#the russians. they are here

[tolstayas]

:D

[suspicious-scarecrow]

[official-time-loop-posts]

Thank you to @sleepnoises for making the original poll & for giving us the idea to to this :)

Sorry if we couldn’t get your favorite on here, we were limited to only 12 options (11 if you don’t include the “other” option).

[kaiserin-erzsebet]

"Why does it make you frustrated that the Captain of the Demeter is consistently not Russian in adaptations?" - hypothetical person

For several reasons:

It takes away a heroic figure who is Eastern European, which significantly contributes to the (arguably incorrect) reading that this book is about an East vs West dichotomy.

Slavic characters so rarely get to be good and heroic figures in English-language media beyond very bit parts.

It takes away the significance of him being mourned by people even when he is buried far from his homeland.

[rainpunk07]

hear me out, danny speaking russian (dc x dp hc)

so i was just watching a video about space, right? allegedly, turns out if you (an american) wanna board the international space station you must speak russian fluently since the only way to get there is by a russian shuttle and pilot (nasa apparently ended their own shuttle program way back when??) (don’t quote me on this)

so picture danny learning russian at a relatively young age for the sole hope of going to space and such, and it coming out every once in a while when he’s mumbling or something like that (it’s basically second nature to him)

so danny ends up at gotham for whatever reason (demon twins, reveal gone wrong, idc, they’re all cool) and he wants to start anew, so he pretends to only speak russian?? ig?? it’d make for some funny/interesting BatFam interactions i suppose

i don’t know where i was going with this but i want to read prompts of danny speaking russian

[uncanny-tranny]

It's honestly frustrating that I've seen non-Russian queer people almost bragging about how they would be illegal in Russia, labeled an extremist or terrorist. Russian queers are in danger, their government has made it clear where it stands, and it's made this effort for the better part of a decade (even longer, perhaps). This will kill people, don't mistake this for a quirky little proclamation from a government, akin to somebody saying the sky is pink. Russian queer people were already expressing their fear, and the least we can do now is express our love for them, and advocate with them.

Russian queer people, I love you. I love you all so much. I am so sorry, I cannot begin to express the grief that I feel, and I hope that you are safe. Words cannot encapsulate how I feel as a non-Russian, and I cannot hope to comprehend how it feels to actually be in this situation.

[soracities]

Marina Tsvetaeva, from "My ear attends to you", Selected Poems (trans. Elaine Feinstein, with Maxwell Shorter)

[gayhoediaz]

ERIC BOGOSIAN as DANIEL MOLLOY in Interview With The Vampire (2022) || NATASHA LYONNE as NADIA VULVOKOV in Russian Doll (2019) [pt. I] [pt. II]

[bromcommie]

tbh I still think Brock Rumlow was an interesting character and upon further examination way more unsettling a villain than most to me because like. Let’s be real, the second you lay eyes on Robert Redford as Pierce monologuing in his pristine suit and glass office high up in the sky he just screams Evil Politician! at you. You can see it coming a mile away. Meanwhile Rumlow is….Just Some Guy. On the surface, he’s just some side dude. He’s not enhanced, he’s not in some major position of power, he’s just someone who’s really good at what he does and seems dedicated enough to the work and functions well with his team. He respects Steve, might admire him even, but not so much that he gets starry eyed like everybody else. He’s lighthearted but focused, he’s no nonsense, he’s the everyman Steve can relate to way more than spooks like Natasha or Fury.

And okay, maybe what Rumlow does for a living is beat intimidate and kill people, but it’s not like that’s the primary objective, right, because SHIELD are the good guys and this is what Steve does now, too, anyway; except that Steve doesn’t really use any weapons other than the shield, he holds back, he doesn’t carry a gun anymore which is usually fine since he’s dangerous enough without it. But when that leaves him vulnerable, he’s covered: Rumlow’s got his six, and he does it well, and he earns some of his trust. This is familiar to Steve.

And maybe Rumlow’s a little too good, fine, maybe he shoots a guy in the head within the first fifteen minutes of the movie when he doesn’t necessarily have to and then cracks jokes immediately after but that’s alright too, because that guy had Steve at gunpoint and that guy was Bad whereas Rumlow is One of the Good Guys just doing his job, right. Rumlow’s joking around because he’s used to the violence, they’re all used to it, and this is just how it works. They’re just soldiers doing the grunt work and following orders, and this is familiar, too.

Except that they’re not soldiers and this isn’t a war, except that the work is for an intelligence agency whose job it is to hoard and steal information and monitor civilians and orchestrate and sabotage and meddle in internal and external state affairs. Except that the Good Guys, in reality, are extremely grey at best. Except that many of the Good Guys turn out to be Nazis on top of everything else, and it’s not that far of a stretch.

But when it’s all starting to unravel, you’re still thinking well maybe some of these guys didn’t know. Maybe they didn’t do it out of individual belief, and if faced with the right choice, they can be redeemed.

That is until you realize that Rumlow maybe didn’t respect Steve and what he did so much as what Steve could do if only Steve weren’t “weak” in other ways, if Steve had chosen the right side. That it not being personal is less a cop out and more a taunt the same way just following orders has always been, for Rumlow and many many men that came before him and will continue to come after. Until the vault when, by the most charitable of interpretations, Rumlow looks at the Winter Soldier letting himself be smacked around and crying and getting shocked like he’s maybe a little unnerved (if not just downright fascinated) by the whole thing, but not enough that it really changes anything for him, because the end justifies the means and it’s not really his problem, anyway.

Until Sam shows up and Rumlow looks at him like a bird of prey and says This is gonna hurt with a fucking smile on his face, and then you think: shit, man, obviously. How was it not clear from the start.

To me, what makes someone like Rumlow a good villain, even a side one, is not that he’s straight up Insane & Evil™️ or suffering from Tragic Backstory Syndrome or all hopped up on magic superstrength juice or whatever, but precisely the fact that he’s Just Some Guy with a cockroach survival mentality who operates well within the established system and just so happens to be really good at his job - a job that he might’ve even joined thinking it was for a good cause, or because he had something to prove, or simply because it gave him one hell of an excuse to be a bully. Because he either wholeheartedly believes in HYDRA or he just doesn’t give much of a shit either way so long as he gets his due in the end, and both are just as bad.

Because when you strip away all the grand scale superhero theatrics, you’ve seen this before. You’ve seen Rumlows in your school and in your neighborhood and in the military and the cop car patrolling your street. They’re the ones who sometimes say or do somewhat offputting shit but you figure it’s fine because they’re otherwise real nice or charismatic or normal looking, or maybe they work a job that’s framed as helpful or protective or inherently good despite the power dynamics at play, or they share your background and interests and you chat about the weather being crap this time of year.

And every time one of them turns out to be a violent, hateful piece of shit, you’re still somehow surprised then, too, when you really shouldn’t be.

[femalemaleangel]

sharing this interview footage i found from after the 2005 world junior game vs USA

[cup-noodle]

the cruelest thing about the world is that there's so many languages and a girl can't learn all of them

[rainworldslugcats]

Little boys, little guys, quite skrinkly, scrumblo, is artificer jealous of gourmands kids?

i think gourmand could help artificer heal

static ver because i don't know how to make high quality gifs

[emotionaldisaster909]

ah?

OH???

OOOOH????

OH MY GODDESS

HIS HEART STUTTERED

THEY ADDED THE SOUND AGAIN

HOW ARE THEY DOING IT

HOW IS THERE ANY HETEROSEXUAL EXPLANATION TO THIS

OH GOD BLESS

CHINESE DOUBLE GAY STANDARDS

[yvehattan]

A Fyodor Dostoevsky doodle for his birthday.

[irhabiya]

Soviet poster celebrating the construction of the Aswan High Dam, 1964, which the USSR greatly assisted in building

[hussyknee]

I just want to make one thing very clear. Black and brown people, especially Muslims right now, don't owe white people for your allyship in racial justice. Not even those who are themselves systemically marginalized in some way. Not white Jews, not white queers, not white disabled, not white working class, not white poor.

Whiteness is the most lethal kind of oppression because it built the current colonial capitalist, imperialist world order. Every white person benefits from and is complicit in its systems in some way because white supremacy is global. Whatever marginalization has white people in it can be and is easily weaponized against the mellanated. When charged with your racist, exclusionary and oppressive behaviour you hold up Black and brown people of the same marginalizations as tokens. This is the only time they are ever visible; more often than not you profit off their labour, hoard their gains, throw them under the bus and make them part of your iconography for liberal progress points once they're dead and have no inconvenient opinions about your conduct.

This is why it's very hard for Black and brown people to take accusations of bigotry towards you in good faith. We also have a duty of care towards others but more often than not it feels like you want us to do what you want while holding a knife to our necks. Even when you don't do it directly, you issue demands like "if you don't do x and y you clearly don't care about my people and deserve the worst!!!" without considering for a moment that the full brunt of that policing will always fall on Black and brown people, because punitive justice exercises itself first and foremost on the vulnerable. If your demands for allyship carry disproportionate punishment for Black and brown people should we refuse, you're just on some power trip and never needed our help in the first place. This also obfuscates the needs and disenfranchisement of BIPOC Jewish, queer, poor, disabled and Global South people, because without racial justice, few of your gains will ever materialise in their lives. It's always trickle down liberation for the rest of us.

Your allyship is supposed to be the work of conscience, a recognition of injustice and a drive towards privilege equal to your own. For white people, it's an individual reparation on your part. It is not an act of kindness, or benevolence, or a transaction that must be repaid in kind. The worst of us deserve the same rights the worst of you already have. That's the meaning of equality. If you're willing to let us get fired, deported, or brutally murdered for bad behaviour, then not only were you never an ally, you were also just waiting for the opportunity to use that weapon you claim you never wanted. There is no justice in an asymmetry of power.