#and by the way 'antisemitism is wrong' stands on its own and i don't need to say more no matter the context

[smhalltheurlsaretaken]

to that anon I got about my last posts: if you're hurt that I'm talking about antisemitism on tumblr rather than the Israel/Palestine conflict itself then you're going to have to make your peace with a star wars blog not being an effective platform for activism.

This is the point I've been trying to hammer home perfectly illustrated. I deviated ever so slightly from what's allowed on the subject to say that I can't participate in this website's idea of 'raising awareness' (distributing real facts and misinfo alike without a care and being a bunch of fanatic Jew haters in the process) and that I don't think I'm able to critically and accurately examine every piece of news that gets passed around here, and you're taking this to assume I don't care. So no, I'm not going to spend my time trying to prove that I do care to that particular crowd.

You're upset with me for not treating this like I did fandom and assuming I value fictional characters more than real people because of it, but it's precisely because this is infinitely more important that I'm not going to be doing real people the disrespect of giving my two cents on their suffering and deaths on the same platform I did STAR WARS.

[trans-kafka]

If you're in a hegemonic group and someone in an out group tries to explain their experience and you feel the need to reframe or re-explain it in a completely different way in order to "help" other people in the hegemonic group "understand" it, don't. Simply do not do that.

White people discarding Black people's words in favor of a more white-friendly discussion of the same phenomenon, culturally Christian gentiles in majority-Christian countries reframing Jews' explanations of how antisemitism affect us or the cultural peculiarities that make antizionism particularly thorny, people from the countries benefiting most from colonialism rewriting the words of the colonized when they talk about decolonization, etc... Don't do it. Simply do not. Try instead to engage with what has been shared with you on its own terms.

If you don't understand, ask questions or better yet, look up other sources to understand the context. If you find something else written by, say Frantz Fanon or Edward Said or whoever is a relevant voice from within that group in that field and it helps you understand, or a scholar's commentary on it that gives more context, then sure, add your further reading links to it.

But don't wholesale rewrite an entire unrelated situation as a metaphor or stand-in for what people are telling you just because you find some other issue with the actual marginalized people and their reality removed from it to be more comfortable to digest. This urge to interpret others through the filter of the privileged group identity and experiences is something I first really understood as wrong when I was reading Orientalism by Edward Said. I hope you can understand from this description, why it is not a good thing to do.

Btw If you are still confused (or even if you aren't) I recommend reading Orientalism. Here it is as an audiobook:

[jinkushiroll]

When you said no one gave a damn about Palestine your actually not even wrong, from stan twitter point of view. No one harassed brett gelmen who is a co-star of noah when he proposed to his fiancé in Israel, no one batted an eyelash when Jerry Seinfeld traveled there. Point is many celebs have went to Israel because at the end of the day whether people hate it or not it’s a country with actual people living inside of it. The way people eagerly jumped at the chance to “cancel” and namecall Noah so fast was so weird. It’s been like this for years when he had his bar mitzvah there he got hate, like what he’s literally Jewish it’s his religion.

Point is I’m disgusted with the amount of antisemitism I’m seeing directed at him it’s unfair to see so many act like all Jews that have visited there *to see family or to pray at the western wall* to all be in favor of its government. It’s simply idiotic and generalizing. Noah can travel where ever he likes and I’m glad to see him reconnecting to his Jewish heritage and religion.

Woke up to anon spitting facts🙏

And it's actually so confusing how, as a post on his tag mentioned the other day, everyone just immediately wants to cancel Noah for everything. I've seen people make wild stuff up about him JUST to find scope to cancel him. Like I swear to God 50 years from now someone on twitter (if it doesn't fall off by then) is gonna be like "Noah Schnapp replaced the nword with neighbour in that rap song during his summer camp. There's video evidence." Bitchass he was 13 😭 and I'm not one to express my opinion on this but I'm pretty sure he apologized profusely and much water has flown in the Ganges since then.

Mostly it's all the internalised homophobia and antisemitism and all the people that think they are PhD scholars about the Israel-Palestine conflict after 5 too many Google searches (again, they didn't bother before some gay and Jewish 18 year old posted Israel in his insta stories) but he simply doesn't deserve all that. He is literally just some kid on a practical level, he has more geopolitical knowledge than many of his defenders give him credit for, but he's 18 and rich and grew up in this sort of over privileged white bubble (not something he deliberately chose and can he counted as his fault, something stan twitter will terribly fail to grasp)

Maybe promoting Israel to 20M people on Instagram wasn't all that cash money and maybe the people he's interacting with are active zionists and the concerns of the Palestinian fans are very much valid but like, we need to remember we don't even know HIS OWN PERSONAL stance for sure. Emphasis on all those synonyms because he hasn't himself openly talked about it.

I am from a country where just about every 60 year old around is pro-israel because of the former/current political relationship between Israel and my country, though it is a generational thing. No one from the more recent generations agrees to ethnic cleansing and genocide, but we can't just boycott our grandparents and older relatives even though we have such a significant difference in opinion.

I know this doesn't really apply to Noah all that much, but point stands that we're building our empire of doubts and contempt for him on mere speculations and supposedly reliable observations (as far as I'm aware) and yes I am choosing to defend him because none of that ever ends well, from my experience.

[butchrupertgiles]

Like Israel does exist because no other state prevents violence against Jews. They're proving us right because yeah you hate us and want us dead. Actually give a fuck abour Antisemitism as it effects real alive people and not as it effects the fandomized war you're turned I/P into while Palestinians fucking die

These are the tags I'm assuming this is a response to as this is the only thing I've recently posted referencing Israel. I added them to a post about queer Jewish symbols incorporating the star of David on them, that they represent queer Jewish identity & don't say anything either way about support for Israel, & that banning them from pride events is antisemitic. There was an addition to the post about not conflating Jewish cultural imagery & support for the State of Israel. I hope its clear that reblogging with no tags indicating otherwise was a sign i agreed with the post.

What I am struggling to follow is why you are so furious that I argued this. I'll clarify, that I think the global solidarity movement with Palestine needs to be principled about the difference between combatting the political aims of the State of Israel & its supporters, & prejudice against Jewish cultural identity, signifiers, & practice. This is because I want the movement to be morally correct, & ethnic & religious discrimination is wrong. I pointed out that some in the movement are disturbingly unprincipled about this difference, & how this makes Jews unsafe, ie 'proving right' the argument that anywhere other than Israel is inherently unsafe for Jews.

When you say "proving us right" I'm going to assume you mean people who believe/argue that no place other than a militaristic Jewish state can be safe for Jews, because thats the argument mentioned in my tags. For what its worth I would agree every other state has at the very least at times failed to prevent, investigate, or bring justice following antisemitic violence, & many if not most have been perpetrators. I'm sure we disagree about whether a militaristic Jewish state is necessary, effective, or sufficient for ensuring Jewish safety. But everything I said was encouraging people to consider antisemitism in their own circles. I get the impression that either you think I'm so antisemitic I don't have standing to acknowledge its presence, or that you think I don't care about antisemitism and therefore shouldn't say something is antisemitic or encourage others to consider it. At any rate I don't expect to get very far on the mutual understanding front.

[valley-of-the-lost]

I don't know if you watched BPA, but.. I have a question, that I don't know if you can answer this, but it's been nagging at me (this is a multi-part ask, this will be a quick rundown): A blog that used to be interested in Barbie claimed that BPA has some racist undertones; this is because, as they claimed, due to the antagonist (who has, as they put it, brown skin) tries to take over the kingdom of a white princess/queen. 1/?- Barbie Multiverse Anon

Okay, so, a quick explanation. This ask has been sitting in my inbox for a few days, and I sincerely apologize to Multiverse Anon for making them wait this long for me to weigh in on this. When I received this ask I was neck-deep in part of an art challenge that wore me out and I had not watched BPA (which I assumed was Barbie Princess Adventure) at the time, and I felt that this was the type of ask that I needed to chew on for a couple days and talk to some people before I was certain of my thoughts on it.

Now, I have done some cursory research, watched Barbie Princess Adventure myself, and bounced it off some of my friends for their take as well. Thus I will attempt to answer this to the best of my ability.

I do agree with the unknown blogger in question that Prince Johan is a brown-skinned character, and that the plot has racist implications due to the combination of this, him being the antagonist, and the fact that his kingdom lost a war to Amelia's prior to the plot to drive his motivation hence why Amelia is taking over the rule of both her own and his kingdom. However, I disagree with them that this is an ongoing theme or that there's a pattern of racist undertones in previous Barbie movies. At least from my own knowledge. 

(under a read more because I don’t want to clog people’s dashes, this is not a simple topic to unpack + the movie did some weird things I wanted to explain too)

Before I really delve into the meat of why I take this stance, I want to quickly discuss why I had to even assert that I agreed that Johan is a brown-skinned character as its own point on the off-chance someone else encounters the same initial weird impression I did. You can skip this part if you want, I'll put a triple asterisk where this ends (***).

Prior to watching BPA myself, I did some cursory research on the Barbie Movies wiki, prompted by this ask. I put together that Johan was probably the antagonist that was being referred to, but when I was on his page, his wiki picture was just this.

This was all I had to go off of at this point, because he didn't have a screenshot gallery for me to cross-reference him throughout different points in the movie. So the conclusion I drew at the time was "he just looks like a tan white guy". This impression was reinforced by his light eyes and recycled Ken face model. I cross-referenced this with some friends, and we came to the conclusion that at best he looks racially ambiguous, with no reason to think he was a character of color unless there was other indication about his race in the movie itself.

And then I watched the movie. And changed my mind when I saw what he looked like in these scenes.

Johan looks noticeably darker than he did in his single wiki picture, especially when next to other more obviously white characters like Barbie and Amelia. His skin tone is closer to Alphonso whom I would call a brown character pretty confidently in the same movie (I wanted to minimize comparisons across movies to eliminate the possible different variables that would come with it).

While this might not be as noticeable to other people casually watching the movie, I found this a bit jarring myself because I was focusing on his skin tone in particular due to the subject of the ask and my initial impression from the wiki picture when he was arguably at his lightest in the whole movie, as well as when he was introduced he was at his darkest because it was set at night. Also the way the animation team decided to shade him to convey that its nighttime confused me because he looked a lot darker than I thought someone of what I assumed his skin tone would look. And then the next scene with him and Barbie further confused me, because he suddenly got this reddish undertone that really highlighted their difference in skin color.

(Barbie’s hands are on the left and Johan’s are on the right for sake of direct comparison)

Finally, in his last scenes in the movie, Johan's skin tone is most like that of his wiki picture's. Darker than Barbie's when they stand in the same shot but light enough that he could've passed as a tan white guy. What cemented my confusion is that he still looks like this in the throne room, where he was before when dancing with Barbie so it should reasonably have the same lighting and bring out that reddish undertone, but no he still looks like that. So my final conclusion on him was that since he looks like a brown-skinned character in around 2/3s of his scenes and there's a 2D painting of him in the bg when Barbie and Amelia are kidnapped, that he is indeed a brown-skinned character and the animation department probably fucked up their lighting which messed with how uniform his skin tone looked across scenes. ***

Now that I've explained my process of confusion and then final agreement that Johan is indeed brown-skinned, let's discuss how this compounds with other elements to create a rather unfortunate picture. I'm afraid its a bit worse than Anon described.

First off, the added context of the history between Amelia's kingdom of Floravia and his kingdom of Johanistan. Prior to the movie proper, these two countries fought in a war and Johanistan eventually surrendered to Floravia. The two countries signed a treaty that said that after her coronation, Amelia would rule both Floravia and Johanistan.

There is a severe lack of critical details about the war itself, such as what caused it in the first place, which really works to the film’s disadvantage, since the absence of clarity does little to clear up the questionable implications of what is known about the relationship between Floravia and Johanistan.

Amelia’s kingdom is the one that took over Johan’s initially, since they won the war and Johanistan would be ruled by Floravia’s queen, with the implication being that she’d depose Johan’s family, the original ruling family. While the lack of details makes it so it can’t quite be said that Floravia is colonizing Johanistan, it also means that it can’t be said that Floravia is not colonizing Johanistan. What is known about the war is very broadly reminiscent of tactics white people have used to colonize other countries, such as using a war to depose the original royal family for the colonizer’s own gain (the US colonizing Hawaii by staging a coup against their ruling family because the white plantation owners got mad) and putting the other country in a disadvantageous position with a treaty (Opium Wars). This would probably just be viewed as normal Kingdom vs. Kingdom politics if... well Johan wasn’t a character of color.

Combined with viewing this movie through the lens of real-life racial biases (which people are predisposed to do because we're inherently based in reality), the likely conclusion drawn is that this white ruler (Amelia) is effectively ousting a character of color (Johan) and his family out of power and force-assimilating his country, and there's simply not enough clarity about previous events before the movie takes place to dispel it sufficiently.

This also poisons the plot proper because Johan's motivation is to take advantage of the law that the rule of both kingdoms falls to him if Amelia doesn't show up to coronation and regain rule of his own kingdom and Floravia as a nice plus. The intention was probably to show him as greedy for wanting lone rule of Floravia and Johanistan, taken together, it honestly comes across as the movie villianizing a character of color because he wants to regain sovereignty of his own kingdom from a white ruler. Its completely understandable that Amelia wouldn't want to lose her own kingdom especially coming off of war, but also her kingdom is also the one ousting out the previous royal family of Johanistan without giving any good reason why they can't compromise.

The effect would be somewhat mitigated if another character of color had a similarly prominent role as Johan on the side of Barbie, but there's really not. The closest I'd argue would be Alphonso, but he doesn't have equal plot relevance. This does, in my opinion, make Barbie Princess Adventure's plot give off racist vibes like that unknown blogger said. But I do not agree with them that there's a "pattern" of racist undertones in other Barbie movies.

Due to the lack of details of what exactly they meant by a "pattern" of racist undertones, I am assuming they mean a consistent pattern of racism across the movies, for example the movies consistently dipping into anti-Asian sentiments with their villains, or their plots inherently having racist vibes woven into them like I just talked about in BPA.

Despite the Barbie movies occasionally dipping into offensive territory, in my personal experience I have not observed a pattern of racist undertones or consistent racism targeting a specific group. I acknowledge that I could fully be wrong and a lot of things could have slipped past my notice, especially since I have not seen all the movies, but from the ones I have seen I have not observed a pattern with regards to this. However, I will point out the offensive/iffy things in the movies that I know of, with varying degrees of detail depending on how much I can remember. This is by no means a full compendium of all the problematic stuff Barbie films have touched on but these are the ones I am aware of at present.

Barbie of Swan Lake - Antisemitism. There was a TikTok on this somewhere that discussed this more in detail that I can't find but will link if I do, but what I do remember was Rothbart was given an extremely large nose which is reminiscent of the "Jewish nose" ethnic stereotype. Also there was something about his name and Tchaikovsky himself being antisemitic and those views being reflected in his ballet. I don't remember all the details I'm sorry and google wasn't giving me much.

Barbie in the Princess and the Pauper - Antisemitism. Preminger hits a couple of antisemitic stereotypes in the movie, such as having a noticeably larger, hooked nose compared to the other male characters which is reminiscent of the ethnic stereotype of the "Jewish nose" and being greedy and corrupt (literally mining every singe piece of gold out of the mines) which is a stereotype of Jewish people. His name is also of Jewish origin which by itself wouldn’t be a necessarily suspicious thing but combined with those other tropes it does add up.

Barbie Diaries - Tia, a black woman and also the only one with curly hair in the cast, making an iffy comment about "getting the tangles out of her hair". POC with different hair textures have gotten a lot of racist shit for their hair so even though this is a small oneoff comment seeing Tia talk about her hair like this in a negative manner rubbed some of my friends with curly hair wrong.

Barbie in a Mermaid Tale 2 - Polynesian racism. Another friend of mine who is Hawaiian brought this up in Mermaid Tale 2, when Merliah and co decided to have a luau (which is a traditional Hawaiian party or feast usually accompanied by entertainment) in Australia. My friend found it a bit iffy they were doing this when most everyone is white, but what they found worse was when poi was being served in the luau. Poi is a traditional Polynesian dish, but in the movie they claimed it was an Australian and Hawaiian dish, which its not, there’s no Australia in its origin. And then there was a "gag" where the people eating the poi were gagging on it, so essentially this movie was making a joke out of another culture's aesthetics and food.

Barbie Princess Adventure - Reread the above text.

Maybe my sample size isn’t big enough but I’m not seeing a pattern or a trend here, which in my opinion would be a larger cause for concern because for these movies their issues are largely contained to their specific movie, and a pattern would be indication of a wider problem. Maybe you see a pattern I don’t, that would be completely valid.

Now, do I think this means you can’t enjoy Barbie Princess Adventure? No, I’d be a bit of a hypocrite if I said that because I still enjoy some of the Barbie movies I listed above that I just said also have problematic elements (Swan Lake and Princess and the Pauper specifically). But I do think it is good to at the very least be aware of it, hear it out, keep it in mind. At the same time I understand why people would be turned off by this topic because they’re here to have fun riding the serotonin of childhood nostalgia and not delve into discourse.

But I hope I answered your question to your satisfaction Multiverse Anon! I’m going to go take a nap now I’m tired 😭.

[bluinary]

you know what, I have decided I will not leave these in the tags

Every time I read the words "Snk is nazi propaganda" a part of me dies inside

[gayregis]

Oh yeah that reminds me of another question I've been meaning to ask (sorry to jump on you like this haha) but which vampire canon change in B&W annoys you the most? For me it's the whole 'even touching silver will harm a vampire' (when it's explained that Syanna figured out Dettlaff was a vampire because he wouldn't directly touch a silver candlestick). I just choose to ignore that detail bc I don't think it makes much sense haha

omg this is such a good ask im so excited to answer

first of all, i really agree with you, even when i hadn’t read the books fully i had read that one passage in lady of the lake where regis gestures with a silver fork at the banquet, and blood and wine tries to make it so like regis and dettlaff are the same “kind” of vampire, so this obviously doesn’t make any sense, and since it’s just such a small detail i tried to ignore it, like, maybe dettlaff just wanted to keep the silver candlestick fingerprint-free, ever consider that, syanna? you’re gonna pawn something, you don’t want like a billion fingerprints mucking it all up... and then syanna thought this made him a vampire, when in reality he was a vampire but the candlestick had fuckall to do with it

but yeah i think i’m gonna do like a top 5 style: TOP 5 THINGS CDPR GOT WRONG ABOUT THE VAMPIRES. im not gonna do a countdown because im a very direct person and think its best to get the worst out of the way.

1. their society and relationship with humans.

the thing that upsets me the most that cdpr changed is how vampires exist on the continent. stuff like tesham mutna and the unseen elder breaks canon lore so hard it makes me physically upset. 

this is a bad thing because not only is the trope of “vampires control everything from the shadows as a secret society so they can feed on human blood” incredibly boring and overdone (it’s a trope, so it’s something that the witcher should stand to invert since that’s pretty much the purpose of the witcher), but it also has origins in antisemitism (the myth of the illuminati or “reptilians/secret societies controlling the world”, blood libel), so it’s super gross! i don’t want the vampires to be that trope, that’s completely unfair.

they already were something other than that trope, they already HAD their own society (or lack thereof) as part of the canon lore. maybe it is personal preference, but i think that their “anti-society” is super interesting. how does something like that function with no rules or figures of authority or customs? it’s incredibly different to the ways humans function in this universe, who are mostly bound around their nation, city/town/village, and home unit, and abide by strict custom and systems of authority. it’s really something to be explored from a lore perspective, there wasn’t a whole lot explained in canon (for good reason: see #2) so it has perfect potential to be elaborated upon in the adaptational spinoff that is the witcher games.

it makes them super boring and trope-y to have them all kowtow to One Figure Of Authority in the area. plus CDPR states that the reason toussaint is so perfect is that this secret society controls toussaint as an area to perfect blood, when toussaint literally existed as a fairy-tale duchy to be an OBSTACLE to geralt and his hansa in the saga. it was the “leave-your-quest” test. think of the island of the lotus eaters from the odyssey. it’s a perfect place, there’s no reason as to why it is perfect, it just is, and it keeps the company hostage there for months so they will get distracted and eventually forget what they came there for. 

in canon as well, vampires do not seem to care much about humans. regis certainly does, but he is regis :). there was little conversation about how vampires view humans, rather about how humans view vampires and project their innermost fears and desires to them. further breaking some vampire tropes. in blood & wine. instead of that trope-flipping, we get... “vampires tortured humans out of curiosity and selfishness.” what? why would they do this? there is not much to gain, and it would take a lot of cooperation and effort to get to this point, which leads me to ask, HOW could they do this? as regis says in bof, there were only about 1,200 vampires when they arrived on the continent, so they were completely and utterly outnumbered as they were likely scattered around. they wouldn’t be able to build a castle and re-engineer toussaint to fit their needs. i understand that he is massively biased, but i feel like regis calls these first vampires “hapless survivors” for a reason, and also since regis is regis, i do not feel like he would feel this way about them if they committed massive crimes against humanity.

tl;dr for this point: not only is it fucked up for no reason but to be gross/shocking to the audience, but it also removes their purpose as a metaphor, which is #2.

2. the removal of their purpose as a metaphor in the story.

originally, the vampires are not meant to be the focus of the witcher series or even a smaller part of the series at all. they are simply a metaphor for aspects of human society so that regis can have a backstory. the vampires are nothing more than a fictional means of exploring the effects of alcoholism, and a thought experiment as to what an authority-less, family-less, custom-less society would be like. the question “what do youth do when they have no support and no guidance?” already is one of the witcher’s major questions as a saga, the vampires and regis’s backstory serves to be another one of the stories within it that fits this theme. except we add more conditions to the thought experiment this time, like “what if these youth never aged and were powerful enough to survive on their own?” there would be no reason for them to ever change or grow out of their behavior. it’s quite interesting, because it’s meant to reflect upon human nature, the vampires are metaphorically humans. there is no reason for regis to even be a vampire, except that he needs to be able to survive death and learn from his mistakes. a human would have died had he hit rock bottom like regis did, but since regis wasn’t human and could rise from the grave, he had the chance at a new life. humans don’t get second chances. this is the point of the entire story being about vampires.

now, i understand that the purpose of the witcher games is to entertain, unlike the point of the witcher book series, which are like any other books and serve an author’s message. so, it stands to reason that the vampires do not have to prove a strong point here, but they should retain their essential traits and serve as the metaphor which was already really interesting and deserves more explanation and thought. i think using a fictional lens to take a look at real-world issues can be helpful sometimes, when done respectfully and when still using creativity. even if it’s just to entertain, that doesn’t mean it should be brainless and throw all of the commentary out of the window.

the vampires as a subject for the game to focus on should really be a vessel for thought and critique. it should mean SOMETHING for them to be there, because they were originally a message and a metaphor.

but in blood & wine, they are incredibly shallow, only there to exist for the attention-getter of gore.

does it MEAN anything that dettlaff regenerated regis from his own flesh and blood? or does that just happen because we needed a convienient way to bring regis back and tie him to the antagonist? does it MEAN anything that dettlaff cuts off his own hand? or is that just because it’s cool and kinda gross. does it MEAN anything that the vampires attack beauclair? or is that just because there needed to be some violence and conflict.

there is no deeper meaning! it’s all just flashiness to shock the audience! it’s incredibly shallow and because it is shallow, it becomes boring and forgettable.

blood & wine focuses on details about the vampires that are gross, gorey or bloody, uncomfortable because of how nasty they are. and these elements have NO PURPOSE to the story other than to gross you out, like regis being regenerated, dettlaff skewering regis like a kebab, dettlaff cutting off his hand and that hand being handled by the bruxa, geralt, and regis, regis going crazy in a cage, syanna also getting skewered, etc. ... it’s this focus on the physical action that is happening on screen with little thought as to any deeper meaning that makes me tired and nauseous. why treat the vampires as savage animals?

as a mention in this topic, i am going to comment on how they deliberately changed the lore to “make childrens’ blood taste better than adults’ blood,” because that is mega-gross. why change it to focus on child endangerment? that’s nasty! why make orianna feed on children when it was LITERALLY canon that the “best” blood was that of strong adults? if you want to make orianna morally grey, she could have owned any other kind of place to get blood from. see #2 for more discussion of this.

3. their focus on the conjunction of the spheres.

the vampires never had this obsession with “returning home.” i... have no idea where this comes from. remember how i just said that i appreciate a metaphor for real-life when it is done respectfully? CDPR gave us this awkward metaphor for the vampires “wanting to go home” because they have to “assimilate” in this new world, apparently every vampire ever misses their homeland. ... it’s the story of immigrants who didn’t have a choice to be born in The New Land, but they were anyways, and now they want to go home. and it’s the story of minority groups, who are overshadowed by the society they live in, but cannot be themselves in, because it would mean violence. 

this is an incredibly awkward metaphor just because it’s not done well, but also CDPR literally just focused on how extremely violent the vampires are, and how they also control everything so they can use the humans they were thrown in with to their own fancies. this is... i didn’t know that the metaphors for fantasy racism in the witcher could get any worse than sapkowski’s were.

also, there’s some weird lore-breaking moments when regis says he misses the vampire homeworld or whatever, and i just am left staring at my laptop like. you’re only like, 4 centuries old, regis. the conjunction of the spheres occured more than 3 times your age in the past. plus the fact that regis in baptism of fire calls himself a “descendant,” it’s obvious that someone at cdpr just didn’t do their research when writing those lines.

4. their power level and exactly how powerful they are. 

let’s take a moment to think about a grain of truth. the second story in the witcher books, it was written before sapkowski had a lot of the vampire lore down-pat. geralt says things like “it’s silver, this blade is silver” and “an ordinary vampire couldn’t come out in the sun,” which are incongruent with what we learn in baptism of fire about vampires. but nevertheless, there’s a lot which is still accurate to the vampires, such as that VEREENA ABSOLUTELY KICKS GERALT’S ASS. geralt very nearly DIED in that fight, he was ABOUT to die, but nivellen saved him at the last split-second. geralt finds out that vereena is a bruxa, and he is alarmed, he shouts and then falls on his ass. he scrambles, he’s unprepared to deal with a foe THIS powerful. he manages to land his sword on her during the fight, but it barely harms her. she dodges incredibly, and swipes of his sword that should have hit do not. she screams terribly, and geralt is in incredible, writhing pain. he uses his signs to help him, this is no normal fight with a normal foe. flash forward to in baptism of fire, when geralt meets another vampire, one that is considerably more powerful and unique than vereena was. dandelion asks geralt, if ... potentially... maybe... and geralt responds that he sincerely doubts that he could beat regis in a fight, and he really does not want to have to try.

geralt was BESTED by vampires in the books. he was as close as a witcher can get to being INTIMIDATED by their power. but what happens in blood & wine? there’s like 8 bruxae and alpors ganging up on you and you can easily vanquish all of them with your silver sword and by knocking back maybe a glass of black blood and white raffard’s decoction. it’s fine, it’s easy to kill vampires. geralt doesn’t hesitate to fight dettlaff. he doesn’t worry, he doesn’t tell anyone that he sincerely doubts that he could beat him in a fight, that he doesn’t want to have to try. instead, it’s regis talking geralt out of the fight, trying to advocate for peace. 

CDPR massively nerfed the vampires just to make them easier targets for the player. i think this is unfair to how the vampires were powerful threats to be reckoned with in the books, foes that even geralt, a witcher, did not want to face. not even out of geralt’s pacifism and apprehension to slay innocent and/or sentient beings, but out of not wanting to fucking hit that die button

i also understand that regis was supposedly less powerful now because he was just tired from being regenerated, but vampires like bruxae should have been able to turn into giant bats. there’s nothing stopping them besides cdpr not wanting to code it in, just like how they didn’t want to code in bruxae or alpors wearing clothes (because vampires do wear clothes in canon).

5. their classification: adding new vampire species, distinguishing between “higher vampires” and “TRUE higher vampires”

just plain annoying to me. there’s only seven types of vampires, as regis says in baptism of fire: 

“In the case of higher vampires, never, I agree,” Emiel Regis said softly. “From what I know alpors, katakans, moolas, bruxas, and nosferats don’t mutilate their victims. On the other hand, fleders and ekimmas are pretty brutal with their victim’s remains.”

“Bravo,” Geralt said, looking at him in genuine admiration. “You didn’t leave out a single class of vampire, Nor did you mention any of the imaginary ones, which only exist in fairy-tales.”

so there are seven classes... five of which are higher vampires which can probably be classified by having sentient thought and not harming their victims, two of which are lesser vampires, which are quite violent with their victims and more animalistic for this reason.

also i am confused as to why CDPR made fleders the least likely to sustain flight, when their name i’m pretty certain is taken from fledermaus, the german word for bat, which just means flying mouse (feel free to correct me if i’m wrong, idk german), so “fleder” should just mean “flutter,” or “to fly.” 

SO. it’s total bullshit to be like “there’s some higher vampires and then TRUE/REAL higher vampires, which cannot be killed...” and it confuses everyone as to who is ACTUALLY a higher vampire and who is not, when the system we had before wasn’t broken at all!

BONUS. general changes to vampire powers

it annoys me how they turn into puffs of mist/smoke instead of vanishing, simply vanishing. no deeper reason why, it just bothers me because you’re not supposed to be able to see them at all, that’s the point of turning invisible/incorporeal.

there was no mention or demonstration of how regis can hypnotize people, even though that was probably his most frequently used vampire power in the books asides from turning invisible/incorporeal. it showed that even though he was very powerful, he opted to use his passive powers and nonviolent routes of dealing with people.

i think it also makes the vampires way overpowered to be able to regenerate each other with each other’s blood ... and it takes away from the finality of stygga... also them just flying and turning into bats whenever they want, as if regis didn’t say that he can only turn into a bat during a full moon. they made them overpowered and still made it super easy for geralt to kill them. alright

[transrightsjimin]

I'm asking as a confused trans and gay person regarding some of your recent posts saying aphobia doesn't exist, etc. Do you consider asexual people to be inherently LGBT even if they are cisgender and straight (heteroromantic)? I don't want to discriminate at all, I'm just confused because I see people fighting on here all the time about whether aces are part of the LGBT community or not. Do you have some insight for me as an ace nonbinary person? Thanks in advance!

no it’s fine lol dw!

i’m not sure how to explain this w/o being too extensive in what i say bc i’ve talked about this before but more in private conversations (and maybe some rants in tumblr posts) nd i tend to ramble abt it.

first of all i do not actually like the common conception that there is one way to define LGBT or the idea that everyone should fall within that category term or not, for example because the English language is colonial and rigid and does not reflect on experiences of all cultures, bc being gay or trans are not distinctly different experiences everywhere while they would be divided into different categories. so whereas i was more insistent on saying ‘you must be gay / bi / lesbian / trans to be LGBT / suffer from homophobia or transphobia’ i’ve come to realize now that this argument is rather exclusive of many gender diverse identities that do not correspond to all experiences or cultures. so i will stay away from using that argument.

however, i am speaking from my experience with online LGBT and asexual communities and have seen how the latter has tried to force itself into the other. i think a large issue with the asexual and aromantic communities is that they are partially based upon the creation of AVEN, an online forum founded by a homophobic and antisemitic man, and partially (though related to the former) by just blatantly made up statistics and history. not once have i seen a good argument or research or even personal accounts that illustrate very well why aphobia is a thing. i am asexual myself but do not want to take the lack of discrimination i faced for it as proof. there have been accounts of ‘aphobic’ discrimination that are either 1. much more a general concern with the OP facing misogyny and girls being sexualized, 2. someone making a remark based on a misconception of OP’s experiences or 3. misappropriation of terms and applying them to asexuality, e.g. ‘corrective rape’ was coined to refer to (African) lesbians who were assaulted under the presumption that it would turn them straight. asexuals have appropriated this term years ago to claim asexual people face rape on a large scale because perpetrators try to force them into liking sex. some people don’t even know the original meaning of the term because of this. i’m also not a big fan of this new interpretation of the term anyway, because legit sexual attraction is not the main reasons people commit rape; it is to seek power. this kind of mindset of asexual people being inherently vulnerable to sexual violence due to lack of feeling sexual attraction is seriously harmful; in the crime show Law and Order SVU, a suspect was let off because some main character said the suspect was asexual and this couldn’t have done it. people can be and sometimes are raped by an asexual person, because it is about taking advantage of someone and not attraction. the sole fact that so many authors of overly fetishistic fanfiction are asexual should prove this much, but instead the lack of attraction is used to distance oneself from the harm one can still cause.

and yes, asexual people can face discrimination, especially if you’re a girl you’re expected to be sexually submissive, which is pretty horrifying on its own. but this is not the same as targeted discrimination on a mass scale or institutional whatsoever. we are not thaught as we grow old that asexuals are disgusting, are a joke, or need to be violently murdered. my biggest issue with the asexual and aromantic community that we (as i have removed myself from it years ago) keep telling it that anecdontal accounts of being mildly discriminated is nowhere near the same as risking being kicked out of your house, being violently attacked due to the way you appear or having a partner of the same gender, being systematically discriminated by all sorts of institutions in society and being thaught that what you are is bad from an early age on. and then the counterargument is that LGBT is more recognized but asexual and aromantic isn’t, so ‘ace / aro’ people deserve to be included because they are underrepresented in media. but that is not the case at all. the speed at which asexuality has suddenly been incorporated and included into LGBT spaces, also offline, has been ridiculously fast. nowadays when you see a bunch of LGBT flags you see the asexual one being included a lot, sometimes in 3 different versions, while the lesbian flag is nowhere to be seen. lesbians are consistently excluded from their supposedly own community and they are not included in LGBT due to a need to change underrepresentation or lack of awareness, but because they face their own version of homophobia. the most mind-boggling thing about cis / cishet asexual and aromantic people being told that they are not oppressed, is that the response is not relief (’oh i’m glad i don’t face systematic oppression for this thing’) but anger (’how dare you not let us into your group!’). LGBT is seen as a fun party that is unnecessarily mean to anyone it gatekeeps, as if it is not actually necessary to keep out cishet people who benefit from their privilege and can use that against the rest in the group if they join.

my largest issue with the asexual community however, and i’ve touched upon this a bit before in the post, is that it victimizes itself, to such a degree where it puts itself oppositional to ‘allosexuals’. the whole idea that people who experience sexual attraction to another person are inherently privileged over abd hold power over asexual people is just not true (and the same goes for this rethoric for aromantic people). this idea is so wrong and the whole concept of the ‘allosexual’ as oppressor collapses once you consider that people who are attracted to the same gender are actually in danger and oppressed for their very attraction. not only are those who experience attraction (that isnt platonic) to other people portrayed as oppressors, but also as perverted freaks. once i decided to stop associating myself with acearo people and instead interact with LGBT people with other experiences, i realized just how much stigmatizing abd frankly, homophobic and transphobic bullshit i’ve adopted within the spaces i used to be in and that i still see gather a lot of traction (now their harmful points are also used on twitter and IRL in the public domain). the community has a huge issue where it teaches you to be puzzled and grossed out by people who want to date / kiss / have sex with other people, and this results in GSAs that now include asexuals to prohibit kissing your partner per request of asexual / aromantic members, asexual people showing up at pride with ‘can we just hug?’ signs, the common serophobic jokes (’at least we dont get hiv!!’ blergh), and for me it led to a great discomfort with kissing and sex imagery and it wasn’t until i left the community that this was in fact subtle homophobia because so much content on here is lgbt themed and to combine that with the increasing aversion to romance or sex without critically looking at that is... very toxic to say the least.

so where it’s standing right now, i don’t think including asexual or aromatic people in LGBT spaces on the basis of those identities is a good idea. one community advocates for the acceptance of sex, whereas the other is stigmatizing it and painting off those who are in fact oppressed for their transness or homosexuality, as the oppressors. it clashes and it doesn’t work. the ‘ace / aro’ community (quote unquote bc i see ‘ace’ being used a lot to imply superiority over ‘allosexuals’ like, theyre being the ace at something) has too many issues, which it is largely based on, to figure out. it can be a community on its own and i do not think you need to join LGBT to have a valid identity that has something to do with sexuality or gender and deals with a form of stigma.

it woukd be a rant, i warned you lol

[returnofthejudai]

What do you think of people (rightfully) pointing out that the countries on trumps ban list have Israelis banned from their countries too? Even though I 100% agree with the frustration that the Israel ban hasn't been getting the same attention and has even been justified by antisemitic leftist and rightists, I felt like some people around me tried to justify trumps bans by saying that in return those countries ban Israelis and idk i just don't see that as a justification even tho i agree? Like

2 I can only talk for Iran/Iranians but for one, the ban includes all people with those nationalities with no regards to their religion (even tho trump said he plans to make an exception if there's a case of immediate danger/persecution). Second (and that's what's scaring the shit out of me) the ban is applied to dual citizens too. For example I was born in Germany but have a German and Iranian passport bc my parents are Iranians and you automatically get an IR passport when your father has 1.

It doesn't matter that I wasn't born in Iran and that my parents have spent over half of their lives in Germany etc, the ban also includes people like me. Not to mention that a huge chunk of Iranians are either atheists, have converted to another religion or at least are VERY secular (like if you ask them they might say they identify as Muslim but they haven't visited a mosque in years, barely read the Quran etc like my dad for instance). Many people under this ban are also escaping that cruel

3 regime. That same regime that is banning Israelis is also persecuting and killing its own people on a daily basis. I guess what I want to tell the people who are rightfully pointing out to the fate of Israelis: believe me, many, many Iranians wish to live in peace and coexistence with Israelis, but can we honestly except from them to fight openly for Israelis when they can't even fight for their own rights without risking jail, torture and death? *sigh* I'm warmed by the overwhelming support

4 the Jewish communities are always lending to those in need, including now during the protests since yesterday on; its so inspiring bc you never shy away from standing next to the people who have done you bad, in the past and in the present. And I think mainly it's just the people I'm befriended with and follow in MY social media who have posted things like "Muslim ban is maybe not ok but hmmm those same countries ban Israelis so" which at some point started frustrating me ugh like I said I can

5 only talk for Iranians, im not familiar with the other countries, their societies etc, but at some point it didn't feel fair anymore and i think both bans are so complex and have been released during different situations, like I don't see an exact similarity between a dictatorship and a free democracy. And the people escaping from those countries don't deserve to be punished for their regimes actions (my friends tho sounded a bit like that), they didn't chose them... do you get what i mean? :/

I think the key point is individuals don’t deserve to be punished for the actions of their governments. This should apply universally. By the same token, people shouldn’t be judged by the most extreme actions of people of their ethnicity, their race, or their religion. And yet this has been done continually throughout human history. Travel bans are wrong. Shutting out refugees is wrong. Judging people by citizenship is wrong. The only way to change this is to visibly fight for each other and work to replace abusive governments. It’s a hard fight, but one that can be won.

[afrodesiaq]

i see lots of people reblogging the film short without the accompanying author text:

https://www.tribecafilm.com/stories/the-truth-according-to-darren-wilson-a-narrative-ferguson-mike-brown

we don’t need to speculate about the author intentions on this crappy wannabe deep film student looking piece of crap, because they’ve written an explanation telling us their intentions.

some highlights of the words of the filmmakers themselves explaining this trash:

“However, our outrage and surprise, our desire to point at this murder, isolate it and choose a side reveals the comfort that we posses in holding onto the pain that we’ve been prescribed. This is our collective identity, divisive by nature, easier to hold on to than letting go to find something new.”

“Our reaction as artists to the ongoing situation was to try and find “that mettle” to seek a way to personify and close the gap between us and Darren Wilson, to move past the standard display of shock and disbelief. This is an issue beyond race; this is a question of our humanity and moral fabric. This requires us to examine what makes us up, what we stand for and why no matter how great our outrage, do we continue to point our anger at the other as opposed to an acknowledgement of our collective responsibility.”

“If we agree that we live in a country born of violence that reacts with acts of violence when cornered, then perhaps we could begin to find a new way to look at the situation. We could explore what happens to us when we take a human life, what happens to the collective psyche when we attempt to assign personal blame or justification alone.”

im putting all this here not because i think it’s in any way necessary for people to read it in order to get that the movie was sending a shitty racist message. i think the piece stands on its own and there’s no need to read the text to understand that it is damaging and hurtful.

but the sheer number of nonblack people who have watched this film and proceeded to attack black people for the widest range of bullshit is galling.

people been coming at us for the most trivial nonsense, as if we are uniquely incapable of understanding our own oppression and need it explained to us, condescendingly. as if the only reasons we look at a thing and get upset is that we are brutish thugs, hyper aggressive and possessed of greater antisemitism and homophobia than any other community: our pain can’t possibly be genuine but must only stem from a desire to hurt others. as if we’re plain and simple too stupid and unsophisticated to understand the depth of ~*art*~ and if we were more intelligent complex creatures then we would have the capacity to understand, as nonblack people do, that this isn’t racist at all!

and it’s tiring, and ugly, and transparent, how everyone will trip over themselves to demonize us rather than treat us as people who deserve respect and a say in issues that affect us. and even if people are just fully committed to their racism, it’s equally transparent how far this commitment to denying their fave could have done any thing wrong ever and insisting the mean, aggressive, antisemitic, homophobic black people are just being bigoted and violent like we do.

because 10 seconds of looking into things gets you the link above, gets you the filmmakers’ own explanation. which explicitly states it is about humanizing darren wilson. explicitly states it is about framing this issue as Not Just Race. explicitly frames the film in looking at both sides bullshit. explicitly frames black anger at our own murders as divisive and misdirected. explicitly states it is about not wanting to assign individual blame to a goddamn murderer who killed a black child because it’s more important to examine how that murder must have made him feel. this isn’t conjecture, it’s right the fuck there in their own words.

Yeah, I also disagreed with them about the ezra Miller situation, but there was some posts about it I saw that were very antisemitic and transphobic and when someone else said it was directed by a black activist about how he was a liar I did for a while think it was just antisemitism and transphobia that was motivating the sudden hate. I did more research and saw it wasn't but if I had posted before I did research I would've made the same mistake because I was defensive.

Honestly (and I’m going to take the time to say this here) as a queer person I really hope that this backlash somehow reaches Ezra’s ears and that as a whole we get this conversation off of tumblr and on twitter and facebook. That we get it sorted out because he’s going to be with us for a LONG TIME. I mean the guy is literally going to be headling his own film as the Flash in 2020.  I want him to apologize for that film and acknowledge that while he’s living up in vermont attending to goat births or posing for photoshoots we’re over here fretting and getting into lengthy internet debates about the merits of his pointless film. Like he could have made a film to celebrate the life of Mike Brown and that mourned the tragedy of a life cut short. Here’s the film if you want to watch it for yourself. trigger warnings for discussion of police brutality, murder, lying (from what I remember I’m pretty sure Mike didn’t attack him? and he certain didn’t have the strength of a hulk?) https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2018/11/actor-ezra-miller-accused-sympathizing-white-supremacy/

one thing that I hated was that it makes it seem like Wilson’s actor got a little kid voice at the beginning, high and childlike.  then they try to make it seem like he’s having a panic attack.  like yes he’s acting but they could have given him a coach or something to make it more explicit because you don’t see he’s just rehearsing until the end. They could have juxtaposed his “truth” with the facts of the case which most white people don’t bother themselves with which are an 18 Black unarmed boy was gunned down for a crime he didn’t commit. When evidence like this is still surfacing https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/11/us/michael-brown-ferguson-police-shooting-video.html 

Like honestly if we could just get Ezra to say, “hey I’m sorry that film was in poor taste and we tried something but it didn’t work quite how we wanted.”  I think that could go a long way.  But yeah its not just about transphobia or anti semitism. though if some people are being transphobic like our own mod ro’s post or anti semitic in their anger that’s not cool either. 

mod mal

[hartsnkises]

Gettlefish

Anontisemite: Whether or not you're willing to admit it, whether or not you even realize it, you are oppressed. I mean look at the ridiculous dress code, being forced to cover everything from toes to hair, just put on some pants already and don't wear long sleeves when it's too hot, it's not healthy! Being forced to be a housewife and bear children, you're living like it's 1950. You are supporting patriarchy and holding back feminism by adhering to a patriarchal religion.

Gentileproblems: I’m being oppressed by dressing how I want you guuuyyyzzzzz…. :( I don’t know how I stand it.

Also, literally nobody is making me get married? I’ll get married and have children because that’s what I want out of life, but those aren’t the only things I want, for crying down the sink! My ambitions won’t end the moment I get engaged, because I’m an actual human being, not a weird cause for you to champion without my say-so. Get lost, I’m not interested.

Anontisemite: Look honey, it's not your fault that you don't recognize your own oppression but you and other women like you need help. Religion is merely a farce created by men to control women. The feminist cause wants to help you, that's what we're here for. Of course you think you're husband will let you chase your ambitions once your married but that's not how religious marriage works. You'll be nothing but a trussed slave and that's a tragedy.

Gentileproblems: Can someone please tell Jacob he is oppressing me he still hasn’t messaged me back and I’m thinking this is to do with our horrible patriarchal religion.

Arothejew: Jacob! Young man, what do you have to say for yourself

Jacob-the-pianist: I'm sorry I'm male, I'm sorry I'm white, I'm sorry I'm male, I'm sorry I'm white

Anontisemite: Oh you poor girl. I hope one day you'll realizing how vile and silly the Jewish religion is because you need help. You could have such a full, happy life but instead you've confined yourself to misery and you don't even know it.

Gentileproblems: 1/10 trolling try harder next time

Anontisemite: I assure you I am not trolling, I want to help you and women like you. I have no problems with Jews but I do have a problem with Judaism and organized religions that inherently oppress women.

Gentileproblems: Kay sure… how about you help by listening to us, rather than fighting for us? I’m not feeling particularly oppressed, here. Are you?

Gentileproblems (general): did anon seriously think sending me anonymous messages telling me my entire culture was Wrong would make me want to convert? Oh, goyim…

Satirenon 1: breaking news an anti semitic anon has caused jews everywhere to decide to be atheists OH NO IT'S HAPPENING TO MEEE *all memory of anything relating to judaism in my life is suddenly gone and i am now a free un oppressed woman*

Gentileproblems: oh, teach me your ways, un-oppressed one! is there hope for one such as me, comfortable in her religion and proud of her people? or will i have to moulder in the cave of deluded yidden… only time will tell.

Anontisemite: Oh honey, I don't want you to convert. I want you to be a secular, free independent woman who doesn't rely on a misogynistic culture of lies and rules designed to keep you oppressed. Surely deep down you realize organized religion is a farce created by men? It's so obvious. If you weren't tied to a backwards culture that didn't allow women education you'd be able to comprehend better. I'm so sorry, please learn to accept help when it's extended. That is what feminism is here for.

Gentileproblems: white feminism has reached its zenith

Anontisemite: I am not certainly not antisemitic, I do not hate Jews, I want to help their women. What I hate Judaism, Islam and any organized religion. They are forms of misogynistic, systematic oppression.

Gentileproblems: 'I'm not raaaaaacist, I just hate these two heavily racialised religions…'

Anontisemite: though i too was once proud of my religion and my people i have seen the light and become a truely liberated woman 100% of anti semitic feminists agree that it is the right course of action so let go of the misogynistic tethers of religion and truely free yourself from your harmful self oppression like i did

Gentileproblems: assimilate and let go of your culture i a random anon know far more about it than you do

Satirenon 1: HELP THE SECOND STAGE IS HAPPENING I FEEL MYSELF BECOMING KNOWLEDGEABLE I NOW UNDERSTAND MY WROOONGS OH THE LIGHT OF SEEING THE WORLD FREE FROM THE HORRIBLE LIES THAT RELIGION TOLD ME I NOW AM EDUCATEEED

Gentileproblems: at the third stage, you ascend to a higher plane of existence, like on the original Stargate show.

Commentanon 1: i hate judaism but im teeeechiiincally not anti semitic right? -actual quote from the anon

Gentileproblems: i know, like how do you even rationalise that what even

Anontisemite: I am not antisemitic, I am antireligion. All I want is to end the systematic oppression of women inherent to Judaism and Islam. It is my life's mission and one day I hope to save all of the women like you, women who trapped and hurting and don't even know it.

Gentileproblems: Did you know Judaism and Islam are the only perpetrators of misogyny ever? GREYFACE TELLS ALL!

Commentanon 2: oh g-d of course anon doesnt include christianity just islam and judaism yet somehow aren't anti semitic or islamaphobic right? anti religion yet only against the two religions with the most hate and violence directed towards them? totally just looking out for women right?

Gentileproblems: i know, right? noooo bias there, no siree….

Anontisemite: You can still be a Jew, you can eat bagels and gettlefish and all of that, but you should be able to wear regular clothes without having rocks thrown at you, have intercourse without needing to do it through a cloth with a hole, not be forced to live separately from other people once a month. It's barbaric. Help me help you. Help me help women like you. This is going to be my career, rescuing the downtrodden women of archaic religious cults.

Gentileproblems: Okay, this is actually genuinely offensive. Where on Earth did you learn about Judaism, Stormfront? For G-d’s sake, choose another career at the very least- nobody will want to be rescued by you.

Commentanon 3: These anons today are even more ludicrous than last week's neo-nazis. Seriously talk about being so "open-minded" that your brains fall out and your mind closes again behind them.

Gentileproblems: Tell me about it, I have a permanent look of disgust etched onto my face by now.

Commentanon 4: Don't let them bother you. That one is literally a xtian-atheist religious missionary. Just treat them like you would any other xtian missionary.

Gentileproblems: 'Nope, I don't want your holy book… I've already got one…. it's vintage…'

Commentanon 5: wtf anon and ur stiiiiill not anti semitic? i'm waiting for what exactly anons definition of anti semitism is or does it even exist since how can you oppress someone who wants to oppressed or whatever they are trying to say jewish women are doing

Gentileproblems: it’s a horrible, horrible journey of ‘not antisemitic i swear’ and i can’t get off

Satirenon 2: I want to be offended but all I can focus on now is gettlefish. Seriously. GETTLEFISH

Gentileproblems: It’s like kettle crisps mixed with gefilte fish, I assume.

Commentanon 6: anon is just jealous of the way i work this super cute skirt with my bright colorful tights and that my marriage will be more emotionally fulfilling because it's not about sex all the time (it's also been proven that because a husband and wife can't have each other sexually all the time they appreciate it more when they do)

Gentileproblems: Oh my gosh, talk frum fashion to me! And I’ve never heard of that second point- I shall Google at once!

Commentanon 7: is gettlefish like non kosher gefilte fish?

Gentileproblems: I think this is one of those things that ‘everyone knows’ about Jews except for Jews

Commentanon 7: oh like hanukkah trees? (always spelled that way because fuck the original hebrew spellings lets at 2 k's for the hell of it because goyim)

Gentileproblems: yep, that’s totally A Thing, because judaism is christianity in a funny hat.

Anontisemite: I don't know what Stormfront, I'm a New Age nondenominational culturally Christian atheist Buddhist. As I've already explained to you I am not antisemitic or islamaphobic, I am anti-Judaism and anti-Islam. Goodness, I wish you were allowed an education where they teach you these things. I don't have a problem with the secular women and I want to help the poor souls who are 'religious' (rapped). It's the men I take issue with, for forcing girls with potential into little more than slaves.

Gentileproblems: Rapped? Did Tupac put you up to this or something? And good grief, that first sentence is the most white-goy line I have ever read.

Satirenon 3: help i think i actually got second hand white goy from that first sentence im dying

Gentileproblems: do you have a weird urge to get a backwards hebrew tattoo? we’ll find a cure, i swear

Satirenon 4: Before your anon I was living my life as a poor, oppressed woman, trapped by the men in my life forcing me to observe archaic rules. This, despite the fact I am a baalat teshuva who was inspired by women and doesn't actually have any men in my life. Not married and absent non-Jewish dad, but they're both oppressing me quite a lot. Thanks to the anon I've realized I can again be free. I will give up my meaningful and beautiful culture that I love. I shall eat gettlefish and run wild.

Gentileproblems: The sarky responses to my anons are the actual best thing. And seriously, someone needs to come up with a recipe for gettlefish, pronto.

Satirenon 5: for gettlefish you should first go to your local store and pick up a few things, gefilte fish, matzo ball mix, latke mix, bagels, lox, chopped liver and cream cheese (just to make sure it isn't kosher). Now go home, and get out a very large mixing bowl and put all of the ingredients into it and mix thoroughly. Place in a large casserole dish and bake until crispy and then eat because it is the single most jewish food in the world according to goyim, add some bacon if you really want to

Gentileproblems: That’s so disgusting I dare someone to make it

Satirenon 5: make it and send to the anon

Gentileproblems: Where do I send it? The Castle of Denial?

Commentanon 8: I literally can't stop laughing. They probably mean to write trapped but I prefer to think they put 'rapped' in parentheses because they want everything in that sentence to be rapped out loud as you read. Break it down now, rap about helping the poor souls.

Gentileproblems: lay me some tasty beats, jumblr. “I don’t like your people but I’m not racist, I swear…”

Satirenon 6: I think your anon is magic. I was a happily oppressed religious women but then I read everything she wrote and

suddenly the world is new, suddenly I am new. My curly hair became straight! My skirt disappeared and was replaced by skinny jeans! I don't know if I can handle all of this freedom yet though, not without a man to guide me. Change me back, oh powerful saviour anon! I'm not ready!

Gentileproblems: Please, we need you to be our white saviour! Oh, whatever shall we do?

Commentanon 9: What the actual fuck is a "New Age nondenominational culturally Christian atheist Buddhist"? Is that a thing?

Gentileproblems: Apparently so… oy.

Satirenon 7: HELP! I chose to practice modesty by covering my hair on holy days and I think I've oppressed myself! Already men are making me little more than a slave although I have an education and so much potential. Damn my religious choices!

Gentileproblems: Gosh darn it straight to heck! Deciding for yourself how you want to be seen, how dare you! That’s for the New Age Christian Buddhist whateveritwas to do!

Anontisemite: I'm sorry to see that you and your friends have resorted to making fun of good intentions. You may not think you need my help but me and other feminists will continue fighting for you nonetheless. I promise that one day we will create a world where you can be free from the bonds of oppressive misogynist religious law and archaic cultural traditions. You are only using negativity to lash out because you fear change, as your religion has taught you. But change is good and it will free you.

Gentileproblems: ngl i laughed

Commentanon 10: I feel like calling you honey just makes the whole thing so patronizing like stop listening to that religion that tells you what to do, I'm going to tell you what to do instead.

Gentileproblems: i knooow! like they don’t even know me! it’s gross as heck frankly- but i’m glad my followers are finding it funny.

Satirenon 8: help though im a lesbian my religion is compelling me to marry a man and become his subservient wife saaavee meeeeee

Gentileproblems: Must…. resist….. anon’s interpretation…. of my religion!

Satirenon 9: Oh..oh my goodness, my magen david necklace was sooo tight and it was choking me but that anon magically broke it and now i can breathe thank g-d or wait am i not supposed to do that anymore

Gentileproblems: Thank Richard Dawkins, probably.

Satirenon 10: anon nooo even though my religion teaches to question our laws and to change with the times it is suddenly morphing into everything you say it iiisss

Gentileproblems: Anon is, in fact, Haruhi Suzumiya

Anontisemite: Laughing is only a defense mechanism but one day you will be grateful for our movement :). There is an ever growling movement of feminist women against organized religion like yours whose mission is to save women like you. We are very well educated about Judaism and your culture and we will help you to adjust to the modern world. Misogyny and systematic oppression of women through forced dress codes and throwing rocks won't happen to you, no one will hurt you. You don't have to fear change.

Gentileproblems: Seriously, who keeps spreading the idea that religious women can’t be feminists? This is frankly depressing, and why we need to educate goyim to free them from their horrible, misogynistic, blinkered ideologies :(

Commentanon 11: It's hard to be convincing when they're sending asks on Anon. Like that's the least personal thing you could do.

Gentileproblems: I know, eh? When it started, I was actually pretty sure they were that ‘women don’t need feminism’ blog from a couple of hours ago, but now I’m not so sure…

Satirenon 11: white feminist goy barbie, she talks! you pull her string and she spouts nonsense!! (idk if anon is actually a she but like you get my point)

Gentileproblems: I kind of hope so, actually, because think of how much more creepy and paternalistic it would be if anon was male.

Commentanon 12: As opposed to cultural Christian atheist Buddhism, which is entirely disorganized.

Gentileproblems: *sniggering* Anyway, correct me if I’m wrong but isn’t the Dalai Lama very much against converts to Buddhism?

Satirenon 12: I somehow seem to have put on a long skirt. Someone please send a secular white "feminist" to help me.

Gentileproblems: I keep thinking of that Monty Python skit, you know, with the peasant shouting ‘Help! Help! I’m being oppressed!’

Anontisemite: Honey, you're being silly! I already have an education because in out free feminist culture women are allowed to learn. You can do it too! And of course a religious women can't be a feminist, it's the exact opposite of feminist. Religion, especially Judaism and Islam, is the source of all misogyny in the world.

Gentileproblems: To be honest there are so many people mocking you in my inbox I thought this was a parody. I am still not quite sure. And.. so do I? Dad’s a university professor, and I got early admission to his uni- had my first class yesterday, actually- where I’m reading Sociology and History. Also, pretty sure a good definition of feminism is that women can do as they please, whatever that means to them.

Satirenon 13: It's all a lie! You've been taught lies your entire life! White goyishé feminists know more than you do about the tradition you were raised in again and again for the past 3326 years. Definitely.

Gentileproblems: No, what are you talking about, they skim-read a Rationalwiki article once! They’re totally qualified to tell me how to live my life!

Satirenon 14: I'm wearing a kippah and a mini skirt at the same time. I'm only have oppressed on my mothers side.

Gentileproblems: :D but oppression is passed down through the mother, donchaknow

Satirenon 11: yeah for all you know anon is a really creepy guy looking to harass jewish feminists and give feminists a bad name

Gentileproblems: yeah p much

Commentanon 13: thats religious misogyny at work, the only true feminist religion is spiritual christian influenced combined with a bastardized eastern """"spiritual"""" religion entirely divorced from from it's actual source and rules and replaced with new ageyness and a hint of racism :)

Gentileproblems: 'Hey, mum and dad! I'm rebelling against you by converting to a watered-down version of a religion I barely understand!'

Satirenon 15: *sighs* Now I have to go tell the three female Rabbis I know personally that none of them should have received an education, because a got on the intertextuality knows Judaism better than us

Gentileproblems: It’s such a drag being oppressed like this, no?

Commentanon 14: Wtf the fuck is "free feminist culture"? I'm laughing so hard. Also kinda offended that anon is equating education with knowledge. Like a lot of people can't afford college or have learning disabilities but they're their own people, fuck off.

Gentileproblems: anon is patronising as heck- go ask them, I don’t know.

Anontisemite: Yes, I see you and the many people mocking me on your blog but I really don't mind because I know that you don't know better. I'm not a man or looking to undermine feminism - why would you even think that? You're a bit paranoid aren't you? Feminism is about female freedom and my life is dedicated to helping women achieve that. Judaism inherently undermines female freedom and that is want to eradicate it and rescue women from it. It's not antisemitism.

Gentileproblems: Alongside Jews, there are atheists, Muslims, and Christians mocking you. Quit while you’re… well, I can’t actually say ‘ahead’, really.

Anontisemite: I don't mind the mockery. I have my cause my cause is you and your fellow oppressed females or Judaism. It doesn't matter if you think you don't need it, a feminist fights for the freedom of all women no matter what. You haven't been taught this but you are woman who has value. You deserve a life without men who shame you for existing and think you have no worth except that which comes forth from your womb.

Gentileproblems: but… you are the only one saying this… can you save me from *you*, please?

Satirenon 16: for $8000 a month i will stop oppressing myself anon

Gentileproblems: yes please anon pay my uni fees

Satirenon 17: I am a Jewish feminist am I causing global warming

Gentileproblems: I want to make a joke about Moses and rising sea levels here….

Anontisemite: Oh honey, let feminism help you be truly free from the bonds of patriarchal religion.

Gentileproblems: we’ve been around a few thousand years, your patronising wheedling isn’t gonna stop that.

Commentanon 15: In all seriousness, what I find most fascinating about the anon is that for someone who claims to want to free me from those telling me what to do etc., she/he is telling me exactly what to do! For someone who claims to want everyone to be free, she/he is not allowing me the freedom to do what I want. In other words, hypocrites will be hypocrites.

Gentileproblems: Goyim gonna goy

Commentanon 16: Anon does know that Judaism is a matriarchal religion, correct? That women are revered and are incredibly valued by Jewish society?

Gentileproblems: what are you talking about religion is BAD forever

Commentanon 17: For all who are trying to say that she is not free while being Jewish is the worst thing you could say. Being free means she can choose what religion she follows. Also the Jewish faith is not oppressive I actually know a female cantor/rabbi who is amazing at what she does. You are being oppressive by telling her she can't be what she wants and saying that you are not being racist even though all your support is stereotypes and from the 1900's get with the time! Take this as a warning

Gentileproblems: Thanks so much, anon! I mean I’m opinionated as all heck, if I didn’t think i was being respected I’d leave, believe me.