#the many casualties of cruelty

[sayruq]

Remember how Israel was like 'ground invasion is imminent?' The most recent time that is. Well they'll have to push it back again

No wonder morale keeps sinking. The real truth is that the IDF is terrified of the prospect of fighting the resistance street by street and in the tunnels. Their own leadership admits their casualties will be very high.

These soldiers simply aren't trained enough for real war. Their real purpose is beating Palestinian women and children and kidnapping their men. Here's Joe Biden making excuses for Israel so they continue to look strong to Americans.

It's no surprise that another delay is being fronted after a day of Israel receiving heavy bombardment from the resistance in Gaza and Hezbollah.

Speaking of major blows, here's more of the resistance attacking Israel

Not to mention, political blows

Naturally, after a day of humiliation, Israel dropped many bombs on Gaza. Remember this whenever you see an attack on Gaza. Yes, it's being done out of cruelty and yes, the aim is to annihilate Gazans, but it's also as a result of impotent rage because they're unable to defeat the resistance or even intimidate them.

(It's interesting how there's more dissent in the Israeli military and media than in America.)

This is Israel finally acknowledging that Hezbollah has become a huge problem for them. Hezbollah has yet to 'officially' enter the war which means it is not even using its full missile and rocket capacity.

To put it simply, Israel cannot handle war with Palestinians and Hezbollah at the same time. They're floundering against both and they have to pick and choose who they want to focus on more.

And finally, just to end the post with an amusing thought. This is the Biden administration's response to the recent polling showing there's no popular support for Israel in America

[oxtoxtoxto]

You know, Carrie probably stuck around in the public consciousness in a much more active way on Earth Bet than it did in our own universe.

Think about it: Carrie - the novel - was published in 1974, and it was in 1987 when the active parahumans at the time decided to go public. We can assume that, because they could decide to go public in the first place, there were probably not that many parahumans around at the time, but even so, there had to be some people with powers by that point. So that's our baseline: 1987 is when people had powers.

1974 to 1987 is a little over a decade, which is a while, don't get me wrong, but it also isn't really enough time for something as widely popular as Carrie to fully leave public consciousness, like how there are plenty of books from the mid-2000s and early-2010s that sold well enough to stick around as something people are aware of and talk about in 2023.

Seeing as how the emergence of powers seemed to ramp up after 1987 in the Worm universe, it likely was not that long (late-80s, early-90s) until you had a mass casualty event which echoed the events that transpired in Carrie. Some kid in highschool going postal with powers nobody thought were possible and had no reason to expect.

I mean, shit, technically the Slaughterhouse 9 was around in 1987.

And people would want to look for some way to contextualize that, to understand horrible tragedy like that, or just find a reference frame for it, and waiting for them, as if by design, would be Carrie, which was likely not even fully out of the public consciousness by this point. A story that has paranormal elements that aren't quite mystical, where the powers are fantastical but the situation itself is almost mundane in its cruelty and ends in a lot of dead teenagers.

I can only imagine Carrie reasserted itself in mainstream culture at that point.

I never really dwelled on Taylor making a reference to Carrie back in the story. I could put two-and-two together. But I imagine her thinking that probably carries a whole lot more weight in her world, where that shit can and almost certainly has happened, then it would here, where Carrie is mainly known for being a good novel that kickstarted Stephen King's career, and where "going Carrie" is an evocative phrase, but nothing more than that.

It also makes me wonder what kind of existential crisis Stephen King would have gone through in Earth Bet. Imagine being The Guy Who Predicted The Horrors.

[mishtachio]

To the 31,490+ beautiful souls who had looked forward to this year's Ramadan, the 112,000+ homes that would've hosted iftars, the 634+ mosques that would've conducted taraweeh prayers, and the 12,300+ precious children who were excited to celebrate eid:

Words fail to describe the unspeakable evils that were ordered upon you, but your loss, and the continued hate that is being showered upon your fellow palestinians will not be swept away as mere victims and casualties, they will stand as a testament to the unwavering spirit of human lives amidst times of unimaginable cruelty, and will continue to be a reminder for one of mankind's greatest failures.

As we inherit this blood smeared earth, all we can do now is, to vow to fight injustice with every breath, to remember your resilient lives and dreams, to keep all your souls in our prayers and to promise you a paradise ahead.

From a society choking with shame and remorse, one that has to go through many more Ramadans and Eids without each of you,

We are sorry gaza.

[jesncin]

Does Lex being black and Superman being white(-passing) in your universe affect his hatred of Superman and/or how he expresses it?

It sure does! I'm gonna link back to my initial post about Black Lex Luthor since it sets the stage for the ideas I want to eventually dig into for this take.

(I chopped some panels from Lex Luthor: Man of Steel for the sake of how these pages display on this blog, this is not how it looks in the comic)

Something really interesting about Lex's character is how his ego copes with seeing power and how hypocritical (for lack of better word) he can be about it. In Lex Luthor: Man of Steel, he dehumanizes Superman because he views him as a threat, all in the name of supposedly giving agency back to (his standard of) humanity. He ironically creates an actual not-living-human robot-superhero as a rebuttal to Superman. When Clark Kent criticizes it, Luthor briefly fantasizes about buying the Daily planet and firing him, assuring himself that people like Kent are "insecure men, ignorantly seeking to tell people what to think", all while he himself acts out of insecurity. He builds a tower to represent the pinnacle of human achievement but destroys it and sabotages his own man-made superhero to make Superman look bad.

I think adding a racial element of marginalization revitalizes all of this in so many ways. We'd get to see the way hurt people lash out through power and corruption. Lex clawed his way to power through cruelty and hates seeing how Superman doesn't use malice to get to where he is in power. Maybe the cognitive dissonance in Luthor's mind justifies his feelings towards Superman by thinking that Superman represents this safe, palatable version of power. It's unearned because of course it is, he looks like a white man after all, and all the benefits and second chances that go with it. It's up to someone like Luthor to show people what it really looks like to earn power, it should be messy, there should be casualties. This is how the world works to him, and he knowingly upholds it to justify the cruelty that got him to where he is.

If he can change even just one person's mind about Superman, maybe all that self sabotage, including hurting others like him, would be worth it.

[elryuse]

A Yandere Jeon Heejin x Male Reader please

THIRST

YANDERE JEON HEEJIN X MALE READER

In the bustling halls of Maplewood High School, Heejin reigned as the epitome of popularity. With her flawless looks, captivating charm, and effortless grace, she was adored by many. Yet beneath her radiant facade lurked a dark obsession, one that revolved around her childhood friend, Lee Y/n.

"Yah Stupid Head... Give me your lunch money".

"P-please don't do this to me.. I've never done anything to you.. ".

"How dare you talk back to me... Boys punch him harder.. ".

"No please. Stop... Ahh".

Once inseparable, Heejin and Y/n shared a bond forged in the innocence of youth. However, as they entered high school, Heejin's rise to popularity led her down a path of cruelty. She reveled in her newfound status, using it to belittle and torment Y/n, relishing in his pain as he endured her relentless bullying.

Despite Heejin's transformation into the school's golden girl, her heart ached with an unspoken longing for the boy she had once cherished. But pride and peer pressure kept her from acknowledging her true feelings, and she pushed Y/n further away with each passing day.

Then tragedy struck. A horrific accident shattered the illusion of Heejin's perfect life, leaving her ostracized by her former friends and drowning in a sea of despair. In her darkest hour, it was Y/n who extended a hand of compassion, offering solace amidst the storm of her anguish.

"Stay away from us Heejin... You're ugly as heck... Ahahaha.... C'mon girls let's leave her".

"Girl's please... I'm one of the most popular girls right..."??

"Bitch please... Once we know how fake you were... Your career is basically over".

"Please... I've done everything for this group... For you all... ".

"Let's leave girlsss.. ".

"No... Please.. Don't leave mee...".

"Are you alright Heejin"?

"Y.. Y/n...".?

"C'mon let's get you back on the right track Heejin.. ".

"Y/n...*sobs* I'm sorry.... I'm so sorry... After everything that I've done... I'm sorry... ".

"It's okay... Let's get you home safely now.. ".

"Thank you... Thank you Y/n *hugs him* Thank youu".

As Heejin found herself drawn to Y/n's unwavering kindness, her feelings evolved into something far more consuming. She watched him with a feverish intensity, her heart swelling with a love she could no longer deny. But as her affection deepened, so too did her obsession, spiraling into a dangerous obsession that consumed her every thought.

Determined to make Y/n hers and hers alone, Heejin's actions grew increasingly erratic and possessive. She would go to any lengths to keep him by her side, manipulating situations to isolate him from others and showering him with suffocating affection.

"STAY AWAY FROM HIM... HE'S MINE BICTCH... *thud* YOU BETTER STAY AT THAT POSITION, IF YOU DARE TO WOKE UP... I'M GONNA HURT YOU AGAIN.. AND AGAIN.. ".

"please... Help-".

"I SAID SHUR THE FUCK UP".

"y/n...help..m-".

"I WILL MAKE SURE HE FORGETS EVERYTHING ABOUT YOU YUNA... HIS MEMORIES WIYH YOU WILL BE GONE.. I SHALL TAKE THAT PLACE INSTEAD... BYE BYE SWEETIE AND SWEET DREAMS".

"y/n...agh..uh...hh".

But as Heejin's grip tightened, Y/n began to sense the darkness lurking within her, and fear gnawed at the edges of his heart. Trapped in Heejin's suffocating embrace, he realized that her love had transformed into something monstrous, a twisted obsession that threatened to consume them both.

Caught in the clutches of Heejin's dangerous affection, Y/n could only watch helplessly as the girl he once knew descended further into madness. And in the shadow of her obsession, their once-cherished bond stood on the brink of destruction, a casualty of Heejin's desperate desire to possess him at any cost.

[from-the-coffee-shop-in-edoras]

On the desecration of Háma…

I’ve been thinking a lot about Háma lately (though when am I not?) and his death. Content warning for violence!

Háma is a unique and singular individual in many respects, and none more so than in the manner of his death and its immediate aftermath.

There are untold numbers of casualties at Helm’s Deep, but only ONE — Háma — where we are told that the person was not just killed but that their dead body was then literally chopped into pieces. Even beyond Helm’s Deep, the gruesome cruelty with which Háma was treated seems to largely stand alone, at least within LOTR (the Silm is a much bloodier and more grisly work overall, and Háma’s death fits much more neatly alongside Fingon or Gelmir than Boromir or Théoden). Other characters are killed, obviously, or nearly so. But their deaths seem to be less ruthlessly excessive. Beyond very vague “rumour,” we don’t really see specific people being wantonly dismembered and their bodies subjected to intentional, gratuitous violence far in excess of what was needed to achieve their death. We don’t see enemies taking time mid-battle just to mutilate and disrespect the corpse of a fallen foe. But we’re explicitly told that’s what happens to Háma.

The only situation I can think of that’s even remotely comparable is the men of Minas Tirith who were decapitated so that their heads could be volleyed back into the city.* But that’s not a wholly analogous situation. That was an indiscriminate act, applied to every man who fell in that battle, and presumably carried out after the fighting was over so that the heads could later be used for a clear strategic purpose: to fill the surviving Gondorians with fear and despair. Háma, by contrast, seems to have been singled out for unique and especially vicious treatment while the battle was still ongoing and without any offered explanation.

I’ve thought a lot about why this happened to him, and ultimately it doesn’t really matter. There are any number of possible in-universe explanations: to horrify the Rohirrim and destroy their morale; to stick it to Théoden by targeting someone he was especially fond of; to “punish” Háma for having drawn the particular ire of the orcs somehow in the midst of the fighting; just a random and meaningless display of general contempt. There’s no definitive answer given, and, really, they’re all equally objectionable as rationales. There’s a reason that desecration of corpses has been considered a war crime since antiquity and is still categorized as such even today. It’s the ultimate denial of a person’s humanity, individuality (since it can make it impossible to identify them), and dignity. It prevents that person’s loved ones from being able to undertake the usual rituals of mourning and, thus, it denies them the chance to start healing. It’s a breach of norms that can never be redressed.

What’s probably the most relevant explanation is actually the meta one. Whatever motive the orcs had, Tolkien’s motivation was to show us exactly how debased, ruthless and vicious they were. For them to stoop so low was a significant upping of the dramatic stakes, and for it to have maximum narrative impact, it couldn’t just happen to some nameless background character. It had to be someone we know and, more than that, someone we are specifically supposed to like. Háma fills this role perfectly, as he is fundamentally decent and good — literally *everything* he does in the story is just and wise and kind — without being such a central character that readers would fully rebel against him ending up with this fate. (Tolkien clearly did not write this with Háma stans like me in mind!)

Setting aside cause, the effects of Háma’s sacrifice are certainly wide reaching. We don’t ever find out how his family took this news or what it meant to them to try to live with that knowledge, but we see how it hit Théoden. Of everyone who died at Helm’s Deep, Háma is the one that Théoden mourns by name. He casts the first earth on Háma’s grave, which is separated from all the other fallen Rohirrim who are buried together. Théoden repeatedly cites what happened to Háma as one of the biggest wrongs committed by Saruman against him and against Rohan at large. He even lists it above the death of his own son, which I can’t fully account for except to say that Théodred died a more typical battle death that was no less tragic but not as shocking.

If Saruman had *any* hope of convincing Théoden to go easy on him in the aftermath of Helm’s Deep — which he tried to do quite strenuously when our heroes visit Isengard at the battle’s end — that hope died when the first gratuitous blow struck Háma’s dead body. Far from cowing Théoden into submission and sending him in search of any way to head off more such brutality, the desecration of Háma hardens Théoden’s will. He may be “a lesser son of great sires,” but he is not someone who will excuse or accept that offense. And he’ll go to his own grave helping to ensure that anyone who would is denied the chance.

No one else can suffer Háma’s fate. There can be only one Háma. There was only one Háma. He was singular, and he was perfect.

*There is also, in a footnote of UT, the suggestion that Grimbold put the heads of the axemen who killed Théodred onto stakes where they fell. But that’s a) a footnote in unpublished material and so not of the same textual weight as a story that was explicitly included in LOTR itself; b) very vaguely worded (“it is told”) so who knows if it’s even true; and c) unclear as to whether those axemen lost their heads in the battle and they were then displayed as such, or if their heads were taken after just for that purpose. No matter how you choose to read it, though, it wasn’t the same scenario as Háma!

[inbabylontheywept]

On Palestine

The Israel-Palestine conflict is not complicated. People will try to make it look complicated in the hopes that you will be intimidated and back away without study, but the truth is simple and can be presented simply.

Israel has full control over Palestine's borders - and among the list of things they've banned from import is rebar, concrete, water pipe, and a significant number of consumer electronics.

They say it's because these things can be used for war. They can. But so can rations, clean water, clothes, and air. Banning these is not a military action - it is cruelty. And in the case of Israel, the goal is to make destruction a one way ratchet. Every building that is bombed, every road that breaks, every pipe that bursts - they cannot be fixed. Palestine cannot get better. It can only rot. And when it does not rot fast enough, it is broken.

The people of Palestine know this. It's obvious. If you as an American don't talk about it, you'll get Ben Shapiro and his ilk all but bragging about it.

If you do talk about it, they'll accuse you of conspiracy. Demand to see credible sources - hoping that you'll forget that foreign journalists are illegal in Palestine as concrete, rebar, and water pipes.

I will not justify the crimes of Hamas. What they have done is unforgivable. But something like Hamas only happens when goading an entire civilization into becoming their worst selves. By condemning them to death by decay, then pointing and laughing. By cruelties beyond imagination.

Imagine being in this situation. Imagine that your water is not clean because a bomb hit your street twenty years and cracked both your sewage line and your water main. Now they leak and mingle. It stinks and you smell it. You see a hospital bombed, and the tragedy isn't just the people in the building - It's the fact that you can't build another. It's just gone. Everything that is taken from you is just gone. And as if that wasn't enough, your tormentors laugh at you. Mock you. Call you a savage that likes to like in open sewage. Call you an idiot that doesn't know how to build hospitals. Call you a zealot for the rage you feel when they shit on your prayer rug. A liar, because every crime you report remains unconfirmed, even as they lock the people who could confirm it out.

It would be very tempting to become a monster. And Israel banks on that too. They want more members in Hamas. It was Israel that raised the organization to such heights. And they did so because it justifies everything they do. Its mere presence in the region does wonders in delegitimizing the dream of a Palestinian state. Its violence is what gives Israel the thin veneer self defense. Hamas gets more members every time Israel drops a bomb, but Israel claims it needs more bombs to deal with the rise of Hamas. This cycle is not an accident. And with self reported casualty ratios of 2 civilians per 1 combatant, all Israel is really waiting for is 1/3 of the region to join. (Although human rights orgs have said the ratio is more like to 9 to 1.)

The world has spent decades watching a slow motion genocide. Now, it's not even slow. There are many things you can do to help Palestine, but the cheapest, easiest, and most effective actions are political. One man spending a day making bombs can undo the work of a hundred men spending a year laying brick. If all you do is keep track of the Zionists and make sure not to vote for them, you'll have done more than enough.

(And thanks for reading.)

[twinkle-art]

Andromeda's garlean, or at least raised in garlean society, right? How'd she take the whole Varis/Anima thing in Endwalker? Or just the Garlemald section as a whole? If you've done all the EW role quests, how'd she feel about that last blasphemy?

unfortunately for her, she sure is! she was raised by her garlean mother and spent her entire childhood in the capital city so coming back to that under the circumstances that she did was, frankly, the worst experience of her life. just a profoundly miserable, harrowing time for her.

wrt to the anima stuff, i don’t actually know how strongly it hit her through the noise of every other horrific thing she was seeing, but i think the revelation that the people of her homeland had been devoured by their own nationalistic fervor nauseated her first and foremost because of how it almost felt like a foregone conclusion- a sort of “of course that would be what destroyed them” reaction that, in the face of how gruesomely it actually played out, makes her too unsettled to really feel any sort of vindication at the karmic comeuppance. mostly it just makes her sad. 

(the particular way she personally suffered at the hands of garlean fascism did little to harden her to the many, many cruelties of war she both witnessed and participated in in her capacity as the warrior of light- she has always done what she must without complaint, but she has never been able to turn off the way she instinctively sees humanity in those she cuts down for the sake of justice, knowing they’re probably a lot like the kind of people she was raised in tenuous community with. she just tries not to think about it too hard.)

of course, within the larger context of the arc, it’s ALSO pretty hard for her to view it as any sort of divine retribution when she knows not only what real, tangible person is responsible for unleashing this disaster on them, but that he all but says he did it to get under her skin, specifically. she might even feel culpable for the massive civilian casualties, if she let herself think about it for more than ten seconds. good thing there’s always something else for her to be doing!

anyways, more broadly, the garlemald arc was when her elaborate lies about being a normal eorzean girl completely and utterly collapsed under the strain of actually returning to where she came from. the psychological toll of keeping up the façade with the ilsabard contingient (though the scions, lucia, maxima, and some others have all kept her secret for a while now) And being treated by the garlean populace as a foreign invader (which strikes a nerve she was surprised to realize was still raw after all this time) And not knowing if her mother, who she had very recently accepted might’ve been a more complicated figure than she assumed, was even alive was, frankly, just way too much. the jig is extremely up. she’s taking out her anguish by cursing out some uncooperative military guy who probably reminds her of her step-father in her native language. she keeps asking everyone they meet if they know a woman named lucretia eir caecus. she’s finding any reason to avoid regio urbanissima because if she sees her old home she’s probably gonna have a panic attack. it went Extremely Bad.

the one and pretty much only spot of hope for her during all this is that it did help to get it through her thick skull that her friends like, really really love her. alphinaud and alisaie were basically glued to her side as much as they could be and each had their own approaches to trying to protect her from something that they pretty obviously couldnt. and, for what it’s worth, even as word began to spread through the ilsabard contingient that Hey I Think She’s From Here? i simply don’t think it destroyed their respect for her the way she had convinced herself it would. if anything i think a lot of them just felt bad for how much of a toll this was clearly taking onher.

…sadly i have not actually done all the edw role quests (i’m REALLY bad about doing role quests. i didn’t even do the shb ones until i made that video essay in june. and we all know i’m a huge shadowbringers guy) so i can’t comment on that but i’m sure it’s probably in line with all of this. yeah <3

[the-labyrinth-of-me]

Alan enters Zane’s room, hoping he’d find the manuscript there. But all he finds is another artist who looks exactly like him, who left his markings and traces everywhere. Ahti keeps reciting his poems, The Old Gods of Asgard use them in their songs, Hartman has one carved into the sundial at the Cauldron Lake Lodge. Zane’s spirit is everywhere. There’s a legendary movie, the „lost film“ that Ilmo and the Cult of the Word are after, and while the Cult of the Tree copies the murders of Alan’s books, the Cult of the Word (who is their leader? Scratch? Zane? Wake? All of them?) copies the ritual of Yötön Yö, the ritual that was once performed by Thomas Zane himself. It drove him into madness. He had to kill the woman he once loved, and still does. But he forgot about it. He’s on another mission now: he leads Alan on. He contacts him over the phone, tries to feed him information. About Parliament Tower, Caldera Street Station, the cinema, the hotel, about Scratch and Alice. But never too much at once. Just plain and simple steps, one after another. Alan is Zane’s biggest chance to get out. He guides Alan to the murder sites. And to his room. But he doesn’t have anything more to offer, at least nothing Alan’s interested in. The only thing he can offer is the truth.

The truth about Alan.

He tries, but Alan either refuses or is unable to understand. Zane’s too far gone, too far down the spiral to explain it better.

Alan, at one point, realised that his constant changes of Return continued to kill people by the dozen. He couldn’t change it to stay consistent with the genre. But he felt bad about it. Simultaneously, Zane found himself stuck. That was unacceptable. He guided Alan to his room, and he knew exactly who he was. That Alan had anger issues, problems with addiction. What Zane needed was Scratch. Scratch didn’t care about casualties. Scratch embraced the horror, the terror. It aligned with Zane’s movie Yötön Yö. Zane was aware of the spiral. He knew the rumors about Alan Wake. Of course he did. It’s all from him, part of the plan. Zane knew how to awaken Alan’s dark side. He made Alan drunk, high, and Alan got unhinged, lost control. Scratch took over. He promised to write. He promised Zane would leave together with him. But Zane underestimated Scratch and his cruelty. Scratch left Zane behind, betrayed him. Zane needed another plan. He knew that Alan would loop back to him.

Zane let everything happen again, but this time made a film, the true companion piece to Return. Alan drunk, high, out of it. Talking rubbish, throwing up, dancing. Scratch. Zane needed to confront Alan about Scratch. He needed Alan to defeat Scratch another time. He planned to confront Alan about this on his next loop, but the Dark Presence interfered. It made Alan forget. The Film confused him more than anything else. Another visit to room 665 was needed .

And Alan came. But Zane couldn’t risk that Scratch would take over again. He tied Alan to a chair. But Alan made progress. Gained power. He managed to fight back, changed places with Zane who was now sitting tied up in the chair. Zane was in shock. His plan failed another time. And many times after. But he needed to guide Alan to the next murder site in the cinema. He cut out the part of the film that wasn’t strictly necessary. He cut out the bit in which Alan, with his back against the wall because Zane had seemingly betrayed him, got angry. They fought. Alan lost trust in Zane and hit him across the face. Zane spat blood. But he didn’t give up. He couldn’t. Scratch was almost back. Alan almost lost control again. A sacrifice was needed. The story demanded a price to be paid. And Zane would pay it.

He made Alan angry on purpose. Alan drew his gun, pointed it at Zane. Zane carefully tried to show him the truth again, about Scratch. But he had to be vague about it, so the Dark Presence wouldn’t be able to interfere. Alan would get it eventually on his way to ascension.

Alan shot Zane, many many times, loop after loop after loop. Zane knew he’d be back until Alan would travel upwards on the spiral. He knew he would have to die countless times, by the hands of his other self. It was the dark sacrifice he chose to make. He was both dead and alive. Dead because the story of Initiation demanded it. Alive because it was just one of his many versions who died. There was always another Tom Zane on the spiral. He knew about it. He told Alan about it when he was drunk, before Scratch showed up. Countless times. Until Alan would remember it.

Zane hid the movie ticket in his shirt pocket, to give Alan access to the final murder site. He had been trying to help Alan all along, as best as he could, but without interfering with the story. Without selling them both out to the Dark Presence. It was necessary that Alan would kill himself in the Writer’s Room again and again. Until he got the story right. Until he got the ending right. And to make sure that Scratch wouldn’t leave without him. He had to make these sacrifices , had to make Alan make these constant changes, until the story was just right. He had to sacrifice himself for the greater good, same as Alice. He didn’t know if it all would work out the way he hoped, but he couldn’t afford to not try it. He spiraled downwards while Alan ascended, continued to lose himself, pieces of who he once was, while Alan gained completion. They needed to be in perfect balance to slay the demon that was Scratch.

[hero-israel]

How many civilians should die in Gaza before it’s no longer worth it? Or is it always worth it? Is it worth it to keep pushing and killing and keep killing and keep killing and keep killing I. The hope that one day Hamas will be defeated? Do their lives just mean less inherently? Because they’re not Israeli?

I've been getting asks like this multiple times per week (and I'm not the only one). It gives the strong impression that a lot of kindly, goodthinking young people saw their political slogans and movements as purely therapeutic, substituting for the mental / communal reassurance of a God they don't believe in, instead of real statements on societal protection and the use of power.

Please think real hard about whether your political principles / orientation have ever involved any of the following:

"Magneto was right"

"Never again"

"Fuck that Confederate statue"

"Antifa / anti-fascist"

"Punch a Nazi"

anything involving guillotines

Then look into what had to be done to actually defeat slavery and fascism and Nazism - the latter in the "classical" sense, not the "chinless basement-dwelling blogger who never actually hurt anybody" sense. Have you been imagining all this time that there WEREN'T civilian casualties in Berlin? I realize this is not a great comparison, because what Israel is doing in Gaza is far more selective and merciful than what the Allies did. But you get the idea.

You cannot qualify war in harsher terms than I will. War is cruelty and you cannot refine it; and those who brought war into our country deserve all the curses and maledictions a people can pour out...

You might as well appeal against the thunder storm as against these terrible hardships of war. They are inevitable, and the only way the people of Atlanta can hope once more to live in peace and quiet at home, is to stop the war, which can only be done by admitting that it began in error and is perpetuated in pride.

You have heretofor read public sentiment in your newspapers, that live by falsehood and excitement; and the quicker you seek for truth in other quarters, the better...  Now that the war comes home to you, you feel very different. You deprecate its horrors, but did not feel them when you sent car loads of soldiers and ammunition, and moulded shells and shot, to carry war into Kentucky and Tennessee, to desolate the homes of hundreds and thousands of good people who only asked to live in peace at their old homes...

Now you must go, and take with you the old and feeble, feed and nurse them, and build for them, in more quiet places, proper habitations to shield them against the weather until the mad passions of men cool down, and allow the Union and peace once more to settle over your old homes at Atlanta. 

Maj. General William Tecumseh Sherman

(credit to @al-kol-eleh)

[blitz0hno]

The universe has a habit for punishing hero types.

The pure indifference of time’s march forward is punishment enough for most human beings to steer clear of this path. Only one who is equally indifferent, it seems, can survive in such a world.

Maybe it’s the sheer arrogance of one who would try to shield others from the inevitable pains of this world that warrants such punishment. 

And yet, the existence of heroes brings its rewards. Hope, happiness, humanity, and all of those other lovely things that blossom in the presence of a “hero.” The moment something terribly wrong goes suddenly right. The right person, the right time, the right place.

A child running into a busy street, only to be grasped tightly at the last moment.

An old woman and her cat trapped in a house fire, a neighbor rushing into the flames and bringing them out in one piece.

A crowd in panic as an attacker brandishes a weapon, when a pistol responds from the hip of an everyday citizen and prevents innocent casualties (not that the gun nuts who fantasize about that shit are any better than violent people themselves).

I can’t honestly say these feats are short of impressive. Disgustingly aspirational, even, to seem so untouchable in a dire moment. In the back of many people’s minds, no matter how mediocre they truly are, there is an underlying want to “save” others in a grand act of heroism. The desire often begins and ends with the ego. 

The feelings that must come with saving a life, they think, consciously or not. Can anyone truly blame them, when headlines such as “NEIGHBORVILLE ‘SUPERMAN’ STOPS ARMED ROBBERY” fill their minds with praise? 

In actuality, though, if there was no armed robber, Superman would be obsolete out of the gate. And in the presence of an armed robber, most would turn and run, for opportunities for a hero are preceded by the presence of serious danger.

No one wants to be Superman the day after. The paperwork alone has gotta be awful. 

On top of that, between every one Neighborville Superman there are about fifty crooked cops, eighteen bigoted doctors, twenty creepy teachers, and eight Friendlytown Stabbers in any given news cycle.

Those who would drop their fantasy and run (“common” sense is common for a reason, they’ll tell you) save themselves a lot of suffering. Fighting one’s instincts is no easy task, after all.

But I, for one, hate those instincts of mine. They’re overridden, almost involuntarily, by something almost alarming.

A hatred.

I hate humans who cause suffering in others.

Many people are afraid of bullies, and saddened by tragic violence, but seem to reserve their anger for the little things. The incredible racism from their leaders doesn’t spark half the anger as their child dropping and breaking a cup, for example.

When I was a kid, anger reigned freely in my life. The adults around me had no issues with letting such an emotion control them; yet when they would beat me and my siblings, the words that came out of their mouths preached “respect” and “love,” things I grew to discover were much more work than any of them had ever put in.

I knew then that I wanted two things:

I wanted to be strong enough to defend those I love from cruelty.

I therefore wanted the people who inflict cruelty on this planet gone.

What resulted was something I jokingly call a disorganized attachment to love. I’m no sucker, after all; I can’t truly say I believe in the “power” of affection, as nice as it feels. The inevitable severance of that connection with another often gives me pause. I think about fights and breakups and deaths, and cowardly as it may seem I then wish to be completely at peace with myself before risking these losses.

But love is still something I feel. At least, I think it’s love; I feel great pain when I imagine the suffering those in my life will face, and feel great joy at the thought of their happiness.

Is it unreasonable, then, to strive for the capability to protect them?

There are many people who would hurt the ones I love. Am I wrong for wanting those people and the systems that create them eradicated?

I’m undoubtedly foolish to think that a perfect world could exist, or that any action I could take would change things for the better. Then again, if it’s so insignificant but makes the world better to me,  does it matter if I go ahead with it?

Because there are some who, objectively, cause unnecessary suffering on massive scales. Should them and their supporters not then be made examples of? Those who oppress and hurt others for selfish gain would be better off gone. If anyone’s life gets better after the oppressive party is gone, the point will prove itself. 

So why, then, should I expect another to act when I could be capable?

If it’s what I want to pursue, should I not give it my all?

Would anything I do even make a dent? Perhaps it would; then what? Another biased entry in a state-sponsored corporate textbook? Another murdered for challenging the status quo? 

I want a world where it is unacceptable to hurt another human for your own personal gain. I have a problem with those lacking compassion. I have a problem with those who judge and torture others for their differences, and those who hoard wealth while billions starve. 

It’s an intense, overwhelming anger that makes nothing else even seem to matter. We have such a short life on earth and we’re spending it under the thumbs of fuckers just as fragile as us.

Every “hero” is thrown out into a world where, in the time it takes many to save one single life, thousands can be taken. What a punishment indeed.  Carrying this knowledge at the forefront of their mind, they hold those they value most at arm’s length, never letting their guard down. Their sole focus is protection, ever-ready to run towards danger.

So goes the life of the untouchable hero.

[sakebytheriver]

Here's the thing about Oct. 7th

Any analysis of the situation that does not acknowledge that the IOF itself is responsible for most of the casualties is incomplete and pretty close to straight up propaganda

I have no love in my heart for Hamas, I agree that it is an extreme fundamentalist religious movement founded on the most radical platform the Palestinian revolution could have had and even as the secularists have taken positions and done work to move the ideology in a less radical direction as they saw that with only Hamas in power they only had one option but to try and change the organization from the inside, that doesn't mean they don't still have extreme views or tactics and nor does it mean that they are not also mistreating the Palestinians in Gaza as any ruling government party mistreats their citizens, remember they only received 44.5% of the vote and then promptly ended free elections there after, not even to mention how many Gazans were under the voting age when that election was held. Their extreme views and tactics for liberation are quite literally why Netenyahu himself funneled money into their operation to ensure that they were the international face of Palestine to make it so that public international opinion would be against them and further destabilize Palestinian liberation attempts

But it has literally been reported by Israel's own media and journalists that the IOF are the ones who shelled Israeli homes which led to those horrific burning deaths of Israeli babies Ben Shapiro won't let the internet forget about, it was reported by the Israeli media itself that the IOF fired at their own citizens fleeing from the music festival, it was reported by Israeli media that the IOF shot and killed hostages with their hands tied behind their backs, and it has been confirmed by Israeli citizens who were taken hostage by Hamas insurgents that the insurgent's main goal seemed to be to keep them alive and relatively safe in order to be taken hostage as leverage for the Palestinian hostages Israel has locked in their prisons while the IOF soldiers and the people who gave them their marching orders were indiscriminate in who they killed, driving tanks through residential areas, shooting citizens, and bombing houses with families, the elderly, and infants inside

This is not to say that Hamas didn't kill anyone, I'm sure they did, but from Israel's own media and their own citizen's reports who were taken hostage we have been told the number of casualties were so high on Oct. 7th because the IOF had absolutely no qualms killing their own people

And nor is this to say that Hamas is some kind of humanitarian freedom fighting militia that will always treat Israelis nice and respectfully, the reason why they've been so nice to their hostages is because they are playing the optics game that Israel won't

They are doing the wartime optics game correctly right now while Israel has all but abandoned it, they are keeping the hostages safe and well looked after so that when held up next to the cruelty and the indiscriminate violence of the Apartheid state (which has over 10,000 Palestinians held hostage in their prisons as of now) they look better in comparison to the international eye, that is the whole point of fighting an asymmetrical war, you have to use asymmetrical tactics, especially in an age where public opinion can mean the difference between life or death

Ultimately, my point here is that the idea that Hamas are the ones who are soley responsible for the massacre of over a thousand Israeli citizens is just false, and that is confirmed by the Israeli media itself. It was the IOF response to the attack that killed so many, Hamas does not have the technology available to them to be able to shell someone's house, the people who crossed the Gazan border were only armed with the guns they could carry in their hands, that doesn't lead to the kind of damage done in these Israeli neighborhoods that we have seen reported on (just check NPR's ig page it's full of videos of the Israeli neighborhoods destroyed after Oct. 7th) but a tank driven by an IOF soldier who has been given the greenlight by his superiors to kill as many Israelis as he deems necessary in the hopes of killing any single Hamas insurgent they can get, definitely will

Innocents died on Oct. 7th, I will never deny that, but most of them didn't meet their end by a Hamas insurgent. They met their end by an Israeli soldier who was supposed to be sent there to protect them and if you don't acknowledge that fact, if you simply say that it was the attack by Hamas that killed so many people then you have not done any research into what actually happened that day and you don't get to use it as some kind of gotcha against the people who support Palestine

[thedeafprophet]

Character Summary: The Percipient Scientist

Josephine Ashwood

Pronouns: She/her

Ambition: Nemesis

Profession: Correspondent

Main Skills: Watchful, Shadowy, Artisan Of The Red Science

Main Quirks: Melancholy, Steadfast, Subtle

They say…

“A determined and studious woman, leading many studies at the university. Though often quiet, with luck you'll get to hear the thoughts within her mind”

Further Writeup under the cut:

(warnings for very parental death, sibling death, illness, and spoilers for Nemesis)

Backstory

Josephine was born in April 1876, to Dorothy and William Ashwood, in a dockside community in Liverpool. Her brother, Gabriel, had been born 7 years before her. Her father was a dockworker, and her mother worked part time in service, and did piano in the rest of her time. For the first 8 years of Josephines life, things were as simple and as happy as they could ever be.

It was the summer of 1884 that things took their first turn to the worst, as an illness swept through the community. Many fell victim to it, and among the casualties, Josephine's parents were lost to the sickness as well. Following their parents deaths, 15 year old Gabriel was left to care for both himself and his little sister, pushing through jobs to try and keep their home and his sister safe from the world that had little care for them.

It was 2 years after this that the event that would shake Josephines world and set her path would occur. Even now, Gabriel's murder is an event Josephine can't understand; a level of cruelty so uneeded and so severe.

All that Josephine has left of her birth family is her father's silver pocket watch which she had taken off of her brother. Inside, a picture of the two of them as children, the only physical reminder of what once was. And all that Josephine had in that moment was an envelope and a name, and above all else a question; why?

It would be many years later before Josephine would embark on her quest for vengeance. Many years before she was able to. But the seeds of the future all began far back within her past.

It was perhaps as fortunate that it could be that Josephine ended up being sent to the industrial school, or unfortunate for how she was moved from the only home she had ever known. Perhaps, it simply was. Josephine's initial arrival at the school was poor. Following her brothers death, Josephine didn't talk for almost 1 year following, which made it difficult for her to accommodate to the new location. With peers and staff who cared little for her, most paid her no mind, and she simply drifted into the background. From the sidelines, Josephine watched, and observed.

It wasn't too long however, that Josephine met Jamie, two years her elder and outcasted just as she was. Jamie was pestering and talkative and didnt mind much at all that Josephine didn't talk. It was through this friendship that Josephine was able to find a semblence of herself again, and find her words. The late nights where Jamie would whisper endless tales they'd made up in their head warded off nightmares, and the books they brought her encourgaed her to learn. A year later, the two of them would meet Alex, and when Josephine was 13, the three of them would depart the school together.

During her teen years, Josephine's thoughts began to fester. She continued to self educate, to learn through books everything that she could. She dreamed of possible futures; of the places she could learn and study, if only she had the aims. But beyond all of that one thing remained; rage and confusion over the loss of her brother. By her late teens Josephine was enaged fully in trying to track down any information she could.

Meanwhile, her relationship with Jamie and Alex became strained. Josephine couldnt understand Jamie's aim to join in with society when she saw it for all the scam that it was. Furthermore resenment grew as she knew oppurtunities that would be availible for them would never be an option for her. Meanwhile, Alex seem almost partonizing towards her continued search into her brothers death, warning her against how all consuming this seemed of her, questioning her inability to move on.

Regardless all of this, when Josephine's search for her brothers killer led her towards the neath, the other two joined in her descent.

It was 1898 when Josephine came to the Neath, at 22 years old.

Game Timeline Events

The neath provided oppurtunities to Josephine that the surface never did. In her initial aim to track down information, Josephine became swept up in some minor matters of detective work, which eventually lead her down a further path of understanding of the neath.

Her discovery of the correspondence stones and the learning of it in general presented something uptmost appealing to Josephine; something inbetween a puzzle and a mystery, something she could learn about.

Though she would later face their scrunity for revealing of a truth, Josephine found her place within the university. Even without a typical academic background, Josephine's publishings had proved her worth, and she found herself among her staff. Had she not had other pressing matters to attend to (and temporary banishment on her hand) she would have been more then happy to spend her days within her lab, researching as much as she could on this strange, mysterious world she found herself within.

However even with all these new oppurtunities, Josephines path stayed firm. She would find answers, even if she didnt like the answers she found. The iron republic left a heavy mark upon her psych, and the further she dove into this mystery the more it consumed her. Little else entered her mind as she tracked down her nemesis, as she schemed to find her way to end Cups once and for all.

Of course, that confrontation did not go as she initially planned. In that moment, with her enemy at her feet, her emotions at all time high... well, perhaps the choice was more an impulse then it was a rational descion. But suddenly it was like she was 10 years old again, and all she wanted was the hope of seeing her big brother once more.

It was not, of course, a deal well thought through. Even without the memory loss, Gabriel stood now 6 years younger then her, the dynamic of their ages now fully swapped. He was left confused and scared at the world around him, and Josephine was left heavy with the level of descion that she had made for him.

The ending of her quest had done nothing to soothe Josephine's emotions, and she found herself all the more anxious and confused. So when Jamie came to her with the concept of the railway, for science of course, Josephine jumped at the oppurtunity to have something new for her mind to focus on.

It would be here where she would meet September, whom she would grow close and later marry. It would sometime after the start of the railway when london would face its first yearly summer disaster, and it would be after she would dream of much colder month.

It would be here she would learn her enemy was much grander then she could have realised

And the railway would not lead her to learning anything new; there was Nothing for her to learn.

A couple exceptional stories are also canon to Josephine's timeline:

Lost In Reflections

The beginning of Josephine's friendship with July and inclination further into her revolutionary ties. In the end, Josephine chose to smash the mirror.

The Shallows

Josephine learned further on the information behind October; and most important, learned of who exactly was behind the death of mirrors

This was the beginning of Josephine's dynamic with October, made all the more awkward with Josephine's secret fact that she released the shade of Mirrors from it imprisonment in parabola.

[mariacallous]

The Russian military carried out at least 36 double-tap strikes against Ukraine from the start of the full-scale invasion in February 2022 to August 2024, killing over 100 people, according to a recent report by Truth Hounds, a Ukrainian non-profit organization that documents and investigates war crimes. Twenty such attacks were carried out this year alone.

A double-tap attack is an illegal military tactic in which an initial strike is followed by a delayed second strike, usually intended to kill or injure first responders who arrive at the scene and cause panic among the population. Russia has been using this tactic extensively in Ukraine and previously in Syria alongside Bashar al-Assad's government forces.

According to Truth Hounds, their report confirms that Moscow deliberately uses double-tap attacks to hinder humanitarian aid efforts, with Russian propaganda framing the killing of Ukrainian first responders as justified.

Truth Hounds verified 36 cases of Russian double-tap strikes, although the overall number of incidents displaying the characteristics of double-tap attacks exceeds 60.

According to the report titled "Cruelty Cascade: Examining the Pattern of Russian Double-Tap Strikes in Ukraine," Russian forces have dramatically increased the use of this tactic in 2024, with instances this year alone surpassing the verified cases from the previous two years combined.

Over 100 people were killed in the 36 double-tap attacks, verified by Truth Hounds, but it is unclear how many of them died as a result of the secondary strikes, Roman Koval, the organization’s head of research, told the Kyiv Independent.

In July 2024, Andrii Danyk, the head of Ukraine’s State Emergency Service, reported that 93 emergency workers had been killed and almost 400 injured since the start of the full-scale invasion, though not all of these casualties had resulted from Russia's double-tap attacks.

Russian double-tap strikes wounded nearly 350 civilians from April 2022 to April 2024, said Timothy Hanway, the acting U.S. envoy to the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), in an address on April 25. Hanway also highlighted that Russia's usage of this illegal tactic had been increasing.  

Since 2014, Truth Hounds has been documenting and investigating international crimes and severe human rights violations across Ukraine and other conflict zones in Eastern Europe, the Caucasus, and Central Asia. Their latest report delves into the pattern and impact of Russian double-tap strikes in Ukraine, offering a legal assessment of these actions and their implications.

In collaboration with the White Helmets — a humanitarian organization focused on helping communities prepare for, respond to, and rebuild after attacks in Syria — Truth Hounds established “a strong connection” between Russia's use of double-tap attacks in Syria and Ukraine, according to the organization’s press release. In July 2023, the White Helmets reported having lost over 300 volunteers in the Syrian war, with the majority killed in double-tap attacks.

In an earlier comment for the Kyiv Independent, Janine di Giovanni, a human rights reporter and investigator with over 30 years of experience working in war zones, called Russian double-tap attacks "a part of a larger strategy of punishment and control," noting that Russian President Vladimir Putin "has a pattern of attacking civilians indiscriminately."

Truth Hounds suggested in the report that the rise of Russian double-tap attacks in 2024 could be linked to the appointment of a new commander of the Russian Missile Troops and Artillery, along with a new head of the Main Missile and Artillery Directorate of the Russian Defense Ministry. "This fact warrants further investigation to uncover the underlying interdependencies, including potential shifts in operational strategy or tactical priorities under their leadership."

The report also assesses the conditions under which double-tap strikes could be considered war crimes. These attacks violate the provisions of the Rome Statute, which explicitly forbids intentional targeting of civilians, and violate the article protecting medical and humanitarian personnel from attacks.

"Our research has thoroughly demonstrated that even if the first strike targets a legitimate military target, the second strike — typically delayed and aimed at rescuers and wounded personnel — crosses the line of legality, transforming these actions into war crimes," said Yuriy Uhryn, a lawyer at Truth Hounds, in a press release shared by the organization.

Based on the report, Truth Hounds outlined a set of recommendations for the Ukrainian and foreign governments, international organizations, and the International Criminal Court. These include investigating Russian double-tap strikes in both Ukraine and Syria, increasing support for Ukrainian and Syrian first responders, promoting public condemnation of these war crimes, and advocating for stronger sanctions against Russia.

“The current situation highlights a critical pattern: impunity for international crimes tends to facilitate their recurrence, placing civilians in increasingly precarious positions,” Truth Hounds said in a statement. “The absence of effective measures to address such violations undermines international norms and emboldens those who commit these acts.”

Ukrainian authorities recorded almost 140,000 war crimes committed by Russian troops in the country, President Volodymyr Zelensky said at the United for Justice conference in Kyiv on Sept. 11. Slightly over 100 people were found guilty of war crimes as of late March, most of them in absentia, according to Zmina, a Ukrainian human rights organization.

Truth Hounds believes it’s crucial to continue investigating Russian double-tap attacks and prosecuting the perpetrators.

“People who lost their loved ones to such attacks or were directly affected by them demand justice, and even if this demand can be satisfied only partially through sentences in absentia, it is still worth doing,” said Koval.

“Russian suspects in war crimes still travel abroad, and such cases are not isolated. Considering that war crimes do not have a statute of limitations, this also significantly increases the chances of their arrest when they leave Russia sooner or later.”

[daisyjules1011]

Glitch in the matrix

I woke up happy

Rememberd the trauma fondly,

Laughed at the cruelty

Guess I'm a casualty of sanity

Glitch in the matrix

Thought I had the world in the palm of my hand

A magicians trick, all the rabbits disappear,

Gave too many 2nd chances

Domino effect, it all cascaded

Guess I'm a casualty of sanity

Glitch in the matrix

I choose positivity

Pretty thoughts, prettier dresses

The faceless man

Spills champagne on me

I apologised, for it was expensive

Guess I'm a casualty of sanity

Glitch in the matrix

I found friends who care,

Went for a drive, wind flowing, free sailing

Car crashes and burning bridges

My feelings got invalidated

Glitch in the matrix

I'm a casualty of sanity

[miramaramora]

BuT iF yOu StRiKe ThEm BaCk yOu'lL be as bAd as tHeY ArE

Shut up , that's cartoon logic , that's to prevent beloved protagonists from doing something on TV that children could immitate.

Let's discuss

Do they have the same motive ?

No,the zionists have greed , arrogance and/or cruelty as a motive . And the Palestinians have the desires to prevent their country from being usurped and to defend themselves, their lives , their bodies, their culture, their dignity!

Do they have the same level of strength and destructive potential?

No , Israel is supported by many wealthy expansionist countries that pioneer in weaponry and mass destruction , elaborate spy networks , and means if economic colonisation.

Palestine is supported by militant groups who are Palestinians , some charity organisations , other Arab individuals opting to be militants and the political recognition of some countries.

Do they use the same methods?

No they don't, Israel and zionists use their abundance in wealth to pay celebrities to support them . They target women and children so that there would be less Palestinians . They resort to torture and lie about it . They mutilate bodies, They try to stop others from speaking about it.

Palestinian miltants don't target children, they treat hostages well , they humiliate/ kill zionist soldiers who fought them ( unapologetically) without feeling the need to lie about it or falsify history. They document the casualties even on enemy side and take responsibility for the casualties caught in their crossfire. They don't resort to torture and all they diligently try to avoid weaklings being collateral damage on enemy side .

So how exactly are they similar ? The only thing they have in common is making your sheltered self uncomfy

So if you don't know which side you're on , fine

If you don't have info , or need to do more research fine

But going around equating the usurper with the resistant victim is deliberate ignorance .