#learn to have civil debate or dont speak about this at all

[funkopersonal]

I love how every pro-pals argument when they're proven wrong is "I'm not arguing with a zionist, go kill yourself."

It's like these people never learned to have a normal, civil conversation without telling people to kill themselves...

[thenightfolknetwork]

I didn't mean to. It was an accident. I swear I didn't know. I just...

The town I'm from is secluded, very secluded. Still using landlines and slow and spotty internet secluded. It's one of those towns hidden away by mountains and trees that take days to get in and out of. My point is that news is slow to get in, and about half is debated as rumor and "conspiracies against the common people."

I hope im saying this right. As i said, resources are limited, so please forgive any offense. The "People of the Night" are still thought to be myth here. If there are any um "Nightfolk" here, they haven't made themselves known. Not that I'd blame them, but it would have made this a lot easier, maybe prevented it even. I'm sorry I'm rambling, I'm still a bit shaken.

I thought I was just approachable. When someone's lost or needed help, they'd always find their way to me. No trouble at all, I enjoyed it. But it happened so often, My friends used to say that I "just had one of those faces."

It felt good to be needed. I'd ask how someone was. They'd vent to me what was going on, and I listened. If I could and they wanted it, I'd offer advice, but most just wanted to be heard.

But, a couple of weeks ago, I was walking with my best friend. We were just catching up, nothing serious. It was meant to be a joke, a reference to my tendency of "being one of those faces." I asked her if she had any dark secrets she wanted to share.

She did.

You'd thought I'd told her to do it at knifepoint. Her story came pouring out like an overpowered hose. When she finished, the look she gave me. I can't unsee it.

When it was over, i tried to thank her for trusting me with such sensitive information, but she told me to save it. I don't know how, but we both knew it was my fault.

She told my friend group what happened and now no one wants to speak to me. I tried to explain myself, but they refused to listen or trust what I had to say. Out of frustration, I asked one person why they were avoiding me, and they responded, "Because I always knew you were weird."

There was no denying that I... forced them to tell me that in some way, but it wasn't on purpose! But I must have proved something because now I can't leave my house because everyone is LOOKING at me.

I've been using a paper and pencil to get by as well as trying to learn BSL because im afraid to speak again. How many of those talks that I had were unvoluntary? How many people were forced to be honest and just pretended to be civil because they were scared of me?

I don't know if this is new or something that I'd always done. I'm alone here. The only reason I know as much as I do about the Creature Community is because I accidentally stumbled across your show on my radio.

I dont know who i am anymore. I miss singing and talking to people, but I'm terrified that I'll compel someone by accident. How do I get better? Where do I go from here?

Oh, reader. This must be a very frightening, upsetting time for you. I'm so glad you felt able to reach out to us here at the Nightfolk Network for support.

First of all, I hope you are able to see the difference between taking responsibility for your past actions, and making a martyr of yourself. You have been unthinkingly, unknowingly hurting people, and you do need to recognise that before you can try to make amends. But the harm you caused was entirely accidental. Please, be gentle with yourself.

In terms of practical steps forwards, I can reassure you: you are not alone in your powers, or in finding them difficult to control. Often powers of this kind make themselves known early in an individuals life, and you can imagine how difficult it can be to control the spoken wishes of a babbling toddler.

Nevertheless, many people in your situation go on to live perfectly ordinary lives with good control over their powers. And you have the advantage over a toddler, in that you are not only fully cognisant of the detrimental effects of such powers but also already able to find alternative ways to communicate.

Your first step is to contact your GP and arrange an appointment to discuss the matter. Write them a letter explaining the situation, and emphasising your need to conduct the appointment without speech. In a small, rural community like yours, it's very likely your GP will have little to no personal experience of such cases. But they will be able to refer you to an NHS specialist with whom you can explore possible treatment options.

In most cases, those options will be either medication, behavioural therapy, or more usually a combination of the two. I understand that there is a great deal of stigma around thauma-damping medication. Please, resist this pattern of thought.

Medication is nothing more or less than a tool we might use to help us live our lives. Taking medication does not indicate a lack of effort or will on your part in controlling your powers. It just makes a very difficult thing slightly easier.

However, NHS waiting lists for this type of treatment can be lengthy. In the meantime, I strongly recommend you reach out as best you can to your community. Writing a letter, text or email to your best friend would be a good start, explaining the situation as best you can and leaving the door open for her to rekindle the relationship if she feels able.

Unfortunately, there's nothing you can do to forcibly mend the relationship. You can only present yourself honestly and hope that, in time, you are able to find your way back to something like the friendship you shared before this.

In the meantime, try to connect with other people in the community if you can. The Internet can be a wonderful place to connect with others, and your local library may have information about support groups in the wider area.

Above all, reader, take heart. There is plenty to be hopeful about here. You are not doomed to a life of fearful silence, or of isolation and solitude. With a little work, and plenty of support from the people around you, I see no reason why you shouldn't enjoy a long and happy life full of genuine connection with the people around you.

[For more creaturely advice, check out Monstrous Agonies on your podcast platform of choice, or visit monstrousproductions.org for more info]

[1tsjusty0u]

also tarrey town

actually i dont have too many facts about tarrey town! i mean akkala as a whole has little pits on the map that fill up with water while it rains (one becoming octorock lack in totk), and in the files the town is sometimes called Ichikara (which from the fandom wiki nomenaculture means “from scratch.”

the goddess statue is there before the town is ever created or youve talked to bolson, also not town specific but in the akkala wilds you can see dinraal and if youre at the top of the skull lake shrine eye you can even hear the music (maybe on ground level too!) however you cant reach it without moon jump or glitches because its as high as the peak of death mountain. thats not an exaggeration either. nice for viewing either way. based on a minish cap map overlay of botw i like to hc the veiled falls from that game are the akkala falls either in the future or in retellings + the veiled falls from zoras domain thats named after the mc is close by :]. also the little flower korok seems to lead link to the ancient ball near the rist peninsula! OH ALSO!!!! whenever you go into tarrey town it will Always be sunny!!! its also very rare in rito village After the singing rocks shrine quest/after vah medoh for some reason. theres also no night theme for it in totk. theres two dogs!!! bolson construction symbol is everywhere from the wood floors to the hylia statue backing, and its the same symbol on the hammer weapon you can use!! also the hylian script says “builders” . ALSO THERES A DOUBLE AXE THERE BY THE SIDE OF A BUILDING? also grante who is robbies son sells rare armour but you probably knew that. otherwise not much!

speaking of not much i think link wouldnt even finish building it after calamity ganon. he gets everyone there eventually but he takes his sweet Sweet time. and when its finished he wouldnt even visit a lot, unless Things Happen like maddison or helping grante move in. he can get arrows from the lizalfos guarding the road to zoras domains and until those guys move he’d have to start getting arrows at shops. despite the inn maybe being be free to use he doesnt ever use it. i Could see him clearing the guardians near the place each time they respawn though. he goes there soon after learning bolson is going there (he already has the shrine there and was confused about the land just. sitting there). but then he just never or rarely fills out the quest. he gives bolson wood once, doesnt speak to him for months or a year, brings another son, and the cycle repeats. he Would bring the wood all at once he’d just get sidetracked beyond belief. zelda discovers tarrey town while visiting robbie and sends Multiple Letters to link telling him to SPREAD THE WORD. FINISH THIS ALREADY. he might even just spread rumors so the sons do it on their own accord or just. ask the champions descendant to tip him off to any sons in the area (he wouldnt make them do the quest for him though.)

its kind of funny in that regard. like theres a whole lot of past motif kind of just by proxy considering how much i focus pre cal and how he’d look back on it, so lots of people seem to consider tarrey town an omen of the future, that things can and Will get better and they can shape it. if this wasnt an au canon link would probably like it and watch over it for that very reason. however here while it Is an omen of the future and a good sign my link just. doesnt interact/doesnt care. in a bit of a twisted way he might even be glad about a lot of civilization being destroyed (which makes him feel mixed things, with a tablespoon or two of guilt and fear and staying silent about that). he wouldnt want tarrey town Destroyed but he’d either see this as an omen and Panic at it, or would ignore it completely. its not his thing to deal with, after all. which is also kinda funny because i see lots of people view botw link view the world as His Failing, which to be fair i could see! but im honestly debating on if my link would see it that way. he’d feel wrong/guilt about the champions, sure, but if he doesnt see the ruins as a bad thing (besides the people being dead. he does feel Off when he thinks about how people used to be there. about how these werent ruins and someone was living peacefully here.) then would he feel like he failed. to him this world is full of opportunities Without . i dont think this is the right word , joker voice Society, to really fully stop him. there isnt widespread rules anymore that stops him from jobs or moving. he cant be hunted by the royal guard because there Isnt One anymore. he can do whatever he wants! and while i do want to emphasize that society does have its benefits (camping irl can really suck my mom got stung by bark scorpions 3 times at the colorado river while brushing it off and it hurt so bad that she wanted to go to the ER/helicopter outta there. she wasnt in life threatening danger and there was a pain medicine guy there but yeah. also have you heard about mormon crickets. they arent dangers except to crops but if you fear bugs i am so so so sorry. also also somethinf something hiking never gets easier, heat stroke can and will kill you and dont hike in the afternoon in the desert you will feel like absolute shit and always ALWAYS BRING WATER. also apparently my science teacher went to a different country with bugs that lay eggs inside your skin and hatch inside your skin. i dont think i’ll mention those things in universe or add them besides possibly the scorpions because i do actually have a fear of bugs and also i dont want this to mirror irl Exactly) the costs that come with society dont really apply anymore. as long as you know how to Not Die and dont have a debilitating fear of bugs nothing besides death can stop you. the question becomes was the means worth the end, do you want to go back to the past even though you hated it at the time, do you miss it, and is it worth it to stick around to a place that may revert in time and create the good and the bad of the past. you cant move to another country either- its all or nothing. you can either live here or. well. plus dealing with the fear of time just fucking go for it. also i think pre cal link would struggle a Lot with the all or nothing approach and the time going for it thing. uh. hm let me know if i should tag anything

[perenlop]

eh if i draw it then itll take up too much time so im just gonna ramble abt it

-so im sure a fair amount of people have heard of the idea of hawkfrost being the father of the three, yeah? welp. thats the first idea. idk how it happens, i dont actually ship them, but like consider that tigerstar hears abt the power of three prophecy and decides to take advantage of it and have both of his sons court the sisters in the hopes of continuing his legacy AND having grounds to take the three under his control eventually.

-with squirrelflight it actually happened w brambleclaw naturally bc of the journey (still has its issues and they should still Divorce but like i dont wanna imply tigerstar made bramble that way) but with leafpool he directly tells hawkfrost to get with her. id like to think in an ideal au that hawk wasnt as one dimensional as he is in the books and actually was genuinely friends with leafpool (and mothwing) but like. yeah it was a fucked up tigerstar thing at its core

-hawkfrosts death and the attempted firestar assassination goes as usual and leafpool sees the aftermath but while she suspects brambleclaw, she doesnt know just how involved he was and cant find out.

-she has her kittens but theres the added anxiety of their father being…. well, an attempted murderer as well as being from another clan yknow how it is.

-hawk and tiger immediately start on trying to get into the three’s heads. it kinda works with lionblaze, not as successful as the other two, but lion still steps away. but while they dont learn abt their parentage (idk why, maybe tigerstar thought it was more beneficial the way it was at that point) they do get some info on hawkfrost over time

-now we get into the meat. the fire scene happens, ashfur dies, they start researching their heritage… except, jayfeather learns about brambleclaws df training and shares it. and they learn about the assassination attempt in its entirety and hawkfrost and leafpool’s relationship. hawk also probably reveals the entire bit at one point

-so the gathering happens and hollyleaf reveals their heritage and ALSO exposes brambleclaw. meaning that all 3 living parents are thrown under the bus. she declares that not only should she and her brothers never have existed, but that their entire existence is based on treachery and murder, and theyre a curse on the clans (we love self hatred induced by their horrible rules)

-thunderclan erupts into a civil war basically, squirrelflight and brambleclaws fallout is even worse, the “brambleclaw vs graystripe” deputy debate is revived in full force, and bramble and leaf are both forced to step down and get ostracized as well as squirrelflight.

-hollyleaf’s “death” in the tunnels is interpreted by the clans as a sign from starclan that the three must be erased from the clans, and so firestar has to exile lionblaze and jayfeather as well. their powers are also put out there maybe and people know about them… so they very quickly are seen as supernatural monsters groomed by tigerstar to wipe out the clans by the more superstitious members

-thunderclan is VERY split on this. many of the more devout warriors fear the brothers and refuse to even speak of them, and the kits are being taught to fear them, but most cats who grew up w them (and ofc leafpool and squirrelflight) are angry with their exile and call it unfair and cruel. again, thunderclan is like in a civil war basically

-dovewing and ivypool are born in the middle of this. dovewings power becomes evident immediately, and dovewing, being taught that the brothers powers were a curse, is TERRIFIED. she probably eventually meets w the brothers at one point but is terrified of them and wants nothing to do with the prophecy. she doesnt end up getting a choice, however…

-idk where it goes from there. but like. thatd be why this version of arc four is titled the way it is…. because the three are no longer seen as triumphant and strong, but as a dark omen from the stars.

i do not know enough to flesh this out tbh lol. if anyone would like to add ideas lmk

*gripping my rickety old arm chair so hard it splinters* help. i have a warrior cats au idea.

[red-will]

I don't know what to do with good white people.

I've been surrounded by good white people my whole life. Good white people living in my neighborhood, who returned our dog when he got loose; good white teachers in elementary school who pushed books into my hands; good white professors at Stanford, a Bay Area bastion of goodwhiteness, who recommended me M.F.A. programs where I met good white writers, liberal enough for a Portlandia sketch.

I should be grateful for this. Who, in generations of my family, has ever been surrounded by so many good white people? My mother was born to sharecroppers in Louisiana; she used to measure her feet with a piece of string because they could not try on shoes in the store. She tells me of a white policeman who humiliated her mother by forcing her to empty her purse on the store counter just so he could watch her few coins spiral out.

Two summers ago, my mother showed me the welfare reports written about her family. The welfare officer, a white woman, observed my family with a careful, anthropological eye. She described the children, including my mother, as "nice and clean." She asked personal questions (did my grandmother have a boyfriend?) and wrote her findings in a detached tone. She wondered why my grandmother, an illiterate Black mother of nine living in the Jim Crow South, struggled to find a steady job. Maybe, she wrote in her loopy scrawl, my grandmother wasn't searching hard enough.

This faded report is the type of official document a historian might consult if he were re-constructing the story of my family. The author, this white welfare officer, writes as if she is an objective observer, but she tells a well-worn story of Black women who refuse to work and instead depend on welfare. Occasionally, her clinical tone breaks down. Once, she notes that my mother is pretty. She probably considered herself a good white person.

In the wake of the Darren Wilson non-indictment, I've only deleted one racist Facebook friend. This friend, as barely a friend as a high school classmate can be, re-posted a rant calling rioters niggers. (She was not a good white person.) Most of my white friends have responded to recent events with empathy or outrage. Some have joined protests. Others have posted Criming While White stories, a hashtag that has been criticized for detracting from Black voices. Look at me, the hashtag screams, I know that I am privileged. I am a good white person. Join me and remind others that you are a good white person too.

Over the past two weeks, I've seen good white people congratulate themselves for deleting racist friends or debating family members or performing small acts of kindness to Black people. Sometimes I think I'd prefer racist trolling to this grade of self-aggrandizement. A racist troll is easy to dismiss. He does not think decency is enough. Sometimes I think good white people expect to be rewarded for their decency. We are not like those other white people. See how enlightened and aware we are? See how we are good?

Over the past two weeks, I have fluctuated between anger and grief. I feel surrounded by Black death. What a privilege, to concern yourself with seeming good while the rest of us want to seem worthy of life.

When my father was a young man, he was arrested at gunpoint. He was a Deputy District Attorney at the time, driving home one night from bible study when LAPD pulled him over. A traffic violation, he'd thought, until officers swarmed his car with shotguns aimed at his head. The cops refused to look in his wallet at his badge. They cuffed him and threw him on the curb.

My father is mostly thankful that he'd stayed calm. In his shock, he had done nothing. That's what he believes saved his life.

I think about this while I watch Eric Garner die. For months, I avoided the video, until we arrived at another officer non-indictment. Now I've seen the video of Garner's death, as well as a second video I find even more disturbing. This second video, taken immediately after Garner has been killed by a banned chokehold, shows officers attempting to speak to him, asking him to respond to EMTs. They do not yet know that he is dead, and there's something about this moment, officers shuffling around as an EMT seeks a pulse, that is so bafflingly and frustratingly human, so different from the five officers lunging and wrangling Garner to the ground.

In the wake of this non-indictment, a surprising coalition of detractors has emerged. Not just black and brown students hitting the streets in protest but conservative stalwarts, like Bill O'Reilly or John Boehner, criticizing the lack of justice. Even George W. Bush weighed in, calling the grand jury's decision "sad." But even though many find Garner's death wrong, others refuse to believe that race played a role. His death was the result of overzealous policing, a series of bad individual choices. It would have happened to a white guy. The same way in Cleveland, a 12-year-old Black boy named Tamir Rice was killed by officers for playing with a toy gun. An unfortunate tragedy, but not racial. Any white kid playing with a realistic-looking toy gun would have been killed too.

Darren Wilson has been unrepentant about taking Mike Brown's life. He insists he could not have done anything differently. Daniel Pantaleo has offered condolences to the Garner family, admitting that he "feels very bad" about Garner's death.

"It is never my intention to harm anyone," he said.

I don't know which is worse, the unrepentant killer or the man who insists to the end that he meant well.

A year ago, outside the Orange County airport, a white woman cut in front of me at the luggage check. She had been standing next to me, and soon as the luggage handlers called next, she swooped up her things and went to the counter. She'd cut me because I was black. Or maybe because I was young. Maybe she was running late for her flight or maybe she was just rude. She would've cut me if I had been a white woman like her. She would've cut me if I had been anyone.

Of course, the woman ended up on my flight, and of course, she was seated right next to me. Before the flight took off, she turned to me and said, "I'm sorry if I cut you earlier. I didn't see you standing there."

I often hear good white people ask why people of color must make everything about race, as if we enjoy considering racism as a motivation. I wish I never had to cycle through these small interactions and wonder: Am I overthinking? Am I just being paranoid? It's exhausting.

"It was a lot simpler in the rural South," my mother tells me. "White people let you know right away where you stood."

The problem is that you can never know someone else's intentions. And sometimes I feel like I live in a world where I'm forced to parse through the intentions of people who have no interest in knowing mine. A grand jury believed that Darren Wilson was a good officer doing his job. This same grand jury believed than an eighteen-year-old kid in a monstrous rage charged into a hailstorm of bullets toward a cop's gun.

Wilson described Michael Brown as a black brute, a demon. No one questioned Michael Brown's intentions. A stereotype does not have complex, individual motivations. A stereotype, treated as such, can be forced into whatever action we expect.

I spent a four hour flight trying not to wonder about the white woman's intentions. But why would she think about mine? She didn't even see me.

In elementary school, my older sister came home one day crying. She had learned about the Ku Klux Klan in class that day and she was afraid that men in white hoods would attack us. My father told her there was nothing to worry about.

"If a Klansman sat at this table right now," he said, "I'd laugh right in his face."

My mother tells stories of Klansmen riding at night, of how her grandmother worried when the doctor's son—a white boy—visited her youngest sister because she feared the Klan would burn down their home. When I was a child, I only saw the Klan in made-for-TV civil rights movies or on theatrical episodes of Jerry Springer. My parents knew what we would later learn, that in the nineties, in our California home, surrounded by good white people, we had more to fear than racism that announces itself.

We all want to believe in progress, in history that marches forward in a neat line, in transcended differences and growing acceptance, in how good the good white people have become. So we expect racism to appear, cartoonishly evil like a Disney villain. As if a racist cop is one who wakes in the morning, twirling his mustache and rubbing his hands together as he plots how to destroy black lives.

I don't think Darren Wilson or Daniel Pantaleo set out to kill Black men. I'm sure the cops who arrested my father meant well. But what good are your good intentions if they kill us?

When my friends and I discuss people we dislike, we often end our conversations with, "But he means well."

We always land here, because we want to affirm ourselves as fair, non-judgmental people who examine a person not only by what he does but also by what he intends to. After all, aren't all of us standing in the gap between who we are and who we try to be? Isn't it human to allow those we dislike—even those who harm us—a residence in this space as well?

"You know what? He means well," we say. We lean on this, and the phrase is so condescending, so cloyingly sweet, so hollow, that I'd almost rather anyone say anything else about me than how awful I am despite how good I intend to be.

I think about this during a car ride last weekend with my dad, where he tells me what happened once the cops finally realized they had arrested the wrong man. They picked him up from the curb, brushed him off.

"Sorry, buddy," an officer said, unlocking his handcuffs.

They'd made an honest mistake. He'd fit the description. Well, of course he did. The description is always the same. The police escorted my father onto the road. My father, not yet my father, drove all the way home without remembering to turn his headlights on.

Brit Bennett recently earned her M.F.A. in creative writing at the the Helen Zell Writers' Program at the University of Michigan. She is currently a Zell Postgraduate Fellow, where she is working on her first novel.

[anteakwa]

tootsie isn’t a bad show: an essay by tumblr user phantom-evil-nightshade (with proof!)

ever since it opened, tootsie the musical has been getting a lot of hate from broadway fans. kind of sad, in all honesty—it truly isn’t as bad as people make it out to be. i’ve watched both the movie and saw the broadway show, so allow me to explain youtube-commentator style why this show is very not transphobic or misogynistic or whatever and why everyone thinks it is. feel free to debate with me in dms, reblogs or replies, but if you make it obvious that you didn’t read this then i will only ignore you.

to kick things off, we’ll be going in chronological order. so let’s go way back to the original movie from 1982. the movie “tootsie”, starring dustin hoffman, is about a man named michael dorsey who disguises as a woman to get a job. cue the high jinks as michael finds himself in very sticky situations, including men wanting to kiss him, his friend getting upset because she was trying to get the role he got, and his inability to ask out the girl he likes because she sees him as a woman.

seems problematic, right?

well, not exactly. the funniest scenes in tootsie (both the movie and the musical) are caused because of michael’s own mistakes. it’s acknowledged throughout both versions that what michael’s doing is bad. hell, there’s a whole song in the musical (“jeff sums it up”) where he says “you fucked it up-you really fucked it up” like ten times.

now, let’s discuss further the two versions together. i saw the movie in preparation for the musical, but when i saw the musical, a lot was changed—from the obvious to the subtle, it’s near impossible to call the musical problematic if you’ve seen it. by “seen it”, i don’t mean “just read one or two reviews and decided you knew everything”. i mean actually saw the musical live, or a bootleg of it. because here are some things the reviews DONT tell you (in the musical):

when jeff (michael’s roommate) finds out about what he’s doing, he tells him that it could be really harmful to certain groups of people. i couldn’t remember all of it, since he was speaking kinda fast, but i do remember he said “gay women, straight women, trans women” right at the end. the show openly acknowledges that michael’s actions aren’t good, and are fueled by his own selfishness.

another gem from our boy jeff is from the same scene as the one above, i believe, as it also ties into what point was made there. jeff tells michael that he just stole a job from a woman, and went on about misogyny in not just the theatre industry, but the working industry in general. and by the way, this and the thing above weren’t meant to be jokes—although it is a comedy, this scene was serious (some people even clapped for jeff).

the woman michael falls in love with is NOT A LESBIAN. this seems to be a super common misconception in the tootsie hate playgroup. she isn’t a lesbian in either the movie or the musical. she literally has a song in the musical where she sings about how she met a guy she loved, but he left her because he wanted a wife and kids, but she wanted to pursue an acting career and just didn’t have the time to be a housewife (“there was john”). i’ll explain it in further detail here—at the very end of act 1, julie kisses michael (as dorothy) on the cheek, and he kisses her back, but impulsively on the mouth as a lover would. they both get super flustered and julie runs off, and michael mad at himself. now, i can see where the lesbian misconception comes from—there’s a scene in act 2 at julie’s house where julie asks dorothy if they can date. i didn’t understand this scene a lot, but i personally believe it’s because julie mistook kindness for love, and also thought dorothy loved her because of the kiss before and wanted to make her happy. however, there was some dialogue here which pretty much speaks for itself:

dorothy: i’m not a lesbian!

julie: neither am i.

FOR THE LOVE OF GOD MICHAEL WASNT INSTANTLY FORGIVEN. everyone was pissed at him. he was immediately fired, there was a whole two minute long scene where sandy was destroying michael’s stuff while jeff watched in amusement, and julie was incredibly angry. the last scene reminded me a lot of that of dear evan hansen. michael finds julie in a park and tries to explain his actions. he tells her that he only did it for the work, and that he wants to make it up to her. he tells her that he wants to try and learn how to be dorothy, but without the wig and dress (since dorothy was someone julie could trust and feel comfortable around). julie tells michael that being a woman was so much harder than anything he experienced as both himself and dorothy, and he understands completely. she doesn’t quite forgive him, but she’s obviously willing to try.

another thing that i see a lot of is controversy around one line in the show taken vastly out of context. after michael reveals he’s a man, he says something along the lines of “being a woman is not the job of a man” (forgive me if the wording is a bit wrong). this quote was taken out of context and was spread with the intention of making people think that it was an attack against trans women. but, let me repeat: it was taken out of context. you had to hear how passionately he said it to understand fully, but when he said it, he meant it in the sense that was mentioned earlier: how he stole a job from a woman. the audience clapped after he said that. it’s hard to completely explain, but again, everything he said was about him being sorry for taking the job (he was talking to sandy), and it took me a couple seconds after he finished it to even think “hey, that quote sounds familiar”.

that’s all i can think of for now. as said at the beginning, i’m open to civil debates and questions about anything i could’ve possibly missed. will add anything more if i think about it in a reblog.

[somnilogical]

belief in being the oppressor and not the oppressed

i dont think exclusion of transfems for 'bad culture fit' or whatever is ablism the same way i dont think the agentic exclusion of cisfems from the workplace is "ablism against the fragile / divergent cisfem psyche"

like we here can see that the forces that prevented them from voting and working were bullshit. that women obviously have the mental constitution for these things. but back at the start of the 20th century there was a big """debate""" about it.

with one side being the reoccurring "there is a natural order to this world, humans eat flesh just look at our teeth / black people were made to work at the fields as slaves, just look at their skin / women were made to stay at home just look at their psychology" and the other side being people who can use intelligence outside of local social stuff, like jeremy bentham with his timeless way of seeing that cuts through this recurrence of evil social coordination. also it helps to have a heart of gold and care about your fellow sentient life.

--

<<I'm friends with an animal communicator and she has said over and over that animals understand their purposes and accept them. This includes animals who have the sole purpose of feeding humans. Animals know and accept their roles so why shouldn't we eat them? Humans are omnivores. Just look at our teeth and anatomy to know this is true.>>

<<Structurally, men are fashioned for purposes of inflicting and suffering pain. Every human anatomy is an elaborate nerve and bone infernal machine — a kind of breathing, perambulating Juggernaut — a superb engine of lethal immolation that automatically stokes its furnace fires with its victims.>>

<<Haskell Moore is a great man. Future generations depend on men like him; men capable of speaking the truth.

Quite.

When I first encountered Haskell Moore's writing, its perspicuity struck me as though delivered through divine revelation. The learned doctor here and I have already spent many a night debating Mr. Moore's tractus.

I'm only willing to concede that he makes a compelling case as to why we are sitting here, enjoying this divine lamb, while Kupaka stands there, content to serve.

Indeed. Uh, Kupaka... you enjoy your life, here with us, do you not?

Oh yes, Reverend, sir. Kupaka very happy here.

You see, you see? This is Moore's ladder of civilization. The reason behind this natural order...

Please, Giles, do shut up. I've been listening to this for weeks, I... would love to know what his own son-in-law has to say about it.

Oh... well let's see... ah, it is an inquiry concerning God's will and the nature of men.

And what does he have to say about the nature of women?

I'm afraid that's a subject he prefers to pass by in silence.

He wouldn't be the first.

Uh, pray, Mr. Ewing, continue.

Well, uh... you know, the question he does pose is... if God created the world, how do we know what things we can change and what things must remain sacred and inviolable?

Reverend Horrox is specific how to run plantation. Georgian way best way he say.

God, this heat is unbearable. How do they take it?

Reverend Horrox say, slaves like camel, bred for desert. He say... they not feel heat like civilized folk. Now we should get you out of the sun.>>

all these "beliefs" start to look the same after a while. they arent actually beliefs, they are coordination mechanisms.

white people in the antebellum south could see that people they enslaved were human beings. they made up bullshit "beliefs" about how they were subhuman to justify and coordinate oppression.

--

carnism and cissexism are collusion structures for predation, where humans who take part have philosophies predicated on might makes right being the best structure they can imagine for how the world can be.

the predation on and oppression of transfems is wrong, the predation on and oppression of non-human animals is wrong. tracing through the logic of why can allow people who give up any myopic gains from their membership in the predatory collusion to coordinate with each other against these unjust systems.

you can collude with people over building structures such that sentient life can ascend to servers rather than feeding on itself, sustaining a fragile existence. there are far better things to enter coordination over than mutual relative power over other sentient life.

[undert33th]

I really like your Chara design can you talk about your interpretation of them?

First off tysm !!!!!!! I’m so glad u like them ;0

Second off yes of course ! Here’s a few things about them :

-they r mongolian-american

-they lived in northern Oregon/southern Washington for most of their life on the surface, both in civilization and out on the woods (I’ve always had this idea of Chara being a forager, super self sufficient, it’s one of the first things I developed abt my interpretation of them)

-lived in a group home as a child (along with that they love kids !)

-Chara has inattentive ADHD as well as bipolar disorder

-SpIn’s include: fungi, knives, sewing and geometry (which they suck at but it’s challenging and stimulating and fun work)

-they were 9 when they ‘fell’ underground and 12 when The Plan was enacted

And now for more game related stuff:

-i whole-heartedly support NarraChara

-I know everyone likes to think that Chara has a special connection with Frisk but I like to think that they could interact the same way with every fallen (that includes influencing their choices)

-going with influencing the choices of the fallen they initially did their best to cause the children to fail in hopes of saving their family after death

-they talk Like That at the end of NM to appear more intimidating (by Like That I mean like a walking dictionary)

-the no mercy route was NOT their doing (I like to think of the player as an entity, while Chara is more of just an outside force if that makes any sense? Chara can certainly control Frisk as a vessel, but only of A) frisk has given them that option, B) they’re anxious/angry/emotional enough that their power amps up and allows them to overtake frisks living soul, or C) the player is controlling Frisk through Chara) (I can post more of my ghost stuff if y'all want it just shoot me an ask) back on track for this one the no mercy route was not their doing, but they do give you, the player, not frisk, an ultimatum at the end of the no mercy route because they’re fucking pissed at you

-Goopy Chara? Cool! It’s congealed blood

-Chara only finds out that Flowey is Asriel in true lab which is why its so weird (i cannot for the life of me find the post but its super popular, probably a birdsareblooming or undertale-in-2k19 post)

Personality wise:

-theyre super skittish and jumpy. Startle at everything and wear headphones Everywhere

-theyre semi-verbal and have selective mutism (won’t speak in public at all, rarely in front of Toriel and Asgore, and frequently to Asriel and Frisk)

-with that, they’re super light on their feet and hardly make any noise when moving

-also; very quick and hard to catch

-they tend to fall apart under pressure . In a situation where something is expected of them they’ll either overwork themselves into a burnout or stop functioning all together .

-very logical and has a hard time processing strong emotions (mostly anger)

-does a lot of mimicking and can take a while to trust

-hyper empathetic 

-they can be very charming and good at manipulation; take that how you will

Extra HC’s:

-Chara knows magic! It’s not much, and it really drains them, but Asgore taught them (it’s mostly enacted through hand signs and they know healing and self defense)

-they stim a ton! Cracking their knuckles and chewing are the big ones

-Worn Dagger is a survival knife gifted by an older human brother from before falling who I’m referring to currently as Anthony . It’s got a wood and resin handle and a seven inch blade with gold embossing of flowers (specifically daisies). The sheath is hand made and embroidered by them !

-they know sign language and are constantly making new slang terms . Their signing is so modified and personalized that a lot of people have a hard time understanding what theyre saying

-arthritis in their hands and wrists from a couple injuries that never healed right and constant use of their knife only made it worse (they have these splints designed to look like gloves that hold their wrist in place)

-listen to me . Listen to me. They get their hands on Tetris and never let go . Tetris is the coolest game to them . Have y'all seen Tetris tournaments ? If not watch one they’re addictive . Chara gets in . Chara rocks it . They don’t win but they get up there . They fucking rock at Tetris guys

-also after frisk shows them minecraft they fucking lose it okay . ‘Frisk’ starts making houses or rooms fully furnished for seemingly no-one and Tori only . raises an eyebrow

-they listen to lots of rock and early 2000′s alternative/techno once they can get their hands on it. Frisk hates it so they’ll debate about it a lot

-super sensitive to smell and textures

(ps: its worth mentioning that a lot of my chara is based around myself! chara is one of my comfort characters and so a lot of them is just kinda … me, or who i wish i was on some level owo)

and might as well throw in some thoughts on canon compliant chara:

-we dont really know much about canon chara, but theyve shown to be somewhat manipulative and have a really strong case of suicidal idealization . this sort of ties into the idea of them being a martyr, the future of humans and monsters; thats like a huge fucking load for a kid to carry that i definitely feel could have some effect on mental health. like, telling a kid that they’re the future of two separate races, while theyre also learning about 1) how horrifically humans acted towards monsters and 2)  how the barrier can be broken, especially while already having a tendency towards self harmful actions (i.e: jumping off a fucking mountain), and given how presumably awfully humans treated them in comparison to all the kindness theyve been shown by monsters, I think I’d get some ideas too.

- I’ve already said that i don’t think they’re evil, and I’ll stand by that opinion until the day of my death

-that said, their plan was flawed. I mean, obvi. the things they did, such as attempt suicide on 2 occasions,  and succeed on one with the help of Asriel (as well as taking him down with them !) were wrong for quite a few reasons. I think ultimately they were blinded by the pressure placed on them, whether it was intentional or not, and not having a place to diffuse that anxiety, they sort of absorbed it and honed it into a plan to save everyone important (monsters, who showed some bare minimum decency and kindness) and kill everyone who wasn’t (that being themself.) And, once the first part of that plan succeeded, they sort of exploded; being on the surface, with humans, the people who hurt them, the people they hated, was a good enough motive to release all that built up tension .

-also, i might as well go into no mercy- I think Chara winds up with a lot of power, a lot of anxiety, and anger built up, so when every monster in the underground is killed theyre sort of gaining power bit by bit- until the end, after you kill flowey, and we get to meet them for real . I think they’re pissed off, and they try to convince you that you’re in the right, they thank you, etc; they try to appeal to the player, who throughout the run weve only seen as a mindless killing machine, in an attempt to get you to erase the world and go back on your decisions . When you don’t, they get frustrated, explode, using all the power they’ve gained through the run to erase the file themself.

I just . I dunno . i could talk about chara for hours please ask me more questions about them

[mythalsknickers]

From DADWC - "things you said with too many miles between us" sounds fun for a Solavellan pairing. ;)

You created a monster lol, I am going to be posting this on Ao3 as well. @dadrunkwriting

There was no pain, her arm was just gone, and he was leaving. She tried to stand up stumbling forward crying out pain as her knees connected with the ancient stones that made up the broken cobbled path.  Panic seized her she didn’t have the strength to move let alone make it to the Eluvian.

“ma Vhenan!” her voice sounded foreign to her own ears full of anguish and pain she didn’t feel. He paused, turning just barely towards her. “Don’t Solas! Don’t leave me ma vhenan!” she begged standing up. It was natural she pulled on the fade with her right hand. The mist began to form around her as she took a step forward.  With a breath, she disappeared into the fade hoping it would work.  

The light robes swished as she strolled through the doors of the Exalted Council. Her bare toes and heels were soundless against the mirror like tile, her passing through the crowd only marked by the faint jingling of the six tiny leaves that adorned her collar. A quiet hush fell over the crowd. Arl Tegan and the Orlaisian unaware of her soundless arrival continued their heated debate. 

“The Herald of Andraste.” A woman whispered reaching out to touch her like she was their savior. The man next to her snatched the woman's hand back.

 “It is a Rabbit woman! She was not sent by Blessed Andraste! More likely the demons her people worship!” He spits toward Fen’aslan. Without a sound, she passed him.  As she became visible to her former advisors she could see Josephine’s visible relief and the Divine’s smug smile. She knew her plan. Good, this would no surprise Leliana. Her appearance effectively pulling the two lords form their argument, just as she desired. She wanted their undivided attention. 

“You all know what this is!” She raised her voice, with each step she took towards the Dais till she came face to face with the men who would attempt to be the Judge, Jury, and Executioner of her organization. She had become that as Inquisitor.  Behind her, the crowd waited with bated breath for her next words. Exhaling she spun on her heel facing them. “This is a Writ from Divine Justinia, authorizing the formation of the Inquisition.” She clearly showed them the book opening it just barely. “We pledged to close the Breech, find those responsible, and restore order. With or without anyone’s approval.” As she turned to partially face Arl Tegan she caught Cassandra’s smirk and nod of approval.

With another breath she continued. “It was not a formalized treaty, that saved Ferelden or her People. The Inquisition saved them when you could not. We will not disband for you.” She could hear as he sat back into his chair taken aback. His expression said it all. How dare she have the gall. She withheld her smile her eyes meeting the Orlaisian. “We will not submit to an empress who failed to end your inane civil war, and only keeps  her throne because of Inquisition support!” At that the Orlaisians women gasped, the men put hands on swords and yelled. She knew the insults and each one was like armor. “This was never just an organization. It was about people doing what was necessary. We will continue to support you as we have done.” Her eyes met Leliana as the Divine bowed her head. “There is worse coming than anything you’ve yet seen.  We will not be rendered defenseless and riddled with bureaucracy and politics of the game. The inquisition will bow  but it will not be to either of you.” Her long strides away from the dais carried her anger. “Now Excuse me I need to save the world again!” She thrust the writ at Josephine. “I will see you back at Skyhold.” 

The gasps and protests of a blasphemous rabbit and the claimed herald of andraste not bowing to her betters grew louder. She passed through the divided crowd. Throwing open the doors to the chamber she grabbed her staff from a page.

As she materialized out of the fade, she could see the eluvian starting to darken, she quickly pushed herself through. How dare he try to shut her out again. Stumbling forward into the crossroads she couldn’t see him “Solas Tel’tuaun min ea el’u i em!” As she moved away from the mirror she could see it closing behind her… A split second she wanted to jump through but she continued away from home away from a guaranteed future. “lasa em’an dirth ma’lath.” She begged they needed to talk.

Each mirror she passed she sketched and made a note in relation to her path. “Ma tel’isala dina sul min! Tamahn emen to ea vir!” She cried out to emptiness. Closing her eyes, she sank down to the ground. “Fen’aslan ma ane a felasil Fen’harel.” She felt tears stain her cheeks her body began to shake as she curled forward sobbing. He had left her again.

“Ma ane las. Da’lan.” She opened her bleary eyes noting the vallaslin. It was her own, Fen’harel’s eyes was what her clan named it.  “Ma ane isa ghi’la.” The  elvhen asserted crouching down.  “Ar ame Rashale. Las ma ane naim, ar juhalani ma vena mar sal.” He offered his hand and she took it standing with him, leading  her over to a mirror. “Fen’harel Enasanal.” He spoke and the mirror sprang to life and he pulled her through it.

“Rashale?” she glanced at him and he turned back. “Do you understand me.” She was keeping it to the common language.  At his nod, she continued “Can you speak like this?” at his nod, her shoulders relaxed. “Where are we?”

“The ones who raise you call it the Tirashan.” He replied as he lead her into the temple. “This was where Mythal sent you to protect you from the Veil going up.” He watched her as her hand traced the wards on the temple walls, as soon as she removed her hand there was a pulse through them. “Temple of the Hoping Moon.” He offered as he guided her deeper into the temple. Statues of two wolves appeared everywhere.

In a week she had learned more then she thought she could up. Las and Solas former spirits that spawned as Mythal’s power grew. As Solas took form, she partially manifested form and Mythal named her Evuniala. She could remember that.  The temple was for her, the evanuris had planned on her calming Solas, Mythal was well what she had learned to expect of Mythal. She was brought here and put in Uthenera. When she woke she was a child who did not know the Elvhen so Rashale gave her to the Dalish. Laying back on the bed she took a breath closing her eyes. Letting herself drift until she could find the fade. She had hidden in her mind long enough.

“Vhenan.” She came face to face with him. “Where are you?” she stood up and the images around them changed he was trying to find her.

“Where are you vhenan?” She countered shifting the fade on her own. “I will find you vhenan. I told you I would not give up.” Around her, the fade stilled, Arlathan.

“I know you will not Vhenan…” he seemed reluctant looking around. “Allow me to show you these before we do not have time?” She nodded offering her hand.

“em ghi’lana.” She offered gently as he took her hand squeezing it. He lead her through the glass spires of the city, She watched the details, seeing reflections of her and Solas. “In another time…” she smiled fondly they had.

“Yes, Vhenan.” He added turning and taking her left hand?  Her brows furrowed. “This is the fade.” He whispered pressing close to her beginning to dance. As they moved over the glass tiles the room filled with people. “The Evanuris held such parties often, this was the night.” He started before spinning her. “The night everything I cared for was taken from me.” He growled and the music took a deadly twist as she watched Mythal crumble to the floor. One of Mythal’s sentinels spirited her away while the Dread wolf confronted them. She watched next to Solas as the party ended with violent threats.

“Wake up Vhenan.” He leaned forward sadly and kissed her cheek. As her eyes opened she sighed. Now it began.

Elvhen Translations

Solas Tel’tuaun min ea el’u i em! (Solas don’t cause this to be a secret with me)

lasa em’an dirth ma’lath. (Let’s talk about it my love)

Ma tel’isala dina sul min! Tamahn emen to ea vir! (You dont need to die for this! There has to be another way!)

Fen’aslan ma ane a felasil Fen’harel. (You are a fool to chase Fen’harel)

Ma ane las. Da’lan. (You are hope. Young one)

Ma ane isa ghi’la. (You are his guide)

Ar ame Rashale. Las ma ane naim, ar juhalani ma vena mar sal. (I am Rashale. Hope you are lost, I will help you find your soul.)

em ghilana (guide me/ show me)

Vhenan (love)

[funkopersonal]

Im quite literally so done with this shit. i keep on going back and forth between hiding all the i/p related tags, but then I realize that its seeped EVERYWHERE. It's in the motherhood tag, and jewish history tag, and everything else. I can't fucking escape it. I opened tiktok yesterday to see one of my favorite characters (iron man) weaponized to support the one group that wants to see me dead, the user saying that iron man would support palestine, and be an antizionist because he "spoke out against the public" and he wasn't like the sheep. It frustrates me to no end this horrible cycle of fucking misinformation that exists.

As a Gen Z, I simply do not understand how its reached this point? I can't even write all my feelings and information about how shitty this is in a single sitting because 1) it'd be too long and 2) my joints wont let me write that long. But how did it reach this point?

How did it reach the point where jewish/isreali stores are fucking marked to notify the public. Their windows are being broken and the stores are being robbed. How did it reach the point where jewish students on some campuses are told to stay home? how they're harassed out of specific areas, and campuses have been made unsafe? How did it reach the point that people literally have written "I ♡ Houthis & Hamas" and "no mercy for Jews."? How did it reach the point that there are nazi symbols, and hanging deadmans, and communist symbols being drawn on college campuses? How is it possible that students are calling for the end of jewish student unions and hillel international on campus? that'd be like calling for the end of the fucking muslim student organization, or disbanding an african-american affinity group. Which would never be acceptable, but apparently its fine when its jews.

I'm sick and tired of all the horrible conditions of palestenian cities being blamed on israel. Palestine is its own country. They had their own government until they elected Hamas to lead them. Hamas, who diverted all their funds to the military. Hamas, who uses hospitals and public spaces as their bases. Hamas, who built miitary tunnels under cities so that when they're invaded, the cities will collapse on itself. Hamas, who steals all humanitarian aid from its citizens. Hamas, who controls palestenian media and teaches hatred to its children. Hamas, who wants their citizens to become martyrs for their country, to die for their goal. Hamas, whose number one goal is to eradicate all jews. Hamas, who denies the existence of the holocaust. Hamas, who enlists children as soldiers and suicide bombers. Hamas, who has has never expressed an interest in a 2 state solution.

Is this the organization you consider freedom fighters? because i dont think they should ever, in any context, be called that. Hamas is nothing but terrorists.

Yes, the deaths and treatment of palestenian citizens is horrible. but no, this is not a genocide. Israel is trying to rid them of Hamas, because quite literally, no country should ever be forced to live in "harmony" with a terrorist group. Especially one who denies their existence and actively wants to kill them all. Israel has been letting palestenians get jobs in the country, has let palestine use their resources and water, all for years. They've let hamas continously bomb them, they've gotten used to a life of bomb shelters in every residence. Hamas has done nothing but crippled their country's own economy and society.

None of the surrounding coutnries want to let in palestenians, or live with palestenians. Egypt wants to annex Gaza, and Jordan wants the West Bank. In fact, they did own that land for a part of history! Yet Israel has let palestenians govern themselves for years, even when Hamas originally came into power, they didn't interfere. Not until they were provoked.

Yes, Israel has flaws. But welcome to the fucking real world, princess. Every country has flaws. Even America, you dipshits. This is not a little fandom for you to play sides on. its not some fictional world that has a black and white solution. Yes theres going to be deaths, just like in any other WAR. But you really can't call for the destruction of a country on the basis that they're trying to make sure they're allowed to stay a country? Because guess what honey bunchkins? "from the river to the sea" really doesn't mean what you think it does. It just means that you want to kill all jews, or at best, forcefully remove them and scatter them around the middle east. (to countries that have killed them in swaths in the past. To countries that have emprisoned jews for helping others escape. To countries that avidly hate jews and want them dead). I don't understand how that would mean peace in any way shape or form?

Not only that, but half of "protestors" and "activists" for palestine, haven't even done basic research. They dont know what river or sea theyre talking about. They dont know that "palestine" was not a palestenian state in 1948, but it was instead a BRITISH MANDATE, that was NOT fully occupied by palestenians. In fact, "palestenians" weren't a thing. Palestenians are just muslims and arabs from countries like syria, who lived alongside jews and christians in the same land (which was largely uninhabited for the most part). Yeah, you heard me right.

Honestly my thoughts on this issue are so scattered its so hard to make a solid points when I can just keep on going forever.

Fact is, Israel deserves to be a country. No one should be supporting Hamas. Everyone should be supporting the eradication of Hamas (and I mean Hamas not palestenian citizens). I don't get how these are debated, and seriously don't understand how citizens of america are so quick to support a terrorist group, to resort to antisemitism.

Im so done with this all. I cant believe we have to tell you gentiles that stoning a 13-year old kid for being jewish is horrible. That throwing a brick through an israeli-owned cafe in New York is horrible. That students not being able to be on campuses because of their religion or ethnicity is horrible.

This has to end.

Do your research, or don't speak (and terrorist-controlled propoganda channels don't count).

[diarrheaworldstarhiphop]

Lmao I have to ask if you've heard JonTron's interview with Destiny on YouTube holy shit this guy

omg

ive had a number of asks like this on top of a posting backlog i want to get to.. i mean

fUCK

OK so i went to check it out and:

this horsehit is 2 hours long…

i was gluing manga to a wall and cutting out lil jebs and gabs to hide on it while i listened to it because fuck (below is the cut out sheet i made lol)

so i had my email open to write notes for later and this is what i wrote, no fixes or anything:

destiny is wrong -> 14 mins -14:30

both dumb at 16 mins for the commies and nazis statement. destiny is compared to commies for noooo reason?? I dont think destiny is backed up by communists???? as a bizarre kneejerk TU QUO QUe when jon tron is thrown a guilt by association argument from destiny because of the neo nazi followers of his. destiny says nazism is a race ideology while communism is an economic thing, i cant wrap my miand  around thisis. he has no idea what hes talking about. jon tron dumb cant adequently adders it either

none of them are using gaslighting right

jon tron loves saying tribalism

at 18:40 desitiny is ignorant as fuck with regards to riots. because he hasnt heard about it, therefore it doesnt exist, which is is about one of the most frustrating fucking things about this shitty clusterfuck of a debate besides jon tron asserting random made up facts and imploring destiny to look it up. Jon tron laughs and references the boiling frog analogy fittingly. Jon tron continues to bring in international examples while dentiny tries to reel it back to the USA and the USA alone. This is annoying on two fronts:

1. Jontron is merely refering to situations rather than go in depth, such as compare tibet to “displacing white perople” when what ttibet is experiencing is hardly comparable to american white flight since the chinese are engaging in conquest/imperialism/ethnic cleansing and the west just simply isnt replacing their own population enough on their own for their corporate overlords tastes, so immigration fills the economic growth hole for better or for worse in their super simplified concept of economy (see: economies stop growing when ethnic civil strife brings it to ruin). but destiny doesnt have a clue what happens outside of his boiases. ;et alone the country, to even call him out, howeever when destiny has the proper misinformation, he will assert things like how japan is dying off or worse off for its homogenity without backing up his argument as well. which is a sign of liberals generally being ignorant to world issues unless their favoured media makes it a big deal ie with japan needing immigration. It’s clear both jon tron and destiny are parroting shit in hilariously broken, scatter shot fasihion

destiny thinks america is the most diverse country in the world, which is fucking wrong. Both of these asshoelss are throwing out garbage statements that are flat wrong that benefit their respective close minded, unresearched biases. Niether of them know any better so they cant even properly dismantle eachother’s argument. Clearly jon tron, nor destiny showed up to the debate with notes or preparation, which is a given considering they are both hot headed gamer shithead youtuber Know-It-Alls becuase they heard something in passing before and just throw out the garbled memory of that soething in debate.

jon tron thinks white people are more libertarian?? for some reason? destiny throws out a garbled statement akin to that MY THING WAS MADE IN THIS COUNTRY WHICH HAD PARTS IN THAT COUNTRY DESIGNED BY THAT COUNTRY YADDA YADDA DIVERSITY IS AMAZING when all these components werent built by americans but by different nation states engaging with others/.

at 37 minutes jontron says rich blacks commit more crime than whites, with no source but smugly tells destiny to look it up, confounding the shit out of destiny and the chatroom becuase hes put the burden of researching a fact that doesnt exist on his opponent.

destiny has

at 42, destiny is called a virtue signaller by jon tron, who is running through a list of things he learned a week ago on a mr metokur video to call destiny, which is every bit as cringe and awful to watch as the australian mp who called another sitting member of government out for man splaining

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOXh5repOWI

desinty throws back a solid rebuttal that jontron side steps going “what im saying is…” and totally fuckign forgets what destiny even said 10 seconds later because jon tron is running through his recently learned, stupid diluted “”facts”” rather than listen and speak to any argument of destiny’s, especially in cases like this when destiny lands a solid question

at 45, destiny gussies globalization with how its great and necessary it is and how cutting off bringing in workers to make stuff in the usa (spoilers: jobs leave the USA, not come in) and trade would lower american standard of living since iiphones will be worth $3000 which is the most liberal, whitest fucking statement of argument because, while yes, iphones would get more expensive, but at least they arent being made in slave labour assembly plants where workers commit mass suicide in protest to their working conditions and that the west isnt pilfering the future leaders and skilled workers from these societies that need them most.

destiny, true to his ignorance, thinks cheap shit is awesome because its made elsewhere, unaware that it’s only so cheap because people die and get crippled in hot, unregulated slave labour factorys making his shitty overpriced electronics

desinty is right though that the american identity goes beyond just being white, because american culture is informed by its various ethnic gorups and peoples, for example it’s black community that does a disproportionately great job of establishing culure, music, activism and art for america as a whole

jon tron again doubles back, shifts the subject to other shit and starts talking about balkanization upon facing a solid argument

at 48 i start to lose my fucking mind because they are talking at eachother and jontron accuses destiny of deflecting when it is jon tron doing all the deflecting. jon trons smug laughter is grating

jon tron has to rely on telephone game “MUH EUROPE” over and over because he cant acknowledge that america is exceptional in how it assimilates and functionas as a melting pot in a way that europe fucking cant, which is creating the situations jon tron fumbless at with greasy game controller fingers to conflate with the USA in the first place.

desinty then claims that germany’s economy is doing great because of taking in refugees, here again he is talking out of his rose tinted ass because not only is it too early to tell if they are mkaing germany money or not, but that the reality is that they are likely a net drain on the germany given other countries and historic precedent

at 50 mins destiny thinks anti-abortion is a white christian thing, further enshrinign his white, middle class, youtuber ignorance. i guess catholic latinx or muslims are pro-choice

at 1 hour desinty says “its ok to keep a country frfom progressing as much as it can in order to maintain a rcaial identity"destiny clarifies it as “stifling growth” which is exactly what jon tron was asserting, to which he goes yeah dude, japan etc and this fucking knob destiny asks jon tron why he came to america instead of japan then, thinking his strawman homerun is about to take off - until jon tron says he was born in amerca.. destiny goes “oh… well…  y-your parents/// ijjuhhhUHH FUCK IM NOT TALKING ABOUT JAPAN IM TALKING ABOUT TEH UNITED STATES!!! which is about the best backfire ive seen all debate long considering the smug setup for it destiny had. furhtemore, what the fuck does “progressing” entail?? Neve raxplained

which is funny because when it isnt a country desinty can use as an argument against jon tron, destiny shrieks IM TALKING ABOUT AMERICA to disguise his ignorance unless it befits him (japan)

soon after though, destiny catches jontron on his shit about slowing immigration down so they can “enter the gene pool”

jontron couldve articulated around this but jontron is a moron, so, he just stutters and gets walked all over

i want to stab jon tron. laughing nervously is anot a good cubstitute for a credible argument

destiny stinks, though he fucking is destroying jon tron because jon tron is regurgitating even more  regurgitated shit arguments gleaned from someone else than destiny, who at points is arguing from his own values.

i have stopped paying attention rea

“that is what im talkibg about” -jon tron, who cant articulate what the fuck hes trying to verbal diarrhea for himself

“my oral ulterior motive is to maximize economic growth, and to maximize the slice of the pie for everybody in the united states” -destiny

destiny’s disposition is clearly and decisively about maximizing economic growth, but it rests upon ignorant hopefulness that these immigrants will arrive and abandon their cultures and become “american"this simultaneously exposes destinys humanitarianism as self serving (so long as it leads to economic growht:) ) which is partly why the immigration model in countries like sweden have completely collapsed (jontron touches on sweden but clearly has no fucking clue besides MUH RIIOTS) beause they took on an ABSURD amount of migrants and immigrants thinking it will pay for itself and transform sweden into a post-ethnic nascent economic power like a jr. america, except what the swedes have done is import a shit ton of people to be a “humanitarian superpower” and threw the lot of them into commie block ghettos and stopped caring about them, assuming they would naturally become swedes, permitting the transformation of these immigrant slums and neighbourhoods into economic and cultural parallel societies that frequently are violent toward swedish authorities and outsiders visiting their area, hence the term "no go zones” where police are instantly attacked and services like ambulances require escort.

“how do you grow an economy if the populatio n is dying off” says destiny, unaware that people can reproduce and will do so the moment people die off enough for real estate prices to collapse from housing supply outpacing demand and wages to skyrocket and make living costs manageable to have enough children to make replacement rate. You know. Naturally rise and fall and rise again. as humanity has done naturally for fucking ever and has fared PRETTY WELL without having to drive the environment and civil stability into the shitter for the ponzi scheme INFINITE GROWTH meme. Destiny argues this yet has no fucking clue what he’s arguing for. fuck destiny, fuck this argument, fuck “economic growth” that means demand from immigration and globalization that makes 600 square foot apartments cost $750,000 and ramshackle crackhouses cost $2million in vancouver. wow, im really feeling the economic growth, fucker.

jon tron brings up the disproportionate violence of black youths, but when asked to explain that, jon tron backs out and laughs about how destiny asking jontron to clarify that point is just like those shows on CNN where people are trying to “TRAP YAH”

Yah, jon tron, it’s called backing up your argument

jon tron jesterly mentions crime rates being consistent across africa when destiny addresses the court systems in america, as if jon tron’s hints toward his earnest views on race were subtle enough

destiny asks jon tron to name 5 african countries

why??

who cares

i am finding myself wishing i were arguing in place of eachotehr, because i see where they are both coming from but are too busy screwin g up their delivery to actually win a point over eachother

they are literally just talking at eachother and calling it a debate

Jon tron accuses destiny of bringing up irish and italians when its convenient

…as if jon tron doesnt bring up MUH YUROP and other whatevers when it’s convenient.

i hate this

they both suck t this. Jon tron has dug a hole through the earth and is now reaching escape velocity with his shovel and is soon to break earths orbit

jon tron brings up turks and iranians being able to assimilate into a culture than a romanian and hungarian would. If jon tron were knowledgeable to pursue this point, he couldve described how Kurds (an iranian people) and turks often fight and engage in conflict with each other in say, Germany to the dismay of germans who expected these groups to assimilate, forget their animosities from their homeland and become good forklift simulator playing germans.

i ahve wasted my hour

i like how i stopped keeping track of time on the video and just started ranting, rambling at the halfway point

I loved it for moments like this tho:

lmao

i feel jon tron is going through a PHILOSOPHICAL AND INFORMATIONAL BLOSSOMING which i guess is taking the red pill for some people. So he is on the same tier as a 16 year old who just discovered holohoax and bell curve graphs for the first time on a 4chan thread loaded with A. Wyatt Man drawings.

He will eventually (hopefully) research for himself these positions if only because he’s constantly being stomped and fighting people over these regurgitated opinions. Which means he is going to try and read up on them to better argue them. Which means he is going to have a hangover of sorts when he realizes what he’s done lol

[the-little-red-noodle]

4/22/17 10:25pm a letter to my writing teacher about callum

you’ve probably gotten the email by now, so why haven’t you said anything? Well that’s tough, because you haven’t said anything for months, not since that night when, I guess, you thought you’d said everything you needed to.

I want to hear your side of the story

I never thought I’d have to defend myself so much to you, especially considering you were the one who fucked up between us. You abandoned me when I reached out for friends. You told me “If you ever need support, just ask for it. I want to be there for you always.” Well I was asking. 

Hey where are you? I need a friend right now

You never responded that night. I saw a half assed text the next morning of, “Hope it all worked out.” But that was bullshit and you should have known that. As your self-described best friend on campus, I would have expected a little more warmth, but I knew where you were. I knew you were with the problem, and you’d take her side because god forbid you risk blue balls helping your friend.

I wasn’t even mad that you two were getting to know each other, you never would have met without me. I hope it gives you both hell that I set you up. Me, this 'disgusting racist, stupid bitch.’ 

White people don’t talk about politics

The catalyst for this clusterfuck of my sophomore year was her, ranting about how white people are all inherently racist because they don’t talk about political issues at family events. I wasn’t even the first one to call her out on this. The whole room seemed on my side that there are a lot of reasons why people wouldn’t want to start fights over politics with older relatives. It seemed so strange to me how mad she was that people were challenging her. She scoffed and glared and sent huge angry rant texts to you about how the whole room called her out. Eventually the conversation lost the topic and it just sat with me.

Hey I don’t mean to start fights, but this thing you said yesterday kind of rubbed me the wrong way so I was wondering if we could clear it up? I just don’t feel like its fair to say that ALL white people avoid political discussion ALL the time. Its not appropriate to debate grandma on your differing views on politics at christmas because fighting at christmas just isn’t cool to do. You think I wouldn’t like to talk to those relative that i disagree with and argue my side? You don’t do that at thanksgiving. 

Im not going to defend white people. You dont talk about politics because you don’t need to, racial issues don’t affect you.

Ryan’s thanksgiving had the same parameters to not talk about politics.. His extended family is all japanese, but they still don’t agree on political issues that aren’t about race, like money and women’s rights..

*ignores my point* if they disagree with you then you should cut them out of your life. you shouldnt sit idly by while your family is racist.

there are a lot of reasons why you shouldn’t cut yourself off from relatives.. money reasons, or the fact that they’re family...

*scoffs*

I never meant to get her angry at me. I hate confrontation as much as the next introvert, I just didn’t like feeling like things were unsolved. I never expected her to blow up. That night after we parted from a her screaming at me for 2 hours, I texted you for help. I reached out. you were the one who abandoned me, but that didn’t matter. You only heard her side of the story when she was angry and getting high off aggression. That didn’t mean that you had to defend her and ask for my side in a nasty way. I thought you knew me better than to think I was such an awful person, or believe the lies she was telling you.

You weren’t even there, you don’t know what I said

You’re disgusting. You’re a racist. You deserve what’s happening.

I would expect a fight from the problem girl, but not from you. Did you forget about every night you came to my door to cry on my shoulder? Did you forget that I made you dinner every other night for the past two years? Did you forget every time that you said you needed a friend, and I was there? Apparently none of your previous memories of me were as fact as what she was telling you. Forget about the years of our friendship built on honesty, and support, even when you messed up. I took your side in your first breakup, I believed you. I held your head in my lap as you sobbed about how she hurt you. That was me being there for you, not Ms. Problem. but i guess i’m happy i could secure you a side chick for the rest of the year, my parting gift. But through our whole fight, past you calling me a disgusting racist, was calling me stupid. You knew my weak spot. Years of being the dumb blonde and bullied in middle school to eventually dyeing my hair; things you knew. Thus you sculpted your flawless argument of attacking my intelligence

Use your fucking pea sized brain you idiot and read what i just fucking wrote you. Are you really that dumb?

I just want to know what I did wrong.. what did i even do to you?

You are impossibly dense, fucking retard

When you only hear one side of the story, you believe it. That’s true of you, along with the rest of my now ex friend group. I was the only one who didn’t live in this house. The whole lot of 10 people who I thought i was friendly with took the same side you did, blind hate for me. I don’t know what I expected from the rest of this group. Gossip and berating other students was just their way of bonding, and i was the next target wheeled out. 

It feels like my feet are drilled to the floor as this gang takes an archery class. None of them heard my side, and they never would. instead, they collectively shunned me.  Ms. Problem kicked me out of the musical crew for Cabaret. Both relieved to not see them anymore and angry at her, I didn’t come back. The whole crew blocked me on social media and would avoid my gaze as I passed by. Some openly glare at me and give me death stares. There is nothing more isolating than your only friend group one day deciding to hate you, and you never get to defend yourself. You’re just screaming under water, no one can hear you, or rather bothers to listen.

Do you feel good harboring this much hate inside you?

No, but I’d rather keep it to myself and you fucking stop trying to talk to me

This is ridiculous.. I’m just gunna go cuz I can’t take you attacking me like this.

Good, finally you’ll leave me the fuck alone

I never thought our friendship would end like this. that was the last conversation we ever had. Those will always be your famous last words to me. A text fight ending with ‘Finally you’ll leave me the fuck alone.’

You used me for 2 years. Convinced me that you valued our friendship, pretended to care when i was broken, and lapped up my generosity.

you always preferred your significant other to your friendships. you would ditch me in a heartbeat if she said she missed you. ironically, i hope you treat Ms. Problem better than that and don’t run back to your ex. Despite being my bully, I still believe she deserves better. No one wants to be someones second choice, like i apparently was for years. It’s such a disappointing feeling when you learn the hard way that you cared way more than the other person.

I feel too soft to stand up for myself, I am so easily steam rolled and affected. Like stepping on gum, I stick to all the hate and can’t let it go. “Kids can be mean”, my mother would tell me. I feel guilty for complaining and for taking everything so personally. i was just trying to have a civil conversation. i never said anything about race, or racially fueled. I wasn’t trying to defend white people either, I just didn’t want to sit idly by while my friend said a pretty prejudiced statement. I just wanted to hear her out more and speak civilly and have a conversation like grown ups, and from that sparked two huge fights that cost me my two closest friendships on campus and an entire friend group 

sometimes i dont even have the strength to be angry, i just curl up and cry. i’ll get glared at and cry, or get another nasty message and cry. i feel haunted and terrorized and bullied but also guilty for saying anything at all.

something that had been eating at me was the brown paper bag of your things that you’d left in my apartment. a constant reminder of the friendship no longer. a red bowl and a red spoon, followed by your owl mug. id cook you dinner every night in that bowl and hot chocolate in that mug and we’d eat on my cardboard box table on the floor of this room and talk about the little things. that was then. now i was haunted by your little napsack of memories. you’ve probably already gotten the email. i went running around campus to student affairs and westlands desk to finally have the purple door accept it as a lost and found item.

Hi i have this bag of stuff that belongs to a student, but i dont feel safe continuing communication with him, can you take it? its just some kitchen stuff but the other places wont hold it..

we can email him that we have it

thank you

[dajoezenone]

REVIEW of The Devil Is A Part Timer! Vol 5 (novel)

I feel like I just posted my review of Vol 4 but I flew through this one I couldn’t put it down. Its hands down my favorite of all five volumes so far. Let me tell you why it is so good.

First off, its funny. The writing in this book makes fun of so much stuff. From cell phones to the death of TV in favor of the internet, to Pokemon, to anything else. The series always satirizes the life of the average Japanese person, but for whatever reason, this book does it in a way thats funnier than I think its ever done before, and its always relevant to the story and mixed in with humor making fun of the characters as well. Its perfect.

Second, I think this might be the most balanced book in terms of which characters get represented the most. Granted, the character that does get the MOST coverage is my favorite character, so of course I’d say that, but nobody feels extraneous or left out in this book. Other than Emeralda and Albert, of course. Eme shows up in a single conversation as always to drop some exposition and then never shows up again.

ANYWAYS though, without getting spoiler heavy (yet), there’s a lot more plot in this novel than usual. This book really gets back to the way the first book had a threat slowly creeping up throughout the duration of the story, not just for five minutes at the end. The climax is really long too. These books are always split into thirds, but the third act of this book seriously takes up about half of the pages. And those pages are filled too. There’s like 3 different twists and reveals that happen, plus multiple epic fight scenes. Its GRAND.

Overall, the writing is better. Smarter. More emotional. The illustrations are better. The epilogue is followed by bonus goodies again. Read it.

Okay SPOILER ALERT BEYOND THIS POINT.

The story picks up roughly where the last book left off, with the Devil and his cohorts moving back into Villa Rosa Sasazuka apartment 201.They discover that in addition to fixing the gaping hole Gabriel left in the wall back in Book 3, their landlord had an HDTV hookup installed. So now they can get TV channels. If they had a TV of course. Maou convinces Ashiya that they have room in the budget, and Suzuno decides to go with them and get one of their own. Ashiya invites Rika Suzuki, as he had previously asked her for help in the task of purchasing himself a cell phone (and to give her a souvenir he got her in Choshi during the previous book). 

As the book progresses, they slowly discover a plot by Gabriel (returning after his unsuccessful attempt to take Alas Ramus and the Better Half from our heroes in book 3) and a less powerful, but higher ranking Angel whos name I cant remember for the life of me, to find the rogue Angel Lailah (Emi’s mother, also implied to be the angel who inadvertently started Maou on his quest, as well as gifted him with the Yesod fragment that eventually grew into Alas Ramus) so they can punish her for crimes against Heaven. In the process, they end up hurting Chiho, which of course provokes the ire of the Devil, the Hero, and their underpaid comrades in arms. 

The first half of the book focuses a LOT on Alciel, which as I said in my last review, was something greatly needed, expected, and totally as good as I hoped it would be. He doesn’t exactly get much of a character arc, as he largely just goes from being totally unwilling to buy a TV, to getting one for as cheap as possible. But he gets development in other ways. In Vol 3, he seemed largely oblivious to Rika’s clear attraction to him, and his interactions with her seemed to largely just be because of his overly-polite personality. But, as their totally-not-a-date goes on, his politeness is revealed to have a bit of mutual feeling behind it, and he even tells her he may sometime tell her the truth about him and the others, something she doesn’t really question, as she never totally believed the story given to her anyways. Sadly, once the danger raises its head, she’s rushed out of harm’s way, and Ashiya stays largely quiet from that point on. 

Maou, as always, is in the forefront, but at the same time kept mysterious. He mentions early on that a TV could be helpful in knowing what is going on in the world, and being able to predict and fight any Heavenly (or Demonic) things that come to threaten the Earth. And after the threat is resolved, mentions that its not like they’ll try the same thing again, so the TV is less useful now than it was. So, did he know they’d try to use the TVs in some way? Probably not, but its not beyond reason. As always, then, he treads the line between being a silly character, and being the most serious, as he can flippantly ask Rika if she likes Ashiya to her face, and can very earnestly out-debate Suzuno (who, reminder, is the closest thing Ente Isla has to a lawyer) when the two discuss whether or not Rika ought to be made aware of who and what they all really are. 

She isn’t, by the way. I suppose we must wait for another book for that. 

Emi and Suzuno, seemingly unaware that their fates were bound in with that of the Devil King a long long time ago, have learned, through Emeralda, that Ente Isla is now engulfed in a Civil War, which was seemingly instigated by Heaven, Olba, and the Demons that seek the Better Half at his suggestion. They decide that, at all costs, Maou must not be allowed to join in this war, as he would likely reuite the Demons, and crush the un-unified countries of Ente Isla, particularly because Emi is unable to join, as siding with any part of humanity over another wouldn’t be proper as the Hero. Hence, Suzuno continues her surveilance of the demons, now with the renewed purpose of making sure no Demons come with the intention of pulling their King into their war. Emi, assured that Eme and Suzuno are capable of the tasks before them, goes looking for her mother, unaware of the two Angels out doing the same thing...

Emi’s story is an emotional one, as it often is. Everything she knows is slowly crumbling around her, and as her mother is unable (or unwilling) to reveal herself and speak to her directly, and the other main characters all either preoccupied or still enemies in her mind, she is left only with Alas Ramus by her side to help her to understand what she must do and where she must go. I dont want to spoil specifics of Emi’s story in this book, but its very good. I didn’t cry as much as she did, maybe, but I at least teared up a bit. 

Crestia Bell, meanwhile, has a lot more time in the limelight after last book forcing her to make sandcastles and do little else. She has slowly grown to be one of my favorite characters in the series. She’s far more multilayered than anyone else, with her background so steeped in religion and politics, combined with a fascination with Japanese culture, particularly the old pre-WW2 stuff, from when Japan was still traditional and religious itself. Plus, she really likes Udon for reasons nobody really understands. She’s funny, quirky, serious, and strong. And she gets a lot of time to show off all sides of herself in this book, and she manages to be awesome at every aspect of it, all with the calm serenity of a person of her religious station. There’s a reason she’s on the cover of this book. Heck, she’s more of the book’s standout character than Ashiya, I just was more happy about him getting focus so thats who I talked about more at first. 

Hanzo Urushihara, after a surprising amount of character development in the previous novel, returns to heaven on earth (the inside of apartment 201 of Villa Rosa Sasazuka) with great enthusiasm. He too wants a TV, but obviously he isn’t going to go outside the apartment to get it, nor is he at all going to be helping pay for it, so he doesn’t help Maou convince Ashiya of its usefulness as that would not help the case. He instead stays home through much of the book. Gabriel stops by about halfway through, and they have a great interaction, where we get an inside look on exactly how Urushihara thinks, and how he justifies his existence to himself. While he seems unaware of it, he really has evolved as a character; He does a lot to help during the climax, and at one point expresses great pride in the work he was able to do at the Beach House in Choshi. Overall, he’s written much better now than he was prior to book 4 as well, as he still feels like a fusion or extension of the disparate parts of himself that seemed kinda incongruous in the first books. In fact, he’s more bad*ss now, humming “Amazing Grace” as he shoos one of the series’ primary villains out of his personal space, than he did menacingly levitating Chiho above Hatagaya in the first book. 

I guess I should also talk about Gabriel, because he comes back, and he’s better now than he was. A nice effort is made to make him and the other Angel distinct characters, rather than Gabe feeling like a tamer, but more powerful version of Sariel like he did when he first showed up. He’s still not as good as Olba, or even Lucifer were as villains, but he’s still cool, and the threats he’s a part of feel really legitimate this time around, which is a really nice change of pace from both the previous books. 

Finally, Chiho. At first, I was kind of dissappointed that her injury was basically keeping her from actually helping with the plot at all, despite being its whole inciting incident. 

Without spoiling it, lets just say that uh, dont count Chiho out because she has a bigger role here than, like ever. I mean, she’s been damsel in distress, she’s inspired the others, and convinced Gabriel to delay his attack in Book 3. In this book, she basically saves the day. 

How does it make any sense when she’s just a normal girl? Um read the book ya dummy. 

[friend-clarity]

Ontario universities still don’t really want free speech on campus

Failing Grades on Campus, W. R. Laird, February 9, 2019

NationalPost.com: They were all ordered to develop free-speech policies. Only two give unconditional protection to freedom of speech

In August 2018, the Ontario Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities, under newly elected Premier Doug Ford, required all colleges and universities to devise a policy on the freedom of speech by Jan. 1, 2019. In particular, it required that the policy adhere to the principles of the University of Chicago statement on free speech, notably that “universities and colleges should be places for open discussion and free inquiry,” that they “should not attempt to shield students from ideas or opinions that they disagree with or find offensive,” that “while members of the university or college are free to criticize and contest views expressed on campus, they may not obstruct or interfere with the freedom of others to express their views,” and that “speech that violates the law is not allowed.”

Universities and colleges should be places for open discussion and free inquiry University of Chicago

Despite these moderate requirements, the faculty unions were outraged. Both the Ontario Confederation of University Faculty Associations and the Canadian Association of University Teachers came out roundly against the measure. They argued first that it actually limits the freedom of speech by violating the autonomy of the university (although they did not invoke university autonomy when previous governments imposed similar requirements for policies on equity and diversity, harassment, and sexual violence). And they argued secondly that universities already had sufficient protections in place (despite the recent and often successful attempts to bar controversial speakers from the University of Toronto, Ryerson, Wilfrid Laurier, Queen’s, and others). In fact, I could find on university websites many existing statements on academic freedom, but only one (the University of Toronto’s) on simple freedom of speech dating from before last fall.

Despite these moderate requirements, the faculty unions were outraged

Academic freedom is the freedom from undue influence in the conduct of one’s professional academic duties, and it is rightly conditional on the upholding of professional standards of teaching and research. It is thus a privilege — literally a private law, a special legal status — that applies only to such professionals in their professional capacity. Simple freedom of speech, in contrast, applies unconditionally to everyone, and in Canada it is protected and limited by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The Charter, however, does not apply to universities, which is why they need their own policies.

But it’s now February 2019, and the policies are posted. How well did the universities do?

Of the 17 university policies I looked at, only two give unconditional protection to freedom of speech, unqualified by any extraneous considerations. The substance of the University of Ottawa’s statement deserves to be quoted at length, as the standard to which the others failed to measure up:

“As an autonomous, self-governing institution whose most fundamental value is that of academic freedom, the University prizes and protects freedom of inquiry and all forms of freedom of expression. It neither seeks to shield its community from controversial or objectionable views nor permits interference with the free expression of the full spectrum of human thought, within the limits that bind the University under Canadian and Ontario law.

The University (of Ottawa) prizes and protects freedom of inquiry and all forms of freedom of expression

“All members of the University of Ottawa community — teaching and research faculty, staff, and students, including both individuals and groups — and all visitors to the campus have the right to express their views freely.

“The University recognizes that free debate and critique are essential to the pursuit of knowledge. As participants in collegial self-governance, all members of the community are expected to act in accordance with these values and applicable laws, which the university will safeguard by whatever steps it deems necessary. Visitors to the campus must also respect these values, relevant University policies, and applicable laws. Complaints in connection with this policy should be filed with the appropriate internal body as defined in University policies and regulations.”

Almost every other policy grandly states some version of the first sentence, but then weakens or negates it with conditions and qualifications. The University of Chicago statement, their supposed model, explicitly says that although the university greatly values civility, and although all members of the university community share in the responsibility for maintaining a climate of mutual respect, concerns about civility and mutual respect can never be used as a justification for closing off discussion of ideas, however offensive or disagreeable those ideas may be to some people in the community.

And this is precisely where almost all the other policies fall short. Only U of T’s policy, adopted in 1992, expressly states that civility and respect are sometimes trumped (reluctantly) by the freedom of speech. As for the rest, some tie the freedom of speech explicitly to the purely social goals of respect, diversity, inclusion and equality (Carleton, Guelph, Laurentian, Queen’s, and Western). Others actually subordinate freedom of speech to these social goals and to considerations of imbalances of power, either explicitly (Brock, McMaster and York) or implicitly by subordinating the freedom of speech to other policies that assert these higher goals (Nipissing and Waterloo). Several universities also seem to have confused simple freedom of speech with academic freedom, by hedging freedom of speech with conditions appropriate only to academic freedom (Carleton again, McMaster again, and Trent). Lakehead, Queen’s and Windsor assert that the university has the duty to protect its members from any harm or risks to health and safety supposedly caused by the exercise of free speech. “Safety” was the cry of protesters trying to prevent Jordan Peterson, Ricardo Duchesne and others from speaking on their campuses.

Others actually subordinate freedom of speech to social goals and to considerations of imbalances of power

Finally, two universities are in a league of their own. Both Ryerson and Wilfrid Laurier — coincidently where the most virulent protests against controversial speakers recently took place — adopted the notion of “inclusive freedom.” (Laurier credits Sigal R. Ben-Porath, author of Free Speech on Campus, with this Orwellian idea). In identical language — either plagiarized one from the other, or both from a common source — Ryerson and Laurier assert paradoxically that their university is “committed to equity, diversity and community inclusion and to freedom of expression. It does not see the idea that free expression and the goals of diversity, equity, and inclusion can be at odds with one another. The university embraces the concept of inclusive freedom which espouses a commitment to the robust protection of free expression, and the assurance that all members — including those who could be marginalized, silenced, or excluded from full participation — have an opportunity to meaningfully engage in free expression, enquiry, and learning. Ryerson (or Laurier) recognizes that at times free expression may harm and/or further marginalize community members from visible and invisible minority groups … In such cases, the university encourages its community members to respond with an educational and intellectual approach that increases awareness and consideration of diverse positions.”

Note that freedom of expression comes last, and is so hedged in by diversity, equity, inclusion, awareness and consideration as to render it nugatory. At Ryerson and Laurier, you are free to say anything so long as it is seen not to impair these higher, social goals. Nevertheless, both universities decline (again in identical words) to censor — not for the sake of free expression, mind you, but for fear of setting a precedent:

“Some challenging cases of free expression will have to be navigated, but it is not the role of the university to censor speech. To grant the institution such power would set a dangerous precedent. Even if institutional censorship were deemed acceptable in one context, there is no guarantee that such restriction would be applied fairly or wisely in other contexts, or as power changes hands over time.”

They would happily censor, but only if they thought no one else could

Being fair and wise themselves, they would happily censor, but only if they thought no one else could.

These policies are up for review in the coming months. The ministry has its work cut out.

W.R. Laird is professor of history at Carleton University in Ottawa. The views expressed here are his own and are probably not shared by Carleton University, although he hopes they will fall under the protection of academic freedom.

https://nationalpost.com/opinion/ontario-universities-still-dont-really-want-free-speech-on-campus

[joyfullightbouquetblog-blog]

Don't let people trick you into thinking that there are 'right' ways to protest Trump

New Post has been published on https://www.uberbuyer.com/2018/07/14/dont-let-people-trick-you-into-thinking-that-there-are-right-ways-to-protest-trump/

Don't let people trick you into thinking that there are 'right' ways to protest Trump

If you’ve listened to the chattering classes lately, you’ve learned that there are civil and uncivil ways to protest Donald Trump and his administration. Most of these pundits frown on nonviolent heckling, confrontation, and shaming of aides like Kellyanne Conway, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, and Stephen Miller. They argue that such behavior erodes civil norms, and they fret that the subsequent viral media attention will alienate moderates. 

While their opinions are worth hearing, there’s an unmistakable disconnect in being told by the country’s most influential writers that the powerless should meet their personal expectations for civil protest.

These are people whose livelihoods and reputations are largely safe from the Trump administration’s bureaucratic cruelty. If they become a target of the bully-in-chief himself, it’ll probably translate into increased book sales or page views — not deportation. 

Nothing more reliably generates panic among US elites than the prospect of powerful white people facing any consequences whatsoever for their words & actions. https://t.co/YgfrZCUt3k

— David Roberts (@drvox) July 9, 2018

Pundits more interested in decency and decorum often view the endgame of protest as satisfying skeptical white moderates. Other strategies are considered doomed approaches for swaying public opinion or motivating voter turnout, which says something about whose needs these commentators think are most central in American life and politics. 

As Nick Baumann, an editor at HuffPost, put it on Twitter last month after a Virginia restaurant owner declined to serve Sanders, “One thing the Red Hen situation has made abundantly clear is that the vast majority of people in the national media identify more closely with the White House press secretary than with anyone who might be in a position to cook or serve food to her in a restaurant.” 

Meanwhile, those who turn to confrontational protest may see it as a signal to the rest of America that Trump’s racist rhetoric and policies are not normal or acceptable. It can be a rallying cry or an act of solidarity, regardless of whether it happens between two people in a restaurant or bookstore, or on the streets with thousands of people chanting the same message of resistance. 

Every time we remind our office holders that the power belongs to we, the people, we are patriots.

— Brittany Packnett (@MsPackyetti) July 4, 2017

It may very well drive voter turnout in imperceptible ways by inspiring people who feel overwhelmed by the relentless cynicism of our politics, or encouraging those most negatively affected by Trump’s policies — and who wonder why their neighbors and countrymen aren’t voicing dissent on their behalf. That analysis, however, gets less interest and attention than the strategy of appeasing those occupying the so-called middle ground, ostensibly to win them over at the ballot box. 

Yet what goes unsaid when we obsess over how white moderates will react to uncomfortable yet nonviolent displays of protest is that one man’s electoral strategy can be another man’s oppression. There’s a reason Martin Luther King Jr. singled out the white moderate for criticism in his Letter from Birmingham Jail, written in 1963: 

“I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Council-er or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action”; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a “more convenient season.”

Some may remember the Civil Rights era as a golden age for civil protest, but Celina Su, an associate professor of political science at the City University of New York, says mainstream historical pundits have a way of shifting the narrative so that those we agree with now abided by “respectability” politics. 

Up until recently, for example, portrayals of Rosa Parks cast her as a tired woman who just wanted a seat on the bus. Instead, Su says, she was a “fierce” activist who’d attended training camps for civil disobedience. 

“Folks who were really effective were definitely not considered civil at the time,” says Su. 

She’s not surprised, given the current political climate, that some people are shaming Trump administration officials they encounter in public. When the average person lacks the financial power and access to a platform that the president and his high-profile staff members posses, while watching democratic institutions fail before their eyes, they may very well resort to using everyday forms of resistance to make themselves heard. 

I keep reading in the press that we’re having an “immigration debate” when it is ethnic cleansing, crimes against humanity, and an assault on all of our rights. We were never having an immigration debate.

— Alexander Chee (@alexanderchee) July 6, 2018

We should also question the idea that consensus can be inherently neutral and fair. 

“Most often, unless you’re really paying attention to power and inequalities of power in the room, consensus is another mask for domination,” says Su.  

There’s one more reason we should view catering to white moderates as a self-defeating task: The goalposts of civility will most certainly change depending on the messenger or the message. When Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) told people to continue confronting Trump officials in public, specifically about the separation of migrant children from their parents, Democratic leaders condemned her remarks, which were also mischaracterized by the president as an incitement to violence. 

Maxine Waters is pushing back and calling on everyone to speak out against this Trump Administration whenever they see someone out in public. Check out this tag to see how pissed she’s making Trump supporters…I wonder why? 🤔 pic.twitter.com/ONjUPrYLc5

— Amee Vanderpool (@girlsreallyrule) June 24, 2018

Liberals may abandon shaming and public confrontation on the advice of pundits, but there’s no act of protest that someone somewhere won’t find objectionable or indecent. We know the president himself has no qualms about turning commentary about protest into inflammatory, misleading tweets. Most of his supporters seem eager to follow his lead. 

So for anyone, liberal or otherwise, who feels compelled to speak out against the president, his administration, and its policies, perhaps look past the lecturing from pundits and focus first on nonviolent forms of protest favored by activists and advocates in the trenches. Listen to what the people harmed by Trump’s policies want to see as acts of solidarity. Hold your conscience in as high esteem as you do electoral strategy. There may be more effective ways of airing your grievances, so spend time studying tactics and talking to organizers. 

But if you’re faced with an unexpected moment to hold someone powerful accountable, I hope its King’s voice you hear in your head, and not a pundit’s who has nothing to lose. 

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Empirical SCOTUS: Don’t cite me like that

An interesting debate was reignited by Chief Justice John Roberts’ majority opinion in Minnesota Voter’s Alliance v. Mansky. This debate surrounds the effect, if any, of oral argument on the justices’ decisions. Here is one of the sections from Roberts’ majority opinion in that case that refers to the oral argument.

In this example, as with many of the instances in which justices cite oral-argument transcripts, the authoring justice used the interaction to expose a weakness in a party’s argument. Roberts refers to the portion of the proceedings when several of the justices, most notably Justice Samuel Alito, engaged the respondents’ attorney Daniel Rogan about the extent of the apparel ban under the statute.

Looking back at the oral-argument transcript, Alito seemingly caught the attorney in a trap in which an affirmative response, although appropriate, could lead the court to conclude that the state statute was too broad to pass constitutional muster. This raises the question of whether the oral argument led to the petitioners’ victory in the case (I looked at a related question in separate post.). Without information on the justices’ deliberations, such as a justice’s personal papers, it is nearly impossible to answer this question with any degree of certainty. Still, both the specifics of this case and Supreme Court cases generally say a lot about the importance of oral argument.

Although not conclusive, the justices’ decisions about when and how much to speak at oral argument are often indicative of their voting positions. In Mansky, the order and amount of speaking looked like this during the petitioners’ turn:

Click graph to enlarge.

And like this during the respondents’ turn:

Click graph to enlarge.

By breaking these figures down to their composite numbers, it becomes clear that Alito, Roberts and Justices Neil Gorsuch and Stephen Breyer spoke more during the respondents’ turn. Speaking more to one side is often correlated with voting against that side, and although Justice Clarence Thomas did not speak at oral argument, he generally agrees with coalitions that include Roberts, Alito and Gorsuch. This leads to the question of whether the oral argument in Mansky helped move Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Anthony Kennedy and Elena Kagan to the majority. I will return to this question toward the end of the post.

The justices cited oral-argument transcripts in 69 distinct instances in opinions this term (Multiple citations in one place were treated as one instance.). The case breakdown of where these cites appeared is as follows:

Click graph to enlarge.

Roberts’ opinion in Mansky, the case with the most cites to the oral argument, mainly used the transcript to oppose the position of the party/attorney involved in the cited segment of the argument. When grouped together into themes, other reasons for citations to oral-argument transcripts this term aside from opposing a particular position include describing when a party conceded a position, explaining the government’s stance on an issue, explaining the relevant law, detailing a party’s position and explaining or illustrating the justice’s point.

Each of these types is easily identifiable. Here is an example of a citation to a concession from Alito’s dissent in Collins v. Virginia:

In this instance, Alito merely cited the oral-argument transcript to show that neither party disputed his assertion. Although the justices may use these kinds of points to support their views in a case, such citations have the initial appearance of neutrality.

Arguments were also cited to explain the government’s positions, as in Justice Sonia Sotomayor’s opinion in Jesner v. Arab Bank, PLC:

The federal government’s position on issues is generally shown deference even if is not adopted by the Supreme Court. The regard the justices tend to pay to statements from the federal government’s attorneys shows that their arguments are at least cursorily examined, as they were here.

Oral arguments may also be used as a tool to explain the law. The following is an example from Justice Elena Kagan’s majority opinion in Sessions v. Dimaya:

The oral-argument transcript in this instance is used as a tool of statutory interpretation. In such a situation, oral arguments may have a neutral application or they may be used to show why a particular view of a law’s meaning is superior to another.

Oral arguments may also be used to lay out specific facts. When this is the purpose of the citation, the justices may look for facts that are particularly favorable to their positions. Below is an example from Kennedy’s majority opinion in Lozman v. Riviera Beach.

The scenario as Kennedy described it included specific details, like the number of times Fane Lozman attended the city-council sessions. In this way, Kennedy set the stage for various interpretations of what Lozman’s regular attendance implies or, conversely, of the importance of the arrest on that particular occasion.

One final way that the justices cited oral arguments in opinions this term was to highlight a party’s positions that may or may not be adopted by the Supreme Court. The following example is from Kagan’s majority opinion in Sveen v. Melin.

The party’s position may be articulated to create a straw-man argument that the authoring justice later deconstructs. This is the trajectory followed by Kagan in the above instance. By citing a party’s own views on an issue, justices have the opportunity to engage in a secondary dialogue, not directly with the party’s attorney, but rather with the transcripts that expose the attorney’s positions.

These six types of oral-argument citations are employed purposefully. With the benefit of a party’s assessments, the justices interpret particular arguments, often in order to explain why they are invalid or incorrect.

The justices’ individual uses of the types of citations so far this term is shown next.

Click graph to enlarge.

The most frequent purpose of oral-argument citations so far this term has been to convey a party’s position. Within this area Roberts is the most frequent citing justice, followed by Kagan and Sotomayor. The rationale for this type of citation is often to develop an argument against the party’s position.

Justices may oppose a party’s position more directly, as Roberts did in Mansky by citing examples from oral argument of miscalculated or erroneous answers. Rather than merely restating a party’s position, these citations often come up in hypothetical applications that the justices use to test the soundness of a particular argument. Kagan and Thomas are the two justices who followed this approach the most in their opinions. (Thomas did not ask any questions during oral arguments this term.)

Oral arguments most likely affect the justices on the margins. We may never know about all the instances when justices’ votes were swayed by the proceedings, but we can make educated guesses, as I did in Mansky, by comparing the justices’ likely and actual votes (The likely votes may be at different points in time, such as before and after oral argument.). Comparisons like these over time may shed additional light on both the justices’ uses for oral arguments and the effect these arguments have on case outcomes.

On an unrelated note: The justices have punted in multiple high-profile cases that were argued this term. These include Benisek v. Lamone and Gill v. Whitford, but also much of Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission. The Supreme Court has not been shy about remanding gerrymandering cases in the past without much substantive guidance. It even did so last term with North Carolina v. Covington. What if Roberts, the master tactician on the court, has learned the importance of cooperation from the eight-justice Scalia-less court of 2015 and 2016? For all of the court’s politically charged decisions under Roberts, the chief justice now seems to shy away from 5-4 ideologically divided decisions in politicized cases. Without a ninth justice, the court managed to avoid big decisions in highly charged cases such as Friedrichs v. California Teachers Association, Zubik v. Burwell and United States v. Texas. If Roberts prefers this outcome to ideological polarization, maybe he and to a lesser extent the other justices are choosing such compromises over highly fractured decisions. In any case, just a thought.

This post was originally published at Empirical SCOTUS.

The post Empirical SCOTUS: Don’t cite me like that appeared first on SCOTUSblog.

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