#the book I just read teehee

[cruelsister-moved2]

I think people have confused the fact that it's definitely possible to go "look this magical guy told me these are the rules so now you all have to obey" with believing that religion is intrinsically just that. and it's like they just discount the possibility that anyone has ever earnestly believed in a higher authority or genuinely had a mystical experience or whatever. the thing is if you actually observe how religious people behave, especially if you look outside of like evangelical megachurch pastors who are clearly just grifting, it immediately becomes pretty hard to ignore that.

for every example of religion maintaining inequality u have muslim charities successfully preventing FGM by informing muslim communities who perpetrate it that it's haram, sikhs opposing casteism, early christians fighting gender inequality etc etc etc + on an individual level literally countless people who have fought against poverty and oppression on the basis of religious belief. like... IS it really something specific about religion or is it the fact that hegemony will naturally pick up and spread whatever supports it and suppress whatever doesn't?because the same can also be said of like... music... so are u going to say music is just a tool of the elite or whatever? bc it definitely can be. but it's equally a tool for resisting oppression and also just a significant part of the human experience.

aren't we meant to be postmodernists now like i think maybe things sometimes do just happen sometimes. what Society does with it after the fact is another question, but if you look at the history of religion I'm surprised if you don't come away with some awareness that genuine belief in some sort of authority or mechanism which is outside of human control can be something very transformative. like the fundamental innovation of the torah was to say that every human life is equal to every other human life in opposition to the code of hammurabi which said that some people's life = other people's pocket change. only a power which comes from somewhere outside human society would be able to ensure that law was applied fairly and equally to all rather than manipulated on the whim of the human with the most power to enforce it. if the "abrahamic" religions can be said to have anything in common at all, it's probably a call to humbleness and the value of every human being. much to think about!!!!

[akademiyas]

day 30: birthday!!!

happy birthday to this guy! thank u everyone for tagging along on this aprilluc journey <3 it's been fun

bonus version

[divine-misfortune]

Aether waking Rain up with a cup of tea, Rain all bleary eyed and his curls are just wild - sweet thing only ever communicates in little chirps when he's this out of it and Aether loves every sound - sits beside him and lets Rain lean into his side while he drinks

It's that lovely mint blend Mountain spent forever trying to perfect for the water ghoul's birthday, he drinks it sparingly even though he knows Mountain would replenish the stock in a heartbeat but because there's something special about those dried herbs in that tin. It's the thought behind them that makes them so important to cherish

When he's done, he passes the mug back and leans up to kiss Aether as a thank you but like most mornings (especially the ones where Rain's feeling a little extra sappy for one reason or another) it's never just one kiss, neither of them ever want it to be just one either

There's a reason the two of them are always the last to the breakfast table after spending the night together

[buggoblin]

I feel like I’ve just been divinely blessed with a great gravity falls fanfic idea but I’m not really a writer nor do I have tons of time but I think I’m going to at least write my idea down so I can have fun imagining it

[rukafais]

people saying FR drow lore is 'teehee they're all sexy, sexy drow dominatrixes' and getting all their information from frwiki which actively blends every source together makes me want to lie down and explode. or they get their information from other people, who are usually also getting it from frwiki or primarily from like, random sourcebooks or whatever. and oops i now have the biggest headache on earth

[marblerose-rue]

HII guess who's reading feline wizards (this is rhiow and she's my absolute fave)

[hyperthinks]

my giant ~1400 page leather-bound tome of the collected works of shakespeare gets here todayyyyy ^_^

[the-algebra-thing]

god. god. this book is off the fucking wall. listen to me rn.

book two of the original percy jackson series introduced one of annabeths most integral character traits: hubris, or in broader terms, pride. and while it was perfectly functional to observe how this affected her from outside, we get our first look into her point of view in the mark of athena. this is huge for several reasons; we've already seen percys point of view, the old main character, for 5.3 books. annabeth is the only other main character that carries over in importance to the plot and to us into heroes of olympus. we get to see the internal workings of the mind that has orchestrated at least 50% of the successful gambits pulled off in the entire percy jackson universe so far. the longer the book goes on the more we are drawn in by her skill and ingenuity. literally everyone in the goddamned world looks up to this kid, and we come to understand even better how right they are to do so.

her challenge in the mark of athena is, by design, one she must ultimately pursue alone. it gets hyped up the entire story and we finally get to it when she separates from the last member of the group two thirds of the way through the book. she uses all the tools she's proven herself to be in command of to get all the way to the final obstacle, and then it cuts off terrifyingly and we leave her point of view for several chapters. when we come back, she keeps going and pulls off the greatest trick of her fucking LIFE by exploiting arachne's weakness: pride. then, when she's succeeded and she's home safe—she doesn't know it, but we even know that her friends are coming to pick her up—she pulls the most fucking CLASSIC blunder in mythology EVER. she rubs it in. it almost feels out of character until you remember that youve only been tricked into thinking annabeth is op as hell, and this is actually one of the most in-character moments she's ever had. arachne is stuck in her trap, subdued, and annabeth is so mad at her for fucking with her family for so many thousands of years that she spits acid about her clever trick and how athena will always triumph over arachne in every way, every time. arachne is so fucking mad she has a fit and manages to use her silk and her command over her children to try to kill both of them and bring annabeth down with her to stop her from winning athena's ultimate power back. it eventually leads to annabeth dragging her best friend in the entire world down with her into tartarus.

the themes previously developed throughout the book through characters like octavian and hercules about demigods not being immune to the vices of the gods that cause everyone so many problems all crop right up to bite you in the ass with incredible force. you finish the book, and they achieve their goal of recovering athena parthenos, and they fall into real, actual hell, and it is devastating, and it is exactly what the entire book spent so much time and care telling you was going to happen. when I started the mark of athena a few days ago I got the feeling that the two times I had read it previously, it was my heroes of olympus favorite, and it is proving its place so fucking successfully

[chiistarri]

the signs of a depressive episode coming back are soooo not it

[brainrot-stitch]

Ough

[rose022]

whenever i see a fandom i have never heard of in my life on my dashboard i always know it’s something you reblogged

ahsgajdb yeahhh its an honor tho being that mutual lmaoo

also if you ever wanna learn more about anything i post pleasseeeee talk to me about them i have so many things i could talk about

[a-a-a-anon]

i hate the self infantilization of women but i sound so "not like other girls" if i talk about it.... "im literally just a girl".... mhm.... "girl math"... eye twitch...

[sarahsedserio]

Don't mind me. Just casually getting brand new spoilers for The Sun and The Star from stalking the "Rainbow Crate Books!!" social media page. Like ya do.

[fagtrickbateman]

louis met armand and immediately started sobbing about how much he wants to die, and armand was overcome with a desperate need to fuck him. he's just like us.

[zickmonkey]

No unfortunately I do have the travel bug now- I listened to the Outlander theme song a little to hard and now I have to go back to Scotland. I didn't do it right last time.

[cozypups]

i super duper wish i could go back to when i was first learning html and css and asking my mom to take me to the library to get those html coding books that were from 2004 or something