#that point being that racism is still a huge problem in the US

[realasslesbian]

Also, I hope Brittany gets off that plane and takes a damn knee on the tarmac just to make all the big mad straight people even madder lmao

[warblogs17282]

Stolas and his accidental racism problems that is still an issue in apology tour, plus how this affects Stolitz coming back together.

Go to bottom for a tldr

Yea the arrangement did not start off well, considering the situation Blitz was in when he got that phone call, I wouldn't be surprised if Blitz saw it as already starting it off as a thing where Blitz is basically serving the royal by having sex with him once a month, that being the only thing Blitz is useful for. Sure Blitz put the idea of the sex thing first into Stolas' head when they met again after 25 years since Blitz used that to his advantage to get the grimoire initially as seen in s2 e1, but it doesn't really change my point much. It still 100% rubs Blitz the wrong way into what his role in the arrangement is.

Then we get into the pet names and shit Stolas mostly used in season 1, in e2 Stolas refused to take the hint, constantly flirting with Blitz the entire way through, ignoring Octavia and sometimes doing it right in front of her, much to Octavia's dismay, as we know and is proven later on, Blitz took these pet names and stuff pretty hard. He gets pretty racist in the harvest moon festival as well, now using those pet names and stuff in front of a huge crowd of people, even after Blitz tells Stolas to stop, putting down Blitz's race of people in front of basically everyone, also making this kinda thing pretty racist of Stolas? He did not do this with the intention to be racist, he's just a horny weirdo who's trying to match Blitz's levels. Like just look at the imps faces while he says this. This specific comment however, is probably just something engrained into Stolas' subconscious, most likely from Paimon as we can see evidence of in s2 e1.

Then we get to the full moon episode, with the two major comments here being 'you were serious?' and 'Treat me like one of your little Butler imps'. The first statement being proof that Stolas gave Blitz enough reason to believe that this was only about sex and nothing else, with evidence to support this being that Stolas didn't even bother to tell Blitz about the change in the planned events, causing Blitz to believe that Stolas was only ever in it for the sex, and now he's getting tired of Blitz, leading directly into the second statement, telling Stolas that he thinks that Stolas thinks so low of Blitz as a person, and because of a later statement and behaviour before this, leading Blitz into thinking that Stolas is being racist towards imps again when that is not Stolas' intention at all.

And then it gets entirely addressed in a better setting, Blitz still thinks it's a sex thing even after the argument in the full moon episode, and this statement proves it, Blitz thinks that Stolas has a fetish for imps and such, all perpetuated by Stolas' pet names and such in the past, his general incompetence at times when discussing heavy topics, and finally, his lack of self-awareness. The last one is the major selling point for Blitz, as much as Stolas tries to get Blitz to understand this isn't all about sex, they both fail miserably at doing so, with Stolas not bringing up the butler imp comment, in 'When I see him' we see the servant imp be fed up because Stolas has just emptied the fridge, leaving him to clean it all up, and in seeing stars where Stolas nearly kills the imps by squeezing him so hard, leaving accidental racism towards imps unaddressed for Blitz, so Blitz will continue to believe that Stolas is still racist towards imps, even if that's not Stolas' intentions, it's still in Stolas' subconscious, something Stolas needs to fix asap otherwise this will be a reason of the many reasons Stolitz has fallen entirely apart right now.

Not to mention for the most part, Stolas has only seen imps in positions such as servants and other jobs like that, with Blitz being well, the only person to break that status quo for him. Sure we have the imps in the harvest moon festival but that basically amounts to nothing for Stolas right now because of the reasons mentioned in that section of this post.

Description reads 'Stolas still not quite being self aware enough at times'

So Stolas believes he's not looking down on Blitz, but he does and just doesn't realise it, leading Blitz to have reason to believe Stolas does in fact look down upon him. Stolas does not seem to understand WHY what he did in the past hurts Blitz so much, proving that Stolas is not being self-aware at all at the moment.

tldr: The fact that Stolas has still yet to address his unintentional racism towards imps at multiple points during this show is a roadblock that Stolas needs to fix otherwise Stolitz cannot get back together.

[td-brick]

I talked about this a while ago (I think) but it annoys me when people use the stupid "well if the roles were revered/if Sierra was a guy you wouldn't defend her" strawman when talking about Sierra and her relationship to Cody as if Sierra as a character would even exist if she was a guy. Her writing and how she acts is entirely driven by misogyny and the people who wrote her seeing women as more neurotic or whatever than men. And this document (which is really good and you should read) goes more in depth about how a lot of her writing and her being depicted as eager/perverted is racist as well but. yeah. And you can recognize this about her without "defending" her or whatever. Yeah she was creepy and weird but MANY other characters in td are and they don't have nearly as much discourse surrounding them as she does.

Anyways I digress... going off my first point I feel like people forget how much misogyny (and racism in sierra's case, what with her being a woc) affects how characters are perceived and written in things. Sierra's character would not be what it was if she was a white guy. You can write flawed female characters who might have traits similar to sierra without being misogynistic and its actually bad if all your female characters are 100% perfect angels because that's misogynistic in its own right. but like there are still stereotypes you have to be aware of and if someone is misogynistic and writing a female character their misogyny will show through in her writing, like sierra. Watching world tour/all stars it feels like they're not giving her any of her own charm or positive traits, it's only attached to other characters (namely cody) and when she exists on her own (barely) she's just doing stuff to make you hate her.

And in and of itself the fact that her character is literally ONLY attached to cody (or cameron in all stars) is misogynistic. She is clearly a really strong person on her own, especially in total drama. like physically she's super strong and agile, she has a good understanding of the contestants already because of watching TWO seasons of the show many times and she probably knows a lot about how the game itself works, etc. Clearly she's also good at finding information about people so she would probably know how to use certain contestants traits to her own gain (to form alliances and otherwise). But for some reason they never really elaborate on that and especially in world tour just attach her at the hip to a random guy who she drags super far through the competition without ever getting any character development of her own and its so UGHHH. And I wouldn't even have a problem with her being a huge fan of Cody in specific (although I do wish they would focus on her being a td superfan as a whole more) if they just handled it better. which they don't. and the shit with Cameron in all stars is just dumb as fuck I'm sorry I don't think I even need to elaborate on that

[rubberduckyrye]

I really wanna hear your thoughts on the racism with Angie, I may not have been in the fandom for like 5 years now, but I have ALWAYS been so bothered by how she and Gonta are treated by the narrative and fandom back then but nobody wanted to talk about that back then too, so it's been refreshing seeing it brought up by you.

Honestly I've been screaming about Gonta ever since I got into the fandom--like, back in 2018? Angie I've known for a while her story was a bunch of racist stereotypes but as a pastey pastey white person, I wasn't sure how much I should speak on it. I started talking about it more casually on my blog at first, and now I'm just screaming it into the void because everyone keeps ignoring or dismissing me about it.

I'll start off by saying that the extent of her racist caricature was really brought to my attention by my partner Celest, and she pointed out the initial stereotypes that lead me to further researching on Pacific Islander cultures, Indigenous cultures, and the stereotypes that are associated with them. Even the use of "Atua", while at first glance seems to be more accurate and inclusive, is incredibly inaccurate at best, and racist at worst.

But I'm getting ahead of myself--time to wipe my hands of this once and for all and talk about the thing that the fandom doesn't want to talk about--how Angie is a racist stereotype of Indigenous and Pacific Islander cultures.

I'm gonna need a lot of resources for this one.

So the biggest problem with Angie is how she is characterized/heavily coded to be Native Hawaiian/an indigenous Polynesian young woman. While I can't find any specific articles about specifically Indigenous Polynesian stereotypes regarding it, I know for a fact that the "Merciless Indian Savage" applies heavily to native/indigenous Polynesian cultures just from the horrible media I was subjected to as a child by my own father. Of course I was never taught about how racist it was until I learned it for myself, but I've seen many a movie where Pacific Islanders, specifically indigenous, were portrayed as savage, violent subhuman cultures that horrifically sacrificed human lives and blood.

I can't tell if this just, isn't well documented or I'm bad at finding research material, but I have first hand experience seeing this stereotype in modern media, so I know it's a thing. Like in King Kong movies--I remember those older movies being especially bad about it. This movie was made in 2005 and is one of the most racist depictions I've ever seen and be warned this is quite disgusting to watch with the context of this being incredibly fucking racist.

(Please remember that King Kong's island is, well, an uncharted island called Skull Island. It's an island in the middle of the ocean. Do I need to say any more as to why this is a huge problem.)

The top comments on this video are also incredibly fucking racist too:

"The natives are scarier than the big scary monster" "I would be scared of directing this scene" like Jesus fucking Christ do you people even hear yourselves.

Anyway. Yeah this movie's depiction of natives is incredibly racist and I'm sorry to subject you to this scene. I just want to specify what I mean though when I say I've seen this shit so much in media and yet I'm struggling to find people talking about it. Like, I'm not going crazy, right?

Still.

The fact that in Angie's FTEs, she bluntly describes blood and even implies human sacrifices is enough to invoke such horrible cringe from me, but the fact that her "native island" is referred to as "strange" with fauna that attack humans is also reminiscent of the racism presented for specifically Pacific Islander stereotypes.

This specific instance is especially telling, because--

If this "DeepSea" shipping service can ship just about anything--including organ meat, children, and blood--then what on earth is Angie talking about when she says they don't stock "Offerings"?

The likelihood is that she's referring to adult humans--as these children from this "shipping" company are clearly trafficking human children, blood, and organ meat. Since we know blood offerings are something from "Angie's culture", it can't be blood offering's she's referring to. Since it only lacks those two things according to Angie, that's the only thing that can be really inferred/implied--adult human sacrifices.

This is also shown here in Kaede's second FTE with her:

Angie is having a nightmare about the blood/human sacrifices necessary for her "culture" and "island", and is clearly struggling and horrified with it. This also plays into the racist stereotype in that Angie is Not Like the Other Savages and condemns her people's practices, even if only internally/privately, and portrays her as a victim of something almost cult-like--which from the clip you saw above, is still a heavily racist stereotype of indigenous cultures due to how the "Merciless Violent Savage" appears cult-like when you involve human sacrifices.

So let's talk about Atua.

This is very much only in the english version, but the use of Atua to replace "god" in a more singular fashion is incredibly inaccurate. From my understanding, "Atua" more so refers to the gods of Māori mythology. The way Angie refers to Atua in canon is more like how one would refer to a singular god. The Hawaiian Kupua, something that wikipedia seems to suggest is the Native Hawaiian version of Atua, also expresses polytheistic customs.

So yeah. the English dub made it worse.

But wait, there's more!

Now I have. No idea where this "custom" came from, as when I looked it up I just got a whole lot of nothing--but notice how Shuichi is reacting to it. The custom presented is supposed to be extremely weird and even terrifying, invoking the reader to see Angie as strange/abnormal. She continues on talking about her "island's customs", and--

The sexuality presented here is very obvious--presenting the fluidity of sexuality one might see in Pacific Islander cultures as abnormal, bizarre, or down-right wrong. A small article for this one because I cannot find the other one I originally read: 1 but the general idea is that Christan/Conservative ideology has oppressed the gender and sexuality of a lot of Polynesian cultures. To express that Angie's culture is "exotic" and "strange" for its fluid sexuality is inherently racist in nature. I don't think this is an intended character flaw--this is blatantly the bias of the writers for V3.

Now for this specific one, I've completely lost the article I read it on, so take my words with a grain of salt. However, a big stereotype of Polynesian cultures is that they are extremely carefree--something that we see Angie being in canon without her FTEs. This is portrayed as a mask by the fandom, however, so it's a bit of a sketchy one to include. Still wanted to mention it though.

Anyway--these are all things I've learned from doing research, and I still can't find a lot of information about it. Pacific Islanders/Polynesians/Native Hawaiian people are often incredibly silenced and spoken over, which is why writing this post up was so incredibly frustrating to me.

I know these stereotypes exists for these cultures--but I cannot find many resources on the subject matter.

As someone who is trying their hardest to be racially aware and sensitive, it is very frustrating to try and comb the internet to find resources to reference, and the best thing you can find is a god-damn Wikipedia page. No, really. I could not find any reliable sources on anything outside of Wikipedia. Again I could just be really bad at finding research material/it could also be that the internet is getting so much worse about finding articles on subjects like this, but I digress. The fact that it's this difficult to find things--and then to re-find things, as I mentioned earlier, some of the articles I found are just, gone now--is a testament to how much of a problem this really is.

And it's so frustrating that I keep getting silenced/ignored about the matter because I want to learn. I want to learn what stereotypes to avoid for this demographic of people and their culture. I want to learn how I can fix a character like Angie--who I DO like, by the way--and make her much less of a stereotype in my own AU. I want to learn if the Atua and the Kupua are interchangeable words like Wikipedia suggests. I want to learn for my own Native Hawaiian OC so I can write him correctly. I, as a white person who doesn't have access to this culture, want to learn about it so I can accurately portray it and help fight against the negative stereotypes that people 5 years ago thought was "great storytelling."

But I can't learn anything if the fandom keeps ignoring me because they're too afraid to acknowledge the racism is there at all, in fear that them liking a racist caricature of a character makes them racist.

And to that, I say: Please stop ignoring me. I want to learn. I want to talk to people about the subject. I want to find someone willing to talk about the culture and educate me. I can't do that if I am constantly ignored.

So. Yeah.

Sorry if this is a little haphazard, my brain died halfway through making it because finding the research materials to showcase my points was incredibly difficult. Literally have been here for hours.

I hope this can be spread around though--so people understand why it's important to have this discussion, why it's important to acknowledge the racism, and why it's so frustrating to feel silenced/ignored when all you want to do is better yourself and your own knowledge.

So... let's talk. Let's talk about the racism in Angie's character--and how we, as a fandom, can address it.

[outivv]

https://x.com/dailycaelus/status/1812890084045389960?t=pnMzWIplb4Qsjeu200JClw&s=19

Very important information!

Long story short an anon insider from Hoyoverse is stating that while raising awarness on social media apps is great. We should take a step further and start dropping reviewing on any Playstore Site that has Genshin.

Express why you are dissatisfied and use hastages to bring more awarness. As for right now the Playstore reviews are dropping that it went from a 4 star review to 3.0 review. Hoyoverse is desperately trying to get reviews back by adding bots.

We shouldn't be just doing this with Genshin. Do this with ALL HOYOVERSE GAMES. Honkai Star Rail, Tears of Themis, ZZZ, etc.

HSR is facing the same problem as Genshin with Boothill being Native American coded, Penacony reloving around Jazz but have no Black character, Aventurine being Romani etc.

YEA YES!! I tried talking about this in my Hoyoverse boycott post, but I only touched on it briefly- but Hoyoverse games IN GENERAL are the overall problem. Tears of Themis has issues with being orientalist- and just shitty. Zenless Zone Zero apparently has actual blackface! Not good! Uhhh- outside of the record store on one of the little record poster thingies I believe. Honkai impact third has… straight up racism, and a subpar character plot about learning to love your skin color no matter what and she just goes “ummm actually no :)”, and oh my god I haven’t talked much on Honkai Star rail on this account but ykw I’ll go further into it.

Boothill- Boothill is based off of Native American culture, and is supposed to also be Latino. In the CN ORIGINAL translation of the game- his planet is named after two very real Native American tribes, his backstory recreates the same colonization that happened to native Americans specifically- calling Boothill’s people savages, and putting them in reservations after completely carpet bombing his planet, killing most of the population, and destroying the ecosystem. However, despite this Boothill has nothing to show for his heritage, or the fact that he is based around native, and Hispanic people except for the fact that he’s a cowboy- and even then sometimes I feel like he’s played up in game as like actually stupid for comedic relief when he’s not stupid AT ALL. (Sorry, Boothill’s one of my favs and a bad hyperfixation so I’m super passionate about how he needs proper representation)

Aventurine- aventurine is called a slur by sparkle, both sparkle and dr ratio point out specific racist stereotypes against aventurine that are usually targeted at Romani people which is who aventurine, and his entire home planet are based off of (that’s why I’m not a huge fan of Dr ratio x aventurine personally. Dr ratio isn’t racist imo, he’s just lowkey fucking mean and said the wrong thing to the wrong person). Aventurine’s backstory is also fucked in my opinion, and the way people in the fandom take his backstory and treat him as a character only really started getting bad bad after we found out he was Romani, but that’s a fandom issue- it’s still something to comment on.

Arlan- while Arlan is the darkest character Hoyoverse has made to date, he also has his talent names beeee references to slavery. Straight up. “Shackle breaker”, “frenzied punishment”, “swift harvest”, and then his eidolons- “breaking free”, and “hammer and tongs”. Not cool, kinda fucked up.

And that’s just the characters I can think of off the top of my head- not including Jade and her shit cause I know she has some stuff that’s like fucked up about her and ik she’s racist I just haven’t done my research on how she is racist and like gathered all the evidence basically lol, but that’s also just the characters, not to mention what you said anon- how penacony is based off of the jazz age but has no playable black characters? Girl whatttt? Gimmie a slay ass like black singer who’s besties with Robin, cmon now- don’t a coward Hoyoverse, you know DAMN WELL that she would sell too.

Hoyoverse games overall are like this, so please pay attention to all Hoyoverse games, and Hoyoverse mostly only listens to the App Store reviews so PLEASEEEEE go and review bomb ONLY Hoyoverse games. Start with Genshin and Honkai Star rail, go to Zenless Zone Zero and Honkai Impact 3rd then finish with Tears of Themis, don’t do it all at once if you can’t!! Just go review all of them one stars!!

[hello-nichya-here]

Who would Michael Jackson vote for, in your opinion?

Ah, I see we were recommended the same clickbait video XD

Until the Bad Era (so around 87-89, aka Michael's late 20s) he was a very devoted Jehovah's witness, meaning he had to follow certain rules. No christmas, no blood transfusions - and no voting, for anyone of any political party, ever. You were not gonna see him being too overly patriotic either, because things like saluting the flag are seen as a form of WORSHIP, and are thus unnacceptable in their eyes.

There's a reason the song of USA for Africa had no flags around, just the artists singing "We are the WORLD." Why his biggest hits about injustices tackled it in a GLOBAL scale. Why he always responded to accusations of racism by showing love to people of all different races and nationalities.

It wasn't just because he was a nice guy with love for everyone (but don't get me wrong, that was part of it). He literally did not have permission to get too into US politics. Even when he was next to freaking presidents he was always polite and friendly - but never expressing any explicit support or disapproval of him, his political allies, or political rivals.

Now, the Jacksons were known for ignoring their religion when it was convenient (the brothers sleeping around with groupies, Joe having a whole other family, The Jackson 5 having a christmas album, etc) but Michael notoriously had a problem with all that. The song "Superfly Sister" is basically him judging his family, with lines like "Mother's preaching Abraham, brothers they don't give a damn."

He almost didn't release the Thriller video and wanted every copy of it destroyed because he "got in trouble" for the supernatural, horror-movie theme. Even when he decided to go for it, he still felt the need to start with a disclaimer on how it was just a music video, not an expression of his religious beliefs (and ending with a cheeky "This is fiction, any similarities to events or people, living, dead or undead, is purely coincidental" because Michael's gotta Michael).

He only stopped being a Jehovah's witness/was kicked out by them because he didn't like how they were interfering with his art - he was literally told to try dancing without moving his hips, because it was "obscene." He realized he got to a point where anything and everything he did would make someone mad, and dediced to just do as he pleased instead of fighting a losing battle.

He still continued living pretty much the same lifestyle and expressing the same beliefs (the only big differences I've seen is that he became a lot more okay with the fact that he was a horny straight guy like any other, and that according to his daughter he's one of the few people in the Jackson family that doesn't treat people not being straight as a huge taboo and treated her attraction to women as fully normal right away).

Even after he had spent YEARS looking into other religions, including lots of talks with his brother Jermaine, who had converted to Islam, Michael was still pretty much behaving like nothing had changed and he was still a Jehovah's witness - hence his family basically burying him as one because everyone knew that was still Michael's religious belief, even if he had been shunned by them.

I am honestly going to be very surprised if it turns out he ever voted for anyone, as that seemed to be one of the beliefs he never let go of - for God's sake, the man cried after celebrating Christmas for the first time, in his 30s, because he felt he was doing something wrong.

Now, please don't misunderstand what I'm saying, Michael had VERY strong feelings on lots of things that were/are relevant in political debates - but whenever he expressed his concerns on a topic, he'd often go out of his way to DISTANCE it from any political affiliation.

For exemple: Earth Song is all about the planet being destroyed and all the suffering it leads to, which, yes, is an issue that is more left-aligned, but once again, Michael deliberately chose to make it a UNIVERSAL thing, expressed it through MUSIC, and while he donated a lot of money to help the cause, he never showed support for any politician that had a simmilar concern as part of their campain. The music video even ends with the planet being healed through a miracle after everyone affected falls to their knees and prays in the midst of their grief. It shifts the focus from any possible association with some kind of anti-captalism sentiment to make it simply about a devout man's own spiritual belief that humanity doesn't have the right to destroy what God created. It blurs the lines so he can do something that the left will cheer for, without angering the right.

The most openly political thing he ever did was show full support for Nelson Mandela (aka a foreign leader) as well as respect and admiration for MLK and Roosevelt in the song "They Don't Care About Us" (aka two important figures of America's past that were already dead) - and remember, that song in particular had videos both in the US and in Brazil. Once again, he makes it all about GLOBAL issues, trying to be, in a way, "bigger" than US politics so no one can figure out who he's supporting, assuming he supported anyone at all, which is unlikely.

Now, I know someone is inevitably going to ask "But weren't Michael Jackson and Donald Trump friends? Doesn't that mean he'd make an exception on his 'no voting' rule and likely support him over both Hilary and Biden?"

Michael hung out with Trump casually many, many, MANY times and has been to several of his properties (if I'm not mistaken he even lived at Trump Tower for a while). HOWEVER he explicitly told a friend, in a private phone call that he had no idea was being recorded, that he warned his father to not get Trump involved in any of the Jacksons business because he was NOT a smart, competent business man like Joe said.

Worse yet, at the end of his song "Money", Michael mentions a few important names, like Rockefeller and TRUMP, making his thoughts on their character crystal fucking clear through it all (and keep in mind, this was AFTER Trump defended him of the false accusations of pedophilia):

"I'll never betray or deceive you, my friend, but If you show me the cash, then I will take it If you tell me to cry, then I will fake it If you give me a hand, then I will shake it You would do anything for money Anything, anything, anything for money Would lie for you, would die for you Even sell my soul to the devil"

To me, it's pretty clear that, while Michael was clearly willing to be friendly with Trump, he was not blind to the fact that the guy is far from a saint, is no mastermind, and is very greedy, to the point that Michael did NOT fully trust him - and was willing to say so both in private and in public.

Any republican that tries to say he would 1000% be one of them just because Trump (who did not even have a political career when Michael was alive) is constantly telling stories about "My good friend Michael Jackson" is as delusional as any democract that thinks "Earth Song" means he would never ever support him.

If Michael Jackson ever bothered to vote for anyone, he kept quiet about it. At most, he'd let his music do the talking - "Slave To The Rhythm" was him being sympathetic to the struggles of women, "Little Susie" was about how neglectful families can full on kill their children, "Song Groove" was him making it clear he was pro-life (though he said he wanted to be careful with how he'd approach it because he didn't want it to be a guilt-trip or offend anyone, and the song didn't come out until 2012, three years after his death, despite being written in the 80s), "Black or White" was about not being racist, "They Don't Care About Us" was speaking out against police brutality/people in power neglecting their responsibilities and/or abusing said power, etc.

Considering "This Is It" was meant to be his final tour so he could solve all his money issues and chill somewhere with his family, I doubt that he'd say a word about who, if anyone, he'd voting for in this election if he were alive today. He was done with being a public figure.

Not to mention: Michael was NOT stupid. He always went out of his way to be the artist everyone could like (again, see him not wanting the anti-abortion song to offend or guilt-trip people, and it eventually being shelved to avoid the headache). He would not openly support a democrat and piss off the conservative half of his US fans, and he'd not be crazy enough to think people wouldn't drag him through the mud if he supported mister "We'll build a wall and make Mexico pay for it" and then went on to sing "The world must come together as one." It'd never fucking happen, he had more than enough problems to deal with already.

Plus, he very famously did not like being told what to do, so if either side tried pressuring him into supporting their candidate because he HAS to vote for SOMEONE, they'd be met with whatever the polite, super nice euphemism for "Fuck you, I'm Michael Jackson, I do whatever I want" is, because I'm pretty sure he had one.

[basket-of-radiants]

Proposal for Re-working the Kholins’ Character Arcs - a semi-coherent “essay” by me (feat. @akpaley​, thank you for your contributions and for your attempts at editing.)

Hey guys. Different kind of post this time around, compared to my usual brand. It’s time for some fix-it fanfiction masquerading as literary critique. I won’t be using a readmore, I dunno, probably to punish anyone still following this blog or something. So! In this post I’m going to solve the all the issues of racial theming associated with the Kholin family.

I’m often very harsh on the Kholins for benefitting so much from exploitative power structures while doing little to help those below them. But then I’ve also criticized them for actually addressing these very problems in-universe. How can I be upset at them for their inaction and then also be annoyed when Jasnah ends slavery? The short answer to all of this is just that the ways these topics are addressed all feel very inauthentic. For example, in real life history it took over a century of protests, slave revolts, political campaigning, and civil wars to legally end slavery in Europe and America, and abolitionists were met with fierce opposition at every turn. A fictional world need not follow our same historical trajectory, but it still seems a little disingenuous for a monarch to just decide to end it within her first year of power because it doesn’t mesh with her philosophical framework. It’s more like trying to wrap up a subplot than actually address the topic.

Ultimately however, there’s only so far this line of criticism can ever take me because the Kholins are the protagonists and you can’t get rid of them without turning the whole story into something else entirely. And Sanderson shouldn’t have to, these are characters that he created and he’s allowed to tell a story about them. And I actually like a lot of their personalities and arcs and outlooks quite a lot. I do think it’s...unfortunate...to have used slavery and racism as disposable props in a story that ultimately turned out to be about a bunch of royals learning to be better people and saving the world along the way. So I guess what I’m interested in is if there’s a way to keep the premise, keep the characters, keep the general story beats, keep the themes of honor and personal growth, keep the basic structure of everything, and still handle those themes with grace. You know, could this be a compassionate story about addressing racism told from the point of view of nobility? Is such a thing possible?

Well, I’m going to try my best. And I’m going to be imperfect about it, obviously, so if you actually care enough to read all this shit, I welcome discussion and disagreement. 

Jasnah is the most obvious example to point to as being indicative of the problem, but I also think she has the easiest character fixes. She’s already been established as an outspoken dissident on many of her society’s deeply ingrained values. Just add to her atheism and feminism that she’s also always been an outspoken abolitionist. Give her ties to an ongoing reformist movement. Have her lecture Shallan about it in Way of Kings. Make that a reason she’s butted heads with her family so much. I do think it’s poor writing to have a ruler end slavery on a whim, but I won’t deny that having the right person in power can make a huge difference. It’s not as cathartic as having Kaladin lead a slave revolt (or as having Moash destroy society <3) but that doesn’t make it inherently bad so long as the topic itself is still treated with weight. Have her moralistic ideology be firmly pre-established so that when she has to explain why she’s abolishing slavery, her reasoning can be purely pragmatic. The reason she’s moving so fast is because this is a historical point of heightened change, and so her reforms are more likely to work, but if she waits too long and things settle back into a new status quo, she may have missed her window. Not to mention, when her nephew comes of age, her own legitimacy as a ruler might be challenged, so she needs to do as much as she can in what may be end up being a short reign. As a character, Jasnah has always been able to girlboss her way past political realities through sheer force of personality, and that’s great and all, but I think it heightens her character’s competence if she does have to deal with real backlash, not just to her but to her policies as well. The narrative doesn’t even need to linger on her opposition, but acknowledging it and acknowledging that she’s simply a member of a preexisting and ongoing movement would have done wonders to portray slavery as a real and prescient issue. Then again, this is a topic which people have fought and continue to fight wars over, so it wouldn’t be unreasonable for her to have receive major backlash either; perhaps when the Kholins hear in Words of Radiance that she was assassinated, the news could come as tragic but not entirely unexpected so as to imply that her opposition has attempted such in the past. All this is to say, I don’t think it’s at all wrong for Jasnah to do what she did. I also don’t think her entire stance on abolitionism should have come down to a comment where she tells her uncle she’s trying to rule according to ethically consistent values. The fact that slavery was insultingly easy to end not only delegitimizes is as a topic worthy of discussion, but also is a really scathing indictment of literally everyone else in the ruling class who didn’t even think to try.

Jasnah done, easy, Dalinar next.

Dalinar is probably the most complicated character for me to discuss and form coherent statements on. He’s just so rife with contradictions down to his core. That’s probably why I continue to like him so much, why he’s still my favorite, even though I still consider him to be a Bad Person over all. I think deep down I’ll always lean a bit too pacifistic ideologically to ever consider a warlord/general to be a good person, no matter how honorable he may be or how much growth he may undergo. Don’t get me wrong, I still do love his growth. Dalinar is characterized by his constant change and forward momentum, even moreso than the rest of the cast. So for discussing him, at what point can I point to him and say “this is Dalinar, this is who he is, this is what he believes and what he cares about”? Of course, during any point in his arc, you’re going to have to grapple with the fact that all of his lofty rhetoric about honor and striving for personal betterment is ultimately going to be pretty useless to all the people whose lives he’s meaninglessly thrown away across his military career. For me personally, when I talk about his character I like to take the end-of-oathbringer approach, where I acknowledge everything he did in the past as Blackthorn, I agree that it was pretty fucked up, and I forgive him and grant him a clean slate. All this to say that even if I’m judging him purely by his behavior as the current Dalinar within the present day continuity of the books, he’s still a massive hypocrite with horrific amounts of blood on his hands which he’s never even bothered to consider. I dunno, when I first read Way of Kings and I first got to meet this general who’s leading an army in a literal genocide campaign, I sort of figured he’d get some kind of “wait am I the bad guy” moment at some point in the future. And he did get a moment in Oathbringer where he has to fully confront his guilt over past actions, it was great, I really really loved it! But it was also all about actions he took before the series even started, so I guess wiping out the listeners wasn’t a sin he thought needed any atonement. I’m not going to get into the narrative’s treatment of singers and listeners on this post (for no other reason than because I have waaaaaaay too much to say there) but the point I’m getting at is that however good Dalinar’s growth is and whatever direction it takes, it’s always going to have poisonous roots to me. And his treatment of class/racial issues is no different. 

Fixing Dalinar is going to take a lot of what Dalinar does best: introspection. In Way of Kings, Dalinar dislikes how Sadeas treats his bridgemen because he believes it to be dishonorable, because he believes Sadeas is forcing others into a situation that he himself would never put himself into. He also has various sympathetic reflections here and there about how sad it is when soldiers die, and about how without the benefit of the Thrill, violence is actually kind of bad. You know how it goes. But I don’t think he ever put himself at risk to actually help or protect any of the people who are dying. Whether he wants to end the war or not, he still continues to participate in it. And he’s still willing to set aside the lives of literally everyone beneath him so he can pursue his dream of unity. The book ends with Kaladin and the rest of bridge four saving him and Adolin, and in gratitude, he purchases their freedom and gives them honored positions in his household. You know, because he’s so honorable. Everyone loves this scene, so I’m going to make it the catalyst for Dalinar’s new and improved character development. The problem with saying Kaladin helped Dalinar so Dalinar helped Kaladin is that when I’m being reductive and uncharitable (like I’m being right now), I can argue that their relationship basically started as a quid pro quo. This scene is meant to prove that Dalinar really is the most honorable person in Alethkar, just as Syl thought, only it doesn’t actually do that. See I don’t actually want Dalinar to start treating Kaladin as an equal. I want Dalinar to, in that moment, realize that Kaladin is better than him. That for all of his pontificating about honor, he would have never even considered risking his own life and the lives of his own family to rescue a bunch of bridgemen. I want him to see Kaladin’s honor, and rather than be validated in his beliefs, I want him to be thoroughly humbled. Let him spend all next book reflecting on all the lives of darkeyes he’s destroyed. Let it shame him, as Evi’s death shamed him. He already flirts with these lines of thought, and he already has an arc about confronting his past actions. Let the racial injustices he’s participated in be a part of that. Let him abandon his books and traditions instead look to Kaladin to learn what honor truly means. I don’t know how any of this would translate to his actions, because if we’re being honest his ideals are already quite incongruous with his actions, but the fact that he manages to have such strong theming regardless makes me think maybe that’s okay. I guess ultimately it would be enough for me if his character, as someone who symbolizes the ideals of a nation, was able to look at a darkeyes publicly be a follower rather than always trying to lead by his own personal example.

That’s Dalinar. Elhokar next?

I actually don’t think there’s too much wrong with Elhokar’s writing, especially in the first two books where a much greater emphasis on these themes were placed. He’s not a protagonist and we the audience aren’t supposed to endorse his actions. Most of what I’d change about his story is more about Kaladin and Moash than it is about him. I definitely don’t love that he can throw away the lives of his own people by the thousands in the genocide campaign that was the vengeance war, and then have the narrative just ignore all that in favor of him being sad about his own incompetence. If Elhokar is meant to be a sympathetic character, then when he calls himself a bad king, that’s what he should be thinking about, the number of lives he’s wasted over these years. I actually like him a lot more as a less sympathetic character, and I think I would have preferred if in oathbringer the narrative and the other characters would have stopped making so many excuses for him. Back to Kaladin and Moash, those are the two characters defined by their experiences as members of the downtrodden caste, so I personally sort of judge the problematic-ness of the whole story by how they get treated. Everyone loves to talk about how those two are foils. So. In order to strengthen Kaladin and Moash’s characters, either Elhokar needs to be as much of a monster as Amaram, or Amaram needs to be just as sympathetic and conflicted and having-of-a-toddler as Elhokar. Don’t get me wrong, I genuinely love the trope of finding at the end of a revenge quest that the person you hated has changed and grown. But I hate how this means that Moash’s hatred is wrong and unjustified, whereas Kaladin’s is validated at every turn. I don’t actually dislike Elhokar. I mean I think he’s a bad person, but I like a lot of characters who are bad people. I just think that if this story really wants to grapple with class and race (because it sure brings them up a lot for a story that doesn't want to talk about them), then Moash is a much more important character than him, with a lot more to add to that kind of discussion, which is why I think Elhokar’s characterization would have to come second to Moash’s development. (Obviously if this series were being reworked to be better on this topic, Moash would have to be written with a lot more compassion in general, but this post isn’t about him.)

Intermission time. Gavilar.

Gavilar is already perfect, 10/10, great character all around, what a guy, no notes, no wonder he’s so universally beloved among all of the fans, social justice icon.

Okay onto Navani.

I may not be the best person to talk about Navani. She has never been a favorite character of mine, and so compared to the others I haven’t thought as much about her values or the way she thinks or the narrative impacts of her actions. Someone who has more love for her would probably write better criticisms of her. (I’m going to reject any premise that falls along the lines of “Navani isn’t racist because she feels X,” but I’m not wholly confident in my analysis here, and I welcome any good faith critiques both of my own thinking and of her character when come at from other angles.) It’s hard to say where she should have grown from how she starts out viewing darkeyes because I don’t actually know how she starts out viewing darkeyes. I know I’m probably meant to assume she just treats everyone equally because she’s a Good Person on Team Good Guys, but it’s hard to just accept that she had all around good values when she married a warlord and was in love with his more violent brother. I dunno, was her “good guy” status meant to have always been an element of her character, or did she get it secondhand from her association with the new and improved Dalinar? With someone like Adolin, we got to see what shitty values he held at the start of Way of Kings (I’m talking about the Alethi warmongering, not his interest in fashion) but we also got to see how his father gradually won him over throughout the course of the book, and then later on we get to see him develop further on his own. For someone like Navani, I find it strange how she’s always so proactively supportive of Dalinar in everything, even when his own goals and values are in flux. I assume her character is just meant to be super ride or die when it comes to her family, and I do like that in a character, but that also means that she’s been wholly willing to support or at the very least excuse her family’s oppression and exploitation of darkeyes without comment. (See, Lirin is a much better parent than Navani, he would never have let his son start a whole genocidal vengeance war for fun and profit (I say this as if I’m joking but I’m kinda not.)) Some people have reminded me that she was pretty much shut out of the political process by Gavilar and Elhokar, and I agree with that, but I don’t really have any evidence that she would have cared much about darkeyes even if she had been more involved. In general it just seems like the whole topic doesn’t matter much to her. So what I would wish for the narrative would be to lean further into this. Draw attention to her cognitive dissonance and try and make the readers feel conflicted about her as a person. Highlight the fact that she’s willing to overlook the suffering that befalls other families if it means success for her own. I think one of my issues with her is that to me, this is a major (and interesting!) character flaw, but the books never seem to treat it as such. Honestly I think if this were intentional, I’d probably find her character really interesting, but from my reading of the text, I feel that I’m supposed to think of Navani as a generally decent person who’s by and large on the right side of things. The thing is, with the caste system playing such an integral role in their culture, I think she needs to have some sort of feelings about it, or else the fact that she doesn’t should be an issue to overcome. Otherwise she becomes another factor delegitimizing racial oppression as a real and important problem. If she’s a good guy and she doesn’t care about racism, then that’s saying you don’t have to be antiracist to be a good person in this world. 

Probably could have done that one better. I dunno. Leave me angry and hateful comments if I’m totally misrepresenting your favorite character. Moving on.

Adolin already has some great character development across the books. And he already has kind of engaged with this stuff in his story. Unfortunately, that’s less used in the “this person was racist but is becoming better sense” and more used in the sense of “Kaladin learns that #NotAllLighteyes are bad” which is pretty unfortunate for a number of reasons. Especially since, if he actually was going to prove he’s different from other lighteyes, out of all the Kholins I think Adolin is the best candidate for being a full on class traitor. I’m serious, looking back over the events of his plotlines, it would suit him shockingly well while disturbing the overall narrative shockingly little.

Adolin’s current plot is loosely as follows: in Way of Kings he likes all the things someone of his station is supposed to like, clothes, violence, dueling, warfare, swords, hangtime with the guys, all the good stuff. At the beginning of the book he doesn’t understand why old, stuck-up Dalinar can’t just let loose and be a relelntless war-monger like everyone else, but by the end of the book he’s come to understand a certain value to honor and thus has begun to become a better person himself. Words of Radiance has him lose his popularity, fall out of favor with all of his friends, grow disillusioned with his society, perform a prison sit-in in solidarity with Kaladin, and murder Sadeas. Most of this is done again, because of his father, and how Adolin now wants to help and support him and his ideals. In Oathbringer he mostly isn’t involved in courtly politics, being away on a mission for much of it, but he does make a pretty big move by rejecting the throne. In Rhythm of War we see the schism that’s formed between him and his father until he leaves on another long-distance mission. Summary over. In general I reject the idea that making the Kholins be individually less racist makes for a better, or more nuanced and compassionate discussion of the topic, but if anyone is primed for a “lighteyes learns racism is wrong” character arc, I think it’s Adolin. Imagine him following a bit less in Dalinar’s footsteps and a bit more in Jasnah’s. You almost don’t even have to change any story beats: in getting to know Kaladin, something clicks in Adolin where he realizes that if he wants to treat Kaladin as his equal, he has to treat all darkeyes as equals, and so he realizes to his horror that he and his entire caste of friends and family are all monsters for treating them the way they do. (Actually, there is one plotline in WoR I’d probably scrap, and that’s his slowburn bromance with Kaladin. I mean I get what Sanderson was going for with the ribbing and then eventual friendship, but Kaladin was an absolute stranger who risked his own life to save Adolin and his father from certain death, and so I feel there should probably have been a bit more overt respect upfront there.) In pushing for his newfound belief in equality, he ends up burning through all of his intracaste goodwill and political capital, causing all of his friends to drop him. When he kills Sadeas, it doesn’t have to be about protecting Dalinar or about personal revenge, it could also be that he’s gotten to know Bridge 4 and learned firsthand about the atrocities they’d gone through, and so there’s no way he’d allow such a pioneer of human rights violations to stay in power. In the following books, maybe he’s become so politically toxic due to challenging the very foundations of his own power, his own family has to send him away on missions so he can’t rock the boat too much at home. Maybe refusing the throne was more of a political statement than a personal one, because he’s come to understand that being a ruler means oppressing thousands of others. Maybe this is another form of hypocrisy he criticizes Dalinar for, how Dalinar might claim to value darkeyes but how he still retains power bought with thousands of their corpses. None of this has to modify actual events very much, it just affects the reasons for them. And it would also meaningfully show why he gets to be a “good lighteyes” if he actually engaged with his status and rejected it, knowing it comes at the expense of others.

Okay, enough about that. Renarin maybe?

I won’t say too much about Renarin here, because I’d probably just end up repeating a lot of the same criticisms of how he’s used as a “good lighteyes.” From a narrative standpoint, all those criticisms hold for him as well. You know, he wants to join Bridge Four, and future-villain Moash doesn’t like the idea because he doesn’t trust lighteyes, but Kaladin reassures him that Renarin is a good boy, so don’t worry about it, and everything works out fine in the end, proving that lighteyes are good people just like you and me. This isn’t a problem with him as a person or character, it’s just more of that general theme of “the caste system is fine so long as nice people are at the top” which I clearly think should be interrogated. Thus far, in contrast to the rest of his family, Renarin is very young and has had much less of a political presence, not to mention fewer POV chapters anyway, so I think delving too much deeper here will feel a bit hollow to me.

Does Shallan count as a Kholin? I’d like to talk about her super briefly.

Unpopular opinion, but I actually think Shallan is one of the better characters on the topic of race insofar as how she’s written, especially compared to the other Kholins. But wait, I hear you say, what about all of her dozens of instances of casual racism? Yes, that’s what I’m referring to. I like how Shallan demonstrates how ingrained these harmful ideologies are in their society. I like how every time she has a distasteful thought, we the audience are reminded that racism still exists and even good people will continue to promote it if they don’t view it critically. I like that Shallan is problematic, because their society has problems! At least with her it doesn’t feel like the story’s trying to sweep the fact under the rug. There are plenty of issues with her writing, plenty of jabs at Kaladin that probably shouldn’t have been treated as cute. She’s actually the main character whose racism and classism I see criticized the most. And I think that’s a good thing! My issue with the Kholins isn’t that I think they should all be less racist, my issue is that their positions are inherently oppressive, and it seems as though the narrative doesn’t think that matters so long as deep down they’re good people. When people critique Shallan in specific instances, I tend to see a fair amount of consensus and agreement there, but when I critique the Kholins people will argue with me by pointing out that Dalinar/Adolin/Navani/whoever actually treats darkeyes as equals, so my arguments are invalid. Purely my own anecdotal experience of course, but it tends to make me think that there’s something in Shallan’s writing that’s working right, something that isn’t working for the other lighteyed characters.

Now obviously with all of this, I’m not saying I want these books to have more racism in them. What I’m arguing is that if the books are going to explore the topic (which they do) then they should treat the topic with an appropriate amount of gravity rather than acting as if it can be solved by having aristocrats become nicer people.

If you’re still here with me, thank you for reading, I love you, I hope you enjoyed yourself through my descent further and further into rambly nonsense. If you just scrolled to the bottom, that’s fair enough, there won't be a tl;dr but you’re welcome for filling your dash with massive text blocks.

[imaginespazzi]

I hope Uconn gets Beers because she is the best player out of the portal. She can give us the best chance to win. We need a true post presence not a player that is undersized. We experienced that with aaliyah and we got killed on the boards. Beers can fix that problem.

Aaliyah was great, but her being undersized and playing out of position did not help us win. Injuries played huge role, but this is a reason why we should get a true post player out of the portal. Beers fits that role perfectly.

Plus, Beers has playing experience which is something that we need in the post. Jana hasn't played a college game, Ice is more of a stretch 4 than a 5. Ayanna, hasn't played in over a year and her playing experience is low.

Unless, Beers has harmed anyone or saying something disrespectful towards anyone, her views should not be a concern. Not everyone is going to share the same views, but as long as everyone is respectful it should be fine. Being mature is respecting others views whether you agree with them or not. There is no history of Beers saying or doing anything wrong for Uconn fans to not want her.

Well it no longer matters now...

But to your last point, once again, implicit support is still complicit racism. And quite frankly, with the way all the girls immediately unfollowed her, they might have held their tongue for the greater good of the team and earning a championship, but it seems they got the same vibes from her that a lot of us did.

As for maturity, I can't tell if that was a dig at me or not, but I don't consider myself immature for not wanting a girl on my team who is okay with racist, homophobic, transphobic and sexist views. She may not spout that bullshit, but if she is actively following people who do, and potentially voting along those lines, that's enough for me. Some things are beyond basketball to me and I'm glad Raegan Beers is not coming to UConn, no matter how skilled of a player she is.

[monstroso]

literally what makes the aristocats bad. its got nice songs. it has silly characters. it’s got really pretty backgrounds and the old hand-drawn disney animation. it’s inspired by a true story. what’s there to dislike.

(*cough* aside from the racism that permeates most if not all of the old Disney movies but since that’s present in so many of them no special case should to be made against the aristocats for it to be a worse movie because of that shared trait *cough*)

also I hope this didn’t come across as like. confrontational or anything bc it’s not supposed to be. legitimately want to hear your thoughts 👍

No, I love this! I appreciate being asked my thoughts, especially since the good people in the tags have told me loud and clear that I am in the minority on this one.

I will say, I did not expect the poll to have quite the legs it's got on it now. My polls usually only get about 60 votes. If I'd known 4,700 strangers and counting would have an opinion on this, I might have worded it differently. The real reason I didn't include The Aristocats is because I knew it would run away with the thing. Most people consider it a classic, regardless of what my opinions on it actually are. I thought throwing in a cheeky little line about it would be a fun gag for my followers who know I'm a true hater at heart.

Before I even got this ask - and because the overwhelming majority of the tags on the poll are telling me I have no taste - I actually did start rewatching it! Hundreds of strangers on the internet have never been wrong before, right? Part of the problem is I have next to no nostalgia for it. We didn't own the VHS when I was a child, so the only times I ever saw it were when I'd go to a friend's house or borrow it from the library. Maybe my judgement was clouded by not having seen it in a very long time.

First things first: The good stuff. There are parts of this film that rank alongside the best of the Disney classics, and I would be remiss in not mentioning them.

The music, for one, is pretty good. You'd have to be some kind of real Scrooge not to enjoy "Ev'rybody Wants to Be a Cat" of course, but on a rewatch I did find myself grinning through "Thomas O'Malley Cat" as well. This is an easy point in the film's favor though, as I'm an absolute sucker for both big band and jazz. This is great use of your Scatman Crothers and Phil Harris, top points awarded for these two numbers in particular.

The animation is also pretty good. Especially on Edgar and Thomas O'Malley. Your mileage may vary on the Xerox style, but the animation itself is relatively unimpeachable. This was still during the era of the Nine Old Men, so there's all kind of impressive work being done with the big sweeping things like character movement and expression as well as in the more subtle animations like expressions and mouth movement.

The cats are doing all the cat stuff you'd expect like licking their paws and poof'ing their tails, but there's less expected movements here too, like arching their backs when walking alongside things or rolling in the dirt to dry off from the river. This is good character work, but it's also pretty standard for guys like Milt Kahl and Eric Larson. If you're at all interested in animation, I highly encourage you to read more about the Nine Old Men and their history with the studio.

(A big thanks to the tumblr gif artists for gif'ing the parts of this movie that look good so I can spice this post up with some relevant visuals!)

Now, the bad. Like many movies from this era, The Aristocats has something of a pacing problem. While it is necessary to do the work of setting up the conflict in the beginning, you might be surprised to learn that it takes 25 minutes for Thomas O'Malley to show up, which is when the story actually starts.

A huge part of the problem is that this movie suffers from a sort of directionless vignetticism that seems to have been driven only by the idea that it would be cute to see the animals do X, Y, and Z. "Oh wouldn't it be sweet to see the kitten paint?" "Wouldn't it be so adorable if the cat played the piano?" "Ohh, what if the mouse ate a cracker dipped in milk, wouldn't that be darling?" I have a very high tolerance for schmaltz, but The Aristocats is where even I must draw the line.

When the movie isn't being tooth-rottingly sweet, it's frequently boring, and when it's not being either of those things it's showing you another chase scene with the dogs and the butler. It's erratic, tiring, and strains the limits of the modern attention span even at the movie's incredibly sparse runtime. It's a 79 minute film and you feel all 79 of those minutes.

Tonally, much of the movie smacks of the kind of rose-tinted sentimentalism Disney was known (and even criticized at the time) for, but without the guiding hand of the man himself, nearly 5 years gone by this point. The studio was floundering in the wake of Walt's death, and The Aristocats is quite close to the nadir of this particular creative valley - though the distinction arguably goes to Robin Hood, I'm much softer on that film for a number of reasons.

The Aristocats reminds me a lot of Lady & the Tramp, in that it's the same story (down to the aforementioned racist caricatures of Siamese cats), but with cats instead of dogs and with a much less focused sense of purpose, tone, and creative direction. If you like The Aristocats for the music and the beautiful scenery, but you haven't seen Lady & the Tramp, give that one a try instead. The animation is better, the music is about on-par, and it doesn't have as many stupid chase scenes. Or just watch 101 Dalmatians, which outstrips both films on sheer charm alone.

I think I had more I wanted to say, but it was mostly rambling that got away from the point. On rewatch, I don't think this movie is as bad as I remember it being, but I stand by my decision not to include it in the poll.

tl;dr - The Aristocats isn't the worst. If you grew up watching it I totally understand having a soft spot for the music and the atmosphere. In a vacuum, I can't say I think it holds up but ultimately I'm not going to judge anyone for enjoying it. Thanks for the ask!

[mueritos]

Seeing like, young transmasc peeps talk about hrt and then getting upset they get masc characteristics other than height and voice deep is uhh genuinely concerning and doesn't make me feel good.

Like when I did T right off the bat I knew I'd end up with lots of body hair and a bit of pudge BC I take after my dad a lot genetically, but I still had a hard time adjusting BC people were giving me crap for getting body hair like??? Which didn't help when adjusting at all. I can say though that I am much happier with myself now than when I was not on T (except for my back hair lol).

I'd have to agree, and it's a large part of why I made the tenderizing post a few months ago. I have to say, for a generation that loves to prove how much they're on their phone and have access to information, they have no media/critical thinking skills or even think to research on their own. Not to "back in my days", but back literally the last 10 years, youtube/forums/articles/blogs were HUGE for knowing about HRT and trans stuff. Nowadays, people only want bite sized information transmitted to them through instagram infographics or tiktok videos.

And I have to say that I've only seen white people act so ignorant toward transitioning and HRT. I have not seen BIPOC trans people who are just so ignorant to their own genetics or about HRT in general. There's also just a huge problem within the community to uphold and love white standards of beauty, on top of the fatphobia, ableism, anti-blackness, racism, etc and etc. The hatred of body hair, of smells, of bodies in general is a Western concept; most cultures outside the US are like yea we all have bodies and it's pretty much accepted that our bodies are weird and fun. Does that mean social purity doesn't exist outside the US? No, but there really is something insidious about the way the colonial mindset in regards to bodies being othered...especially when your body is ALREADY othered...like why would u internalize that onto yourself and others...i dont fucking know its like insanely exhausting at this point

the best we can do is just keep campaigning for media literacy/critical thought, share accessible information, and share as much knowledge as possible, because there is already a LOT out there

[fayesdiary]

Faye's Fòdlan Journal: Season 1 - Episode 5: Truly the best Academy

<- Previous Masterpost Next->

As I still slightly suffer from the loss of footage, we get the mission for our second month at Garreg Mach: Wipe out a group of bandits that have taken refuge in the Red Canyon Zanado, led by Kostas.

Yes, that guy Byleth killed twice in the Prologue. Somehow he's still alive. Never thought I'd see the day an earlygame bandit boss would have plot armor.

So, time to go talk to everyone again. As a note in the future, I'll only point out the stuff I think it's interesting. Even if I wanted, I can't include everything due to the 30 image limit.

Am I... getting sassed by a generic NPC?

Oh by the way, here's the combat professor Jeritza. We actually met him last month but he got lost along with the footage.

There is very little to say about him right now, except he really wants to outedge Felix. His two passions are fighting and being alone. Thrilling stuff, let me tell you.

Here we see the first glimpses of what will likely be a major theme in Three Houses: Fòdlan's huge problem of racism and xenophobia. It's going to get ugly fast, especially in the case of Duscur.

Here I learn how recruiting students from other houses (and eventually other professors and knights) works: You have to reach a certain threshold on the things they require, be that Byleth's level or a specific stats, or even their rank with a particular weapon. You can still gain support conversations with them, and those lower the requirements for recruiting them. And since Bernie wants a high Bow rank, I will spend the following chapters trying to train Byleth in it. Luckily we have unlocked Faculty Training, which lets Byleth take lessons from the other professors in a specific skill whenever they have activity points to spare. Which unfortunately at this point is not often the case.

Similarly I got interested in recruiting Leonie since she seems so close to Jeralt (although to be honest I thought she was lying at first because certainly Byleth would know her if that was the case, right? Even more proof there's more going on between the two), and she requires a high Lance rank, so that will also be a priority.

And while I know I can potentially recruit everyone and crowd the Blue Lions class like crazy, I will be limiting myself to an extra students from each of the other two houses to preserve the experience. Besides, this game lets you deploy 12 units at most.

Speaking of Blue Lions: Hi, Felix.

If I didn't know any better I'd just think he's being a dick as usual and don't get me wrong, he is. But given how Dimitri turns up at the start of the timeskip... there may be a hint of truth in what he's saying.

AT TIMES, Ingrid!?

Anyway, moving on. This month Jeralt gives us some battallions, an exclusive of this game: To put it simply, they grant the unit that equips one extra stats depending on the battallion which can be upgraded up to Lv5 simply by using it. Things like extra Attack, Hit/Crit/Avo, Def/Res and so on. For now the gains aren't much, but they will become way more significant when we gain higher rank battallions.

The main thing battallions grant, though, is Gambits.

Think of them as the precursor of Engage attacks: Most of them let you hit multiple enemies at once without risk of counterattack (the type and AOE depends on the battallion), and if you manage to hit , all of the enemies in that area will not only be damaged, but also be frozen in place and have their stats lowered. You can also use them whenever.

But compared to Engage Attacks, not only are they not guaranteed to hit (the chance to either hit or avoid a Gambit depends entirely on Charm, a stat unique to this game), they can also only kill the enemy directly targeted by it. And they also not replenishable until the end of the month. Regardless, they are still incredibly useful.

A few days later Byleth gives their first lecture to the class, and once again makes an embarassment out of the Academy by not even knowing how to teach and having Dimitri explain it.

The fact that the house leaders give the tutorials for teaching instead of the staff is hilarious. The most esteemed Academy in Fòdlan and they don't even brief or tutor their new staff and have the students do it instead. Rhea please.

Well, I wouldn't say it's inaccurate. I know on my first day of work I got dumped right onto it with absolutely zero guidance or directions so... yeah, that unfortunately checks out. Three Houses takes place in Italy confirmed.

Anyway, before the mission itself we have a mandatory training battle where we have to beat up some church soldiers. Not much to say.

No Dimitri. No they do not. And this is something they should know as a mercenary, but Jeralt says he never taught them much of tactics.

Seriously, what did Jeralt even teach Byleth beside wielding a sword? This is why homeschooling is bad, everyone.

With all that said and done, it's the end of the month. And that means it's time to beat up some bandits.

Also enjoy this Rhea screenshot. I didn't know where else to put it, but her pose is really cute. She's so excited!

<- Previous Masterpost Next->

[good7luck]

My quick ramblings about VNC manga chapter 62 part 1

(more under the cut)

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Time flied again, and now ch 62 part 2 is coming or already out XD so I'm roughly writing some bits at least asdfg

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I wrote some depressing prediction for this chapter, and I'm glad things didn't go that (physically violent) way, especially for Noe :) Vani stood up (as he should, cuz he is part of the cause) and "solved" the problem...by being verbally violent asdfg Anyway, I still feel something similar to that might happen at some point, though ^^;

I'm anxious about Johann for several reasons, but for now...I feel so sorry for him that he had to perform that much to "smoothly" solve(TM) the uncomfortable situation and protect his family ;_; I just...don't know what (proper words) to say, and I hate it :(

I'm happy to be quite right about Riche X) It's a huuuge shame that the anime completely cut out her cute interaction with Noe in the Catacombs :/ It wouldn't have taken too many minutes ://

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a little or a lot negative from here, with some potentially triggering words

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Apparently...some people think it's a bad / problematic writing decision that "white" Vani enlightens "black" Noe about "racism" towards Dham...as if the narrative / context was meant to mock Noe or such?? Also, as if similar situations (not just about racism) never happen in real life?? Honestly, they seem to be the ones who are somehow obsessed with the skin color tone of fictional characters the most lol

Like...did Vani have to leave Noe ignorant as he was, then? Was there any other "better" person (ex. "black" Dham) to explain "better" at the moment?? It doesn't even look like what Vani said was particularly wrong, either - especially compared to the situation when Luca "explained" to Vani/Noe what the Book of Vanitas does(TM), and then Vani got annoyed and tried to fix his (Luca's) wrong idea/info (not to mention Blue Moon clan is a discriminated minority as well).

For some imaginary example in regards to real life - it's said 99% of people are allosexual and only 1% are asexual in the world. It may happen that some asexual person never realized oneself being asexual and suffered from it for so long alone, and some allosexual person who happened to know a lot could notice what's going on and introduce "asexual" to the asexual person in a sincerely kind / helpful manner, "saving / freeing" the one, even.

Isn't it a good thing to learn about something "new" that is necessary "in any way (not offensive!!)", rather than staying behind and unintentionally repeating the same negative situation, if not causing worse things? Not everyone is lucky to get to know something or everything "naturally" or "normally" by a specific "proper" age.

Besides, Noe is understandably ignorant (like us readers / audiences) in canon from the beginning, with all his unfortunate, traumatic, and isolated childhood backstories and extremely limited interactions with other people... Noe's such huge, naive ignorance indirectly tells something about the "Teacher" Shapeless One as well! which is quite subtle from MJ-sensei XD

IDK now I'm curious if they called it a bad writing, too (and called MJ-sensei racist), when "black" Noe turned out to have been treated as a chained slave / property in the black market and "taken" by "white" Shapeless One...as if it's all meant to look "pure positive"? What about the scene where "white" Domi put a chain on "black" Noe's neck? Was it only great because it's "female dominant"?? lol :/ I also remember that not so long ago - "white" Misha enslaved "black" Noe and violated him in multiple, stressful ways (including the rapey blood-drinking)...and yet, the fandom mostly felt so sorry for the "white assaulter" Misha much more and got sooo disappointed / mad at the "black victim" Noe for "daring to" fiercely fight back and hurt his face, NOT "gently" pushing him away or (just forgetting about kidnapped Domi his important childhood friend and) "angelically" understanding him (the abuser) and "eagerly" protecting him as a "mere obedient black slave" of his "poor young white master" aka Stockholm syndrome lol =_=

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This was not going to be this long and this petty, but it happened midway, sorry asdfg

Thank you for reading my subjective opinions so far!

[janeyshivers]

how Mobile Suit Gundam SEED and SEED Destiny misunderstands eugenics (and how 0079, Zeta, and ZZ nailed it)

(note; unless i specify otherwise, i'm using 'Gundam SEED' as a catch-all for the combined 100 episode run of both Cosmic Era shows)

Gundam SEED is built around the idea of genetic modification on steroids, where huge populations of Coordinators (Spacenoid stand-ins, living in the Cosmic Era's equivalent of the Sides, the PLANTs) are genetically modified in-vitro to be immune to disease, to be stronger, smarter, and kind of better at everything than unmodified Naturals (Earthnoid stand-ins who are just normal-ass Earth people). i feel like this core setup, and the way the show handles it, falls into the trap of treating the arguments of eugenicists seriously, when there's absolutely no reason to give them an inch on anything, something that the early UC understood all too well.

for one thing, Gundam SEED fails to actually address any of the really pertinent questions gene therapy raises, especially since SEED doesn't just feature genetic engineering as a plot device like G-Witch and ZZ, it bases an entire faction around its use and makes it the driving force of the show's core conflict. the show does not, for example, broach the extremely thorny topic of how genetic modification will affect the marginalised. many current pushes for genetic modification are pushed by insane eugenics groups, and the show never addresses whether, for example, the PLANTs try to gene edit out autism, or screen for any kind of genetic markers for being gay or trans. it doesn't ask whether there is any validity to the search for genetic explanations for these things, as contemporary eugenics organisations such as Autism Speaks insist. would non-white Coordinator parents be pressured to bump their kid's skin up a couple of shades to reduce the impact of racism and colourism on their lives? we see from the forced-labour camps the Alliance sets up in North Africa during Destiny that the CE is a world where racism is still very much a cultural force, and yet SEED never addresses how that interacts with Coordinators, despite a lot of the roots of modern genetic research (undoubtedly something that has led to a lot of positive medical advances) nonetheless lying in the 'scientific racism' of the early 20th century. an unfavourable reading might even point out that since we never see any of this stuff addressed or treated as a problem (for example, we don't meet any queer or neurodivergent Coordinators), SEED accepts that these are indeed qualities for which there are genetic markers, and it's not worth examining that the PLANTs bin them. that is a slightly unfair reading because the lack of those kinds of characters among Naturals suggest it just wasn't something the writers felt they could include for whatever reason, but then I would argue that if you're not able to address these things then you have no business writing a science fiction story where an entire core culture is built around genetic modification in the first place.

i'm not arguing that any stories about genetic modification are, by definition, eugenicist; G-Witch features it in the form of Suletta herself, and Notrette's patented brand of Tasty Tomatoes. the difference is that the show doesn't feature an entire society built from the ground-up around genetic engineering, which makes the comparisons to fascists less immediate, and even then G-Witch takes the time to address that Suletta herself feels like her only value is as a tool, precisely because she was genetically engineered to fulfil a specific purpose. it comes closer to grappling with the real dark side of these ideas in a 25 episode run than SEED did in 100.

instead, the framing of genetic modification in SEED as creating people who are, unambiguously, better at absolutely everything, and whose main obstacle is jealousy from unmodified people, accepts at face value the premise that to be superior due to your genetics is possible. by doing this, and also ignoring any of the real concerns marginalised people had at the time, and continue to have to this day about the possible uses of genetic modification, the show comes off as validating eugenicists. while SEED hedges on the details, i would argue that by accepting this as a basic premise to begin with, the show has already validated an extremely noxious worldview.

that being said, the Coordinators do experience significant problems with fertility, with birthrates collapsing in the third generation and requiring interbreeding with Naturals to sustain their population. the show does not assert that genetic modification makes the Coordinators into flawless ubermensch, and clumsily attempts to argue for a middle ground between fascistic genetic purity and a degree of equality between Naturals and Coordinators. imo the issues the PLANTs end up having is because SEED isn't like, actively trying to write a treatise on why eugenics is good, instead, the writers chose a hot-button issue to address and then badly fumbled it, in the process treating seriously and partially validating ideas that are in the real world just a flimsy cover for racial hatred and other bigotries. to my mind, it's saying that eugenics works to a point and then starts to break down, but i think the idea that it can work up to any kind of point is giving it a lot more credit than it really deserves.

my core frustrations with that are a) that SEED is actually pretty good when it shunts that stuff into the background, e.g. in the first half of Destiny, and it's frustrating watching the show fall back into being about this shit and neglecting the stronger elements like the solid character work with Shinn and Athrun, and b) previous Gundam shows already staked out a strong position that what SEED takes as a given is actually total horseshit. the show's themes would be frustrating enough if they didn't exist as part of a franchise which has previously gotten this issue more or less right, with the highly combat-effective Coordinators being an obvious stand-in for the UC's Newtypes. the Zabis hijack the idea of Newtypes from Zeon Deikun and treat being a Newtype as a matter of genetics because it made their fascist spacenoid supremacy sound semi-legitimate and scientific. meanwhile, the text of 0079, Zeta, and ZZ insists that to be a Newtype is something almost impossible to define quantifiably. characters who are stated in-universe to be Oldtypes nonetheless experience Newtype visions, and the defining factor in developing Newtype abilities is nothing to do with being a pure-blooded Spacenoid, but about the simple fact of existing in space and allowing that to change the way you interact with the world. to my mind, the early UC's position is that while capable of providing miracles like the Sides, science is also too often invoked as a rhetorical device to retroactively justify existing dehumanisation and hatred by making it sound objective and logical, leading to Zeon seeing Earthnoids as so inhuman that killing billions of them in Operation British was acceptable to them. SEED doesn't just lack an interesting take on this core element of the UC (like Iron-Blooded Orphans' focus on how this creates avenues for labour exploitation through the stigmatisation of the Alaya-Vinjana system), it fails to understand it by accepting such a retroactive justification as part of its core premise, something that sticks out really badly because the CE shows are so interested in being a modern update of 0079 and Zeta.

my animosity towards the character of Kira in particular is that he's emblematic of these thematic and worldbuilding fuckups, cut as he is from the eugenic cloth. SEED Destiny's best moments were early on when Athrun seriously questioned Kira on his beliefs for the first time, after Kira insisted that Athrun betray ZAFT over nothing more than a hunch. and yet, Kira is vindicated, and his worldview of peace at all costs, while initially challenged by Shinn and Athrun in Destiny, is treated seriously by the show's end. Destiny's conclusion is that Kira, due to his superior genetics, simply knows better, and that we should sit down, shut the fuck up, and let our families be vaporised by nuclear murderbeams if that's what our genetically pure overlords think is best, even if the best evidence Kira has to support his worldview is little more than a hunch, wisdom granted by his superior genes. again, i don't think SEED understands that this is what it's saying; Kira talks the talk about equality between Naturals and Coordinators, it's just that the text of the show is so muddled and poorly written that it ends up saying the opposite. taken along with all of the other ways in which his character ends up screwing with the elements of SEED that i find legitimately compelling and interesting, it's difficult not to really hate him, and to find SEED as a whole deeply frustrating and disappointing.

SEED Freedom does so little to develop any of these ideas that it's honestly barely worth mentioning. having spent 100 episodes ceding ground to the eugenics shit, Freedom mostly just plays in the space that was created for it. it's much more concerned with bullshit comphet and assassinating the blackened, charred remains of Shinn's character than it is with grappling with the fact that "hey the show kept saying eugenics works do we maybe want to examine that a little in our legacy sequel". bad movie for a variety of reasons, but mostly unconnected from what im on about here.

[bohemian-nights]

These are for the anons who are trying to find an explanation for Nettles being pushed back to season 3: I get what u mean, I get you’re trying to see a silver lining, but the thing is, we shouldn’t have to content ourselves with that. If HoTD have the time to introduce every single character under the sun, and even make up new characters that don’t exist, they for sure have time to include a canonically black character in this story.

We don’t need Ulf and Hugh scenes, they are basically the same character and interchangeable, we don’t need 162737 Addam scenes with seasmoke when there’s nothing special about how he claimed his dragon, we don’t need Dyana scenes when she doesn’t even exist in the books.

You know who’s character is unique and not interchangeable with any other character? The black girl nettles. You know who’s character has a special bond with their dragon? The black girl nettles. You know who actually exists in the books and have a huge impact in the storyline? The black girl nettles. Emphasis on her skin color because we know that this is what dictated the decision of cutting her off if the rumors are true.

There’s no excuse for them to push her back to season 3 and doing that is still racism.

Thank you so much for explaining the situation. There really isn't any other way to explain Nettles potentially being cut this season when they have time to not only include but to add to everyone’s story as well. It's misogynoir plain and simple which this show already has a problem with.

That's why it's so evil to see people celebrating it. This goes past a ship war. Past this show. This always happens with Black women characters(see Sleepy Hollow, or The Vampire Diaries, etc.) and it's so disheartening to see and have people dismiss us when we point it out.

[winxwannabe]

why do you hate the netflix show? i'm genuinely curious, as my wife adores it and was also a huge fan of the animated series growing up.

I mean the TL:DR of it is I just think it's a bad show. I found the pacing strange, I didn't like half the characters so it was hard to root for them, Season 1's plot was so awkwardly paced it was boring, but in Season 2 there were like 3 different plot points per episode and I found them hard to get invested in. The LONG answer: my 3 biggest problems with the show were (!):

The blatant racism/whitewashing

This is pretty self-explanatory and I've gone over it before , so I'll keep it brief; the show's whitewashing was the biggest turnoff for me. Musa and the fake out Flora (because Eliot Sal WAS originally Flora, hope whoever made that change got a bonus) were awful, and then the treatment of Dane and Aisha's characters sucked (being taken advantage of by Riven and turning into a huge asshole, and Aisha being turned into Bloom's life coach). We got a little more diversity in Season 2, but by then it read more as a response to backlash than anything else. Same with Dane and Aisha; Aisha gives a little speech in Season 2's first episode where she says she's done being Bloom's life coach, and then proceeds to get a boyfriend who's secretly evil and lies to her all season. And Dane acts like an asshole for 2 scenes before he's shoved to the side as a supporting character.

2. Homophobia

Again, recap from my last rant; Season 1 was very straight. The Bloom/Sky/Stella love triangle took center stage, the only non-straight character was Dane, who I'm 90% sure was bisexual but we'll never know because not once in Fate: The Winx Saga does anyone say the word 'bisexual.' The closest we get is Dane saying he finds both Riven and Stormy Beatrix hot. But Dane, Riven, and Beatrix turn into this awful polyamory thing that goes on for like an episode and a half before it breaks up, and it's never spoken of again. Season 2 gives up an openly lesbian character, Terra, but her love interest (a female specialist whose name I don't remember) is in her own on-again-off-again relationship. Terra and the girl do get together, but last the audience knew the relationship was on! So Terra gets a girlfriend, but said girlfriend is a cheater. Gay rights? oh, and #JusticeforFrancesa

Those are the serious reasons, and with those out of the way I would argue the other really big reason I didn't like Fate was

3. THERE IS NO FRIENDSHIP

At the end of the day you can take away magic, the Specialists, and a lot of supporting characters from the show because the core of it - the reason Winx Club works so well - is because these six girls are best friends. The show is about them going through school and breakups and universe-saving together, and kicking ass at it because they have each others back. It is the show's central theme, it's where the best writing is, and where some of its best moments come from (for me at least).

Fate...does not do that. They started the series out making Sky the one to show Bloom around Alfea and introduce her to things instead of Stella, sidelining one of the strongest friendships in the series for the sake of a love triangle. And it only goes downhill from there! I get the whole 'take an episode or two to figure out where we stand as friends' but by the end of the 1st season these bitches are still fighting over the dumbest shit! We start out Season 2 with Stella using invisibility spells again so she's not seen with the other girls - I don't even think Stella likes any of them by the end of the series! Sure everyone goes to classes and plans dangerous missions to save the world together, but outside of that it doesn't seem like they even like each other. There are moments sprinkled throughout where they're supposed to be genuine friends, and they're easily some of fate's best stuff (the car scene in 2x01 is an example). But they're also awkward, because 20 minutes ago they were sulking in their rooms and yelling at each other about their lack of communication. They aren't deserved is the point I'm trying to get at here, and the only way they do feel deserved is if you a) already know their friendship dynamic because you watched the animated series, or b) you follow the actors on social media, where they actually talk and hang out like best friends.

The strongest friendship in this entire series isn't any of the girls - it's fucking Sky and Riven. Because they were pre-established best friends, had arguments throughout season 1, but by the end of season 2 had come back together because the world was in danger, and they both knew despite everything, that they would have each other's backs. Do you know how badly you have to fuck up, where one half of your best friendship is the queerphobic, predatory asshole character, and the other half is a slice of untoasted Wonder Bread?

Do you know how mad Riven would have been if Sky went to not-Omega with Bloom in the season 2 finale? He would have been fucking pissed and ordering everyone to a classroom to give his 30-slide power point on how to get them back within 3 days. Meanwhile Bloom doesn't actually say goodbye to the Winx girls, she just writes them letters and says goodbye to Sky in person (because it is well established that Bloom and Sky's romance is more important than the girl's friendship, let's be honest). And then girls are all hugging and Stella's crying that Bloom's gone and I just thought 'you spent more time with Beatrix than Bloom this season Stella, why the fuck are you sad.'

This is all a longwinded way to say the central theme of friendship was pushed aside for CW-style romance, which made the core cast of girls unable to connect, which made the show bad.

Fate had the same overall runtime as a single season of Winx Club. Later seasons are bad, don't get me wrong, but those original 2004-2007 seasons had twice the character moments, more concise plots, and felt way more fun than anything I saw Brian Young put out these last few years. I would watch an original season (and even season 4! sue me!) any day over Fate the W inx Saga.

Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk, and probably don't show your wife this.

[morhath]

hey I saw your tags on that one simpsons linguistics post and like legit curious... what's linguistic relativity? (this is assuming you'd wanna talk about it; if not feel free to tell me to google it 👍)

as much as I love a good rant sadly I have a migraine on top of COVID so I am not up for one right now, so yeah, I recommend looking it up to get The Full Info, the wikipedia page is pretty good

it's also known as the sapir-whorf hypothesis but that's inaccurate

there's a strong version ("language super controls how you think") and a weak version ("language influences how you think a little bit") and as you may be able to guess the strong version is almost definitely wrong while there's decent evidence for the weak version

the basic points of my Entire Rant are:

honestly I'm still a lil suspicious of the weaker version at times/at least suspicious of how it's interpreted

I would like to confiscate the strong version from sff authors for at least twenty years. no more linguistic relativity for you. you can't use it anymore. I'm so tired. Ted Chiang you get an exception because Story of Your Life (short story that was the basis for the movie "Arrival") is very good even if it is scientifically inaccurate. but I think it's overdone, frankly often stupid, and playing into public perception of this kind of stuff which is a problem because...

so much racism all the time (this is a huge part of the previous two points) (I cannot overstate how much racism I encounter with this stuff) (primarily in non-linguistics spaces but still) (I've even fallen for it when I was younger and just interested in linguistics but hadn't studied it yet) (it's so pervasive and so many people believe this shit) (obvi you can't just Take This Theory Away b/c people are being racist about it but I really don't love how people generally talk about/use it)

giant disclaimer tho that this is not really My Area of linguistics so I am BASICALLY a layperson here

also the full rant involves exploding babies and [other main interesting bit redacted because it occurs to me there's a possibility for some sort of paper or talk there actually and I keep SAYING I want to return to the cold and unloving arms of academia]