#granted she’s probably not as extremist as this dude

[classical-vanity]

Do you want to discuss the opinions you have on Romania or at least post them?

Sure, didn’t think anyone would care tbh:)))

I don’t have any positive ones, I feel like this is a very frustrating situation and I guess a wake up call for me too, I suppose I was in a bubble and it was so much smaller than I ever could have imagined. Obviously I am not happy to have all the extremist parties in the parliament, all the ultra conservatives and nationalists, I think that will prove to be very detrimental to us in the long run.

When it comes to the presidential elections I feel like I am going insane a bit because Georgescu is just consistently saying the most outlandish, factually incorrect and downright insane stuff (his wife too). And he still gets so much support. I don’t understand how a pro-Russian, anti-EU, anti-NATO candidate is so popular. I don’t think people are thinking it through when it comes to him.

I understand that the president isn’t as important to us compared to other countries and he mostly is there for external relations. However I am very scared that we will end up with a similar situation to brexit if this dude does end up getting elected. Realistically, our country won’t survive that economically.

Also, people who immigrated to the west screwing us over big time. I find that very frustrating since they’re not the ones who’ll deal with the consequences directly, they’re just making it worse for us who are still here. I am genuinely surprised and concerned about all of the results in general. I get it that the situation has been bad and it has radicalized a lot of people. However, I do find it so alarming that they do not seem to realize the gravity of this situation. It hasn’t even been that long since the revolution and it’s like everyone forgot.

[phantomphangphucker]

Phic Phight - Conspiracy? More Like Consp-idiocy

For: @crowswithize

This is just me taking a piss on extremist conspiracy theorist and how they fuck everything up for everyone else. (Looking at you anti-vaxers)Dan just needed a chink in the shield to bring the whole thing down, and human stupidity was the best kind of chink. Desiree has just… given up.

Desiree considered herself one of the lucky ones, lucky in that she could easily hide and could get protection under the livings shield. However, she was unlucky in the way that she was currently stuck in a damn lamp/vase again and bored.

Someone would rub it or drop it eventually. Some moron -usually a child or a man- always did.

And sure as shit, some man did.

Apparently the fool was trying to find out if her current vase-based prison had uranium to have proof against the Russians for bribing some living politician and ‘bring her down for treason’.

Russia didn’t even exist anymore. The fool. And of course he was trying to ‘bring down’ a woman; fucking men.

“See! What did I tell you. Green! And Russian”.

She’s not going to bother pointing out that ectoplasm glowed green too, who would think a white porcelain vase was uranium anyways? Either way she stretches out dramatically, “I am Desiree, tell me, boy, what is your wish?”.

He points aggressively at her, “Russian spy!”.

She glares, pinching the bridge of her nose and squeezing her eyes shut, “no, you fool. I’m a genie”, putting on a sickly sweet smile, “one who can grant your every desire, should you wish it”.

“Then I wish you weren’t Russian”.

He… he looks like he thinks he just pulled a ‘gotcha’ card… She still snaps her fingers -she is so not wasting her time arguing about her heritage with some man- but of course nothing changes; she’s getting a migraine already.

The boy next to the absolute dunce sticks up a finger and stammers, “m-maybe we sho-should get her to, uh, save us? Maybe? Heh”.

Even if that was a wish, she wasn’t quite that powerful; that monster wouldn't be destroyed with one simple wish. Such unacceptable defiance from a man.

The idiot looks like he just got a great idea though, slapping a fist in the palm of his hand, sounding giddy, “oh! Yes! Russian or not and maybe sent by leprechauns-”.

What.

“-I wish-”.

Oh thank The Ancients, let this be something she can actually work with.

“-to be freed from this microwave dome and taken to whoever’s fighting to destroy the lizard girl in Red’s deep state plans”, waving a finger around, “the creature says it’s protecting us with its psychic electric fireflies, but I know a false flag operation when I see one and I will not be baked into a soufflé!”.

What.

The teen freaks a little, waving his hands around, “Dude! What the fuck! No! Outside is bad!”.

“Oh don’t let them fool you with their plotting. This is MKUltra’s Jonestown experiment all over again, but with microwave signals”.

Desiree stares a little before facepalming, oh what the heck this world didn’t deserve to keep existing if this is what the living are like now. If this colossal fool wants an express trip to his own death, he can have it.

She swirls her hand and away the two men go.

Outside of the shield.

Directly into the monster's path.

How… how are men this fucking STUPID.

---

Dan tilts his head at a sudden sense of ectoplasmic energy followed by a more sudden appearance of two living heartbeats. He’s a little curious how they got here, but he’s not looking a gift horse in the mouth.

He has been a little goddamn bored after all, and beating around some flesh sacks was welcome entertainment.

And then he can hear them talking and…

Alright.

Okay.

Dan thinks he can be forgiven for dropping the whole ‘evil’ thing for a second here. Because this fucker.

This blue-eyed, pink-haired, shitty-overpriced-latte-drinking, fucker right here.

Doesn’t believe the moon exists.

Yes he was planning to kill the man. Probably the same tired way he killed most unimportant, unnotable, morons that left that stupid fucking shield. But now this fucker is walking around ranting to some kid -who he clearly dragged out with him and who looks justifiably and satisfyingly scared shitless- about how the moon was just ‘a projection of a piece of stale cheese put up there as false proof the earth was round’ and how he could ‘prove it now that they were free from the microwaves’.

Dan almost doesn’t want to kill the bastard now. Someone this glaringly and blatantly stupid might be more useful; or at least fun with mess with. So Dan decides to fly/crash down hard enough to leave a crater in the ground, being a dramatic little shit made everything more entertaining. Standing up with a nasty smirk, he points vaguely at the crater, “there’s lots of craters on the moon. Guess I must have made them then”.

Pink-haired idiot McGee actually nods enthusiastically. Like Dan’s comment made an ounce of logical sense inside his pea brain. This moron doesn’t even have the smarts to be scared. The other dude though... Dan can practically see the teens life flashing before said teens eyes. Meanwhile, the moronic fuck nugget snaps his fingers at Dan; earning a quirked eyebrow from the ghost. “Exactly! You’re the kinda guy who looks like he makes a living punching all those holes in Swiss cheese. You know, before the giants shrink it so they can sell it to us”, waving his hand around, “eh it’s probably the only way they can get funding to use against the leprechaun mafia”.

What.

The teen had started slowly walking backwards, back towards the safety of the stupid fucking shield, while numbnuts had been speaking. And Dan had let him. Because seriously.

This brand of stupid was worth savouring. Killing the teen would probably fuck up said savouring, since the man who is probably considered an example of the definition of stupid, would be understandably and satisfyingly scared.

Dan crosses his arms, smirk only growing, because he’s officially got an idea. One that officially requires a very special brand of stupid. And lucky him! He’s got his order of ‘one moron baked extra dumb’ right the fuck here. “Oh yes indeed. Now it’s only too bad I can’t go about making any cheese deliveries with the silly shield up”, chuckling darkly, “really hard on the eyes, you know how it is”.

Turd-for-brains actually nods again. “Damn they are overworking you. Delivery and hole puncher?”. This guy must have brain damage. Dan-unrelated brain damage. Maybe whoever fucked this poor bastard up was more of a sadist than Dan was, at least Dan put people out of their -and everyone else’s- misery while also making the ground and walls that much more colourful. Blood was a very juicy shade of red you know. The dumbass actually turns away from him -killing this man wouldn’t even be enjoyable at this point. Idiot would probably think it was just a painful candy Cotten-induced hallucination or some shit- and waves his hand limply at the glowing green stupid fucking shield, “yeah leprechauns would make anyone hate that ugly colour. I mean, the lizard men could at least have some taste for their psychic electric fireflies and make them pink. I get that it’s the only way to keep the microwaves working but come on man. Not like the thing could actually be an energy shield, am I right? Half circles are obviously impossible”.

Dan resists cackling, unfortunately, the stupid fucking shield was not a ‘half circle’ since it went unground. Quirking an eyebrow, “what if it goes underground?”.

“Eh, can’t be. Seeing as we’re not at war with the mole people”.

Holy Shit.

Dan nods and hums like he agrees. Though let it be known, he doesn’t fucking agree. Why? Because he’s not a complete idiot. Sure not destroying Amity first was pretty stupid on his part, stupid lingering bits of human emotion and sentimentality, but still. “Indeed, and I can’t imagine how unpleasant it would be to get a mouth full of... fireflies”. He is only barely managing to keep the mocking disbelief out of his voice. He is not an actor. Regardless he leans forwards menacingly, “say why don’t you be a pal, cross a few wires in the firefly controlling poles the lizard men set up. You wouldn’t want anyone inside to miss out on a shipment of cheese, would you?”.

Dan would feel like he just made himself lose a few ectoplasmic Core cells after saying that load of idiotic garbage, if it wasn’t for the fact that this colossal titan of a moron actually nods. “Oh sure thing! Cheese might be made by giants as a way to fatten us up to feed their pet snakes someday, but it is delicious”.

Dan just stares at the man as he walks back through the shield. Fuck, he thinks he needs a drink -preferably drunken out of some poor saps skull- after listening to that man. Vaguely he wonders how and why none of the human meat sacks haven’t killed him with their bare hands themselves yet.

But seeing sparking coming from the pole nearest him, he cackles.

Human stupidity. One of the only things that’s got a higher body count than Dan does. And today it’s gonna finally be the catalyst for the entire species kicking the bucket in a truly spectacular fashion.

And people had thought Wes was an insane moron.

---

Desiree watches one of the shields poles spark, seeing that moron giving the monster a silly thumbs up.

This is why she hates men.

She really hates men.

But this entire planet can stuff it, these living were way to far gone; no more wishes for them. Maybe if someone starts things from scratch they’ll skip making men and idiots exist.

End.

Prompt: Desiree is ready to grant wishes and cause chaos. That is until she has to hear the stupidest wish she has ever had to grant.

[nightcoremoon]

weird opinion but christians aren't religious.

ok so like, jews generally follow god's rules, muslims follow allah's rules, hindus probably follow their gods rules, so on and so forth. and overall they do it out of faith; they do it because they want to honor the deity who loves them rather than because society forces them to.

granted the zionists and the radical extremists and the zealots do exist but as loud minorities and thus are statistical outliers & don't matter.

christians are... a different breed.

"if you aren't x branch and dont obey y rules you'll go to hell so we'll fucking murder you" is pretty much the main driving force behind a significant portion of christianity in history. the catholics, the protestants, the orthodoxy, all are built on a foundation of fear, anger, and hatred. it's shaped the way society developed; in the 4 nations that did the most genocidal imperialist colonialism- England, France, Spain, and Italy- a combination of convenient coastal locations, naval prowess, military tendency, christianity, and ultranationalism lead them down a path of missionaries, holding bibles in one hand and bloodstained knives in the other. the religion is inseparable from the culture and inseparable from the horrible things done in the name of their god, and the resulting cancers of society we feel today from the campaigns of slaughter. xenophobia. capitalism. savage barbarism via sensationalized capitol punishment. misogyny. queerphobia. gender fascism. classism. racism. all of these issues in the "civilized world" stem predominantly from those four nations and the disease ridden pestilent filth some call pilgrims.

here's something interesting:

there are less than 1 million rastafari in the world.

there are less than 5 million shinto in the world.

there are less than 25 million jews in the world.

there are less than 30 million sikhs in the world.

there are roughly 100 million african cultural religious adherents in the world.

there are less than 400 million chinese cultural religious adherents in the world.

there are about 500 million buddhists in the world.

there are about 1.1 billion hindus in the world.

there are about 1.2 billion nonreligious people in the world.

there are 1.6 billion muslims in the world.

and one final statistic

there are over 2.1 billion christians in the world.

the jewish count is a highball, rounded up, and includes several different definitions of jewish including people who are only one quarter. so for every single person who is even remotely jewish, there are more than 8 christians. for every hindu, there are 4 christians. for every atheist, agnostic, or "other", 2 christians. this frightening statistic should set off warning bells for everyone who is involved in a discussion about religion. and anyone who knows BASIC world history and can correlate data at all can probably piece together what I'm putting down.

now, I may be slightly biased here considering my eclectic religious beliefs. now, I personally believe that there is some primary force of energy that may or may not manifest itself as a humanoid being, that engineered the most basic laws of physics in the universe: atomic magnetism. as can be inferred by planck's constant and its implications, our universe is digital, written in binary. an electron either moves or doesn't move. there are no other options. so I genuinely believe in some form of intelligent design; whether it's a bearded guy on a cloud, some dude with six arms and an elephant for a face, just a big swirling pool of ectoplasm, or a big ol' plate of spaghetti and meatballs, something is out there that we are physically incapable of contacting from our plane of existence, just as a drawing on a piece of paper cannot reach out to interact with the world: a gif will move on its own but it will never acknowledge our existence, even if it could think by itself. and all the different mythologies of the world- egyptian, greek, norse, shinto, whatever- very well could be the agents of that unknown "god". perhaps anubis, ra, and bastet are just angels with animal heads that all of the peoples of ancient egypt saw and were like oh I guess this must be a god. maybe zeus and loki were the same person with a magic dick who fucked a bunch of animals in both greece and the scandinavian countries and spawned all of the horrible half-animal monstrosities that, idk, made vishnu think "well I have to kill that" and caused the biblical flood or something. maybe the jewish god gifted wisdom to siddhartha for sitting under a fig tree for 6 years through the angel pomona [roman goddess of fruit, had to google that one], so buddha gets his wisdom from demeter and is in nirvana right now right a step up from hades on yggdrasil the world tree keeping an eye on his charge persephone. any theory could theoretically be true but we ants of humans will never fucking know because we can't just point a telescope at the magellanic clouds and say "look, there's amaterasu with russell's teapot, and she's having tea with... *rubs eyes* lemmy kilmister??? wow I guess gods are real after all!" it's impossible to know the secrets of our universe because of the very restrictive nature of the universe itself. is it a circle? is it a donut? WE DONT FUCKIN KNOW.

we cannot know what religion is truthful.

""anyone who says that any one religion is more or less true than any other is a fucking moron, and if they're suggesting that White Western European Colonial Imperialist Protestantism is the one true faith, they're probably a fucking racist colonizer who beats his wife/sister and burns gays at the stake. and considering how that exact demographic is typically the one that murdered people for not converting to their religion, I don't think they have the intellectual non-deranged ability to make those logical connections.

again, I'm not saying that there AREN'T a lot of people of every religion who are evil assholes who contributed to mass genocide. israelites killed palestinians. shiites killed sunnis. hutus killed tutsis. danes killed geats. turks killed armenians. the ottoman empire has as much blood on its hands as the holy roman empire. germans who called themselves aryans but weren't actually aryan killed jews. but all of these tragedies were isolated incidents rather than repeated patterns over the course of two thousand years. not like christianity was and is.

just look at the United States, Canada, Mexico, Hong Kong, South Africa, Australia, & India's British Raj. Britain, France, Spain, and Italy, by extension Protestantism and Catholicism, are the shared factor between the long and bloody history fraught with massacring indigenous populations who wouldn't convert religions. native americans, indigenous canadians, latin americans but predominantly mexicans, the eastern chinese, coastal africans, aborigine aussies, indians- coastal coastal coastal. true the western chinese and the mongols/hunnu and xinjiang muslims haven't exactly been on civil terms and the silk road has always been a battleground and the middle east was already tenuous before murrica bombed them for oil but those happened in such a spread out area among asia which is FUCKING HUGE, MIND YOU! but also that's three high traffic places with massive diversity, it's human nature to have conflict, but not nearly to the same level as all of the shit christianity has done to the world. it's impossible to separate the religion from the cultures; victorian england without protestantism is just dirty people who die at 15 from having their 3rd child. italy without the catholicism is just grass and cheese. france and spain without religion are just kingdoms that fought wars with england for forever and now just make food that's one part delicious and three parts horrifying. religion is directly responsible for a significant portion of the evils those countries committed. one religion in particular.

they don't practice religion the same way as the rest do. they aren't faithful to their god. they don't follow his rules out of love but out of fear. they execute dissenters without a second thought, heresy they cry. they execute women and little girls for being free thinking or having sickness associated with mercury poisoning in the water, witch they cry. they slaughter men women and kids alike in the name of cramming their beliefs down the natives throats, we're chasing out the snakes they cry, we're bringing god to your godless people they cry, we're just civilizing you they cry. they shit in the streets and proudly display rotting corpses and leave the impoverished disabled and starving to die alone and whip their slaves and rape teenage girls and scrap in the streets while sopping wet with spilled ale over insignificant insults and stab people to death in the night and never even fucking BATHE, and they have the nerve to say the natives were uncivilized. the nerve. because hey. they read a magic book they stole from a culture who stole from another culture who stole from another culture, mistranslating each time from hebrew to greek to italian to english, and they think they're better because their skin is white.

christians never evolved. their mentalities have stayed the same. all thatms advanced has been technology. that's it. they're still the same evil disgusting degenerate bastards they always were. they just have the money they stole to buy stained glass windows, rosary beads, giant tacky metal statues, bigass robes, leather, and printing presses. and as time passed they used the money they continued to steal to buy cars and websites and radio stations and commit felony tax evasion and secretly molest children and line the pockets of the politicians.

all of their holidays are stolen from pagans anyway.

so fuck christmas. fuck easter. fuck lent. fuck the golden calf christian holidays that the tiny minded fragile snowflake conservatives lose their collective shit over because the pandemic response common sense stipulations won't let them buy the shit they can't afford with money they shouldn't have for people they don't even LIKE, all in the name of tradition, tradition! the rituals that worship something so much worse than satan or baphomet or pan or whatever: the dollar. they buy all the new shiny shit they can, at the expense of the chinese kids that the corporate pigs outsource to, buy the pine trees and the coca cola vunderbar and the fake mint corn syrup Js and watch the same shitty cookie cutter white supremacist hallmark fash movies and stuff their kids full of enough sugar to go into a goddamn coma when the african slaves who pick the cocoa beans will never get to know what actually being a kid will ever feel like because they're gonna die from falling into a combine harvester and be eternally forgotten to history and no christian will ever give a shit because they don't fucking care about what they don't see on their safe space news or hear on their safe space radio or read on their safe space social media. they think their worst sin is eating cheeseburgers so instead they'll go eat a mcchicken or chick fil a or an arby's chicken sandwich instead but not at popeyes because "that place is sketchy" and by that they mean they don't wanna eat where black people eat, that's why cracker barrel was so popular for so many white christians for so long because it had racially segregated seating until barely 20 years ago.

they don't love jesus. they love a paper doll they shove into their back pockets until every other sunday where they go to a fucking mall with a baptism waterslide and raise their hands like a bunch of dumbass weirdos and away to adult contemporary indie schlock with the word jesus pasted into a boring-ass hetero romance song, pat themselves on the back, then go to starbucks to scream slurs and misgenderings at 14 year old starbucks baristas who give them a cappamochalattechino instead of a fucking carmamochalattechino because you mumbled under the mask you didn't even fucking cover your nose with because you don't give a shit about the virus beyond how it inconveniences you.

they are horrible people who pretend to be good. until you suggest the slightest infinitely small inconvenience to them that would alter their holiday plans even the littlest smidge. then they would kill you if not for the police. don't get me started on them because you know by now what I'd say about those fuckers. but they'll gladly wear shirts about how they'll kill you. how they'll go back 200 years. how they'll murder you and watch you slowly suffer because their primate brains shoot a million endorphins when they watch things die by their hands because they never evolved a sense of empathy, compassion, or morality beyond how wearing a cross necklace will remove any of the consequences they will face in their afterlife.

they are horrible people who pretend to be good. unless you're gay or black or trans or Not Christian™ or mexican or disagree with them about politics economics sociology science technology music or movies. assimilate or die. assimilate or die. assimilate or die.

they don't deserve special treatment for their false idols.

they aren't better than jews or muslims.

they're worse.

so much worse.

and they should be stopped.""

-Nightingale Quietioca

save as draft arch draft bookmark draft where did I put my keys contra code kontra kode I need to remember this and copy it buzzwords keywords find it later please god tumblr don't bork on me this is good stream of consciousness repackage repackage change the words this is a great character study if I do say so myself thanks 3am me you're welcome 3am me

[calyssmarviss]

Calyss Watches the Clone Wars - 51

03x10 - Heroes on Both Sides.

WHY ARE THOSE GUYS STILL ALLOWED IN THE SENATE.

OKAY SO I WENT AND ASKED WOOKIEEPEDIA because I just can't stand not understanding that shit and Lott Dod the Neimoidian apparently once said that they had "Nothing to do with the Separatists. Nute Gunray is an extremist. His views do not reflect those of the Trade Federation." But he was also working with Rush and Poggle (which I forgot) on that droid factory so, yeeeeeeah, the Trade Fed isn't that loyal to the Republic.

Is that Ahsoka in the background? I'm not sure with this shitty image but it really looks like her.

Don't other Senators have the *hover to the center of the Senate* function? They're all like *wave fist and shout* but Padmé just presses a button and suddenly everyone has to listen to her.

"Members of the senate. Do you hear yourselves? More money, more clones, more war. Say nothing of fiscal responsibility, What about moral responsibility? Hasn't this war gone on long enough?"

THAT'S NOT THE POINT PADME!!! The other side has droids, they can go as long as they want because those aren't sentient lives that they're wasting (and even if they were, I doubt that would bother them that much) and they probably don't hesitate taking credit from the Banking Clans in order to keep making them.

(Btw why doesn't the Republic use droids??? That would solve so many of their problems)

Well at least I'm pleased to see my characterization of her in my fic is spot on on that point: SHE WANTS TO NEGOTIATE WITH THE SEPARATISTS!!! Tho I'm for the right of the people to decide if they wanna belong to a nation or whatev' (like, for what I care, Corsica can fuck off if they don't wanna be french??? That's how democracy should work: If enough people in an administrative sector wants independence, it should be granted to them.) I'm not sure that it's what they really want. Like, sure that must be what local governments were promised by Dooku, but that's not what Palpatine wants.

Oh, yeah, that's Ahsoka, with Anakin. What are they doing there? Don't they have someplace to be like, I don't know... Fighting in the Clone Wars???

Bail's like "Why don't we, like WAIT for any EMERGENCY bill, uh??"

I really like this conversation for some reason:

Nix Card: "That legislation would have meant billions for us." Gume Saam: "I tried my best to push the bill through." Lott Dod: "You did your part, representative. Senator Amidala is the problem." Nix Card: "I thought age might temper her idealism."

(That guy needs to meet Satine. She's like 10 years older than Padmé and there is nothing temperate about her.)

Gume Saam: “I know people who could do something about her." Lott Dod, getting genre savvy: "That task is more difficult than you presume." Nix Card: "Gentlemen, the Banking Clan and Trade Federation are about business, not violence." Lott Dod: "Hmm, in this case, our business is violence." Nix Card: "Precisely.With or without senator Amidala, the Galactic Senate is unlikely to de-regulate the banks... Until this war hits home." Lott Dod: "What exactly are you proposing?" Nix Card: "Perhaps some unexpected bloodshed on Coruscant, uh, may change a few minds." Lott Dod: "Coruscant? Coruscant has not been attacked in over 1,000 years." Nix Card: "Then it has a false sense of security. There are some powerful clients on the other side who could help us, uh, shall we say, make the point?" Gume Saam: "Ooh, I like this plan." Nix Card: "No one cares what you think."

:'D

Padmé to Anakin: “You must ask the Jedi Council to...”

Imma gonna stop you right there, Padmé. Do you think the Council is going to listen to him???

“... speak with Chancellor Palpatine.” Anakin: “Don’t involve me in this!”

I love Anakin so much.

WAIT

DID IT JUST HAPPENED WHILE OBI-WAN WAS CHASING ZIRO WITH QUIN? DID ANAKIN HAD HIS MAKEOVER????

ANAKIN YOU’RE KILLING ME

"War's complicated, Ahsoka. But let me simplify it. The Separatists believe the Republic is corrupt, But they're wrong, and we have to restore order."

You sweet summer child.

Also did no-one thought to explain it to Ahsoka before?

Ahsoka: "Master Skywalker said you should teach me about politics." Padmé: "Right." Ahsoka: "You know, you two have more in common than you think. It's no wonder you get along well." Padmé: "Huh. Of course."

Oh, Ahsoka, baby... How do I explain to you... :’D

GRIEVOUS'S SPEECH TO THE DROIDS

I love this?

How the fuck was Mina Padmé's mentor? What was she doing on Naboo?

I want that house Uh. Mina's voice sounds older than she looks. And Ahsoka looks already done with Lux :'D

Seriously what a dollface.

AHAHAHAHAHAHA AHSOKA I LOVE YOU GIRL.

So it’s been a while but I’m pretty sure this was referring to Ahsoka and Lux and “seems like boys are the same weither they are Republic or Separatist.”

Padmé: "I sense Dooku's dirty hand in all of this."

Boy does he has dirty hands. Have you seen his fingernails?

Mina: "Too peace, then." Padmé: "To hope."

URGH. Can they talk about something else than hope in Star Wars? I'm growing tired of the optimism here. Like they could toast to common sense that would be refreshing.

That looks a lot like the british parliament.

So the Separatist Parliament agrees on meeting with the Senate to talk peace, which we all know is gonna fail obv... 

Grievous really gets all the best stuff. Look at this fancy chair! :o

Clone working directly for the Senate?

Because that's the Senate symbol... Don't they have their own guards? That's a rhetorical question I know they have guards I killed a whole bunch of them in my fic it was glorious. (No actually it wasn't I was too busy killing Temple Guards the Senate Guard got a bit overlooked)

Cleaning murder bots fucking stupid they don' teven know where the power generators are *eyeroll*

Senate Clone: "Stupid droids."

OMG SHEEV SHUT YOUR DIRTY FUCKING MOUTH. AND PADME YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO BE MORE CLEVER THAN THIS JUST DON'T SQUINT AT HIM LIKE "I don't understand" OF COURSE YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND BITCH NO ONE UNDERSTAND BECAUSE YOU'RE ALL FUCKING MORONS.

You gross Amedda.

What is this I love it. OH SHIT IT'S, LIKE, UNDER THE SENATE???? ARE THOSE THE POWER GENERATORS???? OMG.

1) are those radar technicians? no they're not but who cares they're the Matts from now one. 2) the Matts are all humans dudes so I think some higher up is both specist and mysoginist

Well shit. Oh much do you wanna bet no one is gonna suspect the Banking Clans when obviously there are the one who beneficiate the most from the vote not happening? AND HERE THEY GO. LET'S DEREGULATE THE BANKS. WHAT A BUNCH OF FUCKING IDIOTS.

For once Padmé is feeling the stupid too.

OH HELLO ANAKIN I'VE MISSED YOU. You're talking shit tho man. He's like "we have eyes and ears everywhere so ofc we know it's the Sepies". Ans also:

"It was dangerous and careless to go to Raxus, not to mention illegal. You went to far this time."

LIKE EXCUSE ME SKYWALKER BUT "DANGEROUS, CARELESS, ILLEGAL , and GOING TO FAR"???? That's you in a nutshell buddy.

Ahsoka: "You would do the same. You do the same all the time!"

THANK YOU SNIPS.

Prev/Next

[scifimagpie]

Louie C.K. and the Sith Lord Dilemma

Happy new year!

(These are the kinds of headlines I only get to write because I don't have an editor to whom I answer. Whee!)

We still have Nazis, so let's talk strategy. I'd also like to talk about something related - the infamous, often contested Centre. To keep advancing leftist ideals (such as healthcare, housing, and basic needs coverage for all; universal access to education and higher education; equal and fair pay for all genders and backgrounds, and accessibility resources for those who require mobility devices or have medical problems, among a few other things!) it can help to figure out who we're trying to talk to - and sometimes, who we can trust.

The time before #MeToo and after it are now crisply delineated by this social event. The freedom to talk about and voice the universality of sexual harassment and assault against people of various genders (yes, men too) has really shaken things up. It's just the beginning of making things right, and society in North America and around the world has some serious adjusting and compensating to do, but it's a good step in the right direction.

#MeToo also torched a lot of sacred cows, exposing people we previously trusted as participating in very bad behavior. Kevin Spacey, George Takei, Stan Lee and Neil DeGrasse Tyson, among others, are a couple who surprised and disappointed me the most. But it seems like some of the people who transgressed are already trying to stage their comebacks - not understanding, it seems, that it shouldn't be up to them to decide when their stint in the time-out corner is over.

As discussed here, it would seem that Louis C.K., who previously admitted to sexually harassing women by masturbating in front of them without consent, has taken a turn for the dark side. Making jokes about transgender people and school shooting survivors, and apparently, insulting black and Asian men, is now part of his comedic repetoire. So much for "learning and listening."

But he continues to be defended by a few people who - apparently, come from the centre - and want to believe that he still has good intentions somehow. To quote that Huffpost article, however -

"C.K.’s new set, according to its leaked version, doesn’t merely punch down; it stomps, pettily, to the bottom. None of it is smart or brave; it is simply cruel."

And how did Louis C.K. - and for that matter, J.K. Rowling - start to internalise and support such negative beliefs?

Star Wars and political strategy

So here's the thing about the two people I've alluded to - they're both wealthy, and they've both been criticised. Now, being criticised is hard at the best of times. But wealth tends to make people more fragile. Is the answer, then, to just not criticise anyone ever? (That probably sounds like a stupid thing to even say, and it kind of is. But the internet likes a good reductio ad absurdum argument, taking things to their most logical extreme, so I'm going to follow that format - as I often do in my posts!)

That would seem to be an over-correction, and to make advancement impossible. But how to we criticise someone without alienating them?

Well, I'm still working on the "doing it right" part, but I can tell you about how not to do it.

In the much-maligned prequels of Star Wars, one of the concerns expressed about Anakin Skywalker is that he's too old to learn the Jedi ways and be successfully indoctrinated in their belief system. In the following movies, as Anakin goes through puberty and discovers that at least one girl exists, this is quickly proven - so it seems - to have been an accurate fear. A lot of people have argued that the way the Jedi turned their back on him as soon as he started to screw up and the way they endorsed such extremist perspectives on emotion had doomed him to fail in the first place. I would say that Anakin actually got a lot of second chances, but the ideology did set him up to fail - and because a single misstep was seen as an inevitable sign of failure, how could he help but find himself tempted by the apparent freedom of the Dark Side?

But as we see examined in The Last Jedi, fearing someone's future and darkness and treating them badly on the basis of that can, in fact, lead to a self-fulfilling prophecy. By assuming the worst of Ben Solo, he becomes Kylo Ren. Now - you could argue about the role of fate in the Star Wars universe, and even in our own, but it's not a discussion I can brook in good faith because if fate was as iron-clad as it is in fiction, all psychics would have 100% accuracy in their predictions - and that, obviously, is not the case.

But are we repeating the mistake of the late-era Jedi Order? Are we scaring off allies when we call them out for bad behavior, or scaring off future allies when they see Leftists chewing someone out?

A digression on the centre, which cannot hold

Oh, the Centrists. The Left hates them, the Right courts them, and they usually don't even identify as such. Most of the time - from what I've seen - Centrists are actually people who would identify as liberals or Liberals, but haven't caught up to every nuance; alternatively, they're soft conservatives. The centre isn't so much a fact as a product of two overlapping political bell-curves, more of an illusion than a real political movement. After all, the centre and centrists usually tend to have either conflicting beliefs or a reluctance to engage with certain groups.

But the centrists that I tend to hear about, as a leftist, are generally the ones who still fall on the liberal side of the equation. Now, here's the thing - I'm not saying that being conservative or liberal are, arbitrarily, either good or bad on an objective scale. BUT - right now, in North America and in a few other places, it sure seems like conservatism has relied too heavily on courting xenophobia in various ways. And that has led to an association of conservatives with racist, sexist, generally horrible beliefs - for instance, the Republicans in the US, and more locally, the UCP. (United Conservative Party, not to be confused with the Progressive-Conservative Party of Canada. They're very good at being polite and rewording their racism and homophobia, because this is Canada, but the underlying platform and beliefs is disappointingly rote.)

But is falling to the racist wayside the fate of all centrists? Should leftists treat anyone who fails to meet certain standards of conduct with suspicion and curtness, because they're inevitably going to betray any progressive ideals in favor of the fear-eater, conservatism?

In terms of the radicalization of young men, a number of people have spilled ink and filled hard drives creating better and more informative videos and articles than myself. And a lot of them also struggle with this problem: who can be reasoned with, and who is a die-hard danger to humanity?

No. Be nice sometimes, but don't hug every Nazi.

All of this is to say that I think the way we deal with people who don't act in good faith and the ones who do act in good faith need to be set in two different streams. It can be hard to tell, and people can switch motivations during a conversation - deciding to troll or being interested enough to start learning, for instance. But I think it would help the Left to confine some of our sharpest criticisms to internal dialogues - you know, saying things with the door closed. We have to meet people on their level.

Unfortunately, sometimes that level is also going to mean putting boots on the ground in terms of showing up to protests and engaging in adequate self-defense against Nazis.

So when it comes to Cousin Jason or Brayden saying that he thinks these dudes wearing yellow vests and talking about how we need to reduce the number of immigrants coming to Canada "might have a point," I would suggest being hard on the ideology and empathetic with Jason or Brayden himself. There's a difference between being empathetic and being a doormat - but we have no choice except to take on these conversations whenever we can, even when we're exhausted. The problem is that people in the centre often agree with us - but are too scared to speak up, or too tired, or even too confused.

We have to make a better future and present by walking the line between having boundaries and making it clear to people that we care about them and their rights. As frustrating as it can be, emotional labour from a person in a position of power, or even an oppressor, is still emotional labour. And we cannot take for granted that people will educate themselves, or yell "educate yourself!" in every conversation. That doesn't mean the most oppressed person should always yield their time and energy to people who may be acting like blockheads - but it does mean that anyone who considers themselves an ally needs to step up or be willing to tag-team something to avoid their own exhaustion.

This stuff is intricate. The problems don't have quick, glib, easy fixes. But they're also not insurmountable, because our opponents aren't monsters or fictional villains. They're people. And most of them actually want what we want - to live in happiness, health, and safety.

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Michelle Browne is a sci fi/fantasy writer. She lives in Lethbridge, AB with her partners-in-crime and their cat. Her days revolve around freelance editing, knitting, jewelry, and nightmares, as well as social justice issues. She is currently working on the next books in her series, other people's manuscripts, and drinking as much tea as humanly possible. Find her all over the internet: The mailing list * Amazon * Medium * Twitter * Instagram * Facebook * Tumblr * OG Blog