#there’s no way the military isn’t exploiting

[btsbs]

.

[bullet-prooflove]

Dean Winchester. Coat, Cheese, Flowers.

Tagging: @kmc1989 @gatefleet @private-jett @cosmic-psychickitty

Prequel to:

You, Me & Tennessee - Dean always returns to Tennessee.

On The Mountain - Dean wishes he was back on the Mountain with you.

Six Pack (NSFW) - You realise the man waiting for you isn't Dean Winchester.

Memories (NSFW) - Michael invades your home whilst you're away.

Sweet Dreams - Dean thinks about how this all started.

Deals With the Devil (feat: Michael)- You wake up with an angel in your bed.

Dean doesn’t intend to fall in love in Gatlinburg, Tennessee. It’s something that just happens after he starts hearing rumours about strange attacks up in the National Park.

You know the instant he turns up at the ranger station to investigate the circumstances that he’s a hunter. He has the same demeanour as the first one you met a few years ago, similar features. He’s surprised when you call him out on it, more so when you agree to take him up to the Fire Tower with you.

“There’s more to being a forest ranger up here isn’t there?” He had said, standing in front of the open weapons cabinet surveying the small arsenal. It’s certainly not the usual shit you see out here in the wilderness, silver bullets, long range rifles, military grade explosives. That’s just some of the interesting paraphernalia you have stored away in there.

“There’s lot of power up here on the mountain, it attracts things.” You had told him as you picked out a flare gun and a couple of blocks of C4. “Let’s just say this isn’t my first monster hunt.”

It’s refreshing being open with someone about the work he does. You spend the evening sharing a mini charcuterie board that you manage to pull together with some cheese, jerky and crackers, swapping stories about your exploits. The attraction starts then he thinks, because you’re pretty, funny and a complete badass. The shit you’ve dealt with on this mountain, it almost makes him quake in his boots. He wants to ask you how this all started for you but then you both hear the cries for help and a scratching at the door and it’s hunting time.  

It’s five hours later that you return to the Fire Tower, the both of you a little worse for wear. Your coat is shredded, there’s mud smeared across your cheek, your hair is a mess and the scent of motor oil clings to you from the C4. Dean isn’t in a much better state. He’s bleeding from a gash in his hairline and there’s a three inch slice up his forearm that you’ve managed to patch up with moss and strips from your ruined jacket.

It turns out there wasn’t just one Wendigo, there were two. It had been a fight to the death before you’d managed to trap them in the abandoned mine shaft they’d been using as a nest before activating the C4.

You’re both still hopped up on adrenaline when you get back to the Fire Tower, usually you’d take it out on the punch bag outside out then then Dean kisses you and you spend the next two hours working it out in other ways. You end up watching the sunrise together with a cup of coffee on the balcony, you wearing his t-shirt and nothing else.

He’s regretful when he has to leave. Usually he has no problem hitting and quitting but there’s reluctance in him because the two of you have shared something special up here, something he isn’t ready to let go of just yet.

“Call me alright?” He says as he writes his number on a post it note. “If you get in over your head and I promise you, I’ll come running.”

“I have a whole team of rangers who do the same sort of shit that I do, I’m sure I’ll be fine.” You tell him, tucking it into your trouser pocket.

He gets the message loud and clear. You’re strong, independent, you don’t need him, not really and somehow that makes Dean want you even more.

The next time he’s travelling through Tennessee, he ditches Sam and drops by Gatlinburg, just to check in, see how things are going on the mountain. He’s barely half way down Main Street when he catches sight of you stepping out of the florist with a bouquet of sunflowers, cradled in your arm. You’re wearing  jeans that hug your ass in a way that has him groaning and a brown leather jacket over an ACDC t-shirt.

You don’t react when the black Impala pulls up alongside of you, it isn’t until Dean calls your name that you realise someone’s trying to get your attention. You pull out your earbuds before tilting your head towards the wound down window, surprised to see Dean Winchester sitting in the driver’s seat.

“Hey.” Dean says with that handsome smile of his. “Need a ride?”

Love Dean? Don’t miss any of his stories by joining the taglist here.

Interested in supporting me? Join my Patreon for Bonus Content!

Like My Work? - Why Not Buy Me A Coffee

[dropoff99]

Moderate Wheel of Time Book Spoilers ahead:

I can’t speak for the WoT community but seeing WoT discourse for over 20 years I’ve seen all kinds of takes on the Seanchan but there seems to be some confusion on their role in the story overall from show audiences so I will simply give my take.

The Seanchan are a civilization that was needed to demonstrate that the forces of the shadow aren’t the only major threat to Randland. There are several examples like this in the story of groups who have degrees of selfishness, cruelty, and prejudice but none as strong as the Seanchan. These include the Whitecloaks, the Red Ajah(Elaida), Shaido, Tairen/Cairhienin Lords, and generally anyone with bigoted ideas or power-hungry agendas who aren’t darkfriends or members of the shadow. The shadow uses these people and groups as useful tools to enact the dark ones bidding.

The Seanchan aren’t inherently “evil” (only the shadow/forsaken/dark one really occupy that role) but of course do lots of evil things and are more or less the worst active group in the story outside of the shadow. They are manipulated by the shadow (forsaken) which the show pretty much tells you but doesn’t go into how far back that goes. But they also don’t need a lot of help when it comes to being awful. The only defense of them you will really find among the fan base are things cited directly from the books or individual characters that were redeemable.

For example, once you swear oaths to Seanchan rule they more or less leave you alone (aside from the channelers obviously). They eliminate crime and corruption (though not from their own ranks as effectively) and arguably treat their citizens more fairly than many kingdoms they conquer. This is all governed by a strict legal code and honor culture followed in their society. Jordan demonstrates the downside of that culture and how it has developed and been exploited to thwart and enslave Aes Sedai and channelers.

The Seanchan are a major example (along with the Aiel) of how morality and ethics change among cultures after long periods of isolation. They have been across the Aryth Ocean for 1,000 years and their knowledge of their own history isn’t much more than legend. The people they are invading know their pre-history better than they do (particularly that of their founder Artur Hawkwing).

But ultimately they are pretty horrible. They will annihilate anything that opposes them. What they do to channelers and those who show the slightest disobedience is indefensible. They are more or less a demonstration of how “evil” a society can become when you marry ignorance/bigotry with enormous military power.

This is all just to say that if you see a book reader defending the Seanchan in any way, it likely is related to how effective they were at fulfilling a certain role in the series, not due to some sort of agreement with their world view. But even that is kind of rare because they just simply aren’t that popular and only have a couple characters that are really relevant in the long run despite having a constant presence. They are baddies who aren’t the shadow but are still awful/scary.

[absolutehumandisaster]

Random TFC headcanons which accidentally ended up mostly name related (canon typical nonchalance about violence ahead):

cMedic’s name is Jacob

Fred’s full name is Wilfred which he greatly dislikes

Ok I could have sworn this was canon but everyone calls cSpy Ghost. I can’t find it anywhere in the comics but I was so convinced it was real. It might have been a headcanon someone else made but that would’ve had to have been years ago. Anyway, his name is Ghost

Everyone calls cHeavy Boss. As like, a name, the same way the tf2 mercs call each other by their titles. The others probably know his real name, they just don’t use it.

Scout!Greg and Demo!Greg have a name related rivalry. They call each other almost exclusively “other Greg” (s!Greg tried using “lesser Greg” or “inferior Greg” but ultimately decided that “other Greg” was somehow the most disrespectful). At some point someone suggests calling one of them Gregory or using their last names and they both promised to kill anyone who did that. You’d think they’d tire of the same joke after four decades. They don’t.

d!Greg’s name isn’t actually Greg, it’s a nickname born out of an inside joke from when he was younger, but he’s committed to the bit now. His real name is Geoffrey and he’s sworn Ghost to secrecy

Just like the TF2 mercs, they started out referring to each other as their titles, but decided that was weird and started using their real names after less than a year

Y’know that part in the comics where it’s implied s!Greg and Ross are trying to exploit children? Not canon to me. It’s my brainrot and I choose which parts of canon I keep and which parts I change. It’s like a single panel, I’m changing it. Or since he was cut off in the middle of a sentence it’s taken out of context and they actually meant something else. Either way, no <3

Both Gregs, Ross, Jacob and Boss all come from some type of military background. Virgil came from the mafia and Fred from nepotism, while Ghost was an independent assassin and Beatrice was a wanted criminal for just setting a lot of things and people on fire. Girlboss.

Virgil had insomnia before he got his eyes replaced, it just made it go from “frequently but manageably struggles with getting enough sleep” to “I have been awake for 53 hours someone help me”

s!Greg is really flexible and can do backflips and handsprings and shit. He can do a triple fold and did it the first time the whole team met to try to freak them out (which sadly only sort of worked)

Bea never tried to cover up the fact that she’s a woman, she’d just threaten to light anyone who disrespected her on fire. The others quickly learned that she was 100% serious about that

Ross collects umbrellas. He got the first one from the Civilian and thought it would be nice to have a few more. He’s probably the most stoic and brick-wall-personality man you’ll ever meet, but he collects umbrellas. Just because.

[blueikeproductions]

So prior to the release tomorrow, a sneak peak of “S3” spotlighting Prowl who instantly chummy with the other Autobots, but instantly cruel to Megatron who looks hurt and embarrassed.

It’s both caused those who’ve seen it to be excited as “Racist IDW Prowl” returning, and harkens to many older cartoons like Teen Titans having the stock “racism episode”.

“It’s worse than we thought, Poindexter, we’re stuck in a cartoon with morals.”

-rubs temples-

Ok. So once again EarthSpark’s writers seem to misunderstand racism allegories. Or perhaps Transformers as a whole does.

It’s complicated.

So stuff in the 80’s cartoon would imply the Decepticons are a separate species in their own right, sort of like classic D&D when monsters like orcs were the defacto evil species.

The cartoon would further reveal the Decepticons being their own race was true, as they descended from “military hardware” built by the Quintessons. It’s a bit muddled how much the Decepticons contributed to the great revolt that saw the Quints chased off Cybertron, as the cartoon chooses to explore it in the POV of the Autobots’ ancestors.

The Marvel comics would flirt with this a bit, with the Furman penned Gene Key arc of the ReGen One continuation revealing the Autobots and Decepticons do possess genetic differences that Scorponok wishes to exploit.

So the racism allegory should fit in ES, right?

Well no.

Outside of the Beast era, which also implies the Maximals, Predacons, and (in a roundabout way) the Vehicons are all distinct species and TFA implying a similar concept, this idea of the Transformers’ factions also functioning as different biologically distinct species tends to be ignored most of the time. (…Except for the Mini-Cons and Terrans…)

Veteran fans in particular have expressed annoyance at this species concept, preferring the Autobots and Decepticons to instead be more politically driven.

And so that’s been the defining characteristic largely going forward, that the Autobots and Decepticons are more like aggressive political parties that can’t agree on anything, but still leaning towards the older concepts of the Autobots wanting peaceful protest and change, while the Decepticons want to blow it all up, the devil with anything in their way.

IDW2 in particular saw the Decepticons start off as a political movement called the “Ascenticons” who wanted to rise up from Nominus Prime’s Energon rationing that was put into place after the devastating War of the Threefold Spark that saw the kibosh put on the Spacebridge program. Megatron didn’t very much care for that, despite being a young soldier in that war, and wanted the Transformers to escape those shackles and run colonization unchecked throughout the galaxy, as it was their right.

The terrorist group, Rise, were also managed by Megatron in secret, trying to nudge things in his favor, with the Ascenticons and Rise formally coming together as the Decepticons to stage a coup d'état.

EarthSpark makes it clear the Transformers weren’t created by the Quints, so they’re not Goods or Hardware here. It’s not particularly clear if there even IS a generic difference here. It feels like the intention in ES was the more modern political-ideological differences, but then S2 implies there might be a racial difference with the “Cons will be Cons”. So not even the show can make up its mind on what exactly the Autobots and Decepticons are in-universe.

Prowl’s dismissal of Megatron kind of reminds me of Rattrap & Dinobot’s exchange of barbs in Beast Wars, and in a way, that should be more what this relationship is like for Prowl and Megs.

The difference so far is Megs seems more legitimately hurt by it, and isn’t fighting back verbally like Dinobot would. And after TFONE, it’s rather foreign that Megs would take Prowl’s skrud like that.

Depending on where this goes, it feels like the writers are trying to channel the alien that called Starfire a “trog” or Malfoy calling Hermione a “mud blood”, but it kinda comes off instead as Prowl going “Ew what’s that Republican jerk doing here?” Prowl is honestly justified at being disgusted at Megatron even being here, as let’s remember, Megatron still started the war that decimated Cybertron. It doesn’t really matter he suddenly feels bad about it, that’s countless lives lost on Cybertron alone because of his actions. So the Autobots and Maltos being so chummy with Gruncle Megatron is still kinda unnerving. Again it’s like they want him to be Vegeta, but without Vegeta’s abrasive Saiyan Pride dictating things.

The problem remains that EarthSpark’s staff are largely Decepticon sympathizers, and similar to IDW, the problem is magnified more by the Autobots rightfully annoyed at Megatron getting away… So much so that Getaway’s own coup in getting rid of Megatron and his sympathizers was technically justified…

Until Roberts realized Getaway was correct, that didn’t fly with the trajectory, and had to instead write him as a psychopath with delusions of being a Prime, among other things…

-sighs-

T’be honest this is one of those times I wish Roberts got his way early on and we got Blitzwing and Powerglide as the couple and Quickswitch in Megatron’s role because this would’ve saved us so many headaches in the long run.

[angstics]

I feel like it’s important to make intentional decisions and do whatever you believe is right when it comes to art.

I really care about artists that are just loud and brash and bring whatever you believe in to question.

I feel like Bowie and Iggy did that for a lot of people. I’d say even Smiths did that.

I don’t think this is entirely political though. It could be spiritual. I just feel like Gerard is really quiet about what he believes in until most people start talking about it. Or maybe he wasn’t informed at all. He caters to a very specific audience and doesn’t actually try to break any sort of taboos or extend the boundaries in art. Most of what he does is just ok to do.

I’d love to hear why you think this doesn’t matter. As I said, I think this kinda art really matters. I don’t care much that Gerard isn’t that kinda artist but I feel like a lot of times he wants it to seem that way. I feel like he has a lot more potential if he didn’t tip toe around these things.

(Also I know lady Gaga hasn’t done anything controversial recently but hey at least she did it for a WHILE.)

Id love to continue this convo if anyone wants to.

I personally get the sense that gerard doesn’t have a strong stance about Anything, at least according to the lack of strong direction in any of his art. He doesnt make a stance as much as he just lives what he believes in — women as people, queerness as interesting, even institutions (military, industry) as exploitative. Especially the last point he neverrr talks about, but it’s an undeniable part of black parade and killjoys et al. But i never got that as a political statement or call to action or anything like that. Just an opinion he has that is a normal part of his life and informs his art.

It isnt like any of the influences u mention, since they have such a strong vision. Sometimes political like the Watchmen comic, sometimes apolitical like Bowie, but nevertheless mainstream revolutions in art. I know what you mean. But i dont think gerard (and others) withholds as much as he . Just doesnt have anything to say.

An example. Fans point to ProRev stage gay as a strong stance against homophobia. And the band members frame it this way sometimes. Some other times, however, they say it was a “heat of the moment”, adrenaline thing. Which I believe wayyyy more. impulsivity over intention. Doesnt mean they didnt mean it, but their lack of intent points to a lack of overall intent. Bowie did something similar, but in a different way that was & still is crazy.

The thing is, you can see the lack of strength in the lack of real influence my chem has had on music, at least so far. The only big artist i can think they’ve influenced is Billie Eilish, and in a way that’s more stylistic than musical. Even small artists are often extremely derivative rather than inspired. Pinkshift & glass beach are the only bands I can think of who were properly inspired by mychem. They were the last hurrah of popular rock, rather than a reshift or revitalization. Time will only tell whether anyone picks up the mantle 🤷🤷 Bowie influenced mcr 30 years later — Nirvana & Thursday 5. Who’s inspired by mcr?

I’m a very formalist person, I think, meaning I care about qualities more than the message, and gerard (and all of mcr) are just fantastic artists Intuitively. It feels good to listen to them. That is their strength. And that is very hard to recreate.

[girldragongizzard]

Chapter 14: Preparation

“OK, Meghan, but I need to inform you that I am required by law to report if I suspect that you have plans to harm yourself or others, and that includes Mr. Säure. Even though he is a dragon, like you, he is still a citizen of the United States and currently legally recognized as a fellow human being.”

That last phrase just feels so wrong.

I did not miss a third therapy session. I’m there. I think I’ve made an error.

“Not harm,” I say. “Stop.”

“What do you mean by ‘stop’?”

“Intervene,” I carefully type out. “Convince to cease terror.”

“Shouldn’t you leave that up to the authorities?” she asks.

“Out of their league,” I say. “Either they let continue. Or they attack with military. Bad either way.”

“That’s like what happens in movies, though, isn’t it?” my counselor asks. “Don’t you think we’re all more sophisticated than that? Don’t you think there are experts who can work diplomatically with someone like Säure?”

I snort. It’s basically a sneeze. A sneeze of derision.

“No? You don’t think so? You know something they don’t?” she asks.

“Am dragon,” I say, and just stare at her.

“Then why did you ask me for my advice on the matter?” she asks.

“How,” I type into my tablet, looking up at her occasionally to indicate I’m taking my time and want her to pay attention, “do we fight fear? You are a therapist. Maybe you have idea about humans I do not.”

—

I’m starting to formulate a plan. But I’m not writing much of it down, just some of the process of putting it together, because I don’t want to tip Säure off to just what I’m doing. You’ll have to excuse me for this, it’s important.

Hang tight. I think this is going to work.

Why try to take Säure down?

That’s a good question. Mostly, for my part, because he’s targeted me specifically. He tried to eat me. But also, because he’s terrorizing my city.

And we’re dragons having a territorial dispute. It’s inevitable.

He’s a competing predator trying to push me away from my food source, but also away from my family and my own hoard.

But also he’s a rampaging billionaire. I keep harping on that without demonstrating just how dangerous that is. He hasn’t really done anything yet besides fly around and scream at the sky and boil the bay, basically threatening everyone. Except, as a billionaire, he is a representative and enforcer of the very system that failed to accommodate my own disabilities and that put me into government funded low income housing while on SSI, and that made and kept Joel homeless before his dracomorphosis, and that had the police illegally working with his own company to kidnap people and relocate them into the wilderness because we had the fortune of becoming full blown dragons. And sure, he disavowed that last thing, but he was complicit in the habits and systems that made it possible in the first place. It was his company. Like, these are just tiny examples in a massive system of the exploitation and destruction of the populace.

I feel like I should just point outside and let the entire world be my example. You can surely see what’s going on out there. And if you can’t see that, then you might not be my audience anyway.

But, in this case, it is actually personal.

And it’s not like I’m trying to hurt or kill him, anyway, just change his perspective and behavior.

I’m going to communicate with him. As legally as I can, because I myself personally don’t want to deal with the consequences of misstepping. I’d like to keep living on the roof of my building and to continue dating Rhoda and Chapman.

And, like, that’s hard. Everything is set up so that the average person can’t do this sort of thing without getting dinged for it. Or without just being ineffectual. What incentive does he ever have to change his behavior in the first place? What leverage does anyone have to give him an incentive?

But, despite all of my instincts or C-PTSD or whatever it is that’s causing me to ideate the act of tearing him apart and spending the rest of the decade swallowing the bits and chunks, as if I can even do that, I do think I have an idea of how to do this in just this particular case.

Every dragon of his kind has a weakness.

And also, as a dragon, I have resources the average person does not.

—

The sound of three seagulls crying as they fly low overhead makes it hard for anyone to talk. It’s kind of amazing how loud they can be sometimes.

Caleb squints his eyes as if that helps keep the noise out of his head. Then he glances at Astraia and says, “We’ve got lines of communication to most of the dragons in the county, now. Each community has their own mirror of your Discord server. Well, not mirror as in a digital copy of it, but an imitation, their own thing. Believe it or not, you weren’t even the first to do it. The city of Jam had a PHPBBS going by the end of that first weekend, of all things.” He sighs, “Anyway, yeah, I think we can do this. But we’re not going to get 100% cooperation.”

“Don’t need all,” I say, knuckling my tablet to do it. “Just most.”

“Yeah, it’s still going to be tough going,” he replies. “This isn’t instant communication. Honestly, a lot of the dragons are being represented by their human friends and family. And while not everyone is always on their devices, there’s a lot of relaying going on, too. The more time we have, the easier it will be to set it all up and get everyone coordinated. Or, most of them coordinated. But, day of, we can’t rely on it.”

“Need humans, too. As many as can,” I say.

“Yeah.”

“Let’s take time,” I tell him. “Day of, Sunday?”

“Might work. Good choice for other reasons, I think,” Caleb nods.

I turn to Astraia, “You lay low. Keep healing. Coordinate.”

“It’s what I’ve been doing,” she responds, doing her eight headed trick with a newer, larger looking tablet. “We’ve had to crowd fund a garage for me, and that dovetails with the other outreach we’ve been doing. I’m good.”

“Thank you.”

“People do like to support their neighborhood dragons,” she says. “We’ve really got that going for us.”

“Banking on it,” I say. Then I work to spell it out, and everyone waits patiently while I type it “When I led roll call on Murder Thursday, the fact it worked tells us what we need to know.”

Joel yawps cheerfully.

We are on his territory, in his park, behind the defunct acid tanks. We’re here so that he stays up to date on the plan, too.

“I have something for you,” I tell him. “It might suck.”

He tilts his head.

With some effort, I pull out the pendant that Chapman made for me, and lay it on the ground next to my tablet, then I say, “Put this on, human. Take off, dragon. Magic. Chapman made. But, make you girl. No talk, only type.”

He sneeze-snorts and looks away.

Yeah, OK. Honestly didn’t think so.

—

As I’ve said before, I’ve had a little training with Wentin since it helped me to see my true nature as a dragon, and to access what I guess could be called dragon magic. Our natural abilities to engage with reality in a way that other life cannot typically do. But I haven’t had much.

And though I still won’t say all that I’ve learned, I will admit I don’t feel like it was enough, despite how little I trust the monster.

Our dream hunt through the woods of the nightmares of my youth, the one that turned into a game of me chasing it, felt like it changed something between us. And I feel like I could seriously use some extra help in what I’m trying to do.

So, I try to set up a meeting with it in its arboretum, despite all my misgivings.

I do this by sending it a direct message on Discord, and then moving on and dealing with other preparation work.

“I agree to train with you at your next earliest convenience,” I send it.

Eventually, I do get a message back from it.

“I’m sorry, My Dear Queen, but I am currently indisposed with other work. When I am done, I will let you know when I am free, and I would love to assist you in your studies at that time. I do not know when this will be.”

For how relieved I am, I’m also sharply disappointed.

But it did respond to me, it is marked as online, so I dare to ask it something that’s been bothering me. If it answers, it might still be a help.

“Did you have life as human before?” I send to it.

“Oh, dear no, My Queen. Not at all,” it says.

I’d asked the question because everything I’ve been learning about it had led me to have a doubt about its origin. To question whether it underwent dracomorphosis the way the rest of us did. But to have it confirm that doubt feels unexpected anyway. And it leaves me with a question about the most frivolous thing.

I wonder so many other things, like what its nature was before dracomorphosis. And whether it had been some other kind of creature, or whether it had always just been a nightmare monster. How is it now capable of manifesting physically?

There’s a lot to wonder about, but instead I focus on this one silly thing.

“Why are you called Wentin?” I ask.

“Oh, I love this story,” It sends. “Long ago, a child I used to hunt chose a novel way of dealing with me. And one night, she turned to face me and told me to stop. And, of course, since I no longer had consent to hunt her, I had to cease. Confused and at a loss as to what to do, I asked her what she wanted from me. And she in turn asked me if I would be her friend. For the life of me I don’t know why, but I agreed. And when she learned that I didn’t have a name, she gave me the name Wentin. She has now died long ago. But I have kept the name ever since in her memory.”

And then its status turns to red, indicating that it has logged off.

In case it will answer another frivolous question when it logs back on, I ask it, “Do you use a computer or other device to access Discord?”

I do feel a little strange trying to have such a mundane conversation with the monster of my childhood nightmares. But I get to, it seems, so I’ll keep pushing it.

I tuck my tablet away and get back to business, part of my mind chewing on its answer.

There are so many clues to other questions it just gave me, as well as a lot more questions.

—

Somewhere in there, I have a genuine date with Chapman.

We do spend some time talking business and preparation, during which I learn that sie can’t prepare much for me to use on such short notice. But that sie thinks my plan has some merit, and won’t dissuade me from trying it.

And then we spend the rest of the evening just getting to know each other better over some unexpectedly good food and live music on a Thursday night. The nice thing about using the table to communicate with each other is that we don’t have to hear what the other is saying.

I also start making longer term plans with hir. Things to do as the world maybe, hopefully settles down from the dracomorphosis. Though we both acknowledge that might not happen for a while. I want to genuinely pursue a remedy for people like Kimberly, who may feel left behind by the latest wonders of the world, who are beings of other sorts stuck in otherwise human form. And maybe if we track down and find the Artist of Transformation, or whatever they actually call themself, we might be able to do that. Chapman agrees to give this an honest shot.

Perhaps we can help transgender humans on the way, if sudden transformation and other spectacular expressions of Art are here to stay.

Or, at least, maybe we can bring a few people some joy while the world seems to continue to vibrate itself apart, as it is apparently doing.

I suppose you might conclude I’ve thoughtlessly thrown my lot in with what Säure calls the Architects, without suspicion or question.

Maybe I have.

But, mostly, I’m following Chapman, because sie has given me reason to trust hir. And I like hir. A lot.

I might be a little dazzled or smitten or something, but I guess I’ll eventually learn.

In the meantime, I’m swallowing bits of marinated lamb wrapped in herby and fragrant other foods, something I don’t think I’d have ever tried before, while enjoying a live band that’s developed a strange and dark fusion of traditional Greek music and bluegrass, with lyrics about the Odyssey.

It’s a very Fairport moment.

—

On Friday, there isn’t much prep left to do, besides wait for the threads that I’ve started to continue weaving themselves together and the net to spread. Fortunately, today’s the day I’ve put aside to tend to Rhoda.

We’ve been back to our nightly tea. And I’ve been spending the night in her apartment, curled up by her front door, ever since that first night she drew her line, made her rule, and offered me shelter. We’ve effectively been living together.

But I need to talk to her about this.

Normally, after a day out and about, I arrive on her doorstep in my faerie trans princess gown and tiara, and relax back into dracoform once inside her door. I’ve been doing this because it’s just easier to get to her apartment that way.

This time I’m much earlier and I relax before I knock. This is our agreed upon signal for this.

Of course, she peers through her peephole before she opens the door, so she already knows.

She opens the door and just says, “I’ll start the tea.”

Her acknowledgement. By being business-like, instead of welcoming me home, she’s telling me she’s prepared to rescind her rule about the apartment for the night.

I see a haunted and exhausted look in her eye, though, and I dread what this conversation will entail.

But she lets me make my way into the apartment, and once she closes the door behind me, she’s smiling and coming to cup my jaw and give me a kiss on my snout. And then she says, “Welcome home.”

“Thank you, Rhoda,” I say. The one full phrase I can smoothly use my syrinx for.

She’s still moving more slowly and thoughtfully than usual when she goes into the kitchen to get the kettle and fill it with water. The tea set itself is already arranged on her coffee table, complete with my customary bowl. The water she’s about to heat is actually for my bowl, her tea is now steeping.

“You seem to have had a busy week!” she calls from the kitchen.

“Yes,” I say.

She comes back and sits down and then plugs the kettle in and sets it on the table.

“Let’s go ahead and talk about that, then,” she says. “Whatever we need to air out is fine. Catch me up.”

I have my explanation as a set of sentences in my tablet that I play one at a time, pausing in between to let Rhoda react or to ask any questions. She just prompts me to continue, so I do. But by the time I’m done explaining my whole plan to her, my bowl is full of tea and I can taste it fully by licking the air.

I then turn the conversation over to her by playing my final precomposed sentences, “I imagine all sorts of ways that this could cause worry and be difficult to bear. We can try something different.”

She considers that for a while, finger touching her lip to keep it from quivering, and then she blinks a couple times and shakes her head, “No. This is good, Meghan. I won’t say I’m happy about your role in this, but I am proud of you for coming up with the whole idea. I can’t think of anything else to try that would be any safer. And somebody has to do something.”

I don’t bother telling her that she’s someone who can do something. We’ve already covered that. She doesn’t want that power or what using it for that level of influence will do to her. She doesn’t want the responsibility or the weight of it, nevermind that the proclamation she’s already made is clearly having a profound and powerful effect. My goal here is to take some of that weight off her shoulders.

I bow my head and stay quiet a little longer to see if she has more to say. She does.

“You have to come home after this, Meghan. I’ve been working on a project that’s important to me, and I think you’re the only one who can edit it properly. I need your insight. Your experiences. I need you to help me make sense of some things I don’t think I can fully understand, and I don’t really know anybody else who is qualified. Except maybe Chapman, but I’d rather it be you.” She lowers her head at me and says, “So, after you do this on Sunday, you come home. Please.”

I know what she means. I know how important it is to her. I hope I can deliver.

[cienie-isengardu]

I like to imagine most Outworlders don't speak English if we were being realistic with workdbuilding. The royal family and their advisors would probably interact with Earthrealm officials during visits but regular Outwrolders probably wouldn't.

The only reason they speak English is for our convenience but realistically most probably shouldn't and it'd be funny if the language barrier popped up at times.

Like I imagine Quan Chi didn't speak English initially so he didn't register Titan Shang was talking to him when he was doing his job in the mines. Like Titan Shang thinks Quan Chi is ignoring him...when in reality Quan Chi simply doesn't register he's talking to him at all.

That is exactly my thought - worldbuilding wise, common Outworlders shouldn’t speak English or any other Earthrealm’s dialects, as they do not have a constant contact with totally foreign cultures from Liu Kang’s realm. I don’t think we ever heard of any vital trade between Earthrealm and Outworld and the portal between realms isn’t that easily accessible for people to just snuck in, and it is not just about Outworlders being wary of Earthrealmers but also Liu Kang decided to keep existence of other realms in secret from majority of his people. So the contact is limited and let’s not forget that the same as Earthrealm, Outworld is not culturally homogeneous realm either, as there is many different cultures coexisting there, like Edenians, Shokan, Centaurians, Saurian, Osh-Tekk to name few. So learning additional Earthrealm's dialects may be more difficult to some of those people than to others.

It makes sense for the Royal Family, their palace guard (Umgadi), advisors and for some military officers like General Shao and Reiko to learn English and possibly other earthrealm dialects, as such knowledge is vital to diplomacy and state security. 

It is understandable that the games use English as common language for simplicity, however 

It really is sad how the cultural/language barriers are not exploited as it has such a great potential (the closest things are: Johnny’s references to Alien that Kung Lao misunderstand as Cage calling Tanya a slur and was both offended and confused by the whole thing and Mileena thinking that drone is some kind of magic)

I don’t like the implication in Liu Kang’s timeline that Great Britain again influenced the whole world to the point English is the commonly used language because with that implication comes the question: did some Earthrealmers again suffer under the regime of other countries, be it under colonization or losing their country's independence. I mean, it is Liu Kang’s timeline, why Royal Family don’t speak in his native language as they had the longest contact with the Fire Lord and English is not, logically thinking, Raiden’s native language either?

Let’s just agree I’m very picky about this issue and I would love all the shenanigans coming from characters speaking in different languages and sometimes failing - or on purpose making it difficult to communicate well. Or, as the Lin Kuei faction has the number of native-speakers from different cultures (China, Czech, Botswana), they could utilize other languages as their “secret dialect”. Like Lin Kuei brothers waiting for Liu Kang, instead of speaking English between themselves, they could talk in Tomas’ native language because the chance Kung Lao, Raiden or Liu Kang’s servants would understand Czech is slimmer than them understanding English. 

I’m seriously crying over the untapped language potential Mortal Kombat has for years. 

As for Titan Shang Tsung, I’m gonna trust he was smarter than using English, when Quan Chi was born in mines and spent his whole life there. The mortal Shang Tsung consuming souls for ages most likely knew and could fluently use a vast number of dialects, so I imagine Titan Shang Tsung would figure out pretty quickly that no one in mines used earthrealm language and talked to Quan Chi in a way he could perfectly understand him, especially since “Damashi” needed Quan Chi’s trust to process the great plan of his.

[a-snails-pace-1917]

Criticism of Israel is,of course,not synonymous with antisemitism. This is known by anyone who isn’t obtuse or uninformed. This has to be said to not give even a rhetoric inch to Zionism.

However,I do find a trend in online anti-Zionism (mostly on TikTok,I’m new to tumblr lmao) quite concerning. Many people seem to lack a good systemic/non-individually focused understanding of the world,and in this particular case imperialism. They see conspiracies of greedy individuals and politicians where for example a Marxist should see systems of power and exploitation that are in a way reified by individuals but not actually under the full conscious control of them.

This conspiratorial understanding leads to this notion of the pro-Israel lobby and “Zionists” as controlling the U.S. government. They see instances of pro-military industrial complex and pro-Zionism groups beating progressives in elections or getting what they want and from that figure that Israel,a regional holding of U.S. imperialism used as a wedge in the Middle East so that America can exert regional power/let the Israeli’s do some of the work for them.

In short,a worrying trend I see among some anti-Zionism comes from their lack of systemic thinking and is the equivalent of seeing a man walking his dog and thinking that the dog is somehow in control of the man on account of it walking in front of him.

[cochart]

Something I wrote some time ago.

Witch of Mercury honest thoughts (you know it’s about to be spicy so cautions for the faint hearted)

Overall, I don’t know if I liked Witch of Mercury very much.

It had some decent characters, and the designs were nice and cute though I don’t know if I liked the mecha designs too much as I’m more for chonky mecha like Zaku. Aerial is nice, but if I’m buying a pla, I’m definitely going for Zeta or 00 Gundam.

People made a big deal out of this series having a female protagonist in a lesbian relationship, and I want to let people enjoy what they enjoy, but I personally didn’t find the whole business too convincing. One thing is that the Gundam franchise has always had multifaceted female characters. Of course, one might argue that as great as those characters were, they weren’t “the protagonist,” but I don’t know if Suletta was the protagonist that the female fans of the franchise dreamed of. The awkward, dorky charms can only get her so far. I know they tried to show that despite her dorkiness, she’s fucked up due to her terrible mother, but I don’t know if that really hit home for me. I mean, for me growing up, the awkward teenage protagonist with fucked up parents was Shinji. And Shinji just feels like he’s been presented better.

Suletta and Miorine are cute together, but they’re cute in a way that an OC couple might be cute. You feel like you’re fondly watching over your two friend’s DND OC’s (from a campaign that you’re not a part of) together. You don’t know the whole shbang between those two, but since your friends are so happy about the ship, you congratulate them. I found it extremely difficult to feel any chemistry between the two throughout the whole series. Suletta obsesses over Miorine like a baby duckling to its imprinted parent, but Miorine—at least throughout most of the series—either seemed like she was trying to use Suletta to get out of her crappy engagement situation or someone who wanted best for her friend who’s been through parental abuse. If you think about how blatant the chemistry is between Byleth(F) and Edelgard in FE3H, I think you could see how Witch of Mercury sort of missed on that regard.

The characters being in school in my opinion felt very “NOT” Gundam. And I’m not just being a curmudgeon here. For a long time, the Gundam series—though there have been some black sheep—has had a distinct antiwar message. There are multiple passages where characters lament the fact that children are fighting wars. Teenagers getting on mobile suits have not been a good thing. So the whole school and weird duel thing put me off. You could argue that the whole thing is a commentary on how the military conglomerates in this world are using weapons of mass destruction as entertainment, but the series doesn’t really show that. There’s very little if any reflection on the implications of making children fight each other using mobile suits.

The way the series tries to create and resolve the conflict felt very uncomfortable as well. It’s clear that the “Spacians” and the “Earthians” are in colonizer-colony relationship. We can clearly see that the spacians are using their economic and military power to basically exploit the people of Earth. Yet how the series tries to resolve the conflict is very lukewarm in my opinion. The part where Miorine tries to peacefully manage things with the victims of colonialism almost felt insulting.

The character designs are cute and charming, but sometimes it feels like some characters—especially female characters—are too busy “being pretty” to act. This might be an issue of taste, but I tend to like it more when an anime isn’t afraid of making pretty characters ugly in a moment of intense emotions.

I don’t hate the series btw. Just a little underwhelmed.

[loominggaia]

Do any of the great kingdoms have rich people taxes? Actually bothering to tax their rich instead of giving them exemptions after exemptions? (Can already tell that Zareen isn’t on the list given their… everything)

I think all Great Kingdoms extract as much money from as many people as possible, including the rich. But of course rich people have more resources to weasel their way out of paying them when they can.

The middle classes tend to get screwed the hardest because they have enough money to take, but not enough to throw bribes around or means to hide money in foreign territories.

Poor classes don't have much money to take, so governments exploit them in other ways, like slavery, imprisonment, military fodder, etc.

One way or another, they will turn people into profits.

*

Questions/Comments?

Lore Masterpost

Read the Series

[zbeez-outlet]

The Emerald Bishop Masterlist (Coming Soon)

Levi Ackerman x FemReader | AOT Canon Universe | Slow Burn Relationship

Concept || Two faces, two names, two identities, and neither of them are the real you — they’re both far more important than the real you. The real you has slipped between the cracks, and it isn’t until a certain Captain comes looking for her that you realize how valuable she truly is.

Summary || The public adores the romanticism of a vigilante. A kink in the corruption of the capital, missing prisoners, thinly veiled anonymous threats, and a calling card embroidered with an emerald wax seal. Haunting, dramatic, and imprinted with the shape of a bishop. In a world that operates like a chess board, the name “The Emerald Bishop” is whispered reverently, worshipped in the shadows by those who need him and ghostly praised by the curious and the bored. Children giggle, playing vigilante in the streets, and women swoon over the masked anonymous hero every time his exploits appear in the paper. Some admire him as much as they hate him. Everyone wants to know who he is, but they’re looking in all the wrong places.

There isn’t much to know about you, Levi thinks in passing. Unassuming and small amid the other soldiers. Until you save his life from a Titan and then suddenly he’s uncharacteristically curious. He starts with your file, as disappointing as it turns out to be. A mediocre cadet in the training corps, far from the top ten in a way that directly contradicts the skills he knows you to have. And then the rumors among the soldiers. Born into the wealth of Stohess, raised on the edge of a silver spoon, no one expected much from you. Beautiful gowns and sparkling smiles and empty thoughts. Certainly no one anticipated your radical choice to join the military, rumors sticking to the heel of your every footstep. Nothing matches, nothing sticks. All Levi sees is your quiet disposition, almost shy, and your exemplary talent that leaves him equally impressed and suspicious. Not to mention you’re rather prone to wondering off.

Maybe making you the newest member of his squad will answer some of his questions. And it has nothing to do with the feeling in his chest every time he looks at you a second too long.

A/N: This is a new series idea that I had, loosely inspired by the novel “The Scarlet Pimpernel” by Baroness Emma Orczy and the Hunger Games fan fiction “The Sterling Nightingale” by CrashingPetals (found on AO3). I hope you like my take on this story! It’ll be a couple weeks before I post it, but I wanted to know who might be interested and if anyone would like to be tagged. Leave a comment or go to the taglist link on my Navigation post!

Warnings || angst, canon typical violence, slow burn relationship, eventual smut, more specific warnings to come

Part One || Coming Soon…

[knarme-stray]

Avatar characters and their Issues TM

Neytiri - Can’t feel at peace bcs things beloved and important to her have been destroyed beyond regognition in front of her, a part of her lives forever in those places that no longer exist. What patched her up and kept her going was making her enemies bleed. She had no choice but to let that pain transform her so she could keep fighting. There are things and people she can’t look at without feeling pain or reliving those events, no matter how innocent. She doesn’t have it in her to call Quaritch’s child hers, - for obvious reasons. Not after everything that happened.

Jake - He never feels like his life or body truly belong to himself bcs of that military hierarchy subjucation he’s adapted into and been injured by. Even when he thought his life is finally in his own hands, Quaritch came and took it from him all over again. He had to leave his home, - again, - and be at mercy of someone else. He is scared of displeasing authority, his courage crumbles when he thinks his kids are getting his family in trouble, even if Tonowari isn’t actually going to demand unfair things of him. He’s just never had someone with power over his life NOT hurt him with that.

Tsu’tey - I always saw Tsu’tey as quite an introverted type who’ll get really attached to few people he knows well. He and Neytiri shared their grief for Sylwanin being taken from them. Sylwanin seems to be someone he sees the most comfort in, as seen in the comics. It’s really rough for him to let anyone else love him, or open up to anyone else after Sylwanin. Also, his parents are kinda difficult people, he probably didn’t have the most encouraging environment to be vulnerable.

Miles - He’s full of contradictions. There’s an open-armed sweetness about him towards new people who join his ranks. He wants to take care of them. He’s happy if they survive their service, get paid and return to Earth. He’s intimately aware of how his choices affect who lives and who dies. His hell-bentness to fight Jake in the end was because of the stakes, - he didn’t want the losses on his side to be in vain. Miles doesn’t exist in isolation,  - he is just one fang in the mouth apparatus of a devouring empire. It’s the exploitative dominance hierarchy of that empire that has impaired his ability to experience genuine community and belonging with others. He can only keep people near him... As his captives or subordinates. He only knows how to take because that’s the way of the empire. And, that’s what makes him an empty and miserable husk of a man. He wants to love, but only does that in ways that harm/control others and push them away. He’ll be rejected by people who are real to him, who see him for who he is, - because “who he is” isn’t deserving of their wamth of connection.

As a recom he becomes someone who probably isn’t even legally a person to RDA, - his new life is just a suicide mission to kill Jake Sully. Everything about his existence is humiliating and pathethic, and he knows it. The lies of the hierarchy he has served in his past life, are crumbling, - the honor is gone, and only agonizing shame will be revealed. He’s also essentially company property at this point. He discovers, too late, that he wants to love, - that he has family, a child he wants to be a father to.

[burinazar]

...

this is the last time i'll talk about the kpop mia thing i promise. i pinky promise. just have to get this off my chest. (post contains mentions of Unpleasant fanservice elements with underage characters in other shows, not terribly detailed but they are described.)

Imagine if every time someone said they liked Gainax’s beloved mecha classic Gunbuster everyone who heard them assumed it was specifically because of that one locker room scene that is in there more prominently than the scenes of nudity in MiA and feature more visible, more detailed, and more prolonged underage nudity and quite unambiguously exists for the sake of titillation alone

imagine if mentioning you were a Fate fan caused everyone to think you were watching it for the little girls making out in Prisma Ilya or the microbikini-clad underage version of Jack the Ripper in FGO. or saying you liked Gurren Lagann immediately caused people to come running with that one interview where a staff writer randomly said Yoko is 14 while most of the merchandise featuring her is heavily focused on sexualization and fanservice, retroactively rendering the show's many many fanservice scenes with her highly questionable for reasons lying totally outside its established canon

or to take a break from objectionable sexualization even though that's the internet's favorite subject: what if every LOGH fan was assumed to share Tanaka's potential tendency of according validity of Great Man Theory or take an uncritical view of the authoritative military autocracies like the one Reinhard establishes amid a mostly positive framing in the story. there are definitely fans that do this by the way but good lord i can't imagine someone assuming the entire fandom does instead of being prone to creating many healthily-critical diatribes questioning the above, even alongside our great love of the characters of the story and the overall work

like nobody assumes these things because it’s widely agreed there’s lots of other good shit in there for all of those shows, and many fans enjoy them without liking and thumbs-upping everything in it. so can you give us Giant Hole Show Liker People that bare minimum of consideration. huh.

like. man. i’m not out here standing by everything in MiA as something I am pleased is in it — like, fucking duh i’m not, since everyone who’s heard me rant about how the otherwise consistent and fantastically delineated theme of “condemning and inspecting a world that exploits innocents for its advancement and those who partake in this” is veritably kneecapped by some of s1’s dumbass lolisho fanservice moments (that Tsukushi just haaaad to throw in, where trauma and humiliation is thrown into casual everyday life montages and brushed off as funny-sexy), knows perfectly well how i feel about them.

but I’m so so tired of people not affording the fans any consideration that we might like The Fucking Rest Of It when there’s way more mainstream things with worse-or-as-bad elements of underage fanservice whose fandom isn’t assumed to be there primarily for the worst bits of fan service.

like can you just accord people the grace of potentially being human beings with complex opinions and well developed reasoning skills and nuanced opinions

[pectinpeeress]

Aarghhhh.... kind of a rant below, sorry about that, somethings just been bugging me...

I’ve been kind of annoyed with a lot of the Opinions I’ve seen on Kimblee as a character, especially in terms of his relationship with Riza. Because I feel like people keep trying to justify his character morally in order to justify liking him. And, first of all, a character doesn’t need to be a good person for you to like them; and secondly, it makes the characters way less interesting?!?

Like, If you look at Kimblees narrative purpose as a character, he isn’t supposed to represent a real person. Just like how the Greek gods are more similar to the element they’re meant to represent than an actual person, Kimblee is the idea of narcissism come manifest. I get that writing is subjective, but Arakawa has literally said that she based Kimblee off of Alex from A Clockwork Orange – a character whose so insufferably self-centered, he makes you wonder if he even deserves to act for himself-- so I feel like it’s fair to say that regardless of what anyone claims, the intention is for him to be an irredeemable person.

I think that what confuses a lot of people is that he has an understandable set of motivations, and people don’t understand the difference between an understandable villain and a sympathetic villain. Kimblee is not a sympathetic villain, he’s given no backstory, no noble goals, or sympathetic motivation. But he is an understandable villain. We understand his thought process, but that doesn’t mean that we can view him as a good person. Honestly, his motivation has always reminded me of alt-right accelerationism, he recognizes that the things he’s doing are bad, but he just doesn’t care.

This is why it bugs me when people claim that he and Riza had a connection, or that Riza sympathized with him. Because it ignores the narrative purpose of his character. He’s the manifestation of the hypocrisy of Amestris. The government claims violence is a necessary evil, but the system is built to reward sadism. It’s sort of like how our society claims to reward kindness, and yet the most powerful people are billionaires who exploit their workers. So when he tells Riza to look in the eyes of the people she kills, it’s impactful because she hates him. It’s her becoming disillusioned with the lies and propaganda of the military. They claim to be protecting the people of Amestris but in reality, they’re just a weapon for the government to use as it sees fit. Riza doesn’t sympathize with Kimblee, she loses her patriotism, and that is the point.

To be clear, I don’t care which characters you like, or what you ship, or whatever, but when you claim that Riza and Kimblee got along, you’re actively making her character less compelling. The narrative goes from “soldier becomes disillusioned with the military” to “woman is tempted by the ~dark side~” which like, that’s fine, there’s nothing inherently wrong with simplifying a character. My issue comes from the fact that people act like they’re improving her character or making her more interesting, and they’re not. She goes from a really interesting look into the purpose of the military and the motivations of the soldiers within it, to a poorly written YA protagonist. And for what?  A love-triangle? The aesthetic?

It just irritates me because there’s this undertone to it like they’re saving Riza from being overly dependent on a man by latching her to another man. Like, the whole point of Riza’s character is that despite being dehumanized her entire life, she is still a human with free will and agency, and their attempt to fix what they perceive as the faults of Riza’s character is to turn her into a tool used by a different man? Like, can’t she just be evil on her own? Why is she only allowed to do immoral things through the proxy of a man? It comes off as way more dehumanizing than any of the tropes they’re trying to fix, while also ignoring that she’s an intentional subversion of those tropes.

IDK, just to clarify, I really do not care about your personal taste or whatever content you make. It’s stupid to act like the mere act of liking a fictional character is indicative of a person’s actual ethics, and it’s even stupider to think that fandom discourse will have any sort of positive impact on their moral compass. What mostly bugs me is when people act like they're smarter than everyone else for liking something when it’s like??? Dude just like what you like you don’t need to lie about the narrative to justify it.

[dragoneyes618]

(April 4, 2024 / JNS)

The growing chorus of voices on the political left that have been loudly demanding that Israel’s war on Hamas be stopped have been waiting for this. After months of seeking to leverage false stories such as one about a missile attack on a hospital, downplaying or denying the way Hamas embeds its terrorist forces in hospitals, schools and civilian homes, and flogging statistics about Palestinian civilian casualties that are clearly bogus, the anti-Israel lobby thinks that it finally has a way to force the Jewish state to stand down in Gaza.

A mistaken strike that caused the deaths of seven World Central Kitchen aid workers who were bringing food and other supplies into the Strip is being treated as not merely a tragic accident all too common in wars, but as an act of transcendent symbolism that proves that Israel’s tactics are too brutal to be allowed to continue.

Subscribe to The JNS Daily Syndicate by email and never miss our top storiesFREE SIGN UP

By signing up, you agree to receive emails from JNS and allied pro-Israel organizations.

That was not merely the substance of a torrent of unhinged comments from World Central Kitchen founder Chef José Andrés who, without a shred of proof, accused Israel of deliberately murdering the aid workers. It was also the substance of the threats directed at Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu by President Joe Biden in a tense 30-minute call. Reportedly, Biden said that future military aid to Israel—vital for the resupply of Israeli forces in order for the war on Hamas to continue—would be linked to whether it satisfies his demands about ensuring that both civilians and aid workers are not harmed.

Backing away from Israel

Biden has been slowly but surely backing away from his initial support for the war and the goal of eradicating Hamas since the Palestinian terrorist group started it with unspeakable atrocities on Oct. 7. The administration has toyed at times with the idea of linking aid to halting the offensive, but never previously acted on the idea, despite the constant urgings of left-wing Democrats to do so. The aid worker incident thus is a turning point as this is the first time that Biden has directly said that he would impose conditions on military assistance.

This takes the dispute between the two governments to a very different and far more dangerous level.

It’s important to be clear about what is happening. While the deaths of the aid workers were the result of a terrible blunder by the Israel Defense Forces, the firestorm of criticism aimed at Israel in the days since the incident occurred isn’t really about their tragic fate, sad though it is.

Nor is it really rooted in a substantive argument claiming that the IDF is failing to take precautions to avoid civilian deaths or to anything to hinder the flow of aid into Gaza, including the area that is still controlled by Hamas. The world’s leading experts on warfare, including John Spencer, the chair of urban warfare studies at West Point, and historian Andrew Roberts, have already declared that not only is Israel upholding the laws of war in its Gaza campaign but has done so in a manner that has caused fewer civilian casualties in such a battle than any in modern history. The claim that Israel has engaged in an “indiscriminate” bombing campaign or is “over the top,” as Biden has claimed, simply isn’t true.

Biden’s hypocrisy

It is also breathtakingly hypocritical.

Mistakes in war always happen as U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan—and famously before that, in Korea and Vietnam—proved.

On his first day in office in January 2009, President Barack Obama ordered drone strikes in Waziristan, Pakistan, which led to the deaths of as many as 20 civilians. That would be only the first of 540 strikes on diverse targets in Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, Afghanistan and Iraq in which more than 300 civilians would be killed during his two terms in office, though that number might be underestimated since the strikes were conducted in areas where reporting casualties was not as organized as it is in Gaza. Though Obama would later joke that he had discovered in the White House that “it turns out that I’m really good at killing people,” no one in the corporate press assumed that the Nobel Peace Prize winner was deliberately slaughtering civilians by the dozens as part of a “targeted killings” of terror suspects.

Biden has direct responsibility for killing civilians in error as well.

On Aug. 29, 2021, during the disastrous and humiliating U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, American forces conducted a strike on what they thought was a member of the ISIS-K terror group transporting bombs. They were operating under orders from Washington; however, it turned out to be a tragic mistake, and the missiles launched from MQ-9 Reaper drones killed 10 innocent civilians, including seven children.

While Biden issued a lengthy and passionate statement denouncing the deaths of the seven aid workers, he did no such thing when his own orders led to the accidental deaths of innocents. Instead, he let military officials make the statement about the error and take the fallout while he went to the beach for the weekend.

Of course, Obama and Biden didn’t intend to kill civilians while Americans were trying to take out terrorists. But it happened quite often for the same reasons that this week’s tragedy occurred. Even with the most sophisticated weaponry and satellite imaging of target areas, amid the fog of war, there are no guarantees that even missions fully vetted with great care and intended to take out only combatants will go according to plan.

Indeed, in December, the IDF conceded that about 20% of soldiers that had been killed during the current war were victims of “friendly fire” in which they were mistaken for foes by their own side. Many Americans have died under similar circumstances in wars fought by the United States.

Even when armies take special care to avoid accidents, anyone who enters a combat zone where bullets and bombs are flying is at risk of being killed or wounded. That is always going to be true whether or not those put at risk are combatants or non-combatants.

In the case of the World Central Kitchen victims, the problem, which remains ongoing, is accentuated by the fact that Hamas terrorists lurk near aid convoys since they steal most of what has been brought into Gaza for civilian use. Indeed, it is fairly obvious that if Hamas terrorists weren’t taking the food, fuel and other supplies that have flowed into Gaza with Israeli permission these past six months, there would be no talk about people starving there.

That doesn’t lessen the grief of the families of those who die as a result of errors. But it should put the situation in perspective. Their deaths—like those of everyone else who has been killed since Hamas attacked southern Israel in an orgy of murder, rape, torture, kidnapping and wanton destruction on Oct. 7—are the responsibility of the terrorists and their many supporters.

Letting Hamas win

Though Israeli military and political leaders have had numerous discussions with their American counterparts in which the counter-offensive into Gaza has been criticized, the latter has had no realistic suggestions about how Hamas terrorist forces might be eliminated other than by the methods the Jewish state has been employing. The notion that Hamas can be eliminated without Israeli troops taking physical possession of their last enclave in Rafah in the south and striking at the four remaining intact Hamas battalions there is risible. Therefore, Biden’s demand for “tangible steps” by Israel can only mean one thing: stop the war or conduct it in a manner that ensures that the goal of the complete defeat of Hamas and the end of its control of any part of Gaza cannot be achieved.

That means that if Israel is to continue receiving military aid, it must agree to a situation in which the war against Hamas simply cannot be won. Should Netanyahu decide that those conditions must be accepted, it virtually guarantees that the Islamist group will emerge from the conflict it began not only alive and well but as its victor, with undoubted primacy in Palestinian politics for the foreseeable future.

These conditions are the inevitable result not of the specific incident involving the aid workers but of an incessant campaign of incitement and smears directed at Israel even before ground troops entered Gaza after the Simchat Torah pogroms in 22 Israeli communities and at the Nova music festival.

Biden’s threats are the culmination of the opprobrium that has been directed at Israel from left-wing editorial pages and the genocidal chants from mobs supporting Hamas that have been heard on the streets of American cities and on college campuses. Indeed, so successful has been the effort to demonize the Israeli war effort that Biden said his own wife Jill had demanded that he do something to “stop it, stop it now.”

Political motives

His willingness to heed these calls to halt the Israeli effort to defeat Hamas goes beyond a desire for domestic peace in the White House. The entire left wing of the Democratic Party, including many so-called “progressives” in Congress, has been clamoring that he use the threat of aid cutoffs to end the war prior to the release of the more than 100 hostages still being held by Hamas, including five Americans. Isolated in the White House, Biden and his advisers truly believe that the reason he’s currently trailing former President Donald Trump in his battle for re-election is because he’s considered insufficiently hostile to Israel by the intersectional activist wing of his party that is ever more hostile to Zionism and the Jewish state.

When measured against the yawns and shrugged shoulders from the White House under Obama and Biden when civilians died as a result of their orders, it’s easy to see that the outrage about the aid workers has little to do with humanitarian concerns. Instead, it is about hatred for Israel that has taken root in left-wingers who have come to believe that Israel must not be allowed to defeat Hamas and that any civilian casualties that occur as a result of the terrorists’ actions are too many.

If Biden really wants to end the fighting in Gaza, then he should be directing all of his anger and threats against Hamas and its backers, not the Israelis. If Hamas surrendered and released the hostages—ranging from a baby to an 86-year-old man—the war would be over immediately. Instead, by threatening to trash the alliance with Israel and the mandate that it must live with Hamas terrorism, including the threat of more Oct. 7 massacres in the future, he has only strengthened the resolve of the Islamist murderers to stand their ground, secure in the belief that the United States will save them from the justice they so richly deserve for their crimes.

As much as we may all mourn what happened to the aid workers, the willingness of Israel’s foes and false friends like Biden to use this incident to end the war against Hamas should not be considered a manifestation of humanitarian sentiment. If their tragic fate provides the leverage that Washington uses to end the war, then the blood of the Israelis—and those in other nations who will fall victim to a revitalized international terror movement funded by Iran—will be on the heads of those who cynically exploited their deaths.