#it makes me sick down to the very fascist language it uses

[the-ghost-king]

Schizophrenic Nico, here's why I think it's possible:

I want to start off by saying these are just my thoughts, there is no one way to be schizophrenic or to have schizophrenia. It's also important to note that many of the schizophrenic symptoms overlap with other mental illnesses/nuerodivergences like ADHD, Autism, Depression, and OCD which I know many people who head canon Nico as having. I'm not arguing schizophrenic Nico is more correct, more canon, or more right, but to explain some thoughts on why I think it's possible/very likely he does so I can use this for future reference in various thing.

I am using the term schizophrenia as a catchall for all "types" of schizophrenia, but not for schizoaffective disorder which I would say Nico probably doesn't have.

Children born in the winter/those who were "sickly" as babies are more likely to develop schizophrenia. It may also be possible if your mother was sick while pregnant with you, or having a father who was significantly older when he had you.

A stressful life, especially trauma, are more likely to develop schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder. It likely has something to do with excessive dopamine production, but it may also have something to do with the same genes that control the sleep-wake cycle. Schizophrenia is more common with other mental illnesses or with other nuerodivergences or developmental delays.

Common symptoms include:

Hallucinations

Delusions

Disorganized thinking

lack of motivation

slow movement

change in sleep patterns

poor grooming or hygiene

changes in body language and emotions

less interest in social activities

Now what does this mean for Nico, and why do I think it's likely he has Schizophrenia?

Let's start with Nico's childhood, "children born in the winter/those who were "sickly" as babies are more likely to develop schizophrenia". Although Rick proposed two birthdays for Nico, the fandom generally accepted the January date more fully. We also know that Nico is described as small when he was younger, smallness is common in children who grow up sickly, but it is also common in children who's mother was ill while pregnant with them. We obviously don't know if Nico was sick as a kid, or if Maria was sick while pregnant with him, but again being born in the winter makes these things more likely, as well as consideration for the time period Nico grew up in and the larger variety of illnesses going around at the time. (He is vaccinated against some things though).

Trauma and Nico... do I really have to go into super detail on this one? He spent his childhood growing up in a fascist country that was extremely racist/anti-Semitic/homophobic/etc, his mom died when he was a child- in front of him, his father intentionally gave him amnesia, his sister died when he was a child, he then proceeded to become homeless living/spending lots of time with Minos who verbally (and possibly physically) abused him, becoming aware of his past memories, becoming aware of the fact that many people hated him because of his father and because they thought he was joining the other side (therefore, he was "bad"), he fought in many battles as a child, fought monsters alone, was often faced with life or death situations, went to Tartarus alone (where the goddess of misery told him he was "perfect"), was trapped in a hostage situation with little/no air for a long time while people debated whether or not to save him, was outed against his will, was freed only to travel again fighting monsters and then win a battle, was eventually made to quest with Apollo despite still having lots of healing to do in ToN. So stressful life? Fuck yeah, that doesn't being to cover it.

Genetic factors, obviously nothing here is confirmed so I'm speculating a little bit again, but the common idea in regards to Hades children through the series is that they are "bad". Mental illnesses have been stigmatized for hundreds, if not thousands of years, and often mentally ill people were made out to be weird/bad/etc. It's more than possible there is some sort of genetic factor taking place, also "having a father who was significantly older when he had you". Although I doubt godly genes work the same as mortal ones (trust me I have lots of thoughts on how god genetics/DNA work, but that's not the point right now), I think Hades being the oldest out of all his brothers and having a reputation for having "questionable" children says something... We have no information on Maria's family history at all.

As for schizophrenia often occurring with other mental illnesses and/or neurodivergences: Nico canonically is implied to have either ADHD and/or Autism, and is canonically stated to have PTSD. I think most people would agree that saying Nico has or has had depression isn't a stretch in the slightest.

So canonically we can all agree Nico has severe trauma and coinciding mental health issues/neurodivergences, so out of 4 possible issues I’ve first presented we guaranteeably have two. If I wanted to stretch this a little I would give myself a half point for him being born in the winter and a half point for the aspect of Hades genetics but I won’t do that.

On top of that schizophrenia usually appears during teenage and young adult years in people who receive diagnosis; most people live with mental illness for a few months or a few years in some cases before they're able to receive a diagnosis. Nico being 15 (16 by the end of ToN/shortly following the end of ToN) is about the age that schizophrenia would start to make an appearance. It's also more likely to be found in men, with men also noticing the appearance of schizophrenia appearing early in their lives, and experiencing more negative symptoms in comparison to the higher commonality of affective symptoms in women. That's a really complicated explanation to basically say there's 3 more things that would make Nico having schizophrenia make more sense.

Alright, let’s go back to the list of symptoms I provided:

Hallucinations

Delusions

Disorganized thinking

lack of motivation

slow movement

change in sleep patterns

poor grooming or hygiene

changes in body language and emotions/behavior

less interest in social activities

Once again, some of these are not solely related to schizophrenia and can be the result of other mental health issues, I’m just going to go down the list and add in some moments from the books in which Nico shows some of these traits/behaviors.

Delusions/Hallucinations (more later)

Our best chances for understanding Nico's thought process is in Blood of Olympus where he has a P.O.V... Sometimes Nico's thoughts do derail, or sometimes they get a little confusing, but not always, and when talking to others he is consistent and aware of what he's saying, as well as blunt. Anything "off" about his thought patterns to me just seems like ADHD..

Dietary changes (whether or not you think he has an eating disorder) are behavioral changes (I personally think Nico has AFRID)

Within House of Hades Nico's poor sleep patterns are constantly referenced, and I'll give him a pass on poor hygiene because he's in the middle of a quest but still..

I have extremely complicated feelings on what Will says here, it's possible Nico is an extremely unreliable narrator (unlikely, it seems many people are bothered by him and only maybe a handful aren't), I've also thought at many points this was Rick trying to backtrack some stuff with Nico because he realized he'd made his story a little too harsh for a kids book, it could also be Will's trauma kicking in and that happening... I'm not counting it as full proof about Nico disliking social interactions, but Nico does try to leave even after this conversation and isn't convinced to stay until the last chapter, so maybe there's something to be said about people's dislike of him for being a Hades kid- but I think it's fair to say Nico also dislikes people at least some because he doesn't have interest in trying to befriend anyone either, and is quick to assume all people dislike him (paranoia/low self esteem/and some other possible stuff). There's lots of discussions to be had about this quote and other similar ones, and I don't think a broad brush approach of "Nico good everyone else bad" is accurate it's more, "Nico is good but he fails to try and you have to work on your own mental health everyone won just go to you, and also people dislike Nico for silly reasons and need to get over themselves and make an effort too". (I'm extremely oversimplifying my thoughts and feelings to keep it brief.)

More on delusions and hallucinations:

Now I want to state that lots of schizophrenia symptoms share a lot of commonalities with ADHD and with depression, so although I might include some moments you think are just ADHD/depression I wouldn’t necessarily disagree with you but they could also be schizophrenia or coexisting mental health issues/divergences. I also went through the DSM-5 for schizophrenia (the DSM-5 is just this big book with lists and it’s how doctors diagnose any mental health issue/divergence), I also looked through the DSM-IV (an older book from before DSM-5 which is no longer really used) and the differences between the diagnosis was fairly minimal but they quit categorizing types of schizophrenia and instead rely more on a couple of word descriptions that seem more in line with a spectrum rather than a checkable box.

In order to receive a schizophrenia diagnosis, two (or more) of the following, each present for a significant portion of time during a 1-month period (or less if successfully treated), and at least one of these symptoms must be (1), (2), or (3):

Delusions

Hallucinations

Disorganized speech (frequent derailment or incoherence)

Grossly disorganized or catatonic behavior

Negative symptoms (i.e., diminished emotional expression or avolition).

It’s important to note that only one of these need to be checked off/true if the patient has voices which narrate their actions/behaviors/thoughts or if the person has more than one voice conversing with each other.

Nico deals with auditory hallucinations (2), he believes the voice belongs to Bob, his titan friend he left in Tartarus:

However this isn’t and immediate diagnosis because Bob’s voice doesn’t talk to another voice(s) in Nico’s head, and we don’t know if Nico has voices running commentary on his behaviors/thoughts.

The reason I state we are unaware if Nico has commentary isn’t because Nico hasn’t said anything, but because many people with schizophrenia before their diagnosis believe the narrative voices are just their thoughts and are a normal internal monologue- usually patients don’t realize anything is wrong until the voices start providing commentary on their actions so instead of “washing the dishes now” the voice(s) might say “wash the dishes now, you’re so lazy you can’t do anything, idiot” during a period of psychosis which may help them acknowledge that the voice(s) isn’t the way most people experience internal voice(s). It is very possible Nico is unaware he is experiencing narrative thoughts and simply assumes that his experience is something most people have, but I won’t use this to argue my point because it’s not confirmation of anything.

Returning now to Bob, Nico knows he is hearing Bob’s voice but he believes Bob is calling to him from Tartarus. Now, Nico says the voices are calling to him from Tartarus but there’s no confirmation of this anywhere… What I think is happening is Nico has a guilty conscience. He feels bad for “using” Bob to get out of Tartarus and various other things, so he feels bad that he is still down there. However, we don’t really know if Bob is calling to him or if Bob is able to do that- what I personally think is happening here is Nico’s brain is convincing Nico that Bob needs him because Nico is upset with himself for not helping Bob more, but also because Nico has never “sat still” before without a quest. Nico has also always felt the want to be needed/important...

It very well could be a delusion.

Schizophrenic patients often experience delusions which make them think they are destined for greatness, or that they have some divine/high force calling out to them for help that only they can provide. It’s an extremely common thing in individuals who experience delusions, and is in fact one of the most common delusions experienced. So although Bob could really be calling out to Nico, I don’t think he is, it doesn’t entirely make sense and there’s lots of little things which point to it being not entirely real- like the fact that nobody else knows about it? Or how absolutely sure Nico is that he need to return to Tartarus? It seems like a mixture of PTSD, delusions, and trauma response (returning to the trauma), working against him. I’ll say delusion is very likely (1).

Using these two factors alone there’s sufficient evidence for diagnosis, but let’s keep going just to see.

For disorganized speech (3) this isn’t something Nico seems to struggle with, and even if he did “derailing” could be ADHD or Autism, so I don’t think this symptom pertains to him.

Changes in behavior (4), seem to all be explainable via depression and/or PTSD- he has begun to express emotion again in Tower of Nero upon learning of Jason’s death he is said to be upset by Will and he walks off to be alone, seems like depression to me. Emotional/Behavior changes from schizophrenia tend to relate more to bipolar disorder rather than a depressive disorder, so I would say if Nico has schizophrenia he probably doesn’t have emotional or behavioral changes from it. If he did he might have some catatonic behavior, but this seems to be clearing up some in Tower of Nero so I’m not super sure on that, maybe during bad periods of psychosis behavioral changes occur, but I would lean more towards this isn’t a symptom Nico personally deals with. Negative symptoms (5) tie into this same idea, it’s possible it’s schizophrenia, but it’s more likely PTSD or depression at work.

So why do I care so much about the possibility of Nico being schizophrenic?

I feel like canonically/fanonically making Nico schizophrenic does a few things, firstly schizophrenic rep in media is extremely extremely awful- can you think off the top of your head of a schizophrenic character who isn't from a horror film/a murder/a villain in their own story? Maybe, but personally I can only think of one which is Charlie from Perks of Being a Wallflower- and even then? That's not canon, it's only implied- and it might not even be true

Schizophrenic media representation always paints schizophrenic people as bad, scary, and evil, and although the horror genre is extremely well known for being super ableist, transphobic, racist, homophobic, and misogynistic (just the final cherry on top) having one of the first- if not the first openly confirmed schizophrenic characters in children's media not only be someone who has lots of character development, and isn't a stereotype, but also be someone people have grown up with, cared for, and sympathized with- would be extremely monumental.

People with schizophrenia and other related disorders aren't something to be scared of or to think of as bad, and often times they're more bothered by whatever they're experiencing than you are.

I don't have schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder or anything like that, but I have various undiagnosed mental health issues which often lead to me questioning reality, or having to set aside time to convince myself that no there isn't a man living in my wall... Having a character have to question those things, work through those feelings, and learn to trust themselves and care for themselves even with those difficulties would be really great to see in media, not just for people with schizophrenia but also for people with similar/related disorders who might share symptoms see parts of their own struggles in a good, educative way.

I have to finish this in two parts because tumblr keeps breaking because there's too many words in my post lmao (2nd part here)

[asimovsideburns]

Surprise, bitch! I bet you’d thought you’d seen the last of me! Guess what? Today you get TWO session summaries—not just the archipelago, no, but also… THE CITY OF TEUCRI!!!!! WHAT???? That’s right, we did an anniversary one shot (turned two shot), so of course I have to do a session summary for it—it’s the first game I started posting these for!

Hello, and welcome to The City of Teucri. It’s been six months since we saved the city from a fascist conspiracy, and things are looking up! Tomorrow is Princess Marlowe’s 18th birthday and, almost as importantly, her coronation as Queen.

We begin our session assembled in the same place we were hired for the last job, but it’s Princess Marlowe herself instead of Guinevere briefing us on the situation. (Guinevere is definitely the one who organized it, though.)

Princess Marlowe tells us, okay, I’m coming of age at midnight, so Guinevere has arranged for me and my friends to go hang out at this bar (the legal drinking age in Teucri is 18) (don’t @ me it’s not my setting /j /j) BUT she wants you guys to tag along at make sure we don’t get into trouble. The place is called—

Smash cut to us waking up the next day at noon in an alley, four hours before the coronation, with a business card, an added modification to Rocky’s sword, a weird flask, a salt shaker of spice that Ferris, a warforged, can almost actually taste (and that deals fire damage to Atlas when they try some)… and missing Marlowe’s mother’s ring, which is not only a) magical and b) sentimental but also c) has the royal seal on it and is required for the coronation. which is, again, in four hours.

Oh, and we also don’t remember anything.

WE’VE BEEN THE HANGOVER’D!

(I have not seen The Hangover)

Those of us in the alley are Iraelin, Atlas, Ferris, Rocky, and Marlowe. We determine that Marlowe’s friends were sent home early in the night because we were going to look into something and it seemed dangerous. Atlas uses a third level spell to cast Sending to contact Bermuda, who was not there at the start of the night but we could really use their help. There is no response. Three seconds later they walk around the corner drinking an iced coffee and wearing homestuck shades (“the spiky ones”).

We send Marlowe back to the palace with instructions to tell Guinevere and only Guinevere everything (it’ll be worse if you don’t) and Bermuda’s iced coffee. We’re going to retrace our steps and find the ring.

Ferris uses Identify to figure out that the attachment to Rocky’s sword allows it so emit sunlight. Atlas gets double nat 20s to determine that the spice is a specialty item that only a few restaurants in the city carry, and the names of all those restaurants. The flask feels like it has water but nothing comes out when it’s opened and upended. Iraelin remembers the place we were supposed to go to, and has the business card she found in her pocket.

We decide to start with the place we were supposed to go to. Iraelin grabs Bermuda’s shades on the way out of the alleyway—it’s way too bright out for this.

We head to the bar, where the bartender (who is dealing with a very large, very shattered window) is super happy to see us.

We flashback.

It’s last night, and we’re at the bar. It kind of sucks. It’s a “$12 for a ‘plate’ of mozzarella sticks that’s really one mozzarella stick cut into six pieces” kind of place. Nonetheless, our night is livened up when a brick comes crashing through the window, threatening in archaic language to burn the place down if they don’t pay their protection fees. We talk to the bartender and the waitress and find out that there’s been a few people coming around to businesses in the area, giving them trouble. At the waitress’s other job, they actually did throw a molotov cocktail!

The unifying characteristic of the people making threats is that they look “kind of sick”, which isn’t a lot to go on, so in-flashback we decide to go check out the waitress’s other job (the bartender is closing the place down, anyway) (also we do tip her)

We flash forward.

We talk to the bartender a bit, Iraelin gives him the contact info for a window guy she knows, and we head off for the next place we went to last night—HGT, according to the business card. When we get there, we see that the full name is Here for a Good Time—and we flash back again.

It’s last night, and we’ve arrived. Marlowe has successfully convinced us to look into this extortion ring (or at least, we couldn’t talk her out of it), and we’ve arrived at Here for a Good Time. It is, of course, a sex work establishment, so Marlowe and Ferris have to wait outside, being 17 and 9 respectively. The rest of us go inside and discuss the attack—a while back, a sickly looking person had come by telling them that they needed to make payments, and not wanting to make waves, they had—leaving gold in a dead drop by the river. Then, more recently, they were instructed to make payments by making a reservation at a specific restaurant, ordering an off-menu item (rotwurst) at an exorbitant price, eating it, and telling the waiter to give their compliments to the chef. This was too much, and they said no. A few days ago, another sickly looking person came by and threw a molotov cocktail into the main lobby; luckily the fire was contained and the perpetrator thrown out, but this is a serious issue. There was also some kind of sigil or rune painted on their building, but it’s been washed off—we’ll have to come back tomorrow for someone to be able to draw it for us.

Flash forward again. We knock on the door (Ferris has to stay outside again, so Rocky stays with them). One of the employees (who has a photographic memory and is one of those people who’s, like, kind of annoying about it) draws us a sketch of the sigil as well as the two sickly people who had come by.

As we go to leave, Ferris demands a treat, “because it’s my birthday” (it is not their birthday) (they turned nine like a week after the end of the campaign) (however they also just found out last night that birthdays are like. A Thing.)

With sigil in hand, we head over to the Monastery to try and see if they have anything in their library that can help us figure out what’s going on. It is at this point that, knowing we’re running on limited time, I have the brilliant idea to 1) hail a horse taxi, 2) flash the Very Important Official Business paperwork that Guinevere neglected to make me return after we saved the city from the previously mentioned fascist conspiracy, and 3) tell the driver he could charge the palace double if he gets us where we’re going fast

We get to the monastery in record time, and I tell him to leave the meter running while we’re inside. Bermuda doesn’t want to go in. Bermuda hasn’t been here in the six months since we saved the city. Atlas convinces them to come inside with us anyway—you can’t hide forever, after all.

Inside, we find El’neye, who has an… unfortunate… haircut. It looks not great. It looks very specific. It looks like the bangs you give yourself after being ghosted for six months, to be exact.

We do some research with her help and find that the sigil belongs to an old, old, old group of people who promoted health through clean living and decided to go live underground. They were not heard from again.

We start spiraling about this in the wrong direction and discover that the flask we have doesn’t pour out, but does have water in it. Ferris does an identify and figure out what it is. Ferris points it at Bermuda and says “Geyser,” which produces 30 gallons of water that gushes forth in a geyser 30 feet long and 1 foot wide.

In a library.

That is in the process of recovering from being extremely vandalized about six months ago.

Luckily, Bermuda is hanging back by the door, so the water doesn’t damage anything. Ferris and Bermuda are still banned from the library. Protests of “it’s my birthday!” fall upon deaf ears. Bermuda walks out sopping wet and goes to stand by the taxi.

We say our goodbyes and then head off to the restaurant where the HGT people were supposed to order the rotwurst, which is ALSO one of the few restaurants in the city that have the spice we found. As we approach, a large goliath man in the restaurant’s uniform waves his hands and makes it abundantly clear that we are not welcome here.

We flash back.

We park the taxi around the corner and head to this restaurant, which has many people waiting for their reservation. We approach the host, and very, very casually begin what will henceforth be known as “pulling a Marlowe, Party of Six”.

To start, we name drop the princess, who is clearly with us, and pretend that we have a reservation. Obviously, we do not have a reservation. Is he sure? He’s sure that the princess can’t be served here? He goes and gets a manager, who confirms that we are, yes, a party of six people.

He, with great pain, escorts us to a table. We are not dressed for this place. Bermuda is wearing basketball shorts. A different manager is explaining to a very rich, very angry group that there has been a mix up with the reservations. People are staring.

We are seated. Except for Rocky, who insists on standing, because his job is to protect the princess from people, including rudeness, and you can’t be rude to the princess if you can’t get to the princess.

We order. Iraelin orders a drow dish, which theh definitely don’t have, in undercommon which these people definitely don’t speak. Bermuda pulls out a bag of chips and starts eating those. Atlas orders a cold dessert soup, just to see if they have it. Rocky orders a wagyu steak, pronounced incredibly wrong. Bermuda also orders one, pronounced incredibly wrong but in a different way. Atlas orders one of those but as a sandwich to dip in their soup. Ferris asks for the rotwurst, but could they put a birthday candle in it and sing happy birthday to them, because it’s their birthday? (this is the first chronological instance of birthday boy ferris.) Marlowe orders the soup du jour, but also with a birthday candle in it, because it’s her birthday, too. The manager says, it’s both of your birthdays? Human Public Figure Princess Marlowe Roberts looks at the warforged Ferris, back at the manager, and says, yes. We’re twins. Also please sing a second happy birthday song for me, because you know how when you’re twins everything is kind of for both of you and it becomes a sore spot.

The manager, who is so so sweaty and nervous, says yes, of course.

They bring out our food. They sing happy birthday, twice. They have to hold on to the birthday candle in Marlowe’s soup while they do it. People at the tables next to us are asking to be moved. Bermuda asks for a refill on the bag of chips they brought with them. Ferris pushes the rotwurst away without touching it and says “my compliments to the chef!”

The manager goes to convey Ferris’s compliments. The manager comes back to tell us that the chef would love to hear our compliments in person. We follow the manager to the kitchen, which appears completely empty. We are attacked by a full Vampire.

We deserve this.

All of a sudden, our flash-forward items make sense—a sword that sheds sunlight, a flask that produces running water.

The vampire attempts to take Marlowe’s ring. He has a +4 to the check, and rolls a natural 19. Marlowe has a +3, so she needs a natural 20.

She rolls a natural 20.

And that’s where we ended our session! We spent so long on Marlowe, Party of Six and other shenanigans that we turned it into a two-shot! I can’t wait to keep playing (I’ve got some Plans), and I’ll be back with another session summary some time after we do

[cadomoisspokenfor]

Legion Rewatch Notes,

Chapter 8:

The Revolution

Aw man, how unfortunate what’s happened to Clark. I feel soooooooo bad. I mean he was just humble div 3 agent, doing his job, gaslighting marginalized individuals, participating in a genocide. How cruel of those bad bad mutants to injure him so badly. He was only actively about to kill David. What could he possibly have done to deserve any of this?

In other words, the Clark propaganda is not working on me this time. At all.

Maybe don’t participate in a genocide? Idk :/

I normally hate when people type in the passive aggressive way I have been for the past few paragraphs, but goddamn, Clark deserves it.

He’s not quite as damaged... but he’s kind’ve like old David here, from the over-medicated living with Amy timeline. Again, not quite as damaged as that though.

Clark considers mutants a “threat to democracy.” 🙄 “Moral panic” I guess?

“The second I walk outta this room, i’m going to war.” There’s that word again. Clark could just... not, and they’d probably have more time to figure out how to safely eradicate Farouk. But because he doesn’t and David busies himself with peace treaties, Farouk escapes and continues to be a problem for the next year. Clark has a family. A husband and child who love him to death. And he chooses war over them. This pattern will repeat in other character. Technically this isn’t even the start of it.

Suit change, new cane, same Clark. This really doesn’t change anything, does it? He could go through the rest of the series in the suit he wore before and it wouldn’t make difference. The valiant hero dressing for an expected victory over their long time (relatively) rival, only to be stopped immediately by an unforeseen development. This pattern will repeat... tragically.

Considering Farouk!David woulda just dusted them, it’s probably nice for his friends to see the real him is much less violent. He just stacks em like a Jenga Tower, no need for anything more.

Also, Wilhelm scream from one of the soldiers.

He’s also talking strangely. In an almost too calm voice. Measured. He talks like this a few other times, but I think those times have sadder context. Maybe they reflect on this moment. He talks like how he talked when Farouk was mind-melded with him, but his intentions aren’t evil this time around. I guess this is just his “fully in control” voice.

Clark’s literally shaking where he stands.

The zoom in to Clark’s blind eye is reminiscent to previous zoom in’s to Walter’s foggy eye. I guess Clark has taken on the role of Walter, artificially. Makes sense since he’s now the main D3 representative/antagonist like Walter was before.

“I don’t care if you save me, or the world, if you don’t save yourself.” David will eventually choose himself over the world, and Syd. And Syd will hunt him for it. Goes to show how much things change in s2.

“You know the most dangerous thing about schizophrenia?”

“You’re not-“

“The most dangerous thing is believing... you don’t have it! That’s the trick, the mind killer, your disease convinces you you don’t have it. So, for example, one day in the hospital you meet a girl and she has some friends, and they tell you you’re not sick. You have superpowers. And more than anything you wanna believe it because that means you’re not crazy! That means you can fall in love and live happily ever after. But you know if you believe it, if you surrender to the hope and you’re wrong, then... you’re never coming back.”

“I’m here. I’m real. The power is real. You gotta accept it, otherwise we can’t move on.”

“I was in Clockworks for six years. Drugged, doing nothing. Contributing nothing. And now, finally I can be useful! I can help! Don’t you get it? I am so sick of myself. This only works if it’s not about me.”

“David...”

So... that’s a lot. David believes being crazy means he’s not allowed to fall in love, or be happy. He said the same sentiment to Amy before Clockworks. This whole season and this episode especially push David into his full “I’m not insane, I won’t believe you if you tell me otherwise” mindset. At the very least that’s the stakes we’re playing with. If David fully gives into the hope, even for a moment, he believes there’s no possibility for recovery. No possibility for love or happiness. Why even try after that? It’s life or death for him. “If the choice is between life and death, I choose life.”

I know this is all already known and talked about and circulated 100’s of times over in various fan circles, but it’s probably the most important line for David’s character (the speech, not the Farouk quote). It’s very ableist, yes, but at least in the moment it’s coming from someone who’s just being too hard on themselves, and not ya know, being actively validated by the show.

2 episodes ago David talked about being worried about an “invincible” feeling. The dangers of mania.

We also know from that episode that David is more at peace in a calm, responsibilityless setting (with Syd) than he is out in the real world. David’s gonna take on a ton of responsibility, some of it’s gonna draw him away from Syd. At multiple moments throughout the show David has known his own mental health better than any of the others, and even warned them about potentially dangerous slopes he could fall down without their help. Despite this, David is pushed further down a path he tells them is dangerous and is still blamed for what happens in the end. I feel like Oliver’s line from ep4 is relevant here again, “We are the root of all our problems. Our anger, our confusion, our fear of things we don’t understand.” Everyone wants David to be something other than... David. A hero, a god, there projected image of a perfect partner. Not just... David.

Man, the more I realize about David’s self-awareness in s1 the madder I am at Syd for saying all that ableist stuff to him in s2 as if he wasn’t already down on himself 24/7. “It never occurred to you that you’re the problem not the solution?” It’s occurred to him like 5 times by now and has been shut down by you at least 3 of those times. I don’t understand.

What’s strange is... to my recollection David doesn’t believe he’s invincible at the end of s2. Or that he’s not sick.

“Saint David.”

“I’m not saying that. I make mistakes.”

“Say you’re gonna let them kill me if I don’t let them turn me into something different. Something easy. Something clean.” He sounds sinister here, but it is an indication that he knows he’s not perfect. In fact it sounds like he’s trying to appeal to Chap 1 Syd’s mentality. Your disorder is what “makes you you.”

So what’s the message here?

“We can’t just kill people. Or is that who we are now?”

“That’s who they are.”

The justification for killing here is that they’ll kill them if they don’t. Div 3 will kill Summerland if Summerland doesn’t kill Div 3, is what I meant. David has a similar justification for killing Shadow King in s2. Well, he has a LOT of justifications for it, but that’s one of them. Syd doesn’t hear it then either. She does attempt to kill David herself though. I don’t quite understand where the line is.

“He was gonna kill you, twice.”

“With that kind of thinking wars would never end.”

So... he shoulda just talked to The Shadow King when they were both powerless? Talking is what ultimately ends their fight in s3... hmm...

Cary is more humane to their POW than Melanie and Ptonomy are.

The show doesn’t necessarily say it was Cary’s fault for leaving Kerry. Either way though, Kerry needs some space.

Melanie calls David a “world breaker��� and outright says now that he knows that’s what he is, div 3 doesn’t stand a chance. I suppose... knowing that... is why they so readily team with Farouk. They stood no chance otherwise. Even then, at least hide him away till after the intervention.

David’s floating meditation pose is seen more in s2 and A LOT more in s3.

He puts the onus of ending the war on Div 3. As if to say, “If things get violent again, it’ll be on you, not us.”

People keep talking about “gods” “waking up” and “realizing they don’t have to listen to us/them anymore.”

When Clark says it David’s first response is, “Isn’t that the history of the world?” But it’s a red herring (or something else) cause he follows it up with, “People of different nations, different languages, learning to live together?”

Clark is afraid if mutants gain power they won’t show humans mercy or equality. This is a common belief among fascist. The “they’ll treat us like we treat them” argument. Only it’s rarely self-aware, and it isn’t here either. Clark genuinely believes he’s not doing anything wrong. It’s all somehow in “self defense.”

Ah, so Farouk and Syd are connected psychically. He entered her mind whenever she entered David’s. He psychically affects her at multiple points throughout the series.

Syd here is convinced to help The Shadow King by The Shadow King. And while he’s wearing a mask at that. Yeah yeah, this pattern will repeat. But still, Syd gives in relatively quickly here. Perhaps she just... doesn’t fully trust Summerlands capabilities? They are legitimately trying to get rid of Farouk, but Farouk has proven time and time again how dangerous he is. Or maybe the “unmake soup” thing is just that convincing to Syd.

Clark’s still standoffish, but he’s slowly becoming more cooperative.

Syd rolled a 4 on that hero speech. She needed at least a 7.

I legitimately NEVER noticed before that Syd secretly turns on the lab camera feed for Clark to watch. They weren’t trying to show him that.

David gets a chance to look back at his whole life and recontextualize everything.

David straight up halts Farouk’s theme. If Clockworks Podcast is right and he can hear that whenever Farouk shows up, this would be evidence of it. Alternatively, he was halting Farouk, and the music halting was for the audience. A fun subversion of expectations.

David describes him and Farouk as, “The Sun and Moon.”

Division 3 sees it. The monster they saw on infrared. Clearly a separate entity from David Haller. Clearly of a different disposition than David Haller as David Haller has acted very differently and non-hostile compared to when they saw him roaming those HQ halls. The monster and David are not the same. They see who their real enemy is now.

It seems evident there was no chance of David beating Farouk on his own here. I wonder why? Was it true? Is Farouk just too ingrained in his mind? Cary said he was like a, “Computer virus. Learning his systems, bypassing his defenses.” Maybe Syd remembered that, and that’s why she believed Farouk. Cause Cary had already said something similar before.

Clark could've escaped, but he stayed, then tried to help fight Farouk.

I feel really sad Oliver got possessed. It never occurred to me before he could even tell Melanie he remembered her. Melanie’ll just go on thinking he never remembered her for a year.

And thus it’s established. There are “good mutants” and there are “bad mutants.”

No one checks on Ptonomy :(

The Lenny that’s talking to Oliver here is still just Farouk.

Did the orb go back as far as it could? Or was this time specifically chosen? If it was chosen, it was probably because it’s very soon after Farouk had been expelled from David’s head, and before the big race for his body starts.

[asgardian--angels]

Recommend some good folk metal music please

:D i never thought i’d see the day when someone actually wants to know more about the music i listen to *cracks knuckles* my time has come

I apologize in advance for this novel. Feel free to skip to the recommended tracks lol.

Most folk metal comes out of northern Europe (Finland, heavily) though you can find it all over the world (Hu Band comes to mind but I mean, it’s on every continent). I am one of those people with like, a small handful of favorite bands that I listen to mercilessly so I am sure that I am only representing a miniscule percentage of what’s available out there. What’s great is that folk metal is much more versatile than many other genres in its sound; the essence of folk metal is simply to 1) utilize traditional (or rather, in the sense of a metal band, non-traditional) instruments such as violin, accordion, brass ensemble, bagpipes, what have you, and 2) have lyrical themes which revolve around regional folklore, mythology, cultural heritage, or place (what I particularly like is a frequent reverence and respect for nature). Other genres of metal (death, black) have the second element but not the first, and tend to incorporate darker overall tones and consistently harsher or lo-fi vocal styles and sounds. Folk metal can be a gateway genre into metal and can often be quite hopepunk (if you will). Because of these criteria, the actual sound of folk metal can range from sea shanties to ‘spooky walk in the midnight woods’ to scathing social commentary to SHOTS SHOTS SHOTS SHOTS SH

Basically you can find a range of styles within the genre that fit what you’re looking for, from those that have an orchestral, ballad feel, to things that border on death metal but have a hurdy-gurdy in there. There’s also a much higher percentage of female-led folk metal bands than other metal genres.

I’ll go through my top picks.

Turisas. These motherfuckers. My boys.

Turisas is based in Finland, but sing primarily in English (with occasional Finnish, a smidge of Greek and Swedish too). Four albums out to date, fifth in progress. Sound is absolutely fucking bonkers god tier shit, if I may say so myself. Every single song sounds like you’ve been transported into an Iliad metal musical. Heavy use of a full orchestra and choir, along with sick violin and accordion solos. Their lyrical themes focus heavily on ancient Greco-Roman and Viking military history - but before you raise any red flags, rest assured they’re liberal as fuck and trust me the tea is scalding when Mathias feels like making a Point about Then and Now. No seriously, I don’t know how to express the beauty and depth of his songwriting - Mathias Nygård is an incredibly talented composer, musician, and songwriter (nay, POET), and an extremely intelligent and down to earth guy. There are plenty of bands that are happy to write Viking songs about pillaging and glorious death in battle and all that (Alestorm comes to mind), those are a dime a dozen. Turisas makes history come to life in a way that transports you back in time and thrusts you into the living breathing world of the past. They deal with the horrors and tragedy of war from both sides, consequences and motivations, fears and pride and loss, home and family, despair and hope. They write songs about people, big and small, and their role in weaving the great tapestry of history. And the best part is that it’s informed - Mathias does his damn research and the tales he tells are rooted in fact. He brings them to life so we can experience what it must have been like for those real living people, with the goal of forcing us to confront our own selves in them. He’s a modern Homer, I shit you not. 

Did I mention there’s a song about pirates that’s actually really complex and nuanced, about how the hypocrisy and vile colonialist deeds of emperors makes them no different than the criminals they persecute?

Or that they do a badass cover of Rasputin?? yeah?????

Anyway enough gushing. Their second and third albums (The Varangian Way, Stand Up And Fight) are consecutive concept albums that follow the story of the Varangian Guard (the legendary Viking battalion that defended Alexander the Great) so the songs are actually chronologically linked to tell this epic tale. It’s a fucking listen, lads. The Varangian Way is probably my favorite album. But all their albums are top notch. 

My favorite songs: End of An Empire (this one comes for 2020 hard), Piece by Piece (AKA die fascists 2k20), Cursed Be Iron, Among Ancestors, Greek Fire, Miklagard Overture (you gotta earn this song tho, it’s the finale)

Good first listen picks/hits: Battle Metal, To Holmgard and Beyond, March of the Varangian Guard, Ten More Miles, One More

Finntroll. These other motherfuckers. My other boys.

Another big name in the Finnish folk metal scene. As you can see, their band revolves both aesthetically and musically around Scandinavian troll folklore. Yall weird elf-fuckers who like the really big ears? Here you go. Look at those ears. They’re good friends with Turisas. Both love their facepaint.

Musical style leans much more towards black and death metal influenced, with a heavier, fuller sound and growling vocals. But it’s an incredibly rich and creative aural tapestry, with layers of masterfully executed sound that’s a real delight to lose yourself in. Use of fiddle, brass, keyboard, accordion, and banjo, and strong folk melodies make their sound unmistakable and unique. They are known for their ‘black humppa’ beat, which basically gives the effect of feeling the primal need to stomp around loudly to their music. It’s great cardio. They also utilize orchestra in some great intro tracks. They know their stuff.

The majority of their songs are sung in Swedish (they do some English cover songs which are FANTASTIC holy SHIT), but don’t let that stop you. The mood and power and emotion of their music transcend language, and you can be sure the lyrics are about either trolls, witches, the dark woods, spirits, or something of that ilk. I think Swedish as a language works very well with this kind of music, and honestly having it in English would lose something. 

They have been around a long time and so have many albums, but I personally have only listened to the last three which feature their current singer, Mathias Lillmåns, whom I adore. Those albums are Nifelvind, Blodsvept, and their recent release Vredesvävd (that i’ve had on repeat since I got it three weeks ago). I’m sure their other ones are great too, I just can’t make a personal recommendation since I haven’t heard them. 

My favorite songs: Galgasång, Tiden Utan Tid, Ylaren, Skogsdotter, Två Ormar, Ett Norrskensdåd, Skövlarens Död

Good first listen picks/hits: Forsen, Under Bergets Rot, Häxbrygd, Trollhammaren (older song), Solsagan

I’ll go through these other ones a little faster, I haven’t heard quite as much from them but I do love them.

Korpiklaani. 

Great, full folk sound, utilizes a lot of folk instruments including some less commonly seen ones like hurdy gurdy. Songs are mostly in Finnish but plenty in English too. Jonne Järvelä has a really unique voice that grows on you, but it’s not for everyone. The band started as Sami folk, and Jonne is trained in Sami yoik singing, which makes an appearance in a few songs. I prefer the Finnish tracks, as a lot of the English ones are drinking songs lmao. But again, really well-executed music with layers of sound that keeps you hooked. I haven’t heard enough of their discography to really recommend enough to cover everything. 

Song picks: Minä Näin Vedessä Neidon, Metsälle, Ämmänhauta, Lempo

Moonsorrow.

Definitely a darker, black-folk band. Probably not a great pick if you aren’t accustomed to black metal - very long tracks (8-15 mins is standard), growling/shrieking vocals, a ‘thinner’ but encompassing wall of sound usual of black metal, but with the benefit of wonderfully entrancing dark folk elements and chants. It’s done really really well. Sung almost entirely in Finnish (apart from cover tracks). Lyrically, focuses on themes of Norse mythology, man vs nature and similar elements. Definitely one of those bands whose music gets you into a zone. I can lose serious time just putting a whole album on and letting my mind wander elsewhere. My favorite album is Jumalten Aika. 

Song picks: Ruttolehto Sis. Päivättömän Päivän Kansa (my fucking FAVORITE), Suden Tunti (well known hit), and also uhh check out their cover of Non Serviam cause it’s a fucking banger

Other bands that I like what I’ve heard but really can’t say much about them, whoops - Tyr (from the Faroe Islands, great stuff, Faroese is a baller language), Ensiferum, Nightwish (female-led).... I’m open to suggestions. Like I said, there are folk metal bands all over the world, and each is intrinsically linked to a sense of place and cultural identity that makes them unique. I’d love to hear about more tbh. 

[selfships-in-spanish]

A lengthy response to big accusations that were made of me

Hello everyone.

I’ve been forwarded screenshots of a certain person calling me out publicly after receiving an ask asking specifically about me. And well, the another one with a more meaner message, from them both. So much for no anon hate huh. But since this person (and I won’t mention names) has me blocked, I am literally unable to even defend myself from their accusations. And they made heavy ones with words that shouldn’t be used this lightly.

I decided to make a lengthy response with my own “version” of the events, so before judging me you can also have more info about this issue, about “the other side”. They may not want to stir the pot or create drama, but they did when they decided to say they hold the absolute truth to this and to reconsider if you should follow me without giving me a chance to explain my own side of the argument.

Well, that and openly insulting me. Welp.

I will attach the few screenshots I was able to gather to prove my points. The pictures attached will have a number so you can know what it references. Sadly I do not have more, but I hope those will suffice.

To be honest, this only shows me how they never actually cared about how I felt, even when we were friends. It’s easier to pin everything that went wrong in a friendship to the other side than to listen and recognise what you didn’t do well.

After our argument, I never posted anything related to them, insulting them or nothing of the sort. No tweets, no tumblr posts, nothing. This was something between us two, so I just let the issue die since I didn’t want anyone getting even more hurt because of two adults were unable to fix at the moment. I must admit I thought about contacting them, because I do recognise I worded my thoughts very wrong and I was hurtful and spiteful. I am not proud of that and of what I did and I am sorry for it. I was in a bad place and I directed my anger to them, took it out towards someone, and that is something one must never do. I am deeply sorry for that and I am working on correcting it because I don’t want that to happen ever again.

I recognise the wrong I did. But, as I said, I’m blocked everywhere, so I am unable to contact this person to even say this or talk it out like two civilized humans. I guess it’s better to make a public post and point fingers at me.

But, I’ve been accused of racism, of lying, of misleading and making them give me money, of grooming and corrupting minors, of ostracising people, creating servers, making myself pass as a woc… and I’ve never been more shocked to read all that with my own eyes than I am right now. Because all those accusations, what they say, the intention, is to cut any wings me or my art may have on this site. Art is my livelihood, and by throwing such heavy implications mean losing people, and we all know what that means when you are creative. Cancel culture doesn’t leave room for one to defend themselves, it’s easier to attack, to “consider who you give your support to.” Did I ever go after their head like this? I didn’t, because I am not that kind of person.

Right now I’ve been painted as some heartless monster. When I first started talking out with them, I was intimidated for sure; they were way more popular, got along with the “cool fandom cats” and I was (and still am) a nobody enjoying her little corner with her OC and bazillion AUs people enjoy. I knew they were very vocal with social issues and I was honestly glad that there were people being loud enough for others to hear, but when that was their whole life, that EVERYTHING had to do with social justice, every second spent with them was that same issue, it drained me down. My life was a mess, I was a mess, I was struggling with so many stuff that in that moment I didn’t need a person constantly telling me I was the fucking worst and a demon for almost anything I did or said. I couldn’t speak, my reasonings didn’t hold any importance because I was a white girl. I understood, even if it seems they do not think so, I understood why they were doing it, where they come from, but some days when you are struggling to even keep yourself alive, it was all too much. Being accused of being a racist is A Big accusation and something that shouldn’t be thrown to somebody’s face this lightly.

I do understand that I come from the privilege of being born with white skin. We are in a society, culture and education system that reinforces the racist behaviour, but it is also something us all are fighting against. We are not okay with racism, we want racism to end and that starts with acknowledging your own privileged ass. And I do, my boyfriend got stopped more than once in airports because he has tan skin and brown hair, easily mistaken for someone from middle east in the eyes of an ignorant. I do know it, but making me a monster doesn’t help it. Being constantly told that you are white scum (actual words if I recall correctly), aggressive tweets telling that all white people are vile and shouldn't be allowed anything, doesn’t help (1). I know what it sounds like, but becoming what you are fighting against only makes you become a bully yourself. I will always try to use my privilege to give poc a voice for them to speak and make their issues known. I’m still learning, I’m still unlearning what our society and culture has grinded down on us, but I’m making the effort to not be a white racist cunt like society expects me to.

I come from people who have been oppressed. Spain has a history of oppressing anyone on their path (colonialism, anyone?), and my people were part of it. We still cry for our freedom, and my grandfather and parents can vividly remember and tell you of how the Facist Spanish government would come in the night, take people and execute them to god knows where, because we still don’t know where our dead are. Until recently, Spain still had the fascist dictator in a mausoleum where people could come to pay homage to! Our culture, our language… everything was prohibited and on the verge of being wiped out from earth. So yes, I understood what struggles can other cultures and people face. Not the wholeness of it, because of course there are differences, but I can understand to a certain degree.

Does this mean I hate ALL spaniards because some do hate us catalans for who we are and where we come from? Absolutely not. So how could they say that because of me they hate all white women? Why do you make me the sole cause of your internalised problems? What about your white friends? You hate them too? Learn. Grow. 

So, when they accuse me of lying about being woc, of not correcting them and misleading them when they thought Spain was full of poc people, when I explicitly said in more than one occasion, that I am NOT a woc, I am a spanish white girl and that Spain is in Europe, I was truly shocked to read that with my own eyes. If your educational system failed so bad on you, don’t accuse me of it. We all have google and we all can look where X country is placed. So I’m genuinely baffled that someone is pointing fingers at me for not correcting them and making themselves the victim when I did correct them. If they listened or not, is another matter. If they assumed something and expected me to know they assumed it… how would I even know?

I have never created a discord server in my whole life. I joined one (we all got those never-ending lists of discord servers you joined), but never created it. If people created one aside the previous discord where me and the person were in, that must be for some reason. Or not at all! Maybe some people get along better and decide to have their own chat so they don’t clog or make the other server members feel bad or weird. But, putting me as the whole “ringleader” of this all? Do you seriously think I got that kind of power over people? I’m a fucking nobody! I made some friends, true, but never ever encouraged them to do anything or obligated them to follow me. On the contrary, I joined other people. I never did anything of the sort! I got other friends besides this person, many other internet friends where we share discords, but I never created or instigated anything. In fact, I’m quite the opposite, I always lurk in the shadows minding my own damn business and not raining on anyone’s parade.

And linking on the whole discord servers, corruption of minors and grooming. How sick do you have to be to accuse me of that? Are you even conscious of what an accusation you are making? Understand what an uncomfortable position you are putting me in, of having to defend myself from those accusations, whether the claim is true or not. It’s a very heavy one to make and forces the accused party to go defensive, like it or not. You publicly said I’m a groomer as someone says it’s a sunny day. Just, what the hell is wrong with you? 

Who is that minor? Where is that NSFW art you claim? Because I do not recall any NSFW art being gifted at me from a frigging’ minor. The only person I’m thinking about never, ever, drew NSFW. Ever.  And the only person who did draw a NSFW picture of Ona and Connor, was a friend who was an adult. Also, when will you stop putting words in my mouth I didn’t say? Is it just to justify your anger towards me and keep painting myself as the heartless cunt and you the poor victim?

We never forced any NSFW content on those minors the person says, and the person who accuses me of this, even created a 18+ channel where all minors were excluded. But before that? That discord didn’t have one and spilled the NSFW on the general chat. Even the accuser spilled NSFW on a channel where a minor was present, but god forbid! I am the corrupting one! We only talked NSFW stuff in there dedicated 18+ channel and I don’t recall actively participating in it. 

And, if we all recall it also, because I’m sure all of us who were in the discord do, there were mods there to prevent and do what their name says, moderate a chat. But instead of that, when one of us who talked about something NSFW in the general chat, the mod came over and said something along the lines of “i’m in public i don’t want to see nsfw when i enter the gen chat”. Then left.

1) It’s on the mod to keep NSFW things in the NSFW chat, and if they feel they need to enforce the rule with an iron fist, they do it. Instead said mod just moaned about it and did absolutely nothing. The affected parties apologised and made a conscious effort to keep the NSFW in its rightful place. Sometimes you may get carried away in a conversation and realise too late it was in the wrong place. It happens, you apologise and transfer the comments or continue the conversation in the right channel, deleting the old comments.

2) Said mod is unable to handle stressful situations, and when there’s a feud between users in the discord server, the mod decides to leave the discord for days, leaving the issue unattended.

Everyone has their right to self-care, but being a mod means you have to deal with such situations. If you are not fit, say so and there will be someone else to do it. No worries. But don’t come to complain about certain people behind their backs and face the issues.

Why am I the sole target of this, when in this case we were all to blame? Including the person who is targeting me in their call-out post, even more when they also talked about NSFW in the general chat, but the mod did not complain about it. Guess why? Because they were best friends. Which is another point to this all. The blatant favouritism in the discord chat.

As I said more than once already, it is totally okay to get along better with other people, it is natural and not something to fret over, but when your “getting along” means disregarding some people and only blindly listening and waiting for said people to follow your every whim? How they are able to hide their heads under their wings instead of facing the issues, even more when people are getting hurt by it? I’m not speaking for myself this time, but for people who was in there and left the server. It was there, they knew the favouritism over some people, and chose to ignore the damage they were doing by tearing the discord apart in two sections.

But, don’t you realise, person who is accusing me, what you just accused me of? The implications in it? For heaven’s sake, I even told this person about how my ex best friend was fucking a goddamn minor and I told her to rethink her whole fucking life. I was disgusted by it, talked several times with her to discourage her from doing that and even seek help, but instead she crossed me out from her life and demonised me. I am fucking disgusted. So, someone accusing me of such things, even knowing part of my past and life…?

How fucking dare you?

Also, how fucking dare you LIE about giving me a website? Paying for it? This person never did. I was planning on it on my own, when I got a job where I could pay for one, but they never once in their life bought me a website. They offered it? Surely, but I never told them to yes, pay for it right now. I always feel so fucking bad when people buy me stuff or give me money, and I never wanted them to do so under any obligation. And they never did, never explicitly told them so. A website was an objective I had as an artist, an illustrator, and I voiced such objectives with them as you would talk about your ambitions to a friend. But I guess I was wrong and they took it as ammunition to throw shade at me. But they did not buy it and I did not explicitly ask her to buy me one. Period.

And keeping on the money topic, they did donate money on my kofi, I think it was 9$ or 10$? I can’t remember right now, but you can look at the message if you’d like. But how sick and wicked do you have to be to emotionally BLACKMAIL people because you were such a saint and donated to someone who didn’t have a job at the time and was struggling in paying anything? How can you boast about how you donated money to someone who was in need of it, and then expect “I’m a good person points” for it? You donate to someone or something because you believe in them or the cause, because you genuinely want to help someone, but not to use it later to make the person you donated to feel bad after an argument. That is something seriously shitty to do. If I’ve donated money, I don’t expect eternal gratitude or the person I gave money to swear their loyalty to me. They are not in my debt. I gave them my money because I wanted to. I wasn’t expecting anything in return.

They talk about ostracising them, but in fact, it’s quite the other way. They created their own clique, which okay, it is fine, as I said earlier, everyone gets along better with some other people and that is fine. But when it gets to the point where the only important voices, the only ones that matter, are the ones in your own clique, and that any other voice who disagrees gets thrown under a bus? They said they supported everyone in the discord chat, but truth be told, they only supported what interested them. 

They talk about the Notre Dame cathedral burning (2). I will speak for myself, but I was angry that they celebrated the burning of an artistic reference of a certain architectural style, a true exponent of it. I was angry because art was burning, and I was as angry and deeply saddened when the National Brazilian Museum burned too, because countless of art and knowledge of civilizations that were long gone were burned, to never be known again. You cannot celebrate the burning of art and culture, no matter where it comes from, and even less when you got a friend who is also deeply rooted to France itself. No “oopsie daises” will fix the fact that you said you were happy the cathedral burned down in front of a french person who was mourning the loss of a symbol of his culture.

But, as soon as those of us who got offended voiced those feelings, their excuse was that “it was just a joke”, which they also like to exclaim is an abuser and bigot tactic. How can you joke about that? Even more knowing that you got Europeans and even French people in your discord? How little do you regard your supposed friends feelings?

For example: someone says something racist, then people get mad. Then the person who said the racist thing defends themselves by saying it was just a joke.

Perplexing, right?

I just got one question for you. Did you ever think about how me, about how we all felt, when we also told you multiple times we weren’t liking where you were going? When we tried to talk to you about such issues, and you just lectured people instead of listening, trying to cover your ass? How many times we tried to fix everything up? Because we all make mistakes, we all think we have the absolute truth, but sometimes we don’t and it takes a great deal of willpower to apologise for those. It wasn’t that hard to get off the high horse and listen. If your white friends are hurt by you, stop and think as to why, instead of saying “good”. They are supposedly your friends, not your enemies. I told you you were becoming what you fought against for.

I was aggressive, I was angry, I was rude. And I do want to apologise to you for handling my feelings wrong. But you never gave me a chance, even less listen to a white spanish girl who you thought was a poc because you assumed things when I said in more than one occasion that I was European and Spanish and white. You jumped to the train when you saw a non-pasty white OC in the community. You yourself told me you were happy and gleeful to see my OC, which made me happy that it brought you joy. And now? Were those all lies? You lied to me for what purpose? What did you gain in getting close to me, as far as you saying two peas in a pod, to now disregard all that, thrash talk about my art, my OC whom you LOVED and praised, just because you’re hurt and angry at me and never, ever, dared to come after me in private, even if it was to yell at me? Never took my own feelings in mind because I was a white girl and thus I do not deserve empathy at all? And after a goddamn year?

But I guess it’s easier to paint me as a monster in public than try to talk things out, knowing where you could find me. Also it’s easier to accuse people of your problems than seeking out help to solve them. I admit I was immature in my execution of wording out my feelings, but that does not invalidate me or discredit me or the reasons pointed out. And it also doesn’t give you enough reason to call me a cunt publicly, besides more insults and truly hurtful things to my integrity and self. I thought better of you, but I guess you disappointed me on that, too.

Any of you who read this, first of all THANK YOU for sticking for so long. Feel free to do as you please. I only felt I had to at least try to defend myself from such hard and hurtful accusations, even more when I have no room to do so besides writing this out and hope it reaches their hands, in case anyone who wonders what is going on has another pieze of this puzzle. This is a direct attack to me, saying my name and also encouraging people to reconsider if they should be following me, telling my followers what they should do. What are you afraid of, accuser? I never once in my life told people to stop following them because of what little feud we might have. It was between them and me, and they didn’t care to solve it either, letting themselves fester in their hurt feelings instead of talking to me about them or moving on as I did.

Thank you for reading so far, and also thank you for the support you have all given me after all this time. It truly means so much to me that you decided to stick out here with me. From the bottom of my heart, thank you. 

Have a good day.

SCREENSHOTS:

(1)

(2)

[antis-delete-your-blogs-pls-thx]

I posted my previous reply to the wrong blog, and then found I was blocked on this one, so uh. Shit. Here’s the reply.

“however, because huge swaths of fandom (ugh) fail to actually underpin their opinions with any concrete understanding of… anything, really, but especially the mechanisms that drive systemic oppression, you get people mobilizing the ideals of “freedom” and the language of “social justice” in order to completely erase the fact that, yeah, there absolutely are huge piles of fics that in an ideal world should be burned to the ground.”

Mmmm, no. You don’t get to say that and then act like you’ve got a solid foundation to your points. I mean, not that I’m going to be particularly keen on thinking an argument is in good faith when you can’t even say fandom without air quotes. Yes, it’s called fandom. I’m sorry? I thought cringe culture was dead.

You should never, never advocate for the burning of fiction. I’m sure you’re joking, or at the very least I hope you are, but an ideal world does not burn books. Unless you’re comfortable living in an ideal world that shares methodology with fascist dictatorships, because book burning -- metaphorical or otherwise -- is the first step in running one. Or haven’t you been noticing the influx of Chinese users to AO3? It’s the only place that’s not burning them in their country.

There is no unchecked swath of illegal fanfic on AO3. The OTW has its very own legal team. Of fully licensed, not black market, professionally educated lawyers. Under U.S. jurisdiction (AO3 is subject to this jurisdiction), everything within the guidelines and terms of use on the site is absolutely, 100% legal. That doesn’t mean people will never post illegal content there, but people post illegal content on Facebook, and Tumblr, and Twitter, and every internet hive of scum and villainy available. Even the most vile, disgusting, sickening fanfiction published is 100% legal. Because we all have the legal right to write whatever fictional scenario we please. And I’m sure I’ll get called Enlightened Centrist for bringing up the freeze peach, but in a purely legal context, this is all protected under the very first amendment to the U.S. constitution.

If we move to talk about terms of purely social responsibility, that’s a different and more nuanced conversation. But let the legal conversation be made very clear. Fanfiction is not illegal. If Lolita is on your library shelves, Karen’s Kuroshitsuji shota fic on an internet archive somewhere that doesn’t market itself as an accessible location for toddlers to the eldery is hardly a breach of legality. Or morality, in fact. Which brings us to...

Is said Kuroshitsuji shota fic written by Karen McBasic perpetuating pedophile apologist rhetoric? Not more than Steven Universe is perpetuating facist apologist rhetoric. Not more than Stephen King is personally responsible for any murder or rape inspired by his works. Or more than JD Salinger is a serial murder apologist for having written Catcher in the Rye, a book which inspired multiple murders (despite not even depicting murder, which really does prove that anything can inspire anything else in a sick enough mind). And I’m not saying every single work depicting underage sex was written by purely innocent-intentioned, pedophile-hating saints, because of course creeps and actual pedophiles have sat down and written stories with the intention of normalising it for themselves. But people with dangerous impulses have been rationalising their feelings since the dawn of dangerous impulses. And people. So coming after fanfiction, which yes, punch me if you will (despite me being a queer survivor of an abusive relationship, hardly the creepy straight white middle-aged woman-demon fandom elder of nightmares), is a primarily queer space, is hardly going to stop the abuse and exploitation of children. And it’s hardly going to stop the abuse and exploitation of children in fandom, either. Because fandom exists beyond AO3. And fandom exists beyond Tumblr. And fandom has existed since fictional stories have been spread in human culture, which is approximately since humans began to communicate. And fandom is just one tool in a toolbox that consists of everything that exists in tangible reality for abusers to use in manipulating and hurting their victims. All it’s going to do is promote censorship in one of the only open, previously-welcoming spaces for queer people and other marginalised groups -- including the survivors who are trying to work through their trauma using fiction. Especially including the CSA and other abuse (hi!!! I’m right fucking here!!!) survivors who do not want you punching people on their behalf, because they use this very medium as a way of healing.

You should certainly say fiction has an impact on reality, because it does. And you should absolutely say writing harmful tropes in fiction is not a move primed to stop the reinforcement and validation of societal biases, because it isn’t. But you cannot start holding people accountable for the actions of abusers unless they are, in fact, that very abuser themselves. You can argue for the basic human decency of being aware of the content you produce and its impact, but I’m afraid making that argument in fandom spaces is rather like telling an English teacher to be aware of grammar mistakes. We know. Why do you think we have meta? Or content tags? Because your local library doesn’t have trigger warnings, extensive tagging or blacklisting systems, or multiple warning pages you must manually disable telling you what work has adult content. It has a separate section for each genre, that any impressionable child (a demographic which is encouraged to come to libraries everywhere!!!!) is free to wander through and grab whatever copy of Flowers in the Attic happens to be in sight. Content warnings are optional in libraries. Content warnings are not optional on AO3.

[dukeofriven]

Oh no I am apparently in the same company as a bunch of die-hard fundamentalists, racists, die-hard atheists, and MRAs because I turned Good Omens off after five minutes too.

I feel like Arlo Guthrie on the Group W bench. [“Why y’ here, kid?” leers the guy who murdered his entire family with a Thermomix because they used pink napkins at his 30th birthday party. I can see a swastika tattooed on his right bicep and an inked Paula Deen gazing beatifically - or perhaps lustily - from out between his chest hairs. His tank-top reads “Bazingooka 8=====D ♂ ♂ ♂” and bears an incredibly homoerotic photo of Eren Yeager dry-humping a gun-toting Punisher’s M61 Vulcan. The heavy gold cross that droops almost to his belly button swings in front of my eyes like a pendulum. I can see every lovingly-carved rivulet of blood and twitching muscle on the Messiah’s tortured frame, while Christ’s expression is that of man facing-down his second hour locked in an aeroplane’s sole bathroom regretting every bite of last night’s Seven Steak Layer Magminfernosane Cockgrind Gordito Supremacy® at Taco Bell®. His breath smells like his body and his body his breath, a stomach-churning mélange of Axe Body spray, old sweat, beef grease, ketchup, and peppermint vape. His buddy next to him (I have never before seen a Mormon with mensur scars) stares at me with a hunger in his eyes, a burning need to either lecture me for three hours on my chosen field or else remove all the flesh from my body and wear it as a bath robe - perhaps both. “I sed,” repeats the man, his bulbous tongue a grotesque extrusion of salvia and gristle sloshing about his cavernous mouth like a toddler in a dystopian bouncy castle, “why y’ here, kid?” “Cause... cause... cause Good Omens was badly directed” I mumble, managing a feat once though impossible by whispering and squeaking at the same time. “And I couldn’t bear hearing the text of one of my favourite books mangled so terribly by a great actress who deserved better treatment from her director.” “What did he say?” asks the scarred Mormon. His voice sounds like Wally Gator crossed with Huckleberry Hound. I say nothing of this.

“Kid said they mangled a book,” growls the Nazi man. “Well don’t I know it, Dale. There ain’t nothing in the Bible ‘bout treatin’ people with kindness. That’s what I told everyone on the bus this morning before they done kicked me off after I leaned in close to that jezebel’s ear so she could hear me best.” “Don’t know bout that shit. You know I don’t hold with readen Bibles” “Gots to read your Bible, Dale. If you don’t read it how you gonna to know who around you is a sinner? Can’t rip out the eyes and shake all the sin out their faces if you don’t know who it is all full of sin.” “There ain’t no God, Kevin - you’d know that if you was as smart as me and ever watched my youtubed channel The Cock Zone - but if there was a God he sure as shit wouldn’t be no b[eautiful woman]. If God were some c[ool actress who was amazing in Fargo] men would all be born knowing how to cook and clean and [do other jobs often devalued by society but which form the backbone of emotional labour performed thanklessly by women throughout history, many of whom were of significantly lower economic status or racial caste from those whose lives they were expected to maintain]. “Dale while Jesus would agree with you I know he’d be disappointed by your language. You should be more like this kid here, whose so polite about how angry he is that this book is so unfair to Christians.” “That’s not-”

“Putting a bunch of [ethnically non-white people] in Eden isn’t what my dad died for in World War Nam. Women Gods and Brown Adams - buncha SJW cucks all thinking that they’ve got a right to make television just ‘cause... just cause... just cause... ”

“Just ‘cause Hillary Hussein Clinton ran for president”

“I really don’t - wait, what?”

“Shit yeah.  This kid here knows that. He knows we need a real man on the TV playing God-” “Like Tim Allen!” “Yeah like Tim Allen as God with a proper white Adam and no chick acting like she-” “OH FOR FUCK’S SAKE YOU FESTERING RACIST WOMEN-HATING NAZI GOBSHITES ALL THAT STUFF IS GREAT! IT’S GROUNDBREAKING! BLACK ADAM? FUCK YES. GAY ANGELS? FUCK YES. A FEMALE GOD? FU... well... well to be strictly fair It's A Very Merry Muppet Christmas Movie did it first with Whoopi Goldberg and while that’s not a great film IT WAS A GREAT IDEA THEN AND IT’S A GREAT IDEA NOW! I AM A PROUD SOCIAL JUSTICE WARRIOR AND I WILL FIGHT YOUR REACTIONARY FASCIST TOXINS WITH MY LAST BREATH YOU NAZI SCUM! BUT PROSE HAS RHYTHM! PROSE HAS EUPHONY AND PROSODY! PROSE DESERVES TO BE READ WITH CARE AND ATTENTION AND GOOD OMENS DID NONE OF THAT. THE TEXT WAS READ SO QUICKLY, SO POORLY, AND WITH SO LITTLE EMOTION THAT I HAD TO BACK UP JUST TO UNDERSTAND WHAT WAS BEING SAID! THE GREAT PUNCHLINES - “BY ALMOST A QUARTER OF AN HOUR” AND “THE EARTH IS A LIBRA” - ARE COMPLETELY LOST BECAUSE THEY’RE GIVEN SO LITTLE ROOM TO BREATHE, THE TEXT PLOWED THROUGH LIKE MCDORMAND HAD A TRAIN TO CATCH AND ONLY HAD HALF AN HOUR TO RECORD THE ENTIRE SERIES! GO LISTEN TO THE AUDIOBOOK WITH MARTIN JARVIS AND SEE HOW THE NARRATIVE TEXT IS GIVEN THE SAME EMOTIONAL CONSIDERATIONS AS THE DIALOGUE.

THE DIRECTION IS BAD. EVERYTHING ABOUT IT - DICTION, CLARITY, PACING, TONE, THAT JARRING AND DISCORDANT VISUAL NIGHTMARE THAT ACCOMPANIES IT - IS HORRID. IT’S FUCKING TERRIBLE. IA AM SICK OF A WORLD THAT DOESN’T GIVE DUE CARE TO THE POWER OF THE WRITTEN WORD!” And they all moved away from me on the bench.]

[floggingink]

Riverdale, “Chapter Thirty-Eight: As Above, So Below”

Day At Least Seven Solitary Coif: struggling

Alice’s thigh: stunning

Sexy, aesthetic Southside: FP’s jellybean tattoo: incredibly, tenderly sad

Certified pedigree: “I’m glad the Farm opened you up to the possibility of us”: either Alice thought about this to herself, or she (absolutely) asked the rest of her cult what they thought. what they THOUGHT about her sleeping with FP again. “What d’you think, girls?” Alice wine clubbed FP Jones’s dick!

who has more game, FP or Jughead? FP a) is a grown man, b) is oftentimes gainfully employed (I’ve forgotten if he’s employed right now), c) is strong enough to carry a high school boy out of the woods, d) was VERY smooth with his seemingly instinctual “Then don’t. Tell him,” e) did that thing where he took the gum out of his mouth when Alice came to his trailer, and f) looked pretty good in his crisp Pop’s uniform when he was employed at Pop’s. however FP also a) tends to drink when not employed and b) is fucking obsessed with Toledo, a town I will burn to the ground if I ever set foot in it. meanwhile, Jughead a) climbed up a fucking ladder to Betty’s bedroom, b) ABSOLUTELY KILLED IT when he and Betty almost fucked each other in the kitchen, c) KILLED IT AND BURIED IT in the moments before fucking her on the couch when he was all, “Or you could stay,” and fucking touched her dress like she was an angel of the Lord and he was just a humble shepherd boy whose eyes were not worthy to gaze upon her countenance, d) only strategically removes his hat, and e) rides a motorcycle. the hat is not a con, necessarily, and being a writer in high school is a cross some of us simply have to bear, but he is like, kind of a pain sometimes and a little squirrelly, but w/r/t the love of his life, he has tailored himself to her every need almost perfectly

OH AND I FORGOT WHEN HE KISSED HER SCABBY BLOOD KNUCKLES! OH SHIT!

Veronica has the most game on the entire show

I like when they have Jughead use words like “modicum”

“Ben’s death haunts me, Jug. He didn’t scream. Why not, I wonder?”: writing credits this episode go to Daphne de Maurier

YYEEEAAAAAHHH THE BLUE & GOLD CRIME BOARD BABY

I would almost expect something more from the warden’s tie, except that I know plain clothing is, in and of itself, a warning sign

anything that gets Veronica in her reading glasses is okay by me, and this includes Pop’s hemorrhaging money

Jughead can wear just a T-shirt sans jacket or flannel any old time he wants, I’m just putting that vibe out there

“Of course we’re calling it a speakeasy.”

Jug’s suspender game is strong, so really Betty should know she has nothing to worry about

his stupid dumb round face looking at her when she pulls him aside is pretty. remember when he kissed her hands? fucking Jughead sometimes, dude

“Evelyn...creeps me out.”

I like Betty’s overalls and Evelyn’s romper thing

what I expected when Kevin dialed the phone was for the whole booth to sink into the basement like a surprise elevator

Kander and Ebb wrote the music to, among much else, Cabaret and Chicago, those being some of their most gay

I LOVE VERONICA’S WHITE SHIRT. IT’S JUST A FUCKING PLAIN WHITE SHIRT, SHE IS SO BEAUTIFUL

Every triangle has three corners, every triangle has three sides: is there some heat between Veronica and Reggie? am I crazy?

the foursome of Reg, Ronnie, Josie, and Kev is basically just as strong as the cour four strictly in terms of hair

I don’t know that I like Penny’s sleeveless Ghoulies vest more than her leather Serpents jacket but I do know I like it at least the same amount (oodles)

Fwoopy hair is the best hair: Day One Lifted Bag Off Head Hair: GREAT

OH MY GOD, JOAQUIN!!!! WHEN WILL JOAQUIN REST. DOES EVERY TERRIBLE THING HAVE TO HAPPEN TO JOAQUIN BEFORE IT HAPPENS TO SOMEONE ELSE. IS JOAQUIN IN THE FARM

does Archie have a scar on his head? is it KJ’s? have I lost track of something?

Gay?!: BABY TEETH is an absolute twink and he was tapped to save his life

I’m suspicious of Peter because his name is, simply, “Peter”

Gay.: Cheryl and Toni are just like lounging in a single chair together and that’s the bisexual agenda

Veronica was rich: Veronica’s heavy card stock IS very nice

Ethel’s cute yellow cardigan is back, which matches her thermos and lunchbox

I enjoyed when Betty sits down and you think she’s going to apologize for being there at Ben’s death but instead she just fucking grills Ethel some more

“...G&G.”

OOOOOOHHHHHHH JUGHEAD’S TURNING IT ON WITH THAT PRINCESS SHIT

Please protect Betty: Betty’s entire expression at being told she’s “not worthy,” God bless her

The female gaze: I don’t know why Reggie’s shirt is off. probably Reggie doesn’t even know

Reggie’s panicked JJ face is one of the top five panicked faces of all time. he’s tied at least with the girl in Jurassic Park when she sees the raptor shadow and her hand holding that green Jell-O starts shaking

Minetta doesn’t even pretend he’s looking for something other than whatever was in those boxes. cold, Minetta

REGGIE’S SALUTE

Reg simply being aware that Minetta and the Ghoulies work for Hiram almost brings me to tears. not only is he a walking sculpture with a pair of lips that would make Sarah Steller throw herself off the Hoover Dam, but he is also a genius

VERONICA IS SO BEAUTIFUL. “Not until I’m properly armed.” just look at her!

Ethel didn’t even come to the first meeting of the Farm Club? cold, Ethel

Evelyn offering Betty a pizza slice comes off as her genuinely wanting Betty to have a piece of pizza if she wants, which is the first non-creepy thing she’s done (Jughead would take the pizza)

she of course follows this up with “that darn medication”

Archie looks like a corpse in the blue light

tell me “wakey, wakey” is a Kill Bill reference. TELL ME IT IS

the guy they have fighting Archie looks just enough like Khabib Nurmagomedov that I was like, is this an unconscious wish on someone’s part to do a rematch of red-haired McGregor vs. Khabib except it’s on Riverdale so it’s in something called “the Pit” which is a drained swimming pool and they’re in juvie? (it’d have to be a fantasy in that Conor McGregor would get his ass beaten by Khabib Nurmagomedov in any rematch in any universe, in the universe)

dude does his best but, as Sweet Pea and Vintage Reggie can tell you, you cannot let Archie land a) a right hook or b) an uppercut or he will end this fight

who’re the rando white women watching? their fucking wives? goddammit, white women

I think Baby Teeth could take Reggie jawline-to-jawline

Veronica’s kittenish heels sinking into the dirt as opposed to her striding effortlessly as Moses parting the Red Sea

Cheryl’s a chaos angel from hell: “THAT VIPER BITCH”

Antoinette Topaz is fluent in many languages, including Veronica’s

God bless jingle-jangle: the fucking cat burglar sequence set to “Jingle Jangle” just about fucking did it

Ethel’s candle game is reaching midnight mass-levels of mastery

so did Betty and Jughead get their ad hoc sex den (good band name) out of the bunker before Ethel got there? or was it there the whole time but for Ben and Ethel?

I feel I want to write down that Ben abandoned Ethel to ascend prematurely with Dilton otherwise I’ll forget and will be tricked by something later on

POLLY’S KNITTED HALTER

closed captioning capitalized the Shady Man, the second strangest Riverdale skull

Alice really just did Betty like that! maybe Betty DOES need to live in a bunker

50 Shades of Betty: “The wig. The webcaming.”

I love how Betty always gets very sarcastically OH, OKAY THEN when she decides to start laying out some truths

Alice stands up and her dress has some sort of insane asymmetrical hemline and she’s also got an ankle bracelet!!!!!!

Dilton Doiley Ethel Muggs is a canonically great dancer the DM: Ethel’s little crush on Jughead circa his birthday party has not abated. even when he was being insane about the Serpents I bet she entertained sweet fantasies of buying a pleather jacket off ModCloth and Jughead “inducting” her. so she found herself a coterie of pliable boys who were also gangly and weird and obsessed with details and pacts and she became their princess. so THERE. you fucking bet she’s gonna get a kiss out of Jughead before she fucking poisons herself

Ethel’s dungeon master voice is giving me a sort of ASMR vibe

I don’t want to veer too wildly but she is wearing a crown, her character has “a crown”

dog, was she about to kill Jughead right then and there? Ethel goes hard. Ethel might go harder than Jughead

“You’re asking me to play Russian roulette!” “I’m asking you to play Gryphons and Gargoyles.” THIS BITCH (in context it’s very smooth and bitchy)

GOD BUT JUGHEAD DID DRINK IT. VERY WELL KNOWINGLY, HE DID IT

Jughead eats: Salud is just the sort of thing I’d expect Jug to say before maybe drinking cyanide (or skol, if he had been watching Ingmar Bergman)

I don’t know if I could drink that much Kool-Aid that fast. Kool-Aid and Sunny D always made my teeth feel filmy. I could definitely down that much Capri Sun, if it were in a pouch the size of my shin

anyway Ethel’s sick move telling Jughead he has to kiss her first got an emotional reaction from me at almost the level of when Cheryl came down to Jason’s wake in that white dress

Jughead and Ethel are almost of a height, which is weirdly lovely

These students are legally children: maybe Ethel put the poison in after Jughead had chosen. I maybe doubt she would’ve just fucking assassinated Jughead

Jughead was reading next to her when she woke up, which is just a specific kind of daydream you have, sometimes

Sixth period is Intro to Film: HEISENBURG

Toni’s pictures are certainly shot with a mind to lighting, depth

is blue light the light of evil? Hiram’s study, the warden’s office?

Archie > Dawson: of course Archie imagines talking to his father and of course he imagines his father telling him to “take one.” I love Self-Sacrificial Lamb Archie (or just momentarily self-sacrificing). better than Fascist Archie!

well, Betty’s room has blue light too. fucking forget it then

although she is SURROUNDED BY EVIL at all times

Mädchen Amick, MÄDCHEN AMICK: “I trust them more than I trust you” is season one-level Alice-shade

Cheryl’s sheaths: I like very much Cheryl’s bosomy sequin thing and Toni’s back jewelry

I also like the RROTC boys in their like WWII uniforms, which may be anachronistic but still hard vintage, and the cigar girls

Jughead doubts it: there’s so much going on when Betty goes all melty and wipes some of the Fresh-Aid off Jug’s lips and Jug, who is not smiling, looks at Sweet Pea helping Veronica

Best costume bit: Veronica is in magenta, because I deserve it

I can’t wholly endorse Reggie’s non-black plaid trousers paired with a solid black blazer but I CAN endorse Reggie as a whole

Cheryl’s Hiram’s pins: I think Hiram has a fucking octopus pin! I think it is!!!!!!!!

the wallpaper behind Hiram downstairs is...interesting. it’s like a cutout from that Disney cartoon for “Winter Wonderland”

we stay on Veronica’s face for sort of an extra beat, so I can confirm a) she’s still beautiful and b) she has a sparkly thing in her hair

The 2001 Josie and the Pussycats movie was a masterpiece: Josie’s got that thing going on where you gem up the part in your hair

God I love a good Riverdale music/mayhem montage. like what were they playing when Jughead ran the gauntlet? fuck sometimes this stuff is just still so good (“Mess Around” when Reggie lunged for Jughead also counts, though not performed live somewhere else in Riverdale at the same moment)

“Anything Goes” is in fact not Kander and Ebb but Cole Porter

I’ve seen Brick like thirty times: I love a good bead of bloody spit dangling from someone’s mouth during a slow-mo fight sequence

I’m writing a scene where it’s gay.: “THAT KID…..IS A STAR.”

that fucking rum, can you believe it? the fucking shade of it all

Fifth period is AP English: OH MY GOD. THE COUNT OF MONTE CRISTO. OH MY GOD, THE FUCKING HAMMER. THE COUNT OF MONTE MOTHERFUCKING GODDAMN YES GOD HOLY BITCH

“Damn good coffee”: the goddamn shot of FP and Alice standing together flanked by the flames of their righteous destruction of the G&G manual

Summer + Blair = Veronica: Veronica is pretty fucking brave to still be living in Hiram Lodge’s HOUSE. and of course that’s what her dressing gown looks like

oh my god, Joaquin is still alive? Joaquin’s STILL HERE?

ARCHIE’S GONNA BREAK OUT OF PRISON AND I MUST CLEANSE MYSELF OF SIN TO BE WORTHY OF ITS GLORY (I trust Riverdale a lot more again at the moment)

so wait, Jughead put the cot BACK? are these two different bunkers? is it the same effing bunker???

“It’s over”: you fucking fool

yes, it’s the same goddamn bunker. the candles are still there! I guess I thought the wicked juju from Ethel’s ~SUICIDE ATTEMPT~ would deter the two of them from FUCKING IN THE EXACT SAME BUNKER but Betty and Jughead literally do not give a single damn where they do it

Jug’s headphones!!!!!!!!!

Cheryl’s expression at reading the G&G manual is appropriately be-Blossomed

The Blossom spawn: she still has a photo of Jason in her locker and I think a sticker that says “Literally no one cares”

What damn high school in America: those manuals have a QR code on the back, so you can play on your phone! GIVE ME THE APP, RAS

who unsheathed Ethel? LORD, WHO LET HER LOOSE?

GEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

NEXT WEEK: Camila Mendes wears glasses the entire time

[lfthinkerwrites]

High School Teacher AU: Fraternization Policy

Superintendent al Ghul does not care for Ellen’s comic and Edward and Penelope finally get on the same page.

It had taken the better part of four hours holding Jonathan under a shower in the boy's locker room for the man to, somewhat, sober up. Edward and Jervis had deposited him in the nurse's office and went their separate ways when the lunch bell rang, Jervis off to the teacher's lounge, Edward to the guidance counselor's offices. Or rather, to one guidance counselor's office in particular. He passed Harley on her way out and she gave him a wink and a thumbs up. This made him even more nervous. Yes, nervous. Anyone might have thought he'd consider a private meeting with Penelope Young his due, but the truth was, Ellen's existence notwithstanding, he'd never really had an easy time talking with women. So for a long moment, he stood outside of Penelope's door and hesitated. What could she have to say to him? She'd been cold to him since they'd met at best, outright antagonistic to him at worst. It had only been in the past week that she'd shown any sign that she liked him. He took a deep breath, then knocked three times on her door.

"Yes?"

Edward steeled himself. Here went nothing. “It’s me,” he said.

There was a brief pause before Penelope responded. “Come in, Edward.”

Edward reached down to straighten his tie before he entered the office. Penelope sat behind her desk, pen in hand. Edward could see a notebook in front of her, which she closed as he approached. "You said you wanted to talk," Edward said. "Well, here I am. What did you want to talk about?"

He watched as Penelope brushed her fingers through her bangs. A nervous habit, he'd noticed. One of the many things he'd noticed about her. "Harley and Pamela told me something at the poker game last night," she said at last. She looked up at him then and Edward noticed that she looked almost...hopeful? Must be a trick of the light. "They told me that you're in love with me."

Edward's world stopped turning at that precise moment and a chill went down his spine. "T-they-did they now?" Goddamn them both. This wasn't how he wanted her to find out.

Penelope cocked her head slightly, her expression as blank as usual. "Are you?"

Edward could deny it, but he'd never been a good liar. "Yes."

Penelope looked almost taken aback. "You-you are?" Then the professional mask slipped back into place. "How long?"

Edward began to pick at the sleeve of his dress shirt. "Since I met you."

Penelope looked less than convinced by that. "Seriously?"

"Alright," Edward admitted. "I've been attracted to you since I met you. I knew I was in love with you the moment I saw you take Valentin down with your taser."

Penelope's mask fell again and she gaped at him for a long moment. "You-I-" then her face flushed and she looked almost angry at him. "Why didn't you ever say anything!?"

"What, was I supposed to come marching up to you and start slobbering over you like that cretin Bolton?" Edward said defensively. "I was slowly wooing you using my intellectual charms-"

"You were playing games because you were afraid of being rejected," Penelope finished, getting up from behind her desk. "I can't believe you! All this time, I thought you tolerated me at best, when we could have been-" she cut off, covering her mouth.

"'Could have been' what exactly?" Edward asked. Wait. Wait a minute. "You mean to tell me that you-how long have you-"

"I didn't fall for you at first sight or anything like that," she said quickly. "But...I'd be lying if I said I wasn't...attracted to you too, when you're not being an ass at least."

Edward felt his own jaw drop. She was attracted to him? That explained why she seemed to have his schedule memorized, how even though she was frequently irritated by him, she didn't shy away from being in his company. Then his own elation turned to irritation. "Why didn't you ever say anything!?"

"Becuase until a week ago, I didn't know if you even liked me!" Penelope shouted, walking up to him. "You seemed to delight in finding new ways to be obnoxious-"

"I'm like that with everyone!" he shouted back. "That's just who I am! Believe me, if I didn't like you, you'd know it!"

"That still didn't mean you couldn't have been honest with me!"

"Likewise!"

Penelope was about an inch away from him, fuming. "You are," she said in a low tone. "The most impossible person I've ever met, Edward Nashton." She grabbed a hold of his tie and yanked him down. "And I need you to kiss me."

Edward blinked once. He had heard that, hadn't he? "What?"

Penelope made an exasperated noise. "I don't want to waste any more time. We might not get another chance. Please."

Edward had both of his arms around her in a moment. "Alright." Then he leaned in.

"Well, I have to say, this morning could have gone worse," Gordon said with a confidence he didn't feel.

"Well, it certainly could have gone better," al Ghul said. "I thought you said that Dent had completed anger management!"

"He did," Bruce defended.

"Then why did he call that boy in his class a son of a bitch, a pipsqueak and a mad dog!?"

Gordon bit his lip. "In his defense, Machin has been a disciplinary problem since he was a freshman-"

"That doesn't excuse Dent using that language," al Ghul said with a finality that no one dared to speak against.

"Anyway," Vreeland said, clapping her hands together. "It's lunchtime. Let's go out in the quad."

The group moved through the still vacant cafeteria and into the outdoor quad, where most of the students chose to eat, given that the food trucks were still there. One crowded table caught their attention. As they moved closer, Bruce recognized Dick, Tim, Cas, and Barbara. "Hey kids," he said in greeting.

The group looked up as one and Bruce noticed that Harvey's daughter Duela and Nashton's daughter were at the center of the table. Nashton's daughter was scribbling away at something. "Hi, Bruce!" Tim waved. The other children gave polite greetings.

al Ghul nodded slightly at Nashton's daughter. "You're Edward Nashton's daughter, aren't you? The resemblance is striking."

The girl nodded. "Yeah. My name's Ellen."

"What are you drawing, Ellen?" Gordon asked.

"Nothing," she said a bit too quickly.

al Ghul frowned a bit. "It's not obscene, is it?"

"No!" Ellen shouted before remembering exactly who she was talking to. "It's for a comic Duela and I are making."

"The girls are very creative," Gordon explained. "Why don't you go ahead and show us?" Ellen and Duela exchanged a long look with each other before Duela shrugged. Ellen slid the paper over to Gordon. He took one look and his eyes nearly bugged out. "Oh my."

Bruce looked over his shoulder at the drawing and read the captions out loud. "Beautiful Captain Zodiac Sparkles and the Perils of the Perverted, Perfidious Professor Pyg?" The drawing was of a girl in fishnet stockings, steel-toed boots and a tight-fighting top doing battle with a grotesque figure holding a meat cleaver and wearing a pig mask. "This is based on Valentin, I take it?"

"Dad said we couldn't use Coach Bolton as the villain anymore," Duela explained. "So we had to make a new villain."

"And just why do you think it's appropriate to draw comics casting members of the faculty as villains?" al Ghul asked.

"Because one of them chased me with a meat cleaver, that's why!" Ellen argued. The other kids at the table said nothing, but Bruce caught Tim nodding in agreement.

al Ghul glared at Strange. "Is that true?"

"The situation has already been handled," Strange said. "I don't think this comic is appropriate, girls."

Duela rolled her eyes. "First we couldn't use Toxic Masculinity, now we can't use Professor Pyg? Lonnie was right, you guys are all a bunch of fascists!"

"'Toxic Masculinity'?" al Ghul repeated. "You drew Coach Bolton in your comic and named him 'Toxic Masculinity?"

"It's what he is," Ellen said. "Ms. Isley said so."

al Ghul took the comic from Bruce. "And your fathers know that you've been creating this?"

"Yeah," Ellen said. "My Dad says as long as he doesn't get sued for libel, he doesn't care."

"He would say that," al Ghul muttered. "Well, we'll just see what your guidance counselor has to say about this, young lady!" al Ghul turned on his heel and stormed back towards the school's interior, the principals and the school board scurrying behind him. It wasn't until the group had entered the cafeteria that it occurred to Bruce that Jason was absent from the table.

"Dr. Young's office is just down here," Gordon said, taking the lead as they walked down the hall that led to the guidance counselor's offices.

"What kind of counselor is she?" al Ghul asked.

"Oh, she's terrific. Very professional. Never had a complaint about her," Gordon said.

"So in other words, she's the opposite of Dr. Quinzel. Good," al Ghul said. The group had just arrived outside of her door when they heard a thump come from inside.

"What was that?" Falcone asked. A muffled groan came from inside the office and Gordon felt sick. He opened the door wide anyway. "Oh, good Lord!"

As soon as the door opened, they were greeted by the sight of Dr. Young perched in the lap of a shirtless Edward Nashton who was sitting on top of her desk. Both looked flushed and their hair was loose. Vreeland made a scandalized noise and left the room, along with Falcone. Strange and al Ghul looked like they were about to have an aneurysm. Nashton, for his part, kept his arms tight around Dr. Young's waist and gave the group a look of bored irritation. "Do you mind? We're on our lunch break."

This quip seemed to bring al Ghul to life. "What is the explanation for this!?"

Nashton shrugged. "Does paradise need an explanation, Superintendent?"

al Ghul's face turned dark red from anger, but Strange saw an opportunity. Nashton had given him the perfect excuse to send the irritant packing. "You do realize," he said in a slow tone, "That this is in violation of our fraternization policy? Faculty and staff are forbidden from having relations with each other."

Dr. Young looked like she was about to say something when Nashton interrupted once again. "We're well aware." He then turned his gaze to Bruce and let out a smirk. "Fraternization between members of the faculty and the school board is forbidden too, right Bruce?"

Bruce felt his face burn. That son of a bitch. al Ghul turned and gave Bruce a sharp look. "You and that gym teacher! I knew it! You whoremonger!" Then he did something unexpected. He backhanded Bruce.

"Superintendent!" Gordon cried out. Bruce took a deep breath to keep himself from retaliating. All the while, Nashton looked on smug, while Dr. Young looked somewhat scandalized. al Ghul stormed out of the office, Elliott, Fox, and Queen following. Bruce then glared at Nashton. If nothing else, at least one of the teachers would finally be removed-

"Edward! It's been forever! Nice to see you're doing well!"

Cobblepot stepped forward and Nashton let out a grin. "Ozzie!"

'Ozzie?' Bruce and Gordon exchanged a long-suffering look when they realized what this meant. Cobblepot and Nashton were friends. Nashton, and by extension, Young, Crane, and Tetch, probably, were untouchable.

"Well, let's not take up too much more of your time," Oswald chuckled. "Do feel free to bring your lady to the Iceberg Lounge. Drinks are on me!" Oswald let out another laugh. "You incorrigible young rascal!"

"See you soon, you old crook," Edward laughed. Oswald walked out, leaving the principals and Wayne no choice but to follow him. Wayne shot him one final glare before he slammed the office door shut behind him. Edward shook his head. "Well, that was amusing."

"If you say so," Penelope sighed. "You never told me you knew Oswald Cobblepot."

"Oh, Ozzie and I go way back. He got me my first programming job. And in my defense darling, you never asked."

Penelope raised an eyebrow. "Darling?"

Edward felt a bit flustered. "Well, I'm assuming that you want more than just a single furtive groping session in your office. Right?"

In response, Penelope got off of his lap and walked towards her office door. Edward's heart sank. Then he watched her lock it. She turned back towards him with a heated look in her eyes. "We still have fifteen minutes left for lunch break, you don't have computer lab until 1:30 and I cleared my calendar for the rest of the afternoon." She then slowly began to unbutton her blouse and Edward's brain shut down. "I'd say we're going to go a bit past a single session, Eddie."

Where had she been all his life?

[iconiceyesleedswestyorkshir-blog]

Issues To Contemplate Whiling Pondering For Graphic Design Outsource

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Instead, the users and consumers of data all sorts of information are low logged into these social media, and what makes them common, it is their capability to allow peculiar of us to partake or control the flow of information with out having 'gate-keepers' censoring or adjusting what is data or what is reported. But Gwala's colleagues have little doubt about what happened that evening: the assassination of a conspicuous and vocal thorn within the facet of native authorities and officers from the ruling African National Congress as he fought corruption within the allocation of social housing. In the days of social media and the Web, these have been delivered to bear and in the front of society within the US. What this means is that, the numerous races and different communities, races, and so forth, snapped when the Grand juries, in numerous states of the United States discovered the cops not guilt or responsible for the homicide of Garner and brown, and these had been captured on video. The eyes of the world are actually more targeted on the offers that governments and enterprise did collectively, on the methods in which public procurement contracts have been determined and who benefitted on those actions by which individuals in power that have hitherto not been sufficiently topic to public scrutiny and oversight-have their actions laid naked within the viral stream.

[treasure-mimic]

So I saw Captain Marvel last night.

It was good. It was perfectly serviceable as an action movie, as a superhero movie, and as a Marvel movie. I imagine there’s gonna be a lot of little girls and grown women who love it because Carol is a really cool character. It was good.

It has, however, gotten me to think about something specific a lot since I’ve seen it though. What’ve I been thinking about?

Nirvana.

Post will contain spoilers for the major plot twist in Captain Marvel.

I think it’s probably pretty easy to harp on Captain Marvel for leaning as hard as it does on the 90s aesthetic. A decision seemingly made out of convenience and enforced by general cultural excitement at just, naming things that existed in the 90s and don’t anymore. But, ya know, let’s give Captain Marvel a little more credit than that. Let’s try and look into Captain Marvel’s themes and see if we can’t sus out a reason behind it.

Let’s talk about Skrulls.

A common reading of all alien invasion media is the idea that the alien force preys upon what the populace fears most at the time. Steven Spielberg’s War of the Worlds (2005), for example, sets itself as a direct and intentional parallel to the September 11th attacks on the World Trade Centers, mirroring a lot of the imagery from the attacks and a lot of the language used about the enemy and events just following. In The Avengers (2012) the evil alien horde presents itself as a tactical and well-armed warforce staging a frontal invasion on a civilian populace, coincidentally in the same city as the 9/11 attacks, and when it does get paralleled to any terrestrial army, is compared to the conquering, expanding force of the Nazi army in World War 2. The US fears an invasion, the hordes at the gate ready to rush in and slaughter us while we sit comfortable and unprotected.

In contrast, however, we have The Body Snatchers, written in 1954, published in 1955, and adapted for the screen first in 1956. A supernatural thriller wherein a race of sentient plants from outer space land in the US and consume regular humans, replacing them with replicas that walk and talk like normal people, but are actually duplicates created by these pods, disguising their presence on earth while they attempt to consume every human being on the planet without any person being any the wiser, with any attempt to expose their actions being chalked up to “hysteria”. While all writers involved deny any intentional theming along these lines, one of the most common readings in all of cinema is that the story, perhaps unintentionally, parallels the fears felt by Americans of communists and Soviet spies infiltrating the country from within, deteriorating our systems to defend ourselves until its too late. It’s very easy to read Invasion of the Body Snatchers in this light as it was coming out alongside much more explicit narratives about much more explicit Soviet spies with similar insidious plots, to the point that even by 1961 their tropes and conventions were being parodied in publications like Spy vs Spy.

A year later is when the Skrulls invaded. In 1962, The Fantastic Four #2 was released, premiering an invading alien race of shapeshifters called the Skrulls who can effortlessly implant themselves among life on earth by taking on the appearance and memories of the people they copy. Following so closely to the footsteps of Invasion of the Body Snatchers, and coming out so soon afterwards, it’s not the biggest stretch to apply the same reading to the Skrulls. They are, or at least were, an extension of the fear of Soviet spies in our midst, turning us on our protectors, scoring key seats in our government, and turning us over to an uncaring invading force. The Skrulls would continue this act throughout nearly every appearance they’ve had since, even after the end of the Cold War and the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991.

You know what else happened in 1991?

It’s likely unfair to point to one single instance as the “start” of a cultural era, but Nirvana’s Nevermind is as good a place to start the 90s as any. One of its tracks even plays during one of Captain Marvel’s key scenes. So let’s now talk about Nirvana. 

The sentiment that sits at the core of Nirvana’s work, as well as the core of all 90s alternative and grunge acts, is a potent combination of disaffection and frustration. After a couple decades of constantly fearing for their own lives and the lives of everyone around them, the mood of the youth of the generation burned out and gave way to a dull irritation. There wasn’t enough energy to keep the anger going sincerely, so instead the anger was kept alive through irony. A bitter hateful sarcasm, frustrated with every power structure that had been involved in leading to this point. Frustrated with corrupt government officials (”Some of those that work forces, are the same that burn crosses”), with uncaring capitalistic systems (”God money’s not looking for the cure. God money’s not concerned about the sick among the pure.”), with societal systems that keep them down (”Oh, I’m just a girl, all pretty and petite, so don’t let me have any rights”), with themselves (”What drives you on can drive you mad, a million lies to sell yourself is all you’ve ever had”), and just a frustration with a world that doesn’t and doesn’t pretend to understand them (”Oh well, whatever, nevermind.”).

90s alternative and grunge as genres set themselves as opposites to the aesthetics of the decades preceding them. In terms of pop culture, the 80s were the decade of glamour and bombast, the 90s were the decade of grounding and moodiness. It refutes and refuses to partake in the systems that created and drove the half century of wars that preceded it.

So doesn’t it make sense then, that the Marvel movie set in and embroiling itself in the 90s grunge era is the one that humanized these representatives of Soviet agents. Gave them families and a backstory and a very human reason to fight.

So, that’s that then. Captain Marvel isn’t just using the 90s aesthetic as a shallow means to pander to nostalgic twenty-somethings, its a thematic connection to reinforce the need to consider the other side’s perspective, using the counterculture of grunge to boost the counterculture of good guy Skrulls, right?

Well, no!

Look, okay, I’ll be the first to admit that I pulled all that directly out of my ass. I can’t imagine this level of thought went into connecting the story of Captain Marvel to the pervading zeitgeist of the 90s, especially when the Nirvana and No Doubt songs are played against Blockbuster Videos and Two Way Pagers. Besides, while it might be a good idea to understand that the Soviet spies and plants are in fact people with families and lives, saying that the Soviet Union were actually misunderstood good guys is at best the innocent musings of someone who genuinely didn’t know how bad things got and at worst grounds to suspect someone is actually some kind of Russian psyop themselves, and it’s far from any kind of message that Disney of all corporations would ever want attached to them. But that doesn’t make the analysis wrong per say. As said before, the writers of Invasion of the Body Snatchers disagree with the reading of its parallel to Cold War paranoia.

But Captain Marvel just doesn’t have the right 90s attitude. She’s defiant, certainly, maybe even counterculture given her response to the sexism she’s faced her entire life, but she doesn’t abandon the system, she doesn’t even really learn to see all enemies as people, and she does the least grunge thing of all and chooses a side.

I’m not saying the movie would be better if Carol reasoned with the imperialistic hivemind robo-fascist that literally brainwashed her to use as a weapon, or if she had just left the Kree to commit genocide against what is, in this universe, an oppressed racial minority that’s already been driven to the brink of extinction by rampant imperialism, but the movie still puts the blame on a nation of citizenry as opposed to the systems that influence them. The Skrulls have family and just want to live their lives in peace. The Kree don’t and don’t. The Supreme Intelligence wasn’t lying to an entire nation of soldiers, telling them that the Skrulls are all terrorists and the aggressors in this conflict, it was literally just Carol. Carol was the only one who didn’t know. Those soldiers that Carol had spent six years training with, living with, trusting with her life, they can be killed without a thought cause they’re the bad guys. Cause they didn’t have families like the Skrulls did.

In all likelihood, Marvel Studios saw a female led movie as being enough of a risk and wanted to keep the rest of film entirely safe. It’ll cause less waves if instead of portraying two warring factions as shades of grey, they just swap out black and white’s positions halfway through.

Captain Marvel adopts the aesthetics of 90s rebellion without going that extra step to actually rebel. It comes close to the realization that war is made of people with lives being shunted to their end by careless systems looking for profit, but still organizes all the players into a good side and a bad side instead of acknowledging the fascist systems behind them seeking excess material wealth and control.

Oh well.

Whatever.

Nevermind.

[larrykrakow]

Censorship: When Is It Warranted And Why?

New Post has been published on https://theprogressivemind.org/censorship-when-is-it-warranted-and-why/

Censorship: When Is It Warranted And Why?

Censorship was a big subject in George Orwell’s book, “1984”. At times, I feel like we are living in that kind of an era again. Was George Orwell giving us a warning about what would happen to us as our world began to become more connected?

I tend to err on the side of free speech.

When has the government crossed the line? Censorship is perhaps the most egregious violation of our founding principles.

Unfortunately, people in power don’t care about free speech. They trample all over our rights as a way to maintain control. The only problem that they have is that there are people like me. I speak up when my rights are taken away. Sadly, I am just one guy, so if you are reading this, I am depending upon you to share this information. Tell people what your government is doing to YOU. Do not let them be the arbiters of what can and cannot be said. It is that simple. That is why the First Amendment of our Constitution does not give any stipulation where free speech is not protected. Sure, you cannot yell “fire” in a crowded movie theater, but you get what I am saying.

First, I want to give you a back story to this. I will keep it short, because you may be reading this on your lunch break. After all, a half hour is not enough to digest an in depth piece about something as complex as this.

Censorship is the subject, but what is the excuse?

I never liked Donald Trump, but I felt that his time would pass and Americans would become wise to the con job he was performing on those that fell for his BS. My job as a butcher in Stewart Manor is just outside of the New York City limits. I started feeling symptoms of Covid19 on the 12th of March. It was mostly body aches. Not thinking much of it, believing it was just fatigue from working, I went shopping after work for some odds and ends.  I made it home that evening quite sore. My wife felt my head and knew I had a temperature. Covid19 was just starting to explode in New York and now I was sure that I was the next victim.

If we have not learned anything in our history, the one thing we should cherish is free speech. That allows us to call out our leadership for their handling of Covid19 and other crises. We live in tough times and having a right to speak up is our only way to insure that changes come.

That day would be my last day at work for five weeks. For the first two, I was very sick and the following three, recovering from 20 pounds of weight loss and weakness.

During the worst of it all, I had passed out in my bathroom and was unconscious for about a minute as my wife was yelling out my name. When I looked up, she had thought my eyes were turning grey as they often do as a person is dying. I came to and made it back to bed. That day was my wife’s birthday.

She spent two weeks putting a cold compress on me around the clock and trying really hard to keep me eating and drinking fluids. I did not even have the ability to move out of the bed for about three days straight during the worst of my illness.

Eventually, all started to turn for the better and I was getting ready to start to speak.

As I started to recover and get back to eating, I made a decision. Knowing that this pandemic could have been handled much better by the system, by our government and mostly, by the fascist himself, Donald Trump, I decided that I would have to write about my experience. I launched this blog with my first piece on April 16th. It was a trying time for me and I had a lot of resentment for the system that runs our country. My wife and I could not receive any support from the outside world other than moral support. We were on our own as if we had been abandoned. This blog fast became my outlet for my anger at a system that left all of us behind long before the virus ever came to our shores.

I am fairly certain that most of you who are reading this blog understand why the working class struggles in many ways. Covid19 hit the working class the hardest.  Our values are shot down by establishment members of both parties. Our wages, healthcare and equal pay for equal work are often under attack. Covid19 put me out of work for five weeks. I did not receive one penny of sick pay or any way to recover lost time. Thankfully, I have a wife who does very well, so we made it through this bad stretch without any financial problems.

Fast forwarding a few weeks, I was thumbing through Twitter, one of the organizations who would soon censor content.

I looked through my recommendations of people to follow and I followed an account named Peace Data. While viewing their profile, I clicked on their website link and saw articles about war crimes and human rights violations. I sent them a message telling them how good it was to see fellow writers challenging the system followed by a link to my blog. They reached out back to me and suggested that I start submitting content through their website. The communications were on and my first articles started going up. The first one that I submitted to them was called “The Military Industrial Complex  and The Working Class” followed by a piece outlining the environmental problems brought on by capitalism.

My pieces with this website, called Peace Data were often more in depth than what I would say on my blog. I felt that my blog was a place to be agitational and that Peace Data was trying to establish themselves as a quality place for independent media. I knew that they were foreign, saying that they were based in Germany. They were happy with the work I was sending them and about once every week, I would send another article for them to publish.

My portfolio of free speech kept on expanding through the pandemic.

By the time that the summer had arrived, I had almost a half a dozen pieces published on Peace Data. My blog was suffering a little bit as I took time to submit to them. I was ok with that as my word was spreading to more places on the Internet. It was refreshing that I was able to speak to someone from another part of the world who was able to understand in the moment what was going wrong with America.

FBI Director, Cristopher Wray laid the groundwork for First Amendment violations by establishing the Foreign Intelligence Task Force

I kept on communicating and submitting pieces.

Most of them were critical of the Trump administration, because he was in charge and failing us.

There was an occasional piece on the website ripping Biden and Harris, but it was not exactly hitting them hard. Most of the criticism on the site was about war and capitalism.

As the end of the summer neared, life took over a bit and writing took a back seat to spending time with my wife. Between work and time with my wife, I had little time to write. In addition to writing, I am currently studying to teach English as a second language as a fall back option when my body gives out and I can no longer do physical work. As I got back into writing and building my presence online,

I faced censorship.

Well, not me personally, but Peace Data was. At first, I did not know what to expect. Censorship was going to become a central theme in my life, even though I was not the owner of Peace Data. Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn all deleted profiles and posts related to Peace Data. Every post that I made of an article on Peace Data had been removed by Facebook. They went after my content, even though they did not go after me. The censorship started from the FBI and went through social media and then the mainstream media and finally towards more independent media.

My wife paid attention to my emails for me while I was working, because she kept on top of things for me while writing for Peace Data. She was proud to see me, a working class man, building something in my life towards a less physically demanding path. That said, I started receiving messages on LinkedIn from news outlets. My wife would let me know about these during the day and I would handle them that night, once I was at home.

The FBI told the social media world to censor Peace Data.

As a rule of thumb, our government is not supposed to question free speech. So why did this happen here? What warranted this form of censorship? Is it ok for the federal government to just say that something online is divisive? When did the government get the power to come after free speech from overseas? Even worse, why are the major social networks going along with this? I personally believe that the next step was even worse. The mainstream media reported about this matter in a very irresponsible and amateur way. It is sad that as a butcher, a member of the working class and a college dropout that I can recognize lousy journalism.

CNN and Reuters were the first outlets to contact me. They wanted to have me give them all of the email addresses from PayPal senders compensating me for my work on Peace Data. The mainstream outlets did not want to hear about my story or my content. They all ran with the narrative that this site was a website designed to divide the left and hurt Joe Biden. There was absolutely no evidence that this was the case, yet they ran with it anyway.

CNN and other major outlets supported the mind controlling censoring of a small operation.

Even if they had evidence, they did not want to share it with me. In fact, they relied on a private intelligence firm to piece together forensics that identified the people at Peace Data as fake people who in reality did not exist.

My counter argument to that one is that if someone wants to say something that challenges power in a way that is dangerous to themselves, isn’t it safer to stay anonymous? After all, much of the content on the website, including writing of my own went after the military industrial complex which makes many people insanely wealthy while destroying the lives of millions of people around the world.

When major news outlets trot out a breaking news story, they often do not look at the circumstances surrounding the story. They put out the sensational story and hope that their prime audience will keep their butts molded to their reclining chairs and their eyes on their screens.

In this case, a CNN reporter reached out to me to communicate. He already had intended to run out with the story that he was told was the truth. I do not believe that he really investigated all angles of this story. He only wanted information about how I was paid for the articles that I had submitted. He never asked me one thing about my experience.

The same thing can be said about reporters from other mainstream media outlets. The Wall Street Journal, Reuters, CNN, NBC News and the New York Times all pushed out the same narrative.

This was a Russian trolling operation so the FBI deemed that it should be censored.

Why was this the case? The content didn’t match any of the claims made in the CNN reporter’s reporting. In fact, he stated that…

Intelligence officials told Congress earlier this summer that Russia was spreading false information about Biden. – CNN article.

The content on Peace Data did not show up as anything that would turn progressive voters against Biden. In fact, the fight between the factions of the Democratic party had already existed since long before Hillary Clinton ran for President. The FBI played up misinformation from Russia as an excuse to tell the social media outlets to shut down everything associated with Peace Data. In fact, in 2017, the FBI laid the groundwork to go after free speech.

They established what is called the Foreign Influence Task Force.

The main goal of this office is to go after free speech that challenges a narrative. I will remind you about the text of the First Amendment of our Constitution.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

This is absolute. There is absolutely NO challenging this fact. The only reason that nobody has challenged this is that the narrative about Russian interference has been played. Most people who find an attack on free speech to be way BEYOND the pale. It offends most of us, including some of Donald Trump’s supporters.

In other words, the FBI can say that any foreign outlet who is critical of American foreign policy can be labeled by the FBI as a foreign influencer thus leading to social media outlets shutting down their pages, links and accounts of members associated with such organization. This means that people who want to expose war crimes around the world committed in OUR name run the risk of being shut up.

This is NOT a supporting piece favoring Russia, but it IS a piece favoring the right to speech, full stop.

So what did CNN want to report about? They and other mainstream outlets wanted to run with a story about Russian interference in our elections. Did they actually show any content that was damaging to Joe Biden as they stated Peace Data published? Did any other reporters? They did not, but they made that claim that they did. I will eat my words if they produce screenshots from Peace Data showing that other than one article soon after Biden announced his VP pick, Kamala Harris. I can recall only one article critical of the Biden/Harris ticket yet I can say that I saw many anti-Trump articles.

Is this an excuse to go after our freedom of speech? After all, speech is the one tool that people have to challenge power. I was fortunate enough to have conversations with reporters from three news outlets that decided that it was important to look further into the story instead of running with sensationalism. The first one was Jacob Silverman from Slate. He wrote ax excellent piece that explained different angles of this situation. https://slate.com/technology/2020/09/peace-data-russia-disinformation-facebook.html

I then spoke with a couple of reporters from ProPublica who weren’t convinced that this was a story that they were interested in pursuing.

A few days later, I had a meeting on Zoom with Jen Kirby, Foreign and National Security Reporter for VOX. We had a great conversation with a lot of hypotheticals and the philosophical angle to this story. Sure, her angle was supposed to be centered around national security which is ultimately was, but she gave credence to the idea that speech ought to be protected by sharing my views in her article. As seen in her article, the problem with the challenge is not that it was Russia creating the so called disinformation.

Kirby told her readers that MY opinion is that free speech is protected and the danger associated with leaving the power to regulate speech in the state. That shows that her mind was open to seeing the whole picture instead of what the mainstream media pushes out.  You can read her article here. —> https://www.vox.com/2020/9/21/21401149/russia-2020-election-meddling-trump-biden

So how was censorship used by the FBI?

That one is simple. Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn are some of the most powerful business entities in the world. They cooperate with the most powerful government in the world as well. Originally, social media was meant to be a way for people to share anything and everything, a neutral bulletin board. Over the years, it evolved into a mesh of political ideologies challenging, bickering and in some cases, serving as an echo chamber for people of certain political leanings.

Many of your conspiracy theories that bounce around the web originate in a corner of the web. It is the right of individuals to spread false news. It is the right of the victim of fake news to sue for slander if they can trace the origins of the conspiracy. In fact, most of the conspiracies known today originate right here in America. Q’Anon started in America as we know and Alex Jones rambles all day long about conspiracies.

So why was a website with legitimate content targeted? One may never know. Perhaps there were things that were serious red flags, but did anyone from Peace Data commit a crime against America? I believe that the First Amendment vindicates them as they have a right to post whatever content online that they wish. Were they wrong to publish things that they published in some cases? Yes, probably so, but when does the FBI get to call out that speech when the Constitution is explicit about their lack of a right to take away speech.

One can argue that Facebook and Twitter are private companies with a right to censor.

I have been openly threatened with violence on Facebook. I have reported those comments to Facebook and their answer was that it did not violate any community standards. So, are articles critical of American foreign policy meddling? Is it meddling if someone in another country says something online like “I hope Trump loses and get thrown in jail for his crimes?” I can say it in America. It is MY right, but why isn’t it a right of someone else in another country, even if linked to a foreign government?

So if Facebook and the other social media giants out there resort to censorship on direction from the FBI, then is the FBI guilty of that censorship? One might argue that in a court room. I believe somebody should. Censorship of hate speech is one thing, if it is on social media and the private social media company pulls down the content for violations of their standards. On the other hand, if the FBI or any other federal agency does, it is an action taken to limit freedom of speech in violation of the First Amendment. 

Where do I go from here? We are headed into potentially dangerous times with a dangerous President in power and a stacked judiciary that does not care about the rule of law. The focus on what is called a 200 follower trolling outfit is a huge misuse of resources in our government, but it is also an effective way to stifle dissent.

If this emerges as a pattern and websites with opinion content start to show up and get taken down, our government has set a dangerous precedent. 

I want to invite you to fight against the power to censor content as much as possible.

We are all in this together. Sure, there is a lot of noise out there on the Internet. Conspiracy theories are everywhere. Jacob Silverman and Jen Kirby are both on your side in their reporting. They want you to get the facts and stay informed. They also have integrity and do not wish to push out a story like the broken mainstream media. The biggest media outlets have a strategy to keep you engaged so that their advertisers have as many eyes on their commercials as possible. The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal want you to thumb past full page ads. Major online outlets want you to go to their site and follow their clickbait.

Ultimately, all three forces, the government, social media and mainstream media all work together in many ways. It is the reason why you often hear millionaires tell you about what the problems are in the country through the lens of a billionaire. It is the reason why we need checks and balances to protect OUR freedoms. Speech is your only way that YOU can put a check on power. If your government is doing something that you do not like, you MUST speak up. You cannot allow the government to shut down content in any way without sharing the facts to you.

With that said, I ask the FBI to produce those facts to me. If they don’t, then Christopher Wray, a Trump appointee at the FBI is responsible for taking away my right, even if the place that I speak is considered by some to be a Russian troll farm. If I am in the dark on that, so be it, one should prove it. That includes the FBI, social media admins AND the mainstream media. Harm is done when voices are silenced without attention to facts.

You have a right to live a life free of censorship.

Finally, I might make another point. The way that you consume media is an important factor in shaping the direction of your country. If you stick to the corporate mainstream media as a way to get your information, I can promise you, the information that you will receive will be presented in a way that benefits the corporations. You can boost their ratings and thus boost their revenue, but that will not help you. If you go to a much more independent news source that goes in depth and breaks things down honestly like Kirby and like Silverman, you can rest assured that you found reliable information.

[personsofnote]

3. Math Kid, Soldier

I became radicalized during the summer of my junior year, I was seventeen years old. At the time I was on academic exchange in Northern England, conducting research of minor importance on the pretense of scientific giftedness. My brilliant peers have pruned my confidence, so I stumped and sulked in the coldish air. I could not communicate properly with my advisor, a loving Frenchman who is battling for tenure, because he does not care for mathematical terms in English. Decidedly, I wanted to exploit what was left in my life, so I began to take walks in the diagonal of the college campus. The campus being a perfect square with hundred-meter sides, the diagonal was the only radical path in the campus square, and on my morning walks I often encounter Taki. I have been meaning to make friends with her, for I found her the least miserable and anxious out of all my peers. Soon I learnt that Taki will not joke around with me, but she meant all the best and would gladly talk about any scientific topic. The formality and rigor of our friendship is surprising, but certainly welcome.

I had just began writing my exposition in mathematics, when I became one with the symbology. When I began what my advisor called my projet petite, I wished to find an analog of the spiral of Theodorus in complex numbers. The plenitude of radicals signs, half-bent roofs over numbers, reminded me of the temporary nature of our lives. I thought about the sick and dying in nursing homes, including, perhaps, distant members of my own family that I was too preoccupied to know by name. Presently, I began to see all numbers as ugly and writhing in skeleton and flesh. Although only ten basic forms existed, the infinitude of naturals, integers, rationals, and reals were allelic for the finite mess of ways to be human. I was shaken and endeared, and I was unable to sleep, and I kept making correlations. For example, the number seventeen over thirteen is a newborn from Singapore born in the hospital of this very university, and the number six point five five is my dear advisor. The ubiquitous e, I felt, was simply the blue-collar worker. I had read about these types of people on Facebook, the crockpots who claim they see through mathematics into universal truth. I had never doubted their madness — for mathematics is only one pathetic language among many — but upon my vision I feared becoming one of them. To forge a personal, almost familial relationship to symbology was the first sign of my radicalization, but I denied it to be a symptom. After writing two more pages of my exposition, I was convinced that my logical faculties remained unclouded despite my vision. I decided against telling Taki, for I was sure she would take it as a joke, and I feared losing her friendship. For the next week I indulged in my vision whenever possible, writing down a summary at the end of the day for the pairings I have produced. The most significant were: the constant pi for refugees, migrants and people in movement, the number zero for Ethiopian women who live to be eighty years old, the number one for an Austrian violinist turned Tibetan monk, and the number three hundred forty two point six five for myself. After performing a preliminary bivariate test, the correlation between location, gender, or occupation and the nature of the numbers were perfectly random. Complex numbers were surprisingly absent from my vision, perhaps because they were the subject of my thesis. My writing was uncannily successful, and I finished my exposition a week ahead of time.

My conversations with Taki slowed my deterioration. We took to sitting on the donated bench after our morning stroll, although we walked in opposite directions. I did not care for her iPod and the classical music within it, but we discussed amicably over scientific ideas that we both understood. The dead fairy godfather of our park bench is one William Shortstorm, who apparently lived a very fruitful forty six years and was survived by his widow Edith. As a Southeast Asian I was unaccustomed to the nuanced mood of the climate, the paradoxically sunny coldness of a British summer. The English was fond of discussing the weather, and I found it justified. The personable gusts accompanied our conversation with equal gusto, and its waking strength reminded me of the youth in Taki’s life and my own. It had not crossed my mind to apply my vision to Taki and assign a number to her. Our friendship was short-lived, and by the end of the program we despised to see each other.

My doomed epiphany came the night before the submission of my exposition. Per my kind advisor’s request, I would read over my writing one more time and make sure that all notation is correct and sound. This fated task, it would seem, sealed the second coming of my inexplicable vision. Performing mathematics, for me, had become emotionally difficult. Although I was able to write down my calculus exercises without question, upon rereading these pages of numbers I was rendered helpless by my visions. The crass pages of my hasty exercises became intricate sketches of central train stations, where all walks of life came to share the misery of waiting. To have all sorts of numbers huddled so close to each other, such kaleidoscopic characters at once! It was difficult to not infer relationships between these people, even for a logical person such as myself. To this end it dawned on me that the mathematical notation represented relationships, not in the sociofamilial sense but in the emotive sense; as a summary of feelings between these number-people. Thus the rereading of my exposition became the disastrous peripeteia of my self-evidently trivial life. I stared at the multitude of radical symbols down the page. It resembled the check sign, as were the German blank cheques given to Austria a century ago, as were all likely struggles between true and false from computers to statehoods to exercise papers like my own. The undiscriminating stoicism of this open symbol, reducing and sheltering whoever comes its way, the same monk, the same privileged children, save the negative numbers — those who refuse to accept who they are. In time, I too, became sheltered under a radical symbol of my own, and I saw how absolutely correct it was. My own square root — could they be my children? Oh, I did not mind, whoever they were — my own square root crawled and seeded within my chest. An immense sense of insecurity and pity came over me: to be sheltered, to be loved, to be cared! — Yet so many could not afford it in this world. For the global capitalist machine had hijacked these numbers and symbology for its own benefit, just as its sentience had robbed life of its meaning. I realized that the precise ingenuity of capitalism was that it used mathematics to eliminate the very truth represented by mathematics. Capitalism, with its monstrous sentience, imposed its own truth upon these number-people, so that mathematical symbology no longer hold meaning beyond the pecuniary for people; for people who are numbers themselves. Truth is no longer truth when truth convinces itself of another truth. I identified it at once: that to eliminate this kidnapper of mathematics was the only means to global emancipation, the only means by which numbers could mean themselves again. Capitalism was an invisible enemy, for it existed around and beyond mathematics but not within mathematics itself. For us, it would mean organized resistance, it would mean armed resistance, it would mean theory-writing and interpretation of Marx and Goldman and Bakunin. Already I am in ruins and shudders. I have not known these names before — I do not understand who they are, save for the numbers they represented. Yet I had never been surer of the next step forward. The radical sign told me to leave mathematics at once: the language of truth had done all it could for me and this world. But my radicalization was not yet complete — as such, nothing is truly complete until it has been set in action.

Impassioned by my newfound mission, I found its actual execution beyond difficult. I could not leave the program, which drags on for one more week; among the daily science lectures and exercises I had emerged as one of the more hopeless of my peers. Taki’s academic standing is mediocre amidst these geniuses, although still above me nonetheless. Yet she does not look down on me: she had asked me to check the calculations in her exposition on astrophysics. But I found that I could no longer complete tasks as simple as these. After taking her pencilled notes and printed exposition back to my room (with plenty airy dandelions on the way, the wind still cold but embracing), I read over it carefully. But I could not edit it — I began to cry. I have not seen any scene as tragic as this — an entire people, an entire people of diversity and voluptuous history, subjecting themselves to suigenocide in defiance of — well, of Taki’s treatment of them. Why does she subjugate mother to son and invert families and ages? Why does she tie them up and feed them their own body parts? Why does she project one number upon another and doing so, destroy both heartlessly? There were but scientific sweet nothings on the page, but I saw concrete blood and corpse and innumerable human suffering. I could not believe that any dictator, fascist in human history could write anything half as cruel as this — and certainly not Taki. She had been nothing but polite and poignant during our friendship — how could I have known of her hidden cruelty! Indeed, how could herself be aware, and how could she understand my vision? Of course, I had no nuanced understanding of my unique situation back then. All I could do was rush to Taki’s room and knock on her door and give an infuriated spiel. I called her, indeed, worse than Hitler. Taki took great offense to this — and rightly so — her Japanese-American family had suffered considerably in the Second World War, and Taki does not forget easily. She had every right to react this way, for I had not explained properly. Nor had I time. When I returned to my pathetic room it was midnight, and I decided that my friendship with Taki had been destroyed sacrificially. With Taki gone, I had nothing to tie me down to the world anymore. I was past the point of inflection. From now onwards, along the t axis, nowhere but onto infinity.

Every coming day I itched for the program to end so I may board the flight home. I continued taking my daily stroll along the diagonal, one of the few activities that still grounded me to reality, and I noted Taki’s natural absence from the route. My advisor was surprisingly delighted with my paper, given that he had contributed zilch to its inception or completion. He told me that he would pass the paper around to other advisors and discuss potential publication. I did not care for his propositions, all I wanted was for this meeting to end, and thus for all math things to end. On the final day of the program I was awarded the best written exposition award. This came as a surprise for myself and an upset for my peers, for nearly everyone had rightfully looked down at my mental faculties. I saw Taki when I went on stage to accept the award. She was clapping; she was still angry. I have not seen her since.

As I landed in the airport of my home country, I immediately destroyed my cellphone to avoid being found by my chauffeur and parents. I counted the money I have on me, which was a comfortable sum. I purchased a second cellphone and SIM card, and I immediately knew who to contact. She was invited to my school to do a presentation on activism, which I yawned over at the time, and she was scantly remembered by my peers. Strangely, I did save her phone number — I was a number hoarder long before my epiphany. I called her at once: I addressed her as prophet, sage and saint. I told her that I was a student at her presentation, and that I am enlightened and I am ready to devote all myself to her cause at once. She was generous enough to not enquire further, but she gave me her address. I called a taxi there at once. Upon arrival at the polished middle-class home I proceeded into the attic and threw myself onto her. I told her about my vision and I sobbed incessantly. This group of strange old hippies must have decided that I was properly mad, but still of proper usage to them. They were Trotskyites, terrorists. I told my matrons that I could stay indefinitely.

Obviously, I had partially thought this through: my father and grandmother wield considerable political power in the city, so a public search ad would be out of the question. On the other hand, my presence under the wings of this underground group could be an immense threat to my life. I hid my passport from them and used a general name. I was not asked to justify why I attended a private preparatory high school. They were merely glad I joined the cause.

I proceeded to spend three months in her basement helping to organize violent strikes and protests around the city. I was a secondary voice in the protester’s earpiece: I helped ‘reconnaissance tasks’ and aided avoiding the police and disposing evidence on scene. I pointed out routes of escape and made sure the choreograph was executed to perfect timing. I lived modestly and comfortably in a room of my own, with an old lady taking care of all my chores. They treated me excellently despite their insistence that I work twelve hours a day — (as a student I am used to much more than that) — they told me that I should just ask if I needed anything. To that I only pleaded a copy of Baby Rudin so I may continue to study mathematics in my free time, which was duly fulfilled. But for all my skills in proof and logic, I faltered at programming: I couldn’t make the Internet my oyster. No matter how excellently we coordinated a strike, more protesters seemed to die every month. As I viewed the latest metro worker’s strike in the central station on my screen, I felt great discomfort at the grand tapestry. I tried very hard to ‘inversely’ apply my vision to translate people to the numbers they correspond to. Although I was successful in finding a trove of irrationals, these numbers were meaningless when arranged together. They revealed no mathematical truth like the human truths I discovered through reading Taki’s thesis, and they were grossly cacophonous when placed alongside the number of Trotsky, the beautiful integer of twenty. I thought all this wrong, so I resolved to leave. I had no possessions with me except Baby Rudin. When the frail old lady attempted to stop me and wake the other women, I simply bashed the hard cover over her head. The book was not thick enough to kill her.

I returned to my family and I told them that I was kidnapped by the Trotskyites. When asked why have they not issued a blackmail, I stated that they were looking for the right time. Our domestic worker bathed me and I saw how harrowed I looked in the mirror. My entire person was swollen and pale for the plethora of unhealthy calories and lack of sunlight. I determined to look better, I determined to find the lean cleanliness of the self before my fateful summer. I gave my father the address and everything was swiftly taken care of. There were no more strikes in my city, and therefore no workers to die a protester’s death. Due to the perceived traumatic nature of my circumstance I completed my final year of high school at home, during which I became greatly invested in my father’s career. I had told him that I also wished to join politics, but both of us did not follow through. I slugged in my study of mathematics: the sight of numbers now make me tremble. I had not read Marx, Goldman or Bakunin. I had betrayed e, the ubiquitous blue-collar worker, a truly transcendental number. To return to the real world was altogether possible: the real world inundates you. We are all, after all, real numbers; and I am a rational number among them.

After a year of fruitful studies I joined a pretentious university abroad. I could find no sincerity and care in my classmates while searching for a secondary Taki. I was able to finish my mathematics degree, although others stopped regarding me as talented and were surprised to hear that I authored that little curio of a paper as a teenager. After university, I have channeled my energies into other pursuits: a capella, gardening, interior design, astrophysics, electrical engineering, anthropology. Tried as I have, I could not become the type of person entailed by their career. It was at this time that I realized that people’s numbers change over their lifetime, and that my vision does not exclusively bind people to number. Mine, however, remained the same. I did not venture into politics. My father retired to our ancestral city, laden with honor's spoils. I made money to sustain myself till I could not anymore.

By the time I was thirty years old I had left polite society. I later joined guerrilla fighting in the newly independent South Sudan. I cried upon hearing of our new unity government. My vision made a powerful return amidst the immense happiness of my fellow soldiers: they rejoiced in a fashion that fulfilled the Euler formula, which glared over our tins and tents. At first I dismissed this vision due to its simplicity; I have known the Euler formula since I was twelve years old. Why not the isomorphism of groups? Why not the Peano Postulates? But then I was humbled: simplicity is elegance, and elegance is beautiful. I was content. From then onwards, there was nothing complex under the sun.

[its-a-lark-blog]

What does "Dragon" mean?

I decided that this is what my first Tumblr post should be about. So, what does it mean? If I'm honest? Arse all. Absolutely nothing. It's just a nonsensical non-word. Wait! Put down the torches and pitchforks, I'll explain.

So... Honestly, the faux, hollow concept of a 'dragon' has always been something of a bastardised melange, right, which is why we have the arguments as to whether the creatures in Elder Scrolls qualify more as dragons or a form of pseudowyvern. Lots of those. Everywhere. I feel they're more prevalent than the Mass Effect Indoctrination Theory ramblings were.

What's called the 'Eastern dragon' (as anything can technically be a 'dragon,' including the mug sitting beside me) is truly a ryu, which is a very separate conceptually from the serpent referred to as drakon in Greek literature. And they are both equally as detached from the concept of a quetzacoatl. Just as neither of those three have any link or relation whatsoever to cymru dreigiau (Welsh draig).

The draig, in particular, is a fascinating example. It looks like what people think of as the 'typical Western dragon,' the heinous hexapod with six limbs (four of which are legs, two of which are wings). And yet, it's very different in concept; The draig is a creature of infinite kindness and wisdom, the guardian protector spirit of the cymru peoples. So how did the draig end up appropriated as the 'Western dragon' with such a different personality?

I mean, it's Rome's fault. When it isn't America's or Germany's, it usually is. Which is just an incredibly controversial way of blaming it on 'fascist douche-canoes who enjoy conquering people.' I mean, look, Trump is basically just Caligula with a spray-on tan, right?

When Rome assimilated Christianity in order to try to use religion to then assimilate other cultures (since Rome was always looking for new and interesting ways to conquer and enslave all those who weren't Roman), it appropriated a number of beliefs and customs from other faiths and beliefs into Christianity.

"Oh, you celebrate that? So do we! That's a Christian holiday. You silly pagans didn't realise? Oh, you ridiculously uncultured pagans."

The druidic pagans were especially difficult to indoctrinate as they were understandably far more fond of their soft-spoken, kindly, quite lovely dreigiau than they were of fascist Roman emperors, who were frankly quite rude by comparison. So the concept of the draig, itself, was perversely morphed into 'dragon' -- an evil creature who sought to kill the poor little pagans. Only the good, decent Christian gawd could protect them all. Damn nearly everything about Christianity after its assimilation by Rome is culturally appropriated nonsense.

You might think that Japan or America have a monopoly on improper appropriation of other cultures, but noooo. Oh goodness me no, not at all. Not at all. Christianity did it first, and to a depraved extent that no contemporary enterprise would e'er dare match. That's why I'll always raise an eyebrow, baffled yet amused, whenever an armchair historian cites post-Rome Christian history and heraldry as if it were somehow some sort of sanctified, perfect, pure thing.

It really wasn't, you know? That's silly. It's mostly a hodgepodge of stuff stolen from other cultures, in much the same way as the very English language itself is nowt more'n a gestalt of bits and bobs clumsily snatched from other languages.

Sorry, other languages. It was quite untoward and unbecoming of the British to do so.

Anyway, after 'dragon' was used as a nefarious tool by Rome's fresh, fresh new take on Christianity, it then became a construct of the media; Used for entertainment in various forms. Ultimately, yes, the 'dragons' in Skyrim are 'dragons' because the non-word 'dragon' is as completely meaningless a non-word as hungleflibbow, which I obviously just invented to encompass all deified human-like avatars.

I'll belabour my point as much as I need to, thank you very much.

So, Jehovah? You mean Jova, right? Weeell, he's just a hungleflibbow. One of innumerable kinds of hungle in the flibbow.

It's silly, really. The non-word 'dragon' is silly. The concepts of 'Western dragon' and 'Eastern dragon' are equally as ludicrous and deserve to be soundly lampooned. Personally, I'd prefer a remembrance of the source material they came from -- like the draig or the ryu, implemented with the aid of a cultural advisor. Instead of the brainrot we saw in Skyrim, the Hobbit films, and Game of Thrones, which are no different really than my hungleflibbow.

Yep. Hungleflibbow. Whether it's Zooz, Jova, Neppy, Ganish, Bhuddy, Kukoo, or any of the others, they're all part of my religion, now! They're all just different flavours of the hungleflibbow of my naturally better religion. And they have absolutely nothing at all to do with your farcical paganistic beliefs. My hungleflibbow are innately superior to your risible pagan 'gods.' In fact, these so-called 'gods' of yours are evil, they're out to get you! So I invite you to become a hungler and worship the holy hungles of the flibbow. Truly, what choice do you have?

I mean, Flibbowity -- my obviously matchless and distinguished religion -- even has a Jovakiin. Of course.

"But there is one they fear... In their tongue, he is Jovakiin. Hungleborn!"

I think you unwashed, under-educated, uncultured pagan savages call them 'saints.' Of all things. Tsk, tsk. How utterly crass. Your efforts are naught but a pale imitation of our patron hungleborn Jeebus. Jeebus, son of Jova, born in a backyard in Beaufort...

I could go on like this, it's actually rather fun! I won't, though. I don't think I need to, do I?

I mean, I sound salty but it's mostly just mildly cross satire. Of course, that might be what salt is? I've never been clear on its American meaning beyond its definition as a type of condiment.

Anyway, this grand effort is all just to make a point about how silly of a non-word 'dragon' is. I'm quite tired of it. it truly is a ridiculous non-word. Such a multimedia non-word. I do wish we could just leave 'dragon' as a concept by the wayside. I'd say 'no more dragons.' That would make me happy.

Jeebus, save us from the 'dragons.'

That said... I would, however, very, very much love to see draig, ryu, and other such creatures repsectfully represented in a similar vein to their cultural origins. Really, just give me a draig any day over a 'dragon.'

It really is a silly non-word.

If we can be honest with ourselves, 'dragon' today is nowt more than a means to have a beast for some pompous, stuffed shirt to slay. Whether as some heroic figure in film or one played in a video game. Would it truly matter if the beast they slew was called a 'dragon' or a nibblesnot to the vast, vast majority? I can't imagine it would. They care not for names nor lore.

I'd be surprised if most of those who played The Witcher games knew as much as ten of the names of the creatures they slew.

For those who do care, lavishing a beast with a decent name simply improves upon the experience. Slathering 'dragon' over everything just tells me that you couldn't give a rat's arse about your creation; Which is very much the impression I got from Skyrim, really. I got the very distinct impression that Bethesda is so sick of game dev. They're merely going through the motions to make the money.

Anyway! Once we can stop using the non-word 'dragon,' we can also stop having bloody arguments about what a 'dragon' is, since the non-word 'dragon' doesn't actually mean anything. Never has. If we simply cease using it, we don't have to argue about it.

Problem solved. Just so. Simple as that.

Honestly, how much more would you have enjoyed Skyrim if the creatures present were always, solely described as dov, and never as 'dragons?' On a similar note, wouldn't you have enjoyed Game of Thrones and The Hobbit more without the deployment of 'dragon?' Wouldn't it have been better if each respective species of beastie had possessed its own unique name? As opposed to plastering 'dragons' over everything as though it actually meant anything.

If you ask most people they'll say that 'dragons' are boring or played out. They're utterly bored of it, it's asinine to them. So why bother?

Point made? Sort of? Maybe?

It’s just a silly non-word.

So give us poor sods something more akin to a draig, ryu, or quetzacoatl, as they're far more compelling creatures. And you could actually have a chat with them, I find that far more compelling than jabbing a phallus repeatedly into a poor critter's newly made gut hole. But that's just me. You know, talk to the monsters, that sort of thing. I must be some sort of idiot as I find a good conversation all the more stimulating.

That might just be me. I tend to prefer a Night in the Woods to a Stabby-Man Simulator 2018. And I can see a whole gamut of value in trying to write from a distinctly non-human perspective. One could build an entire game or film around conversing with such a being.

I'm not sure where I'm going with this now, though my point is is that 'dragon' is an utterly silly non-word and I'd really like to see more media where a character interacts with a draig or a ryu in some way other than giving it various new orifices that it didn't request, requie, or ask for.

That's that then.

Footnote: This isn't an attack against Otherkin as I'm an Otherkin myself (see my prior posts). Simply -- Otherkin 'dragons' aren't really so; They tend to be Otherkin draig, Otherkin ryu, et cetera. The Otherkin perception is closer to those words than the multimedia non-word 'dragon.'