#Prospect Point

[mapsgirl]

The Best Things to Do in Niagara Falls, NY

Niagara Falls, New York, is renowned for its breathtaking natural wonders and rich historical significance. From experiencing the majestic falls up close to exploring historical landmarks and scenic trails, there’s no shortage of activities to engage in. Here are some of the best things to do in Niagara Falls, NY. Experience the Majesty of Niagara Falls State Park Niagara Falls State Park is the…

[trying-to-jew]

Constantly torn between my desire to convert and the crushing weight of knowing that I won’t be able to exist in the wider fandom spaces that I love without being constantly reminded that Jews are always guilty until proven innocent post-Oct 7.

[divorceblogger]

1.07 // 1.01 // Interview with the Vampire, Anne Rice

[cicerfics]

You know what? There are so many reasons I love a demiromantic/demisexual Q. So many reasons why that characterization detail works for me and resonates with me personally.

But also? I am kinda just in it for Q falling in love for the first time when he's in his 30s.

I'm kinda in it for Q having a crush on someone/being horny for someone for the FIRST TIME at the ripe old age of 32, after a lifetime BLISSFULLY free of such nonsense.

He got through his ENTIRE education, including MULTIPLE graduate degrees without even a STIRRING of attraction to anybody. He progressed rapidly in his career because he was not DISTRACTED by such things!

And now? The indignity?? The mortifying ordeal of falling in love??? The humiliation of finding himself HORNY for a fellow human being???

I just like to think about Q contently shaping his life around his work and his cats, never feeling sexual or romantic attraction or WANTING to feel it, comfortably single and content to remain so.

And then Bond enters his life like a wrecking ball.

And six months into their friendship, Q is placidly sipping his cup of tea one morning, thinking about Bond.

And suddenly he freezes and goes, Oh no.

[sunderwight]

Bingyuan modern ABO AU where Shen Yuan tutors sweet white lotus Luo Binghe and dutifully sends him off to university all prepped and ready to take the world by storm, and then three years later Omega Binghe shows up on his doorstep with a baby, all washed out with his prospects ruined and the father in the wind.

Beta Shen Yuan, furious, is determined to look after Luo Binghe and his adorable baby whilst tracking down the feckless Alpha involved and then... castrating him? Forcing him to step up? One of the two at least!

Only it turns out:

-Baby isn't actually Luo Binghe's

-Luo Binghe isn't an Omega

-Binghe also didn't wash out and in fact just came into a massive inheritance

He didn't even know Shen Yuan was living at the apartment he went to, he was bringing the baby to Shen Jiu in order to blackmail him. The baby is SJ's and Omega Yue Qingyuan's, and had been quietly sent away to avoid scandal. As the next phase of Luo Binghe's hundred-step plan to marrying Shen Laoshi, cuddling the baby in a vaguely sinister fashion while making thinly-veiled threats was vital to blocking Shen Jiu's inevitable attempts to interfere with Binghe's pursuit of his younger brother.

But then Shen Yuan opened the door and promptly drew all the wrong conclusions, and now Binghe is rethinking his entire strategy, furiously googling Alpha-to-Omega transition options and making Mobei Jun make Shang Qinghua find out how to fake a birth certificate for a stolen baby.

[stromblessed]

Mizu's spectacles, and the levels of her disguise

In drafting some more Blue Eye Samurai meta posts, I find myself writing out the comparisons between what Mizu can and cannot hide about herself, and how that affects how she moves through the world.

Like, I get the jokes about Mizu's glasses, if only color contacts had existed back then, etc. etc., and I think (hope) that most viewers don't take the glasses jokes seriously, as in "I don't care about the suspension of disbelief because BES is a cartoon." But I wanted to write these thoughts out anyway without burying them in a text post about something else.

I think the points I'm going to lay out here are viewed very differently by different people, so please feel free to add to this post, reply, or put your thoughts in the tags!

Not only do Mizu's glasses not actually help her that much, there's surely more to Mizu's mixed race appearance than just the color of her eyes.

In my view, this was pointed out in episode 1:

I'm willing to bet most of us were expecting young Taigen to say "blue eyes," not "ROUND eyes."

Obviously this is still about Mizu's eyes, but not even spectacles can hide their shape.

I don't think the show is obligated to point out everything about Mizu's face that isn't quite as Japanese as the people around her expect. Though the creators have said that they specifically designed Mizu - and her clothes - to read both as "white" and as "Japanese," as well as both male and female. I think there's more about Mizu's features that read as "white" than just her eyes.

This is where my own headcanons start entering the picture, but it's my impression that people can just tell that Mizu looks different, whether or not they can put a finger on exactly how.

There's the little girl who looks at Mizu and then hides on the way into Kyoto:

When there's more to your face you'd like to cover up than just your eyes, big hats are a big help!

By the way, most of these examples have to come from the first half of the season, since by the second half, either Mizu is too preoccupied with fighting henchmen, or everyone Mizu is facing knows who she is already, and she therefore has no reason to hide her mixed race identity.

It's worth mentioning that the mere fact that Mizu has to hide multiple aspects of her identity - her mixed race and her sex - results in her having to choose clothes that really, really cover her up, which doesn't win her any favors either:

(Zatoichi reference, anyone?)

If it were as easy as, for example, tying her glasses to her head and wa-lah, nobody would ever know she was half-white - then (1) Mizu would've just done that long ago, and (2) Mizu wouldn't be so on guard and on tenterhooks 100% of the time the way she's depicted in the show, even when her glasses are on.

Her spectacles sure don't help her in the brothel, which is full of observant women who are trying to seduce her, meaning they get good long looks at her:

Mizu never takes her glasses off, but they still send a woman to her who has light eyes, thinking that must be what will interest a blue-eyed man:

No wonder Mizu gets mad after this, lol

So Mizu never takes her spectacles off in the brothel, it's dimly lit inside, and the women can still tell that she has blue eyes. I'm getting the sense that Mizu putting on her spectacles isn't a guarantee that people suddenly can't tell that she looks different.

And yet no one spots that she's female.

Mizu can hide her breasts, can wear her hair in the right style, can hide what's between her legs, can walk and talk and behave like a man - and she's been doing it for almost her entire life, to the point that not only is she very good at it, but the threat of being found out as female is deadly, but isn't presented in the show as omnipresent.

Let me explain.

She threatens Ringo for nearly saying the word "girl" out loud, because while she's constantly ostracized for being mixed race, being a woman traveling without a chaperone, carrying a sword, and disguised as a man will get her killed or flogged or arrested or some combination of these things.

But in addition, it's been drilled into her since she was a child that if she is discovered as female, the combination of her being mixed race and female will identify her as someone extremely specific, someone known to some bad people, and she will be killed:

I think of it as Mizu thinking to herself, "Being found out as mixed race means I'm treated badly. Being found out as mixed race and a woman means I'm dead."

Mizu's hair is cut as a child. But she isn't made to wear a big hat, or cover her eyes somehow, or anything like that. Because hiding her sex is a more successful endeavor than hiding her race.

Ringo finds out she's female by accident, but once Mizu accepts the fact that he won't rat her out, she relaxes pretty early on in the season. Because the threat of being found out as female is mitigated pretty much 99.9%, since Mizu has gotten so good at being a man. And also, because most of the time, people see what they want to see. Even if Mizu's face makes her stand out as "not 100% Japanese," no one in the world of BES looks at Mizu's clothes, her bearing, her sword, hears her voice, and will ever in a million years conclude that she is a woman, because expectations around gender roles in the Edo period were so rigid and so widely enforced.

One detail that proved this to me is after the Four Fangs fight:

Ringo takes off Mizu's clothes so he can stitch her up, then leaves her clothes off even after he's done. He doesn't even throw her cloak over her as a blanket or anything. There's a little a straw (pallet?) as a divider there on the left, but anyone could just peek around it and see Mizu and her chest bindings. (I think it's mostly there as a windbreaker.)

And Taigen is right there, but he doesn't give a shit:

Opinions probably vary hugely on this, but my impression is that because the show doesn't make any kind of deal about Taigen being in the room with Mizu here, my guess is that Mizu isn't in any danger of Taigen thinking she's female. Even when I watched the show for the first time, I assumed that Taigen had seen Mizu out of her clothes here, and that he thought nothing of it.

Eat your heart out, Li Shang (Mulan 1998). I actually do think that this scene is a direct and purposeful side-eye to that movie, lol

There's obviously some nuance to how "severe" being mixed race is compared to how "severe" being a woman is for Mizu:

After all, Swordfather can't bear to listen to Mizu confess to being a woman.

So a Japanese man can go wherever he wants, whenever he wants in BES. A Japanese woman has limited options: marriage, religion, or a brothel. A mixed-race man is an eyesore in this story. A mixed-race woman is a death sentence.

May as well eliminate the female aspect, and do what you can about the mixed-race aspect. Because that's just realistic.

Meaning Mizu can avoid the strictures Edo society places on women. But she can't avoid the repercussions that come with being mixed race. And I truly don't think that it's just because "there's no brown contacts yet."

[saltpepperbeard]

a pensive babygirl™

[picture source]

[daily-hanamura]

[ellies-enrichment]

another version of me >> i was in it

[cod-fishing]

Drift compatible GhostSoap. Pacific Rim jaeger pilots GhostSoap. That’s it that’s the post.

[babyboybuckley]

Since I met you... I've been thinking about getting a car

How can I NOT be insane after that line it's truly one of the slowest of slow burns and it's beautiful and Shawn's monologue here is truly one of the best love confessions I've ever heard

[orangechickenpillow]

Love a fictional man whose only redeemable quality is The Child

[bioethicists]

irt poverty/homelessness + alcohol use (esp with @butchfeygela‘s tags on my post)- people really underestimate the function that substance use/alcohol use can have for someone who is unhoused. being unhoused is boring, cold, painful, + lonely. substances can allow the 8 hours panhandling to get the $45 you need for a motel to fly by. alcohol reduces your perception of the cold + can knock you out whben you can’t sleep. substances can help you cope with the physical deterioration from malnutrition, constant stress, + sleeping outside. substances can provide social connection with others who you would otherwise not enjoy or help you cope with being alone.

not only that but- many unhoused people are stuck in a seemingly inescapable position. the pathway to financial stability or even housing is difficult or even impossible. in the wake of that hopelessness, the downsides of substance use start to seem insignificant. arrest? you’re getting arrested anyway for sleeping outside, peeing outside, standing in the wrong place, etc. physical danger? you’re already beat the fuck up, anyway, right? loss of relationships? you’ve lost most people already. inability to keep a job? nobody will hire you + you can’t stay employed, anyway, because you have no car + no shower.

perhaps for you or me, the cons of heroin use or binge drinking nightly greatly outweigh the pros. that isn’t the case for everyone. if we are really serious about ending overdose/addiction, we need to start looking at giving people lives worth recovering into instead of shaming them for their own hopelessness.

[aayakashii]

I'm sorry I only write Haku with a praise kink, as in he gets off on praising his s/o, it will happen again

[randomnameless]

Do you think Edelgard perceives herself as a victim? I’ve been thinking and I can’t decide myself, on one hand she clearly hates the idea of people being victims or helpless, and constantly reframes the victims of the war as “necessary sacrifices” instead of, y’know, tragic causalities of a war she started. She plays up her sad backstory to try to get Byleth to join with her in WC, but then she does all these things to concentrate as much power as possible on herself. On the other (other) hand, she pushes the culpability of the war on everyone except herself, and has trouble taking accountability. She’s obsessed with controlling everything but she doesn’t want to be blamed for the problems she’s created. What do you think?

Oh!

(sorry for replying one literal month later lol)

I find Supreme Leader hard to write because of this, but in a way, I believe that yes, she does.

However, for all the flak Faerghus gets for "ToXiC mAsCuLiNiTy" and "Chivalry BaD", there's something very toxic with the way some Adrestian victims (often women... blame the writers I guess?) deal with their abuse.

I'm not going to spend a lot of time on Doro because I already typed a lot about her, but while she still sees herself as a victim from what she endured and suffered in her childhood, she adopted the toxic mindset of "this suffering is a thing of the past and I grew from that/beyond that to become the person I am now" - which we can also see in Manu who suffered from, roughly, the same traumas.

Petra also follows this pattern, being a hostage and treated like shit, but she grow "beyond" her status of a victim to become the strong person she projects and believes she is - it's only out of House that she realises more accutely her status within the Empire, the reality of her situation and, in Houses, refuses vassalage to Adrestia to make her country independent without having to "ask the Emperor".

It's the same pattern : "I was a victim" but "I became strong" so "I am not a victim anymore, this is something of the past".

Applied to Supreme Leader...

Well, trying to ignore the Agarthans and her dad's own infuence on her character (which is kind of hard, since the games try their hardest to make Agarthans responsible for everything BaD and we're not clear on how much they had an influence on her), I think Supreme Leader believes she was a "victim" of abuse.

But - through further abuse and surviving said abuse - she became strong* enough to "not be a victim anymore".

Which is why her line of "if the weak remain weak it's their fault" feels like it echoes part of her mindset : she was a victim but became strong enough, maybe by hardening her own feelings to become "strong", so she is not the same helpless "victim" she once was.

If she managed to do that, then everyone can do the same.

As for the "necessary sacrifices", since early 2019 someone theorised that "the people" she pretends the fight for as seen as some general "concept", much like the "greater good". So if some people are sacrificed, it's for her ideals - the goal and aim of her newfound strength - , and it piles on her drive, she must realise them otherwise those people would have died (and she would have suffered) for nothing.

However, despite acknowledging her past self as a victim, and because she's now "strong", she's not above using her past trauma (but actually, still present! Remember the rat scene?) to reach her goals, because, at her core, Supreme Leader is soemone who is very determined. Maybe it's her only drive to grow beyond the trauma, or her own illusions, or a mix of everything, but AM made it clear, Supreme Leader is not above, well, using herself if it means seeing her goals come to fruition : unlike Lobotogard from AG, AM!Supreme Leader willingly transforms in Hegemongard.

This is the cost she's willing to pay, so while the memes about Lord Farqaad were on spot, I still think that Supreme Leader is ultimately willing to sacrifice** herself for her goal (but only when there's no other way to ensure her future will come to fruition, and in a way, I guess she thought she would survive the Hegemon transformation, jury's out on what she meant to do in AM's finale, but imo, she still tried, even beaten and battered as she was, to claim Dimi's head).

Ultimately I think everything's a bit muddled by the fact that, as @fantasyinvader pointed out, Supreme Leader is a liar and knows the importance of maintening good PR.

She lies and manipulates the truth to reach her goals (which again, is a red flag when CF claims to want to restore the "distorted history" of Fodlan!) and for all the flak I give them, the devs managed to scrap enough material to give us a peek in Adrestia's mindset (or at least its top nobles), they're not people who self reflect, they are salty because they aren't ruling the world anymore, and they feel like they are better than the rest of Fodlan.

Put everything in the mixer, and you indeed have Supreme Leader (but also her court, especially Ferdie in SB who dares to say, as he is invading and trouncing people who don't really like and accept the idea of being invaded, that the fear those people feel are only in their mind, or something like that? Like, dude, you're rolling over their people and country, of course they'll fear and hate you!) giving her weird rhetoric lines (why are people opposing me if they are going to die?), victim blaming (something Treehouse swallowed like honey, if their lolcalisation is anything to go by, remember, it's Rhea's fault for not offering her head on a platter that is the reason why the War continues in CF!) and so on.

IDK if the devs wanted to bank that much on the Dany parallel with her "if I look back i am lost", but again, I don't know if her drive to make a "better Fodlan" is motivated by her trauma, Adrestian revanchism, Ionius telling her dumb things or Agarthans agarthaning, but her goal and vision are everything to Supreme Leader.

So she will do anythign to see them realised, even if it means sacrificing her people, starting a war, tweaking "the truth" or using her own trauma to motivate and recruit powerful people who might assist her with her goals.

To reply to your question, IMO she sees herself as someone who had once been a victim, but won't let that stop her from reaching her goals, even if it means creating thousands of "hers" in the process, because, in her mind, reaching her goal is more important than anything else.

*I know, she refutes Dimitri's claim that she is "strong" or laughs at it, but imo, it was more in the sense of "I was weak and became strong" so everyone can "become" strong.

**I don't think she wanted to throw away her life, but more something in the lines of "putting my life on the line" or sacrificing her precious (and to see how precious it is, just play CF lol) humanity.

[odysseys-blood]

im never getting over how belphie just...yoinked beleth's halo. like the artifact says "given" but he very much did not give it 😭

i lowkey think it was to take some of the heat off of beleth for being a fallen angel and to keep others from being too loud about it but still he did it in the most goofy manner possible. (and smthn smthn a crown symbolizing protection for his people and its from the first person he wanted to keep safe personally)