#STOCK Act violations

[kingofmyborrowedheart]

I’m sorry but you can’t cry “human rights violation!!!!” when you are actively carrying out a campaign of genocide.

[racefortheironthrone]

Since SAG AFTRA has also gone on strike, does that mean the negotiations between the WGA and executives went poorly?

This is a great question, because it allows me to do some educating about labor law!

Today's topic: "bad faith" bargaining.

While often honored more in the breach than the observance, U.S labor law requires employers to engage in collective bargaining with unions, once those unions have been recognized as the "exclusive representative" of the workers via card check or union election.

Because Leon Keyserling and Senator Robert Wagner were not idiots and could see it coming that employers would drag out negotiations in order to try to destroy the union through attrition, the Wagner Act of 1935 required employers to not just negotiate with unions, but to negotiate "in good faith" and made it a violation of the law to negotiate in bad faith.

Two major forms of negotiating in bad faith are "dilatory tactics" (deliberately using the procedures of collective bargaining and labor law more generally to delay the process) and "surface bargaining" (where the employer goes through the motions of meeting with the union, but refuses to engage in substantive discussions). This can include stuff like sending representatives who don't have authority to negotiate, refusing to schedule sessions or trying to unilaterally control the timeline, not asking questions or engaging in back-and-forth discussion, refusing to discuss topics that are germane to conditions of employment, and so forth.

These kinds of actions are considered Unfair Labor Practice violations and the NLRB can issue "cease and desist" orders and "affirmative bargaining" orders, as well as some rather creative "special remedies" that get around the Wagner Act's lack of monetary penalties. As that suggests, however, part of the problem is that because the Wagner Act doesn't have significant monetary penalties, a lot of companies will just budget a line item for breaking the law and treat that as the cost of doing business, while using the same dilatory tactics to appeal NLRB decisions through the courts in the hope that they can outlast the union. (This is why one of the most effective labor law reforms that could be passed in a Democratic Congress would be adding compounding daily monetary penalties and streamlining the ULP process in both the NLRB and the courts.)

From what I've read of the negotiations, I think there's a pretty clear cut case that AMPTP engaged in surface bargaining and used dilatory tactics, with the intent to run out the clock and thus provoke a strike in which they believed economic pressure would force the union into surrender, essentially a lock-out without declaring a lock-out.

I think it's backfired on them. A big part of AMPTP's strategy for winning that strike was to divide-and-rule - hence why they came to an agreement with the Director's Guild - by getting through the lean months by filming and releasing shows and movies with already-completed scripts. Now that SAG-AFTRA is on strike, that lifeline of content is immediately cut - which means AMPTP is going to run out of revenue in the near future, which as WGA leaders have pointed out means bad quarterly earnings reports, which means stock prices tank, which means investors and boards of directors get angry and executives become the ones facing the prospect of losing their jobs at the same time that all the compensation they've structured as stock options to avoid taxes loses value.

[love-takes-work]

if there were a Steven Universe-themed cafe, what would you want on the menu?

Ya know, this would be very difficult to narrow down, even with you saying it would be a whole café with a Steven Universe theme so it wouldn't have to share with any other theme! Having made well over 150 Steven Universe recipes myself, I know there's a LOT to choose from, and it would be hard to get a good highlights reel down.

However, if you're gonna go with a Steven Universe theme in a café, you would have to be able to appeal to casual fans as well as deep Steventhusiasts. That means you would want the well known classics as well as stuff that the hardcore fans would remember, but you would also want stuff that's Gem-themed and fits the vibe without necessarily referencing specific food that's been eaten on the show! But of course, you also wanna have a good mixture of nutritious/filling food and snacky/desserty food. So you'd need a good variety!

We'd have to call our café The Best Diner in the World, of course.

BREAKFAST

Together Breakfast (Single or Family Size)

Best Breakfast in the World

Bagel Sandwiches

Biscuits & Jam ("He's the biscuit!" "And she's the strawberry!")

Waffle/Egg Sandwiches

Baby Melon

Various cereals (the show has cereals that look like Cheerios, Froot Loops, and Honey Smacks)

MAIN COURSES / SPECIALS

Fish Stew Pizza

Square Pizza

Hot Dogs / Veggie Dogs

Pizza Bagel with Fantastic Fries

Salmon Bagel Sandwich ("Perfectly Timed Afternoon Sandwich"), comes with Chaaaaps

Club Sandwiches with Gem-themed anchoring toothpicks

Amethyst's Torta (also comes with Chaaaaps)

Zucchini with Linguine

Pepe's Burgers Meal

SIDES & SNACKS

Fry Bits

Snack Sushi

Caprese Salad

Chaaaaps

Onion Rings

Breadsticks

Popcorn

Spicy Pretzels

Mozzarella Sticks (to violate the food treaty)

BEVERAGES

Sugar Shock Shut Down

Fountain Soda

Coffee

Tea

Fresh-Squeezed Lemonade

Apple Sidra

Fancy Orange Juice

Hot Cocoa

(You could put some of the beverages in cups or cans labeled "Guacola" and "Durian" but I recommend against actually making a drink with those.)

DESSERT

Donuts (Fire Salt optional, in cute tubes. Use Pop Rocks for sizzle!)

Cookie Cats

Ube Roll Slice

Star-shaped cookies

Steveny Gem-themed cupcakes

KIDS' MENU

Crying Breakfast Friends meal

Noodles and Butter

Hot Dogs

Juice Boxes (Durian design)

Macaroni & Cheese (Maybe let them mix it themselves, so they can be served macaroni & nothing)

Pepe's Burgers Kids' Meal

I have no idea what I would order. It would all be too tempting!

You'd have to have a performance stage up in the corner with a banner over it that says BEACH-A-PALOOZA and have local acts or open mic stuff sometimes, and stock the place with games (some SU-themed!) as well as having maybe a little gift shop with Steveny trinkets and coffee mugs. Yesss!

[oleworm]

I keep coming back to this film being highly symbolic. The first three deaths at Burgers Burgers Burgers may be less personal but that does not mean that they are unconnected. Through Benson’s eyes, the burger joint signifies a place of inappropriate and violent sexuality.

(Thank you to @saintathelstan for posting the screenshot of the ominous sign, "Violators will be shot. Survivors will be shot again.")

Chris represents the aggressive and dominating sexuality of the young male as informed by pornography and hypermasculine culture, who asserts himself by sexually humiliating other men and flaunting his access to women, while as a character Jess exists to be a sexual object, a prop to reinforce Chris’s masculinity, with the way she drapes over him and laughs at all his jokes, encouraging his violation of Randy. Even her costume—short skirt, boots and fishnets—is part of the stock characterisation of the harlot.

Hardy, the manager, holds a position of authority but does nothing to stop the bullying and watches pornographic videos on the job—he does this the second that Randy leaves his office, a moment after he has offered him praise and a promotion. His sexuality is that of the voyeur. He does not participate, but instead allows various acts of misconduct. His introductory scene characterises his unwillingness, obfuscated as incompetence, to stop Chris from groping and rubbing against Jess in the middle of a work meeting. The boundaries of the workplace, of what is appropriate and inappropriate, are blurred under his supervision. And later we see that he was dressed in similar manner to Benson’s teacher.

The one who survives the ordeal is Randy, who in Benson’s perspective remains untouched by the mediocrity and filth of their surroundings.

Now, in real life, workplace relationships do happen, and who hasn’t had a boss that was kind of a sleaze. What is interesting is that all of this is established within a few minutes of the film. That there is such a focus given to these details.

To Benson, whose trauma is of a sexual nature, it makes sense that these details would stand out from the others. Their boss is a pervert, there are two people almost having sex in front of everyone, and finally Randy is orally assaulted, if not sexually then in a way that is intentionally suggestive of sexual assault. The impressions accumulate until he snaps, in an almost Smerdyakovian manner (see Dostoyevsky’s passage about the contemplative peasant).

[intersex-perv-writes]

"sex isn't that big of a deal, everyone acts like its more fun than it is"

at least that's what you told your self until tonight. Finally, you gave in. Its not that you couldn't get any, or that you where ugly. beauty is subjective. You just where far to nervous to look someone in the eyes as they used you. to ask someone to violate your warm wet holes. it seemed dirty, worse than that it seemed awkward to position someone for a hookup. Your aromantic however and don't want to get in a relationship, so you thought you'd just give up.

that was until the free use rooms opened. anyone with a pussy would volunteer to be put in a vaginal glory hole, only their ass and legs sticking out the wall. Inside the sluts are strapped in place after signing an agreement to being used. Most dont even really read it!

So, you find yourself laying down on your back in the glory hole stock. You couldnt take it anymore, you signed up, you let the people strap you in. Soon you can hear people shuffling in the other room, the one that YOUR little tight pussy is on display it. before you know it, a cock head is prodding your entrance and it feels wonderful

Youve been empty for so long, you and that cunt of yours. Now theres a hard cock much to big for you pushing its way inside. Its only halfway in and your bodys twitching in pleasure and pain. Your so full and stretched out, its the most lovely moment of your life. Nothing youve ever done has been as important as this, you really are a slut. All you can think about is the throbbing cock pushing its way into you.

then before you know it, its all the way in. the tip is kissing the entrance to YOUR cervix. now your pussys full, but somehting else is still empty. Something that must be filled right away. And it will soon, because your ovulating and didnt read the fine print. You signed up for the condom free breeding room <3

[shiyorin]

The Inquisitor knows about yandere astartes, it won't end well

Inquisitor [REDACTED] report on yandere Astartes (????)

+++ CLASSIFICATION: [LOCK]

+++ CLEARANCE: Obsidian

+++ ENCRYPTION: [LOCK]

+++ DATE: 327.M38

+++ AUTHOR: Inquisitor [REDACTED], Ordo Malleus 

+++ SUBJECT: INVESTIGATION INTO SUSPECTED GENEFLAW AFFECTING ADEPTUS ASTARTES SUBJECTS ACROSS ALL CHAPTERS AND FOUNDINGS

+++ EYES ONLY HIGHEST TRANCHESINQUISITORIAL CASE FILE [EXCISED]

Summary of Findings:

Initial reports of this suspected "Geneflaw" first reached my conclave several terran years ago. Astartes assets deployed to war zones began exhibiting highly erratic behaviors and perverse compulsions unbecoming of the Emperor's finest warriors.

Behavioral divergences included:

Unnatural emotional outbursts and loss of emotional mastery

Uncontrollable sexual urges and deviant acts

Possessive, clingy behaviors violating sacred chains of command

Irrational self-destructive and anti-imperial actions driven by object fixations

At first, these cases seemed sporadic and isolated across different Chapters. However, as more deplorable incidents piled up, a clear pattern emerged. Something grievous had gone wrong on a fundamental level.

Excerpted examples of documented cases:

[REDACTED] - BLOOD ANGELS CHAPTER Audio log of Sanguinary Priest [REDACTED]

"Some dark curse has been visited upon our Chapter. A growing number of my battle-brothers have become… afflicted with wanton hungers. No mere physical needs, but all-consuming fixations on certain mortals within our care."

"They will stop at nothing to "claim" these individuals for themselves, body and soul. Any attempt at intervention results in unthinkable acts of disobedience and violence…"

[SAMPLE ENDS]

[REDACTED] - BLACK TEMPLARS CHAPTER Thought downloading from captured Chaplain [REDACTED] upon interrogation

"The time for restraint is at an end. I can bear this throbbing in my soul no longer! She must know the depth of my unfettered desire, the fever pitch of my infatuation. If she does not return these longings, I shall shatter worlds until the God-Emperor take pity!"

*Interrogator's Note: [NEUTRALIZE]

[REDACTED] - EXCORIATOR CHAPTER Recorded pict-captures from helm-cams during incursion on [REDACTED]

-Extreme Battlefield Fraternization between crusaders and human auxiliaries -Acts of exhibitionism and self-mutilation by crusaders -Systematic execution of any battle-brother expressing disgust at above actions -Final pict: [REDACTED]

The list of astartes goes on. Worse, there appear to be no patterns in age, founding, homeworld or even primarch genealogy. These repulsive behaviors are emerging across every Adeptus Astartes chapter at random. The Imperium teeters on the brink of an catastrophic, gene-coded crisis.

Research into potential countermeasures and remedies continues. However, my conclusions thus far firmly advocate an extreme response to contain this threat.

RECOMMENDED ACTIONS:

1) Immediate executions for any Astartes subject exhibiting Geneflawed behaviors. No exceptions.

2) Full and systematic extinction-level viral bombings against all potentially compromised Chapters and fleets.

3) Pre-emptive destruction of all Astartes gene-seed repositories, along with any Adeptus Mechanicus factions and forge worlds implicating in its creation or study.

Only through the complete erasure of this genetic stock can the essence of the Adeptus Astartes be preserved for the inevitable darkness yet to come.

The Emperor's work must be done, no matter how abominable the means required.

I await your tribunal's final judgment on this matter.

Thought for the Day: "There is nothing to be gained through mercy, only fleeting weakness and eventual damnation."

-Inquisitor [REDACTED]

[fitsofdespair]

If you heard about the TikTok ban act, don't think it's a big deal or will impact you at all, you are absolutely wrong.

Tik Tok is the red herring and not much is being said about the legislation that will be used to enforce this ban. Neither TikTok, nor ByteDance are mentioned once in the bill.

Congress introduced the RESTRICT act (S.686 2023-2024) and it is the internet version of the Patriot Act on steroids.

The RESTRICT act grants government authority to monitor and police any internet connected devices including:

Home WiFi & Internet (includes wired)

Your personal Phone, Computer, Smart Devices, Security Cameras, Game Consoles ..ANYTHING that connects to the internet.

Social Media Platforms & Websites with 1 Million users

Your payments on internet banking. PayPal, Cash App, etc.

Your Small business website, Etsy Store, TeeSpring store etc

Spreading of any information the Government deems as false.

Can ban TV Shows, Music, Games anything deemed unfit by the Government

And much more, basically anything that is "on the grid" will be monitored. (Apps, Texts, Videos, ect)

If you use a VPN to use a banned app, they can hold you, your ISP and the VPN liable and take legal enforcement action with a $250K fine and up to ten years in jail.

The enforcement clause states that it's enforceable against individuals as well as businesses. They can seize any devices and indefinitely detain individuals they suspect were used in commission of the violation. It also gives the program unlimited funding and the ability to operate without having to obey FOIA requests.

This bill has bipartisan support and every single one of the senators who sponsored this bill own stock in Meta and google.

(via PorkVacuums on reddit)

[beardedmrbean]

California became just the third state in the nation to pass a "right to repair" consumer protection law on Tuesday, following Minnesota and New York, when Governor Gavin Newsom signed SB 244. The California Right to Repair bill had originally been introduced in 2019. It passed, nearly unanimously, through the state legislature in September.

“This is a victory for consumers and the planet, and it just makes sense,” Jenn Engstrom, state director of CALPIRG, told iFixit(which was also one of SB244's co-sponsors). “Right now, we mine the planet’s precious minerals, use them to make amazing phones and other electronics, ship these products across the world, and then toss them away after just a few years’ use ... We should make stuff that lasts and be able to fix our stuff when it breaks, and now thanks to years of advocacy, Californians will finally be able to, with the Right to Repair.”

Turns out Google isn't offering seven years of replacement parts and software updates to the Pixel 8 out of the goodness of its un-beating corporate heart. The new law directly stipulates that all electronics and appliances costing $50 or more, and sold within the state after July 1, 2021 (yup, two years ago), will be covered under the legislation once it goes into effect next year, on July 1, 2024. For gear and gadgets that cost between $50 and $99, device makers will have to stock replacement parts and tools, and maintain documentation for three years. Anything over $100 in value gets covered for the full seven-year term. Companies that fail to do so will be fined $1,000 per day on the first violation, $2,000 a day for the second and $5,000 per day per violation thereafter.

There are, of course, carve outs and exceptions to the rules. No, your PS5 is not covered. Not even that new skinny one. None of the game consoles are, neither are alarm systems or heavy industrial equipment that "vitally affects the general economy of the state, the public interest, and the public welfare."

“I’m thrilled that the Governor has signed the Right to Repair Act into law," State Senator Susan Talamantes Eggman, one of the bill's co-sponsors, said. "As I’ve said all along, I’m so grateful to the advocates fueling this movement with us for the past six years, and the manufacturers that have come along to support Californians’ Right to Repair. This is a common sense bill that will help small repair shops, give choice to consumers, and protect the environment.”

The bill even received support from Apple, of all companies. The tech giant famous for its "walled garden" product ecosystem had railed against the idea when it was previously proposed in Nebraska, claiming the state would become "a mecca for hackers." However, the company changed its tune when SB 244 was being debated, writing a letter of support reportedly stating, "We support 'SB 244' because it includes requirements that protect individual users' safety and security as well as product manufacturers' intellectual property."

[sapphorror]

The relevance of chronology in IZ is dubious at best (in the show—it is flat-out non-existent in the comics), but I do kind of love to think about it regardless because there are so many weirdly specific points of internal continuity, practically and sometimes even emotionally, that we can't pretend there's absolutely nothing to examine there, even if the degree to which it matters is next to null. And anyway, I love a fool's errand.

So with that disclaimer I'd just like to talk about everyone's favorite organ harvesting episode and how much it kills me when examined in the context of an on-going continuity, because it's not just one of the most horrifying things Zim ever does across canon, it's really the first horrifying thing that Dib is present to bear witness to, at least on that scale. For all that NanoZim must've been scary and violating on a personal level, it was ultimately still a contained, targeted attack, and not even an unjustified one—not that Dib would consciously think of it this way, but Zim was acting in reasonable self-defense, he just chose to be really brutal and vindictive as he did so. Plus, Dib did come out on top of that encounter, so there were no real lasting consequences besides losing his evidence, which only put him back to square one. Basically, it was a great basis for forming a personal grudge, but it didn't really say anything about how generally malicious or threatening Zim actually was outside the context of their quickly-coalescing rivalry. Zim's only a monster at this point insofar as it's fun for Dib to have a dragon to defeat. The danger he poses does not yet hang over Dib's head like a guillotine.

Dark Harvest, though. In Dark Harvest, Zim shows just how capable he is of committing brutality on total bystanders at a mass scale under much less urgent circumstances without so much as a trace of hesitation or remorse—and by the end of it, Dib learns firsthand how severe the consequences for losing to Zim can actually be. Healed through the miracle of the status quo reset button or not... well.

And this adds a lot of context to why Dib spends the rest of the series so totally convinced of the danger Zim poses, even if most of the time that POV is extreme overkill. If he ever starts to doubt the necessity of his mission, just think about the time Zim stole a bunch of kids' organs, and that's irrefutable proof that Zim CAN accomplish terrible things if left unchecked. If he ever starts to doubt the morality of his intentions, just think about the time Zim stole a bunch of kids' organs (and would do so again!), and he can rest easy knowing Zim deserves every terrible consequence coming for him. If he ever forgets why he absolutely cannot afford to let his guard slip for even a second, just think about the time Zim stole a bunch of kids' organs, including Dib's, and now he remembers exactly why it's so important Zim's never allowed to gain the upper-hand. Even when he finally ditches Zim in Mopiness of Doom, it's not because he stops seeing Zim as a threat, it's that he's gotten too burnt out on single-handedly saving the world all the time to care.

(Gaz, of course, was there too and still thinks Zim is harmless, but Gaz also thinks expressing pain after having your entire lower body melted into off-brand bug spray makes you a whiner, so let's not put too much stock in her judgement here)

Even during Dark Harvest, Dib's immediate response upon finding Zim is to tell him this is totally beyond the pale, as if Zim might actually care—and while Dib trying to convince Zim he's acting totally unhinged isn't exactly unusual throughout the show, past this point he usually does so by appealing to Zim's self-interest ("stop trying to blow up the planet, you're still ON the planet") rather than any hypothetical better nature or good sense, can you even imagine. But that's exactly what he does here, reflexively or not, and that to me is a perfect demonstration of how this episode marks a radical shift in what Dib thinks he's up against.

And for some bonus meta? This also stretches into The Wettening in a really fun way, which is the second episode after Dark Harvest and the first with Dib. The sheer glee Dib takes in exploiting the new-found weakness for all it's worth, just because he can, makes a lot of sense in the wake of Dark Harvest and his new understanding of Zim as an out-of-control inhuman lunatic he has no idea how to stop. Seeing Zim vulnerable to something, openly afraid, and in obviously agonizing pain—well, humanizes would be the wrong word under the circumstances, but it cuts him back down to mortal size. He might be tough, and he might be terrifying, but he's not invincible. Even after Zim very unambiguously wins that fight and finds a way to protect himself from Earth's water, the important take-away is that there are things that can hurt him—Dib just has to figure out what they are. If Dark Harvest is the episode that shows Dib Zim is truly a monster, The Wettening is the episode to teach him even real monsters can be defeated.

[nohkalikai]

We are a group of individuals and collectives in revolutionary solidarity with the people of  Palestine. As a response to the feminist call to strike for Gaza on the 8th of March (International Women’s Day), we feel the need to put out this statement to recognise the occupational, genocidal deprivations perpetrated by the terrorist settler-colonial Zionist state of Israel that has led to a death toll of over 30000 Palestinians with countless trapped under rubble, decomposed, and millions displaced. We bear witness to the carceral violence, torture, humiliation and murder of Palestinians, especially those held captive in besieged Gaza and hostages taken by the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF). This includes a wide range of carceral forms of torture including the use of  Palestinian men as human shields, widely circulated dehumanising images of public sexual violation of Palestinian men, sexual assault of Palestinian women in Zionist prisons, enforced disappearance of children, and other acts of violence and debilitation. These largely go unreported, under-reported or misreported because of the Zionist hold over mainstream media.

Humanitarian aid is being withheld by Israel to intentionally starve Gazans as an instrument of ethnic cleansing and genocide. When the few aid trucks are allowed by Israel to finally cross into Gaza, or aid is airdropped by other countries attempting to break Israel’s siege, the Zionist army bomb, shoot, kill, and run over Palestinians rushing to food trucks as seen in multiple incidents including the recent flour massacre. Children continue to die from starvation and severe climate conditions; and those not dead yet are severely malnourished. Since October 7, Israel has incessantly bombed Gaza from F16s using 2,000-pound US-supplied bombs that blow up whole neighborhoods, internationally banned white phosphorus, and smaller lethal bombs dropped from the constantly circling drones. Israel has destroyed the 70% of the housing stock in Gaza, rendered all hospitals unable to provide care, and has further destroyed medical facilities, desalination plants that supplies clean water, schools and universities, public archives, cultural and historical landmarks, mosques  and churches, bakeries, roads and highways, and all civilian resources and infrastructure crucial for survival rendering Gaza unlivable. The sustained targeted attack on medical facilities have necessitated medical procedures like amputations and C-sections without anesthetics while the  neonatals and infants are dying on hospital beds and ICUs for lack of oxygen. Palestinian medics are not only overworked and severely under-resourced but under direct attack. Mass graves continue to pile up and Israel strips Palestinians of dignity even in death. Palestinian families are not allowed to recover bodies. Instead, the occupying forces attack and bomb graveyards and steal dead bodies for organs and skin to be used in Israeli forensic institutes. We have also seen the insidious images of Israeli soldiers posing with looted Palestinian women’s lingerie, mannequins, stealing children’s toys and making videos cooking inside houses Gazans have been forcibly displaced from. The entire population of Gaza has been subjected to collective punishment directed towards the acts of resistance forces, which is, in fact, the right of a colonized people for self-determination and autonomy. Israel has carried out  targeted attacks on journalists, medics, artists, academics and anyone who can help save lives and ensure the survival of Palestinian culture. The Zionist regime has killed over a 100 journalists to suppress news coming out of Gaza. Murdering journalists has been a tool to silence Palestinian voices throughout the 75 years of occupation. We recall the targeted killing of journalists like Shireen Abu Akleh in 2022 in occupied West Bank. We honour and learn from resilient voices like Wael Al-Dahdouh who survived an Israeli attack and whose entire family was murdered by Israel.

The Zionist entity also has a long history of pinkwashing, touting itself as a queer haven, and using that as a justification for genocide. We see IDF soldiers proudly upholding rainbow flags on rubble or others proposing to their partners amidst the horrors they inflict on the Palestinians. We see from various archives of queerness that Palestinian queers have always resisted this. Queer people all over the world reject Israel’s pinkwashing with the slogans, ‘Not in our name’, ‘Not Gay as in Happy but Queer as in Free Palestine’ and ‘No Pride in Apartheid’, and lately, ‘No Pride in Genocide’. We call for all queer comrades to include the liberation of Palestine in their imagination of queer liberation. Amidst the excruciating, incomprehensible ongoing physical and emotional trauma genocidal occupation inflicts, we call on our mad, queer, crip comrades to unflinchingly demand a free Palestine because disability and queer justice is intimately tied to Palestinian liberation.

On January 26 2024, in the case against Israel brought by South Africa to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) found that through the actions of Israel, Gaza is experiencing a plausible genocide. The ICJ ordered six Provisional Measures that under law, Israel must fulfill. The ICJ ordered Israel to take measures within its power to prevent genocidal acts, including preventing and punishing incitement to genocide, ensuring aid and services reach the Palestinian population in Gaza, and preserving evidence of crimes committed in Gaza. As we can see, Israel has completely ignored and defied all Provisional Measures.This also shows the impunity Israel enjoys because it is backed by imperial regimes. It reveals how colonial imperialism undergirds international law that has historically failed the colonised by protecting the interests of colonial imperialist regimes. Yet, the colonised have stood strong in their struggle for freedom and liberation, which has historically led to the downfall of colonial empires.

We understand that our liberation as oppressed people is deeply intertwined with struggles of the oppressed worldwide. We recognise India’s complicity in enabling the genocide and occupation of Palestine. A recent report by Pew Research Center, shows that India leads in support for autocracy and military rule among surveyed nations. Indian right-wing accounts are among leading amplifiers of anti-Palestinian fake news and have used it to fan and escalate anti-Muslim violence in India. As Azad Essa traces in his book Hostile Homelands, despite its official stance supporting the 1975 UN resolution that concluded Zionism as racism, India continued maintaining relations with Israel through security and defense engagements. For example, India adopted Israeli security systems in response to the November 2008 terrorist attacks on Mumbai. Thereafter India bought its mass surveillance systems infrastructure – the Central Monitoring System – from Israel, which can operate without court orders and access any individual’s communication data. The BJP-led Hindutva regime (under whose fascist vision of ‘Hindu Rashtra (state)’ crimes against Muslims, Christians, Dalits, Adivasis is at an all time high) upgraded this relation to a ‘strategic partnership’ following Modi’s 2017 Israel visit where the two parties signed a defense deal worth 2 billion USD. This deal included the Israeli spyware Pegasus, that the government used to arrest journalists, government critics, students, especially Dalit and Muslim organisers and throttle political opposition. India is now the top arms buyer from Israel, and our taxes fund Hermes 900 drones manufactured by the Adani Elbit UAV Complex (the first facility in India and outside Israel to manufacture this drone) which Israel uses to massacre Palestinians. Israeli drones ‘field-tested’ on Palestinians are imported to be used on Kashmiris, thwart Adivasi movements in Bastar, and are being used against the ongoing Farmers’ protest.

Much like Israel, the Indian state is a settler-colonial state occupying Kashmir. The abrogation of article 370 in Kashmir in 2019 that catapulted the facilitation of Indian citizens settling in Kashmir is starkly similar to Israeli settler-colonial policies. Kashmir has thus had a long history of what Ather Zia calls ‘affective solidarity’ with Palestine embodied through various ways of resisting whereby the Palestinian struggle is ‘inspirational, cathartic’ to Kashmiris. Following the article 370 abrogation, Palestine-Kashmir solidarity strengthened with the BDS movement’s call for solidarity for Kashmir. Pro-Palestine protests in Kashmir continue to be repressed, a history that goes back to 2014 where amidst chants of ‘Save Gaza’ and ‘Go India, Go Back’, the Indian Armed Forces shot at young boys who were stone pelting, killing a 14 year-old.

We also stand with the workers of India who have made their solidarity to the Palestinian cause clear – the water transport workers who have refused to aid the shipment of arms to Israel on 14/02/2024 as well as the major Indian trade unions who, on 09/11/2023, rejected the Indian government’s move to replace Palestinian workers with Indian workers in Israel. We extend our revolutionary solidarity to the workers of the world resisting the ongoing genocide. We stand with the students who have organised for Palestine and whose protests have been met with repression by several Indian universities. Indian academia continues to receive funding from and collaborates with Israel. We call for an immediate cessation of this act of enabling occupation. We call for a total academic boycott of the Zionist entity – no more enabling of the coloniser’s knowledge production, which is a tool for genocide. The Zionist regime continues to murder academics and destroy schools, universities and libraries. We recall and honour the memory of professor, writer and poet Refaat Alareer. We urge Indian academics to see how Zionism is directly connected to the Hindutva machinery that continues to imprison Indian scholars like Hany Babu, GN Saibaba among others and student organisers like Sharjeel Imam, Umar Khalid, Gulfisha Fatima, among others, arrested for being dissenting voices. Our universities have long been bastions of resistance and we should strengthen our solidarities in knowledge production with the people worldwide facing violence. We learn from and honour Palestinian resistance in every form and remember Rafeef Ziadeh’s words, ‘We Teach Life, Sir! 

Following the call for strike on 8th March we put out this statement and will be participating with various actions in individual and collective capacities in solidarity with the people of Palestine. We learn from and honour Palestinian resistance in every form and remember Rafeef Ziadeh’s words, ‘We Teach Life, Sir! Actions can range from actively engaging in the Boycott Divest and Sanction (BDS) movement, raising awareness in-person and on media platforms, sending emails to government representatives to send aid to Gaza and push for permanent ceasefire, amplifying fundraisers, donating e-sims, and more. From Palestine to Sudan, Congo, Western Sahara, Kurdistan, Balochistan, Kashmir all the way to Haiti and Tigray—no one is free until everyone is free. We call for economic, academic, cultural and social boycott. We call upon organisers to honour the call for the strike by addressing and embracing the call for a free Palestine in their 8 March programs and events. We call for the end of patriarchal, capitalist, colonial regimes that oppress us. We demand immediate permanent ceasefire, end of the siege on Gaza, end to settler-colonial occupation and the dismantling of the Zionist state of Israel. We demand a free Palestine from the river to the sea.

Do make your support for the statement heard by posting on social media and handing out the handouts we have made here .

Do comment your organization’s name below to be added to the list of signatories.

Signed

Trans Queer Feminists in Solidarity with Palestine Feminists in Resistance, Kolkata  LGBT Academics collective, India COLLECTIVE, Delhi

[bestworstcase]

i would personally love to see you go on the "rwby is a polytheistic narrative" tangent

i have already made the post(s) but fuck if i can find them now. BASICALLY,

where the rwby fandom tends to go awry vis-a-vis the brothers (and the blacksmith, since v9) is interpreting them through a monotheistic and specifically christian lens: i do not mean in the sense of the moral framework of christianity (although there are shades of that to) but rather in the basic conception of what God is and what the role of the God is cosmologically speaking.

in short, people keep looking for a Supreme Creator who decides how the world is and by extension defines what is right and what is wrong. acting in violation of God’s Design is necessarily wrong, for the same reason that saying 2+2=5 is necessarily wrong; it’s incorrect. the God made everything a certain way and it can never be anything but that certain way, because that’s how it is, just as two and two make four.

the first problem here of course is that rwby does not have a God. even from the start of the religious narrative coming out into the open with qrow’s tale of the two brothers, it’s made crystal clear that there were two gods who made the world together and were co-equal creators of mankind. this in spite of the biased framing that qrow, and later ozpin-via-jinn, use to cast light as the benevolent one and darkness as the evil one.

the existence of lesser deities is not in and itself non-monotheistic necessarily; for example, christianity has the devil and acknowledges the existence of numerous non-divine supernatural entities some of whom are worshipped (by non-christians) and are thus gods. the monotheistic conception of these kind of beings is often that they are subordinate agents of the God or else adversarial “false gods” who might do harm or otherwise lead people astray.

there are a lot of fantasy stories that feature pantheons whilst also being fundamentally monotheistic in their treatment of those gods, and this is how monotheists who lack familiarity with polytheistic traditions reflexively tend to look at pantheons: there’s a Ruler God and then gods who follow the ruler god and then any gods who have a more antagonistic relationship with the ruler god are devil-figures. this is a tendency that i believe rwby is deliberately exploring in the same sort of way it developing characters by setting up stock archetypes and then deconstructing and elaborating on them.

but you can see it very clearly in the fandom responses to the brothers before and after the end of volume nine: before, the lost fable was almost always read from an underlying presupposition that light was the Supreme Creator and darkness a Subordinate Devil—even when light was understood to be cruel and unfair—such that light’s judgment of salem’s character and exhortation that she needs to learn “the importance of life and death” was taken to be objective fact. it doesn’t matter if God’s Design is unfair; it’s inviolate and you must accept reality. similarly, the conception of salem and ozma’s stint as god-rulers was (and continues to be) parsed as sinful—they are “false gods” and ozma is lead astray from the right path laid out by the Supreme Creator.

after? the very first thing that happened after 9.10 dropped—immediately, the reaction to the new revelations was “oh, so the brothers were false pretenders playing god and transgressing against God’s will.” immediately, the fandom slotted the blacksmith in as the Supreme Creator who makes the rules. insofar as this refiguring led to a general reassessment of salem, it was that she’d either be furious when she found out the brothers weren’t even real gods or (SIGH) refuse to believe it out of hand because she thinks humans are pathetic ants. the notion that she needs to learn her lesson because she is arrogant and selfish and does not understand the true importance of life and death did not budge whatsoever; the blacksmith was presumed to be the true supreme authority whose lesson salem needed to understand.

(WHICH WILL BE FUNNY IN A FEW YEARS IF I’M RIGHT ABOUT SALEM KNOWING THE BLACKSMITH)

but. polytheistic religions do not work like that. and before getting into how they do work i think it is helpful to explain why they’re different. it sort of all comes down to:

what is a god?

broadly defined, a god is some form of entity with some form of power or influence over some phenomenon, which interacts in some emotionally or spiritually meaningful way with people who worship it and regard it as divine. and you can’t really narrow it down from there without drawing a line that excludes some entities that were or are inarguably gods. in the polytheistic sense, if it’s regarded as a divine and/or worshipped as a god, ipso facto it is a god.

which can get sticky and complicated fast, because within a polytheistic system the delineation between “god” and “non-divine supernatural being” and “powerful human authority” and “culture hero” and “ancestors watching over me” is often not at all clean or impermeable; if you are a farmer living in, say, the roman empire, there is not particularly meaningful distinction between mars and the emperor in terms of their power to alter your circumstances for better or worse, nor in your relative personal importance to them. they are both abstracted and distant to you but also very real and imminent in their ability to benefit or harm you from afar.

this is how the boundary between mortals and gods becomes porous. some gods are very big (mars), some are quite small (the lares), and some mortals are very small (you) while others are quite big (the emperor). your household lar may be the closer presence in your life, but the roman emperor indisputably has greater power. what then is the difference between a god and man?

it’s not a measurement of power—which is the basic yardstick monotheistic systems use, with the God being a supreme, omnipotent force or entity and everything else, by virtue of having limits, Not God. it’s not about a particular type of being, as if “god” were functionally a species. godhood is a role. divinity is socially defined.

how is it defined in rwby? depends on who you ask. (this in itself is one of the clear tells that the narrative is thinking about gods polytheistically, that it eschews an unambiguous answer.) maybe it’s something that uses magic and comes back from the dead. maybe it’s an unseen force all guiding our choices for some higher purpose. or maybe it’s a vast but finite being that gives of itself to bring new things into existence. or perhaps an adjudicator, or a wise trickster who shares magic with their chosen people and leaves the rest of the world alone.

the brothers are gods, by several of these definitions. salem is a god by at least one, maybe three, and ozma is a god by the first two. the maidens and silver-eyed warriors have magic and complex relationships with death, as well as mythologies that lend themselves to deification—personification of the four seasons on the one hand, culture heroes on the other. the only reason for the spirits in the relics to not be considered gods is that nobody but ozma knew them until very recently, so they’ve never been worshipped. but once they’re free? gods.

if you brought the cat or the jabberwalker or the herbalist or whomever to remnant, they’d probably end up gods.

the tree is a god. the blacksmith is one of its aspects. (she is also plato’s demiurge—the maker and shaper of primordial matter into tangible forms in accordance with their forms, who is not the God in the monotheistic sense but a philosophical construct for modeling a point of transition from formless raw material into the well-ordered and differentiated world that is now. this is a subtle but very important distinction; the platonic demiurge is not an authority, merely the benevolent force which fashions and shapes.)

in a few centuries it is not inconceivable that team rwby will end up being gods, via posthumous deification of culture heroes.

the notion of a “false god” in a polytheistic context is inherently a little silly, and the kind of accusation you don’t make unless you intend to wind up ripped to shreds by maenads, PENTHEUS. which is not to say that there are no gods who misrepresent themselves—vucub-caquix comes to mind—by boasting of greater power or influence than they truly have, but generally the framing is that this is uncouth and self-aggrandizing and something that pisses off other gods whom they’re disrespecting, not so much that these figures are false pretenders to divinity.

in large part because of this way of thinking about gods, polytheistic traditions tend to be a lot less about belief than they are about practice. monotheistic faiths have orthodoxy—correct beliefs. the equivalent in polytheistic worship is orthopraxy—correct praxis.

this is why, whenever i discuss salem’s religiosity, i talk about how she does things correctly or the right way, and why i describe the brothers’ retaliation as a punishment for worshipping them. because what salem does in the lost fable’s first act is the essential interaction at the heart of polytheistic worship. if you’re christian or culturally christian, you’ve probably heard the saying that “faith without deeds is dead;” the polytheistic equivalent is that ritual offering or sacrifice without prayer is useless.

there is NO POINT, within a polytheistic context, to venerating or propitiating a god UNLESS you can ask for something in return and expect that god to either grant your request or offer you a courteous refusal. asking the gods for things in exchange for what you give to them is the foundation of polytheistic worship.

from a monotheistic perspective this can seem bizarre, because monotheism is not so grounded in mutual reciprocity; you worship God because He is the Creator and therefore deserves your veneration. (yet there is reciprocity, even at the furthest extremes of christianity; christians expect to be saved from hell because that is what their God promises in return for their faith.)

but the polytheistic view tends to be that the gods… exist. they’re there. they live in this world just as you do, however powerful or strange they may be. they’re part of your community. whatever you personally might think of them, they’re there, and you’re obliged to take their presence into consideration in the same way you’re obliged to consider your neighbors as you go about your life.

the god of the woods lives in the woods. do you like him? maybe not. maybe you’d really be happier if he wasn’t there. but he is there, and he lives in the woods, so if you have to go into the woods to hunt, you should observe the proper etiquette and make an appropriate offerings to entreat him for safe passage, because you are entering his home. it’s the same basic politeness as bringing a bottle of wine to a dinner party.

the idea behind correct practice is that gods are much vaster than you and much more powerful, so it pays to be very precise and deliberate and clear about what you want so as to avoid any misunderstandings or accidental insults. the reverse side of course is that you expect them to uphold their end of the social contract; if you’re going to all this effort to show them due respect and consideration, you are entitled to fair treatment in return. the gods are not always fair and may not understand ‘fairness’ the way you do, but that’s why you need to tell them why you’ve come to them.

and this is quite plainly the way salem conceives of religion: she expects this reciprocal give-and-take, do ut des, which is why she brings flowers to light and leaves them upon his shrine after he turns her away. yes, she was upset that he said no—she’s grieving. her tiny hope was crushed. it’s not fair! but when he repeats his refusal and removes her from his domain, she departs without bothering him further. her emotions overwhelmed her momentarily, and then she calmed down and accepted that he wouldn’t grant her request.

she doesn’t decide that the brothers are monsters until they behave monstrously toward her—reviving and incinerating her lover in her arms twice over because they’re having an argument. (they’re brothers. it took years after this happened before it dawned on her how fallible they were, how she’d accidentally turned them against each other. salem took it as a given that they would act in harmony with each other.) and once they reveal themselves to be unjust and unworthy, she cuts them out of her heart and dedicates herself to overturning their rule.

ozma in contrast seems to hold a more monotheistic or at least monolatrous view of the brothers, as Supreme Creators whose word is law, with the god of light being Good and the god of darkness Evil. this is the root cause of the conflict between salem and ozma and why it’s so intractable; they have fundamentally different ideas about godhood and whether the brothers are gods or Gods.

and salem’s perspective is completely right, as a simple matter of narrative fact. not only are the brothers not Supreme Creators, there is no Supreme Creator at all. rwby is a Godless story. there are gods, there is the demiurge, there is the cosmic tree. light believes that he’s supposed to be the Supreme Creator; he is, literally, in the wrong story. he’s a god with a God complex. and that’s what makes him the final obstacle the characters must overcome before remnant can be free.

and that’s what makes rwby a polytheistic narrative thank you for coming to my tedtalk

[philhoffman]

I just stumbled on an article by film professor Caetlin Benson-Allott called "The Queer Fat of Philip Seymour Hoffman," originally published in the book Millennial Masculinity: Men in Contemporary American Cinema and it is FASCINATING. Here's an excerpt that lays out her basic thesis:

In these films, the actor manipulates his physical breadth and weight as well as his gestural scale to draw the viewer’s attention to how compulsory heterosexuality marginalizes certain lives and bodies. These physical techniques help Hoffman visually exceed the fat male stereotypes of his early career, stereotypes that coded his body as immoderate, less than masculine, and thus most suited for minor roles, comedic turns, and pathetic losers. In such cases, fat male stereotypes rely on stock meanings attached to the actor’s stockier build. Hoffman transcends these roles with nuances of movement and deft exploitations of gesture and in so doing illuminates the process through which overweight male bodies are made unintelligible by a filmic culture that denigrates fat genders even among the gender and sexual alterities that it occasionally exploits.

Hoffman’s physical acting exemplifies the gendered as well as sexual potential of gesture and performance, for he uses his corpulence to visually refuse the traditional masculine-feminine gender binary and dramatize orientations and physical expressions of the body otherwise excluded from heteronormative American cinema... In each [film], he offers another version of what has remained a pale, overweight male body... As James Lipton notes, these relentlessly physical performances suggest that “Philip Seymour Hoffman may be the archetypal sex symbol of our time” in that he gestures toward new approaches to representation for marginalized sexualities and genders.

She goes into a deeper analysis of PSH's roles in Twister, Boogie Nights, and Mission: Impossible III, mentioning a few other performances throughout and focusing on how he used his body to challenge cinema's traditional ideas about fat male bodies and sexuality.

On his role as Dusty in Twister:

Hoffman must still perform the invisibility traditionally associated with fat bodies on-screen or risk violating Twister’s already tenuous verisimilitude. The genius of Hoffman’s performance is that he manages to do both by exploiting the cultural unintelligibility of obesity; he uses the spectator’s own tendency to dismiss fat men to camouflage Dusty’s narrative centrality. Because Hoffman is the only overweight actor in this film, his girth emphasizes Dusty’s position as the film’s fool, which helps disguise his formulaic responsibilities. Hoffman’s weight opens up a dramatic tradition through which he can exacerbate his character’s hedonistic qualities and conceal his intelligence and manipulative capacity. By making his body both overly visible and easily overlooked, Hoffman obscures Dusty’s generic necessity.

On Scotty J in Boogie Nights:

Hoffman orients Scotty’s physical expression of his sexuality around his belly. Because Scotty is written as inarticulate and suffering from unspeakable desires, Hoffman uses his body, specifically his largest and perhaps least mentionable feature, to communicate Scotty’s unmentionable orientation. Hoffman thus borrows a technique from gay male fat pornography and “displaces erotic pleasures [or their symbolic representation] from the genitals and disperses it to other parts of the body, thereby reconfiguring what can count as a pleasurable body.”

On Mission: Impossible III:

In contrast with Tom Cruise’s strong jaw and hard muscles, Hoffman’s relaxed flesh becomes a manifestation of his confidence; Hunt is tense, but Davian is at ease. This lack of visible affect exempts Davian from the tradition of fat villains whose bodies incarnate their overabundance of desire, appetite, or greed. His smooth contours and the reflection of light off the broad planes of his golden skin allow Davian to transcend associations of his body with appetite as he refuses to show interest in Hunt’s interrogation or subsequent threats to his mortality. Hoffman’s elimination of gesture thus helps Davian become a new kind of fat villain, one whose body suggests a lack of interest in the physical world rather than an excess thereof.

Pleaseee seek out this article if you have any interest in Phil's work and physicality—it's one of the most detailed and intriguing pieces I've ever read on him and I'd loveeee to talk about it, the good and the bad. You can download the PDF for free on academia.edu but if anyone has a problem getting it... just DM me lol. Wrapping this up with one excerpt from the conclusion bc I know Phil has taught ME a lot about "being in one's body," as the author says, so I love seeing that in print:

Hoffman’s body offers a new vision of male embodiment outside compulsory heterosexuality, an alternative use of the flesh we might even consider queer. Kathleen LeBesco has observed that the queer and fat liberation movements share many similar projects, but watching Philip Seymour Hoffman suggests that in some cases fat is queer... [Hoffman's] movements propose a new way of being in one’s body, for even within the highly structured heterosexual order of Hollywood cinema, Hoffman helps us envision the body outside normalizing gender strictures.

[mariacallous]

The United Auto Workers union, which represents some 400,000 workers in the automobile, aerospace, and agriculture industries, on Tuesday said that it filed federal labor charges against Donald Trump and Elon Musk. The charges follow what the UAW describes as “attempts to threaten and intimidate workers” that arose during a conversation between Trump and Musk, hosted on X Spaces Monday evening, in which Trump appeared to praise X owner Musk for firing workers who strike.

“Well, you're the greatest cutter,” Trump told Musk, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX. “I mean, I look at what you do. You walk in and you just say, ‘You want to quit?’ They go on strike. I won't mention the name of the company, but they go on strike and you say, ‘That's okay. You're all gone. You're all gone.’” Musk did not respond specifically to Trump’s statements, but laughed as the former president spoke, and said he would “be happy to help out” on a government efficiency commission.

US workers—both unionized and nonunionized—cannot be fired for engaging in protected strikes, according to the National Labor Relations Board. In his comments, Trump “stated a position which is a violation of law, flat and simple,” says William B. Gould IV, a professor at Stanford Law School and former chair of the NLRB. Trump could be seen as acting as an agent for Musk’s companies, Gould says, and his words could potentially interfere with votes to unionize at companies.

The NLRB will need to investigate the claims and then decide how to move forward if it feels the charges have merit.

“When we say Donald Trump is a scab, this is what we mean. When we say Trump stands against everything our union stands for, this is what we mean,” UAW president Shawn Fain said in a statement. “Both Trump and Musk want working class people to sit down and shut up, and they laugh about it openly. It’s disgusting, illegal, and totally predictable from these two clowns.”

The UAW has endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris for president, and previously called Trump “a scab and a lapdog for the billionaires.” The union did not provide a copy of the charges it filed Tuesday when requested by WIRED; they were not yet docketed on the NLRB website as of press time.

Musk’s companies have a blighted record when it comes to workers’ rights. Trump did not name the Musk company he was referring to, but Musk is CEO of Tesla, SpaceX, Neuralink, and the Boring Company. Musk has said in the past that unionization at Tesla would result in a loss of stock options, and he slashed staff at X (then Twitter) when he bought it, ultimately even canceling services from janitors who went on strike. Meanwhile, SpaceX is currently sparring with the NLRB in court.

The UAW previously tried to unionize Tesla workers, but fell short. The union is trying still to do so. Tesla and SpaceX did not respond to requests for comment. Trump’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment either.

Shortly after the UAW announced the charge, Musk posted to X: “The last two UAW presidents went to prison for bribery & corruption and, based on recent news, it looks like this guy will join them!” (Two former UAW presidents were sentenced to prison time in a large corruption probe, but they were not the two most recent union presidents.)

[mydaddywiki]

David Perdue

Physique: Average Build Height: 6′3″

David Alfred Perdue Jr. (born December 10, 1949 -) is an American politician and business executive who served as a United States senator from Georgia from 2015 to 2021. A member of the Republican Party, Perdue was an unsuccessful candidate for Governor of Georgia in 2022. The Macon, Georgia native was a former globe-trotting management consultant and CEO of a sneaker manufacturer Reebok and a discount-store chain Dollar General.

Perdue first ran for the U.S. Senate in 2014, later losing his reelection bid in 2020. He later supported a lawsuit by Trump allies seeking to overturn the election results, and falsely claimed during his 2022 gubernatorial election campaign that his 2020 Senate election was "stolen."

Handsome with a nice looking ass, Perdue has developed the ability to bulge in just about every pic he's in. Perdue was linked to the 2020 congressional insider trading scandal for allegations of STOCK Act violations, but unless that is somehow going to result in him doing nude photo-shoots and porno's on Older4Me then I don't have much of an opinion. He's a politician, of course he's corrupt.

Of course he's married with with children. What politician now days isn't. What politician now days isn't. Anyway, he had quickly become one of my favorite politicians. And if you've seen some of his bulge shots, he'd be one of your favorite politicians too. Also, he's a first cousin of Sonny Perdue, former Governor of Georgia and United States Secretary of Agriculture, who I'd also take a deep dicking from.

I'd SO like to spend a weekend of vigorous fucking with the two of them. For now, I can fantasize about David and how good of a fuck he is.

[bogusavathepit]

(S4) ASoIaF "Career": Maester

this career is a very simple, nonactive one meant to assist in any ASoIaF playthroughs people have, therefore it's pretty superficial. It's more a placeholder for immersion.

DESCRIPTION

As the order of scholars, healers, messengers, and natural philosophers, maesters educate new students at the Citadel of in Oldtown, a city in the Reach. House Hightower was integral in the Citadel's foundation, and continues to patronize the order. The Citadel is also financed by the lords who pay for having a maester in their service, and from certain taxes that it collects at Oldtown.

As advisers to the Westerosi nobility, the maesters have largely supplanted the Alchemists' Guild. They are sometimes called "the knights of the mind." Some may never become an official maester or even an acolyte!

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Levels

"Novice": You are a new students and have begun your education at the Citadel. Most acolytes will treat you as if you have little mindpower, and if you violate the rules of the Citadel, a maester order you to be confined to your rooms by the maesters. You may receive a more physical punishment, such as if you steal from the kitchens, a rector might put you in stocks at the Seneschal's Court, where acolytes may throw rotten vegetables at you. Act smart! To officially become an acolyte, you must earn a link for your chain by going before an archmaester to demonstrate your knowledge. If the archmaester judges your knowledge to be proficient, they will award you with a link of a metal reflecting the subject.

“Acolyte”: You have earned your first link for your chain! You can train at letters at the Scribe's Hearth, and an Oldtowner may hire you to read their letters or write their wills. When you complete your training and are prepared to take your vows to become a maester, you will put in a black-dark room with one of the Citadel's glass candles made of razor-sharp dragonglass. You must stay in that room for the entire night in darkness, unless he is able to light the candle.

Branches

"Maesters": Scholars and healers who have completed their training at the Citadel. They can be sent by the Citadel to serve at the holding of a lord throughout the Seven Kingdoms. A lord has to pay the Citadel for a maester's service, and smallfolk believe that maesters are unwilling to help them. Maesters are only found in castles; if a lord does not have a maester in his service, he is seen as unimportant. They have vowed to hold no lands or lordships, and to be celibate. Maesters wear a collar, which is supposed to remind him of the realm they serve. When they complete their education and take their vows, a maester puts aside their House name. Although they are supposed to be loyal to the seat to which they are assigned, regardless of the changes in control of that holding, old allegiances or loyalties might continue linger.

"Archmaesters": Maesters who have demonstrated mastery of a particular subject. They receive a mask, ring, and rod in the metal corresponding to the link of the maester's chain which signifies their expertise on the topic. Archmaesters teach the students at the Citadel in their subject of expertise, and they judge whether a novice or an acolyte has shown enough knowledge on their subject to receive a link for their chain. They have the right to sit on the Conclave, a council which elects the Grand Maester and determines when the seasons change. Although the Conclave puts effort into demonstrating their consideration of ability before birth, this is generally a pretense, as family status often affects their final choice for Grand Maester. The meetings of the Conclave are conducted behind closed doors at the Citadel. Each archmaester is said to carry a heavy, black iron key that will open most of the doors in the Citadel. They keep them close on their person, or hide them well.

"The Grand Maester": The office of Grand Maester was created in 5 AC by Aegon I Targaryen, who asked for an archmaester to advise him on governing the Seven Kingdoms. Sworn to serve the whole realm, the Grand Maester sits on the monarch's small council and acts as one of the royal advisers. As the Citadel's representative at the royal court of the monarch on the Iron Throne the Grand Maester is elected by the Conclave, and only the Conclave can unmake them again, although several Grand Maesters have died violently. The Grand Maester wears many interwoven maester chains to indicate their high office, but these do not reflect their true studies. Gems are woven into the chains.

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Go Check it out or Download

[darkshrimpemotions]

Also just as an aside I hate when an obviously villainous character with a clear agenda counter to the protagonists' happiness says something and people just. Accept it as true despite all evidence to the contrary.

That is to say, I get why Stede buys it, but there's no reason whatsoever why we should put any stock in Ned Low's taunting about the act of his murder being what will make Stede a "real pirate."

Was he not a real pirate when he held two British naval officers hostage for days? How about when he bested Izzy (the first time)? Or when he infiltrated a French party boat, instigated a violent riot, and left everyone aboard to die? How about when he accompanied Ed and his crew on all their raids? Bested Izzy again in a duel (sorry to my poor little meow meow, but he did)?

How about when he violated the terms of his pardon? Faked his own death? Orchestrated the theft of valuable loot from Jackie, which would have gone off flawlessly without Ricky's interference? Escaped Zheng Yi Sao with her prisoners, several of her newest crew members, and her wheel in tow? Raided an adrift vessel? Led the capture of another vessel, without Ed this time? Freed himself during an attempted takeover of his own vessel and negotiated with fellow pirates for a peaceful end to the conflict and the surrender of their captain?

He did all of that in his own delightfully weird Stede way with his own delightfully weird Stede goals, and we're going to take Ned fucking Low's word for it that until he killed the bastard, he wasn't a real pirate?

If piracy is anything in this show, it's a multi-use metaphor. For freedom, for belonging, for masculinity, for queerness. In this instance it's pretty clear which thing it's a metaphor for: Ned is insinuating that killing him will make Stede a "real man."

And I get why Stede buys that. I do. But I do NOT get why I keep reading takes and metas that just accept that as truth and build whole readings of Stede's character on it when it so very clearly isn't true at all.