#but also it does apply to a LOT of things

[frodothefair]

Ok, yes, this is absolutely something that we need to fight because to co-opt the words of Martin Luther King Jr., a threat to free speech anywhere is a threat to free speech everywhere, and this law attempts to capture a larger swath of material than any law in recent memory.

However, a couple balancing thoughts, to counter everyone's anxiety.

First, I looked up the legislator who introduced this law, and he has a history of proposing extreme, far-right legislation that doesn't go anywhere. Even in Oklahoma, he seems to be one of the "crazies." Let's hope this helps.

Second, please take a look at this except from the proposed law - its latest iteration. The part that may affect literary works has to do with the law's definition of "obscene material."

It is an almost exact, word for word replication of the Miller test, which is something that already exists at the federal level, and has since the 1970's! The Miller test is a result of a case that was brought before the Supreme Court about this very issue vis-a-vis the right to free speech.

(source)

The one potentially reassuring part is that they've included the words "when taken as a whole." As a result, it is likely that romance novels will be exempt, because sex hardly constitutes the entirety of a typical novel. But then again, you never know. After all, they are the ones deciding what meets the standard of "offensive," "community standards," and "serious value."

Now, one thing I've always though is, a lot of the videos one might find in an adult video store, or online at p0rnhub and the like would be very unlikely to pass the Miller test. Arguably, a particularly poorly written oneshot of a sexual nature would also not pass the Miller test. But even so, those materials exist! The internet is inundated with them. How exactly does this happen? The answer, I think, is that obscenity laws are very selectively enforced.

That said, none of this means that laws like this are not an issue. It is not enough to simply hope that if a law passes, it will not be enforced because of the sheer scope of the materials it affects, or because it will not apply to your specific thing. And if you think it won't affect your specific thing you could easily be wrong -- back in the 80's, artists as impactful as Prince and Twisted Sister were accused of creating music that was "p0rnorgraphy without the pictures."

Oklahoma is attempting to pass a bill that would ban explicit romance novels. Authors, narrators, and sellers could all face fines of up to $100,000 and up to 10 years in jail for each instance.

If you live in OK, call your representative and tell them this bill should not be allowed to pass.

This is likely a test case. Republicans will try to pass it in OK and if it passes other states will likely try to pass similar laws.

In the meantime, get physical copies of books you like. Download those pdfs. Archive your AO3 stories and keep them on a physical hard drive. (Storing those files in the cloud could be problematic in the future as the company managing the cloud service can see what your files are)

[rubberduckyrye]

I've been seeing a fair bit of "Shuichi treats people more like cases than people" sentiment, and while it is an interesting idea for Angst Purposes, I just don't think that's very in character for him realistically.

Especially when people talk about the runaway cases he dealt with.

I think a lot of people think "runaway" and think "children who are in abusive homes who NEEDED to run away" and not "Children who got emotionally devastated by something and made an irrational choice in the heat of the moment" because there is a fundamental difference between the two. Even still, you should not leave a runaway child to fend for themselves! They are vulnerable! They need help!!!

Whether they need help getting home or help into a new home.

I think that also people don't acknowledge it when Shuichi says that he checks up on the runaway cases post-investigation to make sure everything's still okay and going well. I'm also sure that, as part of the process, he learns from the runaway child the reason why they ran away, and if the reason was as devastated as domestic or sexual violence or severe neglect, he would NOT just send them off home.

That is not in character for him.

He has a lot of very human interactions with his classmates (outside of Kokichi, who is explicitly hated by the narrative) and tries (maybe fails, but tries) to be considerate towards them and their inner feelings.

His interactions in his LSEs aren't just acting, he's still being "himself", and his interactions with characters like Kirumi (I.E. validating her and humanizing her, insisting that her love for him isn't bad because she is his equal) despite playing the role of her "master." And in Gonta's, he knew Gonta was upset over scaring him so he comforted him and reassured him that everything was okay.

Also in Kirumi's FTE's, Shuichi offered to be Kirumi's "master" when she was playing a joke on him with the whole stray maid thing, and in Kiibo's FTE, he offers to continue helping Kiibo find new avenues to explore via his robot emotions and the whole robot business thing.

Shuichi doesn't just, stick around only to figure someone out and then get bored of them when he's done. I'll be the first to admit it, how Shuichi treats Kokichi specifically is pretty terrible at times, but that is a narrative flaw that does not apply to everyone else.

He's very thoughtful, tries his best to be accommodating and supportive, and does try his best to make connections with the people around him. He almost overextends himself just to help others--which is something that he would do for runaway children as well.

I think people need to give Shuichi more credit than just seeing the Runaway Cases thing and immediately thinking his neglectful person who only cares about solving mysteries because canon didn't explicitly state how he handles those cases.

[changingplumbob]

For @riverofjazzsims: A Holiday to Die for

Jamel has a dream. Sure, we all have dreams, but Jamel is serious about his. So serious he has cut off the rest of his family who have belittled him. He may have earned a basic degree, but he has been rejected for a masters program several times. "It's not scientific", "We don't do fiction" and straight up laughter have been some of the responses from university boards. This renaissance sim knows he must continue to grow and sharpen his skills if he will ever achieve it. What is Jamel's controversial dream?

He wants to be the one to reunite sasquatch and humans. He believes! They exist! Cryptozoology may be labeled as a pseudo science but that's only because the sasquatch are superior at hide-and-go-seek! If he applies his perfectionist streak with his curiosity he must find them!

Fresh from a month in the wilderness he's taking some time off, you need to rest the vocal chords when you're trying to imitate sasquatch calls for so long. A holiday in the snow sounds perfect. And Winter being a mystery? Well mysteries are his favourite thing to learn about. He may be a bit "out there" but he'd genuinely love someone to cuddle at night.

His favourite colour is orange! But he does also like yellow, white and blue. As requested he has two everyday outfits and a cold weather outfit. Everything else unless changed will appear as... well...

What? Being paranoid doesn't mean he can't look good. I don't know his height sorry, he's cagey about giving away details.

What makes him naughty? He likes arguments. Like a lot. Especially about conspiracy theories! Strictly naturally occurring ones though, he doesn't have time for holocaust deniers or those who think school shootings are staged. He's paranoid not insane.

What makes him nice? Well he loves photography and seems to always be documenting something. He's also one of the most open minded people you will ever meet. If you have a dream he's going to encourage you to chase it as much as he chases his.

CC: beard, Download without cc - it's the only way I can get the site to work for me (SFS)

Feel free to take him into your heart and game friends!

[pillowspace]

hey, um!!! i absolutely adore your art and aus and writing and everything sososososo much but, since you ship sifloop and it is selfcest... whats ur perspective on like. the whole "selfcest is incest/worst than incest" debate. and how it applies/if it applies to sifloop at all. IM SORRY IF THIS IS A SUPER UNCOMFORTABLE QUESTION/TOPIC u can skip and just ignore this ask if u want!!! /gen /nf im just curious ur perspective since i enjoy sifloop dynamic So Much but i'm just. confused and a lil uncomfortable w/ actually shipping them romantically bc of. well. The Selfcest Factor :'D

Hey, it's okay!!! I don't really mention topics like that on my blog, I'm very tame in how I post, so I'll just shyly hide under a readmore for my answer <3

First of all, I don't see selfcest as incest. I think that if someone were to meet a clone of themself and see them as family, they very reasonably could, but that it itself is not a family situation on its own if no one has decided that. It's a "decide it, and it'll be" situation.

I understand that a lot of people are weirded out by selfcest, and I think that's very valid and reasonable, but I'm very used to it so it's just normal to me.

As for whether or not it's worse, I'm sure it can gross someone out WORSE than incest, that's fine, but I really don't believe a completely fictional concept that does not exist in the real world (even if you can get a tiny bit close) is like... morally worse. It's practically clay, you can shape it however you want.

Growing up around the concept of selfcest made me feel better about myself honestly. It's comforting to tell yourself "I love you," and I dealt with my self-worth issues as a kid by making selfcest OCs to process self-love through creation. Knowing that a fictional character could find worth and affection in themself as if looking at someone else always made me wonder if I could do that too, and that's quite possibly the least harmful thing I could have ever had that reaction towards. Whenever I felt bad, I felt more willing to "talk it out" with myself as if I was talking to someone separate, which made it easier to treat myself with kindness.

I also just generally think the word "selfcest" contributes to this ickiness around it, and I do dislike the word, but I try not to think about it much. It probably could have been named better.

Ultimately: anyone can not like it. That's okay. But at the end of the day, it's harmless and is as fictional as a vampire. And anyone can also not like vampires.

[red-cicada]

Some random traits i want to give my Herbert ( also guys some of these things are also just my hcs that just started to become my own ideas lol ) 1- Herbert has blood sugar issues, i just think it makes sense that you know he doesn't eat well, he's autistic so he also doesn't register when he is hungry, and when he does eat he tends to eat the quickest most efficient meals. this leads him to developing blood sugar issues and has to often deal with migraines, Shakey hands, and nose bleeds. He keeps pieces of hard candy ( like little caramel candies ) on him because its the quickest, easiest, and effect way to spike up his sugar when its low. Instead of stopping his work to go get some juice or something he just reaches into his pocket or his bag and eats a few candies quickly without disrupting his work.

2- He keeps one of those glasses clothes on him all the time in his little shirt pocket, where he keeps his pens and stuff he got one of em lil square fabrics in there. I have a specific shot in my head where he's like all bloodied and he goes to get the glasses cleaner from his pocket and its all just soaked with blood and he just defeatedly throws it to the ground lol.

3- the reason why Herbert wears suits all the time because he came from a rich family, so growing up he always had to look proper which was wearing fitted, dress close, dress shoes, button ups, ties, coats ect: So its become routine for him to always dress in that type of clothing, its a comfort, sensory, and consistent pattern thing. ( he also wears brand clothing because that's just what he's used too, but he also does NOT give a shit about it, he doesn't buy brand names cause they are expensive he buys them cause that's just what he's used too )

4- post beyond timeline, some of Herbert's traits change, he acts differently, his schedules are different, some things he used to be picky about ( clothing, food, ect:) he isn't as picky with, he's also a lot cleaner after getting out of prison, his work flow and space will be drastically different. ( I have some comic ideas for future danbert projects with this )

Also just so you guys know, while this stuff is for my own version of reanimator it also applies to Stuart Gordon's reanimator cause all of this started as simple hcs for danbert that just got out of hand and i HAD to make my own lol.

they should make a show like Hannibal but for re-animator, and they should let me direct and write and also let me play Herbert West

[roodles03]

Hazbin Hotel Angelic Wings Theory

Something I thought of while falling asleep last night, is that after Vaggie regains her wings, they become retractable.

Vaggie regains her wings in Hello Rosie, but as we can see in the next episode they're seemingly gone

But later in The Show Must Go On, it's shown she can just pull them out at will and then retract them when she wants later.

Now comparing her to another Angel of her kind (exorcists) Lute ALWAYS has her wings out and it appears she CANNOT retract them. (This also applies to Adam but I don't think he counts as a true exorcist angel)

This may also apply to Vaggie herself before she was brutalized and attacked by Lute. As she has her old set of wings at all times.

(Yes, TORN off, not CUT off. Lute didn't use angelic weapons to cut off Vaggie's wings, she TORE them off with her bare hands. That's why Vaggie was able to grow them back)

So perhaps having your wings physically torn off in some way, when you grow them back it has the side effect of making them retractable. I was thinking that maybe the animators just don't want to draw the wings at all times but clearly they do for other angels and other winged characters so this seems purposeful.

This also seems to apply to the seraphim angels we see, Sera and Emily. They ALWAYS have their wings out and it doesn't seem they can retract them at will.

Now, who else is a Seraphim who CAN retract their wings?

Yes, it's Lucifer.

In fact, it seems Lucifer highly prefers to keep his wings retracted. Seemingly only using them to fly, fight, or show off. They also appear to come out automatically similar to his horns when he goes full-demon.

Now I actually did go back to the opening storybook sequence, and Lucifer has his wings out the ENTIRE time rather than just before which does make this a bit confusing.

But I do find it really odd he only has half his wings here, just before being thrown into hell, despite it not being a side profile. As an artist I really see no reason for that choice, it wouldn't really affect the silhouettes too much because they show overlap in earlier scenes. It just seems super odd here. But at the same time, there's no way to know the true intention of why they drew it the way they did. Maybe it was to make things appear clearer, it could be foreshadowing he lost half his wings? Who knows. I don't have an answer for this part.

But It's also important to note this opening scene was narrated to us as if it were a storybook being read to a child. Narratively, It's a simple narration/exposition of a previous event in the story. A lot of shows do this and leave out the details in order to actually show us what happened on screen in a flashback down the line. And to make that actual flashback more satisfying and NOT feel like a waste of time, they most definitely had to leave stuff out of this initial exposition. (Plus you still want mysteries to keep viewers engaged) Think of the Roo, Root of all Evil Theory, or how they don't talk much about Eve at all. This could be stuff they intentionally left out in case they do have a flashback of this moment later in the series.

So it's entirely possible that they purposely left out Lucifer getting his wings torn off to make it a surprise for when they do actually show us the fall of humanity, and in turn, Lucifer's fall.

Of course, you could argue that Vaggie and Lucifer CHOOSE to retract their wings while the other angels don't, but the fact that no angel we know of besides them does it, and they're both fallen angels, one of which we know FOR SURE had their wings torn off, it raises enough eyebrows for me.

Basically, I think it's very possible that through the evidence of Vaggie's wings being retractable after growing them back, and every other angel we know of never retracts their wings and has never had their wings torn off, it can be assumed that Lucifer might have had his wings torn off as punishment when he was sent down to hell.

[spidybaby]

Makeup Voice-over

Madrid Boys x Influencer!Reader

Summary: You ask your boyfriend for help to record the voice-over of your makeup routine.

Warnings: cursing.

A/N: Hi guys! Many of you asked me to do a version of Barca Boys but with Madrid guys. I took the most mentioned in the requests, hope you like it, love you 🙂‍↔️❤️

Jude

"So, I just have to do say what you are doin'?" He asks, confused while you place the airpods on his ears.

"Yes, baby." You smile at him.

"What if I don't know the name of the product?" He asks, worried. "Or the name of the tool?"

"Jude, just do it your way, call it whatever."

"Alright, boss." He smiles.

You left the room, leaving him to do it alone. You walk with a laundry basket to the laundry room. Wanting to be surprised with the video once it's done.

Jude does what you told him, play the video, and start to say what you are applying with a lot of detail.

"Hello' mates, I'm Y/n, your favorite one. Today, I'm doing a tutorial so you can look as amazing as I do."

He chuckles as he stops the video. You recorded in parts so he could pause and do the voice over slowly.

"I'm applying this green gel, I think that's for hair." He says, confused. "Oh, on my face, okay." He doesn't understand why you would apply that to your face. "Now I'm grabbing this and putting drops of it on my face. As you can see, it's the same color as my skin." He explains.

He takes a pause to drink some water.

"With a sponge, I know that cause my amazing boyfriend who I adore gave it to me!" He says proudly. "I spread it all over my face, then you grab another product with the same color and put it under your eye, in your chin, in your forehead."

He tries to understand what you are doing but he doesn't really know much about makeup and he doesn't really know much about the names.

"Okay, so now you need to use powder, place it all over the stuff you just spread." He confusingly says. "Now I know this one, you need to blush your face just like when my perfect boyfriend gives me a compliment. Love you, darling." He chuckles.

He feels happy that he knows what you are doing, he might be dumb but he wasn't dumb to blush.

"Now apply brown powder cause why not." He explains. "Also, now with a brush, you grab this other brown powder and apply it to the eye, close it before, we don't want to become blind."

He praised himself for the knowledge.

"Now that your eyes are powdered with brown, you grab an even darker brown and do it to only a part of your eye." He says, obviously thinking he is correct. "Now you take this shiny powder and apply it to the other part of your eye, yes."

He pauses again, taking a other sip of his drink.

"Okay, mates, and you grab this mascara. Yes, that's the name. Write it down. You apply it to the lashes twice, apparently."

You are downstairs finishing with loading the washing machine, not thinking that it was going to be as funny as it was being.

"Now we apply lipstick, but if I'm being honest let's skip it, fuck!" He says, very confident. "Oh, shit. Not this glossy thing. Okay, apply a glossy thing to your lips but don't kiss your man because that will end up on his lips."

He hates gloss, everybody knows that now.

"And then you spray your face, why? I don't know." He chuckles. "Thank you guys, now go buy a real madrid jersey with the number 5, bye."

Kylian

"Bonjour à tous, je suis Y/n."

"Kyks, in English, please!" You say from the kitchen. He was recording the voice-over on the couch.

"Anyways, today I'm doing my skin care and makeup. Let's start." He says in a very sweet tone. "First wash your face if you don't disgusting."

You can't help but laugh at him.

"Shhh, I'm working here." He says, trying not to laugh. "You now need to pass this cotton thing with this mmm, water?" He questions.

You shake your head, he tries to praise that he knows everything but clearly don't.

"Pass it around and let it dry." He nods at himself. "Then you need to apply this silicony gel, make sure it's spead correctly because if not you will root and die."

"Kylian!" You warn him. "You can't say that to people."

"I know what I'm doing, mademoiselle." He tells you. "Now that you did, apply foundation on this plate and add some of your skin care. Why? Don't know, but do it just like I do."

He pauses the video to talk to you.

"What is the plate?" He asks.

"It's a mixing pallette." You explain. "You use it to mix products."

He nods, understanding. "Now you pick it up with a brush, applying it to your face. Blend it up calmly because if not, you might break an arm." He chuckles. "Then you move to your small foundation, I think that's not what is called but Google it. It's Dior as you can see."

He makes sure to say it because when you did a video asking him to guess the price he was impressed that Dior had makeup.

"Once that's done, you grab this brown cream. Grab the brush and take some product, apply to the forehead and the cheeks." He explains. "And grab this blush, one dot on each cheek, blend it."

You smile at how he looks like he is enjoying doing it.

"Grab the powder and powder yourself, make sure to be very powder, or you'll be all wet with the other products, and you will be the clown of the party."

You cover your mouth, can't believe how extra he was being.

"Then you'll grab another brown product, applying it again, same with the blush, do it again. Don't worry if it seems wasteful. Make your boyfriend get you another one."

He chuckles, knowing that he was being a hit.

"Now you need to move to the eyes. You are going to grab a pallette and apply a color to the eyes. You then gran your marker and draw a line, make it sharp, it needs to be able to cut the enemies."

You shake your head no, laughing at him being so extra.

"Once you do that, you need to apply more lashes, bigger ones." He explains. "They glue to the eyelid, and once it's done, grab a mascara, apply it."

You move from the kitchen to where he is. "Almost done? The food is ready."

He nods. "You are going to grab a color pencil. Paint your lips with it because you'll need it for the lipstick. When you are done, you need to apply a spray."

He tries to remember the name of that spray but he can't.

"And done, now I leave to go to a Real Madrid game to see my boyfriend, love you Kylian, the best, vote for him on La Liga player of the month, bye."

Arda

"Are you sure you want me to do this?" He asks, very shyly.

"Yes, love." You smile, caressing his face. "It's just a voice-over of my makeup tutorial."

"But I'll mess up things."

"No, you won't." You smile. "Just name things as you think they are, okay?"

"Okay."

He walks over to your studio, you let him alone to do it because he asked you to.

"Okay, shit." He takes a deep breath. "Hello everyone, my girlfriend is doing a makeup tutorial. First, she's applying this skin color cream with an eggy looking sponge."

He's confuse at the sponge but won't pay mind to it.

"Then you need to grab another skin color cream. This one is, I think, a little bit more bright, or maybe it's the light." He says, very confused. "You need to hit your face with the sponge and move the cream around. Then you are going to grab a big brush, she's using one I gave her for her birthday, don't ask me, my mom helped me." He chuckles

He didn't lie. He got you a lot of makeup things for your birthday. Thanks to his mom, he got everything right because he was lost.

"Now, with another brush, she's grabbing this thing to make her face have shape or something like that. You need to apply it to the jawline, the cheek, your nose, everywhere basically."

He's confuse about why is it everywhere, but he won't question you.

"Okay, now a different brush. This has been in her collection for a long time, I know cause I once almost broke it, and she told me that." He chuckles. "You grab this pinky powder, apply it to the cheeks and I don't know why she's also applying it on the top of her nose and on her eyelids."

He's confused at why you are doing that but won't complain. He isn't a woman, he can't argue with you about it.

"Okay, now she's using this eye makeup. She likes orange, and she will use it on her eyes. This makeup was when we played with the orange jersey. Love that jersey. Also, the white one is cool, but this one has its own thing."

He's rambling, but you don't mind about it. It was supposed to be something fun for you and him. So you told him to be himself and to ramble if he wants.

"After the eyes, she usually grabs this lash comb, makes her eyelashes grow, they look amazing." He admires the image of you. "She doesn't like gloss or lipstick, so she's using this belly thing on her lips, tapping it with her fingers to make it seem natural."

He was almost done. He knows it because when you do this, you then apply a spray and say you are done.

"To finish you grab this spray, it makes your makeup last. Why? I'm not sure, but I just trust the process, apparently." He says, trying not to chuckle. "Now we are done, and as you can see, she looks amazing. Thank you for watching."

Brahim

"Bueno gente, let's start this." Brahim says. "You'll need to be pretty cause if you are not as pretty as me, sad." He says.

You shake your head no, trying not to let the big laugh you are holding out.

"You need to use some foundation, I use this one from Rihanna." He mentions, not sura about brands but dealing with it. "You grab the sponge, hit your face with it, hard please so you can stamp that makeup on."

You lost it, letting the laugh out.

"Shhh, amor venga!" He says. "Okay, move on, you grab your concealer. In this case, I couldn't sleep because I like to watch my boyfriend who is very handsome, guapo el chico!"

You laugh again.

"You then grab this powder, also grab this triangle, press the powder, and then place it under the eyes, the forehead, the cheeks." He explains, feeling like a pro. "You then grab that cocoa powder lookalike. Then please grab a brush and a blush, I love the kiko one, muy bueno, mucho pimiento!"

"Pigmento!" You laugh

"Exactly," He says. "Now I don't like to add much eye shadow, I place this light brown, como café corto de leche, then I add highlight."

"Coffee with light milk?" You ask.

"Shhh, guapa." He says, waving his hand. "To finish, I apply my favorite mascara. It's named better than sex, even tho it is not because my boyfriend joder!"

You almost pee yourself from how hard you are laughing at his silliness.

"Now, apply a lip oil and go around your day." He says sassy. "Also, don't forget to go and see my boyfriend, The Brahim Diaz, highlights on La Liga Instagram. Adiós, kiss kiss." He finishes with a kiss sound.

[specialagentartemis]

Feel like dropping the rant about how "pre-written records = prehistory" is not a good way of conceptualizing history? It's not my area at all so I'm fascinated.

Hah absolutely

It’s a mix of semantics, and word connotations, and the way history gets presented, and tbh legacies of racism.

So. Part of it comes from the distinctions between the academic field and practice of history, and the academic field and practice of archaeology. The practice of history means analyzing the past through written texts and records; the practice of archaeology means analyzing the past through the material remains left behind. This is fine. It refers to the way you approach information about the past and what tools and theories you use to do so. I have no problem with this part!

Of course, it starts to get more complicated when you also have classicists (who study ancient Greek and Roman history primarily through texts but also incorporate some aspects of archaeology) and Assyriologists (ditto but for Mesopotamia), which have their roots in old-school European practices of formal education. There’s also historical archaeology, which is primarily archaeology but incorporates written records of the time and place for a fuller picture, or uses archaeology to complicate or fill gaps in the records. Historical archaeology is a practice that can be applied to any place and time with historical records, but primarily it refers to archaeology of the Americas post-European colonialism.

These refer to the ways we study the past. Where I start to disagree is when these terms get applied to the past itself.

Historians study history through written texts, so there is often a delineation where history = the presence of written texts, and prehistory = before that. And I have problems with that delineation of time.

For one thing, the connotations of the terms. History, in common use, is important, it’s everything that built the world we live in and led to where we are now. Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. While prehistory conjures images of dinosaurs, or cavemen. It implies that the things that happened in it aren’t as important as the things that happened once history proper started. It also feels very, very old—it feels weird to call, say, the Inca empire prehistoric, when the Inca Empire is younger than Oxford University and the first Inca emperor was crowned in Peru after the Norman Invasion of England in 1066—something nobody calls prehistoric.

Because that brings up a more objective issue with splitting time into “history” and “prehistory”: writing was invented at different times in different places, and used to different extents. Writing was first invented in Mesopotamia in the Early Bronze Age, about 5,000 years ago. It was probably independently invented in Egypt shortly afterward, and was independently invented in China 3400 years ago, and in Central America about 2500 years ago. Writing spread across Asia, India, North Africa, Europe, and Mexico/Guatemala; it was not used in North America, South America, southern Africa, Australia, most parts of Polynesia, Micronesia, Australia, or New Zealand at all until European contact. According to the written records definition, this means history starts in very different times in these different places. Not only does this unbalance what we think of as “history” a lot, it ends up discounting or minimizing these people’s own ways of reckoning history, making their history start when Europeans arrived.

This is an incredibly dismissive way to consider whole continents’ worth of people and cultures! It turns them into a “people without history,” and implies that whatever they were doing before Europeans (or Chinese, Indians, or North Africans depending on the region, but mostly Europeans) doesn’t really matter to what happened since. If anything happened at all in that ��time before history”; a common perspective of both early colonists and modern pop-history in places like the American West or Australia is that the people there have been living the exact same way for thousands of years, unchanging since the Stone Age. Only upon contact with Europeans did anything change and “history” start. This is hugely dismissive of these people’s autonomy and their past. (You’ll notice it’s a lot of people who suffer from racism who are denied the title of “history”!) It’s also just not true.

I’m an archaeologist who studies the US Southwest/Mexican Northwest region; I focus on Arizona and New Mexico in the 1000s–1400s AD. And one of the things that opened my mind so much in studying the US southwest was just how much things changed from decade to decade and century to century in the past, the same way they did anywhere else in history at this time. There was no written history in this part of the world, but what we do have is very precise tree-ring dates. Using tree rings, we can date when this or that building was built down to the precise year. And because it’s a desert, things preserve well for a long time, so we have lots of ancient tree-ring dates. Because of this, we can see how art styles, architectural styles, settlement patterns, family organization, farming practices, religion, politics, and cultural interactions changed over the past four thousand years. And we can see that they did change, and sometimes they changed slowly and sometimes they changed rapidly. People did things. They had new ideas, they formed new political organizations and adopted new religions, they came together and broke apart, they developed new art styles and new technologies, elite lineages controlled the social order until their power fractured, people moved into new places and adapted their old practices to what they found there, or developed new ones… and because of tree-rings and desert preservation, archaeologists can see it in ways we can’t in cooler and wetter environments. This is history. This is people doing things, shaping the physical and social landscape for the centuries that followed.

And of course, Pueblo and Diné and Apache and O’odham people of the Southwest have their own oral histories that overlap with these archaeological studies. This is true in many, many places that did not traditionally use writing. They can’t be discounted just because they weren’t written down.

So to me, history = writing and prehistory = before writing is a false dichotomy that’s unhelpful at best and racist at worst. To me, history starts when people become socially organized enough that they care about what happened before, what happened where, and why it’s important, and what it means. Every culture has history, whether they wrote it down or not. Studying it may not always be suited to the skillset of historians, but that doesn’t mean it’s not history.

[darklinaforever]

Even before Charlie, she (Claudia) wasn't calling him (Lestat) "papa" but the lesser "uncle" indicating a lesser connection. Add to that Lestat's intense resistance to even making her, suggests that he is withholding his affection.

Just... what the fuck ? 😂

Claudia calls Lestat uncle it's mainly because of society outside (because Louis and Lestat unsuccessfully try to pass off their relationship as brotherly).

And otherwise... Claudia considered herself as the daughter of Lestat ? She literally tells him at one point that she is no longer his child anymore but his sister companion. That he is not his uncle or her dad now either. And that in the end of her life, Claudia looked at Lestat like a child looks at her father. So, in fact, Claudia considers herself effectively as the Lestat's daughter, all the same as for Louis. Claudia even considers that she was brought back to life by their blood, to both.

And I remind that even though she said Louis was her favorite, that she and Lestat had a lot in common. They even literally have a nickname among themselves (without Louis) for human blood.

Moreover, on several occasions the show shows that Lestat seems to understand and know Claudia better than Louis on certain things (he is the one who notices the dark changes in her, understands that she is a predator, that she does not starve, etc).

Lestat is also the one who teaches Claudia to drive, to be a good predator (because he sees clearly that on this point she has nothing to do with Louis), he doesn't want Claudia to be limited about her nature, he essentially made subtly her sexual education, that they should not mix too much with humans, etc.

The story also spends its time reminding us that Claudia is indeed Lestat's daughter (that she is their daughter to him and Louis, Louis daughter, Lestat daughter, she was even called in the show Claudia de Lioncourt specifically, that they are her parents) and that she resembles him. That they are very similar to each other.

Their connection is maybe less tender than that of Louis and Claudia but no less strong (and certainly not because she calls him uncle).

And uh... wtf ? Lestat's refusal to make Claudia has nothing to do with a lack of affection for her (he don't even know her in that moment), or even a future lack of affection / love for her, but simply because it was forbidden by law and because he knew very well what he was condemning Claudia to if he transformed her ?!

At that moment, it was even Lestat who had more consideration for Claudia than Louis. Lestat thought about Claudia's future, while Louis only thought about himself and what Claudia could bring him and the guilt he felt. Lestat cares, Louis should care but doesn't.

Yes, Lestat didn't want Claudia at first, but he grew to love her anyway over time (and I know season 3 will prove me right about the fact that he loved her).

However, it is clear that he loved Louis the most, but that is something that also applies to Louis. They were both extremely shitty parents.

Lestat and Claudia then began to hate each other because they saw themselves in each other, because they were too similar. Something they can't stand because they partly hate themselves.

And also because Lestat was afraid that Claudia would take Louis from him, which he couldn't stand because of his abandonment issues. Not to mention that big episode when she put their lives extremely in danger with her murders in New Orleans (with was the first big divide on Lestat's side for his relationship with Claudia).

And for Claudia, also because she was stuck in a body too young for her mind (fault of Louis and Lestat equally), that Lestat did not want to create a companion for her (at the same time he is not going to transform someone close to Claudia's physical age a second time obviously, and she herself is aware of the atrocity of her own condition), that he said she was a mistake (which is sadly not technically wrong), that he have a mistress (a post on why Lestat had this affair with Antoinette would be interesting to do elsewhere), and because apart from telling her that vampires from the outside are dangerous (the simple true by the way) and nothing else about them, which annoys her knowing that she absolutely wants to meet them, because she is less and less able to tolerate life in the company of only her parents, which is understandable.

Their relationship became very toxic (something that could perhaps have been mitigated if Lestat had been better at least in simple communication, even with Louis himself). But that didn't stop the love from staying somewhere until the end between them, even with the hate present.

[wonderfultheatre]

A pet peeve I have...

A pet peeve i have that's purely just something that happened a lot in the last year while being in a server.

Don't let your character hate bias rule how you interact with someone else's muse. Not only is it usually blatantly obvious it makes it not fun to interact with you, especially if we know that each time you interact you're going to get super aggro at our character for no reason.

Like sorry just because YOU hate Valentino, doesn't mean your muse is aware of what he does behind the scenes and closed doors. The instant aggro is annoying as fuck. It makes writing with some people insufferable.

Like it's one thing to react to what a character does IN CHARACTER, but if I'm chillin' and you attack my muse, I ain't fuckin' wit you. ESPECIALLY by all means if my muse has no idea who yours is and or your muse is an oc.

It's annoooooying. It also like often times proves to me you didn't read someones rules or character bio because often times if someone hasn't explicitly stated canon compliance, they're canon divergent and as someone who writes canon divergent muses for fun because I have lots of ideas for certain character personality types or dynamics I think would be fun.

It's annoying to get your muse just suddenly hating on my muse who wouldn't by any means apply to canon or even know who your muse is.

Like my Angel Valentino got an odd amount of hate even though none of the canon events occurred (because there aint no way his ass getting redeemed otherwise), even sometimes the OOC response has me like "Bruh"

Respectfully don't interact if you can't read anything I took the time of making for you to reference if we are to write together.

[quinloki]

I gotta take a moment and say a thing:

Stop expecting perfection from people.

I mean. Especially singular individuals on the internet.

People aren’t going to know everything. I don’t know everything. YOU do not know everything. You can dedicate your life to a singular topic and still not know everything.

So perfection is impossible.

Social media artists cannot be held to celebrity or business standards. We don’t have copywriters or law teams or press liaisons.

Assuming someone knows the intricacies of English enough to be perfect in it is classist/ableist at best, and assumptive at the least. I know one language, I went to college to learn about this singular language, and I can promise you, i fuck up wrtijg and speaking English CONSTANTLY.

Hounding someone from behind anon is bullying. If you mean to help educate or enlighten someone, be sure enough in your knowledge and conviction to do it with your entire face, or just move on. I’m irritated seeing perfectly decent people pestered by pedantic cravens who can’t even own their views honestly.

And if you don’t want to be put on blast for “trying to help”, then realize your convictions are thus, and move on.

^_^

[snails-and-tangerines]

Those are great points! Details like this, and whether the author takes the time to purposefully make a world make sense, can really make or break a reader's experience with the worldbuilding in a book.

If it's alright to add on to your post, OP, I think that a similar concept could also be applied to education? What gets taught at schools has changed a lot over time and it's different in different places. And, a lot of that depends on what professions people go into. A school that expects its students to grow up and go work on the nearby farms will teach very different things and have different standards than a school that aims for its students to become scientists. This has a ton of implications on characters and what they know.

But also, who even has access to schooling? Is it everyone? If it's everyone, are all children legally required to attend? Until when?

Are there different levels of quality and access to quality?

Who can teach? What requirements are there for the profession, if any? How many children is one teacher responsible for? Do they teach one age group (i.e. just 12 year olds), or is one person teaching all 34 kids in the village at once, from 5 year olds to teenagers?

How valued is education in society? Do you need to have gone to school to get a good job? Which kinds of jobs require it?

What is school culture like? Is it competitive? What are the school rules, and does someone make sure they're followed? How? Are there extracurriculars? Clubs? How are sports and the arts treated? Is there a mix of different types of kids (social status, race, culture, gender) or is it more homogenous? Is the school in a city, suburb, or more rural area? What items are banned, and do students bring them anyways? What items aren't banned that the average modern person would assume is (i.e. pocketknives and guns in a rural historical type of school)?

How much money does the school have to do its job? How well does it allot those funds? Are teachers buying their own supplies? In schools with bands and/or orchestras, are there school instruments or do students have to buy their own?

What do the parents expect out of the school? Is the school doing those things? How well? How does this affect the students?

[Obviously not all of these questions are relevant to every story, or even most, but there are a lot of people out there like me where most-to-all these things are actually necessary to think about for the types of stories they're trying to tell, so I figured it wouldn't hurt to share]

I'm working on and off on a fantasy series, and one of the things I really need to do is completely overhaul my assumptions of (and maybe even completely rewrite) its professional world as well as the education systems.

One thing I don't see show up as a consideration in worldbuilding a lot is what things are professionalized.

By that I mean how (and whether) certain activities or focuses are conducted in an organized, professional manner or treated as a career path or industry (often with set standards or training involved) rather than those that are treated primarily as hobbies or conducted in an ad hoc manner.

Standing armies, for example, are professionalized in a way that temporary armies or militias aren't. Being in the military is a profession that is organized and has specific standards and training and that clearly distinguishes between people who are or are not in the military. If we look at a lot of past wars, though, as well as many militias, being in the military was not a career for most people (especially most enlisted) and the time and effort between deciding to join and being on a battlefield was significantly smaller.

A professionalized military will generally be a stronger, more cohesive, more effective military--but it is also far more expensive to maintain, because as it is a profession the military servicemembers pull their salary from the military on a regular basis, and it takes away hands from other tasks such as manufacturing and farming.

Over the last few hundred years a lot of countries have seen (to varying degrees) professionalization of fields like firefighting, policing, pharmacology, emergency response, and search and rescue. In these cases, it reflects 1) a recognized need for a standing trained force that can respond quickly; 2) a recognized need for standards and credentialing; 3) the ability societally to have individuals who might otherwise be contributing to manufacturing or food production not do that indefinitely; 4) a dedicated ongoing effort to maintain standards, trainings, etc.; and 5) organizations (generally governments) that can pay for these services.

We also see the professionalization of other things, like youth sports--the push to treat youth sports as either primarily a system to develop professional athletes or a career on its own.

When you're doing worldbuilding, consider what roles would be treated in this professionalized manner, rather than those that would be viewed as temporary positions or conducted on an ad hoc basis.

Is there a standing professional military? How does the professionalization differ between officers and enlisted?

Is emergency preparedness, response, or recovery a professionalized field? Is the focus of that profession on planning? On search and rescue, triage, or other immediate response activities or coordination? On rebuilding following disasters? On managing grants, tax relief, or other monetary aspects of rebuilding?

Is pharmacology a regulated industry that requires training or credentialing? Is medicine?

Is firefighting generally conducted by individuals in the neighborhood? By private industry? By unpaid volunteers managed by a governmental or non-governmental organization? By full-time paid staff?

Are these positions generally a full-time job or an ad hoc/as needed job that can be called on? If it is an ad hoc position, what are the credentialing requirements to be put on the roster?

[dykedvonte]

I think depictions of Anya being cruel to Curly or drawing out his suffering are artful and chilling but completely miss the point of the story and her character.

I'm not saying she doesn't deserve to have that "I told you so" moment with him but not in something callous or cold. Even if that is how it happened, she'd immediately feel guilty cause at that point she's not tormenting her tormenter or even the person truly at fault. She's doing something cathartic, similar to how Jimmy likely hits Curly to release rage he can't against the rest of the crew. She'd see herself as no different when she'd come back from the moment and see Curly cowering at her. She wants someone to take responsibility but how does being cruel to the defenseless help? Why would she want the power Jimmy has over her over Curly?

The idea of her extending someone else's pain is just so against the struggles she already faces and how she can't even bring herself to cause someone pain even to help them. Her very desire is to release herself from her own suffering and I doubt she'd even fine some sort of guilty release in being cruel to another.

[sysig]

Ah, childhood memories (Patreon)

[trappedinafantasy37]

We did it guys! Minthara is in the top 100 most mentioned video game characters on Tumblr, sitting comfortably at rank 55!

With Astarion at rank 1 (cause of course), Gale at 5, Shadowheart at 6, Karlach at 8, Lae'zel at 9, Wyll at 12, Halsin at 16, Tav at 19, Gortash at 47, and The Dark Urge at 67. Baldur's Gate 3 is also the most talked about video game on this platform, as well as the 6th most talked about thing on all of Tumblr!

I wish Minthara was higher, but you know what, I'm happy she's on there at all! It is also interesting that she ranks higher than Durge and that Durge is that low on the list. It's also pretty interesting that there is such a discrepancy between Durge and Gortash as Durgetash is also the 67th most talked about ship on the platform. It is quite an achievement that our favorite drow is even on that list at all.

It is all just making me think back to some of the more dejecting AO3 statistics with Minthara almost being a blip, practically a statistical outlier in some ways. Even some insignificant side characters got more attention and adoration than her, or had numbers that would compare to her. But Tumblr is a much bigger platform than AO3, containing a much wider array of topics (including fanfics). So for Baldur's Gate 3 and Minthara to stand out that much is really saying something! Reading these statistics on Tumblr does go to show that one platform does not represent the entire fandom and that AO3 is only a piece of the picture.

[mosswiind]

There was a call for Minrathous defenders - you don't have to agree with me, but I do think there are some points you may want to consider! The point of the choice between Minrathous and Treviso is that there objectively isn't a right answer, and to say that there is denies the options the nuance they have. Functionally, the two choices are a trolley problem; save Treviso, save Treviso/save Minrathous, save Northern Thedas. It's a choice about scale, and tricking you into which side is actually the "little guy."

REASONS TO SAVE TREVISO:

You are a Crow.

You are romancing Lucanis. 

You don’t want to miss out on Spite Content™. 

The blight-in-the-canals thing is objectively pretty terrible. 

You don’t want Jacobus, Chance, Heir, and Fletcher to get blighted.

You don’t want to give a thriving, canal-filled merchant city the Blight.

You don’t want to give up good food, good coffee, or string lights. 

The Grand Market becoming a field hospital makes you sad. 

You don’t want to upset Teia and Viago.

You care about the wellbeing of specifically Treviso. 

You care about the wellbeing of specifically Lucanis and his family. 

You think the Crows have potential to be a better institution overall once Lucanis becomes First Talon, despite most Crow business being intra-house and not directly presided over by the Talons. 

“The only thing Treviso has are the Crows protecting them.” 

There are no gondolas in Minrathous. 

“Treviso gets so shitty after it’s blighted.” 

“Minrathous can defend itself, it’s heavily fortified.”

The fallout of a hardened Lucanis is too sad. 

REASONS TO SAVE MINRATHOUS

You love Neve (romantically or not). 

You are a Shadow Dragon. 

You don’t want to lose out on Neve content. 

You don’t want to hand the most influential empire in Thedas to a fascist murder cult. 

You don’t want people being executed in the streets en masse. 

You can acknowledge that while Minrathous Proper is a well fortified and extremely defensible city that can also be evacuated, those privileges are reserved for the Middle and Upper City. Dock Town’s buildings barely have four walls, and are inhabited not by magisters, or templars, or soldiers, but by unhoused and malnourished Regular People Who Can’t Afford To Leave. 

You recognize the impact that Handing The Government To The Fascist Murder Cult will have on the entirety of Thedas, especially the North. 

You have Been Poor and can empathize with the experiences of the people living in Minrathous in a way that is difficult to do if you have not Been Poor. 

You think that places are worth saving even if they are Ugly. 

You do not need a place to be a tourist trap to be worthy of your help. 

You are able to see the things that Neve thinks are beautiful the way she does. 

You recognize that if you do not save Minrathous, Neve was right - she’s the only one who gives a fuck about the people of Dock Town. 

You do not think that hard-resetting the largest city in Northern Thedas by uh…letting everyone get murdered by the fascist murder cult…is a good way to do political reform. 

You recognize that a lot of the shit we know about Minrathous, and the greater Imperium, is propaganda, or about people who are powerful. Poor folks trying to get by are the same everywhere. Poor people who can’t defend themselves against a dragon, just like the civilians in Treviso. 

You recognize Tevinter that, while being the Roman empire aesthetically and lore-wise, is also a metaphor for the current state of the world with regard to the United States. Again, handing the government of the largest and most influential empire on the continent to the murderous fascists is objectively fucking awful. 

You want to let Neve have the choice to take over the Threads and clean them up - something that is only possible to do if the Shadow Dragons are still a viable faction, as the two groups can functionally fuse after Neve becomes the boss. 

Harding has a quote about Solas that I think also applies here - something to the effect of “If we say he can’t be saved, that means there’d be a point where I couldn’t be, either.” 

There were some comments made early on in this episode about how the Blight didn’t really affect Minrathous. Here’s the thing: the Blight was never the point of the attack in Minrathous. Saving Minrathous was never about saving it from the Blight. The dragon attack was meant to be a diversion so the Venatori could move forward with their coup, and kill the sitting Archon without consequence from any opposition. 

Minrathous could not have defended against the dragon without Rook (and, I cannot stress this enough, the dagger that forced it to land), because the people in charge of calling those shots are the same people clearing the way for the dragon. 

We talk about Minrathous like we are talking about all of Minrathous. We’re not. We’re talking about Dock Town. Dock Town is not part of Minrathous Proper. Dock Town is where they put the Poors, who those in power either don’t notice, or view as disposable. Dock Town is the part of the city that could be swallowed by the tide, and the Magisterium would largely be none the wiser, besides losing labour for their ships. 

Minrathous’s problem was never the Blight. It was always the Venatori. The effects of the coup in Minrathous are immediately and permanently visible. If you save Minrathous, the Crows still exist, still function, still operate much as they always have. The Cantori Diamond is untouched. If you save Treviso, the Shadow Dragons are gone. You want to talk about a place only having one faction defending them? Let’s talk about the decimation of the Shadow Dragons. The mass executions. The executions of any dissenting voices, with the reason given that they were “sympathizers.” 

The number of unhoused Dock Town citizens triples (I did a count, it’s at least triple the number of people begging). Half of the merchants are presumed dead, the markets now marked with pools of blood and cartloads of bodies. The walls are painted in blood, and Venatori fill the streets. 

If the end of the game is to be believed, anyone with the Blight is cured of it when Elgar’nan disappears. The only remaining damage is to the architecture, and those already dead. It will take time, but Treviso will ultimately recover. Teia and Viago confirm towards the end of the game that they are pleasantly surprised by the city’s progress, if you do all the blight-clearing quests. All of the Antaam army were sent to Tearstone Island, and presumably did not return, at least not in the numbers they had before the ritual. If you save the world, that means no more Blight, and no more Antaam - both of Treviso’s problems are solved with the asskicking of a couple of gods. 

Minrathous, under Venatori rule, has effectively neutralized all dissenting voices, and almost anyone who could conceivably stand against them. This will take much longer to undo than laying new bricks and training new baristas. 

As far as Neve being harder to connect with goes - yeah! She is! Which makes sense given the life she has led. We as players also aren’t present for the most traumatic thing that’s ever happened to her, like the Ossuary with Lucanis. She makes it clear very early on that she’s a tough nut to crack. That said - she’s absolutely worth it. She is not as loudly passionate or open about her feelings as Lucanis is, but she is very deeply empathetic, even hardened. She stops to check in with unhoused people, asking if they have somewhere to stay because there are “demons in the street, tonight.” She supports small businesses. She approves if you pet cats while you’re on her personal quests. She sneaks treats to Assan. She daydreams with Davrin about setting up shop together, and recruiting Emmrich to help them with murder victims. 

She just needs to believe you care about people as much as she does before she lets you into her world.  

If you save Treviso, a lot of people go hungry or get kidnapped by slavers (Venatori and freelance) because they don’t have the Shadows or the Pawn Shop to fall back on.

Saving Minrathous is not about saving a beautiful place full of beautiful people. Saving Minrathous is about standing up for the little guy - interestingly, the main reason people choose to save Treviso. 

Episode 3 is UP Friends!

This time we talked all about one of the most major choices you make as a player in Dragon Age: The Veilguard- choosing which to save between Treviso and Minrathous. There's a right answer in our professional opinions, time to see if you agree! We ALSO get wildly off course in the best ways in the second half, as is completely in character for us ladies with ADHD 🤣 We had way too much fun recording this, hopefully you enjoy listening just as much!