#a phenomenon nobody wants to talk about but is undeniably there…

[wafflesrock16]

Shakarian Life/Death AU

The second choice in my drabble poll. It’s said that the personifications of Life and Death have been in love since the dawn of creation...

“Life and death have been in love for longer than we have words to describe. Life sends countless gifts to Death... and Death keeps them forever.” --Anonymous 

Most saw death as an end to be feared, black and cold and cruel. Death didn’t like to think of herself that way. She wasn’t cold--or at least she didn’t think so. She cherished all the souls she shepherded into the afterlife. And while she did undeniably like the color black, she also enjoyed the color red. And blue. Blue was her favorite 

Death was a name bestowed upon her, but not one she’d have chosen for herself. She preferred to be called ‘Shepard.’ At least by friends. Not that she had many, but there were a few, and they tended to choose their own monikers as well. 

Ocean, for example, for reasons nobody could understand, liked to be called ‘Jack.’ Shepard supposed the name was fitting for the ocean’s tempestuous, unpredictable nature. Why Moon wanted to be called ‘Miranda’ was another mystery. 

Miranda and Jack enjoyed a loving, if not complex relationship. It ebbed and flowed, pushed and pulled yet remained an unbreakable force. 

“Perhaps the only relationship more complicated than Jack and I is yours and Life,” Miranda had stated in a crisp, erudite tone. 

Shepard glanced down at the swirling marble of blue and green that hung below them in the infinite cosmos. Swirling clouds coruscated across the surface in an unending dance. The world looked like a joyous, happy place. Shepard frowned.

 “Life--Garrus--can be so cruel,” she sighed. “Sometimes I swear he creates life for no reason other than to watch its light flicker and fade. Then I’m called heartless. I’m the one who ends the suffering.”

Miranda hummed, ethereal light reflecting off her ebony hair and making it glow a radiant silver. “We all have duties. Not all of them are pleasant.” She turned her pale face to Shepard, settling her hands on her lap. Her starlight gown pooled beneath her like a silk river. “You ought to talk to him. He misses you.”

“I know.” Shepard lowered her head, crimson hair creating a curtain across her face. “He still sends me gifts,” she murmured. “The most beautiful souls from his most treasured creations. But,” she lifted her face to look Miranda in the eye. “I don’t want his gifts. I want…” she trailed off, unsure how to explain. 

Miranda rose from the silver crescent of her throne and beamed down at Shepard. “I know,” she whispered softly as a night breeze. “Tell him.”

Shepard stepped out under the orange melon glow of sunset. Soon, the sky would erupt in color; reds and golds, pinks and orange. Everything--even the atmosphere seemed to resist fading away. That wasn’t what sunset was about, of course. It, like so many other phenomenons the creatures of the world admired for their beauty, had been created by Garrus specifically for Shepard. 

She watched the light show blossom over the green valleys and meadows with eyes the same verdant hue as summer grass. Eyes she’d selected because Garrus liked the color. 

“Shepard!”

She turned toward the burning white light of Life. It pulsed and diminished until Garrus stood, framed by eternal sunshine like colossal wings, blue eyes aflame. His form was different to that chosen by herself, Jack and Miranda. There were others who preferred the tall, armored and plated appearance. He had talons and fangs, mandibles and a crest of horns. He looked at once radiant and dangerous. Which was an apt personification for life, if Shepard considered it. 

“Shepard, I… I’ve missed you.” Garrus stopped in front of her. Close enough for her to reach out and caress his scared mandible. For Life wasn’t flawless, but rather a rugged thing, whose beauty shone all the brighter for the imperfections. 

“I know. I just…” Shepard sighed, before squaring her shoulders and looking her love in the eyes. “I needed some time. After the war… there were so many, Garrus. Some were so young. I know you don’t control the famine, plague, pestilence and war. But it was a lot.”

Garrus nodded, the dying rays of sunlight reflecting off his silver plates and throwing the cobalt cloak he wore into stark relief. “I know. I didn’t want- never want, my creations to meet violent ends. It’s a comfort to know they’re going with you, at least.” He dared to take a step forward, then another. Slowly, giving her the chance to pull away if she wanted, he reached out to her. 

Shepard squeezed his hands. So much larger and rougher than her own. Different, but familiar. The hands that held her, that threaded through her hair, that drew sighs and hushed pleas as they worked--calibrated, to use his words--her corporal body into a writhing mess. 

“Shepard.” He purred the word, using both sets of vocals. It gave his voice a smokey quality that Shepard loved. “I’m sorry if my gifts have caused you pain. I… want you to be happy. I can’t control what my creations do with the life I give them.”

She moved, taking the final step to press into his warm, glowing embrace. “I know,” she sighed against his tunic. Her long, flowing shawl of midnight fluttered in the evening breeze.

Twilight was the time they’d carved out for themselves. On the cusp of light and dark, Life and Death would join together, confirming their devotion. 

Shepard lifted onto her toes as Garrus bent his head. He tasted of mint and holly, fresh spring water and brilliant dawn. Her hands wrapped around his neck and he pulled her closer. Stars burst overhead in a glorious cacophony of diamond and glittering nebula spun away as Life and Death reaffirmed their vows. 

“You still want to be a one deity kind of woman?” Garrus breathed against her parted lips. 

“I love you, Life. Garrus Vakarian. Until the end of all things.”

She felt more than heard his rumbling reply, pitched in octaves lower than the sounds of seeds coming to life within their bed of soil and clouds forming in the heavens. “I love you too, Death. My Shepard. Always.”

Far away, Time hummed an old song he’d heard somewhere, reciting fractions and events over in his infinite mind in a rapid-fire succession no mortal could ever keep pace with. He glanced down upon Life and Death in intimate embrace.  

As it should be, he mused upon the pair. There is no Life without Death. No Shepard without Vakarian.

[brandyovereager]

The Phoenix Effect - pt. 4

I had a lot of fun writing Rowan’s POV for this and I may have gotten a bit carried away...but I love Rowaelin! <3 :)

On ao3:

https://archiveofourown.org/works/22195906/chapters/58766644#workskin

Summary: Rowan is in Rifthold with Dorian when a strange phenomenon sweeps the land. Those once dead are popping up alive. Everyday, more and more are Reborn. One day Rowan encounters a Reborn young man who refuses to give his name, only asking to know the whereabouts of Celaena Sardothein.

-

As helpful as the Fae king had been so far, and as much as he could be trusted with his discretion, visiting the Keep was something Sam had to do alone. This was his revenge, and he needed to be the one to carry it out.

“I’ll do what I need to and meet you at the castle gates by dusk if I haven’t gotten the information I need.” Hopefully the scum left at the Keep could tell him the full story of Celaena’s fate, but if not he would still need the Rowan’s help.

“Absolutely not.” Sam was taken aback.

“Excuse me?” This was the first time the Fae had outright denied him the discretion he asked for.

“No way are you going to do whatever it is you think you need to do alone. I’m coming with you.” Sam hadn’t expected that.

“I can handle myself.” He’d spent years at the Keep, he knew the terrain and the people like second nature.

“I don’t know what sort of trouble you’ve gotten yourself into but I can tell it’s with some very bad people. You need to be smart about this. I might not be necessary, but I certainly wouldn’t be detrimental. You could use someone to watch your back, after all, I’m assuming these people are the reason you died in the first place.”

Sam had to admit he was right about that.

“You can come with me, but you stay outside. I will go in and take care of my business alone. You’ll stand guard and wait for my signal if something goes wrong.”

Rowan’s response was a simple nod. Good. The Fae would be nearby if things to a turn for the worst, but this was a conversation Rowan had no part of. As curious as the King of Terrasen’s past seemed, Sam didn’t want to bring him into this. A royal had no place in the murdering of three well-known assassins to avenge the death of another well-known assassin.

————

The further they walked, the more certain Rowan became that this kid was in some deep shit.

They were trekking through the city, side-by-side, and in silence. Rowan observed the young man carefully as they maneuvered through the crowds, in part to make sure they didn’t get separated, but also out of curiosity.

The young man was slender, but not in a way that put him at a disadvantage. On the contrary, he was lithe and nimble. He could slip easily through the crowd practically undetected, quite the opposite of Rowan’s method—simply be hulking and angry-looking and people move out of your way. The young man was not scrawny or weak. He was probably made of lean and compact muscle underneath his clothing.

He reminded Rowan of Aelin, and wasn’t that just a heart-wrenching thought—soon, they’d be back together soon. His delicate movements were similar to that of the former assassin’s—perhaps that was how this young man got himself mixed up in underhanded dealings. Rowan could easily picture the boy as a thief or an assassin, silent but dangerous.

“So Aelin Galathynius is alive?” The young man’s question made Rowan crook the edge of his mouth up in a secret smile.

“Yes, Terrasen’s true queen is alive and well, just as she will be for many years to come.” Rowan was sure of that. If her sheer power and immortal grace alone wasn’t enough, Rowan would lay down his own life to keep her breathing.

“What’s she like?” Whether these questions were simply small talk or the young man was trying to figure Rowan out, the Fae did not care. He would gladly praise his love to anyone who would listen.

“Fierce, determined, relentless,” Rowan smirked slightly as he continued, “stubborn, arrogant, hotheaded,” his face softened, “immensely beautiful, loyal to kingdom and kin, passionate as her fire,” he would forever be in awe of her, “and powerful beyond legend.” The young man was now analyzing his face closely.

“You two married for love, yes? It was not arranged?” Rowan couldn’t help but chuckle at the question.

“I bring her absolutely no political advantage as a husband. My status as a Prince was nothing but an empty title. I had no money or land, and she had far better options in that aspect, but that didn’t matter to Aelin. We are mates, simple as that.”

“I’m afraid I don’t know much about Fae, but your kind mate for life, yes?”

“In a sense, yes. When a Fae meets their true mate, there is an undeniable connection. Mates are tied to one another in a bond far greater than the mortal concept of marriage. The mortal world would see our marriage as a poor move for Terrasen, but such things are insignificant in the face of a mating bond.”

“I thought you were kind of odd for a king.” Rowan laughed at the kid’s observation.

He was more husband than king. Aelin was a wonderful queen, and did not need a consort to make decisions for her. What she needed was his love and fealty. He supported his mate emotionally as she bore the mantle of queen. He was blood-sworn to her, and he would do whatever she asked of him—hence his presence in Rifthold.

The two walked on, further and further, and with every turn Rowan felt the pit of his stomach sink deeper. He didn’t know how close they were to their destination, but the area was sickeningly familiar. Rowan hadn’t spent too much time in Rifthold before, especially not in any one area, but he knew this place. They were near the Assassin’s Keep.

His observation was proven true as the young man turned down a street and then stopped in front of a familiar building.

It might just be that his earlier deduction was correct. However, this young man and Aelin moved so similarly not just because they were both trained assassins, but because they were trained by the same man.

Rowan had a horrible feeling about this.

————

Sam hadn’t seen the doors to the Keep since he left with Celaena. Arobynn and his lackeys had likely taken him here to be tortured and killed, but he’d had a blindfold on the whole time.

The place was just as dark and terrible as always. Why make a building full of professional murderers look inviting? From the information Sam had found in the Hall of Records, Arobynn was no longer there, but he still felt no great desire to enter.

He glanced over to his Fae companion, who was staring at the building with an odd look on his face.

“Stay out here. I could be a while, but don’t come in unless I call for you.” For a monarch, Rowan accepted the outright order quite well, and Sam once again wondered about the story behind the King of Terrasen.

The Keep was cold inside, just as it had always been. Celaena had always used it as an excuse to buy the most expensive blankets and other finery to keep warm, but Sam had always had a deep chill through him whenever he was here.

He found Tern first. The man was sloppy, always had been, and it was easy to catch him off guard. With hardly any effort he had the other assassin subdued and tied to his own chair, Sam moved to stand in front of him. The moment Tern finally saw his face a look of shock appeared before quickly being replaced with anger.

“I heard a bunch of dead ones were popping up, some god’s gotta be off it if they picked you.”

“I’m aware you prefer me dead, you did help kill me after all.” Sam was, in fact, still a little bitter about that.

“Is that what you’re here for, revenge? You’ve come to kill me for killing you?” Tern’s teeth were bared in a sneer.

“I am enjoying the feeling of you tied up and at my mercy—and it may come to that later—but no, I’m here for information.”

“You want to know who ordered the hit on you? I thought it was pretty obvious it was Arobynn, but maybe you’d like my confirmation?” This buffoon was quickly exhausting his patience.

“No, that was obvious. I knew even then that it was him. I need you to tell me what happened to Celaena. Why was she sent to Endovier, and where is Arobynn?” Tern’s mouth curled into a sinister smile.

“You do not know?” Sam was growing tired of tedious conversation. Tern was acting quite proud for knowing something Sam did not.

“Obviously not, so tell me. What happened between the both of them after I was killed?” What did he do to Celaena?

“I take it these questions mean you have not heard whispers around Rifthold about the assassin or her master? I’m sure you have deduced what that means.” Sam briefly sacrificed his sharp focus to roll his eyes in annoyance.

“Neither is in the city, yes, but why?” Tern’s answers were sounding a lot more like questions.

“Arobynn Hammel is dead. He was murdered in his sleep two years ago, most likely by that brunette whore he kept company with.” So Arobynn was dead, but Celaena had not killed him. Celaena had never gotten to enact her vengeance on the cruel man.

“If he only died two years ago, then he would have been alive to see Celaena’s capture. Why didn’t he save her? Was it his fault?” Why would Arobynn give up his star assassin to the King?

“Yes, he set her up to be arrested. He baited her with your murder, knew she would come for revenge, and arranged for Adarlan’s Guard to be waiting for her. He was angry about her trying to run off with you, thought he’d teach her a lesson, starting with your death.” Sam’s blood was boiling with his strong emotions, one of which being immense rage.

“So I was a pawn, killed so Arobynn could reprimand his precious protege? It was better for her to meet a slow, torturous death than for the two of us to leave the Guild?” It was horrible, pure hatred and cruelty. Why could they not be happy?

“It’s your own fault for thinking you could. Nobody gets out of here. The life of an assassin follows you wherever you go, and you two had to learn that the hard way.” Not for the first time, Sam imagined how their story could have ended had they not both belonged Arobynn Hammel. If they had been born average children in Rifthold, would anyone have gone to such lengths to prevent their happiness?

“Arobynn is lucky he’s already dead, the bastard deserved far worse than a slit throat for his sins, but perhaps I can make do with you and your cronies.” Sam felt a sadistic smirk appear on his lips and slowly stalked closer to his prey. “How much did you know beforehand of his plan for her? Did you help him set the trap?” Tern began to shake slightly and struggle harder against his restraints.

“Hey now, I was just a henchman—an ignorant henchman at that. Arobynn didn’t tell us anything but what we specifically needed to do, and only right before we needed to do it. He didn’t trust us with anything that sensitive.” It was an empty excuse, really, not enough for Sam to spare him.

“You still did it, though, and I bet you were happy to. The three of you held no great love for Celaena Sardothein. I’m sure business only got better.”

“That may be true, but you still don’t want to kill me.” It was laughable, and Sam let out a short guffaw at Tern’s statement.

“Why not? What more could I need from you? You’ve answered my questions, and given me greatly displeasing answers. I should take your life as vengeance for Celaena’s.” It’s what he’d come here intending to do, anyway.

“What if I told you that Celaena didn’t die in Endovier?” Sam froze. “I can tell you how she got out and where she went, just leave me here alive.” Tern knew he had him with that, and began to look smug again. Ordinarily, Sam would have swiftly wiped the look from Tern’s face, but he was entirely fixated on what the assassin just revealed.

“You have my attention.”

@rowaelinforeverworld @flowersinvegas @aelin-queen-of-terrasen @camixd93

Message me or reply to be tagged (or just to let me know what you think)!

[bluerosesonata]

The Legacy of Aika Village

[This will be the first of a few mini-articles I plan to post here, just about different things I’m passionate about. Please indulge me.]

This article originally was written back in early April- since then, Nintendo announced that the “Dream Suites” would be coming to the latest update of ACNH, as “Dream Islands.” As such, I thought it would be timely to finally post this.

Update: On July 2nd, the original creator of Aika Village made a tweet announcing their plans to remake Aika for Dream Islands in New Horizons! The legend lives on!

Image Credit: thumbnail from chuggaconroy’s playthrough of Aika Village on Youtube.

Animal Crossing And Horror: The Legacy of Aika Village

With a lot of the world in lockdown, Animal Crossing New Horizons has become a creative and social outlet for many, leading to a lot of people who never played Animal Crossing to engage with it for the first time. I’m sure most of you have encountered the various types of people present in the Animal Crossing community by now, but there’s a type of Animal Crossing players that a lot of people didn’t realize exist, and have existed, for a while now: The Horror Town Creators.

These players were the subject of a brief write up on Polygon by Patricia Hernandez [Hernandez, Patricia. “Animal Crossing: New Horizons is now a horror game, thanks to fans.” Polygon, 24 Mar. 2020. https://www.polygon.com/2020/3/24/21190826/animal-crossing-new-horizons-horror-game-decorations-scary-nintendo-switch-blood-spatter-pattern.], who posted an article featuring quotes and pictures of people creating horror themed towns and rooms in New Horizons, but only made a brief mention of the legacy of horror that many of these players are striving to recreate: The Nightmare Suites of Animal Crossing: New Leaf.

(These next few paragraphs are a bit of a self-indulgent aside, so feel feel to skip ahead.)

Horror gets a bad rap. Horror artists get comments like “lmao what SCP is this,”  “that’s fucked up,” or get flippant remarks about it all “looking the same.” Horror writers get made fun of for only writing “three types of stories.” Even the term “creepypasta,” which has evolved into shorthand for “horror stories independently published online,” still carries the stink of derision from the typo-filled, often poorly-written shock stories the term originated from. Despite this derision, horror, as a genre, is MASSIVELY popular (and profitable as well!). There’s an undeniable appeal to it.

More importantly, horror always finds a way to adapt itself to different mediums. As one can easily see by the success of horror podcasts like the NoSleep Podcast and The Magnus Archives, it isn’t even limited to a visual format! Like fear and dread itself, the horror genre crawls on, inexhaustible, undying, and ever-present, always returning to us in ways both novel and familiar.

Horror lovers are a tight knit, but welcoming, community, and that’s one of its biggest strengths and weaknesses.The biggest drawback is that a lot of really cool stuff produced will never be experienced, let alone documented, by people outside the community. And that’s what prompted this post. I was trying to explain the Dream Suite horror movement to my cousin, and despite my best efforts, didn’t find a lot of coverage about them, beyond the fact they existed. Worse, most of those were articles written five years ago. Even so, I’ll link to a few of them at the end of this post, as they’re definitely worth reading.

For me, I wanted to share my experience of the horror town phenomena with people outside the community. The Nightmare Suites movement was really something magical, and I know that I, personally, am still trying to recreate that magic in New Horizons. And hey, maybe once you’re finished reading this, you will too.

The Dream Suite

Before we can talk about Aika Village, we need to explain the feature that made this whole movement possible. In the 2012/2013 3DS game, Animal Crossing: New Leaf, there were two areas in every town: The village, and Main Street, which laid beyond the train tracks that ran across to the north of every town. Main Street was home several important structures, including the town shop, the Happy Home Academy, and the Post Office. Later on, more structures could be unlocked and built as public works projects, one of which was the Dream Suite.[“Dream Suite.” Nookipedia, 25 Apr. 2013, nookipedia.com/wiki/Dream_Suite.] 

As for how it worked, Nookipedia explains it best:

To begin a dream, the player must lie down on the bed and pay Luna 500 Bells. They may then choose to visit a random town, input the Dream Address of a specific town to visit, or search for a town. They may then choose to visit a previously visited town or a random town, or to input the dream address of a new town to visit. While dreaming, the player may walk around the town and perform actions just as they would in the real world, but their actions will have no effect on the town.

While dreaming, the bed will be on the dream town's plaza. Luna and Lloid stand near it until the player decides to wake up. Players can borrow tools like a shovel and axe from Lloid to use within the dream. If the player lies on the bed a second time, they will leave the dream and anything they have in their pockets will be lost.

The player cannot go to Main Street or enter any buildings with doors besides homes. Additionally, messages left on the bulletin board cannot be read; instead, the board displays the town's name and Dream Address…custom designs on display in the town, such as on the ground and in houses, will be visible. The player who uploaded the town can also be found walking about. When spoken to, they will say their recorded greeting.

In essence, the Dream Suite takes a snapshot of your town at the moment you ask Luna, the NPC running the Dream Suite, to share a dream- this includes your outfit, the way  you decorated your home, the items laying around town, etc.

The most important aspect of this feature, and the one that I feel had the most impact on the Nightmare Suite creation movement, was the method of discovery. If you didn’t know someone’s code, you would be sent to a random dream of a random town, from anywhere in the world- and this is where I feel my personal experience of being in the community departs from the articles that have already been written about the Nightmare Suites.

The Urban Legend of Aika

In the years leading to 2013, I was going through some rough shit. I won’t go into details here, but video games had become my entire life. Coming into the summer of 2013, I didn’t have any friends I kept in touch with, and I was “starting over” in a city where I knew nobody- things were looking up, but outside of tumblr, I didn’t have anything even resembling a social life. Animal Crossing: New Leaf was a stabilizing force of my life during this time, and really helped me. I had the Shampoodle haircut guide saved to the camera roll on my phone, for pete’s sake.

It was in the beginnings of my friendship with a group of girls (whom I sadly no longer even have contact with), where a lot of our initial bonding happened because of anime and RPGmaker horror games. We were sitting together in the campus dining area, me playing on my 3DS, when I first learned about the Nightmare Suites.

“Have you heard about Aika Village?”

I hadn’t.

“It’s this really creepy town in dream suites, I heard about it from a friend online.” Later that day, she linked me to a tumblr post compiling a series of codes leading to different “creepy dream towns,” the first one being simply labeled as “Aika Village.”

That dream village became a phenomenon: people would write up their interpretations and theories about it, and even lead to a few articles and videos on gaming sites like IGN and Killscreen, which is why I’m not gonna even bother going into the content of the village itself.

And So, The Dream Begins…

This, in my opinion, was the draw of the Nightmare Suites. Without a way to directly share codes from your 3DS to your social media, the discovery and sharing of Dream Towns was like that of urban legends- like virtually passing notes in class, or sharing scary stories that “totally happened to a friend of my cousin’s sister” at a campfire. It felt like a cool discovery- something exclusive and scary and weirdly intimate. They had a mystique to them, a mystery of who their creators were and what they “really meant.” But above all that? They were cool as hell.

The Nightmare Suites used the limitations of the game to try and create an unnerving atmosphere in ways that were reminiscent to me of the RPGmaker horror game subgenre, and for me, created a lot of memories of excitedly typing in my once a day dream suite visit late at night in my dorm. I never lacked variety- there were so many people either influenced or inspired by Aika to make a horror town that there are entire lists and tumblrs dedicated to collecting those codes. (I even played around with the idea of making my own horror town, but never found the right inspiration, instead dedicating my time to making themed homes and custom outfits based on different anime characters.)

The sad fact that so many of these towns have been altered or overwritten, if they’re available or accessible at all, is in itself, a part of their urban legend-like appeal. While many of us may never get to experience these towns, the stories about them endure, in lists on long-abandoned blogs and youtube videos from people’s playthroughs.

And that mystique is the real legacy of Aika; While the Nightmare Suites may be gone, the wonder and dreamlike memories many of us hold from our chance encounter with it will never fade. You could even say we’re a bit…haunted by it.

[kitsoa]

The Duality of Ven

Speculation of a Potential Split-Personality Plot Twist

I’m a big Ventus fan, and Ven’s involvement with Khux has been a maddening scenario for me because a lot of the time, it feels like his role is laying the groundwork for whatever tie-in khux has with the next chapter in the kh saga. He’s an observing force meant to bring the questions to the forefront of the main characters. After all, we’d know what his deal is by now right? 

Well dissatisfaction with that line of thought can probably be traced in the Ven is the Murderer theories that have risen in alarm and it is from there that I found myself captivated with the idea that something major is happening with Ventus in the khux story. And I think it’s gonna hit us upside the head honestly.

This is not a “Ven is the Murderer theory”. I’m actually not in that camp, but if this helps the believers so be it. No, I’m gonna compile my walk through of the idea that Ven’s got a split-personality. And I’m probably gonna walk through my speculation on how that ties in with the logic of the greater plot of khux and the circumstantial evidence left in our understanding of Ven’s future in the series. 

We’ll start from the beginning, analyze Ven’s character, connect that to the process that drives the theory, speculate some details, take a stab as to why and finally glance at some circumstantial hints. You know, a long post.

A Heart Half Dark

The birth of most all of Ventus’ suspicion theories lies in the fact that we have had a glimpse of the exact ratio of dark and light in his heart. The BBS scene shows at least a third of his heart was gouged out but Xehanort’s experiment to create Vanitas. As this is a lot of darkness, the train of thought is to conclude that Ven must be hiding something. It’s the reason Ven’s got a following as a suspect in Strel’s murder. 

I don’t necessarily see this capacity for darkness as indicative of Ven’s guilt of course. But alongside other hints in the narrative, we are forced to consider that this darkness in him is not something to dismiss, both based on Vanitas post-split and the mysteries presented in the age of Fairy tales.

We are in search of this potent darkness. We begin with the evidence of Ven’s personality and we watch the conclusions unfold alongside what I believe are hints at this possibility. 

What is “In-Character”

Ventus does not have a lot of scenes as a complete person which makes this aspect of the analysis something worth returning to, but if I had to make a blanket statement on Ventus’s pre-split personality... it’s that it really didn’t change much at all. 

We’ve known this for a hot minute. In the flashback of Xehanort’s experiment, Ventus is pleading in frightened surrender. He doesn’t believe he is strong enough and he collapses at the impressive threat. This is the image of a frail, sensitive personality that persists post-split. So frail that it makes him weaker than a minority portion of his heart. But say it’s the amnesia. Let’s look at Ventus before the time-jump. 

He is introduced as a lonely, down-on-his-luck key wielder. He is soft spoken. A follower with low self-esteem. This much is true in his very first scene. He doesn’t understand why he was chosen as he does not have excellent rankings. He expresses his wonderment and surprise at the prospect of having friends. 

This pretty much matches up with the short glimpse of pre-split, post-amnesia Ven (uh... the khux amnesia not the trauma amnesia gdi nomura). 

Ventus is timid. So much that when he stands up for a strong belief, it surprises and amuses everyone in the room. Overall, this is not the personality of a selfish, cruel, albeit very troubled dark personality that would eventually create Vanitas. I’ll get into why he may potentially have these strong values and the impressions this entire plot could lead toward in the narrative but let’s parse it down to this.

Ven’s personality doesn’t match up to create Vanitas. It’s too night and day.

Opposing Argument: “It’s an act”

The potential of Ven’s khux personality being an act for the sake of some kind of ruse is troubling for a multitude of reasons. First of all, it’s too good of an act. He’s got the self deprecation and he’s made no suspicious moves or actions for it to be logically foreshadowed. But let’s say he’s as good as he seems-- the only suspicious error he’s made thus far is...

“Failing to read the rulebook”. Which, is a very grave error. Like one that wouldn’t happen with an honest, strategic infiltration. I’ll get back to this exact error later. But if he’s a lying liar, he’d be too good to make this mistake.

Finally, if it’s an act we have a conundrum as to where exactly post-split Ventus’ personality derives from. It’s far too similar to his khux behavior and we know for a fact that post-split Ventus is an honest good boy. That’s his personality, albeit with some childhood amnesia.

Manifestation of Darkness

Khux Ven has darkness, that much is undeniable, but how does it manifest? 

Well it’s worth considering how darkness manifests naturally in a person in kh. Riku is the best example, harboring jealousy, rage, and a lust for power to manifest his darker powers. We also know that loneliness, sadness, and isolation are a form of darkness as seen with Aqua. These are natural and only when those emotions take over do we have the heartless phenomenon and corruption jazz happening. 

So where is Ven’s darkness?

Well, it’s very likely suppressed. Like we are talking more suppressed than Sora’s darkness. Missing Ache is probably the greatest indication of a very real, very crippling habit of shoving one’s bad feelings in box and this is because of the keyblade’s symbolism and history. See, it’s not just there to give him another connection to Roxas. 

Missing Ache is a keyblade from Day’s that Roxas wields and it fits right along with the depressing themes of everything Nobody we’ve become used to. But the name is important. For a Nobody, who doesn’t feel anything-- being unable to feel the heartache of pain is just another reminder of what isn’t there. The keyblade is touting the power of the pain that is missing. A bit of a conundrum for a Nobody but ultimately indicative of their real and growing hearts or even their desire to have hearts (even the pain they come with).

So for Ventus to wield Missing Ache kind of suggests that he’s missing some kind of pain. He’s not feeling something. And knowing that pain often buds darkness we can assume that this missing ache is the very darkness in his heart that we know he harbors. Ven has gone through some things, even before Khux introduced him and that pain has been suppressed in his heart so much that his keyblade reflects that absence. 

Gameplay wise, Missing Ache is a rather dark leaning keyblade in khux from my understanding (this part is not my forte) so that supports it’s name more so than anything. Because when you start pushing down darkness and refusing to feel it or let it pass, it logically finds outlets to escape (think of anti-form and rage form for Sora).

A Darkling Conundrum

As Khux has established, Darklings are Keyblade wielders who have succumbed to darkness. They are basically a heartless variation that is unique in that they have more sentience than a typical heartless with the ability to speak and less mindlessness. They are visually distinct and there have been nods to their appearance in modern examples of keyblade wielders bathed in darkness suggesting a universal darkling transformation process. 

So say, Ventus has been suppressing his darkness big time. It grows and festers, becoming stronger. We don’t know what exacerbates his darkness (though I do think there are hints as to what his shtick is) but it’s probably persisting and we know this isn’t healthy. But it creates a very interesting conundrum.

If Ven’s refusing to feel the pain of his darkness, if he’s rejecting it so much that he’s ignoring it to this point, he’d theoretically be unable to actually succumb to it. It wouldn’t go away, it would just... get stronger. And now his heart has this paradox. Ven should be a Darkling. But he isn’t.

So this is my speculation. Instead, a second personality develops. Ven doesn’t fall to darkness, but the overwhelming strength of the darkness in his heart hijacks his heart and that other self is born. This is basically Ven’s Darkling self. And in a narrative this dark personality will most likely have goals. But Ven basically lives alongside this other personality with a questionable level of awareness of said personality. 

An Enemy Within

A second personality, a heart that is basically a Darkling in human skin, logically wants to act upon the heartless-like instinct we see from the former keykids in the previous entries. And while that is vague at best, it does not see the light favorably and seeks conflict. But the best way to devise the ambitions of Ven’s secret personality we have to wonder what kind of darkness actually created it. 

(the above hilariously compiled by @twilightsthorn on twitter)

And Ven paints that picture very clear. 

Loneliness. 

I speculate that Ven is the product of the Daybreak Town system. We see this with Skuld’s story with Ephemer, and Strelitzia. The keykids of Daybreak Town have this superficial concept of friendship. Making allies to complete missions and moving on without any real friendship or connections. It’s a culture like this that completely ignores someone like Ventus who clearly has not been able to keep a party and feel the connections of friendship. He’s lonely. And that pain’s probably stirred resentment against his fellows and the system. Maybe even Daybreak Town in general.

An Inner Battle. 

So one of the aspects about Ven’s personality is his very strong pacifism. Something that also doesn’t mesh well with the Daybreak Town system or the system that the New Leaders are tasked to put into place.

He reacts dramatically to the concept of PvP. The idea of pointing keyblades at each other is unthinkable. And as I’ve noticed before, his atypical keyblade stance enforces this unwillingness to fight.

By wielding his keyblade in the reverse-grip he is incapable of pointing his keyblade at another. It’s a part of his belief system. A very dedicated. Very honest belief system. Which brings me back to the most suspicious things Ven’s ever done.

The rulebook thing. He specifically ‘fails’ to read the passage about the PvP. And while his flimsy defense paints him as a lazy reader, you could also read it as Ven having disliked the idea so much that he simply... suppressed it. Now it’s up in the air how much Ven is aware of this personality. The other possibility is that the pacifism comes in response to his knowing that the darkness in him desires that kind of combat. 

Enemy Without

And this brings us to the ultimate conclusion of this second personality. It becomes Vanitas, through and through. Meaning that at the time of his split, Vanitas was essentially already a separate entity born from Ventus’ heart. Even Xehanort’s verbiage supports this.

‘Riven’ means ‘to be split from.’ Which makes sense as he is a broken off piece of Ven’s heart but it can also suggest that it was already there and attached to the whole to begin with. But now that he’s split from the body and light half of his heart, Vanitas begins to prove his strong association with Darklings. 

His darkness suit, in much the same way as Riku and Anti-Aqua, hearkens to the visual design of the Darklings-- (the black and red, textured hands, and tattered clothes, though anti-aqua fits this link the best). 

And if the speculation about Missing Ache is logical, this darkness comes from a stark sense of loneliness and a rejection that Ven buries and refuses to feel, meaning Vanitas bears all of that pain and it consumes the entire personality as darkness would consume the heart of a whole person. 

A pain that is Ventus’s through and through.

While this aspect of the theory is almost pure speculation, I draw this connection to place Vanitas and this dark personality of Ven’s on a side in the khux conflict. At this moment the darkness has served no purpose in machinations of MoM, Ava, Brain, or the mysterious murderer, but the darklings move about nevertheless. Despite being pulled by more basic instincts, the Darklings and any associated force can’t be underestimated as either having a goal or being manipulated toward someone else’s goal. 

Sleeper Agent

‘Peace is but a dream’ and the Darklings are still an at large, unaffiliated force in khux. The connection with Ven’s dark side would add a substantive face and power player to the entire narrative. It either gives them an edge, provides a leader, or simply infiltrates the system needed to consume the most lux. And from my perspective, the most advantageous thing the forces of dark could do is start the keyblade war (again). Where best to do that than from inside the Union’s sworn to prevent that from happening?

It’s an inside job. An infiltration. This is where you start to wonder if Ven is the outsider in the group-- The Virus in the Master’s system. Honestly, I don’t think any of this turning true would conclude that necessarily. See, for all we know MoM could be invoking the war even with the intent on ‘stopping the wars for good’. I wouldn’t put it past him to set the Dandelion’s up for a sham scenario so planting a Darkling Agent into the Union Leaders is on the table for him to have authored. But from the ‘dark perspective’ (for the record, I don’t think the darkness is a conniving force) Ven partially falling to darkness would work in the interest of all things dark and make him an ‘agent’. But I consider it more happenstance than actual scheming.

Thematic Associations

aka: less concrete forms of support or hints

Box Art Proximity

So we know there’s a ton of secrets hidden in the kh3 cover, one of which most amusingly being the Nomura’s cat, standing guard next to Ven as a reference to Chirithy. But I’m more interested in Ven’s proximity to the Darkling as well. We never get a complete idea of the Darkling’s symbolic purpose and I still think it’s up in the air, but it it’s drawing a connection to the Dandelion under it’s gaze, that would be indicative of it’s purpose. 

Void Gear Symbolism

I am not alone in seeing Void Gear as a potential reference to the clock tower of Daybreak Town. From here things become speculation central but knowing the Darkling’s desire to consume the light and the value of instigating the Keyblade War in that ambition, Vanitas’ essential homage to the clock tower is potential a nod to his goal, or perhaps success in using that clock for it’s fated purpose: which is to toll the start of the war. 

Ven’s Character Design

Since we understand that Nomura is clearly working backwards, we can’t take his character design as hard evidence that he’s got a split personality but I do think it’s worthy to serve as corroboration. Ven has a unique black and white theme with his jacket that perfectly represents 2 equal halves-- 2 selves. Yes, he’s fashioned to be the light half to an equal dark half, but you might think he’d be styled more toward the white/light colors to contrast with Vanitas’s dark color scheme. They would then appropriately compliment each other as a pair then. But Ven holds the body of the complete being. The original being that was styled symbolically to represent two equal halves and his former incarnation in khux is consistent. 

Ven’s Actions Going Forward 

Now again, Ven’s awareness of this second personality and the exact nature of it’s ability to interact is still in question but there’s a lot of a angles it could take. For example, it could be a body hijacker, acting and moving things toward a specific goal at opportune times, potentially acting as the Ven we know in temporary situations. This means that we can start being suspicious of who is in control of Ven’s body at a given time.

Then there’s the more passive method which simply has the personality observing and gaining strength through Ven’s suffering until it finally breaks free at some crucial time. This means we can expect a surprising twist when things get heated.

Whether he’s aware of it or not, Ven’s behavior should be considered separate from this force. It has the double benefit of keeping Ven’s hands clean.

Finally we have to consider the reasons for Ven’s selection in the Union Leaders. At first I thought maybe a second personality could create this double life for Ven that would qualify him with the arbitrary powerful keykid excuse for the position. But with a more passive role being just as viable, there’s a very good chance that MoM selected Ven with the intention of creating tension or tempting the rise of darkness with the Daybreak Town experiment. Whether MoM is earnestly trying to prevent the endless cycle of darkness destroying and light reviving the world or simply trying to invoke it for his own gain, we can at least be assured that there’s no sacrifice he wont make. This is assuming Ven is one of the selected and not the impostor (But I’m pretty sure Brain’s the impostor).

This is ultimately why I kind of dub Ven as a ‘sleeper agent.’ While harboring this second personality, he could very well be the infiltration of the forces of darkness which until this point have behaved as a mindless force of nature. Be it circumstance or not, he is for all intents and purposes a ‘sleeper agent’ in that regard. And while I don’t personally believe this makes Ven the murder of Strelitzia, I do think this makes him capable of anything.

Conclusion:

There’s a lot of speculation but the mystery is very much there and I think there’s enough to assume that the question of Ven’s darkness is very much something we need to be asking. Now we have additional strands this idea could branch into consider what this means for Ven’s role in creating the X-blade and may explain why he was so specifically poised to be the vessel for that project. And then we have to wonder what this means for Ven’s future. Was it a good thing that Xehanort separated Vanitas? Is Vanitas redeemable? What does it mean for Ven to get his memory about this back? 

Overall, I have my eye on Ven. He’s still a good boy in my eyes. But he could be the very thing that brings the khux world into chaos. 

(A big thanks to @kaweebo​ for some of those screencaps)

[psychodollyuniverse]

Arrival is a stunning science fiction movie with deep implications for today 

Science fiction is never really about the future; it’s always about us. And Arrival, set in the barely distant future, feels like a movie tailor-made for 2016, dropping into theaters mere days after the most explosive election in most of the American electorate’s memory.

But the story Arrival is based on — the award-winning novella Story of Your Life by Ted Chiang — was published in 1998, almost two decades ago, which indicates its central themes were brewing long before this year. Arrival is much more concerned with deep truths about language, imagination, and human relationships than any one political moment.

Not only that, but Arrival is one of the best movies of the year, a moving, gripping film with startling twists and imagery. It deserves serious treatment as a work of art.

The strains of Max Richter’s "On the Nature of Daylight" play over the opening shots of Arrival, which is the first clue for what’s about to unfold: that particular track is ubiquitous in the movies (I can count at least six or seven films that use it, including Shutter Island and this year’s The Innocents) and is, by my reckoning, the saddest song in the world.

The bittersweet feeling instantly settles over the whole film, like the last hour of twilight. Quickly we learn that Dr. Louise Banks (Amy Adams) has suffered an unthinkable loss, and that functions as a prelude to the story: One day, a series of enormous pod-shaped crafts land all over earth, hovering just above the ground in 12 locations around the world. Nobody knows why. And nothing happens.

As world governments struggle to sort out what this means — and as the people of those countries react by looting, joining cults, even conducting mass suicides — Dr. Banks gets a visit from military intelligence, in the form of Colonel Weber (Forest Whitaker), requesting her assistance as an expert linguist in investigating and attempting to communicate with whatever intelligence is behind the landing. She arrives at the site with Ian Donnelly (Jeremy Renner), a leading quantum physicist, to start the mission. With help from a cynical Agent Halpern (Michael Stuhlbarg), they suit up and enter the craft to see if they can make contact.

It’s best not to say much more about the plot, except that it is pure pleasure to feel it unfold. The most visionary film yet from director Denis Villeneuve (Prisoners, Sicario) and scripted by horror screenwriter Eric Heisserer (Lights Out), its pacing is slower than you’d expect from an alien-invasion film, almost sparse. For a movie with so many complicated ideas, it doesn’t waste any more time on exposition than is absolutely necessary. Arrival is serious and smartly crafted, shifting around like a Rubik’s cube in the hand of a savant, nothing quite making sense until all the pieces suddenly come together. I heard gasps in the theater.

The film’s premise hinges on the idea, shared by many linguists and philosophers of language, that we do not all experience the same reality. The pieces of it are the same — we live on the same planet, breathe the same air — but our perceptions of those pieces shift and change based on the words and grammar we use to describe them to ourselves and each other.

For instance, there is substantial evidence that a person doesn’t really see (or perhaps "perceive") a color until their vocabulary contains a word, attached to meaning, that distinguishes it from other colors. All yellows are not alike, but without the need to distinguish between yellows and the linguistic tools to do so, people just see yellow. A color specialist at a paint manufacturer, however, can distinguish between virtually hundreds of colors of white. (Go check out the paint chip aisle at Home Depot if you’re skeptical.)

Or consider the phenomenon of words in other languages that describe universal feelings, but can only be articulated precisely in some culture. We might intuitively "feel" the emotion, but without the word to describe it we’re inclined to lump the emotion in with another under the same heading. Once we develop the linguistic term for it, though, we can describe it and feel it as distinct from other shades of adjacent emotions.

These are simple examples, and I don’t mean to suggest that the world itself is different for people from different cultures. But I do mean to suggest that reality — what we perceive as comprising the facts of existence — takes on a different shape depending on the linguistic tools we use to describe it.

Adopting this framework doesn’t necessarily mean any of us are more correct than others about the nature of reality (though that certainly may be true). Instead, we are doing our best to describe reality as we see it, as we imagine it to be. This is the challenge of translation, and why literal translations that Google can perform don’t go beyond basic sentences. Learning a new language at first is just about collecting a new vocabulary and an alternate grammar — here is the word for chair, here is the word for love, here’s how to make a sentence — but eventually, as any bilingual person can attest, it becomes about imagining and perceiving the world differently.

This is the basic insight of Arrival: That if we were to encounter a culture so radically different from our own that simple matters we take for granted as part of the world as it is were radically shifted, we could not simply gather data, sort out grammar, and make conclusions. We’d have to either absorb a different way of seeing, despite our fear, or risk everything.

To underline the point, Dr. Banks and the entire operation are constantly experiencing breakdowns in communication within the team and with teams in other parts of the world, who aren’t sure whether the information they glean from their own visits to pods should be kept proprietary or shared.

It’s not hard to see where this is going, I imagine — something about how if we want to empathize with each other we need to talk to one another, and that’s the way the human race will survive.

And, sure.

But Arrival also layers in some important secondary notes that add nuance to that easy takeaway. Because it’s not just deciphering the words that someone else is saying that’s important: It’s the whole framework that determines how those words are being pinned to meaning. We can technically speak the same language, but functionally be miles apart.

n the film, one character notes that if we were to communicate in the language of chess — which operates in the framework of battles and wars — rather than, say, the language of English, which is bent toward the expression of emotions and ideas, then what we actually say and do would shift significantly. That is, the prevailing metaphor for how beings interact with each other and the world is different. (Some philosophers speak of this as "language games.")

This matters for the film’s plot, but more broadly — since this is sci-fi, and therefore actually about us — it has implications. Language isn’t just about understanding how to say things to someone and ascribe meaning to what comes back. Language has consequences. Embedded in words and grammar is action, because the metaphors that we use as we try to make sense of the world tell us what to do next. They act like little roadmaps.

You have empathized with someone not when you hear the words they’re saying, but when you begin to ascertain what metaphors make them tick, and where that conflicts or agrees with your own. I found myself thinking a lot about this reading Arlie Russell Hochschild’s Strangers In Their Own Land, which is up for a National Book Award this year and describes the overarching metaphors (Hochschild calls them "deep stories") that discrete groups of Americans — in this case, West Coast urban liberals and Louisiana rural Tea Partiers — use to make sense of the world. She isn’t trying to explain anything away. She’s trying to figure out what causes people to walk in such drastically different directions and hold views that befuddle their fellow citizens.

Part of the challenge of pluralism is that we’re not just walking around with different ideas in our heads, but with entirely different maps for getting from point A to Z, with different roadblocks on them and different recommendations for which road is the best one. Our A's and Z's don’t even match. We don’t even realize that our own maps are missing pieces that others have.

Presumably one of these maps is better than the others, but we haven’t agreed how we would decide. So we just keep smacking into one another going in opposite directions down the same highway.

Arrival takes off from this insight in an undeniably sci-fi direction that is a little brain-bending, improbable in the best way. But it makes a strong case that communication, not battle or combat, is the only way to avoid destroying ourselves. Communication means not just wrapping our heads around terms we use but the actual framework through which we perceive reality.

And that is really hard. I don’t know how to fix it.

In the meantime, though, good movies are somewhere to start. Luckily Arrival is a tremendously well-designed film, with complicated and unpredictable visuals that embody the main point. Nothing flashy or explosive; in some ways, I found myself thinking of 1970s science-fiction films, or the best parts of Danny Boyle’s 2007 Sunshine, which grounded its humanist story in deep quiet.

The movie concludes on a different note from the linguistic one — one much more related to loss and a wistful question about life and risk. This may be Arrival’s biggest weakness; the emotional punch of the ending is lessened a bit because it feels a little rushed.

But even that conclusion loops back to the possibilities of the reshaped human imagination. And this week, especially, you don’t need to talk to an alien to see why that’s something we need.

from: https://www.vox.com/culture/2016/11/11

.

[introvertguide]

Psycho (1960); AFI #14

The next movie on the AFI list was one of the few films in the horror genre that made the list at all, Psycho (1960). This is arguably the most well known of all the films by Alfred Hitchcock and was quite successful for the modest budget. The entire movie cost about $800,000 to make in about 3 weeks of time utilizing a small TV film crew. This little slasher flick made 32 million and was nominated for 4 Academy Awards (including Best Director for Hitchcock) although it didn’t take home any trophies. So what is so special about this film? Let us first review the plot to find out...

SPOILER ALERT: This movie is almost 60 years old and I introduced it two weeks ago, but I still seem to get the occasional complaint if I don’t say something.

The story begins with what seems like a random hotel room and a woman who seems to be having an affair with a man who won’t free himself to be with her. The woman is Marion Crane (Janet Leigh) and the man is her secret lover Sam Loomis (Jon Gavin). She leaves upset to return to work and he goes back to his home in a little town outside the city. Marion is asked to take $40,000 in cash from a customer as a deposit on a house over to the bank (this would be about equal to a third of a million in today’s money). She instead drives away with it to go to her boyfriend so they can run away together. As she is driving, a sudden storm forces her to stop at a roadside motel so that she can get some sleep and get her bearings. 

She stops at the Bates Motel and finds she accidently veered from the main highway so she decides to get a room. She finds the very shy owner Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins) charming at first, but she starts to realize that he is a little strange after having some dinner with him. He seems to have a very strange relationship with his mother who is mentally ill and yells at Norman. Marion goes back to her room and it is made clear that she realizes that she can’t keep the money she stole so she is going home in the morning to face the consequences and give back what she took. Sadly, as Marion takes a shower, she is attacked in what might be the most famous scene in American cinematic history. She is stabbed mercilessly by what appears to be the mother of Norman. Norman finds the body and puts Marion into her car and pushes the whole thing into a swamp near the house.

Naturally, a person with a load of stolen cash will soon be missed, so Marion’s sister Lila (Vera Miles) finds Sam Loomis and asks where Marion is. The audience knows that he was not in on the plan so he is shocked to hear about the stolen money and agrees to help find her. The owner of the stolen money has hired a private detective named Milton Arbogast (Martin Balsam) who also joins in the search for Marion and the cash. 

Arbogast goes to the Motel to ask some questions and finds Norman. The PI askes many questions and makes Norman upset so Arbogast calls in to say he is going to check out the old Bates house above the motel because he believes the mother knows something about Marion. This is a fatal mistake for the PI because he is unaware that there is a murderer about. He goes into the house and then walks up the steps looking for Mrs. Bates and he runs into her at the top of the stares when she rushes out of her room and slashes his face. Arbogast falls down the steps and Mother rushes down after him and continues to stab him. 

This is another person missing, so Lila Crane and Sam Loomis go to the motel to look for the private investigator. Sam distracts Norman while Lila goes to the house to try and talk to Mother about her missing sister. Norman figures out what is going on and knocks out Sam and runs up to the house where Lila is. Lila wanders around the house in an attempt to hide until she finds the skeleton of Mother in the fruit cellar. A crazed Norman dressed in his mother’s clothes jumps out and tries to attack, but he is subdued by Sam who came up from behind.

An ending exposition scene has a psychologist explaining that Norman’s mother died long ago and Norman had formed another personality of Mother to replace her. He had a split personality. By the time the police came and Norman was taken, he had fully changed into the Mother personality. The movie ends with a close up of Norman smiling in a cell with crazed eyes and the skeleton of mother is underlaid to show that the transformation was complete. Roll credits.

I grew up with a staircase in my house and going up to bed at night seemed strangely difficult after seeing the scene with the detective. The shower scene never was that big of a deal to me. Not sure why I thought one was worse than the other, but that was just me. From what I gather (a grueling couple of questions to a whopping half dozen people), my sample of women tended to have more issues with the shower scene. I understand the fear because everything seems so wrong about that death. It is so early in the movie and it is the apparent protagonist who has seen the error in her ways and wants to make amends. She is washing herself clean of her crimes in a place we like to think we are safe and she is unceremoniously slaughtered. At the end of the scene, a pan over to the untouched money shows that it wasn’t here crime that got her killed, but her being a tempting woman to the wrong man. She did not deserve to die, but she was killed anyway. And that is terrifying. 

The movie was originally going to be an episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents (which explains the tiny budget), but two things brought in the crowds and made the movie the phenomenon it was. First was the score by Bernard Hermann. The film was actually almost scrapped because Hitchcock was a perfectionist and he didn’t like quiet driving scenes and silent murder scenes. He rewatched the movie with the attacking score of Hermann’s that had a string section played in an attacking manor (the bowing action is somewhat similar to a slicing motion). I truly believe that the soundtrack completes the film and I think that Hitchcock agreed. It is said that he tripled Hermann’s fee after watching the shower scene with the stabbing score entitled “The Murder.”

The other thing that really got the butts in the seats was a rather simple gimmick. The trailer for the movie showed Alfred Hitchcock walking around the grounds of the Bates Motel talking about all the horrible things that had happened. It was rather silly in some ways, but the end gave a warning that there was such a surprise twist early on that nobody would be allowed into the theatre once the movie began. It also showed Hitchcock opening a shower curtain to reveal a screaming Vera Miles, so audiences didn’t know that Marion Crane would be the one that was killed off so early. It was a little piece of marketing genius that really heightened the movie going experience. 

I have the Hitchcock box set, so I watched it a couple of times alone and a couple times with others in the house. Every time I watched the trailer before the film and it sets it up so perfectly. I also find myself impressed with the score no matter how many times I hear it. We even had our first jump scare that really startled the group (top of the stairs murder). This movie is so much fun and perfect for the Halloween season.

This film is surely worth recommending, but it might be a little much for the young and the sensitive. Be ready to have some nervous showers for a couple days after watching if it is your first viewing. Most certainly, watch the famous shower scene because it is maybe the most impressive three minutes of American cinema of all time. The director, the characters, the music, the setting...it is all iconic and a master class on how to make a suspenseful thriller. Watch the movie for yourself and enjoy what is undeniably one of the best films in its genre. Fully deserving of the high ranking on the AFI list.

[haleigh-sloth]

I'm going to add onto this by putting in my two cents as to why this seems to be an issue on the villain side of the fandom, from my perspective. Because I agree here, and I've found this phenomenon frustrating as well.

I can't say I'm not guilty of viewing the League this way in the past, because I am, but I feel like...we're so close to the end and it's time to let the idea go that the League is a revolutionary group seeking to change things for the better, as in rebuild and restore.

They aren't. And based on what I read these days when people talk about the villains, there is so much focus on how they want a better society.

They don't. They want no society at all. There is zero intention of replacing it with anything better. They are not changing anything in the sense that they're shifting the tide. They are changing things in the sense that they want it all to disappear.

That's why they're not literally protagonists. That's why, by definition, they are still treated as antagonists as long as they keep opposing the heroes and trying to destroy.

So, my bottom line is that--Hawks is so viscerally hated in the way that, people have convinced themselves and others that while Hawks upholds an oppressive system (he does), the League wants to change that oppressive system. People make Hawks out to be worse than the League, because people make the League out to be better than they are.

In other words, they're woobifying the fuck out of the League's actions.

There's not really any room to do that with Hawks. He is undeniably upholding a system that only benefits people like him (strong, useful, conventionally attractive people) and rejects people like the League.

But I honestly feel that this extreme woobifying of the League is what causes that disconnect when it comes to analyzing and understanding Hawks and what he does.

If you're a villain fan (which I am), it's rough to watch Hawks murder Twice and then face absolutely zero consequences immediately following. However, letting time tell the story obviously was the answer, because *gestures to current chapters*.

But I get it. It is frustrating. But Hawks was just as brainwashed and groomed and robbed of agency as Tomura and Touya.

But with all of that agency ripped from him, his choices are still his choices, just as Shigaraki's choices and Touya's choices are still their choices. There is no difference.

The unfortunate part of it all is that Hawks ultimately benefits from his brainwashing in the sense that nobody is trying to kill him or lock him away. He's free in that sense. And I mean, that's a fair discussion to have over how frustrating that can be in the manga when looking at how the villains are viewed by the heroes. But also---it's called plot. Sometimes plot requires Not Happy Things to happen before they resolve themselves in a happy way. So...yeah.

But, anyway my take is that unfortunately people erase Hawks's victim status in favor of making the villains out to be a positive force in the manga--when framing of their actions, the reactions we're shown to their actions, and the way the story treats their actions, tell us everything but. They're sympathetic characters. They're set up to be saved and understood and reconciled with. That much is clear. But that doesn't mean they're like, doing anything good. If they were, they'd be treated differently, and be shown to be a positive force.

As of now? The villains are lashing out and destroying everything in sight--including themselves. Nothing good there.

What I see when I look at Hawks and the villains alike--is that their victimhood fucked them up to extents that require serious mind-breaking experiences to snap them out of their destructive patterns. For the villains, it's almost burning to death (Touya), it's losing the little in life you have left to care about (Toga), it's losing your identity and existence to someone else altogether (Tomura). For Hawks, it's being forced to face a decision you made that you had to convince yourself was a good choice, lest you lose all meaning to your existence (being useful to people around you--that's Hawks). Finding out a choice you made in order to be useful, ended up being the most useless choice made in the entire war? That should be mind-breaking enough for Hawks to finally be forced to self-reflect--just like the villains having to at the very last second when almost everything is lost from them.

I don’t particularly care to stand on polarizing fandom opinion, but this one gets under my fucking skin.

I don’t consider myself a hero or villain stan when it comes to My Hero Academia because I just look at the individual person. I find myself siding a hell of a lot more with the villains because in general, I think it’s true that society failed them, and it’s so sad and infuriating that it failed them at such a young age.

And then there’s Hawks.

And what baffles me about the perception of Hawks is that people will never admit that he’s far more like the villains than the heroes.

Indoctrination goes both ways. Just like Shigaraki was indoctrined by AFO to bring about destruction, Hawks was indoctrined by hero society and the JPHC specifically that Heroes were the ultimate good. Just as Shigaraki was “saved” from his family, Hawks was saved from his. Shigaraki was a tool for AFO to bring about his plan. Hawks is a tool for the JPHC to keep control.

Hawks and Shigaraki are at most two years apart. Hell, we barely ever use Hawks’ birthnames just like Shigaraki and Dabi!

It just doesn’t make sense that people will call the hero society corrupt, but then not call Hawks a victim for being made to carry out its will. Like yes, Hawks chose to be a hero, but he was like, fucking 8 years old and saved from abject poverty and parental neglect. And then you call him a monster for doing the job he’s been brainwashed to do.

If you’re going to have sympathy for villains, and if you’re going to erase some culpability from Shigaraki, Dabi, Toga and Twice because of what they endured, then you have to do the same for Hawks. Because they’re literally all the same. Society failed ALL of them.

[betadereader]

It’s “just” fiction.

How many of us have come across the typical phrase "it's just fiction"? Starting from a personal basis, I have always found it as a justifying sentence of an author with its content. And if the author has to get away with this defense, it is because someone has previously questioned said content. 

To begin with, I will clarify a point. Writing about a murder does not make you a murderer, just as writing a rape does not make you a rapist; role-playing a sadistic and abusive character does not make you that character, acting in your real environment just like them. 

In the world there are people who know how to separate the line of fiction and reality very well, while others do not. However, this is not the focus of this essay. I wanted to focus on the undervaluation of fiction in that very phrase "it's just fiction." I am going to articulate it with several examples that have occurred or continue to occur in reality, in addition to raising a series of questions. 

For better or for worse, the news media have configured a heritage of History. We are aware of History because there is written and / or audiovisual material, but the story offered by the media may not represent History itself. We know the version of history that they tell us. 

If I have gone to a very current example, the simple fact of creating a story in the format of an informative speech does not always reflect 100% of the object that occurred. 

With information abuse (the saturation of information) and so-called fake news, they also have the possibility of affecting the user's conscience, despite being a totally invented, fictitious story. 

Again, for better or for worse, and putting history and the media together, people tend to learn history more easily with fiction series. The fictional discourse can be educational and, at the same time, not represent History as such, trivializing some political aspects or creating a polarized world of black and white; good vs. bad. 

I also wanted to highlight a sociological experiment that was carried out on television, replicating Milgram's experiment. 

Milgram's original experiment, now cataloged by several experts as immoral, reflected very favorable results for the scientific community in its day. His main objective was to study the forms of obedience and whether they could find connection with those condemned during the Nazi era. Translated to the television world, in the documentary The Game of Death, they wanted to see to what extent a game show could become an authority, in addition to coming up with several theories. 

Like the original experiment, an agentic state (sometimes conformism too) was found in the contestant, relegating all authority to the guidelines of the program. There is an additional theory that mentions “belief perseverance”. In the contest, electric shocks are given to a subject who cannot be seen but can be heard. As the program progresses, the greater the intensity of the shock. Obviously it is an experiment and the pain is acted out, but in the participant —who did not know that they were part of the experiment— the following belief came up: "I can't really be hurting him because this is television."

“This is television” as a synonym for prior planning and pure spectacle; as a synonym for falsehood; just fiction.

I mentioned this example because, especially at the beginning of the documentary, it denounces a normalization of violence and physical and emotional torture on television. It denounces, also at the end, that commercial televisions, in their desire for money, "teach us that it is normal to humiliate, eliminate and be sadistic." (It’s an old documentary but if you want to see it, click here. It’s in French, I’m sorry).

Continuing with sociological experiments, how many experiments have tried to study the link between violence and video games? Or sexism and video games? Or xenophobia and video games? Or nationalism and video games? 

It should be said that the last mentioned are more common in the attitude of the player, using the video game as an expressive way to say whatever they want. However, we cannot ignore that, like historical television series, video games can also serve for nationalist discourses by demonizing the enemy and sanctifying themselves (especially when talking about video games which main topic is war).

I do not wish to dwell too much on each of the questions raised, since the emphasis is not the result of these experiments, but the undeniable interest and concern on the community of experts, as well as more and more students who are interested in these problems in order to analyze and debate them.

We are not indifferent to the images or books we consume. No matter how invented a story is, it stirs up real emotions. We grow with the media (traditional or digital media) and the content they have to offer us. There is socialization with the media at a very early age, and when we grow up we continue to learn from them.

Media acts on our emotions. And the stories that are told to us through media help to frame a collective imagination that even affects the vision of reality itself. Reality can also help build fictional worlds. And so the cycle would begin, since new ideals in fiction can act as a mirror for a future society and/or perpetuate harmful values (especially when under romantic treatments). They are two worlds that feed into each other.

For this reason the famous so-called "romantic love" has been so analyzed and criticized for promoting toxic ideas such as 1) love is the final happiness of every person and we are not complete otherwise, 2) we must to depend on someone else consider ourselves a "whole", 3) "for love everything is forgiven", "true love is eternal" and more idealizations that impacts on society and its perspective of love.

(Closely linked to romantic love, monogamy has been accused of being toxic and I wanted to make a small point that the decision of a closed relationship is as valid as an open relationship, and that an open relationship can be as toxic as a closed one. Here everything is said).

If fiction lacked that power, censorship would never have existed. The witch hunt in Hollywood or censorship that existed in the USSR for the control of the media and its content should not have happened. And many more historical contexts that I am ignoring. Governments were afraid of a content contrary to the predominant ideology, because it could break and violate their established values.

If fiction lacked power, propaganda would also lack power. Propaganda, especially in the context of dictatorships, offers a cult of personality; they idolize, endow dictators with divine values.

We just have to see the television advertising: it is all an idealized, invented version of the product. Don't give me that you've never been disappointed in buying the real product because "it wasn't like it was on TV."

We just have to see how certain groups in society (racial groups, different sexual orientation and gender identity groups, cultural ...) demand to be participants in fictional stories because fiction configures a mirror of the real world, where they are already participants.

Okay, taking a step closer to the "it's just fiction" statement ... so why do film academies exist? Depending on the film, they work with fiction to a greater or lesser degree, but it is still fiction. Why would there be jobs that are dedicated to worlds which work with fiction, if that is worthless? If "it was only fiction" nobody would pay for a movie or a book. And the same happens with television and animation series; no one would consume them. Any story that contains fiction, that is, any made-up story (depending on the needs of the script and the historical context), has no value.

By the same logic, any literary work would not have survived in memory and the writers we know as the "classics" would no longer be. By the same logic, any artistic movement (theater arts, literature, audiovisual and more), would have fallen into oblivion and its formal codes by which they acquire identity, would not be worthy of analyzing and studying. 

Because what difference does it make. It is just fiction. Nothing happens for the massive creation of very questionable content (the topics of which this blog will address later). 

Continuing with this essay, does anyone remember 50 Shades of Grey trilogy? Yes, that mess that originated (if I remember correctly) as a Twilight bad fic. How much movement was there on social networks denouncing an abusive and toxic relationship? Apart from BDSM and the criticism that it was painfully written (I started reading it by laughing and ended up wanting to tear my eyes out), there were countless posts in which the relationship of the characters was analyzed. Many voiced their complaint and amazement at how a book that focuses on and romanticizes a toxic relationship could hit the market.

I suppose that something problematic is even more when it becomes popular and it is about making money with it. And probably publishers don’t give a damn because they're going to make money anyway. Although the world of FanFiction is not destined —in principle— for commercialization, the fic that romanticizes problematic subjects is not "less important" for this reason, because it can do the same damage. There is a vast "FanFiction culture", and more than one fic has made the jump to the market. We have all seen a book with its brilliant promotion of "phenomenon on Wattpad".

Fickers —writers of FanFiction— are not film or television producers. It is good that FanFiction (and like FF we have Wattpad and AO3) is not a strictly professional universe. A fic, like a movie or a television series or a video game, can narrate very murky and dark things from life. A story can talk about drugs (or other types of addictions), the inhumanity of war, torture, sexism, rape, pedophilia and more that I’m ignoring. You can do it from the critical perspective of the characters and their actions, or from the point of view of the addict, inhuman, sadistic, sexist, rapist or pedophile respectively with the aforementioned.

Why if the producer/writer who whitewashes the image of pedophilia or terrorism (for example) or romanticizes them is considerated as a pedophile or as a terrorist but nothing is said against romanticization and the subsequent normalization of rape in the FanFiction world?

That question is one of many examples of harmful behavior by content creators, which toxicity can be seen thorugh fiction. That question is one from many others that this Tumblr account wants to develop as essays.

Because fiction is not “just” fiction. Whoever wants to rely on this phrase, is the equivalent of being a shameless person... as something to begin with.

[wetwareproblem]

Like. You want to talk about “settler colonialism?” I am a white person, living on land that still legally belongs to the Mi’kmaq people. It was stolen from them by force of arms by a government whose official, openly-stated policy was “kill the Indian, save the man.” To this day, that white government builds pipelines through native-owned land, over native protests; it ignores its responsibility to the victims of brutality and genocide that were ongoing well into my lifetime; it ignores an epidemic of suicide and frankly inexcusable living conditions; it ignores its own courts’ legally binding orders to support native children as well as white ones; it ignores a terrifying phenomenon of missing and murdered women and girls. I can go downtown right now and watch as half-million-dollar condos encroach on poor neighbourhoods, displacing essential services, creeping ever closer to the native community center and school.

That’s the face of settler colonialism. America has a similar legacy of indigenous blood.

And yet, if I - an undeniably white person living on stolen land - say that I am proud to be a Canadian, if I say that Canadian cultural values and institutions have saved my life, if I applaud the handful of good things my nation has done? It is utterly uncontroversial. Nobody will say that, because I support universal health care, I must support oil pipelines. Nobody will argue that I support the kidnap and murder of indigenous women. Nobody will demand that I surrender my home to a native person.

But when I bring attention to some of the issues faced by Jewish people in diaspora - inarguably a marginalized minority - people positioning themselves as progressive leftists will come out of the woodwork to say “But Israel!” If a descendant of refugees says that she is proud of the cultural values and institutions that literally saved the lives of hundreds of thousands of people in the community she comes from, then that is grounds for silencing her and demanding that others deny her a platform.

There’s a word for that.

[simplemlmsponsoring]

New Post has been published on http://simplemlmsponsoring.com/attraction-marketing-formula/copywriting/why-going-viral-should-not-be-one-of-your-goals/

Why going viral should not be one of your goals

The word ‘viral’ used to refer to the sudden, uncontrollable spread of an illness, but in recent years has been repurposed, becoming synonymous with the rapid proliferation of certain types of online content.

Regardless of whether it’s a news story, funny video or cute photo of a cat typing on a keyboard, viral content is now an inescapable part of how the internet (and social media in particular) work in modern society. Going viral can also come with huge benefits, ranging from increased exposure and sudden fame all the way through to providing a platform for getting a certain message out into the world.

For a long time, viral content was something of a mystery, with few able to predict which pieces of content would capture the internet’s attention and spread like wildfire. That’s changed in recent years though, with an entire industry springing up around the concept of going viral and what it takes to achieve such widespread success online. But is this really the right approach for businesses looking to improve their digital presence and better reach their audience? Recent examples of going viral have illustrated the importance of being careful what you wish for, while also underlining the value of taking a slower, more controlled approach to online campaigns.

Why is #Wendy’s so savage? Striking the right social media tonehttps://t.co/jE9l9u0fGS #contentmarketing #contentmktg pic.twitter.com/tqWvCHfuBr

— Castleford Media (@castlefordmedia) May 19, 2017 What does going viral really mean?

Before we can get into the reasons why going viral may not be the best strategy for your business,

It’s important to clearly define what viral content is. The content side of the equation is easy, encompassing everything from articles and photos to videos, songs, graphics and other images. So what about ‘viral’?

A great definition comes from Elise Moreau, who writes in Lifewire that: “On the internet, a piece of content can spread just like a virus if people become “infected” when they see it. The infection usually comes from evoked emotions that spur the viewer to share it, so they can relate with other people and discuss how they feel.”

Going viral requires emotion

With this focus on emotions in mind, it’s easy to see why certain types of content capture the online zeitgeist. Perhaps they’re funny, sad or simply strange, but all share some form of emotion that a huge group of people can relate to.

The stronger the emotion, the more shareable a piece of content is, and these emotions aren’t always the most wholesome. In fact, many pieces of viral content, be they Wendy’s mean tweets or over-the-top political rants, deliberately tap into the darker sides of the human psyche. There’s a reason why videos of people falling over or being embarrassed tend to perform so well on social media platforms.

Viral content is therefore unpredictable, and even if you do manage to create something that captures attention, there’s no real way of telling what sort of emotions you’ll stir up.

The reach of viral content

What’s undeniable about viral content is its reach, offering businesses the kind of attention and connection with audiences they could only dream about with traditional content marketing tools.

This vast reach is the benefit most closely associated with going viral, and it’s easy to see why companies might be enticed by the promise of instantly broadening their audience by thousands, if not hundreds of thousands. The problem, however, is that the definition of viral content changes with every new phenomenon.

Back in the early days of YouTube and Facebook, a video or post with 10,000 likes or more might have been considered a viral success. Today, anything with less than a few million is a mere drop in the bucket, as exemplified by the recent example of the Instagram page world_record_egg.

Created with the express goal of becoming the most-liked post on the platform (beating Kylie Jenner’s measly 18 million likes on a photo of her newborn baby), the account’s only update – a stock photo of, you guessed it, an egg – currently boasts a whopping 44 million likes and counting.

That’s the kind of audience money simply can’t buy, but before you start planning your own egg-based marketing campaign, it’s worth taking a closer look at whether it will succeed and what the benefits would be even if it did.

View this post on Instagram

Let’s set a world record together and get the most liked post on Instagram. Beating the current world record held by Kylie Jenner (18 million)! We got this #LikeTheEgg #EggSoldiers #EggGang

A post shared by EGG GANG (@world_record_egg) on Jan 4, 2019 at 9:05am PST

Why going viral is a bad goal

The first reason attempting to create viral content isn’t the most efficient or effective goal is that it’s unpredictable. Using the example of the world record egg, there was no indication that the post would achieve anything like the success it’s had, with the post’s spread a completely random occurrence that could only happen in the age of the internet. In another time, the exact same success could have been had with a photo of something else, or the egg could have quickly faded from popularity with only a few hundred likes.

Of course, there are certain factors that can play into viral success, such as hopping on to a popular trend, mimicking other successful campaigns or attaching a brand to a popular influencer. Even with all of these characteristics, there’s simply no guarantee, making attempts at viral campaigns an often expensive waste of time, money and energy.

The next reason why viral video marketing and other forms of rampant online success aren’t always the best option for businesses is that there’s no real next step. If you reach an enormous audience with a well-timed piece of viral content, that very rarely translates into meaningful leads or conversions. Nobody is buying eggs through Instagram.

As with many aspects of content marketing and digital advertising, it all comes back to the idea of quality versus quantity. All the web traffic in the world won’t help your business sell more product, and while raising brand awareness is a good goal in its own right, that awareness needs to be within an audience that may decide to convert at some point in the future.

Finally, viral success is short-lived. Even though the world record egg is currently a big deal, it will only be a matter of time before something else comes along and eclipses it. For this reason, viral marketing isn’t a sustainable investment, unlike higher quality content such as informative blog posts or whitepapers that have a long shelf life.

Viral success is short-lived. Even though the world record egg is currently a big deal, it will only be a matter of time before something else comes along and eclipses it. Viral marketing gone wrong

If you needed more convincing that viral marketing isn’t the best approach for a business, it’s worth keeping in mind that in addition to the strategy’s drawbacks, there’s also a very real potential for viral videos, articles and other content to spectacularly backfire.

We’ve talked about this before, using the example of Kendall Jenner and Pepsi, but it’s worth looking into some more examples of when traditional businesses have tried to go viral.

At particular risk are viral campaigns centred around social media. The appeal of this approach is it allows  users to put their own stamp on a certain piece of content by interacting with it, but the risks are significant. One recent example is Southern Rail, which attempted to get users to have their say on the effects of its employees’ rail strikes in the UK. While the campaign certainly went viral, the responses were definitely not what Southern Rail wanted to hear.

Similarly, when Coca Cola encouraged online followers to ‘gif the feeling’ as part of a rebrand, it was probably expecting a series of wholesome images reflecting how people feel about cracking open an ice cold can or bottle of Coke.

Instead, the company was treated to a wide variety of gifs that ranged from anti-capitalism messaging to explicit content.

These examples underline the very real dangers associated with going viral, which come down to the simple fact that it’s impossible to predict how users will react to a particular campaign. For every wholesome share of a photo of an egg there’s a hijacking of a well-intentioned viral strategy. The risk of falling victim to this sort of backlash makes viral marketing a risk too great for many businesses.

So, instead of attempting to go viral, which guarantees almost nothing in terms of success, it’s a far better idea for businesses to play the long game and focus on generating quality leads through long-term plays that can be controlled, calculated and tweaked as need be.

The post Why going viral should not be one of your goals appeared first on Castleford Media.

Read more: castleford.com.au

[mrtouchthesky]

Kanye West is not only a rapper, but also a fashion designer, songwriter, and businessman. Kanye's ego and unpredictable nature have won him many haters in the last few years, however, I fell in love with Kanye in the beginning of his career. There is so much that he has achieved in his life and I don’t think he’s as appreciated anymore. Kanye is one of those artists that has been through so many detrimental life events and yet still comes out on top in whatever he puts his mind to. It’s hard to even know where to begin when talking about this phenomenon. Kanye is one of the best-selling artists in the 21st century and most awarded artists of all-time. Popular music is one that blends musical and socio-economic characteristics and his music doesn’t fall short of that. His beats, lyrics and overall tone of his songs have an eclectic taste. Whether he wants to take a more hip-hop, rap, electro, trap, religious, provocative, emotional, political or societal spectrum, they still become the top hits of their time.

Early Life

Kanye West was born in Atlanta but soon moved to the South Side of Chicago after his parents' divorce. Kanye started rapping in the 3rd grade and composing his own songs in the 7th grade. After graduation, he attended Chicago State University to drop out only a year later to pursue his music career.

Portability

Kanye West’s music can be available on multiple devices and apps. In a mobile music handbook, Gopinath and Stanyek talked about how music needs to be “everywhere and anywhere” or ubiquitous. Whether it’s on laptops, phones, iPods, or CDs, Kanye’s music can be listened to anywhere. Spotify, YouTube, Vimeo, Tidal, Apple Music, Pandora SoundCloud, and more have also made it easier to access his music in the 21st century. 

College Dropout

My favorite Kanye album was released on February 10, 2004. I was only seven years old when it released, but I instantly fell in love with his music. Of course, having older brothers really introduced me to different genres of music outside of religious songs. After producing songs for multiple artists, Kanye wanted to start his own career which catapulted just by this very album. What also really pushed West to record this album was his almost fatal car accident in October 2002. In this album, Kanye combined hip-hop, soul, religion, and the “chipmunk soul” (high-pitched, sped-up vocals) as reflected in a couple of his album covers.

“Jesus Walks” expressed Kanye's religious faith and not being afraid to share that on a musical platform. It also reflects how lucky West felt after his accident and his denial to conform to the world’s sin and not talk about religion. This song surprisingly won a Grammy for the Best Rap Song of 2004. I really liked this song because it encompasses beautiful orchestral instruments, gospel, and inspirational lyrics.

“Through the Wire” was literally sang through Kanye’s wired shut mouth after being released from the hospital. In the accident, his jaw was severely shattered and he had to be wired shut in reconstructive surgery. If you listen closely to the song you can hear the struggle he has just singing the lyrics and the pain reflected in the song. This song was Kanye's therapy to pursue his own path of becoming that famous artist that he always dreamed of.

Late Registration

Released on August 30, 2005, the most popular song from this album is “Gold Digger” and may undeniably be Kanye’s most known songs. What made this song a hit in 2005 was its simple lyrics, happy beats, and wit. If you asked, I’m sure everyone knows the lyrics to this song even if they aren’t a Kanye fan. I still regularly jam to this song because the beats are willing people to dance to it called “call-and-response”. The instruments aren’t as complex as his usual work, but I think that was the objective of this song - to make everything simple and catchy enough for everyone to relate as many music scholars realized back in 1989.

In case you were wondering where I got my Tumblr username from:

Graduation

On September 11, 2007, the world saw a subtle shift in Kanye’s style of his songs. College Dropout and Late Registration almost sound similar, but Graduation has a variety of different styles. Graduation has a more electronic tone and hard-hitting songs like “Stronger” that was a popular song from this album. I think "Stronger" reflects popular music because as David Suisman says in his book about American music, it "uplifts- elevates the mind, body, and character of individuals and the spirit of the nation". The lyrics repeatedly chant, “Now that don’t kill me, can only make me stronger” meaning that you shouldn’t conform to the norms of life just because of what others say. 

808s & Heartbreak

This album, released in November of 2008, was the first album Kanye had released since his mother, Donda West, died in late 2007 from a heart disease. This album reflects his devastation over his mother and breakup with his fiancée, Alexis Phifer. This had a huge turn in his career and personality. This album doesn’t really have any rapping, rather him singing his heart and being masked with Auto-Tune. “Love Lockdown” and “Heartless” are pretty much the only dominant songs in this album.

Even now, Kanye still contributes his outburst and mood swings on his mother’s death. This is reflected when a year later he embarrassed Taylor Swift at the VMA's to state his opinion on who really should have won Best Female Video. This time is when he became rude, egotistic, confused, and angry at himself and the world.

My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy

My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy was released on November 22, 2010, and shows a complete 360 turn from 808s & Heartbreaks. I absolutely loved this album and can agree that it showed a completely different side of Kanye. This album is beautifully and maniacally crafted and shows how Kanye can come back from his past with an even stronger album. Rolling Stone said that "nobody halfway sane could have made this album" which is so true, after all, he had been through, what else would you expect? “All of the Lights” was an international hit and was my favorite song from 2010-2011. The song encompasses beautiful orchestra instruments like trumpets, violins, pianos, drums, bass, and sick lyrics. The instruments follow a syncopated pattern with the tone of the song. What made it so amazing was how it featured Beyoncé, Drake, Rihanna, Elton John, Alicia Keys, Fergie, John Legend, Bon Iver, and many more legends of our century.

The beauty of this album is evident in this montage of all the album’s songs:

Watch the Throne

Watch the Throne is one of my favorite albums by Kanye and Jay-Z. This collaboration dropped on August 8, 2011. One could only imagine how great this album was going to be just by hearing that the two biggest hip-hop artists were creating an album. This album went platinum and also features other African-Americans such as Beyoncé, Frank Ocean, James Brown, Otis Redding, and Nina Simone. Kanye and Jay-Z used their platform to make a political statement in terms of racism and institutional racism and had a huge impact on how hip-hop influenced the youth. Music scholars, Starr & Waterman, stated in their book about popular music that the 1950s “invented the teenager as a commercial and cultural entity” so it’s obvious that music now is still targeted towards youth. Even the title suggests how hip-hop culture is seen in the public now and that they have to defend their “throne”. Kanye and Jay-Z are constantly talking about how their careers are going to surpass anyone else in the music business and black excellence.  Songs like “Made in America”, “Murder to Excellence”, and “No Church in the Wild” have very apparent meanings. The most known song is “No Church in the Wild” which beats are in the background of numerous commercials. Timothy Taylor, a music scholar who focused on youth and capitalism in Sounds of Capitalism, said that around 1960, “advertisers learned to use popular music in commercials” to really target the baby-boomers and younger generations. The repetitive and upbeat nature of the song makes you really focus on the lyrics and what that company is advertising. The lyrics of this song is about faults in the religious hierarchy of life and how power certain powers are canceled out like a mob vs a king, a king vs a God, and a God vs a non-believer. Ultimately, Jay-Z and Kanye are saying that they are the gods of the rap world. This album shows that they believe they can overcome any skepticism that the world throws at them because they have already made it big in the industry.

Yeezus

Yeezus debuted on June 18, 2013. This was the same month that Kanye and Kim Kardashian had their daughter, North, after being together since 2012. This album is probably Kanye’s most controversial album in terms of people’s reactions because of the harsh sounds, the electro, and industrial sound it resonated. Rolling Stone even said that this is the “darkest, most extreme music Kanye has made and is extravagantly abrasive”. Despite that, I still really liked a few songs from this album and it reflects how versatile Kanye is. Around this time, Black Lives Matter emerged and I think that’s what Kanye is referencing to in a lot of the songs of the album. My favorite is “Blood on the Leaves” because of the intensity of the rhythm and beats. It talks the detriments of living the life of fame and about drugs. The song starts off on a haunting note with Billy Holiday’s “Strange Fruit” in the background recounting lynching and over events from the Civil Rights era. Kanye is reminding us about the history and taking another social-political stance with his platform.

Products & Advertising

Kanye has done clothing collaborates with Louis Vuitton, Nike, Adidas, and A.P.C. His most known product is the YEEZY collection Back on February 8th of 2015, Adidas confirmed their clothing and shoe collaboration with Kanye with many posters and advertisements. When his brand came out he did fashion shows and music videos and advertising for Kanye’s fashion paralleled with his music which was a very smart move for Kanye. In the video, the youthful models just stand motionless in tattered clothing. His fashion line is another way Kanye reflects his ideas to be different and a true artist. In this interview, Kanye talks about how he wants to be creative in all areas and won’t take anyone’s criticism towards him. The music playing in the background is a sample of a song from his album that would have released a year later. It sets the mood and blends all of his artistry together.

The Life of Pablo

The Life of Pablo is Kanye’s latest album that was released on February 14, 2016. This album originally was only on Tidal so it took a while before it was available elsewhere for me to listen to it. Kanye was the first artists to have an #1 album off of mainly streaming totals. This album came out a few months after Kanye and Kim had their second child, Saint. I think this album reflects all of Kanye’s messy, confused life as he battles psychiatric problems. Kanye explains that the title is a reference to, “Pablo Picasso, Pablo Escobar of course, Apostle Paul. [Paul] was the strongest influencer of Christianity, Pablo Escobar was the biggest mover of a product, and Pablo Picasso was the biggest mover of art. And that mix between message, art, and product is The Life Of Pablo”. I love this album because it reminds me of mixtapes that Chance the Rapper has done. This is no coincidence since Chance actually helped Kanye with this album a lot. One of the most shocking things about this album is the infamous “Famous” video that depicts all of the people Kanye has in “made famous” naked in a bed together. I’m not even sure if he got permission from all of these celebrities to use their replicas, but it definitely has given this album a name with some pretty harsh lyrics. The album has a lot of sampling from hit songs of the time like in “Father Stretch My Hands pt. 2″ which uses Desiigner’s “Panda”. This may make the album seem discordant, but it reflects Kanye’s thoughts and how disarrayed he was at the time. A lot of the songs are contradictory as Rolling Stone said because it’s like a battle of how he sees himself and what he doesn’t want the world to realize about him. This explains why Kanye seems so distant and rude in the public eye. The album features a lot of great artists of this time like Rihanna, Drake, Kendrick Lamar, Frank Ocean, Chance, Post Malone, Desiigner, The Weeknd, Chris Brown, Sia, Kid Cudi, etc.  

Although Kanye’s actions and egotistic behavior has turned many people against him, they can’t deny his talent. Critics will look past his rash behavior and still enjoy his music because someone this talented can’t be underrated. In 2016, Kanye surpassed Michael Jackson for having the most top 40 hits on the Billboards for a male artist, which proves to show that his career only goes up from here. Even David Bowie believed that Kanye was a “messiah of music” and knew he would rise to fame in the future. Kanye blends music, advertisement, entertainment, sampling, portability, fashion, relatability, personality, memorability, and structure to establish his career.

Works Cited

Amaloney. "David Bowie predicted the rise of Kanye West in 1972, according to    this bonkers theory." The Sun. The Sun, 21 Nov. 2016. Web. 07 Feb. 2017.

Biography.com Editors. "Kanye West."

Biography.com

. A&E Networks Television, 22 Nov. 2016. Web. 09 Feb. 2017.

Dolan, Jon. "Yeezus." Rolling Stone. Rolling Stone, 14 June 2013. Web. 07 Feb.           2017.

Gopinath, Sumanth and Stanyek, Jason. Anytime, Anywhere? An Introduction to the Devices, Markets, and Theories of Mobile Music. The Oxford Handbook of Mobile Music Studies. July 2014. Print.

Horowitz, Steven. "Jay-Z Explains "Watch The Throne" Title, Significance To Hip Hop Culture." HipHopDX. N.p., 14 Aug. 2011. Web. 6 Feb. 2017.

"Kanye West Explains The Meaning Of 'The Life Of Pablo' Title." Exclusive Hip Hop      News, Interviews, Rumors, Rap & Music Videos | AllHipHop. N.p., 22 Apr. 2016. Web. 07 Feb. 2017.

Sheffield, Rob. "Kanye West: My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy." Rolling Stone.          N.p., 25 Nov. 2010. Web. 5 Feb. 2017.

Sheffield, Rob. "The Life of Pablo." Rolling Stone. Rolling Stone, 16 Feb. 2016. Web. 09 Feb. 2017.

Suisman, D. 2009. Selling Sounds: the commercial revolution in American music. Cambridge, Ma. & London: Harvard University Press.

Starr, L. & C. Waterman. 2013. American Popular Music: from minstrelsy to MP3. New York: Oxford University Press.

Taylor, T. 2014. The Sounds of Capitalism: advertising, music, and the conquest of culture.

Chicago & London: University of Chicago Press.

[reluctantrenegade]

365 Day Writing Challenge,  Day 256

Write about someone of a different nationality than you. 

Okay. This is gonna be a rambly one. The person I want to talk about is someone I love, though I don’t know their real name. The name I know this person as is Rocky Flintstone, the genius creator of some of the worst/best erotica ever written. 

This is a My Dad Wrote a Porno fan ramble, in case you were wondering. And Rocky Flintstone is the “Dad” in that scenario. My Dad Wrote a Porno is a podcast in which Rocky’s son reads his erotic book series aloud to his friends and listeners around the globe and we all marvel in the strange, demented, and wonderful brain of Rocky. 

We don’t know all that much about Rocky, but one thing we do know is that he is very, very British. Irish, actually. So here’s just a list of things I genuinely, non-ironically love about his writing. 

1. His almost aggressive UK-ness. All the books are very British, even when (and sometimes especially when) the characters travel to other countries. The Englishman abroad is a well-documented phenomenon, and Rocky captures it...well, not to a tee, but he does something. You get locations like Cricklewood Pumping Station, the Millennium Dome Building (not what people actually call it), and frequent visits to the Ritz. You get Christmas themed chapters, something Brits do like no other. You get English royalty and the riding set. It’s all lovely. 

2. His strangely progressive portrayal of women (?). When you first listen to his writing and hear mention of breasts like pomegranates and realize just how little understanding he seems to have of how the female anatomy works, you might not think of him as a feminist icon. And yeah, these stories are tinged by a weird sort of James Bond-ish, 70s era, mile high club sort of vibe. But it cannot be denied that these books are about a woman making sexual conquests for the sake of her career and being celebrated for it. Not only that, but she really enjoys her job, too. One time she shouts how much she loves it while she’s having an orgasm. Weird, but undeniably refreshing. She also has no long-term partners, no desire to have kids, and nobody gives a shit about it. It’s great. 

3. Obviously he has a pretty good sense of humor to let his kid make fun of him all the time, and that sense of humor does make its way into the books. It’s even sometimes on purpose! Bless him. 

I have a soft spot for Brits, and Rocky is definitely strange and demented, but he also might be one of the good ones. Cheers to him. 

[sempiternalsandpitturtle]

Why going viral should not be one of your goals

The word ‘viral’ used to refer to the sudden, uncontrollable spread of an illness, but in recent years has been repurposed, becoming synonymous with the rapid proliferation of certain types of online content.

Regardless of whether it’s a news story, funny video or cute photo of a cat typing on a keyboard, viral content is now an inescapable part of how the internet (and social media in particular) work in modern society. Going viral can also come with huge benefits, ranging from increased exposure and sudden fame all the way through to providing a platform for getting a certain message out into the world.

For a long time, viral content was something of a mystery, with few able to predict which pieces of content would capture the internet’s attention and spread like wildfire. That’s changed in recent years though, with an entire industry springing up around the concept of going viral and what it takes to achieve such widespread success online. But is this really the right approach for businesses looking to improve their digital presence and better reach their audience? Recent examples of going viral have illustrated the importance of being careful what you wish for, while also underlining the value of taking a slower, more controlled approach to online campaigns.

Why is #Wendy’s so savage? Striking the right social media tonehttps://t.co/jE9l9u0fGS #contentmarketing #contentmktg pic.twitter.com/tqWvCHfuBr

— Castleford Media (@castlefordmedia) May 19, 2017

What does going viral really mean?

Before we can get into the reasons why going viral may not be the best strategy for your business,

It’s important to clearly define what viral content is. The content side of the equation is easy, encompassing everything from articles and photos to videos, songs, graphics and other images. So what about ‘viral’?

A great definition comes from Elise Moreau, who writes in Lifewire that: “On the internet, a piece of content can spread just like a virus if people become “infected” when they see it. The infection usually comes from evoked emotions that spur the viewer to share it, so they can relate with other people and discuss how they feel.”

Going viral requires emotion

With this focus on emotions in mind, it’s easy to see why certain types of content capture the online zeitgeist. Perhaps they’re funny, sad or simply strange, but all share some form of emotion that a huge group of people can relate to.

The stronger the emotion, the more shareable a piece of content is, and these emotions aren’t always the most wholesome. In fact, many pieces of viral content, be they Wendy’s mean tweets or over-the-top political rants, deliberately tap into the darker sides of the human psyche. There’s a reason why videos of people falling over or being embarrassed tend to perform so well on social media platforms.

Viral content is therefore unpredictable, and even if you do manage to create something that captures attention, there’s no real way of telling what sort of emotions you’ll stir up.

The reach of viral content

What’s undeniable about viral content is its reach, offering businesses the kind of attention and connection with audiences they could only dream about with traditional content marketing tools.

This vast reach is the benefit most closely associated with going viral, and it’s easy to see why companies might be enticed by the promise of instantly broadening their audience by thousands, if not hundreds of thousands. The problem, however, is that the definition of viral content changes with every new phenomenon.

Back in the early days of YouTube and Facebook, a video or post with 10,000 likes or more might have been considered a viral success. Today, anything with less than a few million is a mere drop in the bucket, as exemplified by the recent example of the Instagram page world_record_egg.

Created with the express goal of becoming the most-liked post on the platform (beating Kylie Jenner’s measly 18 million likes on a photo of her newborn baby), the account’s only update – a stock photo of, you guessed it, an egg – currently boasts a whopping 44 million likes and counting.

That’s the kind of audience money simply can’t buy, but before you start planning your own egg-based marketing campaign, it’s worth taking a closer look at whether it will succeed and what the benefits would be even if it did.

View this post on Instagram

Let’s set a world record together and get the most liked post on Instagram. Beating the current world record held by Kylie Jenner (18 million)! We got this #LikeTheEgg #EggSoldiers #EggGang

A post shared by EGG GANG (@world_record_egg) on Jan 4, 2019 at 9:05am PST

Why going viral is a bad goal

The first reason attempting to create viral content isn’t the most efficient or effective goal is that it’s unpredictable. Using the example of the world record egg, there was no indication that the post would achieve anything like the success it’s had, with the post’s spread a completely random occurrence that could only happen in the age of the internet. In another time, the exact same success could have been had with a photo of something else, or the egg could have quickly faded from popularity with only a few hundred likes.

Of course, there are certain factors that can play into viral success, such as hopping on to a popular trend, mimicking other successful campaigns or attaching a brand to a popular influencer. Even with all of these characteristics, there’s simply no guarantee, making attempts at viral campaigns an often expensive waste of time, money and energy.

The next reason why viral video marketing and other forms of rampant online success aren’t always the best option for businesses is that there’s no real next step. If you reach an enormous audience with a well-timed piece of viral content, that very rarely translates into meaningful leads or conversions. Nobody is buying eggs through Instagram.

As with many aspects of content marketing and digital advertising, it all comes back to the idea of quality versus quantity. All the web traffic in the world won’t help your business sell more product, and while raising brand awareness is a good goal in its own right, that awareness needs to be within an audience that may decide to convert at some point in the future.

Finally, viral success is short-lived. Even though the world record egg is currently a big deal, it will only be a matter of time before something else comes along and eclipses it. For this reason, viral marketing isn’t a sustainable investment, unlike higher quality content such as informative blog posts or whitepapers that have a long shelf life.

Viral success is short-lived. Even though the world record egg is currently a big deal, it will only be a matter of time before something else comes along and eclipses it.

Viral marketing gone wrong

If you needed more convincing that viral marketing isn’t the best approach for a business, it’s worth keeping in mind that in addition to the strategy’s drawbacks, there’s also a very real potential for viral videos, articles and other content to spectacularly backfire.

We’ve talked about this before, using the example of Kendall Jenner and Pepsi, but it’s worth looking into some more examples of when traditional businesses have tried to go viral.

At particular risk are viral campaigns centred around social media. The appeal of this approach is it allows  users to put their own stamp on a certain piece of content by interacting with it, but the risks are significant. One recent example is Southern Rail, which attempted to get users to have their say on the effects of its employees’ rail strikes in the UK. While the campaign certainly went viral, the responses were definitely not what Southern Rail wanted to hear.

Similarly, when Coca Cola encouraged online followers to ‘gif the feeling’ as part of a rebrand, it was probably expecting a series of wholesome images reflecting how people feel about cracking open an ice cold can or bottle of Coke.

Instead, the company was treated to a wide variety of gifs that ranged from anti-capitalism messaging to explicit content.

These examples underline the very real dangers associated with going viral, which come down to the simple fact that it’s impossible to predict how users will react to a particular campaign. For every wholesome share of a photo of an egg there’s a hijacking of a well-intentioned viral strategy. The risk of falling victim to this sort of backlash makes viral marketing a risk too great for many businesses.

So, instead of attempting to go viral, which guarantees almost nothing in terms of success, it’s a far better idea for businesses to play the long game and focus on generating quality leads through long-term plays that can be controlled, calculated and tweaked as need be.

from http://bit.ly/2TdXYws

[newsnigeria]

Check out New Post published on Ọmọ Oòduà

New Post has been published on http://ooduarere.com/news-from-nigeria/world-news/eu-become-russia/

Can the EU become a partner for Russia?

[This analysis was written for the Unz Review]

The re-nomination (albeit somewhat reshuffled) of the “economic block” of the Medvedev government has elicited many explanations, some better than others.  Today I want to look at one specific hypothesis which can be summed up like this: Putin decided against purging the (unpopular) “economic block” from the Russian government because he wanted to present the EU with “known faces” and partners EU politicians would trust.  Right now, with Trump’s insane behavior openly alienating most European leaders, this is the perfect time to add a Russian “pull” to the US “push” and help bring the EU closer to Russia.  By re-appointing Russian “liberals” (that is a euphemism for WTO/WB/IMF/etc types) Putin made Russia look as attractive to the EU as possible.  In fact, the huge success of the Saint Petersburg summit and the Parliamentary Forum is proof that this strategy is working.

Continue reading after the page break. This hypothesis is predicated on one crucial assumption: that the EU, under the right conditions, could become a partner for Russia.

But is that assumption warranted?  I personally don’t believe that it is, and I will try to lay out the reasons for my skepticism:

First, there is no “EU”, at least not in political terms.  More crucially, there is no “EU foreign policy”.  Yes, there are EU member states, who have political leaders, there is a big business community in the EU and there are many EU organizations, but as such, the “EU” does not exist, especially not in terms of foreign policy.  The best proof of that is how clueless the so-called “EU” has been in the Ukraine, then with the anti-Russian sanctions, in dealing with an invasion of illegal immigrants, and now with Trump.  At best, the EU can be considered a US protectorate/colony, with some subjects “more equal than others” (say, the UK versus Greece).  Most (all?) EU member states are abjectly obedient to the USA, and this is no surprise considering that even the so-called “EU leader” or “EU heavyweight” – Germany – only has very limited sovereignty.  The EU leaders are nothing but a comprador elite which doesn’t give a damn about the opinions and interests of the people of Europe.  The undeniable fact is that the so-called “EU foreign policy” has gone against the vital interests of the people of Europe for decades and that phenomenon is only getting worse.

Welcome to Europe!

Second, the single most powerful and unified organization in Europe is not even an EU organization, but NATO.  And NATO, in real terms, is no less than 80% USA.  Forget about those fierce looking European armies, they are all a joke.  Not only do they represent no credible force (being too small, too poorly trained, under-equipped and poorly commanded), but they are completely dependent on the USA for a long list of critical capabilities and “force multipliers“: command, control, communications, intelligence, networking, surveillance, reconnaissance, target acquisition, logistics, etc.  Furthermore, in terms of training, force planning, weapon systems procurement, deployment and maintenance, EU states are also totally dependent on the USA.  The reason?  The US military budget totally dwarfs anything individual EU states can spend, so they all depend on Uncle Sam.  Of sure, the NATO figurehead – the Secretary General – is usually a non-entity which makes loud statements and is European (I think of that clown Stoltenberg as the prefect example), but NATO is not run by the NATO Secretary General. In reality, it is run by the Supreme Allied Commander Europe (SACEUR), who is the head of the Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe (SHAPE) and these guys are as red, white an blue as it gets.  Forget about the “Eurocorps” or any other so-called “European armies” – it’s all hot air, like Trudeau’s recent outburst at Trump.  In reality in the EU, as in Canada, they all know who is boss.  And here is the single most important fact: NATO desperately needs Russia as justification for its own existence: if relations with Russia improve, then NATO would have no more reason to exist.  Do you really think that anybody will let that happen?  I sure don’t!  And right now, the Europeans are busy asking for more US troops on their soil, not less and they are all pretending to be terrified by a Russian invasion, hence the need for more and bigger military exercises close to the Russian border.  And just to cover all its bases, NATO is now gradually expanding into Latin America.

Third, there is a long list of EU governments which vitally need further bad relationships with Russia.  They include:

Unpopular governments which need to explain their own failures by the nefarious actions of an external bogyman.  A good example is how the Spanish authorities blamed Russia for the crisis in Catalonia.  Or the British with their “Brexit”.  The Swedes are doing even better, they are already preparing their public opinion for a “Russian interference” in case the election results don’t turn out to be what they need.

Governments whose rhetoric has been so hysterically anti-Russian that they cannot possibly back down from it.  Best examples: the UK and Merkel.  But since most (but not all) EU states did act on the Skripal false-flag on the basis of the British “highly likely” and in the name of “solidarity”, they are now all stuck as accomplices of this policy.  There is *no way* they are simply going to admit that they were conned by the Brits.

EU prostitutes: states whose only policy is to serve the USA against Russia.  These states compete against each other in the most abject way to see who can out-brown-nose each other for the position of “most faithful and willing loyal servant of the USA”.  The best examples are, of course, the three Baltic statelets, but the #1 position has to go to the “fiercely patriotic Poles” who are now willing to actually pay Uncle Sam to be militarily occupied (even though the very same Uncle Sam is trying to racketeer them for billions of dollars).  True, now that EU subsidies are running out, the situation of these states is becoming even more dire, and they know that the only place where they can still get money is the USA.  So don’t expect them to change their tune anytime soon (even if Bulgaria has already realized that nobody in the West gives a damn about it).

Governments who want to crack down on internal dissent by accusing any patriotic or independent political party/movement to be “paid by the Kremlin” and representing Russian interests.  The best example is France and how it treated the National Front.  I would argue that most EU states are, in one way or another, working on creating a “national security state” because they do realize (correctly) that the European people are deeply frustrated and oppose EU policies (hence all the anti-EU referendums lost by the ruling elites).

Contrary to a very often repeated myth, European business interests do not represent a powerful anti-russophobic force.  Why?  Just look at Germany: for all the involvement of Germany (and Merkel personally) in the Ukraine, for all the stupid rhetoric about “Russia being an aggressor” which “does not comply with the Mink Agreements”, North Stream is going ahead!  Yes, money talks, and the truth is that while anti-Russian sanctions have cost Europe billions, the big financial interests (say the French company Total) have found ways to ignore/bypass these sanctions.  Oh sure, there is a pro-trade lobby with Russian interest in Europe. It is real, but it simply does not have anywhere near the power the anti-Russian forces in the EU have.  This is why for *years* now various EU politicians and public figures have made noises about lifting the sanctions, but when it came to the vote – they all voted as told by the real bosses.

Not all EU Russophobia is US-generated, by the way.  We have clearly seen that these days when Trump suggested that the G7 (or, more accurately, the G6+1) needed to re-invite Russia, it was the Europeans who said “nope!”.  To the extend that there is a “EU position” (even a very demure and weak one), it is mostly anti-Russian, especially in the northern part of Europe.  So when Uncle Sam tells the Europeans to obey and engage in the usual Russia-bashing, they all quickly fall in line, but in the rare case when the US does not push a rabidly anti-Russian agenda, EU politicians suddenly find enough willpower to say “no”.  By the way, for all the Trump’s statements about re-inviting Russia into the G6+1 the US is still busy slapping more sanctions on Russia.

The current mini-wars between the US and the EU (on trade, on Iran, on Jerusalem) do not at all mean that Russia automatically can benefit from this.  Again, the best example of this is the disastrous G6+1 summit in which Trump basically alienated everybody only to have the G6 reiterate its anti-Russian position even though the G6+1 needs Russia far more than Russia needs the G7 (she really doesn’t!).  Just like the US and Israeli leaders can disagree and, on occasion, fight each other, that does not at all mean that somehow they are not fundamentally joined at the hip.  Just think of mob “families” who can even have “wars” against each other, but that does not at all mean that this will benefit the rest of the population whom all mobsters prey upon.

The Ukrainian crisis will only benefit anti-Russian forces in Europe.  There is a very high probability that in the near future the Ukronazi regime will try to reconquer Novorussia (DNR/LRN).  I submit that the outcome of such an attack is not in doubt – the Ukronazis will lose.  The only question is this: to whom will they lose:

Option one: they lose to the combined forces of the DNR and LNR.  This is probably the most likely outcome.  Should this happen, there is a very high probability of a Novorussian counter attack to liberate most of the Donetsk and Lugansk regions, especially the cities of Slaviansk and Mariupol.  Since past behavior is the best predictor of future behavior, we can be pretty darn sure of what the reaction in Kiev and in the West will be: Russia will be blamed for it all.  The AngloZionists will *never* admit that the Ukronazi regime lost a civil war to its own people because the Novorussians will never accept a Nazi regime ruling over them.  Thus, a Novorussian victory will result in more hysterical Russophobia.

Option two: the Ukronazis succeed in their attack and threaten to overrun Donetsk, Lugansk and the rest of Novorussia.  Putin simply cannot allow this to happen.  He has made that promise many times and he has recently repeated it during his “open line” with the Russian people.  If the Russians are forced to intervene, this will not be a massive ground invasion – there is no need for that.  Russia has the firepower needed in the form of missile and artillery strikes to destroy the attacking Urkonazi forces and to impose a no-fly zone over all of Novorussia.  If Kiev pushes on and launches a full-scale attack on Russia proper, the Ukrainian armed forces will be totally disorganized and cease combat in about 48 hours.  This scenario is what I call the “Neocon dream” since such a Russian intervention will not be imaginary, but quite real and the Kremlin will even confirm it all very publicly and probably recognize the two Novorussian Republics just like what happened in 08.08.08 when Saakashvili decided to invade South Ossetia.  So, AngloZionists will (finally!) have the “proof” that Russia is the aggressor, the Poles and Balts will prepare for an “imminent” Russian invasion and I think that there is a pretty good chance that NATO forces will move into the Western Ukraine to “stop the Russians”, even if the said Russians will have absolutely no desire (or even possible motive) to want to invade the rest of the Ukraine or, even less so, Poland, Sweden or the Baltic statelets.

I will admit that there is still a small possibility that a Ukronazi attack might not happen.  Maybe Poroshenko & Co. will get cold feet (they know the real condition of the Ukie military and “dobrobat” death squads) and maybe Putin’s recent not-so-veiled threat about “grave consequences for the Ukrainian statehood” will have the needed effect.  But what will happen even if this attack does not take place?  The EU leaders and the Ukronazi regime in Kiev will still blame Russia for the Ukraine now clearly being a failed state.  Whatever scenario you find more likely for the Ukraine, things there will only get worse and everybody will blame Russia.

The crisis in Syria will only benefit anti-Russian forces in Europe.  It is becoming pretty clear that the USA is now attempting a reconquista of Syria or, at least, a break-up of Syria into several zones, including US-controlled ones.  Right now, the USA and the “good terrorists” have lost the war, but that does not stop them from re-igniting a new one, mostly by reorganizing, retraining, redeploying and, most importantly, re-branding the surviving “bad terrorists” into “good ones”.  This plan is backed by Saudi money and Israeli firepower.  Furthermore, Russia is now reporting that US Special Forces are already working with the (new) “good terrorists” to – you guessed it – prepare yet another fake chemical attack and blame it on the Syrians.  And why not?  It worked perfectly already several times, why not do that again?  At the very least, it would give the USA another try at getting their Tomahawks to show their effectiveness (even if they fail again, facts don’t matter here). And make no mistake, a US “victory” in Syria (or in Venezuela) would be a disaster not only for the region, but for every country wanting to become sovereign (see Andre Vltchek’s excellent article on this topic here).  And, again, Russia will be blamed for it all and, with certifiable nutcasts like Bolton, Russian forces might even be attacked.  As I wrote already many times, this is far from over.  Just as in the Ukrainian case, some deal might be made (at least US and Russian military officials are still talking to each other) but my personal opinion is that making any kind of deal with Trump is as futile as making deals with Netanyahu: neither of them can be trusted and they both will break any and all promises in a blink of an eye.  And if all hell breaks loose in Syria and/or Iran, NATO will make sure that the Europeans all quickly and obediently fall in line (“solidarity”, remember?).

The bottom line is this: currently, the EU is most unlikely to become a viable partner for Russia and the future does look rather bleak.

One objection to my pessimism is the undeniable success of the recent Saint Petersburg summit and the Parliamentary Forum.  However, I believe that neither of these events was really centered around Europe at all,  but about the world at large (see excellent report by Gilbert Doctorow on this topic here).  Yes, Russia is doing great and while the AngloZionist media loves to speak about the “isolation” of Russia, the truth is that it is the Empire which is isolated, while Russia and China are having a tremendous success building the multi-polar world they want to replace the Empire with.  So while it is true that the western leaders might prefer to see a liberal “economic block” in the new Russian government, the rest of the world has no such desire at all (especially considering how many countries out there have suffered terrible hardships at the hands of the WTO/WB/IMF/etc types).

Conclusion:

The AngloZionist Empire is not based in the USA, or in the EU, or Israel, or anywhere else on the planet.  It is a trans-national entity with regional variations and which includes different interest groups under its umbrella.  You can think of it as a gigantic criminal gang racketeering the entire planet for “protection”.  To think that by presenting a “liberal” face to these thugs will gain you their support is extremely naive as these guys don’t care about your face: what they want is your submission.  Vladimir Putin put it best when he said “They do not want to humiliate us, they want to subdue us, solve their problems at our expense”.

However, if the EU is, for all practical purposes, non-existent, Russia can, and will, engage with individual EU member states.  There is a huge difference between, say, Poland and Italy, or the UK and Austria.  Furthermore, the EU is not only dysfunctional, it is also non-viable.  Russia would immensely benefit from the current EU either falling apart or being deeply reformed because the current EU is a pure creation of the US-backed Bilderberger types and not the kind of Europe the European people need.  In fact, I would even argue that the EU is the single biggest danger for the people of the European continent.  Thus Russia should use her resources to foster bi-lateral cooperation with individual EU member states and never take any action which would strengthen (or even legitimize) EU-derived organizations such as the EU Parliament, the European Court of Human Rights, etc.  These are all entities which seek to undermine the sovereignty of all its members, including Russia.  Again, Putin put it best when he recently declared that “either Russia is a sovereign country, or there is no Russia“.

Whatever the ideology and slogans, all empires are inherently evil and inherently dangerous to any country wanting to be truly sovereign.  If Russia (and China) want to create a multi-polar world, they need to gradually disengage from those trans-national bodies which are totally controlled by the Empire, it is really that simple.  Instead, Russia needs to engage those countries, political parties and forces who advocate for what de Gaulle called “the Europe of fatherlands“.  Both the AngloZionist Empire and the EU are undergoing the most profound crisis in their history and the writing is on the wall.  Sooner rather than later, one by one, European countries will recover their sovereignty, as will Russia.  Only if the people of Europe succeed in recovering their sovereignty could Russia look for real partnerships in the West, if only because the gradually developing and integrating Eurasian landmass offer tremendous economic opportunities which could be most beneficial to the nations of Europe.  A prosperous Europe “from the Atlantic to the Urals” is still a possibility, but that will happen only when the current European Union and NATO are replaced by truly European institutions and the current European  elites replaced by sovereignists.

The people of Russia, EU and, I would argue, the United States all have the same goal and the same enemy:  they want to recover their sovereignty, get rid of their corrupt and, frankly, treacherous elites and liberates themselves from the hegemony of the AngloZionist Empire.  This is why pushing the issue of “true sovereignty” (and national traditional values) is, I believe, the most unifying and powerful political idea to defeat the Empire.  This will be a long struggle but the outcome is not in doubt.

The Saker

PS: just as I was sending this article away I came across this article by Paul Craig Roberts “Is Europe Too Brainwashed To Normalize Relations With Russia?” – make sure to also check it out!

UPDATE: those of you who understand Russian, here is a great video about what kind of stuff goes on in the EU and to get a feel for these folks:

[jmrphy]

On turning left into darkness

In the past week, many associates of mine on the radical left have expressed grave concern about my recent cultural politics. If you haven’t been following, here’s my best shot at a succinct, impartial recap. I have been blogging about what it means to engage intellectually with smart people on the right. By “smart people on the right,” I mean people with non-trivial intellectual projects defending right-wing perspectives, potentially even including some that appear horrifying and/or evil. I use the word “smart” only to exclude from the mind two images that have come to define “conservatism” in the left-wing imagination: infantile and fundamentally disingenuous politicians, and then mindless, racist armies of trolls. Specifically, for instance, I have expressed interest in the writings of Nick Land and Curtis Yarvin (Moldbug); I recently hosted a podcast with psychologist Diana Fleischman that included discussion of controversial topics such as “human biodiversity” (some say this is a euphemism for racism and some say it’s an empirical reality). Obviously not the usual talking points for a left-wing intellectual, but to be clear nobody is accusing me of writing or saying anything particularly impeachable. I did receive some very thoughtful concerns, however, so one goal of this post is to clarify at least one or two of the most fair and important criticisms I have received. This is a caring thing to do, and I still believe deeply in caring.

On the other hand, any culture of absolute kindness becomes a conservative system of unspoken violence insofar as painful truths get repressed and all participants become deformed over time. It is because I genuinely love my friends on the left that I am stepping up to publicly state, and seriously pursue the implications of, dozens of difficult questions we have basically had an unspoken pact to not speak about for perhaps decades now.

If you are one of my comrades on the left who is generally overexposed to human docility or illness, I must also warn you, caringly, that you might be alarmed or confused by what follows. Many of you are now accustomed to a particular script: comrade is “problematic,” group pulls moral alarm, comrade begs forgiveness and (even in the best of cases, not to mention the horror shows), comrade dies a little on the inside, group feels reassured comrade will do no harm, group grows old and gray wondering why they never changed the world. Well, I have seen this script performed too many times to play along any longer; over the past several years I think I have learned a thing or two about why our groups don’t change the world. One reason is that we punish our own for grappling with questions we pretend to understand but are in fact to fearful to seriously consider.

So at the same time this post will charitably respond to some left-wing critiques of my project, in the same breath I am going to unapolagetically push further outward on my perspective that so horrifies many of you. I will no longer fight rearguard battles against fearful and disingenuous people on the left who would rather condemn something than admit they don’t have the time to read and process it; but neither am I here to cozy up with right-wing currents, as so many on the left assume of anyone who starts really speaking up and speaking out. I should like to become a worthy opponent of the smart wings of the new reaction, rather than merely pretend they are stupid; for I consider it a great embarrassment that the revolutionary left has yet to generate anything as genuinely interesting and creative as The Dark Enlightenment or Unqualified Reservations. If so-called left-acclerationism is our best response, then we’re in deep trouble (see below). Fortunately, I think we can do much, much better, but we won’t know until we try.

One of the key objections put forward by my more thoughtful critics from the left is the following. They argue that it is ethically and/or politically wrong to entertain a frame of debate in which racist implications appear likely. For example, my podcast with Diana is ethically or politically bad because by even discussing biological differences across groups, I am effectively increasing the perceived legitimacy of notions that can and will be used to support racist ideas or policies. I think this is a reasonable concern based on a plausible model of culture. Yet after reflecting on this for several years, I believe this idea is fatally mistaken in ways that have not yet been fully grasped or written down anywhere (that I know of, anyway). Here is a first, short attempt.

This idea that it is ethically or politically wrong to entertain a certain frame of debate is a fatal error in both the normative and empirical sense of that term. First, on the normative level, the idea of refusing to engage people with certain frames of reference dehumanizes people who have no access to anything other than those frames of reference. In short, this objection writes off large swaths of humanity as inhuman. I believe that this monopoly on humanity claimed by educated leftists is now, on net, a more violent and reactionary phenomenon than any legitimacy that would be given to racism by even talking with a proper racist (let alone decent people who merely have dicey or controversial positions). What many on the left ignore is that today large swaths of human beings are, through no fault of their own, socialized into right-wing and often racist frames. There exists a large number of people who are racist because they were sociologically doomed from birth to be racist (e.g. poor undeducated white kids in racist families and geographies are statistically doomed to be racist). Their humanity has been robbed from them (as it’s increasingly robbed from everyone).

It is my view that the revolutionary left is absolutely obligated to treat such people as the humans they truly are despite the dehumanization they have been subjected to. When the “humane” leftist says thou shall not engage with any racist “framing” of a conversation, they are saying that large swaths of essentially innocent people do not have the right to think, speak, or participate in public life, i.e. this position coldly writes off the past and continued dehumanization of literally millions of people. Leftists think they are being radically humane, guarding the last line of defense against the collapse of human equality, but the horrifying mistake nobody is willing to reflect on is that this is actually saying “keep those filthy animals out of the little circle of humanity I still get to enjoy with my educated friends.”

The genuinely humane, revolutionary-emancipatory position in contemporary culture is that we must dare to do the cognitively and emotionally terrifying, and dangerous, work of extending whatever last shreds of humanity we have, to everyone we possibly can. Therefore, the truly humane, caring, revolutionary gambit today ethically requires us to “engage with racist frames.” As a militant antifascist, I also believe in drawing lines across which absolute refusal or physical resistance becomes the correct move: to me, the clear line is if someone is actively engaged in violence or directly inciting it. I would not have a conversation with a neo-Nazi marching in my town throwing bottles at immigrants; I would, with my community, physically remove them from my town. All I am saying is that to draw this line of militant non-engagement at the level of “thinking and speaking with a racist frame” would require us to tell millions of people to go die in the cesspool they were born into. We have been effectively doing that for decades now, and not only does it fail, but it appears to engender or intensify novel mutations of racist politics (e.g., carefully non-explicit white “identitarian” movements, etc).

Continuing from the previous part, the second problem is as follows. This notion that it can be wrong, a priori, to consider certain frames of reference is a grave error in the practical or strategic sense as well, because to cast off so many people as inhuman casts off all of the humans we would need to change anything. It empirically dooms the left to never achieve the fundamental transformations we claim to be fighting for. If you listen to smart people on the right, they are currently laughing their way to the end of humanity as the left continues to push deeper and deeper into the mistakes we are actively refusing to learn from. It is very difficult for the few revolutionary leftists still alive to confront this, because it’s genuinly so vertiginous and horrifying that it really approaches what is cognitively and emotionally unsurvivable for genuinely caring people: there are at least some objective reasons to believe the human species may be genuinely crossing the threshold at which exponentially increasing technological efficiency makes the absolute end of humanity an objective and irreversible empirical reality. I think it’s debatable where we are at in that process, but it seems undeniable this question is now genuinely at stake and I simply don’t see a single person on the revolutionary left seriously considering this with the radical honesty it requires.

If folks like Srnicek and Williams and the “post-capitalism” types are the best the radical left has to offer on this front, I’m very sorry but we’re in serious trouble. No disrespect to those folks, they are all very good and smart people. But that is exactly the problem. A really profound problem nobody on the left wants to consider is that being a “good person” imposes psychological constraints on your most basic capacities to think and express yourself honestly. To understand this, we need to take a little historical detour.

Recall that capitalist society only emerged and grew on hypocrisy as the standard mode for cognitively and emotionally managing the necessity of having to brutally exploit each other to survive. This hypocrisy is what the word “bourgeois” means, and it is nothing less than the naturalized lifestyle of everyone who qualifies as a “good person” in modernity. Because living as a human being under capitalism requires hypocrisy, being empirically correct about what is happening and how the world functions (science) as well as interpersonally adequate to each other (what is called “caring,” or saying/doing what helps specific other people in specific moments) are mutually exclusive to a substantial degree. The psychologist Jonathan Haidt has shown with several years of research that people who identify with the political left are disproportionately interested in “care” as a value; conservatives have a more multi-dimensional “palette” of moral foundations). To be clear, I am in fact deeply interested in the value of care, which is one reason I find myself sociologically on the left-wing of political culture. The unique challenge I don’t see anybody on the radical left seriously confronting is how our committment to care comes with the cost of certain systematic errors we happily ignore by dishonestly repeating over and over that we ignore them because we “care.” The issue here is that, it is programmed into the nature of a capitalist bourgeois society that to pursue unlimited “care” means that you objectively do not care about changing reality. This is because changing something as complex as “society” requires an extremely sophisticated empirical rigor deeply at odds with the care we also need to exercise in order to cooperatively change things together as diverse human beings. How to achieve the optimal balance of these genuinely contradictory tendencies is, in my view, one of the million-dollar questions for any serious revolutionary political thought today.

(An aside. The first and most stupendous person to see all of this in the early stages of capitalist modernity, who so clearly saw the doomed destiny of any society organized on hypocrisy, that he preferred to sacrifice his public “goodness” to produce monuments of honesty so outrageous he hoped they would raze the hypocritical order altogether, was, of course, Rousseau. Now, Rousseau did not squash the rise of bourgeois hypocrisy, but he had demonstrable effects in generating the modern revolutionary left tradition as we know it, from the French Revolution to Fanon and beyond. There are many good critiques of Rousseau, but if there is one example of how a sincere individual can craft a life that contributes to genuinely collective, world-historical waves of revolutionary political change, it is surely Rousseau. If this aside does not help you to see the world-historical difference between my own perspective and the neo-reaction, then it is unlikely any other citations ever will.)

In my view, this tradeoff between being correct about how the world works and caring for each other enough that we can cooperatively change it in the direction of peace and abundance for all—this is perhaps the most vexing and urgent puzzle for a genuine revolutionary left today. Yet remarkably I am not aware of a single person genuinely risking themselves on solving it, so I’m going to try. At present I am working on understanding the mechanisms whereby such an important problem has somehow been so stubbornly invisible to so many of us for so long. My wager is that we if we can truly understand the mechanisms of our own blindness, we will find pathways to the holy grail of the revolutionary left tradition: the flourishing of all human beings in peace and abundance, immediately, without recourse to all of the right-wing solutions that get raised in direct response to the left’s willful neglect of exactly this impasse.

It is because of this tradeoff between being correct and caring that I have recently become interested in what I have been referring to as the “smart” right-wing. Many people are concerned that my recent interest in intelligence means that I’ve become an IQ elitist or something. On the contrary, I am keenly suspicious of the politics of high-IQ subcultures, precisely because I know there is a trade-off between being correct and caring. Because we care about each other, there are certain things we refuse to see or else refuse to tell each other about what is really true. That’s fine, and perhaps a hard constraint of the types of beings we are on the radical left. But “smart” far-right people, who do not give a fuck about how people feel, they might just be the only ones capable of telling us those truths we need to process if we are ever going to have a sufficent command on reality to generate the systemic transformations we believe in. But at the same time, I am highly skeptical that the evacuation of care is a viable political project, because warmth is a condition of life for we creatures who require the sun to live, we creatures who are literally composed of a once-exploded star. I think right-accelerationists are wagering on the possibility that, if technologically super-charged hypercapitalism is understood correctly (hence the call to minimize care), that is objectively the most likely path for the possibility of surviving, perhaps into the becoming of something post-human.

For instance, a remarkable feature of Nick Land’s current writing is his obsession with coldness; I have never read anyone who so conscientiously endorses the absolute evacuation of care as a political project. Many on the left find this so evil they are resolutely insisting that if one so much as speaks his name with even one non-negative adjective in the same sentence, that very act is enough to force the speaker out of the publicly defined circle of “good humans” into that outside zone of cast-off inhumanity (consider that Land’s handle is @outsideness), via the same intellectual-social process I described above. If we self-servingly cast off human beings as if they are sub-human, we cannot then feign surprise and indignation if they say, “OK then! I’ll go off to become one with the superintelligent eugenically produced cyborg overloads you’ll be enslaved by in a couple of generations and I will laugh my ass off all the way to the singularity!” That’s the vibe I get when I browse Nick Land’s ongoing work, and when I look at the objective reality of runaway global finance and the tech sector, it does not seem implausible that something like this could potentially be underway. Of course I find that horrifying, which is why I am calling absolute bullshit on the people who say that it’s “too evil to engage.” On the contrary, it’s too alarming not to engage.

The more evil you think someone is, the greater should be your concern to ensure there is not the slightest chance they understand something better than you. If they are so evil, and they understand even one tiny thing you don’t, perhaps they are off using that edge in knowledge to engineer you out of existence. This suggests to me that when people say, “intellectual engagement with person X is prohibited,” what they are actually saying is “we are so afraid they might be part of the superintelligent cyborg army coming to enslave us that, even if they are literally preparing to, we do not want to know about it, even if there is a chance that we can still stop them!” And this is where I get off the train to nowhere, for this is where moderate respectable leftism (including most currently existing “radical” variants) converges with the most insiduous and cowardly conservatism. If there is some chance that hyperintelligent cyborgs are preparing to overtake humanity once and for all, because there is some chance that for generations now they have been operating on a model of the world we made it our pact to never consider, then I’m going to take a real look. Not everyone has to be comfortable doing so themselves, but at this point I think that any honest, decent, thinking being on the radical left will at least allow me to try.

I believe that currently, a dirty little secret on the the left is that for some people, the “left” is an agreement to protect each other’s right to look away from the most horrifying and potentially tragic realities of planetary life today, to (implicitly) secure amongst ourselves the last bits of interpersonal warmth available on the planet, agreeing to allow the rest of humanity’s descent into irreversible coldness. It helps to explain why, if you even approach these issues with the slightest indication of analytical coldness, you have to be ejected from the warmth cartel, for ejecting such existential threats is a condition of its survival. But I believe it has always been the vocation of the revolutionary left, properly understood, to risk its own survival on deploying just enough analytical coldness to engineer the unique machine that would take as an input the left’s unique material resource (warmth or energy via care) and produce as an output non-linear, systemic dynamics the ultimate equilibrium state of which would be peace and abundance for all. What that machine looks like is the question, and this is only a formal statement to illustrate the revolutionary left position today as an engineering problem. There are many reasons that have been adduced as to why such a machine cannot exist, and I do not pretend to offer responses to them here. I am only suggesting that any revolutionary left today, worthy of the name, would need to “solve for X,” as it were. The point of the engineering metaphor is not that everybody in the revolutionary movement will need to be an engineer, not at all; the point is only to show that any left-revolutionary project, to succeed, will have to solve this engineering problem.

What does this mean for revolutionary politics, in plain conversational terms? By putting all of our eggs in the basket of care and kindness, the radical left is now suffering from an engineering crisis it does not have enough engineers to even notice. In short, making revolution is a complex practical problem we are not solving because we are now generations deep in a long-term strategy of prohibiting people who are good at high-level problem solving but bad at being polite. Not to mention people who are good at creative and social openness, but bad at obeying rules. Thinkers of the respectable-radical left, people such as Paul Mason or Srnicek and Williams are selling a hope of technological super-abundance, but they are too sweet to tell any of their left comrades that all of the people you would need to actually produce that super-abundance are off building hyper-exploitative super-capitalism in part because they once went to an activist meeting and everyone treated them like fascists. To bring this back to anti-capitalist basics, the reason left post-capitalist thinkers don’t reflect much on such little problems as this one is because selling books is as mutually exclusive with truth-telling, in the short run, as is being a “nice person.” Hence the need for a fundamentally anti-bourgeois revolutionary intellectual culture cold enough to seek all of the darkest truths, but still warm enough not to betray the calling of solidarity. I’m not saying the left should start worshipping cold analytical power; all I’m saying is that if we genuinely believe in the necessity of changing the world, a revolutionary culture would have to be at least minimally hospitable to a minimal number of people who have knowledge of how complex things work and how they break, and people with the traits and inclinations to maneuver among diverse others. Both types of people are effectively prohibited from those who currently define radical progressive politics. Contemporary radical left culture is now so fully doubled-down on the wager of kindness over intelligence and creativity, that I am afraid it is almost vacuum-sealed against learning why it might be on the verge of extinction. I am writing this, and will continue writing to this effect, on the last-ditch possibility there exist other people out there, somewhere, who can see in this something more important than a moral offense.

from Justin Murphy http://ift.tt/2ppFcmI