#and we can argue about monarchies in real life

[lastoneout]

Like every time Luffy's on an island there's a 70% chance he's going to overthrow the local government before he leaves but yeah sure he'd totally love and support the police.

[lushaletta]

miss potions expert (two) / theodore nott x reader

pairing: theodore nott x fem!reader

warnings: swearing, mischievous!reader, theo being annoying

summary: the slytherin boys require your potions expertise once again, and they find themselves intrigued. most especially a certain theodore nott.

a/n: part two to thisssss! hope u guys like :p

read part one here!

⋆ ࣪.  ⁺⑅ ⋰˚ *.ﾟ .˳⁺⁎˚ ˚⁎⁺˳ . ༺ ˖࣪ ˖࣪ ∗

You don’t expect to see them again so soon.

But Slytherins are as unpredictable as they are arrogant, and you feel their presence hovering at the back of the library like vultures. You know their eyes are on you before you even look up. You don’t need to. Your sixth sense is never wrong.

Theodore approaches first, because of course he does. The others hang back, gossiping as if this is some event.

“You fucked up the potion,” he says flatly, glancing at Lorenzo, who’s making obnoxious kissing sounds, with that unmistakable glare.

“Did I?” You blink, innocently.

“You know you did.”

You shake off the façade. “Maybe, but I fixed it first. That’s what you call balance,” you click your tongue, grinning. “You’re welcome, by the way. Again.”

Theo opens his mouth like he’s about to argue, but Enzo steps forward, smoothly cutting in first. “Listen, we need help. Real help.”

Now that piques your interest. Theo’s arms are crossed, tapping his feet impatiently like this is the last thing he wants to be doing. “Oh, princes asking help from a peasant, huh? This is a first.”

“If you’re the peasant, then I’m seriously rethinking the monarchy,” Enzo quips, not missing a beat as he sizes you up. It earns him a low whistle from Mattheo behind him and a glare from Theo. You try not to smirk. He’s quick. You like that.

“We need another Confusing Draught. A working one. Snape’s threatening to get us banned from Quidditch if we don’t get it to him,” Enzo continues, his smug grin making way for puppy dog eyes. He’s good at it, you’ll give him that.

“And we’re not about to let that happen,” Theo says, begrudgingly.

You sigh dramatically, shutting your book as you lean against the chair lazily. “Fine, but I have conditions.”

“Of course you do,” Theo mutters lowly.

“One: I’m in charge. Two: I pick the meeting place,” you start, rattling them off. You lean in, lips brushing Theo’s ear. “Three: You owe me.” Your last condition is said with so much mischief it sends chills running down his spine as the boys watch intently.

Your smile is wicked. “Deal!” Lorenzo says easily, before Theo can protest.

“Great! Third floor, second door to the right tomorrow at noon.”

Mattheo frowns. “But that place is forbidden.”

“Exactly,” you wink.

And then you’re gone, leaving everyone bewildered and bested, the only trace of you being the flush on Theo’s cheeks.

Enzo hardly registers you disappear behind the shelves, a grin tugging at the corner of his mouth. “I’m scared of her.”

Theo exhales slowly, eyes still on the space you just occupied. “Good,” he breathes.

Mattheo claps him on the shoulder, chuckling. “You are so screwed, mate.”

You’re already waiting when they arrive, once again leaning against the stone wall like it’s yours, wand spinning lazily between your fingers. You don’t even glance up as they come around the corner.

Theo steps in first, expression taut and unreadable. As always. Lorenzo trails behind, his hands in his pockets, followed by the rest. You grin at their entrance.

“Took you long enough,” you say, flicking your wand to shut the door behind them with a soft click. “Hope no one saw you.”

“We had to bribe Peeves. Kept singing songs about Enzo’s love life. Git cost me ten pounds,” Mattheo says exasperatedly, dusting cobwebs off his sleeve.

You snicker. “What’s he gonna do with ten pounds?”

“Worth it!” Lorenzo says, looking around the dusty classroom. Or what used to be a classroom. “What’s all this?”

He struts across the room, grazing his hands over the lovingly dented cauldron and the worn desk. Blaise follows, narrowing his eyes at what seems to be just another day to you. “Done this before?” he asks.

“Here and there,” you say vaguely, preparing the ingredients.

“Are you gonna teach us something or what?” Theo mumbles impatiently, crossing his arms.

“Touchy,” you say. And then, more quietly, “As if you have places to be.” You know Theo hears that, because he rolls his eyes and steps forward to be closer to the desk.

The potion begins with reluctant cooperation. Mattheo does what he can, being mildly helpful along with Blaise and Draco bar for when he almost sets his sleeve on fire. Enzo proves annoyingly competent, following you around like a lost puppy, awaiting your direction. Theo… watches. A lot. Not just the potion, but you. Your hands, your frown when Mattheo adds too much scurvy grass, the tiny upturn of your lips when Enzo actually stirs at the correct speed.

You notice, of course. And you let him.

“You’re not going to help?” you ask him finally, once you feel he’s stolen enough glances. “You can wash your hands, you know,” you say, acting like you’re mistaking him for being posh.

“I’m observing.”

You hum, a high sound that all but knocks the wind out of his chest. “Right. Observing,” you say with too much emphasis. “That’s what we’re calling it.

Draco and Enzo exchange funny looks and Mattheo ribs Blaise. Theo goes quiet, like he isn’t already. He mutters something about checking the book, but he doesn’t stop staring.

Once the potion is an acceptable shade of emerald green, you hop up, loosening your tie with a smile. “Congratulations! A passable Confusing Draught. I’m shocked. Truly,” you deadpan.

“Are you going to sabotage it again?” Theo says incredulously.

You peer into the cauldron. “Tempting.” You smile.

“You owe us a working one.”

“And you owe me,” you counter, stepping closer. It makes his breath hitch.

“I know,” he whispers, forgetting the room around him. Enzo clears his throat before Theo can respond and tosses something your way— a wrapped box. Small, square, and suspiciously rattling.

“Fret not, Miss Potions Expert. We held up our end of the bargain.”

You raise a brow and unwrap it slowly. Inside was a vial holder, adorned with a small bottle of familiarly orange substance. Felix Felicis, you realise, scoffing at the thought. Then you see the note.

“For your next adventure,” it reads, written in expensive cursive.

Your smile falters for a second. Then you recover.

“Sentimental,” you say, slipping the vial into your pocket. “Dangerous. I like it.”

Theo finally speaks. “You never gave me your name.”

You flash him another grin. “That still depends.”

“On?”

“The same old thing— whether you’re going to thank me or not.”

He inhales. Takes a step forward, almost as if he’s challenging you. “Thank you,” he whispers, like it costs him something.

You freeze. Then you smirk. “Well, damn. Now I actually have to tell you.”

[gengor]

I think my most unpopular takes among people who have a more sympathetic view on Edelgard, but enjoy the blue lions characters, is that I don’t think it’s very likely any of them would defect.

While it might be in some of their best interest to defy the kingdom, the blue lions were specifically written as the characters who are inclined to uphold the system.

I just think that a person who chooses to serve an institution that they know is flawed or is actively hurting them is a very real type of person, and is, in fact, the average person irl. I think I’m gonna start doing breakdowns of all the blue lions one by one to explain what I mean by this. I’m gonna go ahead and start with one of my favorite examples— Ingrid.

Part 1: chivalry

“Knights, I suppose. I do what I can to live like one. And I hope to die like one too…when the time comes.” - one of Ingrid’s expedition quotes

Chivalry and Knighthood are very important themes to the azure moon route. And their politics are woven into the fabric of the monarchy. It’s no mistake that Felix is to Dimitri what Ferdinand is to Edelgard, and Lorenz is to Claude.

But while Felix serves as the oppositional character to chivalry, Ingrid foils this by being an embodiment of it.

Ingrid is a character who is hurt by the system as a woman whose family values her solely for her ability to have a richer man’s child. She understands that her life is made worse by her place as a woman, and although she wants to break free of that, she can’t envision anything that isn’t just subjugating herself to a different set of rules. Ingrid strives to be disposable in a male gender role rather than a female one.

She reveres knighthood and the code of honor in death—which is often propped up as an ideal for non royal men. So while her endings where she conforms to gendered expectations are tragic, I would argue that any ending that sees her knighted is also far from a feminist tale.

And I think what a lot of people miss about this aspiration of hers is how glued it is to her grief for Glenn and the subsequent romanticization of Dimitri.

Ingrid is one of the few characters who cannot engage with criticism of Dimitri’s excessive violence. If you seek her during the exploration time within the heights of Dimitri’s recklessness she will never once acknowledge the sinking ship they are all on. For many characters, it’s common that they only retroactively acknowledge Dimitri’s instability after he apologizes and says he wants to do better. Most of the army will give you some sort of acknowledgment that Dimitri hasn’t been a perfect leader during the “kings triumphant return” chapter.

Yet Ingrid never does.

And while she does argue with Dimitri within their supports, it is only because Dimitri expresses discomfort at the rationale that places him on this pedestal to begin with. It is the only thing he can say that she cannot affirm. And toward the end of the support chain, she’s rationalized his aversion to knight codes to fit a more digestible narrative for herself. If Glenn’s death for Dimitri was the gold standard, then it means Dimitri has to be the perfect heir worth protecting with her life. She *has* to figure out how his disagreements with her can fit neatly into the narrative of Glenn’s heroic death. If she doesn’t do this, she would be forced to grapple with the possibility that someone she cared for died tragically without meaning.

I would argue Ingrid is an unreliable narrator to herself here when she claims she has moved on. If her requirements to process death involve retroactively deeming death to be good, then she is still rationalizing a random tragedy.

And this is something we see her do in her last support with Felix. I think there’s a subtle kind of horror in the conclusion of her Felix supports. She could be very well justified in lashing out at him over his repeated misogyny, but what she sees as the most important issue to correct is his aversion to chivalry.

She positions herself in a way that’s hard to combat because she is simultaneously arguing that she is *not* falling in line with any propaganda while also pushing the idea that Glenn died honorably in a way that’s worth imitating. Instead of framing this as a lesson in obedience to authority, she gives more a ‘friendship is magic’ vibe.

But the thing is, Glenn likely *was* influenced by the culture surrounding chivalry. The only characterization we have of him is that he adhered deeply to the ideals of chivalry (Dimitri claims Glenn and she are ‘very alike’ in that regard and Felix tells us that Glenn used to read him knight tales) Glenn was also child soldier, specified to have been around 15 at the time of his death. The man who raised Glenn will also state outright that he would have held his son responsible had he survived.

And it doesn’t appear to just be an isolated instance with Ingrid and Rodrigue. This kind of rhetoric is very common in the kingdom, popping up within npcs as well.

All that’s to say that Ingrid’s desire to become a knight is steeped in her baggage surrounding Glenn and cannot be copy pasted to another country so easily without breaking her character.

Being a knight under a different banner wouldn’t be the same because Ingrid doesn’t want to do many of the questionable things military personal are ordered to do on a regular basis, in fact she has an active aversion to it.

But she views her inclinations to disobey Faerghus authority as the wrong choice, a weakness she ought to instruct out of herself in order to be an ideal knight.

Part 2: Gender

So I see a some criticisms leveled at Ingrid’s character in relation to Glenn that I want to acknowledge.

I think it’s very fair to criticize the idea that she is defined through her grief for a boy she was in an arranged engagement to. I can see why some would write off her character as being just another misogynistic portrayal of a woman and move on.

But I think what saves this plot line (to me) is the implication that she idealized Glenn as someone she wanted to *be* more than marry. I really appreciate that when asked directly about whether she would have married him, she implied that she wouldn’t have.

I think there’s something to be said about the interpretation that Ingrid is an incredibly repressed sapphic or possible aromantic.

The only man she expresses romantic interest in is Dimitri, which is likely an extension of her reverence for him as a royal ideal, more so than it is a genuine interest in him. To me, her expressed interest in him undermines her claim that she has let go of her past idealization of being his knight. She is still prioritizing him first and foremost before herself, which is the heart of the issue.

I think Ingrid as a person is just very susceptible to the idea that she should fulfill some kind of established roll within the existing system instead of breaking free from all of it. This is why she only sees her life as only having two paths forward— knighthood or motherhood.

And even within the latter, which is more widely understood to be regressive, Ingrid will still make excuses for the people who attempt to reduce her to her ability to bear a nobleman’s child.

There’s a lot to be said about her hesitation to condemn her father for putting her within an arranged marriage. And within Houses, I think her Byleth supports, combined with her paralogue, communicate this well. But I think the most blunt example of this can be found in her Mercedes Hope's support

In response to Mercedes asserting that Ingrid’s family loved her unconditionally Ingrid says, “I wouldn’t go that far.”

I think it’s important to assume Ingrid’s perspective on her family is the most reliable account of them. If she says they didn’t love her. They didn’t love her.

She is a woman enduring objectification at the hands of her father. And even if she herself hesitates to name it as abuse that is textually what this was. Mercedes is projecting her own love for her brother onto these men who she has never met before.

Yet even still, her conclusions within many support chains end with her reaffirming a gendered status quo on herself. The same is true of support chains that end in her performing an expectation of femininity.

Part 3: Xenophobia/Racism

So I think Ingrid's racism is not an isolated, uncomfortable trait of hers. It is an extension of her patriotism.

When Glenn died, racism was just one of the multiple propaganda pieces that Ingrid fed herself to create a more digestible narrative.

Within her Dedue supports Ingrid seems to be grappling with the possibility that she was wrong to buy into this narrative. I think it's notable that the only thing that pushes her to reconsider her bigotry against Dedue is that he shares an unhealthy reverence for Dimitri. And within this flawed start-up, she is still expecting a victim to engage with her in an open discussion on whether or not he is a person.

Ingrid seeks to hold him somewhat responsible for not educating her on racism enough. And yeah, I don't have a lot to say on this, it just sucks.

I don't think Ingrid ever fully moves past this bigotry, which is in part due to the creators not actually knowing what an anti racist narrative would look like.

I've said this before, but it's worth stating here too.

Ingrid is far from the only racist person in Fe3h. Most of the narratives around racism end up with the characters reaffirming racism.

But within Ingrid's case, I think it makes narrative sense that she would still show signs of bigotry. Because within all aspects of her life, she doesn't escape the system.

And I know that within her gender, this is the writers themselves doing misogyny. I don't think they intended Ingrid's arc to be a tragic one. And I wouldn't fault anyone for disregarding the narrative value of this on the basis that it's not meant to be tragic. I've personally just come to love the blue lions as accidental tragedies because, regardless of intent, it just feels real. I think Ingrid is one of the few that I could see potentially realizing the flaw in her thinking someday, but it does her writing a disservice to imply that this could be a quick and seamless transition for her.

[wordsandrobots]

What are your thoughts on the relationship between Mineva and Haman and whether or not Haman cared for her beyond being a political puppet? SRW V put forth the idea that Haman may have had some genuine care for her and leaves Mineva with a lot of conflicting feelings on who was essentially family to her

Hmm.

So I was struck when I was rewatching Zeta episodes for the analysis of Haman that one of the first things she says about Mineva that isn't official-speak is calling the seven year old puppet-queen a coward.

I don't think there's any question that Zeta shows Mineva holding affection for Haman. It's very clear she is by far the most trusted figure in her life. But we are also told, almost immediately, that Haman has little sympathy for her over what is a fairly natural response to violence breaking out among the adults surrounding her. Later, Mineva says that Char understands her better than anyone else, which is interesting and ironic, but also points to her dependence on Haman having its limits.

Nevertheless, Mineva goes out of her way to defy Haman's instructions in order to return to the battlefield and share a warning when things spiral out of control. And Haman is surprised, evidently not for the first time, by the child's perceptiveness. So their relationship is not as simple as Mineva dancing to a tune set by her guardian. She has her own will and desires, and if those are a problem for Haman, there's no sense that she is overly restrictive of Mineva beyond what would be expected of the girl's position (etiquette, public relations, towing the party line - honestly, Char's reaction is at once valid and wildly naive).

Indeed, I think it's important to bear in mind that Haman's style of leadership is just generally quite publicly pleasant to those around her. I don't mean she never raises her voice or gets sharp, but rather that she has a very firm, very level, very confident persona that doesn't ever descend into you have failed me for the last time type excesses. She might brainwash and manipulate people on her side, but she doesn't get directly abusive to their faces (unless they prove themselves her enemy, at which point all bets are off). One of the reasons the break in Dakar works so well is because Judau scares her enough to drop the act and barrel furiously through her guards.

It's not really a surprise, in context, that Haman would be relatively kind to Mineva. That's the smart choice, especially since it is vitally important she control someone who, though young, outranks her. Mineva can simply decide to go off with a bunch of random kids, or move around on her own, or send Haman a bowl of (presumably expensive) fresh fruit as a gift, and there's not a lot anyone can do to contradict her. If there were, the entire underpinning of Neo Zeon society would collapse. You don't get to argue with the monarchy.

Under these conditions, it's also not a surprise Haman would swap the real Mineva out for a more pliable double when she needs to start making big moves (checking the Wiki, it asserts that Char took her away after the Gyps incident, but I don't think that's necessarily the implication from the end of ZZ - certainly it's never stated outright why Haman replaces her and the double must have been prepared ahead of time). We really have extremely little material where the real Mineva is interacting with Haman. Everything in Gundam ZZ has to be assumed to be the double, who we know doesn't believe Haman cares about her. We can additionally assume Haman preserving the double's safety is about maintaining the illusion, because if she doesn't, her authority is in jeopardy. She's already got Glemy true-Scotsmanning his way into a Zeon schism; she can't afford to lose her status as regent because it looks like she lost the queen.

So where does that leave Haman's feelings towards the real Mineva?

In my opinion, we're given too many reasons to read Haman's actions as cynical to attribute any of them to genuine affection. Haman is defined by her loneliness and there's nothing in their interactions to suggest Mineva does anything to ease that. I don't see how she could, given she is so thoroughly embedded in the structure Haman is subverting. Mineva is a figure, first and foremost, her actual personality and feelings secondary to her status as the thing to be controlled in order to achieve a certain result.

I think Hamann is presented as showing genuine care for Mineva, but the implied motivations are always self-serving and based on what would make life easiest. Quite often, the best means of getting what you want is to be nice about it.

And that would surely still leave Mineva with a lot of complicated feelings to work through. Heck, one of the things I would genuinely love to see as a UC spin-off (even though I think the franchise is massively over-saturated with tUC spin-offs) would be a follow-up focused on Mineva and her double getting to have a conversation about Haman. We never found out what happened to that other girl and it feels like a big missed opportunity.

Anyway, those are all the thoughts I currently have. Thanks for the ask!

[ganondoodle]

so, doing this as an extra post bc i dont want to spam op nor invite more disaster into their post (sorry)

(i get annoyed, i get frustrated, but i rarely get pissed off, so if this sounds aggressive to you, it is; i have had enough of arguing with people -even if most of that arguing has happened on twitter-)

someone had replied (and later apparently deleted) something along the lines of "well zelda wanted to restore hyrule at the end of botw and what is so bad about ganondorf always being the bad guy in the way that he is?"

so first off, while i know hyrule and KINGDOM of hyrule is often used as an equally interchangeable word to refer to the world there, i dont think she meant the kingdom or its or its monarchy when she said that (does she? i dont have the end in my head rn and pretty sure its a lil different than english anyway) and much more the LAND of hyrule, its still in shambles even if people have found ways to live with it- that is an interpretation of me mostly, you can think what you want in that regard idc

secondly .... im not gonna get into that rant bc you cannot be seriosuly asking what is bad about how ganondorf is presented, treated in the games (espeically in totk) and his role and "writing" (oh geez i dont know maybe all the racism and stereotypes?? also, frankly boring ass writing, if your villain can be replaced by a cloud of toxic goo incapable of speech and nothing would change except saving money for voice actors that dont fit the role that is not a great look- hes never gotten much but totk is a new low)

then theres this reply

astro-shark3113 replied: "You're kidding right? If she cared about reinstating the monarchy then why is the castle still in disrepair after five years? Why does she become a teacher and live in a cottage with her boyfriend instead of taking on duties as princess? She clearly wants to help people and be a leader but she can do that without wanting to be a Queen. Please be real"

i am not kidding and i AM being real, i think you need to look at the game without your rose tinted glasses for a second; the castle is still in ruin? what the hell do you expect, theres no soldiers and very few servants left, repairing anything is quite impossible in that time and frankly not a priority (not proof of her not caring lol) also there is a plan for it at the very least given the camps with the hyrule crest all over it in the ruins of castle town- we dont SEE her as a teacher, or living a "normal" life, that happens in between the game, its flavor text, what HAPPENS in the game is her being taught a lessson on who she needs to be and what hyrule needs to be (pretty in your face too, she gets sent to paradise past of the "first" king that is some supposedly godly thing from the HEAVENS and watches him and his queen die at the hands of the eviiil guy, the last scene in the game mimics perfectly the scene where everyone that god king got under his rule swears undying loyalty to her ffs); she does live in that house, but what other option is there, set up camp in the collapsing throne room all alone?? nigh everyone from that time is long dead and the only one she actually knows is link who happens to have a house (bc impa doesnt care i guess idk), with her ""boyfriend"" is also interesting, a "boyfriend" that apparently is locked in the basement, lives in the woods or straight up dematerlializes when theres no big bad in need of stabbing bc why the hell does no one fucking know him in hateno??? not even the kids that come to the house EVERY SINGLE DAY?? and taking on duties as a princess, she very much does? just bc she doesnt get physically carried around in a castle doesnt mean she isnt doing royal stuff (also, again, that happens BETWEEN the games, not actually in totk), she still sees herself as the princess, everyone calls her that, she herself calls herself that (if the memorial stones are anything to go by) and everyone listens to the most overtly stupid and nonsensical stuff that zelda puppet says (even her friends follow that order without even asking back???) after over 100 years of there not being a kingdom as such its pretty weird how everyone immediately, even the ones not alive for the calamity event, snaps into blindly following her orders

"she can still lead without being a queen", did we play the same game?? totk? TEARS of the KINGDOM?? (its zeldas tears, she IS the kingdom) that game?? the game couldnt be more directly telling you that its whole point is that royal family holy and good and how much everyone has to sacrifice to uphold the holy kingdom bc its the only thing that keeps evil man from overtaking it!! including turnign herself into a farmable, glorified stone pedestal for the entirety of the actual game and then that sacrifice not meanign shit bc she just gets deus ex machina'd back (i didnt need her to stay a dragon, though it would have been the better choice if she still didnt get an active part in the game i would kill for her to have been a capable companion instead of the stupid ghost sages, and you dont even get to actually do anything for it, it just happens), not even the nuclear pebble is lost, how great! she and everyone else that is a leader of their people has a nuclear pebble now!! they will not let a bad evil man be a threat ever again!! like the point to bring her back in that utterly unsatisfying way is that otherwise the royal line wouldnt exist anymore, its a blessing of her ancient ancestors!! woohooo!!

and the thing is, i LIKE botw zelda, i liked her character, that she wasnt the typically maiden princessy type, her struggle (even if i find the way she unlocked her powers lame), i do NOT like totk zelda, after the intro of the game she is a princessy maiden standing prettily at the side of the god king that rules the only thing keeping evil at bay, the level of how much totk disrespects her makes me mad on her behalf but i have ranted about that alone enough as well

and with this i am DONE talking about this game, i have ranted so much about it, made my points carefully clear over and over, said that i dont have the nerves left to be nice anymore about it given how much shit alone on twitter i had to live through just bc i dared mildly critisizing the damn game, if you comment some snarky "be real" thing again im just gonna go straight to blockign people bc i am done with this

[branwendaughterofllyr]

OMG you’ve seen Elisabeth! I don’t know much about Austro-Hungarian history, but Elisabeth is such a fascinating character! That musical also really suits Alyssa, especially with how you depicted marriage as a tomb in chapter 8. In my country (I’m Asian), back in the day, brides would prepare burial clothes as part of their wedding preparations. It was a way to prepare for the unknown day of their husband’s death, but when I learned that as a kid, I thought, "Marriage really is like death!" It seems Alyssa is thinking something similar to what I did as a child lol To her, marriage is a threat, a compulsion on women, and honestly, considering the Targaryens, she’s not wrong. I don’t really like the Baelon-Alyssa pairing (sorry if you do!), and I think Alyssa barely had any real choices in her life. She was always the property of a Targaryen prince. I hope to see more of this Alyssa someday in A Poison Tree!

Oh gosh, I’m so sorry I took so long to answer this, I’ve had this sitting in my drafts for ages now. I took a bit of a break from both tumblr and my fics, which was nice but I’m back now.

Yeah, I really like both the musical Elisabeth and I think Sissi is an interesting historical figure herself, and I enjoyed Brigitte Hamann biography a lot. I think there’s a lot to the way life for a woman ended in a way when it came to getting married, it’s kind of the end of the line in some ways, and I love the detail from your culture about brides preparing funeral clothes, it’s so final and somewhat ominous? Especially if you ended up married far away before modern communication and transportation, you might be pretty much cut off from your family and prior life. I think Alyssa has picked up, both consciously and subconsciously, on all this, and Targaryen women in particular end up unhappy in marriage, it seems.

(I usually refer to Baelon’s Alyssa as “Alyssa T” for clarity. To distinguish from my Alyssa, haha)

I think partly why Baelon and Alyssa T are so popular is they are easy to romanticize because Alyssa T dies so young. She’s only 24 or so, and she dies before most of the succession crisis kicks off, and before their marriage can truly be tested by time and also family problems that comes with raising kids and being part a feudal monarchy.

Like think about how Jaehaerys and Alysanne might be perceived if Alysanne had died that young. That would be before the Saera scandal, before Daella’s death in childbirth, before Viserra’s death, before Jaehaerys continued to impregnate Alysanne into middle age against her wishes (and citing their mother who died in childbirth in her forties!!!! As a reason to keep doing it!!). They had a very intense romance when they were young, and it likely would still be intact as the great Targaryen Romance if Alysanne had died before all their later troubles. I would even argue that Alysanne and Jaehaerys are much romantic than Alyssa T and Baelon, considering their tragic childhood and later elopement against the wishes of pretty much everyone. (I think that Jaehaerys and Alysanne were intensely trauma bonded as children, considering that they were left all alone with their mother for years on Dragonstone and then in exile while Rhaena and Viserys 0.5 were both else where and then later dead, and their romance sprang from this intense bond, as it was the only way they knew how to conceptualize it with the normalization of incest in their family and there was the threat of separation by marriage hanging over them). Alyssa and Baelon are kind of thrown together because they are close as children, and really groomed to be in love. And then Alyssa dies before any of the major issues of JaeJae’s late reign really appear. We have no idea if she would have supported Baelon or Rhaenys as heir, if she would have supported her husband or gone against him, how she would have handled Viserys and Daemon’s marriages, how she would have dealt with Aemma or Rhea. And who’s to say if she would have supported Rhaenyra as heir, she very well may have supported Daemon as heir and built a faction for him at court. How would she have handled exhaustion from back to back pregnancies over two decades, the death of a child, or even menopause? She dies so young, it easy to chalk their marriage up as a happy and romantic one without any major problems because none have had time to appear. Alysanne and Jaehaerys were happy once too.

And this isn’t even getting into the bare glimpses of Alyssa T and Baelon’s personalities, which are pretty mixed in my opinion. I’m really not a fan of how both of them treated Vaegon, after Jaehaerys ordered Baelon to make him into a proper man, which Baelon did and even used Alyssa to shame Vaegon for not being masculine enough by having his sister come and mock him for not putting up a fight against her.

I’ll actually say that I’ve got a Baelon flashback planned for the next chapter that I’ve had in mind for ages that’s inspired heavily by this very incident with Vaegon. Baelon seems to have very much been his father’s enforcer, which doesn’t exactly endear him to me, and both of his canonical surviving children were pretty dysfunctional, which suggests some issues there, grieving widower or not. (And at some point, I think I will have my Alyssa reflect on the life of Alyssa T, as their lives take more and more similar trajectories with their marriages to second sons, but I don’t have anything concrete thoughts there.)

[lepeletier]

How was your life after the return of the Bourbons?

Ah… Those were times filled with both joyful and deeply violent, tragic memories — some of which still ache in my heart.

I played the hypochondriac (or at least exaggerated the effects of my very real illness) to make it seem like I had mellowed (a tactic I occasionally use against my enemies to buy time and devise better strategies), spending a bit of time with my daughter when the Bourbons returned.

Sensing an opportunity, I resumed action — as mayor and president of the canton of Bacqueville, I began stirring up incidents against the monarchy. I made several trips back to Paris to better organize the Republican opposition.

Unfortunately, my deputy, Panié held a celebration in honor of the monarchy, flaunting the white flag, candles, and blessed bread. I made it clear that next time, he should fund that little show out of his own pocket. Unsurprisingly, the courts ruled against me, just as I expected.

I gave speeches refusing to recognize Louis XVIII’s laws, arguing that the people had never been consulted. And just to irritate the authorities who accepted Louis XVIII, I walked around openly wearing a red sash around my waist — and no white cockade. To further express my rejection of the monarchy, I resigned from office — and, I admit, partly to annoy and humiliate my enemies who had been scheming to have me dismissed. They had spent a great deal of time writing reports against me — all for nothing once I resigned of my own accord.

During the Hundred Days, I faced a true political dilemma — one that cost me, for the first time, a rupture with my lifelong friend and comrade, Antonelle. It was painful, but I would do it again. He believed — wrongly — that we should support Louis XVIII under strict political conditions, probably driven by his hatred for Bonaparte. I understand that hatred — I share it. That man did terrible harm to us and to our friends, he even put to death some of them. But aligning with the Bourbons was a grave mistake. They would erase everything we had fought for without feeling bound to give anything in return. Bonaparte, during that brief moment, would have been forced to listen.

So I sided with my old enemy, Napoleon, knowing that, like many of my fellow citizens, I had to bury the grievances I held against him — in order to resist both foreign domination and the monarchy. I returned to Paris and was elected to the Chamber of Representatives. Alongside my adopted son Émile Babeuf and my loyal companion Toulotte, we chose to work with Lazare Carnot, whose reputation we knew well.

I can tell you — it truly warmed my heart to see Carnot again after all those years. Despite some political disagreements we had in public, I always admired the man in private — and he felt the same way about me.

Carnot appointed me Commissioner for the department of Seine-Inférieure.

But once again, the monarchy returned — briefly — along with foreign occupation. I was arrested, detained, and, shortly after being released, nearly killed by furious royalist fanatics. It was a time when a patriot could be murdered just for crossing the wrong crowd. Even Antonelle — despite siding with Louis XVIII — narrowly escaped death.

And so, for the umpteenth time, I was exiled. It was brutal and violent. I'd endured this before, but this time, none of my contacts could help. Carnot had helped me during the Directory. Saint-Jean d’Angely helped me too during my clashes with Bonaparte. But now, I had no one. Many of us were banished — including Carnot, Prieur de la Marne, and others.

I felt that I had failed my promise to Gracchus Babeuf — to protect his sons. Caius had been killed in 1814 by foreign armies , and Camille had taken his own life in 1815. I had to leave behind my adopted son Émile, who narrowly escaped deportation, and my dear friend Marie-Anne Babeuf, all alone. Learning that several of our comrades had been murdered by royalists — it was crushing.

In exile, I went first to Belgium like many of my fellow outlaws, but peace eluded me even there. So I moved to Germany. In hindsight, maybe I should’ve gone to Warsaw to see Carnot again, for old times’ sake — but the journey would’ve been too complicated.

Either way, my mind was already set on preparing for my return. As I said, I’ve escaped worse.

I focused on planning how I would — once back in France — continue to harass the Bourbons and push them out. And indeed, I was amnestied in 1819. Upon my return, I reconnected with my old friend Buonarroti, and we began weaving ties with the Charbonnerie (the Carbonari). We knew we couldn’t bring down those kings immediately — the ones who brought us so much misery. It would take time.

I deeply regret that Carnot died in exile — I would have gladly included him in our plans. One other thing we regret: Lafayette joined the Charbonnerie. What an unbearable man! Just as insufferable as he was in 1789, when I had the displeasure of dealing with him.

Buonarroti made the painful but correct decision to place limited trust in Émile — despite the deep affection we felt for him. He would never have betrayed us, but politically, he had become less reliable. Maybe that was for the best, given all the trauma he had endured.

So, we returned to our old ways — working in secrecy, as in the good old days — while some among us started writing their memoirs like Buonarroti .

Of course, the path was hard. But that idiot Charles X made the revolution easier by one foolish decision after another. The day I heard crowds shouting, “Long live the Charter! Down with the ministers!”, I knew we had won. Unfortunately, once again, it came at the cost of many lives among the people who rose up—just as they had on July 14, 1789, and August 10, 1792.

As usual, Charles X proved his idiocy by believing he could abdicate in favor of the Duke of Bordeaux. Truly, just when you think it’s impossible for him to surprise us with new depths of stupidity, he still manages to outdo himself.

Sadly, it still wasn’t the Republic. So, I quickly returned to my good old republican habits — this time, against the Orléans regime. As I said: routine for us revolutionaries. But that’s part of our charm, isn’t it?

[thecoiledserpent]

thank you for your answer and I appreciate it. BUT, if we are talking about stripping someone of their life . Then we should not be only be concern about animals but plant too. They are also a living being . They too breathe . They do sense their environment . If you have some psychic gifts you can talk to them, dance with them . We feel good around plants. So are we not stripping of their life. When we eat them. So if Geeta did not said that eating plants is considered bad karma then we can eat . Sorry I did not have knowledge about Geeta .

Look where there is so much cold. To keep themselves warm they eat fish. I know there are vegan choices but they are expensive.

And what about insects , mosquitoes, flies are we not causing them harm by killing them.

If karma is real then it should be on expensive brand . They are using animals for their pure selfish reason. The leathers, fur, silk , cashmer, making bags out of lizard skin, crocodile and snake.

During monarchy, king hunts to show their power and status. GOD should punish these people who are using living beings for their obnoxious reason saying it is luxury.and not those people who are eating for their health. I know I am not someone who should be arguing to hindu religion. I AM SORRY.

about the cold regions: yeah, that's what i said too, they can't afford anything else so it's not considered for them just as animals don't take on negative karma for killing prey.

yup, i mentioned on that post: animals, plants, insects, aves, everything is god's creation and are thus equal. plants are not to be cut, and we do take on bad karma by killing or cutting them. in fact, (i can't remember where) it is stated that killing a peepal, banyan, bel patra trees, etc is equivalent to harming a thousand people and is a sin which is never pardoned.

we don't cut trees for our food tho? even stuff like cinnamon, rubber, resins etc can be obtained from trees without harming them. we only eat fruits, vegetables or take flowers from plants or trees, don't we? it's like taking milk from a cow, you aren't harming her in any manner.

and imma tell you a secret: people who sin most die last. it's like god leaves their hand to stumble and die off. there are insects who eat stool, worms who are stepped on by us, insects who live insignificant and useless lives without ever getting a chance to know god. even animals live insignificant lives, but they still live in dignity, so we adore them. but insects, worms, flies, they have a soul too. god can't just stop creating these things, can he? so naturally, he reserves a special spot for people who harm animals, plants etc in the name of money and luxury.

and yes ofc, every living thing has a soul. so do insects. but their lives are literally just to suffer. just as predators need to kill prey to survive, we too, as large animals do not physically have the ability to completely abstain from killing these tiny organisms, knowingly or unknowingly.

but the great take care of even those tiny insects. when lord buddha would sleep, he would sleep while being very still so as to not accidentally kill an ant or insect while he slept. and besides, what do you think those toe stubs, tiny paper cuts, scratches, knee scratches are the result of?

every karma results in an equal payment; you killed a tiny ant, so you get a toe stub. you can go kill another human and you'll be born as an insect for the next seven lives. so yeah, everything has an equivalent result. you cannot say that humans, animals, insects, worms and plants live with equal purpose and dignity. this is why a human being with no dignity or purpose is called an animal.

even human life is for suffering, but in the midst of this suffering, we have the option to get to know gods and the way they work. we can comprehend, we are not cows, dogs, insects or birds. we live with purpose, reproduce with purpose, and live with certain moral responsibilities. animals don't. that's what makes all of us different.

... obnoxious reason saying it is luxury and not those people who are eating for their health ...

you're not in a race with someone else, you're in a race with yourself. i don't know, but it sounds like you're trying to justify yourself somehow, you don't have to. if you think giving up meat is impossible for you, try something else. try donating to animal shelters. try leaving food and water out for animals or birds in your region. try offering sugar and flour to ants. try serving old people or children. if you think something else can make you a better person, then do that; bcs like i said, you're in a race with yourself, not with anyone else.

but regardless of all of that, eating meat will still be a sin. it won't change. people can fight other people, but they can't fight against the laws of nature. again, like i have mentioned, acceptance or rejection is in your hand. you decide how fate treats you. it's not a threat, it's the truth.

sorry to end on such a bitter note, but dw, you aren't fighting hindu religion; there are millions of people who strive to achieve vishnu, they give up even salt and all worldly pleasure. lord vishnu pursues those who pursue him. in the bigger picture, people who argue aren't even a dot.

instead of arguing, try curiosity. it's better, pays well. at least you'll get to know smth more about an ancient culture.

[thegunmaybetheperfectweapon]

THE NATURE OF FREEDOM

93. We are going to argue that industrial-technological society cannot be reformed in such a way as to prevent it from progressively narrowing the sphere of human freedom. But, because "freedom" is a word that can be interpreted in many ways, we must first make clear what kind of freedom we are concerned with.

94. By "freedom" we mean the opportunity to go through the power process, with real goals not the artificial goals of surrogate activities, and without interference, manipulation or supervision from anyone, especially from any large organization. Freedom means being in control (either as an individual or as a member of a SMALL group) of the life-and-death issues of one's existence; food, clothing, shelter and defense against whatever threats there may be in one's environment. Freedom means having power; not the power to control other people but the power to control the circumstances of one's own life. One does not have freedom if anyone else (especially a large organization) has power over one, no matter how benevolently, tolerantly and permissively that power may be exercised. It is important not to confuse freedom with mere permissiveness (see paragraph 72).

95. It is said that we live in a free society because we have a certain number of constitutionally guaranteed rights. But these are not as important as they seem. The degree of personal freedom that exists in a society is determined more by the economic and technological structure of the society than by its laws or its form of government. [16] Most of the Indian nations of New England were monarchies, and many of the cities of the Italian Renaissance were controlled by dictators. But in reading about these societies one gets the impression that they allowed far more personal freedom than our society does. In part this was because they lacked efficient mechanisms for enforcing the ruler's will: There were no modern, well-organized police forces, no rapid long-distance communications, no surveillance cameras, no dossiers of information about the lives of average citizens. Hence it was relatively easy to evade control.

96. As for our constitutional rights, consider for example that of freedom of the press. We certainly don't mean to knock that right; it is very important tool for limiting concentration of political power and for keeping those who do have political power in line by publicly exposing any misbehavior on their part. But freedom of the press is of very little use to the average citizen as an individual. The mass media are mostly under the control of large organizations that are integrated into the system. Anyone who has a little money can have something printed, or can distribute it on the Internet or in some such way, but what he has to say will be swamped by the vast volume of material put out by the media, hence it will have no practical effect. To make an impression on society with words is therefore almost impossible for most individuals and small groups. Take us (FC) for example. If we had never done anything violent and had submitted the present writings to a publisher, they probably would not have been accepted. If they had been been accepted and published, they probably would not have attracted many readers, because it's more fun to watch the entertainment put out by the media than to read a sober essay. Even if these writings had had many readers, most of these readers would soon have forgotten what they had read as their minds were flooded by the mass of material to which the media expose them. In order to get our message before the public with some chance of making a lasting impression, we've had to kill people.

97. Constitutional rights are useful up to a point, but they do not serve to guarantee much more than what might be called the bourgeois conception of freedom. According to the bourgeois conception, a "free" man is essentially an element of a social machine and has only a certain set of prescribed and delimited freedoms; freedoms that are designed to serve the needs of the social machine more than those of the individual. Thus the bourgeois's "free" man has economic freedom because that promotes growth and progress; he has freedom of the press because public criticism restrains misbehavior by political leaders; he has a right to a fair trial because imprisonment at the whim of the powerful would be bad for the system. This was clearly the attitude of Simon Bolivar. To him, people deserved liberty only if they used it to promote progress (progress as conceived by the bourgeois). Other bourgeois thinkers have taken a similar view of freedom as a mere means to collective ends. Chester C. Tan, "Chinese Political Thought in the Twentieth Century," page 202, explains the philosophy of the Kuomintang leader Hu Han-min: "An individual is granted rights because he is a member of society and his community life requires such rights. By community Hu meant the whole society of the nation." And on page 259 Tan states that according to Carsum Chang (Chang Chun-mai, head of the State Socialist Party in China) freedom had to be used in the interest of the state and of the people as a whole. But what kind of freedom does one have if one can use it only as someone else prescribes? FC's conception of freedom is not that of Bolivar, Hu, Chang or other bourgeois theorists. The trouble with such theorists is that they have made the development and application of social theories their surrogate activity. Consequently the theories are designed to serve the needs of the theorists more than the needs of any people who may be unlucky enough to live in a society on which the theories are imposed.

98. One more point to be made in this section: It should not be assumed that a person has enough freedom just because he SAYS he has enough. Freedom is restricted in part by psychological controls of which people are unconscious, and moreover many people's ideas of what constitutes freedom are governed more by social convention than by their real needs. For example, it's likely that many leftists of the oversocialized type would say that most people, including themselves, are socialized too little rather than too much, yet the oversocialized leftist pays a heavy psychological price for his high level of socialization.

[horizon-verizon]

Also-also---

Since Dany accrues the power she needs from Viserys/Aerys/Rhaegar/Rhaego/Drogo's deaths AND needs to be queen both for her own and her people's safety, does that mean that she can never be truly "heroic"? So because monarchies are and have been patriarchal and abusive, she herself can never be a "good" ruler or a good force in this world?! You can't make the argument that the original or beginning material must be "feminist" (as in something made towards the political and ideological movement) or set that as a reason to deny how any woman gaining power from a patriarchal structure bc are we then to say she can't be a "real", altruistic ruler?

Often, that is exactly how many women & feminist groups get power back, as I already noted above, but also in real life often women use the patriarchal logic of any familiar argument against men to show how stupid that argument is or unsustainable its implications are for how we form and shape society in the broader sense. Or they have to go through and make use of or manipulate the laws/policies designed for men for their own use to gain power and then they can decide to use that in both underhanded and overt ways against men for a bigger or altruistic cause. One way this is literally embodied is how Dany obtains the Unsulllied in a more anti-slavery context; but for feminism we have that case in Australia (I think) of that artist who succeeded in making her point about those Gentlemen's clubs, made a ladies' club, was sued by a man for excluding him, but won all while still making her point (a much more overt example). She could not have made her points more salient with the effect that it had without creating her gender-exclusive ladies' club WHILE ALSO giving a safe space for (some) women from men. Dany cannot free slaves without becoming the queen that she is, which is very dependent on the already existing systems of rulership in both Essos and Westeros.

Feminism as a movement in of itself didn't exist until the 18th century, so we shouldn't care what any woman does before then or how they resisted & made use of the patriarchal narratives for themselves and/or for others? These women are no longer "heroes" or inspirations for private or public resistance/resisters? Because they used what existed for them to use?!

So it's more than "shortsighted"; it's dangerous to argue a thing. It smacks of "we shouldn't care about Rhaenyra's story or Dany's story or Rhaena the Black Bride's bec none of them were feminist"...okay...

From time to time, I see some people argue that Dany can't be Azor Ahai because Azor Ahai was a man who killed his wife and such a character can't be considered a hero. So Dany couldn't be Azor Ahai because she is a hero and because such a feminist character like Dany can't be associated with Azor Ahai.

I agree that Dany is a hero, and I agree that Azor Ahai killing his wife is not the most feminist story. But I disagree with the idea that this means Dany isn't Azor Ahai, because literally all the foreshadowing points to her, she fulfills every aspect of the prophecy. Just because we as readers might think there's a moral dissonance in Dany being Azor Ahai, doesn't mean that she isn't. Whether we as readers might not like her being Azor Ahai, whether we think it's not feminist for Dany to be Azor Ahai, it doesn't change the fact that GRRM wrote all the clues pointing to her.

Also, while some people may argue that it's not feminist for Dany to be Azor Ahai because the original Azor Ahai killed his wife, other people might argue that Dany being Azor Ahai is a feminist subversion, because everybody expects the prophesied hero to be a man.

[dwellordream]

“...A lone woman could, if she spun in almost every spare minute of her day, on her own keep a small family clothed in minimum comfort (and we know they did that). Adding a second spinner – even if they were less efficient (like a young girl just learning the craft or an older woman who has lost some dexterity in her hands) could push the household further into the ‘comfort’ margin, and we have to imagine that most of that added textile production would be consumed by the family (because people like having nice clothes!).

At the same time, that rate of production is high enough that a household which found itself bereft of (male) farmers (for instance due to a draft or military mortality) might well be able to patch the temporary hole in the family finances by dropping its textile consumption down to that minimum and selling or trading away the excess, for which there seems to have always been demand. ...Consequently, the line between women spinning for their own household and women spinning for the market often must have been merely a function of the financial situation of the family and the balance of clothing requirements to spinners in the household unit (much the same way agricultural surplus functioned).

Moreover, spinning absolutely dominates production time (again, around 85% of all of the labor-time, a ratio that the spinning wheel and the horizontal loom together don’t really change). This is actually quite handy, in a way, as we’ll see, because spinning (at least with a distaff) could be a mobile activity; a spinner could carry their spindle and distaff with them and set up almost anywhere, making use of small scraps of time here or there.

On the flip side, the labor demands here are high enough prior to the advent of better spinning and weaving technology in the Late Middle Ages (read: the spinning wheel, which is the truly revolutionary labor-saving device here) that most women would be spinning functionally all of the time, a constant background activity begun and carried out whenever they weren’t required to be actively moving around in order to fulfill a very real subsistence need for clothing in climates that humans are not particularly well adapted to naturally. The work of the spinner was every bit as important for maintaining the household as the work of the farmer and frankly students of history ought to see the two jobs as necessary and equal mirrors of each other.

At the same time, just as all farmers were not free, so all spinners were not free. It is abundantly clear that among the many tasks assigned to enslaved women within ancient households. Xenophon lists training the enslaved women of the household in wool-working as one of the duties of a good wife (Xen. Oik. 7.41). ...Columella also emphasizes that the vilica ought to be continually rotating between the spinners, weavers, cooks, cowsheds, pens and sickrooms, making use of the mobility that the distaff offered while her enslaved husband was out in the fields supervising the agricultural labor (of course, as with the bit of Xenophon above, the same sort of behavior would have been expected of the free wife as mistress of her own household).

...Consequently spinning and weaving were tasks that might be shared between both relatively elite women and far poorer and even enslaved women, though we should be sure not to take this too far. Doubtless it was a rather more pleasant experience to be the wealthy woman supervising enslaved or hired hands working wool in a large household than it was to be one of those enslaved women, or the wife of a very poor farmer desperately spinning to keep the farm afloat and the family fed. The poor woman spinner – who spins because she lacks a male wage-earner to support her – is a fixture of late medieval and early modern European society and (as J.S. Lee’s wage data makes clear; spinners were not paid well) must have also had quite a rough time of things.

It is difficult to overstate the importance of household textile production in the shaping of pre-modern gender roles. It infiltrates our language even today; a matrilineal line in a family is sometimes called a ‘distaff line,’ the female half of a male-female gendered pair is sometimes the ‘distaff counterpart’ for the same reason. Women who do not marry are sometimes still called ‘spinsters’ on the assumption that an unmarried woman would have to support herself by spinning and selling yarn (I’m not endorsing these usages, merely noting they exist).

E.W. Barber (Women’s Work, 29-41) suggests that this division of labor, which holds across a wide variety of societies was a product of the demands of the one necessarily gendered task in pre-modern societies: child-rearing. Barber notes that tasks compatible with the demands of keeping track of small children are those which do not require total attention (at least when full proficiency is reached; spinning is not exactly an easy task, but a skilled spinner can very easily spin while watching someone else and talking to a third person), can easily be interrupted, is not dangerous, can be easily moved, but do not require travel far from home; as Barber is quick to note, producing textiles (and spinning in particular) fill all of these requirements perfectly and that “the only other occupation that fits the criteria even half so well is that of preparing the daily food” which of course was also a female-gendered activity in most ancient societies. Barber thus essentially argues that it was the close coincidence of the demands of textile-production and child-rearing which led to the dominant paradigm where this work was ‘women’s work’ as per her title.

(There is some irony that while the men of patriarchal societies of antiquity – which is to say effectively all of the societies of antiquity – tended to see the gendered division of labor as a consequence of male superiority, it is in fact male incapability, particularly the male inability to nurse an infant, which structured the gendered division of labor in pre-modern societies, until the steady march of technology rendered the division itself obsolete. Also, and Barber points this out, citing Judith Brown, we should see this is a question about ability rather than reliance, just as some men did spin, weave and sew (again, often in a commercial capacity), so too did some women farm, gather or hunt. It is only the very rare and quite stupid person who will starve or freeze merely to adhere to gender roles and even then gender roles were often much more plastic in practice than stereotypes make them seem.)

Spinning became a central motif in many societies for ideal womanhood. Of course one foot of the fundament of Greek literature stands on the Odyssey, where Penelope’s defining act of arete is the clever weaving and unweaving of a burial shroud to deceive the suitors, but examples do not stop there. Lucretia, one of the key figures in the Roman legends concerning the foundation of the Republic, is marked out as outstanding among women because, when a group of aristocrats sneak home to try to settle a bet over who has the best wife, she is patiently spinning late into the night (with the enslaved women of her house working around her; often they get translated as ‘maids’ in a bit of bowdlerization. Any time you see ‘maids’ in the translation of a Greek or Roman text referring to household workers, it is usually quite safe to assume they are enslaved women) while the other women are out drinking (Liv. 1.57). This display of virtue causes the prince Sextus Tarquinius to form designs on Lucretia (which, being virtuous, she refuses), setting in motion the chain of crime and vengeance which will overthrow Rome’s monarchy. The purpose of Lucretia’s wool-working in the story is to establish her supreme virtue as the perfect aristocratic wife.

...For myself, I find that students can fairly readily understand the centrality of farming in everyday life in the pre-modern world, but are slower to grasp spinning and weaving (often tacitly assuming that women were effectively idle, or generically ‘homemaking’ in ways that precluded production). And students cannot be faulted for this – they generally aren’t confronted with this reality in classes or in popular culture. ...Even more than farming or blacksmithing, this is an economic and household activity that is rendered invisible in the popular imagination of the past, even as (as you can see from the artwork in this post) it was a dominant visual motif for representing the work of women for centuries.”

- Bret Devereaux, “Clothing, How Did They Make It? Part III: Spin Me Right Round…”

[halogenwarrior]

I find it interesting the moral double standards employed by fiction where all animals are depicted as sapient and able to talk to each other, ecological balances i.e “the circle of life” is a major theme i.e the Lion King, and at least some of the main characters are carnivores. The premise is always that the predators can’t be seen as horrifying or evil for eating sapient prey because they live within an ecosystem, and, as in real ecosystems, everything is complicated and connected enough that it can’t be boiled down to “everything would be better if the predators weren’t there”. No death can be seen as definitively a bad thing because of this ecological complexity. But in practice this premise never holds - prey deaths are acceptable and we shouldn’t be quick to call them bad, and yet we are supposed to feel any deaths of the predator protagonists are tragic and those who deliberately kill them are evil, in spite of the fact that by the same logic you should argue that no one can say those deaths are inherently bad, either - one lion or wolf’s death is just part of an overall cycle and who can say it’s bad because that death will mean other animals get to live. So it becomes a double standard - typical morality of death being tragic and murder being wrong for me, cold moral relativism for thee. 

And I get why this is tempting to do since to do otherwise would make a very cynical, depressing, morally nihilistic story that wouldn’t be a good fit for a kids’ movie - nothing you do matters, whether you live or die does not matter, as long as the overall ecosystem is preserved. So they will often try to make the stakes matter by having a villain who is not just threatening the individual lives of the main characters but threatening the “balance of nature” altogether; e.g, using The Lion King as an example again, Scar isn’t just bad because he kills Mufasa and tries to kill Simba, but also because by letting in the hyenas he enables overhunting, unbalancing the ecosystem and causing mass starvation. The problem here is that a lot of portrayals of “disturbing the balance of nature” rely on an overly idealized portrayal of ecology, where as long as the predators just take their fair share the prey’s overpopulation never causes problems for other species and the predators never starve. A basic look at predator-prey population graphs proves this wrong, though - it’s a constantly shifting “equilibrium” where the prey does get overhunted sometimes and drops in population, causing the predators to starve and drop in population themselves until the prey population rises again. So the famine Scar is causing is something that would have inevitably happened anyway. Rather than a constant peace the cynical sacrifices have to be made for it’s a constant strife where at any given time someone is always given the short end of the stick. 

An that’s not even getting into the part of the premise where the sapient prey species are considered so incapable of understanding ecological management on their own that they have to be paternalistically killed by ecologically knowledgable predators to keep them from overpopulating. And what would they do if they did feel they could manage their own affairs? The omnivorous animals are one thing, but what about all the obligate carnivores who have no choice but to kill even if they weren’t making moral justifications for it, would they just have to all be killed? Of course, a story where characters had to make the choice between accepting a constant state of being picked off and murdered for the “greater good” and committing genocide wouldn’t make for a good kids story. 

In the particular case of the Lion King, the setup is particularly disturbing because the “circle of life” stuff is being explicitly analogized to human systems of monarchy, which have a long history of using exactly this kind of double standard of “everyone must stay in their role and make sacrifices to keep the Balance, but somehow the lower-class people are the only one who have to make actual sacrifices while we don’t” to justify their power. And I can’t help but noting that there’s probably a reason along these lines that just about every Lion King fan work focuses completely on the lion (and sometimes hyena) characters, not really acknowledging other animals as characters. It’s just a lot more comfortable to have a more human-relatable story of one sapient species with everyone else being treated as moral non-entities (which raises questions about humans assuming one needs to be sapient to be a moral entity, though that’s an entirely different topic), than either maintaining the oppressive double standard of which lives have value or going for full-on moral nihilism where nothing anyone does in the story really matters. Or maybe it’s just that they like designing lion characters better and I’m reading too much into it, I don’t know.

[stromuprisahat]

Alina and the Darkling’s interactions, pt. 8

Chapter 21- This will be long, split into two or three parts. There’s a lot in this chapter to analyse.

Aleksander, five minutes before Alina’s arrival:

“I was right all along, wanting made me weak and too dumb to see she cares only about running away with her otkazat’sya.”

after:

“SiT dOwN, aLiNa.”

He’s good in hiding his emotions, so I’d argue that exasperation wasn’t faint.

“If I insult you, you won’t take me seriously.” I wonder why...

Well, yeah, half-right. The Darkling already figured out Maaaaal is the only thing Alina cares about. What kind of an idiot wouldn’t use their sole leverage? And where did we learn Darkles loves power? Oh! Got it! “He was blinded by his hunger for power.”- Baghra, Ch 15

Technically, the Darkling’s very nice. He should’ve handed Malyen to his superiors. There would be no discussion with Alina, just court martial and swift execution.

Or possibly interest? Perhaps he’s intrigued?

Alina’s not just some village girl, bound to be married to someone and pop up one kid after another till death does them part. The Darkling sees her as someone meant for more. It started before he developed his unwanted feelings for her. His lack of understanding isn’t only about his antipathy for Malyen or Malina.

“Ivan, mind your tone. She is Grisha now.”

He spent his long life being punished for what he is, but also proud of his difference. Part of it is his upbringing (Baghra’s insistance they’re more than others.), but I’d say part of it started as a coping mechanism. Acceptance of yourself, esp. the parts others use to bully you, can be very empowering. Look at real-life fat children, gays etc. To quote Tyrion in A Game of Thrones:

“Never forget what you are, for surely the world will not. Make it your strength. Then it can never be your weakness. Armor yourself in it, and it will never be used to hurt you.”

Not only you take bullies’ ammunition, you make yourself stronger with the same step.

As someone, who accepted himself long time ago, and made sure others won’t have to struggle this way on his watch, I think the Darkling genuinely cannot grasp, why would Alina deny herself in such a way. He fails to understand why would she want to be something she’s not. Not necessarily lesser, as in “under” Grisha, but incomplete, rejecting parts of what she is. Which is exactly what she did as a child, when she's with Malyen in Noviy Zem and eventually it’s done to her in Ruin and Rising.

“Back to pretending to be less than you are, I see. The sham doesn’t suit you.”

Siege and Storm- Chapter 1

I’d love to see Alina play diplomat...

If nothing else, she’s healthy now. She has friends in Little Palace. Slave? Sweetie, you live in absolute monarchy. Dark wizard locks you up in fancy tent to use your magical powers in war effort? Well, you could’ve been send to the front as canon fodder. Or left to starve, while working the fields. Or bend over the nearest flat surface by some wealthy noble, who thinks it’s his Saints’ given right to do as he pleases with any servant. I’d say you don’t have it half bad.

She’s dehumanising him again. Saints forbid our heroine would admit her antagonist is a person. With feelings!

For someone, who’s been let down countless times, who’s hated and feared by the very same people he’s protecting, Aleksander’s maintaining admirable amount of love for his country. Ravka and Grisha first. No matter the cost.

pt. 1, pt. 2, pt. 3, pt. 4,  pt. 5,  pt. 6, pt. 7, pt. 9, pt. 10, pt. 11, pt. 12

[ravenclawisms]

just finished watching star vs the forces of evil all the way through and realized something and suddenly i have a lot to say about it

i am aware that it is a kids show and they might not have intended for this but hear me out!!

there are obviously a ton of inconsistencies and unanswered questions posed by the ending and the sudden merging of worlds but we're not supposed to know!! the show spends four seasons spelling out many many things, one of them being how the presence of magic in any world is a double-edged sword: what happens when people reserve the use of that magic for, say, a monarchy; what can come from this structure governing a diverse population (ie mewmans and monsters) where the monarchy is entirely comprised of one faction of the population; the discomfort, growth, and radical change that it takes to get people to confront their own biases and accept a new reality. which is why the show ends with the "no magic" angle.

but another one of those pillars of central themes (or, i argue, THE central theme) is the crazy, wonderful, amazing, terrifying, uncomfortable and supernatural things that can happen when we connect with each other and relate to each other deeply. we see this in terms of the previous theme of magic, and in terms of mewmans and monsters, mainly through eclipsa: her struggle with being accepted by the public in season 4; her turbulent relationship with meteora in season 3 turning to her genuine deep love and admiration for her baby daughter; her attachment to and borderline obsession with freeing globgor and how, at the start, it governs nearly all of her decisions and actions as queen. we see it through moon literally building a community out of nothing in the middle of the forest because she simply can't help but care about people. (and river's subsequent complete adoration of her.)

but we also see it very often through the lens of star and marco. at first (and the vast majority of the time) it isn't even in a romantic manner--literally the day they meet, they are already fighting in sync, a pattern that continues throughout the first season--they finish each other's sentences, etc etc etc. and it could be argued that a lot of that is a direct result of the blood moon ball, where their souls are (theoretically) bound together at the ripe age of fourteen. but whether or not it was a magical curse (again, the role of magic and its positive and negative effects in life) doesn't matter in the end. to me, it is simply a story of two people who have something real and beautiful and powerful, and how the presence of magic first hinders but then helps them uphold that.

we're not supposed to know what happens after the worlds merge because we're supposed to believe that by the power of friendship or love or any combination of the two they will figure it out. it's because of that very power that they've always figured it out in the past!! the ending raises a ton of good and important questions about worldbuilding, society, etc but we're not supposed to care about those questions; at the very least, we're supposed to accept that they themselves don't care about those questions. there's a reason the last scene is the two reconnecting: it is clearly ALL that they care about. and that's beautiful!!!

literally everywhere you turn in this show, basically every single plotline or arc you can think of, boils down to people (or not-people) loving, wanting to love, wanting to be loved, wanting to be accepted, wanting to feel connection. ex: ludo didn't get love as a child and so resorts to commanding respect to cope, and the only way he's able to snap out of this cycle is when dennis finds him and they both experience the first real loving connection either of them have ever had. meteora knew nothing of her family history growing up and was taught that everything natural about her should be shunned and suppressed, and the only times we see her drop or even soften her guard before the end of season 3 are when she is trying to foster a connection with rasticore (which doesn't go well) or when she finally finds eclipsa and is overjoyed at the prospect of true, unflinching motherly love. tom starts the show obsessed with star, driven solely by the idea that someone who once loved him might be able to do so again, and as the show progresses he not only learns to control his anger issues but learns how to respect both her and himself in doing so, leading to a relationship that is visibly much more healthy the second time around.

star and marco are another example of how this concept is done so beautifully, and an example of the fundamental idea that fierce and true love shouldn't break a world, it should make it. and i think the ending aims to show that. we know that there is a story after the one we stop seeing, and we know it's one that's going to be driven by empathy and connection and hope, and to a certain extent (especially in a kids show) isn't that all you ever need??

tldr: at its core svtfoe is yet another piece of media about the otherworldly power of human connection which is why the ending is Like That

(i'm aware this is a contrarian take and i'm sorry in advance i just like to be positive)

[symphonyofsilence]

What annoys me about a Jon Snow sequel series is more than how it is yet another forced, unnecessary spin-off of a beloved franchise to milk it dry.

Yes, HoTD was great. I did not expect it to be. But it surprised me in the best way. But it was from a very great book GRRM has already written. We already knew it was a great story. GRRM wrote it because he really had a great idea. And the show was loyal to the books. In some ways, it improved on it. And it had an entirely new cast of characters with entirely new stories. Even the world was different than what we knew.

But the thing about Jon snow is that show! Jon Snow had ceased to be Jon Snow for some time. Jon showing his intelligence and strategic thinking and political skills by suggesting Alys Karstark's marriage to Sigorn of the Thenns, and advising Stannis to attack the Iron islands first instead of attacking Winterfell was key to his character. But I could live with the erasure of those. It would make him less awesome, but it wouldn't make him a bad character.

What did make him a bad character was not only making him fall in love with Daenerys after about 3 conversations all of them arguing about the throne, but GIVING THE NORTH TO HER! The north! Which two of his brothers died for! His sister suffered so much for it! The North that its people trusted him with! Even though all his life he had thought that he would never have the chance to inherit it! And he desired it so much! Remember how tempted he was when Stannis offered it to him?! And remember when he said that he couldn't accept it because it was SANSA'S BIRTHRIGHT?!

Real Jon Snow would not only fight tooth and nail for the North but he would do it because he'd believe that it's Sansa's birthright! He wouldn't give Sansa's birthright away! Especially not after she went through hell for it!

You can't distribute land and kingship because your crush saved you, Jonathan, you're not Maedhros the tall!

And to top it all, he only looked miserable and had about three lines for the entirety of the last season. He was my first favorite character in the books I couldn't wait to get to his chapters, but in season 8 I wanted him to shut up every time he opened his mouth.

(No, I didn't want him to become the king. I didn't want anyone to become the king. I thought the story showed us so many even good people becoming horrible monarchs to show that "absolute power corrupts absolutely." And Monarchy should be set aside. But even if we went with Monarchy, No, Jon Snow was not the true heir to the Iron Throne because he was the last Targaryen. Targaryens were legitimately and lawfully removed from the Iron Throne and replaced by the Baratheons. But at that time, Westeros was in so much chaos that the Iron throne belonged to anyone who could get their hands on it.)

So I hope the Jon Snow show surprises me and turns out to be enjoyable. But I don't see how a show about Jon Snow can be good after they have destroyed Jon Snow and the world he lives in.

[layingeggs]

@cricketflour You raise interesting points! I have thoughts. Oh, I need a read more for spoilers of course.

First of all, I don't think the show ending on Dianna's death is necessarily against the optimistic narrative themes. Death is a part of life. And crucially, Turn A's optimism is the optimism in the face of loss. Not the absence of it.

And liking to believe they grow old and happy together. We all like that, don't we?

Here, I think this is a question of love. And all of Dianna's loves are either tragic or problematic.

Dianna and Kihel.

It's very easy to interpret Dianna and Kihel as having a profound and deep love. But Kihel goes to the moon to live as queen. It is precisely this sacrifice that allows Dianna to finally rest and truly know peace!

Theoretically, it's possible that Kihel Dianna was able to make some moon earth visits from time to time and reunite with Dianna Kihel. But if we're going to imagine that then we can just as easily imagine it happening in one of the timeskips implied by the epilogue.

It's also more suitable to the story I think that Kihel Dianna would get swept away in the moon politics and possibly be put into hibernation again, and the next time she wakes up Dianna Kihel is already passed away. Dianna Kihel becomes Kihel Dianna's very own Will Game!

Remember, it was the burdens of the crown that put Dianna in all this mess in the first place. The system of monarchy that used her up, her spirit and her health. It was her fear of dying on the stagnant moon that lead to rushing ahead the return to earth and the escalation of war. Dianna's greatest regrets are her trying to escape her fate of dying alone as queen. But if she had never acted selfishly, then she would have hibernated and politiced until her end!

That's what Kihel Dianna inherits. Turn A was about preventing the mistakes of history from being repeated in the present. It was not about creating a perfect system with no possible future risk of those mistakes ever being repeated again. And I think it is precisely fitting for a love story specifically that Kihel Dianna should fall in love with Dianna Kihel and then be unable to see her again by nature of her being queen, and having to live through the deaths of her loved ones by nature of her being queen.

But it was precisely Kihel's love for Dianna that motivated her to make this sacrifice for Dianna to be able to live as Dianna Kihel. And it would not be a sacrifice in the first place if there were no downside to Kihel becoming queen!

Dianna and Loran.

Pop the bottles because I think we win this one!! This was my ship and I fully wholly argue they get together in the end. Loran still as Dianna's servant but still they are servant master lovers.

It is very problematic. It would be disgusting in the real world. But it's a personal favourite fantasy of mine, and frankly it would be no better for a noble to choose one of their servants for a lover and elevate them to noble status 'to make it okay'. That's still an unbalanced power dynamic!! That's still presenting servants with a harsh reality where hoping a noble falls in love with you makes you their pet is the best odds you have for a decent life! Historically, real life relationships that go down this road tend to end very badly!

Nonetheless, this is a story. And I very very much enjoy Loran and Dianna's relationship. There's a lot of complexities to it and a lot of push and pull. He is clearly very embarrassed at being in love with his own mistress and she clearly enjoys that. It's a wonderful dynamic. The ending confirms nothing but leaves the ambiguity that they get together. In my mind, that's as good as it being canon!

Dianna and Harry.

This one is both problematic and tragic. Harry is again working for Dianna. And also, I think the show implies that Harry is in love with the queen and not with Dianna? I think he feels greater admiration at the queen who had earn it rather than the queen who was born into it? I think the show implies that. It's a lot of complex scenes that say that though.

I think that Harry is in love with the queen, and possibly has a preference for Kihel Dianna. Dianna Dianna is not as great as Kihel Dianna, and Kihel Kihel is just some earth girl.

But if Harry and Dianna could have been lovers, then that's tragic because Harry goes off to serve Kihel Dianna!

Dianna and Will Game.

Obvious tragedy. He dies. Twice.

So you know. Does Dianna have a happy ending or a sad ending? I don't know. I think she dies and it's a happy ending. In terms of a love story? I think there's many ways to read it! I do feel sad that Kihel and Dianna can't be together more. But again, that is the nature of being queen! And their story would be wholly different without that!

Oh! You've written up two more comments in the time it took me to write this reblog. (I would have commented myself, but I have too much to say! When I go past the word limit, I just cut and paste to a reblog rather than starting a comment chain!

omg

OMG

Okay so first of all, I'm pretty sure Loran was irradiated in a number of scenes? I'm not sure that he lasted much longer than Dianna did! I think maybe the easy to digest soup wasn't just for one sensitive palate!

If he did have more years in him, then yeh that would be quite sad! Though once again I insist that Turn A is about the optimism in the face of the loss. I think Loran would keep living! Maybe go work for Keith's bakery. Maybe he finds something new.

Sochie. Oh boy Sochie.

Sochie's epilogue is very sad for her. But I do think she needed the grieving. Repeatedly throughout the show, she is shown to face hardship and to respond to it with lashing out and anger and revenge. I think maybe part of her story is the accepting of loss.

I think in particular, the use of the moon toy, the carved fish toy, the use of that in the epilogue was crucial I think. This thing from Loran's innocence that he held onto even through his passage into adulthood, and then he somewhere left behind in the course of his adult life. That Sochie held onto as her own symbol of innocence right up until the end.

And then Loran and Dianna Kihel leave. She has to accept that she's not going to get together with her childhood crush. She throws the toy away in a river just as she met Loran in a river.

Could Loran and Sochie have reunited after that? I don't know. Perhaps they could have done but only as normal master and servant, don't you think? He never loved her. And surely, her story is about moving on? I think it would be more hopeful in this circumstance if they build new futures for themselves.

Don't worry about hijacking my post. The conversation is the thing.

A Gundam Called Turn A Gundam. Ending spoiling.

So Dianna dies at the end, right?

There are a number of moments throughout the series. At one point when Dianna and Kihel together are running in a battle, and Dianna gets breathless first, and she says how the cryosleep isn't perfect, she looks young but her quality of fitness is of someone much older, due to how many centuries her body has been artificially preserved.

And there's another scene where she talks about her sins. How she was supposed to be the ruler of the moonrace, and it was her selfishness and shortsightedness that lead to war and loss of life. And specifically, she says, the selfishness that she could feel herself wearing away from the cryosleep. She could feel that one day she would just not wake up. She could feel how she was trapped on the moon and trapped in this era of history of waiting for humanity to recover from the previous catastrophe. How she rushed ahead the plans to return to earth because she wanted to feel alive and ultimately she wanted also for her nearing death to be in a place of contentment and happiness, not of waiting and stagnation. This was her sin.

So then, in the final episode, in the epilogue. We see Dianna. Having swapped placed with Kihel for the final time. Living with the last person alive who she loves and who loves her. Kihel carrying her sins for her. Kihel bearing the weight of monarchy and Dianna having the peaceful last days of her life that was all she wanted.

We see her dressed in heavy layers and carrying a walking stick in a snowy mountain. Seems appropriate attire for the environment. But she doesn't appear to travel far from her home. And Loran doesn't appear to need any of that gear. It seems more like she just has trouble walking. Just has trouble with her circulation and staying warm.

Loran feeds her soup. (An easy to digest meal!) And lays her to sleep. The camera lingers on that shot of her, resting motionless, in the dark. We begin to hear what sounds like the chanting of the moonrace who were left behind on earth?

So like, she dies, right? That's her death, right? Posting this because like, this isn't too far fetched is it? I'm not jumping to spurious conclusions am I? She dies, doesn't she. For her sins. Forgiven for her sins.