#Two wrongs don't make a right

[blackflash9]

"Can we move on? I'd love for you to be part of my life again."

So, I've recently come across some disturbing opinions in the community where some people are actively supporting or cheering for Lin to beat up Suyin for her childhood mistakes and personal imperfections, which gives off serious domestic abuser vibes? Look, I understand that everyone brings their own baggage to their reactions to fiction and fictional characters, but sometimes I wish people would acknowledge that more. It's literally okay to say, 'I don't like this character because they remind me of people I've had bad experiences with.'

But at the same time, I think people often miss the forest for the trees in what Lin and Suyin are supposed to embody about (imperfect) family and relationships. I'll preface this by saying that not everyone who hurts us deserves forgiveness. However, there are people we might benefit from forgiving or even just talking to. Lin and Suyin demonstrate that forgiveness can positively impact lives and that effective communication is essential for this to happen.

[dramoor]

[trexalicious]

Seriously Texas? Don't you have enough to worry about at the border without persecuting a young mother of five for returning her books a month late due to pregnancy complications? A $570 arrest warrant has been issued for her and the judge compared returning her books late to stealing merchandise from Walmart...🤯🤬👎

[creationsabyss]

My thoughts on the Aventurine drama

I've been inactive for a while, I was (still am) busy in real life but coming back online to post and seeing discourse about a newly crowned favorite character is disheartening. Even more so, that people are harassing other writers over a drama I feel is overblown.

I have thoughts regarding it but I'm unsure if my opinion would be appreciated. But if you'd like to peacefully talk it out with me, I'd be happy to lend an ear. I'd like to hear both sides, as meager as my opinion may be.

Oh boy, here we go.

Aventurine is a character, a fictional being born to entertain the players. He is not real. He can not be offended by what you create of him. There is no point getting upset on the behalf of a character and prioritizing fiction over a person who does actually exist.

If we do want to condemn slavery fics, why not also cancel slave reader fics? Or ones that include things such as dead dove (including yanderes in general) fics because those topics are equally terrible to condone and write about from that point of view. Or how about other characters that have similar topics in their lore. Should those also be canceled too?

*There are also folks who make problematic pieces to help cope with their own trauma. Does that mean they should be canceled too? (On that note: making a piece that holds problematic content does not always mean the person condones it in real life. Fiction is fiction for a reason.)

In the end, I think everyone can have their own opinions, but I would like to say that your opinions do not justify terrible actions. Just because you disagree with something does not justify you bullying someone into deleting one of their works, whether it is art or writing or anything else, I do not think that is justifiable. Harassing someone or calling people to harass them is not right either.

*If you did disagree with it, why not message the author about it instead of making accusatory posts? Even when done with good intentions, all it does is cause harm when it's practically inviting people to go harass someone over a fanfiction. A very mild fanfiction at that.

If you disagree with a piece, cool. That's your opinion. Just don't interact with it then. Block that creator or that tag or whatever it is that led you there. Or if you're curious, ask that creator.

Also, to reiterate, in my opinion, fiction is still just fiction. Especially when it's a fanfiction about a fictional character. Yes, his canon lore exists, but people can use that basis in fanfiction, something that will inherently warp canon because we are not the original writers and can not capture him in the exact way he was created. In case that doesn't make sense: Fanfiction does not have to comply with the original lore. Also since some of you seem to be forgetting: fiction does not mirror real life.

If you are truly that concerned over sensitive topics like that, directing that energy towards projects that involve such topics in real life would be much better than attacking people on the internet.

[onsomekindofstartrek]

Like, I don't think this is profoundly feminist or even deep, but I want to write a sci-fi novel that gives older sexist male sci-fi fans the exact experience of being a nerdy teenage girl and reading a Larry Niven novel.

Like, it's not even that it was a failure of progressivism, the way those novels treated women, it's just that you get halfway or less into all these novels and realize that the author is truly incapable of being normal about women, that the aliens are more human than the women in this man's inner world.

I want to create the equivalent for grown-ass men who like Warhammer and Dune. A novel that leaves a forty-five year old libertarian Heinlein fan like... well, that's an amazing vision of the future, but why does the author think I'm... icky?

[abearinthewoods]

This is what radical feminists do when you don't agree that 100% of men jerk off to rape.

@radfemih8men Care to fucking explain yourself? (edit: she did, in the comments. long story, she confirmed it and thinks two wrongs make a right)

>mentions the darknet. 100% needs to have her hard drive check out.

Anyways, report this convo to the police, saying this kind of thing to a 13 year old is actually a sex offense PURELY ON ITS OWN in a lot of places.

[sapphicczaroftorture]

Being a jewish anti militarism and colonialism living in occupied Palestine, i really feel like i have no place.

Even the tiniest empathy for PEOPLE, HUMAN BEINGS, CIVILIANS who are Palestinian is considered as "supporting terrorism". I feel i have no place here, and im ashsamed being part of the occupying side.

I really feel This [anon online spaces] is the only place i can say that w/o concequence;

Occupation is occupation. Don't you understand every single person attacking NEVER HAD A FREE DAY IN THEIR LIVES? Evey soldier was born to insane propoganda and active justification of the occupation? They were born into the occupation, none want to die to it.

Terrorism is awful. But not ONLY muslims do terrorism. The way the military and settlers controls the Palestinians is terrorism. The massacre in Reim was terrorism. Terrorism does not justify terrorism.

Also, criticizing either is not antisemitism and is not islamophobic. I also do not blame individuals, the people being drafted are not to blame, i criticise the Governments who give no shits about human lives, they only care about political power.

Hammas and Bibi need each other to stay in power.

[jayjuno]

Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip right now.

Just sayin'

[dragonbleps]

That makes you a fucking asshole hypocrite btw <3. People died

[blusical]

While we're still on the subject of the Booktok mess. This should go without saying, but please don't harass any booktok creators, especially if they had nothing to do with this situation. What's happening is disgusting, but two wrongs don't make a right. Just stick with calling out the harassing users or better yet maybe even blocking them.

[djevilninja]

Mary Wells - Two Wrongs Don’t Make a Right

[poligraf]

A good End cannot sanctifie evil Means; nor must we ever do Evil, that Good may come of it.

— William Penn

[b0bthebuilder35]

💯

[kforourke]

Charlie Foxtrot

The last few news cycles have been packed, so it's understandable if you missed the Biden administration's recent decision to send cluster munitions—also known as cluster bombs—to Ukraine.

I'm not alone in disagreeing with this decision; The New York Times editorial board noted that cluster munitions are not "a weapon that a nation with the power and influence of the United States should be spreading."

What, then, are these things? And why are some people (myself included!) so opposed to the use of cluster munitions?

Briefly, cluster munitions are "any of a number of weapons systems which ... deliver clusters of smaller explosive submunitions onto a target," according to the Convention on Cluster Munitions. They have a "propensity to leave behind large numbers of unexploded remnants which exact an even greater indiscriminate toll amongst civilians."

The weapons we're sending to Ukraine contain 88 "bomblets" in each round, and each "bomblet has a lethal range of about 10 square meters, so a single canister can cover an area up to 30,000 square meters (about 7.5 acres), depending upon the height it releases the bomblets."

This is obviously bound to cause harm after the war is over. How much harm is the question—tracking mine and cluster-munition injuries is difficult, and the data are poor.

The Global Burden of Disease doesn't include separate causes for mine or munition-related injuries/deaths (they're lumped under "conflict and terrorism"), and the ICD-10 doesn't even include a code relating specifically to cluster munitions; Y36.81, "explosion of mine placed during war operations but exploding after cessation of hostilities," comes closest.

Nonetheless, even if the data are poorly classified and/or underreported, land mines, cluster munitions, and other "explosive remnants of war" (ERW) clearly constitute an ongoing threat.

Stats: during the Vietnam War, the US military dropped more than 250 million cluster munitions, of which 9 to 27 million unexploded submunitions remain. And according to the Landmine & Cluster Munition Monitor, "since global tracking began in 1999 the Monitor has recorded more than 122,000" casualties due to land mines and/or ERW.

Here, from the same organization, is a map showing current (2018) cluster munition "contamination" around the world. Red and dark red = bad.

To put the harm cluster munitions cause in more human terms, here's a picture of farmers from Vietnam who were injured by leftover bomblets.

Of course, not everyone agrees that the US shouldn't send Ukraine cluster munitions.

Turkiye began sending Ukraine cluster munitions earlier this year, and Russia has been using them against Ukraine for some time, as the Washington Post's Max Boot points out:

Boot's use of the term moral equivalence—even if he's denying that there is one in this case—brings to mind Noam Chomsky's characteristically forceful take on the phrase:

"Moral equivalence is a term of propaganda that was invented to try to prevent us from looking at what the acts for which we are responsible ... I reject that reasoning."

Perhaps a simpler way to look at this whole clusterfuck is: two wrongs don't make a right. Take it away, Barrett Strong.

...

Header image via Wikimedia Commons.

Cluster bomb victims' hands also via Wikimedia Commons.

Etymology bonus: the term "clusterfuck," in the sense of "bungled or confused undertaking" or "fuckup," arose as military slang during the Vietnam War.

When referring to a clusterfuck over the radio, or in the presence of parties they'd rather not curse in front of, members of the military would instead refer to something as a "Charlie Foxtrot," hence the title of this piece.