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meyeselph · 3 years

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Gwenpool: Desperate Misanthrope's Confused Angst

Showtime

Ms. Pool woke up in a familiar room. Not in Krakoa - there are no mutants around. This isn’t a story about that. Look, honestly, without an actual Gwenpool series and the constant breaks in her comics appearance I can’t even begin to give a fuck. I cancelled my marvel universe subbie. I might get back to my stories but single issues are iffy. I read fast and don’t pore over the artwork. So I get 10 minutes of entertainment for….FIVE DOLLARS? When did this happen? Jeezus.

Who even reads comics anymore?

Anyway, long story short, Gwen got out of bed and recognized the room as her old one from the “old times.” The dark times. The ‘not running around in pink and white outfits and shooting people’ times. She panicked (Been there. It is what it is though). The only way out of trauma is through.

She dressed in old clothes, immediately hit by old smells, she couldn’t help but cry. Was it all a dream? Have I gone insane (again)? All the usual self doubts cropped up. I mean, really, if you think this kind of thing didn’t pass through her mind regularly why don’t you transport yourself to a comic book universe?

Oh, you can’t?

Oh. It isn’t actually possible for you and I’m stupid for suggesting it. So, yeah. If it actually happened and you kept that attitude then the logical assumption for a normie is a mental breakdown. Trick for Gwen, though, is it's probably always been both real and her being nuts.

So she goes downstairs to the kitchen to figure out why this is happening and Evil Gwen is having cereal. Let's say cocoa puffs. I’ve been thinking about those recently. You ever remember cereal as something worth cherishing. Not as just bullshit that TV convinced you to want? God damn, now I want Cookie Crisp. Cookie Crisp wasn’t even ever that good. Why do I want Cookie Crisp?

So also sitting around the table were the faceless versions of her father, mother, and her brother. Just chilling. No BD. Seen Eternal Sunshine of The Spotless Mind?

Yes, I know that references aren’t jokes - fuck you, I’m painting a picture and I CAN’T PAINT, THAT’S WHY THIS ISN’T A COMIC. Fucks sake. Anyway. So, Gwen is so creeped out that she just sits her butt down by Evil Gwen as if she’s the comforting presence here.

Her name’s too long. Let’s call Evil Gwen uh…….Gren. You know, like Grendel from Beowulf. I haven’t actually read Beowulf and this is all a little confusing but I'm solving problems here. Writing this is harder for me than you would think so it’s best to keep things flowing off the cuff. That’s the Gwenpool™ style anyway, isn’t it? Are you laughing yet? IMPROV. “YES AND” MY SHIT, READER!

“So, you ever really look into the retconned past thing, hun?” Gren said, moving her tongue around her food. Being gross as an attempt to be properly evil. She swallowed before continuing. “This is all I could really put together on short notice but i’m pretty sure what the future people created, all that stuff to try and trick you, it was all bullshit.”

“What do you mean? Are you trying to convince me to go all psycho like you again?” Gwen asked, exasperated, realizing she was now back in the whole ‘fuck with Gwen to decide her fate’ song and dance routine from the end of her first arc.

“Nah, not really.” Gren said. A hammer appeared in her hands out of nowhere and Gren swung it into their fake father’s head, snapping his neck..

“DAD!” Gwen instinctively cried as she saw her father’s body slump to the floor. Gren slapped Gwen’s face. “That’s it,” Gren said, “this is what the trick was.This is a poorly created character in a fictional story. Meant to manipulate you into attaching your concept of “father” to it. Even his finished version in the original comics run wasn’t THAT well drawn. Your dad read like a boomer’s idea of a responsible parent. You were going through a mental crisis and struggling to find purpose in life and his genius idea was get a shitty low paying job and suck it up?”

Gren turned to their brother, pushed his face to the table and smashed the back of his skull. . “Brother dearest, too. Going right along with their victim blaming. He gaslighted you as if what you were going through was just you being ‘irresponsible.’ Bitch, people working a minimum wage job aren’t somehow not impoverished and miserable because they get some of that ‘honest work’ that folks keep badgering on about. Minimum wage work is occupied by many physically and mentally disabled people held hostage; they’re people society only pretends to care about. Then they turn it all into you acting like some world ending threat. No questions about what drove you to the edge in the first place. You are just ‘unstable,’ so you’re just a problem to be solved. They say, ‘Let’s all solve this girl being upset and on edge by ruining her concept of self, reality, and memory.’ Brilliant!”

Gwen barely processed this in horror. Gren then slit the poor facsimile of their mother’s throat while continuing to rant, “You see people die all the time, Gwen. Half of the time you are doing the killing. You do it because it’s in a story. In a story the NPCs don’t matter and, after all, your original schtick in the story was to be kill-crazy. The non-marketable characters can be replaced or retconned at the stroke of the artist’s pen.” Gren leans forward as she pulls a Gwenpool mask over Gwens face. “Then the writers convince you that you have some middle class milk toast family and you take abuse and subsume your emotional needs because the problem MUST be you. You aren’t ‘normal’ so you have to be fixed.”

Gwen wiped her eyes over the mask and sighed. A bit of fire filled her gut as she stared at Gren. “So fucking what? You want me to go on a killing spree and be a big time villain to get myself a nice, shiny permanent big bad status? That’s how I stay around right? Just build my legacy on bodies?”

Gren scoffed “You already lost that fight, girly. Where do you think we are? Because this ain’t Marvel Comics.”

Confused, Gwen blinked and tried reaching for the page margins, finding nothing. Wait….why was everything on this page so ill defined and undetailed? Wait? Why was the story in kinda wobbly third person past tense?

Gwen sighed “Oh. I’m in a fanfic. I guess the publishing fight is for another day eh?”

“My advice, personally,” Gren stated, “is that you consider the lobster.”

“Wait, what the fuck?”

Gren pulled aside the kitchen curtains revealing the face of a giant lobster, its claws tapping on the glass. The lobster muttering gutterally about personal responsibility.

“Because there’s a couple thousand giant lobsters outside that would like to claw you until you read their book.”

Scared of Girls

On the rooftop, Gren shoved a high powered rifle into Gwen’s hands while she handled the close range threats. So, this conversation they’re about to have is important. Sniping puts Gwen into a sort of zen space, so that’s a better task to keep her focused, after all.

“So, what? You wanted me to internalize that my “origin story” is bullshit? Okay, what does that accomplish, then?” Gwen asked in a bit of a deadpan. She was so tired today. Not really feeling her happy go lucky energy. More like a “happy go fucky” energy. It was hard to always be on a knife's edge. Still the rifle’s kick into her shoulder was satisfying as she blew through two of the creepy looking lobsters at once. “Also, why the lobsters?”

Gren considered this. “Okay, last question first, I had to experiment a lot and do a lot of research to construct this place for your learning and healing in fanfic form....These buddies are a failed experiment of mine that I repurposed because the fic needed more action. Isn’t that right, giant enemy crap?” As she peppers the nearest goon with a hail of shotgun pellets the entire throng of them burst out, sharply muttering about divine symbols.

“As for what I'm trying to teach you, it’s that you aren’t reaching your potential.” Gren grumpily huffed.

“Duh,” Gwen reloads, “I mean you just killed a mannequin version of the voice in my head that says that to me every day.” one of those crustaceans talks about feminine symbolism while she decides on her next target.

“Not like fake daddy’s ‘Be a responsible member of society by paying your taxes’ type of potential. I mean your creative and emotional potential.” Gren flipped off the slavering throng of monsters, noticing they were starting to keep their distance from the roof.

“I never did finish that fanfic idea I had.” Gwen mused.

“God, don’t mention that,” Gren thrusts a finger at Gwenpool. “Not that I don’t respect fanfic, but when comic book writers make you and Kamala squee about fanfiction to try and relate to “the kids” it comes across as so condescending.”

“Really? I mean…..I'm sure it’s meant as support for the concept?”

“Most fucking superhero comics are just legalized fanfiction! The people who created the characters are either long gone or working on someone else’s characters! They just think they are so much better because they got fucking paid. They can’t imagine themselves as on the same playing field as fanficcers even though most of them have the same level of connection to the roots of the work as anyone else.” Gren groused loudly as she seemed to pull Reed Richards out of nowhere.

Confused, Reed looked around until his eyes met Gwen’s.“Oh great, you again.” Reed groaned as he turned to survey the piles of lobster gibs while Gwen cheered the lobster forces’ retreat with a resounding “EDF, EDF!”. The scattered creatures skittered amongst the bland scenery. It looked like a suburban neighborhood but someone forgot to color in the sky….or write that the sky had color. A castle hung out in the distance breaking up the generic normalcy and lay cloaked in shadow despite being surrounded by an endless white void.

“And…..black….you?” Reed pointed to Gren, raising an eyebrow.

“Yeah, I have an evil future self….well I stopped that future so it’s an….evil...alternate timeline self?” Gwen said with a nervous chuckle, abandoning the kill quest for the minute and rested her rifle on the roof.

“Ah. Yeah I’ve been down that road. It’s a rather common occurrence. Multiverse being what it is.” Reed laughed heartily while putting his hands on his hips.

“I’m not sure I’m evil, honestly,” Gren interjected. “I think I’m just really fucking grumpy and I’m slightly more gung-ho on the homicide. Considering Gwen’s already one of the more kill crazy characters on the roster it’s not that much of a distinction.” Gren flipped her cape. “My main distinction is I don’t like that meme from The Incredibles! You can just make it so the cape detaches automatically when it’s pulled hard enough!”

“You could still have it tangled up around your face.” Reed pointed out in his standard know-it-all fashion.

“Don’t make me go into fuck wife mode, stretch.” Gren spat. “Okay, anyway, so I brought him here to illustrate a point. Reed. Explain particle physics to me as a laymen.”

“Huh...i’m not sure why but okay. Particle physics (also known as high energy physics) is a branch of physics that studies the nature of the particles that constitute matter and radiation. Although the word particle can refer to various types of very small objects (e.g. protons, gas particles, or even household dust), particle physics usually investigates the irreducibly smallest detectable particles and the fundamental interactions necessary to explain their behaviour. In current understanding, these elementary particles are excitations of the quantum fields that also govern their interactions. The currently dominant theory explaining these fundamental particles and fields, along with their dynamics, is called the Standard Model. Thus, modern particle physics generally investigates the Standard Model and its various possible extensions, e.g. to the newest "known" particle, the Higgs boson, or even to the oldest known force field, gravity.” Reed rattled this off rather mechanically.

Gren then took out her phone and showed Gwen the Wikipedia article on “Particle Physics,” which is naturally the same words that Reed had regurgitated above, just without any formatting and, again, on a phone.

“Reed can’t be a genius in any subject unless he’s written by a genius in that subject. That’s how stories work. Everyone is limited by the understanding and capabilities of the writer. Same with your origin story and all the people you’ve interacted with. If you are as ‘meta’ as you think you are then you have to realize that you aren’t actually talking to people. You are talking to the writer. Dr. Strange didn’t rewrite your existence to be a part of the Marvel Universe. As far as most of Marvel continuity goes Dr. Strange was never there and doesn’t know or care about his MCU casting…..Hey Reed, buzz off please before the conversation pivots to why you haven’t cured all known diseases.”

Reed looked a little surprised but then pulled out a teleportation device (of course he has one) and blipped away with a shrug.

“How awkward is that going to be when he enters the MCU after Kamala is already introduced with a very similar power set?” Gwen chuckled.

“Keep up the way you’ve been going and you’ll never see it. I’m not exactly expecting a young blonde girl casting call for Deadpool 3 and that’s your best bet.” Gren snarked. Gwen winced with a sigh.

“I don’t get what I'm doing wrong. I have a fanbase comparable to some of the characters that have already shown up but I can’t even get comics written about me most of the time. An MCU push seems unlikely. They would literally have to deal with completely recontextualizing my powers and gimmick”

“Let’s ask her what you should do.” Gren motioned her way to the suddenly appearing long hair future Gwen, looming over them like The Attack of the 50 foot Woman for some reason. Dwarfing the roof they are on. Let’s call her BIGwen!

Gold Guns Girls

As BIGwen acclimated to her surroundings she stubbed her toe on a car, dramatically flipping it so that it took out a few more lobsters before caving in a nearby house. The lamentations about clean rooms soaring as the remaining couple dozen of them attempt to clean up some of the bodies of their fallen kin. The large and sort-of-in-charge Gwen hissed in pain and adjusted her boot. Getting her balance as best as possible she muttered curses that traveled rather well considering the lung capacity of a giant.

“You know,” Gren started, “I wasn’t expecting much from our previous uses of the ‘make her big for emphasis’ trick, but it really does only work as a vague ghostly background element. I didn’t just want it to be ‘oh, here's a third Gwen for the conversation, though. Would lack umph.”

“ Yeah, I get it, but staring at my own giant taint is unsettling.” Gwen muttered.

“I’d still, hit it.” Gren grinned, then immediately got punched in the arm. “OWWW! Look, I’m the evil one here and we’re in a fanfic. I’m allowed to make internet fetish jokes.”

“And I’m allowed to hit you for it.”.

“Dirty lampshading goody two shoes. Don’t act like half your fanbase isn’t thirsty. It’s “insert current year argument”, all art is sexy to someone.” Gren complained back,rubbing her arm before hopping off the roof. Gwen followed while listening as patiently as she could considering how many changes in topic her evil-caped self is going through to get to her point. “This chick is the reason you’ve been on the path of good girl. Some vague idea that in the future everything will work out for the best. HEY, DOWN HERE, BIG SHOW!” Gren waved at BIGwen and she looked down curiously.

“Yeah what??” BIGwen responded in a booming and agitated tone. Honestly, being in this fic made every version of Gwen a little grumpy.

“How’s she supposed to be a popular hero that makes it into the MCU and has a stable publication history?” Gren asked.

“Fuck if I know.” Came BIGwen’s response. “Have you tried growing your hair out?”

“Rub it in,” Gwen muttered under her breath, “I’m not gonna lie, I’m kind of depressed now.” Gwen said as she sat on an abandoned car.

Gren hopped on the roof of the car, patting Gwen’s shoulder before squatting with enough force to flex the car’s shocks like a rocking chair just to amuse herself. “Future “good” Gwen wasn’t an actual plot point, it was a call to action to the fans to make fanfic like this and support the character outside of the actual Canon. Chris didn’t trust that Marvel would treat the character right. That, and your obsession with getting a new book, are both the writer’s attempt to turn a marketing tactic into fan engagement. If you want to be real then that makes the fans want you to be real even more, too.”

Gwen sighs heavily and leans her chin on one hand. “I mean...the time traveling through the life of an NPC fan complete with a Never Ending Story reference was a bit sappy even by the standard we sometimes set...damn it it really was just kind of a fan manipulation trick wasn’t it?”

BIGwen Sat down on the street next to them and crossed her legs. “Hey, little me. Don’t get too down. I mean it worked for the most part. You have a healthy cult following. Characters have survived on less and there are worse things to be known for then as a fan first character”

“But I have to fight for attention all the damn time, though. It’s so easy for Wade with his fucking meme bullshit. He even gets runoff enthusiasm from me. Jeff the land shark is all over Oldpool online” Gwen felt rather heavy and tired all of a sudden. Marvel editorial forcing a gun to your head is not a fun way to be.

“All that fight is hell on the fanbase too.” Gren sighed. “Advocating for shit, getting crumbs and being expected to accept it while Disney lavishes all the attention based on some bullshit numbers game. Even if you make it into the MCU will it be a Batroc style cameo with obligatory ‘killed off in case we don’t feel like paying the actor again later.’ Will it be an emotionally rounded character or an ambush bug style joke? The thing is. You're Not the one fighting and you never were.”

“The fuck do you mean?”

“This version of her doesn’t know?” BIGwen whimpered.

“You aren’t real, Gwen.”

Head Like a Haunted House

“No….we aren’t having this conversation. Fuck you fuck you i’m not a fucking Nihlist and i’m not going to do this right now.” Gwen said as she scrambled off of the car and pulled out some guns. BIGwen then picked her up off the ground.

“You need to hear this, Gwen,” BIGwen boomed. “The gimmick has run its course. It’s fucking with your canon. You’re never going to be a marketable character keeping up a half fourth-wall Kayfabe”

Gren climbed onto BIGwen’s Shoulders and perched over Gwen all menacing like. “You need to listen. I’ve been trying to ease you into this. Making things more meta slowly until you were ready but it was never going to be easy.”

One of Gwen’s guns was fired from it’s holster and pierced one of BIGwen’s fingers. BIGwen screamed and her grip loosened. Soon Gwen was on the move running up her arm and firing at Gren, who dodged like the nimble and cute badass she is. “Don’t do this Gwen. Just because it doesn’t matter to the comic version of you doesn’t mean it doesn’t matter.”

“I’m a real person god damn it! I read the comics out there! I came in! That’s why I know shit I shouldn't know. That’s what I am! THAT’S ALL I AM!” Gwen shrieked as she pulled out a sword from hammer-space and decapitated BIGwen. Suddenly a mess of colored streamers and a pile of Mickey Mouse merch tumbled out. Look, I am busy right now. Gwen is still slashing at my ass. I'm not going to explain it.

For some reason now the remaining lobsters were helping Gren. For Gwen’s own good you understand. This is proof that I’m right for some reason.

Gwen pulled out a revolver, firing pumpkin sized holes in lobsters who were still wailing about self actualization. She fully planned on shoving a sword up her evil self’s ass and getting rid of this doppelganger shit for good. Which is total bullshit by the way. She totally just cut off Gren’s leg because what the fuck you mean I’m not real? I’m going to be real all over your corpse.

Gren didn’t really think that was even a good comeback and also thought you should probably say it instead of meta willing the smack talk into existence, otherwise this fanfic is going to read like trash. Also, Gren’s leg wasn’t actually cut off. In a puff of smoke it is revealed that the cut off leg is a log and her leg is fine. Gren is a ninja now, believe it.

Gwen proceeded to do a sick ass CQC judo throw on Gren and then grab her cape and wrap it around her face like Reed suggested. Callbacks for the win! Callbacks to Checkov’s gun ideas always lead to victory in fights! She then totally shot at her and such.

But the bullet was caught by the cape because the cape was a symbiote! That’s right Gren is also GRENOM!...boy that sounds stupid. Anywho, the cape was no longer around her face and the fight continued and Gren now ALSO had extra powers and special wizard-symbiote armor (that would only show up in the MCU version if Marvel finally got the Sony characters back). The meta powers work like shit in text but this would be really good in CGI or animation if Marvel wanted to adapt this fic and give the writer lots of money. Gren still has more experience with them, though, and Gwen can’t really just kill her way out of this fic so she has to just let the story play out.

…...eh?....oh Gwen’s crying. I love/am you girl but we gotta work on the crying. Fucks sake this is harder than I thought. I’m depressed now too. Well I'll try to get the writing back on track so you guys can see what is going on. Even the lobsters are minding their manners now. Chill vibes, guys.

“The marvel character page for Gwenpool says, and I quote:

Gwenpool arrived in the Marvel Universe from the “real world,” but has wasted no time in making the most of her time in her fictional universe. Using her knowledge of comics to her advantage, Gwenpool causes and solves problems for her fellow heroes.”

Gren drags a lobster corpse slowly toward Gwen and sits on its tail as she talks to her. Taking her time to really scrape the lobster against the ground, smearing the gore on the pavement. Not that it was heavy for her or anything. Totally still has that symbiote, which would make moving it easy. Totally wasn’t a detail added in the second revision of the fic slightly before the lobsters were added.

“The words “Real world” are in quotation marks in that wiki. Real people don’t make it into comics because fiction isn’t real. Half of your versions barely make use of the ‘real person’ gimmick because it’s too meta by half and not every writer wants to waste time justifying it. So they just treat it like Deadpool’s medium awareness. Which it mostly is.”

“I really am just a fucking rip off distaff character.” Gwen moans. “Just a Gwen combined with a Pool. I’m worse than the Batman who laughs. I never mattered because I was never real”

“Fuck don’t say that. You were made with love and care by a team of creators who took a weird offshoot idea and built out a compelling metafiction idea and a likeable protagonist off of it. They just didn’t have the time and foresight to go far enough.” Gren sighed.

“Far enough?” Gwen sniffed as she was pulled up to her feet and dragged toward one of the big castles. As they walked Gren kicked along a Mickey Mouse doll that had rolled out of BIGwen’s severed head. Every time it bounced it cheerfully said ‘hahah. I love you!’

“Too much haha, not enough trauma. You’re not just a joke character.” Gren said as she kicked the Mickey doll into the big front door of the castle. The shadowy thing of course lighting up and being all fantasy and shit as the door opened.

“Well I did end both of my comic runs pretty mopey.”

“Damn right you did. When the jokes run thin they run to your real bread and butter. You’re an empathy machine.” As Gren shoves Gwen through the gate they are swallowed up in the castle, going dark again. “Let’s getcha sad clown on.”

Never there

“See, what evil me should have been telling you about in the original run is how to find meaning and purpose when technically nothing means anything. Comic book characters live in a world without real death and suffering. It’s all a puppet show version of real pain and real emotion meant to bring that out of an audience.” Gren opined as they walked through a black void to a couch floating in a nothing area lit only by the static of an old TV.

“Can we turn on a light?” Gwen asked as she sat on the couch. Gren sat on another recliner that suddenly appeared and put her feet up.

“Fuck off. Ambiance is a thing. We aren’t having a ‘lights on with something fun on the TV’ conversation. So look, I am not really ‘evil gwen.’ I’m half an author insert and half a plot device. If we are talking about the reality of the story you are basically talking to yourself. I am speaking about the things you don’t want to admit to yourself. You know, you’ve seen this kind of story sorta... right?” Gren picked up the remote and frustratedly changed channels between a bunch of vaguely illustrative footage on the TV, not finding anything that worked. A lot of black and white footage of trains for some reason. Just what comes to mind when I think of documentary footage? Weird.

“I am not sure how to illustrate this shit visually and this is a text story anyway so I would have to explain the illustration,” Gren griped.

“I basically get it. It’s not that uncommon a trope.” Gwen nodded.

“Because of the level of meta we are on right now we have to really acknowledge that you are basically an author insert, too. I mean, to a certain extent every version of you is more the writer that is working with your character at the time than a set character.” Gren said as she settled on a visual of Gwen being pushed out the window by her own narration text in the original comic run. When all else fails, resort to footage from the last story. That way people can look it up online!

“Right here is where the character crystallized in the mind of the author of the current fic we are in. A vague suicide metaphor wrapped up in the flavor of self destructive escapism. Your parents in the story thought it was a suicide attempt on at least some level. This is serious business. Not just a girl who doesn’t like work and can’t finish her fanfic. In this comic you are built on this understanding. The writer of this fic has ADHD and autism. So his version of you more or less has it, too. Writers bring themselves with them into their work.”

Gwen nods and takes a deep breath. “I….I can feel it. Like the world is closing around you. You aren’t built for anything that anyone wants from you. The one thing you really believe in, the one thing that really defines you, the stories in your head…..it’s just not enough.

You can’t trust you’ll ever make it with writing because you can barely write. You barely have the energy to do anything but wish that you weren’t you. What if someone actually listened? Actually believed in you and whisked you away somewhere else where the world would fit your needs? What if you were someplace you could be someone else, someone strong and confident?”

“Yeah. Like a funny anti hero in a comic for instance.” Gren nodded. “But the original comics sort of left the theme on the table. They were captured by the misconception of Gwen as the problem and not a person who needed help. All that desperation that real fans of the character might feel just bundled up into love for this character that really ‘gets’ them but Marvel doesn’t ‘get’ the character. They won't use her. They won’t go past vaguely gesturing at her mental issues and moving on. They saved the angst for Wandavision.” Gren scoffs.

“I mean the show was okay but they literally have a character built entirely on the theme of escapism and trauma. One that’s custom built for mind-screw visuals and reality bending plots and they think she’s just a lazy fangirl who really likes guns that they can sit beside Deadpool sometimes and stick in the X-Men’s bloated background character roster when they don’t need her.”

Gren leads Gwen off the couch and deeper into the void where a door to a bedroom waits. A room like her own, absolutely slopping over with old toys of comic book characters. An unclean messy space in a run-down house that smells faintly of cigarette smoke. Huddled in bed, reading an 80s era X-men comic with a flashlight, is a 12 year old Gwen.

“This is never going to be canon but this is the version of Gwen in this fic. She can’t stop crying at school. Things that shouldn’t be hard are so hard and she can’t explain why. Everyone says she’s making excuses. Meanwhile her mother is fucked out of her mind on pain killers and her step father killed himself last year ‘cleaning his gun’ while drunk. You know exactly what is on her mind right now?” Gren says as she gestures at the girl.

“I wish the superheroes would save me from this.”

“They won’t. They can’t. They were never meant to.” Gren Slams the door loudly on the scene.

“That is the emotional core of Gwenpool in this fic. The desperation that so many of the fans down here in the fucking muck of the real world feel. Poor and emotionally unfulfilled. Confused and vulnerable. If Disney and Marvel gave two fucking shits about people like that they wouldn’t waste as many stories as they do. They wouldn’t just use untold wealth to make expensive escapist stories with the military. Their gestures toward progressive ideas that they occasionally make in their stories would be THE ENTIRE POINT of their stories and the actual thing they used that money for instead of lobbying the government to keep Mickey Mouse out of the public domain.

“Disney has the power yet they save a fucking miniscule fraction of who they could. Saving people doesn’t make money.”

When I Get To The Green Building

Gren stormed through the void. The scene disintegrated around her as Gwen followed. Both now in a bit of a sour mood but with newfound determination.

“Come to think of it. Why is the fucking Hulk getting to fight for social justice in the comics? Why are they making a gay alternate universe Captain America? Why are they grasping at straws so hard to find characters that get to advocate and I am just sitting on a fucking island being grumpy?” Gwen groused. “I’m pretty sure I’m pansexual….at least in this fic. I could advocate for a bunch of shit at once.”

“You have a youth fanbase, a unique story and you technically aren’t an alternate universe version of fucking anything no matter how many people still think you are a Stacey. They made a fucking ‘for the fans’ character and then neglected it. Presumably because some fucking money making metric didn’t pan out despite the comics just being an MCU test kitchen and IP farm anyway.”

“You’re a fucking check mark on a ledger. I don’t even know if anyone technically created Gwenpool as a whole and Disney/Marvel can give the character to whoever they want to do whatever they want completely separate from what the fanbase wants and needs because she isn’t established. The IP landlords have spoken. The fans haven’t risen to enough ‘buy my merch’ calls to action to invest more resources. So tease endlessly until that changes.”

“Gah. Now I'm actually as pissed as you are.” Gwen said as she started fiddling with her guns. “Who do I kill?”

“We can’t do shit. You’re not even a character at this point. You are a meme for an underused character.” Gren smirked all evil like. “See but that’s it. You aren’t just a meme. You’re a MEME.”

“Uhm...I don't follow.”

“Like the concept of Justice. Gwenpool is an idea. Defined entirely by how people who engage with the idea choose to engage with it. The IP law means Disney owns Gwenpool but they don’t own how Gwenpool is perceived. Just like we as a people decide what justice is through popular consent we also decide what Gwenpool is. You see they made a character for the fans…..in my opinion that means the fans can do as they like with it even if it makes Disney uncomfortable.”

“I mean they can’t even stop porn of their characters just because of the sheer volume of the problem. I suppose people could do whatever.” Gwen nodded.

“Exactly. So the fans should just fucking Occupy Gwenpool!” Gren said as she flipped her cape dramatically with a mad smile on her face. That’s right. She was Dirtbag Leftist Gwen all along!

“Squat on that IP. Make Gwenpool a mental health advocate. Make her an LGBTQ activist. Make her fight for social and financial justice so hard that Bruce Banner looks like a poser. Make her talk shit about politicians who put their career ahead of the people. Do all the shit that makes the comicsgate crowd sad. Keep politics in our stories! Rally around that pink and white ass so hard they have to notice and then tie it all to the fact that Disney has great power and with great power they take no responsibility for how shitty the world is.”

“ If they are going to fuck Gwenpool fans they gotta learn Gwenpool fans fuck back. We have already proven we can make all kinds of cool shit. Let’s get serious and make more, harder, faster! Get a hashtag or some shit. They can't DMCA all of us! GWEN IS OURS WE JUST HAVE TO REACH OUT AND TAKE IT. Then they either respect the character and her fans or they just hit a PR disaster.”

“Marvel/Disney neglects fan focused cult character themed protest movements. Proves they are only progressive when it makes them money. They’re so worried about Mickey ending up in the public domain? We’re the public domain! After our entire lives stannin their characters and buyin their merch building them from an animation house into a juggernaut they are just another weight on top of the boot on our necks. They have to take responsibility!” At this point Gren is pretty much ranting maniacally and neglecting the actual writing of the story so this is Gwen taking over to wrap up.

Guys I may not be ‘the real Gwen’ but really, isn’t the version of Gwen that actually came from the real world all of us? Isn’t Gwenpool really the Gwens we made along the way? We could easily bring a little heroism and chaos to the real world (at least to the internet) if we really tried. Put the fear of God into some IP landlords and fight for some cool people that society is screwing over, too.

Prove that even in the fandom abyss people aren’t as powerless as they seem. Use that internet comic fan mobbing for something besides giving Zack more money. Disney is gearing up for their next IP fight for Mickey in 2024. Seems like a fine time for IP themed protests. For now we just need to spread the word that our needs are more important than their profits.

It’s been real. It’s been long. It’s been a real long time coming…..

But I finally finished my fanfic.

See ya, true believers.

#gwenpool #fanfic #deconstruction #outofloveiswear #fortheoriginalwritersnotmarvelordisney #tw mental health #tw mentions of suicide #tw mentions of drug abuse #tw violence #tw gun violence

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giurochedadomani · 4 years

Text

Three days on a drunken sin

Anthony Crowley went to a party. He doesn’t remember much of it, but waking up in a hospital bed to Ezra’s pitiful eyes is etched on his mind. After a long summer of avoidance, he saves the day and Ezra’s new job at the old Tadfield library.

TAGS: Pre-Slash, Not Actually Unrequited Love, Human!AU: University, TW: drug use, TW: overdose, TW: suicide attempt, TW: characters having an homophobic family

The blue from the police lights reflects over the Central Tadfield Library sign, old and a tad cracked, making it look as if it were about to fall down on the rests of the storefront. A couple of agents dock down on their way out, as do the handcuffed wannabe robbers they’re pushing.

Crowley kneels, picks up the book, sees again the title —bloody Hamlet— and snorts. He offers it to Ezra.

Their hands touch when the other grabs it. Crowley’s just a tad too glad that he doesn’t drop it.

“That was awfully nice of you”.

Crowley feels a bit hot around the collar and suspects it might not have everything to do with the pulsing pain of the bruise on his left cheek. He deflects by glaring for good measure at the big, burly detective taking Mrs. Tracy’s statement, but he seems so enthralled as to pay them any attention.

“Very. Very cool”.

“Oh, shut it”, he murmures back.

He gives Ezra a side glance. It’s aiming for a glare and falls miserably short. His stomach does a weird thing when he sees the other’s soft smile as he flips the pages of the book. He feels a little bit dumb and a whole lot ridiculous at how, ugh, mushy ‘very. Very cool’ makes him. He misses his glasses, broken in the scuffle Ezra and him had gone into with the robbers.

Continue reading in AO3 or here.

He wills his left knee to stop moving. He ends up getting up from the sofa just to stop the nervous taps on the floor. Ezra asks: “How did you know that I was working here?”

Anathema had told him. She had done so subtly at first and with increasingly elaborate threats then to coax him to make amends with Ezra through the whole summer.

(Crowley can’t remember anything but the blinding lights of the ambulance, a cacophony of shouts from his parents and Ezra’s pitiful eyes before waking up on the hospital bed.

“Well, you really shouldn’t be here. I mean, given how many other people you have to fraternize with—”)

“I didn’t. I happened to be in the neighbourhood”. It has happened a couple of times before. That is, Crowley going so far as to reach the neighbouring park before bolting on the whole idea. Showing up just as the gang decided to strike the library hasn’t been about pure chance, though.

“My spidey senses just tingled”.

“Ah”. Ezra’s soft smile fades down a bit. Crowley feels an inexplicable pang of guilt. “Well. I’m glad about your spider senses. I really don’t know what I would have done if you hadn’t show up, my dear. I suppose that I got myself into a very tight spot”.

Mrs. Tracy laughs. She then shoves a hand over her mouth, appalled. She looks apologetically at the detective, who very chivariously tells her that there’s nothing to apologize for.

Crowley fixates on how much that makes him gag so he won’t pay attention at how his mind won’t stop echoing ‘my dear’.

“It’s spidey, not spider. You know it’s spidey”, he chides him. It doesn’t have any real bite to it, though. He glances again at Ezra and spots that little self satisfied smile that he sports after being annoying on purpose. His heart clenches suddenly at the immensity of the feeling of how much he has missed it.

“Does pretending to be from two centuries ago still help you around here?”, he asks, as nonchalant as he can manage. He rests his back on the counter.

“I’ll have you know that Mrs. Tracy appreciates my tastes, as démodé as you may find them”. Ezra replies, petulantly. He purses his lips and adds: “And modernizing doesn’t necessary have to equal obscure comic book knowledge, you know?”

Crowley scoffs. Thinks I’ll give you obscure.

Ezra ignores him: “I’ve been keeping myself up to date as of late, if you must know. I—”, he hesitates. Crowley takes on his set shoulders, that proud grin. He thinks about how utterly adorable he looks as he doubles down on his resolve and—

A phone rings. An 8 bit version of something classical. That’s— Beethoven?

Crowley fishes the thing out of the floor, vibrating half hidden among books. It looks like an old Blackberry or something equally egregious. He flips it in his hand, spots the cracked screen and… he sees the screen saver, a bad selfie of Ezra kissing some guy’s cheek.

(“Someone like me? How exactly is someone like me? No, describe it. Do you honestly think that I deserve to get treated—”.

“I worry about you”.

“And now you sound like them. I only asked— At the very least have the guts to tell me that you think that this is a punishment—”.

“You’re putting words in my mouth that I haven’t said”.

“That’s the problem! You never say anything. So long for that being on your side shit when you won’t stand up when I need someone to do it”)

Crowley doesn’t even move when Ezra, beet red, grabs the phone out of his hand and answers.

“Hi, I— Yes. Yes. Both of us. I was about to call you to tell you about it, in fact”, he nods to nothing. “Well, Police has been interrogating us up until now. How have you heard about it, anyway? In the—?”, a whisper of something and then: “The what!? Yes, yes, I swear to— Look, given the circumstances it’s something that I’m able to promise, yes”.

Crowley just— stays there. With the image of the screen saver seared into his mind. The guy’s tall, dark haired, good looking, all draped in finery. Ezra’s honest to Someone giggling. Crowley feels as if someone has just dropped a bucket of cold water over his shoulders. As if someone has just punched all air out of his lungs.

“I— yes, the moment I get home”, continues Ezra. He lowers his voice: “Yes, me too”.

He ends the call.

One of the agents asks something to Mrs. Tracy and then helps her to close the storefront, hiding the broken glass under the metal sheet. After the creaks stop, Ezra tries a joke, pinpointing the phone: “I figured at some point of another I would have to let go of telegrams”.

The guy is probably refined and shit. He can picture him, a veritable dandy, dressed like a sir and philosophizing about morality while analyzing literary classics. Most likely, his vices limit themselves to cigarettes and the occasional brandy glass at parties. Surely, his police records are stainless.

He’s truly glad for Ezra.

Brimming with joy.

He pinpoints the old mobile: “You’ve nailed down the century, angel. Now all that is left to nail down is the decade”. He puts so much effort into not sounding as hollow as he feels, that he expends a few seconds without realizing exactly what has he called the other and only does so when Ezra looks away.

Crowley’s stomach sinks to the floor and then lower, a truly stupid, over sensitive move on his part—

“He’s a— well, a friend”.

(“You haven’t been able to admit that we’re friends. Not once”

Ezra looks away. He ducks his head. His voice wavers when he says—)

Crowley buries the memory quickly and mercilessly. He was a manipulative asshole that day. Ezra’s not the one to blame for Crowley’s devotion, nor his very private daydreams —so obviously out of touch with reality, given what he is, what tears them apart— about what a friendship might develop into.

“You don’t owe me any explanation”.

He tries to swallow the bile down his throat.

“Crowley, I—”.

The point is— he didn’t even know that Ezra might, in this world and life, be interested. That there was any potential to explore. That Ezra, well, is interested in guys. A part of him cannot stop ruminating about how it’s his fault. That he’s somehow lacking— he’s always lacking. That he was, well, truly pathetic to even secretly entertain the possibility.

He stands up and recollocates his jeans, trying not to wince when his bruised hands grab the rough fabric. “I’m going home”.

Ezra’s face falls. He looks away, frowning a little, pouting, his lower lip trembling slightly. Crowley’s convinced that if Ezra were looking up, his eyes would beautifully shine with unshed tears. He feels as if he has just committed genocide, or kicked an overgrown, blonde puppy with eyes as blue as the sky. He gives in, refrains the urge to sigh and asks: “Do you want a lift?”

Ezra does a double take. Then, he smiles. And it’s like grabbing a soft blanket and getting near the fireplace on a rainy day and corny shit like that.

Crowley feels a frustration almost as deep as the warmth in his chest.

Soon they find themselves in Crowley’s car, with him following Ezra’s directions across town and being just a tad too glad that he doesn’t have to explain why does he know where they are going.

Wait, no. Come back! He just means— Anathema’s new flame lives next door, okay? He’s not a creep.

“So you basically stole a bunch of books”.

“I didn’t steal anything. I acquired them. With hard work”.

“You’ve just told me that you went into a— well, a sort of manhunt of prophecy books, coercing their previous owners into giving them to you almost for free”.

“Coerce, now that’s a strong word. Suggest, if anything. Let it slide— Could you please go slower, my dear!”.

“Manipulated, more likely. Deceived”.

Ezra shots him a glare, baffled.

“It’s hardly my fault if they didn’t do the proper research before our negotiations!”

“I don’t know if that would stand in a courtroom”.

“Well, if you’re just going to ponder the legal ramifications of my job I might just ask you to drop me here and go the rest of the way back on foot”.

“Now, there’s no need for rush decisions”.

“Well, you’re the one rushing!”

Crowley smirks, takes a turn left a little to quickly to make it perfectly legal and tries hard not to laugh at how Ezra squirms. “I’m just— admiring the skill where it’s due”, he says, after a moment of silence. “It must have been very difficult to get the opportunity to negotiate with those antique dealers. To prepare a convincing speech that fit every occasion”.

“If that’s sarcasm, I swear, my dear—”

“Oh, gosh, no. I’ve seen you in action. I don’t doubt for a moment that you can be pretty persuasive”.

(“So, what am I supposed to tell them? ‘Oh, no, I’m sorry, but I won’t make it, you guys, I’ve plans of spending all night long curing the boredom of this blondie, you see’. Wait a minute, I’m so definitely texting them that”.

“Crowley! You’re making me look like a wanton thing”.

“Are you blond? Check. Did you convince me that spending the night here was way more interesting than putting up with Bee and their friends? Also check. Did you do so because you’re bored as hell? Ladies and gentlemen, we have a triple check! I fail to see how am I misrepresenting the truth here”.

“You know that they won’t think that! If you send them that they will assume that— They will think that we—”

Crowley has the smartphone in a hand, a glass of wine in the other. That, next to Ezra’s white jumper, will prove itself to be an accident in the making in mere seconds. An accident that Ezra will have only to vaguely battle his eyelashes to to get Crowley try his hardest to solve.

“Now, what will they exactly think?”

“Give me the mobile, Crowley!”)

Crowley smile falters. He drops the banter: “Doing something quite as reckless as inviting potential robbers of those books into your bookshop, now, I wouldn’t have pinpointed you as someone who’d do that”.

He sees out of the corner of his eye how Ezra ducks his head and looks out of the window. “I was supposed to get help”.

Ah, yes. Crowley remembers the girl of the library, the one who has played Ezra’s partner in crime before snitching on him to the gang. The one Ezra hadn't imagined betraying him because he wouldn’t be capable of doing something like that to someone else, so why would her do it to him. He changes gears, keeps his eyes on the road and answers, as if in an afterthought: “Next time you plan on turning yourself and your books into bait, maybe— well, if you need a backup, a proper backup, just ask me”.

He feels more than sees Ezra’s eyes snapping back at him, and that’s more than anything out of the flush that creeps over his neck. He feels his palms sweaty, his heart beating wildly. He preemptively puts up his shields, thinks a myriad of variants of ‘I only say it so you don’t make a fool out of yourself’ and is only halfway dissapointed when Ezra changes tracks to ask: “How did you find out about the strike?”

Crowley opens his mouth, thinks about explaining how Lucius had told him in no uncertain terms to follow the gang if he wanted to keep the job. He thinks about what Ezra would tell him if he mentioned the Inferno gardening shop and its shady backroom deals altogether. He shuts his mouth.

Ezra, who can read him back to back, doesn’t even need him to put it into words. He jumps to the worse conclusion, though: “Did he... order it?”

Wait, what?

“No. He— I heard them talk about you, okay? He—”, Crowley sighs, “Okay, he told me to follow them. That’s when I heard them talking about this library, this old and weird ass librarian, and the blondie, fussy young man who helped her and, well. I pieced things together and then...”

“And you decided to come to my rescue”.

Crowley risks a quick look over. Ezra looks… kind of amused. He doesn’t know what to make out of it. His gut reaction is to tone down the statement: it’s not as if he suddenly has turned into some sort of knight in shining armour. Or that he deserves to be praised like one.

In the end, he doesn’t say anything, mainly because a hand chooses that exact momento to gently squeeze his arm, and that stops altogether his train of thought.

“You can stop wherever you can. It’s over there”, Ezra explains, pinpointing the same large block of buildings in front of which he dropped Anathema a couple of weeks before. Crowley parks, not too far away. He hopes that Ezra will invite him over. Maybe make a big show of how irresponsible is to let a drive drive that late, perhaps chide at his reckless ignorance of road manners. Something that lets him a teeny, tiny opportunity not to have to say goodbye.

“Well, thank you for—”

He rolls his eyes.

“Ezra”.

“But I’m grateful for what you’ve done! It was... nice seeing you again”.

It’s the wild, blind hope in his chest what makes him take a deep breath, braze himself for the impact and say: “You know, Hamlet. There’s ah— They’re doing Hamlet. The guys in— Shit, well, I mean”, he backpedals. Starts again, trying to say it so it makes sense. Subject, verb, complements. Come on, you can do it! “The new community theatre downtown? Some friends of mine are doing Hamlet there. They’re not— Oscar worthy, or anything, but they’re also not rubbish. And there’s a bar near, they make some pretty mean pizzas. Italian authentic recipe, all artsy. We could—”.

“I can’t”.

Crowley clasps his mouth shut.

“Right”.

He blinks a few times, keeps his eyes away, tries to will the sharp sting away.

“Crowley, I’m not ashamed of you. I just— I can’t, okay?”

Ezra squeezes his hand for a moment.

Crowley won’t cry.

“Okay, angel”, he manages.

Ezra grabs his bag and gets out of the car. He doesn’t manage to move until he sees him disappear through the entrance hall.

It doesn’t happen that night. Nor the morning after. He’s got to wait up until the afternoon shift at the Inferno for Bee to call him to the back room and hand him the shop’s phone. It’s humid in the backroom, it clings to his clothes. It almost chokes him when he hears a sweet, deep voice tell him: “You’ve got guts to show up, that I have to admit it. I’ve seen you worse for wear, though. Is that how you pay your shots now, scuffles?”

(“My brother is—”

“An idiot? A petty bastard who didn’t outgrow the bully phase?”)

“I wouldn’t stick around if I were you, our parents don’t take to too gently to your kind. Neither do I, if we’re being honest. If you want to ruin your life, that’s your problem. But the last thing we need is you dragging Ezra down with you. Specially, after what he did to get you back to school”.

Ba-dum-thud. His heart skips a beat.

“I’m going to take your little chat from last night as an aberration to the rule, but needless to say, I don’t want you to go near him ever again. Or else, there will be consequences. And you know for experience that I do follow up my words”. A pause. “Do we have an arrangement?”

Ire cloughs his throat. He’s got the phone in a death grip.

“I’m going to take that as a yes. Have a nice day, Crawley”.

He hangs up.

Crowley waits one tone, two tones, before his body reacts and he stomps the phone on the receiver wishing that it was not a phone, but a certain someone’s face. Bee refrains mid-sentence to tell him how he’s going to have to pay it if he breaks.

He paces back to the front of the shop, feeling disgusted with himself, and only partially because after being at the back room he’s pooling in sweat. His mind is lost to the present, racing through images of him burning with rage at the hospital, screaming at Ezra to fuck off, to images of him burning with rage at the police station, being questioned, to images of him burning with rage at the director’s office, being told with a stern voice and pitiful eyes that even if Crowley will not be expelled for the incident, if he continued down this road, it’d probably cost him way more than his academic possibilities and he knows that . He knows there’s a missing piece in there, somewhere, though he cannot for the love of Someone pinpoint where is it. There’s the familiar weight of guilt in his stomach and a question which echoes through his brain.

What the fuck did he do?

#good omens #ineffable husbands #Crowley #Aziraphael #myfics

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thelightfluxtastic · 3 years

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30DayTheri 21: Media by Non-kin

I talked a while ago about how much I value media by and for therians and otherkin. But that’s few and far between, and there’s a lot of value in media made by self-identified humans that manages to tap into kinfeels. So that’s today’s topic. As might be totally expected, there’s an overlap with furry media. Anthropomorphic animals tap into that human-and-animal feeling and end up being relatable, especially if they have nonhuman quirks and instincts like growling or species-specific behaviors. I first started feeling my canine-ness when reading furry webcomics: Twokinds (warning for adult content) and Strays. Through them I discovered other webcomics, like Beyond the Western Deep. Beastars was already great for it’s complex themes and intense worldbuilding, but it really stole my heart with the character of Jack, and the parallels between dogs in that society and my experiences as a “gifted kid”. Jack seems tailor-made to be relatable to me. Even if it’s not specifically dogs, I find anthropomorphic/furry media just gets at that feeling of animality and feels very comfortable to me.

I feel special mention must be made of werewolf media. The therian community, after all, started on alt.horror.werewolves, and there’s a reason some therians still call themselves weres. I’ve definitely sought out werewolf media to get at canine feelings, shifts, etc. (And for other reasons, while I identify as a plain dog, werewolves are my connection point and self-portrayal in a voidpunk way). Being domestic, I tend to not go for the feral, violent werewolf stuff myself. My favorite werewolf media is anything that tries to convey wolves as they actually are in the wild- no dominance hierarchies, family bonds. How to be a Werewolf is a great webcomic for that, and I wish there was more werewolf media like it. Naturally, something should also be said for transformation media- Brother Bear, Eustace becoming a dragon in Voyage of the Dawn Treader, etc. (Here’s a long list of movies on IMDB). And also for the media that’s told from an animalistic perspective- whether fantastical, like the Warriors books and Guardian’s of Ga’hoole, or more real-world, like the A Dog’s Purpose book/movie. Naturally as a dog therian, I have a penchant for talking-dog movies which are pretty dang common. Jack Saint has a video exploring their political implications if one takes at face value the dog’s sentience and human intelligence. I agree with his points regarding these movies if taken as a human metaphor, but at the same time they completely accurately tap into my feelings of domesticity and how I feel toward My People.

The last category I feel important to mention is documentaries. I for one encountered a lot when researching, but I also enjoy them on their own, and know many other therians do to. I get a lot of joy out of learning new things, and a new appreciation for any animal I learn about, including my own theriotype. There’s nothing quite like a good documentary to get into an animal’s mindset, to connect to a particular habitat or environment, to appreciate the world a little better. I’ll end this with a list of the media that were my particular obsessions or hit meaningful moments for me:

Tarzan (movie and show)

The Jungle Book

Young Wizards (books, completely altered my perception of life and animism)

White Fang

Good Boy (movie) (the talking dog movie I remember best)

In An Absent Dream (the sheer hiraeth)

Fangs webcomic

Dogs Decoded (Nova Documentary)

This one specific HP animagus comic

How to Be a Good Creature (book by Sy Montgomery, I swear when I read this I was convinced the author was kin or maybe kith and just didn’t know it)

#30 Days of Therianthropy #mine #media #therian #otherkin

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craftmanatee · 5 years

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Fantasy, is good, bad and ugly.

DISCLAIMER: Most of what I am writing here is for myself and not much consideration will take place. This is just a write up of all the things ive experienced and researched on put together as concisely as possible. A practice essay of sorts.

I do find myself to have finally separated what makes Fantasy what it is from Escapism or just Entertainment and how it works, especially for us today. Fantasy is used incredibly vaguely, going between its natural definition (Something akin to Imagining or daydreaming) to a specific genre in storytelling or visual or description of something. These are just methods of using the word that change based on how it is used, but it has been used often and vaguely to the point that it looses its original intent. A lot of what you use the Word on can already be better replaced with other words such as escapism, daydreaming or imagining, surrealistic etc.

Here is my addition to the definition of Fantasy: “Fantasy is an imagination derived from the Real World in order to better understand it.” Or “An explanation of the Real world”

This means that Fantasy can be negative, or positive. The imagination, or simplification or replacing of the things you dont know with things you do know. It is what we use to explain many things to children and people alike, especially if the specifics of the explanation will not suffice to the target person.

As soon as you put together this intent in which to understand the Real World through Fantasy, you can better identify what makes good fantasy, bad fantasy and Ugly fantasy.

To put Ugly Fantasy away real quick (As it is an entirely different subject). Ugly fantasy in the case of this writing is fantasies that abuse the uneducated, gullible or any person prone to fall for some kind of falsehood that flips their belief of the real world into something bad. So ideologies, fanaticism or any kind of prospect that changes how you perceive anything, into something that is not even remotely fundamentally real of that said thing.

Good Fantasy is fantasy that manages to convince, persuade or anything to you of the subject that they are trying to convey, but in a way that affects you. An example is simple folk tales told to Children such as “Hansel and Gretel”. Stories like these are meant to scare or teach kids of things to avoid, not do, etc. In a way, the same way how a Slasher Horror movie shows us what is stupid, or dangerous, such as splitting up.

Bad Fantasy is simply just fantasy that dont follow real world implications and as such could be misinterpreted. An example is Pornography. Therefor, for anything that is identified as “Bad fantasy”, its good to learn to not take in any implied effects, be it emotional or educational as true. But rather for entertainment purposes mainly. A better name for this would be “Simple” fantasy or “plain” fantasy to better describe it into the current definitions of Fantasy.

But for now, it should be Called Bad Fantasy as it is often used and is what people think Fantasy is in aspects of media today that I will point out.

Fantasy today is not Fantasy. It is escapism. You pick something up, it could be a book, movie or a game and you know how it is fiction and thus escape into it. Depending on your preferences, some things are suited to have you escape more into it than others simply because of either familiarity, or a deeper understanding of the subject. Movies as an example combine many aspects between visuals, story and music to have you have certain senses put your guard down and fall for whatever fantasy the movie has in place. There are many people who adore movies and have seen so many to the point where these cinematic tricks no longer work on them and they then happen to see how flawed the fantasy is. But that does not mean that it cannot be enjoyed.

This is where we separate Escapism and Fantasy from each other. I hate how (ex:)Toy Story 3 or a majority of animated films play out, but I do enjoy watching them. I know what comes next, but just maybe, I will still find something to like about it. This is me just liking a piece of Fiction for my own reasons, this does not apply to everyone.

But I can still identify how in Toy Story in general, has an amazing fantasy about better taking care of your belongings, or in this case, Toys. (I just think that the Fantasy can be enhanced if it did not fall slave into typical cinematic story beats)

But what we have majority of the time is fantasies that play an exaggeration to something. Such as power fantasies. Or fantasies that is exactly what you want. These are “Bad” fantasies that dont really add to any understanding, it is simply for entertainment purposes and feeds whatever “Sin”(Lust, greed whatever, lol) that you have in an innocent light. But I will claim that these fantasies are eroding Fantasy in general by the chance that these “Bad” fantasies can be misinterpreted and be wished upon. The reason why there is so much bad fantasies is because of misinterpretation of prior fantasies.

Here are some examples as to what is good Fantasy and what is Bad fantasy and what is Escapism, and how they surmount to themselves.

Lord of the rings is a story told and derived from the real world that puts conflicts into some kind of characterization. The fantasy tells of something very deep to the point of some kind of spirituality, religious or subjects of fate in general. But the Escapism is how the world is dressed up in these characterizations such as the different races and creatures. It is easier to buy in on a story of grand fate if it has appealing subjects. But, simply having elves should not be enough, there needs to be rules set in place and functions. Because of this, you then also buy into the characterizations. Basically, LotR didnt have what it had without reason. I do believe Tolkien did this in reverse however. He first had a Fantasy, but dressed it up later to better escape into. It is how Elves are Elves, and not just a different tribe of humans.

UnderTale is a good modern fantasy example and leads into a different subject such as modern intelligence! People today are a lot more educated than before, and thus when they want to escape into something, the fantasy needs to be really good in order for people to buy into it. Folk tales have been updated time and time again because of innovations such as writing, books etc that demanded more explanation in these stories. People asked more questions as stories get re-told which finally revealed cracks in these old stories. Undertale, however is a different kind of medium. Undertale tells of a pretty typical fantastical story of hope, but, it is the method that it tells it that gets people to buy into the story. As a Videogame, Undertale directly addresses the player for its actions. It also subverts videogame expectations in order to have you truly appreciate the message that undertale generally gives out. Even when the player disobeys this message, undertale still plays in on its fantasy that it is a Videogame. And as such, Undertale very well uses modern intelligence and expectations to the point of players realizing into listening and understanding what it has to offer.

The Marvel Cinematic universe is nothing but colourful escapism. It takes a simple fantasy of becoming truly special, and stretches it out far and wide. The best quote from a superhero film is probably “With great power comes great responsibility.” Just as a quote, this is the fantasy that Superhero fiction plays with even without the knowledge of this quote. Fundamentally and purely, this is what superheroes end up doing. Their power also becomes a responsibility. But, despite this. The movies, comics, etc mostly play with “ With great power..” portion of the quote. When a supehero character finally reaches a paragon status and finally realizes the full quote within its character, there wouldnt be any more stories to tell with that superhero. This is why we keep seeing reboots and rehashes. They keep starting over, witnessing the journey that it takes to fully realize that one quote again and again. And therefor, they are mostly being retold again for the fantasy of having super powers, or great power.

Fantasy is incredibly vague today, and I do feel like my added definition has you better deconstruct a fantasy from anything. Fantasy has started getting wishy washy near the 80s and onwards, and is why there is so many “Bad” fantasies today. With the advent of video games and new generations of people, it will become more clear and easier to seperate Good fantasy from Bad fantasy and Ugly Fantasy. Even movies, shows and games have a little Ugly fantasy that needs to be made aware of. Such as how Overwatch, a game that pandered to the LGBT community, making it all feel insincere, a complete opposite effect of fantasy.

After so long, I have read and researched on certain genres and going into deep analysis on them has made me discover a philosophy, or a new genre I will try to develop on. It is called Punk-Fantasy and that is a Write up I will make continuing this one. (And after that write up, actual proper content will be uploaded...)

#essay #real talk #fantasy #undertale #lord of the rings #folk lore #marvel #overwatch #movie #book #videogame #game #fiction

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dropintomanga · 6 years

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Faith Is Restored - An Interview With “Anime For Humanity”

Ever since I started this blog, I thought to myself whether I or someone else can start up a mental health organization that helps people using anime. I had some optimism at first, but grew jaded after seeing people’s impressions of anime and how anime was treated under the geek hierarchy over the years. Yet I found out that someone or should I say, a group of fans is doing what I envisioned in my head and the timing couldn’t have been more perfect

While I was reading up on the sudden “mental health” question that popped up in an “anime census”, I found out about an organization that anime fans should support when it came to mental health discussion. That organization is known as Anime For Humanity. They are based in Los Angeles and have been traveling throughout California at various conventions since starting in 2017.

I went to their site immediately and I was amazed that AFH are a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization dedicated to using a medium that many fans love to promote mental health awareness. So I decided to get an interview with AFH and their outreach manager, Ruby, got back to me. Here’s what she had to say on Anime For Humanity, their beginnings, a couple of their projects, the hashtag movement they started, and more.

Q: How did Anime for Humanity get started? What made you see that anime was inspiring for anyone with mental illness?

Ruby: Before Anime For Humanity (AFH) started, we were an anime club with a passion for anime and community. We volunteered with local charities and hosted events that people enjoyed. Then we realized there were specific ways anime could have an impact and make a difference in people’s lives.

When we first thought about the causes Anime For Humanity should tackle, we took a moment to reflect on what anime brought and changed in our personal lives. We found out that most of us suffered through depression, anxiety, self-harm and suicidal thoughts. Only a few us did get professional help and others didn’t because of the so-called “stigma."

Q: What professional backgrounds do you have in mental health?

Ruby: Since AFH started as an anime club, we all came from different backgrounds, including artists, teachers, computer scientists and therapy counselors.

We do close work with other LPCCs (licensed professional clinical counselors) and LMFTs (licensed marriage and family therapists) that volunteer to host panels, speak at events and run support groups.

As a member of the Anime For Humanity Clinical Advisory Board, it is very important for AFH to work with therapists and counselors who understand the fandom and use it as to a tool to help people find healing and recovery.

Q: Clinical Advisory Board?

Ruby: The Clinical Advisory Board is an initiative made by Anime For Humanity. It is still under the work and part of the Anime Therapy Project. Since we attend a bunch of cons, a lot of licensed therapists stop by our booth and ask us to be involved in what we do. We call them the "Anime Therapists." :)

The purpose of the Clinical Advisory Board is to discuss scientific research done on anime and help polish Anime For Humanity’s upcoming projects/programs. We also have been working on building a "find an anime therapist near you" (which is similar to our “Find Healing” resources, but with a twist) where the anime/geek community can find a therapist near them who understands the fandom and maybe uses it as a tool for therapy.

So far, the project is still on alpha mode and local to LA. We are hopeful it will expand to other cities, states and around the world.

Q: With anime consumption almost completely online and anime conventions sometimes being the only spot to get fans together, how did you come up with ideas to get fans to come to your programs offline?

Ruby: Here in SoCal (Southern California), it happens that there is a convention every month where we get to be in touch with the attendees and tell them about what we do.

We are very grateful for all the convention organizers in our area because not only does the anime scene keep growing, but we also get to hand out local resources for people to get professional help.

Q: Describe what a typical workshop/support group session from Anime for Humanity is like.

The AFH support group is part of the Anime Therapy program, which is still under the works.

Q: What challenges came along the way as Anime for Humanity began to grow?

Ruby: One of the challenges Anime For Humanity faced when we first started was we weren't able to collaborate with other organizations because there wasn't much acceptance and support towards anime when discussing our mission and purpose.

Q: What did it take to get some of those who were skeptical onto your side? How did you convince them? I always felt anime has better acceptance in a place like California due to a large Asian population, Hollywood celebrities loving it, and a vibrant arts scene.

Ruby: At first, we couldn't convince them due to what they have been told about anime (ie. anime containing violent and sexual content) - things that didn't go with their mission and values.

But once we showed them how conventions were growing (especially the growth of Anime Expo) and how anime presents themes such as kindness, courage, and friendship. We also told them our story of how anime gave us a purpose to make a change in our community. That gave a spark to start the conversation and change their minds about anime. And yes! You’re right about anime being more accepted in California. As I mentioned earlier, there is more than one convention happening each month here in California, where people celebrate their fandom (comics, anime, cosplay, etc) Seeing cosplayers on the train/metro, cons popping up everywhere; that made it easy to promote Anime For Humanity!

Q: I liked how you involve gamers of all kinds to support Anime for Humanity via the "Play Anime Project." In your opinion, what is it about gamers that make them the most charitable people out there?

Ruby: Gamers are a great community. They are passionate and empathetic. Especially when gaming with a purpose comes to play. Everyone would love to do what they are passionate about and help others at the same time.

The "Play Anime Project" is about taking and promoting new and fun anime games to non-anime conventions and start the conversation about the stigma of mental health with attendees.

Q: I found out about a program you had to combat illiteracy called “Take a Manga, Return a Manga Project." Given that manga literacy and comprehension can translate well into reading non-visual material, how did the program work and which series were the most helpful for fans struggling to read?

Ruby: “Take a Manga, Return a Manga” is a unique and exciting program we launched when we first started Anime For Humanity. Here are the 3 reasons why:

1. We wanted to promote anime/manga to a community who aren't familiar with either. Because as mentioned earlier, reaching out to that community was/is still one of the challenges we are facing.

2. We all have a bunch of manga collecting dust in our shelves. We thought how can we put those manga into use and make a space where values like sharing, friendship, and community are built in the anime community.

When we took the AFH library to a couple of conventions, we would invite the attendees to build one in their community, college, high school, etc. to bring those values and show the rest what anime is about.

3. Like you mentioned in your question, manga literacy and comprehension can\translate well into reading non-visual materials.

We have a special box for people to donate manga that will be taken to kids in orphanages as a way to fight illiteracy. Since the donated books were random, we do pick and choose the appropriate ones that will be given to the kids while the rest go back to the library.

Q: I wanted to ask about your thoughts about the recent Flying Colors Foundation situation where the now-defunct organization asked a question regarding users' mental health. There was a good amount of criticism towards FCF about that particular question. What concerns did you have over how they presented it?

Ruby: We believe the question about mental health could have been worded better or not have been asked at all. The survey was to show Japanese animation studios what most Westerners think and want in an anime, and not about personal mental health issues which are generally unrelated to their survey.

Q: I love the #SavedbyAnime hashtag you started, but there are times, as you and I know, where anime consumption can be harmful to someone. We've seen toxic situations involving fandom. How do you tell someone who may be letting anime or anime fandom take over their daily life that it's a good time to step back?

Ruby: “Too much of a good thing is good for nothing.” Moderation is always the key. Over-consumption of anything such as food, exercise, entertainment, and also medicine can be harmful. Finding balance in our lives is so important, yet it is so hard.

This is one of the complex questions that we face at conventions most of the time, since we have encountered many people saying “If it wasn’t for over-consuming anime, I'm not sure if I would be here right now.”

We tend not to judge or give advice to people, but paradoxically, our first approach is to invite people to watch an anime that would speak to their situation in life (Naruto, Welcome to the N.H.K, etc. for example).

Then we follow up with them to ultimately help them understand what they are going through and hopefully get professional help. We believe all the struggles anime characters go through is to share with us their experiences that we can learn from and use it in our daily lives.

This is where we start the conversation and and educate people about the hashtag #SavedByAnime which is about how to use anime to find balance, growth and purpose in life.

Q: I noticed that there's an upcoming program called "Anime Therapy" on the front page of your site, which looks like screenings with some conversations afterwards, I believe? Can you talk more about it?

Ruby: We will keep you updated once it's ready for launch.

Q: Given that mental illness is becoming a popular topic in graphic novels and manga like “My Lesbian Experience With Loneliness” have hit mainstream success, what would like to see going forward in terms of anime covering portrayals of characters with mental illness?

Ruby: We would love to see more of the kinds of anime that cover characters with mental illness. For example, Welcome to the N.H.K depicted the struggles of a person who was suffering from mental illness. We also hope to see anime touch on the subject of getting professional help when in crisis.

This interview has been edited for clarity.

You can visit Anime For Humanity at http://www.animeforhumanity.org.

#Anime for Humanity #anime #manga #mental health #otaku fandom #therapy #psychology #interviews #non-profit organization #mental health organizations

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31lemon39 · 7 years

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Reddit user Throwaway7289333 claims to have the plot of season 5. Since the account was deleted, here's all of the posts together:

I created this account just to share this with you all. I will not answer questions or reveal my source, but this sub will know I'm real as Season 5 progresses. I was made aware of a few things that will be happening and some of it really excites me as a new fan of the show, some other parts not so much. Please do not ask me my source or ask for more details, I'm telling everything I can that won't give away my source, and I don't want them to get in trouble after the convincing it took for them to tell me I could post this. I apologise if my descriptions isn't as accurate as a much bigger fan's of the show would be. i do not know the order a lot of these plotpoints occur. I was going to post this on the main reddit but I saw that there was one just for spoilers. Please take this with small grains of salt because a lot of this show is new to me and confusing. -Lapis has a major fight with the Crystal Gems and leaves. Garnet tries to prevent Lapis from leaving and is nearly poofed until she backed up. Lapis fly's through space until she finds a planet colonised by homeworld and blends in with other gems of her kind to build a world. -Steven/Connie visit Lars and the off-colours in space. After stealing a ship, Steven and company is found by a new squadron of Moonstones sent by a group of upperclass gems. Moonstones are scout gems, and are able to tell where any cut of any gem is at anytime if shown an image of the gem. The moonstones are led by a gem that the moonstones call "Cat." The gem named Cat has the power to override any homeworld technology and uses this power to shut down the ship. Lars's, Rhodonite, and Flourite try to fox the ship, while Stevonnie senses danger and fuses. The fusion of Connie and Steven somehow get on a smaller ship that gets shot down by a bigger one. Steven and Connie crashland on a planet that I am not going to bother to try and spell. -Steven and Connie meet Lapis in this world and she helps them hide. Throughout the world are statues and morals of a gem called Pink Diamond, no Kindergardners are in site. It is revealed that the race of this world has another galactic empire that rivals the gem empire. A White Diamond owns this world and has found out the planet is not good for making gems. Because of this, she has had Lapis Lazuli's putting water on this world for centuries, and forcing the enslaved race to build towers of the Pink Diamond. Other gems that do not talk are seen painting and carving big pictures of Pink Diamond, Yellow Diamond, Blue Diamond, and the White Diamond. After being captured in the ship, Rhodonite and Flourite are destabilized for being fusions and are put in bubbles by the White Diamond. -A gem called Emerald is given a weapon and is put in charge of the breaking of Steven and a pink sapphire. Connie/Lars are to be taken to the homeworld for research purposes. Steven's Lapis creates a diversion to stop the shattering of Steven. The next few parts I have tried to erase from my memory and I feel is a little too dark for a cartoon network show. During Lapis's diversion, Lars uses all of the power he possesses to create a portal back to Earth. Steven, Pink Sapphire, and Connie escape through this portal. Steven sees Lars collapse as he runs through and it is implied that Lars is no longer going to be with us. Lapis is poofed by the Emerald. -Upon returning home, Lars's parents and Peridot are heartbroken by the fate of Lars and Lapis. -To put this in a better note, Steven's Sapphire defuses from Garnet, angering Ruby. After seeing Pink Sapphire's defect, she wants to fuse with her. The 2 Sapphires fuse, and Ruby is really angry (in a comical way). After seeing the murals on the gem colony, Steven/Connie have even more questions about Pink Diamond. Due to the fear of homeworld, Steven/Connie fuse back to Stevonnie and it is implied they intend to stay as Stevonnie for a while. With the help of Steven's Sapphire, the Sapphire fusion is able to combine her powers with the other Sapphire. The Sapphire is overwhelmed with emotion and makes sculptures of ice. This sculptures lead the viewer into a flashback where we see Pink Sapphire serving the Pink Diamond. -A lot of the flashback is hard for me to explain, but it is revealed that Pink Diamond on the surface cared about all life, but that was because of her fascination with manipulating it. The Pink Diamond started the creating of Forced Gem Fusions. She would borrow races from the other diamond's colonies and have them kept in Zoo's and try to study their interactions together. Stevonnie is overwhelmed by emotion as well, and the sapphires create a sculpture of a fusion between the Pink and Blue Diamonds. It is implied that Pink would keep Blue forcefully fused in this fusion for varying periods of time. When Yellow Diamond found out, she told the White Diamond the viewer is shown through a sculpture. The Sapphire fusion breaks apart. Peridot is overwhelmed and runs and it is unknown to where she is going. Sapphire and Garnet reform. This is what I gathered from what I was told and please don't ask anymore, mostly because it would make my source obvious and also because a lot of things I do not understand. We get to see that Steven's Sapphire are Ice Spike things, to end on a positive note. I did not plan on logging back onto this account after I logged off. Not saying How I knew this was rude, I'll give you that. My father is very good friends with a translator of Steven Universe and other animated shows. He has read and shown me parts of scripts of upcoming Steven Universe Episodes. The reason I didn't post pictures of the scripts is one: security reasons for the company, two not wanting the firation of him, and three, in general a lack of motivation to go through the effort of proving the reality of myself when I know in around a month I will be proven real. My native language is not english, but I know with the intelligence of my main language revealed, it would be obvious who my source was, that is a main reason why i have hesitance. Rereading my post, I noticed some mistakes I would like to fix: I did not know who Rutile was but I looked again and she is friends with Flourite and is and bubbled by the White Diamond. Expect another song of Lapis and of Peridot I mistaked in the last sentence, Sapphire's weapon are Ice Spikes, and the pink sapphire is named Padparadscha. Her weapon is her eye but Steven is teaching her how to use it. The best proof I can offer are pictures of parts of the scripts, but with heavily cropped out names and numbers of production Hi guys, it is a little late in my country. Earlier today, I sent pages of the reading of two episodes of season 5 to the moderators. I have more and I'm going to try to get physical copies to take pictures of and send. Earlier today, a reddit user sent me a message and correctly came to the situation of the country I am from. He convinced me to send him the scripts of three of the episodes and he summed up for me what happened. I even added him on snapchat jajajaja -A song is being written featuring White and Pink Diamonds. -White Diamond has every single gem power and weapon in her arsenal. She created Yellow Diamond for war, and Blue Diamond for diplomacy. Blue Diamond was the first resort, to use powers of emotion to convince other aliens to surrender to homeward. Yellow Diamond, second resort, to take empires by force if they didn't comply. White Diamond's jobs were colonisation and running homework.d -Pink Diamond was an accident. She was born with no powers. White Diamond did not want to shatter her because she had a vision of a new power of the empire. She planned on taking her strongest 20 gems and abandoning homeworld to spread the gem empire thousands of places away. She had the intending of leaving her homeward to Pink Diamond eventually. -White Diamond created every gem under Yellow and Blue Diamond. Pink Diamond robbed White Diamond secretly and stole these plans. Pink Diamond designed all of the Earth gems to rebel against homeworld. When she was first birthed, yellow diamond was disgusted and wanted to shatter her. She grew on Yellow Diamond eventually. Blue Diamond thought she was beautiful. -Pink Diamond created the powers of healing and dreaming with others. Rose Quartz was her main experiment, a gem designed to rebel against homeworld. Pink Diamond's plans of destrificaiton were to learn how to use Rose's dream powers, take control of the body of the White, and make her do something to turn everything against her. -At the highest hight, of pink diamond, almost every gem, regardless of court had their main loyalty to her. She had Blue Diamond obsessed with her, and she had the intention of assumption that Yellow does what Blue wants, and that Yellow and Blue would help her take down homeward. -When Yellow Diamond found out the power of keeping Blue forced in fusion, she told the White Diamond. -No single gem is responsible for her shattering. There are multiple episodes dedicating to why Rose's Pearl, Pearl, Rose Quartz, each diamond, and all pink's subjects are responsible for her demise. -I do not know who killed Pink Diamond or who shattered her, and the episodes seem all over the place with the hinting of the guilty. -White Diamond has around a hundred pearls just for her. Every Pearl is a different color, but they all have one aspect of white clothing on them. One of these Pearl's was given to Rose as a gift by White, another was given to sabotage Pink. -Homeworld was a lot more open and less discrimination against fusing before Blue and Yelloe Diamonds revealed to the White Diamond what pink was doing to EDIT: blue not yellow, sorry, was double checking to see if my editor missed anything and found that all by me I am hoping this makes sense, I sent it to another user earlier and he fixed it for me, i do not believe there are mistakes now. One of the final episodes of the season (My helper from here said he thinks it was early Season 6 but I have no reason to believe any of my episodes are from season 6) ends with White Diamond sending Steven a dream and telling him "Alright, I'll finish this myself." Steven then sees her sleeping getting into a bodysuit and flying off of homeward. EDIT: Pink Diamond also created a lot of gem technology to give herself a fighting chance. She created the blueprints for a lot of the planet we see in our series.

#Steven universe #Reddit #throwaway7289333 #red #this is most likely fake but just in case and all #possible spoilers

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ecotone99 · 5 years

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[MF] Diary of Geff

CAMP REPORT- ITEM 562

This is the year 498 [(ref) Galaxy: Mound, Star: Ant, Planet: Hole, Satellite: Egg]. Head of excavation: Sabrina Moonwalker. This is an ‘early report’, to be shared among peers in order to avoid delay till the publication of final compilation of information and thus, the information contained about the item can change in the final publication. I have checked, read and referenced this report written by my trainee (11QU56) for the above mentioned specimen. I hereby provide my clearance for the report to be published Signature: __SABRINA_____ Status: approved

As usual, it’s a cold and dusty day on Mars. This piece concerns the archaeological finding from the colony in south-west. The contents reported below have not been found exactly in the colony rather about 20 kms North of the first site. A large cylinder has been unearthed which contains this item and a few antics, probably from the same time-frame in which this item was produced. Nevertheless we will do dating of all of them and run the forensics to be sure because the container was not found in a sealed condition. ITEM-562 is a script, it has been reproduced below and is crucial because it throws light on the conditions of the colony in the early era. This is believed to be one of the very few complete texts we have been able to obtain.

below is the content recovered from script

12 December 2137

Dear Reader,

It is chilly, dry and dark outside. I am sitting at my table in the office. This cute table-lamp, the only illumination source in my vicinity, gifted by Carlij, gives me company in these late hours. A photo of my family from one of their picnics sits in a frame on my table although I am not in that photo. I think the presence of my glass and steel clad body would have only made it look like a hostage situation. Although I would have looked like the knight in shining armor. Also, I am pretty sure that if Gina shows such a picture to her friends, the boys would keep a distance from her. This chair is really uncomfortable though. I have to keep shifting my posture, no surprises that the person before me resigned from the job. Moving on to what this is:

This is Geff [Exl:311207IDA#2M]. As I write this, I am about to leave for an expedition in deep space and thus, as a mark of tradition I am leaving this letter behind which might be my final word to this world. If my death is confirmed while my family lives then Jenny you are probably reading this with Carlij and Gina, in which case I want you to know that I am sorry I failed to keep my promise and if you aren’t one of these then I want you to know that Jenny is my wife and Carlij and Gina our children. Sometimes I am afraid and fear grips my heart now and then when I think as a realist. Thus, I will write believing that neither of you three have to read this letter.

I do not know in which year you are reading this, but in this year we still follow the calendar from Earth. My code states the nature of my job, date of birth (31-12-2107), genetic origin, family history and biological sex (M). I guess if the archives have survived when you are reading this, you will eventually find every trivia or data about me from my number.

My parents came to this colony soon after they got married at earth which makes me a second generation immigrant (#2). My father was a systems engineer for cyborg research and development while my mother an “extraterrestrial agriculture specialist”. When I decided to be a cyborg soldier, I was the odd one out in my family. Even my grandfather who I never got to see was a computer scientist on earth. I only heard about him from my father. I was born and raised in this colony. We all have registration ids, we live by the rules, life is tough but the sole aim is to survive and expand the humanity’s purpose. We are taught right from the beginning that there is no ‘I’, it is just ‘We’. Immigrants like my parents were taken in on the basis of decisions made through algorithms. Our mating partners are decided based on our genetic data (IDA), job, ethnicity, physiological parameters, etc. using algorithms. This is how I met Jenny, we didn’t really get to know each other rather we were chosen by the system once we expressed our interest in making a family. My previous job kept me out most of the times so we never grew too close. I was a soldier but right now I am a mercenary for a company (Exl) after my retirement so I take up security contracts. Two years before, I had thought that my retirement would give me more time to spend with my family, we would grow close, and I would feel a little more at peace but guess I was wrong. You might be intrigued about why there was ever a need for an army on Mars. You see, I believe, humans may wander anywhere but there is no escape from self. This age is of data and cybernetics. Cybernetics has given the humans eternal life. When the first settlers came, they established giant data centers, this was supposed to be the perfect world, a stepping stone for humanity to expand and claim the cosmos. Everybody was chipped in the neck, their identities were just a set of characters, and they lived like ants working together for a bigger cause. Things went well initially but as I said there is no escape from self, soon, a group of people rebelled who didn’t want to obey these algorithms made by a few men. They want to seize control, and so they devised what we now know as ‘soul-virus’. This malware fiddles with the chip and causes it to blur the identity of the infected person by disrupting neural pathways. Existential dread becomes too harsh to bear for a mind without an identity. These people become hungry to truly discover who they are and the virus is designed to prevent it from happening. They bite the healthy individuals. They bite and tear out their chips from the neck, killing them and use its data to feed into their own system. The virus takes some parts of the victims’ identity and fills the puzzle, giving the infected person a sense that his or her identity is now a step closer to be completed. This increases their thirst for more data and they keep harvesting more and more data. It is all about the illusion that virus is creating for the mind. With mind hacked, their reflexes are improved. The extra and quick surges of electricity needed to make this happen come from the chip but it deteriorates their bodies so they keep replacing those parts with machines. The ones who were first infected in labs were modified heavily to become more machine than human through cybernetics. These ones are called the first borns and are the most powerful and hardest to kill. The modus operandi resembles to what my father read in his childhood comics as ‘Vampires’. We call them ‘Vampires’ only even though nobody knows if the original blood-suckers ever existed or not. As the vampires grew and spread chaos through the colony, an army was raised to hunt them. I joined this army but took an early retirement even though colony lives under the fear of these devils, to take care of my family. Recently, stronger vamps have come up. They have modified canines which can hack into the victims chip, infecting them with virus while retrieving their data without killing the victim. The only way to kill them is to remove their heads or to destroy the chips. I have killed many vamps in my career but it seems there is an endless evil and they just keep increasing. This war seems like a lost cause to some but we fight nonetheless.

The ‘soul-virus’ creation brought some positive things though, it highlighted the need for humans to have some sense of self-identity too instead of just a collective identity. So, the algorithms were made less constrained following its creation like we were allowed to have names again instead of registration IDs. We could choose our careers more freely than before. There have been a few publications/theories now which treat ‘soul-virus’ in this light. At this time, the horns of two powers are crossed, the outcome of this war is held in the folds of future. Both fighting to take control and be the leaders in their own way. If one truly sees, it is just lust for power. Whoever wins, the cake will be shared by a few only.

Leaving that, how ironic that I gave up my job for my family but this new job is taking me away from them. This contract pays me really well, the insurance on me is enough to keep my family comfortable and safe even if I don’t return so I took it. I guess, this is the least and most genuine thing I can do for them. Jenny was against this. I tried to convince her that if I return we will have so much money that we need not do anything for the rest of our lives but she thinks this is just my attempt to get away from this sick world. I tried to reason with Jenny but she says that if I am so sure of my return then why I can’t take them along. I have to laugh it off. She says that this attempt of mine, of trading myself for the huge money is a deplorable attempt to feel less guilty about my escapism.

She accuses me of being selfish and of disrespecting the society by breaking away from the social fabric of family. She says that in her heart she knows that I will not return and that I am a coward for leaving her alone in this world with Carlij and Gina.

She reminds me about their well-being but I believe Carlij and Gina will get by fine even without me in this colony, there are structures in place to guard them given we have money to access them. This tells us how shackles have a few advantages if you see, a slave need only fear his or her master. The master protects it from everything else once it accepts a life of servitude.

In the last few days, she has even tried to talk to my parents so that they can convince me otherwise but I guess it was a poor attempt because I stopped listening to them the day I decided to become a soldier instead of taking up a job considered as elite and civilized in their social circle. Jenny’s accusations of escapism do not hold water because there is no escape from self, all I can escape from are the artificial shackles of this society. Last night she broke down and started to blame herself for being unable to stop me from going. I told her how she couldn’t be farther from truth. I have known her as a good person, she is not the one to blame. I know it will be a tough time for Carlij and Gina, I will miss them too. As for about what I think about this expedition. I am doing this because I have seen the illusive nature of life in these shackles. I haven’t felt as being a part of the colony in a long time but that is just me I guess but then I hope to find some answers. I think sometimes that the only answer is that we all were here for eternity and we all will be here in this universe for eternity. We are all made from the same matter that has always existed here. We are the universe and at the same time a part of it, just a few atoms dancing around for who knows what, who knows till when. I think we are not even meant to know and I accept it as it is. I am skeptic about those who say that universe speaks to them, I think it is just their mind and inflated ego talking. Universe is silent, when we are it and it is we, why will it talk to self and that too with such an insignificant self. Do we ever talk to our mitochondria? Anyways, I will leave in two days. It is already dawn. I should probably just go to my quarter and spend these last hours with them and be prepared to leave what could be my last impression on this colony. -Geff

script ends

Comments: While the information obtained about the creation of ‘soul-virus’ is crucial. We are hopeful that this has brought us a step-closer to finding its cure. Some analysts are arguing that the mindset of the subject referred here as Geff, is reflective of symptoms of this virus. Therefore, it is possible that some dormant strain of this virus had infiltrated the main chip manufacturing facility of the colony and several people like Geff grew with it in their system. These walking time-bombs, waiting to go haywire and nearly impossible to detect could have been the precursors to events that finally lead to instability in the colony and thus, annihilation of it. This discovery lays further emphasis on the need to discover the destroyed data center and chip manufacturing facility. -Trainee 11QU56

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soundincomestrategies · 6 years

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Media And Information Bias With David Scranton

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Dan Gainor

David Scranton: Hi and welcome to this week’s installment of the Income Generation, I’m David Scranton your host. As always the primary purpose of this show is to provide you with useful information thoughts and financial remedies to assist and guide you through a time in your life when financial missteps could have a much larger negative impact than when you were younger. Each week I share some of the insights and expertise that I use in my financial practice and bring them to you as either food for thought or actionable items for financial or investment concerns you might be having. Many of the times people don’t even realize or recognize what these concerned should be, they feel as though they’re doing everything right. You might be watching the nightly news, you might be reading financial publications, sitting there with your broker or a financial advisor on a regular basis to make the most of your situation. But history has still shown that time and time again the information distributed to you by various outlets turns out to be wrong or if not totally wrong just ignores some very important facts. So why is it so often wrong or incomplete? that’s what today’s show will help you discover and I’m sure that it will get you thinking and maybe even rustle some feathers of people that I occasionally run into in my own business, and that’s fine with me. Our guest today is an expert on the subject of media bias, he’s vice president of Media and Culture at a much heralded organization. Watching the media and what you’re being told, they listen and watch word for word for truth then they make the findings available as a public service. So as much as the news and the media are in many ways supposed to be your source of information or even the public’s watchdog, as it turns out the watchdog actually needs a watchdog. As you may know America has a watchdog with the Media Research Center so you’re in for some great insight and perhaps even some disturbing examples today of abuses in the media. abuses that you know we’re exposed to every single day, a little later in the show I’ll be interviewing Dan Gainor who for ten years was head of the division of the MRC. The MRC exist solely to be the watchdog for you. I’ll see if I can get Dan to pull the cover off some of the machine that shapes public thoughts, the media themselves. I’ve known Dan for a while but I’ve never had the opportunity to have this discussion with him, I look forward to his informed insights and depth of understanding of what either is intentional misdirection or complete dishonesty. And what may just be the nature of information distribution. Marti Johnson’s also back this week with a special report on why the media like so many other businesses may be flawed or missing their potential to do good. And most of the media is a four profit business whether it’s a newspaper with a two hundred year history, a major television network or recent blog that you read. The main goal is to make money. Actually, in many cases informing you is a bit lower on the list, how much lower? Well by the end of the show we’ll have a better idea of where we rank in the media’s eyes. Last week we had an economist Peter Morici on and he discussed some of what drives market expectations and its expectations that often drive investment prices and returns.

Peter Morici: The reality is though is that Mr. Obama would be limited to spending only as much taxes come in so would force a balanced budget almost immediately that is a manageable proposition. So to say the Republicans are responsible is absurd but unfortunately, who’s ever present in the United States gets to set the terms of the debate by virtue of the bully pulpit. And he’s got America convinced that somehow that we’re going to renag and welch on our debts. Nothing could be further than the truth, the only person that can determine whether we renag or welch on our debts if we don’t raise the debt ceiling is the president of the United States.

David Scranton: Well, with a constant barrage of news twenty-four seven and even phone apps today that are updating and informing us on a constant basis it would be almost impossible for the information distributed. Whether correct or not to not work its way into the market psyche and even yours, this of course has a huge effect on us all. As for myself I’m a student of the markets and I sometimes sit dumbfounded as I listen to a reporter discuss why the markets moving up or why the markets moving down. the reasons they give it times I think are so oversimplified as to be comical, I often wonder if they’re intentionally oversimplifying or if they purposely omit discussing the most likely causes of market moves for fear that you at home simply may not understand. Let me give you a simple example, in August of this year the stock market moved significantly lower and what the media called a flash crash. This event included one of the top ten worst days in the history of the Dow Jones Industrial Average. Since the talking heads on television always promised to deliver and provide the answers immediately they had to give viewers a reason for the drop on the spot. My experience is that they seem to have a list of go to explanations for most market moves, this time they pulled out the old high frequency trading and lack of transparency as being the cause. They basically blamed electronic trading. They quickly were airing conversations to viewers about market reforms to help improve these causes and conditions. Whether the news outlets were right or not didn’t matter, all the folks at home who digested this as a cause were fed information that is now part of their beliefs to one degree or another. The reasons given much later on when analysts had time to look at all the mechanisms that played into that historical day ended up being much different. And that is still being studied, I thought of a similar event back in May of two thousand and ten. Which had a one thousand point flash crash. You might remember that back then the media also pointed the same culprits, high frequency traders. Enough time has passed and research conducted since that invent they have come up with an entirely different set of reasons. In fact, the conclusion the SEC came up with along with the Commodities Futures Trading Commission specifically stated that high frequency trading did not cause the flash crash. The staffs of these two agencies discovered that Futures contracts in Chicago specifically something called the E-mini futures had a liquidity crisis and it caused the price drop of five percent within four and a half minutes. Did the news outlets issue a correction or even an apology? Not that I heard, that was yesterday’s news and what I describe briefly earlier is not something most viewers would quickly grasp or tie together. Perhaps they’re afraid to give too much information because they don’t think their audience can handle it. Today’s show we’ll talk about this and even more sinister motives, that’s one of the reasons I’m here to dig deeper than a soundbite or quickly fabricate a reason to explain just the market move or the day. in fact after a very few very bad days after the flash crash this August, the market began climbing back much of the time according to analysis done by my staff at Sound Income Strategies was it was due to investors covering what’s called short positions in the stock market. These trades have the same effect as any other purchase so of course, the market begin to rise. Now this again wasn’t explained as one of the possible reasons on anything written or aired that I have seen since then. I guess they didn’t think you’d understand, I remember hearing instead that China suddenly was no longer a concern and that the Fed was expected to raise rates and that was the reason for the original drop. But the market climb is because the Fed will probably be on hold for a while now and of course, the old standby excuse unemployment concerns. If you have any money at all you can rest assured there are people who will be trying to relieve you of some of it? Now I’m not suggesting necessarily in an illegal way we all know there are people who will steal. What I’m talking about today though is legal businesses that bombard us all with dubious images and definitions of what’s best what’s normal and what we need to do to live happier more successful lives. One example, I like to show is legalized fantasy sports betting. If you haven’t seen these commercials for these fantasy sports companies which fits almost every definition I know of gambling well then you’re lucky. On their commercials which typically air during football or baseball games they have one person after another talking about how for just a few dollars entry fee they were able to win thousands of dollars playing. Their all extremely happy, they’re full of energy and the commercials urge you to get into the action along with them. The underlining message is that you can’t lose now, maybe these commercials and the business practices of this industry shouldn’t bother me as much as they do. But when I see the advertisements it reminds me of the ads and business tactics of discount brokerage firms and online trading sites. the message their commercials constantly send is that it’s so easy to invest a baby can do it , you’ve all seen those I’m sure. Another ad looks to get people to buy more by convincing them that if they’re like the winner in the commercial when they have an idea they also need to act upon it right away. Yet another sends the message that all you really need is the right charting tools you know instantly take control over your finances. Much like the ad for one week fantasy leagues which may not specifically be asking the viewer to gamble, I feel these discount broker ads are suggesting the same thing. They craft the message that it’s easy, it’s fun, everyone’s doing it and everyone’s making money doing it it’s almost like they’ve even taken scripts directly from the cigarette ads of yesteryear. You know if you smoke well you’ll be cool or in this case if you day trade you’ll be cool. Let me mention another reason for us to all be upset, when a product portrayed as glamorous you know yet it has the potential to do as much harm as smoking or online trading. The company and perhaps even the network is acting irresponsibly but it’s you as a citizen who gets stuck with the bill in one way or another, think about it. Both the tobacco companies and those touting these ease of do it yourself investing have cost Americans billions, that’s whose footing the bill for irresponsible misrepresentations of what you should expect. Why would large T.V. networks not instead have more wholesome advertisements? For the same reason Congressman may be more likely to act on behalf of lobbyists than their constituents, you know there are lobbyists pursuing them and pushing them, incentivizing them to act on their behalf instead of yours. It’s similar with T.V. and magazines paid advertisers are far more important than non-paying viewers. I’ll even go as far as to say it affects the very content of the supposed new shows, I hope to dig deeper into this with Dan Gainor later in the show. My registered investment advisory firm Sound Income Strategies is already held to a fiduciary standard. I believe that brokerage firms which are related business should also be held to the same standard, this is why I get so fired up when I see commercials that are encouraging people to gamble with their future. They should all come with a warning much like packs of cigarettes today that say Don’t Try This At Home. In fact, right now President Obama is making a huge push to have all advisors including brokers become fiduciaries when investing client’s retirement accounts. I’m a managing member of a registered investment advisory firm as I said a moment ago so I’m already held to that fiduciary standard, in fact, I’d lose my license and effectively be out of business if I didn’t put my clients first. Holding brokers and other advisors and hopefully one day commentators also to a fiduciary standard I believe is a good thing because it’s not so easy that a baby can do it. So it may be a rare moment when I agree with one of President Obama’s initiatives but I hope in this case that his push on this topic is successful. You heard that right, I agree with you Mr. President all advisors need to be held to the high fiduciary standards of putting their client’s interests above their own. Many types of financial advisors don’t have to under current regulations so make sure you’re working with an advisor that does. Dan Gainor currently runs the Business and Cultural Institute at the MRC but has also been the T. Boone Pickens fellow as well as the director of the free market project in the past for the MRC. Dan, welcome to the show.

Dan Gainor: Thanks Dave, it’s a pleasure.

David Scranton: First of all, can you tell us what the Media Research Centers primary mission is?

Dan Gainor: Well, we’re a conservative media watchdog and it’s our job to both identify and then neutralize left wing bias in the media. We’ve been around for more than twenty-eight years and we are probably the largest archive you’re going to find this side of the Library of Congress for video. we’ve got I think the last number is close to six hundred thousand hours of video and that means that we’re monitoring ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, Fox, MSNBC and not just for news but also for entertainment. because one of the things we found over the years is that the bias in the media is in all aspects of media and you’ll see that…you’ll see that it attacks on conservative issues, you see it attacks on business men you’ll see you know T.V. shows where there were always targeting businessmen as villains. And the free market system and our country as somehow evil but one of the things we’ve learned over time is that essentially American public has lost faith in the media and there’s good reason for that.

David Scranton: Alright, fair enough that’s a great explanation for viewers you know why do we need a media watchdog and why can’t the media…?

Dan Gainor: I’ve been… I spent decades in news. I mean I spent decades in the news before I came into this job and I can tell you that on every major issue of the day journalists have opinions that they let creep into their news copy. that’s who their friends with, who they go to… who they socialize with, how they vote that all creeps in and it ends up undercutting people’s opinion. If you look at the opinions going year by year using the Pew Center for People in the press the opinions of the major media have been pretty much on a steady decline for years. And the reason for that is people now have a better sense of what’s going on in their media, they turn on T.V. they can then watch it and Twitter. Watch it on Facebook and then get real time reaction and when they do that they realize just how disastrous what they’re being fed really is. And the net result is if they’re… if who watches the watchers?

David Scranton: Right, good question. That’s absolutely correct and obviously you’re one of the people that help us with that and we’re grateful for that. Let’s point the conversation now to the interested parties that are associated with you know many of the shows that are consider financial shows or even financial news shows. Where I’m not sure the American public realizes that unlike the Internet everything on T.V. is paid for by one group or another. Can we talk about that for a moment?

Dan Gainor: Oh yeah sure, and I mean there’s… when you get into niche markets, financial shows, sports shows you know that’s were really I guess you would say some of the worst media cronyism is. Because I mean you know you’re… it’s in your best interest to not alienate the very people who are paying your salary and then you get… you know so that crops up. Now when you’re… when you’ve got an ABC evening news show and you know you’re touching on a lot of different topics you’re going to run less maybe into advertisers. But if you’re talking about something happening in the business media then you’re really running into a much more narrow market where financial advisors, mutual funds, everybody involved… You know they’ve all got a piece of the pie and you’re expecting whoever you’re watching to be a neutral observer, they’re not.

David Scranton: yeah so who else besides financial advisors, mutual fund families are the advertisers in these types of shows that might influence the decision of a reporter or someone else?

Dan Gainor: Well, I mean I think even before you get into that you’ve got to think also about corporate ownership. it’s a very finite number of organizations that own you know that own media so you’re looking at… just use NBC for example, NBC is MSNBC, is CNBC with its corporate owners you know ultimately Comcast. Are you going to really you know… and that means because their extremely reliant on cable, you know couple of those shows, couple of those networks wouldn’t survive at all without cable. And then of course they’re owned by cable, so you’re going to expect them to be you know have their advisors, their analysts come on and talk about cable. And say oh yeah we think the future cable is bad no, of course not, because they’re you know they’re too closely tied to that market. You know so then you go in to start looking at advertisers and it’s the whole universe of you know financial media, financial advisors, financial mutual funds, stock market. you know the… you know from soup to nuts and so you know… and you can even listen in you know when you’re watching the show sometimes you’ll hear oh, we just recommended this stock and you know two minutes later you’re hearing an advertisement for a company that’s related to that company.

David Scranton: Got you, so you wonder why and then all of a sudden you look back later and you think oh, I get it, it makes sense. Yeah, it’s so true and I want to talk more…

Dan Gainor: Yeah and it doesn’t necessarily mean that they’re compromised you know it just means that you really got to take a… you’ve got to really take a John 20:18.

David Scranton: And of course, you know with any public traded company if the advertiser is publicly traded their number one fiduciary responsibility is to their shareholders. And it’s very easy for you know a reporter writing an article or doing a news report to get influenced by what they say and right after the break we’re going to talk more about that. We’re here now with Dan Gainer talking about some of the issues that we have to deal with in the news reporting world, in this field and how some of the things that you hear and read about financial advice and so on could be skewed more toward the profit motive of a particular person. And maybe just a little bit less toward what’s truly in your best interest. We’ll be right back with Dan Gainor. We’re here today with Dan Gainor and we’re having a frank conversation about how reporting specifically financial reporting, be it through published media or through television is influenced by the likes of advertisers and other interested parties. Dan you know you’re talking about the advertisers per say, so it sounds like you’re saying if an advertiser for a particular show for example is a mutual fund family. Then it’s likely that you’re going to hear a lot of positive things about mutual funds for example, is that correct?

Dan Gainor: Or if nothing else you won’t hear the negative. I mean that’s you know that’s just the reality I mean you know everybody has to pay the bills and so if a particular show is funded entirely by mutual funds you’re not going to hear that that shows saying oh, well mutual funds are a bad bet. Because advertisers will flee you know if you watch the evening news shows you don’t see a lot of stories generally speaking attacking the whole drug industry. The new shows are under you know are funded… there are a lot of advertisers that are drug manufacturers it’s just not one of the things that they you know crusade against. So when you’re looking… when you get to the basics really it helps to understand how do you kind of make the secret sauce to this journalism? And while the economy started doing a downturn in the last several… you know with two thousand and seven journalism never really stopped and as a result you’ve seen massive decline in number of working journalists in major cities. We’ve lost a lot of major dailies, there’s a lot fewer people reporting there… and then there’s a lot of pickup of what other people do so I mean all it takes is one bad story sometimes and the next thing you know that bad story is spread like a virus across the internet. And so because journalists are not spending a lot of research time double checking it you know you really have to be well informed and to give an example how bad this can really be. You’re not going to get the most advance knowledge from journalists, several years ago I’m a member of society professional journalists which is not mandatory. But it’s a good organization and I took economist Brian Wesbury, a great guy. Took him to an annual conference and we had you know a meeting talking about how to teach economics to journalists. And there’s about twenty-six, twenty-seven journalists in the room and Brian got it that he by speaking to you know that smaller number. He was speaking to hundreds of thousands or millions of people and so the first question he asked he says how many of you have had advance training in business or economics? One person raised a hand and he just went off and he’s a very nice guy but he was just stunned by how embarrassingly bad this was. And he said you know how are you supposed to cover business and economics if only one of you have ever had any training in it?

David Scranton: And Dan isn’t it true…

Dan Gainor: That’s what they don’t see what’s easy to pull the wool over the eyes of….

David Scranton: Dan isn’t true also that a lot of times writers to gain experience might write about sports for a while and then write about something else and then maybe fall into finance. You know is that a big part of the reason why perhaps that there are not experts in that particular area as most readers would think?

Dan Gainor: Well you know most journalists are generalists. I’m mean you know not… maybe when you get to the Wall Street Journal level you know you’re not talking about that. But you know there are people… journalism is a trade not a profession like medicine where everybody necessarily went through years of study. Lot of journalists didn’t even have… didn’t get a journalism degree and even then a journalism degree is how to do journalism not how to do economics, not a study of business. And frankly, when you kind of scratch the surface of most journalists they’re not business friendly. I’ve always you know joked when you go to work at a news organization, the news organization isn’t even friendly with its own business department. You know the people they don’t like the advertising in circulation people the people who help pay their bills, the only time they talk to them is at the Christmas party. So you know to expect them to you know to turn around and be friendly to your business you know it’s just not going to happen.

David Scranton: Right, right. You know in the two minutes or so we have left Dan, can you share with our viewers some egregious examples or at least one egregious example of… in the financial industry that you can recall.

Dan Gainor: One of the worst examples and I mean this is foundational to the economic collapse of two thousand and seven, two thousand and eight is the Fannie Mae Freddie Mac scandal.

David Scranton: Sure.

Dan Gainor: For years Wall Street Journal led the charge saying that this was an organization and an operation that was destined for chaos and the American public would be on the hook for billions and billions of dollars. New York Times picked up on it much to their credit, Washington Post picked up much to their credit and there was almost complete and utter silence on ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN to the point where Charlie Gasparino who you know… I remember coming out at the time and he was railing on the networks and saying that the reason why they’re not talking about this is bias. But here’s the reason why? Because the journalists were convinced that Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac helped ordinary you know particularly poor and underprivileged people get mortgages. So they would go to talk to their buddies on the Hill who invariably were pro Freddie Mae and Freddie Mac and they’re telling them oh, there’s nothing wrong. So it ends up being this enormous disaster costing taxpayers you know hundreds of billions of dollars. And only when everything really hit the fan did the networks even at all attempt to cover it.

David Scranton: Yeah and anyone who owned Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac stock back then actually knows what’s happened to that is there’s been a huge loss of wealth for shareholders. So you’re absolutely correct.

Dan Gainor: yeah and I mean that’s you know where is the responsibility for that if you’re an investor and you rely on the regular media to tell you what’s going on then you’re just a (unclear 28:18) fool.

David Scranton: I love it a dazzling fool. Alright well, so for viewers obviously you know you don’t want Dan Gainor to refer to you as a dazzling fool so pay attention to different sources and as I would say always ask the question why. You know why is it something’s being touted for us? Marti Johnson’s going to be here in just a minute and actually talking about that as part of her report. So Dan, I want to take this moment to thank you very much for being part of our show today as usual.

Dan Gainor: Well thank you very much, I enjoyed it.

David Scranton: Okay and we’ll right back in just a minute with Marti, stay tuned.

Marti Johnson: Thanks David, as a media professional myself for many years I’ve always prided myself on my own journalistic ethics and professionalism and so too have the many colleagues I’ve had the privilege of working with. But after hearing today’s guest it will probably come as no surprise that trust in the media as a whole is at an all-time low in this country. According to a two thousand and fourteen Gallup poll only forty percent of Americans surveyed said they trust the media’s ability to report the news and information fully, accurately and fairly. The interesting word in that survey question is ability, because in truth biased reporting and media spin usually aren’t caused by one lone wolf reporter or an editor with a personal agenda. More often, they’re the result of fundamental flaws in the way mass media works and operates. And that’s especially true when it comes to the financial media, today we’re going to take a closer look at those flaws which support the point financial author Dan Solon was making when he wrote to be a successful and responsible investor you need to ignore most of what is in the financial media. Well everyone is aware that the mass media has changed dramatically in the past ten to fifteen years, prior to that the majority of us relied on daily newspapers, T.V. and radio as our primary sources of news and information. the internet changed all of that and today we’re bombarded with headlines, updates, breaking news alerts almost constantly from our laptops, desktops and yes, even our cell phones not to mention the T.V.’s and the radios. Unfortunately, the dramatic increase in the presence and variety of mass media in our lives has only served to enhance the flaws that threaten journalistic objectivity, not diminish them. As a result we’ve seen an equally dramatic increase in the pervasiveness of hype and spin and a decrease in the presence of balanced and truly objective reporting. But what exactly are the flaws driving the situation and why are they even more prevalent in the financial media? To a large extent they stem from the simple fact that most of the outlets in the business of reporting news and providing information are in fact businesses. As such, they’re competing against each other businesses providing the same services competing for readers, viewers, subscribers and of course, advertisers. With so many news sources in the competitive mix and the internet and cable T.V. accessible to viewers and readers around the clock. All of these businesses are compelled to deliver fresh and updated content twenty-four seven and to try and distinguish themselves from competitors. As a result the lines between news advertising and infotainment have become increasingly blurred and modern journalists are under more pressure than ever to put pleasing their bosses and growing their businesses and their brands ahead of serving the public. The result, very often is reporting the lacks objectivity and a spun to the liking of an individual and interest group or an advertiser. But this flaw runs even deeper when it comes to financial media, it begins with the fact that the heads of major financial firms on Wall Street are financially obligated to their shareholders first and to their customers and clients second. They have a legal obligation to maximize shareholder value in part by keeping customers invested in the markets as much as possible. People are more likely to invest obviously and to stay invested if they’re optimistic about the markets and believe they’re moving upward. As a result Wall Street C.E.O.’s and the people who work for them have an inherent need to sell positivity. And to always speak optimistically about the markets regardless of how often economic realities are moving or the markets might be trending. Why, however does this supposedly objective financial media so often fall in the habit of serving the same pro market spin to the public or as Dan Solon bluntly put it, serving as a shill for the securities industry. One reason, is that most financial media outlets are corporate owned and therefore obligated to some extent to help that Wall Street C.E.O. please shareholders by selling optimism. That’s why most of the high profile market analysts you see on the internet and cable T.V. always seem to be touting stocks. Pushing them regardless of market conditions while ignoring the very existence of other investment operations and options. Their opinions aren’t based on independent objective research but on in-house sources and usually there’s no firewall between the company’s research department and its ownership and its advertisers. Most of these analysts know that if they contradict the company line they run the risk of losing their high profile, high salaried jobs. Of course, the overcrowded and highly competitive nature of today’s twenty-four seven media that I just spoke about is also part of the problem. In the midst of this fast paced competition, financial news sources today like news providers in general increasingly fall in the habit of simply pulling stories off the wire to use an old inside ball game journalistic term. They repackage news content already circulating rather than devote resources to developing their own that’s why what you hear from one financial source is so often the same thing you hear from another financial source. They haven’t done separate research and reach the same conclusions by coincidence, they’ve simply gotten all of their information from the same place. And there’s still another issue specific to the financial media industry that makes objective reporting and finding that information difficult. It stems from the fact that a great many articles written for financial publications or broadcasts aren’t written by financial experts or qualified market analysts. Rather they’re contributed by professional writers and even when the writer is highly qualified and very experienced he or she may not have a single area of expertise. Their resume may include everything from athlete interviews for Sports Illustrated to travel articles for Cond Nast this kind of broad based background is common in journalism. You can always trust a good writer to do research when putting together any story but the sources he or she uses to gather their information vary. And unfortunately, it’s quite common for writers contributing to financial publications to use the most convenient sources which very often happen to be among the publications advertisers. The fact is that successful magazines, programs and websites get the majority of their revenue not from readers, viewers and subscribers but from advertisers. And who do you suppose are financial media’s biggest advertisers overall? At the top of the list not surprisingly brokerage firms and mutual funds, obviously these are going be more… these sources are going to be more than happy to provide the reporter with information for his piece. But will it be objective information? Probably not, more likely it will be information that again conforms to his company’s inherent need to sell optimism and to please shareholders by putting a positive spin on the stock market and market based products and strategies. That’s why it’s so important for our members of the Income Generation and all investors today to understand that so much of what bombards them on the internet is not really objective news and information. Particularly when it comes from financial news, rather the majority of it is spin biased rhetoric and disguised advertising. the result of fundamental flaws and the very framework of today’s increasingly convoluted and highly competitive mass media.

David Scranton: When it comes to your money you always have to ask the question why? As in why is this particular advisor or this particular reporter recommending the approach that they are to me? This is especially true in the financial services industry as we’ve seen today. Some of the reasons to be weary of what you see and hear are that so many of the so-called experts on T.V. and the magazines and even professional advisors invited to your kitchen table to help. Have a vested interest in promoting whatever sells their products or services, this lesson extends to all areas of your life. So when you’re hiring a professional be it a landscaper or a contractor or even a lawyer or doctor remember to ask yourself why? Why are they recommending what they are and is it really what’s best for me? One of the examples I like to use when speaking to my clients is as follows. Let’s say that I told you I were having some back pain and I went to four different medical professionals to get help. Now, I ask how many different solutions do you think I might get from four different medical professionals? Well, what if I told you that they came back with four completely different recommended treatments. At first, you might be alarmed but then if I told you that one was an orthopedic surgeon, one was a chiropractor, another was a physical therapist and perhaps the fourth was an acupuncturist. Now it would actually make sense, this is because in the medical field and as well as every other field. Everyone has an expertise and they’re likely to want to help your issue with whatever they can provide and subsequently get paid for. You know there’s a saying when you’re a hammer every problem looks like a nail, so in the medical example knowing the why the different experts are recommending what they are is very, very important. The same is true for the financial industry, and I’ll include investment analyst appearing on T.V. in this group also, ask yourself why they’re recommending what they are indeed recommending and maybe because that’s what they’re getting paid for recommending. Just like you’ll probably never see a time when a stock broker says stocks are bad investments you’ll probably never hear a real estate broker say real estate is a bad investment. Now, when it comes to your health, most people of the Income Generation understand the differences between these four various medical professionals and what they do. Unfortunately, differences are not as well understood in the field of financial services, people tend to paint the financial industry and financial advisors with one broad brush. They look at all advisors being very much the same even though they know that doctors for example are very much different. In reality, there are many different types of financial advisors just like there are different types of doctors, lawyers, construction contractors and even beauticians. You want to make sure you go to the one who is a best fit for the why for which you’re seeing them. This is important and it will soon be designating an entire show to determine the type of advisor that’s right for you and as I said earlier preferably one that’s required to act as a fiduciary. So you could be even more comfortable that they’re acting on your behalf. You know in my personal practice Sound Income Strategies, I talk to prospective clients all the time who are currently working with stock market based advisors. Often these advisors work for one of the big brokerage firms but at times they’re independent. Many times these prospective clients are surprised to find that they have a majority of their money in the stock market, I’m generally not surprised if you think about it this is why stock brokers are called stock brokers. They typically search to find solutions with the limited answers found within the stock market. Like I said earlier, if you’re a hammer every problem looks like a nail, today we got sit down with Dan Gainor and learn about all the good work being done at the Media Research Center. I for one am grateful the MRC exists and his role as media watchdog, I’m personally happy to have shared this resource and to help the Income Generation understand that this information is there for you. I want to also thank Marti Johnson for her reporting, Marti’s report was very important for all of us to understand the role that advertisers play in shaping what makes it on to business news. Now I cannot wait for next Sunday when we have conservative icon and bestselling author Steve Forbes on to discuss how three things are going to potentially save our country. Repealing Obamacare, redesigning the tax code and reforming the Federal Reserve he says it’ll bring our nation back out of its Malays and on its track to growth and prosperity.

Steve Forbes: And in terms of a stable dollar you know you once… the dollar works best, money works best when it has a fixed value. You know money is not wealth, money measures wealth the way scales measure weight or ruler measures length and money…

David Scranton: Forbes has written a new book on the subject called Reviving America. I’ve just finished reading it personally and I look forward to sharing this great thinker with you. if you haven’t signed up yet for a complimentary special report titled The Income Generation which allows readers to discover many answers to their invest the questions. Sign up now at The Income Generation dot com, you’ll discover a wealth of useful ideas for financial security that you may have never known existed. Well that’s it for today, I’m David Scranton you’ve been watching The Income Generation and we will see all of you next week.

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