#or maybe i'm just too easily influenced by other ppl's styles?

[zhukzucraft]

Can I just say how fascinating I find it that you can pull off all these different art styles? Like it's insane to me! I really like every single unique one I see everytime I see a post from you :D

my secret is that i'm several different tiny artists in a trenchcoat

[appledotcodotuk]

why the hive fckin suck at its job: a rant

spoilers for tgwdlm ahead!

first of all, it's important to consider what exactly the hive's job is. my answer is... who the fuck knows. literally. what is the hive's aim. what do you want Paul? more like, what do you want hive? let's find out!

it kinda evolves, as the play progresses. the intial aim of the hive, and one that does actually remain consistent is the constant burning need to grow and devour and gain more and more (insert capitalism metaphor here).

however, this is distorted by the people it possess who influence that aim, as we'll see later.

also the fact it crashes into a theatre displaying Mamma Mia gives the hive the motive it need to fit the world around it to the structure of the musical. having no originality of its own, the hive instead just picks up what is given to it. kinda like an evil baby.

it wants uniformity, that is indeed its ultimate goal and desire, no duh. it thinks it can achieve that through musical theatre, shame that the hive is dead wrong. cause the hive fucking sucks at its own job / aim / ultimate purpose / one concrete goal that motivates all its actions.

can't maintain control over its subjects

okay, so, the hive wants uniformity. it wants everyone to be dancing to the beat of its own tune. right? yeah. shame it literally can't keep its own possessed subjects in line at all. at the risk of sounding like the 10th doctor waxing lyrical abt humanity for the 50th time, humans are really difficult to control cause we're not really motivated by an altruistic allegiance to one primary good. we've got icky emotions that often move us to do stupid unpredictable stuff way more. it makes me wonder if the reason the hive wanted to use musical theatre to try and persuade ppl was cause it seems to think that is how theyll get emotive humans; through emotive songs. anyways. let's look at some examples shall weeeee?

Mr Davidson:

so, Mr Davidson. funnily enough, he's the guy whose in part acting as the hive trying to figure out what it wants through his interactions w/ Paul. every person it possess gives it just a bit more humanity and curiosity abt the world it is currently taking over. at least I think so. hence why as the musical develops u get character's like possessed!Alice wondering 'why does it hurt to love?' - the change in music and mood to something much more introspective really suggests to me that the hive is beginning to question the thoughts and emotions of its human hosts.

Mr Davidson is a family man through and through, he loves his wife Carol. she's his muse, his source of light. his feelings for her are not concrete or easy to explain and solve - hence why his sudden ahem demand of her is so hilarious and also jarring. it completely clashes with the 'I want song' which is simple, and often pushes forward a wider cause. not so with Mr Davidson, he just really loves his wife man. enough to break a frickin alien possession.

tbh I think its hilarious that (at least to me) the hive has to force him to forget and continue with the song, like, he straight up is just talking to his wife in that phone call, talking, not singing. so, no possession until he reverts back into song. ergo, the hive cannot maintain the uniformity it wants. even from the get go when theoretically its control should be stronger cause it has less ppl to co-ordinate. bad. at. its. job.

Paul:

this one hurts folks. yes, I know it's generally agreed, though somewhat debated that the state of Paul by the end of the tgwdlm is not purely possessed. I agree. once again, the hive is unable to truly enforce uniformity.

at this point, the motives of Paul and the hive are kinda just mixed, neither fully human nor fully alien. hence the constant shifts between pleeing for her to get away, to hide, to stay safe: 'what if the only choice is you have to sing to survive' and just full on old style hive nastiness 'let me puke in your mouth and just open your food bin girl' (so romantic 🥰 /j).

the hive has gone away from its original aim, and become something... different. no longer stuck to just one type of genre or style of song, it's really clever to show the developing complexity of the hive by showing how it is now juggling lots of different motifs with references to all the old songs from before recontextualised in a new way - its learning. evil baby... no longer uniform.

general miscommunication:

there are several instances of the hive not fully having uniform control over its subjects. for instance, right after not your seed with the three teens having to like... calibrate. they aren't just completely connected then?? also, this is a very small thing, but uhhhh at the end of inevitable when Paul is about to say the apotheosis is upon... the chorus interrupts him with USSSSSSS. interruptions??? not very in sync of u hive.

I think this inability to exert uniformity is also shown in the contrast between genre of musical theatre. my alien abomination cannot decide whether it wants to be the more modern edgy rock musical (join us (and die), not your seed ) or super happy go lucky old style musical theatre (lah dee dah dah day, and inevitable). it tries to do both, even while trying to encourage union, and sticking to one thing. hypocrite!!!!!

2. aims are guided by the people it possess

so, I mentioned this a bit already, but the hive isn't only mutating the humans, the humans are mutating the hive right back. this is more an interesting observation than any actual analysis but let's goooo.

greenpeace girl:

I think it's very likely that greenpeace girl is one of the first to be possessed. This is probably easily debunkable but whatever this analysis is flying by the seat or its pants anywayyyyy. why? cause where else would it pick up that whole 'this planet needs fixing' thing? it's interesting too, cause it morphs from expressing the desire to join hands and sing together, unity and peace with no actual action behind it. this then goes right to the other end, with the hive going 'fine I'll do it myself' and trying to save things by enforcing a dictatorship on the world. it develops and changes, and strays from its original means of accomplishing its aims! speaking oooooof...

3. inconsistent in means of accomplishing aims

okay, ur an evil hive mind. u think musicals are the way to win over these silly humans cause they're all weak and emotive and seem to respond to them. but, wait! schwoopsie! you haven't realised that for emotional depth and growth to mean anything, you need there to be established development and well... growth. otherwise the sentiments are as vague as the ones expressed in What Do You Want, Paul?

this show has genuine emotional moments, just not really during the musical numbers WITH EXCEPTIONS. any strife is smoothed over quickly, and so the development and change that would have to go into such growth is just gone. (see, You Tied Up My Heart) all so it can achieve its own desire to grow and grow and grow, maybe a metaphor for art being killed under late stage capitalism??

what actually matters is the impact the songs have afterwards, in causing a death - because we have a bond and care abt these characters. those short scenes between Paul and Emma are actually way more resonant than any song. except... inevitable, and also not your seed a bit. at this point the hive has learnt a thing or two, and can actually twist human emotion a little. but for it to do that, it has to reject the uniformity it prizes, and be adaptable. point towards being more human than it first thought? methinks so. and yet it's just not enough...

it's also why let it out, to me, feels really ingenuine. Paul has expressed himself in much better ways already. what they're doing is clearly paining him, and hurting the guy. he's terrified bless.

you can't force someone into being emotional vulnerable, man.

it's why all the deaths for the characters who are forced to express themselves are really violent, involving them being ripped open - literally forcing them to expose themselves from the 'inside out' as Alice reflects in Not Your Seed. you can't force genuine emotional connection, it has to be fostered, shown in the much more affecting relationship of Paul and Emma. the only reason the hive actually has power over our characters is because of these genuine emotional connections, which it tries and often fails to take advantage of, resulting in just resorting to brute violence. messy hive, very messy.

at the core, the musical's a kinda attack on that toxic positivity mindst: trying to force people to reach the sort of easy solutions by sharing feelings in a way that feels pretty invasive and deciding you are instantly fixed. the problems these characters face are jarringly not really what you'd expect a character in a musical to face, cheating, a lot of it, mid-life crisis. problems that are bland, or wayyyy too real. this is purposefully done, to reveal just how silly the hive's aim to use musical theatre to solve everyone's problem is. life is more complex than that smh.

4. a human can write a much more expressive, and genuine song than they ever could lol

u know which song I'm talking abt. what more is there to say. so much for making persuasive songs to tempt people over.

5. make me sad cause they took some perfectly nice ppl and funked them up 😭

this was a stupid point lol. basically I'm just bitter that this hive took a bunch of perfectly okay ppl and gave them hive brain. screw u hive. I swear I'm gonna watch Black Friday soon, cause I'm sure it's gonna completely destroy every thought I've had so far, but whateve,,, just take this as a look at tgwdlm like it's a stand-alone piece.

these guys are supposed to all be 'individuals' on one level, but also 'appendages of a much larger organism'. there's a little too much individualism and fracturing to be cohesive enough to do that I feel. the hive to me is not an infallible, unstoppable force, in fact, every human it takes over only brings it closer to understanding us. so that's maybe a slight positive note??? idk ?! I just have lots of thoughts and feelings abt this musical even if this doesn't make sense I'm proud i wrote it down hehe.

[ofcloudsandstars]

ratsintherosebush said:

OBSESSED with your takedown here. You've put so much I've felt into words, and done so very well. Thank you.

Hahahaha it’s been a rant bubbling for ages. Finally someone is like: what’s a hot take you got?? And it’s like that dam meme finally bursting. 

thegardenwolf said:

Your tags on your latest reblog of this are a shared feeling I'm always too nervous to voice... Just. Yeah. Being mixed race in America makes the idea of anarchy terrifying to me.

#I dunno I just don't like the idea of anarchy and having people do whatever the fuck they want #like reason 1) straight cis men are crazy #reason 2) white people are crazy #3) some people out here just need some laws I am just saying (look at things when there are already laws in place) #4) it's better to strengthen our education and cultural etiquette/respect of others and sense of community then strip away authority and -#-expect everyone to be able to take care of themselves and respect others and be ethical #cause they won't be lol #ethics are taught and they are cultural #I just feel like anarchy is some white ppls fantasy #some wild wild west type shit I just want some peace lol

Lol yeah I am mixed too along with having a uterus, being queer and knowing what the people in power feel about people like me and others they’ve deemed inferior, I don’t want a society where everyone just is free reign to do whatever they want especially when certain demographics are disproportionately armed and we still are harbouring toxic beliefs against marginalized groups. Especially somewhere that’s such a powder keg like America it will just feel like chaos. I don’t care about how many think pieces that’s out there or old outdated books by some philosopher white men which people masturbate intellectually over, it sounds like a terrible idea along with communism haha. 

I also don’t care about the potential some of these systems have like people are really trying to convince others to change an already hellish system (capitalism) for the potential promise of maybe a better system which real life examples have all proven to be equally as hellish. I don’t care about how these systems work in theory like in theory capitalism promises peace and everyone having a chance for a ‘piece of the pie’ and communism says the same thing and the biggest communist countries are hot ass corrupt dumpster fires that don’t care about it’s citizens wellbeing anymore than the hot mess corrupt dumpster fire of America does. And I find it so concerning after there is proof that Russia influenced America’s election that the pro-communism memes are less tongue-in-cheek and more a call to action.  

I don’t know why people need extremes. Maybe its a privilege of mine to have lived in some western European countries but like socialism is.. an option.. It’s chill.. Excess wealth gets redistributed. We aren’t denied our religious practices nor free health care. You can get free college and have 5 choices of cereal. I don’t know why people gotta think in extremes like.. 

And in extremes you can easily sow manipulation and corruption. Yeah not every socialist country is perfect, but the happiest ranked countries and most balanced life styles I’ve experienced have been in those systems. Like yeah Canada is also a mess full of racism and it’s own issues but there’s a reason why people are sneaking across the border despite cold ass winters that last half the year. I dunno I just feel like governments have a use and that is just to manage shit and be like housekeeping for the society and maybe politicians should not get paid a shit ton of money but be seen as our equals and get a standard liveable wage that can get them a normal sized house and maybe being a politician would have that same level of communal respect as like a teacher or mailman or firefighter or whatever instead of some corrupt overlord that can take away our human rights. 

Amber and orchard for the fall asks!

amber - share an unpopular opinion that you may have.

Hahaha this is like cracking open pandora’s box. I feel like I have too many. 

I think my primary one though is I absolutely despise capitalism’s affect on witchcraft. I DO NOT think it’s made it more accessible for people, I feel like the only very minor positive thing is that you can now tell people you are a witch and into tarot cards and they won’t find you as weird anymore. Otherwise people don’t realize how capitalism is a force that actually strips culture of it’s meaning in order to sell it for profit and it’s affects on this practice has left a lot of damage not just to some aspects that are sacred but towards the earth since it’s a practice that works really closely with nature. 

(added a read more to spare you poor scrolling souls from my rant lol)

Anyway what crapitalism does is it takes a culture and turns it into an easily consumable concept- almost like a brand, so that as long as you slap something ‘witchy’ seeming together then it qualifies as that brand. It boils everything down to an aesthetic. And no one has to actually believe in it anymore, or practice it or make any effort towards learning it or incorporating it into their lives. As long as they buy into the brand or embody the aesthetic then they count. Sometimes you can try to express that some traditions and materials and such do have meaning (I mean of course they do no one just sat around and made this shit up) people kind of have this nihilistic view that’s fed from this weird modern capitalist society that like: nothing truly has meaning anymore. But it’s like they are feeding this consumerist culture by repeating this mindset and gaslighting others when they appropriate magical practices or other cultures that are still very much alive and still tended to (often by indigenous people still being prosecuted) that are focused on working with the earth. 

Then you see this ripple effect on places like instagram or the big mainstream like magazines and shit and do not get me wrong cause there are a lot of cool and creative people that practice this that are on there but there is so much cashing into this field now and oversaturation that comes with seedy and shady background stories that show creators being completely disingenuous because they really just want to make money. And then going back to my point that this practice works closely with nature, capitalism exploited the fact that we like working with certain herbs, woods, crystals etc and is overharvesting and mining and tainting the very tools that we want to work with, with greed, pollution, child slavery etc. And it’s irritating cause you can make your own tools and don’t have to import anything and you can tell everyone how bad some industries are but they don’t listen cause they are buying into capitalism’s lie that they can sell you anything at a price, even if it’s sacred. Then if you try to defend your point they tell you that this is the only way it can be accessible to everyone, but it’s NOT accessible to everyone, it strips it away from people that could be working with these tools for generations and protecting the climates that these guides and resources for the tools grow in. It also disempowers people in their craft to begin with because witchcraft is about finding that connection to your own power and magic and the bridge with the universe’s power and magic and when you venture down into this practice you will find tools and guides local to you and find ways to make your own magical tools but capitalism disempowers us by telling us that we are not legit until we can put a price tag on it. So people don’t believe in their ability to find the sacred in themselves or nature, they just keep consuming whatever herb bundle or tool capitalism spits at them because it’s the only way to feel legit in this culture. 

And then since it’s seen more of a title or aesthetic and less of a way of life or set of ethics or practice, you have people interested in this spiritual or witchy community that don’t do any work or want to work on themselves that bring their shadow baggage into it. So you get racism seeping into it, homophobia, I also am so fucking confused how TRANSPHOBIA has made its way into here like transfolx are magical by just existing they are walking manifestations and works of alchemy like wtf; and like if you guys were friends with any queer people and hung out with them, they get the idea of magic, ritual and manifestation so well cause so much of their daily life already embodies some of that. But that’s a whole other topic. I vibed well with my queer friends on this and they were the only ones I could talk to about it before witchcraft became mainstream. 

 Then in general it’s seen as like radical if you tell people that are supposedly practicing witches that our energies should be focusing on restoring balance and we should put our energy towards healing nature or towards human rights (since humans are apart of nature) you will literally have witches being like: don’t tell me what to do!!! Like!! Gurl wtf lmaoo I don’t know how people claim to be empaths or into this but they don’t see that maybe if there was a so called “Great Awakening” to “Empower Ourselves” that’s probably what the fucking point was? Not to say that you need to spend every waking moment protesting (another contribution of capitalism- showing some kind of documented proof on social media that you stand for something instead of little daily actions embedded into your everyday life) but you can find ways to change your daily patterns to make space for the societal change that’s coming to bring in a more compassionate world and better community. But since we are so indoctrinated in this consumerist culture, so many people don’t know how to incorporate their values into their everyday lives anymore. It’s all about quantity and showing off on social media. And that negatively impacts witchcraft cause witchcraft is a daily practice you do little things for everyday that just gets embedded into your everyday life, but people get confused and think to be legit it’s something you gotta buy into or show off as proof with stylistic rituals and of course for many people that’s exhausting or financially inaccessible. 

And for the sake of clarity cause the internet hates using critical thinking sometimes, of COURSE you can have a fun and flashy craft I’m not saying you can’t, but there is a massive imbalance here I am pointing out with how people are developing insecurities because they cannot attain this aesthetic overnight without dropping a shit ton of money. Yes witchcraft is very aesthetic-heavy but that’s because it’s a really creative practice that people pour their creativity and energy into and capitalism saw a way to put a price tag on it and now it’s confusing everyone else that’s mistaking this as something else to consume in exchange for money. 

And then I hate that I feel often I cannot talk about this cause instead of people using their critical thinking braincells and realizing how bad capitalism is, they somehow turn this conversation into thinking that I just don’t like when a culture becomes mainstream cause not everyone should enjoy a culture or whatever and it’s like fucking hell of course I would LOVE more witches and to have more people into celebrating nature or finding their own magic and connecting to the universe and whatever, but capitalism isn’t helping at all. It’s separating us from it’s connection and the meaning behind it’s practice. (Also one day I dream of living in a witchy town or community so yeah, the more the merrier, but right now with capitalism, this method is not the way to get into this practice lol). 

You really see the negative effects of capitalism marketing witchcraft because people now treat it as like this commodity they can jump into without finding a way to genuinely connect with it cause it’s all just a gimmick until the next zeitgeist. This either manifests in two ways where they think they can just buy a book or read some posts and not do any work on themselves or thinking on stuff like cultural appropriation so when they start experimenting they might bring harm to themselves by evoking spirits that do not want to work with them, or taking in some sacred herb or substance that can fuck them up leaving deep psychological damage or death- or they can harm others in a myriad of ways. 

Then the other way it manifests are people feeling like witchcraft is suddenly inaccessible because you need money to practice it because capitalism put that veil over their eyes. It’s now another thing gatekept by money. So they try to reclaim it by being like: it’s just a title you can slap on yourself; but they give capitalism more power because that’s what capitalism was doing all along by stripping the meaning. Stripping it down to a concept that only matters as a label that evokes a brand or idea but not an actual practice. In a way it’s very counter culture to not buy into the aesthetic or put in effort anymore. Even if you want to put in effort you feel like you are not good enough cause you will never fit capitalism’s standards of quantity and money to spend to showcase it on the internet to feel legit. So people develop this no-effort approach to it. And ONCE AGAIN for clarity for the internet’s lack of critical thinking and jumping to conclusions I am NOT referring to anything like spoony witchcraft or energy based witchcraft (I am an energy witch primarily thank you very much) I am talking about people calling themselves witches but then when you want to sit down and chat about the craft they have a blank stare cause they were never serious and sometimes judge you for how much you cared about it cause they don’t really believe in it anyway. Not even cause it’s woowoo it’s cause capitalism doesn’t make you believe any anything anymore. The only thing it wants you to believe in is money and what you can consume with it.  

And then when people online try to talk about this and point out it’s a practice these guys get angry with you like you are gatekeeping but it’s like BITCH it’s a FREE FUCKING PRACTICE like GO TALK TO A TREE go COLLECT A ROCK YOU FOUND IN THE CLEAR STREAM OF A BABBLING BROOK and maybe you’d CALM THE FUCK DOWN. Capitalism making it seem like you gotta buy all this shit to be seen as legit is not what this practice is about and it makes me upset how there is like this massive group of people that want to access this culture but are so lethargic about actually doing anything because they are disenchanted and it’s really because they are mentally bogged down by capitalism’s grip on it making them feel like they aren’t shit cause they can’t afford all that bullshit that ain’t gonna help them anyway so they just call themselves witches to get them 2 drops of serotonin and feel included but never really go anywhere beyond that cause capitalism strips the fucking joy and meaning out of everything. The only reason why this bothers me is cause I could be staying in my lane drinking my herbs and shit and chilling but then people either judge me for the effort I put into my practice’s aesthetics thinking I am shallow and buying into this or they think I am being reckless and dangerous believing in something not real by practicing a craft that tbh has a lot of dangerous aspects to it so it’s not rated E for everyone. Like you can fit it to what you want it to be since it’s your journey but it’s always been a bit edgy in some ways and it’s annoying when you get people judging you now for your lifestyle or they wonder why you are so invested cause they don’t get it. 

Anyway that was a rant but you asked for it lol. 

orchard - share one thing that you’d like to happen this autumn.

Get some more weed 

Thanks for the asks lol. Kept the last one short haha but it’s true I have been trying to manifest for a while after my quarantine rations went out. Here are the autumnal asks if anyone else wants to ask or reblog them!