#fbi investigation 2018

[thoughtlessarse]

Donald Trump’s claim that the FBI was given “free rein” to investigate sexual misconduct allegations made against prospective U.S. Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh was false, according to a congressional report. Trump’s assurance that the FBI was on the case came in September 2018 as abuse claims made by two women threatened to derail Kavanaugh’s confirmation to America’s highest court. “I want them to interview whoever they deem appropriate, at their discretion,” Trump said of the FBI at the time, reports the Washington Post. But a new report by Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), released on Tuesday, says the White House never authorized the FBI to independently investigate the sex abuse claims.

continue reading

[trans-axolotl]

"Much ink has already been spilled on Harris’s prosecutorial background. What is significant about the topic of sex work is how recently the vice president–elect’s actions contradicted her alleged views. During her tenure as AG, she led a campaign to shut down Backpage, a classified advertising website frequently used by sex workers, calling it “the world’s top online brothel” in 2016 and claiming that the site made “millions of dollars from trafficking.” While Backpage did make millions off of sex work ads, its “adult services” listings offered a safer and more transparent platform for sex workers and their clients to conduct consensual transactions than had historically been available. Harris’s grandiose mischaracterization led to a Senate investigation, and the shuttering of the site by the FBI in 2018.

“Backpage being gone has devastated our community,” said Andrews. The platform allowed sex workers to work more safely: They were able to vet clients and promote their services online. “It’s very heartbreaking to see the fallout,” said dominatrix Yevgeniya Ivanyutenko. “A lot of people lost their ability to safely make a living. A lot of people were forced to go on the street or do other things that they wouldn’t have otherwise considered.” M.F. Akynos, the founder and executive director of the Black Sex Worker Collective, thinks Harris should “apologize to the community. She needs to admit that she really fucked up with Backpage, and really ruined a lot of people’s lives.”

After Harris became a senator, she cosponsored the now-infamous Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act (SESTA), which—along with the House’s Allow States and Victims to Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act (FOSTA)—was signed into law by President Trump in 2018. FOSTA-SESTA created a loophole in Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, the so-called “safe harbor” provision that allows websites to be free from liability for user-generated content (e.g., Amazon reviews, Craigslist ads). The Electronic Frontier Foundation argues that Section 230 is the backbone of the Internet, calling it “the most important law protecting internet free speech.” Now, website publishers are liable if third parties post sex-work ads on their platforms.

That spelled the end of any number of platforms—mostly famously Craigslist’s “personal encounters” section—that sex workers used to vet prospective clients, leaving an already vulnerable workforce even more exposed. (The Woodhull Freedom Foundation has filed a lawsuit challenging FOSTA on First Amendment grounds; in January 2020, it won an appeal in D.C.’s district court).

“I sent a bunch of stats [to Harris and Senator Diane Feinstein] about decriminalization and how much SESTA-FOSTA would hurt American sex workers and open them up to violence,” said Cara (a pseudonym), who was working as a sex worker in the San Francisco and a member of SWOP when the bill passed. Both senators ignored her.

The bill both demonstrably harmed sex workers and failed to drop sex trafficking. “Within one month of FOSTA’s enactment, 13 sex workers were reported missing, and two were dead from suicide,” wrote Lura Chamberlain in her Fordham Law Review article “FOSTA: A Hostile Law with a Human Cost.” “Sex workers operating independently faced a tremendous and immediate uptick in unwanted solicitation from individuals offering or demanding to traffic them. Numerous others were raped, assaulted, and rendered homeless or unable to feed their children.” A 2020 survey of the effects of FOSTA-SESTA found that “99% of online respondents reported that this law does not make them feel safer” and 80.61 percent “say they are now facing difficulties advertising their services.” "

-What Sex Workers Want Kamala Harris to Know by Hallie Liberman

[dontmean2bepoliticalbut]

On 7/31/2019 Trump has a private meeting with Putin. On 8/3/2019, just 3 days after his private meeting with Putin Trump issues a request for a list of top US spies. By 2021 the CIA reports an unusually high number of their agents are being captured and/or being murdered. During the search executed at Mar A Lago the FBI find nore documents with lists of U.S. informants on them.

A Timeline

• FBI wiretapped Russian gambling ring headquartered at Trump Tower for two years - March 21, 2017

• Trump revealed highly classified information to Russian foreign minister and ambassador - May 15, 2017

• Trump, Putin Meet For 2 Hours In Helsinki - July 16, 2018

• Rand Paul Goes To Russia And Delivers Letter For Trump, Marking Our Era Of Irony - August 9, 2018

• Following the Money: Trump and Russia-Linked Transactions From the Campaign to the Presidential Inauguration - December 17, 2018

• The US extracted a top spy from Russia after Trump revealed classified information to the Russians in an Oval Office meeting - September 10, 2019

• Trump’s Loose Lips Force US to Extract Spy From Kremlin - September 10, 2019

• Was Mar-a-Lago Trespasser a Tourist or a Spy? A Judge Said Her Story Didn’t Hold Up. - November 25, 2019

• Trump downplays massive cyber hack on government after Pompeo links attack to Russia - December 19, 2020

• Russia has been cultivating Trump as an asset for 40 years, former KGB spy says - January 29, 2021

• There was Trump-Russia collusion — and Trump pardoned the colluder - April 17, 2021

• Longtime GOP operatives charged with funneling Russian national’s money to Trump, RNC - September 20, 2021

• Captured, Killed or Compromised: C.I.A. Admits to Losing Dozens of Informants - October 5, 2021

• Files Seized From Trump Are Part of Espionage Act Inquiry - August 12, 2022

• Ex-Clinton aide implies 'President of France' file found at Trump's home during Mar-a-Lago raid could be valuable to Putin as 'kompromat' - August 13, 2022

• Inventing Anna: The tale of a fake heiress, Mar-a-Lago, and an FBI investigation - August 22, 2022

• Russians used a US firm to funnel funds to GOP in 2018. Dems say the FEC let them get away with it - October 30, 2022

• Trump makes shocking comments about trusting Putin over US 'intelligence lowlifes' - January 31, 2023

• Russia's Prigozhin admits links to what US says was election meddling troll farm - February 14, 2023

• GOP operative sentenced to 18 months for funneling Russian money to Trump- February 17, 2023

• Trump allegedly discussed US nuclear subs with foreign national after leaving White House: Sources - October 5, 2023

• 'So appalled': What witnesses told special counsel about Trump's handling of classified info while still president - April 24, 2024

🤔🤔🤔

[girlfriendsofthegalaxy]

tuesday again 7/23/24

i woke up at ass o'clock monday morning to find BOTH of my cats sleeping on the bed with me :') temporary peace and love on planet niceys

also read a book where my takeaway was that there are SO many opportunities in the world for evil engineering but not nearly enough for evil puzzle games

listening

my sister sent me ONE instagram reel/screencap of a tiktok and ive been muttering "emergency! emergency! paging DOCTOR BEAT!" under my breath for the past three days. alarmingly catchy remix of this gloria estefan song. this specific video below is pretty close but there are approximately eight zillion versions

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reading

Dark Wire by Joseph Cox (photo from here, description from the publisher's site).

The inside story of the largest law-enforcement sting operation ever, in which the FBI made its own tech start-up to wiretap the world, shows how cunning both the authorities and drug traffickers have become, with privacy implications for everyone. In 2018, a powerful app for secure communications called Anom took root among organized criminals. They believed Anom allowed them to conduct business in the shadows. Except for one thing: it was secretly run by the FBI.    Backdoor access to Anom and a series of related investigations granted American, Australian, and European authorities a front-row seat to the underworld. Tens of thousands of criminals worldwide appeared in full view of the same agents they were trying to evade. International smugglers. Money launderers. Hitmen. A sprawling global economy as efficient and interconnected as the legal one. Officers watched drug shipments and murder plots unfold, making arrests without blowing their cover. But, as the FBI started to lose control of Anom, did the agency go too far?   A painstakingly investigated exposé, Dark Wire reveals the true scale and stakes of this unprecedented operation through the agents and crooks who were there. This fly-on-the-wall thriller is a caper for our modern world, where no one can be sure who is listening in. 

i really liked this one! cox did a really good job of slowly unfurling the extremely technical details as they became relevant, instead of one horrible infodump near the beginning, and has a real gift for humanizing little anecdotes that illustrate the concept. he's also dryly funny in a very british way, eg the transition between one paragraph describing a very talented olive oil salesman and his lifestyle to how that olive oil processing covered up drug labs with the sentence "But Catanzariti didn't stay with olives; he pivoted instead to methamphetamine." i loooooove reading about how the drug trade gets around customs. i love edge cases and figuring out why things fail. i truly think some of the finest materials engineers of our time are out there trying to figure out how to get cocaine into australia.

this is deeply reported in a way that's very different from a lot of popsci and pop-history books that annoy me: this is NOT a book where it feels like the author is simply padding out a wikipedia page, supplemented with articles he's already written. he's been on this beat since 2016 and it shows: he has quotes from hundreds of people on many sides of the drug war. something i also appreciate is that cox is not automatically, rabidly pro-cop; he does not gloss over the very real tortures and kidnappings and all the other nasty realities of the global drug trade, and frequently shows how much overreach and entrapment took place during this whole endeavor. i particularly liked a chapter where he flipped back and forth from various law enforcement officials assuring him they of course complied with all relevant privacy laws and blacklisted anyone using it for simple secure communications, and lawyers telling cox "no the cops very much did spy on my privileged communication with my clients and i know this because these texts came up in court". also gratifying to read about some cases overturned or thrown out, in the odd case a judge decided it looked too much like entrapment.

i feel like i devoured this book SO fast but it's a solid 352 pages in hardcover. i also had to wait a good two months on the libby holds lists so there is strong interest in this book! good for cox!

how did i find this book: it's austin underscore walker's fault. they used to be coworkers at vice and cox and three others broke off last year to found 404 Media, which has had an absolutely crazy amount of real-world impact for the size (again! four people!) and how long they've been around. rip vice. wish u did better by your people.

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watching

watched Hercules (1997, dir. Clements & Musker) with my bestie's five year old. i did not grow up with disney movies and don't really have a nostalgic affinity for them but this shit holds up! i like how meg has the silhouette of a greek vase

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playing

powerwash simulator has a new free DLC out! we get to go to the aquarium and wash some exhibits and wash the research submarine!!! VERY soothing. took me a good solid two hour podcast episode to clean the exhibits.

the temporary summer event in genshin impact is very darling this year-- there are big indie game vibes and unlocking every chest is a little more complicated or has a little bit more story attached than usual. very excited to see if this continues with the next big update that introduces a whole new land.

i also like that they've picked An Art Style to work with-- everything is very toy-like or origami. not that genshin doesn't have a distinct art style, but playing around with something less realistic is fun!

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making

look im going to have to add a cross stitch update to the morning reblog. the lighting in here is simply Not Good Enough

[eugenedebs1920]

“No prior President has ever abased himself more abjectly before a tyrant” Were the words spoken by the late Senator from Arizona, John McCain after the July 2018 summit between President Trump and Russian president Vladimir Putin. His fellow Arizonan Senator Jeff Flake would say, “I never thought I would see the day when our American President would stand on the stage with the Russian President and place blame on the United States for Russian aggression. This is shameful.”

McCain would pass away from an aggressive brain cancer on August 25, 2018. His fellow statesmen would not seek reelection, giving a lengthy em passionate speech condemning “new normal” of the Trump era, saying,  “the personal attacks, the threats against principles, freedoms, and institutions; the flagrant disregard for truth or decency, the reckless provocations, most often for the pettiest and most personal reasons, reasons having nothing whatsoever to do with the fortunes of the people that we have all been elected to serve.”

Look at those pictures of Donald Trump! Have you ever seen that lack of overbearing arrogance on his face before!? Putin either makes him soil his diaper with fear, he has dirt on Trump, or our tiny handed tyrant is in love! This has little to do with what we’ll dive into but, just happened to run across Flake’s announcement for not seeking reelection. It was pretty good! Anyway…

With our short attention spans and constant distractions, we may only remember a phrase when we associate the word Russia, and the word Trump. That being the former President’s response to a reporter, saying “Oh! Russia Russia Russia”, that’s my word association image anyway. But yes. Russia Russia Russia.

We’ll go in a reverse chronologicalish order, or most relevant recent order, or whatever order it ends up as. There’s a lot to cover, see how long you make it… 😆

Trump has long had affairs overseas, and no, not the kind he’s known for, but business dealings. After making a series of bad decisions in the later 80’s early 90’s American banks were hesitant to loan to Trump. As it turns out, the Kremlin had their eye on Trump, and had Czech spies working for the Kremlin covertly tail him as early as 1987. Throughout the years Trump Would rely on Russian assistance quite often. From the financial and business side to the political and personal side.

Upon the merger of Trump’s, Truth Social and Digital World Acquisition Corp, Truth Social became, Trump Media and Technology Group. Before the merger Truth Social had been hemorrhaging money, showing significant losses on all quarterly reports.

In late 2021 the social media platform seemed as if it was doomed. In December of 2021, a Christmas miracle occurred in the form of two loans totaling eight million dollars, acting as a lifeline to the failing site.

These loans came as one for $2 million and another $6 million. The $2 million loan was from Paxum Bank, an entity tied with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Paxum Bank is partially owned by a man named Anton Postolnikov, who is related to a man named Aleksandr Smirinov (not the same As Alexander Smirinov that tried to relay Russian misinformation to the FBI, and was subsequently arrested for doing so in the House, Biden impeachment inquiry, political theater headed by James Comer of KY, but a different Smirinov) a former Russian government official, who runs Rosmorport, a Russian shipping company. There was $6 million loan paid by a separate entity by the name of ES Family Trust, who’s director at the time was the very same man who held the title of director at Paxum Bank, the same bank who loaned the smaller $2 million loan. You almost need a poster board with pictures, some tacks and yarn with that one!

In 2023 prosecutors in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York began an investigation into the Russian based financial backing and Trump Media and Technology Group (TMTG). The case is still ongoing.

We’re going to skip out of order here because this is already lacking brevity, so. Let’s turn to the end of Trump’s presidency, in the waning days, after the insurrection, Jan 16-20th.

After the disgraceful behavior Trump had engaged in upon losing the 2020 election to Joe Biden, Trump and his remaining staff were scrambling to exit the White House. On Jan the 18th, just two days from Biden’s inauguration, Trump requested the delivery of a binder.

This ten inch thick, treasure trove of documents contained some of the United States most closely guarded information and secrets. So much so that even lawmakers and congressional aides with top secret clearance could only view the binder, and information within, at the Central Intelligence Agency’s (CIA) headquarters in Langley Virginia. Inside were the highest levels of confidentiality and secret information from the United States, its allies, and top secret NATO intelligence as well. It was a collection on Russia, assets working for or against the Kremlin, sources, methods in which the U.S. government received its information and even an assessment of the Russian President Vladimir V. Putin.

Trump’s request was carried out under the care of the Presidents Chief of Staff Mark Meadows. Trump’s sociopathic narcissist disorder caused the exiting, disgraced President to feel the need to declassify a host of documents, including the FBI’s investigation into himself and Russia.

White House lawyers and aides hurriedly redacted names, dates, locations as fast as they could knowing the erratic behavior of Trump. His top administration officials would attempt to block the publication of the classified information. The day before leaving office, on Jan 19th, despite pleas from White House officials, aides and staff, as well as out of spite, Trump issued the declassification of nearly all the sensitive material, putting the lives of agents, informants, and sources in jeopardy. Multiple copies of the initial redacted version were printed out and were set to be distributed throughout Washington to Republicans in Congress and to right wing media outlets. The copies that did get sent out were quickly recovered by White House lawyers, demanding that further redactions were necessary.

Minutes before the inauguration of President elect Biden, Meadows rushed to get approval from the Justice Department, hand delivering the redacted copy for final approval.

Suspiciously, in all the chaos of the final 48 hours, and Trump’s temper tantrum, the original, unredacted, ten inch thick binder of the most sensitive material regarding the U.S. and its allies went missing. There’s a redacted copy in the National Archives, but the whereabouts of the original binder remains a mystery.

During the hearings on the criminality that occurred in Trump’s final weeks in office, aide, Cassidy Hutchinson testified that she saw Chief of Staff MarkMeadows leave the White House with the binder, suggesting that her assumption was that he had put the top secret information in a safe, located at his home.

This brings us to our next act… Of sedition.

The declassification and illegal retention of the world’s most secretive binder was not the only act of treason Trump would engage in. After his loss in November and into December Trump had authorized the removal and transport of dozens of boxes of classified information, state secrets, nuclear secrets, U.S. and its allies war plans to various properties he owned.

The FBI was aware of the taking of the documents, after requesting their return several times a warrant was issued to Trump’s Florida “home” Mar-a-lago. It was coordinated out of respect, safety and to not make a spectacle of the raid, that Trump would not be present when the FBI searched his club/home.

What the FBI found was dozens of boxes containing the classified documents as well as other trinkets like magazines and newspaper articles, strewn around, knocked over and spilling in various locations such as a closet, bathroom, his youngest child Barrons’s room and a hidden room containing surveillance equipment for the property.

In thier assessment of the evidence they found 43 empty folders with tabs labeled, Classified, 28 empty folders labeled, Return to Staff Secretary or Military Aide. In the boxes, folders that weren’t empty included, 18 documents marked, Top Secret, 54 marked as, secret, 31 marked as, Confidential, and 11,179 other Government documents, some with photos that weren’t marked.

This case is the most egregious act of sedition of American President in our nations history. A Special Prosecutor, Jack Smith, was tasked by the DOJ of heading the case. In a stunning move of partisanship and a complete disregard of standing Jurisprudence, Federal Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee, would go against 50 years of precedent and dismiss the case under the grounds the the special counsel was improperly funded. The American people would be denied their right to get the truth about who, what, when and why these documents were retained, missing, and in the condition they were found. The binder talked about earlier was not in the trove of documents found at Mar-a-lago, its location remains unknown.

So yea! Russia Russia Russia… There’s SO much more Russian ties, scandals, shady business dealings to show but. If this is nearly as long to read as it was to write, I’m proud you made it all the way through.

I’ve been saying it for years, Trump is a Russian asset, I even made a bet saying in 20 years if it doesn’t come out that Trump was a Russian asset I owed this person a sloppy, dentureless blowjob (because I’ll be kinda old in 20 years and I assume I’ll have dentures).

Don’t be conned by Americans most notorious conman and give him the chance to steal and share even more of our state secrets. Vote Kamala Harris for President. Blue down ballot for real change in our country.

I may finish this and post the whole thing from 2013 to what we dove in to on my substack, which I’ll try to remember to leave a link in the comments section. Until next time. Let’s hope for the sake of our democracy Trump loses here in 2024 or maybe I’ll see some of you f*cks in Gitmo 😉😅😆☮️🇺🇸

[dd-is-my-guiltypleasure]

David Duchovny: ‘The X-Files took up my life, but it was a miracle’

It's behind a paywall so if somebody has access I would love to read the article

Update : got it, thanks @aimsies-mctaymellburg

David Duchovny: ‘The X-Files took up my life, but it was a miracle’

As Fox Mulder in the hit sci-fi show, the actor and singer peddled fringe conspiracy theories. Now the 63-year-old says Mulder’s paranoia is everywhere.

In hindsight it wasn’t a great idea for me to kick off an interview with David Duchovny by suggesting that he was a musical dilettante. You’re most likely to know Duchovny, of course, as Fox Mulder, the conspiracy-theory-guzzling FBI agent in The X Files, one of the biggest shows of the Nineties, watched at its peak by 30 million in America alone. Perhaps you saw him as the womanising writer Hank Moody in Californication or the 1960s detective Sam Hodiak in Aquarius. You may even have read some of his five books.

Duchovny, a New Yorker living in Los Angeles, is less known for music, although he’s been making rather decent folk-rock for a decade — songwriting, playing guitar and singing in a honeyed drawl. His 2015 songHell or Highwater has been streamed more than a million times while Layin’ on the Tracks, from 2020, has pointed lyrics about a certain politician (“It’s a killing joke that no one laughs at/ A stupid orange man in a cheap red hat”). He has released three albums, with a fourth due next year, and this month plays Latitude festival in Suffolk and the 2,000-capacity Shepherds Bush Empire in London.

So does the 63-year-old feel that he should no longer be seen as just a musical dabbler? “That’s part of a lazy person’s perception,” he says, bristling slightly. “It’s a lens through which people want to see me. I think music is an innocent art form — you listen to it and you have a response. To bring any kind of baggage to bear on it in the beginning seems to me to be dishonest, but that’s the way things go.”

YouTube clips of recent shows suggest people were having a lovely time, I say. This doesn’t have the soothing effect intended. YouTube footage lingers “because of the horror of the cell phone”, Duchovny says. “It’s a pet peeve of mine.” Is he tempted to ban them at his shows, as artists from Prince to Bob Dylan have? “I don’t know that I can enforce that view on anybody.”

For Duchovny, it’s as much about phones limiting his performance as it is about the audience not living in the moment. “To do something unique or for the first time, to reach for a note or play a different melody — all these are chances you might take if you weren’t inhibited by the fact that somebody is [recording] it,” he says. “You’ve got to be able to fail and the ubiquity of cell phones makes failure scarier than it needs to be.”

Failure is the key to another of his jobs: podcasting. In his series Fail Better, he adroitly interviews guests including Bette Midler, Ben Stiller and Sean Penn about their failures. “I feel like I’ve been failing my entire life,” Duchovny said on launching it in May. That may sound strange from a man with English degrees from Princeton and Yale, who has won a Golden Globe for The X Files and another for Californication.

Is he familiar with Elizabeth Day, the British journalist who has hosted a successful podcast called How to Fail since 2018? When Duchovny announced Fail Better, Day tweeted: “I might invite David Duchovny on @howtofail to discuss his failure to be original.”

“This is the first I’ve heard of it,” he says. “If she wants to be rigorous in her thinking, she would investigate what my approach to failure is. I don’t know what her approach to it is. My sense, since failure is universal, is that there’s room out there for more than one discussion.” This is a rather po-faced response to what seemed like a playful comment from Day, and surprising because Duchovny has a wicked sense of humour. He can also afford to be more magnanimous, given that his podcast is at No 12 in the UK chart and hers is at 54.

Gillian Anderson, his X Files co-star, certainly likes his podcast, writing this week on Instagram that she had listened to all of the episodes and found them “intimate and vulnerable … very smart questions, although I wouldn’t expect anything else from you [David]”.

“It’s very sweet,” Duchovny says. “I will email her and thank her. I’m sure somebody running my social media is … I don’t really like to be on social media.” Later that day his Instagram account replies to Anderson’s post: “Thank you for listening, you have an open invite [to appear on his podcast]!”

That encounter would be worth hearing because his relationship with Anderson is fascinating. Despite their chemistry in The X Files there were rumours of friction — although they looked to be getting on swimmingly when they appeared on Jimmy Kimmel’s talk show in 2016 to publicise the return of the show, which ran for two more seasons.

When asked by Kimmel about frostiness between her and Duchovny in the Nineties, Anderson collapsed into giggles, laid her head in Duchovny’s lap and put any froideur down to the dampness of Vancouver, where the series was shot. Her hair kept going frizzy, she explained, and “for every single take we’d have to stand there and blow dry my hair again”.

“And I got pissed at that?” Duchovny asked.

“Well, I think it added to the tension,” Anderson said.

“It kinda makes me sound like an asshole,” Duchovny replied.

Anderson had nothing to do with him leaving The X Files in 2002, he says now. “That was just me wanting to have a family, but also to try other things. It had kind of taken up my life. There was no animosity with the actual show and the people that I worked with. I am proud of the show — it was culturally central in a way that it’s very hard to do these days in a fragmented landscape. There’s so many lightning-strike aspects to it that I can’t help but think of it as some kind of a miracle.”

The X Files gave conspiracy theories a kind of nobility — “the truth is out there”, as its tagline ran. Now they are more widespread and pernicious. “Mulder’s way of looking at the world was through conspiracy and that was the fringe at that point,” Duchovny says. “It doesn’t seem to be so fringe any more. It’s really the world that [The X Files creator] Chris Carter foresaw happening almost 30 years ago. He’s almost clairvoyant in that case.” Is Duchovny more evidence-based than Mulder? “Not at all. I’m an artist — I am associative-based and I see poetry as science and science as poetry.” So are there some conspiracy theories that he buys into? “No, I’m talking about art. I think conspiracies are mostly just lazy thinking.”

One failure that has shaped Duchovny is that of his marriage to the actress Téa Leoni, who starred in Bad Boys and Deep Impact. They married in 1997 and have a daughter, West, 25, and a son, Kyd, 22, but divorced in 2014. “That darkness does deepen you. It makes you more empathetic and humble,” Duchovny says. One of the themes of his podcast is “the difference between humiliating and humbling. Often we focus on humiliation in our culture. I don’t see any positives coming from humiliation, but I see a lot of them coming from humility.”

One wonders if the reference to humiliation has something to do with Duchovny checking into rehab for sex addiction in 2008. Could him playing the bed-hopping Hank in Californication be a case of art imitating life? “People never tire of trying to figure that out,” he says with a sigh. “But to me, that’s not what acting is about. I don’t look for things that are mirroring my life in any way.”

Well, there are parallels in Reverse the Curse, the 2023 film that Duchovny directed, starred in and adapted from his book Bucky F***ing Dent. He plays a would-be novelist who has “sacrificed his artistic dream to put food on the table”. His father, a publicist, did the same, publishing his debut at 75, the year before he died. The film has some really funny scenes, including one where Marty and his son have a farting competition in a motel room that ends up smelling like “an aquarium that fed a sock”. That may have come from a line in Aquarius where someone says something similar about a police station. “I might have ripped it off, I’m not sure,” Duchovny says. “ You can ask Elizabeth Day about that.”

David Duchovny will perform at Latitude festival, near Southwold on July 25 and 02 Shepherd’s Bush Empire, W12 on July 27

[mariacallous]

As November’s U.S. presidential election draws closer and the campaigns of former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris kick into high gear, so have efforts by hackers from Washington’s adversaries aimed at disrupting or influencing the vote. One adversary in particular is playing an increasingly prominent role: Iran.

Iranian state actors have stepped up their efforts to interfere in this year’s election through online disinformation and influence operations as well as cyberattacks on both presidential campaigns, three U.S. agencies—the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA)—warned in a joint statement on Monday.

They’re not the only ones sounding the alarm. In the past three weeks alone, current and former intelligence officials as well as cyber threat researchers from Microsoft and Google have shared a growing body of evidence of Iran’s hacking efforts. As several of them have pointed out, Iran’s targeting of U.S. elections isn’t new—hackers linked to Iranian security services have attempted to interfere with presidential and midterm races dating back to at least 2018.

However, “Iran perceives this year’s elections to be particularly consequential in terms of the impact they could have on its national security interests, increasing Tehran’s inclination to try to shape the outcome,” the U.S. agencies wrote in their statement. “We have observed increasingly aggressive Iranian activity during this election cycle.”

Trump and his acolytes have been particular targets of Iranian hacking, with some former intelligence officials speculating to Politico that efforts to compromise their email accounts could be part of an effort to assassinate U.S. officials in retaliation for the 2020 killing of Iranian Gen. Qassem Suleimani during Trump’s presidency.

In their statement on Monday, the FBI, ODNI, and CISA officially blamed Iran for the so-called hack-and-leak operation against Trump’s campaign that the campaign made public earlier this month. Those tactics, mirroring Russia’s breach of the Democratic National Committee during the 2016 election, are only one part of Iran’s election interference efforts along with broader disinformation campaigns aimed at sowing discord among the American electorate.

“Iran, especially because of the past events with Suleimani, they have a marked interest in this election,” said retired U.S. Army Col. Candice Frost, the former commander of the Joint Intelligence Operations Center at U.S. Cyber Command. “They have attempted to message on past elections,” she said, but “I think this one is almost personal to them.”

Iran’s relatively elevated profile and more brazen cyber efforts may also be spurred by the ongoing conflict in the Middle East between U.S. ally Israel and Iranian proxies Hamas and Hezbollah, Mohammed Soliman, director of the strategic technologies and cybersecurity program at the Middle East Institute in Washington, D.C., told Foreign Policy. “I think the timelines have collided [between] regional confrontation with Israel and the U.S. elections,” he said. “This made them more proactive in attacking high-value targets that have brought massive visibility to their work.”

Iran is not the only adversary officials in Washington are concerned with—election interference efforts by Russia have been extensively documented, and U.S. officials have increasingly warned about China’s shift in cyber tactics from espionage to more disinformation and disruptive campaigns. Those two countries remain the prime threats, in large part because their capabilities are relatively more sophisticated.

“Russia and China are really a league of their own,” said Frost, currently an assistant professor at Georgetown University’s Center for Security Studies. “We oftentimes discount Iran and North Korea, and then you’ll have something like the Sony hack or this hack [of the Trump campaign]. So it’s not necessarily the level of advancement or competency that they have, but the fact that they kind of found a vulnerability and have been able to exploit that.”

“Any nation that has an interest or perceived stakes in the outcome of a U.S. presidential election is going to be thinking about how to influence that outcome,” said Gavin Wilde, a senior fellow in the technology and international affairs program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and a former U.S. national security official. “It’s easy to point to Russia and China as the most adversarial and the most sophisticated, but every nation around the world has some perceived interest in the outcome, and so I think we need to calibrate along those lines.”

Officials and experts say the U.S. government has learned from the missteps of previous elections, particularly 2016, and is better prepared to defend this November’s election from cyber threats than it has ever been. Part of that is the shift to publicly calling out adversaries and their activities much earlier in the process and adopting a form of sunlight-as-best-disinfectant strategy, like the ODNI, FBI, and CISA did this week with Iran.

“It’s very hard to counter that narrative once it gets into the American psyche and our citizens’ spheres of influence,” Frost said. “But I do see the focus and calling out [of] this behavior. … That is what we’re seeing at a much faster pace, and I give the current intel community a lot of props for doing that early.”

But Wilde warned that while U.S. officials are “unquestionably” more prepared this time around, they also now need to be careful about showing their work without inciting panic about elections being compromised. “The tightrope they now have to walk is [being] helpful without creating the very kind of panic that might itself undermine confidence in the election,” he said, adding that it’s also important to draw distinctions among hack-and-leak operations that have become “a new normal” for political campaigns, election influence efforts that can sometimes be hard to legally define, and actual efforts to interfere with the ballot box itself.

“I think the most consistent thing from all of them is how much it’s been a lot of just entrepreneurialism and experimental spaghetti-against-the-wall tactics to kind of just see what works,” Wilde said. “The U.S. and everyone has to be careful not to inadvertently incentivize this activity by making too big a deal out of it, and luckily I think we’ve done a lot better this go-round than we did in 2016.”

[ausetkmt]

Ahmaud Arbery's murder: Four years later Ahmaud Arbery's murder: Four years later 05:29

Attorneys are asking a U.S. appeals court to throw out the hate crime convictions of three White men who used pickup trucks to chase Ahmaud Arbery through the streets of a Georgia subdivision before one of them killed the running Black man with a shotgun.

A panel of judges from the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta was scheduled to hear oral arguments Wednesday in a case that followed a national outcry over Arbery's death. The men's lawyers argue that evidence of past racist comments they made didn't prove a racist intent to harm.

On Feb. 23, 2020, father and son Greg and Travis McMichael armed themselves with guns and drove in pursuit of Arbery after spotting the 25-year-old man running in their neighborhood outside the port city of Brunswick. A neighbor, William "Roddie" Bryan, joined the chase in his own truck and recorded cellphone video of Travis McMichael shooting Arbery in the street.

More than two months passed without arrests, until Bryan's graphic video of the killing leaked online and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation took over the case from local police. Charges soon followed.

In legal briefs filed ahead of their appeals court arguments, lawyers for Greg McMichael and Bryan cited prosecutors' use of more than two dozen social media posts and text messages, as well as witness testimony, that showed all three men using racist slurs or otherwise disparaging Black people. The slurs often included the use of the N-word and other derogatory terms for Black people, according to an FBI witness who examined the men's social media pages. The men had also advocated for violence against Black people, the witness said. 

Bryan's attorney, Pete Theodocion, said Bryan's past racist statements inflamed the trial jury while failing to prove that Arbery was pursued because of his race. Instead, Arbery was chased because the three men mistakenly suspected he was a fleeing criminal, according to A.J. Balbo, Greg McMichael's lawyer. 

Greg McMichael initiated the chase when Arbery ran past his home, saying he recognized the young Black man from security camera videos that in prior months showed him entering a neighboring home under construction. None of the videos showed him stealing, and Arbery was unarmed and had no stolen property when he was killed. 

Prosecutors said in written briefs that the trial evidence showed "longstanding hate and prejudice toward Black people" influenced the defendants' assumptions that Arbery was committing crimes.

"All three of these defendants did everything they did based on assumptions —  not on fact, not on evidence, on assumptions. They make decisions in their driveways based on those assumptions that took a young man's life," prosecutor Linda Dunikoski said in court in November 2021.  Three men found guilty of hate crimes in the death of Ahmaud Arbery 02:18

In Travis McMichael's appeal, attorney Amy Lee Copeland didn't dispute the jury's finding that he was motivated by racism. The social media evidence included a 2018 Facebook comment Travis McMichael made on a video of Black man playing a prank on a white person. He used an expletive and a racial slur after he wrote wrote: "I'd kill that .... ."

Instead, Copeland based her appeal on legal technicalities. She said that prosecutors failed to prove the streets of the Satilla Shores subdivision where Arbery was killed were public roads, as stated in the indictment used to charge the men.

Copeland cited records of a 1958 meeting of Glynn County commissioners in which they rejected taking ownership of the streets from the subdivision's developer. At the trial, prosecutors relied on service request records and testimony from a county official to show the streets have been maintained by the county government.

Attorneys for the trio also made technical arguments for overturning their attempted kidnapping convictions. Prosecutors said the charge fit because the men used pickup trucks to cut off Arbery's escape from the neighborhood.

Prosecutors said other federal appellate circuits have ruled that any automobile used in a kidnapping qualifies as an instrument of interstate commerce. And they said the benefit the men sought was "to fulfill their personal desires to carry out vigilante justice."

The trial judge sentenced both McMichaels to life in prison for their hate crime convictions, plus additional time — 10 years for Travis McMichael and seven years for his father — for brandishing guns while committing violent crimes. Bryan received a lighter hate crime sentence of 35 years in prison, in part because he wasn't armed and preserved the cellphone video that became crucial evidence.

All three also got 20 years in prison for attempted kidnapping, but the judge ordered that time to overlap with their hate crime sentences.

If the U.S. appeals court overturns any of their federal convictions, both McMichaels and Bryan would remain in prison. All three are serving life sentences in Georgia state prisons for murder, and have motions for new state trials pending before a judge.

[beardedmrbean]

In the early summer of 2020, Jamie Stevenson was taking advantage of the lifting of lockdown restrictions to meet associates outside a four-star Glasgow hotel.

They were sitting at a picnic table when they heard shouts and the screech of tyres.

Men in plain clothes were moving rapidly towards them so Stevenson, a notorious crime boss who had reputedly been the target of numerous attempts on his life, took to his heels.

He ran 100 yards before stumbling down a steep grass slope and falling on to a path, where his pursuers brought his flight to a halt.

An investigator who witnessed the scene said Stevenson had thought he was going to be "taken out".

"Once we got hold of him, he was relieved it was the police," the investigator said.

Stevenson was taken to England and was no doubt relieved a second time when the authorities released him on bail.

Within a month, the veteran criminal - nicknamed the Iceman - had fled abroad.

He spent 18 months on the run until Britain's version of the FBI, the National Crime Agency (NCA), tracked him down in the Netherlands.

Dutch national police grabbed Stevenson while he was out jogging with another Scottish fugitive, convicted killer Dean Ferguson.

Stevenson had thought he was safe and was said to be shocked to find himself back in custody, this time with no chance of escape.

Now he has been jailed for 20 years for masterminding an international cocaine smuggling operation where the drugs were hidden in a shipment of bananas, and setting up a drugs factory in England.

There are parts of this story which read like a darkly satirical crime thriller but Stevenson was very much the real deal - a top-level gangster who made a fortune from trafficking drugs linked to hundreds of deaths.

The man dubbed a real-life Tony Soprano tried to flood Scotland with a tonne of cocaine estimated to be worth £100m and millions of deadly Etizolam tablets. This happened in 2020, the year the country suffered its worst ever drugs death toll.

In 2019, Etizolam, better known as street valium, had been implicated in 756 deaths, half that year's total. By the end of 2020, it had been linked to 814.

Police are convinced that had Stevenson succeeded, many more people would have lost their lives while he raked in millions of pounds.

Det Ch Supt Dave Ferry of Police Scotland said: "Serious and organised crime ruins lives, kills people and leaves families devastated.

"Has this operation saved lives in Scotland? I think you can definitely say that."

Stevenson, 59, and his gang were brought down by four years of intensive police work, international co-operation between law enforcement agencies, the infiltration of an encrypted messaging service and an overwhelming body of evidence presented by Crown Office prosecutors in court.

The public first heard Stevenson's name after he was accused of shooting his criminal associate Tony McGovern outside a Glasgow pub in September 2000.

Stevenson and McGovern had once been so close they were the best man at each other's weddings. The murder charge was later dropped because of a lack of evidence.

In 2004, the Scottish Crime and Drug Enforcement Agency launched Operation Folklore, a three-year investigation which targeted Stevenson with unprecedented electronic surveillance and forensic financial analysis.

Boxed into a legal corner, Stevenson pleaded guilty to laundering £1m of drugs money and was jailed for 12 years and nine months.

By 2018 Police Scotland and the National Crime Agency had formed an organised crime partnership based at the Scottish Crime Campus at Gartcosh in North Lanarkshire.

The aim was to take down top-tier criminals. Stevenson was out of prison and on their list.

Their big break came after they received intelligence that a Glasgow fruit merchant, David Bilsland, had links to organised crime and was trying to further his business interests in South America.

Operation Pepperoni was launched. Read nothing into the comical name, which was chosen at random.

Bilsland was planning to import consignments of bananas from Ecuador, close to the cocaine producing countries of Peru, Bolivia and Colombia.

Experts told the Pepperoni team it was a loss leader; only supermarkets could turn a profit by bringing in bananas from South America.

In February 2020, the police and NCA became aware that Bilsland was making an unusually brief visit to Spain, flying out on Valentine's Day and coming back the next. He wasn't taking bags and it was assessed to be ��a criminal matter".

They didn't know who Bilsland was going to meet but at the request of the NCA, Spanish police secretly photographed the two men at Alicante's Melia Hotel and sent the pictures back to Scotland.

Bilsland was with none other than Jamie Stevenson.

Asked how his team felt when they heard the news, Det Ch Supt Ferry said: "It was a relief that we knew who he was meeting. That kicked the investigation into a different level."

Around this point, two different strands of this case began to converge.

Through conventional intelligence gathering, the police learned Stevenson had been involved in setting up a pill factory which was churning out millions of Etizolam tablets in Rochester in Kent.

The factory was raided on 12 June 2020. That same day, police arrested Stevenson as he ran from the picnic table at the Sherbrooke Castle Hotel in Glasgow.

He was carrying a phone which turned out to be an EncroChat device.

EncroChat was a highly secure encrypted messaging platform used by criminals who felt able to communicate with each other without fear of being caught.

Each device had a handle, chosen at random. Stevenson's were "elusiveale" and "bigtastey".

He was so confident it was safe, he sent someone an image of his own driving licence via the platform.

In April 2020, French law enforcement had infiltrated the system. They harvested vast quantities of incriminating data and shared it with colleagues around Europe.

On 12 or 13 June 2020, EncroChat's administrators became aware the system had been compromised and advised their customers to turn off and dispose of their devices. The warning came too late for Stevenson.

The raid on the pill factory in Kent meant it was an English case, so Stevenson was taken south of the border. After being released on police bail, he fled the country.

Scottish investigators say that under the English system, there wasn't enough evidence to justify his being kept behind bars at that early stage of the inquiry.

That summer, UK Border Force officials kept a close eye on the consignments of Ecuadorian bananas coming into Dover addressed to David Bilsland's business in Glasgow.

They searched several to no avail until the 18th shipment was found to contain nearly a tonne of cocaine hidden in 119 foil packages.

In the months that followed, the organised crime partnership analysed 50,000 pieces of EncroChat data, a painstaking process titled Operation Dragonfire.

Stevenson's EncroChat conversations with his associates yielded evidence which proved their involvement with the cocaine and Etizolam.

The group's top tier was ensnared, along with people further down the ladder like Bilsland.

Appeal court decisions in England had upheld the admissibility of EncroChat evidence and it was not challenged in the High Court in Glasgow, where Stevenson and his colleagues eventually pleaded guilty.

The NCA's regional head of investigations in Scotland and Northern Ireland, Gerry McLean, said Stevenson was operating at the top table of organised crime north of the border.

He was on an "upward trajectory" and re-establishing himself after his 2007 jail term.

"What I think this conviction demonstrates is that he truly had a global international reputation," said Mr McLean.

"He would not have been able to bring these amounts of drugs into the UK if he didn't have that network of contacts right around the world."

He said the pill factory in Kent had been manufacturing "industrial quantities" of Etizolam.

"The venture that Jamie Stevenson was involved in was of a scale that I don't think we've seen before, certainly in Scotland and really within the United Kingdom."

Deputy procurator fiscal Sineidin Corrins leads the organised crime unit at the Crown Office, Scotland's prosecution service.

"These convictions are monumental. Jamie Stevenson and his criminal gang were involved in drug trafficking on an industrial and a global scale," she said.

"It's also a marker from law enforcement and the criminal justice in Scotland.

"Collaboratively, all the preparation and effort brought this serious organised crime gang into the dock at the high court. The evidence was presented in a way that was absolutely watertight."

Det Ch Supt Ferry said Stevenson would have made tens of millions of pounds during his long criminal career.

The next step will be for the Crown to pursue Stevenson's assets under proceeds of crime legislation.

Its success will depend on what can be found and what can be proved in court.

[thornsent]

On RAMCOA, Satanic Panic, and the dangers of conspiracy theory

Lately I've seen a term gaining usage in online DID/OSDD communities, and I would like to talk about its origins and implications.

I want to establish right away that while I do not believe in RAMCOA or SRA, I do believe that these people are genuinely traumatized.

This is not written with the intent to invalidate anyone, rather I am legitimately concerned about the negative impact this is having on survivors of severe trauma as well as marginalized people targeted by conspiracy theories.

Let's begin with what RAMCOA is, and where the term comes from.

RAMCOA stands for ritual abuse, mind control, organized abuse. The term has its origins in the ISSTD, with the creation of their special interest group (SIG) dedicated to the topic. The ISSTD, which began in 1982, has a long history of controversy and is in no small part responsible for the beginnings of the Satanic Panic.

Multiple significant parties of the ISSTD have made claims of transgenerational Satanic cults dating back to two thousand years.

Michael Salter, who would eventually become the chair of the RAMCOA SIG in 2018, claimed in 2008 that there were secret tunnels and chambers beneath the school to facilitate the abuse. This claim was not only disproven, but it is reminiscent of both the Satanic Panic and Pizzagate-era allegations, both of which have also repeatedly been disproven.

Michael has continued to assert his claim as recently as 2019. In 2023, Michael Salter would become president of the ISSTD.

But Michael isn't the only sketchy person involved in the ISSTD. Founding member and former president George Greaves would lose his license for engaging in sexual activity with his patient in 1994.

Bennet Braun, the founder and another former president, has faced multiple malpractice lawsuits due to misleading his patients, resulting in distorted memories and more harm done to an already vulnerable person. Braun’s license would be revoked in 2023.

Also accused of malpractice by multiple patients is Colin Ross, president of the ISSTD From 1993-94. Ross is also known for his claim that he can shoot energy beams from his eyes. This, unsurprisingly, was disproven.

In 2020, the RAMCOA SIG was renamed to the Organized and Extreme Abuse SIG due to the optics of the term no longer suiting the organization.

We have established that the ISSTD was founded and consistently led by conspiracy theorists and abusive psychologists who have since had their licenses revoked. Let's dig a bit into the Satanic Panic and SRA.

The Satanic Panic is a moral panic that began in the 80s and still goes on today. In recent years there has been a resurgence of the same rhetoric taking new forms, but it all has roots in allegations of Satanic Ritual Abuse. The Panic of the 80s properly began with the publication of the book Michelle Remembers, written by Lawrence Pazder and his patient-turned-wife, Michelle Smith.

The text contains an account of SRA recovered through the pseudoscientific modality of recovered-memory therapy. The claims in this book have no substantial evidence and are generally regarded as a work of fiction influenced by social morality and pop culture at the time.

Over 12,000 claims of SRA were given during the height of the Satanic Panic, but even after the FBI launched an investigation no evidence of the legitimacy of SRA could be found.

The stories offered by SRA survivors are shocking: Multigenerational cults, sometimes stretching worldwide, going on for hundreds and sometimes thousands of years, in which children were bred as sacrifices and/or as slaves to “the elites of our society.”

That phrase should give you pause, because it's an antisemitic dogwhistle, and a loud one at that. The Satanic Panic’s roots go deep into history, back to the burning of so-called witches and back to the antisemitic conspiracy of blood libel.

Blood Libel is an accusation that Jews use the blood of Christians (typically children or infants) in the making of Passover bread and other religious practices. Such claims have resulted in the murder of countless Jews.

These accusations against the Jewish people have continued into modern times, seeing a resurgence within conspiracies such as Qanon’s claim that “Hollywood elites” are harvesting adrenochromes by enacting SRA upon children.

You cannot separate the concept of blood libel from the concept of Satanic Ritual Abuse and the Satanic Panic, and subsequently, you cannot separate conspiratorial thought from SRA and associated terminology.

Abuse that is orchestrated by multiple individuals is real. Conditioning is real. Religious and spiritual trauma is real. Cults, too, are real-- But Ritual Abuse, Mind Control, and Organized Abuse is not. Using these terms promotes conspiracy theories that put Jewish people and systems both at risk of harm.

Let's talk about programming now. The idea that a system can be programmed purposefully into a child is unrealistic pseudoscience.

The sheer amount of knowledge and effort an individual would need in order to maintain a constructed system like that is impossible, and this also assumes a much more widespread knowledge of DID and OSDD than is actually present.

While it is technically possible that an abuser (or abusers) may pick up on their victim's ‘quirks’, while it is technically possible that an abuser may realize doing X action leads to Z desired result for them, this is not programming. This is conditioning.

It is still a horrible abuse to inflict upon another person, but the concept of programming and mind control has its roots in yet another disproven conspiracy theory: Project Monarch.

Project Monarch was alleged to be a subset of Project MKUltra. It was said to be a project which trafficked children, using torture-based mind control to force them into becoming sex slaves for international trafficking rings, drug barons, Satanic cults, and “elites”.

These claims originate from Cathy O’Brien, who claims she uncovered repressed memories of this abuse under hypnosis, similar to Michelle Smith. She claims that this abuse led her to develop Dissociative Identity Disorder. This is echoed in the concept of programming as we see it today.

While we are on the subject of DID directly, I'd like to talk about HC-DID.

HC-DID is a community term meaning Highly Complex Dissociative Identity Disorder, which was coined to specifically describe DID caused by RAMCOA/SRA.

Other than the specific claim of origin, HC-DID is virtually indistinguishable from C-DID, otherwise known as polyfragmentation. This is a term with professional research and backing behind it, unlike HC-DID which is a term coined by someone within the RAMCOA community.

In my opinion there is no need for this term when there is already a well-known, scientifically-backed term to describe the same cluster of symptoms, and it is also well known that DID is already a highly complicated disorder with presentation varying widely from system to system. Usage of this term seems at best an alternative description for something which already exists, and at worst a way to further isolate an already vulnerable population.

To be clear, I don't for a second believe that the RAMCOA community has a secret agenda to isolate survivors or anything of the sort. I think the community as it currently stands is full of deeply traumatized, lonely, isolated, and younger plurals who are grappling for language to describe the horrific things they suffered.

I also believe that it has become a dangerous echo chamber that not only distorts people's memory, but may further traumatize and isolate them.

The RAMCOA community does not use plain language to discuss their experiences. Frequently they speak in a code, using esoteric community terms when they do not outright refuse to discuss what RAMCOA may be like whatsoever.

That is not to say that we are entitled to the stories of trauma survivors, rather that this language and how guarded the community is regarding information on RAMCOA results in a very insular community where discussing the subject with outsiders becomes difficult due to this inaccessibility of information. And this leads to these survivors feeling all the more cut off from the outside world, left with only the language coined by conspiracy theorists to describe the indescribable.

This inadvertently pushes the narrative of these dangerous conspiracies I've spoken about throughout this post. To once again make myself clear, I believe these victims in as far as I believe they went through something unspeakably traumatic at a very young age.

But with the volume of RAMCOA claims ever-increasing, yet substantiation of those claims ever-lacking, I cannot logically believe that the intense claims purported are completely and factually true given the evidence in front of me.

SOURCES AND FURTHER READING

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=https://www.ojp.gov/pdffiles1/Digitization/136592NCJRS.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwiigJ75pNuIAxX8LtAFHfjvIdUQFnoECBAQAQ&usg=AOvVaw1rF29SeYdt2ZljtHvnOLqI

https://greyfaction.org/isstd-exposed-a-culture-of-conspiracy/

https://www.nytimes.com/1997/09/10/us/hypnosis-may-cause-false-memories.html

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9531675/

https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/blood-libel

https://www.the-independent.com/news/world/americas/satanic-panic-film-movie-michelle-smith-memoir-b2300716.html

https://web.archive.org/web/20131014102812/http://www.process.org/discept/2010/02/08/dr-colin-a-ross-psychiatry-the-supernatural-and-malpractice-most-foul/

https://www.ojp.gov/ncjrs/virtual-library/abstracts/abuse-innocence-mcmartin-preschool-trial

https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1999-mar-07-mn-14693-story.html

https://www.dallasobserver.com/news/colin-ross-has-an-eyebeam-of-energy-hed-like-you-to-hear-7121325

https://web.archive.org/web/20240119125127/

https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-2004-02-13-0402130313-story.html

https://rentry.co/ssct_satanic-ritual-abuse https://scholar.google.com/scholar? hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C24&q=programmed+dissociative+identity+disorder&oq=programmed+diss#d=gs_qabs&t=1715683073093&u=%23p%3Dc6utAUJfID0J

https://guilfordjournals.com/doi/10.1521/jscp.1997.16.2.112

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/r476y63t603wc9p7kpzoh/ALUZm1JXJ--kDpn34rXCSwg?rlkey=vkkkqm8w28fi11741hak63y55&e=1&st=drvkpis9

https://archive.org/details/ozian-u-w-chainless-slaves-trauma-programming/page/n210/mode/1up?q=illuminati

https://rentry.co/xy7zpu83

https://www.pepijnvanerp.nl/2022/12/dutch-commission-finds-no-evidence-for-satanic-ritual-abuse/

[whumpees]

The X-Files whump list

Synopsis: The X-Files focused on the professional lives of two FBI special agents, Fox Mulder and Dana Scully, who are charged with investigating unusual and unsolved cases, known as X-Files, that involved elements of the supernatural or paranormal. Some of these cases forwarded the series’ mythological story arc and involved the investigative duo’s moving closer toward uncovering a vast government conspiracy regarding the existence of extraterrestrials.

Whumpee: fox mulder played by david duchovny

Seasons: 11 (1993-2018) (218 eps)

Movies: 2

_______________________________

S01

Ep2: kidnapped, held down on a stretcher, restrained in the stretcher and given a sedative injection by force & oxygen mask put on his face, delirious (half awake), in an operation room, scully got him out and he looked confused & shocked & wasn't walking well? He forgot how he got kidnapped

Ep5: mini attack & lifts his shirt for paramedics to bandage his torso

Ep10: mini attack & bruised cheek. Thrown against the ground & limping & using crutches

Ep12: suffocating from smoke, collapse on the floor and helped to walk by firemen

Ep13: shot in the leg and falls on the floor, laying in a stretcher unconscious with an oxygen mask & leg bleeding, recovering in the hospital (the whole things was very brief and boring)

Ep14: hit on the head and falls on the ground then hit again and knocked out briefly

Ep20: attacked by insects, hospitalized & has bruises on his face

_______________________________

S02

Ep1: found passed out

Ep15: stabbed or something in the arm by magic or whatever and falls on the ground & scully finds him laying on the ground

Ep16: flash forward: brought to the hospital in a critical condition, hypothermia, bad eye bruising, but in a bathtub to warm him, his heart stops and the scene is cut

Ep17: thrown at the ground multiple times, a substance gets in his eyes and he's almost blinded,dragged out side of the submarine and falls from a high distance, unable to see properly & difficultly moving, the scene from last episode continues and he his in a bathtub. Defibrillation, in the hospital for days unconscious, woke up and speaking with difficulty

Ep18: attacked by a gorilla and falls on the ground, hit by light and then found unconscious with his head bleeding

Ep19: "aging fast", rescued & passed out in hospital

Ep25: sleep deprived, loses his temper and attacks someone and so is manhandled. Asleep, wakes up started by scully, says he came home cuz he might have been running a fever, coughs. Sweating and breathing heavily a lil bit crying at the death of someone and comes home to scully with a fever and she puts him to bed and puts a cold cloth on his head. He won't listen to scully so she shoots him, falls unconscious, wakes up in someone's house bandaged, turned out he was being drugged and it's what caused him to get out of control to get everyone to distrust him. Holding his arm to his torso to stay still and not aggravate his wound. In a burning place, status unknown

_______________________________

S03

Ep1: found passed out under debris, carried to safty, passed out for 3 days with high fever

Ep4: fighting, thrown in the ground, hurt & winces in pain

Ep7: pushed across the room (srsly what's with the useless pain free pushes???)

Ep9: in a fight & pushed to the ground (i swear one more push and imma 😤 i just write them in case somebody cares about details 🙃)

Ep10: strangled, blood marks from the robe on his neck, knocked out & kicked multiple times, found unconscious with bloody face, carried while unconscious

Ep14: hit in the face, face treated by paramedic

Ep16: in a car accident, passed out, wakes up briefly and passes out again, wakes up in the hospital

Ep24: in a fight and thrown to the ground & a little hurt

_______________________________

S04

Ep1: smashed against a car & falls on the ground, meets scully and she says "you're freezing, you're in shock."

Ep3: tranquillised, collapses, found paralysed with his eyes open, unresponsive, dragged by scully

Ep8: whipped, passed out on the ground in a prison cell then wakes up, held down by many men & injected something to take him to do "experiments" on him, woke up tied in bed, worms entering his nose and get through his eyes and whole face 🤮

Ep9: passed out in the cell in a fetal position, thrown away by an explosion, helped to walk by scully

Ep15: punched & stepped on

Ep23: woke up on the floor covered in blood (not his) & doesn't remember what happened, scully finds him in a bathtub trying to warm himself and says "you're in shock", gets a sudden severe headache, on the floor & comes to consciousness, headache again, slapped hard af lol, goes to a doctor to perform a certain procedure on him to trigger his memories, doc injects him with something, in a bed struggling like he's having seizures ( he's remembering things) & doc restrains him

_______________________________

S05

Ep2: puts his head next to scully while she's sleeping and cries silently (i don't list emotional whump but this one he looked so helpless i liked that 😂)

Ep3: a substance is sprayed all over him & is painful so he takes off his shirt & writhes in pain on the gound & seems delirious or smth

Ep4: attacked by smth and hurt his arm and has a scratch on his chest, is cold and scully says you might still be in shock, scully cuddles him and he sleeps like a baby on her lap, the scratch on his chest is bandaged

Ep5: collapses from gass

Ep11: chained & electrocuted, virtual reality: woke up in an ambulance & confused asks what happened & finds his arms burned from the electrocution, opens his eyes again, sweating & being rushed to the operating room, turns out those "doctors" want to experiment on him & he notices that and is dead scared and asks for scully to be his doctor, injected smth in his neck, wakes up, says "i feel sick", finds his arm cut and panics, nurse suffocates him with pillow, wakes up again with both his arms cut:: back in reality: tied to the machine that forced him to watch that virtual world, scully calls out for him but the machine druggs him to not answer her, scully gets him off the machine & he's unresponsive, she helps him walk

Ep12: eats drugged pizza & is found passed put & is slapped to wake up (& the scene is repeated but from mulder's narrative and he has difficulty speaking then passes out), "attacked" & wakes up in a car

Ep14: attacked & falls on the ground & a gun point at him

Ep18: blindfolded, his hands are restrained to the table, being interrogated & every time he doesn't "confess" they pull back his finger and he's in so much pain & screams, they finally break his finger & he's dying 😂😂, finger in a cast

Ep19: hysterically attacking someone cuz he thinks he's a monster & so he's manhandled, thought to be having psychosis so he's admitted to the hospital restrained in bed, injected smth & winces in pain, nurse turns off light so he can sleep and then the monster comes to him and he screams for help and begs the nurse to untie him but she dismisses him and thinks he's crazy so he just screams all night 😂😂

_______________________________

S06

Ep3: (this man has to get him self in trouble all the time 😂😂😂) passed out in the water face down, pulled out of the water by rope while passed out, wakes up fast & coughs up water, punched several times but the men who saved him, jumps into the water, wakes up in hospital & says "i feel like hell"

Ep13: attacked by an octopus (but not shown) & has its marks around his neck & he can't breathe well, stumbles

Ep14: shot, scully rips his shirt & puts her hand in the wound to stop the bleeding

Ep21: unconscious and being digested alive by mushrooms, rescued and pulled from underground and put in an ambulance

Ep22: an image keeps triggering him every time he sees it: feels disoriented, hissing ears every, blurry vision, collapses in pain, later put in a psychiatric facility and is shown through the camera to act hostile & screaming, doctors said they're given him alot of drugs enough to put him into a coma put his brain has an "abnormal brain function"

_______________________________

S07

Ep1: abnormal brain activity that won't allow it to shut down or rest manifesting in episodes of aggression, attacks someone, manhandled against the wall, unresponsive & restrained in bed hands & legs, in a wheelchair while still unresponsive, given a high dose of a drug to lower his brain activity so he can walk to get him out of the hospital but results in a seizure & held down in bed

Ep2: still in bed like a zombie, injected smth in his head & is in pain , in handcuffs & still in hospital gown, on a table arms & legs tied & unconscious, being operated on, laying unconscious, wakes up & says to scully with difficulty: "help me"

Ep4: found in a basement sitting on the ground with hurt his arm (zombie attack) , arm bandaged

Ep6: shot in the arm (literally has no whump at all not even pain!!), being bandaged in hospital

Ep9: bitten by snakes & found unconscious on the ground by scully, in the hospital

E13: beaten by a character in a game

E16: attacked & drowned but doesn't pass out

Ep18: coughs blood, insect eggs are hatching in his lungs, unconscious in the operating room and the worms are being vacuumed from his lungs by a tube, unconscious in bed, wakes up & his voice is weak, gasps for air, "code blue", the docs are trying to stabilise him

Ep21: thrown to the ground by an explosion

Ep22: abducted by aliens

_______________________________

S08

Ep1: aliens doing experiments on him (honestly brutal ew), screaming, in scully's "dream" but it's actually real & shown later: naked & restrained to the chair by bars pierced through his hands & legs, his chest being cut open & screaming

Ep2: ( not actually mulder but someone masking as him but it looked good tho 🙂: jumps from a cliff, passed out on the ground), again shown in someone's dream but it's real: naked & unconscious, and again at the end of the episode

Ep14: found in a forest passed out.

Ep15: presumed dead, dug out of the grave, at the hospital

Ep16: flashback of the horrific experiments

Ep20: attacked & falls unconscious on the ground, scully treats his face

_______________________________

S09

(He was missing the whole season)

Ep19: appears in a prison cell, a soldier asks him "what are you thinking?" And mulder replies "where am i?", the man goes "wrong answer" and punches him in the stomach and he crumples to the ground, soldier: "no sleeping!", the man comes to ask him the same question again and "wrong answer!" And hits him, tries to hit him again but mulder resists but the man holds the weapon up his throat and is choking him, in the ground sleeping naked and the man comes again and shouts "no sleep!" and mulder is startled, he asks him again what is he thinking (basically torturing him into compliance) and mulder says "what should i be thinking?" The man says "you're a guilty man who did blah blah" and holds his stick up to hit him and shouts "say it!!" and mulder flinches, mulder submits and says "I'm a guilty man who did blah blah" and is shaking

_______________________________

S10

Ep2: ringing ears, falls on his knees and holds his head

Ep5: takes drugs and is high, wakes up in the hospital, in a wheelchair

Ep6: is shown with bruised and bloody face, flashback showing why he had the bruised face: in a fight, choked:: on the ground (sick from a disease spreading in the whole population), passed out in a chair, wakes up, someone picks him up and helps him walk

_______________________________

S11

None

_______________________________

Movies

The X-files: fight the future (1998)

Shot in his head & falls on the ground, wakes up at the hospital and tries to leave immediately and they try to stop him

Passes out on the ice (from exhaustion?), scully hugs him to keep him warm

The X-files: i want to believe (2008)

To be updated

[posttexasstressdisorder]

Because of course they do. We saw it all go down in real-time. Nice of you to fucking catch up. Bitter? Oh, a tad...

[mightyflamethrower]

When Donald Trump seemed to have a lock on the 2016 Republican primary, the Democratic Party concluded that the people could not be counted on to do the “right thing” of electing the Democratic candidate in waiting Hillary Clinton.

What followed were eight long years of extralegal efforts to neuter candidate, then President, then ex-President, and then candidate again, Donald Trump.

The nonstop efforts were all justified as “saving democracy”—albeit by nearly destroying it.

In 2015-2016, the Hillary Clinton campaign fueled the lie that discredited ex-British spy Christopher Steele had discovered Donald Trump to be a veritable Russian agent.

Hillary did not disclose that she had paid Steele—with checks hidden through three paywalls. The FBI, under Director James Comey, also hired the fraudster.

Yet almost nothing in his “Steele dossier” was true.

The FBI doctored evidence submitted to a FISA court. Comey leaked to the press confidential documents about his private conversations with President Trump.

Comey’s successor, Acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe, lied on numerous occasions to federal investigators.

Both former CIA Director John Brennan and former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper repeatedly lied to the nation, saying that Trump was de facto working with the Russians.

The result? Trump lost the 2016 popular vote but still won the Electoral College.

Next, celebrities and well-funded liberals waged a media campaign to convince the electors to become “faithless.” Left-wing elites begged them to renounce their constitutional duties and instead throw the election to Hillary Clinton.

Once Trump was elected, “Russian collusion” was fired up again in hysterical fashion.

A special counsel, Robert Mueller, consumed 22 months of the Trump presidency. His investigation team constantly leaked falsehoods about the “walls closing in on” Trump.

After nearly two years, Mueller announced there was no evidence of a Trump effort to collude with Russia.

Next was the first impeachment of Trump—nearly the moment he lost the House in 2018.

Supposedly, Trump had leveraged Ukraine to investigate a corrupt Hunter Biden by delaying foreign aid.

Trump was impeached on a strictly partisan vote.

But later, no one denied that the drug-addled Hunter Biden had indeed gotten rich from Ukraine, or that Joe Biden had fired a Ukrainian prosecutor looking into his son’s misadventures while still vice president, or that Trump released all the military assistance designated by Congress, or that he included offensive weapons formerly denied Ukraine by the Obama-Biden administration.

Next, in 2020, when Hunter’s laptop turned up abandoned at a repair shop and full of incriminating evidence of more Biden family skullduggery, the left struck again.

It rounded up “51 former intelligence authorities” to mislead the American people on the eve of the vote that the laptop was likely a fake—once again cooked up by Russian disinformation experts to aid Trump.

And once more, that was another complete falsehood. But the lie proved useful to Joe Biden in the debates and campaign. And he won the election.

Next, the learn-nothing, forget-nothing left turned to the 2023-2024 campaign.

This time, their next extra-legal efforts were twofold.

One, they unsuccessfully sought to remove Trump from some 15 state ballots.

Two, local, state, and federal courts began to wage lawfare to convict and jail candidate Trump, or at least bankrupt him and keep him off the campaign trail.

Three county and state prosecutors campaigned on getting Trump on charges never filed before against a presidential candidate—and rarely against anyone else as well.

The Fani Willis Georgia lead prosecutor met secretly with the Biden White House counsel.

Alvin Bragg’s Manhattan team hired the third-ranking federal prosecutor in the Biden Justice Department.

Special counsel Jack Smith was found by a court to have been illegally appointed and much of his case was dismissed.

On July 14, a shooter nearly killed candidate Trump, nicking his ear after somehow firing a rifle from a rooftop a mere 140 yards away—while undetected by law enforcement inside the very same building below.

Prior to the shooting, Joe Biden had boasted to donors that “it’s time to put Trump in a bullseye.”

Biden had railed nearly nonstop that a Trump victory would spell the end of democracy—a theme the left had fueled by comparing ad nauseam Trump to Adolf Hitler.

Yet here we are in mid-July 2024 and Donald Trump, the Republican candidate, is alive and leads incumbent Biden—either because of, or despite, the crude efforts to destroy him.

After nearly a decade of utter madness, can we finally order the FBI, DOJ, and CIA to butt out of our elections?

Can a bankrupt media cease whipping up hysterias about a supposed Nazi-like takeover?

Can the left stop relying on washed-up British spies, corrupt ex-spooks, and teams of clownish partisan prosecutors?

Instead, why not, at last, just let the people choose their own president?

[averagewriter-inthedark]

My Wingman 💋| Joaquin Torres Marvel Headcanon

Link to my marvel Masterlist

Joaquin Torres crushing on an avenger would look like:

Just shortly before the Ultron drama, you were a young recruit to the avengers after the fall of S.H.I.E.L.D. Unbeknownst to the team—especially Natasha—you were a former Black Widow who escaped the red room during a mission and defected to the U.S. before Dreykov could track you. Because the Red Room was constantly moving, you were clueless to where it could have gone and for your protection Fury had your identity changed and record concealed from the rest of the organization. This of course had people wary and suspicious of you—considering you were exceptional in the field—but you kept a low profile and did whatever Fury asked of you. He promised to inform you if the Red Room every came on their radar and vowed to help you take it down when the time came.

Unfortunately that promise would not happen with the implementation of the Sokovia Accords. Fury was off the grid, and your teammates were at odds with one another. Though you verbally remained neutral and did not physically get involved when the fight in Germany occurred, behind the scenes you were supportive of Steve and became close with him and Sam. You finally went rogue at 17 when Natasha confronted you after she discovered your identity and the fact the Red Room was still active. “Fury knew didn’t he? This whole time—you both knew Dreykov was still out there!” “It’s more complicated than you think, Natasha. I was barely fourteen when I escaped and had no where else to go! Fury did what he had to protect me. We both have tried tracking the Red Room but have gotten no leads.” “Well I have one. So let’s go end this once and for all.”

Together you two took down Dreykov with the help of her adoptive family before ultimately meeting up with Steve to break the others out of the Raft. For two years you went on the run. Then in 2018 you all were called to battle against the Mad Titan, Thanos, where you lost half of the population when he succeeded in his mission. For five years you and Natasha remained at the compound, doing whatever you could to maintain the Avengers. And when the opportunity came to fix it all, you were left heartbroken at the loss of her and Tony.

Sam took you under his wing (pun intended) when you and the other former fugitives received pardons. Steve was gone, the Avengers were not so much an active organization anymore, and the Accords had been abolished. You pretty much became a government agent again—with your true identity now that Dreykov was long gone. Every agency wanted you; FBI, CIA, Homeland Security, OSI, the Secret Service, even the goddamn Marshals were calling you to be one of their operatives. “Have you decided whose badge you’ll wear yet?” “I’ve pretty much narrowed it down to either the CIA or OSI. Ross is with the CIA so that’s a plus, but with OSI I could work with you when you’re off with the Air Force. Honestly, Sam, I feel like just becoming a free lance so I can get a taste of everything.”

In the end, you did become a free lance agent under the code name ‘Red Widow,’ as not to be confused with Natasha since she was always known as THE Black Widow. You wore a similar suit she did, except yours was red and the hourglass on the belt was black. You enjoyed being a free lance agent where you got to be flexible with what you did. But boy was it fucking hell at times. One week you’re escorting the President, the next you’re investigating a potential threat to the country, and (like most times) you’re partnering with Sam when he finds himself in a pickle. It’s on one of those many adventures with Sam that you meet First Lieutenant Joaquin Torres.

After the threatening phone call from Karlie, Sam had called you and you immediately sent a team of agents to protect his sister & nephews before getting on a plane to Riga. It was not even a second after you landed that you received dozens of phone calls, emails, texts, and news notifications about what took place in the middle of a crowded area between John Walker and a member of the Flag Smashers. You pretty much hauled ass to the location when you finally got a hold of Sam—and you’d be lying if you said you didn’t feel satisfaction at being the one to cuff Walker and escort him to the SUV.

Finally you find your friends, running into Bucky on his way out where you two exchanged words on what he was about to do. “Need me to get in touch with Okoye for you?” “I’m already on it—don’t worry about me.” After saying goodbye you entered the doorway to see Sam and a young Air Force Officer chatting. “Hope I’m not interrupting.” “You’re right on time, Red.” Your voice had the officer, who had his back to you, spinning around to which he froze when y’all made eye contact. First thing you thought was, ‘Damn he’s a cutie.’

Joaquin was practically smitten upon first glance. There was a light blush to his cheeks when he unconsciously checked you as you strutted up to the pair in your eye catching Red Widow suit. When Sam introduced him, the man couldn’t even find his voice, “Uh-Uh hi. I-I’m Torres—Joa-Joaquin Torres.” Sam looked amused, as did you, “Nice to meet you, Joaquin. I’ve got many names, but you can call me Y/n or Red.” Your wink at the end pretty much sealed the deal, Joaquin thinking, ‘Oh yeah, I’m screwed.”

Anytime Sam called you after that Joaquin would silently looking forward to seeing you. He thought you were absolutely beautiful, funny, intelligent, and a complete badass. The first time he saw you in action the man was rendered speechless. Of course he knew who you were (after restoring the population, you and the remaining avengers were international heroes) so Joaquin was pretty much a fanboy (if you know you know 😉). Seeing you take down ten men twice your size in the flesh was something he literally bragged to his squadron about for days.

You were well aware of the little crush Joaquin had on you. And to be honest, you shared the feeling. The first time you saw him you thought he was adorable with his cute smile and blushing cheeks (not to mention he looked damn good in uniform). Anytime Sam called you up and Joaquin was there, you couldn’t pass on the opportunity to flirt with him. “Nice to see your pretty face again, Torres.” “I heard that Sam gave you his old wings…have you decided what to do with them? I could use a wingman now that Sam is off being Captain America and hardly needs me anymore.”

Something about you implying you’d want him as a wingman motivated Joaquin to finish fixing up the wings he had already started working on. It excited him to work with you from behind the scenes, but he was itching to get in the air/on the ground and be an asset alongside you. Sam could tell what his goal was, so the older man slowly took Joaquin under his wing like he did you to help prepare him for the superhero life.

When it finally came time for Joaquin to join in on the action, he became your eyes in the sky while you scouted the ground. The Air Force was pretty much your main employer (similar to Sam) but you still did work for other agencies. And since you and Joaquin worked so well together, it was no surprise you’d call him up for help. He was your wingman after all. Not too long after, you two were a team sought after by the many agencies you did free lance work for. “Damn that’s the third mission this month! Don’t you ever get tired of this sometimes?” “Everyday, but I gotta keep the bills paid, pretty boy.”

Your friendship was very flirtatious. People often thought you two were a thing and were surprised to find out they were wrong. You teased and bickered, gave little glances when the other wasn’t looking and complimented each other. His name in your phone was literally ‘pretty boy💋’ and yours was either ‘muñeca🧸’ (doll) or ‘hermosa🥰’ (beautiful). Each time y’all would call the other the pet names, you’d both blush. The crushes on each other definitely increased with each flirtatious remark.

“Damn girl, you know how to make an entrance.” “Wait don’t go yet, let me commit your face to memory in case I die out there.”

“Imma need you to focus, Torres. I know I’m exceptional to look at, but I don’t want that pretty face of yours getting hurt because you’re distracted.” “If you die out there, who’s gonna dance with me at next months officers ball?”

It would be a good time before Joaquin finally worked up the courage to ask you out. As much as he liked you, there was the fear it would ruin the friendship y’all had created. Joaquin admired you from afar and would brush aside his feelings when it came time to business, but at the end of the day there was no denying he wished for something more. At one point Sam even brought it up, wondering why he hadn’t made a move. “It’s complicated, Sam. She’s my wingman and I’d hate to lose her.” “Torres, I see the way she looks at you. Have you ever noticed she never flirts with anyone else when we go out. At banquets people hit on her, but her eyes are only on you. Trust me, she wants the same thing as you.”

Although Sam’s words made him confident, Joaquin was still anxious it wouldn’t work. So he continued to harbor his crush on you from behind the scenes. Finally you had enough and decided to take matters into your own hands after a mission. It had been nearly a year since y’all met and quite frankly your feelings for Joaquin were starting to become overwhelming. “Are we gonna dance around this forever, Torres? Or, am I gonna have to drag you to the bar to have a drink with me and kick this off once and for all?”

At his incredulous expression, you walked up with your hands coming to his collar to pulled him toward you. That finally had him snap out of his daze, face red by how flustered he was. But within his expression was joy and awe, “I-uh. Are you sure, y/n? I care about you so much a-and I know I’ve made my crush on you painfully obvious b-but I-I don’t wanna ruin what we have—.” “Joaquin, you’ll always be my wingman because I trust you more than anyone else on this planet. The fact you are blind to see I feel the same about is both shocking and adorable. I want you to be my wingman both on and off the field in a more personal manner. So what do you say?”

Let’s just say, the kiss you received was him a great answer.

[misanthropicvampire]

My Top 10 Cinema Recommendations of 2023

movies/shows that I watched for the first time this year, worth a try, ranked

10. Eastern Promises dr. David Cronenberg (2007)

Nikolai, both ruthless and mysterious, has ties to one of the most dangerous crime families in London. He crosses paths with Anna, a midwife who has come across potentially damning evidence against the family, which forces him to set in motion a plan of deceit, death and retribution.

9. Thelma dr. Joachim Trier (2017)

A confused, devoutly religious college student begins to experience extreme seizures while in denial of a female friend's feelings for her. She soon learns that the violent episodes are a symptom of inexplicable, and often dangerous, supernatural abilities.

8. Interview With The Vampire (2022)

Aging journalist Daniel Molloy returns for a second interview with Louis de Pointe du Lac, who presents a new spin on his tumultuous relationship with the vampire Lestat de Lioncourt.

7. Benedetta dr. Paul Verhoeven (2021)

A seventeenth century nun becomes entangled in a forbidden lesbian affair, but it is her shockingly transgressive religious visions that threaten to shake her Church to its very core.

6. Femme dr. Sam H. Freeman & Ng Choon Ping (2023)

Jules, a drag performer, seeks revenge on the perpetrator of his sexual assault. But as the facade of his relationship with the man, Preston, develops, this revenge is called into question.

5. Infinity Pool dr. Brandon Cronenberg (2023)

Guided by a seductive and mysterious woman, a couple on vacation venture outside the resort grounds and find themselves in a culture filled with violence, hedonism and untold horror. A tragic accident soon leaves them facing a zero tolerance policy for crime: either you will be executed, or, if you're rich enough to afford it, you can watch yourself die instead.

4. Possessor dr. Brandon Cronenberg (2020)

Tasya Vos, an elite corporate assassin, takes control of other people's bodies using brain-implant technology to execute high-profile targets.

3. High Life dr. Claire Denis (2018)

Monte and his baby daughter are the last survivors of a mission consisting of criminals used as scientific experiments, on a doomed journey to the outer stretches of space. They must now rely on each other to survive as they hurtle toward the oblivion of a black hole.

2. Crimes of the Future dr. David Cronenberg (2022)

As the human species adapts to a synthetic environment, the body undergoes new transformations and mutations. Accompanied by his partner, celebrity surgery performance artist Saul Tenser showcases the metamorphosis of his organs. Meanwhile, a mysterious group attempts to use Saul's notoriety to shed light on the next phase of human evolution.

HONOURABLE MENTIONS

The Indian Runner (1991)

Talk to Me (2022)

Midnight Mass (2021)

Malignant (2021)

1. Hannibal (2013-2015)

Reclusive FBI profiler Will Graham is recruited to help investigate a serial killer in Minnesota using his empathic abilties. With the investigation weighing heavily on Graham, his superior, Crawford, decides to have him supervised by elusive psychiatrist Dr. Hannibal Lecter, the very perpetrator of these gruesome crimes. The bond Lecter forms with Graham begins to threaten his double life, as Lecter is fascinated by Graham's ability to empathise with murderers and hatches a plan to push the boundaries of Graham's fragile sanity and transform him into a killer.

[crownmemes]

The X-Files Sentences, Vol. 1

(Sentences from The X-Files (1993-2002, 2016-2018). Adjust phrasing where needed)

"It's happening again, isn't it?"

"Sorry, nobody down here but the FBI's most unwanted."

"So, who did you tick off to get stuck with this?"

"I was under the impression that you were sent to spy on me."

"Do you believe in the existence of extraterrestrials?"

"You just think you can come up here and do whatever you damn please, don't you?"

"You're saying that time disappeared? Time can't just disappear!"

"There's classified government information I've been trying to access, but someone has been blocking my attempts to get at it."

"I see no evidence that justifies the legitimacy of these investigations."

"Let's just say that I'm in a position to know quite a lot of things."

"You know, the government is not above the law."

"What would be the chances of someone like me seeing a UFO?"

"It can't be aircraft. Aircraft can't manoeuvre like that."

"Just because I can't explain it, doesn't mean I'm going to believe they were UFOs."

"The brain doesn't work like that. You can't just go in there and erase certain files."

"I can provide you with information, but only so long as it's in my best interest to do so."

"Each victim was found with their liver ripped out."

"Why would I make them so uncomfortable?"

"Reputation? I have a reputation?"

"Do you think I'm spooky?"

"If you explain to me what you're talking about, maybe I can help you out."

"What was she doing right before she died? Was she pleading for her life?"

"Come with me or don't come with me, but until they find a body, I'm not giving up on that girl."

"Fact is, we've got a cannibalised body. Someone - or something - out there is hungry."

"On the contrary, I think I've been exceedingly polite."

"So, can I ask about the case you're on, or can't you say?"

"Look, I wouldn't ask if it wasn't important."

"I have to admit, that fulfilled one of my boyhood fantasies."

"I have my orders, and the license to execute them as I see fit."

"How can I disprove lies that are stamped with an official seal?"

"No government agency has jurisdiction over the truth."

"Are you at all familiar with the phenomenon of cattle mutilations?"

"You know, some mistakes are quite worth making twice."

"There's something else I haven't told you about myself..."

"Some killers are products of society. Some act out of past abuses. Some kill because they like it."

"I thought you'd be pleased that I'd opened myself to extreme possibilities!"

"How come you don't believe me?"

"Our best lead is gone. Someone stole it before the lab had a chance to look at it."

"Remember the day you first walked into my office? You pissed me off just looking at you, but then I saw how your mind worked - how you're always three jumps again."

"A lot of people are saying you've become an embarrassment - a liability."

"The government can't control a deficit or manage crime. What makes you think they can plan and execute such an elaborate conspiracy?"

"That's why I like you! Your ideas are weirder than mine!"

"I think it's remotely plausible that someone might think you're hot."