Bene Gesserit thing where Karuna has generations of wise women's consciousness now?

Or maybe it's not as literal as that. To me, "it is our way" sounds like it's describing a cultural practice. Put yourself in Karuna's shoes. You were raised by this woman for as long as you can remember. She taught you all her knowledge of history, medicine, etc., and more than that, she taught you her arcane methods of thinking about that knowledge. She is the only person you know whose mind works like yours. And she has always made it clear to you that you are her successor, and when she dies, you will become her. Isn't it possible that when she does die, you just sort of... do? Nothing physically or psionically passed between you, you simply start being her. To humans, identity isn't shareable or transferable - one person cannot be another person. But is that a fact of nature, or is it another cultural construct? Perhaps the Kinda constructed it differently.

And this, too, is Faction Paradox! The Remote in that series reproduce with remembrance tanks, in which a lump of raw biomass is bombarded by the thoughts of the entire society until it becomes a person. Using this method, dead Remote can be resurrected, but the more it happens the more the person will become a reflection of the way people saw the original. Still, there is continuity of a kind. Immortality not through physical, biological technology, but through cultural technology. Conceptual cloning.

I don't really have a conclusion here. Uhh... Kinda is a good episode, and social technologies are pretty cool. Thanksforreadingbyeee!

[alexissara]

Luxaren Allure Review

Karuna, Chisa, Merel, Lynette, and Aurelie stand as a totally charming JRPG cast as you enter this very character focused JRPG. Luxaren Allure is in many ways a very classic JRPG story, gather the magical items, stop the evil guy who is summoning all the evil monsters but stands out in the way it focuses on lesbian love and characters in a really fantastic way.

The game features two romances the tragic romance of Karuna/Aurelie and the sweet love at first sight romance of Merel/Chisa. Aurelie gets possessed by an evil force known as Darkloft becoming her and making the world worse, tragically on the day Karuna hesitated to tell her that she loves her, gasp, the romantic pain. Then Karuna is chosen as the hero and she must defeat darkloft and save the world. Is Aurelie still in there, are the feelings requited even if she is, will Karuna have to kill the white girl she is so down bad for? It's really comelling and dramatic and you for sure want to see how it will play out. On the other hand you have an equally fun and compelling romance with Merel and Chisa, Merel falls for Chisa right away and the shy and sweet Chisa isn't used to being loved or praised. You see their relationship develop over time and get more into Merel's feelings as a Naga about humans and stuff. They are real adorable and they keep a fluffy and nice sapphic element to all the harder tragic romance going on.

The game narratively outside of it's characters is fairly standard, kingdoms exist, silly rulers who are mostly there to be a bit of a goof, darkloft's ambition is black and white evil for evils sake. Your not gonna find anything particularly politically captivating or anything here. There is a little bit of overcoming bias and restorative justice going on as well as a bit of working on discrimination but their all fairly standard fare. Naga's don't want human outsiders there but maybe they learn to accept humans a little by the end. These evil people maybe aren't all bad and deserve to be a little happy too.

Still, the characters are really amazing and anything but standard. Karuna is a woman who is extremally torn and hurt, she wants to be nice and she wants to protect lives but she also is still so deeply in love with Aurelie she is willing to risk everything for her. Then she has this sense of self hate because she is willing to risk everything for her when people are dying. Chisa starts as the meek shy sweet heart and she doesn't stop being sweet or meek but we see a depth to her, why she is meek, what she wants, and her finding what she standards for and what she wants to do with herself even if it's hard for her to do in public. Merel is a perfect take on the over affectionate flirty lesbian. She is a social outcast for her affection for humans, a tragic past crush on a human woman, she is flirty but cares about consent, she loves love and teasing people, utterly charming. Lynette is my least favorite character, she's gonna be a main character for the devs next game and it kinda shows in her character arc being a bit more shallow, there is progress but it's not deep. She has a massive inferiority complex and it is interesting but not enthralling. She wants to murder evil and aggressive women enjoyers will enjoy her shouting at everyone and rejecting sweet little things.

The game features some really neat little accessibility features from having a really nice and fun really easy mode for someone like me who doesn't want to smash her head against the wall to an utterly amazing feature that should be in way more games of this kind which is a toggle to have arrows spawn to show you where to go towards progress.

The gameplay itself while "standard JRPG" is very fun, there is a nice diverse set of moves, the party members work well together, the impulse system is really fun and they serve as nice big special moves to use. It's not like massively throwing out new things but instead just doing something really refined and nice with existing JRPG formulas. It was a perfect game for me to play while just hanging out, a casual game I could play to just have my brain on something while doing something else but also engaging enough in the narrative where when I got to the plot I wanted to switch gears and focus on what was cooking in the story.

The spites in the game are really neat, their all original assets and while they aren't the most refined their all fun to look at and they all have their own charm as something that is uniquely Luxarene Allure. The actual characters sprites in your party are also banger sprites, I really love them and I am glad their around. Unity, the designer was not afraid to make weird little guys to fight and the really special design sensibility is fun to watch the whole way through, your not gonna get a lot of standard enemies portrayed in the most standard way. The art for CGs is also very cute and well drawn, I really like um.

The game isn't very long, I 100%ed the game beating all the optional bosses and everything and it took me about 15ish hours which I think is a perfect run time for this story. It was probably shorter since I did leave the game on several times while I did other things but I did also play on the easiest mode possible so milage will vary. I think the game would be worth a decent price tag but it's actually free so like, you can just have a full as JRPG about lesbians for 0 dollars although your always free to give the creator money on Ko-fi and maybe it's pay what you want on Itch.io so if you enjoy it I do encourage you to support the creator so she can make us another amazing game.

If you enjoy these reviews you can read more, I write lots of them and if you really enjoy them I can always use support over on Patreon and Ko-fi.

[nyssausage]

Doctor Who be like is this an alien or just a cosplayer

Team Fivey be like

And then you have stuff like Terminus where it's legitimately ambiguous if they're aliens at all or future humans

1990s sci-fi television makeup is like "is this character supposed to be a space alien, or just old?"

[sarahwatchesthings]

So about this prophecy of the Kinda.

The Kinda at first believe that it refers to Aris, who can speak because he's been possessed by the Mara. But Panna and Karuna insist that this is wrong, because Aris doesn't actually have the "gift of voice" himself; it's the Mara that speaks. If they're right, the prophecy doesn't refer to Aris, but this story does take place "at the beginning of things, when the Not We are come" (the Not We being the people from the dome). So it's time for the prophecy to be fulfilled, and there's no other man among the Kinda who can speak.

The prophecy must refer to someone else who arises "from among we," a man who can speak and "must be obeyed." For the sake of the Kinda, the man who actually must be obeyed is the Doctor. It's his guidance that saves them from the Mara.

The Doctor, of course, doesn't arise from among the Kinda, but he's also not really one of the "Not We" - he's not from the dome, he's not even human, and, more to the point, he can look into the Box of Jhana without going mad, something no male should be able to do.

I wrote a whole other entry a while back on why this might be the case, but in short, the Doctor has an understanding that only the Kinda also have: he can see the world outside of time. He shares a crucial worldview with the Kinda such that he can easily understand them, and in that sense he could be considered "one of them," despite being an outsider.

So I would conclude that the male who has voice, arises from "among we," and must be obeyed is in fact not Aris but the Doctor.

[wubyreal]

Samar love hog

Forgot if I already asked

This guy is an utter disaster that doesn't deserve love, yet somehow he gets a pull thanks to luck. Anyway it's baffling Samar gets an ask before Riti

How does your character view the idea of romantic love?

Love is all about finding a hot chick that also indulges in his gambling addiction and vices. She should also find his dancing awesome

2. What was your character's first heartbreak, and how did it influence their approach to relationships?

He probably had a teenage crush that broke up with him cause Samar is insufferable. He's convinced that if he becomes filthy rich then that would nullify any of his negative traits

3. Does your character believe in soulmates, and why or why not?

Due to his gambling addiction, Samar strongly believes in luck guiding his life. Luck is very fickle giving him more problems than blessings, but it's too late to quit. After all good luck is definitely gonna come after losing a bazillion times. Thus soulmates are real. Life is full of chances and coincidences, so Samar rolls with whatever life drops him

4. What traits does your character find most attractive in others?

He cares a lot about looks. The chicks have gotta be hot with massive chests whilst having a spicy personality. Having very nice fangs is must too since it is an important beauty standard among vampires. Samar has some homo tendencies so he likes handsome guys, albeit he very very strongly prefers girls

5. What does your character fear most in a relationship?

He's scared of the girl breaking up with him cause he failed to become filthy rich during their time together. If she had just waited a couple more days, the gambling would have paid off and they'd live comfortably for eternity

6. How does your character handle jealousy or insecurity in relationships?

Samar would try to start verbal fights to outwit the peon who dared to upstage him. Of course Samar always gets owned. If things escalated and a brawl broke out, Samar is definitely gonna get his bones broken

7. What past relationship still impacts your character's current life?

He attempted to start a relationship with vampire femme fatale Theda Thorne. Unfortunately another vampire was interested in her and proceeded to pummel Samar. Since then Samar has been constantly bullied by Lee Harlow. It doesn't help that Samar owes him a ton of money

8. How does your character show love and affection?

Gambling is life. Naturally taking his loved ones to the casino is a fun bonding activity. Another way to show affection is by going out on fancy dinners and dancing

9. What significant change has your character experienced in their understanding of love?

He kinda learns that there's more to life than gambling and casually throwing himself into danger after meeting his soulmate Peony. Samar is still a massive thrillseeking jackass, so Peony tugs him by the ear to make him not foolishly die

10. What sacrifices has your character made for love, and were they worth it?

His body is literally sacrificed to nourish Peony. It's worth it because she is very very affectionate, and becoming constantly tired from her feeding means less energy to gamble

11. How does your character's cultural or familial background influence their views on marriage and relationships?

Samar actually used to be human. He hated his family for constantly nagging him and treating him like a loser. Gaining a long vampiric lifespan means that he outlived them, which is an epic win in his book. The lack of family means he can do whatever he wants and fail as many times too. Love is all about the thrills, passions, energy, and getting laid

12. Does your character have a relationship that everyone else misunderstands?

People find it strange that he has a female friend, fellow vampire coworker Karuna. So it's easy to assume she hangs out with him out of pity, but they are actually friends. No one understands how he and Moriti are friends cause they are at each other's throats a lot

13. How does your character handle rejection or unrequited love?

He'll gamble his sadness away whenever he gets rejected or broken up with. Maybe even create a dance routine to express his sorrow, or improve his mating ritual dances to better attract girls

14. What lesson about love is your character still trying to learn?

That there is more to life than money and thrills. Love is all about pausing and relaxing

15. How has your character's professional life affected their romantic relationships?

Samar works as a getaway driver for a gang. He tried dating girls from rival gangs, so naturally those attempts would never work out due to their allegiances. Dating civilians means dragging them into the crossfires of gang warfare

[shockinglysubmissive]

Soon I will start working on The Video sequel.

Tw: pseudo-incest, dub-con (kinda?)

It'll be about Shiggy making requests for more videos that Dabi and Karuna film, but Karuna has no idea it's happening. Sometimes she doesn't even know she's being filmed. But Shigaraki comes up with some pretty twisted ideas that Dabi is more than willing to oblige.

[lumilasi]

Finished up another redesign, this time Frankie, Angus' sister. She's kind of a goth as well, though maybe more glam goth whereas the MC of this set is a Victorian-goth lol

Eh, her face looks kinda funky in the first pic, but this is more about the outfit anyway, and her face looks right in the other ones.

Bio below:

Name: Franziska Belmont

Nicknames: Frankie (Most people she knows) Franzie, Kitty of Doom (Youko) Neko-chan (Shura, sometimes) Frankie bell/Franken Bell (Quinn)

Age: 34

Cat witch with special cat fae/witch heritage

Occupation: A manager for a local popular singer

Family: older brother Angus, honorary nephew Clover

Friends: Quinn McCormac (the popstar she manages) Alois (Quinn's brother) Taiga (A kitsune) Sebastian & Kaspian Kravchenko (Wyvern brothers) Youko (A little chimera girl) Shika & Shura (Youko's caretakers)

Love interest: She has a crush on Max Karuna, the drummer of a famous and popular rockband whose member her bestie Quinn is already dating.

Abilities:

Shapeshifting: Being a feline shapeshifter witch, she can, obviously, shapeshift into a cat/shapeshift parts of her body into that of a feline.

Cat Abilities: She has extremely sharp claws that can even cut stone, and generally has other typical cat abilities like being very stealthy, being able to see in the dark, and being both a nuisance and beloved to those around her.

Illusion magic: She is capable of projecting illusions of any sort and even give them mass to make them more real. She is also able to break free from other people's illusion magic fairly easily. Franziska can also make herself and others invisible if she wants to

Telepathy: She can read people's thoughts by making eye-contact or touching them, and can project her thoughts onto others the same way

GTG fast: She is very agile and fast.

Weaknesses:

Frankie can't shapeshift into full human on her own, and needs to use special talisman or stick as a cat if visiting human world (unless its a cosplay event; she really enjoys those bcus she can just be herself)

Due to her self-esteem issues, she sometimes neglects her own well-being and overworks herself, or bottles things up she really shouldn't. She is also too paranoid to be on her own or sleep in a house or apartment without anyone present, because she still fears of her father bursting through the door to try and punish her like what happened when she was a child. She can't currently even consider living on her own as a result, staying with her brother Angus.

Franziska struggles with developing romantic relationships with anybody despite really wishing to have someone like that in her life; her low self-esteem and trust issues make it very difficult for her to trust someone so much to make it possible. This is why it took her FOREVER to ask her crush out for one.

Personality:

Franziska comes off very cheerful, easy-going and a bit mischievous, loving to pull small pranks on people like spooking them or hiding their stuff somewhere else from where they put it. She is quite emotionally intelligent and able to read people's mood though, and can tell if something would go too far.

Beneath this cheery persona though, she has self-esteem issues and tends to put 110% into anything she feels she has responsibility over, such as Quinn as his manager; she is able to switch from relaxed and almost airheaded-seeming persona into something very serious and focused in an instant.

She hates feeling useless and like a failure - something her parents labeled her as - and sometimes puts others needs over her own to her detriment. She is a damn good manager and will not take anyone's bullshit towards Quinn, but sometimes neglects herself as a result.

She is a curious person and likes learning/discovering new things, and is also amused pretty easily over small things like knocking water bottles off the table (because cats).

She can be quite fierce in a fight despite not being the strongest, especially when it is about her boys (Angus and Clover) and can even be scary. Her fighting ability doesn't usually surprise her brother and nephew like it does others, given not only they know her the best, but she is a cat, and cats are good hunters.

BG STORY

tba

Fun Facts:

Franziska's catness often manifests with her cat hijinks, such as knocking things over shelves when she pouts, stealing people's stuff and hiding it for funsies, being affected by catnip, and bringing random gifts to people she likes. Also she purrs if someone she likes scratches her ear (mostly Angus or Clover, but sometimes her friends also cause this)

Franziska LOVES cosplay/masquerade events, not just in human world where she doesn't have to hide her true form, but because she just generally enjoys dressing up in elaborate costumes.

While her main favorite music is metal/rock, she is open to all genres and does enjoy Quinn's music too.

Franziska has a shirt that reads "metal kitty of Doom" that she made herself, based after the nickname Youko gave her.

Franziska is a lesbian and had a brief crush on Angus' Seeker coworker Amalia, though that faded pretty quickly given Amalia is taken and in a way "too old" for her.

Her current crush is the bandmate of Quinn's boyfriend, a naga called Max Karuna. She takes forever to admit her crush due to her trauma, though Max figured it out long before she tells her/them.

Sometimes she even wishes she was aromantic like her brother, so she didn't have this desire for a romantic relationship at all, as this struggle often causes a lot of upset for her.

Frankie does her absolute best to be a good big sister/motherly figure to Clover, to compensate on the bad mothering she herself experienced. She's a bit over-the-top and awkward about it sometimes, but given Clover himself had a shit mum, he does really appreciate her efforts, even if she's sometimes annoying.

Quinn calls her "Franken Bell" as a reference to Frankenstein jokingly, because Franziska is sometimes a bit scary and loves horror movies. Frankenstein's monster is one of her favorite human created horror stories in fact, because she relates to the rejection the monster gets from his creator.

Franziska does have a "witch form" like how her brother has a Warlock form, but neither use it often as it's rarely necessary to unlock so much of their powers at once.

Franziska and Quinn often gossip about things and have 'girls nights' together (Quinn being a guy doesn't matter as he has the spirit of Girls Nights lol)

She also has these with Taiga, though those tend to often revolve around more serious topics, because Taiga also acts as sort of a calm, stabler big sister figure for her.

While she likes to pull pranks and mess with people, Franziska does know where to draw the line, such as not touching things of Clover's, that have significant emotional meaning to him. or any dangerous stuff from Angus for that matter.

Her cat form is a black cat with white ear fluff and yellow eyes

Franziska is tanner skinned than her brother when in human disguise, as her skintone comes after their father, whereas Angus comes after their mother

Both siblings have special heritage that has influenced their powers and appearance somewhat. This is not too surprising, given their family line has a history of including all sorts of powerful beings into it for power and status. They were literally known as Chimeraic Magic family.

[alonyssima]

Me naming all the side characters from Nyssa's episodes.

The Denis Carey Keeper (which I call Keeper Hellas), Consul\Keeper-Nominate Tremas of Traken, Consul\Keeper Kassia of Traken, Consul Seron of Traken, Consul Katura of Traken, Consul\Keeper Luvic of Traken, and Proctor Neman of Traken.

Vanessa Verney, two human policemen, the Monitor of Logopolis, and two human men working at the Pharos Project. And the Watcher on a technicality.

Shardovan of Castrovalva, Mergrave of Castrovalva, and the little "mini-Liz" girl.

Urbankan Monarch, Urbankan ministers of Persuasion and Enlightenment, Kurkutji, Lin Futu, Princess Villagra of the Mayans, and Bigon.

(There's also Prof. Saunders, Prof. Hindle, Prof. Todd, Elder Panna of the Kinda, Elder Karuna of the Kinda, Aris of the Kinda, the Kinda Trickster, and the Jerry Judge Kinda. Oh and Dukkha and the other two visions. But Nyssa was'nt there to meet them.)

Richard Mace, Terileptil Leader, and other two Terileptils. Oh and a father with son and daughter at the very beginning.

Ann Talbot, Charles Cranleigh, George Cranleigh, Lady Madge Cranleigh, and Latoni.

That redhead bouffant elder lady, and a boy and a girl working for her.

A professor, two radio station workers, and two plane passengers.

Omega, Colin Frazer, Robin Stuart, a new Borusa incarnation, Chancellor Damonwhatever of Gallifrey, Chancellery Guard Maxilsomething of Gallifrey, and four other Time Lords.

Chela of Manussa, Ambril of Manussa, Dojien of Manussa, Queen Tanha of Manussa, Dugdale of Manussa, Prince Lon of Manussa.

TWO Brigadiers (which of them is the one episode character?), Mawdryn of someplanetperhapsTrionbutpropablynot, Hippo Ibbotson, the Black Guardian, a nurse from the school, two elderly versions of Nyssa and Tegan, two child versions of Nyssa and Tegan.

Kari, Olvir, Bor, Sigurd, Aegard or some other Scandinavian name, the Garm, and Olga.

[swagging-back-to]

ok so ive been taking kava for a while and im very mixed tbh

im not even quite sure it's actually working. seems more like a placebo at times. im also taking karuna kava which is only 13g of kava root per pouch (most people take 20-40g per session.)

it's a very mild feeling, just kinda chill. it isn't a noticeable buzz or high like alcohol or weed and there's no physical sensations at the doses I've had so far (going to be having two pouches tonight tho).

the good thing is im not smoking as much while drinking it. im still smoking it but it's just a little bit vs constant

----

so far ive tried the coconut chai, morning jasmine, and spiced mint.

coconut chai had probably the best effects but the worst taste by a long shot. like literally had me gagging. it was also the first one i tried so you can see my dedication to actually getting rooted

morning jasmine has second best feeling and best taste. its still ass but its better than absolute ass. like i could tolerate it being in my mouth for more than a second.

spiced mint was pretty gross but not as bad as coconut chai. it's effects were mid and forgettable honestly.

ive also ordered the cacao vanilla, fiji apple, mulled peach which im excited to try. and also have the relaxed damu which i am not excited to try tbh which is why i haven't drank it yet lol

[ollifree]

Firuz Cadash Eldest child of the paragons of fertility Yasmin and Ardashir. Surprisingly modern for the one of the siblings that remembers Orzammar the most. Though perhaps it’s not so surprising once one meets his lover, one Karuna Trevelyan (@atypicalacademic). The two met during Firuz’s first lyrium run and continued to meet during his subsequent ones. He’s a tad cocky due to his personal and professional successes. Considering the sky’s about to explode, that’s not the worst thing he could be.

[theocseason4]

it's so funny how on karuna satori's guru gossip thread theres just pages and pages of people chatting shit about her but then in the same breath they're like her asmr is kinda bomb tho😍

[pridecomesbeforethefall]

Ngl kinda wanna shove Karuna into an ABO AU, have her in heat and watch Lucifer and Diavolo fighting over her.

I may or may not need a life. 🙃

[rassilonwatchathon]

The Doctor, Todd, Panna, and Karuna in the Classic Doctor Who serial Kinda. Tune in next week to The Watch-A-Thon of Rassilon and listen to us talk about them.

RSS • Patreon • iTunes • Stitcher • Google Play • ESO Network

[ambiguouswhotopia]

Somewhat scattered reactions on rewatching “Kinda”

There's nothing subtle or terribly nuanced about the themes of this story but there's so much unsubtle stuff going on that it ends up rather dense. The central conflict is between ways of living that are aggressive, extractive, and seek to exert control over their environment on the one hand, and ways that are enlightened, collaborative, and harmonious with their environment on the other. This conflict instantiates itself over and over, and often on several levels at once in a given scene: between the colonial culture and the indigenous one, between individuals in each culture, between men and women, and within the psyches of the characters. The suggestion is that all of this is facilitated by the corrupting influence of the Mara, a "creature from the dark parts of the mind" who encourages violent, fearful, and selfish behaviour.

Binary gender essentialism is baked into the worldbuilding in surprising ways. Women in this story are fundamentally rational and clearsighted in a way that men are not. The colonial men are desperately violent, clinging to hierarchical authority and the trappings of their civilization to reassure them of their own ability to assert order on the world around them, ready to defend that order with truly disproportionate force. Even Adric, when he's piloting the mech suit, is a danger to those around him because his very fear of losing control causes the body he's in to lash out unpredictably (and then he flees from this knowledge, insisting to Tegan afterward that he had been getting the hang of it). By contrast, the Kinda men, and other men who have opened the Kinda box, seem to have peacefully surrendered control. They are placid, gentle, and kind, but they happily go along with the whims of whatever strong personalities are nearest; Kinda culture seems to rely on a situation in which the only such personalities will be the wise women, the only ones (in the ordinary way of things) who can be exposed to the Kinda collective experience and still retain an individual voice. On the other hand, when Todd the female scientist opens the box it doesn't seem to wreak any major changes on her personality or worldviews, and Panna the wise woman isn't surprised by this.

(As an aside, this is a story in which masculinity and British imperialism are treated very critically, but it doesn't do well by women or indigenous people either. Even though the script suggests that they're very advanced (and presumably as in North America the bountiful forests of the planet are the product of long and careful human cultivation), the Kinda as they appear on screen are, by and large, noble savage caricatures; meanwhile, the women characters mostly spend the story reacting to the men around then. The story's interest in femininity and indigeneity seems to be mainly in holding them up as an idealized contrast to the characters it takes as its main concern. At this point in the series' history, to my knowledge, we still have a year to go before we get a televised story not written by a white man.)

So what's going on with Tegan, then? The Mara is a transparent metaphor for feelings and tendencies of fear and aggression which are masculine-coded in the story, and itself seems to prefer to speak in the dream space in the form of a laughing and predatory young man. Tegan is the only woman we see who seems to fall prey to those feelings even briefly, and she goes so far as to be completely possessed by the Mara, one of only two characters to whom that happens (and the only one of those two that there's any sense of interiority for). Karuna later suggests that the reason that she was vulnerable was that she slept by the chimes alone, something that all the Kinda know they should never do. Tegan is isolated in part because her closest companion of the TARDIS crew, Nyssa, isn't really in this one (which presages "Enlightenment", another time she'll be menaced by a masculine figure the Doctor can't protect her from because he doesn't spot the danger). Even so, the fact that women must observe taboos to keep from welcoming in the Mara suggests that the story's gender essentialism needs more active shoring up behind the scenes, and is less just part of the fabric of the universe, than it would prefer to admit.

The other figure who troubles gender boundaries here is, obviously, the Doctor, who opens the box and experiences it as women do: a new piece of information, rather than an annihilation of his former self. This does startle Panna, who suggests that it must be because the Doctor is "an idiot." It's a jarring choice of words; one doesn't want to imagine that the Kinda, who are otherwise harmonious and enlightened and et cetera, go in for the quasi-eugenicism of insulting people for being mentally deficient or unfit. There's also the question of what it is about men she calls idiots that makes them immune to the effects of the box. One headcanon I like is that what we're hearing is a sort of mistranslation or equivocation, that by "idiot" she really means "fool," like the capering clown figure we see entertaining the Kinda and mirroring their emotions to defuse moments of stress: someone playfully open to the world, someone who doesn't take himself seriously. This is able to nicely parallel the way that the Twelfth Doctor will much later use the same word, declaring himself an "idiot with a box" as part of a deliberate turning away from his series 8 tendencies to try to control and manage everyone around him, from the accusation of trying to be "an officer" in a violent hierarchy like the colonial men in this story.

I'm pretty sure this was the first serial in which I ever saw the Fifth Doctor, and I was immediately really taken with him. He seemed to be thoughtful about other people in ways that I wasn't used to from the Doctor, and he's still one of my favourites of the classic series. Watching this time, I was struck how much of what I liked was in his performance rather than the writing. Davison acts the Doctor as someone warm, unassuming, understated, a little bit anxious, more interested in hearing about you than talking about himself; the Doctor is written here as someone who doesn't listen to his companions but is quick to berate them when something goes wrong, who is frequently frustrated to know more than the people around him and not be able to find the ways to explain so that they'll shut up and do as he says for once. This is, as I recall, a tension that will continue in his Doctor going forward. My immediate and intuitive reading of it on that first encounter was that he was someone who was consciously trying, though he was very unused to it, to put down his power and approach other people open-handed; I wonder how much of that sense was influenced by the context of this story happening around him.