#Non Fides

[dailyanarchistposts]

Editor’s foreword

This essay is not yet another one on "free love", the “affects“ or "deconstruction". It hopes to be more than that. Written in late July / early August 2013, it served, until October, to lay the foundation for many informal conversations. These discussions were deep and led to a more nuanced and full understanding, as well as raising many questions about the ideological relations that often govern the modes of thought and relationships of the French anti-authoritarian milieu. So if this text is not just another text on the affects, it’s because it is foremost a text on ideology, on scenes and milieus, on inconsistency and leftism. The way it managed to echo many and varied situations that do not necessarily involve emotional relationships, but numerous other issues such as power relations, the conformity of an anti-conformist milieu, how alternatives become the norm, social roles , individual patterns of consumerism, struggles and the tools of struggles etc., make it a text whose primary purpose is to open a debate that will exceed it. If we wanted to publish it today, after these few months of incubation and excited discussions, it is precisely to open this debate, consistent with the content of the text, beyond the limits of sub-cultures and affinity groups. And thus we hope that it will continue its adventure.

October 2013,

Ravage Editions.

***

It is reassuring to see that for some generations of anti-authoritarians, the dogmas which are too often used as our starting points, that consume us and make us go round in circles in a vacuum, are occasionally questioned, that when certain ideological principles end up causing human collateral damage, we are able to question them, abandon them or reformulate them. Companions recently released a text that likely caused excited and important discussions[[“ Amour libre “, vraiment ? Et après ? Published by Le Cri Du Dodo, June 20, 2013.]]. The strength of the writing was that it guided us back in some small way to individuality where it has more or less been replaced with dogma and ideology, and individuals with stereotypes. And when those discussions on free love, coupledom, polyamory, jealousy, non-monogamy etc. did take place between us, most likely in environments where people live together and have occasionally lost their sense of intimacy (squats, communities, etc.) than elsewhere, there was no will to make these discussions public through a text that would not just get passed between one or two groups of friends.

"Free love" is a term in use since the nineteenth century. It originally functioned to describe the anarchist rejection of marriage from the perspective of the individual emancipation of women and men. Its supporters rejected marriage as a form of slavery, primarily for women, but also as an interference by the State and the Church in their privacy, opposing marriage with the notion of "free cohabitation". It consisted in the assertion that two individuals could freely choose each other, love in an irreverent manner, without permission from the mayor and the parish priest and give the finger to all those who wished to interfere in their relationship. Once the concept interacted with educational and communitarian anarchist circles at the end of the Belle Epoque [i], in the form of so-called "loving friendship", it took another sense, though anecdotally, but we shall return to this.

It is really during the 1960s, in contact with the hippie movement, that the term’s meaning totally changed. It suddenly meant having various forms of multiple and joint relationships, as well as opening sexual intimacy to two or more people at once, especially in the form of threesomes and group sex, and most of the time the free-lovers added a dose of mysticism to it all (Tantra, sexual magic etc.).

But "free love" is an expression that is already, in itself, biased, used as it is in a world in which we are not free in any way. It is no wonder that this term prospered in both the educational and communitarian settings of the libertarian movement from the end of the Belle Epoque. Just re-reading that annoying rhetoric of the “en-dehors” [1].

These libertarians, who generally lived in fairly closed communities, where children were "protected" from the outside world (Amish-like) who succumbed to all the ridiculous fashions of the time (oil diet, banning of teas and caffeine, exclusive consumption of nuts, sickly Hygienism, absolute scientism and progressivism etc.), had the feeling of living apart from the world, of living freely. Given the quantity and quality of the revolutionary work necessary to change the world, they used fancy ideological footwork to find a most comfortable position: experience freedom now, among themselves and within their community. These were not the first [2] not the last [3] But we must speak of a total and indivisible freedom because what good is freedom of movement, for example, if there is nowhere to move but in streets filled with shops, surveillance cameras and cops? The same goes for love, how to be free in love when we aren’t free anywhere else?

The typical and historical error of leftism, which is to be satisfied with simply reversing the values of the enemy - to take money from the rich and give to the poor rather than completely abolishing classes, to reclaim the rhetoric of discrimination and turn it into sources of pride (workerism, ethnic, gender and territorial pride of all kinds, …), to do politics better than the official politicians, to invert patriarchy rather than abolishing it etc. - does not spare the arenas of romantic and emotional relationships. It seems therefore that the thing to do would be the opposite of previous generations, of all those parents who have sacrificed their desires and their lives for the institutions of the couple or of the family. It has long been felt that we can invent something new simply by suggesting new prototypes of relationships, modeled on negatives of the old, and then comply with them, as happens with each new norm.

The standard in place today in the way of love and emotional relationships within our milieu is the exhortation to diversity, the moral principle of non-exclusivity, the "creation of an abundance of affection" [4] and having multiple partners. The standard now having been reversed, recalcitrance to the new standard is too. A self-sufficient relationship between two people becomes the new deviance to suppress.

It seems important to reaffirm that two people can feel good together without experiencing the need to multiply their passionate adventures- while also not presenting faithfulness as a moral tenet or wishing to suppress “extramarital" sex because of thoughtless values. But there will always be the loud mouths who believe themselves more liberated than others who will cast down their judgment into the face of others: "they are a couple, shame!"

Basically, why express opinions, as the parish priest or bishop, on things that we do not own and which do not jeopardize our revolutionary project? On things whose issues do not concern us? That one is a believer in monogamy or of polyamory is not the problem of the other. Only one thing is important: everyone should find their fulfillment in their own way without being blinded by any ideology, whether from patriarchal society and its moral imperatives or the milieus of those, who, thinking themselves able to tell who is free and who is not in a world of cages and chains, believe they possess the recipe for freedom. Why refuse to see that the complexity of situations and the complexity of individuals mix together? That if a rule could encompass everyone, it would necessarily be defective and contribute to the negation of individuals? That since it would be a rule, it would once again impede freedom?

How many pamphlets are needed to explain how to fuck, how to love, what relationships one should have with one’s body? [5] How many narrow standards for our desires and perceptions? How many of us, now past the excitement of the misleading freshness of being sixteen or twenty years old, have not managed to find ourselves in these new models of pseudo-freedom? How many have had to suffer being told that they were not made for freedom because they liked only one person and were loved only by one person? How many have whipped themselves for experiencing jealousy, have felt consumed by the other under the pretext of their freedom? How many have felt uncomfortable under the inquisitive eyes of those who believe they are free while living in a social order based on domination? Forgotten in the sectarian and ideological confinement of small cliques, is that there are still billions of people around us.

As in any ideological diversion, even before examining reality, we fit reality to how ideology would like it to be. We do not try to do what we want, we try to want what we should want, and there are plenty of pamphlets, books and texts in the press catalogues of our milieus that explain what we should want, rather than urging us to follow our authentic, individual desires. So in this race for deconstruction and pseudo-freedom, it’s all about being the most open of all, trying anything, because we have to. Or more precisely, we have to in order to feel part of the narrative of deconstruction, better than others, armed, as it were, with a new form of progressivism. So we cannot see past the beam that is in our eye, to invert the biblical metaphor, and no longer see the infinite field of possibilities available to us in the destructive urge- as though the deconstruction of the individual and the destruction of this world could not do well together.

It was good old Kropotkin who said that "structures based on centuries of history cannot be destroyed by a few kilos of dynamite" [6], and he was right, in the sense that physical destruction is not sufficient by itself, that it necessarily must be accessory to a profound renewal of social relations. But nor did he want to express that a few kilos of dynamite could not themselves be helpful in the emergence of splendid possibilities.

Moreover, it is not a few visionaries of deconstruction, modeled on Zarathustra (who retreated into the mountains for ten years, and one day felt the need to share his wisdom with the little-people), that carry the potential to create revolution. Revolution (and to a lesser extent, insurrection) is a social fact, that is to say, like it or not, it will necessitate that at one time or another a large stratum of the population rises. It will be alongside the celebrated "real people" (as we sometimes hear them described) that we might make a revolution, not just with a few anti-authoritarian ultra-deconstructed types who will only be able to participate on their extremely limited scale. Revolution will be the work of these "normal" people, with their qualities and also their many faults, and who are often light years ahead on this issue (and many others …).

But let us return to our butterflies. Armand said that "in love, as in all other areas, it is abundance which destroys jealousy and envy. That is why the formula of unconstrained love should become that of all anarchist milieus." But how can we, then as now, afford to say with such arrogance and satisfaction, what is THE form (" formula "!) of love and sex to be adopted by THE anarchists (or any other social milieu)? The term "free love" already contains in itself this form of exclusion, since it implies that it alone is capable of bringing freedom, but we seriously doubt the possibility of finding freedom through love, whether it is called "free" or not. And is it really freedom that we seek through love?

We must not delude ourselves that in the post-modern era, the concept of freedom is unfortunately too often a pretext for denying individuality as well as the denial of any real will to change the world. "I don’t care and fuck you" seems to be the new freedom, in other words, the notion of a total and indivisible freedom, individual but conditioned by the freedom of the other (which has long been central to anarchist perspectives) was replaced by a sort of already pervasive liberal outlook. Add to this a normalization process which expresses its violence through the marginalization of individuals who are viscerally opposed to these standards, explaining that if this does not work for them it is because they are the problem. But there is nothing surprising in this. After all, this small milieu is the product of the social order, and it reproduces it in return.

But this liberalism has many facets, and goes far beyond the issue of emotional relationships. By habitually thinking in terms of acceptable and sanctioned beliefs and keywords, we ended up being no longer capable of anything other than navel gazing with self-satisfaction in a cozy little bubble where the billions of other humans are forbidden to enter, despite the façade of ultra-social, inclusive speech.

We are told that freedom is about wandering, that it is to flutter, but how then do we embed ourselves in a real revolutionary approach, with continuity, in a neighborhood, a village, a region, a publication, a place, a struggle? Are those who feel free to drift from one struggle to another aware that they can only afford it because someone else is maintaining the continuity? Do they realize that this romantic drifting is really just another form of comfortable consumerism?

We are told that freedom is about wandering, that it is to flutter, but how then do we embed ourselves in a real revolutionary approach, with continuity, in a neighborhood, a village, a region, a publication, a place, a struggle? Are those who feel free to drift from one struggle to another aware that they can only afford it because someone else is maintaining the continuity? Do they realize that this romantic drifting is really just another form of comfortable consumerism?

And when we speak of the revolutionary process as a long process, one which requires substantial efforts and a little "sacrifice" of one’s time, sometimes of one’s freedom and often of one’s comfort, how many are they to be offended, exclaiming: "sacrifice, effort, yuck, dirty capitalist!" Then congratulations dear comrades and companions, you are free, you are not capitalists, you are super deconstructed, but why bother? History will remember that you had fun, but other revolutionaries will remember only that you consumed them, and in the deepest way, this is where capitalism is found: in the consumption of the efforts of the other, but also in the consumption of the body.

To clarify, so that the gossips do not spit their venom through my mouth, this isn’t about opposing revolutionary praxis to enjoyment. I especially want to point out that happiness is not necessarily found in the forms that the spectacle usually gives it. I am not here to advocate any asceticism because what good is it to have fervently critiqued activism only to reproduce it in other ways later. As the product of a certain diversity of experiences, I say that the revolutionary project is found elsewhere than in the false oppositions of leftist militancy and post-modern and subjectivist milieus. Let those who doubt know that we take pleasure and satisfaction in building subversive paths, and that the flutterers and butterflies do not have a monopoly on ecstasy and joy. For as beautiful as it is, the butterfly is an insect that lives only a few days, and whose capacity therefore to develop projects, to consider the future, is severely limited. Butterflies are attractive, and it’s certainly quite romantic to compare oneself to them, but one must choose between becoming revolutionary and merely reveling in the myopia and the immediate gratifications of the inconsequential of liberalism and anarcho-leftism.

We do not necessarily mean by leftism a specific milieu, but trends that are found everywhere in our circles, whether among anarchists, communists, squatters and even among the most ardent supporters of a complete break with the left. As we have said, one of the most important features of leftism is the reversal and inversion of dominant values, which when wedded to a certain form of libertarianism becomes liberalism.

May 68 has probably helped give birth to these new forms of self-absorbed leftism, sometimes in spite of it. In a bourgeois society with an entrenched and stifling morality, many have only sought to free themselves by doing the opposite of what society expected of them, in this way simply creating a mirror image of the same morals. If drug use is a social taboo, why not make a symbol of it and then feel free between two overdoses, one’s head in the gutter? Is the couple a cornerstone of alienation in this society? Then let us be free, orgiastic, fuck as often as we can, collect our passionate conquests and feel free while so many others have only loved people who have used them.

One just needs to open a brochure on "free love", on so-called "liberated" relationships, on non-monogamy, "emotional comfort" and the famous "affects" to realize that the only thing that is being proposed is the total negation of the individual and their use for the sole purpose of egotistical instant gratification, mostly in a ratio of economic accumulation, profit and social cannibalism. So it seems that freedom is having the opportunity to shoot fifty strokes and to "have choices". Reification on every level! Tonight it will be John, he is tall and I’d love to lay a tall one, I am saving Josephine for tomorrow because I like mature women and the day after will be my fetish trip with Billy. Joy unhindered! [7]

But this is a relationship of capital accumulation, of an emotional capital, where the goods are human, considered as social stock, emotional assets accumulated in a romantic bank account. So yes, we are free to exploit and be freely exploited, but then the word ’freedom’ has no meaning: social democracy has won, the economy has won, the time period has won, even our emotional intimacy and our inter-personal relationships have been penetrated to the point of nullifying any form of free association of individuals.

When this world makes us believe that our freedom is found in a supermarket, in the choice between several brands of shit brushes, it operates with exactly the same strategy. Free love or post-modern polyamory as they exist in our milieus are, for the most part, no better than this "freedom to consume". They are actually very similar to that of bourgeois libertinism or the sex friends and other fuck-buddies of urban gilded youth. However, one difference is that bourgeois libertinism gives its practitioners the exciting sensation of breaking or circumventing social norms and prohibitions, providing the thrill of non-conformity and of subverting dominant moral values, even if in a very limited and superficial way. Libertinism in anarchist milieus however is very different in that it enjoys a sort of majority support, which gives the individual participant a sense of complying with the ideological standards of their milieu, despite the unique desires of each person, which of course are perpetually changing, never frozen as with a milieu or any community that sets reductionist rules that must apply to all cases and to all individuals.

Do John, Josephine and Billy really share the same vision of the relationship I have with them, and under the sole pretext that we would have “clearly” discussed? Are we all coming from the same situation when we commit to this type of relationship? Does ideology, combined with the dumbed down language of a world of domination, really clarify everything?

Basically, there is little difference, if we ignore for a moment the differences in posturing, between the free-love consumer and the Emir’s harem from which he chooses every night who he will want to fuck and / or to love while the others prepare him food. There is perhaps one significant difference in our milieus, where an intertwining of leftism and feminism has had an influence: women sometimes have a wider tolerance in the practice of the harem. A bit like men in the rest of society.

The most ideological supporters of free love ultimately make the same mistakes as those who are blinded by ideology generally. They deny the uniqueness and complexity of real-life individuals by replacing them with interchangeable stereotypes. When two people start an ultra-defined relationship, that is to say with the expected discussions intended to “clarify” early on its terms and what each expects from the relationship, we first have to consider the balance between them. Does one of them already have several relationships and not the other? What if one of them is considered "ugly", "beautiful" or "charismatic" and not the other? What if one of them is only looking for affection while the other hopes for love? How is their balance impacted if one of them is happy and the other is unhappy and insecure, or if one is more articulate than the other? Can anyone deny the importance of these things?

How many people, not particularly eager to have a non-exclusive relationship, have accepted one just to match the desires of the other? But is this acceptance really freely chosen? For if John is in love with Jeanne and in a weak position, and Jeanne explains her desire for a non-monogamous relationship, John will accept. And Jeanne will have the impression that everything is simple and easy, without wondering if John would not have equally agreed to the opposite.

Is this weak yes so different from the "yes" that we give to the boss at work?

We affirm that it is the same, and that talk of freedom in such cases perpetuates what Nietzsche called "the sublime lie that interprets weakness as freedom" [8].

Ideas of sexual liberation are beautiful and noble ideas, but each of us, by passing them in the crucible of our own individuality and in the recognition of the uniqueness of the other, give them different forms. As we said earlier, we affirm that there is no single rule that can govern human relationships, for the same reasons that we oppose Law, because it can never take into account the complexity of the individuals it puts under its control [9]. This is also why we counter unlearned and undigested ideas from ideological brochures with an individual and visceral ethics. We also affirm that the only relatively emancipated relationship is the one with the welfare of each other as the center of its attention, free from self-absorption and free from the traps and imperatives of ideology. Why wouldn’t the only valid rule of love be to pay attention to the other, to treat one’s companion properly, as an individual, rather than foolishly applying rules intended to make ourselves free through personal enjoyment, but without any sensitivity to otherness? And why make the analytical error of confining criticism of the economy to the formal economy, rather than to flesh it out in the social relations that govern our alienated relationships?

In order to break the socially expected obligations of coupledom we choose ideological polyamory and manufacture a different norm that will last until new human dramas emerge. And it is no coincidence that the events of May 68, beyond the incredible experiences of occupation and destruction of factories and universities, the clashes and barricades and the generally wonderful experience of having touched the possibility of a real subversion of the existent, it is no coincidence that beyond the Image d’Epinal [10] hide many human tragedies; suicides, overdoses, betrayals and infinite sadness. It is no coincidence that behind every experience of widespread emancipation (or at least experienced as such by its protagonists) hide equally widespread human dramas, from May 68 to Woodstock, from sexual liberation to the Maoists and radical student movements in the United States of 1960/70. No wonder too that so many have bounced back on their feet, now forming the ruling classes of this order, while many others who took the ideas at their word find themselves languishing in jail in oblivion for over forty years, paying for not being inconsequential like the others, for not having merely sought pleasure and immediate gratification.

Those who were there merely to have fun, to flutter and navel gaze, have profited. Those who believed and still believe in revolution have paid the price. Profit for one group always implies the exploitation of another, be it with the arms of capital and labor or with those of ideology, whether autonomous or of the party.

While the butterflies forage, may the flowers revolt.

August 2013,

Aviv Etrebilal.

[i] La Belle Epoque is a period of Western European history. It is conventionally dated from the end of the Franco-Prussian War in 1871 to the outbreak of WW1 around 1914. It was a period characterized by optimism, regional peace, economic prosperity and scientific and cultural innovations. In this climate the arts flourished, especially in Paris. The Belle Époque was named, in retrospect, when it began to be considered a Golden Age in contrast to the horrors of World War I. ; translator’s note.

[1] It literally means outsider. Some individualists who were prone to separation used to refer to themselves in this way. During the Belle Epoque, the individualist movement could be roughly cut in two. One, the ‘educationists’, advocated for communities, pacifism, lifestyle anarchism, social experimentations, etc., and another tendency known as ‘illegalist’, the most famous of which were The Bonnot Gang. Other illegalists are Albert Libertad, Zo d’Axa and Renzo Novatore. Both tendencies referred to themselves in this way, but it had a much different meaning for each ; Tn.

[2] See for instance the followers of Fourrier, the utopians, etc.

[3] From the Kibbutzim, the post ’68 semi-rural communities to the pseudo-commune of Tarnac, etc.

[4] Cf. Contre l’amour (against love), Iosk Editions, August 2003, available at infokiosques.net.

[5] Not unlike the pamphlets circulated by the reforming church during the 1950s in the US.

[6] In an essay published in the journal Le Révolté in 1887. But let’s also remember that 7 years earlier in the same journal, he called for “permanent rebolt by word, by text, by the fist, by the gun, by dynamite”

[7] In French: “Jouir sans entraves” a famous May 68 slogan ; Tn.

[8] Friedrich Nietzsche, The Genealogy of Morals, 1887.

[9] On top of which of course, it will always belong to Power and its maintenance.

[10] The expression Image d’Epinal has become proverbial in French and refers to an emphatically traditionalist and naïve depiction of something, showing only its good aspects. Tn.

[uranniumgirls]

Stomund, Captain of Fidelis: “That heretical umbral lamp-“

Andreas of Ebb: “AH YOU MEAN THE OHIO LAMP WITH THE BURDENING FANUM TAX?”

Stomund, Captain of Fidelis: “Kill yourself.”

[yinyuedijun]

SINCERITY

Flirting with Suo is never a good idea—you can never tell whether he means to charm you or make fun of you when you do it. Sometimes it feels like both. Occasionally it feels mean. More often than not, you like to entertain it. But you can't right now, not when his blood is all over the washroom sink. Your manager will be furious about the mess, and also about the fact that you're giving first aid to three delinquents while you're on the clock. If Suo makes one more joke about marrying you, you'll probably throw up and cry. (Or: Suo, Nirei, and Sakura get into a fight in the red light district and go to you to get patched up. Suo takes the opportunity to tease you mercilessly.)

4.5k words, suo x reader with implied one-sided sakura x reader, sfw with mature themes. set post-canon (they are all 18-19 years old), non-canon backstory details for suo and sakura (speculative as of ch. 146). fem reader – references to gendered professions, e.g. hostessing; reader wears a dress for her job in a girls’ bar. warning for inaccurate depictions of first aid! dividers by @/cafekitsune.

Suo’s never liked your job.

You suppose this is fair. The feeling is mutual. You’ve never liked the fact that Suo chose to go to a delinquent school rather than a proper high school, and he’s never liked the fact that you chose to drop out of your proper high school to go work in the red light district—first at a kyabakura, and now at a girls’ bar. His master, who also happens to be your master, has always told you that this was a natural reaction on his part. Having a secondary school certificate is important, after all. But Suo’s disapproval of your income sources, no matter how politely or subtly phrased, has always felt like it runs deeper than simple concern for your education.

Still, this has never stopped him from visiting you at your place of work, though he only tends to come by under the worst possible circumstances—tonight worse than any other.

When you see the three of them limping through the clamour and heat of the red light district—the neon glow of the street making the blood smeared across Suo’s face shine vibrantly—you entirely forget that you're on the clock. You chuck your sign onto the ground (3000¥ per hour! it reads) as you cut a path toward them, almost tripping in your stiletto heels. Your customer service voice gives way to your regular one, which is so outraged that it startles everyone around you.

“Suo, you motherfucker—are you trying to lose the only eye you have left?!”

Suo is unbothered. His smile is calm and deeply shameless as you approach him. It’s nothing like Nirei, who cringes at the furious look you give him, or Sakura, who looks like a deer caught in headlights when you round on him instead. Like he doesn’t know what to do at the fact that someone is worrying over him, and especially not when that person is wearing an extremely revealing evening gown. For a minute, you think he's going to bolt.

But Suo keeps him there, grip tight on his arm.

“Hi,” he says brightly, like there isn't blood all over his face and shoulder. “Are you busy? We might need to trouble you.”

“Of course I'm busy! I'm in the middle of a shift!” you fume at him. But you still extract Sakura from him, scruffing him by the neck before he can clam up and run. You pull him in the direction of your bar, and gesture for the other two to follow. “Hurry up before my manager sees you.”

Smuggling three delinquents into the washroom of a girls’ bar is not a skill you thought you'd ever need, but it is one that you've become an expert in. This is at least the third time you've done it. The Furin trio rarely ever loses fights, but they occasionally slip up in the part of the red light district that isn't controlled by Roppo-Ichiza. This is somewhat unavoidable, as Keyaki Street is a different beast from Keisei Street. It isn't just delinquents here, but bona fide criminals. “Like, actual fucking Yakuza,” you grouse at Suo for the millionth time. You wipe at the blood remaining on his face—most of it you've already rinsed off, staining the melamine sink with iron—and the paper towel in your hand blooms red.

“But these guys weren't Yakuza,” he says cheerfully.

“They still pulled weapons on you! Bladed weapons!”

“Mm… well, that's true. I'm sorry.”

You scowl at him. “No, you're not.”

“No, I'm not.” He’s still smiling. “In our defense, we didn't have much of a choice. They were about to do something terrible to an innocent person,” he says, and you deflate a little, because you know Suo can't stand to see injustice. This is something you love very dearly about him, and also a quality of his that constantly raises your blood pressure. But then you roll your eyes when he happily adds, “And in my defense, it’s all our Captain’s fault!”

“Oi!” Sakura yells from one of the stalls, where he’s sitting and holding a bag of ice to a knot on his head. “Wasn’t my fault we ended up fighting. They were practically beggin’ to have their asses kicked.”

“You did provoke them, Sakura,” Nirei says. He's in the other stall, trying to stay off his sprained ankle.

“Well, they were dangerous! Not like you wanted to just leave them alone either,” Sakura grumbles, and Nirei apologises, though Suo accurately points out there is no need for him to. After hearing this story, you can't help but agree, and you suppose you shouldn't have expected any differently. After three years at Furin, Sakura is no longer the type to pick fights for no reason. Whatever those guys were up to must have been pretty bad for him to start shit in unfamiliar territory.

Still. The red light district is what it is. Touts, street gangs, and Yakuza are constantly causing problems here, with violence of a scale and nature that Bofurin simply don't see on their own turf. Your street in particular makes someone like Endo look like a joke. “You should still learn to exercise some restraint,” you say to Sakura. “And you”—you give Suo a miserable look—“you know the area. You should have known better. At the very least, you should have called me for backup.”

“But you were on the clock,” Suo points out, and you frown. Despite having absolutely no need, you take out an alcohol wipe and swipe it over his cut. He winces.

“I'm still on the clock now,” you reply, voice dry, “and here you are, distracting me anyway. My boss is going to be on my ass about it if I don't bring in any customers tonight, you know.”

“We can be your customers,” Suo offers.

“You aren't old enough to drink!”

“Neither are you, yet you work here.” His gaze has turned a little sharp. His voice too. You blink, suddenly mollified.

“...okay. If each of you buys a drink after this, I’ll call us even.” Then you glance down at his changshan, which is sliced through, the pearly silk stained red at the shoulder. He’s insisted that the wound is unserious and said that he'd rather clean up his face first, and you're starting to question his priorities. “That is, if you don't have to go to the hospital after this.”

“I don't.”

“I don't know if I believe you.” You pull out some polysporin. “Come closer.”

Suo could do this on his own. His hands aren't incapacitated. But he humours you, as he's always humoured you, and allows you dab his cut with the antibiotic. You feel a little sentimental as you do it, and almost a little sad. Doing this reminds you of when he was a kid who had just started learning martial arts. Granted, he never got any real cuts back then, but sometimes he’d scrape his knees or his elbows or—god forbid—his face, and you would plaster bandaids all over him when he did. But none of those were real injuries.

More than anything, doing this reminds you of when he lost his eye. The state that he was in after the accident. The way his face was bandaged after the surgery. The texture of the gauze against your fingers when you asked to try swapping out the dressings for him.

If Suo notices the way your lip is trembling, he doesn't comment on it.

“You’re so mean—how come you never believe anything I say?” he asks. You press the gauze to his cut with more pressure than necessary, and he blinks. He opens his mouth again, but then the door rattles violently.

“Sorry!” you yell. “Washroom’s closed for cleaning!” You wince as you hear complaints in reply—you’ve been closed for half an hour!—and shoot Suo a sour look as the customer leaves. “I’m really risking it all for you three,” you remark.

“I'll make it up to you,” Suo says. “I'll stick around the whole night and buy as many drinks as you want. Your manager won't be able to hassle you about anything then.”

“No way. You're not wasting that much money on the red light district.” You frown. “Master will kill me if I let you piss away your inheritance like that.”

“I’m not wasting my money on the red light district. I'm wasting it on you.”

“Well, I'm employed at a girls’ bar, so when you waste money on me, you are in fact spending it on the red light district.”

“Then you should quit so I can spend as much money on you as I want.”

“Quit and then live on what income?” You set aside the first aid kit and grab some more paper towel. “Take off your shirt.”

“Oh? Right here? Right now?” His eye goes wide. “How forward.”

Sakura coughs very, very loudly from the stall. If you weren't so used to Suo saying this kind of thing just to mess with you, you'd probably do the same. In fact, you'd probably choke on your spit and die on the spot. But as it is, you only sigh and start unbuttoning Suo’s changshan, starting at the high collar. Any sentimentality or concern you previously felt is quickly drowned out by annoyance.

“Suo.”

“Don’t worry—I don't mind,” he adds. “I thought you'd never ask. I just didn't think it’d happen here. And so suddenly.”

“Don’t do that. I can't do this today.”

“Don’t do what?” he says innocently. He lets you slip his changshan off one shoulder. To your relief, the cut does look very shallow—he’s too quick for anything other than a bullet to land a serious hit on him, you guess—but you still swallow when you see it. It looks like he's bled a lot more than he probably actually has.

Or you hope so, anyway.

“Joke like that,” you reply after a moment. “It's very mean.”

“I’m not joking about anything.” You feel his eye on you as you start dabbing at all the red on his skin, the paper towel in your hands blotting crimson as if with ink. Your breath shakes as you study the wound. He lifts his hand, his knuckle brushing against your cheek. You smack it away, but he doesn't seem bothered. “I was being very serious,” he continues. “Quit working in the red light district and let me support you instead.”

“Suo,” you say, your voice flat, “there is no job you could qualify for on this planet that will let you earn more than what I'm making now. If anything, you should let me support you.”

“Ah,” he says brightly. “I get it now—you want me to be your trophy husband!”

Now you are choking on your spit and you do think you're dying. Sakura sounds like he's not doing much better—something bangs loudly against the washroom stall, and you assume it’s his forehead. Even Nirei is affected, not-so-subtly clearing his throat.

“I do not want you to be my trophy husband.”

“Just a regular husband, then?” he asks. “That’s alright. If I joined the Yakuza, I could make plenty of money. You could even stay at home if you wanted.”

“Suo you motherfucker you are not joining the fucking Yakuza! And I wouldn't be a stay at home wife!”

“Oh? You wouldn't want to be?”

“No, god! Do you know how much I could make if I scored a hostess gig at a high-end place? Why would I ever turn down that kind of money?!”

“Ah, so you want us to be dual income?”

“Of course I would want us to be dual income!”

“You could get a different job and we could still be dual income.”

“There’s no other job that would pay as well.”

Suo sighs, and your brow twitches. You've always been suspicious about why he disapproves of your choice in career. It’s not in his disposition to judge people, but sometimes you still worry that he's doing it to you.

“What,” you ask, “would you be so against marrying a hostess?”

“No, not at all. But I'd be worried if my spouse worked somewhere unsafe. What if you end up at a Yakuza-owned club?”

You pause, startled at the abruptly earnest tone of his voice. Suddenly you feel guilty.

“Oh… well, I wouldn’t work at a Yakuza-owned club.”

“Hm… then I guess it's fine.” Suo nods, as if arriving at a decision. “We’ll get married, we’ll be dual income, and neither of us will work for the Yakuza.”

“Yes, exactly. We’ll get married, we’ll be dual income, and neither of us—” Your eyes go wide as you realize what you're saying. You feel yourself flushing. “Wait.”

“What? Is there a problem?”

“Suo.”

“Don’t tell me you're going to change your mind now. That would just be mean.”

“I'm being mean?” you ask, flabbergasted.

“Well, yes. You don't think it would hurt if you changed your mind about marrying me? And so soon after agreeing, too.”

You stare at him in disbelief. You have a number of possible retorts that cross your mind, and somehow you pick the least relevant one: “You can't trick someone into marrying you.”

“Then can I trick you into dating me?”

“Suo! I said don't do that!”

“Don’t do what?”

“Joke about that kind of thing!”

“I'm not joking about anything.”

“Yes you are? You don't actually want to date me. Stop saying that you do!”

Suo leans in. He stares at you, his gaze distinctly vulpine. It's very attractive, and also intimidating, and you should be used to it by now, but your heart rate ticks up anyway. You swallow thickly as his thumb glides along your cheek again, your skin scorching beneath his fingertips. You forget to bat his hand away this time.

“You’re so mean,” he repeats, voice lilting, “how come you never believe anything I say?”

He's baiting you. He's obviously baiting you, and you consider for a moment whether you want to bite.

Flirting with Suo is never a good idea—you can never tell whether he means to charm you or make fun of you when you do it. Sometimes it feels like both. Occasionally it feels mean. More often than not, you like to entertain it. But you can't right now. His shirt’s stained with such a bright red that it keeps distracting you, just like the blood he's left all over the washroom sink. Your manager will be furious about the mess, and also about the fact that you're giving first aid to three delinquents while you're on the clock. You think they'd go broke before they could spend enough money here to appease her, were she to discover the four of you. You might even lose your job. Then you wouldn't be able to support yourself anymore, let alone Suo, who cracks jokes as easily about being your trophy husband as he does about being Leonardo DiCaprio.

If he makes one more joke about marrying you, you'll probably throw up and cry.

“You're not being very gentlemanly right now,” you finally point out. He raises a brow.

“No?”

“No. I'd even say you're being a menace, actually. Doing a very bad job of”—you almost laugh as you say this, because you've heard this speech so many times—“engaging with my feelings. Not being supportive at all. Really falling off the staircase to adulthood, you know.”

Suo studies you. Something complicated passes through his eye before he pulls away, his expression now back to normal. It's deceptive how innocent he looks.

“Sorry,” he says. “You’re right. I’ll play nice.”

“No, you won't,” you retort, and Suo smiles at you, not replying. But he does give you a break. You finish cleaning up the cut without incident, although you do get flecks of blood on your evening gown, which you hope won't be too noticeable against the black satin. You bemoan the lost cause of Suo's changshan too—made of Suzhou silk, a gift from your master—and silently make a note to buy him a replacement sometime.

You're in the middle of buttoning up his shirt when the door clicks and swings open. Met face to face with your coworker, you freeze up.

Your stage name leaves her mouth in an angry bark. “What are you doing? I told you you're not supposed to be having sex with customers here, you should be doing that someplace—” She stops, evidently spotting the blood on Suo’s shirt, and then the other two individuals locked up in here with you, one of whom is blushing violently and looks to be on the verge of dying from embarrassment. Beneath your hands, you feel Suo’s body go stiff too.

“Oh,” she says before either of them can comment. “It’s just your delinquent boyfriend and his buddies.” Suo waves at her, and she nods back before squinting at the sink. “Are you going to clean that up?”

“Yes,” you say quickly. “Please don't tell our boss.”

“Have I ever ratted you out?” she asks. “Just get out of here soon. People do have to piss, you know.” Then she stops, looking at Suo with a dubious expression. “And make sure your boyfriend doesn't die.”

You're too tired to correct her on the nature of your relationship. “I've been trying,” you say, and she gives you a sympathetic look before retreating. You hear her laughing with a customer about people fooling around in the washroom, and I'm so sorry for the inconvenience, sir, and could you please go downstairs while I clean up. You’re so relieved, you nearly fall to your knees. A calloused hand touches your back as you rub your temples.

“I’m sorry for worrying you,” Suo says quietly—sincerely—and instead of saying no, you're not, you reply, “I know. I’m sorry too.”

Suo’s always hated your job.

He’s always hated your job, your boyfriends, your apartment, and a lot of other things about your life that Sakura doesn’t have any business prying into. And it's just as well. Sakura also hates your shitty job, and your shitty boyfriends, and considering that you live in the same shitty building as him, he isn't a fan of your rental situation either. Nirei’s too polite to say anything about it, but Sakura can tell that he disapproves as well. It’s not like any of them are living the most comfortable lives either—Sakura has personally been living from shithole to shithole, mostly alone, ever since his parents passed—but your lifestyle does make them all feel poorly.

You're just a very easy person to like. And it's very easy to want nice things for you. So Sakura gets it, how Suo feels about you.

What he doesn't quite get is how Suo acts about you.

One thing he’s learned over the years is that Suo is very good at reading people. Sometimes he understands Sakura better than Sakura understands himself, and he can convince Sakura to do things which he himself didn't think were possible for him to do. He's done the same with Nirei, and about half the other people in their grade, and at least a third of the guys in Bofurin. It’s frankly a terrifying skill. But Suo never uses it with you—not to get you to change jobs, or boyfriends, or even apartments.

At first Sakura thought that you were just immune to Suo’s tactics, but he's recently come to realise that Suo simply gets too emotional about you to know how to convince you of anything. He’s even emotional enough to get kind of petty and a little mean with you, which is something that Sakura has only witnessed from Suo during fights. Really bad fights.

It’s terribly uncomfortable, especially when you’re clearly head over heels for Suo.

Sakura doesn't have any business prying into your personal problems. Though truthfully, he’d be happy to thrash some random assholes for you anyway, if that would fix your heartbreak. (He's already done this to at least one of your exes, and it worked shockingly well.) The problem is, Suo is not a random asshole and Sakura isn't sure that you'd want him thrashed in the first place. But it's just fucking painful watching the two of you act like this around each other, so he ends up pulling Suo aside after you kick them out of the girls’ bar, scowling.

Suo looks at him, surprised. “Sakura? What's the matter?”

He doesn't mince words. “How come you were being such a dick to your friend?”

Nirei goes stiff. “Sakura,” he says in his panicked ‘why are you trying to pick a fight now’ voice, “where is this coming from? I don't think Suo was being rude…” But Sakura can tell, as Nirei’s finishing his own sentence, that he's second-guessing himself.

“No,” Suo replies. “I was being a bit terrible, wasn't I?” There’s no humour in either his words or his face, but the corner of his mouth lifts. He actually looks endeared. “I'm surprised you noticed, Sakura.”

“I mean”—Sakura feels himself going red, embarrassed at just the memory of how you looked at Suo; first so worried, then painfully fond, and then like you were going to burst into tears right there in the washroom and ask him to hold you, as if you were in a horrible getsuku drama—“it was kinda hard not to.”

Suo nods. “I suppose it’s natural to be sensitive to the feelings of someone you like.”

Heat floods his face. “I don't like her!”

“Did I say you did?” Suo’s mouth curls when Sakura can't answer. “Don’t be embarrassed. She's a very easy person to like.”

Sakura tries his hardest to ignore Suo—which should be easy, because Suo lies randomly and pointlessly all the time, whenever he thinks it's funny—and says, “If she's an easy person to like, how come you act like you don't like her at all?”

“Was I acting like that? Or was she acting like it was impossible for someone to like her?” Sakura stops. Suo gives him a long look, then smiles. “You would know how difficult it can be to accept being liked, Sakura. And how long it can take to understand that there are people who want to support you unconditionally.”

Sakura opens his mouth once, twice. A third time. Nirei sighs. The two of them watch as Suo—rather than walking in the direction of the subway—steps over to a vending machine and buys a bottle of oolong tea.

“Are you going to wait for her shift to finish?” Nirei asks.

“Mm, I think so.” Suo glances down at his ankle. “But you should go home, Nire-kun. You can’t fight like that. In case those guys come back here, I mean.” He opens the bottle, takes a sip. “They had bladed weapons. It would be bad if you risked it.”

Nirei glances at the entrance to your bar, worried. “But…”

Sakura understands without Nirei finishing his sentence. The security at your bar is terrible, and plenty of people like to exploit that. It was Nirei who noticed a group men eyeing you before anyone else did, following you all the way from Keisei Street to your place of work. And sure, Suo kicked the shit out of them in the end, did much worse to them than vice versa—but who knows if there aren't more of them.

Suo hates your job. All three of them do.

“It’s okay,” Sakura says. “I'm sure the two of us will be enough.”

“...I'll ask Tsubaki if he's free,” Nirei finally relents. “And I'll text Kiryu and Tsugeura too.”

“Thanks, Nire-kun.”

Suo gets a bottle of ramune after Nirei leaves, passes it to Sakura. Tsubaki comes by later, still in his pole outfit, with several pieces of taiyaki for them to share—I’m always snacky after dancing, he explains—and the three of them loiter in front of your bar until four in the morning. Tsubaki asks questions about you in a tone that has Sakura wanting to crawl into an alleyway just to hide, and Suo deflects masterfully with questions about Tsubaki’s new boyfriend. The guys from earlier don't show up. Maybe the sight of Roppo-Ichiza’s top fighter scares them off.

You're surprised to see them there when you emerge a little later. You give Tsubaki a happy but perplexed look as he hugs you.

“Tsubaki? What are you doing here?”

“Keeping these two company,” he replies. “And I wanted to say hi, of course. You should come by the club sometime, you know! I haven't seen you in forever.”

“Sure! That would be nice, but…” You turn to Sakura and Suo, puzzled. “Why are you guys still here?”

Sakura, on instinct, nearly recounts the whole evening to you—about the men tailing you, about how they got into a fight, about the kind of things they said they'd do once they caught you—but Suo answers first.

“Troubling you again,” is all he says. “It’s fine since your shift is over now, right?”

You give the two of them a long, curious look. For a moment, you look worried, but you're eventually disarmed by Suo’s expression.

“I guess it's fine,” you reply. You sound so happy. Suo’s gaze goes soft, and Sakura has to force himself not to look away. “Let's hurry up and go home.”

You smile at them, and it's the kind of smile that makes it very easy to like you. The kind of smile that makes it natural to want nice things for you. The kind of smile that would make anyone emotional, even if they're normally very controlled. It makes something in Sakura squeeze tightly, all knotted up and painful.

He’s starting to understand why Suo acts the way he does around you.

END

this wasn't meant to be a love triangle, my apologies…

this was also meant to be a very short piece (like 500w lol), but I kept thinking about what suo’s backstory might be, and why he was so comfortable in the red light district in the manga, and what these guys might realistically act like in an aged up, romantic context. that all coalesced into this very bizarre fic LOL. I'm not sure how it'll land, but I hope someone out here enjoyed it! I would like to write more about this triangle (+ nirei) but I'm not sure what the level of interest would be, or if it'll even make sense with the manga. I guess we’ll see eventually!

in any case, thank you for reading!! <3

[unsolicited-opinions]

Bro no one hates jews for ethnicity, news are hated for faith.

If you are an atheist "jew", no one gives a shit about you.

Stop pretending to be a victim and trying to appropriate antisemitic struggles.

I'll address these point by point.

Jewish readers, please share your thoughts!

You wrote: "No one hates Jews for ethnicity, [J]ews are hated for faith."

"Hitler...defined the Jews as a race and not a religious community, characterized the effect of a Jewish presence as a “race-tuberculosis of the peoples,” and identified the initial goal of a German government to be discriminatory legislation against Jews."

[Source]

More here

As David Baddiel put it, "I'm an atheist, but that would get me no free passes out of Auschwitz."

The Jews are a people. Judaism is the traditional religion of that people. A Jew who does not engage with that religion does not cease to be a Jew by Jewish definitions OR by antisemitic definitions.

You wrote: "If you are an atheist Jew, nobody gives a shit about you."

First, see above.

Second, you're incorrectly assuming that a Jewish atheist is not engaged with Judaism.

Here's the thing:

Judaism isn't necessarily theistic.

Let's set aside the explicitly non-theistic movement of Humanistic Judaism for a moment (huge topic for another time) and just talk briefly about theism in Judaism.

Most kinds of Judaism, while certainly encouraging faith, do not require it. There are no thought crimes in Judaism, no crucibles of faith, and no requirements that one announce or perform proof of belief for witnesses. Those things are often parts of Christianity and Islam, but in Judaism...not so much.

In Jewish thought, it is not what you believe about metaphysics which lifts you up, ennobles you, improves you, or makes the world a better place. In Judaism, you pursue those things by how you behave.

Sola fide is a Christian concept which Judaism does not share. Judaism is a profoundly existential religion with ethics which are overwhelmingly humanist.

I was raised in Reform and Conservative congregations...and non-theistic/atheistic/humanistic views were very common there.

When I was studying to become Bar Mitzvah, our congregation's Rabbi made crystal clear to me that there was no contradiction between my identity as a Jew and my inability to swallow the idea of an anthropomorphic, sapient, interventionist God who cared at all about petitionary prayer. He felt that wrestling with God was a very Jewish thing to do. He introduced me to Maimonides' apophatic theology. Decades later, I'm still grateful.

Many Jews pray, I believe, not to be heard by God, but so they can hear their own hearts and minds. This is why kavanah is important and why I disliked (and still dislike) prayer-by-rote and rituals performed for the sake of ritual. It's more mindfulness meditation than petitionary prayer.

There's a famous Hasidic story, recorded by philosopher Martin Buber in his "Tales of the Hasidim," about how Judaism views atheism:

The Master teaches that God created everything the world to be appreciated, since everything is here to teach us a lesson.

One clever student asks "What lesson can we learn from atheists? Why did God create them?"

The Master responds "God created atheists teach us the most important lesson of them all- the lesson of true compassion. You see, when an atheist performs an act of charity, visits someone who is sick, helps someone in need, and cares for the world, he is not doing so because of some religious teaching. He does not believe that God commanded him to perform this act. In fact, he does not believe in Goda at all, so his acts are based on an inner sense of morality. And look at the kindness he can bestow upon others simply because he feels it to be right."

"This means," the Master continued "that when someone reaches out to you for help, you should never say 'I pray that God will help you.' Instead for the moment, you should become an atheist, imagine that there is no God who can help, and say 'I will help you."

You wrote: "Stop pretending to be a victim and trying to appropriate antisemtic struggles."

I invite other Jews to advise if I have appropriated anything which is not mine.

Your opinion, though? Your view, as a non-Jew, about what is or isn't Jewish? On what is or is not mine in my heritage? Your claim, framed by your obvious and absolute ignorance of my life, my family's history, Jewish history, Jewish theology, and Jewish philosophy, that I have not experienced antisemitism and am "appropriating?"

I don't have a single fuck to give about any of that, and neither does any other Jew

Still, thank you for the writing prompt. It helps to crystalize my own thinking and provides an opportunity to educate.

[writers-potion]

Latin Phrases of love

Latin: Words/Phrases of Love ⋆𐙚₊˚⊹♡

Thank you all for the attention that my Latin words/phrases lists are getting! (interesting latin phrases, soft-souning latin phrases)

Here are some Latin phrases regarding love:

aeger amore: love sick

aegra amans: [lover's disease] love sick

amo: I love

amor sui: self-love

amor habendi: love of possessing

animo fractus: heartbroken

caritas: love or charity

cupido: longing or desire

cum corde: with the heart

digitulus: [little finger] the touch of a finger

digitus auricularis: the ring finger

imo pectore: from the bottom of the heart

in saecula saeculorum: [for ages of ages] forever and ever

philtrum: a love potion

potentia amoris: the power of love

vinculum matrimonii: th bond of marriage

vis amoris: the force of love

amo et pax: love and peace

amo ut ivenio: love as I find

amor et honor: love and honor

amor gignit amorem: ove begins as love

amor amnibus idem: love is the ame in all (Virgil)

amor tussisque non celantur: love and a cough are not concealed (Ovid)

amor vincit omnia: love conquers all things

amore sitis uniti: be united in love

cedamus amori: let us yield to love

cor ad cor loquitor: heart speaks to heart

cor et manus: heart and hand

cras amet qui numquam amavit: let those love now, who never loved before (Catullus)

dulce periculum: sweet danger

fide et amore: by faith and love

fortis est ut mors dilectio: love is strong as death (Song of Solomon 8:6)

in omnibus caritas: in all things love

meminerunt omnia amantes: lovers remember everything (Ovid)

nihil amori injuriam est: there is no wrong that love will not forgive

nihil amanti durum: nothing is hard for one who loves

nihil esta more veritatis celsus: nothing is loftier than the lover of truth (Propertius)

non mihi, non tibi, sed nobis: not for you, not for me, but for us

redintegratio amoris: the renewal of love

serva jugum: [preserve the yoke] preserve the bond of love

si vis amari ama: if you ant to be loved, then love (Seneca)

ut ameris, amabilis esto: to receive love, be lovable (Ovid)

...and because ruined love is also love:

a vinculo matrimonii: [from the bonds of marriage] an absolute divorce

aurear compedes: golden shackles

corpus inane: body without a soul

succubus: a female spirit or demon believed to prey sexually on young men while they sleep

zelotypus: jealousy

expertus dico, nemo est in amore fidelis: I say as an expert, no one is faithful in love (Propertius - I wonder what this man had to go through to say this?)

neno in amore videt: no one in love sees (Propertius - seriously, what happened, Propertius?)

omnis amans amens: every lover is demented

res est solliciti plena timoris amor: love is full of axious fears (Ovid)

As always, happy writing.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* . ───

💎If you like my blog, buy me a coffee☕ and find me on instagram! Also, join my Tumblr writing community for some more fun.

💎Before you ask, check out my masterpost part 1 and part 2 

Reference: Latin for the Illiterati: a modern guide to an ancient language by Jon R. Stone, second edition 2009.

[sirfrogsworth]

Dinner with Aunt Denise & Uncle Jeff A Tale of Science Fair Photography

Ever since my parents died my aunt and uncle have done their best to fill some of the hole left in my heart. It almost feels like they adopted me in a way. They check on me. They help me clean. They helped me sort through all of my parents' belongings. And from time to time they invite me over for dinner when I'm feeling up to it.

Last week I got a new invitation. I had been feeling pretty lonely as of late so I graciously accepted. Before I left I saw my camera sitting on the table and realized I had this fancy new lens which is especially suited for taking pictures of people.

I thought to myself...

"This lens has only taken pictures of bridges at sunset."

Which is cool and everything, but I don't really want my only photos to be of bridges at sunset. I like taking pictures of other things.

I didn't have any lighting equipment handy—just a single external flash. And without a solid plan for how I was going to use it, I quickly packed said flash and headed westward. As I saw the sun lowering in the sky above the highway my big photography brain had an idea...

"I should take pictures of *people* at sunset."

I needed a reflector of some kind to bounce my flash against. I thought poster board would probably suffice so I stopped at Walmart and headed to the arts and crafts area. I found these tri-fold poster board thingies that grade school kids use to display their science fair experiments.

I got 2 for $7!

What a deal!

After I arrived I asked if my aunt & uncle minded having their photo taken. My aunt said she was fine with it but warned me that no one had ever been able to take a decent photo of her.

I'm typically not one to be braggadocious, but I replied...

"Well, that's because you've never had your photo taken by ME."

I'm not sure I should have been so cocky considering my lighting equipment is typically used to display the life cycle of earthworms, baking soda volcanos, and... potato batteries—which was the delightful and totally real project I just found on Google.

Science Fair Entry from Billy, Age 10

After a delicious feast of bratwurst, salad, and non-electrified potatoes, I convinced my aunt and uncle to sit for a sunset photoshoot. They even helped me set up my science fair project.

Science Fair Entry from Froggie, Age 42

I decided to do a quick test indoors to make sure my plan would work. Jeff volunteered for my first experiment.

Without my contraption...

With my contraption...

I think my experiment was quite promising. But would my idea hold up outside during the sunset with constantly dimming conditions?

We moved everything to the backyard. The tri-fold poster board was a bit ornery regarding its uprightness and needed to be tamed. My Uncle Jeff used a large rock, some pillows, and a step ladder to keep the makeshift reflectors in place.

I started taking test photos without the flash to figure out the background exposure.

Those pesky power lines were going to need to be zapped later in Photoshop, but I was really digging the scenery.

I dialed everything in, started taking photos, and even on the little rear camera screen I felt like they were turning out well. With the sun setting the sky looked like it was on fire. But then the batteries died in my flash and I was starting to lose that fiery sky as darkness began to creep into view.

Unfortunately, all of the potatoes were in our bellies so my aunt scrambled to find regular batteries in the house.

This photoshoot had become a complete team effort with everyone doing their part to make it a success.

Surprisingly it was my Uncle Jeff was giving me some bona fide model poses. He just naturally has some sort of... resting model face. Very masculine and authentic. And my Aunt Denise is just pure sunshine manifested as a person. So I had no problems getting nice expressions from her.

So... would you like to see the pictures?

Will I get a blue ribbon on my science fair project?

Am I building up the suspense too much?

Okay, here we go...

I suppose the only validation I really need is from the person who has never had a decent photo taken of them.

Let's see the verdict.

All of those hours and hours of photography training helped me learn the problem solving skills I needed to pull off a photoshoot with seven dollars in supplies.

Take a small light source, bounce it off something larger, and you get a big light source.

And big light sources make people look snazzy in photographs.

Easy!

Are you kidding me?

I lost to the potato kid?

What kind of rigged nonsense...

[anotheroceanid]

The Romans figuring out how to worship Frank the new roman god who was born from Fidas and Mars. He is to be such a great symbol to the camp.

[Some Romans freaking out because is the bow also his sacred weapon? Have they been toeing the line with speaking against the weapon? Was him coming here a test upon their loyalty and strength to the gods?]

Frank having an identity crisis, an existentiql crisis, and a demigod crisis.

The rest of the seven showing up a week later and get introduced to their missing Perse, a girl back from the dead, and a god named Frank.

When Frank can turn into animals, it only adds to the credibility because ahh this must come from his mom. He is the favored (only) child of his parents.

[I have taken this concept and ran with it.]

Romans building a temple to Fides, Mars and Frank. Frank accidentally became part of the (non Catholic Apostolic) Roman Holy Family.

Juno is having the time of her life because she finally got a grandson who ain’t a bastard. Well, technically Frank AINT the son of Fides, but that’s close enough. Next one will be a little girl named Junette or something.

Clarisse will NOT be accepting Percy as her stepmother. That’s literally the last straw for her.

[genderoutlaws]

A statement released by The German Chess Federation in response to FIDE’s new policies prohibiting trans women from playing chess against other women — The English and French Chess Federations have also echoed the same sentiment: this decision is based entirely in transmisogynist bigotry and exclusion as a means of further removing trans people from public life, and is not compatible with non discrimination laws.

ID: White text on a blue background, with the DSB chess piece logo in the corner. The text reads as follows -

The German Chess Federation (DSB) has a clear position: we do not exclude trans women. In Germany, a trans woman already became German Champion in the 2000s and trans women will of course be allowed to participate in all German tournaments for women in the future. The German Chess Federation is not changing this practice. In doing so, we stand together with European partners, such as the French Chess Federation, which handles this in exactly the same way.

We have serious concerns that these new FIDE rules are not compatible with the legal situation in several countries. If a person is legally recognized as a woman, it is incomprehensible to us what FIDE still wants to check and why it needs two years for this — as stipulated in the new rules.

From the point of view of the German Chess Federation, these regulations issued by the World Chess Federation for the registration of transgender chess players are an example of how discrimination arises when those affected are not involved in any way.

The German Chess Federation is committed to the well-being of all regardless of origin, age, ethnicity, skin colour, disability, religion, gender, sexual orientation and gender identity. No one should have to experience violence and discrimination.

[here-comes-the-moose]

I know Thanksgiving hasn’t come yet, but I’m having my a depressive episode and was listening to my Christmas Playlist to cheer myself up, so here’s what I think each member of the Bad Batch’s favorite Christmas songs would be (religious and non-religious and yes I was raised Catholic as you can tell by the songs😂)

Non-Religious

Hunter- “A Holy Jolly Christmas” (because it’s my dad’s favorite)

Wrecker- “Jingle Bell Rock”

Tech- “All I Want For Christmas Is You”

Crosshair- “Santa Baby” (my favorite as an adult)

Echo- “Feliz Navidad” (my mom goes CRAZY for this song)

Omega- “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year” (my favorite as a kid)

Bonus Phee- “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas”

Religious

Hunter- “Ave Maria” (SPECIFICALLY the version sung by Luciano Pavarotti because it’s my dad’s favorite; may or may not tear up)

Wrecker- “We Three Kings” (because kids are always screaming along to this song when it’s sung at Mass for some reason)

Tech- “Adeste Fidelis” (I feel like he’d like the Latin)

Crosshair- “O Holy Night” (I am once again projecting onto Crosshair)

Echo- “Mary Did You Know?” (my mom loves this one)

Omega- “Angels We Have Heard On High” (she goes crazy for the thousand syllable Glorias)

Bonus Phee- “Adeste Fidelis” (same reason as Tech)

[yeshuaedits]

frases cristãs em latim para bio.

solus Christus (somente Cristo);

omnes enim Christus (tudo por Cristo);

de fideli (com fidelidade);

Deus est Deus (Deus é Deus);

Dei gratia (pela graça de Deus);

Deo gratias (graça à Deus);

Deo ac veritati (por Deus e pela verdade);

Deo confidimus (em Deus confio);

Deo juvante (com a ajuda de Deus);

Deo, non fortuna (com a ajuda de Deus, não de sorte);

Deus caritas est (Deus é amor);

nobiscum Deus (Deus conosco);

Deus spes nostra (Deus é nossa esperança).

[freak-accident419]

deprivation

Derek Danforth x AFAB!NB!Reader

Summary: After scrolling through social media and seeing several beautiful women that you couldn’t be, your insecurities rose into you once more. Believing that Derek deserved someone better, he makes it his mission to prove you wrong.

Word Count: 2.3k

Content: 18+ MDNI, smut, AFAB reader, non-binary/transmasc reader, non-woman reader, reader has had top surgery (reader has no breasts), oral sex (v-receiving), vaginal fingering, p in v penetration, trans guilt, slight internalized transphobia, self-deprecation, angst, fluff, comfort

(A/n: finally a self-indulgent fic by me??? i know, right?! thank you to everyone who supported the creation of this fic, ily guys so much. while the reader in this is an afab enby, anyone is able to read it. no gatekeeping here :3 just a reminder, these are my own experiences and thoughts whenever i’m in a dark place—everyone has different experiences. if you are reading this and are trans in any way, you are beautiful, seen, and loved. thank you to everyone for your support!)

-

Derek began to press soft kisses to your neck, one hand cupping your face and the other caressing your sides. His palm rubs over your stomach, then made its way to your arm, dragging the soft pads of his fingertips against your skin. His kisses felt like heaven to you, each one sending a desperate chill down your spine.

“B—”

“I don’t wanna hear it,” Derek mutters hoarsely as he began to nibble the sensitive skin on your neck, softly biting it between his teeth and sucking, sure to leave red and purple marks much sooner.

Recently, you had a random wave of depression: your insecurities rose back up, much more severe than before, crushing your self-image entirely. Expressing your concerns to your lover, relentlessly insisting that he deserved someone better, someone prettier, someone normal, a bona fide woman, something in him just snapped. He was going to do whatever it took to prove you wrong and convince you that all he wanted and needed was you.

Your previous words had repeated abysmally in his head, like shitty earworm songs. He was brought back to the past moment with your phone in your hand, opened to several pictures of beautiful, confident women and models, something that you could never be. And he could hear your miserable voice reverberating over and over again:

“I deprive you, don’t I?”

So there you were, laid out on the cold mattress where you’ve always slept together. Both of your clothing were sprawled out across the room, tossed carelessly by Derek as he’d previously removed everything himself. You were under him, unsure that he truly wanted this and truly wanted you. Surely he deserved someone much prettier and more normal than you.

“I know what you’re thinking about,” he mumbles, looking up at you slightly before trailing kisses downwards to your collarbone, reaching your chest. “I love you.” Derek began to pepper kisses against the faint line on your chest from your top surgery operation many years ago, the scarring already completely healed. “I don’t want anyone else,” he pressed his lips against the other side, following along the scar, “but you. Do you hear me?”

You nod quietly, but with that, falsely. You were uncertain why you couldn’t just accept his words. It seemed too untrue. You had faith in Derek, you couldn’t doubt him, but you knew that nobody, especially him, should ever be reduced to a partner like yourself. Shouldn’t he be with someone who was much more beautiful than you? Why was he with you? He deserved much more than you. Your body was unnatural, your identity was unnatural, you weren’t normal, your—

“Hey, hey, hey,” he whispers affectionately, wiping their tear at the corner of your eye that left as you had been drowned in those thoughts. “You’re beautiful.” It was like he could read your mind. “You’re so, so beautiful.” You hated it. “You’re perfect.”

Derek pressed his lips to the center of your chest, inhaling deeply as he trailed down towards your stomach, covering it in kisses. Then he reached the top of your thigh, beginning to leave more hickeys, marking you up incessantly. Soft whimpers escaped your pretty mouth, making Derek smirk to himself as he continued, letting his gentle palms caress at your sides.

“I wouldn’t trade you for anyone or anything else, my love,” he declares, rubbing your inner thighs with his thumbs before opening your legs, spreading them out. While you admit that you were still very insecure about your relationship with Derek, you couldn’t help but become aroused from his affectionate touches and words, thus revealing an astonishing wetness between your thighs. Your boyfriend moans softly at the sight, looking up at you while he kissed at your skin right above your clit. “You look so fucking gorgeous, my love, so gorgeous…”

He hooks his arms under your thighs to grip them with his hands before licking up a stripe at your pussy. The sound that escaped your mouth was complete perfection, Derek observing the way your lips parted and eyelids grow heavy, his own lustful eyes boring into yours. He then began to lap his tongue at your center much faster, teasing between your folds, tasting you, kissing you, making your legs squirm under him. “Fuck, you taste so good, baby, what a pretty fuckin’ pussy,” he praised breathlessly, “Fuckin’ love your perfect, pretty pussy…” And once you finally feel his lips close around your clit, his warm tongue lingering against it, you moan out in pure pleasure, hands immediately reaching for his hair.

“Ah-ahhhh,” you cry softly as your fingers tangle in his curls, tugging lightly. The pulling sensation prompted Derek to remove one hand from your a thigh, lining up his finger with your entrance as he continued licking at your clit. His finger methodically ran along your wet folds before slowly easing in, slipping so easily inside of you. “M—Mmmm…”

You hummed softly in contentment, feeling his finger explore your insides until he instantly slips another one in, stretching your walls and making you cry out a choked moan. His other hand spreads your other thigh out wider, pumping his two fingers in and out of your wetness at a steady, loving pace.

You felt your own hands fail yourself, falling back down on the mattress as your fingers gripped the sheets below you instead. You could feel the tip of Derek’s tongue flick at your sensitive bud skillfully, then kissing and lapping his tongue against it. Your nails dug further into the mattress as your moans became louder, face red and flushed in ultimate ecstasy.

Your eyes rolled to the back of your head as you moan. “Mm—Derek—”

“Mmmm,” he hummed with his lips still at your clit, sending small vibrations to you, causing you to squirm and whine further.

“Fuck,” you pant as you felt closer to the edge and then…

Shit. You let out a soft, desperate whine as Derek slowly withdrew his fingers, leaving a chaste kiss on your skin before pulling away. His lips pressed against several areas of your thighs, then to your folded knee. “You taste so fucking good,” he mumbles, “You turn me on so fucking much, your body turns me on so much, you know that?”

Your bright, satisfied eyes looked up at him in pure submission, nearly begging him to touch you more. And yet, you couldn’t help but think: was he just saying this because you brought it up in the first place? And would he keep touching and tasting you longer if you were prettier? Would he touch you even more and thoughtfully if you had the body of a goddess? A siren? A woman? Ultimately, it all came down to this:

would he love you more than he did if you weren’t trans?

Derek witnessed you spacing out again in your thoughts, cupping your face gently and shushing you. “Hey,” he whispers, kissing at your neck and your face. “You’re all I ever want. Nothing’s gonna change that.” He reached down to kiss at the healed scarring on your chest again, making you shiver.

“God, look how fucking hard I am,” he cooed, urging you to see his throbbing length, “just by looking at how damn sexy you are…” His cock was completely hard, precum leaking slightly at the tip as you admired him intensely. His body had always been so beautiful and attractive to you, that you felt your own core heat up.

Derek kissed your lips briefly, deepening it while he grabbed under your thighs, lifting you up so he could sit against the bed frame with you straddling him. “That’s it, baby, I’ve got you,” he reassures gruffly, gripping tightly onto your hips. “I’ve got you.” As you hover over his lap, holding yourself up by your knees, Derek removes one hand from your hip, gripping onto his thick cock, stroking your wet folds with its head, teasing your entrance.

“Ah-Ahh,” you sigh softly in pleasure, mind beginning to become fuzzy as you succumb to the feeling of his dick slowly rubbing your pussy. Your head hung low as your hands held onto his shoulders, nails slightly digging into his skin.

He lined up his cock with your slick entrance, pushing you down onto him, stretching your walls with his thick girth. And suddenly, you could feel all your worries and insecurities dissipate into something so much more meaningless, as microscopic as a particle of glitter—except they weren't as pretty. But this allowed you to completely enjoy every feeling, every sensation guiltlessly.

“Ahhh, fuuuuck,” you whine, “fuck, Derek… sh-shit—”

Derek’s grasp on your hips remained as he lasciviously slammed them up and down his cock, grunting and moaning softly.

“Oh, fuck…” Derek’s lips parted gorgeously as he let out pleasured groans. His eyes were half-lidded, looking at you as if you were prey, yet simultaneously overwhelmed by a haze of arousal. He not only got off by the tightness of your pussy around him, but also from your beautifully rhythmic moans. You panted and whimpered loudly in such a gratifyingly repetitive manner that it was practically a dirty symphony to Derek’s ears. Paired with the lewd sound of skin slapping against skin, it was as if it were the only orchestral piece that he could stand.

Derek slightly jerked his hips up into yours each time he slammed yours down on his, making your cries louder and more desperate. He then moved his hands to your ass, squeezing the flesh selfishly as he controls your movements against him, sneaking a small smack against a cheek.

“So sexy, you’re so fucking sexy, baby,” he pants heavily, grabbing the side of your face with one hand to kiss your lips deeply, shoving his tongue past your lips to taste you. “I’m so… fucking lucky to have you…” he mutters in between kisses until he finally pulls away with a short string of saliva connecting one another’s lips, breaking it with a quick peck from Derek.

Suddenly, he changes the position by pushing you down, your back now flat against the mattress as he hovered over you. His legs were spread apart, his hips still lined up with yours as your ankles were above the back of his thighs. Placing his palms on the mattress while your knees were raised, his arms, against the back of your knees, trapped each leg in that open and spread out position. Penetrating you again, the two of you let out a loud, soft moan in unison.

“Fuck!” Derek hisses from immense pleasure as he began to move again, at a much faster pace than before. You choke out high-pitched sounds as you feel his cock constantly thrusting in and out of your fleshy walls with every wet slap. The bed creaked and rocked violently with every movement that came from Derek. He relentlessly stretched you open and buried himself even deeper inside of you, ensuring that he strokes his pelvis against your clit with every thrust, the closeness between your bodies creating an even more intimate atmosphere.

“Oh, fuck!” You cried softly, lips parted as you felt so much throbbing pleasure against your heat.

“You’re so fuckin’ pretty… Tell me that you’re pretty, baby, can you do that for me?” He inquired in a hot, low mutter.

Your thoughts froze at the request. “I—But I’m—”

He thrusts even deeper inside of you, making you moan louder. “C’mon, baby. You’re the most beautiful thing I’ve ever laid eyes upon. C’mon, tell me you’re pretty. Say it.”

“I—” You looked up into his eyes with desperation. “I’m pretty.”

“That’s my good baby… Now tell me that you’re beautiful…”

“I—” you stammer, “I’m… beautiful.”

“Again.”

“I’m beautiful.”

“Again.”

His cock pounded deeply and harder into your walls, making you cry in complete pleasure. “I-I’m beautiful.”

Your hands reached up towards the back of his neck, bringing his face down to press his forehead against yours, staring deeply into each other’s eyes while gasps and moans escaped the two of your lips.

“Tell me you belong to me. That you’re mine only,” he commands vigorously.

“I-I’m yours,” you whimper loudly.

“Damn right, you’re mine,” he huffs breathlessly, almost in a lustful slur, “all fuckin’ mine…” Derek smashes his lips against yours in a fiery and passionate kiss, burying his face in your neck to add more dark hickeys than you’d already had. Your hands go to his hair, holding his head as you tangle your fingers in his curls, lightly tugging as you feel your body begin to clench around his dick.

Your moans become more desperate as you felt yourself getting closer and closer to the edge, whining to yourself from how ecstatic this all felt. The raunchy silhouette of Derek’s body rocking lustfully against yours was truthfully a beautiful sight.

“I—I’m close!” You whimper out, your panting speeding up. “I’m so close, I—I’m gonna cum—!”

“Fuuck,” Derek grunts, “Cum for me baby, fuck, c’mon.” He sped up his pace, making your vision blur as your eyes rolled to the back of your head in pure ecstasy. And finally, with one more deep, fast thrust, your body tensed up completely, a loud whine escaping your mouth as you came, your pussy clenching deliciously around him.

Your orgasm instantly drove Derek to the edge, groaning as he came deep inside of you, shoots of his warm white cum decorating your walls and filling you up. He stays like this for a while, collapsing on your body as his face is buried in your neck. The two of you were panting heavily, struggling to catch your breaths from the intense climax. Derek began peppering kisses on your neck once more, going over the old hickeys that formed several moments ago.

“I love you so fucking much, okay, baby? I wouldn’t—I’d never leave you,” he mutters, making your heart full. “You could never, ever deprive me, baby, you’re everything I could ever want. Your body is so damn beautiful, you’re so fucking perfect…”

Derek kissed your lips deeply once again, spilling all his authentic admiration and love for you. He would rather perish by suffocation from kissing your lips as much as he could, if it meant that even a sliver of you would be convinced that he loved you for who you were. And who you were in his eyes was utter perfection.

[the-garbanzo-annex-jr]

by Steven Zeitchik

Those comments sparked a backlash at the time. But many liberal Jews in Hollywood, media and tech identified with her remarks.

To some non-Jews I talked to, today’s news was just a case of a tribal rooting interest not going our way. “Oh well, you’ll get the next one,” went their vibe. But when a Jewish leader this popular from a state so necessary gets passed over, it becomes more than just a matter of losing a round of identity-politics poker — it touches an existential nerve.

Some Jews have also noted that in choosing Walz, Harris was simply trying to stay away from raising Gaza as an issue. But outside of antisemitic projection, why would it do that? The idea that a candidate would automatically want to talk more about Israel simply because he’s Jewish raises ugly tropes of dual loyalty, or worse.

Wary of seeming killjoyish, some liberal Jewish Americans also sought to find a silver lining — at least now Jews wouldn’t be blamed for administration failures, they said. They cited The Atlantic’s Yair Rosenberg, one of the most eloquent expositors of the double standards applied to Shapiro, who in a recent piece expressed some reservations about what a Shapiro vice presidency would bring.

“Anti-Semitism conceives of Jews as clandestine puppeteers who control the world’s governments and economies, fueling political and social problems,” he wrote. “A Jewish vice president would provide the perfect canvas for these fevered fantasies — a largely ceremonial figure onto whom bigots could nonetheless project all of their conspiracies, casting him as the real power behind the Resolute Desk.”

Rosenberg has forgotten more about the history of antisemitism than most of us will ever know. But this train of thought has always struck me as self-defeating. The response to fears of prejudice can’t be, “Let’s hide the Jews to prevent us from finding out about it.” 

A Jewish vice president would have been important not only because it would have signaled the latest progress of one ethnic group in America as thrillingly as Harris’ candidacy does for Americans of Black and Indian heritage, but also because it would have drawn antisemites out from the crevices, shining Louis Brandeis’ disinfecting light brightly upon them.

(That Harris’ husband is Jewish, incidentally, should do little to quell the unease. Jewish affiliations are proof of nothing except the reminder of past justifications. It calls to mind those who several years ago said Taika Waititi’s Nazi comedy Jojo Rabbit couldn’t be antisemitic because Waititi was Jewish. It wasn’t antisemitic. But that wasn’t the reason.)

Walz is a solid candidate with a strong record of speaking out against antisemitism. Just this spring he told Twin Cities PBS that, “I think when Jewish students are telling us they feel unsafe in that, we need to believe them.”

But Walz’s pro-Jewish bona fides don’t mean the decision to put him on the ticket — or the reaction to his appointment — can’t also be shadowed with antisemitism. Both can be true.

And so here liberal Jews again find ourselves, hopelessly marooned between a belief that Democratic policies are fundamentally better for our interests and yet worried we are not welcome in our own home — feeling a gentle nudge that perhaps we might find ourselves more comfortable in another place but unsure, in the end, of where else to go.

[splatoonpolls]

SPLATOON OC TOURNEY QUARTERFINALS PART 3

Maddy Medusa by @anemonequeen vs Robin & Ivy by @possiblycringe

PROPAGANDA/BACKSTORY

MADDY

oc post

my splat3 sona! shes a funny anemone girl she's the heiress to the throne of a not-so-distant region called Choralia, populated by mostly sea anemones. She's in hiding though, since she doesnt want the responsibility of being queen and she's strictly anti monarchy she has a purple clown fish named perseus who's constantly acting like she still wants to be the heiress moved to the splatlands from reef city, the capitol of choralia she constantly has her headphones blasting loud music as a form of stimulation. she enjoys the vibration she runs a music store in splatsville called Medusa's Temple, but it's barely open cause she's out playing turf war and napping

ROBIN & IVY

Siblings! Robin is Callies agent Four in a swap au and Ivy is Marie’s agent Four in a non au setting. Robin and Ivy have no parents and are barely making the rent as they slave away at Grizzco shifts. Though, Robin finds a new source of income around splatoon 2 (whether that be thanks to her agent work, or by less…legal…means) that she won’t tell Ivy any details about. While Ivy helps out Marie in splatoon 2, shortly before splatoon 3 she ends up accidentally causing Robin to be captured by Grizzco and fuzzified, leaving the 16 year old to Marie’s doorstep in a reversal of their original roles.

[winged-self-indulgence]

“What’cha got there?”

It was the first thing Z asked as soon as you sat down in the booth, and you paused briefly before settling fully into the seat. As much of a non-sequitur as the query was, you weren’t too surprised. After all, you had turned up at a bar with a book thicker than the table between the both of you held under your arm. That would have already been strange enough, were it not for the title.

The demon wrinkled his nose at the shiny Gothic-style lettering embossed on the cover. “The Dark Grimoire: The Art of Demonic Entities and Magickal Forces–? Human, what the fuck is that?”

“What?” You blinked innocently. “Is it wrong to want to find out more about you?”

“There is nothing about me that would turn up in that trashy abomination of a book,” Z hissed at the hardback volume, his tail whipping back and forth in agitated motions. “For hell’s sake, they didn’t even get the sigil right.”

You studied the silver shape on the cover; a complex array of loops, straight lines, and crescent moons all enclosed within a double-ringed circle. You decided to take Z’s word for it, but still pulled the book closer to yourself and out of range of dark claws that had gouged furious grooves into the table’s surface.

“Well, don’t you want to know what humans think about demons?” You pointed out reasonably, to which Z made a face like you’d crammed a lemon into his mouth – rind and all. You tried again. “I wouldn’t mind if you read up on what humans are like. Do you even know anything about us?”

The demon scoffed, puffing out his chest proudly. “Oh please. I have been around since before humanity was a speck on the cosmic horizon. There is nothing about you little beings that is beyond my understanding.”

“Cool. Quick question: how many bones are inside my body?”

“Fuck if I know. At least 10?” Z shrugged, ignoring your unimpressed stare in favour of a sly smirk. “Though it could be 11 if we–”

“Oh, look at that. It’s time to shut up and read!” You interrupted loudly. “No talking during reading time!” You cracked open the book and planted it in front of your face, perfectly obscuring your view of Z who immediately began to whine.

“Oh come on,” he reached over, clearly planning to snatch the book, but you leaned further away. With a sigh, Z folded his arms across the table and sank into a melodramatic malaise. “Seriously, Dove? You’re going to read a trashy, fake book about demons when you’ve got a real, bona-fide infernal entity in the flesh right next to you? I’m hurt. I may never recover.”

“There’s no talking during reading time,” you mumbled again, surprisingly finding yourself more engrossed in the book. Most of what you knew about demons came from pop culture references and video games. Even if most of the book was made up nonsense, you still recognized some of the names.

Z hissed and clicked his teeth. Then he perked up with a grin. “Well, if you find that pile of rancid waste so interesting, then I can’t help but be curious,” he hummed. “Read to me.”

The look you shot Z was skeptical. “Really?” The request was so out of character that you felt the need to ask, to be certain. “You want me…to read aloud to you?”

“That a problem?” He asked, batting his lashes. Or at least you assumed that was what he did. His eyes were almost impossible to see beneath the mop of brown that could charitably be described as a hairstyle. “What can I say, I am an enjoyer of the literary arts.”

“Right,” you drawled. Your every sense told you that this was a trap, a trick of some sort, but how? You were the one who had brought the book, and Z was on the other side of the table. Reluctantly, eying him all the while, you slowly lifted the pages and returned your attention to the words on the paper. “And lo, the Seventy-first Spirit is Dantalion. He is a Duke Great and Mighty, appearing in the Form of a Man with many Countenances, all Men's and Women's Faces; and he hath a Book in his right hand. His Office is to teach all Arts and Sciences unto any – ngh!”

“What was that, Dove?” Z tilted his head, a beatific smile on his lips. Under the table, the tip of his tail slipped into the gap between your underwear and skin and pressed between your legs. It curled teasingly, the flat shape of it sliding further inch by agonizingly slow inch. “Sorry, I didn’t catch that. Something about being a nerd I guess?”

“Z–!” You tried to sound firm, but a flex of his tail dissolved the rest of whatever you might have said.

The demon clicked their tongue with a smile. “Hm, no I don’t think that’s what comes next, dummy.”

Tears beaded at the corner of your eyes, blurring your vision. Your thighs twitched and shook beneath the bar, and you clapped a hand over your mouth to stifle the whimpers that threatened to pour out. The muffled sound of distant conversations sent a flood of red-hot mortification sweeping over you, and you quickly glanced around the bar to check that no one was watching.

Immediately, Z lunged across the table and grabbed your face, forcing your eyes to meet his. His tail flexed, pumping faster. “Don’t look at them, Dove. This isn’t about them. Keep reading.”

You tried. The book felt heavy in your clumsy hands, body sensitized and aching for release. The words swam before your eyes until, with a muffled gasp, you gave up – soaking your pants and Z’s tail before collapsing face-down on the table.

The demon had the nerve to tut with faux disapproval. “Aw, poor baby,” he hummed condescendingly, relishing your whine as he slowly pulled his tail out from your underwear. Your cheeks went hot at the sight of it, shiny, slick, and dripping with your juices. Z brought the appendage to his lips and – maintaining eye contact all the while – dragged his tongue over it, licking the flared tip clean as if you were a gourmet meal to be savoured.

“Such a messy human,” he teased, sitting back down and placing his chin in his hands. “How unfortunate. I suppose you’ll just have to start all over again.”

[bestworstcase]

Do you have thoughts you’d like to air on the Raven is actually Ruby’s dad theory? No prob if you’ve answered this before but could you link?

my general feeling on secret-biological-relation theories is that they’re usually something that arises from a misreading of narrative foiling (in that a bona fide narrative connection between two characters is taken to be foreshadowing for a literal material connection between the characters in-universe, rather than parsed as a narrative device that services theme; this also plays a role in why shipping narrative foils is so popular, because it follows from the textual thematic relationship) and in the case of secret parentage in particular, it is also often motivated at least in part by shipping (this is absolutely the case with summer/raven – and summer/qrow for that matter).

with rwby and the question of ruby’s parentage, such as it is, the fundamental issue i find in theories that taiyang isn’t ruby’s biological father, irrespective of Who the proposed alternative is, is that in practice each one boils down to two options:

#1, summer had an extramarital affair with raven that nobody else but the two of them knows about (in which case the only person who could reasonably reveal the truth is summer, because ruby is so much the spitting image of summer but for the fluffier hair she could’ve just as easily gotten from tai as from raven or qrow that no one would question she’s tai’s – especially given that we know now summer is a skilled liar!)

or

#2, everything was aboveboard (whether poly triad or open relationship or summer and tai actually having a platonic partnership or what-have-you), ruby’s true parentage is known to TRQ (and their friends/colleagues may have some general awareness of whatever the real situation was) and… nobody ever told ruby for Some Reason.

now personally i think – if we’re doing a theory in this vein – option #1 is both more interesting and more narratively plausible (because again: 9.10 flashback establishes that summer is a good liar and puts that trait squarely in focus), but the preference among the rosebird conspiracy crowd seems to overwhelmingly be for option #2, so we’ll focus on that one.

ON ITS FACE, i don’t think it’s crazy to speculate that the keeping secrets family might be keeping this secret, given e.g. yang wasn’t told about raven until summer’s disappearance (and may not really have been told so much as discovered, depending upon what “found out” means). why not hide effectively the same information from ruby?well.

for one thing, it then becomes narratively awkward to explain “yang knows raven is her mom, ruby knows raven is yang’s mom, and raven expressly claims yang as her daughter (and has a bond to her); but neither ruby nor yang know that raven is also ruby’s mom*, raven has evinced exactly zero of her i-don’t-care-she-said-caringly behavior toward ruby, nor used “bet your daddy and uncle didn’t tell you that ruby is also my daughter, did they?” as the mother of all trump cards in her “here’s why you shouldn’t blindly trust whatever you’re told QUESTION EVERYTHING” gambit, and when qrow called raven out for being a deadbeat mom to yang he said sweet fuck all to her about ruby.”

[*we do not do the insistently referring to the non-carrying parent as The Dad thing in this household, thank you.]

if the presumption is that raven being ruby’s parent is not secret-secret—as in, this is known information to TRQ—then it becomes untenable as a surprise twist once you reach v4 and have qrow and raven, in a private conversation, discussing her abandonment of only one of her two daughters. even if raven felt (for some reason) that ruby didn’t really ‘count’ as her daughter, qrow has zero. reason. to let that fly, and no reason at all to uphold a charade when it’s just himself and raven.

rwby is better than butchering his characterization in this one scene for the sake of a dramatic reveal down the line; there are ways you could write qrow’s dialogue there to include both girls while being vague about the specific biological relationship, and then it becomes punchy foreshadowing instead of a retroactive “…why does qrow not give a damn about raven abandoning ruby too?” moment.

and foreshadowing like that is one of rwby’s greatest strengths! they do this sort of dialogue sleight of hand all the time!

but say they did fumble that one moment—it happens, it’s not impossible—well… as a narrative secret this becomes really untenable after v5. even if raven flat out did not consider ruby to be her daughter whatsoever for her own labyrinthine raven branwen reasons, if she is aware of a direct biological relation between herself and yang’s sister of which yang has clearly been kept in the dark, and her goal is to shock yang with information that will break her trust in taiyang and qrow—which it is, that’s exactly why she does the whole shapeshifting song and dance—then why wouldn’t she drop that bomb?

you could not possibly design a more flawless QUESTION EVERYTHING ALSO NEVER TRUST DAD OR UNCLE ABOUT ANYTHING EVER AGAIN kick in the face for yang than “oh by the way, your sister? i’m her mother too. the only reason you know about me is because you went looking; if you hadn’t… well, they would have happily kept you in the dark your whole life, too.”

and if raven didn’t drop that bomb because she has her signature Complicated Feelings about ruby, then shouldn’t we expect to see a glimmer of that in her response to ruby, as opposed to what we plainly get—which is “hm. you sure are summer’s daughter. fireball in the face for you for one thousand years!!!”

in the reverse direction, we have the question of whether such a reveal really serves the narrative, and i don’t think it does.

the general thrust of the “for” argument here is that the revelation of such a frankly pointless lie about something that is only a big deal because the adults conspired to hide it would tie off all the existing threads about team strq being generally dysfunctional in a tidy little bow and highlight it by virtue of that dysfunction being emphatically Not Salem’s Fault. to an extent this is a line of thinking that i find not unreasonable because it is quite clear that team strq’s dysfunction was indeed Not Salem’s Fault – the shadow war was a significant stressor of course, but there is an awful lot of small interpersonal messiness simmering inside that pressure cooker.

HOWEVER,

rwby has spent Nine Whole Volumes meticulously slow-boiling “what happened the night summer rose met salem?” as THE central mystery – that is the question haunting this entire narrative, the missing piece of the puzzle, the answer that must be found and resolved before the story can end. and i promise. I PROMISE. that the answer to this question will not, in any configuration, principally concern the intra-team romantic fuck ups of team strq. LOWER THE FILTER SETTING ON YOUR SHIPPER GOGGLES THAT IS A SIDE DISH OR PERHAPS A GARNISH.

the problem for rosebird parents (and other ruby parentage theories) is that it’s very difficult to fit a reveal like that into the margins of The Most Important Narrative Reveal. (which is: summer joined salem.) narratively you put yourself into a corner where you have to balance exploding ruby and yang’s relationships with all of team strq at once against… resolving the actual central conflict of the story and dealing with the fallout of “OUR MOM JOINED YOU?!” and the end result is going to be either:

the parentage reveal just kind of falls flat and gets skimmed over quickly in a not very satisfying way because everyone has a bigger, unfortunately immortal fish to fry

the parentage reveal turns into a narrative black hole that eats up way too much runtime proportionate to its actual narrative importance and salem is like “…so should i come back when you kids are done yelling at your parents or…?”

neither one is a great idea. again, the optimal time for a ruby parentage reveal was v4/5, with raven’s entry proper into the story. doing this in v10, with everything else that is going to be going on in vacuo as the story enters its final arc, would not go well.

a secondary issue is the impact such a reveal would have on 1. the nascent dad’s chickens come home to roost arc, and 2. resolving matters between raven and yang in vacuo, however that shakes out.

for the first, any kind of “actually tai isn’t the dad” reveal inherently moves the focus of his character arc, from “tai neglected his kids and favored ruby, also why is he still in vale” to, you know, the lying. it dilutes the payoff for all the development with regard to neglect/favoritism by veering off at a wild angle right before the punch. there is a time and a place for narrative velociraptors in the bushes, but swerving like that isn’t it.

and for the second… there is no way to do a reveal that raven is secretly also ruby’s mom, at the point in the narrative where yang is meeting raven again after their confrontation now that raven is committed to trying, without drop-kicking yang and yang’s finding-her-mother storyline off the stage. sorry. you can’t do this without making it all about ruby and how ruby feels and how raven feels about ruby and summer and how yang feels about ruby having the same moms. like lol they are not going to do that, in the same way they’re not going to suddenly drop ruby’s summer rose identity disturbance storyline in favor of going “aaaaactually yang is raven’s and summer’s baby so let’s focus on how yang feels about learning summer is her biological mother for real.”

tertiary problem with the rosebird parents theory, and this isn’t a narrative issue but rather to do with the “explaining how two women made a baby” exercises, wearily taps the sign. Intersex Conditions Do Not Work That Way.

[real-fire-emblem-takes]

That music take got me thinking about which other characters would like dad rock, and man... if I'm gonna call myself the classic rock nerdlord, I best flex a bit, so -cracks knuckles- here we go. This is gonna be a long one. I'm gonna focus on non-lords for this

Ashe. His dad was into a lot of 70s rock and it rubbed off on him. Same for Lonato, which just makes the whole genre that much more special to him. Putting on a classic rock record brings him back to happier days. There's a lot he enjoys like Eric Clapton and Journey, but a special place in his heart is reserved for Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers [and by extension, the Traveling Wilburys]. Favourite song: I Won't Back Down

Inigo/Lazward. Come on, take one look at him and tell me he's not a Beatles fan. I dare you. Guy's practically in love with John Lennon. Subsequently, he also loves John's post-Beatles work. Favourite song: Love Me Do

Frederick. I dunno, something about him screams Jackson Browne fan. He'd also be into the Eagles and Steely Dan. There is no doubt that his music taste influenced Chrom's to a substantial degree. Is that a good thing? You decide. Favourite song: Doctor, My Eyes

Rodrigue. To the surprise of absolutely nobody. What we call dad rock now used to be fresh top 40s hits to Roddy, of course he likes the shit. The first time he heard the Byrds on the radio, he fell instantly in love. He's also a big fan of the Who. Favourite song: My Back Pages [this is a Bob Dylan cover]

Takumi and Leo. This is a two-in-one and yeah I'm breaking the non-lord rule, but hear me out here. These two are bona fide metalheads, but like old school metal. I'm talking Black Sabbath old school with a huge helping of 80s thrash metal. That said, both do enjoy some typical classic rock. Takumi has a soft spot for the Eagles while Leo is a closet Fleetwood Mac fan. Favourite non-metal songs: Lyin' Eyes [Takumi] and Dreams [Leo]

Oboro. Alright, I admit I'm projecting here with this one, but I can't unsee her being a Def Leppard fan, and these days the Leps would be considered dad rock. She's also into David Bowie. Favourite song: Lady Strange [I'm trying not to project too hard here]

Griss/Gregory. Technically a two-in-one, but for all the ways they are different, their taste in music is 100% identical -- or rather, 99.99% identical. Both are huge fans of Alice Cooper, but they have different favourite songs. Favourite songs: Teenage Frankenstein [Griss] and Billion Dollar Babies [Gregory]

Leonie. This surprises a lot of people, but she's not into modern music. I dunno, she just doesn't vibe with it. Older music, however, is a different story, and it turns out she really likes Kiss and AC/DC. No one's quite sure what drew her to those bands above everyone else and she doesn't feel inclined to share. Favourite song: Black Diamond

Lewyn. He didn't have that much of an opinion on the genre before, but traveling on the road resulted in a lot of classic rock getting stuck in his head and he finds he enjoys it. The Allman Brothers Band and Electric Light Orchestra are the ones who take up the most free real estate in his head. Favourite song: Midnight Rider

Tsubaki. There's debate as to whether this is out of left field or completely expected of him. Not that he knows this debate is even happening because nobody wants to get involved in that discussion with him. Like Lazward, he also enjoys the Beatles' post-breakup work, but while Lazward loves John Lennon, Tsubaki leans more towards Paul McCartney, especially the Wings years. Favourite song: Nineteen Hundred and Eighty-Five

Xane. One might think he wouldn't care for music, but no, he actually likes music. His taste in music is quite varied and isn't limited to classic rock, and of the classic rock he's heard, honestly he wouldn't be able to pick a favourite group out of anyone. He just likes it all. It's really interesting. Favourite classic rock song if he had to pick one: Bad Moon Rising - Creedence Clearwater Revival

I'll be here all day if I keep listing out more so I'm gonna stop there

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