#it's a show about cycles by its very structure

[aletterinthenameofsanity]

Me, to my new date: doctor who thinks it's a sci-fi story because the Doctor thinks it's a sci-fi story and because the companions think it's a sci-fi story, but it's really just a story about ghosts. a story about an ancient creature carrying the ghosts of everyone they have ever loved, meeting new people, and seeing them only as future ghosts. they are haunted by the future and the past and the present because they are the only constant in a world constantly in flux, and they are running as fast as they can to things before they burn and fade to dust but everything will always end, you understand, because this is the only thing the Doctor understands and yet they keep going. they love too much to stop. doctor who is not science-fiction, it's horror and optimism and spiritual more than anything else, it's religious unto itself, the TARDIS is a haunted house and a church and a graveyard and a hospital and the Doctor is the most haunted being in the universe but more than anything, this is a love story, because how can you love something without being haunted by it- hey, what are you doing?

My date, shoving breadsticks in their purse: I have to go-

[doodlepede]

hey Rain World fans. I'm gonna show you a lore interpretation that I personally have never seen anyone talk about except myself. If you know me as Sliverist, then you know what's up.

Everyone knows the first five Karma glyphs represent the so-called Five Natural Urges. Violence, reproduction, trade and social connection, eating, and self preservation. People generally believe the next Karma glyphs before the tenth are meaningless, but this is WRONG. Understanding this revelation requires seeing the big picture, which I will guide you through.

Rain World really likes to blur the line between organic and inorganic, with the most obvious example being the Iterators themselves, these biomechanical superstructures whose function in large part is outsourced to their "microbe strata" (Purple SL pearl), but it goes even further, into the very world design.

Five Pebbles' internal structure resembles a brain with its many sections all divided into specific regions with specific purposes. His chamber makes the resemblance even more obvious, where you can clearly see the brainstem.

Within Five Pebbles' dark interior swim swarms of colorful neurons which turn white in broad daylight, each one a carrier of information. Often, they are brushed along by cilia lining the computer halls.

The Void Sea writhes with a swarm of beings enormous beyong reckoning which closely resemble real neurons. The void worm that takes interest in the slugcat uses a dendrite to make a tether to drag the slugcat to its final destination.

As the slugcat swims and swims, it is joined by countless many just like it, and together they swim toward the light, referred to in the code as "TheEgg" (VoidSeaScene.cs)

This is the table of Karma, showing every level above Five. Doesn't it look rather like..

dividing cells being crossed out?

In Rain World, birth and life, cognition and enlightenment, death and ascension are all inextricably connected concepts. You might even say they're connected in a cycle. The imagery and themes are rich and complete, integrated fully into the world. This is even without mentioning the voidspawn which also resemble sperm, swimming to the same place. This is why Ascension is the best ending :artiyoy:

[maryrouille]

Toxic romanticization of studying

In a word of introduction, my profile partly shows that studying and exploring is wonderful. But as a person involved in science*, I would like to show healthy and true patterns of this beautiful adventure in acquiring knowledge.

The inspiration for writing this post this time was not the phenomenon from Tumblr (although you can also observe it here), but from Pinterest. There you can come across cycles composed of quotes and photos whose aim is to motivate young girls to learn, succeed and get good grades. These images often also show examples of characters from movies, TV series or real life that you can aspire to be like. Overall, I have to agree that it really works! But I would like to draw attention to certain elements that need to be verified.

1. You shouldn't get up at 5am

First of all, the correct amount of sleep is one of the most important factors affecting the proper and effective functioning of our brain. During sleep, nerve cells regenerate, organize information acquired during the day and consolidate memory traces, which is directly related to learning. Lack of sleep increases impulsivity, deepens negative thinking and slows down the body's reaction time!

2. You can be a genius without good grades

Of course, good grades are a pleasant confirmation of our knowledge and praise for hard work. However, sometimes it is worth considering whether the structure of exams themselves, especially those with closed questions, affects the results. We often study for one specific exam, the knowledge of which may be very… limited and sometimes not useful, so it is worth prioritizing the topics that we study hard.

3. It's not cool to think you're better than others

We are different and have different priorities in life. It is also worth considering how many people escape from the rat race and start a slow, stress-free life. So we have to agree that judging people based on grades or responses under stress (sic!) is not cool.

The good thing about romanticizing studying

As I have already said, these types of collages are really motivating. So let's talk about what's great about them and what's worth highlighting and saving for later.

1. Knowledge is beautiful, but your outfit and surroundings can also be

We know that we should never judge a book by its cover, but… the issue of social perception painfully confirms that we do and will continue to do so because this is how our brains work. And isn't it nice when someone looks at us and thinks this girl is so classy?

Moreover, a nice outfit that makes us feel good gives us a lot of self-confidence. There are also many studies confirming the positive impact on motivation and concentration of a neat and aesthetic workplace.

2. Not just cramming, but also discovering

Broadening your horizons is easier with passion and real commitment. And to achieve this, the topics must really interest us. Not everyone has yet found something that they are extremely passionate about in science, so that is why you have to dig deeper and discover different areas.

3. Don't be afraid to use your knowledge in practice

Schools and universities, unfortunately, have their own rules and they do not always allow you to show your 100% potential. Thus, share your knowledge with others externally, write essays, blog and social media. This form of activity also makes you learn things faster and easier. In addition, contacts with others will expand your knowledge.

Therefore, I must say that it is worth choosing your inspirations carefully. Nothing helps you enjoy studying better than a clear head and lack of prejudices.

*This post was inspired by my own experience with studying. If anyone is interested, I think I can share my mistakes that did not help me in an academic adventure :)

[batnip]

Reversed Karma AU

A Rainworld Alternate Universe.

...

 The.. triple affirmative has been found- the affirmative that a ..solution has been found, the affirmative that the..solution is portable, and the affirmative that technical implementation is possible and generally applicable.

I remember that cycle... ancients swarmed the stuff, only privilege given to the founder, Sliver of Straw, was leaving us first.

And then cycle by cycle, our parents left..

Spoilered for absurd about of text, and general spoilers.

Saint never wanted to ascend anything. And by the time every last ancient was dead and gone, cycles passed, and structures fell. The green fuzzy thing was not once fuzzy, growing a coat as the rain sent by iterators stopped.

- - So it trailed along, guilty for what was not its fault, bringing iterators to life again. With a new name, [Pilgrim].

-- Footnote : Karma needs are reversed with the Pilgrim. Dying will up their karma, surviving will lower it. Secret passages will be added to cross gates you cannot with low karma, as it is needed to progress. =======================================

Rivulet is an odd case. I wanted them to obviously give rarefaction cells, as they did to Moon originally. So the tale goes they were created by a rebellious, younger Ancient who was fond of life and the cycle. One who refused the common ideals.

-- The swift little mouse they created, was given their own ability to create low-density rarefaction cells (singularity bombs) and refine them into more high-quality cells which the Ancient learned themself.

-- As soon as the news was spread to the general public of the triple affirmative, they sent the [Technician] out into the world, wearing several pearls describing their mission. ===========

Monk and Survivor lived with their colony, and were sent to scout a new home for the colony by the [Mapmaker]. They are named [Guard] and [Scout] in Reversed Karma. They brought Scout's two slugpups with them, even if the journey was dangerous, finding a new home for Scout pups was important to both Scout and their Sibling.

-- They find the tree in journey's end, Guard staying with the pups there as Scout tells the rest of the colony, including the leader, Mapmaker.

-- Footnote: Monk still brings Moon her cloak and several pearls. =========================================

The [Mapmaker] replaces Gourmand in Reversed Karma, making a map for their colony to follow. They are the leader of their colony.

-- Very similar to vanilla, leaving current living to the tree, showing the colony to the new home.

-- Footnote : Rain is beginning to return to normal, without cold mechanic. =====================================

The [Traveler] replaces Hunter in Reversed Karma, created by Five Pebbles to check on the local group. They spawn in the grounds of Unparralled Innocence. They do not have the Rot due to Five Pebbles more careful creation of a purposed organism compared to No Significant Harrassment.

-- Footnote : Cold mechanics are in work in these areas, as UI and CW were revived later than LTTM and FP.

-- Footnote : You may optionally visit Chasing Wind. ==========

The [Mother] replaces Artificer in Reversed Karma. Their slugpups are both alive, with the same explosive quality. They give Pebbles back his cloak and become a citizen after Sofanthiel locks onto them.

-- Footnote : Mother has bad reputation with scavengers due to passing tolls without payment before the campaign. They get a backspear due to one less hand slot having two pups.

-- Footnote : Rain has returned to normal.

-- Footnote : Mother has reduced food needs compared to vanilla Artificer due to needing to feed their pups. ===============

The [Messenger] replaces Spearmaster in Reversed Karma. They were created by Seven Red Suns to send messages between them and their friends, similar to [Traveler]'s check-ins with other iterators.

-- Footnote : Messenger has a mouth, and cannot duel wield spears.

================================================

A note from the OP: I hope you like them.. I've been wanting to show them off for a while. One of my headcannons for iterators was that the natural urges are coded into them with anti-ascension stuff. Like. Make ascension for us, but not for you. This is why they were wildly unsuccessful in finding the triple affirmative. Also.. Tumblr nuked quality of my image :c If u read all this and liked it perhaps a rb?? also hehe funny number thank u all

[hermitcraftx]

Actually, no, I'm not done talking about the Minecraft Movie. I'm so incredibly angry about what could have been. Rant incoming, sorry to any and all witnesses. All ye who enter here abandon all hope.

The Lego Movie was a good movie because it was an homage to animators and the community it had built up during the years, was genuinely very well animated and had good plot points despite maintaining its humor, and was a good watch to people who didn't even like Legos. It did have a couple big name actors placed in there to draw views (i.e. Will Ferrell) but for the most part the movie was completely animated with very sparse real life moments that worked very well to tie into the narrative the movie was creating. You're a little kid and the world is so big and angry and full of structure, and you just want to create the things you want to see without being told what to do. Emmett is an ordinary guy told he's special as a lie to get him to comply with what Vitruvius wanted, the same way he complied with orders his entire life, and he defeated that cycle of thinking by showing kindness despite his terrible treatment, unlike Lord Business (i.e. Will Ferrell). It worked astoundingly well to create something that ticked a lot of boxes: narratively sound, incredibly pleasing to look at, funny, and capable of handling serious topics despite being a Kid's Movie.

The Minecraft Movie... does none of that. There are no well placed homages or tributes to a loving community that has been built up for well over a decade. There are no callbacks to Minecraft animations, to any of the Minecraft covers that were a staple of early Minecraft, no references or respects paid to anybody that has been a big name in the community. For fuck's sake, they didn't even put Herobrine is. Herobrine is, to be frank, the most basic Minecraft reference they could have input into this movie as a subtle nod to the community that almost everyone would have understood, and I remain disappointed.

The art style isn't respectful of Minecraft animators at all, instead vaguely resembling AI slop where they tasked it to make Minecraft in real life with realistic shader packs as the references. To be quite frank, it is a spit in the face of almost every creative person in the community. It's disrespectful to the animators, the parody creators, the modpack creators (highly unlikely but I really hope they get in deep shit for using some of them as references, because it's almost uncanny how similar they look), the Minecraft content creationists, everybody. I know they let a scant few Minecraft youtubers on set, but still.... no well hidden easter eggs? No CaptainSparklez logo? No Yogscast? No EthosLab tnt slab? Not even any of the newer youtubers that have made the Minecraft scene up for the past several years. (Not talking about the green guy, god, no, I'm very grateful for that in fact. But nobody at all? Seriously?) I get that it's a MINECRAFT movie, not a Minecraft youtuber movie, and is supposed to be well-digestible for the average audience that isn't familiar with Minecraft, but there are very easy ways to implement this. Most people would at the very least be happy to see a couple seconds of community references, regardless of what they were. Again, NO HEROBRINE? What the fuck are the Warner Bros doing.

There appears to be no strong structural narrative that ties into the base game either, despite there being a... relatively straightforward way to implement one? Look, man, the game literally has objectives for you, despite being relatively sandbox. You spawn in, you chop wood, mine for diamonds, and fight monsters, you go to the Nether, you beat the dragon. The piglins as an element outside of the Nether don't make sense as gameplay wise they zombify, which has been mentioned a lot, true, but I haven't seen ANYONE mention that they could just... I don't know... Go to the fucking Nether!? Why is the plot line being pulled from Minecraft Legends, a game that everyone thought was boring and forgot about instantly? Why are Mojang and Microsoft trying so hard to branch out from base game Minecraft? So far it looks to just be a bullshit poorly carried out isekai movie with a bunch of big name actors, one liners, shitty quips and "he's right behind me isn't he"s. There's no SERIOUS plot beat at all, not even getting a feeling that this might be any more than "uh oh, they're stuck in Minecraft and piglins are trying to kill them!"

The CGI is terrible. Just incredibly poorly implemented. The people look gigantic at the start and it's not immersed at all, it genuinely looks like some of the worst green screen work I've ever seen. They look like they're standing on a rug.

I don't know. It just makes me incredibly angry. There's a deep lack of understanding and appreciation for the game, and that sounds childish, but I think it is decently imperative to at least understand the basics of Minecraft before you make a game on it. Most people under the age of 30 understand at least a little bit about Minecraft, and if they don't, it is your job to make it enjoyable for them! You can make a story about a man that washes up in a strange world and goes to kill a dragon. Everyone can understand that. That's a very basic story that we've been milking for literally hundreds of fucking years. Nothing in the trailer resembles Minecraft at ALL, it was genuinely unrecognizable and alien to me when I first saw it. The trailers don't have a strong resemblance to Minecraft either, but it's there, and they could have honestly just based it off mostly the trailers and that would have been better? Making the movie fully animated would have given it charm and appealed to kids in the same way, and they could have pulled a Lego Movie and done an in person sequence with Jack Black at some point. I don't know. I don't understand a single cinematic decision in making this film.

A lot of people wanted a deep somber animated film about Steve exploring the loneliness and solitude of the world he's in, trying to thrive and create in spite of that, and while I agree that would be incredible, there is just no universe where that would happen in. But that doesn't mean this is excusable. There are so many better ways to execute and implement the ideas that would do well in big theater for a kid's game and it looks like they spat on those ideas and put them in a blender. It's almost comical how bad the movie is: and such a huge, SAD fucking jump from Warner Bros blowing it out of the water with the Barbie Movie last year. My young cousin finds the pink sheep scary and wanted me to turn it off when we showed it to her. There is truly no audience that I feel this appeals to in a meaningful way, and I hope it flops like Morbius. I hope Microsoft and Warner Bros go bankrupt from this.

All in all, it's a terrible example of a game that has been near and dear to a lot of people's hearts and a significant portion of a lot of people's childhoods and makes a mockery of the people that enjoy it, I feel. It's like if The Mario Movie and Jumanji had a terrible, terrible baby. Unless their plan was to get so much negative attention that hoardes of people go to hate watch it, I have no fucking idea who the hell let any of this be released to the public.

Don't go watch it. Don't give these people your money. Demand better for your community and your fans. Hold Microsoft and Warner Bros accountable for bad quality. Microsoft has been a fucking nightmare since... forever, really, but Mojang has really suffered under their iron fist rule for a long time now. Microsoft has been trying to push Mojang to other games and Mojang, due to Microsoft's restrictions, is unable to function as it's own entity anymore. Any drama with updates? Updates too long? Missing out on content from certain updates? Caused by the copyright being owned by Microsoft. Make no mistake, I'm not defending Mojang, they aren't a small little indie company like they say they are- they're owned by one of the biggest goddamn companies in the world. Microsoft has been working on this movie for a goddamn decade and has been working on this concept specifically for almost four years, and this is what they came up with? It's nightmarish. Knowing them they'll try and push it onto the people that actually play the game too, god forbid.

Don't let them ruin our game. Don't give them your money. Watch something worth your time.

[amorphousbl0b]

Arcane does a fun thing with its narrative Darkest Hour.

Or: yet another post about how insanely smart this show is and how absolutely genius its writers are (and how jealous of them I am).

For the uninitiated, the Darkest Hour is the moment just before the climax in which the heroes are at their lowest point. When the Avengers are scattered and Loki opens the portal in NYC, when the Falcon has escaped the Death Star but lost Obi-Wan, when the Fire Nation is set to annihilate the Earth Kingdom, when Frodo fails to destroy the Ring at the Crack of Doom. The heroes must confront their flaws and change for the better for a happy ending.

Arcane’s darkest hour is, of course, in Act 3. One might place it at the very end of episode 9, and that’s certainly where the story is at its most hopeless. But I’d contend it starts as early as the end of episode 8 and carries on through the entirety of episode 9.

After all, that’s when Caitlyn and Vi have separated, lost all hope, and Cait is kidnapped by Jinx. Jinx’s mind is fully gone and throughout the episode everything falls apart around her. Silco is losing control of his chembarons and may well have lost his daughter, the thing most precious to him, and is only barely keeping his powerful façade in line. Zaun has realized how ridiculously outmatched they are in a war with Piltover and the revolutionary cause has become almost impossible. Viktor has manslaughtered his assistant and may never be cured. Jayce has manslaughtered a child and finally realizes how quickly he’s losing his morals. Mel and her mother are fully separating and she is struggling with her warlike destiny. Sevika gets the absolute snot beat out of her and limps to an empty office without a boss.

So yeah. Lot of personal Darkest Hours going on.

“But what’s the interesting thing?” I hear you ask in my ear. I don’t know why I hear you. Shut up. I’m writing. Are you even real?

Excuse me.

Arcane’s interesting twist on the Darkest Hour lies in part of the trope that I didn’t mention. That’s in the villain.

Most stories with a clear-cut villain have a plot structure something like this:

Whether things are going well for one side is inversely proportional to the other. During the Darkest Hour, when the hero is at their weakest, the villain is at their most dominant.

Wait… isn’t Silco the villain of Arcane? Not to be too blunt, but he’s having a shit time. Things are falling apart for him just as badly as for everyone else.

That's the trick. Caitlyn and Vi are suffering. Jinx is suffering. Silco is suffering. Jayce is suffering. Viktor is suffering. Zaun as a whole is suffering. There is only one party in the whole story that isn't suffering, that actually is benefitting from this horrid state of affairs...

EKKO AND HEIMERDINGER

Kidding. They're not really a part of this dance. A big part of Arcane's theming is that acting to help people without an agenda is simply more virtuous than fighting for any invariably-flawed nation that innately perpetuates the cycle of violence.

No, the side that is doing fine is the other that is conspicuously absent from my two prior lists. While the characters that make up its leadership are experiencing personal Darkest Hours, the organization itself is essentially on top of the world, having just scored a huge victory and getting set to bring the war to an end before it even begins. I mentioned how poor the situation for the Undercity looks, but not its counterpart.

Piltover.

Wasn't it so that Piltover started this whole mess? Didn't their oppression cause the revolt that orphaned Vi and Powder's parents? Isn't it their actions that drive Silco to ever greater extremes? Isn't it their normalized political backstabbing that causes Jayce to sacrifice his principles because that's the only way to get ahead? Isn't it their corrupt police force that lets Silco operate his drug empire with impunity?

Silco might look the part. He might be the most personally evil character, might be the one who causes the most misery for our main protagonists Vi and Powder.

But structurally, the shining city of Piltover, its political machine, and its Enforcers are the actual villains of Arcane.

[gerogerigaogaigar]

Phineas and Ferb fascinates me from a structural standpoint. I'll admit I haven't watched the show front to back, but I've caught the odd episode here and there and I certainly get the gist of it.

The first time I saw P&F it seemed charming but unremarkable, the second and probably third time it became obvious that it was a clever but formulaic show. At some point it clicked. Children's shows are usually formulaic, Dee Dee will destroy Dexter's invention, Elmer Fudd will fail to hunt the Wabbit, He-Man will defeat Skeletor, and Sisyphus will roll that boulder up that hill. Phineas and Ferb asks not just that we imagine Sisyphus happy, but that we imagine that he is ecstatic to see that boulder roll down the hill.

Where the status quo is an unspoken rule of older cartoons it is the explicit law of the P&F universe. There is a roadmap to every episode, you probably already know it but I will spell it out regardless. Phineas will say the phrase "I know what we're gonna do today" thus kicking off their project for the episode. Candace will try and fail to get them "busted". There will be a musical number. Meanwhile Doofenshmirtz will have made an -inator that Perry will be called upon to destroy. Perry will get caught, Doofenshmirtz will explain his plan, Perry will escape, destroy the -inator and the ensuing chaos will clean up Phineas and Ferb's backyard shenanigans just in time for their mom to get home. Ferb says something at the very end, often his only line in the whole episode. The end.

There are stock lines that must be said. "I know what we're gonna do today" "I wonder where Perry is" "Busted" "🎵Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated🎶". The show doesn't just have a cartoon status quo, the universe operates off of the laws of cartoon status quo to the extent that characters actively notice when the cycle doesn't complete correctly. The characters seemingly know that their world operates on cartoon physics, but to them it's just physics. In P&F a giant whirlwind carrying away a giant backyard amusement park is as natural as gravity.

Candace's place as the character who knows this is all insane must be a tortuous existence considering the whole world is conspired against her. Not out of a cosmic meanness but a deep thematic kindness. Candace is the only character whose intent is to cause purposeful harm and the universe will not let her get away with it.

Truly this is one of the most unerringly kind shows I've ever seen. It is unreal how much faith it puts into wordplay, running jokes, and raw absurdity to carry itself while never stepping into the realm of cartoon cruelty.

You know cartoon cruelty. It's why Tom gets punished for Jerry's actions and why the Trix rabbit can never eat his own damn cereal. At its best cartoon cruelty manifests as Ed, Edd n Eddy or the Looney Tunes short Duck Amok where there is catharsis in seeing the characters hoisted by their own petard. At its worst you get CatDog which is so intensely cruel to the character of Cat that I can't comprehend what the writers were going for.

The confident lack of irony is part of what makes Phineas And Ferb work. The show is a parade of cartoon cliches and dad jokes and it never it never winks at the viewer or lampshades how silly this is. It just has absolute faith that the corniest jokes ever really are that funny. And so they are. I actually laugh out loud every time they do the "Aren't you a little young for this?" "Yes, yes I am" bit. Maybe it's the delivery, maybe it's just the confidence in the bit. Probably a bit of both. I am smiling to myself just thinking of this dumb running joke.

But what this all amounts to is what every bit of fandom wankery amounts to. I am of course talking about shipping. For my money the best bit in the show is the romantic framing of Doofenshmirtz and Perry's rivalry. This is where the show's cartoon logic and unrepentant kindness synthesize perfectly. The homoerotic undertones of the spy/supervillain dynamic are an extremely tired observation and are usually only emphasized in an ironic sense to poke fun at pieces that never intended the gay subtext. P&F flips this joke by not being even a little bit ironic about it, but still adhering to the unspoken nature of the gag.

The end result is that Perry and Doofenshmirtz's status as a romantic couple is tacitly understood to be part of the shows status quo, but never commented on. The world of P&F is too inherently kind to be homophobic (homophobia being a key component of the joke) but it still has a joke shaped hole to fill. So it does the funniest possible thing and fills the hole with nothing. The joke is the lack of a joke. The expectation of a joke that is met with a shrug from the show's own internal logic. And that's really funny. An evil scientist and a platypus are in a loving relationship that happens to also be a hero/villain rivalry. Don't worry about it. It's not the weirdest thing happening in the tri state area I promise.

[tododeku-or-bust]

do you think this is a justified take? do you think “white feminism” could be another brand of misogyny? https://x.com/anamorphisis/status/1817222026119327908?s=46

This is a stupidly racist take lmao, and is very much a part of how White Feminism functions. I would highly suggest Hood Feminism by Mikki Kendall and White Tears/Brown Scars by Ruby Hamad, as well as listening to literally any Black and Brown woman on the topic of how White Feminism impedes the rest of us.

White Feminism (oversimplified) is white women with access to white privilege putting forth issues that affect them as "all women's issues". It's them thinking that we're all on the same page, at the same starting line with the same problems and solutions... and we're not. Because even amongst women, whiteness puts them at an advantage (and therefore a lack of perspective) over the rest of us.

And rather than confronting that, they'll accuse you of hating "women" (notice who gets defined as a woman, here 👀), simultaneously taking advantage of the very victimization complex set up by the WHITE PATRIARCHY (that they're supposed to be fighting!!) to show that they are the REAL victims. It'll never bring down the white patriarchy bc it depends on the very same whiteness for its own structure. It's why white women voted for Trump despite EVERYTHING; bc "white" holds more value than "woman".

As for this tweet, what I'm guessing is that she's saying that we can feel bad for both women, and that's true... But the reality is that I am not about to feel as bad for a millionaire white woman as victims of genocide using scraps for their menstrual cycle. Because far more people have dragged their feet about the latter. And the fact that I am being told that these struggles are equivalent and that I'm "hating on women" for not doing so is preposterous.

But yes. White Feminism is useless, and anyone who wants you to "not use it" to discuss the difference between white women and women of color is useless as well. 👍🏾

[lichpassing]

How would a c singer sew or do some other very precise job? can u show that?

To start, I think it's important to point out how they manipulate anything at all.

Cs don't have arms, we know this, but they do have overly complicated pseudomouths! The main manipulators that are part of it are the dark green patches at the corner of their mouth.

They work a lot like snail eyes, and their default position is retracted, but when they're in use they look like this!

It's almost entirely muscle, save for the chitin based "skeleton" in the hand for structure. While it is not very strong, it does the job, especially with precise tasks. There is one on each side, along with the pseudo-tongue within the pseudomouth (I will be saying pseudo a lot). When retracted, the whole thing tucks into special groves in the pseudomouth.

These indents serve a secondary purpose, also, and its allowing them to do THIS!!

This position is what lets them do precise work of all kinds! They need to use assistive devices for a lot of tasks, but for sewing specifically, they get by just fine without them.

Here's a visual example of how they would go about it, it's rough but I hope it gets the idea across.

and then the cycle repeats!

I wanted to draw assistive devices but I have already taken longer than I would like to answer this ask, I might come back with some examples later down the line. Basically, they're mostly stuff attached to parts of the snout to hold the fabric more firmly, which is useful for more refined stitching or embroidery.

[octuscle]

Id love to become a hot Asian bodybuilder. if its not too much trouble?

Mate, that's a no-brainer. I have a pretty cool preset that I'll send you.

Yeah, that's smoking hot, isn't it? I think you can be very happy with it. If you want to make some adjustments, you can adjust the attributes in the "Active Preset" menu item.

Yes, you are satisfied. You can hardly get enough of your reflection. But somehow you are jealous of the big lads in the gym. So you reach for the Chronivac and set the muscle mass to "Like the biggest lad in the gym". And "Less fluffy" for hairstyle. And "More body hair".

An Asian hunk, as it is written in the book. A few side effects are already showing. You start to smell like sweat and musk. And your cock is also the biggest in the room. Fuck yeah, we're getting close…. You go to Mindset and change it to "Addicted to the Gym". Your head empties. And for that you know everything about nutrition and training cycles. About the right supplements. And about the winners of the big tournaments of the last 20 years. Your hairstyle is self-cut. Visits to the hairdresser only cost unnecessarily precious training time. And tops are only worn by losers who can't afford to show off their upper body.

Your Korean has already become very simple in structure. But your foreign language skills are even worse. You start to have problems with the menu navigation. With muscles you enter "big much much big". Your muscles swell. You start having problems washing all over your body. You smell like a locker room. And you are as dumb as toast. But you are much much big.

You need to go to the bathroom urgently. Shit and fart. The problem because you eat all the time. You take off your pants and see the reflection of your back in the all-round mirrored anteroom of the toilets. You let your pants down. Shit, you have legs like a beanpole, you think. Where is the Chronivac? And how does this damn thing work again? You can no longer cope with the menu in the foreign language. You're so angry, Hulk would turn green now. But you are bigger than Hulk. And you crush your cell phone.

The supervisor must point out to you that you have forgotten your pants. Hehehe. This happens to you more often. But you are much, much bigger! Enjoy it!

[ocean-sunfish-hater]

Hi,

I saw your post about barrel bugs and I wanted to ask if you know more interesting marine parasites?

(Personally I think that dendrogasters are quite cool)

Dendrogasters are pretty cool! I don't know much about them but they look really... odd.

ID: a picture of Dendrogaster showing its unsual body plan, with its branching structures that end in spherical growths. It is light yellow to orange in colour. It is set against a black background and part of a ruler can be seen.

There's a whole host (haha) of interesting marine parasites, and I won't go through all of them now but here's a few that you might like.

Rhizocephala are a parasitic group of barnacles that live on crabs. They have no internal organs except gonads, a few muscles and the remnants of a nervous system. In fact, their only distinguishable bodyy structure is the female reproductive organs, which sit outside of its host's body. Here's a really cool drawing of the filaments which it sends out into its host's body to absorb nutrients directly from their blood:

ID: a black and white drawing of a crab infected with the parasite Rhizocephala. It shows the underside of the crab with the externa (female gonads) visible and a network of filaments that the parasite has grown throughout the host body.

I'm sure you've heard of tongue lice, so I won't labour the point too much, but spark notes is that they attach to the gill arches or tongue of a fish, then cut off the circulation to the tongue so that it withers off. It then replaces the fish's tongue.

ID: an image of a tongue eating louse inside a fish's mouth. The louse is pale, almost white in colour and has two black eyes. The fish is like :O

Finally, this isn't a marine parasite but you'll see why I include it in a second, but the tongue worms (not to be confused with the tongue eating louse). They are actually terrestrial and mostly infect the respiratory tracts of vertebrates (sometimes, though very rarely, us). What I find interesting is that they have no circulatory, excretory or respiratory organs and rely soley on the host to do all these things. Isn't that cool?

ID: a drawing of a tongue worm (Pentastomida). It has a segmented body that ends in a point. At the other end there are 4 stubby limb-like structures.

If you're still reading , you might be wondering why I picked these ones and why the tongue worm is awkwardly shoved in there? Because @chowaniec I have tricked you; this is not a post about marine parasites, it's a post about the diversity of crustaceans. THAT'S RIGHT, ALL OF THESE ANIMALS, WITH THEIR WEIRD LIFE CYCLES AND UNCRUSTACEANY BODIES ARE COUSINS OF CRABS AND SHRIMP AND LOBSTERS. AND THAT INCLUDES YOUR ORIGINAL SUBMISSION OF DENDROGASTER, WHICH IS WHAT GAVE ME THIS IDEA IN THE FIRST PLACE.

All of these lil guys just have highly specialised bodies that have lost many of the features we associate with crustaceans so that they can be better parasites. It's really only though careful analysis of their lifecycles and genetics that we can even determine them to be crustaceans at all.

I wanted to showcase the immense diversity of crustaceans and the weird and wonderful flexiblity of evolution. I also wanted to show you why morphological criteria for classification fall short, even beyond the "coconuts are mammals" meme.

Thanks for the submission, and thanks for being patient with me! I know this one took a little while longer to receive but I hope it was worth it.

[thesiltverses]

Hi! Big fan. Wanted to ask-- how did yall develop the structure/audio style of the Silt Verses? Where did yall draw from? I love the show because it's one of the first really fresh, creative takes on the audio drama medium I've seen since Nightvale--your blending of diagetic & nondiagetic sound and dialog is very lucid and flowing; it's vivid and easy to follow *because* it's not so hung up on an in-universe explanation for why the audience can hear the characters and action. The montages especially are just exceptional.

Hi and thank you so much! The mix of diagetic sound, dialogue, narration, etc, has honestly been an evolving and organic aspect of the show rather than something that was drawn from a master-plan. We knew we wanted to do a full-cast audiodrama, but we'd never worked with actual sound design before, directly or indirectly (and we wanted to establish an intimate, confessional aspect to the storytelling that contrasted with the secrecy, lying, and spitefulness in Carpenter and Faulkner's initial exchanges) - hence the narrated segments, and we've dialled them up and down for various purposes as we've gone on.

The montages this season are, I think, more obviously and directly drawn from television; I'm a massive fan of the four-minute montage that closes out The Wire's season finale, which manages to cram in final glimpses of 15-20 protagonists and antagonists across a dozen different locations, demonstrating in a heartbeat who's managed to change their life for the better and who's repeating the same old cycles - while also underlining the fact that there's an entire vast world beyond the central cast, and life goes on there as well.

This is the kind of broad-scope, location-and-POV-jumping storytelling and worldbuilding that as far as I'm aware, we don't see very much of in audiodrama (I'd guess partly because audiodramas tend to focus in tightly on a few close characters, partly because creators understandably fear that the work will become incoherent or impossible to follow.)

But what's really interesting to me about that sequence is that while the montage is geared towards its own medium (including the very deliberate contrast between the silent conspiracies of the drug dealers and the noisy applause that greets the white-collar criminals and establishment figures), The Wire has previously worked to develop such a rich audio vocabulary that with a few tweaks, you really could make this scene work entirely without visuals.

We can already recognise the sounds of police brutality, corner boys yelling out the latest product, the horns of the cargo ships down at the docks, the smash of vials and the sound of running footsteps, we can hear the environmental shifts from a prison yard to a sterile office to the projects - and we can understand that these simple repeating SFX are conveying the central theme that nothing has changed in Baltimore but the players.

In other words, there's no reason you can't accomplish something as absurdly ambitious as that sequence in an audiodrama, so long as you've already done a good job of conveying the thematic and emotional significance of a few individual sounds to the audience - and I think that's really, really exciting for audio storytelling.

[alphynix]

Crystal Palace Field Trip Part 1: Walking With Victorian Monsters

The Crystal Palace Dinosaurs take their name from the original Crystal Palace, a glass-paned exhibition building originally constructed for a World's Fair in Hyde Park in 1851.

In 1854 the structure was relocated 14km (~9 miles) south to the newly-created Crystal Palace Park, and a collection of over 30 life-sized statues of prehistoric animals were commissioned to accompany the reopening – creating a sort of Victorian dinosaur theme park – sculpted by Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins with consultation from paleontologist Sir Richard Owen.

The Palace building itself burned down completely in 1936, and today only the ruins of its terraces remain in the northeast of the park grounds.

The Crystal Palace building then and now Left image circa 1854 (public domain) Right image circa 2011 by Mark Ahsmann (CC BY-SA 3.0)

Six sphinx statues based on the Great Sphinx of Tanis also survive up among the Palace ruins, flanking some of the terrace staircases. They fell into serious disrepair during the latter half of the 20th century, but in 2017 they all finally got some much-needed preservation work, repairing them and restoring their original Victorian red paint jobs.

———

…But let's get to what we're really here for. Dinosaurs! (…And assorted other prehistoric beasties!)

The "Dinosaur Court" down in the south end of the park still remains to this day, displayed across several islands in a man-made lake. Over the decades they've been through multiple cycles of neglect and renovation, and are currently cared for by the London Borough of Bromley (Crystal Palace Park Trust are due to take over custodial duties in September 2023), with promotion and fundraising assistance from organizations like Historic England and the Friends of the Crystal Palace Dinosaurs charity.

Just about 170 years old now, the Crystal Palace Dinosaurs represent fifteen different types of fossil creatures known to 1850s Victorian science, with only three actual dinosaur species featured. Although often derided for being outdated and very inaccurate by modern standards, they were actually incredibly good efforts at the time, especially taking into account that the field of paleontology was still in its very early days.

They also just have a lot of charm, with toothy grins and surprisingly dynamic poses.

Unfortunately on the day I visited in early August 2023 most of the statues were heavily obscured by plant growth, both on their islands and on the sides of the paths they can usually be viewed from. Since I'd seen images from about a month ago showing things being less overgrown, this was probably just some unlucky timing on my part coinciding with some explosive summer foliage growth.

The first island on the trail features a few Permian and Triassic animals which were only known from fragmentary remains in the 1850s. These "labyrinthodonts" were recognized as having similarities to both amphibians and reptiles, and so were depicted with boxy toothy jaws, warty skin, stumpy tails, and long frog-like back legs.

Today we'd call these particular animals temnospondyl amphibians, specifically Mastodonsaurus, and we know they were actually shaped more like giant salamanders with longer flatter crocodilian-like jaws, smaller legs, and long paddle-like tails.

———

Somewhere in the foliage beyond this specific "labyrinthodont" there was also supposed to be a pair of dicynodonts, but I couldn't see much of them at all and didn't manage to get a remotely visible photograph.

Crystal Palace Dicynodon when much less overgrown Left photo by London looks (CC BY 2.0) Right photo by Loz Pycock (CC BY SA 2.0)

These Dicynodon are depicted as looking like sabre-toothed turtles complete with shells. That was fairly speculative even for the time, but considering only their weird turtle-beaked-and-walrus-tusked skulls were known it was probably the best guess Hawkins and Owen had. Today we know these animals were actually synapsids related to modern mammals, but Victorian understanding considered them to be a type of reptile.

Modern reconstructions of dicynodonts have a slightly different face shape, along with squat pig-like bodies and semi-sprawling limbs. They may have had fur, but currently the only known actual skin impressions from the genus Lystrosaurus show leathery bumpy hairless skin.

———

Next time: the Jurassic and Cretaceous sculptures!

[syzygyzip]

The Soul Still Burns: Analysis of the Lords of Cinder (DS3)

What follows is a short essay on the Lords of Cinder from Dark Souls 3, exploring their symbolism on spiritual and metatextual levels. After that is a related reading of Slave Knight Gael, the final adversary of the Dark Souls trilogy.

The Lords of Cinder are in many ways the primary adversaries of Dark Souls 3. This title they share, “Lord of Cinder,” refers to a personage who has rekindled the first flame, keeping the cycle of light and dark going.

Cinder is a substance which continues to burn without the presence of fire but does not reduce to ash. So euphemistically, it seems that the Lords are somehow stuck in their process of purification, and the game suggests that the world is stuck along with them; this is why it is the Ashen One’s task to “set them upon their thrones”—to hurry them along and thus allow the world to follow its natural decline. As individual characters, each of these Lords represents a different attitude that complicates and prolongs the cycle.

Through these stubborn Lords the game is commenting on at least two things. On the metaphysical level, it reflects the Buddhist idea that certain attitudes keep people reincarnating over and over again, unable to extricate themselves from the material world of suffering (samsara). While on the metatextual level, the game is suggesting that certain attitudes keep players coming back to Dark Souls again and again, starting new games, making new builds and revisiting old files.

The idea there on the metaphysical side finds an easy analogy in Buddhist doctrine: the “three poisons,” the three root causes of suffering. These are hatred, greed, and delusion. What’s interesting is that these essential vices also fit pretty easily onto the different types of players that are being caricatured by the Lords. We’ll break these correspondences down in a second.

But First: Why Do They Correspond? So we have these sets of three. Three lords, three poisons in Buddhism, three types of Souls players. How convenient. When we analyze art, we sometimes ask, “Huh, is this structure really there, or am I projecting it into the material?” And if the structure is really there, baked into the work, that doesn’t mean that it’s due to developer intention. Archetypal forms sometimes show up in work via an unconscious influence, be it due to the cultural milieu, personal psychology, or some a priori biological disposition of the human being.

And the thing about Dark Souls is that it’s an unusually honest piece of art, in that its creative team allows their own free associations and intuitions to show up in the work without too much self-censorship or questioning. They make space for a mystery to show up on its own terms, and in leaving its riddles unanswered, there is more space for discovery by the people who play it.

It should also be said that cultural ideas persist for a reason. Beneath the ethics and ideology of the people who originally named the Buddhist “three poisons,” there may be something timeless, something perennially descriptive of human nature. If that is the case, then it would make sense for this same triplicity to unfurl itself in other cultural products. So for one reason or another, these three poisons, these addictions, show up diegetically in the characters and are also expressed in player psychology.

I say all this just because sometimes I feel very aware of the disconnect between much of Souls lore discourse and the broader field of mythological study. Since we are gamers first, there may be this tendency to want to “solve” the lore, but that’s not what we’re doing here. Myth functions because it elaborates our experience of the world through affective resonance; it attaches images and characters and stories which help us anchor our own prelinguistic impressions of the world, cultivating our sensitivity there.

Anyway, let’s look at these Lords.

Abyss Watchers Poison: Hatred The lore of the Abyss Watchers is pretty clear: they have an obsessive fixation on the abyss, and are ready to raze an entire town if they suspect abyssal encroachment. This obsession has literally possessed them, as they are now “abyss touched.” Gaze too much into the abyss, etc. They carry such strong contempt for the disavowed object that they don’t care what comes between it and their sword. This is clearly demonstrated by the fact that they are a brotherhood yet are unhesitatingly slaughtering themselves again and again. Hatred has made them blind, and has also caused them to resign their individuality (they are identical, mere instruments of a transpersonal grudge). They cannot die, their hatred keeps them locked in combat.

Type of Player: competitive | Interest: combat The Abyss Watchers are a representation of PvP addicts. They have no powers other than tenacity; they perform the same combos repeatedly. When you are really gripped by a PvP binge in Souls, you often end up doing the same thing again and again. The fight takes place in a mausoleum, on top of many chambers filled with human remains. The fact that this boss fight is instructional about combat, specifically about looking for tells (a cloud of dust always signifies the end of their combos) might be another clue. There is no limit to how good you get at Souls PvP; every foe is an opportunity to improve timing and strategy. You can just keep stacking anonymous bodies under yourself.

Aldrich Poison: Greed Aldrich invokes the concept of supremacy many times: he is in the supreme area from Dark Souls 1; in the supreme boss room of that area; he wears as a crown the former supreme lord of that area. This is because he devours lords; he tries to take prestige upon himself through acquisition and incorporation—greed.

Type of Player: completionist | Interest: content Aldrich is a commentary on completionist players. He is someone who “plays the game to death”, acquiring every object, reaching every achievement, devouring the soul of the game through taking everything into himself. He becomes bloated by consuming as much of the game’s content as possible. The old God whose likeness he has adopted is Gwyndolin, who was, in narrative terms, the one pulling the strings in the land of the Gods. And in gameplay terms, he is a secret boss. So on both counts we have someone who is elusive, and exists more or less at the boundary of the gameworld. When a player tries to see every last little morsel of a game, they become somewhat like Gwyndolin, a manipulator of a virtual world. If you know too much about a game, you have the risk of being less immmersed.

Yhorm Posion: Delusion In Buddhism, the poison of delusion secretly underlies the other two poisons, as the impulse toward hatred and greed are ultimately born of some false view about reality. This is akin to how the profaned capital sits below the rest of the kingdoms. To beat Yhorm you essentially have to “play pretend” with him, picking up a fake super-weapon, or fighting alongside Siegward, a knight who appears to be somewhat deluded about the state of the world, enthralled in the same fantasy as Yhorm himself.

Type of Player: lore researcher | Interest: meaning The profaned capital is full of statues—fixed images of myth; and empty goblets—treasures with no utility. Not to mention the area with the swamp which is full of symbolic imagery, but serves no narrative or mechanical purpose. The entire profaned capital challenges us to make sense of it; it is the ultimate temptation of lorekeepers in DS3. It throws at us a disproportionate amount of reference to DS2, which is famous among Souls players as the least thematically sensible Souls game. The Greatshield of Glory is found right outside Yhorm’s room, in a conspicuous room full of treasure, and yet it is a very impractical shield and offers very little lore value. If a lore-minded player picks it up, it directs them to a legendary personage from the War of Giants, which raises far more questions than it answers. The same is true of much of this area—the Eleanora, the Monstrosities, the Profaned Flame itself—they are all there to get you to speculate. These are the players who come to Souls games again and again, trying to find the “ultimate meaning.” They seek the grail, claim to find it, and then chuck in a pile with the others.

Yhorm's story also imitates the primordial Artorias myth: forsaking his shield in preservation of something more valuable. Other than that Yhorm is largely a cipher when it comes to biography, with a void for a face, which itself epitomizes what must remain at the center of mythology and storytelling: mystery.

Sit Down and Seek Guidance So we have the three reasons that people become fixated on Souls: the combat, the achievements, and the mystery. But there is a fourth lord of cinder boss, who is conceptually apart from these three: the Lothric Twins. They represent yet another kind of person who must keep playing Dark Souls: the developers. Lothric is striving to produce “a worthy heir,” a proper sequel to Dark Souls 1. The Princes are bound to their chamber as the developers are bound to their project, as that is their curse—“but you may rest here too, if you like.” In this context we can see their duality as the dual nature of having to work on the game and also play it to death. The privilege and the loftiness of the promise of a great piece of art (Lothric), and also having to go back "into the trenches" of the work itself (Lorian). Notably, neither of them can walk, they just teleport around. They are stuck at work, trying to bring the new world into being. Also I can’t go this whole essay without mentioning the obvious: that the Ashen One is bringing Lords to their thrones, and we players and developers have to assume our little chairs and couches when we access this world.

Playing Beyond the Point of Pleasure Of course the most extreme example of someone stubbornly remaining in the world no matter what is Slave Knight Gael. He is looking for pigment, which seems to be a euphemism for the substance of humanity (the Dark Soul). He wants to give it to the painter, the world-creator, so that a new world can be made. He is willing to indulge in a wasteland of abject violence for as long as it takes in order to renew something. Ironic that he is probably only prolonging the current world in his obsessive drive to recycle it faster.

Let’s examine the relationship between the figure of the painter and her relationship to Gael. That she is a spiritual entity is obvious: we never see her touch the ground, she is always in an upper room and lifted on a piece of furniture. Among other things, she is a clear metaphor for life springing eternally. A creative child who continues to paint despite kidnapping and imprisonment. She is the heart of the painted world, itself a place that symbolizes the idea of the representation of reality.

I want to make sure this is clear, because it is a bit of a kaleidoscope to consider. Any subject in Dark Souls stands for many things, but something that the painted world specifically represents is the very concept of representation. So of course the places in our imaginations are painted worlds, but so is this physical world of appearance, the maya of mundane reality. Not to mention that a work of art is a painted world, and the game we’re discussing is a painted world. When a work of art is able to recreate itself in itself, we can see this funny effect of mirrors reflecting mirrors infinitely. This results in seemingly inexhaustible symbolic content—there is so much potential to find meaning and create connections. Because Moby Dick represents a work of literature; the Tempest represents a play; Twin Peaks represents a TV show, these works can offer extensive insights not only into their medium but into the nature of reality. In these and other examples, the representation of the medium within the work may or may not be a single subject, but since Dark Souls is formally a game about levels and level design, the painted world is the heart of its self-reflexivity. The painted world can be pointed to as the summary of this fractal device. And the personification of that device, its ambassador to the player, is the painter.

The miracle or divine child is also an archetype familiar to us from Lothric, in their struggle to produce the “worthy heir.” Reality seeks salvation through the appearance of grace. They want it in a clear, incontestable form—to be able to point at it and say, "thank goodness we went through all that, because look, now here is the meaning, here is that which validates all that came before." In the world of Dark Souls 3 the religion of the masses is the Lothric stuff; meanwhile knowledge of the painted world is much more obscure. Lothric’s religion is obviously regulated and hierarchical, while Gael’s devotion to the painter is highly personal and private: he carries around a scrap of painting; he prostrates to a hidden idol in a small chapel; he considers the painter his family. He is emotionally close to the object of his worship.

But whether it’s Lothric or Ariandel, they are anticipating the divine child to redeem the world. As an archetype, the child ultimately represents surprise. The possibility of being delighted by life in its creative novelty. The child as an archetype appears in our own behavior when we do something without any sort of contrivance or mental interference, doing something in the world which doesn’t seem to have come from who we conceive ourselves to be. This is miraculous. Such an action enchants the world, and there is no explaining it, even if it may weave all kinds of stories around itself, retroactively framing things that have led up to it as portents or promises. (Though not exclusive to him, this trait is well-known in characterizations of Christ, and DS3 is clearly indebted to Christian iconography, so do with that what you will). Regardless of the specific cultural invocation, the divine child is a personification of something that happens within the human spirit. TFW you are renewed by a fresh and spontaneous engagement with life.

The grace of the miraculous often comes to us through play. Play is more of an attitude than an activity; the feeling of play may come to us through making a painting, or chatting with a friend, or moving around in a video game. We can play video games idly, competitively, experimentally, creatively, studiously, whatever, the feeling of “play” can show up regardless. We can sit there playing a certain game from a certain motivation, and feel totally rote and joyless, and question, “Why am I doing this?” Or we might sit there and play the same game with the same motivation, feeling totally lit up by it, its purpose to us obvious and self-validating. We are not even questioning why we are doing it, we are enjoying life.

This is really the ground that the miraculous tends to land on. Grace, meaning, and an immanent love of life are more likely to show up when we are in flow and not exercising our capacity for self-assessment. But like everything in life, we mistake the images and objects around us for the feeling of grace. Any given object might only be the catalyst once; it’s not about the object. This is extremely easy to see in cases of acute nostalgia; adults chase enchantment through collecting Zelda memorabilia or going to Disneyland, in pursuit of what kindled their spirit as a child. It was never really the game or the character that was doing it, it was what they were able to access within themselves.

So anyway Gael has yet to realize this. He thinks the Dark Soul is out there in something else. That it will be yielded as a drop if he just kills the right enemy, or 10,000 enemies, or goes to the right place at the right time. You can see that this is something of a synthesis of all the other Buddhist defilements: there are elements of completionism/greed, violence/hatred, mysticism/delusion. There is even the suggestion of the developer of these games again, in that Gael is a “slave,” forced into participation in the world to assist some creative apotheosis. (Isn’t it funny that his weapon is a worn-down executioner’s sword?—whether the person coding or the person playing, we are all “executing” command after command). The thing that really keeps him on the wheel is something beyond any of the player types and their vices; it is almost some sort of pure, amoral automatism, a churning drive that on one side resembles wanton nihilism, and on another side single-minded piousness. Is one disguised as the other, or has Gael somehow stepped beyond this binary? Yet another dichotomy in Dark Souls that begs to be reconciled, but whose tension creates the opportunity to participate creatively in its expansive mythology. When things are held apart we can move between them.

To really understand Gael, we have to contend with the question of a person’s relationship to their own soul, since that relationship is so plainly suggested by Gael and the painter. (This question, by the way, is much elaborated in Elden Ring, with its repeated foregrounding of the image of the maiden or “consort”). If we were to see Gael and the painter as partitions within one person--whether she is his soul, or his inner life, or his better nature, whatever—then in any case Gael is the side which goes out into the world and experiences it. He is the creative extension into the world as its active participant and realizer. Yet he is clothed as the warrior, the executioner. While the one who is dressed as the artist, the painter, just stays in her room and imagines the world—but this is where the magic of creation is really felt. We involve ourselves in life, or in a game, but we are only really changed and renewed when that exterior experience is “brought home” into the inner life. We do something “in the game,” but the act of “painting,” in renewing the world through our creative interpretation, is a decidedly interior experience.

[fudanshipoe]

bungo stray dogs, themes of trauma, the abuse cycle, and how ranpo's disability+autistic trauma is an integral part of untold origins ★

🦴 abilities represent trauma and trauma responses

🦴 trauma as a theme of cycles

- the abuse cycle

- the "savior" cycle

🦴 the government, war, and society

- yosano, mori

- verlaine, chuuya

- fukuchi, teruko

- the role of the government

🦴 untold origins

- ranpo's ability is autistic masking

- his trauma

- untold origins through the lens of autistic trauma

wc; 2.6k (Origins quotes included in pictures only but I explain them briefly)

(this is also crossposted on Twitter, this is a long read format)

In this I want to cover trauma, and by extent mental illness, as an overarching theme in BSD, and how it portrays the cycles and effect of abuse, war, and is an exploration of traumatized individuals operating in a world not built for them. Additionally, Untold Origins is about autistic trauma.

Despite the approach of supernatural themes, Bungo Stray Dogs lends itself heavily to the discussion of trauma, mental illness, and its effects. One of the most notable themes in Bungo Stray Dogs is trauma and abuse, but it extends beyond the main abuse chain that most recognize to partially originate from Mori and end with Kyouka (Mori, Dazai, Akutagawa, and Kyouka, to be specific). There is a large focus on the abuse cycle and how trauma affects people. Emphasis is also placed on the specific structural abuse and violence of society within the world of BSD. The complexities of the abuse cycle are highlighted in organizations such as the Port Mafia, which is by far the most recognizable example within the series, but the government as another authoritative state plays another role in the cycle. BSD shows its readers various depictions of how trauma will manifest or affect two people who encounter the same thing. BSD shows a very honest depiction of mental illness in general, but it's specifically in how trauma affects the characters that these themes become integral to the story.

To start off the actual analysis, abilities themselves are representative of trauma responses. They arise from high stress situations in order for the user to have a protective mechanism for themself, uncanny to how actual trauma responses develop. Whether you think it is non-exclusive because abilities are based upon literature, many if not all of the characters’ abilities parallel their trauma. This is highlighted with tons of the characters, obviously, but I'll only point out a few because a separate analysis would be needed for every ability in the series (I want to one day, but not now). Each ability exhibits what each ability user needed in order to survive. Atsushi was a victim of child torture from what could have been birth, or at least since coming into the orphanage, to young adulthood, and he needed to become something to combat it. Beast Beneath the Moonlight is an ability that allows Atsushi to become something near invulnerable, with his impenetrable fur, regeneration, and the claws that cut through abilities themself. No Longer Human reflects how Dazai never allows anyone to get close to him, how he always keeps his guard up, how he never allows himself the vulnerability of being seen or touched. Both literally and metaphorically. Akuatagwa, similar to Atsushi, growing up in the slums needed a way to protect himself, Gin, and the other children around him. His ability is one that I feel is the most obvious with its connection to his trauma, as it is so important in depicting his relationship with Dazai and his own ability, though that is more about his coat itself than explicitly Rashomon. He only had the clothes on his back to protect him, so that is what manifested, the ability to control and kill his enemies with what little shield he had against the world. These will be the only ones I highlight in this section as they're some “main” examples and this is not meant to be exclusively on what the ability represents for individual characters. There are also plenty of characters that we can only speculate on, as we don't know much about their past, if at all many of them.

The cycle of abuse is the main theme present under the topic of trauma and how it relates to BSD's story. The most notable abuse chain that runs from Mori, to Dazai, to Akuatagwa, and finally ending with Kyouka is easily the most recognizable example of this. Whether you believe Mori's relationship with Dazai, and affect on him, was inherently classified as child abuse is irrelevant here and up to interpretation, I suppose, as a lot of people seem to believe so for some reason. Regardless, you cannot deny that the lessons of optimal solutions, needing to live for a purpose, and harsh treatment runs in this line of mentor/mentee relationships.

This is also the case between Mori and Yosano, though I'm not sure how much Mori would constitute as a “mentor” to Yosano over just being her superior, considering his relationship and treatment of Yosano is vastly different compared to Dazai. The cycles of abuse is not only present within the mentor/mentee cycle of BSD either, another major example is how many characters treat others based upon how they would treat themself, and this treatment arises from a place of projection. In the Dark Era, Mori acts according to his own judgment, assuming that Dazai will not act adversely based upon the shared qualities he sees of himself in Dazai. A shared logistical, observant brain and their ability to navigate a situation through predicting and utilizing their pawns. Dazai trains Akutagawa the way he does because he believes it is what Akuatagwa needs in order to be successful and survive.

Kouyou is a very great instance of this, too. The Port Mafia is a root of much of the abuse taking place within the story of Bungo Stray Dogs, and Kouyou shows this the best, aside from characters like Dazai and Akutagawa. This is where I want to specify that Mori is not the root cause or direct start of the abuse cycle within the series, as the Port Mafia itself was a tool of organizational abuse from the start. The Port Mafia has always used tactics of aggression and suppression as an operation, however, there is a stark difference between the Old Boss and Mori on how this force is used. There is no real difference on how they affect the Port Mafia individually, except the methods used and the tighter reign of control Mori uses compared to the reckless abandonment for critical thought towards the end for the Old Boss. It's an inherently corrupt organization despite the importance it holds in the balance of Yokohama. Kouyou was in the Mafia from childhood, and when she lost the hope of being able to escape that world, she lost her trust in both the organization and the greater world of people. This is the reason that she pushes her own beliefs onto Kyouka and tries so desperately to keep her in the mafia. Her disdain for hope and recognition of herself in Kyouka is the causation for her to attempt to drill this mindset into Kyouka.

Kouyou isn't the only one who projects herself onto Kyouka specifically either, as Akutagawa follows the lessons he has learned and forces his beliefs of giving Kyouka's life a “reason” through her ability and killing ability. Which is exactly what he learned through his years in the Port Mafia as Dazai's mentee. Another example of a character projecting their own traumas onto someone they recognize themself in is very obviously Verlaine, through the events of him forcing Chuuya to his side because of his thought process.

There is a common justification that many of the characters make that they are doing what needs to be done. There are many other examples that could be made from the series, but all of this is to say that there is a large representation of the idea that “hurt people hurt people”. It's what the abuse cycle is on an interpersonal level. The actions taken are not excused by a victim’s own past, however it is a very real depiction of the abuse cycle and its effects in the series.

There is some hope to be found though as the parallel to this is being “saved”. Exemplified through the Armed Detective Agency as a whole, it ends up being essentially a safe haven for many of the members. Earlier I mentioned Kyouka, and she is specifically helped by Atsushi. I really don't want to refer to this as a savior cycle because it's really not, they're not all “saviors”, I just don't really have a better name for it.

The best examples for the roots of this cycle in the series are Fukuzawa and Oda, though they are naturally not the only cause for the chain of events within this cycle of influence. Fukuzawa brings me back to the topic of the Armed Detective Agency, which was established in the first place in order to help Ranpo and others. He left his influence on Ranpo first in Untold Origins, and Yosano when the two are able to get her away from Mori, but he also is the first in the chain that impacted Oda (though not the only), another important figure in this theme. He is the person that is able to plant a moral seed in Dazai and change the course of his life, and he was the only one able to do this. This brings me back around to Atsushi, who after being taken into the ADA by Dazai is able to save Kyouka, Lucy, and Sigma in one way or another.

It is important to highlight the Decay of Angels arc and portraying the tragic results of war. The ones I'm going to discuss are Fukuchi, Fukuzawa, Yosano, Mori, and Teruko as participants of war, Verlaine and Chuuya as the result of the government experimentation after the war, and then Tachihara from an outsider's perspective because of his brother. There is limited information that we have on The Great War itself, but what we do know is that it was a fight between ability user organizations and for the use of abilities in warfare. It is shown to be the cause of much of the suffering of many characters in the series, whether it is as a participant or a result of the inherent tragedy of war. Yosano was a child soldier exploited by Mori, who was able to use his position to prove his thesis for the beneficial use of abilities in warfare. It's unclear to me whether it was issued from upper levels, but his Infantry Division was for the purpose of proving what you could harness with abilities and warfare. This is not the only time that ability experimentation resulted during/from The Great War either, both Verlaine and Chuuya were a result of ability research and singularity creation. You could also infer that The Hunting Dogs project, though it is not confirmed (I think?), is a result of this as well. All of this to show the role that the government plays in the war, and alongside the damage that war already brings the government is shown to prey on the vulnerable within.

Fukuchi is probably the most noteworthy example of war and trauma in BSD, as he is the one who enacts the greatest damage in order to stop another war to his knowledge. His entire motivation for creating the DOA and bringing calamity was to prevent a repeat of what he had witnessed in the battlefield. Though he also has personal beliefs for world peace from the beginning, it grew to be more than that. The war intrinsically changed him due to the trauma, and soldier’s PTSD is naturally a common thing. The war changed Yosano as well, and while the two had very different circumstances, they carry the weight of their sins years later. Teruko was essentially born from war itself, and similar to Atsushi, she was forced to become something or someone that was able to fight, hence her ability forcing maturity and age. Teruko's ability itself is an example of how intense or prolonged trauma can cause a person to force self preservation in the face of it as a tactic to survive. Many of the characters show this, but it is especially prevalent with Fukuchi and Teruko because of the war. The entire arc brings into question the role of the government in war, corrupt power, the tragedy of war, and the point of it in the first place.

I'm making a seperate section to talk about Ranpo's ability, Untold Origins, and autistic trauma. Ranpo is the only character based on an author who does not have a literal ability, and I believe his lack of ability and insistence on keeping the illusion up is reminiscent of autistic masking. As to why I think he is autistic outside of the context of Origins, please refer to this thread .

Masking is camouflaging autistic traits in order to appeal to neurotypical or allistic (non-autistic) expectations. This could be internalizing discomfort, suppressing behaviors, copying others’ behavior in order to “fit in”, or an array of examples of forcing yourself out of your nature. Long-term masking can lead to extreme damage to your mental health, it can cause burnout, distressed behavior (meltdowns, shutdowns), issues with sense of self, etc.

Ranpo doesn’t mask very much in the present canon, he has a support system with his friends and family in the ADA where he is not judged for his autistic traits or behavior. Yet he keeps up the illusion of being an ability user partially for his own sake, but mostly to appear a certain way for the Agency and others. His ability is the only mask he keeps up, and the reason for this is the same reason he got it in the first place. Ranpo had to deal with the world outside of himself not accepting him for the way he is, and this is specifically because of his autistic traits. His false ability was essentially given to him by Fukuzawa as a way to quell his frustrations with the world, an explanation to Ranpo for why he is the way he is, because the world didn't understand the way he was and vice versa. He does seem to mask his autistic traits in Untold Origins, however, both due to his experiences he talks about and his parents. Masking can be traumatic, growing up in a world not built for you is traumatic, and the culmination of it all is what leads to Ranpo’s meltdown. Being autistic is not inherently traumatic, but the instability of day to day life can even be a causation for it, and this is the case for Ranpo. He goes about the story assuming that he will get adverse reactions if he speaks up or acts like himself, showing specifically his autistic traits, and this is the reason that he masks. Like any other autistic person, he masks in order to survive situations or to avoid confrontation over it when he never intended it. He was already a sheltered kid, and so he was raised with the deliberate suppression of his autistic traits, to which he cannot control and that cannot be separated from him. Even if it was an effort to protect him by his parents, it had negative consequences on Ranpo. Growing up that sheltered is damaging enough but it is dire to understand that this is in relation to Ranpo's being autistic as well, so he was thrust into a world that already did not understand him as a young autistic person after he lost his parents, an added trauma on top of the loss.

(below are the quotes I was referring/alluding to)

(In order is Ranpo's meltdown scene, an example of the double empathy problem (difficulties due in part due to a mutual lack of understanding when socializing between autistics/allistics because of the way we experience the world internally/externally) in which Ranpo looks at the same thing as someone else but they percieve it vastly different and Ranpo does not realize this, an observation from Fukuzawa on Ranpo's inherent difference, Ranpo's expectations of rejection, another observation from Fukuzawa on how Ranpo doesn't realize any of this, Ranpo expecting rejection based upon experiences in the past, and finally what I interpret to be an example of suppression of Ranpo's autistic traits (in a literal sense it is referring to his ability, which is representative of his autistic masking/really autism in general)

The manifestation of his ability is not a literal one like the other characters in the series, but it is an extension of his need to mask at times. Whether it is damaging or not, Ranpo clings to it because it is both connected to Fukuzawa and it is the first time he got an answer to why he is this way instead of being told to hide it for the convenience of others. When you grow up in a world that does not like you for what you are, it would only be natural for him to be desperate for the comfort of something after believing for so long that there was something inherently wrong with him.

There are definitely more thoughts that I have on this topic, such as poverty in relation to the Akutagawa siblings and Atsushi (Beast, specifically as well), but I want that to be a separate analysis.

[blood-orange-juice]

I promised a "Furina is Jesus" post. It's kind of a shitpost but also it's not.

The theatre of the courtroom

I'll first have to note that law is a peculiar thing. It is created through practicing it.

It's not just the written rules, it's how we apply them, and who gets to write and rewrite them, and there's no solid foundation underneath.

It's supposed to be treated as immutable until it's suddenly not. Until an insurgence turns into a revolution or the divine right of kings becomes a symbolic relic of the past. In the mildest scenario a bunch of old farts just gather and vote for new rules. Sometimes the very same rules that give those old farts the right to decide rules.

A law remains a law as long as enough people agree to believe and enforce it. How much is "enough" is also debatable (often depends on the size of your army).

It is very much like theatre. Humans like it when the world is molded into coherent stories so they happily participate.

Furina making a show out of trials is not a perversion of law, it shows she understands its very nature.

Transgression and transcendence

Now back to Christianity. The essense of Christianity is transgression. No, seriously.

It's as punk as a religion can get. A god hanging out with publicans and harlots? Killing a god in the most humiliating way possible and being forgiven for it? Symbolically eating a god?

It's insane.

Such practices are usually reserved for small communities of a very special sort (*ahem* left-hand path tantrics*ahem*). It's the only religion I know that gleefully and unashamedly incorporates such things into rituals meant for the lay public.

(this is probably a good time to mention that I'm not Christian and it's a look of an outsider fascinated with philosophy of religion in general)

It's actually one of the real reasons a lot of pagans rejected Christianity so fiercely: it's spectacularly nonchalant in dealing with things that would be considered "unclean" by most archaic cultures.

Now this is important.

As post-structuralist theories state, any attempt to establish a power structure, to set rules or to define self will also produce things that would seem unclean. Impure. Things that should be cast off. It's in the nature of our psyche. The concept of uncleanliness is one of the core mechanisms that allow our mind to function.

(I'll redirect you to Julia Kristeva and the concept she names abjection if you want to dive into it.

I also want to note that abjection and horror go side by side and it makes a lot of sense that Fontaine is also the Lovecraftian expansion)

And what did Christianity do? It subtly removed the importance of "cleanliness". The gravity of it. It established as the norm that norms can be redefined and transcended. That the outcasts and the sinners are not to be forgotten.

It fucking changed the rules of how human psyche and society function. Added an extra possible move.

A sin can be forgiven. A criminal executed in the most ignominious way can turn out to be a god. You never truly know. And also anything can be made clean. Go wash it kitten.

(yay)

(and yes, I know a lot of modern Christians practice the opposite of what I describe. I'm not a fan of these folks too. doesn't matter. the possibility is there. it's glorious. also horrifying and a bit disgusting)

That dude from two thousand years ago

What about him.

I often see people calling a "Jesus figure" anyone who is sacrificed to save others. Or anyone who is reborn. The thing is, this is not how it works.

A god dying and being reborn is the oldest myth on this planet. Last time I checked it was connected to the sun worship, day/night cycle and winter solstice rituals (although it could have changed and also I didn't check very thoroughly). In any way, it predates Christianity by millennia.

Sacrificing all kinds of things and beings to get something in return or to offer gods something else in your stead is also pretty old and very much not Christian.

The unique beauty of that story is that a supreme being, ultimately more worthy than any human, wilfully chose to sacrifice himself for lowly mortals. Actually, allowed them to betray and kill him. And then forgave them.

Do you see how it ties to the previous section? It defied the previoisly established world order (where gods were incomparably more important than humans). It created a paradox. It broke the rules, or rather it destroyed the rules.

Theological debates aside, on a symbolic level it pretty much destroyed the old concept of sin and the idea of a fundamental difference between a god and a human. Everything a paradox touches stops being fully real and needs to be redefined (ceci n'est pas une pipe).

'Sin' doesn't mean the same thing anymore, and 'god' doesn't mean the same thing anymore, even 'death' means a different thing now. The world just starts to function differently after a story like that happens or is told.

(since it only needs to mess up the symbolic order it doesn't even need to happen, only to be told and believed)

And there we have it. A Jesus figure should establish new rules. Preferably better ones. It's someone who fundamentally changes the world with their sacrifice.

That's also where we get back to "law is established by practice". That was the process of establishing a new law.

(this is also why I dislike the idea of Childe as a Jesus figure. he is not a supreme being, he's not the type to sacrifice himself for people he perceives as lower than him, and he is not integrated into society enough for his death to establish new rules. he can still die and be reborn in a new quality, he can even change the world in some way but that would be a different type of story)

Our precious girlfailure

So. Furina.

Fontaine's prophecy speaks of all Fontainians being born with some kind of 'sin'. And the way Neuvilette is talking to the pool of primordial water in 4.1 implies that its ability to dissolve Fontainians is not some kind of natural law but an intentional wrathful act.

And Varunada Lazurite (we know that ascension materials contain the final lines of the archon quest) says this:

"My ideals have no stains. I must correct you. People here bear no sins in the eyes of the gods... Only laws and the Tribunal can judge someone. They can judge even me. So praise my magnificence and purity."

I assume the solution will not be simply killing the eldritch whale or "cleansing" the sin or locking the sea away.

I think Furina will in some way redefine what is considered a sin, or how it should be judged, or who gets to administer judgement. She will create new rules for the world. Probably by dying in some way (temporarily or symbolically) to create a paradox.

(maybe we'll also get to learn that death in Teyvat is not true death)

As I said at the beginning, she understands the law and the very nature of law very well, probably better than Neuvilette. Who else would be better suited for this task.

And no one will notice the beauty and insanity of her gesture, like no one really noticed with that guy two thousand years ago. They'll just think things got fixed because they sacrificed Someone Important.

But that's all right. She'll forgive them.