#in my magisterium era

[callum-hunt-is-bisexual]

the boy you hate breaks up with his girl for you.. he does not tell you though, he instead visits you in prison and complains about the breakup until somebody blows up the building. you now have to sleep in the same room as him while he is one of the only two people in the world who does not view you as murderer. you wish his ass died in the explosion

[ashpkat]

i’m in my callmara era and just thinking abt how much they were screwed over? like instead of using “i pushed you out of the way because i LOVE you call” they could’ve used a B subplot where call helps guide tamara through accepting her choices, accepting that she was just a kid and it wasn’t her fault that aaron died — it was alex. we could’ve seen tamara helping call through his grief, and instead of abandoning him, she could’ve shown him that it was alright to miss aaron but it isn’t okay to try and mess with the dead. oh, and have i mentioned that their entire romance subplot was completely misplaced? TSM was not the place for that. TSM was the place for grief, anguish, and pain. but you know what comes after you work through all that? HAPPINESS. like think of the callmara fans that would’ve come out if they had started the romance in TGT!!! as things are wrapping up call thinks back to all the moments that tamara has helped him, gave him a second chance, protected him, and was there for him in his grief. his strong, courageous, beautiful best friend that was ALWAYS there for him, ALWAYS reminded him that he was lovable and that he was never and would never be constantine madden or maugris or any of his alter egos. he could’ve told tamara all this AFTER (wait for it) they let aaron’s soul rest, not in the body of alex, but in the afterlife where aaron could be happy. and tamara would’ve be right there for him, as she always had been.

so when people ask me if i’m upset calron was never canon, believe me, i am, but you also have to focus on the actual canon ships as well that were done horribly. no one was ever done justice and calron wouldn’t have gotten justice either. it’s a lose lose situation, where no one gets what they want. yeah. fuck canon callmara. we all deserved better than what canon gave us.

[loving-n0t-heyting]

Against my better judgement, a not-very-original contribution to rattumb feminism discourse

Theres a common retort to complaints about feminism from rat-adjs, which when phrased politely reads like "You have the excuse of yr main exposure to feminism being 2010s era jezebel bullshit" and when phrased impolitely reads like "yr main exposure to feminism being 2010s era jezebel bullshit is not an excuse", which takes it for granted that the dumb shit that occupied seemingly 90% of the internets collective attention in 2011-2015 was some inane culture war drivel significant basically only insofar as it sucked up ppls attention or contributed nebulously to the "wider conversation" with distant and vaguely delineated consequences in the objective world

This is kinda funny, bc what i remember from the feminist resurgence of that time period was the massive, largely successful campaign perversely combining a bold expansion of the boundaries of "rape" and an intensified brand of punitive vitriol for alleged rapists. Criminal and quasicriminal consequences for rapists were ramped up, concerns about "due process" were dismissed (with institutional effect!) as antiquated patriarchal relics, judges bemoaning the eighth amendment were touted as heroes, protesters with ak 47s showed up outside the houses of convicts they thought got off too easy. Ppl would extol distant bands of vigilantes in public, and domestic lone assassins in private. Ppl lost their freedom. Ppl lost their lives. And all of this nancy grace nonsense in the most pristine of bleeding heart blue enclaves, under banners of deepest pink!

I could provide citations, but i wont, partly bc i am tired, partly bc all of these are things ive given concrete evidence about on this blog previously, partly bc we all know this to be true anyway

And what grates on me about that patronising reply to those of with the gall to carry trauma from this orgy of bloodlust is that these noose-tying fanatics and the avant garde against the gamergator menace were the same fucking ppl. Saying it all for the same fucking reasons. Again, no citations bc ive said this all before, but search yr feelings. Im not complaining about some more serious problem that gets mixed up with the way the internet collectively decided zoe quinn deserved to be pre-canonised by the magisterium of public opinion as a martyr for the true faith, im complaining about the same problem, of which the lynching enthusiasm was the worst expression. In the annals of the horrors of war, small losses in public life are placed alongside the lists of honoured dead, bc they are alike symptoms of the same overarching social disease

And if you hear more about the milder instances of this mass insanity of last decade, consider this might be bc famous "cancelled" performers and academics have access to more bandwidth than randos stuck rotting inside state prisons

[constantinemaddeswife]

That's actually how we got most of our food on the table. That and hunting together. (By which I mean he would tell the chaos animals to walk into our shitty traps so we could eat them). 🙃

Master Joseph, professional Enemy of Death impersonator. Bet he could make some money with that.

[constantinemaddentheenemyofdeath]

Copper Gauntlet final update:

OKAY SO A LOT HAS HAPPENED!!

Alastair isn’t actually evil which I’m glad of cuz now he’s back in my top 3 favorite characters. But what I’m not glad of is that there’s a spy in Magisterium. I’m not exactly worried abt the spy but about what the spy wants. They clearly don’t work for Joseph since the wild elemental tried also to kill Call which means that there’s an another evil guy who is probably even stronger than Joseph and is also from Magisterium which means that there will be a betrayal. To be honest i have two suspects and one of them is Celia(NOW HEAR ME OUT!) she knows everything about everyone and just feels a little too innocent and kind just like Drew did and he ended up being Josephine’s son. Also I think Celia doesn’t like makars because of Constantine. She also showed her darker side to Call when she said that she would murder Constantine if she ever met him. But here’s the problem with this solution: Celia doesn’t have an access to the wild elementals nor does she have the power to command them which can explain why the elemental started attacking everyone and not just Aaron(or maybe she’s just evil). Or maybe she tried to kill Call cuz she somehow found out who he is and she hates him. But why did she kiss him then?(it should’ve been Aaron) My other suspect is one of the Masters or even Rufus himself since they have the power to access the elementals. But why would they kill their students? The answer remains to be seen.

But what I actually came here to talk about is Call…where should I even begin?

First of all, the severed head was a slay move(literally)(talking abt Constantine not about Verity)(I really don’t understand how they said that a book with severed teenage girl’s head as a door knocker is for children)

Second, the more important thing, the secret is out. In the whole book it was my favorite moment, especially when all the chaos-ridden people followed all his orders. He also unlocked his chaos magic which means nothing but problems. I’m so happy that Call’s friends were so much more chill abt it than I expected. I kinda want to see Call in his evil era tho…

(Yaaay Jasper is getting his character development!!)

I just remembered that next to Drew’s body there was a picture of him and his dad and someone else but that person was ripped out of the picture. Sus.

I’m so sad they Jericho’s body was destroyed because it was so cute how he has all his important stuff around him😭Constantine really loved his brother🫶🏻🫶🏻

[lidathedefiant]

After much research on the Plan of St. Gall and Benedictine monastic life, I have completed the first floor of the monastery as it would've looked during its height of operations, roughly 200 years, give or take, before Lida et al. find it on their travels. I will be making another floor plan showing it in ruins.

Something to note is that this is where they encounter the terror-feeder, because the Northern Reaches really was the gods' DeviantArt page. Though I modeled this on Christian monastic life, the experiences of these monks are fundamentally different and far less ascetic so I made some fundamental changes.

Let me take you through some of the design choices I made!

Directional focus is the Overlook of the Gods, so southwest. The cathedral points in that direction as do both chapels.

Original Benedictine monasteries had very limited access points to the inner sanctum. I modified this with a few extras, but I still maintained some separation between the acolytes and monks.

Which leads me to the big main storage room. This was actually a surprising distance from the kitchens in the Plan of St. Gall.

The original kitchen had no outside access, iirc, but was separated from the main building by a hallway. I maintained this here, as it was a pragmatic and not religious decision; kitchen fires wiped out a hell of a lot of monasteries and abbeys before they moved the building off. Now they still maintained zero outside kitchen access, condemning anyone trapped in the kitchen to death, but I digress.

Monasteries were fully self-sufficient. This bad boy would’ve had crops and livestock and breweries. I did not want to design all that out because it would be gone by the time Lisa et al. arrive, but I did keep chambers for the brothers-in-service.

This place would have had an old men’s rest home to account for. Remember, part of the reason this monastery is so popular and well-maintained is because there’s too many men born in the Northern Reaches. (Don’t ask me why, I’m working on it.) So they would’ve had services for old impoverished men who couldn’t marry and had no families. I’m giving them three men assigned to the role and then an additional six that are cycled through the ranks to fulfill the mitzvah (for lack of a better word) of caring for others.

I eliminated the Benedictine conversation rooms, as Lida monks are free to talk, but kept the warming room out of practicality. It would be prohibitively costly to maintain fires everywhere. In monasteries that had dormitories, monks typically slept over the warming room, which will happen here. But unlike the ascetic Benedictines, I’ve given the brothers-in-service and others sleeping in beds far from the warming room little furnaces.

The conservatory is also not a traditional Benedictine room. My boyfriend asked the question of whether the era (roughly modeled on the Middle Ages) would’ve had such tech, which is absolutely valid, but the gods gave them a lot of knowledge. Also, greenhouses in general date back to 30 AD, when the Romans did it before it was cool.

Now we get to the big question: what the hell is up with the arcana rooms? Well, I may have jumped the shark. In constructing this on Inkarnate, I saw they had summoning circles, and I wondered, what if they had been practicing forbidden magic? Not magic outlawed by the Magisterium, but the one form of magic outlawed by the gods? What if they had accidentally summoned the terror-feeder from cryo underneath the Overlook of the Gods and this was their downfall?

I don’t have all the answers yet and I have a whole second floor to build before I can demolish it, but it’s interesting to think about and damn this was fun to make.

[kostantina]

When you get this, publish 5 songs you like to listen to, then send it to ten mutuals!!

Thank for the message <333 I love sharing about what I love, so I'm very much happy :D

I Want You To Stay (Victor Lundberg) - it's like a lullaby love song. The voice is so soothing. And it's a beautiful song to listen to when imagining soft scenarios with my favourite pairings. Listening to it again, I think it fits Female HRE and France from a sad fanfic I read about them. 「相杀组」赠路易莎小姐 by Nivio.

War of Hearts (RUELLE) - my theme song for characters who have love-hate or complicated relationships (currently looking at France and older!HRE).

Chemtrails Over The Country Club (Lana Del Rey) - so relaxing and ethereal. Just like with the first song, I can't help but imagine soft/domestic scenarios.

Sex, Drugs, Etc. (Beach Weather) - my theme song for England, for the song gives me the feeling of freedom, of doing anything that one wants without caring about what others think. I like to think that he had been more social back then and would engage in different vices or dangers. But there are times when he just prefers having a quiet and reclusive life, which is pretty evident in the Modern Era.

The Water is Fine (Chloe Ament) - my theme song for HRE!Germany and France because of their shared connections to the Kingdom of Francia. The song makes me imagine two people who had a very close bond but eventually fought one another, which fits the pairing I mentioned. I like to imagine Holy Rome and France having a brotherly bond during their time under Francia. They ended up going their own separate ways that when colliding would result in them fighting. Bonus: METAMORPHOSIS (INTERWORLD) - ignoring the lyrics, it gives me otherworldly vibes, makes me feel badass, and spurs me to imagine power-related scenarios with my favourite characters in AUs. - England in 1984 AU. I personally imagine him representing INGSOC (English Socialism), and that the war that had happened weakened America enough for his people to rebel against America's hegemony over them and form INGSOC to take power over Oceania. - Holy Rome in His Dark Materials AU. I personally imagine him representing the Magisterium, along with the Papal States. He represented its temporal authority, while the Papal States represented its spiritual authority.

I have other songs I wish I could share, but I only needed to share five songs, which I did, and even have a bonus lol.

[victori-krause-writes]

My suggestion for the propper title is Magisterium [Mg. pronounced Mage or Maggie (soft g)]. Meaning master-but not connotating male. Fits with the whole "Master of the Arts" shtick Honorables have.

Other Ideas:

All well of men should not only wish for a mistress; but a mistrial artisan, too.

Such duties of the Magisterium of the house include

• secondary income (For the entire trio shall be ashamid to The Father if the primarily depend on the Mage's income. That is the place of the Master.)

• socialite duties: Socializing, Planning events, inviting people, introducing their husband to Ladies of stature (as an appropriate third party), introducing their wifes to men of stature (as they are elagent in their nature, and thus more fitting for the meeting of parties than mens agressive likenesses.)

• in this alternative Victorian era, alter server duties and other helpful things around church might befit a young Honorable in society that's family cannot afford to send them of to training.

• training of course from a Magisterium artist. This and selling to patrons is how Mage's make money. To train a young Honorable is a great privilege.

• patronages is also a good way for an Honorable to strengthen their husband's place in society. An upperclass noble or bless your luck nobility places your trinity high in the social climb. (But same if you patron a Honorable without yourself being married to a wife or your own Mx, that is comparable to having an affair. Even more shameful if your supporting a lone Honorable. Your own triad is complete and yet you disturb God's natural order and make yourself the Master of two Magisterium's of the Arts? Shame, Shame, and that THING your no better than chasing like a dog is no Honorable - it is no better than faggotry)

I don’t think adding nonbinary to Victorian’s gender system would’ve fixed their weird sexism. If anything I think it would’ve made them weirder and sexismier

[envihellbender]

Legion in Dragon Age o:

Rating: Mature

Fandom: Dragon Age/Dead By Daylight

Characters: Frank Morrison, Jules Kostenko, Susie Lavoie, Jos Alyse, (Legion) Neve Gallup

Content: Violence, transphobia, death, fire

Neve Gallus’s Case notes regarding the Mysterious Legion.

At first, I thought it was a myth made up by high bloods to demonise the poor people… but no, it seems that the Legion are as real as I am. At least, that is what they call themselves in the notes they leave at the occasional crime scene. Very polite of them to do so and sign their names: Frank, Joe, Jules, and Susie. I don’t believe their pseudonyms, but I wonder if they are what they prefer to be called regarding Jules and Joe. I think they are local, their crimes show they had to have knowledge of the area. Their letters also claim they are “one”, they are Legion - four quarters of one whole. They have been spotted several times and they are always wearing homemade masks that completely cover their faces. Susie’s often are different types of masks attached together - sometimes bright colours are painted on them, Frank’s have a handrawn toothy grin, similar to Jules’, and Joe’s tend to mimic a skull.

Whether they are friends or foes to the Dragons is… difficult to say. They seem to not really have an opinion on anything societal or political. They’ve attacked Dragons before, but my research has brought up crimes against the Venatori, the Threads, the Magisterium, the Union of Minrathous Bards, Antivan Crows, the Lords of Fortune, Hal, the Miners Association… The list is endless. I think they could be helpful, but we’d be mad to trust them with anything secret or important.

So far the following crimes have been attributed to them either by themselves or by reputation:

Vandalism (many buildings around Minrathous (primarily Dock Town) have had graffiti which seems to fit the handwriting of the Legion notes that have been found with their confirmed crimes, a tailor with smashed windows, a trashed interior, and smiley faces painted on the walls with Xs for eyes, a public lift had LEGION in red paint written on it and the lever was broken, several upside down boats at the docks, carriages have had their wheels removed, and horses being released from stables.)

Repeated reports of arson (a candlemakers, two buildings hosting Venatori meetings (1), and the home address of a Sylvester Lavoie.)

Burglary/theft (The Kostenko residence, rumours of freed slaves originally belonging to Lydus Dulcitius (2), the Cobbled Swan, several market stalls, and five horses).

Assault of at least sixteen High-Bloods, nine Shadow Dragons, twelve merchants, and approximately ten Coddled Swan patrons but it is difficult to get specific numbers.

Murder of: Marius Everett, Clive Andrews. Olivian Naevius, and Sylvester Lavoie (three weeks after the arson attack). There are also eleven unaccounted for murders which fit Legions MO.

Theories as to Legion’s identities:

Susie’s weapons seem to circle around anything she can obtain that is sharp enough to break the skin. Examples she has been seen with include: a Steel Age era short sword stolen from the Military Museum of Minrathous, a sharpened ruler, the head from an elven bass sawn from the neck, and shards of glass. There is a brutality and emotional side to the way she attacks, it is as if she doesn’t care about who she is hurting to the point where their pain is irrelevant to her. Her fast sharp cuts that she leaves all over her victims suggests a duellist rouge combat style, and eyewitness reports indicate she’s elven. Susie seems to be more involved with assaults and vandalism rather than any murders.

Pink hairs have been found at several crime scenes which matches Susie Lavoie’s description, including in the fist of the victim. As does the fact that she is usually seen in colourful clothing that ranges from eclectic, bright, sweet, and greatly modified with handpainted slogans and designs upon them. Lavoie fits all of the possible criteria - but right now it can all be dismissed as circumstantial. She is the only non-magical child of two elven mages, her mother managed to buy her way out of slavery before having any children and her father was an Orlesian merchant. Upon talking to them both I’ve discovered they are reluctant to use Susie’s proper name and pronouns, as well as showing a severe sense of neglect. It seems the only family member who showed an interested in her life was her uncle Sylvester Lavoie - one of the murder victims. However, his death, charred remains of his house, and the note left by Legion suggests it was too much to the wrong, terrifying interest.

Joe is perhaps the most mysterious. His clothing tends to be dark, and often resembles characters from various serials (special thanks to Bellara for pointing this out.). He is the one I am at least sure about the identity of but there is one person I have in mind. Susie Lavoie and Jules Kostenko have had a friend named Joey Alyse for years, however everyone who knows him either hasn’t a bad word to say or seems to think him a naive, foolish, easy target. His mother is impossible to get hold of, and his father was killed by the Templars due to a case of mistaken identity in a scandal a few years ago. He seems to be mostly known as a quiet sort who is an avid reader and dedicated fan of many different serials and novels.

The most interesting link is the death of Marius Everett, a janitor at a shop which Joey worked at until the night before his death. The murder also coincided with the shop being vandalised with offensive words painted on the walls. The boss who fired Joey did have some rather heinous views on anyone who was not from Tevinter. Joey had been born and bred in Minrathous but his dark skin, and his mother’s Rivani heritage, caused his previous employer to think differently.

Jules is a human mage who has been particularly fascinated with fire from a young age. They seem to be more restrained than Susie and Frank, but with a less cruel and more erratic attitude than Joe. Jules seems mostly interested in the thrill of the crimes and setting things aflame. They tend to dress fairly plainly which seems to unsettle the victims even more. Excluding the masks they seem quite normal, and any survivors have noted how they thought this meant they could be reasoned with. They seem to be in a romantic relationship with Frank which makes sense given my theories regarding them both.

My suspicion is they are none other than Jules Kostenko. Their family insist they were an angel until they began seeing Frank Morrison. However, people outside the family describe someone who used to set fire to their mother’s skirts in childhood. They were betrothed to Olivian Naevius, son of an unimportant Magister with no true power to speak of, against their wishes. Jules was in love with Frank Morrison, giving them both an incentive to kill him. The way Olivian’s chest had been stabbed repeatedly and hollowed out, with his heart missing, and the way his testicles have been removed gives me the impression of an extremely personal and vengeful murder. Jules Kostenko’s parents house is also one of the places that had been burgled by Legion, two days after the Kostenko’s went to the Templar’s about how their eldest child had gone missing. The insistence they had at calling Jules “she” and “Julie” told both me and Tarquin that perhaps they have good reason to run.

If rumours are to believed Frank seems to have the longest criminal record of the group. He is almost certainly Frank Morrison from Ventus, a fact he barely tries to hide as he has a tattoo of a flaming skull on his neck which is not hid by the mask. This is the biggest indicator that my other suspicions on Legion’s identity is correct. Many people are happy to chat about how Susie Lavoie and Jules Kostenko have been driven astray by Frank Morrison.

Tarquin actually knows a great deal about him due to them growing up in the same neighbourhood. I asked whether they were friends and he looked uncomfortable made a joke and didn’t answer the question. It seems Frank was abandoned by his father from birth, and he was taken mother when he had reached ten. He was passed around foster homes in Ventus, and Tarquin said he always felt sorry for him. It was difficult enough being a trans child in Ventus without having to worry about how disposable he was to his guardians. He was known for committing a lot of acts of vandalism and assault, Eventually Frank was taken in by Clive Andrews, a drunk who treated Frank extremely poorly. He has always had a reputation as being quite cruel with a very short temper. He seems to be the leader of Legion, whilst they are insistent they are all equal … He does seem to take a dominant role in the group.

(1) It is not clear if this was accidental or if they are actually against the Venatori. From what I can tell they aren’t on either side, I think they could be potential allies but only when they are aimed at the right people.

(2) I am fairly certain Ashur did this one but I will have to double check.

[fmpclk]

World Book Day Book Reference

So we were tasked with finding a book that links to our project and the topic of my game is all about a parallel dimension, and after having a look I came across the novel series His Dark Materials. His Dark Materials is all about parallel dimensions and alternate universes. Here is a summary of the setting of His Dark Materials:

The trilogy takes place across a multiverse, moving between many parallel worlds. In Northern Lights, the story takes place in a world with some similarities to our own: dress-style resembles that of the UK's Edwardian era; the technology does not include cars or fixed-wing aircraft, but zeppelins feature as a mode of transport.

The dominant religion has parallels with Christianity.[6] The Church (governed by the "Magisterium", the same name as the authority of the Catholic Church) exerts a strong control over society and has some of the appearance and organisation of the Catholic Church, but one in which the centre of power had been moved from Rome to Geneva, moved there by Pullman's fictional "Pope John Calvin" (Geneva was the home of the historical John Calvin).[7]

In The Subtle Knife, the story moves between our own world, the world of the first novel, and a third world containing the city of Cittàgazze. In The Amber Spyglass, several other worlds appear alongside those three. (Taken From wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/His_Dark_Materials)

[callum-hunt-is-bisexual]

hot guy im talking to has read the magisterium series im going insane

[ashpkat]

me trying to convince people The Cosmos Blade was real and we were all robbed in plain sight from a better and more thrilling plot:

[hyperpotamianarch]

Well, since this post got a bit less traction so far (as much as it means anything, which, I'll be fair, it doesn't), I have decided to update it a bit! The most important part, right now, is Eastern Europe. Apparently, there has been an explosion in Jewish population there around that era in our world, so it might do well to understand why:

Expulsion.

You see, every self respecting European country had, once in its history, banished its Jews. Be it from Britain in 1290, France during the 14th century, various Italian states during the 16th, Spain in 1492 or Portugal in 1497... And I've skimmed over most of it, really. Scandinavian countries can boast to never requiring any such thing, because no Jews were allowed there until the 19th century. And yes, I'm going to keep restating that because I find it genuinely surprising.

Anyway, apparently the 16th century was full of expulsions not only from Italy, as mentioned, but from Germany as well. And right after a bunch of banishments in the 15th century - including, apparently, from Sardinia, Sicilia, Provence and Austria as well as Spain and Portugal. Those expulsions, in turn, followed the Black Death and the pogroms stemming from the antisemitic theory that Jews brought it about. So, basically, Western Europe wasn't very nice to Jews at the time.

The Polish kings, however, took a liking to the economical boost Jews regularly offered, and were more than willing to accept them - which eventually led to Eastern Europe becoming the largest center of Judaism until WWII.

Now, I'll be honest: there was one actually effective Jewish Expulsion - the one from Britain. The rest didn't really cleanse Jews from their lands, though the Spanish and Portugese Expulsions were very effective in erasing signs of the Jewish religion in their lands. The other expulsions, though, weren't as thourough and there tended to be some Jews left there. That might change with the advent of the Magisterium, though only might.

Another point, before I go on to explain how screwed the world's Jews are in a world where the Jewsade occure: many of the banished Jews from Spain went to the Ottoman Empire. If we do want to be more precise about things, they went just about anywhere: the Netherlands, Italy, France, North Africa... But the Ottoman Empire accepted them especially with open arms, with the Sultan Bayezid the Second proclaiming that Ferdinand and Isabella were foolish to give up their economic superiority on a silver platter to him. For the next couple of centuries, the Ottoman Empire was very warm toward Jews. In addition, they were the ones backing theJewsih pirates in their efforts against Spain.

All right, now we can talk about the Jewsade and why it's so stupid. You see, the Ottoman empire controlled the Holy Land at the time. The very same Ottoman Empire that helped the Jews expelled from Spain and Portugal. And who does David Reubeni turned to for help against them? To the Portugese king, of course!

All right, I can get it. From what I'm given to understand, whoever Reubeni was - he probably came from some Muslim country in the east, perhaps Yemen. He was described as dark skinned, and apparently spoke Arabic in addition to Hebrew. My guess is, the guy knew Muslim opression up close, but watched the Christian one from afar. He may not have realized that the Ottoman Empire was better for Jews than any European power.

It's a good thing he failed gaining their support, then, because otherwise I suspect he'd have caused a disaster. Beyond the mere fact he won't be the one ruling the land even if he conquered it, antagonizing the Ottoman Empire is... not a good idea. Even if he had any semblance of success, he'd have been immediately assaulted by Portugese soldiers claiming he conquered the land for them on one side, and by angry Ottomans on the other. Not to speak of the likelihood of Chales V, the Holy Roman Emperor, deciding he wanted a bite as well. And no matter who got the land in the end, the Jews there and in the rest of the Ottoman Empire are screwed.

Why do I think so? Well, it's easy to understand if we're talking Christians. Portugal wasn't nice to Jews at the time, remember? Emperor Charles V Might be better, but I'm not really sure. The real question, though, is about the Ottoman Empire. And my answer is simple enough. Antagonizing people for belonging to the same nation and religion as the people who attacked you? Where have I heard that one before?

The Sultan himself might actually try to protect his Jews, honestly. He might actually think better of it. The people won't, though. So, the Jewsade would likely be disasterous to all the Jews, involved and uninvolved.

However, the Jewsade isn't a necessary result of the actual alterations Lyra's world has compared to ours. Even without it, though... John Calvin as pope might want to create a unified front behind the Magisterium over the entirety of Western Europe at the very least. He apparently had clear views regarding the involvement of the Church in matters of the state. Him taking over Catholicism and turning it into the Magisterium...

Experts disagree regarding how antisemitic Calvin was. Some say he was the least antisemitic than the other reformators, such as Martin Luther. Others claim he was a little more than that. Either way, he wasn't a huge Judophile. It is plausible, but not certain, that under him most of Europe will carry out expulsions like the ones in Spain and Portugal.

Now, it gets really complicated. Because... remember Poland? With the whole "accepting western Jews with open arms" thing? Yeah, they're Catholics. As a matter of fact, outside of Greece, Ukraine and Russia, most eastern European states were Catholic at the time (not that greece and Ukraine existed, exactly, as independant states, but you get what I mean). I don't know what was their relationship with the pope, but transferring the Papal seat to Geneva will make it ever-so-slightly closer. I'm sure experts on Polish Catholicism could go on in explaining how they would react if told to banish their Jews, but they might comply.

That leaves us with Ukraine/Russia - which were heavily antisemitic, barely giving the Jews the Pale of Settlement to stay at - and the Ottoman Empire.

So, yeah. Ashkenazi Judaism might not be a thing anymore in Lyra's world. Maybe. Also, if it'll go closer to our world, there are still the Ukrainian Revolts to worry about - the Eastern European Jewish commuinity managed to survive them, but not very easily. If you add the Jewsade and assume every other Catholic country (and Protestant ones that were force to get into the fold) expelled its Jews...

Let's just say that even a century after it ended, the Jewsade could still screw Judaism up pretty badly.

There are other options, of course. The Magisterium won't take a firm hold on the entirety of Europe in one year. A lot might be surprisingly similar to our world. However, I think it's possible to say that by Lyra's time - most of the world's Jews live either in central Asia somewhere or in America. It might be a slight exaggaration, though.

All right. So, first: if you are either Jewish, like His Dark Materials, or both, please reblog. If you aren't any of those but know someone who is - please share it with them. I want to get as many thoughts on this as possible.

In essence, I just want to ask two simple questions. I have the beginnings of answers for myself, but Judaism is nothing if not full of discourse and many opinions on one topic. So, again: reblog. Share your thoughts and opinions. Hopefully, it will give us a wide variety of possibilities and answers.

The two questions are: where are Jews in Lyra's world? And what are the theological and Halachic concequences of having dæmons?

I intend to share my opinions in two separate reblogs, but please share your thoughts even if you don't see mine. The short version is that I looked about events in Jewish history around John Calvin's time for the first question (pope John Calvin being the major alternation of history in HDM). As for the second question - I have some thoughts relating to the Chabad thought stream. Elaborations, again, going in reblogs.

Thank you in advance!

(PS, question number 1 was handled once by the sadly deactivvated user the Tea Detective, though their full post disappeared. Link to a reblogging of the first half: here. Note, another reblog mentions other religions - feel free to discuss them, I'm focusing on Judaism because I'm Jewish. Another post asking this question was posted here, so have fun with it. Meanwhile, this post is about dæmons and religions in general and lightly touches Judaism.)

[linaseraphina13]

OKAY BUT Tamara justifying Gwenda and Jasper’s sudden romance by referencing their “flirting” ie: them generally pretending to hate and insult each other at every opportunity

you cannot convince me that’s not applicable to Jasper and Call too. Come ON.

[balioc]

I’ve been watching the BBC/HBO His Dark Materials series, which means that I’ve been thinking back on the books.

(Spoilers for the His Dark Materials books follow.)

epistemic status: I’m sure someone else has come up with all of this before, probably many someones, but it’s the thing that’s on my mind

Looking at things with 2020-era discourse eyes, it really is striking how much this fantasy story -- for a supposed anti-Christian polemic -- feels like it’s coming from exactly the same discursive place as the Christian tradcon rhetoric that I read.  Pullman feels the same way about his heroes that tradcons feel about themselves; Pullman feels the same way about his [extremely Christian-coded] villains that tradcons feel about their [secular, progressive, “degenerate”] enemies. 

It’s a Cult of Strength thing, if you’ll forgive me for returning to my own homebrew terminology.  Pullman believes in the Natural Order.  He wants people to be what they were born to be, to be healthy, which is the same thing as being both strong and morally good.  Which is exactly what all the vociferous Christian ideologues of our age want, only without the cross logo. 

A couple of extremely-salient examples:

* His Magisterium is presented as a weird, creepy, head-up-its-own-ass cult that cares about abstractions of its own invention to the exclusion of anything real and valuable.  A caricatured Cult of Vision institution, in other words.  Its Big Scheme is a mad-science project to -- in directly-analogic local-worldbuilding terms -- castrate the world’s children en masse so that they will never become proper adults and never encounter the features of adulthood (especially sex). 

This is not a horror-story version of the Christian self-identity.  This is the kind of horror story that tradcons tell about progressives.   It is a hubristically utopian scheme to rework human nature in the face of the natural order. 

(It’s also worth noting that Magisterium clerics tend to be portrayed in exactly the way that conservative polemicists tend to portray progressives: greasy sallow men-without-chests, pseudo-intellectuals and self-important bureaucrats whose only love is institutional power, perverts whose souls take the form of unpleasant creeping things.)

* Iofur Raknison could be a C.S. Lewis villain.

Actually, wait, I’ll go further than that.  Iofur Raknison is basically Buffalo Bill from Silence of the Lambs, made suitable for a children’s book. 

For all that he’s dangerous and frightening, in the end, he is mostly pathetic and contemptible.  The reader is invited to feel scorn for him.  And the reason for this is that he is dominated by a perverse desire to traduce the natural order, to be what he cannot be and was not meant to be.  This leads to the grotesque spectacle of him parading around as the thing-he-is-not [human], with a cringeworthily unconvincing substitute version of the proper accoutrement [daemon]; this makes him a delusional fool, easily manipulated by anyone promising to help him fulfill his ridiculous impossible desire.

He is unwilling to accept the proper order of things, he insists on fighting it, and that makes him both wicked and weak. 

...again, this is how Christian tradcons portray their enemies, when they’re not feeling charitable. 

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

My takeaway feeling seems to be “Pullman doesn’t actually understand the people at whom he’s mad, or what drives them.”  They wouldn’t see themselves, even caricature versions of themselves, in his supposedly so-very-Christian villains.  They would see themselves in his heroes, and despise his villains for pretty much the same reasons that he does. 

But movements change over time.  Certainly Christianity has been countless different things, and they rise and fall in prominence.  I don’t know whether the public face of the religion has somehow become much less world-rejectingly Cult-of-Vision-y, and much more natural-order-loving C.S.-Lewis-y, in the time between when the books were written and now -- I don’t see any particular reason to think so, but, well, maybe I’m missing something.  I suppose mainstream secular culture has gotten less freewheelingly sex-positive in comparison, which may have something to do with it.  (The bit where Christian tradcons have been the ones lamenting the collapse of teen sex rates has, uh, certainly been memorable.)

[lycanthrology]

here we go!! 🥳

BASICALLY the au is set in hdm universe so its like my characters were dumped into the plot. canon hdm characters are around but theyre only mentioned in passing. is this fanfiction? i guess it is. anyway i cant decide whether it takes place before la belle sauvage or after but its definitely before northern lights. peak lord asriel era

Kaleela and Baize are married 🥰 in all ways except legally because the Magisterium will definitely not allow any sort of gay marriage to be certified at all so they have to keep it secret outside of the house. Kaleela is still a muslim but she cant publicly practice because of the Magisterium.

But! There’s a group working against the Magisterium called Oakley Street and Baize managed to get in and join. They’re a branch of the government but don’t have the same oversight other government funded groups have. Basically the hdm world runs very similar to Victorian England with parliament being made up of genuine Lords so most people in the government (and by extension Oakley Street) are of nobility. BASICALLY im trying to take the good bits from The Book of Dust and salvage something decent from it because the book of dust was horrifically disappointing.

Of course, Baize is a regular citizen with no title so wouldn’t typically be allowed into this group, but recently a member that used to do all the dirty work for the Lords called Lewis Armitage (<- omg!!) had been killed in action so there was a job opening. Baize takes on the dead guy’s role but the other members constantly berate and look down on her for a) not being as good as him b) not being of a Good Noble Pedigree c) her freaky little bear-weasle-dæmon. Lord Booker is put in charge of her and is getting information from an inside guy at the Magisterium and uses that to give baize jobs like talking to people, visiting places of interest and actually killing people sometimes (but no one’s allowed to talk about that because they’re Good Noble People who do Good Noble Things)

Kaleela is still a ballerina and the Magisterium takes arts and culture very seriously so she ends up meeting a lot of different important people. She keeps an eye on politics and hears a lot of talk about the Magisterium conducting more raids on supposed Oakley Street meeting locations and is scared for her wife’s safety. She doesn’t know exactly what work she does but knows it’s for ‘a better society etc etc’ and asks Baize to take her to the next meeting to a) find out whats going on b) they’ll be together if they get raided c) she can meet all the lords and go oo thats a nice hat

Baize is apprehensive but takes her because she knows it’ll be even more suspicious if she refuses and she respects Kaleela’s concerns and doesn’t want to hide anything from her. Kaleela finds out she’s killing people for ‘a better society etc etc’ and is rightfully pissed off. She comes to understand that it ‘must be done’ but is still angry that it’s her wife that’s been caught up in it all and it had been kept from her. She has the opinion that the other members have essentially groomed her because of the difference in social standing and baize is a recovering alcoholic and overall not very mentally healthy.

Anyway Kaleela gets approached by Lord Booker to join Oakley Street as a spy because he’s noticed how good she is at blending in and making smalltalk and she’s got her connections to important people through her dance. She agrees so she can keep an eye on Oakley Street without looking suspicious because she does not trust them at all and thinks there’s something they’re hiding

Lennox time 😎. Lennox is a Alethiometerist. The alethiometer has been in his family years and his dad did contract work for the Magisterium before becoming too old to work it properly. Lennox is really good at using the instrument and Booker is paying for him to work with Oakley Street’s senior Alethiometerist to help hone his skills. He was approached by the Magisterium to pick up where his dad left off but refused and faced arrest but Booker swooped in and whisked him away before they could get him. So technically he’s a fugitive but it’s not a big deal. Lennox is experimenting with the alethiometer to find a way to read it without needing any of the big books. The old way is too slow and complicated. There are only six alethiometers in existence and Oakley Street have two and the ability to read them both accurately. Win!!

However, Aidan is working at the Magisterium and is an alethiometerist himself and somehow manages to get connected to Lennox’s instrument through his own. So there’s a whole thing with them communicating and spying on each other and experimenting with the compasses in secret and reporting back to their respective superiors

Baize gets some information from someone at a pub and while she’s there she bumps into Crow. He’s from the Consistorial Court of Discipline (splintered from the Magisterium) and is known for killing Oakley Street agents. Omgg can you believe it this is the guy that killed Lewis.. She thinks he’s not here for her but notices he’s using a fake name and alias so she chooses to do the same. When she tries to leave he reveals he knows exactly who she is and was messing her around for the fun of it because he’s a bastard. They fight in the pub. Her spares her and later explains that he’s working with Lord Booker to get information from inside the Magisterium. He’s his inside source and has occasionally been killing Oakley Street people but only enough to avoid suspicion in the Magisterium. It’s all for ‘the greater good!!’ (Literally how many times are people going to say that). Shock and horror turns out Crow is Lewis Armitage. Obviously Baize is freaked because the guy who apparently killed Lewis Armitage IS Lewis Armitage and she’d stolen the Crow’s job. Wild!!!

Anyway the rest of it is like the original suicide squad movie: they assemble a team. its bad and not funny. the tone is everywhere. will smith is there