#i am not lying these are all legitimate quotes

[jessaerys]

god black sails is legitimately the creme de la creme of television alongside the sopranos and breaking bad and the wire and better call saul and atlanta fx like it should've had 46 emmy nominations and like one single win because it kept losing to game of thrones and it should've been in the covers of 2010s Vogues and Hollywood Reports and Varieties with photoshoots of the ensamble cast doing either blasphemeously risque renaissance painting reproductions but its their characters or like they're all dressed in white and are lying tangled in a bed shot from above and there should've been clearance rack t-shirts with a really bad vector of flint's face and an out of context "macho" quote in shopping mall pop culture stores and they should've had a handful of unfunny SNL skits parodying it and tying it somehow to US politics and there should be online 2020s mashable thinkpieces titled something like "things we missed in 2014: is toby shmitz....kind of a sex symbol?" and toby stephens and luke arnold should own a brewery together and jessica parker kenedy should be parading around a 65 year old butch lesbian wife that she hard-launched in 2021. sorry i am really really really really stoned

[victorluvsalice]

The "Valicer In The Dark Meets Baldur's Gate III" Not-Incorrect Quotes/Shitpost Collection

(Don't worry too much about spoilers -- most of this is early-game stuff, with just a couple of things relating to stuff in Act II)

--

Alice: [having just met Lae'zel on the Nautiloid and been informed of the situation with the parasites] And who are you, exactly?

Lae'zel: Who am I? Your only chance of survival.

[later, after the imps have been fought, and everyone's met back up and freed Shadowheart:]

Victor: [introducing himself as they get back on the move] I'm Victor.

Alice: I'm Alice. [pointing to Lae'zel] And this is Only.

Lae'zel: ?

Alice: Well, you've given me nothing else to call you.

--

Shadowheart: [after being informed the trio live in a world without a sun and that's why they're being so weird about the sky being blue] I -- are you Shar's Chosen? Is this some sort of test? Am I not supposed to believe you when you say you like sunlight? I can totally not believe you if that's the case!

Alice: ...I feel like we've missed something.

Smiler: [lying down and sunbathing] Yeah, it's in the sky above us.

--

Withers: What is the worth of a single mortal's life?

Victor: I -- I would say priceless. You can't put a value on life itself.

Alice: I say it's worth whatever you're willing to pay to defend it. Only the owner of said life can set the value.

Smiler: I'm pretty sure the standard rate of assassins in Duskwall is four Coin minimum -- not sure how that translates to your money.

Victor & Alice: [look at Smiler]

Smiler: What? It's a legitimate answer!

--

Withers: I shall be here, in thy camp, for whenever thou has need of my services.

Alice: Oh? What kind of services do you offer?

Withers: A mending of the threads between life and death. Should thou or any of thy compatriots perish, I will cleave soul to body once more.

Victor: Cleave soul to -- wait a minute, isn't that how you get vampires?

Astarion: [rearranging his tent, pauses and gives them a really weird look]

--

Alice: [during one of the meetings with Raphael] You do seem like a very powerful devil.

Raphael: [preening] I consider myself no slouch, yes.

Smiler: [cheerfully] I bet your blood could power an entire city block for a month!

Raphael: [blink blink] ...thank...you?

--

Strange Ox: Ah, you're addressing me. A humble ox. How...quaint.

Smiler: [tilting their head] What are you?

Strange Ox: As I said, a humble ox. I don't know why you're --

Smiler: No, I mean, what's an ox?

Strange Ox: ...

--

Smiler: [standing behind a table lined with eight samples of the same Potion Of Glorious Vaulting, with Victor, Alice, and the companions all gathered around the front of it] Thank you all for coming to this blind taste test, where we will be disproving the idiotic notion that you only need one specific ingredient per potion to create something that does what you want it to. In front of you are eight individual Potions of Glorious Vaulting, each made with a different type of Ashes -- I would like you each to drink one, test the effects, then rate it based on how strong the effects were, how long they lasted, and how tasty it was.

Wyll: You care about the taste?

Smiler: Of course! If we're going to be making potions, the least we could do is make them pleasant to consume! We're working toward maximum happiness here! Now everybody pick one and let's get jumping!

--

Gale: [realizing the trio isn't with them as they move through the mind flayer colony under Moonrise] Hold -- where's Victor, Alice, and Smiler?

Karlach: I think I saw them looking at a cage in the last room.

Lae'zel: Chk -- they should know by now that we cannot pause and look at every little thing that --

Smiler: [rejoining the group carrying a certain intellect devourer, beaming, as Victor and Alice come up behind them] Hey everyone!

Lae'zel: [stares at the brain] ...

Astarion: Why are you carrying an intellect --

Lae'zel: THAT. THING. SURVIVED?!

Us: Hello Angry Friend!

Lae'zel: I'M NOT YOUR FRIEND

--

Aylin: [after everyone's agreed to meet up with her and Isobel again later at the camp] Now -- you will leave us. We must take succour in one another's bodies and words.

Isobel: Aylin. We'll see you later.

Victor: [hiding a smile] Of course.

Alice: [biting back a chuckle] Later.

Smiler: [big beaming grin and a double thumbs up] Enjoy the hot lesbian sex!

Victor: Smiler!

Aylin: I intend to.

Isobel: AYLIN.

[andromedaexists]

The Teras Trials || Lucien Burr

★★★★☆½

TW: HOMOPHOBIA (+ USE OF SLURS), SUBSTANCE USE, ABUSE, CATHOLICISM (+ SACRILEGE), BODY HORROR, BODY DYSMORPHIA, GORE + VIOLENCE, DEATH (GRAPHIC), SUICIDE (GRAPHIC), EXPLICIT SEX

This book is pretty much just a misery fest from start to finish. Things go from bad to worse to somehow worse but instead of resolving things or overcoming them they just... are bad.

Okay, all jokes aside (the prev is a quote from a 1 star review), this book is phenomenal. It follows Cassius Jones through the admission trials he needs to pass in order to enter the University in London and keep his family safe within the walls of the city.

I think it's safe to say that this is how I feel about Cassius Jones:

God, it's so hard to encapsulate everything about this book into words. This book changed me. Legitimately.

I guess before I start rambling, let's talk about why it's getting a 4.5 star and not a 5 start if I love it so much. That's simple: I felt that the book could go through a bit more editing (I found quite a few typos though the text) and I fucking despise Latin and I despise that this book makes me want to like Latin.

Okay, all that aside, time to ramble about what I love about this book!

This is an incredibly dark and bleak book and it does not shy away from that. It does not try to hide that behind a shiny marble veneer of myth. It is also unapologetically queer and I love that with every fiber of my being. Cassius is queer, and i mean that in the very American way (despite the book and I think author being British). Cassius is not only gay, he is queer and he is proud of that fact and nothing stands in the way of him and his inherent queerness.

There is very little hope in this book, it takes a mirror to the monstrosity lying just below the surface of the reader and forces you to confront that. Forces you to acknowledge that if you were in the same situation you would have done the same.

There is a lot of finding beauty in the monstrous here, only the monstrous is humanity. There is a lot of beauty and a lot of horror shown through people in this book and it enraptured me, held me at the edge of me seat the entire time I was reading.

I was crying at multiple times in this book because of the way that monstrosity and beauty is shown. One of the times that really got me (twitter and Rafiq can attest to this) was the line:

God, is it such a sin to wish to be loved?

IN THE MIDDLE OF A SEX SCENE. I was weeping while Cassius was getting his back blown out and I am a better person for it.

Actually, since I brought out a quote, lemme tell you some other ones that got me:

You cannot escape it by wealth or war. No fort will keep it out, no ships outrun it.

I feel the brunt of my grief at that moment. I am my father's queer son. I am not the one he wanted.

I fear being seen; I fear being known.

The admission itself makes us co-conspirators, harbourers of queer desires in a queer little world.

For there is no escape from miasma, no hiding from the gods, no avoiding the judgement that is deserved.

I think my soul is a whore;

"Are you a Godly man?" "For you, I could be."

I also particularly love the conversations in Latin. I can't say too much on them without spoiling it so please skip over this if you don't want potential spoilers, but:

Horresco olfaciens tuum putridam odorem, qui sicut sanginem alterium putet (I shudder to smell your putrid odor, which stinks like the blood of another)

Vivo ut te concelebram et prosequar, quod mihi voluptatem dat (I live to haunt and hound you)

Amore et melle et felle es fecundissimus (You are most prolific in love and pleasant things and poison)

and of course, a Latin quote that I literally have tattooed on my body:

Flectere si nequeo Superos, Acheronta movebo (If I cannot move the Heavens, then I will raise Hell)

And if I can get a little nerdy over here (I'm gonna), the book mentions at one point the Homeric Hymn to Apollo! I know those hymns, they're something I did special research into last year! Specifically here he references Hymn 3, the Pythian Hymn to Apollon, lines 356-374:

ὃς τῇ γ᾽ ἀντιάσειε, φέρεσκέ μιν αἴσιμον ἦμαρ, πρίν γέ οἱ ἰὸν ἐφῆκε ἄναξ ἑκάεργος Ἀπόλλων καρτερόν: ἣ δ᾽ ὀδύνῃσιν ἐρεχθομένη χαλεπῇσι κεῖτο μέγ᾽ ἀσθμαίνουσα κυλινδομένη κατὰ χῶρον. θεσπεσίη δ᾽ ἐνοπὴ γένετ᾽ ἄσπετος: ἣ δὲ καθ᾽ ὕλην πυκνὰ μάλ᾽ ἔνθα καὶ ἔνθα ἑλίσσετο, λεῖπε δὲ θυμὸν φοινὸν ἀποπνείουσ᾽: ὃ δ᾽ ἐπηύξατο Φοῖβος Ἀπόλλων: ἐνταυθοῖ νῦν πύθευ ἐπὶ χθονὶ βωτιανείρῃ: οὐδὲ σύ γε ζώουσα κακὸν δήλημα βροτοῖσιν ἔσσεαι, οἳ γαίης πολυφόρβου καρπὸν ἔδοντες ἐνθάδ᾽ ἀγινήσουσι τεληέσσας ἑκατόμβας: οὐδέ τί τοι θάνατόν γε δυσηλεγέ᾽ οὔτε Τυφωεὺς ἀρκέσει οὔτε Χίμαιρα δυσώνυμος, ἀλλά σέ γ᾽ αὐτοῦ πύσει Γαῖα μέλαινα καὶ ἠλέκτωρ Ὑπερίων. ὣς φάτ᾽ ἐπευχόμενος: τὴν δὲ σκότος ὄσσε κάλυψε. τὴν δ᾽ αὐτοῦ κατέπυσ᾽ ἱερὸν μένος Ἠελίοιο, ἐξ οὗ νῦν Πυθὼ κικλήσκεται: οἳ δὲ ἄνακτα Πύθιον ἀγκαλέουσιν ἐπώνυμον, οὕνεκα κεῖθι αὐτοῦ πῦσε πέλωρ μένος ὀξέος Ἠελίοιο.

Tanslated by Hugh G. Evelyn-White as:

Whosoever met the dragoness, the day of doom would sweep him away, until the lord Apollo, who deals death from afar, shot a strong arrow at her. Then she, rent with bitter pangs, lay drawing great gasps for breath and rolling about that place. An awful noise swelled up unspeakable as she writhed continually this way and that amid the wood: and so she left her life, breathing it forth in blood. Then Phoebus Apollo boasted over her:

���Now rot here upon the soil that feeds man' You at least shall live no more to be a fell bane to men who eat the fruit of the all-nourishing earth, and who will bring hither perfect hecatombs. Against cruel death neither Typhoeus shall avail you nor ill-famed Chimera, but here shall the Earth and shining Hyperion make you rot.”

Thus said Phoebus, exulting over her: and darkness covered her eyes. And the holy strength of Helios made her rot away there; wherefore the place is now called Pytho, and men call the lord Apollo by another name, Pythian; because on that spot the power of piercing Helios made the monster rot away.

This review is getting kind of out of hand at this point, I just don't know if I can whittle down my thoughts into just one post about it. This book has changed me. This book is everything I never knew I needed, it healed a small part of my soul that I had thought was untouchable. I am fully considering my relationship with religion and how that can mesh with the very things that drove me from my faith because of this book. It is beautiful and I highly recommend people read it (while being mindful of the content warnings, of course)

[randomclam24]

The last post was an obvious sensationalist title

I've made it a point to my parents in the past that you shouldn't work on the Sabbath, and then in recent weeks it's been like I can only get up to work seriously once it's already almost Sunday, so I looked it up, and once article eventually referred to Colossians chapter 2

COLOSSIANS CHAPTER 2 KJV (kingjamesbibleonline.org)

My honest question, which may be uncomfortable to people, is, why is this kind of doctrine only just appearing in a letter sent as a personal address to specific churches?

Would they have already known that?

Also, less importantly, every time a quote is made for something that's supposed to switch lanes on interpretation of the Bible according to someone's take, it will fixate on the specific verses that contain the buzzword text even though they likely start with clauses like "therefore", implying deriving meaning from the last verses. The reference only pointed to verses 16 and 17.

Update While knowing the lying in wait of the jews more personally than most people is what woke me up to Christian religion most formally, although I always stuck to it otherwise, does that really mean there is a way to get a lot of people to agree on the nature of the text? The Old Testament sounds as removed from the nature of the New Testament as it did before.

Update If you consider that most people's action was taken in the form of a vote for Trump, expecting immigration to be more limited, back then and not just now, I think the line in the sand already has been crossed, and so we legitimately are in this situation being outlined carefully by the lawmakers to frame speech as violent - that's because it is

On second assessment, that sounds so jewish. How is the startup of *mentioning* something tantamount to the act of getting up and doing it?

Update But yes, that leaves us with the basis of our survival being the prerequisite that those in power do not fear their governed body

Update I tried listening to By the Numbers on therightstuff.biz, starting with episode six God isn't just dead. God is rolling in his grave, God doesn't exist, etc. - this is what we're really looking at.

Update It's not like anyone with any position to have agency over these things has access to any of that kind of information.

Update I've always had a problem with the fact that all people can afford me anymore as an activist is lame default responses, but, when you look at things by the numbers, that's the legitimate depth of people's faith, is lame default responses.

The actual depth of national discussion is still stuck as if we were just freshly rebelling against 16th-century Catholicism. It is!

Oh, wait, that expression of "It is!" was really supposed to be the people's outpouring over the fact that it's in fact that we really are just freshly rebelling against 16th-century Catholicism.

But that's not true- am I going to get disappeared

Update There's a whole world out there, but it's populated with nothing but these "I'm not the subject of your rant but the critic of it" midwit assholes who genuinely have believed that their lame drivel which is specifically what I've been calling out has been in fact, as in them being the critic of my rant and not the subject of it in the first place, the epitome of power. You don't have *anything*. You don't have anything.

*But*, when it comes down to reality outside the self, which is me specifically, which is literally the sole reason all those exceptions to the usual drivel were raised in the first place, hence their being the usual - see, I *do* get that - well in that case you understand what judgment is coming in the afterlife - it's already, why don't you just dump them into Hell, and that stands - sorry, that's not me - that's never been me - that's always been the simple truth. Well, why didn't you do anything about it? Are you just lazy?

Update This insistence of people who are playing as the critics - are they just trolling? I was going to say, what keeps it going is nothing but absolutely animalistic. There's no logic behind it. You were just going to keep brute-forcing me.

Update No matter what, people's headcanon of me is always going to be dictated by the signs of the times which I don't ever personally identify with, hence I'm so bored in the first place, which in the first place no one cares about.

Update And on the usual call-out of Denzel Curry "The Game", I'm calling your bluff formally - if people were half as not-lazy as that implies, we would have a functioning society. We obviously don't. We simply have no society.

Update A regular thing of strong alcohol won't be enough to kill me. I know by now enough that it's going to be tolerable. I'll have to get more if I can't find it more concentrated. All productive means are cut off, and so living my life is going to be used to hurt others, in that my narrative of hapless killing is going to be used as the example for future generations. It's not that I don't want to. I don't even want to be obligated to suppress that. You midwit critics' lives don't have any merit or value, none at all whatsoever.

Update After today's session of listening to By the Numbers, I'm killing myself in style. If there aren't high-proof spirits in a special section for that at the other Wal-mart, I have no better option than to get multiple 80-proofs at a lower price.

Update People are despicable. Why do they do what they do? I'm not just horny like the rest of you. I already have my satisfaction in that. All that's left of life, then, is a crater with nothing in it.

Everything's just low-IQ and baiting people who are horny into sexual frustration. That was it.

Update Human beings are despicable creatures. We should abuse them as much as we can.

Oh just kill me. The boring is too much to bear

Look. I literally *get* that the parasitic nature of people who pose as critics who are doing so as midwits is the final authority of the land, enforced by all law enforcement. Why do you think I want to die?

No one's ever going to address that. Am I just going to have to - what?

I think it was said succinctly but maybe unintentionally on that broadcast in the last release - if you go to church and speak your politics, you'd think, I thought these people care about my eternal soul. Same with fucking midwit critics, same with their shit-headed enablers

Do you have anything else in society? This is it? Yes!

Is my sentiment what the Russian boogeyman was that was upheld well after the collapse of the Soviet Union? Yes probably

So yeah, addressing the fact that the police/whatever factions they send when that's not enough is the most activity you get in this culture today, which doesn't even live up to the word "culture" because it's dead for years

Yeah, critic midwits act like their unabashed street-shitting of behavior is the *incidental* of this where in reality it was *mine* that was, when in reality - specifically, we haven't been in forcing-out of the 16th-century Catholic church in over centuries - so literally it's you, shittening, eternally, and you *know* this. You *know* this! And you still buckle down with "nope!" when I want to attack. *You know what you're doing.* You're making life's hell eternal on your own decision, and you expect to get nothing back as flak for that, absolutely none because you're - I don't know! And I keep getting told stupid shit like if you had watched hentai contents, *you would have calmed down*. *What* does that have to do with *anything?* Answer me

You keep acting like "all these niggas screaming that they game game game be the *same niggas* fucking up the *game game game* - no they're not! No they *are not*. You are lying.

None of mine have ever failed me. I never knew *what* you were talking about. If that's what you mean by "niggas" - and it doesn't get any more specific than that. That's the limit of these people's "society"'s conversations - you expect me to read all that? It's not stating *anything.*

God I hope all of you individual midwit fuckers eternally burn in hell.

*No* - you're just going to keep laying down the already-present foundation of the usual runaround that doesn't exist - in my case. Act like it's *"hentai"* that I put my words to effective use, not the will from attacking you in the first place that *got* me here. Otherwise, I wouldn't lift a finger for you utter faggots!

I hope all of you individual fucks burn in hell.

I can't stress this enough. You're going to keep giving shit - shit, shit

Update Do I have to write your personal account name out so you know it's you I'm talking to and not a nonexistent abstraction? That would be considered doxxing, even if it's without the personal information, because in this situation, someone out there could just try to find it.

Stop paying your mind to midwits! How hard is that?

Update The level of rebuke I have for people at resting state is now so profound, it cannot be stated in any venue, not even privately. So I don't want to live on this planet anymore.

Update Acting like it's a personal overcoming of yours and not like a rich kid with his inheritance that in the end I have to live on the same earth as the *rest* of you - oh fuck you!

Update On Propertarianism breaking up, over something which was probably a psyop - granted, it's embarassing - but what are you going to break up to do instead? This is the only earth to inhabit! You're looking right at it! What else do you *want*?

I'm not an actor in this game! The only people who *are* are failure quitters - or just deliberate actors

I've been seeing and feeling with the occasional "I don't want to live another day" since 2016

Update later The By the Numbers facts were just too much

I'm keeping my record clean in real life because I have an *obligation* to

Anyway, I have the appropriate amount of alcohol this time for the suicide ritual

The first bag of chips I bought out of my own paycheck when I don't even have a job - Sun Chips - garden salsa flavor

to enjoy while I die (don't pity me)

I'm a would-have-been mass-murderer. I don't have anything better in my mind (mainly because people can't be worked with, but that much is redacted)

(There is actually part of me that just goes on and on, on its own, that has to be kept in check, so on the Denzel Curry lyric that eternally is popped up, okay)

I give up on life, I give up on God - nothing was going to stop the speed of mediocrity

This drinking - God, I hate how easy this is - my parents really should have put a stop to that

That comment earlier about becoming a mass murderer isn't true - because I wouldn't do that (out of a sense of obligation not to - and that really just has to do with the fact that I'm in this position now as opposed to before - so - you don't know - I can't prove that)

No, no, the point was that I would have to stoop to that now, even given this position, because it's all so hopeless

That broadcast was the last straw - I don't like you people

So it was saying, everything I kind of knew up until then, all of that is unchanged even up to this point? Yup

Whatever motivation I had is just me making things up, because nothing makes up for what these people were there doing

Update I have a serious gag reflex, so I seriously doubt I'll die from what I'm doing - but I'm trying, I'm trying

Update There's nothing left to interest me in life. I'm turning some of my lights off.

There's kind of a mortal terror when thoughts come about the different body parts that would render the rest of the body dead, which comes up with this sort of thing - and yet that has no connection to how one values life otherwise - if I happen to get saved or not, who cares really

Honestly, with my gag reflex, it would take fooling myself in order to do it

Update This is a Captain Morgan white rum, at 40% ABV, but 1.75L. I've barely made it hit the top rim where it's parallel to the rest of the bottle, and that feels like I'm going to gag, but that's because I just had KFC which was very good

I don't like myself not to put myself through these things and these postings with what repercussions they bring

I'm tired of being a pansy. I want somebody to show me the deep darkness Actually, I've really been a pansy in life about things like haunted houses - but I don't think as much is read into them than in my case

On one hand, I wouldn't want anyone actually with authority in religion taking the stance from Colossians 2 about all things being made whole in Christ even despite ignoring the Sabbath etc. to its most logical extreme, which would try to rationalize where the church is *currently* at - well, in that case, I don't want to pursue it at all I *do* want to pursue understanding how bad things can get to its logical conclusion, but that's because I've heard of things like "know your enemy" as mentality

My life is already going to be about as isolated from other people's direct contact as it can be, even more so than how little community average people actually get.

Real talk - I don't think I've *heard* anyone, for all the life of things like Silent Hill, as short-lived as that genre actually was in its heyday, mention the kind of actual mental feeling of isolation that I got from originally playing the original Doom past its shareware episode. Especially at Spawning Vats near the end of episode 2, something clicked in my brain finally that - there was this sense that absolutely no one cares about you or what happens to you, and it made me want to cry because I was a tween

Update The plain-and-simple explanation to what I'm trying to say about "The Game", hopefully permanently this time. I may be accident-prone on my end, but I have a disproportionate-enough self-awareness that doesn't get the best of me. Miraculously. In the end, what *should* be done is having no more *pseudo-logic* just be a band-aid temporary fix to our actual problems, especially when our leaders are without excuse. But because you wanted to push "The Game", you had to push a proxy between me and that for what may as well be all time. I don't get this.

What if, as it turns out, most of our media is wasting our fuckin time? Actual meaning, it's not like it can't be found. The trope of the corrupt "millionaire" is basically the modern philanthropist jew.

To the guy who had the idea of change presented to them and concluded, yeah, that's like Charles Manson, fuck you for comparing me to that. I didn't mean violence literally I wait baiting, okay

I'll stop doing it, if it's that glaring a problem

What if in reality it was the simple facts that the "burnt-out countryside" and such exists as a perpetuity that exists as the greatest evidence in the back of our minds that we live in a simulation and not even what's going on behind the scenes per se?

Second opinion: how does 40% ABV + Monster bode? Way back when the wix site was started, I was trying vodka in a cheap flask, but that was because I was balancing out the formula to match a four-pack of Monster, which seems stupid now. That was when I said the total was about $10, which is kind of existential in itself to get that kind of state out of it. Now it's just under $20 for the 1.75L white rum, which tastes better, beyond a shadow of a doubt

I've never seriously had that kind of ground-level conversation, because I'm essentially shadowbanned on every site - but the question would be something along the lines of, regardless of your religion at starting point, if I could show you the "lying in wait of the jews" to such an extent that it was undeniably shown to be a problem we all face at the systemic level, would that count for anything in the long run?

Imagine what the Biblical passage could mean that mentions that, those who have seen the glory of Christ but still sin are beyond help, could mean to just anyone - could it be applicable to viewing Hollywood stuff?

All I have honestly is a series of tribulations which don't reconcile to anything other than the aforementioned

I don't know. There's nothing I hate more by this point than this dismissal, constantly. At this point it's *worse* than being "dissed".

Tell me I'm in trouble for all I've recently posted. That already would be better

Update So there's this concept in the rap industry (maybe not the actual industry) of going "green", which doesn't mean "going green" in the environmental sense at all Maybe it's that I like going "green" too often, and in fact all this alcohol is there to make me feel more open to do so even though normally I do have that restraint not to.

No, even then, I really don't feel like I'm going "green" like that.

So what I've found is that in principle, if you never stray from what you know concretely, even where you could defend it in some way but it's still not entirely concrete, people can't denounce you over it, plain and simple. So if there's anything like going "green" in my example - what is that?

I don't know how to defend it exactly. But there is that quote that, you don't have to remember what you said if you told the truth.

So in that is what I'm trying to get out of saying this - it's not by necessity going green, stating what you know.

The rap game is like, I'm pulling on this bong, and I feel so ascended - I don't think I'm shilling that. This alcohol - I'm normally uptight, and this seems to even it out

What if I were to tell you, relative to the evil that is in the elites' ranks, and all of that, the kinds of evils we denounce as our politics today even with the trannies and all that, unless you're calling out the uncanny-valley nature itself - then that would be up the alley - are ultimately still in the range of what the stuff of Colossians 2:16-17 would account for? I really think only if you're able to call out the uncanny nature of something are you able to identify the evil of the elites in it. That means, otherwise, in the long run, they're probably going to triumph over you in their normalizations.

I don't want to be me.

I swear, the amount of alcohol I do takes the load off; it doesn't make me worse - I say the dumbest things normally, and not drunk. At least, I'm not in front of anyone when I do it. It's always in private, where there are no conflicts, and I literally keep a check on my doorway to make sure I don't get caught.

Update after some Doom I *wish* I wasn't borderline crazy. Keep me quarantined from everyone else. I'm already being gangstalked like no one else, so I'll have to be.

I'd rather die drinking than go to prison

I don't think I can get it down though

Second opinion on that mixture: I wouldn't recommend it

On one hand, I wish some leader more "real" would take my place, but at the same time, that person would have gotten weeded out by today's standards - because i accepted that at best you're going to get to lean what you want, that's probably the closest thing to real you're going to get - and I'm sorry for being the one

So I've got a combination of mods with Project Brutality on Death Wish spawning on Painkiller difficulty, with a selected mix of Chrono Trigger, Earthbound, and other Snes classic music on randomizer

Mamma mia

The fact that it was - in fact, Phocas2.wad I was playing to have the ideation in mind that formed the inspiration that was stolen to launch the Metaverse - I really do believe the meme, we deserve better psyops - that doesn't even accomplish that much, and that was one isolated game. That's what they called it: the Miiverse Plaza.

To say I hate the current political zeitgeist is an understatement, because my hatred of what's right in front of me with unprecedented gangstalking is kind of the origin story of the meme "I hate the Antichrist" - it didn't pop up until around that time

Update What if things *could* be so easy as what Kyle Rittenhouse implied with breaking down, like we should all be friends? Not without the government being afraid of their people. And there's a role in that in someone like that. That's why I think that was a psyop. It's just not legitimate.

It's okaye nigga I got the audio distortion

That was a reference to something somebody posted (years ago)

Update Losing a tumblr account wouldn't be so bad. But getting a conviction for real, that I couldn't handle.

I don't think I hate anybody. I'm just very peeved.

Okay so I found a mixture between alcohol in that 40% range and Baja Blast which they now sell in stores - now I tried adding a hint of Monster to that

I don't know what we need, 'cause we can't get anything out of our system!

In a perfect world, the way I would defend myself is with what I've been saying - I've been getting gangstalked to an unprecedented degree historically. That's not made up. That's doing a number on me.

But very seriously I was not okay before all this happened. It took a situation of already being gangstalked to the degree of having my parents clearly bugged throughout a conversation where it's set off to make me want to declare war on these people for intruding on me, and *that's* what set off the current level of gangstalking. I quite literally was the one to fire the first shot, verbally.

I'm coping with a life where I'm going to have to spend the rest of it, with a few segments of seeing my short-term family, short enough that nothing serious gets started gangstalking-wise, just working a from-home computer programming job. Who knows if I'll like it. I'm not one to be biased against it, but I've heard it's boring.

Honestly, it's even in the context of knowing about the powers that be themselves - reality is treated by people in the modern day like you can't really understand things unless you've been high to witness them for yourself, so otherwise just follow your horniness

Update What are the significance of my dreams? They seem to bridge the gaps in my sense of community where otherwise I just get islands of activity here and there

I honestly cared enough to look through the Charles Manson prison interviews to see the parallels, and when it comes to his quoting on being alone being the point at which you're free, that seems like one of the most benign, if that's going to be the parallel

It's not like it's just the sensation of it getting me off - I feel like there's something profound, not in a religious sense or any of that

but it's like the motvation people have to play videogames as an escapism - these environments are rich

Now, with that established, I don't want to ever talk about that family ever again

I actually hate that. Where there's a borderline issue like that, people tend to apply their subjective lenses rather than their objective ones per se, when they're trying to be open-minded, so then to take that and say you're off your rocker - it's like, okay, I won't be open-minded

No, I don't care for this - I don't want to talk about it

My stance is steadfastly that the government should fear its constituent people, not the other way around like it presently is. I don't recall him ever mentioning anything like that.

I'm tired of being me, in a situation where the best community I'll get even *without* the gangstalking is a trip from work back to home about 99% of the time. It's a point to be made: where do people get together publicly as a community, as politicians continue to virtue-signal

What can I say? What do I really want to say, though? "Hate" is a fixation, like "racism" is a fixation, "sexism" is a fixation, "homophobia" is a fixation - none of us have these feelings. That doesn't mean it's illegitimate to criticize these parties.

I feel like it's going to *take* midwit-ranges to feel perturbed to get through this crisis. I really do. Otherwise, they're going to feel like everything that's said to mediate is said in compliance only. That's not what we want. That's not good.

That's partially what I figured my mission was to do, was take the most serious issues and bring their discussion out of what was called "TRS stank" - or at least make the prerequisite steps toward accomplishing that

Update I want people to learn to mediate amongst themselves, because I'm too hyper to do that personally

Update So I said "drop them into hell" over the fact that most people who are left in the rural areas aren't the gifted kind that would be used to further society - what an asshole I am but TRS made it feel like they were that way because of some moral deficiency

This is why I should shut up, and what I said holds true, that I'm worse off caught up in the heat of the moment than drunk to a certain extent, because my entire mindset is outsourced

Update Kyle Rittenhouse, even more so than me, is a flat-out porker now

This was the most recent new release I've seen - Isn't Ghostemane's entire high-pitched shtick an offbrand of the persona of Morty from Rick and Morty in the context of the show? I don't get it

It's been a while since I felt the urge to earn any street cred points among anybody

I watched a bit of Invader Zim and eventually figured it was forcing it

I'm bored, I'm bored, I'm bored

but I promise if you don't lock me away I'll behave

I did good work up through the Saturday before the cutoff with Sunday and how you're not supposed to do work on that day

Update If I gave up on humanity really and truly, maybe one thing I would try is make my own mock-up network like - what was it called? It's not Jetix, because that was for kids, and - kids with some mental disorders at that - something on the same channel as Adult Swim before it got deleted

Can you legally stream in high quality over a personal site on the Internet that hasn't been payed for out of pocket?

I remember I was able to rouse a completely over-the-top reaction with "Doomcute" - but how do I know I would be able to rouse the same kind of reaction in another engine like UDK? That takes a ton more effort.

Update I feel like I deserve whatever comes to me, but no, I don't want to be locked up.

Update The opposite to this entire stance would be like, let's just pursue universal welfare. Unironically the means by which to do that are more along the lines of John Deer replacing the negroes back in the cotton era with new inventions, and I don't mean that to be domineering. That's how it would actually be, if we were to outmode all domestic labor.

Update What Ghost on his livestreams would say to "troll terroritsts" posting racist slurs is that it's "too early", a lot of the time. Is perpetuating the meme, that it's fine if minorities *are* judged by the content of their character, as Martin Luther King said, too early?

Update I don't love myself

I respect my own family enough to not go completely off the handle, but apparently not *too* much - that's not good

I can't convince people to come out of the rural burnt-out status. It doesn't matter what inspiration I come up with, ever.

7/31 night I've started work again, since it's past midnight again, although it's not very good.

I know that in the rap game, they fetishize practically doing substances to amp themselves up, and that's not something I want to promote. But, I'm also extremely pessimistic about the way my parents held me hard to telling them something I "learned" each day up from kindergarten when we really just weren't. At least now I'm in a relaxed state. Yes this is my mentality. It sucks.

Update I've got issues. Please don't take after those.

Update I wish somebody would roast me in a way that's actually really ballsy, like come on, you've got to step up and get this shit man

Actually I just went through how the main mission is probably already past - something like that.

Update I could have been a lot more annoying.

Let's have King Harkinian saying "enough" in animated ASCII format

Update I can ultimately pass the online quizzes for the online course to hopefully get a job even while a little drunk past midnight: by referencing my typewritten notes like it's open-book - that doesn't sound very good (because I'm not much more competent normally)

Update Tranny education is an accepted part of school cirriculum; therefore, we should respect it with all the respect we give the education system People are like, I just want to be able to have my entertainment without starting a conflict 24/7

Update So usually, new law stipulations that are anti-white generally speaking come out in the middle of the night, so at a time like now

[theliterateape]

Mistaken Ethnicity

by Don Hall

For most of my life I thought I was Irish.

At least mostly Irish. I was also bizarrely proud of the fact that I had some Cherokee and African blood mixed in the genetic soup but I was told and I fully identified as predominantly Irish.

I didn't embrace Irish culture. No deep dive into the history of the country nor an embrace of traditional foods or dance, music or literature. My early church experiences were defined by the midwestern values of my youth which, while sometimes contentious between the Lutherans and the Baptists, wasn't a lifelong war. I projected from the place of stereotypes—I gave credit to my Irishness for my drinking, for my seemingly pointless anger, for my stated inability to be psychoanalyzed (per the famous quote by Sigmund Freud).

Let's face it—race is a fiction created by faux scientists who needed some sort of justification for separating us into haves and have-nots. A belief in race is only slightly different from a belief in werewolves or faith in identity apart from biological reality. It's powerful but kind of silly when you look too hard. Culture? That's real stuff but more like a costume one chooses to wear. Ethnicity? Based entirely in reality but closely aligned with culture; not chosen but easily ignored.

Irish is not a race (cuz that's all made up) but it is both an ethnicity and a culture. I thought I was the ethnicity; I only claimed the culture when I found it convenient.

This fall my mother, who did one of those ancestry.com things, informed me we were not Irish. We're...

Welsh. At least we’re equal parts Welsh as we are Irish.

My identity has been compromised. I can no longer legitimately call myself Irish. I’m mostly Welsh and I don’t even like rugby.

So what? Ireland and Wales are both in the Anglo-Saxon family, right? How different could they be? The Irish are belligerent drunks and the Welsh are known to fuck sheep. Both really despise the English and for good reason (likely the same reason West Virginians despise New Yorkers). More to the point, I was never really Irish in any real sense. I identified as Irish but those were only words. It isn’t like I lived the life of an Irishman.

If I had lived the Irish life and fully embodied the cultural heritage of that specific ethnicity, would I suddenly have to stop because I’m Welsh? I don’t think so. I mean, I suppose if there were a job that required I be Irish and I told them I was so I could squeeze in, that would be crossing some sort of ethical line. My belief of Irishness doesn’t make me Irish any more than if I ran around with an Afro wig and used black slang would make me black or if I frequented my speech with Yiddish and wore a yarmulka would make me Jewish.

Identity is just another costume.

At our base, we really all are exactly the same creature. We all basically want the same thing and suffer in similar ways. We find joy in similar things and are all angered by injustice, dishonesty, theft, unnecessary violence (as we interpret them). We all gotta eat, we all need water to survive, we all need to sleep. The simple biology of humanity is the same with no regard for the costumes we dress it up in.

If I am hit by a car, lying on my back in pain, does the driver care if I'm Irish or Welsh? If I'm hungry and come in to order a hamburger and fries, does the kid at the counter give a shit if I'm straight or gay? If I wander into an art museum, does the docent volunteering her time stop to even consider if I am affiliated with a religious belief?

This is due in part because I don't identify as almost anything at all but some random dude. There a lot of random white dudes in the world so I blend in. I don’t stand out in a crowd and that’s on purpose. The costumes of race, ethnicity, and culture are double-edged and practically beg for assumptions to be made about us.

How you present yourself is your personal choice and expressing oneself with appearance is both very powerful and empowering. How you present yourself also carries with it consequences and the responsibility for the setting of those consequences belonging to he or she making the choices, not those who react to them. As I used to tell actors I worked with, the audience always gets it. If they don't, it's because you aren't communicating clearly.

Choose wisely, assess risk realistically, and blame no one else for the choices you make. The only solution to this set of circumstances is to reframe how we decide to perceive one another. Because, just like the choice to demonstrate as either Irish or Welsh, how I decide to perceive someone else is likewise a choice.

If I choose to assume that the homeless dude with no teeth who rummages through the trash and tosses it all over the street was once a pediatrician with three kids who no longer bear any responsibility for him, my reaction to him is changed. If I choose to assume that the black teenager with the Gangsta Rap t-shirt and gold teeth is an honor student who volunteers on Saturdays at the local animal shelter, my reaction to him is improved. The woman with the midriff t-shirt from Hooters and booty shorts has a PhD in biophysics. The guy with the Marine tattoo and the handlebar mustache councils young boys to understand their masculinity.

When I was a younger person I wanted to stand out. I wanted to be seen. I wore the costumes of the ostentatious and bold. I was loud and gregarious. I exaggerated my personal history to seem more noteworthy—not in a George Santos complete fabrication way but merely adding a bit of sauce to each truth. Which, I suppose, is a very Irish trait.

These days, I'm not inclined to be noticed for the costume but for what I accomplish. If you notice me, I hope it's because of the things I do rather the things I identify with, the way I carry myself rather than any assumption of ethnicity I may wear. Those are the things I'd rather notice in others.

I'm a lot of things mixed in there—musician, writer, carnival barker, cinephile, child of the eighties, Apple enthusiast, lover of most things Marvel, smoker—and, now, I guess I'm Welsh. A mutt in all ways like almost every other person on the planet.

Hey. I'm also single so maybe a sheep might look good right about now.

[bandstandtuff]

The Donny Nova Band as Things My Friends And I Have Said

Johnny: Vegan sausage rolls are a gift from God

Davy: Yeah like the plague and straight white men are a gift from God

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Jimmy: Everything is capitalism

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Nick: I hate how murder’s illegal

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Donny: I nearly died and it’s not even 8am

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Julia: I’m always nice to people

Julia: Just with varying levels of truth

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Wayne: You are a disgrace to all biscuit eaters

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Jimmy: I don’t steal stuff, I steal knowledge

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Jimmy: it's called DT because you design shit not because it’s technology 

Davy: it's called design TECHNOLOGY bitch are you a bench?

Jimmy: well yeah- but like-

Donny: actually it’s called product design

Johnny: because like, you design products

Nick: oh no shit 

Julia: so what are you all doing for it?

Wayne: a hoover

Donny: a games console

Jimmy: a skipping rope

Johnny: a s k i p p i n g r o p e-?

Davy: why the fuck do you need to design a skipping rope

Nick: it’s a fucking piece of string

[gammija]

The final Web!Martin evidence list

Now that canon is done, and we’ve got word of god confirmation that Web!Martin wasn’t complete nonsense, I decided to go back to my lil chronological evidence list and actually clean it up a bit, delete parts that in hindsight weren't all that indicative, and put everything in a slightly more readable format. (Obligatory disclaimer that i don’t and never did believe or advocate for some kind of evil web!martin, and that I'm not intending to connect a moral judgement to martin (or anyone else for that matter) having some of these traits)

So here: The (hopefully, please) final list with Web!Martin Evidence! Presented in order of importance, according to. me

The final (hopefully) Web!Martin evidence list

(In order from most to least obvious)

Spiders

I mean, it’s called the Web. TMA reiterates quite a few times that Martin liked spiders. Sometimes it IS that easy.

MAG022: Martin: "I like spiders. Big ones, at least. Y’know, y’know the ones you can see some fur on; I actually think they’re sort of cute -"

MAG038: | Sasha: "A spider?" Jon: "Yeah. I tried to kill it…" [...] Sasha: [Chuckles] "Well, I won’t tell Martin." Jon: "Oh, god. I don’t think I could stand another lecture on their importance to the ecosystem."

MAG059: Jon: "I have done my best to prevent Martin reading this statement in too much detail. I have no interest in having another argument about spiders."

MAG079: Jon: "Apparently, biologically, his account of the spiders doesn’t make any sense according to Martin."

MAG197: Martin: “What? Because I like spiders? Well, used to.”

Lies and subterfuge

Martin is able to use lying and subterfuge to achieve his goals, and is called manipulative a few times.

Lies:

MAG022: Martin: "[He] became slightly more co-operative after I lied to him and told him that one of the upstairs residents had buzzed me in."

MAG056: Martin: "I lied on my CV."

MAG158: Peter: “But you said –” Martin: “Honestly, I mostly just said what I thought you wanted to hear.”

MAG164: Jon: "You – I actually believed you!"

MAG189: Martin: “Sorry. Sorry, John. Not sure how much everything up there actually understood what was going on. But, y’know, I didn’t want to take any chances so it made sense to… um…” Jon: “Put on a show?” Martin: “Yeah, basically, more or less.”

MAG191: Martin: "That's not true." Arun: "Liar!"

Subterfuge:

The plan in 118, which revolved around convincing Elias that Martin was only “acting out”, to create a distraction for Melanie. (Also compare the way he evades giving a straight answer here with the way Annabelle talks in 196.)

Working with Peter in s4 under false pretenses, to distract him from Jon and eventually try to learn what Peter wanted.

Manipulation accusations:

These, I know, are somewhat contentious, since it’s mostly villains saying this to him. I’m still including them, since

1): From a media analysis standpoint, being mentioned 3 times is a sign to pay attention, even when it may not be the full truth.

2): I only see it as describing Martin’s behaviour in the previous points, not as a moral judgement; Especially since he almost always ‘manipulates’ people in positions of power over him.

Still, if it bothers anyone, feel free to ignore these.

MAG138: Martin: "That’s it? No, no monologue, no mind games? You love manipulating people!" Elias: "That makes two of us."

MAG186: Martin: “I can be a real manipulative prick, you know that?” Also Martin: “Oh yeah.”

MAG196: Annabelle: “Because you always managed to get what you wanted through smiles and shrugs and stammerings that weren’t nearly as awkward as they seemed.” [SMALL SOUND OF MARTIN’S CONCESSION TO THE POINT] Martin: “Point taken.”

The Lonely/the Web

The Lonely and the Web sometimes affect Martin to similar degrees.

In season 3, when Martin is getting used to reading statements for the first time, most of them leave him emotionally affected: MAG084, MAG088, MAG090,

MAG095: Martin: “S-S-Statement… done.” [HEAVY BREATHING & TREMBLING AS MARTIN STEADIES HIMSELF] “I don’t like recording these. There. I-I said it.”,

MAG098: Martin: [Panting] “End of statement.” [Deep breath] “I, um, I think I might need to sit down. Oh. Yeah, I am. Right. I don’t, uh, I’m not really sure if these are actually getting easier or harder. I mean I don’t feel –”

Only the last two statements he reads are remarkably easier. This might be a hint that Martin is just getting used to reading them, but the quote from MAG098 seems to contradict that. Either way, it’s likely not a coincidence that those last two happen to be the Lonely and the Web:

MAG108: Martin: “Statement ends.” (exhale) “That wasn’t so bad…”

MAG110: Martin: “Statement ends.” [...] “I mean, I think it sounds like a Jurgen Leitner book. About spiders. Hm. Good John didn’t have to read this one, anyway. I know he’s not a fan. Although, this one wasn’t too bad, actually! I – yeah. Anyway.”

In season 5, there are two powers’ Domains that actually affected Martin mentally, as opposed to only physically: the Lonely’s, in 170 (and arguably 186), and, depending on your interpretation, in 172, when Martin went exploring without knowing why he did so.

Proximity

Martin investigates a lot of the Web statements during season 1 to 3 (in other words, when the archive team still researches statements). The only ones he isn’t mentioned in during this period are MAG019 and MAG020, when he’s being harrassed by worms, and MAG081, which Jon records by himself outside of the institute.

Most notably, he’s the one who discovered the statement in MAG114, ‘Cracked Foundations’, which is the one statement in the entire show that sets up the interdimensional properties of HTR.

The Web!Lighter passed through Martin's hands first, before he gave it to Jon.

Similarly, Annabelle mostly spoke to Martin in season 5, despite most other Avatars usually focusing on Jon.

Aesthetics

Apart from the above obviously Web related areas, there are some other aesthetics which are mentioned in connection to both the Web and Martin, throughout canon.

These are describing the Web;

These are describing Martin.

Tapes:

Martin is the only character to treat the tape recorders as friends - any other character is either indifferent, or treats them as enemies.

MAG039: Martin: "I think the tapes have a sort of… low-fi charm."

MAG154 Martin: “Oh. Hi. Hello again.” … (small laugh) “Sorry pal, false alarm this time.”

MAG156 Martin: “Mm? Oh.” [HE LAUGHS, GENTLY.] “Yeah. (rustling paper) I was going to read one. Hate for you to miss it!” [SHORT, FORCED LAUGH, AS HE FLAPS THE STATEMENT AROUND.]

MAG170 Martin: “Oh. Oh, hello. What’s this? Wow, retro! What are you up to, little buddy; just – listening? That’s okay. It’s nice to have someone to talk to.”

MAG190 Jon: "[The tapes] seem to like [Martin]."

Retro:

MAG069: Statement: “I only saw Annabelle Cane once during this period. She wasn’t hard to pick out. She dressed like a vintage clothing store exploded on her, and her short bleach-blonde hair stood out sharply against dark skin.”

MAG160: Jon: “Anyways, don’t tell me the phonebox down there doesn’t appeal to your retro aesthetic.” Martin: “It – might. Maybe.”

MAG163: Annabelle/the Web callying Martin via an old payphone: [ A PHONE RINGS. IT’S NOT THE TINNY, ELECTRONIC SOUND OF A CELLPHONE – NO, THIS IS A TRUE, HEAVY, CLASSIC RING.] Martin: “Uh. John? Uh, J, John – the, uh, payphone that’s – here, for some reason – it’s ringing?”

Hatred of burns:

MAG067: Jack Barnabas’ statement: “I looked up and noticed within the corner of the room, where there had been a spider’s web this morning, there was just a faint wisp of smoke.” “Another held a bag that seemed to be full of candles, while a third had a clear plastic container filled with hundreds of tiny spiders.”

MAG139: Statement by member of Cult of the Lightless Flame: “The Mother of Puppets has always suffered at our hand; all the manipulation and subtle venom in the world means nothing against a pure and unrestrained force of destruction and ruin.” Agnes burned down Hilltop Road.

MAG145: The Web ties Gertrude to Agnes, stopping the Desolation’s ritual (the only Power whose ritual the Web is known to have prevented).

MAG167: Gertrude enlists Agnes’/the Desolation’s help in order to burn her assistant Emma, who was Web aligned.

MAG169: Martin: "Look, I just – don’t want to get burned, all right? It’s, it’s like my least favorite pain ever. [...] I, I legitimately hate burns, alright? They’re, they’re awful, and they scar horribly, and they just – it – it just makes me sick; I, I hate it. Hate it!"

Phrasing:

MAG039: Martin: "I’m trapped here. It’s like I can’t… move on and the more I struggle, the more I’m stuck. [...] It's just that whatever web these statements have caught you in, well, I’m there too. We all are, I think."

MAG079: Martin's poem: "The threads of people walking, living, lovi–"

MAG117: Martin: "This last couple of years, I’ve always been running, always hiding, caught in someone else’s trap, but, but now it’s my trap, and, well, I think it’ll work. I know, I know it’s not exactly intricate, but it felt good leaving my own little web. Oh, oh, Christ, I hope John doesn’t actually listen to these. “Good lord, is Martin becoming some sort of spider person?” No, John, it’s an expression, chill out! Besides, spiders are fine. I mean, yes, people are scared of them, obviously, but actual spiders, they just want to help you out with flies."

MAG167: Jon: “Methinks the Spider dost protest too much.” Martin: “Jon –” Jon: “Joking! Just joking.”

Personality:

How applicable these are depends heavily on how you interpret Martin's own personality, so your mileage may vary.

MAG008: Statement: “Nobody ever said a word against Raymond himself, though, who was by all accounts a kind and gentle soul [...]”

MAG123: Jon: "The Web does seem to have a preference for those who prefer not to assert themselves."

MAG147: Annabelles statement: "I discovered a deep and enduring talent inside myself for lying. [...] My manipulations were not intricate, but they were far beyond what was expected of a child my age, and I have always believed that the key to manipulating people is to ensure that they always under- or overestimate you. Never reveal your true abilities or plans."

Word of God and Annabelle

I kinda wanted to ‘prove’ that Web!Martin had quite a bit of evidence to back it up, hence this header being last. But of course, in this post-canon world, there are a few lines that most obviously confirm the theory:

MAG197: Martin is Web enough to be able to read the 'vibrations', like Annabelle, and see Jon and Basira (the latter being especially notable, as he hadn't known she was there beforehand): [CHITTERING, BUZZING AND HIGH-PITCHED SQUEALS CHANGE CADENCE] Martin: "Wait… Wait, hang on, is that him?" Annabelle: "Yes. I guess you’re better with the Web than we thought." Martin: "And – Wait, ha– No, uh… is that… Basira? He – He’s got Basira with him!" Annabelle: "Yes."

Season 5 Q&A part 2: Jonny: “Essentially, it was fascinating looking at the fandom and, like, the Web!Martin believers, because what they were doing was correctly picking up on hints dropped in the early seasons that were later, like, not exactly abandoned, but it was much more like, ‘Well, no, he does have like aspects of The Web to him, but he is moreover The Lonely.’ And that came about very… very organically, really. Because throughout Season 3 and going into Season 4, we had this conversation and we were like, ‘No, actually he's like-” Alex: “‘It can't be, it cannot be, it must be the other way round’ Yeah.”

(Note that they say “throughout season 3 and going into season 4,” which likely means that season 1, season 2, and at least part of season 3, aka half of the entire show, were written with Web!Martin as an intentional possibility.)

If you read all that, thanks so much! Obviously, Web!Martin never really came to fruition, so it's fine if you still don't like it. This is just a post explaining where it was coming from, at least for me and the other theorists I've spoken to.

[thekatebridgerton]

On Sophie vs Kate and being interclass. Actually, Book Sophie is a higher class than Show Kate. While Show Kate is of common birth, not to mention foreign birth, Book Sophie’s legal documentation lists her as the legitimate daughter of a dead gentleman, and the legal ward of an Earl (her biological father, who is straight up lying to the county registry). Furthermore, the Earl provided for Sophie upon his death by bestowing her a large dowry. Sophie only became working class because Araminta threw her out and stole her money. If Araminta hadn’t thrown her out originally, and later been so loud about Sophie being a bastard, Benedict could’ve married “daughter of unknown country gentleman” without scandal, and they wouldn’t have had to live in the country unless they wanted to. Book Sophie’s social status was basically Harriet Smith of Emma, who could’ve had a respectable marriage to Elton if Elton hadn’t been an asshole.

I have no idea how they’re going to fix the unforced error of messing with Show Kate’s birth though. The Sharmas could’ve just been gentry poor, like the Sheffields in the books?!? There was truly no reason for Lord Rupert Giles Sheffield to exist on the show.

Sigh okay Anon, you really make me want to go trough my previous replies one by one looking for that one where I already talked about this. And at this point I'm unhappy to be digging trough Interviews and articles on the subject again, because people seem not to believe me. That Kate WASNT considered a commoner and that she's not considered lower class!!!

just hit the keep reading button, there are at least 3 article links and 2 screenshots that back me up. I'm going to bookmark this post for the next person who asks.

Also regarding to Sophie, the above would have been true about Sophie if Hyacinth HADN'T made a comment referencing the fact that her sister in law is the bastard daughter of an Earl and some unknown singer in her book 'It's in his kiss' implying that pretty much all sundry knows that Sophie IS the bastard daughter of an Earl.

On paper, she was legally gentry. But in the eyes of society, she was a bastard. a by blow, the illegitimate daughter of an earl and some courtesan somewhere. completely undesirable. etc. I made a very long post about why this meant Benedict retired hapily to the country with her and wasn't really invited to balls, I did it last year, I remember.

Now Kate's upbringing is different, Mary married an unnamed clerk, Mr Sharma, who already had a daughter Kate. And we are not given any more information on how Kate's father managed to meet the diamond of the season and have her agree to run away with him to India.

Which, to me, dear reader meant that Mr Sharma in question had to be a gentleman. But one looked down upon by higher parts of society, such as some sort of graduated professional or a barrister. sort of how Mr Colins and Mr Darcy where both Gentlemen but Mr Colins was regarded as beneath Darcy.

Please do read the following article on the subject it's fascinating.

Additionally I'd like to add a quote from Chris Van Dussen on the subject of Kate's actual upbringing in India

And also may I add the interview where  Durba Ghosh, a professor at Cornell University and author of “Sex and the Family in Colonial India." says the following:

link to the full article here

And I would talk more about the difference between a working class, by blow. Bastard child of an earl with a wicked step mother and well, Kate.

but I hope this answer was enough. if not, I am happy to continue talking about it.

[a-small-batch-of-dragons]

Let's Call It Funny

Prompt: Hi! If you know about those gen z peter parker posts, could your write something based on that? With Steve Getting It (tm) because fatalistic nihilism in humor tended to show up during the world wars and we’re seeing a reflection of that now? Sorry- I just think it’d make great options for steve and peter bonding, and dad!tony but actual emotions (gasp!) You can totally ignore this if you want!

Don't ever apologize for giving me such a great ask

Read on Ao3 Part 2

Warnings: uhhh gen z humor

Pairings: none! all found family in this bitch

Word Count: 2529

Here’s the thing about humor. It’s not necessarily that one generation is any funnier than another, it’s just that high school kids are perpetually the funniest people alive. Something about being in a pressure cooker of an environment with a bunch of other people whose bodies are changing in new unpredictable ways whilst having very little say in how their lives go creates humor. Gasp of shock, right?

So basically what Peter’s trying to say is that he’s fucking hilarious.

Come on, not only does he have the default high schooler stuff, he’s also gay, which gives him an instant bonus. He’s trans, which opens up a whole new subset of humor for him to explore. He’s neurodivergent as fuck, and we all know that makes people funny as hell. And if that weren’t enough, he’s severely traumatized and he’s Spider-Man.

Peter Parker is funny as hell.

What is truly devastating—and really, it’s their loss—is that so few people seem to appreciate it.

Ned gets it. Ned’s not someone Peter would expect to not get it, just because hey, it’s Ned. They’ve met each other in the hallways and been like ‘hey! You’re still alive! Congrats on having a body!’ Only for the other one to go ‘hey! You’re alive too! I wish I had an intangible form!’

Because bodies are stupid and evolution really fucked us over but at least we’re not horses.

A solid 50% of their interactions are just quoting John Mulaney and Bo Burnham bits back and forth at each other. Peter’s never gonna forget the day they both had detention and had to watch that stupid Cap PSA—it’s propaganda, you Nazi fuckwits—and something reminded them of the ‘horse loose in a hospital’ bit and they just did it. Full out. Stood up and did the actions and everything. The rest of the room was either trying to do it with them—and failing, because they didn’t have nearly enough practice—or looking so confused. The security guard—Paul, he’s great—just looked at them blearily after they finished and went:

“I mean, you kids are right, but you’re not supposed to talk in detention.”

Well, excuse them for trying to make it more entertaining for everyone.

MJ gets it. If Peter’s being honest, he learned most of his humor from her. She is the master and it is an honor to study in her wake. He’s definitely hijacked the asking whether or not anything’s actually meaningful existentialism jokes and they’ve wormed their way into his day-to-day repertoire.

“Why are you late, Mr. Parker?”

“Time is a social construct, Mrs. B, none of us are ever late or early except in the subjective spacetime paths. The limits of our sensory perception make it so we can’t tell if anything is real, let alone whether or not they conform to some arbitrary definition of ‘time.’”

“…just sit down, Peter.”

See? It works.

Aunt May gets…worried.

Sure, they’ve actually talked about when Peter needs help and wants to reach out and when he’s just making jokes off the cuff because hey, humor’s a great coping mechanism or it’s just a joke and not that serious. Peter loves his Aunt May, so so so much, and the last thing he wants to do is really worry her. And she’s gotten pretty good at figuring out when he’s just joking and when he’s spiraling.

Sometimes, though…

“Peter,” Aunt May calls from the kitchen, “did you remember to stop by the store on your way home?”

Peter freezes halfway through the door.

“Peter?”

He swallows. “…no.”

“Why not?”

“Because I am too stressed and consumed by the swirling pit of blackness deep in my soul to remember my head is connected to my body, let alone remember to go to the store.”

Silence.

“…Aunt May?”

“Do you want to drop off your stuff and then go to the store?”

“…yeah, please.”

“Love you, Pete.”

“Love you!”

“Try to remember that you’ve got arms so you can pick stuff up.”

“Got it!”

See? It’s fine.

The Avengers don’t get it. Like, at all.

Natasha and Clint like, sorta get it? They make the same jokes all the time when they think Peter can’t hear them, which—come on, you guys are super spies, surely you know people are gonna hear you when they’re gonna hear you. Natasha will make a crack about something, Clint will laugh and shove her shoulder. It’s their dynamic, we get it. But when Peter does it…

“Hey, Baby Spider?”

Peter sticks his head up from the ceiling. “Yeah?”

“Where’re you crawling off to?”

“I’m gonna go hide in the garage.”

Natasha blinks up at him. “Why?”

“Because if I get crushed by the airlock doors then I won’t have to do my paper tomorrow.”

Silence. Natasha’s mask is too good for Peter to actually see what’s going on with her, let alone from this angle, but silence isn’t good.

“Nat—oof!”

Something blurs out of the vent nearby and tackles him down onto the couch.

“Clint!”

“Nope,” Clint mutters, wrapping Peter up in a hug as Natasha comes to join them. “You’re staying with us now, Pete.”

“Guys, I’m fine.”

“Peter,” Natasha says softly, “don’t joke about that, you’ll make us worry.”

“I don’t wanna do that,” Peter mumbles, “but it’s fine.”

“Coping mechanism, huh?”

“Yeah.”

“He’s got too many brain cells to do that,” Clint says, ruffling Peter’s hair.

“Stark has a lot of brain cells, you see what good that does him?”

“Hmm. Guess you’re gonna have to stay awhile, Pete.”

There are worse fates. Definitely.

Thor just kind of gets confused by it. He acts like Peter isn’t going to be absolutely fine because there’s no need to do anything like that. No, Peter, you don’t have to put the bleach in first into your cereal, there’s plenty of milk left over. No, Peter, you don’t have to throw yourself off the roof because your laptop is freezing, Stark has so many just lying around. No, Peter, you don’t have to pack a rucksack and run away to the Alps and live like a recluse, come here and get a hug.

Peter suspects Thor’s playing dumb on purpose. The man is smart as hell, there’s no way all of this is flying over his head. And honestly, it warms his heart a little bit when he sees Thor’s sincere, concerned look when he thinks Peter’s not looking.

Banner and Rhodey just kinda shake their heads and move on. They’re used to it. They live and work with some of the most dramatic fucking people in the goddamn universe, they’re used to a little bit of extra humor. Occasionally one of them will give him a look that says he’s pushing his luck, but that’s not often. Less often now ‘cause he knows what he can get away with. He’s also seen them hiding smiles behind their hands or poorly disguised coughs. They’re not as slick as they think they are.

Tony.

Tony is the fucking worst.

Peter can’t get away with so much as sighing too hard before Iron Dad��� is swooping in all soft words and concerned touches. Jesus. You’d think he’d get it, he uses humor as a coping mechanism too, goddamnit, why is he so worried about Peter?

Okay, fine, he knows why.

MJ’s over at the Tower, having another one of her ‘sketch people in crisis’ appointments with Natasha. Peter is coming off of a 32-hour caffeine rush and is violently wishing for death. Tony is in the kitchen doing…something.

“Hey, do you think bleach would make a good smoothie?”

Tony wheels around to see MJ pulling a glass out of the cupboard.

“Kid—“

“Sounds like a filling breakfast,” Peter groans, “can you make me one too?”

“…I’m legitimately concerned,” comes Tony’s mutter.

MJ ignores him. “Who’s the bitch on your forehead?”

Peter rubs absentmindedly at the massive knot on his head, courtesy of a wall that rudely decided to move at the last second while Peter was attempting to walk through a doorway. “He’s called DJ Braindeath and he’s my only friend in the world.”

“Peter—“

“Oh did you meet him at the furry convention?"

“Technically it’d be a buggie convention.”

“What the hell are you two talking about?”

“The pantry doesn’t have good coffee, I’m going to Starbucks.” MJ grabs her bag. “You want anything?”

“A will to live?”

“Peter, what the fuck—“

“Oof, I’ve only got like…20 bucks.”

Peter lets his head drop back to the counter. “Then just leave me here to die.”

“Can I have champagne at your funeral?”

“I’ll be dead, I won’t fucking care.”

“God, I wish that were me.”

Then MJ’s gone and Peter gets treated to a 20-minute conversation with a very concerned Tony Stark that he doesn’t remember most of because hey caffeine crashes aren’t fun.

He definitely does it on purpose sometimes just to wind Tony up. Like there’s this one incident with an interview he does as Spider-Man and he gets asked what he thinks about Tony Stark’s newest intern, Peter Parker.

“That boy’s an embarrassment, just…complete failure. Can’t speak without stuttering through every other word and self-esteem issues all over the place. Also looks like he got dressed in the dark.”

The reporter had awkwardly moved on to another question. The interview aired later that day while Peter was at the Tower. Tony sat next to him on the couch about halfway through.

“You look good, Pete.”

Peter had mumbled halfheartedly, only to hear the reporter ask the same question.

“See, that’s the problem with having a secret identity, you don’t…” Tony trailed off as he heard the answer.

Peter snorted as Spider-Man finished talking. “Say that to my face, you bitch, get a real job. At least I don’t look like someone vomited silly string all over my spandex.”

“Are you okay?”

See? Fun.

The only one he’s made a conscious effort to not be this funny around is Steve.

Because, okay, here’s the thing. Steve’s disappointed look has no effect on him anymore. He’s immune, motherfuckers, he’s had detention too many times for it to still work. Here’s the other thing: Steve doesn’t actually use that tone of voice that often. It’s this meticulously crafted image he plays up in interviews because it catches all the bad guys so off guard when Captain America is suddenly swearing a blue streak at them and telling them to go fuck themselves in, honestly, quite creative ways. The sincere Steve Rogers disappointment and concern still very much works. Also doesn’t help that Steve does caring so fucking well, like…who gave him the right to say a few things and hold Peter like he’s something precious and do the quick one-two punch of saying a super sincere compliment and following it up with ‘I love you.’ Who did that? It’s rude. Stop it.

And yeah, Steve’s the resident Mom at the Ready. It’s a risk to even sit on your bed looking sad ‘cause here he comes, wearing something snuggly and saying ‘hey’ in that stupid, stupid compassionate voice. So Peter knows he’s just gonna end up crying from too much soft if Steve actually gets concerned. Which won’t be fair because he’s gonna try and explain that he’s fine and it’s just his sense of humor while crying. Yeah, like that’s gonna be believable.

So he’s trying not to but damnit it’s hard.

Then he walks into the kitchen one day to see Steve struggling with the toaster.

It’s one of Tony’s new prototypes—which means that anyone struggling with it is so fair—and from the looks of it, it’s managed to not only burn the bread to a crisp, but also mangle the slices beyond recognizable shape.

Peter’s not paying that much attention. He’s on his phone, heading towards his spot in the corner with the beanbag chairs and definitely doesn’t recognize Steve as he goes.

He only plops down and hears someone declare, in a completely deadpan voice: “There is no point to existing at all.”

“Oh, mood.”

He doesn’t think much of it. He doesn’t even know who said that, that’s how hyper-focused he is right now. He hears the others come in and feels Clint plonk down next to him.

“Hey, Pete.”

“Sah, dude.”

“Just vibing. Did I do it right?”

“Yeah, man you’re going great.”

“You teach Thor ‘yeet’ yet?”

“We’re getting there.”

“Steve,” he hears Tony call from the kitchen, “what the fuck did you do?”

“Language.”

“Don’t fucking talk to me about language when you’re making toast that looks like a goddamn welder’s table, what is that?”

“Your prototype’s work, I imagine.”

“How did you even—“

Clint chuckles next to him as the two of them start fondly bickering. Peter’s too busy speedrunning the five stages of grief in his head.

Did…did Steve say the thing about there being no point to existence at all?

No…no way.

He must be imagining things.

Then, of course, there’s a chime on his phone.

Ned: Did u do the bio hw?

There was bio homework?

Ned: yeah, due at noon

“I now know why God abandoned this timeline and when will death come to take me?”

The room goes silent.

Shit.

“Peter,” Clint says, “it’s gonna be fine, you can do bio homework in your sleep—“

“Are you okay?” Ah, that’s Thor.

“Kid—“

And Nat, and Tony’s probably rushing over here as he speaks.

Then there’s another voice.

“We can only pray the reaper arrives early for his appointment with us, kid.”

Peter’s head snaps up.

Steve.

Steve fucking Rogers raises a coffee cup at him in salute and takes a sip. He makes a face.

“…that was definitely salt,” he mutters, before shrugging and downing the whole thing.

…what?

Peter’s still staring at him until he catches his gaze and winks.

Oh, fuck yes.

“Steven Grant Rogers,” Tony says, hands on his hips, “explain.”

Steve just gives him a look. “I grew up in the Great Depression, Tony, and I was in the army. You don’t think I have a fatalistic sense of humor?”

“Plus the fact that most of my generation is resorting to types of humor found when death and stress are so ever-present that you have to joke about it says something,” Peter adds, “doesn’t it?”

Steve raises his cup again. “See? He gets it.”

And just like that, the bond between Peter Parker and Steve Rogers was written, formed, and sealed in salt and existentialist depression.

“There’s two of you,” Tony mumbles, “oh my god, there’s two of you.”

“Oh, you just wait ’til Buck and Sam get back.”

Peter can’t fucking wait.

[thefirstknife]

Born of Wrath - Ruins of Wrath

I want to elaborate on this post because I think it's important how the whole boss area is set up.

First of all, the whole Shattered Realm this week feels different. It's just a vibe and some aspects of the whole area. But the boss room is definitely the most interesting.

It's in a Hive warship and the centerpiece of the room is something like an elevated podium from which you have a good view towards the big Taken ball in a strange device hovering in the air. This was shown during the reveal trailer as well.

The rest (with pictures even!) under the read more:

This is the same device located in the Shrine of Oryx:

It almost appears like the one in the Shattered Realm is positioned to look into the Shrine of Oryx from above. This structure, btw, is a communication device that the Hive on the Moon used to talk to Oryx. Now, obviously, no longer used to talk to Oryx and instead, they most likely use it to talk to Xivu Arath. This would also make sense as the Shattered Realm is Xivu's domain. That room is a place from which the Hive in the ascendant plane can communicate with the Hive in the Hellmouth, vice-versa and beyond. Presumably.

And of course, there's the elephant in the room.

A strange dark crystal bound with chains overlooking the Shrine communication device structure. I'm not the only one to be unnerved by this, nor am I the only one to have the thought that this is Osiris' prison. A place where real Osiris is suspended in some sort of hellish Hive version of cryo. The chains are what really sell it to me. If this were bigger, I'd probably say it some sort of a Hive creature being held here for some future boss fight, but the size just doesn't fit.

Furthermore, I've said a few times now, but I am beginning to suspect that Xivu Arath and Savathun are not really the enemies they're trying to tell us they are. It's important to know that the Hive have a very strange and utterly alien social structure. To them, murder and torture are expressions of love. They believe that this is what gives them strength so if you kill someone a lot, it means you love them a lot because you're helping them grow stronger.

Of course, Savathun is legitimately an exile to the Hive. She has practiced heresies. Goes without saying. The problem is that we kinda took her word for a fact that she is being hunted by her sister while not really thinking about how we have no confirmation of this from the other side. We don't know what Xivu thinks. Is she tolerating her sister's heresies for a grander plan? It wouldn't be the first time that Savathun is scheming in order to strengthen the Hive. Xivu knows her sister. I am finding it harder and harder to accept that Xivu would simply hunt her down on behalf of the Black Fleet without thinking it through.

After all, their last known interaction was Savathun preparing Torobatl for Xivu's invasion. They were on good terms. Savathun helped Xivu to obliterate the Cabal. And what was the whole plan with Osiris if not Savathun preparing OUR system for Xivu's invasion? These two are mirrors of each other, but with slightly different execution due to the fact that humanity has something the Cabal do not: Light. So obviously, infiltrating the Guardians required a more careful and insidious plan.

I believe this plan started a long time ago, but was finally fully put in motion, you guessed it, in Immolant. In Immolant, Osiris is exposed to the whispers of Xivu Arath, is drawn out to fight her and is eventually stripped off his Light BUT he is left alive.

There are two points I have to mention that do not align with what we know from Immolant (and Immolant is the most reliable source out of them all):

1. Savathun's speech from week 1 - specifically, the cutscene. Quote: “I found a form more pleasing to your eyes. Osiris was lost. Lightless. I saved him from Xivu Arath and assumed his shape.” This is a lie. Savathun did not save him from Xivu: Sagira did. Sagira's sacrifice is what pushed Xivu's influence away: "Blinding Light erupts from Sagira's core as she splits apart. A wave of Light surges and tears across the chasm. Her sacrifice cleanses every trace of Xivu Arath's presence. The sigil: erased. The cryptolith that supported her projection: destroyed." 2. Page 3 of the new lore book Ripples (still not on Ishtar as of writing this so I'm linking to my post with the relevant bit) - For easier reading:

"Savathun was weak to allow their deaths. To cede ground to the Celebrant; to Guardians." - This is not what happened. Xivu Arath lured Osiris to the Moon, Xivu Arath spoke to Osiris, goaded him into killing everyone and LAUGHED while he did so, because Osiris' rampage gave her tithe. Not only that, but Immolant describes the Celebrant carving a ritual to drain Osiris' Light away and let him die. The Celebrant then leaves. So it wasn't Savathun who ceded any ground.

"The Celebrant steps forward. A massive cleaver dangles from its hand, weightless. The beast carves a rune into the stone on either side of Osiris, its eyes locked with his. It nods to him, and then turns to the sigil.

"All tithes to Xivu Arath. War Dominant. Endless." Its tone is soft rasp and soot."

And:

"The Celebrant drives its sword into the cliffside stone above Osiris's head. The cryptolith erupts in neon flare.

"Die well, Osiris." The Celebrant bows and withdraws from sight into Luna's depths.

Wisps of Light hemorrhage through his skin, trimmed in blood and drawn around the blade embedded above him as if it were a nostepinne spike."

This is very odd. There's a lot of inconsistency and lying going on. Hell, Xivu didn't even take Osiris' Light at all. The attempt was made but Sagira made sure the ritual isn't finished by sacrificing herself. Kelgorath was lied to, both by Savathun AND Xivu Arath to whom he pledged himself (and died for in the first mission during Season of the Lost: Kelgorath was the Wrathborn we fight just before we enter the portal to the Mara & Osiris cutscene).

This, to me, implies that they're in on this together. It's important to note that when it came to the Cabal, everyone thought that Umun'Arath was being influenced by Xivu, but it was actually Savathun doing it on Xivu's behalf. It is possible that all the voices Osiris was hearing were actually also coming from Savathun on Xivu's behalf. But if that was the case, then Kelgorath wouldn't have felt the need to renounce Savathun because she was the one who helped Xivu, instead of "ceding ground" as he claims. This inconsistency makes me believe that Savathun's and Xivu's courts don't really know the full scope and details of their mutual plan. The Hive sisters are literally lying to their own people for the benefit of the plan.

We only have Savathun speaking to us, but never Xivu Arath. What are her thoughts on all of this? What are her thoughts on Savathun? Is she really hunting Savathun at all? Obviously, Xivu would know that Savathun will most likely betray her, but if Savathun lays down the ground work for Xivu's invasion (like on Torobatl), why would she care? She knows her scheming sister well enough. As long as there's war, Xivu will be fed her tithe, making herself stronger and stronger. Savathun's schemes are benefitting her.

Which leads me back to the chained crystal in Shattered Realm.

Savathun's bargaining chip, Osiris. Where is he? Who is looking after this most valuable prisoner while she's trapped in her own crystal? Who would she trust to make sure he stays bound until the time is right? Who has the power to keep him bound while she's playing the game on the other side?

Well, it's Xivu Arath of course. So it would not surprise me for this crystal to really be him, bound and chained in Xivu's domain, under her watchful eye and kept in place by her power.

And, of course, where did we find "Osiris" on the Moon when we went to rescue him? In the Shrine of Oryx. The same place that the chained crystal is located in, on the other side, looking down to the Shrine from the ascendant plane.

I didn't mention it until now, but the post's title is a reference to both Immolant and Shattered Realm. "Born of Wrath" is the name of the first chapter of Immolant pt. 2, where Osiris first encounters the cryptolith, visions and voices of Xivu and gives her tithe. It would be fitting if Osiris' wrath that was "born" in that moment led to his "ruin" and eventual imprisonment in the "Ruins of Wrath."

I am looking WAY too hard into this, but it really isn't a Destiny lore analysis unless I'm a little unhinged. :)

[iamanartichoke]

[please blacklist spoiler tags: #loki tv series spoilers, #loki series spoilers, #loki spoilers] 

I know I have missed a lot of people’s takes and reactions, there’s just - there’s so many. So I’m sorry if I’m inadvertantly repeating anyone or whatnot when I proceed to make my own posts. 

Cut for length and spoilers.

Which is a segue into - I feel legitimately concerned, based on how many people are reading the TVA as being the moral authority and/or being on Loki’s side, and Mobius Dick’s interrogation being therapeutic for Loki (and how gross that is), along with an emphasis on ooc-ness for Loki and just overall cracks and fractures in the (what I thought was a) more or less solid episode - 

I feel legitimately concerned that I may have wildly misinterpreted, like, everything, up to and including Loki’s characterization. And it’s actually kind of hilarious bc like - 

Me: All opinions and interpretations are valid! No worries! Also I’m open-minded! Also I have no issue admitting I’m wrong! 

Also me: *feels physically ill at the idea that my interpretation is so very wrong* 

I’m not even lying, guys, my stomach is in knots. And I guess it’s because, like - I thought that it was pretty straightforward that the TVA are the antagonists here?? That Mobius isn’t Loki’s friend - he’s Loki’s interrogator and handler bc he needs Loki for his own purposes. That the “single sacred timeline” is not only nonsensical but also kinda fucked up (as Loki rightfully points out). 

Like I’m watching these scenes and it doesn’t even occur to me to take the TVA’s word as the correct one here. Why would I? I’m taking Loki’s word as the correct one - Loki, the one who’s calling out everything that is stupid and ridiculous about the concept of the Timekeepers and the TVA, the one who is being scape-goated and is aware of it. 

To touch on the ooc-ness of Loki - I mean, the first half of the episode was cringey and ooc, yeah; Loki was too over-the-top and the “comedic” tone didn’t quite land (I’m honestly wondering if Tom’s just not good at comedy? I mean, Betrayal was a genuinely funny play (and heartwrenching) but besides that, I can’t think of anything really comedic that he’s done.) but I’m willing to overlook that because when we got into the second half of the episode, he began to feel much more like the Loki I love.  

Historically, Loki has consistently been the one to see the truth for what it really is and either saying or doing something about it. He actively tries to delay Thor’s coronation because he recognizes, when no one else does, that Thor is not ready to be king. He knows that Odin isn’t as righteous and wise as he pretends to be (and, in fact, he knows that Odin is guilty of more than Loki could ever be, and he calls that out too). He sees SHIELD as the farce it is (and possibly knows Hydra has infiltrated it; I headcanon that he knew but just didn’t care bc why would he?), and he sees Earth and the humans in a much more accurate light than Thor could hope to. You lie and kill in the service of liars and killers; the humans slaughter each other in droves while you idly fret. Etc. Here, it’s the clowns are playing their parts to perfection (that’s the only quote I can remember right now). 

And I mean, yeah, the narrative has never acknowledged that Loki is right about everything. It’s a huge source of frustration for me bc the narrative continues to be so black-and-white about heroes and villains and, being villain-coded, Loki doesn’t get to be validated no matter how right he is. 

But I don’t think that’s the case here. I think, as the protagonist, his word holds a bit more weight. It should, at least, and I personally didn’t see anything that made me think that we shouldn’t consider Loki the authoritative voice in all of this. Loki, not the TVA. 

Mobius’s interrogation? Was very clearly cruel and fucked up, to me. The sham of a fake ass trial that Loki had to endure, with the implication being that no one who stands trial is actually getting a fair trial bc the TVA has no intention of judging anyone not guilty? Fucked up, with horrifying implications. The process of deleting people from existence being literally as detached and soulless as a trip to the DMV (complete with tickets!)? Very disturbing. Like, none of these things are the traits that I would look at and say, hmm, yeah, these guys seem legit and totally correct about everything, too bad for Loki. 

And Loki’s reactions to Mobius - his frustration, his defiance, and his eventual emotional breakdown (which we only saw when Loki was completely alone) all felt accurate to me. Again, there were a lot of over the top aspects of Tom’s performance here but I think what makes me more willing to overlook them is that, in general, we’re getting a more animated Loki than we’ve gotten to see him before, in a way that feels true to him as opposed to whatever was going on with him in Ragnarok. 

He’s not in the middle of a mental breakdown/identity crisis. He’s not being mind-controlled anymore (or influenced). He’s not being villain-coded while Thor is propped up as the hero and the ideal which, to me, means that we are actually getting to see Loki’s personality when all of that is taken away and the only thing he’s got left is himself. It’s a really shitty situation and I hate that he’s in it, but after the initial exaggerated reactions, his response to it worked for me. 

So - yeah. And now I’m like, biting my nails and my stomach is in knots bc I thought I knew Loki and I had a comfortable idea of Loki, and I thought I was more or less decent at interpreting things - but, so, clearly there were things happening and being picked up on that just whooshed right over my head bc it never occurred to me to be on the lookout for them in the first place. Does that make sense? I don’t even know what I’m saying. 

Just - I am really, really doubting my own perception of what this series is attempting to do with Loki and it does not feel good at all. So I guess ultimately I am not capable of putting my money where my mouth is and treating all interpretations as valid, when it comes to myself. (I didn’t realize I was that far up my own ass so as to speak confidently about validity while telling myself that my idea is pretty correct.) Soo there we are. 

Idk if I even want to post this but it’s time for me to clock out now so, for better or for worse, *hits post button* 

[mnemo-li]

Calebros: A Rant About My Favorite VTM NPC

I do love the newer Vampire: the Masquerade content, but sometimes the writing leaves a lot to be desired. A prominent example is - what in my opinion is - the butchery of Calebros’ character in Beckett's Jyhad Diary.

While I do love seeing the more brusque side of Calebros’ personality, I don’t think I’ve ever recalled him being this vulgar in the original Clan Novels. He was definitely not dropping the f-bombs left and right, and even his gruff manner had more to do with dry humor, sarcasm, and keeping up the dignified image fit for a clan leader. I do realize that this series of chat is set much after his whole ordeal as Prince of New York is over, so maybe the experience really changed him. However, the in-universe explanation of his drastic shift in personality is lacking– it is most likely the result of a change in writers which led to inconsistent writing and characterization.

Here are some examples of scenes that presents his characterization in a more nuanced light.

Scene 1: The Nictuku Accusation

“They would have eaten me, I tell you!” “I believe you, Jeremiah,” Calebros said in a forced, calm tone. He was tired of nodding politely, of reassuring his clanmate. Jeremiah could be a difficult person to like at times. This was rapidly becoming one of those times. “Don’t you humor me!” Jeremiah snapped. “I’ve been coming to you about this for weeks now.” Seems more like years, Calebros thought. “And still you’ve done nothing. Nothing!” Jeremiah paced around, gesticulating wildly. There was no second chair by Calebros’s desk, and for this very reason. He mostly didn’t like guests, didn’t want guests, didn’t want to encourage them to sit down, to take a load off and stay for a while. Most anyone who had reason or inclination to visit Calebros was irate, complaining, or tiresome. Jeremiah happened to be all three presently. “That is not true,” Calebros assured him. Jeremiah snorted in disgusted. “What, then? Tell me. What have you done?” “I have considered quite carefully your report.” “Ha! Like I said, nothing. ‘Considered my report…’” Jeremiah repeated contemptuously. “This is what I think of you and your reports—” he said, grabbing a handful of papers from the nearest stack on Calebros’s desk. Jeremiah made to fling them into the air— Instantly, Calebros’s hand shot out and latched around his visitor’s wrist. Talons pricked undead flesh ever so slightly. “Believe me,” said Calebros evenly. “You do not want to do that.” They faced each other for a moment, one monstrous creature restraining the hand of another. Jeremiah’s fingers, biting into the papers, were long and grotesquely thin, little more than needles of bone. His entire body was thin and hard and covered with knots, bulging masses of hardened tissue, like an old, gnarled swamp tree. Finally he stopped resisting Calebros and returned the reports to the desk. “I’m sorry,” Jeremiah said and resumed his pacing, just as intently if less frenetically.

This is from the Nosferatu clan novel. Here, Jeremiah is trying to get Calebros to believe that there truly are Nictukus dwelling in the sewers. Calebros is, frankly, tired of hearing the folk tale especially when he has other pressing matters to deal with. Yet, even with his patience paper thin, he does not lash out at his broodmate. He is shown to be deeply introverted, anti-social perhaps, but he does not let his own nature affect his duties. As the Nosferatu primogen - as the leader of the clan - he has to listen to the concerns of his family, no matter how absurd. He knows when to express his authority, and he never abuses it. Again, no f-bombs dropped.

Scene 2: The Salt Lake

“Geez, what am I, your mother?” Emmett asked. “No,” Calebros said. “You are my brother, my broodmate.” “Brood, litter, whatever. We were both chosen to suck the old blood tit, so who am I to ask questions?” Calebros sighed. Blood tit, indeed. “That’s not how you remember it.” Now it was Emmett’s turn to sigh. “Don’t do this. Don’t get all… You always do this, get all touchy-feely we’re-all-brothers-in-the-blood, when you soak your head, blah, blah, blah…” “Make light of it if you will—” “I will. Thank you very much. Got enough salt here?” Emmett flicked some at Calebros.

This is from the Nosferatu clan novel. Here, Calebros has just came up from his meditation within the mud hole / salt lake. He is shown to be introspective and even sentimental. In terms of character voice, his more poised speaking style and inner monologue is contrasted against Emmett’s rough, colloquial style.

Other Sources

In the Calebros graphic novel, a similar scene is shown where Calebros is depicted to be trying and failing to remember his past before he became a vampire, losing his mind as he mixes up imagination with false memories. His inner dialogue in the graphic novel shows him saying:

“Do I tell him that his prince, his... compatriot?, is losing his mind? Never.”

This very much reflects his true nature. In Vampire: the Masquerade, there is a system of nature vs demeanor. According to his character sheet, his demeanor is that of a “director” while his nature is a “martyr (penitent)”.

Director: To the Director, nothing is worse than chaos and disorder. The Director seeks to be in charge, adopting a "my way or the highway" attitude on matters of decision-making. The Director is more concerned with bringing order out of strife, however, and need not be truly "in control" of a group to guide it. Coaches, teachers, and many political figures exemplify the Director Archetype.

Martyr: The Martyr suffers for his cause, enduring his trials out of the belief that his discomfort will ultimately improve others' lot. Some Martyr simply want the attention or sympathy their ordeals engender, while others are sincere in their cause, greeting their opposition with unfaltering faith in their own beliefs. Many Inquisitors, staunch idealists, and outcasts are Martyr Archetypes.

Penitent: The Penitent exists to atone for the grave sin she commits simply by being who she is. Penitents have either low self-esteem or legitimate, traumatic past experiences, and feel compelled to "make up" for inflicting themselves upon the world. Penitent Archetypes aren't always religious in outlook; some truly want to scourge the world of the grief they bring to it. Repentant sinners, persons with low self-esteem, and remorseful criminals are examples of the Penitent Archetype.

All of these quotes, if feel, matches very much with the Calebros I knew from the clan novel saga. Below are also a set quotes detailing Calebros’ inner dialogue in his graphic novel.

“As prince, only I can save them, only I can keep them from looking where they shouldn’t. A force exists underneath this city, sleeping, and it must remain so, lest we all perish.

“Augustin, my sire, left us to investigate the Nictuku, and came back to me with this information. Could this be Gehenna? The Final Nights? When the Ancients awake to devour their errant children? Can it be stopped? Should it be stopped? Everything that is done is a hope of staving off the inevitable. Why?”

“My embrace into this world was a foregone conclusion, made for me by Augustin. It is no different for anyone else. Why then do we not welcome the coming Armageddon? Exchange one world for another. It sounds almost painless, except I would never accept such a course, neither would my fellow Nosferatu. Neither would my fellow Kindred, for that matter.”

He is incredibly contemplative, and determined too, willing to fight against the inevitable apocalypse of the vampires. As long as his clan and the Kindred as a whole does not give up, does not give in the the despair of Gehenna, he too will be willing to fight for the survival of others.

Scene 3: Against a Master Manipulator

The character of Hesha is... complex. I see him as sort of a sweet-talking, cunning, charismatic cult leader. Here is a dialogue between him and Calebros.

“No harm was done,” Hesha said softly, his voice still the slightest bit scratchy from the ordeal he’d undergone. “As you say,” said Calebros, not looking up and continuing to write furiously. “You concede without agreeing.” Hesha laughed quietly. Calebros’s head whipped up. Angry words were ready on his lips, but the Egyptian’s smile was not mocking. The Setite obviously realized the weakness of his position, physically and strategically, as well as the fragility of their alliance. “Candor is important between friends,” Hesha said. “Otherwise, perceived insults take hold and fester.” “I am quite accustomed to festering,” Calebros said curtly. “I fear that I’m growing so as well,” Hesha said, squeezing one of the boils that stood raised about one of his many open wounds until the canker popped, and frothy pus ran down his arm. He laughed quietly again. Calebros punctuated a written sentence with a particularly violent period. “Your woman willfully disobeyed her instructions.” “She exercised discretion,” Hesha countered. “She blatantly disregarded the safety of my people.” “If anything had gone wrong,” Hesha said, “it would be Pauline lying torn on the ground. Your people would have faded into the night, none the worse for wear.” Calebros fumed. Probably Hesha was correct—but the Nosferatu was not about to admit as much. “I will speak with her,” Hesha said reasonably. “She has not encountered those of your clan before. She’s not aware of how strongly your predilection for…” “Cowardice?” Calebros suggested accusingly. “Prudence, I was going to say. She’s not aware of how strongly your predilection for prudence runs.” Good choice of words, Calebros thought. But, then, Hesha always chose his words carefully, always seemed to know just the right thing to say. It was discomforting in a way, how easily the Setite could alleviate tension with just a few words. Go ahead, Eve. Take a bite of the apple. Adam might like some too. But it seemed that they needed one another—and that outweighed their natural and mutual tendencies to distrust one another. Just barely.

Hesha’s actions managed to get under Calebros’ nerves, as seen in his curt speech, his furious writing, his accusatory reply to Hesha. He is angry for the safety of his clan (which, as seen from all the other sources, is something very dear to him). He is even shown to be stubborn, refusing to admit that Hesha was correct. Even still, he keeps his head rather than loose his cool completely. He also realises Hesha’s smooth words for what they are- manipulation. He is willing to compromise and form a sort of alliance with Hesha too, despite of his distrust and personal feelings.

Calebros and Ramona

I found the strange friendship Calebros had with the Gangrel Ramona to be incredibly touching, and tragic due to the turns it took towards the end (which I won’t spoil). Below are some excerpts from the Nosferatu clan novel showing Ramona’s initial meeting with Calebros and his later assessments of her character.

Neither Pauline nor the other girl, Ramona, had been subjected to the full brunt of facing a Nosferatu. Not until now, that is, when they were brought into Calebros’s presence. He did not hide his true appearance from them. And he could read the dismay, the fear and disgust, on their faces. Of the two, Pauline made the worthier attempt, attempt, to maintain her demeanor of professional detachment—perhaps Ruhadze had taught her well. The Gangrel, unsurprisingly, was not so couth. She gawked, both at Calebros and at Hesha in his current condition, and she hid her revulsion quite poorly, if she tried at all. […] Ramona looked at Calebros again, a more measured look this time, trying to see through the deformities. Good girl, Calebros thought. Young and brash, but not stupid.

Ramona reached for a calendar on Calebros’s desk, but tossed it back when she realized it was from 1972. “That’s still a whole month, and nobody knows where Leopold was that whole time. He could have gone back to the cave.” Smart girl, Calebros thought. He was leading her along the same path of reconstructing events that he had followed.

He compliments her intelligence again and again, and seems genuinely fond of her. Which I believe is why, after he became Prince of New York, he allows her a private audience with him to which he offered her a safe passage out of town which she rejects, viewing his actions as a betrayal. Below is an excerpt from what I think is the Clan Brujah novel.

The hunched form stepped forward, leaning heavily against the seatbacks as he came. Ramona kept straining to pick out the sound of broken gasps that must accompany such labored progress, but the air did not stir. "You had requested an audience, my dear. A private audience. I have gone to some pains to secure a place where we might be alone. Privacy is such an indulgence here. All too often, I find myself unable to justify the expense of importing it. And there is always someone else jealous of such decadence. But you have not come to hear of my distractions. Sit here, next to me, and tell me why you have come.”

[…]

“Calebros chuckled low, a sound like an engine turning. "No, I don't imagine you would. I will miss your straightforward style, Ramona. I find it refreshing. But already you know that there is no longer any place for you here. In the midst of battle—against the Sabbat and later, against Leopold and the Eye—we could afford certain marriages of convenience. But these partnerships will not survive the challenges of peacetime. Your associates, Mr. Ruhadze and Mr. Ravana, they found themselves in much the same position. Each has already left New York.”

[…]

“Calebros was silent for a time, letting her wind down. "I'm sorry I couldn't help you with the Eye, Ramona. And I'm sorry you will have to leave us. Believe me, I would like nothing better than to find a place for you here. I will have sore need of people who can be relied upon in the nights ahead. But you know what you would be up against if you remained here— the posturing, the none-too-subtle snubbing, the outright backstabbing. You are a rarity among our kind, Ramona. But because you are different, you will be hated and eventually destroyed if you stay among the society of the damned. Know that I will remember our time together fondly. If I can be of any assistance to you in relocating..." "No, I understand. It's 'thanks for your help; here's your bus ticket.' Well, I don't need any of your favors. I don't like the strings attached to them. And I resent the fact that you think I'm so stupid that I'll let you screw me over and then thank you for it." "Ramona...”

Again, even during his tenure as Prince of New York he is so damn eloquent, I definitely can’t fathom the word fuck ever slipping out of his mouth. He is compassionate, helping Ramona perhaps for future gains too, but mainly I believe he genuinely wants to do something right, give her the happy ending she deserves for once.

Moreover, I have a soft spot for this quote of Calebros pondering about Ramona’s nature, why she’s always so angry at the world, why every word out of her mouth sounds like an accusation. It showcases well his world-weariness, a cynical attitude that hides his concerns for others.

What have you seen that makes you so angry, so bitter, little one? Calebros wondered. Family killed? Have you been betrayed? How many times, I wonder. You’d best get over it, if you hope to survive.

So... yeah. I’d pay money to see an accurate portrayal of Calebros in a newer media otherwise I might have to write my own fanfic pairing my OC with him

[ranboo5]

Ok I am not judging at all but I feel like the my chemical romance feels, not out of place, but I did not expect to see it in a dsmp web weave ASTHFKL . So if you want an ask about your process and all of that, why boy division in particular for this web weave?

It's actually stolen from A Mixtape For Excellent Adventures, Priz fireworksduo's peerpressure playlist ajhsaknhdkln

That quote in specific has actually been on this webweave since its VERY early days – it was one of the initial collection of deathmotifs because I go insane about Ranboo's general death miasma and the concept of the suit-as-deathmotif as the corpse at a funeral irt "I'm not dead, I only dress that way!"

It's also. I mean it's specifically a peerpressure song I don't like to really use the rest of the song as necessary implied context but specifically the lyrics I include very much. Give Doomsday imo specifically the "same as yesterday" exchange

I think a point of c!peerpressure is this like... it's the concept of pretention if that makes any sense? Like, at the end of the day the reason that each of them is able to start to extend his trust to the other is that there is no necessary maintenance of Pretense between them and the places that they leave undiscussed (many) and the bits they do (also many) are mutually understood as simply not each other's business and as bits respectively and that's a Component of how they signal trustworthiness and trust to each other – each of them is very careful and deliberate to try and back up all his legitimate promises with the action they would imply and it's what allows Techno to relax and Ranboo to tentatively get off the eggshells he's on around everyone by default

So there's trust and that connects directly to the preceding doubts thereof and the "I would have to trust someone" -- the specific recipe for that trust is Crystallized in the understanding implied in "I'm not laughing, you're not joking" and then "I'm not dead, I only dress that way" ties it back directly to death and avoidance thereof. It's almost confessional in itself too like. Trust is being associated with being not dead even in the appearance of it and in the painting Body which . Is a man in formalwear lying on a bed, sprawled, possibly dead -- and is followed immediately by the Respawn point set from when Ranboo sets his spawn at the commune

So that's the work it does here; trust, pretense, death and survival, and the cruelty of how it isn't, in the end, enough to save him

[jovalencia]

we all knew this was coming and I’m a sentimental bitch. I just wanted to write all my mutuals some little messages about how much I love you. you guys have changed my life and I am so grateful for each and every one of you!!!💕💞💓💗💖💘 anygays have fun searching for yourself in this mess and I’m sorry for any typos, I’m illiterate (and if i forgot you it’s because i lost my brain in 1912)

@cr1spyy fernanda, my first ever mutual. who would have thought that your 5th wave posts would have brought one of the most amazing people in my life to me. your posts always make me laugh and your dedication to the good morning asks is admirable (fr I could never have that much consistency) you’re so kind to everybody and you’re absolutely beautiful and incredible and I fucking love you so much. I honestly don’t even want to think about what my life would be like if I had never met you, MWAH💕🤍

@sundaymorninghangover I remember you being my first ever note!! you liked this post I made that was a reblog of a “uquiz” that was actually a rickroll lmao. you didn’t even follow me back then but whatever. Then I remember waking up one day to see that you had tagged me in a bingo ask game and I was like “ummm tf is an ask game” but I do still have a bingo card for it that I never used ekenksjs. anygays, you have good opinions on everything and you’re absolutely fucking hilarious. If you told me back in may that I would be friends with you I wouldn’t believe it bc you intimidated me but regardless I’m glad to be an arson gang member with you. your memes are god tier and so is your music taste. I love you whore!!!!!🖤💜

@sound-and-colors ma’am you’re so nice and for what??? the aesthetic stuff that you reblog is *chef’s kiss* and nobody else is out there doing it like you. we’ve never talked but I just know that you are absolutely incredible mwah❤️💛

@embeddedinmybrain tasfia you are the nicest person on his hellsite and you know it (I hope). It was so much fun being your secret admirer anon while it lasted, like fr I loved it. Your art is beautiful just like your heart and i honestly don’t know what I did to deserve such a kind soul like you in my life. You’re always there to hype me up and ily (also just cut your own hair already I believe in you)🤍💙

@gumptin you hooked me with your suus icon and reeled me in by being the coolest and funniest person ever. your posts are consistently hilarious, accurate, or relatable and I admire that. I mean it when I say you’re one of the coolest people on here. idk what I did to have you think I’m cool but I’m honored nonetheless. also you have really awesome style and hair jdnjdjdjd mwah💚💛

@nori-in-pink first and foremost, your blog always has a very nice aesthetic and I feel like I need to acknowledge that. anyway, you are so kind and supportive and you don’t take any bullshit and that is absolutely amazing. you are absolutely iconic and always reblog the best stuff so I know I can count on your blog to be fantastic. you used to scare me (idk why don’t ask) but now I know that you’re just a big teddy bear ily💗💜

@matteohnora my slurpee queen and my mememate!! you always send me the funniest shit and it doesn’t go unappreciated. You’re always there for me with a silly meme or emotional support and I don’t think I’ve ever told you how grateful I am for that. whenever you stalk my blog it makes my heart go whooosh and I feel so special. Ily and I am so glad to have met you💜❤️

@lieverobbe ah yes, the girl with the impeccable music taste. that’s what I know you as, oh well. you are more talented and kind than you could ever believe and your edits are amazing!!! whenever I see you on my dash I get all happy bc I’m like “em’s here!!!” I love all your lil posts and I am so glad that you are my mutual ilyyyyy💙🤍

@ironymane you’ve watched limitless which automatically makes you amazing. you’re an absolutely incredible and amazing person and even tho you aren’t on here as much anymore, I still love youre lil posts. And one time you kept me entertained on a 6hr car ride so you deserve some kind of award for that. ly🧡💛

@kingarthurpendragons okay the obvious thing to talk about here is your incredible talent when it comes to gif making. Like how in the hell- but you are also so kind and loving and it doesn’t go unnoticed. You don’t have to send nice asks but you do and ily for it mwah!!❤️💗

@engelkeijsers the skam nl stan that we all deserve to have in our lives. you are so fucking hilarious and relatable and all around amazing and for what? your posts always put a smile on my face and it is so much fun to clown with you. ilyyyy💚💛

@happiness-isin-you let’s ignore the fact that it took me forever to realize that this was your main lmao. your art is some of the most beautiful shit I’ve ever seen. like your style is so cool????  I could literally go on about this for hours don’t test me. the cute animal pictures are the absolute best and you’re always there for emotional support. Ilyyyyyyy💛❤️

@isakyaqi fiz you are so kind and talented and cool and I really do mean all that. You reblog always the best of content so I know I can trust it. you always put nice tags in the things you reblog things and it’s fun to read what you write because it’s almost always you hyping up the creator or the thing itself. you are awesome jdjdjdndjjd mwah🖤🤎

@cash-queens sam oh sam. Idek where to start with how much ily. You’re my famous mutual which is very iconic of you and you put up with my cat pictures and my silly antics and my riverdale posts. You’re so kind to me and everybody and whenever I make a post when I’m having a mental breakdown you’re always there to make sure that I’m doing okay. That def doesn’t go unappreciated. You’re legitimately one of the kindest and most amazing people I’ve ever known and I love you so much, more than you could ever know💛🤍

@welcometo-saturn çağrı you’re so cool. end of statement. that’s all I have to say about it. your gifs are so beautiful and you don’t take shit from anybody. you’re so down to earth that it makes it seem like you’re somebody who I’ve just always known (even tho we’ve never talked sjdjdjdjdj) so yeah anyway, you’re are a really awesome person with really good opinions and I am so glad that we are mutuals🧡❤️

@amifeelingokay it’s difficult not to start with your url bc it’s amazing and I love it. your skam posts are always so nice and cute and positive (just like you!!) and I love them. the content you reblog is always aesthetic or a nice text post and I just love your blog okay. ily💜🖤

@isthatelpome you’re so nice that I’m willing to overlook your opinion on salt and vinegar chips (they’re not good I’ll fight you on that) your dani icon is beautiful just as you are, mwahhhh🧡❤️

@earthling-isa babe you are so cute with your lil edits and your clowning. the near constant black and white aesthetic is very iconic and i love it. you’re a suus stan so I have no choice but to love you for it. i absolutely adore your gifs, especially the ones with the lil squares in the middle fygzbgut. you are absolutely beautiful and incredible and kind and I love you MWAHHHH🖤💙

@grey-mist-exist okay we’ve never talked but you seem like such a rad person. not cool but like rad (there are are subtle differences) your art is beautiful even tho idk the quotes (go off smarty pants) and overall you are just really rad, idk how else to say it mwah!!!🤍🖤<pretend it’s a grey heart

@fatoudixon hey look it’s one of the most talented people here!!! You’ve always been so kind and supportive of me and I really really do appreciate it. you have good opinions on everything and did I mention that you’re talented?? cause you are, very. Your reaction videos are amazing and not to mention iconic, just like your hair. anyway, ily and I am so glad that I have somebody as amazing as you as my mutual💙💛

@sander-klaas you are so kind and and you have so much passion. I can always trust you reblog only the best of wtfock and sobbe content which I am very grateful for. you literally just started making gifs and they are so beautiful (okay it was like months ago but whatever dkdjdjjdjdj) anyway, thank you so much for being my mutual mwah❤️💛

@jusdekiwi okay we’ve never talked but you genuinely seem like such a sweet person??? I love the stuff you reblog, it’s always the best gif sets. idk I can just tell you have good taste. I hope to get to know you better in the future, but for now I am very grateful to have you💚💙

@kritiquer my twin!!! you and I have a lot in common so ofc I love you. I’m joking obviously.... anygays you are always so supportive of everybody and you are so sweet. I love all of your personal posts, it always makes me really happy to see what you’re up to and how you’re feeling. I also like the aesthetic stuff you reblog, I have bad taste in all that, clearly you don’t. I am so glad that we started talking and I hope that we continue! ily kit!!!!💜🤍

@bleachblondebitches you aren’t on here that much, but whenever you are I get so happy! Your gifs are beautiful and I think about your sobbe and booksmart parallels gifset every day. you have amazing taste in movies and I love you!💜💙

@lesbeanfatou clara!!! bitch!!!! You already know how much I love you but I guess I’ll reiterate. I honestly don’t know what I did before I knew you. I always remember looking at the no idea blog with the Nora icons like “who is this?” Little did I know back then that you would be one of my closest friends. your support of me means the world and I am so grateful for you. I’m so glad that I have somebody in my life like you to talk to and be friends with. you are one of the funniest people in and I just love you so much I could burst mwah❤️🧡

@gucciboner okay hiii ypu are literally so fucking kind and funny, i admire your sense of humor sm. your art is so beautiful and you are so goddamn talented, it never ceases to amaze me. I also love all the little funny posts you make and reblog!! ily💙💗

@helmtaryn even though you put supernatural on my dash, I am willing to forgive you bc I love you so much. your gifs are so beautiful like ma’am didn’t you just start?? icon shit. your hate for photoshop is iconic and you are awesome. you’re always sending me asks and responding to my posts and you’re so nice and it makes my heart go whooosh. anygays you’re cool and ily💙🧡

@starmansander nina when I tell you that you give off the best vibes- okay sorry I had to start with that. I love how you are so nice and supportive of me, it really means a lot. I really like the stuff you reblog like,,, cool art? pretty women? those hopeful little posts? iconic. also youre a noor stan which is a sign of good taste. love you🤎❤️

@ijzermanora daniiiiiii madam you are so epic and iconic and I really could go on about that forever. you are so kind and you’re following all my joke sideblogs (even the ch*cken l*ttle hate blog??? why???) which is very brave of you. I love reading all of your lil wholesome posts and hearing about school and how much you hate chemistry (even tho you like sushi???) anygays we were already sending memes 10 hours into our mutualship so I think we were soulmates from the very beginning. I love you so much and I have no idea what I did before i knew you💜💗

@alwaysin-myhead okay, you give off cool person vibes and I had to acknowledge that. your art is so beautiful and you are so incredibly talented!!! I hope to get to know you in the future🧡💛

@alexiaugustin here she is!!! the queen of good opinions!!! you are such a smart cookie and you use that power to make long paragraph posts that I can actually read without falling asleep. which is impressive honestly. never has a person been so kind and funny and genius in such a well rounded way (that makes no sense) I’m so happy that I have you in my life ilyyy💚💗

@ijntba hihi you’re such a sweet person and I literally love your skam blog sm. I am so honored that you’re using one of my icons you have no idea. even though I’m confused when you post about anime, I still appreciate your passion lmao. mwah💛🧡

@hidden-joy liz!! you are such a kind soul and I absolutely love looking at the things you reblog and reading all the nice things that you put in the tags, it’s always so sweet and supportive!!! we’re relatively new mutuals, but I do hope to get to know you better in the future!!!💚💛

okay sorry to group y’all together but @fudgetunblr and @alexiswoke I like just became mutuals with y’all but I do love you and I’m glad you’re here and I hope 2021 treats you well and that i get to know you better!!❤️❤️

aaand one last final message for max and sarah, i know yall wont see this but ily🧡 💜

okay yeah I know I already said this but I really do love each and every one of you so much and I am so lucky to have so many amazing people in my life💕💕💓💕💖💖💕💘💕💗💞💓💕💖💖💘💕💓

[thosearentcrimes]

In defense of "standpoint epistemology"

People like to denounce something called "standpoint epistemology". Now, in responding to this, I am faced with a dilemma. I could either interpret "standpoint epistemology" as being that which the people complaining about it are talking about, or I could interpret it as what the articles in which it was theorized described. What I will do is first present standpoint theory and standpoint epistemology as I understood them from its promoters. In particular, this essay will largely be a commentary on "Rethinking Standpoint Epistemology: What is 'Strong Objectivity?'" (1992) by Sandra Harding. First, I have to say that I do not find the text particularly satisfying. Most of its critiques are valid, but on the rare occasion that Harding implies any methodological changes, they seem infeasible or ineffective. Given that Harding is proposing a change of worldview and not directly a change in behavior, this is understandable, but it would still be nice to know what the actual implications of the change in worldview would be! All that said, I am prepared to defend the vast majority of the text.

According to Harding, standpoint epistemology is a response to the "sexist and androcentric results of scientific research". It is one of two responses she presents, the other of which she calls "feminist empiricism", which says that the biased results of prior scientific research were due to insufficient rigor, and that the underlying principles are fine. In contrast, standpoint epistemology, according to Harding, proposes a transformation of science and its mechanisms to more actively remove bias. Harding explicitly rejects relativism and essentialism, which are the positions most commonly attributed to her work. I am not sure why anyone would think she was lying, given that Harding clearly considers relativism and essentialism to be popular strands of feminist thought, and as such they are positions she could safely adopt publicly. Perhaps the jargon and the relative lack of concrete proposals have convinced people the idea is more radical than it really is.

Standpoint epistemology derives from standpoint theory, which is broadly the claim that the perspectives of people who are marginalized in society are, if anything, more relevant and accurate than those of dominant groups. Historically it draws from Marxism and the dialectic approach more generally (in particular, Hegel's Master/Slave dialectic), but the observation that marginalization compels people to understand their oppressor better than their oppressor understands themself (and as a corollary, that a life of privilege can be blinding, like how rich people do not know the prices of common household items) does not require dialectics at all. It is still however a rather controversial idea, with two major opponents. The first is that the view from the dominant position is more objective because it is less involved. This is blatantly false and silly. The more serious objection is that this theory obstructs the objective "view from nowhere". It is very important to ask - is there such a view? Is there knowledge that is not socially situated? The answer, according to Harding, is no. This is really the heart of the dispute between Harding and empiricism. It is rather difficult to prove the non-existence of "nowhere", especially on empiricist terms. If there is a "nowhere" to view reality from, then where? Of course, in reality, the view from nowhere is typically the view from above repackaged. Standpoint Epistemology can rightly be accused of self-contradiction, but at least it does so consciously.

This leads us into Harding's first methodological change, and the only one that is complete enough to be worth discussing separately. The idea is this: the lives and perspectives of marginalized people should be used as a starting point for the production of knowledge. This is as opposed to the only implied alternative of production of knowledge starting with the lives and interests of the dominant group. We might then imagine, from this, that Harding seeks to exclude men from philosophy in a mirror to the way women were historically excluded. This is however not the case. Harding believes it is desirable, and in fact very much necessary for men to also produce knowledge using the lives and perspectives of women as a base, and even names some philosophers, men and women alike, who she considers to have done important philosophy from women's perspectives in the past. Additionally, this quote from the article is extremely important here: "for standpoint theorists, reports of marginalized experience or lives, or phenomenologies of the 'lived world' of marginalized peoples, are not the answers to questions arising either inside or outside those lives, though they are necessary to asking the best questions". Clearly Harding and standpoint theorists in general are aware of the tendency that they are accused of promoting, and are just as opposed to it as the empiricists are.

Harding presents some interesting distinctions between the subject of knowledge under empiricism and under her reformed model of science. Harding alleges that it is a problem that science is presented as being disembodied, as being information existing outside of time or society, because the things science studies are embodied, exist at particular times and observed by particular societies. I'm not sure I agree here! Is it actually necessary for the object of knowledge and the subject of knowledge to be similar in kind? Surely that kind of distance has its advantages as well as its disadvantages. The next claim is more interesting. Empiricism supposedly has a tendency to consider knowledge to be generated by generated by particular individuals and not by societies or groups. This is a view that I think was significantly more prevalent last century, when the article was written, but it is still the implication behind much of the existing pop history of science and the way science is taught in schools. But why is this not correct? Harding makes the interesting point that she only considers her beliefs to be knowledge when they are socially validated. That is, while the beliefs may have been formulated by an individual such as Newton, it is a scientific community, over centuries, that transformed them into knowledge, and later restricted that knowledge to motion at non-relativistic speeds. The distinction between a belief that is true and will be turned into scientific knowledge and scientific knowledge itself is actually quite important, because it leaves the door open for true beliefs that do not, for whatever reason, become knowledge. However, the social methods by which beliefs become knowledge in science are acknowledged by empiricists and are in fact a core part of empiricist ideology. The whole point of peer review and scientific discourse is that knowledge is generated through social legitimation, so it seems a bit off to assert that the standpoint epistemological project is aware of this and the empiricist project is not. What I will say is that empiricists rarely embrace obvious conclusions of the fact that scientific knowledge is socially constructed, so I kind of understand why Harding feels the need to point it out.

What is it that Harding actually proposes? It is to use the lives and perspectives of marginalized people as a starting point in the production of knowledge. The purpose of this is that "the subject of knowledge be placed on the same [...] plane as the objects of knowledge", that is, that we should consider the conditions under which a particular piece of knowledge was produced to be a component of that knowledge, and reported along with it, producing what Harding calls "Strong Objectivity". I think it can be useful to study the conditions under which ideas were created, and that this can provide productive avenues of critique. On the other hand, that is what History of Science and History of Ideas are already doing, so I'm not sure this point provides any methodological changes that would simultaneously be useful and not already be part of the revised empiricist model of knowledge production or easily imported into it. The last thing Harding proposes is for science to be integrated into democratic structures, but it is important to note that by this Harding means democracy in the sense that anarchists mean it, which is a notion too vague to constitute an actual methodological proposal. Harding devotes the last section of her article to explaining why it is the notion of objectivity that needs to be transformed, and not simply the scientific method, from what I gather her reason is mostly that it is the more intellectually coherent thing to do. If I were to propose my own methodological change in line with Harding's critique, it would be that scientists should attempt to identify communities that are relevant to their research, and then run their experiments and articles by sensitivity readers (which I understand is done in fiction writing), as a form of review complementary to peer review.

Harding's work is in some respects an unfortunate casualty of the march of history. She herself notes that her ideas will inevitably become obsolete over time, but I suspect that there are things she did not expect to happen as quickly as they did, that make the article less relevant now than it was when written. Her assumption that scientific knowledge production is necessarily the domain of the elite is somewhat dubious. Academia has become significantly more diverse and representative over the last three decades, and it has also become much less prestigious and well-paid (I do not think this is entirely a coincidence). It remains true that knowledge production is the domain of a particular non-representative subculture (in fact, the fact that they are involved in knowledge-production will itself make this culture non-representative in at least one way), but the only parts of that subculture that seem to be heavily integrated into the socioeconomic elite are people who were already prominent when the article was written. Additionally, empiricist science has had three decades to fortify itself against the critiques that were made of it, which it has done to at least some extent.

What have we learned? Well, first, that none of the people denouncing "standpoint epistemology" seem to know the first thing about it. This may be because there are people loudly promoting standpoint epistemology who don't know the first thing about it either. I have frequently encountered people who are clearly interacting with a large group of confidently ignorant people and then absorb their vocabulary while critiquing them. What I would suggest as a remedy is to ignore people who don't know what they're talking about. Second, we have learned that standpoint epistemology is probably not possible to do, and it is unclear if doing it would be worth the cost if it were. Lastly we have learned that critical studies are depressingly often simply studies of academic environments (reminiscent of psychology studies performed on a dozen white male college students). Why does Harding focus on scientific knowledge production, and not on knowledge production more generally? At the very least a mention of theories in media studies that are complementary to the account she provides would be appreciated. Or perhaps, even more ambitiously, any sort of reference to the real world rather than only endless discourse.

I would like to end by presenting an interesting open scientific problem that seems to be hard to grasp using empiricist methods, but might be more yielding to a standpoint approach. The article "Physician–patient racial concordance and disparities in birthing mortality for newborns" (2020) (sci-hub.do/10.1073/pnas.1913405117), an analysis of 1.8 million hospital births in Florida between 1992 and 2015, suggests that, while there is a generally higher rate of infant mortality for Black babies than for White babies, the rate of infant mortality for Black babies being delivered by White physicians is significantly higher than for Black babies being delivered by Black physicians (note that the infant mortality rate for White babies does not vary significantly with physician race). The authors of the study controlled for a number of possible confounding factors, and the only difference they reported was that specialized pediatric instruction reduced the size of the gap in outcomes but did not remove it entirely. Now, my own hypothesis to explain the data is that White doctors in Florida and likely the US more generally are doing racist, likely eugenicist, infanticide, and this hypothesis does not require the standpoint approach. But for people who want other explanations, I think approaching the issue with methods from standpoint epistemology might be productive.

[yourdeepestfathoms]

Foresighted

[Wing AU; Tour!Verse]

i was thinking about this duo again and just poor tour!Joey dealing with her shitty future sight, so i whipped this up super fast while eating cookie dough!!

EB belongs to @spooner7308! I am really sorry if I butchered her 

Word count: 1311

-------------------

Joan awoke crying.

She stared up at the ceiling, perfectly still, as if she were afraid that the bonds of her nightmare would pounce on her and snare her in its hellish grasp once again if she were to move.

Her vision bled at the edges, darkness seeping into the corners, the scarlet splatter of fresh blood burned into the back of her eyelids. Her breathing hitched, a whimper escaping her mouth unwittingly.

It was all she could see. Blood. Blood and a body, crumpled at her feet like a broken doll, throat slashed open wide and goddesses it’s too real, it’s too familiar--

Joan curled into a ball, pulling her wings over her head like a feeble shield. She knew, though, that they could not block out the visions. Nothing ever stopped them from shoving their way into her head, tainting her mind with their horror, warping her thoughts until it was the only thing she could think about.

Well. There was one thing that helped…

No. Their friendship was still so new. She couldn’t do this to her, trouble her with her nightmarish power. 

But-- 

Goddesses, she couldn’t be alone. Not after what she saw.

So, so lurched out of bed, ran out of her apartment, and flew to the vulture’s nest.

------

EB was not one to get scared. Not after she had been tortured and hung. But a stick-thin hybrid slamming into her window at two in the morning? That was enough to make her nearly jump out of her own skin.

She had approached the window cautiously, claws brandished and feathers standing on end, but loosened up when she saw who was outside.

  “WHAT the FUCK.” 

Joan’s thin, awkward body spilled in through the window like a puddle of hybrid, weird wings stretched out on the floor, even weirder tail lying like a dead snake behind her. Then, her big ears folded back and she whimpered sharply.

  “Oh no,” EB snapped. “You are NOT getting out of this by crying. Not this time!” She wouldn’t be admitting that saying that kinda rude statement made her heart clench up slightly in guilt. Nobody needed to know that part. “What the HELL are you DOING?! It is TWO in the GODDAMN MORNING! Some of us are TRYING to SLEEP!!”

Apparently she wasn’t thinking about her neighbors at the moment.

Joan made another woebegone noise on the floor. EB thought she wasn’t going to move, but then the hybrid lunged at her, threw her arms around her, and buried her face against her stomach, which was enough to make her flare her crest in surprise. She could feel growing wetness on her nightshirt, and that was enough to snuff out her irritation and replace it with worry.

  “Woah, kid,” EB set her hands on Joan’s shoulders to try and push her back so she could look at her face, but Joan audibly whined and dug her claws into her back. She winced. “Hey. It’s alright.”

A great, shuddering sob wrenched from Joan’s throat, and EB instinctively wrapped her wings around her, hoping it would be able to hold her together when she was so clearly falling apart.

  “I’m going to move you to the bed, alright? It’ll be a lot more comfortable than the floor.”

Joan didn’t answer, but she also didn’t say no, so EB took it as a good enough sign to scoop her up and make the short trek over to the bed. Upon climbing in next to her, Joan burrowed into her side and sobbed again.

  “Talk to me, love.” EB urged gently. She was still new to this comforting thing, but Joan’s crying hadn’t gotten any worse, so she thought she was doing well enough. “Let me help.”

  “Don’t--don’t--” Joan’s entire body heaved as she tried to speak. Her frail lungs couldn’t take both crying and talking at the same time. Hell, they could barely function when she was flying (EB had learned that she avoided going on flies with her because she actually couldn’t fly for long periods of time and also made “weird wheezy noises that she would make fun of”). 

  “Hey. Take a breath.” EB said.

  “Don’t go to work tomorrow.”

EB blinked. “What?”

Joan took a shuddering gasp, then broke into a coughing fit. EB thumped her on the back to help her along, maybe patting a bit too hard.

  “Don’t--work-- You can’t--”

EB blinked again, and then realization dawned on her.

  “Did you have a vision?”

Joan whimpered and nodded.

  “Aww. It’s sweet that you care about me, but I’ll be fine.”

  “NO!!”

Joan’s shrill tone of voice made EB jump. Stubby, chewed down claws dug into her arm and side as Joan clung to her for dear life.

  “You can’t! You can’t go! You can’t, EB, you’ll-- you’ll--” She broke down into sobs once more.

EB frowned. She knew how false visions were after hers got her killed, but then again she wasn’t exactly a Vesper, which could legitimately predict the future… But she also knew damn well what she saw was real... 

She shook her head. No. Those alleged ‘moon powers’ were bullshit and made up by pretentious Vespers to try and seem better than everyone else. Nothing was set in stone.

But maybe she should stay home. Just for Joan’s sake, of course.

  “Please, please, please, please,” Joan wept.

  “Hey. Hey, shh,” EB wrapped a wing around her, which she nuzzled into. “If it messes you up that bad, I’ll stay home.”

  “Please, please,” Joan begged.

  “I am. Don’t worry.” EB pulled the small hybrid in closer. “But you can’t always believe what you see. You’re going to stress yourself to death one day, I swear.” She grimly remembered when Joan didn’t eat for a full week because she was too busy trying to track the exact moment some random event would happen when she wasn’t performing. She pushed everything aside, even EB herself (which she would NOT admit that it stung a little; she just wasn’t used to not having the company of the scrappy little thing after her trailing after her like a lost duckling for awhile now, that’s all). “And what for, kid? Your visions aren’t exactly very accurate most of the time.”

Joan paused her crying to look offended. “Th-that’s not true!”

EB snorted. “Remember that time you said a freak storm was going to hit and the show would be cancelled but then it never happened and half of the crew was late to a performance because they slept in?”

Joan blushed. “Umm--”

  “Or that time you kept me from getting a new tattoo because, and I quote, ‘the bluebird doing it is going to hit on you and then stab you in the neck once you’re vulnerable.’”

  “I-I don’t--”

  “Or that time you INSISTED on staying at my apartment with me because you had to make sure there was no homeless guy underneath my bed, but I, personally, think you were just lonely and wanted to stay over for company.”

  “Okay! Okay!” Joan shielded her bright red face in her wings. “My visions are bad, okay…”

EB chuckled. “Nothing to be ashamed of. Visions suck anyway.”

Joan looked a tad bit wounded at that. “Yeah…” She mumbled. “I just-- I thought they made me special...”

EB bumped her gently. “You don’t need visions to be special, dumbass.”

Despite the swear, Joan smiled weakly. Then, it faded in a near instant and she said, “B-but what if something I see comes true?”

  “Well, did you see me smothering you in my wings right now?”

  “No?”

  “There you go.” EB said, and then smothered Joan in her wings. In the mass of feathers, Joan giggled softly. 

  “Ooh, are you growing mammary feathers?” 

  “OKAY--” EB flung the little hybrid out of her wings, causing her to giggle again, this time louder. 

  “No, no, I definitely saw something!” Joan said, then rubbed her temples like she was some kind of stereo typical psychic on TV. “Yes. I see very fluffy wings in your near fu-- OOF!!”

EB whacked her onto her back with one of her wings. “Oi. None of that shit. It’s stupid.”

Joan crawled back over to her side. “I won’t be wrong this time.” She said, flashing her a grin. It was wry and thin, but a grin nonetheless.

  “We’ll see about that.” EB said. “If you’re staying, get comfortable. And don’t steal my blanket this time!”

  “Now THAT is a future I know won’t happen.” Joan said.

EB groaned. “Great. Now the psychic jokes begin.”

  “You love me.” 

EB squinted at her. “Somehow.” She said. “You’re going to have to pay for your crimes against humanity the more you steal my shit, though. I’m going to start charging you for rent.”

  “I don’t see that happening in the fu--”

  “Enough of that!”