#trenchant

[readok]

Британская подводная лодка класса T Royal Navy HMS Trenchant (P331) всплывает на Северном полюсе

#hms #trenchant #подводная лодка #северный полюс

[prettyboysdontlookatexplosions]

maybe not the absolute best thing about les miserables the novel (it’s a long book) but the one that stood out the most to me and has remained with me most strongly is that when the book is explaining to us the plight of fantine, who basically like finds herself poor and knocked up bc iirc she hooked up with some fuckboy who was never gonna stick around, victor hugo really takes pains to be clear that fantine did a lot of really dumb shit. she made stupid ass choices. she was naive and impulsive and unwise and myopic. it’s not a story where a tragic heroine did everything right and still got screwed. but the moral argument put forth by, i mean, to some degree the entire novel but particularly (to my recollection) by this section is essentially like, isn’t it so fucked up that we live in a society where someone can be functionally condemned to a life of suffering for the crime of being a fallible human being in their youth? isn’t being young and stupid and getting to move on from that a human right that we are denying people? shouldn’t you be allowed to be kind of an idiot without ruining your entire life? it’s such a clearly and expansively empathetic view and it’s an idea that people obviously continue to struggle with based on Any Time Anything Happens Ever and also one that i feel like continues to be rare in narrative art or media, at least expressed this fully or strongly.

#the fantine section also has my favorite line in les mis #which my translation recorded as: #Curiosity is gluttony. To see is to devour. #insane that the most trenchant line about celebrity culture came from a 19th century french dude but there we are

[theglobster]

have dinner with andre and maybe youll calm down

#watch while eating dinner for a 4D experience #trenchant insight. bon mot

[unopenablebox]

sorry that every time i write about biology my usual personae fall into nothing and i become Science Educator Guy, who loves paragraphs and hates ambiguity

#my capacity for irony is like really subsumable to my love of talking to people about cells #although i did manage to start a skeptical question in lab meeting yesterday with #''i'm going to be‚ like‚ SO real with you right now'' in maximum uptalk drawl #which let me tell you really kills in the right setting especially if you follow it up with some genuinely significant criticisms. #the person presenting is my friend i'm not just out here doing this to people. but it DID land and my critiques WERE trenchant. #box opener

[girlonthelasttrain]

Prolonged captivity also produces profound alterations in the victim’s identity. All the psychological structures of the self—the image of the body, the internalized images of others, and the values and ideals that lend a person a sense of coherence and purpose—have been invaded and systematically broken down. In many totalitarian systems this dehumanizing process is carried to the extent of taking away the victim’s name. [Jacobo] Timerman calls himself a “prisoner without a name.” In concentration camps the captive’s name is replaced with a nonhuman designation, a number. In political or religious cults and in organized sexual exploitation, the victim is often given a new name to signify the total obliteration of her previous identity and her submission to the new order. Thus Patricia Hearst was rebaptized Tania, the revolutionary; Linda Boreman was renamed Linda Lovelace, the whore. Even after release from captivity, the victim cannot assume her former identity. Whatever new identity she develops in freedom must include the memory of her enslaved self. Her image of her body must include a body that can be controlled and violated. Her image of herself in relation to others must include a person who can lose and be lost to others. And her moral ideals must coexist with knowledge of the capacity for evil, both within others and within herself. If, under duress, she has betrayed her own principles or has sacrificed other people, she now has to live with the image of herself as an accomplice of the perpetrator, a “broken” person. The result, for most victims, is a contaminated identity. Victims may be preoccupied with shame, self-loathing, and a sense of failure. In the most severe cases, the victim retains the dehumanized identity of a captive who has been reduced to the level of elemental survival: the robot, animal, or vegetable. The psychiatrist William Niederland, in studies of survivors of the Nazi Holocaust, observed that alterations of personal identity were a constant feature of the “survivor syndrome.” While the majority of his patients complained, “I am now a different person,” the most severely harmed stated simply, “I am not a person.”

— Judith L. Herman, Trauma and Recovery: The Aftermath of Violence - from Domestic Abuse to Political Terror

#well! #i should've reread this book sooner #reading journal #trauma and recovery #judith herman #i'm aware linda lovelace's situation is a thorny subject and herman's attitude towards it is really trenchant

[aeide-thea]

Stuck Under Dreaming Catte, Send Help

#i both need and want to get up and go to bed #but that will unavoidably involve dislodging her and i haven't been able to bring myself to be that cruel… #the thing abt my new poäng pal is that it makes sitting like a neurotypical feel much more ergonomic than usual #so i've got more of an actual lap available than is my scrunched-up wont #and it's been extremely exciting for the local potato contingent <3 #(presumably also helps that i'm the only game in town rn but. choosing 2 believe i'd be appreciated regardless!) #anyway. as ever‚ i remain grateful for yr attention to the trenchant journalism that comprises this blog #as does‚ i have faith‚ the cozy little beneficiary of the extra laptime it facilitated… 🦐😴 #domesticities #catblogging #journaling

[ivan-fyodorovich-k]

As I now read that the state or federal government intentionally murdered dozens of people with a wildfire in Hawaii, I am once again wondering whether there is such a thing as a natural disaster or a genuine catastrophe in the minds of terminally online people who think everything was done by Them

And like

Every single time? Nothing bad has ever just happened? And it’s never incompetence or neglect? It’s always malice? It’s always because They planned it?

#the scrappy True Narrative is always almost exactly the same shit too #it’s like it’s written out of a script #if I didn’t know so many of them personally I’d almost think that the conspiracy narratives were damage control from the government #trying to hide the fact that they’re actually indifferent and incompetent because saying they planned it all at least projects power #and the point isn’t that the government is always perfectly transparent and nothing suspicious ever happens #because obviously the government lies constantly and the official narrative is going to be unreliable #and new details will emerge #and things will look different in retrospect #it’s just the confidence #the bitter and utterly trenchant and completely intensely and apoplectically self-assured confidence #that you always just immediately Know what Really Happened #and it’s always the same story

[v-a-t-i-o]

new professor praise just dropped

#i had to GOOGLE trenchant to be sure what she meant.... big big fan

[aiiaiiiyo]

#Richard Pryor -aged 7 - class photo 1947. Pryor was an American actor and stand-up comedian. He reached a broad audience with his trenchant #mrnastymannn #oldschool

[alternis]

literally everybody time I try to stop the film reel in my head from thinking about SHS au it just yanks the script from my hands and projects more shiva and Tim interactions into my brain again. "what about an atla au," I suggest, "you guys love atla aus. bending. the Greek elements. philosophical examinations of pacifism and the correct use of violence. kicking people."

"fuck off," my brain replies. "lady shiva."

#the combination of adhd autism and ocd is like trying to pilot a body when you're secretly 15 pigeons in a trenchant #I can never drive a car because it would be like 8 people in the drivers seat and none of them are paying attention to the road

[springbeanz]

#Trenchant Insight #Tell Me More #Bon Mot #OP is @Durbikins on twitter

[im-totally-not-an-alien-2]

Every year, Sam, Danny, and Tucker go on a vacation courtesy of Sam's very reluctant parents. This year, it was Tuckers turn to choose the location and activities, and he chose Gotham.

Not only did it have Wayne Tech, one of the most technologically advanced companies, but Gotham was also hosting a massive furry convention this year and the three of them were complying as Succubats from the Dragon Quest series. They had gone all out, full purple body and face paint, contacts that made the whites of their eyes black, hand died leggings, leotards, and fuzzy leg warmers as well as everything else. Let's just say there was a lot of sowing involved.

Danny even made a mad scientist invention that toyed with gravity so that they could fly while flapping their wings. His parents were so proud and made them stop for pictures before they left.

The convention was fun and they got saved by Robin once and ended up teasing him a bit. Sam was cackling the next day when she found out Robin had gone through the rest of his patrol not knowing that Danny's purple galaxy lipstick was still on his cheek the entire time.

The only part they didn't like was this weird trenchant guy kept following them around in the shadows but Batman was with him so it was probably okay. The justice league had found out about the anti ecto acts and publicly tore the government a new one. Danny had barely managed to hide his parents involvement and work with Tuckers and Vlads help. While he hand Vlad were still bitter enemies, Vlad didn't want to see Maddie in jail and Danny could work with that.

On the flip side of things, the Justice League still had no idea about the portals in Amity Park or that anything was going on there. So when John Constantine found out about a insanely powerful entity that radiated death energy like the sun radiated light heading straight to Gotham, he panicked and immediately went to Batman to tell him the bad news.

Jahn had no idea what this creature was and was determined to find out, but between the make up and body paint and everything else, it was impossible to discover the identity of the three teens. It didn't help that Danny could just turn them invisible/fly them everywhere so John and Bruce are suffering

#prompts #fanfiction prompts #dpxdc #danny phantom #danny fenton #batman #damian wayne #tucker foley #sam mansion #succubat #dragon quest #tucker totally begs tim/ lucious for his autograph if he gets the chance #danny had gotten his wierd death vibes all over tucker and sam so no one knows if they're actually human or not #lucious is interested in the tech Danny made and wants to hire danny and Tucker in the future #succubat is a monster from dragon quest btw

[comeon-intothemadhouse]

Hot take for the rampant biphobes in the Supernatural fandom:

Castiel is bisexual not gay.

Goodnight.

#No I won't elaborate #Much #Supernatural #Angel in a trenchant #I won't tag his name bc I don't wanna be harassed by hellers #MegCas #Is canon y'all #My autocorrect tried to screw me here ngl

[zedecksiew]

DECOLONISING D&D

In 2019, after seeing yet another round of alarmist discourse in Xwitter about how Dungeons & Dragons is FULL of COLONIALIST tropes and patterns, and needs to be revised, SCRUBBED of its PROBLEMATIC FILTH---I rage-tweeted this brainfart:

"Decolonising D&D"

I've seen this thread round the community, since. Humza K quotes it in Productive Scab-picking: On Oppressive Themes in Gaming. Prismatic Wasteland quotes it in Apolitical RPGs Don't Exist. Most recently, it was referenced in a 1999AD post about Western TTRPGs (an interesting discussion on its own merit; one that already has a counterpoint from Sandro / Fail Forward.)

If folks are still referring to it five years later, maybe I should give the thread a little more credit? Perhaps the fart miasma has crystalised into something concrete.

In the interest of record / saving this thought from the ephemerality of Xwitter, here is the text in full, properly paragraphed, and somewhat more cleanly expressed:

+++

"DECOLONISING D&D"

Firstly: saying "D&D is colonialist" is similar to saying: "the English language is colonialist".

If your method of decolonising RPGs is to abandon D&D---well, some folks abandon English; they don't want to work in the language of the coloniser. More power to them!

For those who want to continue using the "language" of D&D---

Going forth into the "wild hinterland" (as if this weren't somebody's homeland);

to "seek treasure" (as if this didn't belong to anybody);

and "slay monsters" (monsters to whom?)

Yeah. There's some problematic stuff here, and definitely these aspects should make more people uncomfortable.

But! I think it is an error to "decolonise D&D" by scrubbing such content from the game.

That feels like erasure; like an unwillingness to face history / context; like a way to appease one's own settler guilt.

Do you live in the West? Do you live in any Asian urban metropole? White or Person of Colour(tm)---you are already complicit in colonialist / capitalist (yes, of course they are inextricably linked) behaviour. (I can't speak for urban metropoles elsewhere, but I bet they are similar centres of extraction.)

Removing such patterns from the TTRPGs you play might let you feel better, at your game table. But won't change what you are.

I think it is more truthful and more useful NOT to avert one's eyes from D&D's colonialism.

The fact that going forth into the hinterland to seek treasure and slay monsters is a thing, and fucking fun, tells us valuable things about the shape and psychology of colonialism. Why conquistadors in the past did it; why liberal foreign policy, corporations, and post-colonial societies do it today.

Speaking personally:

I write stuff that evokes / deals with the context I'm in---Southeast Asia. An intrinsic part of that is looking at the ways colonial violence has happened to us---as well as the ways / reasons we now, supposedly free, perpetrate it on others.

A long chain of suffering. Heavy stuff.

I also write for people who want to have fun / kill monsters / pretend to be elves, of course. But for those people who want to consider serious stuff like colonialism: I offer no FIGHT THE POWER righteousness, no good feeling, no answers.

Only discomfort. Because the truth is uncomfortable.

Here's a screenshot of the Author's Note for Lorn Song of the Bachelor:

"Any text inspired by Southeast Asia has to reckon with colonialism ... This text presents a difficult situation; there are no easy solutions. "... If I offered a mechanical incentive for you to fight colonial invaders, you wouldn’t be making a moral decision, but a mercenary one. "The choice you face should echo ... the kind of calculus my grandparents faced."

I stand by that.

Also: might we be more precise and more careful about using the term "decolonising", please?

Here I quote Tuck and Yang's landmark and (sadly) still trenchant "Decolonization is not a metaphor":

"Decolonization brings about the repatriation of Indigenous land and life; it is not a metaphor for other things we want to do to improve our societies ..."

+++

Further Reading

So this post isn't just me reheating a hot take, here are some touchstone writings from around the TTRPG community about colonialism as a subject and mode of play in games:

+

"Jim Corbett was called upon to hunt down another fifty maneaters over the course of the next 35 years. Together, those tigers had killed over 2000 people, for much the same reasons as the Champawat Tiger - injury, desperation, starvation, and habitat loss. Would you look at that. The root cause was British colonialism."

D&D Doesn't Understand What Monsters Are from Throne of Salt

+

"Another effect of having colonizers in my setting would be giving players the opportunity to drive them away from the islands, their home. This maybe just be for the catharsis. After all, isn’t catharsis a big part of why we play roleplaying games?"

I’m Adding Colonizers To My Setting from Goobernut's Blog

+

"When you have a slime boy and the other characters are a really fat lizard and one's playing Humpty Dumpty, it completely shatters the straight-faced serious authoritarian illusion of race, and replaces it with complete fucking nonsense. I love the idea of proliferating the number and types of "races" into absurdity, to the point where the entire logical structure of it collapses in on itself and race as a category ceases to become coherent or meaningful in any sense."

Interview with Ava Islam - Designer of the RPG Errant from Ava Islam / The Lost Bay

+

"Perhaps most critically, the fundamental basis of power is not land or even money but manpower. That’s what local rulers fight over, and what Chinese commercial networks export, in return for unique island products. It’s what the European colonists really need (even if it’s not what they most desire). There is rich loot to be grabbed in the form of spices, Spanish silver, Indian gold, sea cucumbers (the Chinese love ’em), perfumes, dyes, cloth etc. so there’s ample opportunity for piracy, trade and smuggling, but the key to long-term success – the key to independent survival – is nakedly and unquestionably uniting people."

Counter-colonial Heistcrawl: previous high scores from Richard's Dystopian Pokeverse

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"They worked their own land—which they dispossessed from American Indians—or became small shop owners or opportunistic gold diggers or bounty hunters or itinerant ranchers. To me, substituting these situations for one ruled by industrial monopoly ignores that the Wild West is a perfect example of how capitalism operates outside of (or prior to) mass industry, instead being composed of self-employers and self-sustainers."

Fantastic Detours - Frontier Scum from Traverse Fantasy / Bones of Contention

+

"... using the Western framing and D&D's baked-in imperialist and capitalist structure to get people earnestly participating in the experience of forming imperial power structures and the early roots of regional capitalism ... The PCs aren't the drifters on the train or the townsfolk watching with apprehension - they're the railroad itself."

An Arrow for the General: Confronting D&D-as-Western in the Kalahari from A Most Majestic Fly Whisk

+++

#colonialism #theory #ttrpgs #d&d #politics #lorn song of the bachelor

[orbitbrain]

Calls Mount for US Gov Clampdown on Mercenary Spyware Merchants

Calls Mount for US Gov Clampdown on Mercenary Spyware Merchants

Home › Cyberwarfare Calls Mount for US Gov Clampdown on Mercenary Spyware Merchants By Ryan Naraine on July 28, 2022 Tweet Cybersecurity professionals from Google’s threat hunting unit and the University of Toronto’s Citizen Lab are upping the pressure on mercenary hacking firms selling high-end surveillance spyware with fresh calls for the U.S. government to urgently clamp down on these…

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#candiru #congress #dsirf #exploit broker #Google #house intelligence committee #iOS #israel #john scott-railton #l3 #l3 technologies #l3 trenchant #l3harris #mobile exploits #nso #nso group #pegasus #shane huntley #spyware #tag #zero-click

[txttletale]

i'm reading socialism: utopian and scientific on your recommendation, and i chortled when engels said "[the working class is], no doubt, shackled by traditions of various kinds. bourgeois traditions, such as the widespread belief that there can be but two parties, conservatives and liberals, and that the working-class must work out its salvation by and through the great liberal party." lmaoooo still relevant

yeaqh this is something you will really notice when reading marx, engels, lenin, etc. -- many of their observations continue to be deeply trenchant to this day

#ask #ovidians