#and the users making the most bad faith claims about why even though they have clearly stated why

[puppytoast]

Discord really did ruin my engagement with anything outside discord huh

Like I suppose it's not Discord specifically per-sey, but I also see it with a significant amount of other people too. It's just another instant gratification thing the world has been latching onto the last decade or so I think. Chatrooms were fun and I spent a lot of time in them back then too but they weren't the end all be all, they were a place to just chat where the main sites were used for their purpose whereas nowadays everything is centralized on Discord and that won't last forever either, giant as it is. (Please I beg people don't keep all of your important information there, keep it localized in a space YOU control. ESPECIALLY if you're a major community for information keeping.) Slower posting required people to actually think about what they were saying most of the time and had public searchable pages in case information there was needed. Now I see people booing concepts like forums in the exact way they made fun of "boomers" for booing newer concepts and absolutely refusing to learn or engage with them. It's fascinating in the saddest way.

I dunno I want to go back to the days of things moving slower I guess. Just in general, not even just internet-wise.

[mdhwrites]

Willow or Gus Should Not Have Been in TOH

This is... NOT about their characters. It simply isn’t. It also ISN’T to say both shouldn’t have been in the show or to say one should have been more important than the other. Who they are honestly has nothing to do with this blog. Their magic is what is fundamentally wrong with having both characters in the show because they do not fit major themes of the show simply by how their magic is. Let’s get into it. And to do that, we actually can’t talk about Willow and Gus. Instead, let’s discuss the Coven system as it is presented by the show. The coven system is an oppressive order put upon witches to force them to choose one coven to join for the rest of their life. It robs them of the ability to do any other type of magic and is implied in story to be much of why the current state of the Isles is so selfish, mean and unruly when compared to the time of the Isles when people used all types of magic as they pleased. It is also explicitly a selfish lie made by the evil ruler of the land so as to work towards a grand plan of his literally hundreds of years in the making, or at least 50 since he first came to power. It is meant to be seen as a categorically bad thing. A lie to under power people with the claim that the dead god, if it’s a god at all, believes that the coven system is the ‘right’ way to use magic. This, in story, wouldn’t actually be hard to keep consistent actually. You have characters always showing themselves at their most powerful using combinations of magic while also avoiding having anyone who seems... blessed... to only use one magic. Yeah... NOW let’s talk about Gus and Willow. The twin prodigies. We’ll talk about Gus first because he is the actually less egregious of the two. He is called a prodigy in story and skipped two grades in school due to how good he is at illusion magic. He is also commonly depicted as the best illusionist in the show, even to the point where an errant panic attack of his is strong enough to accidentally beat the literal strongest illusionist in the government ON ACCIDENT. I also don’t believe we literally ever see him use another type of magic. The closest is when he borrows Luz’s glyphs and that is hardly him using a different school of magic when lack of faith in those glyphs and his abilities still lead to incredible results (Luz’s glyphs being bad is another blog itself). All of this... CAN be explained though. Or most of it. There’s no excusing the panic attack taking out a head of state in their own field. Gus is an energetic, imaginative guy and that energy goes well with illusions. He theoretically has been training with and mastering illusions from a young age. He has put in the work to be where he is and so at least there’s a basis for why he is as strong as he is. For anyone wondering why I’m not discussing Amity in this blog, THAT’S WHY. She explicitly put in the work to be a skilled abomination user and she honestly doesn’t do anything outrageous with those powers when compared to other abomination users in the show. She never shows up her dad. Gus shows up literally everyone else. But uh... Let’s talk about that other side and Willow. Half a Witch Willow who is never depicted as having practiced plant magic in a serious capacity. She likes plants but she was explicitly made to study a different track because of the career options tied to it. When we see younger her, she’s not using plant magic but she is failing at other types of magic. In fact, ANY time Willow uses a different track of magic than plants, she fails miserably at it. Without fail. BUT with plants? Well... With no training, no preparation, and a single seed, she turns the common area of a school into a garden of vines INSTANTLY. In episode six of the show, three episodes after she starts practicing plant magic, she takes out an entire group of monster hunters, who are adults, and specifically trained for combat, SINGLE HANDEDLY as neither of her companions have any form of combat magic at that point. She is so good at plants that once she is no longer the target of Amity’s bullying, she is somehow immediately extremely popular for her use of plant magic as to overshadow a sport’s star at the start of their team’s season. With no training. Willow is in fact actually stated by one character (and this could be hyperbole by a friend tbf) as “The strongest witch they know” while they are actively apprenticed to a witch who studies all types of magic and is the self proclaimed strongest witch in the Boiling Isles. The show backs this claim up though. Willow is CONSTANTLY defined by just how stupidly powerful her magic is and how often it is effortless for her. She doesn’t break a sweat, she doesn’t need to try, she is just on a DIFFERENT LEVEL. As if blessed by a god. As if a god said to her, “You will practice plant magic and nothing else.” So technically, if either Gus or Willow were to be taken out, I would personally argue for thematic integrity, Willow should have been above Gus because she is so much more blatantly blessed to just be powerful. To simply be better but only with one magic. But they both have this problem. So why not get rid of both? Why aren’t I saying that they’re flawed and problematic characters for the show? Well... There is a case to be had there, especially with Amity existing. Especially with Amity’s social pressures from her parents making it so she should be more pro-coven than any other character (another reason why Reaching Out is a bad episode). But I’m kind of trying to be fair and not say cut them both even if a reduced cast probably would not have been a bad choice for the show. But the other reason is argumentative balance. If you have one character who has a reason to believe in the coven system and another who is firmly against it, and Luz in the middle being pulled between them, that opens up some good possibilities for conversations, dynamics, episodes, etc. The two trying to make their point made and prove it. And who would be this theoretical other character? This champion for multiple magics? Do I have some new OC to show- IT’S FUCKING VINEY. VINEY WAS RIGHT FUCKING THERE AND THEY DIDN’T MAKE HER A MAIN SUPPORTING CHARACTER! WHAT THE FU-

*cough, cough* Sorry. Lost it for a moment. But yeah, Viney. She is a force of personality, steals the show in almost any scene she’s in and, oh yeah, USES MULTIPLE MAGICS. Healing and beast keeping. And she’s not depicted to be some god at either, sure (not until they claim she’s the best healer in S2 but *SIIIIIIGH*), but that actually strengthened the point in S1. She shouldn’t be the best in either but how she incorporates the two should allow her to best others who only use one. That would actually disprove the coven system. Because as it is? We have to take the show’s word that the coven system is a lie. That it’s a bad thing. Because if we take the show’s actions, if we look at our supporting cast and what they use... You have an abomination mage who at least has an excuse to be the best at her age. You have an illusionist who is younger than even the rest of the main teenage cast but is literally able to beat the strongest mages in his field on accident, he is that blessed with power. And a plant mage who never trained but once she starts using it is immediately the best in her school where PLANT MAGIC IS TRAINED. And only one of these people ever uses another type of magic, the first one, and it’s not even a type of magic technically claimed by any one coven (that has to do with general issues with the coven system being dumb though and that’s another blog). And she does it ONCE. So... Yeah. Someone needed to be cut and Viney needed to be added. Or either of Viney’s friends. Or just literally anyone who could rep ‘wild magic’ besides Eda because Eda never makes a case beyond “It restricts a witch’s freedom.” Well... Sorry, but if literally all witches, especially those we get to know, seem just to be wasting their time with other types of magic, it seems like to me the coven system is simply helping them live better, more enriching lives by it being okay for them to use the one magic god blessed them with rather than them being forced to be taught multiple in school. Sure worked out for Willow and Gus.

[magz]

Have been think for while, but will try put in words:

Misuse "reading comprehension" so much is part of broad trend.

Broad trend of use common ableist n classist misconcepts as default reaction.

Sure, on rare time - Magz have blame "reading comprehension" offhand.

Though, is of repeat what other say - like script.

Aside: Which very ironic. Often am mention have issue understand or misread or of logic from disability. Have issues end up mean take more time think n more try be careful. Am imperfect tho.

Moreso than if make offhand comment ...

Bigger issue is when let ableist n classist misconcepts go unchallenged.

When misconcepts materially affect how interact with others,

Am often ask bare minimum.

Not ask of "completely wipe from vocabulary".

Instead, am ask of realize extent that ableism become normal to self n why.

To challenge n change what seem "normal" in whatever way can.

:: Yet criticize what seem "normal" in ableism, always become boogeyman of "people think 'stupid' is slur". A discourse n interpretation so disingenuous n outdated. Outdated of early 2010s Tumblr, when most youth not had vocabulary for "ableist microaggressions being common". As people fear n refuse even question what they think normal, common, inoffensive.

Untrue conclusions as result: - Questioning subtle ableism must be a ""chronically online"" viewpoint divorced from reality. - Is "Bad" re-assess ones viewpoint on intelligence as a marker of value for life.

To not question why ones first reaction, is mistake.

When extend idea of "unintelligence as fault" to actual political stance and political analysis, is mistake.

If everything to blame on lack skill (or disability), there can be no nuance n weighted stance. Just surface level analysis with bigoted implications.

Things that are not inherently "reading comprehension" issues:

every type of ignorance

bad faith interpretations

not try question bias

strangers refusal understand what other people say without being combative

It rarely is because of "just not having skill to understand text"

Still, when is "reading comprehension issue":

Like OP say - of make it shameful to have honest mistake or lack of reading skill, not help that.

Instead, shamefulness of reading skill alienate comrades that do need accommodation.

Those comrades need compassion extend to them.

While, not realistic for accommodation be provided by every random tumblr user;

can at least disengage or point toward something that could accomodate.

In material effect, is pattern of misuse "reading comprehension" and "anti-intellectualism" and "illiteracy" for both:

Everything Annoying Online

Actual Ignorant Malice

Making actual meaning of impacted reading skill, instead be for more inflammatory use n scapegoating.

Disabilities and disenfranchisements that actually get take advantage of n discriminated of n being more likely poverty,

become about ... fandom discourse, discourse bait, and annoying strangers.

Wrongful use: Statics of actual illiteracy rates n lack of resources, being for "why all bad things happen actually".

Is when access of resources, texts, dense materials are almost never provided in digestible or accessible formats n places or alternatives.

When claiming to have issues reading or have disability or actual illiteracy n needing Simple English or equivalent is automatically seen as false.

Wrong reasoning being:

There been people that were disabled or lower economic class that could do everything without accommodation.

Wrong excuse: "but there are annoying people that do weaponized incompentency n are anti-intellectualism tho"

Bad Effect: To punish n alienate a whole class of people that *do* need help.

Disability n circumstance is spectrum n diverse. It not matter if there some "Very Intelligent" cognitively-disabled poor people. we should not use other people capabilities as metric nor use respectability politics.

Worse:

The language of eugenics n "normalcy" as good, escalates when unchallenged.

Of blame inferior genes, smooth brains, brain damage, and degeneracy.

Even worse:

People and words open to reactionary politics.

That when it become problem. As it have for long time.

hey, I was reading your posts on the use of 'reading comprehension' and found them really enlightening. I'm wondering, are there similar undercurrents to how people use lack of reading comprehension to describe the tendency for people to read and interpret in bad faith online, or are they different things grouped together under the same label?

hm yeah i would say there are some similar undercurrents happening. i think glibly mocking [a lack of] reading comprehension in response to a bad-faith/hostile/animous/etc engagement (like eg. the trend of replying with 'reading comprehension questions' that aim to glibly point out logical flaws in the initial response and present it as obviously ridiculous and overblown) is falling back on that same discursive construction -- that a lack of 'reading comprehension' is embarrassing, that reading something poorly or wrongly is something you should be sure never to do in public, and whoever can score the most Reading Comprehension Points in the argument wins the discourse.

i also just find it, like, unfunny and boring. even in genuinely bad-faith interpretations of a post, it has an air of smugness to it that i find really off-putting -- it's a very, like, you sir have won the internet for today-type tone. and there are multiple cases where i've seen this Ha Ha No Reading Comprehension thing deployed to suggest that someone reading between the lines of a claim made in a post to point out eg. particular biases, particular suggestions of bigotry, that the post doesn't explicitly name but are certainly discursively present is obviously being dense or hysterical; it's an easy win in a discourse where to name something as eg. subtly racist, transphobic, misogynistic, etc., is already presumed to be hysterical overreaction by people who know better than to outright name it as such but are still predisposed to view it in that light when given the opportunity to do so covertly.

(eg: op says X; a responder points out that X implies Y and is emerging from a discourse of Z; op laughs at them by claiming that they only said X and if you're seeing Y or Z then you clearly have no reading comprehension because X without Y or Z is obvious to op's often already biased audience and the conversation is shut down.)

it's got a real like, deployment of Facts And Logic feel to it; i don't think it does a good job in actually engaging with the responder and understanding where their interpretation is coming from, which can ofc be chalked up to the fact that that's literally not what it's supposed to do -- it's supposed to get a fun dunk in and make the initial responder look silly. i more than understand frustration at people reading your posts in bad faith and i can't fairly be mad at people for lashing out about it -- i've done it before! -- but, like. i think we should just try and steer clear of discursive constructions which reify the stigmatisation of poor reading comprehension (or mediation of tone on the internet, which is also at play here).

[kyra45]

Vet Donation Scams

Common vet scam asks v2

A common scam going around as of recently is several asks regarding the post of a cat or a dog. The ask tells you to check out their blog and reblog their pinned post because they desperately needs funds to support their pets surgery or medication or something else important because their pet is ill and may not be doing too well. For the most part, the ask doesn’t seem too suspicious and for some it doesn’t seem all that bad at a glance. Sure, the asker came out of nowhere but someone asking for help isn’t too uncommon in these days.

However, the blog itself is highly unusual if looked at more closely. Rather new, has one post, and seemingly hasn’t been reblogging anything else. The story you read seems heartbreaking, urging you to donate or reblog to spread the word and written to upset you and want your aid in great detail. It claims the cost of the operation is either very high or very low, but doesn’t specify anything else. The pictures supplied are quite distressing, sometimes showing the pet is grave condition or seemingly just snapped at a random moment in time. Often they’ll supply pictures of vet records, to make it seem like they have all the things necessary to prove to you that it’s real.

However, something will be odd. It’s just one post. There’s either random reblogs up to the post itself or none at all. There’s no updates on the pet even after several days or hours have passed when there could be anything to tell how the pet is doing. You can’t contact them because even if you say something there’s no reply to your ask. Sometimes communication is even disabled even though you was sent an ask their asks are off. Replies on the post are off sometimes. But regardless, it just seems a little suspicious. Why would someone not have any way of contact open or seem to not reply to any concerns? The email is usually there, but sometimes it’s just a PayPal link.

So what makes up a vet donation scam? A fraudulent story written about a cat/dog that needs desperate attention yet the story changes so often it becomes entirely different then when it first appeared. Several asks spammed within days or even hours of the blogs creation, all asking to reblog a pinned post. The email/PayPal often changing while the story itself is all the same as before with only minor adjustments to look more legitimate. The pictures will still be the same pet as before until new pics are stolen and a new story is written and the cycle begins again.

So the next time you see the ask telling you to check out the blogs post about their cat/dog, and read the story that seems to tug at your feelings, and consider reblogging it out of good faith to spread the word that the user needs aid with vets…Please search the ask you received. Look at the story and consider if it’s being truthful. Try and see if the pictures used are stolen and see if the email or PayPal is well known as a scammer. If you locate the information it’s a scam, warn those who already have reblogged it and inform them it’s a scam.

[chill-pills-yandere-haven]

Cult Culture

An: my tags are limited to just these because for some reason, on mobile, my Tumblr is high 24/7 and won't let me write in tags. Just a little dive into how SAGAU would affect Teyvat as a whole.

Honestly, the whole cult Sagau thing would actually effect the entirety of Teyvat's culture in so so so many ways. Take all of this with a grain of salt tho as I don't know much about other religions and was raised Christian so I'm taking from that. Mainly because Sagau also seems to be based off of Christianity.

We've talked about things like the Creator being the start of new trends or characters getting popular because of them, but it would most likely be to a much larger degree. 

In the Sagau community, the majority of aus are placed in worlds where the public knows and actively worships the creator. The statues, the Creator's shrines being a universal sign of "no fighting… shakira shakira (I'm sorry I saw it when writing and couldn't resist)", the Creator instantly being accepted and loved. 

However, wouldn't this affect the acolytes greatly?

Imagine this, you live in a world where there's one religion, minor deities like the archons and whatever happened on Inazuma included, where you mainly worship this Creator figure, the Creator of all.

Of course, in the way that majority of religions have it (might not be that common tho, I was raised Christian), you have leaders in the faith, people who are supposed to be examples for worshippers to follow, and people who are blessed.

As is incorporated in some aus, visions are seen as blessings from the All-Creator. Something that would essentially be sainthood in the eyes of society due to how idolized the Creator is. 

Due to this, merely having a vision would not only be seen as a reward for one's ambition, but also a sort of sign from the Creator themselves to respect this person. 

This could easily flip one's reputation on its head just from having a vision. For example, even having a vision could be enough for Mondstadtions to at least not chase Eula out of town anymore or deny her services. Having a vision would be so prized that fake vision (like the ones we used in the vision-hunt) sales would go through the roof; people would pretend to have visions so they were respected for being blessed by the All-Creator.

However, there's even more.

You know how the self aware characters are able to hear the Creator's voice?

That would be seen as a sort of 'mark of the chosen' among the public. Even though it is only a sign if that person being a playable character.

 Starting out in Mondstadt, people first thought that Amber and Kaeya were on board with some kind of bad joke when they first talked about hearing the Creator's true voice. After all, the All-Creator was so holy that not even vision holders heard their true voice. Then, they heard of Lisa and Noelle hearing the same voice. After the public realized that these people were hearing the true words of the Creator themselves, they most likely believed that they had 'ascended' in some way, now able to hear the creator's voice.

Even more, imagine how the Creator's mere existence could affect the regions themselves.

In the beginning, when only Mondstadt was available to the player, when the other nations got word that Mond had been blessed by the All-Creator, the other countries must have gone wild.

Many more people would have traveled to Mond just for a sight of the 'Traveler Brought by the Creator'. Debates would be started about why the Creator seemed to favour this nation above all. Tensions may even rise due to this, Mondstadtions claiming that their nation was above the others due to the Creator's favour.

Status would literally be tilted in favour of vision users with the new view of them. Having a vision would make people see someone differently, even if they were the worst. After all, if the Creator blessed them, they had to be good deep down, right? 

This is me half joking, but imagine how getting a vision in this society would be for teenagers. Suddenly, you're the hot shot everywhere you go! All your friends think that you're the best thing since Dawn Winery's apple cider. Best of all, your crush notices you. But really, they only love your vision. It's like pretty privilege turned up to eleven.

Everything the Creator does would also be seen as some sort of holy metaphor for what the people of Teyvat should be striving to do.

You hit trees and gain wood yet don't chop them down? It's a metaphor for the idea that people should be free to take from nature but give back at the same time.

 You choose the most generic responses everytime the Traveler gets to speak? The Creator must be showing the people that everyone is equal when in the eyes of the All-Creator.  

You kill Timmie's pigeons every day without fail? It's to show that everything will return to what it once was: nothing.

[cackled0g]

{Image ID: A reply by user ikishima. The text reads: "maybe its (sic) because you can literally search (transandrophobia) and see people lay out exactly why its (sic) transmisogynistic and no one needs to spoon feed you this information. but have fun using a term coined by someone with a fetish for raping lesbians I guess"}

For context, the post this user was replying to is this one

Well first off, I think it's a rude assumption to make that I haven't researched a term that I use near daily to explain traumas that I have personally faced. I have actually, believe it or not, researched transandrophobia. I've looked at both sides of the issue, and it has consistently been the side that is against a good faith term for a marginalized group's oppression that has been lacking in good arguements. Let's go over a few of the most common ones I've seen.

a.) The coiner, Saint, has been accused of having a corrective rape fetish. I have seen screenshots to verify that he has engaged with that, but from my understanding it was a password protected nsfw blog where he engaged with it and similar fetishes with his partner, who was a trans feminine person who had said fetishes. I don't know either of the people involved and haven't found any good sources leaning either way on that situation except for one callout document that has been accused of being bad faith and factually false. Like I've said, I don't know anyone involved in that whole situation so I can't say I have an opinion on it one way or the other until I have better evidence to go off of. Regardless of whether Saint is or is not a horrible shitty person though, I don't think he has full claim to the word "transandrophobia" and certainly not the concept behind it--the specific combination of transphobia and antimasculinism that primarily transmasculine folks face. The word is just the combination of the the words 'transphobia', the hatred of trans people, and 'androphobia', the fear or hatred of men, and I know that I at least stumbled across it before I ever knew who Saint was. It's simply the most popular term, aside from transmisandry, which I also use regularly. For trigger tagging purposes and general tagging purposes, it's the most widely used term and also has the most theory and good faith debate behind it from what I've seen

b.) The term 'transandrophobia' is inherently transmisogynistic because it copies the same formula used for the word 'transmisogyny', a word describing the intersection of transphobia and misogyny that primarily transfeminine people face. I don't find this a very compelling argument personally. First off, I'm not aware of if the term was in fact based off of the word transmisogyny, as the convention of "oppression"+" oppression "= "word for combined or intersectional oppression" isn't new or particularly controversial (see: misogynoir) when applied to other forms of oppression.

c.) The idea that transmasculine people are punished for their masculinity and not only their transness is inherently transmisogynistic because ???. I genuinely don't get this one honestly. Even if it were true that marginalized men weren't punished for their masculinity, which it isn't (see: black men bearing the brunt of police violence, the way that ast Asian men are hypersexualized by euro-american women, the way that all Asian men are desexualized by euro-american people) I don't see how that "false" belief being held is an intersection of transphobia and misogyny.

d.) Trans men don't need a word for their oppression because they don't face a unique oppression. This is demonstrably false. Many recent laws restricting HRT in the UK and United States have been actively targeting trans men. JK Rowling, the TERF surpreme, wrote an essay that extensively talked about trans men, books like 'Irreversible Damage' are explicitly about trans men 'ruining their bodies'. If that isn't blatantly transandrophobic then what is?

Of course, if anyone has any sources or additions feel free to drop them below or DM me. Engaging in good faith is highly encouraged, including from the person I'm responding to. I also may add on to this post later with more common anti-transandrophobia arguments as I think of them.

[antianakin]

You don't seem to be asking this in particularly good faith, but sure let's go for this argument again.

What do you expect the Jedi to have done about the situation? You acknowledge the Jedi weren't responsible for what happened, that the whole deal was engineered by the Sith and that the clones were made for the REPUBLIC, not the Jedi, so the most you can actually accuse the Jedi of is working with "slaves" in the same army.

I'm putting the word slaves in quotes because at no point in canon are the clones really ever acknowledged as slaves beyond one line in one episode by a clone who is deliberately written to be untrustworthy anyway. I don't deny that this is exactly what the clones SHOULD'VE been acknowledged as, they AREN'T acknowledged as slaves within the context of the Star Wars universe. This is the same problem you find when people make the claim that droids are slaves. If you follow that to its natural conclusion, then you get to the belief that Luke Skywalker is a slave owner. And Luke Skywalker, I think we can all agree, is the hero of that particular story. He's clearly a good, kind, compassionate dude. He's the person we're supposed to be rooting for and he wins in the end. He also owns droids. So if droids are slaves, then Luke Skywalker is a slave owner AND the hero of the story which means that Star Wars as a story is now advocating that slavery is a good, heroic thing. And I feel like most people would agree that that's not the story Star Wars is telling, even if the situation with the droids sometimes veers uncomfortably into feeling like slavery given how much sentience the droids are often given.

The situation is the same with the clones, the narrative doesn't ever acknowledge how uncomfortably similar their situation is to slavery in any real way, and even if we argue that they ARE supposed to be seen as slaves, the natural conclusion to come to is that we as the audience are intended to see the Jedi as slave owners, who are generally considered pretty unequivocally evil. The problem with this is that the entire Prequel Trilogy ends with the Jedi all being killed off with sweeping sad music behind the scene, which tells me that the narrative wants me to be sad that the Jedi are dying. But if they're slave owners, why should I be sad the Jedi are dying? If they're unequivocally evil because they owned slaves, why would the narrative of Star Wars advocate that I should be sad when they're murdered? Even if you personally don't feel sad at all during the Order 66 scene and cheer when Anakin murders all of the children in the Council chambers, I find it hard to believe that you could effectively argue that the audience isn't INTENDED to be sad during that scene.

Getting back to a more in-universe argument, though, what do you think the better response would have been in this situation?

I assume your answer to this would be to simply refuse to fight in the GAR at all out of protest regarding the Republic's use of the clones. Cool, let's look at what the consequences of this would be. The clones are still enslaved in an army owned by the Republic, but now they're going up against a bunch of really powerful enemies without a single person who has the ability to protect them fighting on their side. Now the clones are being led by people like Tarkin or Yularen who don't care about the clones at all and are pretty likely to just treat them even MORE like tools instead of people and throw their lives away every chance they get in search of victory.

And if we back away from the consequences to the clones directly, if the Jedi refuse to fight, the Separatists win the war. Like, unequivocally, the Separatists win the war if the Jedi aren't fighting in it because the Separatists have several Force users on their side (or people specifically trained to kill Force users) and they aren't afraid to cheat and use human shields and bioweapons. And the Separatists winning is, in fact, a BAD thing, because the Separatists are run by a bunch of evil people who are pretty happy to keep empowering other evil people to commit atrocities all over the galaxy.

So the Jedi are in a position where they KNOW that there's nothing they can do to stop the war, they KNOW the other side of this war has some pretty powerful opponents in it, they KNOW the other side of this war is willing to lie and cheat in order to win, they KNOW there's nothing they can do to save the clones from having to fight in it. So quite honestly, what is the benefit to sitting it out? How does this help anybody? And none of this even touches the consequences TO THE JEDI of sitting out the war. Palpatine is prepared to launch a smear campaign against the Jedi no matter what, and the Jedi refusing to help protect the Republic would make his life 10,000x easier, which basically removes any possible political power the Jedi might've once had.

If they fight in the war, they have the ability to protect the clones as much as possible, protect the Republic, free innocent civilians on Separatist controlled worlds, maintain what little political power they have left, and hope to at least get everybody through this war to the other side where maybe they can try to fight for a better world overall, which presumably would include freedom for the clones once there was no war that had to be fought. Just because this future never came to pass doesn't mean it wasn't worth fighting for. Just because they lost doesn't mean that they made the wrong choice or that the alternative would've somehow landed them or anyone else a better result. It wouldn't have.

The Jedi made the only choice they could have within the confines of the situation. And the confines of the situation SUCKED, sure, there were no GREAT options, but there were some pretty obvious WORSE options that they chose to avoid. People who bring up this argument choose to ignore the obvious consequences to whatever alternative you seem to think was available to the Jedi.

The Jedi didn't WANT to fight in a war, they didn't WANT to be handed an army of people bred only to fight and die in it. But they didn't really get given a ton of choice in the matter, either. The Sith spent YEARS engineering the situation to put the Jedi in a position where their choices were bad or worse. So how can we possibly vilify the Jedi for making the best choice they could have in a situation designed to be impossible? Why is it so wrong of them to have chosen the bad choice instead of the worse choice?

Lastly, ALL OF THIS assumes the Jedi had any choice about entering the army at all. Word of god tells us the Jedi were DRAFTED into the war, which means they really weren't offered a choice about becoming Generals. Individual Jedi could just accept it and go along with it, or dodge the draft by leaving the Order entirely (which means they are now separated from their home, their family, their friends, their community, their culture). Those were the two options, there was nothing in the middle.

I don't know if you were asking this in good faith at all, most of the people who ask me this question aren't asking me this because they care about the answer and they've already made up their minds that the Jedi are evil slave owners, so I'm not holding out much hope, but that's my defense of the Jedi working with the clones during the war.

I never, ever say the Jedi were flawed, and here's why.

It's not because I don't think people can BE flawed, or that I don't think GOOD people can be flawed, of course they can. Even people who are genuinely doing good things and making good choices and trying their best to be selfless and kind and compassionate can make mistakes and have a bad day.

But there's really only two reasons I see anybody bring up "the Jedi were flawed."

The first is from Jedi fans who are trying to stave off the Stanakins and the anti Jedi crowd by adding that in as a disclaimer. "OF COURSE the Jedi are flawed, but it doesn't mean they aren't good people!" It's a meaningless statement because the side saying it doesn't even really believe it to be true and the side they're saying it TO thinks the Jedi being flawed means they all deserved to die. This is the kind of statement that leads to people deciding that individual Jedi are okay but their culture needs to be completely reformed in order to allow people like Anakin to just do whatever they want whenever they want and then they can all live.

The second is from people who DON'T really like the Jedi much and will insist that "the Jedi are flawed" is part of the whole point of the narrative of Star Wars, especially the prequels. This is the kind of statement that leads to people like Leslye Headland INSISTING that George Lucas intended for the story of the Jedi to be one of failure and criticism and casting the Jedi as "the evil institution" in her interpretation of Star Wars. This is what leads to stories like the Ahsoka show insisting that the Jedi were elitist bastards whose arrogance led to their own genocide. These people usually try to claim they like the Jedi, but they'll still cast the Jedi as the bad guys in the story instead of, say, Anakin. These are the people who genuinely have no idea what attachment is and don't care to learn. These people believe that, at best, the Jedi THOUGHT they were doing good, but that they had completely lost their way and were truly not that much better than the Sith anymore and their destruction was necessary to create balance in the galaxy.

I have no desire to appease people who don't like my interpretation of Star Wars, and I don't think that "the Jedi were flawed" was ever the point of Lucas's story and I genuinely think it takes a lot AWAY from his story to say that it does. So while I am perfectly happy to admit that people in general, even overall GOOD and kind and selfless people, are always flawed and can make mistakes, I will never, ever say that the Jedi were flawed. The Jedi lost, yes, but not due to their own flaws. They lost because of EVERYONE ELSE'S flaws, so what does it MATTER if the Jedi were flawed or not? If you truly believe the Jedi were good people who did everything right and simply lost due to other people's selfish choices, then what does it add to the story to insist the Jedi were flawed? How does it change anything, for the better or otherwise? The Jedi were right IS the point of the story, so insisting they were flawed actually takes away from that by distracting from how the Jedi were RIGHT, and it's people choosing not to listen to them or trust them or act like them that brings about the downfall of an entire galaxy.

The Jedi weren't flawed. The Jedi were RIGHT ABOUT EVERYTHING and that is the hill I will die on.

[nevertheless-moving]

Suicidal Misunderstanding XIV

Part I - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -  Part XI - - - - Part XII - - - - Part XIII

Star Wars Time Travel AU #27

Plo Koon woke to find himself chained in a dark room.

Somewhere behind him he could hear steady dripping; it was uncertain if that was deliberate or not.

He strained to discern anything in the dim light, but the walls of his prison refused to form into anything recognizable.

Cautiously, the trapped Master cast his senses out, only to find them reflected back at odd angles. He decided to wait before attempting to push any further past what his captor wished him to see.

Time passed strangely, but sooner than expected there was the sound of a pressurized airlock opening and, distantly, a raging ocean.

The airlock cycled through its rotation and Obi-Wan Kenobi stepped out of the amorphous shadows looking...decidedly worse for the wear. 

Plo ached at the sight. His normally carefully maintained beard was a scraggly mess. His robes hung tattered and bloodied. Of particular concern was how dry he looked, skin cracked and bleeding for want of water. The figure standing before him with a dead-eyed glare resembled less an accomplished Jedi Master and more the wretched husk of one. 

“Who are you?”  Obi-Wan's shade hissed. The chains around the Kel Dooran tightened. 

Well, however he might view himself and others...at least he’s willing to fight to defend what remains? At the bare minimum he’s not acting intentionally self destructive...

“Good Morning, Obi-Wan. I am a Jedi Master and your friend. I have been attempting to reach you through your rather impressive shielding. I must say, you’ve done a remarkable job confining me in this mental construct, its been sometime since anyone has managed to get the best of me in this arena.”

Obi-Wan snorted. “Don’t try and flatter me, you barely fought back. You could easily have forced your way anywhere, but for some reason you let me corral you, presumably to try and gain my trust. Now answer my question. Your presence is very much light so I doubt you’re Sidious or...Vader. I could be wrong obviously, but i can’t see either of themselves putting this much effort into that sort of mask...just tell me who you are, and why you’re with them.”

“I am Master Plo Koon, a High Council Member, and I am not unknown to you” he elaborated without hesitation. “I am glad that you can identify that I am a light force user. Can you not sense familiarity within my force presence, even so far within your domain?”

Obi-Wan reared back and the dripping noise in the corner stopped.

“It’s a trick. We might be in my head but that doesn’t mean I’m surrendering any of my thoughts to you,” Obi-Wan snarled. “I felt Plo Koon’s death, he was one of the first...and even if he somehow survived he would never work with the Sith to invade my mind. Never.”

“Obi-Wan. Listen to me. Please. I am not dead. I am not working with the Sith. I was brought in to reach you because no other method was working. You are in the healing halls at the Jedi Temple on Coruscant.” Plo spoke calmly, but implacably, “We believe you have either experienced a uniquely detailed vision, or a run in with a dark-sider. Whatever has happened, I can feel the lingering impression of unsafety. But here and now, you are not in any immediate physical danger. There must be something I can do to convince you of your present physical location.”

“A uniquely detailed vision, huh? ha!” Obi-Wan replied, gesturing wildly. “Ha! You expect me to believe that what, the last four years of my life were a detailed prophecy? Why?”

“You...believe you have lived years beyond the rest of us. I take it the- what you remember has been dangerous enough to warrant maintaining abnormally tight control over your mental walls, precluding simply reaching out to ascertain the truth yourself.”

“Clearly my control wasn’t enough if you’re in here.” Obi-Wan muttered.

“I do apologize for the intrusion, but we’ve already used every other tool at our disposal to reach you. I repeat, is there anything that can be done to convince you that you are, from your perspective, ‘in the past’. You are a High Council member with a grandpadawan. It’s been two years since the start of the clone wars. You recently finished an extended clean up of the Mon Cala sector after your victory.”

Obi-Wan stared at him curiously. “If I set a test and you fail, will you agree to dispense with the pretenses?”

Plo-Koon hesitated. “Perhaps I’m making this deal in bad faith, as I am know I am Plo-Koon, and that everything I have said is the truth... but I swear that if you somehow prove that neither of those things are true and I am secretly working for a sith lord, I will...reveal that.”

Obi-Wan sighed. “Best I’m going to get, I suppose.”

The chains holding Plo-Koon loosened. Before he could respond, there was a hurtling rising sensation that he struggled not to fight against. After a disorienting moment, he found himself in his own body, feeling vaguely seasick. Obi-Wan blinked awake, apparently unfazed by the precautionary bonds holding him in place. Master Aerdo’s gaze flicked between them intensely. Plo-Koon held up a clawed hand to forestall any interruption while the two gained their bearings.

Obi-Wan spoke first:

“Cihynglo’s Fourth Meditation”

“...What?” Koon replied, honestly confused.

“Cihynglo was a renowned Kashykian Jedi, her mediations are, well i suppose were considered a quintessential example of High Republic cosmic poetry.”

“I’m familiar with Cihynglo- my master used to speak of her fondly.” Plo Koon said slowly. “Though I can’t say I’m familiar with her Fourth Mediation.”

“Hmm. Yes, well her poetry in the last few decades of her life got increasingly, well, esoteric. While most of her work was widely translated and distributed, she requested that those who wished to read her fourth Meditations do so in person, so as to experience without dilution the full calligraphy and artwork that accompanied her words. She only ever produced two copies. Any guesses where they were kept?”

Obi-Wan’s voice started out in the steady tones of a born lecturer, only to grow bitter towards the end.

“Is one in the temple?” Master Koon asked.

“Yes, one was held in the Master’s wing of the temple archives. The other was housed in a place of honor in The White Forest’s Great Tree of Knowledge. Considering both libraries were reduced to ash in the first month of the Empire, it is quite impossible, even for the Emperor, to find a copy.” 

His vague attempt at a smirk quickly fell flat. 

“I was privileged enough to be granted time to begin reading it once, but, alas, an emergency situation in the intergalactic war you created meant that I had to run off mid-sonnet. Bring me that book, let me hold it, read it, and I will believe that I somehow unlocked the secret of time-travel while overdosing on Spice.” 

Obi-Wan paused, catching his breath. “In the next fifteen minutes, please. Any more than that and you might try tracking down the few surviving Wookie scholars.” Koon flipped open his comm. “Master Nu, I have an urgent request.”

“Nu here, go on,” came the response.

“This may sound strange, but it is crucial that Cihynglo’s Fourth Meditation be brought to the healing halls, room seven. Within the next 15 minutes.”

“You do understand you’re talking about a physical book, not a flimsi-stack or a holocron. It’s not meant to leave a climate-controlled room.”

“I promise you, I would not ask if it weren’t life or death. Please Jocasta, I’ll explain later.”

“I’ll be there in 10. It had better be one durned good explanation.”

Obi-Wan looked bemused. ”You’re setting yourself up for failure.”

“I am glad you were able to come up with a test you found meaningful. Remember, you have friends here, regardless of whether you experienced subjective time travel or an incredibly detailed vision.”

They waited a little longer. Obi-Wan critically examined Master Aerdo.

“I’m a Senior Soul Healer” they offered at the non-verbal prompting.

“How interesting.” Obi-Wan remarked dryly.

They sat in awkward silence for another minute. 

They were all equally trained in suppressing fidgets, coughs, or other nervous tics, which made the wait that slightest bit more unbearable, each second nearly imperceptible from the one before.

Eventually the sound of heavy boots moving at speed approached.

Master Nu strode in, gently cradling a great burden. The book gleamed large and vital in the light of its stasis wrap. Her eyes widened at they took in Obi-Wan, still cuffed to the bed. 

“Cihynglo’s Fourth Meditation, as asked for. I trust you have an excellent explanation for how a book of poetry is a matter of life or death.”

“I’m hoping that it will convince our friend Master Kenobi that I am who I claim to be and we are where I claim we are.” Koon gently pulled the book from her grasp and reverently placed it on Obi-Wan’s lap. Obi-Wan stared at it uncomprehendingly.

“Obi-Wan, I’m going to uncuff you now. I trust that you will use your freedom to examine our ‘proof.’ We will physically intercede if you make any attempts at self harm.”

Master Nu gasped. “Then the temple rumors...I don’t understand.”

Obi Wan picked up the book as if he was afraid it might bite him. With an irritated snort, he opened brusquely to the middle, and began carelessly flipping ahead.

Master Nu started forward, offended, but Plo Koon held her back. “Please Master Nu, patience-”

Finally Obi-Wan seemed to reach the page he was looking for and stopped. “..And still the rain fell like blood of the womb” he murmured. “That...I tried to think of how the line ended but I...”

Everyone watched as the book shook in Obi-Wan's grasp. He turned the page, gasping slightly and murmuring as he read. “This is...a little gross, but oddly touching. I certainly would not have come up with it myself...but its so clearly...” They watched his react, eyes darting wildly and brow furrowing in confusion.

Several pages later he dropped the book abruptly.

“This is impossible,” he gasped.

Nu darted forward, carefully snatching it from his lap, "I am endeavoring to practice tolerance, but how is destroying an irreplaceable piece of literature supposed to help anyone?!” she snapped

“I admit I wondered that myself, but when I imagined what harm the Sith could do with some of the archive’s more practical works, I understood your decision to torch the collection” Obi-Wan responded dreamily. “I suppose the more beautific works would likely have been destroyed anyway...”

“Torch the archives? I would never.”

“But you did,” Obi-Wan insisted feverishly. “I found your message when we searching for survivors. There were so many bodies piled at the archive door that I was almost hopeful that they had managed to...but I suppose they held out just long enough for you to complete your task.”

Nu backed away slowly. “That sounds like quite the disturbing vision, Master Kenobi.”

“It wasn’t just a vision, it was my life. It-visions don’t last years!” he said, finally growing hysterical. “I remember everything! That gods-awful mission to Cato Nemodia! Getting takeout food with Anakin! The smell of burning flesh in the creche! Singing to Luke! The last year of the war! All of you! You crying after Dooku’s death,” he added gesturing wildly at the archivist. “It was so awkward! You were embarrassed! You told me that for some stupid reason you had ‘held out hope’ it was all an insane uncover mission, that he wasn’t really- Three years alone in the desert! I remember three years of living on fucking Tatooine, how could that possibly be a vision!”

“I...hadn’t told anyone that,” Nu whispered with a hint of alarm. She glanced at Plo Koon, daring him to comment. “I know its very much unlikely at this point, and by any measure, he’s taken things too far, but he’s gone on such long shadow missions in the past...” she looked away.

“Oh, Jocasta...” Plo sighed.

“Master Kenobi. I cannot explain how you came to have such detailed knowledge of the future,” Aerdo said, drawing focus back to the bewildered Obi-Wan, who had shifted into a defensive crouch on the bed. “But I do know one reasonably sure fire way to establish that this, us, is the present. Open yourself up to the force, please, just let yourself listen to what it has to say.

“I...want to, of course I want to believe- but the idea that I’m here- it’s, if you’re real than you can’t possibly understand, its too good to be true.” Obi-Wan responded brokenly.

“I know things have been clouded of late, but, if nothing else trust in the force to not lie to you.” Plo-Koon urged. “If you keep closing yourself off like this, how can you possibly learn if things are better than you think”

Obi-Wan collapsed from his crouch, knees folding underneath.

“If I am...even if I am in the past... Sideous might be watching...i didn’t- i don’t know the extent of his gaze- even if...” he trailed off.

“If it makes you feel safer, you are of course free to again raise your shields to whatever extent you feel necessary once you have verified your reality.” Aerdo replied smoothly.

Obi-Wan looked warily at the three Jedi in the room.“I...” he started, trying to articulate the swelling hope and fear only to find himself at a loss for words.

Aerdo shot him a reassuring smile, “If you don’t feel ready right now, that’s perfectly understandable. We’re very happy you’re willing to reach out as much as you have already. Would you like to pause this discussion for now so we can find you something to eat? I believe a simple broth is a customary first post-bacta meal, but if you have any special requests I’ll do what I can.”

Obi-Wan let out a deep breath, dropping his head into his hands. “I- I need to know, don’t I?” he mumbled. “Force help me...you win.” He took one last, searching look at the faces of his fellow Jedi before closing his eyes and surrendering himself to the force.

He opened a small hole in his mental barricades and tentatively allowed his thoughts to drip out. Tentatively, he trickled over the bank of Plo Koon’s being (expecting a frigid burn) only to find a warm and heartbreakingly familiar pool of tempered kindness. 

He ran, slightly faster now, over the other Jedi presences in the room. Having finished his course without encountering any dark undertow, he ebbed back. There was an indistinct impression of something heavy giving way.

Obi-Wan’s Shields Fell Like A Dam Beneath a Tidal Wave -

[gucci-giogio]

GioMis Headcanons (2/?)

The first time Giorno saw Mista completely shirtless (it was a healing session) he noticed that mista wore a crucifix around his neck under his cashmere top. It has a tiny golden fixture of Jesus nailed to it. It was thin chained but looked very expensive and vintage. Giorno asked about it and learned that Mista is actually very Catholic. Giorno himself is agnostic at best, but he found it endeering, albeit a little contradictory given his chosen line of work, that Mista was such a man of faith. He said that he prayed for his and the gang’s safety and repented for his sins as often as he could. Once when he was the closest he’s ever been to death, Mista told Giorno that he saw him as God’s small gift to him. A guardian angel of sorts in mortal flesh. Giorno took that as a bitter sweet moment to be sang praises. “I’m no angel you fool...” he said quietly as he did his best to fix what he could as fast as he could.

It does worry Giorno that Guido is very often put on the chopping block for his sake. It all got worse once he became the Don and Guido his underboss. Giorno still fixes him up just like the good ole days. “Believe it or not, I didn’t get shot as often as I did until I met you.” He chuckled which made blood gush out of an open wound in his stomach. He cringed and so did Giorno. “Are you saying I’m bad luck for you? I thought I was your angel.” Giorno teased to cover up his nervousness as he continued working on him. “You are my angel. But shit, sometimes you’re also my devil. You make me stupid on the battlefield or something.” Giorno laughs at that one outright. “I do no such thing, Guido. Take accountability.” Guido is just dazed as he says “Yeah” and nothing more.

Giorno is the strongest person in all of Italy as far as he knows. There is no mortal man, stand user or not, that is a match for him. And yet, he feels antsy if Guido isn’t by his side to back him up. He feels a sense of vulnerability and he loathes that feeling. He would never say this out loud to anyone. He simply continues to assume the perfect picture of confidence even if he feels he’s lacking it at that moment.

Giorno’s stand can take simple commands from Guido at times. If he calls on GE it will sometimes respond, non verbally, just an acknowledgement in his general direction or to complete very simple tasks. Same with Guido’s Sex Pistols. #5 in particular often appears for Giorno. He loves to interact with Giorno, even though Mista isn’t too fond of that. His stands have a habit of shaming and embarassing him at random moments. Giorno finds it peculiar. “Guido, are you self hating?” He asks outright to which Mista claims “No! I love me! They just... well they are me but I don’t know why they drag me like that sometimes! They’re like my intrusive thoughts but manifested or some shit instead at times!” Giorno thinks this is odd but also prime entertainment.

Giorno likes Mista’s black, curly hair a lot. “You know, my hair used to be black when I was younger, though not curly...” This takes Mista for a surprise. “What? You’re not a natural blond?? And that’s a perm??” He asks but Giorno shakes his head. “No, I woke up one day and my hair was just blond and curly. Do you ever see me dye my hair? Do you ever see my roots come in black?” He says to which Guido just stares on in confusion but quickly shakes it off with a “I’m just now realizing that I’ve known you for a few years now but.. Dude I really don’t know you.”

Giorno is a fiend for chocolate and Mista often wonders where he puts it. Giorno’s body remains to this day just lean muscle. If Guido ate the way that Giorno tended to eat, he could kiss his abs goodbye and say hello to an even bigger ass while he was at it. Giorno never seemed to have a cavity. He never seemed to be on the brink of diabetes. He asked about it to which Giorno simply said “Easy. I have a fast metabolism and I make sure to stay healthy by working out. I brush my teeth 2 to 3 times a days as well.” Guido nodded. That seemed plausible— “Multiple teeth have rotted from my mouth as it was eroded by sugar. I’ve replaced them easily thanks to my stand. I’m sure if my A1C got higher than what it is, I would figure out a way to reverse that with Gold Experience.” Guido gave a judgmental stare to which Giorno ignored in favor of focusing on his gelato.

“Why do most of your tops have your midsection out? Abs are a huge part of your aesthetic I see.” Trish said to Guido who was leaned against a wall texting. He paused to give her a lazy once over before grinning. “The tits out look you have going is also a statement. Who you got your honkers out for?” He said, which caught her off guard. “I— Well for myself of course!” Trish retaliated to which Guido replied “Ditto.” and resumed texting. He sent a picture of his outfit of the day to Giorno, abs on display with a caption “can u believe trish in here complainin about me having my abs out? 😭😂” who responded quickly with a “in dis house we respekk thots! keep itup Mis! 😤💯 🔥” to which Guido just stares in silent disbelief. A second text follows quickly. “My apologies, that was Narancia’s doing. But the sentiments remain the same regardless. xx” Guido smiles. Giorno likes his abs and wants to keep seeing them! Guido immediately frowns. Did he just agree with Narancia calling him a thot?

[unpopularfanopinion]

@pressed-poppy  (because this is a side-blog and I can’t reply)

You are definitely using the slippery slope argument though. It doesn’t matter that there are actual people who complain about grey areas. In fact, I never denied people are complaining about grey area’s nor did I say I agree with those complaints. My point is that you’re using THOSE examples to justify not having to do anything. That is literally the slippery slope argument.

Who is doing nothing?

I am doing my personal best to recognize and unlearn the racial biases I have grown up with. In real life I offer support for black activist and vote for candidates that that I believe will support and build on policies that lead to greater equality and social justice. Which I admit at times doesn’t feel nearly enough, but I am also a single person who doesn’t have much, there is only such much I can do as an individual.

Ao3 is building better tools for POC authors to protect themselves from harassment.

Neither of those is “nothing”

The only thing they’re not doing is creating a system that will allow for censorship of fan authors, which you know goes against their entire mission statement

Is there a reason why you are ignoring the efforts Ao3 is working toward making the site better and safer for all fans? Is it because you don’t think it is enough? What would you prefer Ao3 to do? And how do you propose they do it without any unintended consequences that will ultimately hurt fans and POC?  You admit there are bad faith actors, how would you propose dealing with them?

And I’m sure you think you’re smart and clever by claiming the “slippery slope” argument as if that invalidates what I’m saying, but take a step back and think about what feminist say when they protest laws and regulations that limit abortion. They point out that these laws won’t reduce abortion. They point out that women will die because of these laws. They are also making slippery slop arguments. That doesn’t make their arguments or points any less true or valid.

 And you’re also again repeating the cultural relativism argument that I already disagreed with. Why would it change my mind this time? All I expressed is that these are dangerous and conservative tactics, not used by people who mean well. It’s shady.

I’m starting to think you don’t actually understand what cultural relativism is. Cultural relativism means not looking at another culture and judging them by our standards. You don’t think of another culture is ignorant, barbaric, or in any way “lesser” to your own because they do things differently(like eat food you consider gross, or your that culture has taught you is unclean) than your culture. And is meant to be used by anthropologists to avoid ethnocentrism with studying other cultures.

People have mis-used and conflated cultural relativism with moral relativism which is the idea that all view points can be equally valid, and therefore tolerant people should be tolerant of intolerant beliefs and view points(and just to make my self clear, not i do not agree with that idea. I am well aware of the Intolerance Paradox)

And really I not even making either a cultural relativism, or moral relativism argument. I am merely pointing out that even if you got everyone to agree Racism is BAD!(and yes it’s sad you would not be able to get everyone to agree to that) you would not be able to get them to agree on a single, codified guideline of what racism looks like, and what counts as racism, or racial bigotry.  Which again is what Ao3 would need if they were going to censor works based on “racism” while still being fair to all users.  And again you admit to bad faith actors and grey areas existing, but at the same time seem to want to ignore them.

And again you seem insistent on taking all my statements in the worst and most nefarious manner and calling it shady.  Honestly it sounds like you’ve already decide which side you agree with on the Ao3 discourse, but just don’t want to say it for some reason.  Needless to say. that is shady as fuck.

[the-nysh]

Garou is a pretty controversial character in one punch man subreddit. What are your thoughts on this?

For as much as he’s genuinely popular and well-loved over there for sure, it’s also a big enough place where it’s true you’ll find no shortage of threads & comments from the other side of the spectrum too. (The most volatile ones often get downvoted and/or deleted however.) From those who openly express their dislike to flat-out hatred of him, yes.

You’ll often recognize a pattern from them though (and they stick out to me like a sore thumb). Most commonly from newer fans of the series who’ve only read parts of the manga (so their understanding of him is incomplete or doesn’t make sense to them yet, recognizable from those who label him an irredeemable ‘horrible person’ or incorrectly a hero killer like Stain for ex), or who’ve speed-read the webcomic and missed things without connecting the dots about him yet after his big end-arc reveal, but who still come to express their distaste, frustration, or general confusion over understanding his arc as a whole. And because there’s still so much of that reader confusion abound, it’s no surprise why ONE’s had to portray manga!Garou with much less ambiguity compared to the wc, with more obvious reader hand-holding, for instance. That’s the writing trade-off (clarity over subtlety more open to interpretation), even though mischaracterizations still happen from those who hastily jump the gun (not ONE’s fault), but I still love the expanded depth and extra attention ONE’s given his character in the manga. So it’s like ONE & Murata have long noticed those readers’ perceptions to overall modify things for the better, I feel.

So in general, those types of reddit threads aren’t so much a problem, since they usually get the clarification needed from other posters (avid Garou fans) chiming in to correct them (repeatedly with patience!), and leave them newly educated with a fresh perspective and/or appreciation for what ONE’s done. I honestly feel like it really shouldn’t be their job to continually put in the work (like a broken record) for other readers’ sake or (lack of) comprehension, and I may not phrase or approach things the same way they do, or have the same rigid interpretation of Garou as some of them, but I appreciate their dedication and vigilance to defend & address the misinformation about his character all the same. :’) (For example, this user often has insightful and niche things to say about him, different from most others there, which is worth checking out.) 

What’s notably not so nice (and what I see as more of a problem) are those other veteran repeat haters, who jump in framing their arguments in ways that sound smart & logical (easily persuading the gullible under the verbose guise of ‘literary analysis’), but when you actually read what else they’re saying, instead of allowing others to see Garou in a new light (informing in a helpful way), their claims contribute towards the opposite: deliberately misleading others in an echo chamber of blatant misinformation. (Which is what I dislike; they can dislike Garou all they want, but don’t do that towards manipulating the trust of the impressionable.) Long story short, I remember exactly who they are too, so I know who to avoid or treat all their takes non-seriously and skeptically with a grain of salt (which is applicable in other fandoms too).

For example, there’s a guy who always bashes on Garou and his purpose in the story, making sweeping claims about his character (in bad faith) and what opm should be about according to him, while also admitting he skips over every fight and chapter without Saitama in it (instant ding to his trust & credibility). It’s then no wonder he ‘hates’ Garou when he’s deliberately chosen to brush all his content and development under the rug. :| (Just don’t sway others to believe what you already admitted knowing nothing about!) There’s another guy who always describes Garou in poor light and condescendingly ‘corrects’ anyone when the anti-hero vs anti-villain conversations come up again, while conveniently ignoring the very words from ONE himself (instant checkmate):

Garou is an “anti-hero,” but I thought he should be more “anti-Saitama” – otherwise, he’d be the same as the other monsters. I didn’t want to show the limits of his potential. He might not be able to win now, but I wanted people to think that if he continues to grow as a monster, he might just be able to fight on the same level as Saitama. The anime emphasized his viciousness, his youth, his whimsical kindness, and his recklessness, which made me look forward to his future.  

So taking everything in, I’d love to see how those Garou naysayers would ‘school’ ONE, the professional writer here, with that same fervor they profess to know more about his own work than him, cause I’ll trust the words of the author over what ‘proof’ they’ll try to convince others on the internet with. :P I suppose overall, just trust your gut and use your best informed judgment, to be aware (of who’s being genuinely helpful or an ass) and navigate the subreddit responsibly.

[kissimirrit]

as an ex truscum how did you come to terms with the harm youve caused others and make up for it? do you still struggle with unlearning truscum standards?

i think it’s important i don’t hide or censor my past, no matter how embarrassed or regretful i might be from it. people have the right to know about someone’s past bigotry and to decide their boundaries with that person from that point on. i think it’s an important part of my past for people to know of when the topic comes up.

i stopped being truscum almost 5 years ago; and yes—i still struggle with unlearning truscum standards, because i learned them during my formative years of development. because of that, i really vibe with the saying "The first thought that goes through your mind is what you have been conditioned to think; what you think next defines who you are." —because i’ll still catch myself thinking very... exclusionary things and have to stop and reflect why i’m thinking that, and then correct my thoughts accordingly. it’s forever a process of self-reflection and checking. 

(read-more’d for length) tl;dr—i realized being truscum was bad and then i became a die-hard inclusionist, and even began identifying with labels that 2012 me would hate.

i only really came to terms with the fact i was causing harm in say, late 2016 or *very* early 2017 when one of my most treasured friends admitted to me that xe was afraid to tell me xe was nonbinary, because we both had identified as truscum and xe was in the process of dropping those beliefs, whereas i hadn’t gotten to that point myself until xe told me about hir identity and reason for being afraid of telling me. and if one of my best friends felt terrified of telling me their identity, or literally anything about themselves; then obviously i was fucking up big time and doing something incredibly wrong.

so that was like, my first step in dropping those beliefs. and making up for it has been an incredibly long road. dropping all forms of gate-keeping, queer-separatism, and otherwise exclusionary beliefs in favor of becoming a radically inclusive person of any good-faith identity, to the point of even adopting some “discoursed” labels myself (ie: straight-lesbian trans man) has been a 5 year long journey. 

i started identifying as truscum when i was 13 or 14, back in 2011 or 2012 when the word was first coined. there was a tumblr post, calling those who were binary trans people and (forgive me my memory is fuzzy) didn’t hate cis people as “true transexual scum. truescum.” and the term truscum stuck from that. and back then the community was really small. there was just a handful of us in the FTM tag telling other trans guys that they can’t identify as lesbians and that they should stop tagging their selfies as both “FTM” and “lesbian”. (which is funny to me now because... i literally identify as an ftm lesbian now lmaaooo. i became the very thing i set out to destroy /lh).

and being truscum was kind of a catalyst for so many of the early exclusionary queer-separatism and incorporating radfem beliefs into early lgbt+ tumblr that i never really noticed until ace discourse got notoriously bad in 2016. 1. nonbinary-exclusion. back in 2012/2013 ‘trans’ used to be written as ‘trans*’, with the asterisk, for the inclusion of nonbinary identities. and at the time, truscum were notoriously against it because at the time, truscum believed that nonbinary identities weren’t real, so the asterisk was unnecessary and useless. and then an article came along that went into detail about how the asterisk was useless BECAUSE nonbinary people were inherently trans without any caveats, and ‘trans’ (without the asterisk) was already inclusive on nonbinary folk, not just binary trans men and women. so that kinda trickled down and eventually became the end of trans* asterisk, and after that an influx of nonbinary folks started to identify as truscum—however a lot of people who identified as truscum prior to this still held heavily anti-nonbinary beliefs. (and then truscum got kinda blamed for adding the asterisk in the first place so that kinda became an in-joke for a year or so. like, things truscum invented: the asterisk after trans asterisk, the word truscum, whales. etc)  2. transmisogyny, and adopting radfem talking points. i know in the early days (and probably still now, but i don’t know the demographics as i never kept up with them), the majority of truscum before 2014 were white, and binary trans men. (emphasis on the white trans men part.) Because of this, whenever there was a collective schism with a notable trans woman for whatever reason (adele idislikecispeople, genderpunkrock, kat blaque, etc. were all big ones during 2014), transmisogyny would be rampant. there were groups dedicated to somehow proving idislikecispeople was pretending to be a trans woman that were really invasive of her privacy (years before kiwifarms even touched the subject), and despite claiming to be a vehemently anti-radical feminist group—willingly accepted radfem talking points and even radfems who self-identified as truscum. and cisgendered self-identified truscum, especially adult cis MEN (usually gay, and were fairly aggressive to us teens??), were accepted with open arms and were looked up to for some fucking reason. y’know, bootlicking.  around 2014 was when the term “transmedicalist/transmedicalism” was coined by john snarkytransman, and was popularized by users who followed suit. it came about around 2013/2014. since then, the term has been synonymous with truscum- but in may 29, 2015, users who wanted to detach themselves from the label of truscum due to drama wish to mark a distinction between the two labels, which was largely popularized by john myragewillendworlds. because truscum was never supposed to be a community initially, it was supposed to be an ideology “like atheism”.  and a lot of the drama around the time when transmedicalist was coined was due to three distinct groups forming: the old truscum (those who had been around since near the beginning, like i was. usually adult binary trans men over 18 and in their early-to-mid 20s.), neo-truscum (mostly made up of teens around my age who were newly out and majorly identified as nonbinary, and latched onto the first group they came across, like i had years prior), and the FUCKING MARIGANG (a notorious group of radfem truscum who only believed in 2 distinct nonbinary identities, agender and bigender, and were... extremely volatile.) i was somehow in all 3 of these groups because of 1. the fact i had been truscum since the near conception of the term so i was oldscum, 2. i was within the age range of most of the neo-truscum so a lot of them were my friends, and 3. mari from the marigang was the first ever other non-SAM asexual (and adult!) i had ever met (aside from my then-gf, Gabe. whomst i still talk to and luv with all my heart <33) and i clung onto her despite how.... fucking wild she was. and her boyfriend eliot was the first ever intersex person i had come across after learning about my own intersex variation, and i was so desperate for validation from these two adults who both held two identities integral to myself that i had never met any else sharing before, so i ignored so many of the red flags they had. (and they had... so many.) which brings me to my next point!!!!! 3. queer-phobia and the beginning of ace discourse. (NOTE: i didn’t realize all of these groups were radfem until years later, and i didn’t know what “TWERF” meant at the time. i barely knew was a radfem was.) so the marigang (2013/2014 i think?) was known for being notoriously volatile and violent at the drop of a hat to anyone who they didn’t like and labeling them as “fauxscum”. even to their own members in the skype group. it was largely made up of radfems and even eliot was a self-described TWERF (despite... at the time identifying as a intersex cis man????). the marigang believed in two nonbinary identities only: bigender and agender. mari herself was agender, asexual, and aromantic, and would brag about abusing eliot because of how much she despised men. she was incredibly anti-AVEN and refused to be called ace, aro, or aroace, and would only go by non-AVEN terms like “asexual” and thought the split-attraction-model was bullshit. (which is why i also refused to go by the terms ace/aro/aroace and would only go by “asexual” up until late 2016/early 2017.) mari was also incredibly hypocritical, criticizing me for having a girlfriend despite IDing as asexual & aromantic, even though she also had a boyfriend with the same sorta partnership (except Gabe and i weren’t abusive, just a bit too young.) despite that, i latched onto mari as an idolized adult figure. branching off from the marigang was a group of asexual & aromantic, usually nonbinary, radfem truscum who called themselves asexual elitists. and i ended up joining that group through mari. this group in either late 2013 to mid 2014 became the basis of what ace discourse would become a year later. some of our key beliefs that would later generally be accepted by truscum (a lot of them even sharing some of these beliefs despite hating the marigang and such) and then later spread throughout tumblr were: 1. there is no asexual spectrum. you’re either asexual or you aren’t. micro-identities like demisexuality and grayasexuality are unnecessary because that’s 90% of the population. (the part about demigray-sexuality was already popular amongst truscum at this time.) 2. people aren’t oppressed for being asexual. it’s either misogyny or misdirected homophobia. (i don’t think the term aphobia/acephobia was coined yet, or was popularized at this time.) 3. queer is a violent slur and should not be used as a personal identity or for the community. (already a common opinion amongst truscum.) 4. the split-attraction-model is unnecessary, redundant, harmful, and destructive. that if your sexual and romantic orientations “conflict” (ie: biromantic heterosexual, homoromantic pansexual, etc.), then you’re either one or the other and just confused. that it’s homophobic/biphobic/lesbiphobic because it reduces people to sex. (was already 50/50 with truscum.) 5. the term “allosexual” is very AVEN-y (therefore bad) and, again, reduces people to sex. because us asexuals were the “abnormal” (an actual word used that i internalized) ones in society, we didn’t need a word to refer to non-asexuals, and just not-asexual worked for it. 6. pansexuality don’t real and it’s just bisexuality under a special label. (was already 50/50 with truscum.) 7. the only existing orientations are gay/lesbian, bi, and straight. asexuality is the LACK of a sexuality and therefore not an orientation.  8. AVEN sucks. fuck AVEN. fuck david jay. MOGAI sucks. intersex isn’t lgbt. (i was the only intersex person a part of the asexual elitists (sans eliot) so i was kinda expected to just... agree with it. so i did. i didn’t have any opinions of my own for it. and mari was adamant about it because she was outspoken about eliot’s intersexuality.) — i’m probably missing some but these were off the top of my head. do those sound familiar? these were the beliefs of both the marigang and the asexual elitists groups, that were probably taken from radfems and then spread to truscum and to the rest of tumblr—which then spread out further through the internet, since many users had deviantarts and twitters and would take discourse to other places. et cetera et cetera. i left the marigang in late 2014 i want to say? and returned to the general truscum community, and the marigang fell apart due to in-fighting. but the damage had already been done at that point, and those of us left were still spreading this rhetoric to others who then continued to spread it. ------ i think i started to become an inclusionist in late 2015 or early 2016 when ace discourse STARTED to take off outside of truscum circles. because whenever i talked about bigotry i happened to face due to be asexuality, i was met with “that didn’t happen” and people dismissing my experiences and telling me i had no place in the lgbt community (“i never thought the leopards would eat my face” -person who supported the ‘leopards eating faces’ party). i began to notice how kinda... fucked up these exclusionist beliefs were, now that i was on the receiving end of them? so i left the truscum community (despite still holding transmedicalist beliefs at this time) and i made an ace discourse blog called acehet (which at the time i made it, was called allosexuel. but before that i helped run a blog called allodiscourse which then got rebranded to something else after i left idk??) i still held onto some of these initial beliefs. that the split attraction model was silly, that asexuality wasn’t a spectrum, that AVEN was harmful, pansexuality is just special bisexuality, queer was a slur, etc etc. and i did my best to actively work towards unlearning a lot of these things and began to blog in support of them, even if my best friend at the time (the one who later came out to me as nonbinary and inspired me to drop transmedicalist beliefs entirely) still believed in all of these things and felt like i was beginning to believe in the wrong things. (i think because of that i sorta inspired hir to become an inclusionist too after hir past exclusionism too? ze's never said what sorta made hir change hir stance. idk!) and through that, i began to realize that the root of so many gatekeeping beliefs and arguments were founded through radical feminism, truscum/transmedicalists, and bigotry in general. that so many of these parroted arguments were rehashed versions of “trans women aren’t women” to “nondysphorics aren’t trans” to “bihets aren’t lgbt” to “asexuals(and aromantics) aren’t lgbt” to “intersex people aren’t lgbt” and so forth. invading communities, stealing resources, preying on young lesbians (making her reject womanhood and become nonbinary/trans, internalized lesbiphobia and IDing as ace or bi, somehow sexually abusing them, etc.) and so on. they’re all the same fucking arguments. from the same fucking sources.  and i have been saying this for years since i realized it. there are maybe 1 or 2 beliefs i held onto since i started interacting with the truscum community back in 2011, before the term was coined. but i believe it only for myself, and do not apply it to anyone else. i, personally and for myself only, believe my own transexuality is a medical condition characterized by my dysphoria, and i’ve never really identified with the trans community. i don’t identify with the trans flag, so i don’t use it for myself. i avoid the term “trans” unless necessary. and in 2016-2018 i pretended to be a cis man online until it became too much and i hated lying. i don’t apply this to anyone else, only myself. because i only want to focus on the medical aspect of my transition. this is a major contrast with my intersex identity. where i don’t consider my intersex variation to be a condition, but rather a major identity of mine. whereas most people would see the inverse of this—that trans is an identity and intersex is a condition. for me, and me personally, it’s the opposite. my intersexuality is my identity and my transexuality is my condition. (i cannot stress enough that i only apply this belief to myself, nobody else.) i identify with the intersex community, i identify with the intersex flag, and being intersex is the most major part of my presentation and gender. there’s probably so many things i’ve missed since it’s been a decade since the conception of truscum as a group. before that i believe there were a similar group made up of trans women on some forums called HBSers (harry benjamin syndrome-ers). unlearning all of these beliefs i’ve internalized in my youth and trying to use my past as a way to dissuade people away from gate-keeping and exclusionism has been what i’ve been doing my best to do since around late 2015, even if i was still in the process of dropping my own harmful and exclusionary separatist beliefs after that time. there are still truscum-y thoughts that creep back into my mind every time i might come across something new or “cringy”, but after 2018/2019 when i finally came to the full realization that HRT would never work on me (my biggest nightmare since 2013 when i learned i was intersex)—i fully embraced my own cringy identity as a straight-lesbian ftm intersex man and embraced MOGAI as a term.  all queer-separatism beliefs, exclusionism, gate-keeping, and other lgbtqia+ infighting all stems from bigotry and hate. it stems from radfems, from truscum/transmedicalists, from people “exclusionists” claim to hate yet have no problem parroting arguments from. it’s all rooted in hatred and elitism and separating the “pure” identities away from the “bad” ones. all forms of gate-keeping in queer communities like this is bigoted and harmful, because it’s a slippery slope into all the other forms of gate-keeping as well. anyway i hope this wasn’t hard to read? i’m pretty rambly and i have trouble keeping my thoughts in check. i’ve most likely missed a lot of things and forgotten many more, but this is more or less the timeline that led me to learn that being truscum was genuinely and incredibly fucking harmful and i am still trying to make up for it. my 2 biggest regrets in life are 1. being truscum and 2. inventing circumgender. 

[thefreakishmuffin]

Hetalia is coming back, and I have some thoughts...

Alrighty everyone, here we go! As if 2020 couldn’t get more insane...

(This is a longer post, so I’ll add fun gifs to separate the walls of text so it isn’t so exhausting to read).

So, if you’ve been on the internet since the early 2010′s, you’ve most likely seen, or at least heard, of an odd show called Hetalia. This anime, with the manga originally created by Hidekaz Himaruya, was later adapted into an anime. For those who are either new to the internet or have been living under a rock for the last decade, Hetalia, first going under the name Hetalia: Axis Powers, is a show about different events in world history and world politics, all being portrayed by people who represent different countries. Each country - or character, you could say - is essentially the embodiment of all their respective country’s stereotypes. 

For example, Germany is extremely strict, loud, militaristic, and often angry or stubborn. Italy is an absolute coward who is obsessed with pasta and beautiful women. And America is an over-the-top, loud, bombastic, arrogant dork who is constantly downing fast food and calling himself a “hero.” The list goes on and on, but you get the idea. 

Hetalia was, and still is, an extremely weird show. And with season seven on the horizon, coming to us in Spring 2021, I feel like I ought to talk about it. And why am I taking the time to talk about it?

Because I am a veteran Hetalian. 

(Me laughing but slowly dying inside)

You read that right. Throughout all of middle school and the first few months of high school (almost four years), I was an absolute obsessive Hetalia fangirl. Outside of the internet, I was the biggest fan I knew, along with the guy who was my best friend at the time. We’d binge watch the show, read and write fanfiction, bring others into the cult fandom, talk about it almost constantly, draw fanart, watch the funny mmd video compilations on YouTube, delve really deep into world history, quote and reenact all of our favorite scenes - we even cosplayed England and Prussia one year for Halloween! This was the show that made me the HUGE history nerd I am today! I even got a book on the complete history of Prussia one year for Christmas.

Yep. We were those kind of fans. (Not gonna lie, as a now twenty-year-old woman, I still kinda cringe looking back at my middle school years. But I was having fun, so who cares?)

So when I heard we were getting another season after a five year hiatus, you’d think I’d be super stoked that a show I was once madly in love with was coming back from the dead, right? 

(The part of me that is thrilled about Hetalia returning)

Well... It’s a little complicated. I won’t lie that I am really excited for this new season, and I’m of course gonna watch the entire series over again in preparation for it. But I have some hopes, worries, and mixed emotions about everything happening, and everything that may or may not go down when the season eventually airs, including the time leading up to it. I even have a particular topic I want to get to, but you’ll see that later in the post.

To address my worries, we first have to go way back to the early days of the fandom. For the most part, the Hetalia fandom was just really weird, fun, nerdy, and quirky. Nothing wrong with that. I feel like the fandom already had an odd reputation, but at least it wasn’t a bad one. That is until we had some... How should I say... Toxic behaviors and incidents start to take place. 

Allow me to explain. How I see it, every fandom has some kind of toxicity level. The toxicity level is from the fans who are, well, toxic. We all know who they are, and you’ve likely met at least a few here and there. And the toxicity levels vary from fandom to fandom. In some it’s very low, and in others it’s very high. I wouldn’t say the Hetalia fandom’s toxicity level was super high, but it wasn’t incredibly low either. We had the usual problems, like some intense shipping wars and people debating on different ideas and headcanons, but the Hetalia fandom had something a bit different going on.

(My two personalities trying to coexist in peace)

You see, a lot of people didn’t like - or even hated - Hetalia, because they saw it as racist and offensive. If you admitted you liked Hetalia outside of the fandom, you ran a definite risk of getting either shunned or degraded for it. And if that wasn’t bad enough, you had a group of fans - a rather small group of fans, mind you - who did some pretty insensitive things that ended up landing the fandom in some serious hot water.

You’d have people in that small group of fans who’d openly do the Nazi salute while cosplaying Germany at conventions, and there was even the incident where you had fans cosplaying as Nazi Germany to the holocaust museum, where they decided to pose doing the Nazi salute. I even saw a cosplay of Germany and Prussia pointing guns at the Star of David, which is a well known symbol of the Jewish faith. Not to mention the fans who seemed to fetishize Nazi Germany and Prussia. Now, I may not know about everything these people did, as I was pretty good at staying on the light side of the fandom, but these were some pretty well known and disgraceful problems that everyone would find out about sooner or later.

Sadly enough, it was that small, tiny percentile of the fandom that did things that were so offensive, so wrong, that it was greatly magnified by others, thus giving the fandom its toxic, even cringey reputation. And I really hope we don’t have to relive that all over again.

(Me singing songs about punching Nazis and eating pasta)

So what I hope is that we are able to leave all of that behind us. Though I’ve already seen some Twitter users try to start drama all over again by reposting the offensive cosplays, and Tumblr users getting their panties in a wad because they apparently have nothing else better to do. But because a vast majority of the Hetalia fans are like me in that we’ve grown older and matured, I’m hoping we can help guide the younger, newer fans in the right direction.

And I won’t deny that I am very worried about the newer fans getting harassed and bullied on social media. I don’t have a lot of advice when it comes to the haters, other than the usual ‘ignore them and don’t respond’, tactic. But just know that if they don’t leave you alone, you can always block them.

And here’s another bit I want to touch upon. While I can completely understand why people see this show as racist and offensive, I honestly don’t think it is. If anything, I think it actually teaches us something. And no, I’m not talking about history right here. I’m talking about the stereotypes, and how they are portrayed. I think this show helps us to understand that all of these different stereotypes we have about different people and countries are all stupid and silly.

Do we actually know a German who is exactly like Hetalia’s Germany? No. Do any of us know an Englishman who is identical to Hetalia’s England in every way? Of course not. This series helps us to understand that the stereotypes so many of us hold onto today are nothing more than just stupid, silly old ideas that have been blown far out of proportion over the years. 

Many people try to claim that this show is overtly racist and tries to divide, but in my opinion, I think it ties us together.

(My last two braincells writing up this post at around midnight)

At the end of the day, I’m incredibly excited and eager to see the new season of Hetalia, and everything that it will have in store for us. And it’s fun too look back on all the nostalgic memories I have of this show. This is all I have to say for now, but I may or may not be coming back to this topic in the future. Might even make another blog for Hetalia while I’m coming back to the fandom. After all, this is known as the fandom you can’t escape from.

Now if you excuse me, I’m gonna go press play on Hetalia: Axis Powers episode one, and let myself spiral into insanity once again!

[ill-be-istj-if-no-one-else-is]

Smart vs dumb anon. Thought I'd explain myself since you say my ask haunts you (and based on the evidence at least left you with questions, most of them about my sanity, I'm sure.) I was thinking about how some blogs give shitty information, such as 'Ti doesn't ever ask for sources when you make a claim' - when in reality any reasonably intelligent person would want a source if they actually cared about the argument - with Ti and Te probably judging the source differently. (1/2)

This lead to thinking about blogs with good information (such as yours) and at first I wanted to ask seriously about smart and dumb behaviours vs Te and Ti (or any function) behaviour. But knowing your penchant for sarcasm, your crusade against shitty introverts, and your regular put-downs of stupid Ti behaviour (while you still have recognised good qualities about Ti) I thought you might have some choice things to say. Clearly I was wrong. Apologies. (2/2)

------

Hi anon,

I’m still not sure what you were going for exactly, but like, I at least think that when phrased this way you were at least kind of aiming in the right direction of a good question.

I hate questions that are like “what does x type look like”/”what does x type like” because while there are obviously broad traits shared by people of the same type, behaviors are so heavily shaped by social factors and other abilities that there’s no answer that won’t be either so general as to be useless and boring, or representative of only a tiny fraction of people of that type. I spent enough time being told that I should, as an ISTJ, be a politically conservative bureaucrat or historian who hates science fiction that I’m not going to do that to someone else; I also do not want to say something like that, even as a joke, because then I will get approximately 50000 questions of “but I’m an ENFP and I’m smart and I don’t do that!” and it will make me want to scream. Like, I think ISTP sister is reasonably smart, and I think Steve Jobs was an ISTP, and they are not very much alike as people beyond having above-average technical and computer skills.

However, and you can correct me if I’m wrong I think the actual question you might have been getting at was what kind of person provides super black-and-white information, and I wonder if perhaps that might be where the instinctual variants come in. I’ve heard that sx-primary people can have this all-or-nothing perspective which might be why a lot of sx-blind people don’t see a value in instinctual variants - so many of the descriptions were given by people with sx and to people without sx they are so obviously extreme to the point of total unreality.

You also might have been looking for an answer to what kind of person doesn’t ask for sources, and while I agree it’s not a very smart move, it’s a single example of a non-smart move; a very stupid person could still ask for a source. It’s hard to really tell, because this is just one behavior. While I agree that attributing not asking for sources isn’t tied to a specific function as much as it’s tied to an understanding of how information works, I do find that high Ti users are often less critical of a source. Like, I find they’re less likely to look for clear conflicts of interest because they try to look at everything “objectively” in a realm of pure logic, which of course falls apart when you consider that people lie and manipulate data. The flipside is that a Te user might discount a valid argument because it came from an unreliable person, or put a higher weight on a bad argument because it came from a usually trustworthy source, though again there’s lots of room for context and nuance here and a smart and healthy Ti user will realize that some arguments are being made in bad faith and a smart and healthy Te user will not accept sources blindly simply because they are sources.

But none of that is really smart and dumb, and those are such broad, subjective terms themselves that any observation of mine will be so vague to be meaningless. There are people with PhDs who believe absolutely moronic conspiracy theories; my own personal perception of what is smart contains a pretty hefty common sense requirement but I think many people would disagree with me if I called those people dumb.

If you were getting at something else feel free to let me know.

[blackjack-15]

The Force of Nature and the Cackling Madman: What Hux Should Be (and What ROS Won’t Be)

Warning: two mentions of the leaked/newish pictures. They will have spoiler warnings bracketing it, along with the appropriate tags connected to the post. You’ve been warned.

INTRODUCTION

With RoS mere months away, this meta really can’t be delayed any longer before it becomes moot, so here we go!

TLJ was a lot of things — some good, some bad —  but what it wasn’t was surprising (unless you count just how shockingly bad 90% of Finn’s storyline was). This is generally a good thing in movies nowadays, where surprises come not from clever writing, but from enormous missteps in the writing or the desire to feel clever by putting in a twist that isn’t foreshadowed, or even just by breaking the rules of your universe.

Ignoring all but the main storyline — which is about Rey and Kylo Ren and their obstacles/conflicts — TLJ didn’t bring any surprises, but instead followed on the lines that TFA set up. As this is obviously the storyline that’s been hashed out from the start and is the point they’re building to, it’s thus safe to say that RoS is simply going to do the same, and follow the lines that TLJ set up.

SPOILER WARNING BEGINS

(Side note: this is why, when the absurdly stupid tuning-fork-lightsaber of Rey’s showed up in the first looks at RoS, it was immediately obvious that she was going to be able to “break” off half of it to give to Kylo when his saber is ultimately gone/self-destructs. Not only does the spoiler picture all but confirm this, but it’s also the obvious trajectory from the two fighting over a lightsaber in TLJ and breaking it in half.)

SPOILER WARNING ENDS

Anyway, with this framework in mind, and with the knowledge that every Star Wars media since the OG trilogy is in some way an adaptation of the OG trilogy, let’s examine what this means for the villain.

TERROR AND STAR WARS VILLAINS

There’s really no getting around the fact that one of the weakest facets of any Star Wars movie — yes, the OG trilogy is included here — is the villains that accompany them. A few SW video games fare a bit better in this, but most follow the movies’ path. This isn’t shocking — Star Wars is a Hero’s Journey, and in a Hero’s Journey it’s the presence of a villain, not the nature of the villain itself, that’s the important part — but it is crucial to understand.

Darth Vader is by far the most iconic and scariest villain that Star Wars movies can boast of, and for those born after 4/5/6 came out, he’s not really that scary, because those viewers go in knowing who Vader is and that he’s (at least partially) redeemed through his sacrifice. The greatest contribution that Rogue One made to that viewership is the scene with Vader at the end, where he is legitimately an object of terror as he was when 4/5/6 were first out.

This leads to a discussion of Palpatine-as-villain in RotJ, where the best that can be said for his status as terror-inducing villain is that at least he has Vader to do most of the heavy lifting for him. As a villain, Palpatine is just not scary. Maybe it’s the makeup, maybe it’s the fact that he gets thrown out like a sack of garbage to his death, maybe it’s the cold ham delivery he gives to what should be properly menacing lines.

Darth Maul’s visuals in TPM alone are scarier than all of Palpatine in RotJ, and, before it’s brought up, Palpatine is even less scary than that in the prequels, so I’m not even considering that part.

The thing that most Star Wars villains have in common (aside from Tarkin, who is my person favorite movie-verse villain) is that they’re forces of nature; they have the force and/or use lightsabers, they’re larger than life and beings of immense power and reputation, and they’re there to sort of loom over movie, causing overwhelming-yet-non-specifc terror to motivate the plot in a “avoid the bad guys” sort of way.

This is especially obvious in the prequel movies, where Darth Maul (ignoring his awesome visual effect), General Grievous, and Count Dooku are all basically meant to Stand There And Look Menacing, rather than having anything about them that’s actually interesting.

And here’s where the interesting things in the sequel trilogy begin.

WHY SMOKE SNOKE?

There was never any way that Snoke was going to live past TLJ, just like there was no way that Hux wasn’t going to survive TLJ. Remembering that the sequel trilogy is in a lot of ways an adaptation of the OG trilogy (as all Star Wars movies are), TFA was trying to get you to think of Snoke as Palpatine — an overlord that survives until the last bit of the last movie and Hux as Tarkin — the non-Force user who is Evil and all but dies b/c he’s too smug and petty.

But neither one of those things were actually true. Because that would position Kylo Ren as the Vader analogue, and all of TFA is dedicated to showing just how wrong that assumption is.

Because Kylo’s not Vader, Hux isn’t Tarkin, and Snoke isn’t Palpatine. Thus, Snoke has to die, because we can’t go into the last third of the trilogy with competing big bads (and no, Kylo and Hux don’t count there, either — Kylo isn’t a big bad at all, unless you think that the Big Bad Villain’s job is to fall for a British honeypot with a lightsaber).

I’ll admit, I was a bit smug when Snoke died and left only Hux alive and kicking out of the Three Bad Guys (as Kylo/Ben isn’t even pretending to be a bad guy anymore), because that’s what I had predicted — a fake-out with a Palpatine-style, force-of-nature villain only to reveal that the real Big Bad was with us all along — a mortal; a cackling madman: General Hux.

PLOTTING WITH PALPATINE

When spoilers first indicated that Palpatine would instead make yet another appearance in a Star Wars film, I was optimistic. Optimistic not in the “hey the Rebels will totally win” sort of way; no, optimistic in the “these kind Jedi will definitely free the slaves and not just take the kid because They Must Deal Kindly With Illegal Slavers”. AKA misplaced optimism rather than genre-savvy faith in the heroes to prevail.

Because actually bringing back Palpatine would be a stupid move all the way around, I tried to figure out why they’d advertise it and not try to hide the bad idea in a Secret Twist.

So here’s where we get the interplay between the Force of Nature and the Cackling Madman.

In a world where the Force exists, it’s easy to imagine that those without it feel rather powerless — or at least overshadowed — when near those who do wield it. Certainly, that’s true for most of Tarkin’s council, and true of Hux. 

Over and over again in TFA and TLJ, we see Hux trying to prove that he’s every inch Kylo’s Equal. Even after Snoke’s death, he uses no deference to the new Supreme Leader and repeats his commands so he can believe that the First Order soldiers are following him.

Hux’s scene in TFA where he’s commanding the troops shows Hux at his finest (and most evil); apart from any Jedi/Sith/Force influence, he is himself to a glorious extreme: the Cackling Madman.

THE CACKLING MADMAN

I don’t use this title to say that Hux is insane (though he’s clearly a bit off) but rather to show the difference between a villain like Hux and a villain like Palpatine. Unlike the Force of Nature villain, a Cackling Madman is usually present over the entire story, seen as a person rather than as a shadowy figure, and is allowed to fail and succeed at multiple times during the trajectory of the story, rather than only failing at the very end when the heroes triumph.

In short, Star Wars has never had, in the movie-verse, a Cackling Madman as the main villain. The prequels play at it for about .5 seconds with Senator Palpatine, but he’s still the Force of Nature, ultimately, just pretending to be a Good Guy.

As the sequel trilogy, is, once again, and like any other SW media, an adaptation of the OG trilogy, I was really excited for this shift in formula — it would play on audience expectation that Snoke would just be Palpatine 2.0, only to reveal — with the proper set up, as shown in TFA and TLJ — that the true villain was there all along, just unnoticed for what he was.

THE FACADE OF THE FORCE

So where would the intervention of Palpatine go in this shift from the formula?

Hux as the ultimate Big Bad would know that he would need the support of a powerful force user — or, at least, the appearance of support of a powerful force user.

And, in the Star Wars universe, you could do worse than to claim the support of (in the EU) the eternally clone-happy Emperor. Hux’s only problem is that the Emperor is dead, and thus not really up to supporting a ginger with dreams of Ultimate Power.

So any support would have to be a facade. And how is Star Wars uniquely equipped to handle facades?

We’re talking holograms, baby.

Holograms of a weakened yet still powerful Emperor — maybe missing a hand or something, a few attacks “directed” by the Emperor meeting wild success, manipulation of the Holograms to say Hux’s name and offer support of him as his Preeminent General or whatever, and Hux has the galaxy at his feet.

IMAGINE MY DISAPPOINTMENT (SPOILERS HERE AGAIN)

And then the spoiler pictures of Palpatine came out and — disappointment was prevalent, but I wasn’t surprised.

The big problem with the Sequel Trilogy is that it has one well-plotted plot line — the main plot line with Rey and Kylo/Ben — and then every other plot line is pretty much left up to the whims of the moment. It’s especially evident in Finn’s TLJ plot line, but it’s present to some extent in every other plot line throughout the two movies currently out.

What Hux should be is the danger lurking in plain sight; the villain seen but not understood, and the evil present but not accounted for. That alone would add a dimension to the Sequel Trilogy that it’s lacking right now — and lacking even more with the advent of Palpatine’s return. Not only would it acknowledge its freedom as an adaptation to play with audience expectation, but it would demonstrate something that both it and the Prequel Trilogy lack: trust in its audience.

THE ULTIMATE CONCLUSION

What RoS should be is a movie that delivers something new but still authentic to the Star Wars universe. Ultimately, that’s all it would take to please the majority of its audience, because those who are watching the ST without having seen any other Star Wars media are few and far between. 

The shame is that what RoS will be is a movie that (wrongly) doesn’t trust its audience to consume  nuanced media, and instead tries to placate them with false advertising (trying to give off the air that RoS will be a trio movie with Finn, Rey, and Poe when everyone knows it won’t be) and with the return of old characters and the descendants of old characters. It’s like adding blue flashing lights to an old snow globe and declaring that you’re recaptured lightning in a bottle.

[kalinara]

So I was having thoughts about a possible Kylo Ren redemption arc again, and why the idea really doesn’t work for me.

Now really, I don’t think it’s going to happen anyway.  I think the Last Jedi basically put the kibosh on that concept when it dismantled every bit of Kylo Ren apologia that his fans have ever uttered.  But let’s be honest, sometimes creators make very bad decisions.  So I suppose it’s still possible.

There’s no way that it can be remotely satisfying though.

The thing about a redemption arc that I think a lot of people miss is that a redemption arc serves a point in the overall story.  It’s not just about the character in question.  In a way, it’s not even about that character at all, it’s about the role that character plays in the central narrative.

There are main characters and there are side characters, there are allies and there are villains.  And ultimately, everything that happens happens to serve the main character(s) story.

Now it is true that some villains are main characters of their stories.  Daenerys Targaryen is a good example of this.  We followed Daenerys basically from her origin.  We saw her grow and change, we saw her defeat and her triumph.  We saw her do some amazingly good things and some horribly monstrous ones.  The seeds of her fate were planted early on, but there were also plenty of indications that she could go another way.  Her fall was tragic (if maybe not the best executed) and we were with her every step of the way.

Kylo Ren is no Daenerys Targaryen and he has never been a protagonist.  He’s no Daenerys Targaryen.  He’s not even a Tony Soprano or a Walter White.  By the time we’re introduced to him, he’s already a monster.  He’s already ordering the deaths of an entire village.  He’s in the process of murdering an unarmed man.  And he’s in the process of hunting one of our protagonists, while another is an enslaved follower.

Each one of Kylo Ren’s appearances in both movies serve to push the actual main characters forward.  His massacre causes Finn to rebel.  His torture of Poe leads to their alliance and escape.  His kidnapping of Rey causes her to learn to defend herself instinctively with the force.  His murder of Han fills our heroes with motivating grief and rage.  Even in the Last Jedi, while we have lip service to Kylo Ren’s angst and possible redemption, what we really end up with is a plot that shows Rey her own vulnerability and arrogance.  He exists, basically, so she can be wrong about him.  So that she can be betrayed and return to her people a wiser person.

He is not a protagonist.  He’s not a main character.  He’s a villain to be defeated.  He’s an obstacle to be thwarted.  He exists for their stories.

Darth Vader comes up a lot in these discussions.  Because of course, Darth Vader is the one who was redeemed.  There are a lot of discussions about whether or not Kylo is “better” or “worse” than Vader, when we’re talking about his potential redemption.  And I think that’s a bit of a trap.  It doesn’t really matter if Vader was better or worse than Kylo, because Vader’s redemption was never really about Darth Vader.  it was about Luke Skywalker.

Luke Skywalker started the Original Trilogy with a very clear (wrong) idea about who his father was.  (A pilot, war hero.)  And soon he had very clear ideas about what a Jedi Knight was.  He knew that Darth Vader was the man who killed his father.  He knew what he had to do.  He blew up the Death Star and saved the galaxy.  He went to the ends of the universe on the whim of a ghost to badger his way into training.  He fought the most powerful Force User ever, surprisingly effectively for someone with a few days to a few weeks of training.  But then he was blindsided by the truth.

Luke Skywalker in Return of the Jedi is a very very different man than Luke Skywalker in A New Hope.  He’s older, wiser, sadder and more scarred.  And even though Yoda and Obi-Wan have both told him that he has to defeat his enemy, he knows that as a Jedi, he has to do more than that.  He has to be more than that.  At the pivotal point, he throws away his saber.  He reaches his father.  His faith and love is rewarded.

That’s LUKE’s triumph.  That’s LUKE’s story.  It’s Vader’s too, sure, but it’s important for what it means to Luke.

Rey isn’t Luke.  If anything, she’s in the opposite position.  She grew up with a very different idea of the Jedi.  She knew the myth of Luke Skywalker and she knew that he saved Darth Vader.  And when he rejected her as a student, she decided that she had to prove herself by repeating his act.  She was going to save Kylo Ren.

That was her Cloud City error.  That was her equivalent of Luke trying to kill Vader.  She didn’t want to save Kylo because he was family.  She didn’t want to save Kylo because she loved him.  She didn’t KNOW him yet.  He was the man who tortured her.  She was mislead (by Snoke) into thinking there was something she could reach.  And she really wanted to prove Luke wrong.  It was ego, and she got hit hard for it when he betrayed her all over again.

Like Luke, Rey was wrong.  Like Luke, Rey was injured by it.  And like Luke, she’s going to come out of it as a wiser person.  

If Kylo Ren does have a redemption arc, that would negate all of Rey’s development in the Last Jedi.  Rey was a character for whom everything Force related came easily, too easily by a lot of fan complaints, but that’s why her arc in TLJ was so important.  She had to be wrong.  She had to learn humility.  If she were then proven to be right after all, then she’s got no reason to be a wiser person.

So Rey doesn’t benefit from Kylo Ren’s redemption.  Who might?

Leia doesn’t.  She had a similar story beat in the Force Awakens. She wanted Han to save her son.  He tried and Kylo skewered him.  In the Last Jedi, she’s sadder and wiser and when Luke tells her that he will have to fight Kylo and kill him, she accepts that.  I’m sure she would be overjoyed to see a Kylo Ren reject the Dark Side, but that’s not the same as an ending to her story.  It’s not something that she fought for or earned.  (Perhaps things might have been different if she could have a bigger role in Rise of the Skywalker.  But unfortunately, her story is fundamentally done.)

It doesn’t benefit Finn or Poe either.  Both of them have suffered at the hands of Kylo Ren.  And it would make some sense to have a storyline where they have to move past their anger and hate of him.  Except, well, that’s not something that the movies have cared to address.  When the Last Jedi sidelined both characters, it neatly moved them into plots that had nothing to do with Kylo Ren.  Poe is learning to lead (execution of said plot notwithstanding), Finn is coming to terms with his past.  Kylo’s irrelevant to the first, and just one face out of many abusers for the second.  (It’s more likely that his direct adversary will be Hux, who advocated for the Stormtrooper program that his father started, who hit him and subjugated him directly in TLJ.  It’s a much more personal tie than Kylo.)  They’d need a whole other movie to establish Kylo’s redemption as being significant in some way to either man.

Han’s story doesn’t benefit.  There are those who will claim that he “died for nothing if Kylo isn’t redeemed”.  But narratively speaking, he didn’t “die for nothing”.  He died to show us that Kylo wasn’t Anakin, and that Kylo wasn’t going to choose his grandfather’s fate.

And honestly, even Kylo Ren’s story doesn’t benefit from a redemption arc.  On a narrative level, how would that even work.  “Okay, so, I know Kylo has been offered redemption at least three times now and he responded by murdering Lor San Tekka, Han Solo, and trying to murder Rey.  The Prequels took the pre-established ending of Return of the Jedi and built a story for Anakin around it.  We learned that fundamentally, love and family were at the core of Anakin’s motivation.  He fell because of love and he let himself be saved because of love.

But Kylo Ren is OFFERED that kind of love.  Han Solo, weeping and unarmed, reaches out to his son only to be skewered.  He REJECTS that love.  Familial love is not enough.

Rey, a woman that he’s clearly attracted to, makes the same offer.  No strings attached.  No familial baggage to be an excuse.  She reaches out to him, just like every single Reylo-is-canon sort insisted that she should do.  And he REJECTS her too.  Romantic love is not enough.

There are a lot of debates about whether or not Snoke was abusive, and to what extent he may have influenced Kylo.  And certainly the idea of Kylo teaming up with Rey and company to defeat his abuser is an attractive one to a lot of people.  Except, well, that actually happens.  He and Rey DID team up.  They DID kill Snoke.  And Kylo Ren ordered his army to stand down, killed Hux when he tried to stop him, and went home peacefully.  Wait no, sorry, he took command and doubled down his efforts to murder every last member of the Resistance.

So that means for a redemption arc to work, the writers will have to give us something that is more important to Kylo than family, romantic love, or being free from an abuser to finally reach him and move him off of the path he’s on.  Murdering innocent people wasn’t enough, enslaving millions of children wasn’t enough, destroying FIVE PLANETS wasn’t enough.

This isn’t even an Adalind from Grimm sort of situation where her self interest can be used to justify hanging around with the good guys enough to appreciate that they, unlike her previous allies, won’t hang her out to dry.  Kylo Ren has literally nothing to plausibly make him want to be a better person.

I can’t say whether Lucasfilms will try to pull off a Kylo Ren redemption arc in the eleventh hour, but I can say that they shouldn’t.