#bigotry is bad full stop

[edenfenixblogs]

I think the top tweet is a bad faith interpretation of this sign. These protestors aren't telling Jewish people they should be in hell. They're talking to the Israeli invading force. The soldiers that have been bombing them.

I disagree. All Jews, even ones you don’t like, are indigenous to the Levant.

IDF soldiers don’t deserve antisemitism for being “bad.”

No Jews deserve antisemitism for being “bad.”

Muslims don’t deserve Islamophobia for being “bad.”

Hamas terrorists don’t deserve Islamophobia or anti-Arab hatred for for being “bad.”

People of any marginalized group do not deserve to face bigoted discrimination for being “bad.”

When you criticize people who you dislike from a marginalized group while weaponizing that group’s identity against them, then you are insulting all members of that group. Not just the ones you don’t like.

Bigotry is not ok. Ever. Period.

[nickbutnodick]

summer camp was both the most fun and exciting week of the year and also the worst and most terrifying

[facelesspassport]

One of my firmest beliefs is that "safe spaces for men" will not solve the issue of male radicalization and patriarchy. If you want men to stop becoming terrorists you need to target the true source of misogyny: male socialization. Once a young boy is taught by his parents that women are inferior to him he is doomed to bigotry, because he lives in a world that will constantly reinforce this idea and reward him for agreeing. As for adult men who are already misogynists, the only way to convert them to feminism is to stop coddling them (and yes, I see all of the "safe spaces for men"/"male mental health" discourse as coddling). Coddling abusers only enables them (and yes, bigots are inherently abusers)! You can not convince an abuser to change by coddling/gentle guidance as this will only embolden them. We can only make men change by holding them accountable for their behavior as a class, period. I think that the best way to do this on a mass scale would be via reeducation camps, but we all know that westerners would see that as unethical somehow. So, our next best bet would be forcing our governments to create feminist programs that aim to do the following: stop domestic violence, "reform" abusers and rapists with court mandated abuser counseling, and educate young people on gender studies, safe sex, and relationship practices. China has a program called "the Ministry of Health and Family" which was created to stop misogynistic violence, and once it was instated their domestic violence rates plummeted. China did not create safe spaces for men to reduce terrorism- they held them accountable and it worked. We should follow in their footsteps. EDIT: I added screenshots and whatnot. nothing to see here, really Im just kinda seething.

I took screenshots of these comments that i made under the original post because I just knew that OP would block me after I wrote this- not because its any harsher than the other replies (in fact mine was pretty tame compared to some of the responses) but because I am spitting straight facts and OP is a misogynist. I just wanted to repost them here for my own safe keeping and sanity ig. I didnt care for the idea of discussing this with OP directly since I knew they wouldnt be interested in a feminist POV, but I was hoping that my comments would be seen by the audience. It bothers me when people make these huge discourse posts and then block certain commenters solely because they dont want their friends to see the opposing responses. It especially bothers me in this case because as we speak OP is fiercely & performatively "debating" with TERFs who obviously wont change their minds- yet they blocked me immediately (though I wasnt interested in directly speaking with them) because they knew my comments made them look bad, and Im willing to bet that they told themselves they "felt unsafe" or something to justify it.

Like, just say you hate women and go... :EDIT over

There should be actual self-help spaces for men (and especially young men) that aren’t just alt-right recruitment centers.

As a person who was a dude the places I wanted to go to with kind people (usually queer people) had at least a few people saying that “men are trash” or “men are inherent dangers” with no pushback and it scared me.

I’m decently emotionally mature and realized that just because some outliers were assholes didn’t mean the whole place was terrible but what about younger or less emotionally mature boys? They see “oh men are trash” and see no pushback then think “Oh. These people do not like me for something I cannot change. These other people (Jordan Peterson fans) like me for who I am (they don’t but they say they do). I will go to the place I feel safer and happier.”

Without a kind safe space for boys then they will go to these toxic places. I used to read a good amount of posts on r/Teachers and a lot of them are saying the boys don’t respect them, love people like Andrew Tate, so on and so forth. This is what happens when the only “safe spaces” for boys aren’t actually safe.

[lastoneout]

I keep thinking about all of the disabled activists and people before me who stranded themselves on the 4th floor of buildings for weeks and crawled up stairs and fought with airline staff and schools and doctors and refused to stop existing in the face of injustice and bigotry no matter how big and scary and hopeless it seemed. Every time I get angry and scared the protests that lead to the creation of the ADA pop up again and remind me that disabled people are so much fucking stronger than anyone has ever given us credit for, and I can't help but be proud of that. And I know not all disabled people feel like we should take pride in our disabilities and have flags or whatever, but I think not just living, but thriving, in spite of a world that wants us dead and gone, in the face of both illness and persecution, and how we've not only bought ourselves forward, but uplifted the disabled people around us, secured more equal futures for everyone who will come after, and truly changed the way so many abled people have seen us for the better is something to be damn fucking proud of.

We have always been here and we always will be, there will never be a world without disabled people because being disabled is not bad, it's a natural part of the human experience and yeah it sucks some times but even when it sucks we have fought to build beautiful, unique, happy lives with people, both like us and not, and that should be celebrated.

The first sign of human civilization is the healed femur. The body of the profoundly disabled person who would have needed help to even just eat being carefully laid to rest after decades of a full, happy life. The medicinal plants showing even before we were entirely human we were doing what we could to not just survive, but alleviate suffering while we're at it. Above everything, evolution selected not the baby who can walk and eat and be quiet, but the one that can ask for help.

Disabled people are not just angry cockroach motherfuckers who refuse to die, we are proof of humanity's HUMANITY. Proof that natural selection selected a species that takes care of each other. From healed femurs and medicinal plants to vaccines and IVs and insulin to now, we are driven to help one another, we are at our strongest when we don't leave our most vulnerable behind. And I am living proof of that. My mother is living proof of that. Every disabled and chronically and/or mentally ill person I know is living proof of that.

And I don't know about the rest of you, but will carry that shred of humanity's true nature inside me like it's my fucking soul. I am scared and angry and hurt, but I have a lifetime's experience being scared and angry, and I can shake off the kind of pain that would make Atlas crumble to dust like it's nothing but a stiff fucking breeze. Disabled people have always been here, turning fear and anger and pain into joy and beauty and connection, and I'm not going to let everyone who came before me down. I'm not going to give up. Not now, not ever.

It's okay if you're disabled and you've hit your limit, you're too scared and tired and hurt, I won't blame you. But I won't abandon you, either. I might not be able to right all of the wrongs in the world, but I'll be strong, I'll carry all of you with me, I will not give up.

As I've said before, society hates a cripple who won't die, so we must spite them and live anyway.

Please, live anyway. I know if anyone can, it's us.

[starstuffandalotofcoffee]

I am trying to like. not attack people with whom I'm broadly aligned on such ideas as "fascism and bigotry are bad" even if they are the sort of person who fetishizes a "mutual aid under tyranny is the true path to Full Communism" mentality. But it is really frustrating that I saw a lot of those sorts of self-identified white people calling Democrats unconscionable and abandoning POC for being fairly hard on immigration and it's like. Given the results we're seeing, we do in fact need to stop pretending people won't vote against their own interests, or rather, the interests that affect people of their same demographic. We do need to stop pretending that being a minority is an automatic pathway to good opinions, and stop treating specific egregiously bad examples as exceptions when even the most liberal-leaning minority groups have non-negligible numbers of Trump supporters. A lot of people do have an "i got mine" mentality and being nonwhite or queer or non-Christian does not prevent people from thinking this way.

[creatingblackcharacters]

"Calling Out Racists? Help!"

(shout out to the situation sender who's chosen to remain anonymous!)

NOTE: People of color, if you feel that your efforts would be in vain or cause more pain than it's worth, I fully respect not doing it. I've been there, and tbh I usually don't. But white netizens, I expect boots on the ground. Racism festers when no one does anything about it.

So, it's finally happened! You've come face to face with antiblackness in your fandom space. You never thought it could be this bad! Naturally YOU don't condone this behavior, so you take steps to remove yourself from this person.

However! Your friends and other fans are still happily sharing from someone that you KNOW is capable of this. Would they still be comfortable knowing they're yapping amongst racists? And then you wonder- should I tell everyone about them? I mean, surely everyone should know?

Thus we've come to the decision:

The Callout

In my honest opinion, callouts are morally neutral. When used to reveal consistent harmful beliefs, intentions, and behaviors to other people, usually of marginalized identities, I think they're critical. Our safety and humanity matters far more than someone's internet fame. If I can't stop someone from being a racist, I at least don't want their vitriol on my dash, and I ALSO don't want people thinking I agree! Racism shouldn't be tolerated at all, but unfortunately, many an antiblack racist has a popular following and will not be removed. Anything less overt than a slur like the example above is more often than not, not a dealbreaker for many.

On the other hand, when it is maliciously weaponized to drag someone down on nothing but hearsay and rumor, it can be devastating. It has often been used as retaliation against those very same marginalized peoples to shut down discussions of racism and other forms of bigotry. In my opinion, you should not do these sorts of things when you don't have any solid proof or an actual education on what you're talking about. Period.

I say that all to say, be intentional. Use your discernment and some critical thinking.

How Ice Deals With It

Let's say you see something that concerns you. First, you need to pay attention to if other Black fans have noted this person's behavior. Has it been previously noticed, have they seen dogwhistles you've completely missed? Keep in mind as well, antiblackness does not have to come from a white person. Don't let "I'm brown" fool you.

If you're confident: confront the person on the particular issue you've noticed.

‼️‼️‼️ For the maintenance of your mental health, you CANNOT go into this expecting to change someone's mind and behavior. If you do, 9/10 you will face demoralization. You cannot walk into these thinking they care. Most people don't, and will deny the harm of their behavior. It sucks, but it's the truth. Change your perspective. The only goal you need to have is pointing out the harm done, so that this person loses the excuse to be racist out of "ignorance". Once you've spoken up, ball's now in their court.

Confrontation doesn't have to be negative! It can be as simple as "hey, what you said was not okay, here's why, and I hope that you can learn from this to do better for yourself and for your fans." Simple, to the point.

‼️Keep in mind, from Fans of Color: the private confrontation is a sign that we're trying to give you a chance to do right. Everyone's not going to receive that grace, nor do I expect every fan of color to offer it. It might just be up with you and your racism that day. 🤷🏾‍♀️ I would take the chance if offered.‼️

We're going to go two routes here.

1) It works

If it works, then what should come next is 1) a full acknowledgment of the violence and harm, 2) visible steps to ameliorate that harm, and 3) an apology to those harmed.

It doesn't have to be a complex apology (unless the situation itself was that large). But it has to be genuine and the change needs to be seen.

Very often you'll see apologies for antiblackness... To white fans. You cannot apologize for your actions to people who were not harmed by them, because they are not the ones with the right to accept the apology!!!! It's not a real apology. They've just covered for being exposed, is all. Be willing to hold each other accountable!

2) It doesn't work

This might still happen after the "it works", btw! Some people genuinely just want the appearance of progressiveness.

Here's where it gets gritty and you'll experience the most discomfort, I'm just being honest:

They might fucking suck!

They might suck, they might make it a point to share with their followers that you suck, and those same followers might also suck! You know how they sound? Like those people who fought for rapist Brock Turner because "he had a good future and this shouldn't ruin it". Yeah.

Recognize that this backlash you may experience from strangers is not coming just from their need to be entertained, but from a realization that if their fave is antiblack and they agree, then THEY are being antiblack too.

That acute pain you're feeling from this effort- you're now feeling a part of the chronic pain that is being a Black fan! And if you're white, you just temporarily sacrificed your whiteness to defend what was right, and now you are seeing a piece what that whiteness shields you from. Idk how else to put it.

Now what?

Well first, this shouldn't make you go "oh well there's no point in fighting racism bc they're so mean." Why do you want to identify with the people who just acted like that lmao. Antiracism is hard, but the right thing isn't always easy. Stand up and dust yourself off, soldier.

Take the steps to protect yourself. That might be a break from socials to decompress. Block people as necessary, use the tag blocker thing.

Recognize that you are not in the wrong for wanting this harm to be accounted for. If this person didn't want to be seen as a willful racist, they should have chosen to do better. They didn't want to, they chose to triple down on their racism, which they are now aware of doing! They just don't care. And that's not within your control. They wanna be a racist, let them be treated like one!

"Curate your space" as they say, and recognize that antiblackness is going to have you potentially removing folks you thought were cool left and right. You might see some people close to you show their true colors. It's time to make some tough personal decisions. I can't walk you through that. But I don't want to be around people who treat antiblackness with apathy, because birds of a feather... 👀

I obviously didn't cover every single scenario here. And this is only *my* way of dealing with these things (if I do at all, anymore). Some folks may go about it differently. But yeah, in summary, go in to point the racism out, and don't let the response determine your self value. 👍🏾

[tododeku-or-bust]

How I Keep My Chin Up

Yes, I'm going to speak from the perspective of antiblackness bc that's my hardest, most comprehensive battle, but just try to apply. We gone be alright, y'all!

1. Be Willing to Fight for Something You May Never See

Here's the thing. I am my ancestors' wildest dream. No one could have fathomed I'd be where I am right now. I live in an entirely different world from my grandparents alone!

And yet, since the beginning of the Transatlantic Slave Trade, my ancestors and I have all been fighting the same- however beat down, rebuilt, replenished, repolished and reformed- tenants of white supremacy. It's been 525 years (if we start in 1500). HALF A MILLENNIUM, and we're still fighting WHITE SUPREMACY (there was a whole ass war, even 😭)

Okay. So. It is clear that if we based our willingness and ability to fight on seeing the end game, no one would ever do so!

We have to be willing to say "okay, look, I might not ever see the end of said bigotry, but I have to be willing to fight and survive so that those that come after me have a chance". We always wish our ancestors had done different- we are the ancestors that could be doing different! You are one part of a long war, and that's okay! Doing your part is all that is asked! Which gets into my next point.

2. The Glory is in the Act

You don't have to win the war. You don't even have to win the battle 😅 The glory is in the fight!

And I think that's what makes it a lot easier for me to continue on. Narrow your scope. Do I want to win and overcome these things? Absolutely. It'd be lovely! But I can't allow myself to move based on guaranteed victory. I can't control that. What I can control is my willingness to show up!

Even if all I do is make racism's existence a tad harder today in some way, every single day. To be willing to say "no, actually, this is full of shit and SOMEONE sees that". Do something. You don't lie down and die when shit looks bad. You could at least fight about it 😅 There is dignity in resistance! If nothing else, even as you go down, you know you were right!

Stop letting them take your humanity from you without a fight. You are worth more than that. They want your hope to die bc that means they win. Fuck em 😤 Lift your chin and tighten up, soldier!

[audhdnight]

Spanking is to parenting what prisons are to criminal justice. Allow me to elaborate:

What does spanking do? “It teaches kids to behave!” Actually, no. It teaches kids to fear their caregiver(s). But say we go with that line. How does spanking teach kids to behave? “It shows them the consequences of bad actions!” Actually, no. It shows kids that when the caregiver is displeased, the kid gets hurt. In the mind of the child, the sequence of events is not [misbehave:consequence]. It is [caregiver unhappy:pain]. And maybe you’ll say “But my kid stopped mouthing off after I started spanking them for it”. Okay, sure. Maybe they stopped responding when you argue, but only because the learned to fear what their response would bring. They’re not holding their tongue because they realized it’s disrespectful or rude or whatever else you believe it is. They’re holding their tongue because they know it won’t do any good and will only make the situation worse for them. I can guarantee they are still thinking all those rebellious naughty talk-backy thoughts. They just aren’t saying them out loud. Spanking did not teach your child to behave, it taught them to walk on eggshells.

Similarly, prisons do absolutely nothing to enforce laws. Prisons do nothing to fix the real crimes that do get committed. A shooter or rapist or embezzler being incarcerated does not bring their victim back to life, un-traumatize them, or make reparations for any damages. Additionally, it makes life a living hell for the innocent people who end up in jail (OF WHICH THERE ARE A HELL OF A LOT). And maybe you might say that the point of prison is to encourage good behavior, because no one wants to go to jail. I would ask, then, why there are so many prisons, of which so many are full or overcrowded. Clearly, the threat of incarceration is not keeping people out of jail. Additionally, much like a child who was spanked being afraid to do normal things in their own home for fear of displeasing their caregiver, regular non-criminal people are afraid of prison, even though they have done nothing wrong. They know they could be incarcerated because of falsified evidence, biased testimonies, unfair trial, or simply bigotry. Especially people of color. Even though they haven’t done anything wrong, they are scared of what could happen to them if the person in power (police) was unhappy with them.

Negative consequences unrelated to the actual incident do not discourage “bad behavior”. Just like a child who is spanked will simply learn to be sneakier, a thief who goes to jail will simply cover their tracks better next time.

Stop spanking your kids, and abolish prisons. Have a nice day.

[rjalker]

Flatland adaptations

[ID: A version of the "missing the point", meme, showing a purple square shouting in all caps, Holy shit other dimensions exist", while staring at a green sphere that intersects with his plane, while the sphere says, with the words literally going over the square's head, "Racism, ableism, misogyny, and classism are bad.". End ID.]

how come I've watched three full length Flatland movies and many shorter animations but only one of them, which is in Italian, which I don't speak, ever has anything to say about the political themes of the book and instead just goes "woah cool interdimensional theory!"???

[John Crichton voice] Where's my damn political commentary?

Why do people want to just throw out all the criticism of systemic bigotry to focus only on the dimensional stuff?

Edit: Yes, this 1000% applies to the 2007 Flatland film. It is not exempt at all. It is one of the main things I was thinking of while making this. A few seconds of absurdist humor does not mean the 2007 Flatland film is scathing political commentary that forces the audience to think about systems of inequality and question whether they might not be upholding some that are just as absurd and made up to keep people in power.

[ID: The same meme as above, now with a hybercube or tesseract saying, "Racism, ableism, misogyny, and classism are bad.", with the yellow A Sphere from the 2007 Flatland film staring at it in open-mouthed shock, exclaiming, "Wow!! Absurdist humor!!!" while the point flies over his head. End ID.]

Edit August 20 2024: Ladd Ehlinger, the creator of the 2007 Flatland film, is disgustingly fucking racist and misogynistic. He is literally a proud conservative.

He made a political ad in 2011 that's literally so blatantly racist and misogynistic that youtube has literally restricted it so you literally cannot share the link outside of youtube.

Because it's that blatantly fucking bigoted.

I wish I could say I'm shocked but considering how terribly the 2007 film handles the themes of the original novel, I'm not surprised in the least.

The ad literally has Black men chanting, "give me your cash bitch so we can shoot up the street", while a white woman, with the face of the politician the add is against photoshopped over her, pole dances as a sex worker.

He runs a tumblr account so make sure you block him. His username is filmladd.

He's literally a racist misogynistic conservative.

For the love of all that's holy everyone please stop defending this film immediately and make sure people are aware of exactly what kind of person produced it.

[bonebabbles]

It is honestly terrifying how they try and justify the mockery of the RiverClan refugees by going " Well nothing violent happened to them so this is them choosing to go home "

It's like getting a clear view into the writing teams brain, their true thoughts on the subject they're portraying, and it makes me sick. ( not saying the writing team hasn't had a /lot/ of scenes like this one in the past, DotC is full of them )

Like idk if they can justify this as just the characters anymore, this is just straight up writing team bigotry shining through, and the only small hope I have is hoping the writing team hasn't actually had the experience of tormenting people so much they've fled the land they fled /to/

Sorry if this is too like, sad or political, but I'm kinda expecting more scenes after this after you know who gets into office. Bigots always get bolder when he's in charge.

No, I agree. I think the longer I sit on it, the more disturbing it gets to me. Especially with the way the "wind is blowing," politically.

At what point do you stop calling it bad writing in an attempt to be charitable? Advanced incompetence has become indistinguishable from malice here. The text flatly says that it's fine behavior, not alarming at all, for two refugees to get harassed into "choosing" to go back to somewhere unsafe.

It's framed like a climactic moment, even. Sunbeam agreeing with Fernstripe shows that she does "truly belong here." Unlike those other immigrants who are just "exploiting" the code.

I can't know what's in the heads or hearts of the writing team at Coolabi. But it sure does start to make a lot of sense when you connect the dots of jilted character dialogue to deliver xenophobic messages, consistent emphasis on birth blood and nation over chosen bonds, and sheer dedication to authority, and draw a picture that The Writers Really Mean It.

[elpeadro]

Part 1: The Good Ending

If the writers wanted CaitVi to be their canon OTP so damn bad, they had two ways of going about it:

THE BAD, TRAGIC ENDING:

While Caitlyn still loses herself to her grief and rage and becomes a fascist dictator, her fall from grace is much slower and fleshed out.

She still has her moment in the gardens where she admits to Jayce she understands how easy it is to hate [Zaunites], though she acknowledges those thoughts aren’t right (“I know, I know” she tells him as the fight goes out of her). The same goes for her seething to Vi after the attack on the memorial, “What kind of animals!” The seeds are there. A few days’ romp through Zaun with Vi isn’t going to undo a lifetime of learned classism, bigotry, and a sheltered, privileged worldview, even if she has a good heart.

Instead of springing the badge on Vi when they reunite in her home, she does it after the memorial attack, when it becomes clear that Piltover will be taking military action in Zaun.

Vi reacts poorly, of course. Rather than Caitlyn phrasing it as “you can show [Piltover] not everyone supports Jinx” because that is incredibly stupid when she says Jinx is a rogue agent at the beginning of the episode, she comes at it from the angle of harm reduction. They can’t stop the enforcers from going into Zaun on a manhunt for Jinx, but they can catch Jinx as quickly as possible and limit the amount of innocents caught in the crossfire if they (Caitlyn) are in charge of the mission. Between Vi’s knowledge of Zaun and Jinx, and Caitlyn’s resources as a Kirammen, they can fix things before they get really bad. (And Caitlyn gets justice for her mother in the process.)

Intentional or not, this makes Vi’s guilt issues even worse, because Caitlyn had the shot and would have stopped all of this from happening by killing Jinx - if not for Vi pleading with her. In an echo of Vander’s words, she internalizes the blame for the fallout and suffering about to come down on Zaun. It’s her fault for creating Jinx and preventing Caitlyn from stopping her.

So Vi takes the badge so she can “fix her mistake”. And just as in canon, it looks gross and wrong for her to wear that uniform.

**Extremely, extremely important to note that Caitlyn doesn’t weaponize the Grey to start. The thought of doing so doesn’t even exist yet. And with her team and Vi’s knowledge, she is confident they will catch Jinx.

Except they don’t.

Every avenue is a dead end. Tensions rise as Piltover demands to know Jinx is dead, so it can sleep easy at night. Zaun doesn’t take kindly to a militarized strike force stomping through its streets, especially once they learn Vi is one of them.

And so bit by bit, Caitlyn compromises on her morals. Holds the threat of Stillwater over people’s heads. Acts on that threat. Is rougher and more threatening with suspects and criminals. It’s all justified in her mind.

She has to do this; otherwise, things will get so much worse if the full wrath of Piltover comes down on Zaun.

The criminals she’s harshly treating are members of the chemgangs. They deserve no sympathy or mercy for what they’ve done to their fellow man, like Huck or the refugees the Firelights take in. Silco’s crimes are their crimes.

She can’t trust anyone else to handle this mission without making things worse. She tells herself that she hates having to do this, but it’s better than the iron fist Piltover is clamoring for.

(In her frustration and rage and grief and privilege, she forgets the lesser evil is still evil, and eventually there will be no difference at all.)

And so when Caitlyn feels she has no other choice, she weaponizes the Grey. It is controversial. Vi is horrified and angry, and perhaps Maddie or Loris get a fleeting “are we the baddies?” thought, but Caitlyn justifies it, just as she has done everything else. It is either this or total martial law, where so many more people will suffer. Vi’s guilt rears its ugly head, and she, too, is unable to recognize the rot that is slowly growing inside of her with each passing day, with each piece of her soul she sells to the machine that is Piltover’s ruthless oppression of Zaun.

Their hunt for Jinx ends the same way as canon. It is here that we finally see the full extent of how far Caitlyn has fallen. 

“It’s her blood in your veins” is wonderfully perfect in its bigotry. There is no going back from this. Just as there is no going back when she hits Vi in the stomach with her rifle and leaves her behind as Vi sobs and breaks down.

Caitlyn accepts her ascension to dictatorship, even if some part of herself recognizes that Ambessa is orchestrating this for her own benefit. Again, she justifies it by telling herself if she doesn’t take power, someone worse like Salo will.

During the timeskip, Vi breaks down as she does in canon. Caitlyn is in some of her hallucinations, but a majority are of everyone she betrayed. Vander, her parents, Mylo, Clagger, Powder (not Jinx), Ekko, Benzo, and even her kid self all look at her with such disappointment and disgust, reflections of her own guilt and self-loathing. She sacrificed everything that made her Violet, and now she has nothing left.

Zaun doesn’t let her forget. They call her a bootlicker, traitor, the Kirammen attack dog, the Piltie pet. With how non-existent her self-worth is, she agrees with them. Her self-destructive behavior is cranked up to the max. The loudest cheers in the fighting arena are always when she takes a big hit or loses.

As time goes on and Jinx’s popularity grows, it’s a direct slap to her face that Jinx is portrayed as Vander’s successor and a revolutionary symbol/hero. After everything Jinx has done, Vi is still that much worse. Again, she can’t help but agree, and spirals even harder.

-

And so when Caitlyn and Vi stay together in the end, it isn’t a happy ending.

Vi comes back to her less because she loves Caitlyn so so much and more because she genuinely has nothing and nobody left. Jinx is gone. There’s no way she can go back to Ekko and the Firelights, not with what she did as an enforcer and the guilt weighing on her. Zaun hates her and sees her as just as bad as Topside. She’s all alone and beaten down by the world.

And so she decides to be selfish and return to Caitlyn, because that is the happiest she can be now.

While Caitlyn does care for Vi, their relationship is still toxic and abusive. Caitlyn was the boot stepping on the necks of Vi’s people for over a year. She hit Vi once; she can (and according to irl studies, is more likely to) do it again. She saw people like Vi as lesser, undeserving of clean air to breathe. She referred to them as animals, and that their blood made them this way.

Without being forced to reckon with and confront the mountain of bigotry she amassed and carried out over the course of her strike force and dictatorship, it is impossible for their relationship to be a healthy one.

(That is all without pointing out just how emotionally, mentally, and socioeconomically vulnerable Vi is by this point, and how desperate she is for something, anything to latch onto.)

So their story becomes a tragedy. Fitting in a way, given the conclusions to the two stories in season 1 are both tragic (episode 3, episode 9).

For Vi, the tragedy is watching a girl burning with revolutionary fire, a protector and defender, slowly lose everything and everyone she ever loved at the hands of the brutal, uncaring system that is Piltover’s oppression. How that fire is slowly snuffed out as she is beaten down time and time again, chooses wrong, loses someone else. How she betrays her deepest convictions while going through an incredibly emotionally fragile time in her life, and she thinks she’s doing the right thing. How she becomes the very thing she always wanted to protect others from. How she is cast aside the moment she doesn’t conform to her oppressors’ standards, is reduced from “one of the good ones” to “just like the rest of them”. How she is left with absolutely nothing after losing it all to the system she is oppressed by. How she ends up as a caged bird: the once revolutionary fighter now “content” to be her dictator’s lover.

For Caitlyn, the tragedy is watching a girl with a kind heart succumb to the corruptive nature of fascism. How she truly had good intentions of fixing things from within the system when she started, but was unable to recognize the moral decay creeping within her - because there are no good cops, no good enforcers, no good fascists. How she lies to herself and becomes more and more cruel with every action. How she is able to justify actions that were once nigh unthinkable as a deep, pervasive rot slowly spreads inside her, calcifying that kind heart into a cold, bitter thing. How she spits in the face of her mother’s legacy and uses her privilege to hurt the oppressed even harder in ways only she can. How she discards Vi, a woman she convinced to sacrifice every principle she believed in, a woman she loved, the moment Vi acts out of line in her eyes. How she is too inundated by privilege and class to recognize just how far she has fallen.

They could have been wonderful partners in another life. We see the potential good they could be together in season 1. 

But fascism has chewed them up and spit them out.

Part 3: The Disjumbled, Tonal Mess of an Ending We Got

[thesiltverses]

Hello! I found the silt verses about three weeks ago and have listened to it several times since. I have a few things to say.

I absolutely adore that episode about the national grid workers. I think it’s my favorite episode of any podcast I’ve ever listened to. My favorite part of that first episode Paige is in is how she justifies not standing up for Vaughn, that cognitive dissonance that you wrote so well. This episode gives me what I wanted from that episode, the workers all banding together to stop the wasteful sacrifice of one of them. The actor who played the foreman did an incredible job as well. I think that having him discuss which of his workers he would sacrifice was such a significant moment, despite how brief it is. It cuts right to the big question that I took away from the podcast which is, “How much is someone willing to sacrifice in order to maintain their comfort?” And the utter disrespect of Glodditch (apologies for the spelling) refusing to cancel even the radio but asking grid workers to kill themselves for 200kw/h! Top tier episode.

I grew up in the south and went to college in Appalachia. I saw the disparity in technology and “advancement” if that makes sense that poverty brings, and the way you set up the world invokes that feeling in me again. You are an amazing world builder and storyteller.

I really enjoyed the cameos - I’m a big fan of malevolent/devisor, Old gods of Appalachia, and all of Jonny sims work, so hearing familiar voices was an absolute delight. Harlan Guthrie as an acolyte of the snuff gods might have been a bit too on the nose with some of the things that man writes, though… /pos

I’m transmasculine, and something that I really appreciate is how you manage to make a trans man do some objectively awful things, but still manage to make him a complex, full character that I was rooting for very frequently. Brother Faulkner is so, so important to me as a character. Paula Vogel has a play called “Indecent,” which is about the true story of a troupe of I believe German Jewish actors between the years of 1910ish and 1940s putting on a show called “God of Vengeance” by Sholem Asch, also a Jewish man. “God of Vengeance” has queer themes and received a lot of criticism from the Jewish community for showing Jewish folks in a “bad” light at a time when there was already so much hatred for Jewish people. Brother Faulkner being as complex and, in my opinion, malicious and cutthroat as he is at a time when trans people face so much bigotry, especially legislatively in the United States, brings this conversation about “God of Vengeance” up again for me. I also love how normalized non-binary people are in this world, without question. “Sibling this or that,” the hunter, adjudicator Shrew - big thanks from me for all of this.

All of this to say, I love this podcast. Can you talk more about the rhetorical gods? Is Babble one? What makes them one if they are, or why aren’t they? I’m fascinated by them. Can you talk more about the propaganda gods too?

Thank you so much for the thoughtful and kind words!

I'll check out Indecent, it sounds really interesting and I'm very glad to hear Faulkner works for you as a character. I think the topic of how to include and write queer characters who are capable of terrible things and thoughts (because, after all, these characters are human beings and not tutelary exemplars), within the context of both a rising movement of transphobia right now and centuries-old scapegoating / pathologising portrayals more generally, is a really knotty but a really important one, and I always want to make sure I'm approaching it with care and due responsibility as well as a sense of humility around the limitations of what, as a cis writer, I can actually achieve.

To that end, I don't want to ever take the audience response for granted, but I'm always really grateful to hear that the portrayal is working for a listener!

Propaganda gods: gods whose prayer-marks or ritual verses are fed directly to the enemy, enforcing destructive or sabotaging changes to reality (so rather than sending a destructive saint or angel to rampage over the foe, you might drop pamphlets or send radio messages to the enemy to 'convert' them).

Rhetorical gods: gods whose followers possess reality-warping powers of language itself (which is why 'rhetorical god' is a polite way of saying 'liar's god'). In other words, the paranoia around them comes partly down to the fact that a disciple like Val may appear to be a limitless shaper of new forms, rather than shaped into a limited form of their own, as a result of their worship.

[kerubimcrepin]

LIVEREAD: WAKFU, THE GREAT WAVE [TOME 1, Chapters 1-3]

I want to preemptively say that I wasn't the biggest fan of The Great Wave, while reading it originally. It had less to do with the contents of the comic, and more with the pacing — it's written in a very... webtoon-unfriendly way. Every week I'd wait, and then not much would happen.

I am hoping it will be less exhausting to read this comic this time, but there just isn't a lot that happens in it. It's quite sad, really.

Now that I am done with the "hey, I am not the biggest fan of the way this was executed, at least in this tome" warning, I want to say that I actually really like the idea of a tragic story. Like fuck yesss. With all the amount of foreshadowing we got, we deserve to see how Yugo's good intentions are going to bring disaster.

I will be honest, the day this dropped I went to discord and everyone was screaming "THEY ADDED PORN TO WAKFU" and then when I was finally able to read the comic after someone finally pirated and sent it to me, I saw the world's shortest scene of intimacy between a married couple.

Normal world.

Anyway: STOP FUCKING WHILE WEARING THE WORLD-ENDING MAGICAL NUKES ON YOU.

Hey chat! This reminds me of a very poggers thing I had said a while before this manga realeased:

You have no fucking idea how bigly I won. And this isn't even the last win of mine in this manga. No, I just keep winning and winning. Please, Tot Ankama, I beg you through whatever psychic link we have: do this thing you did to Yugo to Joris too. He deserves it.

In the future, I will be liveblogging myself reading the entire tomes too; instead of making small posts, as the comic releases chapter by chapter.

One of the reasons why? I love writing this post, while knowing full-well that these are Grougalorasalar's words.

MAN, I predicted Grougalorasalar using emotionally manipulative language that's pretty much "you're a fraud, you're amoral, DIE" in nightmarish visions sent to people ages before this manga happened, in my fanfic. And I was so giddy — because I love the idea of 'Salar torturing people like that, and because it means I got something right without having too much data to back it up!

First Joris war criminal arc, then Salar emotional abuse via nightmare visions arc... How is my taste so similar to Tot's??

I think it's very funny for Salar to be moralizing now. My brother in crepinjurgening, you were trying to resurrect your lizard son by shattering his soul forever and bringing him unimaginable suffering so that you can go commit more war crimes together?

Then again, his war crimes had virtually no chance of ending the world. I suppose it's natural for a Black Fire dragon to understand the sort of danger Yugo presents — the fact that they may all end up the same way the Necro world is...

I guess his morals are as weird as Joris's (world ending = bad, war crimes = sometimes good if they do those themselves?). Similarities are only to be expected, since they influenced and changed one-another irrevocably.

this shuoild happen to joris too. pleask.

LITERALLY IT'S SO FUNNY. HE'S SEEN THIS SORTA SHIT HAPPEN AGAIN AND AGAIN AND IS STILL GOING DOWN THAT ROUTE. BRO? 😭

Somehow I really doubt that Grougalorasalar's involvement in this situation is going to improve it in any way.

"I am the black dragon Grougalorasalar and I am going to save the world" ok and flowers can sing, and the world is made of pudding. Get a grip.

[twirling my hair around my fingers, giggling cutely] A shadow you say? This reminds me of Dofus MMO lore :3

I've seen people be upset at there being bigotry towards Eliatropes, but really — this has been coming since season 2. You've seen what a shitshow the idea of another class appearing caused back then.

Maybe it's my "knowing too much about hupperage oppression lore" and "knowing just a little bit about ouginak oppression lore" bias kicking in, but I'm not surprised? Eh?

THEY MULTIPLIED?!

Guys I don't think they're happy.

Originally this made me giggle: "ohh, is Joris going to have to choose between Bonta and his friendship with Yugo, in the future tomes of this manga? I wonder what he will choose, tee-hee."

But ngl, considering the fact that Joris has already demonstrated choosing Yugo over Bonta in season 4, and has been implied to be at odds with the government of Bonta during some ages, and downright opposed in others — I think we know the answer.

Literally not how it would work in real life. Even if Aurora has the right to inherit the throne in some way, her father is completely unrelated to that. He shouldn't even be here — if Aurora has the right to inherit the throne, it means she was made a member of the Sheran-Sharm family, and is no longer a part of her original family, because— [STARTS FOAMING AT THE MOUTH FROM ANGER]

[odinsblog]

One About The Atmosphere: Want to change minds? Stop trying. Change the atmosphere instead.

Donald Trump in 2016 greets a screaming horde of ecstatic white christian nationalists

Minivan was a nice enough guy. He was easygoing; a happy guy with a frequently deployed smile. I don’t recall much anger from him, nor many strongly held opinions. I wouldn’t call him a philosophical type. No deep late night talks with Stove Minivan is my recollection.

This is the sort of dude I’d hang out with at a party, if there were a party we were both at, but not one with whom I’d maintain a relationship if we both graduated and then moved to different places—which I know for a fact, because that’s what happened. We drifted.

So then what happened is twelve years or so later I got on The Facebook, and Stove Minivan was there, too, and before long, we were friends again, he and I, and so were me and my other college friends, and them with him, and … look, you know the drill. It was The Facebook.

Minivan was no longer a pre-med student at a small northern liberal arts college. He was a doctor—a general care practitioner, if memory serves—in a smallish plains state town, very much like many other towns in the great plains or elsewhere in the country, I imagine.

Anyway, before long I noticed something about Minivan. Even though his feed was full of pictures of him and his lovely family, and he was smiling in them just the same as he always had in college, he was angry.

He was *enraged*

What was he angry about? The Demonrats.

Minivan was absolutely enraged about everything the Demonrats did. He also was out of his mind angry about Killary, and Obummer, the leaders of the Demonrats—or at least they were the front for the real leader of the Demonrats, who even back then I believe was George Soros.

What did the Demonrats do? Oh my heck, what *didn’t* they do? Mostly they hated America and American security and American economic strength, it seems. They engaged in corruption and bowed to foreign powers a lot. They shredded the dignity of the presidency, that’s for sure.

Minivan’s worldview wasn’t particularly coherent, if you want to know the truth.

I couldn’t help to notice that the Demonrats weren’t actually doing many of the things that Minivan thought they were doing.

And I noticed other things.

For example, I couldn’t help but notice that a lot of the policies Minivan supported were directly *causing* the sorts problems that made Minivan so angry.

And I couldn’t help but notice that well-sourced information enraged him more than pretty much anything else.

There was a lot of linking to sites I’d never heard of, like Breitbart and Newsmax, and of course plenty of Fox News. There were a lot of memes. There were a lot of conspiracy theories (a big birther, was Minivan).

Some of his posts contained subtle bigotry. Most of the rest contained not-subtle bigotry. Several of them contained slogans and statements that were, very simply, neo Nazi and white supremacist memes and shibboleths.

There was a lot of commentary accompanying these posts from Minivan, who was saying shocking stuff for a small-town family doctor … the sorts of things that it seemed to me would make people not want to use this person as a doctor, or or sit next to that person on a bus.

I hadn’t heard of Alex Jones, yet, but Minivan sounded a lot like Alex Jones, word for word and beat for beat. He’d even start his posts like a right-wing radio host: Sorry folks, but you can’t even make stuff like this up—ironically, accompanying things that had been made up.

This was all pretty distressing to those of us who had known Minivan back in the day, before he had become so obsessed with Demonrats.

So, a lot of us, myself included, did exactly what The Facebook wants.

We engaged with him.

At the time my belief was, you defeated bad ideas with better ideas, by confronting the bad ideas directly with the better ideas. Debate was for changing minds. You presented your ideas, they presented theirs, you countered, they countered, eventually everybody saw the truth.

But the intention was that I’d change his mind, with facts presented logically, delivered calmly and patiently.

This was my belief.

What happened confounded me, but perhaps you can predict it.

Minivan escalated any correction, however calmly stated or bloodlessly presented, into scorched earth territory. He rejected all proofs by rejecting the source outright as irrevocably tainted by bias, or he’d spiral into non sequitur, spamming our feeds with more misinformation.

He would claim he never said things he had just said, even though the statements were still there for anybody to read, one comment earlier in the thread.

He’d claim that I said things I'd never said, as anyone foolish enough to read through our conversations could discover.

He demonstrated a complete dedication to his ignorance and anger, and a total disinterest in anything like observable truth that contradicted his grievance.

It was confounding and unfamiliar behavior to me, at the time.

At the time.

All of it was larded with grievance, a sense that people like him had never wronged anybody, and everybody else had done nothing but wrong people like him.

The bigotry and authoritarianism grew.

And all the time, on Facebook, he and his family kept smiling their perfect smiles.

I’ll admit that over time my interactions stopped being polite and bloodless, and I’m not particularly sorry for it. I told him some things about himself he seemed not to know, but which I thought really ought to be said.

I have a bit of a penchant for sarcasm, which you may have noticed.

I employed this skill, and you can feel how you want to about sarcasm, but I think it helped convey the correct posture to take toward someone who says the sorts of things Minivan was saying.

The correct posture being "you have proved yourself to be a person who should not be taken seriously, and your positions do not deserve even a modicum of respect."

I found this a more healthy message to convey about Minivan to anybody watching, and I still do.

Eventually he blocked me, and he was out of my life forever. It was the right choice, and I'm very glad he did that.

I’ve pondered the incident since, as it’s become more and more relevant to “the way things are.”

A few things had become clear over time.

Minivan was not somebody whose intentions could be trusted. He was not operating in good faith, and I believe he well knew it, because many of his favorite sources of information have written instruction books on how to engage with people in bad faith.

Minivan was not debating; he was using debate to inject his counterfactual beliefs into the discourse, which were designed to further marginalize already marginalized people while simultaneously cloaking himself in self-exonerating grievance.

More, he was exerting an active effort to not know things that could be easily known, and to demand to be convinced out of deliberate ignorance, not because he was interested in having his ideas challenged, but because he demanded a world in which he got to decide what was real.

Further still: Minivan *learned* from me. The effect of telling him he was using one or another logical fallacy was not to sharpen his reasoning, but to teach him about the existence of logical fallacies, which let him (incorrectly) accuse others of those same logical fallacies.

So Minivan was deploying the language of logic, in ways that betrayed a total lack of understanding about what those fallacies were, granted, but in ways that likely made him seem more knowledgeable and reasonable to a casual or sympathetic observer.

He learned to ape our phrases and arguments, in much the way he’d learned to ape the style of Alex Jones and all the various Breitbart and Newsmax contributors he used to inform himself.

And these days it occurs to me: I hear a lot about "groomers."

We were not changing him by engaging with him thoughtfully.

We certainly weren’t changing him by engaging with him in kind.

Rather: we were making him better at what he was doing, and we were validating his world view—to himself and others—as one that merited engagement.

And week after week on Facebook, Minivan kept smiling and smiling and getting angrier and angrier, at us and Obummer and all the other Demonrats and liberals and every member of every minority group who dared to fail to ceaselessly assure him that he was right about everything.

I don’t miss Minivan's black-hole-sun smile. I think of it as my first hint of MAGA: politically overrepresented, socially coddled people, often living outwardly happy privileged lives, while seething inwardly that other people might be getting anything, anything at all.

Indeed, soon enough, another figure would come on the scene, whose behavior matched that of Minivan almost exactly, a perfect avatar for this spirit of aggrieved bigotry and supremacy that seemed to be moving through my former friend.

And sure enough, as I saw, there were millions and millions of smiling seething people who loved him.

And that guy became president.

Nobody believed he would. And then he did.

Because Stove Minivan, it turns out, wasn’t some weird outlier.

He was part of a growing new normal, a group of people who had been offered a chance to immigrate from observable reality and enter a dark world of constant hostility, misinformation, and self-loving grievance.

It's an invitation they leapt at, to which they cling even now.

It's a constituency immune to proof, angered by equality, cheered by cruelty, who blame others for the foulness of the shallow puddle of reasoning within which they have demand to be seated, even though we can all see them fouling it themselves, every day.

And afterward, a huge number of those shocked by this development decided the proper reaction was to accommodate it, in the name of unity—a belief, it seems, grounded in the idea that what you choose to get along with isn’t as important as getting along no matter what.

I’ll finish with the question that all of Minivan’s former friends would eventually ask, whenever they gathered together long enough for the subject to arise.

"What the hell happened to Minivan?"

Here’s the answer, I think: nothing.

Nothing happened to Minivan. Nothing at all.

He was always that guy, and he always thought the things he thought.

What changed was that he was given a lot of language with which to express those ideas, and access to enough other people who thought that way too, that it created a critical mass of permission.

The permission allowed him to change his attitudes and actions, and created a lot of other people willing to accommodate and normalize his antisocial anti-reality behavior, rather than reject it out of hand.

In college you could be pretty conservative, honestly. It was a pretty conservative place. But you couldn't behave like Minivan later would.

You’d be understood to be a far-right extremist, and people would then treat you like a far-right extremist.

Which is what you'd be.

I think it just wasn't possible for Minivan to be what he later became, because the atmosphere wasn't conducive to the possibility.

But then the atmosphere changed.

If we want to change it back, it's worth thinking about how atmospheres change.

(source)

[stoutguts]

headcanon rambling/my personal hc for Johnny's backstory bc I think it'd be interesting also I like the idea of Ghoap where the both of them had a shitty childhood bc of an abusive parent and the both of of them hv trauma/I love angst 💕

CW: drug add\ction, s*lf-h*rm/s*icide, parental/child abvse

Soap was born into a big family in the Scottish countryside, being the youngest with 6 older sisters. His father was a deadbeat, and walked out on him at a young age, being effectively raised by his mom and big sisters. Having strong female influences on his life benefited him greatly in the long run, he grew up to be a very well-adjusted, kind, and respectful man (particularly towards women, as he is a staunch feminist (you go Johnny).

However, on the other hand the only true parental figure in his life, his mother, was a horrible person. She was mentally and emotionally abusive, as well as unstable. She would even get physical with her children at times, including Soap. Johnny was also raised Roman Catholic, though today he considers himself agnostic or a flat out atheist. His mother was incredibly homophobic and transphobic and would use religion to justify her bigotry towards him, leading Soap to hating himself and struggling with self-harm and suicidal ideation for years. Particularly, by cutting himself (he has s/h scars all over his thighs, arms, and shoulders). Has attempted at least 10+ times in the past. Not to mention, he did a lot of hard drugs during his middle and high school years to cope with his mother's abuse. (Particularly coke and heroin). He's come incredibly close to ODing on a few occasions. An addict and a total mess, until his sisters intervened and forced him against his will into rehab.

After 2 or so years he was clean and eligible for the military.

He still relapses from time to time (whether it's self-harm or drugs), and when he does its bad. He even still regularly smokes weed to this day, though it's not nearly as bad as some other substances. It's a wonder he hasn't been discharged, (because he doesn’t try to hide it too much), but probably because he's too much of an asset.

Ghost is the one to bring him out of his slumps now. Not minding one bit, as all Simon cares about is Johnny's safety and well-being.

Needless to say, he could never see religion in the same light after that. He’s even quite apprehensive and wary of people whom are religious and religion in general.

He and his mother were never close and soon would never get along with each other, as he’s proud and not the type to even tolerate shit from anyone. It was an almost daily occurrence that he and his mom would fight, particularly when he finally reached his pre-teen/teen years, sometimes evolving into full-blown screaming matches.

Being the protective type of person that he is, most of the time he’d get into fights because of his sisters coming to him about how mom had hit them or made them cry (despite the fact he feels nothing but pure hatred for his mum, he has a very deep bond/connection to each and everyone of his sisters and loves them all dearly).

That was what pissed him off more than anything.

His mom could do whatever she wanted with him, frankly he stopped caring and her cutting words no longer held any weight or meaning to him at some point, and being hit was soon the equivalent to getting bit by a mosquito, he became numb. He didn't know when he stopped feeling, but he did. (He of course wasn't entirely immune, she'd eventually break him). But he was determined to stay strong for his siblings.

Bringing harm upon his sisters? No way in hell that was ever gonna fly, and he didn't care if she was his mother or not.

Johnny naturally grew to resent his mother, and to this day he still calls her a “witch” or a "cunt" instead of his mum. Eventually he’d had enough and couldn’t take his mother’s abuse any longer, (she is half of the reason he went into the military as soon as he possibly could, besides it being a lifelong and childhood dream of his).

He kept in touch with his sisters (and still does), of course, calls them everyday or whenever he gets the chance to let them know he’s alive and well and to see how their doing. Visits when he can or when he’s off duty. Though he completely cut ties with his mother after joining the military,—a couple of his sisters would keep him posted on what was going on with her.

Later on, his mother went to go on to be diagnosed with terminal cancer, and passed shortly thereafter.

He attended the funeral up in Scotland, but mainly for his sisters’ sakes. He actually ended up staying in Scotland for a while after that to provide support for his sisters, (emotional or otherwise), and to try to ease the grieving process. Even though she wasn’t the greatest mom or person in general, it was still a tough loss. Though Soap still didn’t regret cutting her out of his life,—it was fucked up but he was glad that she died in a way, and even visited her grave just once after the funeral, by himself, just so he could spit on it. Maybe even say some things he never was able to say to her, half as retribution and half to just get it off his chest.

Ghost is the only one who knows of Johnny's past and his abusive mother, and is incredibly understanding and gentle about it (as naturally it's a particularly touchy subject). On all official stuff regarding his background, the most it ever details is where he was born or that he was raised Roman Catholic. Not to mention, although Soap is a yapper and almost never shuts up, he’s a very private person and just simply doesn’t like others knowing his business (with the exception of Ghost of course).

Even though Johnny didn’t let his mother’s death bother him regarding the funeral and his prolonged visit to Scotland, when he got back he broke down completely.

He stayed strong for his sisters as he felt like he had to and just as he's always done, but the facade came crashing down once he was in Simon's arms again.

He hated his mum, she didn't really deserve his tears, yet she was still his mum. That fact still reigned true even after everything.

And Ghost was there by his side the whole time. Hell, if anyone knows what it's like to lose a family member, it's Simon "Ghost" Riley. Whether they be toxic or not. Simon's heart positively ached for Soap, and they couldn't help but get all misty eyed at Johnny's pure, unbridled grief.

Ghost had never felt so sorry for anyone in his life, and Soap was eternally grateful for Simon's patience, empathy, and it consoling him to the best of their ability. 💖

DADDY ISSUES GHOST AND MOMMY ISSUES SOAP MY BELOVED(S)

[socialistexan]

Very easy to spot bad faith actors.

Remember, folks, the term "zio" was popularized by David Duke, a man too racist and antisemitic even for the KKK. It's a straight up neo-nazi term. Full stop.

If you use or or defend it's use, then anyone and everyone, regardless of political affiliation, is allowed to completely dismiss you as both unserious and a threat who deserves no platform.

Either you're a grifter using a tragedy to spread bigotry or you're a useful idiot who couldn't spare a critical thought to save your fucking life.