#RAND Corp

[hardcore-direwolf]

Pocketwatch Question!

I know Kitten is into Robin I/Nightwing and Dick Grayson, so my inspiration of Ace will be based on her for blond hair and blue eyes like her mother with her father's insane madness.

Matt's permanent portrayal has changed from Noah Nixon from Generator Rex to Danny Rand aka Iron Fist from Ultimate Spider-Man, I loved Greg Cipes for voicing him so much.

His portrayal starts from Noah Nixon for S1 and S2, and Danny Rand for S3 and S4...that's the procedure.

Recasting her will be good for the rivalry between Kitten Moth and Catgirl, but I chose Lucy due to the Injustice trailer video in Arkham Asylum between Harley Quinn and Catwoman in their Arkham City skins.

Lucy Quinzel's character portrayal is Annie from Generator Rex mixed with Jinx | Powder from League of Legends, and Misty's portrayal will be Beverly Holiday from Generator Rex mixed with Stocking Anarchy from Panty & Stocking.

Knowing users make redesigns of heroes and villains are very savage...follow those people who recreated them if they're really savage.

I would usually picked my portrayals by watching shows like Invincible, Young Justice, Ben 10 (Not the Reboot...it's OS/AF/UA/OV), Generator Rex, Teen Titans (2003), the Last Airbender, X-Men: Evolution, DCAMU, the Secret Saturdays, Danny Phantom, Kim Possible, the Legend of Korra, Spectacular Spider-Man, Ultimate Spider-Man, TMNT (2003), Wolverine & the X-Men, and others.

Since Gizmo, Jinx, and Mammoth got some redesigns...Mammoth got a different design and I love it...we will choose the portrayals.

We got Psimon, Devastation, Gizmo, Shimmer, Mammoth, the Terror Twins, Jinx, Icicle Junior, and Holocaust.

Let's start with the sirens; Devastation, Shimmer, Tuppence, and Jinx...they need four more members to make this even.

I chose Blackfire, Terra, Ace, and Domino...I know Kitten was the original one till I realized that she has something I hate about her...and that'll be dating and using a mutated spider guy.

Blackfire's portrayal is Circe from Generator Rex with violet to blue dye within her black hair, I want her to be step-sisters with Wildfire and Starfire while having a big brother named Darkfire...portrayed as Moss.

Starfire's hair is an ombre with brown, pink, red, orange, and yellow for the fiery ends like fire...Blackfire's hair is now ombre with black, violet, blue, cyan, and white for the snowy tips.

Ace's portrayal is Annie from Generator Rex, the natural hair and eyes before becoming her new alias...this was Kitten's original portrayal.

Ace Spades will have Kitten's portrayed looks, Jinx's tattoos and color scheme to her hairstyle, Harley's clothing styles, Joker's insane madness, and their choice of weapons.

Domino's portrayal is still will be Beverly Holiday, though I want to give her Stocking's color scheme to her stuffed cat with Misty Kilgore's hair and clothing...her mother's portrayal is Rebecca Holiday to show off the resemblance between the two characters.

Going to the guys...Psimon, Tommy, Gizmo, Mammoth, Holocaust, and Icicle Junior.

For Billy's portrayal, I chose Walter aka Skwydd from Generator Rex.

For See-More, his portrayal will be Rex Salazar and I thought it'll be cool cause he has the Omega Nanite Goggles to the powers...watch the show...it's nostalgic.

It's up to Zatanna to protect Matt from crazy chicks...comment down below and follow.

[metamatar]

$200k seems like quite a reasonable cost for a small sterile lab. It's not a plan to make it at home, it's a plan to make it in your town. As of now, there are so few insulin plants that the economies of scale aren't optimal for distribution (but they are for profits!)

did you miss the part that it was speculative? that it has never been demonstrated? also no, the economies of scale are fine for distribution cold chain distribution it is a solved problem. people aren't struggling to get insulin bc it can't be delivered, they're struggling bc its expensive.

im not sure you understand what economies of scale means, it means when you try to do things at larger scale – you are generally able to deploy productive technologies and innovations in organisation (specialisation) which make things easier to produce (less labour and capital input) on average. things become cheaper to produce. it is cheaper to weave cloth at a factory than in a loom you install in your backyard. that's why open insulin can only hypothetically get a vial down to the price of for profit insulin in the uk. big pharma is able to profit from insulin at 7 dollars a vial, ie it's even cheaper to produce. this is like, adam smith pin example.

the existence of a big factory or doing things at scale doesn't create destructive megaprofits... this is such a bizarre worldview of the world. you have to make a very sophisticated argument to prove this, which imo is immediately debunked by the reality of worker organised cooperatives in factories or even state run industrial production. profit tends to be a function of factors like labour relations + market dynamics like supply, demand and competition. us healthcare sucks bc your workers don't have rights, private insurance colludes with hospitals and competitors and the govt doesn't regulate pharma companies who are providing an inelastic good (medicine.)

also addressing this bc some people are mad at me but the only part of my argument that cites a piece hosted on RAND corp is the extremely high price of US insulin compared to every other country in the world. its like 30x. i don't think that is a fact that's a capitalist conspiracy, the data can be confirmed with other sources too, it just illustrates how dysfunctional US healthcare is. like, when your enemies agree...

[stupittmoran]

Top 10 headlines the media didn't tell you this week, Repost & FoIIow for more

Rand Paul announces investigation into Fauci's 'secret trips' to the CIA prior to the COVID outbreak.

Brazil threatens to Cut Off access to 𝕏 and detain employees after Elon Musk refused to censor accounts.

Woman who found Ashley Biden's diary sentenced to jail time.

FBI contractor confirming there were likely at least 20+ undercover FBI agents in the crowd on J6.

Donald Trump's support among black men has doubled in battleground states.

64-year-old Trump RV operator and supporter beat nearly to death with a sledgehammer by 36-year-old Michael Gonzalez.

Rep. Jim Jordan launched investigation into Fulton County DA Fani Willis.

Donald Trump pushes for a bill to ban non-citizen voting.

NAIA bans men from competing in women's sports.

54 convicted sex offenders caught by Border Patrol agents in Del Rio since October.

BONUS: Biden to send Ukraine aid amounting to more than we've spent on our entire Marine Corps.

At what point do we secure our own border?

If you appreciate this Top 10 recap, remember to Repost and FoIIow me for another week in a clown world 🤡🌎

[contemplatingoutlander]

America has legislated itself into competing red, blue versions of education

This is an excellent article in The Washington Post about how our school systems have begun to reflect the political divisions in our nation, with many red states legally banning discussions on racism, sexism, and gender issues, and many blue states legally requiring those kinds of discussions. This is a gift🎁link, so anyone can read the entire article, even if the don't subscribe to the Post. Below are some excerpts:

Three-fourths of the nation’s school-aged students are now educated under state-level measures that either require more teaching on issues like race, racism, history, sex and gender, or which sharply limit or fully forbid such lessons, according to a sweeping Post review of thousands of state laws, gubernatorial directives and state school board policies. The restrictive laws alone affect almost half of all Americans aged 5 to 19. [...] The divide is sharply partisan. The vast majority of restrictive laws and policies, close to 9o percent, were enacted in states that voted for Donald Trump in the 2020 presidential election, The Post found. Meanwhile, almost 80 percent of expansive laws and policies were enacted in states that voted for Joe Biden in 2020.

The explosion of laws regulating school curriculums is unprecedented in U.S. history for its volume and scope, said Jonathan Zimmerman, a University of Pennsylvania professor who studies education history and policy...states have never before stepped in so aggressively to set rules for local schools. [...] [A] nationally representative study from the Rand Corp. released this year found that 65 percent of K-12 teachers report they are limiting instruction on “political and social issues.” “What the laws show is that we have extremely significant differences over how we imagine America,” Zimmerman said. [...] In practice, these divisions mean that what a child learns about, say, the role slavery played in the nation’s founding — or the possibility of a person identifying as nonbinary — may come to depend on whether they live in a red or blue state. [...] Almost 40 percent of these laws work by granting parents greater control of the curriculum — stipulating that they must be able to review, object to or remove lesson material, as well as opt out of instruction. [...] Another almost 40 percent of the laws forbid schools from teaching a long list of often-vague concepts related to race, sex or gender.

[...] At the college level, among the measures passed in recent years is a 2021 Oklahoma law that prohibits institutions of higher education from holding “mandatory gender or sexual diversity training or counseling,” as well as any “orientation or requirement that presents any form of race or sex stereotyping.” By contrast, a 2023 California measure says state community college faculty must employ “teaching, learning and professional practices” that reflect “anti-racist principles.”

Some experts predicted the politically divergent instruction will lead to a more divided society. “When children are being taught very different stories of what America is, that will lead to adults who have a harder time talking to each other,” said Rachel Rosenberg, a Hartwick College assistant professor of education.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Trudy Ring at The Advocate:

When marriage equality was but a dream, right-wingers alleged that somehow it would cheapen marriage. Twenty years after the first same-sex couples married in Massachusetts, a new study proclaims that’s not the case. “For LGBT individuals and same-sex couples, their children, and the general U.S. population, the benefits of access to legal marriage for same-sex couples are unambiguously positive,” says the study by the RAND Corp., a nonprofit research organization. The study’s authors reviewed the existing research on the effects of marriage equality — 96 studies — and conducted their own new analyses. They found that “when states legalized marriage for same-sex couples, the physical health of LGBT individuals in those states improved; state-level rates of syphilis, HIV, and AIDS fell significantly; same-sex households in those states experienced more-stable relationships, higher earnings, and higher rates of homeownership; and sexual orientation–motivated hate crimes and employment discrimination against LGBT individuals declined,” the study says. “Children of same-sex couples benefited when their parents were granted access to legal marriage, and state-level adoption rates rose after marriage became legal for same-sex couples,” it continues.

There was “no evidence for a retreat from marriage,” the study notes. “New marriages increased by 1 percent to 2 percent among different-sex couples and about 10 percent overall,” it says, and there was “no consistent evidence” that cohabitation increased among unmarried different-sex couples or that divorces increased as a result of marriage equality. “Some of those who opposed the granting of marriage rights to same-sex couples predicted that doing so would undermine the institution of marriage, resulting in fewer couples marrying, more couples divorcing, and an overall retreat from family formation,” study coauthor Benjamin R. Karney said in a RAND press release. “Overall, the fears of opponents of same-sex marriage simply have not come to pass.” Karney is a psychology professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, and adjunct researcher at RAND.

A new study from the RAND Corporation reveals that the benefits of marriage equality for same-sex couples are “unambiguously positive” to the economic and moral well-being of the USA.

[haggishlyhagging]

The extreme of the male culture has become a grotesque caricature of part of the potential inherent in every human being, whether female or male. Why are so many blind to the grotesqueness of the tough, hard, super-balls, insensitive, unemotional male image in John Wayne, James Bond, the Marines, etc.? Or so blind to the grotesqueness of the super-mind, intellect, reasoning, and abstraction removed from any connection with life in the "think tanks" of the Rand Corporation, the academy, the corporations, the Army Corps of Engineers, most scientific research, war games strategies, etc.?

The extreme of the female culture has also become a grotesque caricature of the potential inherent in every human being. Why are so many blind to the grotesqueness of the super-sex goddesses, the sex-object removed from mind and emotion, the motherhood myth, the pettily personal existence which is not allowed to transcend itself into the individual autonomous existence, the enforced delicacy without full feeling and intensity, the sentiment turned into bathos because removed from direct sexual or creative expression, etc.?

The abstractions of male and female are extreme and many people are not molded wholly into either category—there is a great deal of overlap. But no one in the society is allowed to be a whole human being as long as the tyranny of the male and female culture or sex role split exists.

Recently there has been an unfortunate reaction among some women's liberationists and feminists. Some women have begun to call anything which they do not like "male." They seem to think that anything that has been defined as a "male quality" is inherently bad. A woman who is strong or takes initiative is told that she is "acting like a man" or "talking like a man." The crushing of initiative and strength and self-expression in women is now being done by other women in the movement under the guise of "anti-elitism," "anti-male-identification," and "collective self-suppression." It would be a tragedy if women were to make our oppressed state into a virtue and a model of humanity and the new society. We need to sift out what is good in our imposed definition as females and to honestly examine what is stupid and self-destructive. We need also to sift out what is good in what has been defined as male and therefore denied expression in us. We need no more glorification of the oppressed and their "super-soul" and "superior" culture, for that will blind us to our weaknesses and only lead us back into the same mire from which we have been trying to free ourselves.

-Barbara Burris, ‘The Fourth World Manifesto’ in Radical Feminism, Koedt et al (eds.)

[bookoftheironfist]

So i was wondering...how does Danny use the fact he's rich? Especialy considering he hangs out with Luke, i could image him being aware of the problems and struggles of the working class and wanting to help, especialy if i understand correctly that he has a very "simple" view of "do what's right and opose what's wrong" while also being generaly optimistic?

Danny's relationship with money in general, and with his inherited fortune in particular, was a recurring theme in Iron Fist comics for a long time, and you're right, it initially came to the fore in Power Man and Iron Fist volume 1, as Danny started settling into Earth society, and particularly through his friendship with Luke and his work as part of Heroes for Hire.

Power Man and Iron Fist vol. 1 #56 by Mary Jo Duffy, Trevor Von Eeden, George Roussos, Frank Springer, and Tom Orzechowski

To start, Danny never had any interest in his parents' money; the inheritance, and his shares in Rand-Meachum Corp, were essentially dumped on him by his father's lawyer, Jeryn Hogarth. In Iron Fist volume 1, Jeryn tracks Danny down, drags him in front of the Meachums (who had taken full control of the company following the Rand family's apparent deaths), and insists that they give him his inheritance. Danny, who has not been back on Earth long and has much more pressing concerns in his life at this time, is irritated by the whole ordeal.

Iron Fist vol. 1 #8 by Chris Claremont, John Byrne, Dan Adkins, Bonnie Wilford, and Joe Rosen

Regardless of Danny's feelings on the matter, Jeryn succeeds in getting him what his parents left him: a huge amount of money, a 50% share in Rand-Meachum Corp, and the penthouse he grew up in. None of this has much of an impact on his stories at the time-- as Iron Fist, he has plenty of enemies to face and challenges to overcome, and at this point he was still trying to figure out who his civilian identity of Danny Rand even was. But one thing that does quickly become clear to him, as he settles further into the world of New York City, is that while he now has all of this money, he has no concept of the gravity or value of it. Having observed this about himself, he makes two key decisions: 1. He gives control of his Rand-Meachum Corp shares to Joy Meachum, and 2. He joins Heroes for Hire*. To be clear: he had many reasons for joining Heroes for Hire, key among them being his blossoming friendship with Luke and his search for a purpose while locked out of K'un-Lun. But he also embraces the opportunity to earn an honest living, and to learn the value of money through hard work.

*Just in case anyone reading this is unfamiliar with what Heroes for Hire actually was/is: When Luke acquired his superpowers and broke out of Seagate Prison (where he was being actively abused while held for a crime he did not commit), he found himself alone in the world, a fugitive, with nothing to his name but his newfound powers and his smarts. He managed to find himself a tiny apartment in Times Square (which was a very low-income, "seedy" part of the city in the 70s) and started up a business whereby people could hire him to help them, for a small fee. His goal was to earn enough money to keep himself fed and pay the rent. Over time, however, he became a known figure in the community: a superhero who looked out for the little guy. The operation expanded when Danny joined, and has taken on a number of different forms in the years since, but it has always been, first and foremost, an operation based in low-income communities and aimed at helping the underserved and oppressed. That is Luke's world, and it became Danny's too. Anyway, back to the post...

However, just because Danny is not interested in his fortune doesn't mean he doesn't still have it, and there are occasions when Heroes for Hire finds itself in need of serious cash and Danny has to dip into his funds. Luke doesn't love this; he, like Danny, wants to make it on his own, and he doesn't appreciate reminders of how well-off his friend is. Danny also comes to realize how complicated things can get when money is involved. At one point, Luke's apartment gets blown up by one of H4H's enemies, and Danny lets Luke bunk with him. He also offers him a check to get him back on his feet-- and is startled by his friend's reaction.

Power Man and Iron Fist vol. 1 #64 by Mary Jo Duffy, Kerry Gammill, Doc Martin, Dan Green, Jon D'Agostino, and Diana Albers

"Being able to help people is the best part of having money" pretty well encompasses Danny's attitude toward his fortune. While he does do the occasional goofy rich guy thing, like going to a fancy restaurant because he never noticed the price and just likes the view, or buying a yacht because he's having an identity crisis and thinks it might help, he pretty much only acknowledges his money in the context of how he can use it to help others. Having made close friends from all walks of life, and been immersed in low-income communities throughout his career as a street-level superhero and Hero for Hire, he is acutely aware of what he has and cares deeply about helping those who have less.

Immortal Iron Fist #16 by Matt Fraction, David Aja, Matt Hollingsworth, and Dave Lanphear

In partnership with his then-girlfriend Misty Knight, he creates the Thunder Dojo, a kung fu school in Harlem for children from struggling families that also provides them with meals, tutoring, and other means of support. And then, at the end of the Immortal Iron Fist series, he shuts down his father's company entirely and commits to donating away the rest of his fortune.

Immortal Iron Fist #16 by Matt Fraction, David Aja, Matt Hollingsworth, and Dave Lanphear

He sells his penthouse and moves into a little apartment with Misty. Not long after, he founds the Rand Foundation, a community-focused non-profit, and brings in Joy Meachum, businesswoman extraordinaire, to help run it.

Shadowland: Power Man #4 by Fred Van Lente, Mahmud Asrar, Ray-Anthony Height, Bruno Hang, Dave Sharpe, et al.

Frustratingly, this strand of Danny's character journey has fallen by the wayside in the decade-or-so since this development. I wrote a post recently about the inconsistencies surrounding Rand Corp and Danny's fortune, the vanishing of the Rand Foundation, and just the blatant lack of continuity regarding Danny's financial situation in general. Currently, for no clear reason, Rand Corp is back up and running and Danny has returned to being a rich guy living in a penthouse. But it's clear-- though frustrating-- that this is largely due to various creative teams' inattention to this particular detail, or perhaps a desire to return to a certain status quo, rather than to any changes in Danny's attitude toward money or helping people.

Defenders (2017) #5 by Brian Michael Bendis, David Marquez, Justin Ponsor, and Cory Petit

Thanks for the great question!

[sugar-splenda]

You know what, fuck you. *Makes your protagonists cats*

CatLine Rescue Center AU ramblings under the cut.

Taylor and T2 are orange cats since they have that vibe and they won't shut the fuck up. Originally thought about making them the black cats with that dialog from HTI but decided I like them as domestic, utterly unprepared for street life, cats. I have a couple of ideas as to how they ended up in the rescue center:

1. T2 is the original family cat, goes missing and is replaced by Taylor because no one tell the kids the cat got out. Eventually, Taylor also gets out and ends up in the rescue with T2.

2. T2 is from the same litter as Taylor, but they didn't get picked and ended up in the streets while Tay has all the comforts of indoor cats. Eventually someone accidentally lets Taylor outside and they meet T2, who hates their guts and decides to take their place (And ends up in the rescue because the family can Tell its Not Their Cat).

Arika and Rand are black cats. Come on, black cats and magic! teenage witches!!! And the image of a mangy feral Arika is too good to pass on.

For them, I think the siblings are from a literal warrior cats inspired colony of feral cats that lived in the outskirts of the city and was starting to make a heavy impact on the native population so a catch and rehome operation was dispatched. If you want to be cruel we can say Adults got culled and Arika and Rand were young enough to be rehabilitated. The point is that Rand got adopted and Arika didn't. So her whole deal is to find her little brother and go back to the streets (Until the rescue center snatches them again)

Alex is a barn cat or at least an indoor/outdoor cat that's being used to deal with pests. When i think of working cats I think of the Maine coons and that's what I was going for first, but then I thought about it more and decided to make him an american longhair.

He is old and should probably retire, but old habits die hard and its difficult to socialize him with other cats. Maybe his owner couldn't take care of him anymore after they moved to the city. He's was also not neutered in time so he developed the big cheeks male cats get as natural defense against attacks.

Wynn was always pictured in my mind as a person whose hair was shaved for the surgery in Flatline, so the logical option for me was to make her a sphynx cat. At least until I found out about another breed that is also hairless (but keeps the whiskers) called Donskoy. I really like the idea of a weird looking cat for them.

As for their plot, I am once again torn between keeping some aspects of the game, or just go for the slice of Life vibes. I have the idea of Wynn being a cat rescued from an unethical research facility, be it PWG or Pearson Corp that was not always a hairless Donskoy. (Some Donskoy have "babyfur" covering their bodies) but the treatments and whatever they were doing there caused their hair to fall.

V. Adams is not included because he is from Whiteout and Clearly A Dog. Sorry Adams.

[ohplagg]

I Love Yoo Timeline Part 4/4

The Timeline

This is part 4 of 4 of my I Love Yoo Timeline as of Episode 241.

Part 1 and 2 consists of laying out all the detailed evidence with descriptions, screenshots and episode number.

Part 3 consists of explaining the evidence, connecting the dates and some math because the I Love Yoo universe (the Yooniverse, if you will) uses letters instead of numbers to represent official years.

Part 4 is the I Love Yoo Timeline.

---------

If you havent read the previous 3 parts of this mega post I highly encourage you to go check them out before continuing since up ahead I will be writing and explaining under the assumption that you have read the previous 3 parts.

All the events are placed where they are according to the evidence. I will not be providing much explanation in this post as to why things are placed where they are in the timeline so if you need explanation go back to the previous parts.

I also won't be adding most of Shin-Ae focused events otherwise the timeline becomes unnecessarily messy.

And lastly, I won't be mentioning every single event that has happened in current year of the story (20XX), only major events. If you want a more detailed timeline for present year this old reddit post that goes up to episode 146 has more details.

While I was finishing writing this timeline AugmentedElle from reddit published her own version of the timeline (Elle, if you see this, big fan. I don't have reddit but big fan) which has some parts I disagree with based on my interpretation of the evidence but her timeline is so well written and easy to follow + it's more detailed than mine that I honestly do recommend checking it out as well because Elle did a way better job than me in that regard.

Without further ado..

Cheat sheet

Because the Yooniverse uses the alphabet instead of numbers to keep track of years, it's hard to really grasp how much time has really passed. This is why I created this little chart where it lays down the year with the number equivalent and the age each character had in each specific year.

Dieter, Soushi, Maya and Rika were born the same year as Shin-Ae.

Sang-Chul and Alyssa were born the same year.

Meg was born the same year as Kousuke.

Yui's age is not exact. We only know she is in her 40s meaning she can be either 40 or 49. Meaning she was pregnant with Kousuke between 16-25. I chose 20 for no other reason than it's right in the middle.

I have no idea of anyone else's age (Rand, Hansuke, YuJing, etc) so I didn't even add my guesses to not confuse the timeline. If you know any clue about someone's age I would love to know!

The Timeline

I'll start with the earliest date and move forward from there.

Italic means that it's not known when exactly in the year that specific event took place. I still placed the event where it makes most sense.

January 20WA === 50 years ago

Young-Chul Kim become Chairman of Hirahara Corp.

Prestigious Prep School starts mishandling reports of SA

+ 25 Year

October 31st, 20WY === 25 years ago

Young-Chul Kim steps down as Chairman after SA accusations

Hirahara Corp CFO of several years, Randulph Hannesson is a witness against Young-Chul Kim

Next year

January 20WZ === 24 years ago

Yui and Rand get married without the public's knowledge

Yui and Rand have their honeymoon in February

Kousuke is conceived in February

Rand gets announced as temporary chairman of Hirahara Corp on March 27th

As of March 27th, the press and public only know that Yui and Rand relationship goes as far as "seeing each other in public"

Kousuke is born November 8th

+ 5 Years

January 20XE ==== 19 years ago

Nol is conceived around March

Kousuke has his 5th birthday

Nol is born December 21st

+ 6 Years

January 20XJ ==== 13 Years ago

Nol and Nessa move to USAsia

Nol and Kousuke meet for the first time

Kousuke has his 11th birthday

Nol has his 6th birthday

+ 4 Years

January 20XO ==== 9 years ago

Kousuke Graduates High School (Nessa is at the park the same day)

Yui and Rand's public marriage reconciliation

Kousuke starts college

Kousuke gets a college friend group

Kousuke has his 15th birthday

Nol has his 10th birthday

Next Year

January 20XP ==== 8 years ago

Kousuke has his 16th birthday

Nol has his 11th birthday

Nessa is found dead December 21st

The brother incident happens

Nol is taken to the Mental Facility

+ 2 Years

January 20XR ==== 6 years ago

Nol gets out of the Mental Facility

Nol get's officially introduced as Rand's bastard son

Kousuke has his 18th birthday

Nol has his 13th birthday

Next Year

January 20XS ==== 5 years ago

Nana moves to US Asia*

Nol moves in with Nana*

Shin-Aer starts going to Min-Hyuk's middle school

Shin-Ae has her 12th birthday

Alyssa has her 13th birthday

Shin-Ae and Alyssa meet

Kousuke has his 19th birthday

Alyssa pushes Shin-Ae

Shin-Ae gets out of the hospital

Nol has his 14th birthday

*This could have happened in late 20XR. It all depends on how exact "5 years" ago was.

Next Year

January 20XT ==== 4 years ago

Shin-Ae has her 13th birthday

Alyssa has her 14th birthday

Min-Hyuk graduates middle school and starts high schools

Meg has her 20th birthday

Kousuke has his 20th birthday

Nol has his 15th birthday

For the past 2 years Nol has had no friends (ever since he got out of the mental facility) and Kousuke has been acting like his "guardian" (during which Kousuke has been constantly badmouthing Nol to everyone)

Next Year

January 20XU ==== 3 years ago

Shinae graduates Middle School

Shinae, Dieter and Soushi have their 14th birthday

Alyssa has her 15th birthday

Nol and Dieter meet while running during "summer before year 1 of high school"

Dieter, Shinae, Soushi and Nol (and the rest) start high school

Nol starts trying to befriend Soushi*

During a very rainy period Nol tries to meet his mom after 5 years of not seeing her*

Kousuke talks to Soushi*

Nol becomes friends with Dieter and Soushi*

Nol hangs out with Dieter and shortly after Soushi joins the group.*

Kousuke takes a break from babysitting Nol*

Nol, Dieter and Soushi meet Alyssa*

Nol and Alyssa start dating*

Alyssa starts the path of becoming a Kpop idol*

Kousuke and his college friends have the fallout**

Meg meets Kousuke*

Meg has her 21st birthday

Kousuke has his 21st birthday

Nol has his 16th birthday

(*All these events need to happen in that order, the placement on the timeline in relation with the other events depend on when Nessa's birthday was or when exactly Nol tried to "see" his mom)

(**I've decided to assume Hansuke doesn't really remember the exact facts of how, what and when Kousuke lost his college friends since he was in a different college, he would only occationally tag along and he was very busy with his doctor exams at the time)

Note: Whatever happened with Kousuke's friends, the fallout could perfectly have dragged throughout a couple of weeks/months. It doesn't necesarily need to have happened in a one day event.

Pretty eventful year

Next Year

January 20XV ==== 2 years ago

Kousuke graduates from his master's degree at 21 years old*

Dieter and Soushi have their 15th birthday

Alyssa has her 16th birthday

Kousuke has his 22nd birthday

Nol has his 17th birthday

(*I've decided to take Meg's flashback gossip about Kousuke with a grain of salt. This could have happened at the end of year 20XU instead of the beginning of this year.)

Next Year

January 20XW ==== Last year

In March a SA investigation in prestigious prep school (the one where Kim Sang-Chul is the Student Council President) gets launch

Min-Hyuk graduates high school

Kousuke has his 23rd birthday

Nol has his 18th birthday

Next Year

January 20XX ==== this year

Min-Hyuk goes to USA for college

Dieter, Soushi, Shin-Ae have their 17th birthday

Alyssa has her 18th birthday

In July the SA investigation in the prestigious preschool ends with nothing found and nothing done.

Dieter confesses to Shin-Ae

Saturday September 17th is the party where Shin-Ae meets the brothers

Thursday November 8th: Kousuke has his 24th birthday

Between Friday 9th and Saturday November 10th Shin-Ae's dad goes into a coma

Wednesday November 14th is the Gala. (That same night Shin-Ae was supposed to get evicted)

December 1st Min-Hyuk returns

Monday December 16th Nol has his trial (and he's sentenced for 120 days starting December 22nd)

Tuesday December 17th: Shin-Ae and Nol meet in the rain, Nol blocks everyone.

Saturday December 21st: Hirahara's Chirstmas party, Min-Hyuk's welcome home party, Nol turns 19 year's old

Sunday December 22nd: Nol is at the hospital (his sentence is pushed to start December 25th)

Personal Thoughts

This timeline broke my brain more times than I can remember. Whenever I thought I was close to being done with it I would remember something new or come across new information that would force me to rethink almost everything.

When I first started writing this timeline it was only going to be 2 parts, the evidence with the explanation and the timeline layout, but it kept getting bigger and bigger. It was supposed to be released the first week of October. We are in November. I've been writing this for 2 months.

I almost wrote this timeline in a manner that I would drag you all along through the same path of insanity that I went through but I decided against it not because I felt compassion for you all but because I plan to come back to these posts in the future for when I want to refresh my memory and I didn't want future me to go through that confusion again. I've suffered enough.

Shout out to my friend who lend me her DMs whenever I was going crazy and let me rant myself into sanity every time.

Conclusion

The timeline is not perfect, specially the events that happen between 20XS (5 years ago) and 20XV (2 years ago), but I'm satisfied with how it turned out considering the information we have so far.

Please don't take this timeline as the one that rules them all. If you have a suggestion on the order of events or theories on what could have happened I would more than love to read about them, so please do share your thoughts!

--------

This is part 4 of 4. In case you missed it, go read the previous parts:

Part 1: The Evidence Part 1

Part 2: The Evidence Part 2

Part 3: Math and connecting the dots

[justforbooks]

Daniel Ellsberg, a US government analyst who became one of the most famous whistleblowers in world politics when he leaked the Pentagon Papers, exposing US government knowledge of the futility of the Vietnam war, has died. He was 92. His death was confirmed by his family on Friday.

In March, Ellsberg announced that he had inoperable pancreatic cancer. Saying he had been given three to six months to live, he said he had chosen not to undergo chemotherapy and had been assured of hospice care.

“I am not in any physical pain,” he wrote, adding: “My cardiologist has given me license to abandon my salt-free diet of the last six years. This has improved my life dramatically: the pleasure of eating my favourite foods!”

On Friday, the family said Ellsberg “was not in pain” when he died. He spent his final months eating “hot chocolate, croissants, cake, poppy-seed bagels and lox” and enjoying “several viewings of his all-time favourite [movie], Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid”, the family statement added.

“In his final days, surrounded by so much love from so many people, Daniel joked, ‘If I had known dying would be like this, I would have done it sooner …’

“Thank you, everyone, for your outpouring of love, appreciation and well-wishes. It all warmed his heart at the end of his life.”

Tributes were swift and many.

Alan Rusbridger, the former editor-in-chief of the Guardian, said Ellsberg “was widely, and rightly, acclaimed as a great and significant figure. But not by Richard Nixon, who wanted him locked up. He’s why the national interest should never be confused with the interest of whoever’s in power.”

The Pulitzer-winning journalist Wesley Lowery wrote: “It was an honor knowing Daniel … I’ll remain inspired by his commitment to a mission bigger than himself.”

The writer and political commentator Molly Jong-Fast said: “One of the few really brave people on this earth has left it.”

The MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan said: “Huge loss for this country. An inspiring, brave, and patriotic American. Rest in power, Dan, rest in power.”

The Pentagon Papers covered US policy in Vietnam between 1945 and 1967 and showed that successive administrations were aware the US could not win.

By the end of the war in 1975, more than 58,000 Americans were dead and 304,000 were wounded. Nearly 250,000 South Vietnamese soldiers were killed, as were about 1 million North Vietnamese soldiers and Viet Cong guerillas and more than 2 million civilians in North and South Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia.

The Pentagon Papers caused a sensation in 1971, when they were published – first by the New York Times and then by the Washington Post and other papers – after the supreme court overruled the Nixon administration on whether publication threatened national security.

In 2017, the story was retold in The Post, an Oscar-nominated film directed by Steven Spielberg in which Ellsberg was played by the British actor Matthew Rhys.

Ellsberg served in the US Marine Corps in the 1950s but went to Vietnam in the mid-60s as a civilian analyst for the defense department, conducting a study of counter-insurgency tactics. When he leaked the Pentagon Papers, he was working for the Rand Corporation.

In 2021, a half-century after he blew the whistle, he told the Guardian: “By two years in Vietnam, I was reporting very strongly that there was no prospect of progress of any kind so the war should not be continued. And that came to be the majority view of the American people before the Pentagon Papers came out.

“By ’68 with the Tet offensive, by ’69, most Americans already thought it was immoral to continue but that had no effect on Nixon. He thought he was going to try to win it and they would be happy once he’d won it, however long it took.”

In 1973, Ellsberg was put on trial. Charges of espionage, conspiracy and stealing government property adding up to a possible 115-year sentence were dismissed due to gross governmental misconduct, including a break-in at the office of Ellsberg’s psychiatrist, part of the gathering scandal which led to Nixon’s resignation in 1974.

Born in Chicago on 7 April 1931, Ellsberg was educated at Harvard and Cambridge, completing his PhD after serving as a marine. He was married twice and had two sons and a daughter.

After the end of the Vietnam war he became by his own description “a lecturer, scholar, writer and activist on the dangers of the nuclear era, wrongful US interventions and the urgent need for patriotic whistleblowing”.

Ellsberg contributed to publications including the Guardian and published four books, among them an autobiography, Secrets: A Memoir of Vietnam and the Pentagon Papers, and most recently The Doomsday Machine: Confessions of a Nuclear War Planner.

In recent years, he publicly supported Chelsea Manning, the US soldier who leaked records of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to WikiLeaks, Julian Assange, who published Manning’s leaks, and Edward Snowden, who leaked records concerning surveillance by the National Security Agency.

On Friday, the journalist Glenn Greenwald, one of the Guardian team which published the Snowden leaks in 2013, winning a Pulitzer prize, called Ellsberg “a true American hero” and “the most vocal defender” of Assange, Snowden, Manning and “others who followed in his brave footsteps”.

Steven Donziger, an attorney who represented Indigenous people in the Amazon rainforest against the oil giant Chevron, a case that led to his own house arrest, said: “Today the world lost a singularly brave voice who spoke truth about the US military machine in Vietnam and risked his life in the process. I drew deep inspiration from the courage of Daniel Ellsberg and was deeply honored to have his support.”

In 2018, in a joint Guardian interview with Snowden, Ellsberg paid tribute to those who refused to be drafted to fight in Vietnam.

“I would not have thought of doing what I did,” he said, “which I knew would risk prison for life, without the public example of young Americans going to prison to make a strong statement that the Vietnam war was wrong and they would not participate, even at the cost of their own freedom.

“Without them, there would have been no Pentagon Papers. Courage is contagious.”

Three years later, in an interview to mark 50 years since the publication of the Pentagon Papers, he said he “never regretted for a moment” his decision to leak.

His one regret, he said, was “that I didn’t release those documents much earlier when I think they would have been much more effective.

“I’ve often said to whistleblowers, ‘Don’t do what I did, don’t wait years till the bombs are falling and people have been dying.’”

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at http://justforbooks.tumblr.com

[woodsteingirl]

i hate the rand corp sooo much 😭. it’s funny because i just adoreeee reading about cia history which is always Worse but the rand corp always seems more sinister to me. they’re like “oh they played kriegspiel a lot and had tournaments in the office” and i’m hyperventilating and having a panic attack

[boycottdivestsanctions]

WEF brought to you by CFR, Trilateral Commission, Rand Corp, Atlantic Council, Club of Rome, CIA, RIIA, Chatham House, Rhodes Roundtable, Pilgrims' Society.

The public faces of the Octopus of global control are arms of the multigenerational hidden Hydra of Technocracy

[protoslacker]

While exposing the dangers and dilemmas of deterrence theory, Kubrick also satirized contemporary military figures and strategists, probably including Henry Kissinger, the author of Nuclear Weapons and Foreign Policy (1957); physicist Edward Teller, the “father” of the H-bomb; the ex-Nazi space scientist Wernher Von Braun; and the bombastic, cigar-chomping SAC commander Curtis LeMay, who in 1957 had told a government commission assessing U.S. nuclear policy that, if a Soviet attack ever seemed likely, he planned to “knock the shit out of them before they got off the ground.” Reminded that U.S. policy rejected preemptive war, LeMay had retorted, “No, it’s not national policy, but it’s my policy.” Much of the strategic thinking that Kubrick critiques, and even some of the dialogue in “Dr. Strangelove,” came from the work of Herman Kahn of the RAND Corp., an Air Force-funded California think tank. Kubrick read Kahn’s work carefully, especially his influential On Thermonuclear War (1960). General Turgidson’s upbeat assessment of the outcome of an all-out nuclear exchange directly paraphrases Kahn’s analysis.

Paul S. Boyer in a 2004 essay at Arms Control Association. "Dr. Strangelove" at 40: The Continuing Relevance of a Cold War Cultural Icon

[theartismi]

وَلَنْ تَرْضٰى عَنْكَ الْيَهُوْدُ وَلَا النَّصٰرٰى حَتّٰى تَتَّبِعَ مِلَّتَهُمْ

Dan orang-orang Yahudi dan Nasrani tidak akan rela kepadamu (Muhammad) sebelum engkau mengikuti agama mereka.

RAND Corp adalah Pusat Penelitian dan Kajian Strategis tentang Islam di Timur Tengah atas biaya Smith Richardson Foundation, berpusat di Santa Monica-California dan Arington-Virginia, Amerika Serikat (AS). Sebelumnya ia perusahaan bidang kedirgantaraan dan persenjataan Douglas Aircraft Company di Santa Monica-California, namun entah kenapa beralih menjadi think tank (dapur pemikiran) dimana dana operasional berasal dari proyek-proyek penelitian pesanan militer.

Garis besar dokumen Rand berisi kebijakan AS dan sekutu di Dunia Islam. Inti hajatannya adalah mempeta-kekuatan (MAPPING), sekaligus memecah-belah dan merencanakan konflik internal di kalangan umat Islam melalui berbagai (kemasan) pola, program bantuan, termasuk berkedok capacity building dan lainnya.

Sedang dokumen lain senada, terbit Desember tahun 2004 dibuat oleh Dewan Intelijen Nasional Amerika Serikat (National Inteligent Council) atau NIC bertajuk Mapping The Global Future. Tugas NIC ialah meramal masa depan dunia.

Tajuk NIC di atas pernah dimuat USA Today, 13 Februari 2005 — juga dikutip oleh Kompas edisi 16 Februari 2005.

Inti laporan NIC tentang perkiraan situasi tahun 2020-an. Rinciannya ialah sebagai berikut: (1) Dovod World: Kebangkitan ekonomi Asia, dengan China dan India bakal menjadi pemain penting ekonomi dan politik dunia; (2) Pax Americana: Dunia tetap dipimpin dan dikontrol oleh AS; (3) A New Chaliphate: Bangkitnya kembali Khilafah Islamiyah, yakni Pemerintahan Global Islam yang bakal mampu melawan dan menjadi tantangan nilai-nilai Barat; dan (4) Cycle of Fear: Muncul lingkaran ketakutan (phobia). Yaitu ancaman terorisme dihadapi dengan cara kekerasan dan akan terjadi kekacauan di dunia — kekerasan akan dibalas kekerasan.

Jujur harus diakui, ke-empat perkiraan NIC kini riil mendekati kebenaran terutama jika publik mengikuti “opini global” bentukan media mainstream yang dikuasai oleh Barat.

Isi dokumen NIC di atas menyertakan pandangan 15 Badan Intelijen dari kelompok Negara Barat. Tahun 2008 dokumen ini direvisi kembali tentang perkiraan atas peran AS pada tata politik global. Judulnya tetap Mapping The Global Future, cuma diubah sedikit terutama hegemoni AS era 2015-an diramalkan bakal turun meski kendali politik masih dalam cengkeraman.

Tahun 2007, Rand menerbitkan lagi dokumen Building Moderate Muslim Networks, yang juga didanai oleh Smith Foundation. Dokumen terakhir ini memuat langkah-langkah membangun Jaringan Muslim Moderat pro-Barat di seluruh dunia. Baik Rand maupun Smith Foundation, keduanya adalah lembaga berafiliasi Zionisme Internasional dimana para personelnya merupakan bagian dari Freemasonry-Illuminati, sekte Yahudi berkitab Talmud.

Gerakan tersebut memakai sebutan “Komunitas Internasional” mengganti istilah Zionisme Internasional. Maksudnya selain menyamar, atau untuk mengaburkan, juga dalam rangka memanipulasi kelompok negara non Barat dan non Muslim lain. Pada gilirannya, kedua dokumen tadi diadopsi oleh Pentagon dan Departemen Luar Negeri sebagai basis kebijakan Pemerintah AS di berbagai belahan dunia.

Berikut ialah inti resume dari Agenda dan Strategi Pecah Belah yang termuat pada kedua dokumen tersebut, antara lain:

Pertama, Komunitas Internasional menilai bahwa Dunia Islam berada dalam frustasi dan kemarahan, akibat periode keterbelakangan yang lama dan ketidak-berdayaan komparatif serta kegagalan mencari solusi dalam menghadapi kebudayaan global kontemporer;

Kedua, Komunitas Internasional menilai bahwa upaya umat Islam untuk kembali kepada kemurnian ajaran adalah suatu ancaman bagi peradaban dunia modern dan bisa mengantarkan kepada Clash of Civilization (Benturan Peradaban);

Ketiga, Komunitas Internasional menginginkan Dunia Islam yang ramah terhadap demokrasi dan modernitas serta mematuhi aturan-aturan internasional untuk menciptakan perdamaian global;

Keempat, Komunitas Internasional perlu melakukan pemetaan kekuatan dan pemilahan kelompok Islam untuk mengetahui siapa kawan dan lawan, serta pengaturan strategi dengan pengolahan sumber daya yang ada di Dunia Islam;

Kelima, Komunitas Internasional mesti mempertimbangkan dengan sangat hati-hati terhadap elemen, kecenderungan, dan kekuatan-kekuatan mana di tubuh Islam yang ingin diperkuat; apa sasaran dan nilai-nilai persekutuan potensial yang berbeda; siapa akan dijadikan anak didik; konsekuensi logis seperti apa yang akan terlihat ketika memperluas agenda masing-masing; dan termasuk resiko mengancam, atau mencemari kelompok, atau orang-orang yang sedang dibantu oleh AS dan sekutunya;

Keenam, Komunitas Internasional membagi Umat Islam ke dalam Empat Kelompok, yaitu:

(1) Fundamentalis: kelompok masyarakat Islam yang menolak nilai-nilai demokrasi dan kebudayaan Barat Kontemporer, serta menginginkan formalisasi penerapan Syariat Islam;

(2) Tradisionalis: kelompok masyarakat Islam Konservatif yang mencurigai modernitas, inovasi dan perubahan. Mereka berpegang kepada substansi ajaran Islam tanpa peduli kepada formalisasinya;

(3) Modernis: kelompok masyarakat Islam Modern yang ingin reformasi Islam agar sesuai dengan tuntutan zaman, sehingga bisa menjadi bagian dari modernitas;

(4) Sekularis: kelompok masyarakat Islam Sekuler yang ingin menjadikan Islam sebagai urusan privasi dan dipisah sama sekali dari urusan negara.

Ketujuh, Komunitas Internasional menetapkan strategi terhadap tiap-tiap kelompok, sebagai berikut:

1) Mengkonfrontir dan menentang kaum fundamentalis dengan tata cara sebagai berikut: (a) menentang tafsir mereka atas Islam dan menunjukkan ketidak-akuratannya; (b) mengungkap keterkaitan mereka dengan kelompok-kelompok dan aktivitas-aktivitas illegal; (c) mengumumkan konsekuensi dari tindak kekerasan yang mereka lakukan; (d) menunjukkan ketidak-mampuan mereka untuk memerintah; (e) memperlihatkan ketidak-berdayaan mereka mendapatkan perkembangan positif atas negara mereka dan komunitas mereka; (f) mengamanatkan pesan-pesan tersebut kepada kaum muda, masyarakat tradisionalis yang alim, kepada minoritas kaum muslimin di Barat, dan kepada wanita; (g) mencegah menunjukkan rasa hormat dan pujian akan perbuatan kekerasan kaum fundamentalis, ekstrimis dan teroris; (h) kucilkan mereka sebagai pengganggu dan pengecut, bukan sebagai pahlawan; (i) mendorong para wartawan untuk memeriksa isu-isu korupsi, kemunafikan, dan tak bermoralnya lingkaran kaum fundamentalis dan kaum teroris; (j) mendorong perpecahan antara kaum fundamentalis.

2) Beberapa aksi Barat memojokkan kaum fundamentalis adalah dengan menyimpangankan tafsir Al-Qur’an, contoh: mengharaman poligami pada satu sisi, namun menghalalkan perkawinan sejenis di sisi lain; mengulang-ulang tayangan aksi-aksi umat Islam yang mengandung kekerasan di televisi, sedang kegiatan konstruktif tidak ditayangkan; kemudian “mengeroyok” dan menyerang argumen narasumber dari kaum fundamentalis dengan format dialog 3 lawan 1 dan lainnya; lalu mempidana para aktivis Islam dengan tuduhan teroris atau pelaku kekerasan dan lain-lain.

3) Mendorong kaum tradisionalis untuk melawan fundamentalis, dengan cara: (a) dalam Islam tradisional ortodoks banyak elemen demokrasi yang bisa digunakan counter menghadapi Islam fundamentalis yang represif lagi otoriter; (b) menerbitkan kritik-kritik kaum tradisionalis atas kekerasan dan ekstrimisme yang dilakukan kaum fundamentalis; (c) memperlebar perbedaan antara kaum tradisionalis dan fundamentalis; (d) mencegah aliansi kaum tradisionalis dan fundamentalis; (e) mendorong kerja sama agar kaum tradisionalis lebih dekat dengan kaum modernis; (f) jika memungkinkan, kaum tradisionalis dididik untuk mempersiapkan diri agar mampu berdebat dengan kaum fundamentalis, karena kaum fundamentalis secara retorika sering lebih superior, sementara kaum tradisionalis melakukan praktek politik “Islam pinggiran” yang kabur; (g) di wilayah seperti di Asia Tengah, perlu dididik dan dilatih tentang Islam ortodoks agar mampu mempertahankan pandangan mereka; (h) melakukan diskriminasi antara sektor-sektor tradisionalisme berbeda; (i) memperuncing khilafiyah yaitu perbedaan antar madzhab dalam Islam, seperti Sunni – Syiah, Hanafi – Hambali, Wahabi – Sufi, dll; (j) mendorong kaum tradisionalis agar tertarik pada modernisme, inovasi dan perubahan; (k) mendorong mereka untuk membuat isu opini-opini agama dan mempopulerkan hal itu untuk memperlemah otoritas penguasa yang terinspirasi oleh paham fundamentalis; (l) Mendorong popularitas dan penerimaan atas sufisme;

4) Mendukung sepenuhnya kaum modernis, dengan jalan: (a) menerbitkan dan mengedarkan karya-karya mereka dengan biaya yang disubsidi; (b) mendorong mereka untuk menulis bagi audiens massa dan bagi kaum muda; (c) memperkenalkan pandangan-pandangan mereka dalam kurikulum pendidikan Islam; (d) memberikan mereka suatu platform publik; (e) menyediakan bagi mereka opini dan penilaian pada pertanyaan-pertanyaan yang fundamental dari interpretasi agama bagi audiensi massa dalam persaingan mereka dengan kaum fundamentalis dan tradisionalis, yang memiliki Web Sites, dengan menerbitkan dan menyebarkan pandangan-pandangan mereka dari rumah-rumah, sekolahan, lembaga-lembaga dan sarana lainnya; (f) memposisikan sekularisme dan modernisme sebagai sebuah pilihan “counter culture” kaum muda Islam yang tidak puas; (g) memfasilitasi dan mendorong kesadaran akan sejarah pra-Islam dan non-Islam dan budayanya, di media dan di kurikulum dari negara-negara yang relevan; (h) membantu dalam membangun organisasi-organisasi sipil independen, untuk mempromosikan kebudayaan sipil (civic culture) dan memberikan ruang bagi rakyat biasa untuk mendidik diri sendiri mengenai proses politik dan mengutarakan pandangan-pandangan mereka.

Beberapa bukti tindakan program ini misalnya mengubah kurikulum pendidikan di pesantren-pesantren dengan biaya dari Barat, kemudian menghembuskan dogma “Time is Money – dengan pengeluaran sekecil-kecilnya menghasilkan pendapatan sebesar-besarnya”.

5) Tempo doeloe, pernah dalam mata pelajaran PMP dtampilkan gambar rumah ibadah masing-masing agama dengan tulisan dibawahnya: “semua agama sama”.

Mendirikan berbagai LSM yang bergerak dibidang kajian filsafat Islam, menyebar artikel dan tulisan produk LSM yang dibiayai Amerika. Intinya menyimpulkan bahwa semua agama adalah hasil karya manusia dan merupakan peradaban manusia. Tujuannya tak lain guna menggoyah keyakinan beragama, termasuk mendanai beberapa web site di dunia maya dan lainnya.

6) Mendukung secara selektif kaum sekularis, dengan cara: (a) mendorong pengakuan fundamentalisme sebagai musuh bersama; (b) mematahkan aliansi dengan kekuatan-kekuatan anti Amerika berdasarkan hal-hal seperti nasionalisme dan ideologi kiri; (c) mendorong ide bahwa dalam Islam, agama dan negara dapat dipisahkan dan hal ini tidak membahayakan keimanan tetapi malah akan memperkuat.

7) Untuk menjalankan Building Moderate Muslim Networks, AS dan sekutu menyediakan dana bagi individu dan lembaga-lembaga seperti LSM, pusat kajian di beberapa universitas Islam maupun universitas umum lain, serta membangun jaringan antar komponen untuk memenuhi tujuan-tujuan AS. Contoh keberhasilan membangun jaringan ini ketika mensponsori Kongres Kebebasan Budaya (Conggress of Cultural Freedom), dimana pertemuan ini berhasil membangun komitmen antar elemen membentuk jaringan anti komunis.

Hal serupa juga dilakukan dalam rangka membangun jaringan anti Islam. Kemudian membangun kredibilitas semu aktivis-aktivis liberal pro-Barat, demi tercapai tujuan utama memusuhi Islam secara total. Bahkan apabila perlu, sikap tidak setuju atas kebijakan AS sesekali diperlihatkan para aktivisnya seolah-olah independen, padahal hanya tampil pura-pura saja.

AS dan sekutu sadar, bahwa ia tengah terlibat dalam suatu peperangan total baik fisik (dengan senjata) maupun ide. Ia ingin memenangkan perang dengan cara: “ketika ideologi kaum ekstrimis tercemar di mata penduduk tempat asal ideologi itu dan di mata pendukung pasifnya”.

Ini jelas tujuan dalam rangka menjauhkan Islam dari umatnya. Muaranya adalah membuat orang Islam supaya tak berperilaku lazimnya seorang muslim.

Pembangunan jaringan muslim moderat ini dilakukan melalui tiga level, yaitu: (a) menyokong jaringan-jaringan yang telah ada; (b) identifikasi jaringan dan gencar mempromosi kemunculan serta pertumbuhannya; (c) memberikan kontribusi untuk membangun situasi dan kondisi bagi berkembangnya sikap toleran dan faham pluralisme.

Sebagai pelaksana proyek, Departemen Luar Negeri AS dan USAID telah memiliki mandat dan menunjuk kontraktor pelaksana penyalurkan dana dan berhubungan dengan berbagai LSM, dan para individu di negeri-negeri muslim yaitu National Endowment for Democracy (NED), The International Republican Institute (IRI) The National Democratic Institute (NDI), The Asia Foundation (TAF), dan The Center for Study of Islam and Democracy (CSID).

Pada fase pertama, membentuk jaringan muslim moderat difokuskan pada organisasi bawah tanah, dan kemudian setelah melalui penilaian AS selaku donatur, ia bisa ditingkatkan menjadi jaringan terbuka.

Adapun kelompok-kelompok yang dijadikan sasaran perekrutan dan anak didik adalah : (a) akademisi dan intelektual muslim liberal dan sekuler; (b) cendikiawan muda muslim yang moderat; (c) kalangan aktivis komunitas; (d) koalisi dan kelompok perempuan yang mengkampanye kesetaraan gender; (e) penulis dan jurnalis moderat.

Para pejabat Kedutaan Amerika di negeri-negeri muslim harus memastikan bahwa kelompok ini terlibat, dan sesering mungkin melakukan kunjungan ke Paman Sam. Adapun prioritas pembangunan jaringan untuk muslim moderat ini diletakkan pada sektor: (a) Pendidikan Demokrasi. Yaitu dengan mencari pembenaran nash dan sumber-sumber Islam terhadap demokrasi dan segala sistemnya; (b) dukungan oleh media massa melakukan liberalisasi pemikiran, kesetaraan gender dan lainnya — yang merupakan “medan tempur” dalam perang pemikiran melawan Islam; (c) Advokasi Kebijakan. Hal ini untuk mencegah agenda politik kelompok Islam.

AS dan sekutu sadar bahwa ide-ide radikal berasal dari Timur Tengah dan perlu dilakukan “arus balik” yaitu menyebarkan ide dan pemikiran dari para intelektual moderat dan modernis yang telah berhasil dicuci otak dan setuju westernisasi yang bukan berasal dari Timur Tengah, seperti Indonesia dan lainnya. Tulisan dan pemikiran moderat dari kalangan di luar Timur Tengah harus segera diterjemahkan ke dalam bahasa Arab, kemudian disebarkan di kawasan Timur Tengah.

Agaknya inilah jawaban, kenapa Indonesia seringkali dijadikan pertemuan para cendikiawan dan intelektual muslim dari berbagai negara yang disponsori AS dan negara Barat lain. Banyak produk baik tulisan maupun film diproduksi “Intelektual Islam Indonesia”, kemudian disebarkan dan diterjemahkan dalam bahasa Arab. Semua bantuan dana dan dukungan politik ini tujuannya guna memecah-belah umat Islam.

Seperti berkembang banyak LSM memproduk materi-materi dakwah atau fatwa namun isinya justru “menjerumuskan” Islam, termasuk munculnya banyak tokoh liberal sebagai opinion maker di tengah masyarakat, merupakan isyarat bahwa konspirasi menghancur Islam itu ada, nyata dan berada (existance). Yang paling memprihatinkan, justru jurus pecah belah dilakukan menggunakan tangan-tangan (internal) kaum muslim itu sendiri di negara tempat mereka lahir, tumbuh dan dibesarkan, sedang mereka “tak menyadari” telah menjadi pengkhianat bagi bangsa, negara dan agamanya!

[libertariantaoist]

News Roundup 11/9/2023 | The Libertarian Institute

Here is your daily roundup of today's news:

News Roundup 11/9/2023

by Kyle Anzalone

Russia

Ukraine’s CIA-backed military intelligence has taken credit for a car bombing that killed a politician in Russian-controlled eastern Ukraine on Wednesday. AWC

Officials from the State Department and USAID pressed Congress to pass a $105 billion spending package that will provide weapons to Ukraine and Israel. One Biden administration official said it was crucial to provide aid to Kiev because “The besieged people of Ukraine are …fighting for basic needs, such as food, water, medicine, and electricity.” The Institute 

Russian official says Moscow will continue to abide by Nuclear test ban agreement. TASSX

Senator Rand Paul slams the State Department over Ukraine policy. RSX

China

The Philippine government has said it’s working on a pact to strengthen military ties with Japan amid rising tensions in the region, Defense Post reported on Wednesday. AWC

Israel

Blinken says the US supports a Palestinian-led government in Gaza after military operation. FTAWC

Pentagon Press Secretary Air Force Brigadier General Pat Ryder expalined Washington’s four objective in the Middle East. The Institute

UN Secretary-General António Guterres says there is clearly something wrong with Israeli military tactics. Politico

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said late Tuesday that Israeli forces were fighting in the “heart” of Gaza City as Hamas is claiming its fighters are inflicting heavy losses on the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF). AWC

Barbara Leaf, assistant secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs, tells Congress the death toll in Gaza is likely higher than reported. The HillXAWC

Israel’s Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich demanded Tel Aviv impose security zones around illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank on Monday. The Institute 

Middle East

The Pentagon said on Wednesday night that the US launched more airstrikes in eastern Syria that targeted a facility used by “Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and affiliated groups.” AWC

Yemen’s Houthis said Wednesday that their military successfully downed a US MQ-9 Reaper drone that was flying off the coast of Yemen. AWC

[Read More](https://libertarianinstitute.org/news-roundup/news-roundup-11-9-2023/

[trashlie]

awwww ashlie you're so sweet 😭💗 i missed talking to u too :3 thank you for always indulging me with your long and in-depth replies! ~

yeah you're right about the ceo shinae thing. the idea briefly jumped into my mind, and i thought it would be interesting in context of yui being denied the position because she's a woman, to see a woman ultimately get it. but yeah on top of it being unrealistic plot-wise, girlboss megacorp ceo is a questionable conclusion for her character. let's scratch that ~

either way the ceo-question will remain relevant for the story because i doubt hirahara corp will fall… and i think ideally it should be someone with the right motivations. to defy yui/take the company from her/to get revenge/out of spite wouldn't be good enough reason because… then what? tbh what i can see happen is that someone reforms the company or at least makes sure these cycles of power abuse don't repeat. it wouldn't solve everything obviously since it's a systematic issue, the problem is ✨capitalism✨ etc etc but it'd be at least something. and between kousuke and nol, i think kou would suit this task more (given he manages to break free from yui), maybe even as a way to redeem himself and "repair" his family reputation. at least this would give him more agency and a better motivation to lead the company than rand's love. it would also tie in with what you said about following the path yui intended, but to turn around and defy her. nol really is a big question mark when it comes to the future plot. yu jing's article will likely spark change in him, but in what way exactly is still unclear. gosh all this is making me so excited for season two and where everyone will be in a couple of years i'm vibrating at a frequency that could shatter glass thinking about it ahhhh!!!!

no no i hear ya! and i refuse to give up hope on the brothers ok i refuse to! ;A; yes the fight was real bad but i don't think all is lost. tbh i think nol could've cut off kousuke and stopped caring about him long ago and the fact that he didn't - despite everything he's endured from him for years - gives me hope that nol would be willing to give kou another chance. and gosh if they bond over "my life is hell because of this woman" or having a common enemy, or if shin has to force them into the "get along shirt", then so be it. 🫠 btw kousuke has tried to ask about nol 4 (four) times (yes i counted) so far since the fight and i know the crumbs are microscopic but i'm crouching over them like a dragon over its treasure ;A; do you think they'll meet during the three days we have left… would kou visit nol in the hospital even if just for a minute? if he comes with the right intentions (actually worrying about his well-being, NOT rand) i think it'd be a good first step. but maybe that's too much to ask… 🥲

agree with everything u said on shipping, romance etc <3 i'm not that big on shipping tbh so i always find it interesting what other people - especially people as sensible as you - have to say about it 🥰

"Acting like it's a cardinal sin for Nol to have inadvertently developed feelings is so afljkakfjjkaf?" THIS THO. honestly, people exaggerate the "wingman" thing so much… it's not like he signed a contract or something?! :/ yeah it would absolutely suck to be dieter, but what are shinae and nol supposed to do now? deny their feelings for each other because oh no poor dieter? how would that be good for anyone :<

"She's never really seemed to like things coming to her easy has she" this is actually so interesting. right, her life is already so tough, no one could blame her for choosing the "easier" path or for being like "sorry i can't do this" re: nol. but instead, she's actively throwing herself into this turbulent sea. it's admirable how committed to the role reversal she is (and obviously it's what driving their dynamic forward at the moment).

and while i enjoy how they intuitively get each other on a deeper emotional level, i LOVE that it's not all there is to them. it's true that it's an important additional layer that other pairings don't have, but even without it, they have that easy chemistry, the friendly banter, compatible personalities, similar values... the gradual friendship buildup was not based on their trauma at all (shin was completely clueless). it helps make it less, well, trauma bond-y lol. and it gives us a little "taster" of what this ship could be like too once they're both in a better place ~ it just bothers me when people are like "all nol does is hurting her how is this romantic" and yes he is hurting her and it's an issue, and no one says this particular detail is romantic! but to claim that that's all he does or that it's always going to be like this is just... silly :< maybe it's because of the way nol has been lately (really going through it) - and by lately i mean like the last 80 chapters or so lmao - that some people forget all the positive things he's done - and is still capable of doing - for shinae. like he was the one who made her open up to people again, sparked this character growth in her which improved her other relationships (like with her father, rika, maya, minhyuk), was her emotional support when she was at her lowest (at the formal), had her back at the office, he metaphorically and literally saved her from drowning! shinae even describes him as the sunshine in her rainy life. speaking of which, that entire segment was actually so funny fgshdjk shinae was like "today is about minhyuk! 😊" and meanwhile nol lives in her head rent-free all day 😭 minhyuk: "so maya and m-" shin: "have i ever told u what yeonggi was like? he appeared and suddenly everything was much more vibrant" minhyuk: "🤨?" like girl at this point just write him a love letter 😭

thinking about them makes me hope we switch back to shinae and nol soon... let's manifest it :> the kousuke/hansuke/yujing/yui side of things is also very fun, but leaving us at the shinae/nana cliffhanger was just illegal! ;A; ah now i'm just rambling. you really don't have to respond to all of this! ;; @ ashlie's followers i'm sorry for clogging y'alls dashes again! byeee have a good day/night mwah <3

- lil anon 😼

No apologies never apologize!!!! I always assume my followers really like our conversations anyway, because they tend to get a little handful of likes depending on the topic and the tangents we end up going on lmao but AAHHHH yessss look at us, two back to back messages and replies in two days?! Love this for us!!!!! One of the funnest things about replying to you is I feel like we really play off of each other's energy and you come to me brimming with all sorts of fun thoughts and I'm like OH MY GOSH LEMME RUN WITH THIIISSSSS!!!!!

This response touches on some more spoilery things from the last FP episodes so if you don't FP, there will be spoilers!

From a narrative point, I DO love the concept of CEO Shinae in how she is the antithesis of Yui! But a belief I've been hanging on to lately is that where Yui is shadow and darkness, dragging people down into her little pits of nightmare, blinding them to anything but their own struggles and strife, Shinae is the light that illuminates and guides the way. So even if becoming CEO is really not in the cards for her, I think we still get a similar narrative effect in her being able to assist someone else, in being able to shed light on what Yui cloaks in darkness. The conflict at the core of the story is so complex and layered, but I think Shinae as an illuminator strongly benefits team black.

Fortunately we see that Kousuke is starting to peek out from under his blindfold right now, but I'm really worried for how he's going to cope with the fall out - if he comes to the realization that it's true, Nol was never the violent one the way he's been made to believe (and to deeply internalize that belief!) then how will that affect him? All the guilt it will leave him with for how he treated Nol, for the way not only has he viewed him but what he's told others of Nol? That, paired with what he's already realized, that he hurt an innocent kid for no reason, he tore him down and made his life hell and refused to let him ever get ahead, ever have a moment of peace, has GOT to be heavy. And it doesn't even touch on what it means for him that he can't even trust his own mother, that everything she's ever said to him or made him belief, every way she's ever shaped his worldview may in fact be wrong.

Would Shinae be able to help future Kousuke to cope and handle that? Not like, emotional labor help but her unique way of bringing light to a situation that helps them see something else. I mean obviously Kousuke is gonna lmao need some therapy or SOMETHING but I wonder if Shinae would be able to help illuminate for Kousuke that despite everything he's done, he CAN change, he can take agency of his own life, and he can work to bring good where he and his mother have brought bad.

I think, yeah, that's a really good concept about Kousuke being CEO. I know ultimately we'd all like to see Kousuke do what he wants to, be what he wants, find something that brings him joy and passion. It's clear he's good at family business, even if he lacks the personability that Rand and Nol possess. But it always feels like he's trying to tell himself that this is what he wants because deep down he knows it's not, because deep down it doesn't bring him joy. That said, it could be that this is the case because despite all his successes, he wasn't earning the pay off he expected. No matter how smart or good or successful he was, Rand didn't give him the attention - the affection - he sought. So if he took ownership of the company with the explicit reason to keep it out of the hands of Yui, to try to make changes to offset what the the Hirahara family had done, could that give him the passion he needs?

On the one hand, it almost sounds suffocating and smothering. I love the thought of double-agent Kousuke, secretly working with team black to realign the power of the company right under Yui's nose, but also I worry what dealing with her will be like for him when he really starts to grapple with the way she's treated, whenever he finds out she's drugging him, whenever it finally clicks to him that she's never treated him with care. To have to work with her and pretend he's on her side, to pretend he doesn't know all of the things he knows. It sounds so awful and unbearable. But if he truly wants to try to fix things in whatever way he's able to, perhaps it would be worth it.

Cos you're right, I don't think it would necessarily fall, either. Depending on what comes out of Yujing's expose, it could harm their name, but it wouldn't dismantle them in the least. The problem remains that those with money and influence rarely deal with the ramifications of what they do, rarely are punished. They exploit others, take advantage of them, often pointedly mess with peoples' lives and after those people are rendered broken, traumatized, they carry on like nothing is wrong. I think that could be a direction the story would go - that it's difficult to dismantle corrupted power, but if Kousuke could divert the corruption, if he could steer the company in a more ethical direction, gut the corrupt from the ladders of power? I like that idea! I think a lot about where I think this is going to go, because while I'm sure Yujing's expose WILL have some kind of effect, the fact that the story is going to reconvene some years after the effect still means that the story isn't over, the conflict still exists. Yui is SO powerful, and the corruption of the affluent is too prevalent for peace to come easily.

I really like the idea that this could be a solid way for Kousuke to redeem himself and the family name, too. I don't deny that he still has negative traits despite his circumstances. He has believed himself above others, as much as he thinks he's trying to emulate the perfect gentleman Rand believes in Kousuke is still lmao pretty rude and cold. But I think earnestly working to undo what his mother has done, to make up for what she's done would be a really wonderful path for his story. I don't expect Kousuke's personality to change very much, but I think watching him make effort, to try to make up for the terrible things his family has done would be really satisfying. Something Shinae has noted about him is that he's very clearly out of touch with reality lmao, he has very little experience with people outside of his socioeconomic stratosphere, but perhaps his "redemption" arc could include him spending time with the people he was always kept separate from, learning to be a better CEO the way Rand has, but for his own motivation, not for Rand's love. I love that, actually? Who would be better for that role, to remold his lifelong dream and make it for himself, find a way to actually love and care about what he does, for it to be fulfilling for him? aaaaahhhhhh! Also!!!! Back to the point I was getting at lmaooo for all his negative traits, Kousuke is NOT his mother. He may have adopted some of her habits and that will be something he'll have to address and deal with in the future. But we've seen that Kousuke is not the sum of his family. For him to acknowledge how horrible Yui is, the track record of the Kims, the ways people have been hurt and decide to make up for it all, to undo what he can, to actually adhere to moral codes? idk I wanna see that so badly! He's not a lost cause, but he IS lost.

Also I absolutely feel Yujing's expose will be THE spark for Nol. Right now I think he just wants to get away, to be free of Kousuke and Rand and Yui, to go away and find peace. He's still haunted by the guilt he feels about what happened to his mom, still strongly believes that it's because of him, that he caused this, that the bad things happen because of him. But if learns what readers believe, that Yui was behind Nessa's death, that it may not have been a suicide at all? My GOD that changes EVERYTHING for Nol. I don't think it would immediately free him from the guilt he feels, since it's so deeply ingrained in him, but I think it could change enough. For now his goal is to escape, but taking down Yui could be the reason he comes back/remains in the future. Seeing her pay for her crimes could be enough to make him work with the people he wants to escape from. But also I do hope it would help him to process his feelings about his mom, to embrace that he was not the monster he's been made to feel, that the things that happened were so beyond his grasp, and maybe help him to build/foster healthy relationships. To allow himself to be cared about ;A; aaaahhhh feelings!

Also I feel you SO MUCH on that hope!!!! I think Nol kept trying for so long - even up to the night of his hearing - because he so badly wanted Kousuke to be that person, wanted him to forget about father and instead be a team with him. Nol has never had those expectations about Rand that Kousuke did, so it was easier for him to see that, as far as they're concerned, that version of Rand doesn't exist. Instead he sought out the only person who shared commonality with him. I think if Kousuke turns around and shows some of that same persistence with Nol, it would help get through to him. Forgiveness would be difficult and if it never happened, I would fully understand. But I like to hope that a Nol who has grown up a little more and has removed himself a bit could see why Kousuke, being drugged by his mom and having his entire perception of reality warped, would have been so impossible to reach. The shared experience of having their lives made miserable by Yui and wanting to make her pay for what she's done for others and more importantly, wanting to dismantle her ability to further harm others, would be a great starting point. But I just cannot help but hope that from teaming up like that, Nol could find some understanding for him.

A moment I think about a lot LMAO is the episode when Shinae called Rand hot in front of Kousuke and Nol, and while she was in the bathroom changing, Nol was just lmao harping on it and it felt like the closest we've ever seen Kousuke and Nol to being brothers. To getting along. I just!!!! IDK like you I'm hovering over these little crumbs, hoarding them away and just WAITING. I used to think I'd be content with peace, because they desperately need it but.... now I can't help but want a little more. Nol deserves the brother he wanted so badly and Kousuke deserves to know that someone cared about him, even if he shoved him away. There's a lot to work on and I don't think any of it comes easily but, yessss I desperately hope!

(Also fun fact LMAO I, too, have talked about the get along shirt and alfjafjkjkafjf a really sweet fanartist in the ILY Discord server has put it on her list of things to draw!!!!!! PLEASE I so badly want to see Nol and Kousuke in the get along shirt!!!!!!!!)

do you think they'll meet during the three days we have left… would kou visit nol in the hospital even if just for a minute? if he comes with the right intentions (actually worrying about his well-being, NOT rand) i think it'd be a good first step.

A theory I've been seeing a lot of people talk about is that Kousuke might end up at the same hospital as Nol to get checked out. Hansuke is concerned about his hormonal balance and wants to get him a head CT. I'm hoping that Kousuke's suspicious feelings about Yui might lead him to a different doctor - does Hansuke's friend work at Hirahara Memorial? Or might Kousuke inadvertantly wind up at the same hospital as Nol? See Nana or Shinae or even later Dieter and Soushi in the waiting room and realize that it must mean that Nol is here and go on a search? Like, I'm really holding out for something like that, too. Kousuke is concerned - no matter what happened during the night, his concern didn't change. I had been so worried that Rand's presence would undo all of the progress Kousuke made, the realizations he came to, but I think yeah this is a GOOD sign. Even when Yui tries to refute his concern, he remains CONCERNED. (And without quite realizing it yet, he's connected that Nol hates tea and now he is being haunted by it....????)

PLS GIVE US OUR CRUMBS Nol's got a 3 day extension, maybe he could show that concern in a healthy, earnest way for once ;A;

it's admirable how committed to the role reversal she is (and obviously it's what driving their dynamic forward at the moment).

Oh my gosh RIGHT? That's the thing, too, about Nol hurting Shinae at this stage. It's so clear that Shinae is committed, even if she doesn't understand WHY. Even if she hasn't really accepted just what his importance to her is, what he means to her. Even though he's hurt her, she's SO committed. She wants to get through to him - and she wants to see him. The real him, not his mask. She wants to see what he hides and she wants to be privy to who he is.

But YES what really makes episodes 215 through 219 SO special is exactly that - getting to see just who they are together. The banter, the way they play off each other, his dumb jokes and how she pretends to hate it but we can see that she enjoys it, the little looks?! It's that he can feel at peace even in a hospital because she's there, because she can make him laugh, because she can chase away the danger because it's her! It's the way she lit up with joy while they danced, even if that moment hurts SO MUCH, because of how much fun she was having, how much she enjoyed it! It's how she brought in their friends to give him the most special birthday ever, by showing him how much they care about hm. It was such a small thing, calling them, the origami ducks, the paper hats, but it means SO MUCH.

The way they interact is just SO!!! GOOD!!!! One of my favorite moments is after he sneezed on her and she's just like DISGUSTING!!!!!! and that whole conversation about why Lil Buddy is even there lmaooooo idk why but it's SO FUNNY seeing them like that, the dumb faces, calling each other out lmao I've missed it so much, and even though Nol is struggling with accepting peoples' care and being loved, I really look forward to when we get to see them like that again - bantering and the playful bickering and that chemistry of how they play right off each other.

I LOSE IT EVERY TIME LMAO SHINAE BABE WHY ARE YOU LIKE THIS?!

but to claim that that's all he does or that it's always going to be like this is just... silly :< maybe it's because of the way nol has been lately (really going through it) - and by lately i mean like the last 80 chapters or so lmao - that some people forget all the positive things he's done - and is still capable of doing - for shinae.

And that's the thing, too, right - like okay first off, when you start liking someone it's not like a whole.... here's a weighted list of good things vs bad things. It's that for her, at this time, what he does clearly has outweighed the ways he's hurt her. It's that what he means is rooted in far more than the right now, the pain. But also, that's the other thing - NO RELATIONSHIP IS PERFECT. People hurt each other, all the time. Minhyuk hurt Shinae even when his very intentions were the opposite. Shinae has hurt Dieter without meaning to. It's how you work through it, how you make up for it, how you get over it that matters more. Nol seemed to really regret pushing Shinae this time - he expected her to be angry or upset, but he didn't expect her to actually leave, and he's so concerned about her! Even though his whole thing is that he isn't supposed to care he can't help caring, asking Dieter about her, wringing her headband in his hands. Like, call me a hopeful optimist but I think we WILL get to see Nol and Shinae again before he goes off to prison. There's no way they're ending on this note - firstly because from a narrative point it would defeat the whole point of the previous reunion at the Parks and would leave us right where we started, but also because I think we might get to see Nol make the first step. I think maybe Shinae will come back - even if just to retrieve her headband lmao - and hopefully Nol will use that moment to apologize, to acknowledge he hurt her and maybe, hopefully lmao admit that's not what he wants to do? alfjakjfkjafjfa lmao like

idk yeah I get why on the one hand, even if you don't ship Stalkyoo there are people who want Nol and Alyssa to break up - because she keeps hurting him without repent, and seemingly without caring much if she does, or at least not in a way she acknowledges. I bring this up to say I think that's the difference - Nol feels regret for what he's doing and I'm really hopeful we'll see him take responsibility. And that's why it doesn't bother me to continue to ship it - because if he actually takes action, if he wants to do better (even if he won't at this time admit his feelings) that's what matters.

But also yeah the trauma bond is like.... I like to joke about it because what happened at the formal WAS a whole nightmare, but it's really clear that Shinae had been changing how she thinks of Nol even before he was her place of comfort and security at the formal. She felt bad when she thought she was too harsh on him during her break! How far she'd come from cleanly, bluntly rejecting Dieter because it's better to be firm to caring about when she hurts people, caring if she goes too far. It's not that the trauma of what happened at the formal is WHY she came to care about him otherwise wouldn't she feel closer to Kousuke? Like, yeah obviously the trauma brought Shinae closer to Nol, but it was the other things he did, too - getting her away from Alyssa when it was clear she was uncomfortable, retrieving her jacket for her during her dance with Kousuke, the whole going out of his way to make her more comfortable during the dance.

Reducing their relationship to trauma bonding denies the actual friendship development that's occurred as a result of each other caring - of Shinae picking up on the details no one else notices, the way he got her to open up more about her home life, calling him when she was so concerned that what everyone on tv and online was saying about him would be making him feel bad, comforting her even when he's trying to avoid her, the whole fucking scene at the wac lmao

Like, I'm not saying this to make people ship them, but just to note that trying to act like they are merely the result of a traumatic night and that they wouldn't have developed as friends otherwise is unfair. Acting like their entire relationship is just unhealthy trauma bonding instead of acknowledging the genuine reasons they've grown closer to each other and come to rely on each other is unfair. At least give their relationship the credit it deserves for how it's bloomed in the midst of all the cracks ;A;

Also yeah Shiane just write him a love letter why don't you lafjkfkjfjfakjjaf that whole part is just SO GOOD? lmao Shinae monologuing and Minhyuk's just like dude i know i wanted you to open up more but idk what to do with this way to hijack the night without trying Nol lmao Nol's whole SOLILOQUY TO A CAT WHO HATED HIM lmao it's just SO GOOD lmao they're both so dumb and I love them for it!!!!!

I AM very much looking forward to learning more about Kousuke's blood results and uhhhh YO YUI ARE YOU GONNA MURDER IN A CHURCH OR..... but teasing the whole Nana and Shinae thing alkfjajkfkjf at the back of my mind as my heart rate spikes with these updates I'm like NANA AND SHINAE ARE GONNA MEET!!!!!!! I think that is what will prompt us to go back to Nol and Shinae - I think Nana is gonna shed a little light that will make Shinae feel better about her resolve to get through to Nol - and maybe even a lil hint nudge wink that you're more important than you think aflkjkafkafjafjk A GIRL CAN DREAM OKAY!!!!!!!! But listen I just can't help but feel Nol's extended stay has to result in making peace with Shinae. There is now way we are moving into a time skip with Nol's walls all the way up!

GOSH lmao I just had a look at how long this post has turned out alfjakjfajkfjk BUT I LOVE RAMBLING WITH YOU I always enjoy your messages so no apologies for this wall of text! No tl;dr we just read it all!!!!! lmao