#this was all about 70-90 years ago in world history

[reasonsforhope]

No paywall version here.

"Two and a half years ago, when I was asked to help write the most authoritative report on climate change in the United States, I hesitated...

In the end, I said yes, but reluctantly. Frankly, I was sick of admonishing people about how bad things could get. Scientists have raised the alarm over and over again, and still the temperature rises. Extreme events like heat waves, floods and droughts are becoming more severe and frequent, exactly as we predicted they would. We were proved right. It didn’t seem to matter.

Our report, which was released on Tuesday, contains more dire warnings. There are plenty of new reasons for despair. Thanks to recent scientific advances, we can now link climate change to specific extreme weather disasters, and we have a better understanding of how the feedback loops in the climate system can make warming even worse. We can also now more confidently forecast catastrophic outcomes if global emissions continue on their current trajectory.

But to me, the most surprising new finding in the Fifth National Climate Assessment is this: There has been genuine progress, too.

I’m used to mind-boggling numbers, and there are many of them in this report. Human beings have put about 1.6 trillion tons of carbon in the atmosphere since the Industrial Revolution — more than the weight of every living thing on Earth combined. But as we wrote the report, I learned other, even more mind-boggling numbers. In the last decade, the cost of wind energy has declined by 70 percent and solar has declined 90 percent. Renewables now make up 80 percent of new electricity generation capacity. Our country’s greenhouse gas emissions are falling, even as our G.D.P. and population grow.

In the report, we were tasked with projecting future climate change. We showed what the United States would look like if the world warms by 2 degrees Celsius. It wasn’t a pretty picture: more heat waves, more uncomfortably hot nights, more downpours, more droughts. If greenhouse emissions continue to rise, we could reach that point in the next couple of decades. If they fall a little, maybe we can stave it off until the middle of the century. But our findings also offered a glimmer of hope: If emissions fall dramatically, as the report suggested they could, we may never reach 2 degrees Celsius at all.

For the first time in my career, I felt something strange: optimism.

And that simple realization was enough to convince me that releasing yet another climate report was worthwhile.

Something has changed in the United States, and not just the climate. State, local and tribal governments all around the country have begun to take action. Some politicians now actually campaign on climate change, instead of ignoring or lying about it. Congress passed federal climate legislation — something I’d long regarded as impossible — in 2022 as we turned in the first draft.

[Note: She's talking about the Inflation Reduction Act and the Infrastructure Act, which despite the names were the two biggest climate packages passed in US history. And their passage in mid 2022 was a big turning point: that's when, for the first time in decades, a lot of scientists started looking at the numbers - esp the ones that would come from the IRA's funding - and said "Wait, holy shit, we have an actual chance."]

And while the report stresses the urgency of limiting warming to prevent terrible risks, it has a new message, too: We can do this. We now know how to make the dramatic emissions cuts we’d need to limit warming, and it’s very possible to do this in a way that’s sustainable, healthy and fair.

The conversation has moved on, and the role of scientists has changed. We’re not just warning of danger anymore. We’re showing the way to safety.

I was wrong about those previous reports: They did matter, after all. While climate scientists were warning the world of disaster, a small army of scientists, engineers, policymakers and others were getting to work. These first responders have helped move us toward our climate goals. Our warnings did their job.

To limit global warming, we need many more people to get on board... We need to reach those who haven’t yet been moved by our warnings. I’m not talking about the fossil fuel industry here; nor do I particularly care about winning over the small but noisy group of committed climate deniers. But I believe we can reach the many people whose eyes glaze over when they hear yet another dire warning or see another report like the one we just published.

The reason is that now, we have a better story to tell. The evidence is clear: Responding to climate change will not only create a better world for our children and grandchildren, but it will also make the world better for us right now.

Eliminating the sources of greenhouse gas emissions will make our air and water cleaner, our economy stronger and our quality of life better. It could save hundreds of thousands or even millions of lives across the country through air quality benefits alone. Using land more wisely can both limit climate change and protect biodiversity. Climate change most strongly affects communities that get a raw deal in our society: people with low incomes, people of color, children and the elderly. And climate action can be an opportunity to redress legacies of racism, neglect and injustice.

I could still tell you scary stories about a future ravaged by climate change, and they’d be true, at least on the trajectory we’re currently on. But it’s also true that we have a once-in-human-history chance not only to prevent the worst effects but also to make the world better right now. It would be a shame to squander this opportunity. So I don’t just want to talk about the problems anymore. I want to talk about the solutions. Consider this your last warning from me."

-via New York Times. Opinion essay by leading climate scientist Kate Marvel. November 18, 2023.

[nieves-de-sugui]

A Quick History of BL

As someone who wrote a thesis on this very subject a few years ago, here is the short version of how BL has evolved throughout the years. For the new comers ❤ 

a minute of silence for the original form of this post that tumblr decied to not save right after I saved it

I am going to go with a chronological approach. Unfortunately, I cannot put everything in one post so if there’s any questions about this or that aspect of the history of BL that you want to know and it’s not talked about here, you are welcome to ask me directly :)

Context and influences - Japan in the 60′s

Before the US forced Japan to open its borders to the outside world in the 1800s, homosexual practices were common place between budist monks, samurais and kabuki actors. During the Edo period (1600s to 1800s) there was a very rich amount of poetry, art, books (such as Nanshoku Okagami (The Great Mirror of Male Love) by Ihara Saikaku) and codes of conduct about how to have a good master/aprentice relationship, kinda like the greeks if you know what I mean. However, with the arrival of western influences, in order to become a more “civilized” country, it was all put in the closet. 

Yet, in the 60′s Japan started to pick it up again through literature about young androginous beautiful boys (aka bishounen). On one hand, in 1961, the novel Koibitotachi no Mori (A Lover’s Forest) by Mari Mori was published. It tells the story of a young and beautiful 19 year old worker and a half french half japanese aristocrat, and their tragic romance. On the other hand, Taruho Inagaki wrote Shounen ai no Bigaku (The esthetics of boy-love), an essay on aesthetic eroticism (of which he wrote a lot of). All this was know as Tanbi (lit. aesthetic) literature. It generally refered to literature with implied homosexuality and homoeroticism such as works by Oscar Wilde, Jean Cocteau, etc. And of course, Mori and Inagaki. 

In chinese tanbi is read as danmei (term used to refer to BL novels in china today, ie: The Untamed it’s all connected friends).

From the birth of Shonen Ai  to Yaoi - 70′s to the late 80′s

Around the beginning of the 70′s, shoujo was being revolutionized by the Year 24 Group, a generation of women manga authors (mangaka) who started to explore new themes. Among them, their interest in tanbi gave birth to a new subgenre: Shounen ai. 

Their most known manga were:

Kaze to Ki no Uta (The Ballad of the Wind and Trees) by Keiko Takemiya, and Toma no Shinzo (The Heart of Thomas) by Moto Hagio

Their stories are characterized by having suffering eurpoean bishounen in boarding schools, living an idealized perfect love (meaning passionate) that, despite the tragic end of one of them, lives forever in the other. 

As this genre starts getting popular, more and more fans of these stories start making their own self published manga, aka doujinshi, of the genre. It is around this time that the term Yaoi is coined. Meaning “YAma nashi, Ochi nashi, Imi nashi” (no climax, no fall, no meaning). Basically PWP fanfiction, for the most part. Doujinshis could be considered an equivalent of fanfiction in manga form.  It is also here that the term Fujoshi (aka Rotten Girl, for liking rotten things) starts being used to refer to women readers of yaoi. 

With this rise in popularity come the start of the commercialization of the genre. Which meant the publication of magazines dedicated solely to yaoi/shonen ai/BL. The most popular yaoi manga magazine at the time was June. The common trait of their stories being the therapeutic power of the love between the mains. The traumatized character would heal throught this newfound love.

Most of the stories at this time happened in the West (Europe or the States) as the exploration of these dark themes intertwined with homosexual romance and homoeroticism still feel safer to explore as a foreign concept. One example would be Banana Fish (1985).

Commercialization and Yaoi Ronso -  90′s 

As more publishing houses pick the genre up, the term Boys Love is used to include every type of manga about homosexuality made for women. 

The increasing amount of BL series sees a changes in its themes: 

the start of the “gay for you” trope where one mantains their heterosexuality despite being in a homsexual relationship, 

the uke/seme dynamic (mirroring hetero realtionships) also relating to physical appearence (one being more feminine, the other being more masculine), 

the use of rape as an act love (sexual violence has always been present but here it becomes a staple),

anal sex as the only type of sex, 

older and more masculine men start to appear 

they now happen in Japan

Good examples of the presence of these themes in manga are Gravitation (1996) or Yatteranneeze (1995).

However in 1992, Masaki Sato (a gay activist/drag queen) wrote a letter in a small scale feminist magazine attacking yaoi and pointing out how it “represented a kind of misappropriation or distortion of gay life that impacted negatively upon Japanese gay men”. The female readers of yaoi responded, defending the genre as a means to escape gender roles and explore sexual themes that was never meant to represent the realities of gay men. This is know as the Yaoi Ronso (Yaoi Debates).

The debate ended with both sides understanding more of each other, with mangakas starting to include queer views in their works. It also started the academic reasearch of BL. 

Yet, it is a debate that has been restarted more than once, as it is still relevant despite the evolution of the genre.

more on this on another post

Globalization and coining of BL - 2000′s 

By the beginning of the 2000s BL is being sold all over the world (like all manga), and has become a stable industry. We could say it has finally become it’s own genre. 

Some of the most well known manga series, to us (in the west), of the time are:

Junjou Romantica 2002 Koi Suru Boukun 2004 Love Pistols 2004 Haru wo Daiteita 1999

all of these have anime adaptations for the curious ones

We also start seeing short anime adaptations or special episodes of the most popular series, with questionable themes, such as: adoptive father x adoptive son  (Papa to Kiss in the Dark 2005), father x son’s friend (Kirepapa 2008), etc... 

However the themes remain more or less the same. Junjou Romantica’s love story starts with a non-con sex scene by the older one (masc, seme) to the younger one (more feminine, uke) addressed years later in the manga btw. Koi Suru Boukun’s love story is triggered by aphrodisiacs and rape. They’re still very present in the stories but slowly going away. A mangaka that represents this era could be Natsume Isaku (Candy Color Paradox 2010).

Change is slow in Japan. Even though the voices of LGBT+ people started to be taken into account in the genre it is not until later that we see it reflect in the mangas themselves. However, we can already see the start of this in Doukyusei (Classmates) (2006) by Asumiko Nakamura. Also Kinou Nani Tabeta? (2007) which is actually part of a more mature genre: Seinen.

It is my personal (subjective) theory that the BL of this era was the one that got popular outside of Japan, which is why we see lots of references to the themes, tropes and dynamics of this time in today’s BL series. 

The LGBTzation of BL and the rise of webtoons - 2010′s to 2020′s

Slowly but surely LGBT characters and themes enter the scene of BL. Existing simultaneously with the previous tropes and themes, we start seeing a shift in these stories. We now see:

characters that identify as gay or some type of queer

discussions about homophobia

more mature themes about life and romance

At the same time as we get the usual love stories with the usual themes, a new trend starts to take over. And we get simultaneously, cute, sometimes questionable but light love stories:

Love Stage 2010 Ashita wa Docchi da! 2011 Kieta Hatsukoi 2019

More profound stories and darker or more complex themes:

Blue Sky Complex 2013  Saezuru Tori wa Habatakanai 2011 (mafias) Given 2013 (suicide) Hidamari ga Kikoeru 2013 (deafness)

And others that adress the queer experience in a more mature way (which might actually fall into the Seinen genre)

Itoshi no Nekokke 2010 (slice of life, queer characters) Smells like Green Spirit 2011 (two ways to deal with a homphobic society) Strange 2014 (relationships between men) Shimanami Tasogare 2015 (an LGBT group helps a closeted gay) Old Fashioned Cupcake 2019 (you know this one 😉) Bokura no Micro na Shuumatsu 2020 (the end of the world)

As queer stories are explored, BL mangakas and mangakas from other genres start to consider more stories about queer people such as the Josei Genderless Danshi ni Aisaretemasu (My Androgynous Boyfriend) (2018) by Tamekou, or the Shoujo Goukon ni Itarra Onna ga Inakatta Hanashi (The story of when I went to a mixer and there were no women) (2021) by Nana Aokawa. 

Still, we can see two realities live side by side. Doukyuusei gets adapted into an impactful animated movie in 2016, meanwhile Banana Fish gets an anime adaptation that keeps the homoeroticism but not the homosexuality.  

For those who might be interested. Here are some of the authors that represent the first half of this era, where they start to include newer points of view:

Scarlet Beriko, HAYAKAWA Nojiko, KURAHASHI Tomo, OGERETSU Tanaka, Harada, KII Kanna (Stranger by the Sea), etc...

And authors that while keeping classical themes break the stereotypes in a subtle manner:

CTK, ZAKK, Jyanome, Cocomi, Hidebu Takahashi, SUZUMARU Minta, etc...

Mangakas also no longer stick to one genre only. They explore whichever of them they want, from BL to Seinen to others. 

ie: Tamekou, 

or Asumiko Nakamura

The curious case of Webtoons

With the digitalization of mangas, throught Renta and Lehzin, it has become easier (and more expensive) to access these stories. Korea makes and appearence with their webtoons. Through the lack of piracy protections and the majority of them being digital, manhwa (korean webtoons) sees a rise in popularity. Through the digital medium the influencee can be the influencer.

However, like many other East Asian countries they have consumed BL, without hearing about the conversations about BL. So they end up mantaining the older themes and stereotypes that newer BL is trying to leave behind. Therefore, we end up with a mix of old and new, ie:

Killing Stalking 2016 Cherry Blossoms After Winter 2017 Painter of The Night 2019

Additionally, it is also thanks to the easy access to internet that Omegaverse, with its higher dramatic stakes (that parallel hetero dynamics), enters the mangasphere in 2016. It has grown in popularity ever since.

With the Thai BL Boom of 2020, Japan rediscovers its own BL market and starts investing in it more. Which is why we get live action adaptations of BL manga that was popular years ago (Candy Color Paradox was a manga from 2010), the more recent ones (The End of the World With You) or new anime adaptations (Saezuru Tori wa Habatakanai in 2020). 

more on this in my japanese live action BL post

What has it become now? is it BL? ML? or Seinen? Or is it all just gay manga?

It is clear that Shoujo manga (with BL, Josei and Seinen) is exploring queer themes such as gender and sexuality more and more. Japan is interested in this conversation, not only in manga (Genderless fashion). Which brings up the current question in BL studies: Does it make sense to keep these categories?

As a response to BL, ML (Male Love), which is made by gay men for gay men, started happening (around the 70s too). And Bara (gay manga porn) in response to Yaoi. However both gay men and women read BL and ML. We also see other themes being explored through BL, such as friendship (in BL Metamorphose), food (in Kinou Nani Tabeta), male relationships of all kinds (in Strange), and different queer views on life and its challenges (in Shimanami Tasogare). More and more what is LGBT and what is BL is merging, the line is blurred. 

Conclusion

BL has been in my life for longer than it hasn't. It is through shoujo and BL that I have come to understand people and romance.

It is flawed, like everything else this life, but it's flourishing in many ways.

The genre feels old and new at the same time. 

We can still find shounen ai/tanbi elements in more modern manga (All About J). Or the gay for you in a new light (Itoshi no Nekkoke). Or more educational manga on queer issues (My Brother’s Husband by Gengoroh Tagame). BL has around 50 years of existence but it is also being born anew in Thailand and Korea. 

BL manga will continue to evolve in acordance to Japanese tastes, as it is still a local market. Hopefully the korean webtoons that get popular will be the more daring ones in their themes. Who knows where it will go from here? The only thing we know for sure is that it will continue to change. Isn't it exciting?

A post on the evolution of live action BL in Japan is coming, to complement this post.  As well as a more detailed explanation of the Yaoi Debates and gay manga.

[gemsofgreece]

https://youtu.be/-tqop31_bzk?si=r0AQimzbIyjOSS80

What's your opinion about this video analysis about Satti's song showing "the New Greece"?

I have already briefly mentioned this video in a post I made in Greek about Marina.

I found the video exceptionally perceptive, as rarely it is when it is a foreign, American in this case I believe, exploration of anything modern Greek. The YT channel is called “Overthinking It” and, no lie, some extra effort works wonders. He’s incredibly accurate for a man who hasn’t done research on Greek culture and society prior to his analysis of Marina Satti’s song and its reception. I was honestly impressed.

It might not be 100% correct but that doesn’t mean much, even some Greek articles in newspapers were not totally “there” in my opinion.

My biggest objection would be the title “Marina Satti is showing Eurovision the New Greece”, which is not so much a mistake on his part as even in Greece the terms we use are, say, Neo Hellenes instead of Modern Greeks, for example. But in truth Marina is not showing the “New Greece”. Marina was showing a facet of Greece people don’t know or care to know about. That’s totally different.

Whereas we say that foreigners only know about Zeus, the Parthenon, philosophy, that’s not entirely true. Several foreigners know Syrtaki, feta, souvlaki, bouzouki and enjoy those things more, and those are parts of “New Greece”. Some maybe conventionally perceived as such, even. But even those things are too few to represent accurately the “mosaic of Greece”, new or old or whatever.

In Marina’s words, that is. She said in an interview that she wanted to present a glimpse of the mosaic. She wasn’t trying to show a “New Greece”, as in an entirely new entity separated or opposite from an old one, but the Current Greece, as in the “how Greece is faring” as we speak, which interests very few and it is a little odd to have people nitpick even the slightest detail of your history millennia ago but the entire population could self combust into thin air right now and nobody would bat an eye. The American understands more of that in the video, it’s just the title that is slightly odd but it’s also attracting clicks.

I would also however like to comment on Greeks and Europeans’ short memory: Marina is not the first to try this. Many Greek entries were attempting to show more of the “mosaic”. But she is the first in the latest years, when the world has started caring about Eurovision beyond the borders of Europe. It is new to these people for sure.

The juice here is not that Marina tried something supposedly novel. Not at all. The juice here is in WHAT she chose to present. She chose the more heavy-duty Balkan and the more-heavy duty oriental and she mixed it with modern urban rap/ trap culture. This is what the problem was for these people. She is showing something that many Greeks try to reject. THAT is the issue. But she is right. This too is a part of the mosaic.

Greeks just care too much how they look to outsiders. They are constantly afraid that a part of their culture / art will not be appreciated and thus rewarded.

I believe we must be left to do our thing without any poisoning afterthoughts. Some things will definitely not translate well to the global audience. But who cares? Even that is better than sending something that is not true to yourself.

Look at other countries. They send joke entries all the time. We only sent SAGAPO (and even that wasn’t intentionally a joke entry) like 20 years ago and we still can’t recover from the shock. Now we wouldn’t take this lightly either. We just take ourselves TOO seriously.

But if we just do our thing with calmness and confidence and openness to a potential bad result, we will build our own following. I mean. Greece already has a considerable following in Eurovision. Its noughties legacy remains strong and people are rediscovering now the very underrated 70s and 90s. In fact, Greece might be the country that gets the most pressure by Eurofans to send something about Greek culture. I legitimately have never seen comments or nowhere near as many anyway of European people being disappointed at other countries’ entries as much as they are repeatedly at a Greek entry, because it doesn’t have a Greek sound or Greek lyrics. I think this pressure from the Europeans in combination with the mixed receptions once Greece complies has really confused the Greek delegation and the Greek artists.

It seems what the Greek delegation forgets is that it obviously doesn’t have to only be Greek in the lyrics or the instruments. It also has to be, you know, a good song lol

I do think we generally fail to communicate our music very accurately in this contest. I don’t know why. Maybe it’s what I said, we are too scared what others will think and try to “adjust” our music to make it either more Western European or more stereotypey Greek in the monolithic way foreigners view Greece. And hence even the mosaic attempt sometimes falls flat. But even with all those problems, I believe we have our own signature. I just want us to reinforce exactly that. Do it more, do it better and do it UNAPOLOGETICALLY. Zari is nowhere near the ideal attempt but it is an attempt nonetheless, a new start that thrives on the unapologetic part.

PS. So far the best example of the Greek mosaic attempt being successful was Alcohol is Free by Koza Mostra and Agathon Iakovidis in 2013 which finished 6th and it could have been higher if so many Europeans had not clutched their pearls at the notion that their kids watching would think alcohol is offered freely at the time 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️ Different times I suppose. Now everyone is fine that every other entry is basically a strip show 🙃

PS 2. In any case I think it is Marina’s success that Zari caused or, rather, bared the social phenomenon that it did and that even foreign YouTubers are trying to decipher and explain what happened.

[graychrissy]

🍐MY JOURNEY🍐

I wanted to share a little about my journey from being normal kid to how I got all interested in loa and void.

Random question guys have y'all ever as a kid thought about what other people are doing in different part of the world.

When I was a kid I used to be a very curious person I still am,but my curiosity as a child was on different level mind you I did NOT have any idea about this loa or any spiritual things but after learning about loa 3 years ago I used to consider this as an spiritual awakening idk if it really is

During my summer or winter break I would always miss my friends and used to think "If I don't see them they probably won't exist" or "Now that I am imagining them they probably exist". This was really random of me to think that but frr I used to believe that if don't look or think of a place or person they simply don't exist and as we know kids can easily believe their own imagination,I too is used too but of course our society had filled my head with limitations and for years with the so call law of (not) attraction,I filled my head with limitations even more and then when I got introduced to LOAssumption I was afraid that it will also be a waste of time but there was a little hope,that I WILL have my dream life I did not care about how long it will take because the only think I learned from LOAttraction was patiences💀.

After that I found about subliminal,reality shifting and quantum jumping through amino. Shifting took all my attention for sure,and as I learn more about shifting I learned about glitch in matrix and this made me wonder I probably shifted, because believe me or not, I think I HAVE shifted not one but multiple times as a child, because I find 90's movie super nostalgic,when I see movies based in 70s,80s,or pictures and paintings seems so dang nostalgic like all those things related to 17-19 century and 90s are so damn nostalgic to me,I once found myself getting emotional in the museum after seeing a painting just because it felt so good in a way it felt like I am from that century,it is another reason why I have interest in history and mythology and also believe in mermaids.

Also the amount of deja vu I get every time I read about Roman Empire, Ancient Greeks and European or any history of other countries I feel emotionally attached like I was there once is INSANE.

All this got me even more curious about myself,and I think loa is giving me all the answers slowly,I feel like an spiritual awakening to me.

[beardedmrbean]

[Huey Zoomer Anon]

What is it with white libs after the election and learning about a huge chunk of minorities voted for trump?

Kamala campaign fail, she talked to ACTIVE SOLDIERS IN THE FIELD like 5 years olds

And have worse vocabulary than me, wait I’m in the autism spectrum, what her’s excuse?

Than like trying to bring in the Obamas, actually I think perhaps gen x and millennials Africans Americans can explain it better

When I saw Chicago DNC clips…idk, to me it was like looking at a cult you were in. They were scared, the blacks are brainwashed to believe that Trump was going to give the KKK F22s. I mean I roll my eyes at my community

But fuck we are brainwashed to the plantation

Also the Obama thing…actually let think about when he came out

Remember it took 99 years after the 13 amendment for the civil rights act to happen. So for most blacks, a black president was a fantasy, where many blacks were told by their own teachers. There will never be a black president

Than 44 years after the civil rights act, a BLACK candidate who will when and be the first BLACK president with the first BLACK First Family in the White House?

AAAAAH DOPAMINE RUSH 9000!

I notice this with my late great grandmother who died a few years ago who had a picture of the Obama family…I mean…it was people like us in the White House not as slaves or servants, but as leaders of the free world

Than….the disillusion for many blacks began…the evil shit that happened under the Obama administration was known more. The fast and furious scandal…how shitty the economy was under him

Oh and Michelle Obama lunch programs, hmmm what slur I can use for her after the garbage I ate in school?

Than them reappearing out of nowhere for Kamala, where you two been? Wait wait Mr Obama chastising black men for openly showing more support for trump?

And he said something about how would Muslim Americans would live under trump…bitch you are called the Obomber, and if I remember correctly called the Butcher of places like Pakistan, Congo, etc?

Just because the wokies and media you aren’t part of the American military industrial complex, doesn’t mean the victims love ones haven’t forgotten

Obama came in just the right time for the asskissing (especially with the mess black America was in during the 80’s-90’s) he was seen as a beacon of hope, only to be a wolf in sheep clothing

Also after I research that 2024 celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act being passed…I…I can’t help just look how we are basically on a fucking different planet to what my elders had to go through at my age in America

Just shit man…sorry…just…so many elders in their 80’s-70’s was alive when it was passed to drink from the same fountain or get books from the library as their white counterparts

It kinda why I’m semi easy on elders(though I look up what theirs did to them) than many

But sometimes I want to go to progressives and say “Bitch back in the 50’s males my age couldn’t PISS in the same bathroom as whites!” So they probably struggle with that 180…than 360 society did

Also white liberals…Americans minorities been through superhells that wasn’t documented. A 2 term of trump will be okay

What is it with white libs after the election and learning about a huge chunk of minorities voted for trump? Kamala campaign fail, she talked to ACTIVE SOLDIERS IN THE FIELD like 5 years olds And have worse vocabulary than me, wait I’m in the autism spectrum, what her’s excuse?

Best guess is she thinks everyone else is too stupid to understand big words.

Than like trying to bring in the Obamas, actually I think perhaps gen x and millennials Africans Americans can explain it better

They were rock stars for some reason, ya for breaking barriers and all but let's actually look at accomplishments and all instead of riding into history on the back of 'first black president'

Identity politcs keeps on going the way it has been it's going to be a while till we get the next one because even on the left 'vote for me because I'm (insert identity here) isn't going to fly with the majority of people.

When I saw Chicago DNC clips…idk, to me it was like looking at a cult you were in. They were scared, the blacks are brainwashed to believe that Trump was going to give the KKK F22s. I mean I roll my eyes at my community

I have to wonder how many votes switched to the other side when they brought out the gender neutral prayer room. They did manage to dial up the fear mongering though.

Wonder how it would go if instead of scaring people with project 2025 bs they instead pointed out all the ways that the president lacks the authority to do the things in it.

You know like how when nancy said the president doesn't have the authority to forgive student debt and then went ahead and let him waste our money trying to do it anyway instead of pushing it through congress and getting that relief to the people stuck underneath that debt.

I notice this with my late great grandmother who died a few years ago who had a picture of the Obama family…I mean…it was people like us in the White House not as slaves or servants, but as leaders of the free world

I do imagine that hits way different,

Oh and Michelle Obama lunch programs, hmmm what slur I can use for her after the garbage I ate in school?

They're trying to rehabilitate the image of those, was looking for some articles about it a few months ago and the old ones I used to have bookmarked are gone and most of what comes up now is glowing praise.

Than them reappearing out of nowhere for Kamala, where you two been? Wait wait Mr Obama chastising black men for openly showing more support for trump?

I liked how he tried to imply they were sexist for not voting for her the same way people implied that folks were racist for not voting for him, in some cases it might have been true, but that's the overwhelming minority of them I'd wager.

And he said something about how would Muslim Americans would live under trump…bitch you are called the Obomber, and if I remember correctly called the Butcher of places like Pakistan, Congo, etc?

They rolled the dice on who would be more likely to get a quick end to the gaza war that hamass started, likely because they also know that the bs barry and the other fearmongers brought up isn't something that's within his authority.

Also after I research that 2024 celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act being passed…I…I can’t help just look how we are basically on a fucking different planet to what my elders had to go through at my age in America Just shit man…sorry…just…so many elders in their 80’s-70’s was alive when it was passed to drink from the same fountain or get books from the library as their white counterparts

It's a shameful part of our history and a stain that will never be wiped clean, but from a global historical context we're moving at light speed when it comes to getting better, regardless of what some people might want to say.

It kinda why I’m semi easy on elders(though I look up what theirs did to them) than many But sometimes I want to go to progressives and say “Bitch back in the 50’s males my age couldn’t PISS in the same bathroom as whites!” So they probably struggle with that 180…than 360 society did

The 360 that was done in places that have openly called for a return to segregation and such has to have caused a few cases of whiplash in that community.

Create unlimited green energy by hooking up the bodies of deceased civil rights activists to generators so we can harness the power created by them spinning in their graves.

Also white liberals…Americans minorities been through superhells that wasn’t documented. A 2 term of trump will be okay

I wonder how many are fully aware of that but are just doing this to be performative about their opposition.

[nikrei]

November Comics Round-Up

Lets goooo!! Starting out with the Fourth World we love to see it!!

Action Comics (409-443) (1972-1975)

Action is starting to use characters and events from Superman and vice versa! Exciting to see. Attention! Issue 440 has Krypto & Green Arrow backup! Important! He's lost his memories and Dinah names him Demian! He's extremely cute!

Superman (248-283) (1972-1975)

They really doubled down on the "every six years on their birthday kryptonians go thru The Agonies due to cultural sadness reasons" But! We do now know that Kal's kryptonian birthday is the 35th of Eorx, and Clark's earth birthday is June 18th! Also we've gotten more into the significance of headbands on krypton, but it is specifically noted as a gender neutral origin (this is important for future reasons).

Superman's Pal, Jimmy Olsen (140-163) (1971-1974)

Holy shit they revived Lucy Lane as an old lady with like three issues left to go what. Okay two issues to go and they deaged her again (but kept the silver hair) (but she still dumped him). Also, there's a "Jimmy had doubles" storyline and it's like everyone has forgot that there was quite a large storyline just two years ago about Jimmy and and his clones. Luthor is explaining what a clone is all over again. The end of the Jimmy Olsen run! They deffo were not expecting it, there was a blurb for "find out in future issues". Overall I'd say that it's a pretty unnecessary read, except for the Kirby bits, unless you really want a Jimmy deep dive. You get a good view of Jimmy as a man of action which isn't really obvious in the main super comics.

Forever People (1-11) (1971-1972)

I have solidified Forever People as my fave part of fourth world (I love u Scott and Barda, but!) Like, sure the storylines are sorta disjointed, and there's an odd little Deadman detour, but I love these kids so much, they are my children!

New Gods (1-11) (1971-1972)/Even Gods Must Die! (1984)/The Hunger Dogs (1985)

Last time I was reading the fourth world, I didn't realize that the 84 run was just reprints with the concluding chapter at the end, so I read it a couple of months after the rest of new gods. It does indeed make more sense when you read it as a part of new gods. Also this is the first time that I've read hunger dogs, and it was fun in that apocryphal way. It is being sad about Essak hours tho!

Mister Miracle (1-18) (1971-1974)

A little after I read this i was watching a truly iconic piece of 90s television that explains how magic tricks work, and everytime they did an escape trick I was like "escape trick?? Like my boy? This is just like my boy!" Of course Barda and Oberon are better assistants than all of those dancing skinny goths combined, so there is that. Shilo is my baby boy, and it got me excited all over again that he becomes Mr Miracle in the early 90s.

Superman's Girl Friend, Lois Lane (119-137) (1972-1974)

I'm really liking the thorn and rose backups and how they often cross over a bit with lois's own adventures. 1972 sees Lois quitting the planet to be a freelance writer after Lucy is revealed to be working for the 100 (!!) and dies (!?!?!). They also put her into a roommate situation with three other women which does have its moments (and also it's bads, 70s stop being fatphobic challenge). There's something really fucked up about Lucy being brought back to life in Jimmy and never showing up in Lois. And with that its the end of the Lois Lane solo! For this one at least they new the end was coming, with a note for lois showing up in the super family mag.

Supergirl (1-10) (1973-1974)

Kara goes to gradschool! She's got into a drama program at a place near San Francisco! This makes sooo much more sense rereading it after reading the rest of supergirl's history!

Superman Family (164-174) (1974-1976)

Okay I am eating my words re: Jimmy getting canceled, this superfam run takes up where his left off at issue 164. Also, I am getting slightly annoyed about everyone jerking Kara around meta-wise. She went to undergrad for ??? (never revealed) got a job as a camera operator for a news show, then they dropped that for her solo, putting her in a graduate drama program and now that her solo's over she's getting a job as a highschool advisor??? And wanting to quit being supergirl with absolutely minimal lead up. Like... have even an ounce of consistency for her! Lena is back though! So she still exists! Then, extremely confusingly the issue after her issue Jimmy has to deal with a small blond psychic boy named Val, who, despite all these traits being exactly the same, is Not Lena's son Val. (Btw Lucy has not showed back up)

World's Finest Comics (210-227) (1972-1975)

I'm generally pretty lukewarm about the imaginary superman jr and batman jr stories... but man.... 222 was one of the grossest, most racist things I've ever read. Its like. Bad bad. Bob Haney when I get you.....

Superboy (182-206) (1972-1975)

Superboy has become comboed with the Legion! Very fun, I like that the members are actually calling each other by name now, too. Also I love Luornu's wedding outfit it's awesome. They just killed off Lyle, what?? Hey. Hey hey hey. As long as we are talking about cloning ethics. What the fuck. Superboy 206 what the fuck.

Adventure Comics (415-437) (1972-1975)

This has gone from Supergirl to an anthology once more! Got to see the origin of black orchid, then it went to Spectre stories with aquaman backups. The Spectre is soooo fun these days he's murdering anyone in horrifying new ways all the time! Garth is still nameless, but the artist is also drawing him like he's 30 (I'm so sorry buddy go back to Scotland).

The Brave and the Bold (100-116) (1972-1975)

Batman gets shot in the heart and is inches from death in one issue and it literally is never mentioned again that's the biggest issue i have with this series is that they know it has a low readership compared to the flagship titles so basically nothing that happens in them matters except maybe to the supporting character with no regular mag appearances. Okay, now a few issues later he's been shot in the chest AGAIN and also has sold his soul to the devil?? And the devil is maybe Hitler?? Buddy.... comics.... what.

Teen Titans (38-42) (1972-1973)

Okay, Garth is at college near Loch Ness and he's wearing a kilt as part of the uniform and i don't care if this is never ever mentioned again this is a cornerstone Garth moment for me. I've made it to the TT hiatus! Things don't quite line up right timeline wise, but I actually put snowbirds don't fly here as far as TT goes. It just makes sense for me that there is just one more support system ended as part of Roy's spiral. I sorta sorta head cannon that he started with painkillers a while back, and then after the peace prize winner is killed that spiraled into more serious use and maybe even starting the heroin, then things get a little better in the Jupiter era when they give themselves their uniforms back, but then they fall apart/drift away and he super falls apart, cause Ollie has gone off at the same time.

The Phantom Stranger (18-34) (1972-1975)

Love that Cassandra and the Stranger have adopted Tannerac as their pet villain and he's just like ??? ??? about everything they do, like hold his hand and save his life. I cannot believe that not one issue after I was getting all excited about this polycule they killed off Tannerac and sent off Cassandra believing that the stranger was dead too. Can't have shit in DC. Now its more and more it's falling into "satanic panic was right" bullshit I'm so tired.

All-Star Western/Weird Western Tales (10-33) (1972-1976)

Little known fact, ever since I first saw the Jonah Hex episode of BtAS I have been low-key obsessed with him, so now I'm picking up the Hex run! Jonah is the OG tsundere it is absolutely ridiculous I love him. I can't believe they have him a wolf buddy and then killed him off not two issues later, so rude. Also, El Diablo is here too, but this ain't about him. So Jonah wears the confederate uniform but also it was teased for a while that he betrayed them in a big way, leading to a large union victory, but honestly I thought that the reveal of what actually happened was pretty.... lukewarm. I know mainstream opinions on the civil war were way more forgiving back then but it was still disappointing.

Shazam! (1-16) (1973-1975)

Excited for Billy time!! V amused that the 20 year break in comics is an in-universe 20 year break as well, with the Marvels and the Sivanas on suspended animation. It is disappointing that it's aimed at younger audiences and is determined to ape the golden age storytelling as well as art.

And that's that for November. Did I think that I had an extra day? Yes. And I Do Not, so here's how the spreadsheet is looking now:

[manhattanspeaks]

[ AUTHOR COMMENTARY ]

Times Sq is the first "building" character I went with for Manhattan Speaks simply because there's so much you could do with the place and I feel like it has characterized itself well enough. Like most people probably know vaguely what it is and might have some impression of it even if they've never been. I dislike it fundementally (especially after Disneyfication in the 90s) but man I can't not admit that from a historical lense it really has grown on me as a place of interest.

I just think there's something so devastatingly visceral about it. It's changed hands several times, has been repainted over and over and over with the NYC land development equivalent of landlord white paint to hide all the flaws. It's a capitalism cash cow and a total waste of energy but no matter what they do it's so flawed... and everyone in the city knows it's flawed.

I think being a major place of interest for tourists and shopping and commute while being hated by the people who should care about you so much while having a notable (but controversial) past and only being cared about because of your worth in the advertising world would make anyone neurotic. You don't get to be flawed because its bad publicity but its still So incredibly obvious that the facade isn't as strong as its made out to be.

Like the prime example of how well this place lends itself to characterization imo is looking at One Times Sq (pictured below) through the years. Gorgeous intricate flagship building that was put in a cage and then increasingly hidden from the world through bright flashing screens.

The times I have been in the area and walked by this building Ive always had to take a moment to look through the cracks, anything to get a glimpse of what once was. It's insane to me on a narrative/symbolic level that you can still see what's underneath and compared to the flashing ads it looks bleak!

It literally took them decades to care about the inside of the building again, only very very recently have they decided to renovate it. AND EVEN THEN ITS BEING USED FOR MORE ADS.

Here's a pic I took a couple years ago of the One TSQ facade. I think one of the screens shut off really adds to my point but anyway you can see the rounded windows from the 70s peeking through!!

There's so much more I could say on this but all in all it just circles back to me going insane about the city's architectural history and how interesting I find it.

I highly recommend looking at stuff from TSQ in the seventies or looking into the project "Messages to the Public" by the Public Art Fund. It's fantastic and the gallery Im gonna link here has some great examples, many of which are still relevant to this day.

[reliqvia]

this is gonna sound absolutely insane but yknow when people are like “oh my life’s so hard cuz i’m obsessed with a really random minor side character with 1 second of screen time” but then you see what character they’re talking about and it’s like. prosciutto from jojos bizarre adventure . i wish these people could walk a mile in my fuckin clown shoes cuz you really have no clue how good you have it until you’ve been fighting demons in the trenches trying to hunt and gather even 1 singular sentence of content about the randomest nichest side character from a doctor who serial from almost 50 years ago that NOBODYYY cares about . and the actor who played him has only really done stage acting + voice acting + really low budget british sitcoms from the 70s-90s so you can’t even watch his filmography because there literally isn’t one . he’s 75 years old now and i could email him and he would probably reply. and the only real mentions of this character i love so so dearly are a page on the doctor who wiki and one inevitable throwaway line in every review of his episodes where they mention how flamboyantly homosexual he is and then they never mention him again . there will never be a poorly written x reader fic on tumblr or a MS paint deviantart drawing of him because i genuinely think only maybe 5 or 6 people have ever thought about him before in human history. and i’m one of them. and i’m going insane . there’s nothing out there . there’s literally nothing . there’s just oblivion. it’s just me and him and my beautiful mind and the world i weave around us that’s entirely my own creation and im absolutely enamoured with him to the point of madness but i can’t tell anyone about this because they’ll look at me like i’m smoking dick and balls from a crack pipe . anyway . how are we all doing tonight. i’m doing fine

[hong-kong-art-man]

The Biggest Music Hero In The History Of Hong Kong, Master Joseph Koo Ka-fai—Our Quiet Friendship And The 2 Great Lessons Given by him

Music that has no past, neither has present…nor future.

The first phonograph record was released in Hong Kong in the 1930s. Cantonese opera ditties and folk songs were popular in those days. Honouring the old music masters of Hong Kong like heroes is the gesture that we can show for all the hard work and sacrifices which they did for our city in the past.

The greatest pop music master of Hong Kong Joseph Koo(顧嘉煇), born in 1931, passed away in Canada in 2023 at the ripe old age of 92. Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. God will never abandon his family and friends, and shall provide them with love to take place of sorrow.

During Master Koo’s golden days, singers in Hong Kong could not afford to lose face without one and would bide their time to wait for a song written by him. He wrote more than 1,200 songs for the history of Hong Kong covering the time periods of 1960s, 70s, 80s, 90s and 2000s. His first published song is called ‘Dream’(夢) as the theme song for the movie Love Without End(不了情) in 1961. His music touches people of Hong Kong emotionally, straight from the heart. His powerful songs produce a kind of pleasure and satisfaction which we cannot do without. They have become the spiritual language in our city. His most popular song ‘Below the Lion Rock’(獅子山下), almost the city anthem of Hong Kong, is a homage that, generation after generation, will be preserved here.

The medal of Gold Bauhinia Star(GBS) was awarded by Hong Kong government in 2015 to Master Koo for his distinguished music contributions of a very high degree of merit to the community. My femtor who initiated the heart-warming efforts to procure such an honour for Master Koo upon his retirement has also vanished gracefully from the political scene of Hong Kong. Time and tide wait for no man. I feel grey too, in whatever meaning of the word.

Master Koo was much older than me. It was not contrived circumstances that brought us together. About 20 years ago, I met him accidentally in the backstage area of a concert presented by Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra in the 2000s. We chatted and had a lot of shared life experience. People of two widely different age groups thus started to reach out to each other. He had his circle of pop music friends and I mainly came across people in the legal and fine art sectors. Yet, true friends were those whom trust came by and conversations could bring out our shared fun and understanding. Master Koo and I were like spices and we added flavours to each other’s life, intersecting as much as interacting.

I told him how I became a lawyer despite my dream of being a writer. He told me why he chose music instead of painting as his career. I told him why I left TVB station as a part-time scriptwriter in the 1980s. He told me how he joined TVB as their Music Director after studying in the Berklee College of Music in the 1960s. I told him I would present a play pertinent to our classic Cantonese opera The Purple Harpin(紫釵記). He told me he was asked to write a book which would be a mixture of autobiography and his songs. But, he hesitated as he felt tired of taking up such a task.

Master Koo travelled regularly between Hong Kong and his second home in Vancouver. When he was in Hong Kong, I would invite him to have a cup of coffee in a quiet local City Garden Hotel in North Point—only 2 of us, since he and I lived in 2 drastically different social circles and we had no close friends in common to be invited. We talked about art, culture, life and Hong Kong—why quality music was in a decline and how people could get hold of their dreams in the midst of all of that social instability in which we were living. Master was taciturn but very ready to bounce ideas off me.

My regular talks with Master Koo remind me of a world famous book Tuesdays with Morrie, first published in 1997, except that ours is a happy but not sad story. In that book, Mitch Albom, the author, visited his former college professor Morrie Schwartz regularly and Morrie taught him the practice of forgiveness. Master Koo taught me in a slightly different way: not everything in life was within our control and not letting go would not change our fate. Giving ourselves more time to enjoy peace and self-pampering would be the true meaning of freedom of life: the freedom of lifestyle and the freedom of not meeting the irrelevant people, no matter good, bad or ugly. He practised what he preached. After announcing formally his retirement in 2015, he cut off a lot of social contacts and devoting more time to himself and family only was the most agreeable way of fulfilling the remaining days of his life. He painted a lot, mostly about the scenic beauty around him. He enjoyed internet surfing which, like music, would let him spread his wings and soar into the air of an artist’s imagination. He still made songs, not for any commercial reason but only pleasing his creative vitality. For Master Koo, sedentariness would mean happy humility after a superstar like him fading away.

I learnt 2 life lessons from Master Koo and they are invaluable and worth cherishing. He told me that it was important not to live life on purpose but live life by accident. Luck was just a matter of hard work meeting opportunity. During World War II, he got no proper education and was forced by circumstances to become a nightclub pianist. He never gave up. He tried to be the best nightclub musician and so when the provost of Berklee College of Music stayed in Hong Kong for a short while and spotted his talent, he was offered a scholarship to study music. He was poor with a family to support. Master Koo was fortunate to get the surprising generous monetary gift from the movie tycoon Sir Run Run Shaw(邵逸夫) through his senior singer friend Mona Fong(方逸華). He completed his music education in Boston and returned to Hong Kong to work as the Music Director of TVB, the biggest television station in Hong Kong. He thrived on overcoming obstacles and deadlines and finally became the most successful music composer in the history of Hong Kong. Master Koo warmly smiled, “When an opportunity arises to test yourself, try to imagine it is also good luck and you must pick a course which may mean improving your life, no matter how many hardships that you will endure!”

He also taught me that human beings were tiny and feeble. We could not resist the acts of God. He sighed, “People liked to compliment me on my ‘great’ achievements. I don’t feel the same. My life is just a chronicle of the social milieu and cultural circumstance of Hong Kong existent in the 1960s to 1980s. During those days, the majority of the population in Hong Kong, a small city, got chiefly TV as their entertainment and this was why so many people could be familiar with my songs written for TV drama. Now, Hong Kong is part of a much bigger country and Asia too. It is no longer easy for a small city to start trends and we have to follow trends. Music fads come and go and we, as pop musicians, could only identify what trends to listen to and what trends to stay away from. No music piece is timeless unless our work, despite the trend, also embraces our own unique style which is about how you carry yourself in order to stand out.” 

There are too many inspiring stories told by Master Koo that I want to share. He told stories about himself inside his own soul. Beautifully, his stories inspire me partially what I am today as a writer. We all learn and build ourselves out of stories of others, especially stories from a great hero like Master Koo who is the epitome of taste, wisdom and etiquette.

Look up at the sky. I saw clouds. There was a cloud which must be Master Koo. I miss this charming old gentleman Master Joseph Koo very much—sitting in solitude now, I want to be reticent and still like Master. Busy life at a certain stage of life can be meaningless. Calm yourself, get to feel your inner voice and listen to the song that Master Koo loves very much—‘Heart will Brush Aside’ (忘盡心中情)…

Maurice Lee

Chinese Version 中文版: https://www.patreon.com/posts/ji-shou-wo-he-gu-79042995?utm_medium=clipboard_copy&utm_source=copyLink&utm_campaign=postshare_creator&utm_content=join_link

1st song composed by Master Joseph Koo: “Dream”  https://youtu.be/jmxwrQdaLMA  Acknowledgement-Andy G

Song “Take care, Tonight” composed by Master Wong Fook Ling  https://youtu.be/lF_A-aXdoTU  Acknowledgement-Alan Kayangan

Master Joseph Koo’s Interview   https://youtu.be/1X1QEdXpmnM  Acknowledgement-HKCO

Song composed by Master Joseph Koo: “Below the Lion Rock”  https://youtu.be/kKWA3aOjsXg Acknowledgement-沿途有你2

TVB/TVBS News Music by Master Joseph Koo  https://youtu.be/S5wyNnVqbvs  Acknowledgement-1912dzsnt

Song “Interlude”  https://youtu.be/7qXej8xJeLk  Acknowledgement-jpeglariosa  

[elfwreck]

FWIW, I didn't mean "that discourse is ancient history and we're all past it now." I meant that the 101 level discussions, the "why is this so important to some people and why are other people getting upset over it" talks, are not happening on Tumblr.

Part of what's missing from that discussion is the huge decimation of queer communities by AIDS - it's not just "you missed that this happened," it's "a lot of the people who had been having these discussions, DIED," so a lot of conversations were shut off. Just at the time when most of the world was connecting to the internet, the queer communities of the 70s and 80s were fighting hard for the right to visit their sick and dying partners in the hospital.

So if you' weren't already connected to those communities, it was easy to miss those discussions. And it's not immediately obvious that the TERF crowd was a splinter-fringe group that got more visible in the media after so many queer voices went silent - either from death, or going back in the closet because of bigots who claimed that AIDS was related to morality.

It's not lazy or foolish to look to social media for quick answers, for an overview and some pointers to more details. It's just... some topics have that; some topics don't, on any given site.

Tumblr will do the intro-level discussions on Why Voting Is Important and How Voter Suppression Works. (This is in part because the anti-voting crowd is not active on Tumblr, cluttering up the politics tags with "really only properly educated people should vote and so it's okay to have policies that disenfranchise the unworthy.")

I'd give recs for the nuanced discussions about gender except I have no idea where they happen. I'm not on Facebook; I expect there are some decent communities but I have no idea where to find them. I expect there's some good Discord servers; again, not the ones I'm in. (I'm mostly in BNHA servers, a handful of video game servers, and a swarm that are about fanfic and digital archives.)

I know that some of the nuanced discussion these days is happening in books. Indie and self-publication are much easier than they were int he 80s and 90s, and there are books today that are essentially extended essays. Some are well-researched; some are random hot takes. (I don't have recs. I have limited time, and am not going to spend it on books that spend 40 pages debunking TERF arguments that I knew were bogus 20+ years ago. But there's value in those essays - I just don't know which ones are good reading.)

I’m this anon who asked about radical feminist/trans debates. I appreciate your response and those of your commenters, particularly @elfwreck who described a long evolution of discourse that I’ve missed. I’ve not been intentionally dense…just a woman and working mother who’s been busy as hell for about the last 15 years and focused on getting through the day. I’ve always supported gay rights, never gave it a second thought. With my kids older and more time on my hands, I started exploring fanfic and have been drawn in. One thing led to another and I find myself down tumblr rabbit holes with women raising questions about girls sports and the dangers of HRT for teens and whether lesbians are allowed to not like dicks, with responses that generally amount to “die terf”. I start researching online and find academic papers and news articles, but find essentially a similar message to you and your commenters: “radical feminists are obviously wrong and not to be taken seriously”. No addressing the questions I’ve seen raised. I get the point—one side is indefensible and I missed the boat on seeing the discussion play out many years ago. I suppose I was looking for a short cut through social media which feels silly in retrospect. Regardless, the radical feminists are out there making intellectual arguments across social media on a range of topics, including men in general, misogyny, porn, prostitution. In all likelihood the post that first pulled me in to their viewpoints related to the imbalance between women and their husbands with respect to child raising, housework, and expressing anger over daily aggravations, which rang completely true to my personal experience and that of other women I know. Likely why I now find myself caught up in fanfic escapism. Anyhow, I’ll dig in deeper to academic literature on the intersection of women’s rights, gay rights, and trans rights because I finding myself caring to know this history now.

--

It happens.

A lot of the roots of current feminist debate are in the Feminist Sex Wars of the 80s. Those were about differing ideas around protecting women and the implications of pornography.

(TBH, part of how very old arguments are able to rear their ugly heads again is that this shit is old enough that the youth weren't born yet during those debates.)

While not about trans stuff per se, some of the ideas about embattled women whose territory is being encroached on link back to there. The "argument", to the extent that the anti-trans side has one, tends to be about defending women's spaces. Many of these arguments are coming from a place of genuine fear. (Maybe not realistic fear, but I believe them that they're traumatized and reacting accordingly.) Some, however, are malicious indoctrination.

There have been efforts (sometimes admitted to publicly, often not) to literally infiltrate young lefty spaces with this kind of rhetoric. It's the queer and female youth version of gamer boys getting indoctrinated by the alt right. So people on my blog have very limited patience for anything that gives this shit the time of day.

I don't think there's a particularly good shortcut since it's the culmination of decades of fighting.

But where I'd start would be by saying that a lot of the arguments sound good on the surface but boil down to "Have you stopped beating your wife yet?" traps.

If someone on social media is still hung up on "But BDSM is abuse! A woman cannot meaningfully consent because [bullshit we fought about in the 80s]", we have nothing to say to each other.

The anti-kink and anti-trusting people when they say they consent attitudes tend to go hand-in-hand with suspicion of trans people and refusal to let people define their own identities.

Misogyny and unfair work distributions are absolutely real, but there's a certain "war on women" rhetoric that's about as legit as the "war on Christmas".

The "other" side agrees about a lot of the basics, like the fact that a lot of dudes really need to hold up their end of relationships better when both partners work and nobody should be solely in charge of the house.

But some feminist classic like the comic You should've asked is not on "The Feminist Side" as opposed to "The Trans Side". Regular feminism doesn't take issue with trans people. Lots of regular feminism accepts that women are kinky and horny and like impure things.

These feminist basics are often used as a strawman ("Our opponents disagree with this basic idea they clearly do not actually disagree with!") and as camouflage for much stupider ideas, like the notion that trans women would choose to be a demographic that gets murdered in bathrooms a lot. It's not cis women who are in danger from trans women! That's complete horseshit.

A lot of the talk of embattled lesbian space actually means "Oh no, some butches came out as trans men eventually, and we have to acknowledge bisexual women now".

--

Re the HRT thing... Yes, there are dangers to prescribing kids and teens hormones. A family should go into the process with a clear understanding of the effects on bone density and such. These risks can be managed the same as menopausal women manage bone density risks. These are not horrific and unknown problems: they're commonplace medical issues we've dealt with before in other contexts. They don't have to be a big deal unless a kid has some pre-existing bone disorder or something.

The part the transphobes don't tell you is that the biggest danger to trans teens is suicide.

Depending on which study you look at, something like 80% of trans youth have serious suicidal thoughts and maybe half make an actual attempt. Lots of teens have issues, but these rates are staggeringly higher than for cis peers, even cis gay peers who also tend to have higher rates than cis het teens.

Forcing someone to go through the body horror of the wrong puberty is... well... not great for their mental health. So a lot of medical professionals are understandably eager to treat kids and teens early because of the huge lasting mental toll. Taking hormones early can also result in an adult body that passes better. And perhaps people shouldn't have to pass as cis to be treated how they want to be treated, but we live in the real world.

Some people do start treatment and then regret it. That's reality. But it's a small percentage, and the issue is often that they're nonbinary and weren't presented with any options other than cis of their assigned sex at birth or transsexual in the 90s sense where you want the full top and bottom surgeries and you're still very binary. I know people who've detransitioned to a degree, but they're not like "Ah yes, I was 100% cis and a fool!" There was generally something going on, just something harder to pin down.

(In fact, most of the "evidence" of people regretting transition are from contexts where the only way to socially transition and get your government ID changed and so on was to do the full medical transition. The regretters would most likely have preferred something in the middle but were not allowed access to what they needed by punitive laws.)

A bunch of alarmist dickheads want to tell you that trans youth don't know their own minds and that everything will be safer and healthier if they just wait to get treatment. In most cases, this is completely untrue.

There used to be far more psychiatric roadblocks to getting physical medical treatment. What the haters want is for these to return. But they didn't deter trans people back then, and they're not going to now.

--

Re the dicks thing... People roll their eyes because it's such an old canard. Nobody thinks lesbians should be required to like dicks. Nobody thinks lesbians should be required to date trans women either.

But lots of trans women get bottom surgery and don't even have a penis. In any case, whether they get surgery or not, reducing them to a body part is the kind of bio-essentialist nonsense feminism normally strives to debunk.

These arguments boil down to "Have penis, will rape".

--

Re sports... Trans women don't end up being the issue. In practice, when there's a lot of scrutiny, what happens is that black cis women are seen as literally not female enough and racist shitheads demand that their hormone levels be tested and they be branded Not Female for testosterone levels or something.

Whatever this kind of regulation is intended to do, in practice, it establishes a correct way to be female, and that way is to have a body that conforms to a particular "feminine", white beauty standard.

The athletes who end up being attacked are sometimes intersex, which they may not even have known. Sometimes, they're just taller and stronger than other women. Often, they don't look normative enough to a bunch of creeps because they're too black.

The assholes cover it up with a good line of patter, but that's where this ends: treating black women like freaks.

--

The bottom line is that anti-trans supposed feminists try to pretend they speak for feminists in general and that there are two major sides locked in conflict.

In fact, they're fringe weirdos who've gained new prominence, particularly in the UK with the backing of JKR, and the rest of the feminists are over here going "This shit again? Jesus!"

I don't waste time debating their "intellectual" arguments on social media for the same reason I don't debate eugenics-preaching racists or fundie religious nuts.

Hence the lack of good resources on "both sides".

[nostalgicatsea]

The second episode of The Falcon and the Winter Soldier showed Bucky's white privilege, and I hope people acknowledge rather than ignore it just because it’s uncomfortable. I’ve already seen people do that or worse as mentioned in my previous post. 

Bucky is a great example that it’s not only evil people or people we dislike but also good people—people we count as allies or even friends—who benefit from whiteness. I would rather have that instead of some sanitized “woke ally” Bucky who can never do wrong. Bucky is human and like everyone else, he has room to learn and grow. That's better than insisting he would be woke about everything. 

Just by existing, both Sam and Bucky are affected by systemic racism. Sam is oppressed and Bucky benefits, however passively or actively. We see that play out in several ways with Bucky this episode because he:

doesn't understand the situation with the cops and even though you can talk about the way that Bucky is treated by the government and law enforcement, you can't ignore how the cops gently guide him into the car and treat him with respect, apologizing, calling him "Mr. Barnes," and showing how reluctant they are to take him in 

berates Sam for Sam's decision to give up the shield when, as Sam says, he has no right to tell Sam what he should do and neither Bucky nor Steve would understand

doesn't, in fact, get Sam's decision and makes the situation about Steve and himself. Is it understandable that he does? Yes. Does it change the fact that he makes it about himself rather than think about Sam's position? No

totally misreads how Sam would feel about seeing Isaiah or how it would affect Isaiah to talk about his trauma

most likely didn't consider the possibility that Isaiah is a victim of the government, not just a man affected by war or his time as a supersoldier

got therapy and a nice enough apartment unlike Isaiah who didn't get any help or any apology or redress for the wrongs committed against him: being experimented on, imprisoned for three decades, and exploited and harmed by both the U.S. government and Hydra throughout those years

Bucky wasn't intentionally being ignorant or trying to hurt anyone, but it doesn't matter. It's because of his white privilege that he's afforded better treatment than Sam and Isaiah. It's because of his white privilege that he has never had to think about what it's like to be them. He doesn't read the situation with the cops properly, and if his and Sam's situations were reversed, Sam most likely would have been assaulted or shot and killed at worst or roughly manhandled at best. He wrongly assumed that it wouldn’t bother Sam to meet Isaiah or thought it would only make him uncomfortable, probably no more uncomfortable than Bucky was about Isaiah’s situation. (Why he thinks talking to Isaiah will help, I don’t understand. It's not like Isaiah would have information about supersoldiers that Bucky, a supersoldier himself, wouldn't or information about the Flag Smashers. That group appeared recently. The Korean War was 70–73 years ago, and most likely Isaiah got out of prison in the ‘80s or ‘90s, depending on how long he was active after the war, decades before 2023.)

It all backfires because Bucky didn't know what happened to Isaiah. He vaguely knew that Isaiah had a rough time but didn't know the details; you can tell he didn’t by how he reacts to Isaiah's story. He didn't think of asking Isaiah how he got his powers and what happened to him after the war before showing up at his house. 

Bucky made huge assumptions that ended up hurting Isaiah and Sam, good intentions or not, and in my opinion, that naïveté and ignorance stem from white privilege. He probably assumed that Isaiah volunteered to get the serum and it worked out because Isaiah was a good person and the U.S. were the "good guys" in the war. They weren't Hydra, and Isaiah was a U.S. soldier who fought against him when he was the Winter Soldier. It never crossed his mind that Isaiah's situation could have been drastically different from Steve's situation and that the U.S. government could have abused and abandoned a hero like Isaiah so badly. 

Although this is a big extrapolation on my part, I don't think it's that much of a stretch to say. Had Bucky thought this was the case, I find it extremely unlikely that he would have brought Sam there or wanted to bother Isaiah, at least without advance warning. If anything, as @fahbee​ mentioned in their reblog of the original, unedited version of this post, he might have looked at the gap in Isaiah’s life when he was in prison and assumed that Hydra or some other evil entity had captured and held Isaiah as a POW during that time. That is, if there was a gap; that’s plausible, but it’s also plausible that Isaiah was imprisoned under false charges and those charges appear on his record. The government has done that and still does that to many black people in real life. Either way, Bucky never would have thought that the U.S. government was responsible for Isaiah’s suffering.

Meanwhile, even though Sam is shaken to discover that a black supersoldier existed decades ago, I don't think he finds what happened to Isaiah surprising. Consider his reaction to Bucky’s when Isaiah tells them what happened and the fact that the U.S. has a history of experimenting on, exploiting, and abusing black men. Sam sees what the U.S. government did to a black man they experimented on and used, and he's broken over Isaiah...and for himself. 

Isaiah is the living embodiment of Sam's conflicted feelings about the U.S. and the Captain America title. Who's to say that that won't be Sam too when they don't want or need him anymore? How can Sam be the symbol of a country who has harmed and continues to harm people like him? There's so much grief, pain, and anger there versus Bucky's cluelessness. Even after their meeting with Isaiah when he and Sam are in the therapy session together, Bucky doesn't connect the dots or understand Sam's feelings and inner turmoil at all. 

As I said, I love how they included Bucky's white privilege because sometimes, it's not always as obvious as a white banker refusing to give a black family a loan or cops treating an innocent black man as a threat and escalating the situation (though sadly, some people have managed to miss even these overt examples of racism). Sometimes it's what I said above. I would rather see Bucky learn and grapple with racism and white privilege than see performative wokeness or an innate, intuitive understanding of racism in all its forms. 

How Bucky moves in the world is different from how Sam does, and it serves as another way to demonstrate how Sam is very much black in this universe. That's why you can't ignore, minimize, or attempt to change (do NOT give me what-if scenarios about Bucky being a white ally) Bucky's actions and thoughts as well as how the world treats him because The Falcon and the Winter Soldier is very much a series about what it means to be black in America and what it means for Sam, a black man, to become Captain America.

[jadagul]

People vary a lot in how strictly they define "nation". (I think probably depending on the context they work in?)

So e.g. the OED has definition I.1.a as:

A large aggregate of communities and individuals united by factors such as common descent, language, culture, history, or occupation of the same territory, so as to form a distinct people. Now also: such a people forming a political state; a political state. (In early use also in plural: a country.)

America absolutely isn't based on common descent. That's kind of central to our founding mythos.

A little less than 80% of Americans speak English as their first language. I get about 90% for French in France, 95% for German in Germany, 90% again for English in England and Wales, and 98% for Japanese in Japan. (In contrast, I get 70% speaking Mandarin in China.)

Do we share a similar culture? In some ways yes and in some ways no. I'd lean more toward "yes" here, though.

Common history? Depends on how far back you go. There's a lot of unifying stuff about what "we" did in WWII, say. Or how "we" immigrated in the 1800s. And for that matter, we talk about what "we" did in the American Revolution, even though I think most of us didn't even have ancestors here then. But we definitely have a common mythic history.

Occupation of the same territory: yeah.

So whether we count as a "nation" depends somewhat on the relative weightings there. And here may be helpful and relevant to remember that in the standard historical analysis, there were no nations in the modern sense before about 1800. A "nation" requires a sort of common-history mythologizing that people only started doing in the late 1700s. (Nationalism was an important military technology; France was the first nation to really develop it, and that's precisely why Napoleon was able to roll over Europe so quickly, until his rivals developed counter-nationalisms.)

So e.g. Bret Devereaux thinks the US is clearly not a nation:

So we have our definition of a nation: a people, historically connected geographically coherent territory, with a shared language, culture and myth of common birth-origin. The United States obviously fails this definition. It isn’t even remotely close. ... Common history is likewise a dud here, but that may require a bit more explaining. After all, there are certainly a set of historical events related to the American polity itself – the founding, the American Civil War, the World Wars, the Civil Rights Movement and so on – which form a key pillar of American civics. But these stories are connected to formation of the key institutions of the state; they are not stories of personal origins. While stories of the American founding tends to focus on the role of English settlers, only around 20% of Americans claim British ancestry and about half of those hearken back to Irish immigrants who arrived well after the founding. Needless to say, the ‘common history’ may not seem quite so common for those whose ancestors arrived on slave ships, or many decades after the founding, or the 13.7% of Americans who are foreign born, or, of course, those whose ancestors arrived over the Bering Ice Bridge perhaps twenty thousand years ago. For my own part, my ancestors filtered over the Atlantic during the 1800s and early 1900s; to the best of my knowledge, none of my ancestors fought in the revolution. ... There is no single dominant American story, but a collection of American stories, none of which can claim primacy because none of them represent even a significant plurality of the population’s own personal origins, much less a majority. ... And territory is also a bust. Of course the United States now occupies a defined territory, but as noted, very few Americans have a longstanding attachment to this land stretching into the mists of time. In historical terms, most Americans got here only fairly recently. Moreover, the tale of American expansion is one in which the ‘soil’ of America was repeatedly notional; the United States was where Americans went (and of course we must note that the places they went were not empty, but seized violently from the inhabitants). The United States can travel and indeed has done so. Moreover, ancient claims to the land – either arguments for autochthony or greenfield settlement – for the majority of Americans, are simply impossible; we all know darn well that we weren’t the first people here and that the United States does not have the most ancient claim to this land. Most nations claim to occupy a sacred, ancestral homeland; the United States is fairly open (if quite conflicted) about the fact that it occupies someone else’s sacred, ancestral homeland.

its crazy that so many people say the US isnt a nation. the US is like, way more of a nation than most countries. way less internal diversity. way stronger sense of self-conception. etc. you may be confused, because we're not an *ethnicity*

[essercipertuttienonperse]

does anyone feel like truly "iconic" and timeless things aren't being made anymore?? like we still listen to music from the 70s and that's 50 whole years ago but personally I can't see any of the stuff that's on the radio right now being played/remembered in 5 years from now, let alone 50!! and I feel like the last few songs that will be remembered were made in the late 90s/early 2000s. and same for movies as well! and I'm not talking strictly about critically acclaimed stuff but also just things that everyone knows and remembers like the Christmas classics! those are all at least 10 years old and I'm like?? isn't that weird?? also all the stuff that became kind of iconic despite not being very good but we still all love and remember it because of the nostalgia like Twilight! or high school musical! or all the iconic pop songs ! like those are all things that a whole generation of people grew up with and still remembers fondly. and maybe I'm just not paying attention but I feel like there's nothing like that being made anymore you know? like in 10/20 years will anyone still remember/listen to/watch things from these years? is there anything that connects everyone (apart from the world dying)? and I could say the same about fashion too!! think about the fashion in history! even just taking the last century, the 50s/60s/70s/80s/90s (and in their own ways also the horrible fashion trends of the early 00s that we love to look back to!)those eras are so iconic and distinguishable that we can recognize the dates of photos just by the clothes! and we love them so much we even have parties/events that have those eras as themes! but the fashion that's been around now and for the last like 5 years?? there's literally nothing that will make it distinguishable or unique/iconic imo and half of it is just recycling trends from those past eras bc we have no more ideas apparently!! can u even imagine a 2020s fashion themed party in the future?? just a bunch of ppl dressed like the Kardashians??! no!!!! why is this happening!!! also the songs/movies/fashion etc themselves seem to be made with the awareness that they won't last long! it's all just for getting as much success as soon as possible before putting out the next thing! and it's all feeding the cycle ! idk where I'm going with this I guess my question is just... how did this happen!!???

[nikrei]

January Comics Round Up

Decided to do this monthly for my own edification

Green Arrow! Read a few golden age that were in the 70 year history, then the brave and bold 85, then did 70s green lantern/green arrow (76-128), then read the backups in action comics (421-458) and worlds finest (244-286). I had already read the backups in detective comics a couple months ago so just went straight to the 1983 mini and then longbow hunters (which is 1988 and therefore my stopping point).

I really enjoyed the first half of the green lantern/ green arrow run. Road trip with unlikely companions my beloved. Also snowbirds don't fly was a wildly good story for its time. Love Ollie as the activist hero for the downtrodden. It's really amusing to me that in fandom the pervasive idea of him being rich like Bruce is everywhere, but he spent all of the 70s and 80s totally broke working class. Maybe he gets his cash back in the 90s? I dunno yet. I was honestly not really a fan of the dark and gritty turn that longbow hunters took, and honestly I'm super pissed about how dirty it did Dinah.

The 70s Jubilee! Issues were read in 2 year chunks so I could stay chronological without having to switch around too much.

Justice League of America (75-186) (1969-1980)

Started reading at 75 cause I wanted to do a Dinah read and that meant JLA (having just said last month that i was Definitely Not going to read Justice League, no sir, too many other comics to read) JLA does a good job as an ensemble comic, which can get pretty confusing and surface level? the more people you add. Coincidentally my least favorite issues were the yearly crossovers with Justice Society, and it got even worse when they added a third team in just for funsies. My surprise fave is Red Tornado can't get enough of that robot being like, I can never understand human love (is a more caring partner and parent than 90% of humans). Any way when I started this I realized that as Barry was a major character I should prolly coread it with the flash...

The Flash (105-305) (1959-1982)

So I'm not really a silver age fan (bronze age woo!), it's always been a bit of a slog for me, but I couldn't figure out a good starting issue in the 70s so I decided to let the completionist in me win and started from Barry's beginning. Love this guy very much! It is wierd the sort of difference of characterization for Barry between JLA and Flash? Like JLA often has Barry being a bit more conservative and stayed, especially in comparison to Ollie. Diana has beef with him when she comes back to the team and he gets accused of being chauvinistic more than once. None of that going on in Flash.

Kirby's Fourth World!

Forever People (1-11) (1971-1972)

New Gods (1-19)(1971-1972, 1977-1978) and the finale issues in Adventure Comics

Mister Miracle (1-25)(1971-1974, 1977-1978)

New Gods and Mister Miracle were So Much Better with Kirby at helm omg. I was very very charmed by the Forever People and I'm sad that it ended like it did, shunting them off to never? be seen again. Also, I never before knew what the anti-life equation was all about! It's been mentioned in other comics and other mediums but I always thought it was a kill all life sort of thing, but it being a blind obedience sort of thing is waaay better!

The Demon (1-12) (1972-1974)

More Kirby. Fun to meet OG Jason Blood and Klarion. It's set in Gotham and a lot of the time I was wondering 'where's Bruce in all this?' The funny answer is that if it has to do with magic, He Does Not See.

Supergirl (1-10) (1972-1974)

Cute! It was sort of fun to read a comic that was clearly aimed at girls for once, even if the 4 different authors (for only 10 issues!) are all men and all have different ideas of what is important to girls. The last issue was a very inexplicable crossover with Prez (they're not supposed to be set on the same earth???? i think???)

Prez (1973)

Gave it a try. Wild and wacky is a way to describe it.

Swamp Thing (1-24)(1972-1976)

Read this one in the trade volumes so it included all of his other appearances too. Loved it, love this guy, really love the sort of bleakness but there's always hope vibes too it.

*siighh* The Joker (1-10) (1975-1976)

2 things: ha ha hacienda, and the joker RV.

Man Bat (1977)

Only two issues and I liked Kirk's stories in Batman Family so I gave them a read. Not really worth it, didn't have what I liked about the fam stories (hero for hire/private detective who has control over himself)

Black Lightning (1-11) (1977-1978) plus the trade volume that collects all his other appearances up to the 90s (except outsiders)

I already read the Outsiders so this was more backstory to me but it was good! Jeff Pierce is great i love him! The JLA did him v. dirty and he was right not to join.

Firestorm (1-5) (1978)

Firestorm started showing up as the backup in Flash so I figured I'd go read the intro comic. Ronnie is the most high-school boy ever, and the fact that he's a jock getting bullied by a nerd gives me real big dog vs little dog energy. Also rip professor stein ur life is terrible.

Got through the 70s Jubilee in January!! But that reading list only had 13 entries! The 80s Bonanza has more than twice that many!

[robertreich]

Bessemer and the Power Shift

The most dramatic change in American capitalism over the last half century has been the emergence of corporate behemoths like Amazon and the simultaneous shrinkage of organized labor. The resulting imbalance has spawned near-record inequalities of income and wealth, corruption of democracy by big money, and the abandonment of the working class.

All this is coming to a head in several ways.

Next week, Amazon faces a union vote at its warehouse in Bessemer, Alabama. If successful, it would be Amazon's first U.S.-based union in its nearly 27-year history.

Conditions in Amazon’s warehouses would please Kim Jong un – strict production quotas, 10-hour workdays with only two half-hour breaks, unsafe procedures, arbitrary firings, “and they track our every move,” Jennifer Bates, a warehouse worker at Bessemer, told the Senate Budget Committee last week.  

To thwart the union drive, Amazon has required Bessemer workers to attend anti-union meetings, warned workers they’d have to pay union dues (wrong – Alabama is a so-called “right-to-work” state that bars mandatory dues), and intimidated and harassed organizers.

Why is Amazon abusing its workers?

The company isn’t exactly hard-up. It’s the most profitable firm in America. Its executive chairman and largest shareholder, Jeff Bezos, is the richest man in the world, holding more wealth than the bottom 39 percent of Americans put together.

Amazon is abusing workers because it can.

Fifty years ago, General Motors was the largest employer in America. The typical GM worker earned $35 an hour in today's dollars and had a major say over working conditions. Today’s largest employers are Amazon and Walmart, each paying around $15 an hour and treating their workers like cattle.

The typical GM worker wasn’t "worth" more than twice today’s Amazon or Walmart worker and didn’t have more valuable insights about how work should be organized. The difference is GM workers a half-century ago had a strong union behind them, summoning the collective bargaining power of over a third of the entire American workforce.

By contrast, today's Amazon and Walmart workers are on their own. And because only 6.4 percent of America’s private-sector workers are now unionized, there’s little collective pressure on Amazon or Walmart to treat their workers any better.  

Fifty years ago, “big labor” had enough political clout to ensure labor laws were enforced and that the government pushed giant firms like GM to sustain the middle class.

Today, organized labor’s political clout is miniscule by comparison. The biggest political players are giant corporations like Amazon. And what have they done with their muscle? Encouraged state “right-to-work” laws, diluted federal labor protections, and kept the National Labor Relations Board understaffed and overburdened.

They’ve also impelled government to lower their taxes (Amazon paid zero federal taxes in 2018); extorted states to provide them tax breaks as condition for locating facilities there (Amazon is a champion at this game); bullied cities where they’re headquartered (Amazon forced Seattle to back down on a plan to tax big corporations like itself to pay for homeless shelters); and wangled trade treaties allowing them to outsource so many jobs that blue-collar workers in America have little choice but to take low-paying, high-stress warehouse and delivery gigs.

Oh, and they’ve neutered antitrust laws, which in earlier era would have had companies like Amazon in their crosshairs.

This decades-long power shift – the emergence of corporate leviathans and the demise of labor unions – has resulted in a massive upward redistribution of income and wealth. The richest 0.1 of Americans now has almost as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent put together.

Corporate profits account for a growing share of the total economy and wages a declining share, with multi-billionaire executives and investors like Bezos taking home the lion’s share.  

The power shift can be reversed -- but only with stronger labor laws, tougher trade deals, and a renewed commitment to antitrust.

The Biden administration and congressional Democrats appear willing. The House has just passed the toughest labor law reforms in over a generation. Biden’s new trade representative, Katherine Tai, promises that trade deals will protect the interests of American workers rather than exporters. And Biden is putting trustbusters in critical positions at the Federal Trade Commission and in the White House.

I’d like to think America is at a tipping point similar to where it was some hundred twenty years ago when the ravages and excesses of the Gilded Age precipitated what became known as the Progressive Era. Then, reformers reversed the course of American capitalism for the next 70 years, making it work for the many rather than the few.

Today’s progressive activists -- in Washington, at Amazon’s Bessemer warehouse, and elsewhere around the nation -- may be on the verge of doing the same.

[blushing-titan]

My reasons to ship Erehisu

About two weeks ago, I got an anonymous ask that reads:

what made you ship erehisu? I don't ship anyone in the series (and defo not eremika lol) and I want to understand the reasons

...but when I tried to answer it on my app, it turned out that I can only post 10 pictures per post, so I decided to make a longer, regular one with my thoughts on this topic 😄 Erehisu remains one of my favorite ships in the series (...with the other ones being Yumi/hisu and Levi/han), so I really enjoy talking about it (...well, at least I did, before I started moving away from the series after that mess of a finale). Without further ado, my reasons to ship Erehisu are under the cut (just a quick warning: the pictures are obviously not mine, and there are some anti-eremika themes in this post).

They had an actual developement

As we know: in the beginning, Historia was pretending to be this good, selfless girl Krista. Later on, we learn that Eren was not particularly fond of her façade (...keep in mind he was the only person who noticed that she was acting off, too - obviously excluding Ymir, who was Historia's closest person and knew about her secret). As Historia chooses to embrace her identity and stop pretending, his opinion on her changes - he reassures her and appreciates the real Historia.

You’re just normal. Just a normal girl who’s absurdly honest. (Eren, ch. 54)

Eren...that day...the time you called me...normal. That made me really...happy. (Historia, ch. 65)

Later on, after Historia saves Eren in the Reiss cave, his thoughts on her change even further. There isn't just something that he likes about her anymore - instead, he starts to actually admire her strength and actions.

(ch. 68)

(ch. 70)

Even further on, he prioritizes her safety and hides an important piece of information that could help Paradis' cause - only because it could potentially put Historia in harm's way.

(ch. 89)

(ch. 90)

(ch. 106)

Keep in mind that there was a time skip in between these chapters, which means Eren kept this secret for years. He hid it even from Armin and Mikasa. After it's finally revealed, he strongly disagrees with, and fights against Historia becoming a titan for the sake of the island. Eren’s sentiment towards Historia is even noticed by Hanji on a few different occasions - it’s something that Hanji brings up while questioning him, later on.

(ch. 107)

Eren also meets Historia in secret, warns her of danger, and downright doesn't let her sacrifice herself - even when she assures him that she's ready to do it. 

(ch. 130)

She's also one of the only people with whom he shares the information about the rumbling. He also brings up her own words that she said to him back in the Reiss cave.

(ch. 130)

I believe he doesn't fight for her just because she's one of his friends. It's a natural progression that comes from the shared experience they had in the Reiss cave. Eren got to know and appreciate the real Historia, so whenever she reverts back to the Krista persona, he's there to remind her that she should live for herself and don't let others use her - just like Ymir told her, and just like Historia told him in the Reiss cave. When Eren stands up for Historia in ch. 107 and blatantly refuses to let her get sacrificed, she's actually touched to the point of tearing up.

Their relationship changes and deepens with time, and it's actually shown in the manga - not just as symbols or small hints, but actual, full-fledged conversations/actions. In my opinion, this should be the base of any well-estabilished ship. We have quite a few one-on-one moments with these two that illustrate this progression. There are also panels in which we can peak into Eren's thoughts on Historia, which makes for an unfiltered source of his opinions on her.

They can relate to each other

Something I find really important as well is that Eren and Historia can find each other very relatable, and therefore - understand each other's struggles better.

Both were used by their fathers, and both caused their demise. Both were fiercely protected by someone. Both felt like the world would be better without them, at some point. Both had a big role to play, despite having doubts if they can do it right (Eren, being humanity's titan; Historia, being the queen). Both wanted to sacrifice themselves for their people's sake - and both intervened, saving each other from actually going through with this decision.

Their relationship is well-balanced

Eren and Historia don't clash when it comes to their personalities. As their relationship grows, they mutually admire, protect and motivate each other, while still remaining two separate characters - with their own goals and traits. They freely talk to each other about their struggles; they also care about each other’s actual feelings on them.

(ch. 54)

(ch. 70)

I can easily see them as partners, which is something I've always had troubles with when it comes to EM. It's just hard not to make this comparison, since Mikasa's character has always been pretty much fully centered around Eren, which - in my eyes - made their relationship look unbalanced and toxic. I've already spoke about my issues with EM in depth in this post, so I won't elongate this one with repeating the same arguments - still, one of the reasons I started shipping Erehisu in the first place is the fact that I immediately saw it as a much more normal, healthy, and well-balanced alternative to EM.

Parallels and relevance to the story’s themes

Parallels are something that, for some reason, make a lot of people mad. I have no idea why - these things appear in the manga, so why not talk about them?

Aside from parallels between Eren and Historia (...please, keep in mind that I didn’t list all of them in this post), there are also a lot of obvious parallels between Historia and the founder Ymir - to the point, when the entire Requiem der Morgenröte ending revolves around this theme:

I've also already spoke about how Ymir/Historia parallels could possibly be tied to Eren in this answer.

(Historia on the cover of vol. 16/Ymir in ch. 122)

Aside from that, there are a few subtle Grisha/Dina and Eren/Historia parallels, as well. Historia is a royal, hiding as a regular person - just like Dina did, before joining the revivalists. Dina also tears up when Grisha stands up for Eldians, just like Historia does when Eren stands up for her.

(ch. 68)

(ch. 86)

(ch. 67)

(ch. 86)

(ch. 56)

(ch. 86)

(ch. 107)

(ch. 86)

Quite interestingly, in a lot of these parallels Historia and Eren act in an opposite way as to previous generations. While Frida teaches Historia to be a good, selfless girl, Historia ends up abandoning this persona to save herself and Eren in the Reiss cave. She doesn’t want to devote herself to fate - instead, she’s prepared for a showdown with it. While the founder Ymir’s children are ordered to eat their own mother to ensure her power’s succession (...and a few hundred years later, Grisha fights to return the founder’s power back to his wife - Dina), Eren does everything he can to ensure Historia and her children are safe and never even titanised in the first place. 

As the story unfolds, we learn about it’s leading themes - some of which are: oppression and fighting for freedom, desire to change history, the mechanism of circle of hate, and how it affects children who are a part of it. In my eyes, Erehisu just perfectly fit with these themes, especially considering how later on Historia’s pregnancy was handled in the manga.

There were countless ways to answer the who’s the father question? immediately, without even starting up conversation about it - for example, I don’t understand why it was needed to bring up the fact that Historia didn’t marry the farmer in the first place. What was it’s purpose, aside from stirring up theories - especially considering how in the last chapter it’s revealed that they are married, after all? Why end up the Eren/Historia flashback on the What do you think about me having a child? question, when the whole conversation they had beforehand was literally about Eren disagreeing with Historia wanting to get pregnant just to save herself? It doesn’t make sense, and led me (and many other readers - judging from opinions I read online and chapter reactions on youtube) to belive that there were other reasons, and that there was more to this conversation then was initially shown.

If the conclusion to this plotline was always supposed to be that she got pregnant just to save herself...then what was this mysterious built-up for? Why show this conversation in the first place, and in such a weird manner, too? Why not have Historia just say it out loud in ch. 130: yes, I got pregnant to save myself in the beginning, and spare us this whole I will not allow it talk...you know, instead of ending the conversation on the What do you think about me having a child? when the whole previous talk was about Eren fighting against it? Where’s the logic?

The truth is - from my perspective, Erehisu had a lot of logical build up that would benefit the story, and stay true to it’s already established themes and both characters’ previous developement. On top of that, I also think they simply had great chemistry.

That’s all from me today 😄 I apologize you had to wait so long for this, anon...life got in the way, and as I said - I think I’m just getting over this series. Hope you’re doing well anyway 😊