#you know not obsessed with money but other things

[rostekhorn]

When it comes to rich people and tech scams, I'm fairly convinced by the argument I read a year or two ago: modern zillionaires chasing after Big Tech mirages are the same thing as the robber-barons and aristocrats of a hundred years ago who went totally gaga over occultism. The pop culture background is the only thing that's changed.

So, in the 1920s, rich idiots went down rabbit holes like telepathy, divination, mediumship, and lost worlds or Aryan precursor civilizations. You know, the kind of thing Conan-Doyle, Maupassant, or Lovecraft might've written pulp tales about.

In the 2020s, the same people's obsessions are now more futuristic and sci-fi themed. Like robot intelligence, or colonies on Mars, or Peter Thiel's insane immortality obsession. In other words, stuff whose common denominator is "I was a teenager in the eighties and I desperately want to believe that Skynet, the Genesis Device, and mutant genes are a real thing, or at least will be if I just throw enough money at them."

Bossware is unfair (in the legal sense, too)

You can get into a lot of trouble by assuming that rich people know what they're doing. For example, might assume that ad-tech works – bypassing peoples' critical faculties, reaching inside their minds and brainwashing them with Big Data insights, because if that's not what's happening, then why would rich people pour billions into those ads?

https://pluralistic.net/2020/12/06/surveillance-tulip-bulbs/#adtech-bubble

You might assume that private equity looters make their investors rich, because otherwise, why would rich people hand over trillions for them to play with?

https://thenextrecession.wordpress.com/2024/11/19/private-equity-vampire-capital/

The truth is, rich people are suckers like the rest of us. If anything, succeeding once or twice makes you an even bigger mark, with a sense of your own infallibility that inflates to fill the bubble your yes-men seal you inside of.

Rich people fall for scams just like you and me. Anyone can be a mark. I was:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/05/cyber-dunning-kruger/#swiss-cheese-security

But though rich people can fall for scams the same way you and I do, the way those scams play out is very different when the marks are wealthy. As Keynes had it, "The market can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent." When the marks are rich (or worse, super-rich), they can be played for much longer before they go bust, creating the appearance of solidity.

Noted Keynesian John Kenneth Galbraith had his own thoughts on this. Galbraith coined the term "bezzle" to describe "the magic interval when a confidence trickster knows he has the money he has appropriated but the victim does not yet understand that he has lost it." In that magic interval, everyone feels better off: the mark thinks he's up, and the con artist knows he's up.

Rich marks have looong bezzles. Empirically incorrect ideas grounded in the most outrageous superstition and junk science can take over whole sections of your life, simply because a rich person – or rich people – are convinced that they're good for you.

Take "scientific management." In the early 20th century, the con artist Frederick Taylor convinced rich industrialists that he could increase their workers' productivity through a kind of caliper-and-stopwatch driven choreographry:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/08/21/great-taylors-ghost/#solidarity-or-bust

Taylor and his army of labcoated sadists perched at the elbows of factory workers (whom Taylor referred to as "stupid," "mentally sluggish," and as "an ox") and scripted their motions to a fare-the-well, transforming their work into a kind of kabuki of obedience. They weren't more efficient, but they looked smart, like obedient robots, and this made their bosses happy. The bosses shelled out fortunes for Taylor's services, even though the workers who followed his prescriptions were less efficient and generated fewer profits. Bosses were so dazzled by the spectacle of a factory floor of crisply moving people interfacing with crisply working machines that they failed to understand that they were losing money on the whole business.

To the extent they noticed that their revenues were declining after implementing Taylorism, they assumed that this was because they needed more scientific management. Taylor had a sweet con: the worse his advice performed, the more reasons their were to pay him for more advice.

Taylorism is a perfect con to run on the wealthy and powerful. It feeds into their prejudice and mistrust of their workers, and into their misplaced confidence in their own ability to understand their workers' jobs better than their workers do. There's always a long dollar to be made playing the "scientific management" con.

Today, there's an app for that. "Bossware" is a class of technology that monitors and disciplines workers, and it was supercharged by the pandemic and the rise of work-from-home. Combine bossware with work-from-home and your boss gets to control your life even when in your own place – "work from home" becomes "live at work":

https://pluralistic.net/2021/02/24/gwb-rumsfeld-monsters/#bossware

Gig workers are at the white-hot center of bossware. Gig work promises "be your own boss," but bossware puts a Taylorist caliper wielder into your phone, monitoring and disciplining you as you drive your wn car around delivering parcels or picking up passengers.

In automation terms, a worker hitched to an app this way is a "reverse centaur." Automation theorists call a human augmented by a machine a "centaur" – a human head supported by a machine's tireless and strong body. A "reverse centaur" is a machine augmented by a human – like the Amazon delivery driver whose app goads them to make inhuman delivery quotas while punishing them for looking in the "wrong" direction or even singing along with the radio:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/08/02/despotism-on-demand/#virtual-whips

Bossware pre-dates the current AI bubble, but AI mania has supercharged it. AI pumpers insist that AI can do things it positively cannot do – rolling out an "autonomous robot" that turns out to be a guy in a robot suit, say – and rich people are groomed to buy the services of "AI-powered" bossware:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/29/pay-no-attention/#to-the-little-man-behind-the-curtain

For an AI scammer like Elon Musk or Sam Altman, the fact that an AI can't do your job is irrelevant. From a business perspective, the only thing that matters is whether a salesperson can convince your boss that an AI can do your job – whether or not that's true:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/07/25/accountability-sinks/#work-harder-not-smarter

The fact that AI can't do your job, but that your boss can be convinced to fire you and replace you with the AI that can't do your job, is the central fact of the 21st century labor market. AI has created a world of "algorithmic management" where humans are demoted to reverse centaurs, monitored and bossed about by an app.

The techbro's overwhelming conceit is that nothing is a crime, so long as you do it with an app. Just as fintech is designed to be a bank that's exempt from banking regulations, the gig economy is meant to be a workplace that's exempt from labor law. But this wheeze is transparent, and easily pierced by enforcers, so long as those enforcers want to do their jobs. One such enforcer is Alvaro Bedoya, an FTC commissioner with a keen interest in antitrust's relationship to labor protection.

Bedoya understands that antitrust has a checkered history when it comes to labor. As he's written, the history of antitrust is a series of incidents in which Congress revised the law to make it clear that forming a union was not the same thing as forming a cartel, only to be ignored by boss-friendly judges:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/14/aiming-at-dollars/#not-men

Bedoya is no mere historian. He's an FTC Commissioner, one of the most powerful regulators in the world, and he's profoundly interested in using that power to help workers, especially gig workers, whose misery starts with systemic, wide-scale misclassification as contractors:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/02/upward-redistribution/

In a new speech to NYU's Wagner School of Public Service, Bedoya argues that the FTC's existing authority allows it to crack down on algorithmic management – that is, algorithmic management is illegal, even if you break the law with an app:

https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/ftc_gov/pdf/bedoya-remarks-unfairness-in-workplace-surveillance-and-automated-management.pdf

Bedoya starts with a delightful analogy to The Hawtch-Hawtch, a mythical town from a Dr Seuss poem. The Hawtch-Hawtch economy is based on beekeeping, and the Hawtchers develop an overwhelming obsession with their bee's laziness, and determine to wring more work (and more honey) out of him. So they appoint a "bee-watcher." But the bee doesn't produce any more honey, which leads the Hawtchers to suspect their bee-watcher might be sleeping on the job, so they hire a bee-watcher-watcher. When that doesn't work, they hire a bee-watcher-watcher-watcher, and so on and on.

For gig workers, it's bee-watchers all the way down. Call center workers are subjected to "AI" video monitoring, and "AI" voice monitoring that purports to measure their empathy. Another AI times their calls. Two more AIs analyze the "sentiment" of the calls and the success of workers in meeting arbitrary metrics. On average, a call-center worker is subjected to five forms of bossware, which stand at their shoulders, marking them down and brooking no debate.

For example, when an experienced call center operator fielded a call from a customer with a flooded house who wanted to know why no one from her boss's repair plan system had come out to address the flooding, the operator was punished by the AI for failing to try to sell the customer a repair plan. There was no way for the operator to protest that the customer had a repair plan already, and had called to complain about it.

Workers report being sickened by this kind of surveillance, literally – stressed to the point of nausea and insomnia. Ironically, one of the most pervasive sources of automation-driven sickness are the "AI wellness" apps that bosses are sold by AI hucksters:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/03/15/wellness-taylorism/#sick-of-spying

The FTC has broad authority to block "unfair trade practices," and Bedoya builds the case that this is an unfair trade practice. Proving an unfair trade practice is a three-part test: a practice is unfair if it causes "substantial injury," can't be "reasonably avoided," and isn't outweighed by a "countervailing benefit." In his speech, Bedoya makes the case that algorithmic management satisfies all three steps and is thus illegal.

On the question of "substantial injury," Bedoya describes the workday of warehouse workers working for ecommerce sites. He describes one worker who is monitored by an AI that requires him to pick and drop an object off a moving belt every 10 seconds, for ten hours per day. The worker's performance is tracked by a leaderboard, and supervisors punish and scold workers who don't make quota, and the algorithm auto-fires if you fail to meet it.

Under those conditions, it was only a matter of time until the worker experienced injuries to two of his discs and was permanently disabled, with the company being found 100% responsible for this injury. OSHA found a "direct connection" between the algorithm and the injury. No wonder warehouses sport vending machines that sell painkillers rather than sodas. It's clear that algorithmic management leads to "substantial injury."

What about "reasonably avoidable?" Can workers avoid the harms of algorithmic management? Bedoya describes the experience of NYC rideshare drivers who attended a round-table with him. The drivers describe logging tens of thousands of successful rides for the apps they work for, on promise of "being their own boss." But then the apps start randomly suspending them, telling them they aren't eligible to book a ride for hours at a time, sending them across town to serve an underserved area and still suspending them. Drivers who stop for coffee or a pee are locked out of the apps for hours as punishment, and so drive 12-hour shifts without a single break, in hopes of pleasing the inscrutable, high-handed app.

All this, as drivers' pay is falling and their credit card debts are mounting. No one will explain to drivers how their pay is determined, though the legal scholar Veena Dubal's work on "algorithmic wage discrimination" reveals that rideshare apps temporarily increase the pay of drivers who refuse rides, only to lower it again once they're back behind the wheel:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/12/algorithmic-wage-discrimination/#fishers-of-men

This is like the pit boss who gives a losing gambler some freebies to lure them back to the table, over and over, until they're broke. No wonder they call this a "casino mechanic." There's only two major rideshare apps, and they both use the same high-handed tactics. For Bedoya, this satisfies the second test for an "unfair practice" – it can't be reasonably avoided. If you drive rideshare, you're trapped by the harmful conduct.

The final prong of the "unfair practice" test is whether the conduct has "countervailing value" that makes up for this harm.

To address this, Bedoya goes back to the call center, where operators' performance is assessed by "Speech Emotion Recognition" algorithms, a psuedoscientific hoax that purports to be able to determine your emotions from your voice. These SERs don't work – for example, they might interpret a customer's laughter as anger. But they fail differently for different kinds of workers: workers with accents – from the American south, or the Philippines – attract more disapprobation from the AI. Half of all call center workers are monitored by SERs, and a quarter of workers have SERs scoring them "constantly."

Bossware AIs also produce transcripts of these workers' calls, but workers with accents find them "riddled with errors." These are consequential errors, since their bosses assess their performance based on the transcripts, and yet another AI produces automated work scores based on them.

In other words, algorithmic management is a procession of bee-watchers, bee-watcher-watchers, and bee-watcher-watcher-watchers, stretching to infinity. It's junk science. It's not producing better call center workers. It's producing arbitrary punishments, often against the best workers in the call center.

There is no "countervailing benefit" to offset the unavoidable substantial injury of life under algorithmic management. In other words, algorithmic management fails all three prongs of the "unfair practice" test, and it's illegal.

What should we do about it? Bedoya builds the case for the FTC acting on workers' behalf under its "unfair practice" authority, but he also points out that the lack of worker privacy is at the root of this hellscape of algorithmic management.

He's right. The last major update Congress made to US privacy law was in 1988, when they banned video-store clerks from telling the newspapers which VHS cassettes you rented. The US is long overdue for a new privacy regime, and workers under algorithmic management are part of a broad coalition that's closer than ever to making that happen:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/12/06/privacy-first/#but-not-just-privacy

Workers should have the right to know which of their data is being collected, who it's being shared by, and how it's being used. We all should have that right. That's what the actors' strike was partly motivated by: actors who were being ordered to wear mocap suits to produce data that could be used to produce a digital double of them, "training their replacement," but the replacement was a deepfake.

With a Trump administration on the horizon, the future of the FTC is in doubt. But the coalition for a new privacy law includes many of Trumpland's most powerful blocs – like Jan 6 rioters whose location was swept up by Google and handed over to the FBI. A strong privacy law would protect their Fourth Amendment rights – but also the rights of BLM protesters who experienced this far more often, and with far worse consequences, than the insurrectionists.

The "we do it with an app, so it's not illegal" ruse is wearing thinner by the day. When you have a boss for an app, your real boss gets an accountability sink, a convenient scapegoat that can be blamed for your misery.

The fact that this makes you worse at your job, that it loses your boss money, is no guarantee that you will be spared. Rich people make great marks, and they can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent. Markets won't solve this one – but worker power can.

Image: Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg

CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en

[dangermousie]

Random other fun things I noticed on my rewatch of ep 1.

The way the camera keeps focusing on his wedding ring makes me think of FoE. But also, she never wears hers (since she's the secret wife, it makes sense) but it's also pretty symbolic since by end of 2, we can tell he's obsessed with her and she wants out of the marriage even via reckless means.

Two eps (and book spoilers) in, it's clear he's not lying. But it's so interesting that the only times we've seen him show any strong hint of his feelings, it's never to her but to others - the ambassador or even 406 (since he loses his temper to 406 in both eps, and he doesn't know it's her, so he thinks it's a random.) It's like he CANNOT admit it to her because it would make him so very vulnerable and he's a man who is terrified of being so - plus he's clearly operating on a very sane principle of "if I can't open up to her, she can't reject me" - it's like those high school kids who send a friend to feel it out with their crush because they can't confront them directly. The most he can manage is this indirect confession that he can backtrack out of to her if he has to. Between all his issues and personality and the fact that it might be hard to convince him any move she makes to reciprocate is of her own volition, it's hard going for these two even if she wanted to make it work which she doesn't. Ironically, by playing as 406, she might find out just how much gone he is for her (and being able to believe it the way she'd never believe an actual confession to her as her, because she could think that's manipulativeness but why would he manipulate her about his feelings as 406?) And I do think if/when he finds out she's unhinged enough to do the 406 thing, he might put at least one fear to rest - that she's vulnerable/fragile/weak enough to only jump him because Mommy ordered. A woman insane enough to do what she's doing now is no (longer a) pushover, if she's acting like she wants him, it's of her own volition.

Her rant is glorious but his face is giving me pause because...does he understand what she's saying? Hmmmm. I mean, he holds everything so close that he could very well know sign language and not let on. I genuinely have no idea.

Everyone has already posted about the indirect kiss but all I can think of is how weird lipstick would taste on wine. You poor simp, just beg her to give you a chance and drink wine from a clean glass like a normal person.

Also there are a couple of really fun moments in the convo where she as 406 mirrors what he told her earlier. Wonder if he will notice.

And the amount of money she asks as alternative to divorce is exactly the divorce penalty!

Also, it's so great to see his freak out when HHJ is threatened. FL thinks it's threat to his career but we all know it's her.

I need more eps! I got spoiled with cdramas and eps every day!

[qu1cks1lversb1tch]

Hoping that this isn't weird but IMAGINE Vox having everything, fame, money, power, but he loses the one thing he treasures the most on extermination day– his family. Like imagine if Vox and his pregnant wife had this hugee argument before extermination day causing her to storm out of the tower, but he didn't chase her cause it was just probably the hormones and she'd come back. But she didn't manage to come back in time. So Vox had to wait in the tower cause he couldn't go out and pray that she was okay. After the extermination, he of course went ballistic trying to find her, jumping from camera to camera until he found her corpse in some random dark alley. What would be the aftermath? I HOPE THIS ISNT WEIRD I JUST CRAVEE ANGST ‼️‼️😭

A/N — I rewrote this a total of four times 😭 I hope this satisfies your need for angst, my lovely anon. This is the one my sister finally approved for everyone to see. Poor kid hates reading my fanfic and she's been subjected to being my conscience while I wrote this. I had to bribe her with coffee and a 20 piece nugget from McDonald's to get her to read more than a paragraph 😭

Fade To Black

Warnings: ANGST, pregnancy, Fem!Reader, loss of wife + child, Vox in denial, got kinda dark with the implications at the end(?), Alastor is mentioned a few times. Guys, I'm literally so sorry

Word Count: 1.2K

“You're not listening to me!” You reiterated for what felt like the billionth time, your gaze momentarily darting to the small curve of your stomach where one of your hands rested securely, the other on your hip.

Vox sighed, exasperated. “Listen, Doll, I'm hearing what you're saying and—”

“—That's exactly the problem! You're hearing what I'm saying but you're not actually listening to me, Vox! For Hell's sake, step away from your work and weird obsession with the Radio Demon for two seconds and focus on what's important!” 

The words felt like knives as you spoke them, each one spearing the air of the penthouse. The room fell silent. The other vees were no stranger to the arguments that broke out, hell, they were a part of most of them. . . But not this one. . . Vox stiffened and squared his shoulders. 

“My work is important. My work is what allows us to live the afterlife we do.” He said, his tone firm, almost condescending. 

“And what about your obsession, huh? Watching the rinky-dink hotel cameras in your office after hours for a glimpse of that antlered little freak who doesn't give a shit about you — when you should be home, here, with me?” 

You waited for an answer, yet Vox only stared at you. It was painfully clear that he didn't know what to say. “Lucifer's tits — fuck you!” You hissed, throwing your hands up in the air, showing just how done you were with all of this.

The next moment, you were turning on your heel and storming out of the room. 

Vox only scoffed and dropped onto the couch, watching as you walked away. Hormones. He thought to himself. It had to be.

He'd never seen you so worked up about his late nights at the office. Never seen you so angry when referencing Alastor, who had once been a good friend and mentor to you. 

Hormones. It was the only logical explanation, right?

He let you go, knowing you needed your space. . . Knowing you'd come home once you cleared your head and had just enough patience to once again approach the topic with a semi-level head, likely once the extermination was over.

You knew the moment you cleared the doors of the tower that you had likely overreacted. The hot, dry air of Hell against your skin seemed to bring the realization to the forefront of your mind. 

Yet it was pride and stubbornness that kept you from turning back to the tower, rather storming through the desolate back alleyways, a metaphorical thundercloud looming over your head.

Vox hadn't followed you, and you weren't about to give him the satisfaction of going back. You loved him, and you knew he loved you too — as shocking as it was that the two of you found genuine love in Hell.

As much as you loved him, he infuriated you, even more so now that you were carrying his child. . . 

The carnage of Extermination Day met your ears and your steps faltered, drawing you to a stop as your instincts then screamed at you to go home. To go where it was safe. 

Safe. 

Safe at Vox's side. At home. . .

How could you have forgotten what day it was? The anger. It had to have been the reason for your lapse in memory. . . So you began heading back towards the tower. 

Pride and stubbornness be damned.

Sticking to the shadows, you ventured forward towards the net of safety that you so desperately needed.

So close, yet so far.

Too far. 

It'd been too long. 

You'd been gone too long. 

The moment Extermination Day had been declared finished, Vox was out looking for you. Every camera on every street he could possibly reach. 

Every sinner he found dead and dying in the streets, he hoped he wouldn't see your face. Your beautiful face. . . The thought alone made something twist in his gut like a double edged blade — fear, he recognized. 

Pure unbridled fear. 

Fear of losing you. Fear of losing the two most important beings in his entire afterlife. 

He searched for what seemed like forever, until he caught a glimpse of you in an alleyway, almost entirely hidden from view. He easily recognized your clothes you had been wearing that day and your hair — oh, how he loved that hair. 

Relief flooded him as he rushed towards you, though it disappeared, his heart plummeting as he dropped to his knees.

“Hey, Doll, wake up. . . It's okay, it's over.” He said, his voice shaky as his hands came up to either side of your face. 

“You did good. . . You played dead so you could survive. They're gone now — you can open your eyes, Doll. . . Please open your eyes. . .” He begged softly, his touch and voice becoming more frantic.

“No, no, no, open your eyes for me, okay? I know you're mad at me, Doll, I'm sorry. . . I'm so sorry. . . Wake up. . . Wake up. . . Wake up. . .” He pulled your body closer to his, clutching you close. One hand held the back of your head to his chest, the other trailed down to your stomach. 

Too many emotions clawed at him as he begged you to wake up, to give up the charade. . . He made promises to make it up to you. He'd spend more time at home with you. He'd give up on his obsession with Alastor. He'd do it. He would do it for you. . . 

But it was too late. . . The blood that soaked your clothes and his was a chilling reminder. . . The all powerful TV Demon choked out a sob as your skin turned cold beneath his hands. 

His world stopped spinning, the axis snapping and floating off into the abyss as he held you close. . . He wasn't used to feeling your skin cold. He was used to the warmth, the life, the light that came from you. 

He couldn't feel you. 

And it killed him. 

He couldn't breathe. His chest ached. Nothing in all of Hell mattered more than you. More than the child that had been created out of love and the use of a loophole within Hell's complex laws of nature. 

And now it had been ripped away from him. He hated himself. He was angry. 

It felt as if the light and warmth had been sucked out of his universe, leaving nothing but cold darkness that seeped into his very soul, gnawing at him, tearing him apart from the inside out. 

He could hardly remember his afterlife before you. Now, facing a reality where he'd have to live in an afterlife without you. . . It consumed him in all the wrong ways. . . 

He wanted you back. 

He needed you back. 

Yet the darkness that gnawed and clawed at his entire being, the absence of you — your light that was supposed to guide him through this perpetual landscape of flame and rot for all eternity. . . The shadows remained like a constant reminder, a plague of its own, slowly eating away at him at every opportunity. 

Without your light, he was nothing. 

Without your laugh, he was nothing. 

Without your attitude, he was nothing. 

Without your warmth, he was nothing.

Nothing more than a shell of the overlord he used to be. . . And when the shadows clawed at his mind like a beast seeking a debt to be paid, he let them win. 

He let it all fade to black. 

[herinsectreflection]

I have been struggling with whether or not to talk about why I've not been updating much lately. On one hand, I know I don't owe anybody anything. This is not my job, I do this for my own enjoyment and I am entitled to post as often or infrequently as I like. On the other hand, I am addicted to Explaining Things, that's why I'm planning to write 300k words about an old TV show I really like. So here, here are the reasons. I'm hoping that by writing them down my brain will stop latching onto them as sources of anxiety. 1) I got a job that I care about. I won't tell you what I do, but I will tell you that I work in a hospital. It takes a lot of mental energy, and unlike previous jobs, I no longer have the time or inclination to sneakily write essays in my downtime. Which sucks. I hate caring about the thing I'm paid for. It leaves less care for the things I'm not paid for.

2) Speaking of getting paid - I cancelled my ko-fi a few months ago. As much as I truly felt supported and humbled by the people who gave my money, I think it didn't help. Writing began to feel like something I owed the people who gave me money, rather than something I was doing because I wanted to.

3) I got into a polyamorous relationship. You ever tried to have free time while polyamorous? 'Nuff said.

4) I introduced one of my (then) partners to Buffy, and we ended up watching S3 while I was also trying to write about S3. I ended up oversaturated on S3. The most fun I had writing the earlier essays was when new ideas would hit me as I was watching. S3 doesn't feel as fresh to me, and so I don't feel eager to get to it.

5) In regards to S3, I've definitely been putting a lot of pressure on myself to say something particularly interesting and unique about it, since it is, you know, The Faith Season, and I have been branded The Faith Explainer. It's a lot of pressure for something that objectively does not matter at all. But that's anxiety disorders for you.

6) I have started new hobbies, new sports, and regular therapy. Which is all wonderful and has enriched my life, but it takes up free weekends rather quickly.

7) Speaking of therapy - you know that tweet that's like "I started new meds and now I'm not obsessed with BTS anymore"? There's a little of that going on I'm not going to lie.

8) Hyperfixations change and apparently I have not been fixating on Buffy for a little while. It's a lot easier to sink hours and hours into something when your brain has decided that that is all it wants to sink its time into.

9) I had major surgery 18 months ago and that has not not been a factor.

10) This post, I got three paragraphs into the Consequences essay and then decided to start Posting. I don't control these things.

11) ANXIETY

[cienie-isengardu]

You know, looking how the elder Sub-Zero evolved through the various source media, it seems we could even argue that Kronika - the Keeper of Time obsesses with Perfect Balance Between Good and Evil - really set her mind to push him more and more on the “evil” side with each restart of timeline.  And to do so, Bi-Han is more and more bound to cruel destiny bestowed on him while there is a part - maybe a memory from the original, previous life, or maybe it is just a cryomancer’s nature? - that rejects it. A pretty interesting thing to think about, as in older comics (Malibu) or even Mythologies: Sub-Zero, Bi-Han is more a neutral part, doing evil things as a means for his own survival and clan’s benefit than a cold bastard enjoying other people’s misery. Check, back in the past Bi-Han at times was a pretty heroic figure despite his assassin upbringing. All the real “corruption” comes after he is killed and turned into Wraith, stripped from his own humanity. So did Kronika consider Bi-Han to be a danger to her beloved Balance? Did she see Bi-Han as a threat of breaking it in a way she can’t control thus designing his fate more and more in cruel fashion? And even then Noob must be mind(?) controlled to keep in check by Quan Chi, as implied by 

MK9 Noob’s Ending

"Quan Chi should never have resurrected Noob Saibot. Nor should he have enhanced his power to defeat Shao Kahn. The revenant he created had broken free of his control. Noob had secretly formed an "understanding" with a cleric from the realm of Chaos and opened for him a portal to the Netherrealm. Shinnok, Quan Chi and the Brotherhood of Shadow were unprepared as the forces of Chaos overwhelmed them, leaving the Underworld severely weakened. Satisfied with his work, the cleric, Havik, returned to the realm of Chaos. Noob Saibot remained to seize control of the Netherrealm."

MK11 intro dialogues 

Noob Saibot: Quan Chi no longer binds me. Shao Kahn: Now what will you do, specter? Noob Saibot: Kill you.

MK11 Noob Saibot’s BIO

“Shadow of the Netherrealm. In life, Noob Saibot was known as Sub-Zero. Unjustly murdered by Scorpion, he was resurrected by Quan Chi and granted power over darkness, but as Quan Chi’s slave. Now, Quan Chi is dead. Noob Saibot is finally free to reclaim the honor that was stolen from him."

or

Mortal Kombat Onslaught (as can be seen here.)

All because Bi-Han refuses to grovel before any Master and once breaks out from the control, is out there to become a master of his own destiny and/or to kill his “owner”.

I mean, Kronika could manipulate time and timelines as she pleased but somehow the more she pushed her agenda, the more dangerous Bi-Han became to her own plans. The mortal Bi-Han, as the original game suggests, would take the money after killing Shang Tsung and quit the assassin job for good. Which is pretty low ambition considering all things while also the most neutral outcome to the general Balance. Then we have the Wraith. Noob Saibot may bow and obey, but he will seize any opportunity to bite back the hand that holds his leash. MK9 Noob? Brings Havik’s forces to fuck up Shinnok and Quan Chi and take over the whole Netherrealm. MK 11 Noob? Kills Kronika and transcends into being Death itself. Even the MK1 (2023) Noob, once his mind is mended, is out there to kill Titan Havik (though why Liu Kang objected that, when previously he had no problem with eliminating other timelines of Dark Titans, is a weird choice of the NRS).

Mortal Bi-Han just wants to be left alone and in peace, his clan’s safety secured. Noob is out there to fuck anyone that stand in the way of his freedom and ambitions, even if he needs pretend to be obedient for awhile. 

Like, I’m really curious what Kronika was thinking when she so stubbornly decided that at best neutral mortal Bi-Han must be replaced with a much more ruthless, ambitious Wraith? It is like playing with fire, lol.

As Noob Saibot, he believes he has achieved absolute freedom, when in fact he is more a slave than ever of himself and the entire universe, even... He's like Hanzo Hasashi: the very personification of the tragedy of human condition in MK (I'm hardly exaggerating, honestly). And yet, he and Hanzo never give up. They refuse to believe that all is lost, and insist again and again on asserting their right to be truly free and happy, and to finally become masters of their own destinies. And in fact, this revolt against the universe's mortiferous determinism is already a powerful form of freedom.

I think Bi-Han as Noob is pretty much aware of his limitations due to his Masters (Shinnok, Quan Chi, Kronika), as most sources imply he is biding his time to backstab them and be on his own quest for power. I do think however he may really believe that death perfected him, in the sense he is cut from human weakness. As I imagine, a cold embrace of death is something a cryomancer accepts better than most people do. 

I agree with what you said about Bi-Han and Hanzo and the fact that both managed to push past their trauma and rebuild their life in one way or another is really inspiring. But there is one big difference between them - all Quan Chi needed to keep Hanzo in check was to manipulate him emotionally, while Bi-Han was stripped from his humanity and enslaved in more controlling ways, like by dark magic. In that way, I think Bi-Han/Noob is even more impressive example of revolt against powers beyond his control and reclaiming what was taken from him while simply adapting to the situation at hand.

Bi-Han, an Imagery of Bondage

"One evening I sat Beauty on my knees—And I found her bitter—And I reviled her." Arthur Rimbaud, A Season in Hell

See below the images for commentary. Johnny Cage:

Nitara:

Ermac:

Shang Tsung:

Kuai Liang:

Mileena:

Havik:

Geras:

Sektor:

Liu Kang:

Have you noticed? There's a recurring motif in Bi-Han's trajectory in MK1 and Khaos Reigns. In fact, it's almost a running gag. Bi-Han wants absolute freedom for himself and his clan. His personal lexicon is thus filled with the closely intertwined themes of independence and servitude: "again kneel before you?", "shackle us, no", "to free the Lin Kuei from bondage", "captivity", "perfect henchman", "now that we serve ourselves", "I had broken the Lin Kuei free of Liu Kang's enslavement", "we were now masters of our destiny", "allowed to desire a better future", "I had gained the Lin Kuei's freedom", "[Liu Kang] wants to control", "we must tighten control", "submit", "no one leaves the Lin Kuei", "living in your sister's shadow", "I refuse to fight in your shadow", etc.

But at the same time, Bi-Han is also the most imprisoned being in the game. The most manhandled, tied up and chained (physically, spiritually and mentally); the one with the most moments of vulnerability and unconsciousness—but also the one who is most carried by others and touched by them. It is as if no one wants him to achieve freedom, and instead wants to keep him jealously for themself. Is it because he is the most gorgeous character in the whole franchise, but also one of the most talented and powerful, as if he had been blessed by the gods? They all want to sit his ethereal beauty on their laps and never let it escape. They all want to possess it, selfishly revel in it and manipulate it as they please like a doll, out of lust, resentment or pure wickedness.

Blessed by the gods, really? Yes, and no. For it is because of all these gifts that Bi-Han's also been the most cursed character in the game for just over 30 years. In reality, the gods are envious, greedy and vengeful, and the laws of the universe wantonly punish the mortals they have elected of all people to embody their divinity on Earth. This is the basis of all tragedy. (All screenshots by me, except for the Nitara ones: sources 1 & 2.)

[ljblueteak]

Obsessed with how Taub, Thirteen, and Chase decide what to do when it looks like their prank in The Down Low (6x11) is going to result in Foreman leaving because Cuddy won't give him a raise and they've tricked him into thinking he makes less than they do.

Taub is the first to suggest they own up to the prank and tell Foreman. Thirteen explains why that won't help, then Chase says they have to confess to Cuddy.

Taub has some doubts going to Cuddy will work, but it looks like Chase's idea wins out. Then Thirteen takes the lead on telling Cuddy

Thirteen: It was all our fault. Taub: We were screwing with Foreman, trying to make him think he made less than we did. Obviously, things got out of control. Cuddy: Well, someone does something stupid and insensitive, I always figure it was House. Good to know it's catching. Chase: Look, there is no other job. He was just trying to get a raise. Even if you gave him a little more money, I know he'd stay. Cuddy: I'm not giving Foreman a raise because the three of you decided to amuse yourselves. Thirteen: We know, and that's why we want you to take it out of our paychecks.

And they're a unified front about giving Foreman money out of their own paychecks even if Taub has a very brief moment of hoping a different solution will work out.

The best part? Foreman was playing them but also must have trusted they'd all come through for him!

[thanatoseyes]

Sometimes I think about the body John would get and all my brain can supply is Kakuzu from Naruto except with yellow eyes.

[hella1975]

so there's a reason my new job got back to me so quickly about my application and that's bc it's an absolute fucking shambles like actually perfect timing for me to decide to rewatch the bear bc i have never more felt like ive been thrown into a broke on-its-knees establishment trying to crawl its way up the ladder where i am somehow a godsend to them. my old job was crazy and shambolic in the sense that the industry is just Like That but this one?????? insanity. every 5 mins i am questioning what im doing with my life. ive already had a walk-in fridge moment

[hecksupremechips]

Recent disney and pixar movies have felt like movies in the way that monster high movies feel like movies. And I don’t want anyone to see this and go “but at least monster high movies are good!” cuz, sure whatever I don’t care, just listen. What I’m saying is these recent disney movies are so forgettable and I don’t think it’s just because of the rise of streaming services fucking up how the films are marketed and viewed, they also feel unbelievably pointless. They feel like movies made around a plot that would be forced into a ten minute episode if it were a cartoon made by smaller creators rn. The plots are so simple I feel like a toddler like I feel like the stakes have gotten increasingly lower and everything is underwhelming. Toy story 4’s big conflict was woody needs to get the plastic spoon back to the little girl. Inside out 2 was the emotions needing to get back to headquarters while riley is just at hockey camp and they learn their lessons in five minutes. Encanto is just mirabelle talking to her family and then singing songs at her. Strange world was a very basic father/son relationship story with no real stakes. The main thing luca wants in luca is a vespa and the main thing mei wants in turning red is concert tickets. Not even gonna glance at wish or lightyear cuz like who watched those what are those movies even for. I can’t remember any of these movies and even the ones I liked are still underwhelming and I walked out of them trying to justify that to myself like “oh well not every movie has to have a crazy plot, sometimes they can be simple”. But it’s like. All their movies now. And the characters are uh, they’re okay in some of them I guess I dunno. And this isn’t even to say that the more beloved older disney movies never had simple plots cuz like look at Cinderella, half of that movie is just animals getting into shenanigans to fill time. But idk, it felt like people actually wanted to make that movie and put love and attention into it. Now these things are just disney pumping out vague emotions that might get them an award while coating everything with this “look at how much money we have” polish

[exopelagic]

WHY DID NOBODY TELL ME BURROWS END WASNT FREE

[bitegore]

Odd to me that the whole "x trans group has it worse, actually" people seem to both be really optimistic about how cissexual cisgender society views trans people of every stripe, just about different groups. Like they don't see any of us as one of them. There's still regular degular transphobia and its fucking everpresent for literally every trans person there is. There's no passing so successful that you opt out of society beong transphobic on literally any side.

[sandinthepipes]

I have just realised that a lot of my favourite ships fall into the-prince-and-the-pauper bin???? And i wasn't even aware??????

[dimiclaudeblaigan]

Just curious, Why won’t you write Sylvain and Claude fics?

I've talked about it before from similar asks, here and here! I'd just be regurgitating the same answers basically lol.

[inkskinned]

i got rickrolled today but it didn't work because i have adblocker installed, so youtube just told me i violated the terms of service. yesterday i was trying to edit a picture as a joke for my girlfriend, and google made me check a box to prove i'm human because i wasn't "searching normally".

it isn't just that capitalism is killing fun and whimsy, it is that any element of entertainment or joy is being fed upon by this mosquito body, one that will suck you dry at any vulnerability.

do you want to meet new friends in your city? download this app, visit our website, sign up for our email list. pay for this class on making a terrarium, on candlemaking, on cooking. it will be 90 dollars a session. you can go to group fitness, but only under our specific gym membership. solve the puzzle, sign up for our puzzle-of-the-month-club. what is a club if not just a paid opportunity - you are all paying for the same thing, which makes you a community.

but you're like me, i know it - you're careful, you try the library meetings and the stuff at the local school and all of that. the problem is that you kind of want really specific opportunities that used to exist. you are so grateful for libraries and the publicly-funded things: they are, however, an exception - and everything they have, they've fought tooth-and-nail to protect. you read a headline about how in many other states, libraries have virtually nothing left.

do you want to meet up with your friends afterwards? gift your friends the discord app. you can choose to go to a cafe (buy a coffee, at least), a bar (money, alcohol) or you can all stay in and catch a movie (streaming) or you can all stay in bed (rent. don't get me started) and scream (noise complaint. ticket at least).

you want to read a new book, but the book has to have 124 buzzwords from tiktok readers that are, like, weirdly horny. you can purchase this audiobook on audible! your podcast isn't on spotify, it's on its own server, pay for a different site. fuck, at least you're supporting artists you like. the art museum just raised their ticket price. once, they had a temporary exhibit that acknowledged that ~85% of their permanent art galleries were from cis white men, and that they had thousands of works by women (even famous women, like frida! georgia o'keefe!) just rotting in their basement. that exhibit lasted for 3 months and then they put everything away again.

walmart proudly supports this strip of land by the street! here are some flowers with wilting leaves. its employees have to pay out-of-pocket for their uniforms. my friend once got fined by the city because she organized a community pick-up of the riverfront, which was technically private property.

no, you cannot afford to take that dance class, neither can i. by the way - i'm a teacher. i'm absolutely not saying "educators shouldn't be paid fairly." i'm saying that when i taught classes, renting a studio went from 20 bucks an hour to 180 in the span of 6 months. no significant changes to the studio were made, except they now list the place as updated and friendly. the heat still doesn't work in the building. i have literally never seen the landlord who ignores my emails. recently they've been renting it out at night as an "unusual nightclub; a once-in-a-lifetime close-knit party." they spent some of those 180 dollars on LEDs and called it renovating. the high heels they invite in have been ruining the marley.

do you want to experience the old internet? do you want to play flash games or get back the temporary joy of club penguin? you can, you just need to pay for it. i have a weird, neurodivergent obsession with occasionally checking in to watch the downfall and NFT-ification of neopets. if i'm honest with you all - i never got into webkins, my family didn't have the money to buy me a pointless elephant. people forget that "being poor" can mean literally "if i buy you that toy, i can't afford rent."

you and i don't have time to make good food, and we don't have the budget for it. we are not gonna be able to host dinner parties, we're not made of money, kid. do you want some kind of 3rd space? a space that isn't home or work or school? you could try being online, but - what places actually exist for you? tiktok counts as social media because you see other people on it, not because they actually talk to you.

there was a local winter tradition of sledding down the hill at my school. kids would use pizza boxes and jackets and whatever worked, howling and laughing. back in september, they made a big announcement that this time, rules were changing, and everyone must pay 10 dollars to participate. when im not scared shitless, i kind of appreciate the environmental irony - it hasn't gone below 40. so much for snow & joyriding.

i saw a bulletin for a local dogwalking group and, nervous about making a good first impression, showed up early. the first guy there grimaced at me. "sorry," he said. "there's a 30-dollar buy-in fee." i thought he was joking. wait. for what? the group doesn't offer anything except friendship and people with whom to walk around the city.

he didn't know the answer. just shrugged at me. "you know," he said. "these days, everything costs money."

[deadandwalking]

if teenage years are the best years of my life why am i apologising to the little girl in my head why am i fearing my family falling apart why am i failing to accept my bio family are not good for me why am i worried about grades and jobs and life why am i preparing to mourn my best friend why am i fearing growing old why do i miss what i never had why do i miss people who don’t miss me why am i disgusted by my own urges, wants and needs why do i cry over the things i love the most why do i seek comfort in fiction because reality is against me why do i fear the touch i crave why do i feel i am dying

[meat-huge-pain-endless]

yeah yeah yeah i know that i need to do the good thing even if its the hard thing but god dammit sometimes it’s rlly fucking hard!!!!