#but it’s still that engagement(among other things) to get out & vote /at all/

[jessicalprice]

I think the thing that most Christian atheists who are rebelling against authoritarian Christian backgrounds don't get is why Jews remain Jewish.

Like, I get it, you engaged in your practices because you were told that God would punish you if you didn't, because you're told you're supposed to fear God.

(Incidentally, we don't even use the same language about this. The term that gets translated in most English bibles as "fear" is, like many classical Hebrew words, a lot more multivalent than the English term, and has more of a connotation of "awe." (See, for example, the Gilgamesh dream sequence: "Why am I trembling? No god passed this way." A god is something in whose wake one trembles.) It's what one feels when one is faced with something bigger than oneself, something overwhelming. For some people that may be fear of being harmed. For others it may be wonder or even ecstasy, standing outside oneself.)

But in 2023, Jews have the option (and, indeed, still the cultural pressure) to completely abandon Judaism. Very easily. We can, in fact, do it quite passively. If we're not actively trying to engage with it, it will very much drift away from us.

And it's not fear of divine punishment keeping most of us engaged.

The thing is, if you proved to me tomorrow that God doesn't exist, I'm not sure anything about my life or my practice would change. (I'm already agnostic, so *shrug*. I don't believe in a God-person. Sometimes I believe in a unity to reality, a life and a direction to it. Sometimes I don't. I just don't have the arrogance to think I understand definitively the way the universe does or doesn't work.) I still would celebrate Shabbat, I still wouldn't eat pork, I still would have a mezuzah on my doorway.

I do all that stuff because I'm Jewish, not because I think God will get mad if I don't. I do all that stuff because it's part of a cultural system that I see as wise and life-giving and therapeutic and worth maintaining.

And the thing is, the cultural system that Christian antitheists want us to assimilate into, under the guise of "getting rid of religion", is very much a white Protestant culture. It's not culturally neutral. It has practices, and it has a particular worldview, and it has cultural norms that are just as irrational as any other culture's.

It's also very telling that Christian antitheists purport to be harmed by Jews continuing to be Jewish. Why? We don't impose our norms on anyone else, and we overwhelmingly vote (and organize, and engage in activism) against the imposition of Christian "religious" norms, such as the curtailing of reproductive freedom, blue laws, etc.

So you're only "harmed" by our continued existence in the same way Christians purport to be harmed by it: by claiming that the very existence of a group that doesn't share your worldview and practices is somehow an act of oppression against you.

Which is, you know, white supremacist logic.

You're still upholding the logic of Jesus's genocidal, colonial Great Commission even though you supposedly don't believe in the god that ordered it anymore.

That's gotta be one of the saddest things I encounter among my fellow humans.

You took down all the crosses in the church of your mind and chucked them out the window, but you still refuse to step foot outside the church building, contenting yourself with claiming it's not a church, and firing out the windows at the synagogue and mosque down the road, the same way you used to.

[sgiandubh]

An intimate lunch

Coming back to this particular C pic, which has sparkled endless comments, today (still very busy days for me & I gave in and binged TCND - this explains the ungodly hour):

Dots have been connected (there are, after all, alternative Keepers of the Dots, a sobriquet I am therefore relinquishing, thanking again the friend who gifted it to me). And comments -ranging from stan blindness to unreasonable conspiracy theories - have been written too.

Tellingly enough, the wording of the Finch and Partners IG post was quite suggesting: 'an intimate lunch' means more than promo, almost a personal get together with, at the very least, carefully selected people.

Was she coat-tailing? Very probably, to the extent she is understandably interested in getting more acting (directing?) projects after OL. And to make it clear: there is nothing bad to it.

Did she know Cooper before? There is no way in hell to confirm it with 100% accuracy, but my guess is no. Someone, as it has been pointed out, obliged. These are the simple, expected minimum benefits of a PR agent, a Rolodex and of networking. And it is true: she has been consistently on Finch's list and invited at many of their events since at least 2016. Which is to say, since IFH? Oh. OK. No further questions, Your Honor.

Was it a reward for dragging along McIdiot at that Netflix gala, the day before? Even taking into account her visible lack of enthusiasm, I am afraid things are not as simple and mechanic as alternatively dangling the proverbial carrot and stick. It's a quid pro quo, not a reward. A part in a movie would be a reward - not a lunch in town: that would be selling herself very cheaply.

But of course, we are all idiots, as this reaction from a particularly ungifted Mordor pundit would like us to think:

This post is not about S, of course. And the posited question is a superb logical fallacy: S is 'never invited to any of these events', because his side projects are different and his social media communication strategy is different, too. She was not there because of S and no one on this side of the fandom seriously suggested it.

Also, let's not show more idiocy than you are naturally able of, denizens of Mordor: Cooper did not really need her 1 (one) Academy Awards vote. And do you know why? Well, her vote would not make any serious difference among the 7,999 others, this is why:

Yes, the Britannica: I know it pisses you, and many other people, mightily off.

But perhaps she was there also because of this?

Enlighten me, please, since I am such a forgetful idiot, what on Earth might have happened to The Cut? You know, the project she was shooting just before the SAG-AFTRA strike began?

Crickets. And, which is more alarming...

If proven correct, this IMDb info is not very good news and I would be bereft for her. Honestly. Check the link: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt26697087/fullcredits/?ref_=tt_cl_sm. It lists the entire crew, up to the last best boy. Whatever happened to C's part? Whatever happened to C? The movie is now announced in post-production. Surely we'll know very soon, one way or another. But if her part has been slashed out, it's only normal to be more active and scout any possible project opportunity.

Ultimately, the core problem remains unchanged: since she did not post this picture on her socials, she is still as uninterested in them as she's always been. Always. And sorry for repeating myself, but spare some scarce mention about make-up and attire (presumably to be nice to personal friends), she does not engage with this fandom. At all. That does not leave her stans with many options but to write their own fanfic, while accusing us (who may know a bit more than them, at any rate) of doing the same.

Smart girl, C. I am sure S&C divided their respective roles in the 'Coping with the Narrative' in-house production for a very long time and this is the most important thing of them all. The rest is babble, including this post.

[controversial-blorbo-bracket]

i don't mean to stir up more controversy so feel free to not post this ask, but like. yeah. i don't get it. is harry potter a shitty franchise filled to the brim with subtle bigotry and glorification of various nasty outlooks on humanity? kinda, in my opinion, yeah. is it written by, and profited off of by someone actively using their platform to cause harm to human rights? yeah. would i ever want to engage with the content or fandom? no not really. but does this mean that anyone who even breathes in the direction of Harry Potter content is condoning all this bullshit, or kissing the author's shoes and ideologies, and giving them money to harm the people they want to harm? uh.......... no, not really. what the fuck

like............ yeah. like you said it's a huge franchise. literally a silly little Tumblr poll that will realistically get under 10,000 votes, let alone notes or discussions, is not at all going to compare to the reach she already has. and it feels weird to twist the blame that way— this author is using their writing and manipulation skill to earn lots of money and do awful things with it... and suddenly it's the individual fans' fault that she has that money and reach? and not just the fans, but even people that don't actively go out of their way to excommunicate fans of the media?

sorry to rant in your inbox i just. im pretty sick of all this "inaction against a major celebrity is the same as condoning their abuse of power and influence" stuff that people throw around instead of criticizing why our social power structure is based on popularity and engagement in the first place (which is bound to put the most cultish, manipulative, influential, and charismatic people in power). idk it just feels really skeevy to blame people who enjoy or passively tolerate something that's expertly designed specifically to be appealing by a master manipulator.

you don't have to post this (though i also don't mind if you do) i just wanted to like. bring some of my takes into your inbox cause these anons sounding like they're accusing you of queer blasphemy or some shit over literally just.... letting someone hate their anti-blorbo/love their blorbo that they think everyone else hates.... are just really putting me off. like do they get that this is the "oil companies tell poor people global warming is their fault" argument all over again?

This has been sitting in my askbox for a long time because I wasn’t sure how to address it or whether to even address it or just delete it, as it feels like a topic that’s bigger than I am and I can’t ever properly address all of it. But all I’ll say is, while I agree that not all discussion of Harry Potter or other shitty medias is promotion and we as individuals shouldn’t be held accountable for the actions of a transphobic billionaire, it is still important to approach the subject with nuance and make sure the ways in which we talk about it do not spread harm. I think that’s why so many polls decide to ban it and other medias from their polls, because most of them are designed to find the “best” of something and to insinuate that something from one of those medias can be the best could be harmful. That’s why I’m not gonna post any asks that defend the series as a whole or the franchise as a property, because it’s not right to even humor those who want to downplay transphobia and antisemitism (among others). Aaaanyways all this to say if people discourse about Harry Potter characters in the notes or askbox go for it just remember the real people impacted by the bigotries present in it when considering the way you want to make your discussions

[chaoskirin]

I have a slightly weird question and I'm sorry if this comes off in any way negatively but I'm worried as all fuck.

I'm Irish, living in Ireland, but American politics has a huge influence over here. Conservative groups here pay folks from American lobby groups to come speak at their events to push banning abortion or queer/trans rights or denying asylum seekers. Not to mention the reach of social media and how a bunch of far right/fascist groups over here get riled up by people on the other side of the Atlantic to start riots and shit.

The prospect of trump being re-elected terrifies me because as bad as it is now, it was even worse when he was in power. Even if Biden didn't have a blue congress for this term it was still better. I'm sorry if this sounds like fear mongering or being unreasonable or naive but that's just way it seemed to me.

I don't know how to help y'all across the pond, I don't know what I can do from here. But is there anything we can do?

Hey, I thought about how to answer this for a while, so sorry it's taken almost a day to get back with you.

The reason I am so outspoken about Americans voting (and people from ALL countries who have a chance to stop fascism from taking over) is that there are FAR more progressive people than there are fascists. The fascists are just louder.

The problem is that progressive people are not playing the same game as fascists. The right wants total domination. They want to be able to jail or kill people who disagree with them. Whereas the left wants fairness, a right to choose, and peace.

The right has no qualms about using less than savory tactics to achieve their goals. Among these tactics are jailing people who disagree with them, denying those people the ability to vote, and engaging in voter suppression. The left believes that if they hold the course and play by the rules, everyone will eventually fall in line.

And, worst of all, the left currently believes in moral victory over damage control. A moral victory to the progressive left means voting for someone who has no bad marks on their record, and they continuously fail to see that that person does not exist. Whereas the right treats their chosen candidate as a god despite what they've done. The right will rally behind one person regardless of their actions, and that makes them terrifying.

In the United States, Republicans only make up about 25% of the population, and yet they account for half the vote. This is, in large part, because of voter suppression. But it's also because there are a lot of progressive voters who are refusing to vote because they believe this sends a message.

The best thing you can do is get the word out to everyone you know that not voting ONLY sends a message to the people who will be harmed by the result. One vote does not make too much of a difference. But a hundred votes? A THOUSAND votes? Every single vote adds up to something that WILL make a difference. And right now, the important task for everyone, both in the United States and abroad, is to impress on just how important it is to stop fascism from spreading.

Biden has done a lot of good things, but people tend not to listen to this. What they see is a man who allowed genocide. What they see is a man who has committed war crimes. A man who has allowed the transportation of weapons to Israel for use in this massacre. And they are all RIGHT.

But the alternative is worse. One of two parties will take the presidency. This is not in question. There has NEVER been a true independent candidate who has won in the history of the United States. And although people will point out that different parties HAVE won, it is only because they were backed by a political machine, and those parties then went on to become the current two party system we suffer with today.

An election year is not the time to challenge the electoral system, but it's only during election years that it seems to be brought up. So besides encouraging your American friends to vote against fascism, you should encourage them to work between elections to change the electoral system so that different parties have a chance at winning, and so the popular vote means more that the numbers achieved through the electoral college.

That's the most important right now.

[mariacallous]

Nate Silver’s first book, The Signal and the Noise, was published in 2012, at the peak of his career as America’s favorite election forecaster. The book was a 534-page bestseller. It set out to answer a perfectly Nate Silver-shaped question: What makes some people better than others at predicting future events? It provided a wide-ranging, deeply engaging introduction to concepts like Bayes’s Theorem, Isaiah Berlin’s The Hedgehog and the Fox, and Philip Tetlock’s work on superforecasting.

Twelve years later, Silver is back with a second book. It is titled On the Edge: The Art of Risking Everything. It is longer than the first one—576 pages, cover-to-cover. And yet it manages to be a much smaller book.

Silver is still in the business of prediction. But where the Silver of 2012 was contributing to the world of public intellectuals, journalists, academics, and policymakers —what he now terms “the Village”—the Silver of 2024 makes his home among the risk-takers and hustlers in Vegas, Wall Street, and Silicon Valley. On the Edge is an ode to the expected-value-maximizing gamblers’ mindset. He calls this the world of “the River.” These “Riverians” are his people. And, he tells us, they’re winning. He sets out to give his readers a tour of the River and distill some lessons that we ought to take from its inhabitants.

The “river” is a term borrowed from poker itself, a game defined by two forms of incomplete information: You don’t know the cards your opponent has been dealt, and you don’t know the cards that are yet to come. In Texas Hold ’em, the final round of betting is called the “river.” It is the moment when the information at your disposal is as complete as it will ever be

Among poker players, this makes the river a rich metaphor. It’s Election Night, waiting for the votes to be tallied, as opposed to a convention or presidential debate, when the shape of the electorate is still undetermined. The best laid plans can be undone by an improbable river card. It’s the final score. The moment of truth. But when Silver talks about “Riverian” culture, he is not drawing upon or referring to any of this established imagery. Instead he deploys it as a catch-all term for embracing risk, identifying profitable edges, and wagering on your beliefs. It’s an odd and awkward writing choice.

The book starts out with a tour of the sheer scale of the literal gambling economy. In 2022 alone, Americans lost $130 billion in casinos, lotteries, and other gambling operations. That’s the amount lost, mind you. The amount wagered was approximately tenfold larger. Gambling in the United States is a $1.3 trillion dollar industry, and still growing.

Elsewhere in the book, he explains how casinos have developed rewards programs and programmed slot machines to keep people hooked. He also lays out the cat-and-mouse game between the online sportsbooks and profitable sports bettors. Much like with casinos and blackjack, if you are good enough at sports betting to reliably turn a profit, then the sportsbooks will stop accepting your bets. The house does not offer games that the house doesn’t win. And, in the United States today, it is very good to be the house.

In Chapter 6, Silver writes, “Here’s something I learned when writing this book: if you have a gambling problem, then somebody is going to come up with some product that touches your probabilistic funny bones. … And whichever product most appeals to your inner degen will be algorithmically tailored to reduce friction and get you to gamble even more.”

Most of us would think this is a bad thing. But Silver stubbornly refuses to reflect on whether the unchecked growth of the gambling economy has any negative externalities. Chapter 3, on the casino industry, reads like a book on the opioid industry lauding the Sacklers for really figuring out how to develop product-market fit.

Structurally, the book is a bit disjointed. It is broken into two parts, with an interlude listing the “thirteen habits of highly successful risk-takers” in between. Part 1 glorifies the gambling industry. The interlude reads like a self-help book: “Successful risk-takers are cool under pressure … have courage … take shots  … are prepared.” Part 2 meanders through Silicon Valley, discussing everything from the fall of Sam Bankman-Fried to Adam Neumann’s latest real estate start-up, along with an entire chapter explaining artificial intelligence through poker analogies. Silver clearly has a lot to say, but it doesn’t entirely hold together. In the acknowledgements at the end of the book, Silver thanks ChatGPT, describing it as his “creative muse.” I’m not convinced the contribution was a positive one.

Missing from the book is any notion of systemic risk. Silver explains the growth of the gambling economy as evidence of a demand-side increase in risk-taking behavior among the post-pandemic public. But this seems more likely to be a supply-side story. The Supreme Court legalized sports betting in 2018. DraftKings and FanDuel wasted no time in flooding the airwaves with enticing advertisements and can’t-lose introductory offers. Casinos—which used to be constrained to Las Vegas and Atlantic City—are now available in nearly every state.

Polymarket, a cryptocurrency-based online prediction marketplace that will let people place bets on essentially anything, went ahead and hired Silver to help promote the product. We legalized vice and removed most of the friction from the system. What’s good for the casinos and the sportsbooks is not necessarily good for society at large.

An increase in gambling addiction is a society-level problem, foisted on the very public officials that Silver derides as residents of “The Village.” Gambling, like cigarettes, should probably face more institutional friction, not less: If you want to waste your money betting on sports or gambling on cards, it ought to at least be moderately difficult to do so.

There’s an unintentionally revealing passage in Chapter 4. Silver devotes nearly four pages to Billy Walters, regaling us with stories of “the best sports bettor of all time.” And in the final paragraph of the section, he lets slip that Walters was sentenced to five years in prison for insider stock trading in 2018. In a footnote, we learn that Walters’s sentence was commuted by Donald Trump on his last day in office. Walters stubbornly maintains his innocence, while Silver notes that “sports bettors often take a cavalier attitude toward inside information in sports. … The Securities and Exchange Commission is much less likely to give you the benefit of the doubt if you’re betting on stocks.”

It’s a crucial passage for two reasons: First, because much of what gives profitable sports bettors an “edge” is materially significant, non-public information. If you can develop sources that will inform you whether the star quarterback is returning from injury, you can use that information to beat the betting lines. The sportsbooks might eventually stop taking your bets if you win too much, but you won’t go to jail for it.

That edge rarely exists in finance, because of systemic risk. The United States has constructed a whole set of regulations and investor protections to mitigate the downside risk of all this “Riverian” gambling, and guard against crime. Poker players, sports bettors, and venture capitalists flourish in regulatory gray zones, where the rules are less well-defined and the edges are available if you’re smart and you’re willing to hustle.

But the second reason is that it invites us to ponder whether there’s any societal value to all this gambling. The stock market may essentially be gambling, but it is a type of gambling that produces valuable byproduct information. Through the activity of the stock market, we are able to gauge aggregate investor opinion on the state and worth of publicly traded companies. What is the social benefit of building an equivalent marketplace for establishing the betting line on NBA games? Sophisticated sports bettors may have a better read than DraftKings on whether the Washington Wizards should be 7.5- or 8-point underdogs in their season opener. But what value does that add to the quality of play, or the fan experience, or anything at all? Why incur and encourage all the systemic risk, when the societal value is effectively nil?

Silver asks and answers none of these questions himself. In the rare passages of the book where he offers some critique of Riverian excess, he makes sure to reassure the reader that he is “not a prude.” In Chapter 8, after mentioning that the sheer, absurd concentration of wealth among Silicon Valley figures like Sam Bankman-Fried might, just maybe, be a bad thing, Silver immediately backpedals, reminding his readers that he plays “poker with venture capitalists and hedge fund guys. I’m a capitalist.”

I suspect this would be a better book if he had less to lose. I myself have been a “+EV” poker player for over 20 years, meaning I win quite a bit more than I lose. I don’t play for the same stakes as Silver, but my poker bankroll includes seven different currencies from four continents. And I can tell you that I would strongly consider committing a few misdemeanors to land a seat in one of those VC/hedge fund games. Silver doesn’t boast about his win rate, but he does let slip that the first time he was invited to play cards with Jason Calacanis and the other hosts of the All-In podcast, he “won enough money to buy a Tesla.”

If I was in Silver’s shoes, I would be wary of writing a book that could get me uninvited from those pillow-soft high-stakes poker games. He can make more money, and have more fun, by offering a gentle exploration, critique, and defense of “the River” than he would by raising questions that would make the notoriously thin-skinned VC crowd uncomfortable. Silver manages to interview a lot of powerful people who rarely speak to journalists, but when they talk to him, they tell him nothing of note.

It also is not clear whether most of the “Riverian” character traits are actually so unique. In the book’s later chapters, Silver rails against “The Village’s” public health response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Riverians, he tells us, would’ve handled the pandemic differently, because Riverians are expected-value maximizers who understand the fundamental importance of cost-benefit analysis. Hindsight does a lot of heavy lifting for him here, and the notion that public health officials are unfamiliar with cost-benefit analysis is painfully ridiculous. Cost-benefit analysis is not some arcane Riverian wisdom. It is intro-level textbook material.

Silver’s experience in the poker world has convinced him that the world should be more like poker. My own experience with poker has convinced me of the opposite. It is because I am skilled at the game that I think people ought to know what they’re getting into before sitting down at the table with me.

He’s right about one thing, though: The Riverians are indeed winning. The Wynn Casino, DraftKings.com, and Andreessen Horowitz are indeed all phenomenally profitable. The part that eludes him is the reason why. They are winning because we have constructed a system that they are well-positioned to exploit. There is a good book waiting to be written about how they have gamed the system, what it all adds up to, and what it costs the rest of us. But this book’s ambitions are much smaller than that.

[fallynleaf]

breaking my rule of not engaging in election discourse because i saw this post and found it frustrating in ways that i struggle to articulate, so this is more or less me just yelling into the void, but...

i'm going to pull a few lines from this in particular:

"You know what actually helps genocide? Doing nothing while pretending you have the moral high ground."

"We as private citizens do not have the power to make the USA suddenly cease all activity with Israel and demand an uncompromising ceasefire deal."

i think maybe more than frustrating, i find this failure in imagination sad. whoever wrote this clearly believes 1) that any action outside of participating in electoral politics is inherently worthless and meaningless and therefore constitutes "doing nothing", and 2) that individual people have absolutely no power whatsoever, so there's no point to demanding better because we will never actually get it.

it's such a self-defeatist attitude! it has you starting out believing you've already lost and are just a powerless pawn getting tossed around by forces beyond your control or responsibility.

i think there actually is some amount of power in participating in electoral politics, but by far the best time to leverage that power is when you have someone who wants your vote, and you vocally withhold it from them. if you can scare candidates into thinking they don't have your vote, you can sometimes wring concessions out of them. you can do this even if you already privately decided you're going to be checking that box on your ballot no matter what! but you gain nothing, literally nothing, by promising to vote for a candidate before they've done what you want them to do. you're just giving up your power for no reason.

you can say "i'm voting for Jill Stein because she opposes genocide!" even if you privately plan on voting for Kamala anyway, because the goal is to make Kamala's campaign scared that they'll lose people's votes so that they'll shift their policy on the genocide. after the election, you lose that power. they don't have to even pretend to listen to you anymore.

currently the democrat party has made it pretty clear that they'd rather lose the election than stop supporting a genocide. but it's absolutely still worth trying to put that pressure on them anyway! if it doesn't work, it doesn't work, but at least you exhausted that method. it's one tool among many, and i think you're leaving an opportunity on the table if you don't take it.

the actual voting part is kind of the least important thing, at least with this issue. American imperialism and the military-industrial complex win no matter whether you elect a democrat or a republican. the harms that you're able to "mitigate" within this system are minimal.

i do advocate for voting at least down-ballot because it makes a much bigger difference, and again, it's a power that you do have, so you might as well use it, but the concessions you're able to get through voting alone are pretty limited, and it should always be an action done in tandem with other, more effective actions.

what are those actions? in the past, strikes, coordinated boycotts, divestment campaigns, riots, etc. have all been effective in forcing change, usually when done in conjunction with multiple actions that place considerable pressure on the government because they cause economic and other types of disruption.

with regards to Israel, we actually have quite a bit of power as individual US citizens! there are boycott campaigns that pretty much everyone can get involved in, and many people have the opportunity to push for divestment in our workplaces and communities as well. through BDS, you can place direct pressure on Israel without having to go through your government.

you can also place social pressure in addition to economic pressure by being outspoken on social media as well as in your personal life.

the goal is to make the occupation untenable so that the occupiers can no longer continue it. obviously some things place more pressure than others (like an arms embargo, resistance forces on the ground, direct actions that prevent weapons from reaching Israel, etc.), but it's a group effort!

voting isn't the limit of your power as an individual citizen.

you don't have to resign yourself to living within the narrow limits of the fate that electoral politics prescribes for you.

please allow yourself to think bigger than this.

at the very least, don't get angry at people who are trying to leverage what little power they have through their vote by threatening to withhold it. these people are not your enemy. they don't want a Trump presidency, either, and many of them will end up voting for Kamala in the end! but the moment you tell her that, you've lost your power. that's the gambit here. it's not a question of "moral purity", but a calculated tactic that aims to keep the party's stated policy in line with popular opinion among the party.

[airlock]

well, the winners and top 20s for CYL8 got announced while I was ass-deep in the CK3, so I missed the midnight hustle; ain't that splendid. anyway, seems they dropped earlier because, uh, only they dropped, and the deeper results -- y'know, the part of this that really interests me -- aren't out yet. weird, since they must have already tallied those, but I guess it works out some way for people who are more interested in the final results

anyway, under the cut are my impressions about those top 20s

Alfonse winning men's is a jeb bushening the likes of which we haven't seen since Eliwood, or ever really. funniest thing that could possibly happen to Felix, too, since Diamant couldn't keep up and the Jugdral people failed to focus fire again so this CYL would have been all his if not for, y'know

on the women's side, f!Robin just barely squeaked ahead of Yunaka (2000 votes on the topmost spots is narrow difference; not so much elsewhere in the poll), so we actually got a 0% victory debut for Engage after all. but also not even due to Engage actually failing to make much of an impression, it was just how the die landed. that's how it be in this bitch of a world sometimes!

speaking of the Jugdral people -- I was expecting people to be pushing Leif, but in retrospect, I probably shouldn't have been too surprised about Sigurd getting a fresh influx of attention this year. Engage just gave him one of the more preeminent roles among the Emblems after all, both in story and gameplay as it were!

still on predictions on the men's side that I got wrong: well, I was spot-on right pretty much about Diamant and Alcryst, but Alfred only just barely hung on to the top 20 at all, which is about the furthest you can get on this list from my original prediction of, y'know, possible actual victory contender. he's not even beating Rosado

now, as for the alears: both of them broke top 10 but are a ways still from real contention, especially seeing as they're both third place so far even among Engage characters. in the direct comparison between the two, it seems that f!Alear is the fan-preferred avatar gender this time around -- and it's not very close, with a difference of nearly 4000 votes between them. we've seen worse (remember how much dirt m!Corrin ate in CYL1?), but the preference is clear

although, interestingly enough, a different avatar -- Shez -- has actually swapped gender tendencies this year, with m!Shez taking a pretty solid 900-vote lead. last year they were very close with f!Shez only barely leading in votes, so I guess that tie is somewhat breaking now? either that, or it'll just swing again next year.

anyway, I had an initial impression from these results that the Fódlan deathgrip is as strong as ever, but looking at the lists closer, it's loosening up a bit actually. to an extent this is because almost all of their top 10 CYL material have actually won CYL by now, another two more this year even, but elsewhere in the list they're losing ranks fast. Sylvain slid all the way down to #17 overall this year, while a lot of the lifers from other continuities just don't seem very disturbed to compete for space with Engage characters at all. (although the Elibe stocks on that front are in shambles -- Nino is decisively out of the top 20, and even Lilina just barely made it)

lastly, man, turnout for CYL is still looking abysmal these days, even with the fandom freshening up a little, huh. it has pretty firmly become seen as a FEH thing rather than the Fire Emblem thing it used to be embraced as, and FEH is, well, I know overwhelmingly more people who got sick of it than are playing it right now, Alfonse win notwithstanding. still though, our big winner this year again doesn't crack 20000 votes. remember when Edelgard won with over 70000 votes? (this was, in fairness, back when they allowed you to vote without a Nintendo account, but still!)

[some-anonymity-preferred]

Izzy Hands as an Old Guard Queer (spoiler: no he ain't)

The discussion of Izzy Hands as an old queer who cares about his pre-existing found family and is protecting his safe space from suspected narcs has been flickering through my feed, and it just keeps going on, and I just keep going no.

I grew up in the 70s and 80s in a Mexican-American family that included a great uncle who was openly gay enough that he brought boyfriends to the asadas, and also an uncle who was so deeply closeted and self-hating that he made my skin crawl.

My family did not discuss any of this openly, and I was young, so there's a lot that I missed. I don't know how my great uncle evaluated any new people that other family members brought to the party, or what actions he took to protect himself and his "friends" if a newcomer's vibe was off. Having been a queer adult myself for going on three decades now, I have some educated guesses. What I do know is that my great uncle was a deeply loved favorite, at least in my branch of the family, and he for sure never freaked out and called the cops on us, nor did anyone in the family do that to him.

My uncle, on the other hand. Woof. He was not well liked. He was a walking, talking caltrop bomb. He both complained about racial discrimination and was a consummate boot-licker. He never called the cops on an asada, either, but if I had to choose one family member I would never put it past? It would be him.

Which of those people sounds more like the Izzy Hands we see onscreen?

My vote is for Uncle Bad Vibes.

I don't know my great uncle's role in the gay community he lived in, but he sounds a lot closer to the idea of an old guard queer who lives quietly and quietly protects his own, doesn't he? And not like OFMD Izzy at all.

There is one fic I enjoy that does cast Izzy that way:

Izzy is literally cast in an avuncular role here. He is older than Ed and Stede. He owns a gay bar. His partner is in prison due to a past raid on said gay bar. He is protective of his bar and community, and he is suspicious of Stede. He's bitchy to Stede, he discusses his misgivings with Ed, he's not nice about it. He tries to pull rank, and it works in the narrative of The Reno Cure because he actually does have a position of some authority, vis a vis Ed. Which he does not (except in his own mind; and, in the world at large, as a white man) in OFMD.

But you know what Izzy does not do in The Reno Cure? He does not call the cops into his own damn bar to get rid of Stede.

I really cannot stress that enough. Protective Old Guard Gays do NOT call the cops. No one who is part of a marginalized community and prioritizes keeping that community safe calls the cops on that community. They may engage in a kind of policing within the community, and that may cause conflict with others in the community who are sick of respectability politics. That happens. All the time. I grew up with it. People I loved and admired did it. Sometimes they directed it at me. I still see it, among my co-ethnics and among fellow queers. I've done it myself, and I work not to. I've worked my entire life and will continue to work the rest of my life to make my peace with it. It is not and never will be the same thing as calling in the literal fucking cops.

I told myself I wouldn't write a long post, that I wouldn't get too deep into this. Whoops.

Nearly everything I've already written ignores the racial dynamics at play in OFMD and in the fandom. And I just can't do that.

The thing that set me off this morning was a new argument that basically says, "Ed doesn't care about his crew and Izzy does." Using, as proof, Ed's line that dying is kinda part of the pirate job, in response to Izzy pointing out that crew died because Ed pursued Stede onto the Spanish ship.

Ed and Izzy are already in the middle of an Old Marrieds' argument that started with the frankfurters. Ed is being dismissive to bait Izzy. Later, he expresses the exact opposite attitude toward the crew to Stede, also to bait Stede. Throughout most of that episode, Ed is a deeply unreliable narrator, and on this point I think it's because he truly feels both. He expresses passive suicidal ideation throughout, which jibes with the "part of the job" line, and he expresses burnout under the pressure of being Blackbeard to Stede. He chooses which element of his complex emotions to share according to what will rile up his given interlocutor the most.

But maybe big scary brown men aren't allowed to have complex emotions? I dunno.

There's that. But what really got under my skin was then thinking about the contrast between how Ed treats Ivan and Fang, with how Izzy does. I think a lot about how, in the snail fork scene, Ed outsources the violence he wants to inflict for the French captain's racial slight against him to Fang. The even bigger, even browner, big scary brown guy. And Fang acts like it's NBD, happens all the time. That is a whole essay in itself; all I want to do right now is lay out there that I clock that. It's bad. It's complex. It's realistic. And it's just about all the abuse Ed lays on either Fang or Ivan. (ETA: That, and Fang’s puppy. Part of me asks, Did Ed say get rid of it, or kill it? And did Izzy relay the order as get rid of it, or as kill it? Because:)

But Izzy? Yanks Fang's beard, does it all the time. Calls Ivan and Fang "the boys." Acts like he's the only Competent Adult in the room in a room (ship) full of non-white people. Acts like he's Blackbeard's keeper and that Ed could not live or function without him. Wants Ed to be the Big Scary Brown Man Fucking Viking Vampire Clown, wants it so much that he's willing to threaten his captain's life if he won't fulfill that role. (Loyalty to your captain my ass.) Gets off on having forced Ed to fulfill that role. Literally buys Ed from the British. Calls the cops on a ship full of non-white queers who are in no way harming him, unless it's by keeping Ed from performing as his big scary racialized fetish object.

Just fucking fuck. Seriously.

Also, not one single thing Izzy does in OFMD indicates that he thinks Stede is a narc. Not one single thing. If that reading were intended, I'd expect these very skillful, very deliberate writers to fucking indicate that. They do not.

The rest of that, though, that I described a couple of paragraphs ago? The mediocre white man with a superiority complex shit? The things that make Izzy a hair-curling, skin-crawling, fan-fucking-tastic antagonist? (not the goddamn hero, what the fuck is wrong with people) That is all there on the screen. So don't at me. Fuck.

[actual-sleeping-beauty]

sorry but it's just like. exceedingly fucking clear to me that republican controlled state legislatures across the country are testing how far they can go right now. bills like tennessee house bill 0009, kentucky house bill 173, and kentucky senate bill 150 are intended to see how far the current political and judicial climate will allow them to restrict the rights of queer people. republicans did this for a little over a decade before they got roe overturned. (source: the first heartbeat bill was filed in ohio in 2011.)

they are setting up to challenge obergefell and lawrence v. texas. the majority opinion of roe cites the due process clause of the fourteenth amendement, arguing that abortion bans violate a right to privacy. obergefell guarantees the right of same-sex couples to marry through the due process clause and the equal protection clause of the fourteenth amendment. the majority opinion argues that marriage is a private decision the state cannot intrude on, citing loving v. virginia (also based on the due process and equal protection clauses of the fourteenth amendment). the equal protection clause protects same-sex couples from being barred from marrying while their opposite-sex peers can marry freely. the majority opinion of lawrence v. texas cites the due process clause as granting same-sex couples a "protected liberty interest" to have private sexual relations. in a concurrence, justice sandra day o'connor cites the equal protection clause as the reason gay sex should be decriminalized. (note: in some states only same sex intercourse between men was criminalized. in others same sex intercourse between women was also criminalized. in still others anal sex was criminalized regardless of whether the participants were of the same or opposite sex. the texas law being challenged in lawrence criminalized anal and oral sex between men only. the lawrence case made it legal for same-sex couple to have sex for the first time in FOURTEEN STATES. that's 28% of the country.)

bills like tn hb 0009 (which would criminalize "male or female impersonators" (i.e. drag performers) from performing in public; a second offense would be a FELONY), ky hb 173 (a don't say gay bill that would "establish limitations on school personnel related to instruction and discussion on sexual orientation, sexual preference, or gender expression," among other fucked up things), and ky sb 150 (which would force schools to out trans and nonbinary kids to their parents and prohibit schools from making teachers use kids' preferred pronouns) are clearly pushing at the limits of legality. they are trying to get the supreme court to uphold these laws when they are challenged so the conservative supreme court can say that according to historical precedent (cited in overturning roe) and publicly agreed upon morality (cited in bowers v. hardwick, a case that upheld georgia's sodomy law in 1986, which also cited historical precedent). whether publicly agreed upon morality actually condemns queer people is unlikely to matter, given the current leanings of the court.

this is all to say: we have to start paying very close attention. a felony charge means you can't vote. they are trying to make sure we can't vote. we have to start calling our legislators. we have to start engaging our politically unengaged friends. we have to. they are coming for us. they are playing the long game. we need to too.

i spent multiple hours researching this and i would appreciate reblogs. it feels like we have come to this crisis point so quickly. obergefell isn't even a decade old. we cannot be comfortable and we must act.

[thecurioustale]

As someone who has also canvassed in a major election (2016), I partially disagree with this.

Different canvassing operations are going to utilize different tactics. The OP appears to be talking about party campaign operations, whereas I was involved with an independent community outreach organization. But in my outfit, the "undecided voter flip" was a core part of our strategy—and we won significantly more undecided flips than the margin of victory for one of our candidates, so if you believe even as few as just two out of every three of those flips, then our efforts single-handedly won a statewide election.

But "undecided voter" and "nonvoter / committed third party voter" are not the same thing, so my example is not actually disputing anything the OP wrote. BUT! We did strategically try to make an effort to engage with those voters, too. It was up to the canvasser's individual discretion whether to engage and for how long, but it was officially encouraged. Hardcore GOP voters, yes; we'd move on from those very quickly. But there are many different flavors of nonvoter and third-party voter, and the vast majority of them are theoretically reachable.

For our outfit, there was no strategic switch point where we went from general voter engagement to partisan voter GOTV efforts. We continued engagement efforts up till Election Day.

If you think about it, the pool of reliably-Democratic voters who vote unreliably and the pool of reliable voters who are not reliably Democratic-voting are distinct pools and both valuable sources of additional votes. Winning a Republican flip is worth +2 but winning a Republican-to-independent or independent-to-Democratic vote is still +1, as is nonvoter-to-Democratic. All of those efforts are valuable.

I think what the OP is trying to do is shame people into voting by asserting that boycotting the Democratic Party is pointless as it does not send a message that will ever be recognized. This is mostly accurate, in my opinion. A nonvoter's reasons for not voting were not statistically collected and evaluated by our organization. At the office, we would talk among ourselves about these kinds of folks—and most of the time we would rightly laugh at, sneer at, or otherwise look down upon them, because there simply are not many defensible reasons for not voting. It's mostly voter ignorance and sanctimony, or, in the case of people who "just forgot," it's stupidity and negligence. There are cases where a person is legitimately too busy trying to get by, but that's what early voting and absentee voting are for, and at the doors we would push those options to the extent we could. (This was in a state with limited options on those fronts, especially back in 2016.)

So, to take away all of this, I agree with the assessment that boycotting the Democratic Party by not voting for Democratic candidates is unproductive. In fact it's counterproductive: If you're not a conservative, the Democratic Party is your only pathway to achieving the policies you want. By giving up your vote you effectively muzzle your own voice.

Having said that, I think perhaps it is a blessing in disguise that some people who should be Democrats on paper choose not to vote for Democratic candidates in elections. If the Jew-hating, anti-Zionist zombie faction of the left were more reliable at party discipline, they would have more of their people in government, and I'm glad they don't. I feel the same way about the communists and other anti-capitalists, the anarchists, the energy NIMBYs, and multiple other factions. Ultimately, one of the things that keeps the Democratic Party sane is that there is a causal correlation between a voter's reliability as a voter and their policy preferences. More reasonable people tend to be more consistent about the act of voting and with other civic engagement. Less reasonable people tend to spend their time whining online and posting stuff that borders on hate speech about whomever and whatever they despise at the moment.

The only real question is whether there are enough people left over who are still willing to get out there and vote Democratic.

We'll know in a week!

So there's something I want to say re: intentionally withholding your vote, and I want to do it without coming across as condescending or dismissive.

I've worked as a field organizer in two campaigns, 2010 and 2012, and my job was to help turnout the vote for Democratic candidates up and down the ticket. Technology may have changed, but people are still knocking on doors for specific voters the way they were 12 years ago.

If you say you're not voting/voting 3rd party, the campaign volunteer is supposed to mark that and move on. Their job, in the final month of the election, is to make sure the campaign's supporters have all the information and resources they need to cast a vote.

They aren't collecting data on why you're withholding your vote. They aren't submitting opinion polling results to the campaign. Something like 155 million people voted in the 2020 election, and if you say you're not voting, the campaign is not going to waste a volunteer's time and morale begging you to vote when there are literally millions of other voters to turn out.

Let me repeat that: The campaign does not track why you're not voting. They simply note your vote is not a priority for turnout and move on.

I say this because I see a lot of promotion of non-voting like that's a boycott, when the function is not the same. A boycott is a coordinated mass refusal to engage with an institution—which sounds similar if you see a vote as a good or service to withhold. Unfortunately, it's not.

A vote is a choice you're making as part of a community hiring committee. Your abstention doesn't prevent someone from being hired. It just lowers the threshold for the worst candidate to succeed.

All this to say: In my direct experience as an organizer, abstaining from the vote sends a message. That message is not "You need to try harder to win my vote." It's "Don't waste time on me."

[annika-f16]

anon I hate Kelly but she at least supported Kamala Harris. if you want to call out Max for „supporting“ Trump 🤨 do that, but also call out the others as well like Lando and McLaren, FIA (ben sulayem publicly congratulated him) etc. they are all guilty in giving that Man a platform//

Ironic that she supported Kamala only once, especially considering that Kelly openly showed her support for Bolsonaro, who is worse than Trump. Bolsonaro is like the Brazilian version of Trump, a racist, sexist, homophobic, and many other things. It’s hypocritical of Kelly, as usual. When it comes to Brazil, she doesn’t mind having a psychopath in power, even though it’s supposed to be her country. But she and her family were very active in showing their support for this twisted figure. She supported a dangerous man to lead a country where she doesn’t even live. She didn’t genuinely support Kamala—she posted a story like everyone else because it was trending; she always acts like that. She loves involving herself in politics because there’s no consequence for her, safe in her tax haven. If she truly cared, if she were that invested, why didn’t she post stories showing her support when it was time to vote? Because she doesn’t care, Max had just won in Brazil, she already had the attention she wanted, and there was no need to act like the engaged woman; her boyfriend had already brought her moment of glory. Her story for Kamala is hypocritical and meaningless when she previously supported someone like Bolsonaro.As for Lando and McLaren, they were criticized for inviting Trump, and Lando faced a wave of criticism for it (deservedly). Meanwhile, Max inviting that racist Piquet into the paddock goes ignored. Lando gets criticized for Trump, but Max, who is extremely close to Piquet and publicly defends him, is spared. When it’s about Max, people tend to turn a blind eye to his connection with that family, acting like he doesn’t speak proudly of them. The FIA also faced backlash for their post on Trump. I’ve noticed that when people criticize Max for things like this, others rush to say, ‘Yes, but look at what this driver did…’ We know that, but we can still call out Max for his behavior. People infantilize him too much and make too many excuses for his connection to the Piquet family. He’s an adult, making his own choices, and he’s not naive; he knows exactly what kind of people Kelly and her family are. He chooses to be with her and stay close to that family. People need to stop thinking of him as some innocent lamb among wolves. He’s just as awful as they are; he’s one of them.

He's had years to break up with her and distance himself from her family. It's been four years now so unfortunately I think he shares atleast some of their thoughts. It's a shame because I really did like him. I still respect him as a driver and maybe if he breaks up with her I'll respect him as a person.

[leonbloder]

An Election Day Message

Today is Election Day, and I will do my best to eloquently discuss the importance of voting and civic engagement as both a privilege and a responsibility, especially for those who say they follow Jesus.  

Let's be clear: Jesus never said a thing about voting.  

He said many things that were considered political, however. Every time he talked about the Kingdom of God, he made what amounted to a political statement because he compared the kingdoms of this world to God's kingdom. 

But the Apostle Paul had a great deal to say about what it meant to be a citizen of the Kingdom of God and a citizen of whatever earthly kingdom was in power. 

For Paul, Christians needed to be the best citizens they could be.  He exhorted early Christians to be good neighbors, to obey the laws of Rome (as long as they did not violate the higher laws of love), and to do everything they could to live peaceably with everyone. 

Paul responded to a genuine issue that early Christians faced in the first century.  

Because they did not partake in the "cult of the Emperor," which demanded the Emperor be worshipped like a god and also had what were considered secretive rites and rituals (Holy Communion), early Christians were often persecuted, not by the Roman Empire, but by their neighbors. 

Paul's exhortations amounted to a call to a higher level of citizenship, as long as participation did not cause them to violate their beliefs and principles.  

He wrote that IF respect and honor were due to the earthly powers that be, Christians should afford them that.  The key word there was "if."  

Paul was all too aware that the Emperor of Rome at the time was a despotic, narcissistic, and undoubtedly insane ruler named Nero. Nero encouraged and demanded that he be worshipped like a god.  

History teaches that many Christians in the Roman Empire found ways to pray for the Emperor even if they were not willing to pray to the Emperor. They could participate in festivals with their neighbors without eating meat purchased from pagan temples. 

They acted with kindness and mercy to their neighbors, they cared for people during plagues at risk to their own lives, and they rescued baby girls who were left to die of exposure by their parents who didn't want them, among many other things.  

Sometimes, Christians even served in high-ranking positions within the Empire itself. 

I've said all that to say this: If early Christians had been given the right to vote (no one voted for leaders in the Roman Empire; they were all appointed), the Apostle Paul would have most certainly encouraged them to exercise that right and to do it as good citizens. 

I can only guess that Paul would have also encouraged them to use their vote to further the common good, vote for candidates of upright character, and do their best to vote their conscience, which ought to be grounded in the shalom or peace of God's kingdom.  

So, if you still need to vote, get out there today and make it happen.  The Apostle Paul would likely approve of it. 

I came across this quote from the late David Foster Wallace, who wrote about the importance of voting:  

“If you are bored and disgusted by politics and don't bother to vote, you are in effect voting for the entrenched Establishments of the two major parties, who please rest assured are not dumb, and who are keenly aware that it is in their interests to keep you disgusted and bored and cynical…"

We have seen this happen in our country for many years since Wallace wrote this.  He goes on to say: 

"In reality, there is no such thing as not voting: you either vote by voting, or you vote by staying home and tacitly doubling the value of some Diehard's vote.”

So, if you don't want to double the value of "some Diehard's vote," make sure you cast yours today.  

Happy Election Day!  

May it be decided by tonight or tomorrow at the latest and not be dragged on and on.  Can I get a witness?  

And may the grace and peace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with us all, now and forever. Amen.  

[gwemmieee]

current vibe

This blog is a mature space. If you're a minor, I promise you won't get anything out of staying here.

I'm a trans femby woman, she/her. Sapphic, lesbian, demiromantic, demisexual, horny, cuddly, extremely neurodivergent, and a fused plural system. On some level, I identify as alien, fey, puppy, and wolf.

I also identify as disabled and mad, but I'm only beginning to have the support network and access to treatment/professionals I need to embrace that stuff in a healthy way. I am informally professionally diagnosed with cPTSD, ASD, ADHD, DID, and IBS. I likely also have BPD and RSD, or perhaps just the remnants of those things as I heal. I've been in many accidents and permanently maimed my left arm. I grew up abused and emotionally abandoned and I identify as an orphan. I'm from a really sad, lonely, poor, toxic, undeveloped region, and I feel very lucky and overjoyed to be able to start over far away in the big city.

I'm polyamorous and currently in an open marriage w/ @kateinacrate1

These days, I'm focusing on a few things I need to heal more. I'm growing every day and it's a wonderful process.

First off, I do not typically engage with nonconstructive criticism or yum yucking. Obviously, I respect a "no" or "stop" in terms of setting boundaries and communicating triggers, but I can't think of any other context in which I will have interest in engaging with a situation in which I feel a distinct lack of yes, and. Especially following this rule in how I treat myself and other people has done wonders for my mental health, my social circles, and my growth as a person.

Secondly, I'm reclaiming my childhood. Sometimes, I even identify as a little. I will not always behave in a way that seems "becoming" of an adult, but I am still an adult who deserves respect of my agency. And just because I am an adult, does not mean I don't also deserve a lot of kindness and patience that is usually reserved for children. I never got any of that growing up, and it is a necessary part of my growth into someone who can participate in society and feel safe.

Thirdly, I'm working on my social skills and I'm working through massive mental and physical health barriers as well as past trauma to someday become the social butterfly I was meant to be. I'm exploring a lot of things, including sexual, as I was very repressed most of my life. I'm open to flirting and I don't want anyone to take it personally if I'm awkward, or inconsistent, or unexpectedly absent, in communications. At the moment, I'm really quite nerdy and introverted. My need to sometimes be a little and my need to explore my sexuality can and do overlap. If you don't like that, then you don't need to engage with me. I do not engage in any such behavior with minors or with anyone else who cannot give consent, or in any situation in which consent cannot be given. I appreciate that you do not associate me with people who abuse power dynamics simply because of my behavior in safe spaces among consenting adults.

I have a long history of feeling like I'm supposed to be engaged in politics, and I'm exhausted by it all. I vote for whoever is going to hurt me the least. I detest hierarchies and nonconsensual authority, and I love cooperation. I will never feel safe dealing with any military, national government, or large corporation. I believe militancy in all forms in all contexts outside of self-defense to be inherently evil. I'm weirded out by any behavior that involves coercion, including pressure to interact with any movements to support people who I don't know and don't feel safe around. You could call me an anarcho-communist, but in my personal experience, almost anyone who is passionate about this stuff beyond just wanting to support their local community and form a commune with their friends, tends to be a dangerous person for me to be around.

[tacthescribbler]

I really don't know how to approach my response, so I apologize for the chaotic mess that you're about to read.

I recall a post that talked about the discovery of a mended bone. One of the first indicators of people working together wasn't pottery, or tools, or cloth. It was a bone that had clearly been broken and reset. A bone that had healed. This means that someone had to not only set the bone, but take care of the injured individual until it was healed.

We are a species who has evolved to work together.

My default state of mind is: Everyone deserves basic human rights. Everyone deserves access to food, shelter, healthcare, and so on. I don't care what color your skin is, what country you hail from, whether you are disabled. You deserve to be cared for.

I engage with everyone from this mindset. I assume everyone who speaks to me also does so from this mindset until/unless they prove me wrong.

Whenever I get into my car, I drive out of consideration for everyone else on the street. When I do my job, I work to ensure that in all the places my job touches someone else's, I've made their job a little easier. I return my shopping carts not for the social karma, but because the employees at the grocery store deserve not to have their jobs made more difficult by laziness. When I vote, I vote for candidates/policies that I know will take care of as many people as possible.

Because the world isn't about me.

"It is well to remember that the entire universe, with one trifling exception, is composed of others." - John Holmes

For most of my life, I've struggled to grasp the idea that other people do not (or sometimes cannot) operate from this perspective.

Of course, that was before 2016. I was raised in a heavily-religious Christian home. My older sister was made to throw away a Pokemon toy from her Happy Meal because "Pokemon are not real animals created by God. They are evil." We were not allowed to read the Harry Potter books. (Not a big deal to me; I've never been interested in them. But my sister was.) The one time my introverted self wanted to do something social in high school, it was a D&D game with classmates. "Are you sure you want to engage with witchcraft," my mom asked me. I dropped it and didn't ask again.

It wasn't all bad, though. My parents showed me how to be kind and compassionate, and how to help others.

They voted for trump. And I watched as my parents turned into people I do not recognize.

I'm not sure how to tie all this up into a neat bow. The point is, if we as people (Left or Right) aren't working to improve as many lives as possible, then what's the point?

Do I expect Pacifism from people? No, of course not. I would never expect a person to forgive their rapist, the person who murdered their friend/family, the guy who flipped them off for taking too long to cross the street.

But I would like for people to have some fucking compassion. Give people the benefit of the doubt (where appropriate).

Look, I understand. I've just about had it with people voting to strip me of my bodily autonomy. To kill my non-binary sibling or throw them into conversion therapy. (To be quite honest, I've fucking had it with my parents' transphobic bullshit. "God made you a man and God doesn't make mistakes.") I'm at a point where I'm sick and fucking tired of trying to drag the rest of my nation with me down a path where they are cared for, fed, clothed, sheltered, and accepted for who they are.

And I also get the fact that there are some who cannot be convinced. I'm certain my parents are among them. After all, they have their bible. They don't have to think critically. Their holy book tells them what to think. It's part of why conversations with them are so unproductive. Because they don't introspect or regulate emotions when they have scripture to tell them how to respond to a thing.

But I've still also not called my parents to chew them out, because I know that won't help anything. It'll only further the divide that they don't even realize is between us. How will I convince them to stand with me if all they get from me is aggression.

Whether you're Left or Right, if your first instinct about someone is to treat them as an enemy, you are part of the problem. We move forward by being accepting and open-minded. For those of us who lean Left, that goes fucking double.

Don't be a pushover, but don't be a bully.

We can only move forward together.

There are obviously caveats to what I've said, as well as plenty I've left unsaid. I hope those who read this will take it in good faith and understand that I'm not asking for everyone to just drop their grievances or pretend that shit isn't bad. I just wanted to share a little of my perspective. We're all human beings and I think common ground can start there, if we let it.

I hope we can overcome ourselves and be better.

I couldn't have said it better myself.

[thatstormygeek]

And so fascists play on, in a land of zero consequences for fascists.

In order to deal with this problem of unpopular and illegal goals in a governmental system that's meant to run on what is popular and legal, the fascists also intend to end democracy, and they sure have been making strides with rules they've changed and rules they're changing. In the swing state of Georgia, Republican election saboteurs have seized control of the election process and are rather predictably sabotaging the election, which they claim they are doing in the name of protecting the election. And Republicans are pushing an election law they call SAVE, which they claim is written to protect elections from fraud, even though the danger they are safeguarding against is non-existent, and one real effect of the rule may be to prevent women from voting. And they're trying to move the goalposts in Nebraska—even though the voting has already started—to claw back a single electoral vote Republicans have managed to let squirt free of its moorings, and they say they're engaged in this clear disenfranchisement of the people in the name of letting the will of the people be heard. This means that every 2 years or so the main choice we're making is whether or not we ever get to make choices again, which doesn't seem sustainable, probably because it isn't sustainable. It's like playing football against a team that only has to score a single touchdown to win no matter what the scoreboard says, because instead of playing football they spend their energy changing the rules, and now they've got one that states that if they (and only they) score one touchdown, then they get to execute any referees they don't like—according to the head referees, who they have been bribing. And if all the cheating fails and they lose anyway, then retaliatory violence is all but assured, partly because that's what happened last time and partly because that's what they are promising. This gang wants killing and they intend to have killing, one way or another.

Robinson also posted far worse things on the porn site than the things about his predilection for peeping on unsuspecting women and other sexual misconduct, which we know, because CNN, who broke the story, decided not to publish the worst stuff, because it was too bad to print. So I guess there's even worse out there that's just ... not being reported on, for our protection, I guess. Protection from what, I might wonder. Maybe CNN is sparing us the boredom of learning things about Republicans that we already assume are true, things that it has decided to decide for us won't "move the needle." Maybe CNN decided that we all already know that the true reason Republican voters liked Robinson enough to nominate him is that he is the sort of person who says things like "some folks need killing," and that statement so obviously represents the true core value of Republican voters that it no longer bears repeating. But it also presumes that Robinson's shocking statements about slavery and Nazism are all things that should probably be assumed of anyone these days who is a Republican candidate for high public office. Still, let's not single Robinson out. It also came out in court documents this week that Florida Representative Matt Gaetz attended a drugged-up sex party with an underage teen, which I could have sworn is something that already came out about Matt Gaetz. But then again sex crimes and predatory behavior and protecting those who commit them just seem to be standard party-issue stuff for Republicans these days, so perhaps it is notable mostly because Gaetz (like the rest of his fascist party) uses the protection of minors from pedophiles as the unfounded justification for their active persecution and demonization and dehumanization of trans people and other queer people and elementary school teachers and librarians (among others). And of course we have the head donut Donald Trump and his vice donuthole JD Vance, who along with demonizing trans people (among others) just won't stop inciting terrorist violence from their violence-aligned cult against Haitian people living in Vance's home state, smearing these poor people with a blood libel for the fake crime of eating neighborhood pets—animals that everyone by now knows were only temporarily missing and are still alive and well. At a recent fascist rally, Vance insisted—even while admitting that the targeted Haitians are there legally—that as far has he is concerned, the Haitians are illegal. And they intend to round up and deport "illegals," even as they signal that the definition of "illegal" has nothing to do with law, is in fact something that is entirely up to them and their bigotries. It's just directly shocking Nazi propaganda straight out of the genocide playbook, and it's quite popular with the sort of people who like that sort of thing, which for many of us includes neighbors and family.

So the report's conclusion was clear: The Republican Party could not succeed in a democracy any longer. Something would have to change. Republicans decided to take the report seriously, and set about making change; not attempting to build popular support by abandoning their base of white supremacists, but rather by destroying democracy. And here we are. Trump is here because he is very popular with fascists, and fascists are numerous enough that Republicans can still squeak out wins by using every anti-democratic tool at their disposal and inventing new ones. Trump is fascist because he sensed that fascism is what fascists wanted, and that fascism could be harnessed by somebody willing to give it in undiluted form. And the fascists responded because he was right about them, even while our institutions all agree to tell exonerating myths about them. All the tales I hear about how Republicans actually have other motivations and other, better, more honorable desires ignore the inescapable evidence that Trump took over the party with no shots fired, with only a few objections quickly walked back, a few murmurs and harrumphs. Trump didn't invade the Republicans. They summoned him. They were what they had decided to be. Trump was an inevitability just as whoever comes after him will be an inevitability, for as long as what he is is what they want. The rot isn't at the head; there is no head. The rot goes to the core. ... Republicans intend denaturalization and deportation and ethnic cleansing because those are the things that fascists want, and they intend to cheat at the election as much as they can, and they intend chaos if the cheating fails, and they plan violence if the chaos fails, because fascists don't care about rules, they only care about ruling, which is a matter they insist has nothing to do with questions of whether they have actually won the right to do so. They're doing all this openly because doing it openly is maximally menacing for the people they want to target, and fascists enjoy the fear of others, because the fear of others demonstrates that they are still dominating others. They're lying about why they're doing it, not because most of them don't know that they are lying, but because getting away with lies demonstrates domination. And the lies are ridiculous and laughably obvious because getting away with obvious lies demonstrates more dominance than being forced to craft believable ones does. They're calling themselves heroes for doing it, even while they mock and scorn true heroism, because being held blameless for abuse when you are the cause demonstrates dominance most of all. And they're getting away with it, because our institutions and systems and even the political opposition favors civility and politeness over truth and consequences. Even acting as if fascists intend to do what they say they intend to do is seen as gauche. And so fascists play on, in a land of zero consequences for fascists.

[theghostpinesmusic]

So, like my post about 12/29's "Oblivion," I'm going to start this write-up with a small gripe, which is that this take on "Life Saving Gun" is great, but is maybe the...fifth (?) most compelling improvisatory moment of this show for me. My favorite is probably the massive "Fuego" -> "Train Song" combo from earlier in the first set, but also the entire second set after a straightforward take on "The Well" is amazing: "Tweezer" -> "Twist" > "Piper" -> "Golden Age" -> "2001" > "Sigma Oasis" > "David Bowie."

I came into this show expecting it to be a letdown compared to the previous two nights based on online reviews but that, as usual, turned out to be a mistake. At this point, it's basically de rigeur for any Phish show without at least one 20+ minute jam in the second set to get voted down by "fans," but the fact is there are a lot of ways to improvise, and often length matters less than how you use it. For my money, this second set never lets up, is consistently creative and imaginative, and, among other things, has the most interesting "Bowie" since the early 2000s (though that's sort of damning with faint praise).

But none of that matters because Phish uploaded video for "Life Saving Gun," SO WE'RE TALKING ABOUT "LIFE SAVING GUN" NOW.

This song comes originally from Page and Trey's probably-underappreciated-by-me-thus-far 2023 album "January," and thus, like "Oblivion," it's a "new" Phish song. The version on the album is a weird, synth-heavy experiment, and I dig it, but this more Phish-y arrangement is a great addition to the band's repertoire and engages in a trope the band has indulged their entire careers: writing new Beatles songs the Beatles never got around to writing themselves.

I don't mean that in a derogatory way by any means: the Beatles are great, and they have obviously been a huge influence on all the members of Phish (to the point of their famously covering The White Album in its entirety in 1994). I just hear that influence really strongly on this song, and feel compelled to mention it because it's fun. Your mileage may vary.

I'm partial to the song in part, too, I think, because it...actually sort of rocks? Like, inasmuch as a bunch of sixty-year-olds can rock compared to Trey ripping through a "Chalkdust" solo thirty years ago at least. It heartens me that not only are these guys still producing tons of new material, but also putting out songs like this and "I Never Needed You Like This Before" that are legitimately great rock songs.

This particular great rock song is pretty short, but ends with a rare moment of Fishman going apeshit on the drums at 2:35, which leads right into the jam proper kicking off at 2:48. The band rides the groove of the song for a bit at first, with Trey taking a solo (and reprising the song's vocal melody a few times in a neat way). Page's super chorus-y organ chords deserve a mention here, too, as they add a 70s-type vibe to the proceedings in a cool way.

At 4:08 everyone in the band does that thing they do where they read each other's minds (?) and collectively turn on a dime, this time into a funkier space. I appreciate how the feel of the jam changes here without losing any of its momentum. Page's synth contributions here are just wonderful. For the next few minutes, these guys are just all doing the things they do really well and while it's not something as weird or as unique as, say, parts of 12/29's "Oblivion" jam, there's something equally satisfying about them just ripping through this groove. The lights are great here, too.

Starting at 6:07, Trey holds/loops a note(ish) for about thirty seconds. It used to kind of bother me when he would do this (he does it fairly frequently) because it felt like he was "dropping out" or "being lazy," but lately it's occurred to me (maybe as I've gotten better at guitar myself) that he's doing it to drop back into the mix and add texture so others can step up, and I feel like that's what happens here. By the time he comes back in, Page is leading the way on the clavinet and Mike's gotten his drill out (yes, he's playing his bass with a drill here).

The band returns to the groove after this brief break, but Trey starts to take a more authoritative approach to soloing, and Fishman starts accentuating his playing with cymbal crashes at 7:35 or so.

I'll be honest here: as much as I love this groove they've locked onto, by now it's been about four straight minutes of it and I'm more than good, and maybe getting a little bored. But then Trey, as if reading my mind, plays this wild ascending scale starting at 8:15 that, in peaking, seems to teleport him back to the 90s briefly and he commences to freak out. I love that you can hear the crowd roar on the video right here. I've never seen a show at MSG, but I've got to imagine a sold-out crowd losing it at a jam peak is probably a pretty great experience to be a part of.

Fortunately, we aren't even close to done with the fireworks yet.

The intensity keeps building over the next minute, with Fishman and the lights both peaking around 9:30. I should say that I haven't experienced their newest light rig in person yet, but it's wild enough seeing things like whatever's going on at 9:50 over the internet. God help everyone in that building who was tripping balls when this happened.

Right around here is where Trey starts building a bunch of guitar loops on top of each other (and there's a crowd shot with a guy wearing a Book It! shirt!) and we enter the stage of the jam where Phish Fries Our Adrenal Glands.

The solo Trey starts playing at 10:18 could have come straight from a CD-R of some 90s-era show that I wore out playing in my car while driving around the Appalachians in 2002. Needless to say, I'm a fan.

Things start to really take off at 11:15, and the lights...well, presumably if were at the show in person and on drugs, you are now dead. Rest in peace.

Trey starts adding loops on top of loops at 12:00 as if things aren't already intense enough, and at 12:40 we finally reach the top of the mountain. From there, it's a short wind-down to the end of the jam and the tune. Whew!

I've got one more post to make from this run, but it's going to be an unfocused rave about how good the 12/31 show was rather than a detailed breakdown of a particular jam.

After that...I haven't actually watched anything else lately (been writing a bunch for work), so I'm not sure? Orebolo is livestreaming next weekend, but they don't really lend themselves to long-form jam posts. In all likelihood, next I'll either be diving into a) old Goose shows that I attended in person and want to revisit, or b) another Phish run from this past year, possibly the spring tour.

Either way, I'll be back sooner rather than later! Thanks for reading!