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asagimeta · 3 years

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Enhypen Theory- Ruins & Rituals

So I've been watching Given/Taken alot lately for writing purposes and am curious about something....

What's with the weird monument?

The beginning of the video starts with Jungwon standing in a desert with a bleeding nose, but we don't see this scenery again until the third "arc" of the music video, when the rest of the boys join him and immitate firing arrows at this broken monument of some kind- we later see them at night, dressed in their uniforms, dancing in front of it- though before this Jungwon is seen again slowly burning from (presumably) the sunlight

But... what is it? What's the significance and why does the video open there? Why are they firing arrows? There are just so many questions and I, personally, haven't really seen this part of G/T addressed yet so I'm going to take a shot at it for my first HYBE theory! (I actually have been *following* HYBE theories for a few months now but I'm new to K-Pop in general so I've been quiet until now)

First, it's important to note that it stands out as odd from the rest of the video

The beginning and middle of the video have two primary locations with similar but still considerably different vibes-

Old fashioned clothes, indoors, a sense of containment and "other"ness, even though they aren't the same, you can still feel the connection to eachother- but that's completely removed in the desert scenes, wich are outdoors, in modern clothing, and present the boys with more individuality (IE: lacking uniforms)

And it makes me wonder if the ruins they're visiting are of their old testing facility

Let me break it down a bit better-

The two primary locations we see other than these ruins are a mansion-wich I'll, possibly incorrectly, refer to as "the orphanage" henceforth- and a testing/containment/research facility of some sort

At first I wondered if the ruins were simply the orphanage but that's clearly not the case as you can see the exterior of the mansion in one of the snapshots early on, it's very different looking- even the shape is extremely different, and it seems to be in a forest just below a hill, not in the middle of a desert

What about the other place though? The facility- as I'll call it from here on- doesn't have the same deniability

In fact, we see a very similarly shaped building to the ruins during one of the snapshots, but we don't have any clear indication of what it is, why would it just randomly be there? Unless, ofcourse, it isn't random

Initially I assumed the orphanage and the facility were the same place because the boys are wearing the uniforms in both locations, but I'm starting to think that isn't the case, and that the boys were moved to the facility after being experimented on at the orphanage

The thing is that vampires don't always turn when they're given the venom/virus/blood/whatever-it-is-that-turns them, and when this substance is manmade or engineered somehow, it takes even less frequently, this is true of all supernaturals, and again, is emphasized when the people attempting to make the transitions are humans experimenting with forces beyond their understanding, so it's typical of these practioners to have large "sample sizes" of potential experiments, often turning to hospitals, schools, and orphanages (to name a few) seeking the few candidates that can survive and thrive under these new conditions- from there they'll experiment on all of them until they get the desired result, and those select few will move on in the process to the next step

Sound familiar at all? I think this is further representative of the idol industry

We know that a big theme of Enhypen's storyline is going against the toxic nature of the idol industry, with songs like "Not For Sale" and "Mixed Up", and themes like being museum or display peices in "Let Me In", and the process of a large group of young boys being picked through and groomed until there are only a few left standing, who are then taken away from the "orphanage" and brought to a more intense experimentation/testing facility, sounds alot like idol-potentials who are on talent shows, win, and then assigned to a group and agency who put them through intense preperation for their debut

We know Enhypen went through that exact process on I-Land, so it's not a stretch to say this may be what they're referencing

But back to the ruins

You can see a definite difference in the way the orphanage looks vs the facility, wile the orphanage is a western style mansion that looks like it came from the late Victorian era- though, as Laina Sunflower pointed out, it does seem to have some modern conveniences like pen lights and electric fans- (the person conducting the experiments is also wearing a face mask, wich looks more modern from what I can tell)

-the facility is seemingly more modern than that, and has a much less homey feel, resembling instead a more containment type of vibe- large areas of open space, large glass windows dividing one from another, and the boys all seem to have their own rooms to keep separated from eachother, very unlike the mansion where you can probably safely assume that they share rooms, as unlike the sleek, minimal style of the facility, is cluttered with children's toys, furnishings, and accents, and you get the vibe that the boys are allowed around eachother often, the entire feel is more casual, and considering the number of tables in the dining room, you can also safely assume that there are many more inhabitants of the orphanage than just Enhypen themselves, meaning that it's more likely they share rooms

We know what the outside of the mansion looks like, but we don't have as definitive of a space for the facility

Wile the tower in the snapshot is a bit different in shape from the ruins, they're similar enough, and the landscape is notably perfect for a facility containing baby vampires- a barren desert devoid of the one thing they need most (blood) and full of the one thing that can most harm them (sunlight), it would be like keeping Superman in a chamber beneath the red sun surrounded by kryptonite, there's very little chance of them escaping

There's also something particularly strange about the ruins, in that there's a LADDER hanging off of one side leading to the top of the facility

The entire set up reminds me of the vampire facility in True Blood, and I wouldn't be surprised if the facility had this peculiar setup to make it even more difficult on the boys to possibly escape, I wouldn't even be surprised if these ruins are only a small portion of what's been left, maybe the original facility was a little in tune with the building from the snapshots before whatever happened to it... happened

There's also some other things I want to point out with this line of thought-

Sunghoon is kept in a room filled with orange light at one point, sitting on the edge of a bathtub-?- when his hand catches on fire

Some have theorized that this is Sunghoon's power, just like other boys have the power to levitate, hypnotize, and teleport, but what if that isn't it? What if that was the facility testing him in a room full of manufactured sunlight to see if he indeed burns in the sun? True Blood, again, has a similar theme (and it wouldn't be unusual for HYBE to draw influences from other popular media, what with TXT's frequent Harry Potter references)

Additionally, could this be in part about their escape from the facility? We see the boys make a running motion as though they're trying to get away, only to stop

We see something almost exactly the same in "Fever", but this time they succeed in seeming to go through the door to their freedom

I also wonder if the Victorian style clothing vs the French Roccoco style clothing is meant to show that there was a large gap between the time they were originally imprisoned and the time they got out?

This also fits with "Drunk Dazed", we see the mystery woman before the boys, still in their Rococo style clothes, performing a "ritual of blood" by pouring blood into the fountain, could the boys have been rescued, found, or "adopted" by **real** vampires after their, probable, human experiments? If the French Rococo style represents the boys during their escape period, this could make senses, and could also serve to explain, to a degree, their blood festivities in the first place

This doesn't make alot of sense though in terms of timing as the Victorian era is around two hundred years *after* the French Rococo period, so unless it's symbolic....

But I've wondered about the weird contrast between the boys being experimented into vampirism vs being turned naturally, as the mystery woman seems to heavily implicate that she herself is a vampire and that she's showing the boys a "natural" ritual, something that's part of the vampire community/species/way of life, but this is a giant contrast to the more clinical, experimentation vibe of what the boys had been going through in their orphanage/facility days; I'm reminded again of True Blood here, as well as "Bitten", "Servamp" (the manga), and plenty of others where the older, stronger vampires (or werewolves) free the younger ones from human captivity

Things I still haven't figured out or that I find most notable:

-Jungwon seems seperated from the others the most here, he's the one at the beginning with the nosebleed and the one catching on fire- something that doesn't happen to any of the other boys- and in one of the flashbacks he's the one standing outside of the orphanage banging on the window as the others go about their routines, and in “Fever” he’s the one left behind/last in line when everyone is running towards the door, he seems to be the "main" charector in Given/Taken, as he's the last one on screen revealing what everyone suspected: that they're vampires; he's also the one with teleportation, most prominantely seen in Drunk/Dazed, flittering around outside the room where Sunoo is pouring his blood into his glass and coming in between the two groups of three who, according again to Laina Sunflower, seem to be at odds with eachother

-Sunoo is also the one seen to be biting (or attempting to bite) Jungwon, this could be a really interesting nod to their relationship, the two seem to be connected in a special way (is this why Jungwon is outside Sunoo’s room in Drunk/Dazed, flittering around anxiously as though he’s not sure what to do with himself or isn’t sure what to do about something that’s bothering him?) Could Sunoo have been responsible for turning Jungwon, or maybe completing his transformation? Or even just feeding off of him, wich, in some lore, creates a special bond between two vampires?

-Speaking of Drunk/Dazed, we see the mansion reappear during their first "bloody birthday party"- when there was only one candle on the cake- does this mean that they celebrated their life as vampires before being transferred to the facility? Were they vampires for a fair amount of time- several months or maybe even a year or two- before being taken away?

-Why are they immitating firing arrows? They don't seem to be *actually* doing this, just mimicking it, why expose themselves to the sun just for something symbolic? Is it a repetition of something they've done before? Did they originally destroy the facility themselves? Or it it something else..?

If anyone has any ideas definitely let me know, HYBE is my new favorite thing for theorizing!

#enhypen #enhypen theory #hybe #hybe universe #kpop #kpop theory #hybe theory #hybe universe theory #dark moon with enhypen

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scriptstructure · 3 years

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part 1 I have multiple alien planets, but the things is I want to to be similiar in earth as in 200 countries, 5000 ethnic groups, 6500 languages, varied climate/terrain/politics. Part of the story is still on earth and obviously as a whole, 99.9999% of stuff on earth isn't even getting used, but we know there is more and sometimes there are little hints. That is stuff we know from real life and generally doesn't need explanation. Example, a character says "We borrowed this from the Russians."

Part 2 Regardless of what is really important, what we know and doesn't need explanation is a lot because we figure readers generally understand--or they can google. Hell, there could even be lots of subtle culture references as well. Anyway, depending on the reader's knowledge, it can enhance the reader's understanding in various and subtle ways. But when I do things similiar in alien planets, it makes no sense and requires extra explanation to fill the details. So, basically useless.

Part 3 Thus it seems I'm unable to fully give the type of experience as when using earth as pretty much everything needs to be important to the story. Unless there's another way to do this so I can make my alien planets seem so much more than what's actually focused on without the needless exposition? It feels like at best I could try to mention a few things but it could never feel as vast as earth does. Perhaps maybe I just need numbers?

Reminder that if your question doesn’t fit in a single ask box, you should use /SUBMIT instead.

I have had a few questions in the past which are very similar to this one, [HERE] is about how to introduce invented elements of secondary worlds (stuff that doesn't exist in the real world but has been made up for the story), [HERE] is about how and why we might include extra details about the places that a character is visiting, [HERE] deals with establishing what a 'normal' day in an invented setting is like, and [HERE] is about ways of thinking about worldbuilding, and how much you need to know vs how much the characters know.

So it is a fairly common shortcut, in scifi writing, and scifi film writing in particular, to portray alien planets as kind of 'one thing' settings. Here is the desert planet, and there is the dessert planet, and over there is the Evil planet, and there's the cute jungle teddy bear planet moon. This can be useful if you're making a film or story where you just want the different worlds to work as shorthand for certain ideas 'shitty home world', 'the seat of democracy', 'the swamp where Yoda lives' etc.

But it is very simplistic, and obviously looking at Earth, as you've said, there's a vast array of different climates, cultures, people, languages etc. We do tend to simplify the way that we portray Earth in film and stories, as well--think about, say, Australia being largely signified by the Opera House/ Harbour Bridge, and the Outback™, or the UK being Big Ben and the houses of parliament, or the USA being a vast stretch of corn fields between New York and Hollywood.

So how do we effectively give the sense of a world being bigger than the particular spot that we happen to find ourselves in?

First off, you need to have background information about the world that you're building. If you know what the major cities are, what the main continents are, if your alien world has countries, or if it has a singular centralised system of government--or is it divided into city states? or is it divided into time zones? or is it divided into... etc

Think about how your characters conceptualise their world, and their place in it. Do they think about the world, with all its variety, as a single vibrant whole? Or do they think of 'us on this continent, and them over on that continent'?

How does trade work on this world? Do they have extensive trade networks among the various cities/ countries/ regions? Or do they rely on off-world suppliers for various things?

What kind of cultural exchange is common among these different areas, and what are the cultural touchstones that your characters might be familiar with, or interact with on a daily basis?

As with the examples I gave in the first linked post above, it is less about providing the readers with an exact view of how the politics and interactions of the various places function, and more about demonstrating what that means in practice for the characters.

Say there's a certain kind of fruit that is PROTAGONIST's mother's favourite, and she spends all day searching the hypermarket for one to surprise her mother with for her birthday, but turns out there's none of that fruit available because it's all from OTHER REGION, and there's a war on, or a volcano has erupted and interrupted trade, or the shuttle crews are on strike and so the fruit can no longer be transported down from the moon.

If your protag's favourite pop group is from a polar region and only produces music six months out of the year, because the other six months they have to work with their community to produce supplies for the long dark winter, that tells us something about the way that polar community is organised, and how it interacts with the rest of the world.

What else can we think about when constructing alien planets/ secondary worlds?

It can be difficult to think 'outside the box' of the culture that we're immersed in. It's very easy to slip into thinking that we're doing things the 'correct' way, and if someone else somewhere else does stuff different, that's weird, wrong, or sinister. Often it can be just a different way of doing things that gives the solution that the person is after.

I think it can be very helpful to read books about ancient history, especially stuff about societies that no longer exist, because a lot of the assumptions that we make about the way the world currently works are less useful when we look at ancient history. There are some extremely varied ways of approaching society and culture and a whole lot of stuff which isn't immediately obvious, but which we can understand by looking at the vast differences between ancient societies.

Well written history books can really help you get the sense of how societies form, and how culture develops, and some of the forces involved in cross cultural relations. Also, there are some great examples from the ancient world, of, for example, the various different Ancient Greek societies, and how each of them thought of themselves as 'doing culture the best', of their neighbouring hellenistic states of 'doing culture not quite as well' and of everyone who didn't speak greek properly as barbaric outsiders.

At the moment I'm reading Philip and Alexander: Kings and Conquerors by Adrian Goldsworthy, and I think one of the things that has struck me as super interesting is the difference between how the Greeks vs the Persians organised their societies, and the way that they thought about and approached warfare.

So what are the basic questions we're working with?

-What is the protagonist/ focalising character's relationship to the world? Were they born on-world? Are they adult settlers? Are they traders passing through? Has the character travelled to other places on the world, or have they mostly stayed in their home city/ area?

-How do the protag/ focalising characters think of the other places in the world that they are not currently visiting? (ie, I am in Sydney, Australia, what do I think of Boston, USA, or Paris, France? Big cities with a Reputation, I probably know something about. Small towns or cities I may or may not be familiar with, depending on my life experience or interests)

-How do the material goods which are needed for daily life pass around the world? Are certain goods only available from certain areas? Are there Events happening which may disrupt supply routes? Are there cultural elements which may cause friction in trade?

-What kinds of cultural export or exchange happen on this world? Is there a particular city which is well known for its entertainment production? (Hollywood, California--movies, New York City--the print publishing industry) Does this mean that portrayals of the rest of the world are skewed by the perspectives of that place? (Remember, Australia is just a bridge, an opera house, and red dirt!)

There's always going to be a gap between what your characters know, or are aware of, and what is 'actually' happening in the world of your story, but as long as you have the information decided, and can write the world consistently and with sensory and suggestive details, the reader can and will pick up the puzzle pieces and fit them together.

It's a complex problem, but it's one that can produce interesting complex settings.

I hope this helps!

#writing #worldbuilding #world building

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cancerbiophd · 3 years

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I'm searching for a gap year job and I'm looking at a lot of lab tech positions. The lab I'm in now has 6 full time researchers and a few undergrads, but the lab I'm looking to join has about 40 people total and I'm kind of nervous about that big of a switch. Are there benefits to working in a large lab?

Hello Anon!

During my gap year(s) I also worked as a lab tech in a medium-ish sized lab (13 people), that was then part of a close-knit department comprised of 40+ people. We regularly worked with everything, including going to all the meetings, sharing equipment, collaborating on experiments, etc. It was like being in a lab inside a lab! Here are my own pros vs cons of working in a huge lab:

Pros:

A history of success. A lab doesn't become that large without a constant flow of grant money, and a constant flow of grant money usually means a regular churning out of high-quality publications from high-quality research.

Lots of resources: be it mentors, equipment, lab space (hopefully), money (presumably), internal and external collaborators, and sources of help. There was never a moment where I couldn’t find at least one person to help me out with something. A note about mentors: a large lab will usually have Scientists (with PhD's) who head their own projects. So the chain of supervising would go to them first, then the PI.

More variety of cool research to do and learn about. This is great if you have a passion for learning new techniques, and will also broaden your CV. In addition, if you help out with various projects, you have the opportunity to be a co-author on all those papers.

Usually will have more dedicated positions, like a lab manager whose full time job is only admin-related stuff, or someone who cleans all the glassware/makes cell media/etc. It takes the multi-tasking away from actual research.

Really organized. You just have to be in an environment like this (but on the downside, if someone deviates from the organization system in place, it could cause more chaos than in a smaller lab with less material).

Company at all times. There will always be someone around, so that's great if you don't like to ever be alone in the lab.

More redundancy in expertise. One downside of a small lab is that if one members is out, their project would come to a grinding halt (or they’ll be bombarded with inquires about where things are and how to do this and that--super frustrating). But in larger labs, the other members can help out.

Your lab will probably be well known, even outside of the institution, so that's useful in leveraging that "brand" during the rest of your career.

Related, you will have a large network of lab alumni who can also help you in your next career steps.

More variety of fun outside-of-lab activities. The large lab I was a part of had amazing potlucks (sooo much food) and even their own soccer games on the weekend.

Cons:

Can be overwhelming, even months in. The learning curve will be higher for fully understanding all the different projects happening at once.

PI may be spread thin, and may not give you the one-on-one time you want (but that can be remedied by the presence of other mentors in the lab).

Can be loud and slightly chaotic at times, which just comes with the territory of being around more people. There may also be a higher chance of interpersonal friction between lab members.

More people will be using the same equipment, so planning and communication are crucial to properly share them.

Personal work space (like your own desk or lab bench) may be limited. Hopefully the lab isn't hiring more people than it can fit, but if having your own space is important to you, be sure to inquire about that during the interview.

Specifically for Covid-19: Social distancing may be harder, and there may be personnel scheduling “rotations” in place (like spreading out shifts during the day, which may involve some members coming in during the evenings/weekends). This is something to definitely bring up in your interviews.

That’s all I can think about from the top of my head. If anyone else has experience working in large labs, feel free to chime in!

Good luck anon with your job hunt! I hope it all works out.

#lab advice

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clumsyclifford · 3 years

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hello bella’s ask box it’s been a min damn.

so the vibes are fucking everywhere w the music in the lab today so i’ve mostly been ignoring it but then unforgettable by thomas rhett started playing and my brain was immediately like This Is a Fic Song

more importantly it is a Bella Fic Song

last time you not so subtly wanted me to prompt u w w thomas rhett song you told me to do that here so i am back again w another song from ur boy

okay i def snuck out just to send this so i gotta go now but this felt important laksdjdld

ok ily bye 💛

hi sam :)

so.................... i was stuck on what to write you for your birthday fic. you sent me this ask prompting me with a thomas rhett song that i had literally been meaning to write a fic based on for almost a full year. the puzzle pieces just aligned REALLY nicely on this one.

happy birthday, my love. there's gonna be a LOT more sappy shit in the ao3 notes, but please know that my life is irreversibly changed for the better because i met you. i am dangerous close to sounding like glinda from wicked and i really want you to get to READ this fic so please see ao3 for more schmaltz. i love you so much.

tw for alcohol

read here on ao3

Every life has a moment that imprints on memory like ink on a fresh page. The kind of moment that permanently alters the trajectory of that life, that marks the ending of one chapter and the beginning of another. Some people are lucky enough to have more than one. Some people’s minds are laden with crystallized memories. But there’s always at least one. One completely unforgettable moment.

For Jack, this moment happens twenty-four minutes after he enters the club.

Twenty-three minutes after he enters the club, Zack returns with his and Jack's second beers and says, "There's some guy at the bar who's totally your type."

"Yeah?" Jack cranes his neck, but he can't quite see the bar from where he is. "My type how? Not just 'lonely and drunk,' right? My standards have gotten higher, you know."

Zack hands Jack his beer. "He's cute and he's wearing a One Direction shirt, and I'm pretty sure he's drinking a margarita.”

"Oh shit," Jack says. "That checks all my boxes."

"I know it does," says Zack, winner of the Wingman Of The Decade award. He claps Jack on the shoulder. Jack sidesteps people until he gets eyes on the bar and scans for a cute guy in a One Direction shirt drinking a margarita.

Twenty-four minutes after Jack enters the bar, he sees Alex.

And everything changes forever.

"Woah," Jack says. His gut is feeling weird and it’s probably unrelated to the beer and a half under his belt.

"What?"

"The guy at the bar," Jack says, grabbing Zack's arm. "Zack. You grossly undersold my future husband to me."

"Your future husband?" Zack sounds amused, but Jack isn't kidding.

"Remember this moment," he says seriously, giving Zack a sloppy pat on the bicep before moving away from him, towards the bar, towards the cute guy with the One Direction shirt who's making Jack understand clairvoyance. "Remember this so you can tell the story at our wedding!"

"Your wedding," Zack repeats.

"Our fucking wedding!" Jack insists, more loudly as space and drunk people fill the growing gap between him and Zack. Zack just gives him a good-luck-and-godspeed wave.

Seconds later, Jack is at the bar.

"Can I buy you a drink?"

The cute guy in question looks up, surprised. Jack practically reels. It's a miracle people aren't flocking to this guy; he's not just cute, he's gorgeous. Bleach-blond hair — clearly from a bottle, which somehow Jack finds more attractive — flops over his forehead in a stubborn commitment to the emo fringe that died out a decade ago, and long lashes frame brown eyes that rival the glossy chestnut color of the bar. Add the five o'clock shadow and the sharply angled jaw and Jack's speechless.

Fortunately it's not his turn to speak. "I have a drink," says the guy, who is rapidly progressing from Cute Guy At Bar to Possible Soulmate At Bar. He quirks a smile. Jack's done for. "I'll buy you a drink, though."

Jack sets his partially-drunk beer on the bar top and slides it as far as he can reach. "Okay," he says.

Possible Soulmate laughs. He slides his margarita away from him, too, pushing it into the space of another person sitting down the bar. "Touché. Okay, you can buy me a drink."

"Well, hey, I don't want you to waste yours," Jack says reasonably. He retrieves his beer and then Possible Soulmate's drink. "I'll get the next one."

Possible Soulmate smiles. Jack is going to need his name eventually. "I appreciate your commitment to environmentally-friendly consumption of alcohol."

Jack blinks. "Yeah," he says. "That was a lot of big words, but sure. No problem. I'm Jack, by the way."

"Alex." Alex. Jack can see the wedding invites now.

"Nice to meet you," Jack says. "I like your shirt."

Alex glances down out of instinct as the wide collar of the shirt slips over his shoulder. "Thanks," he says with a chuckle, and looks up at Jack. "I like yours."

With great effort, Jack tears his gaze from Alex's shoulder and the hint of collarbone peeking out, but he would like it on the record that it is tremendously difficult. Fortunately he already knows what shirt he's wearing because he'd agonized over it for several minutes longer than Zack's patience ran, shortly before going out.

"Yeah, Kurt Cobain," he says, nodding with probably too much enthusiasm. "I'm a lead singer guy."

"Really?" Alex tilts his head and raises an eyebrow. "Meaning what?"

"I go for the lead singer types," Jack explains. "Kurt Cobain, Billie Joe Armstrong, you know." He nods at Alex's shirt. "Harry Styles."

"Harry Styles wasn't—" Alex breaks off and snorts. "Eh, whatever. Who cares."

"Wait," Jack says. "Hold the phone. Did you fucking cross out Zayn's face?"

Alex looks down at his shirt again like maybe he'll have forgotten what it looks like. "Oh, my friend did that. But now the shirt is factually accurate."

"If you wanted an accurate shirt you'd have to cross them all out since none of them are in the band anymore," Jack observes.

Alex slowly smiles. "I guess."

"I always liked Zayn," Jack says wistfully. "His solo shit is so good, though."

"It's good," Alex says, kind of in the tone of voice of someone who doesn't really agree but doesn't want to get into it, so Jack leaves it be. They can poll their wedding guests. "I'm really digging Niall's solo shit."

"That's an extremely acceptable answer," Jack says, nodding vigorously. In the moment it slips his mind that he's holding a beer and the liquid begins to slosh out of its container. "Oh shit, fuck, sorry."

"Didn't get me," Alex says, passing Jack a napkin. "Couple too many, I get it."

"What?" Jack is very focused on drying his hands so they don't get sticky and gross. "I'm not drunk."

Alex laughs. "Yeah, right."

"I'm not!"

"Okay," Alex says lightly, but it's clear he doesn't believe Jack. On the bright side, he doesn't seem bothered by it.

"I am acceptably drunk for a guy in his mid-twenties at a club,” Jack amends. "And you owe me a drink anyway."

"Hey, I intend to buy you that drink," Alex says earnestly. "Another beer?"

Jack shakes his head. "Vodka soda," he says. "It's a special occasion."

"Really! You celebrating something?"

"I am now," Jack says. "Celebrating meeting my future husband."

"Your future husband?"

"You," Jack says, in case it wasn't clear. "It's not every day you meet the man you're gonna marry. I think it calls for a celebratory vodka soda."

Alex stares, obviously expecting Jack to say sike! When Jack does no such thing, he gives a small, incredulous laugh.

"Fair enough," he says. He sounds like he's humoring Jack. That's okay. Jack is serious, but Alex will figure that out on his own time. "I guess you're not wrong. That doesn't happen every day."

A large shadow materializes on Alex's other side, blocking light like some very cliché movie villain. It's not Doc Ock, but it is some tall, burly guy, a leer affixed to his face that's probably been there since Alex's haircut went out of style.

"Hey, baby," he says in an unnervingly deep voice. The part of Jack that isn't super skeezed out is a little jealous. But Burly Guy isn't talking to Jack; Jack may as well be invisible. To Alex, Burly Guy says, "Saw you across the bar and I just had to come over."

Didn't have to, Jack thinks grumpily to himself. You could have stayed across the bar. If you walk away now we’ll pretend we never saw you.

"Can I get you a drink?" Burly Guy asks, and honestly, Jack has no idea what Alex is going to say.

Big Burly Guy with a deep voice a la Morgan Freeman vs. resident beanstalk Jack whose voice sounds like a rejected cartoon character design. What a tough choice.

Jack is just preparing to cut his losses when Alex grabs Jack's wrist, turns to him, and says, "Honey? What do you think?"

Jack's tipsy, but Alex is definitely communicating something with his eyes, and between that and the pet name Jack is pretty sure he's on the same page.

"You want to buy my boyfriend a drink?" Jack asks Big Burly Guy, cranking up the Bitchy energy because he doesn't get to do it a lot and it's kinda fun. His voice has definitely gone vaguely southern-auntie, but he's rolling with it. "Sorry, sugar, this seat's taken. Must be this guy" — he points at himself — "to ride."

"This guy?" Burly Guy echoes, furrowing his eyebrows at Jack and then looking at Alex with profound confusion, like he just doesn't get it. "You're with this guy?"

"Happily," Alex says, glancing back at Jack, who offers him what is definitely a convincingly enamored smile because Jack is legitimately enamored. Alex laces their fingers together and Jack's not delusional, can't be, not when they fit this well together. No way. "So I'm gonna pass on that drink. Sorry, man. No hard feelings."

Burly Guy seems to have some hard feelings. Maybe he didn't get the memo. "Whatever," he says gruffly. "Your loss."

Jack can't resist countering, "Actually it's your loss, sweetums," as Burly Guy retreats. If he dies tonight, he knows who’s responsible.

As soon as he's gone, Alex breaks down laughing, and Jack quickly follows suit. Alex's hand slips from Jack's and begins to tug at the ends of his own hair instead.

"Sugar?"

"I don't know what happened," Jack says/wheezes. "I became possessed by Blanche from Golden Girls.”

"You have to be" — Alex prods Jack's chest — "this guy to ride." He dissolves into giggles and Jack is laughing too but mostly because Alex's laugh is incredibly contagious.

"Look, I don't blame him," Jack says, feeling exhilarated. "You are the best-looking guy in this establishment. He just happened to have creepo vibes."

"I am not the best-looking guy in this establishment," Alex says, grinning at Jack. "Nice of you to say, though."

"Hey, I'm serious!"

"I thought you were Jack."

Jack stares at Alex and Alex doesn't even last a second before he's breaking down laughing yet again.

I'm going to marry you, Jack thinks, and it almost scares him how serious he is about that. He opens his mouth and says, "That wasn't even— that's not even one of the good dad jokes! That's the most boring one!"

"There is no such thing as a boring dad joke."

"You should go into stand-up," Jack says dryly. "You'd tear down the house with this set. I can see it now." He waves a grandiose hand in the air as if painting the marquee into existence, but when he goes to introduce the act he realizes he's missing most of the crucial information. "Alex…something…something. Austin, Texas, one night only."

"Gaskarth," Alex says. "That's my last name."

"Alex Something Gaskarth," Jack loyally amends, and gives Alex a look like, well?

Except Alex is giving Jack that same look. "I only know your first name and you expect me to tell you my full one?"

"Jack Bassam Barakat," Jack says, gesturing impatiently. "Come on, I'm trying to introduce your act here."

"Guess," Alex says.

"Guess?"

"It's a pretty basic middle name," Alex says. "I'll buy you your vodka soda when you guess it."

"Alex," Jack says. "I am not going to guess your middle name. I am so bad at these games and I'm fucking drunk."

"Quitter," Alex says. "Do you want your drink?"

Jack scowls, trying to channel Blanche again, but Alex is apparently immune.

"Give me a hint," he finally concedes.

"It's a British name," Alex says. “Pretty standard British.”

"Are you British?”

Alex nods. "Born and raised. Moved here when I was about…eight? But I'm not an American citizen. I have a green card."

Yet another reason they should be married. Jack could extend his citizenship to Alex. Plus he'd gain British citizenship, which would probably be useful for, like, travel or One Direction stalking or whatever.

"That's sick," Jack says. "I was born in Lebanon. We moved when I was a baby."

"That's so cool," Alex says, sounding genuinely interested. He props his chin on his hand and gives Jack a cheeky smile. "Now guess."

Jack sighs. "Uh, Charles."

"No."

"Darcy."

"Darcy?"

"Margaret."

"Jack."

"You said it's a British name!"

"A British man's name," Alex says, rolling his eyes in fond exasperation.

Jack takes a long pull from his beer, swallows, and says, "Harry."

"No."

They're going to be here awhile. Jack pulls out the seat next to Alex and settles in while he racks his brain for British names.

“Alfred.”

“Nope.”

“John.”

“No.”

“Paul.”

“No.”

“George.” Alex shakes his head. “Ringo.”

“Yup, you finally got it,” Alex says. Jack is over the moon for a split second before it sinks in that Alex is fucking with him. “Alex Ringo Gaskarth. Well done.”

“Fuck off, I’m doing my best here,” Jack says.

“You’re missing one incredibly obvious name,” Alex says. “It’s not that hard.”

“For you,” Jack says. “Because you already know it.” Alex is grinning. Jack likes that he’s enjoying himself. It makes this guessing game fun. Under any other circumstances, this guessing game would not be fun, but Alex makes it fun.

Alex has also finished his mango margarita by now, and Jack’s beer is long since empty. He’s itching for another drink, mainly for something to do with his hands.

As if reading his mind, Alex flags down the bartender, who sidles up with a small smile and says, “What can I get you boys?”

Jack blinks at her. Mostly at her accent, which is not American.

“Vodka soda,” Alex says. To Jack, “I think you’ve earned it.” Jack smiles.

“And a mango margarita,” he puts in to the bartender, “and are you British?”

The bartender looks amused. “I am British,” she says.

“Please help me,” Jack says. “Alex says his middle name is a British name and I cannot for the life of me figure out what it fucking is.”

“Jack, the nice bartender lady has other things to do,” Alex says with a laugh. The nice bartender lady probably does have other things to do, but she shifts her weight and gives Alex an appraising look instead.

“Harry?”

“Tried that,” Jack says, realizing at once that this is a pointless endeavor. The nice bartender lady is going to guess everything Jack’s already guessed and he’ll just have wasted her time. “I’ve tried every member of One Direction, every member of the Beatles, every member of Oasis, every Harry Potter character, every member of the Royal Family—”

At this, Alex coughs conspicuously.

Jack rounds on him. “I have.”

“Edward,” the bartender offers. Alex’s lips are pressed together in a smile and he shakes his head. “Meghan. Kate. Richard. Dick. Philip.”

A lightbulb goes off as the bartender is listing Royal Family names. Jack wants to kick himself. “Oh my— William?”

“Yeahhhh, there you go! See, it was easy,” Alex says, grinning widely.

“William,” the bartender repeats with a charming little laugh. Her lipstick is bright with clean lines, an impressive feat considering Jack has seen her bustling around this bar for almost an hour now. “I had an ex called William.”

“Oh no,” Alex says. “I hope he didn’t ruin the name for you.”

“Please,” the bartender says, waving him off. “The only thing he ruined for me was a few meters of drywall.” Jack and Alex must have twin looks of concern, because she explains, “Anger issues. No worries, boys, I sent him packing, and a vodka soda for you, and a mango marg for you.”

She slides their drinks into waiting hands and starts to turn away. “Wait a sec,” Jack says.

The bartender turns back to him with wide Bambi eyes. “Did I fuck up the drink? I’ve made it a million—”

“No no no,” Jack assures her. “I just wanted to know your name. You rescued me from an eternal guessing game, you’re my hero.”

The bartender smiles and tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. “Maisie,” she says. “It’s nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you, Maisie,” Alex says. “Thank you for the alcohol.”

Maisie laughs again as she moves to the other side of the bar.

“William,” Jack says, swirling his drink with the miniature straw. “God damn. I can’t believe I missed William.”

“You got close,” Alex says. “You guessed Liam twice. And thanks for the drink.”

“Same to you,” Jack says. “It’s a good drink. Yours, I mean. You know what offends me, though? Why aren’t mango margaritas orange?”

Alex furrows his brow. “Why the fuck would they be orange?”

“Mangos are orange! Fruity drinks should be the same color as their fruit.”

“Mangos are not fucking orange,” Alex says with an incredulous laugh. “They’re straight-up yellow.”

“They’re orange with yellow tendencies,” Jack says, “but mostly orange.”

“They are entirely yellow,” Alex says. “Coldplay even wrote a song about them. They were all yellow.”

“They’re orange,” Jack insists, but now Alex has moved on completely and is loudly singing Coldplay.

“I came along! I wrote a song foooor youuuuu! And all the things you do!”

“You’re ignoring the truth!”

“And it was called ‘Yellow’!” Alex shouts.

“Okay, I surrender! Sheesh. You win.”

“Thank you,” Alex says placidly, like he hasn’t just been yelling obnoxiously over the (worse, but much louder) club music. “I’m going to enjoy my yellow mango marg very much.”

“And I will enjoy my victory drink,” Jack says, lifting his glass. Alex lifts his. It smells like mango and tequila. They clink the rims together. “To William.”

“To William,” Alex agrees, laughing.

The DJ plays a song Jack loves to hate from hearing it on the radio so many times and Alex is out of his seat before Jack’s managed to put down his drink.

“What are—”

“I love this song, I want to dance,” Alex insists. The implication is clearly that he wants Jack to dance with him, which is like. What is Jack gonna do, say no?

Alex must anticipate some kind of argument, though, because with a glint in his eye he adds lightly, “These are the kinds of things you’ll have to do if we’re married.”

On the one hand, he’s clearly making fun. But on the other hand, the fact that Alex was a stranger an hour ago and is still comfortable teasing Jack about suggesting they’re going to get married speaks volumes. Alex is smiling. They’ve known each other for less than an hour — a drink and a half each — and Alex is smiling at his own joke about marrying Jack. Like he likes that Jack said it first. Like he likes Jack.

“Just wait ‘til you learn all the weird shit you’ll have to do when we’re married,” Jack says, sliding out of his stool.

Any sane person would have run away by now. Even Jack knows when he’s coming on too strong.

But Alex does the opposite; Alex grabs his wrist and pulls him towards the dance floor.

“Fair warning,” Alex says. “I don’t actually know how to dance.”

“I’ll be the judge of that,” Jack says, and then eats his words not two seconds later when Alex demonstrates how very much he doesn’t know how to dance. All of his limbs seem to move as their own entities, zero synchronization. A couple surrounding people take various minor assaults before taking the hint and giving Alex some space, but this does not stop him. “Okay,” Jack says loudly over the music. “You were right. But luckily neither do I.”

“I’ll believe it when I see it,” Alex says.

Jack does the sprinkler. Alex snorts. He does the wave, very poorly, and Alex continues it, also very poorly.

“Mr. Moves,” Alex says. “I’m impressed.”

“Yeah? Check this one out.” Jack does the running man with extreme focus. Alex laughs, leaning towards Jack as he does. Jack stops dancing so he doesn’t accidentally hit Alex, who is suddenly much closer and who somehow smells like pine and flannel and fall and winter in one and is the best-looking person in blue jeans and checkered Vans on this dance floor. Far from the only person, but without question the prettiest.

Fuck.

“I don’t think I can do that one,” says Alex, grinning. Jack nods at him like, try it, so Alex does, proving himself right. He almost takes Jack’s eye out.

“Yeesh, okay, you’re— alright, take it easy,” Jack says, swatting Alex’s wayward hand away and laughing. “Well, we all have our strengths.”

Surrendering the running man, Alex starts up with some bizarre hand-wavey foot-kicky thing, singing along to the music.

“Do you seriously like this song?” Jack asks, attempting to imitate Alex’s dance. “Dance,” heavy quote marks implied.

Alex shoots Jack a look. “Hell yeah. What, you don’t?”

“It’s just…always on,” Jack says. “Everywhere. How are you not sick of it?”

“Because it fuckin’ slaps!” Alex looks incensed.

“I don’t know why I’m surprised you’re a pop music person when you’re literally in a One Direction shirt.”

“I’m a lots of music person,” Alex counters. “Including pop music, yeah. You don’t like pop music?”

“I sometimes do,” Jack says. “I like Taylor Swift. Britney Spears.”

“Okay, well, you’d have to be insane not to like them.”

“Yeah, and I’m obviously sane.”

Alex barks a laugh. “Drunk but sane.”

“I am not drunk!” That’s probably a lie by now.

“You’re not convincing me otherwise,” Alex says. “I’m confident you’ve been drunk this whole time.”

“You haven’t exactly been an innocent bystander,” Jack says. “You bought me a drink, and you’re gonna buy us shots in a minute.”

“I did— I what?”

“Yeah,” Jack says, and this time he drags Alex off the dance floor, back to the bar. “I can see the future, I forgot to tell you.”

“You—” Alex laughs again and leans on the bar, trapping both his elbows between his stomach and the bartop. “You’re buying the next round.”

“Oh, happily,” Jack says. “I’m actively trying to get you drunk.”

“Why’s that?”

“Studies show I am 75% more attractive to people when they’re drunk,” says Jack.

Alex turns to him. Without missing a beat, he says smoothly, “I don’t think it’s possible for you to get any more attractive.”

Fuck. Actually, fuck. Seriously. Fuck.

“You must be drunk already, then,” Jack says.

Alex smiles serenely. “I feel pretty sober.”

“Exactly what a drunk person would say,” Jack says. “J’accuse, William.”

Alex laughs. “In that case, your studies are right.”

Jack’s probably blushing. He does that in extreme cases only, but this is nothing if not an extreme case. Alex is fucking relentless.

Maisie the bartender is back, and Alex orders them shots of tequila. Somewhere in the recesses of Jack’s mind, this unlocks a memory, and he snaps his fingers. “I should hunt down my friend, he loves tequila.”

“Friend?” Alex looks around while Maisie pours their shots. “You ditched your friend?”

“He told me to,” Jack says. “He’s probably gonna pick up some girl. Actually, he probably already has.”

“Really,” Alex says, sounding amused.

“Zack’s a strong silent type,” Jack explains. “Emphasis on strong. We’re single guys in our mid-twenties, Alex. We’re not going to clubs for the atmosphere.”

“Admit it,” Alex says. “You a little bit are.”

Jack bites his lip. “Fine, I like the atmosphere,” he admits, more affected than he should be that Alex seems to have picked up on this about him. “And the alcohol. And the chances I’ll meet my future husband, which clearly paid off. Zack will never admit it, but I’m pretty sure he likes trying to set me up with random people in clubs.”

Alex laughs. “He set you up with me?”

“Oh yeah,” Jack says. “He wingmanned me hard. You can thank him in your vows.”

This only serves to make Alex laugh harder. “I’ll thank him now,” he says with a grin. Taking his cue, Jack grabs his shot glass. Alex does the same. “To Zack.”

“To Zack!” Jack cheers, and they both down their shots.

“Me?”

Jack whirls around and trips straight into Zack. “Zack!” he says brightly. “We toasted you.”

“I heard,” Zack says. “Why, exactly?”

“I’m Alex,” says Alex, holding out a hand. Zack shakes it. “Apparently you set us up?”

“Oh,” Zack says. “I wouldn’t really say that. I just kind of pointed Jack in this direction. If you can put up with him, that’s all you.”

“I was gonna come find you anyway,” Jack says. “We’re doing tequila shots. Next round on me.”

“Oh, hell yeah,” Zack says. “Count me in.”

They can’t come up with a toast for their second round so they just knock it back with an ambiguous cheer; then Zack offers to buy another, and Jack’s not about to refuse. It’s starting to hit just right, so he’s buzzed but not incoherent. All his most brilliant ideas come in this state.

Case in point: as Maisie is pouring them their third round, Jack suddenly says, “Maisie! Do a shot with us!”

Maisie looks up and laughs. “I’m not supposed to drink on the job,” she says.

“It’s not drinking, it’s bonding,” Jack insists.

“Yeah, we’re forming lasting friendships,” Alex jumps in.

Zack looks entertained. “You guys know each other?”

“As of half an hour ago, yes,” Maisie says.

“Maisie here helped me guess Alex’s middle name,” Jack explains. “Which is William. Like the prince.”

“I feel like I missed so much,” Zack says, half to himself. He shrugs and nods at Maisie. “One shot. On me. For Jack. We won’t tell.”

Maybe it’s because Zack is buff and has cool tattoos or just has good vibes or whatever, but Maisie hesitates only a second before inclining her head. “Just one, and no blabbing,” she says, meeting all of their eyes in turn. Everyone nods solemnly, and Maisie discreetly pours herself a fourth shot.

“Hell yes!” Jack whoops as they all take a shot glass. “To Maisie!”

“To Maisie!” Everyone echoes, including Maisie with a wry grin.

The third shot goes down smoother than the first two. Jack swallows his easily, as does Alex. Maisie puckers her face a bit. Zack has zero reaction, because Zack’s just kinda like that.

“While I’m here, I was hoping to get another beer,” Zack says.

“On it,” Maisie says immediately, giggling. “Thanks for the shot, boys. You’ve kept me far more entertained tonight than my usual shift provides.”

“You can give a toast at our wedding,” Jack says to her. Zack’s eyes widen a little, Alex snorts, and Maisie laughs.

“I’d be honored,” she says. “Back to work now. You need anything, let me know.”

“Seriously, Jack?”

“What?” Jack gives Zack an innocent smile. He pats Zack on the cheek. “Don’t worry, sugar, you can give a toast too.”

Alex laughs. Zack stares at him and shakes his head. “You’re insane,” he says, but he says that roughly twice a day so he’s still below his quota. “I’ll leave you two alone. Come find me when you wanna go. If…” He eyes Alex. “...Just…yeah.”

And with these eloquent words, he disappears with his beer into the crowd.

“I like him,” Alex announces.

“Me too,” Jack says. He turns back to Alex. “Back to the dance floor?”

“Get out of my brain,” Alex says. “I’d like to see your drunken running man.”

“It is gonna blow your fucking mind,” Jack promises, and Alex laughs again.

They’re not even being gross like everyone else. Alex has pulled Jack into an exaggerated tango performed mostly with missteps when it happens: someone shoves them aside as they walk past, and Alex loses his balance and falls into Jack, who just barely manages to catch them both. He doesn’t manage to stop his arm from winding around Alex’s waist. To be fair, he doesn’t try very hard.

Jack’s first thought is homophobe, but then he spots the offender, lumbering off with heavy footfalls, and it’s Burly Guy from earlier. The guy who tried and failed to pick Alex up.

All of this registers as Alex slowly regains his footing. “Damn, who pissed in that dude’s Cheerios?”

“It’s the guy from before who tried to buy you a drink,” Jack says, pointing at his back.

Alex whips his head around. “Seriously? Asshole.”

Jack chooses not to observe that from his vantage point, being shoved close together is hardly a dick move. In intent, sure, but not in actuality; Jack’s enjoying the proximity a great deal. Like, a lot.

Like, his hand is still on Alex’s hip, subtly keeping Alex close, and Alex has his arm around Jack’s shoulders from their dance and he’s not moving, either.

“Yeah,” Jack says. They’d already been on the outskirts and now they’re off to the side of everyone, wallflowers.

Alex breathes a laugh and looks back at Jack. He doesn’t step back or even lean away, even though their faces are too close to be friendly now. Jack hadn’t really been expecting friendly, but they’ve been tightrope-walking between sides, and if neither of them breaks this up then they’ll be irreversibly left on one end.

Jack has no intention of moving away. He likes this end of the tightrope. For all he cares, they could cut the tightrope and free-fall together.

“You’re pretty good at bad tango-ing,” Alex says, reaching up to brush away the sweaty fringe that’s clinging to his forehead.

Jack grins. “Well, you know what they say. It takes two.”

Alex kisses him so suddenly that Jack almost loses his balance.

He tastes like tequila. That’s all Jack gets before they’re not kissing anymore. The room feels quiet and then unforgivably loud the next second, and Alex is flushed and smiling nervously, and Jack is smiling too, not nervous at all.

“Did I tell you I’m in a band?” Alex asks in a rush.

Jack’s brain struggles to keep up. He can’t remember Alex mentioning a band, but he’s also distracted by wanting to kiss Alex again. There’s no understating the power of wanting to kiss someone over failing to clock anything they say. “What?”

“I’m in a band,” Alex says. “Not as a job, just like, for fun.”

“Oh,” says Jack.

“I’m the lead singer,” Alex says, with a flickering look down at Jack’s shirt.

“Oh,” says Jack, because, like, oh. “Can I kiss you again?”

“What, here?” Alex meets his eyes. “With all these people around?”

“You kissed me first,” Jack says. “Let me kiss you and then we can call it even.”

“Okay,” Alex says, and Jack’s kissing him before the word’s really out of his mouth.

And he tastes like tequila and mango and sugar and the color yellow and the sweat of the dance floor and God, it’s good. It’s like kissing a memory, except this memory is still here, not frozen in time, not trapped in an ornate frame. He’s creating a memory that he knows he’ll relive for the rest of his life.

Somehow, though he doesn’t know the end of this chapter, he knows the end of the book.

Alex’s warm palm cradling Jack’s cheek to hold him steady, fingers splayed out like a star; Alex’s other hand grazing skin over the collar of Jack’s shirt. Alex singing Coldplay in Jack’s ear. Alex’s blue jeans and his checkered Vans and his ridiculous One Direction tank top. Alex holding Jack’s hand and calling him honey to get Burly Guy to leave him alone. Grinning as he shoots down guess after guess for the elusive middle name. Laughing at Jack’s stupid dance moves. Knocking back a shot like it’s nothing. Smiling when Jack says they’re going to get married, never moving away, only ever closer.

Alex sitting undisturbed at the bar, ankles crossed, and Jack seeing him from across the room like something out of a goddamn Hallmark movie and just knowing.

He tugs Alex closer but Alex is already pulling away with a smile. “You wanna get out of here?”

“Yeah,” Jack says. He smoothes a hand over a crease in Alex’s shirt and nods. “Taxi’s on me if we go back to your place.”

“Sucker, I was gonna suggest that anyway,” Alex says with a quiet laugh. “You should tell Zack. Don’t wanna just leave him.”

“Don’t worry,” Jack says. “He knows.”

“He knows?”

“Zack and I are brothers in clairvoyance,” Jack says. “How many times do I have to tell you this?”

“I knew you could see the future,” Alex says. “You never told me Zack could, too.”

“Zack can see everyone’s future,” says Jack. “I can only see mine.”

“Yeah? What’s your future look like now?”

Jack filters out several inappropriate comments. It’s hard when Alex is smirking, clearly baiting him. “I told you,” he says. “You, me, vows, rings, the works.”

“Not that future,” Alex says. “I’m talking about the immediate one.”

It takes everything in Jack not to get down on one knee and say so was I. There’s a tilt in Alex’s head, like a dog listening carefully for a familiar sound.

“Honestly?” Jack says, and Alex nods. “I think it’s more fun if we find out together.”

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tyrannuspitch · 3 years

Text

been reading abt this one genetic study and it is rlly interesting but also bc using modern genetics to infer stuff abt history is something i'm Aware you have to be Cautious of it does kind of result in me having Knowledge that i don't feel entirely comfortable thinking of as Knowledge. which is a v weird state of mind. esp when some of the original phrasing was already really cautiously vague.

(cut to ramble abt boring things i am in no way qualified to teach)

like okay time to ramble: i found it bc as part of a long slowburn identity crisis i got rlly frustrated with what little i know of history & not having a clue where to place myself in it - like, england has had so many different waves of migration and changes of regime, and also aristocracy-focused history isn't always good at even distinguishing between those, and if we don't even know which of those groups we're descended from... do we know anything??? (eg: fucking druids wld be talking abt The Old Ways and i'd be sitting here like. okay even if you weren't glorified wiccans, are they "the Old Ways"? are they??? is that our history or someone else's entirely? like, literally, i don't have any particular interest in doing this, but if i theoretically WERE to try and return to the religion of my prechristian ancestors, should i reconstruct druidry or heathenry or smthn else entirely?)

SO i basically wanted to ask how much, if at all, are the modern english descended from the various groups who have lived here. Who The Fuck Actually Are We

and i did basically get a cautious answer! (after finding better scicomm than the fucking guardian, which didn't even take enough care to clearly separate "english and cornish" from "british". fuck the guardian.) the actual conclusions we can pretty safely draw re: this question are:

1. the modern english have a v high level of similarity with other peoples of the uk (the study said "british isles" but roi was not counted), much of which appears to be v ancient dna, which means the genetic evidence directly contradicts the old theory that the anglo-saxons completely displaced/wiped out the britons of england. which is nice. love when my ancestors do not commit genocide on my other ancestors

2. the genetic "clusters" in england and cornwall showed a significant minority of dna (less as you travel north) theorised to be anglo-saxon - "between 10% and 40%". which, like i was saying, is both Information and Non Information. "congratulations participants, you're helping our understanding of history evolve bc you're def partly descended from the ancient britons but you also appear to have some anglo-saxon ancestry!" "oh cool. how much?" "oh you know... some". i know it doesn't matter in the real world but sjfkflshlk damn historic population geneticists u live like this? (they weren't even saying "25% +/- 15%". didn't even give us an average. just like. somewhere in this range lol)

(okay actually i am in Explaining Mode so here goes. afaict part of the problem is they're not even sure which common ancestry to be counting. only clusters in england/cornwall have any northern german common ancestry, but everyone in the uk has danish common ancestry - BUT the danish dna is significantly higher than average in groups w n.german dna. so the problem is: what's ancient, what's anglo-saxon, could any of it be viking? we just don't know.)

(they might have been able to tell by dating it but idk if they tried. and also some of their other dating was coming out Wonky - eg iirc the n.german dna is mostly dated to abt 300 years after anglo-saxon migration ended. so what's going on? did the two communities just take a v long time to integrate, or is something afoot?)

(also, of course - england is pretty genetically homogenous but there is still Some variety by region in this genetic component so making a sweeping statement abt "the english" is hard.)

3. there is a Mystery ComponentTM that makes up a larger segment than the alleged anglo-saxon dna, is found in england, scotland and northern ireland BUT not wales (so it's not just Basic British Ingredients), and matches northern france? i think they're guessing prehistoric migration for that. idk if they dated it. Hmmmm. ~Mystery DNA~

4. methodological info if you're concerned: they used participants from rural areas whose grandparents had all been born in the 50mile radius from them, so region-specific info should be p trustworthy, and the sample size was over 2000. they also found their "clusters" algorithmically and then plotted them back onto the map, so there shouldn't be confirmation bias there.)

(if i *were* to complain, looking at their map... scotland and wales have some gaps in them. some significant gaps.)

5. smthn we might genuinely be concerned abt in the analysis of these results - are we taking the results from places we know to have a historical migration as more meaningful than those we don't? looking at the results shows me every single cluster has a small but significant portion of common ancestry with modern belgium, maybe 1/12. (i'm looking at blurry pie charts, that's my best guess lol.) no analysis i've read has mentioned it.

on the other hand - idk anything abt the history of belgium but i wld not be at all surprised if their genetics were basically somewhere between germany and france, and we've already discussed both those places.

plus, possibly more relevantly - they DID scan for similarities with various other countries in europe and didn't find them. eg, no signficant/detectable common ancestry with the finnish. so if it's showing up at all, let alone as 10% or more, it's more than just random noise.

so it's knowledge but it's not knowledge but it's /more/ knowledge than not knowledge? yeah. i'm having a great time

6. assorted fun(?) facts for those who made it this far:

-the most unique place genetically they found was orkney (note: there were no participants from shetland), who showed ~25% norwegian ancestry, followed by wales, who as we remember have no Mystery DNA.

-the differences between cornwall and devon were minor, but they were definitely there and they followed modern county line p much perfectly!

-there were two different clusters in northern ireland and the west of scotland, but they DIDN'T break down into ireland vs scotland. it looked more like it might be a highland/lowland gael/gall thing. i don't know if they checked if the n.irish respondents were catholic or protestant but uhh probably better not to all things considered

-no matter how minutely you break down genetic differences, there is a large group covering much of england that is basically homogenous. you can tell genetically which island in orkney someone's from, but you can't tell the difference between people from north yorkshire and people from kent.

okay this has been a poorly explained ramble if you'd like to read the damn thing yourself it's this: https://peopleofthebritishisles.web.ox.ac.uk/population-genetics

nb that is their website for laypeople, i've looked at a few different interpetations of this but i haven't looked at the actual paper (yet? dk if i can be bothered going deeper. we'll see)

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thebibliomancer · 3 years

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Song of the Dark Crystal liveblog pt 23

Song of the Dark Crystal by J.M. Lee because Tavra’s a spider now. It be like that sometimes.

Last times in book: On the way to Ha’rar after failing to retrieve the firca of Gyr the Song Teller from the Tomb of Relics, Kylan discovered Tavra was an imposter. He, Naia, and Amri manage to outsmart and trap her and discover that an angry spider called Krychk had taken control of Tavra’s body at the behest of the Skeksis. Kylan does a dream-stitching which puts Tavra’s mind in Krychk’s body and leaves Krychk to die in the mess it made of Tavra! He’s not sure how he did this actually!

Chapter 23

Tavra-Spider explains it all, the group turns around to go back to caves

Tavra-Spider gets right into it, no pausing to adjust to her new existential nightmare, and tells the group they’ve got to head back to the caves.

She jumps on Kylan, who understandably jumps at a spider crawling on his arm and has to fight the urge to swat her off.

“... but you’re a spider.”

Fully extended, her legs were almost the length of his fingers, but needle-thin and shining black. She easily climbed his sleeve to sit on his shoudler, wehre he could see eight faceted eyes in her tiny head, like miniature crystals set in the stone of a pendant. Her small voice was much more audible from there.

“And alive, thanks to you,” she replied. “It’s not ideal but it doesn’t matter.”

Its not ideal but it doesn’t matter

Tavra, you are killing me again!

She is taking this exceptionally well!

She’s got her duty to follow and dangit she’s gonna do it. If they don’t act, the Grottan could well be wiped out and she will not stand for that.

Tavra also mentions that Krychk had been using a Crystal shard to communicate with the Skeksis at the Castle.

The Skeksis have invented crystal cell phones and the best the Gelfling have is courier! Dangit!

Kylan, still having more trouble coming to terms with this than Tavra herself, asks Tavra what they should do with her body.

Tavra says that they’ll have to leave it (no time to pause and bury or cremate it) but to grab the Crystal shard (not that one) and a pearl amulet from within her cloak. The pearl is so that spider-she can prove her identity when they eventually reach Ha’rar. She has a lot more faith in this group’s ability to ever reach Ha’rar.

No one was eager to search the Silverling’s cloak, so Kylan did it. He found the shard and the amulet, a pearl drop on a silver chain. The pearl itself was shining, white and blue, wrapped in a silver cage shaped like tiny Vapra wings. The shard was small enough to hold in his hand, black as obsidian, though he sensed a flicker of energy from deep inside it, like the sound of voices just muffled enough to be incoherent. At first he was drawn to it, wanting to peer further into it to see what waited on the other side, but Tavra pricked him with her spider feet.

asdfsdf

She pricks him with her spider feet!

Oh my god. She’s a spider and she’s poking Kylan to stop him from looking into the crystal shard like a palantir.

Tavra tells them to destroy it AND NOT LOOK INTO IT so the three Gelfling smash the shard into dust with a large rock.

Naia thanks the finger-vines because she’s polite, they pay respects to Tavra’s body really quickly, and then they hurry back toward camp to retrieve the supplies they left there.

“I’m sorry,” [Kylan] said as they hurried back along the trail along camp. “I didn’t mean to... do whatever I did. I just didn’t want you to die. I hope you aren’t angry with me.”

“I’m not angry. My body will return to Thra. When my work is done, I will join it. Until then, I have no time to worry or complain. We need to go to the tunnels north of Domrak.”

Tavra is handling being a spider now REALLY WELL. She’s very philosophical about it.

Kylan also realizes that Krychk’s plan HAD BEEN to go to Ha’rar so it could spy on the Gelfling’s plans for the Skeksis. Which got completely upended by Kylan and Naia chasing sidequests ha ha. He also realizes that since he barely interacted with Tavra in Shadows and since Krychk was Tavra for most of Song, he doesn’t really know Tavra at all.

“Are you all right?” he asked, not knowing what else to say. He tried to imagine being in her predicament, but it was impossible. There was no way to know how Tavra felt, after the terror at the castle and being a prisoner in her own mind while Krychk controlled her withered body.

Despite all that, Tavra’s response was stoic and loyal.

“I will be all right when the Skeksis are stopped and our people are no longer living in their shadow.”

TAVRA PLS you’re too powerful! Are you the Gelfling Captain America??

They reach camp and retrieve their stuff and Tavra sets to Planning. She asks Amri what would be the fastest way to get to the tunnels that connect Domrak to the Grottan Sanctuary.

Amri isn’t much help since he’s not really familiar with the aboveground but Naia suggests Kylan check the Raunip book’s maps.

While Kylan gets out the book, Tavra decides to exposit and fill in some plot gaps.

Tavra couldn’t wrest control away for long but left the DO NOT TRUST HER message. It was vague because Krychk stopped her from finishing it. I’d guess that Tavra sensed she’d lose control so chose HER vs TAVRA because fewer letters. She also confirms that Krychk couldn’t read.

I SUSPECTED.

Tavra feels like crap for being too weak to not be body-jacked by spider but Naia tells her “Let’s agree to all be sorry and all forgiven. And then... move past this so we can stop them.”

Presumably except for Amri who might as well think ‘excuse you I’ve never done anything wrong in my life. I just got here.’

“The crystal spiders are an ancient race. I don’t know how long they have been working with the Skeksis, or how long they have been using weak and dying hosts to spy on the Gelfling. They are not under power, like the creatures that look upon the darkened Crystal or its veins. They are loyal to the Skeksis by will.”

So, yeah, like I mentioned last time. Seems like the spiders are just unapologetically evil in this take.

Also, any Gelfling could be under control of spider. The correct response is to be paranoid forever.

Kylan remembers that horner that attacked them back in Stone-in-the-Wood and wonders if that too was controlled by a spider. It did just pas out after Neech found a crunch snack in its fur.

Wow, there’s no unwoven plot beats in this book! The blue mouth tree that tried to eat Kylan and Naia inspired his trap against Tavra and the darkened Horner might have been controlled by a spider!

At the least, it demonstrates the amount of paranoia learning about the crystal-spiders would engender. Who knows whats secretly controlled by spider!

“Krychk called on the Skeksis while we were in the Tomb of Relics. When it confirmed that it had destroyed the firca, its spider brethren took Domrak by surprise. We were already headed away and in the opposite direction. The Grottan didn’t stand a chance in Domrak... Many fled north, toward the Sanctuary. That is the last I heard, this night when Krychk spoke to Lord skekLi through the Crystal shard.”

“skekLi!” Naia exclaimed. “A Skeksis... Could he be urLii’s other half?”

“I do not know. Krychk was in contact with many of the lords, but skekLi was its master so far as its mission to find you, Gurjin, and Rian. It was promised the Grottan caves as payment for its loyalty.”

SPIDER BROKE THE FIRCA I KNEW IT OR AT LEAST SUSPECTED

Also, I gotta say I love the incredibly blunt attempt to draw a connection between urLii and skekLi because I guess we’re too far into the book to set up another conspicuous injury for them to share.

And I love Tavra just brushing past the question.

Tavra-Spider says that if they can reach the Sanctuary before the spiders, they might be able to fight back. To Naia’s doubt. They almost got their asses kicked by a small swarm just now and the odds will be worse against more spiders and in tunnels.

Tavra asks if Amri knows anything about the Grottan Sanctuary but all he knows is that its one of the most ancient places in Thra, that it was entrusted to the Grottan, and that urLii travels there often to “commune with the singing mountains.”

Kylan gets excited because the singing mountains were supposedly formed by the bell-birds.

“The same,” Tavra said. “The Sanctuary was a nesting place of the bell-birds. When the spider destroyed the firca, I wanted to tell you that your plan was still a good one. There’s still hope. It is possible that there may be bones left of the bell-birds, though they died out many trine ago. If the Sanctuary has been untouched, and protected by the Grottan, then we may yet have a chance.”

May yet! Firca Quest is back on!

... I really want a point-and-click Dark Crystal adventure game. It feels made for the genre.

Amri points out that even if there is a bell-bird bone, that’s not the same as having a firca and making it into a firca doesn’t mean it’ll have the same power as Gyr’s.

But Naia just decides that Kylan can make a firca like that. Such faith in him!

And her confidence makes Kylan confident enough to want to try.

Best friends!

Kylan finally finds something on the map, an underground tributary to the Black River called the Tide Pass that’ll bring them close to the Sanctuary.

Amri warns them that its a mostly submerged underground channel. But its the only path that will get them to the Sanctuary in time. Going back through Domrak would put them in the highest concentration of spiders. Its the Tide Path or nothing, and at least Naia can breath underwater and Amri can see in the dark.

“What do you think, Amri?” Naia asked. “Is it possible, or will we die for sure?”

“You and I wouldn’t die for sure,” he replied, but his assurance ended there.

I mean that’s not funny but its not not funny and I laughed.

Amri does say that if the other two are willing to try, he’ll do whatever it takes to see all four of them through. But Tavra’s spider body doesn’t require a lot to live so she’s not in a lot of danger really either.

The person most at risk is going to be Kylan AND the one they most need to succeed.

So it has to be Kylan’s decision.

But Kylan would be blind in the Pass, half or more submerged in deep, dark cave water. He was tired of tunnels and being underground. In fact, there was nothing he wanted to avoid more than another crawl through the dark, needing help from the others just to move or breathe.

Despite her new arachnid form, he couldn’t help but imagine Tavra as she once had been, touching his cheek in the same way and saying the same words. He had not been able to do anything to help his own clan, but maybe there was something that could be done for Amri’s. For once, there was something only he could do, and that was what he had wanted all along.

He committed the map to memory and packed the book.

“Then what are we waiting for? To the Tide Pass we go.”

Heck yeah, Kylan

#dark crystal #the dark crystal #Song of the Dark Crystal #liveblog #Kylan #Naia #Amri #Tavra #but she's a spider

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system-of-a-feather · 4 years

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Hello! I was wondering if you had any tips for balancing work/college/life with DID and the stress along side it? And for #2: do you have any tips for bringing up DID to a therapist? I've been questioning if I have this for a few years and I've been seeing her for a year, but a large part of me keeps telling/yelling at me to not ask her for many different reasons. The words just get stuck in my throat and I don't know how to bring it up. Sorry abt the length of this, but thank you!!!

PerOh boy these are two long / large questions I could probably go on a bit about. I’m going to hold back a bit since I have a tendency to ramble, but if you have any follow up questions / elaborations feel free to ask!

Balancing Work / College / Life

The two largest key skills to work on to help balancing all of that is 1) communication with the rest of the system 2) learning grounding techniques.

Communication within the system is a bit of a cop out answer I feel, but it really is integral to living / coping with DID and trying to make life work around it. If alters aren’t on the same page about what is wanted and needed from life and aren’t on the same page on what is valuable in life, then things tend to get messy in everyone’s overall life as interests conflict, experiences aren’t communicated, memories and gaps in memory can get hard to fill properly, and a lack of communication promotes a lack of stability (and improved communication promotes more stability). I also find that personally with better communication, we have less severe dissociative states that DON’T cause a switch so it is less times when it comes to being unfocused.

Also when it comes down to communication, it also really helps in managing all the stress that comes along with it since - to be quite honest - in my personal experience it often feels like there is always some level of a crisis (mental health or otherwise) going on at all times with little break in between. By working on improving how well each alters know each other and work with one another and creating a synergy / rhythm / balance for all parts to aid in life and how to handle these crisises can make the stress of dealing with them a lot less.... overwhelming I suppose?

Like I’ve gotten used to it, but at this point when a major issue comes up, I have general trust that our system has a way to navigate it and have generally understood ways of minimizing the damage and promoting healing and can generally trust one another to try to help one another.

For working on communication, that can vary from person to person and can kind of come with trauma processing / exposure therapy / reaching out internally, but one thing I always like to say is a good idea is to try to figure out some from of external communication that can be relied upon. It can be a bit difficult to get all alters on board to take part in a journal or similar, but when you get down to it, if one can be established, it can be a decent mechanism to reliably communicate issues since internal communication can be really patchy at times XD

Our system has three different discords - one that is for socializing with friends, one that is the general private one for only our system and the members, and a third that is run by our gatekeeper and has selective access to certain channels to facilitate conversation while keeping parts that aren’t ready to handle topics out of it. We each have our own independent accounts and go on the honor system not to look into eachothers unless it is important / necessary.

In terms of grounding techniques, those are in place for the moments when you are dissociating / having a flashback or anything similar and you can’t switch, aren’t safe to switch, and/or just need to stay out as yourself. There are a lot of things that can be done and I would honestly recommend doing a google search for them, but typically in my experience sensory items can help a lot. I over use my hand sanitizer since it is cold, wet, and lets me focus on my hands and where I am touching. Ice water can be good and helpful. I’ve been told by my therapist that simulating running can help ground, but I always forget it when I get like that XD Its kinda a “find what works” sort of thing.

Bringing DID Up to a Therapist

To be honest, I haven’t had the best in person experience with it XD I didn’t really mention it to my first therapist and he considered it himself but considering he wasn’t trained and we were covert and in heavy denial, he kinda went “nah”. The therapist I saw for a session that redirected me to my current therapist I just went “uhhh I have dissociative symptoms and they are like this” and she went “Oh I can’t work with that lemme get you someone who can.” And my current therapist I think I was like “idk I’ve got these dissociative issues” when I walked in since that was an issue that got in the way with my first therapist and why I was redirected to him and I don’t actually remember the details but lowkey was like at a point like “wellllll I useeed to have these fragment-personality like things and I have this issue with it like coming back up and my last therapist was worried I had DID because of how I talked about my online vs offline i dunnoooooo”

So like XD I don’t really have the best personal experience to talk from since I didn’t talk about it much at all with my first therapist, my 1.5th therapist didn’t see me past “I have pretty bad dissociation”, and my second therapist now jokes about “how I wasn’t entirely honest about my symptoms / system in the beginning”. Plus when it comes to psychiatrists, I’m generally hesitant and either straight up tell them or just dont tell them at all which I wouldn’t recommend all the time.

Personally, from how I know therapy should work, if you are comfortable and feel it is safe to discuss with the therapist (as in you feel she listens to you, has treated you well, you have a good relationship / dynamic and you feel comfortable / safe around her) then I would just bring up the concern. Something along the lines of “Hey I have been experiencing [insert reasons why you are concerned you might] and I was curious if we could screen / see if this is a dissociative disorder / DID”

Typically - unless you do not trust or feel safe with a therapist - it is best to be up front and straight forward with your concerns and if you are curious on their opinion of a diagnosis / to look into it being a possibility, that it is often best just to ask. Therapy is meant for you so it is always alright to say “hey I have concerns I might have ___ because of ____, can we discuss that as a possibility for this session?”

Also not part of the question, but if you are ever confused about your diagnosis, it is always okay to ask “Hey can we go over my ___? I want to understand it better” or something similar.

-Riku (Host)

#ask #asks #coping with did #coping #communication #alter: riku #actuallydid #dissociative identity disorder #therapy

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wordsnstuff · 5 years

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Guide To Writing Found Family

This is also available on wordsnstuffblog.com!

– Found family is a very popular trope that I don’t often see explored in technical writing resources, and as a person who is currently in the middle of developing one for my own series, I decided to make a resource for those who were also confused when approaching this character dynamic. If you have anything to add to the topic, feel free to comment down below for the other writers out there. Hopefully this is helpful to those who need a place to start. Happy writing!

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Avoiding Romantic Subtext

This is one of the hardest obstacles to sidestep when writing an unusual dynamic, and for certain genres it can be ten times worse. For example, in fiction written specifically for young adults, there’s a baseline expectation for a hefty amount of romantic tension, and readers will often insert it no matter what the text and subtext suggests. In order to prevent this automatic insertion of romance in the reader’s interpretation, it’s wise to establish a clear and reasonable explanation for why the relationships are platonic and will never develop into something more.

It’s not a good idea to go for the “person a nor person b has ever considered this relationship blossoming romantically” because that’s often the basis for romantic stories, and will leave that wiggle room for the reader to run with. Show in the way they interact and perhaps in the narration/first person that each party has thought of that scenario and ultimately come to the conclusion that there’s just no romantic potential.

Showing Familial Relationships

Families rely on each other and in diverse ways. The way these individuals interact and build a familial bond is determined (often) by the way in which they form a dependence on the other, and this is more often than not in found family stories, a healthy dependence. It shows the other person’s reliability, care, and compassion, and the way this develops is different for family than it is for friends.

Certain family members also have specific types of humor when it comes to each other. A father and a daughter will have a different sense of humor or understanding with each other than maybe the daughter and her brother do, and this all adds to form a vivid dynamic in your reader’s head that will alter the way they perceive relationships. Found family will be exactly the same, but they’ll have different backstories and different reasons why that sense of humor or understanding has developed that way.

Friendship vs. Family

Found family is unique in the way that readers can very easily perceive a relationship as close friendship rather than a familial one. However, friendship lacks a certain vulnerability and dependence that found family can use to its advantage, because family sees each other at their highs and lows and conflict usually carries different implications.

Family also implies a different attitude and motivation behind the relationship. Conflicts between family members are less severe in the long-run because there’s a ground-level understanding that no matter what happens, arguments will end in forgiveness and closure, whereas that is not necessarily guaranteed with friendships or romances. The motivation, also, is different in the sense that found family is more often meant to last a lifetime, and therefore is less fragile and opens the door for more open communication and vulnerability.

Converting Tension to Intimacy

When you’re tasked with turning a tense, unfriendly relationship into a close and familial one, it’s daunting to even begin thinking about how to go about it. First, it’s important to understand the function of this stage of their relationship as a starting point for growth in both of the characters rather than merely a device to create drama for the reader to munch on. Intimacy of any kind develops out of mutual growth, vulnerability, and understanding, and in order to convey these things to the reader, you need to take your time letting this stage simmer. If you extinguish the tension too fast, it will read as shallow and futile, and it will throw a wrench in the natural pacing.

Now, the transition from tension to intimacy is a several step process and does not happen in one chapter. Mindsets, perceptions, and attitudes change over time as both the reader and the characters learn more information and experience more genuine interaction. The relationship, as I mentioned earlier, will change as the characters see each other in increasingly vulnerable situations and in periods of growth, and as they witness this their understanding of the other and ultimate acceptance will change the way they treat each other and their mutual perceptions of one another’s place in their lives. This usually happens in the subtextual area of the story, excluding events that are formulated specifically to depict this evolution.

Different Sizes of Families

The size of the invented family very much impacts the way that the group relationship develops. For example, two or three people who develop a family-like connection will be much more intimate and dependent than a created family that includes ten. Larger groups imply more diverse, but also more shallow representations of what relationships between family members can be, but they often leave more room for relatability and comedy. Smaller families work well for more serious struggles, and make more sense with characters that deal with serious issues that a real person wouldn’t be comfortable giving all the details about to ten other people.

There’s definitely a spectrum and it fluctuates wildly for different types of stories, genres, character archetypes, and themes. Deciding how large to make this found family really depends on the fine details and requires some time and thought.

Common Struggles

~ Bringing people together when there’s an age gap… Age gaps can serve really well in the area of establishing a familial relationship without suggesting romance because most readers will assume that a close relationship between a younger woman and an older (say, 65 year old) man is more of a father-daughter relationship than a romantic one. The way you an bring together two people with an age gap and establishing a familial relationship is by playing on the aspect of guidance and support that a parent or typically older figure would provide to a younger, more naive person. This can come off trope-y but, like any other aspect of a story, putting an original twist on it can make it more original and interesting to the reader.

~ Starting with tension… This is very common in the case of a sibling-type relationship or a guardianship situation. Usually, there’s some resistance from the party that does not hold the upper hand, and this can create tension in both of them. I suggest that if you’re going to develop a tense relationship into a close one that resembles family, then avoid tropes. There are so many ways that you can twist these ideas and situations based on your world and characters’ traits, so don’t go straight for the “I hate you because you’re trying to control me even though you’re not my real dad” thing.

Other Resources

Useful Writing Resources

Useful Writing Resources II

Resources For Describing Characters

Resources For Describing Emotions

Resources For Creating Characters

Resources For World Building

Resources For Plot Development

Resources For Writing Science Fiction

Resources For Writing Dystopian/Apocalypse

Resources For Fantasy & Mythology Writers

Giving Characters Bad Traits

Writing Children

Having Trouble Connecting To Your Characters?

On Making Scenes/Characters Unpredictable

Keeping Characters From Sounding Identical

Writing About Uncomfortable Topics

How To Foreshadow

Commentary On Social Issues In Writing

Tackling Subplots

How To Make A Scene More Heartfelt

How To Develop A Distinct Voice In Your Writing

How To Perfect The Tone In A Piece Of Writing

A Guide To Tension & Suspense In Your Writing

Writing Arguments Between Characters

Ways To Fit Character Development Into your Story

Tips On Writing Intense Scenes

Showing vs. Telling

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popwasabi · 4 years

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“The Matrix Reloaded” deserves a re-watch in 2020

Here’s a burning hot take for, y’all; “The Matrix Reloaded” is not bad actually!

In fact, it’s more than not bad, it’s actually pretty good and perhaps a bit misunderstood by the fans.

Now, I’m not here to tell you it’s the best Matrix film. That honor will remain always and forever with the first movie, as it remains not just one of the best action films of all-time but one of the best science fiction films ever, period. It’s a classic and simply one of my all-time favorite films.

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(Not to mention turned me into a Rage Against The Machine fan.)

But somehow, over the course of my lifetime, you know what movie I have watched exponentially more than “The Matrix?” The fucking “Matrix Reloaded!”

I used to think maybe it was an ironic infatuation. To a certain extent, I think it still is, as its overly indulgent action, bad lines at times, cringey new characters, and over the top moments can make it about as comical as many so bad it’s good movies. But growing up time can change perceptions, sometimes for the better, and can help you see things in new ways that you didn’t before and “The Matrix Reloaded,” especially this year, was one of them for me.

(My plans vs 2020)

I could defend the much controversial sequel by going in on its ambitious action film-making (the car chase is still my all-time favorite in any movie), pulse-pounding score, or its eye-popping cinematography that, honestly, holds up even to today’s standards but I think these are all things that even the film’s detractors generally agree on.

No, I’m going to defend this film by talking about its most controversial scene: The Architect room.

I can hear the groans already and I don’t blame you. I found this scene preposterous and mightily confusing when I first saw it.

“The One is actually a part of the Machines’ system?? WTF!?”

(I remember having a similar feeling after playing Mass Effect 3...)

To be fair, its set up is a bit muddled, given the clunky script and pacing issues of the movie but when you start thinking about the message more deeply, given current events, and its relation to the real world it hits about as hard and fits as neatly as the first film’s more positive message.

The first Matrix film has a pretty dark setup, obviously. Neo finds out that he’s a part of gigantic computer program meant to create the illusion of free will for humanity while they are quite literally eaten for power by the Machines like cattle. Of course, Neo discovers he’s more than just another human connected to The Matrix but a prophesized messiah who has the ability to combat the system beyond its considerable control. By the end of the film he fulfills his destiny by becoming The One and beginning a new revolution against the Machines that control the human race.

(And looking fucking cool and totally 90s while doing it!)

It’s a pretty positive and uplifting story when you really break it down. It shows the viewer the lengths at which power tries to maintain its control and the Machines are a worthy avatar for this metaphor, but it also shows that power can be fought against when someone begins to empower themselves. When Neo says he will “show you a world where anything is possible” at the end its an earned moment of catharsis for not just him but the audience as well. We begin to start to believe in hope and beating the system too.

“The Matrix Reloaded” however goes several steps further showing that power can maintain its control in far more nefarious ways. Throughout the film Neo is told about the illusion of control and choice by characters like The Oracle and the, admittedly cringey, Merovingian. It feels strange at first because Neo is supposedly someone who is above the system but you can tell there is sense of jadedness, with some optimism of course, when The Oracle explains his role in saving Zion, like someone who has seen someone try to do this before, and The Merovingian simply mocks him for being another in a long line of “predecessors” who is completely “out of control.”

But then Neo finally does get to the Architect after being led there by The Key Maker and it’s here he learns his true nature; that he is the sixth in a long line of previous “Ones” in the Matrix and a part of The Machine’s control. He is less a prophet and more just another cog in the machine meant to lead humanity in one direction over and over again in order to create an illusion of free will for the resistance, the same way The Matrix does its human cattle.

Neo was a part of their plan and had been from the start.

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(In case y’all need a refresher...)

There were tons of fans, including myself at one point, who couldn’t square with this strange narrative turn. Like Morpheus at the end of the film, there was refusal to believe it. It seemingly rewrote how one could view the first film and Neo’s role in it.

It changed the way a lot of people could see the positivity of the first film and understandably that could, and did, make a lot of people upset. Neo wasn’t sent to save humanity; he was there to keep them in line. It was like saying “actually Emperor Palpatine always wanted Luke Skywalker to blow up the Death Star.”

(I mean he does say this a lot though...)

But “The Matrix” was always about the lengths at which power works to maintain its control over the masses and “Reloaded” asks how can a corrupt and evil system be a part of the solution? How can it be reformed?

It can’t.

Way back in 2008, I cast my first vote as an eligible American for Barack Obama for president. Like many millennials at the time I found his mantra of “hope and change” sincere and uplifting and I truly felt the country was going to take a turn for the better the night he was inaugurated. For a moment it really did feel like things would be different after eight years of Bush.

Fast forward to 2011 however, and things changed dramatically for myself when I found out about the drones.

I’m aware of the fact that in leadership positions hard choices are made but after spending the previous decade vociferously calling out the Bush Administration for what they did in the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars this was a truly rude awakening for me. Combine this with finding out about him continuing Bush era tax cuts, re-upping the Patriot Act, the mass deportations, the major corporate donors, his mishandling of Flint, and The Standing Rock Crisis it became clear Obama was just as much a part of the machine as Bush was.

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(Also, no matter how much you hate Trump, DO NOT participate in the the gas-lighting of this man’s record...)

Now, I can already hear the pitchforks picking up and I’m not here to tell you that the Obama presidency didn’t have its moments or that it was worse than what we have now BUT this does not excuse what would be considered awful behavior by liberals under any conservative president.

Each Democratic presidency or nomination I’ve seen in my lifetime, from Clinton to Obama, has always touted themselves as a chance to “fix America” and bring “hope and change” to a largely corrupt system. But neither of these presidencies really changed much of what the previous conservative administrations did, in fact in some ways they got worse. Minimum wage hasn’t risen in over a decade, we still have the world’s largest prison population by far, the wealth gap has only INCREASED regardless of who held the White House, and need I remind some of you Black Lives Matter started under the Obama administration.

At some point the problem goes beyond just conservative stonewalling and political impasse. You can’t blame everything on Mitch McConnell (though a lot of it can too, admittedly). The system is behaving exactly as its supposed to because corrupt people hold power.

(They’re not laughing with you, they are laughing AT you...)

The extremely cynical Biden-Harris ticket we got going right now is being pitched, more or less, the same way as a "fight to fix everything terrible” that Trump has done. Look, I’m not going to tell you Trump hasn’t been terrible because that should be obvious to EVERYONE at this point, but when you have Wall Street goons actively cheering the announcement of the Democratic party nomination, a DNC that is running more conservative speakers in its first day than Latinx across the entire event, you have to wonder to yourself if they are really “The One.”

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(A reminder that “Never Trump” Republicans are not your friends either...)

Again, I’m not saying things can’t be “better” right now under a Democratic White House or that some communities would benefit greatly from a change in leadership BUT the bar is FUCKING LOW and the truth of the matter is people WILL be hurt under the next administration regardless of who it is and framing it as “privileged” to think otherwise is actually quite privileged itself.

There are people who can’t wait for medicare for all. There are people who can’t wait for sentencing and prison reform. There are people who cannot survive another wave of US imperialism overseas.

We are being guided to the same predetermined destination that The Architect gives Neo and its what makes all this so aggravating for many.

“The Matrix Reloaded” shows Neo that he is simply another system of control for the afflicted masses but what makes the final moments of the film important is that he chooses to stop playing its game. When The Architect gives him the choice of the door that guarantees the “salvation” of the human race but in bonded servitude to the Machines and the door to make the supposed “selfish” decision to save Trinity from death but doom humanity to extinction, he does this fully expecting Neo to make the same choice every other One did before him did.

But Neo doesn’t, he goes through the door to save Trinity and for a chance to destroy the system in another way. Neo decides to break the cycle even if it might have catastrophic consequences. He challenges The Architect on whether he would be willing to allow Neo any chance at any other outcome and calls his bluff. It’s what makes him a hero and in a strange way gives “Reloaded” a positive ending as well.

(And again, just looking cool as hell while doing it.)

Now, with the way the next movie ends you could make the argument that the cycle continues and this theme gets contradicted but I would argue it’s a bit more ambiguous than that and with the fourth film supposedly on its way in the coming years there is a chance for a more conclusive and satisfying ending. This write-up is strictly arguing the message of the second film anyways.

What a viewer should get on further review of “The Matrix Reloaded” is that corrupt systems have more insidious ways of maintaining control than we may be able to accept. Wall Street goons wouldn’t allow a consistent formidable opposition party to run against them every year, it’s why they are deep in both red AND blue pockets. It’s why campaign financing is out of control. It’s why ultimately both wings of our government are pro-surveillance, pro-big money donors, pro-US exceptionalism/imperialism and the only real difference comes down to mostly minor minutia between the two to maintain their illusion of choice.

In the end to a certain extent, I still believe in the system, given that I donate money and support various leftist causes, progressive primary challenges, and reelections around the country in hopes they run a real left wing someday. However, each year, and frankly each month at the rate we’re going, I’ve grown more cynical about it. At best it is incremental change and at worst its ultimately empty power against the larger juggernaut of corrupt politics throughout our government.

(Me desperately trying to avoid the relentless bullshit of this year.)

“Reloaded” deposits that in order to break the cycle you have to make a choice not accounted for by the system. That in order to truly change anything, as silly and as obvious as it sounds, you have to do something different. Voting for people who better represent your beliefs much more fully and refusing to vote for ones who don’t is one way but as I stated in my “Black Sails” write-up the more active third option should never be off the table.

Changing the world shouldn’t come down to a false binary choice like the ones the Machines gave Neo at the end of “Reloaded.” And while, for the record, I’m not necessarily against people making the lesser of two evils choice again, people need to stop ignoring the ways in which corruption keeps its power and start having honest looks at those who call themselves “The One” who will make things right.

If this entire year hasn’t convinced you of that yet, I don’t know what will and the sooner we understand this the sooner we can start a real “revolution” in this country’s cynical politics.

Until then The Machines will continue to win...

*Me getting away from the liberal bullshit that will likely be tossed at me over this*

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astrologysvt · 4 years

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Chan’s Ideal Type - Natal Chart Reading

Happy Birthday Chan~ 🎉 Thank you for inventing kpop 💛posted early cuz i managed to get it done in time for when it’s actually his bday in korea!

For ideal types, I’m not going to be doing specific placements of their ideal partner. Instead, I’m gonna be listing personality traits I think would mesh well with them, as well as focus on their needs and the kind of person who could meet them. what this reading cannot account for is the compromising the members would do on their end for their s/o. so just keep in mind this is only half of the whole picture!

someone very smart.

he’s a very communicative person.

he wants to discuss and have an exchange of knowledge and passion thanks to that aqua sun and mercury.

with a sag influence there is a desire to surround himself with knowledge, and i think he’d be very attracted to someone who could be considered a professional/expert in their field.

he’d not only really respect it, but it’d feel exciting to know and communicate with someone who is so deeply involved in a career/lifestyle different from his.

he’d love to pick their brain, and it would generally make him feel like his life is being enriched.

sag also adds a desire for travel as it expands ones perspective.

so derived from that, he may want to be with someone who is both not in the entertainment biz as well as someone potentially from a different country/culture.

chan is a really interesting mix being of very knowledgable and curious (aqua/sag), passionate and active (sag), dedicated and stubborn (aqua/scorpio), mixed with this very thoughtful and emotional influence (pisces/scorpio).

he has a very well-rounded chart (potentially tunnel visioned) but he’s a very sincere guy.

he’s present on almost all fronts, and isn’t very afraid of emotions or emotional intensity.

so he wants someone with a great deal of intelligence, as well as emotional intelligence.

he’s also very honest, and with this brings a very low tolerance for people who may be overly concerned with appearances.

this is due to his aquarius influence valuing individuality over conformity, as well as his scorpio mars that gives him a very keen eye for shallowness.

it’s not that he wouldn’t like someone who looked/dressed a certain way, but if he felt as though there was something blocking him from gaining his s/o’s full attention, or something preventing them from leveling with him -- that’d really frustrate him.

so with this kind of “truth-seeking” attitude about life, he’s going to want someone very upfront, honest, and unapologetic in how they carried themselves/acted with him.

not even in a sense of them being rebellious or super eccentric, he just wants someone who doesn’t feel the need to put up any fronts around him or has a perception of what they should be together vs. to others.

if he feels like there is a wall, he’s not going to have a lot of patience in trying to accommodate that in his daily life.

this is also emphasized by his pisces influence, but not necessarily in a discerning “ur being fake” sense.

he is incredibly intuitive in relationships because of his pisces venus, and this makes him conscious of other people’s energies.

so he’s very hyperaware if he feels like there is this wall, as it’d feel like there is this connection error to him. he’s very quick to notice if their energies are being withheld/directed elsewhere.

layers, on the other hand, are very different from walls.

his scorpio mars loves people with depth, both emotionally and intellectually.

his s/o should be very complex & have a bunch of different sides to them as he loves feeling like he’s delving deeper and seeing parts of his s/o only he can see.

his s/o should be very open to deep and philosophical conversations.

they should also be different enough from him that there is a feeling of discovery as they get to know each other, as well as a decent amount of friction/push back as this is very rewarding to a scorpio/aqua influence.

but with this sense of difference/friction.

it’s interesting because with a well-rounded chart like his, he’s obviously able to get along with people similar to him, while also having this ability to communicate and empathize with people much different from him as well.

and so, personally, i think there are a bunch of factors in dino’s chart that point towards him being attracted to those very different.

one of them being, with his rising in aries, this puts his descendent in libra.

i’ve been talking a lot about descendants but i haven’t really gotten too much into what they mean.

so your rising sign is very highly linked not only to your identity, but to your perspective and to your approach on life/people.

it’s the energy you excert.

with aries in his rising this makes him a very straightforward, ambitious, energetic, and excitable person.

his approach to life is very hands-on.

and so if you think about your rising as a kind of magnetic pole, on the exact opposite side of it is an energy that is intrinsically attracted to your rising sign in order to balance it out.

so on the opposite side of his rising you have this very diplomatic, intellectual, and easygoing presence through libra.

this is the descendent, which is also the cusp for the 7th house which is the house of love, marriage, and partnership.

so having libra in his descendent/7th house signifies an incorporation of external energies to the self through partnership.

to me, there are a bunch of different interpretations/applications of it in a reading, but i generally tend to read it as compromise.

i see it as what this individual most likely needs to take into account when sharing their life with someone else.

for chan, this manifests as him learning to be more diplomatic and thoughtful than he initially feels inclined to be.

it’d be about thinking “other” when he’s more focused on thinking “me.”

so what this means for an ideal type can kind of go in a bunch of different ways, but i think the most simplest reading would be that he’d more than likely be drawn/destined to be with someone who is going to force him to think.

he’s going to want to be with someone who forces him to stop before acting, and to take into account the general group as opposed to his own agenda.

teaching him to think more broadly than simply what he can immediately affect.

and this more or less loops in his pisces venus.

his pisces venus is a very gentle, loving influence to have in relationships.

he’s an ultra empath, generally really impressionable and easily swayed as he’s super inclined to try and understand others.

this is an influence that can kind of throw his truth-seeking scorpio through a loop, as his pisces can be easily swayed by romance and emotion.

this danger is especially relevant considering the idealist/optimist that his sag moon is that makes him maybe not the most discerning of negative intent if someone is charismatic enough.

so this is an influence that both needs to be reeled in as well as embraced.

his s/o should be as equally emotionally open and very privy to non-verbal communication through affection and that emotional intelligence.

he wants a relationship where they’re able to understand what the other needs without putting it in so many words.

they should also able to understand when each other needs space.

but with that, he’d also really benefit being with someone who is grounded/realistic enough in their perspective to ensure that he doesn’t get lost in this super compassionate/sensitive part of him without him needing to shut it off entirely.

i also think this stabilizing influence in a s/o other is really important for him with this pisces venus as he may have a tendency to get lost in thoughts/emotions.

he is such an individualistic person thanks to this aqua/sag/scorpio, but his pisces may come in and create a sense of disillusion where he can lose his grasp on what that means for him especially in relationships.

so someone who really and genuinely loves him for him, who isn’t going to incorporate a sense of self-doubt/consciousness in how emotional he is, while also truly encouraging him to go out there and do his thing.

they should allow him to be all the things that come easily to him, may it be passion or emotion, while teaching him balance and stability.

his s/o other should reinforce his sense of self, not dilute it.

and now that i’m writing this i want to make a point in perspective.

in relationships, no one should ever feel “diluted” or that they need to compromise on what being themselves means.

but for dino, since his perspective is so individualistic, there are certain circumstances that he may view as restrictive that to others will not.

lets say for a cancer influence, these people really like security, company, and are pretty comfortable with the idea of being someone else’s person as this gives them a sense of belonging/purpose. these “restrictions” add to their sense of self

for an aquarius influence, this may seem a bit off-putting as they want the space/freedom to continue to pursue being their authentic self in whatever way that may mean to them. for this influence, these definitely feel more like restrictions.

i think it’s also really interesting doing this reading because i really get the sense he wants to look to his s/o other for strength, guidance, and knowledge.

and for that reason i can see him wanting to be with someone older.

as much as he wants to offer these energies to someone else, he may find it much more exciting to discover rather than impart.

i also think this is shown in his rising/descendent.

with his rising being in aries, the first sign of the astrological cycle, this gives him a very young perspective.

then you go to his descendent in libra, and there is a sense of maturing in relationships that i think is very indicative of that “older” influence.

“older” in quotations mainly because i don’t think it indicates a large age gap but rather more so just a dynamic.

but overall, chan is just a super kind guy.

he wants a relationship filled with compassion and intellectual understanding.

communication is an absolute pillar and his s/o should agree on that.

there’s a desire in him for stability, and this could be implemented through push-back, discussion, and contrast.

and i think if i had to narrow it down to one specific thing he desires in a relationship, that’d be variety.

he wants to learn and grow in relationships, and for his world to be ultimately broadened.

#seventeen #svt #dino #chan #seventeen scenarios #seventeen imagines #happy dino day #kpop_future_dinoday #don't even know if these tags are even meant for tumblr #but my god will i use them

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eiirisworkshop · 3 years

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Soul

2020, Dir. Pete Docter, Kemp Powers

Overall Quality ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️5/5

Entertainment Value ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️5/5

Story ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️5/5

Visuals and Craft ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️5/5

Soul is a beautiful movie, both in terms of visual artistry and in what it shows and says about people, about passion and fear, about life. Pete Docter—who is also the mind behind Inside Out, Up, and WALL-E—clearly has a feel for the depth and nuance of human emotion, and it is my understanding that we have Kemp Powers largely to thank for taking Docter's initial story of a soul reluctant to experience life and turning it into the celebration of Black American community that the finished film is.

The story is one of learning to appreciate life, to live for the sake of the little things that bring you happiness whatever they may be, to not tie yourself up too much in the idea of having to have a particular goal that you must constantly strive for and achieve otherwise you're a failure. The film tells its characters—and through them, us, the audience—not to be so hard on yourself, and also to be gentle with and mindful of each other because we all have struggles and we all impact each other. It's very astute in its assessment of human behavior and the message is one that I think we all could use to take to heart. That's one thing that Docter's films all seem to have in common: they teach, directly without being heavy handed, lessons about life that are just as important for adults in the audience to learn as for the kids.

This message is taught through interpersonal relationships (with only the slightest passing mention of romance!) that center the importance of community. School, the way a good teacher can impact kids, the cultural importance of the barber shop and of matriarchs in the Black community are all given particular emphasis. There's a groundedness to the world of the film—highlighted, not detracted from, by the fantastical elements—that's artful, and often subtle. The subway is grimy, but the music being played by a busker in the station touches the heart. The neighborhood with its driveways full of taxicabs is, by that wordless detail, shown to be working class, and it is precious and it's home.

There is a sequence that does deserve the warnings floating around about it, because it very accurately portrays the experience of a sensory overload and may be triggering for some viewers, especially because it comes on abruptly, but it's brief and only happens once. A later sequence deserves a similar warning for portraying the experience of a rejection-sensitive dysphoria or similar anxiety spiral.

The visuals of the film are stunning. The etherial texturing of everything in The Great Before is reminiscent of the soft effervescence of Joy in Inside Out and feels appropriate to the setting. The real world, living world sequences are where the animation really shines, though, particularly in lighting and the rendering of Black bodies—two things which are ultimately closely tied together.

One of the trickiest things CG animation tackles when attempting photorealistic texturing (which the vast majority of CG films do, even when the designs are stylized) is recreating the way light interacts with human skin. The difficulty in getting CG skin to not look wrong and deeply unsettling is, for the record, exactly why the first Pixar feature film is about toys. Plastic is relatively easy to render. If anything, “looking like plastic” is the default mode of CG animation.

Anyway. Skin is made up of layers of varying translucence, so light passes into it some before bouncing back. That process behaves differently on lighter vs darker skin because dark skin isn't just darker, it's more opaque—more, but not entirely. Now, in the early days of photorealistic CG we were actually better at dark skin than light—in Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within (a groundbreaking foray into CG filmmaking from 2001), the character who looks distinctly the least plastic is Ryan, the one Black man among the cast. But as time has gone on, an enormous amount of time, money, and effort has been poured into attempting to perfect CG renderings of light skin, while dark skin has been neglected, so we've gotten white characters (and a few lightskinned characters of color) who look more and more human while the few Black CG characters out there have lagged behind in plastic land.

For Soul, the time, money, and effort has been put in to close that gap. We get Black characters in sunlight, under stagelights, in dim oblique lamplight, under harsh yet innadaquate subway fluorescents, and they look human. Their skin looks like Black skin—there are a couple moments in particular that really capture the kind of soft, refractive glow you get from dark skin in bright light, which I have never seen animated before.

The lighting team for this movie deserve all the accolades they can get. In addition to the above, Soul features the distinct look of extremely high-gloss black piano finish under various lighting conditions, brass instruments of varying levels of polished under various lighting conditions, city streets at all times of day, a sequined dress under stagelights, sunlight filtering through the semi-translucent leaves of a maple tree in seed—all of which look exactly right—and a square of sunlight through a window that just looks warm.

The character designs are stylized in a way that reminds me of the work of caricature artists you often find in city parks—each individual's physical characteristics are emphasized such that they made even more distinctly them, which is pretty much the exact opposite of the genericized, stereotyped, frankly racist character design that's still all too common.

I have seen some not-entirely-undeserved critique comparing Soul to The Princess and the Frog for having the Black main character spend a significant portion of the film in the body of an animal. I feel like there's an important difference between the two, though, in that the protagonists of Princess and the Frog are transformed into animals so that for the bulk of the movie there are not Black bodies on screen and the story is divorced from those characters' existence as people of color, whereas Soul is a body swap situation where the experience of the characters existing in a Black body, living life, and interacting with the community around them is key.

There's pages more that I could write, analyzing and gushing about this film, the way it treats jazz music and the historical importance of that art form in Black culture and wider American culture, the impeccable rendering of various hair textures, the humor, the validation and value it gives to people who are often treated as lesser (public school teachers, children, sign-spinners), but for brevity let me just say:

This is an excellent movie. It's worth watching. It's good that it was made, and I think it may represent an important turning point in the film industry. Time will tell what its legacy ends up being, but for now, it's a really enjoyable film.

#soul #soul (2020)#movies #movie review #eiiri reviews movies

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comicteaparty · 4 years

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April 13th-April 19th, 2020 CTP Archive

The archive for the Comic Tea Party week long chat that occurred from April 13th, 2020 to April 19th, 2020. The chat focused on Desert Spell by Madison Bacon.

Featured Comment:

Chat:

Comic Tea Party

BOOK CLUB START!

Hello and welcome everyone to Comic Tea Party’s Book Club~! This week we’ll be focusing on Desert Spell by Madison Bacon~! (https://tapas.io/series/Desert-Spell)

You are free to read and comment about the comic all week at your own pace until April 19th, so stop on by whenever it suits your schedule! Discussions are freeform, but we do offer discussion prompts in the pins for those who’d like to have them. Additionally, remember that while constructive criticism is allowed, our focus is to have fun and appreciate the comic! Whether you finish the comic or can only read a few pages, everyone is welcome to join and chat with us!

DISCUSSION PROMPTS – PART 1

1. What did you like about the beginning of the comic?

2. What has been your favorite moment in the comic (so far)?

3. Who is your favorite character?

4. Which characters do like seeing interact the most?

5. What is something you like about the art? If you have a favorite illustration, please share it!

6. What is a theme you like that the comic explores?

7. What do you like about the comic’s story or overall related content?

8. Overall, what do you think the comic’s strengths are?

Don’t feel inspired by the prompts? Feel free to discuss anything else that interested you!

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

woah, traditional comic :0 rare breed.

eli [a winged tale]

Indeed! I love the hook of the water spell and the creatures so far!

Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]

I got a chance to read it! So I like how it opens up the world building with the desert, the baby interacting with the llama beast. They are shown to to be in a harsh desert climate. 5. I really like the traditional look of the comic artwork. The magic shown by the mom is fasinating. How they seem connected to nature(edited)

SpaceBum

The beginning is so good! I also really like the families dynamic specifically between the chief and their daughter. I wish the chief had been more understanding of why her daughter stepped in to safe that guy even though I understand where they’re coming from

RebelVampire

For the beginning, I like kind of just how quick certain aspects of the world were introduced. Like the story pretty quickly established theres magic, how the nomadic tribe feeds themselves in the desert, and the stakes now that that is growing harder. You learn a lot about the world without there needing to be heavy exposition, which really helps with the story flow. My favorite moment in the comic so far is probably the market scene when Dorian appears since I enjoyed the brief interaction there and the communication gaps that had to be overcome because Thaina is deaf. It was interesting to see how that is handled in the comic's world. My favorite character right now is actually Thaina's mom who is holding the tribe together, taking risks, and doing everything a chief is able to do to keep things together. Can't not respect that. Also she makes awesome speeches. My favorite characters interacting is probably Thaina and her brother just because I like how similar they are and how they each help each other out. It's very cute and heartwarming.

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

Oh, wow, I love how this comic handles sign language. Mostly like a speech bubble, but the end of the tail, instead of being a point that leads to the mouth, opens up into a bracket to reflect that the dialogue is coming from the person's whole body? That's brilliant.

(And the way it's square instead of round, so you can tell what kind of speech it is even when there's no tail -- also a great choice.)

snuffysam (Super Galaxy Knights)

I love the look of this comic! And yeah, I agree Erin, the way sign language is handled in the comic is super cool. I’m really curious how the story is going to progress from here. Like, will we start to see measures taken against the nomads thanks to these city politicians? Will we focus more on Thaina and Dorian getting to know each other?

Feather J. Fern

The art is so cool, I love the woobly panels

RebelVampire

Back to questions. For the art, I like the color choices and blending quite a lot. The colors just all make the comic so pretty to look at, and somehow really suits the desert-y setting. That's some atmospheric about is that I really enjoy. As for themes, I like that the comic is exploring adapting to change. Whether we want to or not, life changes, and this often means we have to do things we never thought we'd do. And I like seeing that the comic hits that right up front and kind of shows/discusses inevitably how we adapt to these kind of changes and deal with them, whether healthy or not. As for the comic's overall story, I again like how communication is used in various ways to tell the story, from unreadable dialogue to sign language to just expressions. It really all speaks to how large a roll communication plays in our lives and the various forms it can come in. As for the comic's overall strengths, I'm gonna give it to just the fact in how unique it is with its traditional art style, deaf main character, and so forth. Sure you can find these in other comics, but it's rare to see it all together like this. So it makes for a genuine experience you won't get elsewhere

Comic Tea Party

DISCUSSION PROMPTS – PART 2

9. What do you think of the way the story handles dialogue and communication given the protagonist is deaf? How does this change how you look at dialogue in general for comics or how characters with disabilities are portrayed?

10. Why do you think the city has such negative attitudes towards the Thaina’s tribe, and do you think the city will grow past them? In what ways might Thaina directly influence the opinions of the city and those in charge?

11. Why do you think James is so adamant about expanding the water pipeline and banning magic? Is there some hidden agenda, or is James actually trying to do good for the city? What negative consequences might there be for either action?

12. What do you think Dorian’s role will be in the story? If a positive for the Thaina’s tribe, what do you think Dorian’s motivation will be? Also, how will Dorian’s actions affect people Dorian knows in the city?

Don’t feel inspired by the prompts? Feel free to discuss anything else that interested you!

snuffysam (Super Galaxy Knights)

I really love the way dialogue is handled with the deaf protagonist!!! The way speech bubbles are drawn is super unique and makes sense intuitively! Honestly, it's a style of speech bubble I may want to steal for my works at some point lol. I really like little touches too, like having speech bubbles with scribbles in them when Thaina turns away. It all just... clicks!

RebelVampire

I also really love the way the story handles dialogue. While I was a bit confused at first, once I figured out what they were going for, it felt really ingenious. It really stretches the boundaries of how you can make characters communicate, and that you can experiment with dialogue in a lot of different ways. I feel like the distrust and attitude for the tribe mostly just comes from the fact their outsiders. It's easy to feel that way about people you don't know, and when it's group vs. group, that getting to know you gap is super hard to overcome. So usually, especially when the groups just avoid each other generally this sentiment only grows. As for growing past it though, honestly I'm less hopeful. I'm sure Thaina can make some people go around, but change like this does not come easy or fast. :( In regards to James, I'm inclined to say a bit of both. I feel like James does have an ulterior motive, but I also don't feel like it's entirely selfish yet. More misguided if anything, cause it's not like a pipeline of water would only benefit James or banning magic wouldn't make it unsafe for everyone else. Though I definitely think this is one of those decisions where it sounds good in theory until they use up all the water or need magic for something and whoops, the longterm wasn't considered. As for Dorian's role, probably part contact in the city, probably part love interest? I don't really feel like I know Dorian enough to say.

Comic Tea Party

DISCUSSION PROMPTS – PART 3

13. What are you most looking forward to seeing in regards to the comic?

14. Any final words of encouragement for the comic?

Don’t feel inspired by the prompts? Feel free to discuss anything else that interested you!

sagaholmgaard

Ahh I only now reached chapter two but I just wanted to say that the comic looks really cool, I love the watercolor style and the way magic has been illustrated so far! And the different ways for communication is also really inspiring to see :0

warriorneedsfood

I like the comic very much. It’s brave to try to draw characters that can only communicate with sign language. And ‘taste my toes, criminal!’ Made me laugh out loud.

RebelVampire

I think what I'm most looking forward to in the comic is just seeing more Dorian since the story moved on so fast I'm excited to see Dorian's role in the story. As for final words, this is a very atmospheric comic that bravely takes a lot of chances that works out well, so even if it's not your cup of tea, it's definitely something to respect and study.

Comic Tea Party

BOOK CLUB END!

Thank you everyone so much for reading and chatting about Desert Spell this week! Please also give a special thank you to Madison Bacon for volunteering the comic and creating it! If you liked Desert Spell, make sure to continue to support it via some of the links below!

Read and Comment: https://tapas.io/series/Desert-Spell

Madison’s Website: https://baconbitmadison.wixsite.com/madisonbacon

Madison’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/baconbitmadison

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cancerbiophd · 4 years

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Hi Julia! I'm just starting my PhD, and my supervisor gives me a lot of freedom and independence. While I appreciate that, I'm not sure where to start tackling my project. I've done a lot of reading, but I'm having trouble designing good experiments. Do you have any suggestions?

Hi anon!

I have a post here outlining one possible path to take when designing your thesis project–however, it does involve communicating with the PI almost every step of the way. I do think that PI involvement is pretty crucial for the development of a PhD student, so if there’s a way for you to have weekly one-on-one meetings with your PI, I think you’ll find that would be really beneficial.

In the meantime, let’s talk about experimental design. It’s a very important skill we learn during grad school, and one of those skills that separates someone with a PhD and someone without. It’s part of the “Ph” part of the degree, after all! So if you’re not getting the mentoring necessary to learn how to properly design experiments, then that’s a huge foundation of your PhD that’s missing. If your program (or any related programs) has a class on experimental design, it would be worth taking (I took two different experimental design courses, on top of regular guidance from my PI, and years later I’m still learning so much about the nuances of experimental design). Regardless, as a minimum requirement for a PhD mentor, your PI should be teaching you proper experimental design and results interpretation. Otherwise they’re just a warm money-pumping-lab-having body for the next 4+ years and that’s not what you, a PhD student, are here for, or deserve.

However, I do understand the reality that is busy PIs and large labs. If your PI is really hard to get a hold of, you can try finding other mentors to help guide you, such as: other senior members in the lab (like the lab manager, research specialists, post-docs, even other grad students), your committee members, the PI next door even. I get advice from as many people as I can, because sometimes even if my PI is available, she may not have the best expertise in certain situations.

As a supplement, I would also recommend finding online resources on experimental design. A quick google search of “experimental design in biology” lead me to this awesome video from Khan Academy that covers experimental design at its simplest.

Now here’s a quick and dirty 4-step crash-course on experimental design (from my experience in doing biology research):

1) Start with a testable and feasible research question:

This is based off a hypothesis/prediction you make, which in turn is based off the knowledge gaps in your research area

It can be as simple (one experiment) or as complex (aka the focus of your entire dissertation) as you want it to be

It should be testable: you actually have a way to figure out the answer

And also feasible: given your time, ethics, and resources (eg. equipment available, funding, people who can help you)

This is something that reading the literature, or talking to your PI, can help with.

(Divide up your research question into sub-questions if necessary)

“Yes” and “No” research questions are totally ok. Sometimes it’s as simple as “does my cell line constitutively express this receptor, yes or no?” or “does Treatment X induce my cell to secrete Protein Z, yes or no?”

2) Come up with a method to answer the question:

I like to first go into “fantasy” mode. Like, what would the perfect assay be to answer this? I pretend it’s the year 3050 and whatever I think of we can do. For example: “ah if only i had xray vision and the ability to tell apart a human tumor cell from mouse bone marrow and can see just how many of these tumor cells end up in the bone with my naked eye!” Thinking like this first lets you get to the bottom of “what do we need to solve this problem?”

Ok, time to go back to the present. We can’t see tumor cells through bone with the naked eye, but what do we have that allows us to do so indirectly? How can I tell the difference between a human cell and a mouse cell, and also quantify that?

Another part of the design process where reading the literature and/or talking to your PI and other researchers would help with, especially if you don’t know what you don’t know.

Like if I have no idea that something like intracellular fluorescent labeling and flow cytometry existed to solve my question at hand, I couldn’t even use that in my experiment

Determining the method you will use is sometimes the most time-consuming part imo. If it’s something you or the lab haven’t done before, you’ll need to do a lot of research into the methods (what’s the best reagent? concentration of reagent? do we have access to equipment necessary? do i need specific controls? what’s the specificity and sensitivity of this assay? are there background issues i have to contend with (eg. autofluorescence))? It may take a few tries with optimization before getting the method down for your purposes. And as you can see, it can be super involved, so getting advice and help from your PI or another expert would be really helpful (and time saving!)

3) Design the experiment on paper with the proper variables, controls, and replicates:

I like to pretend I’m solving a murder mystery and I have to convince the jury that Suspect A, with weapon C, is the one who dun it. How do I go about designing an experiment that will eliminate all possible suspects and murder weapons (and thus convince the jury)?

Sometimes it helps to draw a predicted results graph of your experiment; seeing it in its “final” form may help you realize some controls or treatment combos may be missing.

Once you’ve designed the experiment, go over it with your PI (or another expert), to make sure it’s sound.

The number of replicates (technical vs biological) you may need will depend on statistical analyses, like power analyses and what kind of statistical experimental design (eg. one-tailed vs two-tailed) you’ve decided beforehand. If this all sounds new, then that’s something you’ll need expert advice on (like from your PI), or take a class in (like biostats), or do lots and lots of independent research (perhaps the most time-consuming and mistake-prone choice). At a minimum though, we always need at least 3 values to perform any stats (so if you’re just running something up the flagpole, n=3 is a quick and dirty thing to do first).

4) Predict the outcomes of each of your variables and controls and do some thought exercises

Ask yourself if these predicted results will answer your question

If it only answers part of your question, what else do you need?

If it doesn’t really answer your question, what should be changed?

What if the opposite of what you predicted happens? What would that mean?

If all this seems super overwhelming, then I think it’s a sign to seek out specific help on experimental design, like your PI or a class. Again, it’s part of your PhD training, but it’s not something you need to, or should, learn all by your lonesome self.

Good luck with your training and research! I hope you find a good path forward.

#Anonymous #grad advice #lab advice #science advice

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patriotsnet · 3 years

Text

What Is Difference Between Democrats And Republicans

New Post has been published on https://www.patriotsnet.com/what-is-difference-between-democrats-and-republicans/

What Is Difference Between Democrats And Republicans

As A Public Service I Have Endeavored To Distill The Differences Between The Parties Into Fair Terms That Children Can Understand

To keep the baseball analogy alive, the two parties are like the American and the National Leagues in baseball. If you have a little sports fan in your home, perhaps this analogy might help. In politics, the primaries are like the early playoff rounds. The parties will pick their winner like the American and National Leagues pick theirs. In baseball, the league winners play in the World Series. In politics, the primary winners will face off in the general election. The winner of the general election becomes President of the United States.

Jessica’s note: Here’s another take on it, in case your kids aren’t eloquent in the language of baseball. ? Imagine the boys and the girls in a class wanted to see who was the best at something. The boys would have a contest to pick their very best boy. That’s like the primary. And then all the girls would pick their best girl. And then everyone in the school would choose between the best boy, and the best girl. The winner over all is like the President.

Back to our baseball analogy. In baseball, there are differences between the leagues. One league has a designated hitter and considers the foul poll “fair.” The other league does not.

In The Most General Terms The Biggest Difference Between The Parties Comes Down To The View Of The Proper Role Of Government

The Republican party generally believes that it is the responsibility of individuals and communities to take care of people in need. The Democratic party generally believes that the government should take care of people. In general, the Republican party believes that if government needs to do a job then it is best for the local governments like cities and counties to make those decisions. The Democratic party believes that the federal government has more resources and is therefore in a better position to do those jobs.

Practical example for a child: There are a lot of people who don’t have enough food to eat. Republicans believe that people like you and me should help them, and our churches should help them. The Democrats believe that the government needs to spend its money to help them get food.

Growing Share Of Americans Say There Are Major Differences In What The Parties Stand For

A majority of Americans say there is a “great deal” of difference in what the Republican and Democratic parties stand for, while 37% see a “fair amount” of difference and 7% say there is “hardly any” difference between the two parties.

These opinions have changed dramatically over the past three decades. From the late 1980s through the mid-2000s, no more than about a third of Americans said there were major differences between the two parties. But the share expressing this view has increased, especially over the past decade.1

In the current survey, Republicans are more likely than Democrats to say there are major differences in what the parties stand for .

In both parties, people who are attentive to politics on a regular basis are more likely than those who are less attentive to see wide, growing divides in the country.

Most Republicans who say they follow what is happening in government and public affairs most of the time perceive a great deal of difference in what the Democratic and Republican parties stand for . Among Republicans who follow government and public affairs less often, a smaller majority says there are major differences between the parties. Among Democrats, there is a similar gap in views by engagement; 70% of politically attentive Democrats see a wide gulf between the parties, while just 49% of less-attentive Democrats say the same.

Republicans Vs Democrats: Where Do The Two Main Us Political Parties Stand On Key Issues

After an impeachment, a positive coronavirus test and an unforgettable first presidential debate rounded out the final months of Donald Trump’s first term, it seems fair to say the past few years have been a roller-coaster ride for US politics.

On November 3, Americans will decide which candidate will win the 2020 presidential election, sparking either the beginning, or end, for each nominee.

But how does it all work?

Well, the US political system is dominated by two main parties — the Democrats and the Republicans — and the next president will belong to one of those two.

Just how different are their policies?

Here’s what you need to know, starting with the candidates.

Republicans And Democrats Have Different Views About Compromising With The Other Party

Overall, Republicans are divided over whether Donald Trump should focus on finding common ground with Democrats, even if that means giving up some things Republicans want, or pushing hard for GOP policies, even if it means less gets done. While 53% of Republicans say Trump should “push hard” for the party’s policies, 45% say it’s more important for the president to find common ground with Democrats.

However, politically attentive Republicans broadly oppose Trump seeking compromise with Democrats even if it means giving up some things Republicans want. Just 39% of Republicans who follow government and public affairs most of the time say it is more important for Trump to find common ground with Democrats; 61% say he should push hard for GOP policies. Opinion is more evenly divided among less politically attentive Republicans.

Democrats, who were asked a hypothetical version of the question about the party’s 2020 presidential candidates, are more open to potential compromise with Republicans. About six-in-ten Democrats say it is more important for a candidate, if elected, to find common ground with Republicans even if it means giving up things Democrats want.

There are no differences in these views among Democrats based on political attentiveness. But liberal Democrats are less likely than conservative and moderate Democrats to say it is more important for a candidate to seek compromises with Republicans.

Poll Finds Startling Difference In Vaccinations Among Us Republicans And Democrats

FILE – Two men talk as crowds gather on L Street Beach in the South Boston neighborhood of Boston.

A Washington Post-ABC News poll has found a startling difference between Democrats and Republicans as it relates to COVID-19 vaccination. The poll found that while 86% of Democrats have received at least one COVID-19 vaccine shot, only 45% of Republicans have.

In addition, the survey found that while only 6% of Democrats said they would probably decline the vaccine, 47% of Republicans said they would probably not be inoculated.

The poll also found that 60% of unvaccinated Americans believe the U.S. is exaggerating the dangers of the COVID-19 delta variant, while 18% of the unvaccinated say the government is accurately describing the variant’s risks.

However, 64% of vaccinated Americans believe the government is accurately describing the dangers of the delta variant.

Iran fighting COVID 5th wave The variant is having a global impact. Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani has warned that the country is on the brink of a “fifth wave” of a COVID-19 outbreak. The delta variant of the virus, first identified in India, is largely responsible for the rising number of hospitalizations and deaths in Iran, officials say.

All non-essential businesses have been ordered closed in 275 cities, including Tehran, the capital. Travel has also been restricted between cities that are experiencing high infection rates.

Reports say only about 5% of Iranians have been vaccinated.

Most Americans Say Partisan Disagreements Extend Beyond Policies To Basic Facts

Fully 73% of the public says that most Republican and Democratic voters not only disagree over plans and policies, but also disagree on “basic facts.” Just 26% say that while partisan voters often differ over plans and policies, they can agree on basic facts. These opinions have changed only modestly since last year.

Comparable majorities of Republicans and Democrats say that Republican and Democratic voters cannot agree on basic facts.

There Are More Conservatives Than Liberals But More Democrats Than Republicans

Gallup

On its face, this presents a puzzle: how can conservatism be the more popular ideology even as the Democrats are the more popular party?

Grossmann and Hopkins disagree. They see this not as a puzzle about American politics but as an explanation for why it works the way it does. They note that 73 percent of Republican voters say they’re conservative but only 42 percent of Democratic voters say they’re liberal. And they note that while voters tend to agree with Republicans on the philosophical questions in American politics they tend to agree with Democrats on the policy questions in American politics .

73 percent of Republican voters say they’re conservative but only 42 percent of Democratic voters say they’re liberal

The Republican Party, in other words, has a very good reason to base itself around philosophical conservatism, while the Democratic Party has a very good reason to base itself around policy deliverables. And so the Republican Party bases itself around philosophical conservatism and the Democratic Party bases itself around policy deliverables.

The question, of course, is how to test this: what would you ask Democrats and Republicans to test whether one side was there for the philosophy and the other side was there for the policy? Luckily, pollsters have more or less solved this problem.

Pandemic Puts A Crimp On Voter Registration Potentially Altering Electorate

For all the discussion about the effect of voter ID laws, however, a study last year found that whatever impact those laws might have is offset by increased organization and activism by nonwhite voters — leading to no change in registration or turnout.

Another battleground is early and absentee voting. Rules vary by state, with some requiring more explanation than others as to what’s permissible.

Bitter lessons

The parties today have arrived at this moment after years of what they would argue were bad experiences with elections at the hands of their opponents.

Republicans, among other things, sometimes point to what they believe was cheating in the 1960 presidential race. Alleged Democratic chicanery, in this telling, threw the results to John F. Kennedy and cost the race for Richard Nixon.

Fraudulent IDs, undocumented immigrants voting, people being “bused in” on Election Day remain consistent themes when Republicans talk about elections.

Democrats look to the decades of Jim Crow discrimination that kept many black voters out of elections.

More recently, they look at the Supreme Court’s 2000 decision that handed the outcome of that election to George W. Bush over Al Gore. The court halted the counting of ballots that Democrats argued could have changed Florida’s results, swinging the state to Gore.

Abrams’ group perceives what it calls a deliberate campaign by the establishment to purge Georgia voter rolls of mainly black or Democratic voters.

Matters of principle

The Legal Fight Over Voting Rights During The Pandemic Is Getting Hotter

Or as former Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, a Republican, told NPR, there are no “fair” maps in the discussion about how to draw voting districts — because what Democrats call “fair” maps are those, he believes, that favor them.

No, say voting rights groups and many Democrats — the only “fair” way to conduct an election is to admit as many voters as possible. Georgia Democrat Stacey Abrams, who has charged authorities in her home state with suppressing turnout, named her public interest group Fair Fight Action.

Access vs. security

The pandemic has added another layer of complexity with the new emphasis it has put on voting by mail. President Trump says he opposes expanding voting by mail, and his allies, including White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany, call the process rife with opportunities for fraud.

Even so, Trump and McEnany both voted by mail this year in Florida, and Republican officials across the country have encouraged voting by mail.

Democrats, who have made election security and voting access a big part of their political brand for several years, argue that the pandemic might discourage people from going to old-fashioned polling sites.

New Poll: Americans Overwhelmingly Support Voting By Mail Amid Pandemic

Traditionally, Republicans have tended to support higher barriers to voting and often focus on voter identification and security to protect against fraud. All the same, about half of GOP voters back expanding vote by mail in light of the pandemic.

Democrats tend to support lowering barriers and focus on making access for voters easier, with a view to encouraging engagement. They support expanding votes via mail too.

The next fight, in many cases, is about who and how many get what access via mail.

All this also creates a dynamic in which many political practitioners can’t envision a neutral compromise, because no matter what philosophy a state adopts, it’s perceived as zero-sum.

Opinion:heres The Difference Between The Democrats And The Republicans

While it is possible that New York Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo will ride out the burgeoning scandal involving multiple complaints of sexual harassment and concealment of nursing home deaths due to covid-19, Democrats are trying their level best to dump him. More than a dozen members of his state’s Democratic delegation, including Reps. Jerrold Nadler and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, demanded Friday morning that Cuomo leave office. By the end of the day, New York’s two U.S. senators, Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand, had also called on Cuomo to step down. This echoed similar calls from Democratic state legislative leaders.

arrow-right

This is what a responsible party does. Its members assess the magnitude of credible evidence of wrongdoing, the severity of the alleged conduct, and the moral and political cost of defending a scoundrel, and then put decency and good governance ahead of tribal loyalty. This is not a weakness; it affords them moral authority and reaffirms the trust that voters place in elected officials.

The irony is that the GOP used to fancy itself as the party of personal responsibility and public rectitude. Now it is a party of professional victims, wallowing in the myth of anti-White racism, incensed when presented with the concept of implicit bias and ready to smear women of color nominated for key posts for the same conduct that Republicans tolerated from White men.

Democrats Are Under More Pressure From Interest Groups To Pass Policy

Policymaking in Red and Blue

Another difference between the Democratic and Republican parties is that Democrats answer to more interest groups than Republicans.

Grossmann and Hopkins assemble studies showing that Democratic delegates at both national and state conventions report more organization memberships than Republican delegates, suggesting that Democratic conventions are the site of more organized interest group activity than Republican conventions. They also note a study showing that more interest groups make endorsements in Democratic primaries than in Republican primaries.

The graphic above is perhaps the most persuasive evidence of the density of the Democratic interest-group ecosystem: it connects interest groups that endorsed more than one of the same candidate or bill in the 2001-2002 Congress and the 2002 midterm election. So, if the AFL-CIO and the Sierra Club both endorsed Senator Mary Landrieu for reelection and they also both endorsed No Child Left Behind, they get a line. The more shared endorsements between two groups, the thicker the line connecting them; the more total connections any individual group has to other groups, the larger the circle they get.

there are more organized groups asking Democrats for policy than asking Republicans for policy

Difference Between Democratic And Republican Party With Similarities

HigherStudy.org

Democrats and Republicans are the two main political parties in the USA. Both parties hold the most of the seats in the Senate and the House of Representatives. They also obtain the maximum number of Governors. Although both parties mean well for US citizens, they have distinct differences. These difference between democratic and republican party are mainly in political, ideological, economic, and social pathways. However, we will try to cover the topic in this article.

Differences and Similarities between democratic and republican party are the main topics. We will know about the Republican Party and Democratic Party at first. Therefore, here is the basic concept of the Republican Party and the Democratic Party.

1.2 Similarities of Democrats with Republicans:

Where Do Democrats And Republicans Stand On The Issue Of Healthcare

The chasm between the parties’ approach to providing healthcare to Americans couldn’t be more vast. Simply put, Democrats have had some form of healthcare reform on their agenda for nearly a century. Republicans not so much. They feel that the status quo is just fine. At the core is a philosophical disagreement about the role of government. Democrats believe that government should be responsible for the people in some ways, and Republicans believe that the less government, the better. In the current climate, this boils down to Democrats wanting to retain, improve, and expand the ACA, and Republicans working overtime to repeal it with no replacement.

Huge Difference Between Democrats And Republicans In Tabular Form

What is the core difference between democrats and republicans?

Democrats and Republicans are the two main political parties in the United States of America. The parties tend to hold major seats in the seat and house of representatives after every election.

The main difference between republicans and democrats is that republicans are conservatives and right-leaning whereas democrats are liberal and left-leaning.

Main Difference Between Democrats And Republicans In Point Form

Democratic Party was founded in 1828 while the Republican Party in 1854

The Democratic Party has about 15 presidents while the Republican Party has about 19 presidents since independence

Republican Party voters are older generation while Democratic Party voters are the younger generation

The voters of Republicans are conservatives while democrats are liberal

The main color of republicans is red while that of democrats is blue

The party symbol of democrats is a donkey whereas that of republicans is an elephant

The Democrats’ party was founded on the basis of anti-federalism whereas republican party on the basis of anti-slavery and agent of modernity

The Democrats’ party has a larger membership subscription whereas republican has a lower membership subscription

Democrats applaud same-sex marriage whereas republicans condemn same-sex marriage

Democrats want the elderly medical program to be allowed while republicans reject suggestions of elderly medical care program

How To Explain The Difference Between Republicans And Democrats

Politics are confusing, even for adults. This year’s political cycle is even more confusing than most. Anything that confuses and parents is sure to raise questions in children.

As the primaries roll on, many children are asking questions about the two major political parties and what all the arguing means. This year’s political cycle is more emotionally charged than most. Those emotions can make it difficult for parents to fairly explain political differences to children. Goodness knows, as an avid sports fan, I could not objectively describe the rivalry between the New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox.

Democrat Vs Republican: Where Did The Parties Get Their Names

In the United States, the words Democrat and Republican are widely used to mean the two major American political parties: the Democratic Party and the Republican Party.

We often hear these words used to describe things the parties do or the people connected to them. For example, former Vice President Joe Biden is the Democratic candidate for president, and members of the Republican Party are often simply called Republicans.

The English words democratic and republicanactually have long, complex histories that go far beyond red and blue states or donkeys and elephants. Let’s take a closer look at where these two words came from and how they came to be used in the names of the two political parties.

How To Explain Democratic Vs Republican Politics To A Child

Faith Filled ParentingEducation

As much as parents want to protect their young children from growing up too fast, thanks to the internet, media, and other new factors, it’s more difficult to shield them from the realities of the world. As a mother, I can only shield them so much, but I know I can’t totally protect them from reality and they’ll have to learn sensitive topics like sex, violence, and politics one day.

So, when your child asks you to explain what democrats and republicans are, what’s the best thing to say? Some parents may brush off their child’s curiosity or say something that is a blatant lie just to get them to stop asking questions . I recommend, however, that it’s best to be honest with your child. But since it’ll be hard for them to understand the true politics between republicans vs. democrats, here’s what you can tell them.

The Republican Party General Policy And Political Values

The Republican Party is often referred to as the GOP. This abbreviation stands for Grand Old Party. Its logo is an elephant. The Republican Party is known to support right-leaning ideologies of conservatism, social conservatism, and economic libertarianism, among other -isms. Thus, Republicans broadly advocate for traditional values, a low degree of government interference, and large support of the private sector.

One main standpoint of the Republican Party platform is a strong focus on the family and individual freedom. Generally, the Republican Party therefore often tends to promote states’ and local rights. That means that they often wish for federal regulations to play a lesser role in policymaking. Furthermore, the GOP has a pro-business-oriented platform. Thus, the party advocates for businesses to exist in a free market instead of being impacted by tight government regulations.

The Democratic Party General Policy And Political Values

The Democratic Party generally represents left-leaning, liberal and progressive ideological values, thus advocating for a strong government to regulate business and support for the citizens of the United States. Thus, one of the key values emphasized by Democrats is social responsibility. Overall, Democrats believe that a prominent and powerful government can ensure welfare and equality for all. Much like the Republican Party, political opinions within the Democratic Party stretch across a wide spectrum, as both parties are, to a large degree, decentralized. However, from a general point of view, Democrats tend to support heavy taxation of high-income households. In comparison to Denmark, where taxes are generally high, the Democratic taxation policy may not seem excessive, but on a U.S. taxation scale these tax percentages are in the heavy end.

Primary Election Snafus Show Challenges For November Vote

Republicans’ and Democrats’ vastly different starting points help explain why the politics over voting and elections have been and likely will remain so fraught, through and beyond Election Day this year.

Sometimes it seems as if the politicians involved barely live in the same country. It has become common for one side to discount the legitimacy of a victory by the other.

And the coronavirus pandemic, which has scrambled nearly everything about life in the United States, makes understanding it all even more complicated. Here’s what you need to know to decode this year’s voting controversies.

The Rosetta stone

The key that unlocks so much of the partisan debate about voting is one word: turnout.

An old truism holds that, all other things held equal, a smaller pool of voters tends to be better for Republicans and the larger the pool gets, the better for Democrats.

This isn’t mathematically ironclad, as politicians learn and relearn regularly. But this assumption is the foundation upon which much else is built.

What Is The Difference Between Republicans And Democrats

Republicans and Democrats are the two main and historically the largest political parties in the US and, after every election, hold the majority seats in the House of Representatives and the Senate as well as the highest number of Governors. Though both the parties mean well for the US citizens, they have distinct differences that manifest in their comments, decisions, and history. These differences are mainly ideological, political, social, and economic paths to making the US successful and the world a better place for all. Differences between the two parties that are covered in this article rely on the majority position though individual politicians may have varied preferences.

What’s The Difference Between Republicans And Democrats

3 Nov 20163 Nov 2016

There are two main political parties in the US – the Republicans and the Democrats

Donald Trump is representing the Republicans in his battle to become the next president.

Hillary Clinton is representing the Democrats – the same party that the current president Barack Obama belongs to.

Generally, people in the same political party have similar hopes and goals for how the country should be run.

But what do these parties both want and how are they different?

The 5 Key Differences Between Democrats And Republicans

Isadora GuidoniPolitics

514.3K

World Atlas

The political landscape in the United States is dominated by two major political parties. The Democrats and the Republicans have been center stage in US politics for more than a century and the two parties have never seen eye to eye on a number of issues. It’s very hard, however, to really tell the difference between a Democrat and a Republican. This is because in the era of so much partisan politics, it’s not easy to know where each of these sides stands. In that case, the best way to pick out the differences is to look at the platforms of each party.

Well, we did that and here is our break down of the five key areas of difference:

1. Tax Policy

Both Democrats and Republicans are for tax cuts but they don’t often agree on the best way to achieve that. While Democrats have always insisted that tax cuts should only apply to low income and middle income households, Republicans feel that such cuts should actually apply to everyone including the big corporations and the wealthy.

2. Social Issues

CNN

3. Labor and Free Trade

4. Health Care

Fortinet

Health care is another area where the two parties don’t agree. Democrats believe that the state should take the role of offering health care. They want to do away with private insurance arguing that it’s expensive for ordinary Americans to afford. However, Republicans believe that too much government involvement on health care could in fact drive up costs and affect the quality of care.

The Parties Act Differently Because They Are Different

Jewel Samad/AFP/Getty

This data only takes you so far. “Conservatism” is more than just a preference for small government. Democrats are only somewhat more likely to introduce new legislation than Republicans. As Grossmann told me in an interview, “these are differences in degrees that are based on a difference in kind between the party coalitions.”

But they’re a reminder that American politics is fundamentally rational. Republicans are uncompromising because compromise tends to expand the scope of government. Democrats are willing to make deep concessions because policy moves in a generally liberal direction. Republicans have a clearer message about government because their message about government is fundamentally popular. Democrats talk more about policy because what they have to say about policy is fundamentally popular.

Republicans are uncompromising because compromise tends to expand the scope of government

The data also explains why Democratic and Republicans have so much trouble understanding each other. Democrats tend to project their preference for policymaking onto the Republican Party — and then respond with anger and confusion when Republicans don’t seem interested in making a deal. Republicans tend to assume the Democratic Party is more ideological than it is, and so see various policy initiatives as part of an ideological effort to remake America along more socialistic lines.

Republicans Prefer Purity Democrats Prefer Compromise

The Ideological Right vs. The Interest Group Left

Since at least 2007, the Pew Research Center has asked Democrats and Republicans whether they prefer politicians who stick to their principles or politicians who compromise. This is a clever way of testing voters’ interest in passing policy, as the American political system famously requires compromise to get anything done.

The chart above shows the results: Democrats consistently prefer politicians who compromise and Republicans consistently prefer politicians who stick to their principles.

“Republicans have been consistent in their elevation of principle over moderation, regardless of which party is in power”

What’s remarkable is that held true even when Republicans controlled the White House. “Though they voiced strong disapproval of Bush, Democrats still expressed a preference for compromise in government — a tendency that has carried over to the Obama era,” write Grossmann and Hopkins. “Republicans have been consistent in their elevation of principle over moderation, regardless of which party is in power.”

Difference Between Democratic And Republican Party :

It is so tough to find out the difference between the republic and the democratic party. Here, there are some crucial differences between the democratic and republican parties to clear the audience and concerned people. We can point out ten dissimilarities in some categories. Such as:

1. Woman Abortion:

The first difference between the democratic and republican parties is women’s abortion. Democrats believe at a sweet woman will have the right to do abortion in reproductive health care service. Whereas Republicans want to ban it from the constitution. Republicans stand against the killing of a fetus.

Read More: Major Symptoms of Democratic Backsliding

2. Same-Sex Marriage Rights:

Secondly, same-sex marriage legalizes the Democrats party. On the other hand, the Republican Party is against it. It is another difference between the democratic party and the republic party.

3. Climate Change:

Thirdly, Democrats believe that Climate change pretenses an urgent. It is a real threat to our national security, our economy, and our children’s health and futures. While Republicans doubt whether the climate is changing, rejecting the findings of the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change as “a political mechanism, not an unbiased scientific institution” with “intolerance toward scientists and others who dissent from its orthodoxy.”

4. Israel Issue:

Read more: Private Administration vs. Public Administration

5. Voting Rights:

6. Money in Politics:

7. Iran Issue:

Comparison Table Between Democrats And Republicans

Basic Terms It originated from anti-federalism sentiments It originated from anti-slavery activists and agents of modernity Philosophy Dominate politics in the Pacific Coast, Northeast, and Great Lakes region Dominate south and west regions Demographics Older voters are an affiliate of the party Party Symbol Minimum wages and progressive taxation Wages should be controlled by free market and taxes should not be increased Human and Social Ideas Based on community and social responsibility Based on individual rights and justice Military Budget Ideas Decrease spending on military equipment Increase spending on military apparatus Abortion Ideas The constitution should be amended to encourage safe and legal abortion The constitution should be amended to make abortion illegal Same-Sex Marriage Climate Change Accept climate change research pose real and urgent threats to the economy, national security and children health Reject findings by the United Nations on climate changes Medicare Program Propose lowering the medicare eligibility age from 65 to 60 Supports imposing work requirements and other limitations on Medicaid eligibility Money in Politics Ease restrictions on corporate and union campaign spending Encourage secrecy and restriction on public corporation campaign spending Colour of the Party 44.7 million 32.8 million Seats in the House of Representatives 235/435 Donald Jr. Trump

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