#and yet it's so uniquely personal and Soviet

[queenlucythevaliant]

Time to share another of my favorite Christian poems with you all. It’s a martyrdom poem by Varlam Shalamov, a victim of the Soviet gulags and also the writer of Kolyma Tales. A few favorite stanza are written out here; the entire poem is typed out below. It’s a little on the long end, but entirely worth it. 

“Avvakum in Pustozyorsk” by Varlam Shalamov

The walls of my church

  are the ribs of my heart;

it seems life and I

  are soon bound to part

 .

My cross now rises,

  traced with two fingers.

In Pustozyorsk it blazes;

  its blaze will linger.

 .

I’m glorified everywhere,

  vilified, branded;

I have already become

  the stuff of legend.  

 .

I was, people say,

  full of anger and spite;

I suffered, I died

  for the ancient rite.

 .

But this popular verdict

  is ugly nonsense;

I hear and reject

  the implied censure.

 .

The rite is nothing—

  neither wrong nor right;

a rite is a trifle

  in God’s sight.

 .

But they attacked our faith

  in the ways of the past,

in all we’d learned as children

  and taken to heart.

 .

In their holy garments,

  in their grand hats,

with a cold crucifix

  in their cold hands,

 .

in thrall to a terror

  clutching their souls,

they drag us to jails

  and herd us to scaffolds.

 .

We don’t mind about the doctrine

  books and their age;

we don’t debate virtues

  of fetters and chains.

 .

Our dispute is of freedom,

  and the right to breathe—

about the Lord’s will

  to bind as he please.

 .

The healers of souls

  chastised our bodies;

while they schemed and plotted,

  we ran to the forests.

 .

Despite their decrees,

   we hurled our words

out of the lion’s mouth

  and into the world.

 .

We called for just vengeance

  against their sins;

along with the Lord,

   we sang poems and hymns.

 .

The words of the Lord

  were claps of thunder.

The Church endures;

   it will never go under.

 .

And I, unyielding,

  reading the Psalter,

was brought to the gates

  of the Andronikov Monastery.

 .

I was young;

  I endured every pain:

hunger, beatings,

  interrogations.

 .

A winged angel

  shut the eyes of the guard,

brought me cabbage soup,

  and a hunk of bread.

 .

I crossed the threshold—

  and I walked free.

Embracing my Exile,

  I walked to the east.

 .

I held services

   by the Amur River,

where I barely survived

  the winds and blizzards.

 .

They branded my cheeks

  with brands of frost;

by a mountain stream

  they tore out my nostrils.

 .

But the path to the Lord

  goes from jail to jail;

the path to the Lord

  never changes.

 .

And all too few,

  since Jesus’s days,

have proved able to bear

  God’s all-seeing gaze.

 .

Nastasia, Nastasia,

  do not despair;

true joy often wears

  a garment of tears.

 .

Whatever temptations

  may beat in your heart,

whatever torments

  may rip you apart,

 .

walk on in peace,

  through a thousand troubles

and fear not the serpent

  that bites at your ankles—

 .

though not from Eden

  has this snake crawled;

it is an envoy of evil

  from Satan’s hand.

 .

Here, birdsong

  is unknown;

here one learns the patience

  and the wisdom of stone.

 .

I have seen no color

  except lingonberry

in fourteen years

  spent as a prisoner.

 .

But this is not madness,

  nor a waking nightmare;

it is my soul’s fortress,

  its will and freedom.

 .

And now they are leading me

  far away in fetters;

my yoke is easy

  and my burden grows lighter.

 .

My track is swept clean

  and dusted with silver;

I’m climbing to heaven

  on wings of fire.

 .

Through cold and hunger,

  through grief and fear

towards God, like a dove,

  I will rise from the pyre.

 .

O far-away Russia—

  I give you my vow

to return to the sky

  forgiving my foe.

 .

May I be reviled,

  and burned at the stake;

may my ashes be cast

  on the mountain wind.

 .

There is no fate sweeter,

  no better end,

than to knock, as ash,

  at the door of the human heart.

#this poem absolutely destroys me #there are so many threads running through it but more than anything I see such beautiful submission to God's will in it #the road to the Lord goes from jail to jail; the road to the Lord never changes #and so there's this exhortation to relish martyrdom and long for glory #like so many of the martyrs #and yet it's so uniquely personal and Soviet #that opening line: if they blow up our cathedrals and outlaw our meetings we will still carry the church in our chests #behind our ribs in our hearts #and then to say 'we don't care about the specific books or rites or liturgies we care about /freedom/ #but not freedom in the way that most people in this situation would mean it in the way that he would have every right to mean it #freedom for God to bind as he please #and somehow the part that makes my heart twist most with grief is 'i have seen no color but lingonberry in fourteen years' #YET still this is not a waking nightmare; it is my soul's fortress #my soul's barren colorless fortress #but God is there #and so my yoke is easy #ughhhh this poem #and that ending #the awareness that the greatest end a person can have is to have one's death be a tertimony #if you haven't read it read Kolyma Tales #it's some of the most beautiful prose I have ever read applied to one of the most awful subjects in history #and for goodness' sake read this poem #it will do your soul good #the unquenchable fire #literature makes us more human #leah learns calligraphy #i would cut off a toe for the chance to write about this poem in a formal context #but tumblr will have to do #martyr club this is for you #russia where are you flying to?

[widthofmytongue]

The other night I had drinks with coworkers. I increasingly dislike all of them. The topic of the Coronation came up, unsurprisingly. One of my colleagues said ‘we should have done what the French did’, and me and one other kinda went ‘haha yeah!’ and I thought for a moment that maybe I wouldn’t be in the political minority, even if these people will never be dedicated to the pursuit of global communism. My boss said, unironically, ‘what did the French do?’

Now I knew this was a bad sign, but me and person who initially referenced the French Revolution tried to sort of extol a few key details of the abolition of monarchy and formation of the First Republic, with probably disproportionate attention on the Terror. But anyway, my boss said something like ‘my knowledge of history isn’t great before the war’, and I asked genuinely ‘which war?’, which was interpreted as a sarcastic joke.

Anyway, this led to talking about WWII. Someone said something like ‘well the Second World War was unique among wars because it was essentially good versus evil’, to which I interjected ‘well kinda more like evil versus evil, right’. The response to this, from all three of my colleagues in the conversation, was ‘oh right, the Soviets’. I think if you follow this blog (or especially my politcal sideblog) you may have encountered my generalised view of the Soviet Union. Keeping in mind that it was Gevurah ShebeHod (since most of my personal posts seem to mark some significant point on the Hebrew calendar), I tried to rein in my response, and just said ‘interesting that when I mention the evil superpowers of the Allies in WWII you say the Soviets but not Britain or America.’ So the following dialogue came out of this:

Colleague (with history degree): Well I don’t know much about Roosevelt’s policy or ideological allignment... Me: Well he kinda committed genocide against the Navajo. C(whd): ...Churchill may have been a shitty guy... Me: Well he kinda committed genocide against India and Palestine. C(whd): ...But Britain essentially had to go to war with the Nazis. Me: To safeguard their material interests though, right, not for the altruism of saving the brutalised people of Europe. C(whd): Well Britain didn’t have any interests in Poland. Me: Well I think upholding a status quo is a very strong material interest for imperial Europe, but I was really talking about North Africa and the Middle East. C(whd): But those regions weren’t threatened by Germany, but by Italy. Me: Do you honestly think Churchill or whoever was thinking in such a two-dimensional way as to see these powers in a vacuum? [I wish I’d said ‘I think they were pretty threatened by Britain too, and remain so.’] Colleague who’d followed silently: Well every government has done horrible things at some point. Me: And yet when I mentioned evil versus evil, you all glanced right past the genocidal empires of Britain and America to look at the Soviets. Boss (unironically): I didn’t think when I mentioned the war that we’d be talking so much about genocide.

Now I wanna leave this on a couple crucial points. One is that I am very overt about being Jewish. I mention observing religious festivals; I use lots of Yiddish and occasionally Hebrew phrases; I have a hamsa and a Star of David badge on my backpack, as well as on the jacket I was wearing that night (I also have a Lenin badge on the jacket). The idea that these three white English men entered this conversation about WWII with a Jew and then were surprised (it was very clear they were all surprised and uncomfortable) at the mention of genocide is baffling to me, but I think all too common. I didn’t even mention the Shoah (although I think I did eventually say something like ‘I don’t think invading other countries is the greatest evil for which Nazi Germany is remembered’).

At some point later in the conversation I said something like ‘for all the negative views abounding on the Soviet Union, speaking as a queer Jew, I think I’d have preferred to live there than in Britain at the time’, to which my colleague with the history degree replied ‘well I obviously can’t speak to that’. It was very clear that he meant he can’t speak to Jewish and I guess queer identity. Now this is not the first time I’ve encountered this, but I think it’s an important phenomenon to observe. I once said to another colleague ‘well, there are lots of people in this country who want me dead because I’m Jewish or nonbinary’, and she said ‘well I can’t even imagine what that’s like’.

What I want to rhetorically ask is: why can’t you imagine it? Why do you imagine you’re safe from these same people? First they came for the communists, then they came for the Jews, then they came for that guy who wrote the poem! Eventually they’ll come for you too, when they drum up some new group to hate and mobilise against. If you can’t imagine what it’s like for fascists to want you dead, maybe you should try?

[jelka-jan]

Да, я снова пропала. Каюсь были дела и проблемы со здоровьем. А еще я поняла, что совершенно забросила рубрику "Человек Дня". Что же, это нужно исправить (хотя опять с запозданием 😭). Итак...

"Человек Дня"

Вчера, 07.08, был День Рождение Михаила Юрьевича Горшенева, также известного как Горшок. Советский и Российский рок-музыкант, один из основателей и фронтменов группы "Король и Шут", анархист, Горшенев был в первую очередь талантливым человеком, который жил творчеством и был полон идей. Он подарил своим слушателям завораживающий и неповторимый мир страшных сказок, который, я надеюсь, останется в пямяти поколений навсегда.

Михаил Горшенев, безусловно, сложная и противоречивая личность, и нельзя приводить его как абсолютный пример для подражания. И все же для меня Горшок, в первую очередь, это неповторимый гений, это искреннее творчество. Горшок - это "Король и Шут", это мое детство, юности и дорога через лес с моим отцом.

Хой! Горшок живой!

Yes, I'm missing again. I admit, there were a lot of cases, as well as certain health problems. And I also realized that I had completely abandoned the "Man of the Day" category. Well, this needs to be fixed (although again belatedly 😭). So…

"Man of the Day"

Yesterday, 07.08, was the birthday of Mikhail Yuryevich Gorshenev, also known as Gorshok. A Soviet and Russian rock musician, one of the founders and frontman of the band "The Korol and Shut", an anarchist, Gorshenev was primarily a talented man who lived by creativity and was full of ideas. He gave his listeners a fascinating and unique world of scary fairy tales, which, I hope, will forever remain in the memory of five generations.

Mikhail Gorshenev is certainly a complex and contradictory personality, and it is impossible to cite him as an absolute role model. And yet, for me, the Gorshok, first of all, is a unique genius, it is sincere creativity. The Gorshok is "The Korol and Shut", this is my childhood, youth and the road through the forest with my father.

#Михаил Горшенев #Горшок #Король и Шут #КиШ #скетчбук #sketch

[whencyclopedia]

Why Study History? Russia Teaches a Lesson

By Jan van der Crabben

Why should we study history? We all have our personal reasons why we love history; some like reading exciting stories that can be stranger than fiction, others let their imaginations transport them to worlds gone by. There are many reasons for loving history, but in this article I want to explore why history actually matters in the here and now.

Unfortunately, that belief is not universal. Around the world, budgets for social studies and history in particular are cut, and the focus in curricula is shifted to more practical subjects, such as science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) in universities, and English and mathematics in schools.

Yet we have to look no further than the top headlines in current affairs to understand why history is extremely important as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine can only be understood through the lens of history. The primary reason for Russia’s war is neither economic (as wars so often are) nor religious (as wars so often were). No, it is Putin’s belief that Ukraine is the cradle of Russian civilization and should not be an independent country… especially not one that aligns itself with Europe. We know very well now that apart from dynastic lineage, the Kievan Rus had very little relationship to modern Russia. In the thousand years since the Kievan Rus, Ukraine has been at the crossroads of Poland-Lithuania, Austria-Hungary and Russia. 

In the lead-up to the war, Vladimir Putin published a long and somewhat rambling historical essay where he places Russia in direct opposition to its western neighbours (who he blames for estranging Ukraine from Russia). The historian Serhii Ploky wrote that “the Soviet Union was created in 1922-1923 as a pseudo-federal rather than a unitary state precisely in order to accommodate Ukraine and Georgia, the two most independent-minded republics.” Ukraine’s independence has been a thorn in the Russian leaders’ side for a long time, but at the start of the Soviet Union, Lenin sided with the Ukrainians while Stalin was against it but went along anyway. Ukraine’s unique cultural mix was accepted as independent during Soviet times, and by the fall of the USSR, 90% of Ukrainians supported independence. Putin wants to wind back the clock to imperial times, fully incorporating Ukraine (and other regions) into a unified Russia. According to Ukrainian journalist Veronika Melkozerova, many Russians share this view.

Russia’s claim to Kiev is not a new one. The Russian Imperial historian Vasiliy Klyuchevskiy already wrote in 1908 that “the Russian state was formed by the activities of Askold and later Oleg in Kiev.” He refers to the Kievan Rus, after which Russia is named, whose dynasty lasted from the Norse leader Rurik (r. 862-879) all the way to ​​Ivan IV, first Tsar of Russia (r. 1547-1584, also known as Ivan the Terrible). The medieval Tale of Bygone Years (c. 1113) called Kiev “the mother of all Russian cities” – which should be read Rus-sian, not Russian, to be historically accurate. Putin’s “favourite historian” Ivan Ilyin (1883-1954) was a fascist philosopher who argued for a greater Russia that included Ukraine. Much of Putin’s rambling historical essay is based on Ilyin’s nationalist beliefs, writes historian Timothy Snyder. Putin’s view completely negates hundreds of years of Ukrainian history, where the region was touched by more Western influences.

If culture is a tapestry, then history is the fabric it is made from. National identities are built upon our understanding of history, which is why in most countries, history has been a compulsory subject in school since the 19th century. Recent legislation regarding how the history of slavery is taught in the United States clearly shows that governments still recognize the power of history to control the national narrative. As the current crisis shows, national identity is a powerful force.

According to Russian historian Dina Khapaeva, “the leitmotif of Russian history [is] a steady fascination with the West, coupled with an urge to excel it in order to escape its influence.” When Vladimir the Great converted to Christianity before marrying the Byzantine Princess Anna in 988, he forced his subjects to be baptized by the river Dnieper in Ukraine, which was associated with pagan beliefs. As a newly Christian state, the Rus needed Christian rules: The Ruskaya Pravda, the first Russian code of laws, was most likely written by Byzantine judges and also forced upon the Slavic population. As such, Khapaeva writes, “people perceived culture and civilization [...] as something enforced by foreign rulers.” Later Western reforms by Peter the Great, Catherine the Great, and other rulers were always enforced at great cost to the general population. After the fall of the Soviet Union, the promise of democracy and a free market economy brought a short period of hope and expectation of prosperity which was crushed by economic crisis and political instability. This “idealization of the West therefore intensified the national inferiority complex”, writes Khapaeva: While in 1990 over two thirds of Russians considered themselves European, by 2007 only one third did. In the same 2007 survey conducted by Khapaeva, 80% of Russians believed that the history of their country should only stir feelings of pride. It is easy for a canny authoritarian leader to use all of this to his advantage.

In this context, Ukraine looking westward and aligning itself with the European Union is a major affront to Russia’s identity and Putin’s vision. After all, Putin and Russian nationalists see Kiev as the birthplace of the Russian nation. The current war can be seen as a calculated demonstration of Russia's might and opposition to the West. While this is a risky gamble for Putin (who appears to have underestimated both Ukraine and the West’s response), the historical context gives it a sense of rationality, albeit a false one.

Only through an understanding of history and how it shapes national identities can we begin to comprehend the major events in current affairs. The past is used by politicians to actively construct national identities; it is misused as pretexts for wars; it is abused in misinformation campaigns on social media. History is very much present and it matters for the present, just as much as STEM subjects do, and must be prioritized accordingly in order to shield our democratic culture from such malignant perversions of history.

Sources

Dina Khapaeva in Peter Furtado, Histories of Nations: https://www.amazon.com/dp/0500293007?tag=anciehistoenc-20

Joshua J. Mark, Kievan Rus: https://www.worldhistory.org/Kievan_Rus/

Matthew Lenoe, Fact-checking Putin’s claims that Ukraine and Russia are ‘one people’: https://www.rochester.edu/newscenter/ukraine-history-fact-checking-putin-513812/

Save Ancient Studies Alliance, The Downward Trend: https://www.saveancientstudies.org/the-trend

Serhii Plokhy in Isaac Chotiner, Vladimir Putin’s Revisionist History of Russia and Ukraine: https://www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/vladimir-putins-revisionist-history-of-russia-and-ukraine

Timothy Snyder, Putin’s rationale for Ukraine invasion gets the history wrong: https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2022/02/25/vladimir-great-putin-ukraine/

Veronika Melkozerova, The Western World is in Denial: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/03/what-if-world-war-iii-has-already-started/627054/

Vladimir Putin, On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians: http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/66181

#History #Russia #Ukraine #Education #Cultural Heritage #World History Encyclopedia

[kamyru]

Me as an OC

In the past, I mentioned that I wanted to write a fic where Ukyo Senkawa and MC go to Romania & Republic of Moldova. I still have a part of that fic in my drafts. However, lately, I thought about creating an OC from my culture and putting her in different situations. So, here's Sanji, inspired by my friends from university & me. I took my appearance as a base for her, and the explanation for why she looks so different in the two photos is that I didn't find the colors to show what exactly my hair looks like. It is blueberry black and dark red underneath. The rest of her profile will be explained lower.

Also, her purpose is to show a little bit of my culture through my writings. I will probably romance her with someone, but I'm not sure yet with whom. She is a comedic relief that will interact with all the characters I write for, even my OCs. In some cases, her behavior will be inspired by me, in others by my friends.

Here you have the links to the picrew I used: 1 & 2.

Real name: Sânziana Casperschi (I wanted to give her a Romanian first name. In many countries, there are names after flowers or hope, and we have them too. However, Sânziana is something only Romanians have. It's inspired by good fairies specific to Romanian mythology. And her surname is an allusion to my surname - the Romanised version of a Polish surname. Her surname in Polish is Kasperki. It sounds nothing like mine, but has the same background. Mine comes from a Polish president, and for years I have been trying to convince the government to change my name to its Polish version.)

Japanese name: 川崎燦士/Kawasaki Sanji (Kawasaki because it's a popular Japanese surname, as Kasperski is also a popular Polish surname. Sanji because that's how Sânzi would most probably be pronounced by a Japanese person. And I know that it's a boy's name.)

Nicknames: Sânzi (by family), Anime girl (by friends, due to her name)

Love interest: Probably someone from Irresistible Mistakes or Romance MD. 

Age: 25/26

Date of birth: January 1

Height: 176 cm/5'9

Weight: 65 kg/143 lb

Ethnicity: 1/2 Romanian, 1/4 Moldovan, 1/4 Hungarian (People from Europe, or at least the Balkans, know why she's so mixed. It's hard to find someone here who is not a little bit of Russian, a little bit of Ukrainian, a little bit of Greece, a little bit of god knows what else. Fun fact: I was born in Moldova, have a Polish surname, and my mom's nee surname is Ukrainian. From my mom, I have some German ancestry because my grand-grand parents were Germans deported to Moldova at the end of the 19th century or the beginning of the 20th. This grand-grandmother wanted to teach my mother German, but it was in the time of the Soviet Union, and they were afraid to do it. And that's why the newer generations of my family don't know German. The fact that she is Hungarian isn't random either. One of the largest ethnic groups in Romania is Hungarians.)

Nationality: Romanian

Languages known: Romanian, Russian, Hungarian, English, Japanese

Unique traits: Seven earrings, colored hair

Dominant hand: Left

Job: Clinical pharmacist in the Psychiatry Department

Hobbies: Playing piano & guitar, writing, reading, anime

Qualities: Empathy, humor, calmness, chillness

Defects: Lack of organization, lack of motivation, rudeness

Fears: Fail, heights, slimy animals (frogs, jellyfish, snails)

Special skills: Listening to others, knowing random things, not understanding when someone flirts with her

Alumni: Bachelor in Pharmacy from the University of Debrecen, Master in Pharmacy from Kyushu University (Debrecen because I have two close friends who went on an Erasmus exchange in there. Kyushu because I have another close friend who studies pharmacy and applied to get her Master's degree in clinical pharmacology at Kyushu University.)

The happiest moment in her life: When she got accepted to study in Japan.

Childhood dream: To help people. 

Goal: To be a safe place for the people dear to her.

Motto: If not me, then who?

Family: Older brother Obi (his name is a Japanese adaptation of the Latin name Ovidius, used in Romanian as Ovidiu), cat Felix

Story: She was born in a city in Transilvania, Romania, to a Moldovan father and a Hungarian mother. During her childhood, she tried every extracurricular activity available at that time. However, she decided that her goal in life was to be selfless and help as many people as possible. After high school, she moved to Hungary to study pharmacy at the University of Debrecen. Later, she applied for her Master's Degree in Japan and got accepted at Kyushu University. Now, she is working as a clinical pharmacist at the psychiatry department in a hospital in Tokyo (Probabpy in Seimei, the same one from Romance MD: Always on Call) while thinking about doing her Ph.D.

#her love in the force #irresistible mistakes #oops i said yes #plust loving u so true #plust #romance md: always on call #romance md #voltage inc #my ocs #personal

[a-student-out-of-time]

Seeing as Stalin was brought up and I know you are a big Superman fan what do you think of the Red Son storyline where Superman lands in the Soviet Union instead of the USA and is raised to be Stalin’s adopted son (and apparently treated better then his actual children though that’s not difficult) and a Superman who tries to use his powers to make people’s lives easier.

//That story is honestly one of my favorites in the Elseworld genre

//It's such a unique and cool idea, especially because it doesn't overwrite his character, but explores it from a different perspective. OSP put it best when they described Superman as an ideal of what society he ends up becoming a part of. The American ideal is fighting for truth and justice, where these things are available to all people; the Soviet ideal is to optimize suffering out of society.

//From that perspective, it becomes a much more interesting look at the idea of Superman as a tyrannical figure, but approaching it from the perspective of a ruthless pragmatism based on paragon ideals about doing good for the people.

//In that sense, he's both the best and worst example of what the USSR aimed for: it's a society that unites almost the entire world by 2001, six billion people are living better lives than ever, crime and poverty don't exist, and people hardly even complain to themselves. But Superman knows all this because his eyes and ears are everywhere; he doesn't need a surveillance system to watch people, he can watch them himself.

//The climax is that, by the end, he's realized he's been doing everything to turn the world into this perfect place where nothing bad ever happens. Yet ironically, he also considers Brainiac's Miniaturization of Stalingrad (which takes the place of Kandor in this setting) his greatest failure.

//So when Luthor hits him with the question "Why don't you just put the whole world in a bottle, Superman?" That hits him right where it hurts the most.

//I have to say, it's probably influenced my writing a lot here too, where this Superman's MO is that he doesn't want to kill his enemies or even brainwash everybody, he wants to win the argument and convince them that he's right. Brainiac tries to convince him to invade the United States, but Superman would rather wait and let what he sees as a broken system fail instead of imposing his ideals on high.

//I like stories like this, which take established characters and examine their personalities and morals from a different perspective, rather than just making them flatly villainous and evil.

#mod talks #a student out of time

[fagcrisis]

yeah it's definitely weird. i do suspect it might be a young person thing (just for the record i am also young and probably prone to this type of thinking just about. different things) because by the time someone who is hard left hits like 5-10 years of actual activism they tend to have learned to pick their battles and see the similarities between things more clearly. it always struck me as weird to single wrestling out particularly because while it's a rotten industry every single field it evolved out of or merged with also has equivalent (if not identical) problems. it's not a unique perversion of capitalism it's just a variation on spectator sports and spectacle theatre those things are. ancient.

ultimately also it feels silly to be passionately opposed to it as a form of entertainment while ok with other things especially considering that pro wrestling has been on a decline in popularity since the 90s and that in many ways it's not the primary representation of the "opiate of the masses"-type entertainment anymore. even in places where it's popular there are typically still more primary exports of mass entertainment. and in the rest of the world it's even less of a big deal.

in my eyes it's a combo of having a very specific superficial image (that, due to the aforementioned describe in popularity, is what most people are familiar with) and ALSO being a performance of combat sport. so it becomes a representation of the scourge of capitalism and the ways in which it reduces the proletarians into base subjects or whatever while not actually being at all different from the majority of sports, entertainment and art. i honestly prefer "wrestling is fake and lame" as a critique.

anyway 1) sorry for the rant 2) davis phone background is awesome i like that guy he is straight up big and has a moustache . also i hope your headache passes ddt is good

nah dont worry about it i love it when people engage w what i post 💗 its why i have this blog. anyway yeah i agree its honestly just the image wrestling presents. its kind of silly and doesnt really matter and i do agree that its a young person thing bc for example my grandma who has been an activist since before my mum was born has enjoyed wrestling when it was on tv after the fall of the soviet union so like, its all fine i think. its also about this whole thing of consumption activism where what you buy and watch decides your morals and i guess you cant just justify disliking wrestling becasue its fake and lame so you have to make it an enemy of communism or whatever. its fine to just dislike things honestly sometimes you dont enjoy or understand something and thats fine, i dont get why people are into chess its patently insane to me and yet ive never accused anyone of being an anticommunist cia agent for knowing who magnus carlsen is or whatever

also thank you my headache did get a bit better im watching that ddt show that went up on universe today and im having fun!

#davis is straight up big and has a moustache. also one of the best movesets in wrestling today. like hes so cool #anyway #ALSO U R ALWAYS WELCOME TO DM ME AND/OR RANT IN MY INBOX I LOVE THAT SHIT. #rumini a zúzmaragyarmaton #wrassle

[chaosincurate]

My month in music - March 2023

slowthai - UGLY (new)

black midi - Hellfire (revisit)

Black Country, New Road - For The First Time (revisit)

machinegum - Conduit

Alvvays discography (revisit)

Fall Out Boy - So Much (For) Stardust (new)

Yves Tumor - Praise A Lord Who Chews But Which Does Not Consume; (Or Simply, Hot Between Worlds) (new)

Regina Spektor - Soviet Kitsch

boygenius - the record (new)

slowthai - UGLY

This slowthai album is really interesting. My experience with slowthai prior to this was limited to Nothing Great About Britain, and I loved the punky energy of that album which merged unbelievably well with his grime stylings to summarize the (justified) angst-ridden experience of the more combative sect of working class Britain, by mixing together the music of the disaffected, frustrated youth of two different generations, similarly to The Clash's London Calling.

This time out though, while anger and frustration are present, they take a bit of a backseat to mental illness and despair, which called for a genre change, and slowthai picked the perfect genre in my view: post-punk. This new sound is not only a better thematic fit than his previous one would be, but it also suits slowthai very well, because, as the name suggests, it isn't too distant from punk in terms of what is required of the performer, but it sounds very different, switching energy for a bit of complexity which suits introspection very well.

Not only is this a fascinating example of artistic consideration for an album, it's also just a great album, and makes for a great introduction to UK rap for alternative rock fans, and vice versa.

Apple Music link

black midi - Hellfire

I've spoken about this album before on my top albums of last year list (spoilers, it tops the list) and everything I said about the album still applies for me. The album has a dynamism and charisma I've seldom seen before. The energy is transcendent, the lyrics are darkly whimsical and almost dauntingly dense, the instrumentals are virtuosic yet restrained to artistic sense in a way that many virtuosos aren't... What's not to love? I believe this album is deserving of godly worship, and may well be my favourite album of all time. Sure, it has it's flaws, but I simply get too whipped up in the beauty of it all that I become a blind evangelical follower of this album's glory. Praise be to Hellfire!

Apple Music link

Black Country, New Road - For The First Time

Although their later album, Ants From Up There, is my favourite of the two albums Black Country, New Road have put out, For the First Time has it's own place in my heart too. For one, it's one of the only albums that contains an instrumental I managed to get into enough to have in my library (I'm usually appreciative of their role within an album, but for whatever reason, they rarely do anything for me outside of making for good transitions), but it also has a sound that leans more towards Joy Division-style post-punk which I appreciate in a wholly different way to their later album.

They have the same patience about their music, a willingness to draw a sound out and let it roam where it may, which, in my experience at least, is very unique and personally highly appreciated. But it's sonically way darker than Ants From Up There, more imminently haunting, all of which makes it so that, even as someone who doesn't like the album as much, I never think of this album as living in the shadow of the other, an issue that band discographies can face if they are unwilling to offer anything new.

Apple Music link

machinegum - Conduit

machinegum is a superband of sorts, with the lineup containing Fabrizio Moretti of The Strokes as well as Ian Devaney from a band that I can't say I've heard of called Nation of Language. They have a wikipedia page, so I imagine I'm just losing touch at the ripe old age of 22. In any case, I heard way more Strokes in this album than anything else, but for me it just didn't hit the same. There were some standouts that I still really like, though, even after a few weeks worth of listens had made me bored of most of the album. The most notable example of that relative longevity is Atomized. Seeing as that comes early in the album and is pretty representative of the albums sound, I'll link that here. Give it a listen, maybe you'll like it!

Apple Music link

Alvvays discography

I've already done a write-up on this amazing indie pop band that deserves more success (they are already pretty successful, but these guys are the best indie band right now). You can find the fruits of my obsession here!

Fall Out Boy - So Much (For) Stardust

I usually try to take the "if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say it" approach when it comes to talking about music, but this album disappointed me to the point of frustration, so I'm gonna get negative here. Fall Out Boy stans, you've been warned.

So, first things first, no, this album isn't dreadful. This album has turned the tide following Mania and a long wait, I won't deny that, but to me this album felt like the perfect illustration of why its so important to know when you have nothing left to say. The album is completely unremarkable. It says nothing, does nothing new, and retreads unexceptionally. It feels like they're trying to make music for the kids of the 00s that don't exist anymore. It reeks of immaturity, which would be fine if not for the fact they don't seem to be aware of it. This isn't a punkish, knowing immaturity, it's a mid-life crisis in audio form, and it makes me question whether Fall Out Boy were ever actually good in the first place or whether their earlier material is just carried by nostalgia.

Sorry Fall Out Boy fans, but I needed that. I did like Fake Out quite a bit, though, and that's stood the test of time a few weeks poses, so I'll share that here. I hope everyone else enjoys it as much as the critics appear to have done!

Apple Music link

Yves Tumor - Praise A Lord Who Chews But Which Does Not Consume; (Or Simply, Hot Between Worlds)

This experimental album from Yves Tumor is the strangest album I've heard that could still be confidently recommended to the majority of music fans. It's very formless, yet still manages to feel familiar. It's a demonstration of Yves Tumor's creativity that he can make something unlike anything else I've heard with such a singular soundscape, but still have the album be easy to get into straight away.

The only slight flaw I can think of that matters, is that it peaks quite early for me, which makes the rest of the album feel worse than the sum of its parts.

Apple Music link

Regina Spektor - Soviet Kitsch

This is one that has been on my radar for probably about a year, and I finally got around to it last month. Maybe I shouldn't have waited so long, because it didn't live up to expectation at first, but as time went on, I've appreciated this album more and more.

Regina Spektor is pretty weird. Like, all round weird. But it's a great example of why weird is not an insult. The brand-new-sentence style of lyrics in particular makes every line sound so intentional because it had to be. She's clearly digging down to the raw, abstract feelings and experiences that aren't yet translated cleanly into an earthly language, and she translates them herself, from scratch, and it becomes so personal and affecting because it's just all her, no cliches. She could say something as common as a greeting in this style and it would feel like she was the first person to say hello and really mean it. It's fantastic.

As I'm writing this, I realize that I might have enough to say about this album to justify it's own post, but that will do for this one. Give this one a listen if you like folk-leaning alternative stuff like Fiona Apple and Phoebe Bridgers. You might be disappointed, but then you won't be and you'll like it a whole lot.

Apple Music link

boygenius - the record

With the record, three very talented musicians, clever lyricists, and beautiful vocalists come together to make an album that is... Good? I mean, yeah, all those things still apply, and it is genuinely good, its not like Phoebe Bridgers, Lucy Dacus, and Julien Baker just lost all their talent completely in a few years, they aren't Green Day, but I guess I just expected more from three women who were such a large part of the popularisation of this kind of sound. It's a good album, and it's still worth a listen if you're a fan of any of the three, or of course if you liked the boygenius EP, but outside of a few fun and/or sincere moments, it felt a little arbitrary to me. Those moments are there though, and they are great, I just think maybe a second EP would be more appropriate than an album that, to me, felt like it had a lot of filler. As always though, you might have a different experience, so if you haven't heard it yet and like sad girl vibes, give it a shot!

Apple Music link

#chaosincurate #my month in music #slowthai #black midi #black country new road #yves tumor #regina spektor #music essay #music reccs #music recommendation #music #Spotify

[diopho101]

Mini-Research Paper & Presentation

The Power of Red

Afghan Girl (1984) Red Boy (1996)

The Nicest World There Is

Father and Son (1980) Monsoon in Indonesia (1983)

Photographer: Steve McCurry

Website: https://www.stevemccurry.com/ 

https://stevemccurry.blog

Steve McCurry: The Power of Red

“Most of my photos are grounded in people, I look for the unguarded moment, the essential soul peeking out, experience etched on a person’s face” (McCurry). Steve McCurry has been photographing war and its consequences to spread awareness worldwide, taking him to battlefields in Beruit, Cambodia, Iran, Iraq, the Philippines, and Afghanistan. McCurry’s works about the war don’t cover photography of the armies, but rather the effects of war on the people and the destruction of their homes— sharing a certain beauty through the capture of colors while emphasizing the life of those who have been caught in the middle of warfare through the simplistic of just a photograph. The following is a discussion of two bodies of McCurry’s work — Afghan Girl (1984) and Red Boy (1996) — as well as the scandal regarding the exploitation, and ‘exoticism’ of non-Western cultures for the Western audience. 

Photographed is Sharbat Gula, renowned as “Afghan Girl” worldwide. She became an instant icon after appearing on the cover of the June 1985 National Geographic magazine at 12 years old— becoming the model for McCurry’s most iconic portrait photograph. This photograph was shot on a Nikon FM2, 105mm f/2.5 lens with Kodachrome 64 color-slide film. The girl's unique look can only be described as haunted, penetrating, and intense. McCurry was able to seize this opportunity by following the conflict between Pakistan and the rebel-controlled areas of Afghanistan by dressing in traditional clothing with a full-grown beard, following the mujahideen as he documented the brutalities as a result of the Soviet Invasion. “I’m devastated for the people of young Afghans whose dreams have been dashed” (McCurry, theGuardian). The raw humanity captured in McCurry’s photograph captures the girl’s expression of innocence, vulnerability, and strength— allowing the audience to empathize with Gula and her people. McCurry’s technique of capturing the girl's face and headscarf, while blurring the background adds depth to the image while keeping the main focus squarely on the subject. Although one’s take on the “Afghan Girl” can vary on their perspective, background, and experiences— one can feel a range of emotions from empathy and compassion to cultural appreciation to political awareness and personal reflection. 

Red Boy is yet another iconic photograph of McCurry’s, portraying a young Aghani refugee who has now been displaced in India. McCurry used the same specs as Afghan Girl, Nikon FM2, 105mm f/2.5 lens with Kodachrome 64 color-slide film. It highlights the sharpness of the boy's expression, while also putting a pause on the background. The pigmentation staining the boy's skin provokes viewers to drown in the heavy emotions of childhood, resilience, and the toll of war. Let alone, the deep testament of resilience in the face of adversity— although his face appears almost ‘bitter’, his posture offers determination and inner strength. “Red, of course, is the color of the interior of our bodies. In a way it’s inside out, red” (Anish Kapoor). Finding this quote from McCurry’s site personally, presented with this body of work— I can only find myself thinking that this quote signifies that wearing red is almost like proudly wearing your blood. Your culture. Your background. 

Personally, at first glance, both photographs were so beautifully and carefully taken— leveling and identifying with their emotions, as I can only see my own family's (and people's) experiences coincide with what is happening to their people. I see resonation with my people; echoes of their struggles and experiences, and the experience of horror during displacement. However, some may have personal cultural pride as a result of looking at these photographs— perhaps specifically of Afghanistani descent, prompting them to reconnect with their culture, seeking appreciation and self-understanding. 

Steve McCurry: The Nicest World There Is

“Home is the nicest world there is” (Laura Ingalls Wilder). While Steve McCurry is infamous for his (impact of) war photography, he has also captures the life of those misfortunated by tragedies in light. Despite the horrific disasters people go through worldwide, McCurry emphasizes the idea that despite how different people are across the world, we still are the same.  Our intimate life highlights how we find comfort in our homes, whether that is a physical space, a person(s), or a feeling. He captures these moments through warmness in the photographs, colors that all seem to melt together while taking advantage and manipulating lighting to enhance the mood and atmosphere. His continuing use of color and light through pieces— Father and Son (1980) and Monsoon in Indonesia (1983) keeps the viewer drawn to the awe of his sense of aesthetics to create these striking photographs.

Father and Son photographs a father with weathered features looking afar while holding his resting young son to his chest. Although the background isn’t necessarily clear to the viewer, it seems it is filled with rubble as a result of the war— moving emotions through the viewer that such a paternal bond is happening in such destruction. Similar to the last two pieces, this photograph was taken in Afghanistan with a Nikon FM2 camera to capture this loving and vulnerable moment between the father and his son. Despite the desolation that surrounds them, the innocence of the son sleeping away in his father's arms, while the father looks out into the distance, resonates with the viewer’s deeper emotional level. Their state of resting on the ground and rubble behind them contextualizes the models with their environment, suggesting this feeling and understanding of instability and conflict among Afghanistani families. However, at the end of the day— this is their home. With their family. And maybe they are residing on the remains of their home within this portrait. 

Photographed in Monsoon in Indonesia is a young girl, leaning against what appears to be a fence, while her childhood house seems to be in the background. It doesn’t take long until the viewer, with the context of the photograph's title, realizes that the girl is in fact standing in the results of the monsoon, with the reality of her home being flooded. The girl appears to be almost consumed by the duckweed-filled waters, as it goes past her waist, and by drawn context clues, viewers can assume that her home has been flooded as well. This photograph was too, taken on a Nikon FM2 camera to capture this moment of a girl, mourning the loss of those things obscured within the monsoon. Although the girl can be characterized as innocent, her expression also carries strength and rigorous resilience. The fact that the girl is half-submerged in the monsoon’s waters so casually, evokes this emotion of regularity and normalcy, as monsoons happen on a yearly basis. However, this is her home— where her country regularly gets monsoons during the wet season from November to March. This is her home— where she must carry on with her day-to-day life within these circumstances. 

Personally, at first glance, both photographs were so heart-throbbing yet beautifully taken with the capture of the subject's faces evoking heavy emotions of bittersweetness. Even much more than the previous group of work— because although I can only see my family again, I can’t fail to think that they lost their homes and resisted holding their ground. Both, Father and Son and Monsoon in Indonesia and other pieces showcased in The Nicest World There Is show the destruction of their homes either through warfare, natural disasters, or misfortunate living circumstances. These photographs can evoke tenderness due to intimacy and a peak into a person(s) life, empathy due to the understanding of their experiences, yet also pride— bringing the audience to reflect and appreciate their own (family’s) history and blood. Very beautifully said, “A man travels the world in search of what he needs and returns home to find it” (George Edward Moore).

[mania-sama]

rule #2 - moonlight

Rule #2 - Moonlight - Fish in a Birdcage

Bungou Stray Dogs Character - Sigma Tags - major character death, world war ii au, no ability users au, hypothermia, soviet union, wwii, hurt no comfort, possible historical inaccuracies Summary - Sigma defects alone from the German military to the unforgiving Russian wilderness in 1941. Unfortunately, Russia doesn't seem to want him there. Word Count - 1,227 Cross-posted from Archive of Our Own Whumptober 2023 - Day 17: Hypothermia See my full Whumptober 2023 Challenge on Tumblr or Ao3

The Russian climate is a cold, unforgiving world that expands as far as the eye can see, reaching to the high Heavens with spiking Siberian pine trees and flowing down to Hell through frozen, veiny rivers. It’s as uninviting as a house layered in spikes with ten guard dogs snapping their slobbering jaws at the front door. The fact that the wind bites against protected skin like a whip should be enough to keep most people away.

Germany does not seem to understand nor share that sentiment, it seems. They marched onto the land like it was their own, ready to push out any Soviets that attempted to stand in their way. The campaign went well for the first few weeks on the Eastern Front — they took cities, people, and land with an overwhelming entourage of force.

Then the Soviets retreated, leaving behind a burning and smoking trail. They strangled the Germans of forts and bases by lighting their own cities on fire, taking as many people as they could with them, and leaving the rest to die in the pursuing fight. Fall and winter froze the Soviet Union into glacial forests and tundras.

Sigma has watched his brothers-in-arms perish under the falling snowflakes. Each snowflake is unique , Scientists say, with each crystalline structure being different from the last. It’s beautiful as it descends lazily from the sky, but Sigma has learned to through the deception. A snowflake is Death's numbing hand gently caressing the German infantry's pale, blue-tinted skin as they lay deathly still.

Snowflakes turn into the compacted snow he walks on, knee-high and ill-fit for the state-issued infantry boots. The commanders got the wherewithal to give them snowshoes, but the damage was already done. Those lost and buried in the snow are never coming back, and the invasion of the Soviet Union has slowly turned out to be the gravest mistake Germany has made thus far.

Sigma takes one step at a time. He knows the mistakes that were made, and he knows that the people who caused it were never going to take the fall.

He is. His life is another expendable toy for the government to throw away at will. He’s a number on a thin metal plate — not a face, not a name, and not a person. Sigma takes another step, and another.

He doesn’t know where he is, but he knows he’s away from the fight. He made sure to restock on ammo before his planned breakaway, so he has plenty of rounds to protect himself from a stray soldier on either side of the Front. His snowshoes are now strapped to his feet to help him scramble through the thick and high layers of snow. He abandoned his walkie-talkie a few miles back, for it’s too heavy to carry and too useless for a defector.

That doesn’t make the Russian countryside easy to navigate. He’s been walking for long enough to see the horizon eat half of the sun but has yet to come across any hint of civilization or even another living person. His rations have depleted only marginally, but his stash was never large to begin with. What’s left won’t get him through the night. Hunting is out of the option — staying stagnant in a tree while waiting for the stray deer or elk will certainly kill him. Then there is the matter of creating a fire, of which he knows he won’t be able to do. Digging in the woods for dry timber would be worse than looking for a needle in a haystack. 

So he walks and prays to the God that has most certainly abandoned him. He needs buildings, regardless if they’re collapsed and scorched by the Soviet’s retreat. Sigma stays attentive, or at least, he tries to. The longer he stays on this path, the harder it is to keep going.

However, stopping means that Death will lay its hand on him like he has done to so many others. Closing his eyes means he might miss the beginning of a human footrail, a predator in the distance, or a watery pothole covered by the thick snow. The wind bites his face like a rabid dog. It dries out his eyes and pushes his body back with every waking second. 

The Russian land does not want him.

Sigma is aware of the atrocities he has committed, whether against his will or not. His aim is terrible for a soldier, but it is an undeniable fact that he has killed and will kill again as long as he wears the infantry uniform and carries a rifle in his hands. Maybe that’s why he defected — it isn’t the creep of Death and distrust of commanders. His own guilty conscious finally took hold of him.

His skin starts to burn as the horizon swallows more of the sun. He doesn’t want to dwell on his reasons for betraying his country; he’s done it, and that’s that. He has a life to live that no one else seems to want him to. He’s going to do it anyway.

He just has to get out of here first.

His feet are numb. He drags them against the snow, tripping himself up more frequently. When he startles at the sound of a bird flying from a tree, his movements are slower. Besides his feet, the rest of his body ignites in flames.

It’s the bite of the cold, Sigma knows. It’s hypothermia. It’s the wind shutting his eyes to get relief from the lack of hydration. He’s seen countless men before undress to escape the “heat,” watched them shield their faces to block out the burning gale. They lay down on the snow because their backs ached and their legs screamed with fatigue. Their skin pales to red, purple, and then blue in a matter of minutes.

Hunger, exhaustion, and being unacclimated to the frigid temperatures brought their demise. It’s a strange phenomenon to have seen their gazes become frantic as they claim it’s just too hot, even as their knees sink into the snow slowing the army down. Sigma had never really understood it — hysteria as an illness itself is not necessarily hard to comprehend, but for it to spread en-masse through his comrades like a plague is harder to wrap his head around. They’ve seen the way their brethren fell before them, so why are they doing the same?

As Sigma falls to the ground, the stars appearing overhead through the thicket of snow-covered trees, he thinks he begins to understand.

His body was burning, but now a benign warmness takes over. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he recognizes his situation; flat against the snow, numb feet and hands, rifle having dropped soundless and unnoticed from his grip a while back. He knows it's hypothermia coming to take the life he defected for.

Sigma allows his eyes to close if just to rehydrate them. Laying down like this, his aching legs that spent well over twelve hours carrying him non-step through the Russian wasteland finally get a rest. He can use this time to rejuvenate and pull himself back together to continue his search for civilization.

A snowflake settles on his face. It feels like a gentle hand caressing his cheek, sending blooming warmth through his frozen body.

He’s never felt this at ease before.

#bsd #bsd fanfic #bungou stray dogs #bsd sigma #sigma #sigma bungou stray dogs #ao3 fanfic #fanfiction #fanfic #wwii au #ai less whumptober #whumptober fic #whumptober #whumptober2023

[mariacallous]

Meduza: (Interview) Mikhail Suslov discusses the themes of ‘Putinism – Post-Soviet Russian Regime Ideology'

In an interview published in Republic on January 12, historian Mikhail Suslov fielded questions relevant to his forthcoming book, “Putinism – Post-Soviet Russian Regime Ideology.” It’s hard to count all the different arguments and concepts that Suslov enumerates and divides into multiple subsections, but here are the highlights of his conversation with journalist Farida Kurbangaleeva.

Putinism is an ideology, but it’s ever-evolving and isn’t “monolithic.” So far, there have been four stages: 

From 2004 to 2009, Putinism attempted “liberal conservativism,” trying to merge individual freedom, a strong state, and tradition.

Putinism then pivoted to “identitarian conservatism,” ditching liberal democracies’ individualism and embracing Russians’ supposed immutable national identity and collectivism.

After 2014, Putinism added a geopolitical element, presenting Russia as a distinct civilization.

Since the fall of 2022, Putinism has sought appeal abroad in the Global South by adopting certain leftist elements to give it universalist appeal, which it paradoxically embraces while remaining a conservative ideology at home.

Suslov argues that Putinism seizes on a global shift from the freedom-focused agenda of the 1980s and 1990s to a justice-based trend that’s emerged in response to the West’s post-Cold War failure to manage humanity’s uneven economic development. He says Putinism seeks a form of populism wherein Moscow represents the “global majority” against humanity’s “golden billion” living in the West.

Why did Putinism fail to cultivate liberal conservativism? Suslov says Russia lacks a liberal tradition to “conserve” in the first place. Conservativism as a political philosophy in Russia’s context, he argues, lends itself either to revanchist communism or a rejection of the Soviet period so radical that it has no popular support.

Suslov says Putinism (by which he means the 10,000 or so political elites that comprise Russia’s “political mainstream” of experts, politicians, and intellectuals) decided to aim its conservatism not at “specific political forms” but at Russia’s “cultural and values identity,” wrapping the latter in an ahistorical “thousand-year” continuity. From the perspective of an “illiberal, communitarian, or identitarian understanding,” the nation’s actual political process becomes “unnecessary bells and whistles” for a society whose fundamental truths and values have been known for a millennium.

Some of Suslov’s potentially controversial conclusions:

Putin’s personality is just a small component of Putinism, and the president himself doesn‘t yet enjoy what can be described as a personality cult to rival Stalin’s.

“Putinism is not some random aberration or mistake”; it’s likely entrenched in Russian politics for at least another two generations. The ideology resonates deeply with most Russians, including in its anti-Westernism and resentment of being “lectured” after the USSR’s collapse. If reasonably free elections follow Putin’s presidency, someone like him (or perhaps a bit more or a bit less radical) will win the race. If the security elites seize control (for example, National Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev), that person would lack Putin’s “social capital” and would have to continue his course.

Russians’ resentment of Western arrogance (their “sense of secondariness and unoriginality”) isn’t unique — all former empires, including Poland, Hungary, and Turkey, harbor similar bitterness (though bad blood in Russia’s former colonies complicates this picture).

Putinism lacks three main elements of fascism (though Suslov insists that he’s not saying Putinism is better, and he suggests that it might reject the values of the Enlightenment more than some fascists): (1) Putinism currently rejects ethnic nationalism; (2) there’s no “revolutionary fervor”; and (3) it is actually an “optimistic ideology” that tells adherents that they’re living in a wonderful historical moment (whereas fascists try to mobilize supporters by depicting the present as sliding into hell on Earth).

A bit more about why Putinism isn’t fascism:

Putinism’s logic is “imperial, not national,” says Suslov, arguing that Moscow’s annexations in Ukraine do not aim, as Nazi Germany did in Eastern Europe, to destroy all alien ethnicities and populate the lands with the metropole’s titular nationality. Suslov points out that calls earlier in the war from the likes of Timofei Sergeytsev to carry out “de-Ukrainification” have not entered mainstream Putinism (though he acknowledges that Putin could later “be steered” in this direction, given nationalism’s dangerous unwieldiness). If Russia is seriously defeated in Ukraine, warns Suslov, ethnic Russian nationalism could get a “historic opportunity.”

So, what’s the future hold?

Suslov thinks the Kremlin will be able to justify even a defeat in Ukraine to the Russian public by presenting the war as a conflict with the entire West, where having lasted this long is already a triumph of sorts.

Putinism’s political base comprises roughly 75–80 percent of Russians in a combination of the 35–40 percent of people who want a strong leader (the “natural Putinists”) and the 40 percent of Russians who want “justice.” Suslov says an “alternative ideological configuration” for Russia is possible wherein the 30–35 percent of people who value human rights can break the “justice” faction away from the hardcore Putinists. But that won’t happen for at least 40 years due to the absence of social-democrat institutions in Russian politics, says Suslov.

[harfom24]

Watching my Personality

It's simple, useful, and elegant, it characterizes me and obtains the qualities to describe me. The Soviet ZIM watch's design reflects an era when craftsmanship emphasized durability and practicality, embodying a philosophy that resonates with my personality. The watch's straightforward design speaks to a pragmatic and unpretentious nature. Like the watch, I appreciate simplicity in life, finding beauty in the straightforward and uncluttered. The ZIM watch's clean lines mirror my preference for clarity and efficiency in communication and decision-making. Despite its simplicity, the ZIM watch doesn't lack charm. Its subtle elegance lies in the restrained details, much like my own inclination towards understated sophistication. I value quality over fanciness, and the watch's modest yet refined appearance reflects my belief that true style is better than flashy displays. Additionally, the ZIM watch originates from Russia which adds a bit of my ethnic background into it, making it more of a reflection of my character in personality and ethnic origin. The ZIM watch serves as a metaphor for my personality—simple yet charming, practical yet elegant, resilient and deeply rooted in a personal history that shapes my character. It's a timeless representation of values that withstand the test of time, just like the enduring aspects of my own identity. The ZIM watch with its history, simplicity, and functionality describes me through a unique and personal perspective. Representation is less seen in plain looks and more in the uniqueness and qualities that make it so.

#watch #simple

[j1cudmore]

Global Cinema Final

Andrei Tarkovsky was a Russian film director, and it is stated that he is "widely considered one of the greatest and most influential directors in cinema history." ​ He is known for his seven films and three shorts, in which he uses a unique filming style known as "slow cinema" as well as his dream like images and scenes that he incorporates into his work. The reason Andrei Tarkovsky's films were so special and unique, as well as known to be one of the greatest and most influential directors, is because of how he viewed his career. For him cinematography was not entertainment, it was an art and the meaning of his world. That is the reason his films reflect his hard work, and ties into his past and shows reflections of him and his personal life. My two personal favorite films by Tarkovsky would be his 1975 film Mirror, and his 1986 film "The Sacrifice". Which are both well known because of Andrei's unique filming styles and techniques used while creating the two cinemas.

What Did Critics Have To Say? 

Tarkovsky had lots of positive feed back from audiences applauding him for his unique style in his work, but at the same time critics stated that his work is "boring or impenetrable." The article "The Films Of Andrei Tarkovsky: A Retrospective" states that "audiences and critics who find his slow, languid, inscrutable work boring and impenetrable. Such wildly divergent adore-him-or-loathe-him opinions can only mean one thing: that Tarkovsky’s films represent the apotheosis of a certain kind of filmmaking and ultimately your predisposition to like that kind of film conditions your reaction to Tarkovsky. Even those who hate slow, meditative, dreamlike films cannot deny Tarkovsky’s mastery of the form." This shows that while others saw his work as something special and different, others disagreed and expressed how it was seen as boring and slow.

It is also stated in the article "Tarkovsky: Films of Eternal Complexity" that "Most complained about the apparent pessimism of the story and the director’s choice to focus on Rublev’s inner turmoil as opposed to Russian resistance to the Tartar yoke. Regardless of the criticism, Tarkovsky refused to compromise his artistic vision by yielding to the political and economic demands of Soviet officials." This shows that even when critiqued and told to change the way he handled cinematography and created his work, he refused to listen to what others had to say and continued to do what he felt was right, and what reflected his styles as a filmmaker.

My opinion on Tarkovsky's films is I can agree with both sides of the audience. I myself, found his films to be somewhat slow, confusing and yes, at times boring. But his work also introduced me to a different style of filmmaking and I can't help but to look past the fact that yes, the films are confusing and hard to follow. But they have such unique and beautiful scenes that really capture the setting, time and place of where the story being shown takes place. I appreciated the dream-like scenes his films offered as well as the cinematograph that is slow and pauses to appreciate the nature and surroundings of each characters. I can see why many can agree that Tarkovsky is in fact "widely considered one of the greatest and most influential directors in cinema history." for his seven unique and dreamlike films.

Sources

#Youtube

[hydralisk98]

Servitor, ArchivalDiscs and UDOs

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So ya, as I was figuring out much about technological histories and all things media for my Servitor project... I am starting to better envision a couple of new details for the computer system I am designing.

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First, the Servitor unique & idiosyncratic hardware. [ DECmate III's Intersil 6120 data processor family inspiration, UDO-ish disk format, FOSS libre & transparent computing hardware workflows; ]

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Second, the Maskoch operating system's suite / software ecosystem. [ TempleOS-family (includes Shrine & ZealOS) inspirations, OpenXanadu + OpenGenera projects reference, Windows 3.11 Win3D UI framework; ]

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Third, ?. [ 1,2,3; ]

And as such, I have yet still much to figure but I got most of the generic details written down and ready to revise/refine into a MVP.

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REFERENCE KEY

Klara, self insert

Falah, mother

Sasha, father

Ether, twin brother

Wyatt, younger brother

Shoshona, house cat

Ava, home servitor

Ashur, my desktop computer

Nineveh, my two-in-one laptop

Nimrud, my smartphone

May, friend from the Mayan Empire

Arya, rival cordial ENTP?

Maskoch, my current hometown

Shoshone Union, my home civilization

Utchwe, my personal constructed language

Pflaumen, my syndicated workplace agency (employee cooperative)

BRAINSTORM

Educational conlangs & simulationist level editor-focus in a Free Libre Open Source Software way, quite CC0-1.0 fashionned, media-oriented exploration-driven game with a fair share of social systems to instigate and tinker around, MercenariesPlaygroundOfDestruction+Tyranny factional "deques" competition and cyclic destruction mechanics;

VCR mediatech mechanic, Quake1 movement, Build2 3D level editing system, retro nostalgia diagenic UI, Wolfenstein TNO computer decora, Alien Isolation feel, Soviet grungey toons aesthetic, hometown initial level design emulation, Liberty+Imagination+Harmony as side theme values, N64 <--> Dreamcast middle ground specs, lore integration and immersion (show not tell mainly)

Electric cars, tribble data structure base for machines, Rogue Servitor-ish machine pathway, synthetic agents, video rental stores, far far away future-driven optimism, ~4096 AfterEpoch, much less Wilsonism, electrical generators during floods, re-growth a century after nuclear warfare, furries and sovietfunk, alternate cultural and geographical history aroud soft grunge earlier, post-Christian symbology, Georgism, Syndicalism, Libre-faire, time wrapping around itself in loops and fancier 2D time structures, alternate yet similar technological evolution, storyline stuck between witches and technicians and other groups taking a chance at success through jobs & gigs...

Analog media as the core currency for recording game saves, dice, playing cards, tickets, roll paper tapes, 'fantasy' currencies, pawns, tarot decks, ZealOS filesystem functionings, VCR handheld decks for media storage (probably a custom media format series between 'AnalogOptical' Archival Disc [storage capacity & hexadecimal analogical encoding], LTO cassettes [data tape-component] and UMD MiniDiscs [media size & 'shell'] which I nickname UDOs)...

Temporal 2D cyclic loop game around defeating Nazis + Neo-Fascists + Wilsonists, OpenXanadu, ZealOS, Shrine, Racing the world game, Win3D UI, Intersil 6120 & DEC Alpha processors, crazily optimized sizes for a 48-bit addressing system, twelve 12-bit "generic" registers of A-F & U-Z nicknames, OpenGenera, HyperTalk…

#maskutchew #servitor #wip

[whats-up-gamerz]

Mentor Game Post #1: Papers, Please!

(More like fewer papers, please!)

What’s up gamerz! For this first blog post, I’ll be addressing my first two hours playing Papers, Please! This game has been on my to-play list for a while- I heard big things about how moving, unique, and thought-provoking it was.

What Papers, Please Is About

...Or at least, as far as I know at this point! In Papers, Please, you play the part of an immigration agent at the border of a pseudo-Soviet nation called Arstotzka (I know this spelling because of my napkin- see below for more information). The UI consists of a space to see the line and entry gates, the face of the person currently attempting to enter, the slot they can push things through, and a desk area where the player must shove all of the documents they are trying to read. Spread along these areas are indicators and actions that unveil themselves as the days go on- the ability to interrogate, search, and detain those who attempt to enter illegally or violently. The game is timed, and after the day is finished you must attend to your expenses- you are paid by passport processed- and must decide where to spend or save money. The game is over if you run out of money (you are jailed in Ending 1 of 20, the first ending I got) so you will have to choose to go without food, heat, or other needs in order to survive. Upgrades to the booth must also be purchased, but I’ve yet to be able to safely afford any...

What I’ve Experienced So Far

It was difficult to jot notes while playing- without pausing carefully, I would be wasting precious time my family needs me to spend earning money. That said, there are some things I jotted or recall:

Branching Saves- One cool piece of UI I encountered early on was the save system. Each day is saved at the start of the day, meaning when I got a Game Over for the first time (after less than a week of work), I got to see how easy the game makes it to go back and try again or try a different option. I LOVE this, as someone who often wants to experiment in games “just to see what happens,” and especially in a game like papers please. I’m big on languid and slow exploration, taking my time just because I can, doing silly things that may not effect gameplay. Thus, I tend to dislike timed games- I’m not necessarily used to moving fast while playing! But early on I learned that it’s okay, if I make a big mistake, I can start the day over very easily.

The Napkin- So after that first game over, I took a moment to think. I was getting frustrated using my trackpad so inefficiently to turn pages in the rule book so that I could check the names of cities with countries. I thought about what I would do in the same situation if I was really living it and went ahead with it- I used a cafe napkin to write down each country’s cities, draw their accepted seals, and other pertinent information on a single item that I could flip and search more easily. I also alphabetized the lists, no doubt not alphabetized on purpose to add to player difficulty and stress. This VASTLY improved my processing abilities and I fared far better on my second play through. 

I Guess I’m Accidentally a Terrorist?- Making it further in this save file, I got to a part in the game where you can, after interrogating someone, detain them. However, I was only prompted to do this once, right after learning the rule. After this, I only missed a search queue once again, several in-game weeks afterwards. Thus when some suspicious people in masks showed up at my window, I had forgotten about the option to detain. I wanted them to go away, but couldn’t find another option to do so, so I accepted their papers as fast as possible. There didn’t feel like time to explore my options, and only this happened several times (and I was now fully included in the anti-government plot) did I realized I probably should have detained them if I wanted them gone. The game gives the player a lot of information relatively quickly, and it felt a little inevitable that I would forget something, haha!

The Ebb-less Flow- As I got into a groove, I noticed some ways the game continued my “Flow” state, namely the timing of tasks. I would be setting up for the next applicant while one left, opening documents and looking up heights while people explained the purpose of their trip, and double-checking issuing cities while fingerprints and scans went through. When penalties came in for mistakes in my approval/denial, they come as I was working, meaning I processed them (mentally and physically by moving the paper out of the way) as I worked. This meant I was always pulling for the next move, completely absorbed. The two hours passed in the blink of an eye and I was shocked at how dark it was outside (and how closed the cafe was, oops) when I snapped out of it. In fact, when other events would happen, like the anti-government conspiracists or special agents discussed things with me, I would still be anxiously anticipating the return to my profit-production.

The First Scan- One of those interruptions to my flow was the first time I scanned an applicant. I didn’t know what to expect so when the scan popped out in my document tray, I was shocked- the scan showed the applicant naked, front and back. At this time, I was instructed to complete such a scan on all peoples from a particular nationality, clear discrimination. This combined with how clearly invasive the scan was completely threw me off. The next several passports were difficult to focus on as I thought about how easily the applicant had been forced to strip for me, how I didn’t know about the security of the disposal of these scans...

The Abstraction- Papers, Please has really enjoyable abstraction, narrowing down the processing of a document to several key pieces, the sorting of papers and books into a single pane in the window. This resource management focus on space as a resource represented in a mentally-manageable and natural way. The satisfying click of activating things and the great sound and feel of stamping all lead to a game that makes a task as complex and boring as document processing into one that is enjoyable.

The Trans Problem- Ah, yes. During my first play-through, several penalties were complete mysteries to me. It took me several tries to figure out what “Height Discrepancy” meant, and much longer to figure out what the “unacceptable gender” penalty meant. Once I did, though, it didn’t change my answers at all. I’m a non binary person, and each time I realized an applicant would likely be identified as trans and, thus, unacceptable, I explicitly said “Ah, I’ll have to take this penalty.” Papers, Please does not spell out all of its lesson and tests of personal ethics. Moments like these arrive by possibly seeing no issue or not knowing how to properly interrogate or investigate the issue and, afterwards, realize one is expected to make discriminatory judgements as this. For me, there was no question. I would rather lose the game and my family than betray fellow trans individuals. That said, I followed rules on the discriminatory scanning. Not happily, but I still did it. These situations make clear some uncomfortable truths about my own ethics- when I can’t afford to live and obey all of my personal morals, the ones I value highest relate to identities closest to mine. I couldn’t help but wonder (distressingly) at my fellow classmates who were cis... were they saving the trans individuals? Were they willing to take penalties to help them, or to refuse to acknowledge such discrimination? Were they willing to do it even when they are not trans, when I wasn’t necessarily taking the same pains for people who were discriminated against?

Player Types and Papers, Please

Finally, a short discussion on Player Type. According to the Quantic Lab’s Gamer Motivation Profile, my player type was a combination of two: The Architect and the Bard. While I agree with some of these things, I read all possible results and think the survey missed placing me in the closest matching category- The Slayer. I don't necessarily need a game to be action-filled (hello Animal Crossing, Untitled Goose Game, etc.!), but I do want to feel like I am part of a cinematic experience, immersed in the emotions or world of a character. That, or I'd like the game to be creative or clever in some way and short. Those two categories describe maybe 90% of all games I have interest in!

Papers, Please is a perfect example of what I mean. The game is not exciting or action-packed, but so unique in its application that I can’t help but love it. I thought I would like it because of this unique idea and unusual gameplay. I think there’s something to be said about these types and whether or not someone is a “gamer” or “gamer-adjacent”. While I play games rarely, many of the people I follow online, friends I have, and news I discuss and seek out are related to games. It’s not exactly on purpose, it just happens that games news is what interests me. Thus I’ve pretty tapped into the games world despite not always participating as much as I would like. I think this is why my gaming motivation is more... specific? Developed? A little abnormal? It’s just a guess.

A Note: I was mistaken and wrote about Game Motivation instead of Player Types. Here’s my Player Types section!

I am certainly an Explorer type, and find this game excellent for that purpose. The chances to redo days to try different solutions and the room for conversation with the characters leaves me room to try out new things. I could see Achievers enjoying this too, since there is plenty of room to improve productivity. I plan to see if there are some speed runs of the game after I finish a run!

Thank you for reading, take care of yourself!

#blog

[stdhealth]

#MikhailBaryshnikov #Sofia-LuisaBaryshnikova