#and people will fixate on whether or not it's a matter of true oppression or not

[feluka]

also idk why people keep bringing up that people will mistakenly think they're ace like that's some sort of tragedy. i thought i was ace then figured out that i really wasn't and was just mistaking my personal trauma response with that. and guess what the ace community was very sweet and integral to helping me figure that out. people go through a journey of trial and error before they figure out who they are all the time. that's completely normal why are you making it weird

[gerrystamour]

kiss away young thrills and kills

For: @daily-thots-ofhistory​

@daily-thots-ofhistory​ said: for the fic request, Nureyev's first birthday with Juno (whether that's really his birthday or Juno just giving him a birthday or something else! Whatever you'd like!)

So I took a few liberties, with it being super introspective and whatnot, and not super focused on jupeter. Hopefully, the requester likes it! ;p

-

Peter woke up in Juno’s bed, yet the former detective was nowhere to be found. However, the sheets next to him were still warm when he slid his cool fingers across the soft linen. Juno had probably gotten up to get a head-start on his morning, maybe even secure a shower first before the other ladies aboard the Carte Blanche beat him to it.

With a tired yawn and a languid stretch, Peter rolled over to grab his comms off of the bedside table to check the time. When he did, he also caught the date and froze.

Thirty-eight.

Peter Nureyev had turned thirty-eight, and he had slept through it. Well, he hadn’t quite slept through it, given the ache in his thighs and hips and the pleasant memories of the night before. But midnight had come and gone, and he had forgotten to mark it with every bit of melodrama he could muster. 

It had been the closest thing to a “tradition” he had for his birthday, watching the seconds tick down until the clock read four zeroes and the date moved forward. Then he would turn his gaze to a mirror and study his face, his hair, the skin of his throat and chest, looking for the evidence of his body failing him, as if the difference between 23:59 and 00:00 would change him as much as a full decade would have.

Peter would stare for what felt like hours, pulling his sagging face tight, poking at the dark bags under his eyes, sliding his tongue along his yellowing teeth. Objectively, he knew all along most of this worry had been in his head, that his face was still mostly smooth, his teeth perfect and white, and the bags under his eyes easily concealed. Objectively, he knew that even if all of those ideas had been true, they hardly actually mattered, least of all to his beloved detective.

Thirty-eight.

Peter was all of a sudden too old to round down to thirty-five, but still too young to round up to forty—not that he wanted to round up. He was officially, completely, in his late thirties, and he wasn’t sure where that left him emotionally.

At present, he was lying in his lover’s bed, rubbing the still-warm spot where Juno had been laying, and pondering linear time. He wondered whether it made sense to rail against it so hard, and if he should feel bad for being the way he was about his age and appearance.

But when he’d been travelling alone, all he had were his looks. 

Sure, Peter had wit and charm, too, but it was mostly looks that got him in the door. Nothing disarmed a rich idiot like a pretty face. 

But as he aged, Peter had quickly learned the unspoken rule the hard way. Rich idiots didn’t just want a pretty face to own and call theirs, they wanted pretty and young faces.

The first time a mark had scoffed at him for attempting a seduction when there were softer, younger, more inexperienced young men to choose from, Peter wasn’t sure who he was more disgusted with; the near ancient art dealer chasing after people only a quarter of his age, or himself for thinking he could compete. Later he had known it was the former, if the liberal use of his knife had been anything to go by, but there was still a fair bit of shame due to the latter. 

It had been after that job when he began his entire routine of painstakingly covering up every single flaw he found.

Thirty-eight. 

The same age Juno had been when they met. Things had… shifted after meeting Juno Steel. 

Seeing the way the lady held himself in his oversized trench coat and thick turtleneck sweater, the way he had worn every single minute of his own thirty-eight years on his face and his shoulders had moved something into focus. The time they spent in Miasma’s tomb, the days he went without his make-up, without the touch-up dye for his roots, even without a toothbrush. Yet without fail, every time he caught Juno looking at him, Juno had seemed… stunned, blown away. His desire for Peter had been unmistakable.

Even during that terrible time, Juno had wanted him.

Of course, that hadn’t cured him of his anxiety regarding his continued usefulness and success with his waning appearance. 

For a time—a period of forty-eight hours cumulatively—he had considered letting his silver hair grow out, as Juno’s had been allowed to. If his beautiful, dear detective could look his age, why not Peter? Together, he didn’t have to depend on his appearance, his desirability on its own.

Then Juno had left, and Peter was back to his old ways. There was no avoiding it, he told himself, and so he returned to dying his hair, doing up his face in oppressive layers of concealer and other make-up, to working his body through long hours or stretches, work-out routines, and yoga.

Things had changed again when he joined the crew aboard the Carte Blanche. With Juno’s return. He had found himself the youngest on the crew, the “baby” as Rita would exclaim when it was brought up, and suddenly every fear and anxiety he had seemed… petty, and even mean to say aloud, even jokingly. 

How could he think himself ruined by a grey hair when their captain had half of her face rotting from radiation? How could he complain about the self-inflicted ache in his neck and shoulders when the rest of the crew had their own plentiful aches with far less room to criticize themselves for it yet never make a sound about them?

It had been a startling revelation during one of his nightly conversations with Juno that his fixation with his appearance had begun when he was with Mag. There had been different heists where they had depended on Peter’s baby-face, and when he began growing out of said baby-face, those jobs were jeopardized. He could remember the day his appearance had sharpened enough that Mag decided it was better to age him up with his presentation and adjusted their jobs accordingly. It was something Mag had claimed required sacrifice, and discomfort even.

Peter hadn’t realized just how far he had carried that man’s teachings in that regard. It had been so tightly packed away in the farthest reaches of his mind, something he kept hidden away since he was seventeen.

Ultimately, it had been a comment from Vespa of all people that had made him truly think about his nonsense. 

They were preparing for a heist, something small for some money, just fleecing some rich idiot for as much as they could. It was just after his leg had healed and they got off that planet, and he and Juno were going in as a married couple. Peter had questioned Buddy’s insistence on that cover every time, but she had blown off the question, instead informing him that they were executing their plan the following day.

Peter had, largely without pausing to consider his words, idly mention needing dye, that all of his existing stores had been destroyed when the ship crashed into the ocean.

“The hell do you need hair-dye for, Ransom?” Vespa had bit out around her mouthful of dinner. 

“Well, if you haven’t noticed, my roots have grown in quite a bit and—” Peter had started, pointedly ignoring Juno’s grumbling.

“You’re s’posed to look like a married couple,” Vespa interrupted with an eye-roll. “You can’t go in there looking twenty-five when Steel looks forty.”

“But I—why—I don’t look twenty-five,” Peter argued, furrowing his brow.

“It doesn’t matter how old you look, Ransom! We get it, you’re used to working alone, whatever,” Vespa snapped before she took a breath. “When you’re working with someone else, it’s better to match. So if you dye your hair, Juno has to dye his.”

“But—”

“For this job, you can’t look like a trophy husband, Pete,” Buddy said, seemingly annoyed by the interruption to the family meeting. “You would stand out. I will gladly pick you up some dye after the job to sooth your ego, but not before. Now, can we get back on track?”

They were right, of course. That didn’t mean he particularly liked it. But he couldn’t continue to get away with making himself look younger and younger while he ran with a band of thieves who were all clearly older than him. 

Peter wasn’t exactly graceful in his allowance for aging, of course, but he was working on it. He started by allowing the silver in his hair to grow in, and wearing less concealing make-up around the Carte Blanche. He hadn’t thought he had made much progress in the “being okay with aging” angle of his growth and unpacking of his emotional baggage.

Yet there he was, lying in bed on his thirty-eighth birthday, stunned he had missed it. He hadn’t just missed it, he realized, but he had forgotten it was coming up at all.

Peter was startled from his thoughts as an arm slid around his waist, skin warm and damp from a shower. “Sorry, babe,” Juno whispered against his shoulder blade. “Didn’t realize you were that far away.”

That was one of Juno’s probing statements; when Juno had a question and wanted the answer, but would have dropped if Peter didn’t respond. That simple statement was equal parts apology for the startle, and inquiring after what had him so distracted. It would have been so easy to say he had just been daydreaming, to roll over and distract Juno with kisses and gentle touches, but…

“It’s my birthday,” Peter whispered, and if it hadn’t been for the way Juno stiffened against his back, he would have thought the former detective hadn’t heard him.

“It is?” Juno’s voice was strained as he asked it, and Peter realized belatedly his error.

“Don’t you worry your pretty head, my love,” Peter reassured him gently, covering the hand splayed over his lower abdomen with his own and tangling their fingers together. “I hadn’t said anything about it. I usually don’t—this is the first birthday in a very long time I haven’t been alone for.”

“Oh,” Juno whispered, and Peter shivered at the kiss pressed to the centre of his back. “Is there anything you wanted to do?”

“Mm,” Peter hummed, rolling over in Juno’s arm to kiss him chastely, warmth bursting in his chest at the hesitance in Juno’s voice. “Perhaps we can… stay in bed? Together?”

Juno smiled against his lips and laughed. “Yeah, Nureyev, I think we can,” he replied and then asked, “Anything else I can do for you?”

“You’ve already done more than enough, love,” Peter replied softly, tucking his head under Juno’s chin. “Just being here is perfect.”

“Sap,” Juno grumbled, and Peter laughed.

“And you love me for it,” he replied, smirking as he felt the heat of Juno’s flush crawl down his neck.

“So what if I do?” Juno grumbled petulantly, and Peter laughed at that.

“Say it,” Peter said, but it was more of a question, really. A request for reassurance. At the last moment, he softened it with a quiet, “Please?”

“Fine,” Juno grumbled jokingly, pulling back so his mismatched eyes met Peter’s own. The prosthetic for his implant was always a few shades different than his natural eye, which Peter was fairly convinced was an intentional choice of Juno’s. 

With a grin, Juno added, “Peter Nureyev, I love you, and I love that you’re a sap, and no I will literally never stop complaining about it.”

Peter smiled at that and accepted the kiss Juno had for him, sighing as it deepened and allowing himself to be rolled onto his back, Juno slotting in between his legs with a soft sound of his own.

“Hey,” Juno said, pulling back and biting his lip nervously. “How about I make that one dish I made a few weeks ago? The one with the flatbread thing you like so much?”

“Why would you make something so time-consuming?” Peter asked, truly puzzled. “Plus, we had decided it uses too much of our supplies, but doesn’t make enough for the crew.”

“I wasn’t going to make it for the crew, Nureyev. I want to make it for you,” Juno replied with a laugh. 

Peter blinked at him a bit dumbly, before asking, “For… me? But why?”

“It’s your birthday, babe. I want it to be a nice one,” Juno said, seeming a bit puzzled. “I mean, I get not liking your birthday, but that doesn't mean I can’t do something nice, right?”

“Oh, you’ve already done enough for me, love,” Peter sighed, pulling Juno into a solid kiss to distract him from the tears that had filled his eyes.

Yes, he still hated that time moved ever forward, and yes, he had another year at least of unpacking to possibly be “okay” with it. There was a chance he would always have the nagging voice of Mag in his head pointing out each new wrinkle, every new patch of silver hair growing in.

But he had his beautiful detective in his arms, and a family out in the halls of the Carte Blanche if he would reach out and accept them… he couldn’t reasonably ask for much more on his thirty-eighth birthday.

[grass-skirt]

thanks for answering my fisk ask! i appreciate it. can you think of characters that are good examples for a well done sympathetic villain? aside from fma's scar

Your welcome! (And sorry to other folks who’ve sent asks that I haven’t answered yet, but sometimes it’s easier for me to think of how to answer some questions than others and again time and energy are very limited resources for me these days) (And here’s the link to the preceding ask on my thought for what constitutes a sympathetic villain, how Scar is one, and how Wilson Fisk is not) 

And let’s see here. If I had to think of some more well-done examples of sympathetic villains… 

Meruem from HxH: amazing example. As someone not human, born not just socially, but biologically, to be king with the massive power to back it up and no reference point for what it meant to care or have feelings for others. And yet, he met someone who could best him in one thing, one simple thing, and slowly fell in love with her and through her uncovered the humanity no one thought he had. (Not to mention, he was manipulated by Pouf who tried to stamp out the love he had learned to feel and set him back on the path of a heartless conqueror, so we can also feel sympathy for his character on that front as well) 

Tetsuo Shima from Akira: this is possibly a more (lowkey) controversial choice. Because yeah, he’s a 15-year old asshole who got psychic powers and became an even bigger asshole. But I feel like he’s an incredibly understandable character precisely because of that. To me, he’s an exploration of the effects that insecurity, powerlessness, poverty, and environmental instability can have on kids. Take a kid who feels miserable and doubts himself and isn’t supported by the society around him who wants desperately to be respected and in control and give him power… He couldn’t control his powers well, they caused him massive pain and made him fear what they would do to his mind and body. He could control through fear but he couldn’t control himself and that pain and uncertainty and fear never left him. One of the elements of a good sympathetic villain to me is that their choices make sense. And Tetsuo is a character whose choices were almost all bad, but IMO make sense from the sad, angry perspective of the view he had and the world around him. (Long ago I made a cool graphic about him) 

Jasper from SU: now here’s an actual potentially controversial choice. Steering clear of the whole Malachite discourse and just focusing more broadly on her character, she was a huge jerk who beat the snot out of people and seemed to relish in it. She was the biggest villain in SU for a good long while, and there was little reason to think of her as sympathetic. That is, until we found out that the reason she hated the Earth and the Crystal Gems and was so fixated on strength is because thousands of years ago the Crystal Gems murdered the person she most loved and adored and the person she was literally created to serve. Then we start being able to see how her villainous beliefs and actions were shaped by the culture and society of the Diamond Authority that doesn’t give it’s members much in the way of choice or freedom. And then we also find out that the person who Jasper’s very existence was for had faked her own death and everything Jasper believed for the past 5000 years was a lie. Again, she’s a villain whose horribleness can be seen as a result of the circumstances around her, and we can see that if she had been told the truth and given different opportunities she perhaps could have been someone good instead of eventually devolving into a literal monster. 

Eric Killmonger from Black Panther: he was someone who fought for a cause he believed him, and that was righteous and justified in his eyes. He grew up in poverty, his father was murdered, and he lived his life on the outside of a great society of wealth and equality, always aware of what they had but wouldn’t share with him or others who were also suffering. He looked at the imperialist, racist, oppressive actions of the world and thought, “Wakanda’s neutrality is acceptance of injustice. If the nation of my birth has the ability to reshape the world, punish the injustice of nations and societies, and give power to our oppressed people, we should do it.” T'challa’s view was that you can’t hurt and kill innocent people in the name of justice. Killmonger’s view was that harm, death, and suffering were constantly happening anyway, and that T’challa’s stance was accepting and tacitly endorsing this injustice. Again, his villainy came from a place of understandable suffering and genuine belief that fighting fire with fire was better than standing on the sidelines and simply watching the fire burn. 

And two final characters: 

Donquixote Doflamingo from One Piece gets an honorable mention. He could have been an amazing sympathetic villain, but for some reason Oda took a character who was born into a culture of ignorance, corruption, and greed, who lost everything and was tortured by angry mobs who blamed him for sins he hadn’t committed, who was then raised by a group of older boys and men who again groomed him and lead him down a road of villainy…. and then said, “Hey, this guy? Doflamingo? He was just born evil. Yeah, that’s it. He was born evil. So don’t worry so much about all the environmental stuff, because he was born evil anyway. Even his brother said so.” (Again, here’s a graphic and analysis I did on the subject for those who have forgotten) 

Lady Eboshi from Princess Mononoke. (I also wrote a big post about her and the overall movie and how great it is.) She isn’t a sympathetic villain. Not really. She is both ends of the moral spectrum simultaneously in every move she makes. She was a monster, a destroyer of gods, an environmentalist’s nightmare who burned nature in the name of industry. She was also a savior, a humanitarian, a veritable saint who took in the sick and the downtrodden of society and gave them respect, empowerment, and a home they were happy in. And all the while… we never actually know what she’s thinking. One could argue that she’s still a villain (rather than simply an antagonist), but the key point here is that she is not sympathetic. Does she help others because she cares, or because through helping them she ultimately benefits herself? We don’t know for sure. The story does not invite us into her internal world. She’s not a sympathetic villain because we’re never asked to sympathize with her. Instead, we’re asked to think of bigger ideas. We’re asked to take a look at the ways human society can benefit itself, advance equality, and lift up the powerless by using and destroying the natural world around us. Is it worth it? What are the unintended consequences of these actions? Can humans harm nature without inevitably also hurting ourselves? Lady Eboshi’s thoughts and feelings and true motivations don’t matter. We don’t know, and we can’t know, and at the end of the day does it matter either way? Even if she was calculated and selfish it wouldn’t change that she’s helping people, and even if she was motivated by love and compassion it also wouldn’t change the harm she’s done. She’s a representation of ideas, forces, and choices larger than herself. Those ideas are what’s important to the film, and they are explored without ever diving into the mind of Lady Eboshi herself because what the thinks and feels has no bearing on the consequences of her actions. 

A villain is someone who hurts others who do not deserve to be hurt. A person is sympathetic when we feel for them. Villainy is external. That person harms others, so we hate them. Sympathy is internal. We feel another’s pain, and understand the reasons for their choices, which includes the possibility that they never even had a choice at all. Lady Eboshi is so interesting to me because she is completely external. We are tasked with viewing and judging her based entirely on the consequences of her actions without factoring in what she thinks, what she feels, and why she’s doing it. We don’t have sympathy for her, rather we have sympathy for the people she helps regardless of whether Lady Eboshi is doing it out of kindness or doing it to benefit herself. 

It’s odd that I spent the most time in this ask about sympathetic villains talking about someone who I think isn’t one, but I think that it’s both helpful and interesting to dive into how a character can completely subvert and dodge the label of a sympathetic villain while still fully capturing their contradictory essence. We hate and condemn the actions of sympathetic villains while also understanding them, respecting the “why” behind what they do, and potentially even loving them. With Lady Eboshi, we’re not supposed to care about the why. We’re not supposed to care about her. While I do love her, that’s not the part that matters. Instead, that same contradictory dynamic takes the form of the audience loving who she she helps while also loving who/what she hurts in the process. The thing’s we’re supposed to care about are entirely outside her. 

I think that sympathetic villains are so interesting because they prompt us to think about why a person hurts others and see that something more than just innate evil is often there–that there are reasons why evil exists in villains’ hearts and that there are things that we can and should do about that. Whether it’s a character like Meruem who was “born” evil but learned to love and ultimately chose to embrace it, or a character like Scar who started out a decent young man who became a serial killer because of the genocide his people suffered. Either way,  through them we are given an exploration of evil that emphasizes heartfelt understanding–understanding the “why” of evil so that we can either heal it or address the circumstances of its creation in the first place. If a sympathetic villain is well written and well handled in their story, the audience should be able to learn about the sources of evil in the world and how it could be made a little better. 

[chronically-illustrated]

I have so many thoughts after DBH Part 7. Nobody has to actually read this - I just need to get my thoughts out so my brain will stop fixating.

I’ve been deeply involved in social justice discourse for years, so I’m really invested in how DBH is handling the social justice aspect of the android awakening. I’m a bit torn because I do appreciate Jack’s decision to make peaceful choices and his reasoning for it, but history doesn’t really support the idea that you can achieve large-scale social change with entirely peaceful methods. 

The parallel with the Civil Rights Movement is actually very accurately done, because the majority of Americans at the time believed Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s methods were too radical no matter how peaceful the protests were. The majority of Americans believed the peaceful marches, sitting at lunch counters, etc. were too disruptive and the view of the Civil Rights Movement was largely negative. The way the media portrayed the androids’ actions in DBH as “terrorism” even though they were entirely peaceful is very similar to the way Martin Luther King and the Civil Rights Movement were portrayed at the time. Meanwhile, the police were beating them with batons, sending attack dogs after them, blasting them with jets of water so powerful it could sweep them across the ground, etc. As more rights were gradually granted, the violence against Black people increased. Any time an oppressed group starts to ask for equal rights, no matter how peacefully they do it, they’ll be accused of going too far and being too aggressive, and this will be used to justify increased violence against them.

It’s also interesting to note that as the movement went on, Martin Luther King started to realize that peacefully asking an oppressive group for equal rights might not work. I’d highly recommend reading Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “Letter from a Birmingham Jail.” In that letter, he talks about how the biggest obstacle to equality was not white people who actively believed Black people were inferior, but white moderates who said they agreed that Black people should be equal but didn’t agree with the methods for trying to achieve equality. No matter how hard he tried to gain the respect of the public by leading a peaceful movement, the majority of the public still thought the movement was too aggressive. Seeing this, Martin Luther King started to question if peaceful methods would actually work. People with a better understanding of history than I have can probably say whether the nonviolent protests or the more aggressive methods of leaders like Malcom X gave more incentive to politicians to change the law, but from what I understand, those changes may not have happened, or may not have happened as quickly, without the violent element.

There are a lot of examples of successfully fighting oppression with actual fighting, including the Stonewall riots that started the LGBT+ liberation movement and led to changes in the law so being gay was no longer a crime, the act of vandalism that started the American Revolution and subsequent war, and the American Civil War that finally ended legal slavery (and those are just in the US). It’s doubtful those changes would’ve happened if the oppressed group had just peacefully asked for equality, because there was no incentive for those in power to listen to them. 

I wish I had more faith in humanity, but with everything going on right now, it’s at an all-time low in terms of trusting the majority to care about the well-being of minority groups who are being mistreated. I’m really interested to see how DBH handles the rest of Markus’ story. My biggest complaint right now is how it shows public opinion going up because of the peaceful decisions, but shows how the media is portraying the movement as terrorism regardless, which seems unrealistic, as most people form their opinions about events based on the media coverage. The news clips were really misleading and made it sound like the androids were being destructive and aggressive, and most people watching wouldn’t even know that wasn’t true. Just from what I’ve seen going on in my own country over the last few years, it doesn’t seem like public opinion would actually go up no matter how peacefully you play Markus’ sections. But it is a video game, so they need to do something to reflect the different choices. In reality, the only thing that really does change anything is legislation that makes discrimination illegal, so I’m interested to see where Markus’ story ends up with that as well.

Anyway! That’s what’s in my head after part 7. I love games that make me think about important topics like this.

[tindang]

Nico!

3/28/21- It's been a week out from my visit to the emergency department at MGH. Blisters have formed since then, flowering from the red/brown patch of skin on my left thigh, where I had spilled boiling water in a terrible accident. I was in a lot of pain yesterday, but I woke up today to shrunken blisters and pruritus in-and-around the area. I'm sad to miss Palm Sunday mass and to have spent the whole weekend room bound. I've been trying to find some positives, but life has not been too kind lately. I'm back in a state of rollercoaster emotions and I'm waiting to get off.

-------------------

4/5/21 - Deviating from the Ideal: U.S. Migration Policies in the Context of Rawlsian Principles of Justice

In "Aliens and Citizens: The Case for Open Borders", the philosopher Joseph Carens begins his argumentation with the following epigraph:

Many poor and oppressed people wish to leave their countries of origin in the third world to come to affluent Western societies...[and] there is little justification for keeping them out.

He goes on to examine three distinctive political theories--Nozickean, Rawlsian, and utilitarianism--and applies them to the issue of immigration. Though distinct, Carens finds that all three approaches evince the moral failures of militarizing borders and restricting the movement of peoples, suggesting that a world without borders is one that respects the idea of moral equality. 

I found Carens's Rawlsian argument most compelling, insofar as it goes furthest in laying the framework for thinking about this issue transnationally. He does this in two ways: first, by arguing that people in Rawls’s “original position”--a tabula rasa -esque scenario in which people first come together to decide how they wish to be governed--would consent to principles of equal liberty and social redistribution if cloaked under a “veil of ignorance” that erases distinctions like race, class, sex, and most pointedly, national origin; and second, by refuting objections to the application of the Rawlsian veil to global contexts (Rawls had only intended for the original position to apply to certain societies with a “particular understanding of moral personality”, not all). 

I posit that the analytical power of Rawl’s original position, as it is applied to transnational affairs, comes from the tensions inherent in upholding principles of equal liberty in real-world settings. Of course, Rawls had predicted such conflict, and sought to address it by drawing distinctions between ideal and non-ideal theory: in ideal theory one assumes that people will abide by the principles chosen in the original position, even after the “veil of ignorance” is lifted; in nonideal theory, one considers the historical and human behavioral challenges of staying true to original-position precepts, which is more reflective of everyday problems and situations. I believe that these tensions between ideal and non-ideal theory serve as useful tools for critiquing restrictive U.S. migration policies. By exploring the deviations from ideal theory--in the context of U.S/Mexico border policies--towards the practicalities of non-ideal praxis, I hope to reify my understanding of border issues and justify (to myself) Carens’s conclusion, that there is little justification for restricting immigration.  

It is no surprise that current U.S. immigration and border policies fall far from the ideals of liberty envisioned in the original position. The question has always been how did we get here? The answer most likely predates any explanation that the Enlightenment might afford us, lying deep in the consequences of American settler colonialism and chattel slavery. Though I acknowledge this history and its foundational impact on modern American society, let me first flesh out my understanding of the gradual legal push away from ideal theory--while remaining always fully aware that the law is but one avenue through which principles of white supremacy and racism are encoded. If we are to then start with the legal perspective for answering the question posed above, we might begin with the Supreme Court’s decision in the Chinese Exclusion Case (1889), which contains the nation’s very first declaration of national sovereignty over immigration and vested Congress with plenary power over such matters. Sarah Song, a law professor at UC Berkeley, traces the philosophical tradition undergirding this decision to ideas espoused by Swiss author Emer de Vattel, whose Les droit des gens (The Law of Nations, 1758) outlined the parameters of sovereignty in the case of international law. Vattel writes:

The sovereign may forbid the entrance of his territory either to foreigners in general, or in particular cases, or to certain persons, or for certain particular purposes, according as they may think it advantageous to the state. There is nothing in all this, that does not flow from the rights of domain and sovereignty.

In staking this claim, Vattel followed already established notions of the state as being like a “moral person,” first laid out by German jurist/philosopher Samuel von Pufendorf, and later further developed by German author Christian Wolff. This personification of the state sanctions it with “an understanding and a will of which it makes use for the conduct of its affairs”, namely, as Vattel reasoned, in the interest of its self-preservation and self-perfection. It’s worth noting that Vattel understood that this self-interest deviated from the ethos of being a “moral person”, which if taken to its logical conclusion with regards to the idea of “moral state(s)”, would result in a “universal republic” in which “a real friendship [would] be seen to reign among them” (II.12). Here, it is not lost on me that this utopian conclusion mirrors the conditions of Joseph Carens’s ideal theory--that is, a global community void of hierarchical distinctions. In this sense, Vattel’s swing towards non-ideal realism, defined by state self-interest, may be at the heart of today’s polemics over immigration.

Indeed, I believe this is so. Public anxiety re the economic burden of migrants on American social institutions and fair wage have led to communitarian objections to increased migration from both conservatives and social democrats--while attending a protest against the Trump administration in 2017, I fondly remember standing next to a supposed feminist who, while rallying against the now former president, also expressed a resolute “no” when the crowd began reciting “Immigrants are welcome here.” The fixation on self-preservation may explain far-right popularization of terms like “chain migration” in lieu of “family reunification,” and the 2019 revision of the public charge rule which would have expanded the definition of being a “public charge,” and would have thus restricted poorer immigrants from either being admitted into the U.S. or attaining Legal Permanent Resident status. And, not surprisingly, today’s fears were enshrined in law vis-à-vis other, past Court decisions that occurred soon after that seminal 1889 case: in Nishimura Ekiu v. United States (1892) and Fong Yue Ting v. United States (1893), the Supreme Court again expanded the U.S. government’s power over immigration, citing further elaborations of Vattel’s theory of sovereignty (Song 2017); within the latter decision, these two passages from The Law of Nations are cited in their entirety:

Every nation has a right to refuse admitting a foreigner into her territory, when he cannot enter it without exposing the nation to evident danger, or doing her a manifest injury. What she owes to herself, the care of her own safety, gives her this right; and in virtue of her natural liberty, it belongs to the nation to judge, whether her circumstances will or will not justify the admission of that foreigner. (I.230)

Thus also it has a right to send [asylees] elsewhere, if it has just cause to fear that they will corrupt the manners of the citizens, that they will create religious disturbances, or occasion any other disorder, contrary to the public safety. In a word, it has a right, and is even obliged, to follow, in this respect, the suggestions of prudence. (I.231)

In other words, the state, by virtue of its personhood and the rights accorded to moral persons, has the right to exclude those it deems dangerous to its self-interest. As many scholars have pointed out, the right to exclude is essentially a property right; and the commensuration of individual property rights to collective, state territorial rights has been the source of much debate (See Carens’s Nozickean argument for open borders).

All this is to say that the principles of state sovereignty that underlie American immigration policy were founded under non-ideal theory conditions, which privilege human interest over ideal theory egalitarianism. The effect of this philosophical turn cannot be overstated; because while it is one thing to erect borders and deny access in the name of self-interest, it is another to punish those seeking opportunity and/or asylum for similar reasons. 

To explain today’s punitive approach to immigration, it is incumbent on me to outline another ideal to non-ideal theory transition: This time, I mark as my starting point the Bracero Accord, a U.S./Mexico bilateral program that, between 1942-1964, facilitated over 4.5 million temporary labor contracts to male Mexican workers in an effort to redress previous, depression-era deportations of Mexican-American citizens and to address labor shortages that appeared during and after World War II. Though imperfect (the program was ultimately deemed exploitive), this bracero initiative may have came closest in realizing the tenets of justice that ideal theory conceptualized, formalizing (now questionable) protocols for far pay and anti-discrimination; that is, in setting aside the dehumanizing experience that braceros encountered, we might think of the legal protections granted to these workers, and the imperative that the U.S. government showed in trying to repair its relationship with Mexico, as a promise towards an ideal--a quasi- “veil of ignorance” that ended up being unrealistic, ineffective, and violent. So, it might be here within the context of the hopes of the Bracero Accord and the porous border through which hundreds of thousands of Mexican workers made their way each year that we locate our ideal beginning.

From this point, the rapid progression towards non-ideal theory, which again takes into account the “historical obstacles and the unjust actions of others” that seek to undermine liberty and justice, paradoxically began during the civil rights era of the 1960s, when a) the termination of the Bracero Program and b) amendments to the Immigration and Nationality Act effectively ended the legal and cyclical migration patterns of years past. Princeton sociologist Douglass Massey summarizes:

Whereas in the late 1950s, some 450,000 Mexicans had entered the United States each year as Braceros and 50,000 as permanent residents, by the late 1970s the Bracero Program was gone and legal visas were capped at 20,000 (Massey 2014)

A closed door, however, does not mean a locked one; notwithstanding new restrictions on migration, former braceros continued their northward journey through unauthorized channels, paving the way for what has become considered “illegal” migration. In his article, Massey provides this useful figure, which takes data from DHS to assess Mexican migration to the U.S. in the three categories shown below:

The noticeable inverse between trends in temporary labor migration and unauthorized migration (measured by the annual number of apprehensions divided by the number of Border Patrol officers, expressed per thousand) in 1964 reveals the unspeakable harms of supposedly benevolent updates to U.S. immigration policy. Despite the tapering of unauthorized migration since 1986, shown above, the wide-ranging consequences of the 1964 recategorizing of what were once “legal” guest workers to now “illegal” trespassers on the political, social, and individual levels of society deserves pause and reflection. 

At the broad level of the body politic, the rising number of annual border apprehensions in the mid-1960s effectuated closer federal scrutiny of the border. At the behest of political racketeers, members of the U.S. Border Patrol, and a changing landscape of public opinion surrounding undocumented migration, Congress enacted a litany of measures that further restricted entry: 1986′s Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA), while granting amnesty and Legal Permanent Resident status to 2.7 million former undocumented migrants--subject to conditions of learning English and seeking citizenship--criminalized undocumented hiring and signed off the first of a series of significant increases in appropriations for the Border Patrol; 1994′s Operation Gatekeeper militarized the busiest border sector in San Diegos (See also ‘prevention through deterrence’ strategy); 2001′s PATRIOT Act made it easier for the government to employ immigration rules to detain or deport non-citizens without resort to the lengthy procedural regulations of the criminal justice system (Akram 2006). Juliet Stumpf and others have mapped these measures to a phenomenon they call “crimmigration,” which describes the American merger of criminal and immigration law that has happened since 1875 when the first federal statute was passed to restrict immigration of Chinese women. Since then, Stumpf writes, “the relationship between immigration and criminal law has evolved from merely excluding foreigners who had committed past crimes to the present when many immigration violations are themselves defined as criminal offenses and many crimes result in deportation” (Stumpf 2006). Indeed, today, immigration prosecutions outnumber all other types of federal criminal prosecutions, including prosecutions for drugs and public order violations (See “Prosecution/Courts”).

Interwoven into the political and structural realignments of U.S. migration policy during this time was the effect that legal/illegal discursive shifts had on White Americans. As politicians seized on the expediency of showing strength against the "Mexican Menace” and “alien invasion”, and as journalists found success in characterizing undocumented border crossers as “illegals” set out to “inundate” American society and “swamp” its culture (Chavez 2001), it becomes easy to imagine the kind of social re-engineering that must have taken place: As Mae Ngai reminds us in Impossible Subjects: Illegal Aliens and the Making of Modern America, Mexicans were once considered legally white and enjoyed migratory privileges not afforded to Asian migrants (Ngai, 38, 2004); but, as UMASS-Amherst professor Moon-Kie Jung might say, racial differentiation happens when people come to hold schemas for “separating human populations by some notion of stock or collective heredity of traits” (Jung, 64, 2006). Viewed in the light of American genocide, slavery, colonialism and imperialism, the racialization of Mexicans based on notions of in/exclusion was par for the course. We might find then, within the border debates of the mid to late twentieth century, the seed of today’s social animus towards Latinx migrants, which has encouraged bias in enforcement of immigration law and (most likely) inspired Arizona’s Senate Bill 1070 (Read more about state/federal collaboration and interdependency when it comes to developing and enforcing immigration law in Judith Resnick’s “Bordering by Law”).

The human impact of these policy adjustments should not be forgotten, nor go unnoticed. For it is at the individual--and for some of my friends with undocumented parents, personal--level that federal immigration policies harm. This case is explicitly made in Jason de León’s The Land of Open Graves, which lays the blame for migrant deaths along the border squarely in the hands of the U.S. government. It is described in this podcast during which a university student talks about her experience growing up living in fear that her parents could be deported at any moment; and again, in the harrowing stories that undocumented child migrants have told, as documented by Valeria Luiselli in Tell Me How It Ends; and perhaps, more recently, in the iconic image of Yanela, the 1-year-old Honduran girl, who was captured crying for her detained mother. Between these examples, one thing is clear: U.S. immigration policies violate, if not the ideals of moral equality that America was founded on, then international human rights.

De Leon writes: “The benefit of the chronological distance from the pain and suffering of past migrations is that many Americans today have no problem putting nationality before humanity” (Leon, 26, 2015). In this blog post/essay, I make the case that this antipathy for life, or explicitly for the life of Others, has as much to do with historical myopia as it underlines the principles of self-interest that lie behind our legal and social interpretations. When people hear that undocumented migrant children are being separated from their families yet still defend the action as just since “They came into our country illegally,” I see this perverse rationalization as but a product of self-preservation. Mae Ngai has spoken about the consequences of normalizing such principles of sovereignty in immigration affairs, suggesting that it “generates the view that immigration is a zero-sum game among competitive nation-states” (Ngai 2004). Not only does this view fuel anti-immigrant resentment, it discourages us from seeing the moral worth of our neighbors and prevents us from coming together to form humane and bilateral coalitions for tackling transnational problems. 

Against the backdrop of U.S. human rights violation, and the radical transition away from the conceptions of justice laid out in Rawls’s original position, I remain cautiously hopeful that there will come a day when justice will be served. It might not happen during my lifetime, but I’ll be on the vanguard of this fight. 

[red-shepherds]

The Prince And The Cartographer

This is part one of like....4. I’m not gonna post 12 pages in one post, that’s insanity. Anyway...have my self insert and my OC meeting, flirting, being embarrassed by flirting...Etc.

If it was another request for a map of Athens, I was going to commit a murder or three. Nonetheless, the knocking on my door was insistent enough that I answered it with a resigned air. Only someone who wasn't familiar with me would be so rude—my regulars knew I'd hike their price up astronomically if they were offensive enough.

All mention of that died in my throat when I saw exactly who was in front of me—the courier bore both the blessing of Hermes and the sign of King Phaethon. Better not to rock the boat on this, then.

“Adina of Chalcis? You've been asked for.” “I've been asked for? Or a cartographer has been asked for? Rest assured, you can find much better than me, I'm sorry for wasting your time—”

“By name. Are you saying you won't take the job?” “Depends on what the job is. And how the King decided on my name when I've been careful to keep my head down. I know of nine other, cheaper cartographers in this city who make an effort to get their names in people's mouths. Someone more expensive, keeping their head down? Why make that choice?” “Because you're better. I've seen Hypatos' work. Not of the calibre yours is. And, perhaps because the atlas you were so kind to gift to the King is so clearly your make? Even if you don't sign, your signature is there. The ship sails in...oh, less than an hour. Are you going to accept or not?” “I'll assume the king knows my fees, and say...yes. Twenty minutes to pack my tools, thirty to the harbor. Cutting it close but...satisfactory?” “Oh, I'm fleet of foot miss...mister....um?” “Mx. Said like mix. Just...go with Adina, when in doubt.” “Alright, Mx. Adina. As I was saying, I'm fleet of foot. There's a reason I'm the king's leading courier. I'll have you to the harbor in ten minutes flat, so please take your time packing your things.” I did not take my time packing, even with the youth's assurances. I was thorough, yes, but time consuming? No. A large bundle of parchments, my charcoal, previous maps for reference. Clothes—I had no idea how long this voyage was to be, but spare clothes were always a necessity—and lastly, on a whim, my good hair pieces. One, a bronze band with bees set around it; the other, a braid clip in the shape of a serpent, set with jet stones. Ten minute's packing, all told. We still had adequate time, though even taking that long made me nervous.

The courier—Sophos, I'd learned—stayed true to his word; he ran at a blinding, breakneck speed to the harbor, and somehow, with my hand in his, I managed to keep up. The ship before us was splendid, as far as I could tell. I knew not much of ships, but it was large, and wooden, and had both sails and oars. Exceptional, to me.

Sophos noticed me staring at the ship, and took it as me knowing things about ships. He was wrong, and I wasn't going to correct him. So when he launched into a speech about how yes, the Patroklos was top of the line, brilliant engineering by Princess Heli—I was more trying to figure out how something obviously so heavy could float. I mean, I know wood floats. But it was a lot of wood, and trees are heavy, so wood is heavy, so...

I was shaken from my musing by the sound of hooves on stone. Either there was to be a cargo of huge goats or...one hooved, half-minotaur king.

Frankly? The latter made more sense, and it was correct.

King Phaethon was tall, first off. I stood at his shoulder, and I am not short. Add to that the dark horns that crowned him, adding another whole head in height...he was very, very tall. I wondered if he had trouble with doors with those things.

Unashamedly, I looked him up and down. I'd seen him before, of course—he was a sociable king—but I'd never been this close. His name fit—Phaethon means the shining one and...yes, he certainly was radiant. Handsomer than most men I'd seen, despite a solid quarter of his ancestry being bull. Maybe all the god blood on Queen Pasiphae's side had made up for it?

Anyway. Dark curls were tied back in a nice braid that hung over one of his shoulders, a few loose ones framing his face nicely. His eyes were gold, as was all the jewelry he wore—a band on one horn, a thematically appropriate bullring in his nose, several earrings in each ear, and a few rings on his hands. King's jewelry, obviously. It didn't interest me much, but I still took note. Detail is what I do.

No, I was more fixated on those sharp eyes of his, keen and sparkling. They stood out nicely against his dark skin, of which he had quite a bit exposed—he was currently shirtless, I assume because of the oppressive heat. I'd've been stripped to the waist to in it, if I weren't so shy. My eyes strayed down his chest—he was built solid, with a nice thick core and abundant muscle. Muscle rippled as he moved to clap Sophos on the shoulder, and I had to rip my eyes away...and, unfortunately, downward. I didn't let my eyes linger on his legs long, but I noted glossy hooves and thighs thicker than my waist.

I forced myself to look anywhere but at the king, but at least he wasn't looking at me—he and Sophos were chuckling about something. I tuned in, interested—

“—you've caught their attention,” Sophos said, with a knowing glance at me.

Oh. They'd noticed.

The first thought that came to my mind was that I could just jump into the ocean—for once that actually was an option. But another second clued me in to the fact that it was a good-natured remark. Not trying to ridicule me or reprimand, simply noting that I was interested, and complementing the king. Fair enough.

“Unfortunate that I didn't catch the king's as well, Soph. Seems I'm not nearly so eye catching.” “Not so, I should say,” the king smiled, finally looking at me with those molten gold eyes, “the only reason I haven't been staring is that I doubted I could rip my eyes away once I began.”

“You flatter me,” I said, trying to hope that the heat on my face was because of the temperature rather than excessive blushing. It wasn't.

“Oh gods,” Sophos rolled his eyes, then placed his head in his hands, “you're about to have five months on a ship together, could you at least wait to flirt until you're on the ship?” “Ah, but I rarely find the opportunity, or someone so worthy of it,” Phaethon said, his glance still on me, warm and intense.

“Then I shall depart and leave you to it. You'll come back with an heir on the way at this rate, and I don't know whether I can stand another you.” Sophos ran, at that, true to his word. A shame—he was a nice lad.

“Adina, correct?” Phaethon held out one hand to shake, “my apologies for staring.” I placed my hand in his, shaking firmly.

“I understand. Wanted to freak the kid out, right?” “No,” Phaethon said, picking up half of my equipment effortlessly and walking onto the ship, “all of that was genuine.”

I scurried onto the ship with my maps and such, following the king at a respectable distance and cursing myself for whatever madness had overtaken me. I cut my mental reprimanding short, though, when I found the king—already setting up my cartography tools in the same office as the ledgers and records.

Joining him in setting up, I could almost forget the earlier exchange—not that I wanted to. But...there was comfort in showing him how to set up my work space correctly—which led me back around to the pressing question.

Just what was my job, on this voyage?

“You're probably wondering what you're here for. What I'm here for as well, for that matter. What this voyage in general is for, let's say. In short...exploration, route mapping, et cetera. Of course that's not all you'll be doing, but I doubt I'll only be here with the ledgers as well. Sound fair so far?” I nodded, not trusting myself to speak. Earlier, I'd been focusing on my shame and his looks. Hadn't had the presence of mind to notice the smooth, deep caliber of his voice, or the sweet tone to it. He sounded almost musical, and it was quite lovely.

“I'm to help with shipboard duties as well, right?” “Quick on the uptake, aren't you? Yes. I'm figuring you'll do well in the rigging, considering how agile you look, and how svelte of figure you are. I will advise you, though, there...aren't always duties to be done. Some days it's simply sailing, sitting around playing games and waiting for things to happen. Are you prepared for that?” “Leaving isn't an option, now is it?” I hardly dared risking a glance at Phaethon, but when I did, it was to see a warm smile on his face.

Out on deck, I watched as the ropes were untied, letting the ship out into the open water. The sails caught the wind quickly, and for now, we said goodbye to Knossos.

Seemingly sensing my shyness, Phaethon had backed down a bit on the flirting. Thankfully so—I could only take so much before my cheeks felt as though they were going to combust, as his earlier session had proved.

But, thankfully, he didn't seem to take it as reluctance on my part, or a desire not to associate with him—no, he still smiled at me on passing, although obviously he had other duties to attend at the moment, in the form of the other two crew members.

I learned well enough, though, and Phaethon had been right about the rigging—it was almost comfortable for me to be so high up. No other people. No way for me to mess up in the eyes of other people, as a welcomed consequence.

But, I had to come down at some point, and that point turned out to be supper. The other crew members had fished while I'd been adjusting the sails, and they'd brought in a nice haul. It was cooked by the time I reached the deck from my high perch, and people were starting to divvy it up by preference. Two seats were left next to each other—one for me and one for...oh. Guess who also hadn't made it yet? I couldn't tell if the others were arranging things, here. I didn't much care. I simply took my portion of supper and hoped for the best.

Phaethon sat next to me with a smile, and his eyes lit up when he saw what I hadn't recognized—apparently, the others had left an eel in the pot for him. I hadn't touched it because I wasn't fond of the greasy skin, but it seemed Phaethon had no such qualms about the delicacy. I noted this for later use—bribing, annoying, whatever. I'd find a use.

“I think we shall all get along well,” the king said, “but you do know you don't have to leave my favorites. Especially not you, Hyakinthos. I know you like eel. Don't be shy to take it.” “We got two, sire. That one's all yours.” “You're sure? Adina? I'm willing if you'd like it.” “I'm not a fan of eel, but that is generous of you. Not to step on any toes but—”

“Unexpected?” “Very.” “Just because I'm a king doesn't mean I'm a prat, my newfound friend. The people come first, even when it's this lot.” A note of affection in his voice—he wasn't being rude.

“I'm sorry for my rudeness, then.” “Don't be. After all, it's quite impossible to step on my toes. Haven't got any, after all.” he smiled—again, good natured. Not offended.

“Don't mind him,” a crew member—Hyakinthos, I was sure—piped up, “he's just...like this. We figure he fell out of the rigging one too many times as a calf and hasn't been right since.” A smirk—oh, it was a little jab then.

“Hard to climb rigging with hooves,” another sailor parried, this one a woman, “I'm Lachesis, by the way. Been sailing longer than any of these lot except perhaps Phaethon. Can't beat being born on a ship.” “You were—” I didn't even get to finish my remark before he was parrying. Had to be quicker.

“What, you were expecting a labyrinth? Conceived there, born shipboard. Of course, knowing me, my child will probably be conceived on shipboard and born there to boot,” he sighed.

“And it'll be as waterlogged as you. Want the last squid?” Hyakinthos, again. He was a sharp one.

“Yes, and I don't know, maybe I'll find someone more sensible to balance it out.” “I'm afraid I'm no more sensible than you, my king. Apologies, but you'll have to look somewhere else if a level head is all you're looking for,” I smirked.

“No. Our child will just have to be daft, in that case.” He glanced at me again, that warm look that seemed to make the very heart of me feel so transparent.

“M-moving a bit fast there, I think. We've only shaken hands, after all. Unless you expect me to conceive from that—in which case, I'm sorry to say that must be a rather...unexciting life.”

“You say I move too fast, and yet you keep leading me into it. Telling me to look elsewhere just so you can hear me say I won't. You, Mx. Adina, are trying to intrigue me.” “And succeeding, it sounds like,” Hyacinthos popped up, again. “Give the poor boy—girl? Person. Give them a break, Phaethon. You'll break their heart before you even kiss them at this rate.” That from Lachesis. “Can't even have my love life in privacy, huh?” “Love life?!” I squeaked out. No one heeded me, except Lachesis. She patted me on the head lightly and sympathetically.

“If you wanted privacy, shipboard life wasn't the place for it,” Hyakinthos noted, sardonic.

“Lay off. Enough teasing for one night; you'll be dreaming of jabs to make at this rate, the both of you. Get you to sleep, unless you plan to continue this into your watch.” Lachesis was quickly becoming my new favorite human.

“Alright, alright, I'll take watch,” Phaethon said, standing, “just wait until you and Adina start verbally sparring, though. You won't have time to reprimand me, then.” “I think you'll be sparring someone else with something else long before that happens,” Hyakinthos threw over his shoulder, disappearing belowdecks. I took that as my cue and went down as well, leaving our solitary king staring up at the moon in deep contemplation, in for a very sleepless night.  

[luminafaith]

Warmth in the Firelight

Nita shivered as they entered the temple, though she could hardly blame it on the temperature. There was some feeling in the air, giving the sacred space an eerie feeling at night. The sense of unease crept into her body, jumping with each footstep as she and Keth made their way through past the entrance hall.

“I never knew a temple could be so… foreboding,” she said, wincing at how her voice echoed through the empty space. The girl frowned at the resulting silence, turning to look at her companion, who was lagging a few steps behind her. “Keth?”

The boy—though she could hardly call him a boy at this point, as he was starting to resemble his father in build—seemed to be deep in thought when she addressed him. His brow was furrowed in a way she had only saw a few times on their journey and the green hue of his eyes appeared somehow darker in the candlelight. So distracted he was that he only reacted when Nita had spoken his name, to which he hastened his strides to walk beside her.

“Apologies,” he said, dipping his head. “There were some things bothering me on our journey and only now did I have a chance to reflect on them.”

Nita cast him a side-long glance; Keth wasn’t usually so formal with her. “What sort of things?”

He shrugged in response. “Nothing major, I should hope, and nothing that I’ll expect will hinder us in completing the seal.”

She stumbled suddenly, seemingly over thin air, and would’ve made an unpleasant reunion with the stone floor had it not been for a pair of arms darting in to support her. Nita felt her face flush, mentally chiding herself for letting herself become so distracted from her goal. The seal was her utmost priority as a priestess, not taking in how disturbingly different a temple could be under the moon.

“Are you alright?” Keth murmured as she regained her composure, stepping back when it was clear that she had her balance back. For a brief moment, she missed the warmth she’d felt in his arms. She met his gaze, now filled with worry and concern, and nodded once in return.

She took stock of her belongings, clenching the edge of her cloak in a vain attempt to calm her rapid heart. All they had to do was retrieve the blood dagger and that would be a simple matter, yet her gut was hinting that there was more to be done tonight. Warmth touched her wrist and Nita looked to see Keth reaching for her hand. She let him take it, marvelling at how a simple squeeze could wash away some of the unease that threatened to destabilize her from within.

He started moving again and she followed, creeping deeper and deeper into the temple. In the firelight, she noted, even her loyal guardian looked different. The light cast shadows over every notch and groove in his armor, and in the space between candles and braziers, they only deepened the darkness that seemed to want to swallow him whole. The same light appeared to lighten his hair to a fiery colour, almost see through as they passed the flames everlit by desperate people in desperate times. Even his sword, sheathed in a rather unremarkable scabbard, somehow looked more menacing and dangerous. Keth’s face was what surprised her the most; daylight rounded out his features, giving her the image she’s always known him for, but here, they were sharp and he appeared older than she’d ever seen him. When he looked back at her—whether to check if she was alright or just to assure her that he was there with her, she’d never know—shadows cut deep around his eyes, reflecting distant fires but carrying little warmth in them. In the dark, her knight looked like a complete stranger and Nita shuddered at the thought.

They walked in silence and her thoughts turned to Keth himself. He seemed unusually subdued earlier, but nevertheless dutiful in his care for her. Since the last time they had retrieved a blood dagger, in the household of the Tmarthran’s, he had been quieter and far more gentler with her. It was so out of character of him that she had inquired about it at one point and he had only replied that he “couldn’t be sure when would be the next time I see you, since I can’t be everywhere at once and protect you from every demon that walks the land.” It’d been months and she still found it strange that Keth would say something of that manner, as he had been rather straightforward when they were children.

Her musings were cut short as the man in question slowed to a stop and she moved to stand beside him. Before them lay a great set of doors, emblazoned with the Lyranitti crest and other markings that signified the purpose of the space beyond. Nita traced her gaze over the various runes and symbols carved in the name of superstitions long gone to ward off the evil that plagued the earth. Keth let go of her hand, placing both of his on the doors to push them open. The ground rumbled in protest of the doors sliding across the stone floor, sending more shivers down her spine as she watched her companion strain against the weight. She stepped forward when there was a sufficiently large gap, placing a hand on Keht’s shoulder. He stopped immediately and straightened, staring into the dark. He glanced at her, then moved his eyes up to a nearby brazier and she complied to the silent request, scouring around the door entrance for a torch of some kind.

No sooner did she find one, she lit it and passed it to Keth, who started to venture forth into the room, one hand on his blade. Their footsteps seemed louder here, but it seemed wrong to try and overtake the oppressing silence with noise. Nita turned her attention to the room, gazing at the treasures and riches that glimmered from the firelight. No sooner had she made that remark did they come across the true relic of the hoard. As Keth moved to light the braziers earlier priests placed around the small podium,  she approached it, only to step back and gasp in alarm. The beating of her heart was only quickened by the sound of Keth whirling around, unsheathing his sword and raising it in case of an attack. When he saw her gaze fixated on the podium, the tip lowered before he replaced the sword into its scabbard and balanced the torch inside one of the braziers.

“Keth!” Nita exclaimed breathlessly. “Why on earth is my name on that blade?”  The object itself appeared fairly innocent. It was a simple but elegant ornamental dagger with its metal smooth and silvery, as opposed to the deep red she knew blood daggers to be. Carved into the blade, just near the handle, was her name. Nita Clerndae.

He made no move to stand beside her or even to meet her eyes. “It is there because it is a blood dagger,” he replied, tone quiet and subdued.

“But blood daggers are red and none of the ones we have have names on them,” she said. Grappling for her satchel, Nita removed a bundle of cloth with shaking hands. Underneath the linen lay a rather ornamental dagger, far more decorated than the one that bore her name, but she could feel the power thrumming within it. The metal was stained a deep red, yet for all its oddities, there was no blemish on the surface, much less an inscription. “How could that be a blood dagger? I don’t even sense any power within it.”

“All blood daggers have names at some point.” The knight shifted his weight, a frown tugging his lips downward. He stepped closer to her and reached out, wrapping the cloth around the blade in her hands once again. “The ones you have are completed, whereas the one we seek has yet to be created.”

A chill passed through her body. “So then, the rumours are true? There really must be a blood offering from the Houses to complete the seal?” Her gaze drifted back to the podium. “But, I’m not a Lyranitti. Why would I be offering blood if the Clerndaes had no part in the pact with the demons.”

“It is not just a blood offering.” He paused for a moment, chewing on his lip as he considered his next words. “To say the least, it is an offering of life. The pact sealed the lives of those who made them, and the lives of their offspring will seal the pact away. It is why Lady Benel and Lord Kintas were absent when we visited their households.”

Her mind reeled, but Keth didn’t continue immediately, instead staring at the blade for a few moments. “Your mother married into the House of Clerndae. As of late, Lord Vethu has no children of his own, and you are the firstborn of the tenth generation of Clerndaes since the pact.” Slowly, he raised his gaze to meet hers. “Your mother never spoke of your connections to the Lyranittis as their cousin, but she knew of what you’d have to do and made preparations for tonight.”

Though the revelation shocked her, Nita could not say that she was completely surprised; she herself had wondered many times the similarities she and her mother had shared with the illustrious family whenever she gazed into a mirror, but to think it was more than coincidence dumbfounded her. Yet one thing still nagged at her that took precedence over all else.

“You knew,” she whispered hoarsely. She took another step back, letting the bundle in her hands fall to the ground with a dull ring, and stared at the face of a stranger who could no longer look into her eyes. “You knew this entire time that I’d have to… have to…”

Keth screwed his eyes shut and the shadows grew around them. “I wasn’t just tasked with protecting you,” he said softly, gripping at his sword’s hilt. “I was also supposed to bring you home after the deed was done.”

Nita fell to her knees, clutching her chest as if it would help ease her troubled breathing. Words echoed in her mind, each driving the stake in her heart further in as she slowly acknowledged what they meant. Warmth encircled her and she held fast to it, clinging to it as a drowning man would do to driftwood. 

“I have to let you die,” came his voice, somewhere above her. He pressed his face into her hair, taking in every last detail. “I can’t, but I have to. And I’ve never been so close to committing treason to Clerndae, if only so that you’d live.

She pulled back slightly to look up at him, though his visage quickly blurred with tears. “Don’t you dare say that,” she sputtered. “You said Clerndae was your home and I can’t let you lose it or the entire world just for me.”

He pulled her back into his arms. “You’re worth the world to me. You’ll be gone if I let you do it and I’ll never get you back.” She felt him take a long, shuddering breath. “I’d be failing my one duty as your knight.”

“No, you’d be fulfilling duties bestowed on you by my mother and father,” she rebutted softly. “You’d be taking me home, just as you have done in the past, and none deserve the title of knight more than you. It’s why I must also do my part as priestess and see to it that the seal will be completed, with or without me.”

Keth smiled ruefully, loosening his hold on her. “May this knight have one, selfish request of his liege?” She nodded her consent and he lightly touched her chin to tilt her face up. “Then I ask for a moment of your time before you do what the world asks of you.”

He leaned down, brushing their lips together and she felt her skin tingle with the barest touch. She thought it so cruel that such a moment with him will be torn from the both of them that she could not help but sink into it. Her heart soared with tattered wings, disfigured by the weight of the burden she’d be placing on his heart instead. It was all she could do to prevent a sob from escaping, if only to let them both pretend that the world did not need them for just a moment longer. 

Breathless, they were, as they stole each other’s air under the fire’s glow, both all too aware of time passing on. Nita took Keth’s face in her hands, leaning her head against his as she decided what next she would say. “We can’t avoid the dagger forever,” she murmured.

He reached up with a hand to cover her own, gripping it in what felt like desperation. “It hurts me to let you go like this.”

She tilted her head up to kiss him on the forehead, then stood up. “And it hurts me to leave you, but we have little choice.” Her breath caught in her throat and grief seized at her chest. “If I don’t offer myself, the pact will never end and more than just us will live on with heavy hearts.”

Nita moved closer to the podium and she heard him follow. Reaching out, she grabbed the hilt, mildly in awe of how light it felt. She stared at the name, then turned to her companion to ask one final question. “Always remember me as a Clerndae?” 

Keth nodded, placing a hand over his chest to make a vow. “I swear to it that you’ll never be known as anything but one.”

The priestess swallowed and gripped the dagger with two hands, pointing it towards herself. “Then I suppose this is it,” she whispered. The dagger found its home and she stumbled forward, surprised by the feeling of her life draining away into the metal. Warmth enveloped her and she felt a kiss upon her brow. “Goodbye, Sir Keth of the First Bataille.”

She clung to reality just long enough to hear his response. “Farewell, Lady Nita of House Clerndae.”

[melanincollective-archive]

The Asian-American Dream in Post-Election Society

Bio:

Valerie Wu is a student at Presentation High School in the Bay Area, CA. She is passionate about exploring the intersection of feminism and racial justice. Her work has previously been featured in Susan Cain's Quiet Revolution, the Huffington Post, and received a National Editor's Choice Award from Teen Ink.

I had been #WithHer for the past few years. I was yellow, female, and undefined. I was looking for representation in the American government--I was looking for an individual that could advocate for my voice because I, as an individual, wasn't able to. I was searching for a solid identity within the tapestry of the American Dream, and I believed that the candidate I was rooting for could support that. I retweeted, shared, liked her quotes and articles on social media. I wrote election statements articulating what I believed and what I hoped for the future of America.

Such sentiment is only an example of the actions taken by marginalized groups in America. Living in a predominantly immigrant community in Northern California, there was a quantitative amount of unrest felt. There was talk of moving back to China, Taiwan--anywhere but here. There was talk of the lack of the American Dream in America. And somewhere in that, another thing emerged: the notion of rightful belonging. Somewhere in the movement of no, no, n o there was yes, yes, yes. That movement proposing the place of Asian-American characters in America was one that developed specifically because of the oppression against it. It was one that I started seeing in the personal narratives I heard; it was one that I started seeing in the personal narratives I've read.

This movement has in turn lead to a literary revolution of its own kind. The Wangs vs. the World is quite possibly one of the most enlightening, thought-provoking books I've read that really focus on the American Dream through the Asian-American perspective. Centered around the financial decline of the Wang family, the novel chronicles the changing shape of the American Dream in the backdrop of an American society while utilizing the atypical "road trip" story as a plot device. Charles Wang is an immigrant who lives the quintessential "American Dream" with a thriving cosmetics business until the 2008 recession hits. In the aftermath of the recession, his business goes bankrupt, and he begins to become fixated on this idea of the motherland, a land in which the land is his, the culture is his, and the concept of home is his. In this, Charles Wang and his family become literary representations of belonging in America. Despite the odds America places against them, they are ultimately able to redeem their own sense of belonging in between the two countries.

In an interview with the Asian American Writers' Workshop , Jade Chang, the author of The Wangs vs. the World, stated on her inspiration for the novel, "I felt that the people of America want to hear stories of immigrant pain or righteous struggle. Not just immigrants, people of color as a whole." In the midst of the hate-filled rhetoric of the 2016 election, I focused on the positive message of the American Dream as I--as my immigrant community--defined it. I wrote a lot. I wrote lots of essays about myself, my neighborhood, my achievements, and my home. I think in a sense, I was trying to advocate for the marginalized voices of the election, to provide them with a voice thacouldn't be heard above the protests and outrage. I joined Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders for Hillary , signed up to volunteer, wrote instead. I think literature has the power to effect change just as much as crying out. In a sense, literature is crying out--the crying out for social justice, for fairness in identity politics.

In this transitory period of American society, my dreams are still undefined. I still don't know whether to call myself Asian or American. The color of my skin is still yellow. But I have a firm belief in the power of the word, both written and verbal. If I had to say one thing to the future president of America--any future president--I'd tell him/her to consider our words, because they matter. I'm an Asian-American female living in Silicon Valley, a place of privilege, and I'm telling you that unless you join our movement, our movement of making the American vision come true won't become reality. It won't become reality unless we make it so. I'm working to effect change through literature, literature that empowers and inspires.

I don't think I'll ever quite realize the implications this election will have for the future. As Asian-Americans, what we want most is to be heard. As a writer of color, I believe that I fulfilled my duty by giving a new definition to American literature as a whole. So dear America, let's start a project. Let's start a project to include minorities within American history. Let's start a movement of rights for the disabled, the people of color, the LGBTQ community. Yes, the election is over. That doesn't mean the revolution is. 

[madqueenalanna]

A story, a love story

Pairing: unrequited Grif/Simmons Word count: 1,637 Prompt: from @goodluckdetective: “I want to tell you a story. A love story" "Does it have a happy ending" "They never do" Summary: Set after 15x06. Caboose and Simmons can’t sleep, so Caboose begs Simmons to tell him a story.

It was midnight. Not that Simmons could tell, underwater. His helmet probably had the right time, but he’d had to sync it with Sarge, and Sarge didn’t obey daylight savings time. Stranger still, he didn’t even use military time. But it was darker than usual, and no one else seemed to be awake, and so even if it wasn’t midnight exactly, it meant the same thing: Simmons was alone.

He was no stranger to insomnia. Back in Blood Gulch there had been nothing to do but sleep, really, and he got a perfect four-point-five hours every night. But ever since… well, everything, really… ever since the first time Church died, ever since the word freelancer started to mean something distinct, ever since he’d said goodbye to that ugly red canyon for what he didn’t know was the last time, he’d been consumed by sleepless anxiety. It wasn’t even like he was anxious about any one thing, really. Okay, these alternates reeked of something wrong, and Gene was really getting on his nerves, and they didn’t even have a version of– Well, there were a lot of possibilities, a lot of things that could go wrong. After so many years it was weird to have Wash and Carolina not be close at hand. Vulnerable, almost. Was that it? He was anxious about his anxiety. Dick Simmons was a self-fulfilling prophecy. But the quiet was good. Right? The quiet was definitely a good thing. After years of screaming matches across a baking plain, after the ear-splitting volume of grenades and gunfire and the sound Wash made when he realized Caboose’s attempts at pancakes were stuck to the ceiling, after all day with his helmet giving him a white-noise buffer, being alone in the dark felt not relaxing but wrong. No one snoring in another bunk, no sounds of Oreo packets crinkling, no tinny music escaping from bad headphones. Quiet. Peaceful. Lonely. He sat cross-legged on his bunk, the retirement-atrophied muscles in his back strained from the weight of his metal arm. In armor, the body suit could support the heft of it, but in just sweatpants and a t-shirt, the metal relied on negligible muscles, weak ligaments, and thin freckled skin to keep it attached. Sarge had done a serviceable job making him a cyborg, even if his robot eye had a tendency to go all “blue screen of death” when he was stressed, but his weedy body still hadn’t adjusted to the cold, solid weight of the robotic parts. As usual, he ached in all the parts Grif took something away from him. But, uh, that was just the eye and arm and fourteen feet of small intestine, not… “Simmons?” “Caboose! Christ, you scared me.” A hulking silhouette in one’s doorway was rarely cause for celebration. Caboose, like him, was out of armor, rubbing his arm like he was cold or uncomfortable. “I can’t sleep.” “Me neither,” he admitted. “Church used to tell me stories when I couldn’t sleep.” “No he fucking didn’t.” Church wasn’t usually as much of an asshole as he pretended to be, but he had his limits anyway. “Was it something like ‘once upon a time, you got the fuck out of my room’?” Caboose’s face lit up. “He told you some too!” Simmons sighed. “Just come in and close the door. You’re letting all my self-pity out.” Caboose followed orders and planted himself at the end of Simmons’ bunk, mirroring his cross-legged posture. “I’ll tell you a story. A love story.” “Does it have a happy ending?” “They never do.” He looked down at his fidgeting hands. His left was slim elegant metal, his right boney and freckled with chapped fingertips. How could his hands look the same after so many years? How could he look the same after everything? “Once there was a– a wizard. And the wizard was really good friends with a… knight. They lived in– in a–” “Castle?” Caboose supplied, wide-eyed. “Sure, if you believe the listing agent. And the wizard was the best at– I mean, he was the smartest guy around. Not very good under pressure, but like, why does that matter, y’know? It matters that he’s good at magic! Not how fast he can do it! The knight’s not very good at being a knight. He’s fat and lazy and can’t ride a horse.” “He sounds dumb.” “Thank you! He is! But the wizard is friends with him anyway.” “Why?” “I don’t know. The wizard thinks about that a lot. Like, he figures someday he’ll learn how to use a sword and then he won’t need the knight anymore, and maybe the knight will learn a little magic too and they’d have more in common… but it never seems to happen. He just realizes that– that the time he spends with the knight is better than the time he spends without him.” Caboose nodded very seriously and Simmons wondered if he was thinking about Church. They’d all lost so much but Caboose had taken it harder than just about anyone; not as vocal about it as Carolina or Tucker, but only because he was still a little in denial. After all, he’d said, people who are loved come back. It was a nice thought. “The wizard and the knight go on a lot of adventures together. They fight a bunch of dragons with weird names, they go back in time, they travel through space! They even become friends with some of the dragons.” “That is good. It is good to make friends.” “That’s what the wizard thought too. But the knight… the knight didn’t really want to be friends anymore. They hung out in a, um, a magical… broom closet. And then after that… The wizard wished he could go back in time again.” “Why didn’t he?” “Cause you can’t just go back in time, Caboose. It’s only… sometimes. So you don’t mess anything up.” “He doesn’t sound like a very good wizard.” “He’s not,” he admitted. “Maybe that’s why the knight wanted to leave. Maybe if the wizard was a better wizard, or a better friend… maybe they would have stuck together. But they didn’t stick together. The knight left the kingdom.” He was going to end his shitty story there, but Caboose looked so crestfallen… “But, um, later he came back! With jetpacks! And he and the wizard ruled the kingdom harshly but fairly forever.” There was a moment of silence and Simmons wished he couldn’t hear his own heartbeat in it. “That story was not very good,” Caboose said finally, and Simmons sighed. “But that is okay. You tried to make it good. I liked the dragons.” “Thanks, Caboose. I appreciate that.” In a worse mood, or a better one, he might have complained that someone who could not read or write was critiquing his storytelling, but it was late and he was tired and somehow he felt absurdly bad that he disappointed Caboose. “I do not understand about the knight.” “What’s not to understand? He sucks.” “Exactly! You cannot be a knight if you are not good at things! You have to be good at things to be a knight! You have to follow the code of shimmying.” “Code of… do you mean chivalry?” “Code of Italy.” “Okay, forget it. And sometimes… sometimes people aren’t what they should be,” he said, wondering how best to explain the fragile nature of human sin and greed to someone like Caboose. “Sometimes knights aren’t very nice. Sometimes soldiers are like Sarge! You know?” “I think the knight must still be good,” he said firmly, in his no-argument tone. “I think they would not let him have a sword if he were not good.” Caboose lived in a different world, Simmons reminded himself. But it was a nice world, in a sense, a world that was not concerned about whether or not dragons existed but only wondered how to fight them, or befriend them. If you have a sword, you’re the good guy. God how he wished that were true. “Maybe so,” he conceded. “I’ll keep that in mind when I make up a better story for next time.” Caboose’s eyes shone at the prospect of next time and he kind of regretted saying it already. Only kind of, though. “Okay. Thank you for the story, Simmons. I like the happy ending.” “Me too, Caboose. You should go to bed. We have to get back to looking for Church in the morning.” “Okay! It will be good to see Church again.” “Yeah,” he said, making himself smile. “It will. Good night, Caboose.” “Good night!” When he was gone, it was quiet again, and Simmons could hear the tick-tick of his pulse. He thought a little human contact would be just the thing to cheer him up, and it was nice of Caboose to thank him for his awful story. But he just fixated on that damn happy ending. Why did his shitty wizard get a happy ending? What was he doing wrong? How was it possible that he could do everything right and still get the short end of the stick? And worse– was he even doing anything right? “I miss you,” he mumbled aloud. There was no answer. Of course there wasn’t. Before Chorus, he thought Grif’s insults were the worst thing– his curses, his shrieks, his rage. Before Chorus he would have given anything to get Grif to just shut up for ten seconds. But now it was after, after everything, and it was dark and he was alone and the stony silence was downright oppressive and Grif’s absence was worse than even the most annoying aspects of his presence. He sighed, curled up on his bunk, tried to sleep. At least his shitty wizard got closure. Why didn’t he get even that?

[dragongem777]

You Have my Word

Here’s a little ficy that’s been sitting in my files for foreevverrr. Enjoy!

This scene is set directly after Hawke’s primary mission: On the Loose in ACT 3.

 “I cannot believe that woman! How dare she put us up to this task and expect us side with her after what we saw! She’s completely mad!”

Anders’ sharp words rang loudly along the walls of the staircase that they descended. Thankfully, the loud clang of the gates being closed behind them didn’t allow the Templars standing guard to hear his cries of fury, but that didn’t stop an angry hiss of a response to fall from his archer companion’s lips.

“Do you honestly believe that the mages aren’t at fault for their actions!?” Sebastian’s angry reply was promptly given, and an angry scowl accompanied his words as the four walked along the gallows path. “The Templars were merely doing what they were told to do, and the mages resisted. Their actions are their fault, and their fault alone.”

“I cannot seriously believe you’re saying that.” Anders snapped back, glaring vehemently at the priest. “After what we saw, you still can’t see that the oppression they face is driving them to these extremes! Even Hawke saw that!”

Hawke winced when he heard his name, and he couldn’t help but feel a small twitch of his lip as the conversation was turned on him.

“That still doesn’t make it true, everyone is responsible for their own actions! What the mages did was against everything –“

“Sebastian, please. You cannot justify what the Templars did with that nonsense.” Hawke’s non-aggressive voice cut Sebastian’s off firmly.  “Does that mean what you did to the mercenaries who killed your family was your fault? Or theirs? Their actions demanded yours, as was the same for the mages.”

“Exactly.” Anders chimed in readily as his pace quickened to fall instep beside Hawke while they walked down the steps to board the small ferry to Hightown. Each of them stepped into the small boat and took a seat. “And each day it grows worse.” The blond mage finished as he adjusted himself on the wooden bench he sat upon.

Hawke shook his head and turned to look at the suspiciously quiet elf who sat next to Sebastian on the other side. He had nearly forgotten Fenris had accompanied them, as the elf had said very little since they had arrived in the Templar Hall.

Fenris had his elbow propped up on the side with his chin resting on the back of his hand. He would have appeared calm or completely indifferent, but the expression on his face was anything but. A dark cloud of anger masked his face, and his vehement eyes deliberately avoided contact with any of the people on the ferry. Hawke had rarely seen such blatant fury in his expression before, at least not so in a place where the eyes of the public lingered. He wasn’t even bothering to hide it.

It would have been unnerving, but Hawke was already so riled up from their encounter with the Knight-Commander he had chosen to ignore it for the time being.

The rest of the short ride to Hightown was silent between the four of them, as they all contemplated what had been said.

Finally, they reached the edge of the docks, and each swiftly exited the ferry.

But no sooner had they set foot upon the dock when the elf, without saying a word, promptly marched away from the small party without even a small glance back in their direction.

Hawke watched him go with slightly narrowed eyes.

He knew for certain that Fenris was upset with his defending of the mages, but his reaction was different from normal this time. Usually, he was quick to make his thoughts known in circumstances like these, especially in front of Anders, but the elf hadn’t said even one word since they’d left the Hall.

“He’s just angry that there’s no excuse this time.” Anders’ voice suddenly said beside him as the mage walked up to his side. “You did the right thing, Hawke. Those mages were not at fault.”

Hawke spared Anders a passing glance and a nod before he turned to Sebastian, who was silently watching them from behind.

“There’s no reason to think about this any longer today. We did what we had to.” Hawke said surely, glancing at the two of them. “We can talk about this another time, but for now I think it’s best for us all to get some rest.”

The two agreed, and with mutual understanding, the three parted ways.

 ~

Yes, he would get some rest. But only after this was resolved.

Hawke stood in front of the Hightown mansion that so famously belonged to the elf. He sighed, knowing that he was about to get his neck wrung for once again standing up for the mages.

It had been a long time since he and Fenris had argued about this issue, as each of them had a mutual understanding of what each other’s stances were on the matter. Each were teaching each other the importance of acceptance on both sides, and it seemed as though, though it was a slow process, that they were both getting better at understanding.

This is why Hawke was reluctant and confused.

He had expected his elven lover to be a bit miffed, but Fenris hadn’t just looked miffed, he had looked furious.

Something was off, and Hawke wasn’t even going to consider going home until it was figured out.

But still…he was reluctant to argue about this. Fenris’s powerful rationale was difficult to refute at times, and his stubbornness was also difficult to get passed.

He was not looking forward to this.

With a sigh, the mage reluctantly lifted a hand and gave the door three sharp raps and waited.

No answer – as expected.

With a deep breath, the mage reached for the handle and attempted to open the door – to no avail.

“Hmm…” Hawke’s brows furrowed.

Fenris usually only locked the door at night, but it wasn’t evening yet, and he was definitely home.

Hawke jiggled the handle a few more times before he stepped back and reached around the corner to search for the spare key that the elf left well hidden in a small crevice in the stone wall.

Nothing there.

Hawke squinted his eyes as he brows furrowed even further, and he looked up towards the mansion windows to see if they were open. He had thought perhaps he could shout his name, but they were closed – and there were also many people around.

So…he was being avoided.

The mage thought about breaking it open with magic, but considering what had just happened, he figured that probably wasn’t the best idea.

“Oohh, no. Not this time.” Hawke mumbled to himself as he adjusted his shoulders and backed up. With a slight smirk, the mage gallivanted around the side of the mansion, mind fixated on the one small chink in the household structure that he had managed to find one day while he had randomly been perusing Danarius’s abandoned things.

“Ah-ha.” With an imagined pat on the back, the mage slowly made his way towards a ledge with only one single window that was on the ground level. With a small push, the window easily gave in, and the frame that held it in place moved aside easily. With a heave, Hawke managed to throw his torso over the edge and follow the movement with a swift swing of his legs.

Wumph

The soft landing was admirable for a rogue, let alone a mage.

Garrett swiftly dusted himself off and turned to shut the open window.

“Right, down to business.” He rubbed his hands together and swiftly proceeded down the hallway towards the main hall of the mansion.

After making a few twists and turns, he managed to find his way to the center of the mansion and swiftly pushed open the door to reveal the large living area. The drafty area was dark and foreboding as usual, and the tilted paintings and random plants popping up throughout the tiled floor would have chased away any cautious person.

Hawke still couldn’t fathom why the elf refused to try and make the areas outside of his main room any more appealing, but he had guessed it had something to do with the fact that either he didn’t care enough to tidy it up, or perhaps he felt it warned away potential intruders.

The mage casually made his way up the steps around the left side, and noted how strangely his anticipation was rising. With a deep breath, he reached the top of the steps and walked over to the, unsurprisingly, shut door of the master bedroom.

Here went nothing.

Knock knock knock.

“Fenris,” Hawke said after he lowered his fist. When the elf didn’t respond, Hawke shook his head slightly and sighed. “Fenris, I’m coming in.”

True to his word, Hawke slowly pushed open the door.

A warm fire was lit and crackling, with random books and various weaponry strewn about the room, it appeared much more lived in than the rest of the mansion.

The elf himself was seated on the bench nearest to the crackling flames. A book was propped in his lap, and had it not been for the sour expression that masked his face, it would have appeared as though he was very absorbed in what he was reading.

“Do you not understand even the simple concept of privacy.” The elf muttered darkly without looking up. The statement barely came across as a question, and half of his face that was illuminated by the fire was bathed in anger.

“I think we both know that I have issues with that.” Hawke responded sarcastically, though he mentally kicked himself afterwards.

Now was not the time.

The elf didn’t respond, instead he continued to stare at the pages in his lap, though it was obvious he wasn’t reading any of it.

Hawke stood there for a moment, judging whether or not it was safer to stand there than to approach him, but after some deliberation, he made his way over to the bench adjacent to where his lover was sitting.

“Fenris, I think it’s important that we talk about this.” The mage said after a moment of sitting in the dark silence. He propped his elbows up on his thighs and folded his hands underneath his chin, waiting for a response from the elf.

He didn’t offer one, and continued to stare at the book in his lap.

“I’m aware that you feel as though those mages were responsible for their actions, but you also must have seen what the Templars were doing that pushed them. We cannot simply turn a blind eye to that.” Hawke continued, he stared longingly at the elf, desperately hoping that he would understand this side.

“We’ve discussed this before, we know that there’s a give and take with both sides, but Meredith overstepped her boundaries, she shouldn’t have –“

“What!?” The sudden outburst from the elf made Hawke blink in shock, while the book that was sitting in the elf’s lap crashed to the floor as he abruptly stood up. “You’re telling me Meredith overstepped her boundaries!?” Fenris bellowed, his hand flying to the side as he gestured. “She has no boundaries! She’s the one who sets them, how could you possibly say that she overstepped them!?” The rage that flowed through his words was enough to make Hawke shrink back, but he merely allowed himself to narrow his eyes as a response.  

“Meredith is not immune to the rules of the city, Fenris.” Hawke reasoned as he watched the elf pace towards the other side of the room. “She cannot be lead to believe that she is allowed to break those rules, someone has to –“

“-Someone like you, Hawke?” The elf spat in response, cutting him off abruptly. “Someone like you has to remind her that she isn’t allowed to say bad things about mages, that she isn’t allowed to blame them for the fact that they’ve turned themselves over to demons. YOU are the one that has to make sure that she sees why they did what they did!?”

“Fenris, someone needs to stand up to her, and given my position, I am possibly the only one that is able to!” Hawke’s voice raised as he presented his rationale, and he stood to his feet so that he could more easily face the furious elf. “The crimes of these mages are just as much able to be laid at the feet of the Templars as their own, how can you not see that?”

“Do not think me a fool, mage.” Fenris hissed, his fists clenching in response to his anger. “I know exactly what the Templars face when mages feel as though they have no other option. And I am perfectly aware of why mages feel the need to give themselves to demons to protect themselves. But for all that reason, you feel the need to aggravate the Knight-Commander of Kirkwall and blame her for the crimes of those mages. How do you think she sees you now?”

Hawke blinked, suddenly confused by the turn in the conversation.

“Do you believe that she sees you as an aid to the Templars?” Fenris continued, his lips curled in a snarl. “No. You made it blatantly obvious that your stance is with the mages and Orsino. There is no longer any doubt. You even have the gall to claim that she is the reason mages turn to blood magic. You’ve made her your enemy, Hawke. Meredith is already cautious of you seeing as you’re a mage, but for you to openly defy and insult her, do you have a death wish!?”

Again, the most Hawke was able to do was stare stupidly at the man before him. He hadn’t been expecting this at all. He had expected their normal argument about mage rights to ensue, but that wasn’t at all what Fenris was referring to.

“She is already looking for reason to turn you over to the Circle, why prod her!?” The elf yelled, a mix of desperation and fury laced his voice, and if Hawke hadn’t been so fixated on his expression, he might have missed the slight glisten in his eyes.

He suddenly realized what was happening.

“Fenris…” Hawke said quietly, his eyes dropping as they shut. He stood there in silence as realization flooded him.

This made a lot more sense now.

After a moment, Hawke raised his head and slowly made his way over to the elf at the end of the room. Fenris was still glaring furiously at him, but there was something in his eyes that screamed defeat – and most of all – fear.

“I’m not going anywhere; Meredith won’t be able to touch me.” The mage finally said, raising a finger so that he could tilt the elf’s head in his direction. “She can’t.”

Fenris closed his eyes and turned away as he brushed away the hand that touched him. “You’re a fool if you believe that, Hawke.” The elf muttered as he turned away to walk towards the open window near his bed. “Meredith is looking for any reason to lock you away. Anyone can see that. She knows you’re her biggest threat.”

Hawke watched the elf’s back, heavily contemplating his words. “I know that.” The mage finally said, taking cautious steps nearer to him. “But, Fenris…I am the only one who can. I have an obligation to defend these people.”

“And what good will you be locked away in the Circle, hmm? How will you defend your precious mages then?” The white-haired man suddenly snarled, turning his angry gaze on the mage beside him.

“It won’t come to that, Fenris.” Hawke reasoned.

“You’re too naive, Hawke.” Fenris huffed, shaking his head. “I can see it in her eyes, the way she stares at you, waiting for the smallest mistake to justify your imprisonment. And after today…” The elf trailed off, eyes unfocused as he recalled the memory.

Silence filled the air between them, only the sound of distant voices coming from the open window and the light crackle of the fireplace filled the room.

“I just…I don’t know what I would do if they took you.”

Hawke’s head raised at the unexpected words Fenris spoke. Though it was little more than a mumble, they might as well have been shouted for all the impact that they had on Hawke’s heart.

The brunet stared at the elf’s crestfallen face, his heart silently breaking at the image.

“They would make you Tranquil, Garrett…” Fenris’s troubled eyes rose to meet Hawke’s as he said the dreaded words. The mage had barely registered his movements before he found himself suddenly and swiftly wrapping the lithe frame in his arms, hugging him tightly in his strong embrace.

It all made so much sense now.

“I’m sorry I made you worry, amatus.” Hawke mumbled earnestly, eyes closing as he absorbed the warmth of the elf’s lean body. “I will do my best not to be so brash again.”

Hawke’s heart felt like it had been shattered into a million pieces, and he would sooner jump off the roof of the mansion than see Fenris’s eyes so hurt again.

“And Fenris,” Hawke said pulling away slightly so that he could look into the elf’s large green eyes. “Please, have faith in my abilities. Try all they want, we’ve defeated hordes of darkspawn, coterie, and Qunari. I think I could take a few Templars. Plus,” Hawke continued, swiping a few strands of white hair out of the elf’s eyes. “I know you’ll always have my back. That alone is enough for me.”

Fenris’s eyes fell, but he looked more reassured than he had before.

“I love you Fenris,” Garrett continued, tilting his head so that he could catch the elf’s gaze, “and it would take much more than a few mad Templars and their Knight-Commander to tear me from you.”

A weak smile pulled at Fenris’s lips as the elf allowed his gaze to fully meet Hawke’s. “You had better keep that promise, mage.” The shorter man said affectionately.

Returning the smile, Hawke leaned down and softly closed his lips over the elf’s, allowing the serenity of the moment to fuel the intensity of the kiss.

The kiss seemed to last a lifetime, but as soon as their lips parted, Hawke reached up and gently placed his hands on either side of Fenris’s face and brought their foreheads together.

“You have my word.”

  Okay – if anyone’s curious, I actually first started this fic out to be an explanation of how I view mages and their oppression and stuff – but it turned into this. It still accurately represents my views though! BUT – what I want to point out too, is that at the end of the game I actually sided with the Templars. I’m not going to explain that in this post – but if you’re curious as to why – please check it out here: 

Hope you liked it regardless! :P

[gardencityvegans]

Weekend Reading, 6.24.18

https://www.thefullhelping.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/weekend_reading.jpg

A friend of mine told me that he recently went to a conference where all of the attendees seemed to be talking about perfectionism, in spite of that fact that it wasn’t the conference theme. They were discussing it as people who had been susceptible to impossible standards in the past, but now counted themselves lucky to have let perfectionism go.

As we were talking, it occurred to me that I haven’t thought about perfectionism in a long time, though it had a hold on me for years. Even after I stopped trying to do everything “right,” perfectionism (and to some extent, being “Type A”) was a big part of my identity. I called myself a “recovering perfectionist,” which was truthful, but in retrospect I think it was also my way of continuing to identify with perfectionism and communicate it to others. I didn’t want to be subject to oppressive standards anymore, but I hadn’t yet figured out who I was without them.

In the end, perfectionism exited my life out of necessity; I untangled from it because I didn’t have a choice. Living with bouts of depression and anxiety in the last few years has meant letting go of a lot of my self-imposed notions of what constitutes productivity, success, or a day well spent.

A common experience of depression, I think, is that small, routine asks can suddenly seem insurmountable: doing laundry, cleaning up, running errands. This would have sounded unbelievable to me at one point in my life, when these kinds of to-dos were just afterthoughts, but now I know what it’s like to struggle with the everyday.

I’m thinking back to an afternoon two summers ago that illustrates this perfectly: my anxiety had been particularly bad, and I’d been paralyzed by procrastination all day. By dinnertime I was genuinely proud of myself for having gotten out of the house to pick up groceries and mail a package. This was a radically different measure of productivity than I was used to, and it didn’t matter: I was relieved to have done something, anything.

I’m in a different place now, capable of fuller days, but my perspective remains valuably altered by that experience. I don’t wake up with a fixed agenda anymore. I don’t plan on doing more than I know I can handle. If I notice that tasks remain undone everyday on my modest to-do list, I take it as a sign that I need to plan on doing less, rather than wondering why I can’t do more.

I’ve learned that my capacity for doing and my tendency to get overwhelmed ebb and flow. Sometimes they shift for reasons that I can identify, like how I’m feeling physically or whether something has made me anxious. Sometimes they change suddenly and for no apparent reason. I don’t try to bully myself out of feeling overwhelmed; rather, I ask what would make me feel calmer and more steady.

I often remind myself of a mantra that my friend Maria gave herself when her MS symptoms started keeping her from the pace and routines that had become customary: “better than before.” The origin of this mantra was an ongoing struggle to keep tidy the home she shared with her young son. As Maria’s “functional self” receded, she noticed the presence of another self, who “though less physically versatile, was stronger than I ever could have imagined from the perspective of the one who functioned’ throughout the day. She began to show me things my functional self simply missed.”

One of those things, she goes on to say,

was to be able to notice when I was completely out of energy to exert myself. This might be when something was halfway wiped, or not wiped at all, but I had somehow managed to put some things away. She would know to say that’s enough for now. And she was very clever about what would satisfy my functional self, who would never have been satisfied with that’s enough. It sobered that functional self to learn when the diagnosis of MS finally came that the “forcing” she had habituated herself to was the worst thing to do if she wanted to preserve her physical abilities.  But as the saying goes, it’s really true that you catch more flies with honey than vinegar. So my deeper wiser identity came up with something even more ingenious than this looming threat:

Better Than It Was.

Or, (depending on the context): Cleaner Than It Was.

These two statements became my mottos. And they still are. They allowed me to learn to pace myself while still satisfying that Functional Self that I was making what she considered progress through the daily requirements of life, even if many of them were slowed to a crawl or a downright standstill.  Better Than It Was.

Maria’s story is uniquely her own, and my own sense of high functionality has shifted for reasons that are uniquely mine. But her clever motto has given me great comfort since I first read about it on her blog. So, too, does this quote from Melody Beattie: “Our best yesterday was good enough; our best today is plenty good too.”

The best thing about letting go of perfectionism is developing a capacity to recognize that “our best” can look very different from moment to moment. There’s no longer an immovable standard of output. I wish that I’d been able to pry my ego away from productivity and being busy on my own, rather than being forced to reckon with a dramatic shift in my capacities, but in the end, it doesn’t matter how I got here. What matters is that I’m learning to be grateful for what I can do, rather than fixating on what I haven’t, or can’t.

Throughout all of this, I’ve had the tremendous luxury of being able to adjust my schedule and responsibilities in a way that allowed me to create a dynamic “new normal.” Not every person has the space to do this, depending on his or her professional and personal circumstances. I recognize and respect the many men and women who go through periods of depression and anxiety while also keeping up with fixed schedules. And of course I worry sometimes about my DI year: now that I’m learning how to take gentle care in the moments when I need to, what will it be like to temporarily lose control of my schedule and workload?

I don’t have an answer, but to some degree I suspect that I don’t need one. My routine next year will be a challenge, but so long as I can do my best without succumbing to the influence of perfectionism, I know I’ll be OK. Much as I’ve made my schedule more realistic, letting go of perfectionism has been an inside job. It resides in recognizing how futile perfectionism is, how it discourages me needlessly while keeping me from recognizing the good that I can do, and maybe have done (another observation that’s prompted by Beattie).

Here’s to a week—and a month, and a summer, and a year—of doing my best and trusting that my best is enough. I wish the same for you, too. And here’s the weekly roundup of links.

Recipes

I would never think to put fruit in a tabbouleh, but I love Katie’s creative mixture of blueberries, parsley, mint, and quinoa—I’d actually love to try it as a savory breakfast dish!

A very different kind of quinoa salad, but no less delicious: a curried mixture with red cabbage, raisins, and pumpkin seeds from Melanie of Veggie Jam.

Two recipes for summer entertaining caught my eye this past week. The first is these show-stopping chipotle cauliflower nachos from my friend Jeanine of Love & Lemons.

Number two is this platter of green summer rolls with mango miso sauce from Anya of Lazy Cat Kitchen. The sauce alone is calling to me, but I also love all of the tender green veggies here (asparagus, zucchini, broccolini).

Finally, a summery vegan pasta salad with creamy avocado dressing—perfect timing, as pasta salad’s been on my mind lately (and I may just have a recipe coming soon!).

Reads

1. This article is about a month old, but it’s very on-topic for today’s post: why you should stop being so hard on yourself, via The New York Times.

2. Ed Yong’s new article on the threat of imminent global pandemics frightened me (and the blurb under the title didn’t help), but it’s an important topic, and I’m glad that it’s being written about. Yong notes the medical supply shortages that are becoming increasingly problematic in the US; hopefully greater awareness might somehow inspire solutions.

3. Reporting on the termination of a major NIH study of alcohol, heart attack, and stroke, which was shut down when conflicts of interest were identified. It’s an important examination of the ethics of funding and scientific research.

4. Dispatches from the Gulf of California, where the vaquita—now the world’s rarest marine mammal—is on the brink of extinction.

5. I was so full of appreciation and respect when I read my friend Karen’s latest post on numbers and body acceptance.

Like Karen, I went through a long period of asking to be blind weighed at the doctor’s office and not owning a scale. That time served a purpose, but nowadays I can be aware of the number without identifying with it, which I’m grateful for. I’ve had a bunch of doctor’s appointments in the last month, and getting weighed has been the last thing on my mind: feeling more at home in my body has been my only point of focus.

Karen opens up about her own recent experience with the scale and the annual physical, then reflects on why she’s committed to being transparent about what “balance” looks like for her. It’s great to witness her journey unfolding.

On that inspiring note, happy Sunday—and from a celebratory NYC, happy pride! I’ll be circling back this week with my first fruit-filled dessert of the summer.

xo

[Read More ...] https://www.thefullhelping.com/weekend-reading-6-24-18/

[oovitus]

Weekend Reading, 6.24.18

A friend of mine told me that he recently went to a conference where all of the attendees seemed to be talking about perfectionism, in spite of that fact that it wasn’t the conference theme. They were discussing it as people who had been susceptible to impossible standards in the past, but now counted themselves lucky to have let perfectionism go.

As we were talking, it occurred to me that I haven’t thought about perfectionism in a long time, though it had a hold on me for years. Even after I stopped trying to do everything “right,” perfectionism (and to some extent, being “Type A”) was a big part of my identity. I called myself a “recovering perfectionist,” which was truthful, but in retrospect I think it was also my way of continuing to identify with perfectionism and communicate it to others. I didn’t want to be subject to oppressive standards anymore, but I hadn’t yet figured out who I was without them.

In the end, perfectionism exited my life out of necessity; I untangled from it because I didn’t have a choice. Living with bouts of depression and anxiety in the last few years has meant letting go of a lot of my self-imposed notions of what constitutes productivity, success, or a day well spent.

A common experience of depression, I think, is that small, routine asks can suddenly seem insurmountable: doing laundry, cleaning up, running errands. This would have sounded unbelievable to me at one point in my life, when these kinds of to-dos were just afterthoughts, but now I know what it’s like to struggle with the everyday.

I’m thinking back to an afternoon two summers ago that illustrates this perfectly: my anxiety had been particularly bad, and I’d been paralyzed by procrastination all day. By dinnertime I was genuinely proud of myself for having gotten out of the house to pick up groceries and mail a package. This was a radically different measure of productivity than I was used to, and it didn’t matter: I was relieved to have done something, anything.

I’m in a different place now, capable of fuller days, but my perspective remains valuably altered by that experience. I don’t wake up with a fixed agenda anymore. I don’t plan on doing more than I know I can handle. If I notice that tasks remain undone everyday on my modest to-do list, I take it as a sign that I need to plan on doing less, rather than wondering why I can’t do more.

I’ve learned that my capacity for doing and my tendency to get overwhelmed ebb and flow. Sometimes they shift for reasons that I can identify, like how I’m feeling physically or whether something has made me anxious. Sometimes they change suddenly and for no apparent reason. I don’t try to bully myself out of feeling overwhelmed; rather, I ask what would make me feel calmer and more steady.

I often remind myself of a mantra that my friend Maria gave herself when her MS symptoms started keeping her from the pace and routines that had become customary: “better than before.” The origin of this mantra was an ongoing struggle to keep tidy the home she shared with her young son. As Maria’s “functional self” receded, she noticed the presence of another self, who “though less physically versatile, was stronger than I ever could have imagined from the perspective of the one who functioned’ throughout the day. She began to show me things my functional self simply missed.”

One of those things, she goes on to say,

was to be able to notice when I was completely out of energy to exert myself. This might be when something was halfway wiped, or not wiped at all, but I had somehow managed to put some things away. She would know to say that’s enough for now. And she was very clever about what would satisfy my functional self, who would never have been satisfied with that’s enough. It sobered that functional self to learn when the diagnosis of MS finally came that the “forcing” she had habituated herself to was the worst thing to do if she wanted to preserve her physical abilities.  But as the saying goes, it’s really true that you catch more flies with honey than vinegar. So my deeper wiser identity came up with something even more ingenious than this looming threat:

Better Than It Was.

Or, (depending on the context): Cleaner Than It Was.

These two statements became my mottos. And they still are. They allowed me to learn to pace myself while still satisfying that Functional Self that I was making what she considered progress through the daily requirements of life, even if many of them were slowed to a crawl or a downright standstill.  Better Than It Was.

Maria’s story is uniquely her own, and my own sense of high functionality has shifted for reasons that are uniquely mine. But her clever motto has given me great comfort since I first read about it on her blog. So, too, does this quote from Melody Beattie: “Our best yesterday was good enough; our best today is plenty good too.”

The best thing about letting go of perfectionism is developing a capacity to recognize that “our best” can look very different from moment to moment. There’s no longer an immovable standard of output. I wish that I’d been able to pry my ego away from productivity and being busy on my own, rather than being forced to reckon with a dramatic shift in my capacities, but in the end, it doesn’t matter how I got here. What matters is that I’m learning to be grateful for what I can do, rather than fixating on what I haven’t, or can’t.

Throughout all of this, I’ve had the tremendous luxury of being able to adjust my schedule and responsibilities in a way that allowed me to create a dynamic “new normal.” Not every person has the space to do this, depending on his or her professional and personal circumstances. I recognize and respect the many men and women who go through periods of depression and anxiety while also keeping up with fixed schedules. And of course I worry sometimes about my DI year: now that I’m learning how to take gentle care in the moments when I need to, what will it be like to temporarily lose control of my schedule and workload?

I don’t have an answer, but to some degree I suspect that I don’t need one. My routine next year will be a challenge, but so long as I can do my best without succumbing to the influence of perfectionism, I know I’ll be OK. Much as I’ve made my schedule more realistic, letting go of perfectionism has been an inside job. It resides in recognizing how futile perfectionism is, how it discourages me needlessly while keeping me from recognizing the good that I can do, and maybe have done (another observation that’s prompted by Beattie).

Here’s to a week—and a month, and a summer, and a year—of doing my best and trusting that my best is enough. I wish the same for you, too. And here’s the weekly roundup of links.

Recipes

I would never think to put fruit in a tabbouleh, but I love Katie’s creative mixture of blueberries, parsley, mint, and quinoa—I’d actually love to try it as a savory breakfast dish!

A very different kind of quinoa salad, but no less delicious: a curried mixture with red cabbage, raisins, and pumpkin seeds from Melanie of Veggie Jam.

Two recipes for summer entertaining caught my eye this past week. The first is these show-stopping chipotle cauliflower nachos from my friend Jeanine of Love & Lemons.

Number two is this platter of green summer rolls with mango miso sauce from Anya of Lazy Cat Kitchen. The sauce alone is calling to me, but I also love all of the tender green veggies here (asparagus, zucchini, broccolini).

Finally, a summery vegan pasta salad with creamy avocado dressing—perfect timing, as pasta salad’s been on my mind lately (and I may just have a recipe coming soon!).

Reads

1. This article is about a month old, but it’s very on-topic for today’s post: why you should stop being so hard on yourself, via The New York Times.

2. Ed Yong’s new article on the threat of imminent global pandemics frightened me (and the blurb under the title didn’t help), but it’s an important topic, and I’m glad that it’s being written about. Yong notes the medical supply shortages that are becoming increasingly problematic in the US; hopefully greater awareness might somehow inspire solutions.

3. Reporting on the termination of a major NIH study of alcohol, heart attack, and stroke, which was shut down when conflicts of interest were identified. It’s an important examination of the ethics of funding and scientific research.

4. Dispatches from the Gulf of California, where the vaquita—now the world’s rarest marine mammal—is on the brink of extinction.

5. I was so full of appreciation and respect when I read my friend Karen’s latest post on numbers and body acceptance.

Like Karen, I went through a long period of asking to be blind weighed at the doctor’s office and not owning a scale. That time served a purpose, but nowadays I can be aware of the number without identifying with it, which I’m grateful for. I’ve had a bunch of doctor’s appointments in the last month, and getting weighed has been the last thing on my mind: feeling more at home in my body has been my only point of focus.

Karen opens up about her own recent experience with the scale and the annual physical, then reflects on why she’s committed to being transparent about what “balance” looks like for her. It’s great to witness her journey unfolding.

On that inspiring note, happy Sunday—and from a celebratory NYC, happy pride! I’ll be circling back this week with my first fruit-filled dessert of the summer.

xo

The post Weekend Reading, 6.24.18 appeared first on The Full Helping.

Weekend Reading, 6.24.18 published first on

[memoryinsufficient]

Since Donald Trump won the US presidential election one year ago, the games sector has tried to work out how to use our medium to resist the rise of the far right. In March, Resistjam brought game developers together around the world to create consciousness-raising works of political art. Rami Ismail is one developer who has used his platform as a respected public speaker at games conferences to speak out against Trump’s discriminatory travel ban and elevate the voices of developers whose work has been affected. Games criticism outlet Waypoint���s remarkable first year included a week-long special feature on the prison-industrial complex.

Videogames and neoliberalism

Class politics of digital media

Art as political response

How to use games politically

References

One year on, it may now be a good time to evaluate the cultures of resistance that are growing in games. What does it mean to resist fascism with games and tech? How can the videogames and technology industries confront our role in fostering cultures of isolated young men who become radicalised? Does it still make sense to focus on videogames at a time like this?

Videogames and neoliberalism

“Duke Nukem’s Dystopian Fantasies” appeared on Jacobin on April 20th, marking a debut post for writer and artist Liz Ryerson on the leftist commentary site. In it, she makes the affirmative case for looking at videogames as historical and cultural artefacts while judging them on their own merits, and makes the connection between the male power fantasy the game embraces, the alienation people feel under late capitalism, and how that can translate into reaction without a coherent understanding of history.

“This is the power of the fantasy Duke Nukem as a cultural figure represents: that through raw machismo, the series of oppressive neoliberal forces that form the framework of our society can be conquered and transcended. Duke cannot exist in a rational world. He can only exist in a one filled with internal contradictions, crossed wires, and broken down buildings.

“His world is never stable. It can only ever be dominated by irrational fears of the unknown and one-dimensional, cartoonish archetypes. His world never resolves any of its cognitive dissonances, and sometimes even seems to be aware of its own self-destructiveness.”

Liz Ryerson (2017) “Duke Nukem’s Dystopian Fantasies”, Jacobin

For the most part, Ryerson’s piece received praise from leftist partisans whether or not they were particularly committed to videogames as a craft. But not everyone felt it was appropriate for a socialist journal like Jacobin to have published a close reading of something like Duke Nukem 3D.

https://twitter.com/garliccorgi/status/855241007692210177

It’s not as if they’d ever previously published pieces on the art, culture and business of games or tech, to relatively little backlash:

Les Simerables, Eva Koffman “SimCity isn’t a sandbox. Its rules reflect the neoliberal common sense of today’s urban planning.”

Empire Down, Sam Kriss “The player in Age of Empires II doesn’t take on the role of a monarch or a national spirit, but the feudal mode of production itself.”

“You can sleep here all night”: Video Games and Labour, Ian Williams “Exploitation in the video game industry provides a glimpse at how many of us may be working in years to come.”

In my own experience occupying the art fringe of the videogame industry–which is admittedly a highly reactionary space–I’ve learned that while there are a lot of young people pouring a lot of energy into their craft, it’s easy to feel lonely and beholden to a lost cause. I’ve worked as a writer and small-time artist and developer for almost a decade, focusing primarily on indie and alternative development communities and agitating in my limited capacity for more of a spotlight on them, their histories, and the labour involved in them. My political activity outside of my work consists largely of anti-fascist organizing in my city–that means participating in teach-ins, free food events, as well as protests and counter-demonstrations against the far-right. This work is voluntary, but can sometimes feel much more fulfilling than my actual profession. It’s easy to feel like no one really cares about fringe technical arts because, well, most people don’t. If the industry’s flagship mainstream titles give us very little to seriously engage with, then why bother digging any deeper?

[bctt tweet=”Political critique of AAA games is a lot of work, for something juvenile at worst, and culturally peripheral at best.” via=”no”]

As the Jekyll that is liberalism has once again fallen into crisis and gives way to its Mr. Hyde that is fascist reaction, I’ve felt increasingly insecure about the nature of my work and why I chose it. I laugh nervously and tell people what I do is bullshit before going any further. Luckily, most of the people I’ve encountered while organizing, or even just through having had a political affinity online, have expressed genuine interest in the medium, the inner workings of our opaque and cloistered industry, and its potential as an expressive and communicative tool. Still, I have met those who think of things like social media as “inappropriate technology”, who automatically assume that anyone who has any interest in videogames is a pepe nazi, or who think of any engagement with new media as a cultural and political dead end.

That said, some of the most personally influential leftist thinkers I’ve come across are also writers, artists and academics in this incredibly weird field. More often than not we organize and march together. This is not an attempt to scapegoat anyone specific or to do as so many desperate thinkpieces did after the election and try to reaffirm the dubious political importance of games as an artform through headlines such as “Trump as Gamer-in-Chief”.

I don’t think that making videogames, no matter how fringe or alt, should be conflated with tried and true forms of street activism. Game jams about the immigration ban are not a form of direct action in the way shutting down a consulate or doing an hours-long sit-in at an airport are. Your app is not saving the world.

ResistJam was an online game jam about resisting authoritarianism. Over 200 games were made by participants.

The dominant ideological expression of late capitalism is liberalism, or more specifically, neoliberalism. Liberalism prefers to try to diversify the middle class of the currently existing system, rather than try imagining something that might liberate greater masses of people. According to this view, capitalism fundamentally works, only needing a slight tweak here or there to make it more “accessible” to those who are deserving. A major way it seeks to accomplish this is by centering symbolic representation of various marginalized identities while also depoliticizing things like technological progress, framing them as inherently good and proof of societal advancement. All actual material concerns and real struggle can then be ironed away in favour of simply trying to optimize the level of participation for marginalized groups, as one would fiddle with a dial. This isn’t to say symbolic representation doesn’t matter, but to fixate on it strips us of the ability to think in terms of collective political power, and cultivate a real political program that fights for material improvements to people’s lived conditions.

Class politics of digital media

Media consumption doesn’t determine political outcomes, at least not in a direct sense, but it does help shape people’s political imaginations. Taking the time to unpack the media we consume can tell us a lot about the conditions of production–that is to say, the ways in which labour power is exploited in order to produce entertainment commodities. This may include the mining of cobalt to make computer hardware, or the manufacturing of consoles and other devices at Foxconn plants, or developers coerced into overwork in order to meet production quotas. There is a potentially international struggle of exploited workers even just when it comes to videogames, yet hardly a labour movement to speak of. That there’s hardly a union presence in the technical arts or in tech work broadly, and that these industries tend toward meritocratic, libertarian or even fascist thinking that tends to be expressed ideologically via their major cultural properties, is not an accident.

Conversely, if politics are the “art of the possible”, then media creation allows us to expand the conceptual scope for what’s possible. Most of the art we consume is conservative in character–even works we consider liberal or progressive are often deeply reactionary in their base assumptions. For example, David Grossman explains why diverse Brooklyn Nine-Nine can’t avoid being apologia for the NYPD, and why using progressive representation to paper over the faults of repressive institutions is indefensible.

Earlier this year, the Vera Institute of Justice polled young people in high-crime areas of New York, and found that only four in ten respondents would feel comfortable seeking help from the police if they were in trouble, and eighty-eight percent of young people surveyed didn’t believe that their neighborhoods trusted the police. Forty-six percent of young people said they had experienced physical force beyond being frisked by a police officer.

“Brooklyn Nine-Nine” tries to get around this problem by pretending the actual Brooklyn doesn’t exist.

David Grossman (2013) “If you think the NYPD is like Dunder Mifflin, you’ll love ‘Brooklyn Nine-Nine'”, New Republic

Videogames in particular have their own sordid history of using diversity rhetoric as a way to deflect criticism of unwieldy, increasingly shoddy games produced under highly exploitative conditions, and reflect profoundly disturbing ideological tendencies (sometimes with the help of the arms industry or the U.S. military.) This has led some leftists to believe that the interactive arts as a craft are inherently reactionary and devoid of creative potential. I sympathize to an extent with this position, but having spent significant time in tech and games spaces, I believe these problems arise from the same historical conditions that render most art conservative, as well as specific ones owing to the opaqueness of the industry itself. I think these are things that can be overcome, not without some effort, and part of what keeps me interested in games is its creative fringe, where artists are finding ways to use the medium to capture as well as suggest alternatives to our current predicament.

[bctt tweet=”Videogames have matured entirely within the context of late capitalism and neoliberalism.” via=”yes”]

Videogames have barely a labour movement to speak of, and are an appendage of the tech-libertarian culture of Silicon Valley. An important aspect of their heritage resides in engineers meddling with MIT military computers. They have never, in their production or conception, been entirely separate from the state or the military-industrial complex or from corporate interest, and as a result often exist as an ideological expression of these institutions.

Maybe this was unavoidable, the forces underlying the technical arts world too strong to ever be meaningfully opposed by a few dissenting voices, but I struggle to think of anything in the modern world for which this is not true. Maybe a game jam, or a book fair, or a block party should not be the centerpieces of our activism. These things have their place, but should not be confused for things like street actions (protests, counter-demonstrations against the far-right), grassroots electoral activism, coalition-building between social and economic justice groups, public disobedience (like the destruction of hostile architecture), accessibility and anti-poverty efforts, workplace organizing and so on. This work can be thankless and grueling, but it’s absolutely vital. Still, engaging with media and culture in a way that actually resonates with alienated people is a good way to let them know there’s something else available to them than resigned helplessness. Perhaps it seems like too much effort for too small and marginal a community, but going to any independent games site will bring up literally thousands of entries, much of it being made by people under the age of 30. Many of these people work multiple jobs while making their art for free or almost free, or work under precarious conditions (employment instability, contract work, etc,) and scrape by on crowdfunding, and many–as I’ve experienced both by playing their works and by actually building relationships with them–lean acutely left and hunger for more robust progressive spaces that reward creative experimentation, but often lack the time, energy or organizational guidance that would help them achieve those goals.

But even more broadly, more people play games than identify strictly as “gamers.” Plenty of people who do work in the industry recognize this term as a corporate invention, and don’t actually resemble the stereotype of the socially-awkward, emotionally stunted, self-pitying bourgeois recluses that so much of the industry has historically built its marketing around. While mainstream ideologies in the subculture tend to range from milquetoast liberalism to right-wing libertarianism to cryptofascism, quite a lot more people consume media like games, comics and even anime than are intimately involved with the worst elements of these subcultures. Snobbishly refusing to make any use of these “deviant” or “degenerate” new forms and reacting with hostility at anyone who tries to strikes me as missing an opportunity, and as needlessly ceding cultural ground to people we seek to oppose at every level.

Art as political response

Though GamerGate is nearly incomprehensible to anyone who hasn’t been following it closely, it’s unusual in that it captured the attention of people who have nothing all to do with video games when it’s ostensibly preoccupied with whether certain online blogs have properly disclosed their writers’ ties to indie game developers. A recent post at Breitbart, however, helps to explain GamerGate’s appeal: It’s an accessible front for a new kind of culture warrior to push back against the perceived authoritarianism of the social-justice left.

Vlad Chituc (2015) “Gamergate: A culture war for people who don’t play video games”, New Republic

Reactionaries–from bog standard republicans to the fractured jumble of fascoid revanchists that make up the so-called “alt-right”–have for a long time viewed nerd culture as part of the broader culture war. This is why Gamergate attracted conservative figures like Christina Hoff Sommers, Todd Kincannon and Milo Yiannopoulos (both disgraced), Paul Joseph Watson, Mike Cernovich and so on. I don’t think gaming or memes really impacted, say, the election, and I tend to think the way we talk about Gamergate–as though it’s the cause of, rather than a product of, the resurgence of the far-right–misses the forest for the trees. I don’t think leftist and labour activists ought to go out of their way to address these hard-identified gamers either. There’s no reason for us not to remain critical of the industry and the ideologies it reproduces.

But it’s obvious that this is a group that gets really anxious when they start to feel like they don’t have control over “nerd culture” anymore, and who have in many ways acted as shock troops to dissuade people from asking too many questions about the industry’s inner practices. In retrospect, there was an opportunity with Gamergate for those in and around the industry to really interrogate the relationship between its issues with labour and its issues with incubating angry reactionary nerds, and for the most part that didn’t happen. It couldn’t, because those who were most likely to suffer professional and personal attack weren’t organized, and still aren’t. It’s no wonder so many YouTube celebrities turn out to be fascists. Actually embracing those who work in or around these fields and who are desperately trying to inject a little grace and intelligence into the medium may help weaken that stranglehold. Not such a terrible idea considering how many kids are watching the likes of PewDiePie and JonTron.

https://twitter.com/liberalism_txt/status/894978105021956096

We’ve seen this work to an extent: bots that tweet out liberal self-owns and dank communist memes can help bring together people who feel their concerns aren’t otherwise being articulated and addressed, and find if nothing else in this a bond with other like-minded souls. I don’t think these things are necessarily directly persuasive, but they do allow us to give voice to that which both invigorates us and that which causes us to despair.

https://twitter.com/ra/status/828686383623593985

Tim Mulkerin (2017) Nazi-punching videogames are flooding the internet, thanks to Richard Spencer

They’re also a natural consequence of a diverse mass of people all feeling the same disillusionment and disgust in their everyday lives, needing solidarity but also craving catharsis. Taking a second look at these commodities we mindlessly consume may not in itself be movement building, but it can help put things in perspective. (And if these things are in your estimation not meaningful, why waste time getting angry at the people who do find value in them, especially if those people are your comrades in every way that does matter? Don’t we value a diversity of skills and tactics?)

We know this can work with podcasts, publications, flyers, banners, zines, comics, and music, despite the problems endemic to all creative industries. Not only can these things let people know that in fact they aren’t alone, but they also give us an opportunity to craft a compelling alternative vision. Unfortunate though it is that the most visible videogames tend to express the vilest characteristics of the industry, certain indie critical darling games have proven that the same tools can be used to vividly illustrate the daily grind of making ends meet while working a minimum wage job, the dehumanizing procedure of immigration bureaucracy, or the desperate, soul-crushing banality of office work.

Games of labour and the avant-garde

Richard Hofmeier Cart Life

Lucas Pope Papers, Please

Molleindustria Everyday The Same Dream

The Tiniest Shark Redshirt

Jake Clover Nuign Spectre

micha cárdenas Redshift and Portalmetal

Paloma Dawkins, Gardenarium

Colestia Crisis Theory

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  Even more avant-garde works like Nuign Spectre or Redshift and Portalmetal use mixed media aesthetics to illustrate the grotesqueness of prevailing ideologies and conditions, while the dreamy work of an artist like Paloma Dawkins allows us to envision worlds which are seemingly impossible but nonetheless worthy of imagining. Colestia’s Crisis Theory subverts the tech world’s own obsession with Taylorism and systems, specifically using flow chart representation of capitalism to lay bare its inherent instability.

This isn’t to repeat the canard about games being more inherently capable of producing empathy than other art forms, or that we ought to focus on one art form to the exclusion of others. But I do think the exercise of ranking different art forms according to how sophisticated they are is inherently reactionary, arbitrarily limits the scope of expression, and constrains our ability to cultivate the new and different when it’s staring us right in the face.

As film critic Shannon Strucci pointed out in her video “why you should care about VIDEO GAMES”–which was made in response to the very attitude I’m describing–no conservative holdout in the history of the arts has ever been vindicated by a wholesale dismissal of a new form or movement as delinquent and therefore not worth engagement.

All efforts to render politics aesthetic culminate in one thing: war. War and war only can set a goal for mass movements on the largest scale while respecting the traditional property system.

Walter Benjamin (1936) The work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction

But this is just regular old art criticism. Not all art is or should be explicitly used toward political ends, and games are no different. Walter Benjamin famously warned about confounding aesthetic with politics, and how doing so creates space for fascism. Grossman’s piece mentioned above ultimately links the dopey neoliberalism of Brooklyn Nine-Nine to an underlying apologia for a racist police state; this sort of prioritization of representation and aesthetics is commonplace in liberal bourgeois rhetoric (the fixation, for example, liberal pundits have with condemning bigotry as being a “bad look” rather than being actively harmful in calculable ways). The tech world, too, is remarkably consumed with style over substance–it’s a world where rainbow capitalism and tokenism reign supreme while the oligarchs who run it not only would be too happy to work on behalf of fascist governments, but have in the past and are in the present.

make this into a footer link

rainbow capitalism

tokenism

“IBM ‘dealt directly with Holocaust organisers'”, The Guardian

“Peter Thiel, Trump’s tech pal, explains himself”, The New York Times

In Ways of Seeing, art critic John Berger tracks the history of the reification of dominant ideologies through art, from colonialism to sexism to capitalism. Berger describes the nostalgic yearning for more “legitimate” forms of art displaced by newer technology as fundamentally reactionary and regressive, writing:

“The bogus religiosity which now surrounds original works of art, and which is ultimately dependent upon their market value, has become the substitute for what paintings lost when the camera made them reproducible. Its function is nostalgic. It is the final empty claim for the continuing values of an oligarchic, undemocratic culture.”

How to use games politically

Suffice it to say, there is little in the history of games or the arts generally that should stop them from expressing reactionary tendencies. It can’t really be helped, after all, if art is to be a reflection of current and historical conditions. By extension, the most regressive elements of gaming culture tend to value only those games that functionally and aesthetically resemble classic games, and classical forms of art. If games are a reflection of an industry full of people who literally want to suck the blood of the young and think unions are a trick of the devil, that’s at least in part true because art forms that preceded them, like oil painting, are a reflection of an inbred aristocracy that believed in the divine right of the propertied classes to rule and thought that they were justified in pillaging entire peoples because of their superior skull shape. That doesn’t mean we ought to deny subversive art where it exists, and it’s a piss poor reason for refusing to support its cultivation in new forms which are as-yet barely understood.

I want socialist, feminist, anti-racist, anti-fascist art to exist anywhere art is being produced, even if it’s with computers, and especially if its core demographic is young people and kids.

Supporting bold, avant-garde and subversive art is a much bigger social project than simply using what exists toward political ends, but I think if we are going to use what exists for political ends it’s useful to think about how what we create can reconfirm our reality. It’s also worth pointing out that plenty of political art is embarrassing, ineffectual or just plain preachy. The same has been true for lots of “serious” games (maybe even some of the ones I listed above), which may be accused of being boring, simplistic, or worse at conveying their overall point than a book or article on the same subject. (I would counter that games should not try to be like articles or books, but more like paintings, where being simple and straightforward isn’t such a big deal. I would also caution that it’s possible to engage serious subject matter while maintaining a sense of humour.) Conversely, when political operatives try to make use of games–rather than game developers trying to portray current events–this also runs the risk of coming off as condescending, tin-eared and trite. For example, the Clinton campaign made use of a “game-style app” called Hillary 2016 that Teen Vogue described as like “FarmVille but for politics”.

https://twitter.com/emily_uhlmann/status/757570149490761728

But I don’t think this is a bad way to approach politics because they used a game–it’s a bad way to approach politics because it avoids addressing constituents and answering simple policy questions. It betrayed a valuing of data over people that so many find bloodlessly reptilian about tech evangelism. Also, Christ does it sound boring.

A politically meaningful use of interactive art could mean the creation of workshops for marginalized communities, similar to the Skins Workshop for indigenous kids run by AbTec, a research network based in Montreal. Or, it could mean the kind of partnerships like the one Subaltern Games had with Jacobin to promote their game No Pineapple Left Behind, thereby using games as yet another way to engage people about issues like colonialism and capitalism in the global south. I’ve personally recently become involved with the Montreal collective behind Game Curious, an independent annual gaming showcase and workshop that seeks to bridge the gap between the medium, non-gamers, and radical activist groups organizing around real-world political struggles.

Initiative for Indigenous Futures | Workshops: Bringing Aboriginal Storytelling to Experimental Digital Media  The Skins workshops aim to empower Native youth to be more than just consumers of new technologies by showing them how to be producers of new technologies.

Subaltern Games | Jacobin sponsorship “We are proud to announce that we will be collaborating with Jacobin Magazine to help promote our upcoming game, No Pineapple Left Behind. […] Jacobin will tell all of the leftists about our upcoming Kickstarter campaign (even YOU). They are also providing copies of their book Class Action: An Activist Teacher’s Handbook as backer rewards.”

Game Curious | Are you game curious? “Game Curious Montréal is a free, 6-week long program all about games, for people who don’t necessarily identify as “gamers.” Sessions are two hours long and will provide an introduction to a wide variety of games, as well as open discussions and group activities, in a zero-pressure, beginner-friendly environment.”

Likewise, mainstream gaming symbolism can be subverted toward leftist messaging–the appropriation of famous imagery or characters for “bootleg” leftist art could be a means for engaging youth culture and kids. Even having something like a YouTube channel or Twitch stream to engage young people on their interests from a left perspective could help shape healthier, more progressive perspectives. And, although the use of incubators and game jams are not inherently radical, and in many ways benefit the industry by training new exploitable workforces, there’s still no reason we can’t sometimes use some version of them for social and teaching events in the future.

[bctt tweet=”Why should we use games to engage and give voice to people, when other art forms exist?” username=”meminsf”]

There remains the question of why we should use games when we can use any other art form–and especially literature–to engage people on ideas and give exploited or marginalized communities more tools for making themselves heard. My answer may not be satisfying, but it’s this: why not?

I want to use all of these tools and more. I want to use whatever’s available to me and whatever works. I want to go wherever there’s movement and culture, and especially where there’s a mass of alienated, unorganized young people looking for an alternative. I see no reason to leave that on the table, or to throw fledgling modes of expression to people who post videos of themselves drinking a gallon of milk to prove their manhood and long for the Fatherland to cleanse itself in the blood of the degenerate races, or the corporations that love them.

Of course it means more to me because it’s my regrettable industry and subculture, and I don’t blame anyone if they read this and still can’t find it in themselves to give a shit. Still, these cultural properties aren’t going away, so we might as well engage with them. More than that, we can make good on the promise of so many oleaginous tech disruptors that Gaming is revolutionary in how it makes possible different and exciting new worlds. Isn’t a new world what we want?

References

ResistJam brings game devs together against authoritarianism

Your app isn’t helping the people of Saudi Arabia

George Monbiot on neoliberalism (a fantastic article that both introduces neoliberalism to those unsure what the word means, and gives those who have been using the word for years an enriched perspective)

Eleanor Robertson (2016) Get Mad and Get Even, Meanjin Quarterly

Jonathan Ore (2017) “Viewer discretion advised? Your child’s favourite YouTuber may be posting offensive content”, CBC News

Laura Stampler (2016) “Hillary Clinton campaign launches ‘Hillary 2016) game app”, Teen Vogue

The Gamer Trump Trope

Patrick Klepek (2017) “The power of video games in the age of Trump”, Vice

Christopher J. Ferguson (2017) “How will video games fare in the age of Trump?”, Huffington Post

Asi Burak (2017) “Trump as Gamer-in-Chief”, Polygon

Back to text

Labour issue examples

Children as young as seven mining cobalt used in smartphones, The Guardian

Chinese university students forced to manufacture PS4 in Foxconn plant, Forbes

Back to text

Otto von Bismarck, Wikiquote

Prince Otto Eduard Leopold von Bismarck, Duke of Lauenburg (1 April 1815 – 30 July 1898), was a German aristocrat and statesman; he was Prime Minister of Prussia (1862–1890), and the first Chancellor of Germany (1871–1890).

Die Politik ist die Lehre vom Möglichen. Politics is the art of the possible.

Interview (11 August 1867) with Friedrich Meyer von Waldeck of the St. Petersburgische Zeitung: Aus den Erinnerungen eines russischen Publicisten. 2. Ein Stündchen beim Kanzler des norddeutschen Bundes. In: Die Gartenlaube (1876) p. 858 de.wikisource. Back to text

Politically meaningful games under neoliberalism Since Donald Trump won the US presidential election one year ago, the games sector has tried to work out how to use our medium to resist the rise of the far right.

[oovitus]

Weekend Reading, 6.24.18

A friend of mine told me that he recently went to a conference where all of the attendees seemed to be talking about perfectionism, in spite of that fact that it wasn’t the conference theme. They were discussing it as people who had been susceptible to impossible standards in the past, but now counted themselves lucky to have let perfectionism go.

As we were talking, it occurred to me that I haven’t thought about perfectionism in a long time, though it had a hold on me for years. Even after I stopped trying to do everything “right,” perfectionism (and to some extent, being “Type A”) was a big part of my identity. I called myself a “recovering perfectionist,” which was truthful, but in retrospect I think it was also my way of continuing to identify with perfectionism and communicate it to others. I didn’t want to be subject to oppressive standards anymore, but I hadn’t yet figured out who I was without them.

In the end, perfectionism exited my life out of necessity; I untangled from it because I didn’t have a choice. Living with bouts of depression and anxiety in the last few years has meant letting go of a lot of my self-imposed notions of what constitutes productivity, success, or a day well spent.

A common experience of depression, I think, is that small, routine asks can suddenly seem insurmountable: doing laundry, cleaning up, running errands. This would have sounded unbelievable to me at one point in my life, when these kinds of to-dos were just afterthoughts, but now I know what it’s like to struggle with the everyday.

I’m thinking back to an afternoon two summers ago that illustrates this perfectly: my anxiety had been particularly bad, and I’d been paralyzed by procrastination all day. By dinnertime I was genuinely proud of myself for having gotten out of the house to pick up groceries and mail a package. This was a radically different measure of productivity than I was used to, and it didn’t matter: I was relieved to have done something, anything.

I’m in a different place now, capable of fuller days, but my perspective remains valuably altered by that experience. I don’t wake up with a fixed agenda anymore. I don’t plan on doing more than I know I can handle. If I notice that tasks remain undone everyday on my modest to-do list, I take it as a sign that I need to plan on doing less, rather than wondering why I can’t do more.

I’ve learned that my capacity for doing and my tendency to get overwhelmed ebb and flow. Sometimes they shift for reasons that I can identify, like how I’m feeling physically or whether something has made me anxious. Sometimes they change suddenly and for no apparent reason. I don’t try to bully myself out of feeling overwhelmed; rather, I ask what would make me feel calmer and more steady.

I often remind myself of a mantra that my friend Maria gave herself when her MS symptoms started keeping her from the pace and routines that had become customary: “better than before.” The origin of this mantra was an ongoing struggle to keep tidy the home she shared with her young son. As Maria’s “functional self” receded, she noticed the presence of another self, who “though less physically versatile, was stronger than I ever could have imagined from the perspective of the one who functioned’ throughout the day. She began to show me things my functional self simply missed.”

One of those things, she goes on to say,

was to be able to notice when I was completely out of energy to exert myself. This might be when something was halfway wiped, or not wiped at all, but I had somehow managed to put some things away. She would know to say that’s enough for now. And she was very clever about what would satisfy my functional self, who would never have been satisfied with that’s enough. It sobered that functional self to learn when the diagnosis of MS finally came that the “forcing” she had habituated herself to was the worst thing to do if she wanted to preserve her physical abilities.  But as the saying goes, it’s really true that you catch more flies with honey than vinegar. So my deeper wiser identity came up with something even more ingenious than this looming threat:

Better Than It Was.

Or, (depending on the context): Cleaner Than It Was.

These two statements became my mottos. And they still are. They allowed me to learn to pace myself while still satisfying that Functional Self that I was making what she considered progress through the daily requirements of life, even if many of them were slowed to a crawl or a downright standstill.  Better Than It Was.

Maria’s story is uniquely her own, and my own sense of high functionality has shifted for reasons that are uniquely mine. But her clever motto has given me great comfort since I first read about it on her blog. So, too, does this quote from Melody Beattie: “Our best yesterday was good enough; our best today is plenty good too.”

The best thing about letting go of perfectionism is developing a capacity to recognize that “our best” can look very different from moment to moment. There’s no longer an immovable standard of output. I wish that I’d been able to pry my ego away from productivity and being busy on my own, rather than being forced to reckon with a dramatic shift in my capacities, but in the end, it doesn’t matter how I got here. What matters is that I’m learning to be grateful for what I can do, rather than fixating on what I haven’t, or can’t.

Throughout all of this, I’ve had the tremendous luxury of being able to adjust my schedule and responsibilities in a way that allowed me to create a dynamic “new normal.” Not every person has the space to do this, depending on his or her professional and personal circumstances. I recognize and respect the many men and women who go through periods of depression and anxiety while also keeping up with fixed schedules. And of course I worry sometimes about my DI year: now that I’m learning how to take gentle care in the moments when I need to, what will it be like to temporarily lose control of my schedule and workload?

I don’t have an answer, but to some degree I suspect that I don’t need one. My routine next year will be a challenge, but so long as I can do my best without succumbing to the influence of perfectionism, I know I’ll be OK. Much as I’ve made my schedule more realistic, letting go of perfectionism has been an inside job. It resides in recognizing how futile perfectionism is, how it discourages me needlessly while keeping me from recognizing the good that I can do, and maybe have done (another observation that’s prompted by Beattie).

Here’s to a week—and a month, and a summer, and a year—of doing my best and trusting that my best is enough. I wish the same for you, too. And here’s the weekly roundup of links.

Recipes

I would never think to put fruit in a tabbouleh, but I love Katie’s creative mixture of blueberries, parsley, mint, and quinoa—I’d actually love to try it as a savory breakfast dish!

A very different kind of quinoa salad, but no less delicious: a curried mixture with red cabbage, raisins, and pumpkin seeds from Melanie of Veggie Jam.

Two recipes for summer entertaining caught my eye this past week. The first is these show-stopping chipotle cauliflower nachos from my friend Jeanine of Love & Lemons.

Number two is this platter of green summer rolls with mango miso sauce from Anya of Lazy Cat Kitchen. The sauce alone is calling to me, but I also love all of the tender green veggies here (asparagus, zucchini, broccolini).

Finally, a summery vegan pasta salad with creamy avocado dressing—perfect timing, as pasta salad’s been on my mind lately (and I may just have a recipe coming soon!).

Reads

1. This article is about a month old, but it’s very on-topic for today’s post: why you should stop being so hard on yourself, via The New York Times.

2. Ed Yong’s new article on the threat of imminent global pandemics frightened me (and the blurb under the title didn’t help), but it’s an important topic, and I’m glad that it’s being written about. Yong notes the medical supply shortages that are becoming increasingly problematic in the US; hopefully greater awareness might somehow inspire solutions.

3. Reporting on the termination of a major NIH study of alcohol, heart attack, and stroke, which was shut down when conflicts of interest were identified. It’s an important examination of the ethics of funding and scientific research.

4. Dispatches from the Gulf of California, where the vaquita—now the world’s rarest marine mammal—is on the brink of extinction.

5. I was so full of appreciation and respect when I read my friend Karen’s latest post on numbers and body acceptance.

Like Karen, I went through a long period of asking to be blind weighed at the doctor’s office and not owning a scale. That time served a purpose, but nowadays I can be aware of the number without identifying with it, which I’m grateful for. I’ve had a bunch of doctor’s appointments in the last month, and getting weighed has been the last thing on my mind: feeling more at home in my body has been my only point of focus.

Karen opens up about her own recent experience with the scale and the annual physical, then reflects on why she’s committed to being transparent about what “balance” looks like for her. It’s great to witness her journey unfolding.

On that inspiring note, happy Sunday—and from a celebratory NYC, happy pride! I’ll be circling back this week with my first fruit-filled dessert of the summer.

xo

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