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radfemfox5 · 9 months

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Hi there - I'm trans and Jewish and I'd like to share my perspective on the "trans genocide" thing. I don't think we're experiencing active genocide in the US; that's definitely an extreme and offensive statement to make regarding what's happening. However, I do think that the increasing legislation attacking trans rights and autonomy as well as an increasingly polarized public view of trans people points to the potential for a worse situation that moves closer to genocide.

Now, personally, I live in a state where no laws limiting trans rights have passed. I was able to legally begin my medical transition when I was 15, I've never experienced transphobic violence, and the majority of people around me are supportive of my transition. My experience is similar to most other trans people in my area, with varying degrees of familial support.

But nation wide, we have seen an increase of trans people being murdered, and a massive increase in anti-trans legislation. This legislation aims to strip trans people of their autonomy and privacy. It seeks to put trans children in danger, remove information about what it is to be trans or queer from children's access, and enforce archaic ideas about what it means to be a man or woman.

Most of this is happening because right wing politicians can capitalize on moral outrage and fear to win votes. They're scapegoating trans people instead of trying to improve the lives of their constituents. This is kind of politician's thing, so it's not surprising in any way. However, when those policies successfully do win these politicians support, they'll have to make them more extreme. They'll want to make it illegal to exist as a trans person in public.

Now I'm not saying that that's genocide. I think we're an awfully long way off from trans people being mass arrested for being trans, and then murdered by the state. But we are in a rising climate of fear, and I don't think the trans people calling this the seventh stage of genocide are doing so out of bad faith. I think they're doing that because they are terrified of having their right to take life-saving medication, or have protection in the workplace, or be able to use a bathroom, or have children, or wear what they want to wear taken away. And they're terrified of those things because the bills on the table in states across the country put those rights in jeopardy. And if calling this a genocide makes people pay attention? I'm not super mad about it.

Hi, thank you for sharing your perspective on this. I appreciate it.

Your fear is primarily based on sensationalist headlines and interpretations of the law that are unfounded. I can assure you, you are not even in the early stages of a genocide.

But nation wide, we have seen an increase of trans people being murdered

In 2021, the Human Rights Campaign recorded 50 deaths of trans, nonbinary and GNC people.

In 2022, the HRC recorded 38 deaths (source). So. If we take these numbers at face value, that's a decrease of nearly 25% in one year, in a growing section of the population.

Taking these numbers and the size of the transgender population in the US (1.6 million), in 2021, trans people had a death rate of 3.1/100k, and in 2022, this dropped to 2.4. Again, the numbers provided by the HRC include nonbinary and GNC people, and accidental deaths.

Some of these aren't even murders or intentional homicides. They just say they were killed. I wouldn't consider these numbers reliable whatsoever, but they're the only estimate we have for now. There are so few trans deaths that they can fit on a single Wikipedia page, along with a little blurb about their life and who they were. It would be impossible to do something similar with victims of femicide, since there are too many to count. This page lists victims of femicide, only in Canada, only in 2022, and it is nearly as long as the Wikipedia page I listed above.

This is a perfect segue to my next point, which is to compare trans genocide to femicide, which is actually real. Women are killed so often that the UN has to categorize female murder victims as either killings (unnatural deaths), intentional homicides or gender-related killings (hate crimes, therefore considered in femicide statistics).

The intentional homicide rate for female victims in the US is 2.9/100k (data from 2021), and it is steadily increasing after having been on the decline since the mid-90s.

That only includes the pink and red circles shown in the UN's chart, not accidental deaths or unknown deaths like the HRC includes in their counts. Some countries have as many as 10.6/100k women die a year.

TL;DR: The murder rate for trans people in the US is not increasing, it is decreasing. This isn't indicative of a trans genocide in the slightest.

But nation wide, we have seen [...] a massive increase in anti-trans legislation.

As I was saying earlier, this idea stems from sensationalist headlines. It's concerning to me how widespread the misinformation about anti trans legislation really is, when house bills are publicly available online. You can literally do a quick Google search and find that most of these bills are nothing burgers.

Unfortunately, it's easier for you to just go on a website like translegislation.com and have them tell you what these bills say. I'll do some of the work for you and go through how these sites lie to you.

Alabama imposing criminal penalties on providers of trans healthcare? Sounds scary. Let's see what the source they linked, the HRC, has to say.

Ah. So it's specifically regarding transgender youth. As in, minors. This is after going through an insanely long title detailing how bad the bill is. The trans legislation tracker essentially lies by omission, implying that all trans healthcare is being criminalized.

Going to the bill in question, AL SB184, we can see that it actually acknowledges the existence of dysphoria in children.

However, they also acknowledge that this feeling may be fleeting, and that making permanent changes to a child's body solely on account of the child's personal sense of identity is unwise.

I won't go through every single bill here, as this post is already very long, but you get the idea. Feel free to send another ask if you would like me to look at specific bills.

Back to your ask: the way you speak of these bills shows that you've never read them for yourself or know how legislation works, since you're acting like it's the beginning of Armageddon.

This legislation aims to strip trans people of their autonomy and privacy. It seeks to put trans children in danger, remove information about what it is to be trans or queer from children's access, and enforce archaic ideas about what it means to be a man or woman.

I'm assuming by autonomy and privacy, you mean the choice to undergo medical transition and the bathroom/locker room/women's sports issue respectively.

Bills limiting "gender-affirming" care are focused on children, since puberty blockers like Lupron are now known to have very negative and permanent effects. The bills don't ban adults from choosing to take HRT. It's extremely profitable for doctors to continue to prescribe HRT and for surgeons to continue to recommend expensive plastic surgeries. Legislation won't go that route unless there's a massive shift in public perception.

The "Save Women's Sports Act" literally just limits participation in women's school sports to females only. That's it. The trans legislation tracker even acknowledges this.

Most of these bills are copy pasted from eachother, which is why they're all dubbed as "Save Women's Sports." Here's a snippet from HB61 in Ohio:

If someone's sex is brought into question, a simple blood test is all that's needed. Contrary to what the media may have led you to believe, there are no forcible genital inspections. No trans person is being forced to undress for this. Only 6 trans "girls" are affected by this in Ohio, out of 400k total athletes in girl's sports. So I'm not sure why this feels like a precursor to genocide to you.

remove information about what it is to be trans or queer from children's access,

Personally, I don't think children should be aware that medical transition is even a remote possibility unless they are in extreme psychological distress related to their sex. Even then, therapy is usually the best solution. I don't think the "Gender Unicorn," a surprisingly complex graphic created in part by an alleged violent rapist and groomer, should be used in classrooms to teach children about gender ideology. Gender ideology should be taught to college students who are better equipped to form their own opinion, not children who barely know how to read.

There are better, more useful things to push in our education curriculum, like compulsory comprehensive sex ed. That way, young men don't learn about sex through violent pornography, and young girls don't accidentally get pregnant without knowing what it means. This would also be a good time to teach them about sexual orientation. Leaving it up to the parents or focusing on abstinence evidently doesn't work.

enforce archaic ideas about what it means to be a man or woman.

The lack of self-awareness here is pretty astounding. The trans movement actively enforces these archaic ideas of gender by telling tomboys that they might actually be a boy. This implies that femininity is what makes womanhood, which is objectively untrue.

By telling masculine women that they are men and feminine men that they are women, you're literally enforcing the gender roles you say you're destroying.

They'll want to make it illegal to exist as a trans person in public.

You can speculate about this all you want, but you can't see laws limiting child transition and keeping sports sex-segregated as writing on the wall. We're not even close to that.

Now I'm not saying that that's genocide. I think we're an awfully long way off from trans people being mass arrested for being trans, and then murdered by the state.

I'm glad to hear you are moderately sane.

But we are in a rising climate of fear,

Your phrasing reminds me of US politics in the wake of 9/11. When people act out of fear, decisions are made in haste, and wars are started over made-up WMDs. Being fearful clouds your judgement.

Look around you. You're safe and accepted. The trans flag is flown almost everywhere in June. A trans woman won the NCAA National Champion title just last year. For International Women's Day, multiple companies featured trans women. Time Magazine featured many trans women as Women of the Year. Language is now inclusive, so women don't actually exist anymore. We're just uterus havers. This is all to cater to trans people.

Yeah. It's getting to be a bit much, isn't it? Don't you expect the least bit of pushback, especially from women? We aren't living in fear of some invisible boogeyman. We are angry at how rapidly our hard work has been undone.

We're pissed that after decades of feminist progress, we've regressed to being considered non-men once again.

and I don't think the trans people calling this the seventh stage of genocide are doing so out of bad faith. I think they're doing that because they are terrified of having their right to take life-saving medication, or have protection in the workplace, or be able to use a bathroom, or have children, or wear what they want to wear taken away.

Puberty blockers and HRT do not save lives. They actually haven't been proven to have a substantial enough effect on mental health to consider them an adequate treatment for gender dysphoria.

2. Trans people have the same basic human rights as any other human being.

3. Many places are adding gender-neutral bathrooms in order to accommodate the growing trans population. No one is checking your genitals at the door of a bathroom, no one cares that much. I care about girls being assaulted at school by boys in skirts and the school boards covering it up in the name of trans acceptance (x).

4. Trans people remove their own ability to have children by going on puberty blockers, HRT and even eventually physically castrating themselves. If you mean the ability to adopt or foster children, I don't know. Gay and lesbian couples still have a hard time adopting to this day, so progress can be made in that department.

To conclude this hodgepodge of various facts, screenshots and links, I'll leave you with this:

I fundamentally disagree with you that crying "genocide" is in any way helpful for your community. It's not. Most of Western society might have forgotten what genocide looks like or doesn't even know what the word means anymore, but you should know better as a Jew.

The attention trans people get from saying that they're going through a genocide is overwhelmingly negative from people on both ends of the political spectrum at this point. People are annoyed at trans people for making shit up, which ruins your movement's credibility.

When you have to lie to get someone's attention, you've already lost.

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sidsinning · 11 months

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UNNECESSARY AND UNHINGED RANT ABOUT CINDERELLA'S CHARACTER FROM CINDERELLA (2015) INCOMING

Lemme talk about Cinderella from Cinderella (2015) for a bit actually yeah because these changes to my girl completely baffle me

She has friends now

Goes outside on her own

Says the only reason why she's staying is because it's her parent's house- bruh.

All of this takes away (+ more reasons down the cut) from the true cruelty of OG!Cinderella's backstory and how it all connects so well to inform you of her character and the actions she takes

OG!Cinderella has been indoctrinated into accepting her life as a maid to her step family since she was a small child. She is never seen going outside of the house besides the night at the ball. The only friends she had were random animals around her she couldn't even fully converse with. She had no other human perspective on her situation or how to get out of it. It makes sense why she's just taking her stepmother's tyranny while holding everything in because this isolation and neglect is all she knows. This is the entire limited scope of her world. A sad reality to many cases of abuse in real life.

And they just. Erased all of this for some. Reason???

The night at the ball was a big deal because she literally NEVER gets to go out. This is the only time she interacts with the outside world aside from the ending. The impact of that was HUGE in the original movie. The new one just cheapened that imo by implying she goes out in town and talks to others regularly. This event was an impossible, fantastical dream come true to someone who is never treated as anything but a servant to everyone she knows.

Basically OG!Cinderella has it way worse which is what makes the ball such a huge deal in the first place.

Third point I don't think I need to explain how Cinderella staying in her abusive home bc the house is "hers to love now that her parents are dead" is not a good character change and doesn't make sense. I would understand if her dad was alive and insisting on staying, but he is GONE. It is a building you grew up in sure, but that's all it is. Not something you sacrifice your wellbeing for. So that's a shit reason they didn't need to make up to say why this character is stuck in her abusive household. The isolation and years of gaslighting were enough. (Also showing how much of a frightening presence and manipulative villain Lady Tremaine is.)

And she sure left it quick after getting hitched lol

The Fairy Godmother having the audacity to test Cinderella with that "oh I'm a poor old woman and I want some milk please" nonsense

Not very godmotherly of her in this version. 🥴 The Fairy Godmother appeared in the original to offer pure comfort to Cinderella in a time of desperate need, when this resilient and kind spirit finally reached her breaking point. The dress, slippers, pumpkin carriage, and magic were all given freely as a present to make her feel better at least for one night.

Meanwhile this goofy ass Godmother has the audacity to be like "hey is she gonna be nice or not even though she's crying in tattered, recently destroyed clothing- I need to see that or else she doesn't get the magic juice". Like why did this become a way to test her morality all of a sudden? Why did you need something from her to give up the magic goods?? It's not even a good test she just walked a couple steps and poured some milk in a bowl,,,

Idk man they made their relationship transactional for no reason which taints the original purpose of this scene imo. The original Fairy Godmother already KNEW Cinderella was kind without having to make sure by disguising herself as a rancid old lady. 😭 Weird and unnecessary addition.

Kinda nitpicky here but this film did not at all match the terror of the torn dress scene which really shows you how horrifying and humiliating it was to Cinderella

Comparison

AND THE BIGGEST OFFENDER: THE WAY SHE "ESCAPED".

I NEED TO TAKE A BREATH

BECAUSE LIKE. WHAT WAS THAT.

Original Cinderella, seeing a real chance of escape from her abuse, uses everything in her possession to do so. She's yelling for the mice to get the key, to get Bruno to chase away the cat, running down to meet the prince's attendants to make sure they get the proof of her identity from her- and that moment she oh-so-casually pulled out the second slipper??? SEEING HER STEPMOTHER'S SLACKED JAW??? GAGGED US ALL.

ICONIC

But 2015. Bitch. What is going on. She gets locked up and easily accepts her doom. She just twirls and sings in her prison like a dunce because cINDerELLa wAs aLReADy cONTenT wIth her sMaLL mOMEnts oF hAPPIneSs anD dREamS wItH thE pRinCE.

Just. Gives up.

Not the mice begging her to get up and save herself come on now

The mice have to do their best on their own to push open her window so the prince and his crew hear her on time.

And yeah, all she had to do was open a window.

WHAT. WHY. HOW. WAS THIS??? MORE EMPOWERING???

1950: use your brain to fight to the very end

2015: quit while you're still ahead, or don't try you just gotta dance and sing all pretty then someone will come along and save you

I'm sorry, but for a production that was so critical of the notion of "Cinderella just waited around for a prince to save her"...is that not literally what they changed the ending to?

You wanna talk about lack of agency in princess stories well here you go 😭

You know what's sad about all this in the end is this is still the best recent live action Disney remake imo LOL

Anyways hello if you've made it all the way down here I rest my case

#disney #cinderella #cinderella 2015 #sidrabbles #rant #i like 1950s lady tremain more but i dont dislike this more sympathetic and character driven take on her either #feels different but not bad #prince is 10000x better no complaints from me #but the bar wasn't that high in the first place so congrats i guess??? LOL RLLY THO THE ACTOR KILLED IT ROB STARK YOU GO GIRL

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bestworstcase · 3 months

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Sooo, I've been going through some of your posts, reading up on your personal opinions on certain characters I like. I'm trying to understand why you think certain things, so sorry if I come off as rude at any point. There's likely some posts I've missed lol

Uhhh, I'll be the first to admit that I don't agree with most, if not all of your takes, but regardless I find your train of thought pretty interesting cause you do make a few points I agree with.

One thing I wanna ask is- why do you see Ozpin as someone who's a needlessly paranoid religious zealot that doesn't understand Salems point of view and is demonizing her for basically no reason?

I've probably bastardized your opinion somewhere in my attempt to paraphrase it, but I'm really curious since your opinion is pretty much the exact opposite of mine lol.

Feel free to ignore the tangent I'm gonna go on, I just want to share my opinions and debate a little (I need a little mental stimulation lol).

Personally, I honestly don't see Oz as a religious zealot, or as someone who follows the GoL unquestionably. His first reaction to the GoL offering him his task is to say- "No." Oz, thinking Salem is dead, does not care about what the GoL wants or needs from him. And when Oz takes his task (which imo he was manipulated into by the GoL) and reincarnates, he immediately ignores the GoL's incredibly vague warning and goes looking for Salem. Not only that, but when he's asked by Ruby if he has a plan to defeat Salem/unite humanity, he says he doesn't. Plus, he actively refers to his immortality as a curse, despite the GoL not framing it that way. Oz deems his task impossible, and has thus given up on it. Imho, none of this says that he unquestionably follows the Gods. Maybe he had more faith in the beginning, but by referring to his immortality a curse, he's basically insulting the GoL's task. Oz isn't as vindictive or as hateful towards them as Salem is (at least not yet, with v9 and all), but imo he's definitely not fond of them, or at least doesn't hold them in such high regard anymore. The only reason why he continued with his task in the first place is because he was already there with Salem. He doesn't exactly have a choice now, and now he's given up with it, just trying to keep the peace. And, if Jinn is as unreliable as a narrator as you say and the lost fable is from Oz's perspective, it paints the Brothers as petty and manipulative and changing their mind at the drop of a hat. The same is true in the fairytales (which I need to read in full, I currently only know a wiki summary so my knowledge is limited, I won't lie), which Ozpin helps create. I really don't think these things would exist if Oz worshipped them so thoroughly and unquestionably. It's very likely he sees them as petty and manipulative brothers whose fights result in needless death.

I'd talk more, but I don't want to make this ask too long 😅 I think your perspective is interesting, even though I don't agree with it. If/when you answer this, is it okay if I reblog so I can share my own perspective more? It's fine if not, I just like debating (in a friendly, respectful way ofc) different points like this. I really enjoy Oz as a character. He's far from perfect but I think he gets a bad rep, some of it just being different perspectives and others being completely unfair. No one can agree on him so I have fun reading lol

you’re fine—& if you want to rb with your own thoughts feel free.

to start with ozpin’s paranoia, aside from the obvious factor that he explicitly does not trust anyone in his own inner circle and justifies keeping secrets on the grounds that every ally is a betrayal waiting to happen: there is zero evidence that salem has been waging a sustained campaign against him ever since the collapse of the ozlem kingdom.

in the lost fable, ozma sees two beowolves attacking his settlement and assumes that salem must have sent them: jinn implies that he sees her hand behind every grimm, hence “her presence was always felt.”

but… not every grimm in the world is under salem’s control. we know this. the grimm that attack the argus express are not hers—they’re wild grimm drawn to the relic. salem had no knowledge of where the relic was or that oz had reincarnated until hazel told her. similarly, the leviathan that attacks argus later is attracted by cordovin (the WOR episode on grimm implies that grimm are drawn to violence and violent emotion specifically). she didn’t send the grimm of mountain glenn to vale; she sent cinder to kill a child on international television to incite mass hysteria that attracted grimm in huge numbers. and during her siege of atlas, it’s noted repeatedly that salem’s forces have not advanced, but wild stragglers are trickling into mantle, drawn by the fear in the crater.

so ozma, in assuming that salem is the mastermind orchestrating every grimm attack in the world, wildly overestimates her actual influence and blames her for the natural behavior of the grimm.

at the same time, over this period of time between their kingdom collapsing and the beginning of the story, ozma has been phenomenally successful in hiding salem’s existence from the world and erasing her from history. there used to be legends about her everywhere—the witch in the woods who commanded dark powers among the beasts and monsters—and those are gone. before ruby revealed her existence to the world, no one had the slightest idea that she existed.

the only way for ozma to bury her like that is if salem herself did not do anything to draw attention to herself and stayed very far away from civilization. ozma is just one person, and there are significant gaps in his presence and influence whenever he dies and reincarnates. there is no way he could have kept salem a secret if she periodically razed his cities to the ground or made overtures to groups like the white fang on a regular basis. what she’s done in the story isn’t a pattern of behavior: salem calls the fall of beacon her first move.

and then in v9? this happens:

SUMMER: You know how Ozpin gets. Mystery after mystery… TAIYANG: And when it turns out to be yet another run-of-the-mill patrol, it’ll be— BOTH: “I always preferred discretion!”

during summer’s time as a huntress, ozpin regularly sent her and her teammates on Urgent Top Secret Missions on short notice in the dead of night only for them to turn out to be… nothing. yet another run-of-the-mill patrol. ozpin was fighting a war that salem didn’t start to dignify with her participation until she met summer rose.

<- paranoid behavior.

but the real uh, meat of this is the zealotry.

to be clear, i think that before all the tragedy, both salem and ozma were religious and had faith in the brothers—i’ve written plenty about salem’s religiosity in the lost fable so i won’t belabor that point, but she believed in the gods until they shattered her faith by, you know, condemning her to eternal suffering because she worshipped both of them. and i see no reason to think that ozma didn’t have the same faith. the same flowers that salem brings as an offering to the god of light are hung up on the walls of their home; this was a religious household.

so. when the god of light wakes him up, ozma believes what light tells him without question—by which i mean, he literally does not ask questions. light says that humankind will rise again, a mere fraction of what their predecessors were, and that they if they are not changed when the brothers return, they will be judged irredeemable and obliterated. ozma does not question the truth or rightness of this premise. he’s frightened and sorrowful, but he doesn’t question the god of light’s implication that humankind, as it is now, does not deserve to exist and needs redemption.

his refusal is not predicated on a rejection of the mandate itself, and he’s very polite and respectful about it: “i’m sorry, but that world just isn’t as dear to me without her. if i may, i’d like to return to the afterlife to see salem.” ozma does not want to be the one to do this—but he accepts without question the idea that someone must, and he deliberately leaves the door open for the god of light to command him to do it (“if i may”). he’s a religious man; he’s prepared to do what his god asks of him, even as he hopes he that he won’t have to.

(the god of light absolutely manipulated him—and he used ozma’s faith, ozma’s belief in light’s benevolence and just nature, to do it.)

and once ozma reincarnates, he actually does heed the warning the god of light gave him: jinn notes that he travels for years, hearing rumors about “the witch” wherever he goes, before he gives in and decides that “he needed to see what she had become.” the god of light told him that the woman he loved was gone, and what was left of her would only bring him pain, and he believed that because, again, he had no reason not to…

…until he reunited with salem. that is when ozma began to experience doubts, because while salem had physically transformed, she was still herself. still the woman he loved. she still loved him. she hadn’t changed; they rebuilt her cottage together and lived happily. and that made him uncomfortable, because it cast doubt onto everything else the god of light had said to him. if light was wrong (or lying) about salem, what else did he lie about?

“though time passed and all seemed well, ozma’s conversation with the god of light still lingered in his mind. he had found happiness, but humanity seemed more divided than ever…”

the stakes could not be higher; the fate of the entire world is on ozma’s shoulders. in his heart of hearts, he knows salem, he wants to believe salem, but… if he trusts her and he’s wrong, the world will be condemned to annihilation. so he’s torn. he can’t stop worrying about it. how could the god of light be wrong? why would his god lie to him? but he’s happy with salem. but the world seems more divided than ever and it’s his responsibility to fix it. what’s the truth?

ozma is an intensely anxious person. he thinks fear is the one truly universal experience because he himself is afraid all the time. in the lost fable, he’s scared of the happiness he finds with salem because he cannot. stop. thinking. about the god of light saying “man will be found irredeemable and your world will be wiped from existence.” but he’s also too scared to tell salem the truth, or ask her for help, because the god of light also implicitly warned him that she was damned. he can’t bring himself to leave her, but he also can’t bring himself to believe her, and if she is damned then he wants to save her, too, not just the world.

so he carefully raises “humanity is divided” as a problem he would like to solve, without giving her any context, and when she answers “we can do that!” he decides to just… go along with her first suggestion in the hope that he can eventually ease her into accepting the rest of the divine mandate. because he loves her. because he’s terrified of losing her, and his faith in the god of light is in conflict with his love, and he tries desperately to square that circle by redeeming her.

which fails, because salem’s faith in the brothers shattered long ago and she sees them clearly as the monstrous tyrants they truly were—so she rejects the mandate entirely and asks ozma to reject it with her.

here is the part where my interpretation of ozma depends heavily on my interpretation of salem, because:

i do not think salem was proposing genocide; i think by “replace them” she meant “replace the gods who demand redemption,” in accordance with her longstanding ambition of overthrowing the brothers, and

i think ozma knew that.

frankly, in my opinion, this is the most charitable possible interpretation of what ozma does when salem holds out her hand because HE HESITATES. he looks at her hand, frowning, and then his eyes flick downward and to the side as his expression crumbles into indecision. ozma wants to take her hand. he wants to stay with her. so either salem said “let’s kill everyone!” and ozma a) seriously considered it for a moment and b) did not challenge that idea or demand an explanation from her, or… salem made her point clumsily but both she and ozma understood what she meant, and what she meant was “nothing the god of light told you matters anymore, the brothers aren’t here, why should we spend our lives trying to redeem these humans when we could make a paradise without the gods, like we planned?”

(since you’ve not read the fairytale anthology, i’ll note that “what they could never be” is a paraphrase of the closing lines of the shallow sea: “And the descendants of the Humans who turned away from our god’s great gift have always carried envy in their hearts. To this day, they resent us for reminding them of what they are not and what they never can be.” just as ozpin uses fairytales to make sense of his life and ease people into his conspiracy, i think salem quoted from this old oral tradition to express her opinion of the brothers; like the faunus in the story, she chose to leap into magical waters and was transformed into something new, and she believes that remnant has the potential to be the paradise the “old gods” failed to achieve. she’s implying that the brothers are envious of remnant and resent these humans—and her—for reminding them of their failures.)

then… you know, they murder each other and kill their children and raze their own kingdom to the ground. and ozma wakes up behind somebody else’s eyes, again. he sacrificed everything and it shattered him and now he has nothing left except the mandate.

was it worth it?

the answer is no. the answer is that this world isn’t as dear to him without salem, and if the only way to save the world is to lose her, he can’t do it. he doesn’t want to. until the end is his song. “to live free or die, it’s all the same/the enemy was right, there’s no reclaiming/in waves of shame/we’re desperate to make amends/but through a simple soul we lie complacent”—like. he knows salem is a person. he knows she’s right about the brothers. he wants to make amends, but he doesn’t believe he can, because the man fucking despises himself.

in his commentary on ‘the infinite man,’ ozpin describes the man—himself—as both a hero and a fool who made such grievous mistakes that to some he is a villain, and suggests that he may not be worthy of forgiveness. in ‘the girl in the tower,’ the character of ozma is simply called “the hero,” and in ozpin’s commentary he says that “if you look far enough ahead […] heroes may turn out to be villains.” he isn’t talking about salem. he’s talking about himself. he sees himself as the villain in her story, and taken as a whole ‘fairytales of remnant’ reads like a tortured apology to her more than anything; he closes with a story about humans breaking the sun and creating the moon, and in his commentary: “[people] not only replaced the sun, a celestial gift from the all-powerful god of light, but also improved upon it through their own ingenuity.”

he thinks it’s too late. if he could go back and do it again, he would take her hand, but the truth is that he didn’t, and he doesn’t believe she will ever forgive him. no second chances. nothing he can do to make amends. ozma’s mindset is that he made his choice and now he has to live with that forever.

and it’s unbearable. it’s torture.

after everything that happened, ozma clings to zealotry as a coping mechanism. in his heart of hearts, he has no real commitment to the mandate: he’s distorted it to be about salem. ozma sought the relics so he could use them to “destroy salem.” jinn told him he couldn’t; he proceeded to devote countless lifetimes to fighting an (imaginary) war against salem. he has No Plan. beacon academy is modeled after her father’s castle and ozma put his office in her tower! in her prison!!

his inner circle is a cult dedicated to the god of light and he built the academies as fortresses to safeguard his reliquaries forever and ever while he fights to protect the people of remnant from enemies like “panic” and “division” whom he represents with her face, her name, and the way he truly feels about All Of This is trapped. it’s been so long that he’s convinced himself that his lies are true—that she’s an inhuman monster who craves only death and revels in destruction—but he built her tower and locked himself inside.

ozpin lies to everyone. even himself. especially himself. the intensity of his guilt and regret drove him to weave an elaborate fantasy casting salem as the villain and himself as the fool destined to be her enemy, and he clings to it desperately because he has to believe that. he has to believe that she lied to him, too. he has to believe she’s the one who manipulated him. if it isn’t all her fault, if she isn’t the Great Evil, then his own choices have no justification.

the lying becomes so habitual, so ingrained that he lies without even thinking. why didn’t he tell the kids that the lamp might attract grimm? when they demand an answer on the train, ozpin freezes. he doesn’t have a real answer. he just… withheld vital information because that’s what he always does. a reflex.

the zealotry is of a piece with the lying. he had faith in the god of light—and he still believes that the gods will condemn and destroy the world if they’re summoned, and i think he believes it’s futile to fight them and that if salem tries they’ll crush her again, so he truly does not want her to try and he’s not lying when he claims she’ll bring about the end, because he believes that’s the only possible outcome of rebellion—and he believes himself to be beyond forgiveness. this is all he has, and the only way he can cope with that is… the fairytales. palliative fantasy. a story about a monster and the man destined to fight her. lifetime after lifetime until the lies seemed almost true.

ozma’s trauma is religious in nature. he’s a religious man who lost his faith a long time ago because his god is using him to punish salem and he hates himself because he fell for it, and now he thinks it’s too late. she’ll never forgive him. he can’t see a way out, so he clings ever harder to the mandate because it’s all he has and it gives him a shred of purpose in being her fated enemy. all he wants, all he’s everwanted, is to be with her, and if he hadn’t believed in his god when all of this began, they would have lived happily in her cottage forever.

all of which is to say, yeah, ozma does not hold the gods in high regard. his obedience does not come from reverence or love—he’s fucking terrified of them. the main difference between him and salem in their view of the gods is that she believes they can be resisted and beaten, and he does not. zealotry doesn’t require that he think the god of light is good or just, only that he obey. he’s still under light’s thumb even as it kills him inside, and he can’t escape until he stops lying to himself about what salem is.

bc she’s… not a monster. she didn’t lie to him, and she certainly didn’t manipulate by not… being able to read his mind when he hid things from her. she made it clear from the start that she wanted to replace the brothers and create a new, better world without them, and in the present all of her rage is directed at his deception and his cowardice in obeying the gods. what he did is not unforgivable. he can make amends, if he finds the courage to try. there is a door he can open to leave the tower. the first step is letting himself believe it’s possible.

(this is why it matters that he asks the kids to forgive him and give him a second chance in V8. ozma has never forgiven himself for anything and for lifetimes he’s believed himself to be irredeemable; not just recognizing the possibility but actively choosing to ASK for forgiveness was so important, and so necessary.)

#‘trust love’ is About Him

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littlescaryinternetguy · 4 months

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What are your favorite g/t tropes?

There's so many, and I can't wait to find out about more. There's so many of us, coming from entirely different cultures, but there's more and more out there that I don't know if I've ever heard from. African G/t? Inuit G/t? Polynesian G/t? I wanna learn!

But at the moment, with my limited perspective, here's my faves.

Comparison. The giant's pupil is bigger than my head. It takes the tiny this many steps to cross my palm. I only come up to so and so's ankle. Nothing drives it home for me like someone saying to me, in hushed wonder, you're smaller than my thumb... and then proving it.

The tinier of the two must be hidden by the larger somewhere on them. A pocket, under a hat, stashed in a sleeve like a trick card. Popped in the mouth and pocketed in the cheek while the biggo rolls their eyes and tries to look nonchalant, fooling no-one but getting away with it anyway. Other places I'll let you imagine.

Inquisitive tiny learns about human culture. Extra points if the bigger person really hasn't thought about it before. "That? It's a coffee maker. What's coffee? Uh... it's a... it wakes you up. No, not like a hawk attack. Wait, you get attacked by hawks?" Having to consider their entire world through the eyes of someone the world wasn't built for.

Size as metaphor for dislocation and loneliness and difference. To be tiny is to be forced to the edge, away from crushing feet and deafening voices. To be giant is to be above, so high above, and so alone. As much as they might try, they are always the other. Even in the most committed mixed-size relationships, there is that moment where they come up against the impossibilities of living with each other. But they try and fail and try and fail and try and fail a little better. We are all alone in our differences, but we keep reaching out. G/t is about what happens when we reach out and find something even more alone in their difference, terrifying, thrilling, and the process by which that difference stops becoming the entire point of the relationship, and instead becomes just one facet of it: hell yes.

There's probably more but my brain overheated and I have to remove it for a bit.

#ask a fairy

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usgsnajs · 5 months

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God I can’t wait until tomorrow’s episode of secret life… it’s obviously gonna be the finale, and unlike previous seasons I watched live, I have wishes for every server member except for the previous winners to win lol

I want Cleo to win because she deserves this story arc, surviving the zombie apocalypse and turning human as a result, being the last green name, and also getting back with her ex husband lolol (just so you know, I have essays of thoughts about Cleo and Ethos character arcs this season that I cannot put it into words. Just trust me that this and Ethos sections should be a lot longer)

I want Etho to win because oh my god??? What has he been on this season??? First off, he has somehow reached higher set cat status than he did in Limited life, which I thought was impossible, but he just struggles so. hard. in the earlier sessions especially. Secondly, he plays the secret aspect of the game really well, where he almost always comes up with a fake task for him to do in addition to his actual task, and sticks with it completely. He’s just really good at the secret part of it while also hiding what he’s doing really badly, which is the best thing to watch ever. But thirdly and most importantly, the fucking…zombie apocalypse session…He failed his task, and made the ENTIRE SERVER also fail their task just because he didn’t want to give up Cleo and Grian… He jumped in front of Bdub’s arrow to protect Cleo… ‘I’m a survivor’ this ‘I’d probably run’ that, you are a liar Mr Etho Slab!! Face it, you’ve had character development since Last Life!!! Stop thinking the worst of yourself!! Also, in addition to all that, he also fits the fact that all the previous winners played the game differently than how it was intended, with the previously mentioned failing of the task, so he also deserves to win because of that.

I want Scar to win because this entire season has been him fighting against what the secret keeper pushes onto him, with him not wanting to be the villain but repeatedly getting villain related tasks, so him winning in spite of that would be so satisfying. Also the idea of Scar, who has spent previous seasons constantly fighting to make friendships, winning the season where everyone on the server hates him does something to me the vibes are just immaculate. Also also! Please let him win he’s come so close so many times 😭

I want Gem to win because Geminislay next question. lol but actually I think it would be really funny if she joined the server for the first time, killed all her friends, won, and then left. Also something something her bringing the boogeyman curse to a season that was never supposed to be cursed in that way, and then fighting her way to victory is really cool. Also also Gem is just cool so I want to see that victory

I want Impulse to win because he’s gotten so close in like almost every season before this!!! He got second last time please just let him win and go apeshit, he deserves it I think. Also last yellow??? He deserves to pop off in the final session and take the win

I want Bdubs to win because this season has been peak Bdubs allying with half the people on the server, and he deserves to win at his worst /j But seriously his perspective so far has been one of my favorites this season because of how funny he is. He spent over an episode building the world when he didn’t even need to. He was murdered by Scar when both of them were green. He has a room in the Roomies base when he’s not even part of their group. He’s so silly he deserves to murder Scar in revenge for his first death and then gloat as he wins.

I want Joel to win because he deserves to go apeshit and then not die from recklessness. I think he should be insane and murder a bunch of people while still staying alive, like Last Life but without the ending part. His base is filled with joy but he is not, and that’s hilarious to me. Please let Joel win one of these he’s come so close

I want BigB to win because out of everyone in secret life he was the one to truly take the ‘secret’ part of the title to its very max. BigB gaslighting everyone he comes into contact with for literally no reason is my favorite part of secret life lol. He should win just for that as well as having the funniest life series base ever. Also his storylines tend to get ignored by a bunch of the fandom, and while it’s definitely improved a lot this season, it still could be better, so I’m hoping he wins just so more people will watch his perspective 😭

I want Skizz to win because like BigB, he is seriously underrated. He still doesn’t have 100k!! Subscribe to him right now!! But other than that, he also deserves to win just because it’d be funny if, now that he’s lived past the third death, he promptly switched his curse as far around as possible and just won lolol. Also also the Heart Foundation has been one of the silliest groups ever, and their base was really cute while it lasted, so any of the members of that group deserve to make it far if just for that. Plus him immediately going after Tango once he got infected with boogeyman was very funny. You go king! Drag your friends down with you! In conclusion Skizz is very funny and deserves to win purely because of that as well as the underdogness of it all.

I want Tango to win because of the Heart foundation stuff I mentioned with Skizz, but also he deserves to win just so he can break his curse of always having a kinda stupid final death 😔 I think it would be really funny if he broke that curse in the coolest way possible, and then in every season after this one he immediately goes right back to silly final deaths.

(Also if a previous winner won this season again I would not be upset as all of them have storylines this season that are really good for it, I just want them to win a little less than the others)

This season has been incredible so far, and it might even end up being my favorite season yet!

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communistkenobi · 8 months

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also I guess I will say that I’m only one person with limited & imperfect information. I’m not claiming I have all the answers or a comprehensive solution to every antagonism or contradiction to be found within social or biological models of gender/sexuality, just that I’m more comfortable with social explanations whenever I’m engaging with social issues (like gender) for a very long list of reasons, some of them strategic (not wanting to give ground to reactionary claims about gender, for example) and some of them empirical (I am not persuaded by the evidence provided that gender is biological).

I’m also coming at this from the perspective that while I believe there are scientific ways to understand gender, that scientific process is itself embedded within ideological frameworks. empirical claims can be harmful if the questions they are answering are harmful - eg “transsexuals are harmed by a mental illness called dysphoria” is a psychological claim that is “true” insofar as you accept that dysphoria is a mental illness, that it arises individually within people, that it exists primarily within the realm of psychological experience, that gender deviance is a function of mental illness, and that when you measure the suffering trans people experience you are measuring this mental illness called dysphoria as opposed to like, oppression lol. And ultimately it is impossible to reckon with gender as a force in our lives without also reckoning with the titanic social, political, medical, and legal power that gender exerts in society - meaning that my desire to have a scientific understanding of gender is always going to be entangled with the claims our political enemies make about us, because how we understand social phenomena (even if we claim it is biological) guides our ability to politically and socially respond to it, and so my resistance to biological conceptions of gender are also bound up in the untold horrific violence that has occurred throughout history in the name of advancing human biology

#whipping girl

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literary-illuminati · 10 months

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Book Review 33 - Solaris by Stanislaw Lem

This was the third work of really classic sci I read in June, and the second that’s probably more famous as the raw material for an adaptation than as a book in its own right. Though in fairness the Tarkovsky movie is as far as I’m aware a better adaptation of this than Shadows of Chernobyl is of Roadside Picnic. Anyway, all to say that I think I’m starting to get used to the sort of abruptness and lack of narration regarding the protagonist’s emotions that seem to have been common in sci fi from the 60s-70s.

Solaris takes places on an eponymous alien world, almost entirely covered in a vast and strange ocean-like body with only half a Europe’s worth of rocky islands scattered across its surface. The story follows Kriss, a scientist, as he arrives for a posting on the skeleton crew living in a station floating above the ocean and studying it. As he arrives, he learns that the only member of the crew he personally knew had died the day before, and that the only two residents are acting paranoid and erratic; this all starts making sense when something that seems to all appearances to be his dead ex-girlfriend appears and starts talking to him, and he learns that the other two have doppelgangers of their own bothering them. Things spiral from there.

So, I’m not sure if this is a cosmic horror story, exactly, but it’s not not one either. The overriding theme is the limits of human rationality and understanding, the total impossibility of what we’d recognize as communication with something truly alien, the feeling of smallness and insignificance in the face of vast and strange and awe-inspiring. The first chapter of the book includes an intellectual history of the Solarists, going over decades of study and all the discarded theories and failed experiments that have made the posting such a dead end as the bright lights of science moved on to more promising problems. The ocean is Other, beyond human comprehension, and even at the end of the book none of the characters have come any closer to determining whether the phantoms it conjured out of their memories is an attempt to reach out and communicate, an experiment to see how they react, a reward or punishment, a purely reflexive response by something that isn’t even really properly conscious, or something else entirely.

I honestly don’t rightly know just what sort of science fiction a Polish guy in 1961 might have been writing in conversation with, but from my perspective there were definitely a few passages that seemed to be taking shots at what most space opera treats as aliens. ‘We have no need of other worlds. We need mirrors.’ and all that. But again, that could very easily be me projecting – easy enough to read it as commenting on a dozen other things.

It was interesting that Rheya was the only doppelganger we ever meet – the story’s quite claustrophobic, and the other two scientists go quite out of their way to make sure Kriss absolutely never sees whose haunting them. Interesting, too, that Kriss is the only one whose actually got anything to be guilty about with regard to his – or, at least, according to Snow the other two were the subject of intrusive thoughts or unbecoming fantasies, whereas Rheya did in fact kill herself a couple days after the two have them had a particularly cruel argument and ugly breakup.

It’s not what the book was about, but I’m honestly kind of sad we didn’t get more insight into Rheya’s psychology? A simulacrum that knows she’s a simulacrum, created by by some unknowable agency for some purely instrumental purpose, not even in her own right but entirely to prod someone else with, unable to spend too long out of sight of him without some control mechanism sending her into a panic attack. There’s some real meat to dig into there, right? Just think of all the juicy existential angst.

My library’s copy of this is the old Kilmartin-Cox translation, which I’ve since regrettably learned is considered pretty rough and low-quality relative to the newer editions. Still, even given that, I kind of adored a decent amount of the prose in this? Or the descriptions of the alien environments, to be specific – the lengthy descriptions of the constructs thrown up by the ocean and how the appearance of the station shifted so dramatically with the rising and setting of each of the system’s two suns were just legitimately beautiful, and make me extremely eager to watch one of the movie adaptations when I can conscript some friends for it.

#book review #solaris #Stanislaw Lem #sff #classic sf

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theambitiouswoman · 8 months

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Hello, i discovered your blog very helpful & articulated and i relate to most of your posts and it made me a little open up with my issues and some of are OCD, overthinking and procrastination. What should I do to overcome from these & make myself a better human being so that I can continue to focus on the right things, my goals, career and the people i care about. It's been very challenging for me to deal with this all alone. I want to do the right thing & i need clarity with an headstart to begin my journey to work on myself to get better & keep evolving. I need help and i want to be a better person.

Thank you so much! <3

First, I want to commend you for recognizing the areas in your life that you would like to improve on. It's not very common and really shows that you are taking control of your life and becoming more aware. Which is one of the most important qualities that you will need to overcome challenges like OCD and procrastination.

Realize and understand that you're already enough as you are. We all have flaws and face challenges, but accepting ourselves is crucial for our mental health. You're more than just the areas you're trying to improve. Life is about growth and it's okay to constantly work on becoming better and addressing what might be holding us back.

Navigating figuring out what is the right way, or wrong way to do is, is definitely hard but part of the process is us learning how to figure out what works best for us. Remember that you can only fail if you give up. Especially when we are discussing things that are in our control. So do not feel bad about the idea of doing the wrong thing, the wrong way.

Start reading books and articles about OCD etc to help you understand the mechanics of these issues. Reading personal testimonials from others really helps you find comfort to overcome these things as well. Some books you can start off with: "The OCD Workbook" by Bruce M. Hyman and Cherry Pedrick and "The Now Habit" by Neil Fiore.

Procrastination often happens when tasks seem too big, feels impossible or stressful. Tasks we may not be interested and therefor lack motivation to do. Break them into smaller steps and focus on completing one step at a time and reward yourself for completing them. You have to reward yourself no matter how small so that your body feels a cycle of these patterns and emotions and establishes a habit.

Write down your goals, so you can have a sense of clarity and direction for your life. Hold yourself to your standards only, but not anyone else's. But make sure you are setting a standard that really challenges you, not one that keeps you stagnant.

Have an honest conversation with yourself and figure out what normally sidetracks you from your work and try to eliminate those distractions. Then, make a plan and stick to it. Living with intention requires organization, which many overlook. Structure boosts our confidence and gives us a sense of direction. It's not about doing things perfectly, but about doing them regularly. Consistency is key. By maintaining a routine, you not only build discipline but also create a foundation for growth and progress. These small consistent actions can lead to significant changes in your life. Prioritize structure and see the difference it makes.

Remember that what we perceive, or even what society can perceive as flaws or weaknesses, can often be our strengths in different contexts. For example someone who is seen as overly meticulous or detail oriented might struggle in situations that require quick decisions. However, that same quality is invaluable in roles that require precision and thoroughness.

It's all about perspective. What might be a limitation in one scenario can be a significant asset in another. Recognizing this can help us embrace our unique qualities and leverage them in situations where they shine brightest.

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queentala · 2 years

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Heyyyy, you can do a imagine of Aedion Asrhyver? I never find any imagines of him.

Thank youuuuuu!

Aedion's Property

Aedion Ashryver x reader

I’m sorry you had to wait for this one so long, baby. But I hope you’ll like it. Because I like it.

Summary: As Aelin would say: “territorial bastards’ shit”

Words: 2185

Warnings: extreme dose of fluff and my poor attempts to write sword fight

So many things were happening at the war camps right now. Your world however was narrowed down to the sword in your hand and your husband panting in front of you, gripping sword of Orynth as he lunged for an attack. You blocked him easily, automatically tightening your hold on the grip as vibrations ran through your sore arms. All muscles in your body were on fire but somehow you managed to find some strength to keep advancing.

“You’re getting slower,” breathed out Aedion when you parried his blow in the last second, by miracle avoiding being cut by his blade.

You groaned out. It started two hours ago when Aedion proposed quick sparring match before commanders’ meeting but said meeting has been postponed until afternoon, so here you were, stuck in an training area, exhausted to the limit. His comments not helping you at all.

“So do you, my love.” Allowing yourself a quick glance at your husband’s sculpted stomach, shining with sweat in late morning sun, you smirked. Well, maybe this had some bright sides. Seeing that he relaxed, mouth opening to make another sarcastic comment, but it that exact moment you launched yourself at him for an attack. Immediately he raised his sword, readying to block you, but swiftly as leaf carried by wind you dived under his arm, kicking him behind the knee and making him fall forward. Using the momentum Aedion managed to roll over his arm and land on his back, giving you those two seconds you needed to turn around and put your blade to his throat. “And this means,” you smiled triumphantly, “that I’m still faster.”

He didn’t say anything, just stared at you with narrowed eyes. With victory written on your face you knelt down, straddling his stomach but your face dropped when with one fluid move Aedion’s sword appeared against your own neck.

“The fight’s not done as long as your opponent have their sword in hand,” he breathed, corner of his mouth rising.

Leaning down, you minimized the distance between you two, the blade still pushing against your skin. “Doesn’t matter. On a battle field you’d be dead. How would you use your sword then?” you asked, tilting your head.

“We’re not on a battle field, sweetheart.” The tempting smile he sent you made you want to kiss him, especially that your faces were almost touching and you could see every detail on his handsome face that you loved to stare at so much.

“I win. Again.”

“Well, from this perspective it looks like a victory to me.” He glanced down and your eyes followed, noticing that the band around your breasts sank slightly during the training, exposing your chest more than it should.

"Shut your face," you murmured, narrowing your eyes.

"Then maybe sit on it." Aedion wiggled his eyebrows, blowing you a kiss.

“You’re impossible,” you snorted, cuffing his head before straightening yourself and fixing the band. “Let’s go, I’m hungry.” Standing up you offered Aedion your hand. He raised from the ground as well, pulling you against his chest and placing soft kiss on your lips. “Good fight, sweetie,” he murmured, making you purr in satisfaction.

Whistles and laughs reached your ears. Just now you realized you had an audience. Some of the Bane soldiers gathered at the edge of training grounds, other soldiers that minutes ago were still practicing with weapons now stood and watched as well. Aedion glanced their way, his smile fading away when he noticed where they’re all looking. At who they are looking.

Your husband’s Fae side and the primal instincts rarely made themselves noticeable, however the low snarl that came out of his throat most definitely wasn’t human.

His arms automatically tightened around you, his instincts telling him to protect what’s his from other males. Aedion never liked treating you like a thing he could simply appropriate, but sometimes he wished he was able to hide you from the world.

He got it, okay?! You were beautiful, and talented, and powerful. Many man wished to have you. Especially that a woman in war camp was rarity, so their desire to stick their dicks into you was even stronger. But you were his. His wife, his love, his best friend. His to stare at, his to cuddle, his to kiss and make love to. HIS! He doesn’t ever intend on sharing his most precious treasure.

“I haven’t realized my presence excuses you from your duties,” he called towards the men whispering between themselves, his voice cold like Terrasen’s mountains. The true Wolf of the North. Soldiers’ eyes widened in fear and embarrassment. Immediately they saluted and stumbling went back to their works.

Your mouth opened to tease him but golden-blue eyes crossed with yours. “Not a word.” Shaking your head you chuckled and pulled your husband towards the tents.

Warm, broad hand slid down your back and rested on your hip when you walked through the camp. The tension in Aedion’s shoulders was strongly discernible but you knew his jealousy was a sign of love. And even though Aedion loved showing you off, whether it was looks or skills, there was very thin line between him being proud, and him being... well, territorial.

“Oh come on, baby,” you cooed, grabbing his chin and turning his head to look at you when you noticed the death stares he was sending anyone that even dared to glance your way. Under fingers you could feel the stubble covering his jaw and made a mental note to hide all his razors so he couldn’t shave it. “You know I’m only yours.”

“Clearly they don’t.” The jealous tune in his voice made you roll your eyes in amusement.

Aedion stopped, raising his hand to move the material covering entrance to your tent and letting you in. Walking in you threw your sword on the bed and turned around, cupping his face with your palms. His muscled arms circled your waist.

“Oh I’m sure they do. Let’s see,” you pretended to think for a second, “I’m your wife, I have your last name, we both wear matching rings on our fingers, I sleep in your tent, in your bed, every night, cling to you at every chance given and often walk around the camp with neck covered in hickeys you left there. We never even tried to hide our relationship from others, even if it annoyed them. Not to mention our wedding was the biggest party this kingdom had seen since eight years, and you most definitely weren't sparing the reasons you love me in your speech after you got wasted with your side chick at 4 in the morning.”

“A) Kyllian is not my side chick, b) I wasn’t wasted, just slightly drunk,” Aedion cut in, making offended face.

“You proposed to me again and started crying when I told I just got married.”

“You could have been gentler and not I’m married meh meh meh fuck off,” Aedion parodied your voice at what you laughed out loudly, him following soon after. (Both perfectly knowing he was wasted as fuck.)

“So,” you started, still chuckling, “what other proof could they possibly need to know that I am yours only?“

When you lifted your chin to look at your husband’s face, his eyes wandered somewhere behind you. The the way the corner of his lips lifted... You knew this look. You knew it and you knew you should be afraid.

Without a word he let go off your waist, heading towards the desk that was stocked with various maps, knives, and even a pair of your panties Aedion threw there when you were making love last night. All muscles in your body tensed, readying to escape, when he turned towards you.

"Aedion..." You backed off slightly seeing a pen in his hand and the glow in his eyes. He took a step forward, lips stretched in a mischievous smirk. "Aedion no-" you didn't get a chance to finish your sentence as he launched himself at you.

Faster than wind you ran out of the tent, squealing as you did. You couldn’t help but laugh happily as you jumped over (extinguished) fireplace, maneuvering between people and horses on your way. Confused looks on the Bane men’s faces made your grin even bigger as you were aware of how ridiculously their general chasing his wife through the camp shirtless must have looked.

Grey, green and golden tents were blending with each other as you ran forward, not quite knowing where. Your ribs started to hurt from laughing and your legs were heavier than usual so relief washed over you when you saw two dark haired men cleaning their blades near the armory.

“Help me if you love me,” you shouted, hiding behind very confused Ren Alsbrook.

“Don’t!” shouted at the same moment Aedion. Running into you, he lifted you from the ground, spinning around as you started to wriggle. “Calm down, babe-” With one hand he squeezed your cheeks, making you pout, and locking your head in the crook of his arm, brought his hand with a pen to your forehead.

“Fon’t yo ducking dre Ashriver!” You tried to rip out from his grip but the pen already touched your forehead.

“May we ask what the fuck you two are doing?” asked clearly amused Kyllian, peaking over Aedion’s shoulder.

“Just marking what’s mine.” You were still grumpy (more because Aedion caught you, not because he’s screeving gods know what on your face), but the cute frown between his eyebrows that appeared as he tried to write straight made your heart flutter.

“Aedion’s property” the young lord read the black letters on your skin with raised eyebrows. “Yeah, as if there’s a lad in this camp that doesn’t know it.”

“I fold yo, idot.” The words coming out of your mouth were still distorted as your cheeks were captured between your husband’s rough fingers. But he only smiled down at you and pecked you on the lips. “Mine,” he muttered, strands of golden hair falling on his eyes, making all your anger go puff.

He finally let go of your face and you stuck your tongue at him, wondering how to get through the camp without being noticed by... anyone.

Ren’s voice got you out of thoughts. “Sign her ass so those that stand behind her know as well.”

With authentic betrayal written on your face you turned towards black haired man you considered a friend. “Seriously? You? Against me?”

Before he could answer you Aedion once again raised his hand with a pen. Devil could envy the evil smirk his lips stretched into. “It’s not that bad idea. C’mere.” This time you wasn’t waiting but immediately jumped into sprint.

“Fuck you, Ren!” you threw over your shoulder. Loud laugh was the only answer you got.

Aedion was right behind you and you were aware you can’t run from him. So instead of racing through the camp again, you turned right and slammed into one of the biggest tents here.

It was stocked with various maps and books, right in the middle stood big wooden table with several chairs around it. The meeting tent.

Instead of hiding, you launched yourself at one of the smaller tables where drafting instruments laid. Your hand reached out to grab a pen laying there but huge body slammed into your back, trying to pin you down on the table. In a result your palm knocked ink bottle, spilling it’s contents on the table and floor.

“Stop,” he laughed, “you’re gonna destroy something.”

You couldn’t breathe but still laughed and squealed as Aedion tried to sign your pants. Doing the only thing that came up in your mind, you drenched your palm in the spilled ink and turned around in Aedion’s arms. Something between yelp of surprise and moan of pleasure ripped from between his lips when you grabbed his crotch, printing your hand exactly between your husband’s legs.

“Mine.” Nonchalantly shrugging your shoulders, second time this day, you sent Aedion the smile of triumph.

“You little -” chuckled Aedion and shook his head when he glanced down.

“Now we’re even.”

Looking deep into your eyes his hips pressed onto your stomach and you could feel a bulge growing there. “Do you have any idea what have you done, sweetie?” Aedion leaned in, his hot breath tickled your ear when he dipped his lips to your neck.

“I marked you as mine.” You couldn’t help the shaky breath that left your mouth. “Because you’re mine.” Your hand tangled itself into his golden hair, tugging at them so he could look into your eyes.

“And your are mine,” he growled lowly. He was so close you could count every freckle on his face. And kiss each one. But the hungry glow in his eyes told you that the time for loving caresses will come later.

“Show me then.” You barely whispered those words against his lips and he was already lifting you and laying on the big wooden table. Your hands were all over his body and guttural moan ripped from you when Aedion grabbed your ass roughly.

“Mine,” he said, making you chuckle.

The tent won’t be occupied for another few hours. You had plenty of time.

#aedion ashryver x reader #aedion x reader #aedion ashryver #throne of glass #throne of glass imagines #tog x reader #tog imagines #a court of thorns and roses #crescent city #SJM #aelin galythinius #rowan whitethorn #aedion defense squad

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miirshroom · 2 months

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A perspective for contextualizing Elden Ring: Marika does not exist

Consider what gods are, in the anthropological sense. Gods do not exist except in the minds and artefacts of people who define them. Marika is a god, therefore, Marika does not exist. Paradoxically, Marika exists because Radagon believed in her.

"The modern gods right now are the things we give our attention to, the things we give our time to, because time is precious, time is what we use to worship." - Neil Gaiman, on the New Gods (American Gods)

A question asked about 4 months ago on Reddit, and which has come up a few times since then:

"What do you make of the nominal primacy of Marika but the de facto centralith of Radagon in the Golden Order? Did Radagon exist at the founding of the GO?"

What I make of it is that Radagon/the Elden Beast/the avatar of the Sun in the Lands Between devoted his time to crafting a dream woman. Attaining this is the Golden Order decreed by the Greater Will. Because that's how it's supposed to work - the ideal masculine man hasn't achieved golden perfection without marrying the perfect beautiful wife - the silver moon reflecting the light of the sun. But Marika gained a life beyond her sculptor's expectations, in becoming a woman crafted not as an ideal partner, but as an ideal self.

Radagon is Marika and has always been the Marika whose echoes are relayed by Melina. Because both Radagon and Marika are personas in the end - both are fabrications of the Elden Beast that was once sent as Envoy of the Greater Will.

"Other dimensional beings are undoubtedly amazed at what human beings will accept as human beings too. 'But it's just a stick with a person on it.'" - Also Neil Gaiman, about bees believing that painted sticks are other bees

And the Elden Beast is itself representative of the order decreed by the Greater Will. The command to become golden. The Golden Order. Something to which so much time was dedicated to following that it grew to become a god of a different magnitude itself.

Therefore, in sequence: the Elden Beast - or "Radagon" for simplicity - created Marika (with her basic characteristics copied and refined from a particular woman who did exist at some point - see Roderika for example). Radagon governed the Lands Between as Marika, for a time (see Mimic Tears, Marika's Mischief, etc for the mechanism, specifics are unimportant. Someday I'll release my queued post comparing Radagon and Loki), because a majority of the population needed to believe in Marika for her to become accepted as a god consort. Then priorities changed when Radagon realized that he liked being Marika more than being "himself", self-image began to crumble, and Radagon went to study at Liurnia how to be Marika permanently. Its all very transgender, although through a strange route that makes sense in the context of gods who do not conform to the grounded limitations of the real world.

To truely become Marika, Radagon had to be destroyed. Because being another person means not being Radagon. But in the end Marika needed to be shattered too, because she had been modelled on a Numen from outside the Lands Between and becoming her could not be anything more than shallow imitation (see Melina being used as kindling to burn the Erdtree as a metaphor for letting go of the dream maiden). So, the status of avatar of the Greater Will in the Lands Between was handed off to someone else, while the discarded shell of Radagon and Marika wait at the Erdtree to be put to rest by the Tarnished.

The revelation that "Marika is Radagon" from using Law of Regression on the statue led Goldmask to conclude that Marika should remain the Inner Order to Radagon's Outer Order. Not a persona to be worn outwardly, but something to be hidden. Jungian psuedopsychology concept of anima. The gods are no better than men. Corhyn either is or represents the monk who wanted to be a maiden so of course he's broken about it when Goldmask concludes that it is impossible and the Elden Ring should be put back exactly as it was (except now not able to be broken). It's a regression that undoes all of the progress that Radagon made studying in Liurnia where he had concluded that for the sake of becoming Marika the ring should be deconstructed and reformed into a new shape.

From a certain point of view, Radagon was at odds not with the original Marika, but with what the idea of Marika grew to become over time while he was the part of the personality that stagnated.

...and that was generally where the original response ended. But now there's DLC on the way that invites us into a dream world to learn about the origins of Marika. And there's Messmer all done up like what I'd expect from a younger Radagon. From what we know of the framing device he won't be - not literally - but this does seem to be circling around more Jungian ideas. Basically, the idea that the 'Shadow' is a part of the unconsciousness where repressed thoughts are shoved, and it is a place accessible to the anima/animus but not the persona. So, the past self of Radagon/Marika envisioned as one of their offspring and buried in the Shadowlands.

And with all the Madonna/pregnant woman imagery I have just this feeling of dread of having to untangle the Freudian pseudo-psychology mother complex stuff that's tied up in this theatrical recreation of Marika's origin.

But anyways this all is what I think about whenever Marika is called a bitch or a tyrant or etc. It's shadowboxing against an imaginary woman whose physical presence is never seen - Marika does not exist.

#Elden ring #media analysis #elden ring lore #the reason why I suspect Freud is because that name was invoked for a character in Armored Core 6 #Also my dismay when I told a friend that god = ideal self & Elden Lord = perceived self & demigods = personas #And he was like “you mean superego & id & ego?” which I don't think is exactly right but it's the pop culture thing #I get the impression that thinking 4th dimensionally to sort out all of this stuff is a major hurdle for most people

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peonycats · 9 months

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Got any vietchu( china x vietnam) fics or art?

This one I've actually posted in my oneshot collection (which you can read on ao3 here) but i quite like it so here you go! tumblr version!

“If you,” China says as he looms over her, the light behind him obscuring his face in shadow. “Pretend to love me, I shall too. Together, we can live in this false paradise.”

At the time, when Vietnam heard those words leave China’s lips, all she could do was stare at him, unblinking. But internally, her insides twisted, disgusted at this display of fragility and self-consciousness, as if he was trying to mock the position she was now in.

After being given some time to mull it over, however, she came to some new conclusions.

One. She was talking to this enormously successful subjugator and devourer of nations. He didn’t need her to pretend she liked him- that was his attitude towards a lot of things, actually, based on his curtness with his government and leaders. China could’ve turned Vietnam into livestock feed for all he wanted. He was the conqueror, and she was the conquered- that was how the world worked.

Two. It could benefit her and her people to get on his good side. Despite her now diminished standing, nations still held sway in administration. Like him, she was a survivor- nothing came before one’s survival. This, however, brought her to her next conclusion, and possible obstacle.

Three. Would he let such attachments and passions cloud his judgment? Would he be swayed by such fleeting and foolish sentiments?

Nations existed beyond what was possible for humans, beyond the limits of their impossibly brief lives and narrow perspectives- China, having massacred anyone who dared to stand in his way, stood as the exemplar of their kind. The chances of him retaining any traces of softness were close to nothing.

But when she’s taken away from her warm, lush home, and brought to live at his damned capital for several months, she makes some new observations, which leads to her readjusting her initial assessment.

The corners of his lips tugged downwards when he met with his ruler, despite his otherwise cordial tone. He would obediently nod and mutter monosyllabic responses, but even she suppressed a laugh at how quickly his head whipped away from the Emperor himself to hungrily stare at today’s banquet. He loved eating, probably too much for his own good.

He was ridiculously vain about his hair at times. He nagged at her for how poorly she kept her own. She told him where he could stick his jade comb.

He insisted on arranging his house and furniture in preposterous ways. “For good energy,” he claims, as he scoffed at a nearby house for their ‘haphazard’ placement of decorative rocks. To her, every rock was haphazardly placed.

He loved children, and frequently stopped to chat or play a game with them. He’d even give up his favorite snacks to them, even when she could see the comically sad longing in his eyes.

He also liked flowers, was often found in the palace gardens. Once, when Vietnam’s form was hidden by foliage and flora, she saw him cradle the bud of a lotus; there was a melancholy glimmer to his gaze, and an almost gentle, thoughtful sorrow in his movements.

It was the weight, the weariness, the ache of walking centuries, millennia on this earth. She knew it all too well.

But it disappeared just as quickly as it came, and he returned the bud to the waters, before he saw her and began to again complain.

There were sides to every nation, she knew that, sides to every human, in fact. But the contrast was still a little dizzying.

One dawn, she woke up early, before the sun had even risen. Slipping out of her room and avoiding the guards, she wandered the ornate palace, tracing memories of past arguments and walks and discussions, and somehow, found herself in his room.

She paused at the doorway, before striding towards his bed where he is still sleeping.

When she reaches his bedside, she stops. Hundreds of thoughts swirl in her mind. He’s defenseless, she thinks, he’s unguarded and unarmed and unconscious and completely vulnerable.

She stares at that white throat of his. Memories of the morning he jabbed her in the rib and told her that they would be traveling to his capital so she could be “civilized” course through her. She had been coughing up blood and phlegm then; the gravest injury he had was some drool finding its way down his face.

She sits down on the bed, motionless. Then, she reaches a hand towards him. She’s staring so hard that her vision is bleeding and her chest is tight from holding her breath and she can almost pretend that she doesn’t feel the way her hand tremble-

It’s only when her fingers make contact with China’s smooth skin that it drops to the blanket, useless.

It’s pointless, Vietnam wretchedly thinks as he pulls her hand back. She knew better than anyone else that this would accomplish nothing, beyond worsening the conditions of her stay.

She looks at China again, this time at his eyes. They were closed shut, and as a result, he looked far more peaceful than any conscious version of him had ever been.

Her hand reaches out again, and it takes everything in her to brush her fingers against his dry cheek and not do something rash.

She refuses to give him false love. She was incapable of it. They had only acquainted themselves over a series of months, fleeting seconds in her eyes. And their knowledge of each other’s existence only went back to a few decades of military engagements, crossed blades, and spat out insults.

No, she could not give him love or any imitation of it. She was too old for such falsehoods.

But, she could pretend she tolerated his presence. That would be enough, for now.

> This is supposed to take place during the Qin Dynasty campaign against what is now Northern Vietnam, around the 200s BCE? > Did you know that Feng Shui (practice of arranging ur house in certain ways for good luck) has been around for 4000+ years?

#hws vietnam #hws china #vietchu #hetalia #ask #anonymous

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