#academic threat era

[drakulateeth]

What have I been up to?

From the last "to do list" post until now many things have changed, mainly, that I have moved abroad and started grad school. So what did I do today and what is there left to do for this week.

I registered for my winter semester exams (I can drop one or two in November).

I filled out my scholarship calculation form, which took longer than expected due to waiting for my new insurance confirmation and some errors on the extranet regarding my study start date. I submitted it with the wrong year, but after several emails in German, I'm done with it.

I finished the preliminary table of contents for my M&A class presentation tomorrow. I also just organized the printed M&A and investment banking lectures since I have to get up early tomorrow.

I edited my cover letter for my thesis submission and realized I hadn’t mentioned my supervisor. I sent her the updated version, and she approved it. It took about six days of work (despite starting in August), but now it’s the end of October, and I just submitted it.

I downloaded the proposal for a project I participated in as a secondary proposer (though I mainly served as a quota of young researchers to be filled).

I finally received my Student Card! Now I can eat in the mensa and use the library. Thank goodness!

More things to worry about in the future:

I need to email my "Vertrauensdozentin" to ask her to be my advisor and arrange a meeting, which I will most likely write in English.

Next, I have to decide which working groups from the foundation I will join. I also need to register for a mandatory seminar on the fundamentals of liberalism, but I haven’t checked the dates yet.

It is my turn to clean the communal spaces, I need to do some more grocery shopping. I should cook the meat in my fridge soon and buy food for my trip with classmates this weekend.

I am still to figure out what the best way to follow my classes is or where I can stay in campus to study. I still have not spoken to everyone in my program.

I must create a new Excel budget tracker for next month, update my October expenses, and schedule some payments for the beginning of the month. Additionally, I need to change my bank account details on various platforms and pay back my aunt for the expenses she covered until I opened my account.

I’d love to visit Munich soon, but I need to check with friends about hosting me. I also need to buy a flight ticket home for the holidays and plan a trip with my Spanish friend. Gosh I am so exhausting

I also want to get my residence permit longer before my visa expires, because I can't be keeping my passport on me all the fucking time. I need to also look into

I also need to condition myself into learning more German, like I know the language but at the same time I don't. Two weekends ago I went to a networking event and every night I would go to sleep with a horrible headache from all that small talk in German. Theoretically speaking I know I will get better, but at the present moment I feel so stupid for not being able to remember the most basic verbs while talking to other people. Like I am very cool and funny I swear, my brain just barely connects auf Deutsch.

In the three weeks I have been here, I have traveled to three different places in the weekends and have gotten sick from my stomach three times. Is this divine protection? I have only received one marriage proposal thus far, I can do better. Anyway I am writing this down so I can look back into these initial moments, and not let them fade away from my memory. All of my days have been action packed, but October 23rd will be cemented in my blog.

Bis bald!

[komsomolka]

While West Germany after the war took on all the trappings of a mainstream western democracy, it still contained within its constitution, its structures and the practices of its legal system elements of a Nazi juridical and ideological legacy, and never fully carried out a thorough de-nazification of society. This process was given support by the western occupying powers. Once the Nuremburg trials were over and the Cold War had set in, the enemy was once again communism and the Soviet Union. Ex-Nazis were, of course, very useful to the western allies in that battle and were duly enlisted. A continued investigation into Nazi crimes and the judicial pursuance of Nazi criminals was suppressed. [...]

Thus the marginalisation and stigmatisation of a great number of intellectuals from the GDR was in stark contrast to what happened to former Nazis in the Federal Republic after the war. A law introduced by the Federal Republic in 1951 granted all those who had served under the Nazi regime the right of re-instatement in their previous jobs. (Only the few categorised as ‘main culprits’ were not included under this legislation.) This right and with it an associated threat of imposing a quota system had the effect of enabling 90% of those Nazi civil servants sacked in 1945 to return to public service. It meant that professionals and academics who had not been merely apologists for fascism in Nazi Germany, but prominent ideologues, were able to return to their old positions without any real interruption and were even promoted to more influential positions in politics and state administration.

Nazi judges handed down around 60,000 death sentences on those opposed to the Hitler regime, but not one of these judges was brought to justice after the war. Hans Filbinger was a naval prosecutor under the Nazis and handed down a number of death sentences on those opposed to the Nazis. In the post-war era he rose to become First Minister of Baden-Wurttemberg and, with regard to those who accused him of being guilty of perverting the course of justice, he made the significant and notorious comment that ‘What was right and just then, cannot be made unjust today’. This however clearly did not apply to the GDR. [...]

In the GDR there was no statute of limitation on the prosecution of those who committed crimes against humanity. But in the Federal Republic, on the other hand, many of those who had fought on the side of the Nazis or worked for them were either not brought to justice or were amnestied and qualified for full pension rights. Even members of the former Waffen-SS in Lithuania (some then living in the UK, USA or Australia) were granted war pensions. These were the same people who had helped the Nazis murder almost all the 70,000 Jews who lived in Lithuania before the war (and despite the fact that the Waffen-SS had been characterised as a criminal organisation by the Nuremberg War Crimes Tribunal). People from the GDR, however, were treated very differently. A special law was passed after unification which retrospectively provided legal justification for the reduction of pensions of those who worked in key positions for the GDR administration. Former GDR citizens who were considered to be ‘systemnah’ (closely associated with the system) receive a reduced pension, often referred to as a ‘punitive pension’ (Strafrente). Following that pattern, a former lecturer at a GDR technical college was informed by the social security authorities that his GDR pension of 1,200 Deutsch Marks per month would be frozen while it was investigated whether this pension was an unlawful remuneration. He then informed the authorities that, as a young man, during the Hitler period, he had worked as a civil servant in Göring’s air transport ministry. All of a sudden his pension was increased to an unbelievable 4,997 Deutsch Marks and on top of that he received a back payment of 149,000 Marks. Working for the Nazi regime was clearly seen as being of more merit than for the GDR.

Those who had actively resisted or suffered persecution by the Nazis had been granted an additional pension supplement in the GDR; after unification, these pensions were reduced by 300 Deutsch Marks. Many who had resisted the Nazis and were forced to spend years in exile or were interned in prison or concentration camps found that those years were not pensionable under the West German pension system.

Even compensation offered to those considered to be victims of repression were dealt with using different criteria: those who were considered to have been wrongly imprisoned in the GDR received 550 Marks for each month spent in prison, whereas those who had been in Nazi concentration camps qualified for only 150 Deutsch Marks for each month of incarceration. This graphically illustrates the double standards used in the new unified Germany. [...]

All German military officers qualify for burial with full military honours, including those who served in Hitler’s army, but not those who served in the GDR people’s army. The message is: it was not ignoble to have served the Nazis but it was the communists.

There is little doubt that successive governments in West Germany after the war played down the role of the Nazis, simply by ignoring it. There were few if any films made or books published dealing with that legacy. For instance, Dachau, one of the few concentration camps to be located in the Western part of Germany was only established as a proper memorial as late as 1965. But immediately after unification, a whole number of museums were opened to show ‘the horrors’ of the GDR, like Hohenschönhausen the former Soviet and then GDR prison in Berlin. [...]

The German government evidently places more significance on dealing with the GDR than with the fascist period of German history. The central office in Ludwigsburg for the investigation of crimes committed by the Nazi regime had, at the height of its activity, five full-time employees. In comparison, the statutory authority examining the Stasi files has more than 3,000 employees and by 1998 had already cost German taxpayers around 1.39 billion Deutsch Marks. And, significantly, despite a long and avid search by the present German authorities, tasked with analysing and taking out criminal proceedings against former Stasi officials for wrongdoing, only a tiny number have been convicted of any crime. Concrete evidence of serious mistreatment of individuals by the Stasi has been minimal.

The tenacious vindictiveness and virulence with which the Federal German government has treated ex-GDR citizens and the whole historical legacy of the GDR, is an indication that anything connected with the idea of an alternative form of society is still seen as a threat. The Germany Federal Republic, certainly before the demise of the GDR, never really confronted its Nazi past. Once the Nuremberg Trials were over and many former Nazis again reinstated in their old positions in business, the state apparatus and institutions, the past was conveniently brushed under the new carpet. It also chose to ignore the fact that its post-war economic boom had come about to a large extent on the basis of the enormous profits made during the Nazi period as a result of illegally expropriated Jewish assets and forced labour. On top of this it had much of its debt burden written off and received lavish Marshall Aid from the USA so that it could play its part fully as the central European ‘bulwark against communism’. The GDR, on the other hand, underwent a thorough de-nazification process which was, horror of horrors, carried out by the Nazis’ erstwhile enemies, the communists. In that sense the GDR always represented an unflattering mirror held up to West German society. It never ceased revealing how many old Nazis were back in power, how reactionary the FRG’s institutional structures still were and how the whole state was built on hypocritical foundations. When the opportunity arose (with the demise of the GDR and unification) to destroy that mirror which had always reflected the ugly reality beneath the sheen of the West German ‘economic wonder’, it was grasped greedily with both hands. One could say, that all that damned up sense of guilt and shame was unleashed on the GDR and its citizens who became the scapegoat for all that was wrong in its own society; the GDR became the ‘other totalitarian dictatorship’, and its citizens – at least those who refused to accept this stigmatisation and their own ‘guilt’ of colluding with an ‘illegal state’ – were treated almost like outcasts or second class citizens.

Stasi State or Socialist Paradise? The German Democratic Republic and What Became of It by Bruni de la Motte & John Green with Seumas Milne (Contributor), 2015.

[sarahreesbrennan]

Quick Evil Note

To all my wicked darlings, I have now received rather a lot of messages asking me about the influences of Long Live Evil. And I wish to get messages about LLE and truly appreciate the ones I do get! And I wish to answer them. But answers about influences are tricky.

The book has been out in the US for a little over two weeks, and it’s going so well so far, I couldn’t be more delighted and appreciative about its reception.

But also I’ve been informed (not asked) that two of my characters are obviously somehow both Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy of Harry Potter, and Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji of Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation. (Very puzzling as I don’t think these pairings - and one isn’t a pair - have much in common with each other or with mine. Vague hostility against a vaguely academic backdrop for a bit? For the record… in the book everyone is an adult and I don’t even have any academic backdrops to be vaguely hostile in front of…) This hasn’t happened to me in a long time, because I haven’t had an original novel out in a long time due to illness, and it is upsetting to always be discussed differently than writers who didn’t openly link their real names to their fan identity.

I have very different feelings and new appreciation for fandom than I once had. It’s been amazing to see and meet people who have stuck with me for decades. People are generally way more open and affectionate to and within fandom than they once were. Love matters to me a good deal more than hate. But getting death threats in your early 20s for excitedly telling your Internet friends you were going to publish a book does mark the psyche, and so does having your characters dismissed as other people’s characters.

And we can say there is nothing wrong with fanfiction or writing fanfiction and there isn’t! Fanfiction is great and can be genius. Terry Pratchett wrote Jane Austen fanfiction, and didn’t (and shouldn’t) have people saying Captain Wentworth = Captain Vimes. Still, when a TV show is discussed as ‘like fanfiction’ or when Diana Gabaldon said she didn’t like fanfiction and many said ‘YOU write fanfiction’ it isn’t intended in any kind spirit, even when it’s fannish folk saying it. And it’s just generally odd to have everyone call your apple a tomato, and has had professional consequences for me in the past.

However! All the asks I’ve received have been very kind, and I do want to answer them. I do want to talk about my influences because they are manifold and because I actually think it’s important to always talk about influences. I don’t believe stories exist in isolation - we tell tales in a rich tradition, and also a story doesn’t come alive to me all the way until it’s heard or read.

Long Live Evil is a love letter to fandom: it’s chock full of references to many many stories I’ve loved, to fairytales, myths and legend and Internet memes and epic fantasy and meta. My acknowledgements are endless partly for this reason. I do owe a great debt to many portal fantasies and archetypes and musicals and jokes about genre and plays through the ages, though I do think of my characters as themselves and nobody else.

I was frankly tempted to go ‘Yes I stole EVERYTHING! Bwhahaha!’ But while I am thoroughly enjoying and finding great freedom in my villain era, I do want to talk sincerely to you all as well, especially when asked sincerely interested questions.

But I’m a little scared to do so and have people say ‘AHA! Now we know what it’s fanfiction of’ (it’s happened before) or ignore me and go ‘we know the truth!’ (it’s happened before) and to feel like I’ve injured my book. Long Live Evil means more to me than any other and I really want to get talking about it right, and make sure it has the best reception I can give it.

So. Questions on all Evil topics very very welcome but answers to influence questions may come slowly. Bear with me. I am working on this!

[dcdreamblog]

We all know about how the HUAC trial of the 50s was, accentually, the end of the mystery men but something that is rarely talked about is the massacre of the 70s. where doctor Trapp killed over 35 superheroes and supervillains over 2 years, witch the most famous victims being the justice experience.

Care to talk about all of those fallen heroes?

Yes, well I must admit to my professional biases first. I know that one of my bad habits, the bad habits of my entire academic focus is that it makes it seem that there were no superheroes between the retirement of the JSA and the foundation of the JLA. It's obviously not true. If you're not from the United States you'd have good cause to be offended by the implication. But there's a reason. The first reason is that because my focus is on the Golden Age it's easier for me to present historical narratives from that angle to the layman, no offense. The second...is because of what happened to that forgotten middle generation.

The tragedy of the Justice Experience.

(Image of the Justice Experience created by famous cartoonist Bruce Timm. (OOC: Gwhitmore on DA). Perhaps for a never made cartoon along the lines of his famous MAU franchise)

They appeared in the early 70s, from the left to right: Acro-Bat, Bronze Wraith, Songbird, The Manx, Mr. Action and Major Flashback. They were a very low key organization but not by choice.

The media, and especially the police and the government were still deeply anti-vigilante by nature. The records of the Experience are heavily incomplete because anything they did was poorly reported and any criminals they caught were often fully credited to the police or the FBI no matter how much sense that made or how much everyone knew it was bullshit.

And that institutional disinterest probably killed them.

A villain by the name of Dr. Trap made it his personal mission to hunt down the heroes and villains of this era, as well as their friends and family. Due to legal pressure the heroes of this era had been unable to organize in the vein of the heroes of previous and following periods and the law enforcement of the time refused to take the threat of a supervillain seriously. Treating Dr. Trap as LESS dangerous than a normal killer due to his "eccentricities"

Nearly two dozen villains of the era were killed inside their own jail cells when prison staff refused to upgrade security or even increase nightly patrols.

The only survivor of the Experience was the Bronze Wraith who would later be revealed as an alternative alias of J'onn J'onzz, the Martian Manhunter. The raid that eventually captured Trap was the only case between their dis-and-reappearance that prompted the public return of the Justice Society who were able to track down and capture Trap within HOURS using their wider organizational net and remaining government contacts, further placing a spotlight on the culpability of authorities in the massacre.

35 people lost their lives in less than 2 years, the powers that be have still yet to acknowledge the role of police disinterest in exacerbating the crime and allowing Trap free reign despite standing condemnations from both the Justice Society and the Justice League. To this day the Martian Manhunter holds a private vigil alongside those the Experience left behind, taking place not on the anniversary of their deaths but of their foundation, to further bring light to their deeds.

The Manhunter has very rarely spoken on his time with the Experience in public saying "their memories are a private matter". His is also quoted as saying "I made a vow to myself that no longer would I allow my allies to suffer in silence. I unveiled my alien visage to the world, I encouraged my teammates to operate openly and without fear. And forever more I have deeply mistrusted those who hold power in human governance."

Justice Experience Remembrance Day is July 6th.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Sarah Posner for TPM:

I am a journalist who has covered the Christian right for two decades. Over the past three years, I began to more frequently use the term “Christian nationalism” to describe the movement I cover. But I did not start using a new term to suggest its proponents’ ideology had changed. Instead, the term had come into more common usage in the Trump era, now regularly used by academics, journalists, and pro-democracy activists to describe a movement that insists America is a “Christian nation” — that is, an illiberal, nominally democratic theocracy, rather than a pluralistic secular democracy. To me, the phrase was highly descriptive of the movement I’ve dedicated my career to covering, and neatly encapsulates the core threat the Christian right poses to freedom and equality. From its top leaders and influencers down to the grassroots — politically mobilized white evangelicals, the foot soldiers of the Christian right — its proponents believe that God divinely ordained America to be a Christian nation; that this Christian nation has come under attack by liberals and secularists; and that patriotic Christians must engage in spiritual warfare to rid America of demonic forces, and in political action to restore its Christian heritage. That includes taking political steps — as a voter, as an elected official, as a lawyer, as a judge — to ensure that America is governed according to a “biblical worldview.”

If you want to see that definition in action, look no further than the career of House Speaker Mike Johnson. Seventeen years ago, when I interviewed Johnson, then a lawyer with the Christian right legal powerhouse Alliance Defending Freedom, I would have labeled him a loyal soldier in the Christian right’s legal army trying to bring down the separation of church and state. He is a product of and a participant in a sprawling religious and political infrastructure that has made the movement’s successes possible, from politically active megachurches, to culture-shaping organizations like Focus on the Family, to political players like the Family Research Council, to the legal force in his former employer ADF. 

In today’s parlance, Johnson is a Christian nationalist — although he, like most of his compatriots, has certainly not embraced the label. But Mike Johnson the House Speaker is still Mike Johnson the lawyer I interviewed all those years ago: an evangelical called to politics to be a “servant leader” to a Christian nation, dedicated to its governance according to a biblical worldview: against church-state separation, for expanded rights for conservative Christians, adamantly against abortion and LGBTQ rights, and especially, currently, trans rights. That mindset is still the beating heart of the Christian right, even as the movement, and other movements in the far-right space, have radicalized in the Trump era, taking on new forms and embracing a range of solutions to the apocalyptic trajectory they see America to be on. Different movements imagining a version of Christian supremacy exist side by side — different strains that often borrow ideas from one another, and that fit comfortably under the banner of Christian nationalism.  

The term “Christian nationalism” became popularized during Trump’s presidency for a few reasons. First, Trump, who first ran in 2016 on a nativist platform with the nationalist slogan “Make America Great Again,” was and still is dependent on white evangelicals to win elections and maintain a hold on power. He is consequently willing to carry out their goals, bringing their ambitions closer to fruition than they’ve ever been in their 45-year marriage to the Republican Party. They have been clear, for example, in crediting him for the downfall of Roe v. Wade, among other assaults on other peoples’ rights.

Second, the prominence of Christian iconography at the January 6 insurrection, and the support for Trump’s stolen election lie before, during, and after January 6 by both Christian right influencers and the grassroots, brought into stark relief that Christian nationalist motivations helped fuel his attempted coup.   Finally, sociologists studying the belief systems of Christian nationalists pushed the term into public usage, as did anti-nationalist Christians, especially after January 6, in order to elevate awareness of the threats Christian nationalism poses to democracy. (The paperback edition of my book, Unholy, which was published in mid-2021 and included a post-January 6 afterword, reflected the increasing usage of the term Christian nationalists by including the term in a fresh subtitle.)

The Trump era, along with the rise of openly Christian nationalist social media sites like Gab, and Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter, have given space for otherwise unknown figures, like the rabidly antisemitic Gab founder Andrew Torba, co-author of the book Christian Nationalism: A Biblical Guide For Taking Dominion And Discipling Nations, and Stephen Wolfe, author of the racist book The Case for Christian Nationalism, to enter the Christian nationalism discourse. Although Torba and Wolfe have made waves online, and extremism watchers are rightly alarmed that their tracts could prove influential and radicalizing, they remain distinct from the Christian right. 

[...]

The conventional Christian right does not want a parallel society or a divorce. They believe they are restoring, and will run, the Christian nation God intended America to be — from the inside. They will do that, in their view, through faith (evangelizing others and bringing them to salvation through Jesus Christ); through spiritual warfare (using prayer to battle satanic enemies of Christian America); and through politics and the law (governing and lawmaking from a “biblical worldview” after eviscerating church-state separation). Changes in the evangelical world, particularly the emphasis in the growing charismatic movement on prophecy, signs and wonders, spiritual warfare, the prosperity gospel, and Trumpism, has intensified the prominence of the supernatural in their politics, giving their Christian nationalism its own unmistakable brand.

For decades, Christian right has been completely open about their beliefs and goals. Their quest to take dominion over American institutions by openly evangelizing and instituting Christian supremacist policies sets the Christian right apart from other types of Christian nationalists who might operate in secret, or imagine utopian communities as the ideal way to save themselves from a secular, debauched nation.  The fact that far-right extremists like Torba or Wolfe embrace the Christian nationalist label gives the more conventional Christian right leaders and organizations space to disassociate themselves from it. Some also berate journalists who use it to describe them, accusing them of hurling a left-wing slur at Christians. 

The bottom line is that Christian nationalism takes on different forms, and despite organizational or even ideological differences, ideas can penetrate the often porous borders between different camps. Someone who receives the daily email blast from the Family Research Council might also be drawn to Wolfe’s book, for example. On a more unnerving, macro level, major right-wing and GOP figures, including Marjorie Taylor Greene and the CEO of the Daily Wire, the podcast consortium run by conservative influencer Ben Shapiro, have embraced the rabidly antisemitic, Hitler-admiring antagonist Nick Fuentes, who is Catholic but also is accurately described as a Christian nationalist. The increasingly influential Catholic integralist movement, which seeks a Catholic-inflected replacement for the “liberal order,” is yet another unique form of Christian nationalism.

Sarah Posner wrote for TPM about the variants of Christian Nationalism within the larger Christian Right movement.

[batsplat]

just so you know bc I don’t think enough people tell you this but every time I check your blog (a bit compulsively at this point? your compilations and opinions are very enlightening on the general psychology of those crazy motherfuckers and also the uhhhhhhhh other part) and see that you answered another ask I honestly break into the hugest grin and settle down at the next given opportunity to read the newest batssay (batsplat essay) like it’s an academic paper (it is to us sports scholars, I believe)… please never feel the need to cut short your thoughts on any subject. the longer the better! connect all the dots, bat! we are listening!!

thank youuuuu this is so sweet, I know this ask is a little older but trust whenever I get something kind in my inbox I very much read and appreciate it and it very much makes my day. and I love the term batssay. a lot

so I thought it'd be fun to do a follow up post to the casey/jorge/valentino one where I just dumped a bunch of photos with a wee bit of context... for the culture, y'know. and I'm doing this with just casey/valentino, mostly for 2007-09 but with one 2005 photo chucked in as. build-up. for flavour

we know from the #archives that the two of them did have like. a reasonably warm dynamic pre-casey's motogp debut. they'd talked... also at least one race where casey shows up to valentino's podium and chats to vale's crew chief and fellow aussie jb... I think about it often. what did it all mean

casey's first win!!! qatar 2007, very first race with ducati. he'd gotten very close to a win before - in his third ever premier class race at turkey, lost at the final chicane. casey's goals going into that first season with ducat had just been winning a few races... he notes that valentino congratulates him warmly, but reckons it's just because valentino didn't take him seriously as a threat, which. I don't think that quite stacks up with supplementary evidence from the time, but we'll allow it

one of my fave photos for a reason, idc it's sweet. I was trying to figure out when this photo was from through like, normal means of reverse image search, but then instead I had a horrifying moment of 'oh yeah I'm pretty sure I remember that specific presser backdrop is at mugello that year' and. I was right. which. god. anyway yeah mugello 2007 pre-event presser. by this point casey was 21 points clear in the championship standings

more mugello 2007!!! look at casey constantly sipping from his lil cup. this will have been after qualifying, where casey snagged pole. I'd forgotten valentino actually makes front row in qualifying because he makes a typically horrendous start. I'd also forgotten that this race is like. proper good. one of the best that year. slows down eventually but the first ten or so laps are some of the most exciting of the entire alien era

catalunya 2007, which unfortunately I also dated solely through the presser backdrop. idk I just like the vibes of this photo. anyway!! this race is ofc the one where casey won an all timer late race duel against valentino (+ dani). it is after this race that valentino said casey was, and I quote "riding like a god". a seminal moment

the championship is already extremely over by the time they get to estoril, but casey still needs to formally wrap it up: this is his first match point race. depicted here is valentino getting one of his few Ws that season. an account of this event: “valentino was playing table football in the yamaha hospitality and somebody spotted casey outside. so they invited him for a challenge. it was all good fun”

motegi 2007. valentino had managed to put off the inevitable the race before and temporarily stopped casey from sealing the title, taking his last win of the season (cool duel with dani in that one). but motegi... well honestly it's just a bit of a flop all round, nobody's bike is working the way they want it to, casey seals the title with his worst result all season of a sixth place (the horror) and in his autobiography he was kinda like 'well I was very happy but also. meh race' (I paraphrase). but really, who cares, he had his title

bit of a time skip!! after both of them have put their sketch early 2008's behind them, the pair of them had a proper fun fight at catalunya for p2. a continuation of the battle the year before with valentino once again coming from lower down the field, this time he gets the better of casey. still, things are finally looking up at ducati... and the post-catalunya test might be enough to put casey right back in title contention. the above photo is from donington, where casey confirms the progress ducati made by winning his first race of the season after the opener in qatar

still donington, both of them watching each other etc etc. valentino is in a much better place than the year before, given both casey's rough start to the season and how they're both now on the same tyres. but it's not a good sign if casey's hitting his stride... at assen, valentino makes his one mistake of the year and crashes on the first lap, remounting to finish eleventh (he still beats casey's teammate melandri). this puts dani in the championship lead - and with casey's second win in a row, he is now very much closing in

look at them chatting here!! cute imo. this is casey's third win in a row, at the rainy sachsenring. dani crashes out from a few miles in the lead - while casey had stayed sensible and brings it home for a pretty straightforward victory. valentino needed to fight his way through from further down the field and in the end he loses too much time to put any serious pressure on casey, but it's still damage limitation and he retakes the championship lead from dani (who will miss the next race due to an injury sustained in the crash). and yet, momentum really is firmly on casey's side now... and the rest of the calendar does looks like pretty casey-friendly territory. next up, they're headed to a race track where casey had won very comfortably the year before. would he seal his fourth consecutive win at laguna?

now with my sincere apologies to casey stoner, every photo that came out of laguna 2008 is objectively pretty funny. I have limited myself to a mere two podium photos, but lbr there's a full collection. casey had already rejected valentino's handshake in parc fermé - which some might have taken as a social cue to give him some space. whereas valentino, local dickhead, just will not stop yapping at casey on the podium. this is quite possibly as genuinely delighted as he gets after a race, and it's simply a beautiful contrast with casey who is not quite rude enough to actually tell valentino to shut the fuck up - but may be fantasising about pushing valentino off the podium. this, to me. is art

gather around body language experts, we need to have a conversation. this is at the pre-event presser of the race immediately after laguna, aka brno. by this point, casey's less than flattering remarks about valentino's riding at laguna had already been distributed near and far... everyone's been talking about them, people have Opinions. the captions for these photos are all something along the lines of 'stoner extends olive branch to rossi to apologise for his post-race comments after losing laguna'. now, I don't know if he literally is apologising in these actual photos - though of course he did publicly walk back his comments, saying all riders can react badly to losses and that he'd overreacted when he'd said he'd lost respect for valentino. he has since walked back his walking back, doubling down on his criticisms of valentino's comportment at laguna

still, for all the talk that the feud properly started after laguna, it's kind of fun to have the presser immediately after it showing... well, it does look like casey is actively engaging valentino in conversation, right? whether he's apologising or not - this isn't just valentino yapping at him, if anything it's the reverse. laguna had been right before the summer break, so casey had been given a month to cool off... and also be viciously criticised by the press. brutal, isn't it? it's not just the loss that sucks, it's also being excoriated by the press and fans for having the audacity to get mad over it. is all of this just him being forced into pretending to play nice to get the press to leave him alone? were there any genuine regrets over his laguna comments? what ARE the vibes between them like at this time? what story do these photos tell us

casey went on to crash out of this race from the lead, the first time he had done so in the premier class and his first dnf with ducati after their one and a half seasons together. when he crashed, he'd had a fairly comfortable lead over valentino - though valentino was steadily closing in, and the commentators were already rubbing their hands in anticipation of another laguna

the next race is at misano - and casey is struggling with an old hand injury, see the bandages in the photo. the previous year had been the first time valentino had gotten the chance to race at this circuit, so close to his home... but he'd suffered a mechanical dnf, not his first or last in a frustrating season. this year, everything is different - and casey once again crashes out of the lead as valentino takes victory in front of his worshipful home fans

another trip to america, this time for indy: their first time racing at the track. after the double whammy of brno and misano, casey's title charge is essentially over... but you never know, right? indy kinda gives off the vibe of being a good casey track

in the end, the race is extremely wet and very, very windy and is eventually red-flagged. because of how many laps they still have to go, it is initially unclear whether they would restart... at which point first valentino (who was leading), then casey (in fourth) go to dorna ceo ezpeleta to tell him they have less than zero interest in going out in that weather again. a beautiful moment of solidarity - long live the power of unionising, capable of overcoming even the bitterest of feuds. blast the internationale over the footage, I've seen enough. the race is called off and valentino wins his fourth consecutive race

by the time they get to phillip island, valentino has already won the title, courtesy of his fifth consecutive win at motegi - the same circuit casey had won the title at the year before and the home race of valentino's old enemies at honda. a couple of nice photos of jorge congratulating his teammate and casey spraying vale with champagne here. casey, known phillip island goat, would of course finally end valentino's win streak at that circuit, which is where the photos are from. idk they're fun to me, like this is still not that long after laguna. I'm aware being able to chat normally with your coworkers and share a smile with them isn't normally that high a bar, but canonically valentino has been known to completely blank some of his rivals. it's not like casey is particularly cold towards valentino either, eh

case in point. this is from sepang 2008. #TheEstablishment does not want you to know casey and valentino canonically still regularly yapped in pressers post laguna. they won't silence me. sepang was valentino's last win of this season, after a good scrap with dani - and the season is rounded off with a casey victory at valencia

jerez 2009, where valentino gets past casey with a block pass at the final corner on his way to victory. unlike in 2005, he actually manages to not barrel into his rival. this is just a fantastic photo... I don't even have much to say about it. a+ vibes

a lot of the photos from this season were already included in the jorge/valentino/casey post, which reflects how casey wasn't consistently a factor in the same way the other two were. this one's from assen, the race right after catalunya when all three of them were tied on 106 points. very good side eye here, excellent job casey. unfortunately, casey is now in mystery illness territory - and he can't really compete with the two frontrunners in this stretch of the season

this is the first race after casey's return to competition - valentino goes up to casey after qualifying at estoril to congratulate him for his front row grid position. casey would win an early race scrap with valentino in the race itself, eventually finishing second behind jorge and swiftly silencing all the people who had declared him mentally weak and done for in his absence. a race that brought back suspense to that year's championship

phillip island 2009, another important moment in the canon where I've limited myself to just the one photo. casey wins just his second race back - and he also hugs vale pretty warmly in parc fermé. jorge was kind enough to crash in the opening lap, meaning valentino can very much be pleased with a second place here

and at sepang, valentino seals the title, while casey wins another race. casey ended up crashing in the warm-up lap of valencia, apparently due to an issue with the tyre warming? just kinda... the general vibe of his 2009, really. valentino closes off the season with another podium at his least favourite track, while dani takes the win

anyway after that they spent three years getting into increasingly. dumb arguments. like. so dumb. by the end of 2012 you feel you're killing your brain cells by even engaging with this stuff. it's beyond undignified. there's zero competitive justification, but they just couldn't shut up about each other. that being said, they're still capable of doing a small talk with each other even during the dark years, so that's something. maybe one day they'll finally be able to get that dinner and talk about all the good times

[jiskblr]

Why care about free speech so much? I used to think that the power to regulate speech is one that no one should have. But really, the power to send men to go lock someone up in a prison is something that ideally should not exist. It is not good, but often it is better than the alternatives. Why not the same for speech? If we're already fine censoring death threats, why not censor hateful speech that logically leads to death threats? Mere anecdotes of speech regulation going wrong proves little.

Firstly, every time someone restricts free speech it gets applied far more broadly than can possibly do any good. There are no anecdotes of speech regulation going well. It never does.

Secondly, free speech is the antidote to invincible ignorance. It is very easy, if you're prohibited from speaking freely, to create situations where large numbers of people are badly wrong but prohibited from learning why. And since the history of cultural, academic, and moral progress indicates that in every era, there are nigh-universal beliefs which are badly wrong, if speech is not free we are almost certainly stuck in that invincible ignorance ourselves.

Thirdly, there's no reason for speech regulation in the first place. I'm not, actually, fine censoring death threats. I am in favor of the right to shout fire in a crowded theater. No compromises. Not unless the fate of the world is at stake, and maybe not even then.

[galacsin]

Hi! I've just read through some of your Riddler character analysis posts and you saying "My Boy Edward got sterilized, after Zero Year ,and he is not allowed to be silly in the name of making him a "serious threat"." on one of them made me wonder what's your opinion on Zero Year and if you have any thoughts on why he got sterilized after it?

I've recently skimmed over it again and while Zero Year makes some notable changes to the character that end up being reiterated on in other modern releases, like making him a successful college educated genius business strategist instead of an odd working class guy with a mediocre high school degree, it still writes him as 'silly' in some way imo, or at least as eccentric and playful, which is a trait that seems to have mostly vanished from subsequent versions of the character, namely ones like TWoJaR, so the sterilization of his personality seems to conflict even with this variant's established character?

(Though I do have to say, even though Zero Year Riddler is still more "weird" and playful compared to later versions, there is something missing about him, for me. Maybe that he doesn't really come across as as emotionally unstable as older versions, as well as him somewhat lacking the usual anxiety and inferiority issues? His arrogance and superiority complex are written to be caused by his academic and economic success and otherwise repeated proof of his intellectual brilliance going unappreciated, instead of being a coping mechanism for dealing with a lifetime of failure and degradation. It seems he simply doesn't really have that internalised voice telling him he is a failure and an idiot the way older versions do, at least not to the same extent.)

Anyways sorry for the long essay but your character analyses are very succinct and interesting to read, so I had to ask

Thanks, Anon. I spent way too much time thinking about Eddie last year, so I’m glad my jumbled rambling comes across as succinct. I have been mulling over this ask for an hour now, I hope what I am going to write will make sense.

What I mean by him getting "sterilized" is this: his aim is often to grab power or commit crimes with a high body count. This isn’t just a result of his general indifference toward human life—it’s baked into his goals.

He often just wears a plain green suit, with little to no question marks, and he rarely has themed goons around him.

He’s treated as a "serious villain," which means he’s not allowed to simply commit larceny or try to annoy Batman to make himself look smart. Instead, he’s usually portrayed as cold and calculating, rather than being driven by his inferiority-superiority complex, insecurities, and other big emotions he’s unable or unwilling to confront. A person can be highly intelligent and still be ruled by these traits, but for some writers, geniuses are inherently cold, logical, and calculating.

The short answer is: Edward is the quintessential "just some guy" character with a gimmick that’s hard to write. This means that the traits selected for him will depend on the era he’s written in (reflecting the general direction of the comics at that time), whether the writer likes Eddie, and the role he plays in the story being told.

If you leaf through most of his appearances, you’ll see that he often has nothing to do with what’s going on in the story—he’s just slapped into the background or thrown at the bottom of a pile of beaten and bloody villains.

I completely agree with your assessment of Zero Year. Additionally, we didn’t get to see writers explore where this new version of Eddie could develop as a character, because the next substantial mainstream Riddler story we got was TWOJAR. Tom King essentially tossed everything in the bin and reinvented Edward as the foil to Bruce Wayne. He really doesn’t seem to know what to do with the riddle gimmick. He just has Edward tell riddles on the page and then murder a child with a poisoned rope. The Riddlers bellow are all supposed to be the same guy within the same general timeline. If you read these stories you know how different their characterizations are from one another.

In Their Dark Designs, Edward leans heavily on the high-tech hacker angle, and he’s clearly an homage to Batman Forever. Meanwhile, Year of the Villain Ed has all the old school elements and that stupid chest scar. We see him as a carnie, winning a puzzle contest that shapes him as a person he has neglectful parents, and hangs out with King Tut. (I love it when writers reference that one Batman Confidential story. I know I am going to eat well when this happens)

Parallel to these, we also have the "Dealer's Choice" version, usually written by authors who don’t dislike him or are fond of some of his earlier iterations. These versions are more likely to be obsessed with clever plans and larceny rather than murdering a bunch of people. They’re also more likely to include his self-destructive tendencies. I personally prefer it when he’s his own undoing, or when something stupid and tragic happens to him—like in Joker Presents: The Puzzle Box. (It’s the Joker. He happens to him. He might as well have been cursed by the gods.)

Like Batman is not going to drink champagne on a rooftop with TWOJAR that is for certain.

The upside of this mess is that sometimes we get absolutely great Riddler stories and appearances. We’re not boxed into just one iteration of the character.

For example, I don’t have the time to go into detail about BTAA Riddler or Unburied Riddler here. Two stories with very different moods themes and Riddlers, both great in their own ways.

We’ve entered a “post-era” era, where every version of him exists parallel to each other and all at once.

[lunarubra]

Hello! I invented the ultimate time machine! But it has some problems, it can go back in time as far as you want, or to the future.

BUT! if you try to go between 1880-1939 it won't allow you. Same if you want to travel to recent eras, 1995-2023.

Call your favourite character, oc/ship and travel with them across the time (except the aforementioned years.) Let me know where you landed!

You can create a moodboard or only tell me, where you are ❤️.

Just press the button.

@justrainandcoffee Flor, this was such a fun exercise, even though I might have gotten a bit carried away! I’m a huge history geek and have countless time periods I’d love to explore or send my characters to experience.

Hypatia!Jiyan AU

First on my list would be the Byzantine era, when the power center of the Western world was the Byzantine Roman Empire. I’m sure Jiyan would have thrived in this setting, especially in Alexandria, where academic and scholarly pursuits were widely accessible to women. I imagine her working at the Library of Alexandria, surrounded by the greatest minds and texts of the ancient world. For anyone interested in this period, I highly recommend the movie Agora (2009). It tells the story of Hypatia—a philosopher, mathematician, and atheist whose life was tragically cut short by religious extremists (Christians) when they destroyed the last vestiges of pagan knowledge. Her dedication to learning, even under constant threat, reminds me of Jiyan’s character in many ways.

I’d also love to set something in Renaissance Italy. Italy’s major cities became beacons of culture, and Venice was a vibrant hub for artists, scholars, and traveling theatre troupes. I can easily picture a young Jiyan, a Venetian professor deeply invested in the arts.

I have many more ideas but I should stop here for now... xD

[amageish]

So, Nico Minoru's in Spider-Man Freshman Year... Let's talk about it.

About a year ago, Marvel spilled some details about the upcoming animated Spider-Man series, Spider-Man Freshman Year. There was a lot of discussion about it, what it was, what it wasn't, and whether what it is is better or worse then what people wanted it to be.

A couple weeks ago, a trademark filing indicated that the show was scheduled for Winter 2024. In an era where companies are killing announced and nearly-finished projects, I was honestly thinking the show was on thin ice... but since it seems to still exist, I want to talk about something that I feel has gotten surprisingly little discussion in all the discourse about the show: the inclusion of Nico Minoru, of the Runaways, as Peter Parker's best friend.

Now, from a Peter-centered perspective, I think this choice makes sense in a very specific way? If you flash back to the original 60s Spider-Man comics, which the show seems to be trying to invoke aesthetically from the little we've seen, Peter Parker had a female close friend who was representative of 1960s youth counter-culture: Mary Jane.

The degree to which Stan Lee's own values undercut MJ's counter-culturism is something that people could/do entire academic essays about, but suffice it to say that she was meant to appeal to the zeitgeist of the era and the character's spirit certainly got through to viewers. Like, there is a reason that she the OTP for Peter for so many people, even if Lee at the time had intended to keep the focus on Peter's more traditionally conservative romance with Gwen Stacy.

Nico Minoru slots into this classic pre-MJ-as-the-love-interest MJ role very well, in my opinion at least? In her 2000s comics, she was cast as a edgy goth social outcast who made her own clothes and did her own thing... In her 2010s MCU show, she was cast again as an outcast, but with a certain amount of doomerpilled depression that she outgrows as the show goes on... In the 2020s game Midnight Suns, Nico is still a devoted goth, but also draws from queer youth culture and has a certain semi-ironic peppiness to her (she calls the player "friendo" constantly - she's just like me fr).

So, honestly, I think picking Nico Minoru for Spider-Man's best friend is a really clever move that slots her into this historical role of the foil to Peter Parker - fun choice!

However, from a Nico-centered perspective, I have a lot of questions about what this version of the character will be like practically... The biggest one being: Why is Nico in New York? One of the core concepts of the Runaways as a team is that they are a response to the oft-asked question "Why is New York always under threat? Why are there no superheroes having to save LA?". While the West Coast Avengers do, y'know, exist, the Runaways introduces another answer to this question: Supervillains cannot operate in LA without permission of the Pride, a LA-based supervillain mafia who made a pact with a demon from Limbo and require a cut of all crime committed in the city. The titular Runaways are the children of these villains, who choose to reject their parent's lifestyle and go on the run rather then be complicit in their villainy.

So... How did Nico get in New York and end up enrolling in a New York high school? That's a big change for her and I hope the explanation is satisfying.

Nico and her team also don't usually appear as traditional costumed heroes with secret identities, at least not for prolonged periods of time. They've used several codenames and several costumes, but it's always bit a touch comedic - Nico goes by "Sister Grimm" because they decide they need nicknames to be superheroes as somewhat-cringy-teens while she later uses "The Gloom" partially at the encouragement of her girlfriend, but she's still largely just... Nico. It's worth noting that both Midnight Suns and Marvel Snap break naming conventions to call her by her first/last name instead of an alias - something Snap mostly does with big-deal characters like Jean Grey and Kitty Pryde, with even other characters more known by their real name like Emma Frost and Danielle Moonstar being called by their hero names instead...

So, I'm curious if Nico will be using her powers to fight crime and, if she is, what codename/costume she has... On top of that, I wonder if Peter Parker will know that Nico is a blood witch and if Nico will know that Peter Parker is Spider-Man - or if they mutually uncover that across the events of the series... Doctor Strange is also set to be in this show - will he be a mentor for her as a budding witch, perhaps even more then he is a mentor for Peter? There's a lot of possibilities there too.

Finally, there's the big question of Nico Minoru's queerness. Now, there's basically two lists of Marvel queers - the characters written as queer by the writers and artists at Marvel and the characters Marvel corporate have actually approved as being queer and stamped with a big rainbow stamp of approval. This is what separates your "did a gay kiss once" characters from your "paraded out every June" characters...

Nico is in the latter category and is potentially one of the most corporate-approved queer characters there are. This girl is BISEXUAL and Marvel is uncharacteristically interested in making sure you know it. She got a Pride variant cover kissing her girlfriend when Pearlmutter was still at the company. Her MCU show is full of gay kisses and has not one but TWO fantasy gay wedding sequences (it also got removed from Disney+ earlier this year, funny that).

Now, uh, America Chavez is basically the face of Sapphic Marvel in the comics and her queerness got reduced to a Pride pin in her movie, so I'm not sure if Nico's bisexuality will be acknowledged in the show given that precedent... but I sure hope it does!!! It'd be cute if Karolina pops in too, helping her girlfriend out with whatever antics she gets into... She wasn't in the initial revealed character line-up, but I could also see them waiting to reveal her and hoping to get hype specifically from shippers who haven't thought about the pairing in a few years since the Runaways TV show ended.

ANYWAY. That was a lot of thoughts, but I'm just very curious what's going to happen here... I love Nico and am eager to see her in this show, but it also just feels like such an unconventional choice... to the point where I am apparently thinking about it this hard a year later.

[the-eldritch-it-gay]

its a shame that tiktok was objectively horrible and I had to face constant harassment and threats on there bcuz there was some fun community. I don't know if its a blessing or curse that I wasn't IDing as 2S on the app, because on the one hand I wish the stuff from that era was more reflective of my current identity, but also god I don't think I would have been able to handle all the extra racism that would come from that. People were already harassing me and sending horrific threats and racism and transphobia and islamaphobia and ableism so much so that my academic performance was affected so much that my professors got concerned about me. And I can barely look at my old tiktoks without having an anxiety attack because nearly every one I had to deal with the most vile shit in comments and messages.

[drakulateeth]

I rearranged my introduction again. I was ready to add two more sections one in chapter 2 and one in chapter 4, but I decided against it because the paper would get repetitive and it wouldn’t serve my research purposes.

I put the final draft on Turnitin, I got 26% and after I fixed three mistakes in citations and after some paraphrasing I have a 21% score. My uni allows for 20% but I am currently annoyed because it is flagging random parts as plagiarism, when it is not!

I think I should still edit the abstract, I also need to translate it in [redacted]. I need to also pick the title, my gosh. But I was somehow able to conclude my work, and fill a gap in the literature, which is crazyyyyyyy

Writing progress,

Today I fixed my figures and my tables (stargazer? LaTex? html? png? fucking hell). I removed some things my professor suggested, rearranged the paragraphs of the introduction and added some definitions.

I still need to cite the robustness tests for part 4.2, I need to add some more citations to chapter 5 and then hopefully I can conclude my paper. After that I would have to write the abstract and I think most of the writing will be done.

But then again I will check my reference list again, see the plagiarism score, write the table of contents and lists of figures, tables, abbreviations, appendixes etc. The final struggle will be the formatting.

I also found it funny how my supervisor kept me in her office for ten minutes and said it's solid work, whereas my other professor took the pen and started annotating.

[positivelybeastly]

First question, what year was Hank born? Second question how might the events going on in our world have affected the characterization of Hank? Beyond the 90s incarnation of the character might make a post about this later…

So, asking for a set birth year for a comic book character is a bad idea, because with very few exceptions, they don't exist. For example, Google tells us that Captain America was born on the 4th of July, 1920.

Or maybe he wasn't? Apparently that got retconned and it isn't 4th of July, but it was 1920? Already we run into problems. COMIC BOOKS.

Outside of very specific characters, they just don't have birth years or birth dates, they exist within the Marvel sliding timescale. If you're not familiar with the sliding timescale, the basic conceit is this:

Modern Marvel comics began in 1961 with Fantastic Four #1. This is essentially the start of the modern Marvel era, and every other superhero group is contextualised in relation to this, pretty much. The Avengers were formed maybe six months, a year later, the X-Men not long after that.

For every 3-5 years that passes outside of comics, 1 year passes inside of comics. E.g. Fantastic Four #1 took place either 13 or 21 years ago, or somewhere in between, it's not an exact science.

As for Hank specifically, well . . .

October, 1983, was contemporary to Hank saying this.

That plot took place in a comic book from 1974, nearly ten years before this, and yet Hank says it's just "a few years ago." So time is passing, but slowly. Hank here is explicitly in his early 20s, maybe 22-23, but the Hank we saw in this week's X-Force #50 was not 40 years older than him. So, how to make it all make sense?

A lot of headcanon and kind of inferring based on contextual hints. Hank is depicted as being roughly 17-18 when he joins the original X-Men, given that he's stated in dialogue to be the oldest of the team, and seems to have been on the verge of graduating high school when his normal human life was interrupted. So, now you just work backwards.

If Hank was 17-18 when the original X-Men were formed, and it's been 21 years since then (referring back to the sliding timescale), then it stands to reason X-Force Beast is 37-38. If he's 38 in our current year of 2024, then logically, he would have been born in . . .

1986!

Which is what I've been running with for as long as I've been writing him. It isn't quite compatible with stuff like this, which is very obviously written in the 60s and set in the 60s, and which explicitly positions Hank as an Atomic Age hero, with radiation based origins and a super scientist pedigree . . .

But eh. We move.

As to the second part of your question

. . . Ooohhhhh boy.

Um.

There's a lot? And I hate to bring it all back to 9/11 and the War on Terror, but it's kind of all about 9/11 and the War on Terror?

Media about terrorism, security, threats to mankind, all looked very different pre-September 11th, 2001. Go back and watch Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, and see how Kira Nerys, a character who is explicitly called a terrorist in dialogue, is treated for her actions. She's positioned more as a World War II resistance fighter than anything else. If that show were made now, she would be an intensely different character, because the American cultural and media consciousness has never recovered from that day.

If you want to read more about this, there's quite a lot of academic discourse on how this has all changed. Here's a decent start.

But specifically Hank? Well, the X-Men have had their own 9/11. Multiple times. The Genoshan genocide, as depicted in New X-Men #116, actually just a few months before 9/11. It's entirely possible that this entire storyline might not have been made if it had been written after.

The Xavier Institute bus bombing.

The Decimation.

The X-Men became a beleaguered minority, besieged on all sides, reduced to the island of Utopia, just 198 mutants and falling. Cyclops explicitly became far more ruthless, willing to ally with former adversaries and use kill tactics to get the job done, and you could see his portrayal, the infamous #Cyclops Was Right movement, gaining a lot of steam during this era. People really like this Cyclops.

And where's Hank in this? Well.

He's the moral counterpoint.

People don't like to acknowledge this, and I feel like there might be a degree of cultural difference going on here, but Hank is correct. I feel like it's not even controversial to say that kill teams are bad. Right?

But people hate Hank for this. They think he's a whiny little bitch who won't and can't help, who runs out on his people, who prioritises his morals over being there for the X-Men. People legitimately think this of him.

Hank is the left wing, conscientious objector and anti-war viewpoint. So, naturally, there's a tendency to look upon him as a whiny little bitch. Just look at how shows like 24 contextualise that kind of moral viewpoint.

I do feel like the writers of this era wanted people to at least question who was right, between Hank and Scott, but the readers pretty much unanimously fell on Scott's side, because even as Scott started to use morally corrupt tactics . . .

He wasn't doing it for America, bullying small countries out of their oil in the name of democracy. He was doing it for a marginalised minority metaphor, fighting comic book supervillains, which is simpler, easier to root for. He had to use those tactics, you understand. He was fighting monsters! He was fighting the good fight.

Is 00s era X-Men War on Terror propaganda? I don't know. I'm not a political scholar, though I do have a B.A. in History. Interesting how the fandom seems to view this ideological conflict, though.

Anyway, time moves on, and then something starts to creep into Hank's character. Something that inevitably happens to characters like him.

Anti-intellectualism.

No longer is Hank the moral counterpoint, now he's the intellectual who will lead us all to ruin because he's smarter than he is wise, because he's an idiot with no impulse control.

This characterisation is wholly incorrect and runs contrary to the fact that Hank learned his lesson about unethical experimentation practises in the 70s, in an incident that only harmed him, but whatever. It doesn't matter at this point, does it?

Only people with real world experience, who are level headed, who aren't eggheads, can solve the real problems of the day. People like, uh.

Hmm.

Who does have the solution to the problems of the day?

Ah, I see.

We just forgive him for all the heinous shit he did on Utopia, huh?

All that stuff he did, the releasing bioweapons, the kill teams, that was fine, because he did it to the right people.

Well, that's all right, then.

Mmm-hmm. So much better than the egghead. Look at him in the corner, fumbling around, making more problems than he solves. What a motherfucker.

So, yes, let's talk about American anti-intellectualism.

I don't necessarily think Bendis is anti-intellectual. But I do think he spends a lot of time across multiple comics criticising Beast and valorising Cyclops, considering the worst thing Beast had done up until that point, vandalising the space-time continuum to get the O5 back into the present, was done explicitly so Bendis could play with X-Men with only 8 issues of continuity to keep straight.

But anything Cyclops did? All that X-Force stuff? Ehh. Don't worry about it. The only crime we care about is the death of Charles Xavier, for which Scott was possessed, so we can't make a moral judgement.

It's a whole ass topic, and a lot to get into, but I genuinely do think that Hank is one of those characters who especially suffers when written by a writer who doesn't trust vaunted intellectuals, because he's certainly not going to fucking flourish, is he?

And then it all comes full circle.

Ben Percy, enter the ring.

Wolverine, the unequivocal hero of X-Force. Beast, the unequivocal villain of the series. The heart vs. the head. The man of action vs. the intellectual. The rugged thug vs. the fancy pants necessary bastard.

It's the same thing, just more extreme, really. I think X-Force is meant to be a critique of the CIA? If so, it's an extremely bad one, considering it ends on this note.

Ah yes. Our heroes. The CIA.

I'm gonna quote the frankly incredible @brw here because they put it way better than I could on this point:

"This is genuinely a larger problem I have with Krakoa, is that rather than explore the culpability and complicity of all the characters involved in not just the creation, but the active maintenance and survival of what is, categorically, an eugenicist, oligarchy ethnostate, we instead act as if Krakoa would have been fine if not for Evil Hank/Evil Moira/Evil Sinister for ruining it all for the rest of us.

Because are Sage or Logan ever properly thought to be bad people for standing by as long as they did? It isn't even that X-Force are the people who do the dirty stuff–it's Hank that does that, and the rest of the character get to keep their hands relatively clean, at least narratively. They're sympathetic, or understandable.

Hank is positioned as this demon in the shadows ready to snatch you up and kill you which is a weird decision to make with what you describe as the CIA.

The CIA isn't evil because evil people are in charge of it, the CIA is evil because it is a fundamentally evil institution based off evil systems! Benjamin, you can't write mutant CIA if your closing statement is how awesome the mutant CIA is, and it's a shame about that one evil blue guy that ruined everything for everyone."

Good thing we got rid of that Beast guy! What a fucker, right? Nasty, gross, intellectual pustule he was, with his oily words and grossness. Look at him, reading books. Sage is fine, though, because she doesn't read books. I mean, she's quantifiably grossly incompetent in this series, but we like her better than Beast, so it's fine.

Beast, from the 2000s era onward, is a very political character. It's just a shame that a lot of comic book writers tend to be grossly ill-informed when it comes to actual politics, capable of only surface level hot takes like CIA bad or kill teams good, actually, because now we've gone from 'Beast is the left wing conscientious objector' to 'Beast is the literal anti-Christ,' and I don't really like what that implies about what we think of the former.

But eh. I'm just a writer.

[runningfrom2am]

1. in her defense, she had warned arachne and academic pressure makes all the best people a little more unhinged.

2. “lady problems” aka the immense urge to use violence.

3. the fact that her threats are very real when directed at anyone but coryo. she had a weakness from the start.

4. sejanus, r, and coryo are the trio that is not exactly loved but hard to cross because who could dare to do such a thing? i love them.

5. i just know that livia was the one to suggest and insist someone should make sure r does end up in the office.

6. “You’re both lying to each others faces and neither of you knew.” OH!! HOW I LOVE THIS!!

7. did r just sibling-zoned him? that’s not how we run from our problems.

8. i will be thinking about the similarities between r and tigris for the next two business days.

9. coryo is the one to talk about, “gross and dusty and dark” honestly. he would know a whole lot deal about it.

10. “Cozy.” his Peeta Mellark moment!

11. i love how they how have their own ideas about what is wrong about the other but they will die before they make it known.

12. “Besides, an old couple wouldn’t be married if they didn’t at least get along most of the time.” with a marriage of 56 years they actually became this.

hi bestieeee (responses under the cut)

1. no literally (like i said,, that may or may not be based on something i actually did when i was that age lmao- i was like “move or i will hit you” and she was like “as if” and then i did and she had the audacity to be shocked like girl i literally warned you?? anyway lol-)

2. HAHAH like sir just say you don’t understand it’s okay (but also,, yes the urge to get violent is sometimes present)

3. yeah 🥹 she has always loved him and no one can change my mind

4. LOL like they’re not hurting anyone (except for r sometimes as a treat) but yk what i mean lol

5. no for real this is exactly how i picture that going down:

Livia: uhh you’re going to let them go on their own? do you seriously trust that?

Teacher: *sigh* Plinth- go get Coriolanus and send him back, you escort her down”

(and then sejanus doesn’t send coryo back but he does just go with them bc he just wants to be included)

6. and it would be a HOT minute before they ever acknowledge their respective situations in any meaningful way

7. unfortunately she did LOL, like the spirit was there. as we know, flirting is not really her thing ESPECIALLY before she was even conscious of her feelings

8. realllll. also (kinda continuing my last point) i’ve heard that some of the most stable het relationships are between a first born daughter and a last born son. this may not be proven but i’ve read up on it a bit and from personal experience i would agree!

9. like sir why are you complaining it probably reminds you of your house like 💀

10. AHH THANK YOU FOR NOTICING THIS LOL

11. YES and i think this is the beginning of the era where r starts to notice these things about coryo that indicate what’s up with his home life. clearly when this takes place he’s at least semi-aware of her situation already, but like i said she’s just starting to pick up on his. it never ever gets easier for them to talk about though- i wouldn’t be surprised if they ever really do (besides the very little that they discuss or allude to it in the main timeline)

12. sejanus once again being a fortune teller lol and as he should

[go-go-devil]

Excerpts from Dedusmuln’s Academic Essay on The Nature of Paper Cups

The following passages your visual organs are about to witness have been extracted from Dr. Dedusmuln’s postdoctoral analysis on the elusive paper cups that they discovered whilst helping save the planet from King Gibby’s tyranny. 

As the original had been transcribed on 115 slabs of polymer, these excerpts were taken from segments deemed most coherent to the common, non-archeological minded hylic as per the doctor’s request, so that all may pleasantly approach the concept of these ancient cups' true potential.

Slab 3

Now that I have introduced your beings to the microcosm of the paper cup, I can imagine one question must be manifesting in your minds: What is paper?

As is the current theory, paper is a texture that once bloomed throughout the planet during the dominion of the one-lifes. They were the larval form of much larger sedentary organisms called trees, which were not too dissimilar to that of our vegetables in that they were vertical and most-likely green in color and/or soul, but vastly different in their manifestation.

A single piece of paper would be crumpled up and buried into the earth, acting as the “egg” for which the stalk of a tree would hatch out of and mutate. Over time its soft flesh would harden into a thick carapace known as “bark,” for which the one-lifes would shred to produce thousands of pieces of paper. Some of these trees were said to be as tall as our cities’ buildings!

The one-lifes molded all kinds of things out of paper, including but not limited to: writing slabs, clothing, wall-clinging memos, medicated water-closet paper for personal use, birds, money, towers, masks, and most importantly cups. It was through these cups that one-lifes were able to intake liquid, their most powerful source of energy, from coolers in order to stay alive as long as their bodies would allow. 

Paper cups were also quite remarkable in their dexterity! Whilst most paper would weaken under the moistness of such a liquid’s viscosity, the cup could most easily contain the clear juice without the threat of disintegrating. They were able to withstand crushing grip of a one-life larva, and could even be used to catch a deluge!

Slab 4

As wondrous as these facts are, however, this durability has sadly become a luxury of the past biosphere that cannot be replicated more than once now due to their immense age. Once a paper cup is used now, it’s gone forever.

Most modern era science has classified paper as a “theoretical concept” texture; one that may have existed at some point on this planet before Accretion 0 but can no longer maintain its form on our current biosphere. This prevailing attitude metamorphosed after Dr. Smuldunde’s success in their Greater Toothpick Expedition, however, due to their world-altering discovery of full intact wood textures.

If the carapace of trees were able to survive our dominion of clay, then surely it is not a farfetched theory that paper must have survived too. I had taken it upon myself to prove this theory correct, a seemingly impossible task that proved just as possible as the beheading and explosion of our planet’s demiurge.

Next I shall take the time to describe the anatomy, thermodynamics, and overall usage of the paper cups and water coolers for clay organisms. I will try to make this brief…

Slab 97

...and the essence of life itself flows from its frustum and into our flesh and souls!

Returning to the topic of Pre-Accretion societies, the resilience of these paper cups and their water coolers they harvested from make it most apparent that, like many products, were once also utilized by beings during the Age of Sages before our own Accretion buried them from us. It would be the most logical explanation behind the idea that willpower was overall greater in that era.

To confirm this, I utilized a rare benefit in my knowledge of the sage’s locations to ask them personally to reflect their memories of the past usage of paper cups toward my research.

Unfortunately, the only sage that would even appear before me again was the Sage of Death, most likely after dying damn near fifty times trying to navigate those catacombs by myself. More unfortunate still, it did not seem to recall anything about how common the usage of paper cups and water coolers were in that era, nor could it even remember how the cooler’s water tasted.

Perhaps that was to be expected. Memory loss is inevitable for immortal cells. Of course hylics of that time would have forgotten such an occurrence by now, but it seems that even psychic brains must shed off the least important of past experiences in order to concentrate most effectively on their designated symbols. Still, my disappointment was palpable. Literally, as when I left an animated statue smelled my dismay and devoured my flesh.

Even outside of the archeologist’s sphere, there have been a small cluster of rumors as to what happened to the paper cups and their coolers. Right away I will rule out the once-prevalent theory that they were left within the mythical one-life city of El Segundo, as that has since been proven false with my findings.

As much as I would forget them, I will have to spend a good portion of this text destroying the many conspiracy theories that have regrettably been gaining traction as to why the paper cups were supposedly hidden from us…

Slab 115

…which doesn’t even make a molecule sense since we don’t have a government anymore, and hopefully not ever again!

Anyhow, I could conclude this essay with a solid recommendation to retrieve and utilize any remaining paper cups your beings may find, but I’m afraid the pitch for such a wondrous discovery is not so simple.

Paper was once an abundant resource, yes, but like all one-life resources it was never destined to last. We hylics have been granted the most shining of biological miracles by even being able to find these remaining cups, let alone utilize them ourselves. Eventually the last paper cup will disintegrate into nothingness after being sipped dry by a being’s lips, and there will be nothing to be done about it.

All except one thing: to preserve its memory. Study it. Learn from it and even replicate its power through the materials we have at our disposal! We may treasure the last remnants of the legendary one-lifes, but tend to forget in our cells' immortality that one day our world may make another drastic change to the point where vegetables, terrestrial juice, and perhaps even clay itself will become as scarce a resource as paper is now.

Until that day, we must tend to the past, and use it to evolve to a greater future!

- Dr. Dedusmuln, Leading Archeologist in the Research of Paper Cups and Arcade Cabinets

[coffeeangelinabox]

Whumpril #16: Alt Prompt #2 You're Pathetic

It’s a firing squad. An honest to Dark firing squad, like something from a war novel of old Earth’s bygone era.

Anger had straightened Lee’s back as he’d been marched through the station - too little, too late - but the white hot fury about being deemed unworthy, so irrelevant that a bargain with him was null and void had kept him stalking forward, lips pressed into silence. 

Then he sees them: black clad Domain soldiers. Faces masked. 

This is going to be no peaceful, quiet drugged slide to the other side of the stars. This is going to be violent and brutal and loud, blood and pain and the last sound in his ears the retort of old fashioned gunfire. They all look up as he’s pushed over the threshold where shock has brought his feet to stillness. There’s no malice in the sets of eyes regarding him, a cool, academic disinterest. 

Lee baulks as it all comes rushing back - the terrible fear of death, of ending that led him to give up the others, his family, Darrow to begin with.

He backs up a step, but the Lieutenant (only now does he realise he still doesn’t know the name of the man who is going to have him killed) is unsympathetic and he’s shoved brutally forward. His bare feet can’t get a purchase and he slides at the force being exerted. Clammy feet on tile let out a screech that echoes the terror coursing through Lee. 

“N- no,” he stutters out, “No. Please.” It occurs to him to be humiliated as his voice cracks, but he doesn’t blush, fear instead training blood from his face and making his skin ash white. The tears are back, but not in anger this time, instead a silent, terrified torrent. “D- don’t. I can…I’m one of Darrow’s crew. No one else knows I betrayed him. There must be other groups, rebel factions, they’d accept me, I could lead you to them.”

He’s forced forward another brutal pace, and he staggers to his knees, grasping at the Lieutenant’s arm in a desperate attempt to resist. 

“Please. Please. Don’t…Just let me live. You promised.”

The Lieutenant sneers down at him where he cowers. “You’re pathetic.” 

He looks away as if considering Lee’s offer and for a fraction of a second, hope bubbles in Lee’s chest.

Then he looks back down at the cringing boy. “The Porter’s are gone, Sierra is still at large but no longer has any followers. Darrow is the last credible threat to order in this sector. I don’t need you.”

Lee’s eyes widen. He’s too petrified even to feel sick. He feels every atom of his body as an individual entity, threatening to fly apart. “Nonononono. I- I’ll do anything. Just-”

“Squad,” the Lieutenant says, turning away from him as though he is a speck of dirt, not even worth the direction of his gaze. “Take aim.”

Lee screams and is aware of heat and wetness between his legs as his bladder gives way. Ammonia assaults his nostrils. The Lieutenant wrinkles his nose and steps backwards, leaving Lee to huddle on the floor in his own piss. 

“Take aim. Fire.”