#to use in an argument to prove they are correct or more righteous

[the-greendalehumanbeings]

i just saw this post talking about how certain characters in this book series should have been poc (and like i completely agree, i would have loved it if they were) but their reasoning was basically bc these character stories were about war and suffering. i mean i’m paraphrasing slightly but ... seriously its wild how so many so called progressives act like there is somehow one universal poc experience that all of us understand or that our lives are just filled with nothing but war, pain and suffering. do people not understand how insulting that is. as if we do not feel the full spectrum of human emotions or experience things other than suffering. 

[mxtxfanatic]

Heyy ✨ hope you're having a good day. I wanted to ask:

What are your views on lan qiren and the so called "righteous" lan sect?

Their hypocrisy baffles me SO MUCH especially if we see the parallel drawn between the situations of madam lan and wwx. Without even knowing the full story or giving them a chance to explain their actions they just serve their judgement upon them. They spend their whole lives conforming to a set of strict rules but then go on and break those same rules (which they punish and berate others for) when it suits them .They go on about rules to not be prideful, to not be arrogant but ARE prideful borderline arrogant about the fact that they are righteous, that they are elegant, that they are the LAN sect . Again, They have rules for forbidding gossip and to not make assumptions but all the judgements they laid about wwx were based upon rumors. The RUMOURS they didn't even bother to check. Moreover, after the siege when they were all proved wrong, they (and all of the jianghu) just kept silent. They didn't even acknowledge their mistakes and wrongdoings. They didn't correct the false assumptions about the wen remnants. They kept on willfully being blind. They fucking portrayed the history with THEM being the beacons of justice and then have the AUDACITY, the NERVE to call themselves righteous, moral and good. I recently read a post comparing wwx and the lan righteous and I couldn't agree more with it.

I'm sorry I'm new to Tumblr idk how to attach it here (I think I was successful at adding a link). Basically it was drawing a parallel between Hindu religious texts like Bhagwadgeeta and Mahabharata with MDZS pertaining to morality and righteousness, and the parallel drawn between Lord Krishna and Wwx's character.

""  The lesson is - don’t do good deeds out of pride or with the desire to win God’s favor. Do it because being righteous is its own reward. That is the distinct difference between the Lan righteousness, which has become performative - done to preserve reputation and save face, and WWX’s righteousness, which is done simply because it is the right thing to do. The former is a slippery slope that can lead to mistakes and an unrighteous path. The latter is a difficult but ultimately the superior path."

Pheww... I'm sorry.😭 I got carried away and started ranting 😅 but it just makes me so MAD. it was so unfair what happened and the jianghu didn't got any punishment neither did they repent. I bet, post canon, even after the whole truth is out, they wouldn't treat my boy wwx as he deserves.

So coming back to the question what is your take about the lan sect and lan qiren?

Btw I love your blog 🥰especially your takes on MDZS. Your arguments and opinions are very concise and factual it leaves less to be desired.

This is a very long and engaging exchange I once had with @/ladyqueth on the topic, and with a few small changes to my view on Lan Xichen (I said he "isn't shown to have learned" by the end of the novel when I should have said he's still processing; the former makes it sound like he pulls a jc or lqr) and a caveat that there is validity to wangxian choosing to leave the Cloud Recesses to enter seclusion elsewhere and I just couldn't find it during that convo, this is pretty much how I still feel.

Idk who said it or if this would even apply to a translation of mdzs since I do not know the language breakdown, but someone once said that it was a mistake that cultivation sects/clans got translated as "righteous" instead of "orthodox," because "righteous" holds a connotation in English that doesn't necessarily carry through to what is meant when used to describe the clans/sect in cultivation cnovels. Can't say that you are a "righteous" cultivator in a world where it is perfectly acceptable and expected of you to kill someone on the street and steal their stuff just because they're weaker than you. That's like the opposite of righteousness as English speakers use the word lmao!

[beautifulpersonpeach]

Do we seriously think that other member fanbases have not posted about donations from China? The difference is that others have not had similar chart success as Jimin, especially in the US. I am not counting Seven here because how much ever the fandom wants to deny it, that song got everything a western artist song does, if not more. There is not much difference in their US streams for the same week considering Seven had double the versions and remixes. 16% of LC overall streams are coming from the US even after 5 months whereas it’s only 9% for Seven. We can see that Seven globally is being carried by asian countries where the number of Spotify users and the streams it is pulling is disproportionate. Even with all this BB is never going to call out Seven success because it has all the playlisting and radio which is what BB wants every artist to do. And who in this fandom is even ready to have this nuanced conversation. Because as soon as you point out all this you are immediately labelled an anti.

And so they were always going to make Jimin the scapegoat irrespective of anything. If not the fanbase funding then it would have been something else. But what I don’t understand is that you know all this and yet you threw shade at Jimin solos. There is this constant push by this fandom to portray Jimin solos as the worst. I’m not saying they are saints but all other member solos do the same shit and yet I see one being called out more than the other. And again if you point this out then you are labelled an anti. Because this fandom always throws Jimin under the bus to call out his solos. Anyways I know I am talking to the wall here because the standard response I see is that his solos are always victimising him or that you guys are in an echo chamber and we call out all solos. I am in enough OT7 spaces to know that is not true but no one would agree to this because then the question arises that maybe it has more to do with bias against Jimin than his solos.

***

You know, the best way to answer this is probably to pick this whole thing apart, line by line, to show for example where you’ve made fairly accurate observations but drawn the wrong conclusion, as solos and their diet versions and/or exiles typically do. Or to show where you’ve made observations that aren’t consistent with the facts as I know them but which also have carry-on effects to other observations you’ve made, and so on. That’s probably the best approach since I’m well aware these are the arguments and talking points in certain fandom spaces.

But we’ve been having this same conversation since March. It’s been six months of nonstop bullshit theories from PJMs, other solos, their enablers within ARMY, ARMY themselves, etc, and I’ve been writing about this the whole time as well, consistently repeating more or less the same things, noting the same misconceptions, reinforcing the same caution, etc, and now much of what I wrote turned out to be correct, but it seems to have entirely gone over your head in all that righteous indignation. I mean, just today, after reading an article like that, reading the ~5 posts I’ve pumped out on it only today, you still don’t get it. Your primary takeaway from this is that Jimin solos were singled out and shaded by me (and the fandom) and that this proves Jimin is possibly disproportionately hated by the fandom and we must all be hypocrites who don’t really care for him either way… You still can’t see beyond that singular point of view.

I’m tired lmao, and I really don’t see the point in continuing an exercise that’s already doomed to be futile if that ask is any indication. Since you already see this as you talking to a wall. I’m very comfortable with you thinking I’m a hypocrite or whatever else, and you having whatever conclusion you have about all this without me trying to persuade you. And anyway, like I said there’s no use crying over spilled milk. What’s done is done. Everyone who can glean whatever lessons they need to learn from this, will do that, and others won’t, which is probably why I’m nearly certain that when we have to do this all over again next year (or possibly later this year), we’ll have much of the same exact problems many of which will be caused by people who still don’t get it. I only hope at that point, that number will be fewer. That would make so much of our lives easier. If BigHit is actually efficient too and on the ball, then it would be even more so.

A couple more things:

1 - If you’re indeed staying in OT7 spaces Anon, then you’d know the focus has already shifted from all this BS, to preparing for PJM2 already, as well as the next releases (which of course currently take priority). PJM2 is what Jimin is focused on, and that’s what many of his fans/ARMY have shifted towards already - a shift that started in a few OT7 spaces since the third week of April after the screwed up Billboard changes, while most everyone else was coming up with every conspiracy theory in the book to explain how BigHit was secretly pulling the strings within Billboard to cause Billboard to shaft their own artist…

2 - A quick note I want to make on Western awards: By virtue of being a BTS member, Jimin’s chances were already slim. After that Billboard article they’re even slimmer, but he’s still got a chance. It might be an ice cube’s chance in hell, but it’s a chance nonetheless. And the hope I have is that he does get recognized.

Anyway, good luck Anon. You seem to be a bit familiar with my blog but I can’t say you’ve actually read my posts. Even if we clearly disagree I hope you’re working towards supporting his current and next releases, because that’s what I’m doing too. Anything else will make all of this entirely worthless.

[atypical-irritant]

I think it goes without saying, but the general concept and key points surrounding syscourse are idiotic. What else is new when you're talking about internet centere discourse, I know. Still, seeing it's effects on the greater plural community really get on my nerves. That anyone takes any of it seriously when arguments commonly subsist of demonizing the opposition and seeing who can scream their point loudest. If it doesn't start that way, it eventually devolves into it when one side runs out of rebuttals.

There is, of course, the fact that when you're talking about people having to defend their very existence against a group adamant that said existence is impossible or a threat to them, things are bound to get personal. I'll admit. It's the lack of self awareness that gets under my skin, especially from those more aggressively assured in their stance.

To be more specific, self proclaimed anti-endogenic systems who go out of their way to harass and discredit endogenic systems regardless of what they say, are a stain and detriment to the plural community. Coming from a group stigmatized, demonized, and outright denied to exist by society, even in the psychology field you so often site as the proof of your point, and to turn around and do the same to another is pathetic and shameful. The lack of perspective and refusal to attempt the slightest amount of nuance or self awareness makes us all look bad.

I'm aware many involved in these arguments are minors, so of course they resort to mockery and regurgitating topic points without much forethought. We, as a community, shouldn't turn a blind eye to this and especially not encouraging it. Those more mature or experienced should be setting an example, not passively ignoring things in an attempt to not make fighting worse. There is a difference between not adding fuel to the fire and being complacent with the damage its causing.

That is not to say all tension between endogenic and traumagenic systems is unfounded or irrelevant. For example, many things written for or by endogenic systems can be actively harmful for some traumagenic systems if applied, especially things more spiritual in nature, but no issue will ever be properly addressed if everyone is too busy having to justify their existence at every turn.

Projecting and misdirecting your pain at others stunts progress. Not to mention I've sat for years watching the same stale points being parroted like some righteous mantra.

No one is "wasting resources", the internet isn't a food bank.

There is more to psychology than a perpetually outdated textbook written by humans just as susceptible to bias and prejudice as you, perhaps even more.

If someone is mistaken about or can't remember how they came to be, it's not your right to forcibly correct them. It's arrogant to assume you know a stranger better than they do, not to mention egotistical given the context.

Demanding undeniable proof of someone's existence straight to their face is still one of the most asinine things I've ever heard. I still can't believe how common that is, do you all hear yourselves?! Not to mention it's scientifically impossible to prove a negative as even the most proven theories are still theories.

That's just to name a few, but you get the point. People existing in a similar way but by different means isn't the intrusion you think it is; traumagenic systems don't own the concept of having multiple people shoved in one mind. Watching so many act like they do in the name of "scientific fact" and "fighting misinformation", as if they aren't actively doing the exact opposite, is infuriating.

It was never about what's fact from faking; you just did what humans have done for centuries. You found something different you didn't understand and wanted it gone. That we put up with this as a fact of life within social plural spaces shows we've failed as a community.

As a disclaimer: I'm only referring to posts and arguments via posts within the community tags and other publically available formats. I'm aware "argument" is a light word when things often escalate to outright death threats, organized harassment groups, and other forms of blatant intimidation. When someone has taken an argument so far as to legitimately try and silence the opposition to that degree, the actual points were abandoned and things have become personal. Here, I'm only focused on the repercussions of segregating an entire community in a way that requires divulging sensitive and private information, like a trauma history, and the hypocrisy of those most vocal.

If there is anyone reading this who doesn't agree trying to push a stranger to suicide or otherwise put them in physical danger is going too far, regardless of their stance on internet plural discourse, then what I've written was likely wasted on you anyway.

[silver-wield]

uh the only two people I know who follow him is spike and stygian?? (Srry for the spelling). They actually do have a love & hate relationship with him.. it's actually really weird.... And it feels toxic.

With spike, I remember they mentioned that proving ken is wring is their favorite pastime or something. There's even a part where ken tells them off as condescending and righteous af. And then recently they're friends"friends" now? I recall spike even tweeting to you to talk to ken instead of SS his shit take. With stygian, uh well.. we already seen them take all sorts of shit and yet expecting change of heart from the other person. I do remember you call them out of it too and honestly I agree.

In general they both kinda get baited onto his neutral propaganda? Personally I only see him as a desperate fool. The ones I like seeing him interact with are people who are like " i dunno what to tell you man, just go write a letter to the management not me" vibes because ken likes to play with semantics to make him sound "smart" but I can see through him. He also occasionally agrees with cloti takes to make you convinced he's agreeing with you, but in reality his characterization of the mc is that he is a douchebag. I think he's actually very entertaining than cali. When they try so hard to pretend something they're not but they are so painfully obvious. You'd actually see right through his movements. He's like TLS. I also don't know if he played the game, I never recall him talking about lore, just shipping. That or occasionally saying tifa isn't vital as if he's part of the devs. But yeah, both of these clotis are into debates and stuff, personally, if you're really into debates, you should already know it's pointless because ltd is non existent by the moment nomura says aerith's parts were made for fan service since OG. I assume even now, because cut it off, and nothing changes, actually it only make the game clearer. Just like cutting off Jessie's parts are not important. And when I mean parts I mean most of with the mc. So yeah instead of into debates.. they're just argumentative. Wanting to win. Wanting to correct.

I sound like a stalk them and you huhu. But I used to try following all of you three on twitter so I can understand the fandom, but I ended up realizing it's actually wtvr. It's better if as a player, you hope the devs to do the job, instead of the fans to fix it anyway. And I do hope from what I'm hearing from you that they actually aren't holding back from showing canon and above all mercilessly killing that crackship that has plagued this IP. It's like some 🦠 🦟. Afterall there's nothing to gain from that, contrary to what others say. Only that those crackshippers feel entitled to something even when they are not and never will be. Demanding shit and making their lives all miserable. Anyway, I hope devs have the same integrity as that jp actor speaking so confidently without a miss of thought about FF7 and beyond all else, CloTi.

Yeah, he's just a manipulative toxic gaslighting clerith asshole and idky anybody listens to him. There's no such thing as a reasonable cleriths. They're all nuts.

More leaks are coming through and confirming what I've shared already, sooo yeah the devs have definitely had enough of their bullshit.

[bookoformon]

The Reigns of the Judges.

The Judges are "governors" or temporal statutes that channel spiritual life into the community through restricted or required behaviors. A Decree, like "Thou shalt not steal" is a spiritual precept backed by the generally accepted idea that theft is not ethical. The Decree prevents the lapse into an unethical channel.

A statute states it is forbidden and that is the end of story.

I believe the Judges represent the datasheets for the Temporal Jaredite Plates. They begin in Mosiah 29.

"Nevertheless, let us appoint judges, to judge this people according to our law; and we will newly arrange the affairs of this people, for we will appoint wise men to be judges, that will judge this people according to the commandments of God."

24 And now behold I say unto you, it is not expedient that such abominations should come upon you.

25 Therefore, choose you by the voice of this people, judges, that ye may be judged according to the laws which have been given you by our fathers, which are correct, and which were given them by the hand of the Lord.

26 Now it is not common that the voice of the people desireth anything contrary to that which is right; but it is common for the lesser part of the people to desire that which is not right; therefore this shall ye observe and make it your law—to do your business by the voice of the people.

27 And if the time comes that the voice of the people doth choose iniquity, then is the time that the judgments of God will come upon you; yea, then is the time he will visit you with great destruction even as he has hitherto visited this land.

28 And now if ye have judges, and they do not judge you according to the law which has been given, ye can cause that they may be judged of a higher judge.

29 If your higher judges do not judge righteous judgments, ye shall cause that a small number of your lower judges should be gathered together, and they shall judge your higher judges, according to the voice of the people.

Alma was the First Judge, whose reign began in 91 BC, "the small hill." The Large Hill of course is Sinai.

To date they are:

Year 1: 5382, the gab, "the building of the argument": Priestcraft is forbidden. This means arguments based on secular law alone are allowed in the court system. Alma 1:12, 35.

12 But Alma said unto him: Behold, this is the first time that priestcraft has been introduced among this people. And behold, thou art not only guilty of priestcraft, but hast endeavored to enforce it by the sword; and were priestcraft to be enforced among this people it would prove their entire destruction.

Year 5 sets the stage for the rest: Free will is a spiritual principal but it is also a temporal principal based on the rights of citizenship.

33 And it came to pass that by thus exercising the law upon them, every man suffering according to that which he had done, they became more still, and durst not commit any wickedness if it were known; therefore, there was much peace among the people of Nephi until the fifth year of the reign of the judges.

The Fifth Year of Judgement is when understanding of the precepts begins to solidify and one's discretion and one's freedom to decide on one's own can be taken for granted:

G‑d commands Moses that the fruit of the first three years of a newly-planted tree is forbidden for consumption; that the fruit of the fourth year should be brought to the holy city of Jerusalem and eaten there under conditions of ritual purity; and that beginning with the fifth year, the fruit is ours to do with as we please: pack those apples on a picnic, sell them in the marketplace, open an applesauce factory — it's up to you.

The strange thing here is the order. One would think that the proper sequence would be from the bottom up — forbidden, optional, holy. Instead, we go from one extreme to the other and then end up in the middle.

In truth, however, the fifth year is the loftiest of all. Here, in the domain of the optional, is where the most meaningful aspect of life is acted out. Here we not only determine what we will do, but also what the significance of our deed will be. 

So, we can go back to Eden, we can eat of the tree after we grow up and are willing to exchange the privilege for a few rites of citizenship. One being the willingness to refrain from murder, violence, corruption, all filth and act with swift justice when the safekeeping of others is at risk.

A post with every statute so far would exceed the character limit for this forum so I will note the addition of the others as we go forward. But Years 1 and 5 explain the mission of the Judges named in the Book of Mormon and that is a big discovery that will help us continue to translate the contents of the Jaredite Plates.

[songmingisthighs]

[20.50] wooyoung × reader ft. ateez

⇀ how do you win a stupid argument ?

⇁ buckle up, it's best friends!ateez y'all

It was supposed to be a fun night in.

All 8 boys were free of schedule and were beyond sick of their dorms so they decided, without telling you that they were having a sleepover at your apartment until they're sick of it or their manager came dragging them back to their dorm.

Everything was going smoothly at first.

Seonghwa and Hongjoong picked the movies obviously from your netflix which they had been leeching off of, Yunho, Mingi, and San brought snacks, Yeosang and Wooyoung brought drinks, and Jongho brought extra bedding for all of them to crash on.

You guys were 2 movies in before San began whining about needing to go to the toilet but not wanting to miss anything. Seriously, what could you possibly miss from twilight?

So you all decided to take a short break before continuing with your impromptu twilight saga movie marathon. As stupid as it is, you guys were actually enjoying it. Even Jongho.

"(Y/N), we're out of popcorn," Hongjoong called out, breaking your conversation with Mingi as he mindlessly drop the popcorn bowl on your lap, making you glare at him, "I'm not your errand girl, Hongjoong, make the popcorn yourself,"

"Sure, okay," surprisingly, he got up and grab the bowl from your lap. You thought he'd just go and make the popcorn himself, but before he walk to your kitchen, he stood by you while tilting his head, "you have the fire department's number on speed dial, right?"

You narrow your eyes at him, understanding what he meant.

Not really wanting to deal with a burnt down kitchen, you groaned, stood up, and grab the bowl from him, "you're lucky I'm such a nice person," you grumbled.

Hongjoong grinned widely at you, happy that you're abiding to his request.

"Aww, cheer up champ, you know I only ask you because you make the best popcorn," he then slung an arm around your shoulder, "come on, pancake! I'll watch, you cook!" He exclaimed while practically dragging you to the kitchen.

You both passed by San who had just finished his business in the toilet and see Wooyoung getting in.

As you made Hongjoong his popcorn, and the others debate which team they were on, Jacob or Edward, and whether it'd be more efficient to be a vampire or a wolf, but the debate was halted when a loud scream was heard from your bathroom.

You all halt all movements for a split second before rushing to the bathroom to see whether or not Wooyoung is okay. You told Hongjoong to stand by the popcorn as it is about to be done.

You bang the bathroom door 3 times before yelling, "Wooyoung? Wooyoung! Are you okay? What happened, what's wrong!?"

When no sound came from the other side, you were ready to run back to the living room, grab Jongho and told him to break your door open.

But thankfully Wooyoung opened the door before you were able to do anything else.

"Jesus Christ, Jung Wooyoung you scared the living shit out of-"

"Why did you put the tab of your toilet paper over?"

You furrowed your eyebrows at him, "I'm sorry, what?"

Wooyoung pointed at the toilet paper roll that hung on the dispenser by the toilet, "appology accepted, but answer me, why did you put the tab on the outside aka over ?"

"Appology accepte- what? Wooyoung are you okay? Did you hit your head?"

He sighed at you and crossed his arms, "I didn't hit my head, no, but you might have because why would you put your toilet paper in that position? THAT'S WRONG!"

Still not quite getting what his problem is, you just shook your head at him, "I just put it that way because that's how I always do it, what's the big deal?" You answered him before walking away to rejoin the others.

But Wooyoung still wasn't satisfied, "noooooo no no no no no, (Y/N), no," he caught up to you and grab both of your shoulders, "you need to repent, (Y/N), come back to the righteous path," he whined.

You tried shrugging his hands off of you but he kept a firm grip, even staring so deep into your eyes to the point that you kinda feel violated.

"Jung Wooyoung, it's just a toilet paper placement, what the heck is your issue with it?" You asked, starting to get irritated, "my issue is that it's not in the correct position!" "Yes, it is!" "No it's not!"

Finally noticing the commotion between you and Wooyoung, the others turned to you both, "wait, what's happening?" San asked, eyes blinking in confusion.

Wooyoung jab a finger to your shoulder, "little princess here put her toilet paper weird!" He shrieked, making you cringe at the sheer loudness of it, "I did not," you cut yourself off to push his jabbing finger off of you, "put it weird, YOU're the one who put your toilet paper weird,"

You don't know how but you've fallen into the argument. Maybe it's because of Wooyoung's persistence.

"There's nothing weird about putting the tab under! It's more efficient a-"

Before he could say more, Seonghwa had cut him off, "YOU're the one who put the toilet paper like that!?"

Blinking confusedly, Wooyoung just nod at his older member.

Seonghwa groaned and glared at him, "that's so unnatural! I had to reposition it so many times but it kept going back to the previous position, I even blame Hongjoong for that!"

Hongjoong, who was back on his position on the mat with a fresh bowl of popcorn scoffed, "told you it wasn't me, I'm whimsical, not a lunatic,"

"Wait, I don't get it," San piped in, "what toilet paper tab position are we talking about?"

Wooyoung ran back to your toilet to procure a toilet paper roll. He demonstrated which side is over and which side is under.

"Oh, pfft the correct side is under, of course," San said, which earned him a shove to the side by Yeosang, "no, the correct one is over," Yeosang said, which prompted a new debate between them, "why would it be over ? If you put it over then the toilet paper will be contaminated by the bathroom's germs!" "As opposed to the very clean toilet wall? Nice logic, San, where did you get it? The corner mini mart?" "Hey! They're the only one who sell that one chocolate milk from Japan, they're heroes!"

Wooyoung turned his attention back to you, "see? I got San on my side," to which you rolled your eyes and scoffed at him, "really? You're proud of that? I've got Kang Yeosang on my side, he's the one with the braincell," hearing that, made San snap his head towards you for a split second, "hey!" He exclaimed to which both you and Wooyoung ignored.

Jongho casually strolled in and plop himself next to Hongjoong, picking some popcorn from the bowl, "I don't get this stupid argument, why don't you guys just use regular facial tissue?"

That, brought a whole new argument to the table.

Hongjoong was the first to spoke up against him, "Jongho! It's called facial tissue!" Jongho only raised an eyebrow at that, "yeah? So?" "It's for faces! Not for butt wiping!" "Well, if that's the case then toilet paper isn't for butt wiping either!"

"Guys," Yunho called from the corridor, trying to get all of your attention.

But no one was listening to him, too immersed in the argument.

"No, no, see, if not for butt wiping, what would toilet paper be for?" Seonghwa asked Jongho.

Jongho shrugged, "I don't know? Toilet purposes? Wiping hands? It was Hongjoong hyung's logic," he defended himself.

"Guys," Yunho called once more.

Yeosang rolled his eyes at Jongho, "then the name should be hand tissue!" He exclaimed.

San piped in, "that doesn't make any sense? Why would you need tissues just for one specific thing? Things could have double function," Jongho clapped his hands at that, "see? Now that's logic!" "Really? So you agree that toilet paper tabs should be under?" "What? Heck no, over is the way"

Having had had enough of being ignored, and seeing that the argument is nowhere of being done, Yunho took a deep breath and yelled.

"GUYS!!!!!"

It proved to be effective as suddenly everyone was looking at him.

"Mingi got his head stuck on (Y/N)'s barred bedroom window" he said simply.

Hearing that, you immediately ran over to Mingi, Wooyoung following first, "God fucking damn it, Song Mingi! What the heck did you do!?" You yelled which was answered by muffles from your bedroom. Soon everyone followed to help their friend.

And with that, the toilet paper argument was long forgotten.

Or at least, for now.

[mariaiscrafting]

can i ask why you dislike dream? im not being passive agressive or something lol i am genuinely curious

S’all good, kinda figured you weren’t being, and a lot of people have asked me this lol. There are so many reasons, and I’ve said this so many times already, but I’ll try to go over some of the main things I can remember:

1) Arrogance: kinda put me off how he’s always responded to criticism. Always kinda had an air of superiority about shit, and it never really bothered me on its own because I think lots of CCs are arrogant & I’m arrogant myself, but combined with all of the following, it became a reason for me to dislike him lol

2) Manipulation of his audience: look, I kinda always knew that CCs with huge fanbases, especially CCs who grow this quickly, have some kind of grasp of how to treat and foster their audience to their greatest advantage. I’ve always been wary of CCs that put on soft or nice personalities, especially since the whole Shane Dawson debacle. But with Dream, it’s been a whole other thing ever since his cheating response video, and I’ve never been able to see him in a good light in regard to how he responds to his fans, ever since. I went into it in a lot more detail back when I first watched the video, the day it dropped, but I’m too exhausted to scrounge that post up, so I’ll summarize: that video had a very specific strategy that he used to victimize himself and appeal to his fans’ compassion for him, and after rewatching the video for the third time that day, it felt gross and calculated to me. The way that he focuses very little on the actual mathematical part of his argument. The way he frames the issue of the mods having favoritism or bias. It was already proven on Reddit and throughout Twitter that the numbers the mods looked at were for good reason, and not because they just wanted to pick the numbers that made Dream look the worst, but that’s how he framed the argument. When I logged onto Twitter and Tumblr that day, there were thousands of fans who had latched onto what he said in the latter half of that video and coming to Dream’s defense, and that’s kinda when it hit me: this guy fucking knows what he’s doing, and he’s doing it well, and I really really dislike it. There’s about a hundred other ways he manipulates his audience, including not coming to people’s defenses when huge chunks of his audience attack them (even though the people had respectful and correct criticisms of him), defending stans so adamantly in the face of antis, and posting periodic alt tweets that help garner the illusion that he super cares about his fans; but, that cheating response video was the major red flag, for me.

3) Cheating & lying: as is likely no surprise to y’all, I think Dream cheated lmao. At first, I was ecstatic that he had actually made a detailed response video and put out a report with the help of an actual professional, but as I read up on his supposed statistical argument and dissected the parts of his argument that felt off to me, I realized maybe he had cheated. Talking to some STEM major friends of mine, who weren’t into MCYT but had obviously heard about the whole debacle because they like Twitter and Minecraft, kinda put the nail in the coffin for me. I’m not nearly smart enough or have a good enough memory to detail exactly why I think he cheated on this blog, right now, in April, but essentially: his main argument relied upon claiming mod bias, instead of a sound mathematical or statistical argument; there’s no way of proving that the world files he provided to the mods and in the open source weren’t altered; the statistical problems he points out (i.e., stopping effect) don’t actually skew the original mods’ model nearly as much as his supposed PhD guy would say; and the odds he comes up with might not be nearly as impossible as 1 in 7 trillion, but they still come up to around 1 in 100 million, which is still fucking ridiculous, considering that there are only, like, 120 million people in the world who play Minecraft.  Not impossible, but laughable that he expects people to believe that. But... I guess they did, lmao. The thing that peeved me the most about the whole thing was the adamant lying lmao. When you look at the situation from the perspective of “dream cheated,” you realize just how fucked up all his Twitter responses, his adamance in streams and that video, and the general mood among his friends is... idk man, it’s just highly fucked.

4) Relationship with stans: look, there are significant numbers of  his fans that take part in Twitter cancelling vendettas, who spread around information about other CCs and their fellow fans that is false and meant to villify them, etc., and he never fucking says anything. It really, really bothers me. There are too many instances to enumerate, but a few that have caught my eye were when Dream stans would attack Techno, prior to their battle and when a Native American woman politely explained why he shouldn’t use Native music, he responded and said he wouldn’t, but tons of stans continued to attack her in her replies for “being so harsh/mean.” Like, he knows that just one word from him will make his fandom follow his beck and call. All it would’ve taken was one fucking word. There are so many fucking people that have been harrassed off of social media platforms because of the hivemind that is dttwt, for christ’s sake.

5) Reddit posts: All of the above were reasons for me to mildly dislike the guy prior to the Reddit posts, but they weren’t really enough to make me stop posting about c!Dream or reblogging fanart or reading DNF fics or watching Manhunts. I kinda just clowned on the guy, answered the occasional ask about the cheating thing or something related, and left it at that. The Reddit posts not only pissed me off for their content, but for the lying, as well. Do you think I fucking cared about him cheating at speedrunning Minecraft, of all games? Fuck no. What I cared about was the adamant lying that went into the whole debacle. Kinda the same with the Reddit posts. I’m one to usually forgive creators who acknowledge past errors, obviously. It is creators who try to brush stuff off, or even worse, create an elaborate lie to cover up allegations, that put me off a fuck ton. This is the reason I could never be comfortable with watching Pewdipie after I realized all the shit he had brushed off, and it’s now the reason I can’t go back to watching Dream. There is so much evidence that points to guilt, including but not limited to: his first move when the slideshow dropped (before posting to Twitter) being deleting as many old Discord messages as he could, the contradiction between him at first denying the account was his at all then changing the story to say he shared it with a friend, the wording and phrasing in the political posts being almost identical to the non-political posts that were clearly him (i.e., the one that explains his demographics perfectly), and the timing of the political posts (some of them being posted mere minutes after posts that were verifiably him, like the picture of Patches to the cats subreddit). People can claim that he’s likely changed, and what this it matter, as long as politics don’t affect his work now, but I can’t believe this fundamental misunderstanding of why bigotry in entertainment matters. I’ve always had a problem with the adoration this fandom has for cishet white men, and the constant criticism of non-cishet, non-white, non-men, but this really feels like the final slap in the fucking face. It’s like everyone truly believes that it doesn’t matter, that his beliefs couldn’t have possibly affected the way he’s treated fellow CCs in his circles or any of the number of people that depend upon Dream, directly and indirectly, for employment/CC clout. It’s like everyone truly believes that political ideology has no effect on the way we perceive, treat, and behave around other people in literally any field, not just politics. I, just... Christ. I don’t really wanna unpack my emotions about this whole thing right now, so I won’t. I’ll just say: I dislike Trump supporters and ex-Trump supporters alike, I dislike conservatives who claim they’re centrists (every fucking guy my age does this, it’s infuriating and makes me want to bash my head into the nearest wall), I dislike people who levy their fans against criticism - even when it’s righteous - and I dislike people who lie about their past actions; Dream fits all those categories, so I dislike him.

[emerald-amidst-gold]

1. What is one word to shut them up? 6. What is something that never fails to make them feel sick?

for Fane

Hello, friend! I see you come with questions, and I'm not going to lie, I had to think on them for a bit! But, that's what I love doing! >:3

Thank you so much for the ask! Time to delve into the morally grey dragon once again! >:D

1. What is one word to shut them up?

This question. This question. I, for the life of me, couldn't think of a single word that would immediately shut Fane up, even if he was in the throes of his rage. I can think of phrases, multiple words that would cut deep, but a singular word? Nope.

That is until I thought of Fane's past and his overall self-image. And the word that would immediately quiet Fane, would have all venom on his tongue dry up? That word would be: mistake.

If someone, especially someone close to him, would utter that word, Fane would disassociate in a heart beat.

So, let me add some context. Imagine if Fane was having an argument. With anyone, really. It would go something like this:

"You know what you are? Do you know what you are?"

"Go on. Tell me. What am I? What the fuck am I?!"

"A mistake. That's what you are; a mistake!"

A conversation like that, even with a complete stranger, would render Fane silent. Fane has a lot of issues with purpose, with where he fits in the world, with what his desires granted him. For the longest time, he one hundred percent believes he's a mistake, a sin. This ties into his draconic aspects, the whole, 'I can't want. No dragon can. But, that's exactly what I did and I don't know where that leaves me.', but it's primarily from his father's abuse and the clan's verbal abuse towards him.

Fane had five years of his father physically and mentally breaking him, uttering things like, 'If you don't do this, then you're useless.' or 'Prove your worth something, someone.' That source ended when Fane turned 20, but another source took its place, and he endured the clan's fear, vitriol, and disdain for another four years until he, Mhairi, and Cyfrin left the clan.

Negativity breeds negativity. Fane already had these thoughts in his head before the clan uttered them, even before his father uttered them. So, to hear another person, be it a stranger or a lover, say, 'You're a mistake.' would have Fane wishing he never made the wish to continue on. It takes a while, but steps are made to correct that thought process. Solas helps, Mhairi helps, the few people Fane grows close to in the Inner Circle helps, Cyfrin helps, and finding a purpose helps.

6. What is something that never fails to make them feel sick?

If we're talking from a physical standpoint, then magic. But, that's fairly obvious since I've mentioned it in writing and in questions. However, if we're talking from a moral standpoint? Then power, influence, and how it ends up being used to harm more than it's used to help.

Fane is by no means Mr. Righteous. He understands that sometimes certain decisions have to be made, that power has to be wielded at times, and he's not entirely afraid to be the hand to hold the sword. He doesn't relish wielding that sword though. Judgments at Skyhold always put him in a foul ass mood.

And that's because dragons already have a wellspring of power at their command and anymore can warp them beyond recognition. It's what happened before the Veil. Fane took in power, let his anger and vengeance and pride take over, and he fell because of it. He does still see it as a necessity, the harmony of order and chaos, but he tries not to let it wholly define him again.

To aid in curbing the calling of power, Fane has the attitude of 'Sacrifice the few to save the many'. It's something he and sister argue about, especially during Inquisition, because Fane doesn't generally go out of his way to assist people unless he sees the practicality in it. He'll aid refugees, soldiers under him, and close allies, but beyond that? He wants no sway over the masses. He doesn't care if Cassandra, Leliana, Mother Giselle or anyone says, 'You have to use the people's faith as a tool if nothing else.' To statements such as that, Fane scoffs, shakes his head, and entirely walks away before he either vomits or loses his cool. It reminds him of the Evanuris, of those that garnered the masses faith and used to them, enslaved them. Fane just sees it as the past repeating and he vowed to himself and to Solas that that would never happen again.

So, if someone is basically telling Fane that he 'has' to use the influence around him, that he 'has' to use the people for the 'greater good'? Yeah, no. He's more likely to spit in your face and call you pathetic than agree or meekly try to downplay.

[hypocrisyofandrewdobson]

A Four Part Post in Which Dobson Claims Men Hate Playing As Women in Video Games

Part Four: Dobson Posts a Bunch of Random Statistics to Prove He’s Right, When Almost All Prove Him Wrong.

Link to Part Three

We’ve officially reached the final part of this overall post, and the main reason I wanted to make this post in the first place. This will also probably be the longest of the four post, as I’ll be breaking down a lot of what Dobson says, so strap in for that.

So Dobson, despite already saying he was done arguing about it, decide to go on a self-righteous Twitter rant about why he was right and smarter than everyone else.

You can already tell how condescending and pretentious he being right out of the gate, can’t you? Anyway, let’s get started...

So 49% of games sampled had a playable female character? Those sound like pretty damn good odds, just saying.

This is such a hyper specific example that it ultimately says nothing. It’s be like if I said “I’m 2018, this one small town in this state had more men working there than women. Therefore, the entire country is sexist”. Same with the following but about paying for characters in an endless runner.

Dobson posted this in 2017. So he’s trying to use a video game study that was, at the time, 34 years old as a statement on modern gaming.

You’ll notice that only the last comment had an actual relation to “men only like to play men in video games” as well as that he’s stopped mentions specific percentages and studies, and is just saying things are facts without proof.

Also, these comments are so purposely vague that they don’t actually say anything. A random accusation of racism without citing any examples, a statement about how bodies are protrayed in video games that doesn’t say or explain anything, and a generic “games with women characters review butter but are played less” which once again is so vague and generic that it doesn’t actually say anything, because nothing has actually been said or proven.

And now comes where Dobson really shoots himself in the foot.

Once again, something that’s not sourced and has nothing to do with “gamers don’t like playing as women”

“60% of girls but only 39% of boys prefer to play a character of their own gender.” Now, correct me if I’m wrong, but if only 39% of boys want to play as a man, doesn’t that mean that 61% either wants to play as a woman or doesn’t care? And I’m pretty sure 61 is bigger than 39, so that would mean that it’s actually the minority that prefer to play as their own gender and not the majority. Isn’t math fun?

In fact, according to the stats Dobson posted, it’s actually the majority of female gamers that don’t want to play as a man, not the other way around. Funny how Dobson doesn’t seem to address that, but he’s too busy proving his own claims wrong.

“28% girls/20% boys choose a game based on the characters gender”. Again, if 20% do, that means 80% doesn’t. And 80 is larger than 20, therefore 20% is not the majority. Dobson is literally proving his own argument wrong while thinking he’s “schooling” everyone.

“16% of gamers think women are protrayed poorly, 26% disagree, and 34% say it depends”. This once again has nothing to do with the argument being made, “men hate playing as women”. In fact, this tweet indicates that the “gamers are sexist” mindset is a minority, which really just once again proves the opposite of what Dobson is claiming!

Dobson...literally everything you said either had nothing to do with what you were arguing or immediately proved the opposite. Yet he acted as if he just shamed everyone with his amazing logic. It’s actually kind of hilarious.

He then wraps up the long chain of tweets trying to imply men hate playing as women, even though two tweets before he said it was game companies who think that. He wants us to “look at the whole picture”, and going with the large amount of people pointing out how wrong he was, and the stats he himself posted, the whole picture still says he’s completely wrong. Mainly because he’s not nearly as smart or clever as he believes himself to be.

He then gets pissy about a joke before finally going to bed for the night.

He then went on to post this as soon as he woke up the next day, because even more people pointed out how wrong his “men hate playing as women in video games” argument was:

And it’s here I wonder if Dobson even understands how the Internet works, because he was essentially yelling at people for not reading through his entire Twitter timeline after they came across a tweet of him being stupid. To which I can only really respond with Dobson’s own words:

[dyalinohera]

An Open letter to Quippy.

Through the various relationships in my life, I have learned a lot about trauma through learning everything I could about various mental issues because the after-effects of my own personal trauma were preventing me from living life normally. I was lucky enough to have family members, be blood or found (or a little of both), who have always tried to help me and love me very much. 

Recently in my life, I lost a good friend to a misunderstanding during a PTSD episode and their partner took that opportunity to swoop in, gaslight myself and another good friend of mine. Before this moment, I only knew a few things about this partner. ONE. My friend.... Let's call them Q.... was not having sex with this person but they were in a romantic relationship. TWO. They sometimes had fights and Q admitted so to me. Three. About a week or so prior their partner admitted that they were being abusive towards Q in various ways. No details. 

After having been subjected to a gaslighting attempt, my other friend P actually crying, and then Q threatening to kill themselves... Well. I blocked them both and ran for the hills. I did have a private private server with Q and I could have reached out to them at a later date, but I could smell the badnews rolling off of F (the partner). 

About a month or so after this event I received a message from Q (on Christmas day like a wonderful puzzle to work over) and I discovered something horrible. Abuse victims will mirror the abuser's maladaptive control techniques and further become entrenched in the Abuser's guiles. 

Below is that message. I have removed any names pertaining to those whom I have dubbed 'P', 'Q', and 'F' from this message. Any text prefaced with ( and ends in ) are my own comments on what did and did not happen while pointing out each tactic used to try to scare, confuse, and manipulate me in some way. 

I am not a healthcare professional of any kind. I can’t diagnose disorders. I simply have learned how to identify abusive tactics from the counseling I have received for PTSD. 

And finally, before we break down this wonderful message, I would like to dedicate this to those who are being gaslighted right now and I pray this essay finds you somehow.

                                         Making It Clear That If Any Distress Comes To Any Other Parties Because Of This Message Then It Will Be Because You Dragged Them Into This. You Will Shoulder That Blame, Not Us. Remember How You Thought We Should Have More Control Over When And Where We Have A Crisis? Practice What You Tried To Preach With Your Reactions To This Message.

(This right here is an excellent show of blame-shifting, gaslighting, and emotional manipulation to throw their victim off and start questioning themselves.) 

To:[Redacted] [Also referred to as "recipient" or simply "you"— as the term will only be used to refer to the recipient for the purposes of this message. Only exception to this being quotes taken directly from the recipient's own messages.] From: [Redacted] [also referred to as "system" or "us/we" for the purposes of this message]

(This Legal jargon is used to make the sender feel more secure and righteous in their anger, which is very much from being scared, pulling power away from the intended recipient.)

This Notice Was Written After The Messages You Decided To Delete Before We Saw Them, Which Leaves Us Only To Assume That They Were Harassing In Nature. That Is Why This Message Is Being Sent. We Wish To State Our Intent In No Uncertain Terms In Order To Avoid Any Possible Misunderstandings. You Will Receive No Further Communication From The System Unless It Is In Order To Inform You Of Actions Being Taken Against You.

Due to the fact that you were intent on:

Blaming the system for being in crisis

Expecting a person/system who had been sent into crisis by an attack to be the one to carry full responsibility even when unaware of key information and still being actively attacked.

(I never did any of these things. What I did was say that a public chat server in discord with people who are emotionally sensitives, me included, was not the correct action and upon them threatening to take their own life, I was sent into a state of fear and reacted with aggression. Was this a smart thing for me to do? I have no idea but it was what I did.)

 Refusing to re-read the very exchange you were attacking the system over in order to see that the system had not been given the information you were insistent they had been given and were attacking them over.

“I am not text shuffling for exact proof. They made it clear that it was affecting them negatively.” "The moment they spoke up about internalizing the guilt is the moment it should of stopped." “[Redacted] said. That they felt it was their fault.” "They said they felt it was their fault."

(I had two chats going on with the poor P who was watching this System go into a severe PTSD episode and lash out at everything around them. I got confused in my panic HOWEVER I was correct in saying that this system was not right in going into that chat and doing that, not because it hurt someone else, though it is apart of it, but because it is a dangerous state to be in. Please note that the text Q is quoting is from my chat with F. Q is F’s mouthpiece now.)

Refusing to acknowledge that you were wrong even after discovering that the information you were attacking the system for ignoring was actually sent to your private messages, not the chat where the system could see said information.

“Okay. They didn’t say what I thought they did. That was in my DMs." "But. I am not gonna talk more of this.”

(Again. This is an attempt to gaslight and invalidate my views and what I did.)

Being a hypocrite by expecting the system to flawlessly read someone while in a blended and unstable state while you, yourself, still drunk dialed the system twice on 08/02/2020 after you had been explicitly told not to do so on 07/24/2020 due to the fact that being drunk dialed causes the system distress.

(I got drunk and sad. I am prone to doing this when upset and I am working on it. HOWEVER. I didn’t say anything on these calls. I only said hi and looked tired. After that, the system did not talk to me for quite some time afterward, but I gave them space and I never made this mistake again. People. If someone keeps bringing this sort of thing up when you have been trying, get away from them. This is a clear sign of abusive tactics. I’ll also go even further in saying that I didn’t even imply that is what SHOULD have happened. I said that was not right. I even told F that Q needed to go to a professional, they are at serious risk and needed help. All I got was excuses. In situations where someone is going through suicidal episodes you have to do everything in your power to get immediate help.) 

Ignoring the fact that both times the system was asked if they were okay they told you they weren't yet you still attacked them under false pretenses.

(I was confused and scared at the time due to ya know, someone I care for greatly threatening to kill themselves. SO. Idk)

 Acting like you have any idea just how far the system has come from the state they started in a decade and a half ago. You have neither room nor right to even dream of attempting to invalidate anyone's progress. Much less that of those who have survived what you never could have.

(I never did any such thing. I tried to empathize and place myself in their shoes to better understand their struggle because I know what it means to be different with different needs and so forth. I am a compassionate person.)

 Attempting to validate your stance after your argument fell apart by claiming you were thinking of leaving anyway. People do not get excited about an increase in activity from those they wish to distance from.

(There were various languages that the system was using that were bothering me but I didn’t say anything because I really cared for them. There was also was a revelation that their romantic partner was abusive and it was brought forth in the public chat. Please keep in mind I was mainly talking to their partner in the end and I decided that for my safety to leave and block both Q and F)

Doing all of this after misleading the system into believing that you were understanding of how difficult it could be for someone to live in a head with people who actively want to kill the body they're in.

(I am still understanding of it. My issue was and will always be the fact that there was a refusal to look at the problem, what they had done, step back, and get help. Because the only thing that was made clear by this message even being sent to me is that I made the right choice to block both Q and F.)

Proving that you need to stay the hell away from abuse survivors because abuse survivors have been blamed for the side effects of survival enough by people like you.

(I never ever blamed abuse survivors for their problems. The system’s abuse is valid, HOWEVER, these past abuses and the unique cognitive issues that come from that trauma does not exempt you from accountability from your actions in or out of high-stress phases. It is up to the individual to find and attempt to get better and stronger from these issues and find solutions that are unique to their situation.)

Any future attempt from the recipient to contact or otherwise interfere with [redacted] or any of said system's alters will be viewed as a hostile act w/ intent to cause further distress and/or harm. Any such attempts will also be viewed as harassment and shall be dealt with via whatever practical — and, when applicable, legal — means deemed necessary. Drunken episodes are not exempt from this and will also be treated as harassing contact. (<Oh my god they really are trying to hammer home I am some form of ‘evil’ just because I was sad and got on camera for a couple of seconds.) 

Just remember, we apologized to the one we inadvertently caused distress to. You were far too weak to be able to do so. We even left you unblocked following the incident to give you a chance but all you did was send us messages you obviously thought better of before they got to our machine. Thank you for confirming that we really will be better without you in our lives because we don't need people who can't face their own shortcomings involved with our system. If you cause any member of this system further distress — in any form — then we swear to you that we will use whatever tools we must to contend with you. 

(Again, more blame-shifting, bringing up that they apologized without addressing the times I have apologized for the various stupid things I did while dealing with amygdala hijacks and so forth. I’ve been in intense therapy for PTSD and underwent EMDR which entails going over trauma memories in hopes to desensitize the brain so that the fight and flight response isn’t triggered so often. AKA. I have literally gone over very traumatic events, in detail, while doing this therapy. I am an abuse survivor, but Q is very clearly still the victim of current abuse.) 

We only hope someone returns the favor to you when your depression is at its very worst.

The account this notice has been sent from will not be signed into again after sending this message on 12/25/2020. Any responses to this notice will go unrecognized.

(And the final last message shows how angry they are at me for leaving a group chat and blocking them. This is from a fear response. A lot of people think that Amygdala is responsible for aggression responses. However, it deals with fear. Aggression and anger is a response to fear. Thus, those who tend to use these abusive tactics are fundamentally scared of not being in control of you. PTSD episodes are called Amygdala Hijack and I am willing to bet Q sent this to me during one.)

Now. For the messages that I had deleted. 

It is hard for me to process my emotions. I tend to get bogged in how to say things in my head but when I try to speak or write it all comes out wrong. The original messages were wordy and confusing and… not very good. So here and now, on this space that you the reader walk on, I would like to formally give those messages to Q in simple and clear terms. 

Quippy, 

I love you. 

And I miss you. 

Please don’t die. 

[askaceattorney]

Dear askrikkaiandhyotei and Anonymous,

Absolutely!  Because for you, I know only Debeste will do.

Sorry, I couldn’t resist.

Sebastian Debeste is the sort of character who can be instantly recognized -- his proud smile, punctuation mark hairdo, Themis Legal Academy uniform, cape-like red coat, and conductor’s baton announce his presence before he has to say a word.

That doesn’t stop him from speaking, of course.

His manner of speech is another strong characteristic -- he loves to talk about himself proudly and dramatically.  If it was his life goal to be an actor, he’d be well on his way, but it turns out he’s an aspiring new prosecutor, well on his way to become “The Best”...or so he thinks.

This brings us to yet another outstanding trait -- his tendency to get even basic things wrong, from case information to simple idioms.

You’ve have to love the irony in that mistake, don’t you?

His authoritative-but-naive attitude is pretty adorable at first, plus it makes it easier for Edgeworth to win arguments against him.  His cockiness even opens the door for Edgeworth to continue investigating.

But it turns out he’s not in quite the same category as your run-of-the-mill Ace Attorney prosecutor (cocky, self-righteous, and demeaning).  No, the main reason for his behavior is that he wants to be seen as a culpable capable prosecutor by those around him -- his mentor, Justine, his fellow prosecutors, and of course, his dear old Pops.  Who wouldn’t have this as a career goal, especially as a rookie?

With that in mind, it’s not so fun to see him goof up at every other thing he tries to do.

...Okay, maybe a little.

Sure, it’s mostly his own negligence that’s to blame, but you definitely can’t blame him for a lack of enthusiasm.  Even sadder than this, though, is his main reason for wanting to be a prosecutor.

Now, there’s a good question.

It’d be one thing if his father, whom he reveres as both a parent and a career role model, were to point out his clumsiness, and perhaps offer some correction, the way Edgeworth often does with Gumshoe.  Instead, though, he publicly disdains him, even calling him an idiot.  Thankfully, this doesn’t do much to discourage him from trying his best (in fact, it gives him another reason to prove himself as a capable prosecutor), and he’s lucky enough to have someone like Justine to provide the encouragement his father denies him.

The real tragedy, however, occurs when he learns (as we do) the ugly truth behind his role model.

As often happens in the Ace Attorney series (and in real life), arriving at the truth isn’t always pleasant, as poor Sebastian learns during Edgeworth’s P.I.C. hearing.  Not surprisingly, the thought of his father and role model being a criminal turns his world upside down.

And as if hearing the truth about his father wasn’t bad enough, he also learns a few unpleasant things about himself.

One by one, Sebastian’s accolades become entirely worthless, and whatever efforts he made to earn them are instantly rendered meaningless.  Even if he were twice as old as he is, I wouldn’t blame him for what he does next.

Like a kid who just got bullied, he runs off crying.  At least it can’t get any worse than that, right?

Obviously, it can.

Soon after that ugly scene at the P.I.C. meeting, he finds himself caught up in another case, and in need of rescuing.  It’s comforting to know he isn’t the only Debeste who goofs up, but now it looks like he’s hit rock bottom, both in his profession and in his self-confidence.

This brings me to the part that, as I mentioned once before, is the one moment in the entire Ace Attorney series that made me cry.  I’ve never been so unfortunate as to be kidnapped or belittled by a parent, but like Sebastian, I know the sting of realizing you don’t know near as much about your field of study as you thought you did.  In fact, I honestly wondered what he could do at this point, or what I would do in his position.

Thankfully, as fate would have it, he has a wise and caring prosecutor there to pull him out from the ditch he’s fallen into.

Unlike one of Edgeworth’s usual Logic Chess sessions, where his only goal is to lure the truth out of someone, he also uses this one to help out an emotionally traumatized Sebastian.  In fact, it could easily be compared to one of Athena’s therapy sessions.

It’s sad enough to see a prosecutor cry, but now his tears are even more bitter (and frequent).  Luckily, Edgeworth’s strategy of waiting patiently for his opponent, or in this case his temporary pupil, gradually helps Sebastian come out of his shell and answer the questions he’s been left to figure out, the biggest one being...

While Edgeworth can’t give him experience, he does offer him some very helpful wisdom:

As the conversation goes on, Edgeworth helps him build up the courage to face the truth about his father, to begin living his own life, and to face the greatest trial of his career, so to speak.  Most importantly, though, he gives him a lesson his father never bothered to teach him:

And in one of the most beautiful checkmates there ever was, Edgeworth sets Sebastian up, not only to be a capable prosecutor, but to be a better one than his father.  Not to mention, he even helps him fix some of his malapropisms!  Have you ever considered being a career counselor on the side, Edgeworth?

So, where does Sebastian go from there?  He mostly disappears from the scene until Edgeworth and company’s final confrontation with Blaise and Patricia, where he somehow (i.e. through the magic of Ace Attorney timing) shows up with crucial evidence in the nick of time, similarly to what Franziska once did in one of Phoenix’s trials.  As soon as he walks in, he’s faced with his biggest fear -- his former role model.

Not to mention an angry prosecutor who took his place after he abandoned his post.

The Sebastian we’ve saw before would probably walk away with his tail between his legs, but the one we’re seeing now?

In the next moment, Sebastian demonstrates in his face, his words, and an aura of courage, just who he is now -- not the “sniveling child” his father expects him to be, but a man who’s ready to accept his responsibilities as a capable prosecutor.  Even Edgeworth didn’t see his transformation coming.

Discovering himself wasn’t the only thing Sebastian was doing, though.  While Edgeworth and the gang were busy with their own investigations, he was hastily searching the garbage dump for the evidence his father threw away.  His efforts to find it were fruitless, but he didn’t come up completely empty-handed.

It seems like a dead end at first, but with Edgeworth’s help, he converts a piece of garbage into the key to finally exposing Patricia and his father for the “stinking” criminals they are.  Naturally, facing and prosecuting his own father takes a little encouragement from Edgeworth...

...but he works up the courage not only to face the truth, but to say goodbye to the one person he’s depended on, in a bold yet bittersweet fashion.

Something like that really does require The Best kind of person.

So, when it comes to character development, something Ace Attorney does beautifully every time, Sebastian Debeste serves as a shining example of a transformation from a bold, naive child riding his father’s coattails to a man who, unlike Blaise, who believes being The Best means being heartless, pursues justice over personal gain.  By the end of his story, he’s still somewhat unsure of himself, but at least his ambitions are a bit more reasonable this time around.

And with people like Edgeworth, Justine, and Uncle Ray around to show him the way, he's more prepared than ever to achieving that dream.

And of course we can’t leave out his unique hairdo.  The question mark shape could be seen as a symbol of confusion or lack of knowledge, while the transition to an exclamation point when he learns something new symbolizes a moment of clarity.  Alternatively, the question mark could be seen as his curiosity for learning new things, while the exclamation point symbolizes the learning process.  In either case, Sebastian’s story illustrates an important life lesson for anyone -- namely, that you don’t have to be The Best in order to keep learning.

-The Co-Mod

[blackroseraven]

You know, you really don’t have to engage with bad-faith arguments. You can just ignore them or make fun of them for being dumb.

I do try and respond in good faith to most things on first blush, but it’s easy enough to pick out when someone doesn’t want to actually listen to you, they just want to be listened to. There’s hundreds of tropes that you get used to seeing and identifying, like “free speech” and “do your own research.” 

Free speech is incredibly important and the First Amendment is the first one for a reason: yes, yes, people say “but guns” and like I get why that’s so important to some people - and I’m not even being entirely mocking - but like, without freedom of speech, a free press, a right to assemble, the government just says “oh yeah we had to imprison Jerry for breaking the law” and like. No one’s going to know that Jerry wasn’t actually breaking the law. Oh sure, there’ll be rumors, but people like feeling safe and comfortable, and a lot more people will be happy reading and following the party line and believing that the government is only punishing the bad people rather than Jerry.

You might scoff at it but just look at how quickly people turn on someone that’s accused of a crime - especially crimes we find particularly repugnant as a society. Or in microcosm, how Jenny can show up with bruises and you know Peter’s always yelling at her but it’s probably nothing and she probably does something to deserve being yelled at, anyway, it’s not our business and we shouldn’t get involved, Jenny’s got friends to help her out anyway. “It’s not my problem.”

But freedom of speech doesn’t mean that telling you to shut up or why you’re wrong is censoring you. That’s answering speech with more speech. Likely, the First Amendment means the government doesn’t get to punish you for your speech; it doesn’t mean that you can’t get kicked off a platform for being an asshole. Unless you’re saying companies aren’t allowed to do whatever they want without government approval, that is, which is. You know. Communism or fascism or whatever today’s word de jour is.

A huge part of freedom of speech is the freedom other people have to respond to our speech - that’s “their” speech, it isn’t just a ME ONLY thing - and freedom of association means I can choose who I hang out with. Just because you really want to cling to me like a circa 2010 teenage girl to Justin Bieber doesn’t mean you can unless I allow you to. Telling you someone to “go away” doesn’t violate that. Blocking someone doesn’t violate that. Bragging about how “I never block anyone!” and “that snowflake blocked me” just makes you look desperate for attention and approval. I mean, if you don’t block, for example, a person who has made it their mission to send you goatse or worse every day, but you pride yourself in being sent that every single day, uh... what are you exactly getting out of that?

Actually maybe I don’t want to know, thanks.

Research is great; I write stuff, I research all the time. But research isn’t looking for an answer that suits you the most: research is asking a question, and looking for people with knowledge and expertise to assist you in finding an answer you can understand. Research is finding facts, not making an assertations and looking for pleasant lies that “prove” you correct.

We like to think of ourselves as logic-driven, but we’re often much more emotionally-driven and, in many unfortunate cases, “righteous” driven. Admiration or love for a person can make us overlook glaring character flaws. We develop particular worldviews that we absolutely do not like being challenged, and we assert that people we like or enjoy must be “like us,” and that means they can’t be cocaine-driven assholes, like James Woods. 

James Woods was a fantastic Hades and is a great actor. He’s also a lunatic and a monster who hounded an anonymous commenter dying of cancer who was rude to him online with pointless but expensive lawsuits until the day he died, where he then celebrated “killing” the person who was rude to him.

These days especially, there is a lot of money to be made, and attention to be had, by creating alternate facts for people. Grift is not always obvious, especially when you set in motion a more long-term goal: what if I just recognize there’s a willing audience out there if I create some comforting pablum about how nothing bad is going to happen to you if you contract a certain virus, and then I monetize these videos? What if I create an asshole character for myself to play who does nothing but make the right people angry, and then I announce a tour to places that don’t want me, and fundraise when “my tour was cancelled by those snowflakes?”

It’s not always grift, of course. People who are prone to believing in conspiracies tend to be people who want to impose order on a chaotic world, often as a defensive mechanism. Combine this with the internet and the human need for socialization and reassurance, and things like believing that school massacres are false flag events make more sense. It eliminates the chaos from the world, the fear of pain or injury from some random, uncontrollable event, and creates an easy narrative that’s far simpler to digest. No one actually died: they were all actors, paid for by a shadow cabal, an evil, powerful, but tangible villain. People explain this to each other and it develops a mythos of its own of “theories,” and now you have friends who “understand” and that you feel connected to.

Sure, at first the fact the Deep State is everywhere seems like it would be terrifying. But think of the comfort! The Deep State is responsible for all evil, and if you could just defeat it, no one would ever suffer again. You lost your job? The Deep State saw you getting too close to the truth and is trying to distract you. If it wasn’t for the Deep State, you’d be rich, successful, happy, and independent, and there would be no wars, no partisan divide, and everyone would work together in harmony.

In other words, there is chaos in the world because the Deep State creates it, which ironically makes the world safer and structured.

Understandable.

And in today’s day and age, where you can “do your own research,” you’re now a soldier in the war against the Deep State. You can grow your community and reach out to people to try and get them to understand, and fight the Deep State with you! It’s exciting, isn’t it? Being a hero without ever having to leave the safety and sanctity of your own home. The protagonist of your very own adventure in real life.

A bizarre combination of magical thinking and delusion.

Okay, I’ve rambled and gone a bit off topic.

But the point is, like, you don’t have to engage these arguments. You don’t have to engage with magical thinkers, with trolls, with the willfully-deluded or anyone who doesn’t actually want to listen to what you have to say and just wants to proselytize to you about how they are correct and you are not.

You don’t have to “save” them, “help” them, or “correct” them if they don’t actually want any of these things, and you don’t have to debate or argue with someone just because they scream “debate me!” at you or sealion their way into a conversation or they goad you. 

You can just ignore them or mock them or shrug. Online or, shockingly, offline as well. I mean, yes, I know. There are exceptions. People we can’t get away from, people we have to deal with or try and be nice to. That will eternally be a problem humanity will be faced with and it’s above my pay grade to solve.

But you don’t have to feel guilty or oblige strangers with more than a courtesy. Technically not even courtesy, but you know, I’m Canadian and all. And too many of us get dragged into pointless debates with people who thrive off abusing the social dynamics that are often trained into us from a young age.

The short version? People are dumb and often wrong. Save your time and effort for the people you actually value having in your life and who aren’t going to forget about you the moment they move on to their next target.

[fierykamuy]

Acknowledgment of Contradiction And The Use of Character Foils - The Eighth Genius

Note: that this analysis will also involve speculations to nail the point that it is centered on the character introduction and that this analysis also includes the opinions of not only me but other members of the community as well.

The first things first, let’s start with the definition of the terms that will be a subject matter in this text.

By nature, contradictions are the details that by themselves prove the wrong of a system that they inhabit, thus efforts are made to avoid them like a plague, as it is strongly believed that any combination of statements, ideas or features will crumble if it consists the inconsistent details – it is considered as an antonym of “confirmation” for a reason. They also tend to make perfect counter-arguments.

Ravages of Time argues that not only everything is consistent, but also from the point of view of the ones that are trying to assert the ideas, said ideas can be built on contradictions, can consist of contradictions, and said contradictions could be used to secure the system. It is still better to hide that fact from the masses to avoid the confusion

(Strangely enough, inconsistencies within the writing of RoT actually enhance its consistency)

A foil of a character, on the other hand, is a tool of the story-telling. It is certainly similar to the “contrast” in artworks, as it is supposed to highlight character trait by placing it near the opposite character train – common usage is the calm and pragmatic sidekick next to the hotheaded protagonist.

In idea, every character can foil any character in the story, so the key part of foiling is the interactions of the concrete personalities. In this analysis, I will explain as to how Ravages’ manages to connect the threads indirectly, through the organic mirroring of the circumstances and affiliations.

Let’s get started.

From the perspective of the governorship or leadership in general, “contradiction” and it’s acknowledgment was always one of the fundamental parts of The Ravages of Time – be it either Cao Cao’s campaign with the image of corruption, which was motivated by greed, for the greater good or selfless selfishness of Sun clan that was aimed at the fundament of the corruption that is the Han dynasty (ironically, against their contradictions) or Liu Bei’s fake image of a saint or even assassin Liu Da who seeks the comforting life through the court by going against himself to the point of forgetting it – everything is chained to the rulership, because that’s exactly what affects everything else.

Full embracement of this exact idea – considering how coherent and varied it is with many sides, even when it comes to religion and politicians *cough* LOGH *cough* – is what allowed RoT to stand out among any other war and political drama. And despite the dense story-telling that spans more than 500 chapters, its brilliance is still being polished by not only showcasing the usefulness of this theme, but also the criticism through its shortcoming, which results in the cycle of never-endlessness (and, arguably, the placement of RoT above any competitor, but that’s but a mere meta-talk):

there's the floating text in 372 that appears to praise the down-to-earth approach (associated with Guo Jia) of seeing humans as being more crow-like (with its positive and negative connotations, both nurturing toward their own and vicious toward targets) rather than dragon-like (with associated images of nobility and grandeur), offering the suggestion that perhaps the thing about humans is that they aspire so much (and as it's insinuated, cause so much trouble in the process) without realizing their station and limits and how such ambition and greed are nonetheless part of how they are in the world

now it's not made completely clear how this monologue is connected to Guo Jia's stances, but perhaps one way to establish the link would be to assume that if Guo Jia doesn't have a lofty view of humans, he could embrace the path of ruthlessly carrying out the reforms one insists on (never mind if others accept them or see them as virtuous), hoping for the best that perhaps at the end of the day things could work out (and someone could pick up the pieces the morning after once he's gone and this is where Xun Yu is supposed to come in, the comfort after the chaos)

what Zhuge Liang takes exception to is the notion that the comparison of humans to crows (even if it's a useful corrective to the boastful comparison of humans to dragons) somehow justifies the brutality of the process of pacification... thus the counter retort that people are people, crows are crows (of course this too assumes that Zhuge Liang knows better about what it means to be human)

and this brings us to the 'immovable and twisted rationality' that Zhuge Liang decries (even if he concedes that some sort of peace that is to say the peace of a pacified population desperate for anyone to impose clear order and guarantee safety can be founded on ruthless subjugation as historically attested in the rise of empires and regimes)

Guo Jia (and by extension, Jia Xu and Sima Yi and others like them) wouldn't mind exploiting and perpetuating that rationality so long as there is a convenient path to quelling the unrest (which they see partly as a result of greed and ambition that form part of the human condition) and putting in place some sort of reform to help manage the chaos

on the other hand, Zhuge Liang still believes that humans can be guided and governed by virtue, that loyalty discourse can be used not simply as a cynical method to prop up the ruling order, but as a moral principle that prevents needless bloodshed (yet he finds himself in the compromised position of having to wage bloody crusades but under a righteous banner)

This basically serves as a set-up to what will RoT shift into and who will be the main actor of the following arc. So, in the same way as Zhuge serving as a foil to Guo Jia, the Eighth Genius is being introduced in his arc and the Eighth will even get focused in the following arc. In the Red Cliff arc Eighth did exactly what Zhuge was doing prior to active participation – judging the conflict and “reporting the weather” – and yet he fails to predict the seventh (well, at least, he waited longer). This dynamic will be further established at the end of the Four Commanderies arc and as of now, we need to completely dissect 8th’s introduction, to have a deeper understanding of what will their discord stand for. All in all, each and every sentence uttered by his mouth is quite worth the attention.

at this point, Zhuge Liang outweighs the 8th in terms of reputation and narrative placement (not to mention that throughout the series, Zhuge Liang has been the one guy most in touch with the rest of his classmates on the sidelines and the one guy the other classmates either admire or dread or want to compete against), though the 8th's status as a shadow counterpart to Liaoyuan Huo (because of the Zhao Yun angle) makes him parallel Zhuge Liang (who in turn serves as the mirror collaborator/nemesis to Sima Yi) in one respect in that both have strange ties to the eponymous duo of Ravages

in addition, the 8th parallels Sima Min (in being the last and shadiest on the list of 8 illustrious names) and possibly the 8th eccentric (assuming this member shows up and fits the pattern), and in terms of outlook he can be compared to Yuan Fang

Another thing that we need to pay attention to in the Red Cliff arc, though, is Eighth’s interest in mind control (as we know, character introductions In RoT reveal a lot about the characters) – as Water Mirror says, to subdue the enemy without a fight is the strongest method of war, but the eighth insists that the method, that the evil cultists are so infamous for, is actually the most productive one (probably because avoiding the war merely keeps the people safe, but is not satisfying – it is not doing anything to enhance the condition of them, as it won’t save people from themselves), but even if one won’t give in to the temptation and derail from the bright path, these techniques are leaving everlasting negative effects on person’s mind.

So, if we were to speculate, the most likely theory is that the Eighth learned said methods, which ties to another theory of him being the renowned scholar named Zhang Song (that being said, I'd rather see Zhang Song as another character altogether (whether the 8th takes that alias later on or just cooperates with him/them since I'd rather see duplicated names than merged characters)), but let’s talk about later on.

But… why and when did he betray the expectations of his teacher? The first one is rather easy to guess. It is about his ideology of individualism – instead of waging meaningless wars with tons of unrecorded blood being spilled, which would also limit everyone else’s desires and freedom (represented by Fang-er), that comes from the natural craving to the anarchy of human nature, whenever it is caged in order, why not exploit and weaponized and control vices and viciousness of a person? Instead of forming a collective mindset, why not try to understand the mind of every single individual? Instead of relying on brainwashing through moral propaganda, why not have faith in inherent human selfishness?

Him being an assassin resonates to this idea very well, because he is doing everything on his own and is not commanding a mere group, collection of people. He is doing things alongside them, understands them, and is, in fact, closer to reality than other classmates. Sure, Zhuge, too, understands the nature of his surroundings, but he is still a man of principles and his viewpoint is stuck on that – growing colder to actually personal human interactions and yet he is the one who values a human life the most (this mirror’s to 8th’s apathy, despite him acknowledging the personal desires in an individual)

To be fair, he is more of an assassin than any other character with the same profession in this story, because he actually lacks identity as nobody knows who he is if he won’t reveal everything by himself and, funnily enough, he is free to hide his identity even if he were to choose a warlord (also, he does not really HAVE TO be devoted to any of them and choose as many he wants to choose for the sake of his plans, which would mirror 7th’s “devotion until death”) and he could attach to himself whichever identity he wishes. Lack of identity was fatal in the hands of Sun clan and lethal in the hands of Sima Yi, whereas they still had some kind of connections, so now imagine how peculiarly promising is 8th’s potential, who does not seem to have any attachments.

I may as well rightfully declare that his lack of identity has a gargantuan perk to counter the cynicism of history – Whatever he does will be judged by future generation’s own assessments, yes, but if 8th’s real identity remains unknown, no one will know to whom they are supposed to connect all of his actions that he committed with the identity of others, hence the perpetual inaccuracy of historical records. Akin to Yuan Fang, who is an original character of Ravages of Time (the difference being, that if Yuan Fang has an original identity, 8th can “grab” identities of actual historical figures and get away with it)

As the last student, of course, the similarity with the first student Yuan Fang (well, his “lord” was chosen instead of him, by being a son of Yuan Shao – that selfish romantic really had no chance to CHOOSE to live for himself with his loved one, huh?) is apparent. Aside of the fact that Fang was connected to the cultist, he was also trying to practice the art of survival, (which he did not manage to perfect, thanks to his daddy) and even being able to kill people by his own hands (as much of a prodigy as he is). But ironically, (which can also be considered as a contradiction) the simplest desires are the root for the grandest ambitions and at the end of the day, Fang proves this point of 8th that self-serving desires may even seduce someone to achieve grand visions, he is delving into the corruption, rather than taking care of “his” people individually. And, after all, 8th does not really resemble to romantics.

Well, it won’t be fair if I do not mention that Zhuge (by torturing people) and Zhou Yu (by being a sparring partner of Sun Ce)… and even Xun Yu (by slapping a wolfneck)… are more than capable of doing some things by their own hands.

So far we can feel free to say, that 8th is not being seduced by desires (take a shot every time the eighth contradicts himself and yet never stops making sense) and he is a quite unemotional human being, considering that after the death of his oath brother he did not really look affected, remained perfectly calm and rational – basically took a duel out of respect and Yun’s lack of stamina. You could argue that he had his mask on, so it would have been hard to notice his emotions, but he instantly gave orders of retreat after the death of “the lord” and it was also implied that he does not really connect well with others.

He wears the mask of a caring person, while Yun wears a mask of an uncaring person.

(Honorable mention of his ability to rapidly adapt to the situation – which should be coming naturally to a person who is a good judge of double meanings (pointed out by his hand signal first and then by “he discovered the secret of various books in the world”)

It is quite fascinating to see such a person to be aware of everything and be appealing. In some mediocre stories, he would have been extremely childish and overdramatized at it, lacking any kind of human decency. On the contrary, 8th respects his enemies, is quite affable, acknowledges the contradictions within the human nature and acts according to it, and does good deeds for others (“repair your shed”), even if not unconditionally – as he is a morally grey character, and not ham-fisted at that.

This brings us to another philosophical part of his views – the value. “Feel helpless all you want, it won’t do anything for you”, every individual has their own, but to attain said value they first need to realize what their defining uniqueness is by themselves, instead of relying on either someone else or heavens and then act on it, make use of it. They must make a choice whether they will be “childbearing” tools or… weapons. To me his reaction (or lack of thereof) to this line of his oath brother “undertake its duties when called to the office; retire otherwise” felt like he (oath brother) completely lost the value in his (8th) eyes, by not only being enslaved to the whore for naught all these years, but also clinging to the brother (when he could have just let the woman infiltrate Shu). This page here can also be easily interpreted as if someone should trade their own valuable people, but it can also mean that people should see the value in whatever they have, whether they be items or loved ones, and cherish them.

So, in short, you do not need to imagine yourself (self-delusion) as a god-emperor to give yourself the value and be content to live.

Above we discussed how 8th is encouraging and guiding others towards seeking the value in themselves, but that is not quite all, is it now. Sure, you find value in yourself and the people around you, but the said value needs to be defined by something. To apply 8th’s standards, the more benefit is from someone, the more is his or her value. And even if she was merely being traded for a lovesick man, she still had some value in her.

He is acting as if he does not view people as objects, Yun is acting as if he does not view her as a loved one (material value against the emotional value)

Infiltration of Shu is quite obvious with all of these details and that freely be interpreted as if 8th is focused on Shu, but we could also take it as a hint that he has tried and may still be trying to plant some moles in other factions as well.

In addition, he usually talks whatever is necessary without much care to his actual intent, which not only results in an interest rabbit hole but is also a very intriguing character trait and a means of manipulation. Reason for that being the fact, that most of what he is saying is actually… true. Yes, his words are self-serving. Yes, his words do not reveal what his actual motives are. Yes, he is purposely aiming at your most vulnerable topic. But he is the only one telling you the truth about yourself and he is the only one giving you the freedom of choice towards what you crave.

The beauty of the 8th Genius' dialogue with Zhao Yun to me is that, despite all of his words being self-serving, they were probably the most honest words Zhao Yun had ever heard. Even Liu Bei or Sima Yi never mention the fact that Zhao Yun has essentially been a slave all these years, who has given up on his happiness to fulfill the wishes of others. And yet here comes this unknown man who manages to get to the very depth of Zhao Yun's character in a mere couple words. And to make it even more beautiful, Zhao Yun faces these words that cut him to the core head-on, and not only acknowledges them but in the face of these truths and in the face of a final chance at his own happiness, he chooses again to remain a slave for the sake of someone else's desires. And that's what makes the 8th Genius so enticing to me. If he can get to the bottom of such an enigmatic character like Zhao Yun in his very first appearance, I can only imagine what he'll do later on.

Though I have to note that the 8th isn't the only one to have confronted Liaoyuan Huo with a dilemma... Zhang Lei sort of did that in 293, Liu Da offered something similar in 384 (the difference I suppose is that whereas they challenged Huo to choose between 2 masters, the offer of the 8th, even though less genuine, is for Huo to choose between serving a master or walking away)

in another note, it's important to stress that if warmongering is the problem (especially if we consider that what usually happens when regimes wage war as a distinct form of mass conflict unlike popular uprisings and insurgencies is that pacified populations are coerced or cajoled into expending their labor and lives to feed machines of organized violence that mainly benefit a select few) it's not a matter of who wins or loses since the game itself is rotten regardless of goals and intentions

Alas, one other issue is that many cut ambitious conquerors (especially if they exhibit charisma and are on the winning side) some slack, while those motivated by ideology or principle (especially if they're losing) are selectively denounced as zealots for trying to push a program

And yet who doesn't like heroic tales…

That’s how the 8th stands out among his classmates mainly in terms of how his rhetoric focuses not so much on principles and ambitions (even Zhou Yu's attachment to the Sun clan involves sticking by some notion of continuity), but simple and personal desires and choices – which fits the narrative of the Four Commanderies and analogically makes it stand out among the other arcs. It is an arc, which highlights the how empty is the shell of people, who are getting defiled by their own egos or thorny roses, beneath the surface of their facade and how some of them stop, start listening to the voice of reason and thus develop into respectable men while maintaining their individuality. The unconventional part that elevates this arc into being a masterpiece is the fact that even protagonists may have a facade and in overall, not every facade is shallow or/and they do not serve solely the corruption.

Sure, I talk a lot about the comparison with Zhuge, but these details were brought from this exact arc that is not even focused Zhuge, but aside of masterfully crafted indirect hints, Four Commanderies put on a table way more than just that. The obvious one being the personal conflict with Zhao Yun, which I already mentioned:

There 8th “asked” Yun to choose what’s his actual happiness, his own life or someone else’s path (that is burdened with failure) – little did 8th know that from Yun’s perspective it did not really matter what he would have chosen, because of how both of these choices are important for Yun as a person, how both of them are what he is craving for and how both of them are going to enslave. And he can’t even choose to not choose, because he would be going against himself in ANY case. As cold-blooded as he is, Zhao Yun got numb by making the best possible choice – “Three days. More than enough”. Truly, 8th failed at psychological warfare (and even if had an upper-hand in a duel, it did not really matter), but admitted that Yun made a right choice, without explaining himself – I think the existence of Zhao Tong made the choice correct. When a father and a son met, both of them found their “pieces of jade ornament that can be traded for cities” (note how Yun compared his son to Sun Ce – that was rather delightful for Tong, considering that no one was taking him seriously whenever he was comparing himself to Sun Ce). That was quite well symbolized by the lively tree near Yun. Usually, whenever a life-changing event happens in his life, he is near a dead tree.

After all, Zhao Yun is already used to selling.

So many lives that he cared about are no more, what’s one more.

(And if I were to fanboy over him more – “Huo” did not really return after the warrior’s duel (named as “a path of no return”))

Briefly to come back to Zhuge, the one who basically pulls some strings behind Yun – when 8th mentioned the facade of the “greater good”, I was suddenly reminded of a saying by melancholy 7th about “benevolent realists” when he was talking about how people like to shield themselves with “FOR THE GREATER GOOD”, while in actuality they are masked egomaniacs. But if Zhuge says that people use “greater good” as a mere excuse (as he always dislikes the certain type of people), 8th remarks that these self-proclaimed paragons of virtue (such as 7th) are merely deluding themselves and the concept of “greater good” does not even exist.

In short, lying to others that you are a savior vs. lying to yourself that you are a savior

If you think that the introduction of this character is already great enough, you need to get prepared, because the revelation, that completely recontextualizes these events into something even more meaningful and profound, is yet to come.

When Yun remembered the bits of 8th’s backstory from his memory, 8th pointed his finger to the sky, a call-back to that scene when Huo was named as Zhao Yun and that, as far as we know, cemented him as the perfect foil to Zhao Yun and now demands from us to re-analyze this precious arc of his as the mirrored life of Liaoyuan Huo from two respective points of view. Considering the fact that Ravages of Time is exploring the history and human condition as a theme, then it won’t really be a surprise if I would define “mirrored life” as if they were the alternative versions of how would Huo’s life continue if he were to choose different paths of life.

1) Zhao Fan’s case is rather easy to elaborate on. He represents the “pretentiousness” (by compensating his lack of masculinity and love from his loved one, through the pretense of just babbling hollow words (merely citing others), as he is not capable of doing anything else) against the “reality” of Zhao Yun (less talk, more action attitude of his and plus the playfulness that is hiding the coldblooded nature beneath the surface).

That pretentiousness would define Zhao Yun as well if he was not so hardened by the high amount of struggle he lived through and later be polished by Liu Bei. Huo would have been in his place if he were to come to his loved one instead of Xiao Meng. But that would come with its own negative consequence, as he would not have been loved.

2) 8th’s case is a bit complicated. They do share the path, but with the polar opposite approach. “Sharing the path” is amusing on its own right, though. Huo took the name “Zhao Yun” and will get recorded in history with someone else’s name, but the guy who was born with the name “Zhao Yun” won’t be recorded in history with his own name as well. Still, his name will exist in history, but it is going to be a guy, who’s completely different from the original Zhao Yun. Talk about an identity crisis.

“observing the passing of time and waiting for its coming, cannot compare to dealing with time and making use of it” – This throws us back in time, as far as the early chapters go, when Yun had an internal monologue about waiting for someone who would change and save the world. Around that time, 8th was persuading Huo’s loved one about how meaningless it is to just wait for something. Perhaps Huo would have undergone 8th’s path if he were to study as a genius to save the world instead of waiting for someone else to do it, but at the end of the day, he managed to understand where he belongs to.

Huo was waiting because he did not see himself as someone who could really make a difference in the world (“if martial arts would have made a difference, then the key positions in the world would already be dominated by various schools”). Meaning, that only “grander” things affect the world (such as Jesus and Dragon). but 8th begs to differ, with an argument that the delusions of grandeur should be broken for people and that even “books”, as tiny as they are, can affect the masses (for example, how Sun clan was hiding the true Art of War for themselves)

“what we need to learn now is observation and patience” – still paid off in Huo’s case and so it did for another Yun as well, as he was busy all these years, observing not only the human nature but the hidden meanings and uses of certain things, such as the literature as a tool of lying (“you won’t understand history without knowing how to lie”). This also foils how Zhuge was “waiting” and cultivating the illusions about Liu Bei for all these eleven years.

It is quite ironic and contradictory when 8th is talking about how important it is to know “where one stands” and yet he lacks identity and that helps him to stand (“infiltrate”) in any faction, at the same time. But us not knowing the identity of 8th further empowers my approach. Matches well with Huo trying to suppress his emotions and forget himself, thus becoming numb and losing his identity, as he won’t even get credit for his heroic deeds.

Basically Zhao brothers can be seen as the Yun’s identity crisis, a conflict between his duality of nature (Fan – wanting a normal life with his loved one. 8th – wanting to go with Liu Bei). And Huo killed Fan by his own hand, so killing the “longing for a personal happiness” also took a life of his loved one at the same time, by 8th mirroring his hand.

(8th casually hinting that both of them are named Zhao Yun)

The point of mirrored life is that he was always suffering, is currently suffering, will continue suffering, and would have suffered even if he were to make different life-changing choices in the past. But he will continue to live and will carry all the weight, as he already accepted it. It is as realistic as it gets – no matter what you are going to choose, the history is going to fix itself.

As to how similar 8th is to Liu Bei, we can talk about that right now. Meanwhile, 8th was judging the character of an assassin, Liu Bei was also being busy by judging the character of another Zhao and that, you guessed it, allows US to judge 8th as the mirror of our Chinese Jesus as well. To begin with, it is implied that both of them have two oath brothers so that comparison is not really far-fetched.

On the surface, both of them are good at judging the characters and while they are at that, none of them are using their real identities, but the substantial difference between them is that – Liu Bei is using the identity of being the cult of a personality, while 8th is not using any identity at all; Liu Bei is giving away a sincere brotherly love, thus gaining help from them on their own accord and that is something 8th is alien to (Zhao Fan was enslaved to his desire, rather than the aspiration of his brotherhood).

Now it should be noted that even if Liu Bei is getting a warm love and help from his oath brothers is a good thing, of course, Chen Mou has not forgotten that even such kind and heartfelt intent/actions can be harmful to the lofty aspirations. I also daresay that there is a great potential of showing the enormous flaws behind saving the world as a cult of a personality.

The first is directly connected to the relationship between the “savior” and the masses – there will be a part of people, who will have an urge to completely become reliant to the “shelter” that was provided to them and not only lose the sense of individuality in the process, but also get so soft in the process that they won’t be able to stand on their own again so easily.

The second problem comes exactly from that and both of these could be depicted in RoT through Liu Shan’s character arc – for the world to be shaped as in the eyes’ of Liu Bei, he has to alienate himself from the garden of earthly delights and the human beings themselves, thus he himself will become a tool, who will only be able to care about his comrades-in-arm. After all, he values them more than his own son.

Right in the queue is standing a dragon (aka, not human) Zhuge Liang, who will also drag Liu Bei’s son to the moon. Moon of course represents the principles of Zhuge Liang and he is going to nail them in Liu Shan’s mind so much, that there will be no one to take the child on earthly adventures to gain necessary experience about the reality and human interactions. After all, Liu Shan is neglected to the point of being used in schemes even as a child. Although the role of Sun Shu in this ordeal is still a mystery.

One thing is clear – without Sun Shu, Liu Shan is going to become an anti-thesis of 8th’s ideology.

To have a clear idea and understanding of what I am talking about, you could always watch that Ghibli movie named “The Tale of the Princess Kaguya”. The Emperor there is so out of touch, he is not even aware that he should not touch women without their consent.

8th’s ideology won’t result in such degradation, but Liu Bei has his own arguments against that world-view. If 8th blames people for having the delusions of their own grandeur, Liu Bei says that people have delusions not about their own selves, but about the world itself, as to how it is “structured”. So, people are not defiled, they are just following the wrong path and guidance could fix that. Zhao Tong depicted as someone who is not being as educated and well-read as Liu Bei further nails the point.

(Thanks to the translator Merc, who told us that this idea was conveyed through the wordplay that was lost in translation)

Surely, they won’t settle about the definition of the right path so easily. If 8th thinks that people should start valuing whatever they have and whatever they are able to do. Basically, the idea of saving the world won’t ever be fulfilled, because the world will only be saved after people save themselves – Liu Bei answers that one does not have to choose necessarily a mediocrity (in 8th’s case, broken people that he chose, such as Xiao Fan) and give it a value, just because the world in their eyes is ruined. Basically, gems still can be found in every corner, but they won’t polish themselves, so the world is still worth saving and could be saved if only we showcase what they can value.

In short, 8th thinks that everyone could have their own things to find value in, but Liu Bei wants to create one general “shelter” that everyone will find value and solution in (and our boy Huo got both)

What makes the feud between 8th and the Shu compelling could be summarized in two features

1) When Cao camp is full of elite soldiers who were trained for what they are doing and Sun clan is fully family oriented and thus chains the family members, Liu camp is full of opportunistic individuals that choose their path on their own. On face value, 8th should be quite fond of them, but divergence comes when the said individuals view someone else’s path as something grand and enslave themselves, forgetting to why even they want a better world and are sacrificing themselves just for someone else. Despite that, they still remain as somewhat respectable in the 8th’s eyes.

2) The inherent duality of men, as both of these approaches find their justification within the human nature and, at the same time, it also serves as a counter-argument to each other – in times of order, people are going to seek disorder and in times of disorder, people are going to seek disorder, hence comes the pivotal point in the dynamic between 8th and 7th – If one wants to make use of human’s longing for peace through crafting the fake cult of personality, which will achieve stalemate and turn into status quo, another one wants to make use of human’s craving for desire through the dispersion of their delusions of grandeur first, by which people would lose interest in waging meaningless wars over meaningless lands and reputations.

After all, “winner takes all” is but a surface level aspect of how Ravages of Time deals with its roots - Poetic tragedies, with proper emotional baggage to convey the horrors of war and an exploration of the inevitability of history and the meaninglessness of our struggles when confronted with it.

Of course, we are not finished here, because aside from Shu, 8th has enough potential to foil Sima clan as well.

Let us start with Sima Yi himself. I'd argue both are exceptional men from powerful clans destroyed by forces beyond their control. Sima Yi being set up by Pang Tong and Sima's destruction changing him irreparably into a darker man. Like Hamlet the main driving force of the story is his revenge and just like Hamlet his actions unknowingly cause a similar tragedy to his own occurring. Sima Yis actions destroyed the Zhao Clam just like Pang Tong eventually destroyed the Sima as a scapegoat. Both attempt to gain revenge and return their clan to greatness. Yet while Sima Yi joins a future kingdom the eight opposes one and fails with his oath brother being forfeit. The irony being that Sima Yis entire life changed by one tragedy yet he doomed another man like him to the same fate unwittingly at the very start of the series. One was Zhao Yuns best friend while the other is arguably his most dangerous enemy now. I think there's a surprising amount of similarities and parallels between the two even this early. Oh, and both killed a woman Zhao Yun loved. Sima Yi by inaction and the eight in a moment of direct revenge. I'm perhaps not articulating this the best but the aptest dramatic comparison I can think of is he's the Leartes to Sima Yis Hamlet. Whether they will end up having the same conclusion as those two characters is up in the air though.

And meanwhile, 8th was concluding his not-so-grand spectacle, another member of Sima clan was introduced in the story – Sima Min, who is also an eighth member, rather polite and even was detached from other seven for quite a while and are considering as some kind of anomalies. After a line “seven out of the eighth aim high. One sticks to the low road”, even comes a hat of the 8th, whom we, in fact, described as someone who stands out by sticking to the low road. If I were to speculate, Min is going to be the one defending his own brothers, but 8th is going to be the one attacking his own brothers.

Both of them also serve as the premises for the next arc, even if they are not participated much in it, as of now: “Breaking the tradition” and the lies behind the books about warfare.

Now let’s come back to the long-postponed theory-crafting of mine. 

-In the 468th chapter was revealed a dungeon that was used for torturing people. It belonged to the 8th who was gathering information about the routes of Shu. Then in 483 was revealed that Zhuge Liang had the exact same dungeon.

-In the 480th chapter on the other hand was revealed that Zhang Song was brought a fake map and thus Zhuge, who thought that Song was aiding Cao Cao, set a trap for him. There was someone special near Liu Zhang who was manipulating the information as if Liu Zhang was incompetent. That was a trap for Shu.

-Now in 483th Zhuge started a discussion about Zhang Song and 8th at the same time. After all, in the 468th chapter was also found a map, which was most likely made by the 8th. Key point was, that both of them were made in the same style, thus were made by the same person. The difference was, that the map made for Shu was fake, and the map made for 8th – was legitimate.

-At the start of the 483 chapter, Zhuge mentions how hard it is to track 8th and unless he announces his name, no one will know and yet, as a result of what was mentioned above, Zhuge deduced that 8th indeed graduated. Meaning, he has actively participated in the ravages of time already.

-In 483 Zhuge also did deduce that this man was merely “named” as Zhang Song. Meaning, his actual name is different. Now, how did 8th managed to convince him to not reveal that even after the torture session is a mystery. I can only think of “eccentric magic” (which I think is exactly what 8th needs for his plans, but it is also something that he wants the least) or heavy psychological pressure (considering that one guy with the damaged psyche in his chamber, chapter 468)

-Even more interesting came into the play after several chapters. It was revealed that there is another Zhang Song, who was aiding Ma Chao (who was also getting help from the Sun clan) and whose face was not revealed suspiciously. Why would there be several people with the same name? That’s rather CLOUDED (excuse the pun). One thing is certain, 8th is behind Song tricks, whether he is the one using that name, is actually named that or is cooperating with original Zhang Song – is another mystery. Zhuge did ruin his plans AGAIN (was it the third time?), but he still is cultivating his influence.

To conclude the analysis, let’s get back to the titular topic with a little hierarchy.

On the first level, there are stories with a black and white morality. Usually, black side is cartoony cynical, with no redeeming qualities and white side is cartoony idealistic, with irrelevant flaws (being hot-blooded and etc) – and the Ravages of Time even features such “stories” in deceptive schemes and labels them as “propaganda” (social commentary)

These “black” sides sometimes tend to be “justified” as if they were realistic (for example, for some reason, it is ok to have such characters if the setting is in the middle ages). Such explanations completely ignore the fact that no fiction is realistic and that every “realistic” being has redeeming qualities.

On the second level, there are stories with seemingly grey morality, through the presentation we do not actually see this moral ambiguity, so the presentation falls apart just because the characters’ words (what is talked) and actions (what is shown) contradict each other so much, that story does not seem self-aware anymore – a prime example would be a good guy, who wants to achieve a stalemate, but his actions tell otherwise and no one is actually calling him out on that hypocrisy. Also, everyone he faces is clearly inferior to him from a moral stand-point.

In such stories “black” sides may even have characters that were abused and victimized in childhood and now they are apparently pointing out the flaws in the system by blatantly indulging themselves in atrocities (for some reason). This is not only a cheap emotional manipulation but completely superficial and immature, as they are whining about the system by being worse than it and do not offer any solution to fix the system or a better alternative – they are merely amazed by the fact, that the world is imperfect and cannot accept it.

On the third level, there are stories with seemingly grey morality, but now they are doing the opposite. Characters constantly talk about the loss of humanity for the greater good, but they never commit to it and even if they were to do some questionable things (that most likely are glorified), they would still whine how bad the “greater good” is, despite not finding (or even trying to find) any better alternative. Here lies a huge contradiction in the presentation – It is preachy propaganda of “necessary evil” and, at the same time, does not want to acknowledge it, thus the story has a hypocritical point.

In such stories, “black” sides tend to be THE flaws of the system, with no redeeming qualities. They will be one-dimensionally incompetent and just abuse their power just for the main characters to have an excuse to commit “necessary evil”. In such cases, people tend to close their eyes on them being one-dimensional “as soon as they fir the narrative”. Such readers/watchers forget why it’s relevant for characters to not be one-dimensional – it is not realistic, considering you can be a flaw in a system and still have positive dynamics to something/someone else. It also lacks artistry, considering how crystal clear will the stance of the author is going to be by implementing such cartoony characters in his story. So… if the writing is so implausible… how are we supposed to trust the author on his beliefs and preferences, if he can’t implement said beliefs and preferences in an organic way even in his own world?

On the fourth level, there are stories with actual grey morality, where every character AND organization has its pros and cons properly presented. Without further complications, focuses on two sides of the conflicting ideas and naturally tells a realistic story, full of plausibility (Eureka Seven and Terra E, as examples)

On the fifth level, there is the Ravages of Time, conceptually exploring said contradictions. It not only has more than two sides with full of characters with their own agendas, but they all are making use of various “contradictions” and that is something I wanted to highlight through the Eighth Genius, who is full of contradictions externally, but fully self-aware internally.

Now it is not outright said that contradictions are bad. Quite the opposite – even if they are full of shortcomings, they are also full of benefits and if everything can be used your and someone else’s good, why would contradictions prove the exception? After all, if any effort is futile and doomed, what it all meant to you and how content you were at your death’s bed is all that matters. Which is another contradiction, because on face value, there is no objective reason to do anything if everything’s meaningless, but at the end of the day, you at least accumulated the experience for the future generation, who will also have to postpone the passive decay of the world (but the said shared experience will lead to even more bloodfest, which is unfortunately inevitable in any case)

Failure of self-loathing stories is not seeing beyond the fixed framework. Ravages’ point, on the other hand, is that – contradiction, like anything else (for instance, loyalty), is simply a method and it was set as a framework to fit someone else’s agenda. Of course, merely trying to step out of a framework is not enough, as you are going to meet others who already did that. That’s exactly what’s so alluring about this piece of art – it not only examines a single contradiction with a hopeful solution (Self-loathing Zhuge not raising Liu Shan as a hypocrite), but offers plenty of other alternatives.

[itsclydebitches]

Three different topics

Hi! Sorry to bother you again. Jist wanted to know your opinion on 3 RWBY topics that have been swimming in my brain.

Ironwood was fine with it

I find it hilariously sad (maybe even ironic?) that the RWBY writers tried so hard to frame Ruby&Co as completely in the right for not saying anything to him because ‘who knows how Ironwood would react?!’ But in the end, they’re still wrong. He reacted just fine. Better than, even. No yelling, berating, or mental breakdowns in sight. So they proved themselves wrong. While trying to prove themselves right. I’m torn between laughing until I can’t breathe or screaming until I can’t breathe. 

Whitley 

With the way the writing is going, I’m kinda worried that they’ll end up playing the 'Whitley is like his father’ thing seriously. Because if they don’t, then Weiss would have been wrong about him. And in this pro-protagonist dystopia that they’ve created, that’s not allowed to happen. But in order to make Weiss the righteous one, they’ll have to demonize Whitley to prove that Weiss was correct about him. And I’m incredibly uncomfortable with the notion that they might just end up doing that. Because while they haven’t been so far, I don’t trust them to stick to their story the way it’s been written. They haven’t stuck with anything else after all. (Except hating Ozpin. Seriously, did the voice actor or the character do something to them? At this point I’m wondering 'did Ozpin run over your puppy? Steal your significant other? Call your mother fat?’ This level of hatred seems a bit obsessive..)

The Grimm and Salem

I don’t know if both the writers and the characters have forgotten, but… do they understand that the Grimm still exist separate to Salem? Like, she can control them, sure. But she didn’t bring them into existence. She dived into a Grimm pool that already existed and gained her abilities. Do they realize that the way the story is setup even if the main characters defeat Salem, the Grimm don’t just cease to exist? One of the biggest 'Ozpin is evil!’ arguments that I’ve heard is that he was sending people to die by going up against Salem, but he was sending them to fight Grimm. The things that she did not create. The things that will still be roaming around attacking people with or without her. I don’t know if that was intentional? (I doubt it.) But this is a major problem with the narrative. 'Ozpin was sending people to die!’ Yeah. Against the Grimm. The things that you already signed up to fight and potentially die to. As far as I can tell the only ones who were actually supposed to be doing anything involving Salem were Qrow and Raven. And they were just supposed to be surveillance. 'We just have to take down Salem!’ But there will still be Grimm. The terrible nightmare creatures that like to tear people apart. Remember them? 'Just collect the relics! That’ll solve the Grimm problem!’ And then you’ll have to deal with uniting people. Everyone. Like Jacques Schnee. Unless you plan to kill everyone that presents a problem to you. It just feels like the show is focusing way too heavily on the 'Salem’ part of the story, when the other two problems are just as bad, if not worse. Salem at the end is one person (simplified down). The Grimm are much bigger in numbers, can show up anywhere, and don’t go down by taking out one. Uniting humanity is another problem because there’s always going to be someone who thinks of themselves as 'better.’ But, you know, Salem. Sure.

************

RWBY topics, hell yeah! Putting the rest below a readmore to save dash space. 

1. Oh my god don’t get me started on that. The real kicker is that I agree with them. In that I agree that EVERYONE should be very careful about who they reveal this information to. I’ve never once thought that Ruby and company were in the wrong for being cautious, only in their and the writing’s insistence that only they can be cautious whereas Ozpin and Ironwood are horrible, flawed people for doing the exact same thing. Regardless of that though, the group was indeed proven wrong this last episode whereas Ozpin was proven RIGHT:

Ozpin: I don’t want to tell you this because I’m afraid that you will betray me and lose hope in our mission

Group: [Proceeds to betray him by stealing the relic, stealing Jinn’s name, ripping his whole past from him, denying him any sympathy or support, physically assaulting him, driving him off, losing hope for a stretch, and continually painting him as a convenient scapegoat to all their problems]

Ozpin: [Hanging out in Oscar’s head] Oh wow look at that, I was totally justified in being cautious with them. They handled that horribly.

vs. 

Group: We’re going to do to Ironwood precisely what Ozpin did to us---only with more stakes attached---because who KNOWS how Ironwood might react. If we went on drinking binges and attacked a kid over this, imagine what a man with real power would do

Ironwood: [A level-headed adult who, unlike the group, has actually proven his trustworthiness in the past, who is not inclined to blame others for bad situations or physically attack them] Wow this is horrifying. Astoundingly though I’m not going to punch you over it. However, I am going to jump straight to blaming Ozpin and absolving you because heaven forbid anyone acknowledge the hypocrisy around here 

tl:dr yeah I’m still salty 

2. Oh man I hadn’t even thought of that as a possibility... but yeah. It’s far from impossible based on a) how we’ve seen RWBY treat male abuse victims in the past (not well) and b) RWBY’s endless ability to straight up ignore things they’ve established. Meaning, we saw in The Lost Fable a huge amount of sympathy for Ozpin which was then completely erased to make him the thematic antagonist. In the same way, we may have seen Weiss coming to that realization that Whitley needs her help... but in RWBY’s writing that means absolutely nothing. We can’t bank on them following up on that because they haven’t bothered to follow up on so much else. We may very well get an evil!Whitley arc and a heroic!Weiss arc to contrast him, leaving the viewer wondering, “What happened to that epiphany you had with your mother about how Whitley has little to no chance of change unless he receive support from someone other than his father?” and the answer will be, “Wait, you thought RWBY was consistent?” 

3. Perfect example of this: literally everything you’ve laid out in regards to the grimm. That has frustrated me for volumes now, ever since the group (and the fandom) started painting Ozpin and his connection to Salem as the sole reason for why things are bad in the world. As if there isn’t, as you say, literal monsters running around devouring people entirely disconnected from her and her spat with the gods. The group willingly signed up to risk their lives to fight grimm. They knew they were fighting an immortal enemy in the form of the grimm. They know they’ve done important work by protecting people from grimm. They know the grimm will still be there even if the Salem threat is taken care of... but no one ever acknowledges this. The writing has forgotten its primary antagonist. Is Salem a super big danger that they need to take care of as soon as possible? Absolutely, but getting rid of her doesn’t solve every problem like the group seems to think it will and it certainly can’t act as a convenient excuse now that things have gotten harder. “You had us risking our lives to kill an immortal woman!” This is what I mean when I say that RWBY’s writing and much of RWBY’s fandom literally just makes stuff up. That is not what happened. Everyone go back and watch Ruby begging Ozpin to let her into Beacon because she, of her own agency and free will, wants to fight the very real monsters that are threatening her world. Salem only makes that problem worse. 

[secretariatess]

@papirouge You’ve blocked me, so I’m unable to respond to your response. I can’t say if this is actually going to reach you, but I felt it necessary to say all the same.

Firstly, to get the bit about Dark Waters (2019) out the way: IMDB has a parental guide so that people can determine whether or not it’s okay for them to watch. This is on all movies listed on IMDB. It’s not a thing where Christian movies are targeted. That being said, I don’t think I can call Dark Waters a Christian movie. It’s a movie based off real events, and just because the main character and his family are supposed to be Christian, it does not make the movie Christian. Regarding the “haven’t seen it” argument- no, I haven’t. Never said I had. But now I’ve watched 24 minutes of it and God’s name is used in vain twice. Yes, I do consider go**amn not only a cuss, but taking God’s name in vain. The main character himself uses Jesus’s name as a cuss. There’s also language in it, and considering the amount used in the first twenty-four minutes and IMDB’s listing, I’m going to say it only gets worse from there. This may have been depending on where you watched the film, as there are sites that remove stuff like that.

My point in bringing up the movie is that you freely accuse Christians of watching shows with content you have deemed unsound, yet you watched a movie with elements that other Christians would certainly have issue with. Things like using God’s name in vain (violation of the third commandment in the Ten Commandments) and language (which would be a violation of the verse “Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouth” Eph. 4:29). If these too are sins, then they should not be taken anymore lightly than what you bring up. 

You constantly brought up “You haven’t even watched it!” as an argument against IMDB’s claims, but can you say you’ve watched all the shows you call out other Christians for watching? If so, then good.  If not, how can you be sure that you’re accusing them correctly? I only say this because your original post really sounds like you’re going after BNHA/MHA, though you also meant in general.

Secondly, you accused me of a couple of logical fallacies. To double check, I presented the entire conversation to someone who is not even on Tumblr and has the ability to remain partial. His assessment was that the logical fallacies you claimed were not correct, but rather that the fallacy used was ad hominem. And I’ll own up to it. I was trying to call you out on hypocritical behavior. To be very clear: I do not care about you watching Dark Waters.  I do not care that you hold the opinion that you do. I do care, however, about the hypocrisy in your statements. Where is my Scripture for this? Certainly the passage of the plank in your eye and the speck in other’s comes to mind (Luke 6:41-42). And if it’s true you were able to avoid the cussing in the movie because of the platform you watched it on, how is it different than a Christian skipping an episode of a show they watch because they know it’s bad? 

Thirdly, you claim that you are on a mission with righteous anger. I would first recommend looking at what 1 Corinthians 13:1 says. “If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or clanging cymbal.” If your mission is driven solely by righteous anger, you’re just making sounds. There is no depth to what you are saying. You can be speaking the truth, but it would not matter.  Further on in the chapter (v.5): “[Love] is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.” Again, if you’re just so full of righteous anger, perhaps take a step back and ask yourself if you’re approaching this with love or self-righteousness. If it’s only fueled by anger, are you really doing this for anyone else’s sake but your own? To sate that anger? I’ve been there. I still will go there. I’ll know I’m right about something and I can have an initial reaction to pound out a response steeped in how right I am and it’ll be fueled by the anger of seeing the other person be so wrong about their stance on the given topic according to Christianity.  I have posts way back that reflect that. But just because I was angry about the right things, doesn’t mean I was right in holding that anger and using it to prove my point. And honestly, there’d be no love in a response from anger. There wouldn’t. Love isn’t wishy-washy. Love is powerful and there is a way to take a firm, passionate and strong stance while still being loving. But if righteous anger is the only thing driving that passion, the lack of love shows and 1 Corinthians 13 stands ignored.  Consider that the Bible says the Lord Himself is slow to anger. How righteous is anyone’s anger if it comes so quickly and ready to get on anyone’s case? 

Furthermore, you like to use Jesus’s anger at the temple to justify your own anger.  You also use Psalms to further justify it.  But Psalms isn’t a justification for actions done in anger, especially actions that prove damaging.  Even Jesus’s actions in His godly anger were with clear thought.  He went in with clear intentions of His goal and how to accomplish it.  As it is, I’m having a hard time finding the situations comparable.  Constantly getting on someone’s case regarding their media consumption is not the same anger as Jesus driving the marketplace out of the temple.  Cussing someone out (again, I consider go**amn to be a cuss) is not the same as Jesus quoting Scripture to summarize the situation.  As it is, the passages regarding Jesus at the temple don’t mention Him being angry.  We can assume it, but the lack of mention of His emotion means that wasn’t the important part.  The justification for His actions were in His stance on Scripture.  Not in His anger.

Furthermore, for someone on a mission, you do not seek discussion. You do not seek to persuade. This is evidenced by the fact that you’ve blocked me from answering you. You claim that your message is only for those who hear, and your actions say you do not want disagreement or discussion. How is this Biblical? Many passages would disagree with this. We are commanded as Christians to love our neighbor as ourselves (Gal. 5:14) and we were told that the world would know that we are God’s because of the love we have for each other (John 17:23).  But how much love do we have for each other if we’re blocking over disagreement?  Why should you have discussion with others? As Proverbs 27:17 says, “As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another.” If you have a message to share, if you see a problem in the Church, why would you not want discussion? If you hold to the verse, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear,” there should be recognition that it goes both ways. The other person may have something for you to hear yourself.  And if this is your mission, if this is your ministry, then from someone who has heard this many times from people who have done ministry for longer than I’ve been alive, one of the biggest rules of ministry is that you need to be ready to learn. If no discussion is possible, what is is your mission? To be right? Paul himself said that he did what he could to persuade people. Heck, if you go to Acts 17:16-17, you’ll find that Paul reasoned with the synagogue leaders over a matter that distressed him. He did not go in there, proclaim the problem and then promptly turn away so that there was no discussion. If you are on a mission, if you have a message to give, then there should be discussion.

We do have spiritual weapons.  But self-righteous anger isn’t one of them. Scripture, however, is. And it is because of the Scripture that I presented above that I find your rant hard to swallow. Not because I don’t think you have a message to give, but rather because you want it done your way. Believe it or not, I agree with you that Christians should look at their media consumption more carefully. I agree with you that there’s a spiritual battle that many Western Christians don’t see. I think there’s a discussion to be had there. I don’t agree with you that your personal visions and convictions are the convictions of the entire Church (1 Corinth. 8 talks about rights and stumbling blocks, how those with a weaker conscience shouldn’t be looked down on, but at the same time it does not condemn those with a stronger conscience taking certain liberties). I don’t agree with your approach to the matter, with all the righteous anger and dismissing those who do not immediately accept your message. I find that unBiblical. I find it damaging, especially to those who struggle. I find it tears people down instead of building them up.  Just because your message is grounded in Scripture, doesn’t mean the rest of Scripture can be ignored so you can proclaim it how you want.  Just because you might have truth doesn’t mean you have the right to use it to damage.  In proclaiming the truth, in denouncing evil, in hoping to set the record straight, you need to examine yourself to make sure it’s not just your message that’s in line with God, but also your attitude and your actions.