#the western culture that steals from us time and time again without giving back? the african american culture that is still

[biprotagz]

ive gotta read more Black thought books bc. my brain won't stop thinking about the cultural condition (detachment, alienation) of the african american.

[demeterdefence]

Thinking about your "Rachel bashing og greek myths" post, methinks she believed herself to be making greek culture a favor similarly to the author of The Phantom of Manhattan, the unofficial sequel to The Phantom of the Opera

In the preface, the author begins by saying that Phantom, unlike Frankenstein or Dracula, barely made a dent in world culture until Andrew Lloyd Webber came along to make the musical, which he considers the "true" version even tho like...it wouldn't exist without the novel! He bashes Gaston Leroux and basically states that his attempt at writing failed miserably and it's like DUDE, again, the musical and your problematic sequel wouldn't even exist without it, and just because it was bigger in France than in the usa it doesn't mean it had zero impact in culture

But of COURSE unless it's usa-approved then it doesn't count and isn't worth anything *sarcasm*

PHENOMENAL point, FANTASTIC point, absolutely true and correct

i can't be a total dick and say this is an issue solely created and implemented by rachel, because we've seen non-western cultures and religions absolutely whitewashed to hell and back - like, people have been drawing jesus of the bible as white for centuries when he was a middle eastern palestinian jewish man, and good god look what the west has done to the religions of india, china, and japan. but it's the way these kinds of stories drip with a sort of smugness in removing the original culture, in depicting it as backwards and broken.

rachel wants to claim she's making a feminist retelling, but the original myth was already feminist. ancient greece didn't pretend their society was not fiercely male dominated and patriarchal, and hades stealing persephone was absolutely in line with the traditional myths - the twist is that demeter wins. demeter punishes the male gods who stole her daughter, and the ferocity of her rage and grief forces hades and zeus to give in. if persephone hadn't eaten the pomegrante seeds, she wouldn't be in the underworld at all! this is a story that is so clearly a triumph for the mothers and daughters of ancient greece, of many worlds over, because it depicted explicitly that a mother's love was more powerful than even the gods. and rachel pisses all over that.

literally even going beyond that, looking at the society that is olympus and the underworld - all the technology they use, all the innovations they have. who exactly is making these??? where exactly is the material coming from??? you can handwave away most of the inventions by saying it's magic, but we've seen demeter talk about algebra, which was invented in the ninth century by a muslim scholar from persia. in speedrunning to this so called perfect modernized world, rachel actually erases the cultural offerings and developments of dozens of other ancient worlds, and kind of just gives the credit to the underworld, which is run by a slave driver.

persephone constantly bemoans the dullness of the mortal realm, and prefers to literally lounge around doing nothing, when the mortal realm is inventing the olympic games, the democratic forum, FOOTBALL. you have thousands of things to show the gods involved in - largely because the gods were the patrons!!! why do we never see zeus looking over the olympic games??? they happen in his sanctuary!!!

like the disdain rachel has for ancient greece is insane. she can't even bother to research the food typical of the time period, seeing as she writes persephone being looked down on for being vegetarian when vegetables were a key and staple diet of ancient greece. one could argue that a vast majority of ancient greece were vegetarian by general habit. she's baking cheesecake and french desserts and having fast food and carrot cake and maybe - maybe - she'll mention baklava. the ancient greeks are FAMOUS for their art, but we sure wouldn't know that from lore olympus. the only character who even references ancient greek music is apollo, with his lyre, and that's not exactly a ringing endorsement.

and this is not to say that an adaption has to follow the ancient text to a t - that's just not feasible and no one is expected to do so. but there's really something to how rachel does dismiss or ignore the canonical importance of so many of these stories to replace them with a western interpretation. even the therapy speak is grating. in episode 227, when persephone is talking about the concept of virginity, she's absolutely correct in pointing out how that's largely a social construct - but in light of the world she lives in and the world she helps control, the same idea could have been reached through means other than americanized psych talk.

so often, people will look back at the ancient world and think we are morally superior because we do not have the same views, or we have seemingly "developed." that is a view i abhor, because it removes the very act of learning and developing and understanding. rachel really talked big about how removing the incest of ancient greece made the story better, but incidentally, she managed to also take out the feminism, and literally the entire lgbt culture of ancient greece. apollo was even considered the patron of homosexuality! he was called to bless same-sex unions! zeus had DOZENS of male lovers; ares, hephestus, and hermes had known male relationships, and several of the ancient heroes and gods of greek mythology were described in terms we would refer to as transgender in modern times.

if rachel had gone "i'm writing a love story that's originally inspired by the myth of persephone and hades but it's very much modern and removed from the myths" that would be one thing, and i would not be bristling at that; myths have inspired countless stories over the centuries and will continue to do so for centuries to come. the problem is rachel wants to claim a rooting in these myths with zero understanding of how they work or why they work, and absolutely lets her contempt for the ancients shine through in every single aspect of her comic. it's gross and it's petty and she deserves none of the self-appointed "mythology expert" she's given herself.

[greatwesternway]

The Great Western Way

Duck found "City of Truro" at the coaling stage.

"May I talk to you?" he asked shyly.

"Of course," smiled the famous engine. "I see you are one of Us."

"I try to teach them Our ways," said Duck modestly.

What is the Great Western Way precisely? We know it includes the polar opposite of the Wrong Way. However, that a whole separate character was created whose entire shtick is telling other engines to "do it right", we can assume that the Great Western Way is distinct from this alone. When Great Westerns speak amongst themselves, they recognize a collection of Ways, but neither the books nor the series ever give details. Nonetheless, we can make some extrapolations from what information their behavior.

Great Westerns do their work without Fuss.

This was expressly stated by Duck in "Duck Takes Charge". In the plainest sense, it means GW engines do not complain about, argue with, or shirk orders. In a broader sense, it may also mean that GW engines do not let interpersonal problems get in the way of work.

2. Great Westerns are not ordered about by other engines.

Duck also states this specifically. A considerable amount of Fuss is probably cut off at the pass by all engines, big and small, being created equal as far as chain of command goes on the GWR. No engine ever has authority over another.

Just a further assumption too, but if the the culture of the GWR includes this concept, it is probably because it relates to the fact that all jobs are important and necessary on the railway. It's also why you'll likely never see a GW engine complain about what jobs he's given.

3. Great Westerns observe chain of command.

Now here's the fun part! All engines are created equal, but not all rolling stock. Toad is also a GW, but he's a brake van. He refers to all engines with an honorific, implying a deference to authority. ("Implying" being the key word with Toad. He is obsequious to his engines at a base level, but is willing to put his brakes down if they're up to some bullshit.) Whether this is true of all GW brake vans is ??? (comparative brake van decorum is a whole other post) but there's further evidence that it might be.

In "Toad and the Whale", when Toad is singing in a way Duck does not like, Duck does not address Toad directly about it even though he sees Toad first. Instead, he takes his complaint to Oliver, who is pulling the train Toad is back-ending. It suggests that on the Great Western, issues with other engines' trains should be addressed engine to engine. One does not directly interfere with another engine's train.

4. Great Westerns address problems engine to engine.

When Duck and Percy make their stand on the points in front of the shed in "Duck Takes Charge", this was obviously Duck's idea. And at least in the book, Duck is clearly taking the lead which is why Hatt addresses him (in the TV show, Percy looks more forward since there's a turntable rather than points and only one of them can sit on it, but Duck is still the one asked to explain. However, when Duck speaks to Hatt, he repeatedly "begs pardon" and addresses Hatt as "Sir" three times in four sentences. He's nervous now. He did not anticipate Hatt coming down and getting involved. He thought this confrontation was just going to be between engines.

5. Great Westerns do not bring problems to their Controller.

"Did you say tell the Fat Controller?" ask Duck thoughtfully.

Even on a matter as important as that requiring the deputation, Duck would never have considered bringing a concern to Hatt directly. It simply isn't done on the Great Western. Of course, on the GWR they weren't scrapping perfectly nice engines either. He's thankfully not asked to do more than consider the possibility of asking Hatt to put it right since Gordon intervenes and assigns the task of actually doing it to Percy.

He also does not complain to Hatt when James steals the idea of using slip coaches. Hilariously too, when he and Percy go on strike in "Diesel Does It Again", he doesn't actually bring a complaint to Hatt then either; he waits for Hatt to come get it.

6. Great Westerns do not accuse other engines.

Moreover, a GW will not outright accuse another engine of wrongdoing to their Controller, even when given the opening to do so.

That's not to say they won't imply blame however.

"Certainly not Sir! No steam engine would be as mean as that."

"Of course! I used to pull them on the Great Western Railway... as I was telling James last night."

A GW will certainly point their Controller in the right direction, but to actually accuse another engine outright is too close to bringing a complaint. (And one might guess that Diesel picked up on this in "Dirty Work" because he uses that against Duck and Percy in "Diesel Does It Again": "Who's going to tell him, I wonder?")

It also counter-intuitively goes along with settling issues engine to engine to let the Controller determine on his own who the problem is rather than just tell him. If one did not explicitly lay blame at the wheels of another engine, having only given strict facts about the situation and naming no names, then one cannot be blamed when that engine gets found out.

7. Great Westerns close ranks.

Maybe part of the reason one never outright accuses another engine of being a problem is because when there is trouble, GWs expect to form a unified front. Cosa nostra and all. Toad states this outright in "Toad Stands By".

"I've a plan, Mr Douglas. May I stay here today and help him? We are both Great Western and must stand together."

Duck apparently objected to Toad's plan at first, but ultimately agreed to it - even going so far as to give Oliver advice about sanding the rails for better grip - because Great Westerns stick together.

And this is perhaps the most important of their Ways that Duck would want to bring to the NWR. All that other stuff ultimately works in service of the engines getting along and working towards a common goal of keeping that railway running efficiently. The other stuff never takes en masse, but the NWR does close ranks and form a unified front when it matters.

[faroreswinds]

Raphael only wants to protect his family. Unlike Ingrid and Caspar, he's happy progress is made. So for the benefit of the doubt, he doesn't think about the aftermath. He ain't the brightest, so he was just fighting for experience considering he's becoming a knight to provide his family. Hearing the execution is rough, considering he's a commoner, where people in charge makes those choices. Which makes Caspar more OOC, because of his gun-ho attitude. Then again, BE is poorly written cept for Lin

Shoot, Lysithea as well. She's speedrunning her time left in studies for the exact reasons like Raphael for her family. That said, the Empire messed her up, so Rhea's authority could intimidate her. I think it'd be interesting if the students saw Rhea as a person, not the Archbishop. Trying to keep peace is hard, when assholes like the Western Church and Moles screw up what's suppose to be a peaceful school life. But InSys don't care for character drama look at Egg's drawing of you (the teacher)

(“They died because of their culture!” but it was us who attacked them first and we basically didn’t even give them a chance to surrender. -you) ...So I'm going to push back on this here. Claude attacked but as he usually does, he generally tries to get people to retreat when they see they have no chance of winning. He does it multiple times. Claude wasn't going to chase down Felix and Rodrigue in this context. Margrave Gautier didn't know that but he really sacrificed himself for nothing here

Hmmmm, I’m not sure I agree. I don’t think Lysithea is intimidated by authority, despite her background. I am not a fan of speculation without behavioral evidence to back it up, and that claim is lacking in that department. Raphael I can somewhat see being a simple soul who doesn’t think about that kind of stuff, but.... Like, again, they openly announce the crimes of the Western Church and why they are being executed. 

Apparently, attempted assassination is too much for this medieval setting. And I find that silly. People have been executed for crimes since the dawn of man, and the crazy and horrific forms of punishment that have been dealt is insane. 

Have you ever seen some of the medieval punishments they have done, for even much more minor offenses than attempted murder? You could be punished for homosexual acts, being suspected of being a witch, for being the wrong religion, etc. 

Now it’s not like everyone was gung-ho about these punishments. There are records, as far back as 12th century, of people calling for reforms against such extreme punishments. But there was a time when hanging was an enjoyable spectacle, or the occasional beheading drew a crowd, eager for blood (especially for a truly hated person). 

As such, Foldan IS a medieval setting, and executions would have been a rather commonplace punishment. Perhaps not as insane as the real world (homosexuality is pretty acceptable in Foldan, and no one is executed for being the wrong religion), but regardless I highly doubt Rhea is the only one who called for the execution of wrongdoers in recent times. Dimitri himself executes his uncle in Hopes. Ionius had a bunch of people executed from Hrym. Etc. 

It’s pretty hard to believe that Rhea calling for the execution of assassins would be shocking. I guess you could say that maybe until that point, everyone viewed her as a sweet, gentle person, and that her being willing to put people to death is what was shocking. But they honestly seemed more bothered that these would-be assassins were just being killed at all. Especially when freaking bandits, who worst crimes could just be arguably stealing, are happily mowed down by the same crew. 

I don’t say any of this because I personally condone executions. But if you view this situation from the lens of someone from Foldan, it apparently seems that killing assassins is too much, but killing bandits is perfectly happy. And that just doesn't make any sense.

The scene was clearly not written with the actual characterization of the characters in mind. It was written to make the players go “oh yeah, Rhea IS scary!” because modern sensibilities condone executions as an acceptable form of punishment even less than past sensibilities. It is an inherently modern scene, for modern audiences. 

Claude attacked but as he usually does, he generally tries to get people to retreat when they see they have no chance of winning. He does it multiple times. Claude wasn't going to chase down Felix and Rodrigue in this context. Margrave Gautier didn't know that but he really sacrificed himself for nothing here

That is not an excuse, first of all. Claude’s first action was to attack to begin with- he never tried anything else. He didn’t even consider anything else. He just went “Yup, we are invading the Kingdom!” and that was that. 

We also don’t know what Claude was or wasn’t going to do with Felix or Rodrigue. He didn’t offer the same hand to them as he did to Ashe. He basically kicked down their door and demanded passage through their lands, straight for the capital. If he would have let Felix and Rodrigue escape, then by that logic Matthias wouldn’t have died in the battle. But Matthias did, because Felix and Rodrigue HAD to have their backs covered. It was that intense of a battle. 

Plus, Claude’s attitude of “it’s just war, bro” is not doing him any favors. He’s the aggressor. The Kingdom at this point in Hopes really was just trying to stay on its feet- it was not an aggressor, it did not start a war, and it was in the process of trying to curb corruption and pay for their crimes against Duscur. 

If Claude had tried all sort of paths first before invading, I might have a different opinion. But he didn’t. His first plan was attack, and his only plan was attack. He really is just Edelgard 2.0. 

[firespirited]

Here’s my review of Border 2018: the short story is available in the book: Let The Old Dreams Die and the movie is available on hulu and disney free and others at $4 - spoilers under the cut.

It’s a lovely story about Tina, a brilliant customs officer who can sense people’s emotions. She discovers that she’s not ugly and broken she’s just different. I recommend the story, it took me just over an hour to read, the movie is stunning too but has a secondary plot that undermines the core message. Tina’s story will resonate and ache with you if you’re deemed different or damaged, don’t fit western gender ideals... basically anyone who’s felt uncomfortable with eugenics talk because hey that could be you and people you love. Both the book and the film have graphic but tender sex scenes between unusual bodies and a bunch of the reviews seem to be more distressed by “uggos getting laid” than some really disturbing history that’s a lot like our own.

Tina is a troll, there are very few left: a genocide program in the 70s saw them placed in institutions or labs where they died, it’s been covered up and followed by cultural genocide as the few remaining trolls have been raised in adoptive or foster families, their tails cut off and told they are humans with a chromosomal disorder. Tina was raised by a father who would be considered loving if he hadn’t kept his daughter’s heritage from her and stood up for her. She would have known to avoid storms (a lightening strike left her badly hurt) and spend more time in nature which is where she’s healthiest and happiest.

She has a naf boyfriend that she keeps around for the company, they don’t have sex because they tried once and it hurt, she accidentally gave him licence to cheat when she secretly hoped he’d say “no: there will only be you”. He’s a bit of a freeloader but it’s not abusive and it gives her a sense of normalcy so she’s ok with this arrangement.

She gradually uncovers her identity and her family history as she meets a male troll called Vore who falls for her, he’s hiding something she can’t figure out and experiences her own new desires and some hidden anatomy. Both the book and the film end with her happy, living the life she wants to live and having something she’s long wanted.

Here’s the thing, Vore, as a male troll makes unfertilized embryos every few months and they die within a few days. These “eggs” can be moulded into looking like exact replicas of any given human baby. Vore who lives constantly on the run as he doesn’t fit in human society makes a living using his eggs to steal babies and sell them. This isn’t great obviously, but in the book there’s no malicious reason: he has no family, no community but it’s something he can do so he does it. At the end of the book, he’s never going to do it again.

So “humans have every reason to hate trolls because they’re baby snatchers” doesn’t work, Vore became a monster because he’s without any guidance or community, he gives it up because Tina shows him that humans aren’t all genocidal trash.

But big spoiler alert and sickening addition, in the movie, there’s child sexual abuse material being smuggled that Tina is investigating due to her work in customs. Vore knowingly sold a baby to a paedophile and stole babies because he’s getting revenge on the humans for his parents’ death and his abuse in care. This not only feeds the myth of the victim turned perpetrator (which is only backed by paedophiles’ dodgy testimony not any actual data btw), it also feeds the “minorities doing a reverse racism” revenge fantasies common among racists especially the benevolent/ignorant types that we have here in europe.

There is a HUGE difference between baby theft because you don’t know better and baby theft because you know how much it’ll hurt. Adding this not just anti-social but actively cruel dimension to Vore takes away from the horror of what was done to the trolls.

“1 minority bad guy doesn’t represent all” applies to real life where there are 100 others who would never, not a fantasy story where Vore is our sole other representative of the troll race, where Tina got a childhood without too much violence and is very kind and Vore's implied to be a product of cruelty. The subtlety given to the rest of the story falls apart for some shock value. It’s absurd. I am so mad: this story is undermined by this stupid addition.

There is a place for stories about how foster care and bigotry messes you up, how generational trauma echoes down the family line even as each generation does their best to do better by their kids. Border 2018 was NOT that place and the book knew how to keep Tina and her racial trauma front and centre.

The film does a very tactful job of showing terrible things: a graveyard with simple unmarked stones as a marker of the disrespect in death and horrible secrecy. The CSAM is people reacting to the light of a small screen and the sound of a baby crying. But it has no grace for Vore to be more than the angry retelling of horrific violence inflicted on his people and his “humans are worse and deserve worse” reasons. Tina is betrayed by her choice of lover in so many ways. This ends up being a trash retelling of an important story and makes Tina look like a chump.

Again, child molestation is not cyclical and it’s not because the perps have trauma. If you’re reading this and were hurt as a kid: the people who may have hurt you in childhood don’t have excuses and you don’t have to live in fear of being a bad adult yourself. Any media that plays into this myth is harmful to survivors and gives stupid ideas to the people around them. Some narratives stick in our culture like serial killers being smart instead of cops being biased and generally terrible at solving crime. You will hear stories about abuse within minority groups like it isn’t in all spheres of society: it’s a lie to make the majority think they’re good and they’re safe.

Full list of trigger warnings if you’d like to watch the movie (it helps to read the story and keep that as “the canon”) and know the extent of it. I’ve tagged a bunch of stuff i personally didn’t find disturbing because we’re all different.

You see, I sat in dread as this film is classified on wikipedia under “films about CSA” and instead got blindsided by the eugenics-genocide done to the trolls who look and sound like people I know and myself when i’m not verbal and unkempt. I kept flashing back to the canadian first nations residential schools, the covid ‘quality of life’ triage orders, the people I love who wouldn’t have been born if genetic testing had been around (my stance is complicated), the indigenous tribes of scandinavia who are more hairy with larger brows or monolids. It’s all very close and all very still sore.

9.20 a man has a SD card removed from his mouth, there’s some spittle and he makes gagging sounds. Dread about what’s on the card begins here.

28.50-30.30: Tina’s boyfriend gets into bed with her, attempts some grabbing, wants to have sex, she’s half asleep and unbothered, she straight up one arm throws him out of bed onto the floor where he whinges. Make sure to tune back in at minute 31 for the disney princess magic.

46.00-46.30: male troll has his version of a period, an embryo birthing, there’s screaming. {I wish I could go out in the woods for my periods and scream it out in 30 seconds}.

49.36-50.30 CSAM investigation, a small camera screen is seen reflected on a man’s face as a baby is heard crying in the video. This happens again in the interrogation room.

57-1.00 make out and consensual sex with unusual bodies and loud growling. they cry during sex and there’s a lot of tongue kissing. She has an ovipositor looking appendage she’s never seen before but they aren’t human so i’m uncomfortable labelling anything. They’re both happy in their gender which is why I’ve used male and female pronouns.

There is happy naked running in the woods and bathing, not going to bother with time stamps for that if you’re offended by non skinny happy bodies that’s a you problem, please never visit the swimming pool or art museums. They also eat insects as part of their diet, this happens several times and it’s not meant to be gross.

1.05.20-1.07 Vore does his “humans should fear us” vengeance and recounts his parents’ and his pain, Tina talks about catching paedophiles who seemed very ordinary people. His childhood pain feels cheapened by this flattening: humans were bad to trolls but just in case that wasn’t upsetting enough, humans suck because they’ll hurt their own human children /s.

1.09-1.10.20 Tina’s dad is playing up his dementia to avoid questions and Tina feels the weight of her grief.

1.17-1.17.35 close up on the squishy unfertilized embryo

1.19.25 man is grabbed out of police car and 3 punched (literally) to death barely off-screen culminating in 1.19.33-39 close up on a dead man’s fresh head wound and 1.19.56 dead body and blood pool seen at a slight distance

1.21 More Vore explaining why humans are pervs

1.22 feeding the not!embryo

1.23-1.24.30 “they took us, I take their children” Tina’s sense of betrayal is agonizing to watch.

1.26.10 the neighbours’ baby is sick and dying, we know it’s not a baby. He didn’t love her enough to stop his crusade.

1.34-36 Tina finds out her true name and her parents’ graveyard, there is joy and grief and power and pain all intermingled. I’m putting this here so you can take a moment to breathe but it would be a disservice to skip it as intense as it may be.

There is a happy ending. Also a 3 wolf hoodie over a silky mint night gown is both terrible and fabulous fashion.

What I take from the film is the euphoria of self discovery and setting boundaries, the beautiful images of nature that’ll stick with me but I choose to believe in the original story.

[jinnie-forthe-winnie]

Partners

Taehyun fluff

Word count: 1.9k

Sana had taken her seat at the front of the class beside her best friends, Hyuna and May. Her friends handed her a snack they had been raving about all week from the vending machine.

Popping one of the cookie balls in her mouth she looks at the schedule on the board. It seemed as per usual, except there was a long work period in the part of the day.

“They are good,” Sana says, pleasing her friends with her answer.

“Well I guess this could be a new weekly treat for us!” May says stealing the snack bag from Sana, taking half the contents of the bag in her hand. Sana rolls her eyes and turns to her friend Hyuna who was doodling in her own world.

“Hey Earth To Hyuna!” Sana says, tapping her pen down near her page. She successfully gets her friends' attention.

“What project are we working on today?” Sana asks, worried she forgot one.

“Probably a new one, and looks like it is in pairs.” She says pointing to the numbers going down the chalkboard, 13, the exact split of the class.

“Damn it, I’m the one left out this time aren’t I?” Sana asks exasperated.

“Yes you are, sucks to suck doesn’t it Sana” May happily calls from her other side.

“Hey don’t use my sayings against me!” She cries back with a pouty face. May brings her hand up and pats her chin.

“I’m sorry my baby.” She says bringing a pout to her own face. Rolling her eyes she then slouches in her chair, upset over having to find a new partner.

It normally meant she would have to work with one of the dumb kids, or the super shy kids, which never made a good duo for her since she already was shy.

The only other people she would be willing to work with are Huening Kai and Taehyun. Although Taehyun is pushing it, due to her big fat crush on him. Huening Kai would definitely be the better of the two. But that wasn’t going to happen, the two were always a pair. The two are seen together all the time, probably due to them both being in a boy group.

The first half of the day goes by without any hitches. But now it is the the fourth quarter of the day Sana is getting nervous about her partner. She never normally liked working with other people, but she knew that it wasn’t an option in this class since the teacher was very strict about it.

Her friends trade places so Sana is on the far right, and May is in the middle. This allows the two to be first to pick. The teacher had always done the same picking process, starting from the first desk she moves like a snake asking for your partner. This is probably why most of the shy people sat in the very back left corner. If it weren’t for her friends Sana would be sitting with them too.

“Well students, I will explain the new project and then you will get all paired up.” The teacher says gaining the attention of the class. “You are to make a presentation about a pop culture icon, and explain the effects they had on their industry, their culture, and any ideas or causes they believe in. A full description and outline will be found online. This will be due next week on Friday.” She ends her speech and moves to the chalkboard, calling out the first student's name.

The project seems easy enough, there are plenty of options, and plenty that you knew a lot about. You had no idea who would be your partner so you planned on passing once it got to you.

“Hyuna and I are a pair,” May calls out after her name is called. The teacher writes their names and moves on to Huening Kai who sits directly behind you all along with Taehyun.

“Huening Kai?” The teacher yells out.

“Han and I are a pair,” he calls out to the teacher. Sana’s head spins around in confusion to Huening Kai, not taking the chance to look at Taehyun.

From beside Sana the two girls giggle trying not to look at her. “What’s so funny?” Sana asks, laying her down on her desk looking at her friends' faces.

“Nothing, just thank us later, and thank Huening as well.” Hyuna says winking at Sana.

“What are you talking about?” She asks, confused.

“Taehyun?” The teacher calls out. His face is red as he gets ready to reply.

“Ah I’m pairing up with Sana” he says, Sana head turns around this time going to Taehyun. His face was tomato red, which is the colour Sana’s would soon be.

“Your welcome” Hyuna and May say as Sana turns back and sets her head on the desk.

“I hate both of you” she says annoyed, yet almost thankful, not that she’d let her friends know that.

“You won’t be saying that when you start snogging next week” Hyuna replies quietly.

“Two things, I won’t be snogging him, and you need to stop reading Harry Potter, who says snogging!” Sana whisper yells over to her.

“Oh shove off” Hyuna says successfully making them all laugh.

Not even ten minutes later Sana is standing beside Taehyun in the hallway off to the library. Both silent as they walk together. As they enter the library Taehyun makes for the computers, but stops as he feels an arm grab his upper arm.

He softly turns to loon at her, her hand is pointing to a part of the library he’d never ventured. “It quiet back there and I have a laptop we can use instead” she says pulling his arm lightly towards the direction where she wants to go.

Normally that spot was occupied by the trio, but the other two had gone to another part of the library letting Sana know that it’s all for her and Tae. As they pass through shelves of books, he noticed they are in the historical fiction section. The one section that hardly ever gets used, except for history projects, but only when you have to have a book reference.

No one is in the aisles, Sana finds the back corner and let’s go of Taehyun. She sets her bag down, she grabs the shelf that is on wheels and moves it up. She moves her arm in a way that tells him to go inside. Behind the last tall book shelf there is a rather larger gap. There were cushions and some supplies obviously left by the trio from other projects.

“We found this spot two years ago, be glad you’re the fourth person in here.” She says sitting down on the cushion, pulling out her laptop.

“It’s nice back here” he says following along and sitting on a cushion.

“We’ve slowly been bringing things back here to make it better, we’re just trying not to get caught and have it cleared out.” Sana says looking at him.

“They should make this an actual book nook, it’s comforting” he says sliding the cushion over to beside her.

“Yeah that can happen after we graduate, for now this is our spot” she says to him, he smiles at her and holds her gaze. The two hold eye contact for a moment before they both realize what they are doing.

“Ah who would you like to the project on?” He asks her leaning back against the wall.

“Maybe Bangtan, most people will do Western Artists so maybe we can have a project no one else is doing” she says fiddling with her keyboard. “If that is alright with you” she asks meeting his gaze once again.

“Yeah, I could always see if I could ask them a few questions” he says.

“Oh yeah I forgot your from the same company” she says smiling. “How is your group doing right now any way?”

“We’re doing good, We are writing for our bee comeback for next year.” He says with a smile on his face. “I’ll give you a hint on one song, you know new rules?” She nods her head eagerly, “ well I suppose I wrote a sequel to it.” He smiles when he sees her clap her hands in excitement.

“So it’s either, old rules, more rules, broken rules or maybe no rules!” She says happily, “you know new rules is by far my favourite song of yours right?” He nods, though he doesn’t tell her he wanted to make the song for her, since he had always heard her singing it around the school.

By the start of the week they were both done the project, they were just waiting on Bts to send them a blurb for their presentation. Now that they were done they spent the work periods in the nook alone. Often times talking about his group and your dreams.

He couldn’t help his feelings for Sana as she told him about why she wanted to be a teacher. She looked so happy talking about it, which made the smile grow on his face. Their moods seems to be based solely on the others mood.

As Sana finished her story she noticed his genuine smile on his face looking at her. This made her blush and turn away looking at the bookshelf in front of them.

“Why are you looking at me like that?” She asks him without looking at him.

It is now his turn to blush, “i think its sweet how passionate you are about it, it makes me smile” he says putting his hand on her knee.

This makes her turn back to him, her eyes meet his. They both slowly start leaning in without thinking. As they close in her eyes flutter closed as she waits for impact. He takes this as a chance to move his body to get a better angle, his right arm is holding him against the wall, his left hand going to the back of her head.

Their lips hardly touch, for a couple seconds they hover over each others lips. Gaining confidence Taehyun moves his face forward enough for your lips to be fully planted against each other.

Slowly their lips move together into a kiss, an awkward one since both of them have a big smile on their face. Once their smiles tame down they continue softly kissing in the back of the library.

Breaking apart they look each other in the eyes, Sana breaks into a fit giggles seeing his silly smile on his face.

“I know I should take you out dates before I ask you this, but would you like to be my girlfriend?” He asks moving his hand from the back of her head and down to her cheek.

She nods and moves in to peck his lips, holding it for a moment before moving back. “Yes, I’d like to be your girlfriend Tae” she says putting her head onto his shoulder. His head moves and rests on hers.

“Oh my god they were snogging May!” Hyuna’s voice comes from the other side of the bookshelf. Huening Kai, Hyuna, and May, all pop up from the ground and move to the moveable shelf, peering over to see the two. The couple blushes, she hides her face in his chest as he puts his face into her hair.

“They’re so cute!” They all say high fiving each other.

[booksrocci]

Smith

 

 

 

Donald Rocci

 

 

 

Chapter 1

They came in the night and were only visible by the small light of their ignited torches, sparking fear within the city that fueled the fires of the unknown destruction that was to come. Their dark and ubiquitous military slithered out of the mountainous hills, ghostly specters within the moonlight hungry for living flesh. They marched in perfect formation to their orders as each creature held off whatever eagerness it felt for the charge, waiting until the first glimpse of any weakness in our defenses revealed itself so they could begin with their grisly duty. They had made no demands upon us thus far so the only thing left was plunder, they wanted our riches, our woman, and our lives, there is no other meaning for their arrival.

I had seen many such armies that would try to steal the wealth of the kingdom that lay behind me, but the wall always held. Impenetrable it was said, and for good reason for many have tried, but their remnants still laid in the fields on which this force stood with their denial in their minds and their souls wandering lost in the abyss. But the wall still faced this test of time, as strong as it had for centuries, tall and unmolested in the dry cold air, leaving us as a city that could not be taken easily by any army who dared to attempt the feat.

This army was somewhat different in its overall design and skill. Even in the pale light the figures looked less than human and almost animalistic. Their leather armor, tattered and sewed together, hung off their muscular bodies that seemed stooped, almost hunched, as they walked from post to post. Dark black skin withheld any features in the night and they were massively sized, even larger than the German hordes that was ever present upon the Rhine frontier. The way their faces looked in the torchlight that showed them as they spoke made it seem as that they were snorting rather than using words to communicate. I wasn't sure who they were or where they had come from, but it didn't matter, I knew they were going to whatever afterlife their belief had determined to exist.

I scanned the defenders of the realm looking for my sons and found their armor shining like stars brighter in the sky than all the others. I let a small smile slip from my stern face but quickly stifled its existence from the earth. As a smithy I was one of the best in the empire, I knew they would not have to fret and wonder about their armor giving away in the heat of any battle. It would last longer than anyone else's within the province and would most certainly would not fail here. My pride welled in my chest as dreams swept through my head of rewards and praise from the peers in my craft. These grandiose thoughts took me away to far off places of glory and riches, the battle before me was but a distant memory. I snapped myself back to the present and the reality at hand, I must remain in the moment, only fools dream of future greatness to bitter ends in the present.

Three sons I had, all heads of their own divisions armed to the teeth with my designs. I had raised them to be leaders not to be lead and they did me proud whenever I saw them and their men marching in formation. Top of their arts in battle logic, archery, and swordcraft. My three were the best this city produced in years or at least they we're never last. As my thoughts drifted toward my third boy and his independent nature I let off another small smile, he was frustrating to say the least.

Could be that I lost one or maybe two today, that is the wages of battle and war. But they would go down heroes who defended their kingdom and others would tell tales of their deeds in the small fires of the night. My pride swelled yet again as more visions of glory sprung forth in the fields of the summers mind. Followed by a solemn sadness, for I knew my wife would be devastated. Their was no way to heal the wound of a child lost, time can only take away so much, but some pain lingers through the scars of love.

But what options did we have, the coming of this army has been foretold for weeks. Evacuees had been coming as their cities, towns, and villages were taken, and stories of savagery and slaughter traveled with them. The kingdom would open its doors, help who it could, feeding and housing most of them, the others we did what we must do in these times but disease is just as terrible as any army. I thought upon the family we had sheltered, telling their tale of horror that befell them while shivering with traumatic memories that even the warm fire could not release. Creatures that I had only heard of in myths were described with frightening details, but I left those notions to simple folk who have never seen other cultures or people of different lands making up stories to explain that which was misunderstood. As I sat and listened to their terrible tales my skin brushed up with bumps and fear filled my treacherous heart. Looking at my wife I saw the despair and trepidation appear in the darkness of her eyes, I had to be strong and still the terrors in the night that would consume dreams. As the refugees left heading towards the east and the great sea hoping for something better. I told my wife and daughters that we will not flee to a safer place. "Our kingdom needs us." I would say as she cried and begged for us to leave, but I held firm, we would not be marked as cowards to be ridiculed.

Some in the kingdom chose to go find them and do small attacks, hoping to at least slow them down and make them think twice. I wanted to wait, I had made swords and armor by the dozens and my men were hard at work all the way to the last day till they arrived. The summer was ending and the cool autumn air rolled in from the east as the massive army slithered in from the western plains.

We had poisoned the wells and harvested all the crops leaving burnt earth behind before we shut the gates. They would die, they always did, from starvation or thirst and would leave in a few months time. This kingdom was well schooled in sieges, as our history was filled with them. But they did not have me before to arm the soldiers, and I was the best in the land. As I watched from the battlements of the wall my pride grew renewed within me, almost every soldier was equipped with my armor or sword. They knew who made it and they trusted my equipment, it would not fail, I was simply the best.

I looked again at the western horizon and thought I saw something flying in the distance. Death was ever present in the air and maybe the ghosts of battles past grew restless with the thoughts of fresh blood to feast upon. It was the way of it I thought to myself. Such as it was from the beginning of time till the end of the earth. A sigh escaped my lips as I brought the chalice of wine to my tongue and turned the bitter liquid within my mouth. Swirling the cup in my hand I swallowed the grapes gift and let it take effect.

It was still in me to be nervous, days of battle were long past and I made a comfortable living as a smith which made my family one of the most richest and respected in the kingdom. Yet still the unease of it all filled me, as the horrific stories still clung to my memory like a bad dream. I cast the thoughts of fear and doubt aside with a laugh.

"No one will breach the gate." I murmured.

"What?" said the sentinel to my right as his armor plate reflected the torchlight beside him. I looked into his frightened blue eyes and saw the stories lying behind the watchful stare. He wore the same cloak of the guard that all the sentinels wore, brazen red with gold outlines cascaded down his back. A black crest held the family house he belonged to. That was the only difference in each mans outfit within the guard. Above that was the seal of the kingdom, bright blue as the sky with a golden eagle shining within. The armor was one of my finest, hemmed with steel and inlaid again with the seal of the kingdom etched into the metal.

"I said they will not breach the gate."

He nodded his approval and stared hard at the siege line searching them for trouble.  They had not moved, no action was taking place even their cavalry lay dormant, every now and then a nervous whine from one of the horses below would echo of the wall but nothing else really pierced the silence. They just sat there and watched stone faced waiting, and that was when I realized what was so odd about the situation. No movement to place and wind the siege engines, no planning being done to breach the wall, no ladders being towed to climb. Nothing they just stayed there staring at the massive wall with neither fear or courage. Strange, how did they expect to succeed where so many others had failed. Surely this was not the armies that the refugees feared and storied with dark ends. Some other mass must have assembled or they were waiting for more forces to arrive, perhaps that was the reasons behind the hesitation.

I could feel the eagerness of the soldiers below me and caught a movement in the western sky again. What was there a storm coming in from that direction, unlikely but stranger things have happened. The sea hardly ever gave birth to rain at this time of year. Maybe a sudden storm or some random wind tempest driven by the spirits of the past. How fortunate that would be if this enemy would be blinded before the fighting began, attacked without us even having to draw a sword. I smiled warmly at the image of the besiegers flailing around in the storm only to be destroyed later by our seasoned troops. This would be over before it began.

A fresh thought of my wife filled my mind, I would be home soon, enjoying the fire and warmth of family as I told tales of the battle. Let the terrain take its victims again, there will be no fear here to be sowed and be reaped by soulless men. The fight would come and the victory would be sweet, won on the blades of righteous men of the realm. Of this fact I had no doubt.

A wind started rising from the north which made no sense at all. The storm was to the east and the sea air in the west was still. Loud thrums of drums started to sound within the besiegers camp, with sounds of metal upon metal filling the nights air. They started forming into companies which timed with the drum beats, they were organized, I would give them that. Ominous as all this was I still let out a chuckle of how foolish they were. Fools led to their destruction, let them come and meet their demise upon our walls.

The cheering from the opposite camp grew intense and filled the night with noise. Then it came like a gale of wind indiscriminate of its purpose. I could barely understand what happened or why I was on the ground when I saw the results of the calamity. Clumsily I stood and saw the charred and melted men that were strewn and entangled everywhere on the ground beneath the stone wall. My face burned from the hell fire that seemed to be feasting on the mortar besides me where the sentinel once stood. Trying to shake off my confusion I searched for what had happened. Only to be knocked down again from the force of the wall obliterating itself where the main gate was placed.

In shock and awe I caught a glimpse of a beast as it turned and flew with wings so massive it blotted out the moon towards the west. It's job was done and we were relatively defenseless, the wall and most of its defenders had fallen in what seemed like an eternity but in actuality was mere minutes. The last men fought valiantly but were being overrun by the now seemingly massive army that was pouring into the city. I had but one thought left that could penetrate the haze and move my body into action, my wife and daughters.

[365days365movies]

March 13, 2021: Ugetsu Monogatari (1953) (Part One)

Submitted for the approval of the Midnight Society...

Ghost stories are fantastic. They’re an old hallmark of cultures across the world, in our everlasting attempt to understand what happens beyond the grave. Every civilization has their ghost stories, and their ways of telling it. The United Kingdom had Charles Dickens reading his classic A Christmas Carol on stage every Christmas, and that tradition has exploded into essentially a genre of holiday films.

The United States had my personal favorite ghost story written in book form, then adapted into various media. That story, taking bits of European and early colonial folklore, was Washington Irving’s The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. 

Ohhhhhhh yeah, that’s the good stuff. By the way, I use @adventurelandia​’s GIFs A LOT, and I feel like I never credit them in tags or anything, so, uh...yeah, THANK YOU, you’re a goddamn legend and I wish you the best in your Disney GIF-making endeavors. Check out their pages, they’ve got a lot.

Anyway, we’re talking about Japan in this case, and DEAR SHIT, their “ghost stories” have transcended far beyond that into just being a part of everyday folklore and belief for many people. But today’s movie isn’t just about ghost stories; it’s also about how these stories are told.

Jidaigeki (時代劇) are essentially period dramas, set around the Edo period, before the Meiji Resotration. In other words, we’re talking samurai warriors - with and without masters - roaming the land, kicking ass and taking names. And in the case of this movie, the time of the samurai is about to be overlaid by a more fantastical setting.

Based on a 1776 book by Ueda Akinari, Ugetsu AKA Ugetsu Monogatari AKA Tales of Ugetsu AKA The Tales of the Wave after the Rain Moon AKA Yeah, really, that’s a legit alternate name for this movie AKA How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Ghost is a ghost story set within the Edo period, making is a jidageki as well. This’ll be the first jidaigeki I’ve ever seen, but not the last. Goddamn, I can’t wait for Western month.

With that, shall we? SPOILERS AHEAD!!!

Recap (1/2)

The Criterion Collection logo brings us in, followed by your typical production logos, backed by the most Japanese music I’ve ever heard. That’s backed by that one guy that makes that one Japanese shouting noise, you know EXACTLY what I’m talking about, it’s a traditional stage kabuki thing.

We begin proper in a period of civil war, on the shores of Lake Biwa in the Omi Province in the late 1500s. A pottery maker, Genjūrō (Masayuki Mori) is set to leave his wife Miyagi (Kinuyo Tanaka) and their child Genichi (Ichisaburo Sawamura) to sell his wares in a nearby city, Ōmizo. He’s accompanied by Tōbei (Eitaro Ozawa), a dreamer and wannabe samurai who’s getting berated by his wife as he leaves.

While he’s gone, the Village Chief (Ryōsuke Kagawa ) comes to warn Miyagi about a possible attack on the village, and is upset about the fact that he’s left at such a turbulent time in order to seek profit. However, Genjūrō soon returns with a sizeable amount of money for his work, to his and his wife’s delight. They use the money to get food and new clothes, including a kimono for Miyagi. But Miyagi, ever in love with her husband, asks him not to be too greedy in seeking money, thinking of what the chief said.

Tōbei, in contrast, isn’t accepted as a samurai-in-training, and is mocked for lacking a sword and armor (which he doesn’t have the money to buy). He soon stumbles home to his wife, beaten and ashamed. He comes back to work with  Genjūrō, who ignores his wife’s wishes and goes fuckin’ HAM on the pottery. This upsets Miyagi, who claims that the hunger for money has changed her once calm and sweet husband, and turns him bitter and irritable.

However, this is about to stop mattering, as the men of the enemy general Shibata Katsuie has come to the village to take the belongings of the villagers, and to take their men for forced labor. Despite forcing his wife to hep save his pottery, the family escapes, along with Tōbei and his wife, Ohama (Mitsuko Mito). Tōbei is a bit held up, though, as he tries to steal armor from one of the soldiers. Nice.

Genjūrō, despite the ardent objection of his wife, goes back to his still running kiln to obtain more of his pottery. However, the fire’s gone out when he gets there, and he and his wife are forced to hide when the soldiers come to search their house for belongings. Once again, they escae detection from the soldiers, and Genjūrō discovers that his pottery has been fully baked in the process. With the help of Tōbei and Ohama, the group grab the pots and makes it to the shore of Lake Biwa, where they go to escape from Shibata’s army. They steer their boat along the foggy lake.

While rowing, the men speak of their soon to be gotten fortunes in the city But then, they encounter a seemingly abandoned boat, eerily breaking through the mists. It belongs to a Boatsman (Ichirō Amano), who warns them of pirates on the lake, who ambushed him as he was going to sell their wares. They give him water, but he dies immediately after giving his warning.

With this bad omen, the men decide to send their wives and Genichi back to shore, as they continue towards the city to sell the pottery. However, Ohama refuses to stay behind, and only Miyagi and Genichi remain behind on the shore, as the other three continue onwards to the city.

At the market, Genjūrō is indeed successful, as the trio sells all of their wares to passerby. One of these customers is a shrouded woman, Lady Wakasa (Machiko Kyō), attended by a handsmaiden, Ukon (Kikue Mōri). She buys a LOT of wares, and instructs them to bring the pots to a large manor later that day. He agrees, and this definitely won’t result in spooky happenings.

Tōbei, on the other hand, realizes that he can now use his shar of the money to buy armor for himself. While Ohama tries to stop him, he runs off and does just that, buying armor and a spear for himself. Ohama loses him in the crowd, and comes to sit on a beach. There, she’s found by a group of samurai, and...well...samurai aren’t necessarily good people. Afterwards, the broken Ohama rightfully curses her husband for his selfishness.

Genjūrō, successful after the day’s sales, goes to look at a kimono salesman, and daydreams about giving all of these kimonos to his wife. This daydream is interrupted by Ukon, who has come to take Genjūrō to the manor. Said manor is abandoned, run-down, and DEFINITELY NOT HAUNTED AT ALL. Genjūrō, lacks common ghost sense, accompanies them to the creepy-ass manor.

However, not all of the manor appears rundown, as Genjūrō is guided to Lady Wakasa, in an intact portion of the manor. As the sun sets, handmaidens at the manor light candles throughout the manor, suddenly making it brighter and less rundown in appearance. As Genjūrō looks on, Lady Wakasa comes in to give him further praise for his pottery.

Genjūrō is deeply honored by the lady’s praise, as they drink from his cups together. She continues to praise his talent, and tells him that he must deepen and enrich his gift...by marrying her at once. And it’s at this point that Genjūrō starts to realize that something is...off. See, Wakasa’s SUPER fuckin’ into him, and she looks at him with those DEFINITELY-NOT-A-GHOST-LADY-EYES

Genjūrō, absolutely not to his credit, doesn’t say FUCK NO to this, in order not to upset her, even as she literally collapses on top of him. He continues to be attended on by her handmaidens, and she performs a traditional dance for him. The song she sings states:

The finest silk of choicest hue May change and fade away As would my life beloved one If thou wouldst prove untrue Our vow to love for a thousand years Is sealed with this cup.

And then, after that song and dance, the voice of her dead dad starts moaning from a samurai mask in the corner. You know, NORMAL NON SCARY-AS-SHIT SCARY ASS SHIT

Um...halfway point? See you in Part Two!

[kinetic-elaboration]

October 30: 1x21 The Return of the Archons

Took a break from Halloween-ing to watch TOS with my mom. Today’s ep, the rather lackluster Return of the Archons.

A very in media res beginning! Unsurprisingly since a lot of the drama of this episode hangs on the audience not knowing the whole story.

Sulu is looking damn fine. These weird outfits really do it for him.

Maybe O’Neill had the right idea in running instead of waiting for the transporter. (Or maybe not, seeing as we later find out they caught him too.)

Look at the heels on their boots lol. I always forget about that.

Today’s official adventure: looking for the missing ship Archon.

“Sulu’s mysterious condition requires that I, the Captain, collect all of the most important people on board the ship and beam down into a planet we already know to be full of dangers.”

“Materialization completed.” Uh good to know Kirk.

Why is Spock wearing that dramatic-ass cloak? (I know it’s because he needs a hood to cover his ears but he still looks very much not of a piece.)

Whereas McCoy looks like a down-home Georgia gentleman. He looks like he’s returned to his natural habitat.

I bet these are the sort of outfits AOS Kirk wished he was wearing when he was sighing wearily at his closet filled with uniforms.

I love that this planet is clearly the set of a Western. Or... Maybury. Or also Miri.

Not only did The 100 steal S3 from this episode, it also stole the Red Sun from it, didn’t it?

They keep saying they came for the festival and yet it is VERY clear they don’t know what the festival is. This disguise is not working.

It got dark damn fast. They’re outside, it’s almost 12--one would assume that’s 12 noon--and then they go inside, talk for about 3 minutes, go to another room, and it’s pitch black out!

Is this like The Purge? (I asked myself this while we were watching and--spoiler alert!--it is! The Purge was based, perhaps subconsciously, on this ep.)

Kirk looks very handsome in this ep. Like whoever directed it looks like he’s in love with him.

“Crewmen, here are your various assignments... Mr. Spock... come with me, somewhere private. To talk.”

Spock sleeping with his eyes open. (Meditating, my mom says.)

Oh look, it’s the secret police, in their brown robes.

Landru doesn’t seem too gentle lmao. “No dissent is allowed. You will be absorbed.” Randomly killing that guy who kinda said “maybe, uh, the festival...isn’t great??”

Kirk makes one comment about how everyone’s slow on the uptake here, and slow to respond to questions and denials, and Spock goes heart eyes. “Captain, how are you so smart and logical?”

“Fascinating, this is merely a hollow tube, Captain.” And uh I guess we’re never going to explain how that hollow tube kills people then?

They’re communing...

Love that Spock points out that the people are being communicated with through telepathy. Though... I remain sightly perplexed how the computer can do that. The next stage in Apple computing I guess.

Why isn’t Reger affected by all this? Like they imply that some people are spared the “festival” festivities because of their age, but that doesn’t seem to explain why he’s not “of the body.” Like being of the body isn’t a choice that people make, you’re ether absorbed or you’re not. They say later that he’s immune--but that in itself requires explanation. Like idk it seems a major plot hole that there can even be a resistance when the computer has controlled the society for thousands of years.

So I guess the backstory on the Archon ship is that they were all either absorbed or killed when they objected to the computer and its creepiness.

I do think the little hints that the society used to be way more advanced are intriguing.

“What should we do about this body that’s going to act as a tracking beacon right to us?” / “Uh, knock him out again.”

This planet is so peaceful.. no war or crime... except for people occasionally beating and raping each other nbd.

Was that Starfleet Officer really just going to shoot that projection? Not the best and the brightest being recruited nowadays I guess.

“The creature called Landru.”

“Enough analysis.” Spock always wants to talk through the whole backstory of the weird situations they’re in, while Kirk is a man of action!

Bones is really not being used to full capacity in this ep. He’s just kinda there in the background, until he’s absorbed.

Spock is very concerned about what will happen to the Captain, but also kind of... skeptical about this whole thing. For someone in control of his emotions he exhibits a lot of emotions imo.

“Happy communing!” Just gonna say this all the time now.

Time for another mind meld. So casual about it now.

Spock’s face during Kirk’s Landru-imitating speech is HILARIOUS. That eyebrow! The eye roll! I really think he’s amused by all of this.

He’s not very good at pretending to be absorbed. He sees Jim and he’s immediately like “Captain...!” all normal like.

“The peace of the factory, the tranquility of the machine.”

“You’re thinking the same thing I am. Mr. Spock... I love you.”

It’s pretty awesome that the same ep that introduces the Prime Directive also immediately finds Kirk forming loopholes in it. “We’re not supposed to interfere.... in living, growing cultures, which this isn’t! Moral conundrum solved.”

Spock actually straight up punched a man in the face lol.

Interesting that the communicators work like that--Spock is talking to the Enterprise on his, and Kirk just slides into the conversation on his device, without Spock abandoning his call. I think because they became cell phones irl that I think of them as cells but they’re not. It’s just weird to see them casually used in these totally bonkers ways.

Lol he returned them to a simpler, easier time. I guess you could say Landru made Beta III great again.

So Reger had second thoughts about actually destroying Supreme Leader once it got too real?

Interesting how Landru’s lair is so much more sci-fi-y in aesthetic than the town. Another hint of what the society used to look like.

Spock without the cloak. Damn son.

“We do not intend to die.” That’s a good attitude.

Revealing the Wizard behind the curtain...

“The whole society is a machine’s concept of perfection.”

A man programming himself into an all knowing machine that lives forever really does remind me of Becca and ALIE except with a 60s aesthetic--a large, physical computer rather than an AI.

“The good of the body is the Prime Directive.” Tbh I feel like what this whole ep is saying is that sometimes Prime Directives need to be bent if the reality of the situation doesn’t square with the spirit of the directive.

I love when Kirk destroys computers using Extreme Logic.

That should be a presidential debate question "What have you done to do justice to the full potential of every individual of the body?"

“Well, now that that’s done, we’re going to go. Have fun rebuilding your entire society from nothing. We’ll leave you a single sociologist to help out.”

So Mr. Sulu is back to normal, and he immediately returns to the bridge to give a little, goofy sitcom smile-and-shrug and kick some random extra outta his chair.

Why do they assume Landru was a good guy lol? I mean he solved their extreme violence problem but he instituted a plenty of other problems instead. Also he was clearly a megalomaniac.

This society’s backstory sounds an awful lot like pre-reform Vulcan. Maybe they should just send a Vulcan to teach them Surak’s ways.

Honestly they were left alone for like an hour and had a handful of fist fights. I think they really were a very violent people! Maybe destroying the dictator-computer was a bad idea!

I find it very odd that the whole festival thing was never actually explained. I guess it must have been a purge idea--that because they are so naturally violent and terrible aliens, they need to let off that steam in some way every now and again, and they do this through a “festival” of no-holds-barred violence. Still kinda wish they’d explicitly circled back on that in some way though.

I think the most interesting part of this episode was the planet’s back story. Kirk acts in the end as if they were basically human, but they’re not. Also, I got the impression that Landru convinced people to follow him first, and then only when he died, set himself up as an eternal God/Computer. So he must have been a very interesting, charismatic person. And that one of his ideas was to return to a “simpler time” in everything from dress to architecture, as if that had any real correlation with levels of violence is... fascinating. Was that the hook that he hung his reform on?

Overall, as I said, not a super strong S1 episode, but not bad at all. Next week is Space Seed, a classic episode that unfortunately was absolutely wrung dry by too many repeats over the course of the franchise. (...Yes I am referring specifically to STID obviously.) Still that shouldn’t take away from the brilliance of the original!

[transfemininomenon]

Hey, i'm actually a "truscum" i found out recently, but im a little confused on the whole ordeal. Im not even sure if i actually am truscum or not- because some posts seem to tie up with me being one but others dont, but i saw you were really against them, so i wanted to ask if you're okay with a friendly calm conversation about it? I am very confused and i just want to learn a bit more or find out if i'm wrong about the whole ordeal. Are you open to it?

i'll be honest im not sure how friendly i can be with this kind of conversation because i really truly genuinely, and i don't use this word lightly, Hate truscum and its hard for me to really be civil about the discussion. but for the sake of this and me giving you a lot of benefit of the doubt that this ask is in good faith i'll explain why i do not like the entire truscum ideology

1. i guess i'll start off with the Big One - the claim that dysphoria is Required to be trans. i'll preface this by saying that i am someone who has experienced, and currently Experiences in wildly different degrees depending on what is happening in my life, dysphoria throughout my entire life. i had my entire teenage and young adult years stolen from me by it. i won't get into details about it because that is a Very Very Personal subject for me, but needless to say dysphoria is something that was a very prevalent part of my life.

anyway. the notion that dysphoria is a Trans Requirement™ is something that i hugely disagree with. i used to think that me figuring out i was a trans woman was because i experienced dysphoria, but frankly the opposite is true. dysphoria is what made me refuse to believe i was a woman or could ever be one. it made me believe i was a man and that was all i would ever be. it wasn't until i really started experimenting with my gender and unpacking a lot of stuff i felt about myself that i started to finally realize the woman i was. i first started trying our she/her pronouns nearing four years now, and started using the name Alice a few months after that. being referred to as a woman & experimenting with different feminine things gave me such incredible feelings of euphoria that i still experience to this day whenever i discover something new about my identity.

and that is something ive heard from SO many other trans people i know. or different things too - i know people who are completely fine with their bodies, just certain words and terms never felt Right to them. because the thing with dysphoria is that it, like all things gender related, is a product of society. dysphoria only exists because transphobia exists - people are told that there are these two rigid things that you are and HERE is what makes you one of those things, and those things are drilled into you literally since birth. everything from colors to jobs to hobbies to cars to entertainment to clothing to Literally Everything is gendered, and when that happens then of fucking course there are gonna be people who don't fall in line with that, and when it's so instilled into people and seen as such societal norms of COURSE people are going to have trouble with that.

and that's not even getting into the subject of gender on a biological level. the fact of the matter is that the two sex system Isn't True and that biological sex is very complicated. intersex people exist, people with all kinds of different chromosomes exist, people of certain body types that have higher levels of different hormones exist, SO much goes into that subject that frankly narrowing it down to two things just doesn't Work

and that's the real problem at the end of the day. dysphoria only exists because of a fucked up gender binary that clashes with both biology and sociology. people are complicated on both a biological and personal level and having set binaries for things is bound to cause confusion & doubt.

like, people's identities are SUCH personal things in so many different ways. there isn't any Right Way™ to be trans. i know trans women with beards, trans women who have no interest in starting hrt, trans men who wear dresses and makeup, non-binary people who make no effort to be androgynous, i know SO many different identities and different people. because the fact is that there's no right way to be trans because nothing is inherently gendered including people's very bodies. people are themselves and there is no Right way to be themselves.

that's on top of the lack of education when it comes to the subject of gender. such a huge part too of me figuring out i was trans was literally learning that it was even a fucking option. i genuinely didn't know just Being A Girl was an option. reading up on gender stuff and researching the different idea of transitioning was intrinsic in my figuring out who i was because oh shit turns out there are people like me and that is Okay.

like, dysphoria literally could've been a non-issue for me. i could've lived in a world where i could just Exist and enjoy whatever i wanted without it being weird. i could've decided so much sooner that i wasn't happy with the way my body was growing and not spent my entire teen years being so confused why i was so sad seeing my girl peers. i could have from the start just gotten to be a girl and never have had dysphoria be part of the equation.

im not trans being i experience dysphoria. im trans because being a woman is rad as hell and it's what i wanted. im trans because changing my name to Alice was the biggest moment of my entire life. im trans because rebelling against the societal restraints of gender is fucking metal. im trans because my friends can't even remember me ever not being me now. im trans because im a great older sister. im trans because god nerfed me and i said nah thanks man but im not feeling it.

my identity and my gender are very personal and complicated things, and narrowing it down to "i experience dysphoria" is frankly insulting to me.

anyway, that's the big point out of the way, so here's some shorter ones

2. this is kinda expanding on the last point, but truscum both insisting non-binary people aren't a thing and them insisting "transtrenders" exist is hmm Bad

the sheer fact of the matter is the concept of being non-binary has existed from the oldest known records of human history on TOP of that concept being prevalent in many different cultures so what do ya know there's a healthy dose of racism involved in the denial of non-binary people. the gender binary is such a western concept and there are SO many different cultures where different gender identities exist.

and, frankly, going back to the above point that gender is fucking Fake and is a societal concept - again, of fucking course there are going to be people who see a rigid set of rules on gender and are like "well wait that doesn't fit me" so of COURSE non-binary people exist

on the subject of "transtrenders" i feel like i shouldn't even HAVE to get into this subject because of how inherently transphobic it is. the concept doesn't exist. there are people who experiment with their gender and then decide their assigned one is fine. there are people who go through all kinds of different identities. there are people who come out as a different gender and then revert back due to backlash. there are people who get told the way they present their gender is the Wrong Way™ and get branded a trender. it's a dangerous thought process that literally does nothing but serve the cis status quo and make people afraid to experiment and think about their identities.

3. the idea that Those Evil Trenders™ are stealing resources from the Real Trans People™ is, frankly, fucking bullshit. issues when it comes to trans people finding difficulty accessing healthcare comes from a transphobic society hellbent on denying us care on top of fucked up healthcare systems in general. hormones aren't some limited quality hard to acquire thing - when i started hrt transferring my prescription from my clinic to my local pharmacy was a non-issue because it's something basically any pharmacy will have for ALL kinds of different purposes. it's an issue because healthcare in general is a god damn Mess on TOP of inherent transphobia

and, frankly, truscum are directly involved in that transphobia in the medical field. unless you find an informed consent clinic you're going to have to jump through all kinds of hoops to prove you're Actually Trans™ by getting referrals from other (almost always cis) people and then get put on ridiculous waitlists to make sure you're not about to change your mind. that kind of attitude is only encouraged by truscum and it is one of the biggest source of trans people having such difficulty accessing healthcare.

4. truscum as far as im concerned are no different than any other transphobe. two years ago before i started hrt i was harassed by truscum multiple times, each time having them tell me i wasn't trans, that i was just a trender, and it genuinely boggles my mind that anyone thinks misgendering me because i disagreed with their ideology is Woke, actually. I've seen so many fellow trans women getting called men by truscum who disagreed with them. i was actively told i shouldn't start hrt because i "wasn't really trans and was gonna ruin my life"

i really hope all of people live in anger every day knowing ive been on hrt over a year and a half and am fucking Thriving

anyway that's all i got to say on the matter i realize my points became less thought out as it went on but frankly the first point is enough for me to not like truscum

(please refrain from reblogging this i don't want any clowns in my inbox)

[dropintomanga]

On the Industry, Fans, and Piracy - My Feelings on Manga Today

This year has been quite an interesting one for anyone who’s involved in manga industry happenings with regards to piracy.

As most of you may know, an infamous manga app known as Mangarock was finally shut down this year after years of proliferating as a “legit” manga-reading app on the Apple and Google Play Stores. They finally got shut down when a Western comic artist found their work being distributed on the platform. While this was good news, there has been criticism about whether there were signs of subtle prejudice towards manga (since it’s a foreign medium) as it took a Western comic to bring things to attention.

There was also the news of Mangamura, a well-known Japanese raw scan site, and how the head honcho of the site got arrested in the Philippines this year and will face consequences for his actions. (Update: 12/21/2019 - Now Mangastream and Jaimini’s Box are out of the game with regards to scanlating popular titles)

While this is good news for people who love to support the manga industries in both Japan and overseas, things are still the same. The pirates will keep coming over and over again. I wonder when enough is enough or maybe I’m just tired of hearing the same old debate on legal vs. illegal manga.

I see multiple Twitter threads from pro-industry folks on why everyone should support buying manga. I also see threads on why manga publishers suck. They’re both right if you ask me.

Lately, I’ve been thinking about how this industry vs scanlators fight is similar to what I’ve been reading about in the mental health field recently - psychiatry vs. anti-psychiatry.

Psychiatry advocates believe that taking medicine is the best way to solve mental health problems and mental illness. They realize that things can happen in the human brain that lead to something worse. However, they think a lot of issues warrant medication when it may not be the best solution.

Anti-psychiatry advocates believes that medicine isn’t the best way to solve mental health problems and mental illness. They dislike how the mental health care system treats people with mental health problems. Yet they believe that “mental illness” doesn’t exist.

So throwing it back to manga -

The manga industry believes that supporting the industry involves purchasing their books at any costs. You buy the books, you support the mangaka drawing them. Yet the system that drives the industry is terrible. As we all know from Bakuman and tales from manga professionals, the system to become a successful mangaka involves often-poor working conditions in the form of long hours, strict deadlines, and a good amount of isolation.

Scanlators believe they are doing the manga industry a favor in providing free exposure to titles that would go undiscovered by fans. More often than not, scanlators do what they do without any care for profit. However, they tend to go a bit extreme with regards to translating certain text. Some scanlators also become a bit too egotistical for their own good and end up causing ridiculous drama among other scanlation groups over material they are technically stealing.

Tying this back all together with all regards to comparing psychiatry vs. anti-psychiatry and industry vs scanlators, there’s a third party being affected that’s ignored in both debates.

For the 1st war (psychiatry vs. anti-psychiatry), there’s not enough focus on the seriously mentally ill. The seriously mentally ill are the community suffering the most right now and present a great deal of harm to themselves and others. A 3rd party group that addresses them would utilize certain views and rejects certain views from the psychiatry and anti-psychiatry movements to help the seriously mentally ill. They are often forgotten as a lot of money goes to those whose mental health issues aren’t as bad on both sides. 

For the 2nd war (scanlations vs. legal manga), you can argue that there’s a huge crowd of fans that are willing to pay for manga as long as you give them almost everything on one platform a la Steam/Netflix at a very low price. That platform also needs to be easily accessible with little-to-no regional restrictions. There are so many fans in certain parts of the world that can’t purchase manga due to lack of access to bookstores/libraries or availability of them. I’ll put this in caps in case people don’t get it - THE WHOLE WORLD IS NOT THE UNITED STATES OR ANY OTHER NOTABLE AND PROLIFIC COUNTRY. I sometimes think certain fans that are able to buy manga forget how lucky they are.

A side note: While a huge step forward for legit digital manga, Viz’s Shonen Jump isn’t enough because not everyone likes shonen. All the other subscription services are fine, but everything’s kind of fragmented a bit compared to how Crunchyroll has almost everything anime-related (though they are going through a big streaming war that’s causing fragmentation as well).  Though to be honest, I think the scanlation community and the manga industry have to band together on one thing I think both sides can all agree on - it’s the relative value of manga compared to other forms of media in general.

To explain, I watched a video feature on the mangaka Shinichi Sakamoto, creator of Innocent and Innocent Rouge. Sakamoto goes into a discussion about manga’s value that really got me thinking. He talks about how manga is treated as “disposable” and how he tries to make his works worth keeping and remembering.

In the end of the video, Sakamoto says: “I feel manga is something that is read, then thrown away. For example, people would read a manga during their work commute and throw it away once they finish reading it. Or they would read a manga at a restaurant during lunch break. Then they would close it once the food is served and forget about it. I thought at first, manga was something that was read then thrown away. However recently, since I started to adopt my current style, I now want to make something that stays close to readers. Something that remains. It’s what currently motivates me to draw manga.

I ask myself what to do in order to make something that stays for a long time, using themes or opinions that they stay engraved in the minds of readers without being forgotten. I keep this in mind in order to leave something behind. It is what motivates me.”

The quality of manga made in Japan isn’t the best. The paper is comparable to toilet paper. If you ever browsed through a manga magazine in person, it feels like going through a super-thick newspaper. Compare that to overseas volumes of manga and it’s a world of difference. I’ll admit that publishers like Viz Media, Kodansha Comics, and Yen Press do a great job in making their printed manga high-quality albeit at a higher cost to fans.

Yet I realized that there’s a larger number of manga fans who don’t care about quality as long as what they want is accessible and cheap. That’s a big reason why scanlations have exploded and will continue to do so. Convenience is something that a lot of outside forces now push onto everyone. I frankly love print books, but I wonder what if the price of printed manga volumes reaches a certain point that makes me go “Yeah, I don’t think I can buy printed manga anymore.”

In the end of the day, even if you make it look pretty as hell and close to a luxury product, manga is still a “throw-away” item with little relative value to a lot of fans thanks to how it’s originally conceived in Japan combined with how internet culture takes advantage of what the meaning of “free stuff” is. Not everyone will find a sense of belonging with manga the same way that fans do.

There are certain folks that support purchasing manga that say things like “Wages need to be raised because they’ve stagnated” and when it comes to fans reading manga on an illegal site, their views sound like “You should buy no matter what” and/or “Just don’t buy.” I know there are those who will point to manga sales and they still aren’t exactly affordable to some fans. 20%-33% off titles with a high price point to begin with may not feel like a significant discount to someone who may not be a hardcore manga collector. Maybe it’s better to say, “You know what? Let’s just smash capitalism for ruining everyone’s lives” or better yet, “Let’s promote wage growth so that manga fans can actually purchase manga and manga artists can survive.”  

For now, let’s all be like Sakamoto and promote how valuable manga can be because appreciating the arts makes people better human beings than learning how to make a “efficient” website/software program look good for someone whose end goal is usually profit. The arts is what keeps people from turning into robots. Yes, this sounds like I’m saying “Let’s have the manga pirates keep doing what they’re doing then.” What I’m suggesting is that everyone from the top down (government, etc.) has to take charge in promotion of anything related to the arts (which manga and comics in general are a part of), not just the regular folks, as they appear to be all on-board the "let’s mindlessly consume/produce everything with ruthless efficiency” train.

I feel sympathetic towards anyone who works with on the American side of manga publishing (or anything that’s based in Japan) because Japan’s mentality on promoting their works overseas is awful. The Japanese want a level of control in how they want to be perceived outside of their own country. Compare that to a country like Korea (where K-Pop is now featured on major American TV networks), you can see how bad Japan is promoting their own brand of pop culture to the world. If you want an example, just look up Nintendo’s history of taking down anything overseas that looks to violate their principles of promoting their games.

I realize that I’m sounding like this Japanese manga creator who criticized publishers for how they handle piracy. Well, I dislike how manga publishers or professionals involved with the manga industry will shame fans for reading scanlations/raws. Almost everyone that reads scans/raws tends to be a fan of manga in general. A lot of them may not be unaware of the nature of scans (especially fans who meet mangaka in person and tell them they read them online). And even if they were aware, have you noticed how wages have stagnated for a lot of people across the world versus inflation?

Plus, how often do shame tactics work on people? They’re just as effective as most diversity training workshops hoping to change people’s bias on visible differences (spoiler alert: not very well). They never change anyone’s minds at all due to being short-term solutions that ignore the shamer’s role in perpetuating the problem. I realize changing minds takes a long time and requires a LOT of nuance (AKA not good for making immediate money), so it’s easy to focus on quick and fast.\

I also don’t like how scanlators disrespect localization efforts at times. I don’t like seeing multiple instances of swear words when most Japanese (or people in general) don’t talk like that in real life. Yes, some localization efforts are full of cringe. Appealing to a bigger array of new readers is important to having an industry thrive. Having just loyal customers isn’t enough.

Loyalty can only go so far. So many people don’t care about brands and/or will switch whenever it’s convenient to do so. There’s always a psychological disconnect between community and profit. That’s why you try to get as many new consumers as possible so they can become great word-of-mouth spokespeople for your stuff. Given how a good number of anime/manga fans stop consuming either medium after a certain age, replenishment of fans is an absolute necessity. I wish scanlators who frown at legit translators who bust their asses off to make manga accessible to a wider audience realize this.

There’s a final thing I want to address regarding the whole debate about scans and it was something I noticed at Anime NYC this year. So this year, Artists’ Alley and the Exhibit Hall were put right near each other on the same floor. In years past, they were separated via different floors or on different sections far away from one another in the same floor. I had a troubling thought and reading one convention recap reinforced it.

It’s the fact that Artists’ Alley is almost always fan works and the close proximity this time clashes with the Exhibit Hall vendors’ sale of official merchandise. There are anime industry members who dislike an arrangement like this with good reason. Bootlegs are a problem in an industry largely associated with piracy. Yet fans LOVE Artists’ Alley. Anime cons can’t just gut them to please industry folks. Supporting the fan artists at Artists’ Alley is a win-win for fans and con organizers. 

Also, some of the artists at Artists’ Alley I spoke to all read scanlations in some way, shape or form when discussing certain series. I have no damn desire to play moral police with those artists because I know they are lovable and messy people. Just enforce the golden rule - don’t be a dick in a public setting even if you have a good reason to because you will never change anyone’s views that way. 

I know some issues have to be made public, but go through proper channels first since I don’t want to see someone being labeled a mood killer without proper context in places that are supposed to be safe for fans.

Another thing - I have friends (both ‘20s and ‘30s) who work full-time jobs that read manga in not-so-legal sites. Some of them I’m very close with. I’m not ending friendships with them over the fact they may consume media differently. The one thing I can say is that even the best of the best will have questionable beliefs/do questionable things and all you can do is figure out what’s really important to you - their actions or the consequences of their actions. Don’t expect the people you idolize will think the same way you do in every thought you have. Everyone has their own closet of behaviors and thoughts that will always irk others.

So for anyone who’s confused on whose side I’m on, I’m on neither. I know the truth is a lot more complicated than what most people will tell me. I do want manga to thrive more overseas. It’s just that outside of Japan, regardless if you pay for or pirate a manga, there’s no appreciation for lifelong reading. Reading is treated as a pain than pleasure in the Western part of the world. Many anime fans are only tempted to read a manga because of how cool an anime adaptation of a certain series is or just from buzz. 

More than anything, I feel like there should be a bigger effort in promoting a sense of lifelong reading. I sometimes get jokes from corporate folks that I like to read and it’s depressing since libraries are always threatened by budget cuts. Reading books (fiction & non-fiction) has helped me processed a lot of things for my mental health. We got to do a better job in emphasizing that reading can be for fun and not just for achievement. Still, buy whatever manga you can for the artist’s sake if you really like the works (not for the publisher’s due to how I feel about capitalism sometimes). If you still want to read or prefer scans, then that’s your thing. You know, I’m glad I’m not really a pro-industry person and a pro-fan. I live in both worlds and feel like I have a balanced understanding of how people act in certain situations versus how they behave normally. I make a joke now that if anyone who works in marketing wants to really understand what their customers are like, they should go to a DMV (Department of Motor Vehicles) and see the misery there.

I guess you can say I blame Japan more than anything as I do buy what I can from the American side of things. I know the hard-working folks in the U.S. manga publishing business probably get frustrated with Japanese bureaucracy to a certain degree at times. 

Next year will be the start of a new decade after a decade of slow then fast growth in all things anime and manga. Things are going to get better and worse for anime and manga. Maybe once Luffy finally gets the One Piece treasure will manga piracy be severely hampered by then. I have some doubts because this is all reliant on what Japan will do as manga is here to stay in overseas markets. I know more Japanese manga editors have been traveling overseas to understand what’s going on outside of Japan. That’s a good start. So I just hope that the final chapter over here involves cultivating a joyful love of reading because I feel technology has to really pick up on that.

When reading really matters to everyone and takes some precedence over video in the minds of people, maybe we can see some meaningful progress in a battle where we might be fighting the wrong side(s) and/or missing a bigger part of the picture.

Regardless, it’s a fascinating and fun time to be a manga fan. I’m glad to have met many people who love and read manga regardless of how they consume it. Those experiences have provided so much value for me.

Manga may be considered “trash” in many ways, but to loosely quote a certain popular Naruto ninja, it’s at least better than giving up on the true joys of life.

Addendum (12/21/2019) - Two days after this post was made, two of the biggest manga scanlation groups on the net, Mangastream and Jaimini’s Box, decided to stop translating all Weekly Shonen Jump titles. I’m indifferent about either platform going away (or completely gone as Jaimini’s Box is still doing titles from other manga magazines). The one thing I will say is that Mangastream took advantage of the growing push for convenience in the minds of people over the last decade. I think about how much tech companies have abused “convenience” to generate unintended division and in some ways, Mangastream was like a tech company when they saw their ego being stroked by the large fanbase they were getting.

Photo Source: The Japan Times For one of my favorite takes on scanlations, read “Why Do Scanlations Persist?” from What Is Manga? There’s also this podcast from GeekNights about manga distribution in the United States which added some fuel to this post.

[theosmatters]

Are Atheists Smarter than Christians?

Aren’t Atheists generally smarter than Christians? Doesn’t it seem like the smart minded academics and scientists are Atheists and people of faith are not as intelligent? Culture could give us the idea that those of better intelligence do not have any belief in God, while people of lesser minds have a “God deficiency” in their brains.

Let’s begin by adding some qualifiers to the idea of being more intelligent. If we define intelligent to mean educational attainment level then there are some atheists who are more intelligent than some Christians. As an example Richard Dawkins, a very popular outspoken atheists and public debater against Christians and especially Creationist, is no doubt more intelligent than myself if we compare college degrees. Richard Dawkins has a PhD in biology and is a professor at an esteemed university in England. He can speak more intelligently than the average Christian about many things concerning biology. 

However, this is not the end of the story. Popular culture and media seems to have portrayed a false story about Atheists. In Western societies it seems taken for granted that Atheists are the real intellects of society. They are too intelligent, too big minded,  for any sort of belief in religion. However upon closer examination we find that in the matters of most importance Atheists are actually not more intelligent than Christians. This even applies to someone of the academic pedigree as Richard Dawkins.

What do I mean by saying Richard Dawkins is more intelligent than the average in certain areas especially biology? I mean he has achieved a higher educational level than many. Yet this is the really important question to ask, “Does this mean he is more qualified to know if God actually exists and if the universe evolved or was divinely created?” Certainly not! The problem atheists have is not one of academic intelligence, it is a problem of sin. They have traded away the intelligence of God for the intelligence of this world.

The Bible is not silent about this issue. The book of Proverbs is essentially teaching a person about how to be wise. Solomon begins the opening section of this book by explaining to us the first step to being a wise person. “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge…”(Proverbs 1:7, NKJV). Solomon is clear that for a person to truly gain knowledge, they must first acknowledge their need and reverence for the one true God. If a person is to truly gain wisdom, they must first be in a right relationship with God. Wisdom’s first lesson is, “Do you fear the Lord?” Without this first crucial step, all wisdom and knowledge that follows will be tainted with sin and incomplete without God.

Solomon finishes the verse this way, “But fools despise wisdom and instruction.” (NKJV). So a wise person fears God. Fear here does not mean to be afraid of God. Fear rather means a reverence and respect for God because of who He is and His powerful authority over our lives. However a fool despises wisdom. What does this mean? Solomon means that a foolish person is the one who does not acknowledge God’s authority over their lives. Therefore they shut themselves off to truly gaining wisdom.

This means that Richard Dawkins is highly intelligent by the world’s standards. However he is also very ignorant and by the Bible’s definition, a fool. How can both be true? Because the intelligence of this world is temporary and ironically it is limited when compared to the wisdom of God. 

Someone may ask, “How can an atheist like Richard Dawkins be so educated yet still not believe in God? Does this mean we Christians are wrong and since he is more educated in Biology we should accept what he says about evolution being true?” The Bible also addresses this.

The problem that someone like Richard Dawkins has is not a lack of enough evidence for God’s existence. The problem is that he has been so darkened in his heart and mind by sin that he refuses to accept the evidences of God right in front of his face. The Bible teaches that sin is not just when we do actions that go against God’s will, but it is a condition every person has due to the curse of Adam (Genesis 3). We come into this world sinners needing salvation, not saints who lost our way. The Bible teaches that one of the effects of sin on a person before they come to faith in Jesus is it causes spiritual blindness. 

Passages such as: John 3:1-20; 2 Corinthians 4:3-4; and Ephesians 2:1-3, 4:17-19 teach us that people with Jesus are blinded spiritually, bound to a sinful nature, and the results are a distorted and insufficient ability to think rightly about the world and God. Practically speaking, this means that atheists can be intelligent by the world’s standards but they are actually fools. The Bible refers to a fool as someone who refuses to acknowledge God. I want to stress again the word refuses. Paul teaches in Romans 1:18-32 that the problem with sinful mankind is not that God has hidden Himself. Rather sinful man suppress the truth about God with his own sinfulness. 

Richard Dawkins does not believe in God because he does not want to believe in God. Atheists who claim they are the more intelligent are actually saying they do not want to believe in God. Because once they believe in God’s existence then they become accountable to a higher Being for how they live their lives. Sinful people by nature run from God.

The pop-cultural notion that Atheists are more intelligent than Christians is certainly not true. Society pushes this idea because they want to make Christians feel stupid for believing in a God we have never seen like you can a person. But the Bible says creation speaks very loudly that God is real and exists. Historical evidence shows us Jesus truly lived and rose again. Atheists who claim they are too intelligent for believing in God are trying to give the impression that they have out grown beliefs in the supernatural. They claim that they believe science and facts, thus giving the impression that if you are a person of faith, then you are not a person of science and logic. It’s ironic though that the facts of science can change. What was once thought to be scientific fact 200 years ago has been discarded, or altered countless times. However the Word of God stands unchanged and never proven wrong.

Atheists who claim they are higher minded are deep down trying cover up their own guilt and provide an excuse for themselves to not be held accountable before holy God. Any God fearing Christian is honestly more intelligent than them because they: believe in God, have faith in Jesus, and stand on God’s Word (the Bible) as the source for truth. These are honestly the most reasonable beliefs to have when you look at the evidence. The Bible declares God’s truth and has never been proven wrong despite anyone’s claims to the contrary. Challenge anyone when they make these claims and ask them to back them up with proof. They will also fall upon their own sword if you press them to be consistent with their own belief system that their is no God. Their own worldview cannot hold up to its own weight. 

What is truly ironic is that Atheists who claim to be more intelligent than Christians have to borrow from the Christian worldview to make their anti-Christian claims. They steal from Christian philosophies and Biblical teachings to support their own claim that God does not exist.

Atheists are not more intelligent despite their claims. Their refusal to believe in God is not a sign of their intelligence, but rather is a sign of their sinfulness. God has made Himself clearly evident in various ways, but Atheists refuse to acknowledge Him. The Bible tells us sin has darkened mans’ understanding to think right about God. The Bible also tells us the intelligence of this world cannot compare to the intelligence God gives to His followers.

Do not buy into the false pop-cultural myth that Atheists have higher minds and higher intelligence. This is a great hoax to convince Christians to abandon their faith. Their are many intelligent and highly educated Christian scientists, doctors, lawyers, academics, and more. Do not let degree acronyms fool you into thinking that person must know what they are talking about if they say they don’t believe in God. All this means is that they are highly educated fools who refuse to bow the knee to their Creator who grants them the privilege to breathe the air He created to sustain their God-denying lives.

[thedovahcat]

And Then There Was...Wildstar

Since today is the anniversary of the shut down announcement, or at least I think it is, and cuz I’m a copycat and I’ve seen a few people’s introspective posts flying around my dash today, it’s time to add my experience to the pile.

Where do I even begin with Wildstar? It came around during an EXTREMELY volatile time in my life, aka the end of the teens and my early twenties. The real ‘formative years’ if you asked my opinion on it.

I had been an avid WoW fan since I could first play at the age of 13, which had to have been about 2007-2008 abouts. When 2013 or so rolled around, I had been told by friends that a new MMO was coming out, and that it was all space-western-y, my two greatest loves.

Naturally I waited, along with everyone else for a beta, and got in and instantly fell in love with what we’d come to know as Nexus. I was star-struck. The art, the music, the style, the humor, everything hit home with me like no other game had at that point, and I was ready to throw WoW to the wind to go full time and soak up as much of those space rays as I could. And it was even better because it was going to be with friends! I had already established I wanted to bring Rev over and start anew in the Dominion. I had so many new plotlines and ideas whirling around in my head faster than a tornado over a bee farm.

Unfortunately, during this time as well, I saw Wildstar as an escape.

I was being bullied away from WoW at the time by someone who wanted what I had. You think, “Who would do that?? What did they try to do, Dovah?” Many things really. At first they were small aggressions disguised as an interest in trying to befriend me, then that curtain dropped and the aggressions got bigger and bigger.

It was like watching something rot out from the inside. Was I absolutely jealous they were trying to steal a close-now-best friend from me?? Absolutely. I knew it was intentional. I could see it written on the walls. And while I was accustomed to this kind of shit occurring in real life and on the internet to some degree, it only really hurt because for a while, nobody believed me.

Rumors had been planted, people had been told lies and god knows what else, that I was the bad guy of this story. Accused of doing everything that was being done towards me at the same time. It was just another episode of ‘Who Started The Drama’ on Wyrmrest Accord, business as usual amiright?

And I won’t lie, I did try to retaliate several times to stop everything. I got desperate. Said things I meant, said things I didn’t mean, to the point where I couldn’t tell which was which anymore. Everything was wrapped in a huge burrito of panic and fear. And will I be ashamed of that, possibly for the rest of my life? Absolutely positively one hundred percent yes.

After a while, I didn’t fight back anymore. I didn’t make public call-outs, naming names. Sure, did I tell people about it if they asked? Of course, but in private only (because it turned out they too had suffered a similar situation like I was at the time.) Or, sometimes I told people unprompted in private because we happened to talk about our experiences being caught in drama, and I never hesitated to give my side of the story. The side that was RARELY ever heard, to my knowledge. I wanted as many people as possible to know what this person was like and what they were doing to me. For my own sanity, and for the sake of getting the truth out there in some form or another. It was relatively contained as far as I knew, so I rolled over onto my back, ready to accept my lot in life once again as someone’s punching bag because they were jealous of me and what I had and just would NOT go away no matter what happened. Naturally, I thought it really was all my fault that this was happening. We all jump to that conclusion at least once or ten times.

And then came Wildstar, and it had started to look very tempting.

I could start over. I could get away from it all. I could play with my friends ‘in secret’ and not have to worry about being slandered or god knew whatever ELSE had been done at that point on WoW, or wherever else.

Foolish was I to think that my troubles had ended there.

Many people from WoW came to play Wildstar, which was both a blessing and a curse. Moreso the latter in my case.

The person in question found out, began to main the same faction, and just put their hands on everything all over again. I felt as though I had hit a reset button, everything just started over once again. They told people about me, they got me blacklisted and blocked from one of the biggest RP guilds ever to hit the server at the time, and who knows where it branched out from there.

I went silent again. Kind of like a dog with its tail between its legs. The Dominion was no place for me, so, what was I to do?? I didn’t want to abandon this game and world I’d come to love so much in such a short amount of time.

I had never taken an interest in the Exiles. For some reason they hadn’t appealed to me at first. They were the overrated good guys. The underdogs that would always win. I wanted to play the ‘bad guys’ and do my whole spiel about making them more than JUST the bad guys.

But suddenly? As dramatic as it sounds, the Exiles, suddenly sounded very appropriate, in terms of matching up to how I felt.

Exiled. For stupid shit ‘crimes’ I never ‘committed.’

So, I rolled up my sleeves and rerolled Rev’s character, deciding to branch him out in a different direction entirely. I ended up with Roger, and was dumped out into the Gambler’s Ruin, the complete shamble-of-an-arkship. And after that? The frosty bitter cold of the Northern Wastes.

My friend had offered to make another character with me, so that we could play together without being bothered. I had a glimmer of hope. Everything wasn’t over and I wasn’t dead yet (but man did I feel it) and so I pressed onwards.

I saw Algoroc for the first time and all its rolling plains and roans and the mountains and the whole wide open range. It felt so much different than the stormy Levian Bay, or the dark and gloomy Ellevar. The music was lighter, more upbeat, more ‘western’, which is silly because I had stated earlier that that was what I was looking forward to the most. The WESTERN COWBOY YEEHAW aspect of it.

Things were brighter, no less colorful, happier, hopeful. There was SO much land to explore and so many things to do. I was ready. Ready to start all over one more time. So I did.

I made my way through the area, learning about the Exiles and their culture, and the Eldan and whatever sinister happenings they had going in beneath the surface.

Before I knew it, I had reached Thayd, and was absolutely blown away by the size of the city. I was used to large environments from WoW, no doubt. But Thayd felt so interactive for some reason or another. Maybe it was the art style or the NPCs inhabiting it (and the players of course). But it felt alive. There were so many nooks and crannys to get lost in, how will I ever see this whole entire city?? I wondered.

It was a broken mish-mash of all that the Exiles slapped haphazardly together. Different people that didn’t fit together, trying to make something out of lots of little pieces of seemingly nothing.

It was a whole symbolic thing for me essentially.

After that I felt like I was home, in yet another dramatic sense.

Thayd felt right, what with its trashy streets and mismatched themes. Illium and its golden and crimson towers had never struck me as somewhere I belonged.

From that point on, things blur. I explored Galeras after that, introduced to the dire situation that was the Dominion descending upon the Exiles, ready to blast them all to kingdom come to reclaim a planet they believed theirs. I felt the tension, in a good way. It was a great story waiting to unfold, I thought. And I get to see it all from the beginning and be a part of it. I was absolutely ecstatic.

And then, from there, I went to Whitevale. One of the most FRUSTRATING ZONES I will never forget. I don’t even remember why. Maybe it was the size. Over time, I grew to love it in its own weird way, only because I departed for the damn MOON (Farside) afterwards and realized I hated the lack of gravity.

But, despite all. I had so much fun.

I thought about Roger and how he’d come to the Exiles, because I still wanted him to have a connection to the Dominion somewhere. I wanted to try exploring new character tropes and such with him, I wanted to be bold and take chances with ideas and do things I’d rarely seen people do (in my case? Traumatic brain injuries, good going.) I did myresearch, I kept exploring the world, I put all the pieces together little by little and I crafted a story. A story that grew larger and larger and larger and branched out to other characters I created alongside just Roger.

Suddenly I had an entire ‘world’ on my hands. Maybe not one the size of all of Nexus in this instance, but it was ROGER’S world.

I had locations planned thanks to the housing system, I had different story lines going alongside the ‘main one’. Every so often they would mesh and meet up and affect one another, and the ‘world’ would continue to grow from there.

These characters, new as they were, suddenly had lives. They had history, they had jobs, they had all those little aspects of fictional characters that bring them to life. Personalities, likes and dislikes, feelings, all of it. I was no stranger to creating characters, of course they did! In fact, most of them were based off many existing characters I had already HAD, just Wildstar-ified.

Over time, they became their own separate entities, only because they had grown and branched out into different directions I had never dreamed they would.

I don’t remember how long I had been in this enormous creative process of planting my roots. Maybe a year or two? It didn’t really matter. I was having the absolute time of my life.

However, on the back burner I knew all those awful things were still being said about me out there. I continued to play the game and storycraft mostly by myself. I knew if I stayed away from the masses that were WSRP, then no one would ever have any ‘proof’. No one could twist anything I said, or twist interactions I had with people, and use it against me.

You can’t accuse someone of something or things when all they do is play by themselves in their own little box all day long, can you? That was my line of logic.

Naturally I still got blocked from people’s tumblrs and such, which I found out on complete accident when I would try to fav posts. I never showed up to events. I did my artwork and only did artwork of my or my friends characters. Everything was very controlled.

And then one fucking day in August, my name gets tagged in someone’s call out post. At first I fucking panic, because of course. What did I do NOW? I made EXTRA SURE to stay out of everyone’s way. Who could POSSIBLY HAVE A BEEF WITH ME-

I checked the post.

Turns out, I wasn’t the one being called out.

No.

It was that person who’d been HOUNDING me for several years at that point, who was finally being called out.

The original poster had mentioned my name because, according to their words, and I’ll never forget it, ‘they heard through the grapevine’ that all that nasty crap had happened to me. Turns out, I wasn’t the only one who had been treated this way. MANY other people had been. There had to have been a good two handfuls of them out there, maybe more, who had been harassed by this person and their crummy friends. I was named in the post, and all the abuse I had took was relayed to the entire damn community (however it was worded in a way that it had to have been from an outsider’s perspective who’d heard the rumors spread about me, and never spoke to me directly. Cuz I didn’t know ANY OF THESE people and some of the details were wrong...but I digress.)

My business was practically on the front page of the Wildstar and WoW RP community (A smaller portion of the latter.) People had known about what happened to some degree. They had been on the receiving end of these rumors, they heard all the bullshit, they looked me up, they saw I had no dirt to my name. Never did anything to anybody. Maybe some of the stories I had told got relayed to them via playing telephone with other people, I’ll have no real way of knowing for certain.

If people didn’t know me then, they sure knew me NOW, I thought.

It turned into a hot fucking mess after that. People came out with their stories, people got angry at the victims, or at the abuser. There was collateral damage from what I could see from my spot in the corner.

That bad person was supposedly reprimanded by their guild leader for the backlash they received, though I’ll never know how big it actually was. It was probably really small, realistically. But like I said, I don’t know.

It was only then that I was finally believed. Like, completely. There were always little shreds of doubt with people, but this? This blew it out of the water.

I wasn’t at fault. People saw it wasn’t my fault.

I felt…

Liberated?? Like the shackles of this depressive, anxious...whatever DISASTER state I was in, finally broke off. And so QUICKLY too. I didn’t really know what the hell to do. There was nothing I COULD do except move on and try to recover.

It was OVER. It was finally fucking over and I was at a loss, because I had grown used to living in a state of panic and sadness and anger and god knows what else.

So, slowly, I started to.

I came to the conclusion, now that it was over, or ‘over’, I wanted to make some new friends.

Roger and company had already been set up and I found very little wiggle room for collaboration with people I didn’t know. So? What better way to fix that than make a new character to use to reach out to new folk?

I grabbed one of my older characters I salvaged from a falling out I had had before this entire post began, fixed him up and threw him into Thayd face first.

And so was the infamous Captain Yaedra reborn. With an e added to his fake name because it was ‘Yadra’ before, yet for some reason both names are said exactly the same way.

I had no idea what to do with him. I hated elves. I hated long ears. They were boring. Everyone was making them and beautifying them and whatever else. I was salty. I wanted to create a raccoon more than I wanted an elf.

The zombie aesthetic definitely helped me some.

I played through all the Mordesh areas, trying to learn as much as I could about their history, about Grismara, about the Contagion.

A zombie story...it utterly fascinated me. And considering I had not changed Captain’s outfit design from his original self in the slightest? Once more, I rolled up my sleeves and began to craft a world. Another world.

Yaedra’s entire world. And by extension, my own version of a portion of Grismara.

His hometown, his career, his life, his family, every little bit. I brought it all to life once more, and soon found myself living in the ‘past’ as much as I was living in the ‘present’. As far as character timelines go.

During all this, I tried being nice to random people, or I saw art and commented on it, I tried to be more open with the community, I even joined another small guild and in the end I ended up making some really great friends who I still talk to today!

They loved what I had created. And I loved their creations in turn. We formed a tight knit group of ‘heroes’ if you would. Got into all kinds of IC shenanigans. It was fun, it was silly, it was dramatic. I didn’t feel any pressure to be anyone in particular. I felt like I could be myself, and so could Captain. We were where we belonged. And it was fantastic. And still is.

From there, I met some of their friends, and so on and so on, and I did end up gaining a small bit of presence in the community via commissions and doing my own artwork as well. Things were finally nice, and calm.

I felt like I had waded through a war of some kind, and finally, at long last, it was OVER. Peace had finally COME. I had gone through a lot of mental trauma, but as the months and several years went on, I slowly came around. I tried very hard to. My dragon scales grew thicker as time went on, and my flames certainly hotter.

And, after a while… I found myself playing Wildstar less and less. Not because I hated it, not at all. But because it no longer felt like a crutch to me. I no longer felt as though I needed it to stay afloat. I had grown and changed, for the better no doubt. I learned to stand my ground from all the knocks I had taken, I learned to start speaking up when things were being done to me that weren’t right, or nice, or whatever. Did I end some friendships that way? Sadly, yes.

But I was done. I wouldn’t be ANYONE’S punching bag anymore.

The Exiles toughened me up. I wasn’t about to take ANYONE’S crap and neither was Captain. Both of us, fists BARED.

My time on Nexus dwindled even more.

I went back to WoW out of habit, and spent more time there. Soon enough I was hardly logging onto Wildstar at all. Many people were bored of the game’s lack of ...everything. Content most certainly. You could only do the same things so many times. I wasn’t part of a huge RP guild that constantly had events going, though I was by the end (but even that was kind of flakey because people just weren’t as interested in the game as they had once been.)

I hadn’t thought much about my story lines or characters. They had, over time, fallen into situations and such that I had long resolved. My ‘characters’ were tired of adventure and drama, and I wanted to give them a chance to have their happily ever afters, via ‘soft-retiring’ them. I still wrote stuff and drew art on the side, just….less of it.

In the months before Wildstar, I rarely thought about Nexus at all.

Until the horn sounded with Wildstar’s imminent closing.

For months prior to that, I had been sitting and watching. I knew it had been on the way. NC SOFT being...NC SOFT of course (with Carbine’s mismanagement in general, though at the time I did not know about this,) made this more than obvious.

So it didn’t come as a surprise to me.

If anything, I felt a sort of subdued melancholy about it.

If I can compare it to anything, it was like watching a pet or something grow old. There was the initial excitement of a new friend, and the beginning years were amazing and fast and fun filled and emotional. And then over time, things grew comfortable. I didn’t need to give Nexus my full attention anymore. ‘We’ had this ‘understanding.’ I could always go back to Nexus whenever I wanted. I always had a place there waiting for me. Characters, fun, stories, etc.

And then I began to move on.

Wildstar for me was a lot of things. It was a period of mental destruction, it was a period of rebirth and growth for me as a person, it was a reminder of the roller coaster ride that was good and bad times all bundled into one. It was my ‘growing up’ period. It was the rocky road of a transitional phase from the end of my childhood, to the beginning of my adult years.

Yes I know this might sound silly, all over an MMO that barely lasted at all, and the last thing I wanna do is be silly, but it’s how I felt. I’m not going to try to disguise it as something else, because that was what it all was to me.

The months sped by and before I knew it, it was the last day the server was up. Wildstar would be closing that evening or afternoon, or whatever. I don’t recall the time.

I had sat there debating whether or not to attend that final count down.

A part of me wanted to. I wanted to be there, to send off this MMO that had meant so much to me!

But another part of it told me to not go.

In the end, I did not go.

Not because I would be crying, or throwing a fit or whatever.

The main reason I didn’t go, was because I wanted to remember Nexus the way it was. I didn’t want to see people bunched up in one area, being turned into all sorts of critters, I didn’t want the lag to destroy my computer, I didn’t want to see their storm of messages and how sad everyone was, I didn’t want to read the Caretaker’s countdown messages saying how he’d miss us, in his own special way.

To me, all that meant Wildstar was due to die at any moment. That Nexus would suddenly cease to be, that all these things everyone worked so hard on, would just be gone, in the blink of an eye.

I didn’t want that to be the last memory I had of that place.

And so, the shut down came. The night went on.

I woke up the next morning, and everything felt ok, for the most part. Yes I felt like I was missing a piece of myself, but it was a lot smaller than I can say for some people.

The hole I had in my heart had mostly patched itself up with nicer memories. With the possibilities that were yet unexplored.

As far as I WAS, and am, aware? Nexus isn’t dead. Not at all. It’s just sleeping, for right now. It’s taking a well needed rest. It’s not really gone.

All the stories, all the characters, they exist in our head spaces. They still go on. I still write for them occasionally.

If anything, I feel like they have even MORE to explore now.

These days, people are working or playing already on private servers, and while I entertain the idea of joining one or finding another group to play with… Well, that’s all it really ends up being. An idea.

I’m perfectly happy with what I got out of Wildstar, and what I got to take away from it and keep.

I grew as a person, albeit the hard way (but that’s just how it is sometimes.) My creativity grew, my ability to make better stories and characters grew alongside that. I made new friends that I still keep to this day. That bad person got their just desserts and my most-likely-over-exaggerated-because-I’m-sure-people-have-gone-through-worse-torment was finally put to rest. I had more confidence in myself, yada yada… You get the idea.

Everything had resolved, for the most part.

Everything was said and done, regarding that chapter of my life.

And what a ride it was.

BUT I have to say, if there’s one specific thing I favor, that I got from this entire putrid mess that I would do it all over again for??

I got Cap back.

So, thank you for returning my raccoon to me, Nexus. I’ll never forget it. One day when those private servers are finished and the game is mostly restored, I’ll definitely come back to play through it again, and most likely come up with even more new adventures for me to write and explore.

Until then, cupcakes! Dovah signing off on this...eight page story-rant!

[nihalsjourney]

Not wearing my hijab anymore

We’ve entered a new decade, it’s 2020. To be honest I’m not a big fan of New Year’s Eve and the hype around it, which is why I waited with a new blogpost. I think it’s nice to look back on some things, one of them being my very first blogpost on here. (link) December 8, 2015 was my very first day without hijab. I can still feel the stress and anxiety of that day. After that, I never talked about it anymore because I still felt guilt and shame. It’s been four years and I feel like I’m able to talk about this past chapter in my life much better.

So we’re going waaaaay back, beyond those 4 years!

My mother is Dutch and my father is Turkish, my mother converted to Islam 24 years ago. When my parents had my brothers and I, baba (father) felt a stronger sense of practicing Islam better as well as raising us with our Turkish identity. Seeing as how Dutch society forces immigrants to assimilate rather than to integrate. The thought and fear of us losing our Turkish identity really stressed him out. 

Being in an interracial relationship asks for more different responsibilities I think. My mother and baba were integrating in each other’s culture, learning one another’s language while working hard and raising us with best of both worlds. 

As we got older our parents signed us up to an Islamic elementary school. With a school bus we’d go in the early morning from Valkenswaard to Eindhoven. There were both Muslim and non-Muslim faculty. My personal experience wasn’t great, I was already dealing with depression, anxiety, and trauma. I don’t remember a lot from what I learned because I dissociated quite often. It was difficult for me to learn because unfortunately we were taught Islam from a cultural perspective and fear inducing. To me Allah seemed like a big angry man and I refused to believe that.

I remember that all female teachers wore a hijab. Muslim or not. The girls also wore a hijab starting very young. After school they would take it off, others didn’t. I remember one time after gym class that I didn’t put my hijab back on. One of the male teachers who saw us on our way back to class shamed me for it. Looking back it was so awful how at first the girls didn’t even bother or noticed. But once the teacher said something about it they started whispering loudly to each other ‘haram’ ‘she didn’t put her hijab back on!’.

There was this unspoken rule that a girl should wear her hijab ‘full time’ when she’s 12. We’d ask each other, ‘When will you wear your hijab?’ ‘If you don’t start wearing it now you never will!!’ ‘Wearing your hijab at 16 or 18 is too late, you should wear it when you’re at least 12!’ Alhamdulillah (thank God) I can say that my parents never forced me.

I switched schools when I was 8, it wasn’t an Islamic school but I still kept wearing my hijab to school as force of habit.  Once I turned either 10, 11 or 12 years old I started wearing my hijab. After age of 12 I had to switch schools again, this time a dominantly white school. From the maybe 200 students, there were 5 students of colour, 4 of them Muslim and I being the only one wearing a hijab. I was facing a lot of discrimination and Islamophobia already and it only got worse from then on. The majority of white people questioned me about every single little thing, my hijab, Islam, if I sympathize with terrorists, if my father came here for money and if I was oppressed. ‘When did you start to realize you wanted to wear your hijab?’ ‘Did you feel ready?’ ‘So you’re Muslim, right? What do you think of ISIS?’ The older I got, I hoped that the questions would stop but they never did. I had very little knowledge, yet people thought I did because of my hijab. Like I was a living, walking human museum or encyclopedia.  

I started to question myself. Did I feel ready? Do I understand what wearing the hijab means? Can I justify myself to Allah for wearing my hijab though the intention of wearing it is non-existent?

It made my heart hurt so much because I had to face reality. I didn’t have an answer. At first I tried reading and researching more about Islam, but back then there was very little willingness of me to do so. I tried to move on despite feeling unhappy, guilty and confused. When I was 18 I decided to talk to my mother about it. She said she had always been worried that I never made my decision to wear my hijab consciously because I was so young. Together with my mother I began brainstorming for ideas and options. Such as trying to wear my hijab in different styles to see it makes any difference and talking with a few women who had taken their hijab off. When I listened to their stories I felt scared. Clueless of what I should do, standing at a cross roads having no idea which path to take.

Once I decided that I wanted to stop wearing my hijab, I talked with my baba. He was very confused and upset. He always tried to protect us from the Western world, so he was worried that it influenced my choice. I told him it didn’t. Although he didn’t agree with my decision he emphasized that he will always be there for me and love me. That’s all I needed to hear. I knew that baba needed his time to get used to things.

Sometimes I still think that I have to explain to others that I used to wear a hijab. Specifically to sisters who wear it. Because I understand all too well what it’s like to be a visible target of Islamophobic violence. There has become such a huge shift in my daily life that sometimes I feel like the odd one out when I’m with Muslim women (who wear the hijab).

Talking about a huge shift in my daily life. In the beginning especially, I noticed how Muslims and non-Muslims were now treating me differently. Whenever I’d greet a sister ‘Assalaam aleikum’, (peace be upon you) she’d look me up and down disapprovingly and wouldn’t return my greeting. It felt awful, I stopped greeting anyone all at once to give myself some sense of security because I was feeling so vulnerable back then. Instead, non-Muslim (majority white) people started to happily greet me. It was mind boggling. 

Like it was some sort of game, I’d keep track of all these differences. How in the past people wouldn’t sit next to me in public transport even when it was busy, to by passers saying ‘Allahu akbar’ or ‘terrorist’ under their breath when walking past me, getting checked by security a lot faster or accused of stealing, always being refused when applying for a job (in my city, Eindhoven, discrimination on the job market is very high) etc. 

When I have to show my ID, that has a picture of me with my hijab on, people always feel the need to tell me ‘You look prettier without hijab!’. When that happens I get a, what Dutch Iranian artist Saman Amini calls in the play ‘A Seat at The Table’, racial freeze. Cashing in the comment, reacting with a fake smile and getting back to my day. Not allowing myself to feel the hurt or the frustration.

It has definitely been a struggle the first year or two. I had to adjust to how society was treating me, nobody sees my hijab but sometimes I still feel like I wear it. A lot of my life experiences before taking it off were based around my hijab. And as I’m writing, realising it now, hurts. Wearing the hijab since a young age, I was basically robbed of my childhood and sure that may sound dramatic but it’s reality. It impacted my quality of life because I was an easy target for Islamophobic violence both verbal and non-verbal.

I got to see first-hand what it’s like to be treated both with and without hijab by non-Muslim and Muslims. Whether I’m a bad Muslim or a well ‘integrated’ (read assimilated) immigrant. 

We still teach girls to judge other girls. In my time we’d judge those who chose not to wear their hijab (yet) or who wore their hijab the ‘wrong’ way. As I got older I started to realise how toxic this behaviour is. But I find that this way of thinking is still deeply rooted. Because I still have some moments that when I see a sister with a hijab showing hair, my first thought is ‘Oh My GoD sHe Is ShOwInG hEr HaIr!! AYIB!!’ it’s been happening a lot less. But when it does I mentally slap myself in the face and remind myself of how toxic that way of thinking is because it does not contribute to anything positive. The judgement I had towards myself and others has lessened immensely. I’ve become a stronger person and learned so much (I’m still learning!!). All the things I named and more, I had to experience. Before I was so caught up with myself. Trying to survive. Now I able to make room in my heart for others to heal.

I look back to these past four years a lot. Feeling thankful and amazed. Never before did I have such a close relationship with Allah and myself. Honestly, I feel ashamed when I say the following. So may Allah forgive me for my ignorance and wrong doings, may He accept my good deeds, prayers and efforts of learning…

I never prayed, sometimes during Ramadan. Like I said, I forgot what I learned as a kid because of dissociating. When someone tried to teach me about Islam I didn’t have the space to listen, my mind never saved the information. Alhamdulillah, with its ups and downs, the past four years I have now been saving the knowledge I learn about Islam. I’m praying 5 times a day, reading translations of the Quran, going to lectures with an open heart and mind. Soaking up all the information I can get my hands on, eager to learn.

I’m not saying this to brag. But to stress that once again, I had to go through these things to grow through them. I had to experience all of this in order to become the person I am today. A better version of myself. Because with this experience and knowledge I am able to stand even stronger on my feet.

Lastly, I want to emphasize that my experiences I shared above, especially the negative ones have nothing to do with Islam. It’s man-made culture. Please see religion separate from its people.

Also there is unfortunately still way too little awareness of how children mimic our words and (misogynistic) behaviour. Pretty much everything I named in my story I learned from aunties, uncles and the girls around me. So especially to us women, I hope that we can start to truly uplift each other and not tear each other down any longer.

Thank you so much for taking your time to read this. A Dutch version of this blog post will soon follow.

Take care, peace and blessings upon you all! Much love,

Nihâl

[plance-analysis]

Pidge and Lance Analysis: Romantic

While I said I am not biased, it would be a shame to not make my first post anything but a plance post! Below the cut, I will dive into some of my favorite aspects of the relationship and then further evidence that may prove its possibility. 

(This is a long post with many images!)

Relationship Basics

Pidge and Lance were introduced to us as the audience as part of the original trio including Hunk. It started of as a regular group of mischievous kids who just had a knack for getting into trouble. This was mostly true and upon becoming paladins of Voltron, not much changed. Pidge and Lanced dynamic started as classmates, but through their individual character developments (Lance maturing into the role of a paladin, and Pidge finally finding her family) their relationship has a large opportunity to flourish. 

Starting with the first episode, Lance and Pidge didn’t have much problem with personal space, which in itself shows how easily they became friends from the get go. It is known that not a lot of time passed between the time Pidge joined the Garrison and the landing of Shiro, but yet upon seeing Pidge sneaking out Lance was immediately intrigued as to where she was going, following her rather that continuing to sneak out for some fun. Upon finding her, Lance is quickly intrigued by her set up and her ability to pick up alien signals. It’s no secret that Pidge is impressed by her own work, but for a non-science man like Lance to be even remotely interested is a feat she is very easily pleased by. Once in space, they continue to bond in ways similar to the rest of the team and there relationship becomes stagnant and very casual. The perfect base for a deeper connection.

Show Evidence

Protectiveness

Pidge and Lance are both characters who throughout the show grow to become protective of their teammates and friends, but there is evidence of their sacrifices for each other specifically. Their actions in the following scenes are the most pivotal plance moments and therefore I’ll go through each one individually. The first instance is the first Sendak attack.

Upon Pidge’s capture, while Keith and Allura do make moves to take her back, the first move is made by Lance.While this doesn't seem like it would be much different from any one of them rescuing Pidge from Sendak, it is to be noted that prior to, and then immediately afterward, Lance was in critical condition and unconscious. 

He uses the word “apparently” inferring that he does not remember the event and that it was a completely unconscious (literally) decision. What are the chances that the writers would have Lance be the one to rescue Pidge rather than any of the other equally as abled, not to mention conscious and ready for battle, characters?

This moment is almost exactly paralleled in the episode Escape from Beta Traz. She is not as successful, but her intent and persistence is there, as she goes in again for a couple more attacks. This is the first time we’ve seen Pidge enraged, with the exception of anything relating to her family being found. 

In the alternate reality episode, when the team first encounters Sven and Slav, Pidge’s rescue is a scene done entirely in slow motion. Why would the staff have any reason to have the shooting of Pidge’s attack be in slow motion, rather than the actual reveal of Sven/Shiro? To showcase the fact that it was Pidge and not Allura who was directly next to her, with a similarly ranged bayard, taking the shot to save Lance.

We cannot continue without the mention of everyone’s favorite season seven plance moment, the “Don’t you touch her!” moment. This moment of Lance’s protective nature is very different from his usual, and it is an important scene for all future planned development.

The writers chose the phrase “this group of heroes has a soft spot for the small one” specifically for Zethrid, implying that she was hoping to torture the entire team at once. What we got instead, was Lance’s surprising lash out, cutting away from the team to protect Pidge. Lance, having gone through a lot of character growth and maturing, is a very rational and accepting of fate person. He has had many instances where he sacrifices himself for the good of the team, but what sets this moment apart from the rest is his obvious anger. When Lance runs into the face of danger for someone else, he does so as sacrifice, taking the hit to save another, but here, he does not offer himself instead. He runs full force towards Ezor, as though she had crossed some line deep seeded in Lance.

His choice of words is also very important. “Don’t you touch her!” He very well could have exclaimed “Stop!” “No!” “Pidge!” or even “Don’t hurt her!” Single word exclamations are a usual when it comes to Voltron writing, but Lance’s specific choice of the words “don’t you touch her” may reveal something deeper to his idea of Pidge, feeling he may not even be aware of. The idea of Pidge being hurt had no time to register, because his first priority is that no one even touch her.

Jealousy

There have been moments sprinkled in the show hinting to Pidge having at least some feelings of affection toward Lance, shown through the ways of jealousy.

Pidge is a smart girl, who knows that the mission of saving the universe is the most important thing, even before saving her family. She knows that should anything get in the way of her doing her duty, it must be suppressed to a later time. Perhaps she does this with her feelings for Lance. From the very first episode, every time Pidge is around to hear Lance mention girls, she almost instantly reacts. Whether it be through her face, or slapping Lance, she almost always shows her discomfort. Except for when Allura had been busy with Lotor. She was specifically teasing Lance that his chances with Allura were gone, giving Lance more time to spend with her, and possibly return her feelings for him.

Noticing

Out of all the Paladins, the one who gives Pidge the most private attention, is Lance. He has noticed her moods and reacted accordingly, even when she doesn’t seek him herself. Pidge, on the other hand, is a lot more introverted, but despite that, she still notices Lance. Based on the show’s scenes, there have been many more Lance watching Pidge scenes (like the ones pictured above). When she becomes upset, Pidge either stands her ground or isolates herself. In both instances, the scenes show that Lance is visibly upset and cares for her, but something stops him from acting. When Pidge unlocks the green lion’s vine cannon, Lance is the only member to speak out about it. In both the first season and the latest game show episode, Lance remember’s Pidge and her favorite robots, Rover and Beezer. He recalled Pidge loving Beezer more than Nyma stealing the blue lion, who at the time, he was the paladin of. He was the first out of him and Coran to notice Rover without the immediate Pidge attached to it. He even at time’s teases Pidge about all her smart talk and skills, much to her delight.

Blushing

Beside the occasional tech, Lance is the only person that Pidge has blushed at. In her vlog, she states that she’s always been better with technology than other people, so connecting with a person to the point that there was an opportunity to fluster her is a feat in itself. Lance, Lover boy Lance, has blushed many times with many pretty, space girls, but the only Earth girl to make Lance blush is none other than Pidge. As it is most commonly known, blushing is almost completely involuntary. The two are some of the only ones shown to blush in the show, and that they’ve blushed at each other multiple times says something.

Final Thoughts

While the plance fandom started small, after the release of the recent seasons, it has grown at an impressive rate, even making the top ten on @fandom ‘s ranked ships list. There is many a theory that plance can end up canon by the end of the series. Fans and supporters of the show constantly bring up more evidence everyday and with every content. I’ll go through a few that I believe have some footing.

Speculation

In an interview long ago, Jeremy Shada (voice of Lance) opened the interview  with drama of Lance dying, and later it was revealed that it did come to happen, regardless of his joking tone. In a separate interview with Shada and Bex Taylor-Klaus (voice of Pidge), he opened with Lance and Pidge falling in love followed by a “I’m just kidding.” 

In the opening of season 2, Pidge is known to make trash versions of all of Team Voltron, which she takes back with her, along with the puff ball aliens. Many shots of her room and the trash versions of the paladins seem to give focus to the Lance one. At one point, it was shown in the foreground with two, a blue and a green, puffball aliens floating on him. 

Many fans already deduced that Monsters & Mana, an episode of season six, heavily parallel and even foreshadow the series’ plot. Meklavar (Pidge) and Pike (Lance) are given similar markings on their characters. Pike is shown to gain an invisibility cloak when the team enter the room of loot. With many of the members gaining an object similar to their personalities, fans theorize that this is a nod to Pidge and the green lion’s cloaking ability.

In the most recent season, the episode The Journey Within, Pidge and Lance hold on to each others left hands. Left hands are commonly associated with marriage in western cultures. In the same episode, they are shown to never switch their position implying that they’ve stayed linked almost the entire time. A fan favorite moment is when tensions were beginning to run, as the other paladins were unlinking, Pidge and Lance were the only two to remain linked.

Bex Taylor-Klaus is also a known supporter of the pairing, and being that they are the voice of Pidge makes fans go wild. 

On July 2nd Taylor-Klaus tweeted a gif of Lance with the tweet being a plant emoji. Plant emoji’s are a very common motif of the plance fandom.

While many wait in anticipation for season eight at the end of this year, fans only become more anxious for any endgame relationships. Plance has a lot of potential, and it can stand on its feet with a decent amount of evidence to support it. With the end nearing, more content is created everyday with hopes, speculation, and beautiful artworks.

Pidge and Lance don’t need any romance to complete themselves, but with the terms of their relationship, being for the most part only love and understanding, plance has a chance.

What do you think will happen to plance? I would love to hear more ideas!

Have a wonderful day and thank you for your time!

[emeraldspiral]

So Ant-Man & The Wasp kinda sucked.

It was pretty much just a bunch of fucking nothing.

The main conflict of the movie is that they want to rescue Janet, whom they had accepted was gone forever for 30 years. So the stakes are; if they fail, nothing changes. The status quo continues on as if nothing ever happened. What makes it extra egregious is that the trailers fucking lied to us. They have this voice-over from Luis saying something about how Ghost stole their tech and went crazy and tried to take over the world and it’s like;

Not only is the line not even in the movie, not one part of it was true. The line tries to make it sound like Ghost got her suit and powers from an accident that happened after stealing Pym’s tech, but her accident happened when she was a kid and could only be considered theft in terms of intellectual property rights, and it was done by her father, not her. The suit was actually given to her by SHIELD. She does steal Pym’s lab, but if that’s what Luis meant, he would’ve said “lab”. He wouldn’t have phrased it that way. Furthermore, her goal isn’t to take over the world or do anything destructive, she just wants to not die and the only person who stands to get hurt by her achieving that goal is a woman who was already considered as good as dead for 30 years. Plus like, I know this doesn’t apply to every culture, but in Western, or at least American culture, the general rule is that the youngest lives are considered most valuable. The closer you are to dying of natural causes, the lower the priority of your survival. So it feels kind of ass-backwards that I’m supposed to root for a woman who’s already had like 30 good years of life with a great career that included saving the world, and getting married and having a family who’ve had 30 years to accept her being gone, over a young woman who was an innocent victim of a tragic accident and has spent most of her short life in constant pain.

They don’t even make Ghost that morally gray. They basically give her this bullshit reason to hate Hank because she blames him for firing and discrediting her father, leading him to take reckless unsafe actions to try and complete his work. But they don’t want Hank to really be responsible so they have him say that her dad legit stole intellectual property and he had every right to do what he did. But either way, the dad was still ultimately responsible for his own choices. But the thing is, even though Ghost has that stupid tangentially-related reason for hating Hank, she never does anything to him. There’s a scene where she has him at her mercy, he fakes having a heart attack, and she just allows Morpheus to go for the pills to save him and doesn’t try to stop him until she realizes its a trick. There’s also a moment where Morpheus tells her that he won’t help her if she goes after Scott’s daughter. Like, presumably she was just going to hold her as a hostage, no reason why she would have to actually hurt her. But to Morpheus, that’s crossing a line, even though their entire plan is to kill Janet. And then Ghost just... Doesn’t go after the daughter. She says something like “There are other ways” and because Morpheus’s line to her right before it was “If you do that, I won’t help you” it tricks you into thinking she means there are other ways she can get what she wants without his help, and she’s going to cast him aside. But no, she just decides to get the lab back by actually going to get it instead of holding the daughter hostage and doesn’t turn on Morpheus until he tells her he’s not going to help her anyway because he’s suddenly had a change of heart because Hank said he’d try and help Ghost. But like, the whole reason Ghost is going through everything she’s doing is because she has like, weeks left to live. She doesn’t have time for Hank and/or Janet to come up with a miracle cure.

But then of course they get Janet back and Janet just has magic healing powers from being in the quantum realm and that fixes everything. Except the movie kind of implies that it doesn’t. She fixes Ghost, then the next time we see her she’s acting like she’s in pain and telling Morpheus to run away. Then in the post credits scene they say something about how they’re going to the quantum realm again to gather quantum energy for her. So I guess they just extended her lifespan a little but are still working on a permanent fix.

But none of that ultimately matters because at the end of the day, everyone gets snapped. Yeah, the entire movie that was about saving Janet, ends with Janet, along with Hank and Hope, turning to dust while Scott is stuck in the quantum realm with no way out. So there is basically zero reason to see this movie. Like, if you thought Iron Man 2 and 3 or Thor 2 were just filler movies of no consequence, at least some things happened that carried over into future films. Like, War Machine was introduced in IM2 and IM3 had Tony removing the shrapnel from his heart and getting rid of the reactor in his chest while Thor 2 had Loki faking his death and sending his dad away, setting the stage for Ragnarok. Ant-Man just ends with everyone either dead or out-of-commission with no hope of having any involvement in the next Avengers movie. Like, the only possible way this film could carryover any consequences to the next film would be if maybe Ghost survived the purge, still has her powers, and they make her one of the new Avengers alongside Captain Marvel.

Also, the movie ends with “Ant-Man and The Wasp will return?” which like, why would they even have that unless the answer was “yes”? Of course they’re going to return. I mean, it’s not like they didn’t already telegraph pretty hard that The Snap was going to be undone in Infinity War itself, but come on, restrain yourselves. I know people already assume that because it’s based on comic books the deaths are all going to be undone, but you’ve gotta at least try to make us think they’re permanent.