#ok so the point is they're really Christian

[omarfor-orchestra]

Well maybe I'll serve gender at my cousin's graduation party as well

#i don't know if I'm THAT gnc probably not but i feel gender in this room today #ok so the point is they're really Christian #but they're not homophobic #i think #i mean ny aunt's brother has a husband so yk #don't know if he's gonna be there tho #like. they're good christians #we're not gonna eat meat today and all that #but maybe there's someone who's less good and I'm gonna make sure to piss them off #sorry about spamming myself i just feel kinda hot

[shipmanisms]

valentine's day with the yjs ୧ 💌 ୨

cw: pretty much just fluff !!! may have swear words included tho ??

a/n: made this for me and everyone else who's single on valentine's day too :l hope this make you all feel a lil better and ily mwah mwah, happy ( early ) valentine's day babes <3

NATALIE SCATORCCIO

- pretends she hates valentines day and everything that has to do it but deep down she adores it

- will stand awkwardly looking at the different kind of chocolates and sweets and being like "uhmmmm.....reeses are never a bad option i guess?" ALSO I FEEL LIKE she'd ask other people buying stuff for their partners what they're gonna get them cuz she's so confused 😭

- we all know she's a sucker for kisses, cuddles, holding hands, AAAANYTHING that has to do with physical touch but hates showing it so i think she'd use valentine's day as an excuse to be publicly affectionate a bit

- ok that's all i might add more later on

JACKIE TAYLOR

- she's OBSESSED with holidays and celebrations, whether it's valentine's day, christmas, anything

- waking you up at like 7am and being like "hi hi valentine hey you're my valentine it's time to wake up my valentine" while shaking you and smooching you all over

- she's never letting go of you on vday. always clinging by your side, holding your other hand while you're brushing your teeth, talking to you from outside of the door while you're on the toilet, hugging you by the waist when you're cooking

- wearing ridiculous matching outfits with her in PUBLIC. i feel like she'd have those shirts that say "their queen" AND YOU "her king/queen/monarch(☠️)" OR GETTING YOU THOSE SILLY LIL HEADBANDS THINGIES WITH THE JIGGLY HEARTS..

- knows exactly what to buy you and she's already gotten everything prepared😭 it's adorable cause she'll give you a gift of something you forgot you wanted and you're just sitting there standing like :O

SHAUNA SHIPMAN

- ditches you for jackie. end.

- JK. i think she'd just treat it like a regular day honestly

- gets you a chocolate and calls it a day but not in a bad way??? LIKE she already loves you and does a lot of things to show it so she doesn't really think valentine's day is necessary

LOTTIE MATTHEWS

- she's suuuuuuuuch a softie for showing you off and getting to shower you with gifts :(

- she wouldn't wanna go out too much, she'd probably have everything set out already. your gifts hiding in the closet, your sweets hidden in the fridge, everything prepared and on point

- i feel like since some of the yjs were mean to her and telling her to just stop talking and stuff, she'd be kinda closed off at the start and she'd be scared to show you how much she loves and adores you, but then when she sees that you accept and give her the same love back and even more she's SOOOO hyper

- writes you cheesy letters that you keep in your drawer forever and probably even little drawings of your favourite things or you and her 😭

VAN PALMER

- THE SILLY!!!!!MAI SILLY!!!DE SILLY!!!:DD

- arcade dates w them on valentine's day or going like on an amusement park☝️☝️

- they'd go print out some silly t-shirts for y'all... like "i love my van" with a picture of a van LMAOO and they'd make you wear it all the time

- if you want to do smth on that day, you BET you will. they'll never let you down i SWEAR they're the sweetest pookiest babiest to ever exist :(((((((((

TAISSA TURNER

- hates valentine's day more than anything... "what the fuck im NOT wearing that" when you ask her to match outfits with you but does it anyway

- she's miserable doing anything on valentine's day cause she thinks it's cringe but warms up to it when she sees how happy it makes you

- she's the girl that said "happy wife happy life" btw so she'll do anything u ask her to no matter how much she despises it which is.. a lot probably

- gets you a chocolate and takes 2 hours to decide if she should write you a corny letter with it and she scribbles down some ideas but then just puts :)

LAURA LEE

- as a christian we shouldn't be celebrating vday but im not really that religious so????

- but laura lee is so anyways she would be all like "im not going to sin, i don't want to disappoint my lord" 😭😭😭

- she'd still go on a date w you, well more like flower picking and stuff and she'd probably pull out the the bible and start reading to you but you love her too much to say no so you just listen

- ok yeah that's it end of post mwah mwah

#natalie scatorccio smut #natalie scatorccio x reader #natalie scatorccio #nat scatorccio x reader #nat scatorccio #nat scatorccio smut #yellowjackets #yellowjackets x reader #yellowjackets smut #shauna shipman #shauna shipman smut #shauna shipman x reader #jackie taylor smut #jackie taylor x reader #jackie taylor #lottie mathews x reader #lottie matthews smut #lottie matthews #van palmer smut #van palmer x reader #van palmer #taissa turner smut #taissa turner x reader #taissa turner #laura lee #laura lee x reader #laura lee smut #valentine's day #im too lazy to put tags ill put them later #my works ও˖ ָ࣪

[fairuzfan]

If you can't see the difference between a diaspora Jew who has seen the violence inflicted on their community throughout history and the world for their entire existence since childhood and genuinely believes they will never be safe until they have somewhere to go that is made up of mostly Jews (and thinks that place might as well be 'where they came from'), and a Christian who wants all the Jews and Muslims back where they belong so that Jesus will come back or just so that 'their country' won't have Jews or Muslims anymore, and you believe those two people deserve the same scorn and violence, and that their Zionism is virtually indistinguishable, you're not a good person. I'm sorry you're just not.

My relatives aren't evil for thinking Israel should exist, they're just scared because they know what an angry, hateful world has done and can/will do to scattered Jews. They want to believe that there is a place in the world that is safe for Jews to live. (Whether Israel actually is that is beside the point- it isn't but that's beside the point).

And I'm a Bundist (not explaining it look it up idc) but with how things have been lately (and always really) I can't say I don't see the appeal.

Obviously Israel's government in general and the Likud party in particular is steeped in genocidal intent and abhorrent racism. Obviously the discrimination, colonization and brutalization of Palestinians should end. Obviously Israel should no longer be what it is- a militaristic puppet state by which the US keeps its hands in the middle east/swana region.

But don't you dare say that the Hobby Lobby CEO and my sister have the exact same Zionism or reasons for it.

I only say any of this bc you reblogged a post essentially saying all Zionism is the same and deserves the same treatment and seeing as diaspora Jews are neither the biggest material nor political backing force behind Israel, and also our fears are completely founded, I can't let you express that belief without at least making an effort to correct it.

(Also my sister technically just believes that Jews should be able to safely visit or live in the Levant, which we're indigenous to- and if you don't believe that where tf do you think we came from bc we didn't just grow out of the ground in NYC one day holding bagels I'll tell you that but I digress- but doesn't like the Israeli gov or its actions. So that may not even be Zionism according to you but that's what she calls it.)

Ok. Right now journalists are live blogging the massacre of my people and no one is lifting a finger and in fact sending them bigger and badder weapons. You're very heartless. I don't care if you don't think I'm a good person but I'm sad that you're not one either.

#i genuinely am sad that you are so selfish.

[demiromanticmickey]

On today's "I am SO not normal about Dead Friend Forever": Discussing Catholicism and Colonization in this gay Thai slasher series

Some background on me: I am from a Latine Catholic family. Raised as a non-practicing Catholic (we didn't go to church or pray). Then my parents enrolled me in a Catholic school that I attended from 5th grade to the end of 7th grade. Today, I am not Catholic and have never really considered myself as such.

Ok, so in the flashback episodes of DFF, I have been noticing a lot of things. My findings under the cut.

Let's start with this crucifix and photo of the Virgin Mary and a baby Jesus.

Screenshot from ep. 5.

The camera lingers here a bit so we're obviously meant to pay attention to the phrase. I put the screenshot through Google translate's image translator and the translation it gave me was, "Think good, do good, be a good person." I didn't think much of it when I first watched the episode other than it was supposed to establish that the boys attend a Christian or Catholic school.

But then there was this image posted on Be On Cloud's Instagram (also from ep. 5): X

Zooming in, we can see there's another picture of Mary in the background. Watching the classroom scenes, it's easy to miss because the series itself is more washed out than the official photos posted. But this emphasis on Mary led me to believe the school is a Catholic one. So out of curiosity, I looked up the schools the writers and directors attended because I felt I was onto something here. And boy, was I!

Source: MDL

Ma-Deaw, if you didn't know, is one of the directors of Dead Friend Forever (he also directed Manner of Death and Inhuman Kiss , and lots of other things).

One Google search later (X) and I learned "Montfort College" is a Catholic school. It started out as a primary school that later added a secondary school as well.

Now let's take a closer look at some of the details of this school:

First, the school's motto "Labor Conquers All Things". This reminded me of the phone conversation Tee had with his uncle:

On my first watch, this sounded familiar to me but I couldn't really place why. It wasn't until I saw this other Tumblr post (X) that pointed out it's similar to a bible quote from the New Testament. The quote varies a bit depending on which version of the bible you're using but it's along the lines of, "He who does not work, neither shall he eat".

This is meant to discourage "laziness". Nevermind the fact that people deserve to eat simply because we get hungry and need food to survive. The idea that we only "deserve" things based on productivity is an extremely colonial one. — Reminder also that Tee is being forced into this "work" in the first place. He's just a high school kid. I don't need to like his character to understand how fucked up his situation is.

Then there's the patron of the school. St. Louis de Montfort was a French Catholic priest most known for his study in Mariology. What is Mariology (X)? The study of Mary, the mother of Jesus. I didn't know that was a thing but it's unsurprising considering how prominent images of Mary were in my own religious upbringing. And she's what started me down this rabbit hole in the first place. Mary is a big deal to the Catholics. I'm going to be paying even more attention now if more Mary imagery pops up.

The Garden of Eden and Original Sin

Now I want to draw attention to these images:

Screenshots from ep. 7

Here we have Non and Phee biting into an apple as they leisure around this lush green field. We know they've visited this location more than once because they're wearing different outfits in the screenshots. And I think it's important to note that it's Phee holding the apple and offering it to Non.

The use of the word "bait" in the bts of ep. 7 is quite interesting too. (X)

The Garden of Eden was the paradise in which Adam and Eve resided. In this garden, there were many trees to eat from. The one tree Adam and Eve were forbidden by God to eat from was the Tree of Knowledge. A serpent (Satan), first tempted Eve into taking from the tree to eat it's fruit. And then Eve gave the fruit to Adam. That is Original Sin. And because Adam and Eve ate from the Tree of Knowledge, all humans thereafter are born sinful and bad, and can only find salvation through God.

Of course in the scene between Phee and Non, the sin the apple represents is being gay. And it's after this, and after the bracelet scene, that Non becomes involved with Por's film and his tragedy begins.

Zoomed in screenshot from ep. 5

And I wonder if the bracelet scene is the last time Phee and Non visit this forest location. It would parallel how Adam and Eve were cast out of the Garden of Eden once they sinned.

Final Thoughts

You give me a story that criticizes Western religion and how it's used as a tool for oppression and colonization, and I'm gonna eat that shit up. I am gonna eat it up. Every. Single. Time.

I really wasn't expecting anything like this from Dead Friend Forever. This level in attention to detail is unmatched. I don't think I've watched a more well planned out show. And no matter where DFF goes from here, these seven episodes will always hold a special place in my heart. 💗

#dead friend forever #dff the series #pheenon #barcode tinnasit #ta nannakun #dff meta #dff spoilers #tabarcode #dff* #* #i just love it here #this is my comfort show idc

[viamia]

After thinking a lot I decided to ask a question. I'd like to know how the boys from SWWSDJ, Dachabo, and The Groom of Gallagher Mansion would react if MC ended up confessing that she's a virgin while they're about to be intimate. (I personally bet a lot that the person who will be most excited and stunned by the information is Bo, and maybe Jack too)

Sorry for any mistakes in English, I confess I used Google Translate :"D

No worries my friend :) I'm just happy to finally get a request after so long. And remember to other readers, don't be afraid to ask for requests from me. Hope yall like it!

SWWSDJ, Tgogm, and Dachabo boys reaction to you being a virgin

TW:implied sexual themes, a bit of swears here and there, and virginity. If you are uncomfortable with the following content, pls leave immediately.

Jack: Jack was honestly kinda glad you were a virgin. To him, it meant you haven't been hanky pankied yet (I could resist saying that XD) So he gets allll the goodies to himself, but he ask you first if your seriously ok with going at it with him.

Ian: This Christian boy was honestly not at all shocked. He knew you were a virgin since yall first met(if I'm wrong pls tell me :')) so he's perfectly aware that you're inexperienced, hell he is too. So basically, yall are winging this

Nick: Considering he's an adult film actor, he's not at all concerned about you being a virgin. Since you're inexperienced, he'll guide you through the way of hankypanky. He'll take it slow with you so he doesn't hurt you.

Shaun: Now, I feel like Shaun would just be a confused boi. like, how did someone like you not get head yet??? Your gorgeous! But he's honestly excited to have a new canvas to paint on if you catch my drift *wink wink ;)* but he's overall excited.

Bo: This dog is ready to plow the fields I swear- this son of a bitch really said fuk virginity, I'm plowing through them like a tractor. Bo is just horny one way or another, so he's hella excited to get a mate all to himself who hasn't been yoinked yet.

Taylor: Poor guy got so confused and flustered. He was a confused mess of a boi. He thought you already your virginity yoinked before, apparently not. He'd immediately resort to asking if your seriously ok with doing it with him. He just loves you so damn much (my precious baby I luv him-)

Elias:Sweet baby boy is so embarrassed to the point that he accidentally gets a noise bleed. He's being bedridden for like the entirety of his living life so of course He's as inexperienced as you are. But you'll probably be the one to guide him through it since in college or previous schools you've probably been to sex Ed. Poor baby don't know the best :')

Anyways, that's the headcanons. I hope you like them!

#somethings wrong with sunny day jack #sunny day jack #taylor potts #elias gallaghar #shaun sdj #nick sdj #dachabo #sOphi4br

[slasher-male-wife]

Slashers sleeping habits

I got the idea to do this from sourblizzard on ao3. They have a bunch of head canons on there that I took some inspiration from for this but I didn't want to fully copy them. This is pretty short because I've been having issues with writing lately and I just needed to get something out for y'all.

Includes: Billy Lenz, Carrie White, and Herbert West

Warnings: Mentions of past abuse

Billy Lenz

He has really bad insomnia, like he will go days without sleeping just because his body physically cannot shut down. On those kinds of nights he usually just stares out the window of the attic or watches you sleep.

I think that because of past abuse Billy is hesitant with physical affection even though he talks a big game. But when he does discover that not all physical touch is bad he'll want to cuddle every night. Sometimes it even helps him to fall asleep.

When he does sleep it's never truly deep sleep. It's very light and if you ever get up or something happens he's snapping awake and taking a while to fall back asleep. When he does get deeper sleep it's almost always nightmares and he wakes up and either wants you to hold him or will want to keep you distant physically.

This man is very cold so get extra blankets to use and make sure to be ready for when he presses his cold hands or feet against you to get warm again. I can see him coming down to your room and moving into your bed just for your warmth.

Carrie White

She prays every night before bed and if you're religious and pray too she'd love to join you in it, although it would take her awhile to fully overcome some wrong ideas about other religions if you're not christian. But she's not her mother and she loves you even if you're not religious.

For the first eight or nine months of your relationship she's scared to share a bed with you because she thinks it would be a sin to do so. But after helping her learn that it's not a sin and it's ok to share a bed she's more open to the idea. She'll still be scared to do any kind of physical touch in bed but over time I can see her enjoying cuddling every once and awhile.

She was never allowed to have pillows or stuffed animals on her bed so she has a ton of them. Most of her stuffed animals are lambs or more comforting animals like that and all of her sheets are pink or floral.

She often gets nightmares about her past abuse and when she wakes up from them she'll say a prayer and will go back to you for comfort. At first it's more words of affirmation, then after a while she'll be more comfortable with physical touch.

Herbert West

Another person who doesn't sleep often, but usually because he's too busy working on something to check the time and realize that it's four in the morning and he needs to get to sleep. But when he does remember the time he has a specific set sleep routine that he has to follow (Autism moment).

Has to sleep in a cold room. Fan is always on. Doesn't matter if it's dead of winter and it's below freezing outside he's sleeping with his fan on. He's not huge on cuddling but he'll let you hold onto him if you're cold. He'll only really hold you back if he knows you're asleep. Doesn't mind having a ton of blankets on the bed either

Can only sleep on certain sheet and wearing certain clothes because of his sensory issues. He can't stand to have any negative texture on his bed. If you ever want to get new sheets then have him feel it first before you buy them. Will refuse to touch you if you have on a certain texture of pajamas on because he hates that texture.

He doesn't really have dreams. He's a decent sleeper who can get some rem sleep but he just doesn't dream often. If he does he never wants to talk about them because they're often nightmares. But he is pretty interested in your dreams from a psychology stand point.

#billy lenz #billy lenz x you #billy lenz x reader #billy lenz x y/n #carrie white #carrie white x reader #carrie white x y/n #herbert west #herbert west x reader #slasher x y/n #slasher x reader #slasher fanfiction

[pizzpizzapizzo]

but what if pizza = religion?

i'm going for it i'm doing the thing

this is the pizza antichrist post i threatened to make. Incoherent ramblings and pseudo-christian imagery under the cut

so pizza, the food, the round delicious thingy, is obviously pretty important to the Pizza Tower lore. Peppino makes it, Gustavo probably does too, almost all enemies are themed after it, etc. There has to be a reason for it, right? (ignore the fact that the reason is most likely a joke please)

so let's focus on two entities in particular: the priest (also the exorcist) and the pizzard

the priest can remove status effects from you, one of which is um DEATH?? dude can straight up resurrect you. Where does he get the power for his miracles? Well, if you look at his hat (and ignore the crosses they sometimes pull out as generic iconography), you can see a red pizza symbol. So what if, right, WHAT IF the main religion of this world is pizza based?

listen. Why else would there be sentient toppins running around. Not only are they deemed to be dangerous/important enough by the inhabitants of the Tower to get put into cages, but they also have an inherent monetary value. That or they all carry $10 on them idk. But i really think they're integral to the divine art of pizza making somehow

Following from this, What if pizza making is less of a trade and more of a holy ritual that allows you to harness the godly powers of this dish? And what if - hear me out - Peppino himself is a rogue pizza priest who's cast away his robes in favour of serving the common folk. Kind of like a renegade paladin

was this just an excuse to draw peppino as a priest? maybe

ok back to pizzards. These buggers are described as practicing "pizzamancy". Don't think we need to wonder too hard where this arcane art draws its powers from. But here's the thing - while priests are generally helpful to the player/Peppino and seem to be working against the Tower and its occupants, pizzards are your enemies. There are two warring sides to this divine power. And if the pizza priests can be assumed to ask the pizza god for miracles and be under the jurisdiction of the pizza pope, why would the same godly entity help pizzards? Well, what if there's also a pizza satan. No not the one with the super hot pizza. Altho wait. Maybe? idk. Let me sleep on it.

POINT IS. whoever they are, the devil is probably off in hell somewhere, but someone else might be on earth in their stead. Someone immensely and seemingly nonsensically powerful. So pizzards serve Pizzahead - he even rents one to Noise as a minion in the comics - and they appear to be coded as this world's equivalents of satanic cultists. Pizzahead has access to vast reality bending powers for no apparent reason but is still firmly rooted in this world. Conclusion? Pizzahead is the pizza antichrist

thank you for coming to my TED talk

#pizza tower #pizza tower theory #pizzahead #pizzard #i should not be typing this right now my head hurts and i feel like i'm not making any sense #but i've spent too long on this to delay it any further #cw religion #i hope nobody gets offended this is supposed to be mostly a joke ;;; #another explanation i had is that Pizzahead is an eldritch abomination #his true form is too horrifying to percieve lol #that's why he turns himself and everything around him into pizza #shhh it makes sense i promise

[youdrewstarsxaroundmyscars]

omg new fic idea

ok so what if it starts out like unrequited starchaser angst right where regulus is like "i wish i were heather 😩" about lily right cause he's jealous of the fact that james is head over heels for her and he wants to be with james but thinks he's not good enough and all that yadda yadda plot angst shit. BUT THEN.

THEN.

regulus and lily are paired up for potions right (cause that's how it always goes obviously duh) and ofc it's cause he got moved up a year whatever that's not the point. THE POINT IS james is now looking over at them and regulus gets upset that he has to deal with james pining over lily when he's right there but also lily is perfect as as much as he tries he can't hate her and they have to work on a project or smth so they become like reluctant friends to actual friends and bond over ✨older sibling issues ✨ and he finds himself falling for HER TOO and he goes about unlearning prejudices and all that fun stuff but like also his feelings for james aren't going away and so he's now stuck being in love with both of them while watching lily be oblivious and james pining for her BUT

what he doesn't realize is james is having a crisis on his own when they get paired together cause oh my god lily what a goddess 😍 but also damn regulus is lowkey looking really good rn wtf 🫣 so HES now navigating his feelings for the both of them and trying not to freak out every time they're in class and he watches them whisper to eachother and smile and is all hopeless and shit cause look at them they're perfect for each other

AND MAYBE

lily is also freaking out a bit cause maybe she's from a more conservative christian household where it's "😡one man one woman😡" (you get one wife! that's the way the world works!!) but oh no the boy who wouldn't stop making fun of her and "fake asking her out" and actually kind of attractive now?? and not quite what she thought he'd be like??? and he's making eyes at the pretty slytherin boy to her left now and moved on from her but yk she can't blame him cause the pretty boy on her left is actually really pretty 😫 and she has a DOUBLE freak out when she realizes she wants both of them while dealing with the religious trauma side of things and also her own insecurities as well while having to watch them both pine at eachother from afar and maybe it hurts

cue the three of them being stupid pining idiots for eachother but very slow burn and gradual and very "oh fuck" "oops" "shit" of them

anyways

james "has two hands" potter BUT ALSO

lily "has two hands" evans AND EVEN

regulus "has two hands" black

cause why stop at james???

#jegulily #regulily #waterlily #jegulus #starchaser #sunseeker #fic idea #new fic idea #fanfic #fanfiction #marauders fanfiction #marauders fandom #marauders #marauders era #hp marauders #james potter #sirius black #remus lupin #regulus black #lily evans #wolfstar #rosekiller #dorlene

[sinni-ok-sessi]

Would love to hear any thoughts on the codification of the poet-persona over time? 👀

Ok so in the spirit of the ask game, I am not checking any citations on this whatsoever, but if you want those lmk (though they uh. largely do not exist for rímur-poets specifically, because only me and Hans Kuhn have ever cared).

This is going to require some context because, as established, the number of living people who know and care about medieval rímur can be counted on my two hands. Probably without thumbs. So, rímur are a poetic form that developed in 14th cen Iceland, which look kind of ballad-y, in that they often use four-line stanzas with ABAB end-rhyme, though actually the ballad tradition in Iceland is quite distinct (on which, see Vésteinn Ólason, The Ballads of Iceland). End-rhyme was very exciting for Icelandic poets because it was only previously a thing in some uncommon types of skaldic metres, but rímur (as their name suggests) have end-rhyme as a defining feature and rapidly become The dominant form of poetry in Iceland until well into the 19th cen.

There are two very distinctive things about rímur, other than their metres: 1) they almost never tell 'new' stories; almost all rímur narratives are attested earlier in other forms, usually in prose, which can sometimes lead to the fun cycle of saga -> rímur cycle -> old saga is lost, new version is written based on the rímur -> more rímur are written based on the new saga -> repeat until the heat death of the universe; 2) as the form develops, it acquires introductory stanzas known as mansöngvar, a term which elsewhere usually means 'love poetry', although that's not really what they're doing here.

Mansöngvar are verses, sometimes in a different metre to the rest of the canto they're attached to, in which the poet speaks directly to the audience. In the medieval period, they're pretty short and often don't say more than 'look, I made you some poetry', but as time goes on, they get more and more elaborate, and the character of the poet begins to develop some quite distinctive traits. What's interesting here is that rímur were (certainly in the medieval period; less certainly later on) performed aloud, presumably by the poet, so there's definitely some questions to be asked about how accurate the poets' self-descriptions are when presumably the audience could go 'you're not pining away for love, Jón Jónsson, I've met your wife!'

So anyway, these mansöngvar are often linked to the medieval German Minnesänger tradition (er. The actual German word might be slightly different because I still don't speak German despite my PhD supervisor's pointed remarks), which is more overtly love poetry and which sometimes features the poet as an abject and despised lover of some cruel lady. This is something rímur-poets from the later medieval period and onwards have an incredibly good time with. You may be familiar with the story of Þórr wrestling with Elli, the personification of old age in the form of an old woman. There are at least two medieval rímur poets who have a whole extended passage about 'oh alas, when I was young I was a terrible flirt but now I'm old and no women like me, except oh no, I am being courted by this ugly old giant lady; Elli is the only ladyfriend for me now, wah'. it's very playful, it's very fun, it's drawing on this general sense that the poets put forward that they're poetically gifted, but romantically unlucky, which is kind of a Thing for poets across a lot of European literature (and probably more broadly, but I don't know much about that), and is especially pronounced in the earlier Icelandic sagas about poets, which usually feature poets failing to win the love of their life for various reasons (sudden attack of Christianity; sudden attack of magic seals; sudden attack of Other Guy With Sword; etc). So in evoking this, rímur-poets are situating themselves in this existing Image of the Ideal Poet, but doing so in a way that ties them into the specifics of the Norse literary/mythological tradition as well. Poets are also frequently old and tired (same, bro), and a statistically improbably number of them are also blind (although that might just be two guys we know about who were really prolific; most rímur are anonymous so it's hard to say. But it is perhaps convenient that this also links them to A Great Poet of Old, namely Homer).

The other thing that rímur-poets really like to bring up in their mansöngvar is the myth of the mead of poetry, which I will not recount here except to say that Óðinn nicked it from a giant, and also that some dwarves used it to buy safe passage off a skerry once, so it's poetically termed 'ship of the dwarves' because it's the thing that brought them safely across the sea. Every single medieval mansöngur, if one exists at all, refers to this myth in some way, even if it's just by having the 'I made you some poetry' bit use a kenning for 'poetry' that references the myth.* And poets have a lot of fun with this too! Iceland's a coastal community, they know about boats, so you get these extended metaphors about poets trying to board a boat to sample the mead of poetry and finding only the dregs because other, better poets got there first. Or they will describe the process of poetic composition in terms of ship-building: 'Here I nail together Suðri's [a dwarf name] boat'; 'Norðri's ship sets out from the harbour [= I'm about to start reciting the main bit now]'; 'the fine vessel has now been wrecked on the rocks [=I'm going to stop reciting now]'. They'll also speak of poetry as smíð, which means a work of craftsmanship, usually physical craftsmanship (obviously cognate with smithing in English), and of brewing the ale of Óðinn, so they're really into metaphors of physical craft when it comes to the intellectual craft of poetry, which I think is really neat.

*kennings = poetic circumlocutions, e.g. 'snake of the belt' is a sword because swords are vaguely snake-shaped and hang from a belt. Common poetry kennings are '[drink/liquid/ale/wine/mead] of [any of Óðinn's literally dozens of names]' e.g. 'Berlingr's wine', and the aforementioned 'ship of the dwarves' - poetic Icelandic has literally dozens of words for different kinds of ships and also literally dozens of dwarf names, so you can get a long way without repeating yourself.

So all these things that I've mentioned that poets like to bring up - old age, unluckiness in love, poets as craftsmen - become more and more tropified as time goes on, which in turn leads to these imaginative and extended reworkings of the metaphor. No longer can you just say 'I'm old and no one fancies me', no, it's 'My only assignations now are with Elli, wink wink, here's a long description of our date'. So you end up with this very codified image of The Ideal Rímur-Poet as an old man,* ideally blind, ideally unmarried, incredibly self-deprecating about his poetry, and because that's how everyone else talks, it's self-reinforcing.

*there is one (1) known female rímur-poet from the medieval period, the poet of Landrés rímur, who unfortunately didn't write many mansöngur stanzas but is doing her best with the 'unlucky in love' bit, although her lover (male) seems to have died rather than ditched her, which is a novelty.

Anyway, it's cool and weird and fun and as I say, only me and Hans Kuhn care, academically speaking.

#lol 1260 words here. which is. maybe 10 minutes of actual speaking time but OH WELL #asks I have answered #if there are bits that I haven't explained well lmk. I have a warped idea of how much the average person knows about Norse literary history #because I *am* on my Stan Rogers Wife Guy kick at the moment please imagine Jón Jónsson holding a guitar #also. lol. I am extremely fucking doxxable every time I talk about rímur so if you do know my full legal name. keep that shit to yourself. #but also. go read my phd thesis. if you like the shit jokes in this post you'll love 70k of them concealed in academese

[max1461]

I was asked by @cardassian-artistry:

I don't want to argue or anything, I'm just curious. What are your critiques of Marxist economics?

Ok, so, I want to clarify that I am neither an economist nor a Marx scholar. I am an informed lay person, who has also had the opportunity to spend a lot of time talking to my close friend who is an economist (well, sort of; his work is at the intersection of econ and CS). He's also very left-wing, and we've both read the relevant portions of Marx and have discussed Marx's place in the history of economics quite a lot, so I have, I think, more informed opinions on this particular topic than most people.

Right, ok, so there are a few things to note about Marx's economic theories. The first is that he does not really propose any sort of economic model in the modern sense. Ideally, an economic model should be predictive (probably a lot of Marxists will already disagree at this point, but I think it's not worth arguing with them because I doubt I will convince anyone). That is to say, an economic model should look at measurable quantities about some part of the economy, and relate these quantities to other measurable quantities, so that we can make predictions about how the economy will behave under different conditions.

Many modern day, orthodox economic theories do not meet these criteria. Those theories are also bad. Or, more accurately: they aren't even theories at all, they're just like, vague ideas. We should have higher standards than that for our economic models.

Anyway, predictivity: Marx mostly doesn't attempt to achieve this. He sort of gestures at a specific, predictive model when he talks about "congealed labor time" (I'll get to this) and so on, but he doesn't make it mathematically or measurementally precise enough to actually use it for anything, or to test if it's true. So there's a sense in which, by the epistemic standards I hold at least, Marx's theory of the economy is not actually saying very much to begin with.

Marx does, however, make some qualitative but testable claims. These are mostly sort of divorced from his economic theories as such, it seems to me, but they are claims pertaining to the economy, so they're worth evaluating. Most prominently, he claims that capitalism is bound to undo itself and give way to communism, via proletarian revolution. He very much thought this was going to happen in his lifetime or in the period immediately after. This did not pan out. You can make excuses for why this hasn't happened yet, as the early Christians did when the rapture didn't come, but I don't think any of these excuses are very convincing. He claimed this and he was wrong. As others have pointed out, at least Marx made a claim which could be proved wrong, which is braver than many thinkers—and probably cannot be said of many of his contemporaries in classic economics.

The second big point about Marx's understanding of the economy is that it comes largely from Adam Smith, whose work he studied intensely. Marx's early work is less concerned with the technical details of the economy, and was of course influenced above all else by Hegel. But Marx's later, more economic work draws very heavily from Smith.

Adam Smith's work has all the same problems. Economists like Smith, Marx, and Ricardo set the groundwork for what would come later, but their understanding of how economies actually behave was both far too simplified and far too mathematically unsophisticated to be useful as such.

And, right, this brings us to the labor theory of value, which Marx also gets from Smith. Well, modern economic theories tend not to use a "theory of value" at all, because… what does that even mean? How do you measure "value"?

Is "value" price? That's something you can measure! But Marx seems to say "no", value is not just price. And if value was price, then Marx's theory of value would be straightforwardly false. Marx claims that the value of a good is proportional to the average labor time it takes to produce that good in the given society in which the good is being produced. Well, this is not true of price (in Marxian terms, "exchange value"). So Marx's "value" cannot be price, if his theory is to hold water.

What is it then? Well, Marx and Smith don't really say. And they definitely don't say how to measure it. So their claims about value and labor time and so on don't amount to much, they don't really amount to testable claims about the real world. They amount to claims about this ill-defined idea of "value" that has relevance only internally within the system of Marxian thought. As such, many of Marx's economic claims don't actually say anything about the economy to begin with.

The upshot is that a lot of Marx's specific claims about the economy are either untestable or simply wrong, which is pretty damning. His theories are far too simplistic to model the economy accurately, and his dialectical method—far from remedying this simplicity—simply introduces more vagueness into his claims.

Marx did not know calculus. With a few lucky exceptions, it is generally difficult-to-impossible to model any real world process of significant complexity with any precision without calculus. Basically every modern day economic model makes use of differential equations. Marx, Smith, and Ricardo did not. A priori, therefore, it would be very surprising if their ideas turned out to be correct. And they don't.

So, I've been pretty hard on Marx. Is there any value to Marx's thought?

Well, I think, yes. Quite a lot, in fact.

Marx's work is sometimes split into an "early Marx", for example as represented in the 1844 Manuscripts, and a "mature Marx", as represented in Capital. People debate the degree to which there is continuity between these two periods, or whether the periodization really makes sense at all. But it's undeniable that Marx's thinking evolved significantly over the years. In particular, Marx's early work is much more concerned with the humanistic effects of living under capitalism. This is where Marx's theory of alienation comes from. He is concerned, everywhere but especially in this early writing, with how it feels to be an industrial worker in a capitalist society. And I think his analysis here is absolutely spot on. It has, in fact, been pretty influential on my own thoughts about markets and private property.

Marx also advanced a materialist conception of history, and of society generally. I think Marx's materialism was too teleological, and too wrapped up in nineteenth century ideas of Progress, but I still think that to a first order approximation his assertion that history is driven by the factors of production was basically correct, and was not remotely obvious at the time. For this I think he should be celebrated.

I think Marx was, in a certain sense, a victim of his time. Almost all the critiques that can be made of his economic theorizing per se are found in the writing of all the classical economists. And it is in this domain where I think he makes the most demonstrable errors. That is to say: most of what is bad in Marx is not that new, and (I think) most of what is new in Marx is quite good.

There's another reason to take Marxism seriously, too. I think that a really significant amount of good thinking about history, society, and the nature of wealth and power has been presented under a "Marxist" heading, or assumes fluency with Marxist ideas. From Marxist humanists like E.P. Thomson to the revolutionary leaders of Third-Worldism. Not that any of these people are above critique, to be sure. But anyway, in this regard I think Marx's thought is a lot like Bertrand Russell's work on logic (I love the Marx/Russell comparison, because they both would have hated it): less important for its actual content than for the work of the people it inspired, and for the century+ of ideas they produced.

#society #navel gazing

[paradoxcase]

Chapter 20 of Nona the Ninth

I suspect Hot Sauce will be back. I don't think her only contribution to the plot will be to headshot Nona. We also haven't learned why she's called Hot Sauce yet, which I feel is still a loose string

Ok, so they just thought that Nona was going to chill unconsciously for a while and I guess them shooting at her was just a reaction to hearing her beat down the door? And obviously they shackled Camilla and Palamedes because Palamedes did observable necromancy on Nona earlier

Is that the secret she told Hot Sauce? Hot Sauce thought it could be solved with organ transplants, but maybe she was just speculating. Palamedes thinks the problem is that her body is rejecting her soul, so not actually a physical problem. But wouldn't Pyrrha also have been having the same problem? Or is her situation special because G1deon became a Lyctor and she was just tagging along for 10,000 years? And Harrow went half of her life with Alecto haunting her, but maybe she didn't get kicked out because she wasn't the primary person in control of her body, sort of like how Palamedes isn't getting kicked out of Camilla? And Wake was stuck in a sword for 18 years, but maybe inanimate objects aren't opinionated about what soul they're being possessed by

And also... Ulysses and Titania were already dead before John ever knew them, and it sounds like we don't actually know whether or not John found their original souls when bringing them back to life, or if it was two random other souls - wouldn't their bodies have rejected the new souls if they weren't the actual original souls, if what Palamedes is saying in this chapter is true? If I remember the timeline right, they didn't become Lyctors for like hundreds of years after the Resurrection

This is a great point that I don't think has been explained yet - Lyctors' bodies are invisible to other necromancers, even to other Lyctors, but Palamedes did something to Cytherea's body back in Gideon the Ninth that helped kill her. So how did he do that? Even Harrow as a Lyctor wasn't able to do anything to G1deon's body without getting him to eat her own bone marrow

Ugh. I don't get like ~~feelings~~ about the whole Palamedes/Dulcinea thing because I feel like it was kind of awful and not a fun way, but still

So this obviously isn't going to happen now that he's spelled it out, but that honestly is exactly what I'd expect out of this story at this point

Is "water bottle" a reference to something?

I mean, we already have several examples of Lyctorhood that can't be described as "half-dead cannibals" or "a mutual death" - we have G1deon and Pyrrha who were both alive in the same body, and they were supposedly an actual Lyctor and not like Harrow was, and then there was John and Alecto, who both survived in different bodies and may have conditional immortality supported by the other person. But Palamedes thinks that "true Lyctorhood" is when both people die? Or does he think that all the existing Lyctors are just at an incomplete stage of a longer process that results in the death of both people? Did John and Alecto both die during whatever happened to them? I mean, obviously Alecto died at some point, but I'm very muddy still on what are the exact conditions that cause a planet to die other than it being flipped with necromancy

I hope Camilla/Palamedes and Nona do go to visit Gideon soon, since that seems to be where most of the other interesting characters have wound up as of the end of this chapter

So in addition to being the Angel, and also "Aim", which is probably the first word of a BOE name, they're also "the Messenger". "The Angel" was the name the kids gave them, and angels are messengers in Christian theology, but it's really not clear to what extent Christianity or Christian theology has survived in any population in this book, and if John imported the idea of angels into Nine Houses theology, that hasn't been mentioned anywhere in any book yet, so it's not clear what "angel" actually means to either the Nine Houses characters or the New Rho characters or the BOE characters. If we go with the idea that people are still speaking Modern English somehow, then I guess it's possible that "angel" survived as a word meaning "messenger" in House/English, although that seems unlikely to me since in most vernacular contexts it just means something along the lines of "being of supreme goodness" these days. But are we meant to conclude that the kids heard someone call the Angel "the Messenger" in some language and translated that into "The Angel" in House/English? And again we have they/them pronouns, and no explanation of why they are important or the reason for all the special rules around them

Also I do love that We Suffer's reaction to chapter 19 was "you're the most horrifying thing I've ever seen. Lots of blood and guts, very impressive, 10/10"

I guess the "key" is Gideon's body, because it open the Tomb? I'm curious as to what exactly We Suffer knows about that

Hmm, I guess from Corona's perspective, it would have made sense for Harrow to tell people about meeting them, Camilla extracted her promise to not tell anyone when Corona couldn't see or hear them

Funny that this is the version of this they play. I love how Corona has been trash-talking Judith for ages, but I honestly think this is just how the twins express affection for people? When we're first introduced to Ianthe she's trash-talking Corona, and they both trash-talk Babs despite the fact that I think Corona at least liked him, but for some reason Ianthe assumed that when Corona was trash-talking Judith it was because she didn't like her

It's pretty funny that Judith described Corona as having been "radicalized" in As Yet Unsent, but now it's Corona who takes the risk to rescue Judith from BOE and bring her back to the Nine Houses. I don't think Corona is actually loyal to any side at this point, she just wants to save Judith, and possibly be with Ianthe, although I'm not sure about that, either - if Ianthe keeps insisting that the best thing to do with Judith is mercy-kill her, I think Corona may switch sides again in the future. She seemed genuinely swayed by what BOE told her in As Yet Unsent, but I think she's ultimately more like Pyrrha where she thinks it's all fucked and just wants to protect her loved ones, rather than being like Palamedes who wanted to go be a big damn hero and find a way to save all the people in the cages and all the people in the barracks. Or maybe Corona is still loyal to BOE, and just thought she could deliver Judith to safety and continue relaying information back? But she had to know that stealing Judith would be considered a betrayal regardless

Who is John's "real" enemy if it isn't BOE? There are the resurrection beasts, for sure, but I'm not sure they actually have the ability to keep fighting them now that it's just Ianthe and John

I'm not sure why Camilla seems to telling We Suffer not to kill (presumably) Ianthe (or, I guess, Naberius's body)? I don't think Camilla has any love for Ianthe and probably Babs getting headshot at this point would be at least a little inconvenient for her

It sounds like John is not in a good place right now, between "mid-dismyriad crisis" and "I've been on-call as Teacher's whipping girl"

I'm curious what exactly Pyrrha told them. It definitely wasn't everything, because Ianthe is referring to "Harrow" and not "Nona", and also Ianthe didn't know anything about Judith being alive and a prisoner, and Judith was a major tactical element since they were using her to work the stele on their ship

#the locked tomb #nona the ninth

[sporesgalaxy]

Real curious about trigun but I got three questions:

1) what's up with the Christian vibes?

2)the blond guys (plants???) have trans vibes, actual coding or just an accident? (fine either way just curious)

3) what's the plot? Space cowboys?

Anyways Millie is cool, (I once mistook the girl typically next to her for that guy from genshin impact)

1) Christian vibes are why I want to lock myself in a room for a month and emerge with a 3 hour video essay about Trigun very very badly right now.

Trigun spends a lot of time exploring Forgiveness, Mercy, and Redemption, which are famously also the themes of Jesus' wacky adventures in the New Testament.

But. You know how in the old testament there was like a bunch of Divine Wrath and stuff? And it feels really incongruent with the forgiveness in the New Testament sometimes. And also for many centuries Christians have cited God's divine acts of wrath as justification for incredible acts of cruelty against their fellow man? You know how that history of cruelty and punishment is, at this point, just as synonymous with Christianity as the Jesus Forgiveness stuff?

Well Trigun is about how the Jesus Forgiveness stuff is better. Not because Jesus said so but because of the enormous OBSERVABLE positive impact that forgiveness and redemption can have. Positive impact that wrath and retribution rob all parties involved of the chance to witness.

Trigun tells a story which demonstrates this in largely secular situations but underscores both the forgiveness and the wrath with divine imagery. And since both the forgiveness and the wrath are equally visually tied to the divine, symbols of divinity cannot be considered synonymous with perfection, unerring judgement, nor inherent rightness or goodness. Divinity becomes simply a symbol of power, and power is a double-edged sword as well. The power to do good is also the power to cause massive harm, and in many cases people will treat power pessimistically out of an understandable will for self-preservation.

But power is neither inherently good nor bad-- power ultimately reflects the flawed and fallible person weilding it. I could go on but this is really long so I'll stop lol :)

WAIT. Divinity = Power, Angels are the symbol of Divinity, Angels are messengers of God, Communication and connecting with others is emphasized, Communication = Power = Divinity ok I'll stop for real tee hee

2) I don't know if the trans coding was intentional, but HOLY SHIT is it THERE.

Most blatantly, Vash and Knives are Plants, and every other Plant we see is referred to as a woman/has female secondary sex characteristics.

Also Plants visually resemble angels, and it's common belief angels do not have gender like humans do since they are pure and holy beings. I couldn't quickly find a source for that, but I know that Alchemy has some emphasis on hermaphroditism as, like, the holier form. So I guess by that logic you could also say they're intersex but I'm veering off topic.

Thirdly in the 1998 anime they gave the child versions of Vash and Knives long hair that ended up being cut off in ways that symbolized important developments in their identities. Knives example is what I have on hand lol. It just smacks of transgenderism.

3) DEEP SPACE PLANET FUTURE GUN ACTION!!!!

Wacky space cowboy Vash the Stampede roams the space desert planet where humans are barely hanging onto survival using the tech of their spacefaring ancestors! He can shoot with perfect accuracy, and is wanted for DESTROYING AN ENTIRE CITY, but is a staunch pacifist?! How odd!

What's Vash's deal? What happened that made humans unable to go back to space? Why'd they land on this desert planet that sucks to live on? Learn this and much more in TRIGUN!

#asks #my trigun #trigun discussion

[abigail-pent]

There's something deeply Frollo-y about the way Silas says "We will waste no truth on liars." Very Spanish Inquisition-esque. Something about his insistence that if you're a member of the out-group -- imperfect in your holiness according to his group's standards -- then it's totally fine and dandy, and even a good thing, to abandon your supposed values (truth, honor, etc). Something very ... reminiscent of Christian colonialism. "It's ok to treat 'savage' or 'heathen' people with abject cruelty and violence; they're not 'real people' unless they convert to our beliefs; and even then we'll look on them with suspicion because they used to be from an out-group". "Oh, do you feel bad about the cognitive dissonance here? I'll absolve you later, and this absolution should make you feel totally fine about whatever fucked-up action I'm telling you to take, in the name of our deity. It totally neutralizes any moral fallout or real-world consequences of your actions, so don't worry."

The Ninth is secretive, for sure, but the Eighth embodies some really fucked up colonial dynamics that don't seem to be present in the Ninth culture. Or at least, if they're there, they're really deemphasized/downplayed. The two Houses sort of mirror each other -- the white and black feels a bit like yin and yang; as @madtomedgar points out, it's likely not a coincidence that Cristabel is a nun (and Silas and Colum are monks), and Harrow is also a nun, but no other House seems to really embrace the structure and titles of monastic orders; and there are clear narrative parallels between Silas/Colum and Harrow/Ortus, her erstwhile cavalier. But this particular manifestation of Christian and/or Catholic violence is almost contained to the Eighth House, where the heir and cavalier primary are called Templars. A clear nod to the extreme, racist, colonial violence of the Crusades. And they're called the Forgiving House; which is perhaps about their tendency to forgive themselves their own sins? Or possibly a play on Mercy's name?

To be clear, I am not/would never claim that any particular House is free of the legacy of racist, colonial, Christian/Catholic violence; the whole system is literally an empire trying to colonize everything outside itself; but in terms of the way the Houses are characterized, it does seem like a lot of this historical/cultural baggage is really concentrated in one spot. And I just think that's interesting, but I don't really know what to make of it.

#tlt #eighth house

[museofpangolins]

sooo here's my top 10 most Good Omens-coded Hozier songs

10) Jackie and Wilson

this one isn't super deep, I think it just gives off that vibe of fun adventures together that mostly the first season had. also, this line

9) Swan upon Leda

this is a song that through religious metaphors captures the brutality of human nature in a way that's so beautiful and poetic. this one isn't so specific, but in my opinion it conveys some of the feeling of the story as a whole

8) Eat your young

I find it insane how it's possible for someone to sing about the exploitation of the innocent in such an incredible way. in this case it can be read about how the authorities (heaven and hell) are only driven by their personal goals and are using humans as a way to achieve them. it's even more literal in Job's story, with angels having no clue on how much his children mean to him and being completely uninterested on the matter, because they're too busy following God's plan.

7) Work Song

here things are starting to get a bit more specific. Work Song talks about a love that goes beyond the grave, but also a love that's so unconditional it goes beyond every human or religious imposition

6) Francesca

Hozier takes inspiration for this song from the tale told by Dante about two lovers condemned to damnation in hell, but the main aspect he uses for this song is the idea of it being worth it in order to be with the loved one, even at the cost of giving up a place of comfort and security. which is also what I hope will happen in season 3.

5) All Things End

I'm so sorry for this one. I'm really sorry. but I swear it's the only thing that could come to my mind when I saw this scene

I won't elaborate more because otherwise I'm going to cry.

4) Unknown/nth

i can't believe this song isn't officially about the two of them. I mean:

you mean mr Hozier didn't intentionally release it last month in honor of Aziraphale and Crowley?? sounds fake but ok

3) Take me to Church

religious trauma. questioning Christian values at its FINEST. love for humanity and for what being human means. all while discussing love and how religion ties it to the concept of sin.

2) Like Real People Do

absolute season two anthem. I think the whole point of Aziraphale and Crowley's characters is finding humanity in themselves, going beyond their angelic/demonic nature and whatever is expected from it. they're neither heaven nor hell's side, but on a completely different one that allows them to live in their own personal identity while often aligning with the interest of humans. that's why even their love for each other is an expression of how close to real people they've become.

1) From Eden

what can I say? it's just so perfect. just one song to summarize every important aspect of the story.

the familiarity derives from the previous angelic nature of Crowley. the destruction of idealism, chivalry and innocence symbolizes the disillusionment with heaven and hell, and the final line how the only hope can be found in the human world, but also, much like Francesca, the idea of giving up safety to be with the loved one. in this case though this is depicted with the use of religious imagery, specifically the garden of Eden. Therefore my hope is that this could be interpreted even more literally once in season three Aziraphale will give up heaven for Crowley. there are many other things that could be said about this song, and I really really hope it will be included in the soundtrack of the show.

if you read all of this, thank you so much, and please let me know if there are songs I didn't include

#good omens #good omens season 2 spoilers #good omens s2 spoilers #aziraphale #crowley #crowly x aziraphale #ineffable husbands #hozier #wasteland baby #unreal unearth #neil gaiman

[tuulikki]

I have a problem with that list of things that make a person 'culturally christian' as the post couples it with the implication that one can cease being culturally christian while still doing some of the things on that list.

I'm probably misunderstanding shit but it bugs me. Several things on that list are unavoidable in daily life, and thus my Jewish friend (and the Jewish poster who made the list) fall into the culturally christian category because they use a christian calendar and buy chocolates on valentine's day. And yet the poster says 'those of us who are not culturally christian' which contradicts their own argument? No? I'm an atheist and I'm absolutely aware of other religions, but the world around me doesn't care, I have to say it's 2022. And it doesn't bother me, tbh. I don't say AD anymore, that's on purpose. But that post...I don't get why it assumed the OP didn't understand that these things come from christianity. The assumption that all victims of religious abuse are living in culturally christian environments, or that they don't know other religions are different from christianity...i really don't like that attitude. It sounds like implying that they haven't found the better religions yet and that's why they're atheist, but not even fully so because their culture remains influenced by christianity. It's condescending. (be gentle, i'm not looking for a fight, and it's ok to not respond if what I'm saying pisses you off because it misses the point.)

Hey, thanks for the ask! I hope I can explain things, and if there’s anything you find frustrating at the end of it, please send another ask and I’ll try to do better—it’ll likely be due to my not being coherent 🥲

The key misunderstanding here is how massive “culture” is.

Using a Christian dating system or observing aspects of Christian holidays doesn’t inherently make any person culturally Christian. Those are byproducts of dominant Christian religion in a culture. But the person who has never felt their own culture subordinated and othered by that culturally Christian default is the cultural Christian. Many culturally Christian people may be deeply alienated or flat-out hate religious Christianity, but the culture we inhabit is culturally Christian and it is our culture. It can be hard to spot how much you’re a product of your culture, but the fact of it remains.

It’s like being raised by a family: it defines what you think “family tradition” means but will also affect little things like what food you want to eat when you’re sick. It’s not that who you are is determined by your family. But you are shaped by the experience of being raised in that family. You can’t erase that history: what you choose to reject or continue from your family legacy is a conscious choice informed by what you’ve experienced. And you can’t assume that the way your family works has any universal applicability, or that that cutting your family out of your life makes you a blank slate, or that your way of rejecting your birth family is universal.

If you are from a culture that is historically Christian, you exist as a part of that culture. People who aren’t culturally Christian can of course be members of a culturally Christian society because participation (and belonging!) in the society is not defined by adherence to the religion. The culture is, however, shaped by centuries of that religion. And people who aren’t culturally Christian are forced to accommodate the majority culture in ways which people who are culturally Christian will not. (The classic example of cultural Christianity is the culturally Christian neopagans/witches who try to argue that the winter solstice is “inclusive” because it’s not Christian. As if “Christian” or “not Christian” are the only ways you could measure exclusivity and inclusivity!)

The OP of that post wrote the phrase “being an atheist is a valid belief system.” That’s some raw cultural Christianity. It presupposes the following:

religion must have a deity (how else atheist?)

atheism is primarily defined as an absence of belief in a deity (rather than omitting a particular act or social practice)

atheism and religion are both defined as being determined by personal belief. The belief in question is in a system of some kind.

adherence to a system of belief determines a specific identity label, which an individual will apply to themselves. This label marks them as a member of an identity group whose members are defined by such individual declarations of belief.

belief systems can be valid or invalid (and it’s worth arguing about)

None of these things are universally believed by all cultures. But a culturally Christian society absolutely assumes those things to be true.

So my point is that atheism in culturally Christian societies is overwhelmingly defined in dialogue with and in reaction to the core tenets of the various Christianities that have dominated those societies. That’s what we’re trying to say when try to tell culturally Christian atheists that they are culturally Christian. I don’t want to be condescending, but the fact that some culturally Christian atheists don’t seem to be aware that they are products of their culture and that they enjoy a baseline level of membership privilege in that culture is… very challenging to me? We’re not accusing them of being crypto-Christians, but since their definition of “religion” is still so Christian, that’s what they hear. They use a narrow, culturally-bound definition of religion when they say “l’m not religious”—and they assume their definition isn’t derived from that culturally Christian experience.

You can’t surgically separate the history of dominant religious traditions from the cultures that practice/d those religions: the culture shapes the religion, the religion shapes the culture. A culturally Christian atheist from England is a different kind of atheist than a culturally Buddhist atheist from Mongolia. You can’t exist in a vacuum.

Deprogramming yourself in this context means acknowledging the fact that you have privilege. This privilege is something you get by default whether you want it or not. It’s not merely knowing that other systems of belief exist or writing “C.E.” at the end of the year. It’s accepting that you are the product of a certain culture that is not universal, even though its dominance can make us feel like it’s a natural default.

Culturally Christian privilege doesn’t invalidate any person’s religious Christian trauma because culturally privileged people can be abused within the social structures they benefit from at the same time. There isn’t a moral binary here. No one is assigned a static moral category. Someone telling you you’re benefiting from cultural Christianity is not them saying “gotcha, you’re irredeemably problematic! #cancelled!!” It’s an invitation to ask yourself if you’re being held back by what you’re trying to reject. To put it in terms we all understand too well: “cultural Christianity” isn’t a sin, there is no shame attached to it, and there is no pressure to be pure and cleansed of it because that would be impossible as that’s not how people and cultures work. And the fact that some of the worst of it still lives in our heads does not mean that we are bad, because there’s no one judging our thoughts, only our actions. The fact that we have a term to describe what lives our heads—which allows us to be aware of it—is a gift, not an accusation.

#long post #Jesus fucking Christ on a pogo stick but that’s a long post #if anyone reads it then good on you #cultural christianity #religious studies #opinions

[magnetothemagnificent]

Ok a bit of an oddball question for you. Feel free to ignore this it’s pretty asinine outside of creative discussion.

Would Jewish Vampires have any wards like Christo vampires do?

For context my partner is in the very beginning steps of his conversion and so Judaism is on his mind a lot. I have just a goofy little story that I’m never going to do anything with about a hive of five vampires in which I introduce the concept of “Old World” Vampires. Which is essentially the idea that vampires that predate Christianity would have no reason to be affected by any of the traditional Christian wards you’d see in media such as crosses and holy water.

We were talking and he mentioned that one tumblr post where someone asked their rabbi how a Jewish vampire could keep Kosher and that it would be interesting if vampires from different religions would be effected negatively by symbols from their own religion. So a Jewish vampire unable to walk into a household with a Mezuzah.

I debated that the idea of vampires being punished by religious symbols in the first place is very based in soley Christianity and the idea that even Athiests do actually know deep down that Christianity is the one truth and therefore are applicable to Gods punishment. So that’s why vampires are affected by religious symbols because it’s from the point of view that nonbelievers are secretly hateful theists. Therefore it wouldn’t make sense for a Jewish vampire who was raised to not fear ultimate judgement and sin in their religion not to have any negative reaction to the symbols of such.

What are your thought’s?

(Also just wanted to put that as a Goy with no desire to convert currently, I don’t think I’d ever be comfortable writing a Jewish Vampire due to how based in antisemitism the original concept of Vampires themselves are. But I thought it would be an interesting theological discussion and my partner has me curious.

I think it's important to understand that the cultural idea of vampires being repelled by Christian paraphernalia is directly due to antisemitism and antiziganism. Vampires in European were often metaphors for Jews and Romani people, two groups of people who were associated with non-Christian culture and everything anti-Christian, and outsiders who blended in with "normal" society. So you have to understand that the only reason vampires in pop-culture are repelled by Christian objects is because vampires were the personification of Jews and Romani people, who were seen as the cultural anti-Christ.

Now that we've unpacked that, let's discuss what vampires are in Jewish folklore and what they're repelled by.

Vampires in Jewish mythology and folklore become vampires not by being bitten by another vampire, but from regular humans just happening to become vampires by being possessed by a malevolent spirit. Humans succeptible to becoming vampires after death had extra measures taken as burial, such as stuffing the mouth with dirt. There are also many different kinds of vampires in Jewish folklore.

The way vampires are repelled in Jewish folklore is similar to how demons are repelled- since pregnant people are most susceptible to being targetted by vampires, amulets were often worn by pregnant people to protect against all kinds of malevolent forces. Once a vampire was encountered, it could be killed just like a human- stabbed or decapitated, and humans suspected of being vampires were buried with dirt in their mouth. Vampires in Judaism aren't areligious, regular people could be vampires and partake in Jewish life, so religious iconography wouldn't really repell vampires.

Demons, however, could be repelled by children learning Torah, but vampires are just....scary creatures that prey on vulnerable people. Nothing about them is anti-Jewish, so Jewish symbols wouldn't repell them.

I think you have to understand that your perception of vampires and how they're repelled is deeply influenced by Christian European ideas about vampires. Many cultures around the world have ideas similar to vampires, like Judaism, but they're not exactly the same. So the idea that religious iconography repells vampires is rooted in Christianity, and thus doesn't apply to vampires in Judaism.

I think in order to understand how vampires "work" in Judaism and Jewish folklore, you need to stop thinking about vampires in the context of Christian European vampires.

#jumblr #judaism #jewish folklore #vampires #jewish mythology #vampires in judaism #antisemitism #antiziganism #christianity