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all-cursed · 4 years ago

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Meet my first OC to have a specific fandom they’re attached to!

So I’ve never created an OC specifically for the universe of a show before, they’ve always been fandomless, but I was excited to create one for Wynonna Earp. I’m going to give him a proper page on the muse list as well as give everyone more detailed biographies eventually, but for now, this should work.

DISCLAIMER: to anyone who may have concerns, please know that I myself am Native American (Blackfoot and Cherokee), and did a lot of research while creating this character to make sure I do them justice and create an actual Native character that isn’t just a stereotype. Some parts that might seem stereotypical - such as the name this character chooses to go by - just comes with the modern era the universe is set in and the character’s own reasons. Several of the struggles he faces as well are specifically chosen because I hope to raise awareness in some small ways to the struggles that IPOC face even today. None of it is meant to be fetishising or stereotypical - some of it just exists in that space as an unfortunate reality.

Alright! Here we go.

[ i. STATS ]

NAME. meecha wo’i " crow " redwolf .

AGE. 23 as of 1x01 .

DOB. nov 29th , 1993 .

GENDER. gender-indifferent cis male : prefers he/him or they/them pronouns .

PREF. pansexual but has a preference for men and nonbinary individuals

SPECIES. human , witch , skinwalker .

RESIDENCE. the ghost river triangle .

OCCUPATION. former cashier ; former lead guitar in an up and coming rock band ; current bartender .

ETHNICITY. in simple terms: native american. specifically: hopi and creek. some scottish but not by much.

[ ii. INTROSPECTION ]

POSITIVE TRAITS. curious , adaptable , perceptive , creative , passionate , loyal , perseverant , open-minded , compassionate .

NEUTRAL TRAITS. persuasive , withdrawn (at first; nervous about other’s intentions) , secretive , free-wheeling .

NEGATIVE TRAITS. temperamental , unrestrained , spiteful , reckless , capricious , hedonistic .

DISLIKES. sounds of traffic or loud machinery in general & the sound of metal on metal & the smell of cheap perfume/cologne & hot weather & dust & houseflies & being told (instead of asked) what to do & rap music & wool scarves & fluorescent lights & lack of hygiene & orange flavoured candies/sodas/anything that’s not an actual orange & deep dark waters he can’t see the contents of & mistreatment of animals & having assumptions made about him & mathematics & onions & football .

LIKES. the scent and sound of rain & physical touch & candles , lighters , and controlled flames in general & the smell of cedar , pine , and the forest & music and playing musical instruments & italian food & raving about attractive people with others; intoxication is a bonus & leather; wearing it and the smell of it & glasses clinking together & late night talks & stargazing & drawing / sketching & records and record players & animals & 'stealing’ and wearing the clothes of people he’s close with & running & card games & dancing and singing & creating something out of nothing & getting the last word .

HOBBIES. drawing & singing and playing instruments & exploring / learning as many places as they can like the back of their hand & people watching & drinking and bar hopping & seeking pleasure and adventure wherever he can find it & collecting random things he enjoys / likes .

WEAKNESSES. he’s standoffish until he knows he can trust a person and can come off rude or aloof & the inability to let go of most grudges & his tendency to follow his desires and his heart before logic or his mind & impulsivity when emotional .

STRENGTHS. independence and ability to function and thrive alone (even if he would prefer to have company it is not mandatory) & ability to be resourceful and adapt to new situations quickly & handles time-sensitive situations well due to his tendency to act quick and think later & stubbornness to stick to a task and see it through & quick thinking & agility and speed of inhuman proportions (thanks to his less than human side) .

HABITS. clicking his teeth together repeatedly when annoyed & flexing fingers & playing with his hair in absentminded / lazy moments & silently staring at someone when he’s done with a conversation until they catch the hint and stop talking & if there’s music playing within earshot he always ends up swaying to the beat & will often make less than human sounds (growls, etc.) when angry if he doesn’t catch himself .

EDUCATION. average student throughout elementary , middle & high school . graduated with an equally average gpa of 3.0 , & decided against college, choosing to seek education in less typical places . fed up with his family and much of the treatment of his peers, he began to learn magic from a witch he met on one of his regular trips to wander the ghost river triangle and explore & learnt magic and about the more mystical parts of purgatory - ultimately becoming a skinwalker via the witch’s guidance and training .

[ iii. APPEARANCE ]

FACECLAIM. booboo stewart .

HEIGHT. 5 ' 8 " , though when able to he wears combat boots that add a few inches to his height .

EYES. a very keen and observant hazel when he’s in human form . when shifting , eye colour can range from yellow to red to green to blue depending on many factors - location , how far he shifts , etc . always alert and bright unless intoxicated or in very rough shape emotion-wise . often wishes they were green or grey and has considered wearing contacts to change his eyes (human-wise) to those colours.

EYEBROWS. defined arch but not so much so that it’s dramatic . not too thin and not too bushy , and naturally neat - he rarely has to tend to them and usually only does so to shave a tiny slit or two through them as a stylistic choice .

HAIR. long and dark ; sleek with an ever so slight wave to it . typically worn either down or in a loose ponytail , occasionally sections are braided . falls just a few inches above his ribcage . every so often he’ll dye streaks into his hair but has never dyed his whole head .

SCARS. many . he has a variety of smaller scars from a rowdy childhood; a few faint ones on his hands and arms from scratches borne of cats and dogs . the typical scars that come from falling off bicycles or off swings ; scraped knees and cuts on chins . his forearms especially are covered in scars he prefers not to speak of . there’s a scar on his forehead from a fight with his cousin as well as a few long scars on his back .

DRESSING STYLE. it varies depending upon mood and whatever job he has at the time . especially fond of punk / alternative styles , likes leather , and enjoys the comfort of loose and flowing garments. whatever style he happens to choose at any given time , he wears well and somehow always manages to draw attention - whether from the jewelry he accessorises with (varieties of bracelets and cuffs , rings , pendants with gems , etc.)

LIPS. naturally full , scar at the right corner of his lip , occasionally sore or split when he goes through anxious phases and tends to chew at his lips .

SKIN. smooth , tanned . he doesn’t have much body hair , a fact that doesn’t tend to bother him much. he rarely engages in a skincare routine and much like his eyebrows generally stays neat and well-kempt without much effort . does not wear much makeup but enjoys eyeliner from time to time . if not for his skin tone, the dark circles beneath his eyes would be much more visible .

CHEEKS. defined cheekbones , not easily flushed . sports the occasional scars due to nervous picking when he was younger.

[ iv. ABILITIES ]

LANGUAGES SPOKEN. english [ fluent ] , hopi [ conversational & spellwork language ] , spanish [ conversational ] .

THREAT LEVEL. mediocre to high .

WEAPONS. fairly efficient in his understanding of magic and can easily hold his own with either combative or defensive magic , but prefers when possible to rely on his own physical skills ; is proficient in hand to hand combat thanks to the speed , agility , and strength bequeathed upon him by his skinwalker nature . very skilled in knifeplay , whether throwing or up close . has little to no practise with firearms as of 1x01 .

MAGIC. magic learnt by his mentor was primarily elemental based and neutral in that it could easily be manipulated for defensive or offensive ; he was never extremely proficient and left before he could complete his training so he is still learning his limits and the heights he can reach , and wants to branch out . as for the magical abilities granted by his status as skinwalker - he is able to shapeshift , which saps him of certain levels of energy that depend upon what creature he takes the shape of . he is also granted higher than average speed, agility, and strength because of this which he keeps with him even when not shifting.

[ v. DETAILS ]

➣➣ he was born in georgia originally to a loving but struggling mother and father - his mother was hopi and his father was creek, and while both parents had originally lived on their own respective reservations, they had met one another by chance during a trip and fallen in love, eventually deciding to seek out their own home outside of the reservations. his parents loved him but struggled financially; eventually his mother’s sister offered to take him in. as that was the better option rather than the three of them becoming homeless, crow’s parents sent him to live with his aunt in arizona on the rez. while they stayed in touch, his parents needed to stay in georgia, and as such he only would see them on the occasional holiday.

➣➣ while his aunt meant well, his cousins were another story. living with his aunt and uncle would have been fine had it not been for their two children; a son and daughter who constantly bullied him behind their backs for not being pure hopi as they were, often harassing him about being a ‘halfbreed’. a quiet boy at heart to boot, he faced bullying in school as well all the way through high school. his cousins, in tenth grade, snooped in his room and found his journal - which they used to out him as pansexual to the school.

➣➣ the moment he graduated, he spent as much time off the rez as possible, avoiding his cousins. on one of his frequent trips to simply explore nearby cities and towns, he found himself in purgatory. one drunken night led to following a mysterious woman into the woods. as it turned out, she was a witch. intrigued and excited at the idea of learning magic and having a way to defend himself, he quickly took her up on her offer to teach him. after a few months, she let him in on her secret - she was a skinwalker.

➣➣ she talked up how powerful she was because of it, and how no one would ever hurt her again. the more he heard about it, the more he wanted it. still unhealed from the way he was treated growing up and too caught up in the concept of never having to be beneath someone ever again, he agreed to let her hold the ceremony that would make him one as well without thinking of the consequences. when she told him that the final task he needed was to kill a family member... he almost faltered but agreed and went back to the rez.

➣➣ he almost didn’t do it. it was night when he returned, and he could see his male cousin drinking on the porch. the concept of killing someone - even someone like his cousin who had treated him so poorly - was daunting. he might have changed his mind had his cousin not seen him arriving and was immediately being malicious; using homophobic slurs and accusing crow of having run off with a lover, talking about how disgraceful it was. and it all was a blur from there.

➣➣ bringing back a lock of his cousin’s hair to the witch, she finished the rituals and he became the creature she had promised - powerful but at what cost? still wrought with guilt despite having made the ultimate choice, crow left the forests on the outskirts of purgatory where he had been training and into the ghost river triangle itself, unable to go home after what he did and unable to stomach facing the witch. living out of his truck, he went from odd job to odd job, eventually landing a stable job as a cashier at a grocery store. around this time he chose to begin going by the name crow - both to distance himself from his past, and because if someone were to want to control or destroy him now as a skinwalker, they could do so if they knew his true, personal name. as such, a nickname seemed the safest bet.

➣➣ fastforward to present day (1x01). after a few years of cashiering and attempting to rent rooms and apartments without success, as well as a stint playing guitar for an up and coming rock band, crow landed a job as a bartender at one of the local bars and instead of attempting to rent rooms or apartments, ended up moving into the trailer park. it was sketchy to say the least, but he couldn’t afford anything fancy and clearly didn’t handle having roommates well. a trailer seemed like the next best thing, outside of living in the woods or in his truck. his tendency to mind his own business and expect that of others meant that he mingled with normal purgatory residents and the revenants equally, pursuing his hedonistic nature as he pleased. which was all well and good, until things began to get... a lot more chaotic due to a curse and an heir he had originally had no knowledge of.

[ MORE TO COME THROUGHOUT CHARACTERIZATION DEVELOPMENT ]

#temporary biography tag

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elysianinsignia · 3 years ago

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IDENTITY PAPER

by: Mary Angelyn D. Villa

Life. One word but lies a thousand meanings and countless experiences. The life I hold is a journey to self-discovery. A trip for me to have a complete understanding of who I am and what I am. Who am I? Am I because of me? or am I me because of how the world molded me? Through the discovery of self, I can identify my purpose and actualize my potential. On the other hand, failure to embark on a pilgrimage of self-discovery will cheat on the opportunity to understand who I am and what I want out of my life.

For years, I never really understood myself. I never had the chance to have a full grasp on myself being a whole. For years, I never felt having a complete sense of self-identity, whose interest is concrete. For years, I was lost in my own realm with no concrete mastership, stability, and control. Growing up, I spent in confusion, with portions of who I am seemingly floating in the mist, my palms reaching out to grasp a piece of myself. Parts of me that I cannot fully latch onto for it ultimately slips through my fingers like warm water.

In my 18 years of existence, I have gone through a lot of roads. Tested me, shaped me, and let me realize a lot of things. My journey started on the year 2002 of December 8th, Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception; it all began when the curtain of night fell upon the province, a province chained together by credence, conviction, customs, and certainty. It was raining cats and dogs at that time. Cold air pierced one's skin, cars were complaining due to heavy traffic, but amidst it all was a woman, a woman drowning in tears because of the unbearable pain she was enduring like she was being torn apart. It was the day I was pushed out of my mother's womb to witness how harsh, hard, and harrowing the world could be. But before I could see the world itself, my father was put in a situation that almost took his sanity. A situation which he needs to decide, his wife;the love of his life or his second-born daughter or else both will die. Instead of choosing, my father fled to the nearest chapel and prayed like there was no tomorrow. Cried rivers and knelt desperately. The moment I was pushed out, my grandmother immediately decided to name me Mary Angelyn. 'Mary' was included for I was born during the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception, the day for Mother Mary, and 'Angelyn' is a combination of "Angel" and my mother's name, Evelyn, it was combined with the word 'Angel' for the reason that my grandmother believed that all the angels of heaven and the Divine God sent an angel, I, to protect and guide my family.

Since time immemorial, my family and my relatives had been religious and avid followers of the Almighty. Maybe it is because our forefathers are Spaniards, who were the ones who introduced Catholicism to the family, or maybe because of all the hardships, challenges, and misfortunes my family had experienced back then that led them to be closer than they ever were to the Almighty. On the other hand, I am a product of love from two individuals from two different localities. My mother was born, raised, and blossomed independently in the tropical paradise of the southern tip of the Philippines, where nature trippers find refuge in the clean, peaceful, pleasant sands of Sarangani. Despite the lack of financial support, she rose from the ashes and strived hard to have a brighter future. My mother did not disappoint herself; she graduated with flying colors. Contrarily, my father, 7 years older than my mother, was born and raised in one of the leading corn producers in the province. A municipality works under the slogan "Cooperative Efforts towards Peace and Progress." The difference between them is that my father had his full support, financially and mentally, from my great grandparents and his parents. He may have his family's full support; this does not change the fact that he needs to strive hard, more complex than he ever did before, to provide a bright future for his own future family. He succeeded. Graduated with flying colors.

The heartwarming affection of the two lovebirds that both have been showering upon me and my older sibling had put us in a pedestrian where we felt safe and protected from the monsters lurking in the dark, waiting for an opportunity. Both had opened our eyes and let us witness how big, and scary the world would be. How one's life can quickly be taken without any caution. This is the reason why on every holiday, free time, or even just a random day, our family would come together, have a simple buffet to catch up on each and every one. Since then, feasting and having yakiniku on a simple day has become a custom in the family. But one must take note that because our clan had a mixture of Spanish, Filipino and Japanese traditions, a simple day and buffet may often be complicated for a new guest. Since day one, as a daughter of a man who was born with parents that was introduced to different countries customs and traditions, we were taught Spanish rule such as to always keep your hands visible when eating; keep wrists resting on the edge of the table, one should not expect dinner any time before 9pm, and when invited to a home for a meal, it has become customary to give the host or hostess a gift: a good bottle of wine, dinner, sweets and/or a dessert. As for the Japanese, we have applied 'bowing' in our daily life. Bow in times of greeting someone or apologizing, asking a favor, or making a request. We also say "let's eat" instead of "itadaki-masu" before a meal. But, growing up in the Philippines, I have learned to be resilient, flexible, adaptive and put my family at the center of everything. Culture is likely compared to an onion; it has many layers, taken from different roots but puts the spice in our life.

The influence of my family guided me in my journey with God as my sole compass. Although I may not realize it at the time, they made a difference and changed my life in a way I never could imagine. To think that they have a profound effect on my life forever is truly a blessing. It is because I've learned some of life's best lessons and often even learn a bit of myself.

In another way, in my journey, I have come to terms and wholly believed that everything that happens in one's life all happens for a reason, and sometimes that means we must face heartaches to experience joy. I may have been filled with comfort and care from my family, yet I still do experience difficulties, especially becoming a woman where I need to depend more on myself rather than on my loved ones; it has been a chaotic phase for me, where friendships run amok, setbacks are commonplace, and even I, who is one of the fortunate children out here still wanders through the woods for own self-discovery. However, at the age of 17, where the world has become unsafe due to the pandemic, it has become more difficult for me to navigate through the tides of my own everyday life. Eventually characterized by circumstances that ultimately shattered the notion of having a complete grasp on my self-identity, where instead of spending my time finding out who I am, I struggled with survival, always fleeing at the sight of danger. Yet, with everything that is happening- the pandemic, rallies, government negligence, and so on have let me exercise my power as a citizen, as a youth, and as an individual. Yes, I am young, but I know what is right from wrong. I'm not stupid. Speaking up against something that I know is inhumane and shouldn't be tolerated by anyone is beyond scary. This is why activism is never for the weak because fighting for what you believe is right takes courage, a lot of that. Frightening and life threatening. But I did it anyway. My parents did not raise a coward. I respect others as we all have different opinions on everything. Mine is way different from others, and others differ from mine. I am allowed to voice out mine as much as you are allowed to voice out yours. If you choose to close your mind and eyes, shut your ears and mouth, it's okay. If I decide to speak out, it's okay, too. All of us are encouraged to speak out, but we're never forced. It's a matter of choice. And this is what I will choose. Always.

I am not halfway through my journey. I am still blossoming. But throughout my whole life, my entire journey, I've established my self-identity solely from the influences of those people and circumstances around me, adapting pieces of passers-by that arouse my interest until their significance vanishes into the wind, and my brain prepares itself for another gust of inspiration. In each road, I take, with its bumps and thorns that often strips my innate understanding of who I am by replacing images with ideas of how I should be, what I should look like, and how I should live out my life had let me discern that only by walking through its bumps and enduring the thorns when I can genuinely reveal the innermost workings of my most natural self and adapt on my whole persona, instead of allowing the road itself change and dictate how I should be.

Nonetheless, I choose a life that will be an endless journey of self-discovery, an infinite collecting of portions of myself hanging in the mist just waiting for my palms to reach onto the pieces. Perhaps someday, I will have a full grasp of my identity as a person and find my niche and establish a foundation upon which to cement my self-identity. Yet, until that day arrives, I will persist with my self-discovery through the fog of danger, threats and challenges, and maybe I will emerge from the shadows with a triumph in my hands. My submersion into this journey has only just begun, and I will not relinquish hope in the face of defeat.

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faelapis · 8 years ago

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Not su critical, but I wish there was less human episodes and plot's loose ends weren't left forgotten for literal ages. I just, idk, feel like crewniverse wants us like lars or ronaldo too much

i mean, by definition it’s not forgotten if it’s brought up again. the show is just very long-term and demands you have a lot of patience sometimes (which makes it satisfying when it happens, but it can also be frustrating before that).

on the subject of humans: i’m not always super invested, but there’s always a rewarding or clever element. i like connie, kiki and sadie a lot. greg’s alright. the cool kids too. while onion’s not my favorite, his episodes tend to be solid and gives us interesting steven-characterization (onion gang was quite nice, they finally made me emotional about both onion and steven’s loneliness).

i have a buddy who loves lars with all his heart - i know he’s not the most popular character, but i like him alright, too. he’s the kind of teenager who can be a jerk without being a one-note bully. there’s a good post going around about you kinda need to see the humans to feel the payoff of them (spoilers) seemingly getting kidnapped in this next bomb, which will be another interesting mix of the human and magical elements of the show.

the “slice of life” elements also has another important function, which i think is vitally important - in fantasy / sci-fi stories, there’s a lot of Othering. by which i mean, strictly good vs evil escapism where a lot of the time, the enemy is so inhuman they might as well be a natural disaster, not a person. good and evil is often decided by which magical species or alien race you belong to, not who you are as a person.

slice of life is the complete opposite - you have your jerks, but they’re still human. those stories rarely end with anyone being murdered for their crimes and this being portrayed as a “victory”. it’s pretty common that while the main character’s perspective expands, we get to know even those characters who we assumed were just cruel or bullies. everyone has some struggle going on, and the punishments for their crimes are not that they’re irredeemable or die. rather, they’re allowed to actually develop and/or have nuances to them.

both sci-fi and fantasy also have an expectation of war in recent years - there’s the expectation of constant high stakes and people getting killed. the plot is expected to constantly be the focus - we need to find the Thing to fight the Dark Side. we need to get to Place before Evil gets there first. the Chosen One needs to collect all five Orbs, four of which symbolize the four friends, and the fifth one will awaken her own power. the Enemy needs to be Stopped, their reasons are (usually) irrelevant.

on the other side, slice of life is very personal: everything is character-driven, and their motivations is the main reason to watch it. i saw a lot of surprise that “yuri on ice” didn’t have a traditional villain - my response was basically “…well, yeah, it’s slice of life”. that’s kinda how it usually works. especially in anime - you may not get to know every character equally well, and some will be deeply flawed, but no one is sorted into a box labelled “inhuman” or “evil”.

so what’s my point? well, steven universe continuously trains its audience to see slice-of-life elements in the ~magical space conflict. it tells you to see the characters through a ‘human’ lens, even the characters who aren’t human. part of how it does this is by adding surprising amounts of empathy and human solutions - not just to the beach city problems, but to the gem problems as well.

the first time we see two diamonds together - the Intergalactic Tyrants™ who most fanart depict as the final boss overlords all the “less-awful” characters will unite against in a Final Battle? oh, they’re grieving the loss of their fellow diamond. blue diamond is crying. their pearls are there, standing as a reminder of the hierarchy they champion, but neither element ruins the other - they can be sympathetic and deeply flawed at the same time. when it’s towards the people they care about, they even seem well-intentioned. yellow diamond chastises blue for not being a good leader to her people.

part of the reason this seems natural is because the show has portrayed its human characters as flawed, not as a faceless mass of “good people” who must be saved from the evil alien race. so it makes sense it would work the other way around too - everyone’s got their own stuff to deal with, and everyone makes (sometimes massive) mistakes.

we’re expected to see both gems and humans as people. part of this is because of the human side of steven’s upbringing - the old crystal gems are used to meeting allies and enemies, steven is mostly used to meeting people, even if he (like everyone) has his own biases between them, or thinks some of them are “mean”.

despite some people’s consistent insistence that any jerk we’re introduced to is just a villain, that’s it, end of story, steven universe continues to challenge those assumptions. time and time again. that’s part of why it’s so vital (to me) that no one are just killed off or bubbled forever, because the show has laid the groundwork that every life is unique, and suffering is never a good thing.

it can be a trade-off, like how we’re exploring rose’s shattering of pink diamond, and yknow, there WAS a war in the style of sci-fi/fantasy, but the show is critical of that solution. pink’s shattering did not, in fact, end the conflict - her death left countless gems leaderless, mourning and FAR from ‘liberated’ (in fact, many of them hate the crystal gems), and earth was still under the slow threat of the cluster… and how was that cluster solved again? not by force, but by talking to a hostile and vicious little green alien. then getting her help to reach the huge, suffering eldritch abomination in the center of the earth… which was also stopped by communication, not by force.

the human side of the show helps steven cope with gem life, make connections that are important to him, develop his character and fuel his desire to help.

i know some will insist these are unrelated, but i think without steven’s human side, he would really “just” be another crystal gem. an empathetic one, who is curious about people, but not on this level. not one who opposes the idea of not just shattering, but wants to find a way to connect with everyone (as he is like no one and everyone), and has the kind of boundless optimism where he refuses to accept that this is just “the way things are”, or that suffering is ever necessary. everything is always changing on earth, and because of that, steven wants to believe everything can always change.

#steven universe #su theory #long post /#text heavy /#steven #~let's talk about genre~#the cluster #the diamonds #the great diamond authority #Anonymous

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theclaravoyant · 7 years ago

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AN ~ for the Anon who prompted (paraphrased):

Genderfluid!Daisy getting drunk and trying to come out to their partner(s)

For the ship of my choice I decided to try my hand at some TripDaisy, and while I don’t think it came out (*ba dum tsh*) as fluffy as you may have intended, I hope the mild angst/hurt/comfort/fluff blend is satisfying :) Hope you like it!

Read on AO3 (~1300wd). Rated light T.

now take a hold of your soul

The small club buzzed with life as Daisy Johnson sat at the bar, casually nursing a lemonade as she looked around for someone she was expecting. She beamed when, at last, she saw Trip enter at the other end of the room. As he passed the tables and the dance floor, looking for her, the strobing pink and green lights shone richly on his dark skin, and on his white teeth that shone across the room at her when he beamed back. He opened his arms as he got close, and Daisy slid off her seat, waving for their first round of drinks before embracing him with a kiss.

“Congratulations!” she called, over the music. “You did a great job today! So glad to see you’re finally getting some recognition!”

“You know what they say though,” Trip said, brushing her off, although his humble smile glowed. “Behind every great man is a woman –“

“Shoving him full of congratulatory drinks?” Daisy suggested, holding up one shot for herself, and one for him. “The first one’s the good stuff. It gets more budget after that ‘cause I’m not made of money, but cheers!”

Trip laughed. “Cheers!”

They tapped their glasses together and threw the shots back, and then Daisy pointed a finger at the jukebox. Someone she’d paid earlier dropped a selection, and the iconic 80s drumbeats filled the bar.

“Ooh!” Trip called. “This is my jam!”

Daisy laughed. She’d never met a man with more jams than Trip, and the enthusiasm with which he beckoned her out onto the dancefloor was enough to draw the attention of half the bar. With eyes on them, Trip leaned into it, pretending to throw a lasso around her and pull her toward him before both of them launched into a semi-co-ordinated dance. Whether it was nostalgia or infectious enthusiasm, Daisy was pleased to find that the rest of the crowd got in on the action with ease. Dancing, singing, and eventually, karaoke, made for an even better night than Daisy had planned, and by the time she and Trip had retired to one of the booths – both tipsy, sweaty, and breathing hard – she was riding a high of sugar, alcohol, and endorphins.

“Love you,” she murmured, cuddling into his chest even though they had the whole booth to themselves. “’m proud of you. You know that? You are bad. Ass.”

“Well, thank you, I am,” Trip agreed, turning his glass between his fingers with pride and a little drunkenness swelling his chest. “That’s why we make a perfect pair.”

“Shux.” Daisy grinned a slow, lazy grin, and lay her chin on her hands on the table. She was drunk enough to feel warm, and Trip’s hand was strolling over her back, and if she sunk any further into relaxation, she reckoned, she’d soon start purring like a cat. The sugar high was wearing off, for now. Either that, or she was ascending a level of drunkenness. Probably both, as the still-dancing crowd seemed to blur in time and colour before her eyes. “Geez, how are those guys still going?”

Trip laughed. “When did you turn into such an old granny?”

“The body is willing,” Daisy explained. “The 5am starts are not.”

“Oh, shit, May’s gonna freak –“ Trip very nearly giggled, and Daisy giggled too, her nose crinkling as she did.

“Nah, I got tomorrow off. Gotta treat my man to a proper congratulations!” She slapped his chest – slowly, drunkenly, fluidly and inaccurately – in praise. Then fell into it, and settled there, her face a little mashed into his chest, where she whispered: “Damn, you’re ripped.”

“Oh, you like that?” Trip raised one of his arms, showing off his guns to Daisy, who poked it with a finger.

“You have really nice muscles,” she said. “And a nice face. And a nice ass.”

“Damn right,” Trip agreed. “And I think this ass wants to get us some water, hm?”

“Hate to watch you walk away,” Daisy agreed, mashing the saying into one. Trip headed back to the bar, dancing so that his hips gyrated exaggeratedly, and Daisy, true to her word, watched. By the time he had fetched the jug of water and returned though, the alcohol and the sugar crash and the warped way that time worked when she was drunk - and that time being spent alone – was bringing Daisy down, fast. The smile had faded from her face and she stared at the blue liquid that was her cocktail, as if she could see straight through it to something that still, somehow, meant nothing. Trip swapped the cocktail out for a glass of water and Daisy looked up at him: part of her still distant, but part of her surprised. Maybe even surprised that he’d come back.

“Do you think I’m a freak?” she asked.

“Nah, man,” Trip insisted. “I mean, only in the good ways.”

Daisy snorted derisively, and took a swig of the water, and pulled a face. She’d been looking forward to restoring the sugar high, but she knew water was better for now.

“They’re all bad ways,” she said. “I never fit.”

“Hey, the way things are going, if everyone fit, the world would be a way worse place,” Trip pointed out. “And besides – you fit with some people. The important people. You fit with me, right?”

Daisy sighed.

“I don’t know.”

Trip frowned. He shifted his seat, moving back to Daisy’s side and pulling her into his arms.

“Hey, now, where’s this coming from?” he crooned. “You and me are good, girl. Don’t get down on yourself about that. There’s plenty else in the world to worry about, but not that.”

Daisy shook her head.

“Can I tell you something?” she asked.

“Always.”

“Sometimes… I don’t always feel like girl. Which is crazy because like, I don’t even know what feeling like a girl is supposed to feel like – like that’s crazy, right, how is that a thing – but like… I feel like I just know sometimes. I’m wrong.”

“No,” Trip assured her. “You’re not wrong, Daisy. You’re here. Your existence... is what it is, but it's not wrong. You matter, no matter what. Hey. How long have you been feeling like this?” Daisy shrugged.

“I dunno. My whole life, I guess. I thought it would go away when I found out all the Inhuman stuff but it never really did. It’s just what I am. Just another freaky layer to the freak onion that is my life.”

Trip squeezed her in a hug, kissed her hair and whispered in her ear: “I love the freak onion. Don’t you forget it. And you know, you’re not alone. There’s words for people like you.”

“Yeah, -“

“Nice words,” Trip interrupted, before she could start on a list.

Daisy pouted. “If you start spouting some cheesy shit like ‘hero’ or something I’m getting a cab.”

“You are a hero, whether you like it or not,” Trip pointed out, “but that’s not what I meant. I mean, there’s a whole bunch of people out there who don’t feel like they’re what they were born as -”

“I’m not-“ Daisy started, but Trip didn’t let her cut him off.

“- and some of those people only feel it some of the time. Like, there’s this thing called ‘genderfluid.’ I don’t remember much about it, it came up in Group once, but it’s pretty self-explanatory, isn’t it? Must be where your gender, is like… fluid.”

Daisy took a long drink of water. Trip took this as a reminder, and poured himself one too. And they started again.

“Gender…fluid…” Daisy murmured, pulling out her phone and googling the term. She squinted at some of the articles through her drunkenness. “That’s cool. Lots of gender binary bullshit though. You sure it’s really a thing?”

“Yeah. If you read what people actually talk about, people who experience it, a lot of it sounds like what you said just now. I mean, maybe consider again it when it’s not 2am and we’re not pretty heavily inn—in—well, drunk.” He laughed at himself. “But I’m pretty sure it’s a thing.”

“And – and I mean if it is,” Daisy put forward. “You don’t mind?”

“Look, I’ve revealed a lot of things I’ve regretted at 2am DNMs,” Trip said, “so if you wake up tomorrow and want to forget this whole thing, that’s fine. But if you follow the trail and it means something, I’m here for you. Names, pronouns, the whole shtick if you want.”

“Thanks, but I mean for you,” Daisy pressed. “For us. I mean, if I’m not a girl all the time – that sort of means you’re… not straight all the time.”

Trip shrugged.

“I’m easy, girl. Man. Whichever.” He grinned. “And if it turns out I swing more ways than I thought I did yesterday then that’s fine with me.”

He leaned back against the seat, smooth as a player, with a falsely self-aggrandising grin that, gradually, coaxed a smile out of Daisy at last. Then, more sincerely, he reached for her hand and looked into her eyes.

“Look, Daisy, you’ve always been special,” he said. “You’re an orphan with a family. You’re a human alien. You’re a hero, but you’re also an oxymoron, and that doesn’t mean you’re a freak. Not in a bad way. It just means you were never going to fit in someone’s neat little boxes, and that’s okay. ‘Specially since, you know, ticking boxes - you’re doing that left right and centre, as far as I’m concerned.”

Daisy groaned silently, but she was still smiling.

“I tick your boxes? That’s what you’re going with?”

Trip nodded, a sparkle of mischief back in his eyes as he became satisfied that the worst of Daisy’s drunken despair had passed.

“You’re welcome,” he said. “I’ll be here all week.”

Daisy rolled her eyes.

“Shut up and drink your water, babe,” she said, and she drank too.

#tripdaisy #tripskye #aosficnet2 #aospositivitynet #prompt me stuff #clara's fic tag #and the award for Deepest Use of a Footloose Lyric goes to

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calcinators-blog · 8 years ago

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Two Irons (Part 4.)

Your encounters with a certain technician had, to a substantial degree, whittled down your perception of who might have been attached to the hand placed on your shoulder. You had made a few speculations in the short moments between the action and reaction, tailored to your preferences. Would you rather it be one of the cooks from the common area requesting your hand to cut a surplus of onions? Absolutely, you would go to town on that offer. You would even take on a flametrooper with a malfunctioning D-93w flame projector gun.

With all intents and purposes, the ideal was any other face than the blond curls, splays of freckles, and evil eyes belonging to Matt.

“Working hard?”

You mouthed an indiscriminate, “thank you,” upon hearing the mild voice of Lieutenant Colonel Zack, taking you away from the very precipice of combustion. If it were a certain deceptively outfitted individual, deciding he wasn’t through toying with you, you were convinced your mind would have short-circuited on the spot. Luckily it wouldn’t come to that.

Not quite yet.

Lifting his hand off your shoulder, he moved around you. The tapered regulation haircut and eyes of recognizable depth came into your field of view. Everything about the man was friendly, a sort of congeniality that he always appeared to be wearing. It was only if you looked closely could you find how he also was dressed in the weight of the entire First Order, dispersed across his shoulders. There was a lasting, profound heartache sealed away. And you, being that it was something you had cared to notice, had known why.

It wasn’t something that you had directly been witness to, since you had still been suffering under the artificial gravity of the Finalizer when it took place, but it had become lore of the base all the same. You had heard the whisperings, most of who had heard it themselves through the rumor mill too, of what happened to his boy.

The Lieutenant Colonel’s son, as you understood, had joined the ranks of the First Order just as you had, sharing the luxury of choice. He had succeeded in making Petty Officer on the command ranks but quickly decided that life the uniform lent was too stagnant and safe. Against the advice of his father, he resigned from his position and joined the stormtrooper training program. It was foggy at best, how he had bypassed regulations, as you implicitly understood trooper’s origins. Perhaps he had been the lab rat– but, perhaps a great many things. What you knew was that he had been admitted into the program and dismally, the parameters of the system were not designed for individuals like Zack’s son; many had been silently wary of what would come from having a rational-minded within the military. Even so, he proved to be talented with the standard F-11D blasters, scoring above average accuracy and showing aptitude in combat scenarios.

But he, in due course, proved to be as much of a problem as he was a success. He would perpetually disrupt training, often going above and beyond to get a rise out of instructors and troopers alike. There was comfortable breathing space in his new position, changing from a stiff suit to fatigues. And though he might not have been aware to the extent, he had become the cause of much friction, frustration, and ultimately, disorder. All of his qualities began seeping into his squad mates; his son sneezed, and the rest of the trooper caught colds. Both Captain Phasma and General Hux had planned to pull him out of the program, understanding that he was becoming too great of a liability, noticing the effects on their soldiers.

But neither did in time.

As initiate of the “code red” joke, all incidents were traced back to him. Kylo Ren had smothered him in the presence of his squad mates. It was personal, choosing his hands over his lightsaber. It was slow, inhumane. Torture for those who watched, the same group who later volunteered their minds for the psytechs to experiment on– time would not allow them forget, after all.

He was said to have been unusually calm as it happened, which was an important detail to all versions of the confrontation that had circulated. Kylo Ren had asked, “What is the code for this?” while watching the young life before him weaken until it faded out entirely.

You felt terrible to admit that it all seemed too unlikely before. Now, having encountered the beast himself, it wasn’t farfetched in the slightest.

Though, it only troubled you further that no one else was the wiser about his obvious costume. In the same way that you could distinguish how sadness grasped the Lieutenant Colonel, you were able to feel how the air bent around Matt without provocation, tainted with catastrophic anger. The disguise could slightly alter his appearance, but it had failed to suppress the shock and trauma of evil. The technician was an open wound, and no less painful than Kylo Ren.

How could you arrange wickedness like that into skin and call it human? Someone who dared to jar the mind open, ridiculing privacy and disrupting constants, had no business thinking himself anything other than a monster. Though he appeared in the flesh to be shaped as a person, no different from you or Zack or Nines, his very mind had slipped into un-salvageable space where salvation was an absurdity to ridicule.

I feel sorry for his mother.

At close inspection, the Lieutenant Colonel’s eyes were restless. And even so he still managed to smile warmly at you. You felt groundless by his gesture, for being so afraid, when he had gone through so much and still served the First Order devotedly.

He could have deserted his position; he could have left just like FN-2187 and no one in their right mind would have questioned it. In fact, people may have understood him defaulting better than seeing him hanging onto his post– people like General Hux. His commitment only added additional cruelty to son’s death, after all. He was a gentle person who refused to be solidified. Kylo Ren had tried but Zack was inherently stronger. Death would not change him; it had come, and he had smiled. There was consolation in that, looking still at the Lieutenant Colonel’s face. You felt calm, even if it was just as short-lived as the feeling you had when looking out on the deck a short time ago, to marvel at the multi-hued dust, colliding about infinity.

It struck you that you had said nothing, and his face was beginning to change as he waited on your reply. All too fast the calm left you, and in its place the pang of nerves settled in. Excited. Like little wings beating. “Working hard? Y-yes...” you fumbled on his question as if no one had ever asked you such a thing before, “I’ve been working. You know. Hard.” Your attempt at sounding enthused hung stiffly in the air.

Nonetheless, Zack offered a forgiving look, looking just as internally divided. A mirror of you.

Past the Lieutenant Colonel, you saw FN-2199 and a few others moving about with full food trays. Matt followed. Which only meant that you couldn’t afford the time on innocent conversation. Especially not if it meant something potentially awful happening to your comrade. But Zack kept talking, unaware of the panic in your sliding eyes, “I received a card today about my son...”

Can we talk about this when Kylo Ren isn’t looking at Nines as if he’s about to strangle him?

“From who?” you asked, while monitoring Matt who had begun ardently speaking to FN-2199 directly. You owed Zack your politeness and as badly as you wanted to rush the table, nothing had appeared to be stirring between them yet. You felt the back of your neck perspire as Matt’s words; “I see his death” ran through your mind.

Nines. Stay quiet. I’ve seen you do it once, I know you can do it again.

Zack reached over to pick up a muffin from a tray. Partially removing the paper off the bottom, he cleared his throat.

Can we hurry up here? Who sent the card?

In annoyance, your eyes shifted away from the table and back to him, catching his shoulders shuddering. The movement was to cut short additional shakes, or to play them off at least. He broke off a piece of the muffin, “Kylo Ren... Kylo Ren gave Matt a card... to give to me.”

Oh.

Before you could process a reply and to your complete horror, you had overhead FN-2199 raise his voice twofold, calling Kylo Ren a “punk bitch.”

The first coherent word to fall out of your mouth, “What?”

Nines, there is no way in Malachor that you just said what I think you said.

“That was my reaction too,” Zack assumed you were speaking to him exclusively, punctuating his reply by eating the piece he had been holding.

A fork clattered to the ground. Nines grasped at his neck, struggling to breathe. “Oh no, he’s choking on food...” You hear Matt speak gently to, no doubt, amuse himself.

“Give me a second, Lieutenant Colonel,” you pat his shoulder and turn on your heel to rush the table, only to get there as Matt raised his hand, directing FN-2199 up and out of his seat.

“I see what’s in your mind,” Spitting, Matt raised his dominant hand, cupping the air in front of him threateningly. Inflamed veins crept across his neck and forearms. This was just a taste of his fabled ire, but horrible enough on sight to throw you into panic.

With his toes just barely scraping over the ground, just out of reach, Nines looked over to you. The look in his eyes told you that it was out of your power to help him. Then, struck by an invisible force, Nines was flung backwards.

With the whole area in disarray as troopers rushed to FN-2199’s side, you failed to notice Matt as he made his escape. By the food tray abandoned at the bench, there were no other signs of him or his disguise present.

Patting Nine’s back, you found him stupefied, he assured you he would be fine and not to fuss.

You hovered over him until you were absolutely certain that he was okay, in the very broadest sense of the term, before leaving promptly. If Matt was planning on coming back, you planned to be totally unavailable.

Your next destination was in the nearby administration block. You made it there without incident, which only somehow added to your suspicion that something was about to happen.

Sliding a coded access cylinder out of its notch on your uniform, you held it to the recognition pad. The familiar click of the door’s unlocking mechanism felt like crossing the finish line; a few glances over each shoulder confirmed you were still alone. Sliding away with a hydraulic whoosh, revealed to you now was your unexceptional, but secure, bureau. The room was L-shaped, with a small, centralized refresher unit. The warm lights hummed and the heating unit buzzed automatically as you stepped in, though this was without further movement, as you had decisively turned to lock it soon as humanly possible.

Adjacent to the small desk, with multiple monitors, sat an appropriately padded chrome chair. You sank into it with a great sigh, expelling as much grief as you cold. This was a small victory in itself; you could provisionally breathe without the dread of being caught by Kylo Ren’s temper. Or Matt’s temper. Either way.

The comm. unit, flanking the database with its various screens, came beeping to life and you had not been prepared for the sound. You’d seen instances like this in shows all the time, and if your life were to mimic the holovids you grew up on, it would be Matt trying to reach you.

Answering the page by punching the receiving button, with a shaking hand nonetheless, you were pleased to find it was not either the man with the wig or the one who hid underneath it. It was someone on behalf of Captain Phasma, who asked for you to prioritize certain data for her, as she needed the information ASAP. You told her you would have it entered and usable momentarily. They were courteous and let you go back to work straight away.

It was your own viewpoint that holding a pen for Captain Phasma was remarkably easier than a blaster. From the troopers you knew through the common area, you gathered that she expected a lot from those under her as a testament to her own proficiency. And stars, was she ever proficient. It was entrenched in the very statistics you entered.

Immersing yourself in work, you tapped away at the keys but replaying in your mind, without command, was the sound of the fork hitting the floor from before.

Poor Nines.

Beeping again, startling you once more. Your heart visited your throat. With a hash swallow to settle it, you punched the button again. Someone from the main bridge jumped right into how he required certain data be processed immediately for the General, as it was of the greatest priority. You began to explain that you were just finishing up numbers for the Captain, when again, the sound of intermediate beeping cut you both off for yet another page.

“Sorry but can you hold for a moment? I'm getting another page...”

“What? You can't-,“ he snarled. You imagined the look of outrage on his face but switched lines regardless.

Asking the next frequency, your body now impatient with the spikes of adrenaline, “Yes?”

It can’t be him.

You weren’t partial to the silence that followed though you tried to become aware that even if it were Matt, or Kylo Ren, he wouldn’t be able to do anything to you over the link.

A familiar voice brought you back, “I’m hoping you are close to submitting the data now?” The one who had asked for Captain Phasma’s data was checking up on your progress. She was crisp now, but still more pleasant than your alternatives.

You settled both calls and buckled into your task.

As time passed you, miraculously without further disruption, you found it easier to push everything in your head aside. Some speck of normality was returned to you. Your mind drifted, as anyone’s would when faced with repetitive task, coaxing yourself down whatever branch your fear had chased you up into. You wanted to fully believe that it was all done and over with. You even laughed to yourself, mumbling and tipping the chair back as you set your feet upon the desk, feeling outlandish for holding such a long conversation with yourself.

I’ll probably never see him again. Doesn’t he have better things to do? Breaking consoles? Terrifying the galaxy? Oh... and I don’t know... restoring order, maybe?

And with that, you felt relief at your inner recesses. Today was a phenomenon. Nothing more or less. And some day, down the line, you and Nines would look back and laugh. Surely he would keel over, laughing until tears brimmed in his eyes, knowing that all that he had done to the technician, he had really done to the Commander.

So, that’s the end of story?

You’ll go back to your personal quarter and never deal with Matt again. You’ll never revisit your feelings of doubt towards the First Order. Your home world is restored. You and FN-2199 sip tropical drinks by the shore, safe from the triumvirate.

You should be so lucky.

You got lost inside your habitual closing ritual: powering the console down, watching the screens flicker from blue to black, before tucking the chair in neatly at the desk and arranging all memos for when you’d return the next cycle. After that, you became occupied with the panel to open the door. Yet as you approached, an overt darkness had begun seeping through. Darkness, yes, but also heat, in the same way a doorknob blisters when there’s a fire at the opposing side. There was a terrible heat. You imagined smoke along with it.

He’s not.

You hoped for anything besides Matt. An actual fire, blazing through the hallway would have been preferable to the reality of the moment that you felt was playing out before you. As the door opened, with the distinguishing hydraulic whoosh, you were met with the opposite wall of the hallway. A dramatic reveal of nothing, pulling relief from your lungs in a great exhale.

On your inhale, a dryness invaded your nose and mouth. Like ash. Or smoke.

He is.

He moved from his hiding spot to fill open doorway, looming before you. You were right to believe there was something in the corridor. You had never seen the silver inlay of his helmet so

closely and you never wanted to. You could have gone your whole service without a moment like this.

He broke the produced silence between you. It was possible that he would have been nondescript if it were not for the strain the modulator put on his voice. Heavy metallic distortion was threaded into each syllable, “I don’t take sympathy for the Resistance lightly.”

It’s possible that you were in trouble.

The helmet was a buffer; you weren’t aware if the violent spark was in his eye. You couldn’t see his lips pulled tightly with annoyance or the narrowing of his brow. But, damn, if you couldn’t imagine it.

He stiffly walked down the hallway, one of his strides approximately equal to two of your own, “Now, come,” the electrical sting of his command pulled you into step with him.

Matt was bad enough, sure. Kylo Ren was worse.

#matt the radar technician #kylo ren #kylo ren x reader #matt the radar technician x reader #kylo ren fanfic

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yes-dal456 · 8 years ago

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New Documentary Looks At Profound Psychological Effects Of Solitary Confinement

About 100,000 prisoners are housed in solitary confinement across the U.S., spending 23 to 24 hours per day alone in an 8-foot-by-10-foot cell.

At Virginia’s Red Onion State Prison, inmates are housed in segregated units with virtually no social contact, sometimes for years and even decades. Red Onion is one of more than 40 “supermax” prisons in the U.S., which takes inmates from other prisons who have been deemed difficult or dangerous.

Solitary confinement is a common practice in U.S. prisons, but one that raises significant ethical concerns. Isolation can be psychologically harmful, and research has shown typical effects of solitary confinement include anxiety, depression, an inability to think clearly, obsessive thoughts, paranoia and psychosis. Self-harm, including suicide, is also common.

Over 90 percent of prisoners who are housed in solitary will be released. While Red Onion has initiated a new “Step Down” program to help prisoners return to the general population, after months or years in isolation, they often face psychiatric issues that leave them poorly equipped to reintegrate themselves into society.

These effects are particularly pronounced for inmates with severe mental illness. One federal judge said that housing mentally ill prisoners in isolation “is the mental equivalent of putting an asthmatic in a place with little air.”

In 2011, United Nations experts called for the practice to be banned, insisting that prolonged solitary confinement is a cruel and inhumane punishment that can amount to torture, particularly for vulnerable individuals such as juveniles and the mentally ill.

“Solitary confinement is a harsh measure which is contrary to rehabilitation, the aim of the penitentiary system,” U.N. Special Rapporteur on torture Juan E. Méndez said at the time.

In a new HBO documentary, “Solitary: Inside Red Onion State Prison,” Kristi Jacobson gets to know the inmates and prison guards at Red Onion, offering an intimate glimpse into life inside a supermax prison, where cameras and journalists have rarely been allowed.

We spoke to Jacobson to hear more about what she learned during a year spent probing inside a supermax prison:

youtube

Why has solitary confinement become such a common practice in the U.S.? What’s the argument in favor of it?

You’re probably familiar with the story of the growth of the prison population. In the 1970s there were tougher sentencing laws, and then in the ‘80s and ‘90s came the “tough on crime” ethos, which was so strong in this country. That ethos led to a prison boom and increased sentencing ― there were more people inside our prisons with less to do, which led to more violence inside the prisons.

In 1983, two guards were killed on the same day at a high-security prison in Marion, Illinois. They put the entire prison on lockdown and kept it on lockdown as punishment for everyone. Experts around the country began studying this Marion model, which was locking people down for 23 to 24 hours a day. The idea was that they would build these “supermax” prisons, take the bad apples and put them in these facilities, and make the rest of the prison system safer. That was the rationale. Supermax prisons were designed to punish, and to limit contact between prisoners.

How do prisoners end up in “segregation”? Is it often those who are mentally ill?

What happened is that we built these supermax prisons, so then we needed to fill them. It became a go-to solution for people running prisons to deal with a range of inmates, including those who may pose a danger to other inmates or officers, but also people who have disciplinary problems ― people who are a problem for the management. It kind of became the de facto way of dealing with problems.

There are a lot of people inside our prisons who have some mental illness. Those are people who have trouble fitting into the prison environment and following the rules, and they are disproportionately sent to isolation ― where then they are susceptible to becoming more ill as a result of being in that situation. It seems to not make any sense, but yet many billions of dollars were spent on these prisons with the idea of isolating prisoners indefinitely.

In your year at Red Onion, what were some of the most striking things you observed of how these conditions seemed to affect the prisoners?

One of the things that struck me the most was the screaming, the crawling, the yelling that was coming out from behind the cell doors. That reflected a helplessness and a pain that’s hard to describe. There was the man you see in the film who appears to be catatonic. There was talk of depression and “It’s either I kill myself or I make it.” There’s a really high level of depression.

I found myself connecting with a handful of prisoners who had an extraordinary ability to articulate what they were feeling and going through in such a profound and almost poetic way. I think part of that had to do with a certain inner strength that was pre-existing.

A 2011 U.N. report denounced prolonged solitary confinement as amounting to torture. After witnessing it firsthand, is that something you’d agree with?

Yes. Look, I don’t run a prison, and I know that there are a lot of competing decisions that are made when you’re managing a prison. But I think that holding people in isolation for long periods of time ― and especially for indefinite periods of time ― absolutely amounts to what is effectively state-sponsored torture.

Under these conditions, it’s common for the inmates’ mental health to deteriorate before they are sent back into society. Is this a public health concern?

It can be dangerous to release people from this system back into society. The statistic that I hear most often is that 90 to 95 percent of people inside our prisons will go home. So to not be thinking about in what state psychologically, emotionally and physically they will return to their homes, I think, is dubious if you care about your community. But in my opinion, we should also care about the human beings that are doing time ― because they are that, they’re human beings.

What needs to begin shifting for us to build a more humane and effective correctional system?

A number of state prison systems have begun looking at this issue of solitary confinement and how they’ve relied on it for many years. The results have been bad, and they need to rethink it. We can’t ignore that.

And in dealing with that, we’re forced to look at what our prisons are doing more broadly. Are they designed to create an environment in which individuals can better themselves and become more productive when they leave, or is it about punishment, punishment, punishment? I think we’ve hit a point where we’ve realized that this punitive system isn’t serving anyone ― we have a more than 66 percent recidivism rate.

The more people talk about it as citizens and constituents, the more that politicians have to address it. We need a big paradigm shift around understanding what our prisons should and could do.

“Solitary” premieres at 10 p.m. ET/PT Monday on HBO.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

This reporting is brought to you by HuffPost’s health and science platform, The Scope. Like us on Facebook and Twitter and tell us your story: [email protected].

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

from http://ift.tt/2jVconL from Blogger http://ift.tt/2li1Mwf

#http://www.topwaytohappy.tk/2017/02/new-documentary-looks-at-profound.html

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imreviewblog · 8 years ago

Text

New Documentary Looks At Profound Psychological Effects Of Solitary Confinement

About 100,000 prisoners are housed in solitary confinement across the U.S., spending 23 to 24 hours per day alone in an 8-foot-by-10-foot cell.

“Solitary confinement is a harsh measure which is contrary to rehabilitation, the aim of the penitentiary system,” U.N. Special Rapporteur on torture Juan E. Méndez said at the time.

We spoke to Jacobson to hear more about what she learned during a year spent probing inside a supermax prison:

youtube

Why has solitary confinement become such a common practice in the U.S.? What’s the argument in favor of it?

How do prisoners end up in “segregation”? Is it often those who are mentally ill?

In your year at Red Onion, what were some of the most striking things you observed of how these conditions seemed to affect the prisoners?

A 2011 U.N. report denounced prolonged solitary confinement as amounting to torture. After witnessing it firsthand, is that something you’d agree with?

Under these conditions, it’s common for the inmates’ mental health to deteriorate before they are sent back into society. Is this a public health concern?

What needs to begin shifting for us to build a more humane and effective correctional system?

The more people talk about it as citizens and constituents, the more that politicians have to address it. We need a big paradigm shift around understanding what our prisons should and could do.

“Solitary” premieres at 10 p.m. ET/PT Monday on HBO.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

This reporting is brought to you by HuffPost’s health and science platform, The Scope. Like us on Facebook and Twitter and tell us your story: [email protected].

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

from Healthy Living - The Huffington Post http://huff.to/2jVogkS

#Healthy Living - The Huffington Post

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dailyaudiobible · 8 years ago

Text

01/26/2017 DAB Transcript

Exodus 2:11-3:22 ~ Matthew 17:10-27 ~ Psalm 22:1-18 ~ Proverbs 5:7-14

Today is January 26th. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I'm Brian and it is my pleasure and a joy to be here with you today around the global campfire, taking the next step forward in our adventure through the scriptures this year. So we’re just getting going in the second book of the Bible, the book of Exodus, and we’re reading from the Contemporary English Version this week. Exodus chapter 2, verse 11 through 3, verse 22 today.

Commentary

In the book of Matthew today, Jesus is exasperated, almost like his patience has run out for a second. “How much longer must I be with you? Why do I have to put up with you? You people are too stubborn to have any faith.” So what's that all about? Where is that coming from?

What sparked this is a boy keeps falling into fire and water. He has epilepsy. He has seizures and, according to the scriptures, there is demonic activity. The boy's father has brought this boy to Jesus’ disciples who have attempted to heal him but have been unsuccessful. That is what brings this exasperation up in Jesus, this frustration. But why?

The boy in question here was brought to Jesus and was made whole again, was made well again. It wasn’t until later that Jesus unpacked his frustration. Privately the disciples asked, “Why couldn’t we do that?” And Jesus’ answer was, “It's because you don’t have enough faith.” “But I can promise you this. If you had faith no larger than a mustard seed, you could tell this mountain to move from here to there and it would. Everything would be possible for you.” This is fascinating because it is not the only time Jesus will behave this way.

So what is the plot behind the story here? Is it that if we had more faith we could be superhuman? Is that what Jesus was being, superhuman? We look at him that way a lot, but the Bible doesn’t say anything about superhuman. It says fully human which would mean that when we look at Jesus, we’re looking at how things were always supposed to be for us.

The echoes of Eden are all over this. Just a few short weeks ago we began this journey, and we began the journey in the beginning and we watched the whole story unfold. There was a perfect person, Adam, and a perfect woman, Eve, which is why theologically Jesus is often called the second Adam, which is a little bit of a weird theological term. The point of the term is that Jesus was sinless like the first person ever created was. In other words, how it was supposed to be, fully human. And Jesus came to redeem people who had fallen and devolved into inhumanity but had gotten so used to it, that it was normal. The limitations of the fall had become normal. So now when we make colossal mistakes, an affirmation might be ‘you’re only human.’ But is that true? Have we’ve fallen to the point that we are not fully human, because if we were fully human we would look like Adam. We would look like Jesus.

Jesus came to call us back to ourselves again, creatures that are made in the image of God and intertwined with God inseparably. In the fall in the Garden of Eden that we read just a few weeks ago in Genesis chapter 3, that was blown to bits and mankind was separated from God. But Jesus wasn’t separated from God. He was fully human while being fully divine.

So these moments of exasperation start to make sense when we realize the frustration of God being here in person, as one of us, saying, “It's upside down what you’ve done. I’ve come to turn it right side up if you would just see what is happening here. If you would just believe. If you would allow your faith to engage, a faith that doesn’t know the word impossible, then if your faith was just the size of a mustard seed you could move a mountain.”

Faith is a force beyond anything we have ever created to get things done in this world. Jesus said, “You could tell this mountain to move from here to there and it would. Everything would be possible for you.” And isn’t Jesus just describing his own reality? And isn’t he plainly saying we can have that too? Or is this just a theological concept? We like to pour things into theological concepts so that we can explain them away sometimes or defer them or not have to deal with them. I don’t think Jesus is talking theologically here. I think he is just describing reality and it is frustrating. You can understand why. Beings created in the image of the creator, built and made to be intertwined with God and have authority on this earth to make it whole, to make it like it is supposed to be, have simply put limitations on what they think can be done.

As always, God does not usurp a person's will. He does not override. Love isn’t love, relationship isn’t true if there is no way out of it, if it is all forced. So it is a collaboration that we’re invited into where impossible isn’t something that really exists. I know that is pretty idealistic. It just wasn’t idealism to Jesus. It was reality and he was frustrated that we could not open our eyes and see it.

There is so much more for us all if we would open our eyes. And if we could just work hard enough to have the faith of a mustard seed, if we could just walk with God like Jesus did, like a fully human person did and that Jesus made possible for us all, then there is no telling what could be done in this world. Maybe we’re still settling for far, far less than the gospel offers us – full humanity, restored, regenerated, made new, renewed, new creatures. This is all over the New Testament. Maybe the door is open wide and we’re still settling for far less. And maybe that is frustrating to God because it certainly was to Jesus.

Prayer

Jesus, as we do many days, we invite you into this, into what you’ve spoken through your word today and even untangling that, even just beginning to peel the onion of ourselves and see all the limitations that we’ve placed on you because we’ve placed them on ourselves and all of the ways that we’ve just kind of fabricated a reality of impossibility that doesn’t exist. How are we going to pull that apart in the different areas of our lives? We could never really do it. All we can do is walk with you and invite your Holy Spirit. So come, Holy Spirit, and lead us away from this impossibility and show us what is possible, what it is you're sending us into, what is our mission right now, today and in the next season, how it is that we’re supposed to walk into impossible situations and then they become possible because we are there and you are there and we are collaborating, because nothing is impossible. Help us, Jesus, because this is too big for us. It always was too big for us. What we have is what is not too big for us, but what you are saying is there is so much more. You have only scratched the surface of what life can be when it is whole and intertwined with the Spirit of God within. So come Holy Spirit. Our focus is just getting our almost nonexistent faith to simply be the size of a mustard seed. Help us God. As we see you stretching us, as we see ourselves reaching precipices in our lives where we have to step out in faith, may we understand what you are doing is stretching us into who we were created to be. So often we get to those places where we have to step out in faith and we shrink back and pray against it. We can see why that would be frustrating because you invited us into so much more. Out of fear and lack of faith we have shrunk back. We have said no. We can’t go out beyond what we think we can manage and protect ourselves in. We don’t really believe. We don’t really trust. We don’t really have faith. In everything may we have faith. In the places where we don’t have faith, we invite your Holy Spirit into those things. May we understand that you are not trying to make us uncomfortable for your own pleasure, because you like to see us squirm. May we see that you are fathering us, you are maturing us, you are inviting us deeper into wholeness where nothing is impossible. Come Jesus, we ask in your mighty name, amen.

Announcements

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And that's it for today. I'm Brian. I love you and I will be waiting for you here tomorrow.

Community Prayer Requests and Praise Reports

Hi, this is Lisa, the Encourager. I just listened to January 20th and I was very moved by the message that Jesus, the parable that he had for us in the weeds and the wheat. I never really…you know, that kind of got brushed over in other parts of the story that Jesus talked about. I never really focused in on that, the weeds and the wheat. So I just want to encourage everybody, wherever you are right now, that we all, including myself, become strong, sturdy wheat in everything that we do and everything that we say and all of the ways that we interact with people and all the Dabbers out there will be strong wheat and that we won't be weeds and we’ll think about that and envision that because that was Jesus’ word to all of us. Remember to be the wheat. We long to be the wheat, not the weeds. So I'm going to pray for all of you Dabbers out there tonight. I'm going to encourage all of you in this prayer, you running by a road, you laying down in bed. Yes, you laying down in bed. You sitting down at a table getting ready to eat something as you listen to your Dabbers, everybody out there, this is for you, this prayer, and myself as well. Dear Heavenly Father, I pray, dear Lord, for all the Dabbers out there that want to be wheat. We want to be wheat for you. We want to be part of your Kingdom. We want you to be part of our lives. We thank you for that story that was so clear and so evident of what you want us to do. You don’t want us to be the weeds of this world. You want us to be strong. You want us to grow in the word, grow in the Holy Spirit, grow in our relationships, grow in our prayers. You want that for all of us, God. And I thank you so much.

Hi DAB family. This is Will from beautiful Bozeman, MT. It is 2-something in the morning of the 21st of January and I just got done listening to the January 19th podcast and Brian, your commentary hit me right where I'm sitting. I just so appreciate that. I'm one of those people who is stuck in the loop and earlier tonight before I listened to the podcast I was just sitting in my seat and I just said, “God, help me. Just be in my heart.” You know, I found myself kind of flaming and complaining. Here I know God has a ministry for me but other things are going on in my life with my home and family. My kids’ vehicles are breaking down and yet I'm in this loop. And it's my fault. I need to just trust God completely, be sold out. So even with margin, you know, making room for God in my life has been a challenge and a struggle as I set my heart and mind to do the things that I need to do and not follow through because either I'm worn out or oversleep or something. This is my first prayer request for this year. I wanted to just pray for the DAB, but I need to just confess this. So Father, I just lift my own soul and heart up to you and those other DAB family members who are in this loop, that God, you would help us to be faithful so that we could __________ so that you could trust us with what is so precious to you. Give us the strength we need to glorify you. Fill our hearts and…

Hi family. I love you guys so much and I pray for every one of you. This is my first year with you, as I used to just read the Bible myself. However, because of the seizures, I can’t read easily anymore so Daily Audio Bible is such an immense blessing. And to hear from every one of you is super wonderful. I'm pretty bedbound so I haven’t been able to leave the house since last Spring and I didn’t realize how much I was missing and I really do love to hear from each of you. I hurt when you hurt. I rejoice with you when your prayers are answered and I pray with you, for you. Both of my parents, they are long time listeners. My mom, Verna, has called in before. Please continue to pray for my sister battling with Lyme disease. She is also trying to get her nursing degree. I pray that she would be able to go to God every day and rely solely on him for her strength, that she would receive God's complete healing on every level. For myself, I am going to see a new doctor on the 27th and I'm really hopeful about it. I'm also nervous. I believe that she will help, but like the father of the boy that had seizures in the Bible said to Jesus, “I believe but help my unbelief.” It's just so many times before they haven’t been able to help, but I believe this time is different. I really do. This time they’ll find out why I have seizures, so many. Please, please pray with me that the doctor will have wisdom in this situation. I'm so thankful that…

Hi, I just called. I realized that I forgot to say my name. I'm Gigi from Gainesville and I had to hang-up earlier because I was starting to have a seizure. I'm really thankful to God for giving me the strength to call in. That was a prayer of mine that I’ve had for some time. I know that you will hear from me soon with another praise report and I hope to call in more.

This message is for Salvation is Mine in California. I just heard your plea for prayer today as you’ve been diagnosed with cancer. My name is Bob. I'm from Michigan. I too am sitting here with a diagnosis of cancer, but your plea made me realize that I need to be praying for you and not just for myself. My world has been centered around my cancer and my needs lately, but now I cry out to the Lord on your behalf. I don’t know what your local community is doing for you, but I can tell you that I am walking and breathing in the prayers of my local community from the Daily Audio Bible and all of the prayers just being lifted. May you be blessed and cling to Proverbs 3:5-6: Trust the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. I'm praying for you today. May your spirits be lifted and all your anxiety be given to him. God bless you.

Hi family. This is Francine from Tennessee. My heart has been broken for Brian in the loss of his mother and I’ve been praying for you, Brian. I am caring for my 81-year-old mother-in-law and my brother and sister and I pray that now that you have had the chance, that you could get some soul rest because caregiving is so emotional, taxing, tiring, hard, humbling, and beautiful at so many times. I'm going to read a quote from Beecher and I changed it to a lady. When the sun goes beyond the horizon, she is not set. The heavens glow for a full hour after her departure. And when a great and good woman sets, the sky of this world is luminous long after she is out of sight. Such a woman cannot die out of this world. When she goes she leaves behind so much of herself. Being dead, she speaks. You’re in my prayers. I love you family. Thank you for your prayers for my own mom.

Hi everyone. My name is Aretha from South Carolina. I’ve only been listening to the Daily Audio Bible since the beginning of this year and I have truly been blessed by it. It so encourages me. Brian, you’re awesome. I love the reading. I love just the understanding that I'm getting. And also I want to say Biola, I think I'm saying her name right, you, my lady, are so encouraging. I love how you are praying constantly for people and just your energy that you have for Christ. I love it. And I love the way that everyone is just coming on here and just being honest and open and just looking for help because you don’t find too many people who want to kind of put their business out there. I am just so thankful for this program and this family because you can’t find people that are right here with you that can give you the encouragement that you give here. I just thank the Lord for you guys. I'm just looking forward to continue listening, continue for the Lord to bless my life, and continue for the Lord to just bless you guys. I write down your prayer requests and pray for you guys. I want all you guys to pray for me and my family. My husband and I in church been filling our home and it has been a little aggravating, but I ask you guys to pray for that. And just pray for me, that I will grow mightily in the Lord. And I really thank you guys again just for your encouragement and your honesty.

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