#so it’s one thousand percent real because it’s present in the text of the show

[hitmeupaep]

Erik Krippe, Jensen Ackles and Misha Collins could all come to my door and look me dead in my eyes and say destiel isn’t real and i would not give a single fuck

[pinkanonwrites]

I loved the animal crossing vs karasuno boys hcs u did!! Do u think u could do another one with a different team? Maybe nekoma but u can choose whatever!! Thank u 😊

AAAAAAHHH This has been sitting in my drafts almost-completely finished for MONTHS and I’m FINALLY GONNA POST IT! Thank you for the request, I love Nekoma so, so, so much! (Fukunaga please call me. I’ll do all the talking)

(( Also also since I did all boy villagers in the Karasuno one, this one has all girl villagers))

LONG POST BELOW!

Kuroo Tetsurou

“Celia is so pretty!~ I love her so much!”

Kuroo’s attention snapped to you, doing his best to keep his face neutral as his brain went rocketing off in the worst direction possible. Pretty? Pretty girl? You like a pretty girl?

He had no room to judge, he also liked pretty girls. But there’s no way you liked this pretty girl more than you liked him, right? Right?

He pulled his attention back to the practice match just in time to avoid getting wailed in the face with a volleyball, able to turn it into a clumsy receive at the last possible second. If his teammates noticed, they were at least kind enough not to call him out.

When he sidled up to you at the end of practice he did his best to sound fake concerned, not legitimately worried.

“You replacing me with some cute girl? I could hear you mooning from all the way on the court, you know?”

You just laughed and shook your head, lifting your phone to show a character from the game you and Kenma had been gushing about. Your phone lockscreen had been set to a picture of an, admittedly adorable, cartoon eagle.

“I finally found someone who had Celia in their town. I wanted her so bad!”

Kuroo snorted, ruffling the top of your head. “Well I’m glad you got her. Next time give me a warning before you start going all mushy for video game birds, alright?”

Kai Nobuyuki

“Oh, Lily! Lily, you’re so beautiful!”

Kai barely gave more than a twitch to indicate that he’d heard what you’d said. He’d heard you gush about celebrities or anime characters you’d liked before, but not to the degree that you’d call them just by their first name.

“New favorite character?” He offered, continuing to pack his practice bag and try not to look too curious about who you were fawning over.

Luckily for him, you were more than happy to supply the answer yourself, squiggling under his arm and holding your Switch up to his face so he could see your colorfully-dressed character sitting at a picnic table with an adorable cartoon frog.

“She’s so cute! I can’t believe I got her in my town.” “I didn’t know you liked frogs so much.” He breathed a silent sigh of relief, feeling silly for letting himself worry, even the tiniest bit.

“Yeah, well she’s the cutest frog!”

“Cuter than most frogs I’ve seen.”

Kai fought a smile as you began passionately debating the cuteness of real life frogs, tugging you a little bit closer with his arm.

Yaku Morisuke

“Ah, Cleo! How could anyone ever be so cute?”

Yaku didn’t much enjoy it when you called him cute, but hearing you call somebody else cute was somehow a thousand times worse. He could swear he felt his own blood pressure spike with that sentence alone.

“Ooh! Who’s cute?”

And there’s Lev. So much for his blood pressure.

You held up your phone screen to Lev and he began nodding along in agreement with you, which somehow made Yaku feel even more irritated than he already did. A stray volleyball rolled across the floor near him, and he sent it spiralling into Lev’s lower back with a kick.

“Quit talking about cute girls and focus on your receives, shithead!”

“OWWWW!!! Yaku-senpai, so mean! You could’ve missed! Then how would you feel?”

“Get back on the court, Lev.”

“I’m sorry!” You said when you pulled Yaku aside after practice. “I just was just really excited about Animal Crossing, I didn’t mean to distract Lev.”

“Animal….. Crossing?”

“Yeah! I got a really cute villager!” You held up your phone and showed Yaku a picture of the pastel horse that had just moved into your village.

“...Oh. Cleo.”

“Mhm!... Are you okay? You’re turning a little red. Maybe you should drink some more water.”

Kozume Kenma

“Rosie! Oh, Rosie is definitely best girl.”

Despite being very well-versed in Animal Crossing, it still caught Kenma off-guard for a half a second to hear you so openly mooning about your favorite villager. Luckily for him the two of you had been talking about Animal Crossing since the new game was announced, so he’d had plenty of time to get to know your favorites.

“Did you find someone to trade with you?”

“Yep! I just need to get Egbert to leave so she can move in! Get outta here, chicken!”

Resting his chin on your shoulder, Kenma watched with a small smile as you started building cliffs around the perimeter of Egbert’s house, determined to get him to move away. Maybe someday he’d have to deal with the discomfort of hearing you openly moon about someone attractive. Thankfully, today was not that day.

Fukunaga Shouhei

“You’re so perfect, Ellie! Don’t ever leave!”

Fukunaga glanced at you and quirked an eyebrow, but you were far too immersed in your Switch screen to notice. Your expression had dropped into this soft, moony-eyed gaze, one that Fukunaga wasn’t used to seeing directed at anything that wasn’t him when you thought he wasn’t looking.

It felt… weird.

“Oh! Shouhei, do you wanna see?” You finally seemed to notice him glancing in your direction, scooting over to show off your screen. “Ellie was moving out of Kenma’s town and he let me take her! Isn’t she cute?”

While your character ran circles around the little tan elephant all Shouhei could do was watch you smile with a warm, fuzzy feeling blooming in his chest.

“Second cutest here.” He quietly replied.

Yamamoto Taketora

“Molly! She’s so cute I can’t even handle it!”

Normally Yamamoto would find the idea of you fawning over a cute girl to be equally cute. That way the two of you could fawn over cute girls together!

But it was significantly less fun when it meant that one hundred percent of your attention was on your phone and zero percent of your attention was on him. He spent the majority of the day landing awesome spikes only to snap his attention towards you and see you fully immersed in your phone screen.

Finally his not-so-quiet grumbling about your lack of attention got the better of Kuroo and he hollered over to you, asking what you were looking at. Before Yamamoto could shush him you raised your phone, showing off an adorable cartoon duck.

“I finally got Molly in my town!”

Kuroo burst into laughter as a blush crawled its way across Yamamoto’s face and up to the tips of his ears, taking a swing at Kuroo to try and get him to shut up.

Haiba Lev

“She’s so stoic and cool. How can you not be completely in love with Whitney?”

“I can be stoic and cool.” Lev grumbled.

“She’s got such pretty white hair and sharp eyes.”

“I’ve got white hair and sharp eyes.”

“I should get her some flowers.”

“Can’t you get your boyfriend some flowers?”

“Hm? Lev, hun, did you say something?”

He’d been quietly murmuring under his breath since you started gushing about Animal Crossing but honestly, how could you not? Whitney was one of your dreamies and finally, after many a Nook Mile Ticket spent, you finally had her on your island. Maybe you had been going on about it for a bit, though.

“I’m sorry, Lev! I’m just excited. I wanna know what you said though!”

Lev puffed up, jabbing his thumb into his chest. “I’ve got all those things you love about this Whitney girl so much, so you shouldn’t need anyone else!” You stared at him in disbelief for a long, painfully awkward moment, before snorting hard as you dissolved into laughter.

“H-Hey!”

I’m sorry! I’m sorry, I shouldn’t laugh!” You choke out between giggles, just silently holding up your Switch to Lev’s face to show off your character presenting some roses to a cartoon wolf…

… Named Whitney.

You don’t think you’ve ever seen someone turn that shade of red before.

“W-W-Well she must be your favorite because she’s so much like me! Right? Right?!”

Good save, Lev. Good save.

Inuoka Sou

“Piper’s just so cool and chill! That’s why she’s my absolute favorite.”

Oh. Oh! You liked cool and chill people? Inuoka had no idea. But that’s okay! He can be cool! He can be chill!

“Dude, you okay? You’re like… Vibrating.”

At least, that’s what Inuoka had thought at the beginning of the day. Truthfully he had no skill when it came to containing his energy, especially since every time he saw you it felt like his heart was doing the equivalent of spam texting you a dozen lines of heart emojis. By the time he had gotten to the end of practice he felt jittery and uncomfortable, like he’d been holding a lid down on a boiling pot of water. He just hadn’t been acknowledging it until Yamamoto pointed it out.

“Sou?” You had been waiting for him outside the gym! Waiting! For him! His heart felt like it did a kickflip off the inside of his ribcage as he enveloped you in a hug.

“I tried! I tried to be calm and chill like you like but I just can’t do it! And whenever I see you my heart goes a RAAAAAHHH so it’s basically impossible anyway! I hope you don’t mind!”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa! Hang on.” You cupped his face in your hands and he melted into your hold, smiling like an idiot. “When did I say I like calm, chill guys?”

“This morning, you were talking about some girl named Piper and you said she was so calm and cool and that's why you liked her so I thought if I could be like that you’d like me more too and-”

You pressed a finger to his lips and he couldn’t help but sigh, turning to putty at your merest touch.

“Babe, I was talking about a character from my game! You know, the one with all the animals?”

“Really?”

“Really?”

“So I don’t need to act all calm and cool for you to like me?”

“Of course not! I love you just the way you are.”

“Heehee~… I feel a little silly.”

“You are a little silly, babe.”

Shibayama Yuuki

“I’m in love! Flora is so perfect! I’ve never loved so much in my life!”

Shibayama stumbled over his own two feet when he heard you professing your love of this ‘Flora’ to one of your classmates during lunch. Glancing just around the door to your classroom, you were holding your phone in one hand and wildly gesturing with the other, leaving your friend chuckling at your excited antics.

He felt an uncomfortable sort of chill in the pit of his stomach, making his just-eaten lunch feel more than a bit unwelcome. Did you even like this Flora more than...him?

It was easy to tell that Shibayama was a bit out of it at practice, doing his best to stay focused but still uncharacteristically quiet. It wasn’t until you met him after practice to walk home that everything was cleared up to him.

“S-So, um… Who’s Flora?”

“Huh? Oh! Oh, lemme show you!”

You pulled out your Switch and ran your little character over to a flamingo and began talking to her, and Shibayama felt all the tension in his body rush out in a single breath. He let out a small chuckle as you fawned over the character.

“Yeah, she’s pretty cute!”

[cpw-nyc]

The Lost Art of Having a Chat: What Happened When I Stopped Texting and Started Talking

We are more connected than ever, but we rarely seem to really speak to each other. So, I decided to try.

The Guardian  Rebecca Nicholson

‘People are almost always nicer on the phone than on text.’

Like most people I know, my Weekly Screen Report is obscene. Every Sunday, when the notification pops up to tell me the hours I have wasted, mostly texting, I think about all the things I could have done. Finished Middlemarch. Started Middlemarch. But as I have my phone in my hand, I scroll through Instagram instead. I send an article or a joke to a friend, a picture of the dog to the family WhatsApp, catch up on someone else’s night out. Recently, I clocked up – and I’m ashamed as I write this – six hours and 29 minutes of phone usage in a single day. I have had days where I’ve barely been awake that long. Messages is my most used app. I am talking all the time.

Like most people I know, my Weekly Screen Report is obscene. Every Sunday, when the notification pops up to tell me the hours I have wasted, mostly texting, I think about all the things I could have done. Finished Middlemarch. Started Middlemarch. But as I have my phone in my hand, I scroll through Instagram instead. I send an article or a joke to a friend, a picture of the dog to the family WhatsApp, catch up on someone else’s night out. Recently, I clocked up – and I’m ashamed as I write this – six hours and 29 minutes of phone usage in a single day. I have had days where I’ve barely been awake that long. Messages is my most used app. I am talking all the time.

 But I am rarely talking. For the chatterboxes among us, this is a time of upheaval. The long, spontaneous chat on the phone is going the way of the fax. The percentage of households with a landline that’s used to make calls is declining every year, from 83 percent in 2016 to 73 percent in 2019; the number of calls made on house phones plummeted by 17 percent in 2018 alone. We still use our mobiles to talk – in 2018, Ofcom surveyed mobile users for three months and found only 6 percent of them never made a single call – but we are not talking in any great depth. The same study found that over 80 percent of calls were shorter than five minutes, and the majority were under 90 seconds. I looked at my own recent call list: three minutes, two minutes, five minutes at a push. What can you say in that time? You can only make the point you’ve called to make. 

  I know many will welcome this as a kind of freedom. The very idea of talking on the phone invokes horror among those who claim to loathe it. There are thousands of memes explaining the many ways that talking, not texting, is rude, basically criminal. Calling is not time-efficient, ill-suited to the attention economy, where all eyes must be on several screens at once. You can send messages when you’re doing something else – watching The Irishman, or having a bath, or even talking to another person in real life. My dad recently marvelled at me being able to text with two thumbs; I marvel at teenagers being able to text while talking to you and not looking at the screen. Once technology gave us the ability to easily screen calls, we ran with it. We can ignore the relative who phones with a list of recent hometown tragedies, the work call we don’t feel like taking, our chattiest of friends who might not let us go for an hour. But what happens if you are that chatty friend?

Smart phones are smart enough to tell you that you’re using them too much. The dumb phone is making a comeback. I wondered if it was possible to ride this wave of the digital detox and make a deliberate effort to call instead of text. I wanted to see if it would change my relationships, particularly the ones I had grown lazy about maintaining. The plan was to stay off text and DMs for a solid month. I was fed up of paddling in the shallows. I wanted to swim. If I needed to speak to someone, I’d have to call them. 

 When the writer Elizabeth Wurtzel died in January, a piece she wrote in 2013, about her “one-night stand of a life”, began to circulate again, and it contained one paragraph that hit me particularly hard. “Look at how we live,” she wrote. “We communicate in text messages and emails; even those of us old enough to have lived in a world where landline was not a word because it’s all there was have fallen into this lazy substitute for human contact. I have.” 

 Who hasn’t? It should be easier than ever to talk. There are limitless outlets for publishing our thoughts, endless ways to begin a kind of conversation. Voice memos are popular, particularly among young people, but they’re a halfway house, still one-sided. We talk with one eye on efficiency, and it strangles what is so good about it – the spontaneity, the lack of ability to control what happens when two people are rambling on to each other. 

The psychologist Sherry Turkle has been studying the impact of computers on human psychology since the early 1980s, and in 2015 she published Reclaiming Conversation, in which she referred to “the edited life” that we live now. She spoke to teachers who observed that their students seemed to develop empathetic skills at a slower rate than they would be expected to. “Face-to-face conversation is the most human – and humanising – thing we do,” she wrote. “Fully present to one another, we learn to listen. It’s where we develop the capacity for empathy. It’s where we experience the joy of being heard, of being understood.”  

Are we losing that joy of being heard? Most offices are quieter places than they have ever been. The open-plan rooms I have worked in over the last decade or so are filled with people wearing headphones, silently tapping away on Gchat or Slack. Even workplaces that should invite conversation are making it easier to avoid talking at all. If you stay in a budget hotel, you can check yourself in and out. If you scan your onions on the supermarket’s self- service checkout, you don’t need to chat about what you’re planning to do with them. When it was common enough to be considered a problem, making a phone call on public transport used to be frowned upon. In the early 00s, Dom Joly built a TV career out of shouting “Hello!” into an oversized mobile in public places. Train carriages are now full of heads bowed, illuminated by blue light. A few years ago the Daily Mash ran a much-shared satirical news story: “A northern man has left a trail of terror across London by attempting to interact socially with everyone he meets.” And even in the north, screens have begun to dominate. Quiet carriages are becoming redundant. We are making ourselves quiet.

 In 2014, someone set up a family WhatsApp group. Before then, I spoke to my family on the phone all the time. Now, we spend more time in touch with each other than ever before, yet I miss them. It’s a noticeboard, more than a conversation. The person I still speak to most often, and for longest, is my nan, who is 83. She has a mobile, but doesn’t text. The other day I phoned to see how she was, and she told me a long story about how she was never supposed to have the name that she has, but there were 23 pubs in the village she was born in, and her father stopped in at most of them on the way to register her birth. By the time he got to the clerk, he’d forgotten what he’d been told to call her, so he named her after the clerk instead.

Verbal conversations are unpredictable and unwieldy in a way that those written down are not, because when we type or tap, we are in control, of our side, at least. This ruthless chat efficiency has excised the flab but, I realise, I love the flab. It’s where the excitement happens. I wanted to revive those conversations with everyone. So in my month of no texts, the WhatsApp group would be the first thing to go. I went to delete the app, pressed my finger on the screen, let it wobble – and then I stopped. There was a video of my niece dancing in front of the TV that I wanted to show my partner and I thought, I can just look at the photos and videos, every now and then. Can’t I?                    

https://getpocket.com/explore/item/the-lost-art-of-having-a-chat-what-happened-when-i-stopped-texting-and-started-talking?utm_source=pocket-newtab

[tealbull81]

Usual Asks

Spotify, SoundCloud, or Pandora? ...I have no idea what these are.

is your room messy or clean? Messy

what color are your eyes? blue-green

do you like your name? why?  Yes.  Not too common and not too unique

what is your relationship status? Married

describe your personality in 3 words or less--Happy, friendly, goofy

what color hair do you have? Brown with a hidden rainbow.

what kind of car do you drive? color? ford flex--black.  NOT my color choice. needs a glitter coat.

where do you shop?  online and have it delivered--so much easier

how would you describe your style? Comfy.  Im either in work scrubs or t-shirt and jeans/pj pants.  if I ever wear regular clothes again, I’d say flower child.

favorite social media account. Tumbler.  Facebook is a close 2nd cause it lets me keep in touch with my family. 

what size bed do you have? King

any siblings? 2 older brothers

if you can live anywhere in the world where would it be? why? Ireland.  Because...it calls to me.  

favorite snapchat filter? a what?

favorite makeup brand(s) I don’t wear makeup

how many times a week do you shower? 6.

favorite tv show? TBGO!!  I also like Bones, Orville, and Psych

shoe size? 8.5

how tall are you? 5′3′’

sandals or sneakers? sneakers.  But I prefer barefoot

do you go to the gym? HAHAHAHAHA!!!   No.

describe your dream date.   A walk around the lake, fishing, followed by dinner and a movie.  

how much money do you have in your wallet at the moment? I don’t carry a wallet or purse.  One more thing for me to loose track of.

what color socks are you wearing? BAREFOOT!

how many pillows do you sleep with? 3

do you have a job? what do you do? Yes, Acute Dialysis nurse.  I perform Hemodialysis, peritoneal dialysis, continuous renal replacement therapy, and plasmapheresis on unstable patients admitted to the hospital.

how many friends do you have? In present life--like 3 or 4.  But only 1 I do things with outside of work on a regular basis.  Online, I have a few more.  :)

whats the worst thing you have ever done?  When I was in middle school, I took part in a group bullying incident against a really nice, but mentally delayed girl.  The thought of it still makes me sick.

whats your favorite candle scent? Caramel Coffee

3 favorite boy names. Lucas, Joseph, Michael

3 favorite girl names.  Britney, Mellina, Rosemary

favorite actor? Vincent Donofrio

favorite actress? Ashley Judd

who is your celebrity crush? Seth McFarlen

favorite movie? TROLLS!

do you read a lot? whats your favorite book? I love fanfiction, but mostly I read medical books.

money or brains? Brains

do you have a nickname? what is it? Teal.

how many times have you been to the hospital? thousands since I work there.  Admitted, 8 times.  6 were for pregnancy related reasons

top 10 favorite songs.  top 3--Time of your life by Greenday, Dance, and Smells like Teen Spirit by Nirvana 

do you take any medications daily? zantac--for stomach acid

what is your skin type? (oily, dry, etc)  Dry

what is your biggest fear? Something happening to my children. when I was a child, it was being kidnapped.

how many kids do you want? 3.

whats your go to hair style? Bunned over pony tail

what type of house do you live in? (big, small, etc) Bigger than average I guess, 4 bedroom, 3 bath.  5 acres.

who is your role model? My friend Kendra. 

what was the last compliment you received?  I was helpful

what was the last text you sent? “Temptation to stay in bed is TOO STRONG”

how old were you when you found out Santa wasn’t real? 6 maybe

what is your dream car? Minivan. No, seriously.  It made my life SO MUCH EASIER!!  Broke my heart to trade it in because I needed something with 4 wheel drive.

opinion on smoking?  If u r over 17 and want to--I don’t care. it’s your choice.  It WILL give you cancer.   I don’t want  my kids to breath it. But it really pisses me off when I take time out of my life and away from my family to take care of you in the hospital, and you piss all over all my hard work and your health by insisting on going outside to for a cigarette.

do you go to college? Yup,  University of North Dakota.  Got my degree completion at Morningside, sioux city

what is your dream job?  Gastrointestinal surgeon.

would you rather live in rural areas or the suburbs? Rural

do you take shampoo and conditioner bottles from hotels? yes.

do you have freckles? I WISH.  I have beauty marks--which are like tiny, flat moles.

do you smile for pictures? Always.  I’m always smiling

how many pictures do you have on your phone? maybe 20. it’s a new phone

have you ever peed in the woods?  Sure.  Hasn’t everyone been camping before?

do you still watch cartoons? Yes!!  

do you prefer chicken nuggets from Wendy’s or McDonalds?  I don’t have a preference

Favorite dipping sauce? Blue Cheese

what do you wear to bed? lounge pants and t-shirt

have you ever won a spelling bee? no--I’m a HORRIBLE speller.  Never made it past the 1st round

what are your hobbies? I love to draw and write.  I enjoy gardening, cooking, and canning. I hope to try making cheese this year.

can you draw? Yes.  At least I’d like to think so.

do you play an instrument? Piano and drums.

what was the last concert you saw? Metallica with Lincoln Park and Limp Bizkit 

tea or coffee? I like Tea the most.  But I love overly sugared, overly creamed coffee a couple times per month

Starbucks or Dunkin Donuts?  Dunkin....for the donuts.  :)

do you want to get married? I didn’t used to. But I found the right person who changed my mind

what is your crush’s first and last initial? B.M.

are you going to change your last name when you get married?

what color looks best on you? Pink.  But I prefer to wear browns

do you miss anyone right now?  Too many to count.

do you sleep with your door open or closed? closed--keep it colder in my room and the noise out.

do you believe in ghosts? Absolutely!

what is your biggest pet peeve? when people spit... on the sidewalk.  Like, DUDE!!  99 percent of the population swallow their saliva or use a Kleenex.  I don’t want to step in your spit!! Gross!!

last person you called` My friend Marissa.

favorite ice cream flavor? Rainbow sherbet

regular oreos or golden oreos? Regular

chocolate or rainbow sprinkles? RAINBOW!!

what shirt are you wearing? Purple special Olympics support shirt

what is your phone background? my kids

are you outgoing or shy? so outgoing.

do you like it when people play with your hair? Oh GOSH yes!!

do you like your neighbors? They are ok.  i prefer no neighbors.

do you wash your face? at night? in the morning? I wash when I shower. I shower at night

have you ever been high? yes

have you ever been drunk? yes

last thing you ate? Smoked Turkey breast

favorite lyrics right now  “Can’t stop the feeling!!!” (I just watched Trolls)

summer or winter? Summer

day or night? night.

dark, milk, or white chocolate? milk, with white as a super close 2nd.

favorite month? April

what is your zodiac sign? Taurus

who was the last person you cried in front of?  I don’t like to cry in front of people.  I prefer to cry alone.  I guess my husband was the last.

I tag @kate669 @toki-trolls @nickki-d-k @eva-93 @pinkaylaortiz  @kinohayashi

[brooklynislandgirl]

If you are still doing the ship meme... all the hearts for Beth and Foggy cause I need to know :)

Heart Eyes || Accepting

❤: who is more affectionate in public? in private?

Long suffering Foggy Nelson has been the victim of ambushing by hug or sudden hand-hold, by bright and bubbly enthusiasm over probably the weirdest things, kisses on the cheek, straightening of ties, thumbs up from around corners…the laundry list gets longer with every passing year they’ve known each other. And he wears her affection with a style and grace that’s rather unmatched by nearly anyone he could care to name.

And he returns those tokens with equal aplomb, albeit differently. Musicals watched at his apartment, a tour of the office while he was still working on it. Phone calls in the middle of the night to make sure she is first…okay, and that she doesn’t forget she actually has a home to go to.“Definitely me in public, him in personal space.”

♡: who is the bigger romantic openly? secretly?

She laughs and the sound radiates warmth and kindness through out it’s duration which is brief. Not because the question is funny but because Foggy is one of the sweetest and most romantic souls she knows, more so than she is, and that’s saying a lot.“Foggy’s romantic in da very French sense of da word. I mean if I had t’ pick someone oddah dan my braddah whom I could see ridin’ resolutely into battle wi’ a token around his arm from some kine maiden fair…I couldn’t pick anyone beddah. He carries a wonder of da world, a belief dat’s deep as oceans inside. He will champion a cause because it’s da right kine to do an’ nevah really t’ink twice, no matter how much he stand to lose, how hurt he could get, how he don’t see himself dat way.

“My favourite knights were always Sir Gawain an’ Sir Galahad….an’ if Foggy isn’t a distant relative of Lancelot, den I dunno who is. So I say….he’s da bigger romantic open like.”

❥: who is more likely to plan something big for valentine’s day?

“I hones’ly t’ink dat Foggy’s idea of Valentimes is him makin’ some kine ono for someone special ~man’s a fantastic cook when he’s got da time an patience for it, an’ he gonna shower you with all of his attention. Dat’s how he let ya know he cares, ya know? Lazy conversation, great little jokes, really lissen an’ rememberin’ small details.”She smiles.“Me…mebbe is cause how I was raise but I feel like… need t’ go real big or go home ya know? Carriage t’rew da park, rentin’ out da stadium for ‘battin’ practice an’ a picnic onna pitcher’s mound. Broadway show wi’ ya name in lights. Dat kind of t’ing.”ღ: who is more likely to initiate hand-holding in public?

They walk through the park, talking about his cases, even the smallest ones bringing a sense of pride and sense of self worth in it. And it starts with walking maybe too close, so that her hand brushes his and eventually she slips her fingers between his. She’s always had a thing about touch, it’s how she navigates the world and sometimes it just makes her feel a little less lonely, a lot safer. And maybe he doesn’t mind so much, because he lets her. Sometimes carrying on through with a conversation or lifting their conjoined hands to point something out that she might have otherwise missed.💕: who is more likely to make huge declarations of love in front of other people?

“Uh. Foggy.”

She remembers it all too clearly. How strange they all looked in Josie’s, Foggy and Karen and Misty and Beth herself. And she watched how he watched their long-legged and blonde friend. And Beth wondered what it would be like to be here for just a moment, though she was jerked out of that feeling when he slammed his palms on their pool table, and ordered another round of drinks.

‘These are my friends and I love them!’The only explanation he gave. Karen doesn’t know how lucky she is. Can’t see beyond Matt or Frank. But Foggy never gives up on people, and Beth admires that, even if she can see the marks it leaves behind. Even if she knows what those marks feel like. He walked Karen home that night, and she…left a picket fence of cocktail umbrellas for her cabbie.She never really had the guts to ask what, if anything, happened that night.💘: who developed a crush on the other first?“Oh, I dunno. We’re jus’…jus’ friends.”

She doesn’t know exactly when she noticed how he lights up a room with his smile. Or how she could spend hours listening to his opening and closing statements, or talking about how he grew up and what his favourite movies are. She doesn’t know why he risked life and limb to come to her clinic the night of the Earthquake. Or when she first traced the veins on the back of his hand and gave it a squeeze. She wouldn’t even really call it a crush so much as…she just likes being around him. She thinks he’s the best cuddler and a good friend and…💝: who spends more time (possibly overthinking) what presents to get the other?

“Me. Cufflinks. Wha’ was I even t’inking?! But a’ least he took it in stride.”💓: who initiates most physical contact?

It’s not exactly initiation, but Beth usually starts it. Whether it’s running her fingers through his hair at the end of a rough day, or letting him doze in her lap when he’s sick, or rubbing his shoulders during the middle of the night and he’s still burning midnight oil at his desk. It is the only real way she knows of telling him that she cares about him, his well being, and all the other things that go along with it. That and the hand holding. Or resting her head on his shoulders while they’re going through their Star Wars marathon.

“Some day, I’m gonna be really sad when I’ve got to force-choke him for being rebel scum dat he is.”💌: who is more likely to send cutesy texts to the other?

“I wouldn’t call dem cutesy, really. But sometimes it’s nice t’ get a random tex so ya know someone out dere tinkin’ about ya. An’ he ~said~ he liked cute animal videos, so reliably no can hold dat against me, jus’ sayin.”💟: who spends time reading their zodiac incompatibilities?

“No idea wha’ ya talkin’ about, incompatibilities. We’re both Cancers, born t’irteen days apart and a couple years, give or take, which means we bot’ got a lot in common if ya don’ count generational kine. An’ so wha’ if his venus is in his sixth… I mean I’m sure I could sit down an’ draw out his chart if I wan too but why? I don’ t’ink it maddah t’ him wha’ da stars say, because it’s slander and heresay, at best.”💙: who is more protective?

Beth absolutely believes Foggy is the more physically protective of the two of them, where as she’s more emotionally protective of him, and in a way it creates a really beautiful synergy. And it’s also extremely endearing though the idea that he could get hurt because of her absolutely kills her. “I say we’re pretty even matched here.”💚: who tends to get sick more often? who is better at taking care of the other?

Beth is convinced that he’s never noticed that she doesn’t get sick. Despite working in an emergency room and running a health clinic in the Kitchen. That whenever things go really side ways {or she spends time with people like Frank Castle}, she has the remarkable good luck not to come away with a single scratch. And she really hopes he doesn’t ever catch on because that is the one secret she can’t share with him.Likewise, Foggy’s worst habit is his lack of self-care and the fact that he’ll run himself into the ground if he’s allowed to. So of course she tries to make sure he doesn’t without seeming weird about it.

“I mean, I’m pretty sure I can say I’m mo’ beddah taking care of him, and oddah people, because dat’s ya know…what I do for a living. An’ I guess den dat makes him da one gets more sick.”💜: who said “i love you” first? or, if neither has said it yet, who is more likely to say it first?

“Objection!” She almost chokes on her cup of coffee at the question. Obviously flustered she seems to drop back behind her personal shell over the matter. Arms hunched inward and face turned away so her hair falls into it. Beth…can’t bring herself to say those words. Even if she meant them, even if they scratched at the back of her mind. Because when she does? The person leaves. She’s watched it happen time after time after time, and she can’t bear the idea of not having Foggy in her life.Besides, she’s a thousand percent sure that he doesn’t see her that way. And that’s okay too. He deserves someone he loves. He deserves the world.“Dis seem really unfair. Wha’s dat called? Leadin’ da witness?”💛: who believes in soulmates?

She’s absolutely sure they both do, but it’s surprisingly not something that’s come up in casual conversation. And if she were honest with herself, she’d admit he’s already found that person. And she absolutely has no remorse punching a certain blind-man dead in the face if he ever breaks Foggy’s heart.Again.

[ciabrainbugs]

Immigration facts and figures

This is a growing list of well-sourced articles and studies on how immigration impacts societies. I apologize for any nonworking or outdated links as this post includes information I’ve been gathering over a long time and encompasses a wide range of topics. This information is important. Most of the text is quoted directly from the sources and items in italics are written by me for added context and clarity.

-Some notes- First, like to address off the top that a lot of this information seems to reduce people to numbers, and statistics. This post is in response to rhetoric from disingenuous people who argue in bad faith. It’s an attempt to dismiss myths and demystify the situation. It is not my attempt to justify boiling people down to their value to a capitalist system. Rather it’s a way to dispell the arguments of those that try to do just that. Lastly, as of right now this does not include information regarding the current detention centers operating along the border. Rest assured I’m working on another post with a more granular look at the horrible conditions and specifics of it.  

_______________________________________________________________________

ECONOMIC EFFECTS

_______________________________________________________________________

The following links and articles demonstrate the net positive effects on the U.S. economy that undocumented immigrants provide in very real tangible terms. 

https://www.epi.org/publication/immigration-facts/

We should regularize the country’s 11.7 million unauthorized immigrants by providing them legal status and a path to citizenship; it would actually be good for the economy and generate jobs. Providing legal status and citizenship enables unauthorized immigrants to produce and earn significantly more than they do when they are working without legal rights or protections and in constant fear of deportation. Their resulting productivity and wage gains ripple through the economy because immigrants are not just workers—they are also consumers and taxpayers. In particular, they will spend their increased earnings on items like food, clothing, housing, cars, and computers. That spending, in turn, will stimulate demand for more goods and services, which will create the need for more workers. In other words, it will create jobs.

https://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/05/business/illegal-immigrants-are-bolstering-social-security-with-billions.html

While it has been evident for years that illegal immigrants pay a variety of taxes, the extent of their contributions to Social Security is striking: the money added up to about 10 percent of last year's surplus

-Cost to Healthcare

Commonly, pundits will claim that immigrants are a drain to our healthcare system. This is blatantly incorrect.

https://khn.org/news/immigrants-medicare-health-costs/

“The study found that in 2009, immigrants contributed $33 billion to the trust fund [Medicare Part A], nearly 15 percent of total contributions. They received $19 billion of expenditures, about 8 percent, giving the trust fund a surplus of $14 billion. People born in the United States, on the other hand, contributed $192 billion and received $223 billion, decreasing the trust fund by $31 billion...”

https://www.healthaffairs.org/doi/abs/10.1377/hlthaff.2012.1223

“Immigrants, particularly noncitizens, heavily subsidize Medicare,” 

“Policies that reduce immigration would almost certainly weaken Medicare’s financial health, while an increasing flow of immigrants might bolster its sustainability.”

-Undocumented Filing Taxes

Another misconception involves the incorrect thought that these people do not pay taxes. Again, this is patently false

https://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/16/nyregion/16immig.html?pagewanted=print

“Illegal immigrants do not have Social Security numbers, but the Internal Revenue Service allows them to file taxes by assigning applicants individual taxpayer identification numbers. The numbers were introduced in 1996 to encourage noncitizens with United States income, including foreign investors, to file returns. It is generally accepted that most of the 11 million numbers issued since then have gone to illegal immigrants.”

https://itep.org/undocumented-immigrants-state-local-tax-contributions-1/#.V-Q4CWWj-lL

“Undocumented immigrants contribute significantly to state and local taxes, collectively paying an estimated $11.64 billion a year. Contributions range from almost $2.2 million in Montana with an estimated undocumented population of 4,000 to more than $3.1 billion in California, home to more than 3 million undocumented immigrants.” “Granting legal status to all undocumented immigrants in the United States as part of a comprehensive immigration reform and allowing them to work legally would increase their state and local tax contributions by an estimated $2.1 billion a year. Their nationwide effective state and local tax rate would increase to 8.6 percent.“

______________________________________________________________________

CRIME STATS

______________________________________________________________________

Even the Koch Brothers’ CATO institute can’t obfuscate the facts. Immigrants, both documented and undocumented, are less likely to commit crimes than their native-born counterparts. https://www.cato.org/publications/immigration-research-policy-brief/their-numbers-demographics-countries-originT

he data show that all immigrants—legal and illegal—are less likely to be incarcerated than native-born Americans relative to their shares of the population. By themselves, illegal immigrants are less likely to be incarcerated than native-born Americans. An estimated 1,955,951 native-born Americans, 117,994 illegal immigrants, and 43,618 legal immigrants were incarcerated in 2016. The incarceration rate for native-born Americans was 1,521 per 100,000, 800 per 100,000 for illegal immigrants, and 325 per 100,000 for legal immigrants in 2016 (Figure 1).

https://www.cato.org/blog/murder-mollie-tibbetts-illegal-immigrant-crime-facts

“To calculate those conviction rates, I used an estimate of the size of the illegal immigrant population in Texas as well as data from the American Community Survey. For the number of native-born Americans and legal immigrants. The conviction rates are per each subpopulation of native-born Americans, illegal immigrants, and legal immigrants. Immigration status makes no difference in the reporting of serious crimes like murder or robbery, so these statistics aren’t likely to be biased.”

-Illegal immigrants are 47 percent less likely to be incarcerated than natives.

Oxford

http://oxfordre.com/criminology/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780190264079.001.0001/acrefore-9780190264079-e-93

“Research consistently shows that foreign-born individuals are less likely to commit crime than naturalized citizens in the United States and that immigration status may abate crime within a community.”

-Crime is going down despite rising migrant population

“Arrest, sentencing, and incarceration rates have been changing in the late the 20th and early 21st centuries. Since reaching an all-time high in both violent and property crime in the mid-1990s, the number and rate of violent and property crime in the United States have been steadily declining (Federal Bureau of Investigation,

2015a

) The states with the highest violent and property crime rates neither are the most populous nor house the largest number of immigrants.

Places with the largest increases in population have been associated with the largest decreases in crime rates in the past decade.”

-NPR

https://www.npr.org/2018/05/02/607652253/studies-say-illegal-immigration-does-not-increase-violent-crime

All of this comes as no surprise to Art Acevedo, the police chief in Houston, which has one of largest undocumented populations in the nation. The chief has been publicly critical of the immigration crackdown. "There's no wave of crime being committed by the immigrant community," Acevedo said.

-Drugs

https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/4450776-Light-Et-Al-AJPH-Published.html

They found that the dramatic influx of undocumented immigrants, similarly, did not drive up rates of drug and alcohol arrests or the number of drug overdoses and DUI deaths. 

I would be remiss if I didn’t also address that the U.S. incarceration rates, something inherently attached to this subject.

“The incarceration rate in the United States is the highest in the world: it is presently 693 inmates per 100,000 people in the population”

https://www.prisonpolicy.org/global/2016.html The American criminal justice system holds almost 2.3 million people in 1,719 state prisons, 109 federal prisons, 1,772 juvenile correctional facilities, 3,163 local jails, and 80 Indian Country jails as well as in military prisons, immigration detention facilities, civil commitment centers, state psychiatric hospitals, and prisons in the U.S. territories. https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/pie2019.html ______________________________________________________________________

Effects of Deportation in Alabama (HB56)

______________________________________________________________________

The following is an account of what happened when a community actively set out to perform mass deportations. It clearly shows a negative impact on the economy and industries in the state.

http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/undocumented-workers-immigration-alabama

“When HB 56 passed, Albertville—where the booming poultry industry had attracted thousands of immigrants from Mexico and Central America—quickly became the national face of the crackdown. From 2000 to 2010, the number of unauthorized immigrants in Alabama jumped from an estimated 25,000 to 120,000, as migrants flocked to jobs in agriculture, meatpacking, and construction. “

“That concern drove Alabama to pass the nation’s toughest legislation but it is not alone in its desire to stem the flow of undocumented workers. At courthouses, simple tasks like renewing one’s vehicle tags now required proof of legal status, which generated long lines for citizens and non-citizens alike. Utilities were unsure whether they needed to cut off service to residents who couldn’t prove citizenship.” The act of attempting such a sweeping measure created a quagmire of bureaucracy and broke down a system unequipped to handle it. The effects of which resulted in an undeniable, measurable economic downturn. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/alabama-tried-a-donald-trump-style-immigration-law-it-failed-in-a-big-way/2015/08/22/2ae239a6-48f2-11e5-846d-02792f854297_story.html?utm_term=.aedce2d6f707 “Business groups blamed the tough measures for scaring away capital and for an exodus of workers that hurt the state’s agriculture industry. Large farms spent millions training new workers. The Byrds conceded that the agriculture sector suffered after some immigrants fled the state. “Most of them left and didn’t come back,” said Terry Darring-Rogers, who works at a Mobile law firm specializing in immigration.”

https://cber.cba.ua.edu/New%20AL%20Immigration%20Law%20-%20Costs%20and%20Benefits.pdf 

“This report presents an initial cost-benefit analysis of HB56, the new Alabama immigration law and finds that the law is rather costly to the state. Economies are demand-driven so any policy, regulation, law, or action that reduces demand will not contribute to economic development no matter how well-intentioned. “ A study by Dr. Samuel Addy of the University of Alabama estimated that HB56 could shrink the state's annual GDP by $11 billion or almost 6%, a result of lost sales and income taxes and fall in demand from lost consumers.

A similar situation was recorded in california in 2015. Unfortunately, there is less information on this incident.

https://www.independent.com/news/2017/jun/22/labor-shortage-leaves-13-million-crops-rot-fields/

“[in California] An estimated $13 million of strawberries, broccoli, leafy greens, and other unharvested produce were plowed under last year [2015], up from five years ago..,”

_______________________________________________________________________

Cost of Deportation Study (285 billion)

The following section is in regards to the enormous cost that mass deportation would entail.

https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/immigration/reports/2010/03/19/7470/the-costs-of-mass-deportation/

“$285 billion total cost to deport the undocumented immigrant population and continue border interdiction and interior enforcement efforts over a five-year period (in 2008 dollars).” There is little to no evidence that any of the money we currently pour into these programs and institutions are doing anything to combat the perceived issue. “While the federal government was doubling down on enforcement efforts over a five-year period, it wasn’t even able to halt growth in the size of the undocumented immigrant population. In other words, the current ICE and CBP budgets (plus a massive recession) were almost sufficient to prevent a net increase in undocumented immigrants but insufficient to diminish it. (pg. 16 figure 6)”

_______________________________________________________________________

Wall

This is an absurd solution to a problem that doesn’t exist in the first place. At best it’s expensive and ineffective, at worst it will lead to loss of human life and exacerbate environmental problems for the region.

cost of the wall (21.6 - 70 Billion)

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-immigration-wall-exclusive-idUSKBN15O2ZN

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/18/us/politics/senate-democrats-border-wall-cost-trump.html

Walls Don’t Work

Simply put the majority of illegal immigrants will not be deterred by a wall, and in fact, it could lead to an increase. Because--

They Come by Air

https://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2015/sep/08/jorge-ramos/ramos-40-undocumented-immigrants-come-air/

They overstay their visas

http://www.pewhispanic.org/2006/05/22/modes-of-entry-for-the-unauthorized-migrant-population/

It Prevents them from Going back to Mexico

https://foreignpolicy.com/2015/08/18/donald-trump-immigration-border/

“estimates indicate that 86 percent of undocumented entries were offset by departures, and the undocumented population grew slowly, rising to just under 3 million over two decades. “

Most do not intend to stay here but increasing the difficulty in crossing the border makes them more likely to not attempt a return.

Building a wall increases the cost of detaining immigrants by forcing agents into more remote areas and the increase in deaths along the border

“Enforcement was further buttressed by the launching of Operation Blockade in El Paso, Texas, in 1993 and Operation Gatekeeper in San Diego, California, in 1994. These operations, led by the U.S. Border Patrol, erected a literal wall of enforcement resources at the two busiest U.S.-Mexico border crossings. They also diverted migratory flows away from these regions, through the Sonoran Desert, and into Arizona. This diversion greatly increased the costs and risks of undocumented border crossing: Since 1986, more than 7,000 migrants have died along the border, and the average cost of crossing has risen from $600 to $4,500, according to estimates from the Mexican Migration Project, which I co-direct.”

_______________________________________________________________________

The Legal Battle

Our immigration courts are ill-equipped to handle the numbers. We should be investing in more public defenders and judges to process more people. The system is broken as it exists is broken.

https://www.justice.gov/eoir/office-of-the-chief-immigration-judge

The Office of the Chief Immigration Judge (OCIJ) is led by the chief immigration judge, who establishes operating policies and oversees policy implementation for the immigration courts. OCIJ provides overall program direction and establishes priorities for approximately 400 immigration judges located in 62 immigration courts throughout the Nation.

This means that there are over 1 million back logged cases

http://trac.syr.edu/whatsnew/email.181106.html http://trac.syr.edu/immigration/reports/536/

_______________________________________________________________________

MULTI SOURCES AND NON TEXT SOURCES Science Vs Podcast https://www.gimletmedia.com/science-vs/immigration Adam Ruins Everything https://www.trutv.com/shows/adam-ruins-everything/blog/adams-sources/adam-ruins-immigration.html WNYC Podcast https://www.wnyc.org/story/bnch-migration-doug-massey/ Ammon Bundy Denouncing Rhetoric https://www.newsweek.com/right-wing-militia-leader-blasts-trump-migrant-rhetoric-1235095

IF YOU MADE IT TO THE BOTTOM THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR READING MY FIRST POST ON TUMBLR. I’M NOT SURE IF THIS KIND OF POST IS RIGHT FOR THIS SITE, BUT I NEED A PLACE TO COLLECT THESE THINGS AND IT SEEMED LIKE THE BEST WAY TO ORGANIZE WHAT I WANTED.

[roxannepolice]

You know, talking in general and not just SW, I think that sometimes the audience surrogate can be a double bladed sword done the wrong way. But there is also this percent of the fandom that thinks that if you don't love the audience surrogate or the other Relatable Character™ you are X thing. (1/2)

It has happened to me with the DW fandom and some people asking me why I like the Eleventh Doctor more than the Acceptable™ Twelfth Doctor. Because you you, the former is a more darker, possessive and selfish character and the later is kinder and all. And I am like... Not my fault if I found one more fascinating than the other because he is a bastard (2/2)

You know, this really carries me back in time to when Philosopher’s Stone was first released on dvd and among extras there was a sorting hat test/minigame and I went positively hysterical when upon first time spontaneous answers I got sorted into Slytherin. It took quite a long time for me to embrace my Slytherclaw self and if the hat had a problem between these two houses I would totally ask for classy underwater mess of a common room now. And I mention that as an introduction to how today grown up, intelligent people are worriedly sideyeing me when I say I'd fancy a Slytherin scarf.

It appears to me that the not-exactly-ostracism-at-least-outside-tumblr towards identifying with villains or even simply not completely cinnamon rolly characters has a couple of deeper rationales. One is that overtly morally unclear characters that are also intentionally identifiable with are a relatively new phenomenon in popculture. Villains could have been sympathetic but not really anything else until quite recently. They could have a point but wallow in how evilly they act on this point. They could even be likeable or awe-inspiring. But there always had to be a clear wall between them and audience, as well as the hero. RotJ Vader is in fact a great example of a villain who is sympathetic but not identifiable with, he exists in a simple paradigm of well he's Luke's dad and he believes there's good in him and he sounds miserable sometimes but otherwise yeah he offers to rule the galaxy because that's what villains do. He's also coded as the parent generation rather than the one the target audience would identify with. And of course, full body armour and mask complete the picture of unapproachability. OT Vader doesn't have motivation, past, psyche or really anything else other than he's Luke's dad, it took 20 years to change that. And now? Now we get good organisations being controlled by baddies, heroes having different opinions on their own ethical status, villains mirroring their motivations... On the one hand it's an interesting breath of fresh air in texts which were slowly becoming their own parodies, on the other there needs to be a balance between these problematic(TM) notions and unproblematic(TM) resolutions and frankly not all creators find this balance as I sometimes worry will be the case with the sequels. And mass audience straight doesn't know how to handle this in discourse, not because they're too dumb only because a tacit understanding even only theoretically present in discussions of more high-brow culture simply hasn't formed there yet. It's a widely accepted fact that some of the most discussed, desirable and given to best actors Shakespeare roles are the likes of Richard III, Lady Macbeth or Iago and there's no need explaining that fascination with them doesn't stem from condoning murder only confronting us with the darker but oh so human aspects of our nature. MCU, SW and BBC discussions have yet to get this memo.

And then there’s the matter of lifestyle commodification, which I think finds its echo even in something as trivial as popularity of online which character are you tests. There is something of a phenomenon of subjecting many elements of our lives to some one hobby or life choice, which sounds obvious until we look at shops trying to sell special coffee only for physically active people - because it’s speculated that it really all boils down to profit being bigger from selling a full lifestyle set (clothes, food, furniture) of some archetypal physically active person (or bookworm, fan or even activist) than y’know, just good shoes and some gear. So the point is that we are tought to think in full lifestyle sort of way rather than dissecting things and taking out only what we want. Ergo, you can’t like, let alone identify with, some aspects of a character and not everything about them - so if the character is morally gray/villainous you need to make it clear you don’t condone murder.

Then there is an old matter which gained new power lately - the moral panic over the influence of media. There’s no denying there exists a relationship between the culture we take in and our psyche, but pratically no serious researcher still believes in the “sponge” model where audience just sucks in whatever the text pours at them (fanfiction is in fact frequently pointed at as an example of actively recreative audience). Can exposition to lots of trivialized violence in tv make us numb to real world violence? Yes, research shows it can. But there’s a difference between sitting all day in front of tv mindlessly watching hours of sex, drugs and violence and engaging in problematic(TM) characters. As it’s frequently repeated, if you go on a killing spree inspired by a video game, there’s probably something wrong with you and not the game played by thousands of other people. Then again, we musn’t forget that part of history when committing a suicide while cosplaying Werther was all the rage among young european men.

And I think this also ties with how everything in contemporary popculture needs to mean something, or even in fact be some aspect of social reality. This is hardly the freshest phenomenon (Roland Barthes claimed already back in the 60s that popularity of aliens, martians more specifically, was due to mental association of red planet with Soviet Union during the cold war), but now it’s become a popular knowledge and, as abstract ideas tend to in mass interpretation, it got simplified to the level where FO aren’t simply visually inspired by pretty much every totalitatian system ever only are neo-nazis. As such it becomes one’s moral duty to waste emotional energy on righteously hating fictional characters in a kids’ movie or else you support nazism. Hence also all the school shooter, creepy stalker, spoiled brat etc. readings of Kylo Ben and all the mess going on around 11 (which really makes me think that new Who audience badly needs to learn what sh*t classic Doctors would pull).

In general I’d say there’s a slightly disturbing blurring of lines between reality and fiction going on before our eyes. It’s almost as if we couldn’t just chill out and let ourselves be transported to Oz without questioning the influence of ruby slippers on munchkin economy anymore. Or return to Kansas without demanding a yellow brick road.

[vicccwrites]

Buffets - You Zhangjing

(A/N: @eriines SURPRISE BITCH!!! You knew it was coming but still ;-; I hope this satisfies your ridiculously high standards, love (gosh you keep raising the bar how do i keep up) <33 To quote you, this is my attempt at “restoring the empty wasteland that is zhangjing fics” welp ^^ ily and I hope you’ll enjoy it :))) ALSO,, to the anon that requested this, here you go bub! I hope you like it~)

Masterlist

- GIF Source: Google -

When Yanjun had first started to gain fame as part of Nine Percent, he, as your brother, would jokingly mention you being a foodie sometimes on variety shows, which led to multiple malicious comments online about you

Ofc Yanjun had stopped as soon as he found out about those rumours,,, but ever since you had been a bit more wary of letting yourself pig out as much as you wanted to in public

While of course you were still a true foodie at heart, you felt bad eating a lot in public where anyone could take unflattering pictures or spread rumors about you

Even though let’s be real nobody cared

This was intensified even further whenever you had to eat in front of your brother’s group mates for some reason

You couldn’t explain why, but you felt like you had to eat really healthy stuff when you were with them

Especially around your crush - recently turned boyfriend! - You Zhangjing

Which brings us to the present, where you’re staring at his text message with a mixture of worry and pure excitement

“For our third date, do you want to check out that new buffet that just opened down the street? I’ve heard it’s all-you-can-eat ;)”

While on one hand you had really been looking forward to trying the food there because it was supposed to beyond fantastic

On the other,,, Zhangjing would be there

Not that you truly thought that he would judge you for eating as much as you wanted, but rather you were mostly shy and embarrassed about being as much of a foodie as you were

Mostly because you were sort of afraid that he would dump you for a skinnier, more diet-conscious girl

Which he would ofc never do and you knew that; it was just your insecurities speaking

And the whole date would involve eating,,, right in front of Zhangjing

Deciding not to let that deter you from (what would hopefully be) an amazing date, you accepted the invitation, albeit with some reservations

So the date rolls around,,, and as you walk into the restaurant with your boyfriend you still have quite a few doubts

But they all disappear for a second

Because HOLY SHIT THERE’S SO MUCH FOOD

You’re 99% sure you actually squealed out loud, if the weird looks some people were giving you were anything to go by

Quickly clapping a hand over your mouth in mortification, you glanced to Zhangjing, but he was just as entranced by the food selection as you were

Thankfully, he hadn’t noticed your slip-up

Once he snapped out of his daze, he all but dragged you to get seated so that you could start eating asap

And when I say asap, I mean like yesterday

There was a huge line of people waiting for food, and when you two finally made it to the front you both had been taunted by the delectable smells for a good 20 mins

Zhangjing started heaping various foods on his plate without the slightest care in the world, fully intending to stuff as much food as he could possibly squeeze onto there

You, however, were a bit more hesitant

Although you desperately wanted to compete with your boyfriend on who could stuff more food onto their plate, your embarrassment led to you restraining yourself and only grabbing a small bit of each dish

“You sure that’s going to be enough, y/n? Yanjun says you’re almost a bigger foodie than I am!”

You just nodded your head with a nervous chuckle, slightly flushed 

Did Yanjun bring up your eating habits a lot? 

(You hoped not)

Gosh, this date was already going to hell

Anyway, you two made it back to your table and started digging in

Zhangjing practically started stuffing his face with food, which you found really endearing and cute

You would occasionally take a bite of your own food, but you tried to focus on your boyfriend instead of how good the food was and how you wanted to drink a whole pot of the soup they had

So you mostly just filled the silence with rambling on about random topics with Zhangjing occasionally adding a comment or two between his bites of food

When he was finally finished with his plate, instead of asking for the bill, he instead said:

“Wanna go for seconds? I loved the soup and would die for some more!”

As much as you would have loved to exclaim in agreement, the words died in your throat and you simply shook your head in a polite refusal, stating that you were already full

“Well, if you’re sure,” Zhangjing said with a slight frown, before helping himself to a second portion of his favorite dishes

You immediately felt bad for upsetting him, but didn’t know why your actions had warranted such a reaction

Didn’t he, like the hundreds of thousands of comments online, want you to not eat as much?

Throughout the rest of the date, he offered to get you more food multiple times, but you declined each time

After he finished eating, he offered to drive you home (like the gentleman he is) despite the fact that you lived literally 5 minutes away

Once you two were in his car, his curiosity eventually gets the best of him and he couldn’t help but ask;

“Hey, y/n, you sure you’re alright? Not that I don’t trust you or anything - because I do! But Yanjun always goes on about how I should bring you out to eat, since you’re apparently a huge foodie like me,,, but today, you didn’t really look like you were enjoying yourself? So I was just wondering if it was me? Or did you not like the food? Or....”

His words shocked you quite a bit

And you couldn’t help but swoon slightly at his perception, even if it was something negative he was talking about

Gently placing a hand over his and interrupting his rambling, you made the split-second decision to tell your boyfriend about your insecurities

After all, if he was concerned enough to notice that something was up, he would care enough to hear what you had to say

Taking a deep breath, you started explaining your predicament to him, carefully watching his expression for any signs of how he would react

Instead of a verbal response, he simply hugged you

Which was slightly awkward around the middle section of the car, but you know what, it was still cute

“I know how you feel, y/n.”

All of a sudden, it hit you

He probably shared some of those very same insecurities - with the comments telling him to stop eating; to lose weight; to give up and all

Your heart ached at the mere thought of what your boyfriend had probably gone through

Squeezing his hand in an act of comfort, you hoped he knew that you understood

“But, you can’t let those comments define you or change who you are. As long as you’re healthy and happy, it really doesn’t matter what others think! I need someone to pig out with me!! Besides, you’re already so skinny~” Zhangjing gently teased, causing you to giggle

“So, ice cream? I want dessert!!”

You outright chuckled at that, marvelling at the sheer size of your boyfriend’s appetite

“You’re still hungry?”

“Hey! I’ve got to grow somehow, right?”

He winked at you, causing both of you to collapse into peals of laughter

He brought you to this cute little ice cream parlor that didn’t look like much but actually had some of the best ice cream you had ever tasted

You two spent the remainder of the date talking about your common interests

*Cough* FOOD *Cough*

Among other things

And he promised to bring you to this place that had the best nasi lemak since you expressed an interest in trying some Malaysian foods

Which he found really sweet!! He thought it was really cute how you wanted to try new foods just because he liked them

After your dessert, he dropped you off at your place, kissing you goodbye as he drove off to the studio for vocal practice with the members

So you walk in the door of your house with a ridiculously goofy smile plastered on your face

Well, that certainly was an amazing date

Bonus:

Days later, your phone buzzes just as you’re about to head to some dinner that yanjun had invited you to

Confused, you check your texts, and the sight that greets you positively warms your heart

“Love you, beautiful!! Make sure to eat lots for me, yeah?? You gotta tell me how it tastes so I can know whether to bug Yanjun to invite me next year, ok? You look stunning, love <33”

[nffalonzo527134-blog]

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[discoveringthebible]

Theology Research Paper

AKA The Exegetical Paper

In the field of Theology, there is a type of research of Biblical text known as Exegesis. In my online class, New Testament Gospels, I had to write one for my big semester project. We were able to pick our own topics. I chose to do the Parable of the Good Samaritan from Luke 10:23-37. (All Translations actually start with verse 25, but for context purposes for my paper, I started with verse 23.) 

Below is the research paper. I thought I knew a lot about this parable, but I learned a lot completing this. (Yes, it is long. It comes out to approximately 18 pages in Microsoft Word at 12 point font Times New Roman. 

(Normally there is a specific standard in which exegetical papers are written, but because of this blog, some of the format changed.)

The Parable of the Good Samaritan

Luke 10:23-37

By Cody Marie Bolton

INTRODUCTION

ORIENTATION AND CONTEXT

Significance of Text

           The Parable of the Good Samaritan answers a very important question, “Who is my neighbor?” In this paper, I will attempt to convey that this passage of Scripture proves that everyone is our neighbor. In order for us to real grasp the Gospel message, we need to not only believe in who Jesus is, but also go out and share that with our neighbors, not just with our words, but especially with our actions.

           There have been two major ways in which to interpret this parable. I am not going to use this paper to side with one way of interpretation. I am not going to push for whether or not the Samaritans were in fact hostiles against the Jews in Jesus’ day or not. While many scholars do believe this, however, there is a growing debate to suggest in fact, they were not. The purpose of this paper is to focus deeper on what it means to “be a neighbor” and how this passage helps us look at the major themes of compassion, mercy and love.

           “…the parable of the Good Samaritan elevates the importance of showing mercy, and implies that it is an essential response of God’s people to his covenant” (Luke 10:25-37; Deut. 6:4-5; Lev. 19:17-18), and to be valued much more than mere cultic acts (Hos. 6:6; Matt. 9:13.) (Alexander, 622).

           A parable is a very common teaching done by Jesus, as represented in the Gospel. “The most famous form used by Jesus in his teaching is the parable. Scholars have frequently pointed out that this is the most characteristic element of his teaching, for not less than 35 percent of his teaching in the Synoptic Gospels is found in parabolic form” (Stein, 33). Stein has also suggested that this parable has a specific form. One that made it easier for those hearing it to remember it. He suggests that Jesus was teaching using irony.

          In a broader sense, however, irony, can refer to an event or a result that is opposite to what one would normally expect….Some possible example of irony in the Gospels are:….Luke 10:29-37 (the irony here in the reversal of roles-the devout of Israel [the Levite and the priest] are the villains and the despicable half-breed and rebel [the Samaritan] is the hero) (Stein, 22).

           It is important to note that “[p]arables are not a shortcut to wisdom. They foster through reflection, meditation, and emotional engagement. They challenge accepted norms and subvert attempts to assign simplistic meaning. In interpreting parables one must work for the reward, and then own the result” (Neale, 45). We must remember that when we study or read parables, that there is no easy understanding and that we must work toward their meaning. The fact [t]hat Jesus’ parables continue to stimulate, even centuries after they were spoken, proves that he was a master of the genre” (Neale, 45). When we study the communication greats, like Aristotle, Hitler, etc., we should also be taking a close look at Jesus because Jesus had an incredible influence with spoken word over tens of thousands of people.  

Historical and Social Setting

           In doing research for this topic, I came to a couple of different conclusions for the historical and social setting. And much of it came down to whether or not there was a lot of hostility between the Samaritans and the Jews. Most commonly, it has been interpreted that there was hostility between the two people groups, because the Jews believed the Samaritans perverted the Jewish bloodline and were considered “half-blood.” A newer interpretation suggests that there was no hostility and that there were no differences between the two groups.

 “Scholars most often interpret the parable of the good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37) one of the best known passages in the New Testament, in the context of intergroup hostility between Jews and Samaritans….Ancient text contemporaneous with Luke-Acts often include Samaritans within Israel without marginalization or classification as absolute non-Jewish “others.” The emphasis on absolute difference emerges rather, from a scholarly habit of both racialized and polemicized readings of the text” (Chalmers, 543).

Literary Context

           The Parable of the Good Samaritan was written in the Gospel according to Luke. “He [Luke] is an evangelist in the sense that he seeks to persuade his readers to adapt a life of repentance and redemption” (Neale, 33).

           “A significant amount of material found in Luke is neither in Mark nor Matthew. Thus the ‘special’ Lukan material is especially important….[t]he analysis of this material provides the richest source for understanding Luke’s unique perspectives and receives particular attention” (Neale, 33).

Jesus used parables to illustrate and reveal his message to his followers. Certainly the parable of the Good Samaritan illustrates ‘who is my neighbor’ (Luke 10:29) in a most unforgettable way, even as the story of the prodigal son illustrates the love of God for sinners and his joyous welcome of the repentant in a heart-moving manner. There is therefore truth in the view that some parables are meant to ‘illustrate.’ Yet frequently the meaning of a parable was available only to the disciples, to whom ‘he [Jesus] explained everything in private’ (Mark 4:34) (Stein, 40-41).

Robert H. Stein, in his revised edition of The Method and Message of Jesus’ Teachings, says that the Parable of the Good Samaritan is a type of parable known an allegory. “In an allegory the details of the story are not simply coloring to fill out the story. They are not simply parts of the main story, as in story and example parables, but are of great importance in and of themselves and must be ‘interpreted’” (Stein, 37).

We need to remember that there was a lot of diversity in Jesus’ day. Not just diversity in culture, but there was diversity is religions as well. “Scholarship since the mid-twentieth century has shown that Judaism was diverse in the first century A.D. A negative characterization of all Jews in Palestine in the period is no more appropriate that it would be of any religious group at the time. Jesus was a Jew, after all, as were all of the disciples and first Christians” (Neale, 38).

 PRESENTATION OF TEXT

Scripture Passage

           Although the official section for the Parable of the Good Samaritan begins at Luke 10:25, for purposes of context and background information, I am starting with verse 23 in the English Standard Version (ESV).

23: Then turning to the disciples and he said privately, “Blessed are the eyes that see what you see! 24: For I tell you that many prophets and kings desired to see what you see, and did not see it, and hear what you hear, and did not hear it.”

25: And behind, a lawyer stood up to put him to the text, saying, “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” 26: He said to him, “What is written in the Law and how do you read it?” 27: And he answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.” 28: And he said to him, “You have answered correctly; do this and you will live.”

29: But he, desiring to justify himself, said to Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?” 30: Jesus replied, “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell among robbers, who stripped him and beat him and departed, leaving him half-dead. 31: Now by chance a priest was going down that road, and when he saw him, passed by on the other side. 32: So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33: But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion. 34: He went to him and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he set him on his own animal and brought him to an inn and took care of him. 35: And the next day he took two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper, saying, “Take care of him, and whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I get back.” 36: Which of these three, do you think, proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?” 37: He said, “The one who showed him mercy.” And Jesus said to him, “You go, and do likewise.”

 Text Critical Notes

           In the original Greek, the same word that has been translated in English, as “blessed are” is used in both Luke 10:23 as it is used throughout Matthew 5. According to the Strong’s New Testament Greek Concordance online: “makários, describes a believer in ‘fortunate’ position from receiving God’s provisions (favor)—which (literally) extended (“make long, large”) His grace (benefits). This happens with receiving (obeying) the Lord’s inbirthings of faith.”

In verse 34, in the ESV, the Samaritan brings the badly injured man into an inn. According to the ESV Archaeology Study Bible, the Greek word used here for inn is pandocheion, which is “a proper way station for travelers, as opposed to katalyma “guest room” which appears in Mark 14:14; Luke 2:7; 22:11 (pg. 1504).

Outline of Passage

I. Jesus addressing the disciples and religious leaders (10:23-24)

II. A Lawyer testing Jesus and Jesus’ initial response (10:25-28)

III. The Lawyer trying to justify himself and Jesus’ parable (10:29-37)

               a.       Man getting robbed and left for “half-dead” (10:30)

               b.      The Priest (10:31)

               c.       The Levite (10:32)

               d.      The Samaritan (10:33-35)

IV. Jesus asking the Lawyer the Point and Purpose of His parable (10:36-37)

 JESUS ADDRESSING THE DISCIPLES AND RELIGIOUS LEADERS

           Beginning with verse 23, we see Jesus having a private conversation with his disciples, however, as we understand from verse 25, the disciples were not the only ones in close proximity listening to Jesus. While there is not much mentioned here, Jesus does bless his disciples, and uses the same type of blessing that He used in his Sermon on the Mount (see Matthew 5:1-12, ESV): “blessed are.” [See Text Critical Notes for more information.]

 A LAWYER TESTING JESUS AND JESUS’ INITIAL RESPONSE

            Starting with verse 25, a lawyer enters the picture, with Jesus and His disciples. According to the ESV Reformation Study Bible online, a lawyer is “an expert in the law of God, and so a religious man. Yet he was not genuinely looking for information but for something that would enable him to accuse Jesus.” From other passages in the Bible, we understand that Jesus is not surprised by this lawyer’s actions, but listens and answers this lawyer anyway. Jesus wants to know this lawyer’s perspective on the Bible and all the laws that are written in it. This would be summarizing all 613 commands in the Mitzvah. 

            According to Britannica online, it states that a Mitzvah is

any commandment, ordinance, law or statue contained in the Torah (first five books of the Bible) and, for that reason, to be observed by all practicing Jews. The Talmud mentions 613 such mitzvahs, 248 mandatory and 365 prohibitive…Through nonobservance of a mitzvah constitutes a transgression, it is understood that not all mitzvahs are of equal importance; circumcision, for instance, is a direct response to a divine command, while the wearing of a skullcap in public is not. In a broader context, Jews consider all good deeds as the fulfillment of mitzvahs, for such actions express God’s will.

Because this lawyer is an expert in the law, Jesus wants to know how he interprets it, as he has spent his whole life studying it—it should be something he can and should be able to do. So, Jesus asks him, and the lawyer answers him, referencing back to a very important commandment from Deuteronomy 6:5: “You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might” (c.f. Luke 10:27, ESV). The lawyer also adds loving your neighbors into the mix. Jesus commends the lawyer in verse 28 and then tells him to follow this mitzvah.

 THE LAWYER TRYING TO JUSTIFY HIMSELF AND JESUS’ PARABLE

            The lawyer, although we do not get the adjective shrewd, might as well have been a shrewd lawyer. According to verse 29, he wanted to “justify himself.” He essentially wanted to know what he could get away with not doing, but still following this commandment of loving God, and loving his neighbor. And here we get the all-important question, “Who is my neighbor?” It’s clear that this lawyer wanted Jesus’ answer to be something like: “those who think like you; those who look like you; whose who worship like you; those who live next door to you.” But this isn’t what Jesus had in mind, hence an important, yet, as we already pointed out, the ironic parable begins.

            a.       Man getting robbed and left for “half-dead”

            We are introduced to a man who was traveling from Jerusalem to Jericho. We don’t know anything else about him. We don’t know if he was from Jericho or Jerusalem, but culturally, both of those cities were presumably Jewish. What we do know is that he was at the wrong place at the wrong time, and ended up getting mugged, pretty badly, and was left for dead on the side of a road, by not one, but by at least two robbers, since the term robbers is pluralized. They took his clothes and beat him, probably hoping that he would die and that the wild animals would dispose of his body. This man was lying there, in considerable pain, naked, and most likely covered in blood. We also don’t know anything else about these robbers, where they came from, or where they went, we just know what it was they did.

            b.      The Priest

            And then, in verse 31, we are introduced to a Priest, who happened to be walking along this same road—from Jerusalem to Jericho. We don’t know much about him either, except that being a Priest means that he is a religious leader. One who is an expert in the law. You’d think a Priest, someone who was charged with teaching people about God, would help this “half-dead” man, but no. Instead, when he notices the man on the side of the road, he crosses the street and continues walking. Maybe the man looked dead, or maybe he was reaching out for help. Although the parable doesn’t say, we know that this priest would have known all 613 commandments, which would have included Numbers 19:11-16. To paraphrase, it was forbidden to touch a dead body, or the person touching it would be unclean for a week, but then had to cleanse themselves to become clean again, or they could be “cut off from Israel.” It is important to note that a High Priest, otherwise called a Kohen Gadol, “may not defile himself for any dead person” (Negative Mitzvah #168, pg. 22).

            c.       The Levite

            After the Priest walked on by, we then see a Levite. A Levite, is, essentially, an assistant to the Priest, someone from the tribe of the house of Levi. Maybe this Levite was associated with the Priest, Jesus doesn’t specify. But similarly, a Levite would also know all 613 commandments, and would have therefore walked by and not assisted for probably a very similar fear, if not the same fear of “becoming unclean.” So, out of fear for his own personal “status,” he leaves this poor man in the road, still bleeding, still needing desperate help so that he doesn’t succumb to his injuries.

            d.      The Samaritan

            And this is where we are introduced to the Samaritan. As stated before, there are two ways in which we can look at the Samaritan from the cultural perspective of Jesus’ day. The more common interpretation is that the Samaritan was someone who was not a welcome person in Jewish circles (even though they were half-Jewish). They were seen as the outcasts, those who defiled what it meant to be wholly Jewish. The second perspective, as stated above by a quote from Childers, suggests that there was no hostility between these two people groups in Jesus’ time. In any case, it is the Samaritan who is the star of this ironic parable.

            Now, the lawyer listening to Jesus’ story, is probably shocked to hear Jesus introduce a Samaritan regardless, and wondered, “What is this Samaritan going to do?” Jesus doesn’t specify the journey that this Samaritan is on, but he does something the other two in the story did not do: He had “compassion” on this “half-dead” man, as verse 33 says. He didn’t just check to see if the man on the side of the road was dead or alive. “He went to him and bound up his wounds.” This Samaritan wasn’t worried about becoming unclean, he wasn’t worried about anything in regards to himself, he was worried about the bleeding man. He not only put band-aids on this man’s wounds, but treated them as best as he could with what he had: i.e., oil and wine, as verse 34 informs us. He then, he put this injured man on his animal, probably a donkey or camel, and walked alongside, guiding both to an inn, a place where this man could be better taken care of than on the dirty, hot road. [See Text Critical Notes]

            Now, this could have been the end of it, and the Samaritan would have been remembered for helping this man, but no. Once he got him to the inn, and made sure this injured man was as comfortable as he could be, he paid in advance for care this this man needed, plus he would pay for any additional fees that would incur with his future care.

The Samaritan displays the selfless love that God commands of us. While we do not know if he was a real person or not, “What we have described in the parables stems from everyday experience. No doubt many of them arose out of experiences that Jesus had as a child, youth, and young man in Nazareth….Jesus was no doubt observant as a child and saw in incidents occurring around him examples that he later incorporated into his parables” (Stein 41-42).  

            Because of this however, we cannot rule out the possibility that the Samaritan wasn’t a real person. Whether he was a real person or not, isn’t what is important. What is important is his example, and how we can learn from that example. C.S. Lewis, in his book, The Problem of Pain, goes deep into the reasons why pain exists. To summarize his work, he suggests, and according to this author, rightly so, that the pain and suffering that humanity deals with stems from The Fall. And that because of our free will to choose to do harm, God therefore cannot stop it from happening. (To specifically read his views, refer to chapter 3). However, this is where Samaritans and Christians of the world are so important. It is here that we can help heal and restore some of what has been broken with examples of compassion, love and mercy. And this means to lay aside our own thoughts and feelings for the sake of others.

There is another route to the center: a more reckless and extravagant path, which is attained not through storing up that energy or concentrating the life force, but through throwing it all away—or giving it all away. The unitive point is reached not through the concentration of being but through the free squandering of it; not through acquisition or attainment but through self-emptying; not through ‘up’ but through ‘down’” (Bourgeault, 66).

But, if Christians love, whether God or fellow Christian, it is in response to God’s love (Col. 3:12-15; 1 Pet. 1:8; 1 John 4:11.) Although Christian love is invariable the obligation of Christians, it is the fruit of the Spirit (Gal. 5:13). It is characterized by humility and gentleness (Eph. 4:1-2); in emulation of the Master, it eschews retaliation (1 Pet. 3:8-9). Inevitably self-restraint becomes a watchword (Rom. 14:13-15) as the Christian learns to love with heard and attitude no less than with action (1 Cor. 13)” (Alexander, 649).

 JESUS ASKING THE LAWYER THE POINT AND PURPOSE OF HIS PARABLE

           After finishing this ironic parable, Jesus asks this lawyer a very simple question in verse 36, “Which of these three, do you think, proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?” There is absolutely no denying that the answer is the Samaritan. In verse 37, the lawyer, who clearly by this point couldn’t deceive Jesus simply replied with, “The one who showed him mercy.” Jesus instructed him to do the same.

           “[The Hebrew word] Hesed, expresses a complex of ideas which includes love, mercy and compassion” (Alexander, 661). According to the article The Meaning of Hesed, “Hesed is not just a feeling, but an action….Throughout the Hebrew Bible, we see hesed translated in a number of different ways; steadfast love, mercy, kindness, and goodness” (Snow, FIRM). This is the kind of love that the Samaritan showed to the “half-dead” person. Jesus is calling the Lawyer, the Disciples and us, to go and do the same for our neighbors. It is through this parable this this lawyer has been given a new definition of who his neighbor is.

 CONCLUSION

 SUMMATION

           “The parable itself seeks to make a single point. It seeks to demonstrate what it means to be a neighbor. The details merely provide local coloring to aid in making this one point” (Stein, 50).

           “At its most basic level, liberation is an act of charity. It is freely opening our hands to the poor and the hurting….It is food, clothing shelter, medicine and financial support….It is, as in the parable of the good Samaritan, showing compassion on the beaten man, bandaging up his wounds, and taking care of him (Luke 10:30-35)” (Stone, 103).

It is a path he himself [Jesus] walked to a very end. In the garden of Gethsemane, with his betrayers and accusers massing at the gates, he struggled and anguished but remained true to his course….It was not love store up but love utterly poured out that opened the gates to the Kingdom of Heaven. Over and over, Jesus lays this path before us (Bourgeault, 70).

           I know I am ready to make more of a commitment to love my neighbors as I love myself and God. How about you?

 APPLICATION

If compassion for humankind is the best religious practice, then presenting a façade of religious legitimacy while failing in compassion is the worst practice. Those who ‘passed by on the other side’ (10:31) may have done so in order to preserve their ritual purity….Perhaps their reasons were even more complex, touching on social stigma and sectarian practice. Perhaps they feared that this was a trap and the robbers were hiding nearby (10:30). In any case, the heroic actions of the Samaritan call us to a new social construct based on compassion (Neale, 71).

Jesus picked a Samaritan as the hero of the story, and the religious as those who failed…But this parable, as well as countless other teachings of Christ and his interactions with people, shows that we are called to love persons regardless of their status in life. Those who love more are those who have received more mercy and grace, he implies (Luke 7:47). We are now called to re-present this love of God to any and all and to be the compassionate hands and feet of Jesus” (Leclerc, 232-233).

           And how do we become the “compassionate hands and feet of Jesus” if we are unfamiliar or if we are a new Christian? Brent D. Peterson, in his book, Created to Worship, quotes from a “mosaic of a theology of worship.” I will only quote some of this mosaic here: “God breathes (inhales) and gathers in individual Christians to heal, transform and renew them as the body of Christ to breathe (exhale) them out to continue the ministry of the incarnation that participates in the kingdom of God more fully coming” (Peterson, 55). We cannot expect to do what the Samaritan did, without first being part of a community. We need to learn and grow in what it means to be the hands and feet of Jesus Christ, so then we can go and do it, in similar and in different ways than what the Samaritan did. This isn’t a one size fits all. This could mean taking someone to the hospital to help someone get physical help. It could mean buying clothes for someone who doesn’t have any or who doesn’t have the proper ones for the weather. We each have our own part in the Kingdom to play.

[T]he influence of…the story of the Good Samaritan (10:30-35) in wider (at least American) society is utterly profound. As Robert Wuthnow has learned, this parable has become ‘one of those ancient myths that embodies the deepest meanings in our culture. In learning it and reshaping it we define what it means to be compassionate….Understanding how the message of Luke articulates with and challenges its world may shed light on our own experiences of the world and of God” (Greene, 129-130).

           “The gospel of Jesus Christ…is a proclamation not only of what God requires, but also, and more importantly, how the Father loves us and offers rich and costly forgiveness in Christ” (Lodahl, 232).

           And sometimes, we don’t know how to help a person best, and that is when we need to get in touch with the Father, the Son and the Spirit. We need to pray. As Max Lucado says in his book, Anxious for Nothing, we should be specific in our prayers. “A specific prayer is a serious prayer” and that a “specific prayer is an opportunity for us to see God at work” (Lucado, 83).

           A quick side note from Richard J. Foster is needed for clarification between “true service” and “self-righteous service”:

Self-righteous service comes through human effort. It expends immense amounts of energy calculating and scheming how to render the service….True service comes from a relationship with the divine Other deep inside. We serve out of whispered promptings, divine urgings. Energy is expended but it is not the frantic energy of the flesh” (Foster, 128). He also says, “Self-righteous service fractures community….True service builds community (Foster, 129).

             May we all choose to build community, rather than “fracture” it.

 WORKS CITED

Alexander, T. Desmond. New Dictionary of Biblical Theology. Intervarsity Press. 2000.

Archaeology Study Bible. Crossway. 2017.

Blomberg, Craig. Jesus and the Gospels: An Introduction and Survey. B&H Academic. 2009.

Bourgeault, Cynthia. The Wisdom Jesus: Transforming Heart and Mind—a New Perspective on Christ and His Message. Shambhala Publications, Inc. 2008.

Chalmers, Matthew. “Rethinking Luke 10: The Parable of the Good Samaritan Israelite.” Journal of Biblical Literature. Vol. 139 No. 3 (2020). DOI: 10.15699/jbl.1393.2020.6

Editors of Encyclopedia Britannica, The. Mitzvah-Judaism. Britannica.com/topic/mitzvah-judaism. 1998. Date accessed: 08/28/2021.

ESV Reformation Study Bible. Edited by R.C Sproul. 2015. Accessed through

biblegateway.com. Date Accessed: 08/26/2021.

Foster, Richard J. Celebration of Discipline: The Path to Spiritual Growth. HarperOne. 1998.

Green, Joel B. The Theology of the Gospel of Luke. Cambridge University Press. 1995.

“The 613 Mitzvot-Commandments-of the Torah. Negative Mitzah #168. Pg. 22.

Havurahshirhadash.org.

Leclerc, Diane: Discovering Christian Holiness: The Heart of Wesleyan-Holiness Theology. Beacon Hill Press. 2010.

Lewis, C.S. The Problem of Pain. HarperOne. 1996.

Lodahl, Michael. The Story of God: A Narrative Theology. Beacon Hill Press. 2nd Edition. 2008.

Lucado, Max. Anxious for Nothing: Finding Calm in a Chaotic World. Thomas Nelson. 2017.

Neale, David A. Luke 9-24: A Commentary in the Wesleyan Tradition NBBC. Beacon Hill Press. 2013.

Peterson, Brent D. Created to Worship: God’s Invitation to Become Fully Human. Beacon Hill Press. 2012

Snow, Avital. The Meaning of Hesed: Hebrew for Love. Fellowship of Israel Related Ministries: FIRM. 2021. Firmisrael.org.

Stein, Robert H. The Method and Message of Jesus’ Teachings. Westminster John Knox Press. 1994.

Stone, Bryan P. Compassionate Ministry: Theological Foundations. Orbis Books. 1999.

Strong, James. 3107. Makarios. The Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible: United States, Hunt & Eaton, 1894. Accessed through Biblegateway.com. Date accessed: 08/23/2021.  

[orbemnews]

For Political Cartoonists, the Irony Was That Facebook Didn’t Recognize Irony SAN FRANCISCO — Since 2013, Matt Bors has made a living as a left-leaning cartoonist on the internet. His site, The Nib, runs cartoons from him and other contributors that regularly skewer right-wing movements and conservatives with political commentary steeped in irony. One cartoon in December took aim at the Proud Boys, a far-right extremist group. With tongue planted firmly in cheek, Mr. Bors titled it “Boys Will Be Boys” and depicted a recruitment where new Proud Boys were trained to be “stabby guys” and to “yell slurs at teenagers” while playing video games. Days later, Facebook sent Mr. Bors a message saying that it had removed “Boys Will Be Boys” from his Facebook page for “advocating violence” and that he was on probation for violating its content policies. It wasn’t the first time that Facebook had dinged him. Last year, the company briefly took down another Nib cartoon — an ironic critique of former President Donald J. Trump’s pandemic response, the substance of which supported wearing masks in public — for “spreading misinformation” about the coronavirus. Instagram, which Facebook owns, removed one of his sardonic antiviolence cartoons in 2019 because, the photo-sharing app said, it promoted violence. What Mr. Bors encountered was the result of two opposing forces unfolding at Facebook. In recent years, the company has become more proactive at restricting certain kinds of political speech, clamping down on posts about fringe extremist groups and on calls for violence. In January, Facebook barred Mr. Trump from posting on its site altogether after he incited a crowd that stormed the U.S. Capitol. At the same time, misinformation researchers said, Facebook has had trouble identifying the slipperiest and subtlest of political content: satire. While satire and irony are common in everyday speech, the company’s artificial intelligence systems — and even its human moderators — can have difficulty distinguishing them. That’s because such discourse relies on nuance, implication, exaggeration and parody to make a point. That means Facebook has sometimes misunderstood the intent of political cartoons, leading to takedowns. The company has acknowledged that some of the cartoons it expunged — including those from Mr. Bors — were removed by mistake and later reinstated them. “If social media companies are going to take on the responsibility of finally regulating incitement, conspiracies and hate speech, then they are going to have to develop some literacy around satire,” Mr. Bors, 37, said in an interview. Emerson T. Brooking, a resident fellow for the Atlantic Council who studies digital platforms, said Facebook “does not have a good answer for satire because a good answer doesn’t exist.” Satire shows the limits of a content moderation policy and may mean that a social media company needs to become more hands-on to identify that type of speech, he added. Many of the political cartoonists whose commentary was taken down by Facebook were left-leaning, in a sign of how the social network has sometimes clipped liberal voices. Conservatives have previously accused Facebook and other internet platforms of suppressing only right-wing views. In a statement, Facebook did not address whether it has trouble spotting satire. Instead, the company said it made room for satirical content — but only up to a point. Posts about hate groups and extremist content, it said, are allowed only if the posts clearly condemn or neutrally discuss them, because the risk for real-world harm is otherwise too great. Facebook’s struggles to moderate content across its core social network, Instagram, Messenger and WhatsApp have been well documented. After Russians manipulated the platform before the 2016 presidential election by spreading inflammatory posts, the company recruited thousands of third-party moderators to prevent a recurrence. It also developed sophisticated algorithms to sift through content. Facebook also created a process so that only verified buyers could purchase political ads, and instituted policies against hate speech to limit posts that contained anti-Semitic or white supremacist content. Last year, Facebook said it had stopped more than 2.2 million political ad submissions that had not yet been verified and that targeted U.S. users. It also cracked down on the conspiracy group QAnon and the Proud Boys, removed vaccine misinformation, and displayed warnings on more than 150 million pieces of content viewed in the United States that third-party fact checkers debunked. But satire kept popping up as a blind spot. In 2019 and 2020, Facebook often dealt with far-right misinformation sites that used “satire” claims to protect their presence on the platform, Mr. Brooking said. For example, The Babylon Bee, a right-leaning site, frequently trafficked in misinformation under the guise of satire. “At a point, I suspect Facebook got tired of this dance and adopted a more aggressive posture,” Mr. Brooking said. Political cartoons that appeared in non-English-speaking countries and contained sociopolitical humor and irony specific to certain regions also were tricky for Facebook to handle, misinformation researchers said. That has caused fallout among many political cartoonists. One is Ed Hall in northern Florida, whose independent work regularly appears in North American and European newspapers. When Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in 2019 that he would bar two congresswomen — critics of Israel’s treatment of Palestinians — from visiting the country, Mr. Hall drew a cartoon showing a sign affixed to barbed wire that read, in German, “Jews are not welcome here.” He added a line of text addressing Mr. Netanyahu: “Hey Bibi, did you forget something?” Mr. Hall said his intent was to draw an analogy between how Mr. Netanyahu was treating the U.S. representatives and Nazi Germany. Facebook took the cartoon down shortly after it was posted, saying it violated its standards on hate speech. “If algorithms are making these decisions based solely upon words that pop up on a feed, then that is not a catalyst for fair or measured decisions when it comes to free speech,” Mr. Hall said. Adam Zyglis, a nationally syndicated political cartoonist for The Buffalo News, was also caught in Facebook’s cross hairs. After the storming of the Capitol in January, Mr. Zyglis drew a cartoon of Mr. Trump’s face on a sow’s body, with a number of Mr. Trump’s “supporters” shown as piglets wearing MAGA hats and carrying Confederate flags. The cartoon was a condemnation of how Mr. Trump had fed his supporters violent speech and hateful messaging, Mr. Zyglis said. Facebook removed the cartoon for promoting violence. Mr. Zyglis guessed that was because one of the flags in the comic included the phrase “Hang Mike Pence,” which Mr. Trump’s supporters had chanted about the vice president during the riot. Another supporter piglet carried a noose, an item that was also present at the event. “Those of us speaking truth to power are being caught in the net intended to capture hate speech,” Mr. Zyglis said. For Mr. Bors, who lives in Ontario, the issue with Facebook is existential. While his main source of income is paid memberships to The Nib and book sales on his personal site, he gets most of his traffic and new readership through Facebook and Instagram. The takedowns, which have resulted in “strikes” against his Facebook page, could upend that. If he accumulates more strikes, his page could be erased, something that Mr. Bors said would cut 60 percent of his readership. “Removing someone from social media can end their career these days, so you need a process that distinguishes incitement of violence from a satire of these very groups doing the incitement,” he said. Mr. Bors said he had also heard from the Proud Boys. A group of them recently organized on the messaging chat app Telegram to mass-report his critical cartoons to Facebook for violating the site’s community standards, he said. “You just wake up and find you’re in danger of being shut down because white nationalists were triggered by your comic,” he said Facebook has sometimes recognized its errors and corrected them after he has made appeals, Mr. Bors said. But the back-and-forth and the potential for expulsion from the site have been frustrating and made him question his work, he said. “Sometimes I do think about if a joke is worth it, or if it’s going to get us banned,” he said. “The problem with that is, where is the line on that kind of thinking? How will it affect my work in the long run?” Cade Metz contributed reporting. Source link Orbem News #Cartoonists #Didnt #Facebook #Irony #Political #Recognize

[anjalena123]

Go News Review -Best  News Website Builder  Software Tool

Introduction Having an online business that runs on its own and generates money sounds great right. A business running silently in the background while you are living your life and doing other things, who would not want that that’s everyone’s dream but you ever tried to build a passive income business like this you know it is not easy it can seem completely unattainable, but there are thousands of people doing it right now and most of them are not just making a small amount of income they are making big money so how is this possible. Any  successful project to create passive income needs to follow these three rules, There needs to be a considerable demand for your product you need to produce an item or provide a service that people are looking for every single day for example a website that millions of people could not live without . A successful endeavor will be in a high demand niche area, this will guarantee a wide audience of people looking for what you have to offer. The product should have a proven track record of being profitable why spend time and energy reinventing the wheel you want to make sure other people are making good money using the same business model. The project should be easy to monetize to make a lot of money from an online business. You need more than just one or two monetization methods the more sources of income you have for the same traffic the higher your earning potential these rules are logical. If you do our  research and follow our guidelines we will have a good chance of building a solid business that will deliver reliable profit. Now the question is there an online business model that meets those three rules there’s one we researched  hundreds of online models and found the one booming niche that consistently makes strong profits  News websites. News websites are huge trend and bring in millions of readers every day because they are consistently high traffic they can also be highly profitable and lucrative for you. First let’s check  whether they are follow our three traits of a worthwhile passive income. Demand Demand for news websites is at an all-time high. People all over the world are addicted to the latest updates on news , politics , entertainment and sports they want to stay consistently up to date to do this they check news sources every day or more for updates. The proof a lot of websites earn thousands of dollars every day and that’s without even pushing people to buy a product here’s how much some news sites earn on a daily basis. Huffington post earns $29896 a day from advertising revenue alone. Mashable earns $15781 a day just from their ad banners. A lot of news websites earn significant income passively by monetizing their valuable content by mixing news with related product and services this technique easily turns site traffic into sales and leads. You can turns the internet addiction to news into money in your pocket. Today’s the best day to get started.  The demand for news and updates  is even higher right now . In these uncertain times people never know what to  expect from the news , every headline can affect their daily lives because of this more people than ever check the news even if they don’t care about the current events before they do now and they willing to look anywhere not just the most popular sites . According to the economist many readers will get their news from any source as long  as they can get the latest updates  this makes it easy for newcomers like you to get involved in the industry. Its clear this is a rare opportunity but there is a big problem it’s hard to set this up the right way. You have to build a site that readers will trust  and will come back to you. You have to design it well and fully monetize it from the ground up that takes technical skills and a lot of work just building a site can be time consuming then after going live you have to constantly comb the internet yourself looking foe news. Once you find  something newsworthy you have to rewrite it , make it eye-catching create offers to add your site the list goes on and on it never ends . You are probably already exhausted and are wondering what you can do to make it easy.

Luckily we have already built a better way for you today I am presenting the next generation of viral site builders it’s called GO NEWS.

With this advanced software you can start your own site easily. It has everything a website needs to stay trending and relevant for years to come.

Overview

Vender : Ariel Sanders

Product: GoNews!

Launch Date: 2021-Feb-10

Launch Time: 11:00 EST

Front-End Price: $19

Recommendation: Highly Recommend

Refund: 30 Days Money Back Guarantee

Niche: General

 What is Gonews?

If you’re still struggling to generate traffic to your News website and you still haven’t made m0ney from online business, I have great news for you. Within a few days from now, a brand-new software called “GoNews” just launched. This software will make making m0ney online becomes a walk in the park.

How you can work with it?

Phase 1:Trending News Dashboard: Go to the Dashboard, which is a big grade 'a' asset shop. You can find content arranged by niches and grouped by the best posts. Here, you can see a mix of the latest top news headlines, all pulled from the best online outlets. You can choose which stories to pick up from.

Phase 2: Click & Spin: The article can be edited and spun on the fly. You open a lightbox with the performance of the content dashboard, and you can rewrite, edit the text, connect and add images. It includes a built-in spinner of text.

Article spinning is a search engine optimization (seo) writing strategy that generates what appears to be fresh material from what already exists. Content spinning works by substituting any number of alternative versions for particular terms, phrases, sentences, or even entire paragraphs to provide each spin with a slightly different variation. Phase 3: You're set! That's your viral site ready! The ready-made banners of the best deals from clickbank, jvzoo and warriorplus are incorporated into all the pages of your viral platform, giving you 50 percent commission on every sale. You are prepared to benefit right out of the box with all of these dfy promotions.

Features and Benefit

There are a plenty of features and countless benefits with Gonews that I listed few of them as below

Benefit building email list: All autoresponders are sponsored by Gonews. Each email subscriber, with Gonews, is worth $1 per month. From a list of 10,000 subscribers, you can make $10,000 a month.

Main Schedule Module: You can organize each group into dates during the time space you want with the main schedule module.

Visual calendar: With a great visual calendar, envision and manage your content to keep track of everything through its simple, easy-to-use drag and drop gui.

Adsense profits: all is ready! Depending on the type of ad, Google pays you for the advertising shown on your site based on user clicks on advertisements or ad impressions. Amazon affiliate profits: you can make from $100 to $25000 from an amazon affiliate website, just put your amazon ID in.

Flipping your domain for profit: the site is your real estate. Some people make just $500 a month, and some make flipping websites more than $5,000 a month. Post's stream dashboard: from the best blog, all the best articles and posts come up, and every post gets scheduled with one click.

The post spinner tool rewords content to ensure its 100 percent original and exclusive, helping your Google rankings and on-site SEO, in order to prevent plagiarism.

Host includes + your domain option: Gonews is a solution that is fully hosted. You may use a subdomain to control your site or add the domain you like.

More Features You’ll Love:

Fake Counters: Thinking is all about it! A little bit of cheating makes it simpler to spread out your stuff.

Simple Social Shares: With social media sharing buttons, promote your site for free and build brand awareness. The most famous posts, the hottest and trending ones, are popular, trends and hot shows in a clear way.

Complete tracking: don't worry about page views or advertisements being monitored. Google analytics is provided here.

Post page control: changing settings globally or per single post! Customize models, and reorder them by hiding & revealing elements that you like. Amazing Polling: Of all viral pages, it'll carry you the most entertaining polls.

Photomix= Photos Mix: Create viral photos without Photoshop touching them. To take action on your platform, be imaginative and engage guests.

Reactions: In a fast and easy way, let you share your reaction to an article. Integration of social comments: pick your favorite comment system or even use them all at the same time, no additional steps needed.

Open your own shop: start selling and make even more cash with our lovely integration of woocommerce.

Integration with Patreon: Patreon is a forum for crowdfunding that allows fans (or patrons) to pay for their work and support artists or companies.

SSL certificates include: An SSL certificate holds confidential details private by scrambling data as it moves to and from your website, such as credit card data. Powerful Voting: You can now add to literally every template a voting user interface so that visitors can vote up and down from any page on your site.

Custom Domain: Advanced users are able to make this page accessible on their own domain by pointing a DNS record to our servers.

Translate: To create multi language pages, translate to any language.

Pros and Cons

100% free traffic and it always will be

Cloud-Based App – nothing to install or download, access from any device

Fully monetized news site builder

Grabs and converts massive addicted traffic into leads, commissions and sales!

New Gonews cloud builder

Ecom store & affiliate store built-in

Unlimited free hosting included

Beginner-friendly – no code

No monthly fees

Adsense to profits for every click

Set-up your own custom domain

30 day money back guarantee.

New news site cloud software

Cons

 Haven’t found so far

Price and Evaluation

Below are the details of different options offered to purchase Gonews. Check them out and pick up your favorite one:

FE GoNews $27 TO $47 Fully Monetized GoNews Builder Grabs and converts massive addicted traffic into leads, commissions and sales!

Ready-made clickbank, jvzoo & warriorplus offers.

Ecom store & affiliate store built-in.

trending articles dashboard & brain planner manager

breakthrough cloud SAAS builds

grab and convert massive addicted traffic into leads, commissions and sales!

Jvzoo, Warriorplus & Clickbankprofits

DFY banners campaigns of the best products to run your campaigns and begin to profit instantly!

Ecom products profits

Begin to make sales out of the box. according to Forbes, at three months the average ecommerce site is generating just over $150,000 in monthly revenue. OTO1 GoNews Traffic $37 TO $47                        

13 Social Media Sites And Generate Traffic From All The Sites Simultaneously

Get Insights On All The Traffic You Generated From Social Media Directly From Your GoNews Dashboard.

Keep Your Social Media Accounts Fresh And Engaging By Regularly Updating The Content.

Customize Each Post Or Post It All As Is. OTO2 GoNews Club $37 TO $47 REQ

You Can Build Unlimited Sites!

Ready Made DFY GoNews To Begin To Profit And Grow Your Network Right Away

DFY GoNews Added To The User Dashboard Each Month.

Premium Addons Like Drag And Drop Builder, Live Chat, And More! OTO3 GoNews Scraper $37 TO $47

Grab & Post Viral Content From Any Websites!

Rewrite The Content In One Click To Make It Yours

Import Everything From The Title To The Images, To All The Text Inside The Content.

Easy-To-Use Thanks To Its Point And Click Interface. No Coding And No Learning Curve.

OTO4 GoNews Store $37 TO $47

Import All The Data Of The Products, Including Its Variation, Description, And Even The Pictures.

Search Directly From Your Admin Dashboard. Save Hours Of Your Time.

No API Key Required. It Just Works!

Get The Chrome Extension Designed To Automatically Scrap And Export Products To Your Site With Just One Click.

OTO5 GoNews Agency $197 REQ Agency License. A License To Sell GoNews Like Your Own Product And Keep 100% Of The Profits.

Proven Selling Tools. Gain Access To A Proven Sales Page And Video Sales Letter

Done-For-You Selling Platform. You Can Use Our Selling Platform To Sell The Product

24/7 Access To Our Support Team Conclusion

So this is my review about Gonews. I hope my article will help you in choosing the right tool to grow your business. -DISCLOSURE- I am affiliated, but not sponsored by any product featured in this article. The links in the article are my affiliate links which means if you click on one of them and buy the product I’ll receive a small commission. Not being sponsored allows me to keep my own opinions and provide product reviews without bias. From the millions of products, I pick the ones I personally have tested and have been highly impressed which I’ll then recommend. This is how I feed my family by making honest and useful reviews so that you can make informed buying decisions. I appreciate your support.

[clumsum]

Best Ways to Increase Real Followers on Instagram

Connect your Instagram and Facebook debts to enhance your advertising and advertising energy. Nowadays, you could have an Instagram tab on your Facebook internet web page. This lets in you to percentage your Instagram posts for your Facebook fans when you have a fan web web page. You can community with buddies and the arena thru Instagram. Instagram can be used for advertising capabilities. Instagram advertising and marketing can beautify your brand's visibility, increase income, and consequently income. Consider the above noted Instagram advertising and marketing guidelines to achieve achievement. Millions of human beings globally at the moment are the usage of Instagram. Instagram has made it less complex to take pictures and percentage them with friends and plenty of human beings enjoy doing this. Apart from networking, you can use Instagram in a greater green way for advertising and marketing. Instagram is a high-quality promotional tool you may use to promote your business enterprise online. You need to put up pictures of your product constantly. Posting photos of your products is one of the nice strategies of increasing your logo attention and boom sales of your products. Photos are actually really worth one thousand phrases and Instagram is all about pix. If you are into Instagram for advertising and marketing functions, then you really want to take into account that random photographs do no longer art work.The pictures do not always need to be very professional. The key issue is having the snap shots highlight the number one functions and abilities of the goods you're promoting. The photos have to enchantment massive goal market on Instagram. While wearing out your Instagram advertising, you want to understand that Instagram is a community composed of humans with various thoughts, feelings, and historical beyond. Always be first-rate to all of us and recognize their time to hook up with you to your page. Always make sure you concentrate in your clients.

Post at least as quickly as daily to hold matters up to date and make certain your followers up to date with the modern-day happenings. You can test posting at varying instances of the day to appearance which period your posts do great. Consistency is essential in Instagram advertising. Are you looking for the best site to Buy Instagram Followers? FamousSeller is the exceptional on line source to Buy Likes, Followers and Views on Instagram,Youtube and Facebook. One step for very secure social media offerings! Be ordinary on your postings and increase a topic that is outstanding to your posts. Let your enthusiasts realize what to expect from you. Videos too are crucial in Instagram advertising and marketing and marketing. You can create and percentage a video with your employees to promote the product handy. You can also favor to do a stay product assessment video and percentage it on Instagram. Pictures and motion pictures are greater appealing to many people than textual content documents. Media files stand higher possibilities of going viral as humans percent them. They also are greater memorable than text files. Create images and movies that show your emblem tale and values. So snap shots and movies are critical in case you need to enhance your emblem and income.

To enhance your visibility, you need to make and share exceptional images and movies in your feeds. Where critical, are looking for professional assist or recommendation from a photographer. However, you can use a outstanding camera to take sharp images. Try to get your photos at satisfactory angles. Edit your snap shots for higher consequences. Nowadays mobile telephones are organized with picture enhancing gadget for this reason. Instagram too has several photo editing device. Apply this gear for your Instagram advertising and advertising and marketing reason. Maintaining touch with your clients is important, mainly for developing commercial company with a small market proportion. You can begin by means of showing your customers that you are involved about their remarks. You can gain this with the aid of replying to their questions and feedback. This will enhance person-generated content material and credibility in addition to sell the visibility of your products and commercial employer. Your Instagram fans can considerably influence the fulfillment of your commercial enterprise organization, and you need to in no manner underestimate them. Hashtags are relevant in Instagram advertising and marketing. You need to use them because Instagram users engage the usage of hashtags. Hashtags allow customers to make your contents searchable and are essential if you need to boom your fans. Has tags like media can create a viral effect which is beneficial on your company. You also can take gain of trending hashtags especially if the hashtags are associated with your product. This is essential because Instagram customers can use hashtags to search for posts. You ought to include your commercial employer call in you hashtags. Use particular hashtags for a specific promotional advertising marketing campaign you run. Not best does this sell your campaign, but it additionally presents a completely unique hashtag on your customers to attach and percentage with other individuals.

[clarencenicholsonata]

10 Best Facebook Ads Changing The Game

Facebook ads are now an essential tool in a successful marketing strategy, while the platform does offer businesses the opportunity to reach a global audience.

Almost 62% of marketers say that Facebook is a 'pay to play' platform and ends up missing their target market. That's not necessarily true.

A Facebook ad’s success hinges on far more than how much money you bid. Big brands know it, smart marketers know it, and now you'll learn it.

I took a look at the top 10 best Facebook ads, what they're doing right and how you can apply the same tactics to your Facebook ads.

Let's dive in...

1. Facebook Ad: Sephora

Overview:

It's now the norm for marketers to use video content. So it came as no surprise when Buffer found that 81% of businesses prefer to use Facebook for their video marketing.

Video content has continued to prove itself as the dominant form of online consumption. It's also the easiest and fastest way to advertise your message and products while keeping your customers engaged.

Sephora is known for selling quality skincare and beauty products, so product-based content and ads are vital to the brand's success. Their video is quick and has an effortless transition. It starts immediately by introducing the product, Amore Pacific's face cream, in a friendly and open fashion. Even at first glance, while the viewer is scrolling by, we see the model presenting the product in a friendly but straightforward way. It feels more like a friend showing you a product, rather than a brand shoving it in your face.

The model then does a mini step by step tutorial on how to apply the product and ends with a smile. The actor in the ad uses a soft-sell approach, almost mimicking a YouTube-like tutorial. Since 86% of women use social media for shopping advice, the ad feels more like everyday content rather than an ad itself. They see someone using the product rather than just the product.

Takeaway:

The art of making your ads feel -- well, less like ads -- is a delicate one. But why go through all the trouble? Because thousands of Facebook ads are promoted every day, and without taking a creative approach, you'll easily get lost in the noise. Your Facebook videos need to stand out.

Tips:

Showcase your products in a lifestyle setting. Sephora, for example, used a beautiful bathroom. When customers can see a product that matches their aspirations, ideals, or style, it allows them to imagine that product in their own life more easily. This makes them much more likely to make a purchase.

Incorporate a well-known influencer in your video. 49% of consumers depend on influencer recommendations. This can even be a micro-influencer, if an influencer is out of your budget.

2. Facebook Ad: Squarespace

Overview:

Squarespace is a brand I love to watch on social media, especially Facebook ads.

From first glance, the ad starts with an artist and bold text across the screen that says, "A website makes it real." From there we instantly we know what this ad is about without second-guessing: making a website with Squarespace.

The ad transitions through showcasing ideas for your site, layouts to choose from, added features and plans. It presents Squarespace as the solution to all your website needs, driving home the call to action to start a free trial.

Takeaway:

Smart marketers know that an ad isn't just eye-catching, but it presents a solution to a customer’s problem in a personable way, saying we're the brand for you.

What makes a good Facebook ad? It's the type of ad that converts viewers into buyers by solidifying the fact that your brand offers them a solution that’s quick and easy.

Tips:

People have a fear of missing out, a fear of losing a good bargain, and the list goes on. Squarespace played on the fear of missing out because you haven't created a website as yet. =

Show them you can improve their lives. Use your ad to show people how easy their life can be with your product around. Again, another opportunity to incorporate lifestyle marketing in your ads.

Testimonials are one of the oldest and most effective marketing methods to date. 93% of consumers say online reviews impact their purchasing decisions. Include your favorite customers or written reviews in your ads to spark an interest in potential customers.

3. Facebook Ad: AirBnB

Overview:

You can spot an Air BnB ad from a mile away.

How?

Their brand colors! But let's not boil down their Facebook ad success to just brand colors. It's all because they know who their target audience is when they create ads.

There are two types of Airbnb social media accounts, one for travelers (guest) and one for the hosts (Airbnb owners).

This account is for (potential) Airbnb hosts. The screen goes to pink ( or if we're being technical about colors, salmon) and opens with the line "Want to make more money?"

After Airbnb promotes, it's calculated so that you can learn how much you can earn with your potential Airbnb.

This opening line works so well because right off the bat you know what this ad is about, and the problem that it's solving: making you more money.

People lose interest in things quickly, especially ads, people have an attention span of about eight seconds.

You don't have the luxury of spending more than 8 seconds to explain your message unless you've mastered the art of suspense.

Don't believe me? Check out these 13 Facebook Ads We Got That Were Right on the Money (and Why)

Airbnb also made sure to add a link to their calculator to their CTA button, so the viewer can instantly experience the calculator and sign up as an Airbnb host, removing steps that would cause friction and creating an uncomplicated and smooth marketing funnel.

Takeaway:

Let's dive in deep and see the key features that you can implement in your own ads.

You must be tired of hearing this, but it's because it’s so important: know your audience! Airbnb clearly knows who they’re targeting. When you have a specific Facebook target audience, your ads have more impact because it's not one size fits all. That means defining your target audience down to the "T." This can also mean the use of geotargeted ads for particular areas.

Keep your ads short, after going over the most brilliant Facebook ads and what most Facebook video ads have in common; they run between 5 to 35 seconds. Additional seconds and it's a stretch. Viewers might lose interest unless you already have strong brand loyalty.

Throw in a unique CTA. As a marketer, I can't tell you how boring it is to write or see, "Click here to learn more." Throw that CTA out the window and give viewers something they want for free. Airbnb offered a "free calculator." Free stuff can be hard to resist and increase sales by up to 2000 percent; it gives people an incentive to try your product or consider upgrading.

Need help crafting your Facebook ads CTA? Here are 25 Proven Call-to-Action Words to Maximize Conversions.

4. Facebook Ad: Adobe Photoshop

Overview:

Adobe decided to take a different approach. Instead of promoting their products, they released a series of short tutorials on Adobe Photoshop’s tools and features.

An outstanding graphic designer never stops learning, just as marketers have to stay up to date with new trends, tools, and the latest "growth hack," the same can be said for creatives. Learning about new design methods and tools helps to advance your career and allows you to stay ahead of the curve. The creative world is competitive.

Adobe understands their audience; they know that whether they're a young or well-seasoned designer, using their ads to teach viewers about new tools would be relevant.

They used Adobe icons, and bold and colorful examples to keep the viewer engaged and ended with a CTA that pushed them to create their own, whether they have Adobe or were considering installing the software.

Takeaway:

If you've read any of my articles, you'll realize I'm always advocating for brands to focus more on the customer than selling the products.

Ray Kroc said, "If you work just for money, you'll never make it, but if you love what you're doing and you always put the customer first, success will be yours."

Whether or not you believe that, your ads should reflect that. After you hone in on who your target audience is, it's time to use your ads to reflect their needs.

Follow in Adobe’s steps: if you have a product or software, show off its best features. Do a quick step by step tutorial from start to finish. Take it a step further and have a representative from your team to host the tutorial. These simple things go a long way with potential customers. It allows your brand to feel and look credible, informed, and start the first stage of your awareness marketing funnel.

Here are 23 Creative Advertising Ideas That Actually Work and 10 Smart & Easy Facebook Marketing Ideas you can try for your next Facebook ad.

5. Facebook Ad: Headspace

Overview:

Headspace is a popular meditation app that offers guided and unguided meditation for a monthly subscription.

The copy of the ad stands out against the contrast color of the backdrop. Catching the eye of anyone looking for a quick mental reset, from there, the viewer can press play and sample the Headspace app for 20 seconds. After, they can decide to sign up with a whopping 40% discount on Headspace Plus.

In the sub-text of the Facebook ad we see a little sense of urgency, hinting that the viewer only has a few hours left to redeem their 40% discount before it's gone.

Every now and then you'll see a Headspace ad pop-up with a discount, mainly used for retargeting ads for users who fell off in the buyer's journey or seasonal discounts.

Takeaway:

Earlier, we spoke about how Airbnb and Squarespace ads both gave viewers something to sample or experience (visually or personally).

Here are three proven ways to influence your buyer's decision with your Facebook Ad.

Understand your buyer's journey. It's easy to jump ahead of yourself and create an ad. Think about what happens before and after your viewer sees your ad. This lets you lead your buyer to the place you want them to be, think about your landing page, and link (even tracking your link).

Make them an offer they can't refuse. An offer doesn't have to mean a discount. It could be sampling your product or service for a few seconds. It could also mean a free trial for a limited time.

Educate your buyers. Inform them about what your products can do for them, and why you should be considered above your competitors.

For more on creating a buyer’s journey and influencing buyers’ decisions, use this detailed guide on the Buyer's Journey 101: Steps to Selling Online.

6. Facebook Ad: Saloman

Overview:

Saloman is a brand that's known for capturing the outdoors in real time.

Their ad makes this list because it tells the story of how Salomon products open the door to unexpected journeys in surprising places. Ultimately, it's not about buying stuff; it's about buying the stuff you need for an unforgettable adventure.

Without words or sounds, it captures the euphoric feeling of the outdoors. So even if you aren't an outdoors person, you're drawn in by the vivid imagery. The mountain captures the audience's attention from the start and leaves them wanting more at the end.

Takeaway:

Use emotion and community to tie your product and your potential customers together in a neat little bow. Why? It works! Look back on the best ads of all time, like Nike's Colin Kaepernick ad.

Emotion tells a compelling story in video ads because photos don't easily capture (most) emotions in ads.

The next key takeaway is to use professional shots for your videos, especially if they're about the great outdoors or for product shoots. You want to make sure that your viewers' first impression of you is the best.

7. Facebook Ad: MailChimp

Overview:

MailChimp doesn't shy away from the unusual when it comes to their branding, website, and marketing. In 2018 Mailchimp decided to do a full brand refresh.

The ad starts with a majestic cat on a pyramid (and we all know the internet loves cats). As the colorful cat transitions into a postcard, landing page and social media, it shows the audience how much flexibility and functionality MailChimp has to offer their customers in a 25-second timeframe.

As weird as it is, let's admit it. You couldn't take your eyes off that swanky cat during the entire video. That's MailChimp for you, brand authenticity at its finest.

Takeaway:

If there's anything you can take away from our pyramid cat, it's that you should be your authentic self, let your brand run wild (well maybe not wild).

Brand authenticity allows your niche target audience to find you, buy from you, and build a community around you. It provides your business with continuity, credibility, integrity, and if done right, powerful symbolism even if your logo isn't present.

So how do you find your brand authenticity to put it in your Facebook ads in the first place?

Try Forbes’ Top Tips For Keeping Your Branding And Marketing Authentic.

8. Facebook Ad: Ikea

Overview:

This summer, Ikea launched a campaign called "Good Night Sleep, Build Your Sanctuary." A good night’s sleep is important to anyone, Ikea should know. Using storytelling with images, they show different lifestyles and families all in one bed.

They create a strong personal connection, linking their beds to enjoying those lovable moments and building your happy place with the people you love.

Whether you have a family of six or a bed for one, it translates to each target market while soft-selling the products and prices in the image.

The carousel ad format is available for Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, and allowing you to showcase up to 10 images or videos within a single ad. That’s more space to show off your brand's creativity, products, and various ads.

Takeaway:

Use up as much Facebook ad features as you can. Try using a wide variety of Facebook ad features. If you do decide to use images for your Facebook ad here are some best practices:

Choose an image that is directly relevant to your product or service

Use an image that is bright and eye-catching, even when viewed at a small size

Avoid images that have many little details or text and opt for something simple instead

Facebook recommends your image be 1200 pixels wide, and no smaller than 600

Place your logo or brand colors so people can quickly identify your brand

9. Facebook Ad: Dairy Queen

Overview:

DQ is a fan favorite for ice cream and sweet treat lovers. They have a cult following for some of their most signature frozen treats. So when they alerted their fans that their Snickers Blizzard Treat was back by popular demand, they ditched the pictures and did this video ad instead for their #HappyTastesGood campaign.

The DQ ad jumps right by telling you about the treats release with a quirky DQ fan enjoying the sweet treat. The ad ends by pushing for social engagement via emoji with DQ, which helps to measure the ROI of the ad.

Takeaway:

Sometimes we have to take a different approach to your ads to avoid Facebook ad fatigue.

You can minimize ad fatigue among your own audience by doing the following:

Rotate your ads to combat Ad Fatigue

Change up the colors to make sure you stand out

Change up or reword your offer and CTA

Target a more detailed audience

Add that to this detailed guide on How to Combat Facebook Ad Fatigue, and your ad should see a boost in clicks.

10. Facebook Ad: Wishpond

Now that you've taken a look at what we can do, let's talk about what we can do for you!

Click here to book a free 1-on-1 personalized webinar for expert marketing help and tips to grow your business.

Summary

There you have it: 10 of the best Facebook ads changing the game. It's time to stop reading about Facebook ads and start making or improving your own.

Here's a mini-guide to run through when you're creating your ad:

Showcase your products in a lifestyle setting.

Keep in mind your customer's fears or wants: focus on them, not you.

Show them you can improve their lives with your product.

Try to use testimonials, especially from your favorite customers or written reviews in your ads.

Know your audience! Start by defining your target audience down to the "T."

Keep your ads short: between 5 to 35 seconds is the sweet spot.

Throw in a unique CTA, and an offer they can't refuse.

Liked the article? Share with your team, a friend, or a fellow marketer, also feel free to comment below and tell me your favorite Facebook ad from the list.

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[televisedbirdwatching]

Portland Hidden History- a Sister City Destroyed

Memorial Day marks the anniversary of the flooding of Vanport, Oregon. In 1948, Vanport was Oregon’s largest city, home to Oregon’s first black teachers and policemen. The Vanport Extension Center would become Portland State University in 1952, where thousands would receive a college education on the GI bill. Vanport was built north of Portland and south of Vancouver (VanPort), along the banks of the Columbia River. At the time of its construction in 1942, Vanport was the largest WWII housing project in the country. Today, exceptionally little remains.

[Photo Oregon Encyclopedia]

[Photo publichistorypdx.org]

At 4:17 PM on May 30th, Sunday afternoon of the Memorial Day weekend, a large section of a containment dike gave way, flooding all of Vanport in thirty-five minutes. The Oregon Encyclopedia reports “the rising water tumbled automobiles and swirled Vanport’s wooden apartment buildings off their foundations like toy boats.” At least fifteen residents died*.  Days prior on May 25th, the Columbia and Willamette Rivers reached 23 feet, eight feet above flood stage. On that day, officials began patrolling the dikes that separated Vanport from the floodwaters, but didn’t issue any warnings to the residents. The United States Army Corps of Engineers assured the Housing Authority of Portland that the dikes would hold, and that Vanport would be safe despite rising waters.

Five days later, the Columbia River reached 15 feet above flood stage. On that Sunday morning, the Army Corps of Engineers slipped paper notes under the doors of all of Vanport’s residents. The text of the note is as follows:

REMEMBER.

DIKES ARE SAFE AT PRESENT.

YOU WILL BE WARNED IF NECESSARY.

YOU WILL HAVE TIME TO LEAVE.

DON'T GET EXCITED.

Mere hours later, the dikes would break, the city would be underwater, and its 18,500 residents would be homeless. Of those, an estimated 6,300 were black.

[Photo Street Roots]

[Photo thrumedia]

Vanport was a project of Henry Kaiser, an industrial shipbuilder based in Portland. Kaiser built ships for the war effort, basing his operation in Portland thanks to the sea access and cheap power provided by the Columbia River and Bonneville Dam upstream. In 1941 when America entered the war, many of Portland’s white, working class residents were drafted. In order to continue production, Kaiser came to depend on groups of people previously not considered for such work- namely, women and minorities.

As black workers moved to Portland to work at the shipyards, the city struggled to house them. Over a 10-year period from 1940 to 1950, Portland’s black population increased tenfold. To say Portland accepted its new residents begrudgingly probably oversells it. In photographs from 20 years prior, we can see KKK members openly meeting with city officials in Portland. The state of Oregon would not officially ratify the 15th Amendment (guaranteeing the right to vote) until 1959. Thanks to overtly racist redlining policies, black residents of Portland were denied home loans in all but one neighborhood- until Vanport.

[Photo North Coast Oregon/ via]

Kaiser needed some place to house his workers, so he enlisted the help of the federal government, securing the funds to begin construction of Vanport. The town was sited along the banks of the Columbia River on the far north side of the Portland triangle, physically separated from Portland proper by the Columbia Slough. In a marsh, between two rivers, kept dry by a system of dikes and retaining walls, one Vanport resident recalls: “The psychological effect of living on the bottom of a relatively small area, diked on all sides to a height of 15 to 25 feet, was vaguely disturbing. It was almost impossible to get a view of the horizon from anywhere in Vanport, at least on the ground or in the lower level apartments, and it was even difficult from upper levels." . The town consisted of about 10,000 dwelling units, a theater, a civic center, schools, playgrounds, and a hospital. It was completed in just 110 days.

[Photo Smithsonian Mag]

Vanport’s construction may have seemed hasty, but this was a deliberate move. From the beginning, Vanport was intentionally temporary- only ever intended as an ad-hoc housing solution during the war. It was presumed that the (especially black) residents would leave as soon as the war was over and the jobs dried up. When the Kaiser shipyards closed in 1945, some residents were able to move to the Albina area of Portland, the only neighborhood in which redlining policies allowed them to live. However, Albina’s housing supply was limited, and many more people were forced to stay in Vanport with nowhere else to go. By 1948, Vanport had shrunk from peak population of 40,000 (estimates vary, but this is the most accurate number I could find) to 18,500.

In Karen J. Gibson’s report “Bleeding Albina,” she reports that “The [Housing Authority of Portland] and city officials were eager to dismantle the town, calling it ‘troublesome’ and ‘blighted’ because of the racially mixed population and ‘crackerbox’ housing construction”. For three years the city’s leaders debated what to do with Vanport. On May 30th 1948, their decision was made for them. A dike on the southeast part of the embankment began to leak. The flood began. The waters rose. Vanport was erased from the map.

Today, we know Vanport is just one story of many in which people of color bear a disproportionate share of the cost of environmental hazards. A 1987 study titled “Toxic Waste and Race in the United States” coined the phrase “environmental racism” to describe this phenomenon. I recently read an article by Laura Pulido of the University of Southern California’s geography department that helps make sense of the role of race in events like Vanport.

[Photo Street Roots]

Pulido argues that in the academic world, most discussions of environmental racism are based on the search for “malicious, individual, discriminatory acts.” Finding no such deliberate acts, researchers conclude that racism had not occurred, and explain their statistical irregularities in some other way. As an example, Pulido quotes from a 1993 study that sought to explain the disproportionate presence of landfills near populations of color in Houston, Texas, in which the researchers concluded:

“Clearly, discriminatory siting is not the primary culprit behind these cases of ‘environmental racism.’ Instead, Houston’s disproportionate distribution of landfills can properly be attributed to the dynamics of the housing market… …the evidence does not establish that siting decisions intentionally discriminated against people of color or the poor.”

Pulido argues that this conclusion depends on a narrow and outdated concept of racism. Instead of chalking up statistical irregularities to the whims of “the market,” we should work to recognize the subtle, unintentional ‘racisms’ that are woven into the fabric of all of our institutions, housing and labor markets included. “By defining racism so narrowly,” she writes, “racial inequalities that cannot be attributed to a hostile, discriminatory  act are not acknowledged as such, but perhaps as evidence of individual deficiencies or choices. Yet if we wish to create a more just society, we must acknowledge the breadth and depth of racism.”

It would be unfounded and irresponsible, for example, to claim that Kaiser made an overt, racially motivated decision when he chose the location for Vanport at such an environmentally precarious position. Undoubtedly, Kaiser chose the location based on convenience, availability, and cost. Portraying Kaiser as a racist would also require ignoring the fact that Vanport, though home to the largest black population in the state of Oregon, was majority white.

However, this particular fact helps bring into stark contrast the particular and disproportionate difference in resilience experienced by working class white and black residents of Vanport. In the aftermath of the flood, many families took refuge with others in Portland. White residents were able to re-settle, by increasing urban density or by expanding Portland’s boundaries. Black residents, on the other hand, faced exclusionary and race-based “redlining” policies that limited the locations within Portland in which they could live.

If you want to learn more about Redlining in Portland, spend some time clicking around on this website. It’s worth your time, I promise. 

The Smithsonian Magazine reports that the total number of displaced black residents was “roughly equal to the entire population of Albina,” meaning those neighborhoods would suddenly and overnight be burdened with a hundred-percent population increase. According to Karen Gibson, associate professor of urban studies and planning at Portland State University, "The flood that washed away Vanport did not solve the housing problem—it swept in the final phase of 'ghetto building' in the central city,” as Albina struggled to absorb twice its population of residents.

The Albina neighborhood would experience a period of urban decay in the 1980’s and 1990’s. Redlining continued to affect homeowners. Journalists at The Oregonian discovered that only 10 mortgage loans were made in a four-census-tract area in Albina in the course of the year 1990 (a recent 2011 study shows we’re not doing much better, still). Multiple sources report that homes were abandoned, and that residents couldn’t secure the capital to fix them up.

Contemporary redevelopments in Albina on North Williams Ave.

A report on the Albina neighborhood’s history in The Atlantic says: “It was then, when real estate prices were at rock bottom, that white people moved in and started buying up homes and businesses, kicking off a process that would make Albina one of the more valuable neighborhoods in Portland. The city finally began to invest in Albina then, chasing out absentee landlords and working to redevelop abandoned and foreclosed homes. Much of Albina’s African American population would not benefit from this process, though. Some could not afford to pay for upkeep and taxes on their homes when values started to rise again; others who rented slowly saw prices reach levels they could not afford. Even those who owned started to leave; by 1999, blacks owned 36 percent fewer homes than they had a decade earlier, while whites owned 43 percent more.”

North Williams Ave today. The new apartment building crowds the site of the First African Methodist Episcopal Zion church, Portland’s oldest African American church, founded 1862.

The story of Vanport is easily forgotten. On Google Maps where Vanport once was, there is a small icon that says “Historical Vanport”with no photos or description. Visiting the site today is forgettable. I park at a small parking lot at an open, grassy field, an off-leash dog park. A small sign commemorates Vanport and the flooding. I walk to the historical site and am taken aback by the lack of anything of import. All around me there are gates and “private property” signs- most of this land is owned by the Portland International Raceway. The rest is owned by the Heron Lakes Country Club. A section is reserved by the Port of Portland as a protected wetland.

I come across a small concrete structure on the shore of an overgrown marsh.  It’s impossible to tell how old it is. I’ve brought along maps of Vanport, hoping to see the foundations of buildings or any other remnants of the built environment that survived the flood. Is this a historical structure? If so, what is it? If it is a recent structure, who built it and why? Is this a dignified memorial worthy of the tragedy of losing Oregon’s second largest city in an afternoon?

But, the real tragedy of Vanport is not the events of May 30th, 1948; but of the aftermath. The flood, an environmental disaster, revealed a clear vulnerability for much of Portland’s working class population, and highlighted a particular race-based lack of disaster resilience experienced by Portland’s black residents.

The events at Vanport are inextricably tied to the city’s development from 1948 onward. I’m trying to look closely, to find the ways that traces of Vanport show up in the urban landscape. Given the state of the Albina neighborhood in the 1960’s, is it any wonder that Interstate 5 was built where it was built? Is it a mere statistical fluke that mostly black residents were displaced by the expansion of the Legacy Emanuel Hospital in 1972? I walk down North Williams avenue, snapping photographs of the new buildings, and some under construction. These buildings and structures, part of the Albina area’s revitalization, all bear the subtle traces of Vanport.

In what other ways has some old, forgotten event rippled throughout the fabric of our cities? How else does pervasive, subtle, and unintended racist and classist thinking play a role in the construction of our urban environments? Where are these inequities today? When we identify them, what can we do to create conditions for justice and fairness? What can we do to build resilience for our most vulnerable populations, and hope to ensure no Vanport happens again?

Post-Script:

I always encourage comments on my posts. If you’re interested in having a discussion, I’m here to chat. I did a lot of research on this article that ended up getting cut. If you’re interested in making a deep dive into any of the particular things I’ve mentioned, let me know and I can probably send you a few articles on that subject. As always, thanks for reading.

[prettylittleliarsxxxx]

but things that shouldnt happen happen on tv all the time dont they? shouldnt viewers know that just because its ok on a tv show doesnt mean it would be ok in real life?

Well, now, there’s a difference between it happening on the tv and it being talked about in a way that tells people it’s wrong (ie. SVU with the way it handles rape), vs things happening in a show that is romanticized and glorified (PLL). 

I could write three thousand essay’s about the way fiction influences reality. As Autostraddle said in their latest recap:

“ i’ve said it a billion times before and i’ll keep saying it until the day i die: there is no such thing as “just a tv show.” there is no such thing as “just a story.” nothing, nothing, nothing ever has or ever will change and sustain our individual lives and our culture like stories. fiction shapes our religions, our politics, our beliefs, our ethics, our behaviors, our relationships with ourselves and with each other. all major religious texts are made up mostly of stories. the bible is 80 percent narrative. lists of rules and consequences mean nothing to us; they’re as easily forgotten as a chance encounter with no one on the street. stories move us. they teach us. they warn us. they reward us. they get stuck inside our brains and hearts and we never forget them. stories are a primitive need. we project ourselves into and onto stories, mentally acting out our place in the world, without anyone ever teaching us how to do it. it is an instinct we develop as tiny children and it never goes away. ” - autostraddle recap of 7x19 “farewell, my lovely”

We internalize so much of what we see and it doesn’t necessarily mean we go and do those things, but sometimes it gets so internalized that when it happens to you, you don’t even realize it’s bad because you see it on TV and it’s seen as normal. If you watch SVU and you unfortunately get raped, you know it’s bad even if you know nothing else about rape, because they make sure to tell their audiences it’s bad and can’t be tolerated. If you watch PLL and have no knowledge of anything else outside the show, you start to wonder if dating your teacher is an okay thing to do instead of the fact that it’s actually morally and legally wrong and that’s because this show has talked about this so rarely that you think it’s okay. The message they’ve sent is “love conquers all” and that abuse doesn’t matter if you’re in love or if you’re soulmates and that’s simply not the case. 

I was emotionally, verbally, mentally abused for years and you know, my therapist and I did conclude that I did get stuck and it wasn’t just because of the abuse. Abuse tends to make you feel stuck and it’s hard to get out. But when it’s normalized in every piece of media you consume, you begin to think that’s how a relationship should be. It’s fine to be called worthless 5 days a week as long as for 2 of those days, he tells you he loves you and makes you breakfast or something. Nothing could be farther from the truth. 

That’s why how it’s presented to its audiences is so, so important.