#to form any sort of meaningful connection. and i feel that disconnect either way because i’m either not being myself or i am and

[invisiblecities1972]

i was put on this earth to be a social experiment

[panharmonium]

Hey, do you ship merthur? I have conflicted feelings about it because Merlin does love Arthur but also their relationship is kinda shitty.

short answer: i do not

longer answer: i might not be the right person to ask about this, because i don’t really “ship” anything?  it’s not how i engage with fandom.  (disclaimer: this is not a value judgment of folks who do engage with fandom that way.  just an explanation of how my own brain works.)

extra long answer: under the cut, because i suppose it was only a matter of time before someone asked me about merlin/arthur, and i might as well put my entire response in one place so that next time, i can just link to it.

questions like this are a little tough for me to answer, because i am completely uninterested in romance as a premise.  if it’s not there, i don’t care.  if it is there, i often wish it weren’t, because it’s almost never developed in a way that lives up to my standards.  i don’t always mind if something contains romantic relationships (provided they’re written well), but i don’t want them to be the point of a story.  i honestly cannot think of anything less interesting to me than a story that has as its main plotline “x character falls in love with y character.”  for me, in my brain, it’s like, “okay...that’s it?  do you have anything else to say?”  there is literally nothing about that that i care about.

this can be a little difficult to navigate in fandom, because one of the oft-heard commendations of “fandom” is ‘gosh, fandom is so wonderful, we can watch the same two characters fall in love again and again and again in a million different scenarios!’  which is true, for the people who care about that sort of thing, but that’s not actually ‘fandom.’  that’s shipping.  and there’s nothing wrong with shipping, but shipping and fandom are not the same thing, and they’ve become so conflated that it can be very difficult to engage in the latter without being absolutely swamped by the former.

many times, for me, fandom can feel synonymous with shipping.  there was a post i reblogged recently whose tags described shipping as often feeling like a prerequisite to engaging with fandom, and that is often what it feels like to me, particularly in fandoms where one ship is so ubiquitous that any and all other material is utterly dwarfed by it in scale.  (for me, my last two major fandoms have been merlin and teen wolf, so - i’m sure you see my dilemma, heh.)

all of that said, in terms of arthur and merlin specifically...

disclaimer: everything i say here is relevant to me only.  these are my own feelings.  i am making this post on my own blog, in my own space, in response to a question about my own thoughts.  i do not want, expect, or need anyone else to share these thoughts.  any commentary i make about fandom trends is not equivalent to condemnations of individual people’s opinions or shipping habits.  i do not mind or take issue with folks who ship these two characters.  i am glad you are having fun.  please do not @ me about something you disagree with.  i promise you it is not necessary.

okay.  with that out of the way.  

part of me is reluctant to expound further on this question, because my personal philosophy is that merlin and arthur as a ship have had more than enough time and space devoted to them in this fandom (way more than their share, frankly) and i generally prefer to focus on merlin and the other people in his life, as a deliberate counter to that.  but, since you asked, and because i have been experiencing the “i’m tired of romance” bug more strongly lately, here is the long-form version.

the number one reason why i don’t ship arthur and merlin is what i already outlined above: i don’t really “ship” anything.  i have never looked at two characters who were not already together/on an obvious potential path to being together and said “i want them to fall in love.”  that has just never happened to me.  (again - it’s not a BAD thing to have this happen, it’s just not something that’s ever happened to me.  i can’t relate to the experience.)

therefore, when i do appreciate a romantic relationship, it’s pretty much always because canon has shown me something romantic (or clearly pre-romantic) that i find to be well-written and compelling.  (it’s rare - as i outlined before, i would usually rather not deal with romance at all - but it happens.)  

arthur and merlin, then, never had that effect on me, because arthur and merlin, as depicted in the canon, are not in love.

[to anybody reading this who just snatched up their keyboard and started furiously typing, i beg you - please go back and re-read my disclaimer.]

they’re not in love.  the truth about these two is that if i had watched this show without having grown up in fandom as a culture (and without knowing exactly what kind of ships fandom immediately sees EVERYWHERE) the idea of anybody shipping these two together would never have even entered my mind.

(and like.  because i DID grow up in fandom, and i DO know exactly what kind of ships fandom sees everywhere, i knew before i even started this show that arthur/merlin was going to be an inescapable thing.  but that would not have been the case, if i had watched the series in a world where i didn’t know what fandom was.)

arthur and merlin, in canon, are not in love.  the show never does anything to give me an inkling that either of them are harboring romantic feelings for each other.  that is never what is happening onscreen.  literally the last thing on merlin’s agenda is romantic attachment, ever, and arthur is never, ever shown to be in love with anyone who isn’t gwen.  the show, onscreen, never tricks me, teases me, or leads me on.  i was never under the impression that merlin and arthur were in love with each other, because they weren’t.

but that DOES NOT MEAN their relationship matters less.  just because they aren’t IN love with each other doesn’t mean they don’t love each other, and one of those things is not bigger or better or more powerful than the other.

i struggle a lot in fandom (all fandom, not just merlin) with the persistent idea that romantic attachment is the peak, the natural endpoint on a scale of “how deep is your love?”  i am constantly running up against posts where the commonly accepted structure is to cite a moment of devotion or caring or some instance of basic connection between two characters, and then add a caption or tag saying ‘because they are JUST FRIENDS, right?’ or ‘^^totally platonic interaction between characters who are not at all in love, sure jan.’  

and honestly?  i hate that.  that is one of my least favorite things about fandom.  it makes me so tired.  

i am completely disconnected from this idea that there are like...things you can do that are too caring to count as friendship.  like - that there is too much devotion you can show, and if you go over the limit, then it’s laughable that you would do those things for “just” a friend.  that’s so unpleasant to me.

(and i do think [when it comes to non-canon queer ships, anyway - straight ships unfortunately have no excuse, sorry y’all] that part of this probably has its roots in pushback at the tendency of people who try to “gal pal” actual queer ships (or literal real life relationships), so this, at least, is something i can understand.  i’m queer myself; i get that.  and that is why i will never like - attach myself to someone’s post and start complaining.  people can vent however they want.)

it doesn’t change my own feelings, though.  i hate seeing every meaningful friendship i’ve ever been invested in talked about like it’s just a romance in disguise.

other things: i am uninterested in romance as a motivator.  

truly, from the bottom of my heart, i don’t care.

we are, at least in my corner of the world, oversaturated with romance, to the point where any piece of media that doesn’t include it in some fashion is shockingly bizarre.  it is EVERYWHERE.  it is in EVERYTHING.  i cannot pick up a book without running into a romantic plotline.  i cannot watch a movie or a tv show without being forced into multiple romances that i don’t care about.  (rare exceptions apply, as always, but i’m speaking generally.)

this oversaturation, for me, means that romance as a storyline no longer holds any meaning for me.  i see it EVERYWHERE.  it is in literally EVERYTHING.  making merlin into a “love story,” for me, makes the show so much less interesting, because there are billions of love stories out there.  love stories are practically the only kind of story our media remembers how to tell!  why would i take a story that is so unique in its exploration of deep friendship (that isn’t even quite friendship, because it’s not real, but merlin wants it to be real, but making it real would also destroy it) and loyalty (that isn’t necessarily deserved, but is still offered, but is damaging to the person offering it) and love (that exists in spite of arthur’s position as the oppressor, but still cannot erase merlin’s oppression, and is patently not a magical fix for the very real problems merlin is facing), and then want to water it down to “and then they fell in love”???

merlin bbc has so much to say about the transformative, redemptive power of love (not just romance), and the bonds we form with each other despite the fact that we don’t always deserve each other, and what we can do to make ourselves better, and how do we make amends for the ways in which we hurt the people we care about, and it is so complicated and there is so much beauty there and i adore it specifically because it is one of the rare pieces of media out there that doesn’t prop up romantic love as the most important and powerful force in the universe.  romantic love is not what moves the story.  merlin’s love for the people around him is based on compassion.  it’s bigger than the familiar and overused ‘i am desperately in love with this one individual person and that’s what drives my actions,” which is a premise all of us know has been done to death.  merlin’s love is not about romantic attachment.  it’s a deep, abiding love for humanity.  it’s based on hope, and faith, and the inherent belief that everybody matters, even in their worst moments.

condensing that kind of story into “and then they fell in love” erases its meaning for me.  it makes it trite.  uninteresting.  i have seen “and then they fell in love” fully sixty thousand times.  “and then they fell in love” has been done so often that it is utterly devoid of power for me.  boring.   i literally do not care.

other people might feel differently, and find a romantic love story compelling.  i don’t.  

i’m guessing the message that prompted this essay is asking me to evaluate how i feel about the “goodness” of the merlin/arthur ship, aka whether it’s worthwhile to ship it or not based on how healthy/unhealthy it is, which i definitely can’t answer, because i don’t think whether it’s “good” or not really matters.  i am definitely too old to be riding the newer wave of, uh...idk, purity culture type stuff that is so oft-debated on here, lately.

but you’re absolutely right, anon - merlin and arthur’s relationship IS kinda shitty!  it 100% is.  it doesn’t mean you can’t ship them, though, if you want; otherwise i wouldn’t be invested in any aspect of their friendship, either.  

the fact that merlin and arthur’s relationship is kinda shitty is an essential element of the show; it’s the microcosmic representation of the macrocosmic problem merlin is trying to solve, and even with that being the case, we can see clearly that this also doesn’t preclude them from having real moments of connection and care and love.  this is the contradiction i have to keep in mind whenever i engage with them in the friendship sense - merlin has been wronged by arthur in so many ways, and yet he still loves him and believes arthur can do better, and yet his dedication to arthur really does destroy his life piece by piece, and you really have to walk a line between those extremes and be thinking: in what ways was this a noble, honorable path for merlin to take and in what ways was this damaging, and was it all worth it in the end?

we probably wouldn’t still be watching this show if we didn’t ultimately think the answer to that last question was yes.  but there are also equally valid ways in which the answer is, truthfully, no, and i think really the only important thing when dealing with merlin and arthur’s relationship (in whatever capacity you prefer) is to keep that dissonance in mind.

so, to more directly address your question, when it comes to my interaction with the source material, i don’t ship merlin and arthur romantically because i don’t see romance when they interact in canon, and i don’t think their relationship could be improved or made more interesting/more meaningful by adding extra-canonical romance into the mix.  that’s really it.

but the other side of things is this: even if i were granted someone else’s ship-goggles to somehow see romance between these two (eg, once, in the distant past i read a harry potter fic that was so well-constructed it sold me on a relationship i didn’t [and still don’t] actually see in canon), i still wouldn’t choose to ship merlin and arthur, and it’s not because they’re a “bad” ship (no such thing, folks - tag your stuff and let people live their lives, thank you), it’s because this fandom has already been swallowed by them and i cannot bring myself to make that imbalance worse.

trying to be in the merlin fandom without shipping merlin and arthur is just...a little bit difficult sometimes.  i think probably even people who do ship merlin/arthur are aware of that.  sometimes it can feel like merlin/arthur is a given in this fandom, not one of many options - as if you’re not in the merlin fandom, but rather the merthur fandom, and you know you really, really do not belong there.

and it’s not even a canonical ship!  it’s not even real.  and yet if you like this show, and you want to engage in the fandom, your experience is, without exception, going to be chock full of merlin/arthur content by default.

essentially, my struggle with the merlin/arthur dynamic in fandom is two-fold:

1) the strikingly imbalanced content distribution

the merlin fandom, in terms of content distribution, is a pretty accurate mirror of merlin’s own existence, to be honest, in that pretty much every aspect of it is eventually taken over by arthur pendragon, and in that there’s a reasonable debate to be had about whether or not that’s a good thing.

(spoiler alert: it’s not.)

even so, it is what it is, and as i said before, me commenting on fandom trends is not meant as a condemnation of individual preferences.  people like what they like!  that’s just how things are.  shipping arthur and merlin isn’t a Bad thing to do, by any means, and the fact that so many people do is just, you know, bad luck for me, lol.  but at the same time, the wildly unbalanced distribution of content does make it more difficult for folks who don’t ship merlin/arthur to engage in fandom with quite the same level of ease, and even though it’s nobody’s fault, it is still perfectly reasonable for people who don’t ship merlin/arthur to be frustrated about that.

fanfic is a pretty good case study for how this plays out.  i saw a post a while back that was titled something like ‘merlin bbc gothic,’ and the first bullet point was “canon ships are rarepairs,” and HOO BOY, that is true.  stats-wise, merlin/arthur makes up ⅔ of the merlin fic on AO3.  ~25,000 fics.  the next most popular tag after merlin/arthur is arthur/gwen, but arthur/gwen have ~2,900 fics in their tag.  and when you remember to exclude any instance of merlin/arthur from the arthur/gwen tag, that number drops by another thousand, to ~1,940.

that’s buckwild.  come on.  merlin/arthur has twenty-three THOUSAND more fics than the next most popular (and CANONICAL, i might add) ship?  and every other ship’s numbers are even lower than that?*

and if you don’t want to read shippy stuff in the first place, like me - the merlin “gen” tag has less than 8000 fics in it, by comparison, and then you STILL have to filter merlin/arthur out of the gen fics, leaving you with about 6300 - which number has to be filtered down further to remove OTHER ships that still make it past the gen filter.

in comparison to 25,000.

like.  i’ve been in fandom long enough that i’m not surprised - mean, i came into merlin directly off a teen wolf phase, and boy, that’s a whole other bowl of noodles right there, with added squick factors that are irrelevant here - but i’m still just...man. 

it still makes my head spin.  and it is still frustrating, every time.

*(there is a lot more to be said about how gwen fits into all of this, and i know it has been discussed more thoroughly in other places, but yes, another reason i am leery of arthur/merlin as a thing is that i’m just...not super comfortable with what that implies for gwen and her position in the story.  even if i personally am slightly more compelled by gwen/lancelot, technically - i still don’t quite feel comfortable taking gwen out of her canonical place.  she belongs at the top.  she deserves to be the love interest and she deserves to be the queen.  and like - people can say that her relationship with arthur isn’t “developed” or “convincing” enough to warrant retaining in fic, and i get it, the show really did fail gwen in S5 - but i still don’t buy that argument.  people literally INVENTED a romantic relationship for themselves and put 25,000 fics worth of effort into building it up; there is no reason why an “underdeveloped” canon romance couldn’t have gotten the same treatment.  except, of course, for the fact that one [Black, female] character was being shoved aside to make way for yet another two white dudes.)

(and i’m not saying that everyone is doing this deliberately or maliciously.  but we all know this is a cross-fandom trend.  there is literally no reason for the gap in content to be THAT wide.  a canon relationship with twenty-three thousand fewer fics than an invented ship?  just...that is a stat that bears thinking about.  it doesn’t mean that merlin/arthur is a “bad” ship, or that you can’t prefer lancelot/gwen, but it IS still important to recognize these patterns where they occur, across fandoms, and to really think about what they mean.)

2) the arthur-goggles

my second struggle with merlin/arthur in fandom is the ubiquitousness of the arthur-goggles, aka: the tendency in fandom, as in canon, to make everything in merlin’s life about arthur, and everything in the show about merthur.

this one specifically really gets to me.  i am very committed to the idea that merlin is a complete individual, whether arthur is there or not.  i write a LOT of meta about merlin being a whole person, specifically pushing back on the idea that merlin was “born” for arthur’s benefit - my motto is basically that “merlin’s life does not revolve around arthur pendragon,” and the way his life begins to revolve around arthur pendragon in later seasons is not in fact touching or romantic or beautiful; it’s a tragedy.  merlin does not exist only in the context of his relationship with arthur; he possesses worth outside of his mission to save the prince of camelot, and he was already a complete person before he ever met the prince of camelot, and one of the many issues we have to think about when dealing with arthur and merlin in any capacity is how merlin is told from the get-go that he is supposed to devote his whole life to arthur, but arthur is never given any such reciprocal responsibility.  

merlin and arthur’s relationship, just like the distribution of content in this fandom, is wildly imbalanced.  merlin spends all of his spare time thinking about arthur’s life; he ties himself in knots trying to help arthur develop as a person.  he is constantly working to keep arthur safe and happy.  but arthur, at the end of a long day, doesn’t spend his nights agonizing over how he can improve merlin’s life.  he just goes home and goes to bed.  he never once thinks, ‘my purpose on this earth is to serve and support my friend merlin.’  he is never told his life isn’t his own, that he is supposed to be one half of some two-sided coin.  only merlin is told that his entire existence is earmarked for someone else, that his life’s purpose is to be someone else’s better half.  only merlin is expected to devote his entire being to someone else’s betterment.  only merlin is expected to say demeaning, self-abnegating things like “i was born to serve you.”  

arthur, by contrast, is allowed to have a life of his own.  he is allowed to exist on his own terms.  he is never told that his worth is dependent on how well he can prop someone else up.  and while fic might like to imagine merlin being the most important thing in arthur’s life, in canon that is just not the case.  

merlin exists on his own merits, and the idea that he does everything he does just because “he’s in love with arthur” will never sit right with me, because it’s simply not true.  merlin and arthur’s relationship is important to both of them, yes, and of course it is undergirded by deep love and care, but it is also way more complicated than that.  merlin’s investment in arthur’s life - and his grief at arthur’s death - are NOT solely driven by his love for arthur as an individual; they are inextricably bound up with a sense of obligation and duty and self-worth and, eventually, failure, because he’s been told that protecting arthur is a) the only thing that matters about his own life and b) the only way to free his people and save an entire kingdom.  and i think ignoring this very real complexity in favor of “merlin does what he does and feels what he feels because he’s in love with arthur” cheapens the depth of the story and flattens merlin’s character.

arthur-goggles automatically make everything about merlin/arthur, though.  so the difficulty, for me, with merlin/arthur as a ship, is that it can be hard to make/find things about merlin that people don’t instantly, always try to link back to arthur in some way.  merlin is not allowed to have things that are just his, and he can’t exist in a state where arthur doesn’t somehow factor in - no matter how unrelated to arthur something is, or how non-shippy it’s meant to be - there’s someone out there who’s going to loop it back to merthur in some way.

just like - scattered examples of things I’ve encountered:

all of merlin’s non-arthur love interests on AO3 having massive chunks of their ship tags actually being merthur fics, with the non-arthur ship serving solely as a stepping stone on the way to getting merlin and arthur together

readers, on fics that are specifically designated as focusing on merlin+someone else and in which arthur does not appear, leaving comments asking “so how long until arthur shows up,” “can’t wait to see arthur,” etc

meta about how ‘merlin’s time in camelot was actually really bad for him as a person’ being reblogged and modified by someone else with an addition like “but merlin doesn’t regret a second of it because he wouldn’t have known arthur if he were anywhere else,” and the OP having to reblog their own post and explain that this is literally the exact problem they were trying to critique

in fic, merlin’s friends being utilized only as vessels with whom he can have discussions about his developing relationship with arthur

etc etc

it’s not always huge egregious things, but wearing arthur-goggles means EVERYTHING comes back to merthur in some way, which for me is just...really insulting to other characters, and really limiting in terms of story analysis.  

so, for example - this is a VERY specific example that few will relate to, because i am probably the only person on here who has ever tried to search the tag for merlin’s friend will from ealdor (a niche fave of mine) - but with him, especially, it is very hard to avoid bumping into a lot of people wearing arthur-goggles, because everybody seems to imagine him as merlin’s ex, who is only upset about what’s going on in 1.10 because he’s jealous about arthur appearing alongside merlin, never mind that will and merlin have known each other since birth and have a relationship that LITERALLY predates arthur by two decades.

so with him, as an example - the other day, i saw some post in the tag that was like “will gets teary when arthur makes his inspirational speech in ealdor because he finally understands what merlin sees in arthur and he can’t be mad anymore”

and that is just patently untrue.  it is not even remotely close to a legitimate interpretation of what is happening in that scene.  will hasn’t come around to arthur’s way of thinking yet; he literally still packs his things and leaves after this happens, and he is - i mean, first of all, he’s not crying, lol, and he stalks out of that scene weary, angry, and fed up, because he thinks the village is delusional and all of his neighbors are going to get killed in the morning.  his arc - his dissatisfaction with what is going on, his anger at the ignorance arthur wields as a nobleman with all of that wealth and privilege, his resistance to the big “let’s fight kanen’s men with sticks” plan - that is about him and his history and who he is.  it is not about an (imaginary) merlin/arthur love story.  

but when the arthur-goggles are on, all roads lead to merthur.  even when the other characters in question (*coughWILLIAMcough*) would be beyond mortified to have merthur, of all things, assigned as their motivation.

SO.  now that i’ve gone over both the canon and fandom aspects of my reasoning, the succinct summary in response to your question is just that no, i don’t personally ship merlin/arthur.  because:

a) i don’t see it b) the fandom is already trying to drown me with it and i choose to center other characters out of spite c) i just think merlin deserves better lol

however, as i said in my disclaimer - that doesn’t mean other people shouldn’t ship and enjoy it!   merlin/arthur is very much not my cup of tea, but that’s no reason why other folks can’t have fun with it.  i think the best portrayals of it, probably, will be those that keep in mind exactly what you said - that merlin and arthur’s relationship is “kinda shitty” - but this is fandom, so if what folks really want to write is just lots of happy AU’s with no issues, then they should go for it!  the point of fandom is to have fun connecting with people over a shared love of something, so i am happy to let others have fun doing their thing, and i will just be over here doing mine. 🙂

[makeste]

BnHA Chapter 190: Standing Tall

Previously on BnHA: Endeavor died! But it’s okay because then he got better! In the meantime, the High Definition Noumu managed to destroy a whole lot of the city, to the point where it reminded a lot of people of the Kamino attack three months prior. There was a lot of meta about why Endeavor couldn’t quit. Part of it is because the world still needs a Symbol, and he’s what they’ve got right now. But as Hawks and Fuyumi also observed, Endeavor is also just really bad at giving up. As Hawks observed, back during All Might’s heyday, Endeavor was the only one who even attempted to try and surpass him, despite knowing he had no chance. And that’s exactly the kind of bullheaded tenacity that allowed this crazy fire man to force himself back up, use his flames to propel himself, and chase after the Noumu while the world (and his son, who’s watching in the U.A. common room with his classmates and Aizawa) looked on. Then Hawks finally showed up to help out, and lent Endeavor some of his feathers to aid him in his speed and movement. And with that little boost, Endeavor launched one final flaming fist attack. Hopefully it’ll be enough.

Today on BnHA: Endeavor punches the High Flying Noumu with his flame fist and tries to burn it from the inside out. Somehow it still doesn’t work. Everyone watching is like “AHHH” and Shouto is like “DAD D:” and Hawks is like “dude you burned all my feathers, I can’t help you out anymore.” But Endeavor is all “it’s okay we good” and he grabs the Noumu and blasts way up into the sky where he can unleash his full power without having to worry about hurting anyone in the vicinity. And then he unleashes another Prominence Burn attack, but this time with Plus Ultra. Everyone is like “holy shit” and it’s fucking tense as hell, and then a moment later Endeavor comes plummeting down from the sky still on fire and goes splat on some random car. And then he stands up and does the All Might victory pose. Goddamn. So everyone is all “YESSSSS”, and Hawks goes to help him because he’s still barely fucking conscious, and for just a moment it looks like everything’s going to be all right. And then Dabi shows up. And is all “hey there Endeavor. it sure is nice to quote-unquote ‘meet’ you, lol.” Oh fucking snap.

(As always, all comments not marked with an ETA are my unspoiled reactions from my first readthrough of this chapter. I’ve read up through chapter 209 now, so any ETAs will reflect that.)

lol

for a solid moment there I read this as “the beginning of Horikoshi Kouhei” and I was like oh no my man you did not just pull a goddamn Steven King and insert yourself into your own fucking manga

so here’s the full dramatic first page

poor Hawks, caught in the crossfire

oh for fuck’s sake, now we’re moving on to page 2 and Endeavor’s fist is still rushing toward this fucking Noumu. just die already please

okay it looks like it is indeed dying

this is actually pretty anticlimactic after all of that. but okay

aaaaaand it’s still regenerating. even though Endeavor has his fucking hand inside of its skull and is burning it from the inside out

shit you guys

so they are being burned up, then. not good, not fucking good at all

Endeavor is shouting Hawks’s name!

and now he’s addressing the Noumu

idk what’s going on, he’s just describing the Noumu in his mind I guess. saying shit we already know. “modified human, manufactured one, holder of multiple quirks, obsessed with the pursuit of strength”

like, what is the point of this

oh I see, it’s simply to be as dramatic as possible so as to build up to this moment

Shouto. that’s very sweet. but. he can’t hear you, honey

he doesn’t actually address him as “dad” very often though does he? in fact, I don’t recall him ever directly addressing him by “name” at all. in the handful of face to face conversations that they’ve had with each other, he’s avoided using any sort of title and has been really brusque. and whenever he talks about him, he simply refers to him as “my father” (I forget which word it is he’s using in Japanese, but it’s something fairly casual and borderline disrespectful, I’m sure)

(ETA: so he normally uses the word “oyaji” (which does mean “father” but has more of an “old man” connotation though) when addressing Endeavor, and apparently that’s the word he uses in this scene too. so there was actually no change there. I’d be annoyed at the translation being a bit misleading, but I guess “old man! I’m watching” wouldn’t have quite the same emotional impact, so that’s fair.)

anyway, so yeah, that makes this outburst even more meaningful than it initially appears to be

Hawks says his feathers are all burnt up now so he won’t be able to help any more

but Endeavor says it’s enough

and he’s flying up higher, somehow. not sure if that’s the remainder of Hawks’s wings boosting him or if he’s just using his fire again somehow. that still makes no fucking sense but okay

he’s trying to put some distance between them and the people and buildings below so as to not cause any further damage

okay here we go. one more time

odd that he would hate that motto given how obsessed he is with strength. maybe it just never clicked with him. or maybe he resented it because no amount of “plus ultra” was ever enough for him to catch up with All Might

but at any rate, this is certain some plus ultra shit right here

looooooool Horikoshi you sneaky little shit

SO THIS SHIT IS REALLY ALL BUT CONFIRMED THEN, HUH

damn it just what exactly is the story behind this. I want to know already

so now Endeavor is plummeting from the sky presumably unconscious and still very much on fire

and the guy with the air gun hands says he’ll catch him. and he’s shooting his hands out toward him

and his buddy with the chopped up floating limbs is helping too. gross

eeesh

I winced

and now there are more reaction shots, with Fuyumi’s hands over her mouth, the people from the newscopter looking on in shock, and Shouto still standing there with that same frozen “oh shit” expression as before

can anyone give this poor kid a hug or even a hand on his shoulder or fucking something already. jesus. Aizawa you’re right fucking there. what happened to all of your dad instincts

Hawks is running over now

ahhhhh yes here we go!

I expected there would be a slower, more dramatic build up to this, but he just like bounced back to his feet and fucking did it right away lol

well whatever. he earned it. he earned this

all right, Enji. I’ll admit it, you are making some great strides here. none of this is gonna get me to actually forgive you, mind. but I have done quite a bit of essaying on redemption at this point, and I gotta say, you meet those criteria. you are learning and trying to be better and actually succeeding. it doesn’t undo any of the shitty things you did, but that’s up to those characters whether they’re okay with moving past it or not. in the meantime you seem to be doing what you can to make up for it now, and while it would have been preferable for you to have learned this lesson some 25 years earlier... better late than never

and now everyone is cheering!

goddammit, they really needed this. a victory like this. something to help restore their faith

All Might’s sitting and looks kind of blown away. like his hair is literally blown away. did someone turn the fan on in this room or

ohhhhh my god

oh my heart. whoa there. I wasn’t ready for this

is he praying?? is this a thank you? or is this just relief and he just kind of slumped for a second and just happened to clasp his hands like that for lack of knowing what else to do

either way it’s giving me a lot of feels

although even now they’re all just standing around him hovering like they want to comfort him, but they’re afraid or there’s some invisible force field there or something. JUST PAT HIM ON THE DAMN BACK ALREADY. jesus he was so tense. that was so intense can you please give him some support please and thank you guys

by the way they seriously need to turn up the heat in the dorms it looks like. holdover thought from the previous chapters that I forgot to remark on because I was binging the rest of this arc. but they’re all bundled up quite a lot for being indoors

awwwwww

what is this. I thought I was supposed to come out of this arc shipping Dabi/Hawks?? I have yet to understand that? but Endeavor/Hawks (or more like Hawks/Endeavor) is certainly coming off very strong

(ETA: to be clear I don’t ship this romantically, because Endeavor is old enough to be his dad. which is kind of the point, actually. Endeavor fucked up with all four of his actual kids, but now with Hawks he has miraculously been granted the chance to make a new start with someone who’s disconnected from all of that. basically this is the first bond Endeavor has ever formed that isn’t fucking toxic, and I think it’s important for him on his path to making amends in whatever ways he can. this is a chance for him to actually try and be a good father to someone, and better late than never. 

because Hawks is also someone who has relatively few close connections with people, because he keeps all his true feelings bottled up for self-preservation reasons, and keeps people at a distance by being casual and aloof with everyone (though in a friendly way). and yet for whatever reason, he’s gone and adopted Endeavor. maybe it’s just that he sees Endeavor as the best hope the world’s got right now, and so mentoring him to be less of an ass gets him closer to his goal of one day not having to do this job anymore. or maybe something about Endeavor’s asshole nature makes Hawks feel more at ease being open with him, because he doesn’t need to worry about making Endeavor worry, because Endeavor will just keep on not giving a shit no matter what, so that’s nice. except that Endeavor does perhaps give the tiniest of shits, shockingly. and I think that’s something that came as a surprise to them both and caught them both off guard.

anyways. so somehow this relationship between a hot pile of garbage and a character who was only introduced six chapters ago became one of my favorites in the series in a staggeringly short amount of time. sometimes life is strange like that.)

LMAO

I USED THE OTHER ARM. SO IT’S NOT THE SAME. SHUT UP

(ETA: also would you fucking look at this fucking fanboy knowing which arm it’s actually supposed to be and still bothering to be all “HMPH!” about it. how does it feel to be a 45-year-old chuuni, Endeavor)

damn he is harsh on himself

jesus christ Horikoshi. I keep thinking this, but it really is like a textbook study of how to redeem a character. he ticked off every single box. give them everything they wanted only for them to realize it wasn’t what they wanted at all. make them remorseful for their past actions. make them strive forward with new purpose. make them suffer but refuse to give in. give them an eyepatch. (ETA: dammit.) give them new relationships that aren’t tied to all of the horrible shit they did in their past, so we can see them interact with someone without that for once and get a glimpse of who they could have been and maybe just maybe still could be with a lot of hard work

like, I know when I’m being manipulated, but damned if it isn’t a masterful fucking job

anyways. Hawks says that he still did a good job and this will definitely be huge

and he says that first off “we have to do something about your injuries” and lol, duhhhhh though

SJSLDFKLSKHGK

YOU HOLD UP!!!! DON’T TELL ME WHAT TO DO! WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING HERE

I FEEL LIKE I SUMMONED HIM LMAO

okay Dabi. meet Hawks? unless you already know him? I don’t know, actually and I’m very curious as to what’s going on here

because it now occurs to me that my earlier suspicion of Hawks still could be right on the money and it’s possible that he was even working with Dabi. because idk but people ship this something fierce so there must be some connection, either past or future. and that attack was no fucking coincidence, and it certainly was no coincidence either that it ended up doing exactly what Hawks wanted it to do

but anyways. I’m getting ahead of myself now and I’m sure we’ll find out more about this shortly!

and look at Dabi greeting his old man like he’s never met him before, too. you think you’re so fucking smooth, huh

(ETA: so the “I guess” part here is actually very significant. I’ll just let Viz’s translator Caleb Cook explain:

basically, your two options are (1) Dabi is a fire-user whose true identity is still being deliberately withheld and whose physical appearance (hairstyle, eye color, approximate age) just happens to match up near-perfectly with the missing Todoroki sibling who was coincidentally mentioned in this same arc for the very first time, and who has apparently met Endeavor before, but in spite of this he somehow is not Todoroki Touya; or (2) Dabi is Todoroki Touya.

I don’t know about you guys, but I know where I stand with this one lol.)

shit. what an ending. what a fucking arc this is turning out to be

[animebw]

Binge-Watching: Kekkai Sensen and Beyond, Episodes 4-6

Honestly, I’m running out of stuff to say about this show by now, so let’s just get this over with as painlessly as possible.

Wasted Moments

At this point, I feel like I’ve said pretty much everything I could say about Kekkai Sensen. I’ve laid out why it doesn’t work for me, where I feel it’s lacking, the issues it keeps running into that prevent me from enjoying it, as much as I want to. And unless something crazy goes down once the plot finally picks up in the back half of this season, I doubt the final six episodes will give me much more to discuss either. So while we wait for this show to be over so I can move onto more interesting pursuits, I want to touch on one more issue that contributes to my overall frustration with this show: incredibly poor storytelling structure.

See, it didn’t really occur to me until episode 6, where Leo has that flashback to Michella’s sacrifice, but we’ve been following these characters for eighteen goddamn episodes, and only now does our protagonist make any sort of effort to actually pursue his main objective: to save his sister from the curse she took on for him. That’s eighteen episodes spent on puttering around disconnected episodic plots and a disconnected larger plot with the Macbeth twins, none of which had any actual bearing on Leo’s quest for his sister’s eyes. There haven’t been any episodes dedicated to this plot thread, and we haven’t even had any indication that he’s been researching possibilities in the background, so it ends up feeling like Leo showed up in the first episode, said he was here to look for a cure, and then just... didn’t, for no apparent reason, until the show arbitrarily decided just now that he should start caring about it all over again. And even by the end of that episode, I have no reason to believe he’s actually going to make any sort of immediate progress towards that goal. For all I know, we could spend another two, three, even four episodes before Michella even comes up again. So not only are we spending every episode ungodly confused by a million details dumped on us without context, the one part of this plot we do have some sort of emotional investment in just completely forgets to even happen. And as a result, it feels like every episode is just one massive waste of time spent frittering over nothing while more potentially interesting avenues hover frustratingly untapped in the background, taunting us with promises that refuse to get fulfilled.

Chain Gang

Perhaps that might be a little more forgivable if the episodic plots themselves were of any interest. After all, Cowboy Bebop got away with spending only like 5 episodes out of 26 on major plot stuff because all the one-off adventures it went on were interesting enough in their own right to keep your attention. Sadly, no such luck can be found here, because Kekkai Sensen is just as bad at episodic storytelling as it is long-form storytelling. Generally speaking, a good episodic story ties every major story thread back to a greater overarching point, giving it a sense of cohesion. If a character’s going through an emotional crisis, the villain of the week should present a challenge that allows them to face and overcome that crisis. If we’re doing a deep dive into a certain character’s psyche, we should spend a lot of time learning how their abilities, tactics and outcomes tie back to who they are and why they do what they do. That sort of thing. But because there’s so little context given to anything that happens in this show, it’s pretty much impossible to tie any of the elements in any one episode together in any meaningful way. It’s just a bunch of disconnected stuff happening that only has the barest minimum of connection, to the point where you wonder if there was even a framing concept at all.

Like, take episode 4, which is all about Chain and her gang of werewolves. As an episodic story, this should be the perfect opportunity to get inside Chain’s head, find out what makes her tick, what her life is like, what drives her, how far she can go when pushed to the edge. But do we learn anything about Chain’s past? How she got involved with her feral werewolves? How they got their powers? Were they born with them, or were they inherited somehow? Did they need to train them at all? How does Chain balance werewolf work with Libra work? Hell, how does she even have a second job when Libra seems to take up so much of its employees’ lives? Are werewolves even a race in this world, or just a profession? I sure as fuck can’t rely on my previous trope knowledge of werewolves, because the vanishing assassins this show calls “werewolves” bear no resemblance to werewolves as they’re traditionally understood. I have literally no context in which to ground my understanding of what Chain even is, and the show doesn’t explain a damn thing beyond “she can displace her very existence to the point of being undetectable”. Which is a cool concept to consider, but all the effect we’re shown is that she just goes more and more ghostlike while her opponent goes more and more sensory to try and keep track of her, reducing such a cool idea to boring power levels. So all we really learn about Chain over the course of this entire goddamn episode centered on Chain is that she has a really messy room and gets embarrassed when people see it. That’s twenty-five minutes spent exploring a single character with only one reasonably interesting take-away.

And that what makes this show so mind-numbing to sit through. For all its impressive animation and strong direction and occasional ability to pull of a legitimately funny gag (Bulter Alf’s body popping like popcorn as his joints cracked got me good), it never feels like anything is actually happening. It’s all disjointed visual information that passes through the system without making any sort of lasting impact. Hell, even with Leo suddenly caring about his sister again in episode 6, the most impact that story thread has on the plot of the episode itself is that there’s a two-second moment where Klaus inspires him not to give up on trying, which doesn’t connect to the big monster they’re fighting or the methods they’re using to fight him or tie into the episode’s resolution in any way. It’s just one more disconnected element struggling for some sort of purpose without finding a single foundation to rest on. Never mind how we never see the girl who got trapped inside the bug mansion again, despite her safety being a stated priority that influenced the tactics of the team outside. We don’t even get confirmation that she died, she just vanishes into the ether despite having been built up as a noteworthy piece to keep track of. Any way you slice it, this is just bad, bad, bad episodic storytelling, unfocused and unfulfilling with so many setups that are just never paid off. Even goddamn Phantom World, though a much more insufferable show than Kekkai Sensen, had decent episodic structure that tried to tie all the elements it was working with together by the time the credits rolled. And when I’m comparing you negatively to the worst of Kyoto Animation, you know something’s gone seriously wrong.

Odds and Ends

-Oh hey, it’s burger kid! He’s a lot more annoying than I remember.

-I do love Chain’s character design, all things considered. She’s so sleek and expressive, cool while still able to be goofy.

-”For as witty as what you were trying to say was, that was painful.” Hard agree, Zed.

-”Sorry! You looked so compromised, I couldn’t help myself!” aksjdhaskjdhasd

-”THE LIVE PERFORMANCE IS ABOUT TO BEGIN!” It’s at times like this I wish I was just watching Gintama.

-”I divide it up.” That’s... actually pretty clever. Good on you, Leo.

-In Soviet Russia, you don’t hit the bar, the bar hits you.

-I’m loving this butler’s morse code. You can tell how in synch these two are.

-Heh, I thought that was Daisuke Ono’s voice I heard as Phillip. He really has a knack for playing these kinds of regal butler characters.

-When suddenly, Redline.

-”I heard you attempted a headbutt but failed.” pfft

-”Would you two please knock it off?” This is the smile of death. Behold it and despair, mortals, for your time on this place has reached its end.

-Thaaaaat’s a lot of skeeters. Hoo boy.

-”You got something stuck to your head.” Aw, baby gremlins!

Well, six more episodes to go. Let’s see if anything interesting happens before it’s over!

[thatomoruri-blog]

The internet (Mass Media) is affecting how we communicate in the 21st century.

In today’s day and age media is the quickest and most relevant way to gain information and stay in contact. whether it be social, sports, politics and anything in between and as a species that thrives on technological development, we need to consider how easy access to a plethora of resources through the internet affects the way in which we communicate in person.

In 2019, everyone wants to be different, everyone wants to have something unique to say or add to the conversation. There is nothing wrong with that, but if it means making things up just to have a sense of individuality, then that’s where the issues lies.

We live in the world where FAKE NEWS EXISTS. It doesn’t matter what is said, where it comes from and or who said it, as long as you said it it first then you must be correct and what you said must be true. if a country, furthermore, a planet is infested with false information, pure, true and genuine communication will be something very rare and valuable to come by.

everywhere you go someone has access to the internet, which means they can alter and manipulate data online to trick people for their own personal gain. Some will pretend to be sick/injured, some will pretend to be assaulted/abused just to gain attention and fame or publicity. but these same people forget or overlook the fact that if it was so easy to make up these stories it will make it possible to expose them eventually. Even for those who genuinely have been affected by these issues, they may find it easier to go to the internet and express their sorrow allowed, yet in anonymous ways to avoid any back lash from their offender and insensitive people. We all go through emotions, but society has somehow deemed it immoral to express your emotions in public without any negative feedback. causing most of the population to believe that in this world emotions are sign of weakness. This causes a lot of people, mainly teenagers and young adults lost and helpless. and feeling like they are part of the problem that they themselves are facing

That’s when someone would go seeking advice or help from a person who might be able to sympathies and maybe guide them, but since mass media is easier to access its seen as the go to, and only when that has nothing remotely relevant to help solve the problem then we decide go seek human help . that’s usually when its sometimes too late or the issue is so far gone that they have been changed forever.

Although it maybe contain a lot of false information and content that disrupt a persons mental and emotional values and morals, the internet can really help and develop a lot of people, emotionally, psychologically, socially, ect. it has as many, if not more, benefits as there are issues. The internet has the capabilities of allowing you to purchase a house in Spain while you live in japan. learn languages of countries you’ve never been to. understand cultures you never experienced. you can even start a multi billion rand company in your moms backroom and meet your soul mate the next week. 

the possibilities are endless. both good and bad. it is some what like a two-sided coin. yin and yang so to speak. it isn’t all bad but its not all sun shine and rainbows either.

With that being said, we need to consider how much it has taken away from human interaction and activity to give us a sense of efficiency and productivity.

for instance when you and your partner go out for diner. instead of having deep and meaningful conversations with each other. you and your partner will be face deep in your phones and take pictures of each other and the food just to prove to people, whom where not even invited and couldn’t care less about you and your partner, what you two are eating and how much of a good time you are having. Which is not a problem at all. to each his/her own, but where does the connection come in that interaction. what do you learn about your partner. what do they learn about you. because mass media made it so easy to share our moments with the rest of the world, we now forget to take in our moments for ourselves and enjoy them to their full potential.  sharing with the rest of the world can be bad thing. because people filled with insecurity and jealousy and envy will see/ hear what you said/did on the internet and hate you for it, and some will take it overboard  threaten you  or even hurt you all because you where doing you for everyone else to see. 

some could say you where asking for it. but you are not wrong for wanting to express yourself. and how you do it shouldn’t matter to anyone but you. That is unless of course it harms others, then you must reconsider your methods.

I personally think the world needs to have some sort of  intervention. Day of disconnection if you will, where all forms of mass media are banned and people must actually interact with and learn about each other and grow and eventually develop a strong sense respect and pride for your fellow brother/sister as well as themselves. which is an outrageous thing to want to happen, but in a world where people would rather pull out a phone to record than a hand to help, something outrageous is exactly what we need.

but those are just my thoughts.

[tipsycad147]

Breathing With Friends

I've had a number of conversations with folks about the gratefulness of technologies like video chat to enable essential services (like mental health and medical appointments) to continue and the complete soul-suck that many experience with the same medium. As one friend put it "I am tired of trying to create meaningful connections through video chat but I also know that I need video to be able to connect at all with folks right now."

Video chat as an essential form of connection isn't going away any time soon, so let's come up with an alternative approach for connectivity with less suckage and more nourishment. At the best of times, for me video chat has been an uncomfortable medium and this has been true long before living in quarantine. It has always had a valley of the uncanny feeling to it and only amplifies the feeling of being observed as opposed to being listened to. As I've been navigating this new world of only video chat based meetings, I noticed that I would get off some calls feeling exhausted and other times I felt a sense of connection and wellness.

What was the difference? Breathwork.

But more on that in just a minute.

There are a few reasons so many of us are feeling burned out about video chat. Even if we're connecting with folks we love, video chat is often a reminder that things are not normal right now. That's stressful in and of itself, but then there is the empathy wall that occurs through video chat. In-person conversations and connections are full of all sorts of shared experiences, including the experience of being in the same environment at the same time as well as energetic markers that don't translate well through video (now there is an upside for folks who tend to get emphatically overloaded in conversations - the empathy wall can actually provide a bit of reprieve). Then there's all the specific to video chat frustrations like technological blips (disconnects, laggy wifi), crappy lighting, interruptions that happen more frequently if we live with others, and having to stare at a screen as opposed to sitting with a person you want to connect with.

Yet, through all these frustrations, I've had consistent moments of connection with folks over video chat and it was because we were using a tool that translates really well to this format: breathwork. Breathwork can take many forms but it's essentially the practice of paying attention to your breath with intention. Breathwork is present in a number of modalities from sitting meditation, trancework and pathworking, spellwork, martial arts, yoga, and more. If you're wanting to connect with folks through video chat but finding it draining or difficult why not try breathwork with your friends and family instead?

Breathwork gets us back into our bodies and even when we're practising mindful breathing at in-person events it is still an inherently private and deeply personal experience. In this way, breathwork is something that can easily be shared together online but still feel like you're having a meaningful individual experience in the presence of community. What's also nice about breathwork within a video chat conference during times like these is that we can experience a reprieve from talking about the crisis while still connecting to our own feelings and holding space for others to do the same all while together. I know that some folks, especially those with an established meditation or breathwork practice, may be full of disbelief at the suggestion that you can have a nurturing, community-based breathwork practice via video chat, but believe me it truly translates well.

There are a lot of beautiful resources out there for breathwork whether by yourself or with friends. Two accessible books are The Power of Breathwork by Jennifer Patterson and How To Breathe by Ashley Neese. Both of these books teach a variety of simple breathwork exercises for everything from helping to go to sleep, finding inspiration, exploring grief, nourishing the body, and more. There are also a number of tutorials on youtube including one on square breathing (a technique that I teach and recommend to a lot of folks) and this video covers a variety of stress-relieving breathwork techniques. Breathwork can also be combined with visualisation such as a grounding and centring tree of life meditation. You can access my version of the tree of life meditation for free on my Begin With the Breath course description page - just scroll down to the course curriculum section and click on "Tree of Life" for both a recording and transcript. There are also a number of wonderful folks hosting breathwork based online gatherings like Yarrow Magdalena and her Unravel course on tending to grief through breathwork, writing, and ritual (I was just on her podcast and she's a gem).

To help you try out breathwork with friends I've created a simple breathwork gathering format for your video chats. For both of them, it helps to have someone in charge of facilitation and time management (one of the ways to make video chats less stressful is knowing that they have an planned ending) and this is a role that can be rotated each time you gather if you like. There is nothing revolutionary about the following outline - it's a format that many of you will probably have come across before. I'm writing it out both for those of you who haven't facilitated a space like this before - either in-person or online - it can really help to have it all laid out and for folks who have facilitation experience but haven't done this work through video chat yet.

A Simple 30 Minute Breathwork Outline

Gathering and settling in - 5 minutes Time for everyone to arrive and get comfortable. Depending on how many folks are gathered you can choose to leave everyone muted or unmuted for this part. Before you move on to the next part, invite folks to take a moment to pull up gallery view for a moment so that they are able to see everyone that they'll be sharing space together at once before returning to their preferred screen setup. I learned this at a recent class with Yarrow Magdalena and it was a magickal moment similar to what I experience at the start of a community ritual where we all take a moment to gaze upon everyone we've gathered together with at that moment.

Three word check-in - 5 minutes Invite everyone to speak or write in chat (especially recommended for groups) three words describing how they are feeling at this moment. Check-ins are a good way for folks to begin to connect with their inner world while beginning to hold space and witness the inner worlds of others. If posted in chat, the facilitator can choose to read through all or some of these words depending on group size.

Breathing with friends - 10 minutes Introduce the breathwork practice with simple instructions (reading them from a book is just fine!) and then settle into breathwork together. You have a few options when it comes to sound at this point. At in-person gatherings you're going to be hearing other people breathing and while you can unmute everyone on the call, that can sometimes prove more distracting than helpful. One solution is to breathe together while muted - the downside is that disconnects happen and that can be stressful for folks who are trying to close their eyes while breathing but also don't want to find that they're no longer in the call. You can choose to have just the facilitator unmuted for reassuring "I'm still on the call" sound cues. Another option is for the facilitator to play a song or two through their computer or play a simple drumbeat if they have a drum.

Reconnect and reflect - 5 minutes The facilitator gently invites folks out of the focused breathwork and into a space of reflection. This can be a time for folks to journal briefly or they can speak or write three words on what they are currently feeling. Especially for smaller groups there is always an opportunity to expand this part - just make that decision ahead of time to create an easeful time container for everyone.

Closing and departing - 5 minutes End by reading an inspiring quote, pulling an oracle card, or some such similar departing blessing. Remind folks to allow space for the experience of breathwork to continue to unfold throughout the day and night. Invite folks to jump into gallery view again to be able to see everyone that has gathered and held space together at once. And then you're done!

http://www.wortsandcunning.com/blog/breathing-with-friends

[firstumcschenectady]

In the Gospel of John, we hear,  “I give you a new commandment, that you love one another.”  Of course, it is not a new commandment.  At all.  Rather, this is as old of commandments as commandments come.  Love commandments are fundamental.  There are two parts, the love your neighbor part (Leviticus 19:18)  “You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against any of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the LORD.” and the love God part.  (Deut 6:4) “Hear, O Israel: The LORD is our God, the LORD alone.  You shall Love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might.”  Jesus' commandment to love each other is grounded in the already there tradition as an abiding commandment. Further, that's a tenet of every major religion in some form or another.  

It isn't new, but it is still challenging.  You know that passage from 1 Corinthians 13 that people love to have in their wedding ceremonies? The one that says “Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends.”  The one that is actually Paul writing to the church in Corinth who are fighting amongst themselves, and he is telling them what Christian love toward one another looks like? Well, if Paul had to write that letter to do that, then we can assume the people weren't following the commandment too well.

And, of course, we have the history of Christianity showing us more examples of how badly we follow this commandment.  If our love for one another is meant to be way we show that we are Christ's, OYE. There was the split between the Eastern and Western Church.  The Protestant Reformation was a wreck – I can't even go into the horrors it other than to say that at least 100,000 people were killed.  And then, in our tradition, our Methodist Church split all over the place over the issue of slavery, and power, and money, and we're facing a new split now because the church doesn't know how to love.  We have NOT loved each other well.  We have not shown ourselves to be disciples of Christ, at least not on the big scale, not if it means showing the world how well we love.

Instead, on the large scale, I think we look like most other human institutions, obsessed with power, money, and control.  It isn't pretty.

While there are great things that do happen on the larger scale (UMCOR, Africa University, supporting seminaries, Imagine No Malaria), I don't think the larger scale is the one that CAN be reflective of love.  The blessed ties that bind us together are just not big enough for the size of organizations that exist.

Have you heard of Dunbar's number?  The New Yorker explains it well:  

The Dunbar number is actually a series of them. The best known, a hundred and fifty, is the number of people we call casual friends—the people, say, you’d invite to a large party. (In reality, it’s a range: a hundred at the low end and two hundred for the more social of us.) From there, through qualitative interviews coupled with analysis of experimental and survey data, Dunbar discovered that the number grows and decreases according to a precise formula, roughly a “rule of three.” The next step down, fifty, is the number of people we call close friends—perhaps the people you’d invite to a group dinner. You see them often, but not so much that you consider them to be true intimates. Then there’s the circle of fifteen: the friends that you can turn to for sympathy when you need it, the ones you can confide in about most things. The most intimate Dunbar number, five, is your close support group. These are your best friends (and often family members). On the flipside, groups can extend to five hundred, the acquaintance level, and to fifteen hundred, the absolute limit—the people for whom you can put a name to a face. While the group sizes are relatively stable, their composition can be fluid. Your five today may not be your five next week; people drift among layers and sometimes fall out of them altogether.1

Dunbar's numbers are about the limits of how many people you can feel connected to at certain levels.  They're also about how many people can feel connected to each other as a group, and how much structure is required to connect people at different levels.  The gist is, the larger the group, the less people feel connected, the more work is required to create a sense of community.

This may explain a bit about church size and function, as well as a lot of human behavior.  It also explains why we've struggled so much as an Annual Conference to feel bonded to each other – we get together only once a year and we're STILL bigger than the largest group that can have actual cohesion.  The disconnect between levels of the church makes sense in this model, although so does the fact that our church is built in layers, so that relationships can be built.

The key seems to be, that human beings, human institutions, and human societies run on relationships, and none of them can be successful if they outgrow relationships.  Institutions that are larger than relationship capacity EITHER have to have ways to subdivide to allow relationships to stabilize OR they will lose their focus and identity, because they lose their basis in relationship.

I don't think Jesus was talking about institutions, I think he was talking about PEOPLE, and the way they treat each other.  The part of the command that IS new is that is it no longer love “your neighbor” but now “love one another.”  It takes the community from physical proximity to one that is defined by shared work. (Which may be more similar than it sounds to begin with.)

Only relatively small groups can have enough cohesion to be defined by how well they love each other, it just can't happen on a massive scale. But let's be really honest – it doesn't always happen on a smaller scale either.  Humans can be REALLY hard to work with.  #shock Groups can really struggle.

I've really been thinking a lot about group dynamics, OK, I ALWAYS think a lot about group dynamics, it seems like they're super duper important to every part of following Jesus.  One of the harder things about functioning in a group is that the group is usually looking out for the group's best interest, and that doesn't always line up with each individuals best interest.   This isn't that fun if you are one of the individuals whose needs aren't aligned.  You'd almost think groups aren't worth it, if it weren't for the great benefits they do offer:  companionship, connection, shared reality, wisdom, growth, hope, a place to make a contribution, support, acceptance, belonging, being known, laughter, inspiration, purpose, stimulation, interdependence – stuff like that.  (I think groups are TOTALLY worth it, can you tell?)  

Perhaps because of the constant need in a group to balance between the needs of the whole and the needs of individuals, it is common in groups for individuals to attempt to gain control over one another.  Sometimes one, or some, or all of the people, just WANT THINGS DONE THEIR WAY. I expect that sounds obvious, and I expect that you have experienced it.  Vying for control is one of the basic dynamics of most groups, and it can unravel them, and the degree to which people are vying for control can relate tightly to how functional the group is.

Now, thinking about a person trying to control groups, and trying to control other people in groups is ALSO interesting, and it leads me to some self-reflection.  After all, sometimes I'm that person and sometimes I'm not, and I've been wondering about what makes the difference.  Two pieces of it have occurred to me:  I don't tend to seek control when I don't really care what choices are made (so when something doesn't much matter to me), and I don't tend to seek control when I trust the group process to come up with a good answer. That suggests that I'm more likely to seek control when I think something really matters (duh), and when I'm scared.  This has been a bit of a relief for me as an insight, because I'm guessing I'm not the only one who gets controlling when I get scared, and that means that when I feel like people are trying to control me, it gives me an option of being compassionate towards them because 1. they care a lot and 2. they're scared instead of … well all the other narratives I've otherwise created in my head about other people trying to control me.  If people are feeling scared, that elicits compassion from me, whereas if I just respond to my experience of someone trying to control me, I'm far more likely respond with annoyance, frustration, and … let's be honest, defiance.  Now, I dislike that this has to be said, but it does:  Having compassion for someone's fear does not require us to give them their way.  This is inherently true.  Also, as people of God, we are seeking to be motivated by love, not fear, so we don't let fear rule.

Now, let's jump over to Peter in Acts.   This is a hard story to preach on, because I want to be very respectful of the Jewish tradition of keeping kosher, which I find beautiful and meaningful.  Keeping kosher is a form of being faithful by paying attention to eating in just ways, and it forms an identity of faithfulness, patterned into one's life.  All that means  that the formative story of why Christians abandoned our Jewish roots, that were formed in keeping kosher, is a tender sort of thing.  Giving up keeping kosher was giving up a primary Jewish identity, and Jesus' early followers were good Jews.  Keeping kosher was good practice.

That said, the history of Christianity is also found in this story.  What was once a sect of Judaism became a major world religion, in part because of these decisions – the ones to include Gentiles as equal partners in the Way of following Jesus, and not to require Gentiles to become Jewish in order to become Christian.  A GOOD THING had to be let go in order to make it possible to do ANOTHER GOOD THING.  To welcome in new people required letting go of what had been very important.  To make space for what God was up to next in that community required letting go of something that was already sacred. Peter is horrified in this story about what is being asked of him. But we wouldn't be here if he hasn't adapted.

That's a lesson that we all have to learn time and time again, particularly if we want to live well in community.  The “love one another” bit requires adapting to each other, and it requires constant attention to the living tradition, to see what needs to bend, or adapt, or be let go.  This loving each other thing – its really hard work.

But, it is worth it.  We know a God of love BECAUSE we know love through each other.  Thanks be to God, and may we continue to love one another.  Amen

1Maria Konnikova ”The Limits of Friendship“  October 7, 2014 https://www.newyorker.com/science/maria-konnikova/social-media-affect-math-dunbar-number-friendships

--

Rev. Sara E. Baron

First United Methodist Church of Schenectady

603 State St. Schenectady, NY 12305

Pronouns: she/her/hers

http://fumcschenectady.org/


https://www.facebook.com/FUMCSchenectady

May 19, 2019

[mitchellkuga]

On Writing for the Muses

Published by The Creative Independent

Astrologer and author Chani Nicholas on the connection between astrology and storytelling, having the time and space to fully be a mess before you finally hit your stride, and understanding the audience you're writing for.

Your voice as an astrologer is so distinct. What was your journey as a writer?

I certainly don’t know anything about grammar and sentence structure—I was a really bad student. [laughs] I was in my daydreams all the time and I didn’t pay attention and I wasn’t good at homework. I also didn’t write consistently for much of my life, but I always remember when I would write things people would say, “Oh, that’s really beautiful, you’re a really good writer.” I had this natural need to express myself, but I never thought of it as any kind of way forward.

When I went back to get my bachelor’s in San Francisco I thought, “Would I really want to be as an essayist? Well, that’s stupid—you know you can’t make money doing that.” And that’s when I started to write astrology. I realized this is a way that I can actually write. So I put my passion for all the things I was learning about into the form of astrology. It helped me build a habit of writing consistently and it was that habit that eventually turned into everything else. It really just started with the habit of showing up at the same time every month or every week or, in the beginning, every full moon, that really hooked me into the relationship with writing.

Would you say the essence of your voice was there from the beginning?

Yeah, my weird sentence structure and all that? [laughs] That person never changed.

Your book opens with a love letter to your wife Sonia Passi, who is the CEO of FreeFrom, [a nonprofit dedicated to financially empowering victims of domestic violence]. How does your relationship inform your work?

It’s very necessary for me to be part of some sort of social change in order for me to feel, somewhat, like I can sleep at night. My ability to support her and her work in the ways that I can helps me to feel engaged. That is a really healing part of our relationship. She also works on chaninicholas.com with me. Within FreeFrom, Sonia is an incredible leader—she’s gifted in a lot of ways, but that’s one of the ways in which she’s extraordinarily gifted—so she teaches me how to be a leader in my own life and business, and about how to create the best kinds of habits for work culture. We don’t just want the work that we do to go out in the world and only help the people that receive it—we want ourselves included in that equation, we want the actual workspace to be as healing as the work that is being produced. It has to happen at home first. She’s taught me about that.

And then there’s just the basic… well, it’s not basic, but I’ve never had somebody believe in me the way that she believes in me. Someone who has that kind of watchful faith, who’s that mindful. It has helped me to take risks I don’t know if I would have been able to take otherwise. It has helped me to develop in ways that I didn’t know were possible.

A lot has been said about the particular resonance astrology has with queer folks. I’m curious about the other side of that equation: if being queer informs your approach as an astrologer?

What I learned from some of the elders in the queer community—whether they’re Black feminists, indigenous feminists, POC feminists—informed everything that I am. It informed how I see the world and everything that I write. If it’s any good, it has someone’s teaching in it that I’ve gratefully received. So my queerness, I mean it should be clear: I think we have to push back against the currents that are trying to sweep us up and say, “Fuck this. This is actually the way I need to take up space in the world.” Even if we can’t take up that space externally, for safety reasons, I think it’s really important if we allow ourselves to take up that space internally. Astrology supports that, because it only ever speaks to your essence in a nonjudgmental way. So as queer folks living in this place in history we need these systems of knowledge that support our understanding of ourselves to say, “You are you. This is exactly what was meant for you. This is exactly who you’re supposed to be.”

How do you interpret the link between astrology and storytelling?

The story that we have about ourselves—and about each other, but it’s essentially about ourselves—is so incredibly important. Astrology is a map of your life. It tells a story of your life and if we can work with it in a way that feels affirming and also in a way that challenges us—not to stay complacent, not to stay in places that are comfortable or quelling our creativity—then it can be used to help us tell our story in a really wonderful way.

Like, everybody knows what Saturn Return is now—the story of our Saturn Return is always so magnificently perfect for that person’s chart. Even if it was extraordinarily painful and challenging, it’s something that helps us to shape, contextualize, tell the story of our life and the choices that we had within that story. It’s still a choose-your-own-adventure. Astrology would say, “Okay, this is the story that we’re in. What are you going to choose within this setup?”

You mention being a late bloomer in the introduction to your book. What did you gain from leaning into your calling later than is culturally expected?

I was such a mess in my twenties and thirties. Like I really, really wasn’t ready. The moment I was ready for it, I felt like it came. I needed all those years to heal. I needed all those years to figure myself out. I’m not someone who naturally has a really thick skin, so learning in public for me, like it is for a lot of people, was really challenging. I’m really glad I lived out a lot of mistakes offline. I’m really glad that I wrote a lot of awful things that didn’t ever see the internet. I’m glad that I got to, you know, like really fuck up and find my way through it. And I don’t know if that’s a cop out or not, but I just needed that time to not be inside the fun house of success. Because success does not make you happy, it just magnifies what’s already there.

Personally, I needed to be really humbled by doing work that I didn’t want to do for a long time. It was a way of me developing my spiritual practice. In jobs that I hated, I would pray or do affirmation and breathing exercises all day long, because I was so miserable that if I didn’t I was sure to get fired. [laughs] Working through the despair was a big part of my journey. Working through the despair of not having “made it” and having to learn how to love and value myself anyway, even though I hadn’t fully established myself in any kind of way that felt really meaningful or connected to me. And then it took me a long time.

My whole story really is about disconnection and abandonment. You know, the childhood story. And so the astrology came along and I kept refusing it and rejecting it, but it was the one thing that, when I started to get into it and write about it, was the one place I felt connected, and it never abandoned me. I had to learn how to not abandon myself and not abandon it. And the more I turned to it the more I felt this internal relationship with it. That was like a lifeline for me internally. It was like, there’s something here, there is energy here. I can keep putting energy into this, and it keeps feeding me.

So much of your business depends heavily on digital platforms. What is your relationship to social media and how do you avoid burnout?

Oof—I get so burnt out. I really do. So like, 90 percent of the time I’m posting something that I’ve created out of the need to create it, and probably 10 percent of the time I’m forcing something and posting it because I feel bad that I haven’t posted something. I’m not as consistent as, you know, I should be for business purposes. I don’t post every day, I don’t do all that stuff. But I do feel like it’s a creative outlet for me that’s kind of compulsive. I know that when I feel pain or when I feel my own kind of sorrow, the way that I feel back in control is to be creating something. That is where I find my agency and maybe it’s where I distract myself—which I don’t think is such a bad thing—but it is from a place of wanting to be able to do something about either how I feel or something that I’ve come to in therapy. [laughs] Like, oh, that thing! Yeah, how can I bring that in? How can I communicate it to people? Is it useful? Is it relevant? Do I make another fucking meme about something or should I just shut up?

Do you have any tendencies as an astrologer or writer that you find yourself actively fighting against?

As an astrologer, I’m always trying to understand what I’m not witnessing or how I’m not seeing the picture. As a writer I’m always trying to think: If this is a square and I turned it on a corner, it would be a different shape—how could I look at it from that additional angle? I really feel like I’m trying to learn how to be a better storyteller, how to point to things that are in support of what I’m trying to illuminate, like rabbis do. I’ve heard a lot of rabbis tell incredibly woven tales: they start with, “It happened on a Saturday,” and then they transition to something that happened in the world, and then they go into a cloud and it’s like, “Oh my god, how do they do that?”

How do you balance the day-to-day tasks of running a business while still giving yourself the necessary space for creativity? Do those two things feel separate or are they pretty intertwined at this point?

My god, that’s a lot of what I’m doing right now. We’re trying to create, again, habits. I’m trying to help Sonia help me help the people we’re working with. I’m not good at it and it’s been total chaos mode and just flying by the seat of our pants, trying to figure it out and fit it all in.

I’m at the space now where I have to block off creative time—it has to be just itself. And then I have to have time for meetings, for email, for all of the other business things that have to be separate from the creative time. Otherwise it’s too easy to let yourself be distracted by all the busyness of the day. I really have to quarantine my creative time. I’m really trying to carve that out in my everyday schedule, Monday to Friday.

Why did you decide to write a book?

I’ve thought about that many days. Why? [laughs] You know, publishers started reaching out to me in ways that made me feel like, “Okay, it sounds like a time to write a book.” I know that writing a book in terms of being a business legitimizes you in some way. And then I felt like there wasn’t a book for beginners to learn the core principles, to understand the meaning of your chart in a very fundamental way. There wasn’t a book I could point to that I didn’t feel was kind of problematic in some way—which is also fine, people can read around things, but I wanted to write my version of it, my kind of updated version. It’s the book I wanted people to read when I was teaching courses.

How do you define success in your work?

Success is feeling like I didn’t let panic or fear ruin my day. That I was able to be present and thoughtful, and that I was able to show up. That I was able to be in the day and creatively, thoughtfully responding and not reacting to what was happening. Because every day something chaotic happens and I need to be able to roll with it in a way that doesn’t tax the fuck out of my system.

How have you been doing that lately?

Well, I fail a lot and I talk about it with my wife and friends. If I fuck up with somebody then I make sure that I apologize right away, or change the behavior right away, or a combination of both. And then I’m trying to remember to breathe. Just take a couple of deep breaths and feel my seat in the manic-ness of everything. That’s the thing I think that helps me the most.

You’ve said in a previous interview: “I actually just write to please the muse I’m writing for or with.” Who is that muse, and do you ever write with a specific audience in mind?

I’m always writing for my people. You know, like I’m always thinking about those people who I don’t know yet or maybe never will, and those that I love and those that I respect and those whose work I know but might not know personally. I’m always having conversations in my head with the things that I’ve read during the day, or have read during my lifetime that have shaped me in some way. Those are all my muses.

And then there’s just an energetic presence when I’m writing that we’ve all experienced some version of. I’m trying to get in line with it. And when the sentence lands in the way it wants to, there’s an energy or lightning or something. My friend Barry Perlman describes it as a little ding-ding-ding. [laughs] Like, yes, you got that. You got the golf ball in the hole or whatever. It doesn’t happen all the time, but when it does, it feels so epic.