#everyone uses the term democracy

[intelligentchristianlady]

Big Surprise?

"...What they do now is disgraceful. Everyone associated with this travesty will go down in history as scoundrels and arsonists who try to demolish our justice system, shatter our most sacred traditions and wipe out the very foundations of our democracy for their own selfish, partisan gain and probably other reasons that we’ll never know. –Donald Trump at a Save America rally in Ohio

Trump, like everyone else, characterizes our system of government as a democracy (as far as my research shows, he has never used the term "constitutional republic"). Quibbling about the "proper term" is beside the point and does not speak to the argument.

#yes it's a constitutional republic #everyone uses the term democracy #including all the Republican politicians #including trump #everyone knows what is meant #quibbling about terms is a way to avoid the argument

[qqueenofhades]

https://www.tumblr.com/qqueenofhades/743255237060689920/the-thing-that-confuses-me-about-the-dont-vote

The “don’t vote” left’s point is basically that, if Biden gets a second term, it’ll basically signal that “They’ll vote for us as long as we’re not Republicans, why don’t we do some REAL fucked up shit, if we can get away with it?” It takes the power out of the people’s hands and places it firmly in the party’s.

I can’t completely disagree with that, my caveat is that there’s no real alternative system or party in place, because top-down change is ineffective; a third party president has to contend with a two party congress.

Except no. This whole "Biden just wants to do as much fucked up shit as possible while not being a Republican, and if you give him a second term he'll do more fucked up shit deliberately to spite you" mindset is only possible as an interpretation if you a) deliberately and comprehensively ignore everything he has done to date, and b) you approach the situation with the maximum bad faith possible. Not to mention, the ultimate outcome of this Big Important Teaching Biden A Lesson is that Trump gets back into power and makes everything orders of magnitude worse, because he does in fact want to deliberately do evil shit to everyone and says so at every opportunity. There is not some magical happy alternative that springs into existence by not voting. If you choose this as a year to Teach Biden A Lesson, you are enabling Trump. Trump will be much, much worse. If you don't care about that, I still do not care what your Great Ideology is. You are not helping anyone and you are directly and irreversibly hurting everyone.

I made a post a few days ago wherein I mentioned that I want to assess Biden fairly, taking into account both strengths and weaknesses, but the rampant bad-faith, lying, misreading, misrepresentation, and open sabotage of him (especially by the online left; the GOP sometimes only wishes they were as good at turning Biden's voter pool against him) makes it really difficult to do that. My frustration with those people makes me just want to go "BIDEN IS GREAT THE END." I know he is a flawed old man (though by literally every account of a career spent in public service, he really does care about making the world a better place and any remotely good faith reading of his accomplishments thus far can see that). It is also very likely that he goes MORE left in a second term because he won't have to face the electorate again, he has always gone more left when pushed before, and he's not actually the scheming genocidal mastermind that leftist social media paints him as. Shocking, I know.

I know there are things in the world we don't like and don't want and want to stop, and therefore we blame our own president for not making it stop. But I have zero, no, none, absolutely none whatsoever sympathy for this pseudo-populist "WE NEED TO TEACH BIDEN A LESSON BY ELECTING TRUMP AGAIN, I AM VERY MORAL MUCH ACTIVIST" mindset. There's this funny thing about America wherein it is still (for now) a democracy. If Biden wins a second term, he can't run again. I would take literally anything these people said more seriously if they focused on developing their dream progressive successor for 2028 (and also figured out how to get that person elected and in a place to make real change) rather than cynically sabotaging Biden in the most consequential election year, again, of our lifetimes. If you don't like him now, find a way to make his successor a better option. Throwing a toddler tantrum and handing the country back to a senile, deranged, fascist, revenge-riddled, theocratic Trump HELPS. NOBODY. I still don't know how many times I'm going to have to say that, but yeah.

#anonymous #ask #politics for ts

[yourtongzhihazel]

Just can't stop deep throating the western propaganda can you? Hong Kong is occupied? By who? The Chinese? Alright, winston churchill settle down.

Question: Is Hong Kong directly administered by Beijing like Shanghai or Shenzhen, or is it an SAR?

The answer is: it's an SAR! Which means, Beijing has no direct administration thanks to its handover agreement signed in 1997. Beijing can only get administration after 2050. This is why billionaires run to HK to escape Beijing's mire! This is why HK housing is fucking terrible compared to literally everywhere else in China! This is why HK companies can get away with 996, whereas companies and billionaires who push for 996 on the mainland, like Alibaba and jack ma, are disciplined under threat of capital punishment!

Funny how you only believe us if we agree with you, otherwise we're "brainwashed propagandized buffoons". Look in a fucking mirror sometime, would ya? You've got propaganda flowing out of every orifice like a racist 长江. Not surprising, coming from a zionist.

Tank man climbed off the fucking tank. He did not get run over! Did you all forget this? You can also search for the Tiananmen incident on the Chinese internet and literally everyone under the sun knows about and talks about it. Maybe if you weren't looking for it with english terms, terms which Chinese people don't use, you'd have found them! And I FUCKING WISH talking about Tiananmen square would get you fucking arrested IM FUCKING SICK OF HEARING IT!!! My fucking libshit uncle has been going on and on and on about "184", "muh tiananmen", "muh CPC oppressions" and the motherfucker is still coming in my messages to drop translated pragerU videos. That's whose side you are on btw. A man who thinks all muslims are all "terrorist cockroaches [sic]". Though I reckon you do actually agree with him on that.

Tell you again how communism is so much better for the workers? Here you go you fascist shitlib:

Workplace democracy in the CPC. Chinese wages are rising. Mandatory annual pay raises for private sector (public sector is a given) and CPC control. 95% of Chinese people have insurance and an annual visit costs just 2 USD. Workplace safety is better than Australia.

#i fucking hate liberals #death to liberalism

[weaselandfriends]

Post-postmodernism in Pop Culture: Homestuck’s Revenge

I recently saw an excellent video essay titled Why Do Movies Feel So Different Now? by Thomas Flight. Though the title is opaque clickbait, the video is actually about major artistic zeitgeists, or movements, in film history. Flight describes three major movements:

Modernism, encompassing much of classic cinema, in which an earnest belief in universal truths led to straightforward narratives that unironically supported certain values (rationalism, civic duty, democracy, etc.)

Postmodernism, in which disillusionment with the values of modernism led to films that played with cinematic structure, metafiction, and the core language of film, often with more unclear narratives that lacked straightforward resolutions, and that were skeptical or even suspicious of the idea of universal truth 

Metamodernism, the current artistic zeitgeist, which takes the structural and metafictional innovations of postmodernism but uses them not to reject meaning, but point to some new kind of meaning or sincerity.

Flight associates metamodernism with the “multiverse” narratives that are popular in contemporary film, both in blockbuster superhero films and Oscar darlings like Everything Everywhere All at Once. He argues that the multiverse conceptually represents a fragmented, metafictional lack of universal truth, but that lack of truth is then subverted with a narrative that ultimately reaffirms universal truth. In short, rather than rejecting postmodernism entirely, metamodernism takes the fragmented rubble of its technique and themes and builds something new out of that fragmentation.

Longtime readers of this blog may find some of these concepts familiar. Indeed, I was talking about them many years ago in my Hymnstoke posts, even using the terms “modernism” and “postmodernism,” though what Flight calls metamodernism I tended to call “post-postmodernism” (another term used for it is New Sincerity). Years before EEAAO, years before Spider-verse, years before the current zeitgeist in pop cultural film and television, there was an avant garde work pioneering all the techniques and themes of metamodernism. A work that took the structural techniques of postmodernism--the ironic detachment, the temporal desynchronization, the metafiction--and used them not to posit a fundamental lack of universal truth but rather imbue a chaotic, maximalist world of cultural detritus with new meaning, new truth, new sincerity. That work was:

Homestuck.

That’s right! Everyone’s favorite web comic. Of course, I’m not the first person to realize the thematic and structural similarities between Homestuck and the current popular trend in film. Just take a look at this tweet someone made yesterday:

This tweet did some numbers.

As you might expect if you’re at all aware of the current cultural feeling toward Homestuck, many of the replies and quotes are incredibly vitriolic over this comparison. Here’s one of my favorites:

It’s actually quite striking how many elements of the new Spider-verse are similar to Homestuck; aspects of doomed timelines, a multiversal network that seems to demand certain structure, and even “mandatory death of parental figure as an impetus for mandated personal growth” are repeated across both works. The recycling and revitalization of ancient, seemingly useless cultural artifacts (in Homestuck’s case, films like Con Air; in Spider-verse, irrelevant gimmick Spider-men from spinoffs past) are also common thematic threads.

As this new post-postmodern or metamodern trend becomes increasingly mainstream, and as time heals all and allows people to look back at Homestuck with more objectivity, I believe there will one day be a rehabilitation of Homestuck’s image. It’ll be seen as an important and influential work, with a place inside the cultural canon. Perhaps, like Infinite Jest, it’ll continue to have some subset of commentators who cannot get past their perception of the people who read the work rather than the work itself even thirty years after its publication, but eventually it’ll be recognized for innovations that precipitated a change in the way people think about stories and their meaning.

Until that day, enjoy eating raw sewage directly from a sewer pipe.

(Side note: I think Umineko no naku koro ni, which was published around the same time as Homestuck and which deals with many similar themes and then-novel ideas, will also one day receive recognition as a masterpiece. Check it out if you haven’t already!)

#homestuck #spiderverse #across the spiderverse #metamodernism #post-postmodernism #pop culture

[matan4il]

Update post:

The US has publicly stated that it has not found Israel to be violating International Humanitarian Law (IHL), in terms of how it uses its weapons, and not blocking humanitarian aid.

Yet for some reason, that doesn't seem to matter when it comes to how the US is currently treating Israel. At the UN Security Council, for the first time since the start of the war, the US has not used its veto to block a resolution that's anti-Israel. This resolution calls for an immedaite ceasefire in Gaza for the rest of Ramadan (half of this month has passed already), and while it does call for an immediate release for the Israeli hostages, it does NOT make that a CONDITION for the ceasefire. The operation in Rafah, since it hasn't happened yet, is not likely to happen during Ramadan, so the main thing this resolution is calling to stop, is the on going lower intensity fighting in places like the Shifa hospital, where at least 500 confirmed Hamas and PIJ terrorists have been arrested by Israel. In essence, this is a pro-terrorist reolution. The US did abstain, showing it knows this resolution is wrong. It's also meaningful that just a few days earlier, a similar resolution submitted by the US itself, which did make the release of the hostages a condition for the ceasefire, was vetoed by those great beacons of democracy, Russia and China.

Did I mention Hamas praised the passing of this anti-Israel UN resolution? I can't stress this enough, but if a genocidal, antisemitic, Islamist tererorist organization is glad this resolution passed, that should be upsetting to EVERY person who values life out there.

Right after praising the resolution, Hamas also rejected the hostage deal compromise suggested by the US, that Israel had agreed to, which would have seen 40 Israeli hostages freed, in exchange for about 800 convicted Palestinian terrorists let go. Hamas might have said no anyway, but we'll never know for sure what their answer would have been, had this resolution not been passed.

Maybe the most troubling part is that the US insists this UNSC resolution is non-binding, meaning it will have no real effect on Israel's ability to continue fighting during Ramadan. That means, the US abstaining from using its veto wasn't done for the sake of a real chance to help Palestinians. It was a symbolic anti-Israel step, a bone thrown to Israel haters. That's how Israelis understand it, that's how every political player in the international arena (including the overjoyed Hamas) understands it, that's how political analysts understand it, and it should be troubling to everyone, that the US can treat a democratic, self defending, IHL abiding ally this way.

In fact, at least one country is already using this resolution to put pressure on Israel. The President of Colombia has said that unless Israel complies with the resolution and accepts an immediate ceasefire, his country will cut off its diplomatic ties with it.

Just one more thing. This is resolution did not include a condemnation of Hamas and the massacre it perpetrated on Oct 7, and yet the US allowed it to pass. The other day, the UNSC immediately condemned the ISIS terrorist attack in Moscow, which left 137 Russians murdered. Nobody suggested that "context" should be brought into it, like that Russia has itself attacked Ukraine (which Putin has implied is behind the attack), or like that ISIS' animosity originates in Russia's protection of the Syrian regime of Bashar Assad, which caused the deaths of hundreds of thousands, including many ISIS terrorists. In sharp contrast to this, almost 6 months into this war, the UNSC has not yet adopted a single resolution condemning the Hamas massacre in which over 1,200 people in Israel were butchered, many raped, and over 250 were kidnapped and are still held captive in Gaza. This discrimination was called out by Israeli ambassador to the UN, Gilad Erdan. He pointed to another example of such discrimination, by reading the resolution that was passed in 2014, when Boko Haram (another Islamist terrorist group) kidnapped Nigerian girls.

This is 65 years old Rami Shani.

He's a journalist, working for an Israeli radio station. On Oct 7, he happened to be covering a bicycle event taking place in Israel's south, which is why he was already awake and there at 5:30 in the morning. At 6:30, the Hamas attack started. As Rami started getting information about the massacre at the Nova music festival, he abandoned his original task, and started driving in there and getting people out in his car. He said everyone he managed to get out of there was wounded, having been shot in their arms or legs, one woman was shot in the stomach. One of the people he saved was an Israeli Bedouin Muslim Arab, who worked at the party, and was crying as he had been shot in both his arms and legs. In one case, he managed to evacuate 8 young people from the scene while seeing a terrorist squad progressing in his direction. He kept going, until security forces wouldn't allow him to go back in. He saved a total of about 40 people, and has been visiting them in hospitals around the country since then. Whenever you hear anyone arguing that journalists at the scene of a disaster can just keep covering the news, without doing anything to aid the victims, please remember Rami.

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

#israel #antisemitism #israeli #israel news #israel under attack #israel under fire #terrorism #anti terrorism #hamas #antisemitic #antisemites #jews #jew #judaism #jumblr #frumblr #jewish #israelunderattack #un

[mr-president]

I think one of my favorite Funtermina things is how it uses characters as narrative foils, specifically in how those characters interact with each other and everyone else.

Karin and Daan’s is the most discussed as it’s probably the most apparent within the text: their volatile opposing viewpoints on life via their upbringings (despite being extremely similar otherwise). When Karin and Daan interact, it’s like a person arguing with themself. They clash like ammonia and bleach, unable to reconcile how similar they are (haha cleaning chemical analogy) yet toxic in their association.

Marina and Levi represent the different realities of Prehevil, what with Marina’s privileged upbringing versus Levi’s absolute shitshow of an existence. And yet, they get along incredibly well and form a cadence with one another because through each other, they can reconcile their upbringings in Prehevil. Levi is the Prehevil Marina tried to escape—Marina is the Prehevil Levi hoped to return to.

Marcoh and Olivia are interesting because—and I will argue this to the death—their relationship is wholly as siblings. And they’re also deeply connected by their relationships with their sisters, specifically how those sisters formulated and defined how they see themselves. Marcoh has done nothing but live to protect his sister, while Olivia has forever lived in her sister’s shadow. Their identities revolve completely around their sisters, and this also colors their relationship with each other as siblings.

I wish it was explored more, but I think there’s a level of disenfranchisement when Marcoh fervently tries to protect Olivia the same way he protected his younger sister (edit: rb for amendment). He clearly sees her in that role, and Olivia’s already got guilt written into her about her disability making her a “charity case.” I say this also because of their different opinions on guns, power, and death: Marcoh has no bloodlust and seems exhausted when he has to hurt others, while Olivia becomes almost jubilant when she receives a gun. And those reactions to enacting violence are directly informed by their relationships with their sisters: a begrudging responsibility vs empowerment.

My favorite is probably Abella and O’saa as foils. As characters they’re probably my favorites, and their foil makes it even better.

Abella easily connects with everyone around her, ensuring that they’re all getting along (or not killing each other) and she tries desperately to help everyone, even at her own detriment. She cares, so much, even too much.

O’saa on the other hand, is the exact opposite. He actively chooses to connect with everyone as little as possible, to the point where you can kill someone in front of him and he won’t give a shit. This is, obviously, to his detriment in terms of his goal towards enlightenment. He cares too little, even if at all.

They perfectly represent the dichotomy between altruism vs selfishness, the mundane vs the macro, democracy vs individualism. Fundamentally, both Abella and O’saa get shit done, and what makes them so compelling as foils is how similar the results of their different processes are.

Both of them are the only two that are capable of saving everyone. Abella does so by interacting with many of the other contestants, while O’saa does this by ignoring everyone and just occam’s razoring that shit. They both get shit done and to the greatest net success, but in both cases, because they operate on extremes, it’s to the detriment of themselves. The game shows this literally because, well, they sacrifice themselves to Logic for the greater good, but the game also implies this detriment via their moonscorches.

Chaugnaur represents how others have reduced Abella to a sexual object for their pleasure or a mindless brute for labor. It is a physical manifestation of how interacting and connecting with others can be to one’s detriment because Abella often cannot control how people see and define her. Mastermind, on the other hand, is O’saa’s brain swelling and overtaking everything else on his head to the point where he is blind (save for the eye) and mute, only able to speak in mumbles. Mastermind is how O’saa values logic, knowledge, comprehension over anything else, becoming blind to other viewpoints save for his own. Additionally, it’s unable to communicate or connect with anyone else, only able to ruminate get never share its thoughts.

Abella is one of the first to Moonscorch; O’saa is one of the last. I love them as foils because even though they’re the most different in terms of anything, they don’t hinder one another at much all. They’re just kinda chill. And this makes sense because their dichotomies aren’t volatile like Karin and Daan’s, nor complementary like the others. Rather, they operate in balance—you cannot be too altruistic without some selfishness. To help everyone and to achieve enlightenment, you must consider both the mundane and the greater picture. Society operates on a shared democracy and on empowering individuals.

Still, the fact that even operating on the extremes has the greatest positive effect (in terms of utilitarianism) really says smth abt whether these values even matter. But I’d argue that they do matter, cause it’s that question of whether it’s worth it to suffer or even sacrifice for the greater good.

As a whole, each foil represents a central theme/motif of Fear & Hunger: internal vs external locus of control (Karin and Daan), environment dictating identity (Marina and Levi), relationships and their impact (Marcoh and Olivia), and the thematic shitshow that is Abella and O’saa.

Tldr; the game is about some girls and their boy best friends.

#fear and hunger termina #i could be stretching all of this and completely delusional but i wanted to do some thematic analysis on funger since i haven’t seen much : #feel free to add on #also for the record i don’t ship abella and o’saa mainly bc abella is a hunky lesbian and o’saa is highkey aro ace to me #they’re like the ‘can u text this for me? oh don’t be too mean tho’ besties if thag makes sense #mr president’s state of the union address #i’ll draw soon trust u gotta hear mh deranged analyses first tho

[probablyasocialecologist]

Safety is a real, material set of conditions: a roof over your head and freedom from violence or injury. British politicians aren’t at risk of being bombed or seeing their children dismembered. Yet it was their speculative safety in the spotlight while Palestinians under military assault became a footnote in the vote.    It’s true, of course, that two British MPs have been killed in recent years. But it’s a cheap shot for politicians to invoke their deaths to avoid engaging with the public about an ongoing genocide. When politicians say they feel unsafe in this context, they mean they feel uncomfortable being challenged by their constituents. 

[...]

When discomfort is perceived as danger, protest is seen as harassment. And when political dissent is positioned as a threat to national security, our human rights are at risk. As sure as night follows day, when politicians begin to cite safety concerns, curtailment of democratic freedoms isn’t far behind. Civil liberties will always play second fiddle to securitisation. Judging by Sunak’s doublespeak at the lectern last Friday, the government plans to corrode our democracy under the guise of protecting it. Sunak’s emergency address was an authoritarian wishlist written in Islamophobic ink: curtail protest rights; threaten to remove immigrants’ “right to be here” if they speak what is considered “hate” at protests; reference streets being “hijacked” by “extremists” and “redouble support” for surveillance programme Prevent. It was framed in response to pro-Palestine protests, but entrenches an established anti-Muslim, anti-protest agenda that promotes surveillance in the name of “safety”. The name of Sunak’s “Safety of Rwanda” bill shows us he already has a cynical definition of this word.  It’s curious how the social capital of playing the protector is often afforded to the violent perpetrators. If we use another very British example, the high-profile transphobic lobby that is obsessed with “women’s safety” has, in material terms, driven transphobic hate crimes to historic levels, but done nothing to end violence against women. In the same vein, it’s inevitable that Sunak’s measures to “combat the forces of division” will create even more far-right racism and state violence for Muslims. The dominant force of division is, of course, the state itself. Trans people and Muslims alike are sociological folk devils; minority groups in society positioned as a threat to social order. The government’s self-authorised mandate to marshal these manufactured threats justifies state control for everyone. In reality, the marginalised groups identified as the enemy within face crushing systemic oppression already. If anyone is unsafe, it’s them.

#uk politics #ukpol #palestine #protests

[racefortheironthrone]

how do you feel about gen ed requirements in college majors?

Oooh, that's a good question, because I feel genuinely conflicted about it.

Cards on the table, I should say that I picked my undergraduate university precisely because it had a broad core curriculum of literature, philosophy, art, music, and science (and because it didn't require math) for all majors.

As a freshman, I had very wide-ranging interests and wasn't sure what I wanted to do for my major when I started, even though I started taking as many history electives as possible starting in my second semester. But even though I didn't need much time to "find myself," I still feel that the "well-rounded" education I received was good for my intellectual development, my ability to participate in society, and so forth.

And then there's the fact that my grad school career was entirely dependent on history classes being used as gatekeeping requirements for poli sci, communications, and sociology majors, which generated a steady demand for TA labor. So I do recognize that gen ed requirements are absolutely essential to the economics of many disciplines, and universities would have to rethink how they fund departments if they got rid of gen ed requirements altogether.

That being said, I do recognize that these kinds of requirements can also be really bad for students who are quite different from myself. As generations of students forced to take Physics for Poets or English for Engineers can testify, it can be legitimately frustrating for people who have a strength and an interest in an area that they want to develop that they can't specialize and instead have their academic success depend in part on their weakest subjects. Moreover, given the rise of tuition prices and student debt, every additional class a student has to take is more of a burden on their shoulders.

This is where I see a symptoms/cause long-term/short-term thing going on. Because of increasing competition, credentialism and credential inflation, and the increasing uncertainty about whether rising educational costs will be requited with secure employment at a professional income, I totally understand those people who want to make the college experience shorter and more specialized as a way to save money.

At the same time, if we ask ourselves why we provide education as a society (as opposed to making employers pay the bill for the training of their workforce), I go the other way. In order for modern democracy to function effectively, we need the population to have a baseline of quantitative reasoning so that they can tell when someone is lying with statistics, to be able to close-read texts so that they can tell when someone is lying with rhetoric, and to be sufficiently media-literate to spot propaganda and misinformation.

That being said, if we are going to say to young people that they have to acquire all these skills, the quid-pro-quo is that we have to provide education as a de-commodified public good, and guarantee a job to everyone, so that the economic incentives pushing us towards shorter, more specialized higher education no longer exist.

#academia #higher education #public policy

[zoethebitch]

hats off to Kyrsten Sinema for selling out every single principle she ever campaigned on and stepping on the progressives that got her to the senate like rungs on a ladder and betraying everyone who ever supported her including the democratic party which she left to avoid having to compete in a primary that she absolutely would have lost just to end up not running for reelection and serving only one senate term after polling in 3rd place behind her democrat and republican opponents. masterful gambit ma'am. between her and George Santos it's become clear that gay representation in liberal democracies will lead us into a bright future.

[ohsalome]

How does a state become fascist? How did Russia do it?

A special kind of nationalism is needed here. To convince people that you were once great. That once you were a military empire — and then you were humiliated. This is what Hitler once said: “Germany was great, had colonies in Africa, but we were humiliated at Versailles

Under the terms of the Versailles Peace Treaty of 1919, which ended the First World War, Germany had to get rid of its numerous colonies in Africa, China and Micronesia, cede significant territories in Europe and pay reparations to the victorious states of the war in the amount of $442 billion at 2012 prices.. Our empire was taken from us, and our people in other countries and former territories faced genocide. We need a strong ruler to come and restore our empire. To show that we are a big powerful player. And Iʼm ready to do it.”

Putin behaved the same way. He even said that if Russia does not regain its greatness, it will destroy the world.

Also, often in countries that become fascist, there are many economic problems. And nationalism, this feeling of power, can replace food — you will draw your happiness from this feeling, or from the awareness of yourself as a German or a white American. After that, you say that representative democracy is evil. That it allows the existence of LGBT people and the like, that the state is weak because of democracy. Fascism appeals to conservative, religious people who would not call themselves fascists. He tells them: we will protect you from your children becoming gay, from someone destroying your churches. And they often call all their opponents communists. And they get votes. Sound familiar, right?

[...]

It is ironic that the Russians, who were once rightly regarded as the victors over fascism and who now practice fascism, call their war "anti-fascist."

It is necessary to pay attention not to words, but to ideology. Putin can say that he is a liberator — but he is closer to Hitler than to Brezhnev, to Peter I than to communists. And this is an important argument in favor of why the Russians should not leave a single piece of Ukrainian land. For the same reasons why it was not possible to leave, for example, Warsaw under the Nazis.

Now Putin is talking about Ukrainians like Hitler was talking about Jews. He says that there can be no Ukrainians, only Russians, and that all Ukrainians are actually Russians. This position means that he is going to get rid of everyone who speaks the Ukrainian language. That is why all this delusion of the West about territorial concessions must stop.

#ukraine #war in ukraine #russia #russian invasion of ukraine #politics #russo ukrainian war #russian invasion in ukraine #fascism #nazism #yale #Jason Stanley #political philosophy

[txttletale]

hi miss healed, could you elaborate what you mean by dictatorship/authoritarian not being useful/meaningful terms? i know they're terms the west likes to tack on its political enemies, but i thought it might be a case of just misuse of terms that can still be useful, rather than outright a problem with the concept itself, so id be interested to understand your opinion. thanks!

so i don't think 'authoritarian' has any useful analytical value because every state is 'authoritarian' -- the only metrics by which one state might be seen as less 'authoritarian' than another are the metrics which privilege liberal democracy and a free market as a meaningful sort of 'freedom', which as a marxist, i don't! every state is an institution for class suppression--in the state and revolution, lenin quotes engels as saying:

[...] it is sheer nonsense to talk of a 'free people's state'; so long as the proletariat still needs the state, it does not need it in the interests of freedom but in order to holddown its adversaries, and as soon as it becomes possible to speak of freedom the state as such ceases to exist.

every state uses violence to perpetuate and legitimize itself. there is no state that would let you march into the capital and declare its dissolution without deploying armed men against you -- every state is authoritarian, it excercises authority, this is a tautological statement about how states maintain their own existence.

and sure, you could then say 'well we can just call all states authoritarian', but i don't think that makes any sense. the criticism of a state 'authoritarian/totalitarian' implies that there is an alternative, a point of comparison against which the state comes short--and i simply don't think it's possible to use 'authoritarian' as a cogent criticism without having such a point of comparison (usually the US or some european liberal democracy) which in turn means buying into liberal & capitalist ideas about 'freedom'.

as for 'dictator', i have a different criticism of that, also stemming from my marxist perspective. basically, i just think it doesn't describe anything useful in terms of political analysis and massively overemphasizes the role of individual psychology and personality. i frequently criticize both anticommunist and 'stalinist' views of stalin by joking that he must have been a very busy man if he singlehandedly ate all the grain or killed all the nazis. which is obviously a glib way of putting it--but my point is that any dictator who has ever 'done anything' could only do it because they could order a government official to do it who in turn could order a department to do it that could in turn mobilize hundreds or thousands of soldiers/construction workers/bureaucrats/etc. in order to make that happen.

sure, the leaders of countries might make decisions, and in some systems an individual leader might have greater leeway than others. but there are always very clear hard limits about what they must do and what they cannot do. i am sure i can say pretty uncontroversially that mohammad bin salman has an extreme level of political control over the economy and government of saudi arabia, but if he woke up tomorrow and said 'good news everyone, we're converting the country to wicca and donating all our oil to iran' then that would not happen and he would be deposed instantly. for a more realistic example, imagine any 'dictator' of your choice saying 'well, it's time to massively defund the military' -- this would be completely fucking impossible without some kind of loyalist paramilitary organization (which then exerts its own forces upon the 'dictator'.)

and of course all that leaves aside the massive extent to which 'dictator' is politically charged. do i think that vladimir putin was democratically elected? obviously not! but i don't think that any US president has been in any meaningful sense 'elected' by anything other than capital either, and two of the last four straightforwardly lost a popular vote even by the standards of liberal democracy! i think that any political system is best analyzed in class terms, in terms of what interests the government serves in terms of class struggle and competition between global capitalists, rather than in terms of individuals or what formal power structures give out the fancy titles

tldr: as a marxist, i think that 'authoritarian' is a useless distinguisher because excercising authority is the sole purpose and function of a state -- 'dictator' is a useless distinguisher because even the most autocratic fiefdom-state is ultimately a class dictatorship first and foremost

#ask

[unrequitedloveletter]

Hi! Can I request a kenji x fem!reader where kenji is always confident and bold but with the reader he’s always nervous cause he likes her and she’s oblivious, plus a fluffy love confession. Thank you so much!!

Coffee- K.K x fem! reader

hi! I am SO SORRY for how late this is releasing--I had a really shitty august in terms of motivation and then the first day of september devolved into the worst day of the past few months very quickly, but I am determined to write all of my requests and give myself a bit of downtime before the fall event releases three fridays from now!

I did end up doing part of this in the headcanon format because it's just easier on me mentally right now, but I did turn the love confession into a fic because doing that in that way made sense to me where describing the lead up didn't, which I hope makes up for the fact that I chose to write it the way I did! I hope you enjoy and again, I am so sorry for the delay with this.

Fic type- this is just. there is so much fluff.

Warnings- hints at a coffee dependency, a mention of the reader constantly feeling the need to be productive even on days off (the reader says that they need to learn that days off can be used to rest, and says that it's not funny anymore) and a mention of Elton Johns book "Me" if that also counts.

okay, so!

Juliette notices it first

She sees how Kenji becomes around you and then she and Warner compare it to how he is with other people

there's a lot of "he's a dick when he's around everyone else," and "He likes her! That's really sweet! Oh, we should get them together."

Juliette Ferrars would be the ultimate wing woman and you cannot convince me otherwise

Meanwhile, every time someone points out something nice about you Kenjis entire attitude is like: "yeah she's pretty. like really pretty. like effortlessly pretty. and I love the sound of her voice. and the way that her eyes look in the sun. and what of it??"

and then he's like "am I falling in love?? is this what love is??" five or six weeks into the crush

Ten or eleven weeks and he's accepted it but has moved into the "she'll never like me back," stage.

Meanwhile, every damn time he smiles at you your heart starts racing and you just kind of freeze up a little, but you're at the same place he is--you don't think he likes you back and that he never could.

there's even a point where, standing next to you and able to sense your emotions, Warner just goes "hm. You and Kenji are looking at each other and feeling the same lovey-dovey feeling."

to be fair to you, you were a few glasses deep into the white wine and every time you looked at Kenji all you could focus on were the depths of his eyes. we're blaming the drunken haze for your obliviousness in this instance

There comes a point, as there always is with falling in love, where Kenji feels like he'll be single and forever alone unless he tells you how he feels, so he decides to do it.

Kenji finds you in the living room of your townhouse early on a Saturday morning, the townhouse having been a spot you'd coveted as it had belonged to a relative before things took off with the Resistance and everyone was still living within the sectors and under the rule of Aarons father. Juliette and Aaron had insisted you take it with the return of democracy and, selfishly, you had.

You were in a sweater that Kenji had forgotten he'd given to you at one point or another, a pair of sweatpants, and had a throw blanket draped loosely over your legs, a book in hand and the lamp on to allow yourself a bit of light to read.

"Hey," Kenji had greeted, the nerves kicking in before he'd had the chance to stop them. "Catching up on some reading, I see. What's the book?"

"A memoir by a guy who used to sing a lot?" You said, glancing at the cover again. "Elton John. His autobiography. It's a decent read so far, so I'll be sticking with it, which is nice. Loads of books were burned by the Reestablishment but I found this one in the physical library."

"The libraries are being reopened? That's incredible," Kenji said. "Also, how on earth can you be tired right now? It's barely seven in the morning and you're typically up with the sun as it is."

"I am allowed to be tired," you said defensively, throwing a throw pillow at Kenji and letting the book sit, somewhat forgotten in your lap.

"Did Juliette and Warner ask you to look after their dog yesterday?" Kenji asked, catching the pillow and throwing it back at you with a laugh.

"Gardening," you said. "I was gardening during the morning, and then Juliette and I took a walk that ended up being three fucking hours long, and then I offered to walk their dog. I need to learn that days off can be used to rest. It's not funny anymore."

Kenji laughed at you lightly, coming to sit next to you on the couch. "I have something to confess," he said.

"Do all of your confessing," you responded. "As long as you promise to make me coffee and give me a--strictly platonic, as Winston would grudgingly point out if he were here, while Brendan looked at me like I was an oblivious fool--forehead kiss."

Kenji laughed, wrapped an arm around you as you pressed your head against his shoulder.

"I'm in love with you," he said. "I am so in love with you, in fact, that every time I see you I become a bashful idiot, to use Warners words."

You grinned, part of yourself giving way to disbelief as you looked at him.

"And you came here, and you told me this at seven am?" You asked. "I mean, I love you too, Kenji, so much so that thinking of you while I'm meant to be working renders me nearly useless--seven in the morning? When I'm tired and I spent a solid fifteen seconds complaining about how yesterday was, when, aside from the foot pain from all of the walking, it was actually an amazing day?"

"Yep," Kenji said, popping the p with a shrug of his shoulders. "I love you and your complaints."

You grinned a bit more, let your eyes flutter closed as Kenji pressed a kiss to your forehead.

"I'm going to make us coffee," Kenji said, his lips ghosting near your forehead. You decidedly didn't care about the coffee anymore--just wanted to be with him, but you didn't say it. On days like that one, Kenji was typically just as coffee reliant as you were.

You let Kenji go, opening your eyes and going back to your book as you realized that you were still grinning.

You found yourself unsure that you'd ever stop, but when you felt another kiss dropped to the back of your head and an "I love you," whispered near your ear, you found that it was something you didn't mind as long as Kenji was with you.

#kenji kishimoto #kenji kishimoto x reader #shatter me

[legendary-defender-of-fandoms]

You want to know the worst thing about Ralph Breaks the Internet?

It wasn’t the already-dated Internet jokes & references - we all knew going in that stuff was never going to work.

It wasn’t the new characters - honestly, they’re all fine (except maybe Double Dan - Alfred Molina deserves better!).

It wasn’t the exclusion of Felix & Calhoun (my delusional ass is still waiting for a short film about the two raising the Sugar Rush racers.)

It wasn’t even the thousands of details they ignored, retconned, or forgot from the original Wreck-it Ralph (Fix-it Felix Jr. was THIRTY years old when Ralph met Vanellope, Vanellope ABDICATED HER THRONE in favor of a constitutional democracy so everyone in Sugar Rush would have a say in how the game was run, Sugar Rush was a two-seater racing game, etc.)

No, the absolute, positively, undeniably worst thing Ralph Breaks the Internet did was tarnish & distort Ralph so thoroughly it made us all question if the original movie was even that good to begin with.

Everything else in Ralph Breaks the Internet could be forgiven or overlooked. But what they did to Ralph is just baffling. He was never going to be mistaken for a Rhodes scholar in the first movie, but he WAS smarter than the doofus who couldn’t even name a graduation cap in the sequel.

Wasn’t he?

And he wasn’t a gross slob by choice - he HATED living in the dump (I believe his exact words were “NOT cool! Unhygienic, and lonely! And boring.”) but he was kind of stuck there because the game literally left him nowhere else to stay. That’s why in the epilogue he decided to finally make something of his situation by building himself a proper shack instead of just camping on the bricks.

Wasn’t it?

And Ralph had many flaws in the first film - he had a short temper, he was a little clumsy, he broke things by accident just because he was a little too strong or things weren’t made for someone with his physical abilities in mind, he was stubborn, he had a one-track mind and couldn’t be deterred from his short-term goals no matter the long-term consequences. But the one thing he WASN’T was insecure. He knew his own strengths & weaknesses, and he wasn’t trying to change himself to win anyone’s approval. He was just trying to find VALIDATION, a way to satisfy the small-minded Nicelanders and prove to them (and himself) that he had value as he was.

Wasn’t he?

I’m terrified to rewatch the original movie now because I’m afraid the Wreck-it Ralph in my head is based on lies & fanfics, and the real Wreck-it Ralph was ALWAYS some insecure doofus with no accountability or self reflection.

And you know the absolutely insane part? Disney is doing their absolute darndest to pretend Ralph doesn’t exist. AND HE’S THE TITLE CHARACTER OF HIS OWN IP!!!!! There’s a new chapter book series about Vanellope & some of the Sugar Rush Racers getting stuck in a little girl’s tablet, and Ralph’s ONLY appearance so far is a line-drop in the first book when Vanellope says she left him sleeping in Game Central Station while all the consoles were unplugged for a remodeling of Litwak’s Arcade. WHAT THE FUCK?!?! Remember how EVERYONE in the first movie lost their shit at the possibility of their game being unplugged, treating it like an Apocalypse? Remember how even the sequel did a halfway decent job reminding folks that having a game unplugged was a Big Deal? Now everyone’s just chill axing on vacation in Game Central Station (which is NOT BIG ENOUGH to hold every single game character - it could barely fit the Sugar Rush citizens when they got unplugged) and Ralph is snoozing in a corner while his daughter is accidentally whisked away to some girl’s tablet.

ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?!?!

The Wreck-it Ralph from the first movie wouldn’t be asleep in a corner when he could be spending time with Vanellope. And THAT man would go through Hell & high water to find her! While Vanellope & her gang are helping Molly (the kid with the tablet) learn about friendship & camping or whatever, Ralph should be an absolute MENACE online, tearing through every website, personal device, and Cloud account looking for his little girl!

Right? Wrong?

Did we all delude ourselves into thinking Ralph was deeper than he was intended to be? Or does Disney just hate Wreck-it Ralph now? And if it’s the latter, why? WHY do they hate him? Why do they want US to not care about him? Is it because he’s the last of the Lasseter projects? Did John C. Reilly and Bob Iger have some sort of falling-out? Did the FANBASE do something to put Disney staff off from ever wanting to do anything with Wreck-it Ralph ever again?

I think I could move on if I knew for certain whether Disney actively sabotaged Wreck-it Ralph with his sequel & subsequent exclusions from merchandise & multi-IP projects, or if I was just crazy for ever liking this character or his movie to begin with. It’s the not knowing that kills me.

#disney #wreck it Ralph #wir #Ralph breaks the Internet #RBTI #it’s over isn’t it #why can’t I move on #rant #rambling #someone please tell me if I’m crazy #or spill ALL the tea about that sequel

[darktapufifi]

5566 — Planet Ourea

Classification: Terrestrial Group - Tectonic Class - EuGaian - Paludial Gaian - Bathy pelagic

[See Resources for definitions/explanations, the post I got them from did some amazing work.]

This planet is located outside of the normal solar system, and its current location has been lost to time.

Terrain & Ecosystem: Boreal zone

The planet is almost entirely comprised of mountainous regions, the mountains made completely of rock, assumed at one point in history to have been the tectonic plates of the planet, but the truth has been lost to time. Between the walls of mountains there lies valleys, abundantly filled with life. Many of the valleys are filled with taiga forests and freshwater lakes, however there are some deciduous forests scattered amongst the coniferous taiga forests all over the planet amongst mountains. The mountains however only take up around half of the planet, the other half is an abundant and deep ocean, with some manmade sea stack island, as some of the more aquatic or recluse species and individuals refused to move on land or to live in the mountains.

Social Climate: Democracy

many of the areas inside the openings in the mountains lack any land to begin with, which is why they've probably adapted a way for sea life to get up to said cities, like a water elevator or smthin, or like a water proof teleportation pad

The planet adapted to the mountainous environments by building homes and cities along the mountainsides, where all walks of life lived from the sky to the land and sea. They built systems to get up and down the mountains, and even to get into the ocean from one point to another with ease, allowing ocean stacks to visit the mainland when needed. Due to the abundant resources and knowledge on the planet however, it became a supply point and rest stop, the economy boosted by the visitors coming and going from the planet. It was visited often enough that the space riders had an unofficial station located on the planet for any business they needed to conduct. Strict laws were set in place so the planet was not over harvested for its natural resources, and those laws were passed down and improved upon over thousands of years until they could have easily been considered sacred to the inhabitants of the planet, the punishment of violation often ending in exile or death, though everyone always had a vote in the matter, and all opinions were heard out. Many markets had currency exchange areas to allow those from other worlds to be able to purchase until there was a standardized currency declared and used widespread. Merchants and merchandise were subjected to laws to ensure regulation standards were followed when it came to the buying and selling of goods, but it was also to keep track on the resources heading out so they could abide by the harvesting regulations. They had a bustling economy and a diverse population up till the end.

Native race/species: Anthropoeidís

Also known as Beast Folk in layman's terms, the Anthropoeidís species is a group of highly intelligent organisms, akin to humans or critters, that originate from the planets oldest living species of animals, and evolved over thousands of years. The history of each different animal is passed down its species line to what was current day before the destruction of the planet.

Status: Destroyed - Necro Gaian

Annihilated by the Prototype. The cult laid siege to the planet, captured any inhabitants possible, then destroyed the planet. First flooded it with red smoke, then completely destroyed into rubble. Disrupted the ecosystem and killed all life.

TLDR: Planet core got pumped so full of smoke that it imploded.

Appearance & Map:

[See Resources for the site used to make the map.]

Space Riders AU by @onyxonline

~{ Resources }~

Planet classification —

Map making —

#space riders au #DarkTapuFifiArt #DarkTapuFifiWriting #SillyBilly #smiling critters #digital art #artists on tumblr #autodesk sketchbook #inkarnate

[robinofinashiro]

"here you, let us through it's a brand-new star! oh, come be the first on your block to meet her eye!"

♡ character: mikey x reader

♡ pronouns used: she / her

♡ note: not checked for grammar or spelling mistakes / if this seems shitty it's because i had some spare time and i wanted to write for my tokrev bois

you looked down to your painted white nails, wondering why you were even being called forward to a dumb gang meeting in the most random hours of the night.

a lot of your gang knew that unless the meeting was urgent and couldn't wait, it wasn't news that they shouldn't go to wake you up.

you lifted your glasses up tiredly, shrugged on your gang jacket, and walked out with your brother.

"if this isn't a life or death situation i'm going to grab the nearest sharp object and start the line of stabbing with you."

your brother laughed as he stood behind you, knowing very well that it was mandatory for him to stand behind you as his father taught him that from at a very young age. being the oldest and as much as your brother hated to admit it, the smartest, he knew it was his job to stand behind you so everyone knew that you were the leader of this very well respected gang.

this was one of your first appearances as your gang's leader, now that your parents had stepped out of place in order to usher in the new generation of members.

not many knew that this gang that had been around for what felt like centuries was now going to be ran by a woman and a part of you loved the idea of shaking these boys to their core when you finally showed your face to them.

all of you were meeting at an abandoned warehouse, one that your people were known to frequent. you let your brother step ahead of you, right alongside with the rest of your members, as you knew that your brother would call you up if any executive decisions needed to be made.

your brother slammed the door opened, making it known to bonten that all of you had arrived. their leader, mikey, smiled as they welcomed all of you in.

"so, it seems as though the gangs from the west side of tokyo have decided to form an alliance in order to take over all of the east and the west. that is not only treading on your territory, but ours as well," mikey stated. your brother nodded, "and your information came from?"

"we had one of our lower ranked members infiltrate their meetings as a new recruit, their motives are to permanently injure you and to make sure i'm away from the city at the time so they can allow themselves to kill or injure both of our members to overtake our ends of the city. they know there's too much risk in killing you and me here in order to achieve what they really want so they're doing it at a slower process than usual in order to gain success without gaining much notice from other allies we have."

your brother clicked his tongue as he processed what ran haitani was saying.

"now if we form an alliance under both of our combined gangs, we will not only remain in power of our territories of tokyo but also gain the small cities they already have control of."

you were tapping your foot on the ground in anticipation as you remained sat on the chair one of your executives had found for you. you were slowly putting together a plan in order to permanently end some of these gangs that were adamant on trying to end your gang's recent success.

"as the leader, we've agreed to the terms of the alliance now it is completely up to you and your members to agree," your brother chuckled, "it is not my final decision to make," he replied as he noticed you finally getting up from your chair.

"are you not the leader of your gang or is this some kind of democracy where everyone gets to vote on it?" mikey asked.

as your brother started to speak, you stood right in front of him, a tired smile on your face as you looked up to bonten's leader mikey and his righthand man, sanzu.

"and this girl is?" sanzu asked, now on high alert. the lights in the warehouse finally turned on as they saw the color of your jacket. it was a bright orange jacket with black lettering as your brother and the rest of your members were wearing black jackets with orange lettering instead, "is she?"

before sanzu could continue, you looked over to mikey, "as their leader and the only one allowed to make final decisions around here, we need to speak individually about the logistics of this deal without the ears of everyone else eavesdropping," mikey's eyes widened in shock.

"i had no clue that the leader of one of the oldest gangs in tokyo was now being led by a woman," your tongue poked the side of your mouth in annoyance, "is there an issue? because the only difference between you and i is that you have dick and i don't but if this is an issue for you and the rest of your team than this 'alliance' is not needed. we can very much handle this situation without outside help."

mikey shook his head in disagreement.

"no issue at all. we can speak individually tomorrow?" you nodded, "we'll meet here at eight tomorrow night. bring your right hand man and my brother and i will meet you here."

you ushered your members to disperse the scene before anyone on the outside got any indication of anything going inside of the warehouse. your brother stood behind you as you gave mikey one final look and left through the metal double doors behind them.

"interesting," rin stated in slight amusement. ran agreed as mikey shook his head, "very interesting indeed."

-

the night came in quicker than you anticipated. being that you were awake until what felt like sunrise, you were in a bit of a weird mood for not catching your full nine hours of sleep.

your brother knocked on your office door, catching you off guard as you once again put your jacket on and got into the car. you knew that your brtoher and mikey's partner sanzu would be waiting outside of the warehouse building in order to protect the two of you from any potential threats.

the warehouse was very scary looking to any regular civilian who passed it but you grew to like this raggedy building for what it was. the building itself was one of the tallest buildings on the block and you knew it'd be hard for anyone on the outside to eavesdrop onto the conversation due to the thick cement walls.

you commanded your brother to stand in front of the doors, right alongside sanzu, as you walked inside of the building by yourself. you saw mikey's blond hair sitting down on one of the chairs.

"hey!" you said excitedly. mikey did a double take as he did not expect this change in personality, "so, if we go through with this alliance with you and your gang, my remaining question is, how long will it remain for?"

mikey pondered, "it seems as though we're asking the same question," he replied. you laughed as mikey looked at you with a small smile, "it seems as though this alliance can benefit both of our gangs in the long run."

mikey agreed before looking at you, now with a more stern stare, "is there an issue?" you asked, now skeptical of his look, "how about we continue this conversation in a less rundown building?" he asked suddenly

you gave him a slightly bewildered look, "what are you inching towards?" you asked. mikey chuckled as he moved closer to you, "i know this restaurant a few blocks down from here that i'd be happy to take you too in order to continue this conversation."

you let out a laugh as you knew what mikey was hinting at. your father warned you about the possibility of other gang leaders gaining an interest in you in order to gain some kind of power over you but a part of you felt that this wasn't mikey's intention. you felt as though this was coming from a romance standpoint and who were you to fight it?

#tokyo revengers imagine #tokrev imagine #tokrev x reader #tokrev #tokrev x you #mikey sano #mikey sano x reader #mikey sano imagine #manjiro sano imagine #manjiro sano x reader #manjiro sano x you

[lockedtombtheories]

Second question, kinda related to the first (in terms of "what's with everyone betraying god?") is: What did Blood of Eden say to so easily cut through years of propaganda and convince Pyrrha, Cam, SexPal, and Coronabeth to join them?

Cam and Pal - they state it pretty clearly in NtN. "We left for a lyctor" (ch. 23). It definitely wasn't easy, for them, but Cam says "if the Sixth House saw fit to discuss something with insurgents, even in its infancy, then she wanted to know what". (also, "well, the Warden would want to find out" - both AYU.) Plus, the Sixth is “the Emperor’s Reason". Unlike all? most? other houses, they don't have a noble line. It's not exactly a democracy, but a merit system - to the fittest - with the Oversight Body to vote on all important decisions. 

So why wouldn't they look at God, say "your math is off" and go looking for someone who does pass their criteria? In their case they picked Cassiopeia and the devil they don't know. 

Coronabeth - I think she’s a bit of that, a dash of rejection, and possibly a sprinkle of scheming. I'll be honest, I'm never sure where we're standing with these twins! But originally, she was convinced by BoE through the maths of it all. 

“I asked her why she listened to these people, why she was throwing off her contentment along with her faith. The princess told me that she had felt for a long time that the Cohort movements didn’t make sense to her. She said what would be most economically productive was intermingling with these people, allowing immigration and absorption into the Nine Houses; that shepherd planets got more costly the further the Houses extended themselves, and that instead of creating long-lasting industry we were doing little more than slash-and-burn trading. Scattershot, she said. Notwithstanding the moral issue." (AYU) 

We don't know how much of her original plans with Ianthe, whatever those are, but it does sound like Coronabeth moved on from them - “we can do good work, Ianthe. I know people who need us” (NtN, ch. 23). Nevertheless, I suspect that Coronabeth was never going to be satisfied in a subordinate position. She's a princess, a king - she might have become the next Wake, given enough time. 

But yeah, part of her conversion was definitely also the lure of recognition. She was rejected by her sister, while BoE recognizes her for the exact talents she tried to dedicate to Ianthe. (Allow me to also point you towards this very short post of mine about Coronabeth, Tennyson's Princess, and the #gender of it all.)p

Pyrrha - What did they say to her?  Absolutely nothing. They didn't have to. She’s the one who convinced BoE not to kill her, and all she really seems to want is to retire and take care of Nona. Don't get me wrong, Pyrrha's done her own share of war crimes, but I do think that she never worshipped John the way the Lyctors did.  Her loyalties were always more personal, and they belonged to G1deon more than to John. And, well -  "Gideon’s dead, and I don’t give a fuck either. Not if I can save our skins.” (NtN, ch. 1)

#tlt meta #blood of eden #sixth house #pyrrha dve #coronabeth tridentarius #camilla hect #palamedes sextus #character analysis