#child trafficking in india

[agirlking]

Delhi most definitely did have slavery. I’m not sure why people are claiming otherwise when you can easily look it up and see that it did.

Also in regard to parents selling kids… watch Bulbbul, because the MC was sold in all but name to be a child bride. This happens. It has happened all over the world, it happens in various forms now.

[quotesfrommyreading]

Even countries with large populations, such as India, rarely have healthy infants and toddlers who need foreign parents. India’s large and growing middle class, at home and in the diaspora, faces fertility issues like those of their developed-world counterparts. They too are looking for healthy babies to adopt; some experts think that these millions of middle-class families could easily absorb all available babies. The country’s pervasive poverty does leave many children fending for themselves on the street. But "kids are not on the street alone at the age of 2," Cantwell, the child protection consultant, says. "They are 5 or 6, and they aren’t going to be adopted." That’s partly because most of these children still have family ties and therefore are not legally available for adoption, and partly because they would have difficultly adjusting to a middle-class European or North American home. Many of these children are deeply marked by abuse, crime, and poverty, and few prospective parents are prepared to adopt them

  —  The Lie We Love

[canadianabroadvery]

“... Hers was neither a love marriage nor an arranged one. Nazima was kidnapped from her home state of West Bengal and transported 1,600km (1,000 miles) to Kashmir, where she was forced to marry a man 20 years her senior who had paid her traffickers $250 for a bride.

With his death, Nazima has been left to support her children alone as she contemplates an uncertain future...”

[cryuk]

By supporting CRY UK, you can make a lasting impact through education, healthcare, and protection, giving children a chance to thrive. Donate money to a charity to protect the lives of children in India.

[runawaycarouselhorse]

They got it right in the article, at least--"victims of traffickers"--these are child trafficking victims!

Brothels are often, even when legalized, the domain of many pimps and traffickers... police have a hard time telling and it's just not bothered with,

“It was always very difficult to rescue the girls because someone would leak the information and the brothel keepers would move the girls. The girls were not a priority for the system, so the police were not helpful. We had to be proactive in getting the evidence.”

---

“The girls are unable to say anything because they are always being policed. You can’t ask questions, you won’t get the evidence on a silver platter. But when you are going around, you hear things and see things,” Singh explains, sitting in a nondescript office, piles of cardboard files all over the floor, documenting the thousands of girls they have rescued over the years, approximately 4,000 at last count. 

““The girls are unable to say anything because they are always being policed. You can’t ask questions, you won’t get the evidence on a silver platter. But when you are going around, you hear things and see things,” Singh explains, sitting in a nondescript office, piles of cardboard files all over the floor, documenting the thousands of girls they have rescued over the years, approximately 4,000 at last count. 

“Most of the time the girls are locked up and they are only allowed out when a customer comes in. To ensure they are not interacting with the customers, the brothel keepers are always banging on the door and take away the mobiles of the customers.”

As a result of an 11-month long operation, conducted before the pandemic, Guria India were able to rescue 136 underage victims of traffickers, resulting in 61 brothels being shut down.”

In the narrow alleyways of Meerganj, the notorious red light district in the city of Allahbad, a man dressed in a brown kurta with a rucksack walks past the dilapidated brothels shouting ‘lipsticks for sale, good prices.’ 

He barely warrants a glance, one of dozens of street sellers who stroll down the alley daily, hawking their wares, a common sight in the hustle and bustle of cities in India.

Word has got around that he’s selling good quality products like Max Factor and other brands the brothel girls recognise from billboards featuring their favourite Bollywood actresses. He’s cheaper than the other sellers and lets them pay in instalments. 

A group of young girls flock to him, picking up bright lipsticks and face powders, to make them look older than they are, or perhaps not, depending on the client’s preferences.

But this is no ordinary seller. He is from Guria India, an organisation which rescues and rehabilitates women and underage girls trapped in the sex trade. 

He has been working undercover, disguised as a cosmetics seller, gathering evidence of victims of traffickers who have been forced into sex work, many of whom are underage and often thousands of miles away from home.

“You are working on a razor’s edge. There are no second chances. One wrong move and you could be killed. It’s not like a movie where you get a retake,” says Ajeet Singh, Director of Guria India.  

The nature of trafficking is changing and so activists are having to find new and innovative  means to take them on. 

Singh said he came up with the idea of posing as a make-up seller after he found that the brothel owners were always one step ahead of him. 

“It was always very difficult to rescue the girls because someone would leak the information and the brothel keepers would move the girls. The girls were not a priority for the system, so the police were not helpful. We had to be proactive in getting the evidence.”

Using rudimentary equipment he bought from Delhi, including spy cams concealed in a pen and button, he began scouring the streets of the red light district for almost a year. 

“Make-up is something very enticing for girls. If you go to India, you’ll see street sellers in every city so I knew I would blend in,” he said.

“The girls are unable to say anything because they are always being policed. You can’t ask questions, you won’t get the evidence on a silver platter. But when you are going around, you hear things and see things,” Singh explains, sitting in a nondescript office, piles of cardboard files all over the floor, documenting the thousands of girls they have rescued over the years, approximately 4,000 at last count. 

“Most of the time the girls are locked up and they are only allowed out when a customer comes in. To ensure they are not interacting with the customers, the brothel keepers are always banging on the door and take away the mobiles of the customers.”

As a result of an 11-month long operation, conducted before the pandemic, Guria India were able to rescue 136 underage victims of traffickers, resulting in 61 brothels being shut down. 

Social media ‘weapon of choice’ for traffickers

The sting, which was signed off by local people, used undercover filming to collect evidence against offenders. When enough had been gathered, ten members of the Guria India team joined police as they carried out dawn raids, using iron cutters to access properties where the victims were being held.

There are an estimated 1.2 million children under 18 working in brothels in India, many of whom have been victims of sex traffickers. Approximately 75 per cent of the cases Guria India dealt with involved under age victims ranging from just six months to 17.

The majority of these trafficked children are from lower castes and more than half of them are from families living below the poverty line.  

While many of the girls sold to brothels are trafficked by relatives or family friends, in recent years, social media, with its low-risk and high rewards, has become the weapon of choice of traffickers, luring victims in with lucrative job offers or promises of marriage. 

“The internet and exploitative romantic relationships are key factors for trafficking in recent times,” said children’s rights activist Bharti Ali.

“Often, the police don’t start their search in cases of adolescent girls immediately as they believe it to be a case of elopement. Many cases end up in girls being sold further by the boy/person they trusted or who promised them false marriage.

“When girls go missing, parents often try to search within their own community, her friends and relatives. This is when they lose critical time. When they suspect that she may have eloped, they may tend to not report at all to protect family honour … The girls too are unable to report as the traffickers keep a close watch on them.”

For victims of traffickers, their introduction into the world of prostitution is a brutal and violent one, in which they face beatings, gang rape and starvation. Some victims also reported having chilli powder placed on their genitalia and being subjected to electric shocks. 

Among the girls they have rescued is Sarita, who was just 12-years-old when she was sold to a sex trafficker by her older brother and was transported 700 km away to work in a brothel. 

“My mum was working in Mumbai and I lived with my sister. My brother was a drug addict. He told me he was taking me to see my mum but instead he sold me to a trafficker. I was locked in a room and beaten and raped by several men. I managed to find a phone and called my mum,” she said.

Sarita’s mother, along with the police and Guria India activists, were able to rescue her and relocate the family. However, the majority of victims are not so lucky. India remains a socially conservative society and victims of trafficking will often be ostracised by their families and community. 

Rescuing victims of trafficking is only half the battle, while keeping them out of the hands of traffickers presents another challenge. 

Rehabilitating victims back into a society which was already hostile to them in the first place is difficult and often the girls will end up falling back into the hands of traffickers. 

In one case, 57 girls who were rescued by Guria were sent to a shelter home in Agra for rehabilitation, but were re-trafficked by the superintendent of the centre. Just this week, the superintendent was acquitted by the Supreme Court and Guria India is currently fighting the decision. 

Despite the setbacks, Singh remains hopeful. “Although I don’t think we can eradicate child prostitution in my lifetime, I’m hopeful we can set the foundations to make the change,” he said.

And sometimes all it takes is a rucksack and a Max Factor lipstick. 

[coochiequeens]

Ladies don't travel to another country with a man if your legal status is uncertain. If you do hold onto your passport and make sure your ticket isn't a one way.

Exit trafficking: Western Sydney man abandons his wife overseas after she fell out with his mum

Western Sydney man convicted over 'exit trafficking'

He took his wife abroad, but only he had a return ticket 

READ MORE: Human trafficking gang that operated a string of brothels jailed

By PADRAIG COLLINS FOR DAILY MAIL AUSTRALIA

PUBLISHED: 06:40 EDT, 27 June 2024 

A western Sydney man who abandoned his wife overseas after she fell out with his mother has been convicted over what is known as 'exit trafficking'. 

It is a type of modern slavery where women are tricked or coerced into leaving a country, in this case Australia, and prevented from returning.

The 44-year-old man, who lives in Merrylands in Sydney's south-west, took his wife on 'a charity mission' to their home country of Afghanistan in January 2018, police said.

But the man, known as AR to protect his family, only had a return ticket for himself. His wife did not realise that her ticket was one-way to Afghanistan. 

The day after he returned to Australia, AR wrote to the Department of Home Affairs, cancelling the sponsorship of his wife's visa, the Sydney Morning Herald reported.

He did so because his mum didn't like his wife, and it resulted in the woman he had been married to for four years being stranded overseas.

The woman's relatives helped get her back to Australia, where she reported her husband to the police.  

AR's conviction last Friday was the third such exit trafficking conviction in Australia.

He was sentenced to two years jail with 12 months of it to be served in the community on a good behaviour bond.

Human rights activist Helena Hassani said there has been an increase in such oppression of women, often in migrant communities, in Australia.

While there are many cases involving men from Afghan and other migrant communities taking their wives abroad and leaving them there, she said there are also many cases where 'Aussie men marry women from Asia, bring them here, but marry them into servitude, or treat them like sex workers'.

Many women, such as AR's wife, are only in Australia on partner visas, leaving them reliant on their husband's sponsorship to stay in the country.

Some women in these communities are discouraged from using money, getting an education or working outside the home because the men want a 'servant'.

'It's a cultural practice where the less educated women are, the happier men are, because then no one is challenging them, no one is confronting them, and they just live the way they want to live,' Ms Hassani told the publication.

Acting Detective Sergeant Sarah Manning of the Australian Federal Police (AFP) said exit trafficking often goes unreported.

No one has the right to 'cancel' another person's visa, including the visa sponsor,' she said. 

'This type of behaviour is a Commonwealth offence and carries a potential 12-year jail term.'

The first exit-trafficking conviction was in 2021, when a man from Lidcombe in western Sydney threatened to murder a woman unless she boarded a flight to India with her infant child.

The horrific interaction was captured on Sydney Airport's CCTV after the anti-human trafficking group Anti Slavery Australia told the AFP what happened.

Anyone with information about potential modern slavery or trafficking is urged to report it to Australian Federal Police on 131 237.

[f1ghtsoftly]

All The Women’s News You Missed Last Week 9/16/24-9/23/24:

Hi, this newsletter is late. On Thursday, September 19th, I was the victim of a crime and needed emergency medical care. I am currently recovering with family outside the city. This is the earliest I could get out this project. I appreciate your understanding at this time.

Male Violence/Femicide: 

US: Sean 'Diddy' Combs arrest live updates: Charged with sex trafficking and racketeering 

India: West Bengal Assembly in India passes bill mandating life in prison or death penalty for rape convictions

France: Shocking rape trial highlights the systematic struggles French sexual abuse victims face

Australia: Suspect in 1977 Melbourne cold case arrested in Italy

US: Several Mark Robinson campaign staffers quit as fallout over online posts continues

Italy: Italy holds a trial into the killing of a woman that sparked debate over femicide

US: Harvey Weinstein pleads not guilty to new sexual assault charge 

UK: Harrods' ex-owner Al Fayed raped, assaulted staff over decades, lawyers say 

Reproductive Rights in the USA/Special Focus:

A dramatic rise in pregnant women dying in Texas after abortion ban 

Abortion Bans Have Delayed Emergency Medical Care. In Georgia, Experts Say This Mother’s Death Was Preventable.

Federal judge temporarily blocks Tennessee’s ‘abortion trafficking’ law

‘She should be alive today’ — Harris spotlights woman’s death to blast abortion bans and Trump

Western nations were desperate for Korean babies. Now many adoptees believe they were stolen

Euphoric two years ago, US anti-abortion movement is now divided and worried as election nears

US Senate IVF bill fails after Republicans block it, despite Trump support

Transgender News/Gender Critical:

Australia: Australian woman's complaint at hostel backfires as manager fires back: 'This guest is lucky we didn't press charges on her'

Women’s Achievements: 

US: 2 Black women could make Senate history on Election Day

Sri Lanka: Sri Lanka has more women voters than men but no female presidential candidates

US: ‘Hidden Figures’ of the space race receive Congress’ highest honor at medal ceremony

MISC: 

Sweden: Sweden charges woman with genocide, crimes against humanity in Syria

Arts and Culture: 

Music Review: Katy Perry returns with the uninspired and forgettable ‘143'

Why does ‘The Babadook’ still haunt? Its director, Jennifer Kent, has some answers

JoJo was a teen sensation. At 33, she’s found her voice again

'Agatha All Along' crafts a witch coven community run by women

Demi Lovato’s ‘Child Star’ Is Now Streaming on Hulu and Disney+

As always, this is global and domestic news from a US perspective covering feminist issues and women in the news more generally. As of right now, I do not cover Women’s Sports. Published each Monday afternoon.

I am looking for better sources on women’s arts and culture outside of the English-speaking world, if you know of any-please be in touch.

[apricitystudies]

what i read in sep. 2023:

(previous editions) bold = favourite

race, gender, sexuality

fighting kung fu

justin roiland used his 'rick and morty' fame to pursue young fans, text messages show

tharman's presidency should be a turning point in the non-chinese prime minister conversation (singapore)

how columbia ignored women, undermined prosecutors and protected a predator for more than 20 years (usa)

goodbye 'girl boss', hello 'snail girl'

i saw my father reflected in the faces protesting against lgbtq rights and sex ed (canada)

mississippi goddam: the ballad of billey joe (usa)

politics & current affairs

derna valley was once a 'paradise.' now there's nothing left but devastation (libya)

'a hidden universe of suffering': the palestinian children sent to jail (israel)

lost in ai translation: growing reliance on language apps jeopardizes some asylum applications (via @dutch-polyglot)

'i log into a torture chamber each day': the strain of moderating social media (india)

how facebook and instagram became marketplaces for child sex trafficking

boy with autism unlawfully pinned to the ground facedown by adults in 'abusive' ndis-funded therapy (australia)

history, culture, & society

quantum poetics

the strange, dark story of smash mouth and 'all star'

flat places are the ground that my mind is built upon

the villa where a doctor experimented on children (austria)

the man in the iron lung

solidarność (poland)

the decomposition of rotten tomatoes

the woman on the line (drug reform)

deservingness (postcommunist europe)

[armandofnowhere]

okay i’ve changed my mind about armand’s origin story AGAIN.

above screenshots are from Hindus Beyond the Hindu Kush: Indians in the Central Asian Slave Trade by Scott C. Levi

so the talamasca notes his origins as “delhi” which is corroborated by armand’s earliest memory (“i’m being ran down by slavers in delhi.”) this would have been when he was a child, let’s say under 12 years old. this makes the year no later than 1520. the portuguese had already established trade links with india through vasco de gama in the previous century but through calicut. calicut is nowhere near delhi as the former is a coastal polity whereas the latter is further up north.

if he was abducted north to south, in order for armand to have been trafficked from delhi to venice, he would have been captured by locals for domestic service → eventually made his way to coastal settlements where european traders were → given to europeans and taken on a ship → eventually landed in venice.

if he was abducted further north before going back south, he could have been abducted for international trade (i.e. central asia) and may have actually spent some time there for an uzbek/chagatai turkic-speaking household (hence “asr namozi” instead of “salat al asr”) before making his way somehow back into the subcontinent - he escaped? he got sold again? he accompanied a party making way down south? cue european traders taking him for their own commodity and the long voyage to the mediterranean. it’s possible his parents’ relative poverty had prevented them from paying taxes to the sultan, rendering them disloyal to the eyes of the aristocracy, and were deemed free game for enslavement.

[reality-detective]

WIRES>]; ATTACK ON ISRAEL WAS A FALSE FLAG EVENT

_Israel with over 10,000 Spys in the military imbedded inside IRAN. Saudi Arabia and world Militaries.... Israels INTELLIGENCE Agencies, including MOSSAD which is deeply connected to CIA, MI6 .. > ALL knew the Hamas was going to attack Israel several weeks before and months ago including several hours before the attack<

_The United States knew the attack was coming was did Australia, UK. Canada, EU INTELLIGENCE...... Several satellites over Iran, Israel, Palestine and near all captured thousands of troops moving towards Israel all MAJOR INTELLIGENCE AGENCIES knew the attack was coming and news reporters (Israeli spys) in Palestine all knew the attack was coming and tried to warn Israel and the military///// >

>EVERYONE KNEW THE ATTACK WAS COMING,, INCLUDING INDIA INTELLIGENCE WHO TRIED TO CONTACT ISRAEL ( but Israel commanders and President blocked ALL calls before the attack)

_WARNING

>This attack on Israel was an inside Job, with the help of CIA. MOSSAD, MI6 and large parts of the funding 6 billion $$$$$$$ from U.S. to Iran funded the operations.

_The weapons used came from the Ukraine Black market which came from NATO,>the U.S.

The ISRAELI President and Prime minister Netanyahu ALL STOOD DOWN before the attacks began and told the Israeli INTEL and military commanders to stand down<

___

There was no intelligence error. Israeli intensionally let the stacks happen<

_______

FOG OF WAR

Both the deep state and the white hats wanted these EVENTS to take place.

BOTH the [ ds] and white hats are fighting for the future control of ISRAEL

SOURCES REPORT> " INSIDE OF ISRAELI BANKS , INTELLIGENCE AGENCIES AND UNDERGROUND BASES LAY THE WORLD INFORMATION/DATA/SERVERS ON HUMAN TRAFFICKING WORLD OPERATIONS CONNECTED TO PEDOPHILE RINGS.

]> [ EPSTEIN] was created by the MOSSAD

with the CIA MI6 and EPSTEIN got his funding from MOSSAD who was Ghislaine Maxwells father> Israeli super spy Robert Maxwell_ ( who worked for, cia and mi6 also)/////

____

The past 2 years in Israel the military has become divided much like the U.S. military who are losing hope in the government leaders and sectors. Several Revolts have tried to start but were ended quickly.

🔥 Major PANIC has been hitting the Israeli INTEL, Prime minister and military commanders community as their corruption and crimes keep getting EXPOSED and major PANIC is happening as U S. IS COMING CLOSER TO DROPPING THE EPSTEIN FILES. EPSTEIN LIST AND THE MAJOR COUNTRIES WHO DEALT WITH EPSTEIN> ESPECIALLY ISRAEL WHO CREATED EPSTEIN w/cia/mi6

_

_

____

Before EPSTEIN was arrested, he was apprehended several times by the military intelligence ALLIANCE and he was working with white hats and gave ALL INFORMATION ON CIA. MI6 . MOSSAD. JP MORGAN. WORLD BANKS. GATES. ETC ETC ECT EX ECT E TO X..>> ISRAEL<<BIG TECH

GOOGLE. FACEBOOK YOUTUBE MICROSOFT and their connection to world deep state cabal military intelligence and world control by the Elites and Globalist,<

_

This massive coming THE STORM is scaring the CIA. MOSSAD KAZARIAN MAFIA. MI6 ETC ECT . ect etc AND THEY ARE TRYING TO DESTROY ALL THE MILITARY INTELLIGENCE EVIDENCE INSIDE ISRAEL AND UNDERGROUND BUNKERS TO CONCEAL ALL THE EVIDENCE OF THE WORLD HUMAN TRAFFICKING TRADE

_ THE WORLD BIG TECH FACEBOOK GOOGLE YOUTUBE CONTROL

_THE WORLD MONEY LAUNDERING SYSTEM THAT IS CONNECTED FROM ISRAEL TO UKRAINE TO THE U S. TO NATO UN. U.S. INDUSTRIAL MILITARY COMPLEX SYSTEM

MAJOR PANIC IS HAPPENING IN ISRAEL AS THE MILITARY WAS PLANNING A 2024 COUP IN ISRAEL TO OVER THROW THE DEEP STATE MILITARY AND REGIMEN THAT CONNECTED TO CIA.MI6 > CLINTON'S ROCKEFELLERS.>>

( Not far from where Jesus once walked.... The KAZARIAN Mafia. The cabal, dark Families began the practice of ADRENOCHROME and there satanic rituals to the god of moloch god of child sacrifice ..

Satanism..... This is why satanism is pushed through the world and world shopping centers and music and movies...)

- David Wilcock

Something definitely doesn't seem right and destroying evidence has been going on for a long time, think Oklahoma City bombing, 9/11's building 7 and even Waco Texas was about destroying evidence. Is this possible? Think about it and you decide. 🤔

[meowmeowmeowmeow4x]

Dark Blue Moon and the Suffering Sun Chapter 32

MASTAPOST

Samson S. Skulker. Wealthy real estate owner, noted trophy hunter.  Been on safaris in Botswana, Indonesia, India, and other countries taking big game. Guy hunted just about everything. Elephants, rhinos, tigers, elk, only to come to Elmerton Bay, just an hour away by boat from Amity Island.

It didn’t take two brain cells to figure out why. The better question was why Phantom tried to point webbed fingers at him as to the whereabouts of Danny Fenton, a move that was transparently (goddammit Dick and your puns) a lie, according to Bruce. Tim Drake slipped into the man’s more private records without even trying.

Of course, getting the data out and parsing what it meant were two very different things. But he wasn’t trained by Batman for nothing. Skulker did make cursory attempts at hiding his electronic paper trail, but cursory was absolutely not enough to keep 13-year-old Tim out, let alone his current self.

Firstly, the man absolutely hunted more exotic, more illegal creatures. That much was clear. Borrowing some of Barbara’s programmes, Tim found the man travelling to much more remote countries. His little vacations coincided with missing persons reports around the same time.

Missing metas, to be exact. Each person with a power set dangerous to themselves and others. Each person having disappeared without a trace and then never to be found again. The picture Tim was building was getting grimmer.

Secondly, the man was buying parts. Robotics parts, to be exact. Engines, weapons systems, hydraulics. Many of them sourced from Vladco, the company founded by Vlad Masters, an old college friend of Jack and Maddie Fenton, who were the parents to the missing teenager of Tim’s current case.

But Danny Fenton did not have the meta-gene, a fact Tim confirmed after yet another concerning breach of privacy. He filed that detail away for later investigating.

Tim pressed a key, letting his programmes run while he got a coffee. Oh sweet delicious coffee. He had once distilled almost pure caffeine into a syrup. It was the most horrible thing he’d tasted in his life, but the buzz kept him up all night, that was until his heart started giving out. That was less enjoyable.

What was also less enjoyable was the revving motorcycle heading into the Batcave. Two motorcycles, in fact. Just as Tim’s afternoon was looking to be peaceful and quiet.

“Don’t fucking give me that, Dickwing!” Jason called out.

“I’m fine, Jay, maybe you need to stop hovering over me like some mama bear.” Dick put down his helmet with maybe a little too much force.

Jason hopped off his own bike. “That’s bullshit and even Timbit knows it.”

Tim shrunk into the Batcomputer’s chair. He so did not want to be a part of this. He just waited for his older brothers to carry their argument out of earshot, like they had been doing regularly now. The men traded strong words with every footstep across the cave.

“Maybe I’m just a little high strung. It’s honestly nothing.”

“You literally cannot fucking say that when I saw you going full-ass Punisher five minutes ago. Like the traffickers yesterday were one thing. Those guys suck. This dude was literally just a mugger. Are you going out of your fucking mind?”

“Jason, I thought you were supposed to be the one who’s all for going full Punisher style?”

Jason groaned loudly, and then transitioned into a frustrated scream. “Do you even hear yourself?!”

The changing room door slammed shut.

That was the second argument in the last two days. If you told Tim that Mr Heads-in-a-Duffle would be lecturing the Golden Child over excessive force, he’d start working on a machine to send you back to the topsy-turvy alternate dimension you’d come from, but apparently his dimension was the topsy-turvy one the whole time. And he hated it.

Turns out Dick inherited more from Bruce than he liked to admit, including his awful coping mechanisms. And to be honest, he was way too tired to even begin to breach this subject.

He should be happy that his literal attempted murderer was going to be out of his hair for a good while, maybe even forever. But even entertaining the thought made him sick enough to avoid the topic in his head for hours, only to think about it again, and get himself sick again.

So back to Skulker it was. Joy.

It turned out his new friend Skulker had made himself a fucking Iron Man rip-off suit, capable of flight, diving, and packed to the gills with fuck-you bazookas, machine guns, and hydroplasm weapons. Hydroplasm guns that he’d sourced from the Fentons themselves, through a long and complicated chain of buyoffs.

And happy day, the man was kind enough to install cameras and microphones, and kept logs from both.

In a surprising twist, it was fiendishly difficult to hack into those logs. Tim was honestly beginning to sweat. He suspected Skulker’s friends at Vladco (namely Vlad Masters, the sleezeball. Tim never liked him at galas and this only cemented his low opinion) had some secrets that they didn’t want out.

No matter, it was only a matter of time. Tim continued typing.

And typing.

And typing.

What the hell was this firewall?! Tim pinched his arm just to make sure this wasn’t a sleep-deprivation hallucination. He could’ve sworn he’d gotten through that layer of security. It was like it was shifting itself to cover up his progress and force him to start over. Almost like it was alive.

Against the thunderous backdrop of his brothers’ clashing voices, Tim set himself on overdrive. If he could just act faster than it could correct itself, then maybe, maybe.

A plain error message informed him of the results long after he’d already seen them. Tim kicked the table for good measure. The only thing he could extract was two frames of video footage. They showed, respectively, a T-shirt and pair of sneakers that matched what one of the missing metas was wearing when they were last seen.

Was it damning evidence? Absolutely. But it also proved to him absolutely nothing that he wasn’t already suspecting, nothing that could point him in a new direction. Still, it made his stomach churn. He hoped those people would get a better second chance beyond the grave.

Maybe the fact that the data was this well-hidden at all proved something.

The locker room door swung open, his brothers in civvies and glaring at each other, trying to appear civil in front of (right behind) Tim, even though they’d literally just been shouting at each other ten minutes ago.

“Timmy!” Dick called out. “How long have you been awake?”

Tim gestured offhanded to his pile of only two used mugs. “Not long enough. I’m still working. Can you take it upstairs please?”

Jason huffed, and stalked off upstairs without a word, probably too disgusted to be in his and Dick’s presence much longer.

Dick clasped his hands. “It’s fine, Tim. Honestly. Jason and I are just having a little, err, disagreement, is all.”

“Hm.” Tim inputted another set of commands. He was starting to see why Bruce liked to say that now. Avoiding painful emotions felt so good. Dick made a pained noise.

“Well, ok. I’m just gonna head back to Bludhaven now. Say hi to Alfred for me! And contact me if you need anything!” And then he sped off.

Tim shook off the awkwardness like old clothes. Thank goodness for some peace and quiet again. Maybe that was why he was working so hard to help Bruce get the demon child back, so he could return to the status quo, and not this. This hell reality where Dick was as emotionally constipated as Bruce and Jason was the one acting as the voice of reason.

The first night when Bruce called home, the entire family was in an uproar. Dick got a pale look on his face, and was halfway about to take the Batplane and go searching for Damian himself, only for Bruce to remind him that they were all still needed in Gotham and Bludhaven, and whatever few leads there were, Bruce would pursue. It was effortlessly logical, but it was clear Dick hated it. He stormed off in a rage that Tim had only seen when Ethiopia was fresh, when he and Bruce were at their lowest.

And Jason? He got this look on his face that he’d never, ever seen before. Tim had laid awake one night just contemplating it for ages.

Actually, no. He had seen it once before. It was Tim caught Jason looking into what Bruce was doing in the months after Ethiopia. Tim had subtly hacked the phone camera, and the look Jason had then was the same as how he looked when Damian was declared missing.

Tim shook his head. It was a gruesome image, what Bruce had sent them. Damian’s clothes ripped to shreds. The ground stained with his blood. No body in sight.

A little brother who may or may not be dead, something he may or may not be glad or sick to his stomach about. Brothers who were acting like completely different people, and a monster of a man who had to be connected somehow.

A ping appeared in the corner of the screen. The government siren hunting branch appearing in Panama?

Sam Manson sat up in her bed, her body finding some way to release the dread and tension. She looked on at her phone in horror and macabre fascination in equal parts.

This had Danny written all over it. She didn’t even need to hear the anchor confirming it to know.

On the one hand, she really wanted to applaud him for fucking them up this bad. The comment section was ripping into the GiW for their actions in Panama, treating the country like it was some vassal state they could romp around in. She personally screenshotted the fucking beautiful mass car crash the GiW had gotten into trying to catch him, and saved it into her favourites folder.

On the other hand, she really wanted to slap him for fucking up this bad. This could’ve easily gone wrong. Danny what were you thinking?! They could’ve got him that time!

And finally, she wanted to yell in frustration, because they had a radio communicator there. Goddammit! If only Tucker had known, they he could’ve hacked in and they could’ve talked to their best friend and actually got an update on what the fuck was going on.

And finally, finally for real, she was so glad, because the GiW would’ve announced it on every news channel if they’d actually managed to catch him. Thank fucking goodness.

Ugh, this headache. She really needed to lie down again.

Knock, knock knock knock knock, knock knock.

Dread pooled in her stomach. “Come in,” she said, resigned to her fate.

Grandma Ida, the person she least wanted to see right now, opened the door. She was the kind of woman who never carried herself very seriously, except for in matters of sorcery, and especially when warning Sam on the dangers of her craft. Dangers that Sam had ignored in order to go all out. Now she marched into Sam’s bedroom like an executioner.

Grandma stood at the foot of Sam’s bed, scanning her closely. “I knew I smelled tinged blood.” She went up to the side, and palmed Sam’s forehead. Her hand was freezing cold to the touch. “You should’ve called me immediately.”

Sam averted her eyes. She should’ve, but she didn’t.

Her parents never failed to get a rise out of her; she rejected their notions of female beauty and social etiquette in every way, their attempts to hook her up with Tim Drake-Wayne, then Damian Wayne, and she hadn’t cowed to them or submitted since she was ten. But with Grandma’s withering disapproval, she couldn’t feel more like a child if she tried.

“I’m sorry.” She whispered.

“I warned you many times of the risks, Sammy. You’re lucky to be here, and not in the hospital or worse.”

“I know.”

Sam moved to lie on her side, facing away from Granny. Granny had questioned her decision to fight alongside Danny, but allowed it under the condition that she did so safely, and turning your body into a popping water balloon, but with blood, was so not the definition of safe.

And Danny’s fate was still in question regardless. He wasn’t able to cross Panama, and who knows what Damian was doing. What if it was all for naught?

A hand was put on her shoulder. “Did you accomplish what you were set out to do?”

Sam nodded. “Yeah.”

“And was it worth it?” Yes. Absolutely yes. Danny bled every day for this god-forsaken town of ingrates. He’d bled for her mistake six months ago.

Granny seemed to understand her feelings. She nodded, and ruffled Sam’s hair, and the tension in Sam’s body drained away.

“Then I trust your judgement. Can you sit up? I’ve brought some more medicine for you.”

Sam pushed herself against the bunched-up pillows at the headboard. Her head spun from the motion, but she was never one to let her body’s limits confine her. “Thank you, Bubbe. I love you.”

Granny passed her a brew of herbal medicine, dozens of dried spices and mushrooms brewed together into a blackened sludge that felt like knives into your tongue, but which never failed to get her feeling better. It was a leg up from what big pharma tried to pedal for ten-fold the price.

Sam lifted up the mug to her face. And, oh yeah. Nothing like bitter liquid pain to help with a migraine. She let the hot tea flow over her taste buds, pathing them in cinnamon, star anise and a million other things.

She finished her tea in one satisfying gulp, running her tongue over her teeth and scratching out the lingering aftertaste. As she put the mug down, it revealed Grandma’s face hovering right in front of her. Sam yelped in shock. “Bubbe! You gave me a heart attack!”

Bubbe smiled devilishly. “So what did you do?”

Sam’s mouth gaped open. Leave it to her Grandma to almost kill her from emotional whiplash.

“Now come on, this is a monumental moment for a budding young sorceress like yourself. Why, when I was twenty-two, I used to run with some heroic types myself. We had all sorts of hijinks together.” Bubbe cackled and clasped her hands, eyes going wispy. “My friends got a heart attack when I pulled off my own hare-brained scheme to topple the evil overlord of the week’s central command. Hah!”

“What?!” Then Sam coughed, and lowered her volume. “What do you mean ‘heroic types.’ You just told me you went to some stuffy academy and eloped.”

Bubbe shrugged. “I did do that. Must have forgotten the extra stuff.”

Sam blinked.

She moved to sit beside Sam on the bed. “We got up to a lot of fun back in the day, and a lot of pain too. I did what I did to protect those I cared for. Did you, bubbeleh?”

She held Sam’s hand with a look that reminded her just how many years Grandma had lived, and how many adventures or stories she had yet to tell, how much heartache she’d had to endure to become the woman she was now. “I projected an illusion all the way off the coast of Panama. It hurt like nothing else in my entire life, but…” She paused. “We got Phantom out. He’s safe now, I think.”

Grandma Ida nodded solemnly, the kind of understanding that Sam craved from her parents every waking moment of her teenage career.

“I don’t want this to be a regular occurrence, ok?”

“Yes, I promise. This was an extreme circumstance.”

“Good. Now, are you well enough for some meditation? It would do well to keep your soul energy flowing.”

Ok, but you have to tell me what you got up to back in the day.”

Granny chuckled, and agreed to it. Sam kicked off her covers, letting her legs get some fresh air. She was probably pushing it, but she needed to recover as quickly as possible. Who knew when she would be needed again?

Maddie Fenton kneeled in the sand. Her hands clamped down on her gun. Her knees shook. Tears prickled in her goggles.

Her baby was right there. He was so close. So fucking close. She could almost touch him, even now.

And he ran away from her. And at first her heart shattered into a million pieces, just like it had when he’d come home after his first disappearance and flinched when she hugged him.

Then she realised. He was protecting her. Some metal menace was shooting at her defenseless son like it was some kind of sick game. The monster of a man had laid fucking landmines on a public beach.

It should’ve been her protecting him.

Bruce Wayne returned to her side, empty handed. They’d scoured this entire beach. Danny couldn’t have gone far, she had thought, only for their search to turn up with nothing.

That left only one option. That her enemy doubled back after fleeing, and snatched Danny up without either her or Bruce noticing. Maddie’s heart sank. She should’ve aimed for the head.

A name pinged in her mind. Phantom had whispered it to her. Skulker.

With nary but nod, she and Bruce mounted their jet skis again.

[runawaysiren940]

I understand you do this to get engagement. Ironic though that a few posts down you have shared a post criticizing The Guardian for the same thing with their sex work title. So you understand how titles can imply something like underage sex trafficking victims are workers but not the concerns over your title?

No. Because 'women shouldn't go to India' isn't inaccurate, misleading, or downplaying the reality of sexual abuse.

Genuinely, India is currently a horrible place to be a woman, and one which I would argue female travellers should avoid. Go ahead and explain to me how that is in any way similar to refusing to call child sex trafficking victims as such.

[eatmangoesnekkid]

The Western World does not live in a democracy. It is more theatrical than a democracy.The government does not listen to its constituents and most candidates are selected, not elected. People's votes do not matter mainly because old money, old power, and sexual deviance like child trafficking fund the political system. Blood rituals are common. The government uses most people as pawns, and will sacrifice nearly everyone except the 1 percent. Magical women must find ways to leave politics alone.We never belonged in it. Like Priestesses and Goddesses, we have always belonged near rivers, seas, waterfalls, forests, mountains, trees, birds, hills, valleys, and plants creating medicine and calm for this planet, doing life differently. Where your attention goes is where your energy is harvested. Get clarity. Get still. And get focused. Our stagnant most densest emotions are their food and fuel. -India Ame'ye, Author

[aboardthescheherazade]

Inspired by @professorcalculusstanaccount's timeline posts, it's Roberto Rastapopoulos through the years! No little Greek boy don't grow up to be a massive shithead--

Rasta is a very difficult character to understand in canon, because so much of his lore is left unknown to the viewer. However, there were little bits and pieces, some in Herge's tertiary studio notes; over time I've wrung some water from that stone, and put together this timeline in my head. I went with a more condensed range than ProfCal (i.e. pre-canon up to canon, rather than into post-canon), since Rob does technically "die"/disappear by the end of the (finished) comics.

Headcanons and details under the cut:

According to speculative official notes, he was born in the 1890s in Leros. It's a beautiful island but also one with a turbulent history, as when little Roberto was born, that part of Greece was under control by the Ottoman Empire. His father was a sponge diver, which was a very viable career at the time. (Decades later, the industry would be ruined when the area's sea sponges were over-harvested by bigger diving operations.) His mother is basically unknown...many official outlets say Rastapopoulos is part American, so I imagine his mother was of Greek-American heritage who either met his father abroad or in America.

There were two real-world figures who influenced my timeline: Aristote Onassis and Aleister Crowley. Onassis was one of Herge's later inspirations when writing Rastapopoulos, and for good reason; much like Rastapopoulos's own immoral dealings, Onassis indiscriminately sold warships during WWII and can easily be considered an arms dealer who profited off of human atrocities. On the other hand, Aleister Crowley was my own connection. All the pseudo-Egyptian mysticism in Cigars of the Pharaoh and the Kih-Oskh Brotherhood seems to be a reference to the very real trend in the early 20th Century where the upper crust of western society became fascinated with esoteric beliefs. (Seances and the Ouija Board were also created during this era.) Crowley rose in infamy during this time, too, as a spoiled debutante who spent his inheritance on journeys through the MENA region to perform rituals and "adapt" Eastern religions for his own belief system. With Rastapopoulos making up an entire pharaoh and emblem for his secret trafficking club, it reminded me very much of Crowley's own endeavours, and the commodification of MENA cultures and iconography during this era.

Child (1897) - Canonically, he has three brothers and two sisters, so l envisioned him as the middle child amidst all that. Little Roberto was spoiled when he was little, but when his youngest brother was born, it left Roberto feeling like the attention had been stolen from him.

15 (1906)- The other siblings hoped Roberto would be just as enthusiastic as they were about the family diving business, but alas, he'd always been more interested in reading prose and classical plays. His favourite play is Gounod's Faust. Some days, he daydreams about what a deal with the devil could get him, thinking he'd be able to outsmart the devil and win his riches for free. Roberto was at a rebellious point in his life, and sadly, he'd come to be ashamed of his background, deciding sponge diving was "peasant work" and that he'd rather tell others he was British or American. Eventually, it became easier for the whole family to just send him to a boarding school. Deep down, Roberto's parents hoped he might become an actor, a writer, or some sort of scholar...but the night before he left, Roberto secretly took down his whole family's banking information.

20s (1910s) - Roberto is now in his "Aleister Crowley's world tour" phase. He throws around mysteriously large quantities of money, often putting it into investments, and taking many journeys through Egypt and India. (I also like to imagine he met the Fakir and Colonel Fuad around this time; maybe Zloty too). Rastapopoulos is an insufferable, preening dandy at this time, trying to carve out his own place among the societal elite. His Greek identity is only flaunted as a way to make him seem more "exotic" to strangers. He tries not to think about the bank accounts he's leeching from.

30s (1920s) - Several of his investments actually flourished. His shares in Arab-Air and Flor Fina yield enough profit to let him buy out the companies, and his decadence only increases as he reaps even more profits. With extra money going around, Rastapopoulos finally decides to foray into the movie industry...as a movie producer. His passion for theatre never died, and if he can't become an actor himself, then why not produce the kinds of stories he wanted to be in? By the time the Great Depression hits, Rastapopoulos has amassed more than enough wealth to stay afloat...and the drug ring he's started with a few good friends sure helps, too. He's more concerned with holding onto every millimetre of his receding hairline.

40s (canon) - By all means, Rastapopoulos could have disbanded the cartel and retired comfortably. Maybe he could have invested more in his own movies, and focused more on Cosmos Pictures's internal operations. And yet, he didn't. Bigger numbers are better, so Rastapopoulos kept amassing his dirty money, thinking he was too big to fall. He got messy and left behind some viable clues, which some Belgian kid happened to stumble across...

50s (1940s-early 50s)- "Roberto Rastapopoulos" may be out on bail and facing decades in prison, but "Marquis Dante di Gorgonzola" is just some mysterious financier with an offshore bank account. Some of the other societal elites recognize him, but they find the alter ego funny and play along; "Oh, here comes "the marquis"...! He's due back in Hong Kong!" He can't make money through drug trafficking anymore, he can't show his face in Hollywood, and he certainly can't go back to Greece. Unfortunately, some of his associates introduce him to a different kind of trafficking, one even more immoral, but just as lucrative... It's the climax of the Rastapopoulos family tragedy: the son of hard-working commoners has ground his family's name into dust thanks to his pursuit of power and decadence; he has now resorted to deceiving those same sorts of commoners, dooming them to unknown fates just so he can buy a boat. Later, he begins resorting to harebrained schemes and petty crime just to maintain that lifestyle. His Greek identity has long been buried in favour of a vague, exotic cultural identity meant to explain away his quirks and twitchiness.

I've long been torn on whether or not Endaddine Akass is Rastapopoulos's final form. Herge's notes do consider him surviving Flight 714 to Sydney by waking up in the tropics with some degree of amnesia...perhaps this is near Jamaica, where he'll meet Ramo Nash under a new identity. It also feels the most theatrical - Rastapopoulos is playing yet another role, and he has a grand finale planned for Tintin's murder. Additionally, the mysticism Akass totes in Alph-Art is inspired by the alternative religion fads of the 1960s-70s; Akass is evocative of some of those many cult leaders, like Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh or Father Yod.

And yet, I almost find it more fitting for Rastapopoulos to survive Flight 714 to Sydney with full amnesia. He only knows himself as some middle-aged vagrant, and he decides he just has to pick himself up, and find some odd jobs to make a living. He gives himself a new name; his family history has been wiped clean. He struggles to make ends meet, much like the family he bankrupted, though he'll never know just how ironic his life has become. The rest of the world knows Rastapopoulos as a bombastic, flashy debutante who died a pitiful death during a police standoff. Tintin feels like he saw him one last time, but it feels like a bad dream he had during a flight layover. The man who always wanted to be the biggest and best died quietly in the sea, his true fate unknown, his body forever missing.

I think that's why I find Rastapopoulos so fascinating as a character! You can either make him into Tintin's greatest scourge who fights to the death to maintain his status, or you can rip all that away and doom him to a humble existence.

[hobiebrownismygod]

OC/Spider-Sona Backstory: The Widow

Maitreyi Jokhar (she/her), Earth-20262, Present day, Spider-man/Black Widow variant

Part 1!

I'm planning on making this a series instead of one extremely long post, so her entire backstory up to her introduction to the Spider Society is probably going to be around two to three parts depending on how in-depth I decide to make it! Let me know if you have any feedback on my writing style or how I can make her as accurate as possible &lt;3

Backstory & Powers:

Born in Andrapradesh, South India, she was kidnapped from her family at the age of 5 years old and never saw them again. Forced into a human-trafficking scheme, she was eventually taken into the Red Room program, better known as the Black Widow program, the same program that the MCU Black Widow was a part of before working for S.H.I.E.L.D. In this universe, the Red Room Program is an extension of H.Y.D.R.A., a Russian spy organization. From the ages of 7-14, she was trained alongside hundreds of other child soldiers to fight, kill and engage in acts of espionage and sabotage, eventually to join the army of mind-controlled Black Widows the Red Room program produced.

When she turned 15, she, along with 9 other young teenage girls, were chosen for H.Y.D.R.A's new adaptation program, where they experimented on some of their best soldiers/recruits to create a new kind of Super-soldier, after their hundreds of failed attempts to replicate the same serum used on Red Skull during WWII. Each girl experienced a different experiment, some being injected with powerful steroids, others having their DNA spliced and combined with others, etc... Understandably, none of these experiments worked. Except for one.

Maitreyi was placed into a leather chair and strapped down, quickly being injected with multiple paralyzers before being told to close her eyes and relax her arm. Doctor Hans Zola, grandson of Doctor Arnim Zola (Arnim Zola worked for the Nazis during WWII, which could be seen in the first Captain America movie), proceeded to inject her with a serum derived from the venom of a radioactive black widow spider, whom's DNA he had spent months perfecting to be able to link to hers accurately. 24 hours later, the process was completed and H.Y.D.R.A. had successfully created a super-soldier. However, this super-soldier wasn't the same kind as what they'd made during WWII with Red Skull.

Maitreyi did receive similar, but not the same abilities as the average Spider-person. She was unable to produce enough web for the daily, so she would use it limitedly, and only if completely necessary. She was flexible, fast and even acrobatic, as a result of years of Red Room training, but she did not gain the abilities of super-strength. She had to hone her strength herself after assimilating to the injection, through more time being trained by H.Y.D.R.A.'s best agents, specifically employed to morph Maitreyi into a super-weapon. One ability which was extremely beneficial for her future endeavors was her newfound intelligence and instincts. After being injected, she was able to better respond to threats, through enhanced reflexes (Spider-sense) and found that her problem-solving skills, especially those mechanical related (robots, machines, gizmos, etc...) were also amplified.

Only a few weeks later, she met Alexander Pierce. The man who took over Hydra after Red Skull's death. The man who's idea it was to turn her into a weapon. The man who was going to use her brainwashed, inhuman self to murder his own enemies until she was either captured or dead.

The missions started off small. Assassinating political leaders of minuscule movements in insignificant cities and towns. Kidnapping the children of runaway H.Y.D.R.A agents, destroying their lives, sparking fear into the hearts of the organization's enemies and even their allies. It wasn't until a few months later that Pierce sent her to the United States. He didn't disclose why she was going there. The only thing she had been given was a picture of an older man with an eye patch who Pierce claimed had something that "belonged to him." He told her that her job was to kill him. Not having a choice, not knowing that there was any other option besides compliance, she obliged. She wasn't even 16 years old.

____________________________________________________________

A/N

Guys idk if any of this makes sense but I'm trying to create a storyline for her so its not like I just threw a random spider-person into the ATSV fandom and started shipping her with characters 😭. I want her to have her own backstory and reasons for her personality and stuff yk

taglist:

@mollyollypuddingpolly

@s6onder

[littlegildedswallow]

radfems, here's some all rounded perspective about prostitution, poverty, child trafficking (and how the rich are involved in all of it), organ harvesting and forced labor in India.

MASSIVE trigger warning, obviously. This woman is an activist who has rescued thousands of women from prostitution/fast fashion factories etc. and we've never heard of her.

in the end, it all comes down to male depravity and poverty. this was a horrifying and eye opening watch. there's english subtitles, even though they're not great.

@ihatemenandtherearereasons