#not the sexism itself but our idea of it

[magpie-trove]

I know there was and is sexism in society but also I get really annoyed at how authors today write about it in the past

[tgirlranting]

okay so i saw some of the discourse ajout Emilia Perez and wantes to see it for myself.

TL;DR: dogshit movie. masterclass in transmisogyny.

the opening song tells us this is a story about violence and love, and it delivers on that promise: in this movie, masculinity is violence; a violence which Emilia (Karla Sofía Gascón) wishes to escape through transition. the film firmly states that Emilia's wish is a doomed one. she was born violent and violence will always be a part of her.

this is an idea inherent to transmisogyny: male bodies are violent, and therefore transfem bodies are violent. "abuser-bodied" is a term used to other us and justify our exclusion from queer and women's spaces. the film Emilia Perez sets out to repackage this idea in a veneer of shitty music, crime and family drama, and toothless takes on too many social issues to count.

the film is apparently interested in many topics; drug trafficking, kidnapping, murder, corruption, sexism, ineffective justice systems, etc. it takes time out of its two hour length to mention all of these, but not to say anything about them. midway through the film, lawyer Rita (Zoe Saldana) sings a #deep song about how all these corrupt politicians are "going to pay, to pay, to pay, to pay"—the implication being that they are going to pay for their crimes—but Rita has no intention of making then do so. the reason she's in this ballroom with them is to ask for their money for her and Emilia's charity—shes not making them pay, she's asking them to. the film wants to act as if it's commenting on social issues here, even though its completely uninterested in doing so. instead of highlighting social issues, it unintentionally paints Rita as a corrupt, hollow sellout. she knows these people, knows where their money comes from, but gets into bed with them anyway. her performative rage at the system is a hollow edifice that appeals to liberal Academy voters, and no one else.

considering what the film is interested in saying, i almost prefer that approach. in a widely (deservedly) memed-on song, Rita is introduced to the world of gender-confirming surgery in a spectacle meant to elicit the macabre, the exotic amd erotic. a doctor sings "man to woman, penis to vaginaaaaaa" while Rita excitedly dances and asks for more. The doctors voice is made robotic, calling to mind cyborgs and robotic women; robotic women like Emilia is soon to become.

Rita later attempts to convince a reluctant doctor to perform those surgeries on Emilia. in a tone of profundity, she claims, "if you could only see what he's shown me."

Note the masculine pronoun. Not only does Rita continually misgender Emilia during this conversation (for which Emilia is not present), but the two of them have only had one on-screen conversation: their first meeting, in which Emilia shows Rita her boobs and says in a raspy, hyper-masculine voice, "I wish to be a woman."

So what is Rita talking about here? The only possible answer is the range of strange, wondrous surgeries she has just been informed of, or the fact that trans people exist, both of which this doctor is well aware of. I suspect the film is gesturing at some nebulous idea of the unloveable other showing us true beauty through their resilience, but frankly that is a reach. The film chooses not to say what Rita is talking about here, likely because the film itself has no idea. What we are left with in that gesturing absence is that the surgeries, the act of changing your body in a way that others find both disturbing and fascinating, is not only the sum total of trans existence, but is itself somehow meaningful; aren't the trannies brave for mutilating their bodies this way? For choosing to make themselves an artificial mockery of womanhood in order to be true to themselves? Isn't there beauty in their struggle to be recognized as something they clearly are not? It's a dismal, patronizing view of transfemininity. But before the conversation ends, a song breaks out in which Zoe Saldana, not Rita, turns to the camera and proclaims to the audience that she will always have our backs. Forgive me if I don't fall at her feet in gratitude.

the specter of Emilia's past, as a cartel boss and as a man, hangs over her constantly in a way the movie does not seek to challenge. she tries to change her ways: fake her death, become a woman through extensive surgeries, and use her money to help those affected by cartel violence. but of course, when her formee wife, Jessi, tries to move on from the husband she believes is dead, Emilia immediately sinks into her "male" voice and physically assaults her, then sends goons to beat and threaten the boyfriend's life. this results in Jessi and her boyfriend kidnapping Emilia during the climax of the film. As Jessi begins to suspect who Emilia really is, she asks "who are you?"

her reply of "Emilia," is drowned out by Jessi singing her deadname. immediately after this, we see Emilia for the last time as she is thrown in the trunk of a car, and all three of them perish in a burning wreck. Emilia cannot escape her manhood, the violence inherent in her body. everyone weep for her; what a tragic figure, the tranny.

[femsolid]

In my opinion, the radical feminist VS gender identity debate boils down to materialism vs dualism and feminism vs post modernism.

To explain:

Mind–body dualism, in essence, postulates that human beings have souls. It's a philosophy that denotes either the view that the mental is non-physical, or that the mind and body are distinct and separable. Therefore, one can be born male and have a female soul/spirit/essence/psyche/personality/identity. It is compatible with many religions and was promoted by famous philosophers and theologians (often both.) It is a form of spirituality.

On the other hand we have materialism. Radical feminism, marxism, socialism and communism come from materialism. Materialism can also be found in science, such as the theory of evolution.

Materialism is a form of philosophy which holds that all things, including mental states and consciousness, are results of material interactions of material things. Mind and consciousness are caused by physical processes in the body without which they cannot exist. It opposes spirituality and dualism and negates the concept of a soul. Therefore, there is no female soul inside of a man's body because there is no soul at all, female or male, only a body. That man's body is male because of its sex which means his personality and thoughts are that of a male.

The other conflict is between feminism and post modernism.

Post modernism, as a philosophy, postulates that there is no "truth" because everything is relative. There is no objective reality, just opinions, perspectives and thoughts. Nothing is real, because everybody is different. There are no facts, only viewpoints. Therefore, postmodern philosophers spend a lot of time discussing theory and abstract concepts instead of the material reality of class struggle and its consequences. Think of all the discussions about "identities", "what is a woman" and how to "feel empowered." In this world, sexism is something relative and abstract, something to talk about, not to fight. To quote Catharine MacKinnon: "students are taught that nothing is real, that disengagement is smart (not to mention careerpromoting), that politics is pantomime and ventriloquism, that reality is a text (reading is safer than acting any day), that creative misreading is resistance (you feel so radical and comfortably marginal), that nothing can be changed (you can only amuse yourself)." Post modernism is directly linked to individualism (a social theory favouring freedom of action for individuals over collective) and neo-liberalism (there is no public interest, only private interests) positioning itself against collectivism, class consciousness and class struggle, all core tenets of feminism.

Feminism is a political and materialistic movement that seeks to liberate women (radical feminism) or at the very least to improve the very real, very concrete, material lives of some women (liberal feminism). It postulates that men and women are social classes and that men are waging a war against women, and have been for centuries. The oppressors and the oppressed are clearly defined, it's not "relative", it's not a viewpoint, it's not "personal": it's historical, political and factual. Strategies and actions are used to free women from male supremacy (radical feminism) or to make said male supremacy more bearable (liberal feminism). In this movement, the idea of Woman the abstract concept or Woman the spirit/personality/soul in a body makes no sense and is considered misogynistic.

To summarize:

-> Trans activists believe that physical bodies are irrelevant or, at the very least, separate from the mind, that reality changes depending on how we think about it, and that women are a personality (and personalities are abstract concepts).

-> Radical feminists believe that women form a social class that is oppressed (even enslaved) by men precisely because of our physical bodies.

Those two positions are irreconcilable.

[cantsayidont]

When attempting to critique the values of a long-running franchise like STAR TREK, it's important to draw a distinction between superficial issues and structural ones.

"Superficial" in this sense doesn't mean "minor" or "unimportant"; it simply means that an issue is not so intrinsic to the premise that the franchise would collapse (or would be radically different) were it changed or removed. For example, misogyny has been a pervasive problem across many generations of STAR TREK media, which have often been characterized by a particular type of leering-creep sexism that was distasteful at the time and has not improved with age. However, sexism and misogyny are not structural elements of the TREK premise; one can do a STAR TREK story where the female characters have agency and even pants without it becoming something fundamentally different from other TREK iterations (even TOS, although there are certainly specific TOS episodes that would collapse if you excised the sexism).

By contrast, the colonialism and imperialism are structural elements — STAR TREK is explicitly about colonizing "the final frontier" and about defending the borders, however defined, of an interstellar colonial power. Different iterations of STAR TREK may approach that premise in slightly different ways, emphasizing or deemphasizing certain specific aspects of it, but that is literally and specifically what the franchise is about. Moreover, because STAR TREK has always been heavily focused on Starfleet and has tended to shy away from depicting life outside of that regimented environment, there are definite limits to how far the series is able to depart from the basic narrative structure of TOS and TNG (a captain and crew on a Starfleet ship) without collapsing in on itself, as PICARD ended up demonstrating rather painfully.

This means that some of the things baked into the formula of STAR TREK are obviously in conflict with the franchise's self-image of progressive utopianism, but cannot really be removed or significantly altered, even if the writers were inclined to try (which they generally are not).

What I find intensely frustrating about most modern STAR TREK media, including TNG and its various successors, is not that it can't magically break its own formula, but that writer and fan attachment to the idea of TREK as the epitome of progressive science fiction has become a more and more intractable barrier to any kind of meaningful self-critique. It's a problem that's become increasingly acute with the recent batch of live-action shows, which routinely depict the Federation or Starfleet doing awful things (like the recent SNW storyline about Una being prosecuted for being a genetically engineered person in violation of Federation law) and then insist, often in the same breath, that it's a progressive utopia, best of all possible worlds.

This is one area where TOS (and to some extent the TOS cast movies) has a significant advantage over its successors. TOS professes to be a better world than ours, but it doesn't claim to be a perfect world (and indeed is very suspicious of any kind of purported utopia). The value TOS most consistently emphasizes is striving: working to be better, and making constructive choices. Although this can sometimes get very sticky and uncomfortable in its own right (for instance, Kirk often rails against what he sees as "stagnant" cultures), it doesn't presuppose the moral infallibility of the Federation, of Starfleet, or of the characters themselves. There's room for them to be wrong, so long as they're still willing to learn and grow.

The newer shows are less and less willing to allow for that, and, even more troublingly, sometimes take pains to undermine their predecessors' attempts along those lines. One appalling recent example is SNW's treatment of the Gorn, which presents the Gorn as intrinsically evil (and quite horrifying) in a way they're not in "Arena," the TOS episode where they were first introduced. The whole point of "Arena" is that while Kirk responds to the Gorn with outrage and anger, he eventually concedes that he may be wrong: There's a good chance that the Gorn are really the injured party, responding to what they reasonably see as an alien invasion, and while that may be an arguable point, sorting it out further should be the purview of diplomats rather than warships. By contrast, SNW presents the Gorn as so irredeemably awful as to make Kirk's (chronologically later) epiphany at best misguided: The SNW Gorn are brutal conquerors who lay eggs in their captives (a gruesome rape metaphor, and in presentation obviously inspired by ALIENS) when they aren't killing each other for sport, and even Gorn newborns are monsters to be feared. Not a lot of nuance there, and no space at all for the kind of detente found in TOS episodes like "The Devil in the Dark."

[scretladyspider]

An interesting effect of purity culture is how often allos don’t have any problem understanding that romantic attraction and sexual attraction don’t have to be dependent on the other to exist, until you’re demisexual, and then suddenly “everyone is demisexual”.

Demisexuality is a sexual orientation in which a person doesn’t experience sexual attraction unless under the circumstances of a close bond, and even then it’s not guaranteed to happen. The assumption culturally is that this bond is always romantic, but it varies from demi to demi.

I cannot begin to count how many conversations I’ve had where an allo has told me “I’d bone that” with it being made clear there’s no romantic attraction there. it’s just understood. But if I’m demisexual, and I say I don’t feel sexual attraction without a bond, that confuses them.

In my case, there’s a lot of sexism going on. People assume I’m a cis woman when I’m agender/nonbinary. Purity culture, which has gone far beyond the church, teaches that I’m not supposed to really want sex- that would make me a “bad girl”, a “slut”. It also punishes me if I don’t want it.

There’s an idea of ownership over the feminine body in any conversation about sexual orientation and attraction. It is ever present, dictating who is and isn’t allowed to seek orgasm, who should have sex as a duty, who should give up her body to others rather than pursuing what pleasures her. On the other side of this is the idea that cis men and masculine persons can easily separate themselves from any emotions surrounding sex. That they can view the act objectively, serving a purpose for survival, the same way that eating a meal helps keep the body going. For him, the act of sex is presented as a need, a hunger that, if not satiated, he may starve. For her, eating this same meal is indulgent, decadent, gluttonous, a sin from which the body is forever tainted. And yet, she is still expected to serve herself up, ready to be swallowed whole.

Neither side is true. The masculine person may not want to partake, may not see it as a need for survival. The feminine body is not simply made to starve and consume; she may have a ravenous appetite for it, expectation be damned.

The long and short of this is if you can conceive of sex being separate from romantic attraction, as this neutral thing that can exist all by itself, it shouldn’t be unthinkable that some people must have conditions set to experience it at all - regardless of their gender or your expectations.

Not everyone experiences sexual attraction freely. Some never have sexual attraction. Some experience it rarely, without reason. Some experience it only under specific circumstances.

While it is impossible to separate asexuality fully from the expectations set by purity culture’s rampant sexism and misogyny, that doesn’t mean people who need to experience a particular bond to experience sexual attraction shouldn’t be believed.

Demisexuality isn’t “how all women are”; that’s heteronormative sexism. Demisexuality is something cis men and masculine persons can experience and it doesn’t make them lesser.

Demisexuality exists. Asexuality exists. Unpack your expectations around sexuality and gender. There are many experiences that don’t fit into our purity culture driven ideas around sexuality and gender. Don’t ignore the spectrum of asexuality just because it challenges you. Asexuality as a whole places the agency over sexuality back in our control, where it always should have been. That’s a good thing.

Happy ace week!

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[thewalrusespublicist]

What do you think about the Lindsay Ellis essay on Yoko?

Hi anon,

Ah, this is a toughie as Lindsay Ellis' video was actually the video that got me interested in the Beatles! So on that front .. I must have really enjoyed it at the time and I am grateful/embittered to it for leading me down this chaotic rabbit hole!

That being said, ughhh the video. On the one hand, to actually deal with the topic at hand she needed much longer than the run time of the video to actually get into it with enough detail, so it was always going to be simplistic. I did like some of her points about the other competing factors in the break-up and how Yoko really shouldn't be blamed for the overall break-up. I also liked her comparisons with Courtney Love and how women get blamed in these scenarios unjustly. However, my problem is she was presenting herself as an informed authority on the subject when to be honest, she doesen't actually show that great depth of knowledge. The not knowing about the nitty gritty about Northern Songs is one thing but clumping May Pang with those desperate for fame or clout ... I found either ignorant or disingenuous. That wasn't the first time I've noticed that with Lindsay's work. Not going to lie, I stopped watching her for ages after I watched a video where she was talking about British media and somehow managed to call John Hurt a low-rate tv actor and said that Blackadder was pro-the class system which I'm sorry, was ignorant to the point of stupidity. So yeah, I think Lindsay is great at conveying information but maybe also perhaps conveying incomplete information as if she was an expert in the subject.

This next bit might be a tiny tiny bit controversial but I don't really care. Knowing what I know now, I found the entire video to be partaking in an outdated and reductive type of feminism which doesn't actually allow women to have any flaws or be real people. Yoko was massively over-hated for all the wrong reasons, but it seems that in reaction some fans including Lindsay refuse to look at her with any critical view and dismiss any dissent as rooted in sexism. As a born and raised from the cradle feminist, I find this approach not only exhausting but sexist in and of itself as it strips women of agency and complexity. In the case of Yoko, the two extremes has meant that we've only recently been able to have honest conversation about her. No Yoko didn't break-up the Beatles, but she was a contributing factor and was a massive factor in why they didn't reunify in the 70s. Not because she sat on the bloody amp but because of nearly everything else she did. To say that she had no impact is terrible source-work and practice as it requires dismissing most of our sources from the period and from multiple primary perspectives in order to fulfil an ideological agenda. This in May's case is also silencing the voice of a female employee in a vulnerable position power-wise to sanitise her much wealthier boss' public image. I don't like that. I also want to make it clear that I don't think a lot of Yoko's actions were borne out of malicious intent but due to her extremely complicated personality and trauma, a personality that gets completely flattened if she's just a bit of cardboard jutting out in the corner. There are no winners if you refuse to engage with women as real people and through a modernised Madonna complex lens.

So ... a well-presented video with some great ideas but at the same time quite a basic overview that showed a lack of understanding of some key elements and a refusal to actually engage with the material to push a particular agenda.

[foundtherightwords]

As the Sun Will Rise - Chapter 1

Pairing: Grunauer (Overlord) x OFC, Beauty & the Beast retelling

Summary: After losing most of his unit in a disastrous D-Day mission, Derwin Grunauer returns to his hometown near Miami, body riddled with scars and heart heavy with guilt, only to find his neighbors shunning him due to his German name. He retreats into his family mansion and remains there, unwilling to rejoin the living, until the day Alba Reyes turns up at his door with a basket full of warm bread. As the daughter of a Cuban immigrant, Alba knows something of being an outsider, and when she offers to work for Derwin as his housekeeper, it is not only to pay off her father's debt to the Grunauers, but also because she feels some connection to the reclusive young man. When that connection develops into something more, they must overcome both the town's prejudice and their own doubts to find happiness.

A/N: My inspiration for this came from these lovely artworks that reimagine Beauty and the Beast in a 1950s setting. The idea of making the Beast a World War II veteran jumped out at me, and given that "Overlord" is a World War II movie, I immediately knew I'd write this for Grunauer. I based this on the original screenplay more than the movie itself (Grunauer's full name and the fact that he's from Miami are both in the script), since Grunauer actually survives in that. The title is, of course, a lyric from "Beauty and the Beast".

Warnings: period-typical attitudes (sexism, racism, prejudice), PTSD, some violence, non-explicit smut

Chapter warnings: period-typical sexism and prejudice

Chapter word count: 5.2k

Chapter 1

"I'm so glad the sugar ration is over, aren't you?" Mrs. McLeish said, peering at the rows and rows of cakes and pastries behind the glass.

"We all are, Mrs. McLeish," replied Alba, handing the gray-haired lady her purchase neatly wrapped in paper bags. "That'll be a dollar and sixty-three cents."

"Are you sure, dear?" Mrs. McLeish felt the bags, trying to remember what she'd bought.

"Of course. Ninety cents for half a dozen loaves of bread, fifty-two cents for ten ham croquetas, and twenty-one cents for three cheese pasteles," counted Alba. There had been no mistake—Alba knew this was only Mrs. McLeish's way to weasel some discount out of her.

Mrs. McLeish started counting out her money with excruciating slowness. "My Ted has been so looking forward to your bakes ever since he came back from the Pacific, you know."  

Alba smiled and reached into the display case again. "Well, here's a slice of tres leches cake, to thank Ted for his service. On the house," she quickly added. Mrs. McLeish's wrinkles immediately relaxed, just as Alba knew they would. Papi wouldn't like it, but they couldn't afford to alienate a customer now.

Mrs. McLeish was barely out of the door when the cheerful chime of the shop bell was drowned out by an obnoxious roar. Alba looked up to see a bright red Aston Martin screech to a halt across the street.

"¡Mierda!" she muttered under her breath. This bit of profanity earned her a stern look from the statue of La Cachita, the patroness of Cuba, on her altar set in a corner of the bakery. "Sorry," Alba mumbled to the statue. She tried to dip behind the counter, but it was too late. The driver, a tall, broad-shouldered man with raven hair slicked back, wearing a leather flight jacket that was too heavy for Miami in late June, was already striding toward the door. He pushed it open with unnecessary force, making the bell chime furiously in protest.

"Allie!" he declared, flashing a grin that showed his white teeth to perfection. "Just the girl I want to see."

Alba tried to pull her lips into the semblance of a smile and ended up with something more like a grimace instead. "Mr. Grant, good morning," she said. "What can I get you today?"

"Call me Gastin, dearest Allie," replied Grant, leaning against the counter. "How many times do I have to ask you again?"

"As many times as I've asked you to call me Alba, not Allie, Mr. Grant," Alba said smoothly. Grant's smile faltered, but only for a moment, before returning to full blast.

"But Allie sounds so much nicer! Allie Grant. Just rolls off the tongue, doesn't it?"

Ignoring his suggestive leer, Alba repeated, "What can I get you today? A pastelito, perhaps, or some croquetas?"

Grant shuddered. "God, no. Do you have any idea how fattening those can be, with all that cheese and butter and frying oil?"

It was on the tip of Alba's tongue to snap that he was in a shop that thrived on cheese and butter and frying oil, but she bit back the retort and simply said, a little impatiently now, "Then what do you want?"

"You know what I want, my dear Allie." Grant was now leaning so far over the counter that a bystander may think he was trying to reach into the till. "A date with you."

"I'm afraid I'm very busy at the moment," Alba said automatically.

Grant let out a derisive laugh. "Busy with what?" He gestured around the empty bakery. It was after eight; the first waves of customers had gone, which meant Grant had timed his visit to catch her specifically. He certainly hadn't driven all the way here from his swanky family mansion on Millionaire's Row for one of La Perla del Sur's pasteles.

Mierda.

"Come now, Allie," Grant continued, seizing her hand in a tight grip. "I don't understand why you keep working in this dump. When we're married, you'll have the biggest mansion on Miami Beach and never have to deal with all this misery..."

Alba's face tightened. For six months now, Grant had been hovering around the neighborhood and pestering her into going out with him, despite her making it clear that she had no time for him. She knew she was the minority in this. Most people would consider him a great catch. A war hero and the heir to a real estate empire, courting the daughter of a lowly baker, a Cuban immigrant at that? She should have been over the moon. It was true that she had been flattered by his attention at first. But she wasn't interested in finding a boyfriend, and she'd treated him the same way she did all customers, polite and friendly. Only when Grant started harping on about marriage, as if they were already engaged, that she firmly shut it down. Even then, he couldn't seem to take a hint, whether because he was too arrogant or too dim, Alba wasn't sure. So her politeness had turned into grudging tolerance and finally into barely concealed dislike. Still, he refused to leave her alone.

"Maybe I like the misery," she bit out.

Grant opened his mouth, but before he could come up with a response, an angry voice rose from the street. It was Mr. Olson, whose grocery store was across the street from the bakery, and whose front door was currently being blocked by Grant's monster of a vehicle.

"Who's the schmuck that parked his car in front of my store?" Mr. Olson shouted, waving his broom. "Move it before I smash your headlights in!"

Grant flung Alba's hand aside and ran out of the bakery without another word. Seizing the opportunity, Alba ducked through the swinging door that separated the front of the bakery from the sweltering back room, where two enormous ovens were constantly belching out steam and heat. She almost collided with her younger sister, Beatriz.

"Alba!" Beatriz exclaimed. "Where do you think you're going?"

"I need you to man the counter for me," Alba said.

"Why?"

"He's here."

"Who?"

"You know who. Señor Slick." Alba's lips curled in distaste.

"Really?" Beatriz craned her neck to look through the curtain. Alba glanced behind her. Grant was busy arguing with Mr. Olson, but she grabbed Beatriz's shoulders and positioned herself so Beatriz would hide her from view anyway.

Alba couldn't understand why Grant was so determined to woo her. She definitely wasn't as pretty as Beatriz, though they shared the same features and coloring. The same hazel eyes on Beatriz were bright and clear, while Alba's eyes couldn't seem to decide which color they wanted to be and ended up as a sort of muddy brownish green. The same dark curls on Beatriz were glossy and bouncing with her steps, while Alba's had a tendency to frizz maddeningly in the humid Florida air, so she mostly kept it under a headscarf. Beatriz's figure was all soft curves, while Alba's was straight and flat as a pond cypress.

And most of all, Beatriz, like other girls in their neighborhood, was always making sheep's eyes at Grant. He never paid attention to any of them though. Perhaps that was it. Perhaps he only set his sights on Alba because he liked a conquest.

But Alba had no time to dwell on all of that now. "Yes," she told Beatriz, "and you can ogle him to your heart's content if you man the counter for me."

Beatriz's face fell. "But Papi told me to make the delivery." She gestured to a basket, packed with loaves of bread in paper bags, a box of ham and cheese croquetas, and a box of pasteles filled with guava jam, still warm from the oven.

"Delivery? Where to?" La Perla del Sur Bakery did not do deliveries. Those who knew of their bread and pastries would line up outside its door before the opening time of six o'clock, come rain or shine. 

"The Grunauer place," said Beatriz.

Alba smacked her forehead. Of course. How could she forget?

The late Dr. Grunauer had been their landlord. When they first arrived in Miami from Cuba thirteen years ago, Alba's parents, Mauricio and Ana, had found a nearly dead town, brought to its knees by two great hurricanes and the Great Depression. They had rebuilt their lives alongside the city. They had found this place for cheap, and Dr. Grunauer, a professor at the university, had only been too glad to let them have it after the crash of the land boom. Mauricio had traded his suit and tie for an apron and worked tirelessly next to his wife to open this bakery. But it was difficult to curb the ambition of a high-ranking government official, even if the coup d'état of 1933 had stripped him of his power. Mauricio had borrowed from Dr. Grunauer to buy a vacant beachfront store, hoping to open another La Perla, to be run by Alba's older brother, Rafael. Then came the war, and Rafael joined the Air Force and never came back from the Pacific, and Ana soon followed him, so that was the end of that. The beachfront property was left to languish through the war, and in the end, Mauricio had to cut his loss and sell it for cheap.

Dr. Grunauer, too, had passed away a year before the end of the war. Mauricio was not one to ever forget a debt, and although Dr. Grunauer's only son, who had come home last year, never mentioned it, Mauricio had been sending him bread and pastries and even fresh fruits sometimes, hoping that he would not call in the debt any time soon.

Now Alba snatched the basket out of Beatriz's hand. "I'll go," she said. "You man the counter."

"But—but—" Beatriz glanced at the back, where Mauricio and the assistant baker, young Frank, were busy loading trays of shaped dough into the ovens. Alba knew Papi didn't like Beatriz to be at the front alone, despite the fact that she always drew a crowd, mostly of young men—or perhaps precisely because of that.

"Bea's too busy flirting," he'd once said to Alba. "She'll mistake flan for croquetas and sell her own shoes as pastelitos next. I need you there, to keep an eye on the till and tell me when we're running low on things." And so Alba had no choice but to grin and bear it, though she didn't have Beatriz's natural charm and ease with the customers, and a day working at the till always left her with crescents of sweat under her arms, sore cheeks from having to stretch them into unnatural smiles for so long, and a raging headache.

"The breakfast rush's over, you'll be fine," Alba assured her sister. "I'll be back before lunch." She rushed out the side door before Beatriz could raise further protest and draw Papi's attention.

"Be careful," Beatriz called after her. Alba wondered if the warning was meant to be about Grant or the Grunauer place.

As she wheeled her bicycle out the back gate and down the lane, Alba saw her best friend, Claudia Barron, watering her garden, the hose curving over her pregnant belly. Claudia had spent her whole life in their neighborhood of Cypress Grove. She'd grown up down the street, dated a literal boy next door, Marty, and after Marty came back from the war, they had gotten married and moved into a house on the same street. Sometimes Alba thought she would go crazy if she were Claudia, never going further than a few miles from where she grew up. Other times, she envied Claudia her straightforward life.

"How's Marty Junior?" Alba nodded at Claudia's belly.

"Kicking up a storm last night. It's this heat, I don't think he likes it." Claudia raised a quizzical eyebrow at the bread basket. "Where are you going with those?"

"Delivery to the Grunauer place."

"Some sweetener for Gruesome Grunauer, eh?"

"Don't call him that," Alba said, rolling her eyes.

"It fits him, though. Like father, like son. He's been back for what, a year? Yet nobody's seen him. He's locked himself away in that mansion with all those snakes and gators." Claudia shuddered. "I wonder at your dad, letting you go there alone. Why can't he or Frank go?"

"They're busy," Alba said shortly. "I have to go now."

Without waiting for Claudia's goodbye, she got on her bike and rode away. Claudia was a good friend, but she could be an awful gossip sometimes. "Gruesome Grunauer", indeed! Yes, it was true that Dr. Grunauer had always been rather strange. With his balding head, owlish eyes, and quiet, mumbling voice, he reminded Alba of a mad scientist, like Victor Frankenstein or Dr. Jekyll, and she, like the rest of the neighborhood kids, had been slightly afraid of him. The nickname had started when they found out he raised snakes and other reptiles on his land, and it stuck. There was a rumor that he even kept an alligator. Every Halloween, the kids always dared each other to go to the Grunauer place to get a glimpse of this alligator.

And then there was Mrs. Grunauer too. Apparently she had been bedridden, and nobody had ever seen her. When she passed away, shortly after Alba's family moved to Cypress Grove, people had whispered that Dr. Grunauer had poisoned his wife.

During the war, those childish rumors had persisted and taken on a more malicious tinge. The war hadn't been easy for Dr. Grunauer with his German name and German accent, and some people had even turned against the Reyes for their association with him. And now, with the old man dead and his son back at the mansion, more rumors had surfaced. They said young Grunauer had been badly injured in the war, and those injuries had left him disfigured. It didn't help that he never set foot outside of his home.

Alba never subscribed to the local rumor mill, but she couldn't help feeling a slight sense of trepidation as she rode her bike down the back lane that followed along the Tamiami Trail. Alba preferred this shortcut, which ran right through the cypress swamp west of the city. She had always loved the swamp, loved seeing the bald cypresses rising from it like majestic giants, their trunks dripping with ferns and orchids, loved watching the herons and egrets that waded amongst their roots, loved the thrill of sighting an alligator floating lazily over the dark water. Even with the occasional blare of a truck horn from the interstate in the distance, it still provided a quiet spot in the busy city.

This morning, though, Alba paid no attention to the beauty of nature. Leaning on the pedals, she only hoped that she'd made enough of a head start that Grant wouldn't be able to follow her in his car. She wondered how the Grunauer place had changed. She knew where it was, of course, though she'd been too much of a wimp to come right up to its gate. In her childhood memory, it was the grandest house she'd ever seen, as grand as the Palacio del Valle in her hometown of Cienfuegos back in Cuba. She also wondered what young Mr. Grunauer would be like. Though they were roughly the same age, young Grunauer had never been a part of the Cypress Grove gang—he had been sent to a boarding school in Jacksonville even before Alba arrived, and none of the kids in the neighborhood knew him.

Soon, the lane branched off into two even smaller trails, little more than footpaths lined by willow and cocoplum bushes. Rolling her bike down the right trail, Alba finally came to a clearing. The willows and cocoplums gave way to magnificent oaks covered in Spanish moss that stood on either side of the path like sentinels, guarding the mansion of her memories. It stood back from the path, a little aloof, a little wary, a queen surveying her empire, its white walls shining like a mirage against the dark canopies of the trees surrounding it. A porch held up by tall columns ran around the house, shielding it from the sun and prying eyes. A beautiful frangipani stood in the back, its branches, dotted with star-like blooms, reaching toward the house as if in adoration. If those oaks were the sentinels, then the frangipani was an attendant bowing down to the queen.

Alba shook her head. Such flights of fancy were usually Beatriz's purview; Alba herself was more likely to notice that the yard was overgrown, the porch needed sweeping, one of the window shutters was sagging, and the paint was chipping. A swing full of dead leaves creaked on rusty chains on the porch, adding to the overall abandoned air of the place. As she drew closer, she also saw a sign hanging crooked on one of the oaks, with "BEWARE OF DOG" scrawled across it. This mundane little detail dispelled any fanciful impression she had of the house, and instead of the palace of her childhood, now she only saw a sad, neglected place.

Alba looked around cautiously. There was no sign or sound of the dog she should beware of. Emboldened, she wheeled her bike past the rank of oaks and leaned it against the porch. The front door had no bell—Dr. Grunauer probably had gotten rid of it after the kids played too many games of ding dong ditch, and nobody came out here now—so she knocked instead.

No answer. She knocked again, louder, calling out, "Hello? Anybody home?" From somewhere deep inside the house, there was a bark. Although it was deep and rumbling, it wasn't the bark of a dog one should beware of. It was not ferocious or angry, only rather annoyed, like that of a dog that had been wakened up from a nap.

Alba reached for the door handle. It turned with some protest. She pushed the door open and stepped into a cool, dark front hall. Something crunched under her foot, and Alba looked down to find more dead leaves strewn across a hardwood floor that hadn't been swept in God knew how long. A door on her left was ajar, showing what looked like a living room overlooking the oak-lined drive. Next to this door was a staircase, its top disappearing into the dimness of the second floor. On the top of the stairs were some strange, pale shapes that looked like logs or a rolled-up carpet that somebody forgot to put away. Sunlight from the open door behind Alba couldn't penetrate the gloom, and thoughts of snakes and gators swirled around her head, making her hesitant to step beyond the little patch of light.

"Hello?" she called out again, her voice lost in the profound stillness of the house. "I'm from the bakery. Is there anybody here?"

There was that bark again, more excited than annoyed this time. In the hallway beyond the staircase, a huge shape emerged, silhouetted against the darkness. It was a dog, she could see that. The biggest dog she'd ever seen.

Alba stood rooted to the spot. She only had the presence of mind not to scream. Screaming would only agitate it further.  

The shape came into view. It was a great boarhound, so dark and glossy that it appeared little more than patches of shininess in the dark. It stalked toward her on paws as big as dinner plates, eyes glinting, nose sniffing, tail lifted in alert.

Then, slowly, that tail moved side to side.

Alba couldn't believe her eyes.

The huge dog was wagging his tail. He'd stopped by the bottom of the staircase, seemingly trying to make up his mind about her, but clearly he didn't see her as a threat.

"Here, boy," Alba said shakily, reaching out a hand.

The dog ran to her and almost bowled her over in his eagerness to sniff the bread basket she was carrying. She tried to lift the basket out of reach, but it was quite difficult—when stood on his hind legs, the dog could easily reach her shoulders. "Down, boy," she said. The dog sat and looked up expectantly at her with his liquid black eyes. Alba gave him her hand. He licked it. "Oh, you're just a big softy, aren't you?" she said, laughing in relief and kneeling to rub his ears.

"He's an idiot," said a voice above her.

Startled, Alba looked up. What she'd thought was a roll-up carpet turned out to be a leg encased in khaki pants, and the logs were the arms. A person was lying on the top of the staircase.

"Who are you?" he said. She couldn't see his face, but she could hear the scowl in his voice.

"Alba Reyes," she replied. "I'm from La Perla del Sur."

"La what?"

"The bakery. I'm Mauricio Reyes' daughter. We rent your store in Cypress Grove?"

There was a groan, and the shapes moved. The man was sitting up. The dog gave a little woof and bounded up the stairs to join him. Alba involuntarily craned her neck, trying to get a better look. His face was still half-hidden in the gloom, and in the light shining through the window at the landing, she could just make out a shock of sandy brown curls and a pair of dark, dark eyes. There was no sign of those disfiguring injuries that she could see.

As those eyes met hers, fragments of memories flitted through her mind—a pair of brown eyes, schoolyard noises, the sudden, bright pain of a split lip, and a voice, asking, Where did you learn to punch like that?

Before she could grasp it, the memory was gone, like the reflection on the surface of a pond being broken up by a pebble. The eyes on the top of the stairs were scowling at her again.

"Good morning," she said uncertainly.    

***

Derwin Grunauer was not having a good morning.

He'd woken at five, as usual. Even though he could now sleep in as late as he wanted, the habit developed after eight years of boarding school and three years in the army was hard to shake. He hadn't gotten up though. What would be the point? He had nowhere to be, nobody to see, nothing to do.

But Otto, who seemed to have a sixth sense of when his master was awake, had scratched at the door and whined, demanding to be let out, so Derwin had reluctantly gone downstairs, opened the door, and gave the dog his breakfast. For himself, he hadn't wanted any. His pantry had been empty since the day before, but he loathed picking up the phone to call the grocer. He knew he had to, eventually. Either that or starve to death, and Derwin didn't think he was brave enough or desperate enough for that. And so he'd made himself a cup of coffee with the dregs left in the pot and gone upstairs to mentally prepare himself, otherwise he would start panicking and stammering on the phone like an idiot.

Then his treacherous leg had tripped at the top of the stairs, making the cane fly out of his hand and sending him sprawling face-first across the steps. The fall hadn't hurt that bad—he'd been climbing as fast as his leg allowed, which was not very fast at all—but it had drained him of whatever energy he had, and left him angry and despondent. Angry at himself, at his throbbing leg, at the world in general. And despondent at life. He'd turned over and remained there, ignoring Otto's attempts to pull him to his feet. There was no point in getting up. There was no point to anything. He wished he could have stayed there until he melted in the heat and dissolved into the floor. Eventually, Otto had given up and returned to the kitchen to clean up the remnants of his breakfast.

He hadn't heard the knocks.

It was the smells that hit him first. The heavenly, warm, yeasty smell of freshly baked bread, the rich, savory smell of fried ham, and the buttery, sugary smell of pastries. His stomach growled.

Great. He was so hungry that he'd started hallucinating.

Then he heard the voice. Olfactory and audio hallucinations might be a bit much, so he cracked open an eye and looked for the source of the sound.

Somebody was standing in the front hall. No, not just somebody. A young woman. Wearing a sleeveless blouse and a sensible pair of slacks and sandals, with strands of her dark hair falling out of her headscarf. Sunlight was streaming in through the open door behind her, framing her like a halo as she looked up at him, her mouth falling open in surprise. She was too far away for him to make out the color of her eyes, but he could see that they were light and bright, fixed on him with none of the suspicion and hostility he was used to from other people, only curiosity.

Otto was licking her hand too. Traitor.

Still, Derwin refused to let himself be taken in. A lack of animosity didn't necessarily mean kindness. When he came home last year, after several months in St. Mary's Hospital in Portsmouth and a longer stint at the VA Hospital up in Bay Pines, where they'd tried and failed to get his leg back to working conditions, Derwin hadn't expected much. His father was gone, killed by the strain and loneliness of the war, and they had never been popular in town to begin with. He'd only hoped to settle down and have a quiet life. Yet somehow, what he found was even less than what he'd expected. People turned their backs on him in stores and restaurants, whispering to each other and pulling their children close wherever he went past, calling him Kraut and Jerry and worse. All because he had the misfortune of bearing a German name.

This young woman, whoever she was, probably hadn't heard much about him. The moment she did, she would turn and run, like all the others. And when she said she was renting the old store in Cypress Grove, it fell into place. She was his tenant. No wonder she was friendly. She couldn't afford not to.

"My father asked me to bring you some bread," she was saying.

Derwin's stomach growled again, so loudly that he was sure the young woman heard it from all the way at the bottom of the stairs. He grimaced, mortified.

The bakery... yes, he remembered now. In the past few months, he'd been finding bread and pastries outside his front door with a note saying "Compliments of La Perla del Sur Bakery". He'd been wary, but then he'd come across the name on his monthly bank statements and realized they were just trying to be nice to their landlord. The bread was good, and the pastries were phenomenal. Plus, it saved him from having to go to the store. They had tried knocking at first, and when he never answered them, they just left everything on the porch, like a silent offering to some faceless deity. Once, he hadn't found it until days afterward, when the bread had gone soggy in the humidity and the pastries stale. He'd eaten them anyway.

His love for pastries didn't stop him from feeling annoyed with this young woman for invading his space, however.

"Are you OK?" she asked after a while, when he didn't say anything or make any move. "Do you need help getting up?"

He grunted a refusal.

"Should I bring these into the kitchen for you?" she continued, lifting a wicker basket to show him. The mouthwatering smell intensified.

"No need," he mumbled. "Just set them down there."

"Where?" The woman looked around the front hall. There was no place to put anything, except for a side table piled high with mail that Derwin couldn't bring himself to open.

"Anywhere."

"Your dog may get into them."

"I don't care."

"I'm going to put them in the kitchen," she said in a voice that invited no further argument, and before he could stop her, she was walking briskly down the corridor. She tossed a piece of pastry to Otto, and he immediately followed her, tail wagging. Traitor.

Grumbling under his breath, Derwin pulled himself up by the banister and limped his way downstairs. If he didn't catch her in time, this woman may go through the entire house, and he couldn't have that.

He stumbled off the last step and almost ran straight into the woman, who was coming back from the kitchen.

"Sorry!" she exclaimed, catching his arms and helping him stand up straight.

Their eyes met, and Derwin found his breath caught in his throat for a moment. He'd been right—her eyes were light, bright green, gleaming like a forest pool in the shade, where the leafy canopy above is reflected in the quiet depth of the water.

Those eyes flicked briefly to the scar on his left cheek, before turning away, not out of disgust as Derwin had expected, but rather of embarrassment. She took a step back and let go of his arms.

"I've put the bread in your bread box," she said (I have a bread box? though Derwin). "I'm not sure when you want the pastries, so I've put them in your fridge. Heat them in the oven before you eat them, they'll taste better. The guava pastries will go great with some coffee."

That was probably the most anybody had ever said to him in over a year. Derwin stared at the young woman, not knowing what to say. She gave him a smile—quick and uncertain, but a smile nonetheless—and walked out with that same brisk, graceful stride, still followed by Otto, who was gazing at her adoringly.

"Otto, stay," Derwin said sternly when the dog looked like he wanted to follow the woman out the door. Otto reluctantly obeyed.

"Oh and, don't set the oven higher than two hundred degrees when you warm the pastries, or they'll get burned," the woman said over her shoulder, before closing the door behind her. A moment later, Derwin heard her bike rattling down the drive.

He glanced at Otto, who met his eyes with a wistful, reproachful look. "Don't look at me like that," Derwin said. "I didn't chase her off."

Leaving Otto in the front hall to whine and watch the figure on the bike disappear behind the oaks, Derwin limped into the kitchen to retrieve the pastries. She was right; they tasted much better warm, though he wouldn't offend them by pairing them with his dishwater coffee. Otto soon gave up his vigil and came into the kitchen as well, looking inconsolable. Derwin took pity on the dog and shared the ham croquettes with him.

"Just because she gave you pastries doesn't mean that she's your friend," he told the dog.

Otto always fell in love with anyone who showed him the smallest bit of attention. It was a terrible habit.

Chapter 2

So here's the Grunauer fic that I promised! It's my longest to date (82k, 20 chapters plus an epilogue), so I'm going to post it twice a week. If you want to be tagged when I update it, let me know, or you can just check back here every Tuesday and Saturday!

[thegodmother007]

My New Neighbor Chapter 11: Apologies

TRIGGER WARNING: This story will eventually contain violence, angst, threat of death, swearing, dark humor, adult themes like sex & drugs, racism, classism, sexism etc. Do not say you have not been warned

Chapter 11:

Slowly I came into consciousness after what felt like one of the deepest sleeps I have ever had, absent of any dreams or thoughts throughout the night. The first sensation to hit me as I regained my senses, was throbbing pain in my head. Keeping in tune with the beating of my heart, sharp pain wrapped itself around my head like a beanie. Next was intense thirst, it felt like my tongue was stuck to the roof of my mouth and I hadn’t seen a drop of water in years. Cracking my eyes open, I can feel they were crusted over, painfully plucking on my eyelashes as I regained my sight. Blurry at first, but slowly my hungover brain started piecing together the visual input I was receiving and I started connecting the dots. 

My hand timidly ran through hair, pulling the rogue strands stuck to my forehead with sweat, away from my face. I rub my eyes, noting that I must have been dead to the world, as once I have the opportunity to look around, I do not recognize where I am. I feel panic seeping into my blood as I look around, my headache reacting to the increased beating of my heart, fed by the fear of being in an unknown place. I see a dresser, enormous in its build, which had bottles of perfume, lotions, boxes of what I can assume is jewelry, & a few miscellaneous items like hair ties and clips. I see the curtains are drawn so I have no idea what time it is. A few pieces of decor are scattered on the wall; a mirror, paintings, a windchime or two & other trinkets. To my right, a bed in the corner of the room larger than an olympic sized pool, already made. A brown comforter with forest green and rust orange pillows, neatly arranged. At the end of the bed, a cream colored knitted blanket, seemingly strategically placed by the owner of the bed. Looking around, I had no idea who the owner of the bed even was. 

I think about last night, memories of being tossed into a pool of beer and being sucked on by a giantess, in between tequila shots, come flooding back. I feel a cold sweat break out, fearing I might be in Myra’s place. What was she going to do with me? She ‘claimed’ me as her ‘drinking buddy' during the party, could she have chosen to take me home as well? Was I now ‘hers’? My stomach dropped at the thought of being used by the giantess again. I look around within my immediate vicinity and see I am shirtless. I look beneath the blanket I am under & see I am only wearing my boxers. Closing the opening in my blanket, I look around to see my clothes are immediately next to my ‘bed.’ My bed seemed to be a folded comforter, or maybe even giant towel, further deepening my fear that Myra took me home with her. To my relief, a few cups of water have been placed next to my bed, the plastic cups look like the ones my friends & I brought for the party to have our drinks in. Without much hesitation, I down 3 cups of the water left for me, the cold liquid soothing my dry & irritated throat. Once I had my fill, my next task was to find my phone. I did not see it around me, so I stuck my hands in all my pants pockets, hoping to locate it. No such luck. My breathing became shallow as I realized that Myra may have taken my phone, intending to keep me here against my will. I thickly swallow and grab my pants, slowly standing on weak & wobbly knees to put them on. 

I stand on the uneven surface of my bed and look around to see where I can get out. My headache continues to pound,  reminding me of its presence behind my eyes, makes finding an escape that much harder. As I look around from a new angle, I see I am on the nightstand of a giant’s room. I walk to the edge, seeing a carpeted floor 30+ft below me. A fall from this height would undoubtedly kill me. That is, if being Myra’s property didn’t kill me first. I froze as I felt the familiar tremors of giant footsteps. Panic freezes my blood and I try to find a place I might be able to hide. Nothing is available, besides the bed I was once laying on. Without any other option, I slid myself back under the covers of my bed and hid there, like a child would hide from the ‘monster’ in their closet. Except, I was hiding from a real monster. I steadied my breathing and laid still as stone as I heard the creaking of the bedroom door slowly open. I dared not look up at Myra, keeping my head under the covers, remembering that the fear I had in my eyes last night just egged her on. I could hear her breathing over me as I balled myself up. 

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I woke up about 8:15am this morning, as seen on my phone screen that sat charging on the nightstand next to Cain. My first concern was to check on Cain, ensuring he had not vomited in his sleep & choked on it. Gently lifting the blanket, I saw he was still clean from last night’s bath. He was still out cold, however not moving, but breathing slowly. He needed to sleep this off, so I quietly creeped out of my bed, making it quickly to give Cain some time to sleep. I grab my phone and close the door behind me, leaving it open a crack in case he wakes up. Walking into my living room, I see the party ended up leaving my place a complete mess. Discarded lime carcasses, cups of stale drinks, salt sprinkled on my table, wrappers from food left scattered and plates with half eaten food on them; all left for me to clean up. With a groan, I grabbed a trash bag from underneath the kitchen sink & started discarding all the refuse in my apartment. 

The entire time, my mind wandered back to Cain & how upset & scared he was. My heart panged with guilt for not being there, for being foolish enough to think the Humans under my care would be safe around my brother’s friends. My hands got sticky as I cleaned up the empty soda cans and sweet wrappers. After about 20min of sorting through personal belongings & garbage, I was able to get everything thrown away. Before I start wiping & disinfecting everything, I check my phone’s notifications to see about 7 messages from various part go-ers, ranging from 9:21pm - 3:44am. Some read “Thanks for the party, sorry it got cut short.” “Heard what happened with Myra & your Human. Hope he’s okay” Others were not as kind “You touch Myra like that again bitch & I will beat ur ass i stg” “Idk why u brought humans to a party when they can’t hang Vi. Lame ass party...” 

I blocked the contacts who were being assholes & stuffed my phone back into my legging’s pockets, starting to clean up once again before Cain woke up. My mind raced at what he would have to say to me once he did wake up. My mind imagines the worst case scenario as I dread having to confront the Human I had hoped to befriend. I felt my hopes being dashed against the rocks, remembering how Myra treated him last night, my anger rising as I recall her arrogant attitude. 

Wiping the sweat from my brow, I see that my apartment is as good as new, smelling lemon fresh once again and not like weed & stale beer. I figured that I would check on Cain before starting on breakfast. If he was awake, I would see if he would let me make him something to eat, or if he wanted me to let him go home. Either way, I would not judge him or resent him for his choices. I crept down the hallway and slowly entered the door to see a lump on Cain’s makeshift bed, moving. Pulling my hair back, I slowly walk up to him and crouch down to be closer to him. “Cain?” I whispered as I gently peeled back the washcloth I had wrapped him in last night. To my utter surprise, I heard a scream emit from the ball of cloth I was slowly peeling away! The sudden yell shocked me so much, I fell onto my back with a loud thunk, finding that in the next moment I was laying on my carpeted bedroom floor, staring at the ceiling. My heartbeat was felt in my ears as I regained my composure. I pushed myself up by my elbows, looking up at the nightstand that stood taller than me in this moment as I recovered from the jump scare. I see Cain’s head pop up & look down on me, laying there with my face pale. “What the fuck, Cain?” I ask breathlessly. “Vi?” I hear him ask with relife in his tone and my face falls in annoyance as who the hell else would it be? 

I sit up, staying at my lower vantage point on the floor, as I look up at Cain “Yea, just me.” I confirm. But I wondered if I had startled him while waking up. “Did I scare you?” I asked genuinely and Cain’s face faltered. “I didn’t know it was you.” He admits, which confuses me. “Who else would it be?” I asked, wondering who in the world would have him scream like that. Cain clears his throat “I- I thought you were Myra. I thought she brought me home or something…” It clicked for me that Cain does not remember anything after Myra’s assault on him. I shook my head “No, you’re in my unit. I kicked Myra & all my brother’s friends out when I saw what they were doing..you know, to you...” I did not want to say it outloud, fearing that I would make Cain re-live it if I did. He nods “Yea, about that…thanks for being there by the way, Vi…” He says with venom in his words, but I deserved that. I hung my head down and nodded “I fucked up, I know I did.” I admit. I look up to Cain who has somehow pulled himself from his makeshift bed and is now standing at the edge of the nightstand without a sound, arms crossed and face red. “I called & texted for help over & over. Where the fuck were you?” He asked me. I felt shame cast its shadow over me. “I’m so sorry…I was outside smoking with a friend and we lost track of time. My phone didn’t have its ringer on and I didn’t see-” I was immediately cut off by Cain “So you left 3 Humans with a ton of drunk & high giants & you thought that was a good idea?” He asks and in hindsight, it wasn’t. 

I shook my head “I don’t know what I was thinking, I-” I got cut off by Cain “No, because you weren’t thinking, Vi! Why would you leave us with your prejudiced friends if you knew that’s how they saw Humans? As playthings?!”  I sat up straighter and my face hardened. “My brother decided to invite a ton of his prejudiced friends that I didn't know about. I never expected they would do that. I thought they’d behave, I didn’t think it would turn out this way.” Cain scoffed “That is an understatement. Do you know how scary that was Vi? To know my one lifeline at a party where I am surrounded by beings 100X my size, was nowhere to be found all night?” I could hear a shaking in his voice as it cracked on the last word. I sat up on my knees and shuffled over to Cain who sits on the edge of his ‘bed’. His head is now in his hands as he breathes deeply. “I thought I was going to die..” He admits and my heart shatters. I wanted to reach out and hug him, to apologize, to hold him in that moment, but I kept my distance. I am sure he didn’t want a Giant touching him right now. I hang my head and feel my chest tighten as I watch Cain reeling over the party “Cain, I am so genuinely sorry. I didn’t know that my brother was inviting those kinds of people. If I knew, I would never have left you alone with them.” Cain doesn’t respond, instead focusing on managing his emotions & breathing. 

As I sat there, waiting for Cain to say something, I remembered something in my pocket that I picked up while cleaning. “I have your phone. I found it on the coffee table..” Gently I place the tiny cell phone at his feet, which he grabs to inspect. He scrolls through a few things, probably checking notifications like I did earlier. I sit down on my bedroom floor and just watch him look at his phone as he scrolls, answering people. Eventually he pauses his scrolling. He watches something intensely & I can barely make out the sound coming from his phone as music and some screams. I didn’t ask him what it was, but periodically looked back over at him as he watched the video. Once finished, he looks at me, with raised eyebrows.  

“You choked Myra?” he asks with a serious look. My heart drops & my face falls as I recall last night’s events & how angry Myra made me with her flippant attitude over harassing Cain. I just stared at him blankly, not sure what to say. Without explanation, Cain flips his phone to face me, where I get as close as I feel I reasonably can, to see what was on the screen. I could make out a couple figures that looked like me & Myra arguing, shot from a POV of someone at the party. More specifically, a Human POV standing on my kitchen counter. The music was too loud to hear what we were saying, but a few moments in, I am on video grabbing her by the throat before my brother steps in, blocking & ruining the shot. When the video ends, everything falls silent between us. After a few beats, I nod “Um..yea..” I confess and wait for Cain’s response. He was quiet for a few moments, piecing together what happened. 

*************************************************************************************************************

It was weird seeing Vi worried, especially worried over me. I didn’t give an answer right away, but I could sense she was waiting with bated breath to see what I thought. But I didn’t know what I was thinking at this moment. Was it cathartic to see Myra being tossed around by a ragdoll like she did to us? Yea, a little bit. Was I also still royally pissed that Vi completely left us behind and at the mercy of strange & intoxicated giants? Absolutely. I just stared at Vi as she stared at me, letting the silence blanket us in awkwardness. Her eyes are sincere, almost saying aloud “I’m so sorry..” begging for my forgiveness. I sighed and realized that she was really sorry, but that didn’t immediately fix my anger towards her & the other giant party goers. A small whisper coming from the edge of the nightstand caught my attention though as Vi asked me “Can I make it up to you with some breakfast?” My interest was immediately caught as my hollow stomach begged me for something to eat. “It’s a start..” I say with a lighter tone, which seems to relieve Vi’s anxiety. I sat there, realizing how silly it was that I was unintentionally comforting a giant in this moment. 

Vi slowly stood to her full height once again, towering over me & reminding me just how unbalanced the power dynamic is with giants. Nothing in her gaze & how she looked at me changed though. Her face & eyes remained sincere & full of remorse. But something in my chest felt different. Slowly, I changed how I was feeling towards Vi. Any other giant hovering over me would have felt domineering and threatening, but not with Vi, not right now. Her desire for my forgiveness and approval really put her in a different light, a more equal light. I was not used to a giant valuing the thoughts and opinion of a Human, let alone myself. Shit, it was difficult to get other Humans to respect each other. And I never expected it coming from an 85ft woman. As I ponder this new feeling, her hand slides up towards me, offering it. My blood, once again, ran cold at the idea of crawling into a giant’s hand. In an attempt to avoid that option, I asked “I figured you could bring me breakfast?” and Vi got low to be level with me once again “You’re going to need to get off this nightstand eventually. Don’t worry, I will go slow. I cleaned you off & carried you in here last night with no problems, I will be super careful.” She promised, hoping I would trust- wait. “Wait, you what? Cleaned me off? Is that why I woke up in just my boxers?” I asked surprised, realizing I had been sitting here without a shirt on, the entire time. Quickly, I grabbed my shirt, which was a little damp and squeezed what water I could out of it, confirming to myself that Vi did in fact, take it upon herself to wash me & my shirt off. 

I watched Vi’s face grow red and she sputtered out a quick response to explain away, bathing me while unconscious “Well yea, you threw up on yourself & I didn’t want you sleeping in vomit, so I washed you off while you were blacked out.” I felt myself reeling at the image of Vi bathing my unconscious body without my knowledge. After a moment or two & some vivid imagining, I decided I didn’t mind it all that much, actually. In fact, I kinda wished I was conscious for that part, disappointed that I wasn’t. I stopped what redness threatened to cross my face as I looked back up at her. All I managed to say was “Thank you.” as I still debated getting into her waiting hand. Knowing I had no other real choice, I stood up and walked over to her where I stood next to one of the hands that bathed me & cared for me last night. My hand only covered the tip of her finger. I felt a slight twitch of her skin when it met my palm, undoubtedly she did not notice the twitch. I look at her hand, remembering how callous and dangerous the other giant’s hands were last night. I pull back a moment, looking up at Vi who's been watching me intently this entire time. “It’s okay. Take your time.” She assures me and I take a breath or two before re-trying. I thought of it like an amusement park ride & Vi was the operator. 

Slowly, I step into her hand, feeling the warmth on the bottom of my feet as her skin shifts beneath me. As I step, the skin feels warm and squishy. I use her thumb as a hand-rail and do my best to find my balance as I inch to the center of her palm. I can feel her pulse underneath me, as the weight of where I was rushed over me. I was sitting on a living platform, in the palm of someone’s hand. I looked at my own, imagining from Vi’s perspective what I must look like to her. The one word that comes to mind was “insignificant.” I put my hands down to hold myself level, realizing I’ve shot my own ego down and look up to Vi who gives me a smile. “You ready?” She asks me. I wouldn't have felt ready if Vi hadn't given me such a beautiful smile before asking me. I quietly request “Be gentle?” knowing that my hangover wouldn’t be able to take moving very fast right now. 

With all the care I can imagine Vi could take at her size, her hand slowly lifts me off the nightstand I was trapped on, and into the air, closer to her person. I couldn’t help but look over the edge a little bit, knowing that we are just going to get higher from here once she stands straight. I watched the floor push away from us as she stands, taking me with her all the way up. Once stationary, I look around from my new perspective and take in the view. From up here, everything looked almost to scale with me. I took this brief moment to imagine myself as a Giant and how normal Vi’s room looked from all the way up here. I imagined flopping down on the bed, or being tall enough to grab one of the perfume bottles from her dresser top. I imagine myself being eye-to-eye with Vi and being able to face her without the primal fear of Giants chipping away at my resolve. I turned to look up at Vi, who I see was watching me look around the room like it was the first time. I look away as I become embarrassed for being so interested in her room & my surroundings, it must have looked dumb to her to see the puny human in her hand was so easily entertained. “S-sorry..”

*************************************************************************************************************

I watched Cain tentatively walk into my hand, unsure at first, but pushing forward anyways. I admired his courage while holding my breath as he settled into the middle of my palm, afraid that any movement would spook him. Once he was still, he looked up at me to give me the ‘go ahead.’ This felt different, this felt much more..intimate to me than last night did. Last night, Cain was unconscious, unaware, & unmoving. He didn’t need to trust me last night, he didn’t even know where he was at the time. Now, he had to literally put his life into my hands, choosing to do so even after Myra & her friends were so cruel to him. I felt grateful that Cain was still willing to give me a chance, still interested in making our partnership in the apartment work. I bring him close to my chest, being careful not to bump him with my chest. The thought made a rosy red color creep along my face and I felt embarrassed for even thinking of that. Quickly I ignored the flashing images of Cain in his boxer shorts from last night, hair wet and face soft & peaceful…”STOP” I scream internally at myself. Looking down to see if Cain saw my embarrassment, I noticed that he was looking around my room like it was the most interesting thing to him, like he was studying it. I didn’t want to break his concentration on whatever it was he was doing, but it didn’t last long before he turned to me and acted like I had caught him doing something he wasn’t supposed to. “S-sorry..” He says quietly, but just loud enough that I can hear him. “It’s weird being so high up, it feels like I am a Giant just standing in your room, everything looks so normal up here…” He explained and I smiled, “Maybe I should get on the floor one of these days to get an idea of what you see?” Cain didn’t seem opposed to his suggestion and nodded “Wouldn’t hurt.” he says as I turn to leave my room. 

I walk out into the hallway & to my kitchen, holding Cain steadily. “Are you a fan of pancakes?” I asked him before setting him down on the countertop. “Absolutely! You do have syrup though, right?” He asks with a tone that tells me we are going to be okay. 

AUTHOR’S NOTE: I am so sorry for taking so long to post. Life has been busy & my family, health & job have to come first. I was also doing quite a bit of traveling lately so I wasn’t able to devote the time to writing. As much as I would love to say that I will start posting regularly, I know I cannot commit to that right now. I will always do my best to post semi-regularly, but I appreciate any & all support this community gives me! Thank you for reading.

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[dailyanarchistposts]

Author: Anarchist Communist Group Topics: health care, NHS, United Kingdom

Save our NHS?

Healthcare in the UK is by no means “socialised”, as critics in the US claim. Though healthcare in the UK is undoubtedly better than healthcare in the US – just as other countries have better healthcare than the UK – it is still subject to the pressures and dynamics of capitalism, existing as it does in a capitalist society. It has also been increasingly marketised over recent decades, with attacks on both social provision and NHS workers coming under the cover of “privatisation” – the introduction of payment by results has introduced a market in health services, many non-frontline services have been privatised or contracted to companies like DHL, the introduction of wholly privately owned and operated “NHS treatment centres”, the rollout of Private Finance Initiatives etc all represent part of the same project of “rationalising” social provisions to the benefit of the overall capitalist system. Even the NHS in its classic form, as the centrepiece of the post-war welfare state, came as part of the attempt to stave off prewar-style class conflict and integrate the working class more closely into the state following the end of the war, and to provide a healthy working class that could fight and die for the bosses in their wars (our masters struggled to find enough fit cannon fodder for their First World War) and healthy enough to slave for their profits in paid jobs, and in unpaid childcare and housework, as well as from the needs for capitalism to stabilise itself after the turbulence of the 1920s, in a change of tactic well-known as the post-war settlement.

We need to defend health services, but critically. The NHS was never ‘ours’ and it is far from perfect.

Since the inception of the NHS, consultants were allowed to use NHS time and resources for their private gain, freeloading that the Daily Mail and their mates are happy to ignore. The Health Service treats our illnesses as individual cases, but most of our illness is due to economic and social conditions that we face collectively: unhealthy and dangerous workplaces, overlong hours and night time working, pollution from factories and cars, poor food, unhealthy housing, lack of trees and greenspaces, all exacerbated by racism and sexism for large sectors of the population. In the 1960s and 1970s women highlighted how unequally they were treated, particularly around childbirth. They won some improvements through struggle, but we are still miles from a genuine community health service.

We know that the current Tory government is making massive cuts to health services with closures of hospitals, casualty departments, rationing of services by age, cuts to services for the elderly and people with disabilities, near frozen wages of overworked staff etc. The whole idea of running healthcare as a business is contradictory (treatment based on ability to pay rather than need), and only benefits the well-off who can always pay for treatment, and the drug companies and other corporate vultures who are taking over more and more of the health service. The whole idea of ‘choice’ in this context is similarly a nonsense. We don’t want to choose which doctors or hospital service to use (the one round the corner / or the one 20 miles away?), we need local services, all of which are accessible and good.

Who Is To Blame?

What is causing the ongoing and deepening crisis in the NHS (and) the ‘lack of money’? Is it –

All those old people selfishly ‘bed blocking’ hospital beds rather than going home unwell and dying quickly so that they are no longer ‘a burden’.

The obese smokers and drinkers: no not the rich ones, and as always, blame the consumer, not the producer (the alcohol and tobacco industries have no responsibilities).

Migrant workers and ‘health tourists’ (the first pay taxes too, and the second cost less than the NHS pencil budget, and no, ignore the rich ones)

The rising cost of the NHS – due to an ageing population (as above), all those poor people who are overweight and smoke and drink too much etc.

NONE OF THE ABOVE!

Back in 2005 the now Health Secretary, Jeremy Hunt, co-wrote a pamphlet calling for the replacement of the NHS with a market insurance system, with the heavy involvement of private enterprise. A fox in charge of the hen coop! The policies pursued are obviously part of a death by a thousand cuts /privatisation by stealth strategy. The idea that the slow death of the NHS is just down to the Tories is delusional however. The PFI (Private Finance Initiative) was a Conservative idea they left on the shelf, with little of it being implemented. It was Labour’s Tony Blair and Gordon Brown who activated it when in government: schools and hospitals were built with finance from the private sector (banks etc) who then leased them to back to the government, who paid for them over the long term on a mortgage basis at a much higher cost (40% more). Old hospitals were closed, so overall there were fewer beds. Labour also introduced ‘the market’ into the health service, the equivalent of putting leeches into a blood bank, and introduced Foundation Trusts. These Labour policies left the NHS with debts of £81.6 billion, and they together with massive ongoing cuts are the cause of the crisis.

What Do We Want, And How Do We Get There?

We need to stop hospitals, casualty departments etc being closed, attacks on GPs, staff cuts, freezing of the wages of health service staff (which are cuts as rents, food etc go up). We need to stop the increasing marketisation of the NHS. We need to stop the NHS being run as a business concern, with vastly overpaid administrators at the top, with at least 800 of these on six figure salaries. We need to end the rigid hierarchies in hospitals, where decisions cannot be questioned, as witness the recent revelations about Gosport War Memorial Hospital where over 450 patients died after being prescribed dangerous painkillers and with according to a recent report “patients and relatives powerless in their relationship with professional staff”. We need to end the grip of drug companies on the NHS. In 2016 alone, the NHS payed these companies £1 billion for drugs for arthritis, cancer, MS, etc. The research for these drugs was funded by public money. “Big pharmaceutical companies are ripping us off by taking over drugs developed primarily with public money and selling the drugs back to the NHS at extortionate prices”. Heidi Chow, Global Justice Now.

How we do this is crucial however. If we use the same old tired methods of petitions, relying on union bureaucrats, trusting in political parties (whoever they are) not only will we probably lose, but we will remain powerless, divided, and with an illness service that doesn’t meet our needs or tackle the causes of our ill health. We need methods and organisation that empower us: to organise ourselves, control our own struggles, without leaders, and to use direct action methods: occupations, work-ins, strikes, work to rule etc. We need to break down the barriers between staff and patients, carers and service-users, workers and unemployed to link our struggles.

What do we want? – A free health service controlled and run by the staff and users. An emphasis on empowering people through helping them to educating themselves in groups about their bodies and health (e.g. books and pamphlets such as ‘Our Bodies Ourselves’ and the collective work in the last wave of feminism). Communities working together to tackle the causes of ill health: dangerous and unhealthy workplaces, an unhealthy, car-based transport system, poor food, widespread pollution, lack of green spaces for relaxation, and exercise etc. Move away from processed and unhealthy food, and from the current over-reliance on drugs. Again, self-organisation and direct action are key. But surely this is pie-in-the-sky? No, we are drawing on what people have done, and are doing, both here and abroad. In Greece, massive health cuts have resulted in health workers running hospitals and clinics etc for free, with the support of their local communities.

London Anarchist Communist Group londonacg@gmail.com

[sokkastyles]

What bothers me in particular after seeing the millionth post saying something to the tune of, "yes, Ursa was abused, but that doesn't excuse her mistreatment of Azula," when the supposed "mistreatment" doesn't actually occur in the show - the post I saw said that the show itself was "biased" - what bothers me in particular is not only the victim blaming of Ursa, but also the insistence that our focus should actually be on abuse that happened offscreen. When you are saying that the show itself is biased, then you're saying that you're willing to discard actual evidence of abuse in favor of another narrative that can be invented out of thin air. Because Azula is not, in fact, a real person. What is presented on the show is Azula as she is. There can be no "biased" portrayal because Azula is a product of fiction and does and thinks and feels only what she is written to do and think and feel, for the purpose of fulfilling a particular narrative function. Ditto for Ursa and Zuko and Iroh. So when you say you don't believe the text as it is presented, and you'd rather come up with another narrative, what you are saying is your first instinct, when presented with an abuse narrative, is to not believe it. That you'd rather believe that Azula's abusive behavior is the fault of other people, many of whom were either her victims or the victims of her abuser, because of her age or gender or whatever.

Azula is an abuse victim who became an abuser and instead of accepting that, y'all want to create excuses for her and blame other victims instead.

We're talking about fiction, but if the only abuse narrative you can accept is the one that only exists in your head, if the abuse survivor for whom you have the most sympathy is one whose narrative you can change to suit your ideas of what abuse looks like, what does that say about your ability to empathize with real people? People whose narratives you can't reimagine into comfortable headcanons because you think the narrative is biased.

That's what bothers me whenever I see people praising Ursa for being "a flawed character." Ursa is, in fact, barely a character at all and mostly defined by being a mother, but there's enough room in the narrative for people to imagine their own headcanons and so what the fandom comes up with is "she must have been a bad mother because her daughter is a bad person." Even though we KNOW why Azula became the way she is. Even though Azula (and Ozai, who Azula imitates) is directly juxtaposed with the goodness her mother represents in the narrative.

It's just so tiringly misogynistic. Like, the fact that Ursa mostly exists to be fridged is itself a product of sexism. Sometimes you need to ask yourself "is this a wonderful, detailed portrayal of a flawed female character, or am I just being a misogynist?"

Another good thing to ask yourself is "am I really listening to abuse narratives, or am I just changing them in my head to fit what I think they should be to make them more palatable to consume?" (i.e. the "but Azula is 14!!!" crowd. Particularly when y'all say Zuko can't be abused by his younger sister.)

Being a survivor of abuse doesn't excuse abusing others, but the character who exemplifies that message is Azula, not Ursa. Ursa's role in that narrative is to be juxtaposed against Azula, to represent that this is a truth Azula knows deep down but won't accept. To argue that Ursa mistreated Azula or is the reason why Azula is the way she is is to miss that point completely.

[artbyblastweave]

As a big superhero guy, I have a question: Why do you think it's so common to show Reed Richards, Tony Stark, Hank Pym, Hank McCoy (ESPESCIALLY those last two) as, at best, morally ambiguous and at worst, downright awful in modern portrayals? Is it standard American anti-intellectualism, tied into our growing distrust of science and technology, or is it just that they seem kinda bland?

I don't think it's anti-intellectualism per se. For three of the four I think it's just a consequence of contemporary writers being Allowed To Notice And Unpack Things.

For Reed Richards, it's the result of fans and writers applying a level of scrutiny to early plots and character beats that weren't intended to stand up to any real level of scrutiny. He's a guy who got all his best friends horribly mutated by taking them up in an untested spacecraft. He's a guy who brainwashed a bunch of captured skrulls into thinking they were cows. He's a guy who keeps whipping up extremely specific technological solutions to the problem at hand, which never seem to trickle down to the consumer market- hence the "Reed Richards is Useless" trope. And he's gotta dodge and weave around patriarchal accusations vis a vis a lot of the casual sexism of early FF, where Sue had limited combat utility and was often in the mix as the Damsel-in-distress classic. And obviously excising the unconsidered sexism from the dynamic is the right way to go, but treating that early recklessness/ruthlessness/callousness seriously, as an actual personality flaw that he has, and has to work around, is significantly more interesting than just rewriting the character to not behave like that.

For Iron Man it's the result of people starting to take more seriously the moral implications of the fact that he's an arms dealer and a billionaire. (Apocryphally, Stan Lee did this to see if he could create a character who would be popular with his left-leaning audience despite being everything they hate ideologically, but I take this with a grain of salt.) Another element, I think, is that in preparation for the release of Iron Man, Marvel made him a headliner in Civil War in 2007; the nature of Civil War lent itself to him doing a lot of authoritarian bullshit, and said bullshit sort of set the bar for his capacity for extreme behavior when pressed. Put Iron Man in any situation, try to determine the extent he'll go to in order to resolve it, and you have to take into account that time he was sticking his colleagues in virtual-reality prisons on behalf of the government. A demonstrated willingness to do atrocities for what you think of as the greater good does add some flavor and tension, I have to give them that!

For Hank Pym, it's totally down to the midlife crisis arc from 1981, where he rebranded as Yellowjacket, got drummed out of the Avengers for using excessive force, and battered his wife Janet when she tried to. You know. Talk him out of building a robot to perform a false flag attack against the rest of the team to get back in their good graces. The whole arc was supposed to be a very deliberate tragedy about his mental breakdown but it kind of poisoned the well on the character and became the thing future writers endlessly relitigate, either doubling down on it (The Ultimates, Marvel Zombies) or trying to repudiate it (Mighty Avengers, Avengers Academy.) Even before that, though, he had a pointed loose-cannon mad scientist situation going on even in comparison to the others on this list- his debut was a Twighlight zone-style horror story where he nearly gets himself killed testing the shrinking formula, and he also created Ultron and nearly got everyone killed that way!

I have no idea what's going on with Hank McCoy. I don't think I want to know what's going on with Hank McCoy. Every time I turn my ear in the direction of that corner of the fandom these days, all I hear is screaming. Are you guys alright

[gendercriticalthinking]

A Thought

If homophobia was eradicated, same-sex-attracted people would have happier, healthier, overall better lives. Any distress gay and bi people experience regarding their sexuality is only because they are targets of prejudice regarding it. Homosexuality is not innately hateful or harmful.

But even if transphobia was eradicated, trans-identified people would still experience distress. To identify as trans or non-binary inherently requires one to hate your body and, by extension, yourself. Trans identity hinges on self-hatred as well as (mental and/or physical) self-harm.

A Thought: Part 2

If sexism was eradicated, this would also benefit same-sex-attracted people as much of homophobia and heteronormativity, concepts that harm gay and bi people, are both based in misogynistic ideas.

But if sexism was eradicated, this would hinder trans-identified people. Our misogynistic concept of gender (or "gender stereotypes" if you prefer) is, """at best,""" a useful tool for trans-identified people to communicate their gender identity to others, or, at worst, a motivator and encourager for people to identify as trans. Either way sexism ends up being reinforced by trans identity because gender itself, a concept that harms women and girls, is based in misogynistic ideas.

[alpaca-clouds]

You cannot "kill" religion

I want to talk about one thing, that often gets lost.

A while ago I spoke about how even in a Solarpunk world, there would be religious diversity. Which is something I stand by and at least here there was not much in terms of arguments about it. Though I had a lot of arguments about it in other forums. Because... Well, religion is a sore topic for a lot of people. Which I understand. Of course I do. I was abused in the name of religion for most of my childhood and youth. So I get it. I had that time myself. The edgy atheist phase in my 20s, where I would get super angry about anything religious.

But by now I have calmed down a lot about it. I can see that religion is not inherently evil, even though it has been used to justify a lot of evil. And yes, that is true for most of the world religions at least.

It was that, that kept me on the anti-religion train for so long, really. Because being LGBTQ* I obviously am so easily the victim of all the evil justified by religion. But at some point I realized, that literally any frame of mind can be used for evil. Science has been used for lots of evil. And with that I do not just mean that science found ways to do evil, but that it has been used to justify evil. Science has been used to justify racism, sexism and eugenics.

Because the truth is, that humans who want to do evil will just find a tool to justify it.

No, but the thing I want to talk about here is this idea that if people were just all efficiently scientifically literate religion would just die out. Or, alternatively, the idea that we could just forbid religion in any way or form and it would be gone.

When it comes to the first thing, I would say: That is in fact an unscientific claim. To the second I would say: History wants to differ.

Let me make one thing clear: Our human brains are kinda just wired for religion. Our brains have just a couple of traits, that makes it likely for us to become religious or at least supersticious in one way or another.

Like the fact, that we are super wired for seeing someone else's intent. Because we are this super social animal species. But we got so good with this, that our brains kinda just see intent in anything. Like, we will look at those wire connected headphones knotted up and think: "Why are you doing this again?!" While of course the headphones are not intent on this. Because they are just things.

As such we have just a tendency to see a spirit or character in every object. Which is how spiritual believes arrive. Giving each tree, stone and animal some sort of spirit.

It is just what our brains do.

The other thing our brains are kinda hardwired for is pattern recognition. Which leads us to see patterns even if there are none. You hunted a deer and just after that it rained? Twice? Trice even? Oh boy, there is a pattern here. The gods give you rain for sacrificing that deer boy.

Just as we are hardwired to kinda associate "vibes" with objects or places based on what might have happened there. There is absolutely no reason to not live in a place where a murder had happened. But even some of the people who think themselves as super rational will just not... want that.

And we see this going on. While scientists are less likely to be religious than the general populus, there is still a plenthora of religious scientists. Who are not worse scientists because of it. Because here is the other thing: Religion give us something to hold onto.

To believe in a higher power who has a plan for you is soothing to many. Just as it is soothing to believe that dead souls move onto something after death. Both because it helps us deal with the idea of dying one day, but also when it comes to dealing with the death of loved ones.

And that is... okay. Really. In by itself it is okay.

And then there is the history of course. See, I decided to put a Torii up there, because oh boy, the Buddhist folks trying to get the religion to spread in Japan tried a lot to suppress the indigenous believes, that later turned into Shinto. And... Well, they did not manage, did they?

But the same can be said for so many other religions. Be it how the Christians stayed around through Roman persecution. Or how there are still Jewish people, even though they have been persecuted for literal millennia.

Even some of those religions we consider extinct are not really. They have just changed and merged into other religions, that have come along.

I mean, just as the Romans tried to get those Christians to stop being Christians, the Christians in turn tried to extinguish so, so, sooooooo many other religions. But it turns out that a lot of them are still around. At times somehow merged into Christianity. But... They are still there.

And really... I do think hating on religion as a general concept is just a wasted emotional effort. You do not need to believe all of those religious things. But... You will not forbid it. So the constructive thing would be to try and find a way to shift religion in a way, that people who believe it are less likely to fall for people preaching hate. To teach people to be able to read those scriptures in context and be critical of those using it to inspire hate.

[synthient]

Doctor Who: Matrix Pastiches Reviewed

Because it turns out DW has a lot of them! The three categories I'm considering will be: 1) Visual engagement with The Matrix, 2) Thematic engagement with The Matrix, and 3) Quality of the overall episode vs quality of its Matrix pastiche

Contestant #1: The Long Game/Bad Wolf

(I'll be bundling our two Station Five episodes together, even if they aren't technically arranged as a "two-parter")

Visual engagement with The Matrix

Right off the bat, we get probably the best-looking Matrix imagery that was possible on a BBC budget circa 2005. A lot of other media going for a "Matrix aesthetic" stops at either the cyberspace visual language, bullet time, or the costuming, so I think it's actually pretty fun and novel that the Station 5 eps go for the pod people instead. Through the labor-zombies (still puppeteered by their jacks in death), and the Controller (conscious, aware, had a brief normal childhood before being sold into instrumentality), we push the horror in some fun new directions.

Thematic engagement with The Matrix

Does manage to at least gesture toward labor exploitation and state propaganda. Draws a nice if underbaked connection between news media fearmongering and anti-migrant policies. Gets a little incoherent and borderline reactionary with its conspiratorial angle (not that that's completely absent from the matrix proper). Featuring a "philosophical debate" that dips a bit more into parody. And we do manage to presage Resurrections via Don't Be A Tech Guy Who Sucks.

Quality of the overall episode vs quality of its Matrix pastiche

The Station Five eps are both a little mid, to me. Adam just isn't compelling, even in a love-to-hate way. Weirdly victim-blaming and misanthropic about the game show contestants. Each episode's parodying of the BBC is a bit too buffoonish to work, and leans a bit too hard on The Alien Behind The Curtain to have any teeth in regards to the real BBC. But I do kind of love Scary Capitalist Snow Hell feat. Simon Pegg. And the Matrix bits, imo, are some of the most charming moments. Decent episode, good Matrix pastiche.

Contestant #2: New Earth

Visual engagement with The Matrix

We get some very direct riffs on both the shot where Neo absorbs the full horror of how many pods there are, and the There Is No Spoon elevator cable sequence. It Green.

Thematic engagement with The Matrix

"Something something Catholicism" is, in fact, a core theme of The Matrix, and I'd say catgirl nuns are solidly in the spirit. "Don't be an evil vapid bimbo who surgically alters her body"? Well, no. (Granted, the most charitable read is that the ep is basically ambivalent on bodymodding - Cassandra's deal is gross, "evolution" and "mutation" are good, and turning yourself into a cat woman is neutral as long as you don't give people every disease in the world). "Don't give people every disease in the world"? Well, sure man, I guess.

We get some nods toward not buying into "human purity" (coded as class purity, and maybe vaguely racial?), and some lines about "we're part of the machine, so we know how to destroy the machine" that make sense as part of the Matrix pastiche and make much less sense in the context of the actual episode. Meanwhile, the NYPD are the heroes of the hour, here to bust all the bad guys and shepherd our shellshocked pod escapees off to some brighter future that we don't have to think too hard about the logistics of.

Quality of the overall episode vs quality of its Matrix pastiche

Gotta be honest: I did not enjoy New Earth very much. It has some fun ideas, and we get pretty visceral with the pod-based body horror again. But the sexism of how it handles Cassandra and Rose just makes the whole thing sort of unpleasant. And this also may have been one of the episodes he was looking back on re: "we didn't have 14 regenerate in 13's clothes because I didn't want it to look like we were making fun of gender nonconformity."

The Matrix pastiche itself is, like, fine? Just kind of shallow and mostly confined to iconography (while the themes of the rest of the episode sometimes tip into anti-thesis). Bad episode, decent Matrix pastiche.

Contestant #3: The End of Time

Visual engagement with The Matrix

If you're asking "wait, End of Time is a Matrix pastiche? In what way?" - it's because the whole Master storyline is riffing on the Reloaded/Revolutions version of Smith. Accordingly, the extended visual gag of the Master turning everyone in the world into himself is straight from the Smith playbook. And the effect looks bad, as a subtle homage to the fact The Matrix's agent possession effect also looks bad.

Thematic engagement with The Matrix

As a Matrix scholar with a Smith concentration: End of Time really, really gets Smith. It gets that he's an evil gay guy trying to excel to the extreme at his fascist upbringing, even though the authority figures he wants to impress will always see him as fundamentally "diseased." It gets the mommy and/or daddy issues that drive him. It gets that he's the shadow self. It gets that he's a Looney Tunes character. It gets that his public breakdown is as much self-harm as other-people-harm, and emphasizes that via the Doctor as concerned friend. They even put that guy on a dog leash (sexual style).

The "Master race" joke is kind of tasteless, but does get at something essential about Smith's machine-supremacy-as-cope and repulsion/fascination with Morpheus (and it's not like mixed-bag racial politics aren't a Matrix quality). "Is the Master in drag making fun of gender nonconformity?" well kind of, but it also slays

Quality of the overall episode vs quality of its Matrix pastiche

Maybe a controversial take, but I really liked End of Time. It's got the homoeroticism, it's got the Gallifrey Sucks reveal, it's got funny strobe light skeletor running around eating people. The Doctor's Got A Gun. Wilf's there. The "billionaire who evilly...loves his daughter? and they're the only people of color in sight besides Cannibalism Victim #2 and Barack Obama?" subplot does kind of flop. But overall, a good blend of the thematically compelling and the sillyfunny. Much like The Matrix itself in that way... Good episode, good Matrix pastiche

Contestant #4: Extremis

Visual engagement with The Matrix

Little-to-none. We're doing The Matrix almost purely as premise, not aesthetic. 12 wears sunglasses, I guess? But he'd been doing that for a minute

Thematic engagement with The Matrix

Return of "something something Catholicism" - this time, our take is roughly "kind of sucks that the pope is homophobic. But I'd still help that guy out if he were in trouble. On account of once upon a time, the pope was a hot lady and we had sex."

[gets blinded] [turns out to be reversible as soon as they actually want to do more stories with this guy] ? That did happen to my buddy Neo.

"Have you guys heard about the allegory of the cave?" ✅

Killing Yourself, is, in fact, a theme of the Matrix movies. I do have to give them that.

Quality of the overall episode vs quality of its Matrix pastiche

The thing about Extremis is that for the most part, it's perfectly watchable and entertaining, even at its most baffling. Still has fun dialog and solid characterization. Still has Mackie and Capaldi doing their best with the material. It just climaxes with such a stupid twist that it kind of kills the whole thing. And that twist is the very fact that it's doing Matrix pastiche at all. Decent episode, bad Matrix pastiche.

Winners of the Matrix Pastiche Awards:

Worst visual engagement with The Matrix:

n/a: everyone's either doing their best with 5 bucks and a ball of lint, or not really visually going for The Matrix at all

Best visual engagement with The Matrix:

The Long Game/Bad Wolf

Worst thematic engagement with The Matrix:

Neck-and-neck between New Earth and Extremis. But I think NE's anti-thesis and aesthetics-without-theme narrowly beats Extremis's "relevant themes but done clumsy and bad"

Best thematic engagement with The Matrix:

The End of Time

Best Matrix pastiche sans rest of the episode:

The Long Game/Bad Wolf

Best episode sans Matrix pastiche:

The End of Time, but Extremis is shockingly close

Most Memeable Moment:

"Super Mario would kill himself"

[lunar-years]

everyone has different interpretations of scenes, but for real that scene with jamie and roy was just plain sexist. roy seriously said "i don't know if we're getting back together because she's a woman and you never know". like what the absolute fuck was that line? they showed up to her house condescending, completely unapologetic about their behaviour, and treated her like a trophy prize. she deserved to beat them up. jamie and roy have always been troubled characters, but they were never (not even in season one) sexist assholes. the show went out of its way multiple times to establish that even when they made mistakes it was due to personal insecurity and not misogyny.

and whenever it was something misogynistic, it was heavily criticised as such, which, in this episode, it was not. a lot of people did seriously not catch the blatant sexism of it at all and went "that's how these men act" (again, what the fuck?). jamie spent season three being respectful of roy and keeley's breakup and not making a move on her, out of consideration of roy's feelings. roy, who knows how abusive jamie's father is, probably better than any other male character on the show, physically assaulted him. despite the fact that throughout the season roy has been approaching jamie with affection, realizing that's what he needs to feel secure (complete disrespect to 2x08 too, one of the best episodes of the series). and while we're on the topic of violence, roy and jamie were never this violent with each other, even when they hated each other's guts. jamie, who gave keeley a truly heartfelt apology about the leaked video, making a point to not victim-blame or engage in literally ANY other sexist behaviour, just brings it up to upset roy in a dick-measuring contest. and one episode ago, one fucking episode ago, they were all getting along, keeley and roy were obviously trying to get back together, and jamie wasn't one bit bothered by it. they were holding hands on his bed and he saw them and smiled! regardless of whether you think the roykeeley arc was rushed (i do), jamie might have been heartbroken or sad, but he wasn't, not once, established as jealous of them. and this entire season was devoted to roy and jamie becoming friends by slowly growing comfortable around each other and actually trusting each other. every single one of those things was thrown into the trash. and yeah, sure, progress isn't linear and perfection isn't possible for people, but that WAS NOT regression. roy and jamie were never sexist dicks. those were two completely different characters.

ALSO, this scene normalizes the idea that it's perfectly forgivable to revert back to sexism whenever emotionally distressed, even if you are generally not like that in your life. it's not. in reality, you're either sexist or you're not, and doing this in one scenario will absolutely mean that you will be sexist in different scenarios too. nobody in real life will be sexist in some areas of their life and feminist in others. implying that this isn't the case shows a very poor understanding of feminist theory and ted lasso has more or less done a good job at not being sexist. i feel like this really excuses unacceptable behaviour that the show itself tells us, with rupert particularly, has very real consequences that perpetuate violence against women. to me, the light-hearted resolution of that whole scene was terrible and poorly written at best. people in the writers' room typed that scene, read through it, and did not find it weird at all. though it's not the first time in the third season, see: forgiving jamie's dad and far-right bigots (???).

and lastly, when people were asking for a love triangle resolution, they meant something fitting for the year of our lord 2023. healthy communication and conversations, mutual respect and love between the charactets, maybe even polyamory (3x11 had a great ot3 set up, too). nobody meant we wanted something from the fucking 1950s. literally the only worse way this could have played out would have been if keeley ended up with the one that caused the other more damage. legit disgraceful ending for roy and jamie as characters, and for the show as well. considering everything it has stood for so far.

(i'm sorry if this reads like i'm calling people out, i'm not, really, i'm just very mad. and also really sad, because i did not go into the ted lasso finale expecting unaddressed sexism. like that was Really Very Bad. for this show especially).

woahhh there's a lot going on here, anon. For anyone wondering, I'm assuming this is a response to this post of mine. While I don't mind discussion or being called out... this does feel like something that could've very well been your own post or an open response to mine instead of an anon note. Because if you've read my meta, you'll probably already know I'm not going to agree with you on this.

Just gonna drop a few short thoughts because I don't have energy to write a think piece when my broader thoughts are already contained in my original post:

I'm not sure where you think I was trying to excuse their words or pretending they weren't being sexist or like they weren't treating Keeley as a weapon in their own games or a prize to be won. I think there's a difference between excusing someone's actions versus trying to understand where they were coming from for the characters and where they are at now.

"while we're on the topic of violence, roy and jamie were never this violent with each other, even when they hated each other's guts" Roy & Jamie were literally beating each other up in the locker room and brawling right out there on the pitch in season 1, anon.

"Keeley and Roy were obviously trying to get back together, and Jamie wasn't one bit bothered by it." this is just not true. Roy was trying to get back together with Keeley. Keeley wasn't shown to be reciprocal (beyond sleeping with him, which is a repeated pattern of behavior for her on the show, and something she in fact did with Jamie in season one), and Roy misinterprets it, as Jamie misinterpreted it. In fact, I'd argue Roy deciding it was a good idea to try and make him and Keeley happen right there in Jamie's bedroom with Jamie crying to his mum one room over, shows he wasn't thinking about Jamie, not when it comes to Keeley. Roy wants what Roy wants and he assumed he was going to get it. And Jamie went through a whole journey of expressions when he opened that bedroom door, so I don't think it's fair to say he "wasn't one bit bothered." I think we've established at this point Roy and Jamie both love Keeley and have always been weird and jealous about it with the other.

"this scene normalizes the idea that it's perfectly forgivable to revert back to sexism whenever emotionally distressed" this scene didn't normalize anything, because the show immediately acknowledged that Jamie and Roy were both in the wrong and had Keeley rightfully kick them to the curb for it. The narrative was not that this is okay or acceptable behavior. I definitely didn't see the scene as light-hearted

"nobody in real life will be sexist in some areas of their life and feminist in others." i am a woman who considers herself very much a feminist. That doesn't mean I've never had moments of internalized misogyny or made harmful comments that buy into a patriarchal narrative, despite myself. Well-intentioned people make mistakes. We are all works in prog-mess trying to get through life as the best people we can be. Jamie and Roy, in my opinion, are fictional iterations of the same principle. I don't think this comes even close to destroying their entire characters in the way you are implying.

All the best x

[compacflt]

Okay, so I was re-reading your Slider one-shot for like the twentieth time, and what really struck me (beyond the brilliance of your writing, and the way you’ve presented the disillusionment of growing up, expecting the world to be a certain way, only to realize that life doesn’t quite work out the way you think it will, when you’re seventeen), is the casual sexism just tossed ‘round by our main characters!! :o We have canonical evidence of both Ice and Mav being pretty sexist (what with “the plaque for the alternates is in the ladies’ room” and the downright stalker-ish behavior exhibited by Mav at the O-club…), but it still surprised me a lil’ when twenty-y/o Ice was just like: “The Soviet Union did the impossible and taught women to drive” —and I realized that ah, he truly was born in 1959, or something. There’s little scenes throughout your story where I find myself wondering, which one of them is better, in this sense: When Ice tells Mav that Sarah isn’t talking to him ‘cause of his combat kills, justifies it by saying: “You know how women are”, and Mav tells him all women aren’t the same… I thought that maybe, it was Mav; but then later, Ice shows a distinctive amount of empathy for Juno, sees and respects her for the skilled pilot that she is… and I thought that maybe, it’s Ice after all—he does seem to be more progressive and accepting than Mav, in general? It also made me wonder, that if either of them had been a woman, would they even have respected the other person enough to consider them to be a rival??—or would it have a been a mildly-amusing circus side show for them, to have a female pilot at TOPGUN?

Ty for the ask anon!! ice is more socially progressive than mav yes.

But—maybe this is my experience growing up in one of the bluest counties in Commiefornia and then going to one of the most leftist-coded colleges in one of the most leftist-coded cities in The World; uhh, even if a white man votes D all the time & has professional respect for women/minorities to their faces etc, get him in a room with a bunch of other white men, especially in a masculine and competitive environment like the gym or the navy, and uh. progressive or not, what you get is a lot of “The Soviet Union did the impossible & taught women to drive.”

And it was the 1980s. (As a reminder, in top gun’s 1986, less than 45% of Americans even approved of interracial marriage.) It sucks to say it, but if Ice was making fun of Cougar for quitting the navy cause of his psych issues such as they may be, and openly calling bullshit on Maverick’s MiG story in front of everyone, I am quite confident in saying he Would Not respect a female pilot to her face—if they were the same rank. At the same rank, it’s a competition. All weaknesses, even perceived biological ones, are to be exploited and called to attention. —But, once he’s advanced in rank, proven his own superiority, he’s more inclined to favor a meritocratic “sex doesn’t matter just fly good” attitude, ergo his relationship w/ “Juno” (she’s just a literary symbol to show that Ice may have respect for other minorities in the Navy “your career speaks for itself” but NOT FOR HIMSELF as a closeted man). This “who cares about gender/race just fly good” attitude is probably where 50s+ Maverick lands too, which is why no issues with Phoenix.

but jesus GOD maverick is a sexist in the original Top Gun. That’s why I wrote the prologue to WWGATTAI—a part of me definitely believes both he and Ice are definitively queer, but a part of me also wonders, are they just also conditioned to dismiss women as intellectual/societal equals because of their time in the 1980s male-dominated Navy? CAN they really only have a truly equal relationship with another man? I have no idea what my Ice’s sexual orientation is for exactly this reason. Yes, he’s functionally gay by the end of it, and that’s what I keep calling him—but sexuality is fluid & complicated. It’s definitely more-than possible he’s mostly straight and it’s just the circumstances of his wildly intense trauma-bond relationship with Maverick that led to their relationship as I wrote it. If you don’t LIKE/understand/respect women, and only feel at home/excited by committing acts of male-typified violence with the few men you respect, how does that bend your definition of the word straight? ...its still straight, but only straight-ish!

not to take it a step further, but WHY ELSE is canon maverick single in TGM? he canonically can’t make it work with women until he retires from the navy!!! he doesnt know how!!! His military environment is not conducive to normal long-term relationships with civilian women!!!