#populations have their numbers rising again. and as they do you see opinion shift to categorize them as nuisances to be controlled again

[lilies-of-the-fields]

[ID: a color-enhanced photo of a bluejay perched on stone. "Copyright Glynn Wilson, LocustFork.Net, 2010" written in small text at bottom left]

look at me. listen to me. this is directed at americans for the record. the reason you think North American animals are boring is because you live here. there are so many cool and beautiful animals here. we have beavers. we have wolves. we have moose. we have sea lions. we have armadillos. we have mountain lions. we have alligators. we have foxes. we have bighorn sheep. we have manatees. we have bears. we have ocelots. we have BISON. and that’s not even touching on the birds! or the turtles! or the snakes! we have amazing beautiful and diverse wildlife right here and it deserves to be appreciated and protected

[pinkmirth]

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷ (ch.1 | feenin')

—𝑶𝑵𝑬.

SERIES MASTERLIST | NEXT CHAPTER | WK: 2.8K

Frenzied cheers buzzed throughout the raving auditorium, the basketball’s reverberating bounces against the slick court floor adding onto the thrill. This match was nothing but hyped, but in a good way so.

The sports chants of the college goers sounded rather foreign to you, since it wasn’t like you attended Stohess University anyway. The fellow audience around you were at the edge of their seats, hailing their team’s basketball players as the raving shouts began to sound borderline intoxicating. So much so that you couldn’t help but clap along to another school’s anthem.

“Havin’ fun?” Marco questions, the corners of his mouth upturned into a smile that showcased his quirky dimples. You beamed right back at the freckled male, plush lips curved into a grin of your own.

It all seemed trivial, just a friendly collegiate basketball match that your friends Jean and Marco had invited you to free of charge, but it was all the break you needed from your own studies and more.

“Hell yeah I am,” you chuckled in reply, “but you know what’d make it better?”

His doe brown eyes flitted between you and the vibrant box of candy in hand, which was seemingly low in supply after you and him dipped your hands in for a bite a countless number of times.

“A refill on these, yeah?” His claims were just as what you were thinking, earning your brief nod of agreement. Marco subtly shook the snackbox within his hold, the spare pieces left beginning to rattle around with the motion.

“You read my mind, Coco,” you grinned, rising up from your reserved seat with spare cash stuffed into your back pocket. “I’ll be right back, ‘aight?” He sends you a brief smile in compliance.

“Get the sour patch this time!”

“You got sour patch money..?”

He pursed his lips momentarily, unsure as to whether you had been joking or not. “M’just messing ‘round with you, Coco,” you snickered with a teasing grin, slipping a hand into your pocket to retrieve the few bucks. “It’s on me.” Was all you said before making your way through the crowded stands, descending down stair after stair.

“It’s only the first game of the season, and our pride and joy, the Stohess Scouts, are already dominating tonight’s guest competitors!” the commentator boomed through the mic, their voice adding onto the various noises that filled the gymnasium. “We’re calling for a halftime, but let’s keep our fingers crossed that Kirschtein can pull through with a fair amount of two-pointers by the upcoming final quarter—“

The mentioned name of your close friend makes you beam with pride, content that your Jeanie was the star of the show. You set eyes on the brunette from where you stood, who was now making his way to the sidelines for a desperately needed and duly earned swig of water, his light brown hair in a disarray of stray strands fraying out from underneath the simple hairband you’d given him a while back.

You eagerly began to flit down the stands to reach him, striding past the poor row of benched players, from the injured to the water boy.

Jean eventually takes notice of your arrival and instantly beams, subtle puffs of air leaving his agape lips after all the running and dribbling and such that came with game day.

The first thing you do is taunt upon your arrival,“Y’all had better win, Jeanie.”

As always, Jean only smirks. “You doubting that I won’t bring that trophy home, Pookie?” you playfully grimaced and let out a stifled laugh over the somewhat embarrassing nickname— one that you made up when the pair of you were seven, and it's the same one that he’s been holding onto for all these years, even at nineteen.

“Well, I’d be lying if I said you aren’t lookin’ pretty damn promising out there,” your reply is genuine, the soft grin that you display causing Jean to display one of his own. It was an affable, never ending cycle— you’d tease and he’d do it right back, until the both of you would laugh over it and depart with a brief smile.

“M’getting snacks, I’ll be back before the breaktime ends, okay?” Kirschtein briefly nods in compliance, sending a few adjusting tugs to the white basketball sleeve hugging his bicep before departing with the sharp squeak of his shoes sprinting against the court floor.

Once again, you find yourself strolling past every individual seated on the benches. You’re speed-walking alongside them, anticipating to retrieve a couple snacks for you and Marco, until something— Someone catches your eye.

It was brisk and almost too sudden, but flashes of green meet your line of vision. You managed to make out the blur of thick brows, long dark hair having been thrown into the messiest attempted bun, a modest, charming smile, and a pair of turquoise irises that seemingly peered into your own with an intensity that made you take it personal. Yet, you hardly even caught a good glimpse of their face, whoever they were.

You passed by said person a good thirty seconds ago, already pushing your way past the double doors and over to the vending machines stationed along the semi-populated hallway, but that striking gaze was still heavily implanted within your mind.

Hazy green-grey eyes, you recalled, accompanied with them shooting you the briefest grin just as you whisked by. Though, as recent as it was, that was all in the past now.

You glance around to see a decent handful of people here to buy food of their own, being perched at other vending machines. The snack-wielding contrivance before you isn't drawing much attention and doesn’t have an awaiting crowd standing around for a bag of potato chips, so you withdraw the dollars from your back pocket and attempt to straighten them out a bit before inserting them into the slot.

“Wow,”

This sudden breathy gasp from a “random whoever” is something that you take notice of, but it isn’t enough to rip your attention away from your scavenge for Marco’s sour patch. To their dismay, you do nothing but continue with what you came to do. In your opinion, whoever that was had been getting a bit too close for comfort..

Albeit the evident way you choose to ignore, another whistle resounds, along with an unpleasantly suggestive hum. It sounds somewhat louder, and it seems much closer than before. You can’t help but tear your gaze away from slot E7 and look up, since it seems so directed towards you.

You've hardly turned around before being met with the abrupt presence of a stranger uninvitingly looming beside you, the man’s beaming grin seeming sickeningly sweet. Almost too approachable.

“Oh, I’m sorry to pop up out of the blue,” his apologies come out within a chuckle, and as inviting as he attempts to seem, your brows only furrow. “—but you really caught my attention!” He was greatly unfamiliar to you, some white male around your age with shaggy auburn hair and chestnut colored eyes in contrast. Despite his subtle charm, you weren't growing a liking to him and his stupid little smile.

“Oh,” You muse with a dull hum, pursing your glossed lips before releasing them with a slight pop, “Did I really?” His nod is too enthusiastic, and you hardly try to cover up the mug-like expression that overtook your features, eyes grazing across his plain face uninterestedly. You promptly slide the dollars right back into your pocket, “Nice to know. Can you mind your own now?”

“Wait! I'm not meaning to be a bother, but.. I don’t see girls like you around much..” You're instantly encased with a shiver of deep cringe, one that annoyingly scurries up your spine and makes your lip twitch into a vexed glower.

You emitted the most exaggerated huff, shifting your weight from one foot to the other, all the while glancing at the sheen glass of the vending machine to see your own reflection. It was plastered all across your face, yet this dense-ass man still couldn't get it; you were pissed-off.

Great. You internally groan, Another snow roach who thinks I’m exotic.

“I really appreciate how different you look,” Was he really still rambling on, despite knowing damn well that you were growing uncomfortable? Or maybe, he was just an utter dumbass and couldn't take the painfully obvious hints.

“You wanna know what I’d appreciate, hm?” You say sharply, taking a swift inhale through your nose, “If you left me alone.”

Your smooth, placid voice was the first thing that Eren heard when he trotted into the hallway, that of which sounded dulcet and intriguingly accentuated, but more annoyed than anything else. He turns the corner and is met with the sight of a bastard that looked too smug for his own good, and a girl, such a pretty girl, whose melanated skin even found a way to gleam under the shitty fluorescent school lights.

It then clicks in Eren’s mind, briefly but distinctively. You were the person who'd strolled by the bench that he was sitting on earlier. You were also the same one who did a double take upon seeing him, glancing once— No, twice, with those captivating eyes of yours. He remembered the way his leg started to bop along the floor with a newfound excitement that he just couldn't place. Though, more than anything else, Eren recalled that he did the exact same; hold his gaze and grin at the sight of you.

“Ah, but you can spare me a minute more, can’t you?” You respond with the swift roll of your eyes, eliciting an exasperated groan, “Nigga, I said bye.” Eren’s thick, neat brows falter into a furrowed position, looking upon the scenario that was being splayed out before him, which everyone else in that hall was seemingly content with ignoring. It couldn't have only been him that saw that this bastard was relentlessly bothering you, could it?

“Woah, no need to get aggressive,” Eren’s expression contorts into a grimace upon hearing every little word, the tips of his ears red with brewing rage. Despite his matured will to control his daily outburst of emotions, it was safe to say that he'd never exactly gotten past his trial of anger issues since he was a kid.

“Listen, this is my nice way of tellin’ you to fuck off, but I can get aggressive if you want.” Your offer sounds downright threatening, “Do you really want that?”

You’re snappy and direct, and Eren can't deny that he likes that. Though, as much as he's growing fond of your strong will and defensiveness, he knows he can't stand idly by all day, he just can't. Besides, everyone knew well— It was practically Eren Jaeger’s forte to intervene.

The green eyed male eventually begins to make his way towards the scene in the form of subtle limps, being cautious of his ankle sprain as he grows closer, which was the reasoning behind him being benched in the first place.

You were much too preoccupied with that cheeky, unrelenting bastard to notice the way that Eren was gradually coming over, anyway. What could he say? He was a fan of the element of surprise.

You halt in the middle of your opposing rant, growing aware of another’s emerging presence. You're yet again bombarded with somebody else making their way beside you with an act of stealth that you were unknowingly soon to be thankful of.

Before you get the chance to merely peer in their direction, tall, a long haired male clad in the black and grey Stohess basketball uniform is towering alongside you, his toned, burly arm slinking around your shoulder.

This sudden proximity leaves your head spinning in the best way possible, and how could it not? You don’t know a single thing about this alluring stranger, but he’s close, so close, and it gets your heart and mind racing miles in a minute. You were subtly, but instantly enraptured once the weight of his arm rests comfortably upon you.

Eren doesn’t pay the confused male not one glance, but instead tends to you and your own state of delighted shock. “Play it cool, alright? I wanna help.” Your breath instinctively hitches once he leans down to ease out his whispered plan into your ear, flashing you a consoling half smile.

You return a brief nod before dragging your eyes along the male’s face, which looks so much better up close. Your interpretation of his image was more literal and precise than you thought to be; The dark, long tresses that had been pulled back with the aid of a thin elastic scrunchie, his expressively thick brows, pink lips that upturned into a supportive smirk, and those sea-green eyes that left you feeling weak right in the knees.

Albeit Eren’s prior grin, he eventually turns his attention towards the unrelenting man for a second or two. In that moment, his expression speedily grew all the more intense, practically sharper than before, and contorted into something of a scowl. Although, you can tell he’s trying so hard to channel his temper and mask away his revulsion.

“I’ve been, ah.. waiting for you to come back to your seat!” Eren begins to improvise, flashing you a subtle gleam that made it seem as though the pair of you were familiar with each other. “S’been a while since then."

He purses his lips within a pause, nimble fingers draping along your shoulder before shooting you a reassuring squeeze, "Is it ‘cause this bastard is keeping you occupied? He’s bothering you, isn't he?”

You're damn near close to stammering over the words that were bound to leave your mouth. Though, it doesn't take much for you to regain yourself. Your lips fall slightly agape all the while you briskly dragged your line of vision along his charming features, but your response follows after in a quick manner. It was just that you couldn't help how his unnerving gaze left you mesmerized.

“—Yes. Yes he is.” You hum, accompanying the claim with your hands crossing over your chest as you leaned into his grasp, in an attempt to appear convincing. Your confession sounded assured and stern, which was the complete opposite of how girls would act around him.

Eren knew well of the doting effect that he had on females— It was hard to forget when he’d merely ask for a spare pencil and wind up with an unasked phone number in return. Though, he admired the way you saw him as any other person and played along so well.

The brown-haired male scornfully laughs, and just the sound of him leaves you feeling uncomfy, “Whaddya' mean? We were just having a small chat, isn't that right?” Your contorted expression is full-fledged disrespectful, and Eren has to stifle his chuckle over your unsmiling glare and scrunched up nose. Damn, were you entertaining.

“Small chat, huh? Well, it was real one sided..” You voice out an irked murmur, “You're over exaggerating, you just haven’t warmed up to me yet—”

“If I didn’t know any better,” Eren makes a very much intended interruption, “I’d say that she doesn’t want to mingle with a sorry bastard that should leave her alone already.” You note at the subtle flex of Eren’s clenching jaw, signifying the way his already weary patience was running rather thin.

“Bastard—? Wait, who even are you?”

“Who am I, huh?” scoffs the green eyed male alongside you, a twinge of drawled hesitance in his voice. Eren pauses momentarily, only now beginning to realize that his little hero act wasn’t as planned out as he thought to be.

What could he say that would be persuasive enough to get this sorry fucker to leave you alone other than throwing fists unnecessarily? Jaeger’s emerald-hued eyes eventually light up in the dawn of an idea. One that he’s somewhat unsure of, but it’s much better than nothing.

Besides, this plan of his had been set in stone by the very moment he had draped his bare arm around you and shot you that all-too-suggestive smile, so he might as well finish what he started.

Eren’s touch trails downwards swiftly, spreading riveting tingles from your shoulder down to your forearm, then along your wrist, and even past there. His hand is now encasing the left side of your hip as his lithe fingers press into the curve of your supple waist. He takes a light inhale, giving you a light squeeze with his large palm, as though signaling for you to brace yourself over what he was bound to say.

“—I'm her boyfriend.”

—𝑭𝑰𝑵.

[theramseyloft]

i read your long pigeon poop post, and after some poking around online i saw that a loft in melbourne australia failed. do you have any idea why that is?

Oh... my fucking God. I am so furious.

Look at this thing!

$70,000 went into this monstrosity?

It looks like they converted a fucking water tower by punching holes in it and welding on entryways shaped like the stereotypical toddler’s first house drawing!

Who fucking researched this?!

Was it designed by a committee purely by aesthetic?!

Here is an article I found on it’s decomission and removal.

https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/melbourne-city-councils-70000-pigeon-loft-turned-into-scrap-metal-20160724-gqcmsc.html

According to the pigeon expert quoted in this article: 

“Frank Hayes is the president of the Australian National Pigeon Association. While his group is mostly interested in show pigeons, a different breed to the city pests, he says it was fairly predictable the coop idea was never going to work.”

“ "The nature of the pigeon is that they find a home and they stick with it. So finding them somewhere else to go is a bit of a dream," said Mr Hayes.”

“ "Trying to shift them is one big headache. It's a worldwide problem and no one has ever figured out how to deal with it." ” 

LOOK at this structure!!!

It’s made of fucking METAL!!!

In AUSTRAILIA!!!

In the fucking OPEN!!!!

From this charming article:

 http://melbournedailyphotodaily.blogspot.com/2011/03/pigeon-loft-batman-park.html

“The loft is painted with light coloured corrosion resistant to reflect the heat and minimise internal over-heating. It houses two hundred nesting boxes for pigeon breeding. Eggs laid will be replaced with artificial eggs intended as a humane way to control and reduce pigeon numbers.”

That is a metal structure in the Melbourne sun...

No amount of Paint is gonna make that less an oven.

And I can’t imagine you can add anything to paint to make it corrosion resistant that isn’t noxious in a small space when the metal under it heats up.

“Bird feeding around the loft base is permitted to attract birds out of the CBD to this area. Bird feeding is not permitted in any other area around the CBD.”

But the city council is not actually providing the birds with good quality fed...

“... and no one has ever figured out how to deal with it."

No one, you ignorant twit?

NO ONE?!?!

Here is the site of a successful branch of the German Stadttauben Projekt, translated:

https://stadttauben-stuttgart.de/

“The Stuttgart pigeon project

Dear prospective customers,

nice that you found our homepage. We would like to introduce our project to you on the following pages:

The Stuttgart City Pigeon Project is an animal welfare-friendly concept for regulating and reducing city pigeons for the benefit of people and animals. We operate several supervised pigeon shots in the Stuttgart city area, in which the pigeons are cared for and their eggs are exchanged for dummies so that no offspring hatch. By the end of 2019, there had been well over 45,000 eggs. By feeding grain mixtures in our shots, the animals are no longer forced to look for food on the streets and squares in the area. They spend 80% of the day and the entire night in the dovecote. Ergo - your droppings also stay there and no longer land on roofs or balconies.

We were awarded the Baden-Württemberg State Animal Protection Award 2015 for our commitment .

The city pigeon is one of the most successful residents of the urban living space and today populates all major cities worldwide. It is the free-living descendant of the wild rock pigeons from the coastal and mountain areas in Africa and Eurasia. Long ago, the rock pigeons were domesticated by humans primarily for the purpose of meat production and thus also carried to our latitudes and cities. In modern times, the stock of the archetypal rock pigeon increasingly mixed with breeding, racing and sports pigeons that either escaped, were abandoned or, exhausted by exhausting competitive flights, ran aground in the cities. Today's city pigeons are the overgrown children and children's children of these rock, breeding and sports pigeons.

In cooperation with the state capital of Stuttgart, the Tierschutzverein Stuttgart und Umgebung eV launched the pigeon project in 2008. The cooperation was formed with the aim of bringing about a permanent and humane solution to the city pigeon problem.

The concept of the Federal Working Group for City Pigeons or the so-called * Augsburg Model * was helpful. It is based on scientific publications, practical experience and has already been successfully recommended by several federal states such as Hesse, North Rhine-Westphalia and Baden-Württemberg. Today it is implemented in more than 80 German cities and towns. For example, there are pigeon houses looked after in Aachen, Augsburg, Hamburg, Berlin, Frankfurt, Saarbrücken and Wuppertal.

We aim for a small, supervised and healthy pigeon population in Stuttgart. Then the image of the city pigeon may rise again. Because healthy animals, which have a permanent home and receive animal feed, do not bother anyone!”

https://stadttauben-stuttgart.de/?page=1,0,0,Chronik+%26+Fakten

“Care instead of fighting: our chronicle

2008:The first step was a dovecote at platform 1 in Stuttgart main station

2009:The second blow was made in the roof of the Leonhardskirche

2009:The third pigeon house was on the Mühlgrün parking garage in Bad-Cannstatt, which has since been demolished and replaced by the pigeon tower in the rope

2010:The fourth facility was the pigeon tower in the city garden on Max-Kade-Weg

2011:The fifth pigeon house stood on the roof of the town hall garage until February 2016. Reconstruction on the roof of the city comb in April 2016.

2011:The sixth dovecote was a second stroke on the roof of the Leonhardskirche (other roof side)

2013:The seventh dovecote was built in the roof of the Fairkauf building in Stuttgart-Feuerbach

2014:The eighth pigeon loft was built (as a replacement for the location at the main station) on a flat roof in the Kriegsbergstrasse

2016:Dovecote number 9 was inaugurated in July 2016 at the Marienplatz in Stuttgart in the roof structure of the imperial building

2017:

On Landhausstrasse in the east of Stuttgart, we were able to set up dovecote No. 10 in the attic of a residential building. It was opened in June 2017

2018:In summer, an indoor pigeon tower was opened at Seilerwasen in Bad Cannstatt as a replacement for the Mühlgrün pigeon house

2019In autumn a new pigeon facility was inaugurated at the station in Zuffenhausen and the first egg was laid in December.    

In addition, a dovecote (trailer) on the grounds of the shelter Stuttgart and Nistwand for about 30 pigeons on the will of the ASPCA Stuttgart  House  Adam Müller-Guttenbrunn in Stuttgart Zuffenhausen care.

... more dovecotes are to follow!

Health hazard facts

A health hazard due to pigeons flying around, running and sitting can be largely excluded. New scientific studies have shown (again) that pathogens that may be contained in the pigeon droppings are usually bird-specific and are therefore not transmitted to humans. This was confirmed in 1995 by the Federal Ministry of Health.

The general classification of the pigeon as a pest was withdrawn by the Federal Institute for Consumer Health Protection back in 1989 on the basis of research results at the time and the opinion from 2001.

Feed facts about pigeons

Feeding pigeons in Stuttgart is prohibited on public land. Well-meaning pigeon friends increase the population density of the city pigeons by regular feeding in the same place, without offering the additionally attracted animals sleeping and nesting places where they are tolerated or the clutch can be exchanged. This creates people who work there or often live more pigeon hate and more pigeon misery.

Above all, too many food scraps are thrown away on the streets and squares of the city! This waste is mostly not compatible with pigeons. They lead to illnesses, shortages and thus, among other things, to the unsightly liquid starvation. Nevertheless, due to the scarcity of bird-friendly feed in cities, these human foods are usually the main basis for the feeding of city pigeons, but their organism is designed for pure hard grain feed. So this means sick pigeon populations that nonetheless reproduce disproportionately due to their (pet) genes raised by humans.

If you would like to help sustainably, please contact us. Only other supervised dovecotes in the city area (including food and egg exchange) start at the root of the "problem". We welcome any support!”

From their gallery:

Here is a loft.

Small, wooden, well insulated from heat and cold.

Those openings are not the nests. They are just doorways with a landing ledge designed around the comfort of pigeons, which are social birds.

Here is the inside.

Lots of comfortable nest boxes, perches in the back, food, water, comfortable socialization space...

Here is an entry into another loft currently in use.

Here is the inside.

Water and feed are provided by the care takers. You can see feed and drinking stations all over the floor.

And this is the inside of a huge new loft in Frankfurt.

These German Taubbenhauses are designed around meeting the birds’ needs for food, comfort, safety from the elements, and socialization with their flock mates.

None of these birds had to be coerced or forcibly relocated.

Because their needs were better met, they came on their own.

Look at the $70,000 Melbourne monstronsity again!

More specifically, look at the bridge behind it.

And tell me where you would rather me.

Compact metal tower designed exclusively around convenient human access, metal nest boxes, 0 landing platforms, no socialization space, no protection from the elements, still no choice but to forage for what ever garbage people toss you...

or the comfortably Cool space under a concrete bridge with a convenient water source.

Three guesses what’s more comfortable for the pigeons.

Now, would you rather live under a bridge with constant noise from traffic, open to predators, 

or

A well insulated apartment building with comfortable suites, a spacious common area, and a nutritious free meal plan with clean water included by default.

"It's a worldwide problem and no one has ever figured out how to deal with it."

My ass, Mr. Hayes!

[notebook-13]

BNHA History

Alright! I decided to assemble what we’ve been told about how society has changed since the advent of quirks. So here’s a rough timeline + my speculation.

Distant Past

≈200 years ago

The birth of a glowing baby signaled the beginning of superpowers. Considering the tremendous chaos that followed, I think it’s likely that the onset was fairly rapid—the glowing baby was the first of a lot of people all at once born with superpowers (or, it was the first baby born with a noticeable superpower). Crime skyrocketed, the law became meaningless, humanity came apart at the seams.

Why there was such an explosion of crime and chaos hasn’t been directly addressed; presumably it’s because early metas were violently shunned as nonhuman, and because new powers entailed the opportunity to use them.

Under these conditions, All for One rose to prominence. He used his meta power to win slavish loyalty, granting powers to those who desired them and removing them from metas who rejected them. His manipulation of his devotees was so great that he didn’t need to give them orders: they anticipated his will and acted on it. He didn’t tolerate dissent and crushed those who defied him. (ch193)

AfO’s period of de facto rule is not included in history books (he persists as a myth), so it’s unlikely that he occupied an official, publicly recognized position. But his rule apparently stretches from approximately the advent of quirks till the battle of Kamino Ward. (ch59)

However, AfO’s younger brother opposed him. AfO punished him by forcing on him a “useless” power-stocking ability. This power fused with the brother’s latent ability to transfer his ability, and the brother was able to pass it on. Over the next two centuries, the OfA holders continued to pass it on, largely to whoever happened to be nearby when they were dying instead of to selected proteges. (ch59, 257)

Relatively soon after the advent of superpowers, the police foreswore using them as weapons in order to keep the trust of the public. Vigilantes emerged to fulfill this role, attempting to mete out justice, and at some point the government authorized certain people (heroes) to use their powers offensively to enforce the law. Heroes were heavily criticized at first, but they eventually developed public support thanks to their strict adherence to the law (according to police chief Tsuragamae). (ch56)

According to the bnha spinoff Vigilantes, the government classified vigilantes into heroes or villains based on public opinion of them. (ch13)

MLA Era

How long ago was the Meta Liberation Army active?

Ch232: Redestro weakly implies that Destro was born before the beginning of heroes as a profession. This early date would also coincide with writing legislation to authorize heroes to use their powers to apprehend any other meta who used their ability.

Ch238: the MLA was in hiding for generations, plural.

Ch223: Redestro states the MLA has trained for “many generations”

So…somewhere between seventy years ago and more than a hundred years ago?

Regardless of the exact dates, Destro was born into a borderline period when there was intense prejudice against metas and official effort to coexist peacefully. When his mother defended him by claiming his power was a mere “quirk,” she was killed by a mob.

Sometime later, when the government drafted legislation to (supposedly?) promote peaceful coexistence, they recalled her idea of “quirk” and tried to use it as part of their reform. Destro, now an adult, opposed this and their reform, asserting that this was not the world his mother envisioned when she’d said “quirk.” (ch232)

He rallied metas to his cause, to bar any restriction of meta ability use, and the MLA fought the government for several years before defeat. It dissolved, many of its members in jail, including Destro himself. He penned his autobiography and then killed himself. (ch218)

Post-MLA, Pre-Symbol of Peace

Unknown number of years ago

Villain: “Seems like no one’s willing to break the law nowadays. All this whining about not selling out their friends. It’s a real pain. […] Man, I miss the days before All Might came along… I was young, and this country was a way more impulsive place.” (ch57)

Yagi: “I believed that this country needed a symbol so I started dashing headlong towards that goal. A shining light…hope. A wake-up call for everyone. As I ran, I swore I’d become that sort of man. People always had these worried looks. All the heroes in the world couldn’t slow the rising crime rates. Much more than now…they were truly scared.” (ch165)

This was an apparently cutthroat, impulsive period where efforts to curb chaos continued but found limited success. Crime was on the rise, something Yagi attributed to the idea that there wasn’t anyone (a “pillar”) for people to rely on. (ch93)

≈70 years ago

When Ujiko proposed his “paranormal singularity theory,” he was roundly rejected and mocked. Due to his own struggles with housing multiple quirks, AfO recognized how prescient Ujiko’s warning was, and he reached out to recruit Ujiko. (ch270)

(Note: Ujiko’s use of “paranormal” could mean he proposed his theory before “quirk” became the standard term, meaning “quirk” could be a rather recent change of language.)

≈35 years ago

AfO killed Nana. All Might was eighteen; he subsequently went to America to complete his training.

Symbol of Peace Era

≈30 years ago – Battle of Kamino Ward

Deku: “Ever since he appeared on the hero scene, his strength has won him undisputed popularity. Every year that he’s been active has seen a marked decrease in the appearance rate of villains. His existence alone is a deterrent to villainy.” (ch2)

Gran Torino: “[Stain’s] ideals and opinions…they’re gonna get out there. On the net. In papers and magazines. On TV. This age we live in, for better or worse, is one of suppression. But mark my words—people are gonna be influenced by this.” (ch57)

Shigaraki: “It’s not crazy to imagine that someone could commit an atrocity at any given moment. So why do they smile and mingle like this? Because the laws and rules are built on their individual morality, they’re convinced that ‘No one would ever do that.’” (ch69)

Shigaraki: “The reason these fools can smile and live their lives is cuz All Might’s always got that grin on his face. Smiling wide, as if to say there’s no one he can’t save!!” (ch69)

Deku: “All Might. Was there ever a time you really couldn’t save someone…?” Yagi: “…? … Sure. Plenty of times. Right now, somewhere out in the world, someone could be hurting or dying. It sucks, but I’m only human. I can’t save people who are out of my reach… That’s why I stand tall and smile. I’m the Symbol of Justice. The citizens…heroes…villains…I need to light the way for all of them.” (ch70)

Kid: “Nowadays people expect different things from heroes than they used to. It’s all about the entertainment factor and approval ratings.” (ch144)

Shigaraki: “You heroes pretend to be society’s guardians. For generations, you pretended not to see those you couldn’t protect and swept their pain under the rug. It’s tainted everything you’ve built. That means your system’s all rotten from the inside with maggots crawling out. It all builds up, little by little, over time. You’ve got the common trash, all too dependent on being protected. And the brave guardians who created the trash that need coddling. […] I don’t care if you don’t understand. That’s what makes us heroes and villains.” (ch281)

After about two centuries of chaos, Japan achieved stability after All Might established himself as the Symbol of Peace. All Might was specifically noted to have demolished most organized crime, so that villain teams were relatively rare (ch83, 115, 125). As Shigaraki put it, now people could go about their lives confident of their safety because All Might convinced them that everything will be alright, a hero will take care of them. This was true to the extent that people would flock to the sites of hero/villain battles to take photos and videos.

Whereas, as Twice put it, if you were on the wrong side of the law, then All Might’s catchphrase “I’m here” was a curse, something to fear and loathe. Gran Torino characterized this era as an age of suppression, as in, the symptoms were suppressed, producing superficial stability, but the underlying conditions hadn’t changed.

During this period, the industry of heroism shifted to over-emphasize heroism as public entertainment, rewarding attention-grabbing stunts and PR skills over humbler virtues.

This shift inspired Stain the Hero Killer to enact a purge of unworthy heroes in order to revive true heroism. He deeply impressed society, and, despite his murders, he became a popular figure. His ideals provoked some people to question whether society’s heroes were “true heroes,” while others disregarded his ideals and simply found him cool.

During this era, 80% of the population had a quirk. Whether that statistic was stable or if it was an effect of demographics (ie, most quirkless people are elderly and almost all kids have quirks) hasn’t been specified.

This era could be separated into All Might’s Bronze, Silver, and Golden Ages, each with a different costume.

≈30 years ago

All Might debuted in Japan, and he kicked off an unprecedented era of stability.

5 years ago

All Might fought and “killed” AfO.

Age of Endeavor

Battle of Kamino Ward – Present (ch283)

HPSC: “All Might had it all…power with enough charm to win the people over. The gulf between him and the perennial runner-up was always huge… I doubt we’re gonna find someone that charismatic again anytime soon.”  Mera: While we’re waiting for the next All Might, hero squads with a focus on team unity are gonna have to fill the gap. This order from up high is meant to make some headway on that front… (ch111)

Miyagi (newscaster): “If we’re being honest, I think All Might just got too big for our own good. So big that we lost sight of things. […] As for us, we shouldn’t just passively protect the status quo. Isn’t it our duty to bring back a culture of excitement around heroes?” (ch115)

Kid: “We know what’s up. Mom and dad and the TV all ask the same thing. ‘Are the heroes doing okay?’ …We know. We’re better than them!” (ch165)

Hawks: “That guy earlier, screaming ‘Long live metahuman liberation’…this [rumors of nomu sightings] is kinda like that. They republished some old-school criminal’s autobiography, and it’s flying off the shelves. I’m thinking that’s influencing people. That stuff tends to sell best when society’s feeling unstable, right?” (ch186)

Gentle: “What counts as a spectacle is a question for the current generation. We shall go to the source [UA]—the source that enchants our society.” (ch171)

Newscaster (surveying the stampede of fleeing civilians during Endeavor’s nomu battle): “This is society without a Symbol of Peace!!”  Can’tcha See-kun: “Stop saying that crap already!! Open your eyes before spouting off on TV! Especially at a time like this! Look! Those flames’re still rising up! You see ’em, right?! Endeavor’s alive and fighting!! So don’t give up just cuz the other guy’s gone! There’s still a dude out there risking it all for us!! Can’tcha see?!” (ch189)

Kuraishisu (newscaster): “In the past, a situation like this [the destruction of Deika City], where heroes were forced to make a difficult call, would have earned those same heroes criticism, but I suspect we may be witnessing a critical turning point in this era. A large-scale shift in opinion from criticism to passionate support.”  Uraraka: “Feels like everything’s different ever since the ‘Can’tcha See kid’ did his thing.”  Ashido: “It’s all cuz Endeavor kicked butt!” Mt. Lady: “Y’think the future’s bright? Not so fast!! It might seem like the winds of good fortune are blowing our way, but if you stop and think about the flip side of all this…it’s actually coming from a sense of urgency—it’s a response to danger! These cheers for the conquering heroes are really prayers—a plea that we emerge victorious! They’ve had enough of the showbiz side of heroism and want us to prove our worth for real now!” (ch241)

Mineta: “Not too long ago, she didn’t give a crap about anything except being on camera…” Aizawa: “Mt. Lady’s not the only one who has changed. Every hero out there is being pulled up by the number one’s rising ride.” (ch241)

After All Might retired, uncertainty gripped Japan as people wondered what would happen now. A strong consensus agreed that Endeavor wasn’t suited to fill All Might’s boots, something reflected in how the crime rate went up 3% in the month after Kamino, and reflected in how people suddenly became interested in reading the MLA ideology of rejecting heroes and protecting themselves.

During Endeavor’s battle against the nomu, the press attributed the public’s frantic stampede—ignoring heroes trying to guide evacuation—to the public’s lack of trust in Endeavor (and heroes generally) now that All Might was gone. Public trust improved after the nomu battle, especially thanks to Can’tcha See-kun.

Within a month after the battle, expectations shifted. People had enough of showbiz heroism and wanted the heroes to walk the talk and protect the public against villains, to the extent that comfortable armchair criticism was replaced a passionate support driven by fear of villains.

Miscellaneous Questions

When did “hero” become a recognized profession?

When did the hero ranking system begin?

When did the celebrity culture around heroes develop?

When did “quirk” come into common use?

How old is Yagi? How long ago did he debut in Japan and begin the era of peace?

How old is AfO? How long after the advent of quirks did he come to power?

When did AfO recruit Machia?

When were the nomu invented?

When did humanity pass the point of quirk singularity? (ch193)

[skepticalcatfrog]

Among The Stars Chapter 4

First Chapter Previous Chapter Next Chapter

Summary: Logan Watts is a famous scientist, known by almost everyone in the galaxy. His most famous invention is his friend and assistant, a healthcare android named Patton. When they are called to another planet for a meeting with the local ruler, they're expecting a completely normal trip. Little did they know, this trip would send them into a daring adventure to protect their galaxy and stop a war. Teamed up with unlikely friends, including a runaway gladiator and an infamous crime trio, Logan and Patton have to figure out how to make peace and save their universe (and beyond) from being destroyed.

Pairings: (Eventual) Logicality, Prinxiety, and Demus

Word count: 3,068

Author's Notes: The last three chapters were mostly introductory, but in this one things are finally starting to come together!

Logan stared at the sky, dumbfounded. His last chance of escape was gone. Patton was gone. He had to do something, to figure out how to get off of this planet. He speed walked out of the parking lot, not wanting to run so he didn't draw too much attention to himself. He walked up to the first person he saw, a woman with purple crystals around her eyes.

"Excuse me, does this planet have any type of public interplanetary transportation?" He asked. 

The woman glanced at him and walked away. He figured that there wouldn't be any point in following her, because if she didn't answer the first time then she wouldn't answer if he asked a second time. He approached a second person, a man whose eye color shifted through different shades of pastels and had round glasses resting on his nose. He kind of reminded Logan of Patton.

"Hello, I apologise for the interruption, but is there any public transportation on this planet?" He asked.

"You're Logan Watts, right?" The man asked. Logan nodded. "I'm sorry, but we're not supposed to talk to you."

"What? Why?" Logan furrowed his brow.

"None of us know, if I'm being honest with you." The man shrugged. "The president broadcasted a city-wide announcement a few minutes ago, he told us not to talk to you."

Logan let out a cry of frustration, which caused the other man's eyes to widen. "Of course! Of course this is his fault."

"O...kay?" The stranger raised one eyebrow. That also made Logan think of Patton, because the android would always make fun of him for his inability to raise only one eyebrow. "I have to leave, I'm really not supposed to be talking to you right now."

The man took a few steps backwards before turning around and speed-walking away. Logan couldn't blame him. He looked around at the surrounding buildings. A library, a supermarket, the presidential building, the arena… a mechanic. He sprinted down the street towards the shop. He burst through the front door to find the mechanic inside, with no other customers.

"Can you get me a ship?" Logan said, trying to catch his breath.

"Who's asking?" The mechanic crossed his arms. Apparently this guy didn't recognize him.

"Logan Watts." He answered. The mechanic started to say something, but Logan held up one finger to stop him. "I know what you're about to say. You aren't supposed to be talking to me. But I really need your help, and if you just give me a ship then I'll be out of your hair in five minutes. I promise that no one will ever find out."

"I don't sell ships, but chances are I can get you the parts to build one." The mechanic told him. "That is, if you have the money."

"I do, and I'll pay in full as soon as I get what I need." Logan shot back. He knew how to build a ship, he just needed supplies.

"I have a shipment of parts coming in next week. Think you can wait until then?" The mechanic asked.

"Alright." Logan nodded. The circuits on his face started glowing, and he made a digital note on the mechanic's computer. It was the code for his phone. "Contact me when it gets here."

He turned around and walked out the door. Everyone seemed to be ignoring him, which was actually very helpful. It would make it easier for him to keep a low profile that way. He went to a few stores to buy supplies, then to the edge of the city. He walked far enough away that he'd go unnoticed, but close enough that he could still see the city. Then he used his supplies to build a small shelter. That would probably last him a while.

Sure enough, a week later he got a notification on his phone. The message was an unknown number, saying that the parts for the ship had arrived. He went back into town and back to the shop. There were two large boxes next to the front desk that hadn't been there last time.

"Welcome back." The mechanic said. "Everything's here, and there's a blueprint in the box."

"Thank you." Logan nodded. "How much will it cost?"

"6,000." The mechanic answered. "Plus an extra 100 if you want something to carry the boxes with."

"Done." Logan's face began to glow again. A little machine on the desk beeped, and the parts had been paid for. He left with the boxes, which were sitting on a metal plate floating behind him. He brought them back to the shelter he'd built and got to work.

~2 months later~

Logan wiped the sweat from his forehead with the sleeve of his shirt. He stood up and looked at the ship. It wasn't anything special, but it was done. There wasn't even a second seat. Hopefully it would start. He opened the door on the side, sitting down and hanging his jacket on the back of the seat. Then he shut the door. He took out his phone and made it track his ship. Not the pod that had been stolen, but the main ship where his lab was. He balanced his phone on the steering mechanism. He pressed the button next to it, and he heard the engine start up. A rare smile crossed his face. The ship lifted off of the ground and he travelled out of the planet's atmosphere. Finally, he was on his way back home.

It didn't take long to get back to his ship, only as much time as it had taken to get to Xialea VII in the first place. He was lucky that his ship was stationary most of the time. He parked the new pod in the space where the old one had been previously. The second he was safely inside the ship, he practically tripped out of the pod and bolted to the stairs up to his lab. He fell into his desk chair in front of his computer and began typing frantically. He had given Patton a built-in tracking device a long time ago, if he could just get the signal then he'd be able to find him. And Logan knew how to get the signal in under a minute. A map appeared on a screen, with a tiny blue dot in the middle. That dot was Patton. Logan never knew why he decided to make it blue despite the fact that Patton was gold, it just felt like it should've been blue.

Based on the location displayed on the screen, Patton was currently located on Planet #739049287193. It didn't have a proper name because of the non-existent population. But now Patton was there, which meant that other people must've been there as well. However terrible the situation was, it was admittedly smart of Patton's captors to bring him to such an isolated planet. The trip would take two days, but he didn't have that kind of time. He would have to take the whole ship, that way he could travel using hyperspeed. Plus Patton would have a home to come back to right away. It was a flawless plan, in Logan's opinion. He transferred the data of Patton's location to the monitor in the pilot's bay. 

Once he got there, he sat in the chair at the front of the room. He turned on Autopilot and typed his desired location into the search bar. He switched the ship into hyperspeed. The surrounding landscape became blurry as the ship began moving faster. Within minutes, everything returned to normal. He looked at the surface of the planet below him. It could only really be described as unpleasant. A shroud of gray storm clouds covered the sky above him. The ground below appeared to be solid rock, stalagmites rising from the ground. Some of them were taller than others, some even looking like mountains.

Logan opened up a screen that would give him a closer view of the ground. It was the same all around, and it was so boring that if he wasn't doing something important then he might've fallen asleep. It took a while to find anything. And when he finally saw something, it wasn't what he expected. Near the base of one of the taller stalagmites, he saw what looked like a person cleaning a motorcycle. He stopped the ship, and the person looked up at him with wide eyes. Apparently a giant ship being parked above you is easy to notice. He opened the trapdoor that was behind his chair and climbed on to a ladder as it was being lowered to the ground.

When his feet touched the ground, he started walking. The stranger in front of him stood up from where they'd been kneeling next to the motorcycle. Upon closer examination, Logan noticed that this person had scales. But only on half of their face. Logan approached them and held out his hand.

"Hello. My name is Logan Watts. Do you mind if I ask you a couple of questions?" He requested, waiting for a handshake and an introduction.

"Dalton Sanders. Sure, shoot." The stranger answered. Logan quickly drew back his hand. He was talking to Dalton Sanders, the infamous thief. He narrowed his eyes.

"Have you seen an android around here recently?" Logan asked, even though he already knew the answer.

"Took you long enough." Dalton snickered. Logan tensed up at the sight of his fangs. "Come inside, he hasn't stopped talking about you for two months."

"Are you serious? No protest or anything?" Logan raised his eyebrows. That only made Dalton laugh even more. Logan was already starting to get tired of this guy.

"Not at all. We'll give him back, we just needed you for something. He was actually really nice to have around, he's good company." Dalton turned around and started walking away. Logan followed him through a door that he hadn't noticed before, into a large cavern.

"Logan!" He heard Patton's voice from the back of the room and saw him jump up. The android ran towards him and tackled him in a hug, holding on tight. Logan was surprised at first, but soon settled into it. "I missed you."

"I can tell." Logan said, a hint of happiness in his voice. "I came to bring you back."

"Oh, that's wonderful!" Patton pulled back with a smile, which quickly shifted into a frown. "But… there's just one thing I need to talk to you about. I-"

"Hey, hi, I'm Remus. Sorry for the interruption, but I have a question for you Mr. Scientist." A new person said, his tone revealing that he wasn't actually sorry. "Why do you not have an accent, but the android that you build does?"

"What? He doesn't have an accent, I would know, I programmed him that way." Logan frowned.

"Okay here, we just listened to you talking, now listen to him talking." Remus gestured to Patton.

"I don't have an accent. At least, I didn't think I did." Patton said. Turns out Remus was right, Patton had a very light Southern accent.

"How is that possible?" Logan muttered, talking to himself. "He developed feelings a long time ago, but I never expected this many changes to his programming…"

"I'm sure it's not that big a deal, Logan. Everything that's happened so far is minor." Patton reminded him.

"I suppose you're correct." Logan nodded. "There isn't a point in dwelling on minor issues."

"Speaking of issues, can we go back to what I was talking about before? Even though this is kind of a big issue." Patton requested.

"Of course, what is it?" Logan regained his focus.

"So, you know how a while ago I was talking about wishing I could meet another android? Well, it happened. But he really needs our help." Patton told him. 

He brought Logan further into the cavern, stopping in front of someone sitting in a desk chair. Logan could tell immediately that he was looking at an android. A very damaged one, from the looks of it.

"Can he speak?" Logan asked. The android's eyes began to glow purple. Patton pointed to the computer.

"No I can't. But I can do this if you want." Words appeared on the screen.

"He can connect to the computer." Patton explained quickly. Logan nodded.

"Alright. Firstly, what is your name?" He asked.

"I don't have one. They call me Anxiety, but I have a number too." Anxiety told him.

"And what is that number? It could be a code for something." Logan looked at the computer screen as numbers started appearing.

"229187912."

"Okay." You could tell Logan was concentrating. "If you split that up into sections, it could be letters. 22-9-18-7-9-12. If this is intentional then those numbers could turn into a name. The 22nd letter in the alphabet is… V. 9 is I, and that appears twice. 18 is R. 7 is G. 12 is L. So when you put those together in order, it becomes V-I-R-G-I-L. Virgil."

"Virgil." Anxiety smiled widely. He'd never had a real name, only ever his nickname.

"Do you want us to call you that now?" Dalton asked.

"Definitely." Anxiety (or Virgil, rather) smiled even wider. Dalton's heart soared seeing him so happy.

"Now, on to the next order of business." Logan brought them back to the current task. "What specifically is wrong with you?"

"I can't talk, or move. I have a glitch in my programming, but I don't think that's fixable." Virgil told him. "Basically, what I was built to do is predict outcomes. But the glitch makes it so that I can only see the bad ones."

"And how long have you had that glitch?"

"I've always had it. That's why I was a prototype."

"So, can you fix him?" Remus asked, a hint of hope appearing in his voice. Logan realized that all eyes were on him.

"Yes, yes I can." Logan sighed. "Patton, the ship is outside. Can you bring them to my lab, and make sure they don't cause any trouble?"

Patton nodded. "Come on, guys. We can take the motorcycle up to the ship, that'll make it easier."

As they left the cavern, Logan couldn't help but wonder why Patton was being so nice to them. They were criminals, not to mention the fact that they'd literally kidnapped him. It was just like Patton to remain optimistic in the face of danger.

Once everyone else had gotten to the ship, Logan took out his phone. He'd gotten to Patton, but he still had one more thing to find. The stolen escape pod. When he got the tracking signal, he couldn't believe what he saw. For one thing, the escape pod was on the very same planet. But the dot that showed its location was jumping around the screen. It didn't seem to be going in any sort of pattern, but it would occasionally come back to the same spot. Logan decided that must've been where it was. It wasn't even that far away, only a couple of minutes of walking. Once he got to the ship, he saw it right away. That was one thing he expected. One thing he didn't expect was to have a sword pointed at him right away.

"Who are you and why are you here?" The stranger asked. Based on his appearance, he was from Xialea VII.

"My name is Logan Watts. I believe you stole my ship." Logan answered. The stranger's eyes widened, and he lowered his sword.

"I did, and I'm really sorry about that, but I promise I had a good reason." The stranger explained.

"And what exactly is that reason?" Logan said skeptically.

"I… needed it." The Xialean said. Logan rolled his eyes. "It's true! It was a matter of life and death. You see, I'm… a prince! And I really needed to leave the planet, because I didn't like it there at all."

"But you're Xialean. They don't have royalty, they have a president."

"But you see, that's the thing. I'm not from Xialea VII, I'm from Xialea VI." He lied, hoping Logan wouldn't catch on. "That was the original kingdom, then some of the citizens broke away and made the city that became famous. I recently took a trip there, but apparently they still have some sort of grudge against us. I'm Roman Northbrook."

Roman was telling so many lies, and he knew it. But it wasn't like he was ever going to see this guy again. This was his chance to be who he'd always wanted to be, even just for a few minutes. At least he'd told the truth about his name.

Logan didn't acknowledge the introduction, simply moving on to examine the escape pod. It was completely broken, and had clearly been crashed. No wonder the tracking device hadn't been working.

"Okay, you know what?" Logan turned back around to face Roman. "Come to my ship with me. I'll bring you home, and you clearly need supervision anyway."

"Please don't take me home! I can't go back, they'd probably kill me for running away in the first place." Roman told him. At least that last part was true. "I can be useful, I'll be like a security guard or something!"

"We'll cross that bridge when we get to it." Logan began walking back towards the main ship. Roman followed him, not really knowing what else to do. The moment they got back to the ship, everyone was staring at them.

"Who's the new guy?" Dalton raised his eyebrow, pointing to Roman.

"This is Roman Northbrook, he is the person who stole my ship. He'll be staying here for a while." Logan explained. Roman waved awkwardly.

"Cool." Remus smiled. "Don't worry, some of us steal things too."

Virgil didn't have a computer to connect to, but he would've been to busy staring to say anything anyway. It was quite possible that this was the most beautiful person he'd ever seen. He looked away quickly. If androids could blush, he'd be as red as the streaks in Roman's hair.

Logan looked around at the group in front of him. He'd come to this planet expecting to get Patton and be on his way. Instead he'd gotten Patton, two thieves, a broken android, and a runaway prince. What was he getting himself into.

Taglist: @idkwhyimhere0o0 @icequeenoriginal @mostpeopleannoyne @007ardra @logan-is-my-spirit-animal

[dreamer-fighter-tswiftlover]

Teaser to Triumph Games

Okay, so maybe I will go through with the Hunger Game AU for Descendants. I thought I’d tease it up a bit more and see if anyone had any opinions or comments. Here is part of two scenes labeled by the year. I’d appreciate any comments or feedback, lol:

October 1992

“You cannot be serious, Adam,” Aurora fumes turning to look at the older king before switching her gaze to his quiet wife. “Belle, you can’t tell me you support this.”

The French Queen opens her mouth, but a pat from Adam has her closing her mouth and Aurora frowns. Helplessly, Aurora scans the rest of the council room feeling Phillip’s hand come to rest on her lower back coaxing her to settle down. It does little to dissuade Aurora, hazel orbs piercing her fellow rulers—Jasmine matches her gaze headstrong, as do Mulan and Tianna, but Duke Weselton sneers in her direction and Prince Florian and Prince Charming glare while Ella and Snow shrink away. Megara clears her throat, but Hercules shakes his head and pulls her away despite the Grecian woman’s glare.

“This is inhumane,” states Aurora, sinking back into her seat at the silence of the room. Suddenly she feels so much wearier than any eighteen year old should ever feel. Glancing at Adam again Aurora frowns, she can see the lines around his eyes—the markings of sleepless nights marring a twenty-eight year old’s face. The weight settling in her shoulders as she takes into the lack of arguments from the rest of the ruling monarchs. Despite it all, she pushes forth: “You asked us to come under your reign for the betterment of our nations, not to imprison part of our population.”

“They have caused unimaginable suffering amongst us all!” Naveen exclaims and Tianna winces at the loudness of her husband. The Prince chest heaves in exhaustion and it takes all that Aurora has in her not to shout back at the man. “This is taking pity on them.”

“I agree with Prince Naveen,” nasally Duke Weselton intervenes and this time the blonde scoffs in the back of her throat. His hair is plated back, suit pristine with gems and stich work only the wealthy could dream of affording. It nauseates the blonde at the utter lack of sense the Duke carries and blatant hypocrisy he spews. “They are guilty of unspeakable crimes.”

“Should you join them?” spits Aurora crossing her arms and taking pleasure in the bristling of the older man. “We all know you’re not exactly a poster-image for a hero or good citizen.”

“That is enough Aurora,” quiets Queen Ingrith next to her son and Phillip offers a squeeze on his wife’s waist as an apology. “The Duke speaks the truth and you may not be aware of the full extent of these crimes. I support King Adam’s decision and we all should.”

Clearing his throat the King Beast stands his posture rigid. Taking a deep breath, Adam sweeps across the room eyes boring into Aurora’s. Slowly he speaks: “We are a land of democracy. A country of many nations; we all have a voice. Let’s put it to a vote, we’ll start with House of Cinders.”

Prince Charming and Princess Ella glance around skittishly and Aurora’s heart cracks when Ella avoids her gaze.

Charming clears his throat and nods: “We agree to the terms, we stand behind House of Beast.”

Adam nods, shoulders slacking a bit before continuing: “House of Li.”

Mulan faces Shang, a silent understanding passing between them before Mulan opens her mouth to speak. “We abstain from participation.”

The drone endures down the line of remaining rulers and as each one answers, the fissures in Aurora’s heart break open. Auradon nation of many, but controlled by seventeen houses and led by one man casts the future—a future held by ancestral beliefs. Standing again, Adam nods his head as he recites the ending vote.

“It is decided,” says Adam, his eyes locking onto the sheet of paper with the final tally. “The houses who abstained from answering and forfeit their vote are the following: House of Li, House of Atlantica, House of Kingsleigh, and House of Pan. The houses who denounce the proclamation are: House of Frost, House of Olympia, House of Smith, House of Agrah, House of Radcliffe, and House of Moors.”

Aurora matches Adam’s glare despite the pit growing in her chest—the vote still against her. Breaking away to look around, the princess nods in gratitude for those who stood in solidarity with her and thanks them for their attempt. Sultana Jasmine nods minutely, Aladdin offering a pained twist of lips, Anita sobs quietly and Roger does his best to comfort her, the others offer saddened looks Aurora does her best to ignore them.

“Those in favor of the proclamation,” reads Adam, voice projecting across the room, “House of Beast, House of Cinders, House of Maldo, House of Blanche, House of Ulstead, House of Trenches, and House of Fae. Seven to six—the proclamation will go through.”

“You’re bringing people back from the dead, Adam,” Aurora growls, throwing her last futile attempt for a change. “You’re using dark magic to rebirth them only to imprison them in a land of no magic. How does this make us any better than their unspeakable acts?”

“Phillip,” Ingrith mutters, nails tapping the table. “Control your wife.”

July 2013

Despite the thick fog englobing The Isle of the Lost the crisp horns ring through the heavy layer. Children and beggars alike scatter to darker corners—seeking cover. The singular large screen that hangs above the Isle’s Court in the main square comes to life. The Auradon Crest proudly on display—a countdown appearing underneath marking forty-seven hours fifty-nine minutes and fifty-eight—fifty-seven—fifty-six (and so on).

From the top of the Bargain Castle, a group of teenagers glower at the square, dread filling the pit of their stomachs. The horns dim to distant rings, but the echo plays out inside all of their ribcages. It shakes them to their cores as they trickle back inside—each falling into a place around the crumbling room.

Turning with the knob, Carlos curses quietly—nimble fingers working quickly to procure an image on the decades old television. Behind him Freddie hovers watching the youngest boy fiddle with wires, taking a knee when Carlos shifts to offer her a better view.

Jay leans against the decaying counter, eyes honing in on the monitor. “Who do you think will be chosen this year?”

“Clayton is unbearable,” Harry groans, plopping himself next to the oldest boy. “He would be better off dead. My bet is on him and hopefully Scar.”

“The adults are dwindling,” Uma chimes in, braids swaying as her gaze hardens. “Anyone above ten is fair game. We saw that with Anthony and Mei Lei.”

The room sobers at the names. At the echoes that accompany the weight of those lost.

“I don’t understand how a land full of heroes can convince themselves that this is a good idea,” hisses Mal, watching how the cracked screen flickers an image of King Adam, Queen Belle, Prince Ben, and Fairy Godmother over a burning ember. Behind them a royal blue banner waves against the sky, bold letters painting the number thirteen in gold.

Evie hums from her spot against the wall, lipstick slipping into her pocket. She eyes the group critically—sensing how they all turn to look at her. Mal may have been the gang’s de facto leader, but Evie was the second in command and the oldest of them making her in some cases the wisest. 

Swallowing, thickly the older girl toys with the hem of her skirt—mulling over the words in her head. “It gets rid of threats while providing entertainment and painting them as victors. In a sadistic way its genius.”

“Fuck, I get it with some of our folks,” Freddie huffs, “but they’re letting kids in it too.”

“It’s not like we’re innocent,” sighs Carlos, falling back onto his heels as sound begins to pour from the busted speakers. “Or that they would even care.”

Without further ado our Auradon Hero to honor his ascent to the throne Prince Benjamin.  

Mal’s lip curls in disgust and Uma’s brow quirks. Jay and Harry chuckle lowly at the nervous glint playing out across the Prince’s gaze. There’s a pause from the screen and unconsciously the teenagers draw themselves closer to one another.

Now for the remaining tributes …

Collectively, the tenseness in their shoulders diminishes. Four more spots, there was hope.

“Well there’s one at least, mate,” whistles Jay bumping his shoulder against Harry. The pirate nods hesitantly, but his heart hammers. Three spots left.

“Three more to go,” Uma whispers, fingers twitching on the hilt of her sword. Mal’s shoulders draw up and Evie glances out the balcony. 

“We should head to the square,” Carlos murmurs, drawing to a stand, his hand settling on the scabbard attached to his left hip.  “The guards are bound to start appearing and we just fixed the door.”

Deftly they rise and begin to trickle out, sticking to the shadows each armed. Evie’s trusted bow swung behind her shoulder hand interlinking with Mal’s for a moment before letting it fall away. Projected across the dome of the Isle Fairy Godmother’s voice carries out continuing to drone.

The Court Square draws closer and despite only one slot remaining the heaviness of the situation dawns on all of them. At the forefront lines of guards in blue decorate the steps of the only building not riddled in graffiti or broken windows. Behind them on the platform a hologram of the Royal Family alongside Fairy Godmother stand looking over the growing crowd. 

“Now for the last tribute,” Fairy Godmother begins hand reaching into the chalice in front of her. The older woman’s eyes sadden and her voice embraces an empty echo. Reluctantly, she clears her throat. “Drizella Tremaine Jr.”

The chatter seemingly stops and Dizzy’s piercing cry shatters the noise of the Isle. Freddie’s arms wrap around Celia feeling her younger sister begin to shake in sobs. Carlos pales considerably and Jay’s hand slips from his sword while Harry swallows and Uma turns to look for the girl. Mal’s mouth hangs in horror turning to face Evie (knowing that the older girl would do anything for the youngest Tremaine).

“E, no—“

But Mal’s pleas fall on deaf ears, because before she knows it there’s a loaded bow. An arrow knocked back that misses the Auradon Guard (just barely) who drags a wailing ten-year-old to the stage over the fifth stand. Loading a second arrow—the guards raise their own weapons pointing them to the daughter of the Evil Queen.

...

“Well it appears that this is a first. A willing participant in place of another. Evelyn Grim daughter of the Evil Queen (defeated in the tenth annual game) will take Drizella’s place. Thus, it is with our great honor to announce the thirteenth annual Triumph Games. Where five Villains will be picked at random against each other and one champion from Auradon to survive. May the odds forever be in your favor.

[justgottafinishthischapter]

Writing Prejudice in a Fantasy Setting

There are a lot of aspects of culture strongly impacted by the world in which they are cultivated. While some Fantasy settings are a bit closer to home, others are completely foreign to our earthly world, and those changes to the world, history, and culture will impact social policies and issues. Due to my extensive study of homosexuality in history, I’ll be using that as my topic, but these topics can be applied to other prejudices.

Without Christianity, there’s probably no Homophobia

Prior to the forced widespread practices of the Christian faith, a fair number of cultures and societies had little problem with homosexuality. Among viking men, they didn’t give a crap so long as the bottom was just as strong a warrior as his lover. In Ancient Greece, the Band of Thebes was an army made entirely of same-sex lovers under the belief that they would fight harder to protect and impress each other. In Native American tribes, there was nothing wrong with a man choosing to do the women’s work, and they were even sought out as the village wise-men. And up until around the 1800s, lesbian activities weren’t even really considered sexual at all by European and American standards due to the idea that women themselves had no sex drives. Even then, the actual reason that Christians were against homosexuality was due to the ideologies of the faith at the time. See, Christianity began to spread through the Roman empire in the 300s AD, but Homosexuality only began to be seen as a sin by the church in the middle of the 1200s AD, 900 years after it spread across Europe. And the source of this sudden shift? Again, it had very little to do with actually going against the Church itself. See, in this era of Christian belief, Earthly life was seen as sort of an awful waiting room, and the only thing that mattered was getting not only your own soul to Heaven, but getting as many other people into Heaven as possible, hence the historic tendencies of Christians to shove their beliefs down the throats of everyone they invaded at knife point. Because the only purpose of life was to lay it down in service of God and to get into Heaven, taking pleasure in Earthly delights was considered selfish and sinful. Because two men engaging in intercourse would not yield offspring and was thus only an indulgence in lesser Earthly delights, it was labeled as a sin because it wasn’t in service to the Christian values of the era. 

So, why did I just write a long paragraph explaining why homosexuality is a sin? Because a fantasy world isn’t guaranteed to have Christianity existing within it, though some writers have equivalents, such as the Faith of the Seven in A Song of Ice and Fire which also derides same-sex relationships. Thus, if you’re planning a novel in a fantasy setting where one or more of the belief systems is against homosexuality (or anything else) this may help serve to inspire you to think about why these things are seen as a sin, how long ago these ideas became a sin, and if the culture has changed since then, are opinions any different now? Homosexuality became a sin in the mid 1200s, but by the time Chaucer started writing the Canterbury Tales in 1387, there were already stereotypes and derogatory slurs used to refer to homosexual men. Understanding the roots of these prejudices can be an integral part of world building and understanding your created world. Nobody really hates for no reason, as prejudices arise from differences in opinion. So ask where these prejudices come from, why do they hold these prejudices, what social, political, or cultural taboo might be being broken by these actions? Ideologies change, and what was offensive long ago might not be offensive now, but people are slow to change. Just because the culture is different doesn’t mean the mass population has changed at the same pace. Old grudges are slow to bury.

The LGBT Community is a Subculture, and thus should be fleshed out and treated like any other culture in your story.

Based on the culture, stigma, and social acceptance you established in the first part, this is where you expand upon it. Due to the need to keep gay romance or sex discreet, gay men developed secret codes to let other men know which team they played for. Whether it be wearing a red carnation in their lapel, wearing a green tie, or carrying a bandanna in their back pocket, there was usually some sort of discreet code. This also extended into dialogue, as phrases like “Are you a friend of Dorothy?” was a common coded way of asking someone if they were gay. Other themes and symbols associated with homosexuality include lavender, such as with the Lavender Scare which accompanied the Red Scare of the 1950s and 60s, or the Pink Triangle worn by homosexuals in Nazi Germany. Symbols could be connected to myths and legends, such as the notoriously bi/pansexual god Apollo. Apollo’s symbols could easily be reclaimed by a closeted shadow society of LGBT people. Phrases such as “Do you weep for the Hyacinth?” could be a stealthy way of finding other homosexuals borrowing from this myth. Beyond these clues and coded messages, there are other aspects of LGBT culture, such as the rise of Shade and Reading with the popularity of drag balls. Most homosexuals moved to larger cities where their chances of finding a partner was better, and due to the higher population density, they were far less likely to be known by half the town, and thus gossip was far less of a terrifying factor. LGBT people would designate locations as safe spaces for them to gather, and many of these locations, including the famous Stonewall Inn were under Mafia protection for a price to be allowed to meet in peace. Subcultures also tend to come with their own language and beliefs, such as the unspoken taboo of outing someone else from the closet. Usage of terms like brownie queen, shade, reading, and twink started off as discreet terms used within the community, and some such as buns have become so widespread that they’re not even necessarily connected to the community anymore, but originate from coded messages used to talk discreetly.

While there are other contributing factors to prejudices in a fictional setting, I’ll wrap up the discussion here, but I can return to it some more at a later date.

[eurello]

Here are the most interesting articles I read this week: 

I wrote this book because I think we’re at a dangerous time in what’s often called the criminal justice reform movement. There’s really exciting growing consciousness among many people in our society about the cruelty and irrationality of the punishment bureaucracy, but all of the same people that created that bureaucracy and profited off it are in charge of deciding what constitutes reform. If we’re not careful and we don’t build the right knowledge about what’s actually wrong with the system and empower people actually harmed by the system to fight against it, then those same punishment bureaucrats will reproduce all of the same mechanisms of oppression using different labels.

“Alex Karakatsanis on the ‘Usual Cruelty’ of the Criminal Justice System,” Texas Observer

Jeff and I volunteered to help out with The Yukon Quest again this year. The Yukon Quest is a 1,000 mile International sled dog race that goes from Fairbanks, Alaska to Whitehorse, Yukon, switching directions each year, roughly following the Yukon River.

“The 2020 Yukon Quest,” Lisa.blog -- My colleague, Lisa, lives in Dawson City, Yukon, which is a place I have no desire to ever go (except maybe in high summer), but find it absolutely fascinating to read about.

Even in healthy people, blocking vision for just a few days can bring about hallucinations. And the connections between vision abnormalities and schizophrenia have become more deeply established in recent years—visual abnormalities are being found before a person has any psychotic symptoms, sometimes predicting who will develop schizophrenia.

But the whispered-about fact persists: Being born blind, and perhaps specific types of congenital blindness, shield from the very disorders vision loss can encourage later in life. A myriad of theories exist as to why—from the blind brain's neuroplasticity to how vision plays an important role in building our model of the world (and what happens when that process goes wrong). Select researchers believe that the ties between vision and psychotic symptoms indicate there's something new to learn here. Could it be that within this narrowly-defined phenomenon there are clues for what causes schizophrenia, how to predict who will develop it, and potentially how to treat it?

“People Born Blind Are Mysteriously Protected From Schizophrenia,” VICE

But beyond the headline economic numbers, a multifarious and strangely invisible economic crisis metastasized: Let’s call it the Great Affordability Crisis. This crisis involved not just what families earned but the other half of the ledger, too—how they spent their earnings. In one of the best decades the American economy has ever recorded, families were bled dry by landlords, hospital administrators, university bursars, and child-care centers. For millions, a roaring economy felt precarious or downright terrible.

“The Great Affordability Crisis Breaking America,” The Atlantic -- I’ve been wondering when we’d start to see this talked about. When gauging the health of the economy, the focus tends to be on employment statistics and the traditional assumption is that if everyone has a job, that means everyone can afford to live. But the problem now is not so much unemployment; it’s that even employed, no one can afford anything. Part of this might be that so many are only employed by the gig economy. I think that with technology, we’re coming upon a situation where we actually don’t need everyone to work -- there’s just not that much for people to do. And I’m not sure how American-style capitalism will work in these conditions, given its moral underpinning that we have to prove our worthiness through some sort of labor. 

About 50,000 years ago, ancient humans in what is now West Africa apparently procreated with another group of ancient humans that scientists didn't know existed.

“‘Ghost’ DNA In West Africans Complicates Story of Human Origins,” NPR

The idea that there were simply too many people being born – most of them in the developing world where population growth rates had started to take off – filtered into the arguments of radical environmental groups such as Earth First! Certain factions within the group became notorious for remarks about extreme hunger in regions with burgeoning populations such as Africa – which, though regrettable, could confer environmental benefits through a reduction in human numbers.

In reality, the global human population is not increasing exponentially, but is in fact slowing and predicted to stabilise at around 11 billion by 2100. More importantly, focusing on human numbers obscures the true driver of many of our ecological woes. That is, the waste and inequality generated by modern capitalism and its focus on endless growth and profit accumulation.

“Why we should be wary of blaming ‘overpopulation’ for the climate crisis,” The Conversation -- I’m hearing more and more complaints about overpopulation being to blame for our problems, and it makes me really uncomfortable. I don’t really think it’s possible to complain about overpopulation without being classist and/or racist about it, because presumably if you think that we’re overpopulated, you also have at least a subconscious opinion about which populations are superfluous (and they probably aren’t your own). I expect this sentiment will increase, because we know that one of the first results of climate change is going to be that people living in areas affected by rising sea levels are going to be displaced, and these are mostly poorer populations. We’re really bad about blaming displaced people for their own displacement (see our attitudes about those currently fleeing Central American violence), so I imagine that relocation is not going to be easy for these folks! Those of us who care about not being assholes should start being aware of these uncharitable notions now, because it’s only going to get worse as we get more crowded. 

If you want to summarize the changes in family structure over the past century, the truest thing to say is this: We’ve made life freer for individuals and more unstable for families. We’ve made life better for adults but worse for children. We’ve moved from big, interconnected, and extended families, which helped protect the most vulnerable people in society from the shocks of life, to smaller, detached nuclear families (a married couple and their children), which give the most privileged people in society room to maximize their talents and expand their options. The shift from bigger and interconnected extended families to smaller and detached nuclear families ultimately led to a familial system that liberates the rich and ravages the working-class and the poor.

“The Nuclear Family Was a Mistake,” The Atlantic -- Look, I am loathe to link to David Brooks, but he’s completely right about this (and only this!). 

[lepus-the-bun]

Fascism in FF14, and the post no one ever asked me to make.

Hello and welcome, it is I, the Garlean Scum, here to come way to late to the actual discourse, with a post no sane person asked me to do. That being said, I wished to make this, with the intent to help explain some things, give a little insight into some stuff, and maybe help people see things a different way. Now importantly, this is not a post of ‘excusing’ violent beliefs, or fascist activities. Those who know me, know I hold a strong distaste for fascism in the real world, for reasons I will make evident. Now, maybe this isn’t your cup of tea, which is no problem! I’ll be starting in earnest below the read more line, so I don’t fill up feeds. Please, look over, read, comment with your own observations and beliefs, and share your stories! 

WHY DO PEOPLE ACCEPT FASCISM?

Lets start off right at the hardest point. What drives people to accept Fascist ideologies? Now, I’m not putting this all on the Nazi branch of Fascism as there are many types, including american fascism, and they all have their unique takes on certain things. But one main key point for fascism, is that it usually involves a form of radical Authoritarian Ultra-nationalism. Most commonly, this is helped and reinforced by racist world views. But okay, we know the basic key point of fascism... Why would people choose to so heavily join into a radically Authoritarian state?

Well, the first reason is simple. Safety. Fascist organizations, hold the firm belief that liberal democracy is a failure. They want a single party to hold control of the state, and for it to completely mobilize society in a party to -serve- the state. Now, this ideal became really prominent in the post WW1 state of our world, and it’s not an unheard of reasoning. They wanted a strong government that can respond to -all- threats, be they another nation, or a group that is disturbing the status norm. 

Which, brings us into the second point. Fascism most commonly, keeps the norms of society, save the dismantling of liberalism. In example, if being a white man was good for you before, it’s still good now. This makes it seem an attractive alternative to radical liberalism or activists. After all, if they are on top of the social ladder, they want to -stay- on top, which doesn’t necessarily mean that they are all super racist, but they can feel that losing their ‘spot’ means not just no longer being number one, but having to accept ramifications for it.

Finally, Fascism often holds heavily to the belief of ‘merit based’ social progression. Which, in essence isn’t incorrect. In an ideal fascist state, someone’s sex/gender/ethnicity doesn’t matter. What matters is their -success-, which when you have a culture that is actively oppressing individuals, can drive some to cling onto this as their way to progress up the social ladder. After all, there is no truer equality to them, then everyone suffering the same BS and having to work up on their own.

WHY DON’T THOSE OPPRESSED BY FASCISTS RISE UP?

Now, this is an interesting question, and one that’s actually been shown commonly in our own history. Simply put... Rising up in revolution isn’t as easy as we display it in media. For every single successful revolution in history, there are countless bloody revolutions that were put down to the core. Even those revolutions that succeed, are often filled with death and destruction, which even if it’s to improve the world... It can be a daunting thing for people to accept. So people hold onto the hope, that the longer they hold on, eventually the world will change for them. They’ll have the equality they wanted, without war. 

In short, when everything around you belongs to the state, including yourself, it’s hard to imagine you can stop it.

DON’T THEY REALIZE WHAT THEY ARE DOING IS WRONG?

Perhaps. But, there’s one simple thing that hurts the most in realizing that -you’re- the bad guy... You’re just doing what you have to, for the good of everyone else. Fascism doesn’t hold violence or imperialism as a strictly negative experience. Again, it’s about results, not ethics. 

Secondly, if they were to say ‘yes I’ve been the bad guy, and need to stop’, something hard to grasp for anyone comes into play... Namely that everything you did, was for nothing. If you live by the ends justifying the means, then it’s even harder to accept that.

Thirdly, they fear the retaliation. Why would people forgive them? It’s better to burn standing by those who are wrong, than standing alone. It’s a hard choice for people to make.

WHERE DOES THIS COME INTO FF14?

Well, more often then you’d think really. If we look at the three city states, they all have a heavy hint of Fascism in them. In Limsa, the Admiral has her own secret police essentially, and what she says is law. If you think she’s wrong, you better bend the knee, or get the hell out or die. However, she’s more dedicated to a free market, and appears to be trying to change her nation... However, they are also heavily dependent on stealing land from the indigenous populations in order to expand as necessary, which is a nice little story point to explore.

Ishgard was a fanatical state, that used religion to help reinforce ultra-nationalism, and had a foe that could ‘not be negotiated with’, that threatened them to the core, for a cause that was their fault but information was hidden from the public. Granted, they have since shifted governmental styles, and this process alone is just fascinating, as it is a perilous point in a society... But luckily they have another large nonnegotiable foe to take the public’s attention.

Gridania. Man. Okay, so they have many conflicting things about them. On one hand, I view them as the most liberal of city states within their borders. Their government seems less likely to police most things, save the things that anger the elementals the most. In short, a high rate of personal freedom, but if you disobey the elementals, death or exile is almost certain. However, this isn’t due to a persons interest, but rather a force that already flooded the world once. So... It’s weird, and the most unique one I can see. 

Ul’dah. Now, this was obviously meant as a city with the most capitalism possible, and honestly, I’d say has the least fascist tendencies to them. However, there are... Implications. That the sultanate, was going to dissolve the government, is a curious amount of power for one person to have. The syndicate, seems like so long as it doesn’t hurt their profits, most of them would assist fascist ideology. Then we follow with the banning of beastmen. It’s another unique case, as usually in a heavily capitalist society like this, you would have more of a ‘puppet’ ruler, than one with the power to dissolve the government.

Garlemald. Man. Oh man. Ya’ll already know this one. It’s Magitech rome during the latter portion of the roman empire during the decline. It’s basically ‘worlds first great fascist enterprise’. 

OKAY, SO SOME OF THE CITY STATES HAVE FASCIST HINTS, AND GARLEMALD IS PURE FASCISM. WHY BRING THIS UP?

Well, I feel that if we don’t incorporate this into our RP, or even acknowledge this... We are not just doing the lore a disservice, but ourselves as well. We as people have a tendency to make characters who base their beliefs and values on our societies. It’s not bad to do so, but that’s not always an appropriate thing to do. RP can teach us new things, and help us understand why people do things.

THE FUCK YOU MEAN?

Well, let me put it like this. Aedwen, is a Gridanian Native, whom left her homeland in secret to join the Garlean Empire. Why? Well, because she felt betrayed by the elementals, and felt her people were less living in harmony, and more as slaves. No matter how good you were, the seedseer, padjal, and the hearers would always be above you. No matter what, unless you were one of these groups, in her opinion you were second class. She was young, angry, and trying to figure things out. Then she gets told by someone, how the empire is harsh, but they are -fair- and everyone can advance. How they don’t want to destroy, but to unite everyone. How the empire could be the one thing, that could help free her people from her perceived subjugation.

Right there, I can explore the feelings of a character who isn’t -evil- by nature, but who took the path of the unjust.

WELL DON’T THEY KNOW NOW?

Yes. They are well aware of the reality now. But, here comes to the hardest part of someone who accepted fascism, and violence as their path for so long. Namely, if she accepts that it’s all for naught, then she’s a traitor, a liar, and a monster. In her eyes, she couldn’t accept that. To admit that, would break her.

SO WHAT NOW?

Well, she explores her morality more and more... And one day, will have to choose between standing by her morals, or by the actions she has committed... And honestly, I enjoy it. Because it helps me to figure out what would happen if I were in similar straights.

CLOSING THOUGHTS!

Don’t reject certain character types out of the blue, and don’t think people are playing them because that’s their ‘ideal’. If you have the desire to explore the thought process of people you oppose, or those that you do not understand, then roleplay can be the most invaluable tool available. So few have the capability of actually putting you in their shoes.

[sabraeal]

The Most Perverse Creature in the World, Chapter 4

Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3

ANS Week, Day 6: Wood Balance | Endurance | Transformation | Rigid

The rail bites into your palm, your one lifeline to this world while you castigate yourself in the next. Your aim had been to be noticed, to make your own wake instead of being caught in the undertow of another, and you --

And you have certainly accomplished that. The king himself wants to hear your arguments.

It is only that you have made it about -- about whores. Whores. Gods, what a pot you have put yourself in.

If no one has taught you to be a Countess, then they have certainly not taught to you be this -- be someone who is listened to, who has a well-informed opinion not just based on gut-feeling and common sense. That you even have one was your governess’s greatest shame; before she left, sent away after you were no longer in the school room and preferred companions your own age, she had confessed she thought your needlepoint had suffered for it.

The carved wood chews deeper, and you release the clench of your hand, just slightly. You have no where to turn, no allies to call upon -- for certainly, if you even knew the names of your husband’s, they would not help you, not when they had expected Atoshi in your place -- and worst of all, you have no idea where to start.

“I must say...”

The deep rumble startles you, makes your chin jerk up to meet dark eyes, only just lighter than the oppressive wood paneling of the council chamber itself. You nearly wither from shame on the spot. Of course, it is Arluleon who must see you in your distress, of course.

“...I had not thought it would be a person in that chair who would protest the tax.” His eyebrows raise, just slightly, in something that treads dangerously close to amusement. Or maybe, you think as you meet his gaze, it is something like challenge.

You lift your chin, rising from your husband’s seat. Your seat. You may not be a lord, raised to the art of war, but only a fool would squander higher ground. “From what I have seen, there is not a man in this room who anticipated me at all.”

At one corner, his mouth twitches. “Perhaps. But that is not what I meant, my lady.”

“Countess,” you correct. My lady may be polite, may be what a lord’s wife will cede to, but you will be damned if you let a single man in this council forget you are his equal. Especially this one.

“Countess,” he concedes, like every letter pulls teeth. “Though I must also admit, I am...interested in the arguments you will make next session.”

So are you, but you know better than to show your belly, to admit defeat is crushing you like a wave.

“Though I suspect you will wish to give up this foolhardy course,” he continues, already turning his back to you, tired of your conversation. “A few nights spent squinting over law books and censuses are sure to leave their mark. And I am told ladies are concerned over...unseemly lines.”

You blood boils beneath your skin, nearly makes you fly down the steps to show him how a man might be concerned with a few unseemly lines himself, but by the time you release the banister, the door has already closed behind him.

Gods, but his device should be a boar rather than a lion.

Nails bite into your palms, but you breathe into the pain, into the loosening of your knuckles. He has said --

Law books. Censuses.

Beneath your veil, you smile. Pig though he may be, he has given you a place to start.

Such tomes as these are not meant to leave the sanctum of the library’s walls, but one look at your crape and your veil has the attendant scurrying to accommodate you. For once, you are glad of superstition; the chairs here are stiff and uncomfortable seeming, almost certain to wreak havoc on the starch of your skirts. Women of your ilk are not meant to be here.

Mayu brews you hot water with lemon -- your brothers’ tutor had always told you it was the best for a clear mind -- and tucked into the yielding plush of your chair, you slowly drive yourself mad.

Gods above, but that ass was not joking about the squinting.

You can hardly make heads or tails of these books; the census are all names and numbers and addresses you cannot place, and the law books might as well be written in Samese for all that they make sense to you.

“Trouble, my lady?” Mayu asks when she comes to refresh your cup. She peers over your shoulder, inquisitive as always, and you let her. Gods know how you’d like a pair of fresh eyes, even if it’s just the chambermaid.

“I hardly know what I’m looking for,” you admit, though it tears at you. “It should be apparent, shouldn’t it? Something -- something wrong should be glaring, not buried in...minutiae.”

The girl laughs, shaking her head. “That’s where you’re wrong, my lady. If something is wrong in Wistal, it’d be nothing but details.”

“Glorious,” you sigh, settling back into the cushion. You have little more than two days to sift through laws never meant to be looked at. “What a task I’ve given myself.”

Mayu settles back on her heels. “What are you looking for, my lady?”

“Laws pertaining to the regulation and taxation of...houses of ill repute.” You drum your fingers on the census pages, at a loss. “And -- some sort of...of count of houses in the capital, at least. And the number of...employees.”

You scrub a hand down you face, blessedly bare in your private quarters. “I just need something to make this real. An issue. They act as though there are ten whores in the whole of Fortissia, and no one is inconvenienced by adding yet another tax on.”

“There should be a registry, shouldn’t there?” Mayu offers. “There’s a whole clerical wing in the north of the palace, where all the taxes are accounted for. And all legal businesses have to register before they can operate.”

You bolt upright. “And who would know the laws better than the men who have to rifle through the taxes?”

It takes moments for the clerical wing to become you favorite part of the palace.

In a room full of young men, not a single one balks at your request for the registries, nor for walking you through the finer points of tax law. They do hesitate when you ask about those pertaining to bawd houses and brothels, but only for a moment and having little to do with you, if the blushes that ride high on their cheeks are any indication.

Unfortunately, it all comes to one drastic conclusion.

“In order to get the measure of how to properly tax such an establishment, given the...startling number of them in the capital alone, the council must actually...” You hesitate, restraining the sigh that lingers in your chest. “...Must actually send a panel of members to speak with the proprietors of said establishments, if not...the employees themselves.”

The laughter is not a surprise, but oh, how you wish it was. Instead you weather it, chin lifted high and glad that your veil and gown cover all the skin that flushes painfully red. The humiliation is only made worse by who doesn’t laugh: Arluleon, of course, for at his birth his humor did not come with him; the king himself, and --

And the second prince, who you quite remember attending the christening of. Why on earth the king thought this an appropriate conversation to have in front of him -- he could only be what? Eighteen? Nineteen? A child -- you cannot say, but it does not change the fact that he is there, and that unlike you he does not have gauze and crape to cover the blotchy way his face reddens.

“You want men of the peerage to what? Take the council of whores?” Toshikazu wheezes, hardly able to control himself long enough to get the words out.

You’ve, quite honestly, had enough. “If men in this room were not already, then I doubt we would be talking about these laws at all.”

That sobers the room. You do not need to see every councilor’s face to know that guilt suffuses them, and that anger will soon follow. Just as you had predicted.

You plow forward, taking advantage of the silence. “The number of...comfort women in the capital is enough to make up a single percent of our population.”

There are furrowed brows at that, the sound of a dozen bodies shifting in their seats. You can feel their incredulity, their ambivalence. Why should men of their stature care about what a percent of the country thinks, when they are only accustomed to caring for less, for their own?

“That may seem small, but it is of no little consequence,” you assure them, voice stronger than the quiver in your knees. “And we cannot just choose to make them bear the burden when we offer them so few protections, as we expect of no other business.”

“But they are just --”

You will not let the words be said again in your presence. “Women, who are part of the lands granted to this kingdom and this council to protect.”

“Who would even volunteer for such an effort?” Norihide scoffs. “It’s a waste of time.”

No hand raises, no voice shouts aye. You knew this as well.

“I will,” you say, wishing you felt as firm as your words. “Since it seem that men fear in the daylight what they take so freely in the dark.”

You are weary, after the council. Mayu helps you out of your robes and into your nightgown, your favorite housecoat left for you in your chambers. Laying yourself on the bed, you let your eyes close, let your mind wander. When the knock comes, you assume it is Mayu, bringing you hot water and lemon.

It is not until the balcony creeks open that you realize -- it did not come from your salon.

You rise, meeting night-dark eyes across the parquet of your floor. In the moonlight, his hair shimmers like waves on the water.

“Lady Bederin,” the second prince says, “I think we have much to talk about.”

You grip the bedpost, trying hard not to think of how you are in your nightgown. The heir to the country itself is in your room, and you have only a housecoat to keep your modesty.

For the first time, you long for your veil.

“Countess,” you manage, finally. “It’s Countess Bederin.”

[starcitizenprivateer]

Portfolio: Bremen Defense Force

Writer’s Note: This portfolio was originally published in Jump Point 4.10.

With the launch of the UEE’s “Militia Mobilization Initiative,” the role that militias play in protecting the Empire has come front and center. The current directive aims to help arm civilian militias, so they can protect their homeworld and system against Vanduul incursions and outlaws. One system where militias have played a prominent role for centuries is Bremen — home to the famous Bremen Defense Force, which is the longest constantly active militia in the UEE.

Bremen was a relatively quiet and safe frontier system following its discovery in 2441. That all changed with the onset of the Second Tevarin War. The armadas of Corath’Thal utilized insurgency tactics to wage an unpredictable and shifting war against Humanity. With little idea as to where or when they might attack next, the UEE needed to raise a massive and expanding force in order to protect the populace, one that they struggled to properly feed. It was then that the fertile soil of Rytif (Bremen II) became the main producer of rations for UEE forces.

With this responsibility came both great wealth and an unexpected degree of danger. Bremen’s location meant the chance of a Tevarin attack was relatively low, but residents still noticed an uptick in Human threats. These outlaws were smart enough to avoid targeting military convoys, instead concentrating their attacks on civilians enriched by the system’s booming economy.

Philippe Lattimore almost lost his life in one such outlaw attack. The spry octogenarian was a veteran of the First Tevarin War who attempted to reenlist in the Navy when the second one began. After his application was politely denied, Lattimore took it upon himself to patrol the system. He spent his days responding to distress calls and meticulously documenting his experience. One day he answered a distress call only to be overwhelmed by outlaws still picking apart their latest catch. He barely survived the attack and although it was a close call, it didn’t deter him. In fact, it only made him more resolute to stop what was happening in Bremen, and he realized one thing: he wasn’t going to be able to do this alone.

In 2605, Lattimore met with Arcturus Koerner, Rytif’s largest landowner and de facto governor, to ask for funds to create the Bremen Defense Force (BDF). Legend has it that Lattimore spoke, uninterrupted, for over an hour about his recent experiences. He presented the detailed reports he had compiled while on patrol, highlighted the system’s current crime stats, and argued that it was vital for the people of Bremen to stand together to keep their system safe. Once done, Koerner only had one question, “How much do you need?”

Weeks later, the Bremen Defense Force was up and running. Under Lattimore’s leadership, the system’s crime rate was quickly cut in half and remained that way for years to come. Being a member of the Bremen Defense Force became a major point of pride for those ineligible or unable to fight for the UEE Navy during the war. A proud tradition that carries over to this day.

Peacetime Problems

Following the end of the Second Tevarin War, the UEE armed forces’ demand for foodstuffs from Rytif was greatly reduced, yet the landowner collective known as Bremen Mills didn’t slow production. They had become an economic powerhouse in the Empire’s grain market, and had quickly shifted their focus to supplying food for the public. Security for these food shipments were of the utmost importance, and Bremen Mills quickly realized that subsidizing the Bremen Defense Force was cheaper than hiring full time private security forces.

This arrangement worked relatively well until the grain market crashed in 2640. Bremen Mills suffered a severe financial hit and was forced to cut funds to the BDF. In addition, millions of jobs related to the grain market were lost, and Bremen saw its population dwindle. Suddenly, the BDF was on a precipice. Lacking funding and losing members, many thought it didn’t have a chance to survive.

Though he had stepped away from running the militia’s day-to-day operations due to failing health, Philippe Lattimore once again got heavily involved to save the BDF. He made appeals to private citizens to donate time or equipment and called upon local businesses to provide financial support. Now, more than ever, he argued, Bremen was in need of a strong militia to protect its people during the insecurity of these tough economic times.

Many resisted until in 2642 the Advocacy’s Travel Safety Advisory System (TSAS) upgraded the system’s threat level to “Medium,” its highest threat level to date. Worried that Bremen’s safe reputation was on the line, the public and private sector rededicated themselves to ensuring the system’s security. Since the Bremen Defense Force was already so deeply ingrained, the powers that be figured it would be quicker and cheaper to get it running at full capacity rather than expanding Rytif’s anemic police force.

Public and private funds once again were funneled to the BDF and a widespread ad campaign to recruit volunteers was kicked off.

Some balked at the system’s main defense force not being a wholly government-run operation, but it was impossible to argue with the results, as the system’s threat level soon dropped back to its previous level. This action also reinforced the tradition of Bremen relying on militias instead of normal police forces for their security. This was a unique practice when compared to other systems, and one that revolutionaries would eventually take advantage of to help bring down the Messer regime.

Revolutionary Road

Over the years, a number of other militias rose to prominence in Bremen, though none ever achieved the sophistication of the BDF. The system’s reputation for being relatively safe persisted and remained a point of pride. It was only because of this that the Messer regime didn’t insist that a more centralized, and controllable, security apparatus be installed. With the rising Vanduul threat on one front and the cold war with the Xi’an on another, the Messer regime didn’t see a reason to change a system that was working for them. Yet, it was the Bremen Defense Force’s decentralized nature that allowed anti-Messer activists to exploit it to their benefit.

According to reports released during the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, the Messers ran several concurrent operations that implanted loyal agents into the militia to monitor its activity. The militia stayed non-committal to Messer regime policies and deflected pressure to take sides on anything not directly related to Bremen. They changed their motto to “Bremen Above All,” and instructed volunteers to not discuss Empire-wide politics while on duty. To avoid like-minded individuals consistently pairing up, patrol partners were randomly selected at roll call.

Actions like this helped the militia maintain their autonomy through the centuries of Messer rule. As the tide of public opinion turned against the despotic rulers, a brave faction within the BDF, unbeknownst to other volunteers, began to use the cover of the militia to smuggle anti-Messer activists through the system. This activity reached a fever pitch following the Massacre of Garron II in 2792.

The events of this time in the militia’s history were captured in The Bremen Beltway, a harrowing account of what it was like to work this part of “revolutionary road.” The book compiled interviews with former militia members and anti-Messer activists, journal excerpts, and declassified government documents to paint a picture of the extreme danger involved with smuggling revolutionaries through the system. Most of the activists were first smuggled from their system of origin into Xi’an territory and eventually into Nyx. That made Bremen the port of reentry into UEE, and a particularly perilous part of the journey. Without this secure gateway back into the Empire, many believe the overthrow of Imperator Linton Messer XI would not have happened nearly as quickly as it did. This only highlights the importance of high ranking BDF officials guaranteeing the revolutionaries safe passage through the system.

For nearly three and a half centuries, the Bremen Defense Force has been the standard that all other militias are held up to. Comprising a coalition of dedicated volunteers and funded by both public and private interests, the BDF has placed the security of their system above all else. When RSI looked to include militias in the design process of the Polaris, the BDF was their first call. Militia members consulted on the design and were among the first to purchase the new capital ship for their fleet. BDF officials can’t wait to put the Polaris to use, in the defense of the system they believe is their responsibility over anyone else to protect

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[michaelandy101-blog]

Test Core Net Vitals in Bulk: Moz Efficiency Metrics Beta

New Post has been published on https://tiptopreview.com/check-core-web-vitals-in-bulk-moz-performance-metrics-beta/

Test Core Net Vitals in Bulk: Moz Efficiency Metrics Beta

The writer’s views are fully his or her personal (excluding the unlikely occasion of hypnosis) and will not at all times mirror the views of Moz.

In Could 2020, Google took the step, as they often do, of giving SEOs a heads up a couple of large change coming to their algorithms. At Moz, we’ve taken benefit of this warning and are introducing a function that can assist SEOs maintain their websites up to the mark.

So, at this time I’ve the pleasure of saying a brand new open beta function accessible to all Moz Professional subscribers: our new Efficiency Metrics suite.

The suite contains bulk evaluation (on cellular and desktop), of the three Core Net Vitals metrics which can be set to turn out to be a part of Google’s Web page Expertise replace subsequent month. That is a part of Moz’s dedication to technical search engine optimisation assets in 2021, together with our just lately launched Technical search engine optimisation Certification, and a few extra options and content material items that we’ll have the ability to share quickly.

On this submit, I’ll undergo the background of Core Net Vitals, and the way the brand new instruments from Moz will assist to identify, observe, and repair web page efficiency points as they occur. However for those who’re keen to simply leap in and get began:

Join Moz Professional to entry the beta!

Already a Moz Professional buyer? Log in to entry the beta!

Hold on, Core Net … what now? Is that this search engine optimisation?

Sure — for those who care about natural rankings, it’s essential care about Core Net Vitals and efficiency metrics generally. As such, that is a kind of items of technical understanding that’s going to must enter normal search engine optimisation information, identical to its predecessors in cellular friendliness and HTTPS. Thankfully, it is not as daunting as it could possibly at first appear.

Right here’s a fast recap on the historical past of subsequent month’s replace:

Sitespeed has factored into Google’s rankings since 2010.

In May 2020, Google introduced that three particular efficiency metrics, referred to as “Core Web Vitals,” could be explicitly used to measure web page expertise. They later pushed again the efficient date to May 2021, then once more to summer 2021. The three new metrics are:

Largest Contentful Paint

Cumulative Structure Shift

First Enter Delay

To get a rating increase, Google’s says that you just’ll must go a threshold on all three metrics, in addition to go 4 different primary technical hygiene checks:

This rating increase would possibly only apply on mobile.

The three new Core Net Vitals efficiency metrics are measured utilizing CrUX (Chrome Person Expertise) knowledge, which suggests it’s being measured within the browsers of actual Chrome customers. Curiously, it’s likely that pages with out sufficient site visitors to achieve this threshold will miss out on any increase.

As with Google’s earlier efforts to form the online (significantly with HTTPS and cellular friendliness), the initial impact may be minimal. Nevertheless, previous expertise suggests it should ramp up considerably over the subsequent 1-2 years.

So what’s Moz doing about it?

Suggestions from our customers suggests the majority are at the moment routinely getting these key metrics by querying URLs one after the other in Google’s Pagespeed Insights instrument. This knowledge is then troublesome to mixture, kind, filter, prioritize, and so forth. Alternatively, they could use CrUX knowledge (just like the recently-launched Google Search Console report), however this solely works for those who’re engaged on pages that already get loads of site visitors, can’t be re-analyzed while you want it, and isn’t a managed take a look at. We wished to ship the instrument that mixed the metrics SEOs care about, recognized potential fixes, and will analyze and observe giant portions of pages. Primarily based on this suggestions, it was clear that there was an opportunity right here to handle all of those frustrations, and in doing so, to enhance search engine optimisation practitioners’ day-to-day working lives earlier than this summer time.

Our preliminary beta is open to all Moz Professional subscribers, and may be discovered within the left hand navigation of Moz Professional, nested beneath the Campaigns’ Web site Crawl instrument.

We’ve taken the freedom of pre-populating 100 of your high pages by Web page Authority with cellular and desktop efficiency knowledge. However, it’s also possible to select an inventory of pages to research from a wide range of sources like high rating pages, pages with different crawl points, or all pages – at the moment as much as a most of 6,000 pages per marketing campaign per 30 days.

Extra sources are coming quickly, and what you choose right here may also have an effect on the overview bar chart on the high of the web page. You may then additional refine the pages you want to analyze by narrowing down with URL textual content, reminiscent of /weblog.

What’s included within the beta?

When you’ve chosen your batch of URLs to research, you’ll be introduced with a desk like this one:

As you possibly can see, my private website requires some TLC.

This knowledge may be filtered and sorted. The “details” dropdown arrow in every row highlights key urged fixes for that URL at fast look.

In the event you click on by to “View Report,” you possibly can see extra detailed info for every URL:

Notice that we’re utilizing Whole Blocking Time as a proxy for First Enter Delay. Google can be utilizing “field data” as talked about earlier on this submit, whereas for scalability causes we’re utilizing Lighthouse “lab data,” such as you see in Google Pagespeed Insights and different comparable instruments. It isn’t doable to measure First Enter Delay on this context as a result of there is no such thing as a person to make an enter, however Whole Blocking Time is an effective approximation.

These metrics can every be expanded to provide extra context on every metric, and what’s thought-about a very good or dangerous rating:

And lastly, we’re offering some urged areas of focus, which may be expanded to supply human-friendly explanations:

Why ought to I take advantage of Efficiency Metrics beta?

You would possibly need to:

Determine URLs which can be more likely to miss out on any Core Net Vitals rating increase

Determine URLs which can be performing poorly

Report on efficiency in bulk and determine the size of any issues

Prioritize accordingly

Discover out what to do about every problem

I’m assured Moz Professional is, by some margin, the simplest technique to get this sort of knowledge at scale.

To attract some fast comparisons with the present state of the market:

CSV obtain, extra knowledge, and continuous enchancment

Nevertheless, all that doesn’t imply we’re accomplished fairly but. We had been keen to resolve sure issues SEOs are going through earlier than subsequent month’s large rollout, however it is a beta, and the search engine optimisation significance of Core Net Vitals is more likely to rise regularly for a while, so we do have a number of enhancements already deliberate.

One explicit enhancement I wished to name out is a CSV export. As a long-time search engine optimisation knowledge junkie, that is considered one of my most requested options for any instrument like Moz to have. Once I first made my Moz profile again in 2013, I listed “endless Excel use cases” as my favourite factor about search engine optimisation. I nonetheless have a comfortable spot for having the ability to manipulate and mix knowledge to my coronary heart’s content material in a dwell atmosphere. Even for those who’re extra onboard the current Python search engine optimisation pattern your self, CSVs are nonetheless an effective way to get knowledge into that atmosphere.

Past that, we’re additionally options to trace efficiency over time, and numerous UI enhancements to ensure essentially the most actionable knowledge is at all times surfaced.

Get began, and inform us what you suppose!

That mentioned, it is a beta, which suggests half the purpose is to get your opinion on what ought to come subsequent. You may get began right here:

Join Moz Professional to entry the beta!

Already a Moz Professional buyer? Log in to entry the beta!

Tell us what you’d wish to see added within the feedback beneath.

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[thenonconformistcurmudgeon]

The Rise and Fall of Quicksand

There appears to be near unanimous support and agreement in my generation on at least one matter. Quicksand.  Bring up the subject and folks will wax nostalgic with both elation and great fondness of viewing movies/TV that seemed to be replete with quicksand.  Reminiscing about quicksand is a great conversation starter and will cement a bond between friends and strangers alike. A substantial survey has indicated a love and fear of quicksand for the old folks that was enlightened by media portrayals and being impressionable children at the time.  

Pretty quickly, in conversation someone will remember it was important not to move if you were in quicksand as that will make you sink faster.  The poor souls would panic and rapidly go under, some bubbles rising to the surface, and perhaps a hat was left floating on the top.  Although not moving was a clear directive, it was not clear how one was to escape unless rescued by someone putting a long branch out and pulling you in or tying a rope around the horse saddle and the horse pulling you out.

Quicksand appeared ubiquitous and thus it was something to fear in daily life. One might fall in a quicksand pit at any moment.  Old Tarzan and Jungle Jim movies would make one fear going in the woods.  Trepidation would follow those that traveled out west or in a swampy area.  The sense that quicksand was everywhere is backed by a survey of movies/TV shows from the 60’s and 70’s which tallies one in 35 programs having quicksand.  Obviously, the viewing public couldn’t get enough Quicksand and the entertainment industry fulfilled their desires.  Children imprinted with these frequent images feared for their lives as at any moment they may be swallowed up whole while walking the dog.   At the same time, there was great attraction to quicksand and watching someone else fall in would have been thoroughly breathtaking.

A friend of mine confessed that he was so enamored by quicksand that he tried to make it behind his house to set a trap for monsters when he was about 7 or 8 years old.  All that he accomplished was to make a lot of mud on a hillside.  He slipped in it and fell on the coffee can he was using as a tool, and then went to the hospital for stitches on a hand. There are so many ways that quicksand can get you.

Quicksand was a remarkably common plot device and crossed all genres of entertainment.  The first quicksand appearance was in a 1916 silent picture where a man and woman having an illicit affair go in the drink while their partners who were also moving towards immorality are on firm ground deciding whether to save them or let them sink.  This early romance/drama used quicksand as a metaphor for what awaits you if you go off the proper path.  By the way, they were physically saved but morally bankrupted.  

Quicksand has been spotted in superhero and adventure movies, in Raiders, Queen of the amazon, Batman, Tarzan and more.  Comedies like Blazing Saddles and the Lucy Show, Police shows like CHIPS, Film Noir, zombie movies, Science Fiction even in outer space such as seen in 2 Episodes of Lost in Space and Star Wars, of course Westerns, and a staple in horror films. The love of quicksand was international as a German Horror/Sexploitation 1960 film, Horrors of Spider Island had the creature fall and die in the muck.  As an aside, the original cut had “Continental scenes” of bare-chested women but those scenes were eventually cut from the American and German versions.  Even with those cuts, the British did not allow it in their Empire as scenes of women in their underwear or discreetly skinny dipping were too much. Apparently, there is a French version that still has the original un-edited version.

Quicksand ranged from high end Lawrence of Arabia to the lowly TV show, the Monkeys.  The worst quicksand scene I have viewed took place during a Flying Nun episode.  Clearly a fake quicksand pit as she goes in up to about her chest and stops sinking. I can’t imagine how desperate the writers were to come up with a plot for that week’s show but it does demonstrate how far ranging and a recurring theme quicksand was at the time. If the flying nun can fall in quicksand, so could you.  Must have been considered a ratings bonanza as if the show had quicksand this week, maybe it will happen next week and fans would tune in. They were simpler times.  

Few people know but Martin Luther King was apparently a quicksand fan.  In his I have a dream speech, he stated, “Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood’.  Ubiquitous, I tell you.

Johnny Weissmuller played both Tarzan and Jungle Jim in movies in the 30’s and 40’s which had frequent quicksand scenes.  As this backlot conversation demonstrates, he likely got tired of the quicksand but would be a trooper throughout his career:

agent: Johnny, I got a good picture for you, you'll love it

Johnny: Does it have quicksand?

agent:  Quicksand, well of course it has quicksand, people expect you to be in a picture with quicksand.   

Johnny:  Don't you think I can do a picture without quicksand once in a while.  Maybe something based on a Jayne Eyre novel, see me as a star-crossed lover?

agent:  The public loves you Johnny, they love quicksand and they especially love you in quicksand.  

Johnny: Tired of all the mud, can't you find me a clean role.

agent: The money isn't dirty, is it Johnny?  You'll do it and be good with it.  

Johnny: Can you ask for a hose on the set with warm water at least to wash me off.  The cold water is dreadful.

agent: sure Johnny, whatever you want.  I can ask but it is costly to bring warm water to the set.  I'll ask. 

The heyday of quicksand is now over in the mainstream media.  Hollywood rung the quicksand plot device dry.  Children nowadays have no fear of it which is quite unfortunate as they would be clueless of what to do in the event of a trapping.  

However, research shows that it is apparently a golden era for quicksand as a fetish.  Yes, you got that right.  Ladies in bikinis or less going in the quagmire apparently excite some males of the species.   Chose not to click on those links. Times are no longer simple I guess.

If you look up quicksand on the internet, you will allegedly learn that quicksand is not dangerous.  They say you are not likely to go further than knee or waist deep.  Notice, there are differing opinions of depth which is suspicious in and of itself.  I learned that there is no government agency that tallies the number of quicksand deaths.  Clearly a cover up.   The government is keeping the truth from the population, saying quicksand is not dangerous.  Local governments fear bad press of quicksand keeping tourists away. Government agents likely use quicksand pits to disappear alleged undesirables.  Lawyer Sidney Powell thinks there are ballots buried in them and wants to dredge the pits in contested states.  The CIA won’t let it happen because of all the bodies piled up in them. Jimmy Hoffa, obviously quicksand.  

Quicksand remains deadly. Just this month a man died in an Egyptian desert a quicksand death.  The middle east is obviously a hotbed of quicksand.  A friend who claims to be a quicksand afficionado could not understand why he could not be rescued.  Seems obvious to me.  Desert quicksand is the worst type. Swallows you up quick.  It’s in the desert so no trees.  No trees so no long sticks to throw and for the victim to grab onto. No horses to put a rope around to pull them out.  Can’t say it strong enough, desert quicksand, absolutely the most frightening type.

There was clearly a cover up in a Texas man’s death in 2016.  Local newsrag reported a man missing, eventually reporting his death near a river, never mentioning quicksand.  However, when police were confronted, they admitted he died in quicksand after his face fell in after his body was waist deep.  

I am petitioning Hollywood to bring back quicksand in entertainment.  The children of the next generation need to be prepared, properly frightened, and learn not to fight the shifting sinking sands.  Without this education, I am afraid more will perish.  It also seems enough time has passed since the heyday of quicksand to use it regularly again in film/TV.  There can be some quicksand in the background of scenes, people falling in and may or may not be rescued or in the foreground of the action.  Folks will then be excited with anticipation of who might go in the quicksand and whether they will be saved or not. Seems appropriate for pandemic entertainment. Millions of signatures for the petition will be easy to obtain for who doesn’t like quicksand. Nobody.  Everyone loves quicksand.

[theliberaltony]

via Politics – FiveThirtyEight

Pretend I’m the owner of a polling company that surveys political races. I prominently advertise my results: According to a Walt Hickey Polling Inc. survey of 600 likely voters, John Doe is beating Jane Doe 58 percent to 40 percent — John Doe will likely win the election. (Let’s say it’s a race for the U.S. Senate.)

But then you keep reading and you notice that the sample on which my poll is based consists of 400 men and 200 women. You can’t really tell whether I’m adjusting the numbers, and if so, how. Would you trust that number? Unless there’s some state I don’t know about where men outnumber women 2-to-1, you shouldn’t.

So why aren’t we more skeptical of movie ratings that do the same thing?

It’s a worthwhile question, and lately it’s made it pretty hard for us to take the ratings provided on IMDb, the largest and most popular movie site on the internet, at face value. The Academy Awards rightly get criticized for reflecting the preferences of a small, unrepresentative sample of the population, but online ratings have the same problem. Even the vaunted IMDb Top 250 — nominally the best-liked films ever — is worth taking with 250 grains of salt. Women accounted for 52 percent of moviegoers in the U.S. and Canada in 2016, according to the most recent annual study by the Motion Picture Association of America. But on the internet, and on ratings sites, they’re a much smaller percentage.

“If you see any number that is a rating number or a number with a percentage sign, it may be compelling or meaningful and it may not be,” said Gary Langer, the president of Langer Research Associates, the polling firm that has long conducted surveys for ABC News. “And what we need to do rather than be seduced by the number is to subject it to meaningful inquiry as to how it was obtained.”

OK, but how skeptical should we be? To figure that out, I wanted to see how strong the male skew of raters is on IMDb and how big an effect that skew has on movies’ scores.

We’ll start with every film that’s eligible for IMDb’s Top 250 list. A film needs 25,000 ratings from regular IMDb voters to qualify for the list. As of Feb. 14, that was 4,377 titles. Of those movies, only 97 had more ratings from women than men. The other 4,280 films were mostly rated by men, and it wasn’t even close for all but a few films. In 3,942 cases (90 percent of all eligible films), the men outnumbered the women by at least 2-to-1. In 2,212 cases (51 percent), men outnumbered women more than 5-to-1. And in 513 cases (12 percent), the men outnumbered the women by at least 10-to-1.

Looking strictly at IMDb’s weighted average — IMDb adjusts the raw ratings it gets “in order to eliminate and reduce attempts at vote stuffing,” but it does not disclose how — the male skew of raters has a pretty significant effect. In 17 percent of cases, the weighted average of the male and female voters was equal, and in another 26 percent of cases, the votes of the men and women were within 0.1 points of one another. But when there was bigger disagreement — i.e. men and women rated a movie differently by 0.2 points or more, on average — the overall score overwhelmingly broke closer to the men’s rating than the women’s rating. The score was closer to the men’s rating more than 48 percent of the time and closer to the women’s rating less than 9 percent of the time, meaning that when there was disagreement, the male preference won out about 85 percent of the time.

That male skew of raters is also apparent in the 250 movies that make IMDb’s top list, which we pulled on Feb. 16:

So, what’s the issue here? If IMDb is content with its ratings being intended almost solely for men, then there isn’t one. (We reached out to IMDb for comment and for more information on how the site adjusts its ratings, but we received no response. So we don’t know, for example, if IMDb is already doing something to the data that accounts for the gender disparity in raters.) But if IMDb seeks to reflect the opinions of the actual movie-going population, the situation is grave.

Can we fix that? Langer is skeptical. Mainly, besides how simple it is for a dedicated individual or group to “manufacture” results, online data from a self-selected group of people is so inherently dubious that any reweighting of that data is also inherently dubious. You can’t just adjust troublesome data to make it reflect the world, he said.

“The notion that you can take bad data and weight it to be OK is … hazardous to your health,” Langer cautioned.

That said, since the scores of the most popular movie site on the internet are already being calculated based on an entirely self-selected sample, would it destroy the IMDb Top 250 to try to mimic actual movie audiences more? I don’t really think so. As a thought experiment, I used everything we know about IMDb’s rating adjustments — which is far from the full picture — and ran them on the ratings of the 4,377 eligible films after I adjusted the raw ratings to weight men’s and women’s views equally.

We can’t do an adjustment that allows us to perfectly replicate the top 250 — again, we don’t know what’s in the black box, so we can’t re-create it — but to approximate it, I excluded any film that didn’t either a) make the IMDb top 1,000 movies list or b) have a rating from the site’s top 1,000 users within 0.87 points1 of the rating from its users overall. This allows us to sidestep films that would have made the top 250 through vote-stuffing.

My main point is that overall, the naive reweighting didn’t destroy the general look of the 250, and if anything, it elevated films that may have been overlooked because one gender is vastly outnumbered.2

What if IMDb adjusted ratings toward gender parity?

Estimated highest-ranking films on IMDb if the men’s and women’s ratings were weighted toward 50-50 vs. IMDb’s actual rank as of Feb. 16, 2018

Rankings Year▲▼ Film▲▼ Actual▲▼ Women only▲▼ Men only▲▼ Gender- weighted▲▼ 1994 The Shawshank Redemption 1 1 1 1 1972 The Godfather 2 10 2 2 2008 The Dark Knight 4 3 3 3 2003 The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King 8 2 4 4 1993 Schindler’s List 6 6 11 5 1999 Fight Club 10 5 8 6 2001 The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring 11 7 10 7 1957 12 Angry Men 5 27 7 8 1974 The Godfather: Part II 3 22 5 9 2010 Inception 14 8 6 10 1994 Forrest Gump 12 9 13 11 2002 The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers 15 11 14 12 1994 The Lion King 47 4 29 13 1994 Pulp Fiction 7 15 9 14 2014 Interstellar 30 25 15 15 1999 The Green Mile 32 12 28 16 1975 One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest 16 24 19 17 1966 The Good, the Bad and the Ugly 9 115 12 18 2006 The Prestige 48 26 16 19 1998 American History X 31 17 27 20 2012 The Dark Knight Rises 65 23 22 21 1997 Life Is Beautiful 25 16 41 22 1980 Star Wars: Episode V – The Empire Strikes Back 13 41 17 23 1994 Leon: The Professional 27 21 37 24 2002 City of God 21 64 20 25 1995 Se7en 22 28 23 26 2001 Spirited Away 28 13 56 27 1991 The Silence of the Lambs 23 20 33 28 2006 The Departed 40 35 26 29 1990 Goodfellas 17 71 18 30 2011 The Intouchables 37 19 52 31 2014 Whiplash 45 54 30 32 2000 Gladiator 46 44 24 33 2012 Django Unchained 60 29 31 34 2002 The Pianist 39 31 53 35 1946 It’s a Wonderful Life 24 56 51 36 1960 Psycho 34 55 40 37 1977 Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope 20 48 32 38 2009 Inglourious Basterds 97 32 43 39 1998 Saving Private Ryan 29 70 25 40 1995 The Usual Suspects 26 58 36 41 1999 The Matrix 18 62 21 42 2000 Memento 49 57 34 43 1942 Casablanca 36 73 42 44 1999 American Beauty 63 51 35 45 1985 Back to the Future 44 49 46 46 2001 A Beautiful Mind 144 34 68 47 1954 Rear Window 43 80 60 48 2000 Requiem for a Dream 80 50 49 49 2011 Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 218 14 126 50 2006 The Lives of Others 58 86 78 51 2010 Shutter Island 177 39 59 52 2008 WALL-E 62 42 62 53 2004 Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind 87 38 66 54 1980 The Shining 61 61 47 55 1997 Good Will Hunting 102 60 48 56 1971 A Clockwork Orange 84 79 50 57 2001 Amelie 82 30 90 58 1954 Seven Samurai 19 336 39 59 1983 Star Wars: Episode VI – Return of the Jedi 76 87 63 60 1992 Reservoir Dogs 77 94 64 61 2017 Coco 51 209 166 62 1988 Cinema Paradiso 54 165 97 63 1979 Apocalypse Now 50 219 38 64 1940 The Great Dictator 53 262 101 65 1950 Sunset Boulevard 55 190 108 66 1931 City Lights 35 294 92 67 1997 Princess Mononoke 64 118 100 68 2015 Room 143 82 139 69 2003 Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl > 250 36 113 70 2004 Howl’s Moving Castle 137 43 216 71 1962 To Kill a Mockingbird 89 102 135 72 2009 Up 115 37 117 73 2014 Gone Girl 179 81 70 74 2010 Toy Story 3 98 66 82 75 1936 Modern Times 38 248 96 76 1988 Grave of the Fireflies 57 159 133 77 2006 Pan’s Labyrinth 130 74 91 78 2016 Hacksaw Ridge 175 161 124 79 1968 2001: A Space Odyssey 91 195 54 80 2007 Into the Wild 181 84 95 81 1958 Vertigo 72 154 87 82 2015 Inside Out 140 78 107 83 2005 Batman Begins 116 106 58 84 1975 Monty Python and the Holy Grail 103 123 104 85 2009 3 Idiots 93 203 93 86 2003 Oldeuboi 67 171 73 87 1964 Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb 56 236 57 88 1991 Terminator 2 42 178 44 89 1959 North by Northwest 74 205 99 90 1968 Once Upon a Time in the West 33 447 55 91 1981 Raiders of the Lost Ark 41 131 65 92 1995 Toy Story 94 85 80 93 1952 Singin’ in the Rain 90 110 170 94 2016 La La Land 207 122 86 95 1979 Alien 52 151 67 96 1941 Citizen Kane 71 188 74 97 2002 Catch Me if You Can 219 97 81 98 1983 Scarface 105 181 69 99 1976 Taxi Driver 88 164 71 100 2014 The Grand Budapest Hotel 194 65 128 101 1987 Full Metal Jacket 92 177 83 102 2010 How to Train Your Dragon 176 47 165 103 1984 Amadeus 83 128 121 104 2007 There Will Be Blood 165 212 72 105 2012 The Avengers > 250 52 144 106 1984 Once Upon a Time in America 69 337 88 107 2013 The Wolf of Wall Street 150 158 45 108 2005 V for Vendetta 151 76 112 109 1939 Gone With the Wind 157 46 279 110 2003 Kill Bill: Vol. 1 174 89 114 111 1995 Braveheart 75 141 61 112 2003 Finding Nemo 166 53 151 113 1999 The Sixth Sense 160 75 116 114 2011 The Help 241 33 245 115 2015 Star Wars: The Force Awakens > 250 92 154 116 2015 Mad Max: Fury Road 204 135 79 117 2000 Snatch 100 144 76 118 2016 Dangal 73 649 195 119 2016 Zootopia > 250 95 187 120 2001 Donnie Darko 226 91 122 121 2008 Gran Torino 158 121 120 122 1989 Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade 112 156 84 123 2012 Jagten 101 183 141 124 1988 My Neighbor Totoro 132 112 183 125 1996 Trainspotting 156 107 127 126 2013 12 Years a Slave 201 100 131 127 1959 Some Like It Hot 118 124 186 128 1973 The Sting 95 284 143 129 2013 Prisoners 215 148 98 130 2017 Logan 202 193 103 131 2016 Your Name 79 399 190 132 2007 Taare Zameen Par 81 448 138 133 2011 A Separation 109 242 125 134 1997 Titanic > 250 45 188 135 2011 Warrior 154 213 134 136 2017 Dunkirk 236 192 145 137 2015 Spotlight 205 155 152 138 1986 Stand by Me 192 125 184 139 2014 X-Men: Days of Future Past > 250 113 159 140 2004 Kill Bill: Vol. 2 > 250 116 157 141 2014 The Imitation Game > 250 69 209 142 2010 The King’s Speech > 250 59 206 143 1986 Aliens 68 217 85 144 2004 Downfall 121 288 115 145 1998 Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels 142 199 130 146 1997 L.A. Confidential 106 225 94 147 2016 Arrival > 250 169 137 148 1957 Paths of Glory 59 704 109 149 2017 Blade Runner 2049 147 368 102 150 1991 Beauty and the Beast 247 40 379 151 2014 Guardians of the Galaxy > 250 111 147 152 1962 Lawrence of Arabia 85 396 105 153 1993 Jurassic Park 198 150 118 154 1927 Metropolis 108 331 182 155 2016 Deadpool > 250 126 155 156 2012 The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey > 250 90 192 157 2001 Monsters, Inc. 224 77 196 158 1988 Die Hard 122 220 77 159 1989 Dead Poets Society 238 103 239 160 2010 Black Swan > 250 98 161 161 2015 The Martian > 250 134 160 162 1957 Witness for the Prosecution 66 476 229 163 2004 Hotel Rwanda 190 176 181 164 2009 Star Trek > 250 117 199 165 2013 The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug > 250 109 205 166 2009 Hachi: A Dog’s Tale 212 127 288 167 2017 Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri 111 351 204 168 1981 Das Boot 70 603 111 169 1995 Heat 123 332 89 170 1978 The Deer Hunter 159 346 153 171 1980 The Elephant Man 148 261 177 172 1931 M 78 465 167 173 1950 All About Eve 114 227 302 174 1921 The Kid 99 459 249 175 1944 Double Indemnity 86 433 169 176 2013 Her > 250 194 106 177 2009 Mary and Max 178 175 274 178 2017 Thor: Ragnarok > 250 200 260 179 2013 Dallas Buyers Club > 250 146 175 180 1960 The Apartment 107 322 189 181 2008 In Bruges > 250 239 140 182 1998 The Truman Show 206 132 149 183 2010 Incendies 131 300 253 184 1939 The Wizard of Oz 232 119 241 185 2008 Slumdog Millionaire > 250 99 191 186 2007 No Country for Old Men 162 244 75 187 1999 The Boondock Saints > 250 254 250 188 2009 The Secret in Their Eyes 135 265 198 189 2016 Lion > 250 170 332 190 2017 Baahubali 2: The Conclusion > 250 1170 343 191 2015 The Revenant > 250 214 129 192 2004 Million Dollar Baby 203 163 162 193 2005 Babam ve Oglum 117 526 291 194 1963 The Great Escape 126 479 174 195 1948 Bicycle Thieves 96 458 202 196 2004 Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban > 250 72 339 197 2006 Blood Diamond > 250 172 212 198 1993 The Nightmare Before Christmas > 250 105 318 199 1974 Chinatown 129 360 158 200 2012 The Perks of Being a Wallflower > 250 108 232 201 1990 Edward Scissorhands > 250 67 357 202 1949 The Third Man 127 484 224 203 2003 Big Fish > 250 133 226 204 2013 Rush 193 252 172 205 1954 Dial M for Murder 155 352 233 206 1995 Before Sunrise 211 179 228 207 1940 Rebecca 173 250 350 208 1992 Unforgiven 120 543 110 209 1979 Life of Brian 183 266 179 210 1998 The Big Lebowski 167 256 123 211 1992 Aladdin > 250 120 308 212 2000 Amores Perros 209 260 225 213 2007 The Bourne Ultimatum 234 235 156 214 2007 Ratatouille > 250 138 211 215 1996 Fargo 161 230 164 216 1995 Twelve Monkeys 245 238 163 217 1965 For a Few Dollars More 104 792 142 218 1980 Raging Bull 124 599 119 219 2005 Serenity > 250 208 295 220 1967 Cool Hand Luke 172 539 215 221 1969 Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid 210 421 231 222 1957 The Bridge on the River Kwai 138 581 180 223 1988 Rain Man > 250 182 217 224 1965 The Sound of Music > 250 101 516 225 1957 The Seventh Seal 141 462 223 226 1993 In the Name of the Father 188 408 268 227 2014 Wild Tales 185 323 282 228 1939 Mr. Smith Goes to Washington 145 466 297 229 2006 The Pursuit of Happyness > 250 185 220 230 1995 Casino 146 419 136 231 1987 The Princess Bride 214 136 298 232 1950 Rashomon 110 626 185 233 2008 Iron Man > 250 140 244 234 1975 Dog Day Afternoon > 250 417 252 235 2014 PK > 250 646 246 236 2005 Sin City > 250 231 148 237 1954 On the Waterfront 139 546 237 238 1982 Gandhi 227 370 221 239 2017 Call Me by Your Name 186 347 528 240 2011 X: First Class > 250 157 248 241 1948 The Treasure of the Sierra Madre 119 786 230 242 2014 Kingsman: The Secret Service > 250 174 259 243 2012 Life of Pi > 250 152 257 244 2016 Captain America: Civil War > 250 215 265 245 2005 Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire > 250 96 431 246 2004 The Notebook > 250 63 452 247 1976 Rocky 220 442 132 248 2013 About Time > 250 189 269 249 1977 Annie Hall 233 289 218 250 2003 Mystic River > 250 245 219 251 2011 The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo > 250 216 222 252 1992 Scent of a Woman > 250 276 255 253 2007 Atonement > 250 139 366 254 2011 The Artist > 250 197 325 255 2014 Big Hero 6 > 250 129 462 256 1986 Platoon 187 490 176 257 1984 Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind 213 378 301 258 1973 The Exorcist > 250 309 178 259 1925 The Gold Rush 136 684 306 260 1953 Roman Holiday > 250 206 426 261 1982 The Thing 163 528 146 262 1984 The Terminator 229 318 150 263 1985 The Breakfast Club > 250 137 391 264 2007 Persepolis > 250 291 477 265 2004 Before Sunset > 250 263 240 266 1959 Ben-Hur 195 481 227 267 1961 Judgment at Nuremberg 134 752 375 268 2013 The Hunger Games: Catching Fire > 250 83 525 269 2004 The Incredibles > 250 222 208 270 2000 Remember the Titans > 250 312 346 271 2001 Shrek > 250 143 323 272 1934 It Happened One Night 184 366 424 273 2001 Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone > 250 88 530 274 2006 Casino Royale > 250 282 200 275 2014 Edge of Tomorrow > 250 293 203 276 2014 How to Train Your Dragon 2 > 250 186 395 277 1941 The Maltese Falcon 216 541 271 278 2014 Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) > 250 299 168 279 1974 Young Frankenstein > 250 443 334 280 1957 Wild Strawberries 152 609 329 281 2001 Ocean’s Eleven > 250 221 262 282 2004 Shaun of the Dead > 250 233 261 283 1967 The Graduate > 250 285 254 284 2006 The Fall > 250 223 594 285 1995 La Haine 231 561 276 286 2006 Little Miss Sunshine > 250 149 349 287 2003 Dogville > 250 328 365 288 2015 The Hateful Eight > 250 411 171 289 2005 Pride & Prejudice > 250 68 754 290 2014 Nightcrawler > 250 380 173 291 1990 Dances With Wolves > 250 375 264 292 1986 Castle in the Sky 250 379 310 293 2010 Tangled > 250 93 599 294 1999 The Iron Giant > 250 418 312 295 2000 In the Mood for Love 240 358 423 296 2016 Hidden Figures > 250 180 651 297 2008 Yip Man > 250 744 214 298 1951 Strangers on a Train > 250 478 371 299 1948 Rope > 250 503 369 300 2009 Moon > 250 350 284 301 2016 Manchester by the Sea > 250 427 243 302 1951 A Streetcar Named Desire > 250 348 448 303 1986 Ferris Bueller’s Day Off > 250 255 303 304 2001 Mulholland Drive > 250 349 242 305 2014 Captain America: The Winter Soldier > 250 204 316 306 2009 District 9 > 250 324 193 307 1982 Blade Runner 149 341 197 308 1999 Magnolia > 250 444 194 309 1985 Brazil > 250 554 287 310 2002 The Bourne Identity > 250 298 256 311 2002 Hero > 250 492 355 312 2005 Cinderella Man > 250 495 286 313 2000 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon > 250 354 313 314 1999 Toy Story 2 > 250 249 266 315 2013 Star Trek: Into Darkness > 250 191 417 316 1968 Rosemary’s Baby > 250 343 304 317 1946 Notorious > 250 500 450 318 1976 Network 191 720 273 319 2016 Rogue One > 250 283 337 320 1997 Children of Heaven 128 678 519 321 2007 Hot Fuzz > 250 259 331 322 1983 A Christmas Story > 250 415 377 323 2004 Crash > 250 226 336 324 2010 Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1 > 250 104 696 325 1995 Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge > 250 902 437 326 2013 Captain Phillips > 250 270 340 327 2005 Walk the Line > 250 224 418 328 2017 Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 > 250 241 446 329 2007 Elite Squad > 250 974 307 330 1982 E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial > 250 246 370 331 2000 Dancer in the Dark > 250 400 447 332 1966 Persona 196 548 400 333 2009 The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo > 250 269 412 334 2008 Let the Right One In > 250 384 270 335 2014 Boyhood > 250 335 238 336 2012 Barfi! > 250 877 440 337 2009 Mr. Nobody > 250 253 434 338 1993 True Romance > 250 557 280 339 2010 My Name Is Khan > 250 535 517 340 2009 The Hangover > 250 258 247 341 1926 The General 153 891 381 342 2012 Moonrise Kingdom > 250 232 386 343 2012 Les Miserables > 250 168 499 344 1979 Stalker 197 767 347 345 2017 Baby Driver > 250 389 305 346 2012 Silver Linings Playbook > 250 237 251 347 2016 Contratiempo > 250 589 561 348 2004 The Sea Inside > 250 428 507 349 2006 Apocalypto > 250 364 373 350 1959 The 400 Blows 200 637 374 351 2017 Get Out > 250 344 314 352 1988 Akira > 250 882 267 353 1964 Fistful of Dollars > 250 950 278 354 2009 The Blind Side > 250 198 488 355 2008 Taken > 250 257 315 356 2008 The Curious Case of Benjamin Button > 250 211 320 357 2007 The Diving Bell and the Butterfly > 250 432 397 358 2011 Drive > 250 361 207 359 2003 Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring > 250 572 416 360 1987 The Untouchables > 250 604 300 361 1944 Arsenic and Old Lace > 250 464 617 362 1996 Sling Blade > 250 715 464 363 2008 The Boy in the Striped Pajamas > 250 207 601 364 2002 Talk to Her > 250 394 430 365 1979 Manhattan > 250 508 359 366 2013 Short Term 12 > 250 474 529 367 2015 Straight Outta Compton > 250 513 459 368 2010 Despicable Me > 250 145 543 369 2000 Almost Famous > 250 320 322 370 1982 Pink Floyd: The Wall > 250 656 510 371 2006 Children of Men > 250 355 263 372 2014 Ex Machina > 250 362 272 373 1997 Boogie Nights > 250 660 213 374 2013 Queen > 250 1005 484 375 1973 Papillon > 250 831 354 376 2010 Elite Squad: The Enemy Within > 250 1116 352 377 2014 The Theory of Everything > 250 173 591 378 1940 The Philadelphia Story > 250 393 766 379 1940 The Grapes of Wrath 221 728 403 380 1971 Harold and Maude > 250 436 685 381 2016 Captain Fantastic > 250 363 505 382 1993 What’s Eating Gilbert Grape > 250 202 574 383 2003 Memories of Murder 199 916 330 384 2009 Avatar > 250 228 296 385 2002 Infernal Affairs 243 875 292 386 1994 Three Colors: Red > 250 644 415 387 1976 All the President’s Men > 250 755 420 388 2016 The Handmaiden 246 595 549 389 1955 The Night of the Hunter > 250 737 471 390 1995 Underground > 250 751 541 391 1990 The Godfather: Part III > 250 440 358 392 1984 Paris, Texas 244 736 455 393 2010 The Fighter > 250 452 283 394 1966 Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? > 250 537 565 395 2014 The Fault in Our Stars > 250 187 513 396 2005 Brokeback Mountain > 250 162 611 397 2007 Chak de! India > 250 1278 317 398 2006 Lucky Number Slevin > 250 416 363 399 1991 JFK > 250 847 324 400 1998 The Legend of 1900 242 608 607 401 2017 The Greatest Showman > 250 272 972 402 2000 O Brother, Where Art Thou? > 250 401 387 403 2010 The Social Network > 250 414 201 404 1997 Gattaca > 250 356 390 405 2012 Argo > 250 243 409 406 1993 Groundhog Day 230 457 210 407 1962 The Manchurian Candidate > 250 849 506 408 1984 This Is Spinal Tap > 250 762 348 409 2013 Frozen > 250 130 692 410 1990 Misery > 250 402 466 411 2007 The Man From Earth > 250 764 290 412 1968 Planet of the Apes > 250 789 294 413 2000 Cast Away > 250 314 328 414 1998 Black Cat, White Cat > 250 676 605 415 1971 Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory > 250 333 496 416 1985 Ran 133 1207 234 417 2008 Changeling > 250 296 405 418 2006 Rang De Basanti 180 1218 236 419 1989 Glory > 250 768 427 420 1989 Back to the Future Part II > 250 374 338 421 2004 The Bourne Supremacy > 250 413 333 422 2006 Letters From Iwo Jima > 250 791 364 423 1952 High Noon > 250 890 407 424 1997 The Fifth Element > 250 247 546 425 2017 Wonder Woman > 250 196 706 426 1995 Ghost in the Shell > 250 917 361 427 1961 Yojimbo 113 1281 235 428 2015 Bahubali: The Beginning > 250 1491 393 429 2007 Zodiac > 250 435 275 430 1990 Awakenings > 250 467 559 431 1993 Three Colors: Blue > 250 552 603 432 1950 Harvey > 250 645 680 433 2014 Fury > 250 449 341 434 1993 Philadelphia > 250 277 644 435 1998 The Celebration > 250 785 404 436 1946 The Big Sleep > 250 750 489 437 1987 Wings of Desire > 250 622 638 438 2016 Hunt for the Wilderpeople > 250 605 701 439 1994 Chungking Express > 250 712 600 440 2012 Kahaani > 250 1212 478 441 1958 Touch of Evil 228 1008 356 442 2004 Finding Neverland > 250 240 570 443 2004 The Machinist > 250 330 438 444 1987 Empire of the Sun > 250 530 668 445 2012 Wreck-It Ralph > 250 281 458 446 1968 Night of the Living Dead > 250 837 385 447 1993 Carlito’s Way > 250 876 326 448 1996 The Bandit 171 1181 362 449 1997 The Game > 250 441 367 450 1946 The Best Years of Our Lives 239 772 604 451 2004 Man on Fire > 250 406 444 452 2014 The Lego Movie > 250 397 380 453 1964 Mary Poppins > 250 234 806 454 1959 Anatomy of a Murder > 250 864 515 455 1999 Being John Malkovich > 250 392 383 456 2015 The Big Short > 250 515 299 457 2008 The Wrestler > 250 621 289 458 1954 La Strada > 250 748 623 459 1999 All About My Mother > 250 405 712 460 2007 3:10 to Yuma > 250 511 456 461 1975 Barry Lyndon 225 991 281 462 2009 Fantastic Mr. Fox > 250 423 445 463 1922 Nosferatu > 250 716 468 464 2017 Wonder > 250 577 862 465 2006 The Last King of Scotland > 250 455 535 466 1980 The Blues Brothers > 250 687 372 467 2012 Skyfall > 250 295 401 468 1997 As Good as It Gets > 250 367 396 469 1955 Diabolique 223 910 534 470 2016 Kubo and the Two Strings > 250 600 616 471 1972 Solaris > 250 996 429 472 2013 Before Midnight > 250 453 449 473 1989 Kiki’s Delivery Service > 250 357 674 474 1994 Ed Wood > 250 545 384 475 1960 La Dolce Vita > 250 793 512 476 1993 The Fugitive > 250 569 392 477 1967 Bonnie and Clyde > 250 648 501 478 1996 Primal Fear > 250 426 578 479 2002 Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets > 250 142 831 480 1999 The Insider > 250 863 378 481 2004 3-Iron > 250 651 719 482 1965 Doctor Zhivago > 250 714 577 483 1927 Sunrise 164 995 633 484 2009 Zombieland > 250 329 414 485 2001 Lagaan: Once Upon a Time in India 249 1190 293 486 1993 Tombstone > 250 794 526 487 2008 Departures > 250 731 613 488 2009 (500) Days of Summer > 250 310 345 489 1969 Midnight Cowboy > 250 818 502 490 1961 Breakfast at Tiffany’s > 250 210 802 491 2007 Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix > 250 147 837 492 2004 The Butterfly Effect > 250 303 428 493 2003 21 Grams > 250 410 500 494 2016 Doctor Strange > 250 287 556 495 2009 Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince > 250 160 846 496 1953 Stalag 17 > 250 1059 642 497 1962 What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? > 250 585 793 498 2007 Once > 250 463 487 499 2013 Mandariinid > 250 666 865 500

IMDb makes adjustments to its raw ratings but does not disclose its methodology. Therefore, these rankings — which start with the raw ratings — may not match a gender-weighted version of a list made by IMDb itself because we can’t re-create the site’s adjustments.

Source: IMDb

The top 100 largely includes films from the original list of 250, and the additions to the list — there are a lot of best picture winners among the newbies — appear mainly in the back half of the 250.

Attempting to reflect a target population is a common practice in many fields that use surveys. It’s not clear to me why movie rating sites don’t do it — or, at the least, why they don’t indicate that their scores are almost all based mostly on the opinions of male users.

[techcrunchappcom]

New Post has been published on https://techcrunchapp.com/a-regulatory-rush-by-federal-agencies-to-secure-trumpslegacy-the-new-york-times/

A Regulatory Rush by Federal Agencies to Secure Trump’s Legacy - The New York Times

WASHINGTON — Facing the prospect that President Trump could lose his re-election bid, his cabinet is scrambling to enact regulatory changes affecting millions of Americans in a blitz so rushed it may leave some changes vulnerable to court challenges.

The effort is evident in a broad range of federal agencies and encompasses proposals like easing limits on how many hours some truckers can spend behind the wheel, giving the government more freedom to collect biometric data and setting federal standards for when workers can be classified as independent contractors rather than employees.

In the bid to lock in new rules before Jan. 20, Mr. Trump’s team is limiting or sidestepping requirements for public comment on some of the changes and swatting aside critics who say the administration has failed to carry out sufficiently rigorous analysis.

Some cases, like a new rule to allow railroads to move highly flammable liquefied natural gas on freight trains, have led to warnings of public safety threats.

Every administration pushes to complete as much of its agenda as possible when a president’s term is coming to an end, seeking not just to secure its own legacy but also to tie the hands of any successor who tries to undo its work.

But as Mr. Trump completes four years marked by an extensive deregulatory push, the administration’s accelerated effort to put a further stamp on federal rules is drawing questions even from some former top officials who served under Republican presidents.

“Two main hallmarks of a good regulation is sound analysis to support the alternatives chosen and extensive public comment to get broader opinion,” said Susan E. Dudley, who served as the top White House regulatory official during the George W. Bush administration. “It is a concern if you are bypassing both of those.”

Administration officials said they were simply completing work on issues they have targeted since Mr. Trump took office in 2017 promising to curtail the reach of federal regulation.

“President Trump has worked quickly from the beginning of his term to grow the economy by removing the mountain of Obama-Biden job-killing regulations,” Russell Vought, the director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, which oversees regulatory policy, said in a statement.

If Democrats take control of Congress, they will have the power to reconsider some of these last-minute regulations, through a law last used at the start of Mr. Trump’s tenure by Republicans to repeal certain rules enacted at the end of the Obama administration.

But the Trump administration is also working to fill key vacancies on scientific advisory boards with members who will hold their seats far into the next presidential term, committees that play an important role in shaping federal rule making.

Few of the planned shifts have drawn more scrutiny and criticism than a Labor Department proposal to set federal standards for defining when a worker is an independent contractor or an employee, a step that could affect millions of workers.

Keep up with Election 2020

The issue has come to a boil as states like California have tried to push companies like Uber and Lyft to classify workers as employees, meaning they would be entitled to benefits such as overtime pay and potentially health insurance, a move that the companies have challenged.

The proposed Labor Department rule creates a so-called economic reality test, such as whether workers set their own schedules or can earn more money by hiring helpers or acquiring new equipment.

The department, in the proposed rule, said it cannot predict how many workers may see their status change as a result of the new definitions because of “uncertainties regarding magnitude and other factors.”

But it is nonetheless pushing to have the rule finished before the end of Mr. Trump’s first term, limiting the period of public comment to 30 days, half the amount of time that agencies are supposed to offer.

That has generated letters of protest from Senate Democrats and 22 state attorneys general.

“Workers across the country deserve a chance to fully examine and properly respond to these potentially radical changes,” said a letter organized by Senator Patty Murray, Democrat of Washington, and signed by 16 other Democratic senators.

The Departments of Labor and Homeland Security are using a tactic known as an interim final rule, more typically reserved for emergencies, to skip the public comment period entirely and to immediately enact two regulations that put much tougher restrictions on work visas for immigrants with special skills. The rule change is part of the administration’s longstanding goal of limiting immigration.

The Homeland Security Department is also moving, again with an unusually short 30-day comment period, to adopt a rule that will allow it to collect much more extensive biometric data from individuals applying for citizenship, including voice, iris and facial recognition scans, instead of just the traditional fingerprint scan. The measure, which the agency said was needed to curb fraud, would also allow it for the first time to collect DNA or DNA test results to verify a relationship between an application for citizenship and someone already in the United States.

A third proposed new Homeland Security rule would require sponsors of immigrants to do more to prove they have the financial means to support the individual they are backing, including three years’ worth of credit reports, credit scores, income tax returns and bank records. Anyone who accepted welfare benefits during the previous three years would be unable to sponsor an immigrant unless a second person agrees to do so.

The agency is limiting public comment on that change to 30 days as well.

Unlike most of the efforts the administration has pushed, the rules intended to tighten immigration standards would expand federal regulations, instead of narrowing them. They also come at a considerable cost, estimated to be more than $6 billion just for the new demands related to immigrants’ biometric data and proof of financial capacity for those sponsoring immigrants.

The Environmental Protection Agency, which since the start of the Trump administration has been moving at a high speed to rewrite federal regulations, is expected to complete work in the weeks that remain in Mr. Trump’s term on two of the nation’s most important air pollution rules: standards that regulate particulates and ozone that is formed based on emissions from power plants, car exhaust and other sources.

These two pollutants are blamed for bronchitis, asthma, lung cancer and other ailments, causing an estimated 7,140 premature deaths a year in the United States, according to one recent study. The agency is proposing to keep these standards at their current levels, provoking protests from certain health experts and environmentalists who argue that the agency is obligated to lower the limits after new evidence emerged about the harm the pollutants cause.

Scott Pruitt, who served as the E.P.A. administrator in the first 17 months of Mr. Trump’s tenure, set as a goal before he left office to get these new standards adopted by December 2020, even though the agency had previously expected they would not be finished until 2022.

Updated 

Oct. 16, 2020, 9:19 p.m. ET

The agency also is rushing to complete a series of regulations that will almost certainly make it harder for future administrations to tighten air pollution and other environmental standards, including a limit on how science is used in rule making and a change to the way costs and benefits are evaluated to justify new rules.

Mr. Trump has played a direct role in pushing to accelerate some regulations. Among them is a provision finished this summer, nicknamed “bomb trains” by its critics, that allows railroads to move highly flammable loads of liquefied natural gas on freight trains. Mr. Trump signed an executive order last year directing the Transportation Department to enact the rule within 13 months — even before it had been formally proposed.

The change was backed by the railroad and natural gas industry, which has donated millions of dollars to Mr. Trump, after construction of pipelines had been blocked or slowed after protests by environmentalists.

But the proposal provoked an intense backlash from a diverse array of prominent public safety officials. Among them were groups representing thousands of mayors, firefighters and fire marshals nationwide and even the federal government’s own National Transportation Safety Board, which investigates fatal transportation accidents.

The gas is stored in 30,000-gallon rail tanks at minus 260 degrees to keep it compressed. But if accidentally released during an accident, it would rapidly expand by nearly 600 times as the temperature rises and cause what is known as a “boiling liquid expanding vapor explosion” that if ignited could not be quickly extinguished, potentially resulting in widespread injury or death if it occurs in a populated area, the firefighters warned.

“It is nearly certain any accident involving a train consisting of multiple rail cars loaded with L.N.G. will place vast numbers of the public at risk while fully depleting all local emergency response forces,” Harold A. Schaitberger, the president of the International Association of Fire Fighters, wrote in a letter opposing the proposal.

The Transportation Department still adopted the rule and rejected proposed speed limits for the trains, generating a petition for a court review by 14 states and the District of Columbia.

“Studies on how to safely transport liquefied natural gas by rail are still ongoing, and this administration has rushed to implement a rule that will needlessly endanger people’s lives and threaten our environment,” Michigan’s attorney general, Dana Nessel, said.

Even while the challenge is underway, the Transportation Department has moved to enact another rule easing safety standards, in this case removing a requirement intended to limit the number of hours truck drivers are allowed behind the wheel and to mandate rest periods.

Certain drivers who carry agricultural products would now be exempt from this federal mandate in a standard that would again be adopted as an “interim final rule,” meaning it would be put in place before any public comment is accepted, under the plan announced by the agency.

“Fatigued truck drivers remain a stubbornly high cause of fatal highway accidents,” said James Goodwin, a lawyer at the Center for Progressive Reform, a nonprofit group that tracks regulatory actions. “The law permits agencies to take short cuts when there are extraordinary circumstances that call for them. That is not present here.”

[danksy-lives]

The Sexual Allure of Prohibitive Fashion

Why is it that the least practical women’s fashion is also the most attractive?

After a century of shifting fashion trends, the high heel has remained a staple of high fashion.  When comparing the typical wardrobe of the 19th century to that of the 21st, no other item is found in common.  The longevity of such a trend is not in spite of its impracticality.  It is that very fact that gives the item is sexual allure.  People typically view prohibitive clothing as the byproduct of fashion’s pursuit of desirability.  In reality, sexual allure in fashion is the result of pursuing impracticality.

Prohibitive fashion has been a staple of high-class women throughout history.  The corset, which was once ubiquitous among this class in the western world, is another well-known example.  This essay is not meant to discuss why these items rise and fall, although that is a worthy discussion.  I wish to answer why these items have appeal in the first place.  Most of this essay applies to any and all past trends of prohibitive fashion. For ease of discussion, I will be focusing on high heels, since this will be the most familiar to my intended audience.

The Role of Status

It would be easy to attribute the appeal of heels to their association with the upper class.  While it is true that rich women wear heels more often than those with less money, this neither addresses nor answers what motivates them to do so.  The most obvious difference is the gap in income, but this does not hold up to scrutiny.  At a typical department store, you can find heels of various types displayed alongside more practical shoes such as sneakers and flats.  Even when they are priced the same, the richer women are more likely than poor women to buy heels over other footwear.  In this scenario, the barrier to entry to the heels is the same as for the sneakers. Considering the potential of presenting as a higher social class, the poor have ample reason to choose the heels.  Therefore, you would expect them to have the same spending habits as the rich.  This is not the case.  As a result, the motivator towards prohibitive fashion cannot be money alone.

Social status, although closely correlated to money, appears to be the best measure of whether a woman will dress in prohibitive clothing.  Oddly, this is true whether or not the woman can comfortably afford the upkeep associated with this behavior.  This is not necessarily out of jealousy for those with more money.  It is caused by the incentives of those with high status pushing them towards greater concern with their own image.

Status is typically how people access each other when determining who to build social bonds with.  Income, despite being easily measurable, is a secondary concern.  Plumbers, who often have a higher income than professors, are more likely to befriend a roof-layer than a professor in the same income bracket.  Conversely, freelance authors often live below the poverty line, but will typically have more in common with their old professors than with the roof-layer that sits next to them in line for welfare.  These statements are true for the same reason: our experiences and behavior are primarily determined by our status in society.

The same gap is found in how much the groups care about their own image.  Plumbers have a reputation of displaying their plumber’s crack, not because they lack the means of preventing it, but because their job requires them to display their ass in their client’s homes.  Conversely, the freelance author will go to great lengths to curate how they are portrayed online and to potential publishers.  Once again, their actions are not determined by their access to resources, but by how their status incentives them to use those resources.

The role of image to high status women makes them focus energy on their appearance.  Their bonds to other women mean that trends will quickly pass between them.  The close link between these traits is how nearly all of these women have developed an affinity for high heels.  This explains why they are popular, but it does not answer the original question of why they are so attractive.

Status Signaling

High status women, or those who seek to raise their status, use prohibitive fashion to distance themselves from physical labor.  High heels serve this function by raising the wearer’s center of mass and throwing off their balance.  The natural question here is why this behavior is so closely linked to high status.  The answer lies in what professions these women undertake, and how those professions provide the freedom for such excesses.

The easiest way to visualize this is to imagine which professions need the full range of human motion to properly function in.  This immediately disqualifies the entire primary sector of the economy.  The idea of someone collecting resources directly from the environment in anything but the most utilitarian get-up is to absurd to be taken seriously.  The same can be said of the secondary sector, which turns those resources into finished products.  These two facts mean that the majority of the world’s population could not use high heels in their daily functions.

The tertiary sector and above is the only place where the use of high heels as common fashion could even be entertained.  This fact may not seem significant to someone immersed in the information age, where the majority of the first world population works in human services.  Its easy to forget that a society based on the service sector can only sustain itself on the back of a highly efficient manufacturing sector.  These people are needed to pave the roads to provide transportation, lay cement for large numbers of people to walk on, and construct buildings with built in elevators.  These innovations level the ground for ease of use, creating an environment where heels can tread.

This makes high heels an unwritten privilege of those who work to manage the goods of others.  Such an excess is only practical when there is no scarcity of resources, nor of the products and infrastructure that take advantage of them.  These sectors rely on the human form to function.  Those above them rely on the brain to function.  Such positions were once exclusive to royalty and their attendants but has since expanded to include most of western society.  Just as those royals used the freedom from work to curate their appearance, those in the tertiary sector and above display the same behaviors.  That freedom means that functionality is a secondary concern.  The prohibitive fashions that come from these conditions are a barrier between the wearer and the physical labor that fuels their position.  To don the heel is to step on the shoulders of those who make the modern world possible.

Status Perceptions in Practice

Irrespective of income, such a position will naturally improve the status of its holder.  This appears to be true regardless of the society’s opinion of non-laborious tasks.  For example, Americans pride themselves on their strong work ethic, especially when it comes to physically taxing jobs.  After all, it was its manufacturing sector that established it as the superpower it is today.  Despite the stated opinion of the public, they have made a national sport of gawking at the British Royal Family whose rule they once bled to overthrow.  The prohibitive fashion that women of this class employ goes far beyond high heels.  Their methods of status signaling include oversized hats, floor length gowns, and every other prohibitive fashion of the past 200 years fossilized in British tax money.  Perhaps Americans view this behavior as an extension of the American Dream: if you work hard enough, you will no longer have to work.  However, there is little evidence to suggest this behavior is linked to being American or any other nationality.  No matter what we say and truly believe about the value of hard work, humans hold a place of honor for those who can afford to be physically lazy.

The status that common people give to royalty and other media celebrities is separate from the respect given to leaders and other powerful people.  The latter relationship is based on the power that comes with responsibility.  Attraction of this kind is separate from the attraction to status that underpins the drive for prohibitive clothing.  That is a unique phenomenon worthy of its own essay.

Power Signaling

I bring this up because of the behavior of high-class women building relationships with powerful people to further raise their social status.  The methods of this are varied, but the reasoning is simple.  The more people they can fall back on in troubled times, the farther they can go.  This has material and social benefits.  A person’s status isn’t just who they are, its who they know.  When analyzing status, people take your connections into account.  Therefore, to associate with influential people is to become influential yourself.

This might be as simple as dating or marrying powerful or popular people.  Old-fashioned as this is, enduringly popular tales like Cinderella present an archetype of this behavior.  In the story, Prince Charming’s attraction to and identification of Cinderella comes from her glass slippers.  Whether or not these are high heels varies between versions, but the idea of a shoe made of glass is no less excessive than raising the back of your foot to accentuate your hips.

The lasting appeal of princesses is an extension of this desire.  Americans have viewed kings as evil for their entire history, yet it is still admirable to be the king’s daughter.  The title has made its way into modern speech for a woman focused on leisure and socializing.  Disney has made a fortune from selling tales of princesses falling in love with princes or other powerful people.  The format has endured for 80 years with few changes, despite the massive growth of women’s opportunities in that period. Audiences want to see these princesses succeed because they represent their aspirations for social advancement.

While the job market for princesses is dwindling, the traits that define them are still found in modern society.  The archetype of the young female secretary is one such example.  Secretaries do not use physical labor, but neither do most office workers.  What distinguishes them in the public imagination is their close workings with powerful people and the status that brings.  This alone pushes them from office worker to sex symbol.

I used the phrase young female secretary because it evokes a specific outfit: a tight blazer, tight pencil skirt, and high heels.  Each of these limits the wearer’s motion in a unique way.  Put together, they make most physical tasks impossible.  Even in the safety of offices, this stands out as a unique display of luxury.

Whether or not this outfit is frequently used is besides the point.  What matters is the association of the outfit with the status of the secretary.  The secretary’s connections mean they can sacrifice practical clothing.  Their prohibitive fashion reinforces their need to build connections.  The fact that such a cycle is possible is why they are imagined in such luxurious dress.  This combination of fashion and influence establishes the secretary in public imagination as a uniquely sexy profession.

Bonding Among Peers

The freedom from labor allows a woman to dabble in prohibitive fashion.  The freedom from work itself allows a woman to fully embrace it.  Most will never be in a position where work is a thing of the past.  However, the pursuit of such a mindset, even if temporary, can improve their connections with peers.

Pursuit of uselessness is the underpinning of the complex social ritual known as partying.  Its every aspect forces partygoers to rely on one another to function.  This is not the result of someone passing down rules, since parties are largely defined by their lack of rules.  Party traditions evolved naturally from the pursuit of uselessness and vulnerability.

These conditions are the perfect time for prohibitive fashion.  This is how party clothes developed as a style unto themselves.  Whereas professional women’s dress adds spice to an otherwise functional base, this is the closest thing to bondage most women ever wear.  They serve to emulate the voluntary luxury of high-status positions (professional or otherwise) in a form accessible to the general public.  This is likely why women who work in laborious or otherwise low-status jobs are the most enthusiastic partiers: they get to live out their fantasies of a high-status lifestyle.

Unlike the secretary, most of these women have no patron to fall back on should their clothing become an issue.  This is why they prepare for and attend parties in groups.  Their restrictive fashion requires a great deal of upkeep which cannot be addressed while worn, such as fixing a zipper or adjusting a bra strap.  Staying in groups means they can fix each other’s problems so that their restrictions do not become too great a burden.

These social ritual leads to observable bonding between the group members.  Rather than viewing their service to friends as an unnecessary waste, they become endeared to those they can help.  This is an example of the Ben Franklin effect, which says that giving a favor to someone will make you more endeared towards them, provided that favor is not excessive.  The practices around restrictive fashion take full advantage of this, especially when multiple people are using it.  Under normal circumstances, asking someone to go to the bathroom or a back corner to adjust your clothing would be seen as a sign that you shouldn’t wear something so hard to control.  This utilitarian perspective is hard to justify when you are similarly dressed and may need the same attention in the future.  In this way, groups use their wardrobes to challenge themselves and then overcome it by working as a team.  This means that more restrictive clothing can lead to greater social bonds.

This is why group members typically wear similar levels of restriction.  To these women, party clothes are the uniform of those pursuing uselessness.  Although they are afforded a great deal of creativity within this style, not restricting oneself in some way is considered to be a rejection of the social ritual.  From a material standpoint, those who dress practically are less likely to need help from their peers.  On the surface, this appears to benefit those peers.  However, by not putting themselves in the hands of others, they are less committed to the goal of uselessness than those who wear the uniform.  There is a clear gap in perceived social status between these two presentations.  The impractical shows commitment to leisure, while the practical shows readiness to work.  In a party environment where the two are close together, all other things being equal, the first group will be seen as leaders and the second as their followers.  If a group agrees to designate certain members as modern butlers, there is no moral issue.  However, those serving others without reciprocation will have a harder time enjoying the party.  Such a task goes against the carefree spirit of these events.  To keep the group on equal (or equally shaky) footing, the practice of party uniforms developed to ensure none are less able to pursue uselessness.

Conclusion

In the simplest terms, the appeal of prohibitive fashion can be boiled down to two things.  The first is their challenge.  They are an impediment to the body that the wearer willingly took on.  The other is trust: trust in other people, trust in your environment, and trust that your new heels won’t land you flat on your face.  To don the heel is to step into luxury and trust your footing.  It is to forgo comfort for a challenge willingly accepted; not for trendiness, but to prove to others and yourself that you can do it.