#this is not a fucking. foreign thing though. you americans can be just as bad

[spocks-kaathyra]

I despise any narrative that positions social progressivism as a western concept. why is every immigrant narrative about escaping from the terrible inherent conservatism of the backwards culture your family comes from and being saved by america's unique progressivism. just this disgusting pinkwashing that is exactly the same as any other narrative claiming that the west invented civilization and all those third world barbarians are only just now beginning to learn it from them. america's enemies do not have a monopoly on social conservatism. white people did not invent queer acceptance or anything else of value. death to america idk

[becausegoodheroesdeservekidneys]

So this is a weird ask but I figured an Actual Welsh Person would be the person to go to, and you've been pretty gung-ho about the language thing. So I hope I'm not bothering you with this.

Is there a cultural consensus on foreigners learning Welsh? I'm American and I don't have a single shred of Welsh ancestry. My family is historically German, and we've been here since the English Colony days, so it honestly seems really weird even to try to claim some tie to German heritage.

Anyway, my point is, I have absolutely zero legitimate claim to the Welsh language. I don't plan to travel to Wales in the foreseeable future. I have no reason to learn Welsh except that it sounds pretty and I enjoy a challenge.

Putting aside the issue of "lmao it's gonna be stupid difficult to learn an endangered language if you don't have anyone to speak it with" (I have a loose plan for dealing with that, and the experience of learning two languages to "can read most novels without needing the dictionary" level without anyone to speak them with in person already) entirely, do you reckon it's okay for me to study Welsh? I know Americans are really, really bad about just kinda assuming the whole world belongs to us, and I'm trying not to do that here. Especially because Welsh IS endangered.

I imagine your average Welsh person probably doesn't care what some random American does. But like, for people who care about the language...Would it be considered disrespectful or overstepping for me to study it? I don't expect you to speak for the entire country, of course, but I respect your opinion and I feel like you'd have a grasp on what the general feeling towards a foreigner like me might be.

Thanks for your time.

I honestly, truly, do not understand how the discussion around cultural appropriation has been twisted in the cultural zeitgeist to such an extent that people now feel anxiety about learning other languages.

This is not a personal attack on you, Anon - the gods only know that you clearly care and want to do the right thing, and that's beautiful and wonderful and also I will come back to extolling your personal virtues at the end of this post, so stay tuned. But I do want to take a moment here to talk about the broader issue at play, which I have seen echoed multiple times elsewhere, because fuck me what are we doing to ourselves.

Learn. Languages.

That is what languages are for! To be used for communication. If you don't learn languages, you are forcing everyone else to use yours. How have we somehow, as a culture, twisted that into being the less selfish option? How have we done that? I posted my favourite Welsh idiom recently, and someone reblogged it and wrote in the tags that they loved the idiom and would start using it, but they would do so in English because their "Welsh pronunciation would make their Welsh grandmother spin in her grave."

What kind of mental gymnastics is that?

How the fuck do you twist it so badly that you think taking a Welsh idiom for your own and exclusively using it in English is less offensive than saying it in Welsh but maybe a bit wrong? I've literally had people proclaim to me that they're learning Welsh on Duolingo but they never speak it because they're too self-conscious, and they tell me this not to highlight a massive flaw in themselves that they need to work on, but as though I'm supposed to pat them on the head and thank them for... still making me speak English to them.

There was that post where a Deaf blogger received an anonymous ask saying learning sign language is cultural appropriation, as though Deaf people haven't been calling for Sign to be taught in schools. As though a Deaf person being entirely isolated in everyday hearing society unless they have an interpreter with them is less offensive than a hearing person being able to use BSL.

Like, these are not sacred or religious languages. The purpose of Welsh or BSL or what have you is not to perform the Eleusinian mysteries. It's a living everyday language, same as English -

Except it's not the same as English. As Anon here so rightly points out, Welsh is endangered. That means we are desperate for people to learn it. That's how it will survive. That's how we reversed it from 'dying language' to 'living language', in fact - we managed to get lots of people to learn it. You know what is a threat, though? People not learning it because, like poor Anon here, they've been somehow convinced by Western society that you're only allowed to learn languages if you personally have a historic or cultural connection to them that you can prove via six forms of ID and a letter of recommendation from a druid. Or people never using it because they're too embarrassed to try and risk losing face by getting it wrong, or maybe sounding a bit silly, and thus forcing us to use English anyway. Those are threats.

Anon. Listen to me, feel the sincerity of my words: we adore you. We adore you. You cannot imagine how appreciated it is when someone learns Welsh. You cannot imagine how touched we are that you wanted to, that you tried, that you respected us enough and considered us valid enough that you made the effort. Our closest neighbours are the very people who are still trying to stamp out Welsh to this very day. Do you know the number 1 reaction I get, by a country mile, when I tell English people that I speak Welsh? It's some variant on a scoff, and the sentiment "Why? What's the point? Bit useless, isn't it?"

By a country mile. That's the reaction I expect, and brace for, and is overwhelmingly what I get.

So when someone who isn't Welsh actually chooses to learn Welsh?

Imagine what that feels like! To go from not-even-hidden disgust, from outright mockery and often active suppression campaigns, to a foreigner earnestly telling me that they love and respect my language so much they're trying to learn it. Imagine how that feels.

Please learn Welsh. Please learn it. We will love you for it. We will build you a statue. We will bake little Welshcakes with your face on in icing sugar. We will write you poems in complex rhyme. We'll name an Eisteddfod prize after you. We'll name at least, like, three sheep after you. Thank you, thank you so much for even wanting to learn. You're a delight and a marvel and a wonder. Your hair looks great today, as it does all days. You're a strong, independent human being of immense wisdom and compassion. If this were a Welsh myth you'd be a wise salmon the heroes came to for advice. What a fantastic human.

The welcome awaits if you choose to learn

[ohsalome]

the intention of comparing the reaction to Palestine vs Ukraine is typically not to criticize Ukrainian victims of war. The criticism is directed at American spectators, because the people in power here are insanely anti Palestinian but have made overtures to help Ukraines resistance efforts despite comparable situations. Regular citizens also mostly support Ukraine but many hate Palestinians. People are just comparing palestine to Ukraine as a point of reference to try to make those people understand.

As kindly as possible, I do not think you can educate people out of islamophobia by appealing to their conscience, at the very least because if they had one they wouldn't be islamophobic in the first place.

And when it comes to people in power, appealing to their empathy in the case with Palestine is fruitless because the help Ukraine got wasn't motivated by emotion either. I do not expect you to know the history of current russo-ukrainian war well, so you probably don't know that the western world was perfectly happy to watch russia roll all over us punishment-free as long as they felt that other "properly european countries" won't be involved. Russia has been butchering us since 2014, and nobody gave a fuck about it. Even during the first few weeks of the full-scale invasion NATO refused to send us any military help, because they expected us to fall and were okay with it.

The current support we have did not fall on us from the sky by the graceful kindness of "our american overlords" - it is a consequence of the cumulative effort of our diplomats, pre-existing agreements with NATO countries, and the economical ripples the full-scale war caused (Ukraine being one of the major world exporters of grain being one of the most relevant).

This is why, sadly Palestine cannot follow the Ukrainian scenario of foreign support. The surrounding circumstances of both of our wars are way to different, and while it is easy to ignore them while making simplistic quick-dopamine-hit posts on hellbr dot com, they do influence the real-world situation on the ground. Which is what posts like the one I replied to do - they create a no-nuance misinformed image of the war in Ukraine. Which amplifies the problem even more, because even though "most americans" can agree on a generic "war in Ukraine bad", their idea of what is going on here is hugely misinformed as it is. And this has harmful real-life consequences on which our very survival depends.

Look. I understand that the war between Palestine and Israel has been going on for decades. I understand that there are many contexts that are obvious to the people in the respective countries that I am oblivious to by the virtue of never being there and not speaking arabic nor hebrew. I understand that there is a lot of propaganda that I may accidentally spread out of my ignorance, and therefore I try to be careful to avoid doing so, out of respect to the people living there. So why is it too much to ask you to give the same respect to us?

Like I have said before, the biggest issue with that infographic post is that it spreads misinformation. In the simplest of terms, misinformation is bad. People are trying to do any smallest thing to help Palestinians - who are currently barely surviving in inhumanely horrifying conditions - and out of ignorance they are spreading anti-ukrainian propaganda. Downplaying the number of ukrainian victims (and, as a result, making russian war crimes look "not as bad") is anti-ukrainian propaganda. Making it seem as we are getting "too much american help" is anti-ukrainian propaganda, because USA is our biggest military exporter, and getting less ammo/vehicles/etc will have catastrophic effect on the amount of death.

Which is why am not staying silent on this, even if your collective intentions are noble and good. Because, I will repeat myself again, your intentions do not matter if the consequences of your actions are harmful. And if (a) comparing Ukraine and Palestine is uneffective; (b) it portrays your ignorance of either one or both of the wars; and (c) simultaneously with spreading support for the palestinian cause you are spreading harmful anti-ukrainian pro-russian propaganda, I do not think it is too much to ask you to stop.

[acapelladitty]

so curious about your thoughts on American remakes of non-American horror films if you wanna elaborate 👀👀👀

Generally? I dislike them immensely because they have a tendency to take the teeth out of foreign horror to make it more palatable to audiences. A choice which often removes the entire point from the original piece and fucks up the concept as a whole.

Notable examples include things like:

Martyrs. A film which changes the ending to allow the women to live. A fact that totally undermines the premise of the film as an examination of suffering.

The Vanishing. Again, the refusal to allow the main characters to die at the end removes the grit from the film as it undermines the antagonists sheer villainy in seeing how far he can push his own evil.

Pulse. Don't even want to talk about Pulse because the remake was so damn shite.

Speak No Evil. Again, they allow the protagonists to win which utterly devalues the tongue-in-cheek darkness of the original film which follows the whole "you LET us do this" to the bitter end.

Wicker Man. An American remake of a British film that takes all the wickedness out and replaces it with uhh...bad acting.

The Descent. Not a remake but they did change the ending for American audiences so that it was less "grim". Again, a pointless choice.

Jeepers Creepers. Just like above, not a remake but the American version has all the screaming of the unseen Derry cut from the ending even though you don't actually see him being skinned at all.

[kojoty]

It's obviously a complex question and discussion and I'm certainly admitting to a level of blue-state privilege wherein my vote really only matters in so far as working towards getting funding for a third party, like green; not to mention the privilege of, being in such a blue swaddled state, my rights are not immediately at stake-- so I am including myself in this but.

I really, really, really, really wish people in blue states like Cali, new York, Illinois, etc-- heart of dem territory and the places where your rights are NOT at contest-- would sometimes shut the fuck up and listen to the extremely valid worries and fears and pleas of people in deep red states. I think saying 'it doesn't matter who is in office, they're basically two sides of the same coin', while true ideologically in the grand leftist scheme, it also does betray a certain level of handwaving to millions of Americans where who is in office DOES matter.

And I know this is the anti colonialism website, and so we don't really want to talk about domestic issues as much as foreign policies-- completely understandable given the current global conflict-- but consider America is a vile colonial project, that which we do to our domestic underclasses IS a colonial issue as well.

I am not going to say 'go vote!' because who am I, Hillary Clinton? But I guess I am trying to say... It is really frustrating as someone who does a lot of on-the-ground community resource work in his fairly privileged area and see how the difference in economic status between a democratic and a republican president really matters, and then come on here and see the ever present leftist issue of taking ideology over material. I cannot imagine the landscape of on the ground resource work in more impoverished areas.

(most Marxists in this website really obfuscate how much material work they actually do, and are, in fact, often pontificating on ideological castles in the sky, but that's another post)

The tldr here really is: the amount of deep red state southerners who are telling you with crystal clarity that someone like Harris in office is magnitudes safer than someone like Trump in office, and urging people in states where it matters to vote....... I mean. You don't have to listen to them (even though I think you should hear their perspective), but the least you could do is not completely ignore and shun the very real realities of millions of Americans who are with good reason scared shitless that one nominee will keep the liberal hegemony (also vile-- don't take this as me condoning it), and the other will systematically make their very existence illegal. That isn't to say it can't still happen-- roe v wade-- under a dem, but. You... You do realize that it does actually matter to some people in certain states whether the pres is red or blue, right? And that yes it sucks that we have to play by American rules to keep some folks safe but.

Idk. The amount of 'leftists' on this site who paradoxically care far more about their ideological purity than the actual people who need actual material work done is... Well, that's not my leftism tbh. The amount of condescension I see levied at people daily on here. It's not just a bad look. It's Imo betraying to me that your politics are more about signpostibg and being right than actual community and human care and connection . And it happens! Ideology is a tantalizing thing. I have to constantly divorce myself from it and reintegrate into the ground. But you can't make policy out of air. You can make policy out of soil. You have to remind yourself of the faces and the beating hearts your ideology is addressing. Even if you're RIGHT are you giving the infoemation in a way that actually cares?

Idk. I don't wanna tone police. But there's a very deep seated and real classism and privilege issue within the online left that is...... Distasteful to say the least. Idc if you go vote. But the least you could do is not bully people who are more scared for policy changes that will actively affect them. It is not betraying fear and outrage at what is happening outside of these borders-- the atrocity in Gaza-- to also be scared of your own living conditions. One can balance both.

[odue-sp]

Saw a TikTok. So here you go.

Aizawa x Male reader

M/n is quirkless. A foreign hero and is quite good friends with Aizawa. A very skilled hero even without a quirk... But... M/n likes to annoy the Japan branch by being the most American he can be. In reality, with Aizawa (including Hizashi) he acts like his normal self.

All Might feels nothing but embarrassment.

"Woof! Woof! USA! USA!" The hero shouted jumping on the table in the cafeteria after hearing that the state won a game. Students looked confused before All Might covered his face in embarrassment. "Suck it mother fuckers!" All Might grabbed him by his shirt, dragging him out.

"Is that a cow!? Aye, let's go ride it!" The h/c male shouted hopping over the fence, the other heroes stared in shock trying to get him away from the cows. "My uncle's a butcher! I can cut this pretty girl up in no time! Meat! Meat! Meat!"

"That's a villain?" H/n asked staring at the strange dressed thing? "Looks like..." He snorted covering his mouth. "That's his name? Pfft!" He laughed as he turned his head away. "Sorry, sorry, I couldn't help but remember a villain I fought that dressed like a cow... You look like her... Hahaha!"

"What are you doing!?" The s/c hero shouted at the students who looked confused as he walked over. "Do you not know how to load a gun?" He points at Snipe. "Have you no pride cowboy?!" Snipe looked shocked and shook his hands. "I'm not American!"

These were a few moments that H/n showed his pride as an American.

"What the hell?!" A hero shouted holding H/n by the scruff of his neck. "What do you mean you have no quirk?!" It was during the big fight with the Japan Mafia. M/n only smiled. "My quirk is being an American. Quite powerful, ain't it?" The hero stared in shock. The hero threw him down, the male coughed up blood. He winced before feeling fabric wrap around him. He let out a gasp. "Aizawa!"

"I know you're playing around, but this is serious." He scolded the hero who looked confused. Aizawa smacked the back of his head pretty harshly. "Cut it out, M/n." His whole demeanor changed. "Hehe, it was fun though. Playing it up made them leave me alone." He said while glancing at the heros who seemed angered.

"but is it really such a bad thing I'm quirkless?" He was confused. "Tsk. I wanna go back to the states. This country is so... Fucked." His crossed his arms. "You can fight them. I'm bored! Aizawa let's go to the car cafe!" Aizawa looked down at the s/c male who stiffened. "Go." He turned to leave before his shoulder was grabbed. "I meant to fight!" The heroes protested.

"Awe, this country is really beautiful. Too bad the people here are pretty fucked." He pulled out a gun. "I can understand why there's so many villains here." He grabbed the suitcase from Aizawa.."I'll be back darling!"

He rushed into the hallway that the heroes couldn't clear. He shot them all, aiming for where their quirks advanced or needed. Throat, eyes, hands, fingers, even hair. He pulled out a knife, slashing and cutting as he jumped on their backs. "Don't kill them!" Aizawa shouted as he saw the hero aim for the killing move. "Self defense!" "This isn't America!"

The hallway was covered in blood, H/n wasn't clean either. Every time the heroes had a hard time clearing a way, H/n stepped up with just a gun and knife. Pure skill that none of them expected out of a quirkless. One could wonder what would've happened if Izuku met this hero first instead of All Might. "Crazy. We need to lock him up." A hero whispered. "There's no need," Aizawa called out glaring at them. "Because he's quirkless yet skilled you want him locked up? Idiots." The s/c smiled waving at the group. "Clear!"

Then it happened. H/n's eyes widened seeing the red bullets aiming for the heroes. Shots rang out but they never hit the said heroes.

They managed to win.

"M/n?"

Aizawa glanced to see the hero looking at the girl they saved. "I'm glad." Aizawa looked confused before he fell to the floor. "You didn't have that jacket on before..." His hands removed the jacket. Quirk erasing bullets riddled his body. "Hey, what did you do?" A hero spoke confused at the many bullets. "I'm... Quirkless. I'm nothing special," his eyes watered as he looked at Aizawa. "It hurts less looking at you pretty boy." He choked on blood as he reached over and held his face. "You all may be shitty... But you're heroes... If I die, it won't matter when they find out I'm quirkless..."

"I'll just be called fake, crazy, stupid..." His tears continued to flow. "But hey, it was a fun ride. I made an impression by being the most american... Do you know how much I hate myself for saying that shit?"

He coughed up blood as his eyes slowly faded dull.

"damn... I really wanted to bother you all more..."

"I wanted to..." His voice went silent as he closed his eyes. "Kiss you."

[tumblingxelian]

Political Discourse - Retrospective

So, regarding some political discourse that happened on my blog earlier, I want to clarify some things.

1: Hyperbole doesn't translate well across text, this applies both to me and those I've spoken/argued with. Hyperbole doesn't translate well when one can't see the associated dramatic body language or tone that would serve to convey that.

2: Context is key, so if one does want to take issue with something its best to have all the pieces in place rather than expecting context clues to create a common frame of reference as it might in a verbal conversation.

3: Its much easier to just not bother and direct one's energy into more helpful and practical goals than arguing online.

On the more political front, I do have some thoughts however:

I am posting this in a good faith effort to not argue or antagonize:

Firstly, I feel that for all Americas horrifically out-sized influence on the world one cannot just dismiss domestic issues as unimportant. Even if we ignore the ripple effects of a right wing VS left wing president on a purely cultural level, the sheer number of queer people, women, and people of color who will be actively targeted if Trump gets back into power is staggering.

There is a marked difference between the parties on these fronts and people will live or die based on that. Let alone stuff like Trumps handling of Covid and how his intransigence basically fucked the rest of the world over, along with killing millions of Americans.

Basically, when the difference between the the parties of the most powerful nation on earth are so drastically different in terms of who even counts as human, being a one issue voter doesn’t really work as an ethical or even practical approach to politics —especially not addressing the kinds of issues making it hard to stomach voting for someone like Biden.

Secondly, I feel a lot of the discourse around the US & Israel's ties are not very helpful or accurate as they often seem to frame it as though they just became allies under Biden or otherwise that this is a new relationship. As it is, ties between the two countries are nearly a century old at this stage and disentangling from that is not easy.

What's more, a politically active American friend said that they feel a lot of Americans, themselves included, often oversimplify foreign policy and that it's never as simple as a good or bad decision.

In this case, America's main focus is trying to keep the war from going regional while not losing what influence they have over a nuclear equipped state in the Middle East.

(It was also notes how the messages of trying to "fight antisemitism" as opposed to just being blunt about the political realities was manipulative and poorly thought out at best.)

But the fact is, as horrific as what Israel is doing is, it's not something Biden just started supporting at random. America's ties are decades long and not easy to divest from without creating more instability and bloodshed in the long run.

So while I of course advocate for pushing for action on these fronts, its integral to both remember that foreign policy is a nightmare and that one will have far better luck using protest to force a Democratic president to change course than a GOP one who will just tell the police to shoot you.

Thirdly, I think its quite reasonable for none Americans to take an interest in these matters. Hell, I have been an activist for years, donating and campaigning on everything from America's forever war, to Palestinian rights, Queer rights both locally and internationally and beyond since childhood.

Add in that, even aside from morality, I've no shortage of friends in other nations who will be impacted by who is president and friends in America who are justly terrified of dying or having to flee the country should Trump get back in.

Put simply, I feel my and other none Americans persistent presence on the matter of who ends up in the White House can be regarded as selfish or coming from a place of privilege. We're asking you to vote because we can't and far more people will die and be hurt if Trump is in power, including yourselves.

We're trying to help.

Finally, I will not see eye to eye with other leftists, they will not see eye to eye with me. That's fine. Ultimately, though we disagree on how best energy should be directed for the common good, I don't think my counterparts, or I have ill intent or selfish motivations.

[ohara-n-brown]

The reason why a lot of people don't respect those Biden 2024 posts is because every single of one of them reduces the readers moral stance to 'virtue signaling' and 'appealing to morals'.

Me not wanting to vote for a Geriatric Genocidal Asshole isn't because I'm virtue signaling - Sorry, I just have those morals.

And if you want me to set those morals aside you're going to have to explain why setting those aside will prove to be good. As in tangibly beneficial - not just harm reduction.

Which - you can't. All you can say is 'It won't be as bad as Trump'.

Every single one of those posts is like 'We all know Biden isn't the best-'

'Biden hasn't done much'

'Biden isn't the most progressive-'

WHY WON'T YOU SAY PALESTINE?

You know that's why we're here. You know that's our problem. Say it with your fucking chest or get out of my face.

It's very clear that y'all can't make your point while also being candid. Because if you said

'I know you have these morals against aligning with those who fund genocide - and I know Biden has openly sent Billions to Israel through executive action - but I need you to vote for him even though he's directly responsible for over 20,000 deaths and the bombing of Yemen because it'll be better for us Americans.'

You know people would call you a horrible fucking person.

So instead you say 'I know you want to appeal to moral and virtue signaling and I know Biden isn't the best but I need you to vote for him because the republicans are worse.'

Then act like we're not supposed to laugh in your fucking face.

If you're trying to start the conversation but you leave Israel out of your whole post - delete it. It's useless. Because you're dancing around the topic and when people bring it up you lash out.

Just because you will vote for Blue regardless of if they're funding a literal genocide you've been watching live on your phone for four months, doesn't mean everyone else is comfortable with that.

Voting for someone in support of genocide will actively have an effect on my mental health.

It's called MORAL INJURY.

Moral injury is a REAL THING with real documented affects. Forcing someone to abandon their morals no matter how necessary has a marked effect on mental health.

I'm sorry but sometimes people just have stronger moral conviction. Some people genuinely loose sleep at night knowing their action gives power to a killer.

If you want people to vote for Biden you MUST be willing to engage the resulting moral injury. You can't ask someone to injure themselves then get pissed when they ask if you're gonna help after.

If you can sleep at night voting for Biden, good for you. But we can't.

If you want us to vote for Biden - you'll have to respect our morals, understand them, and then give us good reason to set them aside other than 'Trump bad', 'Republicans bad', 'things will get worse'.

If you want to make a Pro-Biden post you MUST address people's concerns about Palestine. You must engage with their morals properly and respectfully.

And if you can't - that's evidence that your standing is weak and most likely morally questionable.

First person to make a Pro-Biden 2024 post that ACTUALLY addresses people's concerns with him and Palestine instead of just saying 'I know you all hate Democrats' gets a cookie.

ALSO if you reply to this and you don't mention Israel or Palestine and their effect on the situation you're only proving my point. If you reply only talking about American politics with no reference to our foreign interference you are apart of the problem 💖

[velvetvexations]

If you're not big into martial arts, you might not have heard of sanda, originally created as CQC for Chinese soldiers. It's often decried by just about everyone as being, essentially...just MMA rather than having roots in traditional Chinese kung fu.

That's only half-accurate. I'll explain why, but I need to catch you up the nearly one hundred years before it's creation for context.

(CW for war crimes, brief mention of sexual assault, mention of Native American oppression, and political cartoons with a racist depictions of Asians - and as always, if someone knows better, please correct me)

The first thing you need to understand is the Century of Humiliation, a concept in Chinese historiography. The premise is that China was regularly fucked over from the 1840s to the 1940s when the communists took full control of the mainland. While this is a narrative heavily pushed by Chinese nationalism, it's not exactly wrong - they had it pretty bad, and thought not exclusively the fault of foreigners, a lot of it was, including the two Opium Wars where England and France wrecked China's shit for the right to keep the drug trade going. The Second Opium War is where the UK first got Kowloon, which would be followed later by the rest of what would become Hong Kong.

English Commerce

I tell you to immediately buy the gift here. We want you to poison yourself completely, because we need a lot of tea in order to digest our beefsteaks.

The Taiping Rebellion, from 1850 to 1864, is estimated to have cost up to about 30 million lives, compared to the American Civil War's 700 thousand. And let me tell you, it's crazy we don't talk more about the Taiping Rebellion, not only because of the devastation but because the rebels were a very strange branch of Chinese Christian that believed their leader to be the brother of Jesus Christ. Which...well, I guess that's also technically the West's fault, although Western Christians were heavily divided on how they felt about the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, and ultimately after some indecision and putting feelers out to the rebels, the West chose to back the Qing.

For the people who love the DDR because their enforcement of laws were not always necessarily the worst in the entire world for queer folk: the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom was spectacularly feminist for it's time, way more than East Germany was pro-queer! Maybe consider switching over to Chinese Christofascism?

(I'm sorry, I'm going to be angry about that literally forever)

China would go on to badly lose the Sino-French War and Japanese-Sino War, the two together resulting in China losing suzerainty (essentially control of foreign affairs) over Vietnam and Korea, and a lot of their influence outside their own borders.

At this point, you can start to see how China was being treated by the West...and Imperial Japan, who, as we've discussed, were great big westaboos. Everyone wanted a piece, and it was a race to get the biggest. They didn't think in terms of what China wanted, they hardly considered themselves in opposition with China, but rather each other.

Putting His Foot Down Uncle Sam: Gentlemen, you may cut up this map as much as you like, but remember that I'm here to stay, and you can't cut me up into spheres of influence!

Needless to say, the Chinese were...not pleased with how things were going.

The traditional narrative is that the Qing's modernization efforts were, at best, a very mixed-success. There's been more questioning of that, though, since "modernization" is inherently kinna a Eurocentric term with arbitrary values. Just before the Japanese-Sino War, everyone was pretty certain "modernization" had gone great and they were going to crush Japan like ants. The Qing did face issues with corruption and firing shells that had their high-explosives siphoned to be sold off, but considering Russia has had to deal with essentially the same problem in Ukraine finding their reserve tanks to be hollow tin cans, I'd say that's fairly modern.

Social instability would continue to rapidly worsen after losing the First Sino-Japanese War, during which Japanese acts of brutality were enough, as I mentioned in my previous historical post, to elicit at least temporary scandal among the Western Powers Imperial Japan hoped so desperately to impress. Tensions were especially high with Christian missions, culminating in an incident in which two German missionaries were killed in an attempt to kill a third accused of rape. That led to Germany invading and taking away yet another piece of China's sovereign territory. Not helping things was that, because of special protections for the practice of Christianity forced on China by treaties from those prior conflicts, many bandits were "converting" or claiming to have done so in order to escape the law. And all of this is in the midst of serious natural disasters ruining lives and leaving people with nothing.

So that brings us to 1899, the main point of this post, and something you may have only heard of before in a throwaway line on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I'm talking about the Boxer Rebellion.

It was then that an escalating series of murders against Christians (missionaries and converts) and attacks on telegraph wires and railroads blossomed into something like but not quite a revolution, the most notable event being the Siege of Peking (Beijing), where over two thousand Christians and foreign civilians took refuge until the formation of the Eight-Nation Army, an alliance of Italy, Russia, the United States, the UK, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Japan, Germany, and France, invaded to rescue them.

You might assume that "Boxer" came from someone's name, or a major location, or something like that, right? The name actually conceals the reason I find the Boxer Rebellion so interesting, and why we're talking about it today. See, back then, kung fu was referred to as "Chinese boxing" in the West.

The Society of Righteous and Harmonious Fists were just one extralegal organization that flourished in late 1800s thanks to the Qing slowly losing their grip on governing even within some parts of their own territory. They weren't just anti-foreigners, they started out pissed at the Qing for the ongoing troubles, and fighting government control is where they got their start. Yet, they famously used the battle cry "support the Qing, destroy foreigners" - hey, wasn't this supposed to be a rebellion by an extralegal organization?

Ha - well - while she initially condemned them, Empress Dowager Cixi would later throw in with the Fists, at least partly because the prince stanned them so hard he met with her wearing one of their uniforms. This, it seemed, was a legitimate path to expelling all foreigners.

So, right now you're probably thinking back to where this post started. The natural conclusion at this point is that the Fists surely lost, but their martial arts were impressive, right? And then that became sanda?

Well.

No.

The movie Boxer Rebellion (1975) depicts martial artists jumping into crowds of armed soldiers and devastating them with the awesome power of kung fu. You might expect this to exaggeration typical of action movies, and it is, kinna. It's also only half of what the Society of the Righteous and Harmonious Fists thought they were capable of.

The Fists believed their kung fu made them invulnerable to blades and bullets, including cannonballs. They thought they could fly. They thought ghost warriors would descend from the sky to help drive out foreign armies. Though they had some firearms, they were mostly armed with blades if anything at all. The Empress ordered the Qing military to assist them, but generals wisely chose to do the bare minimum or outright ignore the command entirely.

Even stranger was the legends that grew around the Red Lanterns. You can think of the Lanterns as a kinna women's auxiliary to the Fists, who spurned women lest they "pollute" their masculine magic kung fu and cause it to fail. The Lanterns were divided by age between Black Lanterns (older women), Blue Lanterns (middle-aged women), and most famously, the Red Lanterns, who were eleven to seventeen.

Like the Fists, Red Lanterns possessed magical powers. They could fly, but also, unlike the Fists, walk on water and stop guns, among other things. When Catholic women were accused of making that masculine kung fu magic fail by exposing themselves, the Fists resolved to wait for the Red Lanterns to arrive, since their magic would be immune to corrupting femininity.

I want to take a moment to say I know how all this sounds, and I've tried to keep my language serious at least in this section because I don't mean to paint the Fists as "stupid" for the things they believed. It's important to keep in mind the Fists were largely peasants driven by nationalistic fervor and desperation from how bad things had gotten thanks to foreigners, natural disasters, and the Qing's own corruption and internal failures. It's depressingly reminiscent of ghost shirts, which just ten years prior had failed to stop bullets during Wounded Knee. The population was despondent and angry, with little still left to lose. That led them to kill innocent people prior to dying themselves to an enemy they never had a chance against. People like Mark Twain, Leo Tolstoy, and others outright took the Fists' side at least in terms of "who started it".

More often than not, history is sad.

So the Boxers lost, badly. Empress Dowager Cixi was given a pass for siding with them because she was more useful on the throne than off it, but the Qing would fall about a decade later in the middle of trying once again to further "modernize". China fell a free-for-all between warlords, ultimately coming down to the Kuomintang's Republic of China and the Chinese Communist Party. The two would (barely) work together to resist Japan during the Second Sino-Japanese War, which quickly became part of World War II. Soon after they fell back into conflict, with the Kuomintang forced to retreat to Taiwan and still claims independence that the PRC still denies.

In Taiwan is the Republic of China Military Academy, which was known as the Whampoa Military Academy when it developed sanda in the mid-20s. It is, basically, MMA. Traditional martial artists certainly played a part in it's early history, but they were doing what Bruce Lee would fiercely advocate for decades later - "absorb what is useful, discard what is not". Foreign combat sports, like Muay Thai and (actual, Western) boxing were worked in as well. Like in MMA, a background in traditional martial arts can be helpful going in, but you're going to have to learn a lot more and probably unlearn several things as well. The biggest influence was actually the lei tai, raised platforms where Chinese brawlers engaged brutal and often fatal matches, sometimes with weapons even. Like, people had organs come out on the lei tai, it was nuts.

The reason MMA and sanda look so similar is that that's just what comprehensive and effective fighting looks like. It's the same reason England doesn't use gyroget ammo for their guns while Germany equips their soldiers with fully automatic crossbows. In video games, which I love with all my heart, fighting styles as diverse as sumo and capoeira are presented as more or less equally balanced, with different advantages and disadvantages. That's not how it works. We solved the optimal way to hold your arms and it's not like this.

You may have heard of Xu Xiaodong, a Chinese man trained in sanda who has a history of fighting and handedly winning against supposed masters of kung fu. The PRC hates him for that because, like with pseudoscientific traditional Chinese medicine, kung fu is a useful promoter of nationalism, and it's better at that if it keeps it's mystique as impenetrable as possible.

I would probably like a lot of modern Chinese martial arts movies if not knowing that they were bankrolled to be propaganda for the PRC, like the first Ip Man, which exists to further the myth of wing chun and remind everyone that Japan sucks for what happened during WWII. I don't think they're making many movies about the Boxer Rebellion.

[envoy-of-the-system]

Fuck it, we vent. That's what I made the account for (besides sharing my OC metaverse), right?

I recently graduated high school, but unlike most Americans my age, I actually went to five different schools. My parents work for the foreign service, so I never really stayed anywhere that long. Tenth grade was my first time being in a school with actual people besides my siblings for the first time in two years, since I had gone into homeschooling (kinda) for 8th grade and then...well...COVID was with me for all of 9th grade.

Needless to say, it was a big moment, and in addition to all the friends I made that first year, I also discovered something every young man should have the honor and pleasure of experiencing at least once:

Attractive people the same age as you that you're friends with.

I had a few friends like that my first year, two girls and a guy (yeah we Pan with this one). The guy was in the year above me though, and moved away after the first year. That was rough, and the first girl...well, we just ended up being friends. There wasn't enough middle ground for me to really engage. But the third one...let's call her Katy.

Katy was kind, strong of character, beautiful, and had a fanTAStic singing voice. She was in my band class and PE, and sat at the group table. In the first year, I asked her to the Valentine's dance, at which point I ran into my first emotional red flag (again, this was more of a red flag for my own health, rather than a reflection of her personality, because she [while not perfect] was amazing): she was already in love with my best friend.

Now ordinarily this wouldn't be a problem, but my best friend was a member of the Church of Latter Day Saints, and his father...wasn't exactly a fan of the idea of him dating. I mean, I don't blame Katy, (we'll call him) Don was a strapping young man who was witty, fit, did bikes and woodcarving for fun, and always walked with a little swagger in his step, but not in a cocky way. More like a "life's going great and there's nothing you can do about it" way. You know the type. He also whistles in-tune, which is a feat in and of itself, but that's besides the point.

So there we were, caught in this awkward high school love triangle bullshit. And despite all evidence to the contrary, my heart still belonged to Katy. I couldn't help it. I had fallen hard, I was down bad, and there was no getting back up. This was an entirely new feeling, and it was crazy! Poets and writers often compair love to flames, and I had always been skeptical of that description until it actually HIT me full-force and I was like "holy shit they were right!!" This went on for about the rest of the school year, but I succeeded in not letting my love for Katy get in the way of our friendship.

And then Don announced that he was leaving.

Y'see, Don was also a foreign service kid, and his post time had started two years before mine. Since the place we were living was a 3-year post, my first was his last. Understandably, Katy and I were sad, her maybe a little (lot) moreso. And I still feel disgusted with myself to this day, but some small, envious part of me fueled a black hope that now that Don was out of the way I could take a proper shot at Katy. And you know the damnedest thing?

It was right.

11th grade rolls around, the guy is gone and the other girl is dating another classmate (I don't really care at that point, like I said before it wouldn't have worked out). Katy and I are getting along fine, with the exception that now I'm not in band class, because I've started doing the two-year college prep program they had, and that means I can't do the school-funded extra classes like band or computer science, or PE. But despite that, I still found and made time to talk to and hang out with Katy. Eventually, I almost felt like she was warming up to me, since our brief exchanges of physical contact were increasing in frequency.

There's three things we need to acknowledge before we move forwards though:

1. Katy was Asexual

2. One of my primary love languages is physical touch.

3. The FUCKING NEW GUY.

Listen chat, I knew I was cooked when Katy TOLD me that they had KNOWN EACH OTHER from a different POST. Now at first it didn't seem like a huge problem, but I was still wary. Life was good though, and there weren't any clouds on the horizon. Then I made some bad decisions I probably shouldn't've made, and that came crashing down. I was too short-sighted, and even though I never asked or confirmed anything, I still think about the moment that Katy found out, and can't help but feel I betrayed her in some way. The worst part is I never even apologized.

That was right before winter break of 11th grade. When we got back, in the first week during lunch (because we always stood together in the lunch line) Katy tells me she's dating The New Guy.

And then my world dropped out from under me.

I had sort of seen this coming, but to have my anxieties confirmed in the worst way possible was not helping my mental state, which was already sort of stressed from the college classes.

And despite all that, I still loved her.

I was a fool.

They dated for a few months before breaking up, and The New Guy dumped HER, his reason being he just "didn't love her anymore." Now I know that under normal circumstances that would be a normal excuse, but ofc me being me I was outraged.

So being the lovesick idiot I am, I thought that if I simply rode this out I could score points. Instead, she only became more isolated and distant from everyone, at least for the rest of the semester. I tried to talk to her about it, but after a certain point I recognized that prodding would only make it worse.

Senior year, and I was seeing less and less of her and more and more of my work. I spent almost no time of the breaks outside the classroom where before I would actively look for her and walk her to class (something she vocally appreciated). I still stood with her in the lunch line, but as the gap between when I arrived at the mess and when she arrived at the mess widened, even that dropped away.

And I still. Loved her. Glimpses or short conversations were the highlight of my day, but we had so little middle ground at this point that they were always painfully short. Eventually I even just stopped engaging entirely, settling for a wave. Then one day while doing art for my final exhibition (minimum of 4 art pieces, I was doing 6 but it was technically 8 because the final piece was a triptych), this song (the song from the beginning of the post, remember that??) came one. Well, rather it was the Good Kid cover. I wasn't even aware that it was a cover, it sounded so much like Good Kid 😂

"What's a girl to do?"

That line resonated with me, for some reason. I mean the whole song sent me into a feels-spiral that almost had me in tears in the middle of class, but that line touched me in particular, and I think it was because it was a question, and it also implies that the singer (and by association me) is in a helpless situation. But I wasn't. If I couldn't be her lover, then I was gonna be her friend and bury my love deep down inside and try to ignore it (I couldn't, but it helped). I re-engaged in all the old things, and just generally tried to build that bridge again. By the time the second semester rolled around, it was like night and day, and I was in tenth grade again.

And then senior prom.

For context, the school had two major dances: the winter formal, and prom. At each previous exchange, we had always danced l, so I always looked forwards to the major events. The highest my love ever felt, the brightest I ever burned, was always in those two minutes where I could hold her with music, and enjoy the two things I loved most deeply in the world at the same time. But senior prom was different...from the start (pfft- I'm sorry 😂). For one, I was FINALLY involved in theme picking, since as a senior we were allowed to give the prom committee ideas, and were the ultimate democratic judge of the party's theme. It ended up being "starry night," which I think was named for space, not the Van Gough painting, but even if it was, I wanted to go with space anyway. As a result, I wanted to do something bold, go out with a bang. I was gonna dye my hair.

Now some of you reading may be going "whoa, so dramatic!!" but for me it was a pretty big deal. It was something I had always teetered on the edge of, but had never really quite gotten around to doing it. Add that on to the fact that every person with dyed hair/hair stylist that spoke English I ever met always told me that my shade of blonde was PERFECT for dying hair, and you'd have thought that I would've done it sooner. There was one problem though: the country I was living in had basically no FUN hair dye. What dye they did have was hard to find and only in normal hair colors. I wanted SPACE hair. That meant (for me) blue, purple, and red. It was mock exam season when I told Katy my plan, and both mock exam season and normal exam season are both off-timetable, so if you didn't have a test, you didn't need to come to school. That effectively meant that there were some days that it was just Katy and I at the table, and it was one of those days that she spoke an arrangement of words that threw senior pr into a whole new light.

"We could do it together!"

I struggled very hard to keep my cool for the rest of the conversation. Her sister (who had graduated last year) would be in town at the time of prom, so she could bring colors from the US. Great! And then the plan was set: I would go to her house to get ready, we would get our hair dyed, and then her mom (who was my guidance counselor, college coach, and also just a good friend at this point) would drive us to prom.

UNDERSTANDABLY, I WAS FREAKING OUT JUST A LITTLE BIT.

My biggest question was "is this a date," and after consulting with my sibling (who happens to be on this platform but whom I will not out) we decided that while it might look that way, she probably didn't consider it that. It was SOMETHING, but it was too little too late, and not enough.

Mocks came and went. Real exams came and went.

Small anecdote: while I was chilling for the first week of final exams (because the classes I picked got me NO EXAMS THE FIRST WEEK, HAHA), I got a text from my sibling saying that Katy had sat down at their table, and had said the words "I feel so lost without [MEEEEEE]!" I had originally not been coming to school because the food at home was simply better, but after that I started waking up at 6:45 to get to the 7:20 bus again like everyone else in my house. Worth it.

So anyway, prom day arrives. I had roller hockey the same day, so they let me use their shower before I got dressed. My dad had paid for a fitted suit, so I was pretty dripped out. We dyed hair before dressing, her all blue and me...well, all the colors 😂

Once I was dressed Katy disappeared and I took the opportunity to pounce upon their full-size keyboard like an eager child (as I had done every time I was at their house. My keyboard is missing a full octave on each end, and it can be painful sometimes to miss a piece by ONE FUCKING NOTE). I played Once Upon a Time and Fallen Down by Toby Fox, and then I played Zelda's Lullaby. And then I played the title theme from OMORI. I couldn't help but feel like my hands were trying to tell me something...and then Katy came out in her dress and my mind pulled a blank. She really was a rare creature.

So we went to prom, and we danced, and we partied, and it was fun!

And then the slow dance. That was the most perfect moment of my life, and it continues to go unmatched, because we sang. Together. One of my secret hopes and dreams had come true at the height of my emotional vulnerability, and it was perfect. Ever since I heard her being the first time, I had always wanted to sing together. She was a beautiful soprano, like silk ribbons. Not to toot my own horn, but I'm a pretty mean baritone/tenor when I want to be, and I'm that moment I wanted to. The song, I will not disclose. It was a moment for her and I, and you were not present nor were you invited.

After the slow dance, I asked her if she knew a song by the name of From the Start by Good Kid, as kind of a one-off question. To my surprise, she answered yes, but not by Good Kid. Then she took my outside away from the crowd noise, and sang the original, and that's when I cried.

Not long after I graduated, and not long after that the last day of school rolled around and we said goodbye. After three years of being quiet, I finally told her I loved her, in no uncertain terms. She said she knew, and I already knew she knew, but I wanted to say it. Just once.

After that I saw her for the last time, and boarded the bus. At that point, all the going-away parties and whatnot had already happened so it really was the last time we would ever see each other.

"But what about social media," you might be asking. And while it's true I do have means of contacting her...I don't want to. This love was...deep, and dismantling it and moving on will take time. Holding onto the connection will only make that harder, and I told her all this at the bus lot, and she understood. She still reached out back in July, but I only replied in very brief (but friendly) messages. I also reiterated my no-contact decision, and I haven't heard anything since.

And now, finally, we arrive back at the song at the top of the post. A random recommendation by YouTube, but a beautifully funded version of both the original and GK cover of From the Start, and as I listened mine and Katy's relationship flashed before my eyes, and suddenly all the feels were back.

What's the moral? Don't wait. Go get 'em. The worst they can do is say no and then, at least, you don't have to live in uncertainty.

Thank you for coming to my TED Talk. Good night.

[withered-rose-unbreakable-lotus]

Dude I can't deal, I will star blocking. This phrase coming from foreigners living in Japan pisses the hell out of me: "It’s ok if you can’t do that (they mention it's ok if you can't come to Japan rn because it is sth hard to do) but don’t try and think you know what’s going on from overseas."

While we can't know everything, claiming we don't know shit as if it's sth completely out of reach unless you are there sounds so fucking entitled to me. Call me bitter, but most of them have that attitude and there's proof they too don't know as much as they think.

I spoke with a girl who shared some live and meet and greet moments of hers with a favorite jrocker of mine with me and it baffled me how much she complained about some parts of his attitude when all she'd been telling me up to that point were normal to me. There was only one thing she told me I didn't expect from him, the others were pretty expected if you read his interviews and pay attention to how he reacts to things. Like honey. Where you are doesn't matter when it comes to basic human reactions. Also I didn't speak about my experience at Kamijo's live here but basically, even though we don't follow Japanese rules at lives here in Europe, even though I didn't have to do choreos or other things "expected from vkei fans", AND it was the 2nd live I've been ever in my 30 years of life cause nb comes where I live and I never have money to go even to the capital to see American artists, AAAALLL of the atmosphere, the live, dealing with other fans etc. felt like sth I do every day. It's a live dammit, it's not rocket science. And Kamijo, a person I'd never once seen in my life up until that point and had only seen live through my screen felt like he was someone doing something I actually have experienced for a long time rather than sth "new" or "unknown" to me. I was at a foreign country I'd never been before. I was scared shitless to go and believed I would fail every single minute as a fan in that arena. Yet I felt this was normal to me. I knew what to sing, what to scream, how to move, and all that? By learning through a screen. Just because you Ms "if you are not here you don't know shit about vkei" never searched beyond what was available to you on vkei while you weren't living in Japan, doesn't mean that everyone stops there. I see many both Japanese and foreign fans being there being just as shitty to jrockers often as some foreign fans living abroad, as if you literally take everything for face value as well, as if you don't know shit, even though you're there. (Not everyone is shitty, what I'm saying is bad apples exist everywhere)

Want me to take it somewhere away from vkei? While studying with 2 Japanese teachers, there were many times I shared stuff with them I enjoy they didn't have a clue Japan has. They'd been locals and yet, there were things they didn't know. Because it wasn't sth they were interested in. Hell, do you know how many times people tell me shit about Greece I don't know? I'm astounded by the knowledge of foreigners, not living in my country, have about my own country's culture in the past. Japan, just like every other country in the world, is no longer a closed off society you can never know shit about. If you look up things, if you ask the right people, locals, and more importantly if you take time to observe and understand them, you will be surprised with how much you learn.

No I don't know everything. And I sure made mistakes while studying, assuming things about a culture different from mine. But I also experienced 2 types of Japanese women who showed me that knowledge lies in the eye of the beholder and how different can people be depending on their maturity and experiences. My first teacher was ambitious, money oriented and didn't know much about subcultures. I found her shallow and selfish, she also looked down on people with mental disorders cause she came from a family heavily affected by it. She didn't value relationships easily and was quick to judge even if she didn't say a word. That person told me about Yoshiki, Gackt and Hyde from a business point of view. I never realized who Yoshiki was in Japan beyond the music industry. Gackt and Hyde too. I was only seeing photos and reading articles so it was refreshing to see them as businessmen from a business standpoint. This woman and I often didn't see eye to eye cause I valued emotions more than ambition and money, yet she was surprised about how much slang I knew for sb who doesn't live there. She was also surprised I knew stuff about mythology, history, Takarazuka Revue, Japanese traditional theater, butoh (which she'd never heard before) etc. Even about the dark parts of Kabukicho's nightlife where she herself had worked. She did add more to my knowledge on that too. My second teacher was much older, much wiser, friendlier and non judgemental. I loved being taught by her cause she was more human and deeper emotionally than the other one. She didn't live much in Japan, she left around her early 20s and kept going back every now and then, but she knew most things a native would and still was so happy when I told her I knew about Takarazuka (she's a fan :P), she wanted to hear about visual kei, she was surprised I knew about Japanese witches, festivals and many more. One of them gave me the nihongo jouzu attitude Japanese people give foreigners, and the other a true appreciation for my love for her country's culture. The latter also told me where to look for more. She encouraged my thirst to learn more instead of disapproving everything she didn't understand about how I approach things. With that old lady we talked shit about Arashi, we talked about SMAP's disband and the industry of idols and talent agencies in Japan. We held a real conversation with plenty of mutual exchange of information xD.

Do tell me or anyone else who doesn't live in ANY country that when you trully love sth you can't know shit about it unless you experience personally. I dare you. And those of you who keep learning things about things you love every day, keep learning, keep asking and let anyone who aquires knowledge ONLY from personal experience doubt you, just cause their learning abilities are limited like that. It shouldn't be a competition, but when you come for my knowledge without even knowing me, I will bite back, cause I can play the "I'm smarter than you" childish attitude too. Help others learn without putting down what they already know dammit, it's not that hard and you are not being "honest" by saying that shit all the time.

[qqueenofhades]

Question from a foreigner: do you have any idea where the brainbug that so many US voters seem to have that they should vote for congressmembers of the opposite party of the person they voted for president to 'balance things out' (as if that's anything but a recipe for legislative paralysis) comes from? Is it, like, suggested in school civics classes for some reason? Does it come from a flawed understanding of what the famous (and based on an external and possibly misinformed view of the last decade or so, seemingly overhyped) 'checks and balances' that we hear about in every piece of US media that even touches politics are? Sorry if this is a stupid question, but as someone from a country with a parliamentary system I just don't understand, and it seems a common enough thought it has to be coming from somewhere

There are a few reasons for this. First, the US very (in)famously has only a two-party system: if you don't vote for one, you're essentially voting for the other, since third parties have no legislative relevance and essentially only exist for people to make frivolous protests and/or siphon votes from Democrats. This is because Republican voters always vote for Republicans, while the Democratic voter base, assuming they vote at all (which can be difficult), is often tempted by third-party candidates (i.e. Ralph Nader) who have a history of then fucking things up for the actual Democrats. In a parliamentary or multi-party system, you have less expectation that one party will act as a direct leverage or counterbalance on the other; it's more fluid and coalitional, and you have more leverage to vote for the party that broadly represents your interests. Because the US is a presidential system, you are voting for the leader directly, rather than just the majority party in power who then vote to select the prime minister/head of state in a different process.

As such, American politics are often tied directly to the figure of the president and how people personally feel about him, the two-party system means that the inevitable discontent with the party presently in power usually gets channeled into voting for their opponents at the next election, Democrats have much more trouble consistently mustering their voter pool than Republicans, and the news media is OBSESSED with the idea that "both sides are bad!" This is because a) it's profitable, and b) the corporations that own them don't want the general public to actually get too interested backing in large-scale financial, economic, or legal reform. So instead of prioritizing any kind of balanced or honest coverage, or trying to accurately convey to the public which policies and/or politicians will or won't help them, they focus on creating a distorted false equivalency where "both parties do bad things." This undermines trust in government, creates voter apathy, likewise works against the Democrats who might challenge the established mega-monopoly, and otherwise makes sure that the status quo never changes too much. This is why they are currently bending over backward to drum up some kind of scandal for Biden, or compare his classified documents situation to Trump's, or otherwise act as if they are essentially equivalent.

The American media ecosystem also relies on making you as angry about everything as possible, which feeds into the zero-sum idea wherein if you are dissatisfied with the current administration for whatever reason, you should "vote for the other ones!" to "balance it out!" or "fix it!" Even though this never, ever works, not least because one half of that equation has abdicated all interest in governing whatsoever. So if you're mad because The Democrats Haven't Lowered Gas Prices, and you vote for the Republicans because you somehow think that doing so will fix the specific problem you're mad about, you're gonna end up with a lot of pointless investigations of Hunter Biden, giving January 6 footage to Tucker Carlson, and other totally useless performative-grievance politics. This is because the Republicans don't actually care about gas prices, or anything else. But the average American voter is so ingrained to do this, as if they expect any kind of change or really think the other guys will fix it, that they just keep pulling Charlie Brown and the football anyway.

[bamboobrat]

succession s4 e2 recap: hitman santa claus and an audition tape from hell

time for this weeks recap, you guys! i'm going into gerri withdrawal, so this feels a bit like pulling teeth, but lets get into this trauma dump of an episode, shall we?

logan is apparently still in his feelings about last episode, but like any man of a certain age, he doesn't want to talk about it.

what he wants to do: take away the kids' helicopter privileges and scrutinize a poor man writing an email.

the kids on the other hand are planning the future of their brand new, 10 billion dollar media empire.

good thing they are really in touch with the people. as we all know, the american public is notoriously famous for being interested in foreign affairs.

it's also connor's rehearsal dinner and he voices his concern his sibs won't make it in the most boomer way possible.

shiv's "taking calls and looking upset" plot line continues.

we will get you that emmy, snookie.

tom's hogged all the good divorce lawyers in new york, similarly to what logan once did to caroline. a truly specific example of generational trauma or something.

logan is at ATN, just chillin' like a villain on the floor.

tom reacts to the news as any employee would, knowing their boss is in the office:

me running back from a one hour lunch after reading on slack that the boss is coming in.

tbh i'd take shiv calling me a lil bitch boy any day.

my close captions did this, and i can't figure out if it's a mistake or tom fucking with greg craig.

also, something tells me greg's sex tape does not have late night tv potential.

and now, for the main star of the show:

kerry's audition tape.

turns out she wants to be a host at ATN. i think roman and kendall speaks for all of us when they say:

never seen kendall so happy.

clearly, logan is the biggest anti-nepotism advocate out there, so he doesn't really want to have a say in what happens to kerry.

calling cyd and tom geniuses, though... seems fishy. perhaps it is not professionalism that is driving him, after all. i guess we will never know.

shiv continues to rack up the largest phone bill ever by talking to sandi (or is it sandy? i care to little to look it up) about potentially asking mattson for more money.

upside: more money. downside: he might just walk away from the table and they'll be stuck with a 10 billion dollar bill and a legacy media company where they focus on the very narrow topics of globan and extremely local.

personally, i don't even fully understand how the stock marked works, and even i can tell that this is a bad idea. but self-destructive people are going to self-destruct i guess.

speaking of:

WHY WOULD HE SAY THAT!!!!!!

logan does a murdoch type speech on the top of printing paper and rips an ATN employee to shreds.

if you ever went to j-school, you know this is the most horrifying scenario.

numbers? i'm a journalist, i can't do math.

logan also quotes a bit of daft punk:

and is completely calm and collected the entire speech, as we have come to expect of logan.

i truly believe logan and brian cox have morphed into one person during the four seasons of succession. i can't tell you why, but i also think this scene is proof.

also, logan is getting a BUNCH of screen time these first few episodes. could they pull the rug out from under us all and kill him off by episode 5? one can only hope.

the kiddos aren't allowed to take the company helicopter to connor and willa's rehearsal dinner and kendall is calm, cool and collected.

it's certainly a long way away from him running after that town car during the first attempt at overthrowing logan in season one. how far he's come. i'd like some of whatever it is he is taking.

stewy and sandi show up to convince the sibs to renegotiate the price with mattson.

i love stewy. i really do. but the show runners don't know how to use him properly anymore, i think. please, for the love of god, give the man some lavender. give him something more to do!

willa does what any young lesbian woman would do: ditch her own rehearsal dinner to have drinks with twenty of her closest friends.

it's not like the bride is needed at that sort of event, anyway.

roman shares my coping mechanism when dealing with any sort of emotional turmoil:

and so does connor, apparently:

there's nothing chocolate and a good rendition of 'don't stop me now' can't fix.

the show runners _really_ want you to know mattson is swedish with the bilar and the julmust and being aggressive whilst also saying you're not being aggressive.

it's the scandi way.

i feel represented.

the threat doesn't work on kendall, though. on the contrary, he's got kid brain and will do anything he is told not to do, so he goes back to back shiv on renegotiating the price. once again, roman is teamed up on, even though i stg he is the only one of the sibs making any sense lately.

this is connor's best attempt at being folksy:

hoegaarden haters unite. i knew there was a reason i liked connor.

positive note: he finally gets his way and they go to karaoke. negative note: he contacts logan and it all ends in a confrontation that makes me want to set myself on fire:

screaming, crying, throwing up.

we get another logan monologue of sorts, with certain interjections from the kids. potentially the first honest encounter this show has ever seen? i'm sick of brian cox face by now, so i couldn't be fucked to screengrab.

just have him die already. he's only there because he acknowledges that the kids have "got juice" and yet he calls them "not serious people".... i guess he is right, but i don't have to like it, okay!!!

roman comes crawling back and asks logan this:

logan responds that he needs him and it's the only thing i think roman has ever wanted to hear and i'm going to go scream into a pillow now.

i guess this marks the end of the siblings teaming up (for now). rip.

i feel drained.

bonus:

gerri is still out in the cold in all the ways and is absolutely NOWHERE in this episode. i'm glad she too had the chance to smirk at kerry's audition tape, but it was with hugo.... cancels itself out.

that being said, i've seen the trailer for next week's episode, and i am ready to be hurt again.

cheers!

[hussyknee]

Democrats gotta be livin in a alternate reality where Biden didn’t publicly accused Palestinians of blood libel, lying & inflating the death toll.

Liberals are fucking delusional, they can’t be out here telling people that if their Democratic candidate does not get elected then something worse will happen because the worse is already here under a Democrat as president. How can it be worse than a FUCKING GENOCIDE ??? What the liberals who say this stuff really mean is, “If you sit this election out, they might elect someone who would do all the things they’re already doing, but to *Americans*, the people who actually MATTERS.

Not just Americans, white Americans. Every other group is already suffering– anti-immigration crackdowns, cop city, a border wall going up, a healthcare system on the brink of collapse, wage slavery under a skyrocketing cost of living, white nationalism, auctioning off half the Gulf of Mexico to oil companies. And even though disabled, trans, poor and Jewish people in the US are all similar levels of endangered, white people in those communities still push this "blue or die" shit because they cannot wrap their heads around the fact that the US has gone so far right that their white privilege has almost no more currency. Most of them are newly poor despite having an education that prepared them to be middle class, and even those who grew up working class are now plunged into the kind of economic instability foreign to even their parents. They are now forced to live the reality that the majority of BIPOC has for generations with no point of reference or ability to adapt, so they cling to what they know. They absolutely refuse to listen to those who have known generational disenfranchisement and systemic exclusion because 1) centering themselves is second nature to them and 2) the problem they want solved is the loss of their white bourgeoisie privilege, not creating equitable resources by dismantling of power structures. Social justice for them is simply about finding a port in the storm, to harbour until their own conviction in the Just World Theory is rewarded and their privileges restored to them.

And the thing is that part of what they're saying is true— Biden's administration has very limited scope to do anything about most of it because these are systems of economic power entrenched in the US establishment, the nexus of which is military operations and contracts. I mean, once you have seen Trump, Biden, Hillary Clinton and Bernie fucking Sanders all take the same party line on Israel's right to raze Palestine to the ground, you cannot possibly have any more illusions left.

Or so you would think. White America is built on the myth that they live at the heart of democracy and enlightened civilization, and anything that contradicts this is an aberration or the work of bad faith actors. That's why they keep saying that the "system is broken" instead of recognizing that the system is actually functioning 100% the way it is meant to. It's why so many of them absolutely refuse to acknowledge that Israel is a settler colony, because America created Israel in its image, and it would mean grappling with the fact that it is also a genocidal settler colony, that they are colonists and beneficiaries of an imperial core that can only perpetuate itself through apartheid and militarization. That both Trump and Netanyahu are not aberrations but simply part of that same ouroboros of violence without the veneer of civility and apologia.

I keep thinking about that liberal white college girl in Knives Out. She made being progressive and an Ally™ her whole personality, defending Marta loudly, pushing back against the conservative politics of her family and earning Marta's trust. But the minute she realized her money was gone and her college fund was in danger, instead of trying to work out an alternative plan or beg Marta for help, she immediately capitulated to the rest of her family and tried to use the goodwill she has established with Marta to try and guilt her into giving up the money. Because approaching a poor Latina immigrant as an equal or from a disadvantaged position is completely anathema to white people across the political spectrum.

Liberals might have turned against Biden during Clinton's time, when more of them were comfortably affluent or had the means of becoming so. I mean, they impeached Clinton not for sexually exploiting his intern but for fucking adultery. But economically and socially destabilised whites will never take the moral high ground over their own interests, even, it would seem, when it comes to three solid weeks of seeing live footage of entire families blown apart, buried under rubble and their homes set on fire. The mask has finally fallen all the way off.

[debbiechanclub]

What are your thoughts on bullet club war dogs as a whole and what are your thoughts on each of the members?

What a nice treat in my inbox, thank you for allowing me to subject you to my insanity about this group of people. My thoughts are that I love them, and let me tell you why.

Preemptively inserting a cut, because I'm sure this is gonna be long.

*Morgan Freeman voice*: It is.

I assume you know this, so I don't mean to mansplain, but it's crucial to my point to reiterate that the original intent of Bullet Club as founded by Prince Devitt was to be a stable of despicable gaijin (or foreign) wrestlers. Which makes total sense as a concept, especially in NJPW. Japan is not the cultural melting pot that North America or the UK is―if you're not Japanese, you stick out. So it makes perfect sense that the foreign wrestlers would gravitate toward each other and band together in that locker room as strangers in a strange land, so to speak.

However, to me, it hadn't felt like that's what Bullet Club was in a long time. Ever since The Elite left NJPW and during the bulk of Jay White's tenure as leader, basically (and he is the longest tenured leader!). At some point under Jay's leadership, BC became less about being a group of foreign menaces and more about just being a group of menaces. And a group of menaces who didn't really have each other's backs, to boot? There was so much in-fighting and it got so old.

But David Finlay and the War Dogs―in my admittedly completely biased opinion―have brought BC back to its original intent. They're a group of young, hungry, foreign guys who came almost entirely out of NJPW's American arm in Strong. And they're obsessed with each other. You can tell from social media and their backstage comments and in-ring promos that they're a cohesive unit who have each other's backs.

Outside of the War Dogs, though... BC is still a hot fucking mess. I'm highkey annoyed that Jay is just being allowed to get away with BC Gold in AEW, and I want nothing more than for Finlay to finally cut House of Torture loose (and hopefully there will be movement on that with him and EVIL being in the same G1 block). I do, however, think Ace and Bey should be brought into the War Dogs; they would fit right in (and I love Chris Bey). As for the BC subgroup in NJPW Tamashii, while I know absolutely nothing about them it does make sense that NJPW would want an iteration of their most-known faction in their Australian arm. And plus Bad Luck Fale is heading it up and he's an original member, so. Pass.

Okay, so now that I've told you my thoughts on the War Dogs as a group, lets get into each of them individually.

David Finlay

I mean, he's blorbo prime. My special (not really) little guy. He just scratches a very satisfying itch in my brain, and it actually started for me back when Kenny Omega took the AEW World Championship over to Impact to become the Belt Collector. Because when Kenny did that, I―like many others―tuned into Impact for the first time in actual decades, and when FinJuice started feuding with The Good Brothers for the Impact World Tag Titles, I just knew I'd vibe with Finlay, you know? Like I said, he scratched an itch. (Also, I should say here that I didn't start regularly watching NJPW until like... mid-2021, so my exposure to Finlay up until watching Impact was essentially that I knew he was a person who existed.) And then Finlay came back to Japan for the first time in over a year to compete in last year's G1 post-split from Juice, and he was a bit more aggressive with a bit of a chip on his shoulder, and the feeling of "yeah, that's my guy," only grew. And then he walked out with Gedo in Bullet Club gear for the New Japan Cup and I was just a goner. Plus his dad is Fit Finlay who I love simply for everything he's done to help elevate women's wrestling. Like, love and respect, Steph, but you didn't start the women's revolution―Fit did when he started treating WWE's women like wrestlers and not just eye candy 💅🏻

Oh, and I will die on this hill: FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, will Tony Khan or someone in fucking AEW acknowledge all the history between Finlay and both Juice and Jay and give us the fucking War Dogs-BC Gold feud we deserve????

Okay, moving on.

Clark Connors

Okay, so. If Finlay scratches a satisfying itch in my brain, Clark scratches a hedonistic one, and that's just it. Seriously―when he first joined BC, he had me acting and thinking weird. He's despicable and cocky and he likes to drink and smoke and fight and I am simply helpless against his dirtbag rhinestone outlaw swag. Plus, he's just a good hard-hitting wrestler. There's a moment in his match against Kevin Knight from this year's BOSJ where he did this crazy sort of spear-spinebuster combo that lives absolutely rent free in my brain. OH. And his theme song is a fucking banger.

Dan "Drilla" Moloney

To be perfectly transparent, even though he was great in this year's BOSJ, I didn't pay much attention to Drilla until he joined BC and linked up with Clark, and I don't know that I like him so much as I just like him and Clark together? That's not to say I don't like Drilla on his own, because I do―he's mouthy and entertaining as fuck and just does not give a fuck. At all. But him and Clark together are just *chef's kiss* to me. Although, I am very much looking forward to Drilla's impending match and feud with Will Ospreay.

Alex Coughlin

This might come as a surprise, but... Alex is lowkey my second favorite after Finlay (sorry, Clark 🫣). And it’s for the same reason that I gravitated toward Finlay in the first place: I just know I'd vibe with him based off the things he posts on IG. I also like that he brings a completely different dynamic to the group in the sense that he's not loud or outwardly cocky and doesn't run his mouth like the rest of them do. He just stares into your soul and picks things up and throws them. And I just think he's neat. I hope he does well in the G1 and I will be sad if he doesn't.

Gabe Kidd

So as of right now, I have the least feel for Gabe out of all the War Dogs, and my thoughts on him are similar to Drilla in that it's not so much him as it is him and Alex together for me. The two of them are a completely different flavor of swag from Drilla and Clark, and I absolutely love that. I love that the War Dogs are a well-rounded unit with both a junior tag team and a heavyweight tag team who each bring something unique and dynamic to the table. That being said, Gabe is quickly growing on me, and I'm sure I'll have more to say about him during and after the G1.

And Jesus H. Christ, I just wrote you a novel. I hope it answers your question? 😂

Seriously though, thank you for asking me this, and now everyone who bothers to read this knows how extensive my brainrot for the War Dogs is. They're my special guys and I adore them.

[vacantgodling]

well now i wanna know about nyoka and verin✅🛑🎁📢🔮🗺️

DANKE <3

✅Biggest turn ons? Something they'll always be into?

verin: making partner scream/be extremely vocal, edging/orgasm denial (for both himself and his partner), overstimulation (for both himself and his partner), and he’s got a bit of a breeding kink 👀

nyoka: monsterfucking (obviously), dirty talk (even if it somewhat embarrasses them), being a pillow princess (tho removed from the main wip they would definitely get into being more Active during sex, they’re just never gonna say no to verin holding them down and giving them what they need)

both: size kink (it’s one of the main things that is a big deal in this wip bc verin goes from 6feet to like 8-9 feet with 4 arms and a MONSTER cock and they’re both very into that)

🛑Biggest turn offs? What are their hard-nos?

verin: being tied down (though he doesn’t mind doing light bondage to his partner he just doesn’t like being restrained it triggers him)

nyoka: penetrating (or topping), knife/blood play

🎁They get a suggestive gift from a partner. What's inside?

verin: if nyoka ever bought him a present he’d be over the moon; even more so if it was a cock ring so he can test his limits of how long he can hold out 💛

nyoka: anal beads would make them beet red but they would absolutely give it a go

📢How private are they about their sex life and sexual preferences?

verin: as a immortal god, verin has Very Little qualms about being open about his sex life. if it exists, he’s probably done it—not that he’s a god of pleasure per se but he’s gotten around. very experienced lol.

nyoka: Is Literally A Virgin and all they’ve ever experienced about sex before verin was just it’s demonizaiton bc if they became a non-virgin they can’t be sacrificed to the gods! sex has always been kind of a mystical thing to them, but they don’t really know what they’re into,,, their personality makes them blunt even if they’re shy about things so while i don’t think they’re open on purpose if you asked they MAY answer.

🔮Are there any unique or fantastical aspects of sexuality in the world of your WIP that they engage in? Non-human characteristics, magic?

well main thing is verin’s god form—so, he has blue skin, 6 eyes, 4 arms, and his cock is like. bad dragon levels of ridiculously big. he can technically shift his form At Will, and i think he CAN split his cock into two (so they’re just slightly less girthy than when he has just one but still decently sized) so there’s a LOT of fun to be had with him. strength, stamina, and cum are all endless for him, so he only really takes a break for nyoka’s sake cuz he could Keep Going. though i’m sure there will be times in the future where he gently and lovingly feeds them more stamina via magic so they can keep going, but nyo absolutely passes out for like 3 days after and he apologizes so profusely even if they’re like, totally fine with it and completely blissed out lmao.

🗺️Does their culture have a strong impact on their sexuality? Which parts?

in the religious sects of their society they’re very puritan and modest/chaste, despite the actual world itself (in my mind) kind of being more adjacent to indian/latin american/island vibes. people don’t necessarily dress modestly but preserving the chastity (especially of sacrifices) is a Big Fucking Deal and sex before marriage isn’t really a THING. obviously red light districts exist but they’re seen sort of as lesser by the main religion even though they all in said red light do fervently worship the host of gods so it’s a bit mismatched every. nyoka doesn’t actually have many of these qualms though because technically they’re a “foreigner” — their parents were merchants and they traveled to this city when they were young, but unfortunately their parents contracted a disease and they passed. nyoka was then taken in by the religious sect as an orphan to be sacrifices BUT they’ve always been super discriminatory towards them. they actually don’t know much about their own culture like where they’re from originally but they know they Deffo don’t jive with the vibes here.