#it might be a good time to note Less has the paranoid trait

[storiesbyjes2g]

The kids were due back soon, and I had been sitting at the computer all day. I got dressed and went for a stroll to process everything I'd seen but also to have one last moment of peace before the minors returned. A little white dog scurried past me and smelled worse than rotten eggs. I knew she'd gotten into with some skunks. But it wasn't the foul stench that caught my attention. Ok...it was because she was pretty rank. She had the saddest expression and whimpered like she was scared, maybe even lost. Whatever the case, she tugged at my heartstrings something fierce, the same way Hunter did when we met the first time. But I wouldn't make the same mistake twice. I had a connection with her. If she felt the same way about me, I'd bring her home without question.

I kneeled to her level and held out my hand so she could check me out. When she decided I was ok, I reached out slowly so I could pet her, letting her know I cared and she could trust me. My touch freaked her out at first, but after a few pets, she melted into my hands. The anxiety she had expressed previously disappeared. The stench was almost unbearable, but I enjoyed the moment just as much as she did. It had been way too long since I had puppy love in my life. We had only just met, but we were such fast friends just like me and Shiloh. I asked if she wanted to have a bath. Her expression was the absolute cutest thing I'd ever seen and all the answer I needed.

It's so crazy how dogs seem to understand exactly what we say to them. I didn't notice how hairy she was until she was soaking wet. Alessia and I needed to brush her every day, or we'd be living in a wig factory. I really hoped she'd liked my new friend. It was totally possible this dog could be crazy, or really aggressive, but that was a risk I was willing to take to give this precious creature a home.

"I think I want to name you Tofu," I said, snuggling my skunk-free friend.

She was white, but not white enough to name her Snowflake or whatever else white dogs were named. And we ate so much of that stuff living with Ali; I was quite familiar with its color. Tofu was a perfect name for her.

The kids came home, interrupting our snuggle time, and Alessia ran straight for the kitchen. She said she had cake on the brain. Her craving must have been quite serious for her to miss our new family member in my arms. When she returned to the living room with cake in hand, I introduced them.

"EWW," she yelled. "I don't want a street dog! Make her go away!"

I was stunned. I just knew she'd be happy about this. She couldn't have been serious. "But you wanted a dog, and Tofu is so sweet."

"No, Mommy! She could have diseases!"

"So we'll take her to the vet. No big deal."

"I don't want it!"

I couldn't let Tofu go back out there. Not after the way we bonded. I had to try a different approach. One way or another, I was winning this argument! "But I thought you wanted us to have a thing. Just you and me."

"Not like this! I'll pick something else."

I panicked. She was even more strong-willed than I was at her age, and it looked like I finally met my match. "Alessia, please! She was so scared! I can't send her back out there!"

I hated begging her like that, but I didn't know what else to do.

"I. DON'T. WANT. IT."

My eyes stung from the pressure of tears building up. Part of me wanted to put my foot down and do the whole "I'm the parent and what I say goes" bit, but I knew in my heart of hearts that would have been the most selfish thing I'd done in a while. I had more than just myself to think about now, and this could drive a wedge between us. The decision boiled down to choosing between my daughter and my new friend, and I knew I had to choose my daughter.

I gathered Tofu in my arms one last time and squeezed lovingly. I whispered into her ear, "I can't keep you. But if you find me again, I'll let you stay. I promise. Please find me."

I couldn't send her away on an empty stomach, so I brought her into the kitchen. She ate that food like her life depended on it, breaking my heart even more. When she finished, I picked her up, placed her outside the gate, and told her to remember what I said. She ran away. I went upstairs and cried.

#ISBI challenge #sims 4 story #sims 4 gameplay #adolting #adolting gen 2 #Emerald Pope #Alessia Amina Murillo #Luca Winston Murillo #Tofu #this broke my heart #it might be a good time to note Less has the paranoid trait #if you didn't figure it out already

[popculturebuffet]

Into The Spider-Verse: Spider-Gwen (Edge of Spider-Verse #2)

Hello all you happy true beliviers! We're back into the spider-verse just in time for national women's month and the third of our main trio of spiders: Gwen Stacey, the spectacular Spider-Woman, referred often to as Spider-Gwen to disguish her from the various earth 616 spider-women before she was rebranded Ghost Spider.

Yeah Spider-Gwen is a lot to unpack, so let's take it from the stop. Spider-Gwen is a variant of Gwen Stacey, who you may remember from some adaptions as the Amazing Spider-Man films, being peter's prop for that hilarious dance number in spider-man 3 that's in my eyes even more rediculous than his saturday night fever schtick, and from cartoons appearing as an updated version of her classic self in Specatcular Spider-Man and as Spider-Gwen in Ultimate Spidey, Marvel's Spider-Man, Spidey and HIs Amazing Friend and Marvel Rising.

For those less familiar with the comics, Gwen Stacey was peter's very second love intrest. Gwen was introduced late into Steve Ditko's run as one of the mileu of jackasses constantly taunting peter parker, this time as he entered college. As seen with Amazing Fantasy at the time peter was a loner Dottie, a rebel, who was mostly picked on. He had one girlfriend briefly, Betty Brant, but after her brother died she became paranoid about him taking pictures of spider-man, blaming spider-man for his death and worrying he'd lead to Peter's. So really.. Aunt may was all peter had for the first 30 or so issues.

Once Ditko left though Lee decided to shake things up as peter had entered college. Since new Artist John Romita drew characters a bit more handsomely, he decided to expand peter's friend group: Harry Osborn, who picked on him previously, decided he had it wrong about peter and genuinely tried to befriend the guy, serving as a nice contrast to the various assholes. It also made sense: people who are withdrawn or feel trapped in the high school hiearchy can often find friends easier in College, where people may be open to trying new thems or not bogged down by history. Granted Peter also had flash there as a rival , Lee coudln't take all his pain away or he woudln't be peter, but he now had a friend.. and soon had love intrests.

Peter soon ended up in a brief archie style love triangle between Mary Jane Watson, at the time a viacious party animal who'd been oft hinted at in a running gag where May tried to set them up and Peter assumed "nice girl" meant

Which has aged like fine egg left on a sidewalk for 9 days. This is where Gwen came in. Gwen like harry realized she might of misjudged peter especially after finding out he snubbed her and harry at first because Aunt May was sick, as part of the legendary "If This Be My Destiny" three parter. The two dated for a long time and she was a fan faviorite with many of a fan, some who'd get promoted to managment, preferring her over MJ. The thing was in the original comics.. Gwen was pretty one note. She was just "nice" and "love intrest". See while stan lee was good at MANY things, creative worlds, working with great artists, showmanship, coming up with brilliant premises for characters… he was absolutely awful at writing women , at least during the silver age. Most of his women's main trait's were "love intrest" or "girl" or "getting overly emotoinal". Their powers were often limited as was their influence, with sue storm ONLY being able to turn invsible at first before gaining her forcefields, and Jean Grey's telekensis being very limited. While Janet Van Dyne got better with her stings and stuff, she was often depicted as flighty. Gwen is , as you can see, far from his worst but is just kinda there to be the "good girl" in contrast to mj at first, then to just cause friction with peter whenever his double identity impcats their romance. She was a plot device, not a person.

She kept on like this till a new writer jumped on board Gerry Conway. Conway had decided someone needed to die as it'd been a while since uncle Ben and while George Stacey, gwen's dad, had in the line of duty, he wasn't close to peter and was mainly killed to drive a wedge betwen him and Gwen. So he ended up deciding on Gwen to both motivate the poor boy and to clear up the cast a bit. So Gwen became famous.. for her death, the legendary "The night gwen stacey died" which I showed the utmost respect and reverence to in my amazing fantasy #15 review

The story is incredibly well crafted though, and the art is gorgeous. It's only weakness.. is being a MASSIVE example of Women in Refregirators syndrome, with Gwen being killed to motivate peter and not having any real agency in her death. Said death at least would haunt peter for the rest of his career and still comes up on occasion. There were clones, terrible retcons not worth mentoining and other things involving gwen, but she remained dead and still is…. in the 616.

Thankfully marvel had a merry multiverse and Dan Slott had plans to explore that in an upcoming event comic Spider-Verse, which while sharing a name and vauge premise of uniting a bunch of spider people with the movie, is nothing like it and involves the spider-person hutning inheretors. I have not read it as it was at a time when Dan Slott's run on the book took a massive dive, so I can't really speak for it's quality. But good event or no it did give us a lot of great new spider-people to go with established variants like Spider-Ham, Spider-Man 2099 and Spider-Man Noir, and Gwen was one of them.

Gwen was an editor's suggestion and a brilliant one: Take the biggest victim in spider-man history , and make HER the one who gets bit by the spider. All Dan Slott really had was the idea to give her a trench coat costume and the red and blues, but the actual making of her went to Jason Latour.

For context as I found out in my research… Jason Latour is a sexually harassing creep. At 2017's Thought Bubble fest, he followed around artist Lauren Tracey who at the time was in her early 20's to his 40's just to add to it, and stalked her, then kissed her against her will. After Tracey revealed the allegations, Latour tried to claim he didn't remember the incident.. only for tons of others to come forward and reveal he was also creepy twoards them or friend sof theres. They likely knew.. but didn't have the power to come forward. Latour weakly apologized and hasn't worked for Marvel since. It was deeply disapointing to find out someone I respected… was an ashole who used his power to harass women, make them feel deeply uncomfortable and affect their careers. He was one of MANY in the industry who did this and I doubt he'll be the last I talk about but it's super depressing he used his power like this and he can promptly fuck himself.

I won't be letting this affect my judgement of the comic itself. It's hard and i'll likely look like this the whole itme i'm typing this

But I have to judge the issue by it's own merits, while still stressing the creator isn't to be worshipped. It's a good object lesson to remember that terrible people can make good art. I try to avoid covering that art to glorify them. It's why despite being a massive x-men fan and having grown up with the story you likely wont' see Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men covered on here unless someone comissions it. Like this it's an important part of comics history and can't just be.. forgotten, but the creator shouldn't be on any sort of pedestal for it unless he truly and completely has repented for what he's done and even then what he's done shoudln't be forgotten in the process.

Now getting into Prailne's and Dick's creative process, Pralines and Dick decided to really swing for the fences. This was an alternate universe.. so he decided to make it really alternate. Instead of a cheery if often weepy coed, Gwen was a troubled college freshman who was reseved and steady out of costume and freer in it.. at a terrible cost. He and Rodregiuz gave her a hood to symbolize the weight she carries and acccents of purple and blue to really help the costume pop against the white, while also giving her the mask to keep up the "anyone can wear the mask" motif from Peter and Miles.

The result wasn't a hit with Dan But he ended up eating his words and fully agreeing they made the right call. The result was an INSTANT hit from her first apperance and quickly got an ongoing. I MIGHT talk about it in the future, it's tricky with Pralines and Dick being the writer. For now though let's go under the cut and into the spider-verse as we explore the startling origin of Spider-Gwen.

So we open with Band Practice for the Mary Janes, the band Gwen is drummer for. Her bandmates are naturally this universe's Mary Jane Watson, along with Glory Grant, a friend of peters in the main universe who worked as Jonah's asstiant and Betty Brant, who I previously mentioned and also worked as Jonah's assitant.

The band plays their signature , and likely only, original song,

I mean that would rule but naturally instead it's called Face it Tiger. I.. I will neve rbe tired of that being a thing nor imagining waht this riot grrl esque song sounds like in my head. Pralines and Dick makes a smart move here: instead of just having the issue go through Gwen's origin, like it seems what other one shots of edge of the spider-verse i've glanced at do, we get the origin in one beautiful two page spread, told quick, susicntly but still with enough emotoinal punch. We get some of the blanks filled in later, but it's enough to make the story work and get a sense of who THIS gwen is.

I also like all the small touches here: the times square having advertisments for Janet Van Dyne with her wearing her classic outfit and signifying she's still the wasp here, and Dzzler. Just little nods. I also like the MC Hammer joke.

On the origin itslef it's great following most of the same beats btu cleverly twisting peter parker: We saw what he was during Amazing Fantasy: he was resentful, alone, and had no one. Here we see where that might of gone where he instead ends up as the alternate version of one of his own villians, dying tragically trying to be popular and loved like Gwen's alter ego.

Glory gets gwen to snap out of it but she can't open up for obvious reasons. MJ here.. is more of a dick, lacking the main universe MJ's better nature and instead being a snippy mean girl.

We then get a fairly sad scene of reflection, of Gwen sitting on the billboard, feeling it was her fault peter died. Much like with Uncle Ben and our peter, that's not necessarily true, but you can undrestand her guilt: he followed in her example. her DEFENDING him isn't her fault, nor him feeling insecure over it, that's just good ole toxic masculinity, but she still went into it for wealth and fame and showed what someone trying to do the same could end up as.

We then get her talking to her father, who views her music more as a distraction, and wants her to focus, while Gwen understandably.. dosen't want to do that. We also find out George Stacey.. is the one hunting gwen.

We also get a nice brief scene of her and a cop trying to shoot her. She webs him up and wisecracks ab it, showing she's far more assertive behind the mask and gets some freedom from it… though it also feels like a coping meachanism, a way to avoid the pain she's going through from Peter's death and her own father hunting her and not supporting her. To try and use the freedom much like peter does to shake off her torubles. It's this kind of thing that shows Pralines and Dick REALLY gets what makes a spider-man story work and what makes these some of the best.

So we cut to our villians for this issue: The Rhino and Matt Murdock.

Yeah one of the bigger swings of this universe, and one of the reasons I enjoy it so much, is that rather than just go the normal alternate universe route we see in most comics of "this reality but one things diffrent", Pralines and Dick switches it up and has a BUCNH of little thigns be diffrent that are not remotely impacted by the fact Gwen is who she is here: The Fantastic FOur are non existant with Ben Grimm being a cop while Reed Richards is a child progedy, Wolverine and Kitty Pryde are shield agents with Logan being a functionally immnortal samurai, Howard T Duck is the president of the united states, and Janet Van Dyne is retired from superheroics and instead super wealthy, Sam wilson is a woman and the captain america who came here from the 40's, and so on. I love how many swings this place takes.

Matt Murdock is the biggest though: instead of becoming an upstanding young man, he was blinded in an accident that also killed his mom and his dad's death happened earlier.. and the Hand got a hold of him. As a result this Matt is everytihing the 616 matt isn't: cruel, selfish while still being every bit as compitent and charasmatic and as we find out later, EVERY bit as powerful. Matt is Gwen's arch enemy and the big bad of this universe, serving as the mouth of sauron for the kingpin.. while clearly planning to dethrone his old boss nad rule.

As for what he's up to with Rhino, whose grey skinned here instead of in a rhino costume it's simple: He's putting a hit out on George. He wants him dead both because the Good Captain's an issue for their operations and general.. and as an issue for Spider-Woman he could be leverage to bring her on their side.

That night it's a concert and instead of waiting for gwen whose just a tad late.. her band goes on anyway

Gwen soon has bigger issue's though as The Rhino shows up to kill her dad and while she's able to stop that, he bear hugs her, nearly crushing her.. but like any spidey, she has a near unstoppable will in he and thus cleverly beats him.. by drumming her way out.

She then FINISHES it by punching the fucker through a wall.

God damn is every spider person's first fight going to one up the next one? I mean we've gone from scaring a thug to near death, to fighting an electric man who knocked out their universes avengers equivleent with ease, to drumming a guy , beating him some more than putting him thorugh that fucking wall, Frank Murphy Style. By the time we get to spider-ham is he just going to whip out a machine gun on funny animal mysterio? We'll fine out I suppose

It's here I gotta stop to comment on Robi Rodregueiz' art. It's gorgeous, stylezed, being very remincent of ditkos but with more of a colorful pop to it. It's kinetic, in your face and perfect for the character and a large reason why i didn't nope out of this; the character isn't just good because of Pralines and Dick, but because of Rodieguesz art really caputring her form her pain to her punches perfectly.

SO gwen saved her dad.. problem is her dad dosen't know it's her and believe sin due process. Gwen rightly points out the problem in that: she didn't kill peter but thanks to JJJ a blood thirsty mob thinks she did and will try and kill her before trial, and that's not getting into the cops who tried to shoot her on sight. Captain Stacey vows to bring her in no matter what it takes.. so Gwen has to pull her trump card, throwing earlier words he said back at him.

It's a beauitful speech that sums up why she's like this: it's her responsiblity> She has the power, she has to use it and going to jail just to prove she's innocent helps no one. Her innocence helps no one. But this.. this can help everyone. George reluctantly lets her go and an emotoinal ending, Gwen's father letting her go both of their futures uncertain and their relationship as father and daughter even more so…. is undercut a bit by this guy.

Yeah look I know who this is, Spider-UK he's also a captain britan, defenders of the crown and the multiverse, long story that naturally for me is x-men adjacent. But to anyone coming in just to see this character after one of her many adaptation apperances or just ucrious is going to be fucking confused. I get this wans't MEANT to lead into an ongoing.. but even story wise puncuating a heartwrenching ending with british spider-man creeping on some random balcony shadowed ominosuly makes him come off more like he's going to add Gwen to some horrifying collection than you know, recurit her to save the universe.

Gwen would go on to the frequently hinted at ongoing and greater hearts btu as a start.. this issue is fantastic. It gets who she is across quick, makes her distinct from our gwen, and all the better than her honestly, and sets a lot of what would make the character famous in stone. It's not a huge shock every version of gwen since has been this nor that this is one of the best spider-man stories in the last decade. Pralines and Dick may suck.. but this story dosen't and is worth checking out for the art alone. Just maybe get it second hand or something.

Next Time we thankfully have a creator who HASN'T sexually harassed a woman as next week we take a look at SP/DR from my boy Gerard Way. Until then keep on swingin and thanks for reading.

#spider gwen #gwen stacey #ghost spider #robbi rodriguez #marvel comics #spider-man #matt murdock #george stacey #peter parker #earth 65 #matt murderock

[makeste]

Do you think Deku will ever get mad at All-Might for keeping so many secrets from him? Deku has been giving All-Might free passes on things he should have known about like AFO, previous holders of OFA and now that Tomura is Nana's grandson. It feels like AM needs to be held accountable at some point.

I think it’s likely; he’s gotten fairly mad at him about this before, back when All Might hid the truth about his falling-out with Nighteye.

and he’s probably going to feel a bit betrayed at the realization that All Might is still keeping things from him even after this conversation. and it’s not like it’s just small things, either; these are some pretty major things that Deku is still getting blindsided by as a result of All Might’s secrecy. it feels like AM hasn’t really learned his lesson at all and is still Dumbledoring his way through this mentorship.

but the thing is, I can understand All Might’s point of view here as well, and I get why he keeps doing it, even if I don’t agree with it. I’ve been meaning to write a post about this anyway, especially since it ties into the matter of the Fourth OFA User and his quirk, so let’s take a look at All Might’s ever-growing List of Secrets, because there’s a pattern there.

1. OFA

starting with the big one. now obviously Deku is very much in on this particular secret. however it is still a secret from just about everyone else, and it’s probably the one secret that All Might has been the most adamant about keeping, going to increasingly elaborate lengths even as it becomes more and more obvious that all of these efforts are eventually going to prove futile.

the thing is, it’s pretty obvious why he’s been trying so hard to keep the truth of Deku’s quirk hidden. OFA paints a huge target onto Deku’s back, one that would attract notice not just from the villain side, but from the hero side as well. OFA is basically the ultimate prize. it’s probably the most powerful quirk in existence, aside from AFO. and once word gets out that this power can be passed on to literally anyone simply at will, things could start getting very ugly.

Deku would suddenly come under pressure from all sides, with people trying to use and control him (well, I say “people”, but mainly I mean the HPSC sob). that’s if they see him as a useful tool and a weapon in the battle against the League, mind you. but if they decide that he’s not, or that he’s not ready, there would instead be pressure for him to give up OFA to a “worthier” candidate. either way, Deku himself isn’t going to be taken into account. his thoughts, his feelings, what he wants, what he deserves; none of that is going to matter to these people.

and these are the good guys, mind! that’s not even mentioning the villains, who have already destroyed an entire city in pursuit of him. Deku is in a lot of danger now. and so far, Tomura/AFO have been surprisingly honorable in their attempts to get ahold of OFA, in that they’ve been targeting Deku directly. but AFO is a notoriously underhanded guy, and it concerns me that there are a ton of more underhanded methods still on the table for him to try out. because we’ve already established that Deku is notoriously self-sacrificing. I mean literally notorious, as in both his friends and enemies alike have all picked up on this trait and made a note of it. so imagine if Tomura ever decides to take hostages, for instance. “give me OFA or I’ll kill so and so.” then what?? jesus.

so yeah, all in all it’s pretty clear why All Might has been exceedingly careful about keeping OFA a secret even from most of Deku’s allies. this isn’t even getting into the whole U.A. traitor thing as well, but I mean, you get the idea, right? the reason All Might has gone to such lengths to keep OFA a secret is to protect Deku.

2. AFO

and now we get to the first of many things that All Might kept hidden from Deku himself! and these are generally going to be a lot harder to defend. like yeah, you probably should have told this barely-pubescent child that that the quirk you were giving him came prepackaged with a built-in mortal enemy, All Might. might want to actually lead with that part next time.

so why didn’t he tell Deku about AFO? well first of all please understand that I’m not trying to justify this decision, lol; I’m just trying to rationalize it from All Might’s point of view. he was less than six years removed from his fateful battle with AFO in which the both of them were gravely injured. and yes, he said that he believed AFO had died from his wounds; but if he really thought that was true, why didn’t he listen to Nighteye and pass OFA on to someone else back then? why did he stubbornly stay in the field for as long as he could? his actions just don’t line up. if he really thought AFO was dead, you’d think he would have been able to retire in peace, as there wouldn’t have been such a great need for the Symbol anymore.

so honestly, what I’m learning towards here is that he didn’t really believe it, deep down. but once his powers really started to wane, he felt like he had no choice but to pass the quirk on to someone else and just hope for the best. and then, once he met Deku, I think he really started to want to believe it was true. because he empathized with Deku and he saw himself in him, and he wanted to give him that chance. Deku wanted so badly to be a hero, and All Might saw that he had the heart and the spirit of one, and only lacked the physical ability. and there All Might was, with a quirk he could bestow on him that could potentially make his dream come true. he wanted to believe he could do that. he convinced himself that the threat of AFO really was nonexistent -- after all, it had been six years! -- and that it wasn’t a burden he was passing down onto this child anymore, but a gift.

and so he didn’t tell Deku about AFO because he wanted to believe it wasn’t something Deku needed to know. so in this case it wasn’t just Deku he was essentially lying to, but himself as well. so yeah, not the best rationale in the world, but a very human mistake for him to make, and one that once again has its roots in wanting to protect Deku. or more precisely in this case, wanting to protect Deku’s dream. he wanted to believe it was all right for him to hand down this power which he so strongly believed that Deku deserved.

3. the Vestiges

honestly it’s a bit up in the air whether or not this one was really a secret, because All Might genuinely didn’t seem to realize that the Vestiges were conscious inside of OFA. or so he says at any rate. regardless, I’m going to include it in the list because he was definitely acting pretty cagey about the subject back during the sports festival, and I’ve never been fully satisfied with his explanation.

if you ask me? I think one of the reasons why he didn’t want to discuss this more in depth with Deku back then was because he was afraid it might inadvertently lead to some other topics that he wasn’t yet ready to discuss.

the idea of the previous OFA users living on inside the quirk is comforting in some ways, but that’s also a conversation that inevitably leads to the subject of AFO and AFO’s brother just for starters. not to mention Nana, whose death was deeply traumatizing for him and which I don’t think he was emotionally prepared to bring up just yet.

but I think the biggest factor that led to All Might being mum about this was the fact that he himself was included among the Vestiges. because I’m thinking he might have been a bit paranoid about avoiding a conversation like this:

All Might: “hey Midoriya-shounen, I just wanted to let you know that those weird little shadow figures you saw during your fight were the ghosts of the previous users of OFA, who are all living on inside of the quirk. my master once told me, 'even if I die one of these days, we can always meet again inside One for All.' so you know, that’s nice.”

Deku: “huh okay, so you’re telling me I have the souls of eight other people trapped inside my quirk, well that’s pretty trippy but I’m a weird little boy who lives for this kind of wild quirk shit so I’m okay with it! but it’s not like it matters though anyway since you’re still here to guide me haha! it’s not like you have any reason to suspect that might not be the case in the very near future, right?”

All Might: “...right.”

so yeah. once again, the reason for All Might keeping this a secret is because he doesn’t want to burden Deku. spoiler alert, the next two secrets also have the exact same reasoning behind them. in fact I’m just going to go and lump them both together.

4. Sir Nighteye, and 5. Sir Nighteye’s prophecy

so #4 is the one that actually finally set Deku off in the scene I posted earlier lol. and yeah, All Might should have told Deku, especially since it was inevitable that Deku was going to find out anyway. once he learned about Nighteye and All Might’s falling-out, him finding out about the prophecy was a given. and so once again I want to stress that I’m not actually trying to defend All Might’s decision here lol. just trying to relate to it.

anyway but that said, the reason why he didn’t tell Deku is pretty straightforward: he didn’t want to burden Deku with that knowledge. he knows Deku looks up to him. he knows that Deku looks to him for support. and All Might has spent his entire career doing everything he could to be that strong support for everybody, for the entire nation. he wants everyone to feel secure and safe. he wants nothing more than to be able to keep them safe. and it’s so hard, when you have that mindset, to let yourself show weakness and allow the cracks to show and to admit and accept that you can’t protect people from everything, no matter how bad you want to.

how do you tell the kid you’re mentoring, the kid who’s come to depend on you for so much, that there’s a good chance you might not be around much longer? that there’s a good chance he’ll be left to deal with everything all on his own, the same way that you were? how the hell do you even begin to approach that conversation? especially knowing what kind of person Deku is, on top of everything else. for a hero, someone who’s dedicated their whole life to helping and protecting others, nothing is more devastating than being told that something terrible is going to happen, and that no matter what, there is nothing you can do to change that fate. that alone would have been reason enough to not want Deku to know. he didn’t want him to experience that kind of helplessness.

and Deku is still just a kid!! Nighteye, a fully grown man and a hero with years of experience, completely fell apart after that prophecy. meanwhile Deku just started hero school less than a year ago. he’s only sixteen. he is far, far too young to have to deal with all of this. yes, he needed to know, both as a matter of trust and as a matter of practicality. but the fact that he needed to know is pretty fucking cruel on the universe’s part, and I get why All Might was so reluctant to tell him. I get it.

side note!! I feel like it’s worth mentioning that this one is still a secret as far as a certain other person goes. like, I feel that’s pretty noteworthy. pretty much every other person who knows about OFA also knew about Nighteye’s prophecy, including Rat Principal, Recovery Girl, Gran Torino, and Nighteye himself. (although it’s not clear whether or not Naomasa knows, come to think of it. but it’s likely, since All Might probably physically can’t lie to him lol.) and of course, Deku now knows as well.

but aside from Naomasa, there is one other person who’s notably missing from that list.

Kacchan knows about OFA and AFO, but neither All Might nor Deku have told him about the prophecy. even though Katsuki has firmly elbowed his way into the OFA Scooby Squad and knows about all sorts of other things including SIXQUIRKS and the Vestiges and all that jazz, and he’s been helping Deku train and has been included in pretty much everything for months now, he still doesn’t know about this.

and honestly, this might be the one time where I actually agree with All Might’s decision. I say that as someone who loves Katsuki to pieces and very much wants him to find out about this, because I’m mean and because I love angst. but once again, I get it, though. because you probably don’t want to tell the kid who was thinking this...

...that at the time, when you came to save him back at Kamino, you were thinking something like this:

yeah. I’m just saying. I don’t think it does Katsuki much benefit to know that All Might originally went out to Kamino fully expecting that it would be his last battle, and fully prepared to die the horrible death that Nighteye foretold. like, on the one hand there’s definitely an argument to be made that Katsuki should know about the prophecy just so that he’s prepared in case anything does happen, because he would then be the one to have to step up and replace All Might as Deku’s primary support. (and this is something All Might already seems to have been grooming him for in recent months, which is a bit of a red flag as far as All Might’s mortality prospects are concerned, but that’s another discussion for another day.)

but on the other hand, Katsuki is a pretty smart kid. and if and when he does find out about this, there’s a good chance he’s going to connect the dots and realize that Kamino was actually a hell of a lot riskier than All Might ever let on. and there’s close to a 100% chance that he starts blaming himself all over again if he ever learns that. I don’t think it would set him back too much, because he’s made a lot of progress, but I do think that even now it’s still something that he feels a lot of responsibility for. and so really this is just an additional burden that he doesn’t need to be carrying on his shoulders. Deku’s not the only one who’s still just a kid.

anyway! so tl;dr this is yet another case where All Might was keeping something a secret because he didn’t want to burden Deku. and is, in fact, STILL keeping it secret from Katsuki because he doesn’t want to burden him, either. basically just trying to protect both of these kids here.

6. Nana’s relation to Tomura

almost done with the list now! for real though, it’s crazy how many of these there are. how can one man have so many secrets. like seriously, calm the fuck down, All Might.

so! again, Deku should arguably have been told this as soon as it became clear that the responsibility of dealing with AFO and Tomura was going to fall to him. except, I guess, the thing is they didn’t think it was going to fall to him. or at least they hoped it wouldn’t. AFO was in Tartarus, and Naomasa and Gran were planning on hunting down Tomura and the League themselves. and Deku is just a high school kid with an internship. so in an ideal world, he would have never gotten near Tomura, and vice-versa. the adult heroes in BnHA may be inept as fuck, but I’ll give them credit where due: none of them wanted this kind of responsibility to ever fall on any of the kids until they were ready. even during this arc, the kids were all originally assigned to the evacuation teams, and the handful who were on the front lines were there because it was essential to the mission. and even then they pretty much had assigned babysitters (Midnight, Fatgum, etc.) shadowing them the whole time and ready to haul them back out as soon as their tasks were accomplished. like, don’t get me wrong, the child soldiers thing was and is still very fucked up, lol. but they were clearly trying to keep them out of harm’s way.

anyway! and so of course this applies to Deku as well. never mind that he’s All Might’s heir and well on his way to becoming more powerful than anyone could have ever dreamed. he’s still just a teenager. and we don’t send teenagers out to hunt the bad guys. we leave that to the adults, supposedly. and so in these guys’ minds, there really wasn’t any reason to tell Deku about the whole Nana/Tomura connection, because even if it was true, in their minds it’s not really relevant to Deku. they weren’t planning on him and Tomura becoming arch-nemeses. and so it was really just another thing that All Might presumably didn’t want to burden him with at the end of the day. “by the way, Midoriya-shounen, you should know there’s a possibility that Shigaraki Tomura is actually the grandson of my late mentor whom All for One killed.” that’s basically just a very unfun fact that Deku can do absolutely nothing about, except feel bad about it. it doesn’t change the fact that Tomura is still a mass murderer who’s eventually going to have to be captured or killed. so in All Might’s mind there’s really no benefit to telling Deku about any of this.

anyway! and so now finally, last but not least,

7. the Fourth OFA User

so now we finally get to the one secret we don’t actually know yet! OFA IV, and his whole mysterious deal.

All Might, after doing all that research on the previous OFA users and their quirks, suddenly changed his mind at the last second and decided not to tell Deku about this one specific user and his quirk (and notably, his cause of death). why is that?? “I don’t want to speculate and talk about things I’m not sure of...” really?? so you think the better option is for him to be unprepared and to not have any idea of what’s coming, then??

no, seriously. I’m seriously asking that. does All Might, in fact, think that it’s actually a better option for Deku to not know anything about the fourth user than for him to be aware of it. I am genuinely asking that question, because I truly suspect that this might actually be the case.

because, you see, that’s the pattern. if you look at all the other things he’s kept hidden either from Deku, or from others on Deku’s behalf, that’s the one thing they all have in common. he kept them secret in order to protect Deku. either to shelter him from the burden, or to keep him safe from people who might try to do him harm.

so I think it’s safe to say that even though we know absolutely nothing about this particular secret yet, it’s still going to follow that same pattern. All Might isn’t telling Deku about the Fourth yet either because he doesn’t want to burden him with something, or because he thinks there’s some other reason why Deku is better off not knowing.

here are a few other things we can extrapolate here:

All Might’s next line after this is “because I’m worried for him”, so yeah. whatever the reason, he’s trying to protect Deku somehow.

All Might has a history of avoiding truths he’s not ready to face yet, such as AFO still being alive. so even though he says here that he’s “not sure of” whatever it is he found, it’s very possible that he is in fact pretty sure of it, but just doesn’t want to believe it.

the fact that he wrote something down but then crossed it out would seem to support that as well. he says “not yet”, but I’m definitely not convinced that’s actually the case.

whatever this secret about the fourth user is, it’s something All Might isn’t willing to tell Katsuki either, even though Katsuki specifically presses him about it. this makes me think that it’s not just something shady or unpleasant about the fourth user’s past (like him being a villain for instance), because if it was just something like that, I don’t think he’d be so insistent on hiding it from Katsuki as well. and also that wouldn’t explain why he’s keeping the quirk a secret, especially since he knows Deku is going to manifest it at some point.

so my thinking is that it’s not something about the Fourth’s history, but rather something about his quirk. and after all, the Vestige storyline is mainly about the SIXQUIRKS anyway, so that tracks. and so if it is something related to the Fourth’s quirk, and this something also convinced All Might to hide the Fourth’s cause of death, I think the most likely explanation is that something about the Fourth’s quirk ended up killing him, and All Might fears that this quirk could potentially harm or kill Deku as well.

“but if the Fourth’s quirk is potentially dangerous, then wouldn’t it make more sense to tell Deku about it so that he can be prepared?” well, yeah. definitely it would. unless, of course, All Might has somehow concluded that the danger to Deku is actually GREATER if he knows than if he doesn’t know. in other words, the risk of the quirk manifesting with Deku unaware of what it is, is outweighed by the risk of Deku knowing and manifesting it on purpose.

and this, I think, is where the rest of Katsuki’s conversation with All Might in ch 284 comes into play:

All Might has no doubt observed the same thing himself. and so what I’m thinking is that this must be some kind of super high-risk, high-reward quirk that Deku, if he knew about it, would be tempted to use while battling someone like Tomura, even knowing there was a risk of it hurting or even killing him as well. this is Deku, after all. Deku, who takes himself out of the equation. Deku, who is ALREADY pushing himself to extremes with OFA and has been doing so from the start. Deku, who barring a miracle will be lucky to have even 1/10th of the normal function in his arms when this arc is said and done. and that’s just with normal, everyday OFA and Blackwhip and Float. if you were to go and add some sort of super-self-destruct quirk on top of all that?? jesus christ. they’d be picking up the pieces of what was left of him, probably.

so yeah. if this really does turn out to be the case, and the Fourth’s quirk really is a potential suicide quirk? I could absolutely understand why All Might would keep that hidden from him. once again, it’s all about protecting him and keeping him safe.

and it’s problematic though, for sure! and most likely futile just like all of his other secret-keeping efforts have been. at some point he’s just going to have to start trusting Deku to handle this stuff, and letting him know these things. like it or not, he’s not going to be a kid forever, and Destiny is currently being Thrust Upon Him at a fairly alarming rate! pretending like all of these threats will just magically go away all on their own is not it. if you didn’t want peril lusting over him at every corner then you shouldn’t have chosen a motherfucking Shounen Protag as your motherfucking heir, my dude.

anyway! so those are all of my thoughts about All Might and his secrets. I do think Deku is gonna call him out on it again soon, and I think All Might will be apologetic for not telling him about Tomura and Nana, but I don’t know if it will be enough to finally get him to change his ways and reveal everything else. he is an overprotective dad filled with anxiety over his trouble magnet son and his arm-exploding ways, and it’s a tough position for him to be in, knowing that either way there will be pain that Deku can’t avoid. it’s rough. anyways, maybe I’m too soft, but while I don’t necessarily want him to just keep getting free passes on everything, I kind of hope they don’t rake him over the coals too badly for it either. he means well!! he is doing his best. hopefully they can manage to talk it out, sob.

#bnha #boku no hero academia #all might #midoriya izuku #bakugou katsuki #bnha meta #bnha spoilers #mha spoilers #bnha manga spoilers #makeste reads bnha #asks #anon asks #I'm so behind on my metas that while everyone else is posting about dabi and enji #I'm only just now getting around to organizing my thoughts on stuff that was revealed seven chapters ago lol #ah well #no chapter this week so I'll have some time to catch up maybe

[thelovelyghostwriter]

Some of my favourite female characters in fiction

This list is not exhaustive and while I do have other characters that I find charming and that I love, I have noted these characters because in my opinion, they have struggled and/or there is a certain analysis to their personalities. 

Please take note that some of the characters are not morally good or have done questionable actions. This is not to discuss or say they are role models, but rather to write up what they represented, their role in the story or simply their personalities. I’m not here to justify the character’s actions.

Remember that a well-written characters do not have to be morally good. 

Also, a lot of them are from memory and the analysis aren’t well-structured. 

Let’s dive in:

1. Daisy Buchanan from The Great Gatsby

Daisy, in my opinion, is incredibly misunderstood and unjustifiably hated among the readers. Her betrayal to Gatsby is indeed vile and it did upset me, I definitely think that she is materialistic, shallow and hurtful.  

“I hope she’ll be a fool—that’s the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool.”

Daisy did shit on Gatsby [trying to avoid spoilers here].  

However, I do like to note that I think part of her materialism and shallowness is because of how women were in the 1920s. They did not have any freedom or agency. To Tom, she seems to be a trophy wife for him to keep; and to Gatsby, he only liked the idea of her, he wasn’t in love with her. To everyone around her, she was an item, a beautiful doll to be possessed, rather than a person. I think that’s why she turned out like that. 

She's materialistic because men around her sees her as an object. Nonetheless, Daisy is still “careless” and hurtful; and I think this stemmed from the life she had led that were a compilation of choices that were made for her. Her betrayal towards Gatsby is what makes her character rather disappointing to most readers. The whiteness in her dress as described in her first appearance? It’s not innocence, but rather a void and jadedness. 

2. Neon Nostrade from Hunter x Hunter

Yet, another girl in our list that loves to be hated by the fandom. Though honestly, most of her haters are Chrollo and Kurapika stans who gets jealous because Chrollo got to hang out with her and Kurapika works under her. Also her repulsive hobby - although this is actually what makes me like her. 

I have addressed this in my other posts before, but let me just copy and paste them (and modify a bit):  Her upbringing and exploitation by her dad makes her materialistic and emotionally detached. This materialism and detachment is manifested in the form of her hobby as a dead body parts collector. But other than that, she’s really a normal girl, just sheltered and spoilt. The money she spends are even from her talent Lovely Ghostwriter, her father will be nothing without her. So I don’t see an issue with her spending them on shopping etc. 

In fact, I would argue that she bathes in materialism to fill the emptiness that she has. Her father is more concerned with her ability and power, she has no friends and is guarded 24/7 by employees.

All the times she threw tantrums and the way she talks… it’s a different speech pattern altogether when she interacts with Chrollo - which may suggest that the whole spoilt attitude is exaggerated to gain attention from a father who is indulgent in terms of material gifts, but not in terms of affection and time for her.

When Eliza cried, she was willing to forgo bidding the auction physically. Yes she did not care about the bodyguards because she is more focused on the living and the present (Eliza) than the dead.

The reason why she didn’t seem fazed when Dalzollene and the others died is because a) they were her bodyguards, it’s their job to put their life on the line to protect her, b) she mentioned to Chrollo that her fortune-telling is for the living, she likes to live in the present and doesn’t believe in the afterlife.

Neon is more focused on who is alive, rather than the dead (which also represented by her hobby of dead body parts collecting). She focuses on the present, unlike her clients who likes to know their future or people who dwell in the past. Kurapika on the other hand, is the complete opposite. He dwells on the past and likes to focus on his dead clan rather than the present times with his friends (which is completely understandable).

Another significance is that her fortune-telling ability is very useful and helpful, she says that she wanted to make people happy with it; but however, it is commercialized and used as a means of power (knowledge of the future = power) by her father and pretty much everyone around her. Just like how she objectifies dead people by collecting their parts, the people around her sees her as a tool due to her fortune-telling abilities, rather than see her as a person. Even Kurapika chose to get employed under her, for his own agenda (he is bound to meet dead body parts collectors at some point). 

She treats people like objects because people see her as one.

Of course, collecting dead body parts is a pretty fucked hobby; but what she represents and her role as a minor character is what makes her an outstanding minor female character in the show. 

Yes. She has traits that are not your typical role model, but neither are other hxh characters. She’s not independent, naive, can’t fight, in need of saving, uncaring at times and spoilt. She is far from so-called “strong female character” that we often look up to. She is a character with bad traits which is a result of being a victim. But that’s what makes me love her as a character in hxh. It reminds us that there are girls out there who has lack of freedom and control over their own fate; and their only way out is through materialism and detaching themselves from people. 

In fact, she might be even relateable to some people more than other female characters because there is vulnerability in her character.

3. Hua Mulan (Mostly the Chinese 2009 film, though the most well-known is the Disney 1998 animated film)

There has been various adaptations for this character, with the Disney Animated version being the most prominent.

However, my favourite one is definitely the Chinese film Hua Mulan: Rise of A Warrior (2009). It portrays the horrors of war and the suffering it brings, nationalism, camaraderie among the army - all while giving us the admirable Mulan climbing up to the ranks of being a war general.

I highly recommend this adaptation. I know the Disney Live Action 2020 version did not receive good reception, and we honestly did not need one because this 2009 Chinese film does the job well (I like their soundtrack though). It's not really well-known because it's a Chinese film (which is hella ironic because Hua Mulan is a Chinese character? Lmao).

"Today we will stain the battlefield with our blood. Behind us is our homeland. If we have to bleed out our last drop of blood, if we have to become bleached bones in this desert, we must defend it to the death! We must let the Rourans know we Wei warriors will never surrender and will never compromise! Soldiers may rebel against me, generals may leave me for dead, but I, Hua Mulan, will never betray my country!"

Generally, I either have an issue with strong female characters because they are just shallow (meaning they are only physically strong, often viewing rudeness, misandry and independence as strength). I like female characters who are so much more to that.

Mulan, in this film, not only showed her badassery in fighting the war for more than a decade, but we also see how much she struggled. Everytime her comrades die, her heart gets broken. Yet she has to learn how to pick herself up and become the leader that they need. She dislikes war, she dislikes the bloodshed; yet she fights for her country.

To me, a strong female character is not just a feminist icon or someone who can fight. In fact, a female character doesn't need to be someone capable of fighting, what makes her strong is to be able to overcome turbulence with determination.

I think this is something that is lacking in recent "strong female characters" - showing us their strength through perseverance.

As for the Disney's counterpart (talking about the 1998 film here), it is less morbid but we also see her trying her best to make her family proud and protect her country. Like the song Reflection and Loyal, Brave and True, she struggles with finding her purpose and her role in her family.

"The greatest gift of honour, is having you for a daughter."

4. Blanche Dubois from A Streetcar Named Desire

It's been years since I had analysed Blanche, but among all the 6 books that I had to study for English Literature, A Streetcar Named Desire has been my absolute favourite.

I think what struck me in this book is not just the style, but Blanche's vulnerability. Her actions are definitely not morally good: she misrepresents things, she lies, she even had sex with an underage student. She's paranoid, mentally unstable and prissy. Which was why, her polar opposite character, Stanley, is so annoyed with her.

After her husband's suicide, we see Blanche relying on the company of men to fill the void of her loneliness and misery. She is also concerned about her beauty fading with age - I find that highly reliable. It sounds incredibly "vain", but beauty does play a part.

Based on Evolutionary and Mating Theories among humans, appearance in women are especially important (also for men but not as much as women). Of course, there are other factors and traits that people find attractive, but Blanche's concern is valid here. She needs to find a husband to escape from her financial troubles; and her age, beauty and chastity plays a huge factor in her search for getting a man in the setting she was in (which was Mitch in this case). Ironically, these are the very traits that she has "lost" and so desperately tries to hide it.

Her ending is truly a devastating and upsetting one. [Will not talk about it due to spoilers]

"I've always depended on the kindness of strangers."

5. Haibara Ai/Shiho Miyano from Detective Conan

Perhaps one of the girls that is a wasted potential. In a series where the characters are mostly flat, she's arguably the most multi-faceted (but somehow I had heard that she no longer has the same complexity as she used to have - it's been a while since I followed this series).

But I remember absolutely loving this character.

Her background story is really unique in the show and one that is embedded within the Black Organisation plotline (why her character was dropped... Forever frustrating for me).

From the moment she was first introduced, we see Conan taking an immediate distrust towards her. A guy who is a detective who had been catching criminals - yet one ex-syndicate member stands before him. The one that actually helped to develop the APTX4869 that changed his life.

Yet, we see that it wasn't entirely within her control. Both her parents were syndicate members and when her sister tries to get both of them to leave, her sister dies.

Ai starts off as seemingly cold, pessimistic and avoidant. But as her arc goes on, the iceberg around her melts. We see her quirky sarcastic replies, her taste for fashion and she genuinely desires to be happy. Her relationship with Conan developed into a beautiful one - to the point where Conan trusts her with anything and they would risk their lives for one another.

Yet, we also empathies with her impending jealousy and heartache. The boy she has fallen for already has someone else. What's more, the girl is genuinely kind and is a splitting image of her sister. After Ran saved her from Vermouth, she quickly warms up to Ran as well.

She's also the key to developing the antidote for Shinichi to be back with Ran - an almost painful metaphor for her to give him away (he never belonged to her in the first place). Yet, she doesn't really stop them from being together (even though in some cases she appears jealous or phrase ShinRan's reunion as a word of caution).

I definitely think she is the most compelling character in Detective Conan because of her character development and the struggles she faces. It's definitely upsetting that her character has been neglected.

“Don’t judge people from the outside. Like any rose has thorns, the more the person appears nice on the outside, the more you should doubt the inside.”

6. Misato Katsuragi from Neon Genesis Evangelion

Who is the best female character in Eva? Asuka or Rei? My answer will always be Misato, Risato is a close second (I wanted to analyse Risato, but I’m trying to keep it to one person per series). Misato is one of the 90s anime babes. She definitely captivated many people’s heart. 

I must say though, I have a soft spot towards female characters who has some sort of daddy issues (why I like Neon Nostrade). It’s been a while since I had watched Eva, but I’m going to try to remember why I like her. 

I think the concept of Hedgehog’s Dilemma has been echoed throughout the series, and all the characters seem to struggle with emotional attachment towards people. I actually like to phrase the Hedgehog Dilemma as “Avoidant-Fearful Attachment Style” - wanting connection with people, yet not being able to do so out of fear of being hurt. 

For Misato, when I initially first watched Eva, I compared her a little to Blanche Dubois in how they cope with loneliness - their sexuality. I remember being confused with her interactions with Shinji, who was half her age. At times, she serves as his guardian/mother figure; but at some moments (I think it was sometimes after Kaji’s death), she tried to seek comfort with Shinji by attempting to initiate sex (which Shinji rejects). I remember coming across a comment somewhere that Shinji and Misato’s relationship is somewhat like Humbert and Dolores (from Lolita) - can’t comment on this as I only read the first chapter of the book. 

It makes me think that she uses sex as a way to cope and the only way she can connect with people (and it’s superficial), which doesn’t work for Shinji because she needs to be her guardian (and ultimately fails to be purely his guardian once she crossed that no-no boundary). 

Another thing to note was her backstory about her dad. There seems to be a dissonance, given that she resented her dad for not spending time with her due to his work, but he ended up sacrificing her life for her. I do think it’s a bit of guilt (because resenting her dad but he saves her - these two contradicts one another). It’s clear that her issues to connect stems from her backstory regarding her father. 

It’s interesting how she compares Kaji to her father. I do think she loves Kaji, but “reminds him too much of her father” (as to put it simply). There is this... stereotype that we find someone similar to our opposite-gender parents, no matter how shitty they were towards us. I believe that it is because we tend to stick to something that is familiar to us, even if those type of people aren’t good for us (I think to break this cycle is to practise self-awareness and know what is good for us). 

Anyway, Misato is a character that I really liked (as all the characters in Eva) because they highlight Hedgehog’s Dilemma that stemmed from their parental issues. Maybe I have not watched a lot of anime, but female characters with issues with their fathers are not as explored deeply as male characters and their parental issues. A lot of times, female characters (especially in shounen) serves as a romantic interest and yes they can have really sad backstory, but not issues towards their father and how it affects their relationship with other people. So far, the only ones I had seen is Mukuro (Yu Yu Hakusho), Misato and Neon Nostrade. 

7. Disney's Cinderella

First of all, she has been a victim of abuse since she was a child. It's not easy for her to escape her predicament. Where can she go? It's not that easy.

Boy. I hate how much people remember Cinderella wrongly and attack her for being "backwards", which is actually factually wrong.

Cinderella always get flack for using the Prince to "escape" her predicament when "she can do it herself".

I say that's bullshit. I actually came across a youtube video: Cinderella Stop Blaming the Victim [please check it out for more in-depth analysis]

Despite all that, she's doesn't internalize it. She knows she doesn't deserve to be treated this way, and she does to a certain degree stand up to them (whenever the cat makes her tasks harder). She knows when to fight back and restrain herself because it might endanger her life.

After years of suffering in this domestic household, she remains kind, compassionate and hopeful. Which is not an easy feat. The problem is, these traits are often seen as feminine and synonymous with being weak. But it is actually, in fact, signs of strength. The mental fortitude she has to remain kind after all she went through is a sign of strength.

The Fairy Godmother only appeared when she was losing hope - take note that she ends up crying because her stepsisters tore her mother’s dress (which is the most disturbing scene in the film). 

Even I had remembered this wrongly - one crucial fact is that... She did not want to go the ball to nab the Prince. That was her stepsisters. Homegirl just wanted to chill. She did not even know she was dancing with the Prince!

When Lady Tremaine locked her up to prevent her from reaching the Prince, it wasn’t the Prince that saved her. She and her animal friends got her out of the room, and proceeded to prove that she was indeed the maiden that had danced with the Prince. Her marrying the Prince was only a fitting end to her because it provides her a home and an escape from an abusive household; however, it was her resilience for holding onto fate and being mentally strong, and her initiatives partially contributed to her happy end. The Prince is more like a passive character. 

I highly think that people tend to brush her traits - e.g. compassion, having fate, being kind is listed as feminine. However, it is far from being weak, which most people would deem it as. But that is definitely not true. 

“No matter how your heart is grieving, if you keep on believing, the dream that you wish can come true.”

8. Mikasa Ackerman from Attack on Titan

Mikasa is either a hit or miss among AOT fans. Some people like Mikasa because she is physically strong and her loyalty to Eren is admirable. On the other hand, some people think she’s clingy and her being physically strong makes her a Mary Sue. 

Whether or not you like Mikasa, there is a fact that she is not a Mary Sue. The definition of a Mary Sue is a female character lacking in weakness and seems perfect. 

She is physically strong, yes - I believe that Isayama wanted to distribute traits to the trio. Even Hannes has said it in S1. Armin represents intellect, Eren represents grit and Mikasa represents strength. So her being physically strong makes sense, and Isayama also provided an explanation for it (being an Ackerman). 

However, this does not mean she lacks any weakness. Arguably, her loyalty to Eren is both a liability and her strength. This “weakness” has been highlighted by her dilemma between her loyalty towards Eren and her belief that mass genocide is wrong.

[I won’t go into details about the manga parts that have not been animated as of 2021, can’t spoil it too much]. 

#daisy buchanan #mikasa ackerman #misato katsuragi #evangelion #cinderella #mulan #haibara ai #ai haibara #detective conan #shiho miyano #neon nostrade #hxh #hunterxhunter #blanche dubois #a streetcar named desire

[phantomofthepairofdice]

Double Features 2: Splatter, Splicer, Slander, Slasher

Considering the fact that we’re locked down and most folks aren’t going out much, why not settle in on a weekend with double feature. As part of a series of articles, I’ve decided to suggest some titles that would make for an interesting pair. It’s a time commitment like binging a few episodes of a TV show, and hopefully these double features are linked in interesting enough ways that it has a similar sense of cohesion. They also can be watched on separate occasions, but the lesser the distance between them, the more the similarities show. Do it however you want, really. I’m merely a guy on the internet, and that qualifies me for absolutely nothing! Enjoy at your own risk.

This template is back! I wanted to suggest a few more double features, but this time keep them in a specific genre: horror. I love horror movies, and I realized that I hadn’t really given them their due on this here blog, so I wanted to remedy that by showing a lot of love across a lot of different movies. I’ve put together some international movies, some classics, some that are silly, some that are serious, and even a bonus suggestion hidden in one of these blurbs. So without any more ramble in the preamble, here are four new suggested double features.

Note: The pairs are listed in the order I think best serves them being seen.

Hausu & Evil Dead II:

Hausu aka House (not to be confused with 1985 American horror film of the same name) has sort of transcended cult movie status to become a staple of off-center horror-comedy. Directed by recently deceased Nobuhiko Obayashi, the film shows his roots in advertisements with every shot designed for maximum effect, a (still) cutting edge approach in the edit, and a joyous, playful approach to special effects. It’s a gauzy and dreamy romp about a group of schoolgirls who head to the countryside on vacation. While staying at one of their aunts’ house, the supernatural hauntings begin, and heads start to roll (as well as bite people on the butt). It’s the type of movie where the main cast of characters are named Gorgeous, Kung Fu, Melody, Prof, Mac, Sweet, and Fantasy and they each have corresponding character traits. I was lucky enough to catch this at a rep screening at the Museum of Fine Arts a few years ago (further proof that this has gone beyond the cult curio status), and this is absolutely a movie that benefits from having a crowd cheer and laugh along - but it’s fairly easy to find and still has lots of pleasures to be enjoyed on solo watch. I’m pretty much willing to guarantee that if you enjoy it on first watch, you’ll want to share it with others. Now, where does one start when talking about Evil Dead II? Sam Raimi is rightfully as well known for his start in the hair-brained splatter genre fare as he is for his genre-defining Spider-man films. The influence of the Evil Dead movies is nearly unquantifiable, apparent in the work of directors like Edgar Wright, Peter Jackson, Quentin Tarantino, and the Korean New Wave filmmakers like Bong Joon-ho and Park Chan-wook. There’s a reason that the second film of his Evil Dead odyssey is the one that people hold in highest esteem, though. There is an overwhelming gleeful creativity, anything goes, Looney Tunes approach to it that makes the blood geysers, laughing moose heads, and chainsaw hands extend beyond gore and shock into pleasure. It’s been noted over and over by critics and Raimi himself that the Three Stooges are probably the biggest influence on the film, and by golly, it shows. Evil Dead II and Hausu are pure in a way that few other movies can be. Both of these movies are an absolute delight of knowing camp, innovative special effects, and a general attitude of excitement from the filmmakers permeating through every frame. They’re a total blast and, in my mind, stand as the standard-bearers for horror-comedy and haunted house movies.

Total Runtime: 88 minutes + 84 minutes = 172 minutes aka 2 hours and 52 minutes

The Thing (1982) & The Fly (1986):

Feel free to roll your eyes as I explain the plots of two very famous movies. The Thing is John Carpenter’s body horror reimagining of Howard Hawks’ The Thing from Another World and the story that was adapted from, “Who Goes There?” by John W. Campbell Jr. The film is centered around a group of men in an arctic outpost who welcome in a cosmic force of shape-shifting annihilation. What ensues is a terrifically scary, nihilistic, paranoid attempt to find who isn’t who they say they are before everyone is replaced with the alien’s version of them. The film is a masterpiece of tone in no small part due to Dean Cundey’s photography and Ennio Morricone’s uncharacteristically restrained score. The real showstopper here, though, is the creature effects designed by Rob Bottin with an assist from Stan Winston – two titans of their industry. There may not be a more mind-blowing practical effects sequence in all of movies than Norris’ defibrillation – which I won’t dare spoil for anyone who hasn’t seen it. The story is so much about human nature and behaviors, that it’s good news that the cast is all top-notch – anchored by Kurt Russell, Keith David, and Wilford Brimley. While The Thing is shocking and certainly not for anyone opposed to viscera, David Cronenberg’s The Fly is the best example of a movie not to watch while eating. Quite frankly, it’s got some of the most disgusting things I’ve ever seen on film. Chris Walas and Stephen Dupuis’ makeup effects are shocking, but the terror is amplified because this builds such a strong foundation of romance in its opening stretch between Jeff Goldblum and Geena Davis in what might be their career-best work. The story is simple: a scientist creates a teleportation device that he tries out himself, but unknowingly does so with a fly in the chamber with him. When he reatomizes on the other end, his DNA has been integrated with the fly. Slowly his body begins to deteriorate, and he transforms into a human-fly hybrid. While this is first and foremost a science-fiction horror film, it’s truly one of the most potent love stories at its center. The tragedy is that the love, like the flesh, is mutated and disintegrated by the hubris of Goldblum’s Seth Brundle. Here are two remakes that – clutch your pearls – outdo the original. They both serve as great examples of what a great artist can bring by reinterpreting the source material to tell their version of that story. The critical respect for Carpenter and Cronenberg is undeniable now, but both of these movies make the case that there are real artists working with allegory and stunning craft in less respected genre fare. It doesn’t take a lot of effort to transpose the thematic weight of the then-new AIDS crisis onto both films, but they both have a hefty anti-authority streak running through them in a time where American Exceptionalism was at an all-time high. If you want to get a real roll going, fire up the ’78 Invasion of the Body Snatchers first to get a triple dose of auteur remakes that reflect the social anxieties of the time and chart from generalized anxiety to individualistic dread to romantic fatalism.

Total Runtime: 109 minutes + 96 minutes = 205 minutes aka 3 hours and 25 minutes

Theatre of Blood & The Abominable Dr. Phibes

That old Klingon proverb that Khan tells Kirk about revenge being a dish best served cold is challenged by these two Vincent Price tales of the macabre. They posit that revenge is best served in extremely convoluted and thematically appropriate predecessors to the Saw franchise. Where Saw trades in shock and extremity, though, these classic horror tales offer an air of panache and self-satisfied literacy. In Theatre of Blood, Price plays a disgraced and thought-dead stage actor who gets revenge on the critics who gave him negative reviews with Shakespeare-themed murder. There’s good fun in seeing how inventive the vengeful killings are (and in some cases how far the writers bend over backwards to explain and make sense of them). It’s a little rumpled and ragged in moments, but Price is, of course, a tremendous pleasure to see in action as he chews through the Shakespeare monologues. Imagine the Queen’s corgis with a chainsaw and you’re on track. Phibes came first and, frankly, is the better of the two. The story is about a musician who seeks to kill the doctors who he believes were responsible for his wife’s death during a botched surgery. The elaborate angle he takes here is to inflict the ten plagues from the Old Testament. I hesitate to use a word that will probably make me come across as an over-eager schmuck, but it really feels best described as phantasmagorical. It’s got this bright, art deco, pop art sensibility to it that’s intoxicating. It also has a terrifically dark sense of drollery - it knows that you can see the strings on the bat as it flies toward the camera. Aesthetically, it feels adjacent to the ’66 Batman show. The music is great and the indelible image of his tinker toy robot band, The Clockwork Wizards, is a personal obsession of mine. Both Theatre of Blood and The Abominable Dr. Phibes feature great supporting turns from Diana Rigg and Joseph Cotton, respectively. Settle in for a devilishly good time and enjoy one of cinema’s greatest vicarious pleasures: getting back at those of criticized or hurt you.

Total Runtime: 104 minutes + 94 minutes = 198 minutes aka 3 hours and 18 minutes

Blood and Black Lace  & The Bird with the Crystal Plumage

The final pairing comes from beyond American borders and, to some, beyond the borders of good taste. Mario Bava and Dario Argento are likely the two biggest names in Italian horror, and that’s for very good reason. Bava, who started as a cinematographer, has made loads of movies (even the film which gave Ozzy Osbourne and crew the name their band name) that have tremendous visuals and terrific sense of mood. Argento, probably most famous now for Suspiria, emerged onto the Italian film scene a handful of years later and picked up that baton from Bava to crystallize the dreamy logic puzzles cloaked in hyper-saturated colors. These two films are regarded as quintessential in the giallo genre – named for the yellow covers of the pulp crime fictions that inspired them. As someone who loves the flair that can be applied to make a slasher film stand out amongst their formulaic brethren, I found that the giallo made for a smooth transition into international horror. Blood and Black Lace is a murder mystery that’s as tawdry and titillating as its title suggests. Set in an insular world of a fashion house in Rome, models are being murdered. The plot feels like a necessity in order to create a delivery system for the stunning set pieces that revolve around a secret diary. Bava puts sex right next to violence and cranks up the saturation to create something thrillingly lurid. Six years later, Argento made his first film which has often been credited for popularizing the giallo genre and already is playing around with some of his pet themes like voyeurism and reinterpretation. Built around an early set piece (that stacks up as one of the best in thrillers) in which a man is trapped but witnesses a murder, the film sees said man trying to find the piece of evidence that will make the traumatic killing make sense. Like Bava, it blends sex and violence with tons of flair, including a score by the aforementioned Ennio Morricone. The film is absolutely on a continuum between Hitchcock and De Palma. If you’re looking for a pair of exciting horror/thrillers, or even an entry point to foreign genre cinema, this is an accessible and enjoyable place to start.

88 minutes + 96 minutes = 184 minutes aka 3 hours and 4 minutes

Well, there you have it. Eight movies, and hours of entertainment curated by some guy with no real qualifications. If you’re interested in some more suggestions (in horror and other genres), stay tuned for the next entry in this Double Features series. And if you’re looking for a way to watch these movies, I highly recommend the app/website JustWatch where you can search a title and see where it’s available for streaming or rental. Happy viewing.

Thanks for reading.

#evil dead #evil dead 2 #hausu #hausu 1977 #the thing #the fly #theatre of blood #dr phibes #blood and black lace #bird with the crystal plumage #double feature

[drawbauchery]

Pre and Post-Second Session Secrets

fic by cartoons-tothemoon!

fic commission info inside!

Private, in all his years, was always regarded as oblivious, dense, benign.

He knew this, and most of the time, he didn’t even mind such a thing. Was it really so hard to believe that a cutie pie like him that liked knitting and baking was also capable of feats of incredible violence?

Of course, the answer was always “yes.” Because of course it was.

However, Private had found himself a different role to settle himself into in his most recent years. Or rather, a secret trait, that he treasured along with his more open and obvious personality traits, like kindness and empathy.

And that trait was quite simply, being perceptive.

It was undeniable that Private wasn’t always aware of his surroundings, but he was aware of people.

He could tell when Skipper was getting a little too paranoid for his own good or when Rico missed Julien especially bad on hour-long missions, or when Kowalski was about to have a sensory-related meltdown.

It was why he was the one who always paid rent.

People liked Private, and Private liked quite a lot of them. Even the ones he didn’t like, he seemed to have an understanding of.

They thought they understood him, and he found that he understood them quite well.

———

He couldn’t understand this quite well, however.

Skipper was a…character. Let’s just say that. Ignoring his haircut and his arms and his sharp eyes that always had a certain spark to them and-

Ignoring all that, Skipper was the type to let things slip under the radar. Sure, it’s not like  Kowalski WANTED people to know how his last relationship went, and Rico’s cavalcade of issues was always on full display even if they created a sort of smoke-screen for other things, but with Skipper…his issues only came up when they physically pervaded their lives. Dr. Blowhole or Hans, for example, it would’ve been nice to know that Skipper had particular targets on his back, but, that was spy stuff lost to the days. Of course he didn’t talk about it.

He was now referring more so to things like his extreme fear of needles, or that one time when it came up that he could tie a cherry stem with his tongue. Just last week was the first time Private had even heard a thing about Skipper’s apparently strained relationship with his family. He’d kind of assumed he didn’t have a family at that point, as sad as that sounded to say.

Weird insecurities, secrets, skills, and even just his past in general were things he never mentioned because it “never came up,” but it’s not like Private hadn’t asked him about a few of those things before. Skipper just happened to always dismiss him, there was always a reason for him not to contend with the questions in mind, be it they were already busy with whatever crisis the day had in store for them or whatever other excuse Skipper could make up at the moment.

So, Skipper was a private person. There certainly wasn’t anything wrong with that. It’s quite ironic that he himself wasn’t MORE private, in fact.

And sure, it occasionally lead to a whole incident, or two, or…five, but it’s not like they could really say something about it anyhow. It wasn’t that they weren’t allowed to call him out for certain things, they certainly were, but if they began asking him to be open…well, wouldn’t they have to be more open too? To point the blade one way and not expect it to pierce you as well was a foolhardy argument to make. And besides, what would they even be asking him? “Be more open and honest about your secrets and feelings?” Not only is that vague as hell, it’s just…

It’s a lot to ask of someone.

Private seemed open in a way that made people comfortable with him, but was he really open at all? Sure, he had no problem discussing things like his interests or some elements of his past with others, but now that he had to think about it, it kind of obfuscated the truth.

After all, being so open about living with Uncle Nigel most of his life made people forget that he could’ve been doing other things with his life as well.

Not that the Armadillo Kid forgot, anyhow.

So, maybe secrets were fine after all. Maybe Skipper didn’t even realize he was keeping secrets until they came up. After all, the needle thing only came up during a physical with the team’s doctor, the cherry stem thing only came up while they were getting ice cream, and his strained relationship with his family only came to light because he received a letter from them that he tore up before reading when he was helping Private sort through his mail pile.

To make something out of it when he has no reason to would just be silly, and to put this extra level of scrutiny on Skipper, or anybody for that matter would no doubt weaken their trust in him, and that was the last thing he’d want.

Being cute and loving and trustworthy wasn’t something Private saw as a skill he had to hone, it was just how he was, but that didn’t mean it didn’t take work. Love and trust were labors all their own, and just because they weren’t the same thing as being able to construct ray guns or have inexplicable amounts of dynamite in his hoodie’s pocket didn’t mean it wasn’t worth something, to somebody like him.

After all, no matter if the team possessed enough dynamite to destroy the Eastern seaboard or conquer Mars, they’d always need somebody to pay rent.

And although there were times when Private wanted to press, wanted to question, wanted to scream from the rooftops how much he wanted to understand with all his heart, he relented. He relaxed. Sure, he took note of such incidents, but that wasn’t being nosy. That was just his job.

So, Private, in all his patience, let things be. Sometimes secret were secrets for a reason, and prying open a treasure chest with a crowbar was never going to be an easy task, especially if he could later count on the key to wash up on the shore. Why pry now?

And that was his mentality for quite a long time.

Until a crowbar washed up on the shore.

———

In retrospect, it felt like it was a few day’s coming. Skipper seemed to be slipping from his usual emotional state of “fine, but tired” to “fine, but tired AND jumpy,” which doesn’t seem like that much of a difference until a tap on the shoulder gets you pressed against the fridge in the exact position it would take to dislocate your entire upper body.

He just wanted a glass of water.

Of course, Skipper apologized a thousand times over, but Private just brushed this off as Skipper having a bad bout of insomnia, and so, Private just dropped him off at his room for a nap, circadian rhythm be damned.

It didn’t seem like insomnia. Sure, it’s not like Private knew Skipper’s sleep schedule enough to say that it WASN’T insomnia, but…

He could just tell that something else was bothering him. He couldn’t tell why, maybe it was the way he only acted out like this when being touched or when he knew other people were around, maybe it was the eyebags that felt less sallow and deep than he knew they’d be after a practically sleepless week, or maybe it just felt like he had something to hide.

If he was trying to hide something, it would seem like he had nothing to hide in the first place. Skipper was a master of the double bluff, the triple bluff, and so on and so forth. Skipper practically waltzed around the truth on the best of days.

However, this clearly wasn’t the best of days. Skipper was obviously, clearly, undeniably hiding something, and was making no effort to even hide those efforts. Sure, a double bluff was a double bluff, but that only meant that this was either a remarkable version of such a psychology, or an absolutely terrible version of what it really was.

You could never really tell with a guy like Skipper.

Of course, given that his ice pack still didn’t seem to dull the pain of nearly having his arm removed from his socket, and how spooked Skipper seemed to be about the whole thing, there was a little bit of certainty that this wasn’t just an act. Whether because he did it in the first place, or apologized for it, he couldn’t say for certain.

(Sleeplessness, erratic movement, paranoia, irritation…were his hands trembling?)

At this point, Private wasn’t really certain WHAT to do, confronting him on it was certain to escalate things, but if he didn’t do SOMETHING about it, Skipper might actually kill somebody. It’s not like Skipper would approach him about any emotional vulnerabilities or problems he was facing. He didn’t talk to anyone about them. Not by choice, anyhow.

He had to do this. He had to figure something out, and it most certainly had to be him.

Private hated to boil this down in such a way, but getting people to open up to him, especially when they didn’t want to, was a lot like operating one of those coin-operated claw machines. Some of those games were easier than others, and a lot more may take it for granted that you would try again, but it was basically the same idea.

To win the game, you had to look at all the angles, you had to time your moves just right in accordance to the game, and, of course, you had to have a delicate touch. That was how you won your prize, be it an adorable stuffed toy, or insight into one of your dearest friend’s issues.

You couldn’t shake the machine, or break it. Because then you’re not playing the game.

You can’t analyze the game simply as a mechanical device, and expect to win either, because there’s nothing wrong with how the mechanisms actually operate, just how the machine takes them.

It has to be him. He’s the one with the gentle hand. He’s the one who can see all the angles, and, yes, he knows when he needs to apply the force necessary to not just play the game, but to win. The people around him need him to play to win.

And in many ways, they’re lucky.

Private’s great at those games. Where else would he get all of his stuffed animals, after all?

———

It felt like Skipper had settled down at dinner. Sure, he tapped his silverware softly when his fingers seemed to lose the rhythm he took while fidgeting, but he seemed more tired than anything else. Tired and sad.

Which, on one hand, was not great. The last thing Private wanted was for his friends to be sad, but it also meant that he was open.

He was stuck.

Trapped by societal convention. He couldn’t leave the table until he ate all of his food, and because Kowalski prepared it tonight, the consequences for leaving would not only be an empty stomach, but a hyper self-conscious scientist in the coming days, a price rather damning considering the combination of how sad he’d get and how much yellow-cake uranium he had access to.

So, now was the perfect time for an intervention.

“Hey, Skipper, how’s it going?” Perfect opener. Bland and unoriginal, a little suspicious considering the lack of conversation currently going on, but, nonetheless, it was the only entrance he really could take.

Of course, there’s already so much weight to be taken from “how’s it going?” But a person who’s doing fine in the world won’t think about that. They’ll just be fine. And they’ll say they’re fine.

“Oh, uh. Fine.” Skipper said, not exactly startled, but not exactly there, either.

“Do anything interesting today?”

“I already apologized for that.”

“I meant other things. Interesting things.”

Now, this did not look to be a compelling conversation, mostly because it wasn’t. Skipper wasn’t even really answering the questions, using half measures to make sure he never had to lift his eyes from the part of the table he had locked his gaze on, and seemed determined to not look up from until he could leave, a classic tactic to be sure.

“Skipper, are you…al..right?” Kowalski asked, hesitantly. “I’m not talking just now, I’m talking in general. You’ve been acting really strange, lately.”

Although Private could handle these things on his own, the fact of the matter is, you don’t turn down good help. Kowalski was good help. Sure, his plan may have to be reformatted, but he’d play it by ear, like he always did.

“Has something happened? Your erratic behavior began almost three weeks ago, and it’s continued since then, with seemingly no cause behind it.”

“I’ve been handling it.”

“Oh yeah, sure. That’s been going real great.”

That got Skipper to lift an eyebrow in his direction, but his eyes remained cast down as he primarily focused on eating. He was almost done, and although Private hadn’t been able to dig a lot on his own, he’d take what he could get.

“Sir, you assaulted a member of team, with no justifiable reason behind it.” Skipper flinched at that, but kept his head down. His guilt was already well-known, so it felt more like picking at flesh wounds at that point. “That is the behavior of somebody not just unstable, but somebody unfit to lead.”

Private…hadn’t expected that. This seemed to be spiraling out of control far too quickly. This is definitely not how he plays the game.

“Kowalski-“

“Can it. Skipper, if you can’t get yourself together and be the leader you’re supposed to be, then I suppose we’re just going to have to find a new leader.”

Private was shocked. Horrified, even. Skipper had lifted his head at this point to glare at Kowalski in twain.

“You seem to forget I have the number to HQ, too. Acquiring yellow cake uranium in New York City is, uh, shockingly difficult, in case you were wondering.”

Private knew Kowalski was bluffing. The team needed Skipper, just as much as Skipper needed the team. Even if he was going on some more secret missions than usual, he always came back to the roost, not to mention that HQ wasn’t really fond of them in the first place. They were stuck with what they had, and what they had was each other. Kowalski was never going to call, and Private knew this. And if Private knew, then Skipper did too.

Not like it didn’t make it hurt any less.

Maybe it made it hurt worse.

Skipper stood up.

“Then HQ better be on my doorstep by morning with a new assignment waiting for me.” Skipper sneered, and walked away from the table to put away his plate.

“Oh, and I’m sure your new team will just, fall at your feet, that’s what you’re looking for, right? For people to be quiet and not question your judgement?”

“And I’m sure your new leader will be just fine with whatever Geneva Convention violating monsters you’re storing in the break fridge. Because that’s what you want, right? A leader that’ll hold you accountable?”

“I’m not even mad about that anymore!”

“I f-feel like I’m w-watching mom and d-dad go through a, through a divorce.” Rico whispered to Private as they watched the scene play out. Private, however, could only watch. He felt like he was learning more and more with each passing venomous jab that they passed back and forth.

Kowalski was clearly mad that Skipper hasn’t been taking the suggestions he’s been giving on how to get back in “tip-top shape,” as Private would say, and whether he was just trying to get Skipper to take better care of himself, or if he was just trying to figure out what caused him to be in such a state, and his methods hadn’t been working. Obviously. Skipper seemed like he was too tired to continue, but only continued to do so out of either pride, or just because it was something expected of him.

“For the last time, I am HANDLING it.”

“Oh, really? Is that what you’re doing?”

Skipper glared, but he seemed more disgusted than anything else.

“For the record, yes, I am actually DOING something, but, think what you want, I’m going to bed.” He said, leaving the kitchen. Private could tell that there was clearly more that he wanted to say, but without the place to be open about it, he wasn’t going to be.

There also clearly seemed to be more that Kowalski wanted to say, but where Skipper went hot, Kowalski went cool. Explosions always got more attention because they were bright and flashy and dynamic, but Kowalski looked ready to launch a new ice age, and a new ice age would bring with it cold, lingering death.

Still, in all of this, there was still a question to be had.

“You’re not…really going to call HQ, are you?”

Kowalski crossed his arms and leaned against the counter with a sigh.

“No.”

Private smiled, not especially brightly, but, gratefully. It was a resigned response, sure,  one that if Kowalski had more energy would be followed up with a tirade, but, still, it meant the world to Private.

It wasn’t his greatest fear, that would be badgers, heights, leopard seals, and whatever was living in the trash can, but Private couldn’t deny that he possessed some sort of anxiety surrounding the idea that this little family of his would fall apart, and eventually, they’d be nothing more than strangers. Maybe because it was something so…true. The fact of the matter was, that this was a job. They went from never knowing each other to what they were now, after all, but if Skipper or Kowalski or Rico got a better deal, who’s to say that they wouldn’t take it? And if they didn’t get a better job, then wouldn’t this job just have to end at one point?

This worried him, as a passive anxiety that he never thought he’d have to consider, the same way that “what if space squids came to Earth and decided to steal Kowalski’s technology, and then conquer the planet?” or “what if I have to be the one to make a doctor’s appointment?” was a passive anxiety. The chances of these events happening were slim to nill, sure, but it could still happen.

Still, there was something to be asked.

“What do you think Skipper meant by “actually doing something?”

Rico shrugged, “p-probably hitting the b-bottle.”

“Mmm. Not likely.” Kowalski replied. “Skipper isn’t the type to be incapacitated by choice, unless under specific circumstances.”

“G-girlfriend? He did say doing some-“ Rico looked at Private when he said it, who did his best to look neutral, if not a little bored.

Kowalski grabbed Rico by his skull, and shook it around. A weird counter-measure to the traditional head slap, considering they were beginning to wonder if that was doing more harm than good. “No, no. Remember Kitka? He was a lovey-dovey mess over her for a week! There’s no way we wouldn’t know if he was dating someone.”

“B-Boyfriend?”

“Night terrors?”

“N-New nemesis?”

“New medication?”

Kowalski sighed. “Who’s to say? Whatever Skipper’s newest problem is, or what happened, we can only do so much if he’s so insistent on not telling us.”

Private was about to pipe up. “And only saying that he’s “taking care of it” is negligible at the best of times. Until Skipper’s knocking down my door for some super-charged xannies, I think the best thing I can do is stay out of it, and I recommend you two do the same.” Kowalski then left the kitchen. And then there were two.

It had been a very stressful evening.

Private looked at Rico. Rico looked at Private.

“J-Julien’s telling me w-we b-bought too much ice-cream l-lately.” Rico sighed, feigning some sort of casual gesture. “W-winky flavored and e-everything. It’d, well, it’d b-be a shame t-to go t-to waste.”

Private smiled at that.

“I’ll go grab some spoons.”

———

Ice cream with Rico and Julien and his gang obviously wasn’t going to solve things, but there was something fun about eating too much ice cream and watching Clueless in Julien’s room that seemed to make Private far, far less stressed than he was when he entered.

For all his crude jokes and lewd gestures, Rico could be a really good friend. He hid it pretty well, but he seemed to be remarkably perceptive.

It was just a good thing to remember.

And although Private could’ve spent all night watching cheesy 90s movies and braiding Julien’s hair, it was already half past midnight, and he was supposed to be up bright and early as always.

…Of course, given Skipper’s state as of late, what had once been an 8 AM wake-up had slipped into 9:30…and then 11:00…and then they kind of gave up on getting Skipper up at any time that they didn’t have to. Still, a healthy sleep schedule makes for a healthy mind, and a healthy body, and Private liked being healthy, despite the fact that he had just eaten half his weight in ice cream, so, he figured it was as good a time as any to go to bed.

…But it looked like he was not alone in roaming the halls tonight, as he turned the corner, he saw Skipper peek his head out of his room, look left, right, up, down, and then left again, before slipping out of his room, and beginning to walk carefully into their living room.

To pretend that Private ever had a choice NOT to follow him would be like saying that you had a choice not to open that secret door behind the bookshelf, or the choice not climb a mysteriously hidden spiral staircase up to the clouds. Once you know it’s there, it’s not like you can ignore it.

So Private, at a pace approximately an entire hallway away from Skipper, followed him. Both carefully making sure they didn’t step on where the floorboards may creak, and carefully side-stepping various messes, until Skipper made it to the living room.

He looked around once again, but seemingly missed Private’s face peeking out behind the doorframe, masked by the cover of darkness.

Skipper seemed to be aware of a presence THERE, but with no way to see it or prove it, he ignored it. He continued to the window in the living room, which was supposedly Marlene’s idea of a fire escape, despite the fact that there was no conventional staircase, and the platform you’d land on was three stories below them.

However, because there was never a fire they needed escaping that wasn’t started by them in the first place, they bought the place anyhow, and disregarded the blatant safety hazard.

Skipper, was obviously aware of this, as when he opened up the window, he walked away to attach a rope he was carrying to a weight-bearing beam, before walking back to the window, and beginning to scale the building.

Private walked quickly to the window, conflicted between staying hidden and knowing what’s going on, but found a way to peer out of the corner of the window without being seen.

Skipper seemed to have landed safely, and scaled down the fire escape from there, before ending up in an alley, and turning a sidewalk out of Private’s view.

He was leaving at night? Well, that sure managed to explain the supposed bouts of insomnia he’s been having as of late, but where? And why?

Where was he going at night? Was Rico right and he was going to go see a date, or at least a sex worker? Maybe that paranoia came from guilt of some kind. Was he living this whole other life as a nightclub singer or gardener or something? Was he doing drugs? Where was he going?

And why was he leaving at night?

Well, obviously he was leaving at night either because it was an activity that could only be done at night, OR it was something that he wanted to keep a secret, and felt was far too shameful to share.

But that doesn’t really narrow it down, no. It becomes more of a Venn-Diagram at certain points than anything else. He’s repressed up the wazoo, just more casual about it. Anything could be worth keeping a secret for him and for him alone if he was operating under that criteria.

Well, regardless. Private might as well go get his pajamas on, because he had a feeling he was going to have a long night ahead of him.

———

He was only a little wrong about that.

It was only two or three hours he had to wait, but that was two to three hours he had to wait sitting silently in the dark, only occasionally being able to pull out his phone to scroll through, before hearing a random noise in the middle of night, feeling his heart rate jump about 20 beats higher than it should’ve been, and turning off his phone as fast as possible so the light illumination it gave off wouldn’t give him away.

It was a long two or three hours, and a mildly stressful two or three hours, at that, let’s just say.

However, it seemed to him that his patience was rewarded when he heard the slightly distant sounds of Skipper climbing the rope back up to the apartment. It wouldn’t have mattered how quietly he was climbing, after so many hours spent stressing over the slightest of sounds, when he heard the slight scuffle of sneaker rubber against brick, he knew it was either Skipper or a burglar, and he was ready to confront both.

So, Private got into position, just a few moments before Skipper had grabbed the window pane and pulled himself inside. He untied the rope from the weight-supporting beam,  pulled the rest of the rope inside, and then closed the window as quietly as possible. He stared at it a moment, and then let out a sigh of relief.

And then Private clicked the lamp on from where he was sitting in Rico’s recliner, and Skipper half jumped out of his skin.

“You’re home late.”

“Private, I-“ Skipper almost seemed happy to see him, but then something made him hold back. “It’s, uh, nice to see-“

“What are you doing? Sneaking out-sneaking out windows in the dead of night? Why? We have a front door.” Private had left the chair that he was sitting on, and began to pace in front of him. He should have rehearsed. “Wait. The more important thing is, where are you going?”

Private didn’t seem to particularly care if he got an answer or not at this point, especially considering that as Skipper stood there with his mouth gaping, looking like he was about to say something, Private grabbed the sides of his face with his forefinger and thumb and pulled him down to his level.

“And just who in the world split your lip? What? Are you doing a fight club now?” He muttered. Skipper hid his hands as discreetly as possible behind his back. Private squeezed his face once or twice before letting go.

“I want answers. REAL answers. Nobody believed you when you said you joined a bowling league last week, so I want REAL answers. Now.”

“…” Whatever Skipper was trying to explain, or trying to cover up, he really seemed to not have a story put together either way. It was either incredibly hard to explain, or he foolishly didn’t have a story put together in advance and just…EXPECTED to never get caught.

“…You give the best hugs?”

“WHAT?”

“And you’re always so optimistic. It helps my uh, team morale.”

Private let out a quite confused screech.

“And you’re really good at cooking. Your meals are practically restaurant caliber as is.”

Private looked as if a vein was going to pop out of his head, he was so furious. “…You are doing NOTHING to help your case if you think that you can just WANDER in here at deadass hours of the night and think you can just GET OUT OF IT by making me fall to your feet smitten-“

“-Not a big fan of that language from you, bud…”

“That’s it. I’m getting Kowalski.”

“Wait!” Skipper rose his voice slightly, maybe a few decibels too loud as he reached out to grab Private’s hand.

This was a gesture that surprised both of them, as Private turned around to hear him out and Skipper dropped the hand like it was a flaming hot crucible. Skipper seemed conflicted on where to put his hands until he stuck them firmly at his sides.

“I’m sorry.” He said. “For…Everything. For, just being kind of awful lately? I know it’s been…Rough, but I’ve…” He sighed.

“Take your time.” Private said, and Skipper looked almost grateful for it.

“I’ve been forced recently to take a long, hard look at myself, by somebody who knows me quite well…Almost too well. The knowledge, and simultaneously the idea that they have that knowledge has been taking a sort of…mental toll on me.”

Private took a seat, apparently ready to listen more.

“It’s, I don’t know, really. On some level, I want to take it out on them for being right, but I really can’t, so…I guess that’s fallen on you guys when it shouldn’t have, and I’m…really sorry about that.”

Skipper sat down as well, in front of Private.

“I really do mean it when I say I’ve been working on it, I just needed to find an…outlet.”

Private tilted his head. This was something to take in. He felt sort of vindicated for having a feeling that there was more going on, but it was still rather vague.

“What are you saying?”

“…I’ve picked up some…night classes…to help with my stress.”

“…What kind of night classes?”

“Oh, you know…baking.” He said hesitantly.

And that basically clinched it for him. Skipper’s thought process had perfectly revealed himself to him! After hearing something that hit too close to home, he endeavored to better himself, but was embarrassed by it! That sounded reasonable, and it was just like Skipper to do too.

“Don’t get that smug look on your face, if it doesn’t work out I’m picking up night archery.”

“Who? Me? Smug?”

Skipper laughed as he gave him a shove. He seemed a lot more relaxed than he did in a long time. It must’ve felt good to get that weight off his shoulder. Sure, taking cooking classes might not be a big deal for anybody else, but this was Skipper. Skipper was a weirdly hyper-masculine, private guy. For him to even get in a situation where he’d willingly tell Private something like this, it was a pretty big step.

“I’d appreciate it if you didn’t tell Kowalski or Rico.”

“Oh, no problem! If you want, I can pick out a recipe for you to bring in.”

“I was just about to ask for one, how serendipitous.”

Private couldn’t help but keep giggling, just from the relief of it all. It was a pretty tense scenario for quite a bit of time, and he couldn’t help but react in some way to the ease he was now feeling. Skipper got up and gave a stretch that was indicative that he was ready for bed, and couldn’t help but smile fondly as Private tried to catch his breath.

“You know, it’s funny. We, Kowalski, Rico, and I, were trying to figure out what was up. We thought it was anything and everything from a girlfriend to seeing a therapist that was putting you off so badly, who would’ve thought.”

“Ha ha, yeah.” Skipper said, as if Private couldn’t tell his hands were shaking.

“But wait,” Private said, in a sorta-fake moment of wonder. “Where did you get the split lip from then?”

Skipper panicked. “Why did you say that me giving you compliments would make you fall to my feet smitten?”

Private panicked more. “Good night!”

Okay, so maybe they were both working on this “open and honest” thing. So sue them. Baby steps or not, it was a step in the right direction. But, if Skipper’s secrets were as benign as that, then Private could take them any day, and he’d make sure he knew that. He hoped Skipper thought the same of him.

(Remember when 3K was considered long for me? Ha ha, anyhow, this is 5.5K words of nothing but dramatic irony. I really can’t believe that I went from writing short fluff pieces based on actual art to my own story arc about Skipper getting some FUCKING therapy.

Anyhow! Much more important things are afoot! I’m doing charity commissions, where all proceeds are going to bail funds across the country. If you like my writing, feel free to contact me at my Tumblr @cartoons-tothemoon, and we’ll work it out from there. $10 for 5K, or $2 for 1K. Of course, I don’t really know what to charge yet, but that can be negotiated! I’d really appreciate it if you commissioned me at this time, but my work on @drawbauchery’s is always going to be free. I hope you have a nice day!)

#cartoons-tothemoon #fics #pom #submission #can FINALLY post this #i'm sorry i always either have tablet problems or am sick when you send me a story #and it might be the most obvious thing ever but #i'm #once again #all over the skivate #private acting like mrs incredible 'i thought you'd be back by eleven' #and skipper the fearless leader FREAKING out because he's in trouble alskdnf #like i love the fact that being in trouble with his subordinates is so pressing #private canonically knows how to be intimidating when he's pissed so this just ticklesme #also small thing but i love how rico looks over at private when he talks about a girlfriend #he's somehow so considerate and inconsiderate at the same time #ko and skip's fight was really fun to read too #they're kind of in a power struggle #like toeing the line between family and business #it's really interesting #skipper's a dummy who's trying his best and i love him for it

[uncloseted]

Hey! I’m the anon (and also Gay!Bama anon) who sent the asks about BPD and being rejected by that closeted guy. I guess the reason I think I have BPD is because I’m in my 20’s now, and I just have issues with perceived rejection for whatever reason. Anytime someone rejects me or something, I get really depressed and question myself a lot, or I question my worth, and it’s over things that should not be a big deal, but to me they feel like the end of the world. It’s like I have no emotional skin, if that makes sense, so everything hurts more than it would someone who is normal. It’s just so hard sometimes. I get so emotional or upset over things that there’s no need in being that upset over. I just wish I could change it, but I can’t. I feel like I’ve destroyed a lot of potential relationships and also friendships by overreacting and it makes me feel so crazy. (1/2)

(2/3) (Gay!Bama anon) I think it might be because my Dad and me always had a difficult relationship, and now that he’s gone things are really more difficult than before. I started going back to therapy and I’m about to go back to school to finish up my degree, but I just wish I could manage these feelings better. The only way I have been able to deal with them is by either numbing them with alcohol, drugs, or fulfilling them with anonymous encounters, or just cutting myself off from other people, so that way I have nothing to react to. It just really sucks because I’m so lonely all the time, but I don’t know what else to do about it other than that. I used to self harm to help me cope with my feelings, because then I could hurt myself and not hurt the people in my life by lashing out over trivial things, like irrelevant rejection or changing plans. It feels like every small thing is a seed, from which sprouts a tree of paranoia and depression.

(3/3) (Gay!Bama anon) I also have had such a hard time trying to figure out my plans for a career and goals because I’m always switching them up, because one personality trait might take the forefront, but then that could change and that influences how I feel about something or what I want to do. I just wish I could turn all of these feelings off for a while, or something, and just be like calm or something.

Hi Gay!Bama anon!  Always happy to see you in my inbox, although I’m sorry to hear that you’re struggling. The fact that I know it’s you and I know you’re in your 20s changes my answer slightly.  

There are a number of symptoms that need to be present to be diagnosed with borderline personality disorder; rejection sensitivity is definitely one of them, but not the only one.  The DSM-5 requires five or more of the following symptoms for a BPD diagnosis:

Chronic feelings of emptiness

Emotional instability in reaction to day-to-day events (e.g., intense episodic sadness, irritability, or anxiety usually lasting a few hours and only rarely more than a few days. Generally, these are out of proportion to the event that triggered them)

Frantic efforts to avoid real or imagined abandonment (e.g., calling a friend/partner/family member several times a day during working hours and getting upset when they don’t answer)

Identity disturbance with markedly or persistently unstable self-image or sense of self (e.g., frequently and suddenly changing goals, beliefs, vocational aspirations, and sexual identity, or assuming the identity of people they’re close to)

Impulsive behavior in at least two areas that are potentially self-damaging (e.g., spending, gambling, sex, substance abuse, reckless driving, binge eating, committing crimes)

Inappropriate, intense anger or difficulty controlling anger (e.g., frequent displays of temper, constant anger, recurrent physical fights)

Pattern of unstable and intense interpersonal relationships characterized by extremes between idealization and devaluation (also known as "splitting"- basically, thinking a person is the best person ever, the love of your life, your best friend, someone with no faults, and then switching to thinking the person is the worst person ever, who has never cared about you, who has no redeeming qualities.  This typically results in alternating between over-involvement with the person and withdrawal from the person)

Recurrent suicidal behavior, gestures, or threats, or self-harming behavior

Transient, stress-related paranoid ideation or severe dissociative symptoms (typically only lasting hours or days, and triggered by an external stressor.  Dissociative symptoms may include feeling like your body is unreal or altered in a strange way, feeling that the outside world is unreal, and illusions).

People with BPD will also typically have a compromised ability to recognize the feelings and needs of other people, and have intense, unstable, and conflicted relationships that are marked by mistrust and neediness.  It’s also important that these symptoms have persisted over time and across different situations.

If that doesn’t resonate with you, there are a number of other different conditions that result in being particularly sensitive to rejection, including social anxiety, depression, generalized anxiety, ADD/ADHD, eating disorders, and childhood trauma are just a few things that could cause a fear of rejection.  I would talk to your therapist about this symptom and ask for help coming up with some coping mechanisms.

If all of that does sound like you, I would talk to your therapist about a possible BPD diagnosis and potentially a referral to a therapist who specializes in dialectical behavioral therapy.  DBT is the most studied and effective treatment for BPD, so it’s a good place to start if that is what you’re struggling with.  In the meantime, you can learn the principles of DBT on your own and try to begin applying them to your life.

DBT combines mindfulness with techniques for distress tolerance, emotional regulation, and interpersonal effectiveness.  Having a therapist and attend group therapy sessions are an important part of a full course DBT.  However, there are several exercises you can try at home:

Keeping a Diary

One of the easiest things you can do at home is to start tracking your behaviors.  Note any self-injurious or life threatening behaviors, behaviors which indirectly cause harm to yourself or others, and quality of life issues.  Write down any triggers you’ve noticed.

Mindfulness

There are a few different types of mindfulness exercises you can try.  Since you mentioned that you want to be able to turn your feelings off, trying meditation might be a good place to start.  There are some good apps, like Headspace and Calm, that can help you learn how to meditate and encourage you to practice meditation, and there are also a ton of videos on YouTube that do the same.

DBT encourages the concept of “radical acceptance”- the idea that one should face situations, both positive and negative, without any judgement.  Try to let go of fighting reality and accept a situation for what it is.  When you’ve accepted a situation, then you can figure out how to change it.

You can also try using “what” skills when practicing mindfulness; these are observe, describe, and participate.  They’re “what” you do when you’re practicing mindfulness. Nonjudgementally paying attention to the present moment is an important component of DBT, so the first thing you can do is observe.  Try to nonjudgementally observe your environment within and outside of yourself.  Notice the feelings you’re experiencing, and then try to let slide off of your mind.  Next, describe: express what you observed, either to someone around you or to yourself.  Try to use your five senses to put words to what you’re observing.  What can you see? Hear? Smell? Taste? Feel?  Finally, participate: try your best to be fully focused on and involved in any activity that you’re doing.  When your mind wanders, gently pull it back to the task you’re currently doing.

Distress Tolerance

One of the goals of DBT is to help people develop the ability to calmly recognize negative situations and decide if and how to address them.  It’s important to learn how to be distressed without becoming overwhelmed or hiding from that feeling.

TIPP is one of the fastest and most popular distress tolerance skills, since it alleviates distress quickly.  Tip the temperature of your face by splashing it with very cold water, intensely exercise for 20 minutes, do paced breathing- breathe in for four seconds and our for six to eight seconds, and then do progressive muscle relaxation- starting from the top of your body, tense and relax each muscle group until you get to your toes.

You can also distract yourself from unpleasant emotions using ACCEPTS.  Engage in activities that you enjoy, contribute by helping others, compare yourself to people who are less fortunate or how you used to be when you were in a worse state, evoke a different emotion by putting on a happy song or watching a comedy special, push away your situation in your mind, and put something else first by thinking about something else, and finally, create sensations that are intense, such as holding an ice cube or eating spicy food.

Another thing you can try when you’re in distress is to IMPROVE the moment.  Imagine relaxing scenes, things going well, or other pleasing scenarios, find meaning in what you’re feeling, pray, if you’re religious, relax your muscles using the progressive muscle relaxation we talked about above, do one thing at a time, and focus all your attention on it, vacation if you can (by taking a break from the situation), and encourage yourself.  Tell yourself it’s possible to make it through your current situation and cope with it.  You can be your own best cheerleader.

Emotional Regulation

Since people who have BPD frequently have intense emotions, it can be helpful to learn how to regulate those emotions.

First, try identifying and labeling your emotions.  Tune in with yourself and ask yourself what you’re feeling.  Is it anger? Fear? Sadness?  Then, you can try to change unwanted emotions using opposite-reactions.  With opposite-reactions, you do the opposite of the urge you’re feeling in the moment.  For example, if you want to isolate yourself, instead, reach out to a friend.  

Fact-checking is also an important technique- ask yourself, “do the facts warrant the intensity of the response I’m feeling?”  Then ask yourself, “what is the event prompting my emotion,” “what are my interpretations and assumptions about the event, and are those true?”, “am I assuming a threat? How likely is it to actually occur?”, “what’s the disaster? How can I cope well with it?”, and “does my emotion or intensity fit the facts?”  There’s a sample fact-checking worksheet that you can find here: http://edencounseling.com/resources/dbt-emotional-regulation-group-4-handouts.pdf

If your facts are correct and the situation is the problem, then you can problem solve.  First, identify your goal in solving the problem- what needs to happen for you to be okay, and what’s reasonable?  Then, brainstorm as many solutions as you can come up with, without being critical of your ideas. Choose a solution that fits your goal and is likely to work, using a pro/con list to decide if necessary. Act on your decision, and then evaluate if it worked.  If it didn’t work, go back to the “choose” stage and pick a different solution to try.

Interpersonal Effectiveness

Interpersonal relationships can be difficult for people with DBT, so it’s important to learn how to ask for what you need, how to say no, and how to cope with interpersonal conflicts.  There are three techniques in this module: DEAR MAN, GIVE, and FAST.

The DEAR MAN technique focuses on conveying your needs to someone else. Start by describing your situation using specific, fact-based statements about a recent situation.  Then express the emotions experienced when the situation occurred, why the situation was a problem, and how you feel about it. Assert yourself by clearly and specifically requesting the behavior change you would like. Reinforce your position by explaining to the person what the positive impacts of changing their behavior might be for them. Mindfully focus on the situation, without seeking validation, and redirect the conversation back to your main point when it seems to be diverting. Appear confident and assertive, even if you’re not feeling confident or assertive. Finally, negotiate with the person to come to a compromise that both parties are happy with.

The GIVE tool focuses on relationship maintenance, whether that’s with friends, family, co-workers, or romantic partners.  It is used in conversations. Use gentle language, free of put-downs, sarcasm, or judgement, even as a joke. Be as interested as you can in what the other person is saying.  Give them your undivided attention by making eye contact and asking questions.  Really listen to them, don’t just wait your turn to talk. Validate their situation, either through words, body language, or facial expressions.  Often, people just want to be heard and for someone to understand what they’re going through. Finally, try to adopt an easy manner: do your best to appear calm and comfortable during the conversation.  Use friendly humor and smile.

The FAST skill focuses on maintaining your self-respect.  Be fair to yourself and to the person you’re talking to. Don’t apologize more than once, and only apologize for things that are your fault.  Stick to your values- determine what you believe and stand by it, without letting other people sway your decisions. Lastly, be truthful. Lying can only damage relationships and reduce the respect you have for yourself.

I know that’s a ton of stuff I’ve just thrown at you, so if you’re still with me, thank you!  You don’t have to adopt all of these skills at once or even at all.  Getting good at just one or two of them will improve your life.  A therapist will be able to help you practice these different skills so that when you need them, they’re already in your mind.  Good luck!  I hope you get the support you need and that things start looking up for you soon.

#DBT #borderline personality disorder #BPD #dialectical behavioral therapy #Anonymous #effys-closet #effys closet

[manifestoinprogress]

Industrial Society and its Future - Ted Kaczynski

Editor's Note: This is the text of a 35,000-word manifesto as submitted to The Washington Post and the New York Times by the serial mail bomber called the Unabomber. The manifesto appeared in The Washington Post as an eight-page supplement that was not part of the news sections. This document contains corrections that appeared in the Friday, Sept. 22, 1995 editions of Washington Post. The text was sent in June, 1995 to The New York Times and The Washington Post by the person who calls himself “FC,” identified by the FBI as the Unabomber, whom authorities have implicated in three murders and 16 bombings. The author threatened to send a bomb to an unspecified destination “with intent to kill” unless one of the newspapers published this manuscript. The Attorney General and the Director of the FBI recommended publication.

INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY AND ITS FUTURE

Introduction

1. The Industrial Revolution and its consequences have been a disaster for the human race. They have greatly increased the life-expectancy of those of us who live in “advanced” countries, but they have destabilized society, have made life unfulfilling, have subjected human beings to indignities, have led to widespread psychological suffering (in the Third World to physical suffering as well) and have inflicted severe damage on the natural world. The continued development of technology will worsen the situation. It will certainly subject human beings to greater indignities and inflict greater damage on the natural world, it will probably lead to greater social disruption and psychological suffering, and it may lead to increased physical suffering even in “advanced” countries.

2. The industrial-technological system may survive or it may break down. If it survives, it MAY eventually achieve a low level of physical and psychological suffering, but only after passing through a long and very painful period of adjustment and only at the cost of permanently reducing human beings and many other living organisms to engineered products and mere cogs in the social machine. Furthermore, if the system survives, the consequences will be inevitable: There is no way of reforming or modifying the system so as to prevent it from depriving people of dignity and autonomy.

3. If the system breaks down the consequences will still be very painful. But the bigger the system grows the more disastrous the results of its breakdown will be, so if it is to break down it had best break down sooner rather than later.

4. We therefore advocate a revolution against the industrial system. This revolution may or may not make use of violence; it may be sudden or it may be a relatively gradual process spanning a few decades. We can’t predict any of that. But we do outline in a very general way the measures that those who hate the industrial system should take in order to prepare the way for a revolution against that form of society. This is not to be a POLITICAL revolution. Its object will be to overthrow not governments but the economic and technological basis of the present society.

5. In this article we give attention to only some of the negative developments that have grown out of the industrial-technological system. Other such developments we mention only briefly or ignore altogether. This does not mean that we regard these other developments as unimportant. For practical reasons we have to confine our discussion to areas that have received insufficient public attention or in which we have something new to say. For example, since there are well-developed environmental and wilderness movements, we have written very little about environmental degradation or the destruction of wild nature, even though we consider these to be highly important.

THE PSYCHOLOGY OF MODERN LEFTISM

6. Almost everyone will agree that we live in a deeply troubled society. One of the most widespread manifestations of the craziness of our world is leftism, so a discussion of the psychology of leftism can serve as an introduction to the discussion of the problems of modern society in general.

7. But what is leftism? During the first half of the 20th century leftism could have been practically identified with socialism. Today the movement is fragmented and it is not clear who can properly be called a leftist. When we speak of leftists in this article we have in mind mainly socialists, collectivists, “politically correct” types, feminists, gay and disability activists, animal rights activists and the like. But not everyone who is associated with one of these movements is a leftist. What we are trying to get at in discussing leftism is not so much movement or an ideology as a psychological type, or rather a collection of related types. Thus, what we mean by “leftism” will emerge more clearly in the course of our discussion of leftist psychology. (Also, see paragraphs 227-230.)

8. Even so, our conception of leftism will remain a good deal less clear than we would wish, but there doesn’t seem to be any remedy for this. All we are trying to do here is indicate in a rough and approximate way the two psychological tendencies that we believe are the main driving force of modern leftism. We by no means claim to be telling the WHOLE truth about leftist psychology. Also, our discussion is meant to apply to modern leftism only. We leave open the question of the extent to which our discussion could be applied to the leftists of the 19th and early 20th centuries.

9. The two psychological tendencies that underlie modern leftism we call “feelings of inferiority” and “oversocialization.” Feelings of inferiority are characteristic of modern leftism as a whole, while oversocialization is characteristic only of a certain segment of modern leftism; but this segment is highly influential.

FEELINGS OF INFERIORITY

10. By “feelings of inferiority” we mean not only inferiority feelings in the strict sense but a whole spectrum of related traits; low self-esteem, feelings of powerlessness, depressive tendencies, defeatism, guilt, self- hatred, etc. We argue that modern leftists tend to have some such feelings (possibly more or less repressed) and that these feelings are decisive in determining the direction of modern leftism.

11. When someone interprets as derogatory almost anything that is said about him (or about groups with whom he identifies) we conclude that he has inferiority feelings or low self-esteem. This tendency is pronounced among minority rights activists, whether or not they belong to the minority groups whose rights they defend. They are hypersensitive about the words used to designate minorities and about anything that is said concerning minorities. The terms “negro,” “oriental,” “handicapped” or “chick” for an African, an Asian, a disabled person or a woman originally had no derogatory connotation. “Broad” and “chick” were merely the feminine equivalents of “guy,” “dude” or “fellow.” The negative connotations have been attached to these terms by the activists themselves. Some animal rights activists have gone so far as to reject the word “pet” and insist on its replacement by “animal companion.” Leftish anthropologists go to great lengths to avoid saying anything about primitive peoples that could conceivably be interpreted as negative. They want to replace the world “primitive” by “nonliterate.” They seem almost paranoid about anything that might suggest that any primitive culture is inferior to our own. (We do not mean to imply that primitive cultures ARE inferior to ours. We merely point out the hypersensitivity of leftish anthropologists.)

12. Those who are most sensitive about “politically incorrect” terminology are not the average black ghetto- dweller, Asian immigrant, abused woman or disabled person, but a minority of activists, many of whom do not even belong to any “oppressed” group but come from privileged strata of society. Political correctness has its stronghold among university professors, who have secure employment with comfortable salaries, and the majority of whom are heterosexual white males from middle- to upper-middle-class families.

13. Many leftists have an intense identification with the problems of groups that have an image of being weak (women), defeated (American Indians), repellent (homosexuals) or otherwise inferior. The leftists themselves feel that these groups are inferior. They would never admit to themselves that they have such feelings, but it is precisely because they do see these groups as inferior that they identify with their problems. (We do not mean to suggest that women, Indians, etc. ARE inferior; we are only making a point about leftist psychology.)

14. Feminists are desperately anxious to prove that women are as strong and as capable as men. Clearly they are nagged by a fear that women may NOT be as strong and as capable as men.

15. Leftists tend to hate anything that has an image of being strong, good and successful. They hate America, they hate Western civilization, they hate white males, they hate rationality. The reasons that leftists give for hating the West, etc. clearly do not correspond with their real motives. They SAY they hate the West because it is warlike, imperialistic, sexist, ethnocentric and so forth, but where these same faults appear in socialist countries or in primitive cultures, the leftist finds excuses for them, or at best he GRUDGINGLY admits that they exist; whereas he ENTHUSIASTICALLY points out (and often greatly exaggerates) these faults where they appear in Western civilization. Thus it is clear that these faults are not the leftist’s real motive for hating America and the West. He hates America and the West because they are strong and successful.

16. Words like “self-confidence,” “self-reliance,” “initiative,” “enterprise,” “optimism,” etc., play little role in the liberal and leftist vocabulary. The leftist is anti-individualistic, pro-collectivist. He wants society to solve everyone’s problems for them, satisfy everyone’s needs for them, take care of them. He is not the sort of person who has an inner sense of confidence in his ability to solve his own problems and satisfy his own needs. The leftist is antagonistic to the concept of competition because, deep inside, he feels like a loser.

17. Art forms that appeal to modern leftish intellectuals tend to focus on sordidness, defeat and despair, or else they take an orgiastic tone, throwing off rational control as if there were no hope of accomplishing anything through rational calculation and all that was left was to immerse oneself in the sensations of the moment.

18. Modern leftish philosophers tend to dismiss reason, science, objective reality and to insist that everything is culturally relative. It is true that one can ask serious questions about the foundations of scientific knowledge and about how, if at all, the concept of objective reality can be defined. But it is obvious that modern leftish philosophers are not simply cool-headed logicians systematically analyzing the foundations of knowledge. They are deeply involved emotionally in their attack on truth and reality. They attack these concepts because of their own psychological needs. For one thing, their attack is an outlet for hostility, and, to the extent that it is successful, it satisfies the drive for power. More importantly, the leftist hates science and rationality because they classify certain beliefs as true (i.e., successful, superior) and other beliefs as false (i.e., failed, inferior). The leftist’s feelings of inferiority run so deep that he cannot tolerate any classification of some things as successful or superior and other things as failed or inferior. This also underlies the rejection by many leftists of the concept of mental illness and of the utility of IQ tests. Leftists are antagonistic to genetic explanations of human abilities or behavior because such explanations tend to make some persons appear superior or inferior to others. Leftists prefer to give society the credit or blame for an individual’s ability or lack of it. Thus if a person is “inferior” it is not his fault, but society’s, because he has not been brought up properly.

19. The leftist is not typically the kind of person whose feelings of inferiority make him a braggart, an egotist, a bully, a self-promoter, a ruthless competitor. This kind of person has not wholly lost faith in himself. He has a deficit in his sense of power and self-worth, but he can still conceive of himself as having the capacity to be strong, and his efforts to make himself strong produce his unpleasant behavior. [1] But the leftist is too far gone for that. His feelings of inferiority are so ingrained that he cannot conceive of himself as individually strong and valuable. Hence the collectivism of the leftist. He can feel strong only as a member of a large organization or a mass movement with which he identifies himself.

20. Notice the masochistic tendency of leftist tactics. Leftists protest by lying down in front of vehicles, they intentionally provoke police or racists to abuse them, etc. These tactics may often be effective, but many leftists use them not as a means to an end but because they PREFER masochistic tactics. Self-hatred is a leftist trait.

21. Leftists may claim that their activism is motivated by compassion or by moral principles, and moral principle does play a role for the leftist of the oversocialized type. But compassion and moral principle cannot be the main motives for leftist activism. Hostility is too prominent a component of leftist behavior; so is the drive for power. Moreover, much leftist behavior is not rationally calculated to be of benefit to the people whom the leftists claim to be trying to help. For example, if one believes that affirmative action is good for black people, does it make sense to demand affirmative action in hostile or dogmatic terms? Obviously it would be more productive to take a diplomatic and conciliatory approach that would make at least verbal and symbolic concessions to white people who think that affirmative action discriminates against them. But leftist activists do not take such an approach because it would not satisfy their emotional needs. Helping black people is not their real goal. Instead, race problems serve as an excuse for them to express their own hostility and frustrated need for power. In doing so they actually harm black people, because the activists’ hostile attitude toward the white majority tends to intensify race hatred.

22. If our society had no social problems at all, the leftists would have to INVENT problems in order to provide themselves with an excuse for making a fuss.

23. We emphasize that the foregoing does not pretend to be an accurate description of everyone who might be considered a leftist. It is only a rough indication of a general tendency of leftism.

OVERSOCIALIZATION

24. Psychologists use the term “socialization” to designate the process by which children are trained to think and act as society demands. A person is said to be well socialized if he believes in and obeys the moral code of his society and fits in well as a functioning part of that society. It may seem senseless to say that many leftists are oversocialized, since the leftist is perceived as a rebel. Nevertheless, the position can be defended. Many leftists are not such rebels as they seem.

25. The moral code of our society is so demanding that no one can think, feel and act in a completely moral way. For example, we are not supposed to hate anyone, yet almost everyone hates somebody at some time or other, whether he admits it to himself or not. Some people are so highly socialized that the attempt to think, feel and act morally imposes a severe burden on them. In order to avoid feelings of guilt, they continually have to deceive themselves about their own motives and find moral explanations for feelings and actions that in reality have a non-moral origin. We use the term “oversocialized” to describe such people. [2]

26. Oversocialization can lead to low self-esteem, a sense of powerlessness, defeatism, guilt, etc. One of the most important means by which our society socializes children is by making them feel ashamed of behavior or speech that is contrary to society’s expectations. If this is overdone, or if a particular child is especially susceptible to such feelings, he ends by feeling ashamed of HIMSELF. Moreover the thought and the behavior of the oversocialized person are more restricted by society’s expectations than are those of the lightly socialized person. The majority of people engage in a significant amount of naughty behavior. They lie, they commit petty thefts, they break traffic laws, they goof off at work, they hate someone, they say spiteful things or they use some underhanded trick to get ahead of the other guy. The oversocialized person cannot do these things, or if he does do them he generates in himself a sense of shame and self-hatred. The oversocialized person cannot even experience, without guilt, thoughts or feelings that are contrary to the accepted morality; he cannot think “unclean” thoughts. And socialization is not just a matter of morality; we are socialized to conform to many norms of behavior that do not fall under the heading of morality. Thus the oversocialized person is kept on a psychological leash and spends his life running on rails that society has laid down for him. In many oversocialized people this results in a sense of constraint and powerlessness that can be a severe hardship. We suggest that oversocialization is among the more serious cruelties that human beings inflict on one another.

27. We argue that a very important and influential segment of the modern left is oversocialized and that their oversocialization is of great importance in determining the direction of modern leftism. Leftists of the oversocialized type tend to be intellectuals or members of the upper-middle class. Notice that university intellectuals [3] constitute the most highly socialized segment of our society and also the most left-wing segment.

28. The leftist of the oversocialized type tries to get off his psychological leash and assert his autonomy by rebelling. But usually he is not strong enough to rebel against the most basic values of society. Generally speaking, the goals of today’s leftists are NOT in conflict with the accepted morality. On the contrary, the left takes an accepted moral principle, adopts it as its own, and then accuses mainstream society of violating that principle. Examples: racial equality, equality of the sexes, helping poor people, peace as opposed to war, nonviolence generally, freedom of expression, kindness to animals. More fundamentally, the duty of the individual to serve society and the duty of society to take care of the individual. All these have been deeply rooted values of our society (or at least of its middle and upper classes [4] for a long time. These values are explicitly or implicitly expressed or presupposed in most of the material presented to us by the mainstream communications media and the educational system. Leftists, especially those of the oversocialized type, usually do not rebel against these principles but justify their hostility to society by claiming (with some degree of truth) that society is not living up to these principles.

29. Here is an illustration of the way in which the oversocialized leftist shows his real attachment to the conventional attitudes of our society while pretending to be in rebellion against it. Many leftists push for affirmative action, for moving black people into high-prestige jobs, for improved education in black schools and more money for such schools; the way of life of the black “underclass” they regard as a social disgrace. They want to integrate the black man into the system, make him a business executive, a lawyer, a scientist just like upper-middle-class white people. The leftists will reply that the last thing they want is to make the black man into a copy of the white man; instead, they want to preserve African American culture. But in what does this preservation of African American culture consist? It can hardly consist in anything more than eating black-style food, listening to black-style music, wearing black-style clothing and going to a black- style church or mosque. In other words, it can express itself only in superficial matters. In all ESSENTIAL respects most leftists of the oversocialized type want to make the black man conform to white, middle-class ideals. They want to make him study technical subjects, become an executive or a scientist, spend his life climbing the status ladder to prove that black people are as good as white. They want to make black fathers “responsible,” they want black gangs to become nonviolent, etc. But these are exactly the values of the industrial-technological system. The system couldn’t care less what kind of music a man listens to, what kind of clothes he wears or what religion he believes in as long as he studies in school, holds a respectable job, climbs the status ladder, is a “responsible” parent, is nonviolent and so forth. In effect, however much he may deny it, the oversocialized leftist wants to integrate the black man into the system and make him adopt its values.

30. We certainly do not claim that leftists, even of the oversocialized type, NEVER rebel against the fundamental values of our society. Clearly they sometimes do. Some oversocialized leftists have gone so far as to rebel against one of modern society’s most important principles by engaging in physical violence. By their own account, violence is for them a form of “liberation.” In other words, by committing violence they break through the psychological restraints that have been trained into them. Because they are oversocialized these restraints have been more confining for them than for others; hence their need to break free of them. But they usually justify their rebellion in terms of mainstream values. If they engage in violence they claim to be fighting against racism or the like.

31. We realize that many objections could be raised to the foregoing thumbnail sketch of leftist psychology. The real situation is complex, and anything like a complete description of it would take several volumes even if the necessary data were available. We claim only to have indicated very roughly the two most important tendencies in the psychology of modern leftism.

32. The problems of the leftist are indicative of the problems of our society as a whole. Low self-esteem, depressive tendencies and defeatism are not restricted to the left. Though they are especially noticeable in the left, they are widespread in our society. And today’s society tries to socialize us to a greater extent than any previous society. We are even told by experts how to eat, how to exercise, how to make love, how to raise our kids and so forth.

THE POWER PROCESS

33. Human beings have a need (probably based in biology) for something that we will call the “power process.” This is closely related to the need for power (which is widely recognized) but is not quite the same thing. The power process has four elements. The three most clear-cut of these we call goal, effort and attainment of goal. (Everyone needs to have goals whose attainment requires effort, and needs to succeed in attaining at least some of his goals.) The fourth element is more difficult to define and may not be necessary for everyone. We call it autonomy and will discuss it later (paragraphs 42-44).

34. Consider the hypothetical case of a man who can have anything he wants just by wishing for it. Such a man has power, but he will develop serious psychological problems. At first he will have a lot of fun, but by and by he will become acutely bored and demoralized. Eventually he may become clinically depressed. History shows that leisured aristocracies tend to become decadent. This is not true of fighting aristocracies that have to struggle to maintain their power. But leisured, secure aristocracies that have no need to exert themselves usually become bored, hedonistic and demoralized, even though they have power. This shows that power is not enough. One must have goals toward which to exercise one’s power.

35. Everyone has goals; if nothing else, to obtain the physical necessities of life: food, water and whatever clothing and shelter are made necessary by the climate. But the leisured aristocrat obtains these things without effort. Hence his boredom and demoralization.

36. Nonattainment of important goals results in death if the goals are physical necessities, and in frustration if nonattainment of the goals is compatible with survival. Consistent failure to attain goals throughout life results in defeatism, low self-esteem or depression.

37, Thus, in order to avoid serious psychological problems, a human being needs goals whose attainment requires effort, and he must have a reasonable rate of success in attaining his goals.

SURROGATE ACTIVITIES

38. But not every leisured aristocrat becomes bored and demoralized. For example, the emperor Hirohito, instead of sinking into decadent hedonism, devoted himself to marine biology, a field in which he became distinguished. When people do not have to exert themselves to satisfy their physical needs they often set up artificial goals for themselves. In many cases they then pursue these goals with the same energy and emotional involvement that they otherwise would have put into the search for physical necessities. Thus the aristocrats of the Roman Empire had their literary pretensions; many European aristocrats a few centuries ago invested tremendous time and energy in hunting, though they certainly didn’t need the meat; other aristocracies have competed for status through elaborate displays of wealth; and a few aristocrats, like Hirohito, have turned to science.

39. We use the term “surrogate activity” to designate an activity that is directed toward an artificial goal that people set up for themselves merely in order to have some goal to work toward, or let us say, merely for the sake of the “fulfillment” that they get from pursuing the goal. Here is a rule of thumb for the identification of surrogate activities. Given a person who devotes much time and energy to the pursuit of goal X, ask yourself this: If he had to devote most of his time and energy to satisfying his biological needs, and if that effort required him to use his physical and mental faculties in a varied and interesting way, would he feel seriously deprived because he did not attain goal X? If the answer is no, then the person’s pursuit of goal X is a surrogate activity. Hirohito’s studies in marine biology clearly constituted a surrogate activity, since it is pretty certain that if Hirohito had had to spend his time working at interesting non-scientific tasks in order to obtain the necessities of life, he would not have felt deprived because he didn’t know all about the anatomy and life-cycles of marine animals. On the other hand the pursuit of sex and love (for example) is not a surrogate activity, because most people, even if their existence were otherwise satisfactory, would feel deprived if they passed their lives without ever having a relationship with a member of the opposite sex. (But pursuit of an excessive amount of sex, more than one really needs, can be a surrogate activity.)

40. In modern industrial society only minimal effort is necessary to satisfy one’s physical needs. It is enough to go through a training program to acquire some petty technical skill, then come to work on time and exert the very modest effort needed to hold a job. The only requirements are a moderate amount of intelligence and, most of all, simple OBEDIENCE. If one has those, society takes care of one from cradle to grave. (Yes, there is an underclass that cannot take the physical necessities for granted, but we are speaking here of mainstream society.) Thus it is not surprising that modern society is full of surrogate activities. These include scientific work, athletic achievement, humanitarian work, artistic and literary creation, climbing the corporate ladder, acquisition of money and material goods far beyond the point at which they cease to give any additional physical satisfaction, and social activism when it addresses issues that are not important for the activist personally, as in the case of white activists who work for the rights of nonwhite minorities. These are not always PURE surrogate activities, since for many people they may be motivated in part by needs other than the need to have some goal to pursue. Scientific work may be motivated in part by a drive for prestige, artistic creation by a need to express feelings, militant social activism by hostility. But for most people who pursue them, these activities are in large part surrogate activities. For example, the majority of scientists will probably agree that the “fulfillment” they get from their work is more important than the money and prestige they earn.

41. For many if not most people, surrogate activities are less satisfying than the pursuit of real goals (that is, goals that people would want to attain even if their need for the power process were already fulfilled). One indication of this is the fact that, in many or most cases, people who are deeply involved in surrogate activities are never satisfied, never at rest. Thus the money-maker constantly strives for more and more wealth. The scientist no sooner solves one problem than he moves on to the next. The long-distance runner drives himself to run always farther and faster. Many people who pursue surrogate activities will say that they get far more fulfillment from these activities than they do from the “mundane” business of satisfying their biological needs, but that is because in our society the effort needed to satisfy the biological needs has been reduced to triviality. More importantly, in our society people do not satisfy their biological needs AUTONOMOUSLY but by functioning as parts of an immense social machine. In contrast, people generally have a great deal of autonomy in pursuing their surrogate activities.

AUTONOMY

42. Autonomy as a part of the power process may not be necessary for every individual. But most people need a greater or lesser degree of autonomy in working toward their goals. Their efforts must be undertaken on their own initiative and must be under their own direction and control. Yet most people do not have to exert this initiative, direction and control as single individuals. It is usually enough to act as a member of a SMALL group. Thus if half a dozen people discuss a goal among themselves and make a successful joint effort to attain that goal, their need for the power process will be served. But if they work under rigid orders handed down from above that leave them no room for autonomous decision and initiative, then their need for the power process will not be served. The same is true when decisions are made on a collective basis if the group making the collective decision is so large that the role of each individual is insignificant. [5]

43. It is true that some individuals seem to have little need for autonomy. Either their drive for power is weak or they satisfy it by identifying themselves with some powerful organization to which they belong. And then there are unthinking, animal types who seem to be satisfied with a purely physical sense of power (the good combat soldier, who gets his sense of power by developing fighting skills that he is quite content to use in blind obedience to his superiors).

44. But for most people it is through the power process—having a goal, making an AUTONOMOUS effort and attaining the goal—that self-esteem, self-confidence and a sense of power are acquired. When one does not have adequate opportunity to go through the power process the consequences are (depending on the individual and on the way the power process is disrupted) boredom, demoralization, low self-esteem, inferiority feelings, defeatism, depression, anxiety, guilt, frustration, hostility, spouse or child abuse, insatiable hedonism, abnormal sexual behavior, sleep disorders, eating disorders, etc. [6]

SOURCES OF SOCIAL PROBLEMS

45. Any of the foregoing symptoms can occur in any society, but in modern industrial society they are present on a massive scale. We aren’t the first to mention that the world today seems to be going crazy. This sort of thing is not normal for human societies. There is good reason to believe that primitive man suffered from less stress and frustration and was better satisfied with his way of life than modern man is. It is true that not all was sweetness and light in primitive societies. Abuse of women was common among the Australian aborigines, transexuality was fairly common among some of the American Indian tribes. But it does appear that GENERALLY SPEAKING the kinds of problems that we have listed in the preceding paragraph were far less common among primitive peoples than they are in modern society.

46. We attribute the social and psychological problems of modern society to the fact that that society requires people to live under conditions radically different from those under which the human race evolved and to behave in ways that conflict with the patterns of behavior that the human race developed while living under the earlier conditions. It is clear from what we have already written that we consider lack of opportunity to properly experience the power process as the most important of the abnormal conditions to which modern society subjects people. But it is not the only one. Before dealing with disruption of the power process as a source of social problems we will discuss some of the other sources.

47. Among the abnormal conditions present in modern industrial society are excessive density of population, isolation of man from nature, excessive rapidity of social change and the breakdown of natural small-scale communities such as the extended family, the village or the tribe.

48. It is well known that crowding increases stress and aggression. The degree of crowding that exists today and the isolation of man from nature are consequences of technological progress. All pre-industrial societies were predominantly rural. The Industrial Revolution vastly increased the size of cities and the proportion of the population that lives in them, and modern agricultural technology has made it possible for the Earth to support a far denser population than it ever did before. (Also, technology exacerbates the effects of crowding because it puts increased disruptive powers in people’s hands. For example, a variety of noise- making devices: power mowers, radios, motorcycles, etc. If the use of these devices is unrestricted, people who want peace and quiet are frustrated by the noise. If their use is restricted, people who use the devices are frustrated by the regulations. But if these machines had never been invented there would have been no conflict and no frustration generated by them.)

49. For primitive societies the natural world (which usually changes only slowly) provided a stable framework and therefore a sense of security. In the modern world it is human society that dominates nature rather than the other way around, and modern society changes very rapidly owing to technological change. Thus there is no stable framework.

50. The conservatives are fools: They whine about the decay of traditional values, yet they enthusiastically support technological progress and economic growth. Apparently it never occurs to them that you can’t make rapid, drastic changes in the technology and the economy of a society without causing rapid changes in all other aspects of the society as well, and that such rapid changes inevitably break down traditional values.

51. The breakdown of traditional values to some extent implies the breakdown of the bonds that hold together traditional small-scale social groups. The disintegration of small-scale social groups is also promoted by the fact that modern conditions often require or tempt individuals to move to new locations, separating themselves from their communities. Beyond that, a technological society HAS TO weaken family ties and local communities if it is to function efficiently. In modern society an individual’s loyalty must be first to the system and only secondarily to a small-scale community, because if the internal loyalties of small-scale communities were stronger than loyalty to the system, such communities would pursue their own advantage at the expense of the system.

52. Suppose that a public official or a corporation executive appoints his cousin, his friend or his co- religionist to a position rather than appointing the person best qualified for the job. He has permitted personal loyalty to supersede his loyalty to the system, and that is “nepotism” or “discrimination,” both of which are terrible sins in modern society. Would-be industrial societies that have done a poor job of subordinating personal or local loyalties to loyalty to the system are usually very inefficient. (Look at Latin America.) Thus an advanced industrial society can tolerate only those small-scale communities that are emasculated, tamed and made into tools of the system. [7]

53. Crowding, rapid change and the breakdown of communities have been widely recognized as sources of social problems. But we do not believe they are enough to account for the extent of the problems that are seen today.

54. A few pre-industrial cities were very large and crowded, yet their inhabitants do not seem to have suffered from psychological problems to the same extent as modern man. In America today there still are uncrowded rural areas, and we find there the same problems as in urban areas, though the problems tend to be less acute in the rural areas. Thus crowding does not seem to be the decisive factor.

55. On the growing edge of the American frontier during the 19th century, the mobility of the population probably broke down extended families and small-scale social groups to at least the same extent as these are broken down today. In fact, many nuclear families lived by choice in such isolation, having no neighbors within several miles, that they belonged to no community at all, yet they do not seem to have developed problems as a result.

56. Furthermore, change in American frontier society was very rapid and deep. A man might be born and raised in a log cabin, outside the reach of law and order and fed largely on wild meat; and by the time he arrived at old age he might be working at a regular job and living in an ordered community with effective law enforcement. This was a deeper change than that which typically occurs in the life of a modern individual, yet it does not seem to have led to psychological problems. In fact, 19th century American society had an optimistic and self-confident tone, quite unlike that of today’s society. [8]

57. The difference, we argue, is that modern man has the sense (largely justified) that change is IMPOSED on him, whereas the 19th century frontiersman had the sense (also largely justified) that he created change himself, by his own choice. Thus a pioneer settled on a piece of land of his own choosing and made it into a farm through his own effort. In those days an entire county might have only a couple of hundred inhabitants and was a far more isolated and autonomous entity than a modern county is. Hence the pioneer farmer participated as a member of a relatively small group in the creation of a new, ordered community. One may well question whether the creation of this community was an improvement, but at any rate it satisfied the pioneer’s need for the power process.

58. It would be possible to give other examples of societies in which there has been rapid change and/or lack of close community ties without the kind of massive behavioral aberration that is seen in today’s industrial society. We contend that the most important cause of social and psychological problems in modern society is the fact that people have insufficient opportunity to go through the power process in a normal way. We don’t mean to say that modern society is the only one in which the power process has been disrupted. Probably most if not all civilized societies have interfered with the power process to a greater or lesser extent. But in modern industrial society the problem has become particularly acute. Leftism, at least in its recent (mid- to late-20th century) form, is in part a symptom of deprivation with respect to the power process.

DISRUPTION OF THE POWER PROCESS IN MODERN SOCIETY

59. We divide human drives into three groups: (1) those drives that can be satisfied with minimal effort; (2) those that can be satisfied but only at the cost of serious effort; (3) those that cannot be adequately satisfied no matter how much effort one makes. The power process is the process of satisfying the drives of the second group. The more drives there are in the third group, the more there is frustration, anger, eventually defeatism, depression, etc.

60. In modern industrial society natural human drives tend to be pushed into the first and third groups, and the second group tends to consist increasingly of artificially created drives.

61. In primitive societies, physical necessities generally fall into group 2: They can be obtained, but only at the cost of serious effort. But modern society tends to guaranty the physical necessities to everyone [9] in exchange for only minimal effort, hence physical needs are pushed into group 1. (There may be disagreement about whether the effort needed to hold a job is “minimal”; but usually, in lower- to middle- level jobs, whatever effort is required is merely that of OBEDIENCE. You sit or stand where you are told to sit or stand and do what you are told to do in the way you are told to do it. Seldom do you have to exert yourself seriously, and in any case you have hardly any autonomy in work, so that the need for the power process is not well served.)

62. Social needs, such as sex, love and status, often remain in group 2 in modern society, depending on the situation of the individual. [10] But, except for people who have a particularly strong drive for status, the effort required to fulfill the social drives is insufficient to satisfy adequately the need for the power process.

63. So certain artificial needs have been created that fall into group 2, hence serve the need for the power process. Advertising and marketing techniques have been developed that make many people feel they need things that their grandparents never desired or even dreamed of. It requires serious effort to earn enough money to satisfy these artificial needs, hence they fall into group 2. (But see paragraphs 80-82.) Modern man must satisfy his need for the power process largely through pursuit of the artificial needs created by the advertising and marketing industry [11], and through surrogate activities.

64. It seems that for many people, maybe the majority, these artificial forms of the power process are insufficient. A theme that appears repeatedly in the writings of the social critics of the second half of the 20th century is the sense of purposelessness that afflicts many people in modern society. (This purposelessness is often called by other names such as “anomic” or “middle-class vacuity.”) We suggest that the so-called “identity crisis” is actually a search for a sense of purpose, often for commitment to a suitable surrogate activity. It may be that existentialism is in large part a response to the purposelessness of modern life. [12] Very widespread in modern society is the search for “fulfillment.” But we think that for the majority of people an activity whose main goal is fulfillment (that is, a surrogate activity) does not bring completely satisfactory fulfillment. In other words, it does not fully satisfy the need for the power process. (See paragraph 41.) That need can be fully satisfied only through activities that have some external goal, such as physical necessities, sex, love, status, revenge, etc.

65. Moreover, where goals are pursued through earning money, climbing the status ladder or functioning as part of the system in some other way, most people are not in a position to pursue their goals AUTONOMOUSLY. Most workers are someone else’s employee and, as we pointed out in paragraph 61, must spend their days doing what they are told to do in the way they are told to do it. Even people who are in business for themselves have only limited autonomy. It is a chronic complaint of small-business persons and entrepreneurs that their hands are tied by excessive government regulation. Some of these regulations are doubtless unnecessary, but for the most part government regulations are essential and inevitable parts of our extremely complex society. A large portion of small business today operates on the franchise system. It was reported in the Wall Street Journal a few years ago that many of the franchise-granting companies require applicants for franchises to take a personality test that is designed to EXCLUDE those who have creativity and initiative, because such persons are not sufficiently docile to go along obediently with the franchise system. This excludes from small business many of the people who most need autonomy.

66. Today people live more by virtue of what the system does FOR them or TO them than by virtue of what they do for themselves. And what they do for themselves is done more and more along channels laid down by the system. Opportunities tend to be those that the system provides, the opportunities must be exploited in accord with rules and regulations [13], and techniques prescribed by experts must be followed if there is to be a chance of success.

67. Thus the power process is disrupted in our society through a deficiency of real goals and a deficiency of autonomy in the pursuit of goals. But it is also disrupted because of those human drives that fall into group 3: the drives that one cannot adequately satisfy no matter how much effort one makes. One of these drives is the need for security. Our lives depend on decisions made by other people; we have no control over these decisions and usually we do not even know the people who make them. (“We live in a world in which relatively few people—maybe 500 or 1,000—make the important decisions”—Philip B. Heymann of Harvard Law School, quoted by Anthony Lewis, New York Times, April 21, 1995.) Our lives depend on whether safety standards at a nuclear power plant are properly maintained; on how much pesticide is allowed to get into our food or how much pollution into our air; on how skillful (or incompetent) our doctor is; whether we lose or get a job may depend on decisions made by government economists or corporation executives; and so forth. Most individuals are not in a position to secure themselves against these threats to more [than] a very limited extent. The individual’s search for security is therefore frustrated, which leads to a sense of powerlessness.

68. It may be objected that primitive man is physically less secure than modern man, as is shown by his shorter life expectancy; hence modern man suffers from less, not more than the amount of insecurity that is normal for human beings. But psychological security does not closely correspond with physical security. What makes us FEEL secure is not so much objective security as a sense of confidence in our ability to take care of ourselves. Primitive man, threatened by a fierce animal or by hunger, can fight in self-defense or travel in search of food. He has no certainty of success in these efforts, but he is by no means helpless against the things that threaten him. The modern individual on the other hand is threatened by many things against which he is helpless: nuclear accidents, carcinogens in food, environmental pollution, war, increasing taxes, invasion of his privacy by large organizations, nationwide social or economic phenomena that may disrupt his way of life.

69. It is true that primitive man is powerless against some of the things that threaten him; disease for example. But he can accept the risk of disease stoically. It is part of the nature of things, it is no one’s fault, unless it is the fault of some imaginary, impersonal demon. But threats to the modern individual tend to be MAN-MADE. They are not the results of chance but are IMPOSED on him by other persons whose decisions he, as an individual, is unable to influence. Consequently he feels frustrated, humiliated and angry.

70. Thus primitive man for the most part has his security in his own hands (either as an individual or as a member of a SMALL group) whereas the security of modern man is in the hands of persons or organizations that are too remote or too large for him to be able personally to influence them. So modern man’s drive for security tends to fall into groups 1 and 3; in some areas (food, shelter etc.) his security is assured at the cost of only trivial effort, whereas in other areas he CANNOT attain security. (The foregoing greatly simplifies the real situation, but it does indicate in a rough, general way how the condition of modern man differs from that of primitive man.)

71. People have many transitory drives or impulses that are necessarily frustrated in modern life, hence fall into group 3. One may become angry, but modern society cannot permit fighting. In many situations it does not even permit verbal aggression. When going somewhere one may be in a hurry, or one may be in a mood to travel slowly, but one generally has no choice but to move with the flow of traffic and obey the traffic signals. One may want to do one’s work in a different way, but usually one can work only according to the rules laid down by one’s employer. In many other ways as well, modern man is strapped down by a network of rules and regulations (explicit or implicit) that frustrate many of his impulses and thus interfere with the power process. Most of these regulations cannot be dispensed with, because they are necessary for the functioning of industrial society.

72. Modern society is in certain respects extremely permissive. In matters that are irrelevant to the functioning of the system we can generally do what we please. We can believe in any religion we like (as long as it does not encourage behavior that is dangerous to the system). We can go to bed with anyone we like (as long as we practice “safe sex”). We can do anything we like as long as it is UNIMPORTANT. But in all IMPORTANT matters the system tends increasingly to regulate our behavior.

73. Behavior is regulated not only through explicit rules and not only by the government. Control is often exercised through indirect coercion or through psychological pressure or manipulation, and by organizations other than the government, or by the system as a whole. Most large organizations use some form of propaganda [14] to manipulate public attitudes or behavior. Propaganda is not limited to “commercials” and advertisements, and sometimes it is not even consciously intended as propaganda by the people who make it. For instance, the content of entertainment programming is a powerful form of propaganda. An example of indirect coercion: There is no law that says we have to go to work every day and follow our employer’s orders. Legally there is nothing to prevent us from going to live in the wild like primitive people or from going into business for ourselves. But in practice there is very little wild country left, and there is room in the economy for only a limited number of small business owners. Hence most of us can survive only as someone else’s employee.

74. We suggest that modern man’s obsession with longevity, and with maintaining physical vigor and sexual attractiveness to an advanced age, is a symptom of unfulfillment resulting from deprivation with respect to the power process. The “mid-life crisis” also is such a symptom. So is the lack of interest in having children that is fairly common in modern society but almost unheard-of in primitive societies.

75. In primitive societies life is a succession of stages. The needs and purposes of one stage having been fulfilled, there is no particular reluctance about passing on to the next stage. A young man goes through the power process by becoming a hunter, hunting not for sport or for fulfillment but to get meat that is necessary for food. (In young women the process is more complex, with greater emphasis on social power; we won’t discuss that here.) This phase having been successfully passed through, the young man has no reluctance about settling down to the responsibilities of raising a family. (In contrast, some modern people indefinitely postpone having children because they are too busy seeking some kind of “fulfillment.” We suggest that the fulfillment they need is adequate experience of the power process—with real goals instead of the artificial goals of surrogate activities.) Again, having successfully raised his children, going through the power process by providing them with the physical necessities, the primitive man feels that his work is done and he is prepared to accept old age (if he survives that long) and death. Many modern people, on the other hand, are disturbed by the prospect of physical deterioration and death, as is shown by the amount of effort they expend trying to maintain their physical condition, appearance and health. We argue that this is due to unfulfillment resulting from the fact that they have never put their physical powers to any practical use, have never gone through the power process using their bodies in a serious way. It is not the primitive man, who has used his body daily for practical purposes, who fears the deterioration of age, but the modern man, who has never had a practical use for his body beyond walking from his car to his house. It is the man whose need for the power process has been satisfied during his life who is best prepared to accept the end of that life.

76. In response to the arguments of this section someone will say, “Society must find a way to give people the opportunity to go through the power process.” For such people the value of the opportunity is destroyed by the very fact that society gives it to them. What they need is to find or make their own opportunities. As long as the system GIVES them their opportunities it still has them on a leash. To attain autonomy they must get off that leash.

HOW SOME PEOPLE ADJUST

77. Not everyone in industrial-technological society suffers from psychological problems. Some people even profess to be quite satisfied with society as it is. We now discuss some of the reasons why people differ so greatly in their response to modern society.

78. First, there doubtless are differences in the strength of the drive for power. Individuals with a weak drive for power may have relatively little need to go through the power process, or at least relatively little need for autonomy in the power process. These are docile types who would have been happy as plantation darkies in the Old South. (We don’t mean to sneer at the “plantation darkies” of the Old South. To their credit, most of the slaves were NOT content with their servitude. We do sneer at people who ARE content with servitude.)

79. Some people may have some exceptional drive, in pursuing which they satisfy their need for the power process. For example, those who have an unusually strong drive for social status may spend their whole lives climbing the status ladder without ever getting bored with that game.

80. People vary in their susceptibility to advertising and marketing techniques. Some are so susceptible that, even if they make a great deal of money, they cannot satisfy their constant craving for the the shiny new toys that the marketing industry dangles before their eyes. So they always feel hard-pressed financially even if their income is large, and their cravings are frustrated.

81. Some people have low susceptibility to advertising and marketing techniques. These are the people who aren’t interested in money. Material acquisition does not serve their need for the power process.

82. People who have medium susceptibility to advertising and marketing techniques are able to earn enough money to satisfy their craving for goods and services, but only at the cost of serious effort (putting in overtime, taking a second job, earning promotions, etc.). Thus material acquisition serves their need for the power process. But it does not necessarily follow that their need is fully satisfied. They may have insufficient autonomy in the power process (their work may consist of following orders) and some of their drives may be frustrated (e.g., security, aggression). (We are guilty of oversimplification in paragraphs 80- 82 because we have assumed that the desire for material acquisition is entirely a creation of the advertising and marketing industry. Of course it’s not that simple. [11]

83. Some people partly satisfy their need for power by identifying themselves with a powerful organization or mass movement. An individual lacking goals or power joins a movement or an organization, adopts its goals as his own, then works toward those goals. When some of the goals are attained, the individual, even though his personal efforts have played only an insignificant part in the attainment of the goals, feels (through his identification with the movement or organization) as if he had gone through the power process. This phenomenon was exploited by the fascists, nazis and communists. Our society uses it too, though less crudely. Example: Manuel Noriega was an irritant to the U.S. (goal: punish Noriega). The U.S. invaded Panama (effort) and punished Noriega (attainment of goal). Thus the U.S. went through the power process and many Americans, because of their identification with the U.S., experienced the power process vicariously. Hence the widespread public approval of the Panama invasion; it gave people a sense of power. [15] We see the same phenomenon in armies, corporations, political parties, humanitarian organizations, religious or ideological movements. In particular, leftist movements tend to attract people who are seeking to satisfy their need for power. But for most people identification with a large organization or a mass movement does not fully satisfy the need for power.

84. Another way in which people satisfy their need for the power process is through surrogate activities. As we explained in paragraphs 38-40, a surrogate activity is an activity that is directed toward an artificial goal that the individual pursues for the sake of the “fulfillment” that he gets from pursuing the goal, not because he needs to attain the goal itself. For instance, there is no practical motive for building enormous muscles, hitting a little ball into a hole or acquiring a complete series of postage stamps. Yet many people in our society devote themselves with passion to bodybuilding, golf or stamp-collecting. Some people are more “other-directed” than others, and therefore will more readily attach importance to a surrogate activity simply because the people around them treat it as important or because society tells them it is important. That is why some people get very serious about essentially trivial activities such as sports, or bridge, or chess, or arcane scholarly pursuits, whereas others who are more clear-sighted never see these things as anything but the surrogate activities that they are, and consequently never attach enough importance to them to satisfy their need for the power process in that way. It only remains to point out that in many cases a person’s way of earning a living is also a surrogate activity. Not a PURE surrogate activity, since part of the motive for the activity is to gain the physical necessities and (for some people) social status and the luxuries that advertising makes them want. But many people put into their work far more effort than is necessary to earn whatever money and status they require, and this extra effort constitutes a surrogate activity. This extra effort, together with the emotional investment that accompanies it, is one of the most potent forces acting toward the continual development and perfecting of the system, with negative consequences for individual freedom (see paragraph 131). Especially, for the most creative scientists and engineers, work tends to be largely a surrogate activity. This point is so important that it deserves a separate discussion, which we shall give in a moment (paragraphs 87-92).

85. In this section we have explained how many people in modern society do satisfy their need for the power process to a greater or lesser extent. But we think that for the majority of people the need for the power process is not fully satisfied. In the first place, those who have an insatiable drive for status, or who get firmly “hooked” on a surrogate activity, or who identify strongly enough with a movement or organization to satisfy their need for power in that way, are exceptional personalities. Others are not fully satisfied with surrogate activities or by identification with an organization (see paragraphs 41, 64). In the second place, too much control is imposed by the system through explicit regulation or through socialization, which results in a deficiency of autonomy, and in frustration due to the impossibility of attaining certain goals and the necessity of restraining too many impulses.

86. But even if most people in industrial-technological society were well satisfied, we (FC) would still be opposed to that form of society, because (among other reasons) we consider it demeaning to fulfill one’s need for the power process through surrogate activities or through identification with an organization, rather than through pursuit of real goals.

THE MOTIVES OF SCIENTISTS

87. Science and technology provide the most important examples of surrogate activities. Some scientists claim that they are motivated by “curiosity” or by a desire to “benefit humanity.” But it is easy to see that neither of these can be the principal motive of most scientists. As for “curiosity,” that notion is simply absurd. Most scientists work on highly specialized problems that are not the object of any normal curiosity. For example, is an astronomer, a mathematician or an entomologist curious about the properties of isopropyltrimethylmethane? Of course not. Only a chemist is curious about such a thing, and he is curious about it only because chemistry is his surrogate activity. Is the chemist curious about the appropriate classification of a new species of beetle? No. That question is of interest only to the entomologist, and he is interested in it only because entomology is his surrogate activity. If the chemist and the entomologist had to exert themselves seriously to obtain the physical necessities, and if that effort exercised their abilities in an interesting way but in some nonscientific pursuit, then they wouldn’t give a damn about isopropyltrimethylmethane or the classification of beetles. Suppose that lack of funds for postgraduate education had led the chemist to become an insurance broker instead of a chemist. In that case he would have been very interested in insurance matters but would have cared nothing about isopropyltrimethylmethane. In any case it is not normal to put into the satisfaction of mere curiosity the amount of time and effort that scientists put into their work. The “curiosity” explanation for the scientists’ motive just doesn’t stand up.

88. The “benefit of humanity” explanation doesn’t work any better. Some scientific work has no conceivable relation to the welfare of the human race—most of archaeology or comparative linguistics for example. Some other areas of science present obviously dangerous possibilities. Yet scientists in these areas are just as enthusiastic about their work as those who develop vaccines or study air pollution. Consider the case of Dr. Edward Teller, who had an obvious emotional involvement in promoting nuclear power plants. Did this involvement stem from a desire to benefit humanity? If so, then why didn’t Dr. Teller get emotional about other “humanitarian” causes? If he was such a humanitarian then why did he help to develop the H- bomb? As with many other scientific achievements, it is very much open to question whether nuclear power plants actually do benefit humanity. Does the cheap electricity outweigh the accumulating waste and the risk of accidents? Dr. Teller saw only one side of the question. Clearly his emotional involvement with nuclear power arose not from a desire to “benefit humanity” but from a personal fulfillment he got from his work and from seeing it put to practical use.

89. The same is true of scientists generally. With possible rare exceptions, their motive is neither curiosity nor a desire to benefit humanity but the need to go through the power process: to have a goal (a scientific problem to solve), to make an effort (research) and to attain the goal (solution of the problem.) Science is a surrogate activity because scientists work mainly for the fulfillment they get out of the work itself.

90. Of course, it’s not that simple. Other motives do play a role for many scientists. Money and status for example. Some scientists may be persons of the type who have an insatiable drive for status (see paragraph 79) and this may provide much of the motivation for their work. No doubt the majority of scientists, like the majority of the general population, are more or less susceptible to advertising and marketing techniques and need money to satisfy their craving for goods and services. Thus science is not a PURE surrogate activity. But it is in large part a surrogate activity.

91. Also, science and technology constitute a power mass movement, and many scientists gratify their need for power through identification with this mass movement (see paragraph 83).

92. Thus science marches on blindly, without regard to the real welfare of the human race or to any other standard, obedient only to the psychological needs of the scientists and of the government officials and corporation executives who provide the funds for research.

THE NATURE OF FREEDOM

93. We are going to argue that industrial-technological society cannot be reformed in such a way as to prevent it from progressively narrowing the sphere of human freedom. But, because “freedom” is a word that can be interpreted in many ways, we must first make clear what kind of freedom we are concerned with.

94. By “freedom” we mean the opportunity to go through the power process, with real goals not the artificial goals of surrogate activities, and without interference, manipulation or supervision from anyone, especially from any large organization. Freedom means being in control (either as an individual or as a member of a SMALL group) of the life-and-death issues of one’s existence; food, clothing, shelter and defense against whatever threats there may be in one’s environment. Freedom means having power; not the power to control other people but the power to control the circumstances of one’s own life. One does not have freedom if anyone else (especially a large organization) has power over one, no matter how benevolently, tolerantly and permissively that power may be exercised. It is important not to confuse freedom with mere permissiveness (see paragraph 72).

95. It is said that we live in a free society because we have a certain number of constitutionally guaranteed rights. But these are not as important as they seem. The degree of personal freedom that exists in a society is determined more by the economic and technological structure of the society than by its laws or its form of government. [16] Most of the Indian nations of New England were monarchies, and many of the cities of the Italian Renaissance were controlled by dictators. But in reading about these societies one gets the impression that they allowed far more personal freedom than our society does. In part this was because they lacked efficient mechanisms for enforcing the ruler’s will: There were no modern, well-organized police forces, no rapid long-distance communications, no surveillance cameras, no dossiers of information about the lives of average citizens. Hence it was relatively easy to evade control.

96. As for our constitutional rights, consider for example that of freedom of the press. We certainly don’t mean to knock that right; it is very important tool for limiting concentration of political power and for keeping those who do have political power in line by publicly exposing any misbehavior on their part. But freedom of the press is of very little use to the average citizen as an individual. The mass media are mostly under the control of large organizations that are integrated into the system. Anyone who has a little money can have something printed, or can distribute it on the Internet or in some such way, but what he has to say will be swamped by the vast volume of material put out by the media, hence it will have no practical effect. To make an impression on society with words is therefore almost impossible for most individuals and small groups. Take us (FC) for example. If we had never done anything violent and had submitted the present writings to a publisher, they probably would not have been accepted. If they had been been accepted and published, they probably would not have attracted many readers, because it’s more fun to watch the entertainment put out by the media than to read a sober essay. Even if these writings had had many readers, most of these readers would soon have forgotten what they had read as their minds were flooded by the mass of material to which the media expose them. In order to get our message before the public with some chance of making a lasting impression, we’ve had to kill people.

97. Constitutional rights are useful up to a point, but they do not serve to guarantee much more than what might be called the bourgeois conception of freedom. According to the bourgeois conception, a “free” man is essentially an element of a social machine and has only a certain set of prescribed and delimited freedoms; freedoms that are designed to serve the needs of the social machine more than those of the individual. Thus the bourgeois’s “free” man has economic freedom because that promotes growth and progress; he has freedom of the press because public criticism restrains misbehavior by political leaders; he has a right to a fair trial because imprisonment at the whim of the powerful would be bad for the system. This was clearly the attitude of Simon Bolivar. To him, people deserved liberty only if they used it to promote progress (progress as conceived by the bourgeois). Other bourgeois thinkers have taken a similar view of freedom as a mere means to collective ends. Chester C. Tan, “Chinese Political Thought in the Twentieth Century,” page 202, explains the philosophy of the Kuomintang leader Hu Han-min: “An individual is granted rights because he is a member of society and his community life requires such rights. By community Hu meant the whole society of the nation.” And on page 259 Tan states that according to Carsum Chang (Chang Chun-mai, head of the State Socialist Party in China) freedom had to be used in the interest of the state and of the people as a whole. But what kind of freedom does one have if one can use it only as someone else prescribes? FC’s conception of freedom is not that of Bolivar, Hu, Chang or other bourgeois theorists. The trouble with such theorists is that they have made the development and application of social theories their surrogate activity. Consequently the theories are designed to serve the needs of the theorists more than the needs of any people who may be unlucky enough to live in a society on which the theories are imposed.

98. One more point to be made in this section: It should not be assumed that a person has enough freedom just because he SAYS he has enough. Freedom is restricted in part by psychological controls of which people are unconscious, and moreover many people’s ideas of what constitutes freedom are governed more by social convention than by their real needs. For example, it’s likely that many leftists of the oversocialized type would say that most people, including themselves, are socialized too little rather than too much, yet the oversocialized leftist pays a heavy psychological price for his high level of socialization.

SOME PRINCIPLES OF HISTORY

99. Think of history as being the sum of two components: an erratic component that consists of unpredictable events that follow no discernible pattern, and a regular component that consists of long-term historical trends. Here we are concerned with the long-term trends.

100. FIRST PRINCIPLE. If a SMALL change is made that affects a long-term historical trend, then the effect of that change will almost always be transitory—the trend will soon revert to its original state. (Example: A reform movement designed to clean up political corruption in a society rarely has more than a short-term effect; sooner or later the reformers relax and corruption creeps back in. The level of political corruption in a given society tends to remain constant, or to change only slowly with the evolution of the society. Normally, a political cleanup will be permanent only if accompanied by widespread social changes; a SMALL change in the society won’t be enough.) If a small change in a long-term historical trend appears to be permanent, it is only because the change acts in the direction in which the trend is already moving, so that the trend is not altered by only pushed a step ahead.

101. The first principle is almost a tautology. If a trend were not stable with respect to small changes, it would wander at random rather than following a definite direction; in other words it would not be a long- term trend at all.

102. SECOND PRINCIPLE. If a change is made that is sufficiently large to alter permanently a long-term historical trend, then it will alter the society as a whole. In other words, a society is a system in which all parts are interrelated, and you can’t permanently change any important part without changing all other parts as well.

103. THIRD PRINCIPLE. If a change is made that is large enough to alter permanently a long-term trend, then the consequences for the society as a whole cannot be predicted in advance. (Unless various other societies have passed through the same change and have all experienced the same consequences, in which case one can predict on empirical grounds that another society that passes through the same change will be like to experience similar consequences.)

104. FOURTH PRINCIPLE. A new kind of society cannot be designed on paper. That is, you cannot plan out a new form of society in advance, then set it up and expect it to function as it was designed to do.

105. The third and fourth principles result from the complexity of human societies. A change in human behavior will affect the economy of a society and its physical environment; the economy will affect the environment and vice versa, and the changes in the economy and the environment will affect human behavior in complex, unpredictable ways; and so forth. The network of causes and effects is far too complex to be untangled and understood.

106. FIFTH PRINCIPLE. People do not consciously and rationally choose the form of their society. Societies develop through processes of social evolution that are not under rational human control.

107. The fifth principle is a consequence of the other four.

108. To illustrate: By the first principle, generally speaking an attempt at social reform either acts in the direction in which the society is developing anyway (so that it merely accelerates a change that would have occurred in any case) or else it has only a transitory effect, so that the society soon slips back into its old groove. To make a lasting change in the direction of development of any important aspect of a society, reform is insufficient and revolution is required. (A revolution does not necessarily involve an armed uprising or the overthrow of a government.) By the second principle, a revolution never changes only one aspect of a society, it changes the whole society; and by the third principle changes occur that were never expected or desired by the revolutionaries. By the fourth principle, when revolutionaries or utopians set up a new kind of society, it never works out as planned.

109. The American Revolution does not provide a counterexample. The American “Revolution” was not a revolution in our sense of the word, but a war of independence followed by a rather far-reaching political reform. The Founding Fathers did not change the direction of development of American society, nor did they aspire to do so. They only freed the development of American society from the retarding effect of British rule. Their political reform did not change any basic trend, but only pushed American political culture along its natural direction of development. British society, of which American society was an offshoot, had been moving for a long time in the direction of representative democracy. And prior to the War of Independence the Americans were already practicing a significant degree of representative democracy in the colonial assemblies. The political system established by the Constitution was modeled on the British system and on the colonial assemblies. With major alteration, to be sure—there is no doubt that the Founding Fathers took a very important step. But it was a step along the road that English-speaking world was already traveling. The proof is that Britain and all of its colonies that were populated predominantly by people of British descent ended up with systems of representative democracy essentially similar to that of the United States. If the Founding Fathers had lost their nerve and declined to sign the Declaration of Independence, our way of life today would not have been significantly different. Maybe we would have had somewhat closer ties to Britain, and would have had a Parliament and Prime Minister instead of a Congress and President. No big deal. Thus the American Revolution provides not a counterexample to our principles but a good illustration of them.

110. Still, one has to use common sense in applying the principles. They are expressed in imprecise language that allows latitude for interpretation, and exceptions to them can be found. So we present these principles not as inviolable laws but as rules of thumb, or guides to thinking, that may provide a partial antidote to naive ideas about the future of society. The principles should be borne constantly in mind, and whenever one reaches a conclusion that conflicts with them one should carefully reexamine one’s thinking and retain the conclusion only if one has good, solid reasons for doing so.

INDUSTRIAL-TECHNOLOGICAL SOCIETY CANNOT BE REFORMED

111. The foregoing principles help to show how hopelessly difficult it would be to reform the industrial system in such a way as to prevent it from progressively narrowing our sphere of freedom. There has been a consistent tendency, going back at least to the Industrial Revolution for technology to strengthen the system at a high cost in individual freedom and local autonomy. Hence any change designed to protect freedom from technology would be contrary to a fundamental trend in the development of our society. Consequently, such a change either would be a transitory one—soon swamped by the tide of history—or, if large enough to be permanent would alter the nature of our whole society. This by the first and second principles. Moreover, since society would be altered in a way that could not be predicted in advance (third principle) there would be great risk. Changes large enough to make a lasting difference in favor of freedom would not be initiated because it would be realized that they would gravely disrupt the system. So any attempts at reform would be too timid to be effective. Even if changes large enough to make a lasting difference were initiated, they would be retracted when their disruptive effects became apparent. Thus, permanent changes in favor of freedom could be brought about only by persons prepared to accept radical, dangerous and unpredictable alteration of the entire system. In other words by revolutionaries, not reformers.

112. People anxious to rescue freedom without sacrificing the supposed benefits of technology will suggest naive schemes for some new form of society that would reconcile freedom with technology. Apart from the fact that people who make such suggestions seldom propose any practical means by which the new form of society could be set up in the first place, it follows from the fourth principle that even if the new form of society could be once established, it either would collapse or would give results very different from those expected.

113. So even on very general grounds it seems highly improbable that any way of changing society could be found that would reconcile freedom with modern technology. In the next few sections we will give more specific reasons for concluding that freedom and technological progress are incompatible.

RESTRICTION OF FREEDOM IS UNAVOIDABLE IN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY

114. As explained in paragraphs 65-67, 70-73, modern man is strapped down by a network of rules and regulations, and his fate depends on the actions of persons remote from him whose decisions he cannot influence. This is not accidental or a result of the arbitrariness of arrogant bureaucrats. It is necessary and inevitable in any technologically advanced society. The system HAS TO regulate human behavior closely in order to function. At work people have to do what they are told to do, otherwise production would be thrown into chaos. Bureaucracies HAVE TO be run according to rigid rules. To allow any substantial personal discretion to lower-level bureaucrats would disrupt the system and lead to charges of unfairness due to differences in the way individual bureaucrats exercised their discretion. It is true that some restrictions on our freedom could be eliminated, but GENERALLY SPEAKING the regulation of our lives by large organizations is necessary for the functioning of industrial-technological society. The result is a sense of powerlessness on the part of the average person. It may be, however, that formal regulations will tend increasingly to be replaced by psychological tools that make us want to do what the system requires of us. (Propaganda [14], educational techniques, “mental health” programs, etc.)

115. The system HAS TO force people to behave in ways that are increasingly remote from the natural pattern of human behavior. For example, the system needs scientists, mathematicians and engineers. It can’t function without them. So heavy pressure is put on children to excel in these fields. It isn’t natural for an adolescent human being to spend the bulk of his time sitting at a desk absorbed in study. A normal adolescent wants to spend his time in active contact with the real world. Among primitive peoples the things that children are trained to do tend to be in reasonable harmony with natural human impulses. Among the American Indians, for example, boys were trained in active outdoor pursuits—

just the sort of thing that boys like. But in our society children are pushed into studying technical subjects, which most do grudgingly.

116. Because of the constant pressure that the system exerts to modify human behavior, there is a gradual increase in the number of people who cannot or will not adjust to society’s requirements: welfare leeches, youth-gang members, cultists, anti-government rebels, radical environmentalist saboteurs, dropouts and resisters of various kinds.

117. In any technologically advanced society the individual’s fate MUST depend on decisions that he personally cannot influence to any great extent. A technological society cannot be broken down into small, autonomous communities, because production depends on the cooperation of very large numbers of people and machines. Such a society MUST be highly organized and decisions HAVE TO be made that affect very large numbers of people. When a decision affects, say, a million people, then each of the affected individuals has, on the average, only a one-millionth share in making the decision. What usually happens in practice is that decisions are made by public officials or corporation executives, or by technical specialists, but even when the public votes on a decision the number of voters ordinarily is too large for the vote of any one individual to be significant. [17] Thus most individuals are unable to influence measurably the major decisions that affect their lives. There is no conceivable way to remedy this in a technologically advanced society. The system tries to “solve” this problem by using propaganda to make people WANT the decisions that have been made for them, but even if this “solution” were completely successful in making people feel better, it would be demeaning.

118. Conservatives and some others advocate more “local autonomy.” Local communities once did have autonomy, but such autonomy becomes less and less possible as local communities become more enmeshed with and dependent on large-scale systems like public utilities, computer networks, highway systems, the mass communications media, the modern health care system. Also operating against autonomy is the fact that technology applied in one location often affects people at other locations far way. Thus pesticide or chemical use near a creek may contaminate the water supply hundreds of miles downstream, and the greenhouse effect affects the whole world.

119. The system does not and cannot exist to satisfy human needs. Instead, it is human behavior that has to be modified to fit the needs of the system. This has nothing to do with the political or social ideology that may pretend to guide the technological system. It is the fault of technology, because the system is guided not by ideology but by technical necessity. [18] Of course the system does satisfy many human needs, but generally speaking it does this only to the extend that it is to the advantage of the system to do it. It is the needs of the system that are paramount, not those of the human being. For example, the system provides people with food because the system couldn’t function if everyone starved; it attends to people’s psychological needs whenever it can CONVENIENTLY do so, because it couldn’t function if too many people became depressed or rebellious. But the system, for good, solid, practical reasons, must exert constant pressure on people to mold their behavior to the needs of the system. To much waste accumulating? The government, the media, the educational system, environmentalists, everyone inundates us with a mass of propaganda about recycling. Need more technical personnel? A chorus of voices exhorts kids to study science. No one stops to ask whether it is inhumane to force adolescents to spend the bulk of their time studying subjects most of them hate. When skilled workers are put out of a job by technical advances and have to undergo “retraining,” no one asks whether it is humiliating for them to be pushed around in this way. It is simply taken for granted that everyone must bow to technical necessity. and for good reason: If human needs were put before technical necessity there would be economic problems, unemployment, shortages or worse. The concept of “mental health” in our society is defined largely by the extent to which an individual behaves in accord with the needs of the system and does so without showing signs of stress.

120. Efforts to make room for a sense of purpose and for autonomy within the system are no better than a joke. For example, one company, instead of having each of its employees assemble only one section of a catalogue, had each assemble a whole catalogue, and this was supposed to give them a sense of purpose and achievement. Some companies have tried to give their employees more autonomy in their work, but for practical reasons this usually can be done only to a very limited extent, and in any case employees are never given autonomy as to ultimate goals—their “autonomous” efforts can never be directed toward goals that they select personally, but only toward their employer’s goals, such as the survival and growth of the company. Any company would soon go out of business if it permitted its employees to act otherwise. Similarly, in any enterprise within a socialist system, workers must direct their efforts toward the goals of the enterprise, otherwise the enterprise will not serve its purpose as part of the system. Once again, for purely technical reasons it is not possible for most individuals or small groups to have much autonomy in industrial society. Even the small-business owner commonly has only limited autonomy. Apart from the necessity of government regulation, he is restricted by the fact that he must fit into the economic system and conform to its requirements. For instance, when someone develops a new technology, the small-business person often has to use that technology whether he wants to or not, in order to remain competitive.

THE ‘BAD’ PARTS OF TECHNOLOGY CANNOT BE SEPARATED FROM THE ‘GOOD’ PARTS

121. A further reason why industrial society cannot be reformed in favor of freedom is that modern technology is a unified system in which all parts are dependent on one another. You can’t get rid of the “bad” parts of technology and retain only the “good” parts. Take modern medicine, for example. Progress in medical science depends on progress in chemistry, physics, biology, computer science and other fields. Advanced medical treatments require expensive, high-tech equipment that can be made available only by a technologically progressive, economically rich society. Clearly you can’t have much progress in medicine without the whole technological system and everything that goes with it.

122. Even if medical progress could be maintained without the rest of the technological system, it would by itself bring certain evils. Suppose for example that a cure for diabetes is discovered. People with a genetic tendency to diabetes will then be able to survive and reproduce as well as anyone else. Natural selection against genes for diabetes will cease and such genes will spread throughout the population. (This may be occurring to some extent already, since diabetes, while not curable, can be controlled through use of insulin.) The same thing will happen with many other diseases susceptibility to which is affected by genetic degradation of the population. The only solution will be some sort of eugenics program or extensive genetic engineering of human beings, so that man in the future will no longer be a creation of nature, or of chance, or of God (depending on your religious or philosophical opinions), but a manufactured product.

123. If you think that big government interferes in your life too much NOW, just wait till the government starts regulating the genetic constitution of your children. Such regulation will inevitably follow the introduction of genetic engineering of human beings, because the consequences of unregulated genetic engineering would be disastrous. [19]

124. The usual response to such concerns is to talk about “medical ethics.” But a code of ethics would not serve to protect freedom in the face of medical progress; it would only make matters worse. A code of ethics applicable to genetic engineering would be in effect a means of regulating the genetic constitution of human beings. Somebody (probably the upper-middle class, mostly) would decide that such and such applications of genetic engineering were “ethical” and others were not, so that in effect they would be imposing their own values on the genetic constitution of the population at large. Even if a code of ethics were chosen on a completely democratic basis, the majority would be imposing their own values on any minorities who might have a different idea of what constituted an “ethical” use of genetic engineering. The only code of ethics that would truly protect freedom would be one that prohibited ANY genetic engineering of human beings, and you can be sure that no such code will ever be applied in a technological society. No code that reduced genetic engineering to a minor role could stand up for long, because the temptation presented by the immense power of biotechnology would be irresistible, especially since to the majority of people many of its applications will seem obviously and unequivocally good (eliminating physical and mental diseases, giving people the abilities they need to get along in today’s world). Inevitably, genetic engineering will be used extensively, but only in ways consistent with the needs of the industrial- technological system. [20]

TECHNOLOGY IS A MORE POWERFUL SOCIAL FORCE THAN THE ASPIRATION FOR FREEDOM

125. It is not possible to make a LASTING compromise between technology and freedom, because technology is by far the more powerful social force and continually encroaches on freedom through REPEATED compromises. Imagine the case of two neighbors, each of whom at the outset owns the same amount of land, but one of whom is more powerful than the other. The powerful one demands a piece of the other’s land. The weak one refuses. The powerful one says, “OK, let’s compromise. Give me half of what I asked.” The weak one has little choice but to give in. Some time later the powerful neighbor demands another piece of land, again there is a compromise, and so forth. By forcing a long series of compromises on the weaker man, the powerful one eventually gets all of his land. So it goes in the conflict between technology and freedom.

126. Let us explain why technology is a more powerful social force than the aspiration for freedom.

127. A technological advance that appears not to threaten freedom often turns out to threaten it very seriously later on. For example, consider motorized transport. A walking man formerly could go where he pleased, go at his own pace without observing any traffic regulations, and was independent of technological support-systems. When motor vehicles were introduced they appeared to increase man’s freedom. They took no freedom away from the walking man, no one had to have an automobile if he didn’t want one, and anyone who did choose to buy an automobile could travel much faster and farther than a walking man. But the introduction of motorized transport soon changed society in such a way as to restrict greatly man’s freedom of locomotion. When automobiles became numerous, it became necessary to regulate their use extensively. In a car, especially in densely populated areas, one cannot just go where one likes at one’s own pace one’s movement is governed by the flow of traffic and by various traffic laws. One is tied down by various obligations: license requirements, driver test, renewing registration, insurance, maintenance required for safety, monthly payments on purchase price. Moreover, the use of motorized transport is no longer optional. Since the introduction of motorized transport the arrangement of our cities has changed in such a way that the majority of people no longer live within walking distance of their place of employment, shopping areas and recreational opportunities, so that they HAVE TO depend on the automobile for transportation. Or else they must use public transportation, in which case they have even less control over their own movement than when driving a car. Even the walker’s freedom is now greatly restricted. In the city he continually has to stop to wait for traffic lights that are designed mainly to serve auto traffic. In the country, motor traffic makes it dangerous and unpleasant to walk along the highway. (Note this important point that we have just illustrated with the case of motorized transport: When a new item of technology is introduced as an option that an individual can accept or not as he chooses, it does not necessarily REMAIN optional. In many cases the new technology changes society in such a way that people eventually find themselves FORCED to use it.)

128. While technological progress AS A WHOLE continually narrows our sphere of freedom, each new technical advance CONSIDERED BY ITSELF appears to be desirable. Electricity, indoor plumbing, rapid long-distance communications ... how could one argue against any of these things, or against any other of the innumerable technical advances that have made modern society? It would have been absurd to resist the introduction of the telephone, for example. It offered many advantages and no disadvantages. Yet, as we explained in paragraphs 59-76, all these technical advances taken together have created a world in which the average man’s fate is no longer in his own hands or in the hands of his neighbors and friends, but in those of politicians, corporation executives and remote, anonymous technicians and bureaucrats whom he as an individual has no power to influence. [21] The same process will continue in the future. Take genetic engineering, for example. Few people will resist the introduction of a genetic technique that eliminates a hereditary disease. It does no apparent harm and prevents much suffering. Yet a large number of genetic improvements taken together will make the human being into an engineered product rather than a free creation of chance (or of God, or whatever, depending on your religious beliefs).

129. Another reason why technology is such a powerful social force is that, within the context of a given society, technological progress marches in only one direction; it can never be reversed. Once a technical innovation has been introduced, people usually become dependent on it, so that they can never again do without it, unless it is replaced by some still more advanced innovation. Not only do people become dependent as individuals on a new item of technology, but, even more, the system as a whole becomes dependent on it. (Imagine what would happen to the system today if computers, for example, were eliminated.) Thus the system can move in only one direction, toward greater technologization. Technology repeatedly forces freedom to take a step back, but technology can never take a step back—short of the overthrow of the whole technological system.

130. Technology advances with great rapidity and threatens freedom at many different points at the same time (crowding, rules and regulations, increasing dependence of individuals on large organizations, propaganda and other psychological techniques, genetic engineering, invasion of privacy through surveillance devices and computers, etc.). To hold back any ONE of the threats to freedom would require a long and difficult social struggle. Those who want to protect freedom are overwhelmed by the sheer number of new attacks and the rapidity with which they develop, hence they become apathetic and no longer resist. To fight each of the threats separately would be futile. Success can be hoped for only by fighting the technological system as a whole; but that is revolution, not reform.

131. Technicians (we use this term in its broad sense to describe all those who perform a specialized task that requires training) tend to be so involved in their work (their surrogate activity) that when a conflict arises between their technical work and freedom, they almost always decide in favor of their technical work. This is obvious in the case of scientists, but it also appears elsewhere: Educators, humanitarian groups, conservation organizations do not hesitate to use propaganda or other psychological techniques to help them achieve their laudable ends. Corporations and government agencies, when they find it useful, do not hesitate to collect information about individuals without regard to their privacy. Law enforcement agencies are frequently inconvenienced by the constitutional rights of suspects and often of completely innocent persons, and they do whatever they can do legally (or sometimes illegally) to restrict or circumvent those rights. Most of these educators, government officials and law officers believe in freedom, privacy and constitutional rights, but when these conflict with their work, they usually feel that their work is more important.

132. It is well known that people generally work better and more persistently when striving for a reward than when attempting to avoid a punishment or negative outcome. Scientists and other technicians are motivated mainly by the rewards they get through their work. But those who oppose technological invasions of freedom are working to avoid a negative outcome, consequently there are few who work persistently and well at this discouraging task. If reformers ever achieved a signal victory that seemed to set up a solid barrier against further erosion of freedom through technical progress, most would tend to relax and turn their attention to more agreeable pursuits. But the scientists would remain busy in their laboratories, and technology as it progresses would find ways, in spite of any barriers, to exert more and more control over individuals and make them always more dependent on the system.

133. No social arrangements, whether laws, institutions, customs or ethical codes, can provide permanent protection against technology. History shows that all social arrangements are transitory; they all change or break down eventually. But technological advances are permanent within the context of a given civilization. Suppose for example that it were possible to arrive at some social arrangements that would prevent genetic engineering from being applied to human beings, or prevent it from being applied in such a way as to threaten freedom and dignity. Still, the technology would remain waiting. Sooner or later the social arrangement would break down. Probably sooner, given the pace of change in our society. Then genetic engineering would begin to invade our sphere of freedom, and this invasion would be irreversible (short of a breakdown of technological civilization itself). Any illusions about achieving anything permanent through social arrangements should be dispelled by what is currently happening with environmental legislation. A few years ago its seemed that there were secure legal barriers preventing at least SOME of the worst forms of environmental degradation. A change in the political wind, and those barriers begin to crumble.

134. For all of the foregoing reasons, technology is a more powerful social force than the aspiration for freedom. But this statement requires an important qualification. It appears that during the next several decades the industrial-technological system will be undergoing severe stresses due to economic and environmental problems, and especially due to problems of human behavior (alienation, rebellion, hostility, a variety of social and psychological difficulties). We hope that the stresses through which the system is likely to pass will cause it to break down, or at least will weaken it sufficiently so that a revolution against it becomes possible. If such a revolution occurs and is successful, then at that particular moment the aspiration for freedom will have proved more powerful than technology.

135. In paragraph 125 we used an analogy of a weak neighbor who is left destitute by a strong neighbor who takes all his land by forcing on him a series of compromises. But suppose now that the strong neighbor gets sick, so that he is unable to defend himself. The weak neighbor can force the strong one to give him his land back, or he can kill him. If he lets the strong man survive and only forces him to give the land back, he is a fool, because when the strong man gets well he will again take all the land for himself. The only sensible alternative for the weaker man is to kill the strong one while he has the chance. In the same way, while the industrial system is sick we must destroy it. If we compromise with it and let it recover from its sickness, it will eventually wipe out all of our freedom.

SIMPLER SOCIAL PROBLEMS HAVE PROVED INTRACTABLE

136. If anyone still imagines that it would be possible to reform the system in such a way as to protect freedom from technology, let him consider how clumsily and for the most part unsuccessfully our society has dealt with other social problems that are far more simple and straightforward. Among other things, the system has failed to stop environmental degradation, political corruption, drug trafficking or domestic abuse.

137. Take our environmental problems, for example. Here the conflict of values is straightforward: economic expedience now versus saving some of our natural resources for our grandchildren. [22] But on this subject we get only a lot of blather and obfuscation from the people who have power, and nothing like a clear, consistent line of action, and we keep on piling up environmental problems that our grandchildren will have to live with. Attempts to resolve the environmental issue consist of struggles and compromises between different factions, some of which are ascendant at one moment, others at another moment. The line of struggle changes with the shifting currents of public opinion. This is not a rational process, nor is it one that is likely to lead to a timely and successful solution to the problem. Major social problems, if they get “solved” at all, are rarely or never solved through any rational, comprehensive plan. They just work themselves out through a process in which various competing groups pursuing their own (usually short- term) self-interest [23] arrive (mainly by luck) at some more or less stable modus vivendi. In fact, the principles we formulated in paragraphs 100-106 make it seem doubtful that rational, long-term social planning can EVER be successful.

138. Thus it is clear that the human race has at best a very limited capacity for solving even relatively straightforward social problems. How then is it going to solve the far more difficult and subtle problem of reconciling freedom with technology? Technology presents clear-cut material advantages, whereas freedom is an abstraction that means different things to different people, and its loss is easily obscured by propaganda and fancy talk.

139. And note this important difference: It is conceivable that our environmental problems (for example) may some day be settled through a rational, comprehensive plan, but if this happens it will be only because it is in the long-term interest of the system to solve these problems. But it is NOT in the interest of the system to preserve freedom or small-group autonomy. On the contrary, it is in the interest of the system to bring human behavior under control to the greatest possible extent. [24] Thus, while practical considerations may eventually force the system to take a rational, prudent approach to environmental problems, equally practical considerations will force the system to regulate human behavior ever more closely (preferably by indirect means that will disguise the encroachment on freedom). This isn’t just our opinion. Eminent social scientists (e.g. James Q. Wilson) have stressed the importance of “socializing” people more effectively.

REVOLUTION IS EASIER THAN REFORM

140. We hope we have convinced the reader that the system cannot be reformed in such a way as to reconcile freedom with technology. The only way out is to dispense with the industrial-technological system altogether. This implies revolution, not necessarily an armed uprising, but certainly a radical and fundamental change in the nature of society.

141. People tend to assume that because a revolution involves a much greater change than reform does, it is more difficult to bring about than reform is. Actually, under certain circumstances revolution is much easier than reform. The reason is that a revolutionary movement can inspire an intensity of commitment that a reform movement cannot inspire. A reform movement merely offers to solve a particular social problem. A revolutionary movement offers to solve all problems at one stroke and create a whole new world; it provides the kind of ideal for which people will take great risks and make great sacrifices. For this reasons it would be much easier to overthrow the whole technological system than to put effective, permanent restraints on the development or application of any one segment of technology, such as genetic engineering, for example. Not many people will devote themselves with single-minded passion to imposing and maintaining restraints on genetic engineering, but under suitable conditions large numbers of people may devote themselves passionately to a revolution against the industrial-technological system. As we noted in paragraph 132, reformers seeking to limit certain aspects of technology would be working to avoid a negative outcome. But revolutionaries work to gain a powerful reward—fulfillment of their revolutionary vision—and therefore work harder and more persistently than reformers do.

142. Reform is always restrained by the fear of painful consequences if changes go too far. But once a revolutionary fever has taken hold of a society, people are willing to undergo unlimited hardships for the sake of their revolution. This was clearly shown in the French and Russian Revolutions. It may be that in such cases only a minority of the population is really committed to the revolution, but this minority is sufficiently large and active so that it becomes the dominant force in society. We will have more to say about revolution in paragraphs 180-205.

CONTROL OF HUMAN BEHAVIOR

143. Since the beginning of civilization, organized societies have had to put pressures on human beings of the sake of the functioning of the social organism. The kinds of pressures vary greatly from one society to another. Some of the pressures are physical (poor diet, excessive labor, environmental pollution), some are psychological (noise, crowding, forcing human behavior into the mold that society requires). In the past, human nature has been approximately constant, or at any rate has varied only within certain bounds. Consequently, societies have been able to push people only up to certain limits. When the limit of human endurance has been passed, things start going wrong: rebellion, or crime, or corruption, or evasion of work, or depression and other mental problems, or an elevated death rate, or a declining birth rate or something else, so that either the society breaks down, or its functioning becomes too inefficient and it is (quickly or gradually, through conquest, attrition or evolution) replaced by some more efficient form of society. [25]

144. Thus human nature has in the past put certain limits on the development of societies. People could be pushed only so far and no farther. But today this may be changing, because modern technology is developing ways of modifying human beings.

145. Imagine a society that subjects people to conditions that make them terribly unhappy, then gives them drugs to take away their unhappiness. Science fiction? It is already happening to some extent in our own society. It is well known that the rate of clinical depression has been greatly increasing in recent decades. We believe that this is due to disruption of the power process, as explained in paragraphs 59-76. But even if we are wrong, the increasing rate of depression is certainly the result of SOME conditions that exist in today’s society. Instead of removing the conditions that make people depressed, modern society gives them antidepressant drugs. In effect, antidepressants are a means of modifying an individual’s internal state in such a way as to enable him to tolerate social conditions that he would otherwise find intolerable. (Yes, we know that depression is often of purely genetic origin. We are referring here to those cases in which environment plays the predominant role.)

146. Drugs that affect the mind are only one example of the new methods of controlling human behavior that modern society is developing. Let us look at some of the other methods.

147. To start with, there are the techniques of surveillance. Hidden video cameras are now used in most stores and in many other places, computers are used to collect and process vast amounts of information about individuals. Information so obtained greatly increases the effectiveness of physical coercion (i.e., law enforcement). [26] Then there are the methods of propaganda, for which the mass communication media provide effective vehicles. Efficient techniques have been developed for winning elections, selling products, influencing public opinion. The entertainment industry serves as an important psychological tool of the system, possibly even when it is dishing out large amounts of sex and violence. Entertainment provides modern man with an essential means of escape. While absorbed in television, videos, etc., he can forget stress, anxiety, frustration, dissatisfaction. Many primitive peoples, when they don’t have work to do, are quite content to sit for hours at a time doing nothing at all, because they are at peace with themselves and their world. But most modern people must be constantly occupied or entertained, otherwise they get “bored,” i.e., they get fidgety, uneasy, irritable.

148. Other techniques strike deeper than the foregoing. Education is no longer a simple affair of paddling a kid’s behind when he doesn’t know his lessons and patting him on the head when he does know them. It is becoming a scientific technique for controlling the child’s development. Sylvan Learning Centers, for example, have had great success in motivating children to study, and psychological techniques are also used with more or less success in many conventional schools. “Parenting” techniques that are taught to parents are designed to make children accept fundamental values of the system and behave in ways that the system finds desirable. “Mental health” programs, “intervention” techniques, psychotherapy and so forth are ostensibly designed to benefit individuals, but in practice they usually serve as methods for inducing individuals to think and behave as the system requires. (There is no contradiction here; an individual whose attitudes or behavior bring him into conflict with the system is up against a force that is too powerful for him to conquer or escape from, hence he is likely to suffer from stress, frustration, defeat. His path will be much easier if he thinks and behaves as the system requires. In that sense the system is acting for the benefit of the individual when it brainwashes him into conformity.) Child abuse in its gross and obvious forms is disapproved in most if not all cultures. Tormenting a child for a trivial reason or no reason at all is something that appalls almost everyone. But many psychologists interpret the concept of abuse much more broadly. Is spanking, when used as part of a rational and consistent system of discipline, a form of abuse? The question will ultimately be decided by whether or not spanking tends to produce behavior that makes a person fit in well with the existing system of society. In practice, the word “abuse” tends to be interpreted to include any method of child-rearing that produces behavior inconvenient for the system. Thus, when they go beyond the prevention of obvious, senseless cruelty, programs for preventing “child abuse” are directed toward the control of human behavior on behalf of the system.

149. Presumably, research will continue to increase the effectiveness of psychological techniques for controlling human behavior. But we think it is unlikely that psychological techniques alone will be sufficient to adjust human beings to the kind of society that technology is creating. Biological methods probably will have to be used. We have already mentioned the use of drugs in this connection. Neurology may provide other avenues for modifying the human mind. Genetic engineering of human beings is already beginning to occur in the form of “gene therapy,” and there is no reason to assume that such methods will not eventually be used to modify those aspects of the body that affect mental functioning.

150. As we mentioned in paragraph 134, industrial society seems likely to be entering a period of severe stress, due in part to problems of human behavior and in part to economic and environmental problems. And a considerable proportion of the system’s economic and environmental problems result from the way human beings behave. Alienation, low self-esteem, depression, hostility, rebellion; children who won’t study, youth gangs, illegal drug use, rape, child abuse, other crimes, unsafe sex, teen pregnancy, population growth, political corruption, race hatred, ethnic rivalry, bitter ideological conflict (e.g., pro-choice vs. pro- life), political extremism, terrorism, sabotage, anti-government groups, hate groups. All these threaten the very survival of the system. The system will therefore be FORCED to use every practical means of controlling human behavior.

151. The social disruption that we see today is certainly not the result of mere chance. It can only be a result of the conditions of life that the system imposes on people. (We have argued that the most important of these conditions is disruption of the power process.) If the systems succeeds in imposing sufficient control over human behavior to assure its own survival, a new watershed in human history will have been passed. Whereas formerly the limits of human endurance have imposed limits on the development of societies (as we explained in paragraphs 143, 144), industrial-technological society will be able to pass those limits by modifying human beings, whether by psychological methods or biological methods or both. In the future, social systems will not be adjusted to suit the needs of human beings. Instead, human being will be adjusted to suit the needs of the system. [27]

152. Generally speaking, technological control over human behavior will probably not be introduced with a totalitarian intention or even through a conscious desire to restrict human freedom. [28] Each new step in the assertion of control over the human mind will be taken as a rational response to a problem that faces society, such as curing alcoholism, reducing the crime rate or inducing young people to study science and engineering. In many cases there will be a humanitarian justification. For example, when a psychiatrist prescribes an anti-depressant for a depressed patient, he is clearly doing that individual a favor. It would be inhumane to withhold the drug from someone who needs it. When parents send their children to Sylvan Learning Centers to have them manipulated into becoming enthusiastic about their studies, they do so from concern for their children’s welfare. It may be that some of these parents wish that one didn’t have to have specialized training to get a job and that their kid didn’t have to be brainwashed into becoming a computer nerd. But what can they do? They can’t change society, and their child may be unemployable if he doesn’t have certain skills. So they send him to Sylvan.

153. Thus control over human behavior will be introduced not by a calculated decision of the authorities but through a process of social evolution (RAPID evolution, however). The process will be impossible to resist, because each advance, considered by itself, will appear to be beneficial, or at least the evil involved in making the advance will appear to be beneficial, or at least the evil involved in making the advance will seem to be less than that which would result from not making it (see paragraph 127). Propaganda for example is used for many good purposes, such as discouraging child abuse or race hatred. [14] Sex education is obviously useful, yet the effect of sex education (to the extent that it is successful) is to take the shaping of sexual attitudes away from the family and put it into the hands of the state as represented by the public school system.

154. Suppose a biological trait is discovered that increases the likelihood that a child will grow up to be a criminal, and suppose some sort of gene therapy can remove this trait. [29] Of course most parents whose children possess the trait will have them undergo the therapy. It would be inhumane to do otherwise, since the child would probably have a miserable life if he grew up to be a criminal. But many or most primitive societies have a low crime rate in comparison with that of our society, even though they have neither high- tech methods of child-rearing nor harsh systems of punishment. Since there is no reason to suppose that more modern men than primitive men have innate predatory tendencies, the high crime rate of our society must be due to the pressures that modern conditions put on people, to which many cannot or will not adjust. Thus a treatment designed to remove potential criminal tendencies is at least in part a way of re-engineering people so that they suit the requirements of the system.

155. Our society tends to regard as a “sickness” any mode of thought or behavior that is inconvenient for the system, and this is plausible because when an individual doesn’t fit into the system it causes pain to the individual as well as problems for the system. Thus the manipulation of an individual to adjust him to the system is seen as a “cure” for a “sickness” and therefore as good.

156. In paragraph 127 we pointed out that if the use of a new item of technology is INITIALLY optional, it does not necessarily REMAIN optional, because the new technology tends to change society in such a way that it becomes difficult or impossible for an individual to function without using that technology. This applies also to the technology of human behavior. In a world in which most children are put through a program to make them enthusiastic about studying, a parent will almost be forced to put his kid through such a program, because if he does not, then the kid will grow up to be, comparatively speaking, an ignoramus and therefore unemployable. Or suppose a biological treatment is discovered that, without undesirable side-effects, will greatly reduce the psychological stress from which so many people suffer in our society. If large numbers of people choose to undergo the treatment, then the general level of stress in society will be reduced, so that it will be possible for the system to increase the stress-producing pressures. In fact, something like this seems to have happened already with one of our society’s most important psychological tools for enabling people to reduce (or at least temporarily escape from) stress, namely, mass entertainment (see paragraph 147). Our use of mass entertainment is “optional”: No law requires us to watch television, listen to the radio, read magazines. Yet mass entertainment is a means of escape and stress-reduction on which most of us have become dependent. Everyone complains about the trashiness of television, but almost everyone watches it. A few have kicked the TV habit, but it would be a rare person who could get along today without using ANY form of mass entertainment. (Yet until quite recently in human history most people got along very nicely with no other entertainment than that which each local community created for itself.) Without the entertainment industry the system probably would not have been able to get away with putting as much stress-producing pressure on us as it does.

157. Assuming that industrial society survives, it is likely that technology will eventually acquire something approaching complete control over human behavior. It has been established beyond any rational doubt that human thought and behavior have a largely biological basis. As experimenters have demonstrated, feelings such as hunger, pleasure, anger and fear can be turned on and off by electrical stimulation of appropriate parts of the brain. Memories can be destroyed by damaging parts of the brain or they can be brought to the surface by electrical stimulation. Hallucinations can be induced or moods changed by drugs. There may or may not be an immaterial human soul, but if there is one it clearly is less powerful that the biological mechanisms of human behavior. For if that were not the case then researchers would not be able so easily to manipulate human feelings and behavior with drugs and electrical currents.

158. It presumably would be impractical for all people to have electrodes inserted in their heads so that they could be controlled by the authorities. But the fact that human thoughts and feelings are so open to biological intervention shows that the problem of controlling human behavior is mainly a technical problem; a problem of neurons, hormones and complex molecules; the kind of problem that is accessible to scientific attack. Given the outstanding record of our society in solving technical problems, it is overwhelmingly probable that great advances will be made in the control of human behavior.

159. Will public resistance prevent the introduction of technological control of human behavior? It certainly would if an attempt were made to introduce such control all at once. But since technological control will be introduced through a long sequence of small advances, there will be no rational and effective public resistance. (See paragraphs 127, 132, 153.)

160. To those who think that all this sounds like science fiction, we point out that yesterday’s science fiction is today’s fact. The Industrial Revolution has radically altered man’s environment and way of life, and it is only to be expected that as technology is increasingly applied to the human body and mind, man himself will be altered as radically as his environment and way of life have been.

HUMAN RACE AT A CROSSROADS

161. But we have gotten ahead of our story. It is one thing to develop in the laboratory a series of psychological or biological techniques for manipulating human behavior and quite another to integrate these techniques into a functioning social system. The latter problem is the more difficult of the two. For example, while the techniques of educational psychology doubtless work quite well in the “lab schools” where they are developed, it is not necessarily easy to apply them effectively throughout our educational system. We all know what many of our schools are like. The teachers are too busy taking knives and guns away from the kids to subject them to the latest techniques for making them into computer nerds. Thus, in spite of all its technical advances relating to human behavior, the system to date has not been impressively successful in controlling human beings. The people whose behavior is fairly well under the control of the system are those of the type that might be called “bourgeois.” But there are growing numbers of people who in one way or another are rebels against the system: welfare leaches, youth gangs, cultists, satanists, nazis, radical environmentalists, militiamen, etc.

162. The system is currently engaged in a desperate struggle to overcome certain problems that threaten its survival, among which the problems of human behavior are the most important. If the system succeeds in acquiring sufficient control over human behavior quickly enough, it will probably survive. Otherwise it will break down. We think the issue will most likely be resolved within the next several decades, say 40 to 100 years.

163. Suppose the system survives the crisis of the next several decades. By that time it will have to have solved, or at least brought under control, the principal problems that confront it, in particular that of “socializing” human beings; that is, making people sufficiently docile so that heir behavior no longer threatens the system. That being accomplished, it does not appear that there would be any further obstacle to the development of technology, and it would presumably advance toward its logical conclusion, which is complete control over everything on Earth, including human beings and all other important organisms. The system may become a unitary, monolithic organization, or it may be more or less fragmented and consist of a number of organizations coexisting in a relationship that includes elements of both cooperation and competition, just as today the government, the corporations and other large organizations both cooperate and compete with one another. Human freedom mostly will have vanished, because individuals and small groups will be impotent vis-a-vis large organizations armed with supertechnology and an arsenal of advanced psychological and biological tools for manipulating human beings, besides instruments of surveillance and physical coercion. Only a small number of people will have any real power, and even these probably will have only very limited freedom, because their behavior too will be regulated; just as today our politicians and corporation executives can retain their positions of power only as long as their behavior remains within certain fairly narrow limits.

164. Don’t imagine that the systems will stop developing further techniques for controlling human beings and nature once the crisis of the next few decades is over and increasing control is no longer necessary for the system’s survival. On the contrary, once the hard times are over the system will increase its control over people and nature more rapidly, because it will no longer be hampered by difficulties of the kind that it is currently experiencing. Survival is not the principal motive for extending control. As we explained in paragraphs 87-90, technicians and scientists carry on their work largely as a surrogate activity; that is, they satisfy their need for power by solving technical problems. They will continue to do this with unabated enthusiasm, and among the most interesting and challenging problems for them to solve will be those of understanding the human body and mind and intervening in their development. For the “good of humanity,” of course.

165. But suppose on the other hand that the stresses of the coming decades prove to be too much for the system. If the system breaks down there may be a period of chaos, a “time of troubles” such as those that history has recorded at various epochs in the past. It is impossible to predict what would emerge from such a time of troubles, but at any rate the human race would be given a new chance. The greatest danger is that industrial society may begin to reconstitute itself within the first few years after the breakdown. Certainly there will be many people (power-hungry types especially) who will be anxious to get the factories running again.

166. Therefore two tasks confront those who hate the servitude to which the industrial system is reducing the human race. First, we must work to heighten the social stresses within the system so as to increase the likelihood that it will break down or be weakened sufficiently so that a revolution against it becomes possible. Second, it is necessary to develop and propagate an ideology that opposes technology and the industrial society if and when the system becomes sufficiently weakened. And such an ideology will help to assure that, if and when industrial society breaks down, its remnants will be smashed beyond repair, so that the system cannot be reconstituted. The factories should be destroyed, technical books burned, etc.

HUMAN SUFFERING

167. The industrial system will not break down purely as a result of revolutionary action. It will not be vulnerable to revolutionary attack unless its own internal problems of development lead it into very serious difficulties. So if the system breaks down it will do so either spontaneously, or through a process that is in part spontaneous but helped along by revolutionaries. If the breakdown is sudden, many people will die, since the world’s population has become so overblown that it cannot even feed itself any longer without advanced technology. Even if the breakdown is gradual enough so that reduction of the population can occur more through lowering of the birth rate than through elevation of the death rate, the process of de- industrialization probably will be very chaotic and involve much suffering. It is naive to think it likely that technology can be phased out in a smoothly managed, orderly way, especially since the technophiles will fight stubbornly at every step. Is it therefore cruel to work for the breakdown of the system? Maybe, but maybe not. In the first place, revolutionaries will not be able to break the system down unless it is already in enough trouble so that there would be a good chance of its eventually breaking down by itself anyway; and the bigger the system grows, the more disastrous the consequences of its breakdown will be; so it may be that revolutionaries, by hastening the onset of the breakdown, will be reducing the extent of the disaster.

168. In the second place, one has to balance struggle and death against the loss of freedom and dignity. To many of us, freedom and dignity are more important than a long life or avoidance of physical pain. Besides, we all have to die some time, and it may be better to die fighting for survival, or for a cause, than to live a long but empty and purposeless life.

169. In the third place, it is not at all certain that survival of the system will lead to less suffering than breakdown of the system would. The system has already caused, and is continuing to cause, immense suffering all over the world. Ancient cultures, that for hundreds of years gave people a satisfactory relationship with each other and with their environment, have been shattered by contact with industrial society, and the result has been a whole catalogue of economic, environmental, social and psychological problems. One of the effects of the intrusion of industrial society has been that over much of the world traditional controls on population have been thrown out of balance. Hence the population explosion, with all that that implies. Then there is the psychological suffering that is widespread throughout the supposedly fortunate countries of the West (see paragraphs 44, 45). No one knows what will happen as a result of ozone depletion, the greenhouse effect and other environmental problems that cannot yet be foreseen. And, as nuclear proliferation has shown, new technology cannot be kept out of the hands of dictators and irresponsible Third World nations. Would you like to speculate about what Iraq or North Korea will do with genetic engineering?

170. “Oh!” say the technophiles, “Science is going to fix all that! We will conquer famine, eliminate psychological suffering, make everybody healthy and happy!” Yeah, sure. That’s what they said 200 years ago. The Industrial Revolution was supposed to eliminate poverty, make everybody happy, etc. The actual result has been quite different. The technophiles are hopelessly naive (or self-deceiving) in their understanding of social problems. They are unaware of (or choose to ignore) the fact that when large changes, even seemingly beneficial ones, are introduced into a society, they lead to a long sequence of other changes, most of which are impossible to predict (paragraph 103). The result is disruption of the society. So it is very probable that in their attempts to end poverty and disease, engineer docile, happy personalities and so forth, the technophiles will create social systems that are terribly troubled, even more so than the present once. For example, the scientists boast that they will end famine by creating new, genetically engineered food plants. But this will allow the human population to keep expanding indefinitely, and it is well known that crowding leads to increased stress and aggression. This is merely one example of the PREDICTABLE problems that will arise. We emphasize that, as past experience has shown, technical progress will lead to other new problems that CANNOT be predicted in advance (paragraph 103). In fact, ever since the Industrial Revolution, technology has been creating new problems for society far more rapidly than it has been solving old ones. Thus it will take a long and difficult period of trial and error for the technophiles to work the bugs out of their Brave New World (if they every do). In the meantime there will be great suffering. So it is not at all clear that the survival of industrial society would involve less suffering than the breakdown of that society would. Technology has gotten the human race into a fix from which there is not likely to be any easy escape.

THE FUTURE

171. But suppose now that industrial society does survive the next several decades and that the bugs do eventually get worked out of the system, so that it functions smoothly. What kind of system will it be? We will consider several possibilities.

172. First let us postulate that the computer scientists succeed in developing intelligent machines that can do all things better than human beings can do them. In that case presumably all work will be done by vast, highly organized systems of machines and no human effort will be necessary. Either of two cases might occur. The machines might be permitted to make all of their own decisions without human oversight, or else human control over the machines might be retained.

173. If the machines are permitted to make all their own decisions, we can’t make any conjectures as to the results, because it is impossible to guess how such machines might behave. We only point out that the fate of the human race would be at the mercy of the machines. It might be argued that the human race would never be foolish enough to hand over all power to the machines. But we are suggesting neither that the human race would voluntarily turn power over to the machines nor that the machines would willfully seize power. What we do suggest is that the human race might easily permit itself to drift into a position of such dependence on the machines that it would have no practical choice but to accept all of the machines’ decisions. As society and the problems that face it become more and more complex and as machines become more and more intelligent, people will let machines make more and more of their decisions for them, simply because machine-made decisions will bring better results than man-made ones. Eventually a stage may be reached at which the decisions necessary to keep the system running will be so complex that human beings will be incapable of making them intelligently. At that stage the machines will be in effective control. People won’t be able to just turn the machines off, because they will be so dependent on them that turning them off would amount to suicide.

174. On the other hand it is possible that human control over the machines may be retained. In that case the average man may have control over certain private machines of his own, such as his car or his personal computer, but control over large systems of machines will be in the hands of a tiny elite—just as it is today, but with two differences. Due to improved techniques the elite will have greater control over the masses; and because human work will no longer be necessary the masses will be superfluous, a useless burden on the system. If the elite is ruthless they may simply decide to exterminate the mass of humanity. If they are humane they may use propaganda or other psychological or biological techniques to reduce the birth rate until the mass of humanity becomes extinct, leaving the world to the elite. Or, if the elite consists of soft- hearted liberals, they may decide to play the role of good shepherds to the rest of the human race. They will see to it that everyone’s physical needs are satisfied, that all children are raised under psychologically hygienic conditions, that everyone has a wholesome hobby to keep him busy, and that anyone who may become dissatisfied undergoes “treatment” to cure his “problem.” Of course, life will be so purposeless that people will have to be biologically or psychologically engineered either to remove their need for the power process or to make them “sublimate” their drive for power into some harmless hobby. These engineered human beings may be happy in such a society, but they most certainly will not be free. They will have been reduced to the status of domestic animals.

175. But suppose now that the computer scientists do not succeed in developing artificial intelligence, so that human work remains necessary. Even so, machines will take care of more and more of the simpler tasks so that there will be an increasing surplus of human workers at the lower levels of ability. (We see this happening already. There are many people who find it difficult or impossible to get work, because for intellectual or psychological reasons they cannot acquire the level of training necessary to make themselves useful in the present system.) On those who are employed, ever-increasing demands will be placed: They will need more and more training, more and more ability, and will have to be ever more reliable, conforming and docile, because they will be more and more like cells of a giant organism. Their tasks will be increasingly specialized, so that their work will be, in a sense, out of touch with the real world, being concentrated on one tiny slice of reality. The system will have to use any means that it can, whether psychological or biological, to engineer people to be docile, to have the abilities that the system requires and to “sublimate” their drive for power into some specialized task. But the statement that the people of such a society will have to be docile may require qualification. The society may find competitiveness useful, provided that ways are found of directing competitiveness into channels that serve the needs of the system. We can imagine a future society in which there is endless competition for positions of prestige and power. But no more than a very few people will ever reach the top, where the only real power is (see end of paragraph 163). Very repellent is a society in which a person can satisfy his need for power only by pushing large numbers of other people out of the way and depriving them of THEIR opportunity for power.

176. One can envision scenarios that incorporate aspects of more than one of the possibilities that we have just discussed. For instance, it may be that machines will take over most of the work that is of real, practical importance, but that human beings will be kept busy by being given relatively unimportant work. It has been suggested, for example, that a great development of the service industries might provide work for human beings. Thus people would spent their time shining each other’s shoes, driving each other around in taxicabs, making handicrafts for one another, waiting on each other’s tables, etc. This seems to us a thoroughly contemptible way for the human race to end up, and we doubt that many people would find fulfilling lives in such pointless busy-work. They would seek other, dangerous outlets (drugs, crime, “cults,” hate groups) unless they were biologically or psychologically engineered to adapt them to such a way of life.

177. Needless to say, the scenarios outlined above do not exhaust all the possibilities. They only indicate the kinds of outcomes that seem to us most likely. But we can envision no plausible scenarios that are any more palatable than the ones we’ve just described. It is overwhelmingly probable that if the industrial- technological system survives the next 40 to 100 years, it will by that time have developed certain general characteristics: Individuals (at least those of the “bourgeois” type, who are integrated into the system and make it run, and who therefore have all the power) will be more dependent than ever on large organizations; they will be more “socialized” than ever and their physical and mental qualities to a significant extent (possibly to a very great extent) will be those that are engineered into them rather than being the results of chance (or of God’s will, or whatever); and whatever may be left of wild nature will be reduced to remnants preserved for scientific study and kept under the supervision and management of scientists (hence it will no longer be truly wild). In the long run (say a few centuries from now) it is likely that neither the human race nor any other important organisms will exist as we know them today, because once you start modifying organisms through genetic engineering there is no reason to stop at any particular point, so that the modifications will probably continue until man and other organisms have been utterly transformed.

178. Whatever else may be the case, it is certain that technology is creating for human beings a new physical and social environment radically different from the spectrum of environments to which natural selection has adapted the human race physically and psychologically. If man is not adjusted to this new environment by being artificially re-engineered, then he will be adapted to it through a long and painful process of natural selection. The former is far more likely than the latter.

179. It would be better to dump the whole stinking system and take the consequences.

STRATEGY

180. The technophiles are taking us all on an utterly reckless ride into the unknown. Many people understand something of what technological progress is doing to us yet take a passive attitude toward it because they think it is inevitable. But we (FC) don’t think it is inevitable. We think it can be stopped, and we will give here some indications of how to go about stopping it.

181. As we stated in paragraph 166, the two main tasks for the present are to promote social stress and instability in industrial society and to develop and propagate an ideology that opposes technology and the industrial system. When the system becomes sufficiently stressed and unstable, a revolution against technology may be possible. The pattern would be similar to that of the French and Russian Revolutions. French society and Russian society, for several decades prior to their respective revolutions, showed increasing signs of stress and weakness. Meanwhile, ideologies were being developed that offered a new world view that was quite different from the old one. In the Russian case, revolutionaries were actively working to undermine the old order. Then, when the old system was put under sufficient additional stress (by financial crisis in France, by military defeat in Russia) it was swept away by revolution. What we propose is something along the same lines.

182. It will be objected that the French and Russian Revolutions were failures. But most revolutions have two goals. One is to destroy an old form of society and the other is to set up the new form of society envisioned by the revolutionaries. The French and Russian revolutionaries failed (fortunately!) to create the new kind of society of which they dreamed, but they were quite successful in destroying the old society. We have no illusions about the feasibility of creating a new, ideal form of society. Our goal is only to destroy the existing form of society.

183. But an ideology, in order to gain enthusiastic support, must have a positive ideal as well as a negative one; it must be FOR something as well as AGAINST something. The positive ideal that we propose is Nature. That is, WILD nature: those aspects of the functioning of the Earth and its living things that are independent of human management and free of human interference and control. And with wild nature we include human nature, by which we mean those aspects of the functioning of the human individual that are not subject to regulation by organized society but are products of chance, or free will, or God (depending on your religious or philosophical opinions).

184. Nature makes a perfect counter-ideal to technology for several reasons. Nature (that which is outside the power of the system) is the opposite of technology (which seeks to expand indefinitely the power of the system). Most people will agree that nature is beautiful; certainly it has tremendous popular appeal. The radical environmentalists ALREADY hold an ideology that exalts nature and opposes technology. [30] It is not necessary for the sake of nature to set up some chimerical utopia or any new kind of social order. Nature takes care of itself: It was a spontaneous creation that existed long before any human society, and for countless centuries many different kinds of human societies coexisted with nature without doing it an excessive amount of damage. Only with the Industrial Revolution did the effect of human society on nature become really devastating. To relieve the pressure on nature it is not necessary to create a special kind of social system, it is only necessary to get rid of industrial society. Granted, this will not solve all problems. Industrial society has already done tremendous damage to nature and it will take a very long time for the scars to heal. Besides, even pre-industrial societies can do significant damage to nature. Nevertheless, getting rid of industrial society will accomplish a great deal. It will relieve the worst of the pressure on nature so that the scars can begin to heal. It will remove the capacity of organized society to keep increasing its control over nature (including human nature). Whatever kind of society may exist after the demise of the industrial system, it is certain that most people will live close to nature, because in the absence of advanced technology there is no other way that people CAN live. To feed themselves they must be peasants or herdsmen or fishermen or hunters, etc. And, generally speaking, local autonomy should tend to increase, because lack of advanced technology and rapid communications will limit the capacity of governments or other large organizations to control local communities.

185. As for the negative consequences of eliminating industrial society—well, you can’t eat your cake and have it too. To gain one thing you have to sacrifice another.

186. Most people hate psychological conflict. For this reason they avoid doing any serious thinking about difficult social issues, and they like to have such issues presented to them in simple, black-and-white terms: THIS is all good and THAT is all bad. The revolutionary ideology should therefore be developed on two levels.

187. On the more sophisticated level the ideology should address itself to people who are intelligent, thoughtful and rational. The object should be to create a core of people who will be opposed to the industrial system on a rational, thought-out basis, with full appreciation of the problems and ambiguities involved, and of the price that has to be paid for getting rid of the system. It is particularly important to attract people of this type, as they are capable people and will be instrumental in influencing others. These people should be addressed on as rational a level as possible. Facts should never intentionally be distorted and intemperate language should be avoided. This does not mean that no appeal can be made to the emotions, but in making such appeal care should be taken to avoid misrepresenting the truth or doing anything else that would destroy the intellectual respectability of the ideology.

188. On a second level, the ideology should be propagated in a simplified form that will enable the unthinking majority to see the conflict of technology vs. nature in unambiguous terms. But even on this second level the ideology should not be expressed in language that is so cheap, intemperate or irrational that it alienates people of the thoughtful and rational type. Cheap, intemperate propaganda sometimes achieves impressive short-term gains, but it will be more advantageous in the long run to keep the loyalty of a small number of intelligently committed people than to arouse the passions of an unthinking, fickle mob who will change their attitude as soon as someone comes along with a better propaganda gimmick. However, propaganda of the rabble-rousing type may be necessary when the system is nearing the point of collapse and there is a final struggle between rival ideologies to determine which will become dominant when the old world-view goes under.

189. Prior to that final struggle, the revolutionaries should not expect to have a majority of people on their side. History is made by active, determined minorities, not by the majority, which seldom has a clear and consistent idea of what it really wants. Until the time comes for the final push toward revolution [31], the task of revolutionaries will be less to win the shallow support of the majority than to build a small core of deeply committed people. As for the majority, it will be enough to make them aware of the existence of the new ideology and remind them of it frequently; though of course it will be desirable to get majority support to the extent that this can be done without weakening the core of seriously committed people.

190. Any kind of social conflict helps to destabilize the system, but one should be careful about what kind of conflict one encourages. The line of conflict should be drawn between the mass of the people and the power-holding elite of industrial society (politicians, scientists, upper-level business executives, government officials, etc.). It should NOT be drawn between the revolutionaries and the mass of the people. For example, it would be bad strategy for the revolutionaries to condemn Americans for their habits of consumption. Instead, the average American should be portrayed as a victim of the advertising and marketing industry, which has suckered him into buying a lot of junk that he doesn’t need and that is very poor compensation for his lost freedom. Either approach is consistent with the facts. It is merely a matter of attitude whether you blame the advertising industry for manipulating the public or blame the public for allowing itself to be manipulated. As a matter of strategy one should generally avoid blaming the public.

191. One should think twice before encouraging any other social conflict than that between the power- holding elite (which wields technology) and the general public (over which technology exerts its power). For one thing, other conflicts tend to distract attention from the important conflicts (between power-elite and ordinary people, between technology and nature); for another thing, other conflicts may actually tend to encourage technologization, because each side in such a conflict wants to use technological power to gain advantages over its adversary. This is clearly seen in rivalries between nations. It also appears in ethnic conflicts within nations. For example, in America many black leaders are anxious to gain power for African Americans by placing back individuals in the technological power-elite. They want there to be many black government officials, scientists, corporation executives and so forth. In this way they are helping to absorb the African American subculture into the technological system. Generally speaking, one should encourage only those social conflicts that can be fitted into the framework of the conflicts of power-elite vs. ordinary people, technology vs nature.

192. But the way to discourage ethnic conflict is NOT through militant advocacy of minority rights (see paragraphs 21, 29). Instead, the revolutionaries should emphasize that although minorities do suffer more or less disadvantage, this disadvantage is of peripheral significance. Our real enemy is the industrial- technological system, and in the struggle against the system, ethnic distinctions are of no importance.

193. The kind of revolution we have in mind will not necessarily involve an armed uprising against any government. It may or may not involve physical violence, but it will not be a POLITICAL revolution. Its focus will be on technology and economics, not politics. [32]

194. Probably the revolutionaries should even AVOID assuming political power, whether by legal or illegal means, until the industrial system is stressed to the danger point and has proved itself to be a failure in the eyes of most people. Suppose for example that some “green” party should win control of the United States Congress in an election. In order to avoid betraying or watering down their own ideology they would have to take vigorous measures to turn economic growth into economic shrinkage. To the average man the results would appear disastrous: There would be massive unemployment, shortages of commodities, etc. Even if the grosser ill effects could be avoided through superhumanly skillful management, still people would have to begin giving up the luxuries to which they have become addicted. Dissatisfaction would grow, the “green” party would be voted out of office and the revolutionaries would have suffered a severe setback. For this reason the revolutionaries should not try to acquire political power until the system has gotten itself into such a mess that any hardships will be seen as resulting from the failures of the industrial system itself and not from the policies of the revolutionaries. The revolution against technology will probably have to be a revolution by outsiders, a revolution from below and not from above.

195. The revolution must be international and worldwide. It cannot be carried out on a nation-by-nation basis. Whenever it is suggested that the United States, for example, should cut back on technological progress or economic growth, people get hysterical and start screaming that if we fall behind in technology the Japanese will get ahead of us. Holy robots! The world will fly off its orbit if the Japanese ever sell more cars than we do! (Nationalism is a great promoter of technology.) More reasonably, it is argued that if the relatively democratic nations of the world fall behind in technology while nasty, dictatorial nations like China, Vietnam and North Korea continue to progress, eventually the dictators may come to dominate the world. That is why the industrial system should be attacked in all nations simultaneously, to the extent that this may be possible. True, there is no assurance that the industrial system can be destroyed at approximately the same time all over the world, and it is even conceivable that the attempt to overthrow the system could lead instead to the domination of the system by dictators. That is a risk that has to be taken. And it is worth taking, since the difference between a “democratic” industrial system and one controlled by dictators is small compared with the difference between an industrial system and a non-industrial one. [33] It might even be argued that an industrial system controlled by dictators would be preferable, because dictator-controlled systems usually have proved inefficient, hence they are presumably more likely to break down. Look at Cuba.

196. Revolutionaries might consider favoring measures that tend to bind the world economy into a unified whole. Free trade agreements like NAFTA and GATT are probably harmful to the environment in the short run, but in the long run they may perhaps be advantageous because they foster economic interdependence between nations. It will be easier to destroy the industrial system on a worldwide basis if the world economy is so unified that its breakdown in any one major nation will lead to its breakdown in all industrialized nations.

197. Some people take the line that modern man has too much power, too much control over nature; they argue for a more passive attitude on the part of the human race. At best these people are expressing themselves unclearly, because they fail to distinguish between power for LARGE ORGANIZATIONS and power for INDIVIDUALS and SMALL GROUPS. It is a mistake to argue for powerlessness and passivity, because people NEED power. Modern man as a collective entity—that is, the industrial system—has immense power over nature, and we (FC) regard this as evil. But modern INDIVIDUALS and SMALL GROUPS OF INDIVIDUALS have far less power than primitive man ever did. Generally speaking, the vast power of “modern man” over nature is exercised not by individuals or small groups but by large organizations. To the extent that the average modern INDIVIDUAL can wield the power of technology, he is permitted to do so only within narrow limits and only under the supervision and control of the system. (You need a license for everything and with the license come rules and regulations.) The individual has only those technological powers with which the system chooses to provide him. His PERSONAL power over nature is slight.

198. Primitive INDIVIDUALS and SMALL GROUPS actually had considerable power over nature; or maybe it would be better to say power WITHIN nature. When primitive man needed food he knew how to find and prepare edible roots, how to track game and take it with homemade weapons. He knew how to protect himself from heat, cold, rain, dangerous animals, etc. But primitive man did relatively little damage to nature because the COLLECTIVE power of primitive society was negligible compared to the COLLECTIVE power of industrial society.

199. Instead of arguing for powerlessness and passivity, one should argue that the power of the INDUSTRIAL SYSTEM should be broken, and that this will greatly INCREASE the power and freedom of INDIVIDUALS and SMALL GROUPS.

200. Until the industrial system has been thoroughly wrecked, the destruction of that system must be the revolutionaries’ ONLY goal. Other goals would distract attention and energy from the main goal. More importantly, if the revolutionaries permit themselves to have any other goal than the destruction of technology, they will be tempted to use technology as a tool for reaching that other goal. If they give in to that temptation, they will fall right back into the technological trap, because modern technology is a unified, tightly organized system, so that, in order to retain SOME technology, one finds oneself obliged to retain MOST technology, hence one ends up sacrificing only token amounts of technology.

201. Suppose for example that the revolutionaries took “social justice” as a goal. Human nature being what it is, social justice would not come about spontaneously; it would have to be enforced. In order to enforce it the revolutionaries would have to retain central organization and control. For that they would need rapid long-distance transportation and communication, and therefore all the technology needed to support the transportation and communication systems. To feed and clothe poor people they would have to use agricultural and manufacturing technology. And so forth. So that the attempt to insure social justice would force them to retain most parts of the technological system. Not that we have anything against social justice, but it must not be allowed to interfere with the effort to get rid of the technological system.

202. It would be hopeless for revolutionaries to try to attack the system without using SOME modern technology. If nothing else they must use the communications media to spread their message. But they should use modern technology for only ONE purpose: to attack the technological system.

203. Imagine an alcoholic sitting with a barrel of wine in front of him. Suppose he starts saying to himself, “Wine isn’t bad for you if used in moderation. Why, they say small amounts of wine are even good for you! It won’t do me any harm if I take just one little drink.... “ Well you know what is going to happen. Never forget that the human race with technology is just like an alcoholic with a barrel of wine.

204. Revolutionaries should have as many children as they can. There is strong scientific evidence that social attitudes are to a significant extent inherited. No one suggests that a social attitude is a direct outcome of a person’s genetic constitution, but it appears that personality traits are partly inherited and that certain personality traits tend, within the context of our society, to make a person more likely to hold this or that social attitude. Objections to these findings have been raised, but the objections are feeble and seem to be ideologically motivated. In any event, no one denies that children tend on the average to hold social attitudes similar to those of their parents. From our point of view it doesn’t matter all that much whether the attitudes are passed on genetically or through childhood training. In either case they ARE passed on.

205. The trouble is that many of the people who are inclined to rebel against the industrial system are also concerned about the population problems, hence they are apt to have few or no children. In this way they may be handing the world over to the sort of people who support or at least accept the industrial system. To insure the strength of the next generation of revolutionaries the present generation should reproduce itself abundantly. In doing so they will be worsening the population problem only slightly. And the important problem is to get rid of the industrial system, because once the industrial system is gone the world’s population necessarily will decrease (see paragraph 167); whereas, if the industrial system survives, it will continue developing new techniques of food production that may enable the world’s population to keep increasing almost indefinitely.

206. With regard to revolutionary strategy, the only points on which we absolutely insist are that the single overriding goal must be the elimination of modern technology, and that no other goal can be allowed to compete with this one. For the rest, revolutionaries should take an empirical approach. If experience indicates that some of the recommendations made in the foregoing paragraphs are not going to give good results, then those recommendations should be discarded.

TWO KINDS OF TECHNOLOGY

207. An argument likely to be raised against our proposed revolution is that it is bound to fail, because (it is claimed) throughout history technology has always progressed, never regressed, hence technological regression is impossible. But this claim is false.

208. We distinguish between two kinds of technology, which we will call small-scale technology and organization-dependent technology. Small-scale technology is technology that can be used by small-scale communities without outside assistance. Organization-dependent technology is technology that depends on large-scale social organization. We are aware of no significant cases of regression in small-scale technology. But organization-dependent technology DOES regress when the social organization on which it depends breaks down. Example: When the Roman Empire fell apart the Romans’ small-scale technology survived because any clever village craftsman could build, for instance, a water wheel, any skilled smith could make steel by Roman methods, and so forth. But the Romans’ organization-dependent technology DID regress. Their aqueducts fell into disrepair and were never rebuilt. Their techniques of road construction were lost. The Roman system of urban sanitation was forgotten, so that not until rather recent times did the sanitation of European cities equal that of Ancient Rome.

209. The reason why technology has seemed always to progress is that, until perhaps a century or two before the Industrial Revolution, most technology was small-scale technology. But most of the technology developed since the Industrial Revolution is organization-dependent technology. Take the refrigerator for example. Without factory-made parts or the facilities of a post-industrial machine shop it would be virtually impossible for a handful of local craftsmen to build a refrigerator. If by some miracle they did succeed in building one it would be useless to them without a reliable source of electric power. So they would have to dam a stream and build a generator. Generators require large amounts of copper wire. Imagine trying to make that wire without modern machinery. And where would they get a gas suitable for refrigeration? It would be much easier to build an icehouse or preserve food by drying or picking, as was done before the invention of the refrigerator.

210. So it is clear that if the industrial system were once thoroughly broken down, refrigeration technology would quickly be lost. The same is true of other organization-dependent technology. And once this technology had been lost for a generation or so it would take centuries to rebuild it, just as it took centuries to build it the first time around. Surviving technical books would be few and scattered. An industrial society, if built from scratch without outside help, can only be built in a series of stages: You need tools to make tools to make tools to make tools ... . A long process of economic development and progress in social organization is required. And, even in the absence of an ideology opposed to technology, there is no reason to believe that anyone would be interested in rebuilding industrial society. The enthusiasm for “progress” is a phenomenon peculiar to the modern form of society, and it seems not to have existed prior to the 17th century or thereabouts.

211. In the late Middle Ages there were four main civilizations that were about equally “advanced”: Europe, the Islamic world, India, and the Far East (China, Japan, Korea). Three of those civilizations remained more or less stable, and only Europe became dynamic. No one knows why Europe became dynamic at that time; historians have their theories but these are only speculation. At any rate, it is clear that rapid development toward a technological form of society occurs only under special conditions. So there is no reason to assume that a long-lasting technological regression cannot be brought about.

212. Would society EVENTUALLY develop again toward an industrial-technological form? Maybe, but there is no use in worrying about it, since we can’t predict or control events 500 or 1,000 years in the future. Those problems must be dealt with by the people who will live at that time.

THE DANGER OF LEFTISM

213. Because of their need for rebellion and for membership in a movement, leftists or persons of similar psychological type often are unattracted to a rebellious or activist movement whose goals and membership are not initially leftist. The resulting influx of leftish types can easily turn a non-leftist movement into a leftist one, so that leftist goals replace or distort the original goals of the movement.

214. To avoid this, a movement that exalts nature and opposes technology must take a resolutely anti-leftist stance and must avoid all collaboration with leftists. Leftism is in the long run inconsistent with wild nature, with human freedom and with the elimination of modern technology. Leftism is collectivist; it seeks to bind together the entire world (both nature and the human race) into a unified whole. But this implies management of nature and of human life by organized society, and it requires advanced technology. You can’t have a united world without rapid transportation and communication, you can’t make all people love one another without sophisticated psychological techniques, you can’t have a “planned society” without the necessary technological base. Above all, leftism is driven by the need for power, and the leftist seeks power on a collective basis, through identification with a mass movement or an organization. Leftism is unlikely ever to give up technology, because technology is too valuable a source of collective power.

215. The anarchist [34] too seeks power, but he seeks it on an individual or small-group basis; he wants individuals and small groups to be able to control the circumstances of their own lives. He opposes technology because it makes small groups dependent on large organizations.

216. Some leftists may seem to oppose technology, but they will oppose it only so long as they are outsiders and the technological system is controlled by non-leftists. If leftism ever becomes dominant in society, so that the technological system becomes a tool in the hands of leftists, they will enthusiastically use it and promote its growth. In doing this they will be repeating a pattern that leftism has shown again and again in the past. When the Bolsheviks in Russia were outsiders, they vigorously opposed censorship and the secret police, they advocated self-determination for ethnic minorities, and so forth; but as soon as they came into power themselves, they imposed a tighter censorship and created a more ruthless secret police than any that had existed under the tsars, and they oppressed ethnic minorities at least as much as the tsars had done. In the United States, a couple of decades ago when leftists were a minority in our universities, leftist professors were vigorous proponents of academic freedom, but today, in those of our universities where leftists have become dominant, they have shown themselves ready to take away from everyone else’s academic freedom. (This is “political correctness.”) The same will happen with leftists and technology: They will use it to oppress everyone else if they ever get it under their own control.

217. In earlier revolutions, leftists of the most power-hungry type, repeatedly, have first cooperated with non-leftist revolutionaries, as well as with leftists of a more libertarian inclination, and later have double- crossed them to seize power for themselves. Robespierre did this in the French Revolution, the Bolsheviks did it in the Russian Revolution, the communists did it in Spain in 1938 and Castro and his followers did it in Cuba. Given the past history of leftism, it would be utterly foolish for non-leftist revolutionaries today to collaborate with leftists.

218. Various thinkers have pointed out that leftism is a kind of religion. Leftism is not a religion in the strict sense because leftist doctrine does not postulate the existence of any supernatural being. But, for the leftist, leftism plays a psychological role much like that which religion plays for some people. The leftist NEEDS to believe in leftism; it plays a vital role in his psychological economy. His beliefs are not easily modified by logic or facts. He has a deep conviction that leftism is morally Right with a capital R, and that he has not only a right but a duty to impose leftist morality on everyone. (However, many of the people we are referring to as “leftists” do not think of themselves as leftists and would not describe their system of beliefs as leftism. We use the term “leftism” because we don’t know of any better words to designate the spectrum of related creeds that includes the feminist, gay rights, political correctness, etc., movements, and because these movements have a strong affinity with the old left. See paragraphs 227-230.)

219. Leftism is a totalitarian force. Wherever leftism is in a position of power it tends to invade every private corner and force every thought into a leftist mold. In part this is because of the quasi-religious character of leftism; everything contrary to leftist beliefs represents Sin. More importantly, leftism is a totalitarian force because of the leftists’ drive for power. The leftist seeks to satisfy his need for power through identification with a social movement and he tries to go through the power process by helping to pursue and attain the goals of the movement (see paragraph 83). But no matter how far the movement has gone in attaining its goals the leftist is never satisfied, because his activism is a surrogate activity (see paragraph 41). That is, the leftist’s real motive is not to attain the ostensible goals of leftism; in reality he is motivated by the sense of power he gets from struggling for and then reaching a social goal. [35] Consequently the leftist is never satisfied with the goals he has already attained; his need for the power process leads him always to pursue some new goal. The leftist wants equal opportunities for minorities. When that is attained he insists on statistical equality of achievement by minorities. And as long as anyone harbors in some corner of his mind a negative attitude toward some minority, the leftist has to re-educated him. And ethnic minorities are not enough; no one can be allowed to have a negative attitude toward homosexuals, disabled people, fat people, old people, ugly people, and on and on and on. It’s not enough that the public should be informed about the hazards of smoking; a warning has to be stamped on every package of cigarettes. Then cigarette advertising has to be restricted if not banned. The activists will never be satisfied until tobacco is outlawed, and after that it will be alcohol, then junk food, etc. Activists have fought gross child abuse, which is reasonable. But now they want to stop all spanking. When they have done that they will want to ban something else they consider unwholesome, then another thing and then another. They will never be satisfied until they have complete control over all child rearing practices. And then they will move on to another cause.

220. Suppose you asked leftists to make a list of ALL the things that were wrong with society, and then suppose you instituted EVERY social change that they demanded. It is safe to say that within a couple of years the majority of leftists would find something new to complain about, some new social “evil” to correct because, once again, the leftist is motivated less by distress at society’s ills than by the need to satisfy his drive for power by imposing his solutions on society.

221. Because of the restrictions placed on their thoughts and behavior by their high level of socialization, many leftists of the over-socialized type cannot pursue power in the ways that other people do. For them the drive for power has only one morally acceptable outlet, and that is in the struggle to impose their morality on everyone.

222. Leftists, especially those of the oversocialized type, are True Believers in the sense of Eric Hoffer’s book, “The True Believer.” But not all True Believers are of the same psychological type as leftists. Presumably a true-believing nazi, for instance, is very different psychologically from a true-believing leftist. Because of their capacity for single-minded devotion to a cause, True Believers are a useful, perhaps a necessary, ingredient of any revolutionary movement. This presents a problem with which we must admit we don’t know how to deal. We aren’t sure how to harness the energies of the True Believer to a revolution against technology. At present all we can say is that no True Believer will make a safe recruit to the revolution unless his commitment is exclusively to the destruction of technology. If he is committed also to another ideal, he may want to use technology as a tool for pursuing that other ideal (see paragraphs 220, 221).

223. Some readers may say, “This stuff about leftism is a lot of crap. I know John and Jane who are leftish types and they don’t have all these totalitarian tendencies.” It’s quite true that many leftists, possibly even a numerical majority, are decent people who sincerely believe in tolerating others’ values (up to a point) and wouldn’t want to use high-handed methods to reach their social goals. Our remarks about leftism are not meant to apply to every individual leftist but to describe the general character of leftism as a movement. And the general character of a movement is not necessarily determined by the numerical proportions of the various kinds of people involved in the movement.

224. The people who rise to positions of power in leftist movements tend to be leftists of the most power- hungry type, because power-hungry people are those who strive hardest to get into positions of power. Once the power-hungry types have captured control of the movement, there are many leftists of a gentler breed who inwardly disapprove of many of the actions of the leaders, but cannot bring themselves to oppose them. They NEED their faith in the movement, and because they cannot give up this faith they go along with the leaders. True, SOME leftists do have the guts to oppose the totalitarian tendencies that emerge, but they generally lose, because the power-hungry types are better organized, are more ruthless and Machiavellian and have taken care to build themselves a strong power base.

225. These phenomena appeared clearly in Russia and other countries that were taken over by leftists. Similarly, before the breakdown of communism in the USSR, leftish types in the West would seldom criticize that country. If prodded they would admit that the USSR did many wrong things, but then they would try to find excuses for the communists and begin talking about the faults of the West. They always opposed Western military resistance to communist aggression. Leftish types all over the world vigorously protested the U.S. military action in Vietnam, but when the USSR invaded Afghanistan they did nothing. Not that they approved of the Soviet actions; but because of their leftist faith, they just couldn’t bear to put themselves in opposition to communism. Today, in those of our universities where “political correctness” has become dominant, there are probably many leftish types who privately disapprove of the suppression of academic freedom, but they go along with it anyway.

226. Thus the fact that many individual leftists are personally mild and fairly tolerant people by no means prevents leftism as a whole form having a totalitarian tendency.

227. Our discussion of leftism has a serious weakness. It is still far from clear what we mean by the word “leftist.” There doesn’t seem to be much we can do about this. Today leftism is fragmented into a whole spectrum of activist movements. Yet not all activist movements are leftist, and some activist movements (e.g., radical environmentalism) seem to include both personalities of the leftist type and personalities of thoroughly un-leftist types who ought to know better than to collaborate with leftists. Varieties of leftists fade out gradually into varieties of non-leftists and we ourselves would often be hard-pressed to decide whether a given individual is or is not a leftist. To the extent that it is defined at all, our conception of leftism is defined by the discussion of it that we have given in this article, and we can only advise the reader to use his own judgment in deciding who is a leftist.

228. But it will be helpful to list some criteria for diagnosing leftism. These criteria cannot be applied in a cut and dried manner. Some individuals may meet some of the criteria without being leftists, some leftists may not meet any of the criteria. Again, you just have to use your judgment.

229. The leftist is oriented toward large-scale collectivism. He emphasizes the duty of the individual to serve society and the duty of society to take care of the individual. He has a negative attitude toward individualism. He often takes a moralistic tone. He tends to be for gun control, for sex education and other psychologically “enlightened” educational methods, for social planning, for affirmative action, for multiculturalism. He tends to identify with victims. He tends to be against competition and against violence, but he often finds excuses for those leftists who do commit violence. He is fond of using the common catch- phrases of the left, like “racism,” “sexism,” “homophobia,” “capitalism,” “imperialism,” “neocolonialism,” “genocide,” “social change,” “social justice,” “social responsibility.” Maybe the best diagnostic trait of the leftist is his tendency to sympathize with the following movements: feminism, gay rights, ethnic rights, disability rights, animal rights, political correctness. Anyone who strongly sympathizes with ALL of these movements is almost certainly a leftist. [36]

230. The more dangerous leftists, that is, those who are most power-hungry, are often characterized by arrogance or by a dogmatic approach to ideology. However, the most dangerous leftists of all may be certain oversocialized types who avoid irritating displays of aggressiveness and refrain from advertising their leftism, but work quietly and unobtrusively to promote collectivist values, “enlightened” psychological techniques for socializing children, dependence of the individual on the system, and so forth. These crypto- leftists (as we may call them) approximate certain bourgeois types as far as practical action is concerned, but differ from them in psychology, ideology and motivation. The ordinary bourgeois tries to bring people under control of the system in order to protect his way of life, or he does so simply because his attitudes are conventional. The crypto-leftist tries to bring people under control of the system because he is a True Believer in a collectivistic ideology. The crypto-leftist is differentiated from the average leftist of the oversocialized type by the fact that his rebellious impulse is weaker and he is more securely socialized. He is differentiated from the ordinary well-socialized bourgeois by the fact that there is some deep lack within him that makes it necessary for him to devote himself to a cause and immerse himself in a collectivity. And maybe his (well-sublimated) drive for power is stronger than that of the average bourgeois.

FINAL NOTE

231. Throughout this article we’ve made imprecise statements and statements that ought to have had all sorts of qualifications and reservations attached to them; and some of our statements may be flatly false. Lack of sufficient information and the need for brevity made it impossible for us to formulate our assertions more precisely or add all the necessary qualifications. And of course in a discussion of this kind one must rely heavily on intuitive judgment, and that can sometimes be wrong. So we don’t claim that this article expresses more than a crude approximation to the truth.

232. All the same, we are reasonably confident that the general outlines of the picture we have painted here are roughly correct. Just one possible weak point needs to be mentioned. We have portrayed leftism in its modern form as a phenomenon peculiar to our time and as a symptom of the disruption of the power process. But we might possibly be wrong about this. Oversocialized types who try to satisfy their drive for power by imposing their morality on everyone have certainly been around for a long time. But we THINK that the decisive role played by feelings of inferiority, low self-esteem, powerlessness, identification with victims by people who are not themselves victims, is a peculiarity of modern leftism. Identification with victims by people not themselves victims can be seen to some extent in 19th century leftism and early Christianity but as far as we can make out, symptoms of low self-esteem, etc., were not nearly so evident in these movements, or in any other movements, as they are in modern leftism. But we are not in a position to assert confidently that no such movements have existed prior to modern leftism. This is a significant question to which historians ought to give their attention.

Notes

1. (Paragraph 19) We are asserting that ALL, or even most, bullies and ruthless competitors suffer from feelings of inferiority.

2. (Paragraph 25) During the Victorian period many oversocialized people suffered from serious psychological problems as a result of repressing or trying to repress their sexual feelings. Freud apparently based his theories on people of this type. Today the focus of socialization has shifted from sex to aggression.

3. (Paragraph 27) Not necessarily including specialists in engineering or the “hard” sciences.

4. (Paragraph 28) There are many individuals of the middle and upper classes who resist some of these values, but usually their resistance is more or less covert. Such resistance appears in the mass media only to a very limited extent. The main thrust of propaganda in our society is in favor of the stated values.

The main reason why these values have become, so to speak, the official values of our society is that they are useful to the industrial system. Violence is discouraged because it disrupts the functioning of the system. Racism is discouraged because ethnic conflicts also disrupt the system, and discrimination wastes the talents of minority-group members who could be useful to the system. Poverty must be “cured” because the underclass causes problems for the system and contact with the underclass lowers the morale of the other classes. Women are encouraged to have careers because their talents are useful to the system and, more importantly, because by having regular jobs women become better integrated into the system and tied directly to it rather than to their families. This helps to weaken family solidarity. (The leaders of the system say they want to strengthen the family, but they really mean is that they want the family to serve as an effective tool for socializing children in accord with the needs of the system. We argue in paragraphs 51, 52 that the system cannot afford to let the family or other small-scale social groups be strong or autonomous.)

5. (Paragraph 42) It may be argued that the majority of people don’t want to make their own decisions but want leaders to do their thinking for them. There is an element of truth in this. People like to make their own decisions in small matters, but making decisions on difficult, fundamental questions requires facing up to psychological conflict, and most people hate psychological conflict. Hence they tend to lean on others in making difficult decisions. But it does not follow that they like to have decisions imposed upon them without having any opportunity to influence those decisions. The majority of people are natural followers, not leaders, but they like to have direct personal access to their leaders, they want to be able to influence the leaders and participate to some extent in making even the difficult decisions. At least to that degree they need autonomy.

6. (Paragraph 44) Some of the symptoms listed are similar to those shown by caged animals.

To explain how these symptoms arise from deprivation with respect to the power process:

Common-sense understanding of human nature tells one that lack of goals whose attainment requires effort leads to boredom and that boredom, long continued, often leads eventually to depression. Failure to attain goals leads to frustration and lowering of self-esteem. Frustration leads to anger, anger to aggression, often in the form of spouse or child abuse. It has been shown that long-continued frustration commonly leads to depression and that depression tends to cause guilt, sleep disorders, eating disorders and bad feelings about oneself. Those who are tending toward depression seek pleasure as an antidote; hence insatiable hedonism and excessive sex, with perversions as a means of getting new kicks. Boredom too tends to cause excessive pleasure-seeking since, lacking other goals, people often use pleasure as a goal. See accompanying diagram.

The foregoing is a simplification. Reality is more complex, and of course, deprivation with respect to the power process is not the ONLY cause of the symptoms described.

By the way, when we mention depression we do not necessarily mean depression that is severe enough to be treated by a psychiatrist. Often only mild forms of depression are involved. And when we speak of goals we do not necessarily mean long-term, thought-out goals. For many or most people through much of human history, the goals of a hand-to-mouth existence (merely providing oneself and one’s family with food from day to day) have been quite sufficient.

7. (Paragraph 52) A partial exception may be made for a few passive, inward-looking groups, such as the Amish, which have little effect on the wider society. Apart from these, some genuine small-scale communities do exist in America today. For instance, youth gangs and “cults.” Everyone regards them as dangerous, and so they are, because the members of these groups are loyal primarily to one another rather than to the system, hence the system cannot control them.

Or take the gypsies. The gypsies commonly get away with theft and fraud because their loyalties are such that they can always get other gypsies to give testimony that “proves” their innocence. Obviously the system would be in serious trouble if too many people belonged to such groups.

Some of the early-20th century Chinese thinkers who were concerned with modernizing China recognized the necessity breaking down small-scale social groups such as the family: “(According to Sun Yat-sen) the Chinese people needed a new surge of patriotism, which would lead to a transfer of loyalty from the family to the state.... (According to Li Huang) traditional attachments, particularly to the family had to be abandoned if nationalism were to develop in China.” (Chester C. Tan, “Chinese Political Thought in the Twentieth Century,” page 125, page 297.)

8. (Paragraph 56) Yes, we know that 19th century America had its problems, and serious ones, but for the sake of brevity we have to express ourselves in simplified terms.

9. (Paragraph 61) We leave aside the “underclass.” We are speaking of the mainstream.

10. (Paragraph 62) Some social scientists, educators, “mental health” professionals and the like are doing their best to push the social drives into group 1 by trying to see to it that everyone has a satisfactory social life.

11. (Paragraphs 63, 82) Is the drive for endless material acquisition really an artificial creation of the advertising and marketing industry? Certainly there is no innate human drive for material acquisition. There have been many cultures in which people have desired little material wealth beyond what was necessary to satisfy their basic physical needs (Australian aborigines, traditional Mexican peasant culture, some African cultures). On the other hand there have also been many pre-industrial cultures in which material acquisition has played an important role. So we can’t claim that today’s acquisition-oriented culture is exclusively a creation of the advertising and marketing industry. But it is clear that the advertising and marketing industry has had an important part in creating that culture. The big corporations that spend millions on advertising wouldn’t be spending that kind of money without solid proof that they were getting it back in increased sales. One member of FC met a sales manager a couple of years ago who was frank enough to tell him, “Our job is to make people buy things they don’t want and don’t need.” He then described how an untrained novice could present people with the facts about a product, and make no sales at all, while a trained and experienced professional salesman would make lots of sales to the same people. This shows that people are manipulated into buying things they don’t really want.

12. (Paragraph 64) The problem of purposelessness seems to have become less serious during the last 15 years or so, because people now feel less secure physically and economically than they did earlier, and the need for security provides them with a goal. But purposelessness has been replaced by frustration over the difficulty of attaining security. We emphasize the problem of purposelessness because the liberals and leftists would wish to solve our social problems by having society guarantee everyone’s security; but if that could be done it would only bring back the problem of purposelessness. The real issue is not whether society provides well or poorly for people’s security; the trouble is that people are dependent on the system for their security rather than having it in their own hands. This, by the way, is part of the reason why some people get worked up about the right to bear arms; possession of a gun puts that aspect of their security in their own hands.

13. (Paragraph 66) Conservatives’ efforts to decrease the amount of government regulation are of little benefit to the average man. For one thing, only a fraction of the regulations can be eliminated because most regulations are necessary. For another thing, most of the deregulation affects business rather than the average individual, so that its main effect is to take power from the government and give it to private corporations. What this means for the average man is that government interference in his life is replaced by interference from big corporations, which may be permitted, for example, to dump more chemicals that get into his water supply and give him cancer. The conservatives are just taking the average man for a sucker, exploiting his resentment of Big Government to promote the power of Big Business.

14. (Paragraph 73) When someone approves of the purpose for which propaganda is being used in a given case, he generally calls it “education” or applies to it some similar euphemism. But propaganda is propaganda regardless of the purpose for which it is used.

15. (Paragraph 83) We are not expressing approval or disapproval of the Panama invasion. We only use it to illustrate a point.

16. (Paragraph 95) When the American colonies were under British rule there were fewer and less effective legal guarantees of freedom than there were after the American Constitution went into effect, yet there was more personal freedom in pre-industrial America, both before and after the War of Independence, than there was after the Industrial Revolution took hold in this country. We quote from “Violence in America: Historical and Comparative Perspectives,” edited by Hugh Davis Graham and Ted Robert Gurr, Chapter 12 by Roger Lane, pages 476-478:

“The progressive heightening of standards of propriety, and with it the increasing reliance on official law enforcement (in 19th century America) ... were common to the whole society.... [T]he change in social behavior is so long term and so widespread as to suggest a connection with the most fundamental of contemporary social processes; that of industrial urbanization itself....”Massachusetts in 1835 had a population of some 660,940, 81 percent rural, overwhelmingly preindustrial and native born. It’s citizens were used to considerable personal freedom. Whether teamsters, farmers or artisans, they were all accustomed to setting their own schedules, and the nature of their work made them physically independent of each other.... Individual problems, sins or even crimes, were not generally cause for wider social concern....”But the impact of the twin movements to the city and to the factory, both just gathering force in 1835, had a progressive effect on personal behavior throughout the 19th century and into the 20th. The factory demanded regularity of behavior, a life governed by obedience to the rhythms of clock and calendar, the demands of foreman and supervisor. In the city or town, the needs of living in closely packed neighborhoods inhibited many actions previously unobjectionable. Both blue- and white-collar employees in larger establishments were mutually dependent on their fellows; as one man’s work fit into anther’s, so one man’s business was no longer his own.

“The results of the new organization of life and work were apparent by 1900, when some 76 percent of the 2,805,346 inhabitants of Massachusetts were classified as urbanites. Much violent or irregular behavior which had been tolerable in a casual, independent society was no longer acceptable in the more formalized, cooperative atmosphere of the later period.... The move to the cities had, in short, produced a more tractable, more socialized, more ‘civilized’ generation than its predecessors.”

17. (Paragraph 117) Apologists for the system are fond of citing cases in which elections have been decided by one or two votes, but such cases are rare.

18. (Paragraph 119) “Today, in technologically advanced lands, men live very similar lives in spite of geographical, religious, and political differences. The daily lives of a Christian bank clerk in Chicago, a Buddhist bank clerk in Tokyo, and a Communist bank clerk in Moscow are far more alike than the life of any one of them is like that of any single man who lived a thousand years ago. These similarities are the result of a common technology....” L. Sprague de Camp, “The Ancient Engineers,” Ballantine edition, page 17.

The lives of the three bank clerks are not IDENTICAL. Ideology does have SOME effect. But all technological societies, in order to survive, must evolve along APPROXIMATELY the same trajectory.

19. (Paragraph 123) Just think an irresponsible genetic engineer might create a lot of terrorists.

20. (Paragraph 124) For a further example of undesirable consequences of medical progress, suppose a reliable cure for cancer is discovered. Even if the treatment is too expensive to be available to any but the elite, it will greatly reduce their incentive to stop the escape of carcinogens into the environment.

21. (Paragraph 128) Since many people may find paradoxical the notion that a large number of good things can add up to a bad thing, we illustrate with an analogy. Suppose Mr. A is playing chess with Mr. B. Mr. C, a Grand Master, is looking over Mr. A’s shoulder. Mr. A of course wants to win his game, so if Mr. C points out a good move for him to make, he is doing Mr. A a favor. But suppose now that Mr. C tells Mr. A how to make ALL of his moves. In each particular instance he does Mr. A a favor by showing him his best move, but by making ALL of his moves for him he spoils his game, since there is not point in Mr. A’s playing the game at all if someone else makes all his moves.

The situation of modern man is analogous to that of Mr. A. The system makes an individual’s life easier for him in innumerable ways, but in doing so it deprives him of control over his own fate.

22. (Paragraph 137) Here we are considering only the conflict of values within the mainstream. For the sake of simplicity we leave out of the picture “outsider” values like the idea that wild nature is more important than human economic welfare.

23. (Paragraph 137) Self-interest is not necessarily MATERIAL self-interest. It can consist in fulfillment of some psychological need, for example, by promoting one’s own ideology or religion.

24. (Paragraph 139) A qualification: It is in the interest of the system to permit a certain prescribed degree of freedom in some areas. For example, economic freedom (with suitable limitations and restraints) has proved effective in promoting economic growth. But only planned, circumscribed, limited freedom is in the interest of the system. The individual must always be kept on a leash, even if the leash is sometimes long (see paragraphs 94, 97).

25. (Paragraph 143) We don’t mean to suggest that the efficiency or the potential for survival of a society has always been inversely proportional to the amount of pressure or discomfort to which the society subjects people. That certainly is not the case. There is good reason to believe that many primitive societies subjected people to less pressure than European society did, but European society proved far more efficient than any primitive society and always won out in conflicts with such societies because of the advantages conferred by technology.

26. (Paragraph 147) If you think that more effective law enforcement is unequivocally good because it suppresses crime, then remember that crime as defined by the system is not necessarily what YOU would call crime. Today, smoking marijuana is a “crime,” and, in some places in the U.S., so is possession of an unregistered handgun. Tomorrow, possession of ANY firearm, registered or not, may be made a crime, and the same thing may happen with disapproved methods of child-rearing, such as spanking. In some countries, expression of dissident political opinions is a crime, and there is no certainty that this will never happen in the U.S., since no constitution or political system lasts forever.

If a society needs a large, powerful law enforcement establishment, then there is something gravely wrong with that society; it must be subjecting people to severe pressures if so many refuse to follow the rules, or follow them only because forced. Many societies in the past have gotten by with little or no formal law- enforcement.

27. (Paragraph 151) To be sure, past societies have had means of influencing human behavior, but these have been primitive and of low effectiveness compared with the technological means that are now being developed.

28. (Paragraph 152) However, some psychologists have publicly expressed opinions indicating their contempt for human freedom. And the mathematician Claude Shannon was quoted in Omni (August 1987) as saying, “I visualize a time when we will be to robots what dogs are to humans, and I’m rooting for the machines.”

29. (Paragraph 154) This is no science fiction! After writing paragraph 154 we came across an article in Scientific American according to which scientists are actively developing techniques for identifying possible future criminals and for treating them by a combination of biological and psychological means. Some scientists advocate compulsory application of the treatment, which may be available in the near future. (See “Seeking the Criminal Element,” by W. Wayt Gibbs, Scientific American, March 1995.) Maybe you think this is OK because the treatment would be applied to those who might become violent criminals. But of course it won’t stop there. Next, a treatment will be applied to those who might become drunk drivers (they endanger human life too), then perhaps to peel who spank their children, then to environmentalists who sabotage logging equipment, eventually to anyone whose behavior is inconvenient for the system.

30. (Paragraph 184) A further advantage of nature as a counter-ideal to technology is that, in many people, nature inspires the kind of reverence that is associated with religion, so that nature could perhaps be idealized on a religious basis. It is true that in many societies religion has served as a support and justification for the established order, but it is also true that religion has often provided a basis for rebellion. Thus it may be useful to introduce a religious element into the rebellion against technology, the more so because Western society today has no strong religious foundation. Religion, nowadays either is used as cheap and transparent support for narrow, short-sighted selfishness (some conservatives use it this way), or even is cynically exploited to make easy money (by many evangelists), or has degenerated into crude irrationalism (fundamentalist protestant sects, “cults”), or is simply stagnant (Catholicism, main-line Protestantism). The nearest thing to a strong, widespread, dynamic religion that the West has seen in recent times has been the quasi-religion of leftism, but leftism today is fragmented and has no clear, unified, inspiring goal.

Thus there is a religious vacuum in our society that could perhaps be filled by a religion focused on nature in opposition to technology. But it would be a mistake to try to concoct artificially a religion to fill this role. Such an invented religion would probably be a failure. Take the “Gaia” religion for example. Do its adherents REALLY believe in it or are they just play-acting? If they are just play-acting their religion will be a flop in the end.

It is probably best not to try to introduce religion into the conflict of nature vs. technology unless you REALLY believe in that religion yourself and find that it arouses a deep, strong, genuine response in many other people.

31. (Paragraph 189) Assuming that such a final push occurs. Conceivably the industrial system might be eliminated in a somewhat gradual or piecemeal fashion (see paragraphs 4, 167 and Note 4).

32. (Paragraph 193) It is even conceivable (remotely) that the revolution might consist only of a massive change of attitudes toward technology resulting in a relatively gradual and painless disintegration of the industrial system. But if this happens we’ll be very lucky. It’s far more probably that the transition to a nontechnological society will be very difficult and full of conflicts and disasters.

33. (Paragraph 195) The economic and technological structure of a society are far more important than its political structure in determining the way the average man lives (see paragraphs 95, 119 and Notes 16, 18).

34. (Paragraph 215) This statement refers to our particular brand of anarchism. A wide variety of social attitudes have been called “anarchist,” and it may be that many who consider themselves anarchists would not accept our statement of paragraph 215. It should be noted, by the way, that there is a nonviolent anarchist movement whose members probably would not accept FC as anarchist and certainly would not approve of FC’s violent methods.

35. (Paragraph 219) Many leftists are motivated also by hostility, but the hostility probably results in part from a frustrated need for power.

36. (Paragraph 229) It is important to understand that we mean someone who sympathizes with these MOVEMENTS as they exist today in our society. One who believes that women, homosexuals, etc., should have equal rights is not necessary a leftist. The feminist, gay rights, etc., movements that exist in our society have the particular ideological tone that characterizes leftism, and if one believes, for example, that women should have equal rights it does not necessarily follow that one must sympathize with the feminist movement as it exists today.

If copyright problems make it impossible for this long quotation to be printed, then please change Note 16 to read as follows:

16. (Paragraph 95) When the American colonies were under British rule there were fewer and less effective legal guarantees of freedom than there were after the American Constitution went into effect, yet there was more personal freedom in pre-industrial America, both before and after the War of Independence, than there was after the Industrial Revolution took hold in this country. In “Violence in America: Historical and Comparative Perspectives,” edited by Hugh Davis Graham and Ted Robert Gurr, Chapter 12 by Roger Lane, it is explained how in pre-industrial America the average person had greater independence and autonomy than he does today, and how the process of industrialization necessarily led to the restriction of personal freedom.

#manifesto #unabomber #ted kaczynski

[obeymematches]

Hi, can I get a matchup? Thank you in advanced and I hope you're doing well despite the current state of the world ❤

(Edit: almost an hour later and I've finally finished writing this. Let's just say this did not turn out the way I expected AT ALL and I'm so sorry in advanced. But at least I got a new story idea)

Introduction (Innocence): At first, I'm extremely shy, timid, and quiet. I have a hard time opening my mouth and starting conversations. It doesn't always bother me since I like keeping to myself because it keeps me motivated and stay focused on my goals. However, if someone approaches me, I try to be as polite, passive, and friendly as possible. The only way to move out of this stage is to constantly interact with me until I feel comfortable.

Chapter 1 (Reality): Now that I'm comfortable, the snark and attitude starts to come through. At first, it will be a few light-hearted teasing that surprise people. Slowly, the jabs grow harsher and my voice grows louder. The dynamic of the conversation changes as I begin to dominate. My voice rises as my hands do all the talking. Sarcasm and eye rolls are regular parts of conversation. A thick cloud of chaos and self-deprecation arises, leading to a storm of endless rangs about my dramatic woes. In the midst of this confusion, you can't help but wonder: what happened to that soft-spoken girl?

Chapter 2 (Chaos): It has become my personal mission to make your life as miserable as possible. My sinister laughter rings through the air, bringing headaches to those around me. Despite all their attempts, no one stop me writing monologues that parody your towards your crush or stealing your phone until you give me your chips. My ego has devoured my self-deprecation; my word is law. My beauty, my hardwork, my intelligence-- me. You absolutely hate it, but you can't leave. The quick-wit, the variety of humor, and the soft crinkle around my eyes when I smile. The smart-assery is almost endearing. You can't help but wonder, what is she doing to do next? It's a game of cat and mouse, but I am always victorious.

Chapter 3 (Darkness): Beneath the madness, lies a small girl fighting against the shackles against her feet. She will not accept any help, she must escape on her own. Doubt constantly lingers in her mind, a consequence of previous endeavors that failed due to pride. She does not care for those who jeer at her as she struggles, holding her head high. There's only one thing in her mind: she will do anything to escape. It will be methodical, calculating, and nothing less than perfection. And when she does, she vows to do everything in her power to take her rightful spot on the throne.

Chapter 4 (Light): And so she escapes and sets on her path to become queen. Along her path, she befriends villagers who aid her quest. Although she becomes the voice of harsh reason, they heed her wisdom. Her companions know that despite her sharp tongue, she is simply looking out for them. Although she dislikes any form of affection, the cracks of her stone heart shine through her actions. It is here that she finds balance. Innocence, reality, chaos, darkness, and light meld into one.

Conclusion: Unfortunately, the journey is not over. However, the journey itself can teach one a lot about themselves. Thus far, the little girl has learned for her love of novels, often with her head in clouds to escape reality. She's also taken a liking to storytelling, finding solace in writing and storytelling to express the emotions she cannot communicate otherwise. She likes to bathe in her vanity by indugling in fashion and makeup, spending hours to create the perfect look. Despite this newfound sense of self, only time will tell whether she can succeed in her quest.

Adding a summary below because as a fellow matchup writer, I can see how this description would drive you insane. I'm so sorry for the story lol

Summary: At first I'm super shy, but I'm actually a sarcastic smartass that has a large ego and annoys everyone. My only redeemable quality is that I'm funny. Deep down, I'm ambitious, stubborn, and paranoid. With friends I'm the unaffectionate voice of reason that shows love through actions. My hobbies are makeup, reading, writing, and public speaking (aka storytelling).

----------

Hello! 💎

Thank you for sending in a request, I hope you like the result ! I’m doing fine, everybody at home is still healthy! 🙏

So I really enjoy how you elaborated on your layered and complex personality, because when I do matches I take people’s negative traits into consideration and they boy’s as well. Let’s face it, nobody’s perfect, and I like how the characters have their own flaws. I always look at how everybody could develop. (although it is not complete redemption cuz i’m not sure if that is possible for demons. like in paradise lost that is impossible but at this point it is not known how far obey me will go with that 🤷 but anyway regardless of canon i like to think that the MC has a positive effect on each character because i prefer healthy relationships) 

So I think your shy first impression would actually draw all of them in. I mean like yeah, they all have their prefered types, but they are also very curious demons (not exactly genuine but curious nevertheless) and would compete to figure out your actual personality. (I mean..Belphie probably not that much but deep down he is interested too)

I think by the time you’d show your deeper layers and vica versa you’d have a strong bond with Mammon (he is supposed to be with you a lot so really; it is hard to avoid opening up to him first but it is up to your imagination how far that goes), Satan would appreciate your shared hobbies and intellect, but it is up to you how much you trust him. Asmo obviously because of makeup, you have a shared interest and he can show you some tricks regarding that. I think both Satan and Asmo could influence your writing also. (Satan knows some lit Devildom stories that the human world lacks, and Asmo probably knows so much gossip nobody is prepared for)     

Now obviously, Asmo is not the ideal partner because he would definitely prefer someone affectionate. 

I’m deciding between Lucifer and Satan..but I am unsure what kinf of improvement you and Lucifer would result in, despite the connection that might form between you two. (I mean I don’t think it is a good idea to pair a kind of arrogant character with a deep-down paranoid person.)

But I think you and Satan could work out. 

I already mentioned the hobbies/shared interests and source of inspiration, but there is more than that to it!

He definitely needs some guidance in his life and no way he would ever let Lucifer play that role. 

It’s not that he is not independent, but he should  reconcile with his birth as much as he can  -  you being a dominant voice of reason under the surface is something he can respect.

Yeah he can be pretty dominant and that might result in arguments from time to time, but you are somebody he needs so he will do his best to apologize if he snaps for some reason. 

You both are witty and sarcastic and I think you would kind of point out the other’s flaws like that. No offense taken on either side.

So his aggressive tendencies the others warned you about might cause paranoia in you but I don’t think he would actually be violent towards the MC so if you bring it up to him in a conversation he would reassure you that you really shouldn’t worry about that. (and then he beats up whoever made you think that, behind your back) 

You see, on the surface he is also calm and collected but on a deeper layer he is also insecure and oh boy he has so much flaws that should be fixed.

Again, you being rational, wise, voice of reason proves to be much needed. 

As I elaborated before, in his case I don’t think there is space for complete redemption but he would go a long way with your aid!

He also adores your ambitions and your goals in life. 

He would read all the work you decide to share with him! He would disappear into the night reading your story and the next time you see him he has a copy of your story in his hand; little notes everywhere, underlined parts, several bookmarks, tons of insanely detailed questions, sharing his interpretations... you better be ready because it will be a long conversation. 

This way he also learns so much about you and the way you express your feelings! He would fall sooo hard, especially when he supposes you like him because of some line on page 73′s third paragraph  

He wouldn’t be sure though. (Again, he can be kind of insecure.)

Not until one of you actually makes a move. I think when that time comes, he would absolutely make a reference to one of your stories one way or another. Even if you don’t write romance. He’s smart, he will find a way.

 I think he would also help you “stay on Earth” considering your fears and tendency of stubborn and prideful behaviour. 

You would never have to ask him for help, as he will be the one suggesting it all the time. He is good at observing people, he will know if/when you need help. He refuses to be rejected by a human so really you have no chance here. 

He also has his own sense of humour so time spent together would involve joking around sometimes. I mean despite his facade, he can be a little brat sometimes. 

Like a cat he likes his independence so really he is not going to force any affection that you would not welcome. Maybe sometimes he enjoys it, but definitely not early in a relationship. 

He would love to participate in your storytelling activities. Not one occassion he would miss. 

#obey me! #obey me #obey me satan #obey me matchup #swd obey me #obey me swd #obey me shall we date #submission

[ucos-files]

Personnel File: Brian Lane, Detective Inspector (ret)

JACK: “Ex-DI Brian Lane, Detective Superintendent Sandra Pullman.” BRIAN: “Pullman. Sussex University, accelerated entry, 1987. Bramshill, ‘92. DI, Murder Squad, ‘92-’95. DCI, Armed Robbery Squad, ‘95 - ‘98.”

Our first introduction to Brian Lane, Detective Inspector (ret) shows us three key character traits about Brian: his photographic memory, his indifferent social skills, and his obsessions, but with detective work in general. As a character, Brian most closely resembles the defective!detective trope in mystery fiction--or the brilliant but insufferable genius: he’s the Sherlock Holmes or Hercule Poirot of the team. His nickname is “Memory” Lane because his memory is really that good. He knows the record of every officer in the Met for the last thirty years. He apparently knows every crime and criminal in the files also. He’s a computer database but better. He’s brilliant, and a brilliant detective (Jack says that he’s a “first-rate detective,” and coming from Jack, that’s the highest praise.) He works best by coming at puzzles from a different angle, by seeing patterns that no one else sees. The problem is, while he can see the most obscure patterns clearly, he can’t see the ones that are in front of his face. It shows up most in the show with Esther, his long-suffering and loving wife, but it also shows up with the rest of the UCOS team. Brian misses social cues, has difficulty with conversations and manners that other people take for granted, has a need for certain rituals and patterns of stability in his life.

Esther is his cornerstone; Jack and the UCOS team are important supportive bricks. DO NOT TOUCH HIS DESK. Brian specifically says that he has OCD, he’s a recovering alcoholic (sober 2 years, 2 months, 8 days as of the pilot.) And it’s strongly coded although never specifically spelled out that he may be on the autism spectrum. In the pilot, he mentions both a car and grandchildren: in later episodes he doesn’t drive and has no children.

Brian is a deeply flawed but very appealing character. He is capable of deep friendship, loyalty, and generosity to the people he cares about--he can be extremely sensitive to other people’s feelings--but he can also be oblivious, selfish and a downright pain. He goes off on obsessive hobbies, and has terrible personal grooming habits. He doesn’t like wearing a suit, and likes wearing dress shoes even less. (It’s interesting to chart how “comfortable” Brian is by what he’s wearing.) He’s depressed, obsessed, and paranoid (a paranoia that can become downright delusional when he isn’t on his medication), and the crux of his personal wounds are his guilt and regret over the man he let die in his custody. There’s always been more to the story, he insists. And we desperately want to believe him. Part of his character arc over the seasons is watching him come to grips with, and grow from his mistakes. Jack’s a big part of that, but Esther, Esther is always his guiding light.

“Our customers?” He asks. Who are the Met’s “customers?” Brian, like the other two old dogs, has a biting sense of humor (see his one-liner to Gerry in the Pill Scene: “Pale blue, lozenge shape. Well, you know what that’s for. Go on, it’s not hard.”). He’s also represents the third leg of the working class background: he’s made it half-way up the Met’s pecking order, but no further. He’s an old-fashioned copper, out-dated and out of touch with policing methods, but  not at all past his prime. In some ways, UCOS, with it’s stable environment and team connections makes him a better detective than he ever was with the Met.

“You mean, he did it, let’s prove he did it, then we can say we are not looking for anyone else in connection with this inquiry?” Brian does his own fair share of techno-speak, but he can speak just as clearly and simply as Jack and Gerry. He has no guff with press-speak or police jargon.

ESTHER! Dear God, loving kind Esther, has been married to Brian for at least thirty years as of the pilot. She’s his anchor. With her, he falls to pieces, and no matter how oblivious or selfish he’s being, he really deeply cares about her. He loves her, and the best signs of how he loves her is how he tries to make himself a better man because she asks him to. She’s worried about him rejoining the Force, even as a civilian. “Brian, I don’t want you doing this—for your own sake. Next time you might not just crack, you might break.” But being a detective is his life’s work -- and being in UCOS gives him a chance to figure out how he was scapegoated for Antony Kaye’s death.

Yes, he is exactly that orderly. Later on he will display his obsessive organization and memory to Sandra and Jack again: “I’ve arranged the case evidence alphabetically. I’ve also listed it with the trial notes chronologically. That way you can cross-reference it more easily.” SANDRA: “I don’t suppose you know the contents of her stomach, do you?”

BRIAN: “Fish, peas, spinach. But no potatoes, which seems odd.” The team will quickly get used to Brian knowing everything; it turns up as a plot point when he doesn’t.

Soon Brian will discover the marvelous world of computing, but not quite yet.

That is HIS coat hanger, and don’t you forget it. Brian doesn’t share easily. We learn later on that he has some good reasons for that, but for now we just think he’s a bit compulsive.

Yes, he does label his things.

Yes, Brian’s manners need some polishing. (Other fabulous one-liners in this scene:  “Don’t smoke the filter, Mrs. Collard. I used to do that, now look at me.”)

Nice pocket knife, Brian.  “Corns, bad. Do you get them?” “I don’t like public transport. I get people to give me a lift.” Gerry, Jack and Sandra will spend a lot of time over the next decade giving Brian and his bicycle a lift. Although Jack is about a decade older, Brian arguably has just as many health problems. It is vaguely suggested that he might be something of a hypochondriac--but it might just as easily be a side effect of the medication. Brian takes pills for sciatica, lumbago, arthritis, rheumatism in his shoulder, as well as anti-depressants. In the pilot, he’s apparently only taking one medication for depression. By the next few episodes, Brian will start taking a lot more depression medication. It suggests that he had a pretty rough and tumble career as a police officer. At the time of Kaye’s death in 1997, he was having therapy for his depression.

Like all the men on UCOS, he carries a tape recorder and knows how to use it.

GERRY: “You know Jack, is he mad?” BRIAN: “No. But I am.”

“He was black. Like you. Which automatically made things more difficult, more political. I found him face-down, having apparently choked on his own vomit. I was the arresting officer. I’d left him for less than two minutes, but no one else saw me in that time. I was being treated for depression. The Union advised me that I should submit a doctor’s report, pending the investigation. It wasn’t flattering. In fact, it basically said I was barking mad. Which gave the Met their get-out. Problem is, I think Antony Kaye was killed—and not by me. He was murdered inside that station. The Met are shielding someone, and I’m gonna prove it. Then we’ll see who’s mad, and who isn’t.” Brian’s soliloquy in this part of the pilot is heartrendingly good. (Alun Armstrong’s performance is bravo.)

GERRY: “Isn’t it all just a bit busy inside your head?”

BRIAN: “There’s probably a lot more going on than in yours”

“Nobody touches this desk. Right? I’ll know if you have. AND my God is a jealous God and He shall smite thee severely.”

Brian loves Esther. It’s a marriage with its ups and downs, but Brian loves Esther. Full stop.

 “I don’t break the law. I don’t smoke, I don’t drink, I take my medication. And you know what? My mind’s on fire.” Brian has two loves: Esther and detection. One of those comes first.

 “This DNA new forensics lark, makes our job easier, does it?” Brian, hanging a lampshade on police work in the 21st century.

THE file. Someday, we will know the truth of what happened; more importantly, Brian will, and will be at peace with himself. And the character growth of a decade will be complete. JACK: “No, no you don’t. You only think you know what happened to him.” (Jack’s right. Jack’s always right.)

BRIAN: “That’s why I left it at home.”

 SANDRA: “Home?!? You brought evidence home?”

 BRIAN: “How else was I gonna get it all filed?”

 SANDRA: “You do realize that if they find out you did this, we’ll get crucified.”

 BRIAN: “Why? Who’s going to tell them?” They do things differently at UCOS. And Sandra, aside from realizing that she’s going to have to deal with a new kind of person in Brian, also realizes that he’s right. No one on UCOS is going to betray UCOS. That’s the loyalty and trustworthiness that will let Brian learn to grow and give back.

Brian, the big eater; Brian, with his silly napkin; Brian, who loves a free lunch. 

Brian, with his toast. Someday, sometime down the road, Brian will figure it all out, and be at peace. He’ll be a good husband to Esther, a good father and grandfather, and a good friend to Jack, Gerry and Sandra. This time, he’ll know the truth, and leave on his own terms.

#new tricks #new tricks bbc #brian lane #alun armstrong

[lady-duskveil]

The Basics ––– –

NAME: Aleyria Duskveil. AGE: An inappropriate question. BIRTHDAY: Late winter. RACE: Ren'dorei. GENDER: Female. SEXUALITY: Pansexual. MARITAL STATUS: In an open arrangement.

Physical Appearance ––– –

HAIR:

Once a cascading curtain of spun gold, the ravages of the void have leeched color and luster from the waves of Aleyria’s hair, its softly roiling silver waves reminiscent of the glint of spider silk in the witching hour. Left loose to be tossed by the whims of the mercurial winds, she somehow always manages to maintain elegant curls and a certain grace that sees it caress the curve of her spine in a way most provocative.

EYE:

Faintly bruised at their sockets by the wonders of her scholarly pursuits, Aleyria’s eyes are gently swept into feline intrigue by a careful application of stiletto sharp liner and smoky powder. Her gaze lightens only at the twilit violet points that illuminate the shadow's incursion into her dark sclera, parting with an unearthly glow that yet defies the corruption of her practices.

HEIGHT:

Five feet, eight inches.

BUILD:

Curvaceous, in a word -- atypical for elven standards of beauty, in others. Though she hardly lacks for the elegance that the timeless blood of the elves gifted her, a certain softness clings to the fullness of her hips, the swell of her bust. While there is much to be admired of her, she favors intimation and subtlety over outright provocation: the peek of a long, shapely leg from the slit of a slip of figure-hugging silk that otherwise maintains her modesty is all that can be expected of this scholar.

DISTINGUISHING MARKS:

An oddity or a trick of the light, the perceptive note that her shadow moves independently of her, shifting outwards in tenebrous tendrils or otherwise mirroring whatever so amuses it in play. At the most dire, that shade might reveal itself to be something more than benign mockery - with good luck, one will never have to see that day.

Whether swept up into preternatural magicks or practicing some eldritch, long forgotten ritual, thin, runic scarring comes to life on her pale skin when her power is motivated to come to the surface. At its height, the lambent light of those foci are no different than the color of her eyes.

Her powerful grip upon the void has been as much a damnation as it is a blessing. That shadowplay has chased much of the living color from her, leaving her a specter of her former self. Accordingly, the cut and color of all of her clothing tends towards that which will flatter her most - black on black on black.

COMMON ACCESSORIES:

Aleyria is fond of creature comforts and accessorizing the otherwise plain gowns that she dons, indulging in a wealth of rings, necklaces and earrings that dangle from the lobes or curve to the sharp points of her elven ears. Her hands - rarely without gloves - often favor the silken fur of a black shroud that hugs her shoulders. Though plain, a curious rosary woven of black beads hangs at her breast, the visage of a veiled maiden at its end. 

Personal ––– –

PROFESSION: Dark Sister of the Cult of Forgotten Shadows. Scholar. Sorceress. In all things magically inclined towards subversive shade and the madness it imparts in the mind, she is an expert. HOBBIES: Making music (harp), painting, fine embroidery, insect collecting, reading, oneiromancy, gardening and archery. LANGUAGES: Polyglot, though particular to Darnassian and Thalassian. RESIDENCE: Hardly a woman of little means, Aleyria keeps a quaint little estate that favors practicality and comfort over the riches that she had accrued in her life. The decor is antiquated, austere and subdued, and the walls are scattered with countless paintings whose haunting depictions are spawned straight from the reaches of her dreams. The Duskveil estate is at once a work of art, a sanctuary for a scholar’s mind and an homage to her studies in the shadow. BIRTHPLACE: Southern Quel'thalas. RELIGION: The Void. FEARS: Loss of control; being robbed of freedom; total and utter loneliness; certain breeds of the Scourge.

Relationships ––– –

SPOUSE:  Deceased. CHILDREN: Deceased. PARENTS: Deceased. SIBLINGS: None. OTHER RELATIVES: Plenty. ACQUAINTANCES: Plenty.

Traits ––– –

extroverted / introverted / in between disorganized / organized / in between close minded / open-minded / in between calm / anxious / in between disagreeable / agreeable / in between cautious / reckless / in between patient / impatient / in between outspoken / reserved / in between leader / follower / in between empathic / unempathic / in between optimistic / pessimistic / in between traditional / modern / in between hard-working / lazy / in between cultured / uncultured / in between loyal / disloyal / unknown / in between faithful / unfaithful / unknown / in between

Additional Information ––– –

SMOKING HABIT: never / sometimes / frequently / to excess DRUGS: never / sometimes / frequently / to excess ALCOHOL: never / sometimes / frequently / to excess

Flaws

moody | short-tempered | emotionally unstable | whiny controlling | conceited | possessive | paranoid | liar impatient | cowardly | bitter | selfish | power-hungry greedy | lazy | judgmental | forgetful | impulsive spiteful | stubborn | sadistic | petty | unlucky

Strengths

honest | trustworthy | thoughtful | caring | brave patient | selfless | ambitious | tolerant | lucky intelligent | confident | focused | humble | generous merciful | observant | wise | clever | charming cheerful | optimistic | decisive | adaptive | calm | loyal

RP Hooks ––– –

Lady of Ruin

Once a lady of an esteemed noble house within Quel’thalas, the fall of the house of Dawnveil’s foremost southern estate was a source of ruin that led her to the grace of the Light long ago. Those particularly embroiled in the politicking of Silvermoon’s most esteemed court may remember her as as one of the devout brides of the Radiant Flame, a cloister of high elven priestesses and a far cry from the shadowy scholar she has become. Some may even seek to reconnect with her in a search for understanding - what could have possibly led her so far from the path of righteousness?

Scholar of Shadow

Particular to studies of the shadow arts and their intersection with the deplorable whispers of the Old Gods, Aleyria’s specialization in the exploration of the realm of madness has been cause for criticism by some. As such, her inquisitive mind is ever in search of lucrative partnerships with other enterprising individuals that might lend a hand to the often dangerous ordeals she puts herself through in pursuit of knowledge. Those of fragile mind need not apply - or do, if you’ve an interest in serving as the perfect subject she needs.

Forgotten Sister

Not all that Aleyria pledges herself to are wild romps through forgotten ruins in search of artifact and antiquity. The Cult of Forgotten Shadows, the conclave of shadow priesthood that praises and idolizes the absence of the Light, is paid due pittance in her travels as a priestess. To those less inclined to seek the embrace of the Light’s warmth in healing the wounds beaten into their ragged flesh, Shadow may prove an apt companion - if you don’t mind listening to the soft whisper of her proselytizing and opening yourself to greater corruption.

OOC ––– –

Hey! I'm Nika. I'm a 28 year old witchy lady living in northeast America in the middle of the woods. I'm an amateur artist, decent writer and avid roleplayer. I'm also a gigantic goofball and a huge introvert, but if I like you, you'll know it. I’m looking for more connections for my sultry shadow priestess, Aleyria.

As I don’t find myself playing much World of Warcraft anymore, most of my RP is done through Discord. I prefer multi-paragraph roleplay but can and will adjust to my partner, and plot lines and long term RP are loved. I'm more than willing to work together on or run story arcs. I am lore-compliant, but appreciate fanon and flexibility.

► Please be 18+. I will not roleplay with you if you are not of age. Sorry, but this is to protect myself and to protect you. ► IC is not OOC. I'm not interested in being the target for frustration or sexual interest. I will block you if you make me uncomfortable. ► My time is limited. This isn't to say that I won't have time, but I have a very active life. Please be patient if I don't respond right away. ► I will play mature content and themes (violence, gore, sexuality, drug or alcohol usage, temporary imprisonment, temporary injury, etcetera). ►Please ask about long term injury or disfigurement, captivity or imprisonment and character death. (These themes should have plot associated with them, as I love my character dearly!)

If you’re interested in plotting with me, I can be contacted at Scowlet#7417.

#world of warcraft #rp character #ren'dorei #void elf #wyrmrest accord

[queerchoicesblog]

Rooftop Talks (Platinum, F!Raleigh x MC)

Since I noticed so many fics starring M! Raleigh but none with F! Raleigh, here’s my attempt to fill that void. Inspired by the rooftop scene, this is my entry for the prompt “ honesty” of the @choicesjulychallenge hosted by @kinda-iconic !

In short, Raleigh and Rachel (Dorian, MC) grow closer as they make a habit of meeting on the abandoned building’s rooftop to avoid paparazzi and spend with each other. Then one night Rachel has a question for Raleigh...

Prompt: Honesty

Discalimer: mild use of bad words and hispano hablantes over here: I tried to incorporate some occasional Spanish in here - I wanted to incorporate that trait in Raleigh’s character- so please tell me if I messed something up with the language (I took Spanish classes ages ago) or in general and I’ll fix it!

Word Count: 2328

Perma Tag: @brightpinkpeppercorn @melodyofgraves @bhavf @abunchofbadchoices @silverhawkenzie @begging-for-kamilah @kennaxval @strangerofbraidwood @crazypeanat @desiree-0816 @universallypizzataco

F! Raleigh x MC Tag: @hellospunkiebrewster @furiouscloddonutpeanut

________________________

The night of the charity gala none of them would have expected it to happen again but Raleigh and Rachel made a habit to sneak away from the paparazzi and hide on the rooftop to catch some breath. They would chat and flirt, share takeaway food and views and suggestions about each other new songs. Some nights they would even bring their guitars and jam together: most of the times they would end up playing and singing their heart out silly hits of the past or campfire songs only to laugh till their cheeks hurt as if they were teens at a party their parents knew nothing about. Other nights they would be a soundboard for each other, especially Raleigh: she would listen to Rachel's ramblings and second-guessing herself and offer her advice: how to keep the tune on that note, a better rhyme, a few sick moves for her next video...even how to make the right impression during interviews, because Raleigh was a professional, not just her rebel stage persona, and she had been around journalists and paparazzi way more than the new sweet shining star. 

In return, Rachel would suggest new kinder strategies to deal with fame and fans or to call home every once in a while: even if she left when she was fifteen, she must have someone who missed her. The thought made Raleigh smile, but in a good way: it was almost painful to see how genuinely good the Dorian girl was.

"Are you homesick, Rachel?" she inquired to divert the question.

"Hm, not really, no...” she said, stirring her noodles as she considered her answer. "But I've lived with my parents longer than you did. I just wanted to break free and find a place of my own after I got my high school diploma. I mean, I love them but at a certain point in life, your roads need to part, so to speak, right? But you, it was different for you...that's why I asked. I hope I didn't overstep though"   Raleigh shrugged and took a bite of sesame chicken.

"I talked with dad a couple of weeks ago. It was his birthday, mom and the whole family squad set up a party for him. And just so you know, he hates parties. He's a good ol' grumpy fellow"

"Aw cool! I bet he's your number one fan even if maybe he doesn't show it much? I mean, your whole family should be your number one fan!"

"Nah, papi sticks and will always stick with the classics till the end of time and mamita y tìa were and still are -I guess- huge fans of Ricky Martin, el Rey del Pop Latino" Raleigh explained.

She didn't realize until the day after that she couldn't remember the last time she had talked about her family with someone. Everyone always asked her about future plans, career path, tips maybe, but private life? Never. Unless it meant asking out on dates, heavy flirting or scandalous gossips about a former lover. Only Rachel asked her about the life she had left behind in Puerto Rico and everybody had long lost interest in.

"You don't strike me as a fan of Ricky Martin" Dorian chuckled.

The R&B singer flashed her a wide grin.

"Not exactly, but thanks to them I can make quite a good impression of him. Wanna see it?"

"Is that even a question? Of course!"

Raleigh laughed and reached for her phone as the new star put down her empty food box and shifted to sit more comfortably. She scrolled down a YouTube playlist then her eyes met Rachel's again.

"You ready?"

As the young woman nodded she pressed play and ran her hand through her hair and produced her best puppy dog eyes, making Rachel laugh. She put down her phone and walked backward theatrically opening her arms.

Un, dos, tres Un pasito pa'lante María Un, dos, tres Un pasito pa' atrás

Then as the tune became more upbeat she produced herself in a complicated yet effortlessly fluid sequence of hands clapping, swirling and hips swaying. Latin Pop may have not been her favorite genre but damn, she owned the choreography just as she owned the stage during her shows.

Así es María Blanca como el día

She sang quickly stroking Rachel's cheek with one finger before spinning and turning away.

Pero es veneno si te quieres enamorar Así es María Tan caliente y fría Que si te la bebes de seguro te va a matar

After striking a dramatic pose, she winked just before bursting into laughter.

"Oh my God! That was everything, Raleigh!" Rachel enthusiastically applauded.

"Muchas gracias, nena" she said ruffling her hair and taking her seat beside her.

"Now I'm living to see a Ricky Martin and Raleigh Carrera duet"

Raleigh looked at her and snorted.

"I don't see it happening but paradoxically my team might love the idea so never say it out loud when they're around. Never!"

"A girl can dream, right?" Rachel shrugged and giggled.

All of a sudden way less bubbly considerations crossed her mind and she lost in her own train of thoughts. A girl can dream...she had repeated those few words in her head so many times lately. Every time Raleigh absentmindedly stroked her arms on a fake date, every time she caught her looking at her from afar, every time they kissed.

Then the night of the gala happened. When the two of them sneaked away and hopped on Raleigh's motorbike. She still remembered the cool breeze of the night caressing her skin as she held herself to her "girlfriend". That was a moment of rare perfection: the two of them finally alone and careless, the adrenaline of the ride, the warmth of "the R&B time bomb"'s body pressed against her. When they arrived on the rooftop and she admired the breathing view of New York skyline, her head almost started spinning, just like when Raleigh twirled her in her arms on the gala dance floor.

But what made her heart skip a beat was hearing Raleigh talking about that place, sharing memories of her past, when her teen self felt lost and lonely in the big city...and her project to turn the abandoned building into a community center for kids.

"You make me feel like I want to tell you things. I don't know why" Raleigh confessed that night.

That was when a familiar warmth settled into Rachel's chest. The same feeling she experienced when her high school crush caught her singing to herself in the auditorium and told her that she sounded like an angel and stopped to chat. She didn't ask her out before leaving - Rachel Dorian life had never been a romcom so far- but the little casual talk stole her younger self's breath away.

Rachel instinctively knew that Raleigh never shared that with anyone else. It was just her tone, the way she said it. And she couldn't remember a single interview or tweet mentioning it. So...Raleigh's walls were crumbling down? You don't share secrets, very private secrets with anyone!

Maybe I was just being paranoid as my usual...maybe I didn't misread the signs, she thought as Raleigh not only accepted but enthusiastically returned the kiss that followed. And took her to the railing, her lips never leaving hers or her neck.

But later...

Raleigh suddenly making a loud noise with her soda breaking her train of thoughts.

"Earth to Rachel"

Avery's protege turned to see her looking at her with a slightly amused grin on her face as she played with the straw.

"Sorry, I spaced out" Rachel smiled shyly, avoiding eye contact.

"No biggie. Just glad we're on the same planet again"

Rachel looked at her sideways: Raleigh was happily humming one of her latest songs. She seemed to be in a good mood, she always was in a good mood when she was on that rooftop. Or so Rachel could tell by what she saw over the past few weeks. Which lead her to summon up her courage and ask her a question that had been troubling her for a while.

"Why did you bring me here the night of the gala?"

Raleigh was probably caught off guard by that but concealed it well. She shrugged again and leaned down on the carpet, propping herself up on one elbow.

"I told you, I had to take a break from those stupid fraud activists and this is where I go to catch my breath. We were at the gala together so it made sense to ask you to join. Lie to me and tell me you don't like it here" she said, flashing her signature grin.

"Of course I do" Rachel gave a quick smile.

Maybe that's the problem. I like it here, when it's just the two of us, no one else in sight...probably I like it too much.

But this conversation was going nowhere. So she sighed and spoke again, hoping to find answers and hopefully reassurance:

"Our time is ticking out, right?"

When Raleigh looked up to her, the usual cheerfulness of Rachel had been replaced by what looked like...melancholy?

"What? It's barely midnight, the night is still young, Rachel!" she joked to clear the mood.

Then she gave another grin and reached to playfully bump the other girl's arm.

"I have a bad reputation in case you haven't noticed. You should know that I'm not the kind of girlfriend who respects nor gives a damn about curfews."

But Rachel didn't play along this time.

"That's not what I meant" she said as her eyes met Raleigh's again.

The Puerto Rican singer knew what she meant. The big issue that had been lingering between them for a while and that was written all over Rachel tired face. She felt a pang of pain at the thought of it and she decided to conceal it as she always did.

"Oh well who knows, Rachel? I haven't spoken to my PR manager about it on our last meeting"

But the other woman didn't seem satisfied with that brief explanation.

Raleigh grimaced and sat up. It actually hurt more than she thought. She reached for Rachel's hand.

"Hey, we both knew the deal. Start a fake relationship and get a career and reputation boost"

"It's all it is, huh?"

The Dorian girl looked at her with painful expectancy. Gosh, I knew this is what we would get out of this, Raleigh thought.

"Well, yes and no. I mean, I like you, Rachel, I'm glad we got closer. You're shockingly pleasant to have around, rising star. And you've been...well yeah so far you're the best fake girlfriend ever, seriously. I hope we will still be friends when this...you know..."

"Yeah, sure"

Rachel diverted her eyes as her chest tightened. She misread the signals, shit. She kept fantasizing and being oblivious of their current situation...but she couldn't blame Raleigh for it. That night, their first night on the rooftop, when the kisses grew hungry on the railing, the Puerto Rican star too soon parted and told her to follow her, she wanted to go on another ride on her bike. Rachel reached for her.

"We don't have to stop, you know..." she noted, gently stroking her hip.

"What? Too scared to admit you might be catching feelings?" she teased, since the other woman just stared at her in silence.

"Whoa, there. Let's not get crazy. I'm a seasoned professional" Raleigh interrupted her, walking backward.

What a stupid I am! What was I thinking? That she, Raleigh Carrera, might fall for me?, Rachel grimace, her face hidden from the R&B star's view. Your life is not a romcom, Dorian, and you have embarrassed yourself already. God, that night she might have...she totally thought I was taking advantage of the situation? Oh shit shit shit!

Her phone beeped. She picked it up as a deep blush spread on her face: Low battery warning.

"Rachel, are you okay?"

The girl didn't turn but she felt the weight of Raleigh's concerned gaze over her.

"Yeah, I'm good...I just-I just forgot that I have a meeting with Avery early tomorrow. Very early. Like dawn"

"Why so early?" Raleigh gave her a quizzical look.

"Oh it's Fiona's doing actually" she said as she stood in a swift motion and gathered up her belongings. "She just want to introduce us to some yoga routine or something like that. She said it stimulates creativity... the point is I gotta go. I'm sorry"

She gave a quick apologetic smile and moved towards the staircases.

"Oh, okay" Raleigh was visibly confused by the sudden change in her "girlfriend". "Do you want me to give yo-"

"No no, I know the way! I'll call a cab!"

Before she opened the metal door leading downstairs, Raleigh spoke again.

"You sure, you're okay though? Did I say something wrong? About the-"

Rachel stopped and slightly turned her head.

"No, of course not. It's just...my silly little head that keeps forgetting things. How things go. Buenas noches, Raleigh"

That said she speed up down the stairs and only the echo of the door resounded on the rooftop, "their place", before the other woman could say goodnight back.

Something doesn't add up, Raleigh thought, still struggling to make a sense of the last few minutes. What did I-

Then her eyes fell on the purple guitar she gave Rachel sitting not far from the wooden bench. Dorian jealously kept her ever since the first day they met. She wore it on every show, even in the music video they filmed together. She even caught her smiling down at it as she strummed a new melody. She really made her happy with her guitar: Rachel would never go anywhere without it, even the press noticed...and now it was there. Did she forget?

"Oh crap!" Raleigh sprinted to the staircases and opened the door, calling her name.

"Rachel hold on, your guitar! Rachel!"

But her words were welcomed by silence only.

#choices july challenge #platinum #raleigh x mc #raleigh carrera #playchoices #choices fanfic

[imagine-organization-xiii]

Org XIII Members as Yanderes

Suggested by: Anon.  I did research for this one, guys, because I’m not very familiar with the Yandere style.  For another good post - that is a lot better than this one - about Org members as Yandere’s, click here.  To find where I got my information, click here.

Don’t know what a Yandere is? Here’s a definition: “yandere is a portmanteau of two Japanese words, yanderu (to be sick) and deredere (strongly and deeply lovestruck.) Someone who is sweet and kind at first glance but will become violent and possessive when it comes to their love.”

Be warned.  This one gets violent in some places.  Also, the behaviors and attitudes listed below are toxic, so if you have a significant other who displays any of these traits, please do what you can to safely leave the situation.

Xemnas

Type: Sadistic

Arguably the worst of the yandere types, Xemnas and sadistic yandere’s have a strong desire to break you.  To tear you apart until you’re nothing more than an empty shell of what you once were, and now he can change and mold you to be whatever he wants you to be.  In his eyes, you are pure and perfect, so he is utterly fascinated with the idea of corrupting you.

Physical pain is one thing that Xemnas thrives on.  Causing physical harm is one of the only ways that he feels he can show affection.  Grabbing you a little too harshly by the arm, grabbing your chin with his hand to force you to look at him, pushing you onto the bed or onto a chair and forcibly ripping off your clothes when he wants to have sex with you? All things that Xemnas does.

However, mental and emotional pain is something that he is seriously good at causing.  Whether it’s harming or hurting your family and friends, manipulating you into hurting them yourself, and causing you to just be completely mentally torn about your feelings for him and his actions.  Xemnas pretty much lives to torture you.

Xigbar

Type: Manipulative

Xigbar’s natural personality is mischievous and dangerous, which makes his manipulation of you all the more powerful.  He’s naturally an enticing guy and lures you in with his bad boy persona and before you know it you’re spiraling down a rabbit hole of possession and manipulation.

Makes you feel like you’re completely and utterly dependent on him so when he wants sex and you don’t, you feel like you have to satisfy him otherwise he might leave you.  Then where would you be? Alone and lonely and with no one to help you?

Before you actually got together and he realized that you had some attraction for him, he would definitely do anything in his power to make you jealous.  He won’t be satisfied until all of your thoughts are of him and no one else.

Xaldin

Type: Overprotective

Xaldin is like a silent guardian for you, following you around and standing behind you with his arms crossed, intimidating anyone that you speak to.  It gets to be so overwhelming sometimes that you want him to back off, but be careful when you tell him that because he’ll scowl and frown and claim that you aren’t taking your own safety seriously.

In general, he’s happy just being by your side.  He likes spending time in your company and doesn’t like being away from you.  However, if he feels at any moment that you’re in harm’s way, you won’t even be able to imagine what he’ll be capable of.  Will definitely attack or even kill anyone who bothers to lay a hand on you.

He loves having you depend on him at certain moments because he feels as though you can’t protect yourself.  He almost treats you like a child at moments and uses your imagined weakness as an excuse to never be away from you.

Vexen

Type: Stalker

Vexen is usually so busy with doing whatever it is that he does on a daily basis that he has a hard time balancing his work with his feelings for you.  Doesn’t get a chance to romance you like he actually wants, so he definitely turns to some stalker tendencies.  The worst he’ll ever get is that he literally has a camera in places that you frequent, including your bedroom.  It’s the only way he knows that he can keep an eye on you - protect you - while still being able to work.

Watches from the sidelines and continuously admires you from afar, very much on the line of ‘creepy.’  Definitely capable of killing for his S/O whether she knows it or not.

Lexaeus

Type: Overprotective

The two of you were always very close and neither of you can really pinpoint the moment when your relationship went from being protective to overprotective.  It was almost a natural transition, so slow and gradual that you barely noticed it.  Even Lexaeus doesn’t believe he’s being overprotective because he doesn’t think that he’s going to far with watching over you.  Your safety isn’t debatable.

Lexaeus is quiet and dangerous as he watches over you, sometimes taking your safety a little too seriously.  You don’t dare call him on it though, in fear of what he might do.

In the end, he makes you feel so paranoid that every single thing in the world might be a danger to you, so you pretty much cease to be your own person.  He uses it as an excuse to keep you by his side at all times.

Zexion

Type: Obsessive

Kind of similar to the stalker type.  The only difference is that Zexion does make contact with you more often than not and communicates with you as though you are less than intelligent - as if you need to be protected and preserved and kept away from any dangers in the world that might tarnish you.

He’s usually very much a sweetheart on the outside, but there’s something about him - about the way he watches you - that makes you uneasy.  It’s almost as though you’re one of his well worn novels that he wishes to put on a bookshelf and keep, to only flip through when he wants to reminisce.

Saix

Type: Possessive

Yandere’s who are the possessive type would like to physically own their love interest, and Saix is no different with you.  Like all of the yandere types, the possessive type goes hand in hand with both the obsessive and the stalker.  Saix wants to keep you safe and protected, like you’re a favorite knick knack or doll that needs to be kept in confinement.

Really at the extreme part of the spectrum.  Saix is extremely good with words and will definitely convince you that you are better off with him and only him.  He’ll try to tell you that the friends you have are bad for you and how you shouldn’t go outside because you might get hurt.

Will definitely use force to get what he wants.  If you ever try to leave, be prepared to be dragged back by your hair.

Axel

Type: Manipulative

“You don’t want your friends to get hurt, do you? I mean, you can barely take care of yourself.  I can’t imagine what kind of burden you must be on them.“  Will definitely manipulate you into thinking you can’t live without him.  Controlling you is Axel’s main goal.  One main issue with this type of yandere is that many people are already involved with or having feelings for the manipulative person, which makes it much easier to manipulate them!  Axel uses your own feelings and love for him to his advantage, making you think that he knows best for you.

“I can’t live without you,“ is not the compliment you once thought. It’s a snare to keep you with him.  Makes it so that you feel as though you have to stay to protect him, and by the time you’ve given up everything for him, he turns on you and makes it so that you want to monopolize him as much as he wants to keep you.

Demyx

Type: Possessive

Demyx’s playful demeanor hides a possessive monster.  Goes insane when anyone tries to touch or make eye contact with you because he sees you as property and not a person.  Will definitely try to separate you from friends and families under the guise of keeping you safe.  He’s so casual about it that you can’t help but believe him, and the next thing you know, you’re locked in his room, cut off from society.

Restrained in public, rough and almost violent in private.  Wants you to dress a certain way, talk a certain way, and act a certain way.  All ways that would suit him.  If you act out or do something he doesn’t like, he’ll make it known and you’ll definitely be punished for it.

Luxord

Type: Obsessive

Like other obsessive Yandere types, Luxord doesn’t see you as a person.  More often than not, he sees you as a piece of artwork that should be admired and praised.  He sometimes wishes that he could pose you like a mannequin in his room forever just so he can admire your exquisite beauty for all eternity.

Luxord manages to keep his yandere tendencies to himself.  His mischievous, kind demeanor masks a person who is possessive and controlling.  Once Luxord has you in his clutches, chances are that you will not be able to escape again.

Marluxia

Type: Stalker

On the opposing side of the clingy version of the yandere spectrum, stalker type yandere’s usually never have much of a chance to win their love’s affection.  Marluxia is so busy with his organization duties, as well as taking care of his plants, etc., that he rarely gets to spend as much time with you as he’d like.

Leaves big bouquets of flowers outside of your door all the time with little love notes saying how much he cares for you and wants to be with you.

Will definitely sabotage any relationship you have with anyone else, especially if that relationship happens to be romantic.

Larxene

Type: Sadistic

Borderline manipulative, Larxene is almost a black widow spider in the way she entices you and manipulates you into her tight clutches and breaks you down until you are nothing like you were before.  Fixated on changing you into what she sees as perfect.  To her, you’re already pure, but not in the correct way.  You’re perfect, but not perfect for her.

As is right with the main definition of sadism - deriving pleasure from the pain of others - Larxene thrives on seeing you in mental and emotional pain.  Physical pain is another thing entirely.  Slapping you around a bit really gets her going.

Roxas

Type: Clingy

When I say clingy, I mean clingy.  Clingy goes hand in hand with the stalker type, when the person feels as if they simply cannot function properly without you.  Roxas has serious abandonment issues, so more often than not you’ll find him at your side, holding onto your hand, asking to hang around you.  You aren’t even sure if he realizes that he’s doing it sometimes.

The most childish out of most of the organization members.  Roxas needs to be near you or he doesn’t feel right.  He almost seems normal most of the time because he just wants to spend time with you, but beware - if someone ever tries to monopolize your time, he will most definitely get possessive, defensive, and dangerous.

Xion

Type: Clingy

More on the childish spectrum of the clingy yandere type.  Almost acting like a child, Xion needs attention or she will pout and throw what could definitely be compared to a tantrum.  Usually just fine with being at your side as you do your own day to day activities, but be warned if you ever try to make a bit of space toward you.

Gets serious separation anxiety when away from you, which means that her clingy attitude will definitely get worse as time goes on.  This means that she needs to be by your side almost constantly and gets fidgety when you’re out of her sight.

#organization xiii #organization xiii headcanons #kingdom hearts #kingdom hearts headcanons #yandere

[mrneighbourlove]

Four Answers for Four Questioning Moon Children

Majora’s Mask is my F.G.O.A.T. It’s an experience that I’m so glad I took part in, and that I can come back to at anytime in my life. I try to space out my playthroughs every few years, as to get a fresh experience with a new view point on the game.

At the ending of the game, you encounter 5 moon children, wearing the masks of the boss monsters. Four of these kid’s challenges are optional, but if you make it through their game of hide and seek and find them, you will get asked a question. These questions rocked me hard as they resisinated with how I feel about where my life is right now, as well as my personal fears and thoughts.

This isn’t so much an in depth analysis of the questions, but more so my own interpretation, as well as my personal answers I give. Thank you for giving this article a read, and for following my work long enough for me to be comfortable with being more open.

Strong swing right out the gate. My friends are people I hold close and treasure. I have a circle of people I would call true friends and I try to share similar values in those friends. People who are kind, brave, and positive. As an extrovert, I love every minute I get talking with them, asking how their days have been, and making sure they are ok. I choose to believe my friends are good people.

I can also, unfortunately, get paranoid. I get paranoid when time passes between us without interacting, thinking they have been injured or are avoiding me. I get paranoid my energy might have rubbed them off the wrong way, and they find me annoying. I get worried that they might not like me the way I like them. I know this isn’t the case. I know these thoughts that come into my head aren’t true, but there is always that little voice that pesters you none the less.

On a personal note, I want to say this. If you ever have negative, intrusive thoughts fill your mind; fight them. Hold onto the belief that you aren’t alone. People do care for you. And that there is always someone out there who enjoys your company. I believe in my friends, I wish them only love, and I believe in my hope that they wish the same for me.

A question I think we should ask ourselves everyday. What makes you happy? I think we all strive to find happiness in our hobbies, our occupation, our connections, and all our actions. If you aren’t happy doing something, why do it? I also think that our own terms of happiness won’t make others happy too. Why would they? Everyone has their own passions, but those individual passions aren’t universal.

I know people who try to make others happy, up to everyone around them, and it can leave themselves feeling empty or without energy to be happy themselves. I believe we need to look inwards and be able to say, “Is what I’m doing right now at this current moment in life make me feel happiness?” If yes, that’s great! Relish your happiness. If you feel doubts about it, take a step back and see what can be reworked to make yourself happy. If the answer is a no, take the courage to walk away and seek out the thing that you need in your life to be happy.

This is the question that resignated with me the most upon replaying the game. The ‘right thing’ is such a broad term. We as a society follow rules to try and do the ‘right thing.’ This is all I know though. The right thing to you is always correct. No one can take away your right to what the ‘right thing’ is to you in a circumstance. You have every right to make the choices you do, as well as the right to have your own belief on them. People might not be happy with your choices, but they should respect them. All we can do in this life is make the choices for ourselves, doing what we believe is the right thing so that we can have safe and happy lives.

However, with that said, there are two things you can’t expect. 1st, you can’t expect everyone to be happy with your choice. It’s just reality. You will always have people who will disagree, be angry, be sad, or even be hurt by your choices. You wanting them to be happy won’t change a person’s viewpoints or make things better, in fact, you may just end up hurting them. 2nd, the right thing for you may not be the right thing for someone else. Not just in a sense that you shouldn’t abuse your beliefs to emotionally or physically hurt people, but that you can’t force what you think the right thing is on someone else. To just assume that your actions are in the benefit of those around you will only alienate yourself from those people.

So the ‘right thing’ is a tricky thing for me. In the end, I can only do my best in standing up for what I believe in, respecting others, and hoping others respect my choice. As long as you aren’t out to hurt others, I’ll respect yours.

In a game about masks, what lies underneath is the greatest face of them all. I choose to believe this question is made to seek a deep answer. I can imagine that a lot of people tend to put on a metaphorical mask for their day to day lives. Like theater actors, they might have to take on traits or personalities to get through challenges of life. Could be putting on a smile, or needing to appear strong. People might put up emotional walls to shield away or hide what they are deep down.

Take off all the masks, get rid of the barriers, acts, and walls, and I believe you are what lies deep in your soul, or an expression I love, wearing your heart on your sleeve. Your true face is your true self. It’s who you are under pressure, when you are purely genuine with your intentions. Are you bitter? Are you kind? Only you know what your true face is, unless you allow others to witness it for themselves.

I do my best to be forward with my thoughts and emotions. I’m empathetic and emotional. So it’s really hard to fake anything. I strive for and hope that when I sit down with another person, and we openly look each other in the eye, we do so with our true faces.

#legend of zelda #Legend of Zelda Majora's Mask #Link #Moon Children #Skull Kid #Philosophy #Emotions #Thank you for reading me pour my heart out for a moment #For friends close and far #And those that might need encouragement #figmentforms #s-kinnaly #ridersoftheapocalypse #Always having a thought out for anyone that needs it

[didsomeonesayventus]

ESSAY TIME I love a ship please come hang out w/ me on this dinghy or like. dont because fates is awful and I can’t blame u for dodging that bullet but i just wanna scream because i love them and they’re the fixation rn so 321 GO

i cant blame anyone for not really seeing this because their support is. Ok. Its alright. Not amazing, it’s serviceable, better options are out there in fates I'll concede. Corrin has like. At least 3 other love interests who feel more canon LMAO but this isn’t about them

It's more from elsewhere in their characterization that really made me adore them and, as I mentioned in tags, a lot of this comes from how I write them which. Is largely filed under rp stuff right now but more ramble time on how i write them i guess dont forget to mark your free bingo space for throwing out large swaths of fates canon and writing.  Also we're scooting their canon support gently to the side because it’s ok it’s not the most offensive writing this nightmare scrap heap of canon has to offer but a massive missed opportunity.

PART 1- One (1) Corn, With a Side of Emotional Neglect

*makes vague gesture at Disney's Rapunzel* Corrin would have been so much better recieved if the devs just took some notes from you instead of writing such a flat character i swear.

Corrin in particular with how I write her is getting a pretty massive rework in the emotionally stable department because honestly I don’t believe she would be. like. She's not dumb, but she is naive, important distinction, and it ends up coloring her views a lot and I have a ramble on that over here on the inverse graph that is Corrin’s confidence but to dissect where her attitudes came from:

Her family was limited to visits, and she has been directly/implicitly blamed for this for roughly a decade and a half, at least a decade, by not being an insane king's definition of strong enough to be with them. Bad memory makes her frail, swordsmanship isn’t up to par, doesn’t seem to offer much else in terms of skills unlike Xander, a Certified Badass(tm), Magic-oriented Leo and Elise, and Magically gifted but just plain ruthless Camilla. She’s held at arm’s length from her family, and while her siblings may have always loved her and expressed that love as often as they could, they’re not always there or a good yardstick to measure her progress with, and she had to always watch them go and likely wonder when they would come back, or if they even would.

As for our beloved butler and maids, being surrounded by servants was probably her most constant and consistent source of contact, and she does love them, but it can be very easy to wonder if they love her because they do or because it's their job to.

Corrin's faith in everyone around her and unwavering trust is there because any sort of doubt is basically redirected to. her. Because she is the dumbass who's still figuring the world out. She's hyper aware she's still learning and making naive decisions and she overcompensates that with "well what do I know" and not feeling really all that worthy to be Special Protagonist. She doubts herself before almost everything else.

Brief mention of Dragon arc because fates was dumb and neglected an entire arc for dragon feelings beyond chapter 5 and foreshadowing for Dad(tm) but I also write in an arc of the Dragon Is A Metaphor For Loving Yourself Faults And Trauma And All Love Yourself And You Can Control Yourself Dammit.

*Corrin hurt herself in her confusion!*

The way I write Corrin is not nearly as put together and confident as Canon™️ Corrin is, at least for a good chunk of the plot. She fakes it till she makes it because she is a leader and being mopey will not get things done but she’s also very self critical and mopey on the inside and quite paranoid that people don’t actually like being around her and just. ball of stress and anxious hidden under Many a uwu that she doesn’t want to talk about because why should she complain her childhood wasn’t That Bad and if she’s mopey how can she set a good example and people don’t like debbie downers and look its fine its fine lmao

PART 2- Mr. Perfect

As for Mr. Subaki he puts a lot of time and effort into looking perfect. I emphasize that because he may very well have natural talent, but honestly it feels like a large amount of his perfection is just. Stressing himself out by planning for and rehearsing everything possible! God this anxious idiot I love him!!! He's sociable and agreeable, but I think with basically everyone it’s. Skin deep. He’s charismatic Enough, and he digs a bit into the other’s history and personality if he’s interested, but he never really lets the other reciprocate like a magician never revealing his fraudulent secrets.

Biggest problem with that is he can't open up and vent because that is to admit a flaw and no no cant have that we cannot have that so he's just. Not sure who to turn to and has trouble being emotionally honest- even to himself. He just! Doesnt let himself have fun or relax; all perfect all the time baby. There’s basically no one who he could consider a close and trusted friend who can love him flaws and all. The closest would be Sakura and Hana and welp. gotta keep things professional and it’s not like Hana really expresses a sense of understanding and patience when they’re fiercely competitive with each other.

There’s probably a lot of muttering to his pegasus while he’s cleaning her hooves or braiding her mane, or staying up late thinking about how narrowly disaster was and wasn’t avoided that day but he. Also doesn’t really vent and also feels that imposter syndrome of “I’m honestly awful how did I even make it here.”

and it stinks because I think at his core he is a very sweet and caring guy and a massive dork, but he just plops himself on the edge of a pedestal and gives himself no room to be himself or anything less than perfect and is likely on the cusp of impending burnout.

you dumb anxious idiot i have S-Ranked you every fucking time I open this godforsaken game I didn’t even fucking plan for this

PART 3- (Patrick Warburton impression) “Oh yeah, it’s all coming together.”

So our characters and stage are set. We got FE Fates (I’ll default to Rev), we got my views when writing these two, so what next? What is the general plot I imagine since we’ve gently scooted aside the canon support chain?

The dumbasses-to-be think they’re out of each other’s league.

For Subaki, it is plot-irrelevant background character falling in love with the protagonist, which yields the exact sort of pining you’d imagine: man you are super cool and hit all my standards but I’d be dreaming if you felt the same about me. She’s sweet, she takes charge, she can fight for herself well enough, has he mentioned she’s sweet? He can actually relax a bit around her which is really odd but I guess that’s what happens when your personal skill is literally called “Supportive”. Oh yeah and also his Lady’s older sister which oof. Sakura? In law???? Hinoka in law???? Takumi in law?????????? ryoma in law oh gods.

For Corrin, it’s Mr. Prince Charming right there and he’s very nice and Sakura is saying so many nice things about him but wow she’s. a princess from a country that has consistently terrorized his and on top of that might a well have been raised under a rock!!! And she picks up details and nuances in people remarkably well, but she overthinks them. She can pick up that Subaki- while very polite and friendly -isn’t being entirely forthcoming about what he’s thinking or feeling, but she can’t pin down exactly what it is, and makes the educated guess that he's just being nice because she’s Sakura’s sister or something.

And they’re friendly. They help each other out a bit. There’s tension, sure, but no one really comments on it (except for everyone making bets in the bg). They don’t really yield on their internal messes because Corrin knows she’s a leader and can’t really do that and distracts herself with believing in everyone around her, Subaki just flat out would rather do literally anything besides admit he’s messed up anywhere or open up. So feeling are put on a low simmer for awhile.

Of course they fall in love, and it almost gets messed up because when Subaki requests to talk with her in private to confess, she immediately assumes he’s going to tell her that he’s not interested. Her simmer roars into a boil because she’s been under Protagonist Stress ON TOP OF having a crush she’s confident won’t be reciprocated, so she snaps quite a bit because that has all been shoved in a bottle and she just wants to get the mess over with if he’s just going to tell her very nicely that her company is lovely but hes not interested it hurts a lot to think that but its fine you don’t have to settle.

But the thing is being emotionally vulnerable like that, pointing out she’s scared too of always not being enough and living up to expectations, to finally get that off her chest, spurs him into it, too. Because she gets it. She honest to god gets it even if she bought into the lie he’s perfect she understands. Oh, yeah, she also reciprocates feelings that’s really excellent too. Like Subaki probably makes a lot of fuss about a bunch of ultimately meaningless details and having “standards” and yadda yadda gods help whatever poor soul asks him to pull out the list of traits of his ideal partner, but I think at the end of the day if he’s looking for love most of all, like a lot of people he just wants someone who he can just. be himself around. Who likes it when he’s being himself!

And they both learn that yeah maybe they’re more flawed than they’ve been lead to believe, but it starts to not matter at all because they still try really hard and everyone makes mistakes. They’re both here to say it’s ok your best is enough, YOU are enough. They both think they’re amazing regardless of their mistakes and love to see each other smiling and succeeding and just make. a nice little bubble of comfort. They’re stubborn and supportive, they learn how to poke and prod the bad moods away be it making a nice cup of matcha and talking it out or laughing at a tiny, meaningless mistake and repeating it to keep that feeling of dread away. Also they both spoil their partners regardless of who they end up with you can’t @ me on that they both do it which means guess what mega spoil time. And long hair on both just means they can braid each other’s hair no problem... waaaaaa.... Also early rise Subaki and late rise Corrin so there’s always a sleepy fight in the morning because UGH this is early you keep saying i’ll get used to it but im not i need a kiss first if you want me to be up this early. Subaki is better at logic and planning than Corrin, and Corrin keeps things optimistic and has a good gut for when to take an improvised risk. They’re always swapping places on who’s holding the other back from a fight that isn’t worth it because some asshole insulted the other, they mediate each other and will fight anyone who even harms a hair on the other’s head. They give and they give back and they work together perfectly.

And when it comes to the kids that bubble expands and they make sure they all have the tools to just take a deep breath and remember it’s okay Mama and Papa love you so much and you’re going to be amazing no matter what you do. Corrin’s got the best stories to tell and Subaki tucks the blankets in just right. They’re good parents with a lot of patience and plenty of mental health wisdom which is good because, as my mom would say, “bad brain chemistry is my bad”.

Like UGH I love them. I love them a lot. A good chunk of this is me making canon better thank me fates devs

Part 4- Katie All of This is Out of Your Noggin What About Canon

(DBZ abridged vc) WHAT ABOUT CANON but ok here have some canon quotes

“The two spent the rest of their lives together. Corrin ruling as the wise Queen of Valla. Subaki adapted quickly to royal leadership and became a great source of support for his wife. “ - Revelation route ending

“I feel like the pressure's off when I'm with you. I don't have to be perfect.” “You'll never be lonely as long as I'm around. Just call me and I'll come running.” - Friendship bonding quotes but also consider waaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

“This might sound corny, but I think you're my soulmate.” - What he says when he is married to you and yes that is corny and its perfect

hot spring is dumb fanservice BUT if you can get the good RNG to get them both in there   “A shared bath warms not just my bones, but my heart as well.” “I-I suppose so...I just wonder if it's right to be so happy...” (emphasis mine) IT ABSOLUTELY IS BE HAPPY AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

also one of his quotes when u stop by your quarters is  "Ah, welcome home, dear. Kick off those shoes and relax. You're with me now!" and you absolute himbo your wife doesn’t fucking wear shoes!!!!!!!!!

Part 5- I’m done I’ve yelled into the void good night enjoy a ship please be excited for the fic I have on the backburner that I will get out there one of these days but I want it to be perfect so RIP me I guess

#katie rambles #long post #in case read more fucks up on mobile

[theragnarokd]

keep you like an oath (1/2)

[rinch, M, sex work AU]

Whatever Nathan might have to say about the subject, there is nothing that Harold's life lacks. Admittedly, he misses Grace. In hindsight, she was right to break up with him. She deserved better. Still, Harold has everything he needs: his work, Nathan’s friendship, and the love of the dog Nathan foisted on him. Curse Nathan’s inability to leave well enough alone. The… paid companion… is foisted on Harold much like the dog. Harold wakes up one day to see a beautiful man kneeling beside his bed. “Hello,” Harold says, at a loss for words. An assassin would probably have acted already, not to mention worn more clothes. “My name is John,” the man says. He truly is extraordinary. Harold’s eyes helplessly trace the fluid grace he exudes even in complete stillness. “I’m a gift from a friend.” At that, Harold sits up and snaps, “Don’t be absurd. Gifts are objects. You’re a human being.” John’s eyes crinkle, so briefly that Harold almost misses it. “My services, then.” “I hope you’re good at shelving books,” Harold says. John rises. Agreeably, he says, “I can do that.” Of course he doesn't bother to put on so much as a stitch of clothing first, so that Harold is subjected to a morning of pointedly looking away from John’s form as he stretches to put books away.

~~

At the end of the first week, Harold decides to be the better man and graciously admit defeat. "Whatever Nathan is paying you," he tells John, "I'll double it if you go away." It's not that John is vulgar or crass. Those traits, Harold would have had no difficulty ignoring. It's that John looms constantly on the edge of Harold's vision, somehow managing to convey without saying a single syllable that he'd be available for sexual gratification at the crook of a finger. John raises his eyebrows. "That's a lot of money." His voice is mild. Harold stares at him steadily and waits for John to get the point, which is that he doesn't care. John is becoming a distraction that Harold can't afford. Finally, John names a sum. It's exorbitant. Harold writes him a check. "There'll be another one next month." John accepts it, examines it, and takes out his phone. He takes a picture and sends it. "Mr. Ingram said he'll double any counter-offer you make." Harold stares at him. Possibly John mistakes his outrage at Nathan for horror, because he adds, "I'm not going to take it. I don't need that much. I'm just curious how long it takes before you run out of place for all the zeros." "I'll move to scientific notation first," Harold says automatically. Then he rubs the bridge of his nose. "You could simply tell me what compensation would satisfy you, since you have an upper limit. I promise you I'm more stubborn than Nathan. This will save time and effort for everyone involved." The smile on John's face is like getting bitten by a mosquito somewhere impossible to scratch. "Now you're just challenging my professional etiquette, Harold, not to mention my skills. I can't let that lie." Harold's outraged expression probably speaks for itself. "Go away," he tells John. With another one of those smiles, John says, "Sure thing, Harold." He walks away with a swaying motion that leaves Harold with a terrible headache and an erection that won't subside. ~~ "Are you going to thank God for Ms. Carter again," Harold states rather than asks, wary. Nathan's got that enraptured look on his face again, the one that means his favorite asset has found him a new way to save lives and incidentally dump a metric tonne of work into Harold's lap. "I'm the luckiest sonuvabitch in the whole world," Nathan says placidly. "First I get you, then I get Carter. Someone up there likes me." "Your player cheated when he rolled your charisma stats, you mean," Harold mutters, sullen. "If you're so grateful, you might express it by removing your professional pest from my house." "He was supposed to be a gift," Nathan says, frowning. Then his expression smooths out. "You work so hard, Harry. You deserve someone being nice to you." Through gritted teeth, Harold says, "Perhaps you should try doing that, instead." Nathan goes to his infuriating habit of pretending the last five minutes of the conversation never happened. "Anyway, we need a couple new features." He pushes a scribbled-on napkin toward Harold, who takes it. For a very short time, he tried insisting that Nathan only give him finalized requirement documents. The end results, printed out, were heavier than his laptop and made less intuitive sense to Harold than Nathan's semi-random notes did. "These aren't just a couple of new features," Harold says. He's not surprised: he was expecting something along the line of a service pack. This, though, is more like an entire version. "We're reaching a brand new market!" Nathan says, beaming. "Nathan. We've discussed this. They have to pay us to count as a market." Nathan waves it off. "They're our customers, Harry. The customer's always right." "That doesn't make any-- you know what, fine." Harold slaps Nathan's notes on the table. He won't need the paper. The important parts are all in his mind. "But if your hire interrupts me while I'm working, so help me God, Nathan, I'm putting your Google history on the internet." "You mean it isn't there already?" Nathan says in perfect deadpan. Harold sometimes misses the days when his crush on the man distracted him from how impossible Nathan could be. Before Harold's halfway back home, he has the new design ready and glittering in his mind. A beautiful thought pattern, as shining and fragile as glass. It's immersive enough that Harold thinks of nothing beside it. Nathan's original idea had involved hacking the CIA. While the idea was irresistibly intoxicating at first, Harold came to his senses soon enough and persuaded Nathan to take another course. People signed away bits and pieces of their privacy every day without a second thought. You couldn't get away with literal murder in the terms of service, but some breaking and entering was certainly possible. Of course, some are savvy, or paranoid, or uninterested in any of the services that IFT has to offer. Harold himself is all three. Others haven't been able to use IFT software up till now because they didn't have a US social security number, which is what Ms. Carter brought up to Nathan. Those additional users would be overlooked by most development companies, as many of them didn't have much spare cash to spend on cellphone apps. Cash, however, wasn't Nathan or Harold's goal. At some point while Harold was busy writing stub routines, a sandwich materialized at his side along with a glass of water. Harold drained the latter, ruefully surprised to realize that he was starving and his back hurt from a long span of time in the same position. He stretched, wincing at his own popping joints. "I do a mean backrub," John says. He's sitting on a couch next to Harold who, after ten years of pretending to work in a cubicle, has gotten very good at ignoring other people in his vicinity. "If you're taking a break." "No, thank you." The words lacked Harold's usual venom. He did appreciate the sandwich. John shrugs. "I'm going on a run soon, actually, if you need to stretch your bones." In fact, a run sounds wonderful, but Harold doesn't have time right now. "I'm afraid not," he says, eyes already back on his screen. On his way out, John pauses. "The thing you're working on. It's trying to reach undocumented immigrants." "Among others, yes." Harold doesn't bother looking to see whether John approves. "You still require an actual address," John says. "If these guys are homeless, they can't fill out your forms. Maybe add an option for a PO box or something." That hasn't occurred to Harold. It'd been admittedly many years since he'd last been on the run without an address, and he didn't have to fill many forms at the time. "Thank you for your input. I'll consider it." John doesn't respond. A few moments later, a door closes, and after that Harold stops paying attention to noises. He has work to do. ~~ The familiar crick in Harold's back tells him he fell asleep at his keyboard again. The gentle hand on the back of his neck, though, that's new. "Come on." He's being pulled up, and it's easier to obey than it would be to resist. He's half dreaming, led to his bed, laid down in it. A series of steps, familiar enough to drown him. Harold closes his eyes and whispers, "No." He's not sure why he sounds the way he does, high and helpless. His voice hasn't been like this in decades. "It's okay," John whispers in return. He pulls the covers over Harold. "Just sleep," and Harold does. ~~ The next morning, he gets breakfast in bed. "Really?" Harold says, staring at the laden tray in front of him. The eggs are unfairly fluffy and golden. John shrugs. "Seems like the best shot to get actual food in you. I think I'd need a crowbar to pry you away from your keyboard." "Hah," Harold mutters. He has to do it around a mouthful of buttered bread, though, which probably detracts from the strength of his point. Sad to say, John isn't wrong. Harold is definitely feeling better for decent food and decent sleep. He's more focused, sharper. Sharp enough to realize that the house has been cleaned at some point since yesterday morning. "You're a housekeeper, now?" Harold says, sniffing at the air. It smells pleasantly floral. "Mr. Ingram pays me to take care of you," John says. "I do what I can." "Modesty doesn't become you," Harold says as he sits in his chair. He becomes engrossed soon enough that John's amused, "I'll bear that in mind," barely registers. When Harold next surfaces, John is sitting cross-legged on the floor, possibly meditating. Harold takes a moment too long to look at him, the fan of his dark lashes against his cheek, how genuinely calm he seems. Maybe he'll be content to feed Harold and clean up after him, and cease his distracting attempts at... other things. Of course, just thinking this is tempting fate. Harold is poking around, checking his changes in and updating his stream before delivery, when he makes the mistake of looking again. John is doing some kind of yoga, is Harold's best guess. Why he's doing it in Harold's work room and not anywhere else is a question probably best left unasked. Harold doesn't know the names of the poses. The one John is doing now displays him in an unfairly attractive way, his chest thrust out, spine and legs stretched out, showing off functional strength, and (Harold swallows) flexibility. He tears his eyes away, hoping John hasn't noticed. Possibly he'll stop soon, or go for a run, or for food, or for anything that doesn't involve displaying himself a few yards away from where Harold is attempting to get some work done. The next time Harold looks, John has his shoulders and feet on the ground, arms braced to support him as his front is perfectly arched, giving Harold a blatant view of a cock that's either half erect or showy even soft. Harold fixes his eyes on the screen ahead of him until he hears John padding off to another room, refusing to acknowledge the persistent pressure against his button fly. ~~ Day fades into night and Harold's arousal turns sour on him, leaving him in one of those moods where he's sick of his own body. He tries to talk himself into getting some exercise: rationally, he knows it will help. Irrationally, he doesn't want to be helped, would rather stay locked in his own self-loathing. He's just nearly convinced himself to go anyway when John smirks and says, "Want to go running?" Harold clams up tight. "No." He turns his chair back to his desk, resolute now. Behind him, he hears John sigh and move closer. Harold flinches when he feels a light touch on his shoulder. A moment later, when John retreats, he turns around. "What?" he snaps. "I'm starting to see why Ingram hired me." John's voice is glib, but there's a small frown on his face. "No offense, but if you keep going like this, you'll have a nervous breakdown." "That's my affair." Harold turns to his screen. Or tries to: John has reached out and snagged his chair. "It's my job to keep you happy," John says, "but it seems like I'm doing the opposite, and I don't understand why. Do you just not find me attractive?" Harold glares at him. "You know I do." John gives him a minute shrug in return. "Then what's the problem?" Harold really doesn't want to have this discussion. "I'm not interested in sleeping with somebody who is paid to do it." That is a gross understatement, but Harold isn't about to elaborate. John tilts his head. "You know, I do find you attractive. No, really," he says, when Harold tenses. "You've got good hands, and that super-intense thing you do is pretty hot. Also, I can tell you're smart. That's hot, too." Harold crosses his arms, unimpressed. John carries on. "You're not paying me to fake attraction." "I'm not paying you at all," Harold mutters. John ignores this. "If I didn't like you, on some level, I wouldn't have stayed in this job. Do you know how Ingram hired me?" He doesn't wait for Harold to respond. "I had a long term contract with another guy before. A hotshot lawyer, a real shark. He'd come home and half the time he was cursing the day Nathan Ingram was born, because he couldn't figure out how somebody who valued people over money became CEO of this huge, successful company." Having a secretive genius at his back probably helped. Harold remains silent, curious despite himself to see where this is going. "Then the lawyer and I ended our contract - nothing bad, he got a boyfriend who wanted to be exclusive - and I got an offer from Ingram." John holds Harold's gaze. Evenly, he says, "When I came to meet him, he wrote me a check for twenty thousand dollars. Said that it was for coming to meet him, that it was mine, whatever happened next, and that he was going to get coffee and if I wanted we could discuss a job offer when he came back." That was very like Nathan. Harold rubbed his eyes. "We're doing a global minimum income program," he says. "He probably would've written you into the pilot, if you looked unwilling." "Yeah," John says. "Point being, I wasn't." He sits down on the sofa, across the room from Harold, letting his legs splay. "This job lets me take care of people," he softly says. "I like that. I could take care of you, if you'd let me." The words are sincerely meant. Harold can tell that much. He wishes he knew why they make him want to huddle in a tight little ball and never come out. As it is, all he can do is shake his head helplessly. "No," he says, "no." He just manages to stagger out of the chair, leave the room before he can fall apart while John looks on, bewildered. ~~ It's not a good night. Thinking about sex makes Harold physically sick. He thinks about Grace instead, remembering the smell of her shampoo, the sound of her laughter. He misses her so much that the longing is like a physical presence. On nights like these, Harold is tempted to pick up the phone. Tell her that he's sorry, that he shouldn't have chosen his work with Nathan over her. He can't forget their last conversation. She didn't cry, although her eyes were suspiciously bright. "You love the work you do," she'd said, "and I love that about you. But it'll always come first for you, and I can only be second for so long." Right now, he'd dump IFT, Nathan, and every project he's worked on gladly to have her with him. At the same time, he knows himself. He'd only pick up another project the second he felt secure, something else to get lost in. Grace was always so forthright and certain about the things she wanted. Harold misses that about her, the way she developed a career in art when everybody told her she'd fail. The way she told him, right at the start, she didn't like sex and would rather be alone than in a relationship with someone who expected that of her. The way she took in the world with single minded delight and let beauty flow out of her in return. Damn Nathan. Up until his stupid attempt to fix Harold up, he'd forgotten how lonely he'd become. ~~ The next morning, Harold emerges cautiously from his bedroom. There is a hearty breakfast set on the table, and John is nowhere to be seen. John returns just as Harold's done eating, his shirt and hair damp with sweat. He goes showers and emerges fully clothes, sitting on the couch with a book in his lap. Harold can appreciate an olive branch as well as anyone. "Thank you for cooking." John looks up at him and smiles. It's a beautiful expression. Harold feels all right admiring it from across the room, safely distant. "Hey, I'm not going to live on hot pockets," John says. "Neither should you." He seems willing to let the other night go. Perhaps Harold should as well, but he knows he'll just worry at it until he's made himself explicit. "I won't have sex with you." He says it with finality, bracing himself up for an argument. John just says, "Okay," as easy as anything. Harold blinks at him. "I admit, I was prepared for you to be much more difficult about this." "Harold," John says, with exaggerated patience, "I get it. No means no. If you change your mind, or want something beside housekeeping, let me know. I'll leave you alone otherwise." "Will you," Harold says, suspiciously. John shrugs and goes back to his book. Later that day, he sees John just as he's lacing up his running shoes, and finds himself saying, "Can I join you?" John flashes him a genuine, if startled, smile. "Of course." Running is not Harold's favorite activity, but he appreciate the way it clears his mind, leaves his body pleasantly sore. John could outrun him with ease, but he keeps his pace to one Harold has no trouble following. They don't talk. ~~ Once they settle into a routine, having John around is... nice. Harold can feel his own productivity going up due to improved sleeping, eating and exercise habits. Nathan gives him a disgusted look when Harold says this. "I didn't hire him to make you more productive, Harold." Harold raises an eyebrow. Nathan is a good man, but even with Harold at his back, IFT did not become a multibillion dollar international corporation solely because Nathan is nice. "Well, all right, not just to make you more productive." Nathan smiles at him. "You look happy, Harry. Do you have any idea how long it's been?" Harold shrugs. He could probably give an estimate. "The newest update is released." Nathan beams at him and raises his water glass, which Harold clinks with a rueful smile. "Okay, so next up, I want you to give me a miracle." "Must be Tuesday," Harold murmurs. Nathan ignores this. "We have some sensitive projects, as you well know. I want a good indication of who might be a good - or terrible - to put in charge of them. As we don't have access to police records...." He spreads his hands. Harold could hack into those, but that's not the issue. When Nathan says sensitive, he doesn't mean classified: he means that the projects deal with vulnerable people in positions of weakness. The very worst types for those wouldn't have a criminal record. A padded bank account can hide any number of sins. "I'll see what I can do." "On another note," Nathan says, "you wouldn't mind if I gave our John an additional task, right?" The our makes Harold bristle. "He's hardly mine. Do whatever you want." It's only when he leaves the restaurant that he realizes Nathan may have done that on purpose, to distract Harold from asking what task, exactly, he had in mind. ~~ It's two AM, and Harold thinks he might be ready to admit defeat. Perversely, the one thing that may be keeping him from doing so is John, who stands blinking in the doorway and asks, "Are you going to sleep?" while yawning. "I think not," Harold says, eyes fixed on the screen. "It's a reprehensible pastime for weak minds." John's laughter is quiet and brief, but it feels genuine. "You know, scratch nervous breakdown: I think Ingram hired me because he was worried about you becoming an evil overlord." "The idea is growing on me," Harold says, swiveling in his chair. "Here, sit down. Be a duck." John obeys, and, rather doubtfully, goes, "Quack?" "Not--" Harold gestures broadly. "It's a, a term for a kind of debugging. I explain the problem to you in detail. You don't have to answer, or even respond. The idea is that the act of explaining the problem would clarify it to me, and help me come up with a solution." John nods and gives him an expectant look. "This isn't a software problem," Harold tells him. "I need to find a good man." He has a sudden mental image of himself carrying a broken lamp and wandering around the country wearing a barrel. God, he needs to sleep. "Or woman, or person -- someone who could be entrusted with the care of vulnerable individuals. No, worse," he interrupts himself. "I need a reliable method of finding such people. And given that I have, at best, a patchy background of any given person's history...." he trails off. "Well, that didn't help at all." "Sorry?" John says. Harold waves it off. "Not your fault. Nathan needs to understand I'm not actually superhuman. He'll live." Mentioning Nathan's name put an intent expression on John's face. "Can I make a suggestion?" Harold mutely waves him on. "What about quizzes?" "...Quizzes." "Like ones in magazines," John says. "Or on Friendczar." Perhaps John had a point about sleep. Harold suspects he might be hallucinating. "...Friendczar." John waves his hand. "You know the type. Which kind of dog you'd be. What Hogwarts house." He pauses, then adds, "A German shepherd, and a Griffindor, respectively." "John," Harold says with deliberation, "please go to sleep." John shrugs and saunters away. The shoulder strap of his too-large undershirt falls as he does, drawing attention to the elegant line of his collarbone. Harold turns sharply to his screen. He persists a few more moments before slinking to his own bed in shame. ~~ He wakes up at six in the morning brimming with ideas. John leaves him a sandwich and says something which Harold doesn't register, clicking away as he does. When he finally looks up, it's evening, there is an empty plate beside his elbow, and John is nowhere to be seen. Well. John is a grown man who can certainly mind his own affairs. Harold busies himself with administrative nonsense and the small backlog of bug fixes that have built up. Nothing absorbing enough to keep Harold from his bed. Harold stays up anyway. He jumps when he hears footsteps. Any hope that this might have passed unnoticed is shattered by John's amused, "It's just me." Harold turns sharply in his chair. He just barely manages to quell the urge to ask John where he's been. Instead, he asks, "What's that?", nodding at the dry cleaning bag that John is holding. "For my mission," John says with a straight face. "Apparently I'm to escort Ms. Zoe Morgan to the gala in two days." Harold blinks. He knows Ms. Morgan, admittedly not well but he would have thought her capable of procuring her own dates. "I see." "Nathan said you wouldn't mind," John says. "I don't." Harold turns back to his computer. A rustle of fabric gets him to look, however. This is a grave mistake, first because there is something fascinating about John in the process of donning a tuxedo, and then-- "Who on Earth picked that for you?" Harold exclaims. The suit nominally fits John, but it's too wide at the waist and too narrow at the shoulders. John looks likely to strain the seams: if the jacket doesn't rip, it will significantly constrain John's range of movement. "Take that off. I'll bring my measuring tape." By the time it occurs to Harold that Nathan has played him like a fiddle, he's on his knees measuring John's inseam. John is standing very still, barely breathing. Harold purses his mouth and decides that he might as well finish taking John's measurements. At least John is wearing underwear, for once. ~~ The new suit arrives the next afternoon. John answers the door to receive it and saunters to Harold. "Want me to try it on?" Harold rubs his eyes. He did not get much sleep last night. "You might as well." He is resolute not to be sorry that John goes to another room to change. He doesn't even try to focus on his work, and just as well. When John arrives back in the room, fiddling with the bow tie he looks about twice as unfairly handsome as Harold expected him to be. "Shall I help with the tie?" Harold says, resigning himself. John gives him a sudden bright smile. "That would be nice of you." Harold goes to stand behind John and fusses with his collar. Then he goes around to John's front to tie a proper bow. "Well," Harold says, retreating. "Let's look at you." "If I'd known formalwear was your thing, I would've tried it ages ago." John's mouth turns up at the corners. Harold beats a hasty retreat, putting most of the room between himself and that mouth. "I'm sure you'll do very well," he says. ~~ Harold gets himself a ticket to the gala. Nathan has been on his case to get out more, anyway. He waits until John leaves to get dressed, choosing his outfit with deliberation. It's more fun than he'd like to admit: it's been a while since he had a good reason to dress up. He can't dress too nicely for most IFT functions, not without anyone asking where Sparrow from IT got the money for this sort of suit. Bear whines at him, and Harold pets him, careful not to get fur on his suit. "You be good while I'm gone." He takes a taxi to the gala, smiles at the woman who takes his ticket and his coat, and makes his way inside. The reception is going on in full force. Harold gets himself a cup of sparkling water and watches society mill around him. The women's outfits are a tad repetitive for Harold's taste this season - everyone is trying to emulate, what's her name, some celebrity or other. The men are worse. It's John that Harold spots first. Ms. Morgan dresses to blend in with the crowd - she's striking, certainly, but in a way that allows her to vanish behind the scenes when she wishes to. Ms. Morgan is one of Nathan's elite team, along with Ms. Carter, the people whom Nathan dispatches to take care of the emergencies that Harold's software reports and in some cases, predicts. Ms. Morgan is very good at her job, and that's as much as Harold knows about her so far. She's also beautiful. People who surround Nathan often are, with Harold as the exception that proves the rule. She and John make a very handsome couple: her leaning on his arm, the power in John's shoulders a beautiful contrast to Ms. Morgan's elegant hands. Before he quite realizes he's doing it, Harold is close enough to John and Ms. Morgan that he can eavesdrop on their conversation. "What about him?" John asks Ms. Morgan. Ms. Morgan's gaze focuses on a man in a suit that's more tasteless than the room's average. "Without a question. Actually, that would be helpful." She smirks at John. "Do you want to seduce him, or shall I?" "I can try, to begin with," John says easily. "You can step in if he needs extra persuasion." They walk in tandem towards the man. The sudden nausea that Harold feels is the only thing that manages to break his horrified concentration. "I think I need to go home," he mutters to absolutely no one, and makes his escape. ~~ Home is mercifully dark and empty, apart from Bear. Harold kneels shakily and presses his forehead into Bear's coarse fur. Bear whuffs and patiently endures Harold's fit of clinginess. He tries to get up, but is overcome by a dizzy spell and the memory of John's confident voice offering unspeakable things. It's better to stay still; there is a real chance of him throwing up if he doesn't calm himself down. "This is ridiculous," he mutters into Bear's fur. "This is bullshit." For a little blessed while, the world is still and quiet. Then there is the sound of a glass settled on the coffee table. Harold doesn't move and doesn't look up. "What," he says, too tired to even snap. "There's some water over there for you," John says. His voice is soft, and Harold pathetically wants it draped over him like a blanket. "Do you need anything else?" "Just privacy." Harold closes his eyes and prays that John will leave as silently as he came, that John will turn out to have been a bad dream after all. "Did you abandon Ms. Morgan at the party?" "I had a sick friend to take care of," John says. "She understood." Harold counts as he breathes: one, two, three, four, and out. If he concentrates on this, perhaps the nausea won't become worse. "I'm glad," he says, inanely. "But you might as well go back to her. I can see to myself perfectly well." "You really don't look like you can," John says frankly. "I'm not explaining to Ingram why I let his star programmer hyperventilate to death." A moment later, something cool and smooth presses against Harold's cheek. "Drink," John says. Harold takes the water. He drinks. To his surprise, it helps somewhat. "I think I'd like to go to sleep now." His voice shakes badly. "Sounds like a plan." John takes the glass away from him and holds a hand. Harold allows himself to be helped to his feet. The ground feels like jello under him. "I want to help you get in bed. If I do, will I make this worse?" "Your guess is as good as mine." But Harold lets John guide him to bed, lets him hold the blankets up so Harold can crawl underneath them. For a long, unbroken moment John is just there, standing right next to him, and Harold knows if John asked to be let into Harold's bed, Harold could not refuse him right now. "Good night," John says, and turns off the light. "Call me if you need anything."

#rinch #poi #my fic #i post #sex work au