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dex-xe · 3 years

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I’ve made Spotify playlists inspired by each of the ghosts and I’ve made these little written pieces to talk about them. if you wanna read them, please go ahead - if not then enjoy the music!!

This is Kitty’s playlist:

Best Friend - Rex Orange County

Kitty’s friendliness is just so sweet to me like I love that after a few episodes Alison accepts Kitty as a good friend but like before that when Kitty wants a sleepover which Alison basically denies her, I’m like O.o Kitty pls be my best friend ily!!

Piano Concerto No. 21 in C Major - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart & Géza Anda

I wanted to include at least a little bit of music from each of the ghosts time frame so I decided on a little bit of Mozart for Kitty - who, given when she lived and the familial culture at the time, probably played an instrument with piano being entirely probable.

Wildest Dreams - Duomo

I wanted to include at least one Bridgerton song for Kitty because I mean it’s obvious how influential issues brought up in the show would be on Kitty’s life. She was alive just before Bridgerton is set (1813 - Kitty died in the late 1700s) so I think she’d appreciate the modern song with a twist, and obviously she’d love the all the dances and everything.

Walking On Sunshine - Katrina & The Waves

An easy choice. I mean, it’s literally the go to song for people who are incredibly happy and optimistic. I didn’t want to include tons of overly happy songs for Kitty because I find her overwhelming happiness to be tinged with such sadness — she’s positive to a fault and it’s so sad what she went through during her life but yeah it’s a nice song for her.

Forever Young - Alphaville

I read somewhere that Kitty is canonically a teenager - I don’t know if that’s true so if someone could enlighten me that would be really great. But yeah is Kitty the youngest ghosts, surely it’s her or Thomas right? Anyway, Kitty will be forever young and I find that a weird concept?? That’s my in depth analysis XD

Enter One - Sol Seppy

I have so so so so so so so so much love for this song I think it’s just gorgeous. Okay but like assuming Kitty grew up at Button House (or I assume Higham House at the time) then she would’ve grown up literally from a little kid in front of some of the other ghosts (Robin, Humphrey, Mary and Annie) so like they witnessed whatever trauma and/or neglect Kitty went through. Ages ago I read someone talking about the ghosts watching her grow up and then taking care of her for the first time after she died (I can’t find the post) so like this verse: “To a friend, A sister in need, Who is not alone, And they are surrounding her, And they will enfold her outstretched hand, In our love” is just so beautiful for that moment when they finally get to take her away from her family which I love and adore and uhhhhh it’s so good, it’s such a good song.

Shake It Off - Taylor Swift

Okay from me legit crying over Kitty’s life and emotional stuff to just being like yeah this is a happy song and just something to dance to!!

Magnificent (She Says) - Elbow

This song just has gorgeous vibes and given that Kitty has just gorgeous vibes as well it was impossible for me not to include it.

Good Day - The Dresden Dolls

Someone suggested The Dresden Dolls for Kitty on my previous music post and I’d never heard of them before I’m a bit in love now… like the dark cabaret style and creepy sorta vocals and piano are just <3 <3 Like damn! And yeah I think this song is Kitty-like cause like when Alison was kinda ignoring her in ALN she got really upset as if this was a regular occurrence in her life as well like her sister or maybe her parents ignoring her in favour of her sister maybe??

Optimistic - Radiohead

“And remember: as long as you try your best.” I think that line is probably the moment of Kitty’s “personality introduction” so I kinda had to include something similar.

Devil Town - Cavetown

Okay I know this song is about parental divorce but I kinda like to apply it a bit more widely to broken families and dysfunctional households which Kitty obviously experienced. I think also the line “nevermind, I’ll settle for two birthdays” shows a kind of optimism in the face of family trauma and the acceptance that bad things often have to be spun in a positive light to cope with it.

growing up is getting old - VICTORIA

Kitty angst, Kitty angst, Kitty angst!!! After the episode descriptions we got today I am really really hoping for much more of a deep dive into Kitty’s emotions. I just want to know more about her life, and I just want the other ghosts to be protective and loving of her O.O

Stacking Chairs - Middle Kids

Kitty’s urge to be around Alison and do what’s best for her is just what I love more than anything. I really love that scene she has with the Captain where he’s like “you one Alison?” And “You want what’s best for her” like Cap/Kitty solidarity is what I live for (more to come in season 3????)

Teenage Dream - Katy Perry

I feel like with Alison arriving at the house Kitty finally has the opportunity to be a young woman again?? If that makes sense. Cause she’s been around generally older and predominantly male ghosts for a long time which is why I think she’s fixated on Alison so much because it’s the first time in centuries that she’s been around someone with similar interests etc as her. So yeah, like asking for the sleepover and wanting to talk about boys and stuff gives me Teenage Dream vibes.

In One Ear - Cage The Elephant

Like I said I didn’t want Kitty’s playlist to all be soft and sweet cause I feel like that’s kinda reducing everything about her into a little soft ball of syrup so yeah this song is sick and it’s basically about not caring what others say about you but yeah I like it!!

Would You Be So Kind - dodie

I had to include something dodie cause she’s just got that soft kind vibe. I don’t love many of her songs, it’s not really my style, but this (and In The Middle) are pretty good. Also I don’t think Kitty has much of a distinction between platonic and romantic love (same Kitty) and therefore this song is pretty fitting.

Amazing Grace - Judy Collins

If I could include Kitty’s ‘Amazing Kitty’, I definitely would cause that whole scene is just really funny. But like I said, I’m trying to include some music from when they would have lived and Amazing Grace is from the 1770s which is just when Kitty would’ve been born.

Happy - Pharrell Williams

An obvious choice but I wanted to talk about this a touch. My irl friend hates Kitty so much because she say she can’t stand people who are always happy and like infectiously positive all the time and literally every time Kitty is on screen she starts complaining and I find it so bizarre and like I’ve called her out a number of times like stfu but it’s constant. Like I find Kitty’s happiness kinda melancholy cause like she has so much to be sad about like her family and sister and stuff and I think learning more about in her life will just extend quite how sad her overt happiness actually is.

We’re Going to Be Friends - The White Stripes

Ngl I had no idea this was by The White Stripes before searching it up but apparently it is. It’s about like childhood friendship and nostalgia which I think is very right for Kitty as she works to try and make Alison her best friend after not having one during her life (and therefore relying on Florence the statue).

Girls Just Want to Have Fun - Cyndi Lauper

This song just gives me major girly sleepover vibes which I think is quite fitting. I find it interesting that as soon as Alison can see the ghosts (and accepts that she can see them) the first thing Kitty asks of Alison is to have a sleepover, maybe she sees that as the true mark of friendship? Perhaps her sister was always having sleepovers with her friends and Kitty wanted to join? I want to know Kitty’s backstory more than anyones, I think she’s fascinating!!

#bbc ghosts #bbc ghosts kitty

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missielynne · 2 years

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Imagine Captain and kitty comparing Captain America the first avenger and the winter solider with Sleepy hollow on FOX after seeing it. The main character of sleepy hollow and captain America is a solider from their time who died then came back to life in the 21st century. Ichabod and Steve saw their friend die but they didn’t see them being transformed into the horseman of death and the winter solider.

I actually talked a little about the cap part in the "What would Cap think about Captain America?" ask. :) I think it would be SO interesting to have them watching these shows together in particular. re his experience with Havers going away making Steve losing Bucky to the Winter Soldier persona be something that really would hit him hard emotionally, especially since Bucky becomes a "bad guy" on the wrong side of the war and whatever.

But when it comes to him and Kitty watching SH and CA, in some ways I think would be interesting for both of them because they can relate to the idea of being "out of time" and having to adjust so to speak, the longer they've been dead.

And I think the Brom/Ichabod thing would hit Kitty pretty hard because while there's a chance that ghost Cap could see older Havers and be relieved he's still the same (just like Cap gets to do with Peggy, and eventually, Bucky, and this is something I would LOVE to see on screen for BBC Cap) Kitty's far enough back that she just has really nasty memories of the sister she thought was a good and loving person unless she looks up a living descendant somehow or something.

I'm probably ranting on a completely different track than what you intended, but I do think they would get a lot out of both shows, especially with Ichabod and Steve being from each one's own time. They see how these characters adjust with a good friend and lots of support (just like they give each other, and this is a relationship I want more of) and I hope it would make them more comfortable with their own journeys before they cross over.

#bbc ghosts #missielynne's awesome anon

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possiblyimbiassed · 4 years

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What happened to Sherlock? Part VIII - The Sign of the Hetero Norm (1)

Why does Mary Morstan play such a prominent role in BBC Sherlock?

I’m surely not the only one asking myself this; while she’s barely mentioned in canon after marrying Watson, she’s all over the place from TEH and onwards in Mofftiss’ adaptation. And when I recently read this excellent fic by @discordantwords, a couple of things dawned on me, that I think have been brewing in my mind for quite some time. Which brings me to the long promised continuation of my marathon meta series about what I think we’re actually seeing in this show. Because the entire point of Mary Morstan seems to be to prevent Sherlock and John from getting together in a romantic relationship - a story of hetero norm. This eighth installment will explore the ‘case’ of little Rosie, and the role she and her mother plays in this show.

This far I’ve published an intro and seven installments, each with corresponding attempts to test my hypotheses:

Introduction - The game is on (explains the method of analysis) Part I - Blog vs TV-show Part II - Re-living memories Part III - Drugs and weirdness Part IV – Heartbreak and coma (1) Part IV – Heartbreak and coma (2) Part V – Bizarre scenarios Part VI - Live and let die (1) Part VI - Live and let die (2)

Part VII - The Importance of Being Earnest (1)

Part VII - The Importance of Being Earnest (2)

This installment will also be parted in two, and the second half can be found here (X). Many of the screen caps from BBC Sherlock in this meta are from Kissthemgoodbye.net - thanks! And thanks also to Ariane DeVere for the incredibly useful transcripts!

My next hypotheses is, in and off itself, a clear and straightforward prediction that can be explicitly verified or falsified once we finally get to S5, so it will be extra fun to see what happens with it in future:

Hypothesis #8: John is not the father of Mary’s baby

(Disclaimer: My suspicion here only concerns John’s biological offspring. It would still be possible that John, and perhaps also Sherlock, might father the child - if it exists - by adoption. It does not exclude a metaphorical reading where the baby represents, for example, Sherlock’s and John’s relationship. I also want to stress that this hypothesis is an attempt at logical reasoning based on observations in the show and in ACD canon; it’s not meant to be ‘gossipy’ and has nothing to do with whether I would actually like to see this happen or not - that’s a whole other story. ;) )

This hypothesis has been brewing in my mind for quite some time now, but I don’t think it’s just a hunch; there are actually a series of reasons that have made me come to this conclusion.

(Continued under the cut)

But first of all: can we debunk my hypothesis at this stage in the story, by testing it ‘scientifically’? Well, not really, since the show doesn’t provide any reliable evidence that confirms John as Rosie’s biological father. Not even IRL would this have been possible without a DNA-test (or without physical circumstances that would have made any other option impossible). And the only thing that the show tells us about human DNA-tests is that not even this procedure is 100% reliable, as shown in ASIB:

JOHN: You were dead on a slab. It was definitely you. IRENE: DNA-tests are only as good as the records you keep. JOHN: And I bet you know the record-keeper. IRENE: I know what he likes, and I needed to disappear.

DNA is brought up in TGG (Ian Monkford’s blood) and again in TST (the identification of Charlie Wellsborough’s body), but since John’s fatherhood is never questioned in the show, little Rosie is never tested, as far as we know. The remaining evidence that speaks for John being the father is circumstantial: that John and Mary obviously must have been living together at the approximate time of conception. And that they both act as if they’re both Rosie’s parents.

So I guess that in order to get any further with this, I’ll have to start at the other end, analysing the characters and see if I can find evidence that support my hypothesis - on a textual level as well as metaphorically and on the meta level.

Mary’s function in the story

I think we can safely say that Mary is the most controversial character of BBC Sherlock. Some viewers love her, others hate her, but I can’t recall anyone claiming to feel indifferent towards her. Mofftiss have indeed managed to push forward a character who is hardly even visible in canon, once she’s married to Watson. In BBC Sherlock, however, Mary totally dominates the show from HLV and onwards. Her appearances may have been increasing in numbers and length already from her introduction in TEH. But from the point where John wakes up in HLV, there isn’t a single case where she’s not somehow involved. Up until TFP, everything is about ’Mary’. And even then, once we might have believed we’d got rid of the ghost of this hijacking protagonist, she comes back, only to once again take over the narrative with a weird and basically inexplicable voiceover. She seems like some kind of obsession; a brain ghost stuck on someone’s mind.

This is rather different from ACD canon, where Mary Morstan has extremely few lines as soon as she’s no longer a client, but Watson’s wife. Personally I find it hard to see the lovable aspect of this character in BBC Sherlock, since she constantly shifts appearance, behaviour and motivation; it’s almost impossible to pin down who she actually is. Which makes me convinced that Mary is not meant to be a real, believable character that we can relate to as such - at least not all the time. And maybe that goes for canon as well.

But what then is the purpose of her, what’s Mary’s actual function in the narrative, looking at the subtext? I think there’s basically three of them, and by no means mutually exclusive:

1. Mary is a metaphor for heteronormativity and its power over people when they internalise it

2. Mary is a façade or ‘beard’, where a straight marriage is established to cover up a story of a gay relationship

3. Mary is a mirror for Sherlock; by substituting himself with a female spouse for John, Sherlock can be with John ‘by proxy’, trying to figure out John without having to face his own real problem: reveal his emotions and risk failure.

As soon as Mary firmly puts her foot in the show, it all becomes a spectacle, a demonstration of how to keep up a straight facade at any cost. After TSoT, no-one ever assumes John and Sherlock are a romantic couple; Mary is the ultimate ’proof’ that John is indeed straight. Which is of course illogical, because why would a bi person stop being it because they married someone, no matter of which sex? Mary admits it herself by telling Sherlock that ”neither of us was the first, you know”. And Sherlock complains that John is dancing around Sholto ”like a puppet” even after the wedding ceremony. But in all the episodes after TSoT, John is happily freed from people’s assumptions regarding his sexual orientation. Gone are all the gay jokes, and John Watson is miraculously ‘cured’.

I think this is perfectly illustrated in the fic by @discordantwords that I mentioned above. The plot follows logically on TFP, as things would be if everything we’ve seen from HLV and onwards is actually meant to be ‘true’. Mary is now dead and John lives alone with little Rosie. For a case, in order to get close to the suspects, Sherlock is planning to fake his own wedding with Janine Hawkins, and John is feeling jealous and excluded – especially when he finds out that one of the murders that Sherlock is investigating had involved a wedding of a gay couple:

"Why all of this, then?" he asked. He tipped his head towards the kitchen, where Janine was fiddling with the kettle. "I could have just—wouldn't it have been easier for us to just—?"

"You're not gay," Sherlock said.

"Well," John paused. "No." He cleared his throat, looked back at the wall. "But everyone already thinks we're a couple. Wouldn't be that much of a stretch, really. For a case."

"No one has thought that for quite some time."

This fanfic rings perfectly true to me, considering S4 on the surface level; John and Sherlock appearing as a couple wouldn’t work after John’s own wedding in TSoT. Because gone is now every allusion to John being anything else than straight. Gone is also John’s admiration for Sherlock; from HLV and on, he hardly ever even speaks about Sherlock in a positive way. (Which also makes me wonder: was ‘The Fall’ also about Sherlock feeling he had fallen from John’s pedestal of admiration?). For the rest of the show, it’s only Sherlock whom we see suffering from (presumably) gay pining. It’s only in Sherlock’s Victorian imagination that Moriarty tells them to ’elope’ together, while John in TLD is shown to be exclusively fixed on his dead wife.

On the surface, Sherlock seems to support John’s relationship with Mary, while I’m sure he is actually suffering deeply. But I think, metaphorically, that Sherlock is acting like some kind of self-sacrificing Christ figure. (Don’t forget Irene’s words from ASiB: “I think you’re damaged, delusional and believe in a higher power. In your case, it’s yourself”). He bears the ‘cross’ of torture by seeing John with someone else, until he can’t stand it any more and trashes himself on drugs. This is what we see at the beginning of TEH, John holding hands with a woman in front of Sherlock’s grave:

Why can’t we see Mary’s face already here? I think it’s because this is from Sherlock’s POV; he’s either seeing or imagining them from behind. She might have a hidden face but a familiar shape because by the time Sherlock is recalling this, he already knows what Mary looks like. But at this point in time, maybe he didn’t? In any case, it must be devastating for Sherlock to see or imagine John with someone else, when he should be there to mourn him, Sherlock.

Thinking about John with Mary, Sherlock can’t even sleep. He is tortured on a cross and dies for all our ’sins’, doesn’t he? On the meta level Sherlock Holmes sacrifices his life, he extinguishes his true self, in the name of heteronormativity. So that John can have his straight marriage, even if it’s dysfunctional. But our worst ’sin’ as an audience, I believe - our ultimate mistake - is to buy into this narrative without questioning it. That’s literally letting the hetero norm rule.

King David the Adulterer

Mary’s ex-boyfriend David is introduced in TSoT, but after this episode he never shows up again. But this seems very random to me; why is David even there, and why is he depicted as some kind of rival to John? What is his narrative purpose? David is often blurred out in the scenes, but he is definitely present during the whole wedding reception, where his role is to be an usher (showing people their places/seats). David gives the impression to be single, since he attends Mary’s wedding without any partner as company.

Sherlock, who meets David alone at 221B during the wedding planning, deduces that he still seems to have an intimate relationship with Mary. Only recently I discovered this meta from 2014 called The Baby Problem by @abitnotgood, which brings up pretty much exactly the same suspicions I have had for quite some time now. The main points are the following:

Mary was dating David for 2 of the totally 5 years she had been undercover with the false name Mary.

They’re still close enough friends for David to attend the wedding, which might indicate their breakup was unwanted from one or both parts.

Mary’s reactions during the wedding reception indicates that she still cares for David.

Sherlock finds out that David has “offered to be her shoulder to cry on no less than three occasions.”

David sits at the same table as most other major characters, which indicates that he’s important.

David doesn’t look particularly happy while toasting for the bride and groom.

To these I could also add that Sherlock gets so suspicious about David that he threatens him with keeping a close eye on his whereabouts with Mary. From a story telling POV, when a character is suspected by the main character who is a genius detective, there should actually be some reason for this - shouldn’t it?

So who is David? Does he appear anywhere in canon? I actually think he does. In ACD’s short story The Crooked Man (CROO), the name David plays a symbolical role. The story is about a (supposed) murder of a middle-aged military officer, colonel James Barclay. It’s a classical Sherlock Holmes mystery with a door locked from the inside and the key missing. The death seems to originate from a domestic quarrel between the colonel and his wife. (Which is particularly interesting considering the Watsons’ ‘domestic’ in HLV).

Turns out the colonel died of fright when he saw his old rival Henry Wood, whom he had betrayed in the war and deliberately left to be captured by the enemy. Henry was repeatedly tortured and crippled and held prisoner for many years, until he could escape back to London and a coincidence brought his old love interest in his way, who was now married to the colonel. (Hmm... tortured by the enemy. Been away. Love interest married. Does this seem like anyone we know? ;) ). Henry was “the crooked man” of the story, who was bereft of his loved one because of James.

But the name David was mystically uttered by Colonel Barclay’s wife while quarreling with her husband - why? Holmes claimed it was a biblical reference to the drama of king David, Batsheba and Uriah. King David committed adultery with the beautiful Bathsheba, who was married to his soldier Uriah. Bathsheba got pregnant after sleeping with David, while Uriah was out fighting a war. David tried to cover up that fact by sending Uriah home, but Uriah refused to leave his comrades. Then David betrayed his rival Uriah the same way James betrayed Henry: by deliberately leaving him exposed to the enemy. The only difference was that Uriah died on the battlefield, while Henry was caught and crippled. Which leads us almost inevitably to Captain John Watson - he is a soldier who was crippled by the enemy too, wasn’t he? ;)

What about Rosie?

Although Mary is dominating the show from TEH and forwards, John’s and Mary’s daughter - little Rosie - is subjected to the opposite treatment; she has very little screen time, and we never learn about a single character trait of hers. In ACD canon the Watsons never had a child, as far as I know. And – even in Victorian times – I believe it would have seemed strange with the Doctor spending so much of his free time (besides work) together with Holmes, obviously neglecting his family duties. So since Mofftiss have introduced a totally new ingredient to their adaptation - a time-consuming baby - one would think this has to have a clear purpose, right? I would have expected Rosie to play a part of her own, someone the audience could relate to just like the other characters, if only still a baby.

But instead, Rosie is seen most of all as an obstacle. Mary is balancing her while discussing a case with Sherlock. Rosie is handed over to John like a sack of potatoes when the family goes on to solve a case with Sherlock; she doesn’t make a sound and we don’t even see her little face. We see John change Rosie’s diaper once (basically to show that he has a toy daisy behind his ear, which is apparently a good flirting device), and then we see Sherlock trying to babysit her at 221B, getting hit in the eye by her toy. We also hear her cry in the background once, and see Molly hold her once. And that’s about it.

When Sherlock texts them from the London Aquarium at the end of TST, Mary and John debate which of them is going to have to stay with the baby, but finally both of them show up at the Aquarium – without Rosie. And this happens not long after Mary has taken a ‘little trip’ around Eurasia ending up in Morocco and John and Sherlock going after her – little Rosie staying at home. Which means weeks without any of her parents. If S4 were real, I’d feel truly sorry for little Rosie.

In TLD, Rosie is more absent than her dead mother! While Mary haunts the episode, all we hear about the baby is John’s tremendous guilt for neglecting and abandoning her (which he manages to do completely). John does seem to have enough spare time and energy to go on another case with Sherlock, though, in the middle of his therapy session. At the end of TLD, all is supposedly fine again with Rosie (until John gets shot with a tranquiliser), but we never get to see it. But then in TFP John goes on a long journey with Sherlock to a far away island, and not a word about Rosie. She’s not even present when John receives Mary’s DVD at home. At the end she’s suddenly there again, though, without any comment.

Based on this, it doesn’t seem farfetched to ask if this little character is even supposed to be real. There’s a subtle hint in TLD which could point in this skeptic direction:

Sherlock: “And, of course, I hadn’t really anticipated that I’d hallucinated meeting his daughter.” “Still a bit troubled by the daughter. Did seem very real, and she gave me information I couldn’t have acquired elsewhere.”

John: “But she wasn’t ever here?”

An earlier quote from TGG could also question John’s fatherhood: ”Of course he’s not the boy’s father - look at the turnups on his jeans!” (Sherlock while watching telly with John in TGG, right after the fourth ‘pip’).

And - of course - if S4 is all imaginary, only happening in Sherlock’s head, Rosie would probably not even have been born yet.

There are also some more subtle hints about Rosie’s narrative function: John’s guilt about cheating on Mary in TLD is connected to the baby. John specifically mentions that he was “cheating” on Mary while she was taking care of Rosie: JOHN (to Ghost!Mary): “We texted constantly. You wanna know when? Every time you left the room, that’s when. When you were feeding our daughter; when you were stopping her from crying – that’s when.” This does make the (otherwise rather exaggerated) texting affair sound a bit more damning for John, doesn’t it? ;) If this is all taking place inside Sherlock’s head, it might rather reflect one of Sherlock’s (possibly) major excuses to himself for not confessing his true feelings to John; it might (once the baby is born) disrupt a whole family and affect an innocent little child.

John and Mary’s relationship

The other day I took to re-watch this little piece of extra material from S4: statements by Martin Freeman and Amanda Abbington about John’s and Mary’s relationship (X). Every time I see this video I’m just laughing so hard. Please don’t miss how Martin is struggling to keep a straight face without smiling, after claiming “they’ve been through stuff already in S3 that would test any couple.” (Yep. Like the discovery that Mary is actually a contract killer who shot his best friend and hasn’t even revealed her real name to John). Or how Amanda avoids looking at the camera when she’s lying talking about Mary’s feelings towards John, closing her eyes and shaking her head. Great acting! :)

I mean, this cannot even be intended to fool anyone; I think this is meant to signal to the audience that the marriage we’re seeing is a dishonest, superficial construction made up of empty words. It’s very similar to the scene in HLV where Sherlock tells John about his ‘relationship’ with Janine. Platitudes like “we’re in a good place” are not only included, but also called out in the very same dialogue. John: “You got that from a book!” Sherlock: “Everyone got that from a book!”. In the video clip, overly sweet violin music is playing when Martin and Amanda talk about their characters’ supposed deep love for each other, but this is mixed up with sitcom-like scenes where this love is made very hard to believe in, like Mary about to give birth in the car and roaring to her husband to pull over, or John telling Mary that he simply intends to forget about a recent past where she very nearly murdered his best friend.

John’s marriage actually seems terrible from start; he can’t even keep himself off Sherlock’s blog comments during his own honeymoon. Which I believe is canon consistent; in ACD’s stories Mary Morstan even encourages Watson to never leave Holmes’ side. And the bad marriage is also confirmed in HLV by Wiggins’ and Sherlock’s deductions about John’s cycling to work and keeping his shirts ‘folded and ready to leave’ at any moment.

But what’s Mary’s position in this? Let’s say, as a mental experiment, that she knows from start about John’s feelings for Sherlock. Why would she want to be together with, and even go on to marry, a man who is obviously in love with someone else? Well, while I don’t buy the facade-climbing Ninja!Mary who tries to kill Sherlock in HLV, she could still be dishonest in her approach to John. She could still be on some sort of mission related to Sherlock, where her role simply is to get in between John and Sherlock, while she actually is together with someone else (and even carrying that someone’s child). Her aim could be to hurt Sherlock as much as possible, for a specific reason.

As far as I see in TEH, Mary seems suspiciously eager to befriend Sherlock. Instead of behaving like one would expect from someone in love who just got their special moment ruined by a rival; with anger or at least annoyance, and of course supporting the beloved - Mary immediately sides with Sherlock.

And she seems to side with him most of all on an intellectual level, taking part in his explanations of how he managed to fake his death.

“Oh, he would have needed a confidant...”

So - what can we deduce about Mary?

If everything we see in the show after TSoT only has happened inside Sherlock’s head (as I’ve tried to make a case for in this meta series), from this follows logically that in Sherlock’s ‘reality’, there is no Assasin!Mary, no SecretAgent!Mary, no Martyr!Mary and - of course - no Ghost!Mary. Because up until the wedding, Mary seemed to be just an ordinary woman. The character’s appearance from HLV and onwards would all be fabrications of Sherlock’s drug-influenced mind, albeit loaded with a lot of metaphorical meaning from his subconscious.

But Mary still seems to exist on some level, doesn’t she? She is referred to by John on his blog, talked about by other people on the blog (including Sherlock), and she even makes comments on it on no less than ten occasions. On the blog, John is clear about getting married to Mary. And after Sherlock’s final blog post ‘The Sign of Three’, it also gets obvious that Mary is now pregnant.

And – most importantly – if S4 is all-fake, this also means that in Sherlock’s ‘reality’, Mary’s drama-loaded death in TST never happened. Mary is still alive! So if Mary is a ‘façade’, a ‘beard’ and/or a mirror for Sherlock on a meta- and sub-textual level, who is she on the textual level? Well, I think there are some clues in the show, and also a lot of subtext material in ACD canon to draw from, which might have been developed into actual story line in the show.

And this will bring us to the second half of this meta, which you can find here (X).

Tagging some people who might be interested: @raggedyblue @ebaeschnbliah @sarahthecoat @gosherlocked @loveismyrevolution @sagestreet @tjlcisthenewsexy @elldotsee @88thparallel @devoursjohnlock @sherlock-overflow-error @yeah-oh-shit

#who is mary?

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ebaeschnbliah · 7 years

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SHERLOCK BBC - THE LIST OF THOUGHTS & IDEAS

________________________________________________________________

Revised and updated version and under the cut .... because it's a bit longish. :)))

July 2017 _______________________________________________________

THE RETURN OF BASKERVILLE ....... Baskerville revisited in S4

HENRY KNIGHT ....... The story of a very interesting character and a mirror for Sherlock

THE RAINBOW CROWN ....... The vitruvian man, the rainbow crown and Sherlock's ‘I love you’

THE GOVERNOR AND HIS WIFE ....... The first task of Sherrinford - Reichenbach all over ... with a touch of TBB

DAVID DAVID DAVID ....... A comparison of the three David's in Sherlock BBC

FIVE FUNNY STORIES ....... The stories Sherlock mentions at the wedding in TSOT and their possible connection to each series of Sherlock BBC

THE ONE IN THE COCKPIT ....... About pilots and drivers, flying and driving, aeroplanes and cabs, queens and serial killers

MOVIE WATCHING IN MYCROFTS HOME CINEMA ....... The movie Mycroft watches at the beginning of TFP and the manipulated part of it

A COFFIN FOR LOVE ....... The third task of Sherrinford - Sherlock and love

A SMASHED GLASS OF CHAMPAGNE ....... Screen caps of the falling glass of champagne in TSOT

WHEN SHERLOCK LIES DRUGGED IN A CAB ....... Musings about the strange parts of the PILOT

COVERED IN BLUE ....... Blue from the end in TFP to the beginning in ASIP

June 2017 ______________________________________________________

THE THREE GARRIDEBS OF SHERRINFORD ....... The second task of Sherrinford. Who are the three Garridebs?

ONE OF A KIND ....... Sherlock is Eurus - what an image reveals

SHADOWS ON THE WALL ....... Musings on the shadows in Faith's memory who are almost going to kiss (TLD)

ANOTHER SIGN OF THREE ? ....... Sherlock, John, Mary - different facettes of one character

JIM'S SONGS ....... Are the songs mirrors for Sherlock's own past?

THE NOTE IN THE BOOKCASE ....... A piece of lost information

FATHERS AND SONS ....... David Welsborough and Major Barrymore

A DOG BARKS IN THE NIGHT ....... When John wakes from his nightmare in ASIP

ELLA THOMPSON ....... The changeable therapist

May 2017 _______________________________________________________

TWO TIMES CHARLES ....... Carl Powers and Charlie Welsborough

THE IMPORTANCE OF LITTLE THINGS ....... Boomerang, hairpin and hairband - are they connected?

EXPLOSIVE - IT'S MORE ME ....... A metaphorical reading of ASIB and Irene Adler

MAGIC AT SPEEDY'S ....... The 'vanishing' mirror behind Mycroft and 'endless mirroring'

MRS. WENCESLAS ....... Good king Wenceslas and a Chrismas song

April 2017 _______________________________________________________

SOME MUSINGS ON DAMP COATS ....... Faith's coat - a possible connection to the pink lady from ASIP?

STALKING THE DEERSTALKER ....... The silly hat throughout the series (used as a port key to change levels in the Mind-Palace?)

THINGS COMING IN PAIRS ....... It started with the kidneys - but didn't end there

SHERLOCK, THE STAG AND THE SKULL ....... Colors & symbolism in TAB

THE REICHENBACH FALL TIME CONUNDRUM ....... Time and daylight

I DON'T WANT TO KNOW HOW ....... Asking for an explanation

A . N . Y . O . N . E ....... One word throughout the story

ABOUT DETECTIVES AND DOGS ....... A name and its history

March 2017 _____________________________________________________

AN INCANDESCENT MIND BEING USED ....... Genius, brother, prisoner (Sherlock = Eurus)

UNDER THE SIGN OF FOUR ....... A.G.R.A. Alex, Gabriel, Rosamund & Ajay - Who are they?

ADDITIONS to UTSOF ....... A.G.R.A. and the 4 assassins from TRF

LITTLE ROSIE - THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM ....... An interpretation

PLAYING WITH COLORS AND THOUGHTS ....... Not the common color code

ONE - TWO - THREE ....... Three players, three bombs

AROUND THE PATIENCE GRENADE ....... What images are telling

WHEN THERE'S NOTHING TO SEE THROUGH ....... Touching the glass that isn't there

VIVIAN NORBURY ....... Who is the person who almost outsmarted them all?

February 2017 ___________________________________________________

A E R O P L A N E S ....... The importance of aeroplanes throughout the story

A STRANGE PERSPECTIVE ....... Eurus cell - shot in different angles

THE ROADS WE WALK ....... From 'headless nuns' to sisters turned into 'ghost stories'

THE BLOOD CARPET ....... Like a puddle of blood on the floor

ON THE ROLL OF A DICE ....... Mary's hiatus in TST - really neat?

DEATH & CHESS & MANY CASES ....... About the appearance of death in each episode

FOUR STAGES & FOUR CASES ADDITIONS ....... Stages inside stages

TALKING ABOUT THE FINAL PROBLEM ....... Steven Moffat, BFI Screening Q&A 01 2017

AJAY - SHERLOCK - JIM ....... Characters with similarities

OH HAVE YOU HAD SEX ....... How I reed that scene

A STUDY IN MIRRORING ....... Eurus/Sherlock vs. Eurus/Jim

SAVING JOHN WATSON ....... From the PILOT & ASIP to TLD

January 2017 ____________________________________________________

THE FIVE HOSTAGES ....... Connections between TGG & TFP

FIVE YEARS AGO WHEN IT WAS CHRISTMAS ...... Eurus, Jim & Sherlock

YELLOWBEARD'S HAIRBAND ....... Eurus, Victor & Sherlock - Symbolism

THE SYMBOLISM OF EXPLODING BOMBS ....... 221b hit by explosions - TGG and TFP

RIGHT UP YOUR STRASSE ....... DI Lestrade using german language

HOLMES FAMILY PICTURES ....... Mycrofts manipulated movie from TFP

IT'S AN EXPERIMENT ....... More thoughts about the PILOT theory (EEMP)

THE FINAL PROBLEM ....... First impression - symbolism and subtext

A DETECTIVE LYING DOWN ....... Throughout the whole story

SHERLOCK is ANYONE ....... Sherlock fighting his demon(s) - drug addiction

THE STAGE IS SET (once again) ....... Possible startingpoints for EEMP

WHAT MIGHT HAVE HAPPENED ON JANUARY 15th ....... A PILOT verse theory (EEMP)

HE'S STILL NOT MOVING ....... The bloodhound and John

THE APPLETREE ON THE GREEN WALL ...... Apples and roses - symbolism

ON THE TRESHOLD OF SAMARRA ....... Sherlock will be epic

JUST LOOK - HOW BEAUTIFUL ....... Mirrors of the special kind - buildings mirrored in car roofs

ACTION MAN & GINGERBREADMAN ....... Burned to a crisp - parallels

WHERE IT BEGAN - WHERE IT ENDS ....... Carl Powers & Charlie Welsborough

THE MASKS ARE CRUMBLING DOWN ....... Sherlock's facade is falling

PORKY PIGS AND LOTS OF BLOOD ....... Dead pigs throughout the series

NORBURY ....... The yellow face in TST

AMMO STRIKES AGAIN ....... Parallels and the Urban Dictionary

December 2016 __________________________________________________

WHAT MIGHT HAVE HAPPENED ON JANUARY 15th ... (first post of it but Tumblr 'ate' it - restored in January)

THE STAGE IS SET - THE CURTAIN RISES ... (first post of it but Tumblr 'ate' it - restored in January)

THE BAFTA CYMRU MONTAGE ....... A very special kind of montage

TPLOSH or TILOSH ....... Somtimes silly thoughts arise ... or maybe not?

November 2016 __________________________________________________

A DOCTOR IN HIS NATURAL MILIEU ....... Two surgeries and their very different lightning

PRETTY GRIM FAIRY TALES ....... Following the trace of media

A MIRROR HIDING IN PLAIN SIGHT - EDITED ...... More parallels between Sherlock & Mary

A MIRROR HIDING IN PLAIN SIGHT ....... Parallels between Sherlock & Mary

READING INFORMATION ....... Sherlock and Magnusson reading people - a comparison

SOME COURTROOM DEDUCTIONS ....... Courtrooms and Hearing rooms

A LITTLE GIRL, BLOND WITH BRAIDED HAIR ....... The traces of hair, hats and pigtails in Sherlock BBC

DRESS MEETS BELL ....... The doorbell of 221b and Mrs. Hudson's dress

October 2016 ____________________________________________________

THE EMPTY HOUSES ....... Three different Empty Houses in Sherlock BBC

UNDERGROUND NETWORKS INVISIBLE ENEMIES ....... Cults, agents, terrorists in TEH & TAB

A SHADOW OF MASSIVE PROPORTIONS ....... Magnusson & Mycroft - another comparison

THIS DOESN'T MAKE SENSE ....... 'Impossible' cases - in TEH and TAB

THE EMPY HEARSE - THE EMPY HOUSE ....... The Reichenfach Fall - a comparison between Sherlock BBC and ACD canon

THE GAME IS AFOOT ....... Shoes, feet and footprints throughout Sherlock BBC

I'M ALWAYS THERE FOR YOU ....... Mycroft & Moriarty - another comparison

MOUTH LIKE A CRIMSON WOUND ....... The trace of lipstick throughout Sherlock BBC

BOOMERANG ....... The boomerang-effect, backfiring, the back of heads and blunt instuments

IT'S YOU MAJOR SHOLTO ....... A perfect Sherlock mirror

September 2016 _________________________________________________

THE ONES AND THE OTHER ONES ....... Musings about the different tenor of episodes - are the middle episodes revealing the Holmes family history?

MYCROFT AND MAGNUSSON ....... A dark comparison

STRANGE SIMILARITIES (edited list here) ....... ASIB revisited in HLV - recurring motivs and situations

THE BOND AIR CONUNDRUM ....... From the rehearsal to the cancelled 'Flight of the Dead'

NEAT - DON'T YOU THINK ....... Reichenbach and Bond Air under the lens - not as neat as one would think

CONNIE KENNY AND RAOUL ....... Mirrors for Mycroft, Sherlock and John?

August 2016 ____________________________________________________

OH! IT'S CHRISTMAS! ....... In each series of Sherlock BBC it is Christmas at some point

PLAYING WITH MIRRORS ....... Ricoletti, Carmichael and Sholto

DREAMS ARE TRICKY ....... The 'Bride' is aiming at a bakery

THREE TIMES JIM ....... Three times Jim brings Sherlock back from the verge of death

LIFTING THE MASK ....... Extended Mind Palace Theorie - a possible version

MARY MARY QUITE CONTRARY ....... Different faces of Mary Morstan

JOHN - MARY - SHERLOCK ....... Comparison of the three shootings - John/Hope Mary/Sherlock Sherlock/Magnusson

JOHN MOVES HIS ARM ....... A closer look at Magnussons assassination

COMING BACK - GOING BACK ....... Sherlock coming back from death to go deeper

July 2016 _______________________________________________________

MIRROR MIRROR ON THE WALL ....... Dark Mycroft and his possible motives

OF KINGS AND QUEENS ....... Who is the 'King' in Sherlock BBC?

MORE THAN JUST A TWIN ....... Who could be 'Sherrinford' - a speculation

AM I SENSING A PATTERN THERE ....... The antagonists of each episode in Sherlock BBC

June 2016 ______________________________________________________

THE BUS STOP SCENE ....... A Harry Potter connection?

AT THE REICHENBACH FALLS ....... About Moriarty's motives to kill himself

THE GREAT GAME ....... Carl Power's shoes starting the Great Game and even more shoes at setlock

A STUDY IN SHERLOCK ....... Pictures from each episode and setlock

A STUDY IN JOHN ...... Pictures from each episode and setlock

May 2016 _______________________________________________________

ABOUT AGENTS AND EX-AGENTS ....... The CIA agents of ASIB vs. Mary

April 2016 _______________________________________________________

IT'S NEVER TWINS ... UNLESS IT IS ....... Mummy Holmes - the secret twin?

March 2016 _____________________________________________________

THE RUG-PULL EXPERIMENT ....... Dark Mycroft - the secret puppet master?

VICTORIAN GHOST STORIES ....... Thoughts about Mark Gatiss's statement

MAGIC IN SHERLOCK BBC ....... Real magicians involved in Sherlock BBC

January 2016 ____________________________________________________

WHAT MADE HIM LIKE THIS ....... Hints at Sherlock's past in Sherlock BBC

THE MYSTERIOUS CULT ....... The disguised women in the crypt

THE CARMICHAEL CASE I ....... Connections to THOB

THE CARMICHAEL CASE II ....... Thoughts about different mirrors

________________________________________________________________

About EMP and EEMP

________________________________________________________________

Extended Mind-Palace Theorie - Starting point at the CAM Tower shooting

Extraordinary Extended Mind-Palace Theorie - Starting point any time before the CAM Tower shooting

EMP-Masterpost ....... Collected works of the fabulous EMP-Group

Reasons for EEMP (24.11.2016) .... About the possibility of an extended Mind-Palace going further back than CAM Tower.

A possible EEMP-Structure (30.08.2016) .... First post about the possibility of EEMP

________________________________________________________________

SHERLOCK HOLMES ADAPTATIONS & OTHER STUFF

________________________________________________________________

SCHWANENSEE ....... Tatort Münster - Thiel & Boerne (a lot of Sherlock-like visuals)

SHERLOCK HOLMES (2010) ....... Octopus, dinosour & dragon combined with a deadly feud between brothers (Sherlock vs. Mycroft)

YOU CAN'T KILL AN IDEA ....... 'V for Vendetta' in Sherlock BBC (an Underground full of explosives ready to blow up parliament)

NOTHING NEW UNDER THE SUN ....... 'V for Vendetta' in Sherlock BBC

SHERLOCK HOLMES IN NEW YORK ....... Roger Moore as Sherlock Holmes (Moriarty, bank robbery, tons of gold, tunnels, Irene Adler)

WILLIAM SHERLOCK SCOTT HOLMES ....... Excerpt from 'SH in New York'

YOUNG SHERLOCK HOLMES - THE PYRAMIDE OF FEAR ....... How Sherlock Holmes and John Watson met at school and their very first case (AU)

JUST A MAGIC TRICK ....... The magic trick in 'Sherlock jr.' the silent movie

SHERLOCK JUNIOR ....... Silent movie with Buster Keaton (solving a crime while dreaming of it)

THE GOLDEN YEARS - TV Series with Christopher Lee as Sherlock Holmes

THE LEADING LADY - Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson on a Viennese adventure with bombs, anarchists, 'Die Fledermaus' (the bat), Dr. Freud and Irene Adler

'Undercover in Eastern Europe'

'Un Ballo in Maschera'

'Digging for gems'

'Detective, doctores and trains'

THE INCIDENT AT VICTORIA FALLS - Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Waton on an African adventure with hidden treasures, secret twins, elephants and rainbows

NEW RUSSIAN HOLMES - Igor Petrenko, Andrei Panin ... by Andrey Kavun

EPISODE ONE: BAKER STREET 221b

EPISODE TWO: ROCK, PAPER, SISSORS

EPISODE THREE: CLOWNS

GRANADA HOLMES - Jeremy Brett, David Burke, Edward Hardwicke

VALIANT SHERLOCK HOLMES ....... The Eligible Bachelor - Granada Version (recurring nightmare, ghosts from the past, facing demons)

OMNE IGNOTUM PRO MAGNIFICO ....... What happens when mysteries get explained (The Redheaded League - Granada Version)

CHISWICK ....... Connections to 'The Six Napoleons' Granada and ACD

OH ... IT ISN'T 3G ... IT IS 3G ....... 'Three Garridebs' vs. 'Three Gables'

LA BELLE DAME SANS MERCI ....... 'The Three Gables' in Sherlock BBC

HERCULE POIROT - David Suchet

DEATH IN THE CLOUDS ....... Detour to Agatha Christie's Poirot (eyes with clocks in it)

ABOUT SMOKE AND MIRRORS ....... Poirots 'The big four' in Sherlock BBC (when a big terror network turns out to consist only of one man - who is an actor)

VARIOUS SERIES:

THE MYSTERIOUS BELLYBUTTON ....... House MD 'No reason' references (investigating inside the head)

A BABY IN 221b BAKER STREET ....... Episode with Ron Howard 1954-55 (Tony .... is it a girl's or a boy's name?)

ROBERT BALDWIN ROSS ....... The man who loved Oscara Wilde

IT WAS WORTH MANY WOUNDS ....... Poem by mrspencil

THE SACRED BAND OF THEBES ....... Gay warriors in ancient Greek

NORTH GOWER STREET & HS2 ....... 'Baker Sreet' and HighSpeed 2

IT'S FORTUNATE THAT I'M NOT A CRIMINAL ....... Canon reference

#the list of thoughts

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party-hard-or-die · 6 years

Text

In India, Facebook’s WhatsApp Plays Central Role in Elections

MANGALORE, India — Waving a giant saffron flag, Pranav Bhat last week joined a political rally for Prime Minister Narendra Modi and India’s ruling party here in this sweltering port city on the southwest coast.

Milling on a vast field with his college buddies, Mr. Bhat, 18, cheered for Mr. Modi and his Hindu-oriented Bharatiya Janata Party, which was trying to wrest control of Karnataka state from the more secular Indian National Congress in legislative elections.

Yet the most intense political campaigning was not taking place on the streets. Instead, the action was happening on WhatsApp, a messaging service owned by Facebook that has about 250 million users in India.

Mr. Bhat, a B.J.P. youth leader, said he used WhatsApp to stay in constant touch with the 60 voters he was assigned to track for the party. He sent them critiques of the state government, dark warnings about Hindus being murdered by Muslims — including a debunked B.J.P. claim that 23 activists were killed by jihadists — and jokes ridiculing Congress leaders. His own WhatsApp stream was full of election updates, pro-B.J.P. videos, and false news stories, including a fake poll purportedly commissioned by the BBC that predicted a sweeping B.J.P. win.

“Every minute, I’m getting a message,” said Mr. Bhat, a college student.

Facebook’s WhatsApp is taking an increasingly central role in elections, especially in developing countries. More than any other social media or messaging app, WhatsApp was used in recent months by India’s political parties, religious activists and others to send messages and distribute news to Karnataka’s 49 million voters. While many messages were ordinary campaign missives, some were intended to inflame sectarian tensions and others were downright false, with no way to trace where they originated.

In the run-up to the May 12 vote in the state — the results of which are set to be announced on Tuesday — the B.J.P. and Congress parties claimed to have set up at least 50,000 WhatsApp groups between them to spread their messages. At the same time, many others — their identities are unknown — distributed videos, audio clips, posts and false articles designed specifically to rile up the area’s Hindu-Muslim fissures.

Right-wing Hindu groups employed WhatsApp to spread a grisly video that was described as an attack on a Hindu woman by a Muslim mob but was in fact a lynching in Guatemala. One audio recording on the service from an unknown sender urged all Muslims in the state to vote for the Congress party “for the safety of our women and children.” Another WhatsApp message exhorted Hindus to vote for the B.J.P. because “this is not just an election. This is a war of faiths.”

Like the rest of India, Karnataka is a Hindu majority state. A staple of electoral politics here is pitting Muslims against Hindus, and various Hindu castes against each other.

Ankit Lal, a top strategist for the Aam Aadmi Party, which fielded 28 candidates for Karnataka’s 224 legislative seats, said WhatsApp has become the most important tool in digital campaigning. “We wrestle on Twitter. The battle is on Facebook. The war is on WhatsApp,” he said.

The role that WhatsApp plays in influencing voters has received far less attention than that of its sister services, Facebook and its photo-sharing platform, Instagram. Both Facebook and Instagram have come under intense scrutiny in recent months for how Russian agents used them to manipulate American voters in the 2016 presidential election.

WhatsApp has largely escaped that notice because it is used more heavily outside the United States, with people in countries like India, Brazil and Indonesia sending a total of 60 billion messages a day. And unlike Facebook and Instagram, where much of the activity is publicly visible online, WhatsApp’s messages are generally hidden because it began as a person-to-person communication tool.

Yet WhatsApp has several features that make it a potential tinderbox for misinformation and misuse. Users can remain anonymous, identified only by a phone number. Groups, which are capped at 256 members, are easy to set up by adding the phone numbers of contacts. People tend to belong to multiple groups, so they often get exposed to the same messages repeatedly. When messages are forwarded, there is no hint of where they originated. And everything is encrypted, making it impossible for law enforcement officials or even WhatsApp to view what’s being said without looking at the phone’s screen.

Govindraj Ethiraj, the founder of Boom and IndiaSpend, two sites that fact-check Indian political and governmental claims, called WhatsApp “insidious” for its role in spreading false information.

“You’re dealing with ghosts,” he said. Boom worked with Facebook during the Karnataka elections to flag fake news appearing on the social network.

Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook’s chief executive, has pledged to curb the abuse of Facebook and Instagram by people seeking to secretly influence elections. But he has said nothing about WhatsApp, which Facebook bought in 2014 for $19 billion.

WhatsApp officials said they are concerned about misuse of the platform, whose terms of service forbid hate speech, threats of violence and false statements. A few weeks ago, its systems detected an attempt by someone in Karnataka to create dozens of groups very quickly using automation. After some people reported getting spam from these groups, the company blocked them all. WhatsApp declined to say who it suspected was behind the group creation.

“We’re working to give people more control over groups and are constantly evolving our tools to block automated content,” WhatsApp said in a statement, adding that it was stepping up education on its safety features and how to spot fake news and hoaxes.

India’s Congress party, which has ruled the country for most of the period since independence, has lost control of the central government and several key states but has held on to power in Karnataka. If the B.J.P. wins the state when votes are counted on Tuesday, it would give Mr. Modi’s party crucial momentum ahead of India’s 2019 national elections.

How much the WhatsApp barrage affected the final election results in Karnataka may never be clear. While WhatsApp has largely replaced text messages and email here, old-school campaign tactics such as rallies, television and newspaper coverage, door-to-door canvassing and outright vote-buying remain prevalent.

Neelanjan Sircar, who was in Karnataka last week studying electoral behavior for the Center for Policy Research in New Delhi, said the flood of WhatsApp messages probably did not change voters’ political views. But they did push emotional buttons and increase turnout in areas with strong caste or religious divisions.

“What it does do is get people out on the street,” Mr. Sircar said. State officials said voter turnout was 72 percent, the highest level since 1952.

Four years ago, during India’s national parliamentary elections that swept Mr. Modi to power, the primary digital tool was Facebook. But as smartphone use in India has exploded over the past year and a half, WhatsApp became the country’s default communication mode — and the preferred medium for distributing campaign messages.

In state elections in Uttar Pradesh in early 2017, for example, the B.J.P. created more than 6,000 WhatsApp groups to get its messages to every district and village. Its landslide victory there prompted the Congress party to mobilize its own WhatsApp army.

So when the time came to gear up for Karnataka’s state elections, the parties turned to the same WhatsApp playbook.

“WhatsApp works like a nuclear chain reaction,” said Randeep Singh Surjewala, the Congress party’s chief spokesman.

U.T. Khader, an incumbent member of Karnataka’s legislative assembly, experienced the WhatsApp effect firsthand. Just before the election, Mr. Khader, a Muslim in the Congress party, was the target of what Mangalore police said was a disturbing new type of WhatsApp attack: a series of profane audio messages purporting to be an escalating exchange of threats between Hindus and Muslims over his candidacy.

In one recording, which was supposedly a phone call between two Hindu political activists, one voice harangued the other for putting a saffron-colored shawl, which the B.J.P. views as a Hindu symbol, around Mr. Khader.

“Why did you put a saffron shawl on Khader? Do you love your life or not?” the first voice said. “If I shove a knife into you, do you think Khader will come to your support?”

Later messages sounded like they came from Muslims threatening to kill the first voice in response. “Son of a prostitute, I’m warning you,” said one. “I’ll take you out.” The messages were sent to various WhatsApp groups, so they were heard by many voters.

Mr. Khader, who has represented the area for more than a decade and won with a large margin last time, said the alleged conversations were fake and recorded in a studio.

He said WhatsApp has a social responsibility to stop such hate speech, but he also believed the negative messages backfired, increasing the support he got from his constituents, half of whom are Muslim. And WhatsApp has been useful for his campaign in other ways.

“TV channels and newspapers largely tend to ignore me,” Mr. Khader said. “WhatsApp has helped me reach my supporters without the help of the mainstream media.”

Mr. Bhat, the college student and B.J.P. youth leader, said WhatsApp has been effective for him as well. After the polls closed on Saturday, he said the messages he shared with the 60 voters assigned to him had helped persuade 47 of them to vote for the B.J.P., including 13 who were previously uncommitted.

“I was successful in making them vote for B.J.P.,” he said.

Sudipto Mondal contributed reporting.

Follow Vindu Goel on Twitter: @vindugoel.

The post In India, Facebook’s WhatsApp Plays Central Role in Elections appeared first on World The News.

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dani-qrt · 6 years