#defending the faith

[preacheroftruthblog]

Asserting And Defending The Faith Once Delivered -- Todd Clippard

In an interview with Cliffe Knechtle on his “Impaulsive” podcast, Logan Paul made the following statement regarding his lack of faith in God: “What I have always struggled with is…Where’s the proof? Why Christianity? There are so many denominations out there, and to put your food down on one…it’s just so hard for me.  I don’t know if I’m willing to make that assertion just yet.”…

[ablogofcourage]

[lizzibennet]

personally the appeal of friends to lovers to me is that i like the idea of a person realizing they’ve always been a little bit in love with that friend, but they needed something to make them aware of it, to point out that that nice, warm feeling that they love about that person isn’t just friendship and perhaps hasn’t been for a long time. i love the idea of “of course i love you, i always have, how stupid of me to not have seen it before.” in that sense, i don’t think it makes sense when people say colin just starts liking penelope in s3/episode 4. the whole point of building up a friendship into a romance is to portray that these characters have deep feelings for each other that may or may not be romantic but that end up melding into a romance in the end. he’s only just understood his feelings but he’s clearly felt them for a long time. the fact he doesn’t understand being a rake doesn’t emotionally fulfill him and processes that through part one is telling, to me, that he’s only now beginning to fully understand what he feels, not only towards pen but also towards himself, towards life in general. so again, i think it makes sense that things become clear to him now, that doesn’t mean they’re just starting to happen now. i think that read of him is really superficial tbh

[sandumilfshou]

"um actually 🤓☝️ the emperor is an abusive psychopath who enthralled and raped duke stelmane and you're an idiot to fall for his tricks because obviously he's a villain he's a mind-flayer!"

have you considered that bg3 really likes to subvert stereotypes and the entire point of the emperor's character is to prove whether you should or shouldnt trust a guy who obviously you would inherently not trust because of his species and tactics?

also re: the duke stelmane stuff have you considered that by rejecting him over and over and only seeing him as an evil manipulative villain that he gives up on trying to prove to you he's trustworthy and starts rolling nat20 deception and intimidation and you fell for it???

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Broken Roofs and Fixed Perspectives

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[furiousgoldfish]

I think one of the things that crush your trust in humanity, is how much you paid for all of the trust you had in the first part of your life. When you're a child, you are born with that base level of trust that you're here because you're wanted, and that people around you are going to take care of you, and they love you. This trust was put in our instinct, it's a part of how human population is sustained, for young of the species to be taken care of, fed, sheltered and protected by adults, until they become independent.

From there on we're encouraged to trust that things we don't understand yet, we'll understand later, and that everything that's done to us, is done for our benefit. Like when something is forbidden, when someone yells at you, when you're told 'no', when you're being physically restrained and hurt – you're told it's all for your good, you just don't understand it yet, but this is how it has to be. You're told that people with authority know what they're doing and they're doing it for you. You're told that it's good for you to be shamed and made to feel guilty, it will make you a better person. It's good for you to grow numb to being yelled and screamed at, it will make you stronger. It's good for you to be left out, neglected, ignored, told that 'nobody cares', it's good for you to be forced to resolve all of emotional and physical problems on your own, it's good that you get even harder version of your parents childhood, it's good that you're forced to do the emotional and physical work of adults and take care of them as if they're children. It will do you good if you take on the stress of worrying about survival, work, future, on top of school and stressful social life and mediating the peace in the home. It's good for 'everyone' that you keep quiet about the worst things that have ever happened to you, it's necessary for you to keep the family secrets, to never complain, to feel worthless, to feel like you have no place in the world, it's to keep you from being entitled, selfish, spoiled brat. You believe that because it's what you've been told by people who you have to rely on for survival, people you trust have your best interests at heart.

And not only nobody denies this, but people outside your family regularly defend this mantra if you ever question it. If you try to say something about your parents threatening or hurting you, you'll regularly hear how they're doing it with good intentions, or just don't know better, but are doing it out of love and because they believe it's the best for you. Because all parents have their child's best interest at heart, right? All parents just want what's best for their child.

Once it turns out that none of this was true, and the one who pays the price is you alone, it's devastating. Everything you've been told was done 'in your best interest' ends up causing you severe ptsd and attachment issues, sometime even chronic exhaustion and pain, and limits what you can do with your life. Every time someone defended your parents to you, they were enabling abuse and convincing you it was normal. Every time you trusted that things were done for a good reason, for a good cause, and for you own benefit, it turned out those reasons were just self-serving, sadistic, entitled, selfish, violent and self-gratifying urges of your parents that they had no business taking out on you, and instead of benefits, the price for it is that you virtually had no parents, had to take care of yourself from the start, and are now unable to see worth in yourself, or feel normal around other people because you've been brainwashed to believe you're either to be exploited or worthless.

How would a person get over that? That not only your caretakers lied to you and abused you, but the rest of the world collaborated and defended what they did to you? That you have to live with this forever, with the knowledge that everything was a lie, told to you just to keep you in abuse and stop you from resisting it? When you were a child and couldn't have done anything anyway?

It's normal to be severely conscious that every word you're being told is done for someone's benefit, and that someone might not have good intentions. It's normal to analyze people to see what kind of damage they could be capable of doing to you, if they could have their own way. It's normal to be afraid and not reassured when people say that bad things won't happen, because they kept saying nothing bad was happening even when you were tortured and traumatized. It's normal to be stressed and scared and constantly trying to figure out how to avoid getting hurt again because you barely survived this mess and you can't be in that situation again, not on the account of your own naivety. It's normal to doubt anyone in authority, anyone with power over you, because they might not have your best interests at heart, because nobody ever did before this, regardless of what they said or promised. You're trying to stay safe and completely losing your trust in anyone who put you in danger before is reasonable and logical. The problem is that it was everyone who did that to you.

[rodentjazz]

I’m okay, actaully yea no I’m really fine :D

[gaslightgirlsummer]

max is being interviewed on canal+, was just asked if his biggest rival now is alonso. he denied, saying his biggest rival is charles because he was p3 before his dnf

[uniiiquehecrt]

Voice actors are NOT the same as actors.

It takes a specific kind of skill-set and training to be able to warp and meld the voice. It takes a certain kind of talent and dedication to hone that talent into the ability to meld the voice and invoke emotion with one's voice alone. Actors are used to using their voice secondarily to their body language and their facial expressions. It's all mirrored back on camera. They do have nuance. But it's a different kind of nuance and a different kind of training to produce that nuance.

Voice actors might get their likeness transposed on their character's design, and maybe their mannerisms might seep into the character's animation. But when it's all said and done: their presence is in their voice. They are bringing a character to life, showing that emotion in their voice, trying to keep a specific accent, drawl, pitch, tone in that voice and keep it consistent for their recording sessions.

The voice actor is like a classically trained musician who can play first chair in a competitive, world-renown orchestra. The actor (who fills the voice actor's role) is like a moot who played violin in beginner and intermediate high school orchestra and thinks they can get into Juilliard with that 2-4 years of experience.

This doesn't mean that the HS orchestra moot can't play. They can even be really good at it. Maybe they won competitions and sat first chair. But they are not in the same league as the person who's been training their whole lives and lives and breathes to hone their craft using the instrument and all of the training they've ever acquired to perfect it. They are not meant for the same roles. They are not in the same caliber. You do not hire the HS equivalent when you want to play complex music in a competitive orchestra.

Actors are not the same as voice actors.

And furthermore, actors - especially big name actors - taking the roles of animated characters for big budget films or TV pilots makes no sense anyways when - at least in the case of TV pilots - there's not a point to hiring a big budget actors anyways. That money could be used elsewhere (like paying your animators), and the talent that is brought onto the screen for X character could then be hired on to voice said character no recasting required.

I wouldn't say voice acting as a profession is in danger exactly, but it's certainly being disrespected and overlooked for celebrity clout, and this has ALWAYS been an issue. Shoot, even Robin Williams knew that much - which is why he tried so hard not to be used as a marketing chess piece for Aladdin and got royally pissed off when it happened anyways. People shouldn't go to any movie (but especially not animated films) because "oh famous actor is in it". People should go because it's a good movie and the voice acting is good.

People who honest to god think that voice actors are replaceable because "oh well anyone can voice act" or "I like xyz celebrity so naturally it'll be good" ... Honestly I just wish you'd reassess your priorities because you're missing the point and are part of the problem.

Voice Actors ≠ Actors.

[clarissaweasley-10]

Fitz Vacker is just a 90 year old grandpa stuck in the body of a teen, leave my man alone 😭😭😭😭

[bigskydreaming]

Imagine if you were a gay or bi man who tried a certain firefighter show because of all the attention it was getting for one of its mains having a later in life bi awakening.....and between seasons you ventured into its fandom in search of material to tide you over til the next one. And you're greeted by a deluge of posts and fics that are just cheerfully homophobic towards one half of the newly out bi character's canon relationship on the basis of 'well he's not the RIGHT gay guy' and pushing the idea that actually its fine to cheat on him because Reasons and he's sexually predacious based on......behind the scenes implications people have divined like they're reading fucking tea leaves.

But don't get it twisted....this fandom, like all fandoms, really cares about representation!

Sorry not sorry, but we really need to kill this idea that fandoms are welcoming and inviting and inherently progressive when they're frequently insular and reductive as fuck. Every single fandom I've been in has had major trends of people doubling down on their own headcanons and fanon interpretations of the characters and willfully enacting trends aimed at running off people who like the 'wrong' characters (usually characters marginalized along one or multiple axes), like the characters in the 'wrong ways' or other bullshit.

Scott is a Bad Friend fics overtaking Teen Wolf fandom was not incidental, it was a FEATURE of the fandom, because the vast majority of that fandom did not want to share its space with anyone who had the nerve to like its main character. Survivors complaining about or criticizing the prevalance of rape fics in a certain fandom has in my experience always led to a reactionary UPTICK in those fics, with gems like 'this character can, will, must be raped' in the tags making it crystal clear that some of these fics exist because how fucking DARE anyone try and push forth a narrative not agreed upon by Fandom Main.

I could cite examples for so many other fandoms, with the commonalities always being that vast majorities in these fandoms are explicitly reacting defensively to being asked to be more mindful of fandom trends revolving around or exacerbating racism, homophobia, transphobia, rape or abuse apologia, ableism, etc....

With the most prolific fucking rallying cry across countless fandoms being "No the fuck we will NOT be doing that," because lolololol.....

Fandom is an inherently progressive space, didn't you hear?

[itsabouttimex2]

A lot of people go with the “you can’t hold fake characters to real people standards” with the SE Macaque discourse

thoughts?

“Real Life Standards”

I guess if these nebulous individuals are holding ALL characters/actions to that standard then yeah it’d be fair…

But they don’t, and they aren’t.

If it was a situation where someone said “MK is so brave for putting himself in danger to save the city!” and these people whipped around and said “Erm, he’s not a real person! Don’t hold him to real life standards! He’s not at risk of dying, so he’s not brave!” Then I’d understand their viewpoint of “not holding fake people to real standards and rules”…

But instead of any of that, this perspective is entirely one-note in defending Macaque’s less than stellar redemption arc, which just makes it… deflective of criticism at best.

If these people were also saying things like, I don’t know, “Stop saying Sun Wukong is bad at communicating! He’s fake! He can’t miscommunicate with people! He’s not real, no one is! They have no agency to be communicated with!”

Or maybe “Sandy is not pacifistic! He’s not a real person living in the real word, so we can’t judge him by our standards of non-harmfulness!”

Or something like “Tang is not a mooch! He’s not real, so there’s no point in attributed a real-life negative word to a character who doesn’t even need to eat on account of being a moving drawing!”

And maybe even “It’s not sad that MK wanted to sacrifice himself! He’s not a real person, and is only doing what the writers want him to! Stop applying real world logic and views to fiction!”

Then I’d at least respect their iron-grip on fiction≠reality, but instead it’s literally just a desperate attempt to defend some awkward writing.

It’s only ever in response to “Macaque was kind of an awful person, and everyone is just… okay with him? They should like… have thoughts and feelings on that. And they don’t, which worsens them and Macaque as characters.”

It’s never a situation where this is applied to any action or character except for Macaque and all the shit he pulled, you know?

​I just personally think that you can like a character with flawed writing while accepting those flaws, and also without… for arbitrarily deciding ‘actually THESE actions are worth disregarding when you take into account the character” and not applying it evenly?

(I criticize Macaque’s writing all the fucking time, and I still like him enough to write for him? That shouldn’t be like… a rare perspective. It’s healthy to criticize the things you like. Being able to pick out good from bad is a fundamental life skill in every area that you can theoretically apply it to.)

But the arbitrary nature of “no real-life standards” UNLESS it’s in a good/positive way… is silly and deflective.

So I don’t really care for that perspective at all, I guess, especially since I’ve gone on at length about all the things I don’t like about his arc?

And how I wish he was able to face like… actual narrative consequences for his actions? And not in way where it’s like… The Gang Tries to Arrest Mac but instead a way where it’s like…

Mei is violently angry at him for hurting her friends and family. She doesn’t want to work with him. MK has to talk her into it. She can’t say no to him. Not over so kind a request as “Give him a second chance, Mei”. So she does, after some grumbling. She pretends to be okay with it. But she’s scared, deep down. Hurt. Secretly, she covers up her old bruises before going to have dinner with her parents.

Secretly, she’s scared of being hurt again.

Sandy is grateful to him and supportive of this newfound morality. Offers up tea and clean clothes. Lends an ear to complaints and frustrations. Lends a bed, if maybe he doesn’t have one. Keeps the monkey fed. Tries to lend self-help books. “You helped me. Maybe there’s something I can do to help you,” he says.

Maybe Macaque actually takes one, eventually.

Tang is scared, doesn’t want to be around him. He’s read the book. He remembers every word. He’s seen Mei and MK and Pigsy suffer at Macaque’s hands. He doesn’t want it to happen again. But he trusts MK, and wants the kid to be happy. So he bites back any fearful words and instead just… frets. Quietly. And far away, thinking: Sanzang insisted on mercy for a demons before. Tang got to see firsthand how that turned out. He had to help put her down.

What if it happens again?

Pigsy is tired. His friends, his kids, always, always in danger, always battered and beaten and hurt. Broken, sometimes. Tears and blood and bruises. He’s not sure how much longer his heart can take the stress. He wants to be angry, but can’t. Between Tang and the store and MK, Pigsy has too much on his metaphorical and literal plate to be angry. So Macaque gets a bowl of noodles. Because by now, Pigsy has learned that he can’t say no to the kindness that MK throws around, scatters like candy thrown from a festival float.

So much heart in his son, and he knows that it’ll end up broken at the end of the road.

Or smth I guess

He deserved better is what I’m saying

[ablogofcourage]

[hussyknee]

I'm really not a villain enjoyer. I love anti-heroes and anti-villains. But I can't see fictional evil separate from real evil. As in not that enjoying dark fiction means you condone it, but that all fiction holds up some kind of mirror to the world as it is. Killing innocent people doesn't make you an iconic lesbian girlboss it just makes you part of the mundane and stultifying black rot of the universe.

"But characters struggling with honour and goodness and the egoism of being good are so boring." Cool well some of us actually struggle with that stuff on the daily because being a good person is complicated and harder than being an edgelord.

Sure you can use fiction to explore the darkness of human nature and learn empathy, but the world doesn't actually suffer from a deficit of empathy for powerful and privileged people who do heinous stuff. You could literally kill a thousand babies in broad daylight and they'll find a way to blame your childhood trauma for it as long as you're white, cisgender, abled and attractive, and you'll be their poor little meow meow by the end of the week. Don't act like you're advocating for Quasimodo when you're just making Elon Musk hot, smart and gay.

[feelingtheaster99]

I just finished Fourth Wing and I realized that the reason that Xaden never really hated Violet is because he knew about her from her brother and already knew she was a good person and I want to CRY

[quantumshade]

there are no "good" dr who showrunners btw. just ones i happen to hate less than others