#Role of literacy

[fairy-bard]

i’ve been loving watching critical role recently if for no other reason than because i get to watch a decent portion of viewers actively falling for cult tactics lmao

a forbes article describes cult tactics as when cult leaders “censor dissenting viewpoints, promote a distorted narrative and use relentless repetition and peer pressure”

ludinus needing to monologue at everyone he meets. cherry picking what information to let people know (ie the orb). showing popular world leaders (gods?) at their absolute worst as a means to win over the vulnerable. creating dissent between cult prospects and the people who they’re close to outside the cult. doesn’t take no for an answer. repeating his points over and over, in whatever context he thinks will be most persuasive. targeting people who’ve lost everything. convincing people that they’re special

matt is a genius.

[shorthaltsjester]

me when the campaign with characters i’ve praised for being essentially pawns/npcs in the greater world is ending by underserving the main characters by [checks notes] highlighting the role those characters have played as quasi-npcs who are nonetheless still the narrators of their destinies within the limits of a world beyond their control

[itsjustlikefallingsnow]

the phrase “has done nothing wrong ever” and it’s various siblings have done irreparable damage to fanon interpretation of morally alright characters . what do you mean she throws up over seeing blood. i saw her kill a man

[alliekitaguchi]

the astronomical reaching i’ve seen from some critters across all platforms is insane, and i would like to gently post this so some of those folks can rethink their “orym forced laudna to feed delilah” stances

[essektheylyss]

They should hold an official Calamity marathon rewatch. Just for funsies. I think we would all benefit as a fandom.

[ophanstears]

🍀

I know that Clover's gender is up to interpretation (the devs DID say so themselves) but I still feel weird when people make them exclusively male or female LOL Like it's TECHNICALLY fine??? but it leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

more in tags as usual because I am a yapper. i am so sorry for having strong opinions about gender and representation. i am usually more fun than this 🥲🥲🥲🥲

[annemarieyeretzian]

orym stating “and I’m telling you, if ludinus had sent people to your home and taken your brother and your father and countless others, how philosophical would you be about it, dorian? he’s done that on a very large scale, far beyond me and my home. think what you want about the gods. we have plenty of sins on our heads to deal with. just like them.”

clearly an unpopular opinion but orym has Every Right,

[mando-abs]

Guys, I’ve read the Wild Robot

And let me tell you, if I hadn’t recently taken a Children’s Literature class in college, I would’ve said this was the best middle-grade book I’ve read since elementary/middle school. I almost read this book in one night (I was sleepy 😴) like I couldn’t put it down.

The heart behind this book is astounding and it never shies away from showing complex and difficult concepts. You will fall in love with Roz and her gosling son along with all of the other animal on the island.

If you’ve got younger ones, I highly recommend reading this to them or having a little book club moment with them. However, be prepared for whatever hard questions may come your way (i.e. circle of life and climate issues). You know your child and how much they can handle/understand. If you’re like me and much older, it’s a quick read and a great way to finish off a long day. It’s a part of a trilogy and you bet I’m patiently waiting for my hold on a copy at the library.

If the movie is anything like the book (which, given a rewatch of the trailer, it’s looking like so), we are in for a special treat.

[jazzapples3]

Imogen: the watching comprehension of this Ruby vanguard is piss poor

Ludinus: how dare you say we piss on the poor?

[baby-girl-aaron-dessner]

Aegon: rapist, enjoys watching his children fight violently to the death, murders innocent people.

HotD Fandom: Poor Aegon, he has an awful mother 🥺.

Alicent: Child bride at 14, rape victim, pimp father, deadbeat husband, forced to have 4 children.

HotD Fandom: Alicent is the root cause of all our problems. This woman is pure evil and the worst mother to ever exist. Shame!

[acebender]

"God loves you but not enough to save you" everyone repeating that but idk guys, I'd save my brother over a bunch of strangers

[shorthaltsjester]

there are literally no standouts in downfall because everyone sat down at that table and said hey you wanna see something cool and proceeded to Become their characters but idk if it’s because they’re beside each other and that aids the dynamic or just because it’s the delicious similarities and insurmountable distance between the god of death and the god of (in various ways) life but ayden and emhira’s interactions were so chewy and delicious. i’ll be thinking of their exchange fairly early on after ayden cast lesser restoration on that old man and emhira not cruelly but just simply stating “you cannot heal everything.” and ayden’s equally simple reply “we can always try.” emhira seeing the family trist has built and wondering at the presence of children, “surprised there is laughter in such a horrible place” and i know she’s speaking of hawk’s hill but i wonder if she is also speaking of exandria itself in some ways. the delicious space between in and out of character that only really happens in improv stories where as brennan is narrating and says “in this dark room” and nick interrupts and adds “it is not dark.” brennan’s incisive point in the cooldown that while the love that ayden and trist have for mortals and for exandria is warm and the kind of love someone would likely Want from gods, there is something maybe more honest or whole about emhira who says . actually these mortals are little shits that will kill you not because they fear you but because they hate you. whose very existence should be (and still often fails to be) a reminder that the gods can be usurped by mortals. the insight nick shared in the cooldown that ayden does not forget emhira’s origins but in a way dismisses them, that the god of death is a different beast. ayden wanting to find. way to save the people of aeor, insisting that the prime deities Win if they can find a way to do so. emhira reminding everyone that death is inevitable (and she does not add anything to clarify that she intends such a statement to only exist for mortals) as she argues for them to work to take down aeor and the people in it. the fact that the god with the most present connection to mortality is also the one given the most explicit clarification that she Is the god we know as SILAHA calls her the matron, brennan’s narration clarifies purvon is her champion, taliesin as asha asks for clarification on the recognition of emhira as a god and prompting the familiar spectre of a woman in a white mask.

i want to be very clear that when i say there are no standouts i Mean it because i’ve been awed and endeared and intrigued by every single character choice everyone made and as always brennan’s narration is so incredibly well suited for the mission impossible greek tragedy vibes that comes with this story and i’m so fucking delighted by the fact that laura, ashley, and taliesin are playing gods that their characters have known quite well in the past. i’m incredibly excited by what we’ve already gotten to see from abubakar, nashir, and nick and cannot imagine what other greatness is to come. i’m psyched to see the relationship between asha and the law bearer and am delighted that (perhaps for now perhaps for the whole arc) it is being seen through the lens of “my wife promised me a visit with apples and all i got was a rock ice emissary”. i also have many incoherent thoughts about the fact that, of the players who appeared as the same character in the opening and the story, taliesin’s ash and asha are the ones whose name remains the most unchanged.

i’m obsessed with the fact that this creature sent as a stand in by the god of law and duty believes his primary gift is love. while there is a certain mourning and sadness to every god we see, that SILAHA has a certain playful whimsy and jofyful curiosity about the world. that the only one of them who has been mortal before stops to steal an imp necklace from the neck of a drunk on the train (and that moment between brennan’s narration that this man will be dead by morning but, with death standing invisible in front of him, he is incapable of seeing it coming, and then laura as emhira breathing in deeply and brennan having that spark a coughing fit. they are Story Telling). asha seeing the erased image of a god, of a family member and saying “there’s a hole in all of us.” brennan narrating “this is a place where they tried to kill a story. it’s a very frightened thing to do.” (and god. the motif of fear. especially given the very present fear felt by the gods in current day exandria. they’re doing insane things in the critical role 3 part departure).

trist reminding ayden “he never tells the truth” and asha contesting “he only tells the truth, it’s just rotting.” emhira and asha both as perhaps the less Good™ much more neutral but doing so in such different ways, asha as bitter and hungry while emhira seems uncomfortable but there’s a familiarity and a certainty in her discomfort with mortality (the law bearer would also be included here but the emissary seems much more like trist and ayden (for now) than emhira or asha). something as insignificant as trist and her husband speaking to their children and affirming that little lies are okay while trist has lead a significant part of her life likely dishonest about who she is. the fact that there’s a certain childlike quality to the emissary who they’re all charged with ensuring makes it to the end of things even if they cannot. the fact that nahal (unclear which god they were, and i’m assuming it’s the first god of death but regardless still an absolutely compelling development in a short amount of time) in those opening moments is horrified by the concept of away which is unfamiliar to them only to soon after look upon their family and say. maybe away was better. Especially if those were words spoken by the god who would one day be replaced. these three episodes are going to haunt me and i’m excited to meet the ghosts.

[soggy-fishsticks]

there's a lot of reasons why I don't like sefikura as a genuine ship (have mercy on me) but why does every sefikura fanart/fic read like this:

[daincrediblegg]

I really wish people would stop being obtuse with their readings about things. Is it really demonizing The Thing or is it deliberately using a social perception and common tropes to frame the character in a certain light so it can deliberately subvert those things at the precise moment when it is necessary to prove that point that people are Not Like That?

[secretly-a-catamount]

I would like to sincerely say to all the people on Goodreads or anywhere else who complain about how the narrative in A World Without Princes treats “feminism” and “feminists” as bad and evil, don’t really understand the point of the book.

Because ever single book in the School for Good and Evil series tries to teach a lesson about not falling into one extreme or the other. Because either can hurt you, if you fall to far into them.

For example, in SEG it was Good and Evil. TLEA — Young and Old. QFG, COT, OTK — Truth and Lie.

So, keeping that in mind, what exactly is this kind of lesson that is trying to be taught in AWWP?

Toxic Masculinity and Toxic Feminism.

In fact, I would go as far as to say that Aric Lesso and Evelyn Sader, respectively, are the two characters that embodied these ideas the most.

After all, they’re antagonists, antagonists that oppose both our heroes — directly, in the story — and each other — fundamentally, in ideology.

[catofoldstones]

“They’re making the dance about Alicent and Rhaenyra when it’s supposed to be between Aegon and Rhaenyra!!!!!” buddy, the source material is called the Princess and the Queen, and you won’t like who the princess or the queen is, but one point at a time