#destroying lives and cultures since day one
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lonelylesbian2 · 1 year ago
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I remember when I was younger people would ALWAYS make fun of me when I talked about my family because of what I called them. My family is Indian (punjabi to be exact) so I was subject to LOADS of mockery anyway. But when we did family trees in primary school I got laughed at so badly and so many people told me I had the 'wrong' names because my maternal uncle wasn't called 'mama', that was what my mother was called. When I tried to explain that that's what I called them in my culture I got told I was wrong. 8 year old me thought that my family tree was supposed to be filled with my family. What they were called to me. 8 year old me got told I was wrong. My teachers gave me sheets to fill out with 'uncle' and 'aunt' and 'grandma'. I grew up like that and when I was 10 years old we went to go and visit my mums family in Delhi. I called my mothers mum grandma. Now, when I visit I'm older, now I call my mother sister 'mausi', I call people who aren't related to me closely but are still very close 'mausi'. Because that's my culture. I am an only child but I have people I call 'didi', I have people who call me 'didi'. My older relatives call me 'beta'. I am not their daughter, but that is our culture. Now, I don't let anyone tell me what I can and can't call my family. Because they are mine. Now when people ask who's visiting, i tell them my 'chacha'.
I hate that I ever let anyone tell me my culture was wrong, that I had to leave my blood and roots behind in favour of what other people knew. But I was young and that was the reality of it. Everyday, my heart goes out to the little 8 year old girl sitting at the dining table, wishing she could change the colour of her skin and the blood in her veins.
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omgellendean · 3 months ago
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So, Sacha Baron Cohen recently endorsed Kamala Harris in a fittingly racist islamophobic manner, by bringing back his character Borat. Yes, it's 2024.
Anyway, here's a 2022 investigation of SBC's vile Zionism and connections to the USA and Israeli intelligence, as well as an insight into the role of the US-American cinema as a propaganda tool.
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Article: https://www.mintpressnews.com/closer-scrutiny-reveals-close-state-power-sacha-baron-cohen-really/279355/
Archived link: https://archive.is/7dSTL
Some quotes:
When asked about the national security state’s role in shaping pop culture, the former intelligence officer [John Kiriakou] said that it is “far more cynical” than most people realize, explaining:
” There is a branch inside the CIA’s Office Of Public Affairs whose job is solely to work with Hollywood Studios. This is something that the FBI has been doing since the 1940s. They’ll cooperate and give the red carpet treatment to any Hollywood studio that’s willing to make the CIA look good. “ [...]
In the end, “Brüno’s” production company did interview someone they claimed was a terrorist (in the Letterman interview, Baron Cohen described the man as such eight times in the space of three minutes). However, the person in question – Palestinian grocer and NGO worker Ayman Abu Aita – vigorously denied he was a terrorist at all. He claimed that Baron Cohen had told him the interview would be about his peace activism and that his life and business had been destroyed as a result. Abu Aita sued for nearly $100 million. The case was settled for an undisclosed sum in 2012. [...]
Even from an early age, Sacha was reportedly obsessed with the Jewish state. “He was very Zionist, very involved in Habo,” recalled one friend, referring to Habonim Dror, a left-wing Zionist group of which he was a member. Others remembered him as “a very nerdy, very funny, Israel-oriented guy” who went to live on a kibbutz in his youth. He appears to idolize Shimon Peres, traveling to meet him in 2012 and sharing quotes from the former Israeli president on his social media accounts. Peres, of course, oversaw the genocide of Palestinians in 1948, attempted to sell nuclear weapons to Apartheid South Africa, and carried out the ethnic cleansing of the Galilee region. [...]
Unsurprisingly, Baron Cohen has also campaigned fiercely against the Boycott Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement, presenting it as viciously antisemitic. “Boycotting? Yeah, fantastic. As long as they are Jews, it is alright. I’m not a racist, but keep the Jews out,” he said, in an attempt to satirize their position. [...]
Much of the movie is actually spent “on location” in “Kazakhstan,” where Borat takes the viewer around an unimaginably poor-looking village, making fun of how backward “his people” are. There are no Western egos or ignorance being punctured here. In fact, it was shot in a gypsy encampment in Romania, where locals were paid around $3 each to be humiliated by a man who spoke to them in a language they did not understand. The villagers were told they were appearing in a sympathetic documentary highlighting their lives. “Borat” made over $262 million at the box office. [...]
The racism was further amplified with the 2020 release of “Borat Subsequent Moviefilm.” Within the first two minutes of the sequel, Borat informs us that Kazakhstan has canceled their traditional event, “the running of the Jew,” but fortunately his country still has Holocaust Remembrance Day, “when we commemorate our heroic soldiers who ran the camps.” Borat also received an award, which he stated will be “put in our national museum along with other treasure we have confiscated from Jews.” [...]
In actual fact, as many have pointed out, Kazakhstan was a haven for Jewish people during the Holocaust, not a perpetrator of it, saving thousands of Jewish lives by taking in people from Eastern Europe and other states of the U.S.S.R. Today, the country is commended by Jewish groups as a model of tolerance. It is also, notably, not a helplessly sexist nation; Save The Children ranked it higher than the United States in its list of best countries to grow up female.
This is a rather inconvenient truth for the Israeli state-building project Baron Cohen supports. Ironically, perhaps the most shocking and newsworthy case of exposing bigotry Baron Cohen has documented has never been revealed. While in character as Brüno in Jerusalem, Baron Cohen was beaten nearly to death by an enraged crowd of homophobic Israelis, who, angered by his camp and sacrilegious attire, started stoning him, on camera. Baron Cohen was reportedly “nearly killed.” Kiriakou told MintPress that Baron Cohen told him that a rabbi even spat on him. It was the only time in his career that he broke character and desperately yelled that he was an Israeli Jew, not a homosexual foreigner. The comedian fled for his life and found refuge in a nearby store bathroom. This footage has never seen the light of day. Perhaps it sends the “wrong” message.
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ir-abelas-vhenan · 2 months ago
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Don't mind me, just revisiting the plot (again) and dying over this line (again). (These screenshots are going to be abysmal, but you'll get the point).
"To stop now would dishonor those I have wronged to come this far."
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Yeah he's talking about Mythal (earned or not) and Felassan and Lavellan and Varric...but the way it applies to HIM, too, is what absolutely guts me.
Long post ahead...
Solas realizing that Lavellan doesn't care about how others see him or want to use him under the inquisiton, that HIS motivations as he has shared them are enough for her and worth defending against those who would tell him he's something he isn't. Solas, for the first time, being confronted with the realization that one these new elves he does not see himself in will still go to bat for him.
(Is he duplicitous? Yes. But intent on working against Corypheus? Undoubtedly).
"You came here to help, Solas, I won't let them use that against you."
“How would you stop them?”
“However I had to.”
“...thank you.”
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Solas grappling with the fact that it wasn't just a one off, that this Dalish woman being faced with "hypotheticals" he's desperately been trying to get her people to entertain is jumping in head first, pushing back and disagreeing with him but never treating him worse for their differences and always admitting when he's helped shape a changing perspective. Solas daring to ask for help and marveling at the fact that he receives it, that the same woman who asked if it might some day be possible to live alongside spirits, who did not immediately shoot down his critique of THE CHANTRY REFUSING TO ACKNOWLEDGE SPIRITS AS LEGITIMATE BEINGS (GAH), who did not laugh at him for saying he preferred their company most days, this woman, is going to drop time and resources during war time preparations to personally help his friend.
And then, when he is too late and has once again failed someone he considers a friend, he disappears within himself, where he has always gone to exact punishment for the weight of the lives he believes he's betrayed. It almost works, too.
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Psych. Lavellan doesn't want him to grieve alone, to stare at the place in the Fade where his friend used to be and think of all he should have done differently.
“The next time you have to mourn, you don’t need to be alone.”
“It’s been so long since I could trust someone.”
“I know.”
“I’ll work on it. And thank you.”
But does she stop there? No. She doesn't chafe at this random apostate who speaks with certainty and unapologetically delves into a past he believes worth preserving, even at the cost of questioning her culture as it currently stands.
The very woman he once thought of as a mistake that HE unleashed upon the world is asking to be a part of his, not because of what he can bring to the table, not because she needs a right hand man, and certainly not because she thinks he has some well of power and intelligence critical to winning over enemies she’s willing to join for "supervisory" purposes (cough cough hi Mythal). She bears the weight of choices that can and will lead to death, to pain, and when it wears on her she relies on him, not for solutions but so that at the end of it all she might smile with someone who knows her heart and the good she tried to do amidst a sea of terrible options. She wants to be known, no inch of her unturned, and worse, she thinks she knows him. But how could she? This is no longer who he is, it is merely the remnants of what he destroyed to make a world at Mythal's whim.
And still she unbalances him, accepts him, wants more. Solas is sharing a personality that brings him the closest he has ever been to his spirit form, and it is ENOUGH for her. Existing as he has always dreamt of is all takes to earn her loyalty, respect, and eventually love.
“You’re an admirable man. Not many people know who they are the way you do.”
“Thank you. Both for saying that and…for seeing that. Few in this world can see me instead of just seeing a pair of pointed ears”
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She. Sees. Him. Every part he slowly is realizing he wants to be known for and even a few he thought he could hide. And then he gives it all up. Because he woke to a new world where spirits and elves and mages were so far removed from the role they played in Arlathan that it can only be yet another mistake he caused and must fix, never mind the fact that the dwarves have forgotten why they fled underground millennia ago in the first place.
The friend who tore him from the world he loved, urged him to take physical form? She is dead, too, never mind the fact that she ignored his urging for a different path, nevermind that he killed and tore and hurt in her name because otherwise what was losing the part of himself he loved for?
"A spirit becomes a demon when denied its original purpose.”
“It hurts. It always does, but I will survive.”
“You bound it to obedience, then commanded it to kill. That is when it turned.”
He may no longer recognize where the Dread Wolf ends and where Solas begins, but if he gives up now and permits himself the chance to remember, the pain he caused himself and others means nothing, because he did it all for Mythal and in his final discussion with her, regardless of what Veilguard tries to convey, she does not release him from his position as her agent.
And maybe that's part of why I'm so angry, because EVEN BEFORE TRESPASSER, the fragment of Mythal that ends up in Morrigan could have freed him, but she does not.
"The failure was mine," he tells her, voice trembling. "I should pay the price."
Silence.
"I am sorry." He whispers.
And do we get that "what we did, we did together" psuedo-fake ass-absolution, the one that, if given enough time and safety to put himself first he may have realised he doesn't truly need to pursue the things he deserves, that make him feel finally like himself again? No the fuck we don't.
"As am I, old friend." She murmurs.
Looking through the lens of Veilguard, this isn't an apology, it's a condemnation. It's Mythal tormenting him one more time, twisting the knife deeper, agreeing that it is Solas alone who has brought them to this point, who deserves to be punished. And then she reminds him what they are to each other, what he is supposed to be to her. What he must become again.
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"It isn't abuse if I ask," Cole says in his personal quest.
"Not always true," Solas shoots back.
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Var lath vir suledin. Our love will persevere.
I wish it could, vhenan.
And so he pushes onwards, spending almost a decade denying himself his true nature and regretting that he ever gave it a chance to come through because now he KNOWS that this world is different and a little broken, but it's a world he could be a part of because of the woman and the friends that made a place for him. It is a world that doesn't necessarily need to be restored as much as it might need renovation, but that is not the world Mythal demanded of him when she let him kill a remaining piece of her. And any solution but that means the hurt of taking a body, of hurting the titans, of time and time again being called on by one evanuris to fix a problem they all caused, was for nothing.
And a Pride of that magnitude, that sinister an origin, has a long, long way to fall.
So he recommits to the friend he gave up his nature for, he refuses to let himself remember that Lavellan learned the full truth of his identity and still begged him not to mourn alone. Even so, he still cannot quite forget.
He kills again. He kills again. He kills again.
He kills a friend.
He fails to prevent the Evanuris from wreaking havoc a second time, wrenches another innocent into his war, and when they ask him about the woman he calls vhenan, he feels the mask stifling him begin to suffocate. But he never lets it fall, because to surrender now is to place her broken heart atop the pile of regrets he's been holding up like Atlas crumbling beneath the weight of the world itself. Because he still thinks it selfish to want the things that make him feel like himself again, so they need to be taken off the board entirely.
And then that same uppity little shit has the audacity to tell him it's not too late, that he can turn back.
"To stop now would dishonor those I have wronged to come this far."
If he gives up now, his entire corporeal life has been a betrayal of many, but worst of all, he will have ruined himself for nothing.
But then she's there. A little older, a little sadder, and still looking at him like she did the night he almost broke and instead carefully removed any suggestion that she had ever belonged to anyone but herself.
"Didn't you hear me?" Her every action screams as she kneels to meet his gaze like he did the day he took her arm (another failure, another sacrifice he cannot let be for nothing).
The tombstone in the fade is his greatest fear, but it is not his fate. Why? She will not let it be. It cannot be his din'anshiral if she is not beside him.
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Lavellan may not have understood the depth of exactly WHEN Solas first came somewhere foreign and uncertain to help, but she never once failed to keep her promise. She refuses to let his initial desire to do good be held against him any longer. And when she sees him accept that not-quite-absolution-definitely-more-of-a-power-play from the god that saw what he was capable of and molded him into a weapon, she finds her in to make sure he doesn't walk off alone to mourn again, never again will she lose him to the expectations others have of him. No doubt she wants to find a way to sink the fingers of her good hand into that spectral visage and tear it away like he wishes to do to the veil. But she is not here for Mythal. She is here for her heart, and for the man who has been carrying it since the moment her lips met his in the fade ten years ago.
“No orders to kill, no conflict with its nature, no demon.”
"There is no fate but the love we share." She tells him as soon as Mythal's too-little-too-late platitudes send shudders through his body.
Banal nadas ar lath'ma vhenan.
She forces him to see that the only remaining betrayal is to lock himself away one more irreversible time. All that's left to lose is the piece of himself he cherishes more than his greatest victories: all that he has to gain comes from making sure the love that was given to him at Skyhold, in the moment where Varric saw all he was capable of and still tried to bring him back home, was not given in vain.
It will not be so terrible a place, so unforgivable a betrayal if he can finally dare to put himself first. If, unlike that night in Crestwood, he finally gives in not to break, but to make himself whole.
There's a codex entry in Inquisiton about a spirit of wisdom who is summoned by researchers and only after a very pleasant conversation do they realize they made a mistake and never successfully bound the spirit in the first place, that it chose to speak with them of its own accord.
"I am not certain the spirit would have talked so freely had it been shackled at the time," writes the author of the entry.
I keep thinking about this alongside the datamined line of Morrigan saying, "And so, the Dread Wolf is stopped by, of all things love."
But that isn't quite right, is it?
Because in the end, of course the Dread Wolf could only ever freed by, over everything, love.
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critterbitter · 1 year ago
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re: your thoughts on legendaries (which is very cool and based) what’s your take on the differences between legends:arceus giratina and platinum giratina, especially since you defined them as hating the world? specifically the bit where giratina (at least seemingly) actively defended the world from cyrus trying to destroy it, after trying to do the same thing with volo’s help centuries prior?
Weird ghost worm upon yee (AND MORE ART BELOW CUT!)
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Anyways, here’s my mad ramblings about Giratina and Arceus’s backstory.
Tldr: Giratina’s a conglomerate of angry souls scorned by Arceus.
(Here’s the playlist. It’s all about worms.)
How it Started.
The original one has chosen favorites over the passage of time. Heroes, legends, protagonists…
Arceus intervenes for those it loves, and the consequences of a god touching the mortal world is devastating in its entirety. One act of divine intervention causes entire civilizations to collapse. One whispered suggestion drives an entire legacy insane.
So Arceus, paralyzed by its love for the mortal world, acts very little, learning from its mistakes. Apathy soaks through every motion. And thus is the way of the world.
But people love the Originator. Religions are born from Arceus’s rare deeds, and generation on generation taught its benevolence. Imagine spending your entire life chasing after that golden light. Imagine knowing its real and there, and it loves you.
Imagine begging it for help, and seeing it turn away when you need it most.
I think those people would feel very abandoned indeed, if they spent their lives worshipping, and receiving no response at all.
Giratina is born from the abandoned, the lost, and the angry. They’re a hundred thousand souls who’s adoration turned to spite. They’re an entity who demands for Arceus to look at them, so they can finally rest.
Arcues can not look at them in full, because if it does Giratina will fade.
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(Scio, beloved. For I can not let you go.)
So the Original One banishes the Unwanted Beast into the distortion world, and Giratina seethes, and starves, and screams.
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(Here are two truths about the Beast Between Dimensions—
1. Some part of them still loves Arceus. Arceus is their anchor, after all— the sole reason why they exist, why they are. But Arceus can not love it back in a way that matters, and that hurts.
2. Giratina is made of a thousand voices. Some of these voices remember that there’s a world above. They miss it.)
Why Giratina attacked Hisui in PLA:
PLA Giratina’s not a new god, but they’re very, very bitter and barely coherent on a good day. Volo serves as a conduct to help unite the broiling mass of ghosts against Arceus, and thus Giratina’s hatred overcomes any flickering affections they have for the land.
It doesn’t help that Arceus intervened for Hisui, sending Akari to directly stop Volo from summoning Giratina.
(As for Volo, well.
Imagine being a child who was thrown into the future due to Palkia and Dialga’s fits, who learned his people (his world) no longer exist beyond a shadow in the history books and a single, bitter lore keeper.
Volo doesn’t remember his original culture beyond vague imprints and singing praises to Sinnoh, but he knew he was loved, and he knew his family is dust four hundred years in the past. There’s a special sort of rage in him that echoes Giratinas.)
(Why did you abandon my people, Arceus? What kind of god are you, to leave those who love you so callously behind?)
(Maybe some part of Giratina recognizes Volo, beyond a feeling of kinship.
Maybe some part of Giratina grieves because it recognized the child Volo was.)
When Volo gets his pound of flesh, (when he realizes Arceus is not beholden to him, that the inherent alien morality Arceus holds is not a personal slight), Giratina will finally rest.
Anyways what I’m trying to say is: Arceus is never a person, but a nebulous embodiment of the connection shared between pokemon and humans. It tries to experience what it’s supposed to embody, but millennia of watching people be and cease has given it choice paralysis, apathy, and a hoarding issue. If something lasts forever next to it? Good.
Giratina was once a person. (Correction, a LOT of persons.) They don’t think very linearly either, but they have context on mortal matters and are thus the more benevolent and malicious of the two. One day, time will smooth them into something like Arceus. We can only hope the two keep each other in check.
THE DIFFERENCE OF LEGENDS ARCEUS GIRATINA VS PLATINUM PEARL GIRATINA
If the ancient version of giratina is an angry conglomerate of ghosts scorned by Arceus, the modern iteration of Giratina’s a creature that’s more settled in its skin and more assured in its duties. Giratina still has beef with Arceus, but they unionized into one being who’s love of the mortal world has triumphed over its ancestral grudge. One might even postulate they have shifted their anchor from Sinnoh the god, to Sinnoh the place.
((We call this character developement. Good for you, weird ghost worm!))
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(((FULL DISCLOSURE, VOLO BEING FROM THE PAST IS INSPIRED FROM FOXFALL. You know. The fic that got me into this fandom. Please give it some love.)))
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specialagentartemis · 5 months ago
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godddddd i have disliked becky chambers' work since long way to a small angry planet and I agree that that fish scene is SO much of what is wrong with contemporary SFF especially queer SFF. refreshing take, great review, thank you. would love to hear what authors or works you think of as the antidote to that sensibility.
The thing is, I enjoyed The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet when I first read it - it was a fun, light adventure, clearly a debut novel but I was excited to see where Chambers would go from there. And I actually really do think the sequel, A Closed and Common Orbit, was good! It did interesting things with AI personhood and identity.
... and then Chambers just kinda. Did not get better. She settled into a groove and has a set number of ideas that I feel like she hasn't broken out of, creatively. And they I M O kind of rest on an assumption that "human nature" = "how people act in suburban California."
As an antidote to that sensibility, I'd say... books where people have a real interrelationship with the land they inhabit, a sense of being present, and reciprocal obligations to that land; books that recognize that some things can never be taken back once done; books with well-drawn characters, where people have strong opinions deeply informed by their circumstances, that can't always be easily reconciled with others, and won't be brushed aside; books where these character choices matter, they impact each other, they cannot be easily gotten over, because people have obligations to each other and not-acting is a choice too.
And it's only fair that after all day of being a Hater I should rec some books I really did like.
Piranesi by Susanna Clarke - A man lives alone in an infinite House, over an equally infinite ocean. Captures the feeling that I think Monk & Robot was aiming for. Breathtaking beauty, wonder at the world, philosophy of truth, all that good stuff, and actually sticks the landing. The main character's love, attention, and care to his fantasy environment shows through in every page. (Fantasy, short novel)
Imperial Radch by Ann Leckie - An AI, the one fragment remaining of a destroyed imperial spaceship, is on a quest for revenge. Leckie gets cultural differences and multiculturalism, and conversely, what the imposition of a homogeneous culture in the name of unity means. (Space sci-fi, novel trilogy)
Machineries of Empire by Yoon Ha Lee - An army captain's insubordination is punished by giving her a near-impossible mission: to take down a rebelling, heretical sect holing up in a space fortress and defying imperial power. She gets a long dead brain-ghost of a notorious criminal downloaded into her head to help. Very, very good at making you feel like every doomed soldier was a person with a past, with a family, with feelings, with hopes and dreams and frustrations and favorites and preferences and reasons to live, right before they brutally die in a space war. Also very much about the imposition of homogeneity of culture as a force of imperialism. (Space sci-fi, novel trilogy)
The Fortunate Fall by Cameron Reed - Maya Andreyevna is a VR journalist in high-tech dystopian future Russia, and she decides to investigate the truth that the government doesn't want her to. She might die trying. It's fine. Also has digital brain-sharing, this time in a gay way. It's bleak. It's sad. It feels real. Not making a choice is a choice. Backing out is a choice. And choices have consequences. Choices reverberate through history. About responsibility. (Cyberpunk, novel)
The Vanished Birds by Simon Jimenez - Nia Imani is a spaceship captain, a woman out of time, a woman running from her past, and accidentally adopts a boy who has a strange power that could change the galaxy. Spaceship crew-as-found-family in the most heartbreaking of ways. Also about choices, how the choices you make and refuse to make shape you and shape the world around you. How the world is always changing around you, how the world does not stay still when you're gone, and when you come back you're the same but the world has moved on around you. About how relationships aren't always forever, and that doesn't mean they weren't important. About responsibility to others. It's a slow, sad book and does not let anyone rest on their laurels, ever. There is no end of history here. Everything is always changing, on large scales and small, and leaving you behind. (Space sci-fi, novel)
Dungeon Meshi / Delicious in Dungeon by Ryoko Kui - A D&D style fantasy dungeon crawl that stops to think deeply about why there are so many dungeons full of monsters and treasure just hanging around. Here because it's an example of an author thinking through her worldbuilding a lot, and it mattering. Also because of the characters' respect for the animals they are are killing and eating, their lives and their place in the ecosystem, and the ways that humans both fuck up ecosystems with extraction and tourism, but also the ways that you can have reciprocal relationships of responsibility and care with the ecosystem you live in, even if it's considered a dangerous one. (Fantasy, manga series)
Stories of Your Life and Others by Ted Chiang and How Long 'Til Black Future Month by N. K. Jemisin and Everyone on the Moon is Essential Personnel by Julian K. Jarboe - Short story anthologies that were SO good and SO weird and rewired the way I think. If you want the kind of stuff that is like, the opposite of easy-to-digest feel-good pap, these short stories will get into your brain and make you consider stuff and look at the world from new angles. Most of them aren't particularly upbeat, but there's a lot of variety in the moods.
"Homecoming is Just Another Word for the Sublimation of the Self," "Calf Cleaving in the Benthic Black," and "Termination Stories for the Cyberpunk Dystopia Protagonist" by Isabel J. Kim - Short stories, sci-fi mostly, that twist around in my head and make me think. Kim is very good at that. Also about choices and not-making-choices, about going and staying, about taking the easy route or the hard one, about controlling the narrative.
The Murderbot Diaries by Martha Wells - Security robot with guns in its arms hacks itself free from its oppressive company, mostly wants to half-ass its job but gets sucked into drama, intrigue, and caring against its better judgement. This is on here because 1) I love it 2) I feel like it does for me what cozy sff so frequently fails to do - it makes me feel seen and comforted. It's hopeful and compassionate and about personal growth and finding community and finding one's place in the world, without brushing aside all problems or acting like "everybody effortlessly just gets along" is a meaningful proposal. also 3) because it is one of the few times I have yet seen characters from a hippie, pacifistic, eco-friendly, welcoming, utopian society actually act like people. The humans from Preservation are friendly, helpful, and motivated by truth and justice and compassion, because they come from a friendly, just, compassionate society, and they still actually act like real human beings with different personalities and conflicting opinions and poor reactions to stress and anger and frustration and fear and the whole range of human emotions rather than bland niceness. Also 4) I love it (space sci-fi, novella series mostly)
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vrystalius · 3 months ago
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Yo! Hello its me again! Could i please request like a reverse isekai where the kny characters end up in reader's house? And maybe she is like Mad rich but like.. Not a spoiled brat she likes to do charity and make money for herself and maybe she is living with her cousins, she is smark but can be stupid (if you know what i mean) i don't know, you can do whatever you want, (there is not enough reverse isekai fanfictions😭), anyhow, hope you have a good day and you didn't get sick of my (a lot) requests😁🫶🏻👋🏻
Hashira getting reverse isekai’d
Your favourite hashira suddenly appeared inside your home! How will they react to your home and the modern world?
Pairing: Sanemi, Kyojuro, Giyu x gn!reader
Sanemi Shinazugawa
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He will not adjust to this change quietly— he is ready to destroy and slice every single piece of tech that decides to randomly beep or talk to him. You once found Sanemi trying to get his katana out of your ceiling after throwing it with full force against your smoke detector, after it beeped to remind you to change battery. It scared the shit out of him, so he put an end to that thing. Often times when using your phone, Sanemi accidentally activates Siri. He first thought that a demon was speaking through the phone with some kind of blood demon art, then, after explaining to him what exactly Siri is and what she does, he just begins cursing her and cussing her out every time she activates on him. You once had to remind him not to grip it so tightly, or else your screen might crack.
A thing he really, really likes about your modern home though is your bathroom. The shower, the large mirror, sink, toilet… just everything about it. The first time he stepped into your shower and closed the glass door behind himself, Sanemi was first confused about the shower settings. He turned every knob that is able to be turned, both cooking himself alive and dodging the water in fear of freezing, achieving both of these things in one shower. Once he finally found the perfect temperature, it was time to test all of the products you have, and not sparingly. Shampoo, conditioner, hair masks, shower gel, body scrub and whatever else he could get his fingers on— once he got out of the shower and returned to you, his smell was almost overwhelming, but at least you know now that his har is somehow able to look even better than before.
After a long adjustment period, you sometimes catch Sanemi watching the TV. He made himself comfortable in a corner of your couch, cuddled up in heated blankets (he learned how to use the settings all by himself!) and watching one movie after another. He’s quite the binge-watcher apparently, watching one action movie after another for hours on end. At the end of such day, he’ll complain about his eyes burning up without having any idea how that happened.
“Hey, wanna join me? Blanket s’ warm and I found a movie about some weird metal things moving really, really fast and guys kicking each other’s asses— Huh? Cars? Are those these fast carriages sliding around on there?”
Kyojuro Rengoku
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He is incredibly curious about every single thing and would try to understand how everything works. Kyojuro would inspect your microwave and press every button their is, watching the pizza pocket he threw into there react to the different settings and then grieving about how the once weird snacks he wanted to try turned into a piece of burnt remains. Despite being the most comfortable with the traditional meals he used to eat, Kyojuro would love to try any dish you even mentioned by name once! Since you can get your food delivered to your front door, Kyojuro can try as many different cultural dishes as he can get his hands on! Or as many as you can get delivered to tour home. Ordering food is something he always gets very excited about, like what do you mean you can order all kinds of cultural food in a matter of minutes? How do the restaurants have all the ingredients available and are always ready to serve customers? And why do you refuse to order a so-called Happy Meal for him? Isn’t it supposed to make one happy?
Another thing Kyojuro is very excited about is the gym. He accidentally stumbled upon a fitness center after returning from buying groceries, staring at the people training inside with those weird machines. The hashira spotted a couple of people build broader and stronger than him, making him realise that this may be some kind of modern training ground. He begged on his hands and knees for a membership so he can explore all these new machines and weight excursuses. Once Kyojuro got inside, he was like a child in a candyshop. He spend the whole day testing out every machine, noting his own limits and setting goals on how to get even stronger. Despite no demons terrorising your world, he still wants to keep his muscles and gain strength to offer nice pillows you can lay your head on and also have the ability to open sealed jars for you without struggling.
“Can we order sweet potato tonight? I miss eating it, and it’s my comfort dish…. Also, I believe I may have started to develop homesickness. I miss my brother the most, though… Not that I don’t like it here, I love it! I just miss my father and brother, that’s all.”
Giyu Tomioka
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Staying true to his nature, Giyu would be silent and awkward in this new space. He’s scared of offending you in any way but simply taking his haori off or sitting down onto your couch since he has no idea about the manners and behaviours expected from him in this world, but at the same time doesn’t bother to ask you in order to not burden you in any way. So, he quietly followed you around the house in and inspect your furniture and decorations, sometimes curiously picking something up and inspecting its function. His favourite object so far is a rubix cube he found on your desk. You caught him turn the sides, trying to understand what the point of this thing is. Does it have something on the inside? Why are the colours all scrambled up? While watching his irritation grow because of not being able to sort the colours, you suggested that Giyu can keep it and try to solve it after giving him a small briefing on what the point of the cube is. Thanking you, he kept the rubix cube on his body to play around with it whenever he has time. He is seriously invested in it and really wants to solve it in order to prove to himself that he can solve a complex puzzle and to maybe even impress you a little.
Also, you discovered that Giyu likes noise-canceling headphones, music and e-books. You often find him cuddled up together on your sofa, his face illuminated by your Ipad in his hands. You could hear the faint sounds of soft and slow music from the headphones he was wearing. He looks incredibly invested in whatever he is reading, so you snuck up on him and glanced over his shoulder, reading a couple of lines. It wasn’t a fantasy story or a random novel like you thought, but Giyu was actually reading an article about the behaviour of cats. Adorable, you thought, so you left him be and went on with your day. The water hashira eyed your form as you left, sneakily switching tabs and returning to what he was actually reading: a fluffy romance novel. He looks over his shoulder twice, thrice, checking if you are still near before feeling comfortable enough to continue his reading in peace.
“Can I borrow your.. headphones? They’re called headphones, right? Yes, I’d like to borrow them again. I want to use them to have more silence, you are being very loud and I wanted to read something.”
💠
You never bother me with your requests! They are always so fun to write for!! Also, I hope it’s okay I kind of “simplified” your request— I hope you enjoyed this anyway. Also, I didn’t include Gyomei because I was unsure of what exactly to write for him, but I may update this tomorrow and a small scenario for him <3
Anyways, make sure to EAT, SLEEP and DRINK enough!!
Take care of yourselves <3
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love-of-the-red-star · 3 months ago
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That time I got reincarnated as an Aeon
(Series)
Chapter eight: In which the Express celebrates the Day of the Dead with you
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Dan Heng’s room was nothing short of simple and surprisingly comfortable.
You’ve been digging around the archives again after your short trip to your favorite desert planet, ready to contribute to the logs that made up Dan Heng’s archive.
He’d allowed you to touch the monitors and type in what you wanted, surprising even Himeko as he was usually rather cautious to let other people(usually March, bless her heart) roam around and touch his things unless they only wanted to read up on things.
You thanked him for that, of course. It was rather sweet of him to allow you to do this.
And so you typed away— made little personal notes on what the culture was like, and people that you also knew as yourself and not Delia. While Dan Heng’s records of Sigonia IV already existed, you were compelled to make your own as well, as a thank you to the people that had been so far hospitable to you.
You haven’t seen little Kakavasha in your visit, so you too wondered how he is now. He’s probably an adult— not so little anymore, growing into the familiar visage of “Aventurine” that you knew in your past life, but you hope it’s not the same horribly tortured man you know.
There was still discrimination, even a bit more than a decade since the freedom of this clan— they still warred with the Katicans here and there, but the disputes were more manageable, less genocidal as the Avgin were more protected by humanitarian groups.
But there wasn’t really any real interest for the cultures of people that had been long discriminated even with your intervention, and if no one was going to do the job of helping them at least preserve a certain view of it, you’d do the job yourself.
Sigonia IV would not be the only place that would stay in the archives for the other future Nameless to find, maybe one day you’d ask for Boothill’s planet, because while it no longer existed, you believed it wasn’t fair for it to die along with him.
You’ve made notes of it, here and there from what little you could get from some books that made mention of it and Boothill’s ramblings. While you could always consult Fuli for the rest of the things, it felt disrespectful towards your friend. You may be an Aeon now, but you knew honor— prying without your friend’s permission felt invasive, you weren’t a human anymore, but you know that kind of stunt wouldn’t be something he would appreciate.
Suddenly, you wondered about the planets you’ve accidentally destroyed, about the lives you had taken without meaning to, and the ones you drove mad beyond your control. Your typing still continued, undeterred by your silent grief as information flowed into the data bank without even a slight inaccuracy despite the difference in how you felt.
You should grieve for the ones who were lost, you thought to yourself. Glancing at the date present in your monitor, you found it was the best time too.
The Day of the Dead.
You’re not even sure if people even celebrated that holiday in this world. Maybe Halloween, but you doubt Dia de los Muertos, as the Latinos would call it, or Araw ng mga patay, as the Filipinos would say, is something widely celebrated in an expanded universe such as this.
Maybe you’d find a world that does celebrate it someday, but for now, maybe you’re going to be alone in giving acknowledgment and silent grief to the ones that had been lost.
You weren’t very close to a religion in your previous life as a human, but now that you thought of the holidays that gave people solace and something to celebrate, you began to feel a little strange that there was no god you could pray to as you were now technically one yourself.
Worshippers weren’t so bad now when you think of it as people laying their problems to a willing ear they can’t see or hear to give them the peace of mind they desired.
You finished up the logs, determined to plant the Avgin’s language inside of it next on the next time you’d touch the monitor. But for now, you had a goal in mind.
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Some researchers knew you as a grieving Aeon, with your cries reaching the far ends of the cosmos for reasons they sometimes don’t understand.
They observed you once again, mindful to keep their distance from hundreds of light years away as the telescope that found your distant visage caught on the fact that you were crying yet again. But this time, you’re quiet. There was no horrible song of lament that fried wires and caused damage, this one was silent, this one was red.
The liquid that flowed from what seemed to be your eyes was crimson, your lips pressed together as your expression looked forlorn. The telescope saw your hands move, then suddenly, nothing.
You did not want it to see you.
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Setting up an altar was relatively easy, decorated with flowers you’d grabbed from a world away in the expanse of a mountain and a lot of candles you’ve carefully lit.
Lives lost in the fight of freedom, and the lives you took without meaning to. There were too many to count, and you doubt Pompom would like to have the train set on fire.
There were no pictures, no relics, there was simply you, the flowers, the altar, the candles.
Welt had passed by your room and seemingly recognized the decor, quietly joining your side as you started to kneel in front of the altar and mumbled something along the lines of a familiar prayer that he vaguely recognized.
Sometimes Welt forgot you were a human in your previous life. You’ve told him before, when you disclosed things about yourself to him and Himeko.
There was no god that you knew to pray to here, and to make it stranger, you were one yourself. Maybe you were trying to emulate it— old habits maybe, old bits and pieces of your human personality, and reliving specific memories. Or maybe you’re just trying to commemorate those you’ve lost in the way you knew a distant life away.
Welt joined you in your prayer. There is no god to direct his thoughts to, but there’s a strange sense of peace there regardless.
Welt stood up after a few moments while you stayed, lingering before eventually leaving the room.
“Why does it smell like candles burning?” March asked as she encountered him in the hallway.
“It’s for a celebration.” He said. “A day to remember and honor the dead.”
She looked a little confused. “Day to honor the dead?”
“Yes, you can join [Name] in their room if you’d like. It’s not a bad thing, although I can understand why you’d be confused— it’s not widely celebrated after all.” Welt smiled as March slowly nodded.
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You weren’t in the room for much longer, opting to head to the kitchen so you could make something to eat. You were there for at least two hours, and everyone seemed to leave you alone to your devices as you made some dishes you remembered from a past life.
Some comfort food, and fluffy bread.
You brought it to the dinner table with a smile as Pompom trailed after you to arrange the bowls and plates for everyone.
Once you were done, you made do of calling everyone in to eat. They don’t really ask why there’s a different feast of savory and sweet food on the table that was clearly not Pompom’s cooking.
Welt looked at you in a certain way that you know that he knew things, and you sent him an appreciative nod as you gestured for everyone to sit down and eat.
“These are some.. recipes that I know from my homeworld.” You began. “These typically aren’t stuff you would get when you’re celebrating the holiday in a very traditional way, but sadly my knowledge of cooking is… kinda limited.” You scratched your temple awkwardly.
“You don’t have to apologize for it.” Himeko said. “It’s the intent that counts.” She smiled, then placed some bread on her plate and stew in her bowl.
“You’re right.” You gave her a small smile of your own.
You failed to spot Dan Heng at the corner of your eye, looking at the bowl of stew in contemplation as Welt’s words sprang up memories of old friends lost in a life he didn’t want to remember.
Maybe he’d allow himself to grieve losses just this once, even if that person who’s lost those people in a distant life away wasn’t him anymore. Maybe for those that Blade had taken from him too in this life.
“Are you okay?” March nudged him gently, snapping him out of his thoughts.
“Yeah, I’m alright.” He said, blinking and snapping out of his thoughts before sinking his spoon into the stew.
Dan Heng found comfort in its flavor.
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March had taken photos of your room with the altar after dinner, plastering it into her wall with the label “Day of the Dead” in earth colored frames that contrasted the aesthetics of her room. She didn’t mind as much, surprising even herself as she was rather picky about her own decorations.
However, this was something that you shared with them, and that mattered to her. She couldn’t remember her past, and so to have a small piece of someone she knew that saved her was a nice feeling because she didn’t really quite know you. She doubt she ever would actually know you in the way the older crew members do, but that’s okay, that meant she could know you through the new memories she’d create.
She thought of you for a moment and what you’d lost, and she also wondered about the past self she can’t remember. Did she have people that she lost too? Were there people that lost her? Were there people that missed her?
She remembered her conversation with you, a strangely solemn topic for a girl so bubbly like her.
“What do you usually do?” She asked, clearly referring to the little holiday.
“People usually prayed, then offered food and flowers to their dead and all that.” You replied. “I thought it’d be a little nice to honor the people lost along the way. It’s a thing in my old world to not forget the dead.”
“Oh, I’m sorry.” She found herself saying. “I shouldn’t have pushed.”
“You don’t have to worry, it’s not offensive at all.” You smiled and patted the spot next to you. “It’s a pretty big celebration in my world, and in some countries it’d be a lot livelier than this.” You said as she went to sit next to you.
“They’d wear costumes and make up and bring out live music and everything. The food’s a lot better too I think— there’s too many for me to remember, so the ones I made weren’t the traditional ones people ate during that day.” You explained as she listened attentively.
“That’s okay, it was delicious anyways.” She giggled, shifting slightly to adjust herself before settling in comfortably in a few moments of silence.
“Do you…. Miss your old world? Ah— you don’t have to answer that.” March sputtered, realizing her mistake.
“It’s okay. And yeah… maybe just a bit. I’m not sure how to feel about it to be honest.” You said, glancing at the windows of your room.
She couldn’t see what kind of expression you were making, and so she found herself hugging you. There was something inherently sad about you despite your antics, like you’ve lost too many things.
You returned that embrace.
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Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV, Part V, Part VI, Part VII, Part VIII, Part IX(HERE), Part X……
Interludes: one, two…
Special chapter: link
Yeeeeee hello y’all!!! Pushing this chapter out in celebration of All Souls Day! :DD
I hope all of you are well! Also I’ll be happy to answer any of your questions regarding the series, so drop any thoughts, don’t be shy <333
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useless-catalanfacts · 3 months ago
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Now it's been a week since the floods, but we must remember that the damage is not nearly over. It will take months and years for the affected families to recover. And that's not counting that 215 people have died and 78 are still missing. Many homes, streets, fields, schools, etc are destroyed. I'm glad for all the solidarity we've seen this first week, but they are going to be needing help for a long time to recover.
All the local organizations are thankful but for some days have been asking for people to stop sending them objects (tools, clothes, food, etc) because the collection points have so many that they can't manage them and they don't even need so many of some things being sent, for this reason there are storehouses full of materials that they don't need but people keep sending and some volunteers are having to stay there to coordinate the stuff that arrives instead of being where they're needed. So, please, don't send any more things unless you are coordinated directly with a local association there that asked for a specific thing. They say that the most useful donations now are money and not any more food nor second-hand objects. (Again, thank you very much because this overwhelming response speaks of the goodness and solidarity of everyone who immediately reacted by sending things! but let's do it in a coordinated way with the affected people to make sure it's useful).
Also, recently some well-meaning people have been sharing fundraisers to help the victims, but some of these posts seem to be made by outsiders compiling what they found on Twitter, which ended up spreading fundraisers that belong to far right-wing groups, the Catholic Church, and to associations that aren't well known in the area.
If you can make an economical donation to help these people who have lost everything in a day, these are some trustworthy associations:
Fundraiser by Fundació Horta Sud. This is a foundation created by many local associations of the Horta Sud area, one of the areas that has been the most impacted by the catastrophe. It's a well-known foundation that brings together many local associations. This and the next one are the fundraising that is most recommended by people on the ground working on immediate needs.
Casals i Ateneus dels Països Catalans (federation of social centres of the Catalan Countries) has many social centres in the affected areas and is coordinated with trade unions to provide immediate needs. The bank number for donations is ES74 3025 0002 4614 3344 7057.
Fundraiser to help small family-owned farmers (farmers are one of the poorest segments of population in our country, families own a small plot of land and they're very threatened by big corporations, they're at the forefront of fighting for climate and the rural communities' traditional way of living with nature). The fundraiser is created by the International Centre of Rural and Agriculture Studies (Centro de Estudios Rurales y de Agricultura Internacional). This is the fundraiser shared by trustworthy Valencian associations that work in favour of rural communities and traditional cuisine, such as Tasta'l d'ací.
Fundraiser for the grass-roots cultural associations and cultural heritage guardians, organized by the Federation of Local Studies Institutes of the Valencian Country, the Coordinator of Local Studies Centres of the Catalan-Speaking Countries, the Federation of "Ateneus" of Catalonia, and the Ramon Muntaner Institute. Many local archives, centres of local studies, "ateneus" (social and cultural centres with an important task as a library for the community and as historians of the area, among other cultural activities) and other cultural associations headquarters have been destroyed. They are very important for the memory, history and culture of small areas. To write articles about the history and legends for this blog, I very often use work published by these local study groups, because most of the time they are the only ones working in detail on the historical and cultural heritage of their hometown. Here is the information on how to donate, as shared by the organizers:
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Translation: Let's help the Valencian cultural and heritage associations affected by the 2024 floods. You can send your donations to [the bank number] ES98 3159 0066 91 3048828523 Or the BIZUM code 10586 (starting on 7th November 2024). You can send the receipt of your donation to: [email protected].
You can find more associations that are collecting donations in this document by Suport Mutu DANA València.
Thank you very much for caring.
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qqueenofhades · 3 months ago
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so I've been watching a lot of videos abt food that's uniquely Hong Kong and y'know with all the changes happening there I had a thought like hm is this preservation and documentation of cultural foods that are at risk of being lost?
and then I thought gosh this sounds familiar likkke everywhere we see violent colonization occur not only are lives and freedom lost but also language culture food
and then I wanted to ask you as a historian: has this always been the case? have people always had low key anxiety about culture "loss" or did they think of it a diff way? is this framing of colonization and cultural loss a recent one?
I'm realizing this is a big question and we are all le tired from les recent events, so pls view this as a no pressure ask, I just uh figured you're the only historian I have real access to haha
This is an important question that I don't currently have the mental wherewithal to answer in great depth, but I think it's important to speak to briefly. And I'll put it this way: yes, human beings have always felt that their culture, their way of life, their present existence, their friends and family, and the forces at work against them are tenuous, uncontrollable, and prone to sudden and violent destruction. I'd say it's one of the key themes of being human. I'll cite the famous example of the 8th-century Old English elegy The Ruin of the Empire, known usually as The Ruin:
This is what many of us would consider the dark and distant past, wherein an unknown person in Anglo-Saxon England is observing the ruins of the Roman Empire in Britain and reflecting on how fragile and frightening the present day feels, as if all the glory has faded into the past, as if things will not be "great" anymore, and the present is just moving inexorably toward darkness:
Bright were the castle buildings, many the bathing-halls, high the abundance of gables, great the noise of the multitude, many a meadhall full of festivity, until Fate the mighty changed that. Far and wide the slain perished, days of pestilence came, death took all the brave men away; their places of war became deserted places, the city decayed. The rebuilders perished, the armies to earth.
And yet... that was the 8th century. That was a very long time ago. A lot of history has happened since then, and despite everything, it's still here. People have always looked at the danger and fragility of their present situation and yearned for the perceived stability of the past. Indeed, the reason we have the myth of the "Dark Ages" is largely thanks to the 14th-century Italian humanist Petrarch, who looked at the (also objectively very, very crappy) 14th century, which is similar to now in a lot of ways, and built the shining myth of the Greco-Roman era as a bygone golden age that society needed to reinstate if it was going to save itself from self-inflicted destruction. This in turn gave rise to the Renaissance, which was intensely a cultural project to reclaim and re-instate a seemingly "better" past in the face of present-day chaos and uncertainty. This included a strict reifying of gender roles (etc. etc. Was There a Renaissance For Women?) and turn toward "purer" social ideals.
Anyway: these concepts have been shaped and articulated differently in various historical periods. But yes, the basic feeling that we are losing ourselves somehow, that the past was better and more stable, that the present challenges can be solved by insular reactionary politics, and so forth, is a very, very common human experience. For better or worse: both tangible and intangible artifacts have always been lost, destroyed, subject to violent sociopolitical conquest attempts, written out of history, and used for oppressive political and cultural processes. Part of the reason the right wing is doing so well worldwide right now is because they are tapping into a very, very old "put the strongman in charge and everything will go back to how [good] it used to be" mythology that is also as old as dirt and time, and which humans just keep doing when things feel existentially scary. This "weaponized nostalgia" is even more of an issue in the age of rampant disinformation, AI, and fake-news bubbles which can totally create what is accepted as reality, very often to the benefit of illiberal, right-wing, authoritarian forces. That is very hard to deal with and overcome, and I don't think we're anywhere near doing it.
That, therefore, is the bad news. The good (as it were) news is that at least these cultural processes and human instincts are not new, and indeed have continued for a long, long time. And even when these old things are destroyed, new ones emerge as well. So yeah.
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artist-issues · 17 days ago
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BAM SURPRISE you are the head writer at Disney or whatever (the entire corporation for all their companies and movies, not just Disney animated) for one week and anything that you do during that time cannot be changed/altered later. What are you doing
Oh geez
Okay, besides torching all the sin-affirming stuff they do—
I would mandate that no more Live Action Remakes be made. Like, ever. I would cancel all upcoming sequels. I would force only Walt Disney Animation Studios and Pixar Studios to work on new animated films coming out—no utilizing the studio in Vancouver or outsourcing the work to AI or Japan or anywhere outside the U.S.
I would do that in the hopes that the animators who understand our specific culture would be forced to meet the challenges posed by new projects, instead of taking computer-generated-AI shortcuts to solving hard-art problems. And, when they make a movie that takes inspiration from other cultures, it forces them to learn about those cultures, themselves. Then, when they make movies, their unique American-in-Fill-in-the-Blank-Culture perspective adds depth, flavor, and my favorite thing, earnestness, to the design of the movie.
Next! I would hire Chris Sanders back. I would pay him literally anything he wanted. Probably by selling all our holdings in Marvel, because Marvel is dead as a doornail.
With that cash flow I would also LOWER THE PRICES TO GET INTO DISNEY WORLD AND DISNEY LAND. The prices get lowered. I don’t care. I don’t care. I don’t care if the whole company goes belly-up because I did that; I would drop the prices considerably to get into the parks. And to get Resort Packages. And then I’m jacking up the prices for the overseas parks.
Know what else I would do? Fix the Yeti in Expedition Everest, add the Hatbox Ghost into the Haunted Mansion, and blitz social media telling everyone about it. While I’m there I’ll make a post about how we’re destroying Genie+ and the Lightning Lanes. Utterly gone. Nobody gets to purchase cut-in-line time slots. Everybody waits in line together. Because guess what, forcing the normal-people line to completely halt while you let traffic from the gave-up-my-firstborn-to-purchase-a-faster-line-experience line go first every three minutes is CAUSING the wait times FOR BOTH to get LONGER, tricking people into purchasing “faster” line experiences that are actually still horrifyingly slow, and ruining the already-overpriced day for everybody involved.
Ahem.
Meanwhile, we’re getting that money back, because I’m putting Chris Sanders on a brand new project; he’s going to pitch me two ideas. One idea is all his own, it can be anything he wants. The other has to be an adaptation of The Firebird fairy tale. But he can be as liberal as he wants with the details, like he was for Beauty & the Beast.
He gets to direct his own, obviously, but since directing two projects would be really hard, I would bring in Roger Allen and Rob Minkoff to handle The Firebird.
Once we have the money, I’m funding four new projects in Disney World. The first is, Pizza Planet is becoming the new restaurant at Disney Springs.
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The second is, the Rock n Rollercoaster is getting replaced by Phineas & Ferb’s coaster—just in time for the new season to come out on Disney+!
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The third is; Avatar: The Way of Water-themed Resort which connects to the park, but guests may only cross over into the theme park during special After-Hours, when regular guests have had to leave because it’s closed. But it would be over the water, and have its own water park.
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There are those indestructible glass windows making holes in the floor and the sides, and the rooms are all suspended over real water (with carefully-constructed foliage so that even though it feels open to the air like in the movie you actually have complete privacy, nobody can see into the rooms. And we’ll add curtains for the faint of heart, whatever) The windows in the floor double as screens which you can turn off or on; if the screens are on, a randomized animated loop fools the eye so that every once in a while, Avatar characters and marine life swim by or interact with guests.
Fourth thing in Disney World: additions to all the lands they’ve hobbled together in the last twenty years.
For example, New Fantasyland gets a Tangled ride where you’re following Rapunzel’s hair trail through the environments of the movie, and you and Flynn Rider are trying to catch up to her; but at certain crossroads the people in the vehicle can choose between multiple paths for your ride vehicle to travel down. This way, you and your party can be racing one another, so there’s an element of competition like there is in Buzz Lightyear Space Ranger Spin.
Also! Galaxy’s Edge gets walk-around droids, two new hangout-style open-air restaurants, and an elaborate playground area made up of of nets, rope courses, and simple alien animatronics like you’re exploring a Resistance Base that was constructed by Ewoks.
Dinoland U.S.A. Is scrapped (except for the Dinosur Ride which is relocated) to make room for The Pridelands. You heard me. You thought I was going to say Zootopia, but no, that’s not jungly enough for Animal Kingdom.
The Pridelands has another the-most-elaborate-playground-in-the-world section, which is huge and sprawly, and full of things like fake tunnels which connect to the hollow skulls of elephants in an elephant-graveyard section, with screens made to look like windows that peer down into the geyser-bubbling lair of Scar. And of course there’s a Pride Rock, but it’s made like Rapunzel’s tower, so it looks far away in perspective, and occasionally an animatronic Zazu hops out onto the ledge, looks around, and hops away, or Simba prowls out, roars, and backs up out of sight again. Like a giant incredible cuckoo clock.
There are three rides to start with. One is a zany Timon-and-Pumbaa ride/game where you’re basically doing the Space-Ranger-Spin thing, looking for grubs. Another is a rollercoaster called “Escape the Stampede” and you’re basically hurtling along as if you’re galloping just ahead of the wildebeest in the gorge.
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The third is a walkthrough of the events of the film, but with Avatar-level-advanced animatronics and hyenas come lurching out from behind things to snap at you.
The Pridelands has two restaurants; one is counter-service and it’s called “Timon & Pumbaa’s Grub Hub” and it’s all pasta bars, and Mac-n-cheese, so you can pretend you’re slurping up grubs if you’re a kid. The other is a reservation-only restaurant made to look like the beautiful forest Timon & Pumbaa live in, with built-in waterfall features and a ceiling that changes color and lighting effects to look like a starry sky or a dazzling sunrise depending on the time of day. It’s very atmospheric and the idea is to go on dates there. There’s also live African music.
And we’ll relocate the Festival of the Lion King here, too.
I’d also make a video game that is open-world and online-multiplayer, like Destiny, BUT it’s an elaborate retro-futuristic world with its own story based on Tomorrowland. The story would be impacted by what the players all around the world choose to do in-majority, and I’ll have three or four different routes it can go—but the main thrust of the game’s long, ongoing plot is a metaphor for the hard, passionate work of being innovative versus the dangers of cutting corners to make a profit in the name of “progress.”
For our Live-Action Department, they’re going to be working on a new series of Westerns based loosely on Big Thunder Mountain. It will be a trilogy, and it will star Matt Lanter as the hero, villain-character played by Chris Pratt, and Tim Allen (Tim Allen is Matt Lanter’s estranged father.) When they’re done with that they get to make a Space Mountain movie starring Letitia Wright. That’s what our Live Action Department gets to work on—original dramas based, if anything, on our original theme park attractions that nobody else in the world has.
And for our television studio, Tom Bancroft and his brother Tony are hired to make an animated series called “Escape Schism” and it’s about a young girl who discovers she has the ability to escape her dystopian-future world by jumping through television screens into movies. Each movie is a loose parody of iconic movies in the real world. The catch is, she can only stay in those movie-worlds for one day, and she can only take one object from the movie-world back into the real world after each visit. Other characters include the little brother she’s always trying to protect from the dystopia of their reality, and her older sister who works as a detective for the evil corporation that’s functioning as the government.
It’s lighthearted, it gets great views.
Then I’d hire @doverstar to make a series on Disney+ as a sequel to Lilo & Stitch: the Series. It can be Stitch & Ani.
Then I’d put the guy who did The Lion Guard in charge of Disney Junior, spearheading two new shows—one is a show about Robin Hood and Maid Marion’s life before the events of the animated movie, and the other is an original show called “Gift Shop” and it’s about a gift-shop owner who is actually a fairy godmother, and has to figure out the exact-right gift to give the fairy tale characters who stop by every once in a while. But it’s told from the perspective of her pet owl, Dusty.
Aaaand finally I’d completely destroy the Haunted Mansion movie in favor of a new, three-part television-film, (like the ones they do on SyFy) told from the perspective of the Groundskeeper. In this treatment, a young man named Kyle is terrified of really making the most of his life because of a fear of failure. He made one big mistake and it cost the family their ancestral home when he was a senior in college, and he can’t get over it. He becomes groundskeeper of the Haunted Mansion because of the exorbitant amount of money offered to do the job, thinking it can help him buy back the family house. Instead, he encounters the Hatbox Ghost—who enlists the new Groundskeeper’s help adventuring to break the control Constance Hatchaway has over the 999 Haunts living there. The Hatbox Ghost and she used to be in love. Kyle has to help them solve that in order to free himself from the position as Groundskeeper—but he thinks there’s something the Hatbox Ghost isn’t telling him.
While we’re at it, I’d remake Wish and The Rise of Skywalker. Because nobody can undo what I’m doing but I can undo what they did, right?
61 notes · View notes
genevawrenn · 1 year ago
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Interested in QSMP but unsure where to start? Then this post is for you!
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Hello all!
I've seen a few posts here and there about being interested in the server but feeling overwhelmed with the amount of information there is, so I want to do my best to help as someone whose been here since Day 1.
Let's start out with what is QSMP?
QSMP is a multilingual Minecraft survival world [English, Spanish, Portuguese, French and Korean predominantly so far] opened on March 22, 2023 that uses real time translations to break language barriers and educate a large audience on different cultures through Minecraft content. It came to life under the careful hands of Quackity and his team, building a fantastic world with plenty of stories to uncover. There is both server-based lore and individual creators stories, whoever you choose have all added their personal touches to this expansive place.
At the beginning of 2024 a soft reset happened where their spawn was shifted 200k blocks away from the original, allowing for a fresh start for both the audience and creators which makes it the perfect time for new members of the community!
More info below;
Brief lore recap so far;
QSMP originally started with Spanish and English creators who all got placed on a single world with a large wall down the middle [Quesadilla Island]. Arriving by train a few commented on their past where most seemed to be going for a fresh start from the worlds they left behind. Placing a giant red button on the wall with the words 'don't push it', the streamers ignored that immediately and pressed it. Destroying the wall that kept the two communities apart, early QSMP was very much building and bonding.
Then, the egg tasks came.
So a bit of fourth-wall breaking on the eggs, the eggs are admins who play children that were assigned to one Spanish and one English parent. During the beginning of the event they were paired up and given tasks to complete so their eggs didn't die [ex. reading a story, clearing a dungeon, mining], as they were also in survival the parents had to worry about keeping them alive from the mobs and other players [as QSMP includes a large list of mods there are several enemies who made their lives living hell].
Unfortunately some of the original eggs have since died leading to all the parents to get extremely protective over their own charges and everyone else's. Whether that be the fault of fellow players or the over-seeing organisation called The Federation, the islanders were bonded by tragedy and tribulations.
The Federation is the organisation that oversees caring for the island and its members, the main face is that white bear you've probably seen art of named Cucurucho. Its unclear where their morals lay, a lot of clues hint they are using the members who arrived via train and later other methods of transports as experiments. There have been plotlines investigating into this mysterious organisation, leading to some characters being harmed.
The QSMP is heavily focused on uniting cultures holding multiple holiday events for the different countries involved and raising awareness about traditions. They have also held server-wide events such as Purgatory 1 & 2 where they were all assigned teams and told to fight one another. Other events include being thrown in Prison together, leading to hilarious escape antics and much chaos.
What languages have been added?
The addition list went the Spanish & English, then Portuguese, then French and most recently one Korean creator [so far?].
Who and where can I watch VODs?
There are a total of 37 members [there was 38, but one has since been removed]. I will list them in order of additions as well as a brief statement about their creator, character and lore, you can view them anytime they are live through the link below.
A website crafted by Quackity and his team that allow you to turn on subtitles in your preferred language!
***These statements may contain spoilers of lore and storylines, I did my best to do a broad overview of the points I believe are important to them***
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Quackity [English & Spanish speaking] (He / him)
The main man himself, Quackity is up first. Quackity has been making content for over a decade moving from server to server such as SMP Earth, DSMP and Karmaland. He started this project with the intent to break language barriers and by god he decimated them. Prone to clickbait and dramatic titles, he's got a kind heart full of passion you can see in everything he creates.
He plays two characters on QSMP currently, a cubito sharing his name then another named ElQuackity. Quackity is an erratic but caring individual who has a rather lonely lore but an intriguing one. Assigned an egg with no co-parent, Tilin and their father's relationship was distant at best. At the time of his child's death they were on okay terms but the guilt stuck with him until current day. Kidnapped by the Federation, he returned a broken man with little to no memories and had to be protected by others.
ElQuackity is his brother who behaves in a more cold and sinister fashion compared to Quackity's kind-hearted intentions. He disappears and reappears at various points throughout the lore, most recently in Purgatory when he infiltrated a team before being revealed as a traitor. Choosing to remain with the Watcher, who is the overseer of Purgatory, its unsure as to his next moves or his inner motivations.
Wilbur Soot [English speaking] (He / him)
Wilbur Soot is a content creator and musician, he has been absent as of late from the server on a hiatus. You may have heard his name attached to such servers as DSMP, SMP Earth, and SMP Live.
[I do not support him as a content creator, I'm adding this edit post everything coming out. Believe victims!]
He is the father of Tallulah, a sweet girl who loves music and flowers. Often serenading her with his guitar and singing. Entrusting her care to Philza, he hasn't been seen in quite some time. His absence has weighed on his daughter, but she has found her true family now.
FitMC [English speaking / learning Spanish and Portuguese] (He / him)
FitMC is a content creator from the wastelands of 2B2T, the oldest anarchy server in Minecraft. You may recognise him for his iconic voice, he streams Monday through Friday on QSMP. He was also on SMP Earth and SMP Live.
He plays a grizzled anarchist who puts up a front of an asshole but that hides his kind heart. He arrived on Quesadilla Island for a mission he's only recently discussed more in his individual lore and found a family along the way. Father of Ramon, his character recently started dating another by the name of Pac, who we will get into later. He was initially paired up with Spreen, who has since stopped playing on QSMP, as such Fit refers to him as his ex-partner. Close with Tubbo and Pac, their clique came to be known as Morning Crew as they often login at the same time. He worked as a Janitor for The Federation and was a part of the Rebellion against the Federation up until the soft reset, his current employment status is unknown since. In canon, he has a prosthetic left arm in which he stores the data he needs to save.
His chat is known as the Huevitos.
Philza / Ph1lzA [English speaking / learning Spanish] (He / him)
Philza is a content creator who is known for dying in his 5 year Hardcore world to a baby zombie, a spider and a skeleton. The clip went viral landing him on the news, boosting him into regular viewership by Minecraft enthusiasts. His history also includes DSMP, SMP Live and SMP Earth. You may know him as part of Sleepy Bois Inc, as well as a warrior in keeping Technoblade's memory alive. He streams Monday, Wednesday and Friday, usually a few hours in his current Hardcore World before he spends time in QSMP.
Father of Chayanne and Tallulah [Wilbur asked him to care for her in his absence leading to him adopting her as his daughter], he is an corvid hybrid fallen from grace. Notable features include the damaged crow wings you may see in fanarts, he is paranoid and observant. Platonically married to Missa Sinfonia, he is close friends with several islanders despite being a hermit. Fierce and will return damages tenfold if provoked, he has a rocky history with the Federation and other methods of authority, joining Ordo Theoritas, earning Cellbit's trust and admiration with his photography and hoarding of important items. With references to his Hardcore Lore & Deities aplenty, he is my favourite POV and the one I started with.
His chat are portrayed as crows.
Jaiden Animations [English speaking] (She / her)
Jaiden is an animator and creator most well known for her animated gameplay videos and funny anecdotes. I admit I don't know much about her past relating to roleplay servers, she has amazing content regardless.
Jaiden's character is a bit different to the others with an unknown past, lore has revealed that she might be more tied to the Federation than she originally thought. Also an avian hybrid, she formed a close bond with Cucurucho which lead to some distrust between herself and the other islanders. Mother of Bobby, who is deceased, she was partnered with Roier as a parental unit and mourns her lost child to this day.
Her chat is a flock of hummingbirds who follow her around.
BadBoyHalo [English speaking] (He / him)
Badboyhalo has an extensive history with Minecraft gameplay, a prominent member within these communities and was one of the first members of DSMP and now QSMP.
BBH plays a demon hybrid who is friendly and kind, he is willing to help out any member new and old. Logging long hours he probably has some of the highest playtime on that server, whether that be caring for the egg children, hanging out with friends or bothering Foolish Gamers. All the eggs look up to him as a parental figure, there are plenty of jokes he is the server's babysitter but I don't think he minds. All islanders have spoken about how much they trust him with their charges, his priority has always been the kids. Father of Dapper and Pomme, he co-parents them with Baghera Jones.
His community is known as Ghosties.
Foolish Gamers / Foolish [English speaking / learning Spanish] (He / him)
Foolish is well known for his incredible building skills, when he was added to DSMP it brought his name into relevancy where he flourished, expanding his gameplay into other games like Valorant which has a loyal following. He often engages in months long projects such as building the Titan from AOT and streams long hours regularly on the QSMP.
His character is portrayed as a Totem of Undying mixed with shark genes, leading to emerald eyes and parts of shark mixed into his physiology. Silly and chaotic, he is a well loved POV of the server for his jokes and ability to stumble across lore. Viewed as a more laid-back parent, he helps them learn through experience while making sure they don't get seriously hurt. He was hired by the Federation as an agent and an enforcement officer, leading to his fellow islanders keeping information away from him in fear. Father of Leonarda with Vegetta, his partner has been absent for many months leading to him raising and caring for Leo alone.
His chat are called Doozers, a reference to the TV show Fraggle Rock.
DanTDM [English speaking] (He / him)
I am going to keep this one short and sweet, Dan was one of the original members but ended up dropping out of the project due to personal reasons, no bad blood. Father of Trump with AgenteMaxo, Trump died quite early into the server due to neither of their parents logging in.
Charlie Slimecicle [English speaking] (He / him)
Charlie Slimecicle is a hilarious creator who has a gift for breathing life and depth into any character he creates. Sharing a similar history as others on this list, he participated in DSMP, SMP Live and SMP Earth.
His character is tragic, in short. He was charged with caring for an egg he named Juana Flippa with his wife ElMariana, their daughter then died from a sweeping edge glitch that was discovered months after her death. Going on the rampage of a lifetime, he was stopped by the other members when his intent was to kill the other children potentially forcing whoever was in control to revive them all including his daughter again. Failing, he has struggled to find a place and purpose for months until his 'daughter' came back and he became infected with a type of code virus causing his physical appearance to become warped. During the QSMP Prison arc he was informed he was a father of one of the newest eggs, SunnySideUp, his co-parents are Tubbo, Pol and Lenay.
Luzu [English & Spanish speaking] (He / him)
I am going to be honest, I am a newer fan of Luzu so I will do my best to describe him but please take this with a grain of salt.
Luzu is a creator who played on the same server as Quackity called Karmaland which a good majority of the Spanish speakers have in common. Sarcastic, chaotic and slightly unhinged, he's always willing to go with the bit.
Luzu's lore is interwoven with the main storyline, though his cubito has been IA from the server he would often log in to leave cryptic messages in binary and computers followed him everywhere he settled. Father of Tilin with Quackity, Tilin unfortunately also passed early into the server leaving them in mourning. Something the parental unit holds to this day, threatening harm against the party who was the cause of their child's death.
Luzu's character is unique as he also has a counterpart named Arin, an AI bot who takes over when Luzu goes to sleep. Unable to speak aloud, they communicate through typing in the game chat and is extremely naïve.
Rubius [Norwegian, Spanish & English speaking] (He / him)
Rubius I admittedly don't know the most about as he was active early in the server's lifetime but less so lately. Also a member of Karmaland.
In those beginning days he played an Angel / Devil entity who seemed particularly protective of the eggs the islanders were assigned between making requests of the server members in exchange for rewards. Prior to the Purgatory Event he revealed he had been stripped of his power and thrown back to the mortal realm to participate in the Purgatory Event, it's unsure past that point as he has not logged back in.
ElMariana [Spanish speaking / learning Portuguese and English] (He / him)
Mariana is a creator who hails from the lands of Tiktok, he's dramatic and friendly, often a little bit flirty.
Mariana is Slimecicle's goverment assigned wife and they often playfully argue with one another between divorces. The other half of Juana's parents, he has a rough past of being the reason Flippa lost one of her lives. It's referenced to this day despite the fact Mariana cares quite a bit for the remaining children, gentle and sweet with everyone's kids. He's one of the less active members, recently given a new child named Pepito who he co-parents with Roier, Carre, Quackity and Rivers.
SpreenDMC [Spanish speaking] (He /him)
Another one I will keep short as he no longer plays on the server. Father of Ramon, his influence only shows in the family he abandoned occasionally making snarky comments against his character. Rumours go he is Missa's brother but I am not entirely sure how canon that is to the server's lore.
Missa Sinfonia [Spanish & English speaking / can understand some Portuguese] (He / him)
Missa is a musician and a Youtube-based creator primarily, he knew Roier, Spreen and Quackity prior to his invitation to the QSMP. The epitome of wet cat energy, you can't help but enjoy his silly energy as he will always bring a smile to your face with his antics.
Very similar to his character in fact, paired up with Philza during the initial egg event they were quick to label themselves platonically married as they cared for their son Chayanne. Missa is a rare appearance on the island but always a delightful one when he does. He believes he isn't worth Phil's affections due to his absences, something Phil is quick to squash as he always makes sure there is space in their lives for him. A rare eclipse when they are together, the fandom likes to compare them to the sun and the moon. Tallulah considers him her third father, post being asked during the Prison event when there was a rare reunion of 4 of 5 members of the Death Family [Philza, Missa, Chayanne, Tallulah and Wilbur Soot].
Roier [Spanish & English speaking / can understand some Portuguese] (He / him)
Roier hails from the land of Youtube gameplays where he posts regularly. Friends with Missa, Quackity, Spreen and Rubius among others, he was one of the original draft for Quesadilla Island.
In character Roier is funny, energetic and known for playing multiple personas with a talent for voice acting. Easy to get along with and goated at fighting, he is only a call away when something serious happens. Paired with Jaiden to become Bobby's parents up until Bobby's death, he remains close with Jaiden and protects her. Adopted as a son by Foolish and Vegetta, he has a playful relationship with his sister Leo and will look after her if needed. Meeting and falling in love with fellow islander Cellbit, after they got married he considers Richarlyson and Pepito as his own. One of his persona's is Melissa, his cousin who runs a therapist office in the original borders of the land. His streams on the server are random, but a good time!
I am not the most caught up on his lore but from what I have seen in passing he went into mourning when Cellbit chose to stay on Purgatory in an effort to save his son and his personality became more withdrawn. Roier has a twin brother Doied who implemented his twin's consciousness into a rat and took over Roier's body. This lore is still ongoing, some islanders have become suspicious of Doied.
Vegetta777 [Spanish speaking / some fluency in English and French] (He / him)
Another arrival who has Karmaland in his past, Vegetta is known for his impressive builds and a love of symmetry. He has a distinct voice and is famous within the Spanish community for his gameplay.
He was decently active at the start, creating a large property he then surrounded with security procedures after a certain red-hood wearing demon broke in to trade with his villagers. Paired up with Foolish as parents of Leo, both doted on their child with great amounts of love until Vegetta stopped logging on.
I don't know the story as to why he hasn't come back in a while, but it led to a storyline of Foolish & Leo becoming much more dependant on each other and his character still has importance each time either of them see something that reminds them of him.
Maximus [Spanish & English speaking] (He / him)
Another person I am not sure about his history [I can't find too much online so I'll talk mainly about his lore].
Maximus is the other half of Trump's parents who took his son's death hard. Launching him into investigating the real truths behind Quesadilla Island and later establishing the The Theory Bros in an effort to uncover anything to help, Max was a figurehead in early lore for pushing back against the Federation and trying to find out their secrets. His creation of the Theory Bros lead to Ordo Theoritas, which will become important in later character discussions. Max has since passed in the lore via giant nuke on Egg Island, where Purgatory was held, but I've heard some rumours he may return in the future. Do not take that as a certainty, I only know from a few clips I have seen with him speaking about it.
~That's it for the original members, let's move on to who was added afterwards~
The Cargo Ship arrival April 30, 2023
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Cellbit [Portuguese, English & Spanish speaking] (He / him)
Cellbit is a famous creator from Brazil through many forms of creative media, his most prominent being a tabletop RPG called "Ordem Paranormal" he created and hosts regular campaigns through. Compassionate and clever, he is known for his love of puzzles and roleplay. Most notably of his past is his escape from prison pertaining to his character alongside Pac and Mike within Minecraft: FUGA IMPOSSÍVEL - O FILME.
The character he plays has an incredible amount of depth, deeply entwined with the Federation and other fellow members of the island. Curious as a cat he began to investigate the mysterious organisation known as the Federation. Going to dangerous depths to find hidden secrets, becoming employed by them in an attempt to grow closer. This eventually lead to his capture and subsequent torture by Cucurcuho.
Once he was released he went on to take a more passive role, forming Ordo Theoritas. Spreading the word he would take any information, other islanders stepping up to help. Leading to him growing closer with his fellow people as his life turns more joyful, he marries Roier in the first wedding on Quesadilla Island. He is the father of Richarlyson, Bobby and Pepito and twin brother of Bagi. Though his past is bloody and left scars on friends of old such as Pac & Mike, many members trust him implicitly and he always takes special care to save flowers for all the egg children, forging close bonds with them all as one of their tios. Cellbit took a break from QSMP post-Purgatory events but has since returned, he likes doing multiple things a stream as such the QSMP is often a segment between various games and chatting.
Felps [Portuguese & English speaking / learning Russian] (He / him)
Felps has a running joke going with the QSMP that he never actually joined, which is only reinforced by his more rare logins to the server. He streams often on Twitch leading to most of his content surrounding that channel and is a longtime friend of Cellbit, Pac and Mike.
I am going to be so real, I don't know the most about Felps and the character he plays other than he dug a giant hole near original spawn and the islanders now worship him as Saint Felps. An adoptive father of Richarlyson he is spoken about fondly by other islanders, indicating he has a caring heart and is an attentive father when he logs in.
Pac [Portuguese & English speaking] (He / him)
One half of Tazercraft, Pac is an excitable and enthusiastic creator who you can't help but become enamoured with. Bright and a fantastic actor, his history is connected with both Cellbit and Mike prior to QSMP in Minecraft: FUGA IMPOSSÍVEL - O FILME.
As a character Pac is friendly and approachable, often even flirty with those he is comfortable with. He is positive to everyone but himself, lacking any love towards the accomplishments of his past. He loves with his whole heart, quick to comfort anyone who needs it or to be a listening ear. His right leg was lost during his escape from prison with Mike, resulting in a prosthetic. He co-owns Chume Labs with his best friend, enjoying causing general shenanigans with those he is close with whether that be breaking rules or going places they shouldn't be. A recent development is he is now dating FitMC after the anarchist told him the truth about the anarchist's past, a couple formed on the basis of a strong friendship they are not afraid to flaunt their happiness. Quick to accept Ramon as his son alongside Richarlyson, he will give it all to protect those he now see as his family. A member of the Rebellion against the Federation, he lends his aid when needed as one of the newest recruits. Close to Fit and Tubbo, a grouping that came to be known as Morning Crew as their schedules matched leading to many occasions of spending time together.
Mike [Portuguses & English speaking] (Any pronouns)
Outspoken, silly and a fun time to watch, you know you will be entertained after tuning into one of Mike's streams. Best friend of Pac and married to a beautiful soul, he has an enjoyable energy to him. The other half of Tazercraft, he participated within Minecraft: FUGA IMPOSSÍVEL - O FILME.
A lot of this carries over to his character, an erratic scientist at Chume Labs with a love for general rule-breaking and experimenting. He *ahem* took a bunch o' Kelp cocaine and passed out for a good long while but he has since returned. Between himself and Pac they have built several minigames on QSMP such as Hide n' Seek and Murder Mystery. A more strict parent of Richas compared to his best friend, he is willing to go to any length to save those he loves including spilling blood. A regular appearance on QSMP, he enjoys spending time with his friends and his son.
Forever [Portuguese & English speaking] (He / him)
I wasn't even sure I wanted to include this but I wish to record the actions of only his character. He was expelled from the QSMP for past actions that I do not condone under any circumstances. I will not go into detail here, I will leave that up to you if you wish to search.
In my statement below I am only speaking of the character he played and the lore he influenced.
Forever arrived with the rest of the Brazilian members and soon thereafter the Elections arc kicked off. He was voted in as President and was the liaison between the Federation and the rest of the islanders. A doting parent, he built NINHO, a protective hotel that could instantly teleport entities by simply interacting with a camera tablet all islanders held to protect everyone's children. When their children went missing it led to him being medicated by Cucurucho to become happier. Pac followed his footsteps with the intent to also become less sad but was convinced by Cellbit to document his symptoms in an attempt to find a cure. Due to that foresight, both of them were cured by Philza, BBH and Cellbit after finding the instructions and ingredients at Chume Labs. Later becoming infected by black matter which seemed to possess him, he was then stopped by Cucurucho during a rampage who then executed him after teleporting him far away.
The Plane arrival May 16, 2023
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Baghera Jones [French & English speaking / learning Spanish] (She / her)
Baghera Jones is a badass. That's the long and short of it. As a creator she has raced cars and is just about the coolest person I have ever seen. She has an active YouTube channel and enjoys streaming regularly.
She also plays an amazing character on the server. Strong, smart, sensitive and strong, she is respected by many members of the island. Mother of Pomme and Dapper, she took to motherhood quickly and dotes on her children with her whole heart. She did run for President but then gave up her chance as a rebellious act against the Federation. Striving to get better in fighting skills to protect her loved ones, she will go to the bloody end for those she loves. She took a break from the server at the same time Cellbit did but has since returned.
Her chat is potrayed as fireflies.
Etoiles [French & English speaking] (He / him)
Etoiles is a man of culture and is honourable, an enthusiast for learning new things besides his gaming content he also hosts museum walkthroughs educating thousands about ancient histories. Known for his prowess in both Super Smash Bros and Minecraft PVP, he often grinds long hours on the QSMP in pursuit of knowledge about the world they were spawned into.
His character is an anthroplantae cucumber, no I am not kidding, who is infected by code after completing his sword earned through combat. One of the main antagonists near the start of the lore were these creatures the islanders nicknamed Code Monsters who would appear with overpowered weapons. Choosing to prove his worth in battle, Etoiles spent many hours battling these beasts and learning their methods, earning himself a special shield and sword and the title of the best at PVP on QSMP. He enjoys bantering with fellow islanders and is generous with items, liking to gift items to people to make their lives easier. Father of Pomme, he will do anything for those he protects and enjoys being tio of all of the eggs. A member of the Rebellion, he strives to create harmony on the server and to protect those compromised or weaker than him.
AntoineDaniel [French & English speaking] (He / him)
Antoine is multifaceted as an actor, streamer and Youtuber [he even has a Wikipedia page, I just found out]. He seems clever and very comedically gifted, easily making others laugh.
There isn't much known about the character he portrays which seems to be ideal thing for him. A mystical identity with multiple faces, alluding to not being human and higher that average health, he will always surprise you. He appears when he wants to and leaves impressions on everyone he comes across.
Kameto [French speaking] (He / him)
There isn't much online with who Kameto is beyond he has competed in League of Legends tournaments in the past and Etoiles is a close friend of his.
It was revealed several months ago that Kameto is an undercover spy for the Federation but he hasn't logged on in a good while so nothing has come to fruition surrounding that.
AyPierre [French & English] (He / him)
He knows a ton about the mods within the QSMP, showing up and building large factories to store massive amounts of resources, plus a good amount of knowledge surrounding redstone. He likes running things from the shadows and being a supplier of goods and services. Enjoys streaming on the server regularly and has a playful rivalry with Tubbo surrounding create and what they can build. Once upon a time he was dating Max but things ended badly, he seems to regret Max dying before things were at least amicable between them. I am not sure the distinction between the cc and the character, I will leave that up to you if you are curious about his content.
The Ice Prison arrival August 28, 2023
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Niki Nihachu [German, Spanish & English speaking] (She / her)
Niki Nihachu is a gifted actor and roleplayer who is close friends with several of the other members of QSMP, a former DSMP member as well and an old friend of several other members. Kind, soft spoken and gentle, she is very open about mental health struggles and provides a safe environment for her community.
In character she is part cat and part human, with white ears poking from her pink hair. Not much has been revealed about her character other than she is fiercely careful surrounding the eggs and is ready to defy figures of authority given any reason. Mother of Empanada, she is close to her fellow mothers as well as other islanders like Tubbo and Philza. At the original spawn her daughter and herself made plans with the Death Family to start a bakery but it is unclear whether those plans still stand where they are living now.
Tubbo_ [English speaker / learning British Sign Language] (He / him)
Energetic to an unhinged amount, he acts like he has consumed about fourteen coffees in thirty seconds but its just so endearing you can't help but tune in. A former member of DSMP and SMP Earth, close friends with Philza, Niki, Quackity, Foolish and Wilbur Soot.
From his day one of the QSMP he has some of the highest playtime between streaming on both his main and alt channel whether it be hanging out with friends or building his thousandth machine. Likes testing the rules and the extent of the servers capabilities, tempting Cucurucho's ire within hours of being on the server leading to him strongly distrusting anyone in power. Assigned a bright and confident egg named SunnySideUp he was alone as a parent in raising her for the first several months, relying on friends nearby such as his fellow Morning Crew to care for her. In character it was recently revealed he is not alive, at least not in the human sense after being forcefully shut down by Richas in a play brawl. Tubbo going offline led to the appearance of Creation, someone who is programmed to protect all the eggs in order of importance starting with Tubbo's daughter Sunny.
IronMouse [English, Spanish, Korean & Japanese speaking] (She / her)
A well known creator for many things including an easily recognisable persona, a beautiful singing voice from many years of perfecting it and an impressive amount of charity work, she is an icon. A gremlin at heart, she was a welcome and surprising addition to the QSMP who I now can't imagine the server without.
Another demon in the lore, she offers advice to her fellow species while being a proud member of her race. With a scream that could shatter eardrums she is willing to claw her way through any obstacle. Wild and free, she is dramatic and fiery with her admiration. Mother of Empanada, she is close to Foolish and was one of the only people he invited to live near him.
Tina Kitten [English / some Korean speaking] (She / her)
Tina Kitten rose to prominence during the era of Among Us playing games with several large creators and becoming a regular content creator. Close to Foolish, she was apart of DSMP up until its conclusion along with Foolish, Badboyhalo and several others.
In character she is a demon who is very secretive about her true race, playing it off like she is human as she seems ashamed of her identity. Interested romantically in another character named Bagi, she makes friends easy but has trouble opening up to others. Mother of Empanada, when she is angry her aggression bursts forth which she attempts to keep at bay as to not scare the others.
Lenay [English & Spanish speaking] (She / her)
Lenay's career is impressive to say the least, a lot of this I am just learning now. Discovered as an actor and hosting a regular show on MTV, she's gone on to have credits in both acting and singing while also being a Youtuber and a Twitch Streamer.
On QSMP she is a rare login but always a delight when that happens, she is the mother of Sunnyside up alongside Pol, Slime and Tubbo. Tubbo crafted this whole lore about her being a mermaid when Sunny discovered one of her mother's bodies floating in a river near original spawn, they have met since but Lenay hasn't logged on past the first day of the soft reset. Married to German irl, they are intent to protect one another during gameplay and often stick close together.
Riversgg [English, Spanish & French speaking] (She / her)
Rivers is a Mexican streamer and Youtuber who has a large list of accomplishments. She is quite sporty including both through soccer and winning a large boxing match plus she owns a restaurant? Basically, the coolest person to ever exist.
Shown to be gifted in player vs player combat, holding her own in Purgatory along with being able to strike up a conversation with anyone around she is a valuable asset to any team. Close allies with Roier and her fellow Spanish speaking creators, she is also the mother of Pepito.
Willyrex [Spanish & English speaking] (He / him)
Willyrex is a famous Spanish Youtube personality and has written a series of books with Vegetta777. His Youtube channel is within the top 100 most subscribed in the world, doing a variety of content. A member of Karmaland alongside other creators such as Vegetta, Quackity, Luzu and Rubius.
Willyrex has a love for explosions, setting mines all over the previous spawn as he moved from place to place. Choosing not to build a house worried it would be destroyed, he has grown close with a few of the egg children during his apperences on the server such as Dapper, Ramon and Tallulah. Wishing to have an egg of his own, he commented on their weakness but grew attached to many of them quickly.
Polispol [Spanish, English & Catalan speaking] (He / him)
A cinematographer and director, he is someone Quackity looks up too. Having a love of film, he has several credits under his name. I admit I don't know the most about him otherwise and there isn't too much online, he seems to have a genuine and kind heart.
Traits that carry over to his character, he is very friendly and enjoys light hearted pranks upon fellow server members. Father of Sunny, they have yet to meet as he has been on break and last I heard the admins were cooking something with his lore but nothings come of that yet.
German [Spanish & English speaking] (He / him)
German has the second most subscribed channel on Youtube in the Spanish language. He is a Youtuber, singer & songwriter, comedian and writer. Married to Lenay, he has many achievements to his name and is well known across the internet including appearing in many Youtube Rewinds.
As a character...there is basically nothing. Tied with DanTDM for how often he has signed onto the server, the only thing to be said is he is protective of his partner Lenay and enjoys exploring the environment around him. He has no egg assigned to him, similar to Willyrex, the only two on the island without children.
The Wheel arrival September 16 & 18th, 2023
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Bagi [Portuguese & English speaking] (She / her)
From the lovely lands of Brazil, she is close friends with several other members such as Cellbit, Pac, Mike and Felps. Youtuber and streamer, she is determined and strong.
Descriptors I could also use for the character she plays, willing to wield a weapon against anyone who harms her or those she cares about. Smart and analytical, she has been independently researching into the Federation and her past. Discovering the fact Cellbit is her twin brother, they share many secrets between them after having a heart to heart in their old home on the island. She knows how far her brother is willing to go in his emotional states and supports him regardless even if she doesn't agree with his methods. One of the first person she trusted with the location of her secret base besides her best friend Pac, she is cautious and clever in creating sanctuaries for her family and loved ones. A regular streamer who is considered to be a part of Morning Crew & Friends, many people on the island trust in her and her abilities. Mother of Empanada and Richarylson, she wanted to be a parent from the moment she joined during the time the eggs were missing. When they returned, she gained two children and loves them dearly.
Carre [Spanish / some English & Portuguese fluency] (He / him)
Carre is a Twitch streamer and Youtuber who does a variety of content winning fans over with his charisma and comedy. Coming from a well known series called Tortillaland, he also enjoys dancing and has won and award for it. Prior to joining QSMP it's noted he is friends with Roier, Quackity and ElMariana which reflects in his gameplay on the QSMP.
He is a carefree and social individual, easily getting along even with people he doesn't regularly interact with. He isn't upfront with his caring nature, taking things to heart like when Roier killed him in Purgatory. He was worried about meeting his son Pepito but once he did they grew close quickly, skateboarding all across the server together.
The Third Train February 11, 2024
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악어 / Acau [Korean speaking / learning English] (He / him)
The newest member of the server, the first Korean speaking creator he joined recently after the soft reset. Relying entirely on the translator unlike the previous additions, he got along well with people immediately.
Teasing others and taking to parenthood right off the bat of the newest egg 춘식 (pronounced Choo-n-shi-k), many other islanders have offered their help as they complete quests and raid dungeons together. Proficient in PVP, he is quick on his feet and stubborn.
I hope this blog helps you if you are interested, this server is one of the most welcoming and receptive of feedback I have ever seen. Everyone who is white-listed grew close as friends if it wasn't the cause of their reunion, drawing a large community to surround them.
I promise even though the lore can seem overwhelming there are plenty of people who are willing to answer any question you may have. I have loved my time here, I started my journey into MCYT content through DSMP and found a lovely home here while still fondly appreciating my past.
If people want I will come back to edit this to include a portion for the eggs, or maybe I will do a separate post?
Let me know in the tags or replies if you stumble across this post after the poll has been completed.
Anyways, this is Wren signing off, this post took me 3 days to write and please feel free to reply letting me know of any mistakes within the information!
o/
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fuzzytheduck · 1 month ago
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Thread so far:
"why are you mourning something the Romans did, out of curiosity"
"I'm not sure how in-detail you want me to get, but the main thing is that they destroyed the Beis Hamikdash, the holy temple, which was (still is, really) the most sacred place in the world to the Jewish people."
"I see. From my perspective, the atrocities committed thousands of years ago have no bearing on my life. I mean presumably you mourn the roman-judea war because one side was Jews and you are Jewish. Not because life was lost but specifically Jewish life. Which is strange to me because surely they lived a very different life to the one you live today. Surely even their understanding of Judaism, the thing you share, was different from yours with your modern sensibilities. Sorry if this is offensive but it just seems like a tenuous connection. Also I am asian (like you! haha)."
Response:
"I see. From my perspective, the atrocities committed thousands of years ago have no bearing on my life."
The destruction of Jerusalem and the expulsion of Jews from Israel, are, to Jews, constantly present in our lives and rituals.
I'm sure you've seen depictions of Jewish weddings in media, where the groom steps on a glass. this is done in memory of the Destruction.
After meals, we say four blessings of thanks. the fourth one was composed in gratitude for being allowed to finally bury our dead after the massacre at Beitar.
Every year, on the anniversary of the destruction of the Beis Hamikdash, we fast in mourning.
At the end of a Passover Seder, we say "next year in rebuilt Jerusalem" in hopes that we can hold a real seder next year, with a korban pesach (Passover offering) brought in the temple.
There are countless songs, poems, and works of art that express grief over the Destruction
This is a poem written in medieval Spain expressing a profound yearning to return to Israel.
This is a video of Jewish boys around the arch of Titus in Rome (the structure built by the Romans* to commemorate the capture of Judea), singing about the memory of Jerusalem.
*in the same way kings hauled up lumps of rock to build Thebes of the seven gates iykyk
youtube
"I mean presumably you mourn the roman-judea war because one side was Jews and you are Jewish."
Yes and no. We dont just share some superficial trait that makes us want to root for that side or something. We ARE that side. we have retained our longing to return ever since.
"Not because life was lost but specifically Jewish life."
Its not just a matter of life lost, which IS devastating. its also a matter of cultural and religious destruction. Korbanos, or offerings, were once a major part of jewish service, but since we are forbidden from bringing them outside the temple, they have not been brought for nearly 2 millenia.
We nearly lost our oral tradition. the mishna was compiled about 1800 years ago to preserve it.
Hundreds of thousands of Jews were slaughtered, taken as slaves, exiled from their homeland. To this day we are considered to be in Galus Edom, Roman exile (the last of four exiles).
We were scattered to the winds, subject to near constant persecution, denied rights, forced to flee again and again, all while keeping our identity and faith alive.
"Which is strange to me because surely they lived a very different life to the one you live today. Surely even their understanding of Judaism, the thing you share, was different from yours with your modern sensibilities."
This is true! there are many differences between the way we live now and the way we used to back in those days, but there are also many similarities. we celebrate the same holidays, operate under the same legal system, follow the same dietary restrictions, rest on the same sabbath, read the same torah... there are plenty of examples i could use to emphasize this. Here are a couple.
A torah scroll can only be written by hand, on parchment, by a skilled scribe using either a reed pen or a feather quill.
On the sabbath, we aren't allowed to start, spread, or feed fires, which makes cooking difficult. For millennia Jews have managed this by cooking stews over Friday night to be eaten in the morning. Some basic info in this video:
youtube
"Sorry if this is offensive but it just seems like a tenuous connection. Also I am asian (like you! haha)."
I don't find it offensive at all! I'm always happy to converse in good faith. thank you so much for reaching out, too few people seem to seek new perspectives, and i genuinely commend you for that.
also while i suppose on a technical level i could be considered west asian, that label is largely inapplicable to me with regards to american race relations. i dont remember where i was going with this
anyway sorry it took so long to get back to you, if i forgot to translate any jargon, or if my writing is unclear, let me know and ill do my best to clarify
P.S.
i want to add that for me personally, it was a culture shock to see things from the other way around. as a child i thought all religions worked the same as mine, and it was wild to me to find out that some people have no strong cultural/religious identity.
i saw a video a while ago that documented the siege of Jerusalem, from a youtuber that primarily covered ancient roman history. I was shocked at the level of detachment the event was described with. Don't they know how important this is? How devastating this was for my people? How relevant it is to us?
here is the video for reference:
youtube
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toptophat · 4 months ago
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Idk if anyone has thought this already but imma try and cook with this one!
So we know that Boothill has that name as a reference to the burial grounds for dead gunslingers, people who "died with their boots on". The man basically sees himself as a walking corpse, not exactly dead but not exactly alive either. His new body was built to bury his old self, his beautiful name and scars. His new cyborg body is his own living grave he built for himself, the old him who died with Aeragan-Epharshel.
However, like I said, WITH Aeragan-Epharshel... He lost everything, his parents, his siblings, his infant daughter, his life! The vast galaxy (thanks to that monster Oswaldo) views the tragic death of the planet as no more than a sad accident with no cause. Besides the IPC, Boothill (the survivor of the attack) is the only one who knows what actually happened to the planet, the only one who carries the memories of it, the people he cherished, the stories lost in time
All of those memories have been stored in his mind and stayed even in his new body, only he can honour that memory, much like a burial ground is built to honour the tragically fallen. He is quite literally, a Boothill!! In fact, he's the Boothill of Aeragan-Epharshel, where everyone fell whilst under attack. If he dies, there's no other way to honour that planet's memory, the IPC would just erase the planet from existence, continuing to farm it's resources until it's no longer convenient for them
He's the planet's happiness, grief, rage and hope combined, he was built for this role! He's unable to leave with his loved ones, a Boothill is meant to honour the dead, not join them! Man! That's quite the responsibility when you think about it! An entire culture destroyed, purposely wiped out! And it's up to you to keep that memory alive when there's an entire corporation trying to hide it! The living burial ground of an entire world!!
There's also the fact that the IPC viewed the people of Aeragan-Epharshel's efforts of defence as nothing more than old fashioned and dated, taking them out with ease. In response, Boothill obviously becomes a cyborg, perhaps since within him is the burial ground of an entire planetary population, it's almost like through him spiritually, the planet itself is evolving as a result, coming back stronger as a one man planet in pursuit of revenge, and it's working! This one man planet has been noticed by those who wronged him, and every day he gets closer to the target of his long awaited revenge, their long awaited revenge!!
"Throughout the rails of the stars, he alone is the Boothill"
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antifainternational · 1 year ago
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Since youre antifascist, how about you give us a definition of fascism? What exactly makes someone a fascist? (and in case you use terms such as left-wing or right-wing be sure to define them too)
Guess it's been a while since a clever Anon challenged us to define fascism, huh? Right, let's get into it: Via the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum:
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Yale professor Jason Stanley:
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“Fascism is a creation of race hatred and its politically organized expression.” - Willhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism (1933).
“Fascism is capitalism plus murder.” - Upton Sinclair
“Repression by brute force is always a confession of the inability to make use of the better weapons of the intellect — better because they alone give promise of final success. This is the fundamental error from which Fascism suffers and which will ultimately cause its downfall…that its foreign policy, based as it is on the avowed principle of force in international relations, cannot fail to give rise to an endless series of wars that must destroy all of modern civilization requires no further discussion. To maintain and further raise our present level of economic development, peace among nations must be assured. But they cannot live together in peace if the basic tenet of the ideology by which they are governed is the belief that one’s own nation can secure its place in the community of nations by force alone. ” - Ludwig von Mises,  Liberalism: A Socio-Economic Exposition (1927).
“Spent most of the day reading fascisti leaflets. They certainly have turned the whole country into an army. From cradle to grave one is cast in the mould of fascismo and there can be no escape … It is certainly a socialist experiment in that it destroys individuality. It destroys liberty.” -  Harold Nicolson, The Harold Nicolson Diaries : 1919-1964 (2004).
“The liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerated the growth of private power to a point where it becomes stronger than the democratic state itself. That in its essence is fascism: ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or any controlling private power.” - Franklin D. Roosevelt
“A fascist is one whose lust for money or power is combined with such an intensity of intolerance toward those of other races, parties, classes, religions, cultures, regions or nations as to make him ruthless in his use of deceit or violence to attain his ends….If we define an American fascist as one who in case of conflict puts money and power ahead of human beings, then there are undoubtedly several million fascists in the United States.” - Henry A. Wallace
“Fascism is the cult of organised murder, invented by the arch-enemies of society. It tends to destroy civilization and revert man to his most barbarous state. Mussolini and Hitler might well be called the devils of an age, for they are playing hell with civilization.” - Marcus Garvey,  Authors take Sides on the Spanish War, 1937 Philosophy Tube's breakdown of the elements of fascism is very thorough and recommended if you're not the reading type. But do you read books? We hope so if you're looking to engage in political discussion about anything. Here are some books that tackle the definition of fascism, in whole or in part, that we would recommend to you (check/order from your local library!) Mark Bray's highly-accessible Antifa: The Anti-Fascist Handbook is a great starting point for this topic.
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Columbia history professor Robert O. Paxton's excellent book The Anatomy of Fascism goes into this in great detail.
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There's also Umberto Eco's The Eternal Fascist
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or his "practical list for identifying fascists" as well as Hannah Arendt's seminal The Origins of Totalitarianism
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We hope you weren't looking for a simple answer to the complex question of "what is fascism?" Anon, just as we hope you're up to taking our challenge of checking out all of the above so you're curiosity is satisfied and you're well-versed on the topic.
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Cursed
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Warning ⚠️; blood, murder, cursing.
Pairing; Micheal Myers/Witch!Gn!Reader
Summary; Micheal’s mother and you got into an argument. Sadly for the woman, she didn't know you were an immortal witch and you swore to destroy her family by cursing her son.
Note; I’ve been rewatching all the Halloween movies and loved the idea of Micheal being somewhat cursed and not fully human anymore.
~~~~~~~~~~~~
There were things in this world that not everyone knew or understood. You were one of those things. You and your people had walked on Earth for centuries, hidding among the mortals and terrorizing them. Some called you demons others witches and none were wrong. Some cultures even created rituals or festivities to appease you or ward off their community from you.
Like the Irish with Samhain.
But in those modern days, people had forgotten about the old ways and why those festivities and ceremonies were made. Worse, your kind had been pushed to the side, your very existence turned into legends and stories to scar children. It was almost insulting.
Almost.
Because now no one remembered how to keep you away. There were still old wives' tales of course, but no one listened or applied them anymore, leaving you free to do as you pleased and go wherever you wanted.
You favoured the United States since its people had all but forgotten the old ways, except the Natives. You never approached them, preferring targeting and walking around the ignorants. You had fun messing around with them, filling their lives with chaos or even making deals without them noticing until it was too late.
But like anyone, you also had your bad encounters.
Deborah Myers was a woman you wouldn't forget anytime soon. The stripper was a strong woman, you couldn't deny it, but she also was a rude one. You got a taste of her tongue one night after accidentally bumping against her. It was one of those day where everything was going wrong and it might have been the case for her too.
Words and degrading gestures were exchanged and Deborah Myers sealed her fate after she hit you. Tasting your own blood, you saw red and returned the gesture, collecting hers in return. You left her on the ground, face bruised and nose bleeding and walked away swearing to make her life crumble before her very eyes.
That next day you hunted for her family. You found her daughter first and the young woman was of no interest for you. But when you saw her son, oh! You knew you had the perfect weapon. Even has a teen, Micheal Myers was full of potential and you would make sure to cultivate it all.
From the shadows you watched the tortured teen, keeping an eye out for everything he did. He amused you by targeting small and defenceless animals. Their screams of pain were disgusting and their end worse, but it showed you what the boy was capable of. Given the right tools, he would be an unstoppable force.
With the right words and time, he would be yours.
When nightfall came, you approached the boy as he walked in the woods, trying to go home without crossing the path of some bullies. You saw curiosity in his eyes and for a brief instant, fear. Children were sensible after all and he must have felt you weren't fully human.
You gave him your gentlest and brightest smile as you leaned above him, pulling a little bag of candies from your pocket. Instantly you saw hunger and joy fill Micheal’s eyes.
- “Hey kiddo, here’s a bag of candies for you. I know it is too soon for Halloween, but I won't be in town to give out candies, so I do it in advance. You are a lucky one, because it's my last one.” You said, chuckling as the boy grabbed it.
- “Thanks, weirdo!” The teen said before leaving you laughing.
You laughed both because of his remark and because it had been easier than expected. Those weren't normal candies after all; you had made them especially for Micheal and the boy was right, you were a weirdo. But once Micheal has eaten those candies, he would be cursed. Cursed to lose all humanity only to become the perfect killing machine.
A modern-day boogeyman.
Your revenge against Deborah Myers.
Halloween came quicker than ever. You watched the town change as the inhabitants decorated their houses and commerce and the trees lost their leaves. The air become cold and crispy and the morning came with a light fog, giving a mysterious aura to the place.
You watched as Micheal began to change. He was slowly becoming more cruel and would snap so easily. He was getting ready to fully transform and that night would be a vital moment in his transformation. It amused you how his family, particularly his mother, saw nothing. None of them noticed the subtle changes in the boy, only the school. Teachers and students seemed to feel it, the kids more than the adults and yet the bullies were still being stupid.
You watched with pride as the cursed boy made his first victim in the very woods where you first met. You smiled as Micheal beat to death to bully before going back home. You grabbed the corpse and dragged it away, hidding it under dried leaves and twigs. You didn't want your new puppet to be found yet. He had much to do tonight after all.
You stayed outside, hiding in the shadows as you stared at the house. Inside you knew Micheal was making a carnage and you couldn't wait until his mother came back to see it all. When Micheal walked outside, his baby sister in his arms, you walked out of the shadow and joined him. You sat by his side and passed your fingers in his hair. His eyes were dark and empty, your curse taking over him.
- “Soon Mickey. Soon you'll forever be like this and you won't feel any remorse or those pathetic emotions. Nothing will be able to stop you or stand in your way.” You leaned down and kissed his hair before leaving him alone on the stairs.
You were filled with satisfaction when Deborah came home. Her screams made you smirk and laugh, the sweet taste of revenge lingered in your mouth as policemen had to restrain her when the corpse of Judith came out of the house.
Deborah Myers had fucked around and now was finding out. Her nightmare wasn't over yet.
As weeks and then months passed you kept track of Micheal. The boy didn't remember anything as your curse had blinded him, transforming him into a mindless killer for a moment. But the curse was still there, growing like cancer and its tentacles wrapped around his young mind and soul.
It wasn't long until his transformation was over.
You were sitting in a coffee shop when you read the news that Micheal had killed a nurse and had been quiet ever since. You knew that your curse was completed and nothing was left of the boy but an empty husk, a killing machine. Now you just needed to sit and wait for him to grow into a man,
Until then, you weren't finished with his mother.
Deborah Myers was at her lowest and yet it wasn't enough for you. You kept tormenting her, filling her nights with nightmares of her bloody daughter haunting her and of Mickey’s murders. Her bills kept piling up and she couldn't keep up with them. Soon she would lose her electricity and the bank would come after her.
After Micheal’s crimes, no one dared approach her. She was the Devil’s mother after all and no one wanted to take a chance. What if she was just like her son, a ticking bomb ready to explode? She only had her baby girl and even then it wasn't enough to keep her sane.
The day of her suicide you drank to it.
You had gotten not only your revenge but also her soul. She was yours forever and some fate are worse than death and hell combined.
All that was left to do was now to wait.
The next fifteen years passed somewhat quickly. You kept an eye and ear out about everything concerning Micheal and even bought the book written by Loomis. The thing was pathetic, a money grab and laughed more than anything. The poor doctor didn't know the truth and probably would never. He was so far from the truth, but his fear of Micheal was justified. But not how he treated him.
It didn't matter if Micheal was cursed, he was still a human being but no one seemed to keep it in mind when whispering awful things about him or treating him harshly. You even saw articles talking about how he should be put down like a mad dog.
It was tragic and you almost felt bad for ruining Micheal’s life.
Another part of you knew you just accelerated his fate. He was always meant to become a killer, you just moulded him into something bigger.
You learned of Micheal’s escape the same night as it happened. You were in his hometown, keeping an eye on his little sister when you overheard a policeman talk about it. You knew Micheal was coming home and you got the place ready for him. You furnished it with a bed and put back his mask under the floor with his knife. You knew he would want them back for old-time sake.
Then Halloween came and so did he. You saw his silhouette walking the streets and heard the screams of his victims. The boy had grown into a fine man and he exceeded your expectation. You admired the corpses he left behind, staying in the shadow and not revealing yourself yet.
You wondered if Micheal would recognize you.
You were surprised when you saw Micheal in need of help. You did not expect his little sister to put on such a fight or for Loomis to arm himself and come fight Micheal. So you stepped in, followed by the wind rising and howling as dead leaves swirled around you.
All eyes turned toward you as you clapped. Angel or Laurie as she was now called, looked at you with something like hope until despair filled her eyes when Micheal walked up to you, dropping his knife.
The Shape had recognized you.
- “My, my! Mark me as impressed. I never expected anyone to outpower Micheal, but I guess I should have seen it coming. After all, he is still inexperienced and has a lot to learn.” You said, turning your gaze on Micheal.
He was bleeding from the gun wounds, but you knew he would be fine. They needed more than firearms to stop Micheal and they had since long forgotten how to stop you.
- “Who are you?” Laurie asked as you waved at Micheal, signalling him which way to go. “Why are you helping it?”
- “Him.” You corrected, tilting your head to the side. “And wouldn't I? I didn't create Micheal and waited fifteen years just to watch him drop dead on his first excursion out.”
- “Created him?” Laurie asked with a small voice before she screamed.
You laughed as Loomies emptied his gun on you. Your blood splashing everywhere as holes were left in your clothes. In seconds the wounds closed and any drop of blood dried and turned into dust. You raised a finger and moved it left to tight as if you were scolding a young child.
- “Tut tut tut, that's not very nice of you Doctor. Do you usually shoot people in the street like that?” You asked as you heard the police’s siren coming closer.
- “No, just the monsters.” He hissed, unimpressed by how unfazed you were.
- “Well then, keep your toy charged and don't forget to look under the bed. We will meet again my friends, take care until then!”
You waved them goodbye before leaving. Micheal had waited for you a bit further and joined your side when you walked next to him. You led him to your car and quickly drove away as the police arrived. You knew they wouldn't be able to track you and Micheal wouldn't go out until Halloween next years.
As you drove, you felt Micheal eyes on you. Empty yet intense, you knew he was judging you. You chuckled as pulled out a new candy bag from your pocket and gave it to him. From the corner of your eye, you saw Micheal staring at it before he took one. He pushed it under his mask to eat it.
- “I am happy that you recognized me, Mickey and Im even happier to see how much you grew up. Gone is the little boy that called me a weirdo, huh?” You laughed as Micheal turned his head and silently stared at you. “Do not worry, I know I am still a weirdo.”
You waved your hand in front of your face as if chasing away some bad thought. But Micheal stayed silent and you knew he would never speak ever again. You couldn't help but wonder what his voice would have sounded like; deep or not? Sadly, there was no way to know. But at least he wasn't fully human anymore, he was your perfect little creation.
For proof his wounds had already stopped bleeding even tho he was soaked in his and others’ blood. It would leave a mess in your car, but nothing you couldn't take care of.
- “You know Mickey, I’ve been waiting fifteen years for tonight. Fifteen years of waiting for you to come out of that damned building and take your place by my side. I enjoyed this Halloween and the spectacle you gave me. You are as ruthless as me, aren't you? I guess you got it from me.”
You laughed cruelly this time. Yes, Micheal had slaughtered those poor kids and parents and you didn't care. It was bound to happen and more blood would spill in the years to come. You relaxed as you noticed Micheal slowly falling asleep next to you. Tonight had been full of drama and exhausting. You weren't surprised that Micheal was falling asleep so quickly. He was in a safe environment after all and he deserved it.
- “Sleep my sweetling. You did great tonight, I am proud of you and everything you did. You went beyond my expectations.” You told him, voice gentle as Micheal rested his head against the door’s window.
It wasn't long until you heard his slow and deep breath somehow deepen as he fell asleep. Yes. Tonight was just the beginning and your years of waiting were finally over. Micheal was now where he belonged; by your side. You knew more adventures awaited you and not just mindless killing. You had opened a door to the dark and not just Micheal had stepped in. It wasn't the last time you met with Loomis and Laurie, it was just the first of many encounters.
And you couldn't wait until the next.
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meanbossart · 1 year ago
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do you have any thoughts on cazador as a character? personally i really loved the parallels between him and astarion & the way that the master/spawn relationship is used as an allegory for cyclical abuse. the scene with cazador’s master’s skull where you find out that he was once victimized in the exact same way that he later victimized astarion was really a lightbulb moment for me re: what vampirism represents in this game.
BOY DO I, i don't think much of it hasn't already been said, though. He's a tragic character in his own right of course, not that that takes away from the awful man he is.
Me and my boyfriend make fun of him a lot, we call him "the best BG3 character" as a little inside joke between us and come up with ridiculous scenarios of things that might have occurred throughout those 200 miserable years the spawn had under his command lol. Maybe he had a month where he was really specific about the shoes everyone wore, maybe once every other decade he had a weird week where he tried to be "nice" only to become frustrated when his efforts weren't immediately met in kind by the rightfully-terrified spawn, maybe between all the torture and horrific-ness he just did some plain weird shit like making someone crouch by in his fainting couch and wait by open-handed for grapes that he dramatically chewed on and then spat right out since he can't actually eat them lmao
And that's hysterical but I think we also started doing that because when you meet Cazador, when you first hear his voice and see his demeanor in person your immediate reaction is probably somewhere along the lines of "THIS is the clown you were so scared of, Astarion?"
And the answer is, of course, yes. This embarrassing little man stuck in a cage of his making instills fear beyond comprehension in Astarion and all his siblings. This man who undoubtedly showed all these spawn, inadvertently, the strangest, most arguably "human" aspects of himself at some point or another during these two centuries they had together is also an absolute monster. And i really like that! I think its far more effective and fitting for his story than if he was, lets say, a Ketheric type.
(this got very long so, more under the cut)
Look at Ascended Astarion in the epilogue now, for example. Everyone agrees that he's an absolute fucking dork - and I think we all also agree that he will go on to destroy the lives of many people beyond repair, especially his own, until the day he is killed.
In the topic of vampirism as an allegory for abuse, I both agree and also don't, at least not exactly - i just think it's deeper than that. I've spoken about this in another post but i find it incredibly refreshing how, to me, it seems like Baldur's Gate 3 has no interest in painting vampirism as sexy or fun past a surface level. It's a curse that nobody asks for unless put in a situation where they feel as if they have no other way out, and it shapes and haunts you for the rest of your undead existence.
Even if you enjoy its benefits at first, that has a time limit. You will see your family and loved ones die, you will see culture evolve while you stay perpetually the same. You will experience so much hurt and pain because the only thing that makes life truly sweet is knowing that it is finite, and eventually it will wear down all of your humanity. And since you can't die unless you are scorched by the sun, staked, or dismembered, you must live with the knowledge that you will never have a peaceful death - and since you won't have a peaceful death, you better not die - and if you don't want to die, you better not be weak - and if you don't want to be weak, you must seek out power at all cost and slash things like love and friendship out of your life.
And what is funny, is that in his attempt to be more like a mortal - to eat, drink, walk the sun, such incredibly simple desires - Cazador (and Astarion, if he ascends) is accidentally only drawing further away from the person he supposedly once was, because that fear of weakness has already utterly corrupted his soul.
That's quite a grim way to look at it, of course. But I genuinely think that it is the natural conclusion of something like immortality.
That's why I quite like that, even after Astarion has found happiness, even after he finds his peace, he still doesn't exactly embrace being a vampire - because It's not something he should be expected to embrace. I think it's a very unique take on the trope.
I also want to leave here this message written by his character writer, which really got me thinking about him on a deeper level since i saw it months ago. It is specifically about the sexual aspect, but I think it branches beyond it too, when you think about it.
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