#editorial notorious

[public---mags]

Big Footprints | The Notorious B.I.G. for Vibe Magazine, March 2004

[alazarrr]

Notorious KIA + Vogue Magazine

[mostlysignssomeportents]

There’s no such thing as “shareholder supremacy”

On SEPTEMBER 24th, I'll be speaking IN PERSON at the BOSTON PUBLIC LIBRARY!

Here's a cheap trick: claim that your opponents' goals are so squishy and qualitative that no one will ever be able to say whether they've been succeeded or failed, and then declare that your goals can be evaluated using crisp, objective criteria.

This is the whole project of "economism," the idea that politics, with its emphasis on "fairness" and other intangibles, should be replaced with a mathematical form of economics, where every policy question can be reduced to an equation…and then "solved":

https://pluralistic.net/2023/03/28/imagine-a-horse/#perfectly-spherical-cows-of-uniform-density-on-a-frictionless-plane

Before the rise of economism, it was common to speak of its subjects as "political economy" or even "moral philosophy" (Adam Smith, the godfather of capitalism, considered himself a "moral philosopher"). "Political economy" implicitly recognizes that every policy has squishy, subjective, qualitative dimensions that don't readily boil down to math.

For example, if you're asking about whether people should have the "freedom" to enter into contracts, it might be useful to ask yourself how desperate your "free" subject might be, and whether the entity on the other side of that contract is very powerful. Otherwise you'll get "free contracts" like "I'll sell you my kidneys if you promise to evacuate my kid from the path of this wildfire."

The problem is that power is hard to represent faithfully in quantitative models. This may seem like a good reason to you to be skeptical of modeling, but for economism, it's a reason to pretend that the qualitative doesn't exist. The method is to incinerate those qualitative factors to produce a dubious quantitative residue and do math on that:

https://locusmag.com/2021/05/cory-doctorow-qualia/

Hence the famous Ely Devons quote: "If economists wished to study the horse, they wouldn’t go and look at horses. They’d sit in their studies and say to themselves, ‘What would I do if I were a horse?’"

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/27/economism/#what-would-i-do-if-i-were-a-horse

The neoliberal revolution was a triumph for economism. Neoliberal theorists like Milton Friedman replaced "political economy" with "law and economics," the idea that we should turn every one of our complicated, nuanced, contingent qualitative goals into a crispy defined "objective" criteria. Friedman and his merry band of Chicago School economists replaced traditional antitrust (which sought to curtail the corrupting power of large corporations) with a theory called "consumer welfare" that used mathematics to decide which monopolies were "efficient" and therefore good (spoiler: monopolists who paid Friedman's pals to do this mathematical analysis always turned out to be running "efficient" monopolies):

https://pluralistic.net/2022/02/20/we-should-not-endure-a-king/

One of Friedman's signal achievements was the theory of "shareholder supremacy." In 1970, the New York Times published Friedman's editorial "The Social Responsibility of Business Is to Increase Its Profits":

https://www.nytimes.com/1970/09/13/archives/a-friedman-doctrine-the-social-responsibility-of-business-is-to.html

In it, Friedman argued that corporate managers had exactly one job: to increase profits for shareholders. All other considerations – improving the community, making workers' lives better, donating to worthy causes or sponsoring a little league team – were out of bounds. Managers who wanted to improve the world should fund their causes out of their paychecks, not the corporate treasury.

Friedman cloaked his hymn to sociopathic greed in the mantle of objectivism. For capitalism to work, corporations have to solve the "principal-agent" problem, the notoriously thorny dilemma created when one person (the principal) asks another person (the agent) to act on their behalf, given the fact that the agent might find a way to line their own pockets at the principal's expense (for example, a restaurant server might get a bigger tip by offering to discount diners' meals).

Any company that is owned by stockholders and managed by a CEO and other top brass has a huge principal-agent problem, and yet, the limited liability, joint-stock company had produced untold riches, and was considered the ideal organization for "capital formation" by Friedman et al. In true economismist form, Friedman treated all the qualitative questions about the duty of a company as noise and edited them out of the equation, leaving behind a single, elegant formulation: "a manager is doing their job if they are trying to make as much money as possible for their shareholders."

Friedman's formulation was a hit. The business community ran wild with it. Investors mistook an editorial in the New York Times for an SEC rulemaking and sued corporate managers on the theory that they had a "fiduciary duty" to "maximize shareholder value" – and what's more, the courts bought it. Slowly and piecemeal at first, but bit by bit, the idea that rapacious greed was a legal obligation turned into an edifice of legal precedent. Business schools taught it, movies were made about it, and even critics absorbed the message, insisting that we needed to "repeal the law" that said that corporations had to elevate profit over all other consideration (not realizing that no such law existed).

It's easy to see why shareholder supremacy was so attractive for investors and their C-suite Renfields: it created a kind of moral crumple-zone. Whenever people got angry at you for being a greedy asshole, you could shrug and say, "My hands are tied: the law requires me to run the business this way – if you don't believe me, just ask my critics, who insist that we must get rid of this law!"

In a long feature for The American Prospect, Adam M Lowenstein tells the story of how shareholder supremacy eventually came into such wide disrepute that the business lobby felt that it had to do something about it:

https://prospect.org/power/2024-09-17-ponzi-scheme-of-promises/

It starts in 2018, when Jamie Dimon and Warren Buffett decried the short-term, quarterly thinking in corporate management as bad for business's long-term health. When Washington Post columnist Steve Pearlstein wrote a column agreeing with them and arguing that even moreso, businesses should think about equities other than shareholder returns, Jamie Dimon lost his shit and called Pearlstein to call it "the stupidest fucking column I’ve ever read":

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2018/06/07/will-ending-quarterly-earnings-guidance-free-ceos-to-think-long-term/

But the dam had broken. In the months and years that followed, the Business Roundtable would adopt a series of statements that repudiated shareholder supremacy, though of course they didn't admit it. Rather, they insisted that they were clarifying that they'd always thought that sometimes not being a greedy asshole could be good for business, too. Though these statements were nonbinding, and though the CEOs who signed them did so in their personal capacity and not on behalf of their companies, capitalism's most rabid stans treated this as an existential crisis.

Lowenstein identifies this as the forerunner to today's panic over "woke corporations" and "DEI," and – just as with "woke capitalism" – the whole thing amounted to a a PR exercise. Lowenstein links to several studies that found that the CEOs who signed onto statements endorsing "stakeholder capitalism" were "more likely to lay off employees during COVID-19, were less inclined to contribute to pandemic relief efforts, had 'higher rates of environmental and labor-related compliance violations,”' emitted more carbon into the atmosphere, and spent more money on dividends and buybacks."

One researcher concluded that "signing this statement had zero positive effect":

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/08/companies-stand-solidarity-are-licensing-themselves-discriminate/614947

So shareholder supremacy isn't a legal obligation, and statements repudiating shareholder supremacy don't make companies act any better.

But there's an even more fundamental flaw in the argument for the shareholder supremacy rule: it's impossible to know if the rule has been broken.

The shareholder supremacy rule is an unfalsifiable proposition. A CEO can cut wages and lay off workers and claim that it's good for profits because the retained earnings can be paid as a dividend. A CEO can raise wages and hire more people and claim it's good for profits because it will stop important employees from defecting and attract the talent needed to win market share and spin up new products.

A CEO can spend less on marketing and claim it's a cost-savings. A CEO can spend more on marketing and claim it's an investment. A CEO can eliminate products and call it a savings. A CEO can add products and claim they're expansions into new segments. A CEO can settle a lawsuit and claim they're saving money on court fees. A CEO can fight a lawsuit through to the final appeal and claim that they're doing it to scare vexatious litigants away by demonstrating their mettle.

CEOs can use cheaper, inferior materials and claim it's a savings. They can use premium materials and claim it's a competitive advantage that will produce new profits. Everything a company does can be colorably claimed as an attempt to save or make money, from sponsoring the local little league softball team to treating effluent to handing ownership of corporate landholdings to perpetual trusts that designate them as wildlife sanctuaries.

Bribes, campaign contributions, onshoring, offshoring, criminal conspiracies and conference sponsorships – there's a business case for all of these being in line with shareholder supremacy.

Take Boeing: when the company smashed its unions and relocated key production to scab plants in red states, when it forced out whistleblowers and senior engineers who cared about quality, when it outsourced design and production to shops around the world, it realized a savings. Today, between strikes, fines, lawsuits, and a mountain of self-inflicted reputational harm, the company is on the brink of ruin. Was Boeing good to its shareholders? Well, sure – the shareholders who cashed out before all the shit hit the fan made out well. Shareholders with a buy-and-hold posture (like the index funds that can't sell their Boeing holdings so long as the company is in the S&P500) got screwed.

Right wing economists criticize the left for caring too much about "how big a slice of the pie they're getting" rather than focusing on "growing the pie." But that's exactly what Boeing management did – while claiming to be slaves to Friedman's shareholder supremacy. They focused on getting a bigger slice of the pie, screwing their workers, suppliers and customers in the process, and, in so doing, they made the pie so much smaller that it's in danger of disappearing altogether.

Here's the principal-agent problem in action: Boeing management earned bonuses by engaging in corporate autophagia, devouring the company from within. Now, long-term shareholders are paying the price. Far from solving the principal-agent problem with a clean, bright-line rule about how managers should behave, shareholder supremacy is a charter for doing whatever the fuck a CEO feels like doing. It's the squishiest rule imaginable: if someone calls you cruel, you can blame the rule and say you had no choice. If someone calls you feckless, you can blame the rule and say you had no choice. It's an excuse for every season.

The idea that you can reduce complex political questions – like whether workers should get a raise or whether shareholders should get a dividend – to a mathematical rule is a cheap sleight of hand. The trick is an obvious one: the stuff I want to do is empirically justified, while the things you want are based in impossible-to-pin-down appeals to emotion and its handmaiden, ethics. Facts don't care about your feelings, man.

But it's feelings all the way down. Milton Friedman's idol-worshiping cult of shareholder supremacy was never about empiricism and objectivity. It's merely a gimmick to make greed seem scientifically optimal.

The paperback edition of The Lost Cause, my nationally bestselling, hopeful solarpunk novel is out this month!

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/09/18/falsifiability/#figleaves-not-rubrics/a>

[genshin-impact-updates]

He who looks down on all that are haughty

Someday, when they return, their true ordeal shall begin.

— Xbalanque, One Entombed With the Primal Fire

◆ Name: Neuvillette

◆ Title: Ordainer of Inexorable Judgment

◆ Iudex of Fontaine

◆ ???: Hydro

◆ Constellation: ???

"Given that our previous behind-the-scenes editorial on the Hydro Archon earned us the honorable epithet of 'tabloid journalism' from our dear Monsieur Neuvillette, this time we'll be focusing on the mysterious Iudex himself. We know little indeed of his true character, and sadly our multiple requests for an interview were all turned down. Instead, we have decided to reach out and draw upon the wisdom of the masses. In the pursuit of the truth, all anonymous submissions and attestations of manifestly questionable veracity have been filtered out. We were rather intrigued, however, by the following letter written in a particularly adorable script:

...

"If the Darknight Hero really does exist, he's probably just someone in disguise. When he gets up in the morning to brush his teeth, it's the real him. Only in the dead of night does he become the Darknight Hero. But not (Monsieur) Neuvillette. The Chief Justice IS the real him. For us Melusines, our ideal of the perfect father — that's also the real him. The only person that isn't really him is the one that goes by the name of Neuvillette."

From this, we can safely surmise... that Neuvillette must be the only male Melusine! Granted, the Melusines actually appeared much later than when Neuvillette took up his post. But in the face of such ironclad evidence, there's bound to be some way of explaining this!"

— Seven Nations Gazette, a notorious tabloid

[simply-ivanka]

Harris and the First Amendment

The Supreme Court rebuked her use of lawfare in California.

By The Editorial Board -- Wall Street Journal

We keep looking for an issue, any issue, on which Kamala Harris differs with the Democratic left, but we keep coming up empty. That includes her party’s use of lawfare against political opponents, as an episode while she was California Attorney General reminds us.

Ms. Harris made headlines a decade ago by threatening to punish nonprofit groups that refused to turn over unredacted donor information. She demanded they hand to the state their federal IRS Form 990 Schedule B in the name of discovering “self dealing” or “improper loans.” The real purpose was to learn the names of conservative donors and chill future political giving—that is, political speech.

Her bullying came amid the Internal Revenue Service’s notorious targeting of conservative nonprofits; Wisconsin’s probe of GOP donors; Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin’s intimidation of donors to the American Legislative Exchange Council; and a campaign of harassment against donors who supported California’s Prop 8 (which banned same-sex marriage).

Free-market nonprofits challenged the Harris dragnet, suing the AG’s office in a case that went to the U.S. Supreme Court. In Americans for Prosperity Foundation v. Bonta in 2021, the High Court ruled 6-3 that the AG’s disclosure demand broke the law. The Court pointed out that a lower court had found not “a single, concrete instance in which pre-investigation collection of a Schedule B did anything to advance the Attorney General’s investigative, regulatory or enforcement efforts.”

The Court said California’s claim that it would protect donor information lacked credibility, since during the litigation plaintiffs discovered nearly 2,000 Schedule B forms “inadvertently posted to the Attorney General’s website.” It noted that the petitioners and donors faced “threats” and “retaliation.”

The Supreme Court said Ms. Harris’s policy posed a risk of chilling free-speech rights, and it cited its 1958 NAACP v. Alabama precedent, which protected First Amendment “associational” rights. Ms. Harris is citing her experience as state AG as a political asset, but the Bonta case is a warning to voters that she’s willing to use the law as a weapon against political opponents.

Lawfare has failed as a political strategy against Donald Trump while undermining public confidence in impartial justice. Ms. Harris’s record suggests she’ll continue down this abusive road.

Copyright ©2024 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 87990cbe856818d5eddac44c7b1cdeb8

Appeared in the August 5, 2024, print edition as 'Harris and the First Amendment'.

[loving-n0t-heyting]

Stumbled upon this rattish academic philosopher(?) with a substack complaining about how the "far left" are not willing to try and persuade ppl of their points of view on contentious topics like palestine and instead rely on purely emotional histrionics, citing as evidence that he spent 20min(!?) trying to confront random student protesters about their opposition to israel. Me fuming about this is maaaaybe a version of unproductive hunting for a guy online to get mad at but this is definitely a sentiment i have heard before, that the far left in particular is disinclined to argument and persuasion

My instinct every time someone says this shit is to ask, Have you ever flipped open a copy of jacobin? There are plenty of ppl on the "far left" willing to make this that or the other "case" for their pov if you actually seek out those arguments in the venues typical of lengthy political arguments. The domain of "arguments for why israel is bad and was a mistake" is famously about as richly inhabited as any on any topic. And if you want further left than jacobin (which has an editorial line that would absolutely still qualify as far left from this guys perspective), leninist pamphleteers and anarchist zine-writers are notoriously happy to provide. Some random university encampment foot soldiers arent likely going to be the ones doing that for the same reason the median participant at a hillary rally is not going to be the most eloquent apologist for centrist-wing democrats and an arbitrarily selected guy with a ron paul bumper sticker will not be particularly compelling when speaking on behalf of a return to the gold standard, theres nothing special about the student activists position on the political spectrum here other than thst ppl seem disproportionately likely to expect every "purple-haired androgynous man wearing a shirt that says [queers] for Palestine" to do the job of a professional editorialist for their faction while allowing for intellectual division of labour on others

If you talk to a Curtis Yarvin-type monarchist about the optimal government, they’ll argue about it for hours on end. Neoreactionaries were famous for writing absurdly long articles going back and forth with those who disagreed with them. Because they were fringe, because most people disagreed with them, they didn’t have the presumption that challenging them was gauche or indicative of moral failing. They were willing to get down dirty and argue.

No, man, mencius moldbug was "famous for writing absurdly long articles going back and forth with those who disagreed with" him. I remember the neoreactionary randos when that fad was still ongoing, and they spent most opportunities for debate instead being loudly self pitying. Which is not even really that much of a dig bc "highly articulate propagandist" will be an extreme minority in any political movt larger than a small friend circle of curious eccentrics, that is the whole point! You have to compare apples to apples, and instead of even looking for any you are deliberately hunting down the aisle for oranges and shaking yr head in disapproval

[lonelywretchjervistetch]

Okay, you like birds and you like superheroes, so you seem uniquely qualified to answer a question that’s bothered me for awhile: WHY is Red Robin named that when there’s already a Red Hood AND a Robin. It just. . . Blends with the rest of the post robin personas so poorly

(If the Crow wasn’t already taken I would have suggested that since Tim has that whole thing going on with the court of Owls and those two species notoriously hate each other.)

So if you could redesign Tim Drakes vigilante persona what would be your pick?

Hoo boy, now there's a goddamn question, isn't there? I answer it at the end, I promise, but I wanted to explain my reasoning. So, yeah, scroll down if you want the answer quick.

But OK, I can answer your first question really easily: why is Tim Drake called Red Robin if Red Hood already exists? Easy: because Red Robin came first. And I don't mean that as a concept or nursery rhyme or expression; I mean that a Robin, one of Batman's sidekicks, taking up the identity of Red Robin, existed first, complete with the costume. BEHOLD! Mark Waid and Alex Ross' brilliant comic book Kingdom Come, one of the most important DC Comics stories ever published, and arguably one of its most iconic near-future stories!

First published in 1996, this story came out after Tim Drake was introduced in comics, and well before Jason Todd came back to life as Red Hood. And...is actually Dick Grayson in the future, not Tim Drake. In fact, Tim never appears in Kingdom Come for some reason, but a future version of Damian surprisingly does! Ask Mark Waid, not me. Anyway, when DC introduced Damian Wayne into the main continuity, they realized two Robins weren't going to do. SO, they reintroduced the identity of Red Robin, and this time gave it to...Jason Todd. Yeah, Jason actually picked up the identity in main continuity first, during the Countdown to Final Crisis storyline. He was given the costume by Batman from an alternate universe that was a utopian society yaddayaddayadda, you get the point. Jason had it first.

But, that didn't last very long, and Jason became Red Hood again after that event was done. And so, Red Robin was eventually picked up by...Ulysses Armstrong. Yeah, the identity was stolen by a Nightwing and Robin villain previously known as the General, who was basically a child genius that used the identity to...well, kill Robin. Ulysses is an asshole, it's a whole thing. Anyway, after this event, FINALLY, Tim Drake takes up the mantle of Red Robin. So, yeah, Tim is the THIRD Red Robin in continuity. Which, now that you mention it, DOES make it odd that Tim would adopt the identity after it was stained by Ulysses. But, DC editorial wanted the Red Robin character to exist in canon, and Tim was the only character that made sense to wear the mantle. It's a reference for reference's sake, which isn't great, admittedly.

But, OK, you're asking me what I would do if given the reigns to Tim Drake's identity after Damian Wayne essentially steals the mantle of Robin. OK, Anonymous, I'll play your game. And I actually do have an answer to this question. First off, what does Tim Drake represent amongst the Robins, especially compared to the others and their superhero identities? All of the Robins are reflections of Batman himself, often somewhat unintentionally. Their superhero identities similarly reflect this. Let's give the two most prominent examples.

Nightwing is the superhero. Dick Grayson, originally, was the kid sidekick of Batman, and embraced that with a lightness that Bruce could never manifest. As a result, his ideals were that of the traditional superhero: the day-saving good guy who does the right thing for the disadvantaged, old chum. So, his adult persona reflects this. It's a reference to Superman (Nightwing was originally a superhero and Krypton that Superman told a young Dick about early in their friendship), and it's a sort-of cheesy heroic name that also references Batman. Nightwing, savior of Bludhaven! Has a ring to it.

Red Hood is a vigilante against the law. Jason Todd, originally, was a little street punk who stole the tires off of the Batmobile. He's a criminal. When he becomes Robin, he embraces the vigilante identity by also embracing his temper, becoming a rougher-around-the-edges Robin who doesn't follow the rules very well. And then, he dies at the Joker's hand. When he comes back to life, he embraces the idea of being a brutal vigilante that doesn't care about the rules or morality, essentially becoming a criminal in the process. And so, when he has to choose the name of a criminal, why not name himself after the man who created him: Joker. So, he names himself Red Hood, which is also the Joker's old identity before getting acid dipped. Maybe this was on purpose, maybe it was subconscious, but it doesn't matter. He wants to be a lawbreaker, so he gets the identity of a lawbreaker.

Damian Wayne is the martial artist. To be fair, Damian still hasn't come into his own as an adult, since he's...well, a teenager. Because of that, we don't know what his identity is going to be, other than...well, Batman. Yeah, he's quite literally the son of Batman, so it does make sense that he'd become the next Batman. But again, that is yet to be seen. In terms of being a reflection of his father, though, he's the overdisciplined and overserious martial artist, and also...a child. Yeah, no offence to Bruce, but he's still in many ways a child in a mask. And so, Damian originally represented that. But now, as he's grown older in comics, he instead reflects the self-assured determination of his father, as well as the superior martial arts skills. And that finally leaves one major aspect unaccounted for, and you know what it is.

Tim Drake is the detective. Look, Tim is known as the "smart Robin" for a reason...because he is. He's the smart Robin. But in terms of being a reflection of Batman, he represents the Dark Knight's more Holmesian aspects. He's the inquisitive analyst, the tactician, the observer, the planner. So, whatever Tim's adult persona is, it should reflect him as a detective and tactician. And here's a question: should it be a bird at all? I mean, Nightwing only evokes a bird, and Red Hood definitely isn't a bird. So maybe Tim should actually be the only one to keep the bird thing in earnest. But if he does...maybe he could be a little smarter about it.

Y'know, I like your suggestion of "Crow", Anonymous. Smart bird, love the enemy of owls point, too. But Crow feels...off. It's not a great superhero name, as you pointed out. Of course, we're really looking for the name of a good detective. So, maybe you have the right family, just the wrong member. SOme people I've seen suggest Jackdaw, which...come to think of it, may just be a Reddit joke, but either way, I don't like it? So, instead, how about...

The Rook (Corvus frugilegus) is a Eurasian corvid known for its ability to solve problems. It's often seen in the presence of similar, related birds (like the Jackdaw), and lives in nests called rookeries. They have the ability to use complex tools, and even understand the concept of gravity. But perhaps the biggest reason why I think Tim should take up the name Rook, other than the fact that his hideout already has a name now (the Rookery), and the fact that he can keep the "R" on his costume, AND the fact that Rook is also a pretty good codename for a detective or spy...is the double meaning.

After all...I feel like Tim is the kind of person who plays a lot of chess to harness his skills in planning and tactics, amongst other games. He probably has played a lot of games with Alfred, maybe with Bruce. And another name for the castle piece is, of course, the rook. A double-meaning, and BOTH work for the character. And for some reason, I've never seen anybody suggest this as a name for Tim Drake. Maybe I haven't looked in the right places, but thinking on it now...I honestly really want this name for him in the future. Give him a dark costume, maybe replace the red with blue, or even give him the Red Robin costume, recolored to reflect this identity instead! The possibilities abound, really.

Hopefully that was a satisfying answer for you! May not work for everybody, but that's what I would do if I were in charge of Time Drake! Definitely not Drake, or Sparrow, or the other names he's been given in the last few years, just sayin'.

[aconflagrationofmyown]

|| Memphis to Fort Hood

Timeline alterations: Spring of 1958

Theme: THAT ASKED FOR BABY ANNOUNCEMENT, sorta

So, so many thanks to all my darlings who I throw my ideas at and they in turn bolster my resolve and refine my daydreams.

Warnings: good ole fashioned 50’s misogyny, Elvis being rather poorly represented? -for the reasons of this being written as critique?…nothing explicit but themes of free use, subspace, paranoia and eating disorders (which ends up being morning sickness so no really big deal there, just wanted to be careful.

A note on the style of this particular interlude: One of my obsessions with this universe has been using multiple points of view and narrative styles, ultimately adding to my own expansive delusion that this AU really was the verified version of his life. 🤓 And see, if it had been we would have magazines and newspapers, speciations and interviews galore, all of which I’ve enjoyed fabricating in the past and intend to continue. Now I’ve cooked up something else, a faux cultural study on what would have been the massively studied and criticized impact of a couple this peculiar and idolized -Mrs. Presley and Other Martyrs:

Strangely, if one looks for the first cracks in a marriage that outlasted five decades, nine children, assasination attempts, adultery, rock n’ roll and the most publicized divorce of its time, one might find that the first fissure had begun to open by the Presley’s third week anniversary. Outlasted, that’s the key. But that doesn’t mean there weren’t things to outlast. The old curse of stepping outside Graceland and finding trouble found them early on, as did their tenacity to simply ignore and surmount the witch’s brew of criticism, ego and exhaustion.

It took 38 hours by train to reach Fort Hood from Memphis Tennessee in the year 1958. Time enough for legends to be made. Dynamics to be established. A couple dozen demons to resurface.

And impressions to be formed. Lasting impressions of herself by the scrutinizing public that Elaine Presley reportedly never forgave Elvis for -a remarkable instance of a grudge in a woman so notoriously absolvent.

At the start of the journey she boarded the train at Memphis a sheltered girl tucked under the arm of the most famous man on earth, her own face captured without obstruction for the first time by the press, wedding band flashing and virginal blush staining her features at the attention and the queries hurled at her. The most envied woman in the country hadn’t known she was wanted a month before and by the time she stepped off in Texas, Mrs Presley was the doe eyed subject and demure recipient of a hundred varied opinions, editorials, fan tokens and bouquets.

What her rushed wedding may have slighted Elaine Presley of in terms of a bridal fuss, this dutiful journey made up for in sheer abundance of notoriety. What her sequestered honeymoon had sheltered her from in terms of being tabloid fodder was more than made up for on the trip as Elaine Presley got paraded on the train balcony at each stop along the route by her beaming groom:

A sauve cad in a uniform who beamed at the crowd with a cocky leer that suggested much in regards to his reserved bride and was in stark contrast to the sober and tear streaked boy he’d been when he came up this way to say goodbye to his mama weeks before. This little couple and their little rebellion of a marriage was manic in appearance and in gaiety, and even the most charitable of well-wishers found the occasion they were celebrating a bit forced, a bit dire, a bit off kilter for something as sanctified and sober as matrimony.

This was compounded by the new groom’s attitude which seemed as eager to display the varied trousseau he decked this almost catatonically pliant girl in -with a change nearly on the hour- as he was to introduce his new wife to his nation’s worth of fans that crowded the rails as they hustled south.

As Hedda Hopper unapologetically noted in her column that week “…it makes a person wonder if this sensational canary of an entertainer is too proud of having conquered a sensible girl child into being his wife to realize he just married himself off the market. America’s daydream is now a taken man and no one in the nation seems ready for that, least of all him.”

Married, to Elvis Presley, was perhaps more of a reality than Miss Hopper and her column gave him credit for, although the old spinster might’ve been aghast if she knew what marital duties the young star prioritized over others. The folks who caught sight of the flushed couple at each stop might’ve had a suspicion. Certainly Elvis’ ever present entourage of childhood friends and relations couldnt hope to be left in the dark.

Even if the close quarters on the route, the thin traincar doors and shared meals were not enlightening enough, Elvis Presley gloated too much in being a new husband to possibly retain any mystery. Love drunk and determined to stay so lest panic or grief overtake him, his friends recall his unreasonable amounts of excitement and generosity in detail regarding his “lil wife.”

-And his skills as a lover, of course.

Nothing had changed for Elvis from his time on the road with these naughty friends of his except that now all his famous drive and obsession was channeled towards one rather overwhelmed teenage girl. One who had, in typical 1950’s fashion, promised to obey his every whim. Turns out, trapped in a train car for over a day with an insomniatic sex addict uncovers an astounding amount of whims that their more placid honeymoon at Graceland had kept at a low simmer.

Whether tamed by the supposed influence of his mother’s ghostly presence at Graceland or whether in a fit of gentlemanly restraint for an untried bride, Elvis Presley had, by all accounts, played the gentleman while at home in those first weeks of marriage. While happy and smug -so much so that the story went that when the colonel appeared at Graceland to assure himself that the secret wedding hadn’t happened, one look at Elvis and the girl on his lap assured him it had both occurred and been consummated- he had nevertheless been considerate, gentle and almost tutoring in aiding Elaine to adjust to her new life.

Trapped in the claustrophobic buzz of the train car speeding south to a life of regimented discipline and obedience in the army, the antsy rebel in him found his boredom and dread peaked beyond endurance and distracted himself with the new and ever captivating charms of his new wife.

Elvis Presley with a goal could be a dedicated and diligent man but without one he was a chaotic force of nature that could catch all those around him in a whirlpool of fun or an avalanche of insanity. Pursuing Elaine Presley had brought out the best in him and so intently did he peruse her with every traditional method of wooing a typical southern girl, that she had quite forgotten the more frightening aspects of his temperament that she and her father had been witness to before. She could be forgiven for thinking he had matured past such outbursts and compulsions he had been thrall to in his early fame. Subdued by grief and spurred by ambition to have her, he had been impressively restrained upon his return to Memphis and driven by a rededication of his life to the old values of his mama’s ambitions for him, he had managed to continue it into the first days of marriage.

The upcoming reality of life within the rigorous confines of Fort Hood was too strong for such flimsy good intentions. As was the oppressive reality of his mother’s permanent absence in his life. His love, which had always been a somewhat smothering thing that required as much as it gave, was needy yet inexpressive in those early days and according to his daughter Ella, who divulged some of her mother’s confidences in her own book, Elaine was yet to learn how terrified her young husband was of a future that most would have envied.

Scared of being alone, yet suspicious that his presence was merely being tolerated, young husband Elvis Presley had every hope he could train a young girl by conjugal powers alone to be loyal to him where others failed. In a fit of hubris and optimism, he chose for this amorous experiment the one woman in town who admitted to not being in love with him. This fear and frustration expressed itself in an appalling physical demand on her bodily attentions. One that their fellow train car occupants could not ignore yet found themselves incapable of preventing, bound by the antiquated respect of a husband's rights.

“I swear he’d not leave her alone for a full hour,” Red West recalled in his book, reflecting on the times he spent in the Presley’s entourage, “and he’d be back there with her for hours at a time, then pop out and then right back again. If he couldn't sleep then he didn’t see why she should.”

Billy Smith, his cousin and a man adamant about staying on Mrs. Presley’s good side over the years, would only admit discreetly, “He was utterly in love with her, had been for years and couldn’t quite pace himself once he got the green light, so to speak. He adored her and was in a bit of a state of shock that she was even better than he’d hoped, she was like the first thing to exceed his high expectations. She was very genuinely kind to him and he ate it up. On the train ride he was bored and it was like taking a bored kid to their favorite sweet shop. And Elvis Presley had a big ole bank account to cash in.”

Big enough, apparently, that by lunch of that day the ever proper young Mrs Presley, in her perfectly starched new outfits and watery lined eyes, was having trouble sitting still at table, much to the comment of guests and friends. After excusing herself early she went back to their suite. Elvis was seen following within minutes. Thirty minutes later the train stopped and Elaine Presley, in a fresh outfit and an uncharacteristic wobble to her stride was paraded by her husband on the balcony to the roar of envious onlookers.

The train moved on, she excused herself again, as did he moments later.

“We could hear them, it became like road noise.” Red West, long used to Elvis’ various rendezvous while on the road in the past took this marital overindulgence in stride, “Initially it was kinda a laugh and a grin about it with all the folks in the dining car, but then we could hear her tiring out, and he’d keep at it and it got a bit annoying, all her pleading and him going on about bein’ able to do anything he pleased with her. He’d come out and brag to us when we told him they were being loud.”

“He was very proud of how sensitive she was,” Joe Esposito does not bother to sound impressed himself when relating this confidence, “he’d tell us how she was a squirter and she got all sensitive real fast before he was even close to done and he’d just have to hold her and make her let him finish, sometimes make her keep going when she swore she couldn’t. He said he was training her to respond the way he wanted. It didn’t occur to him maybe she was made different than the ones he’d been with before, he just thought he was a damn good husband. Figure she just wanted a nap and maybe some Vaseline. Nobody dared to tell him to give her a break.”

Ultimately Vernon Presley ventured to do just that at breakfast the next morning, after his daughter in law had skipped dinner the night before and breakfast that day from a ubiquitous headache that was likely not an ache in the head at all.

“He was so timid about it as Elvis was in a mood, worn out and hadn’t slept, stabbin’ his eggs like they’d done him wrong.” Lamar Fike remembers the incident, “Vernon just spoke up real gentle like and says ‘son, why don’t you go easy on the little lady, she’s real fresh and delicate,’ Elvis just glared at him so he tried jokin by sayin’ something like ‘you got the rest of your lives for this, don’t gotta cram it all in today.’ Elvis didn’t even try to act dumb, he just got mad and stood up from the table and said ‘daddy, you mind your own business, reckon I don’t need lessons for how to take care of a wife, not from you leastwise.’ And that was a low blow, you could see it on Vernon’s face and like I said, Elvis stood up, with his napkin still tucked in his shirt neck, and went back there to her again like he was makin’ love to spite his old man. Ya just don’t tell Elvis what to do with what’s his.”

Charlie Hodge wasn’t there and in an admirable display of keeping in his lane only commented that, “Elvis told me they danced a lotta the way, had the old records on, trying to keep the cramp away. He’d get antsy on trips.”

Marty Lacker had the decency to at least be sheepish and a little apologetic about the times when relating his version of events, “Just a different time back then, ya know? Didn’t occur to us to step in. We’d say a thing or two but ultimately that’s between a husband and wife to sort out and back then wives just didn’t fuss. It all worked out, they sorted it. Elaine never breathed a word of anything and we wouldn’t think of saying anything to her. Not even after the little emergency, you just don’t talk about that stuff. It’s not fitting. Even Elvis knew that, he didn’t appreciate the advice or adminitions from his daddy. Braggin’ between boys us one thing but talkin’ about what goes on between a man and his wife beyond that it’s, it’s just, it’s not fittin. It’s just not a thing to be discussed, you know? Different times, man.”

The little emergency in question was a case of Elvis bursting out of the train car an hour or so after lunch on the second day in search of his paternal grandmother, old Dodger as the family called her, full of consternation that his young bride was unresponsive.

“I really think he rode her silly, that’s all there was to it.” Joe shrugs at this bold diagnosis, “He’d brag about how out of it she’d get when he would start again after she thought he was done. Said she’d space right out and start shakin’ and shivering and get plain stupid. I think he liked that, makin’ a smart girl feel dumb. He’d dress her up and redo her makeup and take her out like that in front of fans, and they all got the impression she was a little bozo. Then I guess he just kept at it one time too long.”

Elvis told Dodger that his wife was not fully concious, although his heightened concern was less regarding her insensibility than the fact that neither a light smack to the cheek nor a resumption of activities on his part could rouse Elaine like it had on previous occasions. Vernon dunked her head in a bowl of ice water with no success, Billy tried to give her aspirins but she wasn’t awake to swallow them down.

Dodger prescribed a drink of water for the young girl, a cold compress to the nether regions and a nap -sans husband. Disgruntled but terrified of losing yet another woman in his life, and with his own cheek stinging from his grandmother's wrath, Elvis Presley secluded himself to playing cards with the boys in the smoking lounge for the remaining three hours of the train ride while his grandmother watched over his bride and her precariously suggestible headspace.

“ ‘I done told her again and again to hold it if she gets so excitable after she comes that she can’t stand to take me longer. But she’s a hair trigger, couple stokes and she’s off, keeps comin’ all the same then acts like I’m skinnin’ her when I keep goin. I gotta finish man, what else am I supposed to do?” Red recalls Elvis bemoaning his bride’s hyper responsiveness like a martyr recounting his sentence -while wearing his signature sulky expression that did nothing to hide the smug pride beneath.

By the time Elaine Presley wobbled off the train onto the platform at Killeen Texas and stiff smilingly took her seat beside Elvis in a taxi to their little crackerbox house on base, the world at large had a firm opinion that the new Mrs Presley was a pretty little thing with dark features and a rosebud mouth, a nice figure and sweet charm but possessing a vacant sorta look to her. It suggested a gullibility so utterly untrue to her real nature that three decades worth of wit and shrewdness could hardly undue their initial impression of her.

Elaine Presley would ultimately have her revenge for such a first impression but it would cost her much in the process and Elvis Presley even more.

The buzz of press did not decline upon her arrival. With Private Presley busy soldiering all day, it fell to his young wife to sort the intricate social circle of his entourage and fellow soldiers, to manage the fanmail and contracts as well as set up house as best she could in such impermanent lodgings. All these precarious duties were stalked and documented beyond all sense, photographs of her and her choice of groceries dutifully printed for readers across the country to guess at what she planned to feed their idol for dinner. If the sharp glint in her eyes, captured on occasion when the intrusion became absurd, hinted at something beyond the vacant and ravished doll of the train ride, no one was eager to investigate. A sharp set to the mouth or a dangerous glitter in the eye got one called a bitch and it was better to be vacuous as a woman than to be venomous. So Elaine was caught smiling with her vegetables and spending her afternoons baking beneath a Texas sun while chatting with snide fellow housewives.

It was the first bootcamp for a lifelong grueling ordeal that Elaine Presley submitted to with grace and tenacity.

If her wit and her marital irregularities were glossed over by the papers in their eagerness to find the noble idyll amongst the immoral muck of rock and roll, what did not go unnoticed was the increasingly wane aspect of what should have been a rosy and glowing young wife. Shortly after arriving in Texas, Elaine’s already strained nerves seemed to have frazzled beyond small fits of fainting and what was once a private display of weariness kept between her and the implacable Dodger. Soon it became bouts of vomiting and exhaustion beyond any reasonable excuse.

The public noticed her figure grow slight and frail, as did Elvis. No longer was she slight but sickly instead, and a milky complexion was now waxy and unbecoming in contrast to her dark hair. The public were concerned for her, not for her health so much as for the future of the readership should her picturesque ordeals unravel further.

Battling his own preoccupation and exhaustion in the hard crucible of army bootcamp, Elvis’ one solace was the charming little haven he had created for himself with a wife and domesticity shipped in like so many plates and doilies. When this fairytale grew pale and bony and even the most cheerful of liars couldn’t convince him his “Tinkerbell” was fine, Elvis Presley grew increasingly paranoid of something fatal having cursed the women in his life. Frustrated at Elaine for allowing herself to grow so weak, his friends recall his behavior towards her vasciaiting from aching tenderness to angry remonstrances at her to eat and to rest and take care of herself. He even paced his own indulgences and begged her not to bring him the usual treats she’d sneak into barracks during the heat of afternoon. He pampered and berated, prayed and cursed.

None of these precautions were sufficient to build her up and alarmed beyond any reassurance, Elvis Presley packed his young bride into a car in the early summer of their first marriage and, having a five hour furlough from the army, drove her himself into the nearby hospital. The statement tossed to the press waiting outside was mild sinus congestion.

Twenty minutes later these two world wide famous young adults stumbled out in a daze of knowledge that they were about to be parents for the first time.

A severe case of twins -and the rigorous discipline of making them- having caused all the raucous.

No longer scared of abandonment, imminent loss or rebellion on his wife’s part, Elvis Presley softened considerably in the next months, the looming likelihood of a separation with his deployment softening him even further. It was the first case of children saving -and complicating- one of the most volatile and devoted couples of the 20th century.

By the first few weeks of the second trimester, Elaine Presley was both filled out enough and sufficiently cheery to regain the accolades lost to her by the press during her first. Finding few friends to be had amongst jealous soldiers' girlfriends and snooty Sargeant’s wives, as well as having been abandoned by most childhood companions after becoming mistress of Graceland, Elaine, never to be out maneuvered by bad luck, turned those publicized grocery store runs into social occasions, her growing belly eliciting advice and solicitations from wise old Texan grandma’s and rancher’s wives.

Accompanied by the stoically indomitable Dodger, Elaine could be found at geriatric swim classes at the local pool in a bid to stay cool during the heat of summer, at smoky poker games at Billy Bob’s honky tonk where she was the lone abstainer from the free flowing bourbon and became winner of a mechanical bull riding competition against a Navy Pilot.

It was a win for the infantry that night and even Elvis drank a cold one in celebration of her winnings that she spent on quenching the Hell on Wheels squadron at the adjacent saloon. Those Sargeant’s wives got somehow even more acrid after that.

Whether there was a correlation between this heated ride-off and said Navy Pilot’s face ending up black and blue the next day from some jealous young husband’s fist, was anyone's conjecture. Either way, Elvis Presley was likely too busy for such petty displays of insecurity, he was hiding in the lavatory most times to get away from his recently energized and insatiable young wife whose visits to Fort Hood soon became a byword and euphemism for something else besides visitation.

Altogether the Presley’s in Texas was an eclectic and occasionally damaging PR debut, but not without its merits.

The nation decided the new Mrs. Presley may have been a little short in the smarts department but she made pregnancy look fun again and that was rather charming and not a little rebellious, as was unapologetically marrying Elvis Presley right from under their noses. And Elvis? Well, it would be two long years before the world got any candid, civilian, unrepentant opinion out of Private Presley.

Hope you enjoyed! 💋

Tags: (let me know if you’d like to be added or retracted)

@paradsol000

@eliseinmemphis

@prompted-wordsmith

@ab4eva

@foreverdolly

@powerofelvis

@butlersxbirdy

@crash-and-cure

@elvisabutler

@heartbrake-hotel

@stylespresleyhearted

@thatbanditqueen

@crazymadpassionatelove

@myradiaz

@ash-omalley

@whatstruthgottadowithit

@arianatheangelgirl

@steph-speaks

@burningloverdoll

@angelface-555

@lookingforrainbows

@missmaywemeetagain

@coolgirl462

@kingdomforapony

@18lkpeters

@richardslady121

@from-memphis-with-love

@lillypink

@artlover8992

@pennyroyalcreep

@notstefaniepresley

@ellie-24

@renaissingle

@waiting4brucewayne2adoptme

@presleyenterprise

@marriedtopresley

@ashtag2887

@dkayfixates

@vampireindistress

@ashtag6887

@i-r-i-n-a-a

@obsessedvibee

@peskybedtime

[at-thezenith]

acquiring a manuscript - the agent and editor

hello, it's me, your favourite publishing student. let's talk acquisition.

so you've managed to secure an agent with your manuscript. then what?

most agents will do a developmental edit on first deciding to work with you. plot, character, pace, continuity and worldbuilding all come under this. what makes a good agent (and editor) is whether they are offering you suggestions on what to do instead of outright rewriting your work.

once you've made those changes (or gone back and forth depending on how much you do or don't want to make that change), your agent will send your manuscript to editors in publishing houses.

a key question on their mind is: can i sell this book? agents (and editors, but i'm getting to that) look at a book's merit, and they look at what they can compare it to. you need some sort of USP (unique selling point)

is it pride and prejudice but trans? most ardently by gabe cole novoa. is it black mirror in south east asia? red dust , white snow by pan huiting. (highly rec both, btw)

key note here - if you are submitting to a publishing house that accepts unsolicited manuscripts, you will skip straight to this next step.

your manuscript will land on an editor's desk, along with the pitch your agent has given them, usually tailored to that editor's or that house's tastes. in a big house, that editor will usually pass that manuscript to an assistant, to do a reader's report, in which the assistant will sum up the plot, point out strengths and weaknesses, and most importantly, tell them whether it is worth publishing. some manuscripts don't make it past this step, and in that case, the agent will send it to another house.

if the editor likes the sound of this manuscript, they will then read it. usually, they will read it three times: one for first glance edits, two for developmental edits, and three for line edits (line by line, spelling/grammar, vocabulary, etc). once this is done, they will tell the agent that they plan to put their house in the running for acquisition. then comes the acquisition meeting.

the acquisition meeting is where your editor will fight to get the publishing house on board with your book. remember that USP? here's where that comes into play. your editor needs, above all else, to get sales and marketing on board. how can i sell this book? editors often ask other members of the meeting to read the book beforehand to have some support, and to point to the book's readability.

the literary qualities of the book certainly come into play, but what sales and marketing want to hear is how your book is both familiar and new. so your editor will construct a pitch that both highlights the excitement of your book, but also point to previous successes with books like yours. i know that comparing books to other books is tedious, but sales are notoriously pessimistic. they control the money, after all.

but your book makes it through the meeting, and you have the whole team on board. now comes the editorial letter. this is where the editor is going to do their best to sweet talk you (and your agent) into accepting their offer of publishing your book. however, they will both gush about your work, and tell you the edits they want you to make to it, from the big developmental changes all the way down to the way a character moves in a scene. don't be discouraged if the list of changes is long; if the editor didn't want to publish the book, it wouldn't have made it past their assistant.

this of course is assuming you decide to accept their offer immediately. you could have offers from other houses, and in that case you usually won't receive the editorial letter - or at least, not in such great depth - until you have signed a contract with the house of your choice. that is more complicated.

hope you found this useful! my dms are open if anyone has any questions :)

[slayingfiction]

Traditional Publishing

In the evolving landscape of publishing, traditional publishing has held a significant place, fostering literary culture for centuries. However, with the rise of digital media and self-publishing platforms, authors and readers are often caught in a debate over the relevance and benefits of traditional publishing methods. Let’s explore traditional publishing and its place in the literary world. 

Pros of Traditional Publishing

Professional Editing and Design: One of the most significant advantages of traditional publishing is the professional support, including editing, proofreading, cover design, and formatting, ensuring that the final product is of high quality. These services are crucial for authors who may not have the skills or resources to polish their work to a professional standard.

Marketing and Distribution: Traditional publishers have established networks and resources for marketing and distributing books. They can place books in prominent storefronts, organize book tours, and secure media coverage, which can be challenging for self-published authors to achieve on their own.

Credibility and Prestige: Being published by a recognized publishing house adds a layer of credibility to an author’s work. It can enhance an author’s reputation, as traditional publishers are selective and publish only those manuscripts they believe will succeed in the competitive market. This may be beneficial to those looking to get into literary writing, and the recognition that comes with associated awards.

Advance Payments: Traditional publishers sometimes offer advances to authors, especially to provide financial support during the writing process for future books. This upfront payment can be crucial for authors who need to dedicate significant time to their writing, which can be very necessary since many writer’s don’t make a full-time income from their writing. 

Editorial Support: You will work directly with experienced editors and receive feedback and guidance to improve the quality of your manuscript and make it more enticing to prospective readers.

Long-term Relationships: Traditional publishing can foster long-term relationships between authors and their publishers, leading to future book deals and collaborative opportunities. Publishing Houses also have established connections with stores, libraries, academic institutions, and more. These relationships are beneficial to the writer, no matter their genre of writing.

Rights Management: Publishers manage subsidiary rights, such as translations, film adaptations, and audio books, potentially opening additional revenue streams.

Focus on Writing: With the publisher handling many aspects of the publication process, authors can focus more on writing and less on the business side of publishing.

Cons of Traditional Publishing

Long Publication Process: The traditional publishing route can be lengthy. From submission to publication, the process can take anywhere from a year to several years, depending on various factors like the publisher’s schedule and market trends.

Loss of Creative Control: Authors may have to concede some creative control when working with a traditional publisher. Publishers can request changes in content, title, and even narrative style to fit market expectations or the publisher’s brand.

Tough Entry: Getting a contract with a traditional publisher is notoriously difficult. The process often requires finding an agent first, and then one must endure the rigorous selection process of publishers, which can be disheartening and discouraging.

Lower Royalties: Traditional publishing pays royalties, but these are typically lower than what one might earn through self-publishing. After the publisher, distributors, and retailers take their shares, authors might find their earnings to be low. Royalties are often made semi-annually or quarterly, leading to slower financial returns for the author.

Limited Marketing Support: Not all traditionally published books receive significant marketing support, especially from smaller or mid-sized publishers, leaving some authors to handle much of the promotion themselves.

Loss of Rights: Authors often have to sign over significant rights to their work, including international, audio, and film rights, limiting their control over these aspects.

Initial Gatekeeping: Authors must often secure a literary agent to approach traditional publishers, adding another layer of gatekeeping and potential delay.

Limited Print Runs: Publishers may limit the print run of a book, which can affect its availability and reach if initial sales are not strong.

Focus on Proven Authors: Publishers may prioritize established authors or celebrities, making it harder for new or lesser-known writers to get attention and resources.

Conclusion

Traditional publishing has its set of challenges and benefits. It offers a level of prestige, professional support, and market access that can be hard to achieve through self-publishing. However, it also involves a more considerable investment of time, a potential compromise on creative control, and can be challenging to break into.

Ultimately, the choice between traditional publishing and other forms of publishing such as self-publishing should be based on an author’s individual goals, resources, and priorities. Each path offers different opportunities and challenges, and what works best will depend on the specific needs and expectations of the author.

Check out Slaying Fiction for more content!

Happy Writing

[dynared]

With Duke #2 due next week as people start to more openly debate Skybound's take on Hasbro properties vs. IDW's (this is not a debate in sales, retailers are claiming Skybound outsold IDW's comics at least 10 to 1), it's worth looking at the fandoms that developed around IDW's takes on Transformers and GI Joe (more Transformers, as GI Joe struggled with numerous reboots and attempts at making a more modern interpretation of the property before the license was yanked by Hasbro) and why they might not gel with Skybound's more casual-friendly approach. Ramble under the cut:

IDW's Transformers fanbase was one that was insular by design. Not in the "you need to understand this concept from a toy line in 1989" insular, or the "you'll be lost if you didn't read Simon'Furman's Alignment novella", way, but more insular in the concepts that they focused on. Bot-on-bot romance, usually between male robots (James Roberts flat out said he was going to write romance, and went with male/male because it was a toyline full of men). A very notable disdain for concepts that would alter that perception, hence the villainization of the Japanese characters and the Beasts, because many of the fanfic writers hailed from unironic "TRUKK NOT MUNKY" and "TRANSFORMERS SHOULD BE REALISTIC" thinking fantasy elements ruined the series (and a disdain for Japanese mecha tropes in general). However, as noted by others, there were also a lot of holes in the characterizations that were filled by fanfic writers. I'm pretty sure the writers knew this since their old fanfic spawned other fanfic to fill in holes, and they saw it as a way to keep the core audience engaged.

This in turn creates a very focused, dedicated, but ultimately narrow audience, and one more likely to influence the direction of the comics, either positively or negatively. The fanbase want more romance? They got it to the point that the comics were more about relationships than anything. They wanted representation? The writers baked it into the mythos although it has since been discarded by non-IDW-influenced work. And if anyone didn't like it, sic the dedicated fandom on them and tell them to go back to the Bay movies.

GI Joe meanwhile, from the word "Go" felt like something IDW didn't really know what to do with, with their best idea being to give Larry Hama the keys to resume his Marvel run from where it left off (and ignoring the quasi-sequel run from Devil's Due which was mostly made without his involvement). It was clear that IDW's writers and editorial cared far more about Transformers and even Jem and the Holograms (a notorious stinker in sales that went for 25 issues and a 4-issue spin-off before IDW was forced to cancel it due to low sales and never bothered to try again) than the Real American Heroes. Some of that might be because the idea of military comics didn't agree with the more liberal writers there, but I'd argue that they didn't really try, especially with the Energon Universe also going out of its way to avoid a stereotypical "MURICAN soldiers vs. terrorist army" scenario. This resulted in the eventual nadir of the brand, the 2016 relaunch where Skywarp was a member of the team because reasons.

The Energon Universe is quite the opposite of that, and I can see where the worry comes in from the IDW fandom. The soldier toys are important again in a more direct way where it's clear there's more effort put into them. Meanwhile, the robot toys are back to focusing on more universal concepts, like war, family in a platonic sense, and general action. That sense of control feels lost, and it is also introducing concepts that feel like they run counter to IDW's writers and their ethos, particularly ideas that IDW writers rejected whole-heartedly.

If I'm off-base, please let me know, but that's what this feels like to me. A group losing their perceived control over a license, and not taking it well.

[weksey]

⭐️ mini ask post (sorry some of these are late)!

i'm glad you found it helpful! i work full time as a studio designer now but as a freelancer it would depend on the project... a lot of times clients would have a budget, so they'd set a flat rate and i'd negotiate from there (with varying results). disclaimer that these are junior rates and i live in the uk where the pay is notoriously bad, even in london:

for context, i mostly did hand-drawn animation for social media/marketing/tv ads - i had jobs ranging from £2k for ~12 secs of animation (though this was inclusive of storyboarding and character designs) to £600 for a whole-ass 90 sec film (also including storyboards/designs/edits). i wouldn't use the latter as a reference point because i was definitely being lowballed and if it were up to me i'd charge way higher LOL but as a graduate i ended up taking on those briefs for my portfolio and they did lead to me getting more work, for what it's worth. for comparison, i've talked to more established freelancers who'd ballpark £8-12k for a 2 min animation over a ~2 month production schedule.

my illustration work (mostly editorial gigs) would vary depending on the drawing's complexity/usage/client budget... but it was typically about £100-150 per illustration (also not great, but people kept telling me this was normal for a graduate so i just accepted it, despite being, like, fully rendered illustrations with bgs). again, i would price things differently if it were completely up to me, especially since i'm more confident with my style now, but i would honestly ask more experienced illustrators for better reference. i wanted to offer up my experience anyway bc i think it's beneficial to have transparent conversations about pay in this industry.

oh, and i do basically all of my illo/animation work in photoshop on my 8 year-old laptop (+ premiere pro for compositing), with a wacom intuos tablet... i don't necessarily recommend this equipment because 1) adobe is dudu, and 2) i recently started drawing on an ipad with procreate and it feels so much better than drawing on desktop, and i will probably upgrade my setup when i can comfortably afford to lol

in reference to these figurines - i used white air dry clay from hobbycraft! painted over with acrylics (and clay varnish, though that didn't seem to do much)

yeah... i salute akechi fans who are like, "i like akechi but i don't condone his actions" etc. because he could kill another 5 people and i'd be like, "that's literally iconic"

thank youuuuu! 💛 i'm glad people like my p5 art... even though a lot of it is old and ooc... i'll always keep it up because i like that others still enjoy it... goro akechi foreverrrrr

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Markos Moulitsas (kos) at Daily Kos:

Remember the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth group that besmirched Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry’s military record during the 2004 election? The architect of that discredited group was Chris LaCivita, who is now one of Donald Trump’s two campaign managers. It’s no accident that Republicans now are using many of that group’s same tactics to tarnish Democratic vice presidential nominee Tim Walz’s excellent military service.  Walz is among the highest-ranking retired enlisted service members to have ever run on a major presidential ticket. Only three vice presidents have ever had military service in the enlisted ranks, and only one president has.

Let me explain what all that means.  There are two kinds of leaders in the military: the officer track (lieutenants, majors, colonels, generals), and the enlisted track. Leaders in the enlisted ranks are called noncommissioned officers (NCO), which are the sergeants of various stripes (literally). Officers set the strategy and tactics, and sergeants execute those orders. They are two different tracks. To become an officer, it requires a college degree, whereas that’s not the case with the enlisted. I was enlisted, working up from private when I was in basic training, to specialist when I finished my service. The next rank up would’ve been sergeant. My son is a specialist today, and he will no doubt become an NCO before he finishes his service. 

Walz, who reached the rank of command sergeant major before he retired, is being accused of retiring when his unit was called up, instead of deploying. This accusation can be traced to this paid letter to the editor published in 2018 by two retired (and clearly conservative) high-ranking Minnesota National Guard members. The letter coincided with Walz’s first run for governor of the state. “When the nation called, he quit,” the two men wrote. To be very clear, when you see conservatives like Republican vice presidential candidate JD Vance claim “stolen valor,” that is just false. Heck, even the notoriously conservative Wall Street Journal editorial board said the claim is bogus. Walz never pretended to have served in war; he never made up accolades. The original accusation is simply that when Walz’s unit deployed to Iraq, he quit.

So what exactly happened? 

Walz joined the National Guard at 17, serving first in Nebraska and later in Minnesota. The National Guard is a reserve component of the U.S. Army, with dual state and federal duties. So under state command, they’ll do things like riot duty, state disaster support, counter-narcotics efforts, patrol the southern border if they have Republican governors looking to score political points, etc. They can also be federalized. That happened with my son’s California unit, where he spent the past year in the Middle East. There are National Guard units in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Virgin Islands. Walz rose up the ranks over 24 years of service until he reached the highest rank possible at the state level, command sergeant major. It’s a big, big deal to reach this level. 

[...] Walz didn’t quit his service to his nation. Far from it. He served 24 years in uniform, and he’s continued serving his state and his nation ever since—in Congress, in Minnesota as governor, and, next year, in Washington as the vice president of the United States.  Republicans pretend to honor military service, but it’s all an act. I would never deign to insult Ohio Sen. JD Vance’s military service. It is an honor to serve, and those who do it should be treated with the proper respect. Anyone who mocks someone who has honorably served is mocking all my brothers and sisters in arms, including my son.  Even worse, Republicans are currently rallying around a presidential candidate who famously used a claim of bone spurs and four education deferments to avoid being drafted for the Vietnam War. Donald Trump didn’t avoid service because of his conscience, which would in itself be honorable. He did so because he was too hoity-toity to serve.

Dear right-wingers who are trying to swiftboat Tim Walz: His military record is of sterling reputation.

See Also:

MMFA: These major news outlets-- especially The New York Times-- amplified JD Vance’s lie about Tim Walz’s military service without rebuttal

[samasmith23]

Kamala Khan's death in Amazing Spider-Man (2022) #26 leaked NOT once... but TWICE in a row!!!

It looks like someone at Marvel RRREEEAAALLLYYY wants this whole publicity stunt of killing off Ms. Marvel (aka, Kamala Khan) to FAIL super hard considering that the pages for tomorrow’s Amazing Spider-Man (2022) #26 have been leaked not once, but twice now! And now we sadly know exactly just how Kamala dies…

Umm… last time I checked, Kamala has a healing factor. Sure it’s nowhere as powerful as Wolverine’s (and it does require Kamala to eat a lot in order to replenish her energy reserves), but unless that sword is powered by some kind of magic bullcrap which completely shuts off her healing factor, this makes zero sense! Kamala literally healed from a bullet wound to the stomach in her opening arc, and even survived having an entire building collapse right on top of her (just barely, but still)!

Also, it feels so random and arbitrary to have Kamala randomly use her shape-shifting powers to pose as a body-double Mary Jane, especially since she’s not utilized them a lot due her opening arc centering around Kamala becoming comfortable in her own skin after previously trying and failing to resemble her idol Carol Danvers (therefore overcoming her personal insecurities and internalized Islamophobia).

Plus, last time I checked Kamala's only since then shape-shifted into a couch, James Rhodes, and a scary cartoon face.

While it does feel somewhat in character for Kamala to risk her life to save someone she barely knows as part of her characterization as a superhero, the actual execution of it feels incredibly at odds with her past character development (whether it be struggling with her fears of death and mortality in Magnificent Ms. Marvel, or already receiving validation from her family, friends, and dozens of other superheroes, including Peter Parker, so why does she need it from him again when she dies?!).

Based on these leaked pages, I get the general impression that Zeb Wells originally fully intended to kill off Mary Jane here since all throughout his Spider-Man run he’s heavily hinted at it and foreshadowed it with that Paul guy (seriously... WHO THE HECK IS PAUL?!) and their two kids (who are apparently actual mystical constructs or something…), and that mystical supervillain wanting “the Scarlet Woman’s blood” (I know the phrase "Scarlet Woman" is specifically meant to refer to MJ’s red hair, but it is also unfortunately a derogatory slang term for a sex-worker). But maybe Marvel editorial told him to rewrite his planned death of Mary Jane at the last minute as a desperate effort to promote the upcoming The Marvels movie (which Wells shares a co-writing credit for the screenplay of), or Wells wanted to subvert reader expectations but did so in a distasteful manner?

I honestly don’t know... but if I had to guess I’d probably say it’s the former option since Marvel previously killed off Doctor Strange and the Scarlet Witch before resurrecting them a few months later to hype up their upcoming MCU films, plus the Spider-Man offices in particular are notorious for their editorial mandates and interfering with writer’s plans at the last minute (just look at how they recently forced Nick Spencer to settle on retconning Sins Past out of existence instead of One More Day like he was originally building-up towards). And do I think that Zeb Wells himself is an Islamophobic misogynist because of this? Probably not... especially considering I don’t know the guy’s personal politics (maybe he's a swell person IRL) and editorial mandates are likely at play here. I do think that killing off Kamala in such a random and distasteful manner is still a bad look and does give off those unfortunate implications. However, based on what I know I feel that this is more a case of judging the actions as bigoted (whether they were intentional or not) instead of labeling the person themselves as a bigot.

But regardless of whether or not the decision to fridge Kamala Khan is the fault of Zeb Wells, or Nick Lowe or someone else over at Marvel Editorial, I do want to make one thing perfectly clear... DO NOT... I repeat... DO NOT SEND ANY OF THEM DEATH THREATS! Like, I've already lost count of how many people I've encountered on both Twitter and Tumblr who are seriously outright calling for both Wells and Lowe's blood in response to these leaks.

And since the issue is being released tommorow, I feel the need to reiterate that harassing creators and sending them death threats is NEVER acceptable under any circumstances, and that doing so makes you no better than the kinds of supervillains that Kamala regularly fights against! We can criticize a bad story WITHOUT becoming supervillains ourselves! Follow the advice of @atopfourthwall here for heavens sake people:

Now this is hopefully going to be the last time I discuss Amazing Spider-Man (2022) #26 here on Tumblr as I have zero plans on giving any actual money to the issue myself. I may consider reading the Fallen Friend: The Death of Ms. Marvel one-shot, if only because it's being written by several of Kamala's past creators G. Willow Wilson, Saladin Ahmed, and Mark Waid, so I trust them to be able to salvage something decent out of this whole fiasco. But that's it. I do plan on releasing a future post which provides an in-depth analysis about the ways in which Ms. Marvel comics have discussed themes of death in a much more nuanced and respectful manner, but I have no idea when it will be released.

Until then folks... vote with your wallets. Please do not cave into the outrage machine and feed into the publicity stunt that this whole mess so obviously is. Don’t give tomorrow's issue of Amazing Spider-Man any more attention than it's already received. Instead go support all of Kamala's past adventures to show your love and appreciation for the character if you do not own the graphic novel collections already. And most importantly... for the love of all that is holy, DO NOT attack the creators involved with this terrible decision and especially DO NOT send them death threats!

[geronimosothercadilac]

I translated the document. Terrible, with lots of misinformation.

Just read this text (translated from Italian). This is the first paragraph:

When I ask my Primary Education Science students to prepare a report on Geronimo Stilton, they immediately seem to lose that edu-ideological seriousness that distinguishes them and their creativity index becomes apical: "The topos of the mouse", they headline for example their essay, or “Geronimo Stilton: human, too human”, “The chronotop of Topazia” etc. etc. In fact, the serial graphic novel of which Geronimo Stilton is fictionally the author and protagonist is not only the only Italian editorial product that can be included in a list of global best sellers, but it is also a serial fiction of absolute quality, aimed at an audience of children and pre-adolescents who are notoriously picky, ready to reject anything that doesn't convince them from the first moment. Last descendant of the Disney mice and, as in Harry Potter's Hogwarts, student in a higher education curriculum that leads him to a degree in Topology of Rathic Literature and Comparative Archaeotopic Philosophy, Geronimo Stilton directs the "Eco del Rodent", a sort of “Corriere della sera” of Mouse Island, and has a very complex personality: among other things, he is an adept of slow food and a convinced advocate of an eco-sustainable economy. Geronimo Stilton's stories have sold more than 100 million copies in 15 years, especially in English-speaking countries, and his brand is managed by the Atlantyca Entertainment Company, an Italian multinational that focuses on global publishing made of paper and animation , editing and licensing: its inventor is Elisabetta Dami, but resorting to the forbidden concept of authorship would be truly out of place in relation to a brand-name capable not only of collecting the embarrassing legacy of Mickey Mouse, but of building a fictional empire that the use of different media has further consolidated over the years.

[loving-n0t-heyting]

over course of trip to seattle learned about damion searls new translation of the tractatus, which left me livid enough to overcome the local SAD. was going to write a long angry post about it until i learned aw moore had already written a much better scathing review in lrb complaining about the exact things i would have—in particular: the travesties made of 1 and 2.141. both, but the latter especially, reminded me of blooms comments on cornford in the preface to his republic translation:

There is no doubt that one can read the sentence as it appears in Comford without being drawn up short, without being puzzled. But this is only because it says nothing. It uses commonplace terms which have no precise significance; it is the kind of sentence one finds in newspaper editorials. From having been shocking or incomprehensible, Plato becomes boring.

this seems like the obvious outcome of a translation that emphasises leaving the final product natural and unjarring in the target language: genuinely jarring thoughts present in the original are penalised from the outset

there was one part of the introductory essay moore ignores i thought was worth commenting on:

partly its shocking that you would openly admit, in the course of translating a text, to simply ignoring anything it has to say about translating btwn languages. but moreso it is baffling you would choose to translate a source text whose explicit statements about the process you clearly regard with such contempt. (he tries to soften the blow by citing the notoriously obscure and evocative 6.43 as evidence of wittgensteins "glimmers of recog­nition" that searls own extreme anti-literalist stance on translation is superior; looking to correct the relatively lucid by the relatively opaque is a classic hallmark of the eisegete.) active malice is a poor foundation for textual fidelity. the fact this contempt leads him to fatuously bungle crucial passages like 2.141 is just icing on the cake

i did think this passage (it goes on much longer but this conveys the gist) from his recent book on the philosophy of translation (which i decided to hateskim) was particularly revealing. this isnt the etymology or meaning of that word in philosophical contexts at all. the root is the latin "intentus", which comes closer to "attentive" or "focused" than to anything like "intending" or "intention" as usually used by english speakers, and the meaning is about mental states that take or attend to an object or state, the way eg that vision is of some visible thing/fact. this more general use dates back to the middle ages; any association with orientation to action is incidental and/or idiosyncratic to certain authors (such as merleau-ponty, whos being invoked here—or maybe it is, ive never actually read him). looking up the term in any reputable reference book would have disabused him of this error

to some extent this is obviously nitpicking; he wants to make a point about the nature of perception and how it relates to his understanding of translation, the phenomenology jargon is just window dressing. but this is a book about translation! he is trying to convey his expertise in finding the right way to translate the right word! speaks extremely poorly to his fitness for this i would think if he makes a slogan for much of his book out of a phrase whose historical meaning he has clearly ignored outside the narrow context of one specific and atypical writer on the subject. even if you think the highly specific theory of intentionality is correct, omitting the historical context of the expression and its cognates cuts any readers off from any larger conversations to which this theory is contributing, the same way flitting freely between different words in the target language for the same word in the source will muddy lines of thought developed internally to the text

whenever i see ppl on here discussing translation it seems to be in a vein much closer to how searls writes about it. the translators task is to capture the feeling or vibe of the passages translated; literal translation, favouring preservation of sentence structure and uniformity of word choice over fidelity to sentiment and deep meaning, is mechanical, soulless, and amateurish. a major pitfall to this approach being that you can easily find plenty of cases where the translator thus interpreting their job is insensitive to the actual vibes at hand