#because there isn't really a difference between whats only “real” because its a social construct and whats real because It Is

[yael-art-den]

Thinking about Uruna's magic, spellcasters and spells. I didn't want humans to be able to just Cast Shit like a DnD wizard, as most of the magic is locked behind the Cuayada and therefore only creatures from the mist can create magical effects and "do magic" the regular way.

And then I started reading the Adivías and the legends around old weavers that were just local folklore witches. + somehow this conected with the post of "if crochet it's just 0s and 1s you can crochet Doom"

So what if very intricate weaving can create magic. You wouldn't be able to just cast a spell on the fly, but expert weavers could be able to create long-term effects, such as, say, magical HRT. The bigger the weave the more palpable the effects but also more obvious that it's a spell and not a weird rug or something

AND WITH THAT now I can start thinking about gender and how it's thought that only women can be spellweavers just because the activity is tradicionally associated with women. Covens would have their own form of power in the way that they can choose who learns what, and keeping It gender-locked would mean keeping that trace of somewhat power over a tradicionally misoginist culture

[nemesis-is-my-middle-name]

I remember something from quite some time ago, where an anon was asking about something something if Ingo was taken back, but his pre-hisui self was still there something something identity issues (I went looking but couldn't find it so I don't remember the exact question), and you said that, by pretty much every metric, pre-hisui Ingo was a more real Ingo than post-hisui Ingo was. Because he remembers everything, has the right bonds and connections, etc. Which makes me wonder how Ingo would think of Helic? To Emmet, when he learns the truth, Helic is a fake Ingo who was trying to taking Ingo's place for reasons only the disk understands, and he has complicated feelings about that. To Ingo, Helic might feel a more accurate Ingo than he himself is. I think that Emmet would still prefer the real Ingo to Helic though, even if Helic acted more like how he expects and remembers Ingo to. It's gotta be pretty uncomfortable to hear someone tell you that they love you, because everyone's knowledge that Ingo-loves-Emmet basically forced them to.

ohh yeah no i remember that but i also can't find it bc it wasn't tagged as anything specific i don't think. augh.

anyway. yeah if ingo has his memories this isn't so much of an issue but if he STILL mostly has amnesia this gets REALLY complicated and messy. because like, yeah, ingo's in the same physical form and helic's in a new one—but helic also occupies the social position identified with "ingo" and post-hisui ingo doesn't. how much does that weigh on personhood? does helic consider itself ingo? probably not, based on what we've said, but then, how much weight does your own self-perception have on identity? because ultimately, the difference between the two of them comes entirely down to the unmeasurable internal self-perception each possesses. neither of them have the "right" memories, really. "ingo" has almost none of them, and helic does have them but they're all from the wrong perspective, from an external viewpoint. if the true version of those memories, from ingo's own perspective, is irrecoverable, which one is "better" or more "correct"? does a lack of memory negate an identity? does seeing one person from an external viewpoint make it impossible to truly be them? helic's own programming would insist that it is ingo. but does that very statement, that something is ordering it, also negate it?

if i remember correctly, where i eventually came down on that other ask was the "a person is a pigeonhole" line of thought. each identity is a box, and everyone must occupy one, and no more than one person can occupy a single one. so in that sense, i would argue that helic can't be ingo because it's too busy being the rift-construct, which is its own identity with its own connections and perceptions. and since warden ingo is a nonperson in the modern day, and based on where the people around him would like to put him, ingo would naturally occupy the ingo-box.

but that's my own opinion and when you're actually one of the people involved you tend to get much less rational about it, so ingo probably starts and ends his rationalization at "the construct has been here longer and knows more about me and so has more claim to the identity than i do." while helic would be torn between the preexisting moral feeling that it isn't ingo and should stop lying about that, and its programmed insistence that it be ingo.

anyway. does that make sense. yeah it's Funky

[toadlilyaus]

Okay this is like 90% true but also 10% false.

Like "court" is just what they call the US Olympic exy team (for some reason) so while "the perfect court" isn't like its own separate team its essentially an 'elite' group within the US Olympic team. Like Riko, Kevin, and Jean were at one point on that Olympic team (its mentioned once or twice but not nearly enough that Kevin was simultaneously on the Ravens, the Olympic team, and some random pro team all at the same time before Riko broke his hand.)

They obviously weren't the ONLY people on the Olympic team, but the idea behind it was that Riko was going to sort of predict who would qualify for the Olympic team and eventually, at some point, would have named enough people in the right positions for the entirety of the team to be made up of the 'perfect court' that he selected. Now whether or not Riko would have ever actually gotten around to finding and claiming people to make up the rest of the team or if he just liked dangling the idea of it over people's head like a bargaining chip or a noose is a separate matter. But it wasn't purely a thought experiment either. The 'perfect court' was an imaginary future version of the 'Olympic court' that Riko would have hand selected. And with him and Kevin as the strikers, Jean and Neil as the back liners, and the implication that he at one point was considering Andrew as his goalie, they were really just a couple dealers away from having a full starting line up.

So like, yes, it's not anything official. There's functionally and practically no difference between being 'perfect court' and being 'court' beyond getting a number tattooed on your face and the hype boost from the fans from your having being 'selected' and 'claimed' by 'the king of exy'. But it's also not like a 100% fake concept.

It's a social construct being powered by Riko, yes, the same way fans will separate out a 'big three' of any given sport or show or what have you and say "these are the best, these are the ones everyone knows about". It was a way of very publicly and permanently saying "yeah sure, other people have talent, but THESE GUYS are gonna be the biggest names in exy." And then because Riko said it, (and because hes "the king" ,) it became true. Ya know what I mean?

So when people say that Jean and Neil were forced to be perfect court, they don't necessarily mean they were being forced to join a specific pro team or whatever, they mean they were forced to be part of Riko's inner circle and forced to perform both as an athlete and a celebrity on the level of being 'the best of the best' (the way getting declared as part of this imagined 'perfect' future line up for the Olympics would entail.)

It's like 90% everything OP mentioned about Riko claiming ownership and using the Ravens cult like mentality to have people fight for positions he had no intention of ever giving them. But also like it does very much so come with certain professional 'perks' as well as expectations that you would not only be on the Olympic team, but be the very best at it.

You don't need to be 'perfect court' to still make court. But the implication is that once Riko had formed his full team lineup, everyone who wasn't part of it would lose their spot to whoever Riko chose to fill that position. Like being 'court' but not 'perfect court' was basically like making the team with the understanding that you were just the temporary understudy who would one day get ousted by the real star. That's why everyone else wanted it so badly. Can you imagine fulfilling a childhood dreams of making it to the Olympics just to have everyone treat you like you don't really matter still? all because this one guy didn't give you his personal stamp of approval? Like sure you made the team, but your not Micheal Phelps, your not Simone Biles, you're not Kevin Day, so who gives a shit.

And that's very true of real life in a way, like how many Olympic level athletes can you name off the top of your head without looking it up? Maybe one or two per sport, if that, right? Unless you're involved in the sport yourself, you probably only really pay attention to the names the media tells you to. It's about who shows up on talk shows and gets their face on a cereal box and all that. You might be a great athlete, you might even have better scores than the dude everyone is paying attention to, but if you don't have the 'star quality' to back that talent up no one's gonna remember you over the person with magazine spreads and thirst trap edits getting made about them online.

Being made 'perfect court' was Riko very much so taking ownership of your life in a symbolic if not literally way. But it was also him telling the world "These one's. These are the names you will actually remember. These are the people who matter. These are the people who will bring home the gold."

So like.... mostly fake. But also very real for anyone who truly believes in it. And it's not an official special contract or anything. But it is a guaranteed 'sucessful' future in the sport. And it's not it's own separate team. But it would be one day. In theory. And it has nothing to do with talent level. But it does. Because these are the names the world will remember and the order they will remember them in.

Hold on yall realize the perfect court isn't...real, right?

Like that's the big tragedy here. The perfect court isn't a real team, they don't belong to any league. There's no tryouts and no recruiting and no contracts. It's made up. It's all made up.

That's why the Ravens spend years fighting for numbers Riko never even considered giving them. Why a 16 year old without a game to his name debuts with a number and why their biggest critic has one forced on him within two weeks in the Nest. They were never a mark of skill, despite the correlation. They were never an attainable goal, or even a reward for sufficient sycophanthy.

The perfect court was always and solely defined by Riko's total ownership of their lives. It's an abusive social circle invented by a pair of 10 year olds and perpetuated by cult dynamics and overpriced stadium merchandise.

[ergativeabsolutive]

no wait spill the calendar nerd discourse, I want to know how we know that it's really tuesday

Well, what is Tuesday? The easy answer is that Tuesday is kind of a social construct and it's only "Tuesday" relative to our specific calendar system, which is 100% a human invention, but that goes without saying. I don't even need to say that weekdays as a concept are far from unique to the now-dominant western calendar, but I don't think it's useful to equate different calendars with each other (and more importantly i'm way more knowledgeable about the system I actually use and the history surrounding it), so I'm going to limit this to the system where today is actually called tuesday.

The real answer is that our calendar isn't just some arbitrary thing that we're just "keeping track of", but a complicated mathematical system that has been kept under extreme scrutiny for generations by nerds and religious officials all over the world to ensure that it remains in sync with various astronomical features, the seasons, holidays, etc. In fact, it was designed that way intentionally, so that we wouldn't have to "keep track", as that post says.

The Roman calendar was originally a 355-day lunar calendar, and like other lunar calendars, it was supposed to have an additional intercalary month every few years, which in the case of the Roman calendar was traditionally between February and March. Unlike modern lunar calendars though, the way this was supposed to work wasn't really codified, and instead it was placed in the hands of the priests to "keep track of", which as you can imagine usually meant "manipulate for political purposes". For example, if someone you don't like is in elected office, maybe the year should be shorter so they have a shorter term... 😏

That also meant that if Rome's religious officials were ever, say, busy doing other shit, sometimes the calendar would just get neglected and be allowed to get out of sync. So when Julius Caesar was elected pontifex maximus, and then proceeded to spend over a decade at war, the calendar basically got an entire season out of sync, because he was too busy fighting to actually do his job effectively. That's why, after the civil war ended and his power was secure, one of the first things he did was solicit the help of Egyptian astronomers to invent the Julian calendar. It was intentionally designed to keep track of the seasons etc. without human intervention, because clearly "human intervention" wasn't working. And for what it's worth, the Gregorian calendar is basically only a relatively minor adjustment to that same system, which otherwise has worked pretty consistently ever since. In other words, that post is kind of talking about a problem that really did exist at one time, but was already identified and solved over 2000 years ago.

Of course, at the time, the Roman calendar didn't have a 7-day week at all, they used an 8 day week, which operated according to its own rules and I don't really know much about it tbh. But I go into all this because, as far as the Romans and the people who use their calendar are concerned, the transition to the 7 day week happened after the Julian reform, which means that this transition happened relatively recently, well within recorded history, grounded in a system we know was already internally consistent. And in fact the 7 day cycle that the Romans gradually began to adopt around this time came to them via Greek astrologers, who based their system on the traditions that had already existed in West Asia. When the Romans adopted the 7 day week, they named the days of the week after the classical planets, and by extension, the gods associated with them. So, Tuesday is called "Tuesday" (tīwesdæġ/Tīwas dag) because for astrological reasons they associated this particular day in the 7-day cycle with Mars, and the Romans equated their god of war Mars with the Germanic war god Tyr/Tiwaz, so it ended up getting called that in English/other Germanic languages. It's important to mention that early on, this astrology-based naming system could be interpreted differently depending on when one considered the day to begin in the first place. It's possible to imagine a timeline where today was actually named "Saturday" in our system instead, without actually being a different day. Regardless though, there is, at least, archaeological evidence of dates as we would expect them to be, knowing this, being recorded just under 2000 years ago. So yeah, today really is Tuesday (or Saturday ig). It's definitely not Wednesday or Sunday, at least.

Despite the pagan roots of the weekday names though, the actual transition to the 7 day week as the default, as you might expect, is associated with the rise of Christianity, and the system as we know it was eventually codified by Constantine. And of course, once you have a consistent pattern codified into both religious and secular law, it's kind of hard to screw up. And again, we haven't.

tldr "tuesday" as such is kind of an arbitrary concept, but we know that the underlying calendar system is consistent, and Tuesday itself came about through, to put things extremely simply, the interaction between astrology and something like at least half a dozen different cultural-religious traditions, such that it doesn't really make sense to think today is anything else while you're still adhering the Gregorian calendar at all. As far as I'm concerned, "is today really tuesday" is two separate questions: "Is our calendar system internally consistent or has there been a mistake in its reckoning of days since it was codified" (which this answer was about, and the answer is yes) and "has the 7 day week in general stayed consistent and been accurately reckoned for its entire history and was that accurately integrated into our system in the first place", but that's more of a historical and religious question, and as far as I'm concerned it doesn't really have to have anything to do with with "Tuesday" or secular dating.

[kendrixtermina]

Since you seem to enjoy analyzing stories I was wondering if you have any advice on what to do when your mind narrows in on critical aspects? I usually really enjoy analyzing media but recently I found that my mind tends to hyper-focus on aspects that I don't like even when I'm actively trying to ignore it and focus on what I do like. So I was just curious if you have tips for dealing with it and/or getting out of this mindset. Thanks and I apologize if this isn't the right blog for this!

Ugh. This is a big question and I’m not sure I’m qualified or immune to complaining. But I consider myself honored, I’ll try my best to answer it. 

There’s three things you can do here

a) Try to find out where it’s coming from. 

Cross-examine yourself active listening wise. Your reactions can generally come from two places: What you’re actually looking at, or yourself. 

Is everything annoying you as of late because you are angry? Are you having a bad week because of something in your private life? Are you sensitive because some larger tendency in RL/society is pissing you off? Is it even anger? What are you feeling and why? Does it really have anything to do with this movie etc?

Or is it something about the work itself? Does it remind you of something that happened to you? Does your displeasure come from a value that is important to you or a pattern that you believe to be a bad influence on society. 

Really try to put into words what it is that makes you feel this way while keeping in mind that your feelings, your reaction to the work and the work itself are separate entities. 

I’d remain open to the possibility that you have a legitimate gripe here. If you personally can’t enjoy a work either because a subjective factor or an objective flaw that’s a dealbreaker for you, you shouldn’t force yourself to like it because your friends do or because it didn’t do anything “unforgiveable”. Deciding that it’s not your cup of tea needn’t be a moral judgement on everyone who made the work or everyone who likes it. 

On the other hand you might find it easier to enjoy it if you acknowledge the flaw and put it into definite words, tell your inner critic that you heard them and then continue. If you try not to think about something you automatically end up thinking about it. 

b) Keep in mind that there are many valid stories and that all of them are worth telling

A lot happens on this green earth. Consider the following cases:

A1: A small, lithe person is mistreated by a big strong one

A2: A small, lithe person mistreats a big strong one and pretends to be the victim appealing to their small ness

B1: An eccentric kid is labeled as disordered just for being eccentric and because the teachers don’t want to deal with her 

B2: A serious-minded kid has an actual anxiety disorder and experiences stigma because of it and people not understanding that it’s real and debilitating

C1: There is a socially awkward, nerdy character. She is eventually revealed as autistic and her friends accept her just as she is. 

C2: There is a socially awkward, nerdy character. She comes out as aroace and all her friends support her. It is emphasized that she is actually as affectionate as everyone else and preconceptions to the contrary were just bigoted misunderstandings. 

C3: There is a socially awkward, nerdy character.  She finds a significant other who loves her even though she is socially awkward, and her love leads her to discover more communicative passionate sides to her personality. 

Clearly, for each of these scenarios, there are going to be people who relate to some but not to others. If you’ve got an anxiety disorder you’re going to relate to the story with the anxiety disorder, and if you were mis-labeled by incompetent teachers you’re gonna relate to that. But both actually happen in real life. B1 is me B2 is one of my sisters. You might even say they’re caused by some of the same intolerant attitudes. 

So ask yourself:  Is any of these intended as a “fuck you” to the people who would rather have the other ones? If in one particular story the character was mistakenly labeled by incompetent teachers and never had a real disorder, it it saying that no one has real disorders? If the small and lithe character turns out to be the victim, does it mean that big and strong characters are never victims? No of course not. 

 - You can criticize it if the story outright makes such statements and it is vital to do so (see next paragraph), but if the point in the story is just that this particular character was wrongly labeled, or this particular small character was the victim, then it’s simply telling a different story, not at all making a point about whether real disorders or big strong victims exist. 

What’s cathartic or empowering or meaningful to people is as different as people themselves. There’s a good chance that there won’t be an exact match between you or any given authors. 

Often the problem is not the stories that are there, but the ones that are missing. It’s not per se bad to have “girl gets rescued by prince” stories, it’s only bad if they’re the ONLY stories. The solution is more stories. 

Obviously there are exceptions to that like stuff that outright includes negative stereotypes or unquestioned bad behavior treated as good, 

c) Focus on constructivity and context instead of loaded labels

The above was more about perceived flaws this one is about real indisputable flaws. Flaws that are important to point out.

The number one goal here, if you really care about stopping harm and not anyones egos,  should be to get people to stop doing it. 

Sometimes in extreme cases making someone out to be a bad person and warning of them is exactly how you stop harm, but often time its not and getting obsessed with “punishing bad people” while losing sight of “preventing harm” does zero to help the people actually being harmed. Or worse than zero, if you associate a worthy cause with frivolous squabbles. 

Some people just don’t care and will never change their ways but you won’t ever convince those. You need to convince everyone else. All the ones who are maybe just ignorant and didn’t know better, or never had to form an opinion about this. Even if the maker themselves won’t change opinion, you can sway those. 

Imagine a bigoted religious person. how are you more likely to convince them? Get them to stop being religious, which is probably a part of their identity? Or try and argue that equality is, in fact, compatible with their religion? If you step on people’s egoes they will be attacked and block/dismiss all you have to say. Not only will they not change, they’ll dig in their heels. In the worst case, they’ll now start thinking that your Reasonable Position is incompatible with their identity. 

Again some people are determined to have their egoes stepped on and will be insulted no matter what, but those are not the target. 

This isn’t about appeasing assholes, it’s about creating change, because that will stop harm. So instead of throwing negatively changed emotional labels at people (which activates the ego and the emotions) try talking about cause and effect and consequences, to talk to their reason. Explain how the consequences happen. 

For similar reasons, try to think of solutions. You don’t want to destroy the work, you want to make it a better work that more people can enjoy without being distracted by unnecessary flaws. 

Avoid: 

“X is a [negative label] who [buzzword] a [sympathy-drawing label]!!! Why are [entire social group that contains people you want to convince] like this?!”

Instead:

“I know that this was probably supposed to express [intention], but it comes off like [unfortunate implication] and given [harmful social tendency] it might have been better to do [alternate redendition] “

Example #1: “The intention in scenes like in the original Blade Runner, several James Bond Movies or in the Original Star Wards trilogy where the original male characters was probably that these protagonists being suave guys know that the girls really want them to screw/kiss them. The authors know this because they created the characters, but IRL you cannot actually read anyone’s mind and what often happens IRL is that person A proceeds without really making sure that the other person is comfortable, and then they freeze up in fear though they don’t want to have intercourse, and ends up horribly traumatized. There’s not enough general knowledge about the “freeze” part of “fight-flight or freeze”, or good consent education and it would be irresponsible to make this worse. 

All it would literally take to fix it is to have the girls explicitly show that they want to kiss/have sex.”

Example #2: “A lot of horror fiction slaps the names of real diagnosable conditions on what are basically violent monster villains. It’s only natural to wonder what’s going on in the minds of killers and monsters and try to want to contextualize this, but it is vital to keep in mind that there is currently a lot of stigma against people with mental ilnesses, and that depictions like this can make it worse and make it hard for actual real-life people to get jobs and housing. 

If you’re going to use the names of real-life diagnosable conditions you should be committed to researching them and writing the characters realistically while being mindful of the stigma and the social impact that wrong renditions would have and not make a freakshow out of it. 

Alternatively, if you just want to do an unrealistic horror movie killer, don’t use the names of real conditions that real people have.”

d) Refresh Button. 

Especially because you’re saying that this isn’t your default mode and that it feels like some recent thing that you don’t really want. 

- take a break, busy your mind with something else, give the subconscious time toprocess and old perceptions time to settle. Then come back to it. 

- Try sort of looking at it from a new perspective, to deconstruct it from the bottom. What dothing really mean? What are we really told about the characters and events? Try processing it all new from the ground up without “common widom” 

- Things that aren’t explained on screen aren’t necessarily plot holes. There’s a difference between a contradiction, something that can’t fit together, and something that can fit together you just don’t know how. Deduce. Speculate. This is where your logic and imagination come in. 

- Maybe watch a new person react to it for all new input like a reaction vid on youtube

e) Outside Data. 

Same as above - People are basically really sophisticated Boltzmann machines/ statistical learning algorithms. I#m the least to want to admit that but to a degree we’re all influenced by the Data we take in. 

If you’re surrounded by a lot of material and soucres that pick apart every little thing in media, it’s natural that it would arise as a thought. 

If you don’t really want that in your life, filter it out. 

I hope this was of some sort of use. But I stress again that I’m no kind of authority on any such things and that many others might pick this apart as blasphemy. 

[arcane-temp-fandomblog]

I agree a lot with you. I think Silco is an idealist and isn't much in it for his own gain as much as the idea. And imo. it's a good characterisation, he's a person that was highly traumatised through circumstances of his upbringing and disadvantages - so much so that he can't put a more concrete plan outside of - we'll do what Piltover does. That's how he constructs his own little 'council' and the trade/hexgates. It's really hard to imagine different direction of progress if that's all you've seen.

Which I'm going too say is pretty realistic when reading some of revolutionary/nationalistic movements that were spurred by inequality of economic systems in the early 20th century. It's good to remember that nationalist movements can have different roots even within Europe, like I hope people can agree that early 20th century german nationalism is no the same as nationalist movements in Ireland or Czech or any other country that was under imperialistic rule from another in Europe.

I'm also going to interject that as much as Silco is very effective within the undercity politics, he has no clue about how Piltover politics work.

Because this is Silco's take away from his peace meeting with Jayce:

Like pfff, Silco you poor idealistic and naive soul.

Jayce didn't have to haggle, he just dictated to you amends to your terms. I assume that Arcane politics logic follows real world logic, as it does until the peace talk. So anyway the not haggling:

Silco lets go of it easily, but remember Shimmer is the primary weapon and one of primary economic exports of Zaun.

The other possible weapon.

If Jayce was a less nice person that actually was okay in weaponising Hextech, like a person that would not want to help in Zaun's independence, Silco would do both this points to get nation of Zaun and then Zaun as a sovereign state would have no way to defend itself or protect it's people from Piltover. What would stop Piltover forces entering Zaun and reclaiming it?

And Silco doesn't even get the 'blanket amnesty'.

Because Silco is as you pointed out someone that grew up in the mines, he has good idea on politics in the undercity, but not in Piltover. How would he ensure Jayce keeps his word? Lol.

I guess Jayce had in mind disarming both sides, but it came out as it came out. But yes, that's why - aside from the mine thing - Jayce says that people from the undercity are right not to trust Piltover.

To our knowledge there is no Karl Marx like figure in this universe.

We'll see season 2?

Capitalism and industrialism together kind of give birth to marxism. Marxism or dialectical materialism theory is the response. Silco is an industrialist, but damn is he close to grasping the transition from theory that proceeds dialectical materialism - dialectical idealism and how in real world it kind of falls apart.

So in broadest of strokes Hegelian dialectical idealism - 'comprising three dialectical stages of development: a thesis, giving rise to its reaction; an antithesis, which contradicts or negates the thesis; and the tension between the two being resolved by means of a synthesis.'

This was the one of most highly appraised philosophical method in academia and widely accepted explanation to how social currents work in 19th century.

You see one side, see the other side - and combined you make 'new whole'. And ideal way to progress not only ideas but every other human endeavour like society. To a perfect final form.

But as Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels - who met through circle of young Hegelians in academia (hegel was dead already) found out when they set out in their partnership to take dialectical idealism and apply it's principles in real world to examine problems - eh, it didn't exactly work. See, in purely theoretical arguments dialectical idealism works great. In the real -material - world - the dichotomy was more like this:

irreconcilable purely through presenting two sides of or argument to arrive at synthesis. Thus over time as especially Engles saw more first hand working conditions in ie. Manchester - they abandoned dialectical idealism principles, and through critiquing it arrived at dialetical materialism. And later

"Engels postulated three laws of dialectics (...)

1. The law of the unity and conflict of opposites"

The class struggle (tm) explanation of historical change.

But funny coincidence to have vague allusions to the idealistic vs material dialectics difference ie. in a show that has as one of core worldbuilding elements economic inequality and industrialisation. None the less, coincidence.

And this show has a lot of them that revolve around the transition from dialectical idealism to dialectical materialism.

Like Friedrich Engels coming from background of petite bourgeoisie and his family owning factories. Since he was a very pleasant and good looking man from good family, at least in early times of their partnership (aka before Marx got himself exiled, one of few times he got himself exiled from different countries for publishing ideas), he was the more public face of their duo. It didn't help that outside of his immediate circle of family & friends, Karl Marx wasn't the friendliest of men - partially because of his lifelong health problems, something the medical professionals of the time shrugged and called 'affliction of weak chest'. And also Marx was born to a family of much smaller means and no status.

That is aside from that they meet through academia and pursued making a change under one mentor figure, thou Hegel was already dead - but his theories were still very much alive and influential.

And then I look at these two

one which was first written as red scare villain in lore, then his lore was rewritten when they added a guy with a hammer. As his partner? nemesis? narrative opposite? And I really start to wonder how many coincidences makes it suspicious.

Ah, and also - Marx and Engles did actually distance themselves from each other, after I think one of their crazy endeavours went south or they just run out of funds. Publicly that is. Engles went back to Manchester and family business, Marx went to one of his available places of exile - London. Thanks to this move Engles was able to fund not only their cause but also support Marx and his family. Bricks like the Capital don't write themselves over night (I mean with how awful Marx's lifestyle and work-life balance were, they were actually written over night). In exchange some of more vocal critique about the system that was written by Engles, was published under Marx's name (thus even if dialectical materialism was their joint venture, only one of their surnames is connected to it today).

In some socialist circles Engles continued to be the public figure of their duo, since Marx's writings were often treated as gospel - something which Marx didn't like.

Anyway in later years their revolutionary ideas on possible pathways of class struggle changed, especially with Engles' fascination with writings of Darwin on natural evolution.

The idea that political acts, grand performances of state, are decisive in history is as old as written history itself, and is the main reason why so little material has been preserved for us in regard to the really progressive evolution of the peoples which has taken place quietly, in the background, behind these noisy scenes on the stage. Engels The Theory of Force (1877)

and seeped into dialectical materialism writings on class struggle and revolution

Dialectics constitutes the most important form of thinking for present-day natural science, for it alone offers the analogue for, and thereby the method of explaining, the evolutionary processes occurring in nature, inter-connections in general, and transitions from one field of investigation to another. Engels, On Dialectics (1878)

pff... anyway this is all a very funny coincidence.

Yes, yes, evolution of peoples and society.

Also I find the joint partnership of Marx and Engles very funny. With Engles being Marx's biggest fanboy - enough to think that natural evolution was sure example that Marx was correct, basically moving when Marx settles himself in exile in Belgium to still continue working together and urging Marx to change his unhealthy lifestyle.

Anyway their partnership growing apart was so 'profound', that after Engles died - Marx's daughter and her husband inherited most of his estate.

Also this is very abridged version of their partnership, these men had a wild life.

So while waking up for work this morning I got thinking about Silco and Zaun in Arcane and about the “what are the plans after you get independence?” question.

Because there’s two obvious questions that kind of follow that: 1. What are you doing about the toxic gasses being pumped down into you? 2. What are you doing about the mines? 

The first one is maybe a bit more easy to see the solution for - as an independent nation make it a demand that PIltover can’t pump their waste into you. I mean you still have to deal with your own and the leftover from decades of them doing it. But… it’ll help.

But the mines? That is a major source of (legitimate) income for your now fledgling nation. You can’t just close them. What you need is technological advancements to make it safer (and probably WHS and like employment rights legislation being implemented generally ASAP). And of course those are things you can push even before you gain independence but Silco doesn’t seem to (which to be fair show’s very short for all the stuff they cover, you have to be economic with your storytelling). 

Of course then I remembered that under Silco’s ‘rule’ he pushed a NEW life-shortening substance onto his people (Shimmer) for his personal gain. So he really is just interested in the optics of Zaun As Independent instead of actually wanting to help people at least anymore (which obviously, villain, but is interesting to consider when you are playing around with different directions his character could go).

[thisblogis-mine-blog]

How To Tell If Someone Is An Entrepreneur

One thing defines an entrepreneur - constructive action. Typically, they're the salesman - doing *everything* to get people to buy their stuff. We all have the image in our heads; the "wheeler-dealer", picking any opportunity to try and exploit (and other people) for profit. Indeed, the term "entrepreneur" seems to have drifted around the present lexicon - from "something you did" (typically to improve people's lives) into a blend of "money mad hustler" and "someone who doesn't 'follow the rules'".

The reality is the modern meaning could not be further from the truth. Entrepreneurship isn't a vocation or job. It's not a label which you apply to yourself in order to make yourself more endearing to a particular party, or clientele... it's a way of doing things. Many "entrepreneurial" types actually have jobs. They'll never admit they are "entrepreneurs", although they exhibit all the traits of one. The question is what these traits are, and whether you - or someone you know - has them.

What Is An "Entrepeneur"?

Entrepreneur is a word derived from French - loosely describing a "problem solver". Whilst its connotation has changed over the years, the premise persists - an "entrepreneur" is someone who creates a "widget" and has the ability to encourage other people to buy it. What this "widget" is can be a commercial product, service or idea.

It's actually interesting... some of the greatest "entrepreneurs" of history actually had nothing to do with money. They were completely focused on the development of a particular "result" and committed themselves whole-heartedly to its realization. Whether this meant conquering the Persian empire (Alexander), developing the light bulb (Edison) or creating stable PC systems (Gary Kildall), conquering the Aztec empire (Cortez), the term "entrepreneur" really denotes someone who wants to build something. The BIG difference between "original" entrepreneurs and the swathes of new-age idiots (who typically aggrandize a hedonistic lifestyle + seem to have an infatuation for "crypto") is that the former were typically committed to a single profession, and manage to "leverage" that through the development of increasingly ambitious "projects".

These projects could be anything... but they all had a core "reason" to exist. This reason was what drove the originator to pursue the endeavour, and continue even when it was questionable whether it was even "possible" or not. Obviously, the reason we remember them is that they not only discovered it was "possible", but entirely feasible... hence their success.

How To Tell If Someone Is One

The typical sign is they will do strange things...

interest in esoteric ideas

pursuit of interests not directly correlated to the accumulation of wealth

strong displays of passion for particular subjects

immersive nature with different ideas (trying to recreate historical events etc)

The point is that REAL entrepreneurs are not typically concerned about money at all. Their primary concern is the creation of a "thing". What that thing is, is determined by either their character or interests... but in every instance of someone who's achieved a large amount of success, they were completely and utterly focused on doing "their" thing no matter what. This is actually important. The modern world seems to have every 18 year old male wanting to be an "entrepreneur" - like it's a badge of honour or something. If you're not "growing", you're "dying"... right?

The truth is that our society has become so focused on convenience that the majority of these money-grabbing idiots have absolutely no business even considering themselves "entrepreneurs". They have no experience, no skills and are only latching onto the latest "fad" in order to escape the mediocrity which has come to pervade the West's consumerist culture. Entrepreneurship typically follows YEARS of interest in a particular subject. It typically follows HUGE investments of time & energy into the cultivation of a skill set, experience and "involvement" in a particular space.

Most importantly - entrepreneurship is about doing something YOUR WAY.

Stay Clear Of Modern Idiots

The BIGGEST problem I continually see from the hoards of idiots is they are ALL following a "book" or some other "rules" on "how" to be an entrepreneur. I see it all the time... guys reading all the biographies, neural studies, latest books from the big wealthy fat cat - all trying to discover the "secret" to massive success. What's ironic is that all of this stuff just works on the "outside" of the issue - the same people who read all the "stuff" end up with the SAME questions... "what do I sell?"- "how do I know if I'm going to make money on a product?" - "what's the secret to getting rich?".

If you have to ask "what do I sell", you're not an entrepreneur.

If you have to listen to what a "successful" person has to say on a subject, you're not an entrepreneur.

If you have to consider all the "rules" put forward by others, you're not an entrepreneur.

The point is that the modern world is chock-full of wannabe losers. Even the "successful" ones aren't actually truly successful - they may have made a bunch of money, but what did they actually achieve? The answer is relatively little (or even nothing).

The truth is that if you want to "be" an entrepreneur, you have to get to work.

EVERYBODY has their own work. Some are models. Some are footballers. Some are computer programmers. Some are painters. The "trick" is to do ANYTHING in order to get moving forward in an industry; clean the floors if necessary. Once you start to gain some progress, the "entrepreneurial" stuff comes from leveraging any progress made within it - either to create & market a product, or to help a market better appreciate the potential of another device/product.

Traits Of "Real" Entrepreneurs

Quiet (or at least reserved)

Fully capable of embracing failure (indeed, using it as a spur to change/adapt)

Working constantly on different elements within their "industry" (again, everyone has a place)

Unafraid of social constructs (just because someone said it doesn't make it true)

Laser focused on what "they" want to do (you want to bring sustainable farming to Africa? This is the type of thing a "real" entrepreneur will actually do)

Unafraid to give freely (most "entrepreneur" types are not attached to money at all... typically not having much until they find mercantile success)

If you haven't worked it out, the core is purpose. The modern world has very little emphasis on purpose; rather it focuses on productivity. Nothing wrong with this, but it devoids most people of their passion. It's good for GDP and McDonald's - but bad for the creativity lying latent within a large number of people. If you want to adopt "entrepreneurial" traits, the key is to become attuned to a particular "purpose" - through which you're able to invest your entire life. If you're just looking at Ferrari's and thinking that you "kind of want to become rich" - entrepreneurship is not going to do that.

It's a very difficult road, with only the most persistent and enduring surviving. You need to get to work, and only then you will discover hidden opportunities into which you're able to apply your expertise, experience or network to build something of real value to the world. This real value is then absorbed by the market, who'll either pay handsomly for it - or reject it. This is pretty-much what determines whether someone could be considered an "entrepreneur" or not.

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[decadentparadisekitty]

1) Someone who intends to commit a criminal offense in a bathroom doesn’t give a damn what the sign on the door says or whether or not trans women are considered women. They’re just going to commit their crime which is already illegal and likely involves committing a series of -additional- crimes along the way. The bathroom debate is a bunch of ‘Think of the Children!’ infantilization of women exclusively for the purpose of being transphobic.

At least it's socially acceptable for a woman to be concerned about a man in a female only space. Don't take that away from us.

2) Sex and Gender are equally “Real”. In that they’re both social constructs upon which we create social hierarchies and the identification of self and others as members of groups. Most “Female Ants” or “Female Bees” aren’t “Female” because they don’t produce large gametes, the biology definition of female. But we -call- them female ‘cause they don’t produce small gametes, either. The material in them that might’ve formed sex organs during gestation instead produces toxins. So their actual sex is “Murder”.

cool story bro neither ants or bees are humans.

in all seriousness, to respond to your claim that worker ants/bees aren't really female because they don't have the capacity to give birth by saying - both ants and bees have a reproductive system that meant to give birth, but it just didn't develop. because they were born to work instead. they sure as hell aint male.

also ah yes, a uterus is a social construct. a penis is a social construct. the idea that a penis ejaculating in a vagina will result in pregnancy is just...weird social science idrk.

@jacine-the-queen do you understand what i mean when i say trans people deny biological sex now?

3) “We just agree biological sex is real.” No. You agree “Biological Sex is Real” for the purpose of alienating trans people and presenting women as weak victims that must be protected from men who are powerful and dangerous. Because you’re not talking about sex, you’re talking about Biological Essentialism.

i try to be polite but fuck off, males and females are different FEMALES ARE NOT INHERENTLY WEAKER THAN MALES WE HAVE DIFFERENT STRENGTHS. ASK ANY NURSE WHICH SEX TAKES PAIN BETTER, LET ME KNOW WHEN THEY SAY MEN. WOMEN HAVE BETTER LONG DISTANCE ENDURANCE, WE GET SICK LESS, AND ARE LESS DEFORMED. WE ARE NOT FUCKING WEAK FUCKS BECAUSE WE'RE NOT MALE FFS WHY DO YOU GUYS THINK FEMALES ARE HAPLESS VICTIMS???

in other words, acknowledging the biological differences between men and women isn't biological essentialism.

i wish you a very bad day, may your conversations be awkward and your tea be cold. you act like if males and females are different then obviously females are inferior. i do not stand for that misogynistic bullshit.

Also, Terfs don’t care if someone is trans femme or trans masc, their intention is to ostracize and other -all- trans people. So the “What about trans men?” angle is more likely to result in “Fine, we need a bathroom for trans people” or “Well I guess trans people can’t use the bathroom in public at all” rather than any kind of introspection on a Terfs bullshit “Logic”.

i personally couldn't give a fuck, trans men wanna use the male restroom anyways?? by all means. they're not hurting anyone.

would say its risky but that would fall on extremely deaf ears.

DPK: I know you’re trying to create daylight between Conservatives and Terfs but there isn’t when it comes to trans folks except in semantics. You both support the patriarchy when it comes to trans folks, you both dehumanize people, you both do your best to treat women as fragile precious items that must be shielded, and you both undermine third and fourth wave feminism.

yo wait to my followers i kinda like DPK but like in a dahlia's pizza kitchen way can we make that a thing

okok back on topic.

conservatives think you guys should conform to gender roles, I think you shouldn't, but you shouldn't deny sex in the process.

tell me who im dehumanizing and how, tell me exactly why saying men are a threat to women implies women are fragile rather than that men are violent.

third and fourth wave feminism kinda sucks. second wave all the way babyyyy

Sure, you might want more liberal policy for Lesbians and Gay folks but so do Log Cabin Republicans. You might want marginally less racism but so does the National Black Republican Association. 44% of Republicans think taxes should be raised on anyone who makes more than $225,000 a year so if you think the rich should be taxed higher so does almost half of the Republican Party. Half of Republicans want stricter gun control. You’re not special in the fact that you’re allying with people who hate you and support people who oppose your interests.

"more liberal policy" i want their parents to love them. I want them to feel safe walking home at night. I want straight people to stop fetishizing them.

accomplishing this is difficult, and can only happen by normalizing their existence. i still dont know how to after lgbt acceptance has been going down for the first time in years.

"marginally less racism" (i live in the US) i want black folk to live without the threat of police violence. I believe an agency made specifically to catch fugitive slaves has no place here. I believe that Black folk deserve millions for the amount they have been denied since their ancestors were sold into slavery and segregation made climbing the economic chain very difficult. I believe black women should not be hypersexualized the way they are. I believe black people should not be labeled as "uneducated" or "animalistic" for just existing.

i want to abolish the police and replace it with a better organization. i want more programs aimed at improving the lives of black folk. I want them to feel like they are welcomed in America.

i want both of them to be in better, more economically stable positions. gays and blacks are far more likely to be prostituted.

i do not believe that men and women are meant to act out the sex stereotypes that we know and hate today. I think sex based oppression is real and is a problem.

I also...don't ally myself with conservatives. at all. if you think i even watched "what is a woman", think again.

And that’s not even getting into the Terfs who blatantly push Antisemitic conspiracy theories and ally with neo-nazis. Or the out and out racist ones who still get tons of respect and are not rebuked by “radfem organizations” like WoLF. Or the fact that the “LGB Alliance” is almost entirely CisHet people trying to break apart the community in order to divide and conquer.

ur right in that radfem spaces have a racism and antisemitism problem...like every community that holds a very politically controversial view. Why is WoLF racist? What is the "LGB Alliance" (assuming its a formal organization)

At the end of the day, Terfs think Roe v Wade was a sacrifice that had to be made to stop trans people from existing. At the end of the day they vote Conservatives into power and boost their voices. At the end of the day they still support Antisemites, Racists, and Islamophobes being in power because they -also- hate Trans People which is the only criteria Terfs have.

we blame you guys for it actually, erasing the definition of the word woman didn't exactly...help the cause of handling sex based oppression is what we think.

At the end of the day y’all’re still allying yourself with the party of Trump.

im a dem but ok

And at the end of the day: You’re just another transphobic bigot who tries to develop some sort of logic to pretend you’re not a bigot. Like Racists who are “Just stating Facts” or Misogynists who are “Just following what’s Natural”.

and you're someone trying to get me to say woman is just a concept and not a reality half the population faces daily.

@jacine-the-queen I can’t interact with the post because the other person blocked me

Rowling even complimented Walsh on it, and regardless of whether you see Rowling as a real terf or not doesn’t change the fact that countless terfs flock to her

we can agree that biological sex is real without agreeing that sex determines your role in life, for example. it doesn’t mean i support capitalism. it doesn’t mean i am patriotic. it doesn’t mean i believe in the traditional family. it doesn’t mean i think people who aren’t white are subhuman/deserve less respect. it doesn’t mean i think males and females must be together as that is the only True Marriage.

doesn’t make us politically the same.

haven’t watched what is a woman so idrk what to say? it could have been good, it could have been bad, im just not giving conservative men money ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

in any case, radical feminists respect jkr for having the bare faced gall to say biological sex is real, i wouldn’t really say they “flock to her” to form their opinions? Idk if you show me examples of people just agreeing with stuff cause jkr did id be surprised.

i personally, don’t like associating with conservatives regardless of whether we happen to agree biological sex is real, take that as you will ig.

The bathroom scare of trans people is literally just a repeat of the same argument but against gay people

from a conservative viewpoint, yeah they just hate those they see as “deviants” i see your point…women having concerns about males entering their spaces still deserve respect though >.>

How long have males been just entering female spaces? That’s a genuine question.