#because it’s a predictable social code

[marinetti-dinner-party]

Red-brown alliance alert: I don’t think William Luther Pierce would have liked ‘brat summer,’ and I don’t care for it either

[gigantomachylesbian]

Guys. I did not know before now that writing could be painfully millennial in a full prose book but the pho*nix ke*per has proven me wrong and I have to complain about it in the tags

[bancaishi]

didn't want to put this rant in the tags of that last post but honestly i feel like a lot of people hate toshiro disproportionately compared to what he actually did in-story. and if we're being real it's most likely because of racism

[fredoesque]

ranking terror characters based on how prophet-coded they are

crozier: 4/10 crozier's kassandra status is often overstated i believe. just because franklin is wrong doesn't mean crozier is right. none of his predictions come true except those regarding the ice. that's not prophecy it's just meteorological knowledge. some points for the act of hubris we may not survive though. i can't deny that they did not survive

silna: [ERROR]/10 objectively framed as a prophet character. makes the number one most accurate prophecy in the show ("she said that if we don't leave now we're going to [disappear]."). i can't say whether she truly is one however, bc her standing outside english modes of knowledge is a big part of what casts this statement in a mysterious light. from the english (and the audience's) perspective this is prophecy, but is it from hers? or is it just, as i said before, meteorological knowledge? maybe the prophet is just another role projected onto silna, bc her having supernatural insight is easier for the english to stomach than her having knowledge they lack. this doesn't entirely preclude her being a prophet as well though, since we know that there are in fact supernatural forces at play. english perceptions of her prophethood being incorrect doesn't mean said prophethood is necessarily non-existent. maybe if we saw more of silna, especially with her own people, i could give a definitive answer, but as it stands i'm undecided. whatever the case bonus points for making that terror model without masts that looks like the actual wreck that shit was cool as hell

david young: 7/10 solid first act prophet. hounded by visions he doesn't understand. gives warnings that ultimately go unheeded. not much else to say about this one it's a classic

hickey: 2/10 wants to be a prophet so bad but has little to no insight into the future. some points for his tendency to be the first to say things that are true about the present or to utter thoughts others have but are unwilling to share. may not be an actual prophet but strangely capable of filling the social function of one

jopson: 1/10 never really does anything prophet related but gets a point for objectively looking like he knows how you're going to die at all times

collins: 3/10 collins has visions but they're not of the future; they're of the past which is a different sort of thing entirely. does get some points bc visions are still visions and the past he sees does in fact mirror the future that awaits

fitzjames: 0/10 i've put him on the list bc he's a main character but he is absolutely not a prophet on account of he doesn't know shit. he IS a walking prophecy however and that prophecy is the rot of imperialism. and scurvy

blanky: 11/10 i've said this before and i'll say it again blanky is the only character who actually understands the situation they're in. not only does he give an ominous speech about the future, but his is actually acted upon in a way that ends up contributing to it's fulfillment. that's prophecy, baby! thinking about this is why i made this post

goodsir: 9/10 gets just one big prophet moment but it's an absolute banger: jacko's death. reads the future in an animal's entrails (if you squint) which is objectively the coolest form of prophecy. like blanky's prophecy, stanley hearing it and acting to avoid it only makes the situation worse

franklin: 1/10 the point is for "i've long wanted to move below"

[adventuringblind]

is oscar the only driver you do autistic!reader for? if not can I request lando x daniel x autistic!reader.

any situation is fine I don't mind 😊

My love, my life, and nerodivergent partners in crime

Daniel Riccairdo x reader x Lando Norris

Genre: angsty fluff (I think)

Summarry: How Daniel managed to keep two nerdiverdent young adults in line... nobody will ever know

Warnings: Lando is ADHD coded, and you can't change my mind (and he's dyslexic anyway), AGE GAP, Max loves to tease

Notes: I am officially only taking requests for poly reader inserts at this time. Also, do Lando and Daniel have a ship name?!?! I need this information for my masterlist, please, and thanks.

Masterlist

Everyone always wondered why Daniel Ricciardo trailed behind Lando Norris and his girlfriend by three steps. People have theorized its because he's thirdwheeling. Some say the pair doesn't pay attention to him.

The real reason, though? It's his way of showing he cares in the paddock.

Max teases him about it all the time and is the only one who gets away with it. The two younger are, however, a chaotic mess. They can not make it from one place to another without something happening. So Daniel trails behind them a few steps to make sure they make it to their destination.

It's certainly wasn't an ideal way to get together. Especially because Daniel is older than both by more than is socially acceptable by most.

Ironically, none of them were together when Daniel started at McLaren. An Australian who smiles a lot, a Brit who is loose lipped, and a shy little psychologist who hates talking until you get her on driver brains and how they work. What could possibly go wrong?

She started work at McLaren the year before Daniel. Something in the strategy department. She watches and listens and somehow can predict what the drivers are going to do, what they need to perform, and how their opponents might respond. Lando says it's a superpower. Daniel says she's autistic and watches how people behave for a living (she agrees with him).

The three of them got along better than anyone wants to admit. The world saw then as awkward and dysfunctional. Which wasn't a lie, but it's also just their combinations of personalities.

Daniel picked up on it first. The stolen glances and blushed cheeks. Then, drunk confessions happen. Neither of the younger two like drinking. Which is ridiculous, in Daniel's opinion. Or maybe it was ridiculous because he's the one who drunkenly confesses to the pair while they attempt to get him back to his room.

Supposedly, Max was there and heard everything. Daniel denies this relentlessly.

Lando picked up on the confession, confronted him about it, and then awkwardly kissed him on his tip toes (he was shorter then).

The biggest hurdle was the female. The one who studies people. The one who can predict what Daniel is going to have for lunch on Friday at two because he likes to eat later.

She's clueless.

Lando tries to tell her. Daniel attempts sober. She doesn't get it.

The two have to put it in the form of a business meeting and tell her until she gets it. That seems to work as they end up going on a date post confession.

If he's being honest, half the time love them is really just making sure they are getting along with the world. Not people, the environments they end up in (which often includes the people).

So Daniel walks three steps behind them. The people tease on socials. They edit him in tiktoks. But he could care less.

He loves his two nerodivergent partners. He loves their little quirks and they way they see the world. So Daniel determines he's okay being behind them. Because he loves them and wants nothing more than to watch out for his partners in crime.

[siswritesyanderes]

i mightve asked this before, in which case go ahead and ignore this lmao. which characters would be the best vs worst when handling an autistic darling?

Oooh, this is a cool question! I would say it depends on the particular symptoms the person has, so I'll go over some symptoms and which yanderes would respond best vs. worst.

avoidance of eye-contact

Obviously, shy, autistic, or autistic-coded yanderes would work really well with this (and other) symptom(s). Your Donatello's, your Newt's, arguably your Peter Parker's. Also, yanderes who are able to sense when their darling's attention is on them supernaturally or just out of sheer social aplomb. Elves, for example, would be great with someone who doesn't like eye contact, because their body language conventions differ as a result of being able to communicate mentally.

Roxanne Wolf would be distinctly bad for this, based on her need for attention as demonstrated in Help Wanted 2. But she's also not beyond reason when it matters, as we've seen in Ruin DLC, so I'm sure communicating about it is on the table.

sensory reactivity

Okay, I think Dr. Strange would very specifically be bad for this, because his movies are all swirling kaleidoscopes of magic that would definitely be sensory overload in real life, and I have mentioned before that I don't see him as a considerate yandere. If anything, he might enjoy inducing sensory overload for the express purposes of making his darling require comfort, care, and isolation from others.

On the other hand, and maybe a weird pull for this, but Zafrina from Twilight would be great. Alec, too. Both have powers that would be super helpful when darling is overwhelmed.

Druig is able to just make everyone nearby shut up, which he would employ liberally.

food sensitivity/pickiness

Yanderes who enjoy cooking could go both ways on this. I could see some being offended by negative feedback and some taking it as being gifted with the challenge of meeting their darling's standards. Teruteru from Danganronpa and Esme from Twilight would both probably be good about receiving feedback and making changes. Super eager to please. Esme more so than Teruteru; he might get offended at first.

Rich and royal yanderes would delight in someone picky. They would love to be able to send food back with new, highly specific orders because darling doesn't like grapes with soft spots. Your Tony Stark's, your Byakuya Togami's, your Toph Beifong's, your Coriolanus Snow's.

Ralph from DBH would be a problem. He has a very weak grasp on what humans eat and a very high sensitivity to negative feedback. (Wait, he's just like me...)

resistance to changes in routine

This one would be a problem for yanderes who feel a need to go on adventures and trips with their darling. Which isn't necessarily the same as adventurous yanderes. Some adventurous yanderes might enjoy the idea of their darling staying behind at home keeping to a comfortable routine. But the ones who want their darling along on the adventure would be problematic. The Doctor, for example. Especially Eleven; he gets bored easily.

Whereas I think a lot of superheroes would like the idea of keeping their darling sequestered away, living predictably and comfortably. Clark Kent, Steve Rogers, Druig...The only catch is that some of them (Druig) would probably be a bit condescending about it.

I think Daycare Attendant would be great for routine. Coloring time, snack time, naptime, same time every day, sign them up! Also condescending, but they genuinely can't help it because it's how they're programmed.

Technically, Phineas and Ferb keep to a very specific routine, albeit a pretty tiring/potentially overwhelming one.

sorting things

This would be great for the disorganized genius character type. A Bruce Banner, if you will. An organized genius probably already has a system and might have trouble with someone sorting things differently than they have them. A distinctly slovenly character probably wouldn't mind either way.

hyperfixation

Yo, Queen from Deltarune would be the best for this. She would create an inescapable palace of the thing darling likes. Swatch and the Swatchlings would be involved.

stimming

There might be a problem if the yandere is easily distracted and needs to focus on something else. The main one I can think of who fits that description is Percy Jackson. That's not a distaste thing; just a pragmatic issue. Yanderes who experience sensory overload might also have an issue with it. My first thought was Queen Elsa.

On the other hand, Leo Valdez would love to make little stim toys for his darling. Donatello, too.

[transmutationisms]

like it's not that i think that no insurance billing codes psychiatric terminology could ever be useful. altho i do Personally eschew it For Myself, again, i understand why some people find it valuable as shorthand for sets of experiences and accessibility needs, and in a material sense this language exists to gatekeep certain accommodations so, yes it is sometimes terminology you must use to get those things regardless of how you feel about it. what i think is useful to keep in mind though is that these terms are simply descriptions of behaviours, and the behaviours to be described / categorised / pathologised are designated such through a series of medical and carceral judgments about how to produce a 'normal' and economically exploitable population. like. that's what these labels do. they're not describing a 'brain type' that is observable or immutable, they're not predicting your future or providing the key to understand your entire past as a function of reductive neurobiology from which you can never escape. they're social tools that make you legible to the state and the medical establishment, and that these authorities use to justify inflicting violence and coercive control on you. understanding this allows you to 1) decide whether, when, and how you personally find these labels useful or not useful for yourself, 2) be precise and cautious when you are trying to use them to your advantage, eg, to obtain accommodations, and 3) avoid the circular, essentialist, and socially violent logic of "well i do x because i have y condition (which was diagnosed based on clinician observations of x) and my brain is simply broken in a way requiring me to submit to expert clinical management and surveillance"

[ceranovis]

So... the thing that IMMEDIATELY stood out to me in Fit's Dec 30th lore stream was the use of the nocom heatmap:

Like this is the exact version if the heatmap Fit uses in his 2b2t vid about the nocom exploit (which is a wild story in itself, please watch it if you haven't before).

But some musing about how nocom might be connected to the lore (which quickly spiralled into some theories about Madagio, the 2 Cucuruchos, and the eggs):

Nocom was an exploit that tracked players in real time, predict their movements, and allowed remote spying on physical changes to locations. Madagio being drawn in by the remenant signal of that could just be a nod to their interest in finding ways to collect information and why they would find Fit suitable for the job.

HOWEVER-- Nocom was built on a Papermc vulnerability that meant it could also work on other multiplayer servers that run it. While nocom was patched on 2b2t, that doesn't mean other servers have patched the vulnerability & the source code has been released by the creators. So Madagio could have been interested in going to 2b2t to get ahold of nocom to use on Quesadilla island so it could uncover the "secrets [it] must have at all costs"-- their POV when tracking down fit shows entity lines so they clearly have some tracking ability/tool.

Maybe they got the nocom code, but found they couldn't use it yet. It's been mentioned before that Fit tried hack clients on QSMP but they didn't work, and exploits get fixed pretty quickly to keep the server stable. Madagio said the only way onto thr island at the time was the Federation train-- presumably the Federation had thing heavily locked down and Madagio wouldn't be able to enter or run any sort of exploit.

2b2t's nocom was made possible because of social engineering-- Madagio could have hired Fit to collect information so it could find a way to successfully manipulate holes into the Federation's security and get onto the island/run nocom.

In the Dec 21st QSMP Info stream, Dark Cucurucho seems to be looking for something the Federation has hidden, and demands Cucurucho tell him where it is. Maybe Madagio is looking for the same thing? Nocom would theoretically allow someone to find hidden facilities/people anywhere on the server.

Where Dark Cucurucho seems tied to the Nether, and Cucurucho the overworld, its becomes pretty notable that Madagio has Fit go through a giant Ender portal.

Madagio being tied to the End also has some interesting implications if you think about the (ender?) dragon that supposedly inhabited the island & created the eggs. While the federation claimed the dragon left when the wall was blown up, there's no actual evidence it was there at the time. Perhaps Madagio is the dragon.

Fans seem to be interpretting the "i am a god" anagram of Madagio literally, which could fit with the ender dragon being a sort of godly being presiding over the End dimension.

BUT it may not be a literal dragon-- the eggs seem to be some sort of science experiements, so what if the anagram is a reference to a scientist playing god?

Maybe Madagio literally created the eggs from End-realm-DNA or something before fleeing/being kicked off Quesadilla, and the dragon story is just what the Federation made up to explain the eggs without having to bring up Madagio.

Maybe the experiements that led to the eggs were about opening up inter-server travel? Madagio said whatever made it leave Quesadilla also gave it server-hopping powers (powers which seems similar in reach to the Federation's ability to pull people to the island/send workers to other places).

The Federation can block interdimensional travel too-- we saw that with the Nether, which the residents eventually broke through with the train bug, implying hacks/bugs are needed to bypass Federation security.

Dark Cucurucho told Forever it wanted to leave, desired freedom, and that the Federation didn't want it to have that. Maybe the thing Dark is looking for is the thing that Madagio created that allows for interdimensional travel, which the Federation stole.

I think the only non-Federation example of cross-server travel we've seen is with the Watcher/Purgatory, but it may have actually been Dark Cucurucho who enabled that, not the Watcher. Aside from Dark being the one to give the residents their tickets to Purgatory via the dice game, Cucurucho claimed the recent security vulnerabilities were due to Dark, so maybe Dark found an exploit that allowed for limited interdimenisonal travel-- if it's tied to the creation of eggs somehow, maybe that's why there were 3 new eggs found on Egg Island?

The Unknown Egg diary Cellbit found could potentially be connected to Dark Cucurucho leaving & making contact with the Watcher prior to the purgatory arc, given the timing (about a month after the residents broke open the Nether, which may have created a door for Dark to get to the overworld despite Federation security and set things in motion). Maybe Cucurucho sent Cellbit to investigate because it suspected Dark was up to something? Cellbit assumed the egg's fate was the Federation's doing, but why would they send him to investigate it then? Maybe it was Dark making a cheap immitation of the Federation adoption center so it could travel, and then abandoning the egg once it had what it wanted?

Cucurucho also said that Dark didn't understand the potential of the eggs, which could explain why Dark would only be able to achieve limited travel.

[cipheramnesia]

Genuine question from a newbie just dipping her toes into horror film: If Candyman isn't actually a slasher (which is all I've seen it called), what is it? And how come it keeps being misidentified as a slasher flick?

Candyman is probably misidentified as a slasher both because of its original marketing, landing in the tail end of the 80s video cassette slasher boom, and having two mediocre sequels.

Generally a slasher has a limited region and a victim pool mainly consisting of teens. For example the big three - Jason, Freddy, Michael - are all somewhat geographically fixed and almost exclusively kill kids. Usually the slasher is specifically intertwined with fears pertaining to the transition between childhood and adulthood such as increasing independence and of course burgeoning sexuality. The victims typically are killed for transgressions of the child-adult boundaries such as rebelliousness, drinking, sex and so on. By and large the slashers have a character which is malevolent in a way that's divergent from mere human emotions because they are often larger than life figures of mortality and social moral codes.

On the cinematic side, most slasher movies have a very consistent plot formula and even similar shots. Usually there is an early on warning, the harbinger. This is followed by stage setting the particular vices of the victims, and some minor fake out scares, before the actual killing starts in earnest. There's inevitably some kind of POV / voyeur shot, several similar victim chase safe / fake out death sequences. A slasher subgenre is not necessary predictable but by nature it is a little bit formulaic - it's a type of character and a plot structure.

Candyman is a different kind of movie. I'm not sure it falls into a specific subgenre. It could be called horror noire, urban legend horror, and in some ways it's almost a ghost story. However there are some crucial differences.

Victim type is obvious. Candyman is not teen exclusive - nearly all of the victims in the film are full adults. Not only that, but his purpose for existing is different. He is not a governor of the transition to adulthood or a symbol of sex and mortality. Candyman exists as an urban legend and is more symbolic of the hidden secrets of ourselves and our cultural history which we try to cover over and forget.

As a personality, Candyman is not malicious, but rather tragic and romantic. His history is as a wronged man, a brilliant man horrifically killed in an act of racist violence. People who call him are summoning this combination of a deeply intellectual and passionate artist, and the history of racial oppression in the USA. And his acts of murder are not brutal enforcement of social norms, but rather keeping his story and the horrific truth of our own past alive - being remembered.

There is nothing either metaphorically or structurally in Candyman that conforms to the slasher subgenre. The slasher killers irrevocably tie sex and death together because of how they are fundamentally linked in our lives. Candyman ties the past to the present, carrying a promise that even his victims are immortalized in legend. The slasher killers are tied to teenagers and related transitional spaces where morality and control are in flux. Candyman is tied to his own legend and the reflection of ugly truths.

Both Candyman and the slasher subgenre have deep and fascinating ideas under the surface, but they are not the same ideas, and structurally Candyman is only as passingly similar to a slasher as to any other movie. Incidentally the recent Candyman also gets this, and I highly recommend both movies. They tell horror stories that are very different from most others, and I think both are vital films to see.

[highdio]

DIO and the Plan for Heaven

I've received a lot of asks for my take on how the "plan for Heaven" in Part 6 relates back to Dio as a character. Some of these included theories and asked whether I agreed with their points. The best way to for me reply is to walk through some misconceptions I've seen repeated about the Heaven plan and at the same time give my own views on how the Stand ability that Pucci enacts in Part 6 can be reconciled with what we know about Dio in canon. Spoiler: IMO the form that the Heaven ability ultimately takes - a universal reset that grants all of humanity knowledge of their preordained fate in advance and down to the micro-level of individual occurances - is not necessarily the outcome that Dio predicted or even desired.

1) The "Heaven" that Pucci enacted in Part 6 is not derived from a subconscious psychological need for security or safety on Dio's part.

This seems basic but I've seen this in comments: the belief that the Stand ability Pucci unlocks through Dio's "heaven" formula relates back to Dio's own need for security and peace of mind. This panel specifically gets talked about, in both discussions regarding Heaven and of Dio's larger worldview:

Of course here Dio is describing "human" needs. Dio doesn't consider himself human and doesn't include himself among those seeking these comforts. Importantly, neither does Araki:

"From perspective of the world in which living creatures naturally prey upon the weak, what DIO is doing is the correct thing. It's out of line with society's norms though, which were created to make it easier for humans to survive. Considered from the worldview of the "Law of the Jungle" [弱肉強食], DIO is acting normally. …People might say I'm anti-social when I say this, but, in a sense, DIO is someone I admire (lol)." (Jump Remix Vol.11 (March 2002), my translation).

Asked to describe his feelings on Dio, Araki heads straight into setting up a direct opposition between "society" - which provides the security, comfort and safety for its participants that Dio describes in the above panel - and Dio, who lives by what Araki calls an "anti-social" code unconcerned with these comforts. It's central enough of a character trait for Araki to say all this unprompted in response to a general ask about DIO.

So anyone claiming that Dio's Heaven plan came out of a need, conscious or not, to allay his own insecurities and for his own peace of mind ignores the fact that Araki wrote Dio with an entirely contrary mindset.

It's also worth considering the context of the panel, since it will relate to a discussion of whether Dio even wants a world where people know outcomes in advance. Dio is describing humankind's need for comfort and security in an attempt to convince Polnareff to submit and to continue to serve him. Araki ties all of this to fear: Polnareff must either give into his fear and resign himself to a comfortable life of submission or he must overcome his fear and reject those comforts.

ofc Dio is playing a game with Polnareff at the same time, using time-stop assisted sleight-of-hand to convince Polnareff that his own body is physically submitting, unconsciously descending the same two stairs. This game, where fear and submission are directly tied to the promise of comfort and security, presents choosing the comforts of society as the weaker, non-heroic path. tl;dr, accepting the security that Dio describes in that panel is a bad thing. Keep this fact in the back of your mind.

If Dio isn't motivated by a need for security, and instead lives according to rules of the natural world, maybe Dio wanted a universe where all of humanity knows its fate in advance for practical reasons, i.e., it would make humans resigned to their fates and simple to rule over?

Again, we need to consider what, exactly, this would mean for Dio.

2) Dio did not intend to create a world where all of humanity became resigned to its fate as a means of ruling over mankind, because this would remove all the pleasure of accumulating and exerting power.

I've discussed this before: Dio actually likes people who take the most arduous path, seemingly rebelling against their own security and comfort. While it is possible that Dio wanted humans to be more docile, this would definitely take away one of Dio's favorite hobbies: subjecting humans to extreme psychological pressure to see how they react, something Dio indulges in regularly. The Heaven achieved by Pucci (a universe where everything is known in advance by its participants) would mean that everything - from that lady sacrificing herself so her baby could be spared in Part 1 to Hol Horse trying to shoot Dio in the back - would be robbed of all dramatic tension. A knowable universe is a boring one. Dio as an immortal would be highly aware of this. And we know that Dio loves a good fight (Araki draws Dio at his most alive and expressive during direct physical confrontation) and loves an opponent who fights back (it's the reason he moves from disdain to respect for Jonathan over the course of Part 1 and the reason he "realizes he likes" Hol after Hol's rebellion). A known universe changes the very nature of "fighting back." When opponents know the outcome of a fight before it starts, combat is reduced to simply going through the motions.

In short, Pucci's universe makes it too easy for a guy who is all about the drama of testing and transcending limits. It would take all the pleasure out of being Dio.

This is where the value judgment I discussed earlier comes in, the one where the comfortable path is also the easy one, and where choosing security means choosing resignation and cowardace. How is it possible then to assert that Dio wants a universe, an eternity, where everything is resignation? It isn't, and he doesn't.

(Here I should point out the obvious fact that the Dio and Pucci flashbacks in Part 6 take place, from a timeline perspective, concurrent with Part 3. While it's surprisingly often that people attribute what they perceive as a difference in Dio between Parts 3 and Part 6 as an easing or maturing in Dio's outlook over time and reflection, there can be no evolution or softening in Dio's thinking between Parts 3 and 6 because there is no time gap. Dio's words in Part 3, if we take them at face value (since sometimes he lies), reflect what he's thinking at the same time he's devising his plan for "Heaven.")

Instead, there's a telling scene early in Part 3 where Dio discusses that "standing at the top of the World" means overcoming fear:

Now consider the Heaven ability that Pucci unlocks at the end of Stone Ocean within the context of this monologue as well as the Polnareff stairway scene. Knowing your fate - the ultimate goal of the universal reset - isn't overcoming fear, it's having the hardship of fear removed. "Fear" in the above passage results from the experience of failure and the reflexive bodily reaction during future struggles to the possibility that one will fail again. When all is known in advance, this fear is removed. The possibility for "conquering" fear that Dio describes to Enya is likewise removed altogether.

Additionally, in Part 6 and while discussing "Heaven" with Pucci, Dio directly states that "true happiness cannot be attained… by being the ruler of the human race," contrasting this with the true victory of "getting to see Heaven." This dialog yet again gives the lie to an assertion that Dio wants universal precognition as a practical means to easily dominate all of humanity.

3) IMO Dio did not know what form the "Heaven" ability would take, just that it would be an OP, transcendent power.

I've talked about this before too but one of the coolest elements to the Heaven formula is how gnostic it is. Some people just ignore this fact, but it's critically important to look at how Araki chose to characterize the "formula for Heaven." 14 cryptic words, the "souls of 36 sinners," a specific latitude and longitude, the phases of the moon. This is esoteric, occult-type stuff. Add to this Dio's own description of how the destruction of his stand will "give birth to something entirely new":

This language is extremely important. It seems the critical detail that's missing from the formula of heaven is what shape exactly the "heaven" ability will take. The outcome of Dio's heaven plan is missing from the formula because that outcome - "whatever is born" - will be revealed through the process. This is precisely why "courage" is needed: this is a leap of faith into the unknown.

It stands to reason that Dio himself would be uncertain what power would be unlocked through the formula. After all, this theme is a throughline throughout Dio's life: Dio constantly does stuff where the outcome is both unknown and radical. Using the stone mask, taking and assimilating Jonathan's body, powering up on Joseph's blood: Dio's pursuit of power consistently leads him to make "leaps" where the outcome is knowable only as "something new" and something transcendent. So it's not just plausible that Dio didn't know what new ability would emerge with the destruction of his Stand, it's in character. And of course, unknowability and the need for "courage" in the face of an unforeseen outcome directly mirrors Dio's assertion in Part 3 that "the one to stand at the top of the World" is the one who "conquers Fear."

4) Pucci has as much a role as Dio in shaping the form that the "Heaven" ability ultimately takes.

If you ignore all of the above and instead assert that Dio had his plan fully mapped out and specifically envisioned a future where he and all of humanity were disavowed of the illusion of free will - comforted by going through the motions of a fate they had already lived through - then Pucci himself becomes unimportant. The character gets reduced to a simple cog or a lackey, carrying out the gruntwork of an absent master architect.

Instead, imo the specific backstory and worldview that Pucci brings to his and Dio's relationship is the key element that shapes the form that "Heaven" eventually takes. After all - this point is not debatable - it's Pucci himself, not Dio, who seems most in need of the comfort, the certainty and security, that a universe in which all know their fate would provide. Pucci's entire backstory is built around the trauma of unforeseen consequence. The reset universe really is, then, the realization of Pucci's own personal "Heaven."

Please keep in mind that Dio did not expect to die and fully expected to be the one to enact the Heaven formula himself. Of course Jotaro had something to say about this, so instead we get Dio's disciple and "trusted friend" executing the formula.

(Add to that the obvious, meta fact that Araki developed the "plan for Heaven" specifically for Part 6. The plan (or even the notion of "getting to Heaven") isn't mentioned in any prior part, and isn't part of Dio's story anywhere prior. In the true "meta" sense (e.g., the real-life production conditions surrounding the fictional work), the Heaven plan is written by Araki for Part 6 and as the major driver of Pucci's story, inseparable from the character. Araki tightly tailored Pucci's backstory around the idea that bad twists of fate sow profound misery and that knowledge of what fate has in store can allay inevitable suffering, the premise of the universal reset. Even Pucci being a priest has obvious synergy with the concept of "Heaven." Without Part 6, without Pucci, the heaven storyline never gets written. And within the story itself, without Pucci the formula to get to "Heaven" is never enacted.)

All of this is to say that discussions that try to link the reset universe and resultant universal precognition too closely to Dio's own personality, his backstory and his philosophies ignore the fact that Heaven was enacted by the gravitational convergence of two individuals who each brought something to the formula. Dio strongly shaped the course that Pucci's life took and Pucci in turn shaped the form that "Heaven" took.

[sunfl0wersandillusions]

people always all the time talking abt mithrun’s eye turning silver as he’s realizing his feelings for kabru yes yes we all know this. classic. however i don’t necessarily think this would happen in the middle of them makin out or whatever. the eye changes as he’s experiencing *desire*, right, not just something he feels passionately about in the moment.

so walk with me here. mithrun’s alone in whatever house or apartment or whatever he’s living in. and he sees the stove, where kabru’s prepared a really lovely utayan-style stew for them to share to make sure he’s eating well. empty. the table where they sit and eat together. empty. even like. a really big chair, big enough for two bodies to occupy, where kabru collapsed with delayed physical-but-mostly-social exhaustion after a long day of work into travel into cooking (the skills of which he’s never been terribly comfortable) and mithrun, taking note of his fullness after the meal, tuning into his own body for once, thinks “yeah i could rest” and joins him sinking into the big chair. empty. and he thinks about these things empty. and he thinks about them full. how they feel right one way, and wrong the other. and he sits in the dining table chair and looks at the empty one across from him and feels this want so deep and crucial as an existential moral code, and kabru bursts in for his regular (but not so regular as to be evenly predictable) check in because mithrun keeps the door unlocked because it’s only ever kabru who comes and it’s only ever a net positive when he does. and they lock eyes. and yeah yeah you get it

[yutori-do]

The four things I notice and hate the most in Gai's (bad) characterization:

Intelligence: In some fics they make him completely stupid, with no ability to conform to social labels or understand what they say to him without rethinking it, and that makes my blood boil because this guy is anything but stupid; He is an avid learner and always seeks improvement (genin at 7, chuunin at 11. He may not be Kakashi but he is still quite a lot, right?), able to predict, if I remember correctly, up to a hundred movements of his enemy before to be executed, someone who thinks quickly in battle and very adaptable.

My God, he drives NUNCHAKUS and you think he's incapable of concentrating? I understand that it is one thing to sit down and study and another to train, but I don't think GAI, of all people, wouldn't take on such a challenge. Appearing empty-minded is his facade, his mask. The only way I can accept that he's pretty stupid is if it's because of the trauma of losing his father, he clings to the attitude of a child as a way to feel like he's back in his childhood. AND YET-

Okay, next point.

Darkness: This man was literally beaten by chuunin because when he was a child just for being the son of a outcast of Konoha, they made fun of him and probably isolated him from the rest as a child, and he has also been under a strict exercise regimen since he was 5 years old. An exercise that made him fall from fatigue and pain, and he, despite everything, continued to get up, continued to force himself to overcome the pain. Gai's darkness is not easily detected because he is not visibly cruel to anyone but himself; The only way he is easily seen is with his relationship with Lee, his dedication to put him through everything he put Lee through even though he is the person Gai loves the most (possibly after his father). The way he pushed his (Lee's) limits to the point of telling Lee that he should face death to hold onto some hope for a better future (to be a shinobi again) is very dark. The relationship he has with Rock Lee ironically brings out the worst parts of Gai, and there we enter the next point.

Cruelty: Gai is a character who has been shown to have an extremely strong code of values, in which benevolence always comes first; He is empathetic in a world where that is condemning, he is kind to people who at best only make fun of him for how he looks. In short, a great person. But that does not mean that he is not cruel, that he hesitates when killing; he is still a soldier, a child soldier who participated in a war based more on ego than anything else. His moral code does not prevent him from killing, but rather makes him limit himself, to limit himself to what is absolutely necessary. If he has defeated his opponents and thus achieved his mission, then he will not kill, because the rest are shinobi like him and also had a mission.

We've only seen traces of Gai's cruelty throughout Naruto, small flashes of what he truly is in battle. Do you seriously think that the title of Beast is achieved only by defeating enemies? It is not even a specific animal, but literally: Konoha's Beast of Prey.

And what is a beast but an animal that kills cruelly? One kick of his was capable of breaking rocks when he was just a child. What prevents him from punching through his opponent's chest? Breaking skulls using just his fingers? You're not going to tell me that someone like him, with his strength, is not capable of ripping off your arm in a single movement.

Gai is capable of great, great cruelty cultivated by years of being humiliated by the village he now protects with his life, by the Village for which he destroys his body day by day. Still, his morals prevail, but it does not mean that cruelty is inappropriate for him.

And possibly the root of all his problems...

Death Wish: Dying for the Village is something that is as ingrained in how Gai thinks as any Konoha child, but this takes a drastic turn when his father sacrifices himself to save him. His father was, despite being ashamed of him, his World. The only person who loved him with everything, who showed him sweetness and tenderness in everything, he who took care of him as the most precious thing he had. In a place where everyone hated him and slowly began to change because Gai was useful to them, only his father loved him unconditionally, no matter what.

It is not specified how old Gai was when his father dies, but he can be placed after 11 and before 14, and that is possibly the source of what he is like; totally adhered to what his father was in an attempt to demonstrate that Maito Dai was a great man and shinobi through his legacy of the Eight Gates, his greatest and only technique. It is known that before he was 20 he had already acquired his title of the Blue Beast of Konoha, so it is accurate to say that he already knew how to open the Seventh Gate, at LESS THAN TWENTY YEARS OLD, the time it took his father to master the technique.

Gai's desire for death and his perspective of it is shown by his speech about Lee's highly risky surgery; If he can't live fully as a ninja, then he doesn't want to live. For him, Death is a price, the most precious coin that he is able to throw to prove something, to prove that he is worth something in a world where Death is common, where he was expected not to survive, much less prosper.

He lives life to the fullest, being his best person, enduring whatever it takes because he knows that his end, his death, when it happens, will show everyone that he was never weak, that he was incredibly powerful, and for someone who grew up being treated as the lowest scum except by his father, who ended up dying in a blaze of glory as an outcast, a death like that is the highest he can aspire to. For him, the only destiny is death, and the only way to prove his worth. And that's not fucked?

(And if you want to add another tragedy, possibly the Eighth Gate was a relief during the war because Gai's death cannot go unnoticed, hidden. Being someone who had so many limitations, being at a significant disadvantage, and being sent to war so young, where the majority are children or other young people who die anonymously, the Eight Gates were his way of establishing that no, he would not be killed, because he would kill himself first. Oh, now i know why he respected Kisame so much at the end.)

[mostlysignssomeportents]

When parties fail, movements step up

This Saturday (19 Aug), I'm appearing at the San Diego Union-Tribune Festival of Books. I'm on a 2:30PM panel called "Return From Retirement," followed by a signing:

https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/festivalofbooks

Does anyone like the American two party system? The parties are opaque, private organizations, weak institutions that are prone to capture and corruption, and gerrymandering's "safe seats" means that the real election often takes place in the party's smoke-filled rooms, when a sure-thing candidate is selected:

https://doctorow.medium.com/weak-institutions-a26a20927b27

But there doesn't seem to be any way to fix it. For one thing, the two parties are in charge of any reform, and they're in no hurry to put themselves out of business. It's effectively impossible for a third party to gain any serious power in the USA, and that's by design. After the leftist Populists party came within a spitting distance of power in the 1890s, the Dems and Repubs got together and cooked the system, banning fusion voting and erecting other structural barriers.

The Nader and Perot campaigns were doomed from the outset, in other words. Either candidate could have been far more popular than the D and R on the ballot, and they still would have lost. It's how the deck is stacked, and to unstack it, reformers would need to take charge of at least one – and probably both – of the parties.

But that's not cause for surrender – it's a call to action. In an interview with Seymour Hersh, Thomas Frank (Listen, Liberal) sets out another locus of power, one with the potential to deliver control over the party to its base: social movements:

https://seymourhersh.substack.com/p/ordinary-people-by-the-millions

It's been done before. The parties are routinely transformed by power-shifts within their internal coalitions: since 1970, corporate Dems have consistently pushed the party to the right, making it the power of white-collar professionals and relying on working people showing up and marking their ballots with a D because they have "nowhere else to go."

Bill Clinton was the most successful of these corporate raiders, delivering the parts of the Reagan Revolution that Reagan himself could never have managed: dismantling tariffs and bank regulations, passing the crime bill and welfare "reform." He came within a whisper of (partially) privatizing Social Security.

This set in motion the forces that made Trumpism possible: when Dems told deindustrialized workers to "learn to code" and blamed them for the destruction of their communities, it opened a space for Make America Great Again, the (empty) workerist rhetoric of the GOP. The Dems' plan of putting "really smart people" in charge and letting them run things was a (predictable) disaster. "Really smart" isn't the same as "infallible" and really smart people can be spooked or bulled into doing the wrong thing – like Obama "foaming the runways" for the banks with the houses of mortgage holders, and leaving the bankers responsible for the Great Financial Crisis unscathed:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/03/15/mon-dieu-les-guillotines/#ceci-nes-pas-une-bailout

"Really smart people" can't get us out of this mess. Instead, we need the kind of muscular political action – the "whirlwind" – that characterized FDR's New Deal: "complete reformation of the banking industry.. just about every other industry as well. Regulation. Social Security. Public works. Antitrust. Soil conservation."

FDR got there by alienating his former classmates and refusing the go-slow entreaties of his cronies. He got there because there was a mass social movement that made him do it ("I want to do it, now make me do it"):

https://humanizingthevacuum.wordpress.com/2014/09/16/i-agree-with-you-i-want-to-do-it-now-make-me-do-it/

Every time in US history where one of the political party duopoly listened to its base, it was because of a mass social movement: the farmers' movement (1890s), labor (1930s), civil rights and antiwar (1960s). As Frank says:

Social movements succeed. They build and they change the intellectual climate and then, when the crisis comes, they make possible things like agrarian reform or the New Deal or the Civil Rights acts of the 1960s.

Today, we see the seeds of those social movements: the new union movement. Black Lives Matter. Neobrandeisians with their "hipster antitrust." These are the movements that are creating "ideas lying around": ideas that, in time of crisis, can move from the fringe to the center in an eyeblink:

https://doctorow.medium.com/ideas-lying-around-33a28901a7ae

They are setting in motion another transformation of the Democratic Party, from its top-down, "really smart people" model to a bottom-up, people-powered one, kept in check by movements, not party bosses. As Frank says, "They require the mass participation of ordinary people. Without that, I am afraid that nothing is possible."

I'm kickstarting the audiobook for "The Internet Con: How To Seize the Means of Computation," a Big Tech disassembly manual to disenshittify the web and make a new, good internet to succeed the old, good internet. It's a DRM-free book, which means Audible won't carry it, so this crowdfunder is essential. Back now to get the audio, Verso hardcover and ebook:

http://seizethemeansofcomputation.org

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/08/17/popular-front-of-judea/#speaking-frankly

[1rubydoodles]

stanford is autistic-coded and that really affected his relationship with fiddleford (tbob spoilers)

(I want to start off saying I’m autistic and might rant about Arthur a bit here because it’s a 10+ year strong special interest and you just have to deal with it)

“another day, another failed social interaction.” (ford, the book of bill)

“when my waitress told me the apple pie was made ‘from scratch,’ I replied, ‘incredible! I must meet the chef who created the atoms!’ She made a face like she had tasted bleach and ended her shift early.”

I read this imagining ford smiling, expecting a laugh from the waitress. I know so many autistic people who make jokes like this, it really to me doesn’t seem much different from the jokes that people do like. Taking things and shifting their meaning. The children’s show Arthur put it best in the episode “When Carl Met George” (or, “Carl and the Missing Puzzle Piece”, definitely check it out, although it was made in 2010 so it uses an outdated term and has few stereotypes)

Basically in that episode, autism was described as George crash landing on an alien planet with no instructions.

here’s some of the transcript:

“(narrator): …And even though you speak the same language, you sometimes have a hard time understanding what they mean.

Francine (as alien): Good night for a banana fight, right?

George: Um, yes? No! I don't know!”

Arthur (as alien) walks up to them wearing flippers, a tutu, a huge bow tie and a hat of whipped cream with a cherry. His outfit is absolutely ridiculous.

“(narrator): and things that seem hilarious to you…

George: (laughs)

 (narrator): ...aren't funny at all to them.

Arthur (as alien): What's he laughing at? Is it my nose?

Francine (as alien): I have no idea. You're weird!

Francine and Arthur walk off.

George: But it was a joke, right? Oh.”

this basically describes the situation perfectly. on top of that, I know of autistic men that seem like they are being aggressive or sarcastic to women when they make these jokes, most likely what happened during this dining incident. (which, honestly, women go through a lot of shit with men and I don’t blame them if they assume the worst.)

But let’s go to fidds and fords relationship. (romantic or not.)

I’ve seen so many fiddlestan posts shaming ford for what are just autistic qualities to justify their ship being superior. (ex. One post said “stan recognized when fidds was distressed unlike SOME people” in a fanfic, which is both shaming ford and pretty uncanon seeming)*

I really don’t think ford realized fidds wasn’t ok until it all fell apart. he closest he goes is basically “fidds seems jittery from the whole shapeshifter thing so we can just relax and that will fix it.” I think it’s a common autistic mentality that “if this happens I can fix it with this, and that will solve the problem.”

many people on the spectrum have logical systematic thinking and a preference for clear rules with predictable outcomes.

I think that’s the closest ford ever got to thinking that something was wrong.

I think he never realized fidds was actually going insane. All he thought was that he was going to betray him because of Bill and that black ring.

“it became clear how deeply I had hurt this man I once held so dear.”(ford, journal 3)

I really think he held onto the thought that fidds betrayed him. autistic people are also a lot of times easier to manipulate due to challenges in seeing deception, probably why bill saw him as an easy target.

but of course, fidds in the end with his big heart and amazing mind forgave ford. i’m almost positive he knew ford thought different.

and probably got fiddle𝓯𝓻𝓮𝓪𝓴𝔂 with him later

Edit: I should mention that the whole “I’ve seen so many fiddlestan posts shaming ford for what are just autistic qualities. (ex.“stan recognized when fidds was distressed unlike SOME people”)” is just a common type of thing I see in fiddlestan posts and fanfics. I really doubt that Stan WOULD do that, but fiddlestan shippers are a whole different breed ig. Edited again for clarity on the same thing

[littlestsnicket]

more disparate iwtv thoughts

- the key to understanding loustat is that lestat falls for louis for the following reasons in this order: 1 louis’ capacity for violence, 2 louis being fucking gorgeous, and 3. louis having enough inner conflict and desire for self knowledge to occupy him for at least a dozen human lifetimes. lestat falls for louis because he thinks louis would make an excellent vampire, and nothing that happens over the intervening decades changes his mind. he believes he knows louis better than louis knows himself, and, narratively, on a number of points he is right. while this would be horrifying in real life, it’s extremely compelling in fiction

- i hate hate hate the idea that love isn’t real if it’s destructive. and i actually see that at least as much from entertainment journalists as fandom. lestat loves louis. armand loves louis. louis loves claudia. that doesn’t mean their relationships are good or positive or anything else. louis loves lestat. louis loved armand once, at least. (claudia loves louis but that’s not really relevant here.)

- relatedly cannot stop thinking about assad saying armand just wants to be loved. 100% correct. the fact that this desire is filtered through centuries of maladaptive coping mechanisms does not make it less true.

- louis has never used social media of any kind. he has a desktop computer to access email and databases of property and art. computers are for work. anything time sensitive gets filtered through armand or his staff.

- armand spends a lot of time on twitter and like 8chan searching for victims. this means he can code switch into perfect tech bro. daniel and lestat find this deeply unnerving. louis doesn’t spend enough time online to really understand what armand is doing. armand used to spend a lot of time on reddit, but even he could tell that the arguments he kept getting obsessed over were bad for him so he had to stop.

- lestat is a tumblr girly. he writes questionable sad poetry and posts artsy pictures. he occasionally gets really into fandom. he is a hannigram shipper. he has the worlds most eclectic music side blog.

- daniel is on twitter in a professional capacity, but he spends enough time there, both doing legitimate investigation and doom scrolling, to be relatively up on modern slang and what is trendy with the youth.

- anyway, my point is, even though lestat and especially armand are most comfortable expressing themselves in a way that is vaguely archaic, louis is the one most likely to need technology/modern phrasing explained to him. but also not that often, he does get out of the house and interacts with real people so he stays pretty up to date.

- i think claudia would entirely mirror louis in regard to computer usage. or maybe not. claudia would be an early internet adopter. she misses usenet and refuses to use any web 2.0. she wouldn’t even use google. she runs into armand on the darknet. mostly she and madeline would run an organic farm in the french countryside using corpses as fertilizer.

- louis and armand are both switches and into violent bloody sex. the fact that most of their sex since paris has been mutually unfulfilling is an achievement. (louis just… isn’t very good at stoping armand from turning sex into trauma reenactment time TM. louis doesn’t like it but armand is very insistent and louis is often lowkey angry at him to start with. they’re both at fault here.) (i’m not going to look up the exact quote but ‘half blank half apocalyptic, what’s it going to be this time? are you gonna want to lick my boots or cut my head off?’ says so so much about loumand.) (and ugh louis wanting predictability after lestat and that being his initial impression of armand and getting mr trauma gremlin instead…)

[merrivia]

We all know that Damen being gifted to Laurent was the Regent's true misstep, and that Damen was exactly what Laurent needed in every way (to heal his heart and to win his throne). But I love how bad a mistake it truly was, and how there was actually no way the plan would have worked.

Firstly, the Regent underestimated Laurent’s cleverness, his cool minded Machiavellian wiles had duped his uncle, as Laurent clearly used spies etc.,. to keep an eye on Akielos and Damen without the Regent knowing, so he could recognise him. And secondly, and more importantly, the Regent underestimated Laurent’s goodness, that he still had a moral code, and that he hadn’t succeeded in corrupting Laurent- because even if Laurent hadn’t known that Damen was Prince Damianos the plan still would have failed, as he would have let him go, something we find out in King's Rising ("You hate the idea of slavery. It turns your stomach.’ Damen said it, a flat statement of truth. ‘If I’d been anyone else, you would have freed me on the first night.’").

I’m working on a huge meta on Laurent and one thing that was saddening me was how well the Regent knows him, that for a novel and half it seems, he is the person who knows Laurent best.

Somehow this does give me solace that the Regent always underestimated him. Maybe this is the Regent’s true blind spot, because it was so alien to him. That’s also why he couldn’t predict that Nicaise would steal the letter to try and help Laurent, that Laurent would sacrifice himself for Damen and that Damen would then do the same for him, that Loyse would put her child before her husband and social status, and Paschal would finally stand up and tell the truth….that people can be inherently good, and make the right choice in the end. And that’s what leads to his downfall.