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axemetaphor · 6 years

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OC Masterpost

I need an organized place to put info about all my OCs so that’s what this post is gonna be for!

In addition to basic bios and some reference images, I’ve also got links to Spotify playlists for every character, because music is a strong association with personality for me. (If you don’t use Spotify, or if you know of a streaming platform more easily accessible than Spotify, send me an anon and I’ll duplicate the playlists to that service then add a link here!) I also have moodboards for every OC.

This post will be rather long so I’ve put in under a readmore for the sake of convenience.

It’s also important to note that my OCs exist in an AU where some things are a little different. For example, Infinite in this AU is 17 and that’s definitely not because I assumed he was an edgy teen like Shadow, and after Robotnik’s defeat in Forces, the Resistance became the Restoration. All the troops who had been battling were reassigned to rebuilding whatever town they happened to be in at the time of victory, with extra troops being redistributed as needed (leading to the formation of small roving teams traveling from place to place to help out).

It’s a little bit of an unorganized info-dump at some points, but I’ll update it to be more organized at some point.

Updated 01/20/2019

Rhys the Serval

Spotify playlist | Moodboard

Rhys was designed by @creative-sanic and she also came up with most of his backstory!

Rhys is a gender-nonconforming cis gay dude. He was born to a ‘feral’ mother in the wilderness closest to Central City (between the City and Mystic Ruins, far enough away from civilization to be undetected for a majority of his early life). At age 7 or 8, a massive fire swept the forest, putting him and his mother in massive danger. Officials sent to contain the fire discovered that she and Rhys were living alone in the forest, and took the two into protective custody while working through the devastation caused by the fire. The city pressured Rhys’s mother to join civilization, but she adamantly refused, and as a consequence, Rhys was stolen from her and put up for adoption, leading to her having a violent breakdown. She was moved to a containment facility and hasn’t seen Rhys since; he has only the faintest memories of her. He was adopted at age 13 or 14 (having been shuffled around in foster care before then) by a family of bears, and went on to be a fairly average Mobian citizen, working as a waiter at Penne For Your Thoughts. That’s where he met Vitriol, who is now his boyfriend. After dating for a few months, they decided to move in together, with Vitriol moving into Rhys’s apartment, which was the larger of the two. Rhys is now roughly 19 years old (18 or 19).

Rhys and Vitriol have a steady relationship relatively devoid of problems. They love each other enough that no problem is too big for them to tackle, and when Vitriol became part of the Restoration (the collective effort to undo the damage done by Robotnik and the Resistance), Rhys moved with him all over the world, glad to have a reasonable excuse to travel. Neither wanted to attempt a longstanding long-distance relationship; their being separated briefly during the Resistance was frustrating enough for the two of them.

Rhys is unaware that he possesses Empathic abilities, and simply assumes he’s very good at figuring people out/being sympathetic, but in truth, the forest fire in his youth served as the catalyst for his abilities. Since his Empathy doesn’t require the same physical drain as, say, Vitriol’s Strength, Rhys mistakes his Chaos-Energy-related fatigue after using his powers to be emotional exhaustion. When he’s that tired is roughly the only time he can show unprovoked anger, but he’s also in-tune enough with himself to recognize when he’s being needlessly mean, and he’ll usually apologize right away. This happened most frequently during the events of the Resistance, where Rhys was tasked with helping to get survivors to safe places; he was very good at comforting those who may have lost friends/family in the attacks. From that, he’s begun to entertain the idea of becoming a therapist someday, though he’s not sure how he would afford the college degree for that.

He gets along very well with Unknown due to them both having rather upbeat personalities. Though Unknown can be a little overbearing sometimes, Rhys likes talking to them and sometimes they’ll gush about how cute Vitriol is.

As mentioned previously, Rhys doesn’t conform to typical gender norms; he’s a fashionista of sorts and doesn’t care what gender clothing is associated with. He thinks skirts are cute and feel nice, and he thinks makeup is a lot of fun, though he doesn’t do either every single day, just every now and then. For the most part, unless he’s feeling adventurous, he wears a hoodie and jeans, though his work outfit is a fancy suit. So, it’s often nice for him to just wear something low-effort. That being said, he always jumps at every opportunity to do his boyfriend’s makeup, and though Vitriol isn’t the biggest fan of it, he likes seeing Rhys smile, so he usually gives in.

Rhys often prompts Vitriol to keep up with his health, and the two go on camping trips whenever Rhys can convince Vitriol to go. He’s very good at camping; he can build a shelter easily, knows which plants are edible, etc.. Vitriol, by contrast, is pretty clueless, but Rhys is more than happy to teach him.

When speaking, Rhys normally has a somewhat-formal tone, and he uses little to no slang (usually just words like “gonna,” and he almost never drops the G’s at the end of words). He’s very polite by nature (and some of the formality was ingrained by his job), and he tends to not talk a lot. When he’s really comfortable around someone (like Vitriol), he can chatter a lot, but if he catches himself, he’ll get really embarrassed about it. He has a soft, lilting voice that many find pleasant to listen to and soothing. When he gets excited, or raises his voice, it gets slightly higher in pitch. He’s not an anxious person (as in, he doesn’t have an anxiety disorder) but he’s rather shy and awkward around new people. He’s more of a reserved person than an anxious one, and he is by no means meek; having been raised (post-adoption) by a family of bears taught him how to roughhouse and hold his own against bigger enemies.

For the most part, Rhys isn’t bothered by his past. His life in the forest is far enough away, mentally, that to him it doesn’t feel like it even happened to him. However, the fire was a traumatic event for him, and to this day he has a deep-seated fear of fire. It’s rare, but on occasion, he will have nightmares about that day, and he doesn’t handle that well when alone. Fortunately, Vitriol is fairly helpful to Rhys—his simply being there is very comforting, even though he never really knows what to say.

Toxic the Porcupine

Spotify playlist | Moodboard

Note: while this character started out as a sonicsona of sorts, they’ve somewhat evolved from that and I don’t see them quite so much as “me” anymore. They do, however, share my name (or rather the name I’m using currently, as I write this). To further complicate things they also look the way I do right now and I use them for vent art lmao so, if I happen to draw myself as a mobian ever again I’ll tag it as #not oc. That way it’s clear what’s Toxic the OC and what’s Toxic the...uh, human being I guess.

Toxic is an agender porcupine who hasn’t settled on their sexuality yet--they know they’re asexual, but they haven’t thought any further into their romantic orientation. They were born in a tiny unnamed village settled in the shadow of Scrap Brain Zone, and only recently did they leave after a majority of it was burnt to the ground...by them. They showed signs of being trans at a young age, and were subsequently bullied quite harshly by both their peers and their family. They came out to their family at age 17, which only deepened the rift already forming, and subsequently Toxic ran away for a week, spending that time in Scrap Brain Zone. That was their first overnight foray into the Zone, something that would eventually become a staple of their life.

At age 19, they discovered an abandoned prototype Wispon in Scrap Brain Zone (devoid of Wisps), which they then decided to retrofit with the flaming spouts from Scrap Brain Zone to make their own strange hybrid flamethrower. A few nights later, after a particularly awful verbal spat with their family, they decided to fake their own death by setting fire to their own room. However, things quickly got out of hand, and the whole town ended up in flames. They fled, unsure if anyone made it out alive that night...and a little less than sympathetic if they didn’t. (Fortunately, a majority of the little village’s populace wound up trickling into neighboring villages and towns)

Since then, they’ve been absolutely destroying almost everything in their path. With no direction and no impulse control, they are a complete loose cannon throwing a wrench in both Eggman’s plans and Sonic’s adventures. They live by a motto of recklessness and “I’m here for a good time, not a long time.” Being an un-powered Mobian, they can’t do much of anything with the Wispon taken away, but taking that Wispon away is much easier said than done. Shortly after their ‘debut’ as a villain-of-sorts, Eggman reached out to them with a message essentially reading, “hey, do you want a direction in which to burn everything down (that is preferably not my everything)?” Since joining forces with Robotnik, though, their chaos has become much more controlled, and now incidents of mass fires can usually be linked to Eggman sending them off somewhere. They are a persistent thorn in the Freedom Fighters’ sides as they just love to fight and don’t really care who they fight.

They will not, however, attack civilians directly. Their fires might pose a threat to cities, but they don’t outright attack people unprompted--their chaos isn’t fueled of malice but rather of recklessness and an extreme lack of forethought. If harassed, however, they aren’t above punching someone in the face, and civilians are warned to just stay the hell away from Toxic. Their behavior overall is best classed as “more of a danger to themselves than others, even when provoked.”

Toxic only owns one jacket and one pair of boots, as well as no other accessories save for the spiked bracelets and collar, since everything else was burnt. One item they are occasionally pictured with, but rarely wear, is a long ankh necklace, the origins of which they refuse to elaborate on. However, it’s clearly important to them… Prior to burning everything, they often wore ripped jeans, loose half-torn-up tank-tops with a variety of detailed patterns, and lots of bracelets. They despite feminine-coded clothing and would rather die than wear it. Overall, they’re fond of clothes that look like they’re being held together by safety pins and hope.

Their speaking pattern is completely all-over-the-place. Their accent is untraceable, they mix slang from a variety of regions, and mix pidgin street-slang with oddly formal sentence structure or complicated words. They alternate between dropped G’s at the end of words and dropped H’s at the beginning, but inconsistently; rather than being a sign that this accent is faked, it’s more a reflection of how scrambled they are on the inside. Toxic’s voice is prone to cracking, especially when they yell (which is very often), and it has a certain hoarse quality to it most of the time. It rests in a midrange between stereotypically “male” and “female” voices, and can be mistaken for a young boy or slightly-older girl interchangeably. This irritates them to no end—they’re no stranger to yelling in demand for their proper pronouns to be used.

Toxic has frequent nightmares, but never speaks of them. They often suffer from broken sleep, only getting a few hours at a time, and on occasion are struck with insomnia. During that time, they doodle or write, dealing with rather dark subjects, but never share this willingly. Oddly enough, they have a rather intense fear of fire (ironic given their Wispon) and of heights. Strangely they seem to use their fear as an adrenaline boost of sorts, embracing it to use as a motivation. (It’s somewhat similar to how Batman uses bats as his main motif, despite having been traumatized by an experience with bats in his childhood.)

They cannot be swayed to being “good,” because they truly believe they are an awful person who could never be good even if they tried. So, they just do what they want out of a very specific, Nihilistic worldview, and truth be told they’re simply a chaotic being who’s in way over their head. Despite being a villain, however, they are a big fan of Sonic and his friends, and they consider it a huge honor to be able to fight him. They’ve created an odd sort of parent-child bond between themselves and Robotnik, adopting him as their dad (he didn’t really get a say). Robotnik isn’t exactly doting but he does view them as his child in a sense, and often makes them new weapons to use alongside their Wispon (which they refuse to part with; he repairs it fro them as-needed).

Vex the Cat/Fox Cross

Spotify playlist | Moodboard

Vex is a bigender aroace genetic experiment who most closely resembles a fusion of a fox and a cat. (Any pronouns are applicable to them, but I use she/her most, because I have a lot of “he” and “they” OCs already) She has lived roughly 17 years, the first 14 of which were spent in the facility that created them. Partway through what would have been the 15th year, a catastrophe occurred at the facility, giving Vex, Vitriol and Unknown a window to escape. During this process, Vex and Unknown became separated from Vitriol, escaping the facility and winding up on their own. They traveled in a world absolutely foreign to them for months, eventually, through a strange turn of events, joining a thieves’ guild in an attempt to forge new identities. They had great success as a thieving duo up until the unfortunate disappearance of Unknown, after which Vex abandoned the guild to search for them. Instead of Unknown, however, Vex ended up reconnecting with Vitriol in Central City, after which the two worked together to find Unknown, eventually finding their sibling in the Resistance. Since finding each other, the three have not been separated, and now form Team Motley.

Vex is generally regarded as the smartest of the trio, having a sharp wit and capacity both to plan ahead and think on their feet. Her Manipulation ability makes negotiations and covert ops very easy for them, with its one flaw being that it doesn’t work on others with similar abilities, such as Empathy. All three experiments possess low natural levels of Chaos Energy, below what is healthy, and their bodies cannot contain it well, so their abilities rely on the Energy around them, both in the environment and other people. Mobians often report “a strange sort of tiredness” after being Manipulated by Vex, as her power functions by draining a bit of Chaos Energy from the target and matching its wavelength.

Due to her affinity for making others do as she says, Vex is the leader of Team Motley, and, despite being the ‘middle child,’ the other two often go to her for advice. She is the organizational backbone to the team, a natural leader with a kind heart hidden behind a few layers of selfishness. Vex values family and friends above all else, and has a keen sense of right and wrong, even if she doesn’t always do what she knows to be right.

Vex is aware of her Manipulation ability, and does her best to curb its effects when she isn’t intending to use it, but given that it’s activated by her voice, sometimes she can’t control it very well. In addition to that, Vex is more than a little greedy; coming from a background where she didn’t even own her own life, Vex fell in love with her life in the thieves’ guild, mainly for the riches they earned and the thrill of the escape.

She’s a fan of loud, gaudy jewelry, luxurious metals, and other frivolous high-class things, though she doesn’t wear them in public. During their time in the thieves’ guild, Unknown and Vex lived in a network of caves, where many of the things they stole during their heyday are still hidden. While she misses those days, she doesn’t regret leaving them behind, and rather considers it an... option for future employment, once the Restoration is all said and done.

Despite her love of jewelry, Vex prefers not to wear clothes at all. They’ll wear their binder or a sports bra, and that’s about all; if necessary, they’ll wear baggy army-pattern pants or a baggy jacket. They don’t like the feeling of most fabrics on their fur, and don’t care a lot about fashion, but they tend towards more masculine clothing, often for its less-skin-tight properties. They also don’t mind skirts, but only wear them casually, as sometimes the extra fabric can get caught on things or be uncomfortable for them to sit on.

All three experiments tend towards more formal speech, but of the three, Vex has been trained out of that habit the most. She’s a real smooth-talker who adapts her speech patterns to mirror those of the person she’s talking to. When speaking casually, Vex is fairly neutral and doesn’t have any specific quirks to their speech pattern. When she’s comfortable around someone, she speaks in a rather husky voice, but not a very deep or gruff sound. It’s more of what would be described as “butch,” because their voice is closer to the stereotypically “feminine” sound than the stereotypically “masculine” sound.

Vex’s main phobia is having their mouth covered by something—anything from someone’s hands to fabric to a muzzle. This is because when her Manipulation was discovered by the scientists who created her, they immediately recognized it as a threat and she was kept muzzled for extended periods of time. The muzzle had supposedly been ‘humanely designed,’ but if at any point she frustrated her keepers, they were no strangers to shutting or covering the air-intake of it until she cooperated. Of the three, Vex has dealt with her trauma the least, and her sleeping pattern is just as broken as if not more broken than Toxic’s, and she tends to grind her teeth when she sleeps as well. She doesn’t speak of it much, but she and Vitriol have really bonded the most over their shared trauma. He is, essentially, the only person remaining who knows what they went through.

Because they’re aroace, they have little concept of how flirting works other than when they’re using their Manipulation ability (which isn’t really calculated, more an instinctive knowledge that saying or doing certain things will achieve the effect they want). In other words, they’re extremely oblivious. The only thing they really care about is family, and they will do anything to protect them--when fighting they have no qualms about “fighting dirty” and will use anything to their advantage. Unusually, Vex has the ability to climb along walls quite easily using their claws, practically like a lizard. This combined with their night vision makes them quite formidable to fight in the dark.

Vitriol the Ferret/Porcupine Cross

Spotify playlist | Moodboard

Vitriol is a gay cis guy who most closely resembles a fusion of a porcupine and a ferret. He has lived roughly 18 years, the first 15 of which spent in the facility that created him. During the calamity leading to his escape, Vitriol separated from Unknown and Vex in order to give them a chance to get out, taking on the officials sent to stop them. He ended up leaving via a different route, resulting in him coming into this world in a completely different place from Vex and Unknown. Vitriol spent the next half-year wandering across Spagonia’s countryside, often stopping to spend a night or two on a farm in exchange for helping its owners, who never questioned why a mysteriously-strong stranger would be wandering the wilderness. Many took him to be some kind of nature spirit, and treated him kindly; he realized through this little pilgrimage that he quite liked helping people out, though he never stayed more than a week in one place. Searching for his siblings was his main priority.

Eventually Vitriol came across a little town, the port of which was a dock for ferries to and from Central City (primarily used by high-end citygoers for transportation to their summer homes). He was told that Central City was a place many people lived and an even larger number of people visited; Vitriol resolved that, if Vex and Unknown were to wind up anywhere, it was likely a place like that--a place people are expected to wind up at. Not understanding the concept of having to pay for things, Vitriol snuck aboard, and managed to go undetected for the entirety of the trip by packing himself nicely into a tiny corner belowdecks. The night before the trip was to end, he snuck off the boat and swam to shore in Central City. Immediately enraptured by the city’s many brilliant lights, Vitriol decided to stay there and do his best to keep an eye out for his siblings.

He spent his first two weeks sleeping on the streets and wandering through the city, until one evening, allured by the glowing neon signs on the inside, he found himself inside a rather lively nightclub/bar. One thing led to another and Vitriol ended up breaking up a fight, catching the attention of the bar’s owner (who was, at the time, half of the staff, as well). Vitriol was offered the job of security officer, no questions asked, and, having begun to come to terms with the fact that money wasn’t just something that one town invented, Vitriol accepted. For the beginning of his ‘career’ he still lived on the streets, but eventually he saved up enough for a tiny postage-stamp of an apartment. It’s only enough space for him to just exist, but that was plenty of space for him. Over time he earned enough money to live comfortably—comfortably enough to get gauges and a septum piercing, both of which helped him in his line of work immensely (as most of his ‘security’ work was simply to look scary enough to keep people from misbehaving).

Vitriol worked there for roughly the same amount of time that Vex and Unknown “worked�� as thieves, and it was during this time that he met and started dating Rhys, moving in with him after roughly three months together. He only reunited with Vex upon happening to run into her when wandering the town one weekend night. The next day he quit his job and left to travel with her, searching for their last remaining sibling. Now that the three are reunited, Vitriol serves as the muscle of the team, doing all the heavy lifting and door-kicking necessary. While he vastly prefers sitting on the couch and watching TV with plentiful snacks nearby (preferably cookies), he’s not the type to shirk responsibilities. He’s just looking forward to going back to relaxing in Central City with Rhys when the Restoration is over (and, though he won’t admit it, he does miss when his only job was looking mean).

Vitriol doesn’t have a lot in his wardrobe. His usual staples are a crop top and leather pants, though he also wears skinny jeans and ripped t-shirts. Sometimes he wears pants without a shirt, and, overall, he doesn’t care a lot about fashion. He just picks up what he thinks is cool, which is usually a t-shirt or crop top with a few words on it (his favorites are “BORN FOR HELL” and “LIFE RUINER”). From there, he’ll often tear off the sleeves of the t-shirt, or cut holes and slits into the body of it. The only thing he always wears are the red fingerless gloves with lightweight chains dangling off the backs.

He tends to mumble the most when he speaks, unless he’s angry or using his “Work Voice.” His “work voice” is the particular loud, gruff tone he takes that he picked up from his job; an intimidating deeper and more snarling version of his voice, often accompanied by a very stern or frightfully blank expression. This is made more intimidating by the fact that all 3 of the genetic experiment characters have a habit of needing to initiate conversation through eye contact, much in the same way that a small child might gently rest their hand on the arm of an adult whose attention they want, albeit much more unsettling. So often if one of the three wants to speak to someone, they’ll stare very intently at the person’s face until acknowledged (Vex has adapted the most of the three and therefore only does it to the other two and Rhys). When not using his “work voice,” Vitriol has a rough undertone to his voice, not necessarily a snarl so much as a growl. His voice is naturally deep, and lends itself well to singing his favorite music—rock music.

Vitriol often suffers night terrors and nightmares* linked to his trauma. When living alone, after waking from a nightmare, Vitriol would pace his apartment or wander around Central City to cool off, but after moving in with Rhys, he’s processing his trauma a bit more as opposed to just avoiding it. He hasn’t told Rhys much, just that he came from “a horrible place, where [he] was trapped,” and Rhys doesn’t pry; oftentimes it’s enough to just be reminded that he’s free for Vitriol to calm back down.

Despite his prickly exterior (both literally and figuratively), Vitriol is much more cuddly than Rhys is. Perhaps it’s from being touch-starved in the facility for so long or perhaps it’s just part of his nature, but either way, Vitriol is no stranger to snuggling up against Rhys (most often) or his siblings (slightly less often as Vex is somewhat touch-averse). Rhys isn’t exactly annoyed by this, and often finds it endearing, but on occasion Vitriol has been known to act like a housecat--flopping down right in Rhys’s way to get his attention. He’s also a bit of a jokester, but only around Rhys and his family.

His deepest fear is of being helpless. He doesn’t tend to show much external emotion besides smiling at Rhys or his siblings, or glaring if he’s annoyed by something, but if he’s being dragged along the floor—especially if he’s being dragged by his underarms, as was his keepers’ favorite way of moving him from place to place—he will absolutely lose his mind in a panic. He also panics if cornered, lashing out with uncontrolled strength to get away, which usually doesn’t end well for his captors.

*Nightmares are your standard bad dreams that occur during REM sleep. Usually when waking from a nightmare, the person remembers what they were dreaming about. Often someone suffering from a nightmare will toss and turn, and maybe sleep-talk. Night terrors, however, are somewhere between dreaming and being awake; someone suffering a night terror might yell, thrash, kick or scream, or sit upright in bed with eyes wide open. They cannot, however, see or be woken from the night terror, and will flop back down anywhere from ten minutes to a half-hour after initial panic. They can often be confusing to the person suffering them, and only a vague recollection of what was going on remains when the person wakes up.

Unknown the Raccoon/Hedgehog Cross

Spotify playlist | Moodboard

Unknown is an agender bisexual polyamorous genetic experiment most resembling a fusion of a hedgehog and a raccoon. They have lived roughly 16 years, only four of which have been spent outside. When Vex and Unknown ended up on their own, Unknown took on a role of the silent intimidator between the two. Vex’s Manipulation came in handy most times, but when necessary, Unknown could provide some intimidation.

Unknown was a vastly different person then from who they are now. They were far more focused, and taught themself parkour, as well as having put themself through rigorous training to maintain a good physical health. They rarely spoke, and refused to give themself a new name, unlike Vex and Vitriol. They weren’t interested in the riches, though they did suffer from a bit of a hoarding impulse, enjoying the feeling of owning something. They didn’t care for jewels or finer things, unlike Vex; they were more participating for the adrenaline rush. At that point in time, they fully understood the brevity of their power, and it was imperative for them to keep a calm demeanor at all times; they were far less animated than they are now.

Then, about a year and a half after they’d escaped, Unknown abruptly went missing. A heist went sideways, the two became separated, and suddenly Vex couldn’t find them. A few months after that, Robotnik began taking over the world, and shortly after that, Unknown awoke in a dumpster somewhere in Park Avenue, with no memory of any life prior to that. They gathered all the information about themself from this police flyer:

From there, Unknown wandered the city amidst the chaos, confused and curious. Through that, they met Sonic when they helped him fight off a few robots. Impressed with their skills, he asked them to join the Resistance, which they cluelessly agreed to, definitely not because a cute boy was offering it to them. Unknown ended up being quite helpful to the Resistance, despite presumably having no Chaos Powers. They got along well with virtually everyone save for Omega and Vector, as they have a slight fear of people taller than them.

After being reunited with Vex and Vitriol, Unknown has stayed relatively close to them; the three are inseparable, traveling in a group for the Restoration. Shortly after the final battle, as the Resistance members were celebrating for the night, Unknown stumbled across Infinite while walking home. Unsure whether to turn him in or not, they decided to take him home and let him heal from his wounds first, then figure out who to turn him in to. In the end, after two weeks of Infinite recuperating (during which he revealed his name to be Zero), Unknown decided instead to keep Infinite in their home, unsure what would happen to him otherwise. For a short while, they didn’t tell anyone else, but once they told Vex and Vitriol, they were urged to tell the Resistance as well. It wasn’t taken well at first, but eventually the issue was settled—Unknown would take care of and reform Infinite, because having him close by and watched over is better than having him roam around unsupervised. Despite that, Unknown doesn’t treat Infinite like a child or prisoner but rather a friend. Currently, Infinite resides in the home Unknown was occupying during the Resistance, which was rather close to the site of the final battle.

Unknown’s usual ‘work clothes’ are a leather bodysuit of sorts with buckles similar to an airplane seatbelt’s buckles (and a hole for their tail) and combat boots as well as padded gloves that help absorb shocks), but in the past, they would wear a large cloak. It’s not clear where this went during their disappearance. In their free time, they prefer to wear clothes with deep v-necks to let their neck/chest fluff breathe, and they often wear ripped clothing like Vitriol. Unknown’s thick fur makes them more prone to overheating, but despite that, they enjoy running as a hobby and a way to stay fit. They often wear fitness clothes (a tank top and gym shorts) when they’re in an urban area, though if in the wilderness, they’ll just wear running shoes.

Typically, their voice has a bright and happy tone to it, all the time, and they’re very good at faking it when they’re actually not okay. Vex and Vitriol can usually pick up on when they’re lying, but most others can’t, something Unknown is actually very happy about. When it comes to negative feelings, Unknown is very secretive, but with positive feelings, they love to share—and overshare. (The only exception to their secrecy is anger; an angry Unknown is frightfully quiet and cold, and painfully obvious.) Oftentimes they don’t realize they’re oversharing, but Vex (or Sonic, if present) is more than willing to quickly interrupt and divert the conversation. Unknown tends to use overly-familiar language with just about everyone, especially words like “buddy” or “pal.” It’s unclear if they’ve picked this up from Sonic.

They often suffer from night terrors, similar to Vitriol, but they claim it has no effect on them, as they don’t remember the trauma giving them nightmares. In the beginning, this was the truth; however, they refuse to open up to anyone, even their siblings, about what’s going on in their head. They’re well aware that they’re the most positive of the trio, and part of them doesn’t want to ruin that idea. Another thing they never tell anyone is that they often suffer from sleep paralysis*, wherein they often see strange things from their past, but existing still in the present. They don’t really know how to verbalize the experience to anyone else.

Unknown doesn’t have many fears, but they are downright petrified of needles and electricity—not in the sense where they’re scared of electronics, but they’re more frightened of visible electricity, like a fizzing outlet, lightning, or the Electric Wispons.

That being said, they do have a few insecurities, namely their sharp teeth. They’ve accidentally frightened people with them in the past, so when they first meet people nowadays, they try to smile with their mouth closed only. The anxiety dissipates eventually, as they’re more concerned about first impressions.

*Sleep paralysis is an event where a person is mentally ‘there’ but unable to move or speak at all. It occurs when they are falling asleep or just waking up, and episodes usually last less than a few minutes, but can occur multiple times, not just once. It’s thought to be linked to a dysfunction in REM sleep, and is caused by sleep deprivation, psychological stress, or a poor sleep schedule.

Extra stuff:

Files from the experimentation: Basic knowledge on Vex, Vitriol and Unknown, as they would’ve been presented to their guards.

Scrap Brain Zone (writing from Toxic’s perspective)

Unknown meets Infinite (Comic) Part 1 | Part 2

Experiment origins (Flipnote) [old] (Flashing light warning)

Unknown waking up (writing from Unknown’s perspective) [old]

OC Voiceclaims (video)

Chaos Vision (superemeralds’ idea) doodles | Click bold text to see his post on his blog.

Chips Ahoy (goofy non-canon animatic that im just really happy with)

Test animation for Toxic (Flicker warning)

Pride (doodles of 4/5 OCs for pride [toxic didn’t exist yet])

Moebius AU (Drawings with short description) | Moebius!Unknown video (Flash warning)

First Punch (Animated comic feat. @creative-sanic ‘s Aurora) | Still version

Rough concept writing - Toxic’s powers [will be removed when I decide on their abilities and how they get them in canon] (Writing)

Character Turn-Arounds (Comic/Animation ref) (Includes colour hex keys!)

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expatimes · 4 years

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Trade to human rights: Trajectory of Trump's China policy

United States economic policy and foreign policy have always been intimately entwined. But what was traditionally a discreet symbiosis cloaked in noble rhetoric of promoting global stability and human rights has been explicitly and unapologetically wedded under President Donald Trump.

Nowhere is that more apparent than in his administration's myriad confrontations with China.

Trump has famously labelled COVID-19 the “China virus”, accusing Beijing of covering up the initial outbreak and sowing the seeds of a global pandemic.

Tensions between the world's two largest economy have steadily escalated since Trump entered the Oval Office promising to get tough on China for what he has described as unfair practices.

It is a promise he has made good on many times over. From slapping tariffs on hundreds of billions of dollars worth of Chinese imports to curbing the global might of Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei, declaring Beijing a currency manipulator, and effectively forcing China's ByteDance to partner with US companies to keep TikTok US up and running, the Trump administration's China policy has used economic pain as a cudgel to try and create an edge for the US.

Human rights appeared to only marginally factor into this transactional approach. But in the run-up to the 2020 election, they have increasingly taken center stage.

Meshing trade with human rights

The US public's view of China has dimmed considerably on Trump's watch.

A recent survey by the Pew Research Center found 73 percent of US adults view China unfavourably - the most negative view in 15 years and a staggering 26 percentage points higher than 2018.

Since March, when coronavirus lockdowns swept the nation, triggering the sharpest quarterly recession on record, negative views of China spiked 7 percentage points, Pew found.

That same survey showed a majority of Americans - nearly three-quarters - favored promoting human rights in China over US-economic relations.

That preference was strongest among Democratic and Democratic-leaning voters.

Earlier this month, the US Customs and Border Patrol Agency issued orders blocking imports of certain products from the Xinjiang region of China, citing concerns about forced-labor involving Uighur Muslims.

In August, the United Nations said it had received credible reports that more than a million Uighurs have been held by the Chinese government in massive internment camps.

Beijing describes them as "re-education camps" that provide vocational training.

The CBP orders followed on from earlier blacklists of Chinese companies suspected of using forced labor - part of a flurry of activity that has seen human rights move to the forefront of the Trump administration's confrontations with China this year.

On July 9, the US slapped sanctions on Chen Quanguo, a member of China's powerful Politburo, and three other senior officials, accusing them of serious human rights abuses against the Uighurs.

Later that month, more officials and the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps or XPCC were blacklisted by the US Treasury for alleged human rights abuses in Xinjiang.

Known as “bingtuan”, the XPCC runs vast agricultural enterprises across Xinjiang, and is described by the US Treasury as a paramilitary organization that is subordinate to the Chinese Communist Party.

The Trump administration revoked Hong Kong's preferential economic status this summer and blacklisted officials from Hong Kong and the mainland in response to a sweeping national security law that threatens to chillties in the semi-autonomous territory.

The US also ordered the Chinese consulate in Houston to close. Beijing retaliated by ordering the US to shut its consulate in the southwestern city of Chengdu.

A man holds a sign during a rally to show support for Uighurs and their fight for human rights in Hong Kong [File: Lee Jin-man, AP]

Together, these actions have kept the spotlight on Trump's increasingly hostile approach to China in the run-up to the November 3 election, as he seeks to depict his opponent, Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden as weak on foreign policy, generally, and China, in particular.

“China will own the United States” if Biden wins, Trump has said.

But according to former US National Security Adviser John Bolton, Trump's focus on promoting human rights through economic penalties represents a U-turn.

Bolton wrote in his recently published memoir the president had been uninterested in the plight of China's Uighurs, preferring to take a soft line as he tried to broker a resolution to the trade war with Chinese President Xi Jinping and boost Chinese imports of US goods to curry favor with US voters.

In The Room Where It Happened, Bolton wrote of a meeting between Trump and Xi in Japan last June, during which Trump “stressed the importance of farmers and increased Chinese purchases of soybeans and wheat in the electoral outcome”.

Bolton wrote that during the same meeting, Trump told Xi building the camps for Uighurs “was exactly the right thing to do” and urged Xi to go ahead.

Trump now appears to have meshed his approach to trade with human rights, pre-empting Biden, who has significantly hardened his rhetoric against Beijing, even referring to President Xi as a “thug”.

Before he even took office, President Trump telegraphed his intention to shake things up dramatically, when he broke with nearly 40 years of US foreign policy by becoming the first US president-elect to accept a congratulatory phone call from the president of Taiwan [File: Leah Millis/Reuters]

2020 double-down

Trump's belligerence towards China resonated with voters on the campaign trail in 2016. Before he even took office, he telegraphed his intention to shake things up dramatically, when he broke with nearly 40 years of US foreign policy by becoming the first US president-elect to accept a congratulatory phone call from the president of Taiwan.

Under the “one China” policy, which the US has acknowledged since 1979, Beijing views Taiwan as part of China.

Once in office, Trump declared trade wars to be “good” and launched his with China, levying tariffs on Chinese goods that prompted Beijing to slap retaliatory sanctions on US goods - actions that have damaged both intersection.

As the US elections have drawn near, Trump has been doubling down on his tough stance on China.

In August, the US approved the sale of F-16 fighter jets to Taiwan. Beijing was incensed.

Trump also signed an executive order banning any transactions with the Chinese owners of the immensely popular apps TikTok and WeChat.

Meanwhile, Biden has yet to set out policies specific to China, but some analysts say he would be expected to hold Beijing to account on human rights abuses, intellectual property violations, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and the unresolved trade dispute.

Democratic US presidential nominee and former Vice President Joe Biden long pursued the line that the US did not regard China as a competitor, though analysts say the pandemic has changed his approach [File: Jonathan Ernst/Reuters]

Biden had long pursued the line that the US did not regard China as a competitor, though analysts say the pandemic has changed his approach.

Many foreign policy wonks believe a Biden administration would likely reset and reprioritise US relationships with allies and international organizations such as NATO; check China's growing influence within the UN agencies; and reassert leadership on matters of global importance, which has been glaringly absent throughout the COVID-19 crisis.

Where Beijing stands in terms of presidential preference is open to debate.

China, along with Russia and Iran, has been suspected of working to undermine the US election, according to William Evanina, director of the National Counterintelligence and Security Center. He said last week China views Trump as “unpredictable” and does not want to see him re-elected.

Yu Jie, an analyst at London's Royal Institute of International Affairs, however, said Beijing has yet to decide on a more favored candidate, but would likely prefer the more predictable approach of a Biden White House.

It is not a choice between a good or bad relationship, she told Al Jazeera, but what sort of a bad relationship does Beijing want with Washington.

“I don't think China has made up its mind yet [which candidate it prefers] Because there is a realization that, irrespective of who occupies the White House for the next four years, the relationship with the United States is going to be a troubled one, ”she said.

#world Read full article: https://expatimes.com/?p=10854&feed_id=7286

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somesortofitalianroast · 7 years

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When My Back Aches: Part 12: le Commandante des Chasseurs

Back in, oh, February of 2016, @beachsequence posted a status update, I caught a writing bug, and with a lot of encouragement from @bonos-grindcore-sideproject, I’ve been working on this story ever since. This story is the story of Paul O’Connell, a Detective Inspector with the Dublin Garda, and the pain-in-his-ass redhead, Pat Coyne. Paul O’Connell is looking for his cousin, Stephen O’Connell, who ran away in 1975. The story is told in snippets, and has been retroactively tagged with #when my back aches.

This section picks up immediately when Section 11 left off, with Pat Coyne telling Paul O’Connell that she is the Huntress, and that Stephen O’Connell left her a warning - about the apocalypse.

Warnings: None, really. Similar to that last section, Paul and Pat are having a conversation. Mary Collins (last mentioned in Section 10, last spoke in Section 9) is still in the room. However, it does have quite the cliffhanger.

Story, as usual, below the cut.

“No. All that I can say for certain is that he [Stephen] is aware that something is in the works. Something big. And he decided to warn me.”

“Warn you? I’m unaware that you two know each other.”

“Warn me, yes. He knew that activating this little tracker would bring me to Dublin. Whatever’s going on, he intentionally called me, intentionally called the Huntress, to Dublin.”

“What would he do that?”

“The impression he left on the device is… the apocalypse.”

- Section 11: The Huntress

Paul O’Connell stared at Pat after her pronouncement, his expression just shy of pure bewilderment, before he rolled his eyes and pulled a reporter’s notebook from his pocket. He locked eyes with Pat, flipping through the notebook, before finding a blank page. He fished a pen from the same pocket, uncapped it, and started quickly jotting notes. Pat watched him for a few moments, before speaking.

“What are you doing?” Pat asked. She seemed nonplussed by his actions.

“I’m taking notes,” Paul replied, skimming what he’s written, nodding. “Now, Ms. Coyne -”

“Doctor.” At Paul’s look, she replied, “it’s Doctor. If you’re going to address me by title, it’s either Dr. Coyne or Madame la Chasseresse. In some circles, I am addressed as Mistress Coyne. Get your mind out of the gutter - it’s the archaic form of my English title.”

Paul’s smile was a note too close to “let’s humor the crazy person” but he nodded and continued his question, “Dr. Coyne, you’re going to have to humor me; I was recently assigned to this case. You said that you found that object in an alley here in Dublin. What is it and how does it relate to my case?”

“What are you doing.” It wasn’t a question this time.

“My job.” Paul looked up. “An answer please, Dr. Coyne.”

“As I said earlier, it’s a tracking device. It was recently in the hands of your cousin, Stephen.” Pat was speaking very slowly.

“How do you know that?” Paul scribbled something in his notebook.

“It’s one of mine.”

“You put a tracking device on my cousin?”

“I did not put the tracking device on your cousin. As I said, I recalled all of them in the 90s, and replaced every single one that was returned. This one is older than the ones I issued.”

“What organization does this belong to? What organization do you belong to?”

“Multiple. As I already told you, Detective Inspector, I’m the Huntress. I’m part of the Hunters’ Council, as well as the… Masters’ Council.”

“Hunters’ Council… That some sort of American fraternity?”

“If it helps, yes.”

“Not what I asked.”

“No.” Pat sighed. “It’s… complicated.”

“Well, un-complicated it.”

“What do you know about…” Pat trailed off. “What have you heard about a Louis de la Côte du Val du Mer?”

“American billionaire. Has reclusive tendencies, and is rather famous for throwing outrageously expensive masked balls,” Paul answered immediately, giving Pat a curious look. “Why? What does he have to do with anything?”

“He’s a Vampire.” At Paul’s disbelieving look, she continued. “And the Hunters were created to control Vampires. At least, in the Beginning. It’s even more complicated now, given the Treaty and the creation of the twin Councils. You do realize that you’re le Commandante des Chasseurs, the Leader of the Hunters’ Council, do you not?”

#my writing #when my back aches #paul o'connell #pat coyne #vampire #i just realized that this story doesn't pass the bechdal test #despite the fact that #of characters who we have actually met #women outnumber men #i just haven't had a chance for Mary and Pat to converse about something other than Paul with it being obviously forced for a bechdal pass..#as in #what else are they going to talk about #give what's happening?#are they really going to discuss lipstick and shoes?#or Mary's job?#Or the Vaults?#No #they're going to discuss Paul O'Connell #or maybe Stephen #but #at this moment #any other conversation would be stilted and forced #like i was attempting to force a bechdal pass #just imagine that while paul was on the floor drooling they discussed his tea collection and the weather in dublin #perhaps any trouble they had getting to his apartment #school or work #that sort of thing #or perhaps they were more serious #and discussed the repercussions of what pat found #and how it would effect mary's job

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mathewingram · 6 years

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Newsgeist un-conference: Facebook faces the music, sort of

Note: This is something I originally published on the New Gatekeepers blog at the Columbia Journalism Review, where I’m the chief digital writer

The Newsgeist conference, which was held this past weekend in Phoenix (as it is every year), is an unusual animal. It’s invitation-only, co-sponsored by Google and the Knight Foundation, and aimed at bringing journalists and academics and others involved in media together for what is known as an “un-conference.” That means there aren’t any organized sessions set up in advance of the event: attendees put their suggested topics on index cards, then the organizers group them, and select which ones get assigned to different rooms at Arizona State University’s journalism school (anyone whose idea isn’t chosen can also use a free room to host a discussion). The event is held under the so-called Chatham House Rule, which states that any information from the conference can be used or published in any way, but no one can be quoted by name.

The ideas at the most recent version of the conference ranged from the technical (“New Formats For Storytelling”) and the opinionated (“How Do We Atone For the Harm We Have Caused?”) to the whimsical (“Pulsing, Useless Anger: How Do We Deal With It?”), and everywhere in between. But just as there have been for the past couple of years, there were a number of suggestions that boiled down to “What Should Facebook Do?” In other words, what should Facebook do for journalism? (There have also been “What Should Google Do?” panels, but they tend to be less confrontational, perhaps because Google helps to fund the conference and many senior Googlers are present).

This year, the Facebook panel (moderated by someone who works at Google) included two fairly senior staffers who work at the giant social network, one on the technical side and one on the media relations side. They talked about the struggle to determine what constitutes “quality” journalism, and how to make it easier to find, while also down-ranking misinformation and fake news. Many of the suggestions from the audience revolved around making those features better, but then a participant who must remain nameless raised a contentious issue: Why, he asked, was Facebook even interested in doing any of this? Why did it care at all about journalism quality, etc., assuming it actually did? Without knowing the company’s inherent motivation, he suggested, it’s impossible to determine whether its goals are aligned with those of the press, or whether its methods will have any hope of success.

This exchange led to a long, awkward pause, but it’s a good question. For example, if Facebook’s only impetus for paying attention to journalism is simply to boost its engagement metrics, keep people on the platform longer, etc. then that is one thing — and something many media companies might be less interested in, if only because users spending more time reading a news outlet’s content on Facebook means less time doing so on a news publisher’s own site. And if Facebook’s motivation has more to do with avoiding possible federal legislation or more uncomfortable appearances before Congress, then that is also worth knowing.

The two Facebook staffers said their sole aim was to improve the experience for users, who in the short term might be tempted by false information, but over the longer term might prefer higher quality information. But this still puts Facebook in the position of wanting quality information primarily to satisfy users’ desires, and to keep them on Facebook as long as possible. Not because they might need to know the information in order to be informed citizens, which is (theoretically, at least) the reason some journalistic outlets publish things, but just so they are happy and remain loyal users. This is the Facebook equivalent of a publisher who prints stories primarily in order to sell newspapers. Although Facebook co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg has talked about his commitment to quality information as a social good, it’s not clear whether this over-rides his company’s commercial or financial goals.

The point of the question, the original questioner said later, was to highlight just how bizarre a situation the media industry is in, where journalists are deferentially asking a private company if it could please figure out how to fix the misinformation problem, or how to promote better journalism. Also left almost unsaid in the panel, was one of the most tangible means of support that Facebook could provide, namely paying media companies and/or journalists for their work. The only person to make explicit mention of this idea, surprisingly enough, was the Google executive moderating the session (no mention of whether Google might be interested in doing the same).

One of the other panels that sparked conversation was a debate over whether the blockchain can help save journalism, a session that saw at least one F-bomb thrown by attendees, and one that seemed particularly relevant given the ongoing token sale by Civil, the blockchain-powered platform for independent journalism that seems likely to fall short of its minimum $8 million fundraising goal. Other popular topics included artificial intelligence, how to fight misinformation, the need for diversity — one of the topics covered by a great lightning presentation from Heather Bryant — and the shift towards reader revenue through subscriptions and memberships. And as a kind of ironic metaphor for the industry’s current situation, during one panels every cellphone started ringing or vibrating simultaneously with an emergency alert. It was about high water levels due to a tropical storm, but it could just as easily have said: “Warning: We have detected declining levels of revenue and trust in the media industry. Please move to a safe location and await further instructions.”

Newsgeist un-conference: Facebook faces the music, sort of was originally published on mathewingram.com/work

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cyanidekissesxoxo · 7 years

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Personal connection to HFA paper... Call it the beginning of self-exploration?

I’m writing a personal connection paper to a study on High-Functioning Autism/Aspergers (which is a term I learned recently I guess is not as favored any more, but it’s been used - was the term I grew up with as far as other family members - and has identifiable traits that people not highly versed can identify with, so get over it.) I'd say do it.

My family is prone to HFA and ASD.. It has been suggested by family members over the years that I'm Asperger/HFA, but my dad & grandmother never pushed to test (my Dad is also most likely undiagnosed Aspergers/HFA), and I felt growing up that my aunt's coddlement of my cousin and his disabilities allowed him to use his disabilities as a sort of crutch through life, where he may have worked with them a little better otherwise, so I took the route of solidly denying any disability chance, and just told myself it was just personal shortcoming -- I needed to make extra effort to be organized, to be on task, etc.

In a way, I don't regret the path I took - I own and run a dog rescue at 26 that I did all the legal paperwork and filing on, I work 28 hours a week as a trainer, and people constantly compliment me on how motivated and put together I am... however, there's also major issues in my life that I'm working through and have led me to explore the ASDs a little more personally at this point:

- I have a horrible sense of organization. I gravitate towards the neatness of everything in places, boxes, etc.. but maintaining organization is horrible... in about a week, my car/room will go from spotless to like a homeless hurricane hit... I'm getting better about setting myself on a strict path of putting things back in their exact place as soon as I use them, and I do find myself thinking about it more, but still, I battle with chaos and disorder... paperwork seems to jumble itself, etc... Then I become stressed and non-functioning (or functioning out of necessity but not necessarily doing well), and this cycle repeats and repeats. As a child, I was a tornado too, but because there was no attempt to diagnose an illness (by 8th grade I was in IEP for being Emotionally Disturbed - a result of bringing part of my beloved knife collection to school which a friend used to cut herself after "borrowing" one, and I believe ADHD at that time as well, which I'll get into more late), so my messiness was seen as defiance, and punished.

- ADHD or HFA? & Substance abuse issues: In about 10th grade, I was put on Vyvanse for ADHD. I'd already been convinced to try meth by girls in the neighborhood I'd known since I was little, and it got out of control because the main benefit I saw was I WAS FINALLY GETTING THAT MATH HOMEWORK I WAS BEHIND ON DONE!!... well, Vyvanse made me get schoolwork done too, but in a jittery, hyper-focused way that reminded me too much of methamphetamine, so I used it on and off for school for maybe a school year, but it did not answer my problems long term, and was not enjoyable. If HFA is a contributer for these issues, it is possible that being diagnosed properly and treated in a different way would not have more beneficial effect than Vyvanse, and it's also possible that with proper support and help, I may not have chose/continued to use meth to try to catch up on math, because I could have had plans in place in school, and better management at home, to not get as behind as I did in the first place.

- (Un)Comfortable Conversation/Specialized Interests: Between the fallout from separating from a group of drug related people from above, conflict with my family from childhood on (my grandmother thought I was insolent and "taunting" her when I would SHRIEK in fear as a child of punishment, among other conflicts), and never really fitting in at school from a young age, and losing friends rapidly and telling my grandmother at home, who would wonder out loud, "How do you go through friends so fast? Are you doing something? Picking wrong friends?"... so from 3rd grade on, the self-belief that I was difficult to make friends with, I was different, and that my friendships weren't that strong because I couldn't relate to them in similar ways began to grow & got stronger over the years, and now as an adult, I go into almost panic attacks about new social situations sometimes, and it takes me a LONG time to trust, get close to new people, and they often consider me a friend before I've reached that comfort zone... not because I'm antisocial -- I can remember one of my earliest childhood grievances being: "I just want to be everyone's friend! I want everyone to like me!!!", but because I'm terrified, awkward, feel like a burden or sore thumb sometimes, and feel that I either talk waaaaay too much, or I can't make small talk like normal people do (what do you say? "Hey, so, beautiful weather we're having today!" sounds staged. Even if it didn't, what do I say after that? How do I keep the conversation going??!)...

Social Impact: If I had been diagnosed with HFA as a child by a medical professional (assuming I am), I could have possibly had action plans, exercises in developing social skills, being interested in a wider set of topics people want to talk about, not being SO excited to predict what someone's going to say and finishing their sentence, or slowly down with my eagerness to reply once I get talking. I could have grown up with less of the belief that it was something I was doing, that I pushed people away after a while or that I wasn't as good as their other friends --- in actuality, I had a lot of problem behavior as a child as you can see, and I gravitated to problem people throughout my life (in grade school, I have no answer for, other than moving from very diverse Anaheim to Temecula which was still pretty small, I was a culture shock in addition to all my oddities... but in the end of middle school up through high school, I hung out with kids who drank, smoked, and honestly burned through other people too, so this is a partial answer... but again, what behavioral and environmental aspects may have caused me to gravitate towards that type?..)

Adult impact: My biggest problem has come later in life. Throughout high school, I hung out with bad kids, like I said... I did great meeting new people, because I had a very comfortable approach of "Hi, I'm Mariah, let's get drunk and make bad decisions", and substance abuse was my crutch that allowed me to socialize, plus conversation is pretty easy and unjudged when everyone is drunk. However, turning 19 and getting away from those kind of people steadily til 23 left me realizing: I don't drink anymore.. NOW how do I talk to people?! This point was where I retreated a lot into the solace of my dogs, as I've done throughout my childhood, and the training/dog rescue/veterinary school aspiration began to take place. I am now 26 with all of this great stuff going on, but A) dogs are now my comfort zone. I'll talk your ear off about that with no social anxiety. If we're not talking about dogs, I'm still probably really uncomfortable and unable to casually maintain conversation as well. B) Dog rescue & training has become my therapy from my social awkwardnesses, and I push myself HARD to achieve for a continuous sense of self-satisfaction (which is generally pretty short-lived on my end: off to the next mountain to climb! And the next!)... I am now stressed, irritable, and experience panic attacks probably once a week. But also, because there is not much of a social group (I have accumulated a small but very important, intellectual, successful group, many who are working through very similar issues with themselves aside from organization), I have more time to overwork myself, when other people are out going to movies, doing random things, etc... So if I had more focus on developing and maintaining social confidence, that is possibly less grief I could have gone through.

For my family, and if I get the diagnosis when I see a medical provider, HFA is not a horrible diagnosis (I know I'm talking about all the negatives above) -- my family is phenomenally more intellectual than anyone I know, the creativity abounds in individual ways, and the original ideas and approaches to things that I have amaze people -- I've always just thought of things in different terms and solutions than other people, and was surprised when they commented on it --- "Why WOULDN'T you think of that?!"...

I think my fear of the stigma and label was the worst thing. "What if people don't like me? What if they think I'm crazy or stupid?"... well. A lot of people DIDN'T like me anyway, some without ever meeting me... that's not going to change, and it happens to typically developed people as well. I feel that instead, people disliked me anyway, but I ended up internalizing that and then being uncomfortable with myself, or not liking myself. Some people still think I'm stupid with or without a label, but talking to me, reading my writing, or looking at my test scores would disprove that in a second... And to keep a clean, put-together appearance over the years so people wouldn't think I was crazy... well, that turned into me instead wondering if I was crazy.

It's totally possible that I don't have any ASD, and that my issues are personal or from other places (childhood abuse, etc), I haven't been diagnosed or not officially yet - this group is the beginning of my exploration and path to being tested... but even if I'm not, if I had been tested, I wouldn't be here wondering.

I think finding out is your best option. No, your child doesn't? Well, then on with life as usual! But if they do, I genuinely feel the diagnosis and proper management, counseling, and building as an adult will help your child love themselves more, enjoy more out of life, and prepare better to be an adult.

Good luck!

#high functioning autism #austim #aspergers #mental health #psychology #paper #writing #self expression #self exploration

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carefullydoesit-blog · 8 years

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EVERYTHING ON MY DESK / IN MY ROOM RELATED TO BROODTHAERS

‘To be bien pensant …or not to be. To be blind’

What is Art? Ever since the nineteenth century the question has been posed incessantly to the artist, to the museum director, to the art lover alike. I doubt, in fact, that it is possible to give a serious definition of Art, unless we examine the question in terms of a constant, I mean the transformation of art into merchandise. This process is accelerated nowadays to the point where artistic and commercial values have become superimposed. If we are concerned with the phenomenon of reification, then Art is a particular representation of the phenomenon – a form of tautology. We could then justify it as affirmation, and at the same time carve out for it a dubious existence. We would then have to consider what such a definition might be worth. One fact is certain: commentaries on Art are the result of shifts in the economy. It seems doubtful to us that such commentaries can be described as political.

Art is a prisoner of its phantasms and its function as magic; it hangs on our bourgeois walls as a sign of power, it flickers along the peripeties of our history like a shadow-play – but is it artistic? To read Byzantine writing on the subject reminds us of the sex of the angels, of Rabelais, or of debates at the Sorbonne. At the moment, inopportune linguistic investigations all end in a single gloss, which its authors like to call criticism. Art and literature … which of the moon’s faces is hidden? And how many clouds and fleeting visions are there.

I have discovered nothing here, not even America. I choose to consider Art as a useless labor, apolitical and of little moral significance. Urged on by some base inspiration, I confess I would experience a kind of pleasure at being proved wrong. A guilty pleasure, since it would be at the expense of the victims, those who thought I was right.

Monsieur de la Palice is one of my customers. He loves novelties, and he, who makes other people laugh, finds my alphabet a pretext for his own laughter. My alphabet is painted.

All of this is quite obscure. The reader is invited to enter into this darkness to decipher a theory or to experience feelings of fraternity, those feelings that unite all men, and particularly the blind.

Ten Thousand Francs Reward (1974)

1. OBJECTS

Q: Do objects function for you as words?

A: I use the object as a zero word.

Q: Weren’t they originally literary objects?

A: You could call them that, I suppose, although the most recent objects have escaped this denomination, which has a pejorative reputation (I wonder why?). These recent objects carry, in a most sensational manner, the marks of a language. Words, numerations, signs inscribed on the object itself.

Q: Did you, at the beginning of your activity, follow so definite a direction?

A: I was haunted by a certain painting by Magritte, the one in which words figure. With Magritte, you have a contradiction between the painted word and the painted object, a subversion of the sign of language and that of painting so as to restrict the notion of the subject.

Q: Do you still value any objects?

A: Yes, a few. They are poetic ones, that is to say, they are guilty in the sense of “art as language” and innocent in the sense of language as art. Those, for example, that I shall describe to you.

A tricolored thighbone entitled Femur d’Homme Belge. Also an old portrait of a general that I picked up at a flea market, I forget where. I made a little hole in the general’s tight mouth and inserted a cigar butt. In this object-portrait, there is a fortuitous tonal harmony. The paint is brown, sort of pissy, and so is the cigar butt. Not just any cigar would suit any general’s mouth …the caliber of the cigar, the shape of the mouth.

Q: Would you call it the art of portraiture?

A: I prefer to believe that it acts like a pedagogical object. The secret of art must, whenever possible, be unveiled – the dead general smokes an extinguished cigar. So, counting the thighbone, I’ve made two useful objects. I wish I’d been able to do other pieces as satisfying to me as these. But I distrusted the genre. The portrait and the thighbone seem to have the strength to make a dent in the falsity inherent in culture. With the thighbone, nationality and the structure of the human being are united. The soldier is not far behind.

Q: There are many shells, mussels, and eggs in your work. Are these accumulations?

A: The subject is rather that of the relationship established between the shells and the object that supports them: table, chair, or cooking pot. It’s on a table that you serve an egg. But on my table, there are too many eggs, and the knife, the fork, and the plate are absent – absences necessary to give speaking presence to the egg at the table, or to give the spectator an original idea of the chicken.

Q: And the mussels – a dream of the North Sea?

A: A mussel conceals a volume. When the mussels overflow the pot, they are not boiling over in accord with physical law, but following the rules of artifice whose purpose is the construction of an abstract shape.

Q: Does this mean that you are close to an academic system?

A: It is a rhetoric that thrives on the new dictionary of received ideas. I don’t so much organize objects and ideas as organize encounters of different functions that all refer to the same world: the table and the egg, the mussel and the pot to the table and to art, to the mussel and to the chicken.

Q: The world of the imaginary?

A: Or that of sociological reality. It is that for which Magritte did not fail to reproach me. He thought I was more sociologist than artist.

2. INDUSTRIAL SIGNALIZATIONS

Q: The plaques made of plastic – do they correspond to this sociological reality?

A: I thought using plastic as a material would free me from the past, since this material didn’t exist then. I was so taken with the idea that I forgot that plastic had already been “ennobled” by its appearance on the walls of galleries and museums under the signature of the nouveaux realistes and American poop. What interested me was the warping of representation when executed in this material.

Q: They were published in editions of seven?

A: I myself was responsible for the edition, since no gallery would assume the risk of bringing them out at that time. To make them I did get some help from the private sector.

Q: What about the language of these plaques?

A: Let’s call them rebuses. And the subject, a speculation about a difficulty of reading that results when you use this substance. These plaques are fabricated like waffles, you know.

Q: Are these plaques really all that difficult to decipher?

A: Reading is impeded by the imagelike quality of the text and vice versa. The stereotypical character of both text and image is defined by the technique of plastic. They are intended to be read on a double level – each one involved in a negative attitude which seems to me specific to the stance of the artist: not to place the message completely on one side alone, neither image nor text. That is, the refusal to deliver a clear message – as if this role were not incumbent upon the artist, and by extension upon all producers with an economic interest. This could obviously be the beginning of a polemic. The way I see it, there can be no direct connection between art and message, especially if the message is political, without running the risk of being burned by the artifice. Foundering. I prefer signing my name to these booby traps without taking advantage of this caution.

Q: What kind of simpletons do you catch with your plaques?

A: Well, those who take these plaques for pictures and hang them on their walls. Although there’s no proof that the real simpleton isn’t the author himself, who thought he was a linguist able to leap over the bar in the signifier/signified formula, but who might in fact have been merely playing the professor.

3. THE FIGURES

Q: Do you situate yourself in a surrealist perspective?

A: This one I know by heart: “Everything leads us to believe that there exists a state of mind where life and death, the real and the imaginary, the past and the future, the communicable and the incommunicable, high and low, no longer seem contradictory.” I hope I have nothing in common with that state of mind. With Ceci n’est pas une pipe Magritte did not take things so lightly. But then again he was too much Magritte. By which I mean that he was too little Ceci n’est pas une pipe. It is with that pipe that I tackled the adventure.

Q: Can you give an example?

A: You can see in the Monchengladbach museum a cardboard box, a clock, a mirror, a pipe, also a mask and a smoke bomb, and one or two other objects I can’t recall at this point, accompanied by the expression Fig. I or Fig. 2 or Fig. 0 painted on the display surface beneath or to the side of each object. If we are to believe what the inscription says, then the object takes on an illustrative character referring to a kind of novel about society. These objects, the mirror and the pipe, submitted to an identical numbering system (or the cardboard box or the clock or the chair) become interchangeable elements on the stage of a theater. Their destiny is ruined. Here I obtain the desired encounter between different functions. A double assignment and a readable texture – wood, glass, metal, fabric – articulate them morally and materially. I would never have obtained this kind of complexity with technological objects, whose singleness condemns the mind to monomania: minimal art, robot, computer.

The nos. I, 2, 0 appear figurally. And the abbreviations Fig. poorly in their meaning.

Q: Is this the condition for your feeling at ease with yourself?

A: What reassures me is the hope that the viewer runs the risk – for a moment at least – of no longer feeling at ease. Be sure to visit the Monchengladbach museum.

Q: But suppose the viewer gets confused, and sees there an expression comparable to that of the nouveaux realistes of the 1960s?

A: My early objects and images – 1964-65 – could never cause that particular confusion. The literalness linked to the appropriation of the real didn’t suit me, since it conveyed a pure and simple acceptance of progress in art …and elsewhere as well. Given that, however, there’s nothing to prevent the viewers from getting confused, if that’s what they want. I do not assume good faith in my viewers or readers – or bad faith either.

Q: Did you begin with an elaborated vision of your project?

A: I have no idea what my unconscious may have fabricated, and you cannot make me put it into words. I have fabricated instruments for my own use in comprehending fashion in art, in following it, and finally in the search for a definition of fashion. I am neither a painter nor a violinist. It is Ingres who interests me, not Cezanne and the apples.

Q: Why haven’t you made use of books or magazines? There are many such means of information available.

A: As it happens I can more easily apprehend conceptual or other data through the information provided by the specific product (especially my own) than through its mediating theorization. It’s much harder for me to grasp things and their implications by reading books – except when the book is the object that fascinates me, since for me it is the object of a prohibition. My very first artistic proposition bears the trace of this curse. The remaining copies of an edition of poems written by me served as raw material for a sculpture.

A: A spatial objects?

Q: I took a bundle of fifty copies of a book called Pense-Bete and half-embedded them in plaster. The wrapping paper is town off at the top of the “sculpture,” so you can see the stack of books (the bottom part is hidden by the plaster). Here you cannot read the book without destroying the sculptural aspect. It is a concrete gesture that passes the prohibition on to the viewer – at least that’s what I thought would happen. But I was surprised to find that viewers reacted quite differently from what I had imagined. Everyone so far, no matter who, has perceived the object either as an artistic expression or as a curiosity. “Look! Books in plaster!” No one had any curiosity about the text; nobody had any idea whether this was the final burial of prose or poetry, of sadness or pleasure. No one was affected by the prohibition. Until that moment I had lived practically isolated from all communication, since I had a fictitious audience. Suddenly I had a real audience, on that level where it is a matter of space and conquest.

Q: Is there a difference between audiences?

A: Today the book of poems in new forms has found a certain audience, which is not to say that the difference does not persist. The second audience has no idea what the first is interested in. If space is really the fundamental element of artistic construction (form in language and material form), then, after such a strange experience, I could only oppose it to the philosophy of writing with common sense.

Q: What does space conceal?

A: Isn’t it like a game of hide-and-seek? Of course, the one who’s hiding will always say he’s somewhere else, and yet he’s always there. And you know he’ll turn around and catch someone. The interminable search for a definition of space serves only to hide the essential structure of art, a process of reification. Any individual who perceives a function of space, especially a convincing one, appropriates it mentally or economically.

Q: What are your political ideas?

A: Once I’d begun to make art, my own, the art I copied, the exploitation of the political consequences of that activity (whose theory can be defined only outside the domain where it operates) appeared ambiguous to me, suspect, too angelical. If artistic production is the thing of things, then theory becomes a private property.

Q: Have you ever made art engage?

A: I did once. They were poems, concrete signs of engagement since without compensation. My work in those days consisted in writing as few as possible. In the visual arts, my only possible engagement is with my adversaries. Architects are in the same position whenever they work for themselves. I try as much as I can to circumscribe the problem by proposing little, all of it indifferent. Space can only lead to paradise.

Q: Is there any difference between the plastic arts and a disinterested engagement?

(Silence).

Q: At what moment does one start making indifferent art?

A: From the moment that one is less of an artists, when the necessity of making puts down its roots in memory alone. I believe my exhibitions depended and still depend on memories of a period when I assumed the creative situation in a heroic and solitary manner. In other words, it used to be: read this, look at this. Today it is: allow me to present …

Q: Isn’t artistic activity – let me be precise: I mean in the context of a circulation in galleries, collections, and museums, that is, whenever others become aware of it – isn’t it then the height of authenticity?

A: Given the chosen tactics – to engage in territorial maneuvers – it is perhaps possible to find an authentic means of calling into question art, its circulation, etc. And that might – although it is unclear no matter how you look at it – justify the continuity and expansion of production. What remains is art as production as production.

Q: In such a game of roulette, how do you keep from losing your bet?

A: There’s another risk, no less interesting, to find the third or fourth degree. And you don’t have to get burned: that is. …

A Dream (1960)

Shattered eyes a Gothic king

strides without end the paving stones

of an ivory cathedral.

Clouds and death embroider his costume.

An angel plays dice:

a dazzling river

a drowned man lain among the flowers

a pewter decoy

a severe path

a harpsichord full of silver

an orchard enclosed with hair of gold

At the cradle of the forest

the paths are empty.

Two o’clock sounds. A

carpenter in a blue apron

descends from the heavens.

He takes a plank from the tree.

What’s the weather like?

It isn’t snowing yet.

The season is mauve. The foliage

opens:

a group of recent sisters roll

their eyes back to a tender storm.

Their hands cross over their enamel foreheads.

The houses burn with a celestial green.

One by one the magi parade by in blood.

It does not cease to sound two o’clock.

Three birds drink a bucket of tears.

Four Five Six Seven

Nine Ten Eleven Twelve

The blue of the fields darkens

at the base of the crystalline night.

Still dreaming the king

takes his hand to his marble heart.

It snows. The street is white.

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gyrlversion · 5 years

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How the Oman tanker attack played out

On Friday, however, the Japanese shipping company that owns one of the tankers said it did not believe its ship was attacked by a mine.

The incident bears similarities to an attack on May 12 when four oil tankers were targeted off the coast of the United Arab Emirates in the Gulf of Oman.

Here’s how the attacks played out.

The first tanker attack

On May 12, four commercial oil tankers were targeted near the strategic Emirati port of Fujairah in the Gulf of Oman, in what the UAE described as a “sabotage attack.”

One was flying a UAE flag, and another the Norwegian flag. The other two were owned by Saudi Arabia, which described the incident as a threat to the security of global oil supplies.

The US blamed Iran for the attack, with US national security adviser John Bolton saying, “I think it is clear these (attacks) were naval mines almost certainly from Iran.” He did not offer evidence that Tehran was responsible.

Iran denounced the attack and denied involvement. But the incident came as tensions between the US and its Gulf allies were ramping up amid deteriorating relations.

Days before the attack, the US Maritime Administration issued an advisory warning commercial shipping vessels that Iran or its proxies could be targeting commercial vessels and oil production infrastructure.

The US had also recently deployed the USS Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group and a bomber task force to the Strait of Hormuz in response to a “number of troubling and escalatory indications and warnings” from Iran, a US official with direct knowledge of the situation told CNN at the time.

Following the attack, President Donald Trump approved sending an additional 1,500 US troops to the Middle East as part of a “mostly protective” effort to deter Iranian threats.

Weeks before, Trump had announced that the US would formally designate Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, Tehran’s most powerful military institution, a terrorist organization.

The incidents come as Iran is promising to restart elements of its nuclear program, following the US’s withdrawal from the nuclear pact last year.

It also comes as Iran and Saudi Arabia continue to fight a deadly proxy war in Yemen. In recent years, Houthi rebels have frequently fired Iranian-supplied missiles into Saudi Arabia — on Wednesday Houthis struck the arrivals hall of an airport in southwestern Saudi Arabia, injuring 26 people.

Ongoing investigation

On June 6, the initial findings of an international investigation into attacks on the four tankers concluded that a “state actor” was the most likely culprit, but did not mention any state by name.

The UAE, Saudi Arabia and Norway told the United Nations Security Council that there were “strong indications that the four attacks were part of a sophisticated and coordinated operation carried out with significant operational capacity.”

Diplomats said the assessment of the damage to the four vessels and chemical analysis of the debris recovered revealed “it was highly likely that limpet mines were deployed.”

In a printed statement describing the conclusions, the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Norway said the attacks required trained divers and explosive charges placed under the waterline, near the engines so as to not sink the ships or detonate their cargoes, which indicated a knowledge of the design of the targeted ships. The countries say rapid withdrawal of the plotters by fast boats indicated understanding of the geographic area.

June 13 attack

The most recent attack occurred a week later on June 13, when two tankers — one carrying oil and the other transporting a cargo of chemicals — were struck in broad daylight sailing through the Gulf of Oman, near the Strait of Hormuz.

The Norwegian Maritime Agency said that three explosions were reported on board the Marshall Islands-flagged Front Altair oil tanker, which is owned by the Bermuda-based Norwegian company Frontline. The company said that a fire broke out after an explosion and that the cause of the blast was unclear.

A second vessel, the Japanese-owned chemical tanker Kokura Courageous, was “attacked” twice “with some sort of shell,” the ship’s co-manager, Michio Yuube, said.

The vessels were hit “at or below the waterline, in close proximity to the engine room,” said the International Association of Independent Tanker Owners (Intertanko).

“These appeared to be well-planned and coordinated” attacks, it added.

All 21 Philippine crew members on the Kokura Courageous were evacuated, Yuube said. The ship’s Singapore-based management company, BSM, said a sailor was injured and the vessel had suffered damage to its hull.

The USS Bainbridge was nearby when the incident happened and a tug ferried crew members of the Kokuka Courageous to it. Images released by the US Central Command showed crew from the Bainbridge assisting the sailors following their rescue.

The 23 crew members of the Front Altair were picked up by a South Korean cargo ship, the Hyundai Dubai, which responded to their distress call.

According to a Hyundai Merchant Marine official, the ship’s captain said in an official report that he heard three explosions prior to the Front Altair’s distress call. He went outside to the dock and saw the ship was on fire. Two sailors approached the Norwegian tanker on a lifeboat and rescued the 23 crew, bringing them to the Hyundai Dubai, which has now docked in Abu Dhabi.

On Friday, the Japanese shipping company that owns the chemical tanker Kokuka Courageous said it did not believe the ship was attacked by a mine.

In a press conference Friday in Tokyo, the president of Kokuka Sangyo Marine, Yutaka Katada, said he believed “there is no possibility of mine attack as the attack is well above the naval line.”

According to Katada, a crew member said the second attack came from a flying shell.

Katada said that all crew members were now back on board the tanker, which is currently tagged to the UAE city of Khor Fakkan, and were working to get electricity fully up and running.

Iran blamed again

Pompeo blamed Iran for the attacks, saying the assessment was based on intelligence but offered no evidence to support his claim.

“It is the assessment by the United States government that the Islamic Republic of Iran is responsible for the attacks that occurred in the Gulf of Oman today,” Pompeo said in specially scheduled remarks at the State Department Thursday, as investigations into the attacks were beginning.

“This assessment is based on intelligence, the weapons used, the level of expertise needed to execute the operation, recent similar Iranian attacks on shipping, and the fact that no proxy group operating in the area has the resources and proficiency to act with such a high degree of sophistication.”

On Thursday evening, the US military released video in support of Pompeo’s claims of what it said showed an Iranian navy boat removing an unexploded mine attached to the hull of the Kokura Courageous.

In the video, a smaller boat is shown coming up to the side of the tanker. An individual stands up on the bow of the boat and can be seen removing an object from the tanker’s hull. The US says that object is likely an unexploded mine.

Another official told CNN that multiple Iranian small boats had entered the area where the Bainbridge continued to be on the scene, prompting US Central Command to issue a statement saying, “No interference with USS Bainbridge, or its mission, will be tolerated.”

Saudi Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Adel al-Jubeir told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer that the Saudis “have no reason to disagree” with Pompeo’s comments blaming Iran for being behind Thursday’s attacks, saying “Iran has a history of doing this.”

Iran denies any involvement

Iran Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said “suspicious doesn’t begin to describe” this latest incident, noting that one of the tankers is Japanese owned and the attack took place as Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was visiting Iran in an effort to calm tensions between Washington and Tehran.

Alireza Miryousefi, a spokesman for the Iranian mission, tweeted a statement saying Iran “categorically rejects the US unfounded claim” that Iran is behind the attacks and “condemns it in the strongest possible terms.”

He added that Iran “expresses concern” over the “suspicious incidents.” And he called it “ironic” that the US, which withdrew from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action nuclear deal with Iran, was now calling Iran to come back for negotiations and diplomacy.

The UN Security Council privately discussed the latest on the attack but declined to produce any formal reaction.

CNN’s Barbara Starr, Vasco Cotovio, and Kara Fox contributed to this report.

The post How the Oman tanker attack played out appeared first on Gyrlversion.

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newsnigeria · 6 years

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Check out New Post published on Ọmọ Oòduà

New Post has been published on http://ooduarere.com/news-from-nigeria/world-news/insights-on-the-iran/

Insights on the Iran deal, BRICS and Venezuela

by Pepe Escobar (cross-posted with The Asia Times by special agreement with the author)

An exclusive interview with former Brazilian foreign minister Celso Amorim on how BRICS came into being, how the nuclear deal was done with Tehran and how the South dealt with Chavez

Brazil is once again in the eye of a political hurricane, after President Jair Bolsonaro’s appearance at Davos and explosive revelations directly linking his clan to a criminal organization in Rio de Janeiro.

With his administration barely a month old, Bolsonaro is already being seen as expendable to the elites that propelled him to power – from the powerful agribusiness lobby to the financial system and the military.

The new game among the elites of a major actor in the Global South, BRICS member and eighth biggest economy in the world consists of shaping a scenario capable of rescuing one the great frontiers where global capitalism is expanding from total irrelevancy.

That includes the possibility of a “soft coup”, with the Bolsonaro clan sidelined by the Brazilian military rallying around the vice-president, General Hamilton Mourao.

Under these circumstances, a conversation with former Brazilian foreign minister Celso Amorim is more than sobering. Amorim is universally recognized as one of the top diplomats of the young 21st century, a symbol of the recent past, under President Lula, when Brazil was at the top of its game as a resource-rich continental nation actively projecting power as a BRICS leader.

I had the pleasure of meeting Ambassador Amorim, who is also the author of ‘Acting Globally: Memoirs of Brazil’s Assertive Foreign Policy’ in Sao Paulo. Here are some highlights of our conversation – from the birth of BRICS to the current Venezuela crisis.

BRICS – the most important group in the drive towards a multipolar world – is a very dirty word in Washington. How did it all start?

I had met [British economist] Jim O’Neill a few times, who first talked about BRIC, which was not yet a group and nobody saw as a group. This may sound pretentious, but it’s a curious story. I told him, ‘It is you that invented the BRICS, right?’ He said, ‘Yes, of course, I’m very proud of it’. Then I replied, ‘Yes, but I’m the one who made it happen’. Well, it was not exactly me – under the Lula government and all that it entails. The first action in terms of creating the BRIC group – still without an “S” – came from Sergey Lavrov, in a meeting we had in New York in 2006. They had the RIC [Russia, India, China], but they did not hold many summits. And we had IBAS [India, Brazil, South Africa]. Both China and Russia were always trying to get into IBAS. There was the idea that these were three great democracies, each one in a continent and in a major developing country – so the Russians and Chinese might have thought, ‘we also want to get in, why not, because we are not democracies?’ IBAS was also present in the commercial G-20 at the WTO, and IBAS had similar ideas about reform of the UN Security Council; so the geopolitical interests were not the same.

Then Lavrov proposed BRIC as a forum, I think maybe to find some more equilibrium inside the RIC. I always talked in terms of BRICS, so one day he asked me ‘Why do you say BRICS?’ and I replied, “because it’s plural, in Portuguese’, so in a sense, we were already anticipating the entry of South Africa.

We first agreed we would have a meeting on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly. Lavrov and I already had something more substantial, the Indians and the Chinese just read a speech, so it looked like there would not be a consequential follow-up. Next year we met at the Brazilian UN mission, outside of the UN, and decided to do it later out of New York. Lavrov then offered Yekaterinburg, where we had the first ministerial meeting in 2008, and then next year the first presidential summit, also in Yekaterinburg, and in Brazil in 2010. It was here that the idea of BRIC was expanded into BRICS – through a dinner that concluded IBAS and inaugurated BRICS.

At the time, did you think about expanding to other top emerging economies, such as Indonesia, South Korea, Turkey, Iran?

IBAS was born on the second day of President Lula’s government [in January 2003], out of an idea to create a group of developing countries, around seven or eight. I thought a larger group would be very complicated, based on my experience – how to coordinate positions and engage in concrete projects. For instance, Egypt would have to be a member.

When did you start to seriously discuss practical steps towards the emergence of a multipolar world – such as trade in members’ currencies? Was it in 2010?

In 2010 certainly, we had the idea of trade using each member’s currency, not yet the idea – that happened under the Dilma government – of the BRICS bank. But we were already talking about the coordination of our development banks. The concept of multipolarity, the Russians may have been the first to outline it. What I do remember about the use of the concept was by the French, especially when there were serious divergences about the attack on Iraq.

Former French foreign minister Dominique de Villepin insisted on it.

Villepin, yes, but even Hubert Vedrine [foreign minister under Jacques Chirac from 1997-2002] before him, who came up with the concept of ‘hyperpower’. So the ones who spread the concept were the French, and we adhered to it, among developing countries. The French, when they talked about the expansion of the UN Security Council, they said they were in favor regarding Germany and Japan, but also ‘three great nations of the South’, Brazil included.

The Lula government started in January 2003. Geopolitics at the time was conditioned by the war on terror. We were already expecting the invasion of Iraq. How did you, in the first days of January 2003, knowing that Dick Cheney and the neocons were about to turn the Middle East upside down, with direct and indirect repercussions on the Global South, how did you start conceiving a multi-vector Brazilian foreign policy? Which were the priorities?

I think neither President Lula nor myself used the term “multipolar” – even though the concept was already on the table. We wanted to have good relations with the US but also with the largest developing countries. When we started the greatest problems were the Free Trade Area of the Americas [FTAA], so we had to look for other partners; the WTO and negotiations in the Doha round; and Iraq. The combination of all these led Brazil to get closer to India and South Africa, to a great extent via the WTO, and because of Iraq, we got closer to Russia, Germany and France. When President Lula went to Davos…

That was Lula’s first Davos, right?

Yes, but first he went to the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre [in Brazil], then he went to Davos. The message was the search for an equilibrium; to do business, of course, but based on the idea of democratic social change.

Were you discussing Iraq in detail with Russia, Germany and France?

Yes, we were, with Schroeder in Germany and Chirac, as well as Villepin at the Security Council. And there was a fourth problem: Venezuela. Lula had already talked about it with Chavez. During the inauguration of President Gutierrez of Ecuador, Lula’s first foreign trip, on January 15, Lula proposed, in a meeting in a room full of presidents, the creation of the Friends of Venezuela Group, at a moment when the crisis was acute, even though the country was not as debilitated as today.

Already in January 2003 was there neocon pressure on Brazil in relation to Venezuela?

I think they did not know how to deal with Lula and the new government. But they were very strong on Venezuela – especially [US diplomat] Roger Noriega. And yet they saw Brazil was proposing something and accepted it. Fidel was against it, but Chavez, in the end, was convinced by Lula. And this is also relevant for today. Lula said it in so many words; this is not a Friends of Chavez group, it’s a Friends of Venezuela group. So this must also include the United States, Spain and Portugal – under conservative administrations. That was a way to escape from the OAS [Organisation of American States] and its penchant for the Monroe doctrine [the US policy of opposing European colonialism in the Americas].

I used to talk to Colin Powell quite frequently – and not to receive instructions. There were many issues he wanted to know about, and he trusted Brazil. He had a notion of the importance of Brazil, our capacity for dialogue.

Switching to the Obama era, tell us about the role of Brazil, alongside Turkey, in the Iran nuclear negotiation, when you clinched a deal in Tehran in less than 24 hours, only for it to be smashed by then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton the next day.

It was a long process, followed by 19 hours of negotiations, the Iranians tried to reopen one of the issues, both Lula and Erdogan refused. What facilitated our role as mediators was that the US had its hands full in the Middle East. I already had contacts with Javier Solana, then a sort of Foreign Affairs Minister of the EU, and also [Egyptian diplomat] ElBaradei, from my time at the UN. Obama, in a meeting of the G-8 + 5 in Italy, during a bilateral with us, he said three things: ‘I extended my hand and they did not answer’; ‘We need to solve the nuclear dossier’; ‘And I need friends to say what I cannot say’. What we did in the end, because we thought it was the right thing to do, with a lot of work and facing hardships, was exactly what the Americans wanted. One month before the deal I thought it would not happen. But then we received a letter from Obama, and to my greatest surprise, that was a reiteration of the same initial three points.

Hillary always had a different position. I foresaw her reaction as a possibility. We talked on the phone, in Madrid, when I was coming back from Iran, and I said, ‘Look, in Brazil we have this expression, ‘I didn’t read it, and I didn’t like it’. She did not want a deal. In a phone call before my trip, she was adding some other points of discussion and I said, ‘Hillary, this is a trust-building agreement. And these points that you mention were not in the letter delivered by your own President’. I’m not exaggerating, what followed was a silence lasting half a minute. So I thought; did she read the letter? Or she read it, and because they are a great power they can do what they want, and we have to take it, and adapt to it?

So what about China and Russia accepting the American line – no deal, more sanctions?

I know the sweeteners that made them accept it – concessions on the sanctions front. But geopolitically…

What’s your informed hypothesis?

There are two. This was a problem they did not solve. Who’s part of the global directory? The five permanent members of the Security Council. Now we have two developing countries, who are not even part of the Security Council, and they solve it? By coincidence, both were non-permanent members of the Security Council at the time. The other thing is whenever we are discussing a nuclear issue, the five get closer, because they are all nuclear powers.

What’s your insider view, as a statesman, of Vladimir Putin, demonized 24/7 in the US as a major existential threat to the West?

The first time I saw Putin face to face was when he received three nations from the Group of Rio, and the main topic of discussion was Iraq. That was before the invasion in March 2003. What most impressed me was his great knowledge of the dossiers – something you usually don’t expect from presidents. He’s extremely sharp, very intelligent, obviously cares for Russian interests but at the same time pays attention to the balance of power. A very realist politician. I don’t see him as a great idealist. He’s like a 19th-century politician, very conscious geopolitically.

Now, in the South American chessboard, regarding the Venezuelan crisis, we are seeing a direct confrontation between the four major poles of Eurasia – Russia, China, Iran, Turkey – against the US. And with another BRICS member, Brazil, siding against Russia and China.

In a multipolar world, we now have a huge test, because Brazil presides over the BRICS in 2019. How is Brazil going to be seen inside BRICS? There used to be an atmosphere of trust inside BRICS.

I’ve got to say that based on my experience at the Security Council, when I was ambassador, during the government of Fernando Henrique Cardoso [from 1995 to 2003], the Russians and the Chinese gave immense weight to respect for national sovereignty. In terms of international law, they always stress non-intervention. I hope we won’t have a confrontation like Vietnam in our region. But when President Trump says that all options are on the table, he’s obviously accepting a military solution. This is very dangerous. I see a very sound Brazilian position coming from General Mourao [the Brazilian vice-president]. And yet the Foreign Ministry says Brazil will support politically and economically a government that does not exist – so that already means intervention.

On a personal level, in the drive towards multipolarity, what is the most important story in the world for the next 10 or 20 years? What is the issue that drives you the most?

I think that the fundamental theme is psychological – and also civilizational. It’s respect for The Other – and the acceptance of alterity. And this also concerns international relations. We need to understand that the common good is part of our well-being. This reflects on individual attitudes, in internal attitudes in politics, and in international relations. Look at the current, violent attack on multilateralism. We should see that it’s better to work multilaterally than capitulate to the law of the jungle.

#BRICS

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vixen-vangogh · 7 years

Text

polyvore banned this for some reason (i cannot figure out what i need to censor for it to be posted though?? i tried even the most conservative of censorings)

so here’s what i was posting in the descrip instead

hey everybody i aged ! i am 23 years old by the standards of the gregorian calendar. differs with other calendars and planets but idrk the exchange rate of time too well

i talked to one of my other roommates about talking to the roommate who has been really flip floppy and ignorant about whether she's actually moving out or not

and idk i'm just really relieved that those of us staying are on the same page

like that one roommate who we're asking to leave yelled at me some really ableist stuff because she had some issues with the temperature being like a couple degrees off from room temperature (as in, like 25 degrees celsius was what it was set to - altho not what it actually was) and she had her upstairs window open in -40 degrees with the wind chill and it made our entire home freezing because i guess? for some reason ?? she needs the temperature to be like 0 degrees?? or something???

my body doesn't thermoregulate very well because i have POTS (postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome) and generally deal w adrenal fatigue because of anxiety and panic and all that other stuff with trauma. the other roommates were also cold though and were trying to blow warm air into their hands etc and we have our windows covered in plastic wrap because windows don't provide enough insulation.

and then when i told her the only reason the heat is so high is because she has her window open and she lied and said it wasn't but after that 'conversation' (she blocked me on fb after yelling so like, it's not like much of that was actually double sided or civil) the temperature got way warmer thru the day almost like she shut her window when she got caught

[hand on chin, thinking emoji]

but anyway she's 27 and the rest of us are 19, 22 and 23 and she is acting like she's 12

i just want her to tell me concretely when she is moving out so i can make accommodations and stop having other people go around just because she literally blocked me on facebook making it impossible for us to communicate

(i don't have a phone contract and haven't in about 2 years because it's just.... a lot of money and organization and planning and i cannot guarantee my money any given day if it were to automatically come out of my account. that and i can't deal with talking on the phone because of anxiety and stuff.)

(it occurred to me somewhat recently though that you can use TTY on my particular device though so I might look into seeing if there's some way to get a pay as you go thing?)

i've been trying to rewire my mind whenever bad memories surface that I know i am to blame for how things happened.

from "i hate myself"

"i forgive myself" "i feel remorse about this" "i have grown" "i was a child" (and this includes times when i was a child in the sense that i was legally an adult but still a child in terms of my own personal growth and sense of self) "i accept that this happened." "feeling so guilty this way now will not make me a better person. i am already a better person now."

etc

i've tried a lot of different tactics to dealing with these things over the years and every now and again something i try will work or help and that is one of those things. :)

obviously i'm not ~cured~ but it's !! not the point? i'm not ever going to be cured because i have always been like this to a degree, and it would appear it's hereditary to some degree. (which i wouldn't have known about but - i was talking to my aunt the other day and we're actually on the same medications ... which is ?? pretty interesting how these things work out.) (i've never met anyone who was on the exact same meds as me, just folks who had the same meds one at a time or at some point now or in the past. just people who i could talk to about it and not necessarily people who are on the same meds as me.)

by talking to my aunt i don't mean to imply that i've got family really in my life still - but two of my paternal aunts and one of my cousins are on my facebook because i do trust them to a degree and they aren't exactly close with my dad anyway. (my dad sucks - i've been taken to calling him Cryptid Dad because it's a fun joke about how he presumably exists but I haven't seen him in years and only get an email a few times a year)

i've also gotten ridiculously into genealogy. like so hardcore into genealogy. it's extremely interesting and i have literally traced so many of my ancestors back as far as the H/uns of the Steppe and am absolutely baffled about that. granted, it wasn't necessarily my own research that put that together myself, but because at some point in the middle ages there was royalty in my lineage and if there's any famous families that have that so researched, it's royal families.

so like once i made that connection it was smooth sailing.

i've also found a bunch of Huguenot ancestors, which is pretty neat because honestly? i'd never heard of the Huguenots at all before wikitree was like "[ancestor name] was a Huguenot"

which is neat to think about and research

i'm also related to a captain john wood who was in the usa continental army during the revolutionary war and then after being held in a quebec d/ungeon for 4 years, decided he wanted to be canadian instead

his descendants got land from both sides. because apparently he helped both sides significantly enough for that.

i also feel like it's very important to know and learn about the very specific land thefts my ancestors took part in so that i can better name and advocate for the specific indigenous peoples today working hard to reclaim that land.

everyone always pulls the whole "but those were my ancestors not me" stuff but like??

you know our ancestors did it because they thought this was what we would have wanted right? because they thought some regressive stuff about "the future of the white rac/e" etc

and it worked because we're like what we are today.

don't you think we should like, idk, overthrow all of that? don't you think there's maybe more to renouncing your ancestors ? like maybe renouncing all the horrific things they did (consciously or unaware) that made it so ultimately there still exists extreme deprivation today that benefits us very directly

idk yeah

also genetics are very wild because i did take one of those ancestry dna tests over a year ago and uploading it to GEDmatch said there was Steppe DNA markers in there which. is ???? something I thought was a fluke or mistake until I got to literally the pre 1000s CE and found that there the H/uns were.

same for the Netherlands and areas around that because I guess a bunch of my ancestors were the original white pe/ople to come to NY

and Anatolia - that was because the H/uns too I think but I'm still not totally clear.

anyway it's some really interesting stuff and everytime I discover something I am left with dozens of new questions.

i'm also learning about isotope analyses and what that's about because i guess based on the atoms and stuff people have in their bodies you can tell where they've been, where they grew up, if they've migrated a lot recently, etc.

idk everything is ! way more interesting than i thought it was in high school.

i wish i had better science teachers back in the day and also like, that someone thought 'hey that kid is taking an hour longer than everyone else to complete their work.... ever think.... maybe there's a learning disability at work here?'

but because i was scraping up alright grades and wasn't much of a rebel as a kiddo they just shrugged it off. i think also, from what i understand, teachers and so on like to sort kids into categories where they say that ADHD and ADD and autis/m etc shows up differently in different genders (rather than just differently in different people, like would make more sense) and thus certain kids get diagnosed and others don't and it has some gender biases where people end up saying "boys are more likely to have ADHD" and it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy.

like no, that's not true. that's not how the human brain works. you just think this way so you ignore certain kids and certain symptoms and it's just going to continue swaying the way you say because your initial base research was ignorant and biased

i feel really proud of myself for knowing the things i know despite being a dropout and not completing more than like, a year and a half of university and a year of college

i hate feeling this way but it's tied in way too much to my ego.

i need to let this go and acknowledge that i am incredibly intelligent and it's just that i transcend and cannot be measured or contained within the standards that were outlined this way.

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howtotechpress-blog · 7 years

Text

Ars does Soylent, Day 2: My God, what is this disastrous situation I no longer need to put any substances of any sort into my mouth ever again.

Two days back, Senior Reviews Editor Lee Hutchinson took a promise to spend seven days eating only Soylent, a nutritiously finish feast substitution made by architect and business visionary Rob Rhinehart. He's archiving his flexibility from strong sustenance by day. Perused about Day 1 here.Day 1 recap: Like trench fighting in France

I finished the past passage saying that I would take off running, yet that did not occur. As it got closer to 7pm, I began feeling dismal thunderings in my stomach—the kind that could either be the indication of some safe gas or the harbinger of the poopocalypse. I remained in, rather watching a few scenes of The Wire with my significant other, who had a fine solid supper while I tasted my Soylent with a constantly souring gut. Somewhat after 8pm, the gas began.

It was terrible. These weren't unimportant ha-ha toot sorts of discharges; this was hair-raising. It was room-clearing, horse-slaughtering, World War I mustard gas-sort gas. I moved from space to room in the house like I was surrendering domain to the Kaiser, my face settled in a look of frightfulness as green hellfire vapor trailed behind me, peeling paint and withering plants. My significant other, favor her heart, said nothing. Eventually, I advanced back to the PC and pulled up the email correspondence between Soylent organizer Rob Rhinehart and me.

"Other than a touch of gas at first (a few people's gut microorganisms are not acclimated to the dissolvable fiber) there have been no unfriendly responses," he wrote in light of my question about potential versatile reactions. At that point my eyes begun to water from the gas and I needed to keep running once more into the parlor.

Substance fighting farts aside, I finished off Day 1 with completely zero issues with appetite. Truth be told, other than a couple brief twinges, I didn't feel real for-genuine craving even once. It even felt like there was excessively Soylent in the pitcher—it was a test to eat every last bit of it.

Day 2, 07:30

I woke up with a light migraine, which is surprising for me. I haven't gone off espresso, and it doesn't feel like a caffeine cerebral pain—it's quite recently sort of a scarcely there disturbance. I trundle into the workplace, get up to speed with overnight email and tweets, and consider my breakfast presenting with expanding fear.

My stomach has never been especially responsive to breakfast, and right now we have the most uneasy of détentes going on—any wrong move could start an episode. As I taste espresso, a few Soylent flatulates issue forward and I pull my shirt up over my nose. My better half has somewhat of an icy and dozed in the visitor room the previous evening, and I'm in reality quite thankful. In case I'm as yet gassy now, I was likely gassy throughout the night. Luckily, I was oblivious and did not take note.

The inescapable part where we discuss crap [skip to the following subhead if squeamish]

Consistency has never been an issue for me—even as I push ever assist into my late 30s, I keep on being honored with accuracy guts. My first post-Soylent crap happens ideal about at the typical time—8:30-ish—and it feels like the same old thing: neither a wild splash nor a rough hard press. I'd give it a four on the Bristol scale. From an amount point of view, it was unquestionably less, yet it wasn't especially unique. Perhaps a couple shades lighter than regular, yet at the same time a typical darker.

The lavatory business is joined by quite roused tooting also. I envision my gut microscopic organisms are altogether wired up and moving their little gut microbes hearts out. My digestive organ is murmuring and pounding like a Soylent-filled discotheque.

Day 2, 09:00—Soylent Green

I enjoy my some espresso, putting off the Soylenting to the extent that this would be possible, however as 9am gravitates toward I can put it off no more. I approach the sack and blender gradually, haggling with myself. Only a little glass at the beginning of today, I think, my canyon ascending as I envision bringing down another extensive serving like I had on Day 1.

Once more, the custom: pack in bowl, blend substance. One liter of water in blender, half of powder into blender, half of a vial of oil. This time, I include a capful of vanilla concentrate and a dash of green sustenance shading. I have now gotten roughly nine hundred hillion jillion squintillion remarks, messages, and tweets discussing "SOYLENT GREEN LOL." So on Day 2, my Soylent will surely be green. This time, I utilize super cold water and the most minimal setting on the blender, giving the blend a chance to rest after a couple seconds.Out of the blender and into the pitcher, then rehash with second liter. The pitcher has no foam today, for which I am grateful. Gradually, I pour an espresso mug-sized serving and taste.

The vanilla has a gigantic effect in taste discernment. The strange non-specificity is gone, similar to the yeasty breadiness—in its place, there's essentially an indication of vanilla. The sweetness is a great deal better now as well, feeling like some portion of the light vanilla flavor as opposed to a simulated idea in retrospect. There's very little to be done about the sticking pastiness however, and the dregs coats my mouth like mud in a riverbed. Still, I control through the mug of thick pistachio-green slurry and really feel OK about it.Day 2, 10:00: Second breakfast

This is turning into a standard hold back: I'm not eager, but rather on the off chance that I don't drink the Soylent, I won't complete the pitcher. Since the calories are incorporated with the sustenance, I have to complete the entire day's serving keeping in mind the end goal to get everything my body clearly needs to work.

The green shading isn't especially off-putting—it looks sort of cool, really, similar to it ought to taste of peppermint. My stomach reels at the possibility of peppermint-enhanced Soylent.I don't especially make the most of my second glass. I am drinking it while I work, similar to a quick paced present day kind of fellow, however regardless i'm full from breakfast and the more I drink of the second glass, the heavier I feel. It takes me 30 minutes to traverse the container, and the prospect of that whole pitcher as yet holding up in my ice chest is truly weighing at the forefront of my thoughts. Now, a light lunch of a modest bit of flame broiled chicken sounds appallingly, unpleasantly engaging. No, scratch that—now, not eating for whatever is left of the day sounds shockingly better.

I'm additionally feeling lovely darn uncreative. Morning is generally when I chip away at short news things and reports, and concentrating on a site sufficiently long to peruse something beyond a couple sections sounds like a preposterous measure of work. Reports of Soylent bringing on mental lucidity and enhanced execution and vitality can be discovered somewhere else on the Web, yet I feel the inverse: drowsy. The cerebral pain from today is starting to strengthen.

I pop some ibuprofen to help with the cerebral pain, and the little piece of water to make the pills goes down makes my stomach feel much more full. I attempt to disregard it and compose.

Day 2, 13:30: I am compelled to eat

The migraine has kindly blurred, and all the more reassuringly, I'm really feeling a little, exceptionally black out measure of craving. I'd love to give it a chance to stew longer and check whether it blooms into a real undeniable yearning to eat, however I don't have time. There's around 1.5 liters of green vanilla Soylent that I need to traverse.

The pitcher has stratified significantly less today than it did on Day 1, as well, for which I am thankful. I feel...odd, is the most ideal way I can put it. It's neither a decent odd nor a terrible odd—I simply feel a little off kilter. I get a decent whiff of Soylent as I whisk away its layers and I feel all the while queasy and hungry, however significantly more queasiness than craving. When I begin drinking it, it's not shocking, but rather I'd truly recently begun to shed the overwhelming feeling from breakfast and I'm not especially anticipating jumping again into feeling so weighted down and un-hungry.There's a considerable measure of gut moving as I drink this specific serving, as well—my digestive organs have been for the most part calm since breakfast, however evidently that is not going to last. When I'm finished with the glass, I've completely demolished any sentiments of yearning I may have been feeling and I truly have confidence in my heart that I will never need to put anything sustenance related in my mouth again for whatever is left of my life.

This sounds like overstatement, however man, Saturday is resembling it's a long, long way away.

As I come back to work, I need to accomplish something to consume through the Soylent funk I feel myself falling into. The previous evening's prematurely ended endeavor at running truly annoys me and I frantically need to get retreat there today, yet there won't be a shot in damnation if my gut doesn't quiet down and my mind remains this foggy.

It's conceivable this is a self-propagating cycle I'm in—Soylent's 2400 calories are more than I requirement for my standard "sit in this seat and compose throughout the day" level of action. Perhaps in the event that I get up and accomplish something, the action will jumpstart things and I'll get more empowered.

Running needs to hold up until some other time at night however, in light of the fact that I live in what might as well be called overwhelm hellfire. Furthermore, I have meetings and due dates and things—flying out for two or three hours today truly isn't an alternative. As the evening extends on, my gut cycles into high action, having a craving for seeming like an organization of dump trucks snarling and slipping their way through an Ice Capades execution. It's unsettling.

Day 2, 17:00: Do not need

Shane Snow, composing for Tim Ferris' blog, talks through his two week Soylent travel with mind and talkative, bypassing the days and clearly feeling great through it all. He describes that by Day 2, he's getting the fragrance of sustenance all over the place and envisioning about eating, about gnawing into a brownie.

I don't feel anything like that. Not by any means remotely. Sustenance is terrible. I have an inclination that I need to sew my mouth close. I would prefer not to ever expend anything again. No water, no Soylent, no chicken, no steak, no lager, no nothing. My stomach is finished. I have broken it.

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