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#isnt that worthwhile on its own?

architectureandfilmblog · 2 months

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The villa of Commandant Höss: a "paradise" which shared a wall with Auschwitz.

ARCHITECTURE OF GENOCIDE: THE ZONE OF INTEREST (2023)

Before I saw this film, I'd assumed that it would illustrate the way architecture can be used to facilitate denial or self-deception. Like PARASITE (2019), in which one - in that case wholly fictional - family creates a lavish domestic retreat from which they can't see the overcrowding, poverty and suffering that surrounds them. But although Hedwig Höss speaks of planting vines to cover the wall they share with Auschwitz, there's no pretending this neighbour isn't there. The Höss's live in a pristine 1937 villa, with a manicured garden where they have parties and their children swim in a pool, and this juxtaposition is chilling. But they can still see the chimneys, and hear the screams, and nobody is denying what's next door.

This is one of the most horrifying movies I've seen, and that's due to the banality of the domestic scenes. We aren't watching a stereotypically deranged mass murderer, or even a psychopathic commandant at work inside the camp. Instead we see a comfortable house, a beautiful garden, two parents who love one another and their children. And who've somehow been able to assimilate the fact that millions are being murdered behind their garden wall.

The film is based loosely on a novel, but also on research into the lives of the real Höss's. A replica was built of their villa and garden, only metres from where the real home still stands. It's suggested that the real Rudolf and Hedwig considered themselves homesteaders, reclaiming rural territory for the 'master race', as was the Nazi ideal. In the film, Hedwig repeatedly emphasises the role of building and grounds as a status symbol. Their villa had been taken from its Polish owners and architecturally altered to fit the Höss's image. Most of the items inside would have been plundered from Jewish homes, and others, such as stools, and the wheelbarrow full of smaller seized items, would have been custom-made by prisoners. This isnt a home that is genteel in spite of the camp next door. On the contrary, everything about it, down to the fur coat on Hedwig's back, exists as a result of persecution and genocide.

The Zone was an exclusion area of over 40 sq. km around the camp, created after Poles and Jews were expelled from nearby villages. It's jarring how idyllic it appears in the film, with meadows, birdsong, a gently babbling river. While obviously not as horrifying as human apathy, the indifference of a place to the evil it houses is disconcerting, especially if you're in a profession like architecture or urban design, where places are thought to be somehow expressive of what occurs within them. We do see the horror occasionally seep beyond camp walls - a practiced scramble to leave sun loungers as crematoria smoke seeps into the garden, a wash of ash infiltrating the picturesque river.

It's likely that the filmmakers were using the extreme example of this family to remind us of our own ability to become apathetic and desensitised to the suffering of strangers, particularly when we feel our personal safety and comfort may be threatened. (Current campaigns to essentially criminalise poverty in the form of homelessness in certain cities, come to mind). Obviously the murder of millions is an evil on a completely different scale, and I have to believe that 99% of us wouldnt be capable of the Höss's actions, but it's a chilling and worthwhile reminder nonetheless.

#the zone of interest #architecture #rudolph hoss #nazi #auschwitz #feature films

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the-s1lly-corner · 5 months

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Hello, good morning/evening! I was wondering if you could do a platonic TADC x reader thing where the reader is sort of like a marionette and has strings and that's how they move? They're really happy-go-lucky but a bit airheaded (and gullible). I don't know if I have to specify a character or if it can be the entire cast, but in case we do have to specify; Gangle, Pomni, and Jax! (Pls Gangle is my fave character omg)

Have a wonderful day! Stay hydrated and well-rested!

Gangle, Pomni, and Jax x puppet!airheaded!happy-go-lucky!reader ! (Platonic!)

Now that's one hell of a title/lh

Originally this was going to be the full cast but I'm truly on a time crunch (grocery delivery soon and my funky brain flow can break easily) and I truly could not come up with any worthwhile ideas for the others TToTT + I got a art wip I need to finish <\3

Couldnt find a cute gif so

Throws slime at you

GANGLE:

Your energy tends to rub of on her; usually getting her to ease around you, perhaps even smiling a bit even with her tragedy mask! That's some real contagious joy you have right there! Isnt too mean about your silly behavior that comes with your air headedness, shes far too nice to say anything about it... maybe if it comes to your own detriment... probably puts cute ribbons and bows and other accessories on your strings!

POMNI:

Similar to gangle, your nature can make the tenseness in pomnis body and mind ease up just a tad! Its not a solution to her problems, but that's okay... shes not going to hold you responsible for that.. tries to keep an eye on you during IHA adventures since you may or may not have a habit of wandering off when something else catches your eye. She doesnt want you to get lose, or worse: hurt..! Has tried to crane her neck up to see where your strings are coming from but they just

Keep going

JAX:

He cuts your strings (which I think would regenerate fairly quickly)/j

Except I can probably see him doing that, at least before you guys become friends. Like hes an asshole, but I dont think he would purposefully immobilize you for shits and giggles when you two get close. Its like how hes comfortable taking zoobles arm off to scratch his back, I think! Ultimately doesn't do any lasting damage but its definitely not nice... cuts it out when he actually takes the time to befriend you (pun intended btw)

Does the finger flick thing with you and you fall for it everytime (the thing where you point at their chest, make them look down, then flick their nose with your finger)

Though with that being said, he thinks you're weirdly cheerful for being in a place like this. Probably lightheartedly calls you weird; I mean yeah sure theres ragatha but shes more optimistic than cheerful.. hmm.. but who is he to shatter your joy?

#tadc x reader #the amazing digital circus x reader #digital circus x reader #gangle x reader #pomni x reader #jax x reader

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megamind2010 · 2 months

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Ladybug dies how

peacefully in her sleep at the ripe old age of 94 NAYYYYY IM SORRY

Assuming youre here cuz koby told you to come and yell at me for doing this and id like to say first of all im very sorry i just love tragedy soooo much. koby got really mad at me when i first brought up the idea and it also tortures me horribly too And we also talk a lot about the alternate universe where she doesnt die and instead she and casey just move to new york and hang out and get married and Chill Out

but in the "canon" ending im sorry yes nell dies (ducking rocks and bricks) IMMM SORRY! She's subject to the hereditary blue beetle curse of dying in a fight tragically young (she jumped in front of the metaphorical bullet for jaime on account of he's exempt because he has a much healthier support system than other beetles)

i'm a hack so i haven't really drawn or written anything concrete about it but how it goes down in my mind is your classic event/crisis where all the heroes are mobilised to fight off the annual universe destroying threat. this time it's aliens of some kind and while the league and the rest of the important guys are up there fighting or negotiating or punching the universe or however this particular one gets solved, ladybug is down on the ground in gotham helping to evacuate people and deal with some alien scouts/robots/etc that are menacing civilians. (casey has already been evacuated and is safely sheltering underground with a bunch of other civilians, being checked in on every now and then by some flash or another, & her general attitude is UGH Can you idiots get this sorted out so we can order chinese and watch real housewives...)

it happens while ladybug is getting a family to safety and an alien scout lands on the roof of their apartment. he ushers them downstairs and to his credit does a good job of holding off the attacker while the civilians get out of there - nell has no powers but is a very competent fighter and also is decked out with plenty of kordtech gadgets to help even the playing field :] but it's been a long day and she's so exhausted and there's only so much you can do when an alien shoots you in the chest with a laser and flies away and leaves you to bleed out

so there's nell with her communications down & unable to move & lying there staring at the sky full of invading spaceships and flying superheroes... if she could get someone's attention she might be okay but everyone is busy. it's a crisis! and nell knows that, she knows what this whole business is like, and she's been ready for something like this to happen for a while. nell is a very confident person but she isn't deluded about her own mortality... it's part of her personal philosophy that it's cruel to have too many attachments if you're likely to die horribly young (a mentality learned from the death of her mother and refined by the death of ted kord) so isnt it great that she doesnt have many friends? and that she's on okay terms but not super close with her family? and that casey doesnt actually care about her at all and wont be affected by her untimely death past the inconvenience of finding a new place to live?

lol

at the end of it all nell isn't really that upset about dying... they went out doing something worthwhile, they saved lives, they did the best they could with what they had, and they made a positive impact on the world while they were here. and that's about what he's always wanted to achieve so hey a+ work ladybug! obviously its not like he WANTS to die, theres always more to do, things he's going to miss... he'll miss talking to ted, working on gadgets and sorting through problems and making him laugh... he'll miss his family obviously but they'll be fine without him... michelle is someone she hadn't expected to get so close to, but she and ted both have booster to keep them on track

really annoyingly as she's closing her eyes the person who keeps coming into her mind though is casey. At this point nell is pretty aware that she cares about casey more than she ever planned or wanted to and has done a lot of mental gymnastics to convince herself that it's fine that nothing ever came of it (and now nothing ever will) and in her last moments she reassures herself that it's onesided and casey doesn't love her and he'll be fine without nell and You did a great job at not forming attachments ladybug that's why you're the best! but she can't help the surge of intense regret and fuuuuuck what if it was different and what if what if.........

here's my primo ladybug dying on a roof song

Nell's fatal flaw will always be her self-reliance and conviction that she's doing things the right way despite it all. if she bothered to communicate with the people in her life then she might be swayed on her views on love, or if she was less stupidly independent then maybe she would have been working with another hero and wouldn't have been in this situation. but that's tragedy i suppose, knowing how a character could have escaped their fate and yet having to accept that in this scenario with this set of rules there was no other way for this to happen

anyway if you'd prefer to think about nell alive and happy living in new york with casey then please do that. It's easy and free and it makes me smile

#i... i... Sorry #SORRY!#caseybug

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johannwolfgangvongoethe · 7 months

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Some Personal Thoughts on Disability in Enstars

disclaimer: disability is a very broad term that covers many different experiences. i will be talking about physical disabilities since i feel most comfortable doing so/have experience with them. obviously that ignores a Huge part of what disability and chronical illness is and can be. but i think it is beyond my capabilities to talk about experiences i don't know much about.

alt caption: i think ritsu is a good character and im trying to explain to myself why

this is sort of a long post, sorry.

content warnings: i talk about ableism and touch on related topics such as dehumanization and objectification and such below. individual parts of this post have their own cw's.

Enstars Writing, Beloathed

to get this out of the way; it is bad sometimes. this is discussed very often. it doesnt depend on the authors either, in my opinion, some writers will hit you with something really troublesome only to (seemingly accidentally) invent human emotion and compassion in a different story. i dont want to repeat what others have said eloquently but there is a fair amount of imperialist worldviews, xenophobia, just racism really, transphobia, ableism, and copaganda to be found in enstars. this isnt about x character being x thing, but about how it is very noticable when the author of a story holds these worldviews and they bleed into their stories.

so that is not the greatest foundation if youre looking for well-written disabilities. but i wouldnt be reading enstars if i didnt think it genuinely is really really good sometimes. in my opinion, the way disabilities are portrayed is a mixed bag overall but there are some extremely worthwhile bits that touched me quite a lot.

What I personally understand as Well-Written Disability

the way disabled people suffer often goes unnoticed, and disabled people dont have a platform to talk about oppression. a lot of life-changing issues can go unnoticed to those unnaffected by them, even if they are in broad daylight: underfounded or entirely lacking healthcare, the way many healthcare systems are marketbased and ethics are prone to suffer bc of this (even under 'welfare' capitalism), a lack of equal marriage, the inaccessibility of the most basic and necessary facilities, financing care and the dependency on family/loved ones (both a logistical and psychological problem), the huge stigma against disabled people, etc, etc, you get me....

we need to write about people who need care, to keep them in mind at all times. disabled people are not a minority in a mathematical sense but in a hierarchical sense. it is naive to think of them as "a substancial percentage" of populations. as we age, we inevitably all enter the stage of needing care at some point. SO to an extend, i want to claim its a topic that affects every single person. yet disabled people are rarely a central topic anywhere. it is not enough to acknowledge them, we need to plan and think with them in mind. and Write with them in mind, i guess.

SO when i see fiction grapple the topic, i am usually really happy, even if the portrayal isnt ideal. (critical, maybe, but generally speaking very happy) pointing out "badly" written disabled characters is obviously not as easy as calling someone out for uncritically saying "i think eugenics are a good idea!!!" through fiction. people with that sort of facist mindset exist of course but ableism does not end there.

if i were to single out things i see often: i think the most disappointing thing a story can do is to - mention a disability without it ever having an impact on people in the story (-> the disability is basically nonexistent, has no impact or relevance, outside of a theoretical mention) OR - uncritically use a disabled character as a mere plot devise, without granting them the ability to speak (-> dehumanization, a lack of understanding that disabled people are, well, People. they do shit.)

and then of course there is fetishization, both in a literal sense and in an inspiration porn sense and the problem of turning disability into a caricature for jokes (either to other disabled people for their behaviour/body or to create a sense of satisfying superiority by laughing at them) but i feel like those problems explain themselves.

to apply these to very basic examples: i think often something like a robotic sci-fi prosthetic is not a good way to represent a disability because it fails to represent what people go through irl and provides a "magic fix" without repercussions. here is a really good post about it. about the plot device issue... i think it is similar to what people often criticise as "manpain". a disabled person will never appear or speak, they are demoted to being the reason an able-bodied character acts a certain way, like a lifeless accessory. this doesnt always have to be bad, esp if its just a sideplot! but it can get tiring if the audience never gets to learn about other aspects of the unseen character in question and we are only introduced to their suffering.

all of this to talk about gacha idol boys. it is how it is. anyway, this is roughly my mental state when i tackle enstars.

disclaimer 2: i am really just a kogaP. this influences which characters i encounter when reading. there are tons of stories i just never looked at and there is SO MUCh lore i just dont know about. please lemme know if you have additions to stuff i say/understand a character better/have related story recommendations! tl;dr the sakuma bit will be long.

disclaimer 3: i genuinely adore every single character mentioned below and am always excited to learn smth new about them. if i criticize writing, that has nothing to do with that character or their fans. it is about the writers.

the most obvious example. Eichi (content warning for brief mentions of self harm and suicidal ideation)

everything eichi does, he does with the knowledge he will most likely die young. that is a truly dramatic setup.

but before i get back to that thought. it always felt to me like eichis illness(/es) lack a certain sense of conciseness? i do not think you need to put a name and diagnosis on it for it to be relatable and real to readers, tbh!! though to achieve believability, there needs to be a good amount of consistency. what i can recall off the top of my head is the following:

he breaks down/straight up blacks out frequently due to weakness and dizzyness

measures were taken to secure his safety in those situations (the infamous Eichi-kun Gauge as seen in Element)

his stamina is seriously low

he coughs a lot

we saw him cough up blood (Daydream)

he relies on long hospital stays because his health needs to be monitored and/or supported this closely

he stays inside a lot (hinting towards problems with his immune system?)

being healthy enough to eat unhealthy food is a big deal to him, so there are dietary restrictions/it was necessary to precisely control what he eats

his grandfather, who died recently, is considered an outlier for how long he lived (so it IS hereditary)

which..... could be a lot of things...? or, more likely: a culmination of many things at once. if you have headcanons on eichis health, please lemme know!

but in addition to eichis terminal illness, there is a second quality to him that seperates him from most disabled people: he is extremely wealthy. and his wealth is fundamentally important to stories. usually illness and poverty go hand in hand, since incame is tied to the ability to work, which worsens an already bad situation. no matter how limited eichis actions are because of his body, the possibilties offered by his wealth make him a central figure in every overarching plot. in addition to this, his family is well aware of his consitution and he is a patriarchal leading figure to them, the head to their coporate hierachy. eichi is free of the things that usually rid the chronically ill of their safety and power: society (he is an idol and popular) and money (he is the richest boy in japan). if youd ask me, i think that while being chronically ill is of course physically taxing, the worse problem is the economic state it puts you in. eichi simply overcomes this? yes, he is terminally ill, his situation is terrifying. but he has an extraordinary amount of control while he lives. more than a poor yet able-bodied person may have.

his unique circumstances enable him to be incredibly active. this is so fun to read about in my opinion. its a fascinating setup to me. without casting any sort of moral judgement on his actions and the antagonistic role he plays; he is, excuse me for my phrasing here, a disabled power fantasy. (at least to me)

this is a double-edged sword to him. because of who he is as a person (ambitious, cunning, ruthless, diligent)

he lives in relative safety but his strong ambition and financial ability to fulfill his dreams tempt him to go past his limits. because his remaining lifetime is uncertain, the need to preserve the body he is given seems uneconomical (a mindset his upbringing and education as an heir to his family would have enforced imo) he is bound to break down sooner or later anyway. i think he begins to see himself and his body as a tool to achieve his goals and neglects spending time on anything BUT working towards them. so the moment he runs out of goals (like at the end of Element), his reason to "remain" becomes futile.

it really struck with me how he appears in Blackbird - emaciated, pathetic, purposefully neglected because he chose to be neglected and weak in an act of self harm bc denying medical attention (something that couldnt have happened otherwise) wataru has to remind him that no one died and the obvious connection to make is that the eccentrics are physically unharmed and starting over, that they should not be a source of guilt to eichi. but i think this is just as much about eichi himself. he might have expected to die since he left the hospital and overexhausted himself at school and as an idol. he didnt die though. it was a real possibility and seemed likely but he didnt. the neglect and indirect self harm here point out, to me, that he saw the "role" he gave himself as fulfilled at that point and waited to die.

eichi stands over economic or social factors that could ostracize and dehumanize him but funnily enough he manages to do so himself by treating his body as a tool and his happiness as an option that got overshadowed by a need to succeed.

this vulnerability makes him, despite how vague the descriptions of his illness are and despite how unrelatable his wealth is, a very satisfying character imo. it is engaging to me. certain limits are removed for him but he created new ones, specifically because he did not see himself as something worth sustaining once he becomes useless. imo, eichi applied the idea that a lifes worth can be measured in its ability to function in an industry to himself. and spiralled over it, entirely inverting his uncanny amount of bodily autonomy. it is clear how the situation he is in worsens his mental health like that. and how his mental health in turn worsens his physical health. it is inseperable.

i cant really get into !! era eichi because i genuinely just dont... know enough. the fine tradition of having a weekly H-Day stands out, though. after all, eichi has new bigger ambitions and is, once again, inviting his own ruin through overexhaustion. so his friends (the new addition of having friends is essential) had to forcefully make him stop for at least one day a week. that is pretty big. i think.

this is true for many marginalized existences so it of course applies to disabled people: if neither your surroundings nor yourself permit you to feel human and therefore assign your person an inherent worth and lovability... sometimes you need a friend to do so!!! social circles are the best support structure for your health.

The Sakuma Family

(i will get into ritsu and rei seperately later on. there are just a few concepts i want to get out of the way that apply to both of them.)

so... to get a little theoretical; the concept of "disability" relies on the concept of a "normative" human existence. "disability" is an otherness and can therefore easily be seen as a "monstrocity" in the eyes of ignorant people, something that instils fear. (there is a reason why a lot of horror exploits disabled bodies as a source of terror and uses mental hospitals as settings) from an able-bodied point of view it seems "desirable" to be a "normative human", yet the disabled person knows that is not a possibility and knows their worth and place as a human in human spaces. at least ideally. able-bodied people sometimes lack this understanding. there is nothing to be desired about an able body or fixed about a disabled body, beyond what medical care can do for ones quality of life.

if you have read operetta, this is all very familiar;

operetta, chapter 17 and, well, here we are. vampires. a very basic truth about the sakuma family that i hate to see denied is that they are human. there is nothing supernatural about them. they are just disabled. or, to turn the idea around, if one was to assign them vampiristic traits and such... is vampirism not a disability and should be taken seriously as such? if you consider the limits a vampire has while coordinating through their life, is that not... strangely just a disabled experience? (MINUS THE KILLING PEOPLE OBVIOUSLY but much modern fiction is sympathetic towards vampires instead and does not display them as violent)

anyway, to hear it from the horses mouth (the horse is rei):

operetta, chapter 19 the sakuma family is a curious case. their condition is hereditary though the severity varies from person to person. it comes up in many stories but for the most part i am thinking about operetta, resurrection sunday, and devils right now. how did this all start? what made an entire family turn to live as vampires, with blood ceremonies and all that? what bizarre kind of generational trauma is this?

(and, while it does not play a role as important as it did for eichi, they are rich. this is important to mention. many normal experiences just dont apply to them because wealth makes them immune. ... how did the sakumas become this influential anyway.)

for an unspecified but long time, an entire family managed to mentally entirely seperate themselves from the rest of humanity because of their chronical illness. personally, i have no doubt this is the result of a world that othered them first. whether the main motivator at play here is a defensiveness towards a society that cannot understand you or an internal need to turn hardships into an identity that can be carried with pride. it takes a considerable amount of emotional strength and planning for the "hey we are human actually" declaration in operetta to occur.

they are, weirdly, what people mean when they talk about a "toxic anti-recovery mindset". (an expression i struggle with because this sort of rhetoric is often used to discriminate against disabled people who speak up for themselves or ask for accomodations. but that aside) it is an amount of pride that leads to internal self destruction.

of course, as is the case with every single character i write about in this post, a lot of it has to do with aesthetics and being chuuni to sell gacha cards. so we know the reason behind the reason. but it makes for some bizarre in-universe implications.

but in any case, the fact that their identity as false vampires is something they have always carried, that modern society sees as "mystical and sexy" has a hilarious side effect: their disability becomes marketable under the guise of vampirism. it is hard to recover from that.

so again, we have a double-edged sword: to present ones medical condition as a "persona" declares it as a performative act, something that is done to bring joy to an audience. personal detriment is not considered here, since it stops being a part of ones being and starts to become "work". the time and place of ones symptoms has to overlap with the time and place of ones performances. or people will hate you for your uncontrollable illness. however, rei and ritsu are both also able to carry their condition with a sort of playfulness. it is almost something like the act of "reclaiming" when they purposefully choose to larp a little for fun. usually, when a scene mentions their disability in the context of comic relief, they have control over the situation that unfolds and even initiate it and invite others to laugh alongside them. this can be a slippery slope to getting harrassed of course.... but i am rather baffled by the amount of dominance they have in social interactions. so it just reads as a healthy amount of dark humour to me.

this, and the consistent writing of their symptoms, and the ability to easily compare it to real existing illnesses, easly make them my favourite instance of written disabled people in the series. their illness has an impact on their behaviour and it is detrimental! and they are both very human in the way they attempt to cope. there is a certain realism to it. idek.

many people seem to headcanon them with myalgic encephalomyelitis, which is a really good explanation, and i personally want to suggest narcolepsy. the point being, there is room to accurately assign them a realistic relatable and understandable condition, even if nothing is ever named in canon. and of course they are mentioned to have an iron deficiency.

bear with this slightly "out there" theory for a moment: have you or a friend ever tried to get a compensation for your disadvantage at school or uni? it can be really hard to do, if it is possible at all, even if it is something very simple (more time, a slightly different enviroment, the ability to drink or sit, etc) yumenosaki is a school for performance arts, mainly idols. bold statement: it might genuinely be easier to get/explain an accommondation for your "idol quirk" (something that would be actively fostered), than for your disability. not that yumenosaki is very strict or asks for a lot anyway, its just something that has been on my mind.

here is another funny thing i have been thinking about: both of them crave juice, soda, and fruit - sugary yet fresh stuff. i feel like this is not uncommon for people who suffer from excessive tiredness and fatigue, the body subconsciously wishes for some sugar intake to "wake up".

Inventing a Guy to Cope. Rei

funny title aside... he... did that... ? rei is a curious example of how different mostly unrelated traumas can overlap. he had no childhood, thanks to his family that considered him "mature" at a very young age and his early status as a child star. and his bad health is a miserable addition to this. it is quite scary to image how pressured to do right he felt growing up and how that resulted in the fragmented distanced way he views himself; reinventable, and ultimately unknowable. (to others AND himself)

despite his bad health he has always been working and performing "well". he was praised for his remarkable talents but rarely had the chance to stop and patch himself up. whether this was a result of a pushy enviroment or his personality as a people pleaser who cannot show weakness and imperfection is hard to tell. maybe both.

the state he is in in Crossroad is fascinating to me. he all but directly lists the criteria of depression to keito when he attempts to explain his sorrows. he is restless, rowdy, mentions later on that he enrolled in yumenosaki against his familys wishes. he is very much searching for joy and his own identity in the middle of a health emergency. this has to do with the way he was raised, only knowing how to exist for and serve others, how he was made to sell a made-up version of himself, but i also believe it has to do with the fact he has started to exclude himself from his familys traditions and values. he started to cast away the uncertain "monstrosity" existence of his family (as well as the false idolhood others assigned him) and instead embraces humanity as a chronically ill person.

crossroad, i forgor which chapters

this of course marks a starting point of change that later results in him making up the wagahai pronouns persona - something he specifically created with the intention of looking vulnerable and weak. because he yearned to do less, to recover from years of exhaustion.

in a way, i want to say both, the ore pronouns persona and the wagahai pronouns persona, are attempts to cope with expectations he cannot handle physically or mentally. one relies on masking, on appearing stronger than he actually is and therefore invulnerable, and the other relies on exaggerating his weakness, in an attempt to finally let others recognize it. i think as a disabled person, both are performances one has to learn in order to "function" in everyday life, while remaining safe from serious harm (doing badly at ones job or classes, angering others that hold power over your life). since ones circumstances are often hard to grasp for someone who does not share the same illness, there is no choice but to simplify and exaggerate until symptoms become tangible concepts or to just brave through it, at the cost of ones health and future time.

rei in particular, for better or for worse, is incredibly capable when he needs to be and unfortunately that means others will often not take his health seriously because they saw him function just fine the other day. this is a general problem but an obvious offender in that regard is koga, who comments on reis fatigue constantly and loves to create a bit of a high expectations toxic work enviroment (and, to be fair, rei terrorizes him too. kogas hostility towards rei is sometimes ableist but not really rooted in ableism. after all koga is highly aware how performative the wagahai persona can be and is a huge motivational and inspirational factor in reis life. its a whole complex)

!! era holds some positive changes. his mental need to please other people remains a persistent source of trouble for him (and others) but he seems to really let his body recover and lives a more nocturnal life. both kuro and kaoru mention that he looks more healthy (in succession match???? i think??) since he finally stopped enforcing a normal day/night cycle on his body just to comply with social norms. you can indeed be very human even if you break human-made rules.

(additional comment: "becoming human" is of course a theme for each of the eccentrics and not uniquely tied to disability, it very much has to do with the objectification one goes through as a public figure. but this is a post about disability and it really fits in well. so here we go)

Literally Just a Realistic Teenager. Ritsu

ritsu, while not really being among my favourite characters, is my favourite instance of a disabled character in enstars. partly because of his writing and partly because my personal experiences overlap with his so much it sometimes is painful - but always extremely satisfying. just had to get that out.

ritsu is perhaps the most visibly ill. he blacks out and sleeps where he stands, everywhere, without control and often requires other peoples (well, mostly maos) assistance in order to remain safe when this happens. he also repeated a year of school, specifically because of his disability.

he is painfully aware of this. that he looks ill, that he behaves ill, that he is an underachiever compared to others of the same age, even to people younger than him.

ritsu developed unique behaviours to deal with this: he is very dependent and clingy and often asks others to do things for him, unapologetically. that does not mean asking for help doesnt hurt his pride, just that it is the most viable strategy for everyday survival that he ended up with. other than that, he clings more to the vampire identity than rei does. either to defy his older brother or, and this is important imo, because it is the one safety net he has to fall back on that makes him feel "normal" and like he is a regular being. albeit not human. no matter how much others might blame him for his shortcomings or how much he is a failure in the eyes of society, he is very regular for a "vampire". under the logic developed by his family, he is just a child, and the world at large is to blame. it is an easier truth to accept than facing systematic injustice and prejudice in a human world.

the stories i mentioned in another part above aside, i really love what ensemble band does for him; ritsu gets extremely irritated with mao in the prologue, seemingly out of nowhere. his character is allowed to express this sort of anger and to take it out on others, even if it is unjust and misguided. it is not pretty and it isnt good behaviour but it is a very heartfelt emotion to me.

its obvious that he cannot compete with others and that this will always been seen as his personal fault instead of a circumstance he cannot influence. and more than that: no one appreciates the real efforts he makes. for instance, getting himself out of bed in time for classes is difficult for regular teenagers and straight up hellish for ritsu. but he manages to do so a lot later on. instead of acknowledging that this is a real accomplishment on his part and possibly really exhausting and bad for his comfort in the long run, this is seen as doing the bare minimum.

while it is not correct, the malice ritsu sometimes treats others with comes from an comprehensible place. able-bodied ignorance can appear as purposeful slights made by those more privileged than him.

yet he learns to conform. his friends are important to him. knights success is important to him. (thought mental health probably played a role here too and made things even harder prior to his third year of high school) and yet;

seven bridge, chapter 24, but its really just an example i had at hand

the remarks stay the same. his peers still cannot help but brand him as "just lazy", even if they are kind and understanding otherwise and habour no ill intent. so i would like to ask: how long can he keep this up? how hard is this on him?

i dont think i need to explain just how common and hurtful it is to be accused of "laziness". probably the single most irritating comment someone with fatigue will hear every single day.

however, on the flipside, ritsu has perhaps the most people who care for him in comparison with other characters, though they sometimes complain (communication is hard, care is hard, everyone in enstars is very young and i cannot bring myself to see those comments as malice. its a mixture of ignorance and ones own burdens) there is mao, obviously. tsumugi is a very funny example. knights, of course, in particular naru. (at least based on my humble knights readings)

quite interesting how he just decided mao is his caretaker, now and in the future. i shared a few of my thoughts on caretaking here. this is.... a huge responsibility to just put on someones shoulders, to say the least. he shouldnt be doing this but i think it speaks for itself that this is a problem that is on his mind. ITS IS A REALLY IMPORTANT TOPIC TO BRING UP, especially since, the younger you are, the harder it is to get insurance to pay for your care. yes, he is often just teasing mao, but ritsu is looking for ways to get through life. by learning to be as independent as possible, whenever possible. though often you really just find yourself at the mercy of friends and family.

Inter-Sibling Violence

apologies, i will be done with the sakumas soon. i didnt know how to fit this in at the start.

the relationship between rei and ritsu, as people with the same disability who experiences different symptoms and challenges, is worth thinking about. infighting within people of the same disability is very common since experiences can be so different, there are no universal truths or opinions. with different lifestyles come different expectations for what is "normal" and sometimes pressure and social norms can cause someone to shift blame onto others who have no achieved the same things in life.

rei and ritsu are said to have been very close as small children and likely depended on each other a lot. i can see how reis fostering nature and ritsus needy nature developed alongside each other and enforced each other.

time and time again, rei says that he is a "less severe" case, that ritsu has it worse. he jets around the world because he feels forced to do so, when ritsu just wanted emotional support from him to begin with. ritsu stayed alone at home, sheltered and likely caged by their families convictions. but! i want to suggest the following: as much as it hurt him, it was important for reis health to be away from his family, too. i dont think staying there would have been good for him. his absence and the experiences he made away from home were an important catalyst for the positive family development we see in operetta.

of course, rei means well. he cares. he is trying to have a positive impact. yet from ritsus point of view, all of this must feel terribly condescending, especially with how much rei babies him. there is just one year between them. this is barely anything when it comes to sibling inferiority complexes the brain can make up. rei, who is successful and famous and beloved and, most importantly, proclaims to have it "easier than him", is trying to find a cure for him. from ritsus point of view this must be unbearable. their lives are so different when they basically started at the very same point of origin.

more than that, rei shoulders the sketchy blood rituals himself, out of love of course, but if one was more jaded, one could assume he doesnt think ritsu would be able to stomach the responsibility.

you will always compare yourself to your siblings in unhealthy ways but ritsu is just doing this on hard mode, i fear.

HHHRAGAHHHH GHHH ghgghrhgh. Niki

nikis writing is... driving me up a wall sometimes, to say the least. dont get me wrong, i love him. to an extend i understand that his single-mindedness and shallowless has purpose to it. in fact, i adore these character traits. he really seems to be behind four mental barriers at all times, unable to let deeper thoughts touch him, lest they make him succumb to despair. (yet nikis specific flavour of menhera cannot quite shine since... well, he has to stand next to himeru all the time)

the descriptions we get of nikis illness are nonsensical, at least to my knowledge. you could imagine he has something like hyperthyroidism. this never really gets explored though. at some point ENGstars mentions he has "gastroptosis or whatever" (the "or whatever" is part of his dialogue - niki really doesnt give a fuck), which makes no sense at all. weirdly enough, it would even be strangely in character if this was just a misconception.

so, can anyone take niki to a doctor? has this happened and i just wasnt there for it? there is no excuse why no one is considering medical care when it comes to him. except that he often is the butt monkey of jokes the writers want to make and has to stay available for it. more than that; his parents just left him alone like this? as a child? did he get an allowance at least? this cannot be legal, right? i wait for the day this comes up as a topic but i fear it is in vain. (please tell me if it actually did. i dont follow niki that closely) this is an unbelievable thing to do to a healthy child, yet alone one with a severe illness. we are basically looking at denial of assistance.

so many things surrounding nikis story are designed to make him as miserable as possible. i cannot help but feel that he exists purely as comic relief, for funny bickering, and superficial drama. i dont really like that at all, his misery just gets exploited.

EVEN SO... his self-image is actually really fascinating. as rinne likes to point out again and again, niki has no self-worth. he works two jobs, one of which he hates, he constantly gets into dangerous situations, and he will do anything just for some crumbs, and quickly forgets when others treat him badly. and of course, the worst bit:

es!! main story, please dont make me go find it

to some degree, he just accepts this as something he deserves. there is no consideration for his own quality of life, somewhere along the lines it seems like he got conviced just surviving is all he gets. he internalized self-degredation to a dangerous degree and i never see anyone mention this mental affliction specifically as a comorbidity of his disability. to me, there is without a doubt a relation here. sure, maybe he would still fight with this otherwise, just because he had to witness his fathers fall from grace as a child and knows there is a stigma attached to his name now. but i think you can tell it is more than that, from the way he is ashamed to beg (even in a life or death scenario, as seen in hot limit), as if his condition was his own fault.

this circles back to the point i made earlier for eichi; how much nikis life is worth, is measured in his economical value.

of the characters i have spoken of so far, nikis is financially the most accurate to real life. there is no safety net for him, no convenient family wealth.

(at this point it feels important to mention that somehow rinne manages to be the only person entirely aware of the danger and desires to change nikis mindset, YET he is a huge strain on nikis health. i dont know how those two function.)

Just a Lamb. Tatsumi

tatsumis specific trauma is a unique one: while most other characters struggle with conditions they were born with or developed as they grew up, tatsumis injury is the result of strain and violence. those are two different pairs of shoes, though the outcome may be similar. whether it is worse to be born into circumstances you cannot escape or to have to live with having something thrust upon you unfairly is up to personal judgement. pain is not really quantifiable. its just important to keep in mind, i think. under the circumstances tatsumi grew up in, he has his own burdens. it is very easy in many ways to compare and contrast him with eichi. of course this applies to how they used their bodies too: as an expandable resource. they had ideals for their school life (and beyond) that just seemed far more important and they both ended up in hospital because of this. (+ we know tatsumis surroundings were purposefully manipulated to destroy him)

and, of course, tatsumi got attacked later on. he never really talks about it directly but his legs seem to talk for him, in ways.

the story does not quite make it clear whether his occasional weakness and pain are the result of old injuries or entirely psychosomantic, and i dont think there is a real need to know, as a reader. in fact, in a certain light, i think it can be considered good that we dont know for certain: it would be relevant for tatsumi himself, sure, since it would influence which kinds of treatments and help he can seek out. however, i think the ambiguity may foster a certain level of sympathy in readers.

often psychosomatic problems are not taken seriously enough in real life: they cannot be proven physically and they dont fit into the neat little boxes that the ICD wants you to believe exist, so they cannot be defined on paper or easily explained to doctors or insurance providers.

to foster empathy with his situation requires his character to be lovable and for the narrative to treat him with care as well. which is thankfully the case. alkaloid are dear with him and, despite the fact he cannot perform in his work enviroment all the time, he is very respected for his other skills. he is a well-rounded person.

all that aside. it is absolutely worth to mention tatsumi pre-injury, too. he came up with a form of small-scale universal income among a semi-union at school. without getting too much into all that. (obbligato really seems like required lecture in the realm of enstars stories) the entire concept strives for social equality and is extremely anti-discrimination. it fundamentally goes against the idea that someone needs to "deserve" care, and is the opposite of the mindset i described with eichi and niki above. he never had to make first-hand experiences with disability to be extremely compassionate. this seems really rare among people in real life, even those who preach altruism.

While we are Here. K.... Kaname

as mentioned, i spoke a little about kaname before. so i wont get into the complex of caregiving.

it is extremely satisfying we got to meet kaname, if only for one event story. he does not have to remain a faceless motivation behind himeru and tatsumis lives, he thankfully became humanized.

the entire conflict around kaname at the moment is a matter of bodily autonomy. how much of your person can be in anothers hand, ethically? there is no excuse for the theft of his (idol) identity through himeru but the damage is done now. ideally, you dont want any part of yourself to depend on others but the disabled reality is that this is very often impossible. especially for kaname. there simply is no one else who could be responsible for him right now and, to be fair, at least when it comes to medical care, himeru seems to behave very responsibly.

repeating what has been said in the other post but i am worried for kanames seemingly inevitable reintroduction to the story. he has been in a comatose state for a year. if he wakes (since this is fiction, it is possible to exchange 'if' for 'when', realistically it really would be an 'if' though) he would most likely be confronted with permanent neurological and physical damage and years of rehabilitation. at least logically. (not to mention the psychological shock) would this be written with compassion and a sense of realism? it makes for a compelling source of conflict and emotional hardships that could be extremely worthwhile to explore. i just cant entirely bring myself to trust the writers with this one but i would love to be convinced otherwise.

that is, of course, if they dont somehow just skip rehabilitation entirely and declare it a miracle healing.....

imo, the in-game discourse between characters is just as important as his future development. i just really hope autonomy and recovery will be large topics.

He doesnt go here, but. Adonis

so bringing him up just really feels necessary within the context of this post because of his interests. one of adonis hobbies is sign language and accessibility.

this is, i think, maybe the best thing they ever did with his "protector" persona. it just fits so well, it is a direct conversion of ideals to actions. knowing undead songs have been translated for a deaf audience in canon is extremely wholesome and uplifting, even if it is entirely inconsequential for the story and just something that gets mentioned.

(now that sandstorm is out on engstars, you can check that out too for further mentions of this! if i could wish for one thing, it would be for the stories to acknowledge that there are tons of independent sign languages and i would love to know which one adonis and rei speak... you ever think about how adonis speaks like four languages fluently. at least.)

nightless city live, chapter 3

everyone in undead loved that and supported the vision. to see koga, who is usually against anything but musical performances and wishes to express art freely, praise the idea really puts deaf identity and accessibility in a great light. it is a very positively radical forwardthinking idea.

so, i just wanted to mention that. adonis is treated horribly by the narrative a lot, it entirely fails to grasp his identity and is insensitive towards foreign cultures, but i would die for him i think.

finishing thoughts

like mentioned, please absolutely let me know if you have different related ideas or recommendations. or corrections, or worries over something i wrote!!! learning and improving is always great. i am sorry i could not get into so many other characters, the ones i wrote about are those that i feel confident enough to comment on. in the future i would love to meet maguro!! i just havent really read any mama stories at all :'''3

i feel like i barely said anything at all and barely engaged with text enough since i didnt get into any character specifically. i would love to write another post about ritsu or rei or both. a draft for it has been sitting around for ages (as did the draft for this post, lol) but i hope someone will find an interesting thought in here somewhere.

all in all, enstars is actually... surprisingly nice to read for the disability in there??? even if it is disappointing in handling many other things. of course, the writings not always ideal (i read hidden beast just the other day and the ableism in there took years off my life) but often its really nice. nothing hits quite like seeing real emotions and experiences through some metaphorical stylized anime lense, you feel.

anyway thank you for listening. i am actually for real done now.

#enstars #ensemble stars #enstarsposting #did i overreact and write too much..... ah... nay......

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n0phis · 8 months

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a handful of people on instagram honed in specifically on character no. 2 from the designs asking/saying that they'd add vitiligo or the character would look nice with it

aside from the strangeness of just saying 'existing design that youre giving away would look better with X', i sat down and really thought about why that perturbed me; at a base level, showing vitiligo is a super nice way to normalize that feature and be inclusive! but unfortunately what i've noticed is that aesthetic seems to trump inclusivity in a way that seems racist to a bystander. the users focused solely on changing the design of the black character i drew to include vitiligo without mentioning any of the others.

showing black and other POC characters with vitiligo is important! but if it means the only reason someone draws vitiligo is for an aesthetic/the contrast, that can be a problem. it comes across as if these users think that a black character design on its own is not interesting enough, or that they need extra detail to make them worthwhile. that and it seems like they dont think any other characters would look as nice with vitiligo, which implies the interest isnt in inclusivity/care for those with vitiligo but is instead in aesthetic. a few people did ask for a character with the feature in the future, and that's fully fair! but as much as i understand the requests about changing the design come from a place of care, they're not only a little disrespectful in their insistance as an artist, but also something i really encourage users to evaluate the roots of and whether theyre asking for this with good intentions. the issue lies in wanting to change existing characters and honing in on one minority group to alter rather than just kindly showing appreciation for a trait that can appear on anyone. ty for reading!

(adding a disclaimer that i am white and do not have vitiligo, and if there are any better suited users speaking on this topic take their word over mine! i'm only speaking on it because it was actively in my inbox about this design i made, and if this is how my audience thinks i want to try to handle that directly)

#tham talks #i hope this comes across well LMAO

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ganondoodle · 3 months

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sorry about that last rambling post, i didnt mean to sound like its worse than it may be, but i got no ... lense to view it through but my own, and the main reason i wrote it out anyway was bc i needed to get it out (even if posting it might be not the greatest idea) .. and bc it kinda showcases, i think, how my stories kinda write themselves, involuntarily in a way? its not like im not putting in any effort- but its like .. i cant STOP it always keeps going and even the dumbest idea stays in some form, its very hard to get everything in place bc theres so much going on all the while i am very slow at making anything, writing or drawing anything, especially anythign coherent is very hard bc not only do i get constantly distracted, i get distracted by my own thoughts suddendly skipping to a certain scene and me having to go throguh imagining in detail NO MATTER how many times i have done it before for the same scene that i already decided on how it goes, when theres a new idea it can take over my entire day bc i cant let go of it-

not trying to sound either like im the only that has that sort of problem, but i think its a big part as of why i start tso many projects without being able to finish them, or even start them bc i constantly have to fight my own thoughts from derailing into another daydream session, thinking of too much too fast than i can ever draw or even write about and not knowing what is worthwhile and what isnt (im telling you i have no idea what is good and what isnt, idk why but for all i know all things i do could be trash, or they all could be bad, maybe the one i thinnk is decent is actually worse than the things i deem not good enough and once i start to think no this isnt good enough i stop having fun making or thinking it bc im trying to do better

honestly its kind of impressive that i can get anything out at all, not to pat myself on the back there but even if i hate how long it takes me, considering how much im having to work just to start working on something at all, the fact that i could post stuff coherent enough for some people to understand AND LIKE is something i should be a little more proud of

#ganondoodles talks #personal #sorry today is a bit of a brain fart day #got a headache and have wasted the entire time until now (5pm) with watching old analysis videos i have watched 5 times already #and crying over undertales music #how much could i get done if i didnt have to deal with thought trains going 200 above speed limit #also didnt mean to sound mean to people who like the things i deem cringy #BC I DONT KNOW WHAT IM TALKIGN ABOUT 90% OF THE TIME #I DONT KNOW IF ITS GOOD maybe it is #my judgement of my own stuff is pretty random #.... maybe thats why i can work with fanstuff that adheres to lore better #bc it sets limits for me #it gives me options of rails to derail onto without falling straight into the woods #idk if that made sense either #... i need to start drinking more #(and i guess by calling some of my stuff cringe bc i am entirely unsure of its quality im trying to make myself smaller than i am)#(so if it turns out to be actually bad- im more safe from ridicule since LOOK I AM SELF AWARE)#and there i go letting my thoughts spin further #maybe ill delete both of these posts tomorrow when i realize how dumb this is to say in the first place

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coldresolve · 3 months

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boiling any discussion of media analysis down to "fiction isn't reality" or "depiction isnt endorsement" and treating it like that's the end of the discussion means that you can no longer criticise any piece of media for the ideas and arguments that are presented in it, implicit or explicit. i don't know if you realize that, but you should.

you know how the harry potter series had those hook-nosed greedy goblins controlling the banks that were, like, a little tiny bit antisimetic? but depiction isn't endorsement, so i guess we just leave it at that.

or how DC's batman has, among other things, a classism issue which it just vaguely gestures at sometimes but never actually engages with. or the torture apologia in 1984 - a book i love, by the way, but it does feature torture apologia. or the blatant racism that occasionally pops up when you're reading lovecraft - you just have to remember that fiction isn't real, so we don't have to talk about it.

and one thing that irks me about your argument isn't just that you're watering down media analysis to its absolute bare-bones zero-thought entry level point of discussion - it's that i don't even think that you yourself believe in this argument. i think you use it as a way to avoid engaging with media critically, but only when it's about media you like. media you created. you'd love to just like it without thinking about all the bad stuff it might contain, because that's more comforting. because it makes you not feel guilty.

i contend that there's a lot of value in digging a bit deeper than "fiction isn't reality". media criticism is a great tool to learn how to spot the arguments behind bigotry and apologia, even if those arguments aren't being made explicitly. you start to unlearn all the shit you've been fed by propaganda throughout your life. you learn how to spot bias. and that's just the big stuff - you learn how to think about interpersonal dynamics in a different way, too. what is the author trying to tell me about the choice this character made here, and do i think it's reasonable. its discussions like that which are very much applicable to the real world. you get to challenge your own worldview and ethics through fiction. you grow, you learn new things. that's what makes it so worthwhile, in my opinion. it's what makes fiction art instead of mere entertainment.

food for thought

#other #media criticism #media analysis

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dballzposting · 1 year

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I think I'm too tired to properly spin this yarn but

Well Chichi is a heterosexual woman.

She is a woman who wants very much to live traditionally and love loyally. Her satisfaction from life stems from having a stable lifelong partner and from being the matriarch of her own family.

She is also, perhaps predictably, a very romantic person. Shes predisposed to it, jumping on it when it enters her worldview, and as a kid, she becomes committed to Son Goku.

She was very upset when he didnt play the romance game with her, and continues to be upset when he isnt the present family man that she needs him to be.

So. Becasue of all of this, you would not consider her a candidate for a romantic triste (that may be the wrong word but I mean, like, an affair). And yeah, true! She just wants to be loyal, and for her mate to be worthwhile, god damnit! It's the taurus in her!

But listen. She is a very traditional and high-strung woman. And theres this phenomenon where people who follow very strict rules may break strange ones, becasue everyone breaks them every once in a while, and if everything is a big deal to you, then you lose sight of what REALLY shouldnt be broken.

And Chichi, yknow, we all know her, yknow? Shes romantic. Shes strong and forceful. Shes a consummate lover, man, I feel like she just really needs that emotional and physcial satisfaction, yknow? Of course it all happens in the privacy of the home of the married couple because THATS PROPER ! And that's how she wants it to be.

But listen, man, ms Chichi? She's a little off her rocker, yknow?

Hey, listen. I do believe that Ms Chichi is heterosexual. But in a lifestyle that does little to develop base pursuits, sexuality means nothing. Who cares what you feel about whom. All that matters is that you find yourself in the family structure that you need to have, with a partner who can help make it happen. Those feelings of physcial attraction - while are nice to feel and to have satisfied - arent a prerequisite to the stability and fulfillment she would get by a life partner whom she likes well enough otherwise to make her happy and fill her needs. My point is that it's like 1950s USA all up in her shit and sex is an underdeveloped reality, unexplored and underappreciated for its versatility and nuance. Therefore, it holds almost no bearing over her practical mind.

But make no mistake - our Venus-in-Taurus Chichi is a strong and physical woman who does need some lovings from time to time.

LISTEN, OKAY? You may feel that what I am about to say is contradictory but hear me out.

If Ms Chichi got hit on by a woman she would not tolerate it to start. She would have her fists on her hips and she'd be glaring and she'd be like "Uh huh. Okay. I've heard of this. Every now and then you get a woman who thinks it's her place to talk to another woman that way. To speak in such a manner - it degrades the whole sex, doesnt it? Better than having the men hear you speak like that, I suppose - but I for one wont disrespect myself by standing here listening to it."

See Chichi wouldnt snap at a woman in her current age the way she would always snap at a man becasue, well, her women are her fellows. She'll hear them out. She knows theyre smart.

But listen. Man. Goku's been fucked off training with Oob for forever. Piccolo wont visit since Goten got older and no longer needs the extra parental guidance (and Goten has frankly become intolerable company and we all know that thats why Piccolo wont visit but that's beside the point). What's a woman like Chichi supposed to do?

Shes ran a tight ship and a good home. She controls her own life. No one even cares what she does anymore. No one has looked at her in a long time.

She has strong beliefs and she reaps self-esteem from playing by them, romantic loyalty is a huge deal to her. But loyalty to whom? What about loyalty to herself?

Hey, this other woman may have spoken to her that way, but she was a sharp-eyed and witty woman, and good company is hard to find these days!

Chichi is not so prideful that she cant see eye to eye with her fellows. It's been a while since she delighted in fresh feminine connection. Women get it, you know?

It's been even longer since shes had physcial satisfaction. She used to be a martial artist, but she hasnt maintained it enough to keep her joints from aching, and with her husband gone, her life is just void of all physicality. Maybe she just wants to be GRABBED, yknow ?

Shes her own woman. Goddamn.

What I'm trying to say is that if she was hit on by a woman, she would assertively disagree and respectfully hold her volume, and she'd leave.

And then later she'd circle back.

She'd come back with her fists on her hips, still glaring at you strongly from under her titled forehead, and be like "Oye. You got seven minutes." Meaning that you've got 7 minutes to impress her and make this worth her time.

If you dont impress her than she would be set in her conviction and leave with full confidence and zero regret or curiosity.

But with that reality looming, she'll stick around for 7 minutes to see what you have to say. She'll give a fellow woman a chance. And if you impress her, maybe you'll get more than just 7 minutes of conversation out of her.

Becasue Ms Chichi is fearless, becasue again, when everything is vulgur, nothing is. Henceforth she'll refer to you as a "close friend" to others and humour you in raunchy conversation. Or depending on your personality or on what you did together, she'd prefer you to be a bittersweet midnight lover, never to return again ...

Ms Chichi everyone

#dballz posting #didnt have time to make this post. Made it anyway

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loverofallthingssmart · 2 months

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PLEASE UNLEASH your hadestown demons!!!!!

unleash my hadestown demons is right this is a BEAST thank you very much ive satisfied the brain worms by dumping all my thoughts under the cut

first off. the beauty of live theatre allows for so much nuance and beauty to demonstrated so i cant even begin to cover all the things that could make me insane its so wonderful i love live theatre everyone should watch at least one live theatre production i believe it will solve at least one problem they have

the tragedy of it all!! its a sad song but we sing it anyway, in hopes that we hope that orpheus doesn't turn. but he will. bc he loves eurydice so much so he went down to the underworld to save her.

guys. the repeated, cyclical nature of everything. its an old tale from way back when and its a sad song but they sing it anyway. the point of hadestown is the HOPE of it all wait theres an article (https://www.standard.co.uk/culture/theatre/anais-mitchell-hadestown-west-end-broadway-b1134613.html) regarding mitchell's thoughts on orpheus that make me insane im gonna paste a quote here:

"If Hadestown has a moral, she says, then it’s “you have to try, you have to have hope, not because success is a given – it’s not. Orpheus fails. We heroicise” – here she breaks off to apologise that jet lag has led to her making up words – “we heroicise Orpheus not because he succeeds but because he tries, and that endeavour alone is worthwhile. How to live, and not merely survive, is to believe things could change.” ARE U KIDDING ME OURGHH

which brings me to the topics of like. climate change and capitalism that the play discusses its so good. the fact that there's no spring or fall, only summers and winter because of persephone's absences, how "is it true" is just a song abt labor protests red carnations are a symbol of love and passion yes, but in germany theyre a symbol of the working class protest. its SO important hades has just created an industrial revolution, has built a wall, has workers work forever, "why we build the wall" is soooo incredible "hey little songbird" "chant" all the songs that take place IN hadestown itself are sooo gritty so despondent in a way its insane.

theres another article that discusses sm of it AND discusses like portrayals of persephone that i REALLY like. im gonna paste it here PLEASE read it it has so much good stuff from a classics person regarding it and OURGH too good

orpheus's "to the world we dream about" but then also "the one we live in now" like oh.okay. im NORMAL….

if u noted every single lalala in hadestown it would be 6 min long. the leitmotif oh i am so normal actually.

okay im not rlly a music person i call myself music adjacent bc my two closest friends r music ppl LMAOJDHJS but like. the first time u hear eurydice say "i do" i.e what you say to seal a marriage is after she tells orpheus she signed the papers. she does not say "i do" in the entireity of wedding song, where they talk abt their nuptials. she says "i do" in informing orpheus she cant come up with him. that she chose this life (or death i guess) of her own doing. isnt that vile….

in wedding song she goes "is he always like this" and hermes responds but then in "a gathering storm" she asks the same question to no response.. idk what's there but something is there.

hermes being the narrator thats involved in the play is SOOOO delicious for my brain, the way he switches between a character involved in orpheus and eurydice getting together, invested in their relationship to a all-knowing narrator who knows the end bc he sees this every time.

there's this sense that only orpheus and eurydice do not know they r in a repeated play. which heightens their love at first sight, the "i feel like i know u but ive just met you" OHHHHH my god.

the original nytw script having orpheus say "ur early. i missed u." directly paralleling hades and persephone but in a different context because OHHHHMYGOD and not even that but the fact that mitchell took it out bc she believed it engaged the brain when the moment should only directly engage the heart. so she had the lovers say each other's name. one last time. im soooo normal

also this is bc one time i was thinking abt hadestown and mitski's remember my name played so . just that song in the context of hadestown is SOOOO bc like. like. how eurydice couldn't rmbr herself when she became a worker but orpheus went down to save her and she remembered.

when he turns back and says.

"it's you" "it's me"

^ are you fucking kidding me. the sort of disbelief the happiness the love the incoming grief im inconsolable.

when orpheus turns back, eurydice says his name w so much joy SO MUCH JOY she is not upset at him. "what was there to complain of, except that she'd been loved?" <- quote from metamorphoses

like yes we wish orpheus doesnt turn around but at the end of the day, orpheus is still the trusting guy he was in the beginning. EURYDICE on the other hand KNOWS how cruel the world is and chooses to trust orpheus anyway. but. "it's a tragedy" and doubt creeps in. part of the tragedy lies in the fact that eurydice, "all ive ever known is to hold my own" eurydice runs after him w open arms, chooses to trust him, chooses to follow the trial, and he still turns around. BECAUSE he loves her ohhhmygod im so normal

obligatory mention to the fact that orpheus could never finish the song he was working on because it was a duet. like okay lol. im fine im normal hahahahaha are u fucking kidding me.

hades and orpheus are mirrors, there r two relationships in the musical obviously and it is clear theyre mirrors of each other even w/o the original script line but like.

hades gives orpheus the test that he himself goes through every spring. hades is the villain of the story yes but he is not evil. he gives orpheus the same trial, sees that if orpheus can judge him for losing faith in his wife through the course of their relationship, let's put his romantic nature to the test. let's see if he can feel the absence of his love and keep going. and he cant. bc orpheus has never had to learn how to fend for himself. so when u take away his support system, when u take anyone's support system, how is he, how r we supposed to succeed?

just. the song "how long" encapsulates hades and persephone's relationship SO WELL. "the girl means nothing to me." "i know. but she means EVERYTHING to him" the fact that this is the first time we persephone REFUSE a drink bc shes had enough oh were SOMBER somber the way the whole song just parallels itself and every verse GOD.

the love was there. the hope was there. its a sad song. its a love song.

every single time before they leave. every time they're on stage, eurydice is in front of orpheus. he trusts that she is before him and she never doubts that he is there. it is when their positions change, him in front and her behind that he bends. it is then that doubt comes in.

those r just the like the thoughst of the music and themes itself we can talk abt the ppl and the live play now:

so first. can we talk abt this we need to talk abt for reeve carney's last show the original orpheus his last show he didnt turn back. he and eurydice lived they passed the trial. sorry that makes me so insane bc like. imagine u play orpheus. doomed to a lifetime of looking back at ur lover and your final show, u finally get to stay. oh im very normal i just love the nuances of live theatre!!! what a send off!!!!

THEN we can talk abt how eva and solea play PERFECT eurydices, full of grit and used to the cruel nature of the world. and how lola tung i feel is a DECENT singer but shes not a eurydice shes so light and soft but idk. who am i to say.

also the soundtrack is just SO incredible so is the set design there's not a single ounce of stage space that is wasted like there are so many nuances like i cant even talk abt all that there is my FAVORITE musical for SOOO many reasons ough.

yeah i think that's it. this took me MULTIPLE hours and i feel drained abt talking abt all this. WOW i love hadestown not normal amounts. i can't die before i see this live its one of my goals i just need to see it live on broadway.

#putting this in #2 am ramblings #bc i invested too much brainpower and time into this LAMSODJHHDFJSK #anyway. yeah <3 that's all. there r so many more nuances you could have w every decision made onstage for each production and it saddens me #that i cant know them all. but theres a beauty in that as well.#hadestown #orpheus and eurydice #guys orpheus and eurydice are actually my second favorite greek myth LSMSNBDGHSUJHD but god theres just so much. OURGH

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abimee · 10 months

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(manifets at your door) hi bestie talking abt xiv music. what would u say are the bangers of all time - either by expansion or in the game as a whole

hold on i want to do best songs per expansion cause i got a lot to say about soken and co's discography of the game but i have to start out of order to let everyone know i think Wayward Daughter is a mediocre track and the actual best Stormblood track is Seven-Hundred and Seventy Seven Whiskers FOR GOOD REASON

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Seven Hundred and Seventy Seven Whiskers stands out amongst every song in Stormblood to me purely because of the Namazu themselves --- the Namazu 777 Festival is obviously based on the Obon, and the music that plays is meant to be music played during the Bon Odori/Bon Dance, and you can even hear the sound of the Namazu dancing to it in the song with the squeak of their feet :]

But what makes this so special is just the story of the Namazu, how their people lost their way and culture and how after one sees a vision of their people being destroyed unless they hold a festival and how everyone involved seems genuinely invested in reconstructiong their culture and being a ''people'' with rituals and beliefs again, rather than simply chasing coin like a lot do when you first meet the Namazu. And when they come to the Azim Steppe to make a spot for their cultural festival, they take the time to learn about the Au Ri cultures around them, and even though its often shown that the different Au Ri people consider the Namazu odd, them wanting to learn traditions from the different clans and incorporate them into their own festival is never framed as a greedy or ignorant ploy, but the Namazu genuinely wanting to learn and understand these traditions. The Namazu are even incredibly respectful to the Uyagiri people, where when they hear that they refuse to come to the festival due to their own religious beliefs about indulgence, the Namazu never berate them or say they should ''just leave their cave'' like other clans on the Steppe do --- instead, the quest is that you make a very simplistic offering, a doll iirc, to give to the Uyagiri as offering since they cant come. The Namazu genuinely try and even though theyre often played off as being stupid and for slapstick theyre never played off as like, ''oooh look at these fish disrespecting a culture because they wanna mimic it haha!"

And its really sweet with the fact that the Namazu story itself is about finding meaning and religion in what you do, and even if others see your beliefs and traditions and habits as ''uncessary'' or ''unworthwhile'', if it means something to YOU, if doing it makes you feel closer to your people or your religion, then it is worthwhile --- they see the festival as worthwhile, as crafting and gathering as worthwhile, and in reconnecting with their traditions they do avert a genuinely life-threatening future of mass exctintion, not because they actually appeased some sort of god threatening them, but because these traditions were grounded in a sense of preservation, that though they seem silly to others they were how the namazu lived and thrived!! and now to mention how the Namazu story touches on the concept of sort of recognizing that the God you worship isnt real with the fact that the Great One is sort of just implied to be not real, just Earthquakes in the ground, with not only it being based off a real legend but also the fact that the Namazu can't/dont summon a primal of it. And once again wrapping back around to the concept of religion always having been a means to self preserve, and whether a god truly exists or not is not what matters, but the community and safety and preservation that comes with religious worship and rules and etc etc. Anyway the Namazu are really good i think they steal the show for best track in stormblood ✌️

ANYWAY. A REALM REBORN. DREAM'S ALOFT genuinely one of the first MSQ songs to hit me in the gut. As a Kingdom Hearts fan and not an ff fan hearing this song did in fact make me feel like i was in Traverse Town again and meeting Cid highwind from my childhood. But also meeting Cid while this song plays and we're up in the airship really did feel like one of the first ''big moments'' in this game to me, so whenever I hear this song I think of my sprout days and how simply being up in the air felt like the most magical thing ever

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second to it HAS to be Edda's theme. No reason for ARR to randomly scare the shit out of me with a cool and emotional side story. I think FF14 does really good with brief moments of horror, cause Edda's plot really did chill me to the bone but it didn't overstay it's welcome or become ''too much'' --- which is where I think ff14 begins to fail in its ''scares'' sometimes. This game does best with like, Halloween campy spooky bullshit and nothing genuinely meant to be ''horrific'' and i think it needs to return to Edda-esque side quests more.

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and Through The Maelstrom for third place. If you dont think the buildup to Leviathan in ARR and the sound of the guitar kicking in after that first slapdown was the coolest, most ''oh shit this is REALLY dire'' then you can get the hell out of my house cause this was when the game hit that OH SHIT factor for me. Scariest and Coolest Primal to date fuck everyone else

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other notable mentions: Oblivion ofc, Limsa Lominsa's day music and Ul'dah's night music, and Camp Bronze Lake's music :]

my pick for Heavensward makes me sad cause finding out they took out Steps of Faith and therefore nobody gets to experience Faith in Her Fury to the most dreadul march of your life is so sad to me. I can't even tell you why Faith in Her Fury sticks in my mind to the point I recognized in EDW, I think it's just a really good introduction piece to Heavensward and made for a good backing track to a fun marching fight

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number 2 for Heavensward has to be Slumber Eternal. I've described this as ''music they'd play in a period movie where a fight breaks out between union busters and coal miners where people definitely die'' and i mean that in a complimentary way. This song really does make you feel like you're fighting up a literal fucking mountain and everything is trying to stop you and i think this was a cool as hell dungeon. I listen to this on repeat so often its not even funny

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also shoutout to Painted Foothils because they share the same tune. Leiftmotif and all that

Alexander. Rise. Everyone agrees. it has a fucking time stop mechanic built INTO THE SONG!!!

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other notable mentions; Baelsar's Wall music Another Brick is good dont let the haters tell you otherwise, Locus, Heroes Never die, and Relics

Stormblood :/ Omega has bangers in it at the very least i know mags already heard me say it but the music that plays before you fight M/F is literally the most ''final fantasy music'' music ive ever heard

WAIT back up. Soken's stolen beat is really good also. thank you soken for stealing this

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I have to put The Twinning here somewhere because this is literally the song that made me play this game. This is what made me download this game after months of going ''ill get a better computer and then download it''. When they refferenced a version of the meme at Fanfest i scrummed

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Amaurot.

theres a 10 video limit on posts but you know im not fucking finished so ill be back

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iratusmus · 1 year

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honestly its a real shame we didnt get to explore moebius as a concept more because it has like an incredible amount of potential to be a really interesting deconstruction of the "alternate universe where all the moralities are FLIPPED!!!" type of stories. like i was talking about it with @/goosewhisker and she brought up a bunch of super interesting points like. okay see the main question that most of this springs off of is... what, exactly, is the relationship between mobius and moebius.

i think its really worthwhile to go ahead and put in this question ian answered on his now-defunct forum that has frankly haunted me ever since i first found it. i've transcripted it below for easier reading.

"Question #4 wrote: When we talk about anti-Mobius, is this an evil version of Mobius really? They seem flipped around, but Knuckles, for example, is a good guy really in either dimension, and anti-Sonic… well, there's some potent foreshadowing in #172. But if anti-Mobius isn't an evil Mobius, in what sense is it the anti-Mobius?" In terms of Anti-Knuckles, at the time he was the antithesis. Knuckles at that point was still a nebulous hero - distrusting, hermit-like, and ultimately heroic in that he helped against the greater evil. Anti-Knuckles also was very open and telling about himself and his world, the exact opposite of Knuckles who sequestered himself away and generally kept everything to himself. Our Knuckles has grown to be more open, trusting, helpful, and truly heroic. One would assume the Anti-Knuckles wouldn't be nearly as approachable nowadays. I think calling the Antiverse the "evil Mobius" is too easy. Originally that's exactly what it was, but as its slowly built up over the years there's more to it. Mobius is a world under one dark cloud as the Eggman Empire seeks to conquer everything. Despite this there are pockets of hope, of heroism, and selflessness that fight back. On Anti-Mobius, the one beacon of hope is Dr. Kintobor's hospital and what he's managed to rescue in the Great Forest. The world is in a perpetual state of chaos as pockets of selfishness, ruthlessness, and misery sustain each other. Mobius is an example of hope enduring despite all odds. Anti-Mobius is a sad look at inevitable doom. I'll have much more to say on this later on.

so as ian himself says, moebius is no longer just the "evil mobius", but at the same time it can't really escape the shackles of being the inverse of prime mobius (see: knuckles vs anti-knuckles). so is this connection one way? do the inhabitants of moebius truly have any free will, or are they simply bound to be the opposite of their mainline counterparts?

i think scourge is definitely an interesting way of exploring this concept. as a character he's concepted on the idea of somebody who hates the idea of being considered a derivative of somebody else. he's not his own person - he's simply a discount version of the "real" him. his identity isn't his own. in his desperation to become anything that isnt sonic, ironically he ends up leaning into... well. still being a derivative of sonic. namely, what he is. anti-sonic. so even in his attempt to break free of the place that the universe has assigned him as a "sonic", he ultimately becomes exactly that.

does he really have free will, or is he simply confined to his lot in life? alternatively, is it that his natural inclinations/personality/choices are exactly that of his assigned place, which is how he ended up as the "anti-sonic" in the first place?

there's also another aspect to consider here - zonic says that scourge's "mutation" has made him "something of a wild card in the grand scheme of things". a line which is... never explained. but fascinates me nonetheless.

what is scourge's mutation, then? is it the master emerald incident, or is it that he rejected(?) his assigned place in the universe? if its the latter, then what does that mean for the rest of moebius, who have all followed in his footsteps (willing or not) to take on new, personal identities that are allegedly separate from their mobian counterparts?

buns' joining of kintobor is also definitely worth mentioning here - at the point that she switches sides, bunnie is still an unwavering freedom fighter. morally, both the mobian and moebian are on the same side. given that after the antoine incident, bunnie was going to join eggman's side to get legionized, what does that mean for the moebius/mobius connection?

is it possible that when scourge made them all take on new identities, he made the connection twofold? can changes in a moebian now affect their mobius counterpart? ironically, again, could scourge's attempt to break the ties between mobius and moebius only brought them closer together, now that both sides could potentially affect each other?

on a different meta note, i really would've liked to see more of moebius just because like... if mobius is a world where people are generally default "good", then is moebius a world where people are generally default "evil"? are they literally set up to fail because of the world they were created into?

frankly, going back to ian's commentary on moebius posted earlier... its no wonder that scourge (+ by extension the rest of the ss) ended up like that. the entire thing is so screwed from top to bottom and i wouldve killed to see it explored more.

#sonic #sth #archie sonic #on a different note though i kind of like the ambiguity of it all. leaves a lot open to interpretation which is fun #also dont ask me where to access ian's forum i havent the faintest clue where i found it #the quote i pulled from a page on the wayback machine but like. i have no idea how to get to his forum again sorry

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corvidcall · 11 months

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been watching a lot of sagan hawkes' videos lately (ABSOLUTELY recommend if you're interested in indie/internet horror btw) and he did this video titled "There will never be another Petscop..." where he talks about some of the works that were derivative of Petscop, and one of them is called AI Builds (ai stands for Animal Investigator, not artificial intelligence) and it really surprised me by how much i emotionally connected with it. the premise is that a guy is posting builds of this game hes making called Animal Investigor, which is supposedly highly derivative of another game called Animal Police. as the series goes on, it becomes a lot about the (fictional) game creator and his struggles and such

and theres one video where the fictional creator is talking about his emotions, and he says something about how people dont like his work when its derivative and they want him to put more of himself and his own voice in his work, but he doesnt HAVE his own voice, he doesnt have a Himself to put IN the art, and the more he tries to make his art more reflective of himself, the worse he feels

idk it was weirdly very resonant to me. i definitely feel like that, and i dont feel like ive ever seen it really portrayed in any media ive consumed. i like to MAKE things, i like to create and be creative, but i dont really feel like im very. idk capable of making something that isnt derivative. i dont really feel like i have a unique experience or perspective to portray in art. i mean, i know i technically do, but it doesnt feel like. its anything worthwhile to go to all the effort of making art about? and its kind of alienating and feels very defeating. especially when, the times ive tried to put myself into my work, it kind of just ends up making me feeling worse. in my experience, people demand access to an authentic you, and then they dont actually want it, or its not enough, or even if they DO like it, it wasnt worth the pain it took to dredge it all up.

idk. its always a little weird when you see yourself in a piece of art, especially when you were very much not expecting it

#anime life

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