#that whole side of celebrity culture is so lame

[blackandwhlteaesthetlc]

I'm not a stan I just think the hate this fandom gives him is so unwarranted and also so ironic considering Harry's whole tpwk thing...

My comment in the tags actually wasn’t just directed at you, anon. I’ve noted you’re not a Jason stan though, gotcha. Actually, the state of my inbox when I got out of my movie was surprising to say the least. I only answered your ask and one other that were tame in comparison. The ones I didn’t publish definitely weren’t very “TPWK” either. And all in the defense of Jason Sudeikis because I said I wasn’t going to watch his award winning show, as if he won’t survive without my streaming numbers. 🙄

So I guess both Harry and Jason’s fandoms are trash. But that’s the internet for you. 🤷🏻‍♀️

[shit-talk-turner]

I’m a psychologist. I’ve met many men who have a hard time showing love. I constantly see people who label them as autistic or cold which only fuels harmful stereotypes. Stop diagnosing celebrities. Outside of my professional work, I’m a huge Arctic Monkeys fan. I saw them live multiple times and was lucky enough to spend some time in their social circle. I’ve lost count on how many times I’ve cringed reading this blog. Gossiping is a part of human nature and I absolutely understand the concept of this whole thing, I didn’t come here to ruin the party. I see the entertainment value even though I’m probably way older than most participants. I absolutely love the open mindedness of the blog owner and her objection against things like: misogyny, fetishizing someone’s sexual orientation, bodyshaming, doxing and other venomous behaviors that are unfortunately, very common in the fandom. I wanted to take a moment to express my gratitude because I’m someone who devotes their entire existence to fight stigma and spread awareness of said topics. On the other hand, I had a pretty good laugh on here reading some of your humorous fashion takes, linguistic jokes and biting satire of the French culture. Pointing out the absurd of current social media trends is also something worth mentioning! Kudos to you because you definitely have a fascinating personality, rich sense of humor and some unique aura in your ways of responding that kinda made me addicted to this blog. Believe or not but I work with famous individuals and understanding their complex minds and relationships dynamics is a big part of my daily routine. I understand witticism but one thing I’ve noticed here keeps bothering me and it’s the main reason I decided to leave a comment….I keep seeing this callous and tranquil attitude towards heartbreak and the general difficult nature of romantic relationships. Now this is the part where I turn into a lame boomer and despite my private connections to people whose problems are the core of your entertainment, I try to stay as objective as possible. No one asked but it truly saddens me to see how much ignorance, misinformation and forms of sadism are being normalized within the fan community. And it’s often only because someone doesn’t meet your expectations of what you consider a „healthy relationship”. I hate(big word but it’s mandatory here) how easily you jump to conclusions with so little information. Like the lack of smile or physical touch in candid photos are being basically treated as diagnostic criteria. Or someone’s stage presence and theatrical mannerism is being called „autistic” without hesitation. The overall lack of education here is constantly showing. Sometimes it feels like you hate your idol, constantly trying to get your dirty hands on the most intimate aspects of his life…and do you really think this type of energy is innocent? Or don’t you see how pathetic it is to literally wait for someone’s heart break because it provides content and the awful egomaniac side of you needs to prove something? And you try to justify all of this because someone has made some mistakes in the past. So, you create a whole image of a possibly complex person by taking little scraps from their social media activity. I know how ridiculous it will sound but please, imagine educated professionals building someone’s entire psychological portrait using very short and blurry videos from parties and concerts. Oh lord. Someone’s awkwardness or dancing skills determine if they’re worthy of love? Whaaaaat? There are so many beautiful and powerful ways of communicating love or forming connection that will never be visible through the lens of an online platform. People have so many personalities and ways of conveying emotions. Not everything has to be obvious or clear. The lack of enthusiasm in body language is not always depression or unhappiness. Our past mistakes don’t reflect our true identity. Imagine yourself being judged by old Facebook posts! This absurdity kills me.

We two are individuals that work with people and understand the importance of relationships and how deep a humans personality goes. Of course we understand no one here (including us) can know everything about these people or what goes on in their lives. Thats why we keep our speculation and shit talk here and don’t take it to their social media profiles or something. We’re not wishing for anyone’s downfall but we do love gossiping about AM and right now, the well is dry, so yes a break up would be content. Notice how we’re not doing anything to bring it about. Just waiting for whatever content we’re going to get so we can enjoy it as is. We also welcome anyone to judge us based on our own social media, past and present (though obviously we’re maintaining our anonymity) because nothing in our past is as misogynistic or racist like some of the people we discuss here. Thanks for being here and for your thoughts

[randomvarious]

Today's compilation:

The Fantastic 50's: 24 Golden Hits 1987 Pop / Traditional Pop / Orchestral Pop / Jazz-Pop / Country-Pop / Latin Pop

OK, well, this is just a little bit fuckin' ridiculous, man. I mean, how can you even try to celebrate one of American pop culture's already most romanticized decades—the 1950s—and then not include the thing that causes people to romanticize about it so much in the first place? That's like trying to summarize the events of the early 2000s and skipping over 9/11! Where is the rock and the roll, dude? Why are you ignoring the most important cultural phenomenon that this country has ever seen with this release of yours here?!

Maybe you don't think about it too much, or you just don't really care about early rock & roll at all, but like it or not, whatever your contemporary genre of choice is these days, it likely would not exist were it not for a paradigmatic shift that started to take place within American pop culture roughly 70 years ago. The 1950s simply saw an unprecedented explosion in the glorification, commercialization, and recognition of youth culture writ large, and one of the things that undoubtedly resonated most with kids at that time was the brash and inherently rebellious nature of this upstart genre called rock & roll, which summarily decided to throw a whole lot of traditional pop conventionality out the window and start anew. The advent of rock & roll brought a raw, uninhibited level of excitement to popular music that it had not really ever been infused with before, and the way that people derived enjoyment from contemporary music drastically changed because of it too.

Like, I of course have no proof of this whatsoever, but there is no way in hell that some guy in 1953 was pulling his car over to the side of the road after hearing Patti Page's "(How Much Is That) Doggie in the Window" for the first time in his life. That wasn't popular music's intended purpose back then. It was supposed to soothe and satisfy with classy, dignified pleasantry; not drag in the mud and kick up a whole fuss with blinding combinations of things like disruptive guitar chords, bleating sax notes, hard and heavy drumbeats, and untrained singing. That would simply be *madness*.

But that's really what this album seems to be all about: holding on to vastly boring, treacly traditionality rather than acknowledging any of the stuff that came to upset that apple cart, and then ended up changing the trajectory of music forever.

So the next time you see an octo- or nonagenarian, be sure to thank them for all the rock & roll records that they most likely bought when they were a lot younger, because if they hadn't, there's a chance that whatever it is that you find yourself most deeply enjoying today would not exist, and we might still be subject to the pop music whims of the early 1950s because of it. Rather than someone like David Bowie ending up as an indefatigably timeless cultural icon, it could've been someone like Pat Boone instead, which is exactly what this very lame CD probably would've preferred in the first place anyhow 😔.

Highlights:

Sarah Vaughan - "Broken Hearted Melody"

[nightshade-minho]

-Embers- (1)

warnings: suggestive, future smut, themes of death

wc: 5.3k

teaser 

White specks of paint, scattered across an inky sky - they truly were beautiful. You adjusted yourself on the grassy hill, eyes closing as you tried to calm your nerves. Sighing, you ran your hand over crimson scales, trying to ignore the blinding lights of your village in the distance.

“The stars are beautiful tonight.”

You wished you could stay here forever. Where the only sounds that grace your ears are the deep rumbling snores of the enormous draconian creature you're curled up against. It's a comforting sound, and yet you knew you were going to have to leave soon. Your father would be absolutely enraged if you were late to such an important event- in fact, you were sure he’d have absolutely no qualms killing you in front of the entire village and crowning a broomstick as his heir instead.

Perhaps that's why you delayed the inevitable for a little longer, nuzzling your head against the dragon's hide. Your heart was pounding in your chest as you observed your bustling village from above, frantically getting ready for the festival and the welcoming. People were decorating their houses, painting murals onto their walls and making sure everything was perfect for the guests that would arrive tonight.

The streets were lit up with lanterns, and the people milling about outside their houses were dressed up in their best. The excitement in the atmosphere was palpable, and you could almost feel it from atop the hill.

Sighing, you looked to the side, your eyes meeting enormous yellow ones.

“Aeracus...I know what you’re thinking.” You sighed and curled up your knees to your chest. “And you’re right. I’m nervous, but also excited. I can’t believe we’re going to be seeing him again after all these years. Can you?”

The dragon slowly shook his head from side to side, and you chuckled. “Do you think he’s changed? Or do you think he’s still a feline-obsessed asshole?” You smiled, his laughter ringing in your ears as you reminisced.

Slowly though, the good memories bled into terrible ones. Loss and pain, mingling in your heart and taking over your emotions. The smile disappeared from your face as you remembered what had happened. The reason he left. The reason you weren’t allowed to participate in the championships that were to be a part of the festival’s celebrations...the reason the whole village considered you an outcast, despite being the chief’s daughter.

You swallowed the lump in your throat, pushing your hair back as you slowly stood up, dusting off your tunic. You pressed a kiss to the dragon’s neck, sighing.

“I’m going to go, Aeracus. Honestly, you should be grateful you don’t have to partake in these events.”

The dragon let out a disapproving rumble at that, and your face softened. That was a low blow. After all, it wasn’t his fault that he was forced to to refrain from joining his fellow dragons in the games. No, the blame was to be shared between you and Minho.

The felicity in your heart was intertwined with a faint sense of lingering sorrow. It happened so many years ago, and yet the echoes were still fresh in your mind...

You couldn’t deny that you were desperate to see him again. In fact, saying you were desperate would probably be an understatement. You were thrilled, electrified- and yet, oh so anxious.

You clenched your fists, taking in a deep breath and starting to descend the hill. You’d put it off for long enough.

***

“Children, listen carefully, now.”

The boy next to you didn’t heed the elder’s warning, continuing to draw on the back of his hand.

“Minho! Pay attention, or I will have to call your father.”

Minho looked up, scowling. He placed the chalk down and pursed his lips, directing his attention towards the clay figurines that were laid out in front of the elderly woman. You, as well as the 10 other kids in the cottage, were fascinated by the story being told. The woman was teaching you about your culture, the information you needed to know regarding the upcoming ceremony. It was important, and yet Minho couldn’t bring himself to care. He liked cats more than dragons anyway.

“As I was saying.” She cleared her throat, resuming her lesson.

“Now that you children are 13, you are no longer babies. Certain things are expected of you. You have embarked on your journey to adulthood...and thus, there are certain things you must know. The elements of our village, for one.”

She gestured to the figurines on the dirt floor in front of her. “As you all already know, there are four elements.” She pointed to a spiky pyramid, and then to a smooth sphere. “Ember, Aqua...” Her fingers moved to the next pair- a rough cube and a glassy cone. “...Terra and Aer. These are the symbols of the elements. Of course, you all have already seen the life-sized versions of these in our square.”

Eager nods, making her continue with a pleased smile.

“Every dragon on this planet has a corresponding element that they have control over. They possess immense power, and the ability to command these elements.”

Minho raised an eyebrow, intrigued. Hm, maybe this wasn’t as lame as he’d thought it would be..

“I’m sure you children have seen your parents, older friends and relatives with their dragons.” There was a chorus of agreement, and the woman nodded.

“Well, from next week onwards, you will each have your own dragons. Through the ceremony, you will all be assigned a hatchling, with which you will spend the rest of your life.”

Minho hummed in curiosity as the woman dismissed the class. “Good luck, loves. Remember, there will be a few more classes to brief you further.”

The others started filing out slowly as you turned to Minho. “Isn’t this exciting?” You tilted your head, running your eyes over the figurines. “Since my family are all fire elementals, do you think I’ll get an ember dragon?”

“I don’t think it works that way. My father said it doesn’t matter what family you come from, the dragon you get matched with can be of any element, apparently. Though it hasn’t ever happened yet.” He shrugged.

“Really?”

“Yeah.” He yawned. “I already knew everything she said. I could have used this valuable time for something else.” He was lying, to be honest. The only thing he knew about dragons was what he’d just told you.  

“Like what?”

“I don’t know. Do you wanna go to the lake?”

You grinned. “Sure, let’s!” You nodded in agreement as Minho stood up eagerly, grabbing your hand and pulling you out of the cottage. You giggled as he dragged you. “Hey, slow down! Also, we can’t be there for long. We’ve got to be home for that joint dinner, or our fathers will be very mad.”

“Eh, they’d barely notice if we’re gone. When discussing village matters, they don’t give a fuck about their own children, even.” He muttered bitterly.

“Well...that is true.” You sighed as Minho pulled you all the way to the lake, weaving past the villagers, even bumping into some of them. A few of them frowned and made shouts of displeasure, while others didn’t seem to mind. Or maybe they did, and was just too afraid to voice their anger towards the chiefs’ children.

The cottages start becoming more sparse, the trees more tightly clustered. Minho held your hand tightly as you made your way through the woods. Finally, the two of you reached the clearing.

Letting go of your hand gently, Minho sat at the edge of the lake, beckoning you over to sit next to him.

“I wish this place wasn’t so far away from the village.” You sighed, legs aching as you flopped down onto the grass.

Minho shook his head slowly, his fingers fiddling with a tiny dandelion he’d pulled out. “The further away, the better.” He grumbled, blowing on it and watching as the seeds floated in the breeze.

You sighed. There it was, again. You knew better than to oppose him, so you hummed, scooting a little closer and placing your hand on top of his. “I know you want to leave this place. I know you want to...to explore the world. I just want you to know that whatever you decide to do, I’ll be by your side.” You said honestly.

Minho looked up at you. “Really?”

“Yeah.”

He felt like there was a lump in his throat. Minho knew how much this village and its culture meant to you. You were really willing to do that for him? Leave, and never come back?

“Listen here, Miss L/n.” He turned to you, inhaling as he pressed a kiss to your forehead, his lips soft as they brushed against your skin. You blushed, staring at him with wide eyes as he spoke.

“I’m the one who’s going to be making the sacrifices here, alright? I’m older than you, remember? I call the shots.” He chuckled, booping your nose. 

“I love you so much, star.”

You cringed at the nickname, shoving him away. “Stop calling me that, you sound like a character in one of Mr Yang’s cheesy novels.”

He smirked at that. “I’ll never stop calling you that. You’re my star, cause you light up my world and guide me when everything’s dark.” He reasoned, laughing and throwing his head back as he watched you wrinkle your nose in disgust, looking a little like a bunny.

Humming, Minho lay back on the grass, and you followed suit after a minute of hesitation.

“I don’t mind you calling me that. Just don’t do it in front of people.”

“Okay, I won’t. It’s just us all the time, anyway...”

The two of you stared up at the sky, listening to the calm sounds of frogs ribbiting, birds chirping, and the splashing sounds of the fish in the lake. Above it all though, was the sound of your heart, beating persistently as Minho’s fingers creeped closer to yours, intertwining your hands.

“It’s always us...”

***

Your father had explained to you that since your family consisted entirely of ember elementals, your dragon would be of the same kind as well. This went against what Minho had told you before, and your mind was swimming with all the different information you were receiving.

“But...Minho said it doesn’t work that way.”

He sat on his armchair, chewing on  a chicken leg as he raised an eyebrow. “Really? Well, he’s wrong.” He sighed, shaking his head. “It’s never happened in centuries, and it’s not gonna happen now. You’re an Ember, through and through.”

You purse your lips. “Well, you’re always right, Father.”

He nodded, not picking up on the snark your sentence was dripping with. "The bond you share with your dragon is one that can never be replicated. You choose it, and it chooses you. It is truly a beautiful process, a spectacle to behold. Every single villager will be watching, so you better hold your head high. Make me proud."

You were about to reply when you heard a knock on your door. Glancing at your father for permission, you stood up. heading through the long hallway to open the front door.

“Minho?”

You looked at him, tilting your head at his troubled expression. “What’s up?

“I came to give you these.” He said softly, looking around before showing you the fiery petals in his palms. “I borrowed a herbology book from the library a few months ago, and learnt how to grow these. Ignis flowers. They’re symbols of good luck, apparently.”

He took your hand, placing the petals on your palm. “They reminded me of you.”

Your eyes widened slowly. “Wow...Minho, I didn’t get you anything...” You said guiltily, humming when Minho gently pulled you into a hug.

“You don’t have to. I’ve got to go home, now. See you tomorrow!”

You nodded, the petals safe in your hands as he left hurriedly. You watched him head to his house, opposite to yours.

After he left, you were about to head to bed when your father asked you to stay back. Confused, you went over to sit in front of him, tilting your head in confusion.

“Who was at the door?”

“It was just Minho.” You shrugged, eyeing your father as he groaned, massaging his forehead. He looked like he was contemplating something, his wrinkles seeming especially prominent.

"Child, be wary of your...friend."

"Friend...?" You knew he meant Minho. You'd never heard him address him in that manner though - void of affection.

Minho's father and yours were co-chiefs of the village, best friends since birth. He’d always treated Minho like his own son. What had brought on this sudden hostility?

He noticed the expression on your face, sighing and patting your shoulder. "I'm just asking you to be careful, dear. There is talk of the Aer elementals gaining power at an accelerated rate these days. Aer dragons are growing up to be stronger, even more so than our Ember ones. It's truly a strange phenomenon. I do not want to be one of these people who is suspicious of everything and everyone...but both the kid and his father have changed. Even I can't deny that."

You swallowed at his words, watching as his face drifted off, deep in thought. You'd heard of it too- hushed whispers claiming that a single chief would be preferable for the village. And if your father's hunch was right...no, you didn't want to think about it.

Minho wouldn't ever betray you. You'd known him since before you could talk. you’d build up a lot of trust in each other over the years. There was no one else you knew as well. If you couldn’t trust him, who could?

No. He would never hurt you. You were sure of it.

***

The whole village was buzzing for weeks after the ceremony took place. They simply couldn't understand what had happened. It was unprecedented- and the news spread like wildfire.

You were matched with a majestic Aer creature, and Minho a beautiful crimson beast of Ember. Mistakes weren't possible- the process was never questioned- but that didn't mean people weren't bewildered.

For centuries, no one had managed to match with a dragon that controlled an element that differed from theirs.

Neither of you could understand why your fathers and the villagers were so perplexed, though. Was it really as big of a deal as they made it seem?

"I don't get it. Why is it such a humongous problem? They’re just dragons. What’s the need for all this drama?" Minho rolled his eyes as he spoke.

You stroked your dragon's neck slowly as you watched him, huffing and ranting away. ‘Just dragons.’ There was a part of you that understood all the hubbub. The people loved gossip- especially if it involved the chiefs.

"It really isn't. They're both so beautiful, I don't really care what element they control."

You looked at your dragon, curled next to you. You wouldn't admit it, but she looked a little too beautiful- almost to the point where it intimidated you.

Translucent, white scales that reflected rainbows of light...long, beautiful almond shaped eyes that were the color of the ocean. She was larger and brighter than Minho's dragon as well. Your father had been right...the Aer dragons were evolving quicker, somehow.

She was quiet and regal, her sleek body elegant and her demeanor refined. You didn’t really have much in common, to be honest. You’d named her Caeli- a name that wasn’t really all that creative, but it would do. Besides, it seemed to fit.

Minho looked at you, sighing slowly. "Aeracus seems hungry. Father will be expecting me soon anyway, I think I'll go home now, Y/n."

"Bye, Min."

He shot you a dashing grin before standing up, climbing his dragon.

As they left, a great whoosh of wind rustling your hair, you looked up at your dragon. She was staring at the water, her eyes narrowed.

You were starting to feel a little worried. You couldn’t exactly...hear her thoughts. She seemed too closed off, barely even looking at you as she blankly watched the frogs jump from one lilypad to the other. You didn’t feel that special bond everyone had been talking about for years, insisting to you that it would be a connection so profound you wouldn’t be able to live without it.

Did she not like you? You looked so average next to her ethereality, drab and plain as opposed to her stunning beauty.

You couldn’t blame her, really.

***

When Minho stood next to your dragon, the sight somehow made more sense. He was  beautiful, and so was the creature next to him. They fit together perfectly.

Aeracus on the other hand, was slightly more average. He was majestic as well, but not on the same level as Caeli. You felt more at home riding him, somehow. Like...he was the one that was meant to be yours.

Of course, you wouldn’t ever tell anyone about this. It could be considered infidelity, even. Your father was disappointed enough in you as it was. Four years of training with Caeli, and you still weren’t able to channel her power into...anything. She just wouldn’t co-operate.

"There you go..." He finished slipping the harness onto Caeli, dusting off his hands as he came back over to you, giggling as Aeracus rubbed his big head against your side.

Minho raised his eyebrows at the display of affection. Aeracus was never that amicable to him. Yes, he listened to him...but that was about it. And yet, to you...he always noticed how the two of you seemed to have some sort of connection. He’d mentioned this to his father once, only to be called ridiculous.

Then again, he couldn’t blame the dragon for having a soft spot for you. Who wouldn’t?

“Hey...” He looked down at you as the dragon pulled away, ambling off to Caeli’s side. You glanced up slowly when Minho cleared his throat, leaning in a little as his fingers ran through your tresses. Your cheeks flushed, eyes widening slightly at his touch.

"A leaf. In your hair." He mumbled, throwing said leaf onto the ground as he stared into your eyes.

Your heart was thudding loudly in your chest as your gaze ran over his features, so close to your face. Fuck, he was so deathly handsome, even more so now that you were both almost adults. Puberty had treated him well.

A little too well.

The girls in the square swooning over Minho became a regular occurrence now. You couldn't even seem to go anywhere with your best friend, without having a mob of fangirls following closely.

When he was this close to you, it became overwhelmingly evident why his fans were so enamored by him. Lee Minho really was beautiful.

"Careful, a fly might make its nest in your mouth." He chuckled. "What's up, kitten? You look on edge."

That was the other thing. His latest habit of calling you pet names- the likes of which included princess and kitten- had come out of nowhere. He really seemed to enjoy making you blush. At times like this, you wished he would have just stuck with ‘star’.

“Nothing.” You stuttered, avoiding his eyes and choosing to focus your stare on the ground. Minho wasn’t in the mood for your shyness, though. He placed his finger under your chin, tilting your face up to look at him.

“You sure about that? Is there a reason you look so flustered right now?” He breathed, leaning in closer until your noses were brushing.

Oh, fuck you, Lee.

You'd always thought Minho was attractive. Of course. You'd be blind not to notice. And yet, at this proximity, you felt like you haven’t ever truly appreciated just how fucking hot the man in front of you was.

And so you did something you never thought you’d have the courage to do.

Leaning in, you closed the distance between the two of you, lips crashing against his. To Minho’s credit, he wasn’t all that shocked. Smirking against you, his arms wrapped around your waist as he pulled you closer, gluing your body to his.

Backing you up against a tree, Minho was quick to lift your thigh, slotting your hips together as he ran his tongue over your bottom lip.

A groan left you as he slid his hand under your shirt, pulling away to stare at you, the sight of your swollen lips affecting him in ways he couldn’t quite describe.

“What...what did we just-”

He shut you up with another kiss, rougher than the last one. Breathless pecks, desperately claiming you with his lips as he pressed himself against you.

“Just go with the flow, baby.”

And so you did.

***

As you carefully made your way down, your mind was racing with a million thoughts. The thought of seeing your boyfriend again after so many years scared you as much as it excited you. After all...it wasn’t like you parted on good terms.

You still remembered the heartbroken look on his face, the last time you saw him. You couldn’t tell him that you’d tried everything, tried your best to reason with your father who simply refused to budge. He’d expected you to do something more...but what?

It wasn’t his fault. It was a fucking accident, and yet he’d had to take the blame.

Deep down, though, you knew what your father’s real intentions had been when he banished Minho and his father from the village. Of course, Caeli’s death had shaken him- the entire village had been in a state of shock. The death of a dragon was the most tragic event that could possibly befall a village. And when said dragon happened to belong to the chief’s daughter? Shattering.

At the end of the day though, it was a convenient incident...one that happened to take place just as your father’s status was being questioned. A blessing in disguise, for him.

“It’s okay, my child. Yes, you suffered a great loss, but I know you weren’t that close to it. We must move on. On the bright side, you can focus on your studies now! Isn’t that what you’ve always wanted to do?”

You scoffed, his words repeating themselves in your brain. Bullshit. There was no bright side, nor would there ever be one without Minho in your life.

***

“There you are. Where were you?"

"I...was with Aeracus." You didn't see the point in lying. Your brain was too tired to come up with a believable fabrication anyway.

As expected, his face screwed up in anger as he glared, standing up.

"Why?" He hissed. "Let me remind you he is not your dragon. How many times have I told you not to get too close to it?"

"Aeracus and I have a bond." You mumbled.

"No. You don't. A bond is forged between a dragon and its owner by forces beyond our control. This measly 'friendship', if you can even call it that, is trivial. At the end of the day, it doesn't really belong to you. It belongs to the boy who betrayed you."

You couldn't bring yourself to react any more. Your father was old-fashioned, his opinions set in stone. ‘Betrayed’. You wanted to scoff.

You turned around without a word, heading for your room. There was no energy left in your body, yet the exhaustion was overpowered by your emotions.

"Y/n, wait."

You stopped, turning and looking at him. "What?"

"Your maids are waiting to dress you. Don't argue with them. You are to wear the outfit I picked out for you. Today's dinner is extremely important." He paused. "And...what I said before still stands. The dragon won't hesitate to betray you, especially now that his true owner is coming back. Be...be careful." Your father said quietly, his face softening.

You sighed. "I will be."

"Good."

He dismissed you. You heaved a sigh of relief under your breath and headed out, opening the door to your own room.

You would never admit this to your father, but as nervous as you were, you were secretly looking forward to the dinner. To see him again.

If you closed your eyes and immersed yourself deep enough into your imagination, you could still feel his touch ghosting along your thighs. His soft lips, pressing against yours.

You missed his voice, his tight hugs...you missed everything about him. You'd only ever felt safe in his arms.

The loneliness and pain had consumed you when he left. Maybe that's why you latched on to Aeracus, the last remnant of Minho in this village that seemed so much more dreary without his presence.

"Miss Y/n! We have no time to lose." Your head maid scurried about your room with two others, spreading out your dress on your bed. One of the maids- Sylvia, you think her name was- snuck up behind you and began undressing you. Yes, you were used to this, but the layer of urgency in the atmosphere was a lot more profound tonight.

The entire village was on edge, and you couldn’t really blame them. The first Elemental Championships, and they were being hosted at your village. The exhilaration was understandable...you couldn't bring yourself to feel the same way, though. Maybe if you were actually participating, you’d feel different.

You looked at the dress the maid was holding onto, initially without much interest...but your eyes widened when it came into view.

It was beautiful, yet simple...the color of spun gold, with tiny rubies clustered at the bodice. The sleeves fell of the shoulders delicately, and the material was diaphanous, the texture rich.

“Wow....Sylvia, you made this?”

“I did. It took me a year.” She smiled widely, your grin satisfying her. “Do you really like it, Miss Y/n?” There was a hopeful lilt to her voice, and your grin grew wider as they started helping you into it.

“Like it? I love it! You’ve really outdone yourself this time.”

She nodded in content, lacing up the back as the other maids began on your makeup. Usually, you didn’t like being treated as a doll, your servants fussing over you and your appearance. Today, though...

You could barely believe the reflection you were seeing in the mirror belonged to you. You'd never felt so glamorous before. 

“You look beautiful, Miss.” Sylvia said softly, adjusting your sleeves.

You couldn’t wait for Minho to see you in this dress.

“Ann?” Another servant’s head appeared around the corner. “It’s time. They will arrive any moment now.”

A flurry of anxious noises and exclamations filled the room as they worked on you faster. You took a deep breath in, your mind blank and full of thoughts at the same time.

***

You stood next to your father, hands clasped in front of you. Surreptitiously, you raised your hand to your forehead, wiping away a few drops of perspiration. It was happening, you were finally going to see Minho again. And if your father successfully manages to make amends with his- fuck, you were grinning just thinking about it. 

The villagers standing behind you were all dressed in their best as well, and the lanterns shone brightly, washing over everything. The air was sparkling, the atmosphere charged with electricity. Everyone had their eyes trained on the sky, waiting for Minho’s people. The two other villages were to come tomorrow, according to the letters.

Four villages. All competing in the championship yours was hosting. It was nerve-wracking, the amount of people who would be crammed into your village, which was big enough, really- possibly the largest in the country- it still stressed you out, though. Since there weren’t enough guest houses to fit everyone, a lot of the visitors would be staying with your villagers, the chiefs and their families staying at your house. You were keenly aware of the fact that this meant Minho would be in the same living quarters as you. Your heart pounded at the prospect.

Later in the night, you were planning to sneak into his room, since you obviously wouldn’t be allowed to talk to him during the dinner. At least, you wouldn’t be able to communicate the things you so desperately wanted to say to him. Every part of you tingled as you thought about what you’d say to him. 

You felt light as a feather as you stared at the starry sky, eyes widening slightly as you spotted the thousands of dots in the distance, flying closer. Anticipation and exhilaration mingled in you as you waited for them to arrive. Just the thought of feeling Minho pressed up against you again, whispering in your ear how much he loved you...it made you want to cry, almost. You’d waited for this moment for too long.

The conch shell was blown as they reached the edge of the forest. More than a thousand dragons, covered in finery, just like their riders.

Hmm. There were a lot more than you expected. You’d only been anticipating about a hundred, since it was only Minho’s village that was coming tonight. Or so you’d thought...

You turned your head to look at your father, letting the confusion show on your face. Noticing your expression, he shrugged. “It looks like all three decided to come tonight.”

You frowned, looking back at the dragons that were at the border now, preparing for landing. That was weird.

You observed the dragons that had landed, your eyebrows furrowing. Huh.

The three dragons at the front were a lot bulkier than the ones in the back. Darker colors, almost hulking muscles and narrow eyes. They looked like no dragon you’d ever seen before. The sight was almost unsettling. You felt a faint sense of dread spreading over you, a feeling you tried to push away as your eyes searched each dragon’s back for Minho.

You recognized Minho’s father right away. He was at the very front, along with two other old men on a green and blue dragon respectively, that you realized were the chiefs of the other two villages. Surprisingly though, Minho wasn’t sat behind him. You’d assumed it to be that way...after all, Minho’s dragon was still here. So where was he? Your eyebrows furrowed, not wanting to assume the worst right away. You wildly looked over them all, craning your neck slightly. You didn’t want to seem too eager, but it’s not like you could help yourself. Could anyone blame you? Here you were, about to meet the first and only person you’d ever fallen in love with, after years of yearning and loneliness.

As your father stepped forward, a smile on his face to greet the chiefs, you finally saw him.

For a minute, it was like you couldn’t breathe. He looked as beautiful as ever, his feline eyes twinkling, his dark hair exposing part of his smooth forehead. His hands gripped the reins so tightly his knuckles were white, and the way he sat on his dragon was regal, his expression confident and filled with determination. He was older, and somehow even more handsome than the last time you saw him. You didn’t even think that was possible.

You swallowed, your breath catching in your throat as his eyes finally met yours.

It was like time had ceased for a minute. You smiled slowly, happy tears pricking at your eyes as you took in his face.

He didn’t smile back.

And that’s when you noticed the pale arms wrapped around his waist. Confused, you watched as the chiefs dismounted the dragons, along with their heirs. Minho alighted from the dragon, helping down the woman who had been holding onto him. He held her hands gently, leaning in to press a kiss to her forehead.

You felt like your whole world had collapsed, bile rising in your throat as you watched her giggle. You noticed she was dressed in blue, her clothing that of a heiress. As they approached, your eyes fell on the sparkling ring on her finger...one that matched Minho’s.

When his eyes looked into yours again, they were cold, just like your heart.

[cartoonfangirl1218]

Royal Friends Headcanons

Because they are good friends, business meetings tend to be relaxed, not so much tension of someone wanting more than their share, they all just want to work together to get the best outcome. 

However, for some it can get so friendly that Alonso and/or Chloe would go off wanting to discuss personal stories and just having fun rather than treaty work. Though when they do get together to party Hoo boy. They party. There's no party like a royal party. And I don't mean Esteban's fancy waltz, seven chambermaids to seven men, I mean the Galdonian chair dances and mulberries and impromptu olaball matches and dance-offs. It's a lot of fun, and no one but a fellow royal really gets how much a party is needed for stress relief. 

Being the only two princes, Alonso quickly took Marzel under his wing to become his best "bro" and his wingman. And though sometimes Alonso's "legendary" plans are disastrous, they are a good influence on each other with Alonso helping Marzel be more outgoing and Marzel bringing Alonso back down to earth. 

Alonso plans to bring Prince Ari under his wing when he gets older. Rebecca not-so-jokingly swears it will be under her dead body. She likes Alonso, but she doesn't trust him to be a good babysitter much less a good role model. 

The girls have royal girls night which is basically a spa weekend with some olaball thrown in, and dressing room fashion shows. Sometimes there’s matching outfits at Val’s insistence. And yes, they it looks awesome.

Chloe and Marisa became such fast friends. Their bubbliness overflows into one another and they're the two main huggers of the group. Plus they both are very interested in learning about each other's worlds, and Marisa can gently but firmly guide Chloe when she backslides in social habits of oblivious selfishness. Also Marisa is always up for helping Chloe journey back to the territory of the sea nymphs and visit her gf Maliga. 

Rebecca develops a snarky relationship with Alonso since she was one of the few that doesn't fall for Alonso's charms or tangos AT ALL. He likes to tease her about her perfectionism and she mocks his playboy attitude. They act like they can't stand each other, but also are brutal when they team up for olaball. When Valentina joins their team, basically the match is won before they even do anything. 

Valentina was a bit perturbed by Chloe's touchy-feeliness, especially when it smushes her ruffles, but she comes to enjoy Chloe's positivity. They really enjoy shopping together too and admire the materials found in the other's countries. 

Valentina sometimes takes Marisa and Marzel as her "pet projects" in teaching them the ways of the human world, and outfitting them in the best of the best Paroisan outfits even if they cannot walk in the many layers and in Marisa's case, the corset.

Chloe, Marisa and Rebecca have ongoing bets on Valentina and Alonso, and Eleteo's relationships.  

More and specific Elena and XY hcs under cut.

Marzel has a small crush on Rebecca, best displayed that whenever Rebecca has to take a trip overseas, he volunteers to guide the ship in case of rocks, even if it takes a couple of weeks, and he has his own princely duties. But he is smitten enough to forget that he has his own kingdom. Rebecca finds it sweet and is considering seeing where it goes especially with Marisa's jokes that they can be sisters-in-law. 

Rebecca is lowkey the mom friend of the group, always trying to find solutions to other's problems and trying to make events enjoyable for everyone. 

Alonso is the one who unofficially cheers the other's up. He doesn't do emotions, and likes to keep things light, so he's the one to go for jokes and pratfalls and caricaturing himself, bound to put the smile back on their faces. 

Chloe gives the best gifts. Not all yachts like King Hector, but very sweet and personal homemade ones.

Elena and Alonso

They still have a teasing flirtation with Alonso knowing it won't go anywhere and Elena always smirking as she shoots him down. But now Elena freely helps Alonso with his romantic woes with Valentina when he endearingly, frantically asks for help to show Val how he cares without looking lame and "whipped." 

In return, Alonso offers free advice which Elena ignores because she doubts Mateo will like the things which Alonso claims "all men want."

Alonso gives Elena updates on how Charoca and Charica are and sends the lava crystals that they send as gifts. 

They enjoy having dance-offs and whenever Alonso wants to show off some new moves, Elena is usually his partner because she picks up dances quickly and they are surprisingly in-sync a lot of the time (they did do an amazing impromptu tango the first day they met after all).

Alonso actually enjoys indulging in her love of puns. Even if he thinks they're lame, he still does them till Elena is crying with laughter.

Elena and Valentina

Elena and Val are probably the closest even if they sometimes fall into a friendly competition. Elena likes to try out her magical expertise, and her new spells that Mateo has taught her with Valentina who is a very proficient wizard in her own right.�� Their kingdoms actually hold wizard exchanges and Elena often invites Mateo to join her meetings with Valentina because watching Mateo and Val geek out about magic to be amusing. As well as Mateo's silent frustration at her boasting.

Now they are allies in the kingdoms, they make amazing teammate on the olaball field and invented the Double-Trouble Queen fastball. 

Elena actually taught Valentina to cook since Val had made it part of her royal duty to learn about all different aspects.

Their first dish was pan dulce, with Avaloran chocolate. In return, Val has taught Elena some new hairstyles with copious locks and waves, with some of the best Paraisan hair ornaments.

Elena and Marisa

Marisa gave Elena multiple, stylishly dyed kelp shirts for her visits to Coronado and inadvertently created a trend for kelp clothes. 

Much like Ariel, Marisa goes to Elena to confirm or ask about new human objects that come to the shores that Camila no longer recognizes. 

Marisa got Elena addicted to romance novels that are apparently very popular in Nueva Vista and they spend some beach days laughing about some of the cheesy paragraphs and then they talk about their own romantic lives or the lives of others.

Elena and Marisa do amazing duets together and every year on the Human-Sirena Treaty to celebrate the improved relations. 

Elena and Marisa took crossbow lessons from the Turners, and have an ongoing competition for who can get the most center targets. So far Marisa is in the lead with 3-1. It's slow-going.

Elena and Marzel Elena and Marzel enjoy each other's company a lot during kingdom negotiations. They find they have a similar worldview with formerly having a black & white morality, insecurities in living up to their fathers and so they work well together in working toward a common goal. They enjoy the feeling of accomplishment.

Marzel taught Elena how to play Hermit Hold'em which is basically a poker game, and soon the two were running around Coronado's casinos, having the time of their lives. But that was a bad idea with all the money they wasted, they have been banned by their family members. 

Elena urges Marzel to participate in athletics and helped to teach him olaball, and fencing, the latter which Marzel was surprisingly proficient thanks to his own battle training. But he still enjoys frisbee the best. 

Elena also helps undo some of Alonso's more damaging advice about how to act on the human world, especially in regards to girls. 

They both share their concerns about their younger siblings, while Marisa and Isabel see them as overprotective and overly cautious, they think Isabel and Marisa are impulsive and jump into situations before they're ready. It's nice when you have someone who automatically agrees with you on things. 

Elena and Chloe Elena and Chloe share the same humor when it comes to puns, and always greet each other with a hug and a pun. 

Chloe tends to go off-topic when she sees her friends again instead of focusing on business as she should, but she also asks questions about the other's lives (as Elena once taught her or sang to her to be more precise) and then Elena gets dragged in describing the latest event that her kingdom faced and a whole afternoon goes by before they go back to the treaty Elena came for. 

Chloe gave Elena a taste of some of the best mulberry pies which Elena quickly consumed and had seconds. Which Chloe made into a friendly pie eating contest. 

Chloe takes Elena on hikes through Norburg's amazing pine trails and Elena shares some of the "winning" yoga moves that Ixlan taught her. 

Chloe gives Elena updates on the relationship between Abigail and Hector and proudly details her own diplomatic skills when they fight. Elena is just glad it's not her who has to do it.  Elena and Rebecca 

Rebecca became a sort of big sister inventor to Isabel, though she's not as knowledgeable in STEM, she has the creative knack for it and helps bridge the gap between Isabel's scientific talk and Elena's out-of-the-box thinking. 

Elena and Rebecca share a love for cultural events and what it means to bring the kingdoms' communities together so they often trade lessons on important dances and foods. 

Rebecca and Elena both have a tendency to focus on the minutiae of event/business details when they feel stressed with something. Luckily, it's not at the same time and usually can talk the other off the brink.   Though Rebecca tends to hold herself to a high standard, Elena helped to unleash her fun side and created a vicious prank master. Prince Ari blames Elena for all of it. 

Elena and Rebecca are often the first ones to go for adventures like rock climbing or horse racing and the others are jealous of how easily they take to things like that. 

[ultrashadowkai]

Avatar: The Last Airbender - The Promise Part 2

One part filler, two parts bad mindsets

Katara and Aang being all love dovey. It's still a little weird but less weird than the pet names

How does Toph sense the ground from on Appa? Could Toph always smell trees and differentiate the trees based on location as opposed to breed? Was that always a thing or did her senses get better with age? 

There's dirt on the bottom of Toph's feet and I love that detail.

If Toph found her calling as a teacher then why did she became police chief of Republic City. The yelling and bossing people around thing makes sense but Toph really doesn't seem like the kind of person to go around enforcing rules that aren't her own. Admittedly, there is a large gap of time between now (13) and Legend of Korra so anything could have happened to turn her into a police chief, but still....

Okay, it being a firebending dojo that had to move as part of the Harmony Restoration Movement makes sense. Kunyo's still a fool for questioning Toph, though

Sokka.... Just Sokka. A match to the sit? I assume he means whoever can knock the other student off their feet and onto their rear first rather than just sitting.

This metalbending school plot feels slightly more like a side episode, not quite a filler because it does involve the affects of the Harmony Restoration Movement but it doesn't feel as politically important

Does the Earth Kingdom palace not have the ability to house guests, especially guests here on diplomatic missions?

Aang has a fan club. Considering how Kyoshi has a state of herself on Kyoshi Island (and an island named after herself) and I do know that Yangchen was regarded in an almost diety-like way in the books that I swear I'll get to someday, this isn't all that surprising. This better not be "The Kyoshi Warriors" all over again.

Katara seems to remember Kyoshi Island rather well. Unfortunately, she will now have to deal with some of the worst aspects of having fans -- the delusional fans who want to date their favorite celebrity and refuses to realize that they have no chance even when said celebrity is already taken.

Aang wants to see something that looks somewhat reminiscent of his culture, and also likes the attention and is just all around a friendly enough guy that he would genuinely love to see their clubhouse. Having said that, don't stay at the houses of strange children when Iroh and the Earth King are right there.

Turtle-crabs are literally just hermit crabs.

"I dove in myself" - Ozai. As opposed to.... Nice to see that Ozai is still a terrible parent. Is the whole family vaguely cryptic on purpose?

Toph's magic metalbending sensing space rock bracelet. Okay. At least it's acknowledged that her students are kinda one off emotional 2d cutouts.

Sokka the Motivationalbender

I like that Katara admits (to herself) that she may have jumped the gun just a little in not seeing any other reason Aang would be excited about his fan club taking him to their clubhouse loosely modelled off of the Western Air Temple to ask questions about his culture and share old relics that seemingly anyone can just buy from a random traveller.

Ozai is trying to spin this as Zuko being so indecisive that it harms him -- and he's right, in a way. Zuko is indecisive; he's had his problem back in Ba Sing Se when he's torn between his honor and his morality. But he also isn't. Not really. He makes a choice; his problem is committing fully to a grey choice. Siding with the Avatar is an objectively good choice; this problem with Yu Dao is a grey one where both sides have a bit of a point (Zuko's moreso). All in all, he should really stop talking to Ozai.

Oh look, combo attacks consisting of different elements, almost like harmony can be achieved despite the differences. I wonder what Yu Dao and similar colonies were doing during the war.

I wasn't going to comment on Kori and Sneers but the conversation is important. Sneers sees her as a member of the Earth Kingdom and is shocked and appalled that she's training with Firebenders despite the fact that they're her cousins. Does he even really acknowledge her Fire Nation heritage? At least Kori doesn't take his attempts to make her choose a side and him leading the protests against Yu Dao. Either he accepts her as she is or they're though.

Moo-Chee-Goo-Chee-La-Poo-Chee the Third is a terrible name. What were his parents and his parents' parents thinking?

Oh...Kuei is exactly as Ozai said (tired of being seen as weak and so overcompensates with military might instead of talking things out with Zuko). I hate when Ozai's right.

Aw, Toph fears that she's being too much like her parents in regards to her students; expecting them to be something their not and getting upset because of it.

Aang's fan club is going to unintentionally cause more problems in Yu Dao

Props to Kunyo for turning that weapon Toph bent around his head that he clearly can't get off into hat. Remove props for "dirt-people" though

Huh, no one ever believed in them. I can see it. A touch cliché but heartwarming nonetheless

[Mai leaving] Well, that was quick. This was probably a longtime coming thing with a lot more build-up offscreen over the year long time skip but still; it feels kinda sudden. I figure Mai's going to be back in the comic or in future comics, not necessarily back with Zuko but back in general otherwise that's kinda a lame way to send Mai off. Mai, Ty Lee, and (I think) Azula are the mainish characters we don't hear what happened to in LoK. At least we know Sokka got into politics and Ty Lee's chi blocking became a widespread thing but we never knew what happened to Mai. Azula can be guessed at seeing as how she was imprisoned or implied to be at the end of the first show. All we have to go on is Izumi's assumed parentage.

Good thing I'm me and don't fall for this relationship drama bullcrap. Suki's with Sokka and that's not changing

When did the Earth Kingdom get war balloons?

Zuko looks like he's wasting away under the stress.

[b-e-h-o-l-d-e-r]

Ghost in the Shell (2017) review

I came into this movie with an open mind. Despite every fibre of my fanboy teenage ghost rejecting this alien reincarnation. I even set aside the whitewashing criticisms to just see if the movie can achieve something significant in spite of it.

Within roughly 5 minutes, this movie assured me I was going to be treated like a lobotomised baby. I shit you not, within seconds of a beautifully rendered manufacture sequence we watch two introduced characters in a room blatantly tell us what "ghost in the shell" means in the most uninspired way imaginable.

I wish I could tell you that this was just me getting off on the wrong foot but throughout, the movie is so uncertain in how to portray the themes, symbolisms and spiritual/ religious references that make up the brain in GitS' cyberpunk action body. The script just glitches between lame exposition by talking heads and still reflection in its precise composition but the two hardly work together.

It's like the film can't find its centre and as a result is neither a compelling action sci-fi or a meditative exploration of its philosophies. If this were Aaronofsky/ Gilliam or Bay/ Snyder perhaps (for better or worse) at least this movie would have a distinct direction to go in but instead it sits in the middle and suffers at both.

Hell, I'm sure many fans would be happy if this just took the Dredd approach. If they just accepted that the fans know the backstory and the non fans don't need it and made this simply about the Section 9 anti cyber crimes team doing their job, kicking ass n taking names, it would at least have a better chance of success amongst its primary demographic.

Instead Hollywood thinks big and wants to initiate a new franchise, origin story and all, n crams so much bullshit to try and get new audiences into it that Section 9 itself gets pushed way back in the corner. Audiences spend more time getting to know the Majors mum/s than they do with any her team.

They ditch the cerebral plot of the '95 anime whereby Major Motoko Kusanagi working within Section 9 are tracking a hacker who turns out not only to be an AI secretly created by the government to assassinate political targets but has become sentient, claims asylum and ends up merging consciousness with Major Kusanagi by the end.

Here we get Major Motoko Kusanagi of Section 9, pissed that many innocent people were murdered in experiments to create her and super shitty that her entire identity was a lie and she's actually a bratty anti establishment punk.

After all is said and done, what we get is Robocop-Lite (and thats the reboot mind you). All the nuance, intrigue and head scratching ideology that we got in the shorter length '95 anime is reduced here to identity theft and yet another unremarkable corporate business villain to cover it up. We've seen this shit SO often. I'm beginning to think Hollywood just doesn't know how to do it any other way. They weren't all bad mind you, Robocop, Total Recall, The Matrix, these are all great films but GitS in its initial reception really broke the mould and here to see it put back in the cage of "been here, done that" is so incredibly disappointing.

As far as anime/manga Hollywood adaptations are concerned, the bar is INCREDIBLY low. I'd argue the only good one amongst them is Edge of Tomorrow/ Live Die Repeat. Aside from that, every otaku since the 90's is used to being made fun of in the result of America trying to morph them into something that works amongst their style of cinema. Japan has made some great adaptations partly because they don't feel the need to repackage the story.

This GitS remake tries desperately to be on the fans side by copying much of the '95 movies look (with varying degrees of success, some scenes are very accurate in their reproduction but the hair in this film is more reminiscent of X-men (2000) and seems cosplay-ish at times).

There are few scenes lifted from the original but most get twisted to accommodate the new storyline, at which point I ask why bother? Half measures don't tend to turn many heads and whilst paying homage by really making the effort to be exact duplications in some ways is applaudable, you're giving yourself less room to do your version of it. At least then, whether the film turns out to be shit or not, I'll respect that you tried to do your own thing.

ok, casting. this argument has already been done to death and I've just about run outta energy already on the whole Scarlett Johanson thing but a few things that never seem to come up: first of all, acting wise, I gotta say it's all much of a fucking muchness isn't it? Kusanagi does not outwardly express much so its mostly a headgame for an actress with the chance to throw in some subtleties in the voice acting.

I don't really like Scarlet Johansson's performances but that its preposterous for anyone to come to the conclusion that her resume would land her this gig is a bit of a stretch. Do people realise how rare it is to find an A-list celebrity that has an extensive list of both highly demanding physical action blockbusters and subtle minimalist detail performances? Of course they are going to cast her. Before anyone throws ME personally into somehow being against ethnic minorities in blockbuster films (which would be absurd for anyone who knows me) '95 GitS director Mamoru Oshii also gave his stamp of approval.

They really tried with the marketing to dodge the bullet by just not bringing it up but it's really not dealt with well in the film and leads to some pretty fucking awkward moments for a racial debate charged audience to watch.

I would have preferred the role to go to a Japanese actress but remember, this is Hollywood and if a studio is gonna push bringing THIS film out, you bet your bottom dollar that they're going with someone that is a household name in America.

The only internationally known Japanese name out there right now is Rinko Kikuchi (who to date has 2 American films out there, both not big successes). I love most of her films and there ARE a few other Japanese actresses I would love to see in the role but Hollywood studios are not gonna bank on the success of Japanese films. Hell, the fact that they put Takeshi Kitano in bit part in this movie is as far as they are willing go to get in on that market. Few seem to point at his casting as some kind of justification and I laugh quite hard. Seriously, you're gonna give this guy (who's acted AND directed in over 20 brilliant films) a few minutes of screen time and applaud that as some kind of cultural milestone?

Which brings me to the big casting shame that NO ONE is fucking talking about because they're so caught up with the Johansson shit. Aside from Kusanagi, there are 6 Japanese members of the Section 9 taskforce. How many are Japanese? Kitano, yes. Who else? Saito. Did you remember him? He's the guy that snipes the helicopter at the very end of the film. You see his face for like 10 seconds. Pretty big step in casting mulitculturally, right? Don't get me wrong, the cast IS incredibly multicultural. We got actors from all over the world pretending to be Japanese:

A Danish guy as Batou A Chinese guy as Togusa An Australian as Ishikawa A Zimbabwean as Borma

Why keep the names?! Just call them whatever, it doesn't matter. You don't give them anything important to do anyway. Have a mulit-ethnic team but when they're all speaking clearly in their national accents and supposed to be portraying Japanese characters, THAT'S what should really piss people off because THESE roles could have gone out to Japanese people and it would not have even been a risk for the studio.

Ultimately, the one real positive thing I have to say is a great job for the WETA production team on some fantastic animatronics and moulds...that's pretty much it. Shame it couldn't be in a better film.

- dug out from the depths of https://letterboxd.com/Do_oM/

[a-queer-seminarian]

preaching during Holy Week is really rough....and this is before i figure out how to address the whole pandemic thing!

i’m trying to find an interpretation of the Palm Sunday story (particularly as told in Matthew 21:1-11) that, like, vibes with me. that makes contextual sense of what happens in it without being 1) horribly antisemitic and 2) not so skeptical about whether it “really historically happened” that i cause congregants who don’t like that kind of take to stop listening ya know?

so anyway here’s a bit from one article (or sermon?) i found that is maybe helpful? questions i have about it are below the quote:

“Passover was a problem for Rome. To not allow Passover to be celebrated would probably cost more, via a general civil uprising, than it was worth. Yet the festival was a celebration of escape from Egypt which always seemed on the edges of a rebellion against Rome. It was not hard to imagine that all that innocent asking of questions by the children: Why is this night different from all other nights? On all other nights, we eat either unleavened or leavened bread, but tonight we eat only unleavened bread? On all other nights, we eat all kinds of vegetables, but tonight, we eat only bitter herbs? and so on, was a thinly veiled reference to events that it was hoped would one day involve an escape from Rome, and, hopefully, something not too far distant from the drowning of Caesar's armies. So to keep things under control, extra troops would be sent into Jerusalem for the duration. They would march in from the west, probably from Caesarea Maritima, and make a great show of military might with war horses and columns of marching troops while entering the city, in an effort to dampen the enthusiasm of any Jewish activists. The story from Rome was that it had conquered the world. Resistance was useless. Jesus appears to have carried out something between a seriously seditious piece of street theatre and what we Australians would see as an hilarious piss-take of the "powers that be." In recent Australian history we see such an act in the Chaser's Breach of APEC restricted zone, which had half the country laughing themselves silly and the government furious. While Pilate and Herod had their "ring of steel" clamping down on the city, Jesus was on the other side of the city at the Mount of Olives, which is significant in biblical history as the place where the Lord's feet would stand when the enemies who had come against Jerusalem were finally driven out. (see Zechariah 14:1-19) Jesus made his own entry down the hill and over into Jerusalem mounted on a donkey and its foal. This is not some bizarre circus trick. It echoes the text of Zechariah 9. The triumphant king who comes in peace rides a donkey. Hebrew poetry uses a technique called a hendiadys where one noun is echoed by another for emphasis. “So humble and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey…” (Zechariah 9:9) is not talking about two animals but emphasizing the fact of the donkey over the warhorse that one would expect of a hostile king. The next lines make this clear: “He will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the warhorse from Jerusalem; and the battle-bow shall be cut off, and he shall command peace to the nations.” There is some confusion about why Matthew, almost certainly a Jew, tells the story as though Jesus somehow needed to have two animals to fulfill the prophecy and ride both of them. (The original story in Mark has only one animal.) Some suggest this is a literary device to emphasise that the prophecy is thoroughly fulfilled; eg, Petty, but I think there is a proto-Australian attitude on show here! The centurions coming into Rome all had their remounts— their spare horse in case the main mount went lame— up at the back of the column in the care of their batman. You don't look half so magnificent if you have an un-mounted horse tethered behind you. But Jesus tows his own remount. And it's only a foal! It's likely that any Roman soldier watching this has no idea of the cultural referencing that's going on. But the people who are coming in with Jesus clearly see a single raised middle digit, and may have taken it further than Jesus desired. (It specifically says that it is the crowd travelling with him which makes all the fuss, not the people in Jerusalem.) They put their clothes down on the road, which is a sign of acknowledging royalty. A clear reference to this is in 2 Kings 9:13. "Then hurriedly they all took their cloaks and spread them for him on the bare steps; and they blew the trumpet, and proclaimed, ‘Jehu is king.’" If we read for the context of this quotation we see that Jehu has just been anointed king by one of Elisha's emissaries—a junior prophet—although the current king is still alive and on the throne! This is a coup. Jehu then rides off, pretending still to be loyal, and kills both the king of Israel—who is the son of Jezebel—and the king of Judah. ...”

Questions i have:

So yeah i think if i’m reading this right it’s saying that Jesus’s “stunt” with the donkeys, with people shouting hosanna and alluding to a coup, was likely viewed as a threat by the Roman military occupying and marching around Jerusalem. If any Jewish leaders had a problem with it, it was probably out of fear that Jesus’ stunt would hurt them all, if Rome decided to retaliate.

Is that a proper reading of this article? And is it like...accurate sounding?

And does it seem...i don’t know...like what i’m looking for for my sermon? Is focusing on the threat Jesus posed to Rome rather than his intra-community conflict with other Jewish leaders a good direction to go with this? Or is there still antisemitism lurking in this take?

Also, I still am very much wary of how, like, the Passion story goes that after this hosanna stuff “all the people” “turn on” Jesus -- these people shouting hosanna today are going to join the crowds that demand his death tomorrow. All the people Jesus has helped turn on him (or at least don’t stick up for him). I just don’t know how to handle that part of the story -- partially because i question the “historical truth” of a lot of all this, and mostly because of the violent consequences of this take for Jewish communities across the centuries.

idk if any of this is coherent haha but if anyone has thoughts....i am all ears

[doctorstrangeaskblog]

One thing I’ve noticed about haters is that they basically dedicate a lot of time just to spread hate, making their target’s fans sad, they often want to impose their opinion, they often misinterpret the facts, make up facts or even exaggerate on interpretation of facts, and that’s not the problem, the problem is that they want to IMPOSE their thought on people, prevent them from having fun with what they like, as if the whole world had to hate what they hate, and this is wrong, because it attacks the other’s right to like something. People have the right to hate stuff, but they cannot harm anyone else’s right with their actions (and arguments), because that way we fall into intolerance, and not just racism, sexism or homophobia, but also social exclusion against personal tastes and opinions. They also sort of invade spaces that were supposed to be fun, such as tags on Tumblr and other social media with hateful, negative and even fake posts. A good example was people blaming Benedict for Doctor Strange whitewashing, while the character in question was the Ancient One and not Stephen per se, and then they start the “Doctor Strange should be Asian” movement, with so much superficiality, because we know we can’t just change the characters’ nationality and be like “see? We’re inclusive”, because that’s just so lame. People who suffer with exclusion feel every day the problem can’t be solved with simple replacement, but with the development of good, well built characters, good stories, with cultural inclusion and all the focus the character deserves, etc. Anyway, it’s not a simple matter, and suddenly haters were blaming the entire racism of the cinema on Benedict (?) while the guy has a big importance when it comes to inclusion, donations, charity, pacifism and a lot of relevant points I won’t list here because just google it.

Anyway, haters end up carrying misinformed people into hating people who actually are doing good things out there, with great projects and charity initiatives etc. (Keanu, Capaldi, Benedict, Hiddleston...). Also, whenever a hater comes to discuss about why the person or character you admire is the worst being in the world, they often get aggressive when you start pointing out logical arguments, they end up getting emotional and coming for the personal side and forcing some interpretations (example, a lot of doctors, actors, psychologists etc. study objects, animals and people so they can work and improve their profession, like, doctors study people with disabilities, from incapacitating ones to very light ones so they can understand the matter and work more efficiently, etc, I’ve seen people turn Benedict into a monster for observing people with autism, because he more than once had to play a role in which the character had autism. If we think about it and keep acting with such hateful attitude, we’ll end up agreeing with censorship, and autistic people wouldn’t either be characters in movies or we wouldn’t get actors working on such roles, meaning the characterization would be way more limited etc. anyway, it would be bad for culture and critique in general, there would be less representation, because even if autistic authors were called, it would make it harder in occasions where that wouldn’t be possible, movies would end up exploring that subject less, etc.), this was an example, but project this into wider areas of cinema and society in general, using your personal opinion to judge people and consider them the ultimate evil, to want to make the whole world hate that person and harming anyone who disagrees with the haters, that’s really bad!

I used some haters speech about Benedict as examples here because that’s what I’ve seen (and been attacked with) the most, because my blog is a Doctor Strange blog, anyway, but I’m talking about all the kind of haters. But understand a thing, being a hater is not the same as disliking something! Everyone has the right to dislike stuff, and people normally just stop there. People dislike something, people avoid that thing, if asked, they say they don’t like it and that’s it! People normally don’t spend hours making toxic posts about what they hate or spend hours arguing with strangers about how they should hate something! People tend to spend their time with things they like (or things they have to do), so if a hater comes to you and keeps babbling, just say you’re not interested or ignore or end the conversation, because normally these people aren’t well intentioned! Haters normally can’t be convinced, there will ALWAYS be a reason to justify their hating, while the truth probably is that they identified with a group and feel important there. Also, haters tend to spread high expectations about people, and that’s just toxic, we can’t judge someone’s entire life by something they said or did, people commit mistakes and that’s why LAW exists, if someone commits a crime, it’s up to the system to judge them, not people! When people assume that role and start writing stuff, a lot of fake news come out, and a lot of people actually believe it, and everything becomes a big hate toxic ball that hurts tons of people who had nothing to do with anything.

We do have to criticize actions we consider evil or wrong, as well as we have to think about  society and about cinema and racism etc. but we can do that with logical conversation, checking the facts in sources we can trust, we don’t have to become haters and hurt others to defend what we believe and trust every tabloid website in order to sustain our arguments, and I’m not even talking about extreme things such as racism and homophobia, I’m talking about something way more “silly” and superficial such as fandom hating, celebrity hating, ship hating etc.

To point out how it’s not normal to be a hater, let’s imagine a situation: there’s an actress or singer (etc) you like who said something really bad on TV, live, everyone saw and it’s impossible to claim it’s fake. You kind of used to like that person’s content before, but what she said really let you down, you don’t like her anymore and you’re sad. What’s your natural reaction? The reaction most people would have? Well, unfollow that person, stop reading their posts, stop listening to their music, stop recommending that person to friends, stop buying their stuff and little by little, that person would have a smaller and smaller space in your life, until you simply forget about that celebrity (they become irrelevant to you), you just avoid their stuff, you don’t even notice them anymore, you have other interests now and that’s it, things barely changed for you, you’re just indifferent. Now, what does a hater does? They create a page (or fill their social page) of stuff with hate against their target, they spend hours reading about how terrible that person is, they talk to that person’s fans to tell them they have to stop liking that celebrity, they invade all the tags of series, songs, movies (anything) the celebrity is in and spam it with negative things, such as “it’s a terrible singer” or “they should have  cast another actor”, anyway, anything really negative that would induce the fans to either quit having fun or start hating the celebrity as well, and that’s just soooo sad and toxic, because spamming a safe, fun environment like that can be considered imposing and even aggressive depending of the content they’re posting, that’s why social media websites often ban accounts that spam tags or other users.

Anyway, haters who spread fake news or aggressive thoughts or accusations often forget they actually could be sued by the celebrity/singer/actor/writer they’re hating on, that’s where personal opinion differs from being a little authoritarian offensive aggressive person. I can totally say “I don’t like that singer because they did X” or because “their song is bad” or “I don’t like their style”, however, we cannot accuse people of stuff they didn’t do, things they didn’t say or even write they thought something or said something they didn’t, because then we’re invading their space, and they have the legal argument to sue you. Normally celebrities don’t lose their time suing small silly haters on social media, however, if a hater writes something offensive about them, including false accusations, they totally CAN sue the hater, or report them so their account gets closed anyway. Haters often forget that some of their actions are criminal, cyber bullying is crime, false accusations and humiliations can be interpreted as injury, and that can be serious, specially if the person being offended is going a hard phase or suffers from psychiatric disorders, the consequences could be way worse for who’s suffering the stalking.

Something that’s very common is Benedict haters taking pics of him and making photoshops making fun of his appearance (they FIND) and making fun of his name. Benedict kind of seems to be okay with that during interviews, considering a lot of his fans also do that, but still, imagine people taking pics of you, making an offensive edit and spreading it in the tags about you or tags about the things you do and like, HOLY CRAP THAT WOULD BE HELL, I WOULD HATE THAT! I WOULD SUE! And not only the celebrity has to endure that as well as all the fans have to scroll past the sooo many hateful posts which are contributing to NOTHING at all. The only ones happy with all that are the little noisy hater communities, who keep spreading all the offensive things, being rude to people and satisfying their ego, because they often feel way superior to the people they hate (and the fans, and anyone else because they feel they have the right to impose their thoughts). Hate tags do exist, and fans normally won’t visit them because they don’t want to read hate, but even so, haters get expansive and spread all their hate to healthy tags as well, and that becomes toxic. That’s why hate posts and spams are really close in many Guidelines of social media, and such posts CAN BE REPORTED, because they kind of break the “behave online, respect people and don’t harm other people” guideline.

In conclusion, if you’re a victim of a hater(s), don’t quit what you like, just report and block the haters. If it turns into stalking, keep reporting, call the police if you feel threatened, cyber bullying is CRIME, and spamming people is considered a bad attitude on most social media. Preserve your well being! Don’t lose your time discussing with fanatic haters, they won’t listen to you. (If someone hates an actor/singer etc. because they are misinformed, they tend to be like “really? I didn’t know it was a lie. I’ll check it out” when you first tell them /or comment on how the information they’re sharing is fake. Misinformed people normally don’t want to impose their thought, normally they’re just confused or lost, and most of them won’t attack you).

If you’re a hater, please, stop that and if you feel you need, go search psychiatric help, because what you’re doing probably is hurting someone, and hate doesn’t make good at all, not to you, not to anyone. You’re free to have your personal group where you hate on stuff together, of course, but try to be careful to not hurt people or to be toxic to others. Some stuff you hate mean the world to other people, so respect their view just like they respect yours.

Just reminding this text isn’t about extreme things such as racism, homophobia, sexism etc. this text isn’t about that. (Wanting to kill someone because of their gender or color isn’t accepted in our society, it’s crime, and I’m not talking about this here.).

That’s it. Stay away from haters, they will try to make you feel bad for not listening to them , they will accuse you of being authoritarian for blocking them, but no, you don’t have to listen to them, you don’t have to spend you time listening to their hate, you have the right to preserve yourself and ignore them, that’s why the function “block and report” exist and you have the right to use them.

[makeste]

BnHA Chapter 184: JP Hero Billboard Chart

Previously on BnHA: We spent the whole chapter enjoying the cultural festival. Class B entertained with a fantasy play that drew inspiration from no fewer than four separate intellectual properties, proving that it’s not just Monoma who likes to copy stuff. Hounddog handed out some of the most terrifying discipline we’ve seen since Orca’s EXTRA GUIDANCE. Eri regaled Deku with her enthusiastic recap of the concert in vivid detail including sound effects and both Deku and Mirio were thrilled to see her so happy. Those jerk upperclassmen from before apologized for their bad attitude. Everyone was grateful to class 1-A for lifting the school’s spirits. Hadou won the Miss Con competition at long last. Bakugou conquered the warped wall. Shinsou traumatized several class A students for life. Mei successfully wowed people with the support team expo and then promptly passed out afterward. Deku presented Eri with a handmade candy apple and bid her farewell. And lastly, over at the police station, the cops processed Gentle and La Brava and seemed to be taking steps to rehabilitate them. All in all it was the most wholesome chapter ever and I’m almost sorry to see this arc end, but the plot must go on.

Today on BnHA: Aizawa brings Eri back to U.A. and is all “oh yeah by the way, she lives here now.” We learn that Tokoyami interned with a hero named Hawks and YOU ALL KNOW WHO THAT IS. The Pussycats visit the 1-A dorms and announce that they’re coming off their hiatus and that Ragdoll will be supporting them as an OL which is some bullshit but at least she’s okay. Pixie-Bob explains that shockingly, All for One was not inclined to just give her quirk back just like that! We learn that the JP Hero Billboard Chart, the organization that ranks active heroes, will be presenting the new official rankings -- the first without All Might -- shortly. Right now, in fact! We then travel to Kamino for the live presentation. The top 10 heroes are introduced, the highlights of which are Ryuukyuu at #10, Kamui Woods at #7, my new bunny fave Miruko at #5, Edgeshot at #4, Best Finest Elite Superlative Jeanist at #3, and THAT MAN, Hawks, at #2. Oh and Endeavor at #1. With a new suit. I WONDER WHO THIS ARC IS GOING TO BE ABOUT.

(As always, all comments not marked with an ETA are my unspoiled reactions from my first readthrough of this chapter. I’ve read up through chapter 207 now, so any ETAs will reflect that. Just to clarify real quick, my stopping right smack dab in the middle of my boy’s big fight isn’t by choice, lol. I’ve been sick for the past few days, but I’m finally starting to feel a bit better, so hopefully I’ll have the energy to resume soon.)

GASSPPPPPPPP

IT’S THE THING. THE THING WITH THE RANKS. THE HERO RANKINGS!!

omg. are we going to get to see how they do it finally? AND ARE WE FINALLY GOING TO MEET FORMER NUMBER THREE AND CURRENT NUMBER TWO HERO IDOL HAWKS?? THE MYSTERIOUS HAWKS WHO HAS WINGS, AND I ASSUME HE HAS THE POWER OF HAWKS. MAYBE. EXCEPT THAT’S KIND OF A LAME POWER TO SOMEHOW GET HIM ALL THE WAY TO NUMBER TWO ABOVE PEOPLE LIKE EDGESHOT AND FUCKING BEAST JEANIST. HAWKS WHAT ARE YOUR SECRETS

maybe I should READ THE CHAPTER and find out. hmmm

anyway so November is ending! that means we’re entering December! which also means I think Bakugou is going to get a new costume soon! and also he and Todoroki have only one month left before they get to retake their exam oh gosh. so much excitement so little time

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

ERI GOT ADOPTED BY EVERYONE!?!??!??!

AIZAWA IS OFFICIALLY HER DAD. OH MY GOD. I’M GOING TO CRY. LOOK AT HIS NONCHALANT FACE. “hey Deku meet my new kid”

(ETA: and he says “U.A.” but we all know it’s really just him. I don’t see anyone else from the school stepping up. Aizawa it’s okay you can admit that you’re completely incapable of turning your back on a child in need and so you stepped in and took responsibility for her and only afterward actually went and asked Rat Principal if it was okay and thankfully he said yes because he’s also a pretty cool guy. just like you. my god I love you)

ERI’S SO HAPPYYYYY

LOOK AT ALL OF HER NEW BIG BROTHERS AND SISTERS!!!

THE FULL STORY IS YOU ALL ADOPTED A KID, DEKU!!!

Nejire put her hair in pigtails omggggg

and Tsuyu, she is your sister now. GET USED TO IT

so now Aizawa and Mirio are leaving her with Tamaki and Nejire and calling the 1-As outside to talk

so they found out that Eri was abandoned by her parents, and that her grandpa is the comatose Precepts boss

and Mirio says that her horn, which you recall had shrunk quite a bit after the Overhaul battle, started to grow again recently. although it’s still pretty small

so they figured U.A. would be the safest environment for her, rather than a foster home

GOOD. I’M GLAD YOU ALL FIGURED THAT OUT

AHHHHHH

(ETA: btw Mangastream’s translation says “teachers’ dormitory” rather than lounge, which makes a great deal more sense)

HE REALLY DID ADOPT HER IT’S OFFICIALLLLLLLLLL

oh my god. he cares so much. obviously it’s not something he had to do, but he obviously grew fond of her and knew it was going to be the best option for her

so now you have a six-year-old daughter, Aizawa. good thing your twenty other kids can help babysit

and also this guy!

so Mirio is now a full-time live-in nanny. I approve

omgggg

yesssssss

but that’s not to say that this the only reason he’s doing this. that will be the happiest ending but he still loves her regardless

“it’s been a while since we did anything gay, Mirio. how bout it”

yes. pretty neat

now Aizawa is asking if the third years can take Eri for a little bit. I guess he has to go and take care of some teacher things. he’s such a busy guy

Mirio says they’re happy to, and he’s saying they should all play Othello

apparently this is not referring to the Shakespeare play but it’s another name for the board game Reversi. that was really confusing for a sec lol. I’ve never heard of this game before

Deku’s asking if they can join in, but Aizawa’s telling them to go back to the dorms

ah??

OH? DO TELL

and now we’re cutting to the dorms and Tokoyami is suddenly sneezing quite forcefully

LOOK AT THESE CUTIESSSSS

why is Kiri wearing a button down shirt. are you going on a date. none of your usual suitors seem particularly dressed up

(ETA: and what is going on with Kami and Momo there oh my. you two sure look mighty cozy)

Kaminari is teasing Tokoyami about the old superstition that if you sneeze it means someone’s talking about you somewhere

AHHHHHH WHAAAAAAAT

THE FUCK!?

fuck me, what? Tokofuckingyami interned with the former number three himself and no one fucking said a thing?!

and was this his actual internship or his work study? I wonder how many other kids had actual internships that we didn’t hear a damn thing about

also why does Ochako look about 8 years old in that panel. holy shit her eyes are big

anyway, Toko is flatly saying he doubts he has any fans yet and that it’s too early

and now the door is cracking open and Iida is announcing that their guests are here!

EYYYYYYYYYYYY

IT’S BEEN A WHILE YOU ASSHOLES

Ragdoll! ❤❤❤ glad to see they didn’t dump you and that you’re keeping your spirits up even after everything that happened

DID THEY BRING KOUTA. THEY SHOULD HAVE BROUGHT KOUTA. he’s probably in school now though. damn

-- NO HE’S HERE!!!

BE CAREFUL WHEN GREETING HIM YOU KNOW HOW HE GETS!

I love that everyone’s so happy to see them and Mina and Hagakure are even running over for hugs. that’s so heartwarming to see, especially given how the camp ended and the scared and sad terms they must have parted on last time

speaking of those events!

it’s nice that he apologized. even though it wasn’t their fault (mostly). but I’m sure Bakugou doesn’t particularly like to be reminded of it and would rather just pretend like nothing happened. so I hope they take their cue from him and try not to make him uncomfortable

something like 90% of AO3 is convinced Bakugou has Secret PTSD from this incident, and while I tend to stick to Confirmed Canon Only and thus am more on the side of he probably doesn’t, I’m sure that it’s not something he likes to think about all the same and the subject probably does put him on edge

(ETA: and! come to think of it, the one thing we do know he came away with for sure is a lot of guilt! so it’s more than possible that he actually blames himself for being the cause of the attack and for indirectly being the reason why Ragdoll lost her quirk. so to have them come up and apologize to him when from his perspective he’s the one who caused all the trouble to begin with... now that is something I can see really bothering him, actually. oh Bakugou)

Jirou, who as you recall was also injured during the attack, says that they’re all doing well

and meanwhile Tora brought bread for all of them and Mina’s waving it around excitedly and Ochako looks over the moon. she always loves sweets

YESSSSSSSSSS

MY TINY ANGRY SON

LMAOOOOO

DEAR MIDORIYA I’M REALLY SORRY

lmaooooooo

look how much better he’s gotten now, though! he’s graduated from groin punching to handshaking! he’s actually super thrilled to see Deku again and you can tell and he’s trying so hard not to show it and I fucking love it omggg

OH MY GODDDD

HE MATCHED DEKU’S SHOES HOLY SHIT. HOW DOES THIS SERIES KEEP OUTCUTEING ITSELF!?

oh my god. Deku really is his hero. I can’t. why do I suddenly want to cry omggg

anyway! so now Satou’s asking why they’ve come to visit U.A.

and Pixie says they came “to celebrate her reinstatement”

???! Ragdoll???

:(!!!!!!

OH COME ON WHAT THE HELL

okay but like. her quirk was all mental anyway. physically she’s still just as strong as she ever was. I don’t see why she couldn’t be out there fighting crime even without the pokedex quirk. sure, it leaves her a bit more vulnerable not being able to track people or knowing their moves and stats ahead of time, but there’s still a lot she could do goddammit

and now Pixie says they got a report from Tartarus omg!

(ETA: okay so I posted Mangastream’s translation here as it makes much more sense than Jaimini’s version. so you can ignore all the confused commentary below. this makes it clear he’s just taunting them and saying “why sure, I’d love to give back all the quirks I stole, but I can’t do that while you’ve got me all tied up :’) too bad.”)

oh my god sudden All for One holy shit. I don’t think we’ve seen him since like chapter 116?? oh snap

so I’m not quite sure what he’s saying here. is he saying he physically can’t return the quirk, or that it’s use it or lose it type of deal? or is he just saying he doesn’t feel like returning it, sorry, too bad so sad?

I’m going to assume it’s that last one, seeing as he’s a dick

but like, there was never really any chance of that happening anyway. we all know the only way that quirk is coming back is if Deku does in fact turn out to be his kid and he takes the quirk himself and gives it back to her

AHHHHHHH

OKAY BUT. THE SHOT OF KACCHAN’S FACE THOUGH! Kacchan being part of the inner circle yesssssss. holy shit. I’ve been waiting so long for this?? thank you, manga, for this friendly reminder that he is the only other one who knows the full story of All for One and his connection to Deku. I love how serious and somewhat apprehensive they both suddenly look just at the mention of him

anyway, so Mandalay is saying it’s going to be broadcast soon, but that on the most recent JP Hero Billboard Chart they were ranked 411th

holy shit what?! weren’t they in the top 50 before?! that’s an insane slide. I know they lost a member and also had a kid get kidnapped on their watch, but still

AHHHH DETAILS ABOUT THE JP HERO BILLBOARD CHART YESSSSSSS

lol actually this is all stuff that we already knew

BUT LOOK AT THAT SILHOUETTE IN THE NUMBER THREE POSITION THOUGH! fucking Rawk Hawk is about to be revealed at long last omgggg

okay yeah, Deku says the Pussycats were previously ranked at #32

so Kiri says oh, that’s why they’re starting things up again, so they can fight their way back to the top after such a steep drop

oh my god

“NO YOU GUYS DON’T UNDERSTAND, WE FUCKED UP REALLY BAD”

they’re saying that the fact that they didn’t drop even lower means that there are still fans rooting for them, and so they have to work hard

lol Kiri’s sobbing into his arm at how manly they are

and now the kids are all “oh yeah come to think of it, the second semester rankings haven’t been presented yet” and that it’s probably because of all the crazy shit that’s happened recently

are they usually presented before now? I just figured it was a twice a year June-and-December type thing

“exciting” isn’t quite the word I’d use, but okay. sounds more depressing than anything :(

ahhhh now we’re cutting to the presentation!

they’re broadcasting from Kamino of all places

so there are a ton of people and a bunch of stretch limos and such, and it seems to be like an Oscar-level event

oh, but apparently it’s not normally like this

RYUUKYUUUUUUUU

HEY WHAT THE FUCK

WHAT FUCKING GIVES. THERE HAD BETTER BE AT LEAST ONE MORE BADASS LADY IN THE TOP TEN THEN OR I’M GOING TO BE REALLY FUCKING PISSED THAT THE TOP TEN RANKINGS GO “GUY GUY GUY GUY GUY GUY GUY GUY GUY, AND I GUESS WE’LL THROW IN A GIRL HERE AT THE END NOW BECAUSE WE’RE SO GENEROUS”

ffff

number 9 is some old samurai asshole

go fuck yourself Yoroimusha. what makes you so special that you’re ranked above my dragon queen

number 8...

...okay he can stay

oh shit Kamui fucking Woods made it all the way to number 7!

fffffff they showed Mt. Lady and for a moment I thought it meant she was at no. 6! but noooooo she’s all the way at #23. despite having participated in the same missions as Kamui. do you know what, the JP Hero Billboard Chart can go fuck themselves

who the hell

“Crust” lmao. toast hero. sandwich hero

OH GOOD

so now women make up a full 20% of the top ten rankings rather than a measly 10%. we really smashed that glass ceiling, y’all. gender equality has been achieved. you’re welcome

(ETA: I feel like this needs more :/ faces to get my full feelings across. :/ :/ :/ :/ :/ :/ :/ okay that’s better)

anyway if she’s in the top 5 she must be pretty cool and I hope we get to see what her power is someday

(ETA: seems to be your basic run-of-the-mill animal-themed super strength, but damned if Dabi did not want to fuck with her though. you go Miruko)

Edgeshot is at number 4, which is expected since he was previously in the number 5 spot before All Might’s retirement. good boy Edgeshot

except for Mt. Lady apparently

AHHHHHHHHHHHH

BEAST JEANIST

GET WELL SOON YOU SEXY PUNK

AHHHHHHHHHHHHH

IT’S HIM!!!!!

RAWK HAWK

HOLY SHIT HE’S SO FINE. LOOKS JUST LIKE I REMEMBER FROM ALL THE FANART. HAWKS YOU SEXY BITCH

“HOW EXCESSIVE”

IT’S LIKE AIZAWA’S FACE AND ATTITUDE WITH ALL MIGHT’S HAIR, OH SHIT WHAT A LEGEND

BUT DON’T THINK YOU CAN JUST AUTOMATICALLY WIN MY APPROVAL OVER JUST LIKE THAT! YOU STILL NEED TO PROVE TO ME WHY YOU DESERVE TO BE RANKED ABOVE MY BOY BEST FORKING GODDAMN ONE AND ONLY JEANIST

and of course, number one is Endeavor

lol what he gets the whole last page to himself. why. just because he got a new costume?? I honestly didn’t even notice the difference lol

but okay fine let’s take a look

well, he’s definitely trying! did he make himself a fire antennae thing. and does he have a cape now I can’t tell

god there’s so much fire. just turn it off when you’re not in action and be fucking normal you asshole

and so that’s it. I guess

what I took away from this chapter is that the people of Japan voted in a washing machine over a fucking dragon. given the choice, they would rather have him on the scene, tossing in red shirts with the villains’ white loads to turn all of their clothes pink. I mean, sure then. whatever

BONUS: Miruko’s profile!

OH SO YOU LIKE CARROTS HUH. I don’t know what I was expecting lol

so her last name means “rabbit mountain.” I guess the mountain part is just cuz she’s strong as hell? idk

and I wonder if her first name has any meaning since it’s just written in katakana. I know the notes say something about it being a reference to a professional fighter, but I have a feeling that’s talking about her hero name rather than her given name

I fucking love her. I wish to god there were more than two fucking female heroes in the top ten, but at least the two we have are pretty badass

[manifestoonmoralmanlove]

Soulless Riffing: Brainless Wrap-up

I got a supernatural action/romance book series as a gift that’s just riddled with stuff that I hate….and as a steampunk Victorian London action romance story filled with werewolves and vampires…it’s yeah gonna be easy to poke fun at.

I just want to say, it’s totally cool if you like this story or ones like it!  It’s certainly a better caliber than a lot of what I make fun of…however…I can’t help but want to make fun of it.

Over here for the 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7+8, 9, 10+11, 12, 13, 14, and Epilogue.

So here are my final thoughts on the book Soulless for those interested in such things:

It’s not good quality but hell, you’re probably not reading magical woman in Victorian times bangs hot werewolf while hitting zombies with an umbrella cause you want really deep themes and tight prose.

Despite my grumblings on Alexia’s Italian prosecution complex and supernaturals as an oppressed race, it’s not really that problematic.  I think it’s a pinch ignorant and unintentionally glib, but dang I’ve seen way worse.

I think the book’s greatest strength and weakness are kinda one in the same, it just depends on your perspective. 

That would be the abiding and consistent frivolousness of it all.  I personally feel as if it hurts the story cause it feels as if there’s no stakes and that the conflict doesn’t matter.  But you can see the appeal.  Even when shit is really going down, it’s not properly stressful or scary.  Humor is never far away, it’s just straight up fluff!

The plot contradicts itself for no apparent reason, it has giant holes, and what sense it does make is highly dependent on every single character (even ones meant to be smart) not having enough brain function to make sentences by themselves.

This is more subjective but the relationship at the center wasn’t great if you ask me. The conflict is all childish, with no suspense that it’ll be a more than chapter long hindrance. The main differences in their personalities are basically on gendered lines, with a little werewolf vs. human culture for color.  Alexia has lower self-esteem, gets sad sometimes, is more likely to be polite, and is more reluctant about a sexual relationship.  Besides that they’re incredibly similar to one another. They’re antagonistic, strong-willed, self-righteous, frivolous, stupid, short-sighted, not self-aware, and have similar politics. They’re so similar when they have an argument they just circle the drain.  Nobody adds anything or learns because they’re just vomiting the same unprocessed, inept perspective at one another.  You’ll never be short on conflict, but it’s all non-arguments about petty bullshit that don’t even manage to be funny.  

For something that’s meant to be fun and frivolous there’s a surprising lack of action and sex. The story wants to both be kinda that virginal ravishment and female empowered libidos at the same time and it just...doesn’t mesh. I honestly feel they should have leaned more on having a horny protag, and just played up feigning confidence, clumsiness, with a bit of uncertainty.  Instead Alexia both wants to both spend a week locked in a cabin fucking this man, but also IS THIS AROUSAL????? WHAT DOES IT MEAN!?!?!?!?!  There is 1 page of a sex scene, the make out scenes were frankly underwhelming and froze the pacing, and Alexia only has 1 proper fight in it all and that’s over by what page 5? LAME!

I feel as if she should’ve leaned more into the cheesy ridiculousness of it all.  Like her umbrella is actually a living familiar (her father’s) who’s perhaps at first begrudgingly working with Alexia.  The umbrella is sarcastic and dramatic but ends up being deeply loyal to Alexia. Named Parry or Saul for parasol?

Her evil family, or maybe a higher up in government is actually connected to the genocide club? DUN DUN DUN!

Queen Victoria seems like a delicate older woman, but in a climactic battle it turns out she can take care of herself and says some dumb nonsensical one liner like, “JUST LIE BACK AND THINK OF ENGLAND!” when she blunderbuss’ the antagonist out a grand window in her castle.

Well…to be fair… I haven’t read the whole series so who knows if that last one happens.

But let me give you a proper Too long; Didn’t read:

On the good side:

It’s easy to read frivolous fun that indulges in the Victorian aesthetic with a supernatural flavor. The opening of the story, I still contend is good. There is genuine friendship tenderness in this story that is lovely.  It doesn’t take itself too seriously, and sprinkles humor throughout.   The lead has sexual agency, women’s libidos are celebrated, and there’s an implication that sex outside of marriage is fine.  It does follow a sensible (if could be improved) pattern of intrigue, romantic development, climax, and conclusion. It’s also written in a particular voice that many would probably enjoy.  The voice is horny, juvenile, and superior both in the respect that Alexia is NOT LIKE OTHER GIRLS but also a snotty kinda British superior attitude for being witty enough that your backhanded compliment seemed polite enough that it wasn’t recognized for what it really was.

…Okay so maybe that last line was in itself a backhanded compliment.  I found the voice irritating, but I can understand why it’s attractive to so many young women.  What does any reasonable person want from a young adult novel aimed at young women?

For it to be sexy, silly, that the protagonist is better than the average person and by extension YOU ARE for enjoying her adventures.  And hey listen, young women are shit on ALL THE TIME for all sorts of bullshit.  Women should have these outlets to just briefly, BRIEFLY feel as if they’re smart, powerful, and sexy!  I give a hearty fuck yeah to that!

On the bad side:

There is a caveat I have with what I just said above. Some of the superior tone of Soulless (and it’s not exclusive to this title I assure you) is that some of the superior tone comes down to misogyny, classism, and even a little of what’s appropriate for a GOOD MAN (beyond yanno don’t be shitty.)  I cannot abide by that.

The story’s frivolousness when it comes to serious topics is a disservice.  

It could have easily been more fun.

The story could have also been EASILY molded into a plot that made more sense.

The story has no idea how to be subtle…which helps it feel as if it’s a YA novel.  This novel books itself as adult, but it’s really really, really, really, REALLY a young adult book and it should have been labeled/marketed/etc as such.  I came in expecting a fun saucy novel, but left feeling condensed to by a 16 year old. Like honestly, I feel as if she wrote a young adult novel, her editor wanted a sex scene at the end, so she quick pushed out a page of a tame one, and because of that they felt weird labeling it YA.

But what the hell do I know?

If you want turn your brain off fun and like supernatural Victorian hooey? Go for it!

If you don’t like those things? Be a butthead like me and hate read things for a masochistic thrill.

Did you know there’s a sequel? THIS BAD BOY IS A SERIES AND YOU’RE GOING TO HAVE TO SUFFER THROUGH SCROLLING PAST MY RIFFS ON THE SEQUEL TOO SOON BUCKO! WOOHOO!

[asphaltapostle]

What I have long predicted is now coming to pass: Google believes it should assume control.

Out of all the technology companies that have made my knees knock and my voice hoarse and my [Tweets manic](https://twitter.com/search?f=tweets&q="google" %40ficklecrux&src=typd) as a technoheretic in the past several years, Jumbo Google would easily take home the winning trophy for Dystopian of the Millennium. I have been rehearsing an especially dear pet prophecy of mine, unsolicited, to family, friends, and podcast guests since 2011 in which I end up arguing quite convincingly that Google is a dead ringer for the 16th-century Vatican: an inherently self-isolating organization with an absolute monopoly yielding gargantuan levels of essentially passive income from a service which nearly everybody transacts with, but only Google understands (and is therefore assumed to be its only possible provider,) which inevitably develops such a distance from the rest of the populace and their way of life (in tandem with total notoriety and celebrity among them all) not intentionally out of malice, but from the delusion of mythically-bestowed philanthropic duty that is borned of and compounded by this economic and cultural isolation in a perpetual accumulation of power and wealth that radicalizes the monopolizers — the majority already highly predisposed to zeal as they would’ve needed to be in order to find themselves in this singular, universally powerful position over every other class — and leaves their egocentric minds to wander exempt from all criticism save for that of fellow radicalized monopolizers, who together begin to feel more and more comfortable wondering aloud about themselves in increasingly fantastic presumptions: what if all of this was bestowed upon us because we are superior to them? What if it is our divine responsibility as superior beings to take charge and shepherd the common people as our sheep — for they cannot possibly know as well as we what is truly best for them?

You see it, right? And you can feel a very specific flavor of terror that is both awed by the scale of the circumstances created by so few human minds and sincerely amused by the absoluteness of your own inability to alter them in any way. Perhaps you even recognize this taste as one perfected by Christianity’s ancient advertising business, but Google knows so much about you that it’s rumored to’ve been selling user data to the Judeochristian God for some time now at a 10% discount, and so we extrapolate and anticipate, yes?

Of course, it’s admittedly satisfying for me to deliver you to this godfearing place in the most perverse look what I saw first that you didn’t see because you’re just not as bright but lucky for you, I’m so fucking generous with my wisdom sort of thinking around which the entire personas and livelihoods of fringe movement fanatics are built upon, but this is my one thing, okay? I’ve been waiting years for the right time to formally argue this theory in depth, and — thanks to this year’s public spotlight finally pivoting on the giants who’ve been silently swallowing their competition and relentlessly forcing their already ridiculous margins higher and higher in relative obscurity for decades, the time has come, indeed. The common people’s trust in Google had a godawful week.

Don’t Be Evil

On Monday, Gizmodo reported that twelve frustrated Google employees were quitting the company in protest of their work assisting the Department of Defense to “implement machine learning to classify images gathered by drones” for the detail fleeting Project Maven, despite some 4000 employee signatures on a letter addressed to CEO Sundar Pichai requesting (in full) that he “cancel this project immediately,” and “draft, publicize, and enforce a clear policy stating that neither Google nor its contractors will ever build warfare technology,” citing the infamous “Don’t Be Evil” motto, which Google then proceeded to remove from its code of conduct for the first time in 18 years the day after the New York Times article went to press, on April 5th.

On initial approach to the abstract of this story, from the ass to our thoughts arrives an easy narrative of a Silicon Valley mutiny comprised of twelve brave, conscientious souls who’ve been eaten up inside by their complicity in the filthy deals made by their power-obsessed CEO over scotch and cigars in a dark D.C. study — kept awake for months by the sound of his puffing cackles at satellite images of dead toddlers in a bombed-out street.

Ah ha, we say. That man is no good, and he just wouldn’t listen! They knew they didn’t have a choice… They only did what they had to do…

The reality of internal disagreements at Google, though, manages to be even more theatrical. The sheer volume of correspondence must surely be beyond anything capable of the enduser’s imagination, so let’s phone a friend: my favorite peek into the day-to-days of inter-Google existence is an old blog post by Benjamin Tilly on his first month at the company in which he was compelled almost immediately to describe in great detail how best to “deal with a lot of email in gmail” at peak efficiency using shortcuts and labels. “As you get email, you need to be aggressive about deciding what you need to see, versus what is context specific.”

Now we have a bit better idea of the aggressive emailing that was a sure constant on a normal workday at Google in 2010, so it must’ve been deafening after 8 years of Gmail development as 4000 employees no doubt vented, debated, and decided to organize last month, though without making much headway because the leadership’s response was apparently “complicated by the fact that Google claims it is only providing open-source software to Project Maven,” this new knowledge having significant effect on our mind’s image of Sundar Pichai’s activities in Washington: he is now swapping seats with a frustrated Colin Powell in order to install OpenOffice onto his desktop from a flash drive, and we recall that Google’s Googleplex headquarters resembles nowhere in modern life more than a brand new playground built in a design language borrowing heavily from Spy Kids. And though these Twelve disciples are unnamed for the moment, a few of them could immediately land book deals by going public, and every single one would always have by default not only the badge of “I landed a job at Google,” (which is really to say I have hit Life’s maximum level cap,) but “I worked at Google for a while, but ended up quitting to do something else,” which is guaranteed to make you the most interesting, intellectually superior person present in whatever crowd for the rest of your life. The ultra-cool Sarah Cooper quit Google to become a comedian and even got to talk to Kara Swisher! I won’t pretend to understand big tech’s diminutive bastardization of prestige, but “more than 90 academics” jumping to publish an open letter (adjacent to a huge DONATE: Support the Campaign to Stop Killer Robots button) in which they “write in solidarity with the 3100+ Google employees” who’s terrible boss decided to help some lackeys in the Pentagon set up their email and didn’t text back for a whole hour doesn’t sound 100% sincere. Notably, I don’t know how or why the fuck 90 people would go about collaborating on a single document, but if it really was managed, they definitely used Google Docs… At one point, it was fun to think about the history of the friendly side-scroller-playing garage ghouls and dorm dorks who gave cooky, wacko names to their dot com startups in parody and defiance of the lame-ass surname anagrams on the buildings of their established competitors, but those who’ve stuck around have only done so by becoming expert at SUCKING UP EVERYTHING around them, and it pisses me off every day how worried I am that my species will finally be done in by a company with a name like Yahoo! and be known only to a bunch of adolescent interdimensional silicon blobs 30 million years in the future as that bipedal race who remained dignified until the last 0.01% of their reign on Earth, when in way less than a single generation, they all just went FUCKING INSANE and blew themselves up because they suddenly hated all sense.

“Google” is perhaps the worst of these to have to shout in fear and/or anger in your last moments as it sounds in American English like you’ve startled your subject with a ticklish pinch followed so immediately by an esophagus-busting chokehold that the two events appear simultaneous, and in real English English, it almost always sounds like a parent speaking of a character on a pre-K children’s television programme whom they find quite foul and upsetting, but will manage to refrain from expressing so otherwise because they know that Teletubbies shit is the most quickly forgotten stage of television viewership. It’s fascinating how exclusive the word “Google” is to American English because in everything else it really is complete nonsense, but lets halt all etymological discussions right now because we’ve only now just finished with Monday.

The Soul Ledger

On Thursday, all of my Google experiences, suppositions, and soul-detaching screenshots were usurped when a thoroughly alarming internal company video called The Selfish Ledger was leaked to The Verge, which I watched once then and do not want to watch again for the sake of this piece, but I will. Though the big V has been disappointingly timid for years about editorializing — when tech journalism desperately needs some confident, informed opinion more than ever — Vlad Savov’s accompanying article should be read in its entirety, to which I can add my own terror where he perhaps could not. The production style is technically identical to that of the very popular thinkpiece-esque, motion-graphics-paired-with-obligatory-sharpie illustrated videos which you find playing at max volume on your mom’s iPad from where she’s fallen asleep on the couch at 9PM, but the repeating stock string soundtrack multiplies one’s discomfort as such that we would all end up in the fetal position without remembering the transition were it not for the appearance of trusty old Dank Jenkins, who’s face I thankfully associate heavily enough with his infamous down-and-out Tweet to be a welcome respite in attention before the very scary hypothesis for which it’s been buttering me up, as best summed by Vlad:

> The system would be able to “plug gaps in its knowledge and refine its model of human behavior” — not just your particular behavior or mine, but that of the entire human species. “By thinking of user data as multigenerational,” explains Foster, “it becomes possible for emerging users to benefit from the preceding generation’s behaviors and decisions.” Foster imagines mining the database of human behavior for patterns, “sequencing” it like the human genome, and making “increasingly accurate predictions about decisions and future behaviors.”

The next time the what if they do something scary question comes up in a casual conversation about Google, you’ll have something a lot more substantial than just speculation. Or will you? The Verge reached out for comment and got an awfully convenient response.

> This is a thought-experiment by the Design team from years ago that uses a technique known as ‘speculative design’ to explore uncomfortable ideas and concepts in order to provoke discussion and debate.

Wow! Leave it up to grand ole Googe to reveal the ultimate excuse for just about any suggestion or behavior, though it does seem almost deliberately uncomfortable, doesn’t it? No matter — whether or not this video was ever about a project or tangible product development, or simply to explore uncomfortable ideas because it is proof that the company has reached that critical Vatican stage — if you’ll remember — where they now feel comfortable exploring Very Bad, but Very easily made Real Ideas amongst themselves about what would happen if they allowed their system to nudge its users around a different, slightly less optimal route to the bar, let’s say — without their knowledge — in order for the system to collect traffic data for the sake of its own interests? Which would be, technically, in the interest of all Ledger users now and in the future, so why not?

> The ledger could be given a focus, shifting it from a system which not only tracks our behavior, but offers direction towards a desired result.”

This, my dear privacy-obsessed friends, is the real issue with data collection — its power over huge groups by way of their behavior and it is never going to be remedied in any significant way by ad-blockers or VPNs because the EndUser shall always out number you 50 to 1, even decades from now. EndUser does not understand — or, crucially, have any desire to understand anything technical about what leads to the PewDiePie videos playing on his filthy screen. Here’s a great opportunity to escape Silicon Valley’s technolibertarianism and resign your Darwinian empathy in favor of meaningful and truly-effective action: if you want to avoid a future Google Church (or Google Government, more worryingly,) you should invest your time, effort, and knowledge into electing officials more capable of understanding and regulating Big Tech.

Google Government

The internet as it stands is made possible by Google as the goto resource for online advertising. In 2016, “Google held 75.8 percent of the search ad market, bringing in $24.6 billion in revenue from search ads,” according to Recode. By 2019, “that’s expected to grow to $36.62 billion in revenue, or 80.2 percent of the market.” Google’s edge in user behavior and targeted advertising combined with their extensive resources available developers to integrate independent platforms with Google’s software services at various levels makes it very difficult for any advertising-funded individual or organization to compete online without dipping in to the Google universe. YouTube — a Google property since 2006 — has actively invested in and supported a new career path entirely within their own platform that is rapidly becoming popularly aspired-to by young children, while the reality of existence as a full-time YouTuber is far less glamorous than the immediately-visible surface would indicate, and the effort already expended by my generation in its pursuit has already made us insane.

So, what would the internet look like if Google didn’t exist? We know they’ve been working with the government now on various projects, but what if some terrible exposed transgression of theirs suddenly warranted an immediate shutdown and seizure of all Google properties? Well, we know from a post on Quora by Googler Ashish Kedia that even 5 years ago, the sudden absence of Google for “2–3 mins” set the internet into a bit of a panic, reducing overall traffic by 40%. In the time since, we’ve all grown exponentially more dependent on Google properties: billions of people rely on Google Maps for directions and, thousands of companies (including the Pentagon and other government institutions) rely on Gmail and GSuites for intercommunication, file sharing, task management, etc., and more and more academic institutions rely on Chromebook devices running connection-dependent operating systems. It’s not much of a stretch to argue that Google’s sudden disappearance would constitute a Civil Emergency in the United States, which will only become a stronger and more serious incentive for regulatory bodies to look the other way.

Though the tangible results of advertising have been quantified significantly in the past 20 years, one can’t help but wonder after watching YouTube ads for the new Mercedes-Benz S-Class on toy unboxing videos if the companies who spend big bucks on Google advertising understand where their money is going, but they know that if they don’t advertise there, their competitors will. This, of course, is a fundamental practice of a monopoly, and it’s yielded Google so much fucking money that they cannot possibly spend it fast enough, as evidenced by their investments in life extension — so that, perhaps, they will have more time on Earth to figure it out.

When you build a collection of the world’s smartest people in a self-sufficient environment that discourages exploration of other lifestyles and ideas, and you sustain the society with a gargantuan, relatively low-maintenance revenue stream, you create a culture which is not only well-primed for isolationism, but is also extremely inefficient. In fact, with its vast collection of abandoned products and properties, Google must surely be one of the most inefficient companies in history. Thinking back on recent software releases along with its recent entries into the hardware space, Google is also one of the worst competing tech companies. Very little aside from Gmail, Google Photos, Google Maps, and Chrome have found their place or garnered significant usership. Google Play Music is unintuitive and impossible, Google Allo and Google+ are all but forgotten addendums to other services, and Google Search — its core, original function — has been out of control for years, and all of them are designed blandly and excruciatingly tiring to look at.

Google Shun

If this all has stirred nothing more in you than a desire to eliminate Google from your own online life as much as possible, there are alternatives in almost every one of the sphere’s they dominate. As of late, DuckDuckGo has accumulated a fair amount of buzz and coverage as a private, more relevant alternative to Google’s plain old search engine. Though it is clever enough to list us as the first result for “extratone,” I’ve found it simply insufficient as a replacement in my own life because, essentially, it rarely delivers what I’m looking for. By contrast, Dropbox Paper is such an elegant cloud notetaking and word processing software that it makes Google Docs look simply idiotic (and warrants its own review very shortly.) For getting around, know that MapQuest is not only still around — it’s now a very competitive mobile navigation app.

I, myself, have allowed Google as complete of access to my information and behavior as possible because I believe “privacy” is a completely futile endeavor if one wishes to be a part of society, though I do often use alternatives to Google services simply because I fucking hate the way they look. If you want a more complete list of services and software that allow one to shun the Google God entirely, you’ll be forced to seek out less dignified sources like Lifehacker and Reddit and decide if the additional time you’ll spend using most of them to accomplish the same tasks is really worth your digital angst.

If Google were to be more explicit with its users and staff about its aspirations to take over control of our lives, there will be little to do but accept the future they intend to create because they’ve long been too powerful to control. In the meantime, I’d suggest you continue to use whatever software works best for you and refrain from wasting your time fretting on conspiratorial suppositions of what the tech industry may be doing to “invade your privacy,” because there is no longer any such thing, nor will there be ever again. However, I would also urge to you worship your own Gods, whomever they may be, for Google will never be worthy. I, for one, shall only pray to our Mother Sun.

#social #google #future #web #privacy

original post

[apandastory]

Michelle Yeoh Says ‘Crazy Rich Asians’ Shares a Proud Heritage

Yes, here I am. I have watched the movie and to be frank, I LOVED IT!! I know the story isn’t great but how many great stories are there? It’s the way of telling the story that matters. Crazy Rich Asians (CRA) is a huge step taken to actually show the world how does the Asian culture look like, the Chinese mindset of family, the South East Asian family setting. This is something to be appreciated not to be shunted aside because the story of a rich boy in love with a poor girl is lame. 

The reason I am writing this is that when I saw the movie, I was really excited and proud that it’s a Hollywood film made out of an all Asian cast. It has been 25 years since the Joy Luck Club, which I actually never heard of until I started to gain interest and started following interviews of actors from the Asian descent working in showbiz, I will do more research on it later, I promise. I was very happy and excited that the story was not only about Asians but specifically the South East Asians.. Which is ME!! I’m not crazy rich, nor rich maybe a little crazy but people out there will be seeing the colours of MY life, people who have zero knowledge about how I grew up and what I was taught, this is something that I could show. You watched CRA? Well, that’s somewhat my life minus the “rich” part. We were taught that family is very important and whatever that comes along the way, the family will still be the first priority. I have friends and family around me thinking that this is just some lame rom-com that is not worth their time. You can’t imagine how angry I was when someone told me that they would rather spend their money on a movie that is more “worthy”. Like, how is this not worthy?? It’s an American Production with an all Asian cast AND!!!! There are TWO, not ONE but TWO Malaysians in the main casts. As an Asian, A Chinese Asian, A Malaysian Chinese.. How could you not support something like this?? Especially within this period that we are feeling exceptionally more patriotic and with the new Malaysian coming along. I would say, there are a lot who are still not open-minded enough to accept the term “NEW”. 

I admit that the storyline is not great. We Asians are immune to this kind of love stories where a rich boy loves a poor girl, rich boy’s mother don’t like the poor girl, finds ways to kick the poor girl away and in the end, Love conquers all and everybody lived happily ever after. Right, that’s the story (Spoilers alerts, sorry too late) but anyway, I believe 90% of the people already knew how the ending would be, of course it’s gonna be a happy ending, it’a a rom-com. But have you noticed the details along the way?? More Spoilers! 

When Nick brought Rachel back home, he decided to introduce her during his grandma’s Tan Hwa blooming party, all his relatives will be there. See that? We love celebrations and gatherings, a small event to get the family together is part of our culture, even something as small as a flower blooming (although it’s a rare occasion) is still the excuse to bring everybody together, to meet new people joining the family (Rachel).

When Nick met his mom and his grandma after spending a long time abroad, the words that greeted him was “you need a haircut”, “you look unkempt”, “you look so thin”, “you need to eat more”… Which are exactly what most of us get when our family sees us after a while. Of course, I always love to hear people telling me that I have lost weight even when I did not.

The Dumpling making session was also great, reminds me of the time my family will get together to make Tang Yuan as we chit chat and catch up along the process. The little “theories” that were made to make the steps easier to remember, like Nick’s tucking the baby into bed or Oli’s “injecting botox into the face” were the cute details of what kept them together.

Nick’s room being exactly the way it is before he left is a symbol of how family will always welcome you back home regardless how you have changed or where you have been. His bed was always freshly made and his clothes were ironed every 2 weeks. It’s like no matter where you go, no matter how you have settled, there’s still a place you can call home where you can go back to anytime.

Peik Lin’s family being very tight together. Her parents are delighted to meet her friend Rachel and how they compared Rachel’s achievements with their own daughter and their own daughter will never be good enough but they are still very proud of her. When Peik Lin was doing Rachel’s makeover for Colin’s wedding, her parents kept barging in to provide opinions and join the fun. It’s a really cute scene to watch. And, the part where they are trying to tell their son that Rachel makes a good wife candidate. I don’t know about you, but it feels so warm and fuzzy.

Then, there’s Astrid. How she was taught to maintain her image as a well-educated woman. She will not cause a scene even after finding out that her husband is cheating on her. She will still present herself elegantly without showing the slight signs of distress. Which is like how the Chinese will say “we shall never show the ugly side of family 家丑不可外扬”. And her grandma stood by her and went to the wedding together because her husband walked out of her. Despite being someone who doesn’t attend events, her grandma showed her love by standing by her side in public as her support and a cover for the scandal.

And of course, the mahjong game which has so much details within that few minutes, there’s an article about it so I won’t go through it in detailed. Click it to read. The part where Eleanor (side track, why does rich mother in laws always has to be called Eleanor??) does not approve Rachel as Nick’s future wife because of her background and Rachel trying to reason why she’s the perfect wife for Nick but she will not stand between his family. Typical but deep.

There are still so many things that I would want to write about but I might end up telling the whole story. But, my point is, you should be appreciating the movie not because it’s storyline or whether or not it has a bombastic plot but to see the subtle details that portray some part of your life, something that you could relate to is now on the big screens showing to the people all over the world. We Asians find it hard to understand how important this is because, we see it on our big screens every day. We could relate to those so why should we make a big fuss of CRA? Well, because it is reaching a wider vast of audience. It’s like how we watch American movies and see how their lives and culture are different from ours, this time it’s the other way round. 

So, why are people still saying it’s a waste of time and money?? 

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

6th Nov >> Fr. Martin's Gospel Reflection on Luke 6:17-23 for the Feast of All Saints of Ireland and Luke 14:12-14 for Monday, Thirty First Week in Ordinary Time.

Feast of All Saints of Ireland

Gospel (Ireland)

Luke 6:17-23

Jesus came down with the Twelve and stopped at a piece of level ground where there was a large gathering of his disciples with a great crowd of people from all parts of Judaea and from Jerusalem and from the coastal region of Tyre and Sidon who had come to hear him and to be cured of their diseases. People tormented by unclean spirits were also cured, and everyone in the crowd was trying to touch him because power came out of him that cured them all.

   Then fixing his eyes on his disciples he said:

‘How happy are you who are poor: yours is the kingdom of God.

Happy you who are hungry now: you shall be satisfied.

Happy you who weep now: you shall laugh.

Happy are you when people hate you, drive you out, abuse you, denounce your name as criminal, on account of the Son of Man. Rejoice when that day comes and dance for joy, for then your reward will be great in heaven. This was the way their ancestors treated the prophets.

Reflections (2) 

(i) Feast of All the Saints of Ireland

Just under a week ago we celebrated the feast of all saints. Today, we celebrate the feast of all the saints of Ireland. We know the names of some of those saints, like Patrick, Brigid, Columcille, Ita, and many others. It is striking how many of the stained-glass windows in our church depict Irish saints. However, today we also remember those saintly men and women of our land of whom we have little or no record. In the words of today’s first reading, ‘some of them left a name behind them, so that their praises are still sung. While others have left no memory, and disappeared as though they had not existed, they are now as though they had never been’. Yet, the impact for good of this second group, those who have left no memory, could have been just as powerful as the impact for good of the well-known Irish saints. The saints are those whose lives are transparent before God; the light of God’s love shines through them. They are always a power for good, whether or not they leave a memory. When a child in school was asked, ‘Who are the saints?’, she thought of the stained-glass windows in her parish church and said ‘the saints are those who let the light in’. Before we can allow the light of the Lord to shine through us, we first have to be aware of our need of his light. In today’s gospel reading, Luke tells us that people were drawn to Jesus from near and far, Jerusalem, Tyre and Sidon. They came out of a sense of their need of God’s life-giving and healing light. They were poor, hungry, distressed, needy, and they knew it, and Jesus says to them, ‘Happy are you..’ He declared happy this mass of broken humanity, because they knew their need of what Jesus could offer them. The first step on the road to sanctity is that awareness of our need of the Lord for what only the Lord can give us. As we come before the Lord in our poverty, we open ourselves to his coming. We make it possible for him to work in and through us. It is our awareness of our need of the Lord which makes us transparent before the light of his love, enabling that light to shine through us into our often dark world.

And/Or

(ii) Feast of All the Saints of Ireland

Today we celebrate the feast of all the saints of Ireland. We remember all those men and women from the time of Saint Patrick who witnessed to the gospel in our land by the way they lived. We thank God for the ways that they kept the flame of faith burning, very often through difficult and dangerous times. They enjoyed a living relationship with the Lord, and that relationship shaped all that they said and did. The first reading this morning speaks of so many witnesses in a great cloud on every side of us. They were innumerable people who lived saintly lives in every generation. Some of them have been canonized, some are on the way to be canonized; others will never be officially canonized. They are an encouragement to us all to keep running steadily in the race we have started, in the words of that first reading. The witness of the saints inspires us and encourages us to be faithful to the Lord, to keep walking in his way. We look to them for the courage we need to keep the faith and to share the faith. We look to them, because we know that in looking to them we are looking to the Lord who revealed himself through them in a special way. We all need each other’s witness. Our own efforts to reach sanctity, to be loving like Jesus, is an encouragement to everyone else As Paul says in one of his letters, the live and death of everyone has its influence on others. We can forget just how much our own struggle to be faithful to the gospel impacts on others for good. To the extent that any one of us grows in holiness, we make it easier for others to do the same. Today’s feast invites us all to be part of that great crowd of witnesses who enable others to keep running steadily in the race they have started.

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Monday, Thirty First Week in Ordinary Time

Gospel (Europe, Africa, New Zealand, Australia & Canada)

Luke 14:12-14

Jesus said to his host, one of the leading Pharisees, ‘When you give a lunch or a dinner, do not ask your friends, brothers, relations or rich neighbours, for fear they repay your courtesy by inviting you in return. No; when you have a party, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind; that they cannot pay you back means that you are fortunate, because repayment will be made to you when the virtuous rise again.’

Gospel (USA)

Luke 14:12-14

Do not invite your friends, but those who are poor and crippled.

On a sabbath Jesus went to dine at the home of one of the leading Pharisees. He said to the host who invited him, “When you hold a lunch or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or sisters or your relatives or your wealthy neighbors, in case they may invite you back and you have repayment. Rather, when you hold a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind; blessed indeed will you be because of their inability to repay you. For you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”

Reflections (4)

(i) Monday, Thirty First Week in Ordinary Time

Jesus lived in a culture where those who had the means to do some good expected to get something in return for the good that they did. If they paid for something to be built, they would expect to be honoured in some way. Similarly, if they invited someone to a meal, they would expect to be invited to a meal in return. This was the culture of giving in order to get. Jesus cuts across that culture in today’s gospel reading, and elsewhere in the gospels. He calls on his wealthy host to invite to his table people who have no means of returning his generosity. Jesus calls for a selfless form of generosity in place of a self-serving form of generosity. Jesus himself shows us what it means to give without expecting or getting any return. Jesus gave everything, his very life, and he received nothing in return from those for whom he gave his life. He did receive something very precious from God; God raised him to new life. Jesus promises us that if we give to others without looking for a return from others, God will give us a return which far exceeds what we gave. In the words of the gospel reading, ‘repayment will be made to you when the virtuous rise again’.

And/Or

(ii) Monday, Thirty First Week in Ordinary Time

In the world of finance a working principle is that whenever you invest you should invest in a way that guarantees a good return. Unfortunately during the boom years many people invested only to discover that over time their investment lost value. We can sometimes take that working principle from the financial world into other areas of our lives. We invest in people only if we are sure of getting some tangible return on our investment. It is that more general principle that Jesus criticizes in today’s gospel reading. He tells his wealthy host not to invite to his table the kind of people who have the means to repay his compliment. Rather he should invite to his table those who cannot repay his hospitality. Jesus is calling on us to give without looking for something back in return. We are not to look for a tangible return on our investment in others. Jesus seems to be saying that giving is its own reward, or rather that God will reward us in God’s own time for the hospitality we extend to others. In the words of the gospel reading, ‘repayment will be made to you when the virtuous rise again’. Paul is in harmony with that teaching of Jesus when he says in one of his letters, ‘God loves a cheerful giver, and God is able to provide you with every blessing in abundance’.

And/Or

(iii) Monday, Thirty First Week in Ordinary Time

In this morning’s gospel reading Jesus addresses himself to a wealthy Pharisee who was his host at a meal. The Pharisees tended to eat only with their own kind. Jesus challenges his host to invite to his table those he would not normally invite, people beyond his circle. Jesus, in contrast to his host, shared table with all sorts of people, with the rich and the poor, with the educated and uneducated, with the religious and those considered sinners, with men and with women. His very broad table was a symbol of his whole ministry. He did not exclude anyone from his outreach. He wanted to reveal the year of the Lord’s favour to everyone, especially to those who would have considered themselves outside of God’s favour. By his whole way of life, including his style of eating, Jesus was revealing the broad hospitality of God. In contrast, the God whom the Pharisees revealed was a God who wanted to exclude more than include. The gospel reading calls on all of us to reveal something of the hospitality of God by our whole way of life. We can all be tempted to exclude others, even whole groups of people. It is very easy to move purely within a circle of people whose outlook, attitudes and social class are like our own. The gospel reading this morning invites us to keep widening our circle so that it reveals more and more of the expansive heart of God revealed for us in the life of Jesus.

And/Or

(iv) Monday, Thirty First Week in Ordinary Time

The opening words of Jesus in today’s gospel reading can seem a little strange to us, ‘When you give a lunch or a dinner, do not invite your friends’. We know from the gospels that Jesus’ friends invited him to their table and he accepted their invitation. He shared the table of his friends Mary, Martha and Lazarus. The last meal Jesus ate before he died, the last supper, was shared with his friends, those who had been closest to him during his ministry. Jesus certainly recognized the value of a meal among friends. However, in today’s gospel reading, as a guest of a leading Pharisee with other Pharisees present at table, Jesus wanted to highlight another value. Jesus noticed that his host and fellow guests had the habit of inviting to their table only those who could give them something in return, such as their friends, family and rich neighbours. He calls on them to invite into their lives those who appear to have nothing to give in return. He is highlighting the value of a truly selfless form of giving. Some forms of giving can be ultimately self-serving. We can give with a view to getting. Not all giving is an expression of authentic love. Saint Paul in his first letter to the Corinthians declares that we can give away all our possessions and still not have love. Genuine love never asks the question, ‘What is in it for me?’ This is the love that Jesus revealed in his life and, above all, in his death; it is the love of God. In his letter to the Romans, Paul says that this is the kind of love that God wishes to pour into our hearts through the Holy Spirit.

Fr. Martin Hogan, Saint John the Baptist Parish, Clontarf, Dublin, D03 AO62, Ireland.

Email: sjtbclontarf@eircom.net or  frmartinhogan@gmail.com

Parish Website: www.stjohnsclontarf.ie  Please join us via our webcam.

Twitter: @SJtBClontarfRC.

Facebook: St John the Baptist RC Parish, Clontarf.

Tumblr: Saint John the Baptist Parish, Clontarf, Dublin.

[idk-my-aesthetic]

@dead-man-still-walking

This comment is so incredibly insulting and disrespectful.

1) jews are allowed to be mad about our forced assimilation into cristian culture. Everything in the world centers around christinanity, and we don’t hate all Christians for it, we just hate the society that perpetuates it. Like my dude, it’s more than just being annoyed by Christmas songs and movies. It’s the weird looks we get from people if we say we celebrate something else or if we won’t eat something to keep kosher. It’s the way that people shame us for celebrating our holidays, saying that we should come into work/school anyway. It’s the way people literally try to foribly convert us the second they find out we’re not Christian. It’s also the root of violent antisemetic hate crimes, but I’m not gonna list any of those here.

Also side note, if Jews were dunking on Christianity, why would u care lol??? U literally said ur atheist and hate all religions equally but u sure seem to have more against Judaism than Christianity 🤔. Also?? We’re allowed to?? Hate???? Our????? Oppressors?????? Minorities don’t need to worship their oppressiors to recive basic human respect, like the allowance to take time off work without every single person you tell saying something about it.

2) saying that Christmas is amazing and our holidays are so unfun does what for you exactly lmao??? That’s the whole freakin point of the post, that our holidays are incomparable to Christmas and that ppl should stop comparing them, and your response is “sounds lame lol”. The point of Rosh Hashana and Yom Kipper is to think about the mistakes we’ve made and how we can grow and become better people from them, and to forgive ourselves and each other for them. It doesn’t even have to be unfun, literaly half the point of Judaism is to interpret the religion in your own way. We don’t learn our texts like you do. Christians straight up are taught it like “this is what it says, this is what it means.” And the way we’re taught it is “this is what it says, what do you think it means?” That’s why we have such huge distinct groups of ppl with different traditions and interpretations.

3) “we know they’re different we just see the very real harm they cause for no reason”. That’s so infuriating. Ur ignorance is actually making me so angry. You cannot put minority religions that have been oppressed and murdered for centuries by Christians on the supposed same level as them, who btw have caused literal genocides in both the terms of death and culture to spread Christianity, just because we have holidays that include optional fasting. Basically less than optional, since your literally not allowed to fast if you are a child or have medical problems. I’m literally so mad at this comment I cannot function. There is absolutely nothing wrong with being Christian, but you have to have some knowledge of the hurt Christianity has caused. Literally so much of the worldwide homophobia/racism/ableism that exists today is the product of white imperialism justified by the idea they were bringing “civilization” (in the form of forible conversion to Christianity) to the places they took over.

4) not everyone celebrates it bc they believe in g-d lmao. I’m literally an atheist Jew. Or agonistic ig, I don’t really believe in g-d but if someone got me some real evidence I would. And I celebrate all these holidays, bc it’s my culture, my history. The Jewish people are an ethno-religious tribe, and because of that being Jewish is much more than just our religion. It is quite literally our ethnicity for one thing lol. And it’s tradition that has been passed down by our people, tradition that still persists even though people have tried to destroy us again and again.

Look, I’m sorry this got so rant-y and angry, both to you and op bc I’m sure they don’t want this mess in their notes. I started writing this reply just with the intention to educate you in a nuetral way of why your statements were incredibly rude and inappropriate, but I obviously got way to emotional. But idk dude I’m just really really frustrated with you and other atheists like you. You blame the fact that you’re rude on the fact that you don’t believe in g-d, while neither thing has anything to with one another. I know plenty of atheists, most of them ex-christian, and none of them say this offensive and rude garbage. It’s a choice man, and I sincerely hope you find it in yourself to get over whatever kind of internalized hatered you have that makes you say such things. Just like scroll past the post instead of commenting and being mean. Ignore it when ppl talk about religion. If they say something that makes u angry even if it’s true, just take a breath and move on. Like I don’t know if making these kinds of comments makes you feel smart? Bc you say stuff like “think about it it makes no sense!!” But like it doesn’t. It just makes you look like a prejudiced dick. Bc honestly? Ex-Christians like you 10000% use ur supposed hatred of “all” religions to mock and shame minority religions such as Judaism and Islam. And idk if ur doing it on purpose or not, and idrc but it’s definitely something your brand of atheist does. And it shows badly on all atheists, bc not all atheists are assholes like you. Re-packaging popular bigotry like antisemitism and islamaphobia in your supposed hatred for all religions does not make you smarter or more woke than others. It makes you actually a lot stupider and more of a dick :)

Aaaaannnnd I got mad again. Sorry. Again to you and op. I’m making a lot of assumptions ig, but all those statements do legitimately apply to the group you are a part of even if they don’t apply to you specifically. I’m gonna stop before someone tells me to shut the f up (which would be completely valid atp) but I wanna say one last thing. Even if my delivery of the message was probably really rude and angry, I honestly hope you at least consider what I’m saying and take another look at your actions. You may not have meant it to be, but the things you said are ignorant and antisemetic. I’m not saying you’re a bad person for that, we all live in an inherently bigoted society and are all inherently bigoted because of that. Which means we all need to monitor our behavior and change it when we recognize we’re doing something wrong. We all can grow and be better, ya know? Like literally all of us, me too lol. Anyway have a nice day/night, I’m gonna shut the hell up

Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur are not the same as Christmas. They aren’t holidays in the vacation sense; we’re at synagogue and we’re praying. We’re focusing on our deeds of the past year and how we can make teshuvah and return to ourselves. We’re fasting for twenty-five hours (not eating or drinking anything). We’re not sitting around the living room, singing carols, and drinking hot cocoa while staring at a dead tree. Forcing Jews (and other non-Christians) to believe that our observances, practices, and holidays are the same or comparable to Christian holidays is forced assimilation. 

Don’t tell me that you’d take off, work through, or skip celebrating Christmas so, therefore, I should have no problem taking off, working through, or skipping my “two-week holiday" celebration. And if I refuse to take off, work through, or skip Rosh Hashana and/or Yom Kippur, don’t accuse me of being a selfish Jew. Stop forcing Jews to fit in a box that was never built for us in the first place.

Oh, and by the way? If you aren’t a synagogue attending Jew, you have the right to your secular observance too without being interrogated by a “well-meaning” Christian. 

.לְשָׁנָה טוֹבָה תִכָּתֵבוּ וְתֵּחָתֵמוּ

[weloseeveryweek]

What Makes Me Happy

What makes me happy? A simple question that may generate different answers from different unique individuals. To some, it is being rich and famous. Others could be being with their loved ones, travelling or meeting their favourite celebrity. For me, it could be the simplest thing such as spending time with the dog or having a delicious meal. But this prompt is football related and to be honest, it is quite hard to pin point one thing or moment, in particular as there are many moments and people that touched my heart throughout the years. 

A typical football fan will tell you a particular game that got their team the trophy, or that crucial goal from a particular player makes them happy. Yes, those things make me jumping for joy but there is something else that makes football a better game for me. It is not a player, not a manager, in fact, it is not even someone from the football industry. It is actually just a football fan who lives the other side of the world, six hours apart from me to be exact. She came from a different culture, background, heck even the food and music that we love are truly different. And yet, a beautiful game called football brings me and Ms A together.

I have always envy about other people finding their best friend through the internet. I never thought that one day I could have mine. And I never thought it could last for three years. It started with an ironic encounter of a fan fiction that Ms A wrote on the internet that I clicked on with the mentality of entertaining myself with a bad fan fiction. However, Ms A proved me wrong with every chapter, drawing me in with her exciting plot twists and fascinating characters. I ended up reading the whole story of 36k words within 48 hours, which is something that I have never done before. Dang, how did she do it? And then I start to converse with Ms A through commenting on her stories. She then starts to read some of my stories as well and conversations start to flow. Although I have always found her too cool to be my friend but I still asked her to be my friend anyway. She casually accepts me and we exchange emails to further our conversation. Within a short span, we became tight friends through the similar philosophy in life and the same passion for Germany National Team. After a few emails, I found out that she also loves a certain black and yellow team which stamps my love for the team. Despite not ever meet each other before, we trust each other and share our darkest secret through an electronic screen. We sometimes would text at odd hours and giggle at the phone screen while updating each other with the latest gossips, gushing over our own favourite players and teasing each other’s bad taste in men. Sometimes I send her some lame stuff virtually and physically on special occasions that she never asked for, and it bewilders her every single time. I sometimes wonder how she tolerates with my child-like antics. We also enjoy creating a list of football players as Pokemon and some inside jokes that may be too offensive to share around. I hope no one sees my face while I am texting to Ms A. If they do they might think that I am texting to a boy. Haha.

Above all, I feel so lucky to have a great companion to share the joy and suffering for my favourite team as none of my family members watch Bundesliga. In fact, I could not even name anyone that I know in real life that watches the league. But live texting with Ms A during games and virtually screaming to our phones when Aubameyang misses a goal is almost like watching a game with a friend in the same room. The support system we have makes the games extra fun and special. Having someone to listen my endless rambling of victory chants after every win is enjoyable as I know I am not alone in this. It is even more crucial during the bad days as we could comfort each other with virtual hugs to ease the pain of losing or the pain of Reus getting injured again. And having that someone to share the same liberal view of controversial transfers of Götze and Hummels and not to mention the drama of Tuchel gate are oh so relief. 

I hope that one day we could meet each other face to face in the future. I really do. Maybe we could watch a game or two together in the bar for real. Not sure when that will happen. It might be two years, five years or even ten. But one thing is for certain. I will put on a smile to every game as I know that I will never walk alone. Until then, we will continue to cheer on our team together from our respective living rooms with Echte Liebe (true love).