#deep knowledge

[daveinediting]

It starts with a conversation about Shakespeare that triggers an old lesson about how humans only used spoken language for a long time before pictographs, hieroglyphics, and written language as we now know it. So in all that time you couldn't just write things down...

You had to remember them.

You had to accurately memorize them.

It turns out our ancestors memorized insane amounts of information through the spoken word. They had to develop that ability in order to pass acquired knowledge between communities and generations.

Memory was their only storage device. An organic storage device.

Once I got thinking on language... I remembered another lesson about the translation of languages and how sometimes one language maps multiple words onto one word in the target language. For example, eight words in ancient Greek onto the one English word, love. As in

I love my wife.

I love hamburgers.

Yeah. Awkward.

Another imperfect memory later and now we're being taught that the Lincoln-Douglas debates of 1858 lasted hours. Crowds gathered at these debates to listen, to engage with them also for hours. As in an hour-long opening statement by one candidate, an hour and a half-long response by the other candidate, and a half-hour rebuttal by the first candidate. The debates attracted crowds of up to 20,000 people including reporters and stenographers who covered the hours upon hours of debate.

Hours?

Yeah. Hours.

Woof.

I point these things out because they’re what made me wonder how different our historic predecessors must have been. After all, they could commit so much acquired knowledge to memory. Their brains were trained on the written word and the way in which the written word forms our understandings of the world. The resulting abilities ushered in deeper human understandings as well as sustained attention to the constructions of reasoned arguments.

I wonder how different these people might be who understood the world around them this way. I wonder how different their predecessors were whose tradition was spoken, whose knowledge was sustained and perpetuated through brute force memory.

How different were they, these people whose abilities are so far removed from our own?

I used to wonder if those abilities made our historical predecessors more capable than us in some way. After all, their oral and written traditions demanded much from them. Definitely their time. Definitely their mental bandwidth.

They exercised their intellects in ways we don't. Because we don't have to. The ways in which we now communicate and perpetuate knowledge bear lighter demands.

Which brings me back to Shakespeare.

Recently I heard a conversation with a professor challenging him to justify reading Shakespeare as a high school or college requirement when we can now understand Shakespeare through ChatGPT. We can generate fifty-word summaries and two hundred-word analyses of Shakespeare with AI and thus know and answer all there is about Shakespeare and his writing.

So why read him?

Seriously. Why?

That's just the tip of the argument, of course. Follow it all the way: Why should we be required to read anything? Novels. Short stories. Essays. What actual purpose does reading even serve when ChatGPT can boil it all down in seconds.

Is there a benefit of deeper knowledge on any subject whether it's a book, a short story, or an essay? And what do we get in exchange for our efforts to achieve such deeper understanding and knowledge. Does that effort, does that understanding, transform us in any objectively measurable way? And if not, does that understanding transform us in some perhaps more fundamental way.

Does it change us? Swap out our abilities like people who communicate primarily through 140 characters whose abilities replaced the abilities of people raised on radio then television whose abilities replaced the abilities of people raised on the written word whose abilities replaced the abilities of people raised on the spoken word.

What’s the actual prize for putting in the time and effort to read what someone else has committed to paper or screen? To deep dive into another human being's mind?

Because the oral tradition required it.

Because the written tradition demanded it.

And now?

Well? Is it or is it not simply good enough to just know what we need to know on demand?

Is access to knowledge the same thing as a deep understanding of that knowledge? And is there a difference that actually, you know, makes a difference?

Is the quality of our understanding really something to strive for anymore? Or is the tradition of study simply a mindless one that's made obsolete by knowledge on demand?

Ultimately, is there some advantage to a more muscular brain? One that’s gotta work harder, be more engaged in order to process the spoken and written word, on ideas and concepts and hypotheses and arguments on its way to understanding?

And.

Are we replacing that specific way of mental processing with something that makes our brains more muscular? More light weight? Or something in-between.

Is it that our mental abilities are now better tallied by the weight (such as it is) of our current mental musculature plus whatever exterior processes augment it like computers and smartphones and AI?

So we shouldn't sweat what we were formerly capable of and can't do now?

Is our resulting intellectual prowess, however it adds up, sufficient for successfully and sustainably navigating our stormy Present that’s seized in a constant state of rapid and relentlessly whirling transformation?

Or is it essentially a product of that change.

And.

Are we fine-tuned for this age of human existence…

Or are we not.

😕

[irate-iguana]

By the way, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine’s “Past Tense” (which takes place starting tomorrow) can be watched as a standalone. You don’t need to be familiar with the show or the characters to follow along. It’s also a really, really good (double) episode.

[alexxuun]

Some sort of creature… (ID in alt text)

[reality-detective]

A United Nations legal affairs official has said he doubts the U.N. will survive a second Trump term and admitted that his colleagues are "terrified" of his reelection.

They are in panic mode... It won't be long and they will be throwing everything at us including the kitchen sink. 🤔

[vlasdygoth]

i've been thinking about a mgs star wars au so obviously this had to happen

[oldwomanwears]

I was helping a friend set up a new laptop today and we started talking knitting and crochet. This is a lady who's about 30 years older than me and has been knitting and crocheting likely for a long as I've been at alive.

She brought out some of the pieces she makes to sell. There were all the traditional granny knits in acrylic yarn: baby blankets, socks, mittens, etc. and every single piece was exquisitely made. Every stitch was perfect, every seam invisible. It was breathtaking.

Anyhow, it makes me think that when someone tries to highlight modern knitting and crochet by throwing older women under the bus with comments like, "not your grandmother's knitting," we need to tell them to STFU. Our grandmothers' knitting was/is steeped in tradition and skill and the rest of us should wish we have even just a portion of the ability they did/do.

[eggthedyke]

The Quickening is such an interesting episode.

Like, the fact Julian is completely unable to comprehend euthanasia for an incurable disease as a kindness.

The fact that despite the fact he’s a doctor whose been through medical school he was Wholly unprepared to lose even One patient while Creating and Experimenting with a cure.

He really thought he’d get it right on the first go and save everyone.

And I think that a result of life with augmentation. While he might know the devastatingly slow process of drug testing he assumes he is exempt from that. Because he’s smarter and faster that he won’t make that “mistake”.

He has a fundamental misunderstanding of science. Because rather then the cruel reality of it being trial and error, to him, it’s something he usually gets it right in the first try.

So far in ds9, once a problem is identified, he finds a way to fix it. The issue is never the solution it’s diagnosing the problem.

Which leaves him complete unprepared for reality. You can’t save everyone. You don’t always get it 100% correct on the first time. Common sense for most people. But not for Julian Bashir. One failure, and he’s ready to give up.

He’s not used to not getting figuring it out fast enough. In fact, his problem is usually he gets there too fast and has to hide it.

He isn’t used to failing when it isn’t on purpose. Especially not in medicine.

It’s why he has no sympathy for a man providing kindness because he views it as giving up.

Because if it had been him he would have solved the problem by now.

Only, it isn’t that simple. And when people inevitably die. Something a normal doctor would have expected, Julian Bashir is completely defenseless.

He cannot face the truth.

He’s never had to before.

[doodlebloo]

C!clingyduo should have ended up together. I don't mean this in a romantic sense in the slightest I mean that we deserved an ending where they were living in the same house and cooking each other dinner. After it all they deserved their ending to be one where they're together

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Master manipulator vs Master manipulator

 [First] Prev <–-> Next

[emblazons]

It’s “realizing that Will’s struggle in S2 with being infected with a virus that spreads and will kill him quickly (but doctors don’t care) is a metaphor for how gay men were treated during the aids crisis” hours

—right alongside Mike (who comes from a family with a Reagan sign in their front yard + a mom who outwardly supported Margret Thatcher), who sat at his now confirmed gay best friend’s side the entire time he was sick and watched as people were willing to let him die because he was viewed as expendable……and now has an ongoing storyline where

1) his relationship with his girlfriend is falling apart because he doesn’t love her romantically

2) he’s staring longingly and pushing toward the freedom his gay best friend embodies for him, and

3) he cannot bring himself to tell anyone around him something because “what if they don’t like it” + dehumanize him for telling the secret truth he cannot bring himself to externalize, despite now knowing something that scares him about about himself:

(Bonus points for the fact that the first time we see Mike push Will and himself toward a girl is after he watches how people were willing to let his gay best friend (and him, by extension) die should they not confirm to expectations)

[accirax]

Chessgram Theory: Who is Kotoko Breaking?

While the object Kotoko is breaking in Deep Cover’s thumbnail is still certainly up for debate, many people (including myself) are of the belief that she’s snapped a white bishop from the game of chess. Given where Kotoko’s mental state is right now and what’s implied by the lyrics of Deep Cover, I think it’s likely that this MV’s theme will depict all of the prisoners as different chess pieces. Therefore, it’s worth asking: who is that? And, in a larger sense, which prisoners could be represented by which chess pieces?

Kotoko pretty clearly sees her situation as her and Es against the rest of the prison. So, I think that the characters would be divided as Kotoko and Es on one team, and everyone from 01-09 on the other. Kotoko is wearing black and appears to be breaking a white piece, so it’s pretty safe to assume that she and Es would be represented by the black pieces. It’s an interesting choice, given that, even to a non-Western audience, black can be considered a color of evil, and white a color of purity and truth. However, if the Es/Kotoko team is “mystery and anger” and the 01-09 team is “cold demeanors and death,” it fits well enough.

And that’s ignoring the most important part: in chess, the white team always moves first. This would fit with Kotoko’s vigilante worldview that everything she does is just a retaliation against others’ wrongdoing. The other characters attack first by sinning, and Kotoko is only picking them off before they can do any real damage to Team Warden.

Anyways, as for the pieces themselves, different websites seem to have slightly different opinions on what each piece can represent, with some obvious throughlines. I’ll be pulling quotes from these three articles, color coded according to which one is being used, which you can read more of if you wish. I’m also not a chess expert, so if I’m missing anything or got something wrong, I encourage you to add any of your own thoughts!

We’ll start with the Black Team, because there are fewer characters and I think it’s pretty obvious who’s who.

Kotoko Yuzuriha

Kotoko herself will probably be the black Queen. As anyone who’s played chess should know, your Queen is the most powerful piece in your arsenal because it can move on straights or diagonals for any distance.

The queen is our impulse to fight and possibly our id. It can argue based on beliefs. It can let loose and fight like a rook. It has no reason to hold back as a knight does and will often attack to the other side of the board just because it wants to.

This hyper-violent description of the Queen reminds me a lot of Kotoko. She attacks the other prisoners because, according to her beliefs, they’re criminals who deserve to be punished. Not to mention, the “id” is actually the same thing as the “es” in psychology. After we voted her innocent in the first trial, Kotoko became our teammate. She thinks that she’s the same as Es, so seeing herself as the “id” would fit perfectly with that self-assessment. Speaking of Es…

Es (and Jackalope?)

Es is most likely going to be the black King.

The king is not as powerful as the queen, but he is considered the most important piece that needs the most protection.

Even if Kotoko has more power than Es inside the prison, Es is still the one ultimately calling the shots. They’re the important piece who actually casts the votes that Kotoko can use to exact justice. The way that Es falls asleep between trials (or, at least, they did the first time) also reminds me of how the king can only move one space per turn, and often remains in the same square until closer to the end of the game.

The meaning of the Queen in the game of chess is she is plainly the closest support to the King and is often the second biggest (tallest) piece on the board, signifying her power and importance.

Es and Kotoko being the King and Queen together also opens them up to being assessed as a pair. They start the game next to each other, far across the board from the white pieces. If Es is the tallest, most notable piece in the prison, Kotoko isn’t far behind, acting as the King’s loyal fang.

I don’t know if any of the other pieces on the black team would have any sort of particular association. Maybe Jackalope could be the pawn that starts in front of the King (I think that’s the E pawn), so that he could hop out of the way on black’s first move to allow Kotoko to escape on a diagonal?

If I’m right about this theming, I also believe it’s possible that the black team would start only with the King and Queen. This would 1) make Kotoko and Es appear as rootable underdogs by having fewer pieces, 2) show how Kotoko is doing all of the work to defend justice, and 3) give Kotoko a lot of space to move around in from the start.

Now that we’re done with the black team, it’s time for the 01-09 White Team! Given that this side has many more main characters, there are several more possibilities to discuss here. I’ve settled on an answer for each of the prisoners, but there’s certainly room to be flexible with any of them.

Haruka Sakurai

Starting with Haruka… sorry, buddy, but I think you’re a Pawn.

Look, there are only eight pieces (not pawns) for each team on the board. If there are nine prisoners on the white team, at least one of them has to be a Pawn. And, especially through Kotoko’s account of the first Trial, Haruka wasn’t doing a whole lot. He didn’t get voted guilty, so she didn’t attack him, and he didn’t try to save any of the attacked prisoners, either. All he really did was get a new fit and align himself with Mu, someone who barely avoided being voted guilty in the first place.

There is a debate about whether the pawns are the peasants who live outside of the castle walls or are the soldiers protecting the royal court behind them.

Specifically, though, I think that Haruka would be the pawn that stands in front of Mu. Depending on which piece Mu is, it doesn’t have to work like this, but if you say that Pawn Haruka’s placement is basically a “if you want to attack her, you’ll have to get through me first,” that’s quite reminiscent of the threat he presented in his second audio drama.

Haruka also makes sense as a Pawn because he has a lot of potential. For anyone who doesn’t know, in chess, if a Pawn manages to make it to the other side of the board, they can transform into any other piece. Haruka’s quiet demeanor might let him slip under the radar, but if Kotoko takes her eye off of him for too long, he could wind up becoming a threat to the King (Es).

Haruka (VD2): “If you don’t forgive Mu-san, I’m going to kill you.”

In the audio drama, Es counters this plan by pointing out that, as a prisoner, Haruka cannot attack them. However, the sentiment is still there. Even if a Pawn doesn’t really stand a chance of attacking the King when Queen Kotoko is on the loose, there’s always the possibility that he could get too close and throw a wrench into Kotoko’s plans.

Yuno Kashiki

As for Yuno… well, we all know that she’s a Queen in general, but in chess, I don’t think that argument really holds up. Yuno really just isn’t… relevant? enough? to the conflicts of the prison as a whole (at least where Kotoko is involved) to be represented by such an important piece. But, if Yuno isn’t the Queen, what would she be…?

Personally, I think she would be a Rook.

The rook is brute force. It is a disregard to beliefs.

Simply put, Yuno is a Rook because she’s a pretty straightforward person. That’s not to say that she doesn’t lie, of course– her whole t1 attitude seems to have been a bit of an act, and that one section in the middle of Tear Drop makes it pretty obvious that Yuno conceals her true feelings on order to better please her customers sometimes– but that, in the end, Yuno always does what she wants. If she wants to barge forward or cut across the entire board sideways, she’ll do it. She often keeps to herself, just like how enemy pieces wouldn’t want to get directly in front of the Rook for fear of being curb stomped.

Back to her t1 attitude, though…

The rook is the castle, the walls, the protectorate of the city, and in being so, is the only piece not representative of a living thing.

While most sources attribute the Rook’s walls to protecting the other important pieces, Yuno’s walls protect herself. Yuno’s Castle keeps her true self locked behind cold and stony walls, giving her freedom from making any attachments.

Futa Kajiyama

Futa is a Knight because… he’s, uh, literally a knight.

The knight pieces are the protective knights in the castle. The pieces are shaped like a horse because it is symbolic of what knights rode during battle.

It doesn’t always have to be that deep. (/j)

Actually, though, there are other reasons to call Futa the Knight– possibly some of the same reasons why the Milgram creative team decided to make one of his MVs themed after fantasy RPGs in the first place.

The knight represents the pure inner-warrior. If a knight starts out passive, it will always end up aggressive and vice versa. It can't move very far, but it never moves in a straight line, always preferring to be tactical and thoughtful.

Futa definitely seems to cycle between aggressive and passive. He passively lived his life as a regular guy until he unleashed his aggression and became a cyberbully. That aggression fueled him until he learned of his victim’s death, at which point he shut down and seemed to become more passive and introspective again. Arriving in Milgram triggered his aggressive tendencies, but getting voted guilty and losing an eye for it triggered his passive terror. At the time of his second audio drama, it seems like he’s returned to aggressively questioning Es again, and it remains to be seen whether he keeps that attitude into t3 or if something happens that once again makes him lose his footing (or die).

Mu Kusunoki

Much like Yuno, Mu also has an argument for being called the Queen– more so than Yuno, considering her strong Queen Bee coding in It’s Not My Fault and the titles of both of her audio dramas– but also falls short in the “being opposed to Kotoko” department. Although Haruka certainly looks to her for leadership, I can’t imagine Kotoko actually considering Mu a serious enough threat to put Mu on the same level as herself.

So again, like Yuno, I think Mu might be the other Rook. Mu also displayed a very “whatever I say goes” attitude in INMF, so she can share the same rhetoric behind Yuno being represented by that piece. The logic behind the castle aspect is slightly different, though.

Every country or medieval estate would have its royalty who were protected within the walled city or castle.

Mu is a rich, half-European girl whose dad sells real estate. Of course she would be represented by the Castle! Mu’s tactics involve consolidating her power in order to lead from a place above it all, exactly like how a castle looks over the rest of the village. Additionally, I can’t find the source of whoever pointed it out first, but I’ve seen it mentioned that the dress Mu wears in her birthday art is a reference to the one that Belle wears in Disney’s interpretation of Beauty and the Beast. It’s a fairytale with a princess (and perhaps someday, a queen), yes, but it’s specifically one where the heroine is trapped within a castle. Making Mu into a Rook would be a great way to keep up her royal theming, while leaving the Queen for a character a bit more powerful and relevant to Kotoko.

(Going back to Haruka for a moment, this would make him specifically the A or H pawn.)

Shidou Kirisaki

I really thought that Shidou might have more competition for the role of King, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized that nobody fit the role quite as well as he did.

Shidou is the perfect balance of a piece who’s very problematic for Kotoko’s win condition, while also not being much of an active threat himself. There are very low odds that Shidou would ever actually try to harm Kotoko directly or get in her way to divert an attack. However, as long as he’s alive, Kotoko can’t win, because Shidou can keep attempting to heal all of the pieces Kotoko tries to eliminate. That’s not something that the King piece can actually do in a chess game, but hopefully you get my point.

Additionally, Triage let us know that Shidou is a family man. While the white Queen will obviously not be representative of Shidou’s deceased wife, and not every other prisoner would enjoy living under his reign (cough cough Amane), the optics of him being the “head of the family” are obviously there. It’s a pretty bad look if the white King starts the game by pleading with the black King to give him the death penalty, but… Well, at least Shidou changed his mind.

Mahiru Shiina

Not to answer the theory’s main question so early into the post, but… I think Mahiru is a white Bishop. Specifically, the one that Kotoko could be snapping in half in the thumbnail.

As far as I can remember, barring Undercover, Milgram’s MVs have only shown us things that have happened in the past. There are some things that could kind of hint at the future (like Shidou’s “So hey, prolong my life / I’m indispensable” in Triage) or depict prisoner’s fears of the future (like Futa potentially being afraid that Es could declare him guilty again at the end of Backdraft). But, I think that every instance of something like that happening could be explained as something that the character did or thought about in the past as well. That might be wrong, as I don’t want to take the time to write out how everything that appears like it could be in the future is actually in the past, but it sounds right to my memory.

My point being, while the snapped bishop could be indicative of Kotoko’s plans to crush someone in the future, if the chess pieces do represent characters, it makes far more sense if her smashing the white bishop is something that already happened in the past. Thus, it would probably be one of the three characters that Kotoko attacked in the past: Futa, Mahiru, or Mikoto.

Of the three options, I think Mahiru fits the role of bishop best.

The bishop is your belief structure. This is why a bishop that starts on white, will always be on white and vice versa for the black bishop.

While not a particularly religious person, Mahiru is someone who lives and dies based on her beliefs about the value of love. No matter what happens to her, she always keeps her same perspective, believing that love is the entirety of who she is and the only thing that’s worth living for. It’s how firmly she clung to those beliefs that sent her to Milgram, and her lack of awareness regarding her actions that got her voted guilty. AKA, Mahiru’s Bishop-like beliefs are exactly what sent her to be crushed in Kotoko’s palm.

To the extent that the blood in the thumbnail is the Bishop’s and not Kotoko’s, Mahiru was also the most grievously injured of the prisoners in between trials. I saw people joking that the thing Kotoko was crushing was “Mahiru’s bones,” and, like… maybe you’re not entirely wrong? 

I hope that you continue reading the post to hear my thoughts on the last three prisoners. But, if you are tapping out here… uhhhh, 0610 enjoyers, go crazy with this one.

Kazui Mukuhara

When I started theorizing for this post, I really thought that I was going to make Kazui the Queen to Shidou’s King. The two of them are pretty close, so the idea of Kazui being Shidou’s guardian makes total sense. And, most importantly, Kazui was the one to actually intercept and divert Kotoko’s attack on Futa. He’s been established as the most muscular prisoner in Milgram, on par with someone like Kotoko, which is perfect for him being the Queen!

Wellllll… I changed my mind and decided to make Kazui a Knight anyway.

There are a lot of good arguments for Kazui being a knight too, okay? After Cat, it’s pretty clear that Kazui was once a police officer. Thus, being a member of the castle guard would be a good match for his choice of career. They’re also probably the most traditionally “manly” piece, representative of an armed man on a horse, and Kazui tries very hard to be manly.

Knights can also hop over other pieces, much like how Kazui jumped into the fight between Kotoko and Futa. In fact…

Never underestimate [the Knight] for its limited range. It’s known as the "Queen Killer" for a reason!

Knights are often a good piece to use to attack Queens because of their unique L-shaped movement pattern. Unlike every other piece, they can attack the Queen from a position that can’t be immediately reversed upon them. Thus, Kazui’s ability to beat Kotoko could be an indicator of this “Queen Killer” quality, instead of the innate power of being a Queen himself. (This logic applies to Futa as well: he can attack Kotoko from the unique angle of appealing to Es’ morals and own sense of justice. Kotoko can’t do the same because, unlike Futa, she has yet to outwardly acknowledge that her murder could have been anything less than righteous.)

Also… the Knight is the only piece that doesn’t move in a straight line. Get it? The Knight doesn’t move straight? And that represents Kazui? Because Kazui is–

Amane Momose

Amane is the other Bishop because… religion.

The bishop stands close to the king and queen because it represents the church which many royal courts held near and dear to their hearts.

The Bishop represents the church, an important and very powerful entity throughout history and even today if you think about it.

Again, not everything has to be a reach. (/j)

So… yeah, Amane’s beliefs– specifically religious beliefs, this time– are also a huge part of her life. Even if she’s changed what the cult’s doctrine means to her, she still confesses that she carried out her murders for the sake of what her religion considers right and wrong.

This is also considered the third most powerful piece on the chessboard because back in the day religion could influence many people, even without the help of the royal family.

Not so much for Mahiru, but this sentiment also fits Amane pretty well! Between the threats of potential conversions and potential assassinations, Amane was definitely one of the prisoners to watch heading into t2. From what I’ve heard, the main reason why her vote was so down to the wire was mostly because people were afraid of the power that Amane held.

Interestingly, this would put another prisoner who was voted guilty in contention for the piece that Kotoko is crushing. However, I still think it’s more likely that that piece would be Mahiru, because Kotoko didn’t physically attack Amane. If it were Amane, it would more likely be that her beliefs were crushed as opposed to her bones, but… I don’t really think that really happened, either. Amane would almost certainly be a bishop, though, so there’s certainly a possibility that that broken piece could be her.

Mikoto/John Kayano

With only one prisoner left to go, you may have already come to the conclusion that Mikoto is the white Queen. And… yeah, I can’t really deny that at this point. Like I said, I wanted to make Kazui the Queen, but I couldn’t otherwise figure out what Mikoto would be.

Because, there’s one main thing that makes me think that Mikoto has to be the Queen… John’s lack of restraints.

She is allowed to move in any direction and in as many squares as she wants.

Due to the whole situation with John not technically being a prisoner, when John is the alter in charge, John cannot be restrained, even when voted guilty. That makes him very powerful; no matter what he does, we can’t use a guilty vote to try to stop him, much like many people hoped to do with Haruka when voting him guilty in t2. The Queen can visit any square, no matter whether it’s black or white, upright or reversed, Mikoto or John. Choosing any other piece that was constrained to a much more limited set of movement rules just felt off for him.

Next, while Kazui was able to defeat Kotoko and save Futa, the fight between John and Kotoko was a draw. That means that they are also evenly matched– perfect for both being the same kind of piece. Mikoto isn’t as close to Shidou as Kazui is (anymore, I think?), but they were at least smoking club buddies, so calling Mikoto the Queen to Shidou’s King isn’t the most ridiculous proposition.

Finally, making Mikoto the Queen, a very feminine piece, is super interesting in the context of people discussing how Mikoto is often associated with stereotypically feminine roles and the girl prisoners (oboetemasuka | candckirby | purgemarchlockdown). I don’t have a whole lot else to say on this matter considering these weren’t points of Mikoto’s characterization I originally noticed myself, but I encourage you to read these posts to get a taste of what I’m talking about. I’m sure there were other posts discussing it too, but… it’s so hard to find things on Tumblr ;-;

Conclusion

Finally, we’ve been through every prisoner! Here’s a summary of what I decided on (left or right side doesn’t matter):

The funny thing about this theory is that it could be fully disproven wrong in, like, a week, if either 1) that wasn’t a chess piece at all, or 2) the chess pieces obviously represent something else. For instance, the chess board could fully relate to, you know, Kotoko’s actual murder and not what she got up to in between trials. We are supposed to get more actual evidence regarding that too, aren’t we…?

Still, if it turns out that the chess board does represent Milgram, I will get the full satisfaction of having called it ahead of time, even if my assignments aren’t 100% correct. No matter what, I had fun thinking about it, which is (in my opinion) the highlight of theorizing! If you have anything else to add, I encourage you to communicate your thoughts in comments, tags, or reblogs. If you don’t, then I simply thank you for reading this far!

Deep Cover… soon.

[creativitycache]

...what it means is they're all drawn by the same studio

[luobingmeis]

u know how people (rightfully) leap to wei wuxian’s defense when someone tries to say that he’s stupid because 1) he is a quite literally a genius and 2) there is no reason for him to have assumed that lan wangji wanted to be more than friends. well i’m abt to do the same for shen qingqiu. he’s not stupid for not figuring out how to con the system, he’s not stupid for not realizing what was going on with binghe, and for all intents and purposes him acting out of assumption because of the plot of pidw was not an act of stupidity, but survival. the tragedy of scum villain is that shen qingqiu couldn’t have known better (like the book literally says “in this world, there is no ‘if only i had known’”). the tragedy of scum villain is that he assumes he knows what the plot is. the tragedy of scum villain is that the system is a neutral yet vague force that leads shen qingqiu to doing what he does. u just can’t suspend ur disbelief enough to see that shen qingqiu doesn’t know he’s in a genre subversion romance novel; he thinks he’s in a survival horror novel.

[reality-detective]

A compilation and there's a whole lot more about this cackling buffoon 🤔

[notbecauseofvictories]

more than anything in this world I love wandering through museums and taking pictures of things to research later. like oh, interesting concept, what if I spent an hour reading about that when I am in my pajamas in bed and it can really blow my mind.

[buckleydiazmp4]

my country is on fire. there are currently 21 active wildfires in Colombia due to a weather phenomenon known as 'El Niño', which brings high temperatures and droughts to our land. our mountains and wetlands are suffering, and the wildlife and plants are getting a lot of damage. the frailejón, one of our most important Andean wetland plants has lost a big portion of its population over the fires. these are plants that take several years to recover. the air quality has declined so much that a lot of workplaces, schools and universities have decided to send everyone home to work/study remotely tomorrow.

i'm not equipped to tell you all if there is anything that you could do to help, except maybe share information on social media and pray for this climate crisis to go away as soon as possible. if you happen to live in Colombia i assume you've heard about this, since it's the primary news this week, but if you don't know how to help they're advising us to help our wildlife by leaving water out for the fauna that finds its way to the city, and calling authorities if you spot an injured animal.

i saw one of the fires today, on the mountain behind my college. by the time i was leaving campus half the sky was covered in smoke. we all just stood and watched the flames from below, hoping they'd end soon. climate change and global warming is real, guys. it's something we should be loud about, to advocate for our environment, even if we can't solve it on our own.

https://thecitypaperbogota.com/news/colombias-high-altitude-andean-wetlands-ravaged-by-devastating-forest-fires/