#all his life all his 514 years of life he's not had the chance to burn something /not/ as part of a performance

[koliyx]

Armand in stained glass, contemplating fire.

[carveredlunds]

"He looked like a boy, masquerading as a gentleman": A meta on Amadeo, Venice, The Picture of Dorian Gray, and standing on the cusp of adulthood

TW: Discussions of SA, underage SA, human trafficking, slavery, and NSFW content

From a historical perspective, Armand's life as a teenage enslaved boy in Venice in the early 16th century gives us a chance to discuss the culture of male-male attraction in Venice during this period, specifically the contemporary understanding that older men could be attracted to young boys. This historical grounding can, in turn, offer insight into why Armand is trapped on the cusp of adulthood, how this manifests itself in his physicality, and how his story can be cautiously and sensitively used as a mirror for the real experiences of enslaved people in Venice during this period. I will be referring to him by his birth name (Arun), the name Marius gave him (Amadeo), and the name the Children of Darkness coven gave him (Armand), where appropriate.

In 1496 in Venice, illegal sexual relations between young boys and older men were so prevalent that 'special patrols [went] searching for boys who were patientes (sc. passive partners), monitoring schools for fencing, dance and song, where youths might be found in the evenings, and once again looking for companions of unequal age.'[1] This was roughly 27 years before Arun was purchased from a brothel by the vampire Marius de Romanus. Due to Armand's fractured memories of this period, it isn't clear when he was forcibly trafficked to Italy, but it is likely that he was bought by Marius in around 1523 at the age of 15 (assuming he was born in 1508, given that he says he's 514 in 2022).

As a physically attractive enslaved boy, Amadeo would have been understood as an object of desire ("object" in a literal sense, with no personhood of his own) to the older men around him. In his recent study Forbidden Desire in Early Modern Europe: Male–Male Sexual Relations, 1400–1750, historian Noel Malcolm discusses the contemporary evidence for the attraction of men towards adolescent boys. Malcolm explains that older men desiring teenage boys was a common and accepted part of Venetian culture, provided one did not act on those desires, and that attractive young men were often described similarly to women in surviving sources and contemporary literature.[2]

The important thing to note here is that teenagers were supposed to be desired before they started to show signs of maturity, when they could almost be considered sexless. As Malcolm writes, when 'a young man's looks became properly masculine (with facial hair, developed musculature, etc.), that is, fully differentiated from a feminine appearance, was precisely the time when he ceased to be seen as desirable by the great majority of older men.'[3] Due to poor nutrition, this might have occurred later for teenagers in the 16th century than it does today, but it was usually between the ages of 17 and 23.[4] Given that Amadeo was an enslaved child, and therefore probably not well-fed, he was likely late to develop. Putting aside the fact that in the books Armand is 17 when he's turned, Queen of the Damned offers some evidence for this:

'Did Daniel know that Armand had been a boy when all this had begun for him? Seventeen years old, and in those times that was young, very young. Seventeen-year-old boys in the twentieth century were virtual monsters; they had beards, hair on their chests, and yet they were children. Not then. Yet children worked as if they were men.'[5]

In light of this, it is worth mentioning that Armand has the slightest hint of facial hair. You can see this clearly in close-up shots, for instance these ones in my gifset. Here's one clear example:

With his long hair, his high cheekbones, and his thin frame, Amadeo would have fit perfectly into the feminine, feminised, youthful archetype that Malcolm describes. It would have been socially acceptable for older men to be attracted to him in Venice in the 16th century. According to Malcolm, 'When early modern writers described good-­looking boys, the terms they used were drawn from a standard repertoire that existed primarily to describe female beauty: coral lips, pearly teeth, ivory skin, and so on.'[6]

Obviously, the last point doesn't apply to Amadeo. Instead, he would have been desired because he was exoticized by the Italian network of artists that Marius "donated" him to (that is to say, his Otherness would have been sexualised, as a young boy possibly from Bengal as @depressedraisin suggested here). This exoticization is apparent in how Amadeo is portrayed in The Adoration of the Shepherds — kneeling, enraptured, with a look of subservient wonder on his face. (For an incredible meta which delves more deeply into this aspect of Armand's history, I recommend reading "Armand, colonialism, and the weaponisation of anti-Blackness" by @shesnake.)

If we assume (besides his obviously lightened skin), that The Adoration is a fairly accurate portrayal of Amadeo at 20 years old, then the main difference between him at 20 and him at 27 is his slight facial hair. As discussed previously, the appearance of facial hair was a marker for young boys growing out of their desirability and into adulthood. Turned at 27, Armand is now stuck in this liminal space between boyhood and adulthood, and this is visibly apparent in his facial hair. His youth is mentioned in the show on a few occasions. When Louis first sees Armand in 2.01, he says that he 'looked like a boy, masquerading as a gentleman'. Madeline calls him 'young man' in a patronising tone in 2.06.

Interestingly, Armand's youth is mentioned more often than his race, though in the 18th-century flashback in 2.03, Nicolas asks Lestat, 'do you know this gypsy?' This is the only microaggression we've seen Armand face so far, but it offers a tiny glimpse into the kinds of comments that Armand will have faced for his entire life, both as a human and as a vampire. Obviously, Armand is not Romani, so the racial slur of "gypsy" does not apply to him (not that it applies in any context, but I mean it's literally inaccurate). However, this erasure of origins is common in contemporary historical references to people of colour. As historian Imtiaz Habib writes in Black Lives in the English Archives, 1500-1677: Imprints of the Invisible, Black people were often referenced in early modern sources using 'cryptic citations', referred to interchangeably as '"blackamore", "moor", "barberee", "barbaryen", "Ethiopian", and "Indian".'[7] Regardless of their country of origin, they were lumped together as one people.

In this way, Armand's lost origins could be seen as a representation for the surviving fragmentary evidence for people of colour from across the globe in English archival sources. He himself describes his memories in 2.04 as "fragments". This may be read as a metaphor for the sparse and fragmentary surviving archival evidence for enslaved people's experiences in the early 16th century, especially enslaved children. Where the evidence does survive, it is limited, and enslaved people's stories are usually recounted through the lenses of their white owners or observers, with their own voices lost to history.

There is another aspect of Armand's life which may be mirrored with the life of a real specific enslaved person. In Contested Subjecthood: Runaway Slaves in Early Modern Venice, historian E. Natalie Rothman recounts the story of Omar, an enslaved boy from Zara, living in 17th century Venice, who was given the name Pierantonio by his enslaver.[8] He had a long history of service since childhood, and had been baptised in 1648 when he was 10 years old, and, at the age of 32, was seeking permission to be married. Rothman writes that Omar's story:

'suggests ways in which enslavement as a child could actually facilitate effective forms of social, as well as spatial mobility, while curtailing others. His long years of service as a baptized slave were eventually rewarded by formal manumission [release from slavery], the acquisition of a trade, and insertion into a network of patronage that secured his ability to forge new kinship ties in Venice.'[9]

Likewise, it was Amadeo's long and loyal service to Marius, since childhood, which ultimately allowed him to become a vampire ('facilitate effective forms of social, as well as spatial mobility'). If Amadeo had not been Marius' property for as long as he was, if he had not had "skill", as he puts it, then Marius would not have shared the Dark Gift with him. It might be a slightly clumsy comparison, but vampirism could be seen as what Rothman describes — the reward of a trade and new kinship ties. However, though he had been rewarded, Amadeo was not yet freed from his service to Marius. He was now frozen in that place between boyhood and adulthood, having not quite lost what made him special to Marius, but not being the same boy he was.

Finally, this liminal state is manifested not only in his slight facial hair, his long hair, and his youthful features, but it is also realised in The Adoration. I made a gifset overlaying a quote from The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde with scenes of Armand looking at his portrait, which is relevant in this discussion. Armand is almost Dorian Gray in reverse. He might have lived for five centuries, but he a part of his soul is still trapped in that portrait, in a position of unwilling subservience. The fate Dorian Gray laments has happened to Armand. He has grown older, and taken on the countless sins of his vampiric life, but his picture has remained the same — frozen in servitude, representing that young boy who was adored for his beauty.

Bibliography

1. Noel Malcolm, Forbidden Desire in Early Modern Europe: Male–Male Sexual Relations, 1400–1750 (University of Oxford, 2024) p. 44. 2. Ibid., pp. 179-81. 3. Ibid., p. 180. 4. Ibid., pp. 46-7. 5. Anne Rice, Queen of the Damned (Warner Books, 1996) p. 102. 6. Malcolm, Forbidden Desire, p. 179. 7. Imtiaz Habib, Black Lives in the English Archives, 1500-1677: Imprints of the Invisible (Taylor & Francis Group, 2007) p. 2. 8. E. Natalie Rothman, Contested Subjecthood: Runaway Slaves in Early Modern Venice, Quaderni storici, NUOVA SERIE, Vol. 47, No. 140 (2), Riscatto, scambio, fuga (AGOSTO 2012), pp. 425-6. 9. Ibid., pp. 426-7.

[skzdust]

Room 514

Part 1

This fic is the result of 1. Me going on a road trip and 2. A poll I did on here! I have the trip back coming up in a few days so I might do another poll to decide what I write on the way back lol!

Summary: You’re moving into a new suite halfway through your sophomore year at Stay University, populated by three guys: Jisung, Changbin, and Bang Chan. You meet their friends and quickly become a part of their group, but you find yourself wanting more with Jisung…

Pairing: Han Jisung x Reader

Includes: slow burn (if I have the patience to write it slow lol), college au, roommates, besties with skz, gender neutral reader (if smut happens reader will be afab)

Word count: 1.3k

Reblogs, likes, comments all appreciated!!!

Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5

Masterlist

——-

The lock to room 514 beeped, its LED turning green, and you moved your phone away. You took a breath and turned the handle.

You didn’t need to worry. The suite’s living room was empty. The decoration gave you hope, though; it was neat and decorated mostly in shades of blue, with a sunny yellow cover on the couch. You hoped it was like this all the time and not just because you were moving in today.

The suite had four single bedrooms, two half bathrooms, one shower, and a living room with a mini-fridge and microwave. You’d been living in a different hall just a few days ago, sharing a room with another girl, Catherine. She’d been awful ever since you’d walked in on her cheating on her boyfriend with another guy, spreading rumors and turning all your friends against you. You’d pleaded with your RA for a single room, and she’d helped you find a suite in another hall. It was a room with three guys, which made you a little anxious, but you’d jumped at the chance nonetheless.

“Hello?” You said, a little louder than you usually would speak.

Nothing.

You found room D, your room, in the hallway to the left. Room C, next door, had a handwritten sign beside the “C”: “Han Jisung.”

One of your roommates. You knew the others were named Changbin and Bang Chan, but you hadn’t met any of the three.

You pressed your phone to the lock on room D and walked in.

The room was small and bare, but you smiled at the fact that you’d have your own space at all. A lofted bed with plenty of storage space underneath was against the back wall, next to a desk and chair, and a tall chest of drawers was beside the closet.

You climbed up on the bed to look out the window. You had a rather ugly view of the parking lot, but the window faced South, so at least you’d get plenty of light.

There was a loud knock behind you.

You whirled around, almost falling off the bed. Potentially the most attractive man you’d ever seen in real life was leaning in your doorway, a grin on his face. “You must be y/n!”

“Yeah, that’s… me.” You said with a little laugh. “And you’re…?”

“Jisung.” His smile grew. “Han Jisung.”

You hopped off the bed. “Jisung. You’re next door!”

“Yeah! Me and Changbin and Bang Chan are excited to have another roommate, it’s been just the three of us for a while.”

“Well, I’m kind of escaping a situation at the moment, so I’m looking forward to a fresh start, too.” You tried not to let your thoughts of Catherine make you angry.

“Well, you’re always welcome to hang out with us.”

“Thanks, that’s nice of you.”

“Actually, we’re having some people over tonight.” He raised his eyebrows. “Chill with us, if you don’t have to study or anything. We’re gonna watch Love Island.”

You grinned. “Love Island? Seriously?”

“How can you not love stupid reality TV with a bunch of hot people?” Jisung held his hands up. “Just saying, just saying. We’re probably gonna order pizza, too, if that helps convince you.”

“Not judging, just wasn’t expecting it.” You shrugged. “But yeah, I don’t have anything going on tonight, that sounds fun!”

“Sounds good. Do you need any help moving stuff in?”

“I think I’ve got it.” You waved your hand. “Just some stuff in the hallway.”

He nodded. “Let me know if you want help.”

“I will.”

He gave a lazy salute. “See you tonight!” He pushed off the doorway and twirled into the hall, and you heard his door click shut.

You squeezed your eyes shut, sending up a silent prayer. Please, please, please let him be single.

—

You stood in the center of the room, doing a little circle and judging it cute enough to be finished.

You’d been unpacking and decorating for a few hours, but the sounds of people in the living room had started about an hour ago, so you’d slowed down. You wanted to see Jisung again, but you were a bit anxious to meet his friends, as well as your other two roommates.

But there were only so many times you could rearrange your books or organize your clothes, and you knew it was a good idea to go out and join the party.

You checked your reflection in the mirror on the inside of the closet door, smoothing your hair, and left your room.

There were eight people in the living room of the suite, the only one you recognized being Jisung. And… wait, was that the guy you’d been on a project with in music technology last year? Hwang Hyunjin?

“Y/n!” Jisung jumped up from the couch when he saw you, beaming. “Guys, this is our new roommate!”

“Y/n?” The guy you were 99% sure was Hyunjin said, tilting his head. “I know you! We did a project together.”

“Yeah! I remember that! It’s Hyunjin, right?”

He smiled softly. “Yeah, Hyunjin. Nice to meet you again!”

You tried to remember back to the project. You’d loved the class, and you remembered the project going well. Hyunjin had been great to work with, doing his share of the planning and the legwork. You’d found him cute then, too, but freshman year you’d been even more timid, and you hadn’t made a move. You were kind of glad for that now, though.

Because Jisung was walking across the room to you, and standing right next to you, and you almost missed what he started to say because you could smell whatever cologne he used, and it smelled good.

“Okay, around the room we have...” He pointed at each of the guys. “Seungmin, Minho, Jeongin, you know Hyunjin, Felix, Bang Chan, he’s one of our roommates, and Changbin, he’s our other roommate.” He pointed to himself. “And you know me. Jisung.”

You nodded at each name, doing your best to match them to faces. “Got it. I’m decent with names, so I’ll do my best.”

Jisung bumped your shoulder, and you giggled. “I’m sure you’ve got it.” He made a shooing motion at Seungmin, who was sitting on the floor. “Pizza’s behind Seungmin.”

“What kind?”

“There’s pepperoni and there’s cheese.” Seungmin picked up a plate. “Here, I can grab you a slice, what do you want?”

“Just a slice of cheese, thanks.”

Seungmin handed Jisung the plate, and he made a little mock bow before holding it out to you. You smiled, taking it. “Thank you, butler.”

“Of course, my liege.” He winked, and a cloud of butterflies took flight in your chest.

“Nice to meet you, y/n!” Changbin leaned over the back of his chair and extended his hand. You shook it.

“Changbin, right?”

“Mhm. Roommates!”

“Yeah, that’s right.” You nodded.

“He sings a lot. You can tell him to shut up if you need to.” Bang Chan grinned. “I’m Bang Chan, I’m your other roommate.”

“I’m sure it’ll be fine. I don’t mind singing.”

“I mean, he has a decent enough voice, but it’s… frequent.” Jisung widened his eyes as he nodded. “Quite frequent.”

“Oh, come on.” Changbin rolled his eyes. “You all should be honored that you get to hear my singing. I’m gonna be recognized for my talent someday!”

“He also raps.” Jeongin added. “I’m sure you’ll hear that, too.”

“I’m an even better of a rapper than I am a singer!” He pointed around the room. “Feel honored!”

Felix held a hand to his chest. “We all feel so honored. All hail the most beautiful voice, Changbin!”

“That’s more like it!”

You laughed with the rest of them. This group felt more comfortable than you’d ever felt with your old friends, and you couldn’t help thinking that maybe moving in with Changbin, Bang Chan, and Jisung was meant to be.

[thekingofthenameless]

I posted 8,554 times in 2022

That's 514 more posts than 2021!

94 posts created (1%)

8,460 posts reblogged (99%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@draal-the-deadly

@taags-old-account

@falling-hand-in-unlovable-hand

@peachdoxie

@writing-prompt-s

I tagged 7,345 of my posts in 2022

Only 14% of my posts had no tags

#disney - 1,529 posts

#amphibia - 586 posts

#tales of arcadia - 478 posts

#the owl house - 444 posts

#encanto - 376 posts

#trollhunters - 323 posts

#lgbtqia+ - 311 posts

#favorite posts - 274 posts

#anne boonchuy - 260 posts

#tiktoks - 252 posts

Longest Tag: 126 characters

#but when i watched wizards for the first time i remember just looking at him when he was in a scene no matter who was speaking

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

Merlin is such an interesting character, with so much angst potential, and hardly anyone realizes that.

He isn’t the typical Merlin. When I, at least, think of other versions of Merlin, the Sword in the Stone Merlin is one of the first to come to my mind. The Sword in the Stone Merlin is sweet, a little bit forgetful, and a little weird. His magic can only be used for educational purposes, according to him. ToA Merlin is a jaded, guarded person. He’s a warrior who’s been through a lot, to say the least, and he remembers everything. Maybe that’s why most of the ToA fandom still doesn’t try to analyze him at all. They don’t look at the layers of his character, they only look at the surface, and go, “Merlin’s a bad person!” That’s barely covering the whole Merlin hate train after Season Three came out, ugh.

Anyway, here’s the hell that he’s been through: He’s been fighting evil for thousands of years. In his words, “I was battling evil when the world was still young.” Because of that, he’s seen millennia of terrible failures, death, and pain. He fought the Arcane Order and their Titans for a thousand years straight, and it’s implied that he was the one who sealed them away. He only got a hundred years of peace before he went to sleep. Well, not even that. Guinevere died, and Arthur’s massacre began, which affected everyone. He became emotionally distant from Douxie. He tried to lessen the effects of Arthur’s massacre by taking creatures under his protection. I doubt Arthur could kill him, but he could have been imprisoned, or banished, for treason. His former apprentice, Morgana turned against them, then she died in front of him.

She came back to life, and he was still trying to process the fact that she had died in the first place. Then Killahead happened. He literally got impaled with her magic, then he learned that Arthur died. He was confused. Before he had the chance to try to process another death of one of his few friends, Morgana tried to kill him. She wanted him dead, irrationally blaming him for her brother’s death. He had to go to sleep for nine hundred years because of that, and the only reason he was asleep for that long is because Morgana was stealing his magic for nine hundred years. Even though he prepared for everything, he was hoping that it wouldn’t happen, and he didn’t know that Morgana had taken his magic until the Eternal Night.

He’s a great judge of character. In a few seconds of meeting Angor Rot, he told Morgana, “Leave them alone, Morgana!” He was talking about both AAARRRGGHH!!! and Angor Rot. She beat him up, wanting to kill him again. He realized that Morgana stole his magic for nine hundred years, which is what kept him asleep. Then after she beat him up some more, she told him that she murdered his Trollhunters. Before that, he had to learn that she was keeping a slave when he met Angor Rot.

See the full post

200 notes - Posted January 3, 2022

#4

I’m screaming

407 notes - Posted February 24, 2022

#3

I have a type.

502 notes - Posted January 12, 2022

#2

Some people really don’t understand complex characters, and it shows.

625 notes - Posted March 11, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

See the full post

968 notes - Posted May 8, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[youknowme-iamyou-blog]

Black Lives Murder

When I saw Nancy Pelosi leading these Democrats, pandering to the Black Lives Matter (BLM), wearing African Kente scarfs, kneeling in worship, I almost suffered an aneurysm. It was at that point I had to stop working and write this article.

Democrats will weaponize any incident for votes, preach victimhood, and demonize all police officers for the behavior of a few rouge cops. The more ignorant among us, drink their politically correct kool-aid and kneel to blacks for being white.

I was thinking of another title for this piece: “Dear White People, Stop Apologizing for Being White.” I never owned slaves and I haven’t done anything to suppress or hurt blacks, and I’m sure you haven’t either.

Let’s end this Democrat, BLM and Antifa charade by analyzing race in crime statistics.

Blacks are responsible for committing 90% of the interracial crimes between whites and blacks, despite blacks being only 13.4% of the population.

Table 14 shows that the majority of interracial violence is perpetrated by blacks.

If we start plugging the numbers in we find that blacks committed 547,948 violent crimes against whites. On the hand whites committed 59,777 violent crimes against blacks.

Statistically blacks are responsible for committing 90% of all the interracial crimes between whites and blacks in America.

Violent Crimes in General

We are not finished. We still can tease out another statistic from our table. Blacks are responsible for 22% of all violent crime in America, again only being 13.4% of the population. But that’s not a fair estimate. Most violent crime is being perpetrated by males. So we can use that information and say with a high degree of confidence that roughly 6% of the population, comprising of black males, are responsible for 22% of violent crime in America.

Homicides -Black on White & White on Black

The situation is similar for homicides.

Blacks killed 514 whites in 2018 Whites killed 234 blacks in 2018

Again, despite being only 13.4% of the population blacks are responsible for 69% of interracial homicides between whites and blacks.

Black on Black Homicides

Blacks killing blacks are 11 times greater (2600) than whites killing blacks (234). Yet, if you listen to the Mainstream Media (MSM), BLM and Antifa, whites killing blacks are running rampant in our country. Black children are afraid to return home from school for fear of being shot by a white policeman. What nonsense.

The fact that black on black homicides are 11 times greater than whites killing blacks are not reported because it can not be racially exploited, so it is not reported by the MSM, BLM or Antifa.

If you are white, you are statistically at greater risk for being killed while in police custody than if you’re black.

More whites are killed in police custody than blacks. If you are white you are 1.7 times more likely to be killed in police custody than a black.

Math used for chart in reference section.

George Floyd Riots

No one excuses the abuse of those police officers Derek Chauvin, Tou Thao, J. Kueng and Thomas Lane. Who kept George Floyd on the ground while police officer Derek Chauvin leaned on his neck, killing him.

People are allowed to peacefully protest. However, the wrongful death of George Floyd does not give the right for protests to erupted into lawless rioting, looting, the beating and killing of innocent people. This criminal behavior is not for the memory of this man. I’ve seen the videos where BLM dragged people out of their cars and beat them up. What was their crime, being white?

The smiling faces of looters carrying their stolen goods certainly didn’t look to me like they were in mourning for George Floyd.

You are not absolved of your criminal behavior because of your supposedly “outrage” and skin color.

The mainstream media doesn’t portrays George Floyd, for the career criminal he was. I am not condoning the horrible treatment he received from police, and he certainly did not deserve to die in the manner he did. But let’s not eulogize him as a national hero.

The day Floyd was killed, he was high on fentanyl and according the medical examiner recent used methamphetamine. He has used a counterfeit 20.00 dollar bill to purchase goods, which is why the store owner called the police. He did not deserve to die the way he did. The police officer Derek Chauvin has been charged with his murder.

George Floyd did five stints in prison:

1998: 10 months in prison for thief with an firearm. 2002: 8 months for cocaine 2004: 10 months for cocaine 2005: 10 months for cocaine 2007: Home invasion. Held a firearm to a pregnant woman’s stomach while accomplices robbed and ransacked the place. He did 5 years for this crime. You can view a more detail account of his arrests here.

I’d venture to say that a non-racist person would look at this incident as a bad cop killing an innocent man.

While those trying to inflame racism, see a white cop killing a black man. The mainstream media, BLM and Antifa are trying to use this incident to paint all cops as racist. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Black Lives Matter only when the black life taken is by a white person.

Soft on Crime Democrats

The soft on crime Democrats allowed the rioting to continue in their cities across the country. Most notably in NYC and Minneapolis. Minneapolis is a city led by Democrats for over 50 years. Their Mayor Jacob Frey, had his police evacuate the Third Precinct station, giving it up to the rioters who burned it to the ground.

If In Trouble, Just Blame Trump, Scream & Shout

To pass the buck on the fail Democrat policies in Minnesota, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison proclaimed the outside agitators in Minneapolis’ riots were “white supremacists” Trump supporters.

This is the same Keith Ellison who in January 2018 tweeted a selfie of himself at a bookstore holding the book “Antifa: The Anti-Fascist Handbook” and wrote “I just found the book that strikes fear in the heart of @realDonaldTrump”

Sounds more Saul Alinski to me, but the point is, these Democrats are sympathizers and enablers for Antifa and BLM thugs and criminals to riot.

Mayor Rudy Giuliani

Mayor Rudy Giuliani said it best. While being interviewed on Fox new said, “Don’t Elect progressive Democrats if you want to be safe.”

Democrat Mayors Bill DeBlaiso (D) NYC and and Mayor Jacob Frey (D),Minneapolis allowed the BLM and Antifa thugs to riot, to destroy business and buildings, to assault innocent people in their cities. They are useless and cowardly and should resign.

BLM and Antifa Militarily Commandeer a Section of Seattle

Weak Democratic mayor of Seattle Washington Jenny Durkan, has allowed a six block section of Seattle to be commandeered by domestic terrorists; BLM and Antifa thugs. They have arm guards shaking down businesses for money in their newly formed “Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone”

Fox News Tucker Carlson had a reporter Dan Springer, in the area, that reported, “Yeah, this is the third night of what can only be described as a complete takeover of a seven-block area of a Seattle neighborhood, and we don’t see a single police officer or city official anywhere,”

He also reported that the Seattle police relinquished control of the area, and I quote, “They did not say how cutting and running makes it safe here.”

Springer also read the BLM and Antifa demands, “abolish the Seattle Police Department and the court system, disarm all cops until they are all fired, and abolish youth jails.”

Another Mainstream Media Blackout

This is happening now and has been going on for days, do you see any of the mainstream media covering this? No. They are too busy reporting on “defunding the police”, and doing their best to make these radical protests and rioting appear reasonable.

Could you imagine if armed Trump supporters took control over seven blocks of Seattle Washington, chased the police out, starting shaking down businesses for money and goods, the MSM would lose their collective minds.

You can read the complete story here along with the radical demands from BLM and Antifa.

15 People Died in the Riots — I Have Questions

The riots are well coordinated and global. Why are there riots outside Minneapolis, Minnesota? How did protests and riots expand into other states? Why are there protests in Europe for an incident that happened in the United States? Who is funding all these protests? Who is organizing these riots? Why were pallets of bricks strategically placed where people would be rioting? There was no construction in the area. Who placed the bricks there? Why isn’t law enforcement looking into this? Who is funding and inciting this violence?

Conclusion

Despite the narrative of the mainstream media, BLM and Antifa, statistically, whites are more likely to be killed by the police than blacks. They take any incident to create a false narrative to promote their agenda.

A few rouge cops are not a reflection on all the police in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Or a reflection of police in every police department, in every state of the US. Just as white people don’t paint all blacks for the racist rioting animals that burned buildings down, beat up and killed innocent people.

For all the companies, like Amazon, Netflix, Etsy, etc., who are pandering and openly support the BLM movement, you are condoning the rioting and rioters and the damage and destruction they have done. Your pandering support will not buy you protection from thugs, it will not exonerate your companies from being burned down in a riot. The rioters burned down black owned business in black neighborhoods. If they can do that, you haven’t a chance.

To the Democrats pandering to the BLM and Antifa rioting thugs to rent the black vote in this November. Intelligent people see right through you.

Dear White People

Don’t let these race baiting lies and fake “outrage” to condone the criminal actions of thugs to riot. Please study the crime statistics in this article and stop apologizing for being white. You have nothing to be sorry for and no reason to kneel.

Cancel Culture

This article has been deleted from both Medium.Com and HubPages. HubPage declared the article “Hate Speech”.

What these leftist cancel culturists don’t understand is that calling something hate speech doesn’t make it hate speech. You’re only voicing your opinion, that is a biased opinion, and imposing you biased opinion on others.

This is the opposite of free speech it is called censorship.

...

Reference:

Homicide data by race chart — the math

It wouldn’t be accurate to compare total numbers of homicides without taking into effect the size of the populations. For instance, whites have a total homicide of whites killing whites of 2677. Blacks have a total homicide of blacks killing blacks of 2600. It wouldn’t be fair to say blacks kill just as many of their own race as whites, because the populations are not equal. White population is 249 million, and the Black population is 32 million. To put the numbers into proper perspective, we adjust the numbers to the population.

There is 1 white killed by white for every 93,187 of whites. There is 1 black killed by black for every 12,553 blacks. There is 1 white killed by blacks for every 63,449 blacks. There is 1 black killed by whites for every 1,060,075 whites.

To graph this information in a chart, we divide 1 by the population in each of the above instances. So for white on white homicide it is 1/93187 that equals 1.07E-5. For black on black homicide 1/12553 = 7.96E-5. Black on white is 1/63449 = 1.57E-5 and finally white on black 1/1,060,075 = 0.09E-5

[traincat]

I've been ranting to my friends about Johnny being abused and raped recently and one of them said: Lyja has damaged and put an element of distrust into every relationship he may ever have. which is really fucking me up and I wanted to share in part bc I don't wanna be sad alone and also bc I think that's an interesting side effect of Lyja's time in his life that doesn't get talked about enough

Thank you for sharing this because the thing is I do think there is a very definite divide in how Johnny acts particularly in regards to relationships before and after his marriage to “Alicia.” I doubt this was entirely intentional on the parts of the writers who handled the book after, but I’ve said before that I think after a certain amount of time and with enough stories behind them characters tend to take on a life of their own, and even if the writers are hesitant to address it there’s no way an event like his relationship with Lyja couldn’t have deeply effected Johnny.

Simply put: I don’t think “playboy Johnny” exists before Lyja. I don’t buy into “playboy Johnny” much as a general phenomenon, because if you actually look at the canon there’s just not much to actually back it up, but he certainly has at periods played into this public (both in and out universe) perception of himself. What I mean is, pre-Lyja, there is absolutely no proof Johnny had ever engaged in casual sex. (There’s actually no proof he wasn’t a virgin when Lyja began working her way into his life while masquerading as Alicia; this panel from Fantastic Four #275 is the first time Johnny having sex is addressed:

That shirt is Johnny’s – you see him wearing it the issue leading up to this one. To be clear, there’s nothing in the issue that supports this being Johnny’s first time, either – it’s just that he doesn’t have any sex scenes prior. Either way, this is not the reaction of someone who had a good time.)

Pre-the Alilyja incident, Johnny had a grand total of three relationships: Dorrie Evans in high school, Crystal Amaquelin, Frankie Raye. He had a few dates with a girl named Lorrie Melton who called things off with him because he was more serious than she wanted to be, and shared a whole one kiss with a girl named Valeria from the Fifth Dimension (no relationship to his future niece). He also briefly pursued a girl named Julie Angel, who blatantly wasn’t interested in him. When Julie’s friend Sharon came onto him during this period, he reacted with discomfort:

(Fantastic Four #259)

So, playboy Johnny Storm, a womanizer who sleeps around – he doesn’t exist in canon at this point. (If anything, Johnny repeatedly reacts negatively to being kissed suddenly and without his permission leading up to and during the marriage.) Then you have the marriage, which happens fairly quickly – Johnny and Alicia’s relationship is “cemented” in FF #275, they get married in FF #300. I want to note that Johnny’s pretty young when he gets married, especially by modern standards – you have to do the Spider-Man math with this one, since Johnny’s age at this point in canon isn’t stated, but he and Peter both get married at roughly the same time. We know that they’re roughly the same age, Johnny being 16 when he got his powers and Peter being 15 and these things happening fairly closely together. Peter comments very shortly after he’s married that he’s been out of high school for five years, which would make both him and Johnny roughly 23 when they respectively tied the knot. Alicia is labeled during Byrne’s run as three years older than Johnny, but it should be noted that Byrne has a habit of making women younger and putting them in relationships with much older men – which would track if it’s his opinion Alicia first met Ben when she was 19. (It’s my personal belief that she should be older than that, but that’s neither here nor there.) We have no idea how old Lyja is in comparison to Johnny. So he’s young, and the relationship escalates very quickly, which, looking at it with the retcon in place, makes sense, because Lyja is on a mission to infiltrate the Fantastic Four. So it’s quick. The marriage, the Skrull reveal, and the ensuing melodrama lasts… a while after that. 

Then the big reset button that was Heroes Reborn got hit after Fantastic Four #416 and Johnny and family were shunted off to a pocket universe for a little bit, sans Lyja. Fantastic Four v2 is the first look we get at a more playboy-ish Johnny Storm in line with, say, the Chris Evans version of the character – older when the accident hits instead of being a fresh-faced teen, a bit irresponsible, comes off a little bit like he might be a dog. But this reboot canon can’t really keep it up: it reunites Johnny and Crystal temporarily, and then everyone gets snatched out of their alternate reality bubble and planted back in their regular timeline anyway. 

So let’s look at Johnny’s relationships after his marriage:

1) Alysande “Caledonia” Stuart: A young woman Johnny found and rescued in another dimension who lived with the Fantastic Four for a while. I’m including this even though it isn’t strictly a romantic relationship – Johnny appears to have feelings for Alsyande, but it’s unclear if they’re reciprocated or if she just feels a deep debt of loyalty to him for rescuing her. Either way, I really like how this relationship is handled; they’re both very respectful of each other in a way that’s missing from a lot of Johnny’s actual romantic relationships. They definitely didn’t have sex. 

2) Namorita Prentiss: The first actual romantic relationship Johnny has post-Lyja. This one’s another weird one; Johnny and Namorita first get together after teasing the paparazzi and commiserating about being famous. They then proceed to spend next to no time together. Seriously, like, to the point where the books remarks on it:

(Fantastic Four v3 #55)

Johnny and Namorita do do things like attend celebrity functions together, so I label this as Johnny’s first “publicity” relationship – less about being in love, and more about him and the other party looking really good together for the public eye. (This is also something he never did before his marriage.) Anyway, they break up off panel, although Johnny did apparently ask Nita to move in with him at one point, which she refused.

Kourtney: A second and much more prominent “publicity” relationship. Kourtney is a supermodel who we’re first introduced to when she breaks up with Johnny when the Fantastic Four go broke and he falls out of public favor. They do get back together for the duration of Marvel Knights 4, and then they apparently break up again. Nothing to write home about in this relationship – she and Johnny don’t really appear to actually like each other all that much, especially on her end. 

We enter a relationship deadzone for Johnny as we hit Waid’s run. He starts it off apparently shaking off a bad celebrity breakup, and while he goes a bit moony-eyed over a few pretty girls at the beginning, basically nothing happens. He at one point meets up with a girl from the internet who claims to be a fan of his and things seem like they might get romantic… except his body language really is screaming the opposite:

Fantastic Four #514 – I’m not saying how much of this was intentional or even what the intent was, but if there’s something a comic book artist should be good at conveying, it’s body language. Here Cole’s is aggressive – leaning in, touching his face – and Johnny’s is closed off – hands in his pockets, leaning away from her. It’s just interesting if we’re supposed to believe he’s hot for this girl.

Anyway, Cole turns out to be the Wizard’s daughter, catfishing Johnny to find a solution for her unwanted superpowers. So. That lasts two issues and nothing happens between them.

Psionics: And now we enter Millar’s run. Millar’s run is probably the biggest contributor to Playboy Johnny – not only does he have an ill-advised sexual affair with a superpowered bank robber named Psionics, he also gets walked in on – apparently – about to have a threesome with two girls cosplaying as Storm and the Scarlet Witch. I’ve had a problem with the cosplay scene for a while now, because it just doesn’t fit with Johnny’s 616 personality. Something about it has always felt very off. And while I could just go “well it’s Mark Millar,” it occurred to me on a recent reread what’s wrong with it: it feels staged. Johnny’s in the middle of filming a reality show; the camera crew is who walks in on him. If he was trying to cultivate this playboy image, well, one way to do it is to make sure you’re walked in on in a compromising situation. He and the girls are all still fully clothed, and he actually ditches the scene as soon as they’re discovered – to congratulate Ben on his engagement, but still – while the girls frankly seem more interested in each other. It’s a weird scene still, but there’s nothing in it either way to say he was or wasn’t setting it up to make it look like he was the kind of womanizing carefree celebrity party boy who has threesomes with hot cosplay girls while not actually doing that.

As for Psionics, the hot bank robber he sleeps with? Well, turns out her family from the future kidnaps him and uses him as a giant power battery in a machine that has a good chance of killing him. No bad feelings or anything, though.

Again with the awkward body language. He certainly just stands there while she kisses him. This is the exact opposite of smoldering passion. Also, next time he sees her she tries to kidnap his niece, kills his longtime family friend Alyssa Moy in front of him, and then gets murdered right before his eyes. So. That all happened.

He has one apparent would’ve-been one night stand in Hickman’s run after this, except she turns into a bunch of bug monsters and activates the Negative Zone portal. He also has a highly implied brief sexual relationship with Daken Akihiro at this point, who… uses that connection to make Johnny feel horribly guilty over Daken’s apparent death and then so Daken can steal a weapon from the Fantastic Four. There’s a weird pattern here.

Darla Deering: The last and most recent of Johnny’s publicity relationships – Johnny starts seeing Darla, a major pop star, sometime after his experiences in the Negative Zone. This is another “they’re in a relationship but they don’t spend any time together” fling, too – at the end of the relationship, when Darla’s gotten together with Scott Lang, Johnny actually admits that he liked dating Darla because of Darla’s celebrity lifestyle more than he liked her. 

Here we hit Robinson’s run. Johnny does a lot of partying after he’s lost his powers, and while it’s not explicit, there’s something of an implication during this point that he is sleeping around. However, his most serious relationships in this run are with his family, Wyatt Wingfoot, and Peter Parker, and he has no consistent romantic partner. 

Which brings us to his last serious relationship: Medusa. This one’s a weird one, too, and it’s one where I’m not hesitant to blame the writer’s lack of research at all when Medusa and Johnny were genuinely very close during her stint on the Fantastic Four team. It’s clearly a placeholder relationship – we know Black Bolt/Medusa were going to get back together. If anything, I think here Johnny’s holding onto a piece of his then-missing family the only way he knows how.

So, a couple of relationships post-marriage, but by in large, with the exception of Namorita where we see hardly any of their actual relationship on page and perhaps Medusa, nothing serious. Certainly nothing like his impassioned “head over heels” falls for Crystal and Frankie Raye. So there’s very definitely a change in Johnny after Lyja and in how he behaves in romantic relationships – the implication that he does have casual sex, the uptick in relationships that are clearly for the public eye, a lack of a previously held deep devotion to his partner. I think you could make a really good case for all this coming about as a result of lingering and unaddressed trauma from Lyja. 

There’s also, and this isn’t explicitly romantic, the appearance of this little quizzing game:

(Fantastic Four: Secret Invasion) This actually is Lyja in her only appearance since FF #416, disguised as Sue and trying to convince Johnny that Ben is a Skrull for… well for nothing good, obviously, but the book never actually gets into why she’s attempting to separate Ben from Johnny, except that separating him from his family is exactly what she tried to do before she was discovered to a be a Skrull during their “marriage.” But it’s telling that when Johnny feels like something isn’t right, he immediately starts quizzing “Sue” about things she should know. Definitely seems like the kind of game someone who unwittingly married and was abused by a shapeshifter would invent to make sure that the people in his life are really who they’re supposed to be.

So I definitely think there’s a lot of lingering trauma there that, if a really good writer dug into it, could inform a lot about both the romantic relationships he had after that point and his romantic future, especially if it was paired with a story where he explores his romantic feelings for men. It’d be interesting to see it doubled up with doubts after his relationship with Daken in that regard, since Daken also used him to gain access to the Fantastic Four. I’d love to see it all really gotten into and actually, for the first time, addressed, especially if it was in the context of a romantic relationship with Wyatt Wingfoot, who was present during the early days of Lyja’s seduction of Johnny and is also who Johnny ran to after he discovered the truth about the monster Lyja told him was their child. A lot of history to get into there.

[tonystarkbingo]

Week Two fills!  We have a TON of them again, so please click on the readmore to see what amazing things your fellow creators came up with this past week!

Title: The Ups and Downs of Dadhood Collaborator: rebelmeg Link: AO3 Square Filled: T5 - bathing/showering together Ship: Pepperony Rating: Gen Major Tags: fluff Summary: Tony has absolutely got this dad thing handled. One way or another. Word Count: 1415

Title: Hospitality is Overrated Collaborator: schroedingersfox Link: AO3 Square Filled: Square S2 - Snowed In Ship: Loki and Tony Rating: Gen Major Tags: canon divergence, hunting related animal death Summary: For the briefest of moments halfway between seconds, Tony was able to contemplate that, perhaps, this wasn't the smartest thing he had ever done. Ahead of him, among the trees a short distance away, a bewildered man stood staring. The man adjusted the body of a small deer on one shoulder and stepped closer. “Stark,” Loki said. His mouth quirked. “To what do I have the honor?” Word Count: 1660

Title: Tony Stark BINGO Fills Collaborator: StrangeMischief Link: AO3 Square Filled: ALL SQUARES FILLED! Ship: IronStrange Rating: Teen Major Tags: drabbles Summary: All my Tony Stark BINGO fills in one spot. Word Count: 2586

Title: I'd Thought You'd Never Ask Collaborator: yourselenite Link: AO3 Square Filled: S4 -  meeting alternate universe counterparts Ship: WinterIron Rating: Gen Major Tags: dimension travel Summary: Somehow Tony jumps dimensions, but he gets to meet someone special Word Count: 514

Title: Vampires and Teenagers Have a Lot in Common Collaborator: tisfan Link: AO3 Square Filled: A5 - Writing Format: Diaries & Journals Ship: Tony Stark and Janet Van Dyne Rating: Gen Major Tags: Fluff Summary: someone appears in a vampire outfit and the others have to seriously figure out if they have actually been turned into a vampire or not Word Count: 852

Title: Inhale, Ex-sail Collaborator: justanotherpipedream Link: AO3 Square Filled: K1 - AU: Steampunk Ship: Stony Rating: Teen Major Tags: steampunk AU Summary: "Rich pirates decked out in top-of-the-line black market gear,” grumbled Tony, ”why don’t I have the budget to make those again?’ Rhodey inched back so that he and Tony were back-to-back. “We’re apparently law abiding citizens now, which means having to pay taxes.” Tony scowled. “Urg, right. Remind me why I wanted to do that again?” Rhodey rolled his eyes. “What was it you called him last time? Your sweet tart? Your apple pie in the sky? The wind beneath your wings? Hopefully he’ll fly here fast enough so we don’t get killed. Or worse, mugged.” Word Count: 1826

Title: Demon in a Bottle Collaborator: rebelmeg Link: Tumblr Square Filled: T4 - image of Tony raising his glass “to peace” in Afghanistan Ship: None Rating: Teen Major Tags: Alcoholism Summary: Moodboard for Tony and his alcoholism

Title: With Your Hands Collaborator: rebelmeg Link: Tumblr Square Filled: R3 - image of IM1 Tony wielding the Iron Man gauntlet Ship: None Rating: None Major Tags: None Summary: Moodboard for Tony and his hands

Title: Kiss Kiss Bang Bang Collaborator: FreyaS Link: AO3 Square Filled: S4 - De-Aging (Any) Ship: Stony Rating: Explicit Major Tags: Underage, explicit sexual content, high school AU Summary: “Gentlemen, might I remind you this is the library?” A voice interrupted. Tony jerked and fell backwards out of Steve’s lap and they both turned to look into the less than amused face of the librarian, Mr Coulson. “Please for the love of God, leave before I have to explain to Principal Fury why the school’s football star and resident genius both got detention,” Mr Coulson said. He had a hand over his face, as if trying to block the sight in front of him. (Or: Steve and Tony can't keep their hands off each other and everyone else suffers the consequences. Also known as that inevitable high school AU.) Word Count: 11428

Title: Just About Perfect Collaborator: 27dragons Link: AO3 Square Filled: T4 - Kink: Cock Rings Ship: WinterIron Rating: Explicit Major Tags: explicit sexual content, bondage Summary: Bucky thinks Tony can come while wearing a cock ring. Tony’s not so sure. (100% pure PWP smut) Word Count: 841

Collaborator: monobuu Link: Tumblr Square Filled: T2 -  takeout/pizza Ship: None/WinterIron Rating: Gen Major Tags: Fluff, art Summary: Tiny Tony and Bucky with a chinese takeout container

Title: Browse With Confidence Collaborator: James Link: AO3 Square Filled: T5 Lost Their Powers Ship: IronStrange Rating: Gen Major Tags: none Summary: Tony might have lost his genius - or at least his computer. Word Count: 1609

Title: Tinker With That Collaborator: rebelmeg Link: AO3 Square Filled: K3 - nightmares Ship: Pepperony Rating: Gen Major Tags: nightmares, PTSD Summary: The missing scene after Tony's PTSD nightmare in IM3. Word Count: 637

Title: Lab Buddies Collaborator: darthbloodorange Link: AO3 Square Filled: K5 - Science Bros Ship: Science Bros Rating: Gen Major Tags: art Summary:  Tony and Bruce are working together on a project in Bruce's lab. Tony gets himself a lab coat. Bruce... is a little less than impressed.

Title: Thinking Collaborator: darthbloodorange Link: AO3 Square Filled: R4 - robots Ship: none Rating: Gen Major Tags: art Summary: Just a usual day in the workshop. Tony is trying to think out a problem, and Dum-E and U want to play around.

Title: Tar and Feathers Collaborator: darthbloodorange Link: AO3 Square Filled: A3 - free space Ship: none Rating: Gen Major Tags: art Summary: It was just like in those old cartoons he used to watch as a kid. He just never thought it would happen to him though...

Title: Looking out into Space Collaborator: darthbloodorange Link: AO3 Square Filled: T2 - image of Tony in space Ship: none Rating: Gen Major Tags: art Summary: Off all the things he thought he would and could do when he goes to space for the first time... this wasn't it. He wouldn't have chosen this to be the way he was in space either, lost and feeling alone. He wouldn't have chosen any of this.

Title: A Monument To A Hero Collaborator: darthbloodorange Link: AO3 Square Filled: S1 - graveyard Ship: none Rating: non Major Tags: art  Summary: The hero Tony Stark died fighting to save the people of Earth. The people in turn constructed a monument in his image.

Title: Tame Your Demons Collaborator: SierraNovembr Link: AO3 Square Filled: S5 -  Bucky Barnes / Winter Soldier Ship: WinterIron Rating: Teen Major Tags: child abuse, violence Summary: He builds his picture of Tony one detail at a time, until the flash-blindness from Tony’s brilliance starts to ease and Bucky sees things in the shifting shadows. Tony is a man of many shadows, some old and deep. Word Count: 1841

Title: Bent, Not Broken Collaborator: ShippersList Link: AO3 Square Filled: A4 - nightmares Ship: Stony Rating: Teen Major Tags: implied/referenced child abuse Summary: A momentary loss of control is all that’s needed for Tony’s world to come crumbling down. Luckily for him, Steve is there to catch him. Word Count: 2658

Title: Can we live that real life Collaborator: cutebutpsyco Link: AO3 Square Filled: R3 - Thor Ship: Tony Stark and Thor Rating: Teen Major Tags: canon divergence Summary: Canon Divergence: Instead of the short movie of Thor in Australia during Civil War, he goes back at the Compound, just while Tony is back from Berlin to recruit Peter. Word Count: 1329

Title: K5- Workshop Troubles Collaborator: thudword Link: AO3 Square Filled: K5 - workshop troubles Ship: none Rating: Gen Major Tags: fluff, bot feels Summary: All Tony wants is a chance to rest. But DUM-E has other ideas. Word Count: 1028

Title: A Very Muppet Conundrum Collaborator: SbiderSlut Link: AO3 Square Filled: S3 - Humour Ship: Tony Stark/Peter Parker Rating: Teen Major Tags: fluff, crack Summary: In which Tony Stark wakes up, and the world has become a Sesame Street set. Long story short: Everyone, including his fiancé, looks like a Muppet. Yes, it is as ridiculous at it sounds. Word Count: 1832

Title: Heroes for Oppy Collaborator: shadowgrl94  Link: AO3 Square Filled: A3 - Free Space  Ship: WinterIron, Iron Dad and Spider Son Rating: Gen Major Tags: bot feels Summary: Peter was in the car with Happy on the way to the Avengers Compound when he heard this news. "What?!" He scrolls through Twitter. Then his facebook. Then his Tumblr and Insta. "No. No. No. No. No!"  Word Count: 737

Title: Wanted: Mom Friend Collaborator: singingwithoutwords Link: AO3 Square Filled: S4 -  AU: Sci-Fi/futuristic Ship: none Rating: Gen Major Tags: none Summary: The crew of the Starlit Spear just want their human to not accidentally kill himself. Is that really so much to ask? Word Count: 1797

Title: Open Hearts, Open Doors Collaborator: mistrstank Link: AO3 Square Filled: T1 - Marriage! Ship: WinterIron Rating: Teen Major Tags: fluff, wedding Summary: In which Tony and Bucky have a very special day, DUM-E is a regular disaster and Tony's friends are a bunch of trolls. Word Count: 6806

Title: Open Hearts, Open Doors Collaborator: TheKitteh Link: AO3 Square Filled: K3 - Never Again Ship: WinterIron Rating: Teen Major Tags: fluff, wedding Summary: In which Tony and Bucky have a very special day, DUM-E is a regular disaster and Tony's friends are a bunch of trolls. Word Count: 6806

Title: Open Hearts, Open Doors Collaborator: FeignedSobriquet Link: AO3 Square Filled: Square K3 - Day in the Life Ship: WinterIron Rating: Teen Major Tags: fluff, art, slightly lemon Summary: WinterIron art

Title: There's Always Next Year Collaborator: rebelmeg Link: AO3 Square Filled: R4 - Cheesy Ship: Pepperony Rating: Gen Major Tags: fluff, Valentine’s Day Summary: Five times Tony's Valentine's Day plans totally failed... and one time it all went perfectly. With a few successes from Pepper! Word Count: 5193

Title: Scandal Collaborator: katling Link: AO3 Square Filled: T4 - Past Tense Ship: WinterIron Rating: Teen Major Tags: canon diverget, not Team Cap friendly Summary: Tony knows the return of the Rogues is going to cause a scandal, no matter what the President's polling data says, however James decides that they'll counter a scandal with a bigger, better, more shiny scandal. Tony approves. Word Count: 1433

Title: Missing You Collaborator: Ironspider Link: Tumblr Square Filled: K4 - Missing You Ship: Tony Stark/Peter Parker Rating: M Major Tags: implied underage Summary: Moodboard

Title: Sounds Like A Plan Collaborator: katling Link: AO3 Square Filled: K3: Rocket Raccoon Ship: background Pepperony Rating: Teen Major Tags: none Summary: Tony's not sure what to make of the walking, talking raccoon in his workshop but he's tired, upset and determined that Thanos has to die. Rocket agrees and a plan is formed. Word Count: 568

Title: Coffee, Curses, Kisses Collaborator: wakandan_wardog  Link: AO3 Square Filled: S4: FIRST KISS Ship: WinterIron, Clintasha Rating: Gen Major Tags: fluff, flirting Summary: Tony Stark drags himself out of his workshop on a regular Thursday morning. Well, mostly a regular morning. Except for Clint Barton lying on the breakfast bar in themed underwear. The theme is new, the rest is depressingly familiar. Ok, so maybe the rose petals are new too. (What the hell, Clint?) It's enough to make a billionaire grateful for the Avengers Alarm. Wait a minute, magic too? Fuck, this is just not Tony's day. (Until it really, really is.) Word Count: 1614

Title: Take My Heart in Sweet Surrender Collaborator: shadowgrl94 Link: AO3 Square Filled: R2 - Cheesy Ship: WinterIron, Vision/Wanda, Carol/Rhodey Rating: Teen Major Tags: none Summary: 5 Times Tony and Bucky treated each other on Valentines Day and 1 time they didn't (on valentines day that is) Word Count: 2168

Title: Ice cream Castles Collaborator:  lilithenaltum Link: A03 Square Filled:  K2 - holding hands Ship: Tony Stark/Shuri Rating: Teen Major Tags: Hurt/Comfort, angst Summary: He didn’t deserve you,” Tony says with a vicious edge to his voice. Neither of them did, really. Word Count: 3,186 

Title: The Pull of the Past Collaborator: dracusfyre Link: AO3 Square Filled: T1 - Misunderstandings Ship: Loki/Tony Stark Rating: Gen Major Tags: PTSD, panic attacks Summary: Stephen has Tony come over to fix a sink and things go very sideways. Word Count: 2149

Title: But did you do it? Collaborator: panna-acida Link: AO3 Square Filled: A3 - Free Square Ship: WinterIron Rating: Teen Major Tags: AU no powers Summary: “But did you do it?” Minute of silence stretched in the little cell, after the other man voice, James, call me Bucky, reached his ears soft and soothing like velvet. Word Count: 557

Collaborator: lbibliophile-mcu Link: Tumblr Square Filled: K1 - Arc reactor Ship: none Rating: G Major Tags: bot feels, art Summary: DUM-E knew Valentines cards were supposed to show a heart, so that’s what he drew. 

Collaborator: monobuu Link: Tumblr Square Filled: A4 - Hogwarts AU Ship: none Rating: Gen Major Tags: none Summary: Tony as the four Hogwarts Houses

Title: we can't save everyone (but we can try) Collaborator: ironspider Link: AO3 Square Filled: A4 - image of Tony zip-tied to bedframe in IM3 Ship: Tony Stark and Maya Hansen Rating: Teen Major Tags: minor character death Summary: Maya Hansen dies unable to make amends for her wrongdoings. Tony Stark watches her die. Word Count: 633

Title: Thanks Fur Everything Collaborator: calmena Link: AO3 Square Filled: S1 - Werecreatures Ship: WinterIron Rating: Mature Major Tags: shapeshifters, fluff Summary: In which Bucky begins to bond with a dog in Stark's lab, and the dog turns out to be... something else. Word Count: 2147

Title: A Very Muppet Conundrum Collaborator: SbiderSlut Link: AO3 Square Filled: S3 - Humour Ship: Tony Stark/Peter Parker Rating: Teen Major Tags: fluff, crack Summary: In which Tony Stark wakes up, and the world has become a Sesame Street set. Long story short: Everyone, including his fiancé, looks like a Muppet. Yes, it is as ridiculous at it sounds.  Word Count: 1832

Title: Cold As Snow (But Just As Soft) Collaborator:  Gothic_Lolita Link: AO3 Square Filled:  K5: Graveyards Ship: Maria and Tony Stark, Tony Stark and Bucky Barnes Rating: Teen Major Tags: implied/referenced character death Summary: Tony hated winter and the memories that came with it. He hated visiting cold graves and dead bodies. But sometimes, it was worth the while. Word Count: 1259

Title: helluva 'vacation' Collaborator: rainbowshoes Link: AO3 Squares Filled: S1: Shipwrecked (Ch 1) R5: Desert Island (Ch 2) K3: Merpeople (Ch 3) S5: Carnival (Ch 4) A1: Arc reactor angst (Ch 5) A2: Infinity gems (Ch 6) R3: Science and Magic (Ch 7) K1: Shapeshifters (Ch 8) S2: Heat fic (Ch 9) Ship: WinterIron Rating: Explicit Major Tags: PTSD, nightmares, panic attacks, explicit sexual content Summary: Pepper and Rhodey join forces against Tony and force him to take some time away from SI after Stane and the palladium poisoning incident. So, for his vacation, Tony gets his yacht and takes it out on the open ocean all by himself. He has to get over his ‘thing’ with water, after all. Only then, there's a storm… Word Count: 19618

Title: Lights (Guiding you Home) Collaborator: mistrstank Link: AO3 Square Filled: K1 - AU: Canon Divergence Ship: IronHubands Rating: Teen Major Tags: angst, fluff, pining Summary: Rhodey's terrified of losing Tony and it seems every time he's not looking, Tony's dying or almost-dying. Or, in which the author looks at Rhodey through Tony's experiences in the MCU and cries over how many times we almost lose our boy, Tony. Word Count: 2626

Title: I’ll Show You the Darkest Parts of You Collaborator: mistrstank Link: Tumblr Square Filled: S2 - Wanda Maximoff Ship: none Rating: Gen Major Tags: fan edit gif Summary: “Ultron can’t see the difference between saving the world and destroying it. Where do you think he gets that from?

Title: Forests and Centaurs Collaborator: ceealaina Link: AO3 Square Filled: T1 - Centaurs Ship: WinterIron Rating: Mature Major Tags: mild smut, Fluff and crack Summary: Tony’s not quite sure where he is, or how he got here. And something seems just not quite right. Word Count: 1370

Title: School Time Legends Collaborator: SyoshoHiataki Link: AO3 Square Filled: T2 - Peggy Carter Ship: none Rating: Gen Major Tags: none Summary: Peggy Carter has punched Nazis, dealt with sexist military leaders and had to teach Steven Grant Rogers how to properly throw a punch. The thing she hates more than that? Stupid rich self entitled people.... Word Count: 835

[emmalynetc]

The Hard Drive Story

I’ve been trying to not think about this for a long time. It happened, I cried, my husband and I argued, and I stuck it all in a drawer and moved on.

When we moved from France back to the US, I desperately needed a computer upgrade. We’d been planning on it for a long time and we waited as long as possible before finally buying a shiny new Macbook Pro for me.

I had previously been using a PC laptop and an external hard drive which had all of my photos, videos, and documents from our whole year and a half in France, which weren’t all backed up other places mostly because I got sick of my computer trying constantly to get syncing up-to-date on the cloud only to have it slow my computer and WiFi to a crawl, so I turned it off.

Switching from PC/Android to MAc/iOS was pretty seamless except for one thing - my file storage system. I went a week or so with still using my old computer to access my hard drive and trying to just store everything I was working on on my Mac desktop, and I was already running out of space on my Mac. We didn’t at that moment have enough to buy a new 2 TB hard drive. It was late at night and I was frustrated and I did something really stupid -

I tried to convert my 514 GB worth of data on my hard drive to a file format that could be read by a Mac.

I know, so stupid.

And it didn’t work.

And I didn’t back up my hard drive anywhere else first because my husband told me to and I was annoyed at him so I didn’t want to do what he suggested.

I mean, maybe it worked, I don’t know. I now have 514 GB worth of arc files instead of regular files and I can’t for the life of me figure out how to convert them back - when I try to unzip any of the arc files on that hard drive, all it does is produce another arc file that my computer tells me cannot be read.

My one saving grace is that everything I had created and saved on that hard drive that was worth posting, I already posted. And, all of our wedding pictures are safe. But everything else may or may not be lost.

Trust me, I cried. I don’t know what possessed me to do that and not just wait another week and save up enough to get a new hard drive to back everything up on first. I seriously don’t know, but that was my first big mistake having to do with technology and I guess I’m glad it’s happened now so I can learn from it and move on.

The only things I didn’t get posted that I’m really sad to not have access to is all of our pictures from our trip to Paris when Vince got his visa in September. I posted a lot of them to Instagram, but I don’t have any of the high-res versions so I haven’t wanted to post them. But it’s been a few months now, and I’ve had time to grieve and try to unzip those stupid files again, and resolve to someday have enough money to get my hard drive professionally looked at, and I’m ready to move on and post what I’ve got and not ever stop posting again just in case this happens, so I don’t have any gaps in my posts that symbolize another tragedy. Man, that was a long sentence.

So, that’s what my next post will be. Everything I’ve got from Paris that I haven’t shared here yet becauseI’ve been too depressed about being a dumb person to post them.

And, if anyone who knows anything about working with ARC files sees this post, just on the off-chance you want to help me…I’m desperate for my files back.

[remonahinson12-blog]

Make-up

If People Electrical Power Occasion during the course of EDSA showed really effective to prevent Battle, then this is actually most efficient to stop area hefty floodings and stagnant flood waters also if those rowdy individuals only works together http://b3stbodyportal.info/ to dispose their trashes in the appropriate garbage can or even establishments. There are some religious practices as well as views that send the children to the roads to start begging for amount of money. Targets for top producing returns sells. Dirt bikes additionally have very little bodywork to them. I expect, having said that, that over the next a number of years, monitoring is going to properly implement on this campaign with the end result being actually a service portion that significantly includes in the larger business's profits power. This need to never ever be actually an urge or lark for a person, due to the fact that they may wind up lamenting this. I spent a great deal of time believing "do I really wish this on myself for the rest of my life?" I related to the final thought that I could possibly live with the the tattoo design as well as the judgment for the remainder of my lifestyle.

They showcase high gear proportions for quick and easy pedaling and also shifting, and they frequently have bigger tires than road bikes, but narrower tires in comparison to mountain bicycle, producing them suited for lightweight off-road make use of like gravel roads and smooth gunk trails. As determined through Buffett and Munger, we choose purchasing premium, surviving providers in contrast to trading in experimental, faceless shares. His hair might be oily and also cluttered, his clothes filthy, and also he might be actually skipping products that are crucial to a prosperous day, like notebooks or file folders. My sister operated at that Cattle ranch house and also I possess pretty an enjoyable loved ones photo (all long haired as well as hippie-fied things) during that parking area. It is actually exciting to have images of those special times to look back on in later years especially if you are discussing these opportunities with people you adore and also care about, your friends and family. The 5 lowest-priced best turnout Wall structure St. Desired Reward stocks since December 8 were actually: Windstream Holdings (VICTORY ); Seadrill Allies (SDLP ); Collection Management (MDLY ); Capitala Finance (CPTA ); Alcentra Financing (ABDC ), along with costs varying from $8.34 to $38.29. They all possess different ticket quantities at various times. The Newbie Set off We People provides cyclists the most standard of BMX bikes while still taking into consideration top quality as well as type. Mount and Ground w 160 is actually a 26 inch studded tire suitable for city bikes. I individually view Peter Lynch as my preferred financier due to the fact that his book "One Up on Stock Market" was actually guide that received it all started for me. In this post I clarified what he suggested by "purchase just what you understand" and introduced his six forms of financial investments.

As a mirror from the S&P 500, VOO includes 514 huge hat stocks of U.S. domiciled providers. Intend on mowing 2 times prior to an available house (this provides the turf cuttings a chance to run out and also impress - sweep up whatever is left prior to your website visitors get there). As taken note, today's starting factor is actually the Drapers' Venue on Throgmorton Road. 3:27) "Through this we understand that our experts like the kids of The lord, when our company really love God as well as keep His commandments." (1 Jn. 5:2). The lord knew the number of times I had experienced the wrath of the dismal skies over Belfast and also Greater london. It is actually something to invest in those business' equities if one observes value; it is actually an additional to fund their profits through spending fees to their respective ETFs. These two images, located in the NYPL Digital Gallery, disclose the straightforward timelessness from The big apple Metropolitan area and its own streets.

Co-founded through Y.G and Lukas, Dirty Street is an artist and also artist growth provider specializing in prepping new talent for the real life as well as the needs from an altering sector. But we were amazed to find countless people swarmed the street of Kenting on a weekday evening.

[americafuneral10-blog]

NFDA Goes Big In Boston

Brookfield, Wis. – The National Funeral Directors Association (NFDA) 2017 International Convention & Expo, held October 29 through November 1 in Boston, drew 6,207 total attendees (4,105 attendees and 2,102 exhibitor representatives). A total of 514 international attendees, representing 42 countries and territories, participated in the 2017 NFDA Convention. The Expo Hall featured 381 exhibiting companies which filled 92,568 square feet of space (925 10’ x 10’ booth spaces).

The NFDA convention proved to be an exceptional experience for all who were able to attend. The convention featured an outstanding slate of workshops that challenged attendees to think about funeral service in new ways and offered practical strategies to help them understand the evolving needs and desires of the bereaved families.

The Expo Hall was a highlight for many attendees because, in addition to connecting with their valued supplier partners, they also discovered new products and services that they can offer to families in their communities.

From the rousing Welcome Party to the celebratory dinner cruise in Boston Harbor that closed out the convention, attendees had many opportunities to network and have fun experiencing everything that makes Boston one of the country’s most loved cities.

NFDA General Sessions Feature Powerhouse Speakers With Powerful Messages NFDA hosted two premier speakers for its general sessions. John C. Maxwell, one of America’s foremost leadership experts, opened the convention on Monday with an inspiring message about how to communicate in a way that runs far deeper than words.

During the Monday general session, 2016-17 NFDA President W. Ashley Cozine, CFSP, CPC, CCO, offered his perspective on excellence and teamwork. He emphasized the importance of every funeral director and funeral home in the country doing their absolute best to serve each and every family that walks through the door.

“I want to challenge and encourage all of us to leave Boston with a commitment to raise the bar, to truly become lifelong learners, to continually look for ways to improve what we do and how we serve families and to pursue excellence in all parts of our funeral homes and businesses,” said Cozine. “Remember that we have teammates all across the country that are all counting on each and every one of us to bring our A-games every time we serve families and to be the very best we can be as a profession!”

During the general session on Monday, attendees also heard from NFDA CEO Christine Pepper, CAE, who shared some of NFDA’s newest offerings including the NFDA Work/Life Resource Program (EAP), a confidential resource that offers information, tools and guidance from licensed counselors and advisors who can provide confidential guidance on a variety of issues, from stress management and substance abuse to relationship issues and financial concerns. The Work/Life Resource program is available to NFDA members, their staff and immediate family members at no cost.

Pepper also highlighted: plans for a consumer website that educates consumers about the value of memorialization and connects families with NFDA-member funeral homes; a new embalming and restorative arts seminar – featuring live demonstrations – in May 2018 at the Pittsburgh Institute of Mortuary Science; a new embalming brochure that explains embalming and the benefits of viewing to consumers; and a new video, “A Career in Funeral Service,” that can be used by funeral directors as they speak in the community about working in the funeral profession.

During the closing session, three-time Super Bowl-winning quarterback Troy Aikman was interviewed by local Boston sportscaster Trey Daerr and shared how attendees can develop their inner champion.

Honoring the Christian and Jewish Funeral Traditions A highlight of the 2017 NFDA Convention was the Service of Remembrance, which explored the rich and timeless funeral traditions of the Christian, Orthodox, Catholic and Jewish faiths. As is NFDA’s custom, the Service of Remembrance was also a time for attendees to remember and honor the memory of colleagues and family members who died during the last year.

Giving Hearts On Saturday, October 28, NFDA volunteers shared their time and talents with Habitat for Humanity of Boston. This year, 12 volunteers helped at a home being built in Dorchester, Mass., for a family with two young children.

Ben and Liz Cressy lived, worked, and worshipped in the Codman Square area of Dorchester for a decade. After learning that their son would become a big brother, they realized they needed a larger apartment for their growing family. They found themselves priced out of Dorchester, a community they hoped to call home. Now they live far away in Lynn, Mass., in a two-bedroom apartment on a very busy main street with no outdoor space for their kids to play. When the couple heard that Habitat for Humanity of Boston was seeking applications for its newest development in Codman Square, it seemed like fate.

Thanks, in part, to the generosity of NFDA volunteers, the Cressy family will realize their American dream of home ownership in their beloved community of Dorchester.

NFDA Honors Funeral Service All Stars During the All Star Recognition Ceremony, NFDA recognized funeral professionals who, within the last year, had earned their NFDA Cremation Certification (Certified Crematory Operator or Certified Cremation Services Provider designation); NFDA Certified Preplanning Consultant (CPC) designation; or their Certified Funeral Service Practitioners (CFSP) designation from the Academy of Professional Funeral Service Practice (APFSP).

NFDA also honored recipients of a Foundation ’45 scholarship or award from the Funeral Service Foundation, and the association’s first recipient of the International Professional Achievement Certificate.

Additionally, NFDA paid tribute to the funeral homes that are Green Funeral Practice Certificate holders and 2017 Pursuit of Excellence Award recipients – including the Best of the Best Award recipients and Hall of Excellence inductees – during the All Star Recognition Ceremony.

Big Winners During the Monday General Session, NFDA presented the 2017 NFDA Innovation Award to ASD – Answering Service for Directors The company was recognized for its Suicide-Telephone Operator Patch (STOP) System. Established in 2009, the NFDA Innovation Award recognizes and promotes creativity, innovation and excellence among funeral service suppliers and vendors.

During the Wednesday General Session, NFDA recognized three funeral service suppliers for having the best booths in the Expo Hall during the 2017 Convention. The 2017 NFDA Booth Contest winners are: · Booths 400 square feet or larger: Messenger · Booths 300 square feet or smaller: Messenger · New NFDA exhibitors: Cherished Keepsakes

Convention attendees voted for their favorite booths in the Expo Hall using five criteria: creativity, imagination and originality; use of product, images and visuals in booth design; booth staff’s enthusiasm, friendliness and interaction with attendees; promotional giveaways; and overall appearance and experience.

NFDA also gave out fabulous prizes to attendees in the Great Big Giveaway, held during the Wednesday General Session.

During Expo Hall hours on Wednesday morning, NFDA’s valued sponsors handed out tickets for a chance to win one of 23 fabulous prizes: $25, $50 and $100 American Express gift cards; Amazon Echoes; Apple Watches; and the grand prize, a 2018 NFDA International Convention & Expo Experience including convention registration, travel reimbursement up to $1,000 and a Salt Lake City-inspired gift.

The winner of the grand prize was Robert Fields of Brown Funeral Home in Martinsburg, W.Va.

Sponsors NFDA thanks its 2017 International Convention & Expo sponsors for their continued support: · Black Diamond: Funeral Directors Life Platinum: FCA-Fiat Chrysler, Federated Insurance Gold: Bass-Mollett Publishers, Batesville, Everdays, FrontRunner, Homesteaders Life Company, LendingUSA, Matthews Aurora Funeral Solutions, Messenger Silver: ASD – Answering Service for Directors, funeralOne, Global Atlantic Financial Group, Implant Recycling, Life Celebration, Live Oak Bank, LoveUrns, Madelyn Company, NGL, Nomis Publications Inc., Physicians Mutual, Tukios Bronze: Clearpoint, Doric, Inman Shipping, Kelco Supply Co, Sich Casket Company, Wilbert Funeral Services

NFDA Convention Photos Now Available Professional photographers captured all of the excitement of the 2017 NFDA Convention. All of the photos can be viewed at www.nfda.org/bostonphotos. Attendees may download as many photos as they like at no charge; prints and other keepsake items are available for purchase.

Planning Underway for 2018 The 2018 NFDA International Convention & Expo will take place October 14-17, 2018, in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Combining the amenities of a major metropolitan area with the friendliness of a quaint, mountain town, Salt Lake City is an ideal location for the world’s largest funeral service convention. A beautiful, safe, and vibrant destination, Salt Lake City combines unparalleled access to natural recreation, a bustling economy, dynamic nightlife, remarkable history, warm hospitality, and “Utah’s Greatest Snow on Earth.”

Information about the 2018 NFDA Convention will be available soon on the NFDA website.

NFDA is the world’s leading and largest funeral service association, serving 19,700 individual members who represent more than 10,000 funeral homes in the United States and 49 countries around the world. NFDA is the trusted leader, beacon for ethics and the strongest advocate for the profession. NFDA is the association of choice because it offers funeral professionals comprehensive educational resources, tools to manage successful businesses, guidance to become pillars in their communities and the expertise to foster future generations of funeral professionals. NFDA is headquartered in Brookfield, Wis., and has an office in Washington, D.C. For more information, visit www.nfda.org.

NFDA Goes Big In Boston published first on YouTube

[therightnewsnetwork]

City Prohibits Pro-Life Advocates From Displaying Crosses or Pro-Life Signs Outside Abortion Clinic

Since Mother’s Day of 2004, a First Amendment religious display of wooden crosses representing the deaths of aborted children has been faithfully displayed each day during business hours outside a Wichita abortion facility. Over the years, the display withstood numerous attacks – both physical and legal.

On April 28, 2017, that all changed.

That’s when the City of Wichita began enforcing a new sign ordinance that prohibits stand-alone signage on the public right of ways.

Mark Gietzen, Chairman of the Kansas Coalition for Life, owns the cross display along with other pro-life signs that have been regularly displayed for years outside a building that first housed a late-term abortion facility and is now occupied by South Wind Women’s Center. In fact, Gietzen was even notified that the sign taped to his literature table that read “We can help you,” is now considered illegal.

Even the use of sidewalk chalk is now a crime in Wichita.

The only type of sign now legal is the hand-held type, which Gietzen says his members cannot use because they are busy handing out literature and speaking to women entering the abortion facility.

Gietzen sent a letter this week to Wichita Mayor Jeff Longwell and the City Council asking that they reconsider the ordinance because it violates Supreme Court precedent, and hinders his group’s free exercise of their First Amendment rights as well as the rights of women to receive their message.

PRO-LIFE COLLEGE STUDENT? LifeNews is looking for summer interns interesting in writing, social media, or video creation. Contact us today.

Gietzen explained the importance of his displays:

KCFL Volunteers, assisted by their 1st Amendment signage, have saved the lives of more than 514 unborn babies who would otherwise have been put to death by abortion. The 514 associated mothers were simply given a choice, and were spared the grief and heartache of knowing that they killed their own child. Most of these now appreciative mothers, would not have known about the life-giving choices available to them, without seeing the KCFL signage located near the abortion facility.

Gietzen says his stand-alone displays are always attended, have never blocked vehicular or foot traffic, and were always completely picked up at the end of each business day.

Yet, there have been incidents with security guards stealing the signs and the city illegally confiscating them.

Last July, one of Gietzen’s nearly-blind volunteers was wrongly arrested after a clinic security guard attempted to steal a sign that the man had momentarily leaned against the literature table. A tussle over the sign ensued, which resulted in the man’s arrest.

“Also, during the past 13 years, NOT ONE City-of-Wichita sign-related complaint or citation has been issued, that stood up in court, even at the lowest levels of court,” wrote Gietzen.

Under the new ordinance, South Wind workers are free to impound pro-life signs outside the abortion business, increasing the chances that pro-life activists may be further bullied and attacked.

Gietzen hopes that the ordinance will be voluntarily rescinded by the city, but if it isn’t, he’s prepared to go to court to seek an injunction barring the city from enforcing their unconstitutional ordinance and infringing on the Constitutional Rights of his members.

Operation Rescue, which is based in Wichita, Kansas, stands ready to assist the Kansas Coalition for Life to restore right to display their their crosses and signage as they have for over a dozen years.

“The way the new sign ordinance is being implemented, it is obviously illegally targeting the pro-life activists and their audiences,” said Troy Newman, President of Operation Rescue. “The Wichita City Council must rescind the unconstitutional law that favors South Wind’s shoddy and exploitative abortion business above the First Amendment rights of its citizens.”

Take action!

Contact Wichita Mayor Jeff Longwell and ask him to rescind the unconstitutional sign ordinance. Voice: (316) 268-4331 E-Mail: JLongwell@wichita.gov

Powered by WPeMatico

from http://www.therightnewsnetwork.com/city-prohibits-pro-life-advocates-from-displaying-crosses-or-pro-life-signs-outside-abortion-clinic/

[patriotnewsblogger-blog]

City Prohibits Pro-Life Advocates From Displaying Crosses or Pro-Life Signs Outside Abortion Clinic

New Post has been published on http://www.therightnewsnetwork.com/city-prohibits-pro-life-advocates-from-displaying-crosses-or-pro-life-signs-outside-abortion-clinic/

City Prohibits Pro-Life Advocates From Displaying Crosses or Pro-Life Signs Outside Abortion Clinic

Since Mother’s Day of 2004, a First Amendment religious display of wooden crosses representing the deaths of aborted children has been faithfully displayed each day during business hours outside a Wichita abortion facility. Over the years, the display withstood numerous attacks – both physical and legal.

On April 28, 2017, that all changed.

That’s when the City of Wichita began enforcing a new sign ordinance that prohibits stand-alone signage on the public right of ways.

Mark Gietzen, Chairman of the Kansas Coalition for Life, owns the cross display along with other pro-life signs that have been regularly displayed for years outside a building that first housed a late-term abortion facility and is now occupied by South Wind Women’s Center. In fact, Gietzen was even notified that the sign taped to his literature table that read “We can help you,” is now considered illegal.

Even the use of sidewalk chalk is now a crime in Wichita.

The only type of sign now legal is the hand-held type, which Gietzen says his members cannot use because they are busy handing out literature and speaking to women entering the abortion facility.

Gietzen sent a letter this week to Wichita Mayor Jeff Longwell and the City Council asking that they reconsider the ordinance because it violates Supreme Court precedent, and hinders his group’s free exercise of their First Amendment rights as well as the rights of women to receive their message.

PRO-LIFE COLLEGE STUDENT? LifeNews is looking for summer interns interesting in writing, social media, or video creation. Contact us today.

Gietzen explained the importance of his displays:

KCFL Volunteers, assisted by their 1st Amendment signage, have saved the lives of more than 514 unborn babies who would otherwise have been put to death by abortion. The 514 associated mothers were simply given a choice, and were spared the grief and heartache of knowing that they killed their own child. Most of these now appreciative mothers, would not have known about the life-giving choices available to them, without seeing the KCFL signage located near the abortion facility.

Gietzen says his stand-alone displays are always attended, have never blocked vehicular or foot traffic, and were always completely picked up at the end of each business day.

Yet, there have been incidents with security guards stealing the signs and the city illegally confiscating them.

Last July, one of Gietzen’s nearly-blind volunteers was wrongly arrested after a clinic security guard attempted to steal a sign that the man had momentarily leaned against the literature table. A tussle over the sign ensued, which resulted in the man’s arrest.

“Also, during the past 13 years, NOT ONE City-of-Wichita sign-related complaint or citation has been issued, that stood up in court, even at the lowest levels of court,” wrote Gietzen.

Under the new ordinance, South Wind workers are free to impound pro-life signs outside the abortion business, increasing the chances that pro-life activists may be further bullied and attacked.

Gietzen hopes that the ordinance will be voluntarily rescinded by the city, but if it isn’t, he’s prepared to go to court to seek an injunction barring the city from enforcing their unconstitutional ordinance and infringing on the Constitutional Rights of his members.

Operation Rescue, which is based in Wichita, Kansas, stands ready to assist the Kansas Coalition for Life to restore right to display their their crosses and signage as they have for over a dozen years.

“The way the new sign ordinance is being implemented, it is obviously illegally targeting the pro-life activists and their audiences,” said Troy Newman, President of Operation Rescue. “The Wichita City Council must rescind the unconstitutional law that favors South Wind’s shoddy and exploitative abortion business above the First Amendment rights of its citizens.”

Take action!

Contact Wichita Mayor Jeff Longwell and ask him to rescind the unconstitutional sign ordinance. Voice: (316) 268-4331 E-Mail: JLongwell@wichita.gov

Powered by WPeMatico

http://www.therightnewsnetwork.com/city-prohibits-pro-life-advocates-from-displaying-crosses-or-pro-life-signs-outside-abortion-clinic/ %cats%

[traincat]

i just found out about the gwen and norman babies and i’m just wondering what the fuck

“What the fuck” is a pretty accurate summary, but okay, so. Story time, because while this ask refers to the developments of a story called Sins Past (Amazing Spider-Man #509-#514), in which it was revealed that Gwen Stacy had twins fathered by Norman Osborn, to grasp the full story here we’ve got to go back to a little bit to before the death of Gwen Stacy.

In Amazing Spider-Man #93, after George Stacy’s death, his brother Arthur invites Gwen to come stay with his family in England. (This is notably where The Amazing Spider-Man 2 gets its “Gwen moving to England” storyline.) Peter had been planning to propose to her, but freezes up under the knowledge that Gwen blames Spider-Man for her father’s death:

Gwen takes it as a rejection, and leaves to go stay with her aunt and uncle in England. One thing I don’t think gets touched on enough with Gwen is that she’s very empathic, and good at picking up on all of Peter’s feelings and cues – it’s just that she doesn’t have the full context to interpret them. This also isn’t the first time Peter’s been in this situation; after he graduated high school, knowing that Ned Leeds had proposed to Betty Brant, Peter also had planned to propose to her, somewhat secure in the knowledge that Betty would’ve chosen him over Ned. (She would’ve, and in fact when Betty’s marriage to Ned began falling apart much later, she and Peter briefly engaged in an affair.) But when Betty says she could never love a man who was an adventurer, “a man who risks his life each day”, Peter realizes that as Spider-Man it wouldn’t be fair to propose to her and storms out.

(He notably did not take into consideration that he was a high school graduate with a freelance job who still lived with his aunt in the “to propose or not to propose” dilemma. Typical.)

Gwen would return to New York in Amazing Spider-Man #98 – a whole five issues later. Coincidentally, this also marked the return of the Green Goblin, Norman’s memories of Peter’s secret identity as Spider-Man having returned. The Green Goblin was briefly stopped when Peter used the sight of Harry – who was suffering from a drug overdose – to shock Norman out of the Green Goblin persona. With Norman once again unaware that his son’s best friend and roommate was Spider-Man, Harry on the mend, and Gwen back from England, everything was coming up Parker and, though no specific details had been ironed out, Peter and Gwen were set to marry. (I think it’s important to note with PeterGwen how serious they were, and that they were planning to get married.)

But, famously, that didn’t last – Norman did remember, during a particularly nasty overdose of Harry’s, and he kidnapped and killed Gwen in Amazing Spider-Man #121. 

So with all that in mind, let’s talk Sins Past itself. This got long. More under the cut.

Alright, so, all that said and done – in Sins Past, the story is flipped on its head. In Amazing Spider-Man #509, Peter receives a letter from Gwen, allegedly written while she was in Paris, indicating that when she died she did so with some kind of secret. The letter arrives incomplete, the secret unrevealed.

Furthermore, two mysterious (and super-powered) shadowy figures are trying to kill Peter, but that’s just like, a Wednesday for him. Along the way, and with a stunning admission from Mary Jane, it’s revealed that the two shadowy would-be assassins are Gwen’s twin children, and that their father is Norman Osborn. 

Yeah.

The twins – Sarah and Gabriel Stacy – are aging preternaturally fast because of the Goblin serum Norman had dosed himself with. They were also born after only seven months – but the infants weren’t premature. It’s revealed that that’s why Gwen left for Europe, not, in fact, to stay with her father’s family, but to secretly have her children.

Yeah.

The twins were brought up in France by Norman, kept isolated from the world, and raised as trained fighters who believed that Peter was their father, and that he had abandoned them and killed their mother. So now they’re here to kill him.

Yeah.

So we’ll pause here to take some questions.

1) “What? Why? What?”

So initially, writerJ. Michael Straczynski wanted Sarah and Gabriel to be Peter’s children with Gwen. This was nixed by Marvel, under the belief that having two adult children would age the character too much. I mean, they’re actually like, seven years old, but okay. Denying Peter the status of fatherhood because it would “age him” too much is a frustrating pattern in Spider-Man canon: Norman notably orchestrated the murder of Peter and MJ’s baby several years before. Instead of chucking the story out of the window altogether, which you know, would have been my first pick, it was reworked so that Norman was the father of Gwen’s children, because that was so much better than Peter discovering he had children with one of the people he loved most in the world. Comics are here to be a frustrating experience for everyone.

2) “So Gwen cheated on Peter?”

This is a frustrating take on the situation I’ve seen on more than one anti-Gwen post, painting Gwen as the villain of the piece for sleeping with Norman, instead of as a vulnerable young woman taken advantage of by the father of one of her best friends, a disturbingly realistic scenario before you ever even add in the fact that Norman is a literal supervillain. When Gwen recounts her one sexual encounter with Norman to Mary Jane, she herself seems confused about how and why she ended up in the situation. While I don’t think the intent was to have the encounter be out and out nonconsensual, there’s more than enough room to wonder. 

This is a very emotional time for the cast of Spider-Man; George Stacy is dead. Gwen blames Spider-Man and Peter is dealing with that and the way he is dealing with it is making Gwen doubt his love for her. Both Harry and Norman are falling apart in very different ways. Sometimes, things happen and situations arise and there’s no planning involved; “naive young woman is seduced by the darkness inside of an older man” is a tired trope, but a prevalent one. In any event, even if Gwen did deliberately cheat on Peter (which, no matter how you read the issue of consent in Sins Past, is clearly not what Gwen describes to Mary Jane), she was taken advantage of by an older man in a position of power over her, and after she had his children he turned around, killed her, and raised and abused her children to believe that the man Gwen wanted to raise them had abandoned them and murdered Gwen. So there’s no version of events here in which Gwen Stacy is the bad guy, and using that argument to prop up one of Peter’s other love interests as a better person than her is a bad take. There are no “good people” here: these are fictional characters who have been handled by many different creators over the years. They cannot make their own choices.

3) “Wait, J. Michael Straczynski? Isn’t that the guy whose Spider-Man comics you’re always telling people to read?”

Haha yeah it sure is!! It can be rough recommending a whole run, because the longer they get, the greater the chance there is of there being that one story in there you reaaaaally don’t think is for everyone, which is Sins Past. And this is tough, because as much as I don’t think Sins Past should be in continuity, JMS’ amazing voices for both Peter and Mary Jane never falters.

There are a lot of different kinds of bad stories in mainstream superhero comics: bad plot, bad characterization; good plot, bad characterization; bad plot, good characterization – and those are just some of the possible bad story combinations. I think Sins Past is a bad plot that’s very disrespectful to a female character whose legacy was already her brutal death at the hands of a supervillain. Reframing that death so that, instead of merely being at the wrong place at the wrong time and paying the ultimate price, Norman purposefully hunted down Gwen before she could tell Peter about her twins, doesn’t help. As a fan of Gwen, I don’t like her part in this story and I personally don’t think it should exist (as the story it currently is, and I’ll touch on that later) in continuity. I think it should be explicitly retconned out in a way that brooks no argument. (JMS himself has said he wished to retcon it out, but wasn’t allowed.)

That being said, have I read this like eight times? You bet. I think the art is stunning, I think JMS’ is really an incredible talent when it comes to writing Peter, who can be, to put it simply, a difficult character to get. I find the PeterMJ scenes are beautiful, as are Peter’s melancholy-tinged memories of Gwen. Also, I love comic book garbage. Skrulls? Clones? Robots? A character’s long lost children, artificially aged to adulthood and back to kill their supposed father? Oh my God, that’s so stupid. I want twenty of it.

So my feelings here are really mixed. I don’t like the rewrite of Gwen’s history. I don’t like that this is in serious continuity (and I’ll touch on that in a moment). Additionally, I don’t think the timeline really works – I’ve never felt Gwen was abroad for quite that long, even with the sped up pregnancy, and when she does come back, there’s quite a lot of time for her to tell Peter, which was something Sins Past had made clear she’d intended to do. But whatever, retcons are retcons, they rarely if ever are perfect fits. I do like the characterization of Peter and Mary Jane, and I like it a lot. If I had to pick a story that in my own opinion perfectly highlights how Peter experiences every single strong emotion, it would be this one, which is unfortunate because, well, everything else about this. It is unfortunately totally believable to me that Norman would have slept with Gwen and then killed her, but tbh if I was picking a member of Peter’s social circle who would willingly sleep with Norman, it’d be Flash, who briefly worked for Norman and was quite enamored by him – before he waterboarded Flash with whiskey, strapped him into a semi-truck, and made him crash into Midtown High, landing him in a coma. Oh, and then, way later, also murdering him. Norman’s gonna Norman.

Like I said: mixed feelings.

3) “Wait, but is it in continuity when it’s almost never brought up again, and nobody, not Peter or Mary Jane or Norman, mentions it even when it would make sense to and also nobody wants this in continuity anymore?”

Hhhh yeah it unfortunately is, and I’ll outline why, because it would have been so easy to take it out of continuity. So Sins Past takes place shortly before One More Day, wherein Aunt May was shot following the events of Civil War, during which Peter had revealed his identity on national television and the Spider-Man cat was out of the bag. In One More Day, Peter’s offered a choice by Mephisto: his marriage for his aunt’s life. Ultimately, unable to live with himself if he says no, Peter agrees. The marriage (although notably not the long term committed relationship – in the altered timeline, Peter and Mary Jane were still together from the date of their wedding to just after Civil War) was erased from the timeline, Aunt May was saved, and Peter’s identity was once again hidden from the world and from many of the people who had already know, like Felicia Hardy, the Fantastic Four, and most notably from Aunt May. There were also some additional changes made: most notably, Harry Osborn, who died in Spectacular Spider-Man #200, the best issue of all time, was alive. Clearly, the changes to the narrative’s web, if you will, extended beyond the framework of just Peter and Mary Jane’s marriage. Like I said: basically nobody talks about this story. It shows up on lists of the worst comic book plots of all time all the time. The characters almost never bring up Gabriel or Sarah – there is a sequel story called Sins Remembered: Sarah’s Story (The Spectacular Spider-Man vol 2 issues #23-26), written by Samm Barnes, where Sarah sends for Peter’s help in Paris and he does his level best to be her dad.

But of course all is not as it seems blah blah. I won’t say it’s the worst comic I’ve ever read. 

It would have been easy, then, to retcon Gabriel and Sarah out with Brand New Day, since nobody ever talks about them or wants this story to be in continuity, including its original writer. Right?

Wrong. In the American Son miniseries, which is post-Brand New Day, Gabriel Stacy makes a prominent reappearance, although Sarah’s whereabouts are unknown.

I’ll be honest: I personally don’t consider this series of events to be canon. I never mention or include it. As far as I’m concerned, it’s extra-canon material, not to be counted. But that’s just me personally as a reader. If I was asked whether or not this was actually canon, in that it was published and not retconned back out – the answer is yes, the twins exist in canon. Not my personal canon, but the actual canon.

But we could fix that.

4) “Well, Traincat,” said nobody, “how WOULD you fix Gabriel and Sarah Stacy so that the twins could be kept in continuity without everyone screaming?”

Great question, me! I would fix it with the greatest out Spider-Man storytelling has ever given us: clones. It’s very notable that Sarah looks exactly like Gwen…

Gabriel was specifically drawn with a strong resemblance to Peter. Look at that. The Osborn hair doesn’t spare people that way. The answer then, becomes simple: keep the story. Keep Gabriel and Sarah. But have them be revealed as two of the Jackal’s Peter and Gwen clones. It’s a better explanation for why Gabriel and Sarah would be adults than “the goblin serum did it”, and planting the twins, who could fully believe they were who they said they were with the use of artificial memories, in Peter’s path as a form of psychological torment fits with many of villains – presenting Spider-Man with the children of his lost love, fathered by one of his greatest enemies, as a form of torture. As for Mary Jane’s recount of when she found out, well – the same thing: implanted memories. There are more than enough characters on the Marvel landscape who are capable of that. It’d be pretty easy to pull off, since Marvel seems stubbornly set on keeping Gabriel and Sarah on the playing field, and honestly, it makes a lot more sense. Clones! (Let me pull it off, Marvel!!)

One final note: Sins Past outright alleges that Gwen and Peter never had sex, because Peter knows from the start in the story that they couldn’t be his children. To which I would like to say: lol yeah right.

So that’s (probably more than you wanted to know about) Sins Past!