#ever let anyone else take center stage regardless of the context

[sarahsupastar]

This is so so common in ensemble TV shows. The core cast can be a group of 6+ wildly diverse characters with varied established religious beliefs (usually, at least 1 Jew, at least 1 athiest, a few varieties of Christian, and maybe a Muslim if one of the actors is Middle Eastern)

and INEVITABLY when December comes around the show has to do a holiday (read: Christmas) episode. and for the sake of making that episode happen, allllll the non-Christian characters wind up joyfully participating in the Christmas festivities & feeling the Christmas spirit

normalize not celebrating xmas. like every single piece of media involving xmas in any way shape or form has everyone celebrating it like no matter their religion they just like do it for the spirit or the holiday or whatever and if they originally don't it ends w them giving in out of consideration and being guilted. like if you love xmas, that's great. i love bubble tea and i love rosh hashanah, but i don't expect everyone to love them or even experience them. it's not sad for me if someone doesn't enjoy them bc i'm not a self obsessed prick who assumes everyone else enjoys and celebrates the same things i do. pls be respectful this year, pls acknowledge xmas IS NOT a secular holiday, please do not other and exclude those who do not celebrate it. and btw this goes beyond inclusive language.

(goyim and christians/atheists can rb and add if you want but do not clown i am begging you)

[deathsteel]

This Ain't a Scene Its a Goddamn Drag Race

~Part Two~

Castiel woke up the next morning to the sound of the show's security guys stationed in the hallways changing shifts. He tried to block out the sound of their chit-chatting by burying his face in his pillow, but ultimately failed when they burst into raucous laughter right outside his doorway. With a groan he dragged himself out of bed and towards the bathroom; might as well get a run in before the production staff descended on them so they could film the reaction shots to last night’s elimination.

There wasn’t much about being on a reality show that Castiel would call ‘glamorous’, but filming the practically scripted confessional segments after each elimination and mini-challenge was probably the most degrading thing that Castiel had ever done in his entire life. And he’d once been talked into ripping open bags of trash all over himself during a show by his drag mother. Needless to say, performance art and lying to the public at large were not his favorite activities.

He’d gotten into a huge fight with one of the producers early on about how staged some of the things on the show were and it was probably why he’d been struggling his way up from the bottom since the very first episode. But luckily Gabby was very adamant about preserving what he called “the integrity of the process” and basically ignored the producers when they tried to steer him towards favoring a certain contestant.

That didn’t mean that the host was around all the time so the execs still got their dose of drama to satiate the audience, regardless of whether the rivalries between the queens were genuine or not. In actuality, Castiel liked most of the others, even Luc and Michael at times had been funny when the cameras were off, but he wasn’t about to delude himself into thinking they were best buddies. Not even Balthazar who had quite obviously been flirting with him the night before right in front of Charlie, one of the less anal PAs, who had been assigned to watch them for the evening. And definitely not Kevin who only lived an hour away in Olympia and treated him like the drag mother he’d always wanted.

Not to say it wasn’t tempting, both Balthazar’s lasciviousness and Kevin’s overtures of friendship, but Castiel wasn’t going to be the next Willam or Latrice Royale; being a slut and a saint hadn’t gotten either of those two queens the crown. And that was what all of this was about, right?

He was plagued by these thoughts as he headed down to the hotel’s indoor gym and put a couple of miles behind him on the treadmill, staring at his own reflection in the mirrors that lined the walls because he wasn’t allowed to turn on the T.V. that was mounted in one corner of the room. Castiel honestly would’ve done it just to spite his contract if he could (because he was dying to find out about some gossip that was centered on anyone besides himself) but Hael, one of the show’s interns, was there with him; ‘keeping an eye on him’ while really tapping away at her phone.

If Hael was a man, Castiel would flirt a little, trail his fingers up the inside of a thigh and BAM! He’d have instant access to being able to call his mom or text his sister or god above, check TMZ. He just knew in his gut that Rihanna had done something since he had been locked up in this rhinestone studded prison for the last month.

But Hael was a woman and even though she eyed his biceps when Castiel was doing half-hearted pushups as part of his cooldown, the thought of whoring himself out for five minutes with an iPhone kinda made him nauseous. Or that could’ve been the mini bottles of vodka he’d been slamming back with Raphael, Kev, and Charlie last night as they’d eaten delivered pizza in Kevin’s hotel suite. Balthazar had stuck to nursing a beer, amused by their antics, but otherwise aloof in the way that Castiel thought only took away from the other man’s attractiveness.

Now that his head was pounding from both his workout and his hangover, Castiel understood why the Brit hadn’t indulged like the rest of them. That strategic, wormy, sexy bastard.

By the time Castiel had made it back to his room, he could see a room service tray being delivered to Luc’s room and another on the floor already outside of Balthazar’s, so at least the other queens were up and about. They’d probably have to leave soon to go back to the studio and Castiel resigned himself to a fast shower and a shave instead of the long, leisurely one he’d intended to jerk off in.

Whatever, he’d just do it later.

Today they’d just be shooting reaction scenes based on last night’s elimination and doing the mini-challenge which wasn’t exhausting, but they never knew what the mini-challenge was going to be so you definitely had to have your wits about you. Castiel definitely did not have much of anything about him at the moment, but he planned on phoning it in for the mini-challenge since it wasn’t likely to affect him too much if he lost whatever little advantage the win would get him.

By the time he had finished changing into a well-loved pair of dark wash jeans and a faded black polo shirt and popped his medication, Castiel was already exhausted. So when one of the PAs pounded on his door and called a ten minute warning for him to be ready or else, Castiel just sighed at the dark circles under his eyes and his messy unstyled hair before shrugging and snagging some sunglasses and a baseball cap out of his suitcase and heading out the door with his shoes untied.

Castiel rode in sullen silence with Luc again mostly because he was the last one to make it downstairs to the waiting towncars, but also because he was the only one of the queens who could stand Luc’s morning routine of picking at his fingernails and muttering obscenities under his breath.

As soon as all of the queens were herded into the studio, wardrobe descended on them like a plague of locusts; tugging at their street clothes and strapping mics around their waists until all of the queens were dressed in their ‘confessional outfits’.

When Castiel had finally gotten the official word that he had been chosen as one Drag Race’s contestants, he had been mailed a two inch thick envelope containing a contact that Castiel had signed without even reading, a list of “suggested” items that he needed to bring for the challenges, and instructions to bring at least two to three weeks of casual clothing to include one outfit that would be used for filming purposes.

At the time Castiel hadn’t known that he was going to be parted from his favorite blue cardigan for literal months, not even allowed to take it back to the hotel with him because the wardrobe crew was scared he would spill something on it that they couldn’t get out. If he had, he would have just let them film him in one of his thrift store t-shirts and cut offs. But now he had to wear his most beloved, comfy cardigan along with a grey button down and skinny jeans two to three times a week, every week, to record his thoughts about the competition’s goings-ons.

The wardrobe crew didn't ever mess with his hair and they mostly didn’t bother putting makeup on any of them unless they looked REALLY rough, but most importantly, the outfits never ever changed. Today, Castiel got some concealer for the bags under his eyes and blush for the pallor that had settled over him due to his hangover.

It took Kevin an embarrassingly long time to understand that the reason behind wearing the same outfit for every confessional was because the producers wanted to splice footage from different days together so that they could create drama by taking things out of context. Castiel had no illusions about the fact that he probably looked like an asshole to most of America right now based on some of the things he had said during confessionals. A witty asshole with a penchant for lighting-fast one liners, but a dick nonetheless.

Castiel was still rubbing the sleep out of his eyes as they set up the footage for him from the last few days, everything from the main challenge to the elimination runway to the behind the scenes or “Untucked” bits where they forced watered-down cocktails into the queens’ hands and then had them be gossipy bitches or start catfights. If the producers were feeling particularly sadistic they would get one of the contestant's homophobic family members to record a heartfelt, ‘private’ message that would then be played in front of everyone.

It was voyeuristic in probably the worst possible way and Castiel had decided that he would sooner get his wig snatched off by being shady than cry off his makeup if they managed to get his estranged father to apologize for calling Castiel a ‘fucking f*ggot’ when he was ten and had caught him with purple nail polish on after having a friend over to play.

He usually just read people during the Untucked segments and so far that’s what he had been doing during the confessionals as well; the camera girls seemed to think he was funny and the producers hadn’t caught on that the Drag Race version of Holly Cummunion was a sarcastic, shady act so he’d keep it up until Gabby or someone else called him on his shit. This week though, he had been uncharacteristically honest- probably because he was tired.

He even complimented Luc’s runway outfit for Christ’s sakes so he must have been feeling extra charitable.

The only good thing about filming the confessional scenes was that nothing else was being filmed at the same time. It meant that at least three of the queens could be filmed doing confessionals all at once because it’s not like the cameras were busy filming anything else. With so few queens left they finished filming everything by lunchtime and after a quick change back to their street clothes and a stop by craft services the queens were scattered casually around the workroom by the production assistants and then left to wait until Gabby showed up.

One time the host had arrived an hour late with Starbucks and a hickey the size of a mid-sized principality on the underside of his jaw. The queens had shared amused looks before going on to do the funnest mini-challenge of the season so far; a matching game that used the butts of the Pit Crew as cards. Castiel suspected that he hadn’t been the only queen flustered by the glistening abs and generous bulges of the Pit Crew in their speedos, but for the sake of Sam and Zeke (Gabby’s two regular Pit Crew men who’d, of course, participated in the challenge as well) Castiel had tried his best not to ogle too much even though he was going through the driest, dry spell of the century.

After being allowed back into his comfy polo and jeans by wardrobe, Castiel let himself be placed at one of the workroom tables with Raphael who was filing his fingernails in the most bored way possible. Castiel kept his sunglasses hooked into the collar of his shirt just in case the studio lights made his already throbbing head any worse, but after glancing in a mirror he decided his hair was fucked no matter what he did so he discarded his ball cap on top of his makeup case and let it be free.

The production assistants were distracted by last minute adjustments so Castiel snuck a glance at Charlie, who was coaxing Kevin and Luc into sharing a mirror since they were both plucking their eyebrows, before he quickly fetched one of his styling heads; the one sporting the ratted up platinum blonde wig that Castiel had styled for the white-trash chic challenge a couple weeks before. He planned on using whatever downtime he had to finally brush the snarls out so he could use it again for something else.

“Alright guys, everyone good?” Charlie asked, doing a thumbs up around the room as she tugged the headphones that she usually wore while filming back onto her ears. “Great, Gabe should be here in five so you all know the drill. Chat, look busy, just act natural.”

Raphael let out a derisive little scoff under his breath but otherwise continued shaping his fingernails and acting like Castiel didn’t exist. But that was pretty natural so Castiel didn’t bother questioning it, instead choosing to joke loudly with Balthazar from across the room about what the upcoming challenge could possibly be.

“Maybe Gabby’s interested in checking out the tightness of our tuck,” Balthazar quipped, winking in Kevin’s direction when the younger queen started giggling.

“Oh, well bless Connie for leaving then,” Castiel replied, referring to another queen, Connie Lingus, who had bowed out of the competition due to medical issues. “That girl had the meatiest tuck I’d ever seen.”

“Well, did you ever see her dragged down?” Raphael interjected, still focused on his nails. “Gave the phrase ‘hung like a horse’ a whole new meaning, baby.”

“I think Gabby has more important things to worry about than our tucks,” Luc drawled in a bored, disinterested kinda way.

He was making conversation to get air time and all the assembled queens knew it; Castiel just barely restrained himself from rolling his eyes and that was only because there was a cameraman hovering at his elbow as he brushed out his wig.

“Hells yea she does,” Kevin piped leaning back from the mirror to smooth down both of his eyebrows with a critical gaze on his reflection. “Like check out the tightness of the Pit Crew! Can I get an ay-men!?”

All the girls let out an ay-men, some less enthusiastically than others, but it happened to coincide perfectly with the now tell-tale sign of Gabby’s impending arrival. Well, it probably wasn't a coincidence, nothing about TV ever was.

‘Ooooh, gurl!’ The hidden speakers in the workroom blared to life with the sign for Gabby’s message that would contain a hint about the upcoming elimination challenge. ‘You’ve got she-male!’

[violetsystems]

#personal

There’s been a lot of encouraging news in the face of absolute disaster lately.  None of it really applies to anybody but me.  So I have been living that reality to the best of my ability.  It hasn’t been without missteps.  Things feel even more fucked up than they were in the world let alone life.  For me society trends downward when I shut the door.  So I’ve been focusing on improving my surroundings.  My kitchen has officially become my office.  Google announced their employees were working from home until the end of the year.  Facebook threw its hands up and said forever.  My situation is far more complex but doing my job depends on the internet.  I upgraded my router back in April at the first hint of all of this.  Slowly I’ve been building up the infrastructure around here to support me being able to do my job.  I upgraded my internet and finally got a home phone number linked to a 312 area code.  I’ve been relying on package delivery for a good month and a half.  The amount of packages I’ve had stolen has dwindled.  Yesterday the Stussy drop from Dover Street Market was misdelivered.  The day before they wouldn’t drop it off without a signature.  I had to flag down the fed ex truck on the corner.  I walked them back to the address explaining that I had to be vigilant due to gang activity.  That morning when I put out the signature release one of the gang members from the block had talked to me.  Mostly in passing about life.  I’m pretty sure theirs is rougher than mine.  But that’s the upfront and transparent life I live.  Having to be up front and center with people at all times nobody what emotions I feel inside.  I wore a mask when I approached the fed ex truck.  When I walked them back they discovered they had delivered both packages for my address to the neighbor.  So I killed two birds with one stone though my neighbor would never know.  I woke up Sunday morning to a pigeon completely ripped apart on my porch.  I can’t tell if it was the cats or something else.  I cleaned it up at eight in the morning regardless.  Finally just decided to clean and minimize the porch for the summer.  I had a refurbished shark robot vacuum delivered by UPS that same day.  They texted my phone and I ran out to grab it.  The guy thanked me for being fast.  I plugged it in and set up the app on my phone.  The splash screen showed a clean, neutral home.  Lurking in the background picture was my router.  I let the thing run for an hour.  It picked up dust I never knew existed.  My cat is bewildered and afraid.  Much like most of the neighborhood is when my name comes up in conversation.  What is he like?  What does he do?  Is he single?  No.  No.  And no.  Do I get things delivered on time?  I get them in the end.  I ran around the neighborhood in the Nike X Stussy drop after my works hours yesterday.  I almost got run over twice.  The shirt says increase the peace.  I guess I struck a nerve.  And yet people have been walking over me for years.  The embarrassing part is now everybody sees just how much and in what context.  And people are reasonably scared because as calm as I seem if they were in my shoes it would be different.  They would break down.  They would collapse.  My credit score went up a hundred points this week.  That’s some encouraging news.  Cash positive is a good look.  Too bad our president isn’t.

Money seems to be all that is important to people these days.  How much you spend.  What deals you make and steals you uncover.  I try to play that game sometimes.  I’ve saved a lot of money over the last few months.  Locked down.  I’ve improved my health, my cooking skills, my body tone, and my video game performance.  I just pieced out the first stage of a new desktop.  A mid sized microatx ryzen.  The first PC I’ve built in over a decade.  My goal is to play wow at the maximum settings on my TV.  More so like the phone, I’d just rather have my own computer for home.  My watch has organized a lot of my appointments and responsibilities in a low key way.  Much how I continue to live my life.  Low key.  This is not to say I feel trapped between two huge plates of metal.  The one grind where I’m not good or important enough to pay attention to in real life.  The other grind where people use me as a bait or decoy to trick people.  Neither of those cases treat me like a human being.  I have been hurt so much by this process that I have transcended to a point where I don’t bother much with society.  And yet society still expects so much out of me.  I ordered my Jacobin magazines for Mayday.  I might sit out on my porch, drink tea and read them by myself.  But nobody ever engages me in a way that’s respectful.  It’s all trick after trick.  Scam after scam.  Hushed back talk and shadowed praise.  I am fucking invisible.  Nobody cares about me.  If they do, they aren’t able to show it.  And there’s only a few people I love enough to understand that relationship deeply.  The rest of the world is empty to me aside from animals and gardening.  I should be so much more.  And somehow looking back to the last decade I am.  It’s just not of value to anyone but me.  And I’m not really interested in taking another step backwards to show how genuine and truthful I am.  The embarrassing thing is while people gave the most vile people the pass because they were more famous or pretty I suffered.  Over and over and over again.  To the point where whatever it was people were chasing after seemed meaningless to me.  I tried so hard to get back on track.  And then I did.  And I took a look around and it frightens me.  Nobody knows the value of anything beyond money.  And I’ve held a job consistently for twenty years.  Paid taxes for twenty years.  Grown actual competitive job skills for twenty years.  Accrued a pension.  Travelled the world.  Networked all over the map.  And I’m still here on tumblr every Saturday.  Typing away as a warning.  One that nobody really hears other than myself and my friends.  Who I think have offered me a place to control my own narrative in the face of lies, bullshit, and selfishness.  It all took work.  Courage.  Callous confrontation.  A look in the mirror of what it is I could become.  And what it is I am now.  I don’t really know.  I deserve to know.  I deserve to be loved, respected and treated like a valuable human being.  I know I am not.

For the record, I’m Tim.  I fucking hate politics.  I am an adult who has seen more of my time wasted and freedom siphoned.  And I also live in America.  A place where people tell me to stay indoors and shut the door.  A place where if you come knocking with a warrant you better be wearing a mask.  A place where I pay it forward enough and keep a high enough profile to avoid awkward conversations like that.  And yet space is still encroached on.  I am for the record enjoying the territorial markings.  I’ve carved out a very special place for myself in the third most populated city in America next to LA and New York.  I was thinking about heading to LA for a day sometime.  A lot of my friends out there are in the same ecosystem.  And yet the internet has kept us all together regardless.  Tied and knitted together by the stories, art, fashion and ideals we felt important to share with each other.  We are a community in and of itself.  The community that I pay forward to and have seen so many great things happen in my life.  Free thinking and independent minds linked like block chain when it comes to the latest drops or rare trivia related to science, anime or that little horny fucking skeleton guy you people draw.  People are always failing at engaging us.  And so we fall back to our dead platform and seeth in our collective anger sometimes.  Other times life goes on and we post another picture.  I post the same picture every once and awhile to let everybody know how much of a nerd I am.  And also how romantic I think I am when everybody tells me I don’t exist and could never connect with anyone.  I’m not good enough.  Handsome enough.  Young enough.  Happy enough.  For the record, people lie to discourage you.  They talk behind your back because they’re afraid of the competition.  They’re afraid of having to work as hard as you.  Suffer as a horribly as you in silence.  They have no plan other than being negative.  Playing dirty tricks.  Playing people against each other.  Using discontent, anger, division against their own people for the sake of consolidating power.  I’ve written about it in anguish for years.  And people just don’t listen.  I do.  I act on things creatively.  I think on my toes.  When the package doesn’t get delivered I don’t sit and wonder why.  I go out there and get it.  When the test of time is withstood.  It’s me sitting there with a faint smile on my face and a knowing look.  It’s been a long time.  And as long as I’m around you know what consistency looks like.  And maybe what forever has the potential to be.  Me and you.  Not me, you and the rest of society constantly knocking on our door asking for milk and sugar.  What will the neighbors think if I don’t answer?  That my time is more valuable spent with you.  A long time of no regrets.  Just forward thinking and self care.  And a humidifier in the bedroom.  Speaking of clearing the air. <3 Tim

[oumakokichi]

What's your view on Ouma and Saihara's relationship?

Oh my god, thank you so much for asking this. This isactually one of the things I’ve wanted to write about the most lately!

I’m going to reference some of Ouma’s FTEs in my answer, soI’d like to thank @kaibutsushidousha for translating them all to English! ThoseFTEs gave me a lot of insight on things, and were incredibly fun to read, so ifanyone hasn’t checked them out already, I’d say go take a look!

My explanation’s probably gonna get long, and it WILL include spoilers for pretty much every part ofthe game, so anyone who wants to avoid spoilers shouldn’t read past this part!

First, let me start by saying I think Ouma is the smartestcharacter in the entire game. Moreso than the mastermind. Moreso than Saihara. He’snot “the mastermind” himself, but he IS one step ahead of just about every single othercharacter, and he’s clever as hell about guiding the rest of them subtly to theinformation he knows while simultaneously making it seem as if he just wants tomess with them.

Ouma’s title is SHSL Supreme Leader. He has charisma, he hasan adorable, childlike quality, and he has the ability to lie his ass off. Ifhe really, truly got off on making others suffer, or if he enjoyed the killinggame half as much as he pretends to for the first four chapters, he could havewooed them all from the moment he met them, earned their trust, and then soldthem out to Monokuma (for one cornchip, etc. etc.). I honestly believe he’ssmart enough that he could have killed everysingle member of that game if he had actually planned to.

But Ouma’s goal is very specific, and in order to obtainthat goal he needs Saihara. Where Ouma and Kaede disagreed on the basis of howto lead the group on a very fundamental level, I feel as if Saihara’s morehesitant approach both to leadership and to pursuing the truth is exactly whatOuma wants. Someone has to take on the role of leading the group, and whileOuma certainly could, he definitely doesn’t want to. He wants someone else todo it, so that he can continue with his own plans in the shadows. And Saihara, slowly coming out of his shell and beginning to finally,seriously weigh the consequences of pursuing the real truth of a matter versusthe perceived truth of a matter, is just the one he wants.

I think he’s a parallel to Saihara in every way conceivable.I’ve seen people call Ouma the new Komaeda of the fandom, but what I don’tthink people quite get is that he’s intentionally similar to Komaeda on a fewfronts, yes—but he’s also a subversionof everything Komaeda was in sdr2.

I remember people talking about how the conflict betweenHinata and Komaeda was originally supposed to be between Hinata and Akane,given the context of their first and last names (Hajime and Owari, beginningand end). That concept sadly didn’t get implemented in favor of giving the conflict-bringerrole to Komaeda at the time, but I feel as if now it’s finally come back aroundvia Saihara and Ouma (although don’t get me wrong, I would love to see anactual female protagonist or deuteragonist for this trope and not a bait-and-switch).

The theme of ndrv3 is truth versus lies, and the greymorality that stretches between them. Reality, fiction, black, white, all thesethings are heavily emphasized even in Saihara and Ouma’s character designs. And at everyopportunity, these two are shown on opposing sides of class trials and debates. 

But I don’t take this to mean the relationship between the two of them ishostile. If anything, I think it’s exactly the opposite. I think Ouma is tryingto guide Saihara into solving things that he already knows the answer to, allthe while acting as if he enjoys antagonizing or wreaking havoc in order tofool Monokuma into thinking he would never, ever present a threat to thekilling game itself. And Saihara is smart enough to realize he’s being led,even if most of Ouma’s thought process remains an enigma to him.

Ouma’s FTEs highlight this perfectly. Throughout all ofthem, Ouma plays games with Saihara, and claims that at the end of a set numberof events, he’s going to “have to kill him” for knowing about the existence ofhis supposed secret, evil organization. And although he could win these gameseasily time and time again, he chooses notto. He teases Saihara and slowly nudges him in whichever direction he wants himto go, and at the end of it all, he loses on purpose, because his objective wasnever to win in the first place.

If that’s not a perfect analogy for how Ouma behaves inevery single one of the trials, I don’t know what is. His resourcefulness andperceptiveness suggests that he knows the answer to just about all of thembefore they even start. In Chapter 2, he even makes an offhanded, amusedcomment about how he “didn’t even read the Monokuma file.” And in hindsight Irealized that of course he didn’t, because he already guessed that Kirumi wasthe culprit by knowing that she had received her own motive video.

At any point in time, he could have chosen to lie blatantlyand condemn the group, and therefore get them all killed, or come clean withthe info and be considered a leader and a savior to all of them. Instead hedoes neither, and teases out the answers in the trial at his own pace. At onepoint when no one, not even Saihara can guess how the culprit climbed up to thegym window, Ouma even goes completely blank-faced before “randomly” taking thediscussion in another direction. And Saihara even asks point-blank if that wasOuma’s way of trying to give him a hint (to which Ouma, being Ouma, respondsthat he has nooo idea what he’s talking about).

Ouma’s not even really what I would call the Komaeda ofndrv3. If anything, he’s the Kirigiri. With an actual detective in theprotagonist role, Ouma instead tails Saihara’s every step when exploring newareas, always acting as if he’s come around to annoy him or the others. But thewhiteboard in his room, the statue of Amami, and his decision to stage a case that not even Monokuma could possibly know the entire “truth” of in Chapter 5,all suggests that he was investigating absolutely everything, running his owntheories and guesses parallel to Saihara’s.

And while I think Saihara is certainly uncomfortable withsome aspects of Ouma’s character and finds him inscrutable, I also think that preciselybecause of his own inability to pinpoint Ouma’s true objectives andpersonality, he’s curious. He’s a detective, so it’s only natural. A characterlike Ouma presents so many mysteries that anyone with a penchant for solvingthose mysteries would be intrigued. Saihara wants to see more of “Ouma’s trueself,” despite Ouma’s consistent efforts to make sure absolutely no one wouldever like him or get close to him.

As Saihara develops and grows throughout the course of thekilling game, again and again he’s led along from trial to trial, given hints,and not-so-gently nudged in the right direction by a perceptive, incrediblyintelligent character with all the patience of a 10-year-old. And just as Kaedeentrusted her will to Saihara and he learned many things from her in Chapter 1,I can’t help but feel as if Ouma’s death in Chapter 5 was meant to mirror that.As Kaede died framed as a culprit but beloved by everyone, her intentions ofsaving them made clear, Ouma dies as a victim but hated by everyone, suspected,doubted, and with his motives unknown to all of them.

Ouma didn’t want to die if he could help it, but he trusted Saiharaenough that he believed he could continue leading the group—without being ledalong anymore—and thus willingly sacrificed himself for the sake of forcing awrench into all of Monokuma’s plans. And Saihara, while still undoubtedlyskeptical as to whether he ever really knew the true Ouma at all, neverthelesssteps into this role, and does catch on to the truth of things in the followingchapter.

This got way longer than I planned for it to, but therelationship between these two is central to the entire story. Regardless ofwhether or not you ship them romantically, I don’t think anyone can deny thattheir dynamic is still extremely important to the plot, or that they’re bothparalleling and observing each other’s actions every step of the way.

Ouma has what I would consider to be pretty canon feelingsfor Saihara. Call him a liar all you want, but without an undeniable interestin Saihara (or a huge crush the size of a brick), there’d be literally noexplanation at all for his actions. Mysteries are meant to be solvable, andthat means Ouma himself is no exception. Rather than pure chaos, his actions arefueled by an interest in Saihara and a desire for pushing him into center stageso that he himself can better undermine Monokuma’s plans.

And Saihara…well, he’s uncomfortable with Ouma’s cold,calculating nature and his tendency to flip-flop from one extreme to the other,make no mistake. But without his interest in Ouma, he would never have come toseriously question the meaning of the word “truth” or the nature of reality versusfiction versus belief. He also probably would have died about ten times over ifhe’d just flat-out doubted Ouma every time instead of trusting on instinct thatOuma was throwing him a bone, rather than hanging him out to dry.

All in all, they’re a very interesting, very fun dynamic,and I do ship them together myself. I just hope the fandom comes to understandtheir relationship a little more and doesn’t immediately assume the worst aboutit.

[junker-town]

Australia will not fear Germany or anyone else at the Confederations Cup

Manager Ange Postecoglou has taken a Socceroos team used to playing defensively and shaped them into a modern attacking side.

Australian soccer has always been slightly uncertain of itself. It stems from years of being the nation’s “backwater” sport, marginalized as a pastime for migrants who were “afraid” of the other more physical football codes such as rugby league, union and AFL. The national soccer league was plagued by administration and crowd issues, eventually scrapped in 2005 for the franchise-based A-League, where any links to the sport’s checkered past were abolished in favor of a shiny, idealistic future. Throughout this turbulence, the Socceroos have always painted themselves as plucky underdogs, fighting against their diminished place in the national sporting landscape.

This mindset of inferiority also stems from years of disappointment in World Cup qualification. They have been robbed, unlucky and sometimes just plain bad across several decades of staring into the international abyss. Even after defying the odds to break a 32-year drought to not only qualify but perform well at the 2006 World Cup, the national team still cast itself as victims. For many years under different coaches, this was characterized by a conservative, defense-first approach befitting of their assumed role as little guys in the world’s biggest sport.

“I've been a little bit frustrated by our constant painting a picture of a team that's not good enough”

It is within this context that Ange Postecoglou found himself when appointed following the sacking of Holger Osieck in the aftermath of two dismal 6-0 defeats to France and Brazil in September 2013, just nine months out from a World Cup for which Australia had qualified. Postecoglou’s mantra right from the start was to rejuvenate the squad and change the mentality of the team.

This was clear from his very first press conference. “I've been a little bit frustrated by our constant painting a picture of a team that's not good enough, a league that's not good enough, players that are not good enough,” he said. “Regardless of the state of the game — and it's been a lot worse than it is right now — we've never taken a backwards step.”

Right from the start, never take a backwards step has been the motto of Postecoglou’s Socceroos. Quite literally, from the kick-off of their first match in the new regime, the team went forward, signaling their new intent. In the build up to the 2014 World Cup, Postecoglou went about doing things his way; employing a new backroom staff to “transform the environment into a world class one,” making dramatic squad selections to cull the last of a Golden Generation in favor of several younger, locally-based players and developing what he called a “modern, aggressive and attacking” style of football befitting of their new motto.

The changes were most evident at the 2014 World Cup, where Australia was drawn into the same pool as defending champions Spain, eventual semi-finalists the Netherlands and the hipsters’ favourites, Chile. Even against top-class opposition, Postecoglou was not shirked. He encouraged his side to constantly play on the front foot. They always pressed high, attacking quickly from advanced positions on the pitch, and in build up play, tried to work the ball forward quickly and effectively from the back. Three defeats suggested a poor tournament, but Postecoglou’s constant remit was that this World Cup was all about building a new future with a younger generation of players, playing a truly Australian way.

The “true” Australian way, in Postecoglou’s eyes, was a team that was aggressive and proactive. There was no place for shrinking violets. Over the next six months, Postecoglou continued to impose this mindset on an ever-changing squad. Throughout the course of his tenure, he has used some odd 50 plus players in a bid to increase the depth of the team, give players the opportunity to learn the new style and to expose some players who may have been struggling at club level to potential new suitors.

Everything up to this point, however, was really about succeeding at the Asian Cup in 2015, which Australia was hosting. Postecoglou was aware that winning the tournament would not only be a landmark moment for the national team, but also an unprecedented opportunity to convert fans who had drifted away from football in previous years to a new era of dominant, attack-minded football. Emboldened by the occasion, the Socceroos triumphed in dramatic fashion, winning the final in extra-time against South Korea. It was a landmark moment — Australia’s first major trophy in international football, and justification for Postecoglou’s daring revolution.

After all, the journey had not always been easy. At every stage, Postecoglou and his players have faced criticism. The selection of players sometimes not playing regularly or even being club-less has raised eyebrows. Additionally, not everyone shares Postecoglou’s stubborn belief in the ability of the squad, and his unwavering vision that they always play the creative, dynamic brand of modern football he craves.

Yet throughout his reign, the team has always exhibited the core principles of his preferred style of play. When in possession, it is all about going forward — players must be positioned where they can face forward and play forward, particularly in midfield. This allows the team to play as vertically as possible, with center backs and even the goalkeeper encouraged to break defensive lines with penetrating forward passes. The aim is always to get one of a creative playmaker, such as Tom Rogic of Celtic or Aaron Mooy of Huddersfield Town, on the ball facing forward between the lines. From these positions, penetration in the final third comes from out wide, with the wide players encouraged to cut inside towards goal with the knowledge the fullbacks will get forward and deliver dangerous balls early into the box if they receive out wide.

At the heart of it all, Postecoglou’s philosophy is about penetration, creativity and playing forward. These have been the core concepts that have underpinned every step of the evolution of the team, and particularly, the formation. Originally starting with a 4-2-1-3, he then flipped the midfield triangle at the Asian Cup to a 4-3-3 to fit a second No. 10 into his team. As creative young players such as Massimo Luongo of QPR broke through, Postecoglou saw the need to change to a 4-4-2 diamond. The next step has been the most drastic, with Postecoglou changing to a 3-2-4-1 formation on the eve of a recent World Cup qualifier against Iraq.

The team has always exhibited the core principles of his preferred style of play. When in possession, it is all about going forward.

This radical new system — where the wing-backs are positioned very high in line with two No. 10s, making the defense a true back three — is the result of indifferent performances in recent matches, where Australia have struggled against teams defending deep and have lacked the usual pace and intensity that characterize their style of play. From Postecoglou’s point of view, the new formation embodies all the key principles of his philosophy, but from the public’s perspective, it’s simply too attack-minded. With the back three often overloaded on the counter-attack, it is hard to disagree — especially after a 4-0 rout at the hands of Brazil in a friendly.

However, Postecoglou’s success stemmed from his stubbornness. Right from the start, he swam against the tide, daring to believe Australian football was capable of more than the underdog status it had carved out for himself. That is why, at the outset of this Confederations Cup, he has said publicly that "we want to win it mate,” exemplifying his ambition. "I'm not going to coach in between, just notch up a stint for my country as a coach flat-lining. Let's go there and see what we can do.”

That sums up his personality, and the change in attitude he has fostered in a team for so long playing on the back burner of international football.

[iamxmylle-blog]

Wait To Date Until You Can Marry by Marshall Segal

When should young people begin to date?

Your answer probably hangs on why you think you (or anyone else) should date in the first place. Anyone can see that the costs are often high — crushing breakups, sexual sin, shocking betrayal, sudden rejection, devastating heartbreak — the pain of love that never walked the aisle.

So why do so many of us still dive so quickly into dating?

Well, in part, because Satan masks the risks so well (Revelation 12:9). He casts romance as a qualification for the good life, and projects anything else as empty, lonely, and purposeless by comparison. He capitalizes on our desires and convinces us we must “love” in order to truly live, that all the highest pleasures and fullest experiences are found in a relationship with a boyfriend or girlfriend (or husband or wife). He brews heartbreak for breakfast, and sweetens every sexual sin with a beautiful, but poisonous glaze.

Satan and his influence in and through the world leads millions of us to date too much and too early, because he loves what that kind of dating does to us.

I had my first “girlfriend” in the sixth grade, my first kiss that summer (different girl), and then a new girlfriend almost every year through high school. From far too young, I was looking for affection, safety, and intimacy from girls instead of from God. I dated earlier than most, and more than most. My teenage years were one long string of relationships that were too serious for our age, went on too long, and therefore, ended too painfully. I said, “I love you” too soon, and to too many. And the devil sat front-and-center, loving every minute of my early dating history.

Why Should Anyone Date?

“Wait to date until you can marry, and save yourself the pain of love that never walked the aisle.”

The spiritual war for our hearts is real, and the stakes are high, so it’s critical to ask why we think we should date in the first place. Why did I have a girlfriend when I was twelve (and thirteen, and fourteen, and even eighteen)?

For many of us, we just want to be happy, to belong, to be valued. We imagine our deepest needs being met in the intimacy of being with a special young man or woman.

We all want our hearts to soar for someone or something. The romance and mystery of marriage seems to hold the highest earthly peaks of pleasure and friendship. We long to be known and loved, to belong with someone, in someone else’s story. We also want someone to join us in ours. And we all want our lives to count for something. We want to contribute something significant to a meaningful cause. We want to make a difference. We don’t want to waste our lives.

Many of us date because we’re trying to fill those needs in love. If you asked us, we might say we’re “pursuing marriage,” but a lot of us aren’t even close to marriage — in age, finances, maturity, education, stage of life. We’re really in pursuit of the happiness, belonging, and significance we think we’ll find in romance.

What Would I Do Differently?

If I could do it all over again, I wouldn’t have dated in the tenth grade (or the twelfth, or even my first couple years in college). I would have waited to date until I could marry.

The breakthrough came for me in beginning to understand the major differences between dating and marriage. A dating couple may feel married at times, but a dating couple is never a married couple. Understanding the distinctions between the relationships will protect us from all kinds of pain and failure in dating.

“Life is never mainly about love and marriage. God has so much more in store for you than any relationship can offer.”

The greatest prize in any life, regardless of our relationship status, is to know Christ and be known by him, to love him and be loved by him. The great prize in marriage is Christ-centered intimacy with a spouse — knowing and being known, loving and being loved by a husband or wife. The great prize in dating is Christ-centered clarity about marriage (or toward marriage). Romantic intimacy is safest in the context of marriage, and marriage is safest in the context of clarity. If we want to have and enjoy that kind of Christ-centered intimacy, we need to get married. And if we want to get married, we need to pursue clarity about whom to marry.

Wait to Date

Legally, at least in the United States, we can’t marry until we’re eighteen (except for Nebraska and Mississippi where it’s even older — nineteen and twenty-one, respectively).

Beyond mere age, though, we should have serious questions of maturity and stability. Has our boyfriend or girlfriend matured enough to have any idea what they might be like as a husband or wife for the next fifty years? Have we really matured enough? Will one or both of us be able to provide for a family financially? Has his or her faith in Jesus been tested enough by trials to be confident it’s real?

Some, no doubt, will hate this advice — I’m sure I would have — but we all need to acknowledge that we can date long before we can marry — and that doesn’t mean we should. We cannot date toward marriage when marriage isn’t even on the radar yet. You may be dreaming about marriage already (I was), but is it realistic that the two of you could marry anytime soon?

Wait to date until you can marry each other. My advice — take it or leave it — is wait until you can reasonably marry him or her in the next eighteen months. It doesn’t mean you have to marry that quickly. The important part is that you could, if God made it clear this was his will and his timing for you. You won’t find eighteen months anywhere in the Bible, and so you should not treat it as God’s law. But you can test — with the Lord, your parents, and close Christian friends — whether that seems wise and safe for you and your heart.

What to Do While We Wait

Just because we are waiting to date does not mean we are sitting around and waiting. Life is never only, or even mainly, about love and marriage. Our life is about Jesus now — his love for us and his plans for us — whether we’re single or married, sixteen or sixty.

“Some of us may have been born wanting to be married, but none of us were born ready to be married.”

God has so much more in store for you than any relationship can offer. He wants to say something spectacular through you and your young life. He wants to use you and your gifts to change other people’s lives. If he wills for you to be married, he wants to make you into a strong and caring future wife or husband. He wants to show the world where to find happiness through your joy.

You don’t need a boyfriend or girlfriend to experience any of God’s dreams for these early years. So, if not date, then what?

1. Set a courageous and faithful example for others.

Let no one despise you for your youth, but set the believers an example in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity. (1 Timothy 4:12).

You may not be able to vote yet, or even drive, but you can live to say something about Jesus. Your speech — the language and attitude you use with your family and friends — says something about Jesus now. Your behavior — the decisions you make every day about what you will do or not do, the ways you fit in with the rest of the world or not — tells the world about your God. Your love— the way you treat the people in your life — says something about how you’ve been loved by God. Your purity — your commitment to trust God and his word, and to treasure him above every premature pleasure and experience — preaches the gospel to peers enslaved to their desires.

2. Live to serve, not to be served.

As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God’s varied grace: whoever speaks, as one who speaks oracles of God; whoever serves, as one who serves by the strength that God supplies — in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. (1 Peter 4:10–11)

Most young people are so consumed by their own needs and desires that they’re oblivious to the needs around them. But you are capable of so much more than social media, shopping, and video games. Look, for instance, at what teenagers accomplish at the Olympics, fifteen- and sixteen-year-olds winning gold against the best in the world.

What if you decided to use the gifts God has given you to make a difference in someone else’s life? You could serve in a ministry at church, mentor someone younger, or ask around about needs in your neighborhood. You are capable of far more than the world expects of you. Live in such a way “that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ” through you.

3. Strive to become the future spouse God calls you to be.

Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior… . Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her. (Ephesians 5:22–25).

“Until you are ready to date, God will be preparing you to love well when you do.”

Some of us might be born wanting to be married, but none of us are born ready to be married. The call to love a spouse is a call to live out the greatest story ever told — God himself coming in the flesh to die for his sinful bride, the Church. Our natural instincts are not to die to ourselves for the sake of someone else, even someone we like a whole lot.

Until you are ready to date, God will be preparing you to love well when you do, transforming you from one degree of readiness to another (2 Corinthians 3:18).

4. Stun everyone around you with joy while you wait.

We have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may … walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God. May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy. (Colossians 1:9–11)

No one has to look far to find sour single people, young men and women bemoaning loneliness while everyone else is dating someone. It is much harder to find young people finding their identity, happiness, and security somewhere else.

Surprise your friends (and everyone else) by being content to wait to date until you can marry, because you already have everything you need in God.

#desiringorg