#respect my beliefs

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

[ovenproofowl]

Why would they speak in whistles? They don't always. They have a phonetic language for day-to-day interactions, but the whistle-speak lets them communicate across great distances. It's not uncommon to find in cultures before communication technology evolves.

STAR TREK DISCOVERY: 5x06 'Whistlespeak'

[faunandfloraas]

Sometimes I think "Should I follow other people's standards?" but if I went on like that, I'd be missing my own standards. For a long time I stayed busy and felt accomplished about the records we set, but when I looked back... Everyone has their own joys in life, but I had come so far from my own joys.

SONG By Seungmin, Episode 02- High and Dry.

[vigilskept]

gnashing my teeth thinking about how veilguard talks about the gods only as a joke when they could've gone somewhere truly crazy.... you're so right.

Yeah... you get it. It's just such a missed opportunity!

I don't even mind the jokey tone they use a lot of the time, because we all joke about things we struggle to understand/cope with.

Except Veilguard refuses to let you even try to broach the subject beyond that surface level. In fact, when it does let you engage with it at all, it manages to make things even less nuanced!

I'm just going to talk about Bellara's quest here since it's the most directly linked with the elven gods, and it's already a lot. Fundamentally, her companion quest is asking us two things:

Should elves be blamed for the actions of the Evanuris?

Should they preserve any of their past at all?

The first one is absurd to even begin with. It's not even a good or interesting take on the (very christian!) question: "Are we responsible for the sins of our ancestors?"

The Evanuris are not the ancestors of modern elves. Dalish religion implies that modern elves descend from those who the rebels never freed from slavery to the Evanuris.

This setup is already awful without looking at any of the parallels Bioware has (intentionally) drawn between the elves of Thedas and Jewish/Indigenous people. I have to put the rest of this under the cut because I genuinely don't think it can be shortened without making it sound flippant. In the context of the coding of the elves, the theological/social implications of all of this are so much worse.

TLDR: the indigenous/jewish coding of the elves makes bioware's treatment of elven religion in veilguard thoughtless at best, cruel at worst. they did not have to write themselves into this corner. there was a way of handling this lore reveal without the implication of elven religion (again, jewish/indigenous coded) being obsolete

So, the religion of the Dalish was part of their enslavement. It's the belief they were forced into by the cruel gods they are still devoted to. That's already pretty bad. How could it get worse, you might wonder?

Whether Bioware deviated from their initial inspirations for the elves or not, the implications for these lore reveals in light of those parallels are particularly cruel. Those two core questions in Bellara's quest? Yeah. Those have both been levied against the oppressed groups that Bioware chose to draw inspiration from. Both historically and presently. To justify atrocities against them.

And to be clear, Bioware does not deviate from or subvert the usual indigeous and jewish-coding of the elves in their writing here. If anything, they end up actively endorsing a very significant element of antisemitic and anti-indigenous sentiment.

Indigenous-Coding

Advocates of colonisation have always justified it by arguing they were 'saving' groups of people who were stuck in the past. They had been ‘left in the dark’ through ignorance of Christianity. In the more secular sense, this was framed as Europeans having journeyed through history to reach enlightenment, while the rest of the world was still in an ‘uncivilized’ state.

Christianity and progress had to be brought to these people to save their souls and bring them into the future with everyone else. Their Gods? There were only two possible ways to frame those. Either they were not real at all, or they were evil. Either way, they were obsolete.

In the Americas, these arguments were still used when corralling indigenous children into residential schools or tearing them from communities through the adoption system. Governments pushed the idea that they had to be forced to assimilate because they were 'backward' in their practices and beliefs.

In the settler-colonial state Canada, where Bioware is based, it's still common enough to hear people justify all of this as having been done "for their own good." Even those who admit that the ways colonization was perpetuated were cruel will still try to defend it by telling you, "it was bad, but their ancestors weren't saints either."

Sounding painfully familiar yet? A little uncomfortable in the context of Bellara's questline?

Jewish-Coding

Since the dawn of Christian Church, Jewish people have had a very fraught place in Christian theology. Christianity claims that that the coming of the messiah in the person of Jesus Christ makes the religion of Judaism obsolete. Christians believed the obvious answer to this problem was that Jewish people should convert.

When many did not, they were labeled as ignorant, obstinate, stuck in the past. They were so focused on their history that they couldn't see the truth which had been revealed in the present. There’s a significant legacy of this idea in Christian artwork with depictions of Synagoga blindfolded next to the clear eyed Ecclesia. You still hear echoes of this sentiment in antisemitic language today.

As for the nature of the Jewish God... there is some deviation here. For some Christians, He is God the Father, and He is good. For others — and this idea has been around from early Christianity till now — He is the Creator of the material world, but He is evil.

There are innumerable variations of Christian gnosticism that probably wouldn't be productive to get into on a Dragon Age Blog. What I need to underline here though, is that the idea of the Old Testament God as the devil/the demiurge/fundamentally evil, has been used to justify atrocity towards Jewish people for over a thousand years.

Should elves be blamed then? For the sundering of the Titans? For the Veil? For the Blight? For the evils of this world, created by their Gods?

Implications for Veilguard

Not only is religion in Dragon Age: The Veilguard often devoid of nuance or ignored outright, when the game does engage with it at all, it does so in a way that quite literally draws on these incredibly harmful antisemitic and anti-indigenous sentiments that have been (and still are) used to perpetuate real harm.

To be clear, I don't think the writing here intends to endorse the idea that elves should be blamed for any of what's going on. Bellara's anxieties are being projected onto her people as a whole while she grapples with what this all means for her, I get that. In fact, you could be generous and read some of this as a critique of this particular kind of anti-indigenous/jewish bigotry.

However, I don't think that absolves the writers of any of the implications they've created by confirming that the elven pantheon did exist and was canonically evil.

Elements of Dalish/elven culture might be preserved after all this, but the conclusion the game railroads you into is that their religion is obsolete. Just like Judaism. Just like the many Indigenous religions around the world. Except in Dragon Age: The Veilguard, it’s no longer just the bigotry of outsiders claiming that to be the case. It’s now the objective truth of the setting.

Going forward, the elves of Thedas can keep their culture, but they can’t practice their religion. If they continued to practice, they would be framed the way the Venatori are: evil and stuck in the past. This really can’t be overstated: this is the exact rhetoric that has justified centuries of violence and oppression of Jewish and Indigenous people. This rhetoric is still around and still weaponized.

It’s so cruel to create an in world ‘lineage’ that draws so heavily from their cultures and histories, then validate the rhetoric that has been used to hurt them. At best, it’s thoughtless. But as a company based in a settler-colonial state, this is something they should’ve put thought into, given that they chose to code their elves and Jewish and Indigenous. That was their responsibility, actually.

What gets me about all this is that they actually didn't need to force that conclusion at all. They could have kept the Evanuris as cruel tyrants without demonising the Creators and their worship at the same time.

The Evanuris weren't always Gods. They weren't even always rulers.

In Trespasser, when asked how they became Gods, Solas tells Lavellan that they did so slowly. That it started with a war. That fear bred a desire for simplicity. For right and wrong. For chains of command. That generals became respected elders, then kings, and finally gods.

Veilguard confirms all of this. The addition it makes is that before all this, the first elves were spirits who made their bodies out of the Titans. This all occurred over the course of thousands of years.

None of this needs to be retconned in order to allow for a respectful yet nuanced portrayal of religion!

TLDR pt2: bioware, u could’ve avoided literally ALL of this by making the evanuris part of a priestly class who seized power after the war with the titans. it wouldn’t even have undermined ur lore! u could’ve kept dalish religion alive! u could’ve implied complex political dynamics for your ancient elves without even having to write it! why didn’t you even try?

Trying to Fix This Mess

Say the elves took their bodies from the Titans and settled the lands of Thedas. Say the Titans even allowed this for a time. The dwarves were made from their own bodies after all.

Yet the elves didn't have the same connection with the Titans as the dwarves did. They had no stone-sense, so they couldn't understand the Titans' song.

Generations down the line, some of them took too much from the Titans. More than they were willing to give. That was when the Titans lashed out, making the earth tremble so that all the elves had built crumbled beneath them.

And what if the firstborn among the elves had taken up priesthood to guide the younger ones. They were closer to spirits than the elves that were born into this world, and so the younger ones looked to them for guidance. Maybe they were the ones who were trusted to reach out to the more powerful of the spirits who chosen stay in the Fade, their old kin who preferred to keep their distance from the physical world to preserve the essence of what they were. The spirits of Justice, of Benevolence, of Craft. Those who the elven people paid homage to, and trusted to preserve them in turn.

So when everything seemed to fall apart, the elves turned to their Keepers, their priests, and asked of them what they ought to do. How could they make the earth stop shaking? What would they have to do to be at peace again?

Whatever the spirits themselves may have responded, many of the Keepers (among them the Evanuris) took up arms and chose war. They saw it could be won so they fought, sundering Titans from their dreams and stilling the land.

And yet there was no peace.

Some Keepers sought to hold on to their power as generals, and wanted to wage war on new shores to keep it. Some Keepers thought they had already gone too far, claiming they had acted without the guidance of the spirits who hadn't wanted war.

These Keepers could've caused chaos and endless bloodshed, so the Evanuris formed their alliance to suppress the others. Likely, they thought they were doing so for the benefit of all the elven people. More war meant more death, and it was needless now that the land was still. And even if what they did to the Titans was wrong, it was done and they could not fix it. Better to silence those who meant to stir up fear among the people.

The Evanuris fought until they were the last faction left, naming the few holdouts the Forgotten Ones. They were praised for bringing peace to Elvhenan, and trusting in their guidance their people crowned them as rulers.

Yet some dissent always remained. None of them were infallible. They were no longer spirits, they hadn't been for thousands of years. They were now more accustomed to command than to priesthood after all that war. They had drawn on the power they had stolen from the Titans to gain the advantage over their enemies, and the corruption of the Blight was starting creep in, ever-so-slowly.

Maybe some of the people, unhappy with their rule, started to voice the thought that was expressed by their rival Keepers once more: that the Evanuris had grown distant from the spirits. That Elgar'nan didn't serve Justice anymore. That Mythal had strayed from Benevolence.

So Evanuris took the mantle of godhood for themselves. It was only for peace and stability.

It would be too dangerous if anyone could claim they were deviating from the will of the spirits, so they would claim they were those great spirits. Elgar'nan was Justice, Mythal was Benevolence. They would use their rule only for the benefit of the people, not abuse their power.

And there you go. None of what I've written above can't be neatly incorporated into the existing lore of Veilguard. It leaves the elves of Thedas precisely where they started in Dragon Age: Origins. Distant from their ancient Gods, trying to pick up the pieces of their forgotten past.

[queerprayers]

i want to say first of all that i fully respect a community's/denomination's/culture's right to have closed practices. i am not entitled to other people's traditions, and when i am a guest in a space i understand that everything is not automatically for me. and i know i do not have to understand to respect.

and also! when i go to a catholic church and can't receive communion i want to fall on the floor weeping. what do you mean i can't have him he's right there. sorry my baptism was the wrong kind of baptism. i'm hungry and you want me to become someone else before being fed.

[thorough-witness-enjoyer]

Looking for Community Perspectives on Destiny‘s Themes and Main Conflict for a Cultural Project!

Greetings everyone!

I‘m currently working on a personal project that ties in Destiny‘s themes and main conflicts with encouraging people of my ethnicity to tell our own stories, even if they include thematic elements that may not be traditional in Western media or have been actively discouraged by oppressive powers in the past!

My focus will be on how others perceive portrayals of social issues/powers we have struggled against as they are depicted in fiction, and to bring Destiny to the table, I want to connect it back to the Witness as a main antagonist and people‘s understanding of the role it plays in Destiny‘s main narrative!

I‘m coming here to ask some questions and have a space for people to engage with the thoughts of others in order to understand what people take away from the story of Destiny! These questions are asked for the purpose of steering my further research and conclusions; nothing will be published and identities of those who participate are not recorded!

My main questions are:

1. What do you think Destiny tries to say about the nature of existence and humanity’s place in it with the philosophies surrounding the Veil and Traveler?

2. What do you think Bungie‘s intentions were with creating the Witness and it’s beliefs to be the main antagonistic force in the Light vs Dark saga?

3. How do you view the Witness‘ relationship with the Traveler and Veil (and what can that tell us about humanity)?

4. What stands out to you about the religious influences in Destiny‘s story and how do they enhance and/or diminish the narrative it is trying to tell?

5. Has any aspect of Destiny changed your worldview and why?

6. Do you believe the Witness to be an evocative villain? Why or why not?

7. Do you have personal experiences that affect the way you view the Witness?

8. Why do you think Bungie decided to make the Precursors and the Witness separate?

9. Why do you think Bungie made the Witness a collective of a civilization’s ethos instead of a singular being/person?

10. Is there anything about the Witness‘ design/influences behind it that you would like to point out (especially in regards to its nearly human look?)

11. What can be taken away from the Witness‘ methodology for obtaining disciples, what it seeks in a potential disciple, or the relationship it has with its disciples?

12. What lessons can be learned from the Witness‘ formation and the affect it had on the universe?

13. Do you have any resources (novels, shows, philosophical concepts, mythologies, etc.) that relate to Destiny‘s main themes or my inquiry in general?

Feel free to comment, reblog, or tag this post with any of your responses to any of the questions (or even any additional thoughts that are related!!) You don’t have to answer every question, so feel free to choose the ones that speak the most to you!

I also open my dms with welcoming arms as well if you have any follow up questions or resources that might aid in my project!

All and any help, even the mere act of sharing this post, is deeply appreciated as this project is very dear to me and I could use all the insight I could get!!

Thank you all for your time and I’m excited to hear from you guys!!

[virgoactias]

as a non-religious person, if the deaths of my child and my closest person were transformed into a religious allegorical tale of martyrdom, i would go insane or kill myself so i am never taking any shauna shipman hate

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

"Where did this idea come from that all beliefs deserve respect? If your beliefs are ridiculous, they deserve to be ridiculed, as would mine." -- MissaMHx

[oneirocide]

Over here bashing my head into a wall @ people calling Hold Them Down problematic like NO ITS NOT. IT IS NOT PROBLEMATIC TO HAVE A REALISTIC REPRESENTATION OF ANYTHING. YOURE PROBLEMATIC FOR TRYING TO BURY AND ERASE ONE OF THE FEW PIECES OF MAINSTREAM MEDIA WE HAVE THAT SO SHAMELESSLY AND WONDERFULLY PORTRAYS THESE ISSUES.

Like what is their issue? This shit HAPPENS and turning your nose up at even the implication of someone victimising someone in such a way is directly contributing to the issues and stigma around SA that caused such harm to survivors and victims, and which allows perpetrators to get away free. JFC

[theoccultmoon]

I’m making this post as a reminder that you should always do your own research.

Whether you’re reading something on my blog or someone else's blog, witchcraft is unique for each and every one of us. It is TOTALLY OK to disagree and to have different perspectives, so doing your own research is NECESSARY.

Critical thinking and forming your own opinion will allow you to read posts and take what resonates with you and leave what doesn’t. HOWEVER, it is NOT ok to be disrespectful. Just because our beliefs and studies may differ, it does not mean that one is more correct than the other, you are free to share your opinion if you do so respectfully and in a constructive way. I do not tolerate any bullshit and disrespect. Blessed be ⛥

[rainsandrains]

I wish I knew how to handle the wish for the gods for be real. I feel emotional connections to certain figures, but I also know rationally they're not real. I see other pagans talk about the comfort they get from their faith in god/s and I wish I had that. I've tried worshipping a specific pagan god in a sort of symbolic/archetypal sense and in a "I know this is make-believe but I'm doing it anyway" sense and it brought some comfort for a few days at a time and then began to feel wrong and uncomfortable because I knew it wasn't real.

[honibumii]

Am I the only one who kinda is w Skully on the whole "banishing bad ghosts stuff" or

[sidecharactersdomatter]

Here are my collected thoughts on why I ship Fenro and not Fendra

@shychick-52 @rommaru

First, if the DT crew wanted to make Fendra canon, they should’ve actually had more episodes building up their relationship, instead of shoehorning all that development in just Beaks in the Shell. Just like georgiarose answered in their respective post.

It wouldn’t have been hard to have Gandra genuinely apologize to Fenton for being in cahoots with Mark Beaks and lying to him in the process, but the show never does that due to the Duck family’s main character syndrome and the show’s cast bloat. Then there are the episodes in Season 3 where Gandra doesn’t interact with Fenton until the final episodes of Season 3, and her redemption arc doesn’t get developed throughout the same season, only in Beaks in the Shell. Heck throughout their “date” in Dangerous Chemistry of Gandra Dee, Gandra did criticize two of Fenton’s experiments for not being risky “What if you don’t like glazed doughnuts?” -Dangerous Chemistry of Gandra Dee” and for conforming with Mcduck’s corporate checklist “So, Rich boss McDuck gets to gobble up all of the Earth’s precious gems for himself? What’s next, some kind of Gold magnet?” - Same episode, although I do agree with her anticapitalist belief, which is the one trait I’m tolerable of. During that whole lab session she also demonstrated her own tech, her Eyebuds and Nanites, WITHOUT Fenton’s permission, to show how good her free lance tech is (which honestly felt like a red flag to me)

Exhibit A, Gandra testing her nanites on Fenton, without his permission

In the whole series, Fenton is a lawful good duck and Gandra’s obviously morally grey, and as you watch Gandra’s cover get blown during the climax of Dangerous chemistry of Gandra Dee you begin to become disappointed with her when she doesn’t apologize to Fenton for double crossing him, that very episode made me completely disappointed in the character herself.

Dialogue is also from The Dangerous Chemistry of Gandra Dee:

Fenton: So I’m the suit? You’re the one working for Beaks!

Gandra: I work for myself. I just …used him for funding and resources.

Fenton: For what? Was any of this real? What are you?

Gandra: A scientist, free of responsibility, and look …for what it’s worth, you’re a good scientist.

Fenton: And you’re a crook.

If you focus on Gandra’s lines, there is an underlying hypocrisy to her character, she is also responsible for creating the nanites to cause Mark Beaks to go berserk. The dialogue reaffirms that Gandra did not formally apologize to Fenton and took accountability for her actions at the end of her debut episode.

Reminder, I rage quit watching the Ducktales reboot after seeing spoilers for Beaks in the Shell. There was not a lot of compatibility and build up to Fenton and Gandra falling in love together near the end of the series. The reason they started their relationship is because of Huey and Webby forcing them to get together on a date, while completely disregarding Fenton’s boundaries in the process, and this is something you should never do IRL. Due to Gandra being a hypocrite claiming she’s a rebel scientist only to reveal she was forced to work for F.O.W.L. Through her sob inducing backstory (Playing the guilt card are we?) does sum up how her redemption arc or lack thereof, didn’t make it feel compelling to us at all. Since Gandra and Fenton only interacted in 3 episodes total, through Beaks in the Shell we learn that they’re in a secret relationship and run science experiments together in a virtual reality which also had so many plotholes. Beaks in the Shell made Fenton and Gandra’s relationship feel rushed and forced with no substance to it at all, they just made them canon to constantly enforce heteronormativity like Disney and pander to the Shippers.

And then you have Fenton’s relationship with Gyro who surprisingly interacted more with him than with Gandra in the entire series. Fenton may be lawfully good and friendly while Gyro is antisocial and focused on his inventions they actually have a solid dynamic and were able to play off of each other. Throughout season 1 and Astroboyd they had a gradual build up of care and respect and especially in Astroboyd Gyro ends up promoting Fenton to a doctor to show the respect he now has for him.

Dialogue is from near the end of AstroB.OY.D.

Yes, intern. I was once like you. Of course, I was a naive idiot back then. But if I had someone to actually listen to me, I might not have been so hopeless. So... you're hired full-time, Dr. Crackshell-Cabrera.

Fenro: That's not technically how doctorates work,and I don't care!

Gyro: Okay, everybody, the hugging is a "just for today" thing.

Exhibit B, Fenton happily embracing Gyro after being promoted to a full time job as a Doctor. Also this hug was before Gyro protected Fenton before Boyd could attack him and managed to apologize and embrace Boyd for the mistake he made in the past. Guess which scientist is more committed to their responsibilities in the whole reboot? Also Gyro reconciling with Boyd and promoting Fenton was the best way to have his character arc go off on a high note and helped improve his relationship with Dr. Crackshell-Cabrera.

Fenton and Gyro helped fight off the main antagonists in all 3 season finales of the Ducktales reboot, they had great chemistry together whenever they’re on screen, they’re opposites attract, they’re both brilliant scientists, heck, that’s why I enjoyed watching scenes of them together, and why I ended up shipping them even thought they didn’t end up together. Fenton and Gyro were awesome characters that had the best designs in the reboot. You’ll also know it’s a problem in the episodes featuring Gandra, the writers had to completely change Fenton and Gyro’s dynamic in order to have Gandra and Fenton be more “compatible”. Due to realizing that they ended up realizing they gave Fenton and Gyro way more chemistry than they did with Gandra. Look these two whole posts aren’t hot takes these are just my opinions I’m sharing with you. Also I wasn’t trying to antagonize the Fendra shippers at all in this critical post. Tl;dr, Fenton and Gyro’s relationship got no homo’d out of existence near the end of the series, and Fendra ended up feeling very forced and obviously rushed with Gandra’s character feeling poorly handled by the DT17’s writers. Fun fact, Beaks in the Shell was one of the least watched episodes out of the series.

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

"I don't respect religion. I don't respect superstitious thinking, which is what religion is. I don't respect childish thinking, which is what religion is." -- Bill Maher

[myfairkatiecat]

not my friends being 400x less supportive about me being Christian than I am about them being atheist

[vaguely-concerned]

I don't know why I find the darkspawn designs in this game so endearing but I do. they have such 'mommy ghilan'nain I frew up :(' energy. I see the ghoul scampering away with the dagger when you go looking for it at the ritual site and I can practically hear it go 'ohohoho! mommy want dagger. ghoul get dagger, give to mommy. mommy proud of ghoul. mommy say 'ghoul did good. mommy always knew ghoul the most specialest little ghoul in darkspawn army very proud of ghoul ghoul did well.' mommy pet ghoul head let ghoul play game on fade phone.' and then I feel kind of bad for killing it. you were the most specialest little ghoul in darkspawn army little fella. you did your best. and never let anyone tell you otherwise

(when you really think about it, few beings in thedas have fucked up as badly as these darkspawn doing the failed clown show relay run here. if one of them had managed to get their little blighted butts to ghilan'nain with that thing, this game would probably have ended very differently)