#not dissimilar to issues of sexuality etc

[horsesource]

I guess that is what drives me crazy about us speaking/masking autistics. There are plenty of nonspeaking/non-masking autistics whose semiosis cannot be successfully recuperated by a semiotics of power. And I think if there is any revolution to autistic flows it has to be with them. Because with speaking autistics who identify as autistic, they're begging to be recuperated! The a-signifying flows of autism are captured (enthusiastically!) and it becomes a rote deadening--"you feel uncomfortable in the gaze of another? you wiggle your foot? that's your autism." Everyone rehearses the signs of autism and how to detect them. Autistic flows can be “breathing spaces”, can be resistant to "the dictatorship of the signifier", but "autism" becomes just another (very convenient) signifier when it turns into "there it is! your autism. now it makes sense." We'd be better off dancing and spitting and humming and exiting or repurposing these technological platforms that hierarchize our semiotic flows instead of trying to detect signs, gestures for meanings of autism in videos posted on said platforms

[frevandrest]

Understanding 18th Century

There's a prevailing problem I've noticed in interpreting frev: people not really understanding that this was 18th century. Oh, they understand it on an intellectual level, but they still apply today's worldview to it. And you can't do that if you wish to understand wtf was going on.

(This is not about anyone here nor a shade at anyone in particular. Just a trend I've noticed, especially in bad takes).

All historical periods have this problem where people interpret things from the point of view of our own time. So that's hardly special about frev and 18c. But a tricky part is that 18c saw the development of things that we still use today (constitutions, voting system, etc.) that it may seem like it's more similar to our world than it actually was.

For example. The voting system. They had it and so do we. Except they were assholes who didn't allow women to vote. (Which is fair criticism, but people often forget that not all men had the right to vote either - so any criticism of exclusion should take that into account. Was it really about women per se, or about their ideas on who can and cannot make a free and rational vote? What is that they saw wrong about women and certain men voting? - Their attitude sure sucks, but if we ask these questions we understand better what was going on vs just going "sexist men", which only explains part of the issue). Or: journalism. They had political slander and so do we. But uuugh, their slander was so openly personal and often ridiculed someone's looks/sexual practices in supposedly serious political attacks - wtf was that? Or: trials. Of course we all know how trials are supposed to be done and what kind of arguments/evidence they should include. The fact they focused so much on character slander is incorrect and ridiculous, and...

Stop. Instead of assuming that they "did it incorrectly", think about: 1) how we do these things today is a product of decades/centuries of development; they didn't have that. They were only inventing it for the first time. 2) They did stuff according to their cultural beliefs. If they focused so much on character assassination as an argument, it means it was significant for their worldview.

You might not like it (and fair enough) but it's not possible to understand what was going on unless we understand how they thought and what they knew and what their worldview was. Which is not easy. It's not simply about knowing the state of scientific thought or what they believed about the world. Understanding how this affected the way they thought and how they interpreted things, or how they build meaning and conclusions - none of that is easy. But we have to question our assumptions, even if we're unable to see things from their pov. Because that's the only way not to arrive at wrong conclusions.

Similarly, many terms what they used had a different meaning to how they are used today (or, at least, they were understood in ways dissimilar to how we use them). Concepts such as despotism, tyranny, dictator, terror; also some seemingly easy to understand terms like "being a moderate" or even "patriotism". If we assume 18th century people used them in the same way that we do, we won't be able to understand wtf they are talking about.

[wombywoo]

Maybe 12, 18, and 33, if you please? Thank you! <3

thanks for asking 😘😘

12. What was the worst advice your OC has ever received on the subject of love and relationships?

I'm not sure about specifics, but Quinn's was probably something from Marc 😒. As if this guy could have anything to offer on the subject of love, Marc most likely spewed a few sentiments to Quinn about how certain sacrifices need to be made, how 'passion' makes someone do extreme things, etc...

I'm sure Vincent had received similarly poor love advice from his father once upon a time. Nelson was a strict man with traditional values, so he most likely burdened his son with the expectation that he marry well and carry on the family legacy. Not so much a heart-to-heart as an obligation

18. What was your OC most surprised to find out about themselves in terms of sex and/or romance? Or perhaps what will they be surprised about in the future?

Quinn has been pretty standard with his sexuality since puberty, lol. Very much gay, very much into older guys. I think the surprise for him comes when he gets with Vincent and realizes that...huh...having actual real deep feelings for someone makes the sex sooo much better. go figure

Vincent was fairly surprised with himself when he first expressed interest in men. He'd mostly had experience (not a lot) with women prior, so his bisexual awakening was a bit of a shock at first. I think he first realized when he was a bit older, in his late 20s, and started catching feelings for some of his fellow airmen. I think he'll still manage to find surprises in terms of sex, especially with Quinn, so it's an ever-evolving thing for him

33. Does your OC consider themselves to be as handsome or beautiful as their partner? Does any perceived imbalance in this regard trouble them? If they are single then are they looking for a partner who is more, or less, attractive than themselves? Why is this?

Quinn doesn't care much for his appearance. He definitely believes Vincent is more handsome than him, but I think he's fine with it. He's not bad-looking, but he uses the fact that he was able to pull such a hottie as a personal win for himself, lol

Vincent finds Quinn really attractive so it's not an issue so much. He might admit that he's not as..ah..refined as himself, but I think he finds appeal in the differences between them. It's a common denominator for them both--they're not so much attracted to someone who looks like them, they're more drawn to the dissimilarities and contrasts

[blueinkedfrost]

Villain Likeability

Some antagonists are just despised by readers who want to see them meet a painful end as soon as possible ... But others get a lot of audience sympathy and attraction.

Why? This is what I think is important.

Tragic backstory that gives some explanation for why they are the way that they are.

Villainous virtues such as perseverance, verbal wit, initiative, ingenuity, a good cause that they've taken too far, etc.

If it's a visual or audible medium, how attractive they are in person and/or how attractive their voice is. (This does not apply to written works.)

Melodrama: The extent to which their bad deeds are viewed by the audience as melodrama that's very dissimilar to the real world, such as destroying an entire galaxy or committing telepathic torture, as opposed to all too realistic bad deeds such as bullying, cheating on your spouse, abusing bureaucracy for cruel purposes, racism, Nazis, or child sexual abuse.

The fourth factor is probably the most important. If the villain's horrible behaviour feels close to real life issues you deeply care about, then you probably despise them regardless of how sexy the actor is. If the villain's horrible behaviour feels more fictional and melodramatic to you, then you can enjoy watching them cackle and threaten from a safe distance.

So by this standard, here is the least attractive villain possible: A spiteful, petty, and lazy person who lives a normal suburban life, is played to look unattractive, and makes their neighbours' lives as miserable as possible by bullying them in their role with the Home Owners' Association.

Now here is the most attractive villain possible: Angsty backstory where their horrible family sold them into slavery, very witty and creative, played by a good looking actor, and commits stylish murders using weird gravity-related superpowers.

Why do these tropes work?

Tragic backstory: Angst turns the story wheels around! From Cinderella and probably even earlier, stories where horrible things happen to a character cause us to root for them. Humans like underdogs and stories about characters overcoming bad things.

Villainous virtues: If they have some admirable traits mixed with the badness, that's fun to read. Witty or entertaining characters amuse us, while competence alone at being a dangerous or threatening villain is attractive.

Attraction: As simple as whether the audience generally finds them attractive, or not. This can be closely related to demographics and bias. In Western fandom, the stereotypical fan is an educated white woman who's attracted to men. So even if a female antagonist has a tragic backstory, high wit and charisma, and attacks people with her clever musical magic, female fans might not like her as much as her attractive male counterpart. Similarly, fandom is often criticised for poor attitudes towards characters of colour and it's easy to think bigotry in our society has something to do with this.

Melodrama: Also varies by the individual. Your personal experiences won't ever be the same as another person's, so your fun melodramatic villain might remind someone else of their real life high school bully. Medium and setting make a difference. Villains who are literally cartoons in a science fiction universe will be taken less seriously than villains in a live action story in a contemporary mundane setting. Visceral impact of the character's misdeeds also has a role: a villain who brutally tortured and killed a beloved favourite in explicit detail is less likeable than a villain who killed thousands of random unnamed characters in a brief sentence, even though 'likeability of victim' is not how we (should) judge crimes in real life.

[augment-techs]

Y, S, M, R + Javelia from the alphabet meme

Yellow or Yarrow (your preferred Soulmate AU for them) There's this thought in my head that has been circling for a while that kind of connects to the whole multiverse thing going on with Darkest Hour. A sort of more relaxed, less complex thing carried on from Shattered Grid. I would very much like the others that got snapped up and turned by the weird Angel guy from Dark Specter's forces to awaken their memories of the Grid shattering, everyone freaking out about how "this has all happened before, why didn't we remember until now?!" and looking towards the Mighty Morphin team for answers. Everyone except the Cosmic Fury/Dino Fury (they were in the mass layout last issue, but I can't tell to what extent) who happen to have adult, post-One and Always Billy as a Mentor. I would very much like Javi and Amelia to have an AU scenario to end up following his instructions to have them assist the Mighty Morphin team however they can while Billy and Solon direct the others (Fizzy, Ollaiyon) into working out in the field against the forthcoming lava zombies that you can bet your ass would freak the hell out of everyone once they realized Coinless Zack and Skull were on the ground and couldn't help but follow orders. Ideally, it would be really fun to play with Javelia being ultra badass on the battle field. Something fun for them while everyone else is kind of having a shit time.

Sexual/Sleep Preferences

Amelia flops and wiggles and moves around in her own bed so much that it really would be a trick if Javi didn't bounce and just end up sleeping on the floor with all the blankets more often than not. Seriously, he once woke up to find he was sucking on her big toe and immediately spent ten minutes brushing his teeth with the bathroom door locked so he could...manage on issue with himself.

Javi looks like a dead body when he sleeps. It's very disconcerting because sometimes he will literally fall asleep wherever he might rest his head and Amelia once freaked out because he fell asleep in the passenger's seat of Ollie's car and it was very rainy and he looked like he wasn't breathing.

MPreg/Medical Scenarios & Recovery (from assault, or trauma, or an accident, etc.)

Going off of previous conversations, Amelia can get pregnant, but can also get Javi pregnant. It's just that if she were to get Javi pregnant, with her slimy little retractable appendage that doesn't look too dissimilar to a gross gelatin tentacle, it would happen through...non-traditional means.

Consider, just consider... She has the equipment and because of some weird Rafkonian genetics, she has this instinct to find a genetic loophole and her body decides to exploit it one of the times that neither of them are smart enough to wear a condom. Her appendage goes in through his slit, up into the urethra, into the ejaculatory duct, where it eventually decides inside of the prostate, "this looks like a promising place to leave an egg to fertilize!" But unlike in Omegaverse or Star Trek circles, it takes infinitely longer to realize that anything is different, because the prostate is smaller and gathers less...helpful material...and, hey, alien baby. Javi doesn't start acting different or mention anything is amiss until he is bone tired in the fourth month and realizes he's having trouble digesting food and passing water--oh, and there feels like there's something heavy making it difficult for him to get hard anymore. So they go to Billy, and have some tests, and while Solon recognizes what the tests mean immediately and is overjoyed, everyone else just sort of....stares into space for a few minutes. Javi decides to keep the baby--even after the forty-seven minutes of Billy and Solon and Aiyon going into a great detail about how long it would take (fourteen months), how much inconvenience it would cause (he would lose significantly more weight and have to be put on bed rest for four of the last months, not to mention the fact he'd need a catheter put in and get enemas every other day while on rest) and how incredibly high the chances were that it would either destroy Javi's genitals on the way out or require surgery at the labor. Fortunately, Amelia pledged to stick by him the entire time, do whatever needed to be done to make him comfortable, and spend the rest of her life making up for the mess she'd put him in. (Also, Billy's husband happened to go through similar straights and Billy has had LOADS of time to make sure everything went right for the young man. So it's good.) Being half-Rafkonian at birth, the baby was only about two pounds and presented as intersex for the first year of life. Javi and Amelia didn't really bother teaching them gender roles and everyone else in their social circle was pretty chill about everything as long as they were healthy and happy, so the child is nonbinary and took after Javi in almost everything except the ability to imbibe in common sense--they took after Amelia with cryptid hunting. And long hair. Though both of them had to put up with Izzy cackling for a week when the kid turned twenty and ended up as part of a Ranger team as the Green Ranger who ended up thirsting for their team's Purple the FIRST DAY. They never had more children, because....yeah, Javi ended up with destroyed genitals for a good three years until he finally had surgery to amend the tearing and...other things. And Amelia felt guilty for as long as Javi was in pain, which set her Rafkonian organs into upheaval so she went through what humans called early menopause, but Aiyon explained was her body reacting to stress. But they love each other and love their child and that's all that counts.

[variousqueerthings]

Daniel LaRusso: A Queer Feminine Fairytale Analysis Part Two of Three

Part 1

Part 3

6. Sexual Awakenings part 1: Love, Obsession, & Size Differences

[Insert that post talking about the creators making sure that Daniel’s antagonists were much bigger than him so that the audience would sympathise, spawning 10000 size kink fics]

I’m sure this won’t awaken anything in Daniel

Corporate wants you to find the difference between these two pictures

The hallmark of feminine fairytales tends to be growing into womanhood, with all those symbolic sexual under/overtones, searching for a prince, encountering monsters (or evil stepmothers), on the surface tending to be quite passive/reactive, but actually being about young girls and women getting out of their environment and choosing to tussle with those deep, dark desires – monsters. They’ve got to function within the limitations of power that they have – escaping an abusive situation through marriage, chasing forbidden desires under the guise of duress, asking questions about sexuality through things like symbolic plucking (flowers) or consumption (fruit) or pricking (needles), etc.

Daniel isn’t striking out to find his fortune or win a girl or a kingdom Like A Man, he’s not a threat to Silver, who – like Jareth in Labyrinth – is in control for almost the whole of the narrative, he’s not actually able to do much more than react until he makes the decision to stop training, and even then he’s immediately ganged up on and assaulted, needing to be saved by Miyagi while he stands and watches, bloodied and bruised. 

Daniel’s journey in the third movie is to be forced into an impossible situation, seduced by Silver, and then prove that whatever violence Silver did to him isn’t enough to destroy him. It is incredibly similar to Sarah’s in Labyrinth, who by the end declares: “you have no power over me,” and that’s her winning moment. Not strength, not wits, not a direct fight, (although Daniel does fight Barnes and gets beat up again – only winning in in the end by taking him by surprise, unlike in TKK1 or TKK2 where you could argue that he proves himself to be a capable physical opponent to Johnny and Chozen), but by declaring that whatever power was held over her is now void.

Daniel’s narrative isn’t satisfying in the same way, because the dynamic of Silver and Daniel only accidentally emulates this - it’s not an intention on the side of the film-makers.

When Miyagi tells Daniel that he has strong roots, when he tells him not to lose to fear and Daniel wins over Barnes (in an almost fairytale-esque set of events), on paper he’s defeated whatever hold Terry Silver has over him. In the film itself though, Daniel never defeats Silver (which will likely be confirmed once he returns in Season Four). Daniel cannot simply say “you have no power over me,” and see Silver shattered into glass shards. 

The film is a contradiction: It wants to be a masculine sports film, but it exists in the same realm as Goblin Kings seducing young girls with the promise of: “Just fear me, love me, do as I say, and I will be your slave.” Unlike Sarah, Daniel doesn’t claim the power that’s been promised to him on his own terms. His subtextually sexual awakening is so corrupted that all he can do is pretend it never happened.

Still, Daniel proves in the film that his strength is not in his fists. It’s in his praying to the bonsai tree that’s healed despite a violent boy brutally tearing it in two.

These looks on Daniel and Silver though?

So why does Silver become obsessed with him? What’s up with all those red outfits (that he doesn’t wear in Cobra Kai)? What does the temptation reveal about Daniel? How does it recontextualise TKK1 and TKK2? Is Daniel bisexual? (yes).

Ah, beach-Daniel, in your red hoodie and your cut-off jorts. Iconic hot-girl summer vibes. 

If you didn’t want me over-analysing this, you shouldn’t have put him in so many red outfits and then have this man leering at him like he wants to eat him alive.

Surface-level it’s not hard to read into a Dude Story: Masculine power fantasies are about strength in a very direct way. Fighting, control, suaveness – and if you’re not the most traditionally masculine of guys, asserting dominance through being a good lover or intelligent or overcoming that unmanliness in some way through beating the bully or convincing the hot girl to go out with you, levelling up in coolness. Being A Man. It’s not too dissimilar from Daniel’s arc in the first movie, if you watch it without taking later events into account, although Daniel is never interested in proving himself as a man, and more in making Miyagi proud. Still, he does win and gain respect, and arguably “get the girl,” although Ali’s interest in him was never dependent on the fight.

7. Sexual Awakenings Part 2: Sexual Assault, Liberation, and Queerness

Feminine power fantasies are often about sex. Metaphorically. More accurately it’s “owning sexuality.” Even more accurately: “Freedom.” They also inhabit a fluid space in which empowerment through monstrous desires and non-consent can happen at the same time. And on top of that, many of these “fantasies” are actually being written by men, so whose fantasy is it really? A lot of them are based in oral traditions so presumably they were originally from the mouths of women, even if modern iterations (starting with Grimm’s collections) are filtered through cis men’s perspectives.

All of that being acknowledged: In Angela Carter’s “The Company Of Wolves,” Red Riding Hood unambiguously sleeps with the wolf. Belle discovers her freedom from expectations and unsuitable suitors (and in some versions, evil stepsisters) by falling in love with a Beast (the original novel was written by a woman, the 18th century Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve). Jareth informs Sarah of his obsessive devotion to her in Labyrinth. To lean into horror for a moment – Buffy is stalked and eventually has relationships with both Angel and Spike, Lucy in Coppola’s Dracula (which I have mixed feelings about) is raped by the werewolf and Mina is stalked by Dracula, The Creature Of The Black Lagoon kidnaps Kay (the lead’s girlfriend) – subverted in both The Shape Of Water in which Eliza forms a consensual relationship with the amphibious sea-god and in the short-lived horror series Swamp Thing, in which the connection is purposefully framed as seductive…

and in The Karate Kid Part Three Daniel LaRusso punches a board until his hands bleed because an attractive, older man tells him to and in this moment he gives in to what he (thinks he) wants.

Not all of those examples are equal. Some are consensual, some are hinted as abusive and/or stalkery, all of them have large age gaps, and a few are outright non-consensual.

But they’re all fantasies.

They’re all power-fantasies.

Except for Daniel, because he’s a man and the idea that being obsessed (lusted) over by an older man who keeps you in his thrall, specifically because you tickle his fancy for whatever reason, because you’re beautiful, breakable, different – could in any way be considered empowering is a difficult concept to wrap your head around. It doesn’t contain that “but I’m a good girl, I’d never go off the path and pluck flowers if a bad wolf told me to, honest,” societal context or the social context of rape culture. It’s closest comparison is closeted (perhaps even unknown until that point) queer identity.

There have recently been some comparisons of Daniel LaRusso to Bruce Bechdel in Funhome (and everyone who says that Ralph Macchio ought to play him in the upcoming movie: you’re right and I’m just not going to enjoy it as much without him). I’ve written a post about Sam being the heir to his legacy and trauma, specifically as a queercoded man. It’s not dissimilar to the plot of Funhome in a lot of ways.

The other interesting source that’s been going around in connection with Daniel is the essay “The Rape of James Bond,” which discusses the use of sexual assault as a plot device for women and not for men: “About one in every 33 men [in the US] is raped. … [your statistically average, real life man] … doesn’t have a horde of enemies explicitly dedicated to destroying him. He doesn’t routinely get abducted, and tied up. Facing a megalomaniac psychopath gloating over causing him pain […] is not the average man’s average day at the office.” That last bit is just a descriptor of Terry Silver, (although I take issue at the blasé use of psychopath).

The two part youtube essay  Sexual Assault of Men Played for Laughs posits that there is nothing more de-masculinising than the threat of sexual assault and therefore any narrative that features this “rightfully” must mock any man who has been a victim or who fears being a victim of sexual assault. It is feminising. There is nothing more humiliating – and therefore unheroic – than a man dealing with sexual assault.

So what do we feel when we see an attractive young man being put into a vulnerable position by an older man? A trope associated with female characters, a trope that is considered unpalatable for men (see reactions that happened when the hint of sexual assault was introduced in Skyfall).

Was it the fact that he was being threatened, or the fact that James’ next line is: “what makes you think this is my first time?”

Some thoughts added by @mimsyaf​ are around the idea of safety in how a lot of cis women might relate to this narrative through Daniel’s eyes. He’s not a woman, he has – societally – more power than a girl or woman would have, which makes this a different watch to, say, if Danielle were to go through the same narrative. Daniel doesn’t carry that baggage of rape culture, or of the male gaze that you might find in a similar scenario of Buffy the Vampire Slayer or Christine in Phantom of the Opera (and once more the age differences between these characters and the men who love/lust over them are substantial), which makes the narrative “safer” to engage with.

I agree with that, although as a transmasc person I also come at it differently. I specifically like to headcanon Daniel as a trans guy and find his fraught interactions with masculinity through his own non-toxic lens relatable, as well as the way other boys and men react to it – also I think Terry Silver is hot. I know there are people who write Terry Silver with female OCs, which is also a form of empowerment.

On the flipside putting Daniel in this space runs a risk of fetishising him as a queer youth who is either Innocent and Pure, or a bisexual stereotype that deserves to be assaulted for not being a real man. After all, Real Straight Men don’t run the risk of sexual assault.

 Alas, the road to empowerment never did run smooth. 

The comparisons between the way Daniel is treated by the text and how female characters are often treated in texts are undoubtedly there. Through Ralph Macchio and TIG’s casting and the direction and acting, but also within the text itself. 

It might not be with the same purpose as Neo’s symbolically trans journey, but it puts the whole narrative that Daniel’s going through from TKK1 under a different light than if there had only been one movie that ended on a triumphant sports win and a girlfriend.

Johnny’s masculinity and the use of tears as liberation, now that’s a whole other analysis….

[bottomvalerius]

Character Solidifying ask for Donna 10, 19 and 28!

Thank you anon!! 💕

From these specific asks here! :3c

10.) Is your character street-smart, book-smart, intelligent, intellectual, slow-witted?

I would say Donna is a good combo of street-smart and book-smart, but with a nice sprinkle of naivety on top lol They definitely knew how to carry themself around Vesuvia, especially since they were essentially a runaway and had to learn to hold their own on their own. Their aunt and Mom Squad were also very good at teaching them how to protect themself and specific cues to look out for because they knew Donna was a bit of an airhead. They're also a big old nerd though, particularly about history, and are an avid reader. HOWEVER COMMA, having been such a huge fan of cheesy romance novels did..... skew their ideas of love and sex in their early 20s lol

Putting the others under cut because of length!

19.) What were your character’s deepest disillusions? In life? What are they now?

Going back to the last question, Donna had some very warped views of themself, their body, and sex and love for quite a while. I've alluded to them being both a very casual lover, but a very emotionally intense lover too. They think that everyone wants some deeper, emotional connection with their sexual partners, hence why a lot of their partners are also their close friends. However, not everyone either wants that point-blank OR not everyone sees there being a distinction between that and a genuine relationship.

This resulted in them having quite a bit of fallouts with people and conflating their desirability with their self-worth. They definitely put a higher value on being the fun and flirty friend who's good for casual hookups than on their own mental health and well-being. This made lots of blurry lines with people and would result in them being taken advantage of quite frequently.

Now (as in Damien's timeline), their biggest delusion is that they still conflate their worth on if they are needed by others, it just isn't in a sexual context anymore. Now they're the "Hero of Vesuvia" who defeated The Devil; they feel a need to uphold this idea and be the rock for anyone and everyone. They're burning out on all ends, which sadly, results in Damien and his growing issues getting pushed to the sidelines while they're struggling to help rebuild a city with Nadia and Valerius 😬

28.) Who is your character’s mate? How do they relate to them? How did they make their choice?

HA the wording of this makes me think of like... AOB AU idfhgifdh BUT Valerius is definitely Donna's life partner! While the two are poly and have an open marriage, they truly do just. Love one another. Once Valerius really let Donna into his life and dropped his many austere masks, they could see clearly that he was just as much of an insecure person as they were, and by looking at Valerius (like... truly seeing him), they could see that he also conflated his own sexuality with his own self-worth, among other things (his wealth, his title, his family lineage, etc).

They stayed with Valerius because he makes them feel... human? Donna's spent their entire life feeling like they're an Object; they were brought into this world to be used as a tool in a deal. Many of their partners only wanted them for their body or their magic or both. Valerius just craved Donna because Donna made him feel seen, made him feel at peace, and in turn, he did the same for them! He's one of the only people to get them out of their toxic "I have to be everything for everyone, or else what use am I?" because he just. Gets it. That's really just it: they're very dissimilar people, but they also are very similar, and so they just Get Eachother.

[littleeyesofpallas]

BLEACH - Name Games(?)

I was asked about zanpakutou stuff.  I don’t know that many have names and kanji choices that super jump out at me at a glance, but the ones that do come to mind all seem to have references to Buddhist icons that I’m sure don’t come across in English very well.  I tangentially touched on that when talking about Mayuri while doing my rambling series of posts about shinigami names, so I figure that'd be my entry point.

I don’t know that this will amount to a lot of posts, but if I had to pick one to start with the obvious choice would have to be Urahara Kisuke’s zanpakutou, Benihime.  It has a lot of wordplay involved that doesn’t come across in English all too obviously, plus a little religious reference tacked onto the very end.  I remember this being kind of a well circulated bit of trivia back in the 2000s but I don’t know that it’s persisted after all this time, so hopefully this isn’t too obvious to people.

The name itself, Benihime[紅姫] is written pretty straight forwardly as 紅: ”Crimson”/”Deep Red” and 姫:”Princess.“  The release call okiro[起きろ] generally gets translated as “Awaken” which is accurate, but “Get up” works as well, but technically it can also mean “Stay awake,” but that’s really more a semantic issue for English, in Japanese the phrase is used identically in either situation.  In the context of Benihime being only the second shikai we ever see (after Zabimaru) it seems like a concealed sword being told to “Wake up” makes the most sense, but there’s a bit of a case for “Stay awake” that I’ll get to a bit later...  (Also worth noting real quick is that this kind of “rousing” verb is specifically about being awake -vs- asleep, and doesn’t extend to the English colloquialisms relating to “[sexual] arousal.”)

Also, it’s never directly referenced, but both in cane form and in shikai form, Benihime has a unique blade shape that suggests that the sword blade has been broken; It lacks the distinctive Kissaki[切っ先]:”Point-area” of a katana blade, and the blade’s Hamon[刃文]:”Wave-pattern” doesn’t follow the edge of the blade properly at the terminus.  This plays into the themes well go on to address, so keep that in mind...

But the fun comes with the various techniques Urahara uses with Benihime over the course of the series.

The one we get almost immediately is Nake[啼け] which the English translations erroneously called “Scream.”  But the Japanese use of the word, as far as I can see, refers to “call (out)” or “bark” or “chirp” generally in reference to an animal noise or to make noise like an animal.  It can also mean “sing” as an extension of the same use but in reference to bird song.  But as a bit of colorful language it’s commonly used in the context of smut and romance to describe little gasps, whimpers, and yelps.

The “Scream” translation seems to have been taken from the Chinese use of the word, which is similar to the Japanese, but includes the additional animal sound “Howl” and by comparison can refer to “crying (loudly)”, “wailing”, and “weeping.”

A curious detail is that when Urahara first uses this to defend from Ichigo’s newly discovered Getsuga Tenshou technique, Benihime produces a red shield, and it’s actually hard to notice at a glance, but the blade of Benihime is dripping with blood as a result, even though neither Urahara nor Ichigo actually got cut by it.  However, when Urahara uses this a second time when defending Ichigo from Yammy, there is no bleeding blade effect.

This shield is also later given the name Chikasumi no Tate[血霞の盾] written as “Shield of Blood Mist.” This all works to reinforce the association with the “Crimson” aspect of the name specifically with blood.

With the same “Cry!” command Urahara can also use his own zangeki projectile, like Getsuga Tenshou.

Kamisori[剃刀] is just the word for “Razor,” it appears to produce the same effect as when “Cry” is used offensively rather than defensively.  It’s possible Kubo chose to retcon “Cry” into being defensive only and renamed the attacking move as “Razor.”  It was never made especially clear...

And Tsuppane[突ッ撥] which is a weird construction of “Stab”/”Pierce”/”Prick” and “Reject“/”Exclude” but it’s a homonym with Tsuppane[突っ撥ねる] meaning “Reject“/”Spurn“/”Turn down.“  These two can be tabled for now as well, but they’ll fall into place by the end...

Finally, Shibari[縛り] means “Bind“/”Restrain”/”Tie up” but it’s specifically the shorthand name for the Japanese method of rope bondage sex play.  And in conjunction with this Urahara uses Hiasobi, Benihime, Juzutsunagi[火遊 紅姫 数珠繋] which breaks down as 火遊: “Fire Play,” "Crimson Princess” again, 数珠繋: “Prayerbead Chain.”

So, if it wasn’t clear where we were headed with all of these, Blood, Crying, Razors, Spurning, Rope Play, Fire Play, and s Chain of Beads might seem all over the place if you take them at face value, but the central theme being evoked here is BDSM.  Which lend an extremely curious tone to Urahara’s character.  More over, there is the broken blade imagery I mentioned before.  Back in the day I had sort of wondered if maybe breaking his sword had been part of Urahara’s exile*, but the state of the blade never got properly addressed, and even the exile would just sit on the backburner for years...

*At the time, I associated it with Kuukaku and Ganju’s similarly severed blades, but they also weren’t ever addressed.  The impression I’d gotten from the overall designs had been that when the Shiba family were stripped of their shinigami nobility status their zanpakutou were all broken as a means of rendering them incapable of ever effectively fighting back against Soul Society.  I also just kind of assumed there would be a similar explanation for Yoruichi’s conspicuously absent zanpakutou.

But there’s an extra detail in this...  We know how zanpakutou work: a Shinigami imprints their own soul onto a blank sword, their sword spirit develops in their inner world, and through meditation they can commune, negotiate, and make peace with their sword.  At the highest levels of that mutual understanding they can summon their swords out into the world, first as shikai and then as bankai, increasing in power and finesse the better they understand their sword spirits and thus themselves.

We see distinctly, in the case of Yumichika, that an inability to make peace with their swords can result in sub-optimal powers: Yumichika has his intentional misnaming of his sword and partial release; Zaraki has his entire inability (at first) to call on his sword at all; and Ikkaku and Shuuhei both have disagreements with the attitude of their swords --Ikkaku calling Houzoukimaru lazy, and Shuuhei being uncomfortable with Kazeshini’s bloodlust.

But we know that Ichigo took a short cut to forging this deep lifelong friendship with his sword, and the fact that the two aren’t in sync and don’t communicate with one another well is a repeated hurdle for Ichigo.  Thanks to Urahara’s special doll Ichigo just summoned Zangetsu directly into the outside world, requiring zero meditation or self reflection on his part.  And Urahara used this same method, to achieve bankai in just 3 days.

So, Urahara rushed his bankai training, his blade is broken, and its techniques all point to a BDSM theme.  The way I always saw this was that it sounded like Urahara forcibly subdued Benihime instead of ever negotiating with her.  His sword is broken because he broke it himself as part of asserting dominance over it. (not unlike how Mayuri broke his own shikai as a form of punishment after the Szayel fight)  And it lined up with a lot of the ongoing ominous tones surrounding Urahara all throughout...  At least until he just kind of vanished during the long drag of the Arrancar Arc, before being hurriedly shoved into the Arc finale.

So when we did finally get his bankai reveal in the Blood War Arc, some things fell into place rather neatly, but others felt a little out of sync with everything else...

Viz translated Kannonbiraki Benihime Aratame[観音開紅姫改メ] as “Opened Red Princess Neo” which isn’t strictly speaking wrong, but it communicates nothing of importance.   観音開: doesn’t really have a clean English equivalent, but it refers to what I can only think to define as “opening outward in two pieces from the center.”  Specifically this tends to reference double doors, or similar but not explicitly door structures like windows or shutters, etc...  It also refers to filleting a fish or dissecting a body in an accordant manner: with a central incision with two flaps peeled back from it. It’s the term used for a “Butterfly cut” in cooking.  Benihime is just “Crimson Princess” again, no alternate kanji or homonym play like some other bankai, plus 改メ: which is a suffix indicating “revised”/”modified.”

There’s also what I assume was intentional wordplay here where the  観音 in 観音開: “double-door” is the name of the Japanese Buddhist god(dess) Kannon.  Kannon (based on the Chinese Guanyin, who is a highly modified interpretation of what was the Hindu Avalokitesvara.) is worshiped as a goddess of infinite mercy.  So  観音+開: might imply something like “Opened Kannon”/“Kannon Unlocked”/”Empty Kannon” evoking imagery of the Goddess herself opened up on an operating table, tying back to the specific physical feature of being opened up from a center line, like double doors.

So the actual vibe of the full name is something like...

“Dissected Goddess-of-Mercy: Modified-Bloodred Princess”

Which has some wild and sinister implications, not dissimilar to Mayuri’s Ashisouji-jizo.  They share tones of corrupting or defiling the divine, and specifically gods of mercy and protection, distorted and mutilated.

[criticalrolo]

IDK if you want to actually talk about this more, but my sister identifies as a Bi Lesbian, and the way she describes it is that she is attracted to women and nonbinary people. I think saying that bi people HAVE to be attracted to men is off-base and ignores the nonbinary part of "more than one gender" - and as soon as you include nb people it is no longer mutually exclusive. ALSO fuck terfs getting to take an id away from people cause theyre shitty, I respect the people who id as that more 1/3

2/3 Of course Bi and Lesbians are full identities, but if people find a label like Bi Lesbian useful, not as a watering down but as a way to speak their truth, then I think it should be respected. It doesn't have to be a scale - maybe if anything a modifier? And it certainly doesn't make Bi or Lesbian less of an identity than the split attraction model makes Ace less of a thing. IDK I'd just rather be extremely inclusive over saying that an ID is bad. IDK about the Bipoc tho as Im white

3/3 one final aside, is I've seen it described as an easy way to explain that they are into multiple genders but not into men. And I think if its useful and easily understood, a useful shorthand, then let people use it. Fuck anyone (esp terfs) who apply it to other people, but I think we dont have to conflate all the ways people are awful to queer people with an Identity itself being fucked up. Anyway sorry to ramble right back, and I hope you have a nice night and Ill see you in the cr tag lol

Hey there! So, to address your points, I do want to say first of all that I totally find it admirable that, given the option, you’d rather stray towards overly inclusive as opposed to Not Inclusive Enough. I totally agree with that sentiment, and think that you’re absolutely coming at this from a good angle.

The things I find difficult about the “bi lesbian” label kind of come from your second ask mainly. So the thing is, all sexualities can potentially include nonbinary people. “Nonbinary” is not a separate Third Gender Option, it’s an enormous array of different identities. People can be nonbinary but man or woman-aligned, completely agender, all the genders at once, etc. etc. etc.... basically the format that you’re thinking of conforms the nonbinary experience into an all encompassing “third gender” when in fact it’s a broad spectrum of experiences and identities that can be extremely similar or dissimilar. 

Because yeah... there are nb lesbians out there. Who are attracted to women, and other nb lesbian/bisexual people who identify with being sapphic or wlw. You’re actually talking to one right now ;) My experience with gender is All Over The Place and I’m not very good at defining it right now, but I definitely identify very strongly as a lesbian who is attracted to women/women-aligned people. Gender Is Lesbian for me personally right now lol

The issue comes when, as you said, you start to use “lesbian” as a modifying term. It’s not a modifier. It’s a full term that exclusively means women who are not attracted to men. I know you bring up the split attraction model here, but I’ve found that that is WAY more useful for asexual identities without getting into some of the sticky areas like this one where IDing as something actually is harmful/doesn’t make sense. I know that the term “exclusive” does bring up some bad associations but in this case, that’s because we have terms for people who experience attraction to Women/NB people who ID as sapphic (basically ur NB lesbians/people comfy with calling themselves NB bisexual women) and for people who identify as being attracted to men and women (and man-aligned etc. etc.)

LIke, see how long those descriptions got once I started including some of the many, MANY different experiences of being nonbinary...? Basically there’s just no single way to define Every Nonbinary Person for Every Single Sexuality since it’s such a broad spectrum of experience, which is why a lot of sexualities might sound pretty binary (like defining lesbian as Woman Who Loves Only Women) but in fact is because there’s no way to include every single nonbinary experience and categorize them into a neat little box, you know? 

So from there, you’ve gotta ALSO consider the points I made earlier about how the identity of “bisexual lesbian” also comes across as lesbophobic, biphobic, and transphobic in ways that harm all of those identities instead of bringing them together. Like, obviously your sister is a Valid Human Being, and it feels weird to be saying an identity is NOT valid... but like. Forcing two mutually exclusive identities together (one that explicitly does not include men and one that does) just ends up hurting the people who ID with those identities in the long run, like how I outlined in my other post. Essentially, it takes away from the overall meaning of What It Means To Be A Lesbian and What It Means To Be Bisexual by trying to force the two of them together. They’re different experiences, and that’s something to be celebrated and something to find commonalities over while discussing our differences instead of trying to mash them together, you know? Like there’s a reason why they became defined as separate identities in the first place.

Anyway, this is probably too long but I hope you can see where I’m coming from here. I’m obviously not going to tell your sister How To Identify, but there’s my thoughts some points you might want to consider showing her while she’s figuring out her identity, you know? So yeah, that’s all I’ve got. Hope you have a good day, and get hyped for the CR episode tonight!! <3

[stark-raving-madd]

Backstory of The Seventh Day

(Just a warning, this paracosm is gonna be lowkey fucked up and dark but I do not condone any of the negative behavior within it!)

So, the idea is that, basically, the governments of the world foresaw that a nuclear war would happen. So they created a project that would be basically a means to recreate humanity. Genesis (the main protag) doesn't have parents. Rather, she was a genetically engineered, frozen embryo, meant to be as far away genetically from a human as she could be while still being sexually compatible and biologically stable. There used to be more like her. As well as a male version- an 'Adam' to her 'Eve'- that, theoretically, could produce a human of any possible genetic combination were they to have a child.

Essentially, a single 'Adam' and 'Eve' could, theoretically, produce children genetically dissimilar enough that they could breed without genetic defects, meaning that if even just one Adam and Eve survived, humanity could restart.

Basically, the idea is that the embryos would be unfrozen and mature automatically once the radiation settled down enough for humans to survive, and then the Adams and Eves would be released into the world to repopulate as best they could. Afterwards, they would (hopefully- they weren't at the point where they could genetically program orders into them) return to the place of their birth, where they would then be educated on everything required. The first thing it would show them is how to make fire, then how to farm, then how to forge and work metal, etc.

The issue is that only three of what were planned to be several dozen bunkers were constructed by the apocalypse.

They all had probably eight embryos of each gender, but the issue is that the builders had no idea how many nuclear weapons would be fired before there was no one to fire them, so they had a range to work with. In terms of when the radiation would settle, I mean.

So Genesis is a part of the last set of two embryos- all the others were released too early, and succumbed to radiation.

There's no telling what happened to the other bunkers, but based on documents the leader of the caravan has, it's probable they were both annihilated during the apocalypse.

When Genesis was released from the wild, she succumbed to her animal instincts, due to not being raised by anyone and having to fend for herself for years. She doesn’t have very good abstract thought, critical thinking, or any executive function. She excels at reading facial expressions, reading emotions, survival instincts, remembering scents, landmarks, and really anything survival related. She never learned how to speak, so she mainly communicates with sounds,

Genesis' was the last one, and she and her Adam the last set of two embryos. And something *still* went even *more* wrong.

Because her Adam was released early.

Adam was eventually found at the Haven, which relieved the scientists there, as well as the leader of the Haven, Elijah, but there was a problem.

Adam is infertile.

I'd think he also has an underdeveloped limb or two, but the most important part is that he's incapable of reproducing- the necessary parts just never fully formed in the first place.

The leader of the caravan found Adam, realized what he was, and took him in. Even though Adam was useless to him in that respect, it still allowed him to locate the rough position of the bunker- or so he thought.

And so the caravan has waited, from the time they found Adam to the time they found Genesis- or, rather, when she found them.

You see, they were off on the location by no more than about ten kilometers- the same ten-kilometer radius that was all Genesis knew before she found them.

She survived without them for 14 years, just outside of the area they were patrolling.

And when the leader finally finds the Eve his father's father essentially wrote the genetic code for by hand, he renames her Genesis- because an Eve without an Adam cannot be called an Eve.

The story mainly focuses on Elijah and the rest of the Haven finding Genesis, and doing experiments on her to find out how she survived out in the wilderness for so long, despite the radiation.

But the thing is, that’s not the true purpose of the experiments.

See, Elijah kinda has a weird God Complex. He believes that he meant to be the savior of humanity because that’s what he was groomed to be, by his father, Cain. This complex makes him go to extreme and unethical lengths to reach this goal. The true purpose of the experiments isn’t to see how Genesis survived out in the wilderness and radiation. It’s to use her as a breeding factory, essentially. But the only people who know this are Elijah, Adam (who isn’t even okay with it but can’t do anything about it) and a handful of other scientists. The other scientists outside of that small group have no idea what the true purpose is, and the only reason why they don’t question Elijah is because everyone in the Haven basically views him as a father because they don’t know his true nature. No one else in the Haven questions it either because they also view him as a father figure. Genesis doesn’t question it because she doesn’t even have the mental capacity to.

The story’s struggle is mainly these two things;

One, Genesis' struggle to understand what's happening to her, despite the fact that she has no context.

Two, the rest of the cast trying to find out the truth about Genesis and, later, struggling with their own morality on the subject.

[jonathandurke]

Another New Year, Still the Same God

Last New Year I wrote a blog called New Year, Same God. In it I encouraged us to remember to cast all our blessings and all our curses onto the Lord. I highlighted the reality that no matter what comes in a year, whether that be sorrow or success, our Father in Heaven remains the same.

I think it is worth repeating this truth afresh as we enter 2021.

So, with a similar title and a similar theme as January 2020’s blog, I start January 2021’s blog by saying we still have the same faithful God.

We received another inspiring preach from Gordon last Sunday, and preceding it a stirring time of worship with Colin and Claire. For me there was a clear sense of God’s unfailing faithfulness. From Gordon’s reminder that God is faithful with His love for us, to Colin and Claire’s melodic statements of the Father’s faithful love surpassing that of mountains and oceans in its breadth and depth. There seems to be a ringing reminder from the Spirit to not forget just how faithful the Lord is – in the highs and the lows (cough! – 2020 – cough!).

The theme of God’s faithfulness has also been resonating with me anew as I’ve begun my bible reading plan. Following bible reading plans is not usually my thing – in fact this year will be the first time I’ve done it! I am glad I made the choice though because it is already blessing me. As I read through the sections they select from the New and Old Testaments I am thoroughly enjoying, in particular, the early Genesis accounts. God’s faithfulness is so clearly demonstrated and evident so often in those initial revelations to our forefathers. Whether it was faithfulness to fulfil the promises of land, descendants, or protection, God was trustworthy and reliable to make good on His word.

Genesis is rich with accounts of many difficult circumstances the Patriarchs (Adam, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, etc.) had to endure. Natural disasters, famines, wars, enslavement, danger to life, riots, and many more. Not too dissimilar from our own experiences to a certain degree. Yet, in the midst of it all God was working His sovereign providential purposes out with love and grace towards those who placed their faith in Him. The Patriarchs never saw the fully realised promises the Lord had made with them. They caught glimpses of them, but never completely received them. They lived with hope in the God of hope.

God is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow.

He still remains faithful, working out His sovereign providential purposes with love and grace in this world, especially to those that are in Christ.

I was speaking to several colleagues recently (while eating pizza from Dominoes!) and we were talking about how history classes in schools will teach on this little cluster of years, where relatively monumental events have taken place. We wondered what exam papers will ask about Brexit, Donald Trump being president, a global plague, the major shift in racial issues, the explosion of gender ideology, to name a few. One thing that will not be asked is if God was faithful. That is a question for me and you to answer.

Has the Father been faithful to you this last year and will He be faithful to you this year?

A spite of what has been overly-described as an unprecedented time in our generation this past year, and even going into this new year, reflect on all that the Lord has given you, done for you, protected you from, blessed you with, taken away from you for you good, restored back to you; meditate on all He weaved into your life. Do that and I guarantee you, if you honestly look, you will see that God is faithful.                  

The Father is doing a mighty work in those who call on His name. He will not stop until it is accomplished in us. He who began a good work in us will bring it to completion. He will never leave nor forsake His plan for us. He will build upon us and develop us into His destiny for us individually and collectively as the Church.

We are witnessing the birth pains of our nation’s independence and the possible difficulties that may ensue as we find our feet. We have suffered with other nations worldwide the deadly effects of a pandemic that has ripped loved ones from us in death or with distance. We have observed the true colours of racial prejudice. We have seen the damaging extremities of sexual politics. Perhaps most devastating for us disciples has been the inability to gather together for corporate worship and enjoy the Father’s presence united. We have felt much this past year. We may be weak, frustrated, confused - now more than ever even – but still God is good, gracious and gloriously faithful.  

We have come through a lot in 2020, and we still have much to go through if the start of 2021 is anything to go by.

But,

Whatever happens this year, it is always the same as every other year – the Lord will be faithful to you. The reconciliation of all things will happen. The restoration of the Kingdom and its coming will happen. The Lord Jesus will return. Our resurrection is certain. The Church will be victorious. Satan will be defeated. Hell will not prevail. Evil will end. Sin will cease. God will get the glory, and we will enjoy Him forever.

Like the Patriarchs before us, maybe we will not see all of this take place in our lifetime. Perhaps we will not see the fully realised promises we are believing God to be faithful for (personally or as part of the big story of salvation). However, like the Patriarchs let us place our hope in the God of hope, and the God of Hope Church – because He. Is. Faithful.

Happy New Year!  

[quakerjoe]

In the end, not even the Progressive Bernie Base showing up for Hillary in larger numbers than her own supporters did for Obama in 2008, could prevent the inevitable. A massively flawed candidate who failed to electrify the Democratic base and make the case to Rust Belt voters- why she is the better option than the Populist candidate spraying out anti-trade rhetoric.

Blame whatever you want. The blame rests squarely on all of us. But there is so many lessons to learn from the 2016 Primary and General Election. Populism and Progressive policy became the central topic. Healthcare is a right. The ultra-rich are KING in America, and they must be reigned in. Primary process should be more fair. Flowery platitudes aren’t enough to generate excitement for the poor to turn out, etc.

Literally ZERO of these lessons were learned. Even in the face of an ACTUAL Corona-virus pandemic, with over 30 million unemployed, more and more uninsured at the time of writing this- the Democratic party has done nearly nothing to fix the problems from 2016. Actually, in all my shock- they’ve made them worse. The Democratic party pulled every string it could. Bent over backwards to not only stop Bernie Sanders, but stifle Progressives and our policy agenda. All in an orchestration to crown their nominee just years after a 2016 lawsuit said the DNC can meddle how ever they like in their own “Democratic process”. All to push a man who did next to no campaigning in any states past South Carolina. A man who didn’t actually work for your vote, but instead- coasted on “Hope and Change” establishment nostalgia, for when times weren’t so chaotic.

So for pragmatism sake, let’s push all that aside for just one moment. We can debate all day about how “fair” Joe Biden’s path to the Democratic Nomination has been. But let’s view Biden on his own merits for his candidacy’s sake. What’s the incentive for Progressives to vote for Joe? Well- unless you’re sticking to the concept of the very first paragraph of this article, the answer is: There isn’t one.

If Hillary Clinton were a flawed candidate, Biden may just be the worst nominee in history. A long history of terrible behavior including coddling racists, racist behavior, repeated threats at slashing the safety net, warmongering for a devastating Iraq war that’s helped kill endless innocent civilians all based on a lie, the nomination of Justice Thomas and controversial treatment of Anita hill, the Obama administration’s failure to even pass a Public Option with a Super Majority government, while pushing a healthcare plan that was little more than barely a small step in the right direction.

Now- Biden stands as the presumptive Democratic Nominee, and with a sizable Progressive Bernie Base up for grabs, what has Joe Biden done to earn our vote?

Answer: Nothing. Well, at least nothing significant.

Three items come immediately to mind on what Joe Biden is doing to “reach left”.

1: Joe wants to lower the Medicare age to 60. By comparison, Hillary Clinton wanted to lower it to as low as 50.

2: Joe Biden wants to eliminate student debt for those making under $125K. By comparison, Bernie Sanders wanted to eliminate it universally.

3: Nebulously- Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders have created “working groups” on various policy issues focusing on education, criminal justice, climate change, immigration, the economy, and health care policy. As of yet, nothing has come of these “groups” on policy.

As the Primary was coming to a close, I as a Progressive- was completely open to Joe moving (not reaching) left on policy positions.

Overwhelmingly, if you ask Sanders supporters what they care about most, it’s Policy.

What will you do for the underprivileged working class people of America?

What will you do for my children and grand children facing a Climate Change future?

What will you do for your Mass Incarceration mess, ending the drug war, legalizing Marijuana, and freeing non-violent drug offenders?

What will you do for the upwards of 45K people who die each year because health care is not affordable?

The 67% of American bankruptcies being due to health care costs?

BUT. Sanders supporters also believe in principle. Consistency. History. Fighting for change. Decency. Human rights. We’re also majority young people (a group Joe Biden did not do well with). Perhaps these things could be talked out. But now there’s a bigger elephant in the room. One that establishment Democrats and Joe’s supporters are ignoring.

Joe Biden was credibly accused of rape.

Democrats spent months yelling about “Believing Women” during the Kavanaugh Confirmation hearings. Rightfully fighting for Christine Blasey Ford’s story to be heard- knowing it would be a fruitless task at the hands of a twisted Senate Republican majority. Now, establishment Democrats are making the media rounds with Biden campaign talking points with denials and every attempt to downplay Tara Reade as not a credible accuser, even as several corroborations of her story have surfaced, 1 of which was an archive video of who Tara Reade alleges is her mother discussing the issue with Larry King on CNN in 1993. Meanwhile, Joe Biden’s campaign has it’s surrogates and supporters on news networks shielding Biden. Nancy Pelosi downplays the accusations, Kirsten Gillibrand (who helped cancel Al Franken) is downplaying the accusations. Alyssa Milano, prominent #MeToo voice, who made a performative appearance at the Brett Kavanagh hearings, now wants to “change the rules” on the movement in favor of a sort of ‘Due Process’- a process that many perpetrators cancelled by #MeToo never got, in favor of protecting Joe Biden.

What this means to me is that Democrats think it’s perfectly fine to be selective on who and who doesn’t deserve to be heard and taken seriously, based on who’s on your team. As if it should be that easy to just shed your principles like Snake skin, hypocritically protecting one predator, while gunning for another that doesn’t fit with you politically.

In 2016, I was perfectly fine voting for the “lesser evil”. Now that the party has loudly stated that not only does my values, principles, and policy demands for the poor and sick of America, not matter- I should fall in line with a candidate that has helped endless innocent people die overseas with America’s imperial military reach, helped endless people die at home because they cant afford a doctor, said that he has “no empathy” for young people- the same young people that have to live and suffer under the conditions of Climate Change while he’s dead and gone, sexually assaulted and violated multiple women, said that nothing will fundamentally change for the same rich people who are now gaining BILLIONS under pandemic conditions while their workers get sicker, if they’re even employed at all.

Moderate establishment Democrats and voters tell me that Trump is the number one threat. That we need to “vote blue no matter who”. Just how “blue” is Joe biden? Just how dissimilar is Joe Biden and his supporters from Trump and his following? For all of the cries of the “angry Bernie Bros” online, I see countless accosting and abusive discourse examples from Biden supporters calling any dissenters “Russian Bots”, or “MAGA Hats”. Being told that I’m somehow a Trump voter by default, for not immediately supporting Biden. All this when all I’ve ever seen from “the Bernie Bros” is aggressively holding smear artists to facts and truth in a thick environment of misrepresentation of Bernie Sanders and his platform.

So- Why shouldn’t Progressives vote for Joe Biden?

This Democratic party doesn’t give a damn about you. Nor does it care about Progressive policy. The party and its supporters spend all this time, smearing Sanders and his base as “Not democrats”, angry “socialists who want free stuff”, “How are you gonna PAY for it?!” etc etc, all while claiming to support SOME form of our policy, and then dropping it the second it doesn’t feel politically advantageous. This party threw everything it could into stopping YOU. With tactics like voter suppression, using a silly app suspiciously funded and supported by shady actors in Iowa, taking WEEKS to give final results, running Super PACs against Bernie and our movement, fear-mongering about Bernie when he did win states, gas lighting the public on “elect-ability”, using a literal pandemic against Bernie to guilt him into dropping out while attempting to blame him for continued spread of COVID-19, while they sent voters to the polls and we didn’t.

And after zero policy concessions, zero good will, repeated demands we fall in line after more than a year of being slammed and disrespected, showing up for Hillary Clinton and then being blamed for her loss anyway, which is inevitable again if Joe loses? Are we just going to keep allowing that? Just how long do we have to hold our noses, voting for Moderate do-nothing lite Republicans who would sooner see you die, than provide you affordable and universal healthcare, because a Billionaire would stand to lose money. Even NOW, during a Pandemic this party has done next to NOTHING to secure the livelihoods of American citizens, as more and more die, get furloughed, and cant pay their bills. All while Trump and Republicans take credit for pitching more common sense plans (even though they want to send us all back to work/school to feed the machine).

This- is the “resistance” party? THIS is the best we can do? Performative rage against a fascist clown while propping up an accused rapist warmongering corporatist with cognitive decline and previous racist tendencies? THIS is what the party keeps telling us we better support or be shamed as somehow supporting the “bad guy”?

Listen, #NotMeUs- this will never stop. This party will NEVER stop using us as a prop for our ideas and passion, then throwing us under the bus when they think they no longer need us. They cannot continue to be allowed to drag us further to the right with guilt trips and shaming. They will NEVER take you seriously unto you take serious action. We’ve been preaching about “action” this whole campaign. Why should that “action” stop in the ballot box? Have some foresight for just a moment and envision how this plays out in future elections, unless you stand up and make them WORK for your vote.

I, for one will not vote for Joe Biden. But I wont shame you for your vote, no matter who it’s for. Why? Because the party did a terrible job at earning -your- vote. I’d maybe only criticize you if you don’t show up at all. There’s so many down-ballot candidate who need support. Even if you leave the President box unchecked, at least show up for the other races.

But consider: There are other options that have been stifled for way too long. Perhaps its time we give them a shot, no? Green Party is running Howie Hawkins and a platform that is much closer to our principles that Biden would ever try for. Justin Amash just jumped into the race if you’re a little more on the Libertarian side. Jesse Ventura is also discovering running on the Green ticket as well. Just imagine Jesse ‘The Body’ Ventura on the debate stage with Donald Trump? Popcorn for DAYS.

In order for us to be taken seriously, we must prove that we’re capable of holding the party accountable. Not voting for them is the ultimate accountability, and you get to keep your principles intact.

Now- to the ultimate argument you’d inevitably get: “You would be helping Donald Trump secure 4 more years”.

My response? You don’t have to bare the blame for that. You wont be at fault for Joe Biden losing any more than those who chose not to vote at all. It’s on the party to earn these votes. That’s how elections work. If you hate the candidate and don’t feel good about them as a person, why is it your responsibility to put them in office? To me- one of the most personal things a person has, is their vote. Not their dollars, or their Tweets. It’s checking a box for the person YOU chose to represent you. If that person doesn’t believe in hardly anything you personally believe in- why is it that they deserve your vote, again? How is it that they’re are somehow entitled to that vote? They don’t, and they aren’t. I’m looking at you too, Republicans.

In closing…

Progressives, I’m sorry to break it to you but- Medicare For All is not on the ballot. Taxing the rich is not on the ballot. Ending corruption and crooked politicians is not on the ballot.

But- ending a terrible two-party system IS on the ballot. Taking your personal vote back, IS on the ballot. In my opinion- the only wasted vote, is the one you were demanded in giving up to what you don’t believe in.

-LZ

https://medium.com/@legacyzero/why-sanders-supporters-should-not-vote-for-joe-biden-a9146bee189b

[sasorikigai]

OTP Ask Meme || @paindealt​ || accepting 

1. Who wakes up first?

Hanzo, simply because he doesn’t wake up first, but he has high propensity to completely forgo sleep (he likes to take catnaps during the days) and watch Kuai Liang sleep or being occupied in productivity - reading, painting, meditating, doing chores, etc. 

2. Who wants to stay in bed just a little longer?

Neither, for they are remarkably disciplined and dedicated to their clans and they are punctual individuals. Unless Hanzo beseeches Kuai - for such circumstance occurs seldomly that he’s actually able to get a good night’s sleep with such abundance of nightmares and night terrors, and even panic attacks, then they will most likely stay in bed for a bit longer. 

3. Who takes longer getting ready?

Hanzo, by the slightest margin, because of his hair - even when Hanzo’s accustomed to comb his hair out and properly tie it in a bun atop his head, the process could get rather tedious, as he has luscious straight hair.  

4. When they can’t sleep, what do they do?

Remain entangled and naked, facing all the realities and verities of their existence and talking about their bliss of growth, the splendor of action, the common dreams and aspirations of their respective clans. They are not overly promiscuous and sexual to begin with, as they both have low to normal sex drives, but they do enjoy revelling in their bodies - all the imperfections, scars, their sculpted forms, every hill and valley of their impressions and such. 

5. Who falls asleep while watching a movie?

Most likely Hanzo, unless he’s entirely engrossed by the storyline and the characters in the movie, he will simply regard it as a white noise that will lull him to sleep. 

6. Who falls asleep last, watching the other with a small affectionate smile?

More frequently Hanzo, watching Kuai Liang sleep chases away all the self-isolation, unexplainable loneliness and warms his heart up. The solitude as the world reduce to only two of them becomes an escape from the pandemonium in a world that never could

7. Who comes up with the cheesy pick-up lines?

Kuai Liang, ever the dorky pun-master. That will either get him Hanzo’s glaring stare or his snorting laugh (provided that it’s actually funny). 

8. Who gets extremely competitive playing Mario Kart?

Hanzo, not only is he extremely competitive, but when in mood, he could be such a sore loser. He’s the one that crashes his car so many times due to road rage. He literally lits himself up in smoldering blaze next to Kuai Liang. Modern Hanzo even worse, because he already engages in motorcycle racing as one of his hobbies and this is only pouring gasoline onto his temper. 

9. Who accidentally pushes a door instead of pulling?

Hanzo, this is the reason Shirai Ryu Compounds have sliding doors. JK. He’s sensible and attentive enough to pay attention to such a thing, but there are moments when his hazy and sleep-addled attention slips and Kuai has to direct and guide him properly. The same goes for the modern Hanzo, as he could be clumsy and rather out of his normal self especially in the early mornings. 

10. Who sets the other’s ringtone to something loud and obnoxious behind their back?

In modern verse, definitely Kuai. Most likely for Hanzo’s alarm in the morning or during the night when he’s assigned a graveyard shift, but Hanzo gets extremely irate and agitated in the morning. 

11. Who rearranges the bookshelf/DVD shelf in alphabetical order?

Both in their canon verses are rather meticulous and organized. Kuai most likely more than Hanzo, because I headcanon him that he keeps Lin Kuei Archives with the utmost care - they are all scribed by hand as he absolutely detests and distrusts technology - and almost appear anal to those who are deemed messy and unorganized. Neither in their modern verses, as they both prefer what I call a ‘chaotic mess.’ Their personal space isn’t a pigsty per say, but there would be neat clutters everywhere, scattered throughout their rooms. 

12. Who does the hands-over-the-eyes “Guess Who” thing?

Kuai. Especially when Hanzo’s immensely occupied with his work in front of the laptop and with abundance of paperworks; either to make his ‘father’ take a damned break, or just simply wanting attention. I can definitely imagine them being outside their house - going to the library, book cafes, etc. to just break the mundane boredom of being stuck in the house when Hanzo works from home - and Kuai attempting to pull pranks and/or just being a mischievous son. 

13. Who points out a dog when they see one?

HANZO HASASHI, your ever-lonesome, touch-starved and animal-loving father. Even when he didn’t have a pet in his youth, there were so many stray dogs and cats around Shirai Ryu Compounds and he especially has fondness for the cats, because they are just like him. 

14. Who’s prone to road rage?

In the modern verse, it’s Hanzo. He has been caught by fellow officers when he was speeding (of course, they all let him get off with a warning), and not even that will slow him down; especially when he’s on his motorcycle. 

15. Who’s prone to wearing socks indoor (or to sleep)?

Neither in their canon verses, but Kuai in their modern verse. 

16. Who reminds the other to put on sunscreen before going to the beach (or pool)?

Hanzo reminds Kuai, 1000000% times, because Kuai and the Sun don’t get along. Hanzo rarely gets sunburned, as he tans remarkably. Kuai on the other hand... needs to cover himself up with all that he could in order to prevent him from literally burning in red. 

17. Who carries all the important documents while traveling?

Neither; whether in canon or other verses, they would never risk losing anything profound and substantial that could be used against them. Especially modern Hanzo, intimately knowing the risks involving identity thefts, frauds, blackmailing, etc that could get them in trouble, urges Kuai Liang almost every day to keep them either in the safe or leave them with him. 

18. Who gets the window seat?

Neither of them are picky when window/aisle seats are considered, but since window seats are more comfortable in long flights and he likes to move around a lot especially in long-hour flights, Hanzo would most likely let Kuai have it. 

19. Who puts their cold hands/feet on the other?

Kuai Liang. Because he’s the one with the cold hands and feet. 

20. What do they argue about the most?

I don’t think they will argue that much, if not, at all, unless it’s Scorpion and Revenant Sub-Zero. Scorpion can be unnervingly merciless, acerbic and ruthless with his words, even towards the Revenant, whom he accepts as his most treasured company and ally, but nevertheless, his words will hurt Kuai Liang, because they are meant to hurt. Except that, I really don’t see them arguing much in their canonical interactions, and maybe in modern verse, it happens more frequently because Hanzo could come across as exceedingly protective and worried. 

21. Who’s clumsier?

They have their moments, but Hanzo’s more of the sleep-deprived one with barrage of issues that would occasionally prevent him from carrying out his routine without having thoughts of suicide and other harmful actions, he may come across more lethargic and uncoordinated. Kuai Liang will immediately pick it up, even though he may not say anything much. 

22. Who texts more often?

Hanzo in their modern verse. He is not a nagging father per say, but he does make the most attempts to try to connect with Kuai Liang, despite his hard-set habits and their generational gap. 

23. Who is better with kids?

Hanzo, simply he has been a father before all the shitshow of his life took its place and he’s still yearning that long-lost fatherhood to become a tangible, fluid reality. Even with Takeda Takahashi present in his life, there’s that hollow void in his heart that couldn’t be filled. 

24. Who’s the better cook?

Hanzo by far; regardless of their verses, he’s used to being in the caretaker’s position and enjoys the process of not only exploring, but developing his culinary skills. Both canonical and modern Hanzo will most likely use Kuai as his unintentional guinea pig, and knowing Kuai doesn’t like heavily pungent and spicy foods, he will try his best to make accommodations to satisfy both of their dissimilar palate. 

25. Who mistakes salt for sugar?

KUAI LIANG. This man cannot cook for the life of him. Does he burn water on the stove? 

26. Who puts the fork in the microwave?

Neither, but a sleepy Hanzo at 3am would. 

27. Who cooks at 2 in the morning?

Modern Hanzo Hasashi. This man will push his body even beyond his limitation just to get his work done. Him being such an excessive workaholic helps him to disengage all the unsavory thoughts. 

28. Who lets the microwave play the loud beeping sound at 1 a.m.?

Depends on who has the gnawing appetite in the wee hours of the morning, because in their modern verse, I can definitely see that they both are perpetual night owls and they will skip eating lunch and/or dinner either one is not present to cook or buy groceries (Hanzo seldomly does and will almost always opt out on delivery or takeouts) and they are too enraptured in their work. They have such one-tunnel vision when they are in their concentration, so most often, it would be both of them sharing leftovers. 

29. Who licks the spoon when they’re baking brownies?

Neither. Hanzo doesn’t have much of a sweet tooth and Kuai Liang can’t cook nor bake shit. Maybe Kuai attempts one of those microwavable brownies with chocolate powder. The only thing he has to do is to pour milk in it and microwave it for a couple of minutes, but he may even struggle with that..... It’s cooking. 

30. Who likes doing the dishes

Canon Hanzo finds chores somehow therapeutic. Doing them gets his mind off of things and he’s more or less used to the repetition. It keeps his mind grounded and anchored to reality. 

31. Who has bigger cravings? What are they?

Again, entirely depends on their moods. Kuai Liang will have an occasional sweet craving that Hanzo will never fathom to understand, but he tries to accommodate his lover / his adopted son as best as he could - bringing sweets from work, stopping by the bakery or cafe to just satiate Kuai’s addiction, etc. - Hanzo cannot be helped when he’s depressed with alcohol - his preference being sake in canon and other strong liquors like vodka and whiskey, although canon Hanzo seldomly gets drunk for the sake of intoxicating himself, because he knows the consequences, and alcohol being a depressant. Modern Hanzo doesn’t give one single fuck as long as it doesn’t hinder his work ethics. 

32. Who remembers what the other one always orders at a restaurant?

Hanzo, regardless of verses, will come up with a mental list of what Kuai likes and doesn’t like. While he could be poetic and eloquent with words, he attempts to be observant and perceptive with such things. After all, he is a ninja who HAS to acquaint and familiarize with not only his surroundings, but finding out about individual(s) as well. He will also attempt to emulate the dish personally, adding in some personal touches. 

33. How do they eat ice cream? What’s their favorite flavors?

Hanzo doesn’t much care for ice cream either, but the only flavor he likes is matcha. He doesn’t do the lick and swirl thing most people do with ice cream; he will just bite off from the top, as if he was eating a granola bar. Prefers it without any toppings, and will eat it either in a cup or in a waffle cones. Kuai likes the sweet flavors, most likely fruit-based, and put all the sprinkles, marshmallows and fruit syrups all over his ice cream. 

34. Do they go on dates? What are they like?

In their canonical setting, their ‘dates’ are limited to the confines of their clans, as it always has been their priority. They would most likely spar, exercise and meditate together, spend some intimate moments in their private quarters - copulations, cuddling, reading and painting and sculpting, pursuing their hobbies whenever they can - eating supper and drinking tea - Hanzo doing the cooking, Kuai preparing the tea - and in their rarest outings, perhaps going out to the nearest town for a dinner and strolling around the towns, introducing each other’s culture to them. 

35. What do they smell when they smell amortentia?

Hanzo: saturated pine and evergreen of the Lin Kuei forest, cool, crisp and minty scent of Kuai Liang’s breath and the severe, yet welcoming damp earth and petrichor. 

Kuai: charred dust, rust and copper, burning oak and maple, cherry blossoms, incense, sandalwood and musk, the salty trail of Hanzo’s sweat, iron and steel of Hanzo’s katana. 

36. Which one is the secret snuggler?

Kuai Liang. Hanzo being a snuggler is not a secret, as he prefers to be the big spoon and the initiator about 95% of the times. Kuai’s gestures and initiations are careful, gentle and meek, but nevertheless, immensely appreciated. 

37. Which one offers their jacket to the other when they complain they feel cold?

Neither. Not that both will ever complain about the cold, but in the modern verse, Hanzo will never be reluctant to give up his jacket if Kuai shivers in the cold. 

38. Who reaches for the other one’s hand while driving?

Hanzo, regardless of situations, corporeal gestures are immensely important and pivotal in his relationship and the kind of relationship - platonic or romantic/sexual. Modern Kuai will reach for Hanzo’s arm and hand when he’s behind, embracing Hanzo from the back. 

39. Who leaves little notes in the other one’s lunch? (Bonus: What does it say?)

Not that Hanzo will pack lunch for Kuai every single day, but when he does cook for Kuai, he will leave something short and sweet in Kuai’s language (Chinese, obviously Chinese and Japanese share many characters, despite phonetic difference). It would say something like “藕断丝连,” which means “Although the lotus root may be cut, its fibered threads are still connected.” Signifying that their friendship survived adversity and obviously connoting that it has become something more in their shared time spent together. 

40. Who is the most affectionate?

It’s hard to compare, because they both are very reciprocative of each other’s affections to their fullest. At the first glance, Hanzo may come across as more affectionate, because he’s more used to initiating and giving gestures and words of love and appreciation. He’s also used to being in such relationship more than Kuai, who has never been a romantic/sexual relationship that deals a lot with gestures that are not meant to bring harm and suffering. 

41. Who is the big spoon/little spoon?

 Most often, it’s Hanzo being the big spoon, as his arms would be wound around Kuai’s midsection and around his neck (Hanzo’s arm being Kuai’s pillow), or Hanzo on his back with Kuai’s head on Hanzo’s upper arm. They don’t mind switching things around, either during sleep or when Hanzo starts to have an onslaught of nightmares and night terrors. 

42. What is their favorite feature of their partner?

Hanzo: Kuai’s eyes. Even when Kuai’s more of the phlegmatic, collected and calm one, he knows that such embedded emotions spill forth from those oceanic sapphire eyes. He likes to look at them, stare at them, drown in them and just appreciate the depth they can offer. 

Kuai: Hanzo’s arms; they are well-sculpted and hard like tempered steel. Hanzo obviously relies heavily on his upper body strength in kombat, and his build shows - while Kuai has more mass, Hanzo’s muscles are more finely chiseled. He also appreciates Hanzo’s lips; they are full and swollen, and absolutely kissable. 

43. What is the first thing that changes when they realize they have feelings for the other?

They have really deep, baritone, gravelly (Hanzo’s) and hard voices that could come across as ruthless and harsh; but when they talk about each other, the timbre of their voices will soften, and there would be less polished intimidation and aggression embedded on their eyes. 

44. What are their nicknames for each other?

Hanzo: beloved, dearest, ice bear. 

Kuai: love, beloved, hearth 

45. Who worries the most? Over what?

Even though they are two of the most capable Protectors of Earthrealm, there is an underlying concern of their safety and sustenance. They both have faced death and risen again, but they both know the chronology they have shared between them as Shirai Ryu and Lin Kuei rivalry reached its apex hadn’t been merciful and kind. Through their shared enemies now, they would do their best to protect each other from dying in battle. 

Modern Hanzo would worry that Kuai will descend towards the life of criminality and sins, because of his traumatic abuse and violence he had to endure before being adopted to Hanzo. There is a fundamental yearning to see Kuai follow the footsteps of his legacy, as Hanzo too, had been a lawbreaker and misfit and had redeemed himself to become a better person.  

46. Who initiates kisses?

Hanzo 100% at the beginning, but Kuai attempts his best to initiate and reciprocate Hanzo’s more natural engagement. 

47. Who says I love you first? How did it happen?

Happened to randomly slip from Hanzo’s mouth during their walks. While he feared rejection and unreciprocated feelings, Hanzo would have taken the risk at least to admit the truth of his feelings, which had been both carnal, visceral, emotionally coalesced and linked. Essentially he was feeling that Kuai was his soulmate; for he possessed so many qualities Harumi used to have - a gentle strength, a strong, mature mind that would secure and anchor him, and would have seen him both at low and high, crossing each other’s paths so many times. 

48. Who tells their friends/family about their relationship first?

Neither, not that they have families to tell. All the other acquaintances, friends and allegiances catch up on their relationship through observing and prediction. They are more or less bound to know each other and they are by far from being engaged in gossips 

49. What do they do when they’re away from each other?

Hanzo will either draw or paint him on mulberry paper or in his sketchpad, bound in Japanese style (that he would always keep in his private quarters). He would sketch Kuai’s portrait, or do expressive croquis when circumstance allows him. Kuai often sculpts Hanzo in ice and and ponder upon the day when Hanzo gifted him the headband he wears. 

50. Who gets overwhelmed by small acts of kindness?

Kuai, because he is still adjusting to non-threatening and vicious gestures and acts, and especially when Hanzo takes him into the utmost consideration by indulging his needs and desires. 

[lovereconthings]

What If You And Your Spouse Are Incompatable?

What Do You do If You And Your Spouse Are Incompatable?

You may find yourself, like many couples, wondering how you ever got together and if you are compatible enough to stay in this relationship. Before we jump into things to do if you think you're compatible, let's consider the upside to differences. It is the differences that make a relationship interesting. Diversity in backgrounds, personalities, personal preferences, viewpoints, and perceptions can be good. You, no doubt, are familiar with the phrase, “Opposites attract.” Even science has proven this to be true! Claus Wedekind is a Swiss biological researcher notable for his 1995 study on attraction. This study is often known as the "sweaty T-shirt study ."In it, men each wore the same T-shirt for two days. The shirts were then put into identical boxes. Various women were asked to smell the shirts and indicate which shirts they were most sexually attracted to. The results showed that women were most attracted to men with an MHC (major histocompatibility complex) most dissimilar from their own. (Source: Wikipedia) AGREEABILITY AND CONSCIENTIOUSNESS Dr. John Gottman believes that compatibility is one of the myths people believe about relationships. He says that when we say

“compatibility," we really are talking about the qualities of agreeability and conscientiousness. I tend to agree! To amplify these two qualities, consider their synonyms: - Agreeability: pleasant, friendly, amiable, congenial, cordial, social, warm - Conscientiousness: responsible, organized, hard-working, honest, honorable, just, upright, scrupulous These are certainly desirable qualities for both you and your partner to possess. These are the qualities of a person who would, in a disagreement, say things like, "I never thought of it that way before," “I am sorry. Will you forgive me? "or I love you too much to try to prove myself right and you wrong."  If you are both agreeable and conscientious, then you will have much more success applying the tools given below for making your “incompatibility” work for you and your relationship. MAKING THE MOST OF INCOMPATIBILITY - Take a deep breath and relax. The calmer and more peaceful you are, the more likely your chance of success in your desire to grow closer to your partner. Being stressed and upset will only push you further apart. You can do this, but it won't happen overnight in most cases.  - Become Expert Communicators. As with any issue in a relationship, communication plays a crucial role in succeeding in that area. Learn the tools of communication like reflective listening, empathy, determining if your spouse is speaking emotional or logical language, etc. You can’t overcommunicate!  - Let Go of Expectations. As I once heard, "Expectations are just disappointments paid forward." You will be disappointed if you expect your partner to live up to your expectations of what a mate should be and do. The gap between what you expected and what you got (reality) can be vast. What feels that gap are intense emotions like anger, bitterness, sadness, deep disappointment, hopelessness, and hurt.   It's important to realize that our expectations can be an attempt to control our partner and the relationship. Therefore, we have to learn to let go of what we expect to move forward, accept what is, and open ourselves to what can be!   - Have a Deep Conversation. Choose an appropriate time and place for an honest conversation between you and your partner. Own your feelings and be careful not to blame or accuse them. Open discussions about complex issues are not easy, but they set a new trajectory for the relationship. Honesty combined with love is a powerful glue for a relationship, no matter the differences.  - Accept Areas of Difficulty and Disagreement. You are two different people and, in some ways, will always be "incompatible ."It has only taken me 47 years of marriage to learn this! She puts it this way, "He goes from A to M, and I go from Z to N, but we always meet in the middle." She will never like country music, and I will never appreciate figure skating, but we have learned to enjoy each other's enjoyment of them. It's a decision to be happily incompatible or miserably incompatible. - Appreciate and Celebrate the Differences. Become a student of your partner. In other words, make it about them, not all about you. Learn everything that you can about them – their personality, preferences, favorite foods, music, team, etc. Don't expect them to be like you – that's putting pressure on them and frustrating you. The more you learn about "what makes them tick," the more you will appreciate them and accept them for the person they are, not who you would have them to be. This can even lead to celebrating and enjoying your differences. Your marriage is one of a kind with its own DNA. There's never been one exactly like it before. Celebrate it!  - Discover Common Ground. There may be very few things at present that you enjoy doing together. One way to connect is to try interests or hobbies that are new to both of you. Doing something together for the first time creates a kind of intimacy and connectedness. For example, you could each make a list and then try things from both lists – this week, do something from her list, and next week, do something from his. Even if neither one enjoys the activity, you can enjoy each other and agree together that you didn't like it. You might also find common ground in exploring spirituality together. A shared faith is one of the strongest bonds a couple can have.  - Be Willing to Grow. Your differences with your spouse are opportunities to grow and expand your knowledge and understanding. You can grow as an individual and as a couple if your attitude is to learn all about each other and your differences. It could be something as simple as learning all about his favorite team and thus gaining an appreciation for the sport he loves. He could learn more about government and the economy to discuss the political causes about which she is so passionate. Both could grow by taking parenting classes together to improve parenting skills. - Envision Your Future. Do you want to be the person who went from relationship to relationship only to find incompatibility with each new partner? Probably not. Wouldn’t you rather be the person (couple) who worked hard at creating a mutually satisfying relationship and left a legacy of love and laughter?  Love Recon and Recon Coaching can help you do just that. All it takes is the right tools used consistently over time. Today is a good day to start! Read the full article

[agnesgoesadventuring-blog]

You know, Vaxleth isn’t my thing but I respect that other people see a lot of beauty in it and it is important to them. It would be nice to see the same respect given to people who care about or identify with Percy. There’s definitely a place to talk about the way male violence and pain is prioritized in fandom, but I think oftentimes that discussion veers in misogyny (I.e. the idea that he’s only beloved bc girls think he’s cute). 1/2

I respect you and your insight a lot but I’ve noticed a lot of negativity towards people who care about Percy that makes me uncomfortable. Let’s talk about the way fandom infantilizes him sure. But I don’t see that sort of complexity given to him, just a blanket “people don’t get him”. Percy is beloved, tbh, because he is a really good look into the aftereffects of trauma and a lot of people relate to that. 2/2

The people pleaser that still exists inside of me was all prepared to fall all over myself apologizing, but then I heard my therapist's voice in my head, telling me to go back and look at what I said and think about whether I actually did anything wrong and whether or not what's being said about my words and behavior are actually accurate.

I'm very glad I heard that voice, because looking back at my post and re reading this message, I realized that there's a lot of misrepresentation of what I said, a lot of projecting things that I never said, and some pretty disingenuous attempts at equivocation of things that aren't really similar.

You're bringing up Vaxleth because of the recent discussion surrounding the abuse that some shippers have experienced, trying to equivocate those things with the way I have talked about Percy and the perception some fans have of the character, as though they're even in the same realm of behavior. Noting that there are sometimes cultural influences to the way we perceive and see characters and that sometimes those cultural influences are problematic is not remotely the same thing as the attacks, the erasure, and the hatred that was being discussed that some Vaxleth shippers have received.

Where the actual similarity lies is in the discussion of those cultural influences in the perception of Percy and the discussion about the need for same gender bi representation and the way heteronormativity can make different gender bi representation less effective. Now, if I dismissed the latter, treated it as though it wasn't an important discussion, you would have a point in trying to frame my discussion of Vaxleth and Percy in some kind of hypocritical or bad light. But that's not the case.

Generally, you have badly misrepresented both my words in that specific post and my behavior in discussion Percy and his fans in general. If you're going to make claims that I've said things that have somehow treated people who care about Percy badly, you're going to need to provide actual posts where this is demonstrated. A thorough examination of my tumblr earlier today, going all the way back to the very first post, shows that no such posts exists. Unless you're of the opinions that simply stating that I think a lot of the interpretations the fans have of Percy don't actually match canon or what Taliesin has said in Q&As and on Talks Machina is negativity toward people who care about Percy. If that's the case then you have a problem with the way you perceive disagreement about things you like.  If you're talking merely in general and you don't have anything to say about my posting habits or specific posts I've made, then I ask that you take up your complaints with the people who have actually taken part in such behavior rather than trying to apply such claims to my posts and behavior.

If I had made some sort of statement that even so much as implied that ALL Percy fans were wrong in their interpretations, your position here might be valid. But I didn't, and acting like saying that I feel a lot of people (note, not all) misinterpret the character is some kind of dismissal of all Percy fans badly misrepresents my words. As does treating such a statement as though it's a dismissal of the aspects of Percy's character that deal with the effects of trauma, considering I didn't say a single thing about that or the validity of identifying with such a character and story.

Furthermore, treating the discussion about the way character traits that are gendered in our culture influence our perceptions of fictional characters as though it's misogynistic in nature is either disingenuous or ignorant. For one thing, the Critical Role fandom is quite varied in terms of gender and sexual identities, and Percy has a great deal of fans who are not straight women. For another thing, the way those gendered traits influence our perceptions of characters are not exclusively about sexual/romantic/etc. attraction, or really even just attraction of any kind. It's a part of it, but it's only one part. Acting like discussing those issues treats fans like dumb horny fangirls or something ignores the complexity of the way those things influence our feelings, opinions, and perceptions of characters in ways that have nothing to do with attractions (sexual or otherwise). Sometimes that discussion might end up being simplified into misogyny. But again, I have not done that, and I don't appreciate such a thing being piled onto my post and behaviors just because I responded to post that you didn't like, or because you didn't like what I had to say.

Now, if you want to have a genuine discussion about the complexities of fandom behavior in regards to the way characters like Percy are treated and perceived and the way that there can be some unwarranted pushback toward the character's fans, I would be more than happy to do that. But I'm not interesting in having such a discussion when my posts and behavior are being unfairly equivocated to hostile, hateful behavior, when it's either implied that I've behaved in ways I haven't or that my posts are somehow connected to bad behavior merely because I disagree with a lot of fans of the character in regards to some of their interpretations. Maybe your wording was poor and the way that you ended up equating my behavior with that of others was accidental. But you didn't start off well by trying to bring up vaxleth as though you "respecting" the people who ship it had anything to do with the discussion surrounding Percy, nor is it a great start when a message with such a tone is spurred on by a post I made about fandom perceptions of Percy. If you want to have that discussion, by all means, come back with asks that don't try to appeal to something completely unrelated and completely dissimilar and that don't associate me with certain behaviors and actions that I don't take part in.

[research-alexlondon]

Updated Paragraph Plan

At this stage I wanted to update my paragraph plan and slightly refine it before going forward with my writing

KEYWORDS women, femininity, objectification, media, advertising, sexualisation, stereotyping

ABSTRACT -want to start with a quote or rhetorical question - i am thinking of using “is the casual objectification of women so commonplace that we should all just suck it up, roll over, and accept defeat? I hope not” - Mayberry -media has a lot of control of ones identity and self, which leads to poor messages coming through the media -gender and sexualisation starts in advertising  -my aims for the commentary- introduce contexts (low self-esteem and body image issues in women & constructing gender roles) -my image- demonstrate there is not one type of beauty, every woman is beautiful despite their dissimilarities with the model shown across media

CONTEXTS first context para- the reinforcement of the ‘ideal’ female body in advertising & media causes ongoing mental health effects in women, particularly around self-esteem and body image

-introduce context in starter sentence -visual advertising becoming colossal as well as digital consumption growing -this means constant exposure to advertising and therefore reinforcement of the ‘ideal’ model -“few women believe they have acceptable bodies, and the media nurture this insecurity and self-hatred, pounding away at the expectation of perfection” - Estelle Disch  -implications include EDs, low self-esteem, body dissatisfaction & depression - American Journal of Law & Medicine  -become unachievable standard over-time- “twenty years ago fashion models weighed 8% less than the average female. Today, models weigh 23% less than the average female” - Jean Kilbourne -companies use this to sell their products- consumers think their product will make them look like the model  -mostly effects a young age bracket due to their online consumption habits and naivety -also effects the way men view women’s bodies 

second context para- the role that gender stereotyping plays in advertisements has a domino effect on gender norms in real life / creates ideas of gender imbalance

-introduce context in starter sentence -define gender, how it is a social construct - socially prescribed roles, behaviours and preferences and are ‘culturally constructed’ - Abel  -the ideas of gender norms and what is masculine/feminine have been shown through advertising -dependency, nurture, concern with beauty, sexuality and objectivity are the gender roles women are given - Cortese -brands want to capture and hold consumers attention and are therefore unconcerned with the messages they send -relationships between men and women in ads are also skewed- men are positioned above ‘in power’ while women are below them  -although the stereotypes and relationships are seen to be decreasing - Hovland - it is only because they are becoming more subtle - Wolin - meaning we are processing these subconsciously  -this subliminal processing can cause issues in future- effecting the way society members make decisions and gives a bias towards certain ideas they are taught - Ruch  -gender imbalance leads to issues in society, this is the root due to our consumption of visual images  -domestic abuse increases due to this (not sure if i want to add this yet) 

METHODS first method para- visual storytelling

-definition starter sentence - “a story told primarily through the use of visual media” - Definitons.net -categories include illustration, photography, media, and infographics - Ron - and are meant to entertain, inform or persuade the consumers - Williams -visual consumers are emerging faster than ever because of technology becoming so popular - Oblinger  -visuals allow consumers to process the information faster, and more efficiently in a way text cannot - Lankow -we are exposed to visual stories every day - Kress & van Leeuwen - so consumers don’t process the works automatically but instead subconsciously - Avgerinou - this means reinforced ideas are what stick with us the most -due to this subconscious examination and more exposure than every - Oblinger - the full extent of the effects this has on consumers can be blurred -this method is important to examine as it is so prevalent and relates to audiences -can be taken further than advertising - such as awareness campaigns etc.

second method para- photography

-dates back to 1839 with a scientific introduction -methods have been the same throughout time, e.g. framing, positioning, lighting, costuming -advertising photography is used to convince buyers by selling a story, showing what it ‘represents’ - Delong - opposed to commercial photography which is more focused on making the product the hero  -objectification of women starts in the photography -photographic advertising has increased with the rise of technology, editing softwares are used more frequently than ever because of this demonstrating a false image -more harmful messages more frequently  -this method is well-used and be powerful to consumers, therefore it is important to consider

CONCLUSION -summarise that negative implications come from the objectification of women within the sex -while progress has been made to display more ‘natural’ looking women, there is still a way to go and body image issues are prevalent in our society -in response to this issue, i will combat through my own photographic procedures, and what i display to the public  -i will display a wide range of women in my work, and demonstrate empowerment of all natural bodies - therefore won’t warp them from its natural shape -if i am to show a relationship between a woman and a man i will show it as equal, not either is more powerful/ over-arching than the other -finish with a quote- i am thinking of “the representation of women in the society, especially in mass media, has been the most delusional act ever done on the grounds of human existence” - Abhikit Naskar - The Bengal Tigress: A treatise on Gender Equality