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lemonhemlock · 2 months

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I saw a comment that really hit the nail on the head regarding a lot of the fandom in both ASOIAF/HOTD spaces. Basically, this comment said that a lot of Dany/Rhaenyra/Targ stans don't understand that targ women can both be oppressed and also oppressors. They literally view Westeros in this lens that the Worst Thing That Can Ever Happen to someone is misogyny, and yes GRRM's ahistorical levels of misogyny imbued in his work don't help here, and that nothing else can come close lol. They don't really get class dynamics, lesser nobles, etc. When you're the crown princess of the realm you have immense power, but also responsibility which, yes, includes not openly cuckolding your spouse and having obvious bastards you try to put into the succession lol. They very much think that every targ women could do whatever she wanted with her immensely privileged and pampered position as a royal and if anyone says anything, well, it's misogyny. It's a deeply unannounced, ahistorical way to look at this series.

Your comment in one of your other anons where you said 'are you really sexually liberated if you are causing pain to others in your vicinity' was funny to me because targ stans unironically would say 'yes.' They are stuck in this modern sensibility that romantic/sexual freedom is the number one civil liberty and anything a character does in pursuit of it is fine, even at the expense of others, and if anything bad happens as a result, well that's just the Patriarchy's fault. It's a fundamental difference in thinking that I don't think can ever be bridged because they are incapable of not projecting modern values. They truly believe that targ women can be privileged, pampered, politically and socially powerful, yet not be beholden to any of the traditions, duties, or responsibilities even with the most, like, basic decorum expected of royal and any calling out of this behavior is just misogyny lmao.

It's just so stupid lmao. Imagine if people had said that Queen Elizabeth II, one of the most rich, powerful, and privileged women in the world for literal decades was 'oppressed' because she couldn't have obvious affairs or take official mistresses or boytoys and have bastard children like her male forefathers did and blame that on misogyny lmao. It's literally the same thought process but these people cannot put two and two together if their lives depended on it.

^^^^ you did it, anon. you condensed targ stans to their essence 😅

some of them act as if being monarch should mean doing exactly what you want at all times and any kind of suggestion that immense privilege comes at the price of great responsibility automatically translates to misogyny. god forbid we put some restriction on "absolute power" and make it less absolute.

also in regards to sexual freedom and their inability to imagine a life without it. you live in the 21st century!! not only that you have recognised rights enshrined by law, but you also have modern medicine!! you have antibiotics, contraceptives, safe abortion, emergency services, surgeons, you can book an appointment with a doctor if you're feeling unwell etc. look me in the eye and tell me that if all of those were taken away overnight you'd continue to be your sexually liberated self and risk dying painfully of an STD in the name of love.

of course there are religious and sexist dimensions to restricting women's sexuality, there is no point in pretending otherwise, but who would really want their spouse to risk infecting them with whatnot in the name of sexual freedom? it's equally unhelpful in pretending there's not an aspect of public health in encouraging behaviours like chastity, monogamy and being faithful to your spouse.

again, this is not to say that it was all good and proper to be like that and what a time of pure morals we left behind in the olden days. it's to say that those times truly sucked for a lot of people, sometimes because of reasons they had no control over, and that they often had to choose between options that all sucked in some way

#ask #anon #anti rhaenyra targaryen #anti targ stans

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hunxi-after-hours · 1 year

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ok so. i am very slowly reading through 七爷, and i don't understand what jing beiyuan is the prince of. like, i understand he's in charge of a territory in the south, but does he have additional responsibilities? is he very low but still on the list of people eligible to inherit? he clearly feels a great sense of civic responsibility, but i'm afraid i'm missing something.

hmmmmmmmm this is kind of complicated because there's some weirdness around translation of imperial dynastic titles, which then gets even more confusing when you slap the general ahistorical ambiguity of genre onto things

so I think the confusion occurs because of the conflation of "prince" as a title of rank, "prince" as "son of a monarch," and "prince" as "ruler of a territory." Jing Beiyuan's exact title is 南宁王 Nanning wang, which is usually translated as "the prince of Nanning," though I can't remember if 南宁 Nanning is simply his title as prince or an actual location (if it is a location, it seems not to be particularly plot relevant since I have uhhh no memory of it)

the thing about 王 wang as a title is that it got royally upstaged (ayyy) by Mr. 嬴政 Ying Zheng (aka 秦始皇 Qin Shi Huang / the Qin First Emperor) back in the 3rd century BCE. The reason why we call him "the Qin First Emperor" is because the man literally invented his own title, 皇帝 huangdi, which we now translate as emperor. Prior to that, monarchs were called 王 wang / kings, and during the Warring States period, you had location-specific kings: 楚王 Chu wang / "the king of [the state of] Chu," 吴王 Wu wang / "the king of [the state of] Wu," 齐王 Qi wang / "the king of [the state of] Qi," etc etc. And prior to that, you had the Zhou Dynasty, whose rulers all carried the title of 王 wang: 周文王 Zhou Wen Wang / “King Wen of Zhou” or “the Civil King of Zhou” and 周武王 Zhou Wu Wang / “King Wu of Zhou” or “the Martial King of Zhou” depending on how you translate them, etc. Qinshihuang, in order to declare his dominance in conquering the Central Plains, decided to one-up all of these petty kings by making up a new title for himself that was automatically higher than the rest of the 王 wang, rather than competing for an existing title

the ripple effect from Qinshihuang raising the ceiling on titles/positions in governance meant that everyone could effectively move up one tier. if, in the past, the ruler was called 王 wang and his son 王子 wangzi (literally "son of the king" but often translated as "prince"), then the creation of the new 皇帝 huangdi / "emperor" title meant that the emperor's sons were referred to as either 皇子 huangzi / "son of the emperor" or 王 wang (the distinction between the two is usually one of age). basically, 王 wang goes from meaning "king" to "position just below the emperor in rank." that being said, it looks like the general decision has been to translate 王 wang as “prince” in the imperial context rather than “king,” possibly because in English, we’re used to thinking of princes as inheritors in the same way imperial 王 wang are eligible for inheriting the dragon throne

notably, rulers of other states/countries/civilizations were all referred to as 王 wang, since imperial Chinese cosmology dictated that the emperor ruled all under heaven (ah, imperial hegemony...). there are also tiers of 王 wang, as in 亲王 qin wang and 郡王 jun wang, but let's not get into that now

so! back to Jing Beiyuan. this gets fun because he’s what’s called an 异姓王 yixing wang, lit. “a king/prince of a different surname.” that means that his family is not patrilineally connected to the imperial family (thus, having a different surname), but the title of 王 wang was at some point conferred upon his family. this usually occurs when, say, an emperor decides to reward a general with the title of 王 wang because he’s so pleased with his general’s accomplishments. during the conferral, the emperor will usually specify if this is a title that can be inherited forever or downgraded from generation to generation (i.e. from 王 wang to 侯 hou, and downwards until eventually the family returns to normal non-aristocratic status).

these 异姓王 yixing wang have a lot of power and influence, comparable to a son-of-emperor 王 wang, but not quite the same because they are not of the imperial family and therefore not in line for the throne. imperial princesses sometimes marry into these 异姓王 yixing wang families, but that can be a recipe for disaster because it begins to make that bloodline — well, not exactly eligible for the throne, but certainly more eligible than they were previously, and if there is one trait you can trust a dynastic emperor to have, it’s the paranoia about potential coups by powerful relatives (but is it paranoia if it really is true? anyway)

all that is to say — I don’t think Jing Beiyuan is the prince of anything in particular, though as a landed aristocrat I’m sure there are fiefdoms in his name. I can’t remember off the top of my head how his family earned the title of Nanning (or if it’s ever explained in the novel), but if I had to guess, I’d say that some ancestor of his was an accomplished general who had the title of 南宁 Nanning (which has the valence of “to bring peace to the south”) conferred upon him, which has subsequently been passed down through the family until it landed on his unfortunate head

#that 异姓王 to 功高震主 pipeline though #seventh time lucky

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nothorses · 1 year

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hi! this is a question about pansexuality that i fear asking. tbh i don't really care what anyone identifies as. everyone's part of my community to me. i am trying to wrap my head around bi v pan stuff as someone who is neither. i know bisexuals who are critical of the pan label because to them it distinguishes bisexuality as starkly Not being pansexuality. when definitions of bisexuality have included "attraction regardless of gender, or to all genders (and including trans and nb people)" for many bisexuals since like the 70s which is how i see pansexuality defined a lot of the time

i know that bi and pan have always been concurrent labels and they have a lot of overlap and that some ppl use them interchangeably. and i truly don't care that ppl id as pan. but i do feel weird seeing it juxtaposed to definitions of bisexuality that aren't inclusive of all bisexuals? (ie that bisexuals aren't attracted to ALL genders, just two or more.. when many bisexuals Are attracted to all genders! part of bisexual history is that people have been fighting to let others know Bisexuality is more inclusive than the literal like latin meaning of bi = two). i don't know where to stand on this divide. i love pansexuals and the pan label and the right to self determination in identity but i do understand the argument that it feels hurtful in a biphobic way to say it is inherently a distinct sexuality from being bisexual when it's. like. many bi and pan ppl would define their sexuality in the exact same way other than a difference in specific label. i feel like people hate this opinion lmao!!! please help! even if you hate my opinion too i literally feel like i need guidance KDBDBS

Tbh I think there's a lot of historical context to this whole convo, and I don't think you're alone in being confused. And honestly given the amount of info you have, I think you're in a pretty respectable spot about it. (And I say "historical" here in the sense that I am. 25. and I'm mostly talking about the things I have either seen firsthand, or read about/heard about from others.)

So like- when I was a Young Queer, it was very common for people to define "bi" as meaning "men and women" (or even "cis men and cis women"), and thus "pan" rose to popularity as an alternative to essentially mean "everyone, including trans and nonbinary people".

This was like, early 2010's? And I'm talking about other Young Queer spaces and interactions. And you kind of have to remember that in that time, it was kind of radical to tell people not to call things "gay" if they didn't like them. Joking that people were trans (usually in terms like "lol Justin Beiber is a lesbian") was common even in progressive spaces. I was stunned when a friend of mine asserted that they were just gonna stop using the r-slur, like, at all.

So I can kind of understand why "pan" might have felt like a needed thing at the time. I think it felt like a kind of shorthand for "I'm cool with trans people", and at least from my perspective, that was something you very much needed to state back then.

I think there are a lot of people my age who, if they don't still understand "bi" and "pan" that way, at least kind of "get" where that definition is coming from. And yeah, it's ahistorical as hell! "Bi" has always been inclusive of trans people. Not to mention people have been defining it all sorts of ways for a long time now; there are a ton of definitions out there, and how the word is defined often depends on who you ask.

But then you ask: if we know "bi" is and has always been trans-inclusive, why does anyone still need the word "pan"? And I think the answer is... complicated. And extremely personal, tbh.

This happens with queer language all the time; as terms are cycled out in favor of new ones, people who've been using them hang on regardless. Sometimes they don't know the language has been updated, but usually it's more than that. Usually they have more of a personal relationship with the word, and the community, that they can't just give up in favor of a new word.

Maybe some people who do understand that "bi" is not actually a transphobic term also still view "pan" as shorthand for "I'm cool with trans people", and that's important to them. Maybe they grew up with that word, formed relationships under it, and came out with it. Maybe the pan community impacted them in some profound way, and rejecting it over shifting definitions just doesn't feel right. There could be any number of reasons.

The other part of this is that much as people have come to understand the original definition of "bi" more widely now, the definition of "pan" and "bi" both have taken on multiple definitions as well. I've seen a lot of definitions that seem to exist just to differentiate the two. For example:

Bi: attracted to multiple (but not necessarily all) genders Pan: attracted to all genders

Bi: attracted to all genders, but in different ways, or with preferences Pan: attracted to all genders essentially the same

Bi: attracted to multiple (or all) genders Pan: attraction regardless of gender

I've also seen people use "bi" as the umbrella term, and "pan" as a more specific label beneath it (often with one of those pairs of definitions).

And you mention that "bi" has a lot of different definitions and understandings- so does pan! How a person understands those words, particularly when they identify with them, is going to be deeply personal and very likely very different from the next person. I think a good rule of thumb is to assume that whoever you're talking to may just have a different definition and understanding of the word they're using than you do, and try to ask them about it if it concerns you.

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betaoctillery · 2 years

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i dont follow ppl that dont support mspec lesbians btw. not only is it bullshit gender/sexuality policing but its ahistorical as shit when bisexuals & lesbians were almost indisguishable from one another until a very specific point in the 1970s when terfs and political lesbians began dividing the community by excluding anyone who had ANY association to perceived masculinity, which included trans women (bcus terfs thought of them as men), bi women for sleeping with men, butches for expressing masculinity, and women of color for racist reasons which posited that they arent feminine/women bcus many dont look/act/talk exactly like cis/het white women.

at any rate, the current accepted definition for the term lesbian is inherently bisexual! everyone says it means “attraction to women and nonbinary ppl” (which is nb-phobic outright ANYWAYS by lumping ALL nonbinary ppl with women -- this is what ppl are criticizing when they say we’re treated as “women-lite”) so if youre not being a nb-phobic asshat, you then have to acknowledge that woman and nonbinary are different genders, thereby making lesbianism a fundamentally bisexual identity as it includes to attraction to two or more genders.

like think critically for a moment. what about a bigender lesbian who feels like they are both a man and a woman? do you personally get to decide, do you personally get to have the authority, to choose which identity of theirs to suppress in order to cram them into one specific neat little box? whichever way you try to pigeonhole them, youre promoting gender binarism, which is nb-phobic. trying to cut up and divide ppl’s identities like nations erecting borders is dehumanizing.

another aspect of this issue ive noticed is that almost every single person ive met who self-identifies as a bi or mspec lesbian is trans or nonbinary. they often have complicated relationships to gender and sexuality that sweeping statements like “lesbians cant like men!!!” end up erasing their experiences. ive seen ppl claim its a term used by cis women to describe sleeping with trans women and i cant stress enough how in all the reading and research ive done on bi lesbianism that ive never once seen that cited as a definition or something having been done in practice. its literally just ignorant teenagers or young adults in their early 20s who know nothing about their community’s culture or history talking straight out of their asses. and if there are ppl who do this, theyre extreme outliers and its disingenous to act like mspec lesbians would defend such a level of transphobia when, again, most mspec lesbians are transgender themselves and are well aware that this division occured bcus of terfs.

read queer history yall. for the love of whatever you consider sacred and holy in this world pls fucking read queer history. dont get all of your information off of social media, random unsourced carrds made by teenagers who obviously dont make an effort to learn about their own community, and bad faith internet debaters who make conclusions drawn off what amounts to nothing more than “vibes” essentially. these people have really big loud mouths, but theyre simply wrong. material history will never agree with them.

throughout history, bi and lesbian have more or less meant and were treated as the same thing, including both women who exclusively were attracted to other women AS WELL AS women who were attracted to both women and men.

and until a single exclusionist can provide sources that can prove that 70′s lesbian separatism wasn’t a huge, well documented movement that resulted in much of the exclusionary attitudes and its effects we see even today, im just gonna continue to laugh at how childishly they cover their ears and go “la la la la” when presented with verifiable and cited evidence that this happened.

#bi lesbian #mspec lesbian #nonbinary #nonbinaryphobia #queer history

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mimzy-writing-online · 3 years

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Hello. I had a question regarding your post about blind characters. I have a character in my WIP that must cover their eyes.. but it’s blind. He may need to tell people he is blind to explain why he covers his eyes though. I was wondering how I might write this character without offending. Thank you :)

I think I want to start by explaining the “covering blind eyes” trope and why it has become a harmful trope. I think understanding why it’s hurtful helps everyone learn how to handle it better.

I would guess that the “blind people wear sunglasses” trope comes from Hollywood for the specific reason of 1. wanting to signal to the audience that the character is obviously blind and 2. avoid breaking the suspension of disbelief by preventing the audience from catching the sighted actor look at visual stimuli (because disabled characters are almost always played by able actors).

But this changed the way the public expects to experience blindness. If watching a sighted actor wear sunglasses and say he’s blind is all the exposure to the blind community a person has had, that’s the only model of blindness they’ll recognize. If they meet a blind person in real life who doesn’t wear sunglasses, it’s going to break this built perception and cause an uncomfortable cognitive dissonance.

And then there is the common “cloudy-white blank gaze” that pops up in media. It stems from the fact that cataracts is the most common cause of blindness and the appearance of severe cataracts is a cloudy film in the eyes obscuring the iris and pupil. It can also alter what color a person’s eyes appears to be, making them appear paler and grey in the beginning and then as the cataract advances it becomes more yellow/brown and alters a person’s vision to appear more yellow tinted.

There are lots of other eye conditions that makes the eyes look visibly different. Albinism for instance affects the color and structure of the iris. Eyes might be congenitally misshapen. The muscles might be weak or not work and one or both eyes point significantly outward. Someone who was born blind and experienced no visual stimuli might also have weak muscles around their eyes because they never had a reason to focus their eyes on anything.

And unfortunately humans have the habit of feeling uncomfortable when they meet someone who looks very obviously different from the norm, whether that’s a personal style choice (hair color and style, tattoos, clothing choices) or something they can’t help (a visible disability, skin color, scars).

To the paragraph above, @gothhabiba replied with: “it's very weird & ahistorical to claim that racism or ableism are some kind of natural "human" trait.. like frankly it's apologia”

You’re right, I wasn’t thinking beyond that generalization or assumption.

Perhaps a better way to put it is: I was raised in a society where I was taught from childhood to think that there was only one kind of human being to be. White, cis, straight, abled, conservative. That’s a very western thing and that’s a thing I’m going to constantly be unlearning.

Racism and ableism and homophobia aren’t innate, that’s a western thing that was forced onto the rest of the world by colonialism. And because western media created this idea that the world is white, abled, cis, straight, and Christian-value leaning, it taught people to think that was the norm so that seeing someone different from that archetype would cause a cognitive dissonance, which causes discomfort.

And instead of working past that cognitive dissonance to learn more and realize there’s so much more to life than media taught you, society encourages you to ignore that cognitive dissonance by sticking your head in the sand-- or TV screen.

So combine these two tropes or common beliefs together and you get something a little dangerous: the idea that blind people cover their eyes because they look obviously different and they’re ashamed (or should be ashamed) of that.

And if you’re someone who’s just gone blind or who was born blind and you have little to no contact with the blind community, then this societal belief that you should be ashamed of how your eyes look becomes detrimental to your self-esteem and further builds internalized ableism.

I’ve lost count of the times I’ve read or watched a blind character cover their eyes with sunglasses because they were ashamed of how their eyes looked. And I distinctly remember a few times where a sighted friend of the character was trying to convince them to stop wearing sunglasses because there’s nothing wrong with looking different--which is true, but it plays into this fantasy of being the perfect abled ally who saves the blind character from being miserable.

In an ideal world, the character has no reason to believe looking different is a bad thing or diminishes their worth or makes people dislike them. And if they develop this belief, it’s more likely that someone more involved in the disabled community, most likely someone disabled themselves, will set them straight. Or that the character will learn to accept themselves on their own, looks included.

But there are some perfectly valid reasons for any blind person to wear sunglasses. They might have an interest in fashion and sunglasses complete the look they’re going for. They could want to protect their eyes from UV rays while they’re outside. They may experience light sensitivity and sunglasses reduces any discomfort or pain. Those are incredibly common reasons to wear sunglasses whether you’re sighted or blind.

But there are some more complicated situations.

In your words, your character must cover his eyes. You never specified why, so my primary guess is that he has some kind of power that is unpleasant or has devastating affects and the only way to prevent it is to keep his eyes covered. My primary guess stems from this post where an anon and I discussed a retelling of Medusa, a hypothetical blinding of oneself to avoid ever killing anyone ever again, and what I think I would do if I was in that scenario.

So how do you write a blind character who must cover their eyes and avoid some of the complications?

1. Your character must always have the ability to say “fuck off, it’s my business, I don’t have to tell you why I’m blind or why I cover my eyes.”

Most blind people really, really don’t want to get into the nitty-gritty of why they’re blind and how they feel about it and what it’s like being blind with a stranger they’ll never see again or a new acquaintance they don’t know well yet. You have exceptions to that rule where sure, educating the public about blindness is a thing you want to do and you’re committed to helping your community, but I still have days where I don’t want to talk about being blind or disclose my medical crap.

And if someone doesn’t respect their right to their privacy or pushes too much, the blind character is allowed to be angry, is allowed to tell them off and complain without anyone else in the situation vilifying them or saying they’re “overreacting” and “should have just disclosed private information because big deal or whatever.” If they are angry, that’s their right, and it’s not unreasonable, it doesn’t make them a bad person.

2. Your character should not be ashamed of being blind or of covering their eyes. It is a part of their life, they’re used to it by now, even if they weren’t in the beginning.

The shame and internalized ableism is something that should be written about, but that’s for an own-voices story with a blind author. I don’t think an abled person will ever be able to understand how much society expects you to hate yourself and your disability because “being disabled is a tragic thing that ruins your life” and how that does affect your mental health, self esteem, your relationships with others, your medical care, and what kind of accommodations you can get.

3. It wouldn’t hurt to have a few sarcastic lines in response to uncomfortable conversations.

Stranger: so what’s with the...

Blind Character: what’s with what?

S: the... you know

BC: you’re gonna have to be a bit more specific

S: Your eyes?

BC: They’re... eyes

S: but you’re...

BC: Blind?

S: uh...

BC: yeah, I’m blind. *walks away*

Or this conversation:

S: *to some other character* so why are his eyes covered?

(author’s note: which, honestly, that’s fucking rude. At least have the guts to ask me yourself)

BC: If I look anyone in the eye they instantly perish.

*awkward silence*

BC: instantly.

Friend: It’s truly tragic

BC: *melancholic* that’s how I lost my sister. *chokes up* She was so young

Or this conversation:

S: Why are you wearing that?

BC: It’s called fashion Karen!

Or this conversation:

S: are you like... blind?

BC: yes?? why wouldn’t I be?? Wait, are you sighted? Are you one of those sighted people? You poor thing! What caused you to gain your sight? Do you have a car? A bike? Were you born sighted? What’s it like to see color? Do you miss not having to see

God, I want a chance to try that last one. I haven’t interacted with a stranger in almost a year. One day...

4. Honestly, it’d also be cool if someone’s reaction to your character covering their eyes was like, “cool sunglasses,” or “cool *insert random character, even one you made up* cosplay,” (which is ten times funnier if this character is a notable figure in modern society like an actor who people might cosplay).

5. You know, if he’s covering his eyes with some kind of blindfold, he should totally have custom blindfolds for his moods. Like, I have a mask that says “suck it up buttercup” and another that says “not today” because sometimes that’s the mood. And sometimes the mood is one of my floral masks, and sometimes the mood is my cat mask.

So, just some thoughts. I hope that helps.

Edit: a commenter said: “op, unless i'm mistaken this kind of reads like anon meant the character ISN'T blind but lies about being blind to explain covering their eyes? it seems like they made a typo on the word "isn't"”

So my original response to the question was based on the assumption that the character is blind. However,

If the character is not blind, then do not under any circumstances have them lie and say they’re blind to escape a mild inconvenience.

It’s better to have the character actually explain the situation or straight up leave the conversation or invent a more ridiculous lie than to perpetuate the very real stereotype and misconception that there are people who fake being blind and therefore it’s okay to discriminate or harass them if you even suspect they’re faking.

Do not under any circumstances perpetuate that stereotype. Do not harass someone because you don’t think they’re blind enough.

#blind character #writeblr #writing community #disabled character #writing tropes #trope talk #blindness tropes #Anonymous

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transmalewife · 2 years

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i’ll never understand people who excuse their exclusionism with their own personal experiences. like “i detransitioned so now i’m a terf” or “i though i was asexual but i was just a traumatized kid so that means asexuality doesn’t exist” like what do you have to gain from that? why do you think the minuscule sliver of the human condition that is your personal experience gives you the right to decide what is and isn’t real for millions of others?

i identify as bi currently, and when i came out in middle school bisexual is the word i used. but when i realised i’m nb a few years later, i started identifying as pansexual, because i had been fed the (wrong, ahistorical, biphobic and transphobic) definition of “bi means two” with pan being presented as a more inclusive alternative. i faced queerphobia i didn’t have to because i thought i had to shove myself into the best fitting box from those lists of hundreds of microlabels that used to float around tumblr (remember those?) and was mocked and ridiculed every time i tried to explain to people irl what pansexual meant, trying not to out myself as trans but having no other answer for “why don’t you just id as bi?” (usually followed by something along the lines of ‘you fucking snowflake’) i felt like i was wrong somehow because no matter how hard i tried i couldn’t categorize all the complex feelings i had about my gender into any of those premade boxes. i tried genderfluid or demigirl for a while but nothing stuck. i started doubting myself when i encountered other definitions of pan, that said it’s attraction regardless of gender AND attraction that is identical to all genders, because mine wasn’t, and was so intrinsically tied to how i experience my own gender that i know now i could never have sorted it into two completely separate labels.

i don’t remember what came first but one day i said fuck it, i don’t want to have to explain this again, i’m just gonna say i’m bi, even if it doesn’t fit perfectly, because it fits well enough and this person doesn’t need to know more. i also started reading about actual bisexual history, about bi nb people, about queer people and about how umbrella terms are enough. nonbinary is enough. queer is enough. and bisexual has such an immense breadth of experiences, varying definitions, vastly different people using it over decades, that it is enough too, and for once in my life i can blend into a crowd.

now does that mean i have any issue with people identifying as pan? fuck no. it was the wrong label for me, it even hurt me to identify that way. but i’m not every person on this planet, nor am i self centered enough to think i have any right to speak for them. if i’d identified as a lesbian before realizing i’m also into men, i wouldn’t be going around saying lesbians don’t exist, would i?

i think we need to make sure people know umbrella terms are an option, queer is there to welcome you and you don’t have to choose a perfect label. i despise how pansexual is often used as a biphobic tool, but i despise when anything is used as a biphobic tool. doesn’t mean i hate the thing itself. i think we have very similar needs and goals in our fight for equality, and i think this rift between us is actively impeding that fight for both. i think the myth of ‘bi means two’ needs to go, and any pan (and not pan) person propagating it after being educated about it is a biphobe. but i’m not so self important as to think my label will be perfect for everyone, or that my feelings are the same as everyone’s. and i remember that wonderful feeling of belonging, when a microlabel just clicks into place and (even if it’s just for a few years) fits perfectly. i think that’s beautiful.

i thrive under an umbrella that doesn’t describe my atraction entirely, because that is its purpose. i thrive knowing that of all the queer people out there, living or dead, not one was exactly like me, and i feel safer knowing i have a word i can give to people that doesn’t tell them everything about that part of me, and doesn’t require me to introduce them to the word for the first time and become the one template through which they will judge everyone they meet who also uses that label. one that allows me to choose the moment when i sit down with them for a long night over a bottle of wine and explain the maze that is my gender and the minotaur of my sexuality that dwells within.

but others thrive on order. on knowing that someone out there feels so similarly to them that they wrote it down, gave it a name. they like being able to have one word that when googled will tell everyone more or less how they feel. they like being able to find another, equally specific word, when the first one becomes obsolete, or choose more than one. they like not identifying as a word that was given to us by doctors or bigots, but a word that came from within, that was created for them. sometimes they like creating a word of their own too, to put a neat bow on their own maze, so they can share it with others who may feel similarly and find each other.

and crucially, neither of these versions is wrong

#pansexual #bisexual #queer #trans #mine

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menalez · 3 years

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Okay, so I want to be clear when I say again that white women in the suffragette movement said/did racist things, just as white women in feminists movements today say/do racist things,. Even white anti-racist activists will, at least on occasion, say and do racist things simply by growing up in a white supremacist society. I don’t want to give the impression that I’m disputing that reality. I only mean to illustrate some of the nuance (and why that matters today).

I sent those quotes in an effort to illustrate how the women’s suffrage movement was intertwined with universal suffrage, both white women and black men campaigned for each other’s right to vote. The women’s suffrage organizations grew directly from the basis of abolitionist movements. The initial suffrage (and wider women’s rights) movement was indistinguishable from the civil rights movement. When the 14th/15th amendment was proposed splits in the civil rights movement deepened — both white women and black women (and presumably some black men) campaigned against any amendment that didn’t include women. Similarly, black man and both white and black women favored the 15th amendment even without including women (of any race), who argued that women could wait. Ultimately the latter group saw their wish, and the division resulted in two separate organizations that continued to campaign for women’s suffrage.

The quotes you screen-shotted are undeniably terrible and exemplify the racism within the movements. To be nuanced however, they also span a wide range of individuals — from actual slave owners to women who said something racist but also directly participated in anti-racist activism.

To illustrate (from the quotes you provided):

Rebecca Latimer Felton - terrible human, slave owner, all out white supremacist

Carrie Chapman Catt - she later said “our task will not be fulfilled until the women of the whole world have been rescued from those discriminations and injustices which in every land are visited upon them in law and custom”, lobbied against the word “white” being added to the 19th amendment, and lobbied congress/used her presidency of the League of Women Voters to advocate for people of color and Jews

Elizabeth Cady Stanton - she also founded the Women's Loyal National League that led the largest abolitionist petition drive at the time, organized the American Equal Rights Association a suffrage organization that explicitly supported universal suffrage. The organization split when (mostly) the black men in the organization supported the 15th amendment without advocating for it to be extended to women. (She definitely said racist things around this time, similarly Frederick Douglass, who was both her friend and one of her main critiques at the time, said many sexist things.) The split was later merged back into one organization that she headed.

Anna Howard Shaw - I know very little about her. She definitely said many racist things, but she did champion universal suffrage and campaigned to end racial violence (arguing that universal suffrage would end lynchings). Still, she also failed to condemn racist actions by her peers.

Same as (1)

Belle Kearney - terrible human, slave owner, all out white supremacist

Frances Willard - confusing mix of actively recruiting and working with black women and also promoting racists myth that white women were in danger of black men that facilitated lynchings (due to her “temperance reform”). Also appeared to be more laissez-faire when president of the WCTU since she let conservative states hold on to conservative and/or moderate positions regarding reform for both women’s rights and racial justice.

Same as (1)

As for why it matters today:

No, women definitely won’t have the right to vote revoked for discussing racism in past movements. But there’s a difference between discussing racism, and perpetuating misinformation. One of the main ways the American government disrupted activist movements throughout history was to sow dissension in their ranks. (And the American government/military taught many of these techniques to foreign countries.) An excellent example of this is the COINTELPRO operation, but it’s only the tip of the iceberg. Their goal was to divide and conquer - a movement can’t make progress if it’s busy fighting itself - and poison the public’s opinions of the movements, so as to dissuade new members from joining. (At this point, I want to reassure you that while this may sound like a conspiracy theory, it is very much proven and it/other programs did much harm to domestic and foreign reform movements.)

The myth that the suffragette movement was specifically racist, rather than operating in concert with and emerging from, anti-racist activism contributes to this divide and conquer method of disrupting activism. If you (general you) can convince women of color that the “original feminist movement” (ignoring the ahistorical nature of such the label itself) actively campaigned against them, then it’s much easier to dissuade them from considering feminist activism or to divide activist movements. (And, if it were true, it would be entirely justified!)

Of course, that’s not to say that feminists shouldn’t criticize (or disavow, to the extent possible) white supremacists like Felton or Kearney, or that we shouldn’t discuss and reform the racist sentiments in past and current movements. (In fact, I believe, and expect you do as well, that doing so is not only permissible but necessary, because to deny the racism that did exist in past/current movements would alienate women of color just as much as the idea that the feminism-of-old was solely for white women, and would in fact be an expression of racism in and of itself.)

I hope this clarifies what I’ve been trying to convey.

im surprised about the claim that white women and black men campaigned for each other's right to vote. i was under the impression that the civil rights movement was largely focused on black men and often outright excluded black women having a say, so i don't really know why they would support other women (such as white women) having a say when i heard they didn't support that for black women, who were always black men's biggest supporters.

i do get your point, to a degree-- and i think we agree overall but simply word things differently. i don't think that the women's suffrage movement was Bad and i don't think the white suffragettes back then were like, all evil and more racist than the avg white person in their society. i would say overall, those women were quite forward thinking and progressive for their time. i don't doubt that a significant portion of women were far worse than that, and even opposed women's rights (bc of the society they grew up in where this was a controversial thing). my only argument is that pretending they weren't also racist and had traits worthy of criticism (such as their racism) is innaccurate. a lot of prominent suffragettes were quite racist, and that's not to say that their feminist beliefs lead to that or that women's rights is interwined with racism, but just to point out that even those women who fought for the right to vote for women were not particularly good allies to poc but most specifically black people, and more importantly, black women. i also wanted to point out that being anti-slavery and campaigning against it, did not mean they were generally anti-racism or fighting against racism overall. they were fighting against the worst and most extreme forms of racism in their time, but they were all still racist in their own right. i'd like to reemphasise what i initially shared that you disagree with (+ my tags, and my previous comment on it so as to be fully transparent), which is not that different from what you're saying imo:

now i'm not trying to argue the origin of the movement, what it rose out of, how it relates to racism or anything else; my qualms are with the claim that the suffragettes were not racist. maybe back then, they were closer to allies to black people than most, however they were still quite racist. similarly, since you brought up white allies, white allies today may be the best we have and the best in our time, but they are also still often quite racist themselves.

my main and only point is that these women were still racist, and this is not to discount the women's suffrage movement, i just think that when we deny that aspect of the past then what we're doing is alienating woc. i've noticed a general trend of white women on here saying that white women were targetted by the KKK for example, fixation on stuff that is targeted at white women like 'karen' and placed on equal grounds with calling black women 'laquisha' to berate them, arguments that white women dont have racial privilege, etc and while i don't think the people making such arguments are necessarily coming from a bad place, many woc seeing this will end up feeling like the movement is geared towards white women and does not properly consider & include woc. that's why i take issue with the claim that xyz white female historical figure wasnt racist bc she was pro-slavery abolition, like, sure that must've been really progressive for its time but at the same time it doesn't change that the same woman did work w white supremacists and white supremacy was used as an argument to support white women's suffrage. it probably worked as a strategy and helped pave the way for other women, but its good to acknowledge these issues and criticise them esp since they remain relevant today when people are still indirectly debating how much woc should be considered in feminism.

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writingwithcolor · 4 years

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Destroying Imperialism to avoid Discussing Racism

Hello! I wanted to write a mostly light-hearted story about cowboys escorting a mysterious stranger to the Atlantic and the weird encounters they have along the way. I know how racist the Western genre normally is but I didn’t think I was the right person to write about the racism Native Americans faced since I’m not Native. To get around this I created a backstory for the world to explain the lack of it:

A century ago during the Age of Imperialism alien asteroids struck the earth, destroying most of Europe and mutating Earth’s flora and fauna. In the ensuing confusion the Native nations banded together and pushed the invaders out, with the freed slaves staying with the Natives. The cowboys are all descended from these former slaves, with the only white person in the entire story being the escort. Since the story involves traveling the cast will meet a lot of Native people on their adventure.

At first I thought this was okay but as I this was okay but as I thought about the idea more I grew less confident in it. I didn’t feel like it was okay for me to attempt to side-step a very serious issue like this. Is there a way to repair this premise or should I just scrap the entire story since I seem to be coming at it from the wrong angle?

I wouldn’t say “wrong angle” so much as “potentially ahistorical to a fairly extreme degree,” which might not be possible to mitigate. There’s a lot of points in here that need addressing for it to be even plausible, and I’m only covering the major ones.

Point the First: Natives Owned Slaves

Part of it was to get in good with the white man, but this is something that happened. I’m not Black-Indigenous, so I won’t speak for their struggle, but I will say that anti-blackness is fairly large in Native communities, and many Black-Indigenous people are denied any sort of place in the tribe.

I’m not very well versed in that history, and I would rather pass the mic to Black-Indigenous folks who have in some cases experienced generations of tribal disenfranchisement thanks to prevalent colourism and anti-blackness in Native communities.

I’m sure some tribes were anti-slavery. But others very much weren’t. This is something you will have to explore, extrapolate, and listen very closely to Black-Indigenous folk for their experiences and preferences.

Point the Second: Some Nations (temporarily) Benefited A Lot

The Metis were a nation with a lot of political power and a lot of wealth, all thanks to the fur trade. They came about through political and/or love marriages between white men and Native women, then grew into their own distinct thing with an intermingling of French, Scottish, and primarily Cree settlers in Canada’s Prairie.

This isn’t counting how relations between Quebec and the Natives in the region were actually very good for a time, the Iroquois were war allies to the British in both the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812. Texas has a treaty that has not actually been broken.

These nations/confederacies would be hard pressed to want to throw Europeans out, because for a long period of time, they got a lot of perks. They got money, the ability to expand their territory, help against their enemies, guns, horses, metal, and resources in general.

Point the Third: Colonialism Was Slow To Boil, Or Devastated Quickly

There is no one exact spot where you can pinpoint it got bad for everyone all at once. When America got its mind on manifest destiny, that was terrible for the Plains, Mountain, and West Coast Natives. When the Spanish came (well before the Age of Imperialism in the 1400s) and enslaved practically all of Mexico and Florida, it very quickly destroyed many, many, many nations that are working on revitalization efforts but will never truly exist as they were again.

Canada’s Prairies got hit hard from the 1800s, onward, but the Inuit were slow to connect with Europeans so their colonialism is very recent and very sudden. The Maritimes in Canada got hit devastatingly before the Age of Imperialism really took hold, but then Quebec Natives hardly had that happen until everything soured. The Iroquois might’ve had even longer in a place of status.

As a result, you cannot assume everyone would either be hurt or feel hurt. In some cases the Natives only realized how toxic settlers were when America actively cheated them out of land. Others when their children were taken to residential schools.

Point the Fourth: Cowboys Existed Because of Colonialism

Cows are a European animal, primarily, as are horses. Ranching began as Spanish and then American people wanted to buy/steal large swaths of land from Natives in both Mexico during early colonialism (I reiterate: before the period your supposed asteroid hit Europe), and the Plains during the manifest destiny era.

Ranching and Native peoples have a hard time coexisting together, because in the plains, you’ve got rancher needs fighting with buffalo needs, just to name one example.

It might be possible to create a respectful cowboy situation, but you’d have to think pretty long and hard about how to not push out Native peoples from their territory, and how to share the land for two very large animals and their different needs.

Also, you’d have to account for how ranching is a Spanish thing, so if Spanish people hadn’t had a chance to import all of their practices, then the whole concept of cowboys in North America would be bust.

Is it possible to have cowboys be adapted, maybe be influenced from a few places in Asia or Africa (because Africa does have pastoralists) instead of the Spanish, and make them respectful? Probably. How? You’d have to do your own research on the needs of cowboys, animal husbandry in East Africa, and what tensions existed between them and Native/Indigenous peoples in both North America and whatever region you’re borrowing from.

Point the Fifth: Colonialism Became Self Sustaining Very Quickly

Aka, they wouldn’t have been impacted much at all by Europe getting wiped out, especially the older colonialism like New France (1500s), Mexico (1500s), Rupert’s Land (1670), New England (1600s), etc. They might have lost some trading partners and a reason to over-produce goods, but they wouldn’t have been devastated. These people:

1- did not rely on Europe after a generation or two, maybe 3-4 at most

2- were often already genocidal

It took all of a generation or two for colonial structures to be self-perpetuating (when families came over like in America, or the active sponsorship of girls to come such as the Files du Roi in New France), and to have killed off major swaths of Indigenous people in the area (although New France did take longer to get bad). The Pequot village massacre that is the reason Thanksgiving is annual was in the early 1600s, after all.

This is not getting into the Caribbean, Asia (British shadow-rule of India started in the 1700s, but they had been trade partners for longer), or Africa, or South America. Colonialism was a long, long, long buildup, and the Age of Imperialism was just a small portion of that.

The likelihood of the Indigenous numbers existing to remove cities that had purposely spent all of their early time “clearing” the land of unwanted Indigenous people is… possible, but low.

This is why non-violent colonialism is an oxymoron, which I’ve discussed at length this week. Many were violent from day one, so unless you change Europe’s history to remove their manifest destiny attitudes and just have them expand to new lands and not be colonists, then your solution is too little, too late.

Also, news travelled a lot slower at the time. People might not’ve even found out about the asteroid for months if not years.

In the End

I highly doubt it will be possible to get the kind of story you want without discussing racism of some sort. The fact you’ve only targeted the Age of Imperialism, and as a result have kinda majorly glossed over the Spanish era (starting in the 1400s), which was majorly devastating to Mexico/Florida and resulted in many peoples being rendered extinct, plus being the root of cowboys… yeah.

It sounds like you’re trying to avoid learning about our struggles/putting in the work to write respectful background characters. You’re too hung up on trying to make it all better instead of learning how to write situations without making the whole story about that situation. I’d take a look at our Can I Write About X? tag for more information on how to write background stuff.

Like I said. It might be possible to create a respectful cowboy/Western story… but I really doubt that this solution is enough. It just doesn’t account for the sheer length of time colonialism happened, and by the time Native peoples have supposedly banded together, colonialism would’ve been self sustaining in many of the regions you’re discussing.

~ Mod Lesya

#Writing question #submission #cowboys #colonialism #genocide tw #native american #Indigenous Peoples #alternative history #worldbuilding

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posi-pan · 3 years

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hi, i love your blog but as a bi person (i’m both bi and pan) i’m just having trouble letting this ask slide and feel the need to respond to it. for one thing bi people did not “pick” or “make” the label bisexual for ourselves, it was first used in a sexuality context (after previously sometimes being used as a term for intersex people) by cishet doctors who considered our sexuality a medical condition and was eventually reclaimed by bi people as an identity term. we didn’t choose the label itself. also, sorry anon but i 100% guarantee you that literally all bi people, even terrible ones like babs, do in fact know that bi means two because people online literally NEVER stop telling us. we literally had to alter our preferred definition (from ‘more than one gender’ to ‘two or more genders’) bc every single time you define bi without using the word two on the internet people froth at the mouth over the prefix and derail the conversation by going “but bi means two!!!!” over and over again like it’s the only sentence they know. like yes, we KNOW bi means two. i promise you, we’ve heard.

i’m not trying to be rude or anything bc of course it’s true that claiming the community or the most used definitions of bi have never been binary is ahistorical nonsense but like……i really don’t think responding with different ahistorical nonsense, while also blaming bi people for a term we didn’t coin being binary and going “haven’t those silly bis ever heard of prefixes tho? checkmate” as if bi ppl who use social media don’t hear about prefixes ten times a day, is a good or useful response

yeah it's a word that was given and reclaimed, not picked. so thank you for adding that. as i said previously, sometimes i miss stuff from reading too fast or literally just forget to address one part from being so focused on a different part.

i will say though, the anon was talking about babs who literally deny there ever being a time when bi was defined as two or in a binary way. that's something they are actively saying in order to be panphobic (like claiming bi has only ever been defined as all genders). it wasn't really the way you're portraying it, like they're just another biphobe telling bi people their sexuality is only two because ~prefix. they were just trying to make a point about the claim of it never meaning something it very clearly has meant in the past, albeit not worded very well (and yes, by also saying something ahistorical themselves).

#asks #anonymous #bi antagonism #long post

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dathen · 4 years

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I’m so angry that tumblr put my read more WITHIN THE ASK ITSELF so I’m copying the whole post since I worked hard on it:

Ask from @ blue-electric-angel

Hi Dath! Would you feel up to rant about the trolley problem? I've never liked it but I don't know WHY or at least can't articulate it, so I would be interested in hearing another person's thoughts 🤔 But it's okay if you don't want to!!

OKAY TWO DISCLAIMERS

a) I was reminded that I should clarify my dislike of the trolley problem bc of @callmearcturus talking about its issues, so can’t take full credit here!

b) I am not a philosophy expert and find ethical thought games only useful in how they apply to the real world, and find worth in ethical discussions in how they’re applied/affect how people think more than how complex/challenging they are.

THIRD DISCLAIMER I’m very sleepy and pretty sure I have surpassed my words quota of the week so this may be a bit disjointed!!

Some background on my ire: I’m a CPA. Which means majoring in business. Which means being around business majors. Which means BUSINESS ETHICS CLASSES. My eyes start to water every time I think about how many American Dream dudebros tried to apply the trolley problem as a flimsy excuse to devalue those they thought were reasonable sacrifices for their own greater good. Is it worth testing weapons on your own population, if you can then use those weapons to end a war faster? Should we get rid of regulations about medical tests on people, if it would result in life-saving medicine being produced faster? And so on. Rules, protections, and just anything that would require giving another human being agency are treated like nuisances in the way of Great Minds moving and shaping the world as they see fit.

I went and did a search to see if anyone already put my thoughts about the trolley problem into words, and the article The Trolley Problem Will Tell you Nothing Useful About Morality sums it up right from the get-go:

It discourages us from examining the structural factors that determine our choices.

[cut for length]

One thing that drove me BATSHIT about philosophy classes is I was never allowed to bring historical or social context into any of the discussions. I couldn’t challenge Aristotle’s view of women as ranking somewhere near livestock, because if I couldn’t word puzzle my way into a truth, nonsense like “disenfranchisement of women in Ancient Greece” and “self-perpetuating social structures enforcing class and gender divides” didn’t belong in my discussions, apparently!

Which, needless to say, is a huge issue when you start getting into topics of “who should we sacrifice for the greater good” as applied to political policy. I don’t even need to elaborate on this one. It’s always those whose lives are valued less and who have less power in that society. The “greater good” is intensely subjective, and will always include the well-being of the person making the choice.

The trolley problem works from a long list of assumptions that will rarely reflect reality, and shortcut past the most important discussions to be had:

- The person behind the switch has the sole power or responsibility for making the choice. They don’t have the chance to communicate, they don’t have the chance to get input from the people in danger.

- The person behind the switch is the only one with agency, and the only one who CAN have agency.

- The safety of the person behind the switch is assumed. No possible choice could involve them being in danger.

- There’s a time limit that allows nothing more than an impulse decision.

- There’s no examination of why there is only one person with power over the situation, or why those at risk are 100% powerless to leave their situation

- There’s no chance of examining why the trolley is rolling down the tracks in the first place

That last one is where my rage comes from about the misapplication of this thought game re: insisting philosophy must be ahistorical. But the thing that especially gets under my skin is how the agency of other human beings is just completely taken off the table. A non-issue. Something we have to assume wouldn’t make a difference, something we should assume isn’t possible to begin with.

[Stop reading here if you’re avoiding The Magnus Archives spoilers to episode 101]

Since this came up in a TMA context, I’ll veer it over to TMA: I see it get brought up in the context of Gertrude sacrificing Michael to save the world. But this dehumanizes Michael as a person who could have been given agency and information, when in fact we know he was kept ignorant so that he could be more easily manipulated. It places Gertrude behind the switch with no other options other than to pull a lever one way or another. But therein lies the issue with the application of this experiment to “real life” scenarios. Where is talking to Michael instead of betraying him? Where is letting him make a choice of his own? We learn later that his sacrifice wasn’t even necessary, but with the limited information Gertrude had at the time, how much were other options (LIKE GOOD OL C4) explored before she decided to ruin the life of someone who trusted her? Why does she get to ensure her own safety behind the switch, rather than considering herself in the trade of “one life to save the world”?

TMA 155 - Cost of Living is a fantastic deconstruction of how rich and privileged people try to apply the trolley problem to excuse their choices and their abuse of others. The statement giver rationalizes murdering dozens of people to fuel her own life, excusing it with “but I can do so much good if I’m alive!” Meanwhile we’re left horrified that she clearly finds those she postures as being so helpful towards as expendable and “less valuable to society,” such as homeless people and the elderly. We’re left side-eying the idea that a rich person giving to charity while living comfortably as being an indisputable “greater good” when all that’s really happening is one person valuing her own life over the lives of so many others. The statement giver insists the net gain of the world excuses her actions, and tries to narrow the choice down to those two tracks: Don’t pull the switch and lose “all the good she could do,” pull the switch and lose just a handful of people. Listening, we know that the only person on the other track is her, and that her rationalization only enables her to kill again and again.

And that is why I hate the trolley problem.

#there are spoilers for TMA 100 in here but I mark where they start #so if you're not interested in TMA or catching up you can read the rest of me hating on the trolley problem

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lemonhemlock · 7 months

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So I was the anon who sent the ask about modern sensibilities and refusal to engage in the time frame and thanks so much for answering. You hit the nail on the head with this social justice warrior who refuses to engage with historicity typology, which seems to make up a majority of the fandom. This trend, and HOTD is a perfect example of this, of historical media nowadays throwing all historicity out the window to Girl Bossify and attempt to appeal to modern sensibilities is deeply annoying.

First, they take the deep religiosity including concepts of sacred oaths, duty, sacrifice, etc. of the medieval period and completely strip it away because writers are deeply cynical when it comes to religion and need to attract the Champagne Agnostics/Atheists who have a deep contempt for anything religious as being Boring and Uncool (and I say this as someone who has never been particularly religious lol, but as a student of history understands how important the concepts of religion, God, faith, oaths, duty, sacrifice, etc. were during the medieval ages). Arguably, the most important aspects of both nobles and peasants' lives during these times were their deep faith in God and devotion to their faith. Not including this religiosity in medieval dramas completely negates a lot of plot and character motivations.

Second, you have deeply ahistorical plot points that are used in a very manipulative way. I feel like now in every period drama I see you have a willful princess aka a Rhae/nyra type that gets placed in an arranged betrothal or marriage and we inevitably get a scene where she's shocked and outraged over marrying a man she doesn't know/love and being used as a BroODmArE (writers loveee this word lol) and I'm just always like ???? Are you knew? These girls have been surrounded by nothing but arranged matches from their parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, friends, etc. for their entire lives? They 100 percent expected to be marrying a man for the realm not out of love? They also saw bearing children to further their line and unite the two families as a sacred duty and a good thing? Like?? it's just so eye rollingly ahistorical I can't. I'm not saying that there have never been cases where women were violently against their arranged marriage for whatever reason. But, by and large, they did their duty and gladly, at least in public no matter their personal opinions. Yet, because of how this is framed in story the social justice media illiterate type act like these literal one percent privileged noble princesses are the most Oppressed People Ever? These literal royals have one fucking duty and that is to make a marriage that stabilizes the realm so smallfolk don't have to go fight and die in unnecessary succession wars while getting waited on hand and foot as peasants are working the field for 15 hours per day, and I'm supposed to feel bad because the Precious Princess didn't get her First Choice husband?? Are these writer's serious? It's so deeply unserious and and the history illiterate fandom eats it up.

Thanks for coming back, anon. 💖 I think there is space to critique aspects of medieval society, even if we're talking about elements chosen particularly because they are egregious to the modern eye, like arranged marriage and blind devotion to God that leads to intolerance and Church abuses etc. But most of it is done in a trite, superficial, redundant way and the critiques are in the same registry.

I agree about the topic of arranged marriage being discussed in the context of a pampered princess that is always so shocked that she has to marry for political reasons and throws a tantrum worded in a way that sounds vaguely human-rights-ish or feminist to our ears. In the case of Rhaenyra, she actually IS offered the chance to marry for love, but even that she considers a chore and squanders it. On the opposite end, I really enjoyed the movie Catherine Called Birdy because it took this trope and did something different with it, both highlighting the inherent unfairness of this practice and being refreshingly honest and human.

Ultimately, I feel like the framing is stale in many medieval or fantasy productions, with talking points that we've already seen a hundred times before. Film-makers feel the need to over-correct for the sins of the past when female characters were often sidelined, but they understand strength and character development in having them trample over everyone else instead. Rhaenyra repeatedly breaks the law, makes destabilizing political decisions and shows little interest for learning how to actually do her job, i.e. governing, but we're supposed to cheer for her because she is living her best life and is a bad bitch, so anyone who opposes her must be a shill for the patriarchy. Similarly, the framing of religious people is nuts and I say this as a staunch atheist.

#ask #anon #anti hotd fandom #hotd critical [storytelling]

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engineer-ai · 4 years

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Why Bill Gates thinks gene editing and AI could save the world

Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates has been attempting to improve the condition of worldwide wellbeing through his nonprofit foundation for 20 years, and today he told the nation’s premier scientific gathering that propels in artificial intelligence and gene editing could accelerate those enhancements exponentially in the years ahead.

"We have an open door with the advance of tools like artificial intelligence and gene-based editing technologies to fabricate this new age generation of health solutions so they are available to everybody on the planet. Furthermore, I'm very excited for this," Gates said in Seattle during a keynote address at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Such tools promise to have a dramatic impact on several of the biggest challenges on the agenda for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, created by the tech guru and his wife in 2000.

When it comes to fighting malaria and other mosquito-borne diseases, for example, CRISPR-Cas9 and other gene-editing tools are being used to change the insects’ genome to ensure that they can’t pass along the parasites that cause those diseases. The Gates Foundation is investing tens of millions of dollars in technologies to spread those genomic changes rapidly through mosquito populations.

Millions more are being spent to find new ways fighting sickle-cell disease and HIV in humans. Gates said techniques now in development could leapfrog beyond the current state of the art for immunological treatments, which require the costly extraction of cells for genetic engineering, followed by the re-infusion of those modified cells in hopes that they’ll take hold.

For sickle-cell disease, “the vision is to have in-vivo gene editing techniques, that you just do a single injection using vectors that target and edit these blood-forming cells which are down in the bone marrow, with very high efficiency and very few off-target edits,” Gates said. A similar in-vivo therapy could provide a “functional cure” for HIV patients, he said.

The rapid rise of artificial intelligence gives Gates further cause for hope. He noted that that the computational power available for AI applications has been doubling every three and a half months on average, dramatically improving on the two-year doubling rate for chip density that’s described by Moore’s Law.

One project is using AI to look for links between maternal nutrition and infant birth weight. Other projects focus on measuring the balance of different types of microbes in the human gut, using high-throughput gene sequencing. The gut microbiome is thought to play a role in health issues ranging from digestive problems to autoimmune diseases to neurological conditions.

“This is an area that needed these sequencing tools and the high-scale data processing, including AI, to be able to find the patterns,” Gates said. “There’s just too much going on there if you had to do it, say, with paper and pencil to understand the 100 trillion organisms and the large amount of genetic material there. This is a fantastic application for the latest AI technology.”

Similarly, “organs on a chip” could accelerate the pace of biomedical research without putting human experimental subjects at risk.

“In simple terms, the technology allows in-vitro modeling of human organs in a way that mimics how they work in the human body,” Gates said. “There’s some degree of simplification. Most of these systems are single-organ systems. They don’t reproduce everything, but some of the key elements we do see there, including some of the disease states — for example, with the intestine, the liver, the kidney. It lets us understand drug kinetics and drug activity.”

The Gates Foundation has backed a number of organ-on-a-chip projects over the years, including one experiment that’s using lymph-node organoids to evaluate the safety and efficacy of vaccines. At least one organ-on-a-chip venture based in the Seattle area, Nortis, has gone commercial thanks in part to Gates’ support.

High-tech health research tends to come at a high cost, but Gates argues that these technologies will eventually drive down the cost of biomedical innovation.

He also argues that funding from governments and nonprofits will have to play a role in the world’s poorer countries, where those who need advanced medical technologies “essentially have no voice in the marketplace.”

“If the solution of the rich country doesn’t scale down … then there’s this awful thing where it might never happen,” Gates said during a Q&A with Margaret Hamburg, who chairs the AAAS board of directors.

But if the acceleration of medical technologies does manage to happen around the world, Gates insists that could have repercussions on the world’s other great challenges, including the growing inequality between rich and poor.

“Disease is not only a symptom of inequality,” he said, “but it’s a huge cause.”

Other tidbits from Gates’ talk:

When it comes to agriculture, climate change is making the challenges facing farmers in developing countries even more acute, Gates said. More extreme weather conditions could bring more floods, more droughts and more pests and plant diseases capable of wiping out crops. Gates pointed to efforts at CGIAR to develop more resilient strains of corn, rice and other crops, and at the University of Cambridge to build healthier soil. The Gates Foundation recently established a new initiative called Gates Ag One to support such innovations.

Gates said he was concerned about two trends in the distribution of health information. “One is that titillating false information is more engaging than true information,” he said. The flap over the false linkage between vaccines and autism serves as an example of that, he said. “And then there’s this general notion of, hey, if the experts say something, are they somehow biased or naive?” he noted. “This is a fight. Will we go through a cycle where it’s not as acute as it is today? I don’t know. Right at the moment, it doesn’t feel that way.”

Gates said he subscribed to psychologist Steven Pinker’s view that the world is getting better. “Despite that there’s plenty to worry about … we shouldn’t lose sight of the fact that the progress has been absolutely phenomenal,” he said. “Many people are literally ahistorical to think that in a meaningful sense, 20 years ago or 40 years ago, life was better. That’s just not the case. Yes, there are huge problems, but if you’re a woman, if you’re gay, if you were subject to certain diseases, if you lived in developing countries, 40 years ago was dramatically worse than it is today.”

#bill gates #artificial intelligence #gene editing #engineerai

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jackawful · 5 years

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Here's the thing: "butch and femme are lesbian-exclusive identities" is a claim that has to be backed up with like...reasoning and evidence if you're going to make it. The vast majority of the time, what's used to back it up is just straight-up wrong about bi women and the nature of our ties to, and participation in, lesbian culture. Often when I've seen this stuff I've been too upset to respond well to specific arguments, let alone compile them, but I have a little bit of distance and feel the need to put this all in one place. So here's a list of actual reasons people give for this assertion, what they imply about bi women, and why the prospect of people just accepting them bothers me:

Butch and femme are identities about performing gender specifically for other women and not men, which is an experience only lesbians have. The implication here - sometimes explicitly spelled out depending on who's writing it - is that bi women, as women attracted to multiple genders (usually) including men, automatically and inherently perform at least some of our gender expression for the benefit of men. This isn't true! Judging from both my own experience and that of a lot of bi women I've talked to, performing gender for men is usually something that happens due to internalized misogyny, and something we work to overcome if it's even something that effects us in the first place. Often, the goal isn't even to perform gender for other women - it's to perform it for ourselves, in a way that flags that we're queer and will hopefully attract other women. It's actually really disturbing and misogynistic to claim that women who are attracted to men inherently shape how they dress and act to please/appease men, cause that's a really unhealthy and damaging thing under patriarchy, even for straight women. This argument also ignores butch and femme lesbians who do their gender expression primarily for themselves, a sentiment I've seen in a lot of published writing on both identities.

Butch and femme were created by and for lesbians in lesbian bars during the 30s-60s, so bi women, who were not present, using the terms in the modern day would be ahistorical. Plenty of other people have made plenty of good, accurate points refuting and complicating this narrative of history: the use of the terms in ball culture, evidence of the words in Polari cant, the continuous use of fem(me) by gay and bi men into the modern day, the way the meanings of "lesbian" and "bisexual" gradually shifted into their modern usage through the 60s-80s, the participation of people we would now consider bisexual women in lesbian bar culture, etc, etc, etc. It's pretty clear to me that this is a flattened, simplified conception of a queer history that is actually very complex and hard to trace - if you want sources, I'll dig them up on request, but it may take a while. But one more thing bothers me about this argument: personally, as a butch/masc woman who specifically has trauma tied to being forced into the traditional housewife role, it would have been much, much more difficult for me to find men who would accept me as I am had I lived in the 30s - so difficult that, in that different cultural context, I may have identified as a 100%-attracted-only-to-women lesbian, especially since "bisexual" wasn't even a cultural concept at the time. And beyond that, I've been raised in a working class environment. I probably have more in common with the lesbians that went to lesbian bars than literally anyone middle class or above. Beyond that, even if this simplified historical narrative were 100% accurate, there is literally no reason these terms would have to remain the same in the modern day. Language changes.

Lesbians need a lesbian-only vocabulary/everyone's taking everything away from lesbians already/our culture is being destroyed by everyone just being considered "queer" and making this vocabulary lesbian-exclusive is the only way to stop this. I usually see this as a tacked-on addition to the two points above, but I have come across it on its own a few times, usually from T/ERFs or crypto-TE/RFs. And I think there's a reason I see this one more in radfemmy spaces: it's reactionary. It's drumming up fear that one's culture will be erased if anything ever changes about it, and a desire to return to an imagined ideal past where there were no culture-stealing invaders. And it's directed at other LGBT people, not like...straight cis people (you know, the ones that hold power in our society?). I worry that it's the first step into a lot of other nasty rhetoric, especially the "lesbian not queer" facet of it, which is something TER/F groups have often used to claim that The LGBTQ Community has betrayed the L by accepting the T (and less commonly, the B). Like, I know there's a subset of people out there who will plug their ears and immediately discount this if I say "this is TE/RF rhetoric" but...it is, and it's dangerous, especially because it's that rhetoric that exists where TERFiness and fascism overlap. And man, on a personal level? It sucks to be the target of that. It sucks to be painted as an invader and an enemy and a thief to a group that by all accounts should be where I can find my siblings. Bi women connecting with the history and culture behind identifying as butch/femme takes nothing away from lesbians, it doesn't dilute the terms, and in fact, it can only contribute to the survival of butch/femme culture because it means there are more self-identified butches and femmes in the world. So even if you're unconvinced by the rest of this post, I'd really prefer you Not with this.

And that's...actually pretty much all I've seen used to back this up, actually. If you have an argument that doesn't boil back down to one of these three, I'm open to hearing it. If "bi women can't be butch or femme" is a thing people are going to believe and spread, I want there to be discussion with some depth to it, and I want it to be respectful of what bi women actually feel and experience.

Also, a note: I've used "bi women" as a shorthand here, but this definitely all applies to other multisexual (pan, queer, etc) women.

Gonna tag some more public blogs who I think might be interested in this: @bisexualfemme @beautifullybutch @bilations @dykebisexual @lesbianthor @feminismandmedia

#bi butch tag #bi femme #bi women #bisexual #bisexuality #butch/femme #butch discourse #femme discourse #just casting a wide tag net so people will see this don't mind me

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myfriendpokey · 5 years

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GARBAGE DAY!

a bunch of scrappy shorter pieces to clean out my drafts folder for the new year!

***

A videogame will tend towards exhausting every possible variation of a design space whether anyone wants it to or not.

Videogames and duration - if something is good it should continue being good however long you extend it. You don't really encounter the idea that something can be good for a little while and then be evil.

***

Works of art are "in conversation" with their audience, with materials, with history, with each other. The aim of an artwork is to start, or add to, "the conversation". "Conversation" sort of edges out the older tic whereby art "examines" or "explores" something, which always made me think of a big magnifying glass being propped up for the benefit of some eerily calm 1950s scientist. But now that sounds too chilly, and perhaps sort of sketchy in the power dynamics it implies. "Conversation" is much warmer, informal and more fluid - "conversation" is the assurance that any given power dynamic can be dissolved away in the warm glow of basic, mutual humanity. Let's talk it through! My door is always open! Whenever there's a complaint over labour conditions or harassment it's nearly de rigueur to also quote the wounded-sounding HR lackey, upset that people didn't talk to them about it before going public. Why would anybody deny the friendly, outstretched hand of the respected opponent and their entirely in-good-faith quibbling about word meanings, personality and tone? Why don't we have an honest conversation about the "honest conversation", that numbing discourse cloud sprayed out like formic acid to neutralize a threat, to melt any unsettling edges or contraries back into the familiar gloop of the private and the personal.

***

One of the pleasures of videogames is that of an infinitely repeatable, always identical procedure. Pressing the button makes something happen, and by pressing it again it will happen again in the same way. So there's a kind of abundance or excess built into the system - like partaking of a fruit which will never be depleted, and in the process taking on in your own actions something of that same infinity. You can temporarily identify with the self-identical, eternally reproducing action that you are performing. I think one of the difficulties of videogames is that as you get (slightly!) older, that immortal quality becomes more visibly alien, harder to align to your sense of self. That these mechanics act like black holes, able to absorb any amount of your life without ever being satiated, becomes a terrible curse rather than an unexpected gift. That endlessness now seems eerie and artificial, a horrible parody of life rather than the highest version of it.

The dadification of vgames has gone much remarked. But as well as a demographic shift I think this reflects a certain anxiety about the centrality of these immortal entities, these endless loops, within the culture. As reward for your fealty to the Mario brand you get even more Mario games, which by now you may not have time or energy to actually play. The VG dad (or even the buff, single pseudo-dads of the superhero movies) is eternally exhausted with the genre that he’s trapped in. We hear him groan and complain as he painfully slogs through the motions. The gratuitous loop is redeemed by the finite human suffering of the dad, as he manfully does what it takes to keep these things going forwards to the next generation, so that the next set of children may be able to actually take pleasure in them again. But the attempt to symbolically re-integrate these things into human life by casting them as a family drama never quite works: their ultimate indifference to that life shines through. A blind, eerie deathlessness is both their charm and their authority.

***

That saying that when all you have is a hammer everything else looks like a nail - similarly, when all you have is willpower, everything looks like an obstacle to be pounded into submission by that same willpower.

Laziness is a good thing in that it means stepping back from this idiot insatiability of the will. If you're lazy you have to pay more attention, because you're more aware of both your own limits and the limits of your material.

I think there can be value in suspending a formal problem rather than building an exhaustive system to solve it forever. That way it's still something you have to think about, something that still throws off and reroutes the normal workings of your awful private fantasy machine. Dropping text strings into the game as elements to spatially encounter is not ideal technically but does force you to be more responsive and exploratory with how you use that text. Robust systems can be cool, but can also really homogenize everything - now "text" is just the miscellaneous stuff within the all-purpose "textbox" at the bottom of the screen, cementing its role as filler content.

The funny thing about really systemic, open-world type games is that their very robustness tends to suffocate exprience before it happens. We know nothing will happen which will significantly impact this camera POV, this dialogue system.. anything can happen except for anything which would require a fundamental change to the underlying inventory system. But maybe the whole pleasure of the open world game is just being able to hold those experiences in suspense.

***

Mostly the characters voicing my own opinions in my videogames are explicitly malign and sinister - which is a corny device for me to vent without worrying as much about browbeating people with my opinions. But it's also a way of having those opinions without allowing them to overdetermine the rest of the game, or be fully in control over the more ambivalent and drifting work of "putting together different pieces on a screen to make interesting spaces". So in that sense my own ideas really are the enemies, and any plot role they serve in the game is a dramatisation of the effort to create a space where they lack controlling power.

***

RPG Maker is a collage machine, you get a set of pictures and start placing them around until they start to form some kind of charged and interesting space.

I think the collage aspect is a lot of what I enjoy about making these things, which is why games with more polished or consistent art styles frequently leave me cold. For me the greater the discrepancy between different objects on screen means a greater effect when they're combined.

How does gameplay etc tie in? For me gameplay can divert the interest but never truly capture it. For decades games have had the problem of effectively being able to train you to do something, but having no idea what that thing should be or why it would matter. They effectively move your attention around without being able to settle it because their inner logic is basically always the same ahistorical, mechanistic void. But this can be a good thing - the permanently restless and unsettled nature of videogame attention can't illuminate itself, but can do so to other things in passing.

Distraction becomes a way to examine surfaces, rather than being sucked into depths or settled to one fixed meaning. And the drift of unsettled consciousness is ultimately what animates game collages, the spaces that shift and react as attention plays across them, revealing or withholding. And so from this perspective, the answer to why I make videogames is: because I don't trust myself to look after an aquarium.

***

Design is managerial aesthetics - a mode of expertise framed as meta-expertise specifically because it scales up so well to systems of mass organisation and production. It's a universal discipline insofar as the task of removing any obstacles to the frictionless flow of attention and of capital is now also a universal chore. In this context a designer is like the MBA who can be dropped into any business to improve it, without ever having to know just what product they make – because the ultimate goal is always the same, the same tools can always be used.

The cutesy books about the design of everyday life and so forth exist in the same vein as the ones that tell us there's nothing wrong with marketing because ultimately isn't all human discourse and activity some form of marketing? Isn't everything "design"? The strange top-heaviness with which these things outgrow their host categories parallels the unstoppable expansion of executive salaries within the businesses themselves. The task of managing other people's labour becomes ever more grandoise, ineffable, cosmic and well-paid as that labour in turn is framed as a kind of undifferentiated slop which exists for the sake of being shaped by creatives.

***

tragedy / comedy:

Generalizing hugely I feel like tragedy is about an event or experience so powerful it changes everything - for the characters involved, for the people in that world, for the audience watching - while conversely comedy is the idea that no event or experience can change anything. Oedipus dies and there's a big announcement and everyone has to sit through the awkward two-minute silence before getting back to work, while trying not to fart or itch too noticeably, and the next day somebody's selling Oedipus commemorative pens which run out of ink five minutes after opening, and the pen cap gets lost and the cat starts playing with it.

In comedy the tragic can still happen, it’s just never strong enough to escape the constraints of the inert material universe which we find ourselves in – all that which remains so stubbornly intractable towards the higher instincts. I can talk about the dignity of man but there's still a risk that my pants will fall down or that someone will hit me with a ladder, causing my head to get stuck inside a bucket of paint, etc. Or my voice might be ridiculous or I might have a stutter (old comedy standbys!), or someone might hear part of my words out of context and assign them a different and unintended meaning. Comedy is consciousness imprisoned within a cumbersome matter which it can't completely do anything with, but also can't exist without.

Taken as a worldview, this sort of risks congealing into the kneejerk reactionary things-can-never-change, whatever-moment-of-human-history-i-was-reared-in-is-eternal-and-inviolate radio DJ / South Park mindset. And of course somebody's view of what constitutes a tragic, life-changing event depends greatly on whether it's happening to them or someone else. But as exaggeration, in its neurotic overemphasis of the inescapable material, i think this approach still has interest and use. Many of my favourite writers have a kind of comic understanding of consciousness: consciousness becomes a churning material process with its own independent momentum which has to be examined and accounted for as part of any real reckoning with the world. In this light comedy becomes a way to think about opacity and limitation, both in physical matter and in our own selves.

I think many people have made the point that vgames are generally comic, intentionally or unintentionally. The rhetoric around them still tends towards the tragic: make the choice which changes everything! Deal with the consequences, accept your fate! But in practice those moments feel less visible than the clumsy material layer of GUIs, inputs, mechanics and representations that contain and constrain them. The opacity of the black box is one inhibition: was that meant to happen? Was it scripted or a glitch? Maybe I should reload my save and try again. Another is the inertia of the various game systems and loops themselves - [x] character may have died but you still need to collect those chocobo racing feathers if you want the Gold Sword. The numbers in a videogame "want" to keep going up, whatever happens: there's an affordance there which exists independently to any merely human wants and needs, and so tends to act as a gravity well for distracted consciousness as it wanders around. When people talk about tragedy in videogames it's usually with the implicit rider that it's within a game, or set of game conventions, which have become naturalised enough to become invisible. Which also tends to mean the naturalisation of a form, of inputs, of technology, of distribution mechanisms and assumptions, which however arty we can get are still inherently tied to the tech industry. Every art game is to some extent an invitation to spend more time internalising the vocab of your windows computer.

I've mentioned that the materialism of comedy can tend towards unthinking reaction. But the insistence on certain limits inherent to the human body – requirements like clean water and clean air, food and shelter, actual bathroom breaks and not piss jugs and also not having to live six feet beneath a rising sea level - can be helpful at a point when all these things are regarded as negotiable impediments to the pursuit of future profit. Maybe it’s a good thing that some materials can still be so insistent about refusing to be absorbed into the will.

***

I think what I most enjoy about art is the sense of a game with moveable stakes: where you never quite know the value of what you're playing for, which now appears absolutely trivial, and now appears to stand in judgement of the whole world, etc. I think this is also the Adorno idea of the aesthetic as really the extra-aesthetic, that which can step outside or threaten to step outside the limits of the merely aesthetic. It's why "just make a good game / pop song / comic / etc" never quite works, in rhetoric or in practice: the really good pop song is never that which just gives the enjoyable three minutes of listening we might consciously assign to be its remit, it's what overflows or undercuts that category, that which however briefly seems at risk of stepping outside it and into the realm of everyday life.

I grew up on pop culture so I don't have to feel positively towards it. Who am I meant to be defending it from? The handful of surviving WASPs reared on Brahms who get the ostentatiously-fussy-culture-review posts at print newspapers looking to pick up a slightly higher quality of margarine advertisement? The best thing pop culture ever gave me was its own critique: that of containing artists and moments which couldn't be squared with what the rest of it was saying, which seemed to call the whole enterprise into question and in doing so broadened the sense of what was possible. Pop culture was never quite identified with itself, the value it has is in containing elements which make that self-identification impossible. So it always throws me off to see people celebrating "pop culture", like it's a self-produced totality, when that totality was only ever good for kicking.

Pop culture survives through a negativity it can never properly acknowledge.

[images: Tower of Druaga, Detana!! TwinBee, True Golf Classics: Wicked 18, Microsurgeon, Dark Edge]

#gamechat #criticism #vgames #garbage day

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tacitcantos · 5 years

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Clash of Kilts - Outlaw King vs Braveheart

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Outlaw King is a movie that’s impossible to review without talking about Braveheart. And both movies are impossible to talk about without also talking about kilts, that most glorious Scottish man skirt.

Before we talk about kilts though, let’s rewind a second. Braveheart and Outlaw King both center on the wars of independence that wracked Scotland around the turn of 1300 AD. Braveheart is the story of William Wallace, who in the film’s universe was a simple man who wanted a simple life but who the cruel English forced into a righteous war of independence after they murdered his wife. After being betrayed by the Scottish nobility, he is eventually drawn and quartered in public, but not before giving one final cry of freeeeeeedom in a gloriously burred Scottish accent. It’s a great movie, but very much a product of the 90’s: dramatic and sincere bordering on mawkish, with epic vistas of the Scottish highlands and a sweeping orchestral score, good guys who are heroic, humble, everyday men and bad guys who are mincing and scheming and evil.

Outlaw King picks up almost exactly where Braveheart ends, with the Scottish nobility bitterly bending the knee and swearing loyalty to the English king. It’s the story of Robert the Bruce, a Scottish nobleman and claimant to the throne who was actually featured pretty prominently as a character in Braveheart, and follows his guerilla campaign against the English that ultimately wins Scotland its independence. It’s a sharp contrast in tone to Braveheart, subdued and realistic in place of dramatic and sentimental, specific instead of broad. That isn’t to say it isn’t a powerful movie though, just a less showy one than Braveheart, with a palpable tension beneath its naturalistic dialogue and performances. Robert the Bruce is a more complicated figure than Wallace, and beneath the subdued mask Chris Pine gives him there’s a sense of deep emotion and intelligence and a constant awareness of the political ramifications of his every act.

The cinematography is great throughout. The opening long take of the movie with the Scottish nobility bending the knee is a truly masterful scene, not just for it’s technical complexity, but for the way the whirling camera and pulsing score establish the underlying tension between the Scottish and English and mirrors Bruce’s drunken state. And while on a smaller scale than for example the battles in the Lord of the Rings, the culminating battle of Outlaw King is wonderfully shot, balancing the confusion and brutality of battle without becoming lost to shaky cam.

The genuineness of the chemistry between Robert the Bruce and his new wife is also something you don’t see in a lot of movies. A lot of movies tend to just tack on a romance to their plot, but in Outlaw King both characters feel whole, independant, and like people in their own right. The interplay between them is both intelligent and charming without relying on sentimentality or emotional shortcuts to get them smushing faces by the end of the movie.

There’s nothing more emblematic of the differences between Braveheart and Outlaw King than their use of the kilt. As a symbol of Scottish masculinity and national pride it seems like a perfect fit for movies about Scottish independence. But, uuuh, the problem is that the kilt as we know it wasn’t adopted until the 1600’s, and both Braveheart and Outlaw King are firmly set around the turn of 1300. Braveheart doesn’t care about the anachronism of a Scotsman wearing a skirt 300 years before it was adopted, and proudly outfits its freedom fighters in plaid man skirts. By contrast, there is nary a man skirt to be seen on screen at any point in Outlaw King which is largely accurate to the period with its costumes.

And that’s the key difference between the two movies: Braveheart wants to be an entertaining movie that represents the spirit of Scottish independence, while Outlaw King is concerned with the intricacies and specifics of the historical situation. Neither approach is right or wrong, both valid ways of engaging with history, but I can’t help but feel like it puts Outlaw King in something of an awkward and unfavorable position. Because Braveheart is such a loud and genuinely emotional and engaging movie, Outlaw King can’t help but feel less impactful. It’s interesting to watch, but doesn’t stick with you the same way Braveheart does after the credits roll. It’s a bit like listening to a lullaby after a rock concert, the subdued emotional notes of the characters in Outlaw King hard to hear after the crash of Braveheart’s sound and fury.

It’s in the two main character that you can see the effect most clearly. Bruce never quite pops on the screen as much as Wallace did; he’s not as likable a character, and worse, not as engaging. Because Wallace is such a broad and expressive character it’s easier to empathize with the emotional ups and downs as he wins and loses against the English. Bruce by contrast is always guarded, and even when he learns his brothers are dead and his wife and child captured the emotion still never quite cracks the surface. As a standalone film this might have worked better, but after Wallace Bruce can’t help but feel a little… dull.

Another misstep of Outlaw King is that it’s trying so hard to deal with the complexity of the historical situation that it forgets to set up certain basic emotional beats. As trite as the English murdering Wallace’s wife is, and the ahistorical nature of the English inflicting prima nocta rights on the Scots, it serves an important story function: it shows why the English are bad, why the Scottish want freedom, and it makes the war personal for Wallace. Personal in a way that it never quite is for Bruce because Outlaw King forgets to show the English doing anything particularly bad in the first half of the movie besides hiking up taxes.

Of course, to make this case for Scottish independence Braveheart has to invent out of whole cloth the idea of the English imposing prima nocta rights, which was never a real thing in medieval times. But here again we can see the difference between Braveheart and Outlaw King: Braveheart essentially makes something up to illustrate English oppression, while the more accurate Outlaw King doesn’t, which makes it feel lackluster by comparison

Outlaw King starts with all the Scottish characters talking about how tired they are of war, and the movie, and Bruce by extension, forgets to ever really make the case for why restarting war with the English is worth it. It’s hard to feel like the Scotts shouldn’t have just paid their taxes. Once the war starts the English do plenty of terrible things, but it’s again hard not to feel like Bruce isn’t the one who started it.

This has nothing to do with the actual historical situation, by the way: it’s purely about what’s shown on screen within the self contained world of the movie. The thing is that the Scottish wars of independence simply aren’t something that most of us have a strong understanding of outside of Braveheart and thus we need Outlaw King to make its case independently. And when it doesn’t, we as the audience are forced to tie it back to Braveheart which inevitably invites comparison.

#outlaw king #braveheart #movie #william wallace #robert the bruce #men in kilts #kilts #historical fiction

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