#so when he sees patient being stupid or refusing a certain test/treatment he KNOWS in the bottom of his heart to be right

[lizzydizzyyo]

I think what's really compelling about House's absolute unwillingness to bow down to anything or anyone (the ethical board, the law, extra rich CEO, vindictive police officer, and even the patients themselves) regardless of how absolutely batshit and downright illegal his actions are, is because it's coming from a chronically disabled person, in more ways than one.

He cannot walk without agony or his cane. His chronic and severe pain led him down the path of deep Vicodin addiction until he also becomes psychologically dependent on it too (once, Dr Cuddy gives him saline placebo and it "works", in that he is not feeling his leg pain anymore for a few hours).

He understands it deeply just how desperate people can be when they're in pain and nobody can (or are willing to) help them—at least, so far, until they land on his doorstep. Which is canonically the most extreme step patients take when everything else fails—you don't just go straight to Plainsborough Teaching Hospital and to Dr Gregory House MD's office; you have to go through dozens of other doctors in various specialties and failed treatments too.

(Although that's a separate discussion about how doctors, particularly resident ones, are overworked and underpaid and redtaped by shithead insurance companies even if they do know how to treat a patient and want to).

He knows, from the bottom of his heart, that having such a painful and life-limitting debilitating condition is comparable to hell on earth, because he has one. He knows, that despite his disability being visible to everyone, yet no one wants to put an effort to help him deal with it—is also hell on earth.

Cuddy simply throws money at him and turns the other way to his Vicodin abuse, like she is saying, "I don't care if he takes 10 Vicodin pills a day or more, and I have to pay at least $1M every year for lawsuits, as long as he gets the job done," (and when they decide to go into relationship, she immediately drops him when he relapses, even if the reason for his relapse is her—although, yes, there is another discussion to be had about keeping yourself and your child(ren) safe being a priority compared to helping an addict, recovering or not). Wilson, as loyal as he is to House, simply either enables him or lectures him without going into the root of the issue and thoroughly help House that way. His subordinates, especially after the original trio, are simply too scared, too ignorant, or too ambitious to even approach the issue and choose to keep their job than help House (also another discussion to be had about how you can't help people who don't want to help themselves and so on).

So when he sees a patient who has gone through hell trying to get a correct diagnosis and treatment, he becomes laser-focused on doing everything under the sun to get to the bottom of it and cure the patient. He doesn't care if he has to break into countless of houses (haha pun) and collect insane and probably biohazard samples to do it—he absolutely will, no question.

Yes, hate-criming and being a bigot is his favorite hobby (still livid at the asexual ep and the production's choice for the resolution, let's just say I still have beef with Hugh Laurie and the entire production team for it), and so is insulting patients in so many ways that Shakespeare would personally fly to New Jersey and shake his hands if someone manage to successfully perform necromancy on ol' Billy boy. But House is no one if not dedicated. "Yes, my patient is an idiot, everyone is an idiot too, but I WILL cure their condition like my life depends on it," is basically his middle name.

Besides, you can make the argument that he is more compassionate than all the other doctors around him, because despite his absolute disdain towards some of his patients' beliefs and stupidity, he still works his ass off to treat them. He will call your god an idiot in 7 different languages while putting you in a diagnostic machine he manipulated the whole hospital into letting him use so that you could get a test which weren't available to you before. He will tell you that your currently-happy marriage will end in a bloody divorce and your ex will leave you penniless so love is not real while injecting you with a medication he had to hack the CDC's database for.

There are even episodes that show him being truly earnest, like the clinic duty scene where he is snarky as usual to a girl who seemingly stupidly had unprotected sex until she lashes out, and House is like, "Oh shit, this is above my paygrade", and immediately goes to Cuddy with a very serious expression and no sarcastic dilly-daliying, demanding her to transfer the patient to someone else because he is not good with "curing" rape case (interesting choice on the writers' part to make the patient insist to have therapy with House, though).

There is an episode about a very workaholic woman executive in a fashion company who has tremor and partial paralysis, and later on it's shown that she seems to tie her worth as a person to her corporate success while band-aiding her deep psychological issue like her suicidal ideation, and House genuinely asks her, "Do you want to live? I cannot help you unless you want me to," or something along the line.

There is also the cursed 9-year-old terminal brain cancer episode where Chase kissed the patient (ew), where at first it shows House being a usual misanthophe to Wilson and saying, "She is not brave, it's the brain tumor clot talking because it must be near the amygdala." Later in the episode, House sits near the patient alone, and compassionately asks her if she even wants to live, going through the rest of her short-lived but horrible agony, even if they catch the clot. The surgery to find and get rid of the clot is risky and can debilitate her even more, and this is why House is laying the decision to her hands. That she gets to choose. This is what truly reveals to him that she is genuinely brave (aside from the scan showing the clot to be so far away from her amygdala), but for the wrong reason. She is brave for her mom, willing to go through horrible surgery and drag out her already painful cancer-ridden life because, "My mom needs me". When everyone is congratulating her in the end, you can tell House has a bittersweet expression of both awe towards her bravery, and sadness that this 9-year-old sick girl has to bear the brunt of her horrible pain just so that her mother is not sad. That he couldn't convince her to be a child until the nearing end of her life.

The most interesting evidence of his compassion to me is the gunman hostage episode. It might sound weird because in the whole episode, he is depicted to first want to outsmart the gunman patient, then becomes laser-focused but only because he sees it as a puzzle, then absolutely selfish and dangerous because he volunteers himself as the last hostage and gives the gun back to the guy after the MRI. I do think it's true that his dedication to solving patients-are-just-puzzle-to-me conditions shines through in the episode, especially the scene of him returning his gun, but there is something else I catch when I rewatched it before.

When the gunman patient is put in the MRI because Cameron tells him a theory through the hostage call, the remaining doctors in the room including House are wary at the gunman but also hopeful. Yet, when the result shows up on the screen, he realizes that the theory is wrong and the guy let go his only bargaining chip for nothing. If you watch this part carefully, you'll notice that House actually looks pitying and sad at the gunman's disappointed demeanor and expression. He realizes he is going to be another notch in the guy's failed doctors list, and at this point (with the gun given away and even the best, most talented doctor also not finding out what's wrong with him), the guy has given up hope that he will ever see the day he will be cured, certainly not behind the bars.

Yes, his thirst for puzzle is House's big driving force in giving back the gun, but you'll be lying to yourself if you don't notice House's compassion for the guy because he doesn't want the guy to go out empty-handed, with absolutely no more hope because House knows once they step out of the door, this guy will never, ever be allowed to be in the vicinity of any hospital or doctor ever again in his life, aside from jail's bare-minimum exams and medications. House can't handle the thought of putting someone else through his own disappointment—that nothing works to help his leg pain. He especially doesn't want to be the cause for this gunman guy's case either. Even in the end when House realizes the guy is a fucking moron because he doesn't know that Florida is, in fact, in earthwide-horizontal tropical zone and this is what stumps most of the guy's previous doctors—House still gives him a subtle salute to the guy while being handcuffed and led away, almost to say, "Enjoy your healing and the defeat of your arch nemesis The Sickness™, glad to be part of it."

Majority of his drive to stop at nothing until his patient is cured is definitely thanks to his own fucked-up leg, even if there are some dialogues with Cuddy and Stacy Warner (House's ex wife) that seem to imply he has always been a misanthrophe whose hobby is getting into malpractice (or general) lawsuits. I wholeheartedly believe that after his leg clot rendered him disabled and with chronic pain, he became much more dedicated and obsessed with getting to the bottom of a patient's medical information, even for info that seems innocuous or irrelevant that always turn out to be important (probably more like a plot armor than established characterization, to be honest), almost like this is his method of relating to the patients in his own weirdly human way, and maybe a little bit (actually, a lot) of projecting.

Thank you for coming to my TED Talk.

[writerapprentice]

Promise (Ethan Ramsey x MC)

Title: Promise Words: 1,919 Book: Open Heart Characters: Ethan Ramsey x MC

NOTE: Some of the characters portrayed in this story belong to Pixelberry Studios so the characters are borrowed from them; I don’t own “Open Heart” or any of the original characters.

Summary: This short piece takes place in Book 2. My MC is Maya García. After she joins the diagnostics team both Ethan and Maya have a hard time controlling their feelings for each other. After the Book 1 finale and the fact that MC now is part of the diagnostics team (and Dr. Ramsey is MC’s direct supervisor), I couldn’t stop asking myself how their relationship and dynamic will change after everything they’ve lived together. This is the result.

Hey everyone! Welcome to my page. The last year I’ve been obsessed with this app called Choices, and more recently I’ve fallen in love with the book Open Heart (especially with a certain grumpy doctor, aka Dr. Ethan Jonah Ramsey). After this Friday’s book finale I needed a sneak peek of Book 2, but let’s be honest it’ll probably be a while until we get the sequel. Therefore, I decided to take the matter in my own hands and write a little something mainly for my own entertainment. I’ve decided to share this small piece with all of you who are as invested in this book as myself. This is my first fanfic EVER, and I’m so excited to share it with all of you. If you decide to give it a try, THANK YOU!! Any constructive criticism and suggestions are more than welcome. I hope you enjoy it :) ______________________________________________________

Maya was sitting on the floor. Books and papers surrounded her, creating a spiral of confusion. She had been researching this case for more than 12 hours and she still couldn’t solve it. What was causing her patient’s chest pain? She had run all the possible tests and nothing seemed to show a possible cause. Even worse, she wasn’t even supposed to be working today. It was her free day and she had planned a relaxing day at her apartment. But, let’s be realistic. Her experience with Naveen’s case created in her a new passion. She had always wanted to help others; that was one of the reasons she became a doctor in the first place. However, this felt different. The adrenaline from solving an impossible case changed her completely. Every new case was a new adventure and she felt a necessity to solve the unsolvable. She was so concentrated reading a scientific journal that she jumped when the door was open abruptly. She raised her head to see the figure standing at the door.

“I’m sorry. I... didn’t know you would be here. I thought it was your day off.” Ethan stood by the door. 

“It was, but I couldn’t stop thinking about this case. And when I realized I was already here surrounded by these,” Maya pointed to the papers around her. 

“What are you doing here? I thought you enjoyed your coffee in your office.”

Ethan looked down at the cup of coffee he was holding in his hand and then back at her. For a moment he had forgotten about the coffee. That was the effect she had on him. When she was close she was everything he could think about. Her brown eyes. Her wavy hair and the way it fell on her shoulders. Her red lips, the bottom one slightly bigger than the other one. How brave she was and the passion that she had for her job. He realized he had been staring at her all this time. 

“They’re finishing the construction happening next to my office and I hate the noise. I was looking for a quiet place and I thought this room was empty but it’s not… I’ll leave you alone… so you can continue working.” Ethan turned to leave.

“No, wait! I was going to take a break and… I wouldn’t mind having some company.” She smiled at him.

Ethan stopped at the door hesitating. Of course, she knew the effect she had on him. One hand still in the door handle and the other one holding his coffee refusing to look her in the eyes. Since Dr. Maya García had joined the diagnostics team their relationship was in a weird place. Ethan couldn’t have a relationship with her while he was her boss but he also couldn’t stop thinking about the times they had been together. How her hands felt on his skin. The warmth of her body close to his. The burning sensation of her kisses on his neck and back. He loved how she pronounced his name and the passion in her eyes whenever their eyes met. Working together the last couple of months wasn’t easy. There were some moments during the harder cases when he wanted to reach for her hand and squeeze it in reassurance. Other days when their case had a happy ending and he wanted to hug her and never let her go. But, of course, he never gave up to temptation. On the opposite, he tried to stay away from her as long as he could only interacting with her when it was necessary. Every moment with her not being able to actually be together killed him.  

“Please, Ethan.” 

Their eyes met. He looked at her at the sound of his name coming out of her lips. He took a deep breath and closed the door. Ethan walked to the middle of the room and sat next to her on the floor. 

“Here,” Ethan said offering her the cup of coffee he was holding. She looked at him for a moment, a smile growing in the corner of her mouth. 

“Thank you.”

Ethan nodded. “So, how can I help you? Tell me what you’ve learned about the case...” he said while picking up some of the several papers scattered on the floor. Maya shook her head while she tasted the coffee.

“No... I had enough of this case tonight…” she said while removing the papers from his hand while another sip to his coffee, “I want to distract myself. Let’s talk about something else.”

“And what do you want to talk about?” A silence emerged between both of them. She stared at him studying his face.

“How was your day?” Maya finally asked. She was nervously playing with the cup in her hands. 

Ethan raised his eyebrows. Did she not understand the pain that it caused him to be open with her? How much it hurt to expose his soul to her when they couldn’t be together? He analyzed the best way to answer her question without making it personal.

“I was in meetings most of the day. Then, I saw a few patients in the evening. The interns were a pain in the ass, as always.”

“Did you miss me? Because I miss you every day.” The confession surprised Ethan so much that he almost choked. 

“Maya...” he began explaining.

“I know, I know.” She interrupted him. “We need to keep a professional relationship. But, how do you expect me to go on with my life after the moments we’ve shared. And I’m not talking only about the sex. Don’t get me wrong, it is amazing.” She could see a blush in Ethan’s cheeks. “But we’ve shared amazing moments. Losses and victories. Our greatest fears and our biggest dreams. How can I pretend that never happened? Is there a medical treatment to erase this connection between us?”

Ethan sighed. “There’s nothing I wish more than having the answer to all your questions,” he replied. “If it makes you feel any better, it is to me as painful as it is to you.” His hand moved involuntarily reaching for hers. Her long fingers squeezed his hand. They watched as their fingers interlaced.

“Will this ever end?” Ethan asked after a long moment of silence.

“Huh? What do you mean?” Maya asked. She had been distracted memorizing the warmth of his hand. Until this moment she hadn’t realized how close they were seating. It would only take a second for her to reach him if she wanted to.

“The pain. Will it ever stop?” Ethan insisted. 

Maya could see the suffering in his eyes and feel the need for an answer in his voice. His greatest weakness was that he never allowed himself to be happy; he always insisted on torturing himself and she hated that. He was the best man she had ever met and he deserved the entire universe. She raised her other hand to touch his face. Ethan hesitated for a moment but he finally rested his cheek on her palm. Maya wanted to comfort him somehow, to let him know that she was there for him. That they shared the same suffering. That she would always belong to him. She left the coffee on the table next to them and leaned closer towards him. Their lips almost touching. Their breaths all over each other. She wanted to kiss him so bad that it hurt. But she preferred the pain to not feeling anything at all because that would mean that she didn’t care about him. She leaned in closer and closer. She saw the hesitation in his eyes, he was about to say something stupid. He would say that he was her boss and they were better as colleagues than anything else. She had a bright future ahead and he didn’t want her to waste her time with someone like him. He thought she was too good for him and he didn’t deserve her. That’s what he had been repeating himself as an excuse to why he didn’t act on his feelings. Before he could say something he would later regret, Maya grabbed his shirt and pulled him towards her. Their lips, partly open, met in a kiss. They missed this. The warmth of their lips. How they fit perfectly with each other. He grabbed her shoulders and pushed her away softly. 

“We… really shouldn’t.” He said catching his breath. He had been holding his breath during the kiss, his mind wondering if this was the right thing. 

“I’m… sorry.” She let her head fall down in defeat attempting to hide the tears falling down her cheeks.

He hated seeing her like this. He knew that she was the most amazing woman he had ever met and he couldn’t live with the fact that he was causing her pain. He would rather die than hurt her. He grabbed her cheeks catching her tears with his thumbs. He would do anything to erase her pain. Holding her head tight he pulled her towards him and kissed her. She was surprised by his actions but didn’t want to question her luck. She opened her mouth welcoming him and deepened their kiss. She grabbed his neck and pulled him closer. Ethan moaned. He grabbed her hips and pulled her over him so she was straddling him. His hands moving all over her body, going to her back and down to her legs. She enjoyed the feeling of his body under hers. His mouth moved from her lips, down to her jaw, and even lower to her neck. He bit her neck and she moved her hands to his hair playing with it. She wanted to remain in his arms forever. Maya moved her hips against his. Ethan groaned in response. He grabbed her butt and pulled her harder against him. They were both breathing faster and faster each time. Need growing between them. They both knew they shouldn’t be doing this, but something that felt so good couldn’t be wrong, right?  

“CODE BLUE! CODE BLUE! Room 234!” 

Loud voices outside the room brought them back to reality. They froze for a moment catching their breaths. Ethan looked down at his pager. 

“I have to go.”

Will it end just like that? Will they go back to pretending like nothing happened just like the other times? He was analyzing her face. Ethan saw fear in her eyes. She didn’t have to tell him because he already knew what she was thinking. She was getting ready for his rejection. Ethan reached for his pocket. He took a deep breath. 

“Here.” 

“What is this?” Maya questioned confused by the set of keys that Ethan took out of his pants. 

“I have to see a patient.” He kissed her again. “But you can wait in my apartment while I finish my shift. I’ll be there as soon as possible.”

“You promise?” She asked while grabbing the keys from his hand.

“I promise.”

She gave him one last kiss and he stood from the place where they had been sitting. He walked to the door and placed his hand on the door handle. Before opening the door he turned to look at her. 

“I’ve missed you too. More than you can imagine.” He said as he winked at her and exited the room. A smile began growing on her face. A smile full of hope for the future. Is this even real? Will this finally be their happy ending?

[automatismoateo]

In response to a question in a recent thread where someone asked me to go in-depth, here's a description of my experience in Education and teaching Science in Arkansas and why I finally quit. via /r/atheism

Submitted July 11, 2021 at 11:22PM by paxinfernum (Via reddit https://ift.tt/3ALPxPr) In response to a question in a recent thread where someone asked me to go in-depth, here's a description of my experience in Education and teaching Science in Arkansas and why I finally quit.

The only thing that matters

Here's something you need to understand first. In most rural districts, pretty much any idiot can get hired to a position and stay there as long as they don't piss off parents too much. The people hiring you don't really understand what you teach, and the parents don't understand or care what quality teaching is, but they care if you say something that offends their backward sensibilities. What that effectively means is that your ability to teach and stay on has more to do with being in sync with the community, who are usually racist and batshit paranoid. If you aren't in sync with that, you either have to keep your head down, or you will eventually get harassed into leaving due to vague complaints.

Abusive parenting is normal here

Okay. So starting with my student teaching. The woman I worked under was a total fucking psychopath. She bragged in the teachers' lounge about how she disciplined her daughter and people don't discipline their kids like that now. By discipline, I mean she told a story about how she chased her daughter down a hallway, dragged her by the hair of her head, and spanked her until she was raw. This was part of a story where she was bragging about how well behaved her daughter was due to her parenting.

If you're wondering if anyone pushed back against this, the answer is that they didn't. They were nodding their heads in affirmation. That's the problem with rural schools in a nutshell. The community hires from the community, and the community is backward as shit and filled with people who were raised in abusive conservative fundie homes. The parents, by the way, loved that teacher because she wasn't one of those soft "liberal" teachers. Parents, more than anyone else, wanted us to hit their kids and were always disappointed when they didn't get spanked. Child abuse is a way of life down here.

Teachers who are fearful of knowledge

Okay, so this woman was a science teacher. That's what I trained to teach. Science. I did so because I wasn't just one of those "science is awesome" Sagan-heads. I genuinely cared about teaching science as more than just fun facts, but as a methodology for uncovering the truth. I naively went into the field thinking that's what most science teachers would be like. I kind of hoped that I'd at least find a community of like-minded individuals in this ignorant state.

Over my entire teaching career, I literally never met another science teacher like me who was pro-science and pro-skepticism. They were overwhelmingly either just dumb and teaching rotely, or they were conspiratorial and fearful of science. This is exactly what an Arkansas school board wants out of a science teacher. They know they have to teach science, but they are afraid of science and see it as the most dangerous subject to teach in their little fundagelical minds. So they hire people who are afraid of science.

That crazy woman I trained under? She ranted about drones being used to spy on us. She told the kids GMOs were dangerous, and she told them homeopathic medicines were something she'd researched to help her friend with cancer. She wasn't unique in that regard. Every other science teacher I met in Arkansas was terrified of GMOs and had some conspiracy they wanted to rant about. One teacher's bugaboo was allergies and how he thought more people were getting allergies because of chemicals being put in the water. He brushed it off when I said it was probably due to more sensitive testing. Another teacher told their students the most horrendous and completely inaccurate facts about nuclear energy.

They're not sending us their best people

The point is these people weren't the best and brightest. Often, they weren't even adequate. One guy I worked with became a science teacher because he needed something to teach alongside coaching. He was dumb as a box of rocks and just barely passed his praxis exams after three tries. I know most people weren't going to ace these tests like I did, but the cutoff for a passing score in Arkansas is hilariously low. Yet, when he finally passed, it was only by a single point, and he recounted it to me like it was only by the grace of god.

Another teacher, a math teacher who was probably the worst speller I'd ever met, got certified in Texas, which has a lower standard for math, and he transferred his certification to Arkansas. So he only was able to teach math in Arkansas on a technicality. The way it works is that you only have to be recertified if you let your certification lapse. All that's required to recertify is doing 30 hours of PD per year, and then, every couple of years, you have to do the recertification process. But this idiot was too stupid to do that, and he let his certification expire. So then, he was teaching math without a license because he couldn't pass the Arkansas tests. (You're allowed to teach for so long as long as you're pursuing certification.)

Propaganda and Indoctrination

Half of the teachers I met might as well have been missionaries. It's illegal to push your religion or politics on students, but fuck if anyone will actually enforce that. Actually, let me step back there. Fuck if anyone will actually enforce that unless you're liberal or non-Christian. The state is an unofficial conservative theocracy so if the teacher wants to rant about gays or Jesus, there's very little chance any parent will even bother to complain. (Even liberals around here know they're outnumbered and won't win.) Even if the parent complains to the Principal, they'll only "have a word" with the teacher in question, most likely to have a chummy conversation where they eye roll about the parent and discuss ways they can continue to evangelize more subtly.

Even if the Principal is the type who takes this seriously, the teacher will only get a vague note in their file because no school board around here is going to fire a teacher for proselytizing children. They don't want the school to get burned down by an angry mob of Fox News zombies. Even if it makes it to the state ethics board, I've seen the state ethics board literally do nothing about a counselor who ignored a suicidal student, a teacher who was caught drunk driving, a superintendent who was manipulating the system to siphon more money into the school, and so many other things. The only thing the ethics board actually takes a license away for is cheating on standardized testing (got to keep our corporate donors happy) and actually fucking a student. Even if you bring a teacher up on proselytizing, they'll get a warning and be back in the classroom the next day.

So if you're a kid in a rural school, get ready for your teacher to unsubtly tell you about how Jesus is such an important part of their life or straight-up rant about the Democrats. When I was a student in Arkansas schools, I had teachers tell me: 1) All gay people should be thrown in prison 2) HIV-positive patients should be shipped to an island or burned (it was the 90s) 3) the Jews brought the holocaust on to themselves by rejecting Jesus 4) the teacher was boycotting Levis jeans because they supported gay people. That's just a sampling of shit I heard as a kid in Arkansas from freaking teachers.

While working as a teacher, I knew of teachers who latched onto kids with poor home lives and invited them over to their homes so they could do "prayer studies" with them. The kids went because they were kind to them and offered food. In case you're wondering, they got away with this because it was a husband and wife, so parents allowed it. (I'm just going to say that I'm actually quite certain this was entirely above board sex-wise. I knew the individuals, and while I despised what they were doing, I knew they were entirely sincere.)

Another teacher, a Trump supporter, went into a rant about how they needed to give all the teachers guns to fight off school shooters (because restricting guns in any way was tOtAlItArIaNiSm.) I nodded along because I was smart enough to know disagreeing publicly will get you shunned or harassed. All I could think in my head was "Dude, if they ever give you nutters guns, that's the day I quit. There will be 10 dead kids within a week." On that topic, one teacher I know of grabbed a student by the throat because they were pissed at them, and they didn't lose their job.

The history teacher, the one who wanted us to all have guns was teaching that the Civil War was about tariffs. You heard it here first, ladies and gentlemen. Hundreds of thousands of people went to war over tariffs that were at their lowest point in decades. It had nothing to do with the people they owned and shackled up like a Saw movie. The Civics teacher pushed Trump election conspiracies.

Another teacher, who had a family member who had a terminal illness and was literally only getting their medical treatment paid through Obamacare would go off on rants about Obama and transgender students.

Harassment

At one point, I was harassed by the campus cop. He found out I was in support of BLM, and literally screamed at me. Later, he transitioned to simply refusing to acknowledge my existence. Like, if I said anything to him, he would pretend he couldn't hear me. The dude was fucking insane and filled with hate. I'm pretty sure his domestic situation with his wife was abusive due to things he said. He was so angry and radicalized that it was never the students I worried would be a mass shooter. It was him. I was literally afraid he would come in one day and shoot the place up. He wasn't an oddity though. Every one of our resource officers was racist and unethical. One was running a vaping ring with students. Another took special joy in cracking down on Latino students.

Eventually, I started getting harassment from students though, and that's what led to me leaving. There are two things that led to increasing harassment. First, I had one conservative student who hated me and surmised that I must be a Clinton supporter. I never said that, but because I was one of the few teachers who didn't violate the rules about discussing religion or politics, they guess that I was a liberal atheist. So they started working to get me fired.

The second thing is that the Arkansas standards changed so that teaching evolution became part of my classroom standards. Just so you know, most schools in Arkansas don't actually teach evolution, even though they're supposed to. The way it works is teachers put it last on their things to teach, and oopsie, I just ran out of time at the end of the year. Some teachers know evolution is real, but they don't teach it because the backlash is too much to take. Others don't teach it because they're fundagelicals themselves, so they go along with the informal conspiracy to not teach evolution. I say informal conspiracy because it's not like they all get together in a back room and decide this. It's just the culture and incentives are all there to not teach it.

I actually taught evolution, and while I had always dealt with some degree of negativity, looking back, I have to say that was the point where I started getting a lot more. I can't emphasize enough how brainwashed these kids were. I'm not saying all of them because there were absolutely kids who believed in evolution, but they were in a minority and knew to keep their mouths shut. But it's sort of staggering to try to teach the history of the Earth and have a kid repeatedly try to prove to you that there was a global flood.

How harassment actually works in the real world

This is the thing I want people to understand. Harassment in the real world isn't usually as obvious as in a movie. No one drives by your house and throws a brick through your window. No one calls you up and leaves threatening messages. No one will ever fire you for being liberal or an atheist. Because these people are dumb as fuck, but they're also very clever at being shitty people. They know they can't walk up and say to the school board, "Fire so and so because they're teaching evolution." They know that's illegal technically.

So they just start making up vague complaints. Principals, even ones who were supportive like my last Principal, are reactive. If a parent comes to them to complain about a teacher, they're going to assume the teacher did something wrong and needs to be talked to. So the girl who found out I was a Hillary Clinton supporter suddenly decided I "made her uncomfortable" and "looked her weird." The great thing about these types of innuendos and character assaults is that you don't have to provide any real facts. It's all about how you just don't like that person. Remember that teachers are one of the few professions where you can actually be fired simply because the community doesn't like you.

So that fell flat because, like I said, my Principal was actually decent and understood how flimsy that was. So then, that girls boyfriend made a complaint about how I'd yelled at him in front of all the students. Unfortunately for him, this supposed incident happened while we were in a part of the school with cameras so it was obviously bullshit. However, parents calling in upset is still a big deal so I was told that I should try to be nicer to him in the future and win the parents over.

The point is that it's basically death by a thousand cuts from little gripes and exaggerated concerns. Another student flat-out lied and said I cussed them out in class. I know that some of this was actually instigated by a staff member who didn't like me. So they encourage students to complain about me. At one point, I know they actually set up a kid's parents to lodge a complaint against me. I know this because the language of the complaint was obviously written by them, and when I was having the parent conference, they actually stayed behind work (something they never did) and didn't leave our adjoining rooms until it was over. They apparently wanted to listen in and see how it went. This conservative teacher at various times: told me the wrong place for a meeting, got kids to say they would show up for an after school event and then not show up, convinced an entire group of students to quit a club I was sponsoring, spread rumors about me to parents.

I'm done

The final straw was covid. I tried to stick it out, but the day a kid told me he wasn't going to wear a mask because "Biden isn't the real President" was the point where I decided I was done. This came from teachers too. The biology teacher wore a mask below their nose. The staff refused to stop having potlucks throughout the entire pandemic. Some people can't be saved.

edit: I forgot to mention the English teacher I met while I was doing my student-teacher training. She was forcing her class to write essays on how Obama wasn't a real US Citizen. All throughout my teacher program, I'd been told over and over that you could get fired for talking politics in the classroom, and this bitch was literally forcing kids to write essays about how Obama was a secret Muslim. And nothing was done about it. She could get away with it because Arkansas is so white and racist. To put it into context, the county she was teaching in was 94% white and voted for Trump by 78% in 2020.

[worldofadvent]

NEO World of Advent Chapter Two

NEO World of Advent Chapter Two

The walls of the recruitment center were brightly lit – so much so that Light had to wonder if it was an intimidation tactic. Find out who the weak are before the battlefield. Crude, but effective. Light simply sat patiently in the hard chair the Assessor had given him to sit in. It had been thirty minutes past the time he said he would be back and Light wondered if he had any intentions of doing so.

Light would not be deterred, however. His bright blonde hair and fierce blue eyes seemed to reflect the light and his determination as he sat rigidly in the space given to him. He had come a long way to get here, physically and emotionally. He had lost people – or rather, they lost him.

The ceiling, Light noticed, was curved. The alignment of the room was uneven. Everything about it seemed off-putting. Not for the first time, Light wondered if the person in charge of the assessment of his skills was prejudiced against Advents. It wouldn’t be the first time he encountered such beliefs – that humans or their children, regardless of species could not fight like a reploid could.

Of course, Light found this ridiculous. The Neo Arcadian Army did not fight close quarters in the vast majority of their combat situations. The weapons given to them would destroy a human’s body, yes. But so would it to a reploid as well. Besides, if it did come down to close combat, Light was prepared.

The door creaked open and a portly reploid holding a schedule stepped inside from the opposite end of the room.

“You’re still here. Don’t you know where the door is?”

“Six feet behind me and two to the left,” Light answered promptly. “Can we move on with this? I’m sure both of us have better things to do than sit around and wait all day.”

“It’s your funeral, kid.” The reploid sat down on a chair opposite Light. His badge read “Assessor Barnes.”

“What questions do you have for me today?” Light asked. This was not his first visit. And if he did not receive what he wanted, it would not be his last either.

“Just a few,” Barnes grunted. “Why do you want to be in the army so badly, kid?”

“You mean a sense of patriotic duty isn’t enough incentive?”

Barnes chuckled darkly. “Whatever it is that brought you here, it wasn’t for the greater good of Neo Arcadia. What are you really here for?”

“The army has certain privileges that civilians do not have access to. I’m looking for someone, or rather, two people. I’m hoping this would help me do that.”

Barnes shook his head. “You came to enlist when you could just hire a Private Eye? You’re either stupid or crazy. And the IQ tests we pulled on you rules out the stupid.”

Light smiled mirthlessly. “Disaster follows them wherever they go. I daresay that I’ll find them in time.”

“They sound like quite the people. Your friends.”

“You have no idea.” Light tapped the metallic surface of the table absentmindedly.

“So then.” Barnes pushed an envelope Light’s way. “I think I’ve wasted enough of your time with trying to chase you away. My conscience is clear; whatever happens out there, I tried to stop it.”

“I assure you,” Light said, “I can handle myself.” Light opened the envelope. Two sheets of paper fell out.

“Those are your application,” Barnes said. “Sign your name in the first one. That’s a release of liability for the Arcadian government. The second is a background check. Answer it truthfully or you will be denied any further access to enlisting.”

Light signed them quickly, sliding them back to Barnes when finished.

“It says here that you were part of that Umera incident. Name’s Light, eh? Say, you wouldn’t happen to be the Resistance Leader’s kid, would you?” Barnes laughed.

“I could be.” Whereas Barnes was clearly making a joke, Light was completely serious. “It’s a strange world.”

“Yeah,” Barnes said, “But I’ll eat my boot if Ciel’s kid turned in an application to work for Neo Arcadia.”

Light said nothing.

“Well then,” Barnes said. “Everything looks to be in order. I just have to run this by the machine to check its viability. You’d be surprised how many criminals try to enlist for a second chance at life.”

“I’m no criminal, I assure you.” Light’s crystal blue eyes were like twin pools in the reflection of the table. “But I am looking for a second chance, you could say.”

“I can believe that,” Barnes said. “Why don’t you go downstairs with the rest of the recruits? If something turns up here, I’ll send you topside again.”

“You mean I actually get to see something other than this charming room?”

“Don’t get smart with me kid,” Barnes said. “I reserve any and all rights to refuse application.”

“Alright, alright. I’m going.” Light made his way through the door Barnes had come through. Through it, a long hallway stretched on for a hundred feet with doors lining every six feet of it. At the end, a small elevator stood, black and grey, gleaming from a fresh coat of oil.

Light didn’t wait to be introduced with the black and grey contraption. He wasted no time in making a brisk walk, eyes fixed firmly on the elevator. Once within arm’s reach, Barnes called out.

“The code is Two-Three-Five-Six-O-Eight,” he said. “Don’t mess it up, or it’ll lock down.”

Light nodded and punched in the code. A bar preventing access to the insides of the transport lifted and a woman’s disembodied voice welcomed him to Neo Arcadian Enlisting Office #3308.

The sides of the elevator were also metal, but with spaces in between them so that Light could see beyond them. Through the elevator’s slow descent, the scenery shifted to various floors responsible, Light surmised, for different facilities in the Neo Arcadian Army. One floor was a fully operational hangar, with jets and carriers being fixed and forged.

When it was time for his stop, the elevator came to a jarring halt and a pleasant “Ding!” The bar lifted once more and a spacious floor presented itself to Light. The four corners of the floor had walls fifty feet high. The floor itself was several hundred feet, with various groups of people surrounding a padded arena. The lights were dimmed.

“Recruit!” A harsh voice rang out. “The name is Sergeant Halls. I’m responsible for passing – or failing – your pretty face.” A heavily muscled reploid woman came into view. “Follow me.”

Light followed Sergeant Halls down the floor toward its center, where a large group of candidates waited restlessly. They snapped to attention at the sight of Sergeant Halls.

“Welcome back Sir!” the crowd cried in unison.

“At ease, recruits.” Halls made a motion for them to relax. “Now that our final member has joined us, it’s time for an assessment of your pitiful abilities.”

“Sir?” a voice quavered. It belonged to a small reploid with green and blue armor. “What exactly will we be doing?”

“We will be assessing how well you handle combat,” Halls said. “First with handhelds. Then with assault rifles, and last hand to hand combat.” She gave a smirk to Light, the only fleshly recruit in the bunch.

“Yes sir!” This time, Light’s voice joined the crowd.

“Good. Now if you ladies will follow me, we have some work to do.” Halls beckoned them toward the end of the floor, where people were firing off into a firing range. “Safety first,” Halls said. “If I catch any of you without proper gear on or with your safety off when not directly inside the range, you will be ejected from the program immediately. Do I make myself clear?”

Halls gave them all a pistol and a number. “Once the recruit before you has finished firing, relieve them of the position according to your number. Number One will go first. Two, second and et cetera.”

Light glanced down at his number. Thirty-two. A quick scan of his group told him that he would be going last.

The first of the recruits hit the target, but was a far cry from a good shot. The second and third recruits fared better, but still suffered from a slight recoil. Light analyzed the recoil rate of each pistol in regard to the muscle mass ratio of each recruit, and determined the approximate recoil rate of the pistol model they were given.

When it came to be Recruit Fourteen’s turn, he missed the target entirely, a “twang!” sound rattling the metal walls from the opposite side.

“Pitiful,” Halls said. “That’s enough, recruit.”

Recruit Fifteen and Sixteen seemed demoralized by this performance, and ended up barely hitting the target. Seventeen, by comparison, hit the bulls-eye on his third shot.

And so it went. Recruit after recruit lined up to fire, be yelled at, have their assessment scribbled down on a notepad and be replaced by the next recruit. When Recruit Thirty-three’s turn ended, Halls directed Light to the range, muttering that he had better not “Fuck it up.”

Light took aim and fired. The bullet tore through the red center, followed by five more bullets that shredded the bulls-eye further. An audible gasp could be heard by some of the reploids behind him. Halls quickly silenced them and scribbled on her notebook. She said nothing to Light.

“Next up, we have assault weapons training,” Halls called out. “Improper treatment of equipment will be grounds for immediate ejection.”

More or less, Light found the assault weapons training to be a replication of the handheld training. Those with experience with weapons found their mark while those who had never held heavy weaponry were made obvious that they had never done so.

Light raised the rifle to the appropriate level, pulling the trigger in short bursts. Each target exploded in a puff of black smoke and powder. Light switched off the safety, handing it back to Halls, who looks begrudgingly impressed.

“Alright, Advent.” Halls addressed Light directly. “You may have done well in weapons training, but we have hand to hand combat next. Any broken bones, and you’re out. Are we clear?”

“And if I break them?”

“Ha!” Halls let out a short laugh. “You’ve got spirit. I’ll give you that. Meet us at the ring, everyone.”

In the direct center of the room, a large arena blocked off on its sides covered a large portion of the floor. It stood five feet high, supported by four constructs at each corner that led into thick steps on each side.

“Recruit,” Halls said, looking at Light. “You will be assessed by Captain Gerro here.” Captain Gerro, it transpired, was a massive reploid at a hulking eight feet. He grinned wickedly.

“Are you sure, Halls?” Gerro asked. “The kid could get hurt.”

“He signed the waiver. You’re good to go. Show him a taste of the Arcadian Army.” Halls stood back, pen ready to fail Light should she hear the snap of a cracked or broken bone.

“Get in the ring, recruit.” Gerro’s footsteps made sinking indents in the padding of the arena. His gray armor did not seem to burden his fluid movement, however, and Light found himself bracing for the fight.

Gerro threw the first punch. Light dodged, elbowing the sie of the heavy reploid, only to have it bounce off harmlessly.

Light’s eyes narrowed. Against any human, this would be an impossible fight. But, Light thought, he was not human. Not fully, anyhow. However much he looked the part, he was equally as much reploid. And so he showed a portion of that latent power.

As Gerro threw the next punch,  Light ducked down, a dark-red sheen covering his body. Time seemed to slow down as his perception and senses were drastically improved. Gerro’s look of surprise may have been in slow motion as Light’s fist sank into the gray reploid’s stomach, cracking the armor.

“Ooph!” Gerro coughed up a spot of oil. But grinned. “So he can fight!” Gerro made a sweeping kick to knock Light’s legs from under him, but Light jumped high, kicking Gerro in the face as he sailed down. The reploid went down like a sack of bricks.

“That oversol…” Halls said, all disparity forgotten. “Who is your sire?”

“I never met him,” Light said. “But I inherited his power.”

“Yes, I can see that,” Halls said. “Well, I’ll be the first to say that I was wrong about you. I’ll have someone wake Captain Gerro up. You seem frighteningly familiar, but I can’t put my finger to it.”

“I can live with being frightening,” Light said. “So. Do I pass?”

“With flying colors,” Halls said. “You see that, recruits? That’s how it’s done.”

Light smiled and allowed the dark-red recesses of metallic skin to revert back to their normal state. Halls patted Light on the back, issuing him a communication device that she told him would beep when it was time for the next phase in his enlistment.

“Enjoy your last few days as a civilian,” Halls said. “Soon you will be a soldier of Neo Arcadia.”

Light nodded. He was approved to go Topside once more through the elevator. As it rose, Light couldn’t help but grin. At last, he had been approved to enter the Neo Arcadian Army. As for which branch he would be entered to, he had no idea.

Anything but the sea, Light thought to himself. He often got seasick on choppy seas and didn’t know if he could handle Leviathan’s marine Corps.

Back on the surface, the long hallway no longer seemed to stretch on forever. Light allowed himself to look at the names that adorned the sides of the hundred-foot space. James McKerner, Tech Support. Julie Sentassa, Combat specialist. Dick Barnes, Public Relations.

“So kid,” Barnes called out to Light from his office. “Get kicked out so soon?”

Light held up the communication device and a camera, snapping a picture of Barnes’ incredulous expression. In the following days it would become his screensaver.

Outside, the sea blew salty air into Light’s nostrils. He relished the scent of the sea. It was really a pity he couldn’t stand the rocky seas. Who knew, if he conquered his seasickness, he might actually enjoy the sea more.

Light looked to the sky, and noticed that it was already dark. Though the streets of Neo Arcadia were well lit at night, Light preferred to use natural light to guide his way back to his flat.

Located in the middle-class area of Neo Arcadia, his apartment was located conveniently over a black market fight club, where he would often practice whenever he needed to blow off some steam. Light figured that he could spare some time and watch a few fights.

The entrance to the fight club was surprisingly mundane. Disguised as a night club, those who were approved with a certain phrase were allowed access to the back rooms, where soundproofing ensured that whatever transpired within those walls did not soil the booming music of the night club.

“Welcome to the “Black Sky,” a clerk said in a dull monotone upon hearing Light’s footsteps. “Please state your name and business.”

“You make this place sound like a respectable business,” Light smirked. “How are you doing, Sneak?”

Sneak jumped up at Light’s voice. “Yo! It’s Crimson, everybody. Old Crimson’s finally returned to us at last.”

Light shook his head at his nickname. It had been received some years earlier, when he had challenged a reploid much more experienced than he.

Back then, Light had nowhere to go. It was just after Chaos and Sanctum had left him in the dust, and he was a much more reckless soul than he was even today. When Light had found “Black Sky,” he asked Sneak if this was the right place to “Blow off some steam.”

Naturally Sneak was suspicious, but a quick pat-down and a determination that he had no acquaintance with the police  gave Light access to the back room, where he was met with a massive reploid named Crock.

Crock had insulted him, Light recalled.

“You there!” Crock called out. “New guy! You up for a fight?”

Light’s eyes found the Scoreboard, and atop it, Crock’s name and ranking. No. 1. Light gave a black grin and put what Zenny he had left on himself. The Score Keeper called him crazy, but Light refuted this simply by stating that he had had “A very bad day.”

The Keeper snorted, and told him that it was about to get worse.

Crock roared his approval along the crowd as Light entered the ring. Light could dodge fairly well, even then, but time and exhaustion gave way to being lifted into the air only to be slammed down on Crock’s massive knee.

“We have another victory for Crock!” he called out, a second too soon. Light stood back up, bloody face and a grimace belying a sturdy stance.

“The runt can take a hit at least,” Crock said. “Who here wants to see what his bones look like?”

The crowd roared its assent.

“Hey.” Light addressed his opponent. “I can’t be sure if this’ll work. But if it does, I can’t guarantee you will leave this arena in one piece.”

Crock roared and ran right at Light as Light’s oversol kicked into place. A black-and-red fist sunk deep into Crock’s face and Crock flew outside the arena, breaking the borders.

There was a moment of stunned silence before th crowd started chanting Light’s stage name, given no doubt for the crimson blood pouring out from his head, soaking his blonde hair deep red.

“Crimson! Crimson! Crimson!”

Light grinned. “Sorry guy,” he addressed Crock. “But I’ve had a really bad day.”

“So the champ returns, eh?” Sneak leaned forward. “What happened? Met a girl? Why haven’t we seen you lately?”

“Been taking care of some official business,” Light said. “Pretty soon I won’t be able to come here. Thought I might as well say goodbye.”

“Alright Big Red,” Sneak said. “Well I’ll show you back room.”

Amidst the roar of the crowd, Light slipped by unnoticed. He ordered a strong drink at the bar, enjoying the thrill of watching people fight and the buzz of alcohol. Two Advents were tonight’s featured fight. One wore a dusty black oversol, while the other darted back and forth without ever activating his. Pretty soon, Black Oversol wore himself out, and his opponent, a fiery girl with a white oversol coming out decked him. Light winced as he heard the “Crack” of her fist into his jaw even from there.

The evening wrapped itself up neatly. Light watched a few fights, had a few more drinks, and retired himself for the night. His flat, a small apartment was just a quick trip up the stairs. Light fumbled his keys and opened the door, collapsing onto the soft bed.

Light grinned drunkenly. It had been a good day. He looked around him, his few personal affects. There was a portable database that he had constructed a long time ago. There was a picture of him standing next to his two best friends, before they had disappeared without ever telling a soul. And last, a crisp newspaper cutting of the day the Umbral Abductions had occurred. Three names were highlighted, underlined: Chaos, Sanctum, and Light. Above them, a woman’s face was burned out.

Ciel.