#like theres always someone out there with a completely different account of how things played out

[magpiking]

The Diary of A Desperate Schoolgirl

ₓ˚. ୭ ◦˚.୭ ˚○◦˚ Magpi's Intro ˚◦○˚ ୧.˚◦ ୧ .˚ₓ

❧ name: Magpi/Em

➺ pronouns: any is fine! idrc.

❧ age: 17

➺ fun fact: I used to have a thing for all things creative, though thats died down as school got tough.

I'm making this blog as a way to hold some accountability over my studies. Unfortuantly, as surely many out there have experienced - I'm a classic case of :

"I used to do quite well in school! What happened to me?"

In primary (K-6), I was always a crappy student. In my memory, I often got C's, though now my parents tell me I got a few B's and A's too - but their word cannot be completely trusted. I remember the dread of reports coming back in their A4 yellow envelopes, and how I never wanted to open them because my parents, my family, my extended family even, thought grades were god. And to that line of successful, responsible thrivers of high stress, letting anybody besides intermediate relatives even have an inkling that you were supposedly stupid would mean that they would be less inclined to waste time lending you a helping hand in the future. I suppose, they had no reason to believe otherwise - all values are borne from foul truths somewhere, somehow.

Then, when I reached highschool (Yr7-12), I had the luck to manage making it into a decently academically-prestigious school, filled wih those who all shared in some degree the same sentiment.

The ugly duckling surrounded by swans all it's life had no doubt in its mind that it had the capability to fly.

This is not simply that case where the monkey, fish and bird were examined on how fast they could scale a tree. It is in human nature to wish to excel - a person who has never wanted to better themselves is firstly:

not a happy person

and secondly:

To not want better of yourself is a person with no dream, and a person who says they have no dream is a liar.

And what is this dream? Where did it come from, and how did it form? Surely such intangible impressions are sprung from fragments of what you have seen, heard, of those around you?

The monkey, the fish and the bird do not value climbing the same way as the animal that came respectively before them - but surely they too seek to excel in what matters to them, like the carp to the marlin, the monkey to the ape?

Anyways, in my classic case, maybe I'm meant for something different, something not academic. But I want to be...! "Find what you're meant for" doesn't take into account what I want to be made for. It's not common, but what happens when I put passion into something, and find out that I'm still not enough?

And anyways, even if I'm meant for something else, discovering that can come later, after this year, after my final exams, and during this time, I will continue to hold on to the belief that grades are god until I actually somehow manifest an academic comeback.

In high school, it was revealed to me that my primary school had some messed up way of marking and grading, and those poor scores finally shot up to where I wanted them to be. Where I wanted to be.

And maybe, thats where I got cocky.

Of course, theres a certain pride that comes with passing an exam with flying colours when everybody knows you hadn't been paying attention in class, or studied majorly for. It was my defining trait for a few years, how did I forget all my efforts from primary school? It was an evil sort of pride, one that brought me to the state I am now. Sure, I'm still passing, but from high 90-somethings to straight up 50% is not a good look. In fact, it's something that brings out that sickly cold in my gut, and maybe a sense of sea sickness despite sitting on my bed, on land.

... hubris. That was my hubris, what am I, a character in a play? Why am I going through hamartia??? Someone tell whoever's writing my life story to put the pen down and stop being a wannabe Aristotle, it's lame, and it's not fun.

So, I now see where I went majorly wrong. And of course, I wouldn't spend my time lamenting. And I recognise that I need to actually lock in hard, and theres still a chance for me. As much as school sucks, learning is fun, and honestly, in proper adult life, not many people have time to purely dedicate hours to master new crafts and knowledge.

But here's the problem. I'm so used to doing absolutely nothing, that I keep procrastinating, and probably a bunch more mental blocks keeping me from picking up my pen to study. It kinda physically hurts to switch from doomscrolling to focusing - which is also a warning of sorts, I guess. Doomscrolling actually kills your brain, I swear. My dopamine receptors are utterly fucked. I visited Instagram reels and Youtube shorts maybe a total of 7 times while writing this? It's insane.

I don't actually have any clue on how to run a study blog, so maybe I'm just going to put my to do list's and progress checks here, and maybe some sappy motivational quotes. Anything to keep me going.

[emperorluffy]

Interesting. Theres a lot of that I agree with. I definitely agree with Weiss not having a love interest.

When it comes to "redemption" it seems we're ultimately talking about the same thing but using different words to describe it. It wouldn't be fruitful to go back and forth over semantics or quibble about the smaller details so I'll just stick to addressing my major points of contention with this mindset.

First off I suppose I should address the Grimm. I agree that they aren't inherently evil. However I think it's false to suggest the Grimm ailments afflicting certain characters isn't something to be cured of. They by definition do not have souls which is what separates them from humanity. They objectively dont have souls. Thats part of the worldbuilding. To suggest that theres nothing to cure from them would be to suggest that something like becoming the Hound is a good or positive thing to be. It's not. At no point is this ever portrayed as a positive thing. We can acknowledge that the Grimm aren't inherently evil but we should be able to agree that this is clearly wrong. Such is the same with Cinder, who has a literal Grimm Parasite eating away at her flesh and consuming her. This is not a good or positive thing and is never portrayed as such. When it comes to things like this, and Salem, and the Hound they are all portrayed as something unnatural.

When it comes to Jaune's character I feel like his role is being a little misconstrued here. He's not really a girl in the tower. He fell in a tree once but I don't think that can be extrapolated to his entire character as he has far more parallels with Ozma than he does Salem. He even played the role of a pseudo Ozma during the Ever After. The old weary Hero who is greeted by 4 maidens who help restore him to his old self. Theres more parallels but it would be tedious to list them all. While Cinder herself is quite literally trying to be Salem.

The biggest issue I have with people ignoring Knightfall in favor of this Gillian stuff is that people are willing to acknowledge it's existence but then only look at how it's portrayed right now in the present in order to dismiss it. While being willing to look ahead at how things theoretically could be with Gillian in the future. It's a complete double standard. Why treat Knightfall for how it looks right now rather than what it could be? If you acknowledge that theres at least some setup there why not take into account the future of where it's going? Like, yeah sure it's one-sided right now but that may not always be the case. If you want to say that it's only half-built, thats still substantially better than nothing built at all for the other partners you're suggesting. Why throw all that aside in favor of potential relationship with someone Jaune hasn't even interacted with once instead of the woman who his entire conflict revolves around? It's just silly. Needlessly dismissive even. It comes off as people being terrified of the prospect of Knightfall such that they do mental gymnastics to avoid it rather than considering it.

We more or less agree on how Salem's story plays out albeit we differ slightly. Salem needs to forgive Ozma and he needs to apologize & forgive her as well. Ultimately they need to come together in the end. Restoring their romance is the key to restoring the story. Knightfall plays a crucial role in getting them to that point. As it would be the premier example to the viewer and other characters that even such impossible divides between people can be crossed with Love. Hence the Blacksmith reiterating that only Love can restore balance.

Even if there are some nice potential parallels with Gillian it just doesn't have the buildup or potential story impact that Knightfall has.

i guess there is always the question of to what extent the fractal-ozlem pattern will hold true for every endgame romantic pairing and the secondary question of whether the tension between salem and ozpin in jaune's character will eventuate as a return to form (salem) or as transformation (ozma).

but for what it's worth

<- i find this a lot more persuasive than the weiss developments in V9

it's a bit thorny all around. by design. i think he's probably intended to be puzzling. the simplest answer is jaune ecloses as the hero and saves cinder but that coexists uneasily with what's going on with cinder and salem, to say the least. not to mention the thematic treatment of fairytale heroism.

he did save neo, so there's that.

rolls over

jeanne d'arc heard the voices of saints and angels guiding her way. i suppose there's an argument to be made for the recording pyrrha left him, but given the importance of salem's piety and apostasy, jaune's distinct lack of religiosity or… belief in anything greater than himself is worth reconsidering maybe. why is he here? he cheated his way into beacon just to prove to his family that he was worth something. now he's just here for his friends. what becomes of salem if she's faithless? if she's cynical?

salem is not a cynic. she's a shattered idealist. there will be no victory in strength. mankind is strong, wise, and resourceful, born into an unforgiving world and yet even the smallest spark of hope is enough to ignite change. passion and ingenuity and resourcefulness. hope breathes fire into the hearts of the weary. hope is mankind's greatest strength. your faith in mankind was not misplaced. it's important not to lose sight of what drives us: love, justice, reverence… and so we must press on.

take all that away from her. what is left?

even cinder believes in something, in destiny as a monster to fight. "i refuse to starve."

she poses a thematic challenge to jaune's cynicism in that she puts a spear through weiss schnee, her own personal symbol of everything she's fighting against, in direct response to jaune telling her nothing matters to him except that his friends live. and then he manifests his semblance. and then cinder murders penny and he can't save her and it's his sword covered in her blood. and now he has to live with that forever.

snaps fingers

the tree is the tower. the lovable idiot stuck in the tree. that tree is death. the reason jaune is so narratively weird is he's anti-theme salem. in cheating his way into beacon he put himself in her tower.

hhh

jeanne d'arc was instrumental in charles vii's campaign to push the british out of france. vacuo just had a short-lived civil war instigated by isolationist monarchists claiming descent from vacuo's royal line, one of whom was top of her class at shade and "would have been a fantastic huntress" if she hadn't dropped out. and her semblance is the inverse of jaune's and she mirrors him in a lot of ways. she might be the summer maiden.

i am so far out on a limb here but

…huh.

the anti-theme salem's ozma ii would be the maiden of destruction.