#Southern U.S.

[annie-manga]

So, in light of recent/current events- specifically on the topic of homonationalism, I'd like to bring your attention to this song that came out in 2018:

[fanboy-feminist]

JD Vance is now Trump’s VP pick for 2024.

Lmaooo what a deeply deeply unserious country.

Anyways here’s some funny stuff I found on Twitter about it

[local-lover-boy]

My boyfriend is slacking on giving me the compliments I deserve so I'm posting these here bc y'all are way nicer

[littleapocalypsekitten]

As someone who is American and still watches actual broadcast television (news, Guy Fieri...) and am suffering through another election year... I am sick to death of hearing the term "illegals." Absolutely SICK. TO. DEATH. Like, okay, I know that the southern border has issues. It's pretty much our modern day Ellis Island, with many people there escaping...some of the same kinds of issues - and others. There are people there waiting to be vetted, seeking aslyum or work. And, indeed, there are a lot of people who hop the border illegally. I used to live in Arizona, in farm country. People without legal paperwork who could be exploited were a staple of the farming industry there...unfortunately. I lost an opportunity for a job at a restaurant once because I "didn't speak enough Spanish" - code for "Our restaurant is employing people under the table for beneath minimum wage and without benefits that we can threaten to report and have deported if they speak up wanting basic workers' rights." (I came away from that particular encounter not mad at immigrants for "stealin' mah jerb!" but mad at the company / restaurant for abusive corporate practices...go fig. Guess I think differently). Even here in Pennsylvania, I've had chance encounters with people who had no papers. (People who just want to work and take care of their children). Anyway, yeah, there are processing issues and people who don't go through the legal channels because our government makes it next to impossible. But every GOD. DAMNED. TIME. I hear the term "illegals" I want to tear my hair out! Or hit people with fish! It's not only used for people who are going through the LEGAL channels (It's code for "Hispanic" basically, or just "non-white"), even people who haven't? It's a dehumanising term. That's what I take it as. "Illegals" is a term purposefully used to make people sound like something...other than people. And so I find the MAGA commercials insulting both to my intelligence and dignity. It's like, why don't you go all the way, MAGA? Why not use the really horrible slang-term I heard waaaaay, waaaay too much in my white-person childhood around Arizona redneck white people? Why not tweak your commercials and start whining about "wetbacks?" I mean, you might as well, since you term everyone "illegals." You expect us to think of people as not human. It's too late for me. I've worked with too many "illegals" in my life to think like that.

[fuckmeyer]

I saw a post about racist Jasper stans bitching bc they’re not able to enjoy shitty J*sper content bc of tags or whatever lol and someone said: “What is there even to enjoy?”. I had to laugh and I thought if you bc it’s so true. Most Jasper content isn’t even that enjoyable. It’s mostly the same boring white-supremacist garbage that I’ve seen before; even the jalice stuff is played out.

The only J*sper content I enjoy is content where he is worshipping Maria, thinking about Maria, talking about Maria, loving Maria, doing anything for Maria tbh. Is that bad? XD I owe it to you and your writing! idk something about a 19/20 year old dumbass confederate falling madly in love with a native brown woman and literally seeing her as a god-like figure as she’s basically handing him his karma for his racist crimes sends me. Ppl act like he was this awesome person before Maria and that it’s her fault he’s gutter trash now with the C*llens but he was gutter trash BEFORE he met Maria. She honestly made him so much better, stronger and MUCH more interesting. She literally created the man these stans thirst over so much. She is the blueprint.

the thing anti-María Jalice stans don't get is, without María, you do not have Jasper. for everything Jasper is, María is the catalyst ❤️

canonically, all we know about Jasper Hale pre-change is 1) he was born in Texas, 2) faked his age to join the Confederate Army* where he became the youngest major in Texas, & 3) was persuasive

beyond that, María made Jasper into the man the fandom adores. you like that he's an empath? guess whose venom made him one. you like that he's a warmonger? guess whose war he fought for. you like that he has a troubled past? guess who put the trouble in it. you like that he's "soft" "empath" "baby" (tbh i don't see it but ok)? guess who made him want to be that way. you like that he's submissive to Alice? guess who broke him in first.

you want Jasper with Alice but wish the María era didn't exist? lol just say you want the hot faceless Confederate to get with the psychic Mississippian & go

as for me, MARÍA ALL DAY BAYBEEEEE

here we have a woman who has suffered all her life at the hands of colonizers. born "1800s or earlier," we can suppose she has firsthand experience with colonization (at least Napoleon's invasion) & lived through Mexico's War of Independence. i.e., she has a deep familiarity with what it means to have your way of life ripped from you by invaders. PLUS she was a victim of Benito's army in the Southern Vampire Wars; her entire coven including her mate was killed.

& despite her losses, she rallied to take back her land & drive out her oppressors. baseline, she is a strong, cunning, powerful indigenous woman with a deep love for her community and her people. HOT

now let's look at Jasper, a bright leader in the Civil War who suffered defeat at the hands of the Union army. yes, María changed him. but did she force him to stay? to go to war? the newborn vamp with the strength & speed to overcome a "grown" vamp chose not to do so. the empath with the power to make anyone disregard him chose not to use it. some say María was "abusive" & "manipulative," but few acknowledge that Jasper had a choice.

why didn't Jasper leave? because he's submissive to anyone more powerful than him. because he was a loser. because the Southern Vampire Wars gave him a second chance at victory. because "empath" or no, he wanted to play war & win.

that's what's compelling about Jasper/María. as wrong as Jasper was for fighting for the Confederacy, he believed he was fighting for the same thing as she. he saw his way of life destroyed by "invaders" & fought back. it's a sick & twisted parallel between oppressor & oppressed that becomes subverted as their relationship goes on... & one that can heal them both.

María's experience with colonizers gives her a visceral picture of what it means to be oppressed... but her relationship with Jasper gives her the victory & emotional reflection she needs to move on. Jasper's military training gives him the hunger & knowledge for war... but his "curse" of empathy provides him with the tools he needs to recognize & address the horrors of his problematic past & move on.

tbh, i find Jasper & María are perfectly suited for a delicious character-driven narrative. Maria's story is that of a traumatized indigenous woman on a path from colonization to decolonization, & the sacrifices & destruction she endures realize that vision. Jasper's story is that of a troubled man on the path from self-hate to self-love, & what it means to undo the societal teachings/traumas & forge a life of empathy & forgiveness.

& that is something Alice alone can never give Jasper.

tl;dr all hail Queen María

[markonpark]

The Galloping Goose. Vintage snapshot photo of a Rio Grande Southern Railroad car for the U.S. Mail Express. https://markonpark.etsy.com/listing/1569068314

[basingstokemercury]

As nice as it is to see an Arab character portrayed without stereotypes, it would be nice to see some recognition of his culture beyond that one time he mentioned couscous.

This goes for all the human characters - aside from Sisko's baseball, they're all perfect, vacuum-packed, backgroundless specimens of universal humanity.

Next to the Bajorans or even the Ferengi, they just feel so empty of any context.

Maybe there are other Muslims serving on the station, and Bashir is called away from Eid al-Adha celebrations by news of a medical emergency?

Maybe Molly can't get to sleep without her father singing a traditional Irish folk song for her lullaby?

Maybe Sisko has some favourite food from his home state (WE DON'T EVEN KNOW HIS HOME STATE DO WE) that the replicators just can't get right?

It would be so easy to include even small touches, but we're left with characters who have nothing aside from their names and appearances to even suggest that these are people of diverse heritage and not all representatives of the same homogenous society.

[cantsayidont]

THE BAD BATCH (2016): Not to be confused with the recent dreadful cartoon spinoff of THE CLONE WARS, Ana Lily Amirpour's followup to A GIRL WALKS HOME ALONE AT NIGHT is kind of a druggy homage to the low-budget Italian MAD MAX ripoffs of the early '80s, starring Suki Waterhouse as Arlen, a young woman among an apparently growing number of people sentenced to permanent exile from the United States to die or eke out a miserable existence in the deserts of the Southwest. She's immediately captured by cannibals, who cut off and eat her right arm and right leg, but she contrives an escape in a truly disgusting fashion and makes her way to a Burning Man-like community called Comfort, which is basically a cult run by a man called The Dream (Keanu Reeves), busily accumulating a collection of pregnant sister-wives. Arlen then ends up entangled with a Cuban exile from Miami (Jason Momoa), another cannibal whose daughter (Jayda Fink) Arlen has more or less kidnapped after killing his baby mama (Yolanda Ross).

As you can probably guess, this is not a movie for the weak of stomach, although it doesn't play like a horror movie, with a spacey, doped-out detachment that makes it feel like a vivid if often unpleasant dream, and it's populated by high-profile ("Hey, wait, isn't that …") guest stars, many of them unrecognizable. It's strikingly photographed and sometimes inventive, with an unusual use of pop songs (I will certainly never look at the Ace of Base song "All That She Wants" in the same way again), but after a while — if you haven't noped out after the extremely gruesome first half-hour — you may begin to wonder if there's a point.

Like GIRL, there isn't a lot of what you'd call plot, but the earlier film's sense of desperation and romantic longing has dissipated into a kind of post-apocalyptic ennui; there's nowhere really for Arlen to go, and while at one point she tells The Dream she wishes she had a time machine so she could go back and fix things, we never really learn where she's been or what's happened either to her or to the world. Also, even given the general level of violence and ickiness, the Black characters are treated with what seems like a disproportionate level of brutality, which sits ill. CONTAINS LESBIANS? Nope. VERDICT: An oddball curiosity, but stay well away if you're squeamish at all.

[prisonhannibal]

I am such an accent fan I will literally follow people on tiktok just because I like their accent and listen even tho I don’t care about the content

[thepopculturearchivist]

The "Southern Strategy," c. 1929?

WARNING: the N-word appears in this TIME magazine story from the February 18, 1929 issue

[yardsards]

this cold snap combined with being Obligated to visit my shit parents has me fantasizing about the fact that some day i will move hundreds -perhaps thousands- of miles away from here

[lighthouseas]

if i ever vc any of my mutuals, full disclosure i WILL put on a fake accent while i talk this is just Something I Do

[k-i-l-l-e-r-b-e-e-6-9]

𝔗𝔥𝔢 𝔇𝔬𝔬𝔟𝔦𝔢 𝔅𝔯𝔬𝔱𝔥𝔢𝔯𝔰 - 𝔖𝔫𝔞𝔨𝔢 𝔐𝔞𝔫

[trustingofwinds]

OMG I HAVENT POSTED ABOUT THIS YET

[jules-hoard-of-stuff]

Me: okay I'm gonna get over my agoraphobia, the world isn't SO scary, it'll be fine!

The south U.S.: by the way we have tons of direct attacks on trans people. Anti-trans violence has gone up monumentally since the start of the pandemic. Your younger brothers and sisters are being hunted for sport.

Me: .... okay maybe staying in the dorm for a while isn't so bad-

[juvinadelgreko]

another train has derailed in Ohio.

friendly reminder that Obama passed restrictions on carriers so that accidents like this wouldn’t happen.

guess who repealed them? Trump.

I know we’re angry that Biden hasn’t been more helpful or visited Ohio, but please, remember who the real enemy is.