#I think the building could be the Empire State Building in America

[permanentswaps]

Nonno’s Globetrotting Adventure

Part One

I sat in my modest apartment, the weight of my years heavy upon my frail shoulders. My once-strong body now betrayed me, confined to a wheelchair as age and illness took their toll. But despite my body, I still felt young at heart. And, more importantly, I had a  burning desire to experience the world beyond the confines of my small Italian town before my time was up.

One day, my grandson Nico came to visit. Although it feels weird to say about my grandson, Nico is a very attractive young man.

He’s currently working as a waiter while pursing his dream of getting signed by a modeling agency in Milan. While Nico certainly has the looks to get signed, he seems to lack the discipline and patience needed to succeed. Every time he comes close, he finds a way to sabotage his chances – oversleeping for a final callback, not bothering to dress nice enough, always something.

Seeing that Nico was struggling, I had an idea for how to help us both get what we wanted.

“Wait, so let me get this straight,” Nico said. “You want to use my body to travel the world, while I stay here in yours?”

“Exactly,” I replied. “I know it sounds strange, but think about it. You’re young and full of energy, it’s really the only way I could see some sights before I pass.”

“But how would it even work?” he said.

“I have these enchanted necklaces. If we both wear them at the same time, we’ll swap bodies. And then, when the summer is over, we can switch back by both removing the necklaces,” I explained.

“Wow, that’s… That’s a lot to take in, Nonno,” he said.

“I know it’s unconventional, but I would be willing to pay you double what you would make from waiting tables over the summer. That way, you would have a cushion to focus full time on landing a modeling gig when you get back. And I’d be sure to take a bunch of pictures for you while I’m away to help build up your portfolio.”

“I don’t know, that’s a great offer, but I’m still not sure.”

“Well, let’s try now and see how you feel,” I said, quickly clasping the necklace around his neck before he could say anything.

Then I threw on my own. I felt my soul rush out of me and slam into my grandson. Standing up tall and taking a deep breath, I felt my strong muscles. Then I looked down at my hands and saw thick veins. Damn, I hadn’t felt this good in years.

Sensing some reticence from Nico, I quickly said “Oh! Thank you so much Nico, it really means the world to me.” Hoping to guilt trip him before he could say anything.

Clearly still worried, he tried to play it off and said, “Alright Nonno, you’re welcome.”

Taking in this body, I snapped this photo on the way to my new home:

Part Two

The first stop on my world tour was New York City. Since I was a little boy, I had always dreamed of visiting America, but I had never gotten the chance.

As I stepped out of the metro and up to ground level, I couldn’t help but stare at the skyscrapers touring over me. Walking down the street, I could tell that guys and girls were checking me out, which was a new feeling. Sure, I was attractive when I was younger, thats part of where Nico gets it from. But even then, I’d never really gotten these types of looks back in the day, especially not from such hot guys … I think I like it.

At the youth hostel, I met a bunch of really cool guys – we hung out in a crew and went to do all the iconic landmarks like Times Square, Central Park, and the Statue of Liberty.

Walking through Midtown one of the guys, Adi, shouted to me, “Hey Sal, check this out!” as we turned a corner, revealing a perfect view of the Empire State Building. I couldn’t help but marvel at the sight, feeling a sense of awe wash over me.

Adi slapped me on the back, grinning widely. "Pretty awesome, huh?"

I nodded enthusiastically. "Yeah, it's incredible. I never thought I'd get to see it in person."

We bar-hopped around the city together, sharing stories and laughter late into the night. At one point, we stumbled upon a street performer playing the guitar, his soulful melodies filling the air with a sense of nostalgia. Adi nudged me with his elbow, a mischievous glint in his eye. "Sal, you ever played an instrument?"

I shook my head. "No, never had the chance."

Adi grinned. "Well, there's no time like the present. Grab that guitar and let's see what you've got!"

With a mixture of nervousness and excitement, I hesitantly approached the street performer, who handed me his guitar with a friendly smile. As I strummed the strings and attempted to mimic the chords he had been playing, I felt a sense of exhilaration wash over me. Despite my lack of experience, the music flowed through me, filling me with a sense of joy and freedom I had never known before.

The guys cheered me on, clapping and cheering as I played. In that moment, I felt alive in a way I hadn't in years. It was a feeling I never wanted to end.

I made sure to snap some more selfies of myself, and get my new bros to take some shots for my modeling portfolio too:

After bidding farewell to the bustling streets of New York, I traveled westward. From the majestic mountains of the Rockies to the tranquil plains of the Midwest, each destination had its own unique charm.

But it was in California, with its sun-kissed beaches and sprawling landscapes, that I truly felt at home. As I walked for what seemed like endless miles along the rugged coastline, the salty breeze tousling my hair and the warmth of the sun on my skin, I couldn't help but marvel at the beauty that surrounded me.

With each step, I felt the strength and vitality of Nico's body coursing through me. I would’ve never been able to do this trip in my own body. Gone were the aches and pains of old age, replaced by a sense of boundless energy. I couldn't shake the feeling that this was somehow meant to be, me in Nico's youthful body.

Part Three

After about a month of traveling, I found myself in India. While I hadn’t really though about traveling there before, so many people had recommended it to me as my next stop. So I decided, why not check it out.

Arriving in Mumbai, I checked into my hostel and made a conscious decision to introduce myself as Nico, not Salvatore, this time. While my fellow travelers were none the wiser, I couldn't help but feel a rush of excitement every time someone addressed me by my new name. It made feel even more at home in this body than I had in California.

Among the eclectic group at the hostel, one stood out to me – Emilio. Another Italian adventurer like myself, Emilio had a warm smile and an easy charm that immediately put me at ease. With his curly hair and striking green eyes, Emilio was undeniably handsome, and I found myself drawn to him in a way I hadn't expected. We spent our days exploring the bustling streets of Mumbai, immersing ourselves in the sights, sounds, and flavors of the city, and going to some nearby hotsprings.

One fateful night, after returning from a night out on the town, Emilio found himself locked out of his bunk. Immediately, I offered him a spot in my private room, and to my delight, he accepted without hesitation.

Since it was so hot in Mumbai, we decided to strip down to just our underwear. As we lay sharing my small bed, I feel his hand trace up my inner thigh. My breathing getting heavier, Emilio decides to increase the pressure of his strokes. In reponse, I reach over to his thigh and work my way up to his cock, which I can feel is massive. That was all the sign he needed.

Emilio gets up and splits my legs, now rubbing both of them and playing with my waistband. As he does that, he also leans over and begins sucking my nipples. While this wouldn’t have done anything for my old body, Nico’s nipples are sensitive as hell.

“Fuckkkk” I said in a low grunting whisper.

As he switched over from one nipple to the other, Emilio then reached into my trunks and began jerking my uncut dick. Eventually, he flips me over and pulls down my underwear before taking off his own. I can feel his cock now teasing between my ass cheeks. The anticipation is agonizing as I wait for him to put it in.

He reaches underneath me and pulls up my chest so that I am on my hands and knees. Nibbling on my ear he whispers “you’re the fucking sexiest guy i’ve ever seen,” as he shoves his 25cm cock inside me.

Thrusting in and out of me, he uses the hand that he has across my waist to play with my nipples again, which drives me crazy. Before long, I feel pressure growing, and without him even touching my cock, I feel myself shoot my load across the bed.

Smirking at me as I turn my head around, Emilio takes his fingers, runs it through my seed, before then showing those same fingers into his mouth. He then lifts up his arm, flexes his biceps for me, which makes me tigthen my hole. The tighthness is too much for him and he shoots his entire load inside me. We collapse onto the bed, his cock still inside, where it stays for the rest of the night.

From that night on, Emilio and I became inseparable. We decided to travel together for the rest of our journey, visiting  South Africa, Kenya, and Egypt before finally finding ourselves in Greece at the end of the summer.

The beaches of Greece were a paradise. We spent our days basking in the warm Mediterranean sun, swimming in the azure sea, and indulging in leisurely walks along the shore. In the evenings, we treated ourselves to sumptuous dinners at quaint seaside tavernas, savoring the flavors of Greek cuisine and the company of each other.

One night towards the end of our time in Greece, over a sunset dinner, Emilio turned to me with a serious expression.

“These past few weeks have been beyond anything I could have imagined,” Emilio began, his voice soft but filled with emotion. “I've had the time of my life, Nico, and I don't want it to end when we return to Italy.”

His words echoed the sentiments that had been swirling in my own mind, and I felt a rush of anticipation at what he might say next. Meeting his gaze, I couldn't help but feel a surge of affection for this man who had become so dear to me.

"Me neither," I replied, my heart pounding in my chest as I gazed longingly into his eyes.

With a determined look, Emilio took a deep breath before continuing, "Will you be my boyfriend?"

The question hung in the air between us, charged with the weight of all that we had shared and all that was yet to come. And in that moment, I knew with absolute certainty what my answer would be.

“Yes, of course,” I replied, a smile spreading across my face as I reached out to take his hand in mine. “I've been waiting for you to ask since the night we met in India.”

He looked at me, his eyes glistening, before pulling me in for a deep, passionate kiss.

Part Four

Eventually, Emilio and I made our way back to Italy. We'd been back about a week, and I was eager to share my adventures and introduce Emilio to the rest of my family, which I planned to do at dinner tonight. However, there was a significant problem: none of them knew about the body swap. I hadn’t spoken to the real Nico since I'd left three months ago, but I'd see him tonight. I knew what I was going to do, but I didn’t know how it would go over.

Walking hand in hand, we approached the familiar doorstep of my family's house. I could feel Emilio’s nerves radiating, but I squeezed his hand reassuringly, confident that my family would adore him as much as I did. Stepping into the warm embrace of my family, I proudly introduced Emilio to each and every one of them.

My mother’s (formerly my daughter) eyes lit up with delight as she embraced Emilio warmly. "Oh, it's so wonderful to finally meet you, Emilio! Nico has spoken so highly of you."

Emilio returned her embrace, a smile playing on his lips. "Grazie, signora. It's truly an honor to meet you all."

My father clapped Emilio on the back, a jovial twinkle in his eye. "Welcome to the family, Emilio! Nico here has been a bit of a handful lately, but it seems like you've got him under control."

We all shared a laugh at my father's jest, and Emilio's cheeks flushed with warmth. "I'm doing my best, signore," he replied, earning a nod of approval from my father.

As we sat around the dinner table, sharing stories of our travels and adventures, Emilio chimed in with anecdotes of his own, effortlessly weaving himself into the fabric of our family dynamic. With each passing moment, I could see my family growing fonder of him.

As we sat around the dinner table, I asked, "Hey, where’s Nonno?"

My mother's expression softened with concern as she replied, "He's in bed, nico. He's been resting a lot lately."

A pang of guilt tugged at my heart as I excused myself from the table, my footsteps heavy with apprehension as I made my way upstairs. "Nonno," I said softly, approaching his bedside with a mixture of sorrow and determination. "I need to talk to you."

"I am so relieved you’re back," he replied weakly, his voice raspy with exhaustion, "but, why did you call me that?"

Taking a deep breath, I summoned the courage to tell him. "I... I met a guy," I began, my words faltering slightly as I struggled to find the right way to express myself. "I've never felt such a deep connection before, and I need to see where it leads."

His brow furrowed in confusion. "But... what about our agreement?" he asked, his voice tinged with disappointment.

"I know, Nonno, and I'm sorry," I replied, my heart heavy with guilt. "But I can't ignore how I feel. I hope you understand."

Anger flared in his eyes. "You can’t do this to me," he said, his voice trembling with emotion. "It's not fair."

With a sudden surge of frustration, Nico ripped off his necklace, the enchanted chain clattering to the floor with a finality that echoed through the room. "I want to swap back right now," he demanded, his gaze locking onto the necklace that now hung around my neck.

I leaned in towards my old body, my guilt giving way to slight confidence as I made my declaration. "I understand it's hard to accept, Nonno, but this is my life now," I asserted, my tone laced with a sense of superiority.

With a swift motion, he reached for the necklace around my neck, his fingers trembling with desperation. But as he tore it away, his expression twisted with shock as he realized that nothing happened.

I looked at him with a face of pity. “It’s not going to work,” I said.

"I melted down the necklace and had it made it into a bunch of different pieces of jewelry while I was in India," I confessed.

His eyes widened in disbelief, his feeble grasp on the situation slipping away with each passing moment. "You... you did what?" he stammered, his voice tinged with incredulity.

"I wanted an insurance policy so that I could ensure nothing would stop me from pursuing Emilio," I continued, my resolve unwavering.

"I knew you probably wouldn’t think to take off the necklace until I cam back. So I took the opportunity to melt mine down into jewelry that I can wear all the time and nobody can just accidentally take off or force me to take off – earrings, bracelets … cock piercing. Emilio thought they were so hot."

"You couldn't get them off me even if you were in the best shape of your life – and well, now I am in the best shape of your life and you’re in the worst shape of mine," I added with a touch of irony.

"I’m sorry, but this is my life now," I concluded, my voice firm. "I hope you can understand."

With that, I turned and walked back downstairs to rejoin my family and my beautiful boyfriend, leaving behind a bewildered Nico in my former body, grappling with the weight of my decisions.

Epilogue:

A week later, I get a call from my mom early in the morning while I am still in bed. Nonno passed away in his sleep. I feel a pang of sorrow mixed with relief, this body was officially mine forever.

I roll back over to see Emilio sleeping peacefully beside me. Leaning over, I gently kiss him on the lips, waking him from his slumber. He stirs and without opening his sleepy eyes, a soft smile graces his lips and he pulls me down into a big hug. In that moment, as I feel his skin on mine, I know with absolute certainty that this is exactly where I belong.

[doberbutts]

I’m wondering if you have thoughts on James Baldwin’s “open letter to the born again”? I’m struggling a bit with what his point is in that piece; it feels kinda dismissive on Jewish zionists agency in creation of Israel? But I may be missing parts or not getting things

The text in question.

And the segment I think anon is struggling with:

I know what I am talking about: my grandfather never got the promised “forty acres, and a mule,” the Indians who survived that holocaust are either on reservations or dying in the streets, and not a single treaty between the United States and the Indian was ever honored. That is quite a record.

Jews and Palestinians know of broken promises. From the time of the Balfour Declaration (during World War I) Palestine was under five British mandates, and England promised the land back and forth to the Arabs or the Jews, depending on which horse seemed to be in the lead. The Zionists—as distinguished from the people known as Jews—using, as someone put it, the “available political machinery,’’ i.e., colonialism, e.g., the British Empire—promised the British that, if the territory were given to them, the British Empire would be safe forever.

But absolutely no one cared about the Jews, and it is worth observing that non-Jewish Zionists are very frequently anti-Semitic. The white Americans responsible for sending black slaves to Liberia (where they are still slaving for the Firestone Rubber Plantation) did not do this to set them free. They despised them, and they wanted to get rid of them. Lincoln’s intention was not to “free” the slaves but to “destabilize” the Confederate Government by giving their slaves reason to “defect.” The Emancipation Proclamation freed, precisely, those slaves who were not under the authority of the President of what could not yet be insured as a Union.

It has always astounded me that no one appears to be able to make the connection between Franco’s Spain, for example, and the Spanish Inquisition; the role of the Christian church or—to be brutally precise, the Catholic Church—in the history of Europe, and the fate of the Jews; and the role of the Jews in Christendom and the discovery of America. For the discovery of America coincided with the Inquisition, and the expulsion of the Jews from Spain. Does no one see the connection between The Merchant of Venice and The Pawnbroker? In both of these works, as though no time had passed, the Jew is portrayed as doing the Christian’s usurious dirty work. The first white man I ever saw was the Jewish manager who arrived to collect the rent, and he collected the rent because he did not own the building. I never, in fact, saw any of the people who owned any of the buildings in which we scrubbed and suffered for so long, until I was a grown man and famous. None of them were Jews.

And I was not stupid: the grocer and the druggist were Jews, for example, and they were very very nice to me, and to us. The cops were white. The city was white. The threat was white, and God was white, Not for even a single split second in my life did the despicable, utterly cowardly accusation that “the Jews killed Christ’’ reverberate. I knew a murderer when I saw one, and the people who were trying to kilI me were not Jews.

But the state of Israel was not created for the salvation of the Jews; it was created for the salvation of the Western interests. This is what is becoming clear (I must say that it was always clear to me). The Palestinians have been paying for the British colonial policy of “divide and rule” and for Europe’s guilty Christian conscience for more than thirty years.

Finally: there is absolutely—repeat: absolutely—no hope of establishing peace in what Europe so arrogantly calls the Middle East (how in the world would Europe know? having so dismally failed to find a passage to India) without dealing with the Palestinians. The collapse of the Shah of Iran not only revealed the depth of the pious Carter’s concern for “human rights,” it also revealed who supplied oil to Israel, and to whom Israel supplied arms. It happened to be, to spell it out, white South Africa.

Well. The Jew, in America, is a white man. He has to be, since I am a black man, and, as he supposes, his only protection against the fate which drove him to America. But he is still doing the Christian’s dirty work, and black men know it.

My friend, Mr. Andrew Young, out of tremendous love and courage, and with a silent, irreproachable, indescribable nobility, has attempted to ward off a holocaust, and I proclaim him a hero, betrayed by cowards.

For context: Andrew Young, considered the right hand of MLK Jr, had a longstanding and occasionally fraught relationship with the Jewish community. He stepped down from Congress shortly after being forced to choose between voicing support for Palestine and continuing to work towards black-jewish interests by his constituents and fellow politicians, as he felt very strongly about supporting both. This was a fairly unpopular move. While I don't believe he ever called himself Jewish by the strictest sense, he was actively involved in Jewish communities and the known "white" ancestry within him is a Polish Jew in his great grandparents.

To be honest, I don't really see much a problem with this as I think it fairly closely matches up not only with my understanding of the history of this problem but also my own country's part in it as well as my personal feelings on it decades later. It pretty blatantly says that Zionism is utilizing a machination of white supremist colonism due to the extensive history of antisemitism and having had the ancestral land dangled in front of them like bait on a hook from the British Empire, which owned Palestine at the time. It also goes on to say that many Zionists aren't even Jewish and are antisemitic in nature, but are Christians happy to get rid of as many Jews as possible and how that tracks due to the Christian church's millennia-deep history of antisemitism.

I don't think it lets anyone off the hook. I think it pretty much flat out says this is a problem caused first and foremost by white Christians who hate Jews and Arabs alike and have a vested interest in getting the two populations to fight because it'll be easier to kill off just the one group instead of both of them, if one ends up eradicating the other. It even talks about the friction between the black community and the Jewish community, what caused it, what drives it, how that friction in itself is a tool of white supremacy to hurt us both.

[txttletale]

i mean i can guess at a lot of it - maybe all of it - but could we hear the sid meier's civilization opinions you have so hinted at?

fuck yeah you can. alright so an easy one off the bat is that sometimes it is just manifestly racist in pretty obvious, surface-level ways. like, i think kongo's civ ability in civ vi (that they are preternaturally good at getting religiously converted) is a pretty good example of what i mean--that and a bunch of stuff from the older entries.

but (as ever) that sort of thing is significantly less interesting to me than the broader assumptions about reality baked into the game's core premises. so let's talk about some of those!

first of all, there is (unsurprisingly, it's a pretty loaded term) so much ideology packed into what 'civilization' considers 'a civilization'. like, let's talk about some of the things that are true about 'civilizations' in sid meier's civilization:

they settle cities

they each consist of one culture which is contiguous both geographically and temporally across thousands of years

each of these cultures is represented by one continuous state with complete top-down control

they 'progress' through a linear set of 'eras', with corresponding 'advances' in technological development & aesthetics

over the course of these eras, they expand territorially to exploit natural resources

they have standing armies

they have innate & deterministic competencies (unique units & buildings in earlier games, civ abilities in V onward)

other than the aforementioned unique units, they develop a certain set of universal technologies and institutions (ie, all civilizations will have access to and build a 'bank' or 'library' building)

they have 'hard' (rigidly defined, mutually exclusive, militarily enforced) borders

so--! off the bat, looking at the very first point--what about the mongols? what about the shoshone? what about the scythians? there is a clear normative ideological implication to say that in order for these historically nomadic peoples to be depicted as a 'civilization' they must be depicted as settling urban population centers--and it is the same normative implication that the rest of these points have, which is a very narrow view of what a 'civilization' is, a colonialist (at best) view of what lies outside 'civilization'

#2 and #3 have unfortunate synchrony with a lot of real-world national myths that obscure vast amounts of violence and destruction of culture in order to create a national identity--the idea of one coherent 'ancient greek' culture, for example, would have come as a very great surprise to the spartans and athenians. the idea of 'france' having a shared set of cultural traits would have definitely not been welcome to the bretons, normans, occitans, or any of the other regional identities that were violently suppressed over centuries to create the modern french nation-state.

#4--especially as combined with #7 and #8--really lays bare a lot of the colonialist assumptions at the core of the game. for example, if you play as the inca in any civ game, you'll have to research 'writing' and 'the wheel', technologies that the incan empire never relied upon, in order to 'advance'. this 'advancement' follows (a pop-history version of, obviously) chiefly the technological development of Europe and later the USA--this is falsely universalised out. and the idea of linear progression through levels of technological 'advancement' is very very explicitly a colonialist one--the idea that the peoples of subsaharan africa, the americas, australia, etc. were 'less advanced' than europeans was a key ideological pillar of colonialism!

it also very much plays into the 'Vanishing Indian' myth. for example, the aztecs get their unique unit in vi (the jaguar warrior) at the start of the game, in the 'ancient era'--at the same time that the gauls get theirs, the 'gaesetae'--and replacing the same unit! now in real life, the 'gaesetae' and the aztec triple alliance were well over a thousand years apart -- the jaguar warrior is more contemporaneous with the real-world basis of the 'conquistador' unit than it is with the gaesetae! in civilization vi, the major cultural innovations of 'the aztecs' are over and done with long before the innovations of 'rome' are--which must be a very great surprise to the millions of nahua people living in mexico now--and moreover is part of the mythologization of indigenous peoples as 'of the past', as precursors who vanished to make way for settlement, rather than people who were violently suppressed and still very much exist in the present day!

#5, #6, and #9 all fall under the same umbrella of both backdating and universalizing the model of the Western capitalist nation-state to all of history and the world. 'national borders' as they're currently understood didn't exist for most of human history--standing armies especially were an extreme historical rarity until the last couple of centuries--Western capitalism is certainly not the first social model to result in colonialism and extractionism but the particular attitudes and manifestations of this are certainly, again, unique to a specific part of the world in the last couple centuries. all these things are universalized out to apply to every single civilization in the game from the moment of their existence, something which some of the people depicted in these games have complained about!

ultimately this is all downstream of the concept of 'civilization', developed as it was as an intentional imperial project of 19th-century anthropology and history! and especially as formulated in samuel huntington's very bad and racist book 'the clash of civilization', which seems to have had a pretty major impact on the civ game's outlook on history (see edward said's critique of it)

and of course, once we get out of that, there's a lot to talk about--how the world of civilization is filled with indiscriminately violent 'barbarians' (!) who, unlike your fellow 'civilizations' have no technology or culture of their own, existing only to be massacred--how the game is structured around the assumption that one civilization will eventually 'win'--but this post is already long enough, so i'll leave those deeper critiques as an excercise to the reader.

oh, and--because a lot of people misinterpreted me on my silly little minecraft post and argued against a much stronger and less justified position that i did not in fact take--i do not think that sid meiere's civilization causes colonialism or imperialism!

in fact, i do not even think that 'colonialist ideology' causes colonialism. the order of operations (as it always does) flows down from historical and material conditions: it is economically advantageous to engage in colonial and imperialist exploitation -> ideological justifications are developed; the exploitation is narrativized and mythologized -> these narratives and mythologies embed themselves in the cultural imaginary and are replicated in media objects produced from that culture. i am never making the opposite case--if you argue with me as if i am you are shadowboxing.

#ask #civilization vi #long post

[summerstrash]

one thing I'm mad about vis a vis the krakoan era is the fact that it only remains implicit that moira's deadly genesis team were, in hindsight, a sort of proto-Five focused around the creation of a mutant state prior to having Krakoa itself on the board.

Like,

proteus was always going to be in her back pocket, trapped as he was. he's the only one to make it to the actual Five, in part because he was never a part of the initial team-building with the others. he's a reality warper and energy vampire, and if I'm not mistaken, omega-level as well.

petra is a geomorph who can generate diamonds with her powers; prior to the entry of krakoa and its flowers into the plan, she could've been absolutely pivotal to the physical and economic stability of a mutant state.

sway is a time manipulator who can replay things she has witnessed. she would be in the role of eva bell, if resurrection was on the table, and/or she could serve as an "objective" observer in a justice or surveillance system.

darwin is evolution itself; his powers appear to have no upper bound, though he is not "officially" classified as an omega-level mutant. I believe he would be a primarily political agent, as a symbol of the nation, given that he is a visible mutant who cannot be killed, but I also believe that his survival powers could perhaps be pushed, maybe with proteus or gabriel in a circuit with him, to create life.

vulcan is an omega level energy blaster with a deep wellspring of rage directed at the shi'ar empire, AND he's the lost summers brother. aware as Moira would likely have been of this, she would have seen the purpose of that blood tie between her team and charles' — the X-Men would have been less likely to cross her team if it holds a member of the summers family.

I also believe that Moira was planning from the beginning to hedge her bets — and this team is perfect for that, too, given that four of them would always be primarily loyal to her, the mother figure who pulled them from the gutters of grief, oppression, poverty, and self-loathing and gave them a new family.

a circuit between these five mutants might be just as potent at terraforming as the Twelve were — Gabriel providing the raw energetic reactions you'd find at the dawn of spacetime, the star at the center of the circuit, Petra giving it physical form and stability and blessing it with untold physical wealth and elemental resources, Suzanne giving it the time it needs to grow, and Proteus and/or Darwin giving it life.

imagine the devotion a populace might give the beings that created their home out of nothing. Imagine, in turn, the loyalty they'd pay to their dear mother.

and Moira, even, familiar as she is with the narrative of the history of mutantkind, would likely have been planning for that, too — by withholding her son from the others at first, she creates a divide that will make it psychologically easier for the rest of the team to sacrifice him for the cause, if he cannot be brought to heel, or if he threatens her all-important life. the tragedy of mutant x is a narrative you can build sainthood or demonization around, and countries and communities need their foundational myths, don't they?

I think it's a devilishly elegant plan, on her part, to find mutants who need her, mutants who can't clean up as well for the cameras or the judgment of a bigoted america as charles' beautiful lily-white teenagers do, and turn them into her own personal nation-building engine.

I also wonder deeply about the Destiny of it all — is sway on the team because, as a time-manipulator, she could move directly against the prophecies of Irene Adler in a way the others can't?

At what point does Moira choose to fully betray the cause? Is it maybe at the moment that her carefully-laid plans and carefully-chosen teenagers are torn out from under her? Did she, in her way, truly love them, like Charles, for all his foibles, loved his original five X-Men?

I don't think I'll ever know for sure, and it deeply rankles at me that it's so.

#deadly genesis #moira x #moira kinross #moira mactaggert #kevin mactaggert #proteus #suzanne chan #sway #petra #vulcan #gabriel summers

[maximoffhimbo]

Origin story | The Villain

Tw: murder, blood, broken bones, sex talk

Continuation of my one-shot, ‘origin story’

-

Four months had passed since you murdered vision. You had fled the compound, now completely alone and causing as much havoc and anarchy as possible. You had lost yourself completely, you were no longer Y/N, you were the being of chaos that Wanda Maximoff had created.

You had become the avengers enemy, killing shield agents willy-nilly. Your entire existence fuelled only by anger and grief.

-

Eventually all anger and grief would burst through the surface, right? Destroying the Statue of Liberty, the Empire State Building. You were truly on a roll. The avengers desperately wanted to stop you however part of them felt empathy for you. The entire team blamed Wanda, unbeknownst to you Wanda had become practically hated by the entire team.

-

The final straw of your chaos came when you blew up a shield base and held them hostage as you tortured them.

“Y/N!”

You snapped your head from the bloody agent on the floor. Eyes meeting the one and only Captain America’s. “Oh wow this really is going to be fun” you spoke with malice. You were a being of mass destruction and most people knew not to get in your way.

“P-please.” The agent on the floor beneath you began to whisper pleas for his life, his eyes bloodshot and afraid. You turned back to him and pouted sarcastically. “Are you afraid of me?” A dry chuckle left your mouth.

“Y/N you need to stop this madness.” Steve sighed restlessly. “So this? This is madness? Tell me Steve, do you know what it’s like to have no one? No family? Hmm? Tell me. Please enlighten me. I killed vision, I’ll kill you if I have to. Do not get in my way.” The way you sneered at Steve had him almost fearful of you. “Y/N/N?” Wanda emerged out of the darkness, her eyes were hollow and dark. A complete contrast to the eyes of your former lover. “What are you doing here?” You spat. She slowly made her way over to you, keeping her eyes locked with yours. “I’m so sorry” she whispered under her breath. “I never wanted to hurt you.” You glared at her like you wanted to kill her. Wanda watched you, you didn’t look like you anymore, your eyes were empty and cold, your once full cheeks were now sunken in and hollow. You weren’t her Y/N anymore. She’d killed you. You walked forward towards Wanda, “How does it feel being alone Wanda? Hmm? Does it hurt?” She looked down then back up, “Y/N I’m here to help you please I-“ “help me?! Help me?! Is that what you’re doing?! Helping me? Is that what you were doing when you fucked Vision?” At the mention of his name Wanda’s eyes filled with tears, “Y/N/N please, I don’t know what happened, I felt a connection to him. Bruce said it could have something to do with the mind stone.” You backed away from her, moving towards the agent you had in your grasp before Steve and Wanda so rudely interrupted you. The shield agent shuffled away as best as he could with his broken legs and beaten up face. You grabbed his face and made him look at Wanda. “Tell me-“ you read his name tag, “Josh, do you think I should forgive Wanda? Forgive her for fucking a robot in our bed?” Josh looked up at you, lip trembling, “I-I don’t know.” You squeezed his cheeks and kicked him in the leg, the scream he let out was blood curdling but you didn’t care. You were numb. “Let me ask you one more time Josh. Do you think that I should forgive Wanda for fucking a red toaster in our bed?” The man looked between wanda and you, debating what answer to give, knowing his life might depend on it. “I t-think you should give her a chance.” Mere seconds passed before you used your powers to blow his head off. “wrong answer Josh” you chuckled to yourself before making your way back over to Wanda and Steve. “I suggest you both stay out of my way.” As you began to walk past them to the exit, you turned to Wanda, “I want you to watch this city burn.”

- tag list: @samallen20062837392

#wanda maximoff #wanda mcu #wanda imagine #wanda my beloved #wanda x reader #wanda x y/n #wanda x you

[999-roses]

unpacking 'sinophone' and its sinophobic roots

so. it never occurred to me to just type "sino diaspora" into google before.

and google is like "oi!! you meant sinophone yeah? here's wikipedia on sinophone" and here's like the other top results

I'm squinting. What the hell do you academics have against diaspora using the term diaspora?? I click.

inb4 this whole rant: I have no qualms with using sinophone as a language-family-use descriptor (like sinophone media), but coming from academia or as an academic field unto itself. but. the literature about wanting to use it as a demographics thing & separate it from "chineseness". just. looook if anyone knows that they're no longer like this let me know. with what im seeing, im having a bad faith moment

so... this is the academic that's hard pushed the term for sinophone.

"crit on orientalism might be complicit for allowing Chinese intellectuals to call themselves victim under an 'unreflective' nationalism" & "but the flipside may be a new imperialism" yeah?? any more unsubstantiated claims???

What a joke!! Clearly only takes authority about Chinese history from western sources, like literally has the uncritical echo of "X country doesn't deserve territorial integrity" that literally fueled western imperialism, and not just of China. Treaty of Nanjing 1842 ringing no bells? Sigh. National sovereignty is the barest basis against overt imperialism where someone just comes over and declares where you live their colony!!! ... is this a test in how far can you stretch the definition of imperialism or colonization? lmfao, China invests in poverty-relieving measures like building houses and improving infrastructure out in Tibet, Guizhou, Xinjiang, and you have the audacity to call that colonizing?!? 我真无言了。

different article by the same person:

laughable to think that the Chinese state even bothers to think I exist, let alone talk to me about my diaspora status. (I was born in the US)

also, people are really out there saying 'diaspora has an end date' huh

here it is. here is the 'scholar' conflating American or western imperialism with things Big Bad Scary Red China does.

Clearly mixing up concepts of tributary system with colonialism, and acting like historically (other than Yuan era under Genghis) that ancient China/Chinese culture was expansionist, going around trying to conquer peoples and set up colonies. Admiral Zheng He would spit on you.

Comparing the spread of culture and language in Ancient China to the colonization and subjugation that the French/Belgium did in Africa, or the British Empire, or the Spanish and Portuguese in Latin America, is so blatantly dishonest. The indigenous people of Tibet, Inner Mongolia, and Xinjiang still speak their own languages and use their own scripts, and yes, they learn them in schools alongside the national language... which is Chinese!!! Yes the Hanyu writing system was adopted and adapted by many neighboring cultures in ancient times, but you literally don't examine WHY? The fluidity in its system: frequently non-Han peoples invented characters to suit their language, like there's even some Canto-specific characters that are in use today. Another reason that Chinese writing system was so popular was because two Sinitic language speakers who do not speak the same language could communicate through the same script. Yeah, Ancient Chinese scholars and dignitaries often had an insufferable elite-ness and superiority complex, but describing their attitude as subjugating and forcing other people to adopt their system? What a wildly malicious mischaracterisation!

just... mask off, gringo butt-licker.

Please. where is the "Chinese containment" policy? The white papers reaffirming what the international community agrees, what Taiwan historically agrees (tho Taiwan held that it was the true capital/head of all of China), that Taiwan is part of China?? I know this article was written back in 2010s but are you seriously comparing American weapons deals and boots on the ground with Chinese military exercises in Chinese territory that haven't harmed a single civilian? "critical" my ass!

gotta love the title of this one. yeah, I know it, I've seen it before. the Chinese or feminist binary, pick a side /s

but hey in this piece she admits she's ignorant and unobjective and out of her league sometimes?

edit: found this:

yeah that about seals it for me. anti"diaspora" sinophobe

#sino diaspora #diaspora #逆向种族分子 #long post #chen yells at clouds. more at 10 #sinophobia #sorry. personal rabbit hole. and taking things personally #we're committing ad hominem crimes today folks #sure chinese->lunar new year. im fine w that. but can you fucks stop trying to take away chineseness away from people who still ID as??? #this person is literally doing the western empire's work of laying ground for sinophobia #can't tell if this academic is a grifter or actually serious lmfao #as if american chinese diaspora don't call americans 老美 and call ourselves 老中. i mean yes i call myself 老美 when in china but hello?? #you cloak your 'expertise' in the lingua & clothes & rituals of western academics. just shake your colonized ass for white people more #reading this drivel makes me want to go into asian american studies & grab this and shake it around like a ragdoll. #but im reminded that western institutions and definitely academics unquestionably cite western sources w/o hesitation #but give anything coming out of China even just academics not anything gov related with skepticism. so it's probably a no-fly #yeah sure im a 'sinophone' but im also diaspora so fuck you. 你忘了你祖先你的族梗。你这个逆子找白人拜金去了。就你这样做榜样？让海外华裔立起来？丢死人。跟你的英文大白菜出卖同类吧 #fuck you for saying that diaspora's connection to their heritage & culture are currently being severed& should be severed & studied as such #like literally uncritical of how exactly that happens. why so many diaspora have internalized racism driving them to scrub themselves of #their asianness heck even chineseness. try to scrub it all away but you still got an asian face. so fuck you #didn't look into 'asian american studies' much before but if it's a lot like this... well. 🤨 #like this academic is so disconnected from our shared histories AHSIJIJDSIAJDAAAHAAHGGHGGG #+ my poasts #imperial core circus

[reallyghostlypost]

The Ferngill Republic's history

(As a disclaimer, this post might or might not be controversial, since it ties SVE with a few... unfortunate real life events like the second world war and the foundation of USA. I think the associations make sense from the dialogue, and Ferngill-SUA Gotoro- Imperial Japan is a pretty popular theory in the fandom, but obviously not everyone might necessarily agree. Also this post is messy in general since I'm trying to build a continent's entire history from like four lines of text.)

I need to add some historical events to my own worldbuilding and unfortunately we know very little about the world's history. Stardew Valley is very light on lore in general and SVE avoided truly touching this part of worldbuilding. Aside from vague dialogue about ancient magic that can't be tied to any actual time period or historical events, we have only two hints about the Republic's past: the pelican statue behind Joja and the event SVE adds for Demetrius.

The pelican statue reads: "PELICAN TOWN- DATE: 04.17.19XX- Built in recognition of Stardew Valley's Elegance", so we have a very vague date of the town's creation (the date changed btw, it used to read something like 20XX). Since it's hinted in the game that the town is young it couldn't have been built before the Republic existed, so we have a vague date that happened during the country's existence. This is a weird way of putting it but it's important because of Demetrius's event.

"A thousand years ago, a huge meteor shower periodically bombarded this specific area of the Ferngill Republic. Of course, back then, the Republic didn't exist yet. [...] So our ancestors called these showers the 'Silk Dew of The Stars'. When the Ferngill Republic was first established 150 years ago, the Admission Union named this valley 'Stardew' in honor of our ancestors. [...] It's the reason so many farmers have established their livelihood in Stardew Valley!"

These are the relevant parts of the event, and I bolded the words I found interesting. So... the Republic seems to be modelled after America in SVE. The war with Gotoro has similarities with the WWII, with the Gotoro Empire resembling Imperial Japan. SVE even has it's own version of Pearl Harbour (this is easily my least favorite part of the mod since tying fantasy events to real world ones brings lots unnecessary implications and puts huge limitations on lore, but such is life ¯\_(ツ)_/¯).

Demetrius's event further proves the fact that Ferngill Republic was modelled after USA. It's a very 'new' country that seems disconnected from it's past and brings to mind the colonisation of the Americas. It even has some kind of Union as the political body responsible for this. While states change their types of government and their names all the time, life within the country remains largely unchanged. Demetrius implies farmers moved to Stardew Valley after they somehow discovered the fertile soil of the area, instead of the Valley being used by farmers since time immemorial, which would happen in an 'old country'. Similarly, re-naming the Valley would be weird, it would simply be known as Stardew throughout it's history and it's name would carry on independent of any new government.

Now, I'm not saying that Ferngill's history follows America's perfectly, or that it was founded after a large amount of people moved here from another place to create a new country, after all the new republic could have been created as a result of a past war with Gotoro, for example. Mainly that this resemblance changes the way it's inhabitants deal with the past.

Ultimately, this theory being true or not doesn't have much relevance on the history of the world itself (mainly because we don't know anything about it), but will determine what historical events are relevant for worldbuilding. If I don't use the Ferngill-USA comparison, than all historical events of the continent are important, since there's a smooth continuity in the country's evolution. On the other hand, if I use my theory, than only the events happening within two centuries at most will be truly important. Past events happened to another 'country' after all.

For example, I want to add some monster related tragedy in the Valley before Pelican Town was built, explaining why it took so long for the town to be created when the soil is apparently famously fertile. This theory would change when the disaster happened. If I rely on it, the disaster must have happened during the Republic's existence, or at least very close to it's foundation. If I don't, then it could happen at any point in the past and I have no limitation on my worldbuilding.

---

Moving on, let's look at the history of Pelican Town, which is just as mysterious, although less important in the grand scale of things. It must be at most 150 years old, assuming it was founded soon after the Republic was established, but it seems to be much younger than that. Marlon implies that he started the guild either when the town was created or soon after, since he mentions that most of the area was covered by wilderness. So the town's history all happened within a human lifespan. It's possible that people lived here for longer before that, and that the area was first inhabited by miners and only later the town was created.

Andy mentioned that he moved here in order to become a farmer, it's possible that he moved when the town was established and farmers were encouraged to take advantage of the fertile and cheap land. Demetrius mentions the fountain being 30 years old, so at earliest the town has existed for three decades. Lewis says he's been the mayor for more than 20 years, he might be the second or third mayor the town ever had. And lastly, the recession that destroyed Aurora Vineyard happened when the farmer was still working at Joja according to Andy.

---

This is pretty much the only thing we know about the history of Ferngill Republic. There's lots of space to fill with whatever worldbuilding you want, but the lack of details makes this surprisingly hard. I'm curious if anyone has any headcanons about this.

#sve lore #sve theory #joja also cant be older than 150 years #this entire post is a mess #but i dont think i could make it better though #we only know a handful of events and there are no connections between them #this is the best i can do with the little lore we have

[dulcewrites]

softlispoken here! whenever you had time, wanted to request some soft fluff between austin!elvis and black reader. like a first kiss or first date or something. something soft and fluffy <3

One for the Road

Pairing: Austin!Elvis x black fem oc (Josephine)

Warnings: none. It’s all fluffy and sweet 50s elvis

Requested: Yes @softlispoken (thank you for the request)

He shouldn’t be over here. She knows that he knows that; yet here he is, in her apartment.

She should’ve tidied up. Then again, she wasn’t expecting America’s new star to give her a ride home, and in that obnoxiously pink Cadillac.

Josephine works at a suit and tailoring spot that B.B King frequents. She remembers the buzz that came over the store when B.B brought in his friend, Elvis Presley. She remembers intense eye contact working in tandem with a sweet smile when B.B introduced them. God, she was a goner.

She’s a guarded, skeptical person, and rightfully so. Not used to throwing caution to the wind like she is now. Like she’s been doing since she’s met him.

Flowers were set to her work, letters and phone calls were exchanged, and way too many suits were bought then specially tailored by her. And now they’re sitting here, tranquil silence except for the The Platters singing in the background.

She’s tucked into his side, his arm secure around her.

“Y’know I can bring you something back from the road,” he says softly. Josephine smiles, typical Elvis.

“Just come back in one piece. Oh and one of those New York City shirts, you know the ones with the Empire State Building on it!”

His laugh rings out in her tiny apartment.

“I can do both of those things for you baby”

Baby

They had taken things slow. Painfully slow according to her friends. They haven’t even… kissed yet.

A part of Josephine wonders if that bothers him. If it does, he’s done a good job not showing it. Elvis is the picture of a southern gentlemen. He’s been patient but also charming and cheeky.

He’s about to go on the road and it hits her how attached she’s become over the past few weeks. A sudden urge to let him know how much she’s appreciated this time.

It stays on her mind the entire time he’s over. While he’s explaining how nervous he is, and while she tries to tries to teach him how to put a thread through a needle in one try.

The thoughts in her head reach a fever pitch as she walks him to the door.

“We have to get on the road early morning, but if I have time I could sw-“

Josephine cuts him off by grabbing his tie and pulling him down, pushing her lips onto his.

Elvis groans in her mouth. Her back is against the wall next to her door and when she feels how soft his ops are, she wonders why she never did this sooner.

It isn’t till she feels his lips working down her neck that she snaps out of the trance.

“Y-you need to get some rest,” she pants softly and she receives is a hum of agreement but he makes no effort to leave her neck.

“Mr. Presley”

He lets out another groan. With a smile, he presses his forehead to hers

“You’re drivin’ me crazy. You know that right?”

Josephine simply giggles. That’s normally his job, making people lose their minds.

“Just think about it,” her voice low, “The quicker you leave here, the earlier you can wake up, and the more time you have to come see me tomorrow morning.”

His grin gets bigger and he nods, taking her up on that plan. She watches him walk down the hallway, fighting a laugh when he turns back and winks at her.

Josephine walks back into the apartment knowing she’s going to dream of blue eyes, pink suits, and soft lips.

#this was fun writing… gave me something to do in between wash day #I hope you like it 🫶🏽 #austin!elvis x reader #austin!elvis x black!oc #black!oc #black!reader #requests #asks and replies #Elvis x oc #elvis x reader

[vokriid]

for yall who wanted an explanation on the Cyrodiilic religion

this post may be disjointed and repetitive bc I’m tired af but if your first TES game was Skyrim, then 1) same here, 2) 90% of TES lore is really confusing, complicated, ridiculous, and mostly boring, especially because a lot of lore comes from stuff that got retconned as the franchise went on, but that either fans or devs wanted to make sense in the world-building.

okay, so there are multiple religions worshipped on Tamriel during any and every era, but in most games, the biggest is the Cyrodiilic. the state religion of Cyrodiil is the, uh, Cyrodiilic Pantheon, or the worship of the Divines. the overall religion was codified (founded) by St. Alessia, who basically combined a bunch of local religious traditions together, made them as similar as she could, and decided official names and such. the main deities are: Akatosh (the most prominent deity and chief of the other deities), Arkay, Mara, Kynareth, Dibella, Julianos, Stendarr, Zenithar, and, after a certain point in time, Talos. the religion (especially once it has Talos) is often called the ‘imperial cult,’ and just keep in mind that it is the state religion of the Empire, not the only religion of the Empire. so while there are other religions in Tamriel, they’re mostly local, and the Cyrodiiic cult is present outside Cyrodiil bc, again, state religion. 

so, just so we’re clear: the whole religion of the Divines is not native to Skyrim, it is native to mid- and southern Tamriel. eg: Christianity is not native to the Americas, but the largest Christian populations are the US and Brazil. also Islam isn’t native to the Middle East outside the Arabian peninsula*, but you can find it from the ME all the way to the Philippines. 

so there are still a bunch of other religions in Tamriel. usually (not always!) religions are, uh, unrealistically consistent with race/culture/province. the Aldmer worshiped their pantheon, and that religion eventually split and separated into the various elven religions which we will not cover here bc they’re not relevant. what is relevant is that by the time of Skyrim, several of the provinces that were part of the Empire and had to at least give some official recognition to the Divines (though they probably weren’t forced to worship them, from what we can tell? though uh, still very much state sanctioned and protected), now have independence and no longer recognize the Divine pantheon. and, in fact, a lot of them are kinda bitter about being forced to recognize the conqueror who used the TES-equivalent of an atomic bomb against them as a god.

addendum: I FORGOT TO ACTUALLY INCLUDE SKYRIM. .............. later, then.

(end note: also, don’t read or listen to Michael Kirkbride. his writing - specifically how he does theology and philosophy - honestly just fucking sucks. it’s pretty much just really, really, really fucking bad esotericism wrapped in layers of what the average high school-age redditor thinks Nietzsche’s philosophy is. there, I’ve just saved you so much time and effort.)

#the elder scrolls #skyrim #tamriel #tes lore #elder scrolls #tes #teslore #*okay if you try to WELL ACTUALLY the origin of Islam on my TES blog I will simply have to beat you with a cricket bat #we're talking about bad video game worldbuilding and bad video game worldbuilding ONLY #look I hate MK's writing bc his is 1000% more pretentious than literally any historical philosopher I've ever read #also less coherent than any of them and that list includes fucking Duns Scotus: the origin of the word 'dunce' #okay we're talking about bad video game writing AND Duns Scotus BUT THAT'S IT

[cavewretch]

updated apr 19 2024

welcome to earth! welcome to PHOTOSYNTH!

once upon a time in october 2022, i listened to a song called "the turn of a dream" by robert schroeder and imagined people in a space ship, en route to move (back) to earth. they've got two cats who are sitting on the dashboard panels of buttons and switches of the spaceship. there's a little bit of urgency, like they're on the run, but they're also a bit caught up in awe at the sight of earth.

visually there was a lot of messing with crt tvs like pushing through electricity and screens and static. more below the cut! feel free to ask me things about it :D

from that little song kernel i started having fun imagining what earth might look like in a distant future, and what the people would be like, and what their experiences might look like in a post climate-change-global-capital-collapse world. what could grow? in this project i'm also thinking a lot about technology- the sustainability and evolution of gadgets and gizmos over the last few decades and what consequences our excess causes.

what use can we get out of things that are old but still have useful parts or still function? what can we create with what's left over?

who gets left behind after the rich and powerful deem earth unlivable? what will they do to survive?

i have no idea what photosynth may come to be - perhaps animation? a web comic? i haven't decided! i'd like it to be a collaborative something someday! this is all a big sandbox i am stomping around in and constantly adding to ! i've drawn some characters a little and have brainstormed some scenes but i don't have something to be read yet. and i'm honestly perfectly content to let it stay that way for years . i hope it's something tangible in the world as a finished object in like. 10 years. i think that's a fair amount of time to give myself. (i have a pinterest board with 700+ images, an 11 hour playlist, unfinished sketches, an archival external hard drive, and a very chaotic notebook.)

anyway! lets ground ourselves a bit beyond abstract conception shall we!

on earth, the great emigration begins. earth has gotten severely dangerous for life, and Scientists have recently discovered the yellowstone volcano in the west of the american empire is rapidly getting close to eruption. they can't predict when exactly the volcano will blow, but they know it will mean certain destruction for much of the continent, and contribute to global climate shift. a volcanic winter/small ice age, at least. the governing bodies make some swift and grand decisions. space travel has improved enough that the upper class can access it when necessary. state-based spaceships are designated for the rich and powerful, because of course we need our government leaders where we go next, or else we'll be lost! mars exploration has developed enough that there is a station large enough for the federal branch of government to set up shop. able bodied manual laborers are organized by tech conglomerates across the country and are sent to work on building ZEXA, a man made base to start up this new ultimate civilization. any employee within the empire working in certain disciplines are given numbers and ships with certain number ranges are assigned for migration. the empire drops its borders, encouraging mass migration to the south and elsewhere in whatever way people can get access to. it doesn't assist the process beyond that.

an empire moves to mars, leaving a majority of its population behind.

yellowstone erupts. north america is largely uninhabitable. the globe's climate is significantly altered.

time moves. the largest settlement (Jovia) in the north american continent is established and is home to roughly [300k? 1 million? idk] people.

Zexa 5's Galactic Federation bombs Jovia, starting the interplanetary war. a little girl escapes the destruction. across an ocean, a pair of newlyweds gear up for battle. two continents over, a "research project" begins development. the war "ends."

occupation remains, and the pressure cooker is reaching fever pitch.....

lets meet some characters!!!!! :D

ROSE EYE, named for her pink heart shaped glasses that double as a sniper scope. also known as JEN, who once escaped the destruction of her home town.

Jen is reputable assassin, with skills in stealth and both long and close range combat. she got her code name after a factory whistle blowing turned into a company's collapse, which she only escaped because of the help of THORN.

THORN, named alongside rose eye for their partnership in rescuing factory employees and carrying out the attack on the company. she's dubbed thorn for her electrified blade weapon and her unique virus software .//th0Rn that gives her full access to multi level security systems. of course it helped she was a security guard at the factory...

also known as HANA. adept at engineering and spacecraft with a love for earth-bound air travel, hana is joyful and loves country music and happens to save her workplace crush who wears those pink glasses everywhere's ass, jumpstarting her criminal career and a high speed chase off-planet. next stop: earth!

on earth, twin boys are knee deep in the junkyards after school to scavenge for new materials. ADI is looking for electronics, AMIR is looking for anything he can fashion into useful clothing. amir is taller. not by much, but by enough that you should know. they've found an old pc with a series of oddly prophetic corrupted plain text files and jpegs. one file looks like some sort of schematic. they'll bring it home and scare their mother, reminding her of what killed their father.

both boys are 19, one sporting purple hair dye and the other a nose ring, for individuality. they're about to complete their foundational educations and choose their apprenticeships and mentors.

across an ocean or two, a galactic federation research facility enters its 21st year of operation. a man who's been fighting to escape it since its inception just might make it this time. in cairo, a pilot receives an order to target that facility.

IVAN has been a prisoner of a galactic federation human experiment facility since he was a child. he's been pushed and prodded in research of the "human limits of strength and survival". despite fighting his captors his whole life, he is what they wanted him to become: a deadly weapon. and he's about to be freed by a man who terrifies him in a different way.

MIGUEL grew up surrounded by rebels and pilots. after his parents were executed by the galactic federation he was raised by an old mechanic in cairo. covered in tattoos piercings and charisma, miguel fashions himself unknowable and invulnerable . with nothing to lose he carries out targeted attacks on galactic federation bases. he just received a mission order that will bring him back to an old friend and give him lives to protect and live for.

thank you for reading !!!! 🫶🫶🫶

#BIG INTRO SUMMARY POST FOR MY WIP :D #photosynthesis #wretched text #Spotify

[centrally-unplanned]

Though to take the idea a little more seriously, I have seen Spain be described as the Accidental Empire (alongside the UK) and I think it fits. To briefly sketch my “theory of Spanish Rise & Fall”, due to the Reconquista the different kingdoms of Iberia were intensely militarist, with ruling classes deeply embedded into a military hierarchy, and - for their resources - very impressive financial & bureaucratic capabilities. They would constantly mobilize for this or that crusade against the Emirates, which culminated in Aragon & Castille’s conquest of Granada in 1491, a war that tripled the size of the standing armies of the two kingdoms. United by marriage and victorious in crusade, but ruling over a kingdom of decentralized-but-robust military society, that energy needed to go somewhere. 

1491? Anything happen around then maybe? Spain kept busy as the Americas were opened up, fighting the Italian Wars against the French & the Pope on and off for 70 years, but soon that warrior class had a new project in ruling the famously decentralized Spanish Empire. Conquest begets conquest, particularly with the mines of Latin America powering your budgets, permitting Spanish military expenditures to keep climbing and the Spanish system to keep pushing along.  But that only works if you win; Spain won in the 16th century, but that turned around in the 17th century, and once you spend the money and get no conquests for your trouble the debt spiral starts very quickly. Spain’s issue was that it had no back-up; its governing system could not pivot away from militarized empire, as Spain itself was poor grounds for development & the culture was too embedded in how the state itself functioned. So Spain continued to double down until it broke in the 18th century, and imploded at the beginning of the 19th.

Maybe the better parallel is the Ottoman Empire, the classic “conquest state” that could only support its government apparatus on more victories. But for the Ottomans that was intentional, and when that ran its course in the 17th century they were better able to pivot (not that much better) due to its highly centralized government system. Spain didn’t do the work of trying to build effective alternatives until it was way too late.

#speculative epistemic status but i think its got some truth to it

[tsunflowers]

finished the book I posted pictures of today and yesterday. I didn’t like it. the title is “the salt line.” it takes place in future America where mega-ticks can burrow into your skin and kill you so people have retreated into tick-free zones and left the rest of the country empty. but rich people go on excursions outside the zones just to prove they can. aside from the GROSS descriptions of the ticks the first part was so boring that I skipped ahead to see if anything interesting happened and the group of rich tourists got taken hostage by insurgents who lived outside the zones and learned the truth of their world

let’s discuss this premise for a sec. the world inside the zones is hypercapitalist and if you’re rich you have pretty much everything you would have had access to in real life. and travel to other countries is possible and I don’t THINK they also have mega-ticks? so literally why would any rich people do this. part of the training they put you through before they let you into the tick infested wilds of the usa is you have to use a tick destroying gun on yourself which is excruciatingly painful and leaves a large burn scar. not to mention the trips don’t take you to the White House or the Empire State Building or any monument to americas glorious past. they LITERALLY go to a derelict cracker barrel. and I guess they would have hiked the Appalachians if they hadn’t gotten kidnapped but fucking come on. it’s revealed that the tours are partly a front for guys to go out and do some real sicko shit in the woods like the most dangerous game but none of the main group seemed aware of that. they wanted to go into tick city and scar themselves so they could see a cracker barrel 

also one of the guys is rich bc he invented an app that just alerts all your followers every time you spend money. ok we all get it. social media is bad and encourages conspicuous consumption. this app sounds like it sucks though. it was unclear to me if you could choose what to post so it would just be like “went to the dentist, 200 dollarks. bought boba, 5 dollarks. new bus pass, 45 dollarks.” who wants this

the most interesting part of the book was that the people who are living in tick world are cultivating a type of poppy that makes you immune to ticks if you drink tea made from it, but over the course of the book they realize that drinking the tea also makes women infertile. so it becomes this terrible situation where the thing they’ve based their community around that brings them together and keeps them alive is also killing them and women have to ask themselves “can I open myself up to pain and death in order to create new life?” which is just an extreme metaphor for the question anyone has to ask before getting pregnant. I feel like the author definitely wanted this to be the emotional core of the story and it was for me but the problem is it only comes up halfway through the book and the character most affected by it only gets two or three pov chapters

I can’t say that it wasn’t a page-turner once it picked up but it was also stupid and bad. not recommended unless you WANT to read about tick related body horror

#my book review corner #body horror / #ticks /

[aukanemin]

I can't explain the amount of worry I have for yall 😭 For you, your family, your art, its all just terrifying sitting here in America, watching all this happen and knowing there's not much that can be done to help, that I can do to help. I really hope at this point Putin just gets struck by lightning or trips and falls down a flight of stairs and just straight up dies so this shit can STOP. I really hope this war dies with him. I can't see it going on past that and that really that give me hope (besides to see you posting).

Hello again!<зз Oh, we are safe, for the most parts! There is obvious place for civil terror - in a meaning of unavailability of electricity or water or heating or connection for specific amounts of time, and costs of living strike their new domes, but that's okay (not really but it doesn't matter in current perspectives)!<зз

I cannot describe the way how I feel at the moment - how much of bile and horror and hate is in my heart, and I know that I shouldn't, as the only way how to describe this general mental state is to show the way how things builded and exist for us at the current time - something that I could not imagine to ever see, and don't feel in my soul to make other's to look at, too. It's inhuman and it awakens something alike.

I cannot really imagine, too, how I shall return to usual life after our victory (as without victory there is no life - being unable to scream does not exclude agony), just as my family and countrymen cannot, I feel - but that is another side of existential horror of current time, the one that we may either endure or not озо It's important to endure, obviously - so I try to create now better future for us, as without that work it may never came, and there will be no actual home to return into.

I.. I don't actually think about him a lot, truth be told. Obviously, I hope he will rot from inside, but I also know that there is too much that builded our current world to be finished like that. It's not the war of one person, such was proven long ago - in Bucha, Izyum, Mariupol, Kherson and hundreds of cities of my homeland and other's, in everyday, it is a war of resourses and of people. Maybe if he will be gone the war shall be stopped since it is not profitable- or maybe there will be separation between marital leaders and gangs that will fight for advantage and dominion, and the land where those conflict shall be continued is may be ours, too.

I mean - country both with basically unlimited war resourses (outdated and unsuited to modern warfare but still can kill people and maim and destroy and terror?) and nuclear weapons that lived with authocrat and his regime that literally cames from criminal records of 90s as long as it existed as independent state, that thinks about itself - and actually is - successor of both empire that enslaved and tantalized nations for as long as it existed and of state - empire, too, by actual way of things - that did the same things but this time together with nations that it thought as of lesser one it also did it with own people, too, just with supressing ideology of unity and brotherhood and suffering and pain? Shall lose their authocrat, will be separated therefore (because authocrathy never considers actual successor or future beside - having at least one of them is enough to lose it's power), with no actual state or control over - just at it was separated previously and it was such a miracle that it didn't ended in the darkest human catastrophe that could be imagined?

If the health of mentality was proven the situation should have been over long ago - but it is rather population than society and, in the same way how they accepted immolation of my nation, they stand still even when their own existance - of their sons, brothers and husbands that will go to war, to either kill or get killed, of women that will live in society of violence and degradation where nor they nor their children will never be safe, is considered as of lesser value and openly shown to them as such. I can see past him - the only way to overcome it is to stay strong and still and on our ground, be better in each way - both how they are and how we currently are, too. …

o//////o (opening curtains of figurative room of mood)

So!<з

I find hope both in art and of your company, too! It means a world for me - to see something as bright and beautiful and delightful and as mellow as you, and to have ability to share those expressions and feelings and love of creations озо

Thank you!!

#ask #artist from ukraine #blog

[fardell24b]

27th & 28th January 2023 Writings

26th & 27th

Excerpt from: Mystery in Polonia

“If there are any issues, they’re probably unrelated,” the Doctor commented.

 “So, there would be something else?” Tegan asked.

 “Almost certainly,” the Doctor said.

 Words: 24

  Excerpt from: Quinn’s Code

“Dinner is almost ready,” Helen said.

 “Good!” Quinn said. “It's been a long day.”

 Words:14

  Excerpt from: Legacy of Westchester

1969

Global

  North America

United States

A group of Mages fight Golems on the Observation Platform of the Empire State Building in mid May.

 In late July, a protest by Mages in Atlanta goes awry when some buildings collapse.

 More Mothman sightings in West Virginia in mid November. (Spreading to Ohio, in mid December.)

 In Atlanta in July, the Feanorian Star Political Party is established by a Mage named Veronica Peters. The Party’s manifesto calls for ‘radical revolution’ for Mages and Neo-Pagans…

 In late December, riots occur in Columbus, Ohio, after police brutality against suspected Mages is brought to light.

  South America

  Europe

United Kingdom

A smaller ring of stones appears near Stonehenge in early January. The Royal Knights are deployed and they see a portal open two days later. Nothing comes through, yet.

 In mid-July, the Royal Knights thwart a plot to take over London using autonomous tanks.

 In August, a mysterious mist appears in the London Underground. People start disappearing. The Royal Knights eventually dissipate the strange mist, but the vanished people aren't found.

 A second portal appears near Stonehenge in October.

  Africa

  Asia

  Oceania

  Antarctica

A hibernating kaiju is found near the South Pole.

 Words: 197

  Excerpt from: Convergence on Lawndale

In the TARDIS, an alert came up on the Scanner. “What?” the Doctor asked as he looked at it. Something was happening. It was interfering with Lawndale’s electrical grid. He set it to scan closer.

  In Cranberry Commons, Kim and Ron saw the flicker.

 “Uh oh!” Ron said.

 Rufus agreed with him.

 “Something’s happening,” Kim commented.

 “But what causing it?” Ron asked.

 “No idea, but we have to get back to the Portal.”

 “Right behind you, KP!”

 Words: 77

  Excerpt from: Adventures of Asteroid Station Delroy

“I know that,” Andromeda said with more petulance.

 “And I know you’re bored. So, once you settle in, we’re going to talk in the cafeteria about your behaviour.”

 “No!”

 “No? You’re acting like a child, rather than a young adult.”

 “I’m not a child. Ask anyone.”

 “Being an adult is not just being able to look after oneself. It is also behaving in a way that doesn’t draw negative attention to yourself. What do you think my opinion of you is right now?”

 “I don’t care!”

 “You should care.”

 “What I care about, you don’t need to know,” Andromeda said, her voice low.

 Words: 103

  Excerpt from: Small Town Mystery

He eyed the food in front of him but remained focused. “What information can you offer?”

 “The Vice Principal did tell me that you were coming,” the lady said. “But it isn’t sanitary to have a dog in here!”

 Shaggy sighed. “I’m sorry, but Scooby and I are inseparable.”

 The lady sighed. “Sure…”

  All in all, she didn’t give much more information than the Vice Principal had. With a gulp, Shaggy knew that he and his friends would have to go inside that house.

  Velma exited the school building and put the thumbdrive Valerie had given her into her tablet. She then listened to the sounds again. ‘They could be anything,’ she thought again, before launching the analysis software.

  Fred looked over the materials he had brought. There was nothing left behind. If they had to make traps, they would be ready.

  Velma went over the sounds many times. There was a clue there, but she would have to go into the house to be sure.

 Words: 166

 Total: 511

#alternate history #daria #doctor who #eleventh doctor #fanfic #fifth doctor #fred jones #january writings #kim possible #original fiction #ron stoppable #scooby doo #shaggy rogers #tegan jovanka #velma dinkley

[professorsaber]

Ramble about WIPs, go:

You asked this on August 8, and it's Halloween now. I'm sorry I never answered before, but TBH the way you phrased that, and being on anon, made it feel kinda hostile I guess? Sorry.

(Anyway, this is in response to this.)

So, for months now my main WIPs have all been Back to the Future-fanfic related. This is very unusual, since I'd usually hold onto an interest/project for a month before moving on to the next one. Then I'd come back after a year or so.

So my current BTTF project is what I call the Royal AU. Basically, it is the year 1885. Marty is the heir to the Grand Duchy of Hill Valley, Doc is his personal tutor (who is also building a steam-powered time machine), Jennifer is a princess from neighboring Grass Valley, and Biff is Prince Frederick, who thinks the throne of Hill Valley is rightfully his.

Right now, I'm (trying to) post bits and pieces of it to A Royal Doctober as part of that challenge, but as of right now I have only two. But I have so much more lore than I've posted! Some of it's on my own website, but that's in progress too.

Some notes:

California is the California Empire, under the rule of the descendants of Emperor Norton. The Emperor is basically the "boss" of George II, Grand Duke of Hill Valley.

The leader of Hill Valley's parliament in 1885 is Amos "Goldie" Wilson. His rival, leader of the main center-right party in the grand duchy, is Gerald Strickland. In 1887, Biff will run as the leader of the far-right party. (I already have the election results--a lot of my projects involve fictional election results!)

History is generally moved back 100 years, and Europe and America's swapped. Europe is the "United States" and a single republic.

SPOILERS, BUT: What they don't know is that several timelines collided in what an agent of a multiversal time police called an "ontoclysm," and I think they might be trying to put them back. Which is a problem, since Marty has more siblings now and he'd very much like them to all exist. The task of the Docs--the AU's Doc von Braun and the canon Doc Brown--is to ensure all the timelines can exist independently.

I could keep going, but I'm being called away from my computer so I'm gonna stop now.

Have a great day! I mean it!

#my fics #answering asks #about me

[criticalbennifer]

Woman of the Year:  Jennifer Lopez

By: Brantley Bardin 

1999

Those eyes. Those curves. That mouth. And oh, the things that come out of it! Those are just a few reasons why we can't get Jennifer Lopez, the star of Out Of Sight, out of our minds.

She's just what you'd want her to be: sassy, street, gorgeous, good. Especially right now. That's because right now the woman who left the South Bronx at twenty-one to become an In Living Color "fly girl," the woman who tells it like it is and don't we like that ("Madonna? Do I think she's a great actress? No," she said to a reporter. "Gwyneth Paltrow? I don't remember anything she was in . . . I heard more about her and Brad Pitt than I ever did about her work."), and - okay, maybe most of all - the woman who brought curvy backsides front and center is stretched across a plush couch in her midtown New York split-level hotel suite while late-afternoon sun floods the room. Packed into a provocatively tight gray Gucci turtleneck sweater, black stretch pants, and high-heeled leather boots, the five-foot-five Bronx bombshell casually raises her right leg skyward, then oh-so-slowly pulls it to the tip of her nose. And, before you know it, there it is right now: She's doing a split for you. Maybe it's just a dancer's thing. Maybe she's shamelessly flirting. Who cares? How could we not make a vision like this our Woman of the Year? Say hello to Jennifer Lopez.

Jennifer had a big year. Most importantly, of course, there was Out of Sight, in which the twenty-eight-year-old actress kicked her way into George Clooney's trunk and America's collective fantasy. It was also the film that earned her the biggest payday ever for a Latina actress: $2 million. But there were other milestones that made Jennifer a unanimous choice: appearances in Sean "Puffy" Combs' "Been Around the World" video and Marc Anthony's "Te Conosco Bien" video; that eye-popping "Danger: Curves Ahead" entrance at the Academy Awards; a big fat modeling contract with L'Oreal; a Sony record deal for her forthcoming debut album of Latin soul; and, oh yeah, a divorce from her husband of one year, followed by unrelenting speculation about an affair with - oh, you read that too? - Puff Daddy.

So join Jennifer as the Empire State Building shimmers outside her hotel (she's been living here since her divorce) and she shimmies around her glamorous abode du jour. She may not be here tomorrow, you know - she "might just fly to Miami - that's the way I am." But right now she's all yours. So get it while you can.

Hey there, Miss Lopez.

Hey, you want a chocolate? I got a big box. It's from Jeffrey Katzenberg and,,. (gets up from the couch, opens a big red box, and gasps). Who eats this much chocolate, Jeffrey? Oh, wait, this is a chocolate covered Oreo. Can't frown on that, right? (straddles the couch and munches down)

Chocolates from Jeffrey Katzenberg and a room with a view - wow, that's not bad for a poor little Puerto Rican girl from the South Bronx.

It's funny. I went to Paris for the Versace show with my assistant Arlene, who I've known since I was seven, and they flew us there on the Concorde. At the airport a silver Mercedes picked us up. So we get in, and I put a tape of my new album in the tape deck, and we're sitting there, smiling ear to ear, and I said, "Look at us. We're two simple girls from the Bronx in a Mercedes in Paris with a guard and a driver, listening to my album on our way to our two bedroom suite!" I felt like Audrey Hepburn.

So did you always want to be rich and famous, Sabrina?

Always. Well, I always wanted to sing and dance and be in movies, but when you're little, you don't really understand what the "rich and famous" part is all about - it's just a catchphrase that means (points at imaginary screen) "I wanna be doing what they're doing up there." And ever since I was three that's how I was - I always felt all this drama inside of me.

So what was this drama mama's favorite movie back then?

West Side Story, which I've seen more than a hundred times and I'd watch right now, if I could. I loved that it was a musical and about Puerto Ricans and that they were living where I lived. I wanted to be Anita because I love to dance and she was Bernardo's girlfriend and he was so hot. (pauses) But then Maria was the star of the movie. So it was basically like, I gotta be Maria.

But Maria's so dull.

She's dull, but she's the star! (laughs)

And you're an ambitious girl.

And I've always said I was.

And you were raised in one of the poorest, most notorious neighborhoods in America.

Yeah, I remember the word "bills" from when I was two. And yeah, my two sisters and my morn and dad and I, we all lived in a small apartment that was cold in the winter and hot in the summer. But hey, there was always rice and beans.

So what made you think you could ditch the rice and beans to become a future Woman of the Year?

Well, first off, chicken cutlets and red beans and rice is still my favorite dish, (smiles) but I don't know - I just always wanted to achieve and be proud of myself.

Were you a major babe as a young Bronx girl?

I wasn't one of the hotter girls - my body hadn't developed much - but I was one of the cooler girls. Then in the tenth grade, I started dating my first boyfriend, and he made me feel like a hot babe. I stayed with him for almost nine years.

And is he the man who made the first touchdown with you?

Yeah. (sighs) I was seventeen.

How was it?

I don't know if anybody has a great first experience - I mean, at the time you're just two kids trying things out and nobody knows what they're doing. Later, it became much more exciting, (ponders a moment) But you know - really, I still feel like I'm learning. And I'm open to learning more. And I want my partner to be, too. (worked up now) There's always room for improvement, so do not get too comfortable!

And how many men have you not gotten too comfortable with?

I'm embarrassed, 'cause I'll sound so inexperienced, but, well, let's put it this way: I can count them on one hand.

Wow. So how important is xes in your life?

Oh God, I can see already that this is gonna be the kind of article that'll make my mother say "Why did you talk about xes so much!" (suddenly yells) Arlene! Come here! (Arlene trudges in) I want you to sit here while we talk about xes. Okay, go ahead, ask whatever. She knows me better than anybody, even my parents.

Um, okay. Arlene, were you the first person that Jennifer told about losing her virginity?

JENNIFER (immediately): No - I didn't tell anybody!

ARLENE (rolling her eyes): She was a geek.

JENNIFER: But Arlene, that was a secret of ours - we didn't tell anybody.

ARLENE (deadpan smile): That's so sweet. Goodbye, (she leaves)

Goodbye. Okay, Jennifer, now that you're all embarrassed, let me ask you this: One of your best movie lines was in U-Turn when you said to Sean Penn, "You don't know whether to fµck me or kill me." When was the last time you had to say that in real life?

(laughs) I'm not as insane as that girl, so I don't drive men to that point. Until after I leave them.

Got it. So when you're fed up with a guy, how does he know?

I'm a very patient person, but the minute I lose my patience I don't beat around the bush - I cut to the jugular and you're there with your head on the floor, still talking.

Sounds like one of your movies. Let's see... so far you've pushed Sean Penn off a cliff and tomahawked Nick Nolte in the chest [both in U-Turn], punched out Wesley Snipes [Money Tram], and shot George Clooney in the leg [Out of Sight]. That's a good track record!

But I did all those things out of love. (smiles sweetly)

Did you, now? So how does the little killer's tough love translate into real life?

It depends on how the guy's getting out of line. But I don't allow them to really get to doing me wrong, 'cause I don't stay in those types of relationships.

How easily do you fall in love?

Not very, but when I do, it's intense. A successful career is not happiness, and if you look for it to be, when it goes wrong you're gonna be sunk, you're gonna be sick, you're gonna be finished. So love is very important in my life - I need to give affection and make people feel good.

And your life has now become a constant stream of tabloid items about people you may or may not be making feel good. Thus far you've been paired with Tommy Mottola, Marc Anthony, and Puff Daddy. Which rumor isn't true that you most wish were?

I swear to God I don't read the tabloids much. I've even trained my family not to call me and tell me what the garbage is - because unless they're saying you're killing dogs in the stairway for some religious ritual, it's better not to know. So, I don't know - which one do you wish was true?

Well, the Tommy Mottola rumor would be nice, because then you could get in fights with Mariah Carey and be sleeping with the head of your record company.(aghast) Why would you want that? That is so sick!

You're the one who asked.

Well, it's not true, thank God!

Okay. Those are lovely diamond rings, though. Where did you buy them?

I didn't buy them - they were gifts, (whispers) From a friend.

Must be a pretty good friend.

I told you - I make people feel special.

Uh-huh. So tell me, what's your secret recipe for seduction?

(stretches out on couch in full coquette mode) One teaspoon of flirtiness, one teaspoon of laughter, and a cupful of uninhibitedness.

And is that why Puff Daddy got you that ring?

(aghast again) Why would you even say that!

Because you know that's what everybody thinks. And also because right now you're humping that pillow between your legs.

No, I'm not- this is the way I sleep! Look, Puff and I have hung out and been friends since we did our video, so people started making up all these rumors.

So you're not dating him?

(none too convincingly) No.

Fine. New subject: Why, at the height of your movie stardom, have you decided to make your singing debut? It didn't work for Don Johnson.

Because it's tough, challenging, and scary - all the stuff I love. And singing and dancing is where I started - and when I was doing Selena, she inspired me to pursue that part of me all over again. I mean, I do get vibes from people like "She's crazy to be going after this," and it is a risk, but I have the same mentality I had with the movies: If I would've held back on that

because I was scared and from the Bronx, I wouldn't be where I am today.

So, like Selena, are you aiming for the Astrodome?

Aren't we all?

What'll you do if the album flops?

Make another.

Go, baby. So what are your songs about?Mostly love and partying.

Quick - what's your party cocktail of choice?

I don't drink, smoke, or take drugs. Never even tried them. I'm too focused.

Wow, again. Okay: The record?

I cowrote three songs. One, "It Shoulda Never," is about a situation when you just feel like you should have never touched that person. You know? Not that you really regret it, because you love that person, too.

People will assume, of course, that this is about your ex-husband, Ojani Noa.

Well, let 'em think whatever they wanna think. I really don't give a sh!t.

Okay, then, let's talk about what you're scratching right now.

My butt? (laughs) It's funny - a lot of people have been asking me lately, "When did people start talking so much about your butt? When did this happen?"

Yeah, some people are famous for their breasts, but you, little one, are famous for your booty.

I think it started with Selena and all those tight pants. But you know, I don't have to be a size 2 to be sexy. I love my butt and I was never ashamed of it, and I guess not being ashamed of something like that, which is uncharacteristic of this society, made it become a focal point.

Yup. A journalist told me that Mark Wahlberg said his personal high point of the MTV Video Music Awards was when you took him into a bathroom and showed him - and I quote - your "bare rear end."

Marky must be trying to score some points with his friends back in his neighborhood, 'cause if you think I would go into a bathroom and show anybody my ass, you must be crazy! I'm gonna have to call that boy and slap him across the mouth!

I guess this means there'll be no Playboy spreads for you.

Hell no - I'm not planning on showing anybody but my gynecologist what I've got between my legs.

You're a pistol, Jennifer. Do you ever feel insecure?

When I'm not prepared. Which is almost never.

What do you think of the term "Latin spitfire"?

I don't know. I mean, what is a Latin spitfire? One of the things that Out of Sight did was make people see me in a different light, in a role that wasn't constantly saying I was Latin. I was just a strong woman opposite a man, and that's always been a goal of mine. Which is not to say that if a Latin role came along I'd turn it down, because I'm more than proud of my heritage.

What's it like now when you go home to that heritage?

Everybody's supportive, but some people are a little weirded out. They've seen you thirty feet big, you're in the papers, and people talk about you on TV, so now they think you're a different person. After five seconds they realize you're still normal.

And, like you say, you're good at making people feel good, aren't you?

Yeah, honey, that's what I do. (picks up her box) Would you like another chocolate? 

#jennifer lopez #jlo #press/article #1999 #details magazine