#especially like... As If humans dont Kill Them With Poison for existing too close to us. yeah theyre the hateful ones for sure

[ethereal-forest-furry]

i have a lot of respect for wasps. they have firm boundaries and they will protect themselves and their home and their family and theyll risk their lives to do it every single time they think theyre in danger. and i feel like it says something about us as a society that we hate them for that

[whaleofatjme1920]

Denying Feelings on the Tiled Floor (Masky X F!Reader)

[Masky X F!Reader]

[Warnings: blood, angst]

[AN: I genuinely dont think I've posted this here before but it's from my quotev and I want it here lots of love <3]

Tim can’t really describe the first moment he knew he felt something for you, only that he did. And he knew the risks that came along with having such feelings.

Hanahaki, it’s a terrible disease, really. Instead of giving flowers to the person you love, you grow them in your lungs. If the person that you’re so willingly throwing your affections at doesn’t return them, you die. The flowers cloud your lungs and unfurl, sprouting and taking root as they invade your chest, making it harder and harder to breathe until you eventually choke.

He wasn’t supposed to have feelings for anyone, especially as a proxy and even more so as a respectable group leader. His job is to guide and lead, not feel softly for someone who might never return his feelings. Tim doesn't really think he even deserves to have these type of warm feelings, if he’s being honest.

Not after he failed to protect Brian. Not after he failed to protect Amy. Not after he failed to protect Sarah. Not after he failed to save Alex. Not after he barely managed to protect Jessica. And certainly not after he failed to do right by and protect Jay. His existence was always bound to be one of suffering, not warm feelings and sly glances at someone he feels so deeply for.

He supposes that’s where the Hanahaki comes in from. He can’t just have warm feelings, he must suffer for those two. The warmth he felt for you was at first a spark, small, floating on the wind from something greater and bigger than he could ever imagine. Then, it took hold on every part of him, consuming him until it was ablaze and the flames licked upwards to the heels of the sky.

It was something he never wanted to feel, something he wanted to shove back. But sometimes, it was pleasant, and sweet, and it lured him in like sailors to a siren song.

Sometimes it was just a little smile.

“Good work today,” Tim complimented as he patted your back, watching as you tiredly stumbled back into the house. “I wasn’t sure we were gonna be able to get that guy but you? You were on it.”

You glanced over your shoulder and smiled at him. “Thanks! He was a slipper bastard, but I make it work,” you giggled.

Tim chuckled and closed the door of the temp house his group was currently staying in. “Get some rest tonight, okay?”

“Why? We have something big tomorrow?” You asked, tilting your head slightly.

He followed you into the kitchen, watching as you began to rummage in the fridge for something cold to drink. “No,” he started. “I just want you to get some rest.”

You poked your head from back out of the fridge, genuinely smiling at him. “Sure thing, Masky.”

His heart skipped a beat.

Sometimes it was your laugh.

It had just been you and Tim in the car coming back from a late night convenience store run. Apparently, the rest of your group wanted to have a movie night but the snacks were severely lacking.

There was music playing in the car but he hadn’t been focused on it all. In fact, he was more focused on you telling him things from your childhood.

“I can’t believe they just let us do that,” you had giggled. “I know senior pranks can get out of hand but I’m certain we cost them thousands in actual damage and even more in water damage.”

Tim chuckled and nodded. “I remember for our senior prank, Hoodie and I got the bright idea to steal three pigs from one of the local farms in the area with a group of other guys, and marked them with a one, two and four,” he explained, watching from the corner of his eye as you began to grin. “So, we let them loose in the school and of course, the staff and the students that weren’t in on the prank spent the entire day looking for pig three-” he’s barely able to get the rest of the anecdote out before you burst into laughter.

Tim’s heart grows softer as he joins you, fighting the desire to hold your hand. You sound so beautiful to him.

Tim knows he can’t deny his feelings. He couldn’t try any harder, and unfortunately for him, he has the inkling you don’t feel the same. It’s painful because he can feel the seeds of that terrible disease spreading further and further, consuming him slowly.

You’ve mentioned it before, not wanting to be in love. Not desiring a relationship and by extension, him.

“I just don’t think I’m up for those kind of things,” you said one night as the two of you say up on the roof together.

He tilted his head slightly to the side. “What makes you say that?”

You shrugged. “I’m a proxy, and I don’t think love is in the roster for people like us.” You giggled slightly and fixed your posture before shaking your head. “I think the only types of people who would work with people like us is people like us. But, even then, I think we’re way too emotionally unstable.” You then paused and looked over to your group leader. “What about you?”

Tim shrugged, a small, sad smile on his face. “I think I’m in agreement with you.” He said it, but he doesn’t mean it. He watched you carefully after he said it, looking for any signs that you wanted to challenge him, and when he didn’t see them, he felt the flowers bloom.

Coughing is absolutely normal for Tim. He’s handled the Operator’s influence for far longer than anyone should, which has been since his childhood. It’s just his body’s natural reaction to being poisoned all those years. But what wasn’t normal was when he started coughing up petals.

Oh how he hates the color pink now. Carnations. They’re pink carnations. He has no idea why they’re pink carnations as you have shown no type of fondness or specific admiration for the type of flower, but they smell so sweet and the color reminds him of you. He tries to smoke his cigarettes more and more in a vain attempt to smoke the roots that have taken hold in his lungs before they consume him in his entirety.

But he knows he won’t stop them, and that he won’t give into that surgery. What’s the use of living if you cannot have the feelings that come alongside it? All of the things that still make proxies human, life, death, love and birth - peace and war? Happiness when you laugh with friends, confusion, anger and somberness. It’s worth it. Every single part of it is worth it. He doesn’t want to lose the warm feelings he has to you either,

Even if it kills him.

It’s not like you haven’t noticed Tim coughing up pink carnations. The way the sparsely blood covered flowers find their ways into vases or in the trash have been greatly concerning you, and as far as you can tell, it’s not from Toby, Brian, or Kate. The only habitual cougher is Tim, and that makes you concerned.

You don’t know how to feel about Tim most days, but you know it’s something sweeter than what should be allowed as a proxy. You’re finally making your decision when you think you’ve almost lost him.

It’s a warm summer night when you finally come to terms with how you feel. You’ve just returned from some kind of ‘cooperation mission’ with Eyeless Jack and Jeff and you are more than exhausted after the mess you had to put up with.

“Anyone home?” You call out. From the kitchen, you can smell fresh pastries. Looks like Kate and Toby have been baking again. You follow the scent and see platters of brownies, cookies and other sweets laid out on the countertops with little sticky notes telling you to only take from the brownies - the rest are for other proxy groups and independents.

You’re just about to pluck one of the fresh brownies when you hear coughing. It’s soft at first, thick, but sounds like normal Tim coughing. You wonder if you should head over and see if there’s anything he needs. “Masky?” You call out again.

He coughs again. “What?” He sounds exhausted.

“Do you need some water?”

“No, I don’t-” he begins to cough violently, and you swear you can hear something falling to the floor as he does so. Tim rumbles around his room, crawling out of bed as he continues to violently cough and to the bathroom.

Worried, you exit the kitchen hastily to see what’s wrong just to see him slinking into the bathroom. “Masky? What’s going on?” You ask in a growing concerned tone, walking down the darkened hall to where the bathroom light shines from under the door.

And there you see it, flowers. Pink in color, carnations. They’re soft under your shoe as opposed to the hardwood. You feel the blood run cold in your veins. “Tim? Tim? Tim, you gotta open up please-” you rush out as you begin to pound on the door.

“Don’t you dare!” He snarls, pushing his weight against the door, still coughing. “I don’t need your hel-” he practically coughs up his lungs as he falls to the floor.

You panic. “Shit, shit, shit!” You cry out as you lean back in the hallway. “I’m coming in!” You know he can’t really hear you as he continues to hack out his lungs, but you kick the door in, bursting it from its hinges. You catch it and practically tear it out of the frame before shoving it back into the hall.

You widen your eyes upon seeing the state of Tim and immediately fall downwards, your hands sliding over his trembling form. There’s blood all over the sink, the mirror, even some of the sub and on the floor. The red drops leave trails down his mouth like snail trails. “Oh my gods,” you murmur as you rest his head on his lap, stopping his skull from knocking around on the tile floor.

“You shouldn’t-” he coughs more. “You shouldn’t be in here!” He’s not able to reprimand you because he’s practically puking up a bouquet.

“Nonsense,” you shrug off, trying to bring him comfort. “What the hell brought this on?” Your fingertips gently trace around his mouth and help claw the budding flowers out. You’ve never hated carnations so much until now.

Tim glares up at you before closing his eyes in pain, feeling the flowers cloud his lungs further. “It’s nothing-”

“Does this look like nothing?” You sound so cross, but it’s just because you’re so worried about him.

A long, pregnant pause passes between the two of you.

You continue to pull the blossoms from his mouth before looking over his form, seeing how his hand is slowly reaching up for yours. “Tim…”

“I know,” he whispers. “I’m sorry, I never meant for you to-”

You shake your head, your hand reaching out to hold his. You grip him before taking his hand warmly up to the side of your face, allowing him to caress your cheek. “Don’t.”

“But it’s true,” he barely manages to wisp out. “I never meant to throw this onto you,” he finishes before weakly coughing up more petals and full budding flowers. He can barely breathe now.

You sigh as you press his hand up to your cheek just a little firmer, letting him feel your warmth before you softly pull him back. “Open your palm, please,” you say softly as your free hand fishes out yet another bundle of carnations.

He weakly nods, closing his eyes and giving into his labored breathing as his lungs compete with the roots and sick blossoms for air.

You sigh once again, a small smile crossing onto your face before you plant a kiss on the center of his palm, remaining for just a moment before allowing him to pull away all on his own. “You always had me you idiot,” you whisper as you watch his fingers curl inwards, gripping the kiss that you had just planted.

Tim looks up at you, starry eyed before resting his hand on your cheek again.

The garden in his lungs begins to wilt.

[ain-t-bovvered]

14x17 Commentary

Zeta and Giuls scream together, and then die.

@purpleskiesandcherrypies and @dean-winchesters-bacon won’t be joining us for this one. 

Me & Zeta will watch together season 14′s episodes as they come out and we’ll do our commentary while watching.

+MASTERLIST of season 14 commentary * 

Giulia: Yo i’m sad he ded tho

Giulia: But is he?

Giulia: YAAA sis Jo

Zee: Ouch

Giulia: Oh go fuck u nick

Giulia: You can burn. I want to use that

Zee: Ded

Giulia: REJECT HIM

Zee: Donnie

Giulia: nick such a drama queen, like his fucking brother. gasps, Lucifer/Nick is Hamlet.

Giulia: Donny babe

Zee: Stabby stabby

Giulia: Shish kebab teenagers

[14x17 Game Night ]

♪ Raindrops keep fallin' on my head ♪

Giulia: Love that song

Giulia: God I love him. IF THEY TOUCH A HAIR ON HIM

Zee: Fucking hell

Giulia: DON T TOUCH HIIIIM

Zee: Seriously ??!!!

Annoyed Dean tho

Oh look at the son of Satan without a soul making pop-corns

Zee: Mary?

Giulia: Yeah well she still exists

Zee: Why again?

D:  SON OF A BITCH!!

Classic Dean

J: I thought this was supposed to relax him.

M: You know, this was his favorite game when he was little.

me: *imagining little Dean playing the game exactly the same and with a high pitched voice: Son of a bitch*  good visual.

J: Everybody keeps asking me that.

Giulia: We aRe FamIlY

J: Well, it’s annoying

Mary: 

Giulia: It is

Zee: Did she eye roll?

M: if you ever want to talk or...vent...

J :You're here. I know.

J thinking: I just wanna eat my pop corns and play stupid game, can I fucking live?

Giulia: Winchester game night

D: All right. Winchester game night is a go  soon as Sammy gets back here with the two double-pepperoni meat blasters AND

Zee: Pineapple. A crime against humanity

Giulia&Jack : I like it

Dean: why have you forsaken me, son

D: Yeah, it's like a crime against humanity.

Me quoting [ X ]  

Zee: SEE????

Giulia: Was that enochian?

Zee: I think

Giulia: IT’S BABE TIME

Look how cute he is.... SO CUTE , SO CUUUUTE

Zee: Knew it Was waiting for it

Anael: wow this place is so ...

Giulia: U MEAN  CUTE JO

Giulia: Omg he has pancakes

Zee: Doesn’t eat them

Giulia:HE’S BEING POLITE OK. Oh look a that they have cream and strawberry *sobs* I’m hungry

A: Well, you said you had something for me.

Castiel sliding a jewlery box.

me [heart attack]

A: 16th-century Burmese blood rubies.

LOOK AT THAT CUTE SMILE 

A:  Five carats. Excellent clarity. Castiel,where did you get these?

Zee: Lightly cursed

C: I need your help. To contact God.

Giulia: Oh honey no

Zee: I just laughed along with jo

- um so Anael was Joshua right hand? so she wasn’t that useless angel afterall. 

Giulia: Joshua is dead?

C: Jack killed Michael.

Giulia&Zee: Good night sweet prince

C: Only God can restore a soul.

ISN’T THAT A BOTHER 

A: The Winchesters -- they don't know you're here, do they?

Giulia: Of course they don t

Zee: Squint

C: Why do you say that?

A: Oh, I don't know, just a general reek of ill-conceived lone-wolf desperation.

Giulia&Zee: Lone wolf desperation

*Cas looks into the camera like in the office*

C: will you help me or not?

A: Not

C *smirking* : I see

A: BUT

Giulia: She s me

Zee: Mental grabby hands

S: It's not Enochian. I-I-I think it's Ancient Hebrew.

Sammy says it’s not Enochian

Zee: It’s not enochian then

Giulia: Oh WeLl AncIenT HeBreW

D: well Sammy sounds stressed

WHAT’S NEW THO

M: I just wish there was something that I c--

D:Hey. You're here, okay? You're here.

Giulia: Mary is here everyone!  Everything is fine

Zee: Chuck I hate her

M: But I should've been here more. But I know how I am. I can be closed off...and hard.

D: Yeah, well, that's where I get it from.

Giulia: OH NO No he definitely doesn’t

Giulia: Dean is always there. Mary just fucks off somewhere

M: I just need you to know... I'm grateful. For every day I get to spend with you and Sam.

Giulia: Listen- I’ve been on this show long enough to know that when someone starts to talk like that it’s bad news-

S: I know this.

Giulia: What the fuck is sam brain made off

Zee: Good question

S: It's from the Bible. It's -- it's Peter. Peter 5:8.

"Be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary the Devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour."

Well that sounds NICE

Zee: Trap?

Giulia: Oh come on

Zee: Trap

[enters Nick with an apron]

Giulia: OH FUCK YOU

N: What, no "hey"? "How ya been"?

Giulia: No fuck off nick

D: How?

N: Instead of rotting away in a jail cell where you left me?

N: Sort of a funny story... and by "funny," I mean a lot of people died.

Giulia: Can they just kill him

Giulia: Dean just kill him

Zee: Valid question

Giulia: Mary can you be useful and just kill the bitch

N: I mean, I sort of injected your friend with poison --

Giulia: Poor Donny

D: Where is he?!

N: Ooh, the angry voice.

Zee: Oh ok

Giulia: Yeees the angry voice

Giulia: I. Don’t. Like. Cas. Doing. Stuff. Alone.

A:Even for us Methuselah?  You sheltered him after the Fall.

Methy: I didn't "shelter" -- We were roommates.

Giulia: OMG THEY WERE ROOMMATES

Methy: He made a mean lasagna

Zee: Loool

C: No. You'll tell me, or I'll burn this place to the ground. and you with it.

Giulia: *Shivers* yeeees

Zee: Kiddo

C: Is that really what you want?

Giulia: SHIVERS *YEEEEEEES*

OK BUT YOU GOTTA LOVE THE SLOW MOTION THO

Giulia: oh Sam baby

Giulia: YES

Giulia: YEEES

D: Whoa! Hey. Hey! Not now. Okay?

D: not yet

Stellar content

Giulia: Let Sam kill that bitch

Zee: Let someone kill him

D: I don't know. If you ask me, that psycho's seen way too many '90s serial-killer movies.

S: The antidote is Prussian Blue

Giulia: *raising hand* Knew that

D: He said he wanted to talk. So let's talk.

Giulia&Zee: Oooh yeah let’s talk

Giulia: I’m sam

Sam’s like “ but Deeeeeean I wanna smash”

D: if Nick looks at you wrong, you're gonna waste him.

LET HIIIIIM

Giulia: Who cut Jared ‘s hair

Giulia: I dont like it

Zee: I need season 8 hair

S: Donatello's in this because of me. A police officer is dead because of me. I'm the one who let Nick go, I'm the one who...

please babe ....can someone just hold him

M: Nick's choices are his. Just his.

M: You gave him a chance because you felt for him.....because you're a good man.

Giulia: Oh look at him being all cute when mary called him a good man

M: You are. It's one of the reasons I'm so proud of you.

Anael complainig about the dust while she’s an angel.

Giulia: LOL SHE S ME

ALSO WE ALL KNOW THAT DANNEEL LOVES CREEPY DOLLS

A: God's not gonna care.

Giulia: das true

A: I believed in Heaven. You know, our mission. I believed, Castiel. But then I got to Earth, and I saw that it wasn't the paradise God promised. I mean, there was so much hate...so much suffering.

A: Why wasn't he helping them? And do you know what he said?

A: "God doesn't meddle."

Zee: Doesn’t meddle

Giulia: Das also true

A: Well, I do. So I do.

C: And here I thought you just performed miracles for the money.

A: Well, you haven't been paying attention, then. I do them for me. I don't need Heaven. And I don't need God. And... I'm happy, Castiel.

LISTEN - I STAN ANAEL

C: Really? Because that sounds lonely.

Zee: We’re all lonely

A: because we're all alone. From ant to lion to human to angel. Every last one of us.

Giulia: SHE S ME

C: God reached down, and he brought me back to life.

A: So he saves one angel...and watches millions of people die screaming, every day. What does that say about him?

Giulia *sweats* : But he saves THE angel ok

Zee: Ouch

D: Where’s Donatello?

Giulia: That’s the content I want

N: I get you, Dean. You and me,we're almost like brothers, you know. Michael, you,Lucifer, me --

Giulia: NOT LIKE THIS

N: we both know what it's like to be hog-tied to a nuclear warhead, man.

Giulia: OH NOPE

Giulia: NICE

D: Cut the crap

N: You're never the same after something like that, are ya? Being one with one of them. It changes you. Makes you more than human. Come on, Dean, admit it. With Michael, you were a prince. Now you're just a broken Hunter.

Giulia: Another one

Zee: Demon dean vibes

Giulia: But also MoC tho

Giulia: So much demon dean

D: Come on, Nick. What's this all about?

D: He says he wants to talk to Jack...alone.

Giulia: His friggin’ cocoa puffs

Giulia: I don t like jack and nick alone Especially jack with no soul. Because let’s be real, he has so little of it ok

j: Sam?

S: I mean-

D: "I mean"? What do you mean, you mean

S: How's he even a threat?

Me: mmmm *opening big ass folder* where do I start?

Zee: Of course. He went there

N: Even your three dads -- how many innocent people you think they've killed?

Zee: Even your three dads

Giulia: Threee dads

Giulia: You broke his heart

N: I don't know. I don't -- I don't see it. I'm looking right at you, and I see nothing.

Zee: I see nothing

Giulia: Don t like that. Mmm mmm nope

Zee: Wth?

Giulia: He killed him

N: Nick. He'll show us where to find Donatello.

oh...he did not kill him. oh bother

Zee: I’m done

Giulia: We ve been knew

A: Look, I just stepped on a rat, so --

Giulia: My babe

Zee: Say it like you  mean it tho

A: You're doing this because you're afraid. Because in your mind, it'd be easier to call God than to tell Sam and Dean Winchester the truth.

C: The truth?

A: Jack's soul is gone, Castiel. And there's nothing you can do about it.

i hate this

A: Look. I don't want to say all that and hurt your feelings, so...what do you say we call it a night?

HI YES I’M WRECKED BY CAS FACE RIGHT NOW, DON’T TOUCH ME

Giulia: Oh he lives

Giulia: OOOOH THAT THAAAAT

Zee: Fuck

Giulia: CRIES

Giulia: tell me he gives it to dean tho

Zee: He has to

Giulia:...OH wait that’s not the same tho , meh

C: God...I don't know where you are. I don't know if you can hear me. But please. Sam, Dean -- we need you. Please.

Giulia: My heart .Cas broken voice

Giulia: Sigh

Giulia: Sob

Giulia: Cries

D: Look, you try anything funny, Sammy's gonna shoot you. Anything happens to me -- 

N: Wait. Let me guess. Sammy's gonna shoot me.

Giulia: Yeah to start

Giulia: It’s been swell

A: So, what are you gonna do now?

C: Go home.

Giulia: The bunker is his Hoooomeee

C: Go home and tell Sam and Dean the truth.

Zee: Can I have the bag?

C: Anael. You know, you're not <i>always</i> right. Just because God's not with us doesn't mean we're alone.

A:  Why? Because we all have each other?

C: Yes.

Giulia: SO CUTE

J: This was filled with angelic grace.

Zee: Can’t word. Sam needs to punch him

♪ Oh, Sammy boy, Sammy boy ♪

Giulia: Oh no Nick singing. Ptsd flashbacks from the crazy sam ♪ Your phone, your phone is calling ♪

Nick doing disgusting things

Giulia: OH WHAT THE FUCK

Zee: Cb radio. He’s awake

S: Y-You trying to communicate with someone?

N: Search your feelings.  Come on, Sam. Nobody stays dead anymore.

Giulia: fucking nick

Giulia: Fucking demons

Zee: Holy crap

Giulia: YES SAM. YES

Giulia: OH COME ON

Zee: Damn nick

Giulia: stop hitting sam’s head

Giulia: Fuck u nick

Giulia: DEAN is so calm and collected tho. MOC baby. I mean...look at his face while he’s kicking those demon’s asses. That looks way too cold ok. I don’t like it.

Zee: That final push. That’s what I saw on tumblr

Giulia: They need to stop hitting sam in the head

Giulia: DAMN IT NICK. i have 0 empathy for that bitch now. 0

Giulia: Oh come on. Fuck. Fuuuuck

Giulia: NO. MARY NO. FUCK

Zee: Jfc

Giulia: JESUS

Zee: Hell-o

Giulia: Again with the chicken wings

Giulia: OH THANK GOD

Giulia: OUCH  but also YES and also NO

Giulia: Oh yeah Jack is definitely going in that box

Zee: He ded?

Giulia: I sure hope so

D: Hey. Hey. Come on. Stay with me now. We're just gonna play a little game.

D: We're gonna count, okay? We're gonna count.

D: Count with me. One.. two...

S: ...two...

D: Yeah, there you go...three.

S: You -- You always put -- You always put me first.

D:No, no. Shh, shh. Come on. Come on, man.

Giulia: IM SCARED STOP IT

S: Your whole life...

D: Okay. All right. All right. Come on. Come on. Just count with me.

D: Sammy. Hey! Sam!

Zee: Wtf is going on?

J: Mary? I had to.

M: Sam -- Uh, he's hurt. Help him.

Giulia: YEAH OK THANK

Oh god Dean’s face. MEDIC MEDIC HELP

Giulia: oh poor Dean. I NEED A FUCKING MEDIC 

Zee: They should stop scaring people

J: Everything's gonna be fine.

Giulia: SAYS NO ONE EVER ON SPN WITHOUT CONSEQUENCES

Giulia: i don t like mary face

Zee: Is she scared of jack?

Giulia: She right to be But she shouldn’t be like that in front of him

J: Tell me it's okay.

M: It’s not

J: Leave me alone X9

Giulia: Can she just shut up. i mean she’s not wrong. But she should shut up

Giulia: ...SEE THEN THIS HAPPENS

Giulia: Oh

Giulia: Nope

Giulia: Dont like this

[after episode]

Giulia: PROMO

Zee: Fuck

Giulia: I HATE IT

Zee: Did Dean just tell Cas that he failed him??!!!

Giulia: No cas said that , fucking Dean said : you are dead to me

Giulia: WHICH IS WAY WORSE

Zee: Yeah that

Giulia: AND MY HEART HURTS

Zee: Can’t type

Giulia: I WANNA CRY AND I’M ANGRY AT DEAN

Giulia: i didn’t need to see that

Giulia: I can’t hear anything else

Giulia: I can’t unhear that

.

.

.SO IS NEXT THURSDAY ALREADY CANCELLED?

BECAUSE FOR ME IT IS I DON’T GIVE A SHIT . 

.                

.

FUCK YOU DEAN , FUCK YOU.

.

.

@wayward-angelgirl @destiel-honeypie     @mariekoukie6661     @dragontamerm      @closetspngirl   @rainflowermoon    @mattiecat     @bunnybaby121115  @aliaitee2   @jacks-word-of-the-day     @4evamc       @dammitsammy     @legendary-destiel   @winchesterprincessbride    @destielhoneybee    @castiellover20   @jacks-word-of-the-day  @ravenhg @evvvissticante  @legendary-destiel  @dustythewind

[samanthasroberts]

Dear Britain: Elena Ferrante, Slavoj Žižek and other European writers on Brexit

Ahead of the European referendum, we asked leading authors and thinkers from EU countries to write letters to Britain. Do they want us to stay, or are they ready to say goodbye?

Elena Ferrante Italy

Dear Britain, I dont have much sympathy for the current European Union. Its upper floors are elegantly furnished, with spacious halls for parties and banquets; there are abundant stores and provisions, rooms with panoramic views where building bylaws pertaining to those residing on the lower floors are discussed and drawn up, security services that design alarm systems and sturdy doors to keep out those who want to set up camp in the entrance hall or at least in the basement. Its an ugly Europe, this one. Behind its facade, it safeguards the interests of those countries that are strongest, both economically and militarily. And yet, despite the rules and regulations, it has never stopped thinking that when there is nothing further to be gained it is best to throw off the union and make do with the old cocksure ways of the proud old nations.

This belief is the most wrongheaded of all. The single pieces of Europe have long lost their autonomy and centrality. Major financial crises cannot be faced by stewing in ones own juice. Migrations cannot be controlled with traffic lights or barbed wire. Global terrorism is not a video game you play at home in your living room. The worlds climate cannot be fixed by opening an umbrella. The happy few are no longer enough, not even for themselves, but must confront the unhappy many.

And so, while it may be a union that has united little or nothing, it is necessary, in my opinion, to stay together at all costs. What we need now is not many small countries but a continent. Amid conflicts and confrontations, in defiance of the facts, we must try to move towards a community that instead of drawing up lists of objectives becomes actively political and puts an end to countless intolerable inequalities. Contained in the treasure chests of its sovereign states, Europe has many kinds of poison but also wonderful jewels. It is time to throw away the former and pull out the latter in preparation for our impassioned feast of common thought and action. We dont need roots now: they make plants of us, splendid, yes, but bound to the ground, and nowadays everything is more mobile than ever, shifting quickly from one shape to the next. A broad, true identity must open itself up to all identities and absorb the best in them. Time is short. Many kinds of malaise and poverty are spreading, the streets are increasingly stained with blood, the worst intentions feed the worst kinds of politics. Staying together is no longer an option but an obligation and an urgent necessity. Women and men of Britain, please, let us stay together, and change Europe together.

Translated by Daniela Petracco. Frantumaglia: An Authors Journey Told Through Letters, Interviews, and Occasional Writings will be published in November by Europa Editions.

Javier Maras Spain

Dear Britain, As Spaniards born under the Franco dictatorship (especially those of us who belonged to families on the losing side of the civil war) we were always aware that we might one day have to leave our country and go into exile. Whenever I imagined this possibility, my chosen destination was never France or Italy or some Latin American country, but Britain. This was perhaps because, early on, I acquired a reasonably good knowledge of English, but it was doubtless also because I had read so much British literature and seen so many British films that Britain seemed to me a familiar place and as undeniably European as my home town of Madrid. Indeed, I partly owe my vocation as a writer to Richmal Crompton and her Just William (or Guillermo as we knew him) books. I was brought up reading Charles Dickens and Robert Louis Stevenson, Rudyard Kipling and GK Chesterton, J Meade Faulkner and Anthony Hope, Agatha Christie and Arthur Conan Doyle. My childhood heroes were portrayed by actors such as John Mills, Stewart Granger, Jack Hawkins, David Niven and Trevor Howard. My first platonic love was Hayley Mills. Britain was not only a constant presence in my fantasies, it also seemed to me a country that would be sure to take me in if things took a turn for the worse in Spain; a place where I would not feel entirely foreign. For me, it is as much a part of Europe as Italy, Germany, France or Austria, possibly even more so.

I knew, too, that it was an invariably democratic country, respectful of individual freedoms and generous to those who took refuge there: from Joseph Baretti to Nikolaus Pevsner and from Elias Canetti to my friend Guillermo Cabrera Infante, who was exiled from Cuba in 1965, not to mention such Spanish writers as Blanco White, Luis Cernuda, Arturo Barea and Manuel Chaves Nogales. It seemed only natural that Britain should form part of the EU. True, the EU does not tend to arouse great passion it more often provokes feelings of discontent however, it is largely responsible for the fact that, since 1945, the various countries of this continent have not resorted to killing each other. That this fails to spark enthusiasm and, above all, gratitude, only demonstrates how ignorant and forgetful our present-day societies are.

Were Britain to leave the union, its unlikely that anyone would immediately start a war, but you never know. One thing I do know is that the rest of the continent would feel orphaned, amputated, empty and even defenceless. Let me explain that last word: those of us who do still remember ought to give thanks every day for the existence of that island separated from us only by a narrow strip of sea. Without it, it is probable that the entire continent would have suffered the consequences of a crushing victory by Hitler. Simply knowing that this small island spent years resisting tyranny and invasion is enough to make us all want to be able to count on its continuing presence, and always to be on the same side, whether in wartime or during long years of peace. We want to keep it as close to us as possible, even if only for purely selfish reasons and in order to save us from ourselves.

Translated by Margaret Jull Costa. Thus Bad Begins is published by Penguin.

Timur Vermes Germany

Dear Britain, Lets keep it short: what is the EU? Its the consequence of the second world war. Its the attempt to make things better.

Even if you dont always get the best result for yourself.

Many, throughout the whole of Europe, dont share this ambition any more.

Thats understandable, for 60 million people had to die before most found it a worthwhile ambition.

And that was a long time ago.

Everyone has the right to wait until this view comes naturally to them.

But they should know this: next time they wont get it so cheaply.

Look Whos Back is available in paperback from MacLehose.

Anne Enright Ireland

Dear Britain, I have two of your children at least, they might choose to be yours. Their father is British, born and reared. He likes cricket. His name is Murphy. His family moved from Ireland to London after the potato famine of the 1840s and five generations later, they are still called Spud. In 1980 he swapped the friendly racism of Surrey for the friendly racism that English people are subjected to in Dublin, which he finds a bit tiresome. The huge migration that unsettled his family and left them forever subject to cheerful insult involved more than a million refugees who left Ireland for the urban centres of Britain and America. When a population tips like that it is hard to rebalance. Ireland has been weakened by migration ever since, and Britain has been strengthened by it.

I dont think there will be a Brexit because people rarely vote against their clear economic interests (Apart from working class Tories, mutters Mr Murphy). But I would like Britain to stay in Europe for more positive reasons. I could talk about idealism. I could talk about the second world war, or other wars less glorious ask why you dont vote to leave Nato, for example, or the community of nations that went to Iraq but the arguments for Brexit seem based on a fear of being contaminated by foreigners, and fear is never truly idealistic. It is tribal. It is the kind of atavistic thinking that makes me step back from my own nationalism, now and then. So it is easy for me to set aside my Irishness in order to say: I like Britain very much. I mean, I like whatever Britain is a shifting thing, a landscape, a language, a library full of astonishing books, a mosaic of peoples stalled in one migration or another, from the raw Saxon faces you see in East Anglia, to the sari shops of Bradford, to the eyes of my two children, who came from God knows where.

They like the trees, by the way. Also, and in this order: curry, cousins, yorkshire pudding, the way that everything is better funded, the BBC, Bristol, sarcasm, the pub, AFC Wimbledon, Edgar Wright, Topshop and how the politicians seem very polite but are really furious. So now you know.

Of course as an Irishwoman I also have to be cheerfully insulting and say that I am really sorry that Britain lost her empire with all the money and the power that came with it, I know that must be hard for you all. But as you would say to any grand old lady, in her nostalgia and wounded pride, Dont isolate yourself. It must be so tempting to shut the doors and pull the curtains, keep the money under the mattress until the value fades out of the old notes, and think about the past. Which was great, if a little bit unfair. But the world has changed, since Britain was last alone. Dont go. You will not thrive, and we want you to thrive. You are still family to us all.

The Green Road is published by Vintage.

Yanis Varoufakis Greece

Dear Britain, Last year I tried, and failed, to convince the EU top brass to behave humanely toward my long-suffering country. Now, I am writing to you with an odd plea: that you stay in this same EU yes, the one that crushed our Athens spring and has been behaving abominably ever since.

Some will deploy tabloid logic to explain my plea (Varoufakis wants the UK to stay in to pay for Greeces bailouts). Others will accuse me of abandoning the fight for restoring democracy. Yet I trust that your Pythonesque appreciation of paradox will pierce through the seeming contradiction.

The reason I want you to stay in is that voting to leave will not get you out. Rather than escaping the EU, Brexit will keep you tied to a Europe that is nastier, sadder and increasingly dangerous to itself, to you, indeed to the rest of the planet.

The masters of the City will never allow a new Boris Johnson government to even think of leaving the EUs single market, despite Michael Goves musings. Which means that all the gadgets sold in your shops will have to abide by standards made in Brussels, your environmental protection rules will be drawn up in Brussels, and market regulation will be (yes you guessed it) determined in Brussels.

So, even after Brexit, the majority of your laws will be written in the same dreary Brussels corridors as now, except you will have no say in their shaping. With your democracy as truncated as it is now, you will remain stuck, albeit less powerful, in a Europe whose fragmentation Brexit will accelerate.

The EU is undoubtedly bureaucratic, opaque and contemptuous of the parliamentarianism that you and I cherish. You may, therefore, conclude that speeding up the EUs fragmentation is not such a bad idea. Think again! Will its disintegration cause progressive democrats to rise up across Europe, empower their parliaments, usher in the forces of light and hope, and foster harmonious cooperation on the continent? Not likely.

The EUs fragmentation will divide the continent in at least two parts, the major fault line running down the Rhine and across the Alps. In the north east, deflation will rule, with millions of working poor Germans, Poles and so on becoming unemployed. In the Latin part, the order of the day will be inflation with unemployment. Only political monsters will crawl out of this fault line, spreading xenophobic misanthropy everywhere and ensuring, through competitive devaluations, that you will also be drawn into the ensuing vortex.

This is why I am pleading with you to stay in our terrible EU. Europes democrats need you. And you need us. Together we have a chance of reviving democratic sovereignty across Europe. It wont be easy. But it is worth a try.

When I was student, a close friend who hated parties nevertheless never missed one just so that he would have something to bitch about the day after. Please do not be like him. Please stay in the EU with enthusiasm for our common cause: to take arms against a sea of troubles, and, by opposing, end them.

And the Weak Suffer What They Must? is published by Vintage.

Riad Sattouf France

Riad Sattouf

The graphic novel The Arab of the Future, Vol 1 by Riad Sattouf is published by Two Roads.

Jonas Jonasson Sweden

Dear Britain, You have many talents. Playing football springs to mind. Brewing decent beer. Speaking a language that people understand. On the other hand, you seem to be having trouble driving. It is the wrong side, you know. But it seems to work, as long as you all make the same mistake.

And you were more than brave during the war. Churchill said all he had to offer was blood, toil, tears and sweat. But he left out self-esteem. You taught the world and yourselves that a Brit is a Brit is a Brit. Meanwhile, Swedes let the Nazis pass through our country, cap in hand.

War is bad. And still Europe engaged in war for a long time in the first half of the 20th century. More than 50 million Europeans died. And we came to sensible conclusions: we decided to work together, across the borders, in such a way that attacking your neighbour would be like attacking yourself. We called it the European Coal and Steal Community, a rather ingenious construction presented by a French politician of German descent. As more countries joined, this community eventually turned into the European Union, and it was quite something. Fifty million died during the first half of the last century. Fifty thousand in the second half. Were it not for the downfall of Yugoslavia, there would be no official number at all.

But then there is this thing called memory. We tend to forget a lot. Like England not being able to beat Sweden in football for 24 straight years (you were just as surprised every time we won). Or like the EU, and what it is really for. In Sweden, people tend to write about how the UK would be worse off leaving the union. The fact that it would be a disaster for the rest of us is given less attention. I think Brexit would be the beginning of the end of an unprecedented period of peace at the heart of Europe. Without you, the EU will crack at its very seams. I wish you would stay, and that all of us together in toil, tears and sweat but not blood will steer the peace project that is the European Union in the right direction. If you accept, you may drive on whichever side of the road you prefer. We will even let you win Euro 2016 this summer. After all, the manager of the England team is practically half Swedish.

Hitman Anders and the Meaning of It All by Jonas Jonasson is published by 4th Estate.

Kapka Kassabova Bulgaria

Dear Britain, The country I come from is where Europe technically ends today, or begins, depending on your journey. But only technically: recently, in European Turkey, I met people who feel proudly European, just minus the passports. To them, Europeanness, like the secular republic, is a hard-won value, worlds away from Brussels, where beautiful Europa has been nibbled to a drab word. The Turks on the west side of the Bosphorus are perhaps the last European idealists.

It was the Ottomans who gave Europe via the Balkans the word komshulak, neighbourliness, the spirit of living next door convivially, sharing joys and sorrows as the tides of history turn. Komshulak is the highest, if humblest, form of civility. When it breaks down, everything breaks down. Komshulak is at the heart of the battered European project. Battered but not beaten. Let us not be fooled, on these most westerly isles, that there is some better place, once we drift away. There isnt. There is only the cold Atlantic Ocean.

I settled in Edinburgh a decade ago, after a decade in New Zealand: I had returned to Europe, and one of its great cities too. When I moved to the Highlands, I lost none of this essential Scottish Europeanness, with its unfussy love of eccentricity, diversity, and live-and-let-live attitude, this sense of continuity with the continent even in remote glens. And though I love Scotland with an almost unseemly passion, I feel like an adopted Brit. Is that a paradox? Then so is the fact that I feel Balkan and European, in the sense that the Balkans are (whisper it) only partly European. And heres the wonderful rub: Europe is not a monoculture. It is a place where people ride reindeer, grow vines, eat Turkish delight, and call themselves Shetlanders. Ill keep my subscription to that.

Border will be published by Granta in 2017.

Slavoj iek Slovenia

Dear Britain, When Stalin was asked in the late 1920s which is worse, the right or the left, he snapped back: They are both worse! And this is my first reaction to the question of whether or not to leave the EU.

I am not interested in sending love letters to the British public with the sentimental message: Please stay in Europe! What interests me is ultimately only one question. Europe is now caught in a vicious cycle, oscillating between the false opposites of surrender to global capitalism and surrender to anti-immigrant populism which politics has a chance of enabling us to step out of this mad dance?

The symbols of global capitalism are secretly negotiated trade agreements such as the Trade in Services Agreement (Tisa) or Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP). The social impact of TTIP is clear enough: it stands for nothing less than a brutal assault on democracy. Nowhere is this clearer than in the case of Investor-State Dispute Settlements (ISDS), which allow companies to sue governments if their policies cause a loss of profits. Simply put, this means that unelected transnational corporations can dictate the policies of democratically elected governments.

So how would Brexit fare in this context? From a leftwing standpoint, there are some good reasons to support Brexit: a strong nation state exempted from the control of Brussels technocrats can protect the welfare state and counteract austerity politics. However, I am worried about the ideological and political background of this option. From Greece to France, a new trend is arising in what remains of the radical left: the rediscovery of nationalism. All of a sudden, universalism is out, dismissed as a lifeless political and cultural counterpart of rootless global capital.

The reason for this is obvious: the rise of rightwing nationalist populism in western Europe, which is now the strongest political force advocating the protection of working class interests, and simultaneously the strongest political force able to give rise to proper political passions. So the reasoning goes: why should the left leave this field of nationalist passions to the radical right, why should it not reclaim la patrie from the Front National?

In this leftwing populism, the logic of Us against Them remains, however here they are not poor refugees or immigrants, but financial capital and technocratic state bureaucracy. This populism moves beyond the old working class anticapitalism; it tries to bring together a multiplicity of struggles from ecology to feminism, from the right to employment to free education and healthcare.

The recurrent story of the contemporary left is that of a leader or party elected with universal enthusiasm, promising a new world (Mandela, Lula) but sooner or later, usually after a couple of years, they stumble upon the key dilemma: does one dare to touch the capitalist mechanisms, or does one decide to play the game? If one disturbs the mechanisms, one is very swiftly punished by market perturbations, economic chaos and the rest. So how can we push things further after the first enthusiastic stage is over?

I remain convinced that our only hope is to act trans-nationally only in this way do we have a chance to constrain global capitalism. The nation-state is not the right instrument to confront the refugee crisis, global warming, and other truly pressing issues. So instead of opposing Eurocrats on behalf of national interests, lets try to form an all-European left. And it is because of this margin of hope that I am tempted to say: vote against Brexit, but do it as a devout Christian who supports a sinner while secretly cursing him. Dont compete with the rightwing populists, dont allow them to define the terms of the struggle. Socialist nationalism is not the right way to fight the threat of national socialism.

Against the Double Blackmail is published by Allen Lane.

Cees Nooteboom The Netherlands

Dear Britain, Imagine for one moment a peculiar kind of parlour game. Take the famous picture by Jean-Baptiste Isabey, The Congress of Vienna, from 1815. Look at the gentlemen involved, Alexander I, tsar of Russia, the Duke of Wellington, the devious and eternal Talleyrand, accompanied by a poet and a writer, De Lamartine and Chateaubriand. Then of course Metternich, the Bavarians, the Saxons and the Prussians, Karl August Frst von Hardenberg, Alexander and Wilhelm von Humboldt. There is even a Dutchman with a German name, Hans Christoph Ernst von Gagern.

The Congress of Vienna by Jean-Baptiste Isabey. Photograph: Royal Collection Trust / (C) Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II 2016

Now take out Viscount Castlereagh, the Duke of Wellington, the Earl of Aberdeen and the rest of the British delegation. Remember it is only a game. Make them leave their seats, that means five empty chairs. Look at the intense amazement on the faces of Metternich and Talleyrand. Where are the British? Have they really left the table?

These last few months we have been reading and hearing daily about Brexit. Economists, politicians, commentators have inundated us with arguments for and against. We have lost our innocence. There is no escape. We must have an opinion. Even me. I am not an economist. I am a poet, like Lamartine. And I have written a book on Germany. Does that make me an expert? I was a child during the second world war. My father died in the British aerial bombardment of the Hague in February 1945. But the British did not start the war. Germany did. And the Germans have understood better than most they were on the wrong side of history. Therefore they are now convinced that they do not want a German Europe but a European Germany.

But what if a British absence will force them to fill the European vacuum? Simply, by their specific weight in the middle, by their industrial strength, and by their history, which will determine the history of Europe, because they are there? And how does that affect the other countries of Europe?

I am a European, convinced, against all odds, and amid the sad turbulence of separatists and populists. The Europeans outside Britain cannot decide their fate this time. Now I read that the bosses of hedge funds are supporting the campaign to leave the EU. These are the people who were called not so long ago the dandies of the apocalypse in a French publication but who reads the French newspapers in the UK? David Cameron has spoken about the possibility of a world war. That seems far-fetched rhetoric, and has been ridiculed.

And yet, who dares to bet that if Britain opts out, later historians might not see this as a Versailles moment? Castlereagh and Wellington never left the congress in Vienna, and as far as I am concerned Cameron or Johnson, or Corbyn should stay seated at the tables of Europe. Our problems are manifold, but 50 years of peace is too precious to gamble with.

Letters to Poseidon is published by MacLehose.

Source: http://allofbeer.com/2017/06/11/dear-britain-elena-ferrante-slavoj-zizek-and-other-european-writers-on-brexit/

from All of Beer https://allofbeer.wordpress.com/2017/06/11/dear-britain-elena-ferrante-slavoj-zizek-and-other-european-writers-on-brexit/