#i think if they were trying to tell an indigenous story they should have used indigenous voice actors right?

[nickbutnodick]

brother bear is probably atleast kinda racist in two different ways but it did have the eagle squeak and thats really cool

[txttletale]

hey not trying to be a shithead but genuinely curious; and not saying it isnt, but what makes honest hearts like super racist? because, okay its been a while but i dont remember it being *that* bad?

am i missing something? (probably)

well, essentially, the whole dlc hinges its plot on its idea of 'tribal' society vs. 'civilized' society. this is like... a distinction with origins in 19th century scientific racism used to argue that indigenous peoples were 'primitive' and 'backwards', a lesser form of life compared to the more developed 'civilized' people. and this is a distinction that is everywhere in all the fallout games, including new vegas (i think it's super fucking racist that the white gloves practice of cannibalism is constantly narratively linked to their 'tribal origins' and described in the terms of a regression or degeneration)--but honest hearts is about it and so it's really inescapable.

joshua sawyer can say whatever he likes about multi-ethnic diverse groups or whatever but the tribes in honest hearts are very clearly inspired by racist stereotypes about native americans--they are naive, gullible morons (follows-chalk can't understand the concept of a casino) at worst and noble savages with (textually) biblical innocence at best. their names, their art, their societies--all just a white guy's idea of "vaguely native american" without any research or care.

and imo worst of all (and this is something im aware the devs have properly acknowledged) they have absolutely no agency--your role in the dlc is to be a "civilized" outsider who tells them which of two white "civilized" mormons to listen to. none of the 'tribals' are able to make their own decisions or lead themselves--they need a mormon missionary to tell them what to do! there is no way to resolve the dlc without picking which white mormon missionary they should listen to other than just murdering everyone indiscriminately.

and, like--i am aware that honest hearts thinks it is gesturing towards a critique of these ideas. you can criticize the paternalism daniel shows towards the sorrows, and the dlc clearly intended it to be criticized--but that criticism is weak and hollow when the only way to follow up on it is to put a different white mormon in charge. it is the most archetypal white saviour narrative possible--and yes, i also know daniel was 'supposed to be asian', but that doesn't change anything because he is in fact, as the "civilized" missionary preaching paternalistically to the "primitive tribals", fundamentally white-coded

so i mean yea it's racist because it relies on racist stereotypes about native americans, mandates that a white person come and take charge of these poor stupid 'tribes'--but even if you changed all that, it's fundamentally about an idea of 'civilization vs. tribal society' that it accepts as a true and meaningful distinction as its core premise, and that is just a straight up racist premise.

(and the reason i keep bringing up that both daniel and josh are mormons is that mormons have a long and storied history of brutal violence and colonialism against indigenous peoples, from their original violent settlement of utah to their 'indian placement program' to their deeply racist scripture, which makes their portrayal as benevolent white saviours particularly galling and repulsive)

[mauesartetc]

FREE PALESTINE MASTERPOST

Trying to keep this blog more art- and creativity-focused in general, so I'll be removing the Gaza-related reblogs that are about a month old. But I'll use this post as a permanent archive that will update periodically (some of this information will grow dated as the situation develops, but I think it's important to keep a record of just how fiercely opposed people were to Israel's actions from this moment forward). We should all continue to raise our voices about this, and refuse to support politicians who enable genocide. Remember, they work for us, not the other way around. Keep going.

October 2023

-Donation links

-Social media links

-US congress ceasefire script

-Decolonizepalestine.com (information, mythbusting)

-More donation links

-Ways to pressure politicians for a ceasefire

-HUGE resource list

-"Is there anything I can do to help Palestinians besides call my representatives and beg them to stop killing people?"

-"We are isolated now"

-Palestine and landback

-210 PAGES of dead people's names.

-Bail money for Palestine Action

-Article list

-US action items

-Boycott info

-Grand Central Station shut down by protestors

-Message to white American citizens

-UK ceasefire petition

-How YOU can help Palestine (regularly updated!)

-"Please try amidst all this fury and grief to still have faith in the common people." (+donation links)

-Reminder about protest etiquette and privacy

-Prints for Palestine

-"We have no communication with the outside world. They are using their military might to harm us. We have no power but the power of God, no one but God. Please, pray for us." (spoken over mosque speakers)

-DAILY donate button + more donation links

-"Doesn't Israel have a right to exist too?"

-Script for US Congress calls

-Queerness under apartheid

-Sudan is also at war

-Hundreds of thousands of protestors in London

-Half a million.

-Tips for folks with phone anxiety

-This comic got real

-European and Canadian ceasefire scripts

-"The people of Gaza see the protests. That is reason enough to come even if nothing else." WE HAVE NOT FORGOTTEN YOU. WE ARE HERE.

November 2023

-More genocides than just Palestine

-How to buy e-sims to circumvent Gaza's internet blackout

-"Occupying territories is illegal. Resistance to occupying forces is legal."

-MASSIVE resource list

-"For decades now the media has told us Muslim men are savages, terrorists, wife beaters and everything in between. I want you to challenge this trope the next time you see it in the media. Let these photos serve as a reminder."

-"Don't stop talking about the Palestinian genocide. IT'S WORKING."

-UN resignation letter

-Israel won't allow Irish or Brazilian citizens to leave Gaza

-"Palestine must never be forgotten. Promise me that." (from the documentary "Children of Shatila")

-Gifs of pro-Palestine rallies around the world

-Support Palestine's last kufiya factory

-Protestors flood the streets in Washington DC

-Explanation of why calling representatives is a numbers game

-FREE ebooks on the history of this conflict

-Petition to screen films by Palestinian directors

-Call to boycott Gal Godot's work

-Indigenous activists block weapons shipment to Israel

-If you're attending a protest, DON'T TELL YOUR GOVERNMENT SHIT. Y'know, friendly advice.

-Links to support Palestine Action and Palestine Legal. Get in the way.

-Parallels between Israel and the surveillance tactics used by NYC mayor Eric Adams

-Don't spiral into doomerism. Persevere.

-Want a different strategy to contact your representatives? Try faxing them!

-Florida rep Michelle Salzman calls for the death of all Palestinians

-"The phone doesn't stop" :)

-Indian trade unions call on the government to scrap deals with Israel

-An overview of Israel's human rights violations, and two major political groups that have exacerbated Zionism in the US

-Israeli man explains why he's protesting

-"Whoever stays until the end will tell the story. We did what we could. Remember us."

-US House of Representatives votes to send billions of dollars worth of weapons to Israel

-Canadian email campaign and petitions

-"Canada's First Nation standing with Palestine"

-"Freedom is infectious as it is just and no one is free until they ALL are."

-Israeli forces invade al-Shia hospital

-Leaked list of weapons the US has sent to Israel

-Only 32% of Americans believe the US should support Israel

-Cop City action demonstrates how to protest effectively

-Refugee grandmother "doesn't have to imagine a multicultural and integrated Palestine- she remembers it".

-Protestors block the Bay Bridge in San Francisco (plus bail fund)

-Israeli forces attack schools in northern Gaza. SCHOOLS.

-Journalist shares an update from an Indonesian hospital and pleads for others to spread it around as it "may be the last video we are able to send"

-Scottish Parliament votes overwhelmingly to demand a ceasefire

-Sobering texts from a friend providing humanitarian aid in Gaza. "They have been distributing guns to the civilian settlers and allowing them into the West Bank to terrorize people" "We have been given option to leave. None took it"

-"the absolute bare minimum in this situation is 1) a complete ceasefire and immediate humanitarian aid in Gaza, 2) complete halt of all military foreign aid to the Israeli government, 3) the Israeli government being prosecuted for its war crimes in the International Criminal Court, and 4) land back and reparations for the Palestinian people. free Palestine means free Palestine, not just temporarily stop carpet bombing Palestine."

-"It's important that you keep posting and speaking about the ongoing genocide. This 5 day agreement isn't the end of things."

-Boosting the incredible, FREE daily donate button again

-Protests at the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade

-"REMINDER THAT ANTISEMITES AREN'T WELCOME HERE AND WON'T BE TOLERATED"

[rubberduckyrye]

I'd like to point to interpretation that Angie isn't portrayal of a native Polynesian islander because almost all the evidence around her character and what she says suggests she's not living in a village that has cult-like practices, but that she is in a straight up cult and is unaware of it. It explains a lot of stuff from the odd monotheism, why her "village" seems to only employ seemingly dark web shipping company, the police apparently bothering her "village" or her having an English name.

Referencing this Ask

I mean. That is one interpretation, sure, but to deny the fact that Angie is heavily coded to be Polynesian/Native Hawaiian is unfortunately ignoring the problem. Which is the problem I am trying to address itself.

Right in her promotional art, you can see that Angie is carving a statue--and it heavily resembles a tiki statue. Specifically this kind of Tiki Statue. Though since it is unfinished, it could be a full body version, but I digress.

She also mentions living on an island.

And the "natural disaster" that made the island smaller--that is probably heavily inspired by how Hawaii was used by US military and bombed frequently--which, naturally, made the islands smaller.

She also greets people in Salmon mode with "Alola," which is a reference to Pokemon Sun and Moon, which has it's main location heavily based off of Hawaii. Alola is a butchered way of saying "Aloha", which is a Hawaiian greeting.

Also, Angie having an English name matches with historical oppression in Hawaii. Where Hawaiians were forced to name their children with Christian White names and their Hawaiian names be their middle names. It was literally a law, at least, according to Wikipedia, for quite some time. (The fact that this is not easily verifiable is the very reason why having this discussion is so important--and why people need to stop trying to avoid the conversation.)

I understand the desire to want to dismiss the fact that she is a racist caricature because it sucks to enjoy a character who is one. I get it. However--trying to deny the fact that she is heavily coded to be Native Hawaiian/Polynesian is just sweeping the racism under the rug, and is a major problem when you have people like me who want to discuss the topic and how one should handle rectifying the canon narrative's bigotry.

The mere fact that she is so heavily coded to be Native Hawaiian/Polynesian makes the whole cult thing part of the racist caricature. Indigenous people (especially Indigenous Polynesian cultures) are subject to extreme racist stereotypes that include human sacrifices and savagery--and while Angie's culture isn't developed in canon enough to know for sure if it was truly as savage as, say, the King Kong Indigenous folk, the cult behaviors are a sort of "cousin" to that savagery. We as a society see human sacrifices as barbaric, as savage, and even when in a cult setting, we still present these topics in that fashion.

I'm sorry, anon--but I'm going to ask you only this one time to not derail the conversation I'm trying to start. I understand that there are interpretations that help explain away the bigotry--and this is one legitimate way to deal with bigotry in canon media, or so I've been told--but what I want is a full blown discussion on the subject. I don't want people trying to tell me "Oh b-b-but she can't be a racist Caricature, because (X)!" Because that is dismissing the problem to begin with.

This is a problem. This is a discussion about racism in V3's narrative. There is no getting around it--no matter how much you explain away the writing with headcanons and theories, these problems are still here.

So please stop trying to sabotage my desire for a discussion.

I'm going to note that I LOVE Angie as a character. I think that, when you remove the racism in her character stories, you have a very interesting and compelling female character of color who's intelligence rivals that of the smartest V3 characters. These aspects of her character I adore--but to ignore the racism, for me, is to just turn away from the problem and, in turn, contribute to the racist way fandom treats these kinds of characters.

So let me speak. Let me find people who will talk to me about it. Let me grow and learn. Please, for the love of god, let me learn.

[wild-west-wind]

Hi 👋As a Park Ranger (interpretative, like me?), I assume you know all about how the NPS was formed- most of the land was brutally, illegally taken from the local tribes. I've been having a moral dilemma about my role in the national park system. I love educating the public and being a positive influence, but am I upholding an oppressive system? I know that if I were to switch to education or to museums, it'd be the same question. What I'm asking is: how do you reconcile with that?

I mean, this is true of all the land in the US, so it's bigger than the park service.

Before I dig into this as a white person, here's what Deb Haaland has to say:

I think that the Park Service has a lot to reckon with historically, and I think parks lately are showing some interest in trying to do that. From big parks like Yellowstone bringing diverse Indigenous stakeholders to to table on management decisions while also supplying buffalo to regrow and strengthen herds thousands of miles away, to Canyon de Chelly's requirement that tourists travel into the canyon only with a Navajo guide in recognition of the location's sacred nature, to Pipestone National Monument celebrating ongoing traditional pipestone quarrying, to advocacy for protection by the Department of the Interior at Bears Ears.

As a (pretty much entirely) white interp ranger, I understand that I'm living in someone else's home, but I was living in someone else's home when I lived in LA too, and none of that is unique to the US. And honestly I think, for the tremendous flaws of the National Park idea, at least we try to preserve things. In a lot of colonial nations that hasn't been the case.

I think more National Park Sites should form better relationships with local tribal governments, and see what they want. Different people have different relationships with different places, and will want different things. I think the Park Service should open the door to co management more, and encourage more opportunities for Indigenous people to tell their own stories and not leave it all in the hands of randos like us. I think we're moving the right direction in that regard.

The fact of the matter, in the end, is that none of this begins or ends with the Park Service. It's a puzzle piece, a tool used to enact, enforce, repair, undo, and uphold the ideals of a nation that has never effectively dealt with its past, present, or future. I think protecting land from development and preserving natural spaces is a valuable, albeit naive, goal. It can't be done in a vacuum though. As I look toward a future of the National Parks, I see a lot more Native involvement in their management. That will look different in each site, in reflection of the different cultures there. I can't speak to what that will look like for anywhere in particular, but it is happening already, and as educators it's part of our job to explain the whys and hows of that to people who don't get it, and who think sharing will mean losing something they love. At the end of the day, that thing they loved was broken, and there is good momentum behind fixing it, and most people can understand that given time.

I think it's good that you feel guilty. It means you're paying attention. I think the important thing now is to turn that into momentum and passion. Figure out what you can do and do it.

[dotthings]

So Sterlin Harjo actually did make the call himself to end Reservation Dogs with S3, but he did in a way that was very evidently him taking control of a story that means a lot to him and seize control back in a system that all too often grabs control from creatives.

I told them that the show’s too important to have somebody else tell me that it’s ending. I wanted to end it on our terms. I don’t want FX or Hollywood or the audience telling us it’s time to pack up because it’s dragging on. I want to go out the way we came in. I’m just really proud of the show. I didn’t ever want someone to tell me it’s time to pack it up. I think it’s better to drop the mic than to get the mic cord cut. You know?... They were shocked. People have asked me if it was their idea. No. I want to respect the nature of the storytelling. This story is coming to an end. I did tell FX, though, there are all of these ideas that I have for spinoffs and stuff happening in the same world. So all that’s up on the table and there’s some ideas that they really like. If someone else told me it was time to end, it would be so offensive to me, because I care about these actors, these writers, these directors, these characters. And I care about the whole crew. If someone told me it was time to pack it in, I would want to battle with them.

There's a lot of other great material in the interview about Indigenous rep and history, it's a very good read. I'm sad about this show ending--these characters and the storytelling style got into my heart and I know how rare a show with this kind of Indigenous rep is. Reservation Dogs is produced, written, directed, and acted by Indigenous artists. But the good news is it sounds like Sterlin Harjo for sure plans to revisit that world, and FX was very surprised about him ending it so soon (they got a taste of how it feels) and interested in having more from him.

Shows like this shouldn't have to be "unique." I know representation is getting better, but it's also slow to improve.

He also talks about the strikes and industry issues:

I still don’t know anything about this industry, but I definitely think people be compensated. We’re in a strange time where the viewership and streaming is not reported and we don’t know. We should be participating in the viewership and whatever revenue that creates. We created the show, so we should be participating in that. I don’t pretend to have any of the answers or know how to achieve that. I was just surprised to be making a show. Once I did that, I realized all these other things I had to try and navigate because I want to keep making work... It’s not a show that has some famous lead. It’s a bunch of people that have never been on screen before, and I want them to have careers. Before that, I want them to be able to survive and pay rent. That’s the only way they’re going to keep working. It’s the only way I’m going to be able to keep working with them. If the industry doesn’t change, if it turns its back on people like that, and then it’s harder for me to make shows with actors that I find interesting and people that I want to work with. People that haven’t been given opportunities before.

[anarchoherbalism]

Some things that drive me up the goddamn wall:

Western medicine is not that old. CHARITABLY its like, 400ish years old, but all the most popular ways of defining western medicine (e.g. based on the modern scientific study) really only apply to information-generating and medicine-distribution practices that started in the late 1800s and were codified in THE TWENTIES. Sure, no ideas come out of nowhere and modern western medicine absolutely has a lineage and if you want you could make a good argument for tracing that lineage back to say, Galen. (Side note: american Doctors love to claim Galen when it makes them sound Storied and Dramatic but foist him off on us stupid herbalists as soon as anything controversial by modern standards comes up). But what's a lot more important to think about is that prior to the past hundred years or so, the diversity of actively-practiced, available medical traditions that existed in "the west" was so much greater than it is today, and if you go back another hundred or more years it's bigger and bigger. For most of human history in most parts of the world medicine has been a great, fluid cultural field (like cuisine! or religion! in fact these three subjects overlap quite a bit!!) that becomes forcibly homogenized and codified as part of nation-building. That has happened and is still happening here in the west as empire seeks to homogenize culture, through, yknow, genocide; and minority medical philosophies are deligitimized, criminalized, and culturally persecuted. Indigenous and folk traditions survive in small bubbles of people desperately trying to keep them alive.

Following from #1, the majority of people on the "left" to postleft & whatever recognize, at least nominally, that this is Bad. However, what most white people seem to be doing with the idea that Cultural Extermination Is Bad is grant some kind of nebulous exception status to their nebulous idea of "Indigenous medicine" while otherwise paying lip service to the western medical progress narrative: What "we" do now is so much better than what "we" "used to" do. First of all, "we" here is an incoherent concept unless you want to buy into the idea that dominant western culture (or civilization more broadly) is an inevitable evolution that all cultures will come to, which is uhm. Social darwinism. Second of all, "used to" is just a straight up lie in most cases unless it's very narrowly referring to any number of practices that were codified in like, 1930 by the still-budding medical establishment and have since been discarded by the extant medical establishment. Diverse, Indigenous & folk medical traditions are still fucking around and alive and being used, adapted and added to. Some are holding on by a thread and plenty are very closed practices now out of defensiveness, while others struggle to be known more widely because of medical licensure laws that claim to be about "safety" but were always about stamping out minority medical traditions. What a lot of motherfuckers miss is that when the western medical establishment tells the story about how everything is so much better now and we know the right way to be, they are telling the same story I told under heading one. The nonviolent story of progress that "we" just "discovered" "new ideas" is conveniently shuffling around the genocide and criminalization that are STILL actively trying to stamp out the """"old"""" ideas.

Does all of this mean that we should just willy nilly accept/use/treat as valid every single thought anyone has ever had about medicine? Fuck no! People have bad ideas sometimes! Medical traditions are LIVING traditions for good reasons. It just means that I wish people would sit down and THINK for a second before making a claim about non-western or historical medical traditions, ask themselves "is my only source for this claim the current western medical establishment?", and if "yes", spend any amount of time trying to find an alternate perspective. If you can't find any source that isn't affiliated with genocide and forced cultural assimilation on the practice you want to talk shit about, ask yourself "why isn't there a proponent of this practice around to defend it?" and like, go from there.

I truly do not care what medical philosophy any given individual person feels most comfortable using for themselves. Your reasons for preferring western medicine might very well be rooted in shit i disagree with/find abhorrent, I might think you could be happier (or more likely to survive climate collapse) if you were at all open to any strategy other than the one that's entirely dependent on empire and extraction, but I am frankly too tired and too busy to be remotely invested in what people I don't know are doing with their bodies. What frustrates me is how little critical thinking is being done when it comes to medicine, how comfortable everyone seems to be with incoherent cognitive dissonance when it comes to criticizing specific instances of oppression/nationalism/racism/etc in western medicine but still buy the overall narrative in a way that renders those critiques superficial, and how successful the project of western medical nationalism has been at claiming a monopoly on the story.

[mjspenumbra]

It's 3:40 AM and I should really be asleep but nevermind that. Saw you also reblogged the 'come talk about my fic' thing which is funny because your fic actually tangentially came up in conversation yesterday. We were talking about natural disasters at work and which ones would be the worst and I remembered lahars exist because of your fic and after teaching everyone else what they are I 'won' the debate. Which just goes to show that your fic still lives rent free in my mind.

So here's a question, I've talked at length about my favorite part(s) of it in the comments, what is your favorite part/theme/detail(s) of it?

Glad I helped you win the debate, lol. This is why I’ve always told writers who ask about such things to do their homework! Even when you’re writing fantasy, the more "real" you can make the world, the more it will work for the readers.

Anyhoo…. Oh my, a favorite part/theme/detail. With something as long as OTP, that’s not an easy ask. But I shall try.

My sister has a quote she likes from a book she read way back when, "your god is too small." The general concept is that many people tend to view God only within the limits of whatever religion they have been exposed to and raised in. Within the confines of whatever dogma they’ve been exposed to, they ultimately stuff God into that box and never let Him out (and for the record, I use "Him" because that’s what I learned as a kid in the Catholic Church. My only positive parental figure was my father, so while I tend to have that sort of relationship with my Maker, I also know that it's absurd to think that the Being Who created everything is not Himself Everything. It's English that lacks a gender-neutral or all-encompassing pronoun. So if someone else prefers to think of God as Her, Them, It, whatever, I am not offended, nor do I mean to offend with my personal choice of pronoun. That being said, very Catholic Colombia of the 1950s would have said "Him," though persons with native backgrounds might have debated the matter, depending on which indigenous group was discussing the matter). ANYWAY: so why can’t Bruno be both a seer of the future AND an actual prophet? Why can't God be more a part of human existence than humans believe? So many people who go to church every Sunday (or Saturday, or whichever day) have religion, but what they don’t have is actual faith. They say the words, come together with fellow "believers," but so, so many of them don’t actually have faith in what they profess, in God. It's sad. I’ve had several friends who spent their entire lives bouncing from one church to another, one religion to another, looking for answers they never found because the one answer they lacked was faith. They wanted proof, and that’s a whole different animal.

So here we have Bruno with the Gift of seeing the future. I’ve read far too many stories where the burden of his Gift strangled any semblance of faith in God. Being weary of a world that seems bent on crushing hope and the belief that the world can be a good place, on telling us that the future is doomed to be dystopian, I wanted to try telling a story that instead embraced hope, where Bruno understood that there was another side to his Gift, that of being an actual prophet from time to time, and what would happen if the people of the Encanto — and his family — finally understood this. So this, I think, covers my favorite theme. Wouldn’t be a story but for that.

I think my favorite parts are the chapter where Bruno reveals his Secret Past to the grandkids, the Big Dramatic Climax, and the very end. They describe the circle of his journey through the story: broken man who has lost everything, who becomes more than a man by surrendering to his faith, and in the end becomes a father in more than one sense, and finds joy.

My favorite detail is probably Bruno's serenity room, along with Pepa's Grove and Julieta's Garden. I personally had a hard time believing that a Miracle that created Casita would just throw the kids to the wolves with powerful Gifts without giving them some kind of training ground — though alas, they were misunderstood and thus misused at the time. Alma needed to loosen up!

sheesh, I don’t do short in much any of my writing, do I? 🤪

[booasaur]

Did you finish Night Country? If so what did you think of it? I loved Navarro—Kali Reis absolutely sells that stately sense capability and strength and hotness lol—and think Jodie/Kali really sold their relationship being the core of the show I also mostly loved how things played out (didn’t see the ending coming at all) but I wish the show had been given more episodes to flesh certain plots and characters out because some things felt a little superficial (it’s interesting to me that so many people were lost because I thought the show made a lot really obvious and could’ve actually used some more mystique) and enhancing them would’ve made things that much better and cohesive. But trying to find balanced criticism or commentary about this show is hard because everyone defaults to racist, misogynistic, no nuance takes on how it’ll never compare to s1 and just refuses to even see a little bit of the good. Idk I feel like you can dislike it and want better and still recognize the good aspects of this season and the value of telling indigenous stories. At this point I almost wish the showrunner had been able to make a new series like she wanted to, instead of having to be tied to the true detective name because maybe people would approach this with more honestly and openness

Hey, sorry for the late reply. Well, I know I've replied a LOT later before and mostly decided to stop saying sorry because I'd have to say every time, but at the moment, I'm having more difficulty than I used to in remembering how I felt when I finished the ep, so I wish I'd just responded at the time.

Let me see... First, I did laugh like an idiot when they took turns falling down the ice caves like idiots, especially Danvers.

Other than that, I liked the ending but it felt a bit too neat... I think if they'd changed around some stuff, it might have offered a bit more tension because, well, at that point, it seemed they'd let more killers go than caught them. Honestly that and all the quibbles I had, where I wish we'd seen some stuff seeded better and elaborated on more at the end, like you said, that all could have been helped with just giving them the two extra eps they should have gotten. I was thinking that too, at the time, lol, I remember now, when I read your ask, I went on this whole rant (to myself, in my head) about those two eps could have done so much, how the streaming model had killed TV, how these shortened seasons were basically like individual movies with an occasional sequel. I know this is an anthology miniseries and the story finished, but still! Too much is suffering for the same reason. I haven't really been able to get into a single new Trek, it's just a different form of storytelling. What can you do in 10 eps every once in a long while, with a full ensemble cast.

I literally looked up how many eps Discovery ends at and it's 65. Compare that to my home Trek, Voyager, where it flourished with new life when Seven appears. Guess when that happens. Ep 68! I literally had to chart the two shows:

Look at those huuuuge Discovery breaks.. It's not just that shows used to be given so much screentime, we just got so much so quickly. I absolutely forget what's going on in between seasons of most shows now. In terms of actual amount of time, Discovery actually lasts longer! But I barely know the characters or their stories. I can't say much different for Picard or SNW (barring what I brought in from before). There's only so much character growth and relationship evolution. How am I supposed to love them? Know them?

Maybe that's why I'm gravitating so much to soaps lately...

Anyway, it's more capitalism than just streaming, of course, which also speaks to your other point; I didn't know Issa Lopez just wanted to make a new show and they put it under the True Detective name?? But isn't that just so typical of all these issues! Like, the fact that they're making an NCIS spin-off with Tony and Ziva? They're retreating to the safest, most conservative ideas they can think of. It's happening with everything, companies dropping DEI initiatives, politics returning to big money white guys. Sticking this female-led extremely Indigenous-sympathetic premise with this particular franchise with its defensive white dudebro fanbase.

I wonder how much that's related to the obligatory bigoted backlash to any media perceived as "woke" now. It's all feeding each other, right, bad actors in each space taking advantage and fanning the flames, but it's beyond annoying now to have watched a normal show and go online and see this rabid overreaction to stuff that isn't even on the screen.

The worst part is, as you said, there's no room for the middle ground. I myself don't want to go into detail about the issues I had because there's so much unfair criticism. Like, if I thought it was a little unsubtle in its messaging at times, how can I say that when these fiends are tearing it apart for daring to even have the message. I'm just glad that Foster and Reis were so good and the show so well received that the fanboys can keep crying to each other about s1.

I will say, a huge part of that ending landing was Diane E. Benson as the older Indigenous Alaskan lady being cool as hell. She was so nonchalant and mischievous and angry as hell underneath it all! That's why I wished there was just a bit more tension, a bit more to that scene in terms of its place in the ep, rather than just its place in the story where it provided a reveal.

The handling of the killer reveal was what I found a bit pat, just being like, well, that happened, okay, bye, but the reveal itself? Freaking loved it. Those men deserved what they got and more. :<

Some things I'm glad they didn't go into more, the accident in the past, and what exactly happened to Navarro. Let me imagine she and Danvers are off together in some liminal space. :P

Anyway...I guess I did remember a lot, lol. And now we have a season 5 ahead. :)

[thenixkat]

Huh, the This Land is Our Land graphic novel is on my normal comic pirating site. It's a Jaime Reyes story. I assume there will be immigration themes based on the title

Jaime you live in the DC universe, i hope, aliens have been a known factor for decades (if it's not set in the DC universe it should have established that fact)

like its hard to keep aliens a secret if Earth's being invaded every other week yeah ok. immigration is a major part of the story

damn if only there were superheroes who are billionaires who could do shit about US policies and also house all the homeless with their pocket change

like the richest superheroes in the world do have more money the the USA's entire national budget and could flex if they gave a fuck about poor people don't tell me this is gonna do the bullshit of Jaime being the first Blue Beetle and erase everything great about him being a legacy character… I'd really hate that. Even his fucking movie managed to keep the legacy thing

is that supposed to be Brenda??? Yeah I noticed that Jaime seems kinda pale in this but why is Brenda darker than him??

or maybe it's the more yellow undertones? instead of the more red but still why is Jaime lighter than Brenda? why does Brenda have no freckles?

did we just slap the name Brenda on an entirely new character?

Jaime I know yer a teen and just got singled out by the teacher but pls have a stronger stance against racism aimed at your demographic

I'm not vibing with this comic thus far

Xiomara exists in this timeline but she's …. in the same school as these guys…

no that actually is supposed to be Brenda ok she could be not half white but still a redhead with freckles like yall can put freckles on a browner character

also pls don't tell me part of this story is Jaime feeling responsible for reaching out to a racist white boy to get him to not be racist cause that's annoying but also why couldn't yall have had half-white Brenda arguing with the racist white boy? the white teacher might not have been as quick to shut her down if she wasn't visibly brown and angry and its not like being mixed makes her any less indigenous if she's actually participating in her culture why the fuck does this Jaime keep trying to give this blatently racist kid the benefit of a doubt. I hate this

ok at least Jaime randomly finds Khaji Da in the dirt of a construction site and not like found a meteor with it in it.

true it isnt that hard to trick racists online

just found out that a new chap of Kaiju no. 8 dropped that might finally have the mysterious larva's backstory and i'm more invested in that than this Jaime origin story retelling so

ok back to the Blue Beetle graphic novel that i wasnt enjoying i'm not going to sympathize with white teenagers getting radicalized into being racist pieces of shit.

fuck em just I dont like how much of a benefit of a doubt Jaime keeps giving this racist fuckhead and I will assume the story is gonna try to reach out to and reform the racist and ugh

why does Jaime know so little about racism? Sir, yer Mexican-American and live in Texas how have you not had the racism talk with yer parents? or experienced shit firsthand

huh Jaime finally gets a Khaji Da human sona hallucination

its honestly underwhelming compared to the other Khaji Da human sonas I've seen

shoutout to Dan seeing Khaji Da in his mind as a whole ass bedazzled Pharoah

they should have hired a furry to make an anthro sona design for Khaji Da cause this is not doing it for me

i just dont think i'm the right audience for this comic ok so that's just what the Reach look like in this timeline. It's not hitting. But I see what that person said about in this comic the Reach trying that 'yer the chosen one' shit on Jaime

Khaji Da said wild animals are dangerous and is throwing down with a bobcat and then a random hawk passing overhead

Khaji Da: I'm giving you superstrength but pls practice safe lifting techniques

i cant relate, shooting at white supremacists aiming weapons at yer friend is ok

like yes this Khaji Da is trying to manipulate Jaime into being a Reach puppet but there's legit nothing wrong with shooting white supremacists aiming weapons at yer friend

hell white supremacists are cowards, threaten their lives enough and they'll fucking leave town or shut up with the hate speech

it does sound like we're just erasing the whole Blue Beetle legacy for this even if Jaime found Khaji Da in the dirt

I'm with Brenda use those powers on some white supremacists

ya dont have to kill them, just scare the shit out of them and they will show their selves out

just i dont think i'm the audience for this story

i'm not the kind of bastich that goes for talk a bitch out of being racist stories, I'm a bastich that goes 'ya wanna be racist? die then'

again Jaime get with the program and scare the shit out of some white supremacists

dont be a fucking coward like they targeted yer family my guy

and yet Jaime's bitch ass is still against doing anything even just leaking names of the fucking racists attacking people

this is making me dislike Jaime Reyes yay! Go Brenda

Jaime the white supremacists are gonna do shit regardless and are less likely to do shit if you make them fear for their fucking lives

man I hate this version of Jaime as a person

i have zero sympathy for this white boy. But like of fucking course the actively violent white supremacist would attack an anti-racism protest what fucking world do you live in where that wouldn't be fucking obvious

again i have zero fucking sympathy for this racist white boy who decided to back out of a hate group b/c he's scared for his own safety story, I am not going to fucking sympathize with the racist white boy just cause he got scared and decided to switch sides.

shoulda had some deep insights b4 he started spewing racist shit in class and then joined a fucking hate group

disgusting

yeah i fucking hate this version of Jaime Reyes trying to fucking appeal to the humanity of white supremacists and get them to see the error of their ways? what kind of fucking dangerous ass preschool shit is that?

that is the emptiest fucking threat i've ever seen

again who gives a shit if aliens shoot up some actively physically violent white supremacists that came out to hate crime people?

just this story is way too fucking sympathetic to racists like oh no they chose to be bigots to make themselves feel better the poor babies yeah def no legacy here for the Blue Beetle its just a name that some random kid comes up with ok i finished it went where i thought it would. Very much didn't like this story. It's way too sympathetic to racists and I'm def not the target audience for it

[faithfromanewperspective]

It seems like no coincidence that you sent me an ask right after I had a brooding session that led to me wanting to send you an ask. Here we are 🤭

Mine's unrelated to music and chronic illness though: I wanted to get your view on what being Australian is to you. Who are we? What are we? I've been having this identity crisis all my life because my ancestors are immigrants from everywhere, with different cultures, and I feel like I don't belong here despite how the land has also shaped me into who I am.

Sometimes I think at the core of the culture of Australia is loneliness/isolation and I also wanted to know your take on that too.

Hope you're well, lovely 💛💛💛

ooh. wow. hmm. i'm... not doing great as you can probably tell by the time at which i'm posting this. but i surprisingly have a lot of thoughts about this.

for me, it's a connection to one of the oldest lands there is--i've studied a lot of geology, i've had to for my degree, and because of the lack of volcanic activity for so long our land, everything about it, is real old, and that's something i have a lot of respect and reverence for. i've also been drawn to Indigenous culture and Indigenous land stewardship for the longest time: the community, the spirituality, the sense of survival and justice, the shared resources, the storytelling, the art, the connection to the land. i'm not the least bit indigenous to anywhere really so i don't really know why, but you've made me realise something writing this, i should start to go seek that out a bit more and find community and stuff in it, it might be part of what i'm longing for.

diversity and a loss and reconstruction of identity is i also think part of it too. we are so diverse, aussies are from everywhere, from those who were born to a long line of stewards of this great land, to all those who came to it from everywhere: all parts of europe, asia, new zealand--everyone's family has a story of how they came here and why, of a brand new start for one generation, and everyone after having to go through putting together the fragments and figuring out who they are, reinventing it as they face new things compared to what any of their ancestors ever have. in a way it's about deciding again and again to rediscover your home culture/s and figure out how to fit them into a context of diversity, find your people or bring a new tradition to your people, but also take tradition lightly in terms of it has to fit around survival in harsh conditions, it always does, practical comes first which I'll get into but i'd say part of it is navigating the patchwork of cultures and realising yours is never going to be everyone but also no one can take it away from you, realising that because they try, but ultimately no one who does that will ever succeed. not even the colonisers who generations down have made us forget a lot of our Indigenous culture and feel empty as a result; if you're here on this land you've got some responsibility to care for it and every generation longs for something we don't quite have: this is where it's so useful to have other cultures around, because we need to learn from each other. we do so much better when we do. (alternatively, say you grew up in sydney without saying you grew up in sydney. it's a whole world there if you haven't experienced it).

but I would say that not only loneliness and isolation but also loss of identity are core to being Australian. questioning it and finding it again, being nothing like you ever imagined. there's a lot of generational trauma written into this land that's going to take quite a while to recover. we've all left it behind in the past, we've more often than not experienced some degree of violence in doing that be it from colonisation and the way the cities we have now (aussies are drawn to cities, the stats show us as one of the most urbanised places in the world, no matter what the stereotypes are) being Not Born Of Indigenous Input to violence of poverty and being driven to crime then shipped halfway across the world away from loved ones, to violence of displacement from other lands from poverty or war or overpopulation. we're all kind of unmoored even though many don't ever show it, we're all coming from a place of having lost that deep connection to self and either trying to find it or not bothering and I think it does really show in the way we connect to each other, the way we connect to the land, the misunderstanding and exploitation and often trying to be something we're not.

but i'd also say our strength is in our survival. we're good at coming together in natural disasters, we're often really creative when it comes to getting by, we're hard working, we know we're entitled to nothing. it comes when you've lived in conditions like ours: poor soil, harsh weather--be it drought or too much rain, we've been there, we've seen it, every year and every season is like we jump to a different climate zone, our agriculture isn't suited to our climate or our soil and our cities aren't planned but we get by anyway. we're hardworking and humble and when you put an aussie in another country and another setting you really see that. and we do it like it's nothing and still think it's nothing and don't understand compliments on it, we're self-deprecating like that. survival happens if we all do well enough to get by, independence leads to interdependence, and as a result we don't like people who take too much and we want those who are struggling to succeed. we aren't all like that, sure, but you see someone trying to get ahead and getting up themselves because of it? they won't last long as an aussie. community can and will ostracise them and no one's gonna feel bad. we hate our politicians but we have them anyway. we don't let them get too big-headed, we know they will, we have artists specifically employed to make fun of them. we're not perfect at this but they're older white men (problem) we don't feel bad about bullying them even if it'd be more productive to have a diverse group of people--but then we might actually feel bad about bullying them so that won't do. politics are for show anyway to get along with other countries. aussies don't care about anything we can't see with our own eyes and touch with our own hands, preferably holding a shovel or too-big set of tongs. 'she'll be right, mate' we say but really we just don't want to deal with it. why would we when getting by for ourselves is hard enough? don't talk about abstract concepts. but behind the survival if you break into that part of our minds that longs to be seen and cared for, you might have gotten our attention even though we will never admit that kind of vulnerability (it's why so many of us find western models of therapy etc so confusing. we're hardened folk)

there's a lot of negative but we kind of live with it i guess? we don't pretend it isn't the case. and sometimes we do something good. aussies invented permaculture, for example. i'm sure there are other things right there but i can't call them to mind right now. do you know what permaculture is? go have a look into it. it's one of my favourite things. in a more academic sense we invented water sensitive urban design and biodiversity sensitive urban design as well. and we needed to from a place of survival. it's the beauty of it, it's authentic and when it's there on the ground we can touch it so it's real and other countries can then see what we do and implement it themselves. with these things having popped up in recent years i think we're in a stage of transition as a nation, we're still a patchwork of confused cultural threads trying and failing at being european with our education and agriculture models--we haven't grown into ourselves yet. we haven't realised the potential of all the cultures we have to inspire something better. we still get a bit scared of each other. we still haven't figured out who we are--and personally, looking back at my family, generations of immigrants whose children become immigrants to somewhere else, i feel like there is a lot to discover that i have no idea how to find. how to internalise. my ancestors come from all over the world, and no one has had to pull together such a diverse range of ancestral and found cultural influences until me (i should give myself credit for that. and also not just talk about it but actually do it). and then when it comes to things like religion we're skeptical but also just long to be loved. and we'll take what gives that if we don't have to talk about it, but we won't take what limits us, and i feel like we're still figuring out how to lose tradition and hierarchy while keeping the heart of all the faith traditions we have here. another thing i should investigate. because we're still trying to be someone else i think, and it's not working. so to sum it up i think we're a whole lot of unfounded potential and messy sort-of functionality. no one does it like we do. not even us.

but this is coming from someone who is strangely really connected to everyone, like it's a bit of a weird talent and a little bit hippie (but aussies are hippies too, even though the hardened country folk would never admit it and the city folk don't have time for it and that leaves the label to tasmanians and northern rivers/byron coast folk who the rest of us associate it with). like i can connect with anyone for better or worse, and i do, i can't stop myself, but it's also tiring. who needs the autonomy and freedom of the bush and the novelty and connection and opportunity of our biggest cities. i'm well suited to my career i guess, but not so much self care! and yet. the reason i know how to survive is that it's handed down from ancestors from literally everywhere. we've all brought that and faced this harsh land in the last century, and now it's up to me to do that in a modern setting with modern problems like overpopulation and biodiversity loss.

and i'll also admit a lot of my conceptulisation comes from i am australian by the seekers. i generally sing/play the song without the third verse (or whichever one is about the war) because i find that in this moment in time it's not actually the biggest thing in aussie history that shaped us--it's more a global thing we were dragged into and we do better to leave it and instead think about ancient history, about the people who came with colonisation who weren't all bad individually though they were forced into a bad situation and became many of our ancestors, about the land as a living thing with a spirit, and about the things we create.

otherwise if you're looking for something that more captures what i think you might relate to being australian and some of the generational trauma you see around you that's so woven into our country if not your immigrant family who are trying to fit in but haven't yet specifically there's bloodline by luke hemmings. you know, because at the moment i can't shut up about him or his music.

anyway, do yourself a favour (heck, do me a favour) and get out of that country town of a suburb you live in. it's very insular, possibly one of the most insular places i've seen in this land and i've been to a lot of country towns and urban precincts. we love walkable cities but we yearn for more, more enrichment in the enclosure, and so literally, get on a train and go somewhere, anywhere, and notice things. notice how they do things there. and let me know if it feels good to do that. I will mail you a go card with money on it if that's what you need. go find yourself

[jyndor]

I'm so sorry you've become the blog for andor discourse 😬 can I just say it's surprising nobody is talking about how white this cast and crew is? yea diego is the lead and there are still some poc in the cast (and as you've said a lot of the black characters die) my issues with the show can be blamed on the creative team. for example maarva is something a lot of people have said they have problems with and I think an indigenous, latinx, or black writer might have taken a different route or chosen to keep cassian with his birth family.

lmao anon naur I am definitely not Theee Blog for Andor Discourse there are plenty of people blogging about it.

but yeah I 10000000% agree. Andor is INCREDIBLY white. On screen and off screen.

I mean Diego is a white Latino, even if that means he's racialized weirdly in the US for Racialization Works Differently In Different Places reasons - I mean I am not equipped to delve into this and I don't think anyone needs to hear it from me LOL. But he is Cassian so lol I mean I doubt anyones gonna be mad at him for playing Cassian since he plays him in Rogue One 🤣 although there were idiots saying he was miscast bc he's idk too old which ... LOL he PLAYED CASSIAN IN ROGUE ONE.

But they could have easily fixed how white the show feels by A) not focusing so much on Mon Mothma and like idk the wealthy Coruscanti upper class, B) keeping Cassian's old backstory lbr lol but even if they wanted to change Fest to Kenari (😡)... let Cassian have his birth family, write an indigenous mother and father* who they are clearly trying to represent to some extent, and maybe even still tell the immigrant's story with the use of diaspora - have Cassian and his family move away from home. Instead of writing his mother as a white woman coded as being from the Global North who has STOLEN an indigenous child. Idk I'm really not the person to come up with that story, it's not for me.

As for Clem, that gets to what you're saying about how like all of the Black characters die. I've talked about how it seems like all of the dark skinned Black men die in violent ways but with relatively little fanfare in comparison to white characters. Clem has the most time spent in his death, but even then he is fucking hanged (and thank God they barely showed it jfc) and it's in service of a non-Black character's story. Darker skinned characters in general get less dialogue, less screen time and experience more direct trauma than lighter skinned characters. I know, I know - something something that's the point that's how fascism and racism works. Yeah but does anyone really think these white guy writers are the ones who should be telling that story?

Idk I think there's a good argument for showing how the harm done by imperialism and fascism differs for different people but again it's also like... yeah Black people should have been in the room in order to prevent anti-Blackness. Indigenous people - especially Nahuatl people and Sami (for Aldhani) people should have been in the room to make sure the show handles the characters who are clearly inspired by their cultures well.

And yeah I can't help it, Bix's treatment was not great imo. I get the point of it, but I wonder about how much it would have helped to have a diverse writers room. Maybe she would have still been tortured, and frankly I don't need the empire's crimes sanitized? but something about that scene rubs me wrong - probably because her s1 arc does revolve around the men in her life. not like some bullshit "cassian is to blame for her getting tortured" take but it isn't about her story. It's about his.

Anyway I think many times the show does things really well but yeah their treatment of Black characters especially? Rancid.

*this is still Messy as fuck want to clarify that. Diego isnt indigenous so like ??? but whatever lmfao just bring back fest tbh

[realjaysumlin]

Ep 10. Historians are BAFFLED by Africans achievements in prehistory.

With all of this good intentions of telling the true story of the African Migration and the advancement of the Black Africans who ruled our planet until the Europeans did all they could to hide and discredit Black Indigenous Africans achievements.

Remember these people invented colorism and so many people still hold on to this harmful idea that the human race are a separate species that scientist call polygenesis.

But this video being explained is still using the idea of scientific racism and colorism to debunk the many lies and the hidden history of Black Africans achievements to the world.

I try my best to educate Black People on science because we invented science like everything else on our planet. Many of you just follow what the invented white people say about you and you don't even question them or do any form of scientific research on your own.

Many of you hate science and accuse many Black scientist of getting into a field of whiteness when in fact it's the complete opposite.

Science is Black African history and there should be no doubt when you can see the pyramids in Africa and the stone building, you need to know geometry and other forms of mathematics to be able to build these kinds of things.

I hate hearing about Black Africans being brought to lands through slavery when Black Africans were the first explorers on earth and we were the first people to arrive on these shores before any humans and you allow people who don't know why they call themselves white tell you who you are.

You have a great brain and I suggest you start using it to define yourself and stop allowing inferior cowards tell you who you are as a people because it's to their advantage if you hate yourself and worship them as an authority over your life, if you do, you are a self contained slave with no ability to think or manage yourself.

You're better off dead to live under inhumane conditions, no one in their right mind would be this stupid or weak. Humans are not going to allow anyone to control their freedoms and independence, this is the thinking of a slave who doesn't have any desire to overcome their unfair conditions.

[farcillesbian]

okay here's a 1 day poll for all of you: what book should I start when I finish the one I'm reading currently (which is about a lesbian witch). book details below and this is all based on what I've got checked out from the library

fresh banana leaves by Rebecca Hernandez: nonfiction about the marginalization of Indigenous people throughout North and Central America and how Indigenous environmental science and management are undervalued and ignored.

in the dream house by Carmen Maria Machado: memoir about the author's experience in an abusive relationship with another woman, written in second person and changing narrative styles with each chapter. it's supposed to be really well written from what I've heard.

shorefall by Robert Jackson Bennett: second book in the fantasy series I started reading where magic is described and used as basically a programming language telling objects how to bend the laws of nature. protag is a lesbian too & this installment is about taking down a god-like entity before he can bring about the end of their world.

the heartbreak bakery by a.r. capetta: a story with light fantasy elements about a baker named Syd (no pronouns) whose baked goods keep causing couples to break up, so Syd enlists the help of a cute delivery person to try to help undo the damage.

a million to one by adiba jaigirdar: titanic with an ocean's 8 twist. 4 friends try to pull off a jewel heist and i think some or all of them are also gay... idk it sounds fun and I love a good historical fiction

27 hours by tristina wright: a tense, fast-paced sci-fi thriller set during one 27-hour night where 4 teenagers have to stop an alien attack on their planet. a big, badass space epic with a truly inclusive cast of teens who have strong friendships, high-stakes love lives, and a central place in the adventures of the cosmos.

when we were magic by Sarah Galley: when accidental magic goes sideways and a boy winds up dead, Alexis and her friends come together to try to right a terrible wrong. their first attempt fails—and their second attempt fails even harder. left with the remains of their failed spells and more consequences than anyone could have predicted, each of them must find a way to live with their part of the story. also sounds like there's some "secretly in love with your friend" plot going on 👀

godslayers by Zoe Hana Mikuta: sequel to a book called gearbreakers. all about a band of rebels trying to take down an oppressive force & a girl trying to save the girl she loves. but also there are giant mechas involved.

[carohasopinionsonbooks]

A Case for The Wave by Todd Strasser to replace Lord of the Flies by William Golding

*disclaimer - these r just my 2 cents, feel free to disagree*

Ok if you went to an American high school, chances are you were made to read Lord of the Flies by William Golding. You usually read this book as a type of cautionary tale to show how slowly and yet fast a society can devolve. One little hiccup within the people in power and the dominoes can fall towards a world of chaos and injustice, usually at a gradual yet effective pace. Now, I will say that the point the book makes is a good one and one all of us should keep in mind.

Given that, I did not like this book one bit...

For a bit of background, Golding wrote this book on the beliefs of Thomas Hobbes, those being that the lives of humans are "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short" and that without structure, humans would just descend into chaos and become, especially in the context of Lord of the Flies, carnage machines. This is something I don't personally agree with but it makes a lot of sense when you find out Golding fought in WW2. He, like many others after the war, questioned how things could go so south so fast. He happened to decide on the theory mentioned above and this way of thinking sets the tone for the whole plot of the book.

(tangent - Golding was also just a really messed up guy, seriously, look him up, he was wild....)

Brief plot overview - A group of British boys crash land on an island and are faced with the task of living alone with no adults and with no one telling them what to do on a remote island in the middle of no where. The boys at first try to deal with their situation civilly, but within a matter of weeks it all devolves into violence and chaos.

The main issue that I have with the book is that it just seems so unrealistic. Now you might be like, "Caro its exaggerated at some points bc he is trying to make a point, not all of it is gonna be realistic, its the message that's important" which is true but like holy moly is the violence just a lot sometimes. Also the fact that its all British boys just creates another detachment. As a person who identifies as female, there is a bit of disconnect there. The racist undertones in regards to indigenous peoples do not help the book's case either. The whole book comes across and looks like a raging angry dumpster fire (I mean have you seen some of the covers? Its really intense :|).

(a fun little fact: there was actually a real life Lord of the Flies example with a group of Tongan boys - here is the wiki in case you want a brief overview of the story - which ended in literally no drama so that deducts another point for believability)

Another reason why I just did not connect with this book at all was because I had read a different book that has the same message as Lord of the Flies which was 1000x times better. That book was The Wave by Tod Strasser. The Wave is a fictional account of a real experiment done by a high school teacher in California. The book starts out with a high school history teacher trying to teach WW2 to his class, specifically the part where Hitler rose to power. The students, all of them bored, complain that they have heard this so many times already and that they would 100% know, detect, and intervene if something like that were to happen again. The teacher, in response, decides to start an experiment with his students to put them to the test. What that experiment is I will not say for spoiler reasons but at first everything seems fine and then devolves oh so fast and oh so slowly. It takes place in a familiar environment (a high school) and I feel it is much more relatable and realistic than Lord of the Flies which is why I find it all the more impactful and effective. I read this book freshman year of high school and the story still sticks with me to this day. I would seriously recommend everyone go read this book if they haven’t already. Why we haven’t already replaced Lord of the Flies with The Wave within high school curriculums is beyond me and probably would have saved me a few brain cells …

[josiebelladonna]

god as my witness, i didn’t want to do this.

but it seems like the world has drastically shifted in the last two months and hatred has swept through everywhere like the coronavirus, and i cannot risk being around people who perpetuate that hatred combined with fearmongering and it’s always done without even realizing it or knowing it. antisemitism is a form of racism, as the jews are levantine and not white, and the fact that swaths of people on here do not see this, understand it, or even question it is flooring to me especially when so many have the fucking balls to preach to the diaspora that they know their culture better than them (that is some real big brother shit, let me tell you).

now, full disclosure: i’ve been critical of israel in the past, just because i didn’t like how they were collectively punishing palestine for h*mas, and yet i’ve always been careful to differentiate the israeli government with the people as well as the rest of the diaspora (and fyi, a huge number of jews and israelis are on my side with this) because people are not their governments—and lo and behold, israel is letting netanyahu and herzog have it as we speak. i’ve always said that i wouldn’t be the artist i am today without the jews as my first big illustrative project with my cartoons was based on a Holocaust survivor story.

and as i’ve done more and more reading into israel, as i’ve been crossing paths with more and more jews and israelis over on threads and instagram, as i remember my brother visiting there back in 2018 and he and his wife absolutely loved it, i realize that the hate and the pro-palestine crowd really has no basis or substance: i get rude comments from that side all the time and they’re always like schoolyard bullies, or they try and flip the script and call me a zionist even though i’m not jewish and i can’t believe that’s an actual slur now because all it is is “the jews should be safe and coexist with their neighbors peacefully”: it’s not fascism, and it’s not “pro-genocide”, it’s about letting the most marginalized people on earth live.

now, do i feel palestine deserves better? absolutely. abso-fucking-lutely, and like i said, there are a lot of jews and israelis (25% of that population is arabic, hence why i say that) on my side with this, and way more than you think, too. they’re all indigenous to that land and this is a conflict that is very old and a little tiresome at this point, and apparently both sides are tired of it. i try not to take sides here for this reason: i’d rather listen to people talk and be supportive.

it’s all anyone can do. it’s imperative to bring in the word “and” here and i don’t understand why that’s so bloody hard, either.

i should also mention that “free palestine” is not only a genocidal statement against the jews and the israelis, but once you realize that h*mas are backed by iran and russia, known hostile powers, you should understand that palestine itself actually has nothing to do with it and this is a conflict that doesn’t involve us. the chant is pointless at best and an excuse to be antisemitic at worst.

kicking cal to the curb hurt, to be honest. always loved them, always got a kick out of them; but when i see them actively participating in blood libel against the jews and then turning around and saying “happy hanukkah”… no, i’m sorry. i can’t. i can’t. hypocrisy is where i draw the line. if you actively post that godforsaken “from the river to the sea” chant and then have the gall to wish all a hanukkah sameach, it’s closet antisemitism. i have to stand with the jews.

dora… i was starting to lose interest a while back, before all this happened, mainly because i was just starting to lose interest in the goth subculture—once a very cool community that i found deep interest in because i’ve always had this darkness in me has become not only just another meme but a bastion of pretension and you guessed it, hate. dora is like one of many former friends of mine, in that she got so belligerent and militant about her beliefs and that makes for a hostile environment. writing hamfisted lyrics and putting “this machine kills fascists” on your synthesizer makes you come off as so corny and edgy and like you have an anger problem more than you’re standing for something (when i was at my heaviest, i had mood swings, too; i get it). and once i realize that she’s older than me, it just gets sad, and uncomfortable and not in a good way, either. it’s on par with bikini kill screaming about palestine and subjecting themselves to potential charity fraud while israeli women and men were quite literally assaulted on october 7 and are grappling with the trauma.

feminism is such a hollow parody of itself now, and these two are just two cases of that, and i have a feeling i’m going to be doing this more. i’m going to start banning people but i don’t care if my follower count drops like a rock, though. it has a number of times, it can do it again. and it’s going to be painful for me, but i need to stand by what i believe in, and i need to clean house before 2024 starts—i’m probably going to be on main here less next year, anyway, just because of lifestyle changes and i have a lot of art and writing including kinktober all year on the horizon for my side blogs, but i need some clarity.

by the way, is anyone else totally weirded out by the sheer amount of lgbtq+ people who are pro-palestine? tel aviv is one of the most lgbtq-friendly cities on earth, and yet being that way in either gaza or the west bank will either get you jailed or killed (it gets even weirder when i realize the region not only birthed judaism but christianity as well; islam didn’t come about until some 500 years later and it came from persia—al-aqsa in jerusalem built on top of the temple mount is enough for me to understand that none of you see the forest for the trees). i genuinely feel like i’m living in a david lynch film or that we all died with bowie, prince, and leonard cohen in 2016 and we’re living in actual hell when i think about all of this.

“pro-genocide”… where do you people get off.