#in islam east africa is sort of like how europe is in christianity

[leroibobo]

mosque of the companions in massawa, eritrea. it was reportedly built by companions of the prophet muhammad who fled to africa due to persecution they faced in mecca. it possibly dates to 620-630 ce, which would make it the oldest purpose-built mosque in the world. however, some of the current structure was most likely built in the late 7th-9th centuries, as the mihrab and minaret as we know them hadn't been developed at the time.

[seewetter]

List of Mythic Creatures

Q: WHAT IS THIS??!

A: This is an alphabetically sorted list of all mythic creatures I could find on Wikipedia. The names are (mostly) identical to the name that will bring up the wiki page.*

Q: All mythic creatures on wikipedia???

A: There are a few omissions: I found there were too many lake monsters so those I didn't exhaustively include. Wikipedia has a lot more information about Greek individual figures than individual figures from other cultures (like Achilles or Glauce or Dioxippe or Ajax) and when those figures are members of a mythic group (amazons, nymphs, etc.) I included them in this list, but the list may skew in favour of Greek mythic women with fewer male figures. Also I have included some gods, goddesses and non-binary deities but just like with the lake monsters, did not include most of the Wiki pages on godheads of the world. But the list should be fairly exhaustive when it comes to heavenly beings (elves of alfheim, gandharvas, horae and so on) who serve the gods in their divine abodes.

Q: Why are hobbits on the list? Tolkien made those up, right?

A: Well technically there are lists of creatures from folklore and one of those lists, which Tolkien came across, lists hobbits. It doesn't explain what hobbits are and they aren't documented anywhere else, but that may be the origin of the word hobbit.

Q: Why are some of these not actual creatures?

A: folktales that make mention of unique mythic creatures have been included. For example "The Red Ettin" is a English folktale that features herds of two-headed bulls and cows. In other cases, Wikipedia has pages like "Aboriginal Australian Creatures" or "Abenaki & Mi'kmaq beings" which are worth looking at because they provide more mythic creatures that don't have individual pages.

Q: Why are some entries styled "Savanello - Salvanello" or "Dwarf - Dwarves"

A: one of the terms is the singular and the other the plural. The list is a bit peculiar, sorry.

Q: How would you recommend this list is used?

A: You can use it any way you like, just keep in mind that some beings on this list are sacred and ideally try to be culturally sensitive about that. For example, some Ojibwe people are not exactly happy that one of their unnameable spirits has been publicly named, misspelled, attached to anti-Native stereotypes (see also here) and then completely misrepresented and trivialized as a horror monster in pop culture and so the "wendigo" comes with all that baggage, as do many other creatures on this list.

Usually if a creature is from a Neolithic / Bronze Age / Iron Age culture like Egypt or North & South Mesopotamia (Akkadian, Assyrian & Sumerian, Babylonian) there is no one who is going to raise valid ethical concerns around the use of your creature.

Similarly, if something is a generic fantasyland creature (elf, dwarf, dragon, ghost, giant, mermaid etc.) or from Greek and Roman sources (sirens, minotaurs, catoblepas) or medieval bestiaries (hydrus, iaculus) you can flesh those out with more research, but I don't think you will run into ethical problems.

But with a lot of other creatures, outreach to that community has value, because otherwise its not just a fantasy work being authored, but also some serious inter-cultural tensions. Stephenie Meyer, who decided to add Qileute shapeshifters into Twilight but never consulted Qileute and doesn't support their community in any way, is a example. There is no need to follow it.

By Region & Culture

Part 1: Indigenous Australians & Indigenous America

Part 2: Settler Colonies & Diasporas of Australia & Americas

Part 3: Europe (Basque, Rome, Viking, Great Britain)

Part 4: Greek

Part 5: East Europe, Northwest Asia

Part 6: Medieval Europe (plus Renaissance)

Part 7: Orthodox Religions (Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Zoroastrianism, Gnosticism, Demon Summoning Books, etc.)

Part 8: Asia and South Pacific

Part 9: Africa

Part 10: Other

Creatures sorted by Type

Letter A

Letters B to Z are in the works.

THE LIST:

This wiki page mentions "a horde of tiny creatures the size of frogs that had spines" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_monster;

9 Mothers of Heimdallr;

Á Bao A Qu; A Hut on Chicken Legs; Aamon; Aana Marutha; Aani; Aatxe; Aayaase; Abaahy; Abaasy; Ababil; Ababinili; Abada; Äbädä; Abaddon; Abaia; Abarimon; Abarta; Abasy; Abath; Abcán; Abchanchu; Abenaki & Mi'kmaq beings; Abere; Abezethibou; Ba (personality); Baak; Baal Berith; Baba Yaga; Babay; Babi ngepet; Babys (a satyr's brother); Bacchae; Bacchantes; Baccoo; Badalisc; Badb; Bael; Bagany; Bahamut; Bahkauv; Bai Baianai; Bai Lung Ma; Bai Suzhen; Bai Ze; Bakasura; Bake-danuki; Bake-kujira; Bakemono; Bakeneko; Bakezōri; Baku; Bakunawa; Bakwas; Balaur; Bal-Bal; Baldanders; Ball-tailed cat; Baloma; Balor; Baloz; Bánánach; Banchō; Bannik; Banshee; Banyoles monster; Bao Si; Baobhan Sith; Baphomet; Bar Juchne; Bar yokni; Barabao; Barbarika; Barbatos; Bardha; Barghest; Barmanou; Barnacle Goose; Barometz; Barong; Barstuk; Barstukken; Baš Čelik; Basa-Andrée; Basadone; Basajaun; Basa-Juan; Basan; Bashe; Basilisco Chilote; Basilisk; Bašmu; Basnak Dau; Basty; Bathin; Batibat; Batraz; Baubo; Bauchan; Bauk; Baykok; Beaman Monster; Bean-nighe; Beansìth; Bear Lake Monster; Bearers of the Throne; Beast of Beinn a' Bheithir; Beast of Bladenboro; Beast of Busco; Beast of Dean; Beast of Gévaudan; Bebryces; Bedivere; Beelzebub; Beerwolf; Befana; Behemoth; Beings of Irkalla or Kur; Beithir; Beleth; Belial; Bell Witch; Belled buzzard; Belphegor; Belsnickel; Bendith y Mamau; Bengali myths; Bennu; Ben-Varrey; Benzaiten; Berbalang; Berberoka; Bergmanli; Bergmönch; Bergsrå; Bernardo Carpio; Berserker; Bessie; Bestial Beast; Betobeto-san; Betram de Shotts; Bhagadatta; Bhargava; Bhoma; Bhoota; Bhramari; Bhringi; Bi Fang bird; Biasd Bheulach; Bichura; Bicorn; Bieresel; Bies; Bifrons (demon); Big Ghoul (dragon); Bigfoot; Bilbze; Billy Blind; Bilwiss; Binbōgami; Binidica; Biróg; Biscione; Bishop Fish; Bisterne Dragon; Biwa-bokuboku; Bixi; Black Annis; Black Arab; Black Dog; Black Dwarfs; Black Hound; Black Panther; Black Shuck; Black Tortoise; Blafard; Blanquettes; Błędnica; Blemmyes; Blodeuwedd; Bloody Bones; Bloody Caps; Bloody Mary; Blud; Błudnik; Blue Ben; Blue Lady of Verdala Palace; Blue Men of the Minch; Blue Star Kachina; Bluecap; Blunderbore; Bobak; Böcke; Bockschitt; Bodach na Croibhe Moire; Bodach; Bodachan Sabhaill; Bogeyman; Boggart; Bogle; Böhlers-Männchen; Boiuna; Bonnacon; Bonnes Dames; Boo hag; Boobrie; Borda; Born Noz; Boroboroton; Boruta; Botis; Boto; Boto_and_Dolphin_Spirits; Bottom (Moerae); Boudiguets; Bøyg; Božalość; Božić; Brag; Bragmanni; Brahmahatya; Brahmarākṣasaḥ; Bramrachokh; Bran and Sceólang; Brazen Head; Bregostani; Bregosténe; Bremusa; Brendan the Navigator; Brenin Llwyd; Br'er Rabbit; Bres; British Wild Cats; Broichan; Brokkr; Brosno dragon; Brown Man of the Muirs; Brown Mountain Lights; Browney; Brownie - Brownies; Broxa; Bruja; Brunnmigi; Bubak; Bucca; Bucentaur; Buckriders; Buda; Buer; Buffardello; Bugbear; Buggane; Bugul Noz; Bukavac; Bukit Timah Monkey Man; Bulgae; Bull of Heaven; Bumba Meu Boi; Bune; Bungisngis; Bunyip; Bunzi; Buraq; Burrokeet; Burryman; Buru; Busaw; Buschgrossmutter; Buschweibchen; Bushyasta; Buso; Busós; Butatsch Cun Ilgs; Butter Sprite; Butzemann; Butzen; Buwch Frech; Bwbach; Bwciod; Byangoma; Byōbunozoki; Bysen;

C' Horriquets; Caballo marino chilote; Caballucos del Diablu; Cabeiri; Caca; Caccavecchia; Cacodaemon; Cactus cat; Cacus; Cadborosaurus; Cadejo; Caelia; Caeneus; Cailleach; Caim (demon); Cain bairns; Caipora; Cakrasaṃvara Tantra; Caladrius; Calafia; Calcatràpole; Caleuche; Calingae; Callicantzaroi; Calliste; Callithyia of Argos; Calydonian Boar; Calygreyhound; Camahueto; Camazotz; Cambion; Camilla; Campe; Cancer; Candelas; Cangjie; Čanotila; Căpcăun; Capelobo; Capkin; Carbuncle; Careto; Carikines; Carman; Carranco; Cas Corach; Catalan Creatures; Catez; Cath Palug; Cathbad; Catoblepas; Cat-sìth; Cattle of Helios; Cauchemar; Caucones; Cauld Lad of Hylton; Caveman; Ceasg; Ceffyl Dŵr; Celaeno; Centaur - Centaurs; Centaur_Early Art; Centaurides; Cerastes; Cerberus; Cercopes; Ceryneian Hind; Cethlenn; Ceto; Cetus; Ceuthonymus; Cha kla; Chai nenesi; Chakora; Chakwaina; Chalkydri; Chalybes; Champ; Chamrosh; Chana and Munda; Chaná myths; Chaneque; Chang; Changeling; Changelings Chervan; Čhápa; Charun; Charybdis; Chasca; Chaturbhuja; Chaveyo; Chedipe; Chemosh; Chenoo; Chepi; Chernava; Cherubim; Cherufe; Chesma iyesi; Chessie; Cheval Gauvin; Cheval Mallet; Chèvres Dansantes; Chi; Chichevache; Chickcharney; Chidambara Rahasiyam; Chilote Creatures; Chilseok; Chimera; Chimimōryō; Chimke; Chinas; Chindi; Chinese guardian lions; Chinese Monkey Creatures; Chinese serpent killed by Li Ji; Chinese Souls; Chir Batti; Chiron; Chitrāngada; Chiwen; Chiyou; Chōchinbi; Chōchin'obake; Choctaw myths; Chol; Chonchon; Choronzon (demon); Chort; Christchurch Dragon; Chromandi; Chronicon; Chrügeli; Chrysanthis; Chrysaor; Chrysopeleia; Chullachaki; Chullachaqui; Chupacabra; Church grim; Churel; Churn Milk Peg; Chut; Chyavana; Cichol Gricenchos; Ciguapa; Cihuateteo; Cikavac; Cimbrian seeresses; Cinciut; Cinnamologus; Cipactli; Cipitio; Cirein-cròin; Cissus; City God; Clíodhna; Clonie (Amazon); Clotho; Clurican; Coblynau; Cocadrìlle; Cock Lane Ghost; Cockatrice; Coco; Cocollona; Cofgod; Coi-coi vilu; Cola Pesce; Colbrand (giant); Colo Colo; Colombian Creatures; Colossus; Colt pixie; Comte Arnau; Conand; Çor; Coribantes; Corics; Cormoran (giant); Cornandonet Dû; Cornflower Wraith; Corrandonnets; Corriquets; Corson (demon); Corus; Corybantes; Courètes; Coyote_Native; Coyote_Navajo; Creatures from Vetala Tales; Creatures of Azerbaijan; Cressie; Cretan Bull_minotaur's sire; Creusa; Crinaeae; Crions; Crocotta; Crom Cruach; Crommyonian Sow; Cryptid whale; Cryptid; Cuegle; Cuélebre; Cula; Culards; Čuma; Cupid; Curetes; Curupira; Cù-sìth; Cŵn Annwn; Cyborg; Cychreides; Cyclops; Cyhyraeth; Cyllarus; Cymidei Cymeinfoll; Cynocephali; Cythraul;

Daayan; Dab; Dactyls; Daemon; Daeva; Dagon; Dagr; Dahu; Dahut; Daidarabotchi; Daikokuten; Daimon; Daitya; Daji; Dajjal; Dakhanavar; Ḍākinī; Daksha yajna; Daksha; Dalaketnon; Dalhan; Damasen; Damballa; Dames Blanches; Dames Vertes; Danava; Dandan; Dando's Dogs; Daniel (angel); Danzaburou-danuki; Daoine Sidhe; Daphnaie; Dark Watchers; Darrhon; Daruka; Datsue-ba; Dawon; Day of the Dead; Dead Sea Apes; Death; Ded Moroz; Deer Lady; Deer Woman; Deianeira; Deildegast; Deity; Delphyne; Dema deity; Demigod; Demogorgon; Demoiselles Blanches; Demon - Demons; Demon (list); Demon Cat; Demons (Ars Goetia) (List); Demons (Christianity and sex); Demons in Mandaeism; Demons of the Dictionnaire Infernal; Dēnglung; Derimacheia; Derinoe; Despoina_Goddess; Destroying Angel; Dev; Deva people; Devak; Devapi; Devas; Devatas; Devil Bird; Devil Boruta; Devil; Dewey Lake Monster; Dhampir; Dharanendra; Di Penates; Di sma undar jordi; Dialen; Dies feminae; Dilung; Dimonis-Boyets; Dingonek; Dioxippe; Dip; Dipsa; Dirawong; Disir; Diting; Div; Div-e Sepid; Dive Ženy; Dive; Djadadjii; Djall; Djieien; Dobhar-chú; Dobrynyna Nikitich; Dodomeki; Dogs in Chinese mythology; Dokkaebi bangmangi; Dokkaebi; Dökkálfar; Doliones; Dolphin; Domovoi; Donamula; Doñas de fuera; Dong Yong and the Seventh Fairy; Donn Cúailnge; Doppelgänger; Dormarch; Dōsojin; Double-headed serpent; Douen; Dǒumǔ; Dover Demon; Drac; Draconcopedes; Dragon of Beowulf; Dragon of Mordiford; Dragon of the North; Dragon turtle; Dragon; Dragons of St. Leonard's forest; Dragon's Teeth; Drakaina; Drake; Drangue; Drapé; Draugr; Drekavac; Drioma; Drop Bear; Droug-Speret; Drude; Drummer of Tedworth; Druon Antigoon; Dryad; Duende; Dulagal; Dullahan; Dumah; Dun Cow; Dungavenhooter; Dunnie; Dunters; Duppy; Durgamasura; Durukti; Dusios; Dvalinn; Dvarapala; Dvipa; Dvorovoy; Dwarf - Dwarfs, Dwarves; Dybbuk; Dysnomia; Dzedka; Dziwożona; Dzoavits; Dzunuḵ̓wa;

Each-uisge; Eagles in Myth; Easter Bilby; Easter Bunny; Eate (Basque god); Ebajalg; Ebu gogo; Echeneis; Echidna; Echtra; Éclaireux; Edimmu; Egbere; Egg Ghost; Egoi; Ehon Hyaku Monogatari; Eidolon; Eikþyrnir; Eingana; Einherjar; Eisenhütel; Eisheth Zenumin; Ekek; Ekerken; Eki (Basque goddess); Ekke Nekkepenn; Ekpo Nka-Owo; El Hombre Caimán; El Naddaha; El Sombrerón; El Tío; Elate; Elatha; Elbow witches; Elder Fathers; Elder Mother; Elegast; Eleionomae; Elemental; Elf - Elfs, Elves; Elf Fire; Elf King's Tune; Elflebceuf; Elfor; Elioud; Ellefolk; Ellemen; Ellén Trechend; Ellert and Brammert (giants); Elli; Ellylldan; Ellyllon; Eloko - Biloko; Elwetritsch; Emere; Emishi; Emmet; Emperor Norton; Empusa; En_Albanian_Deity; Enbarr; Enceladus; Enchanted Moura; Endill; Enenra; Enfield Monster; Enfield; Engkanto; English Fairies; Engue; Enorches; Eoteto; Epiales; Epimeliad; Epiphron; Erchitu; Erdbibberli; Erdhenne; Erdluitle; Erdmännchen; Erdweibchen; Ergene iyesi; Eriboea; Erinyes; Erkenek; Erlking; Erotes; Erymanthian boar; Estonian Creatures; Estries; Ethiopian pegasus; Ethiopian superstition; Ethniu; Etiäinen; Ettin; Euryale; Eurybius; Eurymedon; Eurynome; Eurynomos; Eurypyle; Euxantius; Ev iyesi; Evandre; Ewiger Jäger; Exoticas;

Fachan; Fadas; Fadhas; Fáfnir; Fäies; Failinis; Fainen; Fair Family; Fair Folk; Fair Janet; Fairy - Fairies; Fairy Queen; Fairy story (Northumbria); Falak; Fallen Angel (Book of Enoch); Fallen Angel; Familiar; Fangfeng; Fänggen; Fangxiangshi; Farfadet - Farfadets; Farfarelli; Farisees; Farises; Fasolt; Fastachee; Fata Acquilina; Fata Alcina; Fata Culina; Fata Morgana; Fata Sibiana; Fate Marine; Fates; Father Frost; Fatia; Fatuae; Faun, Faunus - Faunae, Fauni; Faustulus; Fayettes; Fayules; Fear Doirich; Fear gorta; Feathag; Feathered Serpent; Fée de Vertiges; Feeorin; Fées; Féetauds; Feilian; Feilung; Feldgeister; Fenetten; Feng; Fènghuáng; Fengli; Fenodyree; Fenrir; Ferragut; Fetch; Feuermann; Fext; Fiery Flying Serpent; Fiery serpents; Fin; Finfolk; Finvarra; Finzweiberl; Fioles; Fionn mac Cumhaill; Fionnuala; Fions; Fir Bolg; Fir Darrig; Firebird; Fire-Drakes; Firefox; Fish-man of Lierganes; Fjölvar; Fjörgyn and Fjörgynn; Flaming Teeth; Flathead Lake Monster; Flatwoods Monster; Flower Fairies; Flying Africans; Flying Head; Flying Horse of Gansu; Fog Mannikins; Folaton; Folgie; Folklore of the Maldives; Folktales of Mexico; Follet; Folletti; Fomorian; Foras; Forest Bull; Forest Fathers; Forgetful Folk; Forneus (demon); Fort Manoel Ghost; Foryna; Fossegrim; Fouke Monster; Fouletot; Foulta; Fountain Women; Four Perils; Fox Spirit; Frairies; Fratuzzo; Frau Ellhorn; Frau Holle; Frau Holunder; Fraus; Fravashi; French Mythic Creatures and Saints; Freybug; Frohn; Frost Giant; Fuath; Fuddittu; Fuglietti; Fujettu; Fūjin; Fulad-zereh; Funayūrei; Fuochi Fatui; Furaribi; Fur-bearing trout; Furcas (demon); Furfur (demon); Furutsubaki-no-rei; Fury; Futakuchi-onna; Füttermännchen; Fuxi; Fuzanglung; Fuzhu; Fylgiar;

Gaap; Gaasyendietha; Gabija; Gādhi; Gaf; Ga-gorib; Gagoze; Gaizkiñ; Gaja; Gajamina; Gajasimha; Galatea; Gale; Galehaut; Galgemännlein; Gallinipper; Gamayun; Gambara; Gamigin; Gaṇa; Gancanagh; Gandaberunda; Gandharva; Gangcheori; Gangr; Ganna; Gaoh; Gaokerena; Garb mac Stairn; Gargarians; Gargoyle; Garkain; Garmr; Garuda; Gashadokuro; Gasin (house god); Gatipedro; Gaueko; Gavaevodata; Gayant; Gazeka; Gazu Hyakki Yagyō; Gegenees; Gelin; Gello; Gemory; Genius loci; Genius; Gerana; Germakochi; German; Geryon; Ghaddar; Ghillie Dhu; Ghosayatra Parva; Ghost; Ghostly Rider; Ghosts in Chinese culture; Ghosts in Mesopotamian culture; Ghoul; Giane; Giant Water Lily Legend; Giant; Gigantes; Gigelorum; Gillygaloo; Girimekhala; Girt Dog of Ennerdale; Giu; Gjenganger; Glaistig; Glas Gaibhnenn; Glashan; Glashtyn; Glatisant; Glauce; Glawackus; Glenr; Globster; Gloucester sea serpent; Glucksmännchen; Gnome; Go I know not whither and fetch I know not what; Goblin - Goblins; Goblin-Groom; Gochihr; Gog and Magog; Gogmagog; Gohō dōji; Gold Duck; Gold-digging ant; Golden Bear; Golden Goose; Goldenhorn; Golem; Gommes; Gomukha; Gonakadet; Gonggong; Good Folk; Good Neighbors from the Sunset Land; Goodfellows; Goofus Bird; Goram and Vincent (giants); Gorgades; Gorgon - Gorgons; Gorgophone; Gormshuil Mhòr na Maighe; Goryō; Gotwergi; Graeae; Grahana; Grand Grimoire; Grandinili; Graoully; Gration; Green Man; Gremlin; Grendel; Grendel's Mother; Grey Alien; Grey Man; Gríðr; Griffon; Grigori; Grigs; Grimalkin; Grindylow; Groac'h Vor; Groac'h; Grootslang; Grýla and Leppalúði; Guahaioque; Guajona; Gualicho; Guang yi ji; Guardian Angel; Guayota; Gudrun; Guerrionets; Guhyaka; Guivre; Gulon; Gumberoo; Gunungsin; Gurangatch; Guriuz; Gurumāpā; Gusainji Maharaj; Gütel; Guter Johann; Gwagged Annwn; Gwarchells; Gwaryn-a-Throt; Gwazig-Gan; Gwisin; Gwragedd Annwn; Gwrgi Garwlwyd; Gwyllgi; Gwyllion; Gwyn ap Nudd; Gyalpo spirits; Gytrash;

Haaf-Fish; Haagenti; Haakapainiži; Habetrot; Hábrók; Hadas; Hadhayosh; Haesindang Park; Hafgufa; Hag and Mag; Hagoromo (swan maiden play); Hags; Hāhau-whenua; Haietlik; Hainuwele; Hairen; Haizum; Häkelmänner; Hakenmann; Hākuturi; Hakuzōsu; Halahala; Half-elf; Haliurunas; Halizones; Halphas (demon); Haltija; Ham; Hamadryad; Hamingja; Hammaspeikko; Hamsa; Hanako-san; Hanau epe; Hanbi; Hanitu; Hannya; Hans von Trotha; Hantu Air; Hantu Bongkok; Hantu Raya; Hantu Tinggi; Hantu; Haoma; Haosi Namoinu; Härdmandlene; Hare of Inaba; Harionagu; Harpy; Haryashvas and Shabalashvas; Hashihime; Hassan of Basra; Hati Hróðvitnisson; Hatif; Hatsadiling; Hatuibwari; Haugbui; Hausbock; Havfrue; Havmand; Hawakai; Hayagriva; Hayk; Haymon (giant); Hayyot; Headless Horseman; Headless Mule; Hecatoncheires; Ḫedammu; Heerwische; He-He Er Xian; Heidenmanndli; Heidenweibchen; Heikegani; Heikki Lunta; Heimchen; Heinrich von Winkelried; Heinzelmann; Heinzelmännchen; Heinzlin; Hejkadlo; Helhest; Hell Courtesan; Hellhound; Hellmouth; Helloi; Hellusians; Hemā; Hemann; He-Mann; He-Männer; Hemaraj; Hé-no; Henwen; Hercinia; Herdweibchen; Herensuge; Hermaphroditus; Herne the Hunter; Heruka; Hervör alvitr; Hesperides; Hevajra; Hey-Hey Men; Heyoka; Hibagon; Hidden Folk; Hidebehind; Hiderigami; Hidimba; Hieracosphinx; Hiisi; Hildr; Hillbilly Beast of Kentucky; Hille Bingels; Hillmen; Himiko; Hine-nui-te-pō; Hingchabi; Hinn; Hinzelmann; Hippalectryon; Hippe; Hippocampus; Hippogriff; Hippolyta; Hippopodes; Hira; Hiranyakashipu; Hiranyaksha; Hircocervus; Hitodama; Hito-gitsune; Hitotsume-kozō; Hitotsume-nyūdō; Hitte-Hatte; Hittite Goddesses of Fate; Hlaðguðr svanhvít; Hljod; Hlökk; Hồ ly tinh; Hob; Hob-and-his-Lanthorn; Hobbididance; Hobbit; Hob-Gob; Hobgoblin - Hobgoblins; Hob-Thrush Hob; Hodag; Hödekin; Hoihoimann; Holawaka; Holly King and Oak King; Homados; Hombre Gato; Home dels nassos; Homme de Bouc; Hommes Cornus; Homunculus - Homunculi; Honduran Creatures; Hone-onna; Honey Island Swamp Monster; Hong; Hongatar; Hooded Spirits; Hoop Snake; Hooters; Hopfenhütel; Horae; Horned Serpent; Hortdan; Hotoke; Houggä-Ma; Houles fairies; Houpoux; Houri; Hòutǔ; Hoyau; Hræsvelgr; Hrímgerðr; Hrímgrímnir; Hroðr; Hrymr; Hsigo; Hú; Hüamann; Huay Chivo; Huckepoten; Hudson River Monster; Hufaidh; Hugag; Hulde Folk; Hulder; Huldre Folk; Huldufólk; Hulte; Huma bird; Humbaba; Humli; Hun and po; Hundun; Hungry Ghost; Huodou; Hupia; Hurricane children; Husbuk; Hütchen; Hutzelmann; Húxiān; Hyades; Hyakki Tsurezure Bukuro; Hyakki Yagyō_Wild Hunt; Hybris; Hydra; Hydrus; Hyldeqvind; Hylonome; Hyōsube; Hyottoko; Hypnalis; Hyrrokkin; Hyter Sprites;

I Verbti_Albanian_Deity; Iaculi; Iannic-ann-ôd; Iara; Ibaraki-dōji; Iblis; Ibo loa; Ibong Adarna; Ice Mannikins; Ice Queen; Ichchadhari naag; Ichneumon; Ichthyocentaur; Ichthyophagoi; Iði; Idis; Idlirvirissong; Idris Gawr; Iele; Ifrit; Igigi; Ignis Fatuus; Igopogo; Ijiraq; Ikiryō; Iktomi; Ikuchi; Iku-Turso; Ila (Samoan myth); Ila; Ilargi; Ilavida; Ileana Cosânzeana; Iliamna Lake Monster; Illuyanka; Ilomba; Ilvala and Vatapi (asura); Ím (joetunn); Imbunche; Immram; Imp; İn Cin; Inapertwa; Inari Ōkami; Incubus; Indruk; Indus worm; Inguma; Inkanyamba; Inmyeonjo; Intulo; Inugami Gyōbu; Inugami; Ioke; Iphis; Iphito; Ipilja-ipilja; Ipos; Ipotane; Iratxo - Iratxoak; Iravati; Irish Mythic Creatures; Iroquois Myths; Irrbloss; Irrlichter; Irrwurz; Irshi; Isfet; Ishim; Ishinagenjo; Isitwalancenge; Iskrzycki; Islam Mythic Creatures; Isonade; Ispolin; Issie; Issitoq; Issun-boushi; Itbarak; Itsumade; Ittan-momen; Iubdan; Iya; İye;

Jack and the Beanstalk; Jack Frost; Jack in the Green; Jack o' Kent; Jack o' Legs; Jack o' the bowl; Jack o'Lanthorn; Jack the Giant Killer; Jackalope; Jack-In-Irons; Jacques St. Germain; Jaculus; Jahi; Jahnu; Janjanbi; Jann; Japanese Serpent; Jarita; Járnsaxa; Jashtesmé; Jasy Jatere; Jean de la Bolieta; Jean de l'Ours; Jeannot; Jenglot; Jengu; Jenny Haniver; Jentil; Jenu; Jersey Devil; Jetins; Jezinky; Jiangshi; Jiaolung; Jihaguk daejeok toechi seolhwa; Jikininki; Jimmy Squarefoot; Jin Chan; Jinmenju; Jinmenken; Jinn; Jinnalaluo; Jipijka'm; Jiutian Xuannü; Jiutou Zhiji Jing; Jiuweihu; Joan the Wad; Joan-in-the-Wad; Jogah; Joint Snake; Joint-eater; Jok; Jolabukkar; Jonathan Moulton; Jormungandr; Jörmungandr; Jorōgumo; Jötunn; Jubokko; Jüdel; Judys; Jué yuán; Jueyuan; Juggernaut; Julbuk; Jumbee; Jvarasura; Jwalamalini;

Kabhanda; Kabouter; Káchabuké; Kachina; Kae and Longopoa; Ka-Ha-Si; Kaibyō; Kai-n-Tiku-Aba; Kakawin; Kālakeya - Kālakeyas; Kalamainu'u; Kalanemi (asura); Kalanemi (Ramayana); Kalanoro; Kâ'lanû Ahkyeli'skï; Kalaviṅka; Kalenjin Mythic Creatures; Kalevipoeg; Kaliya; Kallana; Kallikantzaros- Kallikantzaroi; Kallone; Kållråden; Kamadhenu; Kamaitachi; Kamakhya; Kami; Kamikiri; Kammapa; Kangiten; Kanglā Shā; Kao; Kappa; Kapre; Karapandža; Karkadann; Karlá; Karnabo; Karura; Karzełek; Kasa-obake; Käsermänner; Kasha; Kasogonagá; Katajatar; Kataw; Katie Woodencloak; Kaukas; Kaupe; Kawas; Kawauso; Kayeri; Kechibi; Kee-wakw; Keibu Keioiba; Ķekatnieki; Ke'le - Ke'let; Kelpie; Kenas-unarpe; Keneō (oni); Keong Emas; Kepetz; Keres; Kerions; Ketu; Keukegen; Khalkotauroi; Khoirentak tiger; Khongjomnubi Nonggarol; Khyāh; Kichkandi; Kidōmaru; Kielkropf; Kigatilik; Kihawahine; Kijimuna; Kijo (folklore); Kikimora; Kikituk; Kilili; Killcrops; Kilmoulis; Kimaris; Kimpurushas; King Father of the East; King Goldemar; King Kojata; King Laurin; Kings of Alba Longa; Kinie Ger; Kinnara; Kinoko; Kirin; Kirkonwäki; Kirmira; Kirtimukha; Kishi; Kitchen God; Kitsune no yomeiri; Kitsune; Kitsunebi; Kit-with-the-Canstick; Kiwa; Kiyohime; Klabautermann; Klagmuhme; Klaubauf; Klaubautermann; Klopferle; Knecht Ruprecht; Knight of the Swan; Knights of Ålleberg; Knocker; Knockerlings; Knocky Boh; Knucker; Koalemos; Koan Kroach; Kobalos; Kobold; Kodama; Kōga Saburō; Koka and Vikoka; Kokabiel; Kokopelli; Komono; Konaki-jiji; Kong Koi; Konjaku Gazu Zoku Hyakki; Konjaku Hyakki Shūi; Konpira Gongen; Konrul; Koolakamba; Kopala; Korandon; Korbolko; Korean dragon; Korean Virgin Ghost; Kormos; Kornbock; Kornikaned; Korn-Kater; Koromodako; Korpokkur; Korred; Korrigan; Korrigans; Korriks; Korrs; Koshchei; Kostroma; Kotavi; Kotobuki; Koto-furunushi; Kouricans; Kourils; Koutsodaimonas; Kōya Hijiri; Krabat; Krachai; Krahang; Kraken; Krampus; Krasnoludek; Krasue; Krat; Kratt; Kratu; Kroni; Krosnyata; Krun; Kṣitigarbha; Kting voar; Kuafu; Kubera; Kubikajiri; Kuchisake-onna; Kudagitsune; Kudan; Kudukh; Kui; Kujata; Kukeri; Kukudh; Kukulkan; Kukwes; Kuli-ana; Kulilu; Kulshedra; Kulullû; Kumakatok; Kuman Thong; Kumbhakarna; Kumbhāṇḍa; Kumi Lizard; Kumiho; Kuṇḍali; Kuntilanak; Kupua; Kurangaituku; Kuraokami (ryu); Kurents; Kurma; Kuro-shima (Ehime); Kurozuka; Kurupi; Kusarikku; Kushiel; Kushtaka; Kutkh; Kuttichathan; Kuzenbo; Kuzunoha; Kuzuryū; Kyanakwe; Kydoimos; Kymopoleia; Kyrkogrimm;

La Bolefuego; La Diablesse; La Encantada; La Guita Xica; La Llorona; La mula herrada; La Sayona; Labbu; Lạc bird; Lachesis; Laddy Midday; Ladon; Lady Featherflight; Laelaps; Laestrygonians; Lagahoo; Lagarfljótsormur; Lahamu; Lai Khutshangbi; Lailah_female_angel_Judaism; Laima; Lajjā Gaurī; Lakanica; Lake Monster; Lake Tianchi Monster; Lake Van Monster; Lake Worth Monster; Lākhey; Lamashtu; Lambton Worm; Lamia; Lamignak; Lampades; Lampago; Lampedo; Lampetho; Lampetia; Landdisir; Landlord Deities; Landvættir; Lang Bobi Suzi; Lang Suir; Lange Wapper; Langsuyar; Lantern Man; Lapiths; Lares Familiares; Lares; Lariosauro; Lauma; Laúru; Lava bear; Lavellan; Lazavik; Lazy Laurence; Le Criard; Le Patre; Le Rudge-Pula; Lebraude; Legendary Horses in the Jura; Legendary Horses of Pas-de-Calais; Legion (demons); Leikn; Leimakid; Leipreachán; Leleges; Lemminkäinen; Lempo; Lemures; Leonard (demon); Leontophone; Leprechaun; Lepus cornutus; Leraje; Les Lavandières; Lešni Mužove; Lešni Pany; Letiche; Leuce; Leucippus; Leviathan; Leyak; Lhiannan-Sidhe; L'Homme Velu; Liban; Lidérc; Lidercz; lietonis; Lietuvēns; Lightning Bird; Likho; Likhoradka; Lilin; Lilith; Lilu; Limnad; Limniades; Limos; Lindwurm; Lip (Moerae); Lisunki; Little Butterflies; Little Darlings; Little People of the Pryor Mountains; Little People; Little Wildrose; Living Puppet - Doll; Lizard Fairy; Lizard Man of Scape Ore Swamp; Ljósálfar; Ljubi; Llamhigyn Y Dwr; Loch Ness Monster; Löfviska; Lohjungfern; Lord Nann; Lord of the Forest; Lord of the Mountains; Lorelei; Lorggen; Lörggen; Losi; Lotan; Lou Carcolh; Loumerottes; Loveland Frog; Loys Ape; Luan; Lubberfiend; Luchtenmannekens; Lucifer; Lucius Tiberies (vs King Arthur); Luduan; Ludwig the Bloodsucker; Lugal-irra; Lugat; Luison; Lukwata; Lulal; Lundjungfrur; Lung; Lungma; Lungmu; Lupeux; Lurican; Lurigadaun; Lurikeen; Lusca; Lutin; Lutins Noirs; Lutzelfrau; Luwr; Ly Erg; Lyeshi; Lygte Men; Lyktgubbe; Lyncetti; Lyngbakr; Lynx; Lysgubbar; Lysippe;

Maa-alused; Maalik; Maanväki; Macaria; Macelo (Telchine); Machlyes; Maćić; Maciew; Macinghe; Macrobian; Mada; Madam Koi Koi; Madhu-Kaitabha; Madhusudana; Madre de aguas; Mae Nak Phra Khanong; Mae yanang; Mãe-do-Ouro; Maelor Gawr; Maemaeler; Maenad (wiki); Maenad; Maere; Maero; Maggy Moulach; Magog; Magpie Bridge; Magu; Maha Sona; Mahabali; Mahakala; Mahamayuri; Maharajikas; Mahishasura; Mahjas Kungs; Mahoraga; Mahound; Maighdean Mara; Mairu; Majlis al Jinn; Makara; Makuragaeshi; Malahas; Malay Creatures; Malay ghosts; Malicious Spirits; Malienitza; Malingee; Malkus; Malo (saint); Malphas (demon); Mama D'Leau; Mamalić; Mami Wata; Mammon; Mamucca; Mamuni Mayan; Manaia; Manananggal; Manannán mac Lir; Manasa_Snake_Goddess; Mānasaputra; Manaul; Mande Barung; Mandi; Mandragora; Mandrake; Mandurugo; Maneki-neko; Manes; Maní; Maṇibhadra; Manipogo; Manjushrikirti; Mannegishi; Manohara; Manseren Manggoendi; Mantellioni; Manticore; Manussiha; Maori ghosts; Mapinguari; Mara Daoine; Mara; Mara_Goddess; Mara_Goddess2; Marabbecca; Marantule; Maratega; Mara-Warra; March Malaen; Marchosias; Mare; Mares of Diomedes; Margot the fairy; Margot-la-Fée; Mari Lwyd; Maricha; Marid; Markopolen; Marmennill; Marpesia; Marraco; Martes; Martlet; Marțolea; Maruda; Marui; Mary Lakeland (accused witch); Maryland Goatman; Masovian dragon; Massarioli; Mastema; Master Hammerlings; Master Johannes; Matagot; Matarajin; Matres and Matronae; Matsieng; Matsya; Matuku-tangotango; Maushop; Mavka; Maxios; Mayasura; Mazapegolo; Mazapégul; Mazoku; Mazomba; Mazzamarelle; Mazzamerieddu; Mazzikin; Mbói Tu'ĩ; Mbombo; Mbuti Mythic Creatures; Mbwiri; Medjed; Medusa; Meduza; Meerminnen; Meerweiber; Megijima; Mehen_Board_Game_Snake_God_Egypt; Meilichios; Meitei dragons; Meitei Mythic Creatures; Melanippe; Melch Dick; Meliae; Melinoë; Melisseus; Melon-heads; Melusine; Memegwaans; Memphre; Menehune; Menippe; Menk; Menninkäinen; Menoetius; Menreiki; Menshen; Mephistopheles; Meretseger; Mermaid (wiki); Mermaid of Warsaw; Mermaid of Zennor; Mermaid; Merman; Merrow; Merrows; Merry Dancers; Merwomen; Meryons; Mestra; Metten; Mfinda; Mhachkay; Miage-nyūdō; Michigan Dogman; Mikaribaba; Mikoshi-nyūdō; Milton lizard; Mimas (gigantes); Mimis; Min Min light; Minairó; Minawara and Multultu; Minhocão; Minka Bird; Minoan Genius; Minokawa; Minotaur; Minthe; Mintuci; Minyans; Miodrag; Miri; Miru; Misaki; Mishaguji; Mishihase; Mishipeshu; Misizla; Mixtecatl; Mizuchi; Mo; Moan; Mob (Sleigh Beggey); Moddey Dhoo; Móðguðr; Moehau; Moestre Yan; Mogollon Monster; Mögþrasir; Mogwai; Mohan; Moine Trompeur; Moirai; Moires; Mokele-mbembe; Mokoi; Mokumokuren; Moloch; Molpadia; Momiji; Momo the Monster; Momotarō; Momu; Monachetto; Monachicchio; Monaciello - Monacielli; Moñái; Mongfind; Mongolian Death Worm; Monkey-man of New Delhi; Mono Grande; Monoceros (wiki); Monoceros; Monoloke; Mononoke; Monopod; Monster of Lake Fagua; Monster of Lake Tota; Monyohe; Moʻo; Mooinjer Veggey; Moon Rabbit; Moon-eyed people; Mora; Morag; Morax (demon); Morgan le Fay; Morgans; Morgawr; Morgen; Mormo; Moroi; Moros; Morvarc'h; Moryana; Mōryō; Mo-sin-a; Moso's Footprint; Moss People; Moswyfjes; Mother's Blessing; Mothman; Mound Folk; Mountain God; Mountain Monks; Mouros; Mrenh kongveal; Mṛtyu; Mu shuvuu; Muan; Mucalinda; Muckie; Muc-sheilch; Mudjekeewis; Muelona; Mug Ruith; Muiraquitã; Mujina; Mukasura; Muki; Mukīl rēš lemutti; Muladona; Muldjewangk; Mullo; Muma Pădurii; Mummy - Mummies; Mungoon-Gali; Munkar and Nakir; Munshin; Munsin; Murkatta; Muroni; Muscaliet; Muse; Mušḫuššu; Musimon; Mušmaḫḫū; Mussie; Mützchen; Muut; Muyingwa; Myling; Myōbu; Myrina; Myrmecoleon; Myrmekes; Myrmidon; Myrmidons; Myrto; Mytilene;

Naamah; Naberius (demon); Nabhi; Nachtkrapp; Nachtmännle; Nachtmart; Nachzehrer; Näcken; Nadi astrology; Nafnaþulur; Naga fireballs; Naga people; Naga; Nagaraja; Nagual; Nahuelito; Naiad - Naiads; Naimiṣāraṇya; Naimon; Nain Rouge; Näkku; Nale Ba; Namahage; Namazu; Namtar; Namu doryeong; Nanabozho; Nandi Bear; Nandi; Nang Mai; Nang Ta-khian; Nang Tani; Nanny Rutt; Nanook; Napfhans; Nār as samūm; Narakasura; Narantaka-Devantaka; Narasimha; Nargun; Nariphon; Nasnas; Nasu; Nat; Nataska; Native Fairies; Natrou-Monsieur; Nav; Navagunjara; Nawao; Nawarupa; Neades; Necker; Neckers; Necks; Negafook; Negret; Nei Tituaabine; Nekomata; Nel; Nelly Longarms; Nemean Lion; Nemty; Nëna e Vatrës; Nephele; Nephilim; Nereides; Nereids; Nessus; New Jersey folktales; Nganaoa; Ngariman; Ngen; Nghê; Nguruvilu; Niägruisar; Niamh; Nian; Nickel; Nick-Nocker; Nicnevin; Níðhöggr; Night Folk; Night Hag; Nightmarchers; Nightmare; Nikkisen; Nikkur; Nillekma; Nimble Men; Nimerigar; Nimue; Nine Diseases; Nine-headed bird; Ningen; Ningyo; Ninimma; Ninki Nanka; Ninlaret; Ninurta; Niō; Nion Nelou; Nip the Napper; Nis Puck; Nisken; Nisroch; Niß Puck; Nisse; Nissen god Dreng; Nittaewo; Nitus; Nivatakavacha; Nixen; Nixie; Nixies; Nkisi; Nkondi; Nocnitsa; Noderabō; Nökke; Nommo; Nomos; Nongshaba; Nongshāba; Noon Woman; Noonday Demon; Nootaikok; Noppera-bō; Norea_burn_Noah's_ark; Norgen; Norggen; Nörglein; Nörke; Nörkele; Norns; Norse_Nude_Snake_Witch; North Shore Monster; Nose (Moerae); Nosferatu (word); Nótt; Nouloi; Nüba; Nuberu; Nuckelavee; Nue; Nuggle; Nuku-mai-tore; Nuli; Nuloi; Nûñnë'hï; Nuno sa punso; Nun'Yunu'Wi; Nuppeppō; Nurarihyon; Nure-onna; Nuribotoke; Nurikabe; Nuu-chah-nulth mythology; Nuuttipukki; Nüwa; Nyami Nyami; Nyi Roro Kidul; Nykken; Nymph; Nyūdō-bōzu;

O Tokata; Oaraunle; Obambou; Obayifo; Oberon; Obia; Oboroguruma; Oceanids; Ochimusha; Ochokochi; Odei; Odin; Odontotyrannus; Odziozo; Og; Ogoh-ogoh; Ogopogo; Ogre; Ogun; Oilliphéist; Ojáncanu; Okeus; Oksoko; Ōkubi; Okuri-inu; Old Scratch; Olentzero; Ōmukade; Onchú; One with the White Hand; Ongon; Oni Gozen; Oni; Onibi; Onihitokuchi; Onikuma; Onmyōji; Onnerbänkissen; Onocentaur; Onryō; Ōnyūdō; Onza; Ootakemaru; Oozlum Bird; Ophanim; Ophiotaurus; Ora; Orang bunian; Orang Mawas; Orang Minyak; Orang Pendek; Orchi; Orculi; Orculli; Orcus; Ördög; Oreades; Oreads; Örek; Orgoglio; Orias; Orion; Orithyia; Ork; Orko; Orobas; Orochi; Orphan Bird; Orthrus; Ortnit; Osakabehime; Osaki; Ose; Oshun; Ossetian Myth; Otomitl; Otoroshi; Otrera; Otso; Otterbahnkin; Oukami; Ouni; Ouroborous; Ouroubou; Ovinnik; Owd Lad; Owlman; Oxions; Oxylus; Ozark Howler;

Paasselkä devils; Pahlavas; Pahuanui; Paimon; Painajainen; Pakhangba; Pākhangbā; Palioxis; Pallas (gigantes); Pallas; Palm Tree King; Pamarindo; Pamola; Pan; Panchajanya; Panchamukha; Pandafeche; Pandi; Panes; Pangu; Panhu; Pania of the Reef; Panlung; Panotti; Pantariste; Pantegane; Pantegani; Pantheon_the_creature; Panther; Panti'; Paoro; Papa Bois; Papinijuwari; Para; Paraskeva Friday; Parcae (Moerae); Parcae; Pard; Parzae (Moerae); Patagon; Patagonian Giant; Patasola; Patung; Patupaiarehe; Pavaró; Pazuzu; Peacock Princess; Pech; Pechmanderln; Peg Powler; Pegaeae; Pegasus; Peleiades; Pelesit; Peluda; Penanggalan; Penemue; Penette; Peng; Penghou; Penhill Giant; Penthesilea; People of Peace (Sìth); People of Peace; Perchta; Père Fouettard; Perëndi; Pereplut; Peri; Perria; Persephone; Persévay; Peryton; Pesanta; Petermännchen; Petit Jeannot; Petty Fairie; Phaethusa; Phantom Cats; Phantome (Trinidad, Tobago, Guyana); Phenex; Phi phong; Phi Tai Hong; Philippine Mytic Creatures; Philotes; Phisuea Samut; Phobetor; Phoebe; Phoenix; Pholus; Phooka; Phorcys; Phthisis; Piasa; Pichal Peri; Picolaton; Picolous; Pictish Beast; Pier Gerlofs Donia; Pig Dragon; Pillan; Pillywiggin; Pillywiggins; Pilwiz; Pincoy; Pincoya; Pingel; Pipa Jing; Pippalada; Piru; Pishachas; Pishtaco; Piskies; Pitr; Pitsen; Pitzln; Piuchén; Pixie; Pixies; Pixiu; Płanetnik; Pleiades (wiki); Pleiades; Plusso; Pocong; Polemos; Polemusa; Polevik; Poleviki; Polik-anna; Polkan; Polong; Poltergeist; Poludnitsy; Polybotes (gigantes); Polydora; Pombero; Pomo religion; Ponaturi; Pop (ghost); Pope Lick Monster; Popobawa; Poppele; Poroniec; Portunes; Potamides; Pouākai; Poubi Lai; Poulpikans; Povoduji; Powries; Prahlada; Pratyangira; Preinscheuhen; Prende_Albanian_Deity; Preta; Pricolici; Princess Eréndira; Proctor Valley Monster; Proioxis; Pronomus; Propoetides; Proteus; Proto-Indo-European Myth; Protoplast; Psoglav; Psotnik; Psychai; Psychopomp; Pua Tu Tahi; Púca; Puck; Puck_Shakespeare; Pueblo clown; Pugot; Pukwudgie; Pulao; Pulgasari; Puloman; Pulter Klaes; Pumphut; Pundacciú; Purzinigele; Puschkait; Putana; Putri Tangguk; Putti; Putto; Putzen; Puu-Halijad; Pvitrulya; Pyewacket (familiar spirit); Pygmies; Pyinsarupa; Pyrausta; Pysslinger-Folk; Python;

Qallupilluit; Qamulek; Qarakorshaq; Qareen; Qianlima; Qilin; Qin (Mandaeism); Qingji; Qingniao; Qippoz; Qiqirn; Qitmir; Qiulung; Qlippoth; Quaeldrytterinde; Queen Mab; Queen Maeve; Queen Mother of the West; Queen of Elfland; Queen of Elphame; Queen of Sirens; Queensland tiger; Querquetulanae; Querxe; Quetzalcoatl; Quiet Folk; Quimbanda; Quinametzin; Quinotaur; Qʼuqʼumatz; Q'ursha; Qutrub;

Rå; Rabisu; Rådande; Rāgarāja; Rahab; Raijin; Raijū; Railroad Bill; Rain Bird; Rainbow Crow; Rainbow Serpent; Rakhsh; Rākshasas; Rakshaza; Rakta Yamari; Raktabīja; Ramidreju; Rangalau Kiulu Phantom; Rannamaari; Rantas; Rarash; Raróg; Rashōmon no oni; Rasselbock; Ratatoskr; Raum; Ravana; Reconstructed Word - Dʰéǵʰōm; Red Cap; Red Ghost; Red Lady; Redcap; Redcombs; Re'em; Reeri Yakseya; Reikon; Remora; Rephaite; Reptilian; Resurrection Mary; Revenant; Reynard; Rhagana; Rhiwallon; Rishabhanatha; Rishyasringa; River Men; River Women; Roane; Robin Goodfellow; Robin Round Cap; Robot; Roc; Rododesa; Roggenmuhme; Rogo-Tumu-Here; Rojenice; Rōjinbi; Rokita; Rokkaku-dō; Rokurokubi; Ro-langs; Romãozinho; Rompo; Rồng - Vietnamese Dragons; Ronove; Root race (theosophy); Rôpenkerl; Rougarou; Roughby; Rozhanitsy, Narecnitsy and Sudzhenitsy; Rübezahl; Rüdiger von Bechelaren; Ruha; Rukh; Rukmavati; Rumpelstiltskin; Ruohtta; Rusalka - Rusalky; Russian superstitions; Ryong; Ryū; Ryūgū-jō; Ryūjin;

Saci; Sack Man; Sadhbh; Sæhrímnir; Sagol kāngjei; Saint Amaro; Saint Nedelya; Sakabashira; Salabhanjika; Salamander; Salbanelli; Salmon of Knowledge; Salvanel - Salvanelli; Salvani; Samael; Samagana; Samaton; Samca; Samebito; Samodiva; Samovila - Samovily; Sampati; Samsin Halmeoni; Samyaza (wiki); Samyaza; San Martin Txiki; Sandman; Sankai; Sanshi; Santa Compaña; Sântoaderi; Sânziană; Sarama; Sarangay; Sarimanok; S��rkány; Sarpa Kavu; Sarutahiko Ōkami; Sarván; Satan; Satanachia; Satori; Satyr; Satyress; Satyrus; Sauvageons; Savali; Sayona; Sazae-oni; Sazakan; Scáthach; Scazzamurieddu; Schacht-Zwerge; Schlorchel; Schneefräulein; Schrat; Schrätteli; Schrecksele; Sciritae; Scitalis; Scorpion men; Screaming skull; Scylla; Scythian genealogical myth; Scythian religion; Scythians; Se’īrīm; Sea goat; Sea Mither; Sea Monk; Sea Monster; Sea Serpent; Sea-Griffin; Sea-Lion; Sebile; Seefräulein (Gwagged Annwn); See-Hear-Speak No Evil; Seelie; Seelkee; Selige Fräulein; Selkie; Selkolla; Selma; Semystra; Sengann; Seonaidh; Seonangshin; Seonangsin; Seps; Seraphim; Seri Gumum Dragon; Seri Pahang; Serpopard; Serván; Servant (Serván); Sessho-seki; Set animal; Setsubun; Seven-headed serpent; Sewer alligator; Sha Wujing; Shabrang; Shachihoko; Shade; Shadhavar; Shadow Person; Shahbaz; Shahmaran; Shahrokh; Sha'ir; Shaitan; Shambara; Shango; Shangyang; Shankha; Shapeshifter; Shapishico; Sharabha; Sharlie; Shatans; Shatarupa; Shdum; She-camel of God; Shedim; Sheela na Gig; Sheka; Shellycoat; Shen; Shen_clam_monster; Shenlung; Shesha; Sheshe; Shetani; Shi Dog; Shibaemon-tanuki; Shichinin misaki; Shidaidaka; Shikhandi; Shikigami; Shikome; Shinigami; Shiranui; Shirime; Shiryō; Shishiga; Shishimora; Shōjō; Shōkera; Shopiltee; Shtojzovalle; Shtriga; Shubin; Shug Monkey; Shuihu; Shuimu; Shukra; Shurali; Shurdh; Shuten-dōji; Sibille; Sidehill Gouger; Sidhe; Sigbin; Signifying monkey; Sihirtia; Sihuanaba; Sila; Sileni; Silenus; Silvane; Silvani; Silvanus; Simargl; Simbi; Simhamukha; Simonside Dwarfs; Simurgh; Sina and the Eel; Singa; Sinoe; Sin-you; Siproeta; Siren; Sirena chilota; Sirena; Sirin; Sisimoto; Sisiutl; Si-Te-Cah; Sìth; Sithchean; Sithon; Six-headed Wild Ram; Siyokoy; Sjörå; Skeleton; Skin-walker; Skogsjungfru; Skogsnufvar; Skogsrå; Skogsråt; Sköll; Skookum; Skougman; Skovmann; Skrat; Skrzak; Skuld (half-elf princess); Skulld; Skunk Ape; Skvader; Sky Fox; Slattenpatte; Slavic Fairies of Fate; Slavic Mythic Creatures; Slavic Pseudo-deities; Slavic Water Spirit; Sleigh Beggey; Sleipnir; Sluagh; Smallpox demon; Smilax; Snake_Worship; Snallygaster; Snipe Hunt; Snow Lion; Snow Queen; Snow Snake; Sockburn Worm; Söedouen; Söetrolde; Soeurettes; Sōjōbō; Solomonari; Solomon's shamir; Soltrait; Somali myth; Sooterkin; Sorei; Sosamsin; Soter; Soteria; Sotret; Soucouyant; Souffle; Soul Components_Finnic Paganism; Sovereignty goddess; Spearfinger; Spey-wife; Sphinx; Spiriduș; Spirit spouse; Spirit Turtle; Spirits; Splintercat; Spor; Spriggan - Spriggans; Springheeled Jack; Sprite - Sprites; Spunkies; Squasc; Squonk; Srbinda; Sreng; St. Elmo's Fire; Stallo; Stendel; Stheno and Euryale; Stihi; Stoicheioi; Stone Sentinel Maze; Stoor worm; Storsjöodjuret; Strashila; Straszyldlo; Straw Bear; Stricha; Strigoi; Strix; Stroke Lad; Strömkarl; Struthopodes; Strzyga; Stuhać; Stymphalian birds; Su iyesi; Suanggi; Suangi; Subahu; Succarath; Succubus; Sudsakorn; Sumarr and Vetr; Sumascazzo; Sunda and Upasunda; Sundel bolong; Sunekosuri; Suparṇākhyāna; Surgat; Surtr; Susulu; Sut; Suvannamaccha; Suzuka Gozen; Svaðilfari; Svartálfar; Swan Maiden; Sweet William's Ghost; Swetylko; Sybaris; Sylph; Syöjätär; Syrbotae;

Ta'ai; Tahoe Tessie; Tailypo; Takam; Takaonna; Takarabune; Talamaur; Talos; Tam Lin; Tamamo-no-Mae; Tamangori; Tamil myth; Tan Noz; Tanabata; Tandava; Tangaroa; Tangie; Tangye; Tanin'iver; Taniwha; Tannin; Taoroinai; Taotao Mo'na; Taotie; Tapairu; Tapio; Tapire-iauara; Tarand; Tarasque; Taraxippus; Tariaksuq; Tarrasque; Tartalo; Tartaruchi; Tata Duende; Tatzelwurm; Taweret; Tawûsî Melek; Te Wheke-a-Muturangi; Teakettler; Tecmessa; Teju Jagua; Teka-her; Teke Teke; Tek-ko-kui; Telchines; Teleboans; Telemus; Ten Giant Warriors; Teng; Tenghuang; Tengu; Tenka; Tennin; Tenome; Ten-ten vilu; Tentōki and Ryūtōki; Tepegöz; Tepēyōllōtl; Teraphim; Termagant; Terrible Monster; Tesso; Tethra; Teumessian fox; Teutobochus; Teuz; Teyolía; Thalestris; Tharaka; Thardid Jimbo; Thayé; The Beast of the Earth; The Beast; The Black Dog of Newgate; The Cu Bird; The Devil Whale; The Elder Mother; The Elf Maiden; The Four Winds; The Giant Who Had No Heart in His Body; The Goose Wife; The Governor of Nanke; The Great Snake; The Green Man of Knowledge; The Heavenly Maiden and the Woodcutter; The Hedley Kow; The Imp Prince; The King of the Cats; The Laidly Worm of Spindleston Heugh; The Legend of Ero of Armenteira; The Lovers; The Mistress of Copper Mountain; The Morrígan; The Nine Peahens and the Golden Apples; The Nixie of the Mill-Pond; The Painted Skin; The Precious Scroll of the Immortal Maiden Equal to Heaven; The Prince Who Wanted to See the World; The Queen of Elfan's Nourice; The Sea Tsar and Vasilisa the Wise; The Silbón; The sixteen dreams of King Pasenadi; The Stinking Corpse (giant); The Swan Queen; The Voyage of Bran; The Voyage of Máel Dúin; The Voyage of the Uí Chorra; The Witch of Saratoga; The Woman of the Chatti; Theli (dragon); Theomachy; Theow; Thermodosa; Thetis Lake Monster; Thiasos; Thiasus; Thinan-malkia; Thiota; Thoe; Thomas Boudic; Þorbjörg lítilvölva; Þorgerðr Hölgabrúðr and Irpa; Thrasos; Three Witches; Three-legged crow; Thriae; Þrívaldi; Throne; Thrones; Thumblings; Thunderbird; Thunderdell; Þuríðr Sundafyllir; Thusser; Thyrsus (giant); Tiamat; Tianguo; Tianlung; Tianma; Tibetan myth; Tibicena; Tiddalik; Tiddy Mun; Tiddy Ones; Tigmamanukan; Tiʻitiʻi; Tikbalang; Tikokura; Tikoloshe; Tilberi; Tilla; Tinirau and Kae; Tinirau; Tintilinić; Tipua; Titania; Titanis; Titans; Titivillus; Tityos; Tiyanak; Tizheruk; Tjilpa; Tlachtga; Tlahuelpuchi; Tlanchana; Toell the Great; Tōfu-kozō; Toggeli; Toho (kachina); Tom Hickathrift; Tomtevätte; Tom-Tit; Tomtrå; Tontuu; Tooth Fairy; Topielec; Torngarsuk; Toyol; Toyotama-hime; Tragopodes; Trahlyta; Trailokyavijaya; Transformer; Trasgo; Trauco; Tree Elves; Tree Octopus; Tree of Jiva and Atman; Trenti; Trentren Vilu and Caicai Vilu; Tréo-Fall; Trickster - Tricksters; Triple-headed eagle; Tripurasura; Trishira; Triteia; Triton; Tritopatores; Troglodytae; Trois Marks (Moerae); Trojan Leaders; Trojan War characters; Troll Cat; Troll; Trow; Tsmok; Tsuchigumo; Tsuchinoko; Tsukumogami; Tsukuyomi-no-Mikoto; Tsul 'Kalu; Tsurara-onna; Tsuru no Ongaeshi; Tsurubebi; Tsurube-otoshi; Tuatha dé Danaan; Tuatha; Tubo; Tuchulcha; Tudigong; Tu'er Shen; Tugarin; Tulevieja; Tulpa; Tulpar; Tumburu; Tunda; Tuometar; Tupilaq; Tur; Turoń; Türst; Turtle Lake Monster; Turul; Tuttle Bottoms Monster; Tutyr; Tuyul; Two-Toed Tom; Twrch Trwyth; Tyger; Tylwyth Teg; Typhon; Tzitzimitl;

Ubagabi; Ubume; Ucchusma; Uchchaihshravas; Uchchaishravas; Uchek Langmeitong; Udug; UFO; Ugallu; Uhaml; Uhlakanyana; Ullikummi; Ulmecatl; Ulupi; Umamba; Umang Lai; Umi zatō; Umibōzu; Umū dabrūtu; Unclean Force; Unclean Spirit; Undine; Undines; Ungaikyō; Ungnyeo; Unhcegila; Unicorn; Unners-Boes-Thi; Unterengadin; Untüeg; Untunktahe; Unut_Egypt_Rabbit-Snake-Lion_Goddess; Upamanyu; Upelluri; Upiór; Ur; Uraeus; Urayuli; Ureongi gaksi; Uriaș; Uridimmu; Urisk; Urmahlullu; Ursitoare; Ursitory; Ushi no toki mairi; Ushi-oni; Usiququmadevu; Ušumgallu; Uwan; Uylak; Uzuh;

Vadavagni; Vadleány; Vaettir; Vættir; Vahana (Mount of a Deva); Vainakh religion; Vairies; Vajrakilaya; Vajranga; Vajrayakṣa; Valac (demon); Valefar; Valkyrie; Valravn; Vâlvă; Vampire folklore worldwide; Vampire pumpkins and watermelons; Vampire; Vanapagan; Vanara; Vanir; Vanth; Vântoase; Varaha; Varahi; Vardivil; Vardøger; Vardögl; Vardöiel; Vardygr; Vassago; Vasuki_Naga_King; Vattar; Vazily; Vazimba; Ved; Vedmak; Veðrfölnir; Vegetable Lamb of Tartary; Vegoia; Vel; Veleda; Vellamo; Vemacitrin; Venediger Männlein; Ventolín; Verechelen; Verlioka; Vermillion Bird; Vesna; Vetala; Viðfinnr; Vidyadhara; Vidyādhara; Vihans; Vila; Vilenaci; Vileniki; Vili Čestitice; Vine (demon); Viprachitti; Viradha; Vishala; Vishap; Vision Serpent; Vitore; Vittra; Vivani; Vivene; Vjesci; Vodni Moz; Vodyaniye; Vodyanye; Vǫrðr; Vörnir (joetunn); Vosud; Vouivre; Vritra (dragon); Vritra; Vrukodlak; Vrykolakas; Vyaghrapada; Vyatka;

Waalrüter; Wadjet; Wag at the Wa'; Waira; Waitoreke; Wakinyan; Wakwak; Waldweibchen; Waldzwerge; Walgren Lake Monster; Walter of Aquitaine; Waluburg; Wampus Cat; Wandjina; Wangliang; Wani; Wanyūdō; Warak ngendog; Warlock; Wars and Sawa; Watatsumi; Water Bull; Water Horse; Watermöme; Wati kutjara; Wawel Dragon; Wayob; Wechselbalg; Wechuge; Weiße Frauen; Wekufe; Welsh Dragon; Welsh Giant; Wendigo; Werecat; Werehyena; Wereleopard; Werewolf; Werewolves of Ossory; Wewe Gombel; Whakatau; Whiro; White dragon; White Ladies; White Lady (wiki); White Lady; White River Monster; White Tiger; White Women; Whowie; Wicht; Wichtel; Wiedergänger; Wight; Wihwin; Wild Haggis; Wild Hunt (wiki); Wild Hunt; Wild Hunter; Wild Man of the Navidad; Wild Man; Wild Men; Wild Women; William of Lindholme; Will-o'-wisp; Willy Rua; Wind Folletti; Wind Horse; Winged cat; Winged Lion (St. Mark); Winged lion; Winged Unicorn; Wirnpa; Wirry-cow; Wisdom King; Witch; Witches of Anaga; Witege; Witte Juffern; Witte Wieven; Witte Wijven (Moerae); Witte Wiver; Wives of Rica; Wolpertinger; Wolterken; Wolves in heraldry; Woman in Black (supernatural); Wood Folk; Wood Maidens; Wood Men; Wood Trolls; Wood Women; World Elephant; World Turtle; Worm of Linton; Wrathful deities; Wulver; Wurdulac; Wurm; Wutong Shen; Wuzhiqi; Wyvern;

Xana; Xanthippe; Xanthus; Xaphan (demon); Xeglun; Xelhua; Xezbeth; Xhindi; Xian; Xiangliu; Xiao; Xicalancatl; Xiezhi; Xingtian; Xirang; Xiuhcōātl; Xtabay;

Y Ladi Wen; Yacumama; Yacuruna; Yahui; Yako; Yakseya and Yakka; Yaksha; Yakshini; Yakusanoikazuchi; Yale; Yali; Yallery Brown; Yalungur; Yam; Yama; Yamabiko; Yamabito; Yamaduta; Yamainu; Yamajijii; Yamantaka; Yamata no Orochi; Yama-uba; Yamawaro; Yanari; Yan-gant-y-tan; Yao Grass; Yāoguài; Yara-ma-ya-who; Yarthkins; Yarupari; Yashima no Hage-tanuki; Yateveo (Plant); Yato-no-kami; Yawyawk; Yazata; Yee-Na-Pah; Yehasuri; Yeii; Yekyua; Yelbeghen; Yellow Lung; Yemọja; Yenakha Paotapi; Yer iyesi; Yeren; Yernagate; Yer-sub; Yeti; Yinglung; Yobuko; Yōkai; Yokkaso; Yōsei; Yosuzume; Yotsuya Kaidan; Youkai; Yowie; Ypotryll; Ysätters-Kajsa; Ysbaddaden; Ysgithyrwyn; Yuki-Onna; Yule cat; Yum Kaax; Yumboes; Yume no seirei; Yūrei; Yuxa;

Zabaniyah; Zahhāk; Zahreil; Žaltys; Zana; Zână; Zaqar; Zār; Zaratan; Zarik; Zartai-Zartanai; Zashiki-warashi; Zȃzȇl; Zburător; Zduhać; Zelus; Zemi; Zennyo Ryūō; Zhenniao; Zheuzhyk; Zhu Bajie; Zhulung; Zhytsen; Zilant; Zimbabwe Bird; Ziminiar; Zin Kibaru; Zin; Zinselmännchen; Zipacna; Zitiron; Ziz; Zlydzens; Zmaj; Zmei (aka Zmei Gorynich); Zmeoaică; Zmeu; Zojz_Albanian_Deity; Zombie; Ztrazhnik; Zuhri; Zuibotschnik; Zuijin; Zulu religion; Zumbi; Zwerg; Zwodziasz;

[stephenjaymorrisblog]

Pigs off Campus!

(College Revolt is Back in Style.)

Stephen Jay Morris

4/23/2024

©Scientific Morality

                Here is a nifty little analogy:  suppose your dad gave money to your uncle to buy a gun so that he could shoot his ex-wife? Would your dad be guilty of murder?  Kind of.  He would be an accessory to murder. Suppose your country gave weapons to another country to commit genocide? Would it be guilty of genocide? Sort of, as they would be an accessory to a war crime. So, is it justifiable for Americans to protest Israel’s genocide against Palestinians? Hell, yeah! Not only is it justified, but it is also warranted.

            Now I am going to play a game of comparative history. The Chuds have been whining and bitching about how college professors are brainwashing their precious White children with leftist propaganda. Back in 1968, most universities were run by Right wing, WASP men in suits and ties. College professors were either moderates or conservative. Only the Arts departments were managed by liberals and Beatniks. Baby Boomers were never brainwashed by college professors. They were autodidactic and hungry for the truth. Some joined the “Ban the Bomb” movement and later, the Civil Rights movement.

            The urgency of the war at hand got ahold of Boomers. Many Vietnamese women and children along with American soldiers were dying by the hundreds, as was reported on the nightly news. A minority of Boomers felt helpless and wanted to stop the killing. So, they resorted to protests and strikes on university campuses. These acts were coordinated by two major student groups: the Black Student Union and Students for a Democratic Society, other wise known as SDS. I joined SDS in 1969. The only communication avenues we had at the time were printed fliers, underground newspapers, and FM rock stations. Oh, and let’s not forget the telephone. The FBI loved tapping them. If we’d had the technology Zoomers have today, we would have stopped the Vietnam War in 1967.

            In 1968, the anti-war movement went international, from Europe to Africa to South America. Most of the world was opposed to the Vietnam War.

So, is this latest movement against Likud Party’s genocide on the Palestinian people a new Anti-War movement? As sure as the Earth is round! Now all this of this carping about Anti-Semitism is no different than when the New Left was accused of being Anti-American. Neither is true! There is a Jewish sect called, “Keturei Karta,” who believe that there can be no Israel until the Messiah comes. Many Jews do not accept Jesus as the Jewish messiah. Now, let me ask you. Is this orthodox sect antisemitic or just comprised of your average self-hating Jews? Shit no dumbass!

            In 1968, we waved Vietcong flags and were accused of being communists. It was all done in the name of solidarity. Now the Palestinian flag is waved. Nothing has changed. We did have contingencies of Tankies, and other types of communist groups, who marched with us and chanted slogans that didn’t reflect the true sentiment of the movement’s coalition. Here are a couple I remember: “America must die! Let the red flag fly!”  and “Get a clue! Fuck the red, white, and blue!” There were other silly ones I’ve long since forgotten.

            Now you have Islamic nationalist groups doing the same thing. The Chants of “Death to America” come from small, Muslim, theocratic groups who are not affiliated with the Anti-authoritarian Left. Due to rumors and erroneous propaganda, the Left, as a rule, do not support Islam. Why? Well, because many of them does not support organized religion! Second, Islam, like Christianity and Judaism, are sexist religions.

            It was the Battle of Seatle, in 1999, that gave me hope. Then came the occupation movement of 2011, and now, this anti-war movement of 2024. If they can pull this off, the movement’s young people can stop this so-called war in the Middle East. As for the young people in Israel, will they rise up and stop Likud Party? That remains to be seen.

[lazaefair]

Learn your history

Another set of excerpts from one of the lectures linked in the Palestine, Israel and WWI: 5 Facts from History article, this time with Dr. Christopher Rose. (Full transcript available.)

Starting around the 27-minute mark:

"Post 1914, when it becomes clear that the Ottomans are going to be on the other side and we abandon all pretense. One, we are going to defeat the Ottoman Empire. Two, we are going to create a pro-British bloc in the Arab world for the purpose of maintaining our lifeline to India (read: profit) and protect strategic British interests (also profit). The imperial, it has been said before, and for somebody who resisted economic history for a very long time, I will state for the record that this is an absolutely accurate fact. Imperialism is capitalism on steroids."

Around 37 minutes:

"Britain's number one priority in the Eastern Mediterranean is here, the Suez Canal. It is the aorta of the British Empire. Without it controlling India is difficult. It takes six weeks longer to get to India by going around Africa. There are now telegraph lines running through the canal. Everything is about the Suez Canal. That is the number one thing that Britain is in Egypt for, is to protect the canal. As we heard last night, one of the British objectives, one of the allied objectives in, not only blockading the coastline of the Levant, but in fomenting the great Arab revolts, was to divide up the Ottoman Army onto multiple, multiple fronts."

Around 53 minutes:

"But the Zionist Movement was a European movement, because antisemitism was still rife in Europe. And one of the, and I'll be perfectly frank with you, the reason it was a European movement, it did not get a lot of traction in the Middle East.

A friend of mine who teaches at the University of Pennsylvania, no he teaches at Penn State, Lior Sternfeld just wrote a book about Iranian Jews and their memory of the whole thing and the early part of the book, he explores when the Zionist Movement really got going in the twenties and thirties, and they would send representatives to Iraq and Iran to meet with the Jewish communities there.

And the response was really kind of tepid because Jews, as a religion that did not proselytize, who had a community ruled by religious law, actually integrated very well into the Islamic world. And so throughout history, until the troubles in Palestine began in the twenties, one could arguably say that Jews usually tended to fare better than Christians in the Middle East and the Islamic world in particular, because they were a minority that couldn't grow and their well-being depended on good relationships with the leaders.

And so literally the Iranian reaction was, "We think Zionism is a great idea for the Europeans. You guys, you're screwed, you need help. You're not safe. We're fine." And I mean, the idea really got sort of a shot in the arm after the Dreyfus Affair, which happened in France, where a high ranking French military intelligence officer was accused of espionage and transported to Devil's Island for imprisonment, primarily for the crime of being a high ranking Jew in the French military.

And so Herzl and other prominent Jewish leaders, you know – he writes this book, there are Congresses to discuss the idea – were of the opinion that as long as the fate of Jewish security in Europe in particular, depended on the state, and especially after Dreyfus, that the state could not be relied upon to protect its Jewish citizens. The only way for Jewish security to be achieved was for Jews to be the majority in their own states.

After all, it was the Arab nationalism, everybody was doing it. I feel like Oprah here. You get a state and you get a state and you get a state, right? But that's kind of how it sort of seemed in the 19th century, especially in former Ottoman territory. Now, let me put it to you this way. Herzl was also right about something very important.

Herzl says in his writings, and articulated this a number of times, we have to legitimately acquire the territory that we are going to build our state on, either buying it, being given it by the ruler. We cannot do a system by wherein we start clandestinely moving into a geographical area and making ourselves the majority population slowly, basically through subterfuge because it will cause problems with the local population. We have to.

Guess what? He was absolutely right about that."

[qqueenofhades]

Hi, I hope this isnt annoying to ask but w the old guard ive seen a lot of people mixing up catholic and christian when it comes to nicky. when by todays standards theyre not interchangeable as catholic is a specific strain of christianity. i was kinda under the impression the crusades were a purely catholic thing since the pope. is that right or were other christians involved??

Hmm. Just to be clear what you’re asking, are you wondering whether it’s a mistake to use “Catholic” and “Christian” interchangeably when talking about this time period or describing Nicky’s faith? And/or asking for a basic religious primer on medieval Europe and the crusades more generally?

First, it’s not a mistake to use “Catholic” and “Christian” as synonyms during the crusades, especially since a) Catholics are Christians, no matter what the militant Protestant reformers would like you to think, and b) until said Protestant reformation, they were the dominant and almost (but not quite) singular Christian denomination in Western Europe. Our source material for the period doesn’t describe the crusaders as “Catholics,” even if they were; they call them Christians or Franks. (Likewise, the word “Frank,” i.e. “French” was often used to describe Western European crusaders no matter which country they were from, since so many crusaders came from France and that was where the crusades were originally launched, at the council of Clermont in 1095.) To call them “Christians” points us to the fact that the crusades were viewed as a great pan-Christian enterprise, even if the reality was more complicated, and nobody would need to specify “Catholic,” because that was implicit.

In short, medieval Europe had two major strands of Christianity, which developed out of the centuries of arguments over heresy, the contents of the biblical canon, the nature and/or divinity of Christ, their relationship to Judaism, paganism, and other religions of late antiquity, and so forth. Eventually these two competing branches took on geographical, cultural, and linguistic associations: Western (Latin) Catholic Christianity, and Eastern (Greek) Orthodox Christianity. The Great Schism in 1054 split these two rites formally apart, though both of them had at least some thought that the internal divisions in Christianity should be healed and dialogue has continued intermittently even up to the present day (though they’re still not actually reconciled and this seems highly unlikely to ever happen.)

The head of Western Catholic Christianity was (and is) the Pope of Rome, and the head of Eastern Orthodox Christianity was (and is) the Patriarch of Constantinople. Both of these branches of Christianity were involved in launching the crusades. To make a long story short, the Byzantine (Greek) Emperor, Alexios Komnenos, appealed to the Catholic (Latin) pope, Urban II, for help in defending the rights of eastern Christians, territorial incursions against Greek possessions by the Muslims of the Holy Land and North Africa, and the city of Constantinople (and Jerusalem) itself. So although the actual French and Western European participants in the crusades were Catholic, they (originally, at least) joined up with the intention of helping out their Orthodox brethren in the East and “liberating” Jerusalem from the so-called tyranny of Islam. To this end, the accounts of the council of Clermont focused heavily on the brotherhood of western and eastern Christians and the alleged terrible treatment of these Christians by the ruling Islamic caliphate in Jerusalem. At that time, that was the Isma’ili Shia Muslim Fatimids (who had replaced the Sunni Muslim Abbasids in the early 10th century -- there are many names and many dynasties, but yes.)

However, despite this ecumenical start, relations between Western and Eastern Christians started to go bad very quickly over the course of the crusades, indeed within a few short years of Clermont. Alexios Komnenos wanted the crusade leaders to swear loyalty to him and pledge to return formerly Byzantine lands that might be recaptured from the Muslims, and the crusade leaders did not want to do this. There were deep cultural, linguistic, religious, social, and political differences between Greek and Latin Christians, even if they were both technically Christians, and these caused the obvious problems. The Greeks were obviously located in a different part of the world and had a different relationship with their Islamic neighbors (they fought them often, but also traded with them and established diplomatic ties) and this caused constant friction during the crusades, since the Westerners always suspected (not entirely wrongly) that the Greeks were secretly in league with the Turks. Albert of Aachen, writing his Historia Ierosolimitana in the early 12th century, referred to “wicked Christians, that is to say Greeks,” and our primary source for the Second Crusade (1145--49) is Odo of Deuil and his De profectione Ludovici VII in Orientem (Journey of Louis VII to the East.) He spent the entire time grousing about “treacherous Greeks” and blaming them for the crusade’s struggles (though the Second Crusade pretty much sabotaged itself and didn’t need any outside force to blame for its failure). There was some truth to this accusation, since Byzantium was then engaged in a war against Sicily (Louis VII’s ally, though it had its own connections to Muslim culture and indeed had been Muslim before the Normans conquered it in 1061). The Greeks had thus been working with the Muslims to undercut the invasion of Western Europeans into this contested territory, and this was not forgotten or forgiven.

The best-known example of Western-Eastern relations during the crusades going catastrophically awry is in 1204, at the sack of Constantinople as the culmination of the Fourth Crusade. Basically: the crusaders were deeply in debt to the Venetians and had already attacked the Catholic city of Zara (Zadar in Croatia) in hopes of getting some money back, then got involved in the messy politics of the Byzantine succession, went to Constantinople, and eventually outright attacked it, sacked and destroyed the city, and raped and slaughtered its inhabitants. This obviously poisoned the well all but permanently between Latin and Greek Christians (frankly, in my opinion, it’s one of the worst tragedies of history) and Constantinople never regained its former wealth and pre-eminence. It declined until it was captured in 1453 by the Ottoman Turks and Sultan Mehmed II, and has been an Islamic city ever since. (It was renamed Istanbul in 1923, under Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the “founding father” of modern Turkey.) Obviously, Latin and Greek Christianity still had to work with each other somehow, but the crusades were actually the single biggest factor in driving the two branches further apart, rather than reconciling them.

The words “catholic” and “orthodox” both have connotations of universality, overall correctness, and all-encompassing truth claims. Therefore, in some sense, to a Catholic Christian or an Orthodox Christian, defining themselves as such, with both words, is repetitious; they are Catholic/Orthodox and therefore the correct sort of Christian (even if their theological opponents would disagree). However, historians obviously do use that convention to distinguish them, since the identity is important, and makes a big difference as to what religious landscape an individual is living in. As for heresy, it was an equally complicated subject. Numerous “heretical” (i.e. not mainstream Catholic Christianity) Christian sects existed in Europe for this entire period, most notably the Cathars. (They got their own crusade launched against them, the Albigensian Crusade of 1209--29 in southern France.) The lines between heresy and orthodoxy (small-o orthodoxy meaning in this case, confusingly, Catholic Christianity) could often be blurred, and religious practices were syncretic and constantly influenced each other. A big problem in the Albigensian Crusade was identifying who the heretics actually were; they looked like their Catholic neighbors, they lived in community with them, their friends and family members were Cathar and Catholic alike, both rites were practiced, and plenty of towns were just fine with this hybrid arrangement. Hence it was not as simple as just pointing and going “get those guys,” and indeed, one of the leaders of the Albigensian Crusade, when asked by a knight how to tell them apart, advocated to just kill them all and God would know who the good Catholics were. Welp.

Northern and eastern Europe also remained pagan relatively late into the medieval era (into the 10th and 11th centuries) and the Northern and Baltic Crusades were launched with the aim of converting them to Catholic Christianity. (You will notice that the crusades have a complicated history as both a vehicle of religious warfare and as an attempted theater of conversion.) Heresy was a constant preoccupation of the Catholic popes, especially Innocent III (the progenitor of the Fourth, Albigensian, and Fifth Crusades). Especially in the thirteenth century, splinter religious groups and localized sects of “heresy” were popping up like crazy, and it was a constant point of contention as to how to deal with them, i.e. by force, persuasion, reconciliation, dialogue, etc. No, the medieval Catholic church was not the stereotyped instrument of fear, oppression, and tyranny, and could never enforce its views universally on all of western Europe. Church attendance on the parish level could be so low that in 1215 at the Fourth Lateran Council, Innocent issued an order requiring Christians to take communion at least once a year. So yes. The standard was very far from “everyone believed Catholicism fervently at all times and if they didn’t, they were immediately punished/burned alive.” The idea of burning heretics at the stake wasn’t even introduced until the early fifteenth century, and even then, it required an often-months-long formal church trial and wasn’t just something that the local village priest could hand out on a whim.

There were also monastic orders, and these (at least in Western Europe) were therefore Catholic, but they had different ways of practicing it and what their orders emphasized. The most common order were Benedictines (founded in the 6th century by Saint Benedict), who adhered to the Rule of Saint Benedict, which is still the basis for the following monastic orders. There were also the Cluniacs (founded in 10th-century France at Cluny Abbey) and the Cistercians (founded as rivals to the Cluniacs at the end of the 11th century, also in France). In terms of the crusades, the Cistercians were by far the most involved with/zealously supportive of them (Bernard of Clairvaux was a Cistercian) and took part in directly financing, preaching, and launching the Second, Fourth, and Albigensian Crusades alike. The better-known monastic orders, the Franciscans and Dominicans, weren’t founded until the thirteenth century, on the tail end of the crusades, and didn’t take much direct part in them. The Dominican inquisition, however, took over the business of dealing with the Cathars after the Albigensian Crusade petered out, and their concern was often with heresy thereafter.

Anyway. This has gotten long, as per usual. But I hope this gives you some introductory sense of the religious landscape of medieval Europe, the divisions within Christianity, and the fact that it’s entirely accurate to use “Catholic” and “Christian” interchangeably when discussing Nicky’s crusades-era faith and counterparts. The crusaders themselves did not specify themselves as being Catholic, and the crusades were (at least initially) viewed as a pan-Christian movement, even if eventually fatal tensions with Orthodox Christians left a permanent scar. The idea of identifying the precise denomination of Christianity is also another Protestant Reformation-era innovation, and wasn’t, at least in this case, necessary to do.

[noshitshakespeare]

I would be interested in knowing more of how to understand/approach early modern dramas, Shakespeare especially, but other writers from his time too if you know more about them, fron the angle of race/other. Do you have resources/references on how to approach early modern drama this way? I do realise this might be a broad topic, I'm looking to expand my readings and the way I approach/read Shakespeare as a non-black POC who is very fond of his works.

As you’ve said yourself, this is a really huge topic. And as you may imagine, it’s one that’s been getting more focus now than ever (though it has existed as a topic of interest since at least the 1980s). I don’t think I could do justice to the topic in just Shakespeare, let alone in all early modern drama. But let’s see if I can make a reasonable start. 

Because the term ‘race’ didn’t signify what it does now, and because Shakespeare was living in a time before England established itself as a major centre for slave trade, the first thing to be aware of is the difference of understanding. We can’t unproblematically apply modern standards and notions of race and other any more than we can talk about Shakespeare in terms of our modern understandings of sexuality and sexual identity. This isn’t to say that people didn’t notice colour, as can be seen from the terms like ‘blackamoor’ that were being used, but the question of otherness was, then as now, caught up in the more complex issue of religion, and colonisation. Because the Ottoman empire was one of the greatest powers in the world at the time, and Islam was perceived as a major threat to the European countries, difference in skin colour could also denote a difference in ideology (I talked about this a little in relation to Othello once). But sometimes an equal threat was perceived in those who didn’t look different, but who didn’t hold similar beliefs. 

Given that your question is about otherness in general, this is very relevant, and broadly speaking, we can categorise otherness in terms of 

Those who come from abroad

Those who look different (black, brown, even a slightly different shade of white)

Those who have different belief systems (Jewish people, Islamic people, Catholic people)

Those who look different and have a different belief system. 

What to make of early modern treatments of this difference is very difficult, because there isn’t a homogenous viewpoint. There’s never been a time when everybody thought the same thing, and so one can find all sorts of perspectives on race and otherness in early modern writings. Some are missionary perspectives, seeing difference as a mark of heathenism, and wishing to ‘help’ them by converting them, which went hand in hand with those who considered them subjects to be colonised and ‘civilised’ (see for instance Richard Hakluyt, Reasons for Colonisation, 1585). But there were people even at the time who saw the colonial project for what it was, and denounced the cruelty of the conquistadores (Bartolomé de las Casas’ The Spanish Colonie, translated into English in 1583 is a very interesting read), and even people like Michel de Montaigne, who admired what seemed to be a state of prelapsarian paradise in the people of the new world (see ��Of Cannibals’). In the other direction, looking from Europe towards the East, the great and far superior power of the Ottoman empire manifests itself in a kind of awe, fear, and Islamophobia, but less in a desire to civilise or convert. Often you’ll even find in military and conduct guides a favourable description of the Ottoman nations to the detriment of European cultures. Part of this might have something to do with the fact that Elizabethan England had treaties with the Ottoman empire, but it might be a tactic to shame to west into better practices too. 

Many scholars now attribute the notion of ‘otherness’ in the early modern period as part of the creation of ideas of ‘nationhood’ in a time when nationalism was really beginning to take shape. It’s an age-old notion and one that Shakespeare points out in Henry V that patriotism and national unity is made stronger by demonisation of others. By contrasting themselves with the Catholics, the Protestants could define their own faithfulness, by contrasting themselves with Jewish and Islam religions, the Christian nations could achieve a more unified identity, and by comparing themselves to the less ‘civilised’. In that sense, sometimes more fears are expressed in relation to those one can’t differentiate easily by physical characteristics, like Jewish people, or, for that matter, Irish people.  In fact, there are some very interesting depictions, for instance in The Merchant of Venice or Marlowe’s Jew of Malta in which the so-called Christians condemn the ‘other’ (Barabas, Shylock) for things they do themselves. Barabas, while playing the stereotypical bogeyman of a Jew, will criticise the Christians for their hypocrisy in the way they quote the bible to steal his money: ‘Will you steal my goods? / Is theft the ground of your religion?’ (I.ii.95-96). Shylock is accused of cruelty for essentially buying Antonio’s flesh, even though the Christians have ‘many a purchased slave / Which, like your asses and your dogs and mules, / You use in abject and in slavish parts’ (4.1.89-91). The same applies to more physically different characters. Aaron from Titus Andronicus is a problematic character, almost a cardboard cutout of an evil villain, but though he’s undeniably cruel, so are so many other characters in Titus, and strangely, while internalising the idea that black = moral blackness, he nevertheless shows more love for his child than Titus (who kills his own son), and questions ‘is black so base a hue?’ (4.2.73)

This is all to say that there’s no single approach to studying race and otherness in Shakespeare and other early modern writers. The treatment of the other will differ depending on the writer, the play, and even between characters in the plays, because it wasn’t a straightforward topic then any more than it is now. So the best thing you could do would be to familiarise yourself with the discourse that surrounds the subject without committing yourself too much to one view as being more correct than another (it’s a good scholarly approach to avoid bias as much as possible). Unfortunately, the books on the subject tend to be quite hardcore academic. But here’s a short list if you want to get started on something. 

Miranda Kaufmann,  Black Tudors: The Untold Story 

This is great for a more general readership and helps to break preconceptions about what the early modern period in England was like, but it’s not strictly about Shakespeare or drama

Catherine Alexander and Stanley Wells, Shakespeare and Race 

An essay collection, which is academic, but gives a broader scope than a monograph

Jonathan Gill Harris, Foreign Bodies

Quite hard, but very good for a wider approach to ‘otherness’ rather than being limited to skin colour. Does focus on drama alongside history. 

Ania Loomba,  Shakespeare, Race, and Colonialism

A classic. Again quite hard, and somewhat inflected by modern notions, but very useful. 

Miranda Virginia Mason Vaughan, Performing Blackness on English Stages, 1500-1800

Good if you’re interested in performance history and the actual presentation of blackness on stage, including blacking up. 

Kim Hall, Things of Darkness: Economies of Race and Gender in Early Modern England

Hardcore academic stuff, and more history-based about the beginnings of the colonial project and slavery. 

Patricia Akhimie, Shakespeare and the Cultivation of Difference: Race Conduct and the Early Modern World  

Covers that question of building national identity and deliberate emphasis of race or difference.

Mary Floyd-Wilson, English Ethnicity and Race in Early Modern Drama

Like the one above, this is broadly about the way English ethnicity is created by othering. 

Sujata Iyengar, Shades of Difference: Mythologies of Skin Color in Early Modern England

Deals with the ways early modern people understood colour in comparison to our own notions. 

Nabil Matar,  Turks, Moors, and Englishmen in the Age of Discovery

Looking eastward and southward at the relationship between Europe and the Ottoman empire as well as Africa

Daniel Vitkus,  Turning Turk: English Theater and the Multicultural Mediterranean

Another work on the relation between England and Islam, and deals very well with the British sense of inadequacy in comparison to the Ottoman Empire, as well as their fears about others who don’t have distinctly racial characteristics.

Jerry Brotton,  This Orient Isle: Elizabethan England and the Islamic World

A history book that charts the incredible trade and political relationship the court of Elizabeth had with the Ottoman Empire. 

Ayanna Thompson,  Passing Strange: Shakespeare, Race, and Contemporary America

Jumping to the present, this is more about how Shakespeare is used in America now, especially focusing on pop culture and the representation of racial issues.

For a more casual approach, and one that’s about as up-to-date as can be, you could check out the #ShakesRace hashtag on Twitter. All the scholars and theatres are using it for discussion, or for advertising new books, new conferences, talks and podcasts on this subject, though the focus is, as you may imagine, more on colour than otherness more generally. 

[anonymoustalks]

The left has become absorbed by identity politics and is obsessed with race.. it scares me that they will create more racists than before they started

(6-17-20) You both like politics.

You: heyaa

Stranger: Hi

Stranger: How are you

You: anything you're interested in?

You: I am fine

Stranger: I'm interested in hearing opinions on things

You: oh, me too ^^

You: what kind of things?

Stranger: Politics is divisive, but in order to get a better understanding I wish to listen to both sides

You: awesome, I think that's great ^^

Stranger: :) thank you

You: do you have issues you care about most?

Stranger: The current fall of western society

You: fall of western society huh

You: can you elaborate more?

Stranger: Over the past few years we have seen western society devolve. Where once we were fairly united and we stood strong, we have become more divided and with the introduction of identity politics, that has just worsened till we have gotten to where we are now. China is currently pushing her borders, and yet with the US in flames and the uk following suit (along with France for that matter), noone challenges it

You: mhm *nodsnods*

Stranger: To speak out against the lunacy is to be called a racist and a bigot, not that that's anything new of course but those who are calling for these things seem to not really understand the importance and significance of their actions. I see this as akin to the 1920s Weimar Republic. They are pushing for things they don't want

You: you type a lot haha

Stranger: Sorry i am choosing my words carefully

You: mhm it's fine

You: so you think strong foreign policy is very important?

Stranger: I do. I am from South Africa, though I live in the uk. For those who live outside the us and Europe, we see the importance of Baro and the us on a geopolitical scale. China owns the east of Africa, if not central as well. The us has been the top dog preventing them and Russia from doing much for years, though that's going to change in the coming years

Stranger: NATO not baro* bloody autocorrect

You: oh okay I was wondering what that was haha

Stranger: If I may ask, where are you from?

You: the us actually

Stranger: I thought you might be given the time :) it's half 1 am here

You: yeah it's late!

You: so in your view, western countries need to have more of a spine?

You: is that basically what you're saying?

Stranger: Always. But history has a cycle.

Stranger: Hard times create strong men. Strong men create good times. Good times create weak men. Weak men create hard times

You: very fair

You: speaking of cycles, I think something that is floating around these days

You: is whether it's sort of like the beginning of the end of american hegemony

You: sort of like UK's empire gradually had its sunset

Stranger: This is what I am concerned with. All empires have their time in the sun, and all shall fade. I had hoped I would be dead before it happened. I made a prediction several years ago that should trump win in 2020 again, there will be civil war. I am unsure on my prediction of civil war, but I can see that he will win. Should there not be war, I give it another 2 presidencies before yourselves will fall, and ww3 breaks out

You: hmm the us is steamy right now, but idk about civil war

Stranger: It's been brewing for a while now by my estimation

You: that said I would not be surprised about China continuing to be more aggressive

You: that stuff with India yesterday?

You: ^^

Stranger: Without strong willed opposition, they will always push more overtly. They have done so in the shadows for years now

Stranger: And that's just one example

Stranger: They have intruded on Thailand air space as well

You: I don't think either democrats or republicans are very foreign-policy aggressive right now though

You: idk if your concern will be that much better with biden

You: clinton was a little hawkish but she lost 2016

Stranger: It would be much worse with Biden, or anyone from the left EXCEPT Tulsi Gabbard

You: oh you sounded like you didn't want trump to win lol

Stranger: I don't like him. But honestly, he's the best option out of what has been shown. Bernie is a socialist, Hillary is a warmonger, Biden will probably be a puppet. Who can stand? Hillary could be strong, but you would go to war. For all his faults, Trump has avoided war and conflict. He brought North Korea to the discussion table.

You: okay ^^

Stranger: I may not like him but he is effective, and has been a boon to you economy though as someone who works in finance, the next crash is due soon

You: fair enough although I think a lot of places are hurt by the coronavirus economy anyways

Stranger: Yeah.. the lockdowns are odd.. why quarantine those who are healthy? We have always quarantined those who were I'll first, and then those who go out and riot get a free pass? It's a bit confusing, and is a little bit of double think. Rules don't apply to you if you have the correct opinions it would seem

You: idk the US never really had forced quarantines

You: everything here was just you were supposed to do it

Stranger: The uk did, apologies

Stranger: Well not heavily enforced near me

You: we had college students going to beaches even though the quarantine was happening

You: because young ppl think they are invincible

You: and dumb ^^

Stranger: Hahaha yeah you aren't wrong in that

Stranger: But I have waffled on, may I hear your opinions on what we have discussed?

You: mhm, I disagree but it's cool yo~

Stranger: No that's great, it shows that we can discuss and hopefully come to compromise

Stranger: Thank you for being chill and relaxed

You: mhm I'm basically a hippie though so I don't usually take strong stances on international intervention

Stranger: That's fair and understandable. I used to agree with that as well for many years

You: I kind of think it's a little bit of a selfish position to take (the peace one)

You: in the sense that I don't want to deal with other people's problems

You: so in a sense it's kinda selfish

Stranger: It is and it isn't :)

Stranger: It's a moral good and a difficult thing. Peace only exists as reprieve from war. Humanity is a war like species, and peace only ever exists between them. And I applaud your pacifism

You: idk I'm not sure if it's always something to applaud

You: I think in a sense it's a kind of inaction

Stranger: A good thought experiment for you then, look at ww2

You: yup

You: I'm familiar with isolationism in history and its ramifications

Stranger: The us was neutral officially for years, and because they took no strong stance, the Nazis rose to power. Admittedly it was partly the fault of all the allies and ww1 but that's a digression.

Stranger: But war was thrust upon them officially by what happened. The peaceful stance can be taken from you, but that is not a bad thing in my opinion

You: yup

Stranger: What would you do if you could, at that time?

You: at that time?

You: hmm

You: it's not a question I've thought very much about

Stranger: I thought on that myself

You: and what did you conclude?

Stranger: My answer was intervention. Stop the Anschluss, the Munich agreement, the extremely harsh measures of the treaty at the end of ww1

You: oh yeah that was a terrible treaty

You: I kind of imagined myself as an average person though haha

Stranger: But I understand the reasoning at the time for allowing all those things to go through

Stranger: I am too

You: you would have protested your government signing that treaty?

Stranger: That's why thay generation was called the greatest generation. We the average man stood up and took up arms, because they believed what was right.

Stranger: It is difficult to say that if I lived in that time I would. Of it was today, 100%

You: mhm... war is frightening

Stranger: We cannot judge the past with the same moral standing we have today

You: of course

Stranger: And yes, war really is a horrible thing

Stranger: If peace was an option, I would go for it. Often times though, we have no control over that

You: mhm there is suffering in a lot of places, and violence that arises from suffering and hatred

Stranger: Look at the Nazis and the hatred of the Jews. That was extremely common all across Europe, the uk and the us. Many leaders in politics and business liked the Nazis initially. But just because something is common, does not make it right

You: I actually never understood antisemitism

Stranger: You are quite wise, and I agree with you. But the sad thing is, there will always be suffering

You: or why people hate(d) jewish people

Stranger: The scary thing is, many of those in BLM look up to a man called Farrakhan (forgive me on the spelling) who is a huge antisemite. Like he openly calls for violence against them. He gets away with it, because he is black. Why he hates them I don't know. They are hated I think, because they are the oldest abrahamic religion and the oldest monothesist one as well, from which both Islam and Christianity draw their teachings from initially

You: I just don't understand why they are hated

You: often by christians too

Stranger: Me neither, I find it abhorrent. They have been persecuted for thousands of years

You: yeah idk I just don't understand why

Stranger: I have yet to find out why. I know in Islam they hate them as it is dictated within their scriptures, though the exact wording I am unsure on. Christians I would think it's because they don't believe that Jesus was the son of God

You: I guess so

Stranger: But I may be entirely wrong

Stranger: Which I probably am

You: idk I don't know anything so I have no clue

Stranger: Hence why I like and want discussion :) we learn more through communication

Stranger: We become better the more we communicate

You: is there a reason why you dislike blm so much?

Stranger: I stand against identitarianism

You: so basically all those "pride" movements?

Stranger: I come from a racist country that segregated everyone and everything based on the colour of everyone's skin and I was hated for being the colour of my skin just for being born. I cannot condone movements that wish to implement the same things, as it will lead to suffering and hatred.

Stranger: I have nothing against being proud of your race, though I think the idea is a bit stupid. I have an issue with everything needing to divided up based on the colour of ones skin, I choose to judge someone on the basis of their character. I'm not perfect and there are times where I have been prejudiced but it is something I am consious of and wish to not do

You: mhm okay

You: I'm not sure if blm wants things to be divided up based on race though

You: I thought they were mostly against police brutality

Stranger: Some very much so are. Though I will concede that not all of them are, and I should tar everyone with the same brush. But as a counter to that, look at CHAZ in Seattle, they have segregated farms though calling them that is hilarious

You: I thought chaz is just a city block?

Stranger: On the police brutality, I agree with them and that reform must happen. Abolishing police is not a good idea. More funding is required, better training and better internal policies and structures to vette and review the officers is needed. Abolishing them will lead to anarchy. You are correct that Chaz is, but it is a microcosm showing the very things I stand against. I am against racism of all kinds, segregation is a form of racism. The us had a history where they did it too and agreed that it was wrong

You: mhm

You: I just wasn't familiar with blm as pro-segregation

You: that said, most blm activists are just really young

Stranger: They have been co-opted by those who are. And many activists are young white kids

You: I don't think mainstream democrats take them very seriously

Stranger: I'm not so certain. But I hope I am wrong

You: idk I mean these days who knows what kind media we each read

You: so I'm sure I'm in a bubble too

Stranger: They may see these things as a good and helpful idea, but the road to hell is often paved with good intentions

Stranger: Of course, and I hope I'm wrong. I recommend a variety of news sources, especially independent ones. A great one is a guy named Tim Pool on YouTube. He is a left leaning centrist guy who is upfront with his leanings. But he gives the news as it is

You: mhm I try to avoid youtube news

You: although idk if it's truly reliable to always go through bbc or ap or others

You: they are just mainstream

Stranger: BBC is very biased in my opinion. Tim used to work on mainstream media but he left. I would call him credible, he looks at news sources and verifies them. He's very milk toast and fence sits allot the problem with news is that all sides want to spin things the way they want it

You: mhm okay

You: is there any kind of mainstream media that you like?

Stranger: I don't trust any of them when it comes to almost anything except weather and sport scores. I will listen to what is said from various sources before coming to my own conclusions. I have lost all faith in the media since 2016

You: I see, I guess it ends up being hard to find something to trust

Stranger: Unfortunately it is. My reasons for it was both the elections in the us for 2016 and the brexit vote here in the uk. I was very similar to you then, very much so a hippie and very left leaning. I disagreed with Trump and Brexit, but I lost. But the way the media and society within the left handled themselves and the situation, that put me off completely and pushed me to become more conservative than what I was

You: interesting, although I'm not exactly following what made you more interested in conservative things

Stranger: The constant denigration of those who you disagree with. The treatment hat those people got, most of whom are the working class, upon the backs of which society is upheld. They are not racist or evil. They have a different opinion and different values. How does making a choice in a democracy make someone evil when neither side is perfect?

Stranger: The left preaches tolerance, except that it doesnt in reality

You: mhm yeah I don't like that

You: I don't think it is effective either

Stranger: All it does is polarize people

Stranger: And drive them further away from reaching g a compromise

You: right

Stranger: Don't get me wrong, I don't agree with Brexit, but as a democracy we made a decision. So now we need to exact that decision. I would have voted for trump despite my disdain for him

Stranger: Enact not exact*

You: I think there are a lot of people who think similarly as you do ^^

Stranger: There really are

Stranger: The left has become absorbed by identity politics and is obsessed with race.. it scares me that they will create more racists than before they started

Stranger: Constantly calling your opposition racist and evil will force them into being it

You: mhm I think there are some things to distinguish between social media left-wing people and people in everyday life I think

You: the vitriol is always much more amplified online than people are irl

Stranger: Oh agreed! Twitter is not real life, but it has started to bleed over

You: I live in a fairly liberal state, although I don't really think I have ever seen twitter irl

You: although I do think there is probably self-censorship occuring

You: in the sense that people are afraid of what their neighbors will think

Stranger: There is allot of that

Stranger: Anything you say will be used against you. Even if it's not that controversial

Stranger: People have lost their jobs for an opinion not done at work

You: that said, I don't think that's per say the "left's" fault though -- I just think that public opinion has shifted dramatically in the last 10 years

Stranger: Or how about the man who lost his job because his wife said something controversial

Stranger: I agree with you

Stranger: I really do

Stranger: Allot of this I do think could have been stopped years ago

You: I don't really like the lynch firing of people

You: that companies do for their public image

You: because the truth doesn't matter

You: it's just public image

Stranger: They do so because they are scared of the mob

You: but at the same time, I think public image is a thing because majority opinion really has shifted in the past two decades

You: opinions on homosexuality have swung dramatically in the US

You: ten years ago it was totally okay in public to be anti-homosexual

Stranger: Obama was against gay marriage until it was politically important for him to win the next election

You: but public opinion I think has swung really fast

You: yeah

You: I think he swapped at the first poll that showed >50% of americans supported it

Stranger: Yep! I find it hilarious that that was the case

You: yes but I think conservatives find this kind of fast change extremely uncomforting

You: I can understand that sentiment

You: also isn't it getting kinda late for you? ^^

Stranger: Conservatives are by their very nature are conservative. Change is neither malevolent nor benevolent, but we cannot look at change as universally good. Not can we disregard tradition

Stranger: It's 3 am and I can still keep going, I'm enjoying this conversation :)

You: I need to do the dishes eventually lol

Stranger: If you wish to leave you can by all means :) I won't hate you for it

You: I'm fine either way tbh

You: are you working right now? if you have work tomorrow you should prob go to bed

Stranger: It's up to you :) I can go for ages though my coherence Kay descend

Stranger: I'm sadly unemployed at the moment having lost my job earlier this year

You: coronavirus?

Stranger: Sadly yes

You: that's unfortunate, I'm sorry

Stranger: Not your fault :) so don't stress

You: so aside from Russia and China and the decline of western things, is there anything else that you stress about lol?

Stranger: The drive of censorship

Stranger: I have serious issue with censory

You: mhm

Stranger: And yourself?

You: mhm I dunno really

Stranger: That's good, though I would urge you to become concerned with censorship

You: mhm maybe

You: for me it's sort of a contextual concern I think

You: in the sense that it depends on your vantage point

Stranger: Opinions, art and books doesn't matter. Today it is their voice, tomorrow it is my voice. The day after it becomes your voice. Censorship takes away their rights to speak, and your rights to listen

You: mhm, what I mean is that my family immigrated from China

You: so my reference point of censorship is literal government censorship

You: in comparison the "political correctness" thing just doesn't seem as big to me imo

You: because 90% of it to me is sort of like a person's relationship with the neighbor basically

You: the US government doesn't censor what you can publish essentially

Stranger: That's fair enough, but this is where it starts. Things take time, and if anyone gives in (such as they have in several cases) that builds. In time that becomes the norm, there after what gets censored will not be at the choice of the people but of those who are in power

You: perhaps, although I kind of have faith in the 1st ammendment and the US supreme court

You: we barely have libel laws or defamation laws in the US because of the 1st ammendment

Stranger: I have seen calls to change and amend it. In the uk we have no freedom of speech, people have been arrested for jokes, what's been said on Twitter, etc. There are those who say that it's ok to censor this and that because e they are problematic or it would be good for everyone. But that is how it starts. The US has so much freedom

You: ahh... yeah I feel like it is different in the uk

Stranger: The uk doesn't care for free speech. It's very worrying and there are calls for even more censorship here.

You: mhm that sounds worrisome

Stranger: I guess I project it across to all western countries, and that is something we have seen recently

You: I don't think the US will lose the 1st amendment anytime soon, it's not politically realistiic

Stranger: Look at Amazon censoring books and movies being removed etc, this is how this begins. If it is allowed now, how can we stop it in the future

You: idk the status of free speech in other countries

You: actually this is a very interesting topic

Stranger: The us is one of the only countries that has it

You: do you think freedom of speech should be protected in private spaces?

Stranger: Codified in law that is

You: because technically freedom of speech for us is supposed to be only related to public government relationships

Stranger: I believe it should always be be protected

You: specifically "congress will make no law restricting freedom of speech" (paraphrased)

You: so you believe that private companies should not control what is said on their premises?

You: I mean it's fine if you believe that, it's actually just a bit further than what the current status quo is

Stranger: Yes. They are not above the law. Society may shun them, but they should not become involved. Outright calls for violence are against the law and that should be honoured, outside of that no they should not impose on pthers

You: hmm in the US this is where things get super complicated

You: because conservatives are also the ones who want content restricted/said in their religious schools too

Stranger: I've noticed.. and that has an effect on the rest of the world

You: basically "freedom of religion" and "freedom of speech" being on the same political side here makes things very weird

Stranger: And yeah I am aware of that as well, though the pendulum seems to have swung to the other side now. And it will swing back to the other side again

You: kind of like "My store should have the freedom of religion to deny my patrons of being homosexual in my store" kinda thing

Stranger: Yeah it is hard but there is more to the opposite side than just the one thing

You: it's a weird convoluted thing when both are conservative issues

Stranger: That's a difficult one, but I would say that should be discussed and debated but the highest courts. I cannot say from a legal sense one way or the other, morally I can say that it's hard to decide. I think that everyone should get a choice but I am uncertain

Stranger: By not but*

You: mhm that's fine ^^

You: I just think it's very interesting because most laws here, they govern the relationship between between the government and the people

You: so our freedom of speech laws do not apply to amazon censoring books because they are a private company

Stranger: Which is the difficult thing

Stranger: They are protected by being a private company

Stranger: As it's not just them

You: maybe ^^ we have a free market though, so things that cannot be published on amazon will find an outlet elsewhere

You: provided there is a demand for it

You: that said, it also has some gray area with morality laws

Stranger: That is true but monopoloes make things harder to find

You: kind of like youtube banning pornographic content

Stranger: Yeah I can understand that morally, legally I don't know but I would assume that there is some laws regarding that

You: I mean I'm just used to many various sites having bans of various sorts

Stranger: The uk has some

Stranger: Yeah, but there are protections for them being platforms not publishers

You: I don't think there is any law forcing youtube to ban pornographic content; it's just a branding choice by the company

Stranger: If they are publishers, those protections don't apply

You: like I think they want to be seen as family-friendly

Stranger: Fair enough, would have thought there might be

You: porn sites are not illegal in the US lol

Stranger: Not family friendly, advertisement friendly

You: lol true

Stranger: Sorry I don't know enough to be able to say :) I'm happy to admit that

You: mhm aside from political correctness, I guess I just don't personally see a big problem with censorship in the US

You: although I think I have a different belief than you that I think it's okay for private companies to choose what they want to publish

You: even if the ban content

You: these companies still need to compete

Stranger: Them doing so is fine, but if they wish to be protected as platforms they cannot act as a publisher. I think that's the Crux of their protections

Stranger: It is something that has been going for a while though

Stranger: And I think Trump will have it in his campaign for reelection this year

You: okay ^^

Stranger: But I don't know, he has been interested in censorship and has said he is against it in the past

You: I think people mean different things by censorship

You: but that's just imo

You: there are almost no western countries that experience censorship by their governments

You: so people mean things like censorship at their workplace

You: although imo that's kind of less censorship and more on the political correctness spectrum

Stranger: True. That is very true. But if you don't stop censorship openly, then should it come from government you don't already know you can stand against it

You: but to me, that "political correctness" isn't anything new either; it's as old as time

You: like did we always worry about saying something that would offend our boss?

You: ^^

You: it's always been there

You: I just think people are uncomfortable because bosses have changed in the last few decades

Stranger: It's not just their work place. The new "town square" is has become online. Your freedoms online are not protected despite it being codified in law

Stranger: And you aren't wrong, and coming from China or at least your family, you bring an interesting perspective

You: I feel like in the US we have very little digital legislation

You: the US of is head of hear

You: *there

Stranger: The world needs a digital bill of rights, to protect us all and our data. But we won't get it

You: but I don't think we have anything guaranteeing that speech on the Internet is free by any regard

Stranger: I would argue we do

You: hm? which law?

You: I like most websites have ToS's and rules banning X Y or Z on their site

Stranger: Freedom of speech and expression

You: oh I mean in terms of law

Stranger: That is what I meant, so that we are free to speak and express ourselves. I also believe that our data should be private and cannot be sold and that should be protected. There are other things that I have heard but it's difficult to remember all those that were proposed

You: ahh

You: yeah we don't have those laws right now

Stranger: Today stuff is okay but you are not protected

You: although the EU has some privacy ones that we don't have in the US

Stranger: The EU doesn't care mostly

Stranger: Some laws only protect some information, I'm talking about all of our information

You: ^^

Stranger: Everything we post and do is tracked, monitored and sold

Stranger: We revel in it, "I was talking about cats/dogs and all of a sudden I got adds for cat/dog products"

Stranger: We hear that often

You: yup

Stranger: Also, with regards to our rights and things, who holds these companies accountable?

Stranger: Take google for example

Stranger: They have been caught tampering with the elections

You: well, again, we have basically no laws about this in the US so there is no accountability

Stranger: They openly censor news and opinions

Stranger: They are a monopoly

You: although some europrean countries have lawsuits whatever with them

You: yup they totally are

You: where are anti-trust laws lol?

Stranger: That's what I think Trump will be looking at, I would if I was in his shoes

Stranger: But they were given special protections

Stranger: Those need to be taken away, the large companies need to be broken up but governments are incompetent

Stranger: I don't trust them to do it well

You: mhm it actually reminds me of south korea actually

Stranger: I mean there are a few senators in the states that I think have the moral fortitude to do so, but I don't know

You: countries are loathe to break up companies that they're proud of basically

Stranger: Yep

You: like samsung in south korea lol?

Stranger: They wouldn't break them up

Stranger: It would do serious damage to the economy and blah blah blah

You: their revenue was like 20% of the entire country's gdp

Stranger: Yep it's a difficult argument

Stranger: And I can understand why you wouldnt

Stranger: That 20% could drop to below 1%

You: anyhow it is getting kind of late

You: it was nice talking to you

You: and you should sleep ^^

Stranger: Likewise! :) I needed to move my sleep schedule for a 24 hour race on the weekend anyway, sp thank you for occuping my time and mind :)

You: goodnight!

Stranger: I'm glad to have met another willing to talk, take care my good friend

You have disconnected.

[sayruq]

I don't know how to feel about Dany's crusade. It's so white savior in all aspects. At the same time I can't hate on Dany for trying to help. What do you think GRRM's inspiration for slavery is?

I agree to the first part in a way. I usually critique Dany’s motives, history, methods and results when it comes to her anti slavery crusade but I can’t find it in me to say she should have never done it. Sometimes.

As for the second part of your ask, there are two inspirations. The first one is the Roman slave system which George has claimed publicly. The second one is probably the more important one because in my opinion it’s the one Daenerys encounters once she leaves Qarth and that’s the Arab slave systems. 

The Arab slave trade happened in two periods of time in two different regions of Africa. The older one is the Trans-Saharan slave trade in which North African Arabs, Europeans and others traded with desert tribes and various West African kingdoms and empires for hundreds of years. The slaves functioned as guards, domestic workers and sex slaves. This one declined because of the emergence of chattel slavery. The more recent slave trade was the Indian Ocean slave trade between the Middle East and the East Coast of Africa. While slaves weren’t the primary ‘good’, they were highly sort after. The decline of this route is attributed to European colonialism.

Here’s where Daenerys’ story comes in. Note I am not saying that George did this on purpose but that a significant portion of European literature feature the same aspect which in this case is the White Man’s Burden or how it’s known as today ‘white saviorism’. Dany’s antagonists are slave masters from city states she had never visited before and with cultures she found unlikeable and alien which is how Arab culture is presented in western media (watch Reel Bad Arabs). Their names are closer to Arab names in our world than they are Italian. Some of their clothing resembles Arab or Asian garbs worn in our world. The level of Otherness is much greater in Meereen than in Qarth. In Astapor we meet a eunuch army which is similar to the eunuch guards in Arab societies in similar time periods. In short with the exception of the fighting pits, the slave trade system and by extension the cultures we meet in Slavers’ Bay are close to North African and Arab societies than southern Europe.

Essentially, Dany’s journey through Essos mirrors the ones under taken by white missionaries in the interior of Africa after the abolishment of slavery in England. Let’s start the comparisons. First the missionaries came from European countries that engaged in chattel slavery in West Africa. Dany’s Valyrian ancestors made an empire on slavery and in many ways introduced it to large parts of Essos. The missionaries adapted and accepted slavery like Dany did until their goals were impeded. Her goal was buying an army to invade Westeros but the price was higher than she could ever truly afford. Their goals were mapping the interior of the continent and converting Africans to Christianity. The problem for Dany was that she could not part with any one of her ‘children’ and give them to the Astapori masters. The problem for the missionaries was that the Arabs had already began converting Africans to Islam and they brought valuable trade to the region despite cutting out tribes like the Yao by coming into the interior themselves. 

So Dany asks the Unsullied to kill the masters and began her crusade all while gaining men for her armies and gold from slave owners hoping she would leave them alone. Later she began ruling Meereen as its queen. The missionaries wrote letters to their governments and newspapers and stirred public sentiment until the Berlin Conference happened whose purpose was to divide the continent among the European powers aka the Scramble and Partition of Africa. Astapor and Meereen were devastated and soon many began turning against Daenerys on both sides. Hundreds of thousands were killed during the initial conquering of Africa and hundreds of thousands died during the fight for independence. The social, cultural and economic devastation is still visible today. 

In both cases you have two entities dealing with a genuinely horrific practice but the abolish of said practice was largely self centred, meant to enrich themselves in one way of the other (militarily, culturally, economically) and left the region in question more devastated than ever before. 

If you thought Dany’s story had similarities to colonialism in Africa, you’re right and she’s not the only one. In fact she’s part of a long line of characters in European and American literature dedicated to recreating the events that led to colonialism.

[militant-holy-knight]

The Secular Disdain for Persecution of Christians

If 2019 so far showed us anything is that regardless of you are a white or not, you are not welcome if you are a Christian.

To say that this year’s Holy Week has been deeply unpleasant is probably an understatement, but there are not enough words.necessary to illustrate how horrible everything was, beginning with the fire of Notre Dame’s Cathedral and ending with Easter bombings in Sri Lanka targeting several Catholic churches and killing over 200 people. The reactions to these events as well as some that preceded the Holy Week have become so predictable that I can conclude: if you are a white Christian and your opinion can be easily dismissed, then so will the millions of Christians all over the world facing persecution.

Monday opened with a fire taking place in Notre Dame which caused extensive damage to the cathedral. At the time of writing, the causes are said to be accidental but some suspect (and not without reason) that it could have been arson. I am sure you have seen the pictures of several Arab looking citizens taking pictures and smiling with the laugh reacts on Facebook vids, but I won’t bother with those. Instead I want to focus on the particular knee-jerked reactions that secular Westerners have made in regards to this fire:

It was an overreaction because “its just an building” and nobody died (never mind that priceless architecture that can’t be replicated today is now lost forever).

It was a retribution for French colonization (never mind that hundred of non-white Catholics - including myself - also venerate the Notre-Dame Cathedral and sought to visit it once in their lives).

Other tragedies happen around the world and nobody focus on them like the Brazilian Museum in 2018.

The last point particularly hits close to home. In case you don’t know, that was probably the most important scientific center in my country which was previously the Imperial home of the last Brazilian monarch, Pedro II. This might shock some regressives out there but the Emperor of Brazil was both a Christian and a man of science that befriended Darwin. That palace contained several precious mummies and artifacts that were dug from Egypt as well as countless fossils of pre-historical creatures as well as the skull of Luzia, the oldest human fossil found in South America from around 12,000 years ago. Unfortunately unlike Notre-Dame, the fire consumed it completely.

I personally was flattered that someone still remembered it, but that feeling dissipated when I realized that most of these individuals bringing up the Brazilian Museum didn’t even knew about it before hand and only discovered it at time Notre Dame’s fire took place, and we were only discussing that to distract it from the event that happened. It was truly a dishonest tactic if there ever was one.

The “retribution against wypippo” part is particularly ironic when during Easter Sunday in Sri Lanka, a series of coordinated bombings took place in three different churches - two Roman Catholic and one Evangelical - as well as several buildings. Now the secular Westerners are screwed - their victims are non-white and not guilty of colonization so how are they going to spin this one? Well the expected tactic is to blame things on religion as usual but few actually feel dumb enough to lay the blame on the victims. Such was the case of Andy West.

He went on a anti-clerical tirade saying it’s the Christians fault because supposedly some of them may have pressured Buddhist children to convert in exchange for food during the Asian tsunami from last year. Regardless if it was true or not, it was an highly inappropriate comment to be made at the time specially when there are actual fatalities and people needing help. Still not content, he seemed to have equated everyone who took a issue with his tactless comments as an “American right-winger” as if every Christian will share the same political position, origin and denomination.

Their tactic is easily understood - they use “Trump supporter” as an label to silence critics and put them under a generalization blanket. The fact there might be Christians that don’t necessarily like Trump don’t seem to occur to them. Such was the case of an Orthodox priest who was attacked by a man who seemed to be enraged by his cross and attire and punched him believing him to be a Trump supporter. 

Despite starting out as a Judaic sect that split from Judaism and became it’s separate religion beginning on the Middle-East, the identity of Christianity is often seen as Western in nature because it was adopted by Europe and was spread all around the world with the advent of colonization. While the Western world appears to have shed Christianity all together, it’s perhaps ironic that the places its currently thriving the most are Latin America, sub-Saharan Africa and parts of South East Asia. It speaks something that its actually Filipino immigrants that are keeping church services alive in the Netherlands. 

The attitude that Europeans have towards this religiosity is one of patronizing because people of these lands had their ancestors forced to accept Christianity by force, yet they are the ones that most hold to it dearest in their heart. The problem is that are seeing a unprecendented persecution of Christians around the world in many places such as the Islamic world because of the rise of sectarianism and targeting Christians is a cowardly easy way to get back at the West or Communist regimes like China and North Korea that do not tolerate any sort of dissent to their rule. Yet most of this persecution went by unheard and it still does.

These Christians are often met with sanctimony such as those from Islamic countries escaping sectarianism - specially those of Muslim background who could very well be killed for apostasy. Such was the case of an Iranian refugee who converted to Christianity who was refused entrance because “their religion was a violent one”. Yet there are people advocating that ISIS housewife Shamima Begum be allowed to return never mind she was a member of one of al-Raqqa’s sharia patrols and was an outright accomplice in the abuse of Syrian women. I cannot keep track of the cases of Copts being abused for the last two decades even before the Arab Spring, they were a punching bag for Egypt’s population to take out their frustration in the West. 

Such atitude towards an persecute minority is honestly unbecoming of people that seem to advocate human rights and freedom yet for partisan reasons, they cannot bring themselves to assist them because they associate them with the Christian conservative right in the West which are their political rivals and they fear that might be bringing a fifth column that votes against their interests because they can’t seen Christians as anything other than Christians. This is well-illustrated here.

I won’t even touch what other religions feel about this particular above because I’ll risk being distracted. But imagine for a second being a Christian minority emigrating to the West for a better life only to discover that Europeans don’t really care about your beliefs and show preferential status to other religious groups because it suits their partisan needs when all you want is to live your life with dignity and without having to worry about a maniac terrorist or the state police knocking at your door to arrest you. Or trivialize the trauma you and your people back home suffered by waging some “war on Christmas” pissing contest to provoke conservatives or nonsense like that?

It’s truly depressing when I know Easter and Christmas are times of the day which in my home country I was raised to celebrate for their spiritual meaning, and yet I know there are millions of my co-regionalists out there that know they are putting their lives on their hands where they live if they tried to celebrate it. I was even more shocked to hear that of all countries I expected this to happen would have been Sri Lanka of all things - a Buddhist majority country, albeit one with a very turbulent story since it endured years of sustained civil war that only ended a decade ago.

If European Christians are trivialized or held in contempt, I have absolutely no hope for the minorities that aren’t even white themselves seeking sanctuary. Even more sad is that in two days it shall be the anniversary of the genocide committed against Armenians, Greeks and Assyrians by the Ottoman Empire which is poignant because it appears even more relevant now than ever.

[schoolcalidity]

“The Jews in Orientalism”

THE GHOSTS OF EDWARD SAÏD

A provocative Paris show of Orientalist art charts the European encounter with Sephardic Jewry

By Vladislav DavidzonJuly 2, 2012 • 7:00 AM

Walking through the astounding new show “Les Juifs dans l’orientalisme”—“The Jews in Orientalism”—in Paris, it is impossible to avoid the ghostly accompanying presence of the late Edward Saïd, who turned the term “Orientalism” into a curse against the West and a political weapon in the service of his people. Hung in the elegant halls of the three-and-a-half-century-old Hôtel de Saint-Aignan, home of the Musée d’Art et d’Histoire du Judaïsme (which by common acclaim has the most interesting programming of any Jewish museum in Europe), the show charts the European encounter with the Sephardic Jewish communities of Northern Africa and the Mediterranean rim at the beginning of the 19th century. Would Saïd, the great scourge of Western cultural condensation and appropriation, have taken the art that resulted from that encounter to be prime evidence in his case against the Occident? Or would he have dismissed it as a high-class form of Zionist-colonialist propaganda?

The lush and often fantastical “Orientalization” of the Jews of Northern Africa was an intrinsic part of the way the West came to understand and appreciate the East. The European fascination with the Orient began soon after first contact had been established by buccaneering 18th-century adventurers and continued as the French and British empires expanded into North Africa and the Middle East with the decline of the Ottoman Empire. One need not go any further than Chateaubriand or Flaubert’s travelogues to get a feel for the brooding romanticism of the adventurers who made Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, and Egypt into standard stops on the grand tour route taken by ne’er-do-well aristocrats slumming their way toward Constantinople and Jerusalem.

The exhibition proffers a large number of Delacroix’s sketch notebooks and watercolors from Morocco. (The exhibit’s one glaring lacuna is the absence of Delacroix’s Jewish Wedding in Morocco, on loan in Spain from the Louvre.) Delacroix’s preparatory sketches, seldom seen separately from their Arab counterparts in his famous 1837-41 trip folios, are striking and ennobling, while Theodore Chasseriau’s diminutive and delicate ink portraits of the Jews of Algeria are empathetic and well wrought. Many of the other paintings and drawings are merely anthropological: Neoclassical depictions of gluttonous feasts; hermetic, almost Dutch synagogue interiors; and fresco group studies of old Jewish men lounging lazily on the Sabbath in front of Moorish scenes or in cozy souk alleyways.

Yet touchy questions of physiological categorization and the complexity of racial relations arise inexorably in others. Intimate portraits of Jewish matrons posing in their salons include African servant girls hovering in the background. Many of the paintings depict the Sephardic Jews as white-skinned, possessing European features, fostering a sense of the painter’s identification with them as fellow colonials—while other pictures depict Jews as very swarthy. In a few cases they are dark enough to give rise to suspicions of brown-face caricature. Dehodencq’s L’execution de la Juive, a thoroughly Orientalist historico-dramatic panorama of a stoic Jewish girl being led to slaughter for her apostasy in refusing to convert to Islam, is exactly the sort of thing that would have made Saïd throw a fit.

The Sephardic communities’ trade, religious and familial links with their European brethren, as well as their knowledge of languages and cultural practices, conferred on them a privileged status as gatekeepers and interpreters between Europeans and local Arab populations; without them there may not have been an encounter. There is also an undeniable division between the sensibilities of the Christian and Jewish European traveler-painters. The latter, especially the French neo-classicists Lucien Lévy-Dhurmer, Charles Landelle, and Henri-Léopold Lévy, were able to distinguish between “universal” Jewish traits and flamboyant local phenomena—and far less apt to portray North African Jewry through the warping lens of “barbaric splendor.”

What begins ostensibly as the story of the representation of the Jews of the Orient in 19th-century European art morphs into a survey of the cultural place of the Jewish patrimony and of the Jew as an amalgamating, border-crossing force, the middleman between cultures, epochs, and artistic movements. The show is also compelling in its portrayal of the multiplicity and variety of Jewish modernisms, as the latter half of the 19th century saw a boom in the production of Holy Land painting and lithography for the consumption of tourists and pilgrims. The lush topography of Thomas Seddon’s and Gustav Bauernfeind’s landscapes and the spare tranquility of David Robert’s Old City lithographs will be familiar to anyone who has ever visited antique shops in Jerusalem. The inclusion of the more obscure paintings of Louis de Fobin and the Russian World of Art star Vasily Vereshchagin—his oil of the Western Wall painted in the 1880s is particularly lovely—is a testament to the depth and intelligence of the curatorial framing of the show.

A related trend during the period was the thunderous popularity of mass-produced and lavishly illustrated high-end Bibles among the English middle classes. A number of artists made several multiyear trips to the Holy Land to gather material for those illustrations, among them well-known figures such as James Tissot. These illustrations are a bridge between the classicizing and figurative representation of actual Jewish life in the Middle East and thematic appropriation by weavers of mythological tapestries for mass European consumption. Lawrence Alma-Tadema’s magnificent Joseph in the guise of an Egyptian Pharaoh, Moreau’s symbolist Salomé, and Horace Vernet’s painting of a Bedouin Jesus stand out here among recurring examples of the Orientalist fascination with kinky Jewish femme fatales.

The third section of the exhibit shows how the influence of the Orientalists looped back around to Polish artists living in the Pale of Settlement, Europe’s own Far East. It ends with the expansion of Orientalist motifs into the fledgling modernist experiments of the so-called New Hebrews—the Krakow- and Prague-trained artists such as Boris Schatz, Abel Pann, Ze’ev Raban, and Ephraim Moses Lilien, who opened the Bezalel Academy of Art and Design in Jerusalem in 1906, bringing European sensibilities in experimentation and a modern teaching craft to Israel. This is a rarely told story, and the selection of paintings runs from the inspired to the bizarrely inspirational. But after the majesty of the preceding parts of this show, the finale feels shallow and undercooked. This is the only part of the exhibition that felt like the curators were grasping for an antecedent historical dialectic, which feels tacked-on.

Another consequence of the Franco-centric nature of the curatorial narrative here is the show’s underplaying of the English contingent of Orientalist artists. Though the smattering of English paintings is well chosen, the show offers a mere work or two each by such eminent orientalists as William Wyld, John Evan Hodgson, and Wil Boyl. There is, however, a wonderful William Hollman Hunt painting of a blue-eyed and red-haired pre-Raphaelite 12-year-old Jesus arguing in the Temple with aged and Semitic-looking priests. In its claiming of Jesus as a Christian European child engaged in oppositional dialogue with his aged ancestors, the painter quite clearly establishes what Saïd could never admit: that the specific 19th-century European fascination with the Orient was in some large part the manifestation of a much older cultural anxiety about the debt that Christian Europe owed to the pre-Islamic East.

***

[diarrheaworldstarhiphop]

I feel like you're one of the best informed and impartial people on tumblr to answer this question - was Islam extremist and radical before Western intervention in the 20th century, or was it already radical but the west made it even more reactionary? Should Islam as a whole be criticized or is there enough good in it to still be salvageable? I'd appreciate any input, thanks.

was Islam extremist and radical before Western intervention in the 20th century

Yes

i mean, look at the rise of the caliphates and spread of islam. Unlike christianity, it spread by the tip of the sword. The crusades, after all, were a collective christian act of resistance to the loss of literally half of the known christian world to the Arabs.

but that’s literally ancient history and not too pertnent to contemporary or even modern islam, because back then, christianity was similarly violent and imperialist in character after they managed to take power over the formerly pagan roman empire.

So I’m going to focus on the last couple hundreds years of history of islam at a glance, because as i said, yea, it was “radical”

But western civilization was too powerful, rich and populous to be bothered by it

like here is the world

Here is it in 1900 at the height of european power, with the countries inflated by the relative share of the global population

the middle east and north africa virtually disappears as Europe explodes outside of it’s bounds. Europeans, as a share of the global population was enormous.

and they fucking dominated India and outskilled China at this time too.

The fundamentalists and religious radicals in the muslim world were too sparsely populated to matter, but also, devout muslims had no interest in politics in pursuit of their pious lives, so people outside of the muslim world never quite dealt with it before the world wars. Islamic society, in juxtaposition to the immensely powerful European powers, just appeared exotic and fascinating (ie: orientalism). Europoors took a fancy to islamic society rather than feared it.

The middle east was floundering under the rot of the decadent Ottoman Empire, which had embraced modernization and emancipation efforts decades before (even decriminalizing homosexuality) while north africa was being inundated with cultural overflow from european colonization. the cosmopolitans were in power in the north african population centres like cairo, casablanca, tunis and algiers. Some of these population centres even had 30-50% european demographics by the world wars. The radical islamists were off fucking around in tiny groups in the desert. They had no relative clout or power from how these regions were snatched from the corrupt, miserable Ottoman empire and suddenly thrust into the commercial and economic boost from being part of the European sphere of influence. However, over time, nationalism from a secular as well as religious take began to take hold once they became accustomed to rulers from far away in Paris or London rather than far away in Constantinople.

In the case of Egypt, after it was conquered by Britain, Britain took control over the government and brought commerce and economic reform to the country, while working to reduce the debt left by Ottoman corruption and mismanagement. The upper classes rejoiced and to a degree, the middle classes as well since both began to profit from the arrangement, but the poorer classes were left even poorer from British refusal to introduce British-style political reform. Then unease began to rise among the middle class from the British staffing positions of power with British officers only. Newspapers began to postulate that, if not for British racism, capable Egyptians could have filled these roles of governance. Additionally, the middle class were losing patience with a lack of effort done to deal with viceroy or ottoman corruption left in the country.

Coupled with military incidents resulting from British soldiers and their racism or insensitivity to egyptian culture, nationalism began to rise across the country as Egyptians came to realize that cooperation was impossible. This developed across the two world wars such as the British denying the Nationalist Liberal Egyptian Wafd party to participate in the paris peace conference, even though they were the most popular party in the country, but eventually Britain budged and afforded Egypt more autonomy under the puppet state monarchy.

But the Nationalist fervour only grew, coalescing under the nascent Muslim Brotherhood and staunchly nationalist elements of the police and army. The Muslim Brotherhood came out of nowhere in the 1920s, quickly outpacing and showing itself as a better populist option for the young, poor and dispossessed after the Wafd party was seen to concede to British whims. Anger rose because of the classism and imperialism exerted on Egypt through Britain, it’s soldiers and the wealthy in Egyptian society. The humiliation of the loss against Israel was the tinder needed to push Egypt into the 20th century with the 1952 revolution with Nasser taking power and imbuing the country with Arab nationalism and a platform for modernization, education, industrialization and sovereignty.

And this pattern of increasing anger over poor concessions from imperial powers lording over them is what you find across the middle east and north africa. As seen in the Free Officers Movement/Nasserists and the Muslim Brotherhood, the general constant in the region is that whoever is the more competent and outspoken in their resistance of imperialism, takes the lead.

Movements like the Muslim Brotherhood were certainly emboldened by the conservatives in their society, but the nasserists found more favour among liberals and Nationalists. The character of the two poles of Egyptian politics became distinctly defined by moderate (radical/repressive by western stanards) islamism or secular nationalists.

And a curious thing happens to the world over the 20th century. Thanks to agricultural reform, it goes from almost majority European (discounting china and india) to a world of only 11% of the population being european - today.

en route to

Tremendous population booms in the middle east and africa take hold, and similar to what you see in the west, conservative religious people reproduce many times more than secular liberals.

between 1900 and 1950, the egyptian population doubles to 20 million people

by 2000, it then triples to over 65 million. By the time of the 2011 revolution, there are 15 million more people

So when the Arab spring occurs, with liberal secularists in urban centres making the push for liberation… and for the first time in Egypts history, it gets a fair democracy, it is the Muslim Brotherhood and not the secular liberals who sweep the election.

and the muslim brotherhood begins dismantling the hard fought for democracy to put in place a repressive islamist constitution instead.

So the freshly old guard military steps in and stages a coup. So ends the experiment in democracy in egypt.

and i cite egypt as an introduction to the population of the middle east and the broader trends because on a more complex scale, there is geopolitics to consider. Particularly involving countries like Syria, Iran, Saudi ARabia, Israel and by far the most powerful middle eastern country, the United States.

so

the west made it even more reactionary

yes, cold war geopolitics, extending from british vs. russia geopolitics in the imperial/colonial era before continued to enflame the region in outrage toward the west. For much of the 20th century, arab nationalists tried to exploit the soviet and american war of influence in the middle to benefit their countries (and themselves), but as the modern muslim world increased in population and wealth through this modernization, they climbed out of colonial rehabilitation into old fissures between each other, beginning to expand their own spheres of influence.

After the failure of Egyptian and Syrian unity (spoilers, the egyptians completely cucked the syrians out of any sense of power in their shared republic), Syria fell back into the influence of similarly shiite run Iran, which had just finally booted the US and Britain out of their own country, so to speak. Syria, like the USA, had a bone to pick with the USA - for iran it was the shah the CIA forcememed the destruction of Iran’s socialist democracy, for Syria, it was fury over Henry Kissinger for destroying Syria’s dream of a unified arab world by fomenting divisions between the different arab states. How do you strike back at a super power? well, terrorism of course, which means funding and forming shiite terror, which coupled with the USA funding sunni terror by allying with Saudi Arabia against soviet aggression in Chechnya and Afghanistan - means a region rife with well funded, increasingly more sophisticated terrorism bursting at the seems to strike anywhere at any time. Most unsettling, is that the USA, in allying itself with saudi arabia, has made the worldwide heart of salafism and radical sunni terror as the primary benefactor and supporter of islamic societies, mosques, madrassas around the world.

So in return for the west bringing globalization to the middle east by force, the middle east via saudi arabia has globalized the spectacularly violent, hyper radical form of islam that now infests muslim communities in the west and around the world. A sort of salifization or arabization of previously secular or natively unique styles of sunni faith.

Should Islam as a whole be criticized or is there enough good in it to still be salvageable

absolutely not, the religion itself shouldn’t. Do you get pissed at a bee swarm for stinging you after decades of bashing it with a club? Additionally, blaming it as a whole is pointless when you can distill which parts and who’s responsible from this mess. Namely salafi jihadism, cough saudi strains like al qaeda and similar shiite, cough, iranian strains that preceded it like Hezbollah.

But also deconstruct the globalization that necessitated the formation of these homegrown middle eastern groups, namely western influence and saudi imperialism/religious ideology, which is the cancer at the heart of this all. And cancer it is, because it is nearly unstoppable now, considering current world geopolitics and the wealth and influence now wielded by furious and vengeful middle eastern regional powers.

radical islamic terror that now sends “trucks of peace” through german christmas markets does not exist in a vacuum. There is a definite cause and effect to it all and to begin addressing that is to begin addressing the common denominator in all this for how shit has got this bad, which is western imperialism and western enforced market globalization that crushes sovereignty and self determination in pursuit of a world order bereft of rivals to western hegemony.

[leroibobo]

some notes on specifically "middle eastern" (mashriqi + iran, caucuses, and turkey) jewish communities/history:

something to keep in mind: judaism isn't "universalist" like christianity or islam - it's easier to marry into it than to convert on your own. conversions historically happened, but not in the same way they did for european and caucasian christians/non-arab muslims.

that being said, a majority of middle eastern jews descend from jewish population who remained in palestine or immigrated/were forced (as is the case with "kurdish" jews) from palestine to other areas and mixed with locals/others who came later (which at some point stopped). pretty much everywhere in the middle east and north africa (me/na) has/had a jewish population like this.

with european jews (as in all of them), the "mixing" was almost entirely during roman times with romans/greeks, and much less later if they left modern-day greece/italy.

(none of this means jewish people are or aren't "indigenous" to palestine, because that's not what that word means.)

like with every other jewish diaspora, middle eastern jewish cultures were heavily influenced by wherever they ended up. on a surface level you can see this in things like food and music.

after the expulsion of jews from spain and portugal, sephardim moved to several places around the world; many across me/na, mostly to the latter. most of the ones who ended up in the former went to present-day egypt, palestine, lebanon, syria, and turkey. a minority ended up in iraq (such as the sassoons' ancestors). like with all formerly-ottoman territories, there was some degree of back and forth between countries and continents.

some sephardim intermarried with local communities, some didn't. some still spoke ladino, some didn't. there was sometimes a wealth gap between musta'arabim and sephardim, and/or they mostly didn't even live in the same places, like in palestine and tunisia. it really depends on the area you're looking at.

regardless, almost all the jewish populations in the area went through "sephardic blending" - a blending of local and sephardic customs - to varying degrees. it's sort of like the cultural blending that came with spanish/portugese colonization in central and south america (except without the colonization).

how they were treated also really depends where/when you're looking. some were consistently dealt a raw hand (like "kurdish" and yemenite jews) while some managed to do fairly well, all things considered (like baghdadi and georgian jews). most where somewhere in between. the big difference between me/na + some balkan and non-byzantine european treatment of jews is due to geography - attitudes in law regarding jews in those areas tended to fall into different patterns.

long story short: most european governments didn't consider anyone who wasn't "christian" a citizen (sometimes even if they'd converted, like roma; it was a cultural/ethnic thing as well), and persecuted them accordingly; justifying this using "race science" when religion became less important there after the enlightenment.

most me/na and the byzantine governments considered jews (and later, christians) citizens, but allowed them certain legal/social opportunities while limiting/banning/imposing others. the extent of both depend on where/when you're looking but it was never universally "equal".

in specifically turkey, egypt, palestine, and the caucuses, there were also ashkenazi communities, who came mainly because living as a jew in non-ottoman europe at the time sucked more than in those places. ottoman territories in the balkans were also a common destination for this sort of migration.

in the case of palestine, there were often religious motivations to go as well, as there were for some other jews who immigrated. several hasidic dynasites more or less came in their entirety, such as the lithuanian/polish/hungarian ones which precede today's neutrei karta.

ashkenazi migration didn't really happen until jewish emancipation in europe for obvious reasons. it also predates zionism - an initially secular movement based on contemporaneous european nationalist ideologies - by some centuries.

most ashkenazi jews today reside in the us, while most sephardic or "mizrahi" jews are in occupied palestine. there, the latter outnumber the former. you're more likely to find certain groups (like "kurds" and yemenites) in occupied palestine than others (like persians and algerians) - usually ones without a western power that backed them from reactionary antisemitic persecution and/or who came from poorer communities. (and no, this doesn't "justify" the occupation).

(not to say there were none who immigrated willingly/"wanted" to go, or that none/all are zionist/anti-zionist. (ben-gvir is of "kuridsh" descent, for example.) i'm not here to parse motivations.)

this, along with a history of racism/chauvinism from the largely-ashkenazi "left", are why many mizrahim vote farther "right".

(in some places, significant numbers of the jewish community stayed, like turkey, tunisia, and iran. in some others, there's evidence of double/single-digit and sometimes crypto-jewish communities.)

worldwide, the former outnumber the latter. this is thought to be because of either a medieval ashkenazi population boom due to decreased population density (not talking about the "khazar theory", which has been proven to be bullshit, btw) or a later, general european one in the 18th/19th centuries due to increased quality of life.

the term "mizrahi" ("oriental", though it doesn't have the same connotation as in english) in its current form comes from the zionist movement in the 1940s/50s to describe me/na jewish settlers/refugees.

(i personally don't find it useful outside of israeli jewish socio-politics and use it on my blog only because it's a term everyone's familiar with.)

about specifically palestinian jews:

the israeli term for palestinian jews is "old yishuv". yishuv means settlement. this is in contrast to the "new yishuv", or settlers from the initial zionist settlement period in 1881-1948. these terms are usually used in the sense of describing historical groups of people (similar to how you would describe "south yemenis" or "czechoslovaks").

palestinian jews were absorbed into the israeli jewish population and have "settler privilege" on account of their being jewish. descendants make up something like 8% of the israeli jewish population and a handful (including, bafflingly, netanyahu and smoltrich) are in the current government.

they usually got to keep their property unless it was in an "arab area". there's none living in gaza/the west bank right now unless they're settlers.

their individual views on zionism vary as much as any general population's views vary on anything.

(my "palestinian jews" series isn't intended to posit that they all think the same way i do, but to show a side of history not many people know about. any "bias" only comes from the fact that i have a "bias" too. this is a tumblr blog, not an encyclopedia.)

during the initial zionist settlement period, there were palestinian/"old yishuv" jews who were both for zionism and against it. the former have been a part of the occupation and its government for pretty much its entire history.

some immigrated abroad before 1948 and may refer to themselves as "syrian jews". ("syria" was the name given to syria/lebanon/palestine/some parts of iraq during ottoman times. many lebanese and palestinian christians emigrated at around the same time and may refer to themselves as "syrian" for this reason too.)

ones who stayed or immigrated after for whatever reason mostly refer to themselves as "israeli".

in israeli jewish society, "palestinian" usually implies muslims and christians who are considered "arab" under israeli law. you may get differing degrees of revulsion/understanding of what exactly "palestine"/"palestinians" means but the apartheid means that palestinian =/= jewish.

because of this, usage of "palestinian" as a self-descriptor varies. your likelihood of finding someone descendent from/with ancestry from the "old yishuv" calling themselves a "palestinian jew" in the same way an israeli jew with ancestry in morocco would call themselves a "moroccan jew" is low.

(i use it on here because i'm assuming everyone knows what i mean.)

samaritans aren't 'jewish', they're their own thing, though they count as jewish under israeli law.

[mitigatedchaos]

@phoneus, here is your answer, and complimentary vaporwave-themed Mitigated Chaos sticker.1

ＲＥＶＯＬＵＴＩＯＮ　ＩＳ　ＯＶＥＲＲＡＴＥＤ

The American Revolution is special. Most revolutions end with governments that aren't that much better than what they started with, or with something bloody like the French Revolution. Many people fancy themselves revolutionaries, but are unaware of this fact.

Crypto-Centrist

While exotic, most of my policy proposals and viewpoints are in a strange center, center-right, or center-left position in practice.

Transhumanist

I favor the use of technology to improve human abilities above human baseline. I'm broadly in favor on issues such as designer babies once the technology is safe enough.

Nationalist

I believe that the organization of the world into multiple individually sovereign territories with friction around migration is healthier than most other ways to organize human civilization on Earth.

Type-19 Paramilitary Cyborg.

1. I believe Americans should have the right to high-output human augmentations under the Second Amendment, once they become available - and in fact, I believe they will. In order for the citizens to have any chance at standing against a military equipped with powered armor and heart monitoring and stabilization electrical meshes.

2. This is also part of the persona I present as when engaging in futurist shitposting, and is something of a personal goal.

Wanted time criminal.

1. I was future-shocked by the 2016 Presidential election.

2. We are currently living in the cyberpunk future.

3. As part of futurist shitposting, this blog posits different futures (such as white nationalist Richard Spencer becoming a Han Chinese cyborg detective) and alternate timelines.

4. As part of discussing future trends, the Union Girl persona I sometimes post under is from a much more post-national future, where social progressivism has continued, and ordinary civic nationalism is considered deeply right-wing and reactionary - and has traveled back in time with the intent of preventing that from happening, hoping to revive the North American Union. (See also the #supervillain tag.)

Class A-3 citizen of the North American Union.

1. I'm a citizen of the United States of America.

2. Class-based citizenships may be used as a possible change to immigration policy in the future, particularly if North America is formed into a North American Union, a continent-spanning superstate beyond even the USA's current continent-spanning-superstate glory.

Opposed to the Chinese Hyper Mind-Union,

In the future, it may become possible to share thoughts through the use of cybernetic implants. Ideologues may seek to create a hivemind to create true equality of the likes never seen before. This is bad.

But in our time, I'm opposed to Communism.

the Ultra-Caliphate,

As oil revenues decline in the middle east, and climate change takes its toll, we may see the collapse of governments throughout that area and the formation of a new theocratic order. That's not really a good thing, though they're probably too fragmented even then for it to happen.

In our time, I'm opposed to both radical and fundamentalist Islam, and basically any form of Islam that aren't as watered down as much of modern Christianity, and would take measures to subject Islam to the same pressures that caused so much of Christianity to engage in less suppression.

Also I'm against both cousin marriage and polygamy.

Google Defense Network,

This became less likely now that Google sold off Boston Dynamics, and is therefore significantly less likely to become either a de facto government in grand cyberpunk style, or Skynet.

But also in our time, the power of a handful of large corporations over the Internet is dangerous.

the People's Republic of Cascadia

So basically, my opinion of modern SJ progressive leftism in combination with Socialism or Communism is that it lacks the necessary safeguards to prevent turning into a terrifying place no one wants to live in, where IRL callout posts take the form of police coming to arrest you for even the smallest transgression if you aren't well connected within the Party.

National Separationist,

As the popularity of Open Borders as a position increases, wanting to keep the nations of Earth separate will gain its own label as a position, whereas currently it is the default.

enemy of the World Federation government and its unificationist allies.

As open borders as an idea takes off, it will become necessary to create an international police agency to track the criminals across the borders. Over time, it will be gradually given more power by ordinary liberals and progressives, the kind that I recently had suggest using the UN to enforce human rights.

However, even after the first attempt at a world government is formed, there will be holdouts. The political faction which believes in uniting humanity under one world government will gain a name of its own.

The median government on Earth is not as well run as the United States, much less Switzerland or Singapore. The world government would not only have little accountability as each vote is tiny and insignificant in size, but since control of it would mean control over all of humanity itself, the stakes incentivize every single political faction to enact total war to try to take it over, while those within it would attempt to use its resources to expand their power by conquering territories that aren't part of the Federation.

Blogs Topics: Cyberpunk Nationalism.

This blog discusses Nationalism as ideology for the 21st century, rather than the now-obsolete movements of the 20th century.

Futurist Shtposting.

I use futurist shitposting as a method to encourage people to think about the coming politics before they get here, and with the intent of more closely examining the politics of today. Here's an example using Richard Spencer, posted weeks before the rally at Charlottesville (link includes bonus discourse questions):

The year is 2064. Having given up on America and Europe, the last remaining members of the Alt Right undergo racial alteration surgery and genetic splicing to join Chairman Liu’s Neo-Chinese Empire, a governmental franchise operating seven megacities on the Asia-Pacific rim.

As a security officer at the front of the Empire’s fight against the Pan-Islamic Caliphate, a sort of distributed theocratic government with enclaves throughout Africa, the Middle East, and Europe, Victor Fang (born Richard Spencer, many years ago) is returned to Hong Kong after being injured by an IED, but he’s about to find out just how deep the Caliph’s conspiracies run…

How does this relate to the modern day? Well you see, with CRISPR (for genetic engineering), tissue engineering, and cybernetics, white supremacy is going to be an obsolete philosophy even on its own terms within a number of decades. (Robotic limbs and lab-grown organs already exist, they're just not refined yet.) See the #augmented reality break and #chronofelony tags for more examples.

Timeline Vandalism.

Posts related to the Union Girl persona and time travel generally, tagged #chronofelony.

Harassing owls over the Internet.

I send asks to Tumblr user Argumate, who as a running joke everyone pretends is an owl.

Use whichever typical gender pronouns you like.

I have not revealed my race, sex, or gender. You may refer to me as 'she', 'he', or 'they'.

Not all content will have sufficient warning tags.

I engage in only limited content (trigger) warning tagging. Users read this blog at their own risk.

Oh, and, for current contemporary positions, see #policy, #flagpost, and #national technocracy.

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[gcintheme-blog]

Honor Killings in Iraq: Examining Patriarchy

It is late here in Baghdad but I’m waiting for the hot water tank to fill back up as my sister took a long shower and then decided to wash her white clothes in a long wash. How annoying! But how lucky I am that this is the thing that is bothering me right now: waiting for my shower. As a young woman, I could have much worse problems on my mind.

What are honor killings?

Here in Iraq, we have a major problem with acts called honor killings, or homicides of family members because that person has brought “dishonor” upon the family. Honor killings are almost always perpetrated against women but have also been carried out against gay (or suspected to be gay) men. Honor killings are a manifestation of patriarchy and a type of male violence.

Family members always blame the victim for the murder. Their reasons might include a woman:

refusing to submit to male authority figures, usually within that family

dressing inappropriately

having sex before marriage, or even the accusation by a husband that she has had sex before the wedding

committing adultery

being a victim of rape, especially if that rape results in pregnancy

refusing arranged marriage (though this reason is more common in South Asia than my home country of Iraq)

seeking divorce

contacting a man outside the family

Or even just rumors of the things above.

In addition to blatant homicide, families might punish a woman by coercing her to commit suicide or forcing her to flagellate herself to death, starving her, forcing an abortion or removing her children, female genital mutilation, or altering the hymen as if to show she has not had sex.

Men can be victims of honor killings if they are gay or assumed to be gay. Certain actions, such as acting “womanly” or effeminate, are thought to indicate homosexuality. I will offer some more critical thoughts on this point later in this post.

Are honor killings legal in Iraq?

Well... sort of.  Article 409 of the Iraqi Penal Code states: 

Any person who surprises his wife in the act of adultery or finds his girlfriend close female relative in bed with her lover and kills them immediately or one of them or assaults one of them so that he or she dies or is left permanently disabled is punishable by a period of detention not exceeding 3 years. It is not permissible to exercise the right of legal defense against any person who uses this excuse nor do the rules of aggravating circumstance apply against him.

[Short Arabic lesson: though this translation says “girlfriend,” the more accurate translation is “close female relative” as the Arabic word in the written law محارم (ma-HAR-im) is the plural form of محرم (maH-ram) which literally means “unmarriageable” or “forbidden to marry due to blood relationship.” This is from the root حرم (harima) which means “to be forbidden,” which is also where the Arabic word حرام (har-AM), or “forbidden/prohibited” comes from. So girlfriend is rather inaccurate since a close blood female relative would certainly not be someone’s girlfriend.]

Note the patriarchal language:  “ Any person who finds his wife in the act of adultery or finds his close female relative in bed with her lover.” This says:

Men are considered people and women are possessions. The “his” pronoun indicates the man as the person and the woman as his possession. (This is just as clear in Arabic.)

A man can kill a woman and receive a reduced sentence, but the reverse is not true. A female murderer will not be taken into consideration under this statute.

A man has property-type jurisdiction over “his close relative” which is then indicated as female by “her lover.” A man can murder the women in his family if he catches them having sex.

There is no stipulation in the law for men killing men. The victim is assumed to be a woman.

So honor killings aren’t exactly legal, but there is a specific law that limits the sentence for a man who murders a woman in his family if she is caught having sex outside of marriage.

Two large regions within Iraq have exceptions:

Since 2008, the law in Kurdistan has demanded treating honor killings like any other homicide.

I can’t find specific data, but making a reasonable guess from reports available, the “law” in the Islamic State in Iraq leaves honor crimes unpunished.

In practice, family who commit these murders are unlikely to face any legal consequences. Most experts believe honor killings are unreported or reported as other types of death like suicide. Because of the overarching sexist culture, people are unlikely to report their relatives and neighbors for such crimes. And if the authorities do find out, that same culture means they might not even care. Other times, family members will force a younger son to perform the murder (or blame him for it) so that he will be released from prison sooner. If men ever see prison time, they are often seen as heroes once they are released.

During Saddam Hussein and the Baath Party’s regime, Iraq was at first very secular. For instance, homosexuality was not illegal (but also not very accepted). However, when Saddam felt his power slipping, he began using Islam more in the government. He legalized honor killings in 1995 against women and gay men and used his own personal army called Fedayeen Saddam to carry out public executions. In 2001, he changed the law to demand the death penalty for adultery, prostitution, sodomy, and rape. This law was supposed to be undone after the Americans overthrew Saddam, but many people just ignore the new laws if they don’t like them.

How many people in Iraq are victims of honor killings?

It’s kind of hard to say, as honor crimes are under-reported and recent and specific statistics are not readily available, especially from the Islamic State in Iraq.

Honor killings are most prevalent in Iraqi Kurdistan, but they also occur in other parts of Iraq, most specifically in rural areas (though city numbers are growing as people from Northern Iraq flee to the cities for safety, and then apparently murder their family members). 

According to the Free Women’s Organization of Kurdistan, in 2014, more than 6,000 women were murdered or forced to commit suicide, and many of those were honor killings. That is almost equal to the total number of Peshmerga killed fighting ISIS in 2014.

Furthermore:

As many as 133 women were killed in the Iraqi city of Basra alone in 2006. 79 were killed for violation of "Islamic teachings" and 47 for honor, according to IRIN, the news branch of the U.N.'s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Amnesty International says that armed groups, not the government, also kill politically active women and those who did not follow a strict dress code, as well as women who are perceived as human rights defenders.17-year-old Du'a Khalil Aswad, an Iraqi girl of the Yazidi faith, was stoned to death in front of a mob of about 2000 men in 2007, possibly because she was allegedly planning to convert to Islam.

Are honor killings in Iraq specific to one group?

No, nor are honor killings specific to Iraq.

Honor killings within Iraqi occur most frequently per capita in Kurdistan, as does female genital mutilation, but honor killings do happen elsewere. Some important things about Kurdistan and the Kurds:

Kurdistan is a region that is the historic home of the Kurdish people with parts in modern-day Iran, Iraq, Syria and Turkey. The Kurds have their own language and customs. In Iraq, Kurdistan is an autonomous region.

The Kurds are an ethnic group and not a religious group. Most Kurds are Sunni Muslim but there are Shia, Christian, and Zoroastrian Kurds, as well as Yazidis who practice a more ancient religion mixed with Abrahamic faiths.

Not all Kurds are conservative by any means. Many of them are socialists and fight with militias like Peshmerga against ISIS. This includes women.

However, the city of Basra which is referenced above has a Shia Arab majority by far. Also, ISIS is a Sunni fundamentalist group with a core group of Arab leaders, and they kill anyone who will not obey them and exercise extreme patriarchy. I cannot find data on other groups such as Iraqi Christians, but I would reasonably guess that in rural, conservative areas, honor killings would be present.

The evidence supports that honor killings are a regional problem across religious and ethnic groups. The two elements these different groups have in common are geography and patriarchal systems that promote male violence.

International data supports this idea. Honor killings are present in the Middle East, North Africa, and South Asia, admittedly in Muslim-majority countries. They have spread from those countries to Europe and the Americas mostly with immigrants who bring their cultures with them.

Also, just because other regions and cultures do not use the “honor killing” label doesn’t mean similar murders do not occur. In the United States, the most likely cause of death for pregnant women is homicide. 

These aren’t exactly the same, and I’m not going to pretend they are to make a point. (That’s actually what I like about gender-critical feminism. It analyzes specific physical facts and real situations rather than imaginary concepts.) Honor killings more specifically demonstrate the man’s desire to purify his public image by killing a woman who acts out. In other parts of the world, these killings are usually personal acts of revenge. (So are honor killings, but most other murders do not have that public aspect, with maybe the exception of murder-suicide.)

However, they are instances of severe domestic violence, which is a specific type of male violence. (Yes, I know women can be violent too, but the problem we are addressing here is male violence against family members, so please don’t derail.)

In any country, women are more likely to be killed by a male partner or family member than anyone else. If we set aside the label “honor killing” and examine these crimes for their motivations, we see a pattern. Patriarchy, male violence, jealousy, control, manipulation, male hegemony, hypermasculinity.

Are gay men killed in honor killings?

Yes. Gay men and men suspected of being gay are killed in similar ways.

From Wikipedia:

Since 2005 there have been reports that the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq's Badr Organization has been involved in death squad campaigns against LGBT Iraqi citizens, and that they are supported in these policies by the Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani. New barbaric attacks, with 90 victims, are reported in the first months of 2012.

These reports seem to stem from a fatwa issued by Iraqi cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani stating that homosexuality and lesbianism are both "forbidden" and that they should be "Punished, in fact, killed. The people involved should be killed in the worst, most severe way of killing".

Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani is the spiritual leader of Shia Muslims in Iraq, but again, this trend does not happen only with Shia Muslim groups. ISIS, a Sunni group who also murder or enslave Shia Muslims for being “infidels,” has the death penalty for homosexuality.

Homophobia is almost universal in Iraq. Usually gay men are targets and the entire concept of lesbianism is ignored. Iraqis know what lesbians are, but perhaps because women do not have the same agency as men to perform homosexual acts in the first place (for example because women are more likely to be married off to a man much younger) people can ignore that lesbians exist and they probably know some.

Technically, homosexuality in Iraq is not illegal (but same-sex marriage is not permitted at all) but when religious leaders are calling for the immediate execution of gay men, this doesn’t matter. Penal code 409 which is stated above does not mention killing men but people do it anyway and they know they will not face legal consequences.

The penal code is also silent on cross-dressing, but this does not mean that men who dress in traditionally women’s clothing or do other feminine things are safe. Iraqis treat this as a sign of homosexuality and use that to justify honor killings. For example, military groups targeted men with the Western “emo” style which they thought was feminine and murdered them for being gay.

It is no secret to gender-critical feminists that the hatred of gay men is connected to the hatred of women. A man who has sex with another man is “like a woman” (especially if he is the one penetrated) and in patriarchy, a woman is the worst thing to be. Therefore men who “behave” like women by having sex with men or dressing like women or basically doing anything misogynists find womanly are deserving of death.

Homosexuality also threatens the patriarchy because it changes the atmosphere of the family. Men have power over the women in their lives, especially their wives within the domestic area. They affirm themselves through this control and use things like honor killings as a way to display their masculinity to other people. Since homosexuality changes the domestic relationship, it shows other men a situation where they do not have the same power, and that frightens them.

Honors killings against women and gay men are perpetrated by men. Sometimes, older women in a family, especially in-laws, will condone and assist in the killing. However, I cannot find any reported incidents of only women performing an honor killing.

Why don’t we discuss honor killings more?

People do discuss honor killings, but often in the wrong way. They are used to criticize Islam and Muslims (which is fair, given that many Muslim men use their religion to justify the killings) but this leaves out victims who are not Muslims and more importantly ignores the problem of patriarchy.

Western men want to believe they would not do something so “barbaric” but the statistics say otherwise. The hatred of women is global so we need to talk about honor killings with this in mind. Of course we should be extremely critical of this problem in Iraq but without looking patriarchy in the face, we cannot have that proper criticism.

We need to look at the problem realistically, using physical facts:

Women, from birth, are placed lower in society than men.

Women who defy men through almost any action must be “punished.”

This manifests in male violence against women, including murders/honor killings.

This violence is permitted by culture. In Iraq, it is even protected by law.

Men who are thought to be like women are also subject to this violence.

Without seriously talking about these problems, the violence is not going to end. We cannot treat the manifestations of patriarchy without taking apart patriarchy as an entire system.

[qqueenofhades]

I really don’t want to start a discourse™, but I want you to know that I really appreciate how you write joe and Nicky in deo volente. So many of the fics I’ve read have placed yusef in the role of more sexually experienced and less devoted to god, while Nicky is depicted as an inexperienced and virginal priest/knight/monk and so forth and so on. Your narrative of joe out there rescuing people and being faithful, while Nicky looks back on his life of gambling and pleasures of the flesh ...(1/?)

Not to say that there’s anything wrong with either, obviously. I love guilty priest Nicky and repressed Nicky and p much every Nicky. But in the vast array of fics out there, it’s rare to see the opposite. Not that you’re working in a binary morally good/religious vs. not way. Your writing in the fic is really subtle and and your characterizations reveal a lot of depth. I just think it’s cool to see Nicky, average second son of a duke, drinking and gambling and feeling terribly guilty (2/?)

Guilty about the crusades and the fucking horror of crusade 1 without being excessively devout. Just an average dude. Not some paragon of virtue (btw, I’m on chapter 2 of the fic, so I don’t know how much your characterization changes moving forward. You have a lovely ability to combine your incredible knowledge of history, your beautiful writing, and these intimate details of the characters that make them fit— fit the canon and fit the history. (3/? Shit I’m sorry this had gotten way too long)

I enjoy the way you’ve really inserted us into the quotidian aspect of history. Aaaaaanyway— the discourse that I was afraid of: I think that a lot of fans of the movie that are generating fan content (tysfm to all of you beauties, btw 🙏🙏♥️) are westerners (which is a whole nother kettle of fish) and that carries a sort of ignorance about the Muslim world in the Middle Ages and this desire to simplify Europe as “Christian” “fighters for faith” etc. (4/? Fuuuuck. One(??) more)

And when we do that, we end up as characterizing the brown people as “not that”. The thing I love about this fandom is that people are definitely down on the crusades. I feel like all the fic I’ve read has been particularly negative about those wars, but the thing I love about your fic is that you don’t just say war is bad because people died and it was despicable and this pious white dude says so and this one brown person agrees. (5/6, I see the end in sight I swear it)

Instead you give us a larger cast of Muslims and Arabs and really flesh them out and give them opinions and different interpretations of faith, and I really appreciate that. The crusades were terrible, and we know this because these regular dudes who struggle with their different faiths and lives say so. And I just. I think that’s really great. Also, I fucking love yusef’s mom. I feel like more people would be accepting of the gift in this fashion and I think she’s lovely and (god damn it 6/7)

Aaaaaaaand. The bit where yusef returns and she’s already gone breaks my fucking heart. Also the moment where he’s like “I’m not sure about Abraham’s god, but my mothers god is worth my faith”?? Just really fucking great. So. Excellent fic. Excellent characters. Excellent not-being-accidentally-biased-towards-white-Christians. That is what I came here to say. Thank you so much for your amazing stories. I love them and I love history. Sorry about the rambling. idek how I wrote so much. (7/7)

Epilogue: tl;dr: you’re great.

Oh man! What a huge and thoughtful comment (which will in turn provoke a long-ass response from me, so…) I absolutely agree that no matter what fandom, I don’t do Discourse TM; I just sit in my bubble and stay in my lane and do my own thing and create content I enjoy. And I don’t even think this is that so much as just… general commentary on character and background? So obviously all of this should be read as my own personal experience and choices in writing DVLA, and that alone. I really appreciate you for saying that you love a wide range of fan creators/fanworks and you’re not placing one over another, you understand that fans have diverse ranges of backgrounds/experience with history and other cultures when they create content, and that’s not the same for everyone. So I just think that’s a great and respectful way to start things off.

First, as a professional historian who has written a literal PhD thesis on the crusades, I absolutely understand that many people (and regular fans) will not have the same privilege/education/perspective that I do, and that’s fine! They should not be expected to get multiple advanced degrees to enjoy a Netflix movie! But since I DO have that background, and since I’ve been working on the intellectual genealogy of the crusades (and the associated Christian/Muslim component, whether racially or religiously) since I was a master’s student, I have a lot of academic training and personal feelings that inform how I write these characters. Aside from my research on all this, my sister lives in an Islamic country and her boyfriend is a Muslim man; I’ve known a lot of Muslims and Middle Easterners; and especially with the current political climate of Islamophobia and the reckoning with racism whether in reality or fandom, I have been thinking about all this a lot, and my impact on such.

Basically: I love Nicky dearly, but I ADORE Joe, and as such, I’m protective of him and certainly very mindful of how I write him. Especially when the obvious default for westerners in general, fandom-related or otherwise, is to write what you are familiar with (i.e. the European Christian white character) and be either less comfortable or less confident or sometimes less thoughtful about his opposing number. I have at times tangentially stumbled across takes on Joe that turn me into the “eeeeeeeh” emoji or Dubious Chrissy Teigen, but I honestly couldn’t tell you anything else about them because I was like, “nope not for me” and went elsewhere rather than do Discourse (which is pretty much a waste of time everywhere and always makes people feel bad). This is why I’m always selective about my fan content, but especially so with this ship, because I have SO much field-specific knowledge that I just have to make what I like and which suits my personal tastes. So that is what I do.

Obviously, there’s a troublesome history with the trope of “sexually liberate brown person seduces virginal white character into a world of Fleshly Decadence,” whether from the medieval correlation of “sodomite” and “Saracen,” or the nineteenth-century Orientalist depictions of the East as a land variously childishly simplistic, societally backward, darkly mysterious and Exotic, or “decadent” (read: code for sexually unlike Western Europe, including the spectrum of queer acts). So when I was writing DVLA, I absolutely did not want to do that and it’s not to my taste, but I’m not going to whip out a red pen on someone else writing a story that broadly follows those parameters (because as I said, I stay in my lane and don’t see it anyway). Joe to me is just such an intensely complex and lovely Muslim character that that’s the only way I feel like I can honestly write him, and I absolutely love that about him. So yeah, any depiction of hypersexualizing him or making him only available for the sexual use and education of the white character(s) is just... mmm, not for me.

For example, I stressed over whether it was appropriate to move his origin from “somewhere in the Maghreb” to Cairo specifically, since Egypt, while it IS in North Africa, is not technically part of the Maghreb. I realize that Marwan Kenzari’s family is Tunisian and that’s probably why they chose it, to honor the actor’s heritage, but on the flip side… “al-Kaysani” is also a specifically Ismai’li Shia name (it’s the name of a branch of it) and the Fatimids (the ruling dynasty in Jerusalem at the time of the First Crusade) were well-known for being the only Ismai’li Shia caliphate. (This is why the Shi’ites still ancestrally dislike Saladin for overthrowing it in 1174, even if Saladin is a huge hero to the rest of the Islamic world.) Plus I really wanted to use medieval Cairo as Joe’s homeland, and it just made more sense for an Ismai’li Shia Fatimid from Cairo (i.e. the actual Muslim denomination and caliphate that controlled Jerusalem) to be defending the Holy City because it was personal for him, rather than a Sunni Zirid from Ifriqiya just kind of turning up there. Especially due to the intense fragmentation and disorganization in the Islamic world at the time of the First Crusade (which was a big part of the reason it succeeded) and since the Zirids were a breakaway group from the Fatimids and therefore not very likely to be militarily allied with them. As with my personal gripes about Nicky being a priest, I decided to make that change because I felt, as a historian, that it made more sense for the character. But I SUPER recognize it as my own choices and tweaks, and obviously I’m not about to complain at anyone for writing what’s in graphic novel/bonus content canon!

That ties, however, into the fact that Nicky has a clearly defined city/region of origin (Genoa, which has a distinct history, culture, and tradition of crusading) and Joe is just said to be from “the Maghreb” which…. is obviously huge. (I.e. anywhere in North Africa west of Egypt all the way to Morocco.) And this isn’t a fandom thing, but from the official creators/writers of the comics and the movie. And I’m over here like: okay, which country? Which city? Which denomination of Islam? You’ve given him a Shia name but then point him to an origin in Sunni Ifriqiya. If he’s from there, why has he gone thousands of miles to Jerusalem in the middle of a dangerous war to help his religious/political rivals defend their territory? Just because he’s nice? Because it was an accident? Why is his motivation or reason for being there any less defined or any less religious (inasmuch as DVLA Nicky’s motive for being on the First Crusade is religious at all, which is not very) than the white character’s? In a sense, the Christians are the ones who have to work a lot harder to justify their presence in the Middle East in the eleventh century at all: the First Crusade was a specifically military and offensive invasion launched at the direct behest of the leader of the Western Roman church (Pope Urban II.) So the idea that they’re “fighting for the faith” or defending it bravely is…

Eeeeh. (Insert Dubious Chrissy Teigen.)

But of course, nobody teaches medieval history to anyone in America (except for Bad Game of Thrones History Tee Em), and they sure as hell don’t teach about the crusades (except for the Religious Violence Bad highlight reel) so people don’t KNOW about these things, and I wish they DID know, and that’s why I’m over here trying to be an academic so I can help them LEARN it, and I get very passionate about it. So once again, I entirely don’t blame people who have acquired this distorted cultural impression of the crusades and don’t want to do a book’s worth of research to write a fic about a Netflix movie. I do hope that they take the initiative to learn more about it because they’re interested and want to know more, since by nature the pairing involves a lot of complex religious, racial, and cultural dynamics that need to be handled thoughtfully, even if you don’t know everything about it. So like, basically all I want is for the Muslim character(s) to be given the same level of respect, attention to detail, background story, family context, and religious diversity as any of the white characters, and Imma do it myself if I have to. Dammit.

(I’m really excited to hear your thoughts on the second half of the fic, especially chapter 3 and chapter 6, but definitely all of it, since I think the characters they’re established as in the early part of the fic do remain true to themselves and both grow and struggle and go through a realistic journey with their faith over their very long lives, and it’s one of my favorite themes about DVLA.)

Anyway, about Nicky. I also made the specific choice to have him be an average guy, the ordinary second son of a nobleman who doesn’t really know what he’s doing with his life and isn’t the mouthpiece of Moral Virtue in the story, since as he himself realizes pretty quick, the crusades and especially the sack/massacre of Jerusalem are actually horrific. I’ve written in various posts about my nitpicking gripes with him being a priest, so he’s not, and as I said, I’m definitely avoiding any scenario where he has to Learn About The World from Joe. That is because I want to make the point that the people on the crusades were people, and they went for a lot of different reasons, not all of which were intense personal religious belief. The crusades were an institution and operated institutionally. Even on the First Crusade, where there were a lot of ordinary people who went because of sincere religious belief, there was the usual bad behavior by soldiers and secular noblemen and people who just went because it was the thing to do. James Brundage has an article about prostitution and miscegenation and other sexual activity on the First Crusade; even at the height of this first and holy expedition, it was happening. So Nicky obviously isn’t going to be the moral exemplar because a) the crusades are horrific, he himself realizes that, and b) it’s just as historically accurate that he wouldn’t be anyway. Since the idea is that medieval crusaders were all just zealots and ergo Not Like Us is dangerous, I didn’t want to do that either. If we think they all went because they were all personally fervent Catholics and thus clearly we couldn’t do the same, then we miss a lot of our own behavior and our parallel (and troubling) decisions, and yeah.

As well, I made a deliberate choice to have Nicky’s kindness (which I LOVE about him, it’s one of my favorite things, god how refreshing to have that be one of the central tenets of a male warrior character) not to be something that was just… always there and he was Meek and Good because a priest or whatever else. Especially as I’ve gotten older and we’ve all been living through these ridiculous hellyears (2020 is the worst, but it’s all been general shit for a while), I’ve thought more and more about how kindness is an active CHOICE and it’s as transgressive as anything else you can do and a whole lot more brave than just cynicism and nihilism and despair. As you’ll see in the second half of the fic, Nicky (and Joe) have been through some truly devastating things and it might be understandable if they gave into despair, but they DON’T. They choose to continue to be good people and to try and to actively BE kind, rather than it being some passive default setting. They struggle with it and it’s raw and painful and they’re not always saints, but they always come down on the side of wanting to keep doing what they’re doing, and I… have feelings about that.

Anyway, this is already SUPER long, so I’ll call it quits for now. But thank you so much for this, because I love these characters and I love the story I created for them in DVLA, since all this is personal to me in a lot of ways, and I’m so glad you picked up on that.

[ebenpink]

World News Briefs -- April 16, 2019 (Evening Edition) http://bit.ly/2IneWa5

Near disaster: An aerial view shows the vast extent of the damage to the Gothic cathedral's roof, where the fire took hold and raged throughout Monday night

Daily Mail: Bloodied but unbowed, Our Lady of Paris: Stunning aerial image shows scale of destruction to Notre Dame as ROBERT HARDMAN, the first reporter inside the cathedral, reveals sense of 'divine intervention' now uniting an angry France * France, along with much of the world, has been deeply shocked at the near-demise of ‘Our Lady of Paris’ * Yesterday evening, fresh images of the wreckage were released showing the aisle piled high with timbers * It could have been much worse. The 850-year-old towers which stand guard over entrance are in one piece Beneath the light rain that greeted a sleepless Parisian dawn yesterday, there was one over-riding emotion: That some sort of miracle had occurred in the early hours as it transpired one of the world’s greatest medieval buildings had survived wholesale destruction. The near-cataclysmic fire which had raged through the Cathedral of Notre Dame for eight hours during the night had finally been brought under control and smothered by first light. Notre Dame has, without doubt, been horribly damaged. France, along with much of the world, has been deeply shocked at the near-demise of ‘Our Lady of Paris’. Yesterday evening, fresh images of the wreckage were released showing the aisle piled high with charred and twisted timbers. Read more ....

MIDDLE EAST

Turkey eyes US sanctions waivers on Iran oil, Russia arms. Erdogan's AK Party appeals for rerun of Istanbul's mayoral poll. Christianity grows in Syrian town once besieged by Islamic State. Syria fuel shortages, worsened by US sanctions, spark anger. Iran's top diplomat in Damascus ahead of Syria talks. Iran ratifies bill designating US CENTCOM as terrorist group - reports. Bahrain strips over 100 of nationality on 'terror' charges. Israeli lawmakers back Netanyahu to form government. Saudi king hosts Abu Dhabi crown prince amid Sudan turmoil.

ASIA

New Zealand's revises national security threat level to medium. Satellite images may show reprocessing activity at North Korea nuclear site: think tank. Indonesians choose president, parliament in world's biggest one-day vote. Pakistan forces destroy 3-storey building in militant battle. Kabul announces list of 250 Afghans for talks with Taliban. Philippines to take legal action against China for clams harvest. North Korea's stockpile of cryptocurrency worth $700M, analysts say. ‘Pompeo lost his mind’: Chinese diplomat hits back at US attacks on Beijing’s investments in Chile.

AFRICA

Congo’s leader sets Ebola outbreak end date after 800 deaths. Western allies add fuel to Libya's fire with alleged military shipments to warlord. Late night shelling in Tripoli as Europe, Gulf divided over Haftar's push. Libya's UN-backed govt appeals to Europe against Haftar. UN Libya envoy: Haftar offensive on Tripoli 'sounded like a coup'. Fear of army action as Sudan protesters toughen stand. African Union gives Sudan military 15 days to establish civil rule. Algerian military considering all options to end crisis. Army chief says 'time running out' to resolve Algeria crisis. Nigerian Army destroys major oil smuggling hub. New UN envoy to work with African Union on Sudan crisis. Egyptian parliament vote could keep Sisi in power until 2030.

EUROPE

The Latest: Macron wants Notre Dame rebuilt within 5 years. Notre Dame assessed for structural damage after fire extinguished. French authorities rule out arson in Notre Dame Cathedral blaze. France's Macron pledges to rebuild Notre Dame Cathedral. Mutual friends and borrowed cars: how Ukraine's would-be leader is linked to tycoon. Tory deregulation agenda stalling Brexit talks, says Corbyn. UK police arrest more than 200 in climate change protests. Russia's parliament votes to unplug internet from world. Russia jails Norwegian Frode Berg for spying on submarines.

AMERICAS

Oil workers reveal a Venezuelan region crumbling despite its resources. Trump expresses Notre Dame 'condolences' to Macron: White House. Trump says he's not concerned about Mueller report's release. Trump says Russia probe ‘con job,’ as fuller report looms. US to allow lawsuits over Cuba property confiscation. US hands Argentina declassified documents on 'Dirty War'. Museum cancels event honouring Brazil's Jair Bolsonaro. Support strong for Guaidó in devastated Venezuelan oil city. US health officials seek to stem measles outbreaks traced to Israel, Ukraine. Hundreds of prisoners released in Nicaragua ahead of protests anniversary. Canada court orders fresh look into Trudeau visit to Aga Khan's island.

TERRORISM/THE LONG WAR

US says Sudan new regime can exit terror list if progress. US military says it killed ISIS-Somalia deputy in drone strike. Instagram accounts of Iran Guards commanders blocked. Iran names U.S. Central Command as terrorist group. Al Qaeda linked Kashmiri terror chief denounces Pakistan, calls for renewed jihad.

ECONOMY/FINANCE/BUSINESS

Stocks rise after solid economic data, earnings. F1 in talks over second China GP, road race on cards. Billions at stake as Apple vs Qualcomm trial begins. Jack Ma defends the 'blessing' of a 12-hour working day. from War News Updates http://bit.ly/2DjEAbw via IFTTT