#william has that gay ass pose

[oryparade]

reblogging this on main because honestly why not im very proud of this so far and i want to show off

teehee...ref sheet for my fic...

need to line and color but its MIDNIGHT im TIRED

[yikesharringrove]

I both really want to read a conversion camp fic and really fucking DONT lol but I trust you to do it well and not absolutely destroy us so... I am asking for you to write the conversion camp fic please.

Oh, my plan is to absolutely destroy you all with this one.

This is modern bc it wasn’t gonna be but then I wrote a part and it kinda had to be lol

TW: religion, homophobia, transphobia (nd Steve), conversion camp, anxiety, depression, physical abuse, the word r*pe is thrown around, suicidal ideations, basically, it’s a DOOZY

Seriously, this shit gets DARK. I have A LOT of untapped emotions.

But it has a happy ending, don’t worry

-

Steve’s hands were shaking as they dug through his bag.

They had already pulled out the eyeshadow palette he had tried to sneak in, needed something to make himself feel okay in this inevitable Hell.

“Did you receive our guidelines?” They had found the lipstick he had shoved in one of his shoes. “We specifically outlined prohibited items.” He took a shaky breath. “Your perversion is much deeper than anticipated, Mr. Harrington.” He just nodded.

He was shuffled about, led to a cold blank room.

His first meeting with a conversion specialist.

“What is your infatuation with women’s things?” The man’s voice made Steve feel like there was cold water dripping down his back.

“I just like pretty things.”

“Why do you deny your manhood?”

“I don’t.”

“You say that, but you do. Every time you pretend you’re a woman-”

“I don’t pretend I’m a woman. I just like makeup and stuff.” He gave Steve a disgusted look.

“By denying your true self, you have turned your back on God. You have allowed the devil to infiltrate your soul, to convince you that these perversions are okay.” He looked down at the paper in his lap, the forms Steve had been forced to sit and fill out with his parents. “You were not close with your father, were you?”

“Um, no. Not really.”

“So you pushed away your male role model?”

“He pushed me away, more like.” The man pursed his lips.

“A father does not push away his son unless there is something evil within him. A father can always tell when there is something wrong, something disgusting in his offspring.” He stood up, towering over Steve.

“You are disgusting, Steven Harrington. You are perverse and foul. You turn your back on your Creator. But you are not without a savior. You can be saved. Denounce the devil that tempts you to this life. Follow your savior, and He will lead you to safety.” He held out his hand. Steve took a breath, and shook it.

-

Steve’s first day was a fucking nightmare.

He was led to his room, a small room with two bunked beds and no doors. He was told he’d have three roommates, and if they were caught touching one another, the punishment would be painful.

And then it was group therapy.

He sat in a circle with ten of the other boys from the program. They were forced to discuss every attraction they had ever felt to anyone besides women. They were forced to discuss sexual encounters they had had with men, and call themselves disgusting.

And as it was Steve’s turn, and he talked about wearing panties, and fingering himself, and sucking Tommy’s dick, and he felt disgusting.

At dinner he met one of his roommates, and his heart sank.

“Where’d they scrape you up?” The guy was fucking gorgeous.

“Indiana.”

“And you just a homo? Or...?” The guy’s voice trailed off as he looked Steve up and down. “You one a’ them crossdressers, too?” Steve flushed deeply.

“How, how did you know?”

“Because you look like they got to you already. Means they got something on you. Make you feel real bad about yourself.”

“How, how long have you been here?”

“Long enough. Seen plenty a’ boys come and go. Some cured, some just a lost cause.” He was so nonchalant about the whole thing.

“Why, why so long?” He grinned at Steve, sharp and beautiful.

“Because I’m immune, Pretty Boy.” Steve’s breath hitched. The guy licked over his teeth. “Can’t beat the gay outta me if they tried. And they fuckin’ have.”

“But why, why don’t you want to change? I mean, they’re, they’re right.” His blue eyes went cold.

“They got you deep. Damn, you might be the quickest turn around I’ve ever seen.”

“I just, I don’t want to be wrong anymore.” He leaned closer to Steve.

“You have never been wrong.” Steve felt like he was gonna cry.

A firm hand clapped down on Steve’s shoulder.

“William, I hope you’re treating our new guest nicely.” William’s face fell immediately.

“Yes, Father.” Steve looked up to see a priest holding onto him. His hair was greying and neat. His eyes were cold and dead.

“I’m afraid I’m going to have to take Steven with me.” Steve followed him, eyes downcast, all the way to his office. “Steven, my name is Father Andrew. I’m here to help you.” Steve didn’t like his smile. “We’re going to meet everyday at 8:30 pm for your therapy.”

He pulled out a folder from the bottom drawer of his desk. He placed a photograph in front of Steve with a flourish.

It was porn.

It was fucking gay porn.

He stood in front of Steve, leaning against the desk, off to the side of the image.

“Tell me what you see here.” One of the men had dark hair. He was being taken from behind by the other man, his blond hair and bright eyes stirred something in Steve.

“Two men. Having sex.”

He didn’t see Father Andrew’s hand, just heard the crack of it against his cheek.

His eyes watered, his cheek burned.

“What do you see?”

“Two perverts.”

“What are they doing?”

“Defiling one another.”

“Good, Steven. You’re learning.”

He placed another photograph down. This time, the man being fucked had a full face of makeup, tears making the dark eyeliner run as he was on his back, hands cuffed to the bed. The man fucking him was smirking at the camera, tongue between his teeth.

“How does this make you feel?”

“Disgusted.”

“Why?”

“That they, they would touch each other like that.”

“Do you have fantasies like this? Of being tied up by another man? Raped by another man?”

And the answer, the answer was technically yes. He had plenty of fantasies of being tied up, taken rough, taken dirty.

But rape. That’s a strong fucking word.

“No, Father.” Another crack. Another slap.

“Lying is a sin, Steven.”

“I, I don’t want to be, to be raped.” Another slap.

“Lying is a sin, Steven.”

“Yes, yes Father. I have had fantasies.”

“These are not fantasies, these are perversions planted in your mind by demons, by the devil trying to pull you away from Christ our Lord. Do not let these demons lead you astray.”

He pulled out another picture.

Steve’s heart fucking stopped.

It was a picture of himself. A nude he had taken for Tommy.

He was wearing pretty lingerie, pouting to the camera. He remembers taking it, remembers putting on his makeup, posing over and over until he took one he liked. They must’ve gone through his phone, through his texts.

“Why do you dress like a woman?”

“Be-because I’m disgusting.” And the thing is, Steve had been told plenty of times that day that he’s disgusting, and he had begun to believe it.

“Good, Steven. You are disgusting. Do you believe you’re a woman?”

“No, Father.”

“Then why have you been experimenting with women’s things?”

“I believed I wasn’t a man.”

“And are you a man?”

“Yes, Father.”

“God made you a man.”

“Yes, Father.” Steve still didn’t like his smile.

He switched the image.

And it was another one of his nudes. This time he was in a skirt, kneeling with his back to the mirror, one hand spreading his cheeks, showing off the silver plug in his ass.

He even remembers the text he had sent with it.

Tommy had been studying for a test, so Steve sent that picture and said but im lonely :( and Tommy had replied I’ll be there in twenty.

“Why do you have an obsession with your anus?” Steve could feel the blood drain from his face.

“I, uh, it feels good.” Another slap.

“How does spitting in the face of your Heavenly Father feel good, Steven? Sodomy does not feel good.” Another slap. Steve’s face felt like it was on fire.

“I’m sorry, Father. I am vile, and disgusting.” Steve was sobbing, felt so fucking pathetic, trying to look anywhere but the printed image of himself.

“I think that’s enough for tonight. I expect you here tomorrow after dinner.”

Steve fucking ran back to his room.

The other boys were asleep. He climbed into the top bunk, curling into himself.

He felt disgusting, he felt foul and wrong and bad.

He tried to stifle his sobs into his pillow, the scratchy case muffling his panic attack.

“Hey, Stevie.”

“I’m sorry. I’ll try to be quiet.” There was a sigh, breath fanning over his face.

And then the boy from earlier was swinging himself into bed with him, curling against him.

“They said-”

“I know exactly what times they patrol. I’ll leave your bed before then.” He sighed. “First night’s always the hardest. You just gotta get through. Tell them what they wanna hear, but remember that they’re fucking wrong. You are valid, and real. Being gay is not disgusting.”

Steve curled into him, letting himself be comforted.

“Thank you. Thank you, William.”

“Oh, Christ. Call me Billy.”

“Thank you, Billy.”

-

As time passed, it was easy to retreat into himself.

He met with Father Andrew every night, got slapped and hit when his answers weren’t condemning enough.

But each night, Billy would crawl into bed with him, would hold him when he broke down.

The kiss was inevitable.

It happened after Steve had an extreme day, the beating he received when he had admitted to being nonbinary, that he had asked his friends at home to use other pronouns.

And Billy had said you’re perfect the way you are, Sweet Thing.

And Steve kissed him.

And Steve wanted to die.

-

“Forgive me, Father. For I have sinned.” Steve took a shaking breath.

He was kneeling in the small confessional.

They had Mass every three days, and confession each Friday.

“It has been one week since my last confession.” He took a deep breath. He needed to get this of his chest, needed to get the punishment he deserved. “Father, I, the feelings have not gone away. There is, there’s a boy, and I, I love him. And I try not to. I try not to look at him, to remember the devil is leading me astray. But Father, I think about him. I think about him often.”

“This is an extremely grievous sin, my son.”

“I know, Father. Please help me. I want to, I want to be pure. To be free of this sin, this temptation.”

“I offer, as penance for your sins, to pray a rosary for each time you have had an evil thought about your fellow man this week. As you ponder the Mysteries of the rosary, consider how God created you, how Jesus died for you, and you wipe your feet on their love.”

“Yes, Father.”

“And our meeting will be arduous tonight, Steven.”

“Yes, Father.”

“Now please, recite the Act of Contrition.”

Steve’s hands shook as he recited the prayer, finishing his confession with Father Andrew.

-

“Now, Steven. You discussed having impure thoughts today.”

Steve’s knees ached from praying the rosary so many times earlier today. He hadn’t eaten, had gone straight to the Chapel after his confession.

He wanted to pray, to cleanse himself.

And he didn’t want to risk seeing Billy.

“Yes, Father.”

“And you mentioned that you love another boy.”

“The devil is trying to make me think it’s love.” Father Andrew smiled his empty smile down at Steve.

“That’s right Steven. Because love cannot exist between two men. Love is a beautiful thing created and given to us by The Lord God.” Father Andrew leaned over Steve, made him shrink back in his seat. “Which is why you are unlovable as you are. You are foul and vile. You may be loved if you change.”

He grabbed Steve’s hair, holding his head still as he slapped his face.

And Steve let him.

He was foul, he was vile.

He deserved the pain.

-

Two months.

That’s how long it took Steve to “graduate”.

He left the facility in clean khakis, a nice sweater his mother had sent him to wear home.

Billy had left a week and a half prior.

He was deemed a lost cause.

Steve’s mother was there to pick him up, hugged him tight and told him how happy she was that he was fixed.

He was quiet as they drove, watching the shadows the summer sun cast on the side of the plain flat road.

“Your father will be pleased. You’ve made such wonderful progress. Free of all those delusions.”

They passed Tommy’s house.

He felt sick.

-

The first thing Steve did when he got home was destroy all his make up.

He took everything feminine from it’s hiding spot in the back of his closet.

He scraped out the eye shadow, smeared the lipstick all over his dresses.

He cut up his lingerie, shoved everything into a black garbage back, driving into town to toss it in the dumpster behind the gas station.

He wanted it away, he wanted it gone. He wanted to be pure.

-

His hands shook as he zipped up the suitcase.

He didn’t have much in there, was planning on taking enough to get him through a little while, then maybe buying some things, some pretty things.

His parents were asleep downstairs, he was planning on being long gone by the time they woke up.

He put on his backpack, taking his wallet and tiptoeing down the stairs, his shoes in his hand.

He had a plan, would drive to the bus station, leave his car there.

Someone will find it, and at that point, he’ll be long gone.

He bought a bus ticket to Chicago, paid in cash and gave a fake name.

He was fucking out of here.

They were fucking out of here.

-

“As I live, and fucking breathe.”

Steve startled as a hand came down on their shoulder.

They startled again when they turned around, came face to face with a ghost from the past.

“B-Billy?” Billy’s hair was longer than it had been at the camp. His smile was lazier, his eyes brighter. Steve’s gut gave an excited little flutter as he looked them up and down.

“You look fuckin’ gorgeous, Pretty Boy.” Steve flushed, adjusting their dress. It was new.

It had been three years since the camp. One year of Steve living in pain, until they packed their shit, and moved to the Golden Coast. They left in the middle of the fucking night, ran away like a scared child, never looking back.

And here was the love of their goddamn life, in some hole in the wall coffee shop in San Fransisco.

“It’s uh, it’s not Pretty Boy, anymore.” Billy’s grin got even wider.

“Thank fuck.” He swung himself into the seat across from Steve’s, upsetting some of the papers they were working on.

“What happened to you, Billy?” Billy’s smiled slipped, just a little.

“My dad was tired a’ paying for that joint if I wasn’t getting better. So he said if I wasn’t fixed in like, a month, he would stop paying, and I would be kicked out. Stayed true to his word. Haven’t seen the bastard since.”

“Oh. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. Getting kicked outta that place is the best fuckin’ thing that’s ever happened to me.”

“I graduated. Went through the whole thing. Took me a year to realize how fucked up it was.”

“Jesus. They got you deep.” Steve shrugged.

“I’m okay now.”

“Yeah? What’re you doin’?”

“Goin’ to school. Gonna be a counselor. Hopefully work in an elementary school, or something.” Billy’s eyes were bright.

“That’s amazing. Gonna tell all the little queer kids that they’re valid and all that?”

“That’s the goal.” Billy grinned. “What are you doing now? You with anyone?”

“I own a bar, actually. Kind of a dive, but it’s a good time.” He looked at Steve through his lashes. “You should come by, sometime. Be good to see you.”

“I’d like to see you too.”

“And to answer your question, I’m not with anyone. Not right now.” He smirked. “But I could be.” He leaned over the table, drawing one finger down Steve’s hand. “I like seeing you happy. Feel like I only ever saw you cryin’ in that joint.”

“Well, spent a lot of time crying there.”

“For good reason.” Billy took their hand. “It’s really good to see you.”

“Y’know I told Father Andrew I was in love with you. Got beat black and fuckin’ blue for it.” Billy’s face was grave.

“Why’d you do that?”

“Wanted to be fixed. Took me a year to realize I didn’t need that.”

“You stop lovin’ me in that year?”

“Not even in the two after that.” Billy took a shaking breath.

“You know, I uh, I love you too. Always did. It broke my fucking heart to leave you in that place. Was gonna wake you up that night, get you to run away with me. But they took me out, uh, forcibly.”

“Bet you put up a real good fight.”

“Broke Father Ryan’s nose.” Steve let out a burst of laughter, clapping one hand over their mouth.

“I was wondering about that. He had a splint for like, a month.”

“Yeah, well, bastard kept tryin’ to exorcise me. Headbutted him right in the face.”

“Good for you, Bill. Sometimes I wish I could light the whole place on fire.”

“Me too.” Billy took their hand, pressing a kiss to the back of it. “I gotta head, but I wanna see you. Soon. Later today, if you can.”

“Yeah, uh, I’m just doing some homework, but I could stop by the bar tonight? I don’t have shit to do tomorrow.”

“Lemme pick you up. We can go to dinner before I take you to the bar.” They smiled softly at him.

“I’d like that.”

[arlingtonpark]

Frozen 2 Review

You know, I’m starting to notice a trend with me and these Disney kid’s movies: I don’t like them.

And not because I’m not a kid, but because they really are badly written.

I’ll start with what I liked.

The animation was great, like in all Disney movies. Animation for Disney is like John Williams’ music in Star Wars - it’s good no matter what movie it is.

The song sequences, taken on their own, were show stopping. The action was grand, the singing was commanding, and the visuals were gorgeous.

…OK, now on to the stuff I didn’t like.

The movie starts off with Anna and Elsa playing together as kids. You know, before Elsa almost killed Anna. I don’t think this is bad per se, but I do think it undermines the gay subtext people read into Elsa’s character, and I’m sure lot of people will see that as bad, so I’m putting this in the “bad” section of this post.

Why do people read Elsa as a lesbian? Because she has to hide her powers, the thing that makes her different, like how gay people have to hide their gayness.

This has always been the case, but this movie really reinforces it: Elsa was only forced to hide her powers after she showed the capacity to harm others with them.

In other stories, people with superpowers have to hide those powers because they have powers, not because they can harm people with them. It’s about the power itself, not the burden of having them. This is a good metaphor for things like homosexuality.

In Frozen, things are kind of a mess. Elsa was forced “into the closet” because of the demonstrable harm she posed to others, not because she had the powers to begin with. Frozen 2 emphasizes this point: Elsa’s parents were accepting of her powers up until she showed they could be used to harm others.

Gay people are forced to hide themselves because people in polite society are expected to conform to certain standards. There is an element of rejecting nonconformity in Frozen. In that movie, people see Elsa using her powers and dub it witchcraft.

So there are some elements to the movie that support an LGBT metaphor, but other elements contradict that reading, so it all ends up being a big mess.

Frozen 2 is about how different groups need to get along and how past wrongs need to be made right.

The story opens with some storytime by Elsa and Anna’s dad:

Anna and Elsa’s granddad made contact with an indigenous group of people called the Northuldra. These Northuldra were not magical, but they were able to harness the magic that was endemic to their land.

Granddaddy had a dam built in the Northuldra’s territory as a peace offering. But during a celebration of its completion, a fight broke out and grandad was killed. Why the fight happened is unknown, but the forest spirits were angered and a mist overcast the whole region, locking it away.

And that is how Elsa and Anna’s dad became the king.

Seriously. That’s the payoff to the king’s story. Interethnic conflict and it’s all setup for how he got his cool hat.

I think that was smart!

Lots of awful historical events are glossed over for the sake of relatively trivial bullshit. I mean, I’m writing this on Thanksgiving. A holiday about being thankful is great! But the peace between colonists and natives that this holiday is built around is negated by…how there was no peace in the end. We all understand that on some level, right?

So I think this is a cool nod to how historical events, even historical atrocities, are mythologized.

The motivator for our heroes is uncovering the true history of Arendelle so the angry forest spirits can be calmed.

The true history is this:

Grandad actually hated the Northuldra. He built the dam to make them a vassal of his kingdom…somehow.

The ceremony was just a way for him to size up the Northuldra and determine their strength. He was the one who started the fight.

So…

Why did grandad use the ceremony to size up the Northuldra if that same ceremony was a trap to…kill them all, I guess?

Grandad uses the ceremony to learn of their numbers and strength, the same ceremony he uses to kill their leader and incite a conflict. You’d think the king would have learned the Northuldra’s numbers and strength before this. Just, you know, in the course of interacting with them and coordinating construction of the dam.

And why did King Grandad go to all the trouble of building the dam if he was just going to start a war with the Northuldra?

That’s a big ass dam! The king had it built and for what? Was he going to enslave them? That hardly seems worth it.

I guess the king was just a greedy bastard, but…he’s barely a character at all, so it’s just bad writing.

The point, though, is that the past!Arendellites did something awful and this needs to be set right. The dam still stands and its existence angers the forest spirits. But if the dam is destroyed, the water behind it will flood the area and destroy Arendelle.

So……

Arendellites of the past are big meanie heads.

This has repercussions through to the present.

This has to be made right.

That means destroying Arendelle.

Is this supposed to be applicable to our world?

White people of the past are big meanie heads.

This has repercussions through to the present.

This has to be made right.

That means…destroying white people?

Yes, the institution of racism still exists, and yes, that has to be made right. But no one is saying white people have to lose their homes. What is this movie even talking about?

Radical leftists, the ones who aren’t shitheads, want to sweep away the current order, but that’s because they want to replace it with a new one.

Reparative action means destroying the old order to replace it with a better one. This movie casts reparative action as just destructive.

I like to think of this as being like global warming. Many people think that to fight global warming we have to basically ruin our lives and sacrifice economic growth. We need to give up all our environmentally harmful practices and this basically means living Extreme Paleo. It’s that or a world with no ice caps.

But that’s not true. We don’t have to make that choice. We can have an environmentally sustainable economy and be just as prosperous as we’ve always been.

This movie seems to believe that making amends for the past requires some sacrifice by the descendants of the perpetrators.

If the racial hierarchy were destroyed, white people would no longer benefit from it, so in that sense they would lose out, but that’s not the same thing as losing your home!

The movie is clearly a commentary. It tries soooo hard to be topical and relevant; it only succeeds in being irreverent.

Why do the people at Disney keep trying to talk about racism? They suck at it! They have no idea what they’re talking about.

First Zootopia, now this. They keep trying and trying; I wish they’d stop.

Do they have any self-awareness? If they did, they’d realize they’re just confusing children with these badly designed messages.  

The movie tries to be a social commentary. It does so by elucidating a dilemma that doesn’t exist. There is no trade-off between righting the past and continuing our livelihoods.

Ah, but you see, this movie is multilayered in how bad it is.

In the end, Anna decides to destroy the dam, Arendelle be damned. The dam breaks and the kingdom is about to be swamped.

And then, in an almost literal deus ex machina, Elsa swoops in on a magical contraption and uses her powers to BS the tension away.

So………

On one level we have the silly trade-off the movie proposes. Do the next right thing and fix racism, but lose your home. (If this movie were a person, it’d be an old man yelling at clouds.)

On another level, if we take this proposal for granted, we’ve got a completely uninspired message about how doing what’s right will never backfire on you.

*vomits*

Returning to the social commentary level, this means the message is that we need magic to solve the dilemma that doesn’t actually exist.

We need a special, almost magical someone who can BS away all the BS sacrifices white people need to make to right the sins of their ancestors.

(It’s not just the politics, this movie is poorly thought out in general.)

This movie has a very unsubtle theme about change. It’s so horribly done, I can’t believe it’s real.

By the end of the movie, Anna is queen now and Elsa decides to live with the Northuldra. That’s the only meaningful change and the implications of it are not shown to us.

The movie ignores the burdens of statecraft, so how much being queen now affects Anna’s life isn’t important to the narrative.

And we don’t see much of Elsa’s new life either. All we see is her frolicking on horseback through a field with a wide smile on her face. Really.

Elsa struggles with alienation in this movie, except we don’t really see it. We are told that she feels out of place, but there’s nothing in the movie to suggest a fundamental disconnect between Elsa and everyone else.

I mean, I get that Elsa’s magical and Arendelle isn’t, but Elsa doesn’t seem unhappy when the film picks up. Whatever angst she has in the first act is because of the voice she’s hearing. If she feels that Arendelle is a poor fit for her, it wasn’t communicated well.

This is to say that Frozen 2 is only tepidly about the dynamism of life. There’s no change for the worse, and what change for the better there is lacks gravitas.

Elsa’s decision to live amongst the Northuldra is another example of the writers not paying attention.

Another attempted example of change occurring is the unification of the Northuldra and Arendelle. A statue of Elsa and Anna’s parents, who it turns out were each from one of the groups, is erected to commemorate this newfound unity. Anna remarks that the races have “finally” been united.

Unfortunately, the implications of this unity are not shown, so it’s all meaningless.

You would think there would be an exchange of ideas between the two groups. Things like music, food, ideals, etc. We don’t see that. So the change that this movie talks a lot about just isn’t there.

Back to Elsa living with the Northuldra, I take it as implying that there won’t be much real coexistence between the Arendellites and the Northuldra. Because if there were a real cultural exchange, I don’t think Elsa would’ve made the move.

She felt she had to live with the Northuldra to feel more at home. This implies there will continue to be a meaningful disconnect between the two groups.

Instead of Elsa moving, why can’t the people of Arendelle integrate magic into their daily lives like the Northuldra?

Are human settlements just inherently anti-magical?

That’s problematic, because the Northuldra in general smack of being noble savages.

The noble savage trope is a stereotypical depiction of native peoples. The stereotype is that natives have a primitive way of life that lets them be one with nature. It romanticizes native culture.

Frozen 2 leans very heavily on the noble savage trope to communicate its ideas. The Northuldra are one with nature, but this is disrupted when the dam is built. Human civilization is a taint upon the Northuldra’s communion with nature, as represented by the forest spirits.

The whole point behind the noble savage trope is that the native way of life is uncorrupted by human civilization.

Exactly how the dam’s existence is a blight is never explained; the movie uses the noble savage trope as a cheat to get across why the dam is a bad thing.

“Why is the dam bad?”

“Uh, er, well, it’s civilization!”

The movie tries to be about how the races need to coexist, even as it sets one side up as being superior to the other, while showing no sharing of ideas or even goods.

In Frozen 2, “coexistence” means separate but equal.

This movie tries to do a lot.

There’s an arc for Anna about doing the next right thing, an arc for Kristoff and Anna about getting married, the social commentary about uncovering the true history and atoning for past misdeeds, and two major arcs for Elsa. One about her feeling alienated and another about her having this savior complex. She thinks she has to be the one to save everyone.

Subsequently, many plot beats feel half-baked and rushed. Elsa’s alienation wasn’t really established. Anna’s decision to destroy the dam wasn’t dwelled upon, so it didn’t have the emotional weight it could have.

Elsa’s arc about trying to go it alone is very badly handled.

The point of the arc is that teamwork is golden and relying on your powers is as valuable as a shiny penny.

But once again, it is clear the writers aren’t paying attention. One scene in particular was a galaxy brain fuck up.

A forest fire breaks out and Elsa tries to put it out. Anna jumps in because it looks like Elsa is going to be overwhelmed. You would think that Anna will get Elsa to drop putting the fire out and save herself.

But nope.

Anna is the one who needs to be bailed out. Elsa successfully puts the fire out.

Just, ugggghhhh.

Then later on, some rock giants are lumbering about and everyone has to avoid their notice. But Elsa tries to go off on her own again and follow them.

Because she thinks she can tame them.

Huh???

Elsa’s arc here is about teamwork, but trying to tame these things is just a stupid idea. With following the voice, it’s clear they have to do it if they want to get things to normal. It’s their mission.

Why tame rock giants?

The problem with this moment is that Elsa isn’t just being arrogant, she’s being an idiot.

Then we get to the finale and Elsa’s arc about teamwork just peters out and isn’t a factor in it. Everyone has a role to play in the climax, but it’s all serendipitous.

The kind of teamwork the movie tries to uphold up to this point entails not just trusting other people, but actually working together.  

They learn they have to venture into the unknown. Elsa tries to go alone, but relents when Anna argues she should go too.

Later, Elsa tries to go alone to the mystery river and sends Anna away against her will. This is presented as a bad thing.

The lesson, so far, seemed to be that you can’t go it alone.

In the finale, they all go it alone while still working with each other. The finale emphasizes trust, while the rest of the movie emphasizes actual teamwork.  

It’s not that they’re all a team working together, it’s more like they’re all playing off each other and making it up as they go.

Elsa learns the true history and communicates it to Anna.

Anna takes it upon herself to go dambusting.

Kristoff helps, but he doesn’t know what’s going on. Teamwork implies everyone is of the same mind. That’s not the case here.

The guards try to stop Anna, but they eventually choose to trust that this is the right thing to do. They don’t really know what’s going on either.

Then, just to really drive home how much they don’t care, at the very end Elsa uses her powers to save everyone singlehandedly.

Because you can’t go it alone.

You can’t just rely on your own power.

Every bridge has two sides, so even Elsa needs help from others.

(That bridge metaphor is the dumbest line in the whole movie.)

The people behind this movie obviously didn’t care. They put no thought in this. See Kristoff’s in-movie MTV music video.

Yes, really, that happened. In it, Kristoff laments being unable to really connect with Anna.

I’m about to sing a song lamenting the future of this franchise.

[undeadvinyls]

more stuff on vera:

she smiles like a polish and has a resting bitch face because she CANNOT let herself do her dad's creepy ass grin (i mean this)

even then she poses like her dad and do sometimes end up making that grin. esp on her middle school yearbook photo when she was 13

she looks up to abigail because that's the only responsible woman she's known yet. it's still not a good role model but at least she understands her with the more girly things

i imagine in every episode she would be, she'd have a different outfit. i mean dad's drip is unfuckable with so hers should be too

she and toki like to watch shrek 1 & 2 together + horror movies w/ skwisgaar and murderface

while she isnt 16 yet, murderface gives her driving lessons in the car he received on his b-day in that episode

pickles always ruffles her hair and giggles because she's like the sibling he always wanted instead of seth. he acts like a big brother around her

vera's genes received from dick include the big aquiline nose, blue eyes, blonde hair and thin posture

i imagine at the end of dethwater they'd be a bonus scene where dick and vera r eating dinner together except nubbler is in sunglasses to hide his bursted eyes from her. when vera asks whys he wearing them he takes them off and she literally falls off her chair

i imagine she's the one who gave him the idea of getting cybernetic eyes lol

because of spending a lot of time with pickles, she picked up his wisconsin accent. and now once in a while she calls knubbler "feether" instead of "father". because of how much she and pickles complain abt their parents

the reason why vera almost ended up in juvie was because she beat up 2 kids with a brick who were bullying her friend

the band is more weirded out by the fact that dick didnt leave her in the dust and actually took the custody of vera instead of the sole fact hes got a kid

speaking of, if she was canon, i imagine there'd be an episode between dethwater and ep 16 where vera is introduced and the band goes "SHE'S YOUR KID?!?!"

i also imagine she was the only person who told william that it's okay to be gay because she's gay herself (lesbian)

skwisgaar also likes to talk abt music with her, a lot

still writing her relationship w/ nathan and charles but i feel like it's neutral-to-positive

despite it all, she truly loves her dad, even if he's like, the worst person to be a dad ever. he's trying his best. even if he brings a bad example most of the time and is the reason why she's got behavioral issues in school

cant believe im doing this. anyways, hi, this is my metalocalypse one and only oc, very self-indulged vera lmfao. im gonna give her a better ref later ig

i know knubbler reads more like a double-income-no-kids gay wine aunt but i had to make him a girlfailure daughter for his girlfailure self (that desparetely doesnt want to look like him)

[differentcoloredkids]

tagged by @kimberlyannharts bc i Always enjoy talking about myself on the internet

tagging @bisexualpowerranger @draenator @jadedsunshine @janesloane @hazelstar9696 @sassynuggetnguyen @unicornaffair

choose any three fandoms (in a random order) and answer the questions, then tag some friends.

i’m choosing: (i had to ask myself if i even have three fandoms besides just like 25 seasons and 3 movies of power rangers)

power rangers

mass effect

star wars

the first character you loved:

you’re asking me to remember back so long oh my godddddd uhhhhh fuck... OH duh ryan mitchell :/ i forgot that my first ranger love was the reason i chose the name ryan

luke skywalker, the pure gay farmboy god i used to love him so much and now look at what’s happened....... reset the timeline

kaidan alenko!!! mostly bc he’s voiced by raphael sbarge but u kno also bc he is uhhhhhhh a Hot space lieutenant i say that he’s my biotic space husband but on my first playthrough i still sacrificed him so am i really a true fan

the character you never expected to love so much:

honestly, kimberly hart :/ like pre-2016, when i was still Not really into power rangers/had Divorced power rangers from my childhood, i was very like... skewed in my opinions of certain rangers and kim was like all of my internalized misogyny projected onto The Staple Girly Girl Character and i was a staunch tomboy who wanted nothing to do with that........ now look at where we are, i literally never shut up about her #RealLifeCharacterDevelopment

liara t’soni! i thought she was a nerd which should’ve clued me in to the inevitability that i’d fall in love with her... and then she turned out to not just be a nerd but be stupidly romantic and i never looked back

all of the female characters in the movies and video games tbh :/ i used to think star wars was a Boys’ World (a fair assumption) but then i played knights of the old republic and bastila shan changed my mind

the character you relate to the most:

is it projecting if i say kimberly hart but reboot? absolutely so i’m not going to uhhhhhhh i mean yeah i guess :/ when i write, i give og and reboot kim a lot of qualities that come from..... me..... but i’m not sure i’m like.... LIKE her..... i’m probably more like katherine hillard tbh

i absolutely 100% relate to tali’zorah vas normandy bc i am 1) a shy nerd 2) a clumsy nerd 3) bad at flirting and 4) has a shitty immune system

anakin skywalker, there is no question at all

the character you’d slap:

i was just going to say lord drakkon bc that works too

wow uhhhhh the illusive man is an asshat so him.... i was gonna say director tann but i guess he’s just doing the job he was shoved into so i can’t fault him..... even if he’s an ass to me like for 98% of the game

emo angst lord kylo ren... fight me

three favourite characters (in order of preference):

reboot kimberly hart, og kimberly hart, adam park

liara t’soni, tali’zorah vas normandy, kaidan alenko

darth revan, bastila shan, carth onasi (this is such a cop-out.... these are all kotor characters)

a character you liked at first but don’t anymore:

ryan mitchell lsadkjfhakf now i’m gay and like his sister, dana mitchell, as how the gay revolution normally goes

none of them! i love all my mass effect children even if i keep like.... killing them

haha........... *will smith pose at the last jedi*

a character you did not like at first but now do:

repeating this but kimberly hart bc i was a misogynist piece of trash

ashley williams bc i was brainwashed by fandom to think she was a space racist and i was blind to how beautiful she was

ummmmmm all the female characters once again but especially bastila shan and padme amidala

three otps:

kim/kat, lauren/mia, kira/tori

i..... have to mention shepard even tho i’ve avoided doing so the entire time...... bc all of my otps are femshep ldksjfhkfjh fem!shep/miranda, fem!shep/liara, fem!shep/tali

revan/bastila, anakin/padme, exile/atton

[wonderfulworldofmichaelford]

Michael After Midnight: The Lion King 1 1/2

Timon and Pumbaa, Disney’s big breakout comic relief characters! What sort of film could these two possibly star in? Well, in the tradition of Disney’s The Lion King movies being inspired by the works of William Shakespeare, this time we have something somewhat inspired by Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead! But hey, that’s not all; before the film, these two goofballs got their own cartoon TV series! Lucky bastards. Not even Kronk could pull that off, and he’s funnier than both of them. Tonight, we will take a look at the movie… I was going to review the show too, but here’s the thing: As I haven’t seen the show since I was a kid, it’s just not nearly as fresh in my mind, and it would be a disservice to half-ass a review on a show I barely remember. I will talk about the show briefly before getting into the movie, but I just don’t remember it well enough to go in-depth.

Anyway... the film! It’s a part-prequel, part perspective flip of the first movie, which shows Timon’s origins, his original meeting with Pumbaa, and most humorously their inadvertent bumbling through several famous scenes from the first movie. This delves a lot more into their backstories and what exactly they were doing during the times they were offscreen during the first film, and it also has a framing device with the duo watching their own movie in a theater… yeah, try wrapping your head around that one. They even pause the movie at one point, at which point Pumbaa leaves for a short time and Timon starts picking his nose. This is a weird one. I can’t even really pose a rhetorical question here because you KNOW the duo come out on top by the film’s end… it’s how they get there that’s the fun.

So if you’re worried that these two aren’t going to be as fun in this movie due to their appearance in the second movie, worry not! They’re much more tolerable. It helps that this is an out-and-out comedy, so there’s never some moment when the two are mucking up a dramatic or emotional moment with silly slapstick or ruining the tone. Now, that’s not to say there’s no emotions to be found; the movie delves into Timon and Pumbaa’s friendship and how they came to be as close as they are, and there’s actually quite a few heartfelt moments. I’ll get into that in a moment, but let’s get what I remember about the show out of the way first.

The show was… good. I liked it a lot as a kid, I remember really enjoying the goofy, silly, comedic nature of it. Still, I don’t exactly find it particularly memorable to an extreme degree, which is part of why this isn’t a major focus of the review. I definitely remember the shows based off of movies like Aladdin, The Little Mermaid, and Tarzan far better than I remember this show, probably because those shows had a more adventurous tone rather than existing for a quick laugh. Don’t take me as saying this show is bad, I remember enjoying it a lot, I just don’t know how I’d feel watching it today.

The Lion King 1 ½ is definitely something that stuck with my far more. Some people are probably bothered by Timon and Pumbaa bumbling through famous scenes, like when they effect the “I Just Can’t Wait to Be King” number or when Pumbaa’s fart causes the animals to bow at the birth of Simba… but I find it funny. Sure, the context is pretty silly when you go back and watch the first film, but I don’t think it ruins anything. I also find the “Can You Feel the Love Tonight” scene even funnier because with the knowledge of what Timon and Pumbaa are doing throughout that whole scene, they now inadvertently are responsible for Kiara’s conception! Timon and Pumbaa are the ultimate wingmen.

As I mentioned before, there are also a few really good emotional moments, especially in regards to Timon and Pumbaa’s friendship. I guess it helps that their ambiguously gay tendencies got ratcheted up here to the point where you have to wonder if it’s really all that ambiguous anymore. These two go really well together, they play off each other extremely well, and the great moments in this film more than make up for how jarringly comedic they were in Simba’s Pride.

Really, there’s not much else for me to say here, unless you REALLY want me to go scene by scene and explain all the jokes and gags. For the series, my memory of it is hazier than I’d like to be able to recommend it, but I imagine if you like silly 90s comedies you’ll probably enjoy it. The Lion King 1 ½ is definitely one I recommend if you don’t mind seeing a more comedic look at the events of The Lion King; as long as you’re okay with having a chuckle at some iconic moments, you’ll have a good time here.

I definitely think that the movie takes precedence in the canon of the series over the show, if you were wondering my thoughts on that at all. The show clearly has its own canon to it, a world more in line with the physics and situations of any number of zany 90s comedies… which might be why I don’t remember it too well. It just blends in with all the others for me. This movie’s a bit more balanced… even with that framing device.

[cadpadawan]

31-Day Music Challenge

The social media is now flooded with all kinds of funny challenges, as people are stuck at home with nothing much to do. I guess online gaming, or getting shitfaced, becomes increasingly boring, when all kinds of tiresome responsibilites, like work, do not present any restrictions and limitations anymore. In a way, Facebook has started to resonate the air of those naive first few years, when your newsfeed was basically just one continuous stream of challenge that and challenge this.

Well, why the hell not?

What else is there to do, in order to pass the time with your mental health intact?

So, here I am...just another bored individual to join this endless crusade to make life worth living again, to make my personal life great again. Thus, I jumped on the wagon, and took on this fancy 31-day music challenge, that has been circulating in Facebook (for years, I think).

Although, I didn't find it challenging enough to just type the daily keyword in the Spotify search box and post the result in my Facebook wall. Because: more is more.

(Go ask Yngwie Malmsteen, if you don't believe me...)

The challenge for day #1 was to pick a song with a colour in the title.

I could immediately come up with a bunch of songs, only to realize that the vast majority of the song titles were themed around two basic colours: black and blue. I guess songwriters are a lazy bunch, when it comes to colours. It's pretty obvious, why lyricist everywhere find these two colours exceptionally appealing and resort to the abundant use of them, neglecting all the wonderful possibilites posed by the other colours of the spectrum. Of course black and blue, in terms of emotion and imagination, are much stronger than, say, yellow and orange. So, instead of just settling with the first few titles that came to mind, I wondered if I could come up with one song for each colour I can think of. I mean: a song that bears some personal meaning to me. In practice, this challenge basically meant that I would have to think hard while rummaging through the main three Spotify playlists that I have compiled with something like +16k or +17k songtitles, with the addition of my personal collection of some +2600 cd's – at least the rarities section for songs that are not available in Spotify.

Let's see if I have the stamina to go through my cd-racks, though. I had the forethought to organize my cd's in alphabetical order, by the name of the artist, years ago. For some weird reason, my beloved spouse has not yet agreed to the idea of re-furnishing our apartment with the central theme being those precious compact discs. That's why the cd-racks are placed in somewhat random and impractical fashion: most of them are located in the living room, with a few sections located in our bedroom. I guess, it's a good thing I had disposed of my vintage Rhodes-electric piano by the time when we started dating 20 years ago. I'm pretty sure she would have opposed strongly to the idea of having the instrument as a kitchen table, with the giant lid down. My Rhodes-piano was the so-called suitcase model, with a keyboard of 73 keys. When I moved out from my parents' house in the mid-90's, I decorated my one-room-apartment in the ethos of Japanese minimalism, due to the fact that I spent most of my income on records and alcohol. That Rhodes-piano served as a kitchen table, when I wasn't actually playing with it. Because: why the hell not?

Ok, then. The first colour...it shall be black.

Oh, boy! What a multitude of choices it presents! Should I pick an iconic 90's grunge anthem, like Soundgarden's Black Hole Sun? After all, I saw the band on stage in Helsinki cirka 1995. (I say ”cirka” because I'm not 100% sure about the year, and I'm too lazy to look it up in Google) The fond memories of those grungey early years in the 90's instantly remind me of a couple of equally important bands: Pearl Jam and Alice in Chains. Although, I've never seen either of them live. Pearl Jam had a song titled Black on their breakthrough debut album Ten. Alice in Chains had a killer track titled Black Gives Way to Blue. That epochal Pearl Jam album played non-stop in my car stereos at the time of its' release. I had it copied on a C-cassette. Remember that vintage format, anyone? (Yes, I'm THAT old...) With this particular AIC song I fell in love much later, as it was the title track on the band's comeback album, released in 2009 with the new singer William DuWall. First, I kinda hesitated to give this new AIC line-up any chances, but it turned out to be pretty damn good. Obviously, nothing can top the impact, that the Laney Staley-fronted AIC made with their Dirt-album in 1992. At the time of its' release, that album was a full-blown mindfuck! In retrospect, the year 1992 seems to have been pretty kick-ass, in terms of album releases:

Alice in Chains: Dirt

Rage Against The Machine: Rage Against The Machine

R.E.M.: Automatic for the People

Pantera: Vulgar Display of Power

Tori Amos: Little Earthquakes

Faith No More: Angel Dust

Dream Theater: Images and Words

Aphex Twin: Selected Ambient Works 85-92

Prince & The New Power Generation: (Love Symbol Album)

Stereo MC's: Connected

Tom Waits: Bone Machine

Sade: Love Deluxe

The Prodigy: Experience

Megadeth: Countdown to Extinction

Eric B. & Rakim: Don't Sweat the Technique

The Orb: U.F.Orb

k.d.Lang: Ingenue

Suzanne Vega: 99.9 Fº

Stone Temple Pilots: Core

Curve: Doppelganger

Nick Cave: Henry's Dream

Neneh Cherry: Homebrew

Maybe I should choose something less obvious? At least, it would make this challenge less arduous for me, because it's evident that making a choice between two particularly dear songs from the past is nothing short of impossible. When in doubt, go for the dark horse! So, here goes: my choice for the song with the colour black in the title is:

Bonobo: Black Sands

Being something of a jazz aficionado, despite not really possessing any of the musical prowess to actually play jazz myself, it was love at first soundbite, when I chanced to hear the title track from Bonobo's 2010 album Black Sands on Bassoradio's morning special back in the day. Bonobo is the musical alias of British DJ-producer-musician Simon Green. His career spawns from the 90's trip hop aesthetics, with heavy influences of jazz and world music. Spicing up electronic beats with raw jazz samples, or even live musicians, was the thing to do, somewhere along the mid-90's. I guess it all started with a few insightful hip-hop artists layering their ghetto stompers with the occassional hardbop jazz sample back in the late 80's. For a short period, acid jazz was the coolest shit ever in the early 90's. In a somewhat natural chain of events, jazz eventually made its way to the brand new genres that evolved around the middle of the decade, trip hop and jungle, too.

That's how I got sucked into the all-consuming whirlpool of this abominable voodoo music – jazz. It's a wonder no-one has come up with a gateway theory yet, regarding the highly addictive nature of jazz music. It usually starts with small doses: an occassional jazz sample is slipped in the hip-hop track, or the breakdown section of a rock song is ornamented with a brief, improvised saxophone lead. Then you find yourself craving for more, and start delving into the depths of acid jazz, nu jazz, or whatever new genre that has incorporated jazz as an inherent element in its' aesthetic toolkit. After this honeymoon period, that might spawn over years and years, you eventually catch yourself red-handed, holding a genuine jazz album in your hands at the local record store, probably the usual entry-level drug-of-choice jazz classic: Kind of Blue by Miles Davis. It has been awarded the title of the greatest jazz album of all time – and for a reason, too. Multiple times. Then you're hooked. Next thing you know, you'll be blasting John Coltrane at a family reunion, with your beloved relatives giving you the dead-eyed stare, doubting the state of your mental well-being. Long story short: you simply cannot go wrong with a mellow waltz rhythm that's punctuated with the organic groove of a flesh-and-blood jazz drummer, and topped with hauntingly beautiful brass harmony.

Next up: the colour blue...

Again, I could go for something utterly obvious, like the song titled Blue by A Perfect Circle. Those lucky few, who know me in person, should be well aware of the fact, that I'm quite a diehard fanboy of the band. I was lucky enough to see the band's live performance a few years back, when they paid Finland a visit. Nevertheless, I think I can come up with something more unexpected.

Just let me think for a sec...

Remember the band Europe? Of course you do! (Unless you were born yesterday, like some, eww, millennial!) I think it would've required some exceptional measures in the noble art of cutting contact with the external world to not have been exposed to the band's 1986 megahit Final Countdown, during the past 34 years. (Fuck! Do I feel old yet?!?) BUT...before you dismiss the band as yet another hair-metal has-been, check out this song:

Europe: Not Supposed To Sing The Blues

It's pretty damn hard to believe it's a song by the same band that's responsible for that Final Countdown atrocity. To be honest, that particular throwback 80's hard rock ear-worm wouldn't probably get under my skin in such a thoroughly repulsive fashion, had I not performed the song countless times myself. It was quite an essential part of the live repertoire of the party band, that I toured with cirka 2004-2008. The modus operandi of this covers-only band was to play the most annoying 80's megahits, with the lyrics translated in Finnish with a liberal amount of tongue-in-cheek references to gay erotica. (On a side note, the band was actually quite popular in certain small regions, despite this dubious approach and the substantially high level of bad taste incorporated in the lyrics and live performances. We even ended up playing in a genuine gay wedding once. The humour of the band was, after all, benevolent albeit a bit harsh, at least in the context of these politically correct times...)

The song Not Supposed to Sing the Blues was released in 2012. It's pretty evident, that during this 26-year-period, following the release of Final Countdown, Europe managed to grow some serious balls, hidden somewhere below my musical radar. The oriental sounding motif, played with some cool mellotron string patch in the refrain before the chorus, has a nice Led Zeppelin-esque feel to it. You can't really go wrong with a slowed-down hard rock blues that is sugar-coated with a grain of Kashmir-strings, now can you?

Next up: white...

What first comes to mind? Whiter Shade of Pale by Procol Harum, and Nights in White Satin by the Moody Blues, obviously. You see, I had both of these tracks in vinyl format, way back in the early 90's, when I was going through my ”moustache prog from the 70's”-phase. (Although, this particular Procol Harum song was actually released in 1968, and the Moody Blues song in 1967 – but, in order to be consistent and thorough, I had to dig deeper, to the roots of the prog...to the very dinosaur fossils)

I could throw in White Room by Cream, too. I used to listen to these particular tracks A LOT! In the age of vinyl, conducting a music marathon themed around, say, 60's and 70's ”moustache music”, was actually quite a laborous ritual. Every 25 minutes, or so, I had to flip the side of the record. Shuffling songs totally at random was simply a no-go-zone. Nowadays, it's so easy to compile a lengthy set of personal favorites in Spotify, WinAmp, iTunes, or whatever the fuck application you'd prefer, and just hit the randomize-button...fucking millennials, they have it SO easy. They have no idea of the struggle.

That's why we had those vintage C-cassettes: to copy that very special selection of songs, compiled with tender love and care, onto a format, that didn't require you to be on a constant lookout for when the album side was closing to an end. Besides, before the onslaught of cd-players, those vintage C-cassettes were the only way to impress people with either your refined taste in music, or with the lack of it, while you were occupied with the gentle art of pussy racing, driving around downtown in your awkwardly tuned-up mirthmobile, every goddamn Friday night.

I could pick White Wedding by Billy Idol, too...

It was one of those 80's hits that I used to play with the ”covers only”-party band.

Nah...

I think I will have to choose between Aisles of White by the Aussie soft-prog band the Butterfly Effect, and The Heart of a Cold White Land by the Finnish doomsters Swallow the Sun.

My beloved wife introduced me to Aussie prog, some 10 years ago. The gateway drug, I think, was Karnivool with their music video for All I Know. One day, when I was coming home from work, I caught my wife watching this particular video in YouTube. A little bit later, she unearthed a shitload of Aussie bands in Spotify. I guess she must've been hitting that ”similar artists”-link quite relentlessly. The Butterfly Effect was one of those magnificent bands she discovered. I remember hearing the song In A Memory for the first time. It struck a chord with me, in such a profound way, that I felt compelled to order the album Imago ASAP from some Australian music webstore. At the time, the back catalogue of the Butterfly Effect wasn't available in Finland. I don't know, if it's available even now, because the band is no longer active, I think. Aisles of White is the track #2 on that album, released in 2006. The band released one more kick-ass album in 2008, titled Final Conversation of Kings, and then I don't know what the hell happened.

Swallow the Sun is a bit doomish Finnish metal band, and I'm not really sure, when I actually found the band's music. I think I had their debut album The Morning Never Came (2003) in my cd-rack for years, but it wasn't until 2012, with the release of the magnificent Emerald Forest and the Blackbird album, that I truly fell in love with the band. It took me some five years to actually haul my ass to their gig for the first time. Every single time, when I found out that they were touring nearby, I was too busy with some utterly meaningless work-related bullshit to make it. Finally, in 2017 it happened. I had managed to get rid of my soul-sucking job, although due to a pretty hardcore reason (a brain tumour), so when I found out that Swallow the Sun was performing in Helsinki, in the legendary rock venue Tavastia, I definitely made sure that I was there – and fuck me sideways! It was indeed one of the best live performances that I have ever experienced, hands down!

In 2015, Swallow the Sun released a monolithic triple album Songs From the North, and this particular track, The Heart of a Cold White Land, is on the disc II, that is focused on the beauty side of the band's doom palette.

Swallow the Sun: The Heart of a Cold White Land

Next up: Red

Sielun Veljet was one of the most iconic Finnish rock bands in the 80's. The band released only a couple of albums with lyrics in English, of which the 1989 release Softwood Music Under Slow Pillars was the only one with the songs originally written in English. There was some other attempts to gain international fame and fortune, but in those cases, the songs were merely English translations of their most beloved hit songs, initially written in Finnish. This particular album was planned for international release – but the label executives were pretty disappointed, to say the least, when the band came up with an album full of acoustic psychedelia. It was released only in Finland and Sweden. The artwork on the album cover is actually a painting by a Peruvian artist Pablo Amaringo, depicting the shamanic ayahuasca ritual. Listening through this album in one go is somewhat similar experience, I would guess: a rewarding journey into the depths of the human psyche, albeit potentially exhausting, especially if you're not exactly in the proper mindset to begin with.

Well, ever since I got exposed to the oriental psychedelia of, say, Jimi Hendrix, Kingston Wall, and the like, I seem to have acquired a taste for this kind of weird and druggy, over-the-top freeform musical expression.

Sielun Veljet: Hey-Ho, Red Banana

Ok, then...What next?

What other colours are there, anyway? The three primary colours are: red, yellow and blue. All the other colours can be derived from these three fuckers. To be precise, I think black does not actually qualify as a colour... So, I've got most of these covered already. Of course, in order to pick some hairs, printers actually use magenta, yellow and cyan as their primary colours – and black, obviously. I can't recall a single song with ”magenta” or ”cyan” in the title, though. I could come up with a band or two, with these colours in the band name, such as Magenta Skycode, or Cyan Velvet Project, but song titles?

Nada.

Maybe, if I combed through my post-rock and soundtrack archives, I could come up with some epic 15-minute instrumental with either cyan or magenta mentioned in the lengthy piece of contemporary literature, that is supposed to be the title of the song...but I guess those tracks would not exactly mean worlds to me, as I clearly cannot remember them now. If something comes to mind, while I'm writing down this epistle, I'll address that particular colour and song, accordingly. Now, I shall get on with this challenge journal, onto the next ”normal”, everyday colour...

Which is?

The colour green.

Having played keyboards in a dubious number of proggy bands, with the tonal preferences leaning heavily toward everything vintage, I might as well pick a mellow Hammond-organ classic, such as Green Onions by Booker T. & the MG's, or a vintage synth classic from THE motion picture soundtrack album of all time: Memories of Green by Vangelis, from the timeless Blade Runner soundtrack.

But I won't...

It wasn't actually easy to come up with that many titles with the colour green mentioned. Excluding these two aforementioned classics, I could barely come up with four! As much as I like the desert rock stonerism of Kuyss, the song Green Machine is not my personal favourite in their back catalogue. So that narrows my options to three. The problem is that two of these songs seem to defy the laws of quantum physics: they both take a firm stranglehold on my soul, and throw it casually down the dark and dangerous alleys of nostalgia.

In the midst of 90's acid jazz boom, I had a peculiar habit of buying compilation cd's at random, if the heading on the cover somehow suggested that the contents of the cd had anything to do with this particular genre of music. By impulse-buying music I discovered a lot of gems, like the song Apple Green by Mother Earth. The band was an English acid jazz outfit, virtually unheard of in Finland, despite the tidal wave of acid jazz washing over also these rural perimeters. If Jamiroquai, the Brand New Heavies et al. rub you the right way, you definitely need to check this band out. I can still remember clearly, as if it happened yesterday, how I picked this acid jazz compilation from the vaults of the local record store that no longer exists.

Mr. Big was a band everybody just loved to hate at the turn of the decace, when the gigantic hair-do's of the 80's started to flatten out, and flannel shirts were showing faint signs of becoming the next level shit in the never-ending quest for cool. At the time, I was an under-aged college drop-out, devoting my attention to the finer things of guitar playing techniques, instead of studying for a decent profession. I had received my first electric guitar from my parents in 1988, and for the following 5-6 years, I spent most of my time and energy in an attempt to unravel the secrets of how to play guitar like Jimi Hendrix. I listened to quite a lot of speed and thrash metal on the side, too. Y'know, bands such as Anthrax, Metallica, Slayer and Stone, which was quite a legendary Finnish speed metal band in the late 80's. My budding personal artistic expression was anyhow more influenced by legendary old timers, like Hendrix. I simply loathed all sorts of pyrotechnical wankery (with the exception of certain tracks by Steve Vai and Joe Satriani). Mr. Big's lead guitarist Paul Gilbert was famous for that very special blend of technical stuff, that I wasn't interested in, not in the slightest. So, I never really gave the band a chance. I think my misconception of the band's music as some kind of a shit-show of technical masturbation was due to some instructional videos hosted by Gilbert. After all, his fame as a highly skilled guitarist must have derived from his contributions to several guitar magazines and instructional videos, instead of his career in Mr. Big. So, everytime I heard the intro of, say, To Be With You, on my car radio, I simply had to change the channel. In order to do so, I had to manually rotate the tuning knob. Yes, my first car stereos were THAT vintage! What a time it was to be alive! Years later, with the maturity of age like with a fine wine, I finally listened to the worn-out hits of this horrid band only to find out that – bummer! - in terms of songwriting, those goddamn Mr.Big hits were actually not that bad at all. The song Green-Tinted Sixties Mind was released on the album Lean Into It in 1991. Now, everytime I am exposed to this particular song, I am instantly reminded of what a stuck-up elitistic music snob I used to be during those emotionally tumultuous times.

So, I could resort to the luck of the draw, but luckily I've got one more candidate to go.

Lonely the Brave is one of my most recent findings. It's an English alt.rock band from Cambridge, formed in 2008. I really don't know much about the band, just this one song titled The Blue, The Green. I was exposed to it while playing the music trivia game Songpop 2 with my mobile phone during the past two years, I think. The game is about guessing songs within the timeframe of a 15 second clip. Pretty addictive at first, actually. This 15-second-soundbite was enough to gain my full attention, so I had to check out the song in full, instantly. I cannot pinpoint what exactly it is, but this particular song has that vague feeling of ”something”, that draws me to listen to it, time and time again.

Lonely The Brave: The Blue, The Green

Next up: yellow.

I was first introduced to Frank Zappa's unique music in the late 80's, by my classmate Jussi, who kindly exposed me to the timeless classic Bobby Brown Goes Down. At the delicate age of 15, it was a pretty anticipated reaction that the explicit song lyrics would strike a chord. A few years later, as I was browsing through the vinyl section at the local second hand record store, I came across a pure treasure: the gatefold vinyl edition of Roxy & Elsewhere by Frank Zappa & The Mothers. In mint condition, too! Dropping the needle on the first groove on the black vinyl back home was like taking the first hit of some mind-altering illegal substance. My perception of reality changed in an instant – and there was no going back. Such an exciting mixture of fusion jazz, rock and harsh satire was sure to make me an addict. So, in no time at all I built up enough tolerance and moved onto semi-lethal dosages, and purchased the albums Hot Rats, Grand Wazoo and Apostophe('). The last one was released in the year, when I was born (1974), and it included the hilarious 4-part rock suite about the unfortunate adventures of an eskimo named Nanook. One part of the suite is titled: Don't Eat the Yellow Snow. Sound advice at the time of a global pandemic, that originated from some peculiar pathogen spillover event in China, don't cha think?

Frank Zappa: Don't Eat The Yellow Snow

Not many colours left, I think...

Next up: purple.

I was exposed to the music of Jimi Hendrix via a documentary on TV, when I was a rosy-cheeked 7th grader in junior high. It happened around the same time, when I got my first electic guitar. So, I guess it must have been written in the stars, or something. The universe simply wanted me to focus on the noble art of guitarism, instead of getting a college degree on psychopathological marketing or accounting (fuck no!). My first guitar was a cheap stratocaster-copy with a Williams-logo on it. In a way, it resembled the vintage Mellotron keyboard: it simply would refuse to keep in tune. One of the first songs that I learned, despite the frustrating limitations imposed by the crap tuners on the guitar, was Purple Haze by Hendrix. I had to learn it by ear. You see, back in the gloomy days of the late 80's, there just wasn't that many guitar tabs around. Not in Finland, anyway. Later I did find an instructional guitar playing manual at the local library, with a few pages dedicated to the art of Jimi Hendrix. Mainly, the only viable option to learn any contemporary rock song, or even any classic from the days long gone, was either to learn it by ear, or to resort to the occassional tabs provided by the international guitar magazines – if you were fortunate enough to spot these much-sought publications at your local bookstore. (These fuckin' millennials have it SO easy!) On the other hand, learning to play primarily by ear must have developed my improvisational skills a great deal, as an added bonus. Improvisation is not so much about throwing up some pre-programmed fancy gimmicks at any given chance, but actually LISTENING to what your fellow musicians are playing and responding accordingly.

Next up: grey.

I think it was my dear wife, once again, who first introduced me to the band Thrice, by playing the song Digital Sea from the band's double album Alchemy Index, a long, long time ago. The band's vocalist/guitarist Dustin Kensrue is one of those few singers, who are blessed with a distinctive voice that speaks, or to be more precise, sings volumes. He might not have the same gravitas like Mark Lanegan or Tom Waits, but nevertheless, he has the voice of a protagonist who's been to hell and back. Mark Lanegan sounds like he's got a season ticket, and Tom Waits sounds like he's the devil running the show – or, to put it in Waits' own words:

”Don't you know, there ain't no devil,

that's just God when he's drunk...”

 Tom Waits: Heartattack and Vine

Anyways, the lyrics in a Thrice song could be compiled of a list of phone numbers, or the decimals of Pi (like Kate Bush actually did), and it would still sound like a profound wisdom concerning the transformative journey of being fully human.

Thrice: The Grey

Last but not least, the colour: turquoise.

For years, I actually thought that Boards of Canada was indeed a Canadian outfit. Y'know, indie bands in particular come up with these band names that have some funny and ironic twist. Somewhere along the way, it finally dawned on me that this magnificent electronic duo is actually from Scotland. Well, of course it is! If my memory isn't playing any tricks on me now, I'm pretty sure that Soulsavers and Hidden Orchestra are Scottish, too. And they all have something in common. Each of these electronic outfits has an extraordinary and unique, boss-level prominance in the way they manage to capture emotion in their instrumentals.

Boards of Canada released a 5-minute electronic epic titled Turquoise Hexagon Sun on the album Music Has the Right to Children in 1998. The name of the song is actually a reference to the duo's recording studio Hexagon Sun. It makes it even more marvellous, that an instrumental track with a title deriving from something so mundane can touch your heartstrings so deeply. It's not that often, when an electronic instrumental with a hip-hop beat, glassy vintage synth motifs and deliberately lo-fi production paired with grainy samples, manage to do that. These Scottish bastards must've been onto something...

Well, that's pretty much all there was to the first day in this music challenge! I was supposed to pick one song, and I ended up writing a fucking novel about it...Tomorrow the plot shall thicken even more, when I introduce you to the theme of the day #2.

In the meanwhile, you can do yourself a favour and listen to:

Boards of Canada: Turquoise Hexagon Sun

Stay tuned! Cheers!

[mistymountainsgay]

Ok I couldn’t think of enough characters to do the big one but here’s my take on Doctor Who from the episodes I’ve watched

yes it’s in comic sans I wanna be Ironic and Memeish

Explanations below the cut:

Lady Me: Lived through All Of History without ending up with Captain Jack Harkness. Clearly not into boys. Also, I’m feeling the outfits from the Medieval Episode so she gets to be distinguished. Also she’s an nb gal who’s girlflux but ever since becoming immortal gender shifts might last decades.

Heather (Potts): Only one who gets her married name in this because I don’t know her maiden name. Has that Art School Aesthetic going on but she’s not, like, a medieval gem thief noble. 

Bill Potts: lbr if I went onto the TARDIS wiki and searched Bill Potts it would just say “lesbian disaster”

Clara Oswald: canonically bi. I have a crush on her and neither of my other two bis can dress themselves tbh so she gets to be Distinguished.

River Song: canonically bi. Not a fave but you don’t get to pass up canon rep when you need 3 of each of 12 queer orientations.

Rose Tyler: A disaster, clearly. Bi and in denial that her hero worship of several other women she meets is in fact a massive crush. Also she’s a trans girl just so y’all know.

Mickey Smith: Uhhhhhh I’m want to stay in Pete’s World because I met a cute boy I want to be a revolutionary. He’s good looking though

Yikes Mate: UNIT’s resident Known Gay. Had to fight 3 to keep the position. 

Wilf Mott: I Realized When I Was 80 That I’m Hella Gay, a novel by a certified disaster who keeps running into other companions at Pride.

Jo Grant: Much to everyone’s consternation, the first companion to pose naked with Daleks is ace as fuck. An Anxious Ace From Outer Space tbh.

Sarah Jane Smith: Ace and grey-heteroromantic. Hasn’t talked to Luke about it because he didn’t so much tell her he was pan as start dating Clyde Langer so it hasn’t come up. Pretends she had a romantic crush on the Doctor because she doesn’t feel like explaining squishes and queerplatonic partnerships at every companion tea. Eventually got past the Plastic Pants phase into wearing functional stuff.

Rory Williams: took a Long Ass Time to realize he could still date Amy even if he didn’t want to have sex with her. Also he’s demi-quoi-romantic anyway so he didn’t realize he liked Amy until she asked if he was gay and he decided it was worth researching how you could be gay but not like boys either. AVEN saved his life tbh. Wears only 204324 identical flannels.

Kate Stewart: In a ton of deeply satisfying friendships at UNIT but her only love is the sound of her heels on a tile floor. Discovered that you could just dress nice with no occasion one day and never went back. Possibly also a lesbian I don’t know.

Donna Noble: Her discovery that she was aro made Wilf realize he was gay, and her QPP made her mom realize she was abusive. Donna being queer is the healthiest thing to happen to her family after Wilf buying a telescope.

Amy Pond: Ace and aro due to trauma. She dates Rory because she doesn’t want to die alone and discovers she likes dating him even though she isn’t attracted to him. Her volatile behavior makes Rory worried she won’t stay with him but she comes back to him in the end after all so it’s probably all good. or at least there’s a possibility that they got less unhealthy after getting trapped in NY.

Luke Smith: The best of all humanity is a scrawny agender pan kid with a debilitating crush on Clyde Langer and a closet full of scarves. That’s not a joke he’s the best of humanity even if his mom is the best human.

Martha Jones: Life is hard when you’re a pansexual mess who’s allergic to expressing your feelings. 10/10 would grow to love more than my life again

Leela: Lives in the trash has 190735930572 feelings can’t cope with any allergic to clothes. “You could poke someone’s eye out with that” is painstakingly embroidered onto the Sash-ilon of Rassilon

Jenny Flint: Let me have my Trans Jenny headcanon I need a reason to root for the Pater Nostril Gang other than scraping the “canon lesbian relationship” barrel so hard I hit an abusive relationship. Those victorian fashions tho

Harry Sullivan: I don’t even know but he dresses nice and I didn’t have a trans guy so have a new headcanon.

Craig Owens: HELP I CANNOT BE A FATHER and other relatable trans disaster moods

Romana: all time lords are nb and you watch Genesis of Wearing a White Scarf on a Desert Planet and tell me she ain’t swanky as FUCK

The Doctor: is not functional but I can’t class 3′s velvet ruffles as a disaster. Nonbinary and proud, but it’s not his fault the TARDIS runs interference on them teaching the companions Gender 210 in the original Gallifreyan.

Susan: *RELATES LOUDLY*

Liz Shaw: ok distinguished may just mean “person I’d let fuck me senseless” but it’s whatever. Also I’m feeling the queer Liz Shaw vibes--she said it would be temporary while she sorted out what the fuck she was and it’s been years.

Captain Jack Harkness: and you are?

Ace: Uhhh I do believe this is canon in episode gay season gay where she looks into the camera and says “I’m a queer disaster” and that’s the whole episode

Thank

i improved the chart :D (i’m disaster aroace bi, functional nb and distinguished queer :p)

TG: someone help me

[bestmovies0]

6 Terrible Stereotypes (That Came From Positive Things)

You probably expressed the view that every slur and negative stereotype jump from the minds of history’s most bigoted people, like that time Sir Misogynist fabricated sexism whole cloth in 1204. But history is more nuanced than that. Sometimes inventions, positive trends, and good aims end up harming the exact people they were supposed to help. Take how …

6

Every Witch Stereotype Comes From Women Working A Cool Job

Picture your favorite witch. Unless you moved with ‘9 0s Sabrina, you’re likely picturing an old woman wearing all black, with a pointy hat, a broom, and maybe hovering over a black kettle. You might have a felines in the mingle as well. Everything you portrait was a relic of a kind of cool minute in history when women could earn a living doing a very concrete task: brewing beer.

Medieval people who didn’t know jack about how the Universe operated, how to read, or why someone should fabricate toilet paper as soon as possible understood at least one thing us sophisticated modern characters can agree with: Their clean drinking water was garbage. Which was why some of them skipped water wholly and booze brew instead. In a world in which hunting, warring, whoring, and maybe cobbling (?) took up most of the day, boys didn’t have time to wait near a kettle to make their own beer. So the brewers were usually( pause for dramatic impact) … females . i>

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You could find them if you knew the right signs. Typically she’d be near a big black kettle. And she’d have a cat to retain all the barley-eating vermin at bay. She’d likewise have an ale stake, which they were required by law to display. What’s an ale bet? A long wooden pole with a bunch of branches at the end, like a broom. And if you were out and about at the market, you could look for the big black pointy hat they wore to stand out while selling their brewskies at marketplace. Sound familiar yet?

David Loggan The green skin thing may have been from a hangover.

But everything started to change for lady brewers in the 1300 s. Men suddenly decided that they craved in on the rising booze market, which entailed girls had to move their ass out of the behavior. And when they refused? Well, there was a certain medieval saying about smart, strong-headed females: witch! She’s a witch! Burn the witch!

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Read Next

5 Hilariously Disgusting Minutes From Your Favorite Shows

Suddenly , now that it suited the men, the tall hat became the witch’s evil uniform, and the barley-protecting feline a “familiar” given to her by Satan. And the broomstick? She plainly rode it to go to her secret devil sessions. And that simmering brew wasn’t beer anymore, but some sort of evil beverage that would induce you go all weird ��� you know, unlike brew. By the 14 th century, people had been poisoned( ironically) against the idea of female homebrewers, right in time for large-scale breweries to take over. And so today, super vexing guys will make sure you know all about their latest microbrew , not realizing their shitty hobby get girls burned at the stake.

5

“Dumb Blondes” Was Accidentally Birthed By The Suffrage Movement

Once upon a time, a troupe of blonde performing women arrived in New York from Great Britain. They set up shop doing a burlesque performance and constructed indecent sums of money. The purpose. Except that the particular day this story was in was 1868, so a lot of sexist bullshit then occurred.

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When we say these blonde wives performed burlesque, it wasn’t burlesque as we think of it today, which is basically stripping with better music and nipple tassels. No, this was the extremely-risque-for-its-time burlesque, wherein women put on a play-act while presenting their legs ! Legs covered in thick tights, like they’re some kind of comfortably warm prostitutes. Some of them even dressed like boys. The nerve! Being a living, breathing girl would have been enough for most misogynists at the time, but add in the sexy prancing, the cross-dressing, and the fact that these British immigrants were taking indecent American occupations, and you have massive outrage on your hands.

Via Musicals1 01. com “Is that a dog garmented as a lamb ?! Will these loose wives stop at nothing ?! “

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So far, so depressingly normal, right? Nonetheless, at the same time, these UK gals were drawing the ire of American suffragettes. These proto-feminists had a difficult tightrope to stroll. On the one hand, the burlesque musicians were owning their sexuality and succeeding at a task in public. On the other, they were openly mocking the suffragist movement — among many other things, like Shakespeare, way, and marriage. In the end, many decided to speak out against the blonde British beauties, enabling another stereotype: that of the sour-faced suffragette who can’t take a bloody joke.

One in particular, Olive Logan, simply couldn’t let it go, even denouncing the women in front of Susan B. Anthony, who had most significant shit to deal with than throwing tint. Logan talked at length about how these blondes were a detriment to the gender, as they had nothing to give intellectually or talent-wise, and people simply went to see them for their bodies. Soon the latter are being put down with the insult “British Blondes, ” which we’re sure we’ve understood printed on a Maxim cover somewhere.

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Eventually, this jargon wasn’t used to refer to simply the burlesque dancers anymore, but to any woman who was famous for her appears, the so-called “professional beauties.” “British Blondes” transformed into “dizzy blondes, ” which is an old-timey term for hella dumb, and so we arrived here the quaint insult still used to this day. It certainly is tragic that Susan B. Anthony, who fought her entire life for equality, could have nipped one of the most damaging female stereotypes in the bud by telling her friend to chill for a second.

4

Cops Eating Donuts Came From Long, Terrible Hours

During the daytime, you can stop in for little bit anywhere, but in the old days, if you were working the night shift and craved something to feed, your options were limited. Sure, you try to find an all-night diner or pack a big lunchbox and thermos, but for cops on the job, one of those is very impractical and the other constructs your collaborator call you a big ol’ nerd.

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But after World War II, a new food fad made the entirety of the U.S .: donut shops. And because donut shops basically operate like bakeries, they open crazy early. Abruptly cops had a one-stop shop to grab food and coffee on the go, keeping them fed and alert as they roved the street. And “its been” cheap too, so even when other options becomes available, they bided loyal to the hole.

Of course, donut stores enjoyed the fact that policemen would hang out at their venues — especially before dawn, when the drug fiends are at their most feral. Dunkin’ Donuts founder William Rosenberg claimed in his autobiography that he actively induced his stores the kind of places policemen wanted to hang out for a while.

3

The Idea That “Lesbians Drive Subarus” Saved The Company

Here’s one you might not “ve heard quite a bit about” “unless youre” homosexual: All lesbians drive Subarus. Weirdly specific, sure, but the stereotype has been hardwired into gay culture. Why? Because of a logical fallacy. Not all lesbians drive Subarus. But for a period, all Subarus were driven by lesbians.

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It all started when Subaru was completely bombing as a company. In the 1990 s, big flashy autoes were coming into manner, and the company’s modest, compact brand wasn’t cutting it anymore. Simply one part of their line was selling well: the four-wheel-drive vehicles. However, the company couldn’t figure why. Then, one executive had a mind-opening converses with a homosexual friend and realise the reason: lesbians.

Lesbians loved everything about the outdoorsy Subarus. They were small, dependable, and cute in an off-road culture that leaned more toward dick-swinging big rigs. This revelation did pose a problem, as Subaru couldn’t openly advertise to lesbians, because this was the ‘9 0s and even Friends was making a million gay gags. Alienating their heterosexual customers, nonetheless few there were, “wouldve been” corporate suicide. They had to stay in the wardrobe, advertising-wise, and had to be subtle. Their new ad bureau created a series of publish ads showing Subaru vehicles from behind, all of them with sapphic-signaling license plates. One plate said “Camp Out, ” and the other said “Xena Lvr, ” after lesbian icon Xena: Warrior Princess .

Subaru Since then, their ads have gotten a bit more direct.

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The final one said “P-towny, ” which supposedly stood for “Provincetown” and not the other favorite p-word.

By 2000, when we all started to loosen a bit more, Subaru decided to go all in, gay-wise. They hired ex-tennis-player and famous lesbian Martina Navratilova as their spokesperson. As dog whistles run, it perked all the ears in the country. And it worked! 12 months ago, and Subaru had its best-ever sales time. The lesbian gamble had paid for by in spades.( Lesbians like gardening, right ?)

2

Hollywood Made The Festive Latina Stereotype To Sell Movies To Latinos

During WWII, Hollywood had a problem. Europe was being overrun by Nazis, which means they weren’t buying American movies!( Likewise demise and demolition, etc. etc .) So the studios necessity a new foreign market to compensate for the loss in revenue. Fortunately, there used to be plenty of movie fans waiting for them south of the border. Simply one problem: They were the same people Hollywood had been racist to since day one.

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Previously, South Americans and Mexicans had been negatively typecast as the bad dudes in movie — bandits tying females to qualifies and things. But with this new upsurge of Latin-oriented movies, they had to become good guys. However, Hollywood kind of … overcompensated. Needing a new Hispanic stereotype, Hollywood looked to Brazilian Carmen Miranda.

20 th Century Fox

She was the fruit-wearing, banjo-strumming, happy-go-lucky Latina who managed to get people crazy about bananas. And despite her best intents, a new Hispanic stereotype was born, one of the constantly happy, guitar-playing, sing, samba-dancing dummy.

According to one novelist for The Washington Post in 1942, the new movies constructed it seem like it was always Carnival and everyone “re dressed like” Carmen Miranda with skimpy clothings and fruit on their heads. You can see why this didn’t go over so well with people who lived there, those hard workers who were mostly non-fruit-covered.

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Miranda’s influence can still be felt today, when you ascertain person like Sophia Vergara. Now the highest-paid wife on television, her “act” is the happy Latina — she even dyed her blonde whisker brown to conform to the dark and somewhat stereotype. A stereotype that trumps other stereotypes. Ay, caramba . i>

1

Most Racist Job Stereotypes Come From Success Stories

This might shock you, but Americans used to be rather shitty to immigrants. Hard to believe, we know. Not content to simply impair them economically, socially, and culturally, people had to start calling them names as well. But despite those severe limitations, many immigrants rose to the occasion, creating empires out of the scraps that had been left for them.

Which simply devoted people further ways of being racist.

While now a lighthouse of progressiveness and decent coffee, 1800 s San Francisco had a serious racism difficulty, what with the many immigrants “re coming out” over the Pacific. Most San Franciscans discovered them far too … what’s the word … not-white for their inclination, and refused to work with them. Eventually, the only two areas these Chinese immigrants observed openings were in the restaurant business and taking in laundry. The pioneer of laundry was Wah Lee, who called himself “King Lee”( awesome) and set up a laundry business in Chinatown around 1855. As his business thrived, his Chinese employees were inspired by his success and started setting up their own laundry enterprises. Soon there were dozens, then hundreds, and by the 1880 s, over 7,500 all across California. So naturally, as a reward for their ingenuity and drive, 150 year later, Chinese immigrants are still linked to the idea they are the absolute best at getting stains out.

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The exact same has come to Vietnamese. During the Vietnam War, Hollywood royalty Tippi Hedren( of The Birds fame) noticed two phenomena: 1) Many Vietnamese women fleeing their homeland were stuck in refugee camps with no way to earn money, and 2) Get your fingernails done cost a lot of fund. Hedren decided to kill two issues with one stone and fly in her own manicurist to teach Vietnamese the trade and give the free market of nails a shot in the arm. Soon, business was booming. These days, 51 percentage of all manicurists (8 0 percent in California) come from Vietnamese backgrounds. But while Hedren is celebrated as both a great actress and the godmother of the fingernail industry, Vietnamese females only get stereotyped to hell.

Via BBC Hedren in back row, middle.( We guess. All white people seem the same to us .)

article >

Of course, America didn’t invent occupational racism. For that, you have to look to the treatment of Jews in medieval Europe. They were are prohibited from doing or owning almost anything, but one field that was open to them was banking. Christians were are prohibited from accusing concern because of something Jesus had once said in the Bible, so they weren’t that keen on the whole banking nonsense. Nonetheless, Jews had no such restrictions, so European commonwealths utilized this religion loophole to get their financial infrastructures off the ground. Eventually, Jews had a decent job prospect, and all that was asked for in return was for them to live in ghettos and wear a badge or hat so that you are able tell who they were at first glance — a bargain that really didn’t work up in their favor.

Unfortunately, like bankers today, Jews didn’t build themselves popular by charging people interest, and soon the stereotype leapt up that Jews were greedy and money-hungry. So you force outsiders into a profession and then dislike them for doing that profession correctly? Stop being such a Christian stereotype.

Screw it, be a witch. Brew some brew at home. Here’s a good read on how to get started . i > b>

If you desired such articles and want more content like this, support our site with a visit to our Contribution Page. Please and thank you . i > b>

For more, check out 5 Gender Stereotypes That Use To Be the Exact Opposite and 6 Absurd Gender Stereotypes That Science Says Are True . i > b>

Also follow us on Facebook. We’ll love you for it . i > b>

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[titoslondon-blog]

New Post has been published on Titos London

#Blog New Post has been published on http://www.titoslondon.in/magazine-cover-featuring-a-naked-zekke-elliott-left-many-men-uneasy-on-internet-but-do-they-have-to-be/

Magazine cover featuring a naked ‘Zekke’ Elliott left many men uneasy on Internet, but do they have to be?

ESPN’s Body Issue 2017 has left many men on the Internet feeling squeamish after seeing a naked Zekke Elliott on the cover. (Source: ESPN/Twitter) Top News

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ESPN The Magazine released its first Body Issue edition in 2009. It had a glowing Serena Williams on its cover, posing nude, but strategically covering her body parts. She was praised and was called a ‘sex symbol of strength’ back then. Cut to 2017, Williams posed again in the nude, this time showing off her beautiful pregnancy on the cover of Vanity Fair. While she managed to garner praise for her graceful power pose again, another cover is garnering flak on the Internet. ESPN shared a dekko of its 2017 Body Issue featuring American Football running back Ezekiel ‘Zekke’ Elliott in the nude with the caption ‘You can add “cover boy” to Zeke’s resume’, and many have gone weak on social media.

Many Twitter users, of whom, interestingly almost all were men, called out the magazine’s attempt at ‘objectifying men’. While they debated, counter arguments came up from other men and women who called out their ‘fragile egos’. ‘So only women should be objectified?’ was one argument, while pacifists had just one thing to say — ‘It’s just a naked body!’ and that it wasn’t necessary to see it in sexualised context. Meanwhile, others went on to tag the footballer ‘gay’ and a ‘homosexual’.

Check out ESPN’s tweet on the Body Issue 2017 cover here.

You can now add “cover boy” to Zeke’s resume. pic.twitter.com/DSS8r0Jzef

— ESPN (@espn) June 26, 2017

Since 2009, the magazine has released Body Issue editions that talk about the bodies of athletes. In addition to regular sports coverage, the edition talks about the best bodies, the damage to athletes’ bodies due to surgery and injuries and have many sports personalities posing in the buff.

The GIF of the cover that ESPN shared on its Twitter account has evidently left many Twitter users, mostly men, feeling squeamish and uneasy. Here are some of the reactions that ESPN’s latest cover has managed to garner.

You can now add “Homosexual” to his resume…

— Odabo Jack (@RobRothschild69) June 26, 2017

Apparently none of them have seen a picture of a man’s chest and thigh before. They all need to get out more.

— Wonder Jennie (@JennieK_NS) June 27, 2017

Zeke the goat but I gotta unfollow espn. Videos of ITs ass and now this?

— Яaymond (@Nizmond) June 26, 2017

“Stop objectifying guys’ bodies. We are not objects,” wrote another man, on the micro-blogging site. Umm.. well irony much?

Stop exploiting guys bodies. We are not objects.

— C. Dawg Knight (@C_Dawg_Knight) June 26, 2017

And when somebody decided to school ESPN on what the S in the acronym stands for, he was in for a prompt reply.

SPORTS. THE S STANDS FOR SPORTS. NOT STRIPPERS

— low key squidward (@ewwitzclutchy) June 26, 2017

…but you didn’t say that about the swimsuit issue, did you?

— Lex Mohr (@LexMohr) June 27, 2017

Get this off my tl

— rlz (@ThotVeteran) June 26, 2017

Didn’t need to see this first thing this morning. Cool for him, just not my thing.

— Derek Craig (@dc24004) June 26, 2017

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Jon ALi Presents: The Dance Winter Playlist ’16 (Cover Shot By Warren Giddarie)

The sun is brighter than ever. The flowers are in bloom. The gays are beginning to rock their short shorts and tank tops. Yes, ladies and gents… Spring has sprung!

The first day of spring was about a month (March 20), technically, and this should have probably gone up a little sooner, but I really didn’t want to deliver this to you guys half-assed – and also, I do what I want with my boday (ahhkay). But yes, without any further ado, I present to you the first playlist of the new year: The Dance Spring Playlist 2017!

For this 27-track collection, I kept in mind what I would want to listen to as I did some spring cleaning or if I was going for a nice little outdoor run (this body doesn’t make itself). The result is an eclectic and lively collection of songs that I’m super thrilled to share it with you all. I truly did my best to find a little something for everyone with my selections, so you’ll see some familiar names and discover some new ones as well, as per usual.

As for the Dance Spring Playlist 2017‘s artwork (displayed above and below), I teamed up once again with the very talented, Brooklyn-based Warren Giddarie, who shot the cover art for The Dance Fall Playlist 2016. We decided to keep my clothes on (for the most part) this time around – ENJOY!

-THE WARM UP- 1. Shaun Frank – No Future (feat. Dyson) 2. Lady Gaga – The Cure (U-GO-BOY Radio Edit) 3. James Arthur – Can I Be Him (SJUR Remix) 4. Ed Sheeran – Galway Girl (Martin Jensen Remix) 5. Coldplay – Something Just Like This (R3hab Remix) [feat. Coldplay] -SPRINGTIME TURN UP- 6. Rihanna – Pose (Deadly Zoo Remix) 7. Maroon 5 – Cold (feat. Future) [Sak Noel Remix] 8. Stargate – Waterfall (Seeb Remix) [feat. P!nk & Sia] 9. Anne-Marie – Ciao Adios (Jillionaire Remix) [feat. Avelino] 10. Dua Lipa – Be The One (Stylezz Remix) 11. ZAYN – Still Got Time (Team Salut x Ray BLK Remix) [feat. PARTYNEXTDOOR] -SUNNYSIDE BOUNCE- 12. Drake – Passionfruit (Tom Budin Remix) 13. Calvin Harris – Heatstroke (Danny Dove Disco ReFix) [feat. Young Thug, Pharrell Williams & Ariana Grande] 14. Clean Bandit – Symphony (David Nye Remix) [feat. Zara Larsson] 15. Mura Masa – 1 Night (Kyle Meehan Remix) [feat. Charli XCX] 16. KATO & Sigala – Show You Love (MJ Cole Radio Edit) [feat. Hailee Steinfeld] 17. Astrid S – Breathe (Shura Remix) -THE COMEDOWN- 18. SNBRN & BLU J – You Got Me (feat. Cara Frew) 19. Cosmo's Midnight – History (Instupendo Remix) 20. Leon Else – The City Don't Care (feat. Oliver) [Radio Edit] 21. Grey – I Miss You (feat. Bahari) [Oliver Remix] 22. Julia Michaels – Issues (The DJ Mike D Radio Edit) -LAST HURRAH- 23. Bruno Mars – That's What I Like (PARTYNEXTDOOR Remix) 24. Kygo – It Ain't Me (Tiesto Aftr-Hrs Mix) [feat. Selena Gomez] 25. The Tide – Put The Cuffs On Me (TRU Concept Radio Edit) 26. Major Lazer – Run Up (Big Fish Remix) [feat. PARTYNEXTDOOR & Nicki Minaj] 27. David Guetta – Light Up My Body (2DB Remix) [feat. Nicki Minaj]

DOWNLOAD: Jon ALi: Dance Spring Playlist ’17 DL LINK 2: HERE DL LINK 3: HERE

WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THE NEW PLAYLIST?!? THANK YOU’S ARE ALWAYS APPRECIATED!

DOWNLOAD: Jon ALi: Dance Spring Playlist ’17 (Continuous Mix)

from Jon ALi's Blog http://jonalisblog.com/2017/04/24/jon-ali-presents-the-dance-winter-playlist-16-cover-shot-by-warren-giddarie/