#you get existing units and we're all just voting for who want to get on a banner or for free | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

decolonize-the-left · 1 year

Text

What can I do? Be an active ally

How can I help? Be an active ally

Be an active ally

Being an active ally:

Men, the patriarchy affects you too. Yeah and negatively. Toxic masculinity, having to do things you don't want to cuz "you're a man," not being able to do the things you Do want to for the same reason, having to be tough and be the socially chosen one to die checking something out at night, repressing 99% of your emotions, also the misogynistic mommy issues that a patriarchy develops is fucking wild, constantly forcing you to dehumanize yourself & feelings for the idea of what a man should be.

All that is WACK. Things shouldnt be like that. I agree. Just understand some of us are struggling just for our right to exist right now, literally. We'd love to help you, we're just...preoccupied. Imagine how much faster this would all be over with if you regularly came to support our protests and voted in solidarity with the rest of us, though. How much more we could do all together with less divided, more united focus.

Also after some lengthy discussion myself and others found white people too suffer from white supremacy. White supremacy isn't just a Black People Problem™. You know that hole where you feel like culture should be? Like everyone else has dances and community and beliefs and culture but you have what you can buy at the store or sign up for at the Y? Assimilation into whiteness. Your ancestors' culture was left behind to blend into American Society. Which is... Capitalism. That's what it feels like as a native too. Except my ancestors didn't have a choice. Be a more active ally in dismantling whiteness and white supremacy. Support the movements, goals, and voices of BIPOC. It'd benefit all of us, like on an emotional-psychological level to be rid of it. Which yeah, helps deconstruct racism as a whole.

Remember you're an ally or becoming an ally today but marginalized communities as a whole have fought against systematic injustice since Columbus started it. Big picture: allowing this to continue has cost lives, culture, and history for everyone across generations and borders. Yeah, some people are gonna be more upset than others but it's Nobody's place to regulate how ppl to react to 500+ years of systematic abuse

Be critical in your allyship & think big picture; are you really going to stop supporting people trying to save Black and queer lives, challenging the patriarchy and white supremacy, trying get get rights and protections codified...over some property damage? Property damages are victimless and easily reparable, but conditional allyship has irreparable and deadly costs.

Look into the activist and leftist groups in your area

Listen when people tell you something is not okay or divisive (like justifying cultural appropriation or useless discourse)

Look into community/mutual orgs in your area (ex: Food Not Bombs, queer groups, and food kitchens)

Join or support them if you can. Create one in some cases if you're able. Go to protests, spend a few days helping, help organize, offer what you can (usually a really loud speaker tbh)

Join a union, pleeease.

I can't stress enough to listen to marginalized communities. The marginalized of the marginalized, even. When you vote, when a bill gets passed, when we discuss protests, and talk about actions to take. ALWAYS consider the voices that will MOST and directly be impacted by it. --- Ex: increased policing/police budgets, slashed LGBT resources, no access to abortion... Listen to the people it will hurt Not just the people it will benefit.

Ignoring these voices is a privilege and one afforded to you by a white supremacist society that inherently seeks to silent and suppress marginalized voices. White supremacists are the ones who decided we shouldn't get a voice in the first place. Your comfort is bought. Be an ally by finding comfort elsewhere, uplift us instead of white comfort supremacy.

Discard your reliance on whiteness and it's privileges all together. If absolutely any of us are to get anywhere we all need to be equal and treated equal, which means you need to be okay with being treated like us.

Be there. Show up.

66 notes · View notes

dontmeantobepoliticalbut · 2 years

Text

A group of former Republican and Democratic officials are forming a new political party called Forward, in an attempt to appeal to what they call the "moderate, common-sense majority."

"Political extremism is ripping our nation apart, and the two major parties have failed to remedy the crisis," David Jolly, Christine Todd Whitman and Andrew Yang wrote in a Washington Post op-ed published Wednesday. "Today's outdated parties have failed by catering to the fringes. As a result, most Americans feel they aren't represented."

Jolly is a former Republican congressman from Florida, Whitman a former Republican Governor of New Jersey and Yang is a former Democratic presidential and New York mayoral candidate. The three will merge their political organizations into the new party, whose launch was first reported by Reuters.

The group cites issues including guns, climate change and abortion as those that could benefit from a moderate approach. The new party will also advocate ranked-choice voting and open primaries, the end of gerrymandering, and nationwide protection for voting rights.

"Sixty-two percent of Americans now want a third party, a record high, because they can see that our leaders aren't getting it done," Yang told CNN's Brianna Keilar on "New Day" on Thursday in a joint appearance with Whitman. "And when you ask about the policy goals, the fact is the majority of Americans actually agree on really even divisive issues. The most divisive issues of the day like abortion or firearms -- there's actually a commonsense coalition position on these issues and just about every other issue under the sun."

Forward is planning a national convention next summer and will soon seek ballot access to run candidates in 2024, according to the Post op-ed.

The party said in a news release that it would launch "a national building tour this fall to hear from voters and begin laying the groundwork for expanded state-by-state party registration and ballot access, relying on the combined nationwide network of the three organizations." It plans to gain legal recognition "in 15 states by the end of 2022, twice that number in 2023, and in almost all U.S. states by the end of 2024."

While Forward won't be running its own candidates in this year's midterm elections, it will "support select candidates in November who stand up for our democracy, even if they come from outside the new party," according to the news release.

Jolly, Whitman and Yang acknowledged the clear lack of success third parties have had in the United States previously, writing in their op-ed, "Most third parties in U.S. history failed to take off, either because they were ideologically too narrow or the population was uninterested." But they said that "voters are calling for a new party now more than ever," citing a Gallup poll from last year.

"Americans of all stripes -- Democrats, Republicans and independents -- are invited to be a part of the process, without abandoning their existing political affiliations, by joining us to discuss building an optimistic and inclusive home for the politically homeless majority," Jolly, Whitman and Yang wrote.

Asked by Keilar on Thursday why they believe their effort to create a third party would work, Whitman said, "We're in a different time."

"When you have 50% of the American people saying that they are registered independent ... people are sick and tired of what they're seeing in Washington and the fact that nothing major is getting done is frustrating them. We have big problems and we want to see them resolved," she said.

A few independent candidates have earned national attention in their races this cycle. In Utah, Evan McMullin, who ran for president in 2016 as an anti-Trump conservative, is challenging GOP Sen. Mike Lee and has the backing of the state Democratic Party. In Missouri, John Wood, a former senior investigator for the House Select Committee investigating the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol, is running as a "commonsense alternative" to the field of Republican and Democratic candidates for the state's open US Senate seat. And in Oregon, former state Sen. Betsy Johnson, who left the Democratic Party last year, is a top contender in the open governor's race.

63 notes · View notes

alexissara · 4 months

Text

A Strategic Guide To CYL Voting Guide For Sapphics

As we prepare for The Chose Your Legends Voting Era I wanted to share my thoughts on how I am going to vote in the event and how I think we could combine our powers to have a sapphic character once again win Chose Your Legends. Sapphics Winning CYL isn't new with Lyn being a winner in the first round and being the first FF paired ending in the series with Florina that counts for something and obviously later we got the queen of Sapphic's Hearts Edelgard with the most votes of any CYL ever. However, CYL voting stocks are majorly majorly down which means a hand fool of queer women can turn the tides if we're banned together.

Dorothea and Monica are the most textual, most canon queers still on the table with a shot to win. While others on this list have strong subtext, strong paired supports, strong endings, Monica and Dorothea are both unavoidably queer and unlike Heather who now is finally in the game have a shot at winning this CYL. Dorothea fell 7 places last year in CYL7 going into 22nd place but with 4,529 votes as an already entrenched voting base having our bisexual icon come up on top is not unviable. Monica ended up in 63rd place but got that rising star award giving her even more momentum for all we know that gives them like a buff in voting a gimmick or something next year. I personally love the idea of Monica and Dorothea both winning in 1st and 2nd ready to follow Edelgard into Brave Hero territory

16,941 votes is ultimately our goal to beat assuming Engage doesn't raise votes [and it isn't that popular, sold worse then the last 3 proper games, and of those people who bought it a lot of impressions were negative]. I do think Engage is likely to have a bit of a buff and Yunaka and Ivy both have a strong chance at a strong showing in CYL but I don't think Engage will fundamentally be the trick to revitalize CYL voting in all honesty we'll either get less votes or new innovations on botting. All that is to say we would need 2421 people to commit all 7 votes to hit past Gulvegs first place win. 2053 to get past Corrin's voting threshold in second place.

However, voting to win isn't the only way to vote in CYL. The highest voted characters will end up in the game the next year, not sure fire but very often they grab some of the most popular characters left from any given game and then place them on a new hero banner. However, those all important slots are getting smaller and smaller as banners now have the option of releasing 5 different types of units that can go inside of a banner. New OCs, Rearmed Hero, Attuned Hero, Ascended Hero, and any of these variants but an OC from FEH who already exists. Often these come with the other units being auto demotes but demotes are ridiculously rare and suck so increasingly praying for a favorite to be in an NHB is coming a less smart thing. I do think just preforming well with a favorite who is popular maybe is better in terms of getting one of those alts for them. Although OCs do seem to be mostly going in order so unlikely voting for like Eir will give Eir yet another alt or something inside of a NHB.

That said, I think it's still a valid way to go I want a standard version of Heather and while this year I am going to pivot my vote I do think I could return to Heather voting in the future and maybe even this year Heather could see a boost from just more people being aware of her. If I saw enough Heather love I would pivot to trying to get Brave Heather.

Who are you voting for? Why? Will you join the Monica or Dorothea army? Personally, I think putting my money on the Monica train sounds good especially since Dorothea still doesn't actually have a base alt which means her CYL winner is likely to be a boring just normal Dorothea as they have done with Three Houses characters in the past.

#CYL #Chose Your Legend #CYL8 #Chose Your Legends 8 #Chose Your Legends #FEH #Fire Emblem #Fire Emblem Heroes #FE #FE Heroes #Heroes #Sapphic #Lesbian #Sapphic Fire Emblem #Sapphic FE #Lesbian FE #Lesbian Fire Emblem

4 notes · View notes

nokingsonlyfooles · 1 year

Text

youtube

Here's some more of Brigitte Empire, a columnist from the Telegraph who is fleeing Britain and could use your clicks, attention and donations! Today, she's talking about cis anxiety and what makes a slur a slur.

So today I'm talking about false equivalency and how the inability to make allowances for an imbalance of power ultimately perpetuates systemic injustice!

The AP walked it back (only by removing "the French"!!) but you've probably seen this floating around:

Conservative media outlets are loving it. Yet another example of "woke" culture gone mad! But being "woke" means not operating in passive mode and making dumb decisions that don't actually do anything to tackle systemic issues. So what's really going on here?

The Machine that Dispenses Justice is a neoliberal fantasy.

It predates the foundation of the US, but the Founding Fathers were certainly trying to build one... and they failed miserably.

Still waiting...

The concept is deceptively simple. We fragile, mortal humans, who exist across a spectrum of greys, can put together a system of laws and enforcement that produces justice every time, in black and white. Even if the people implementing our system of justice are a bunch of self-serving devils, we'll constrain them to following the rules so their only option is to be fair. In order to do so, first and foremost, everyone must be equal before the law.

On paper, a Black woman murdered by the police gets the same protection as a white woman murdered by the police, and therefore -no matter how differently each case is resolved in the real world! - we can say justice has been dispensed fairly. It's as if you sent both of your children off to school with the exact same bagged lunch. If one child comes home hungry, you can show them exactly what went into their lunch, what their nutritional needs should be, and why they should not be hungry.

"But, Justice," the hungry child might say, "when I try to eat my lunch, a gang of bullies takes it away and stomps on it, and they don't do that to my sister."

"Well, if someone stole your sister's lunch, she'd be hungry too. That's why she doesn't let them."

"But, Justice, they don't try. I have glasses and braces and I'm small and she's not."

"I'm sorry, but if you want extra lunch, I have to give you both extra lunch. Otherwise it just wouldn't be fair!"

Have you seen some version of this image with the kids on boxes?

The situation we're dealing with is: the tall kid makes the rules, he can already see over the fence, and it makes him super uncomfortable that someone might take one of his boxes away, so he yells down, "I don't see a fence! There is no fence! Problem solved!" Meanwhile, the short kid in the hole can't even get to a polling place to vote the tall one out of office.

It's terribly inconvenient for conservatives and "moderates," but Martin Luther King didn't just cough up that quote about hoping one day society will stop seeing race and then croak.

“A society that has done something special against the Negro for hundreds of years must now do something special for him, in order to equip him to compete on a just and equal basis.” — Martin Luther King Jr.

We do know dispensing Justice requires us to actually dismantle the fence. That information is lying around, free for anyone to pick it up and hold it in their brains. It's just much easier to shut our eyes, stick our fingers in our ears and say we've already dismantled it. We had a Black President and everything! Please, ignore the fact that he was born with boxes strapped to his feet and Republicans inexplicably tried to build the fence higher to prevent him from accomplishing what was essentially a conservative agenda. That doesn't matter! The fence isn't real!

The neoliberal fantasy creates a tautology, a rhetorical snake eating its own tail. If we want to get to a place where we're all equal, we gotta treat everyone equally right now. Equality under the law means reducing everybody to one contextless unit of humanity whose actions take place in a vacuum. There is no fence, there is no height disparity, there's just one kid trying to take boxes that don't belong to him. That's just as wrong as any kid taking something that doesn't belong to him. Equity becomes an impediment to Justice instead of a desirable (necessary!) step along the way. It is legally impossible to do something special to fix special harm, because that's not fair.

Thus, we have the AP trying to level the linguistic playing field, while wilfully hallucinating a total lack of fence. "Hmm, we need a new gear for the Machine that Dispenses Justice. It must be as simple as possible and treat everyone equally. Well, then we certainly can't say anything about being careful not to dehumanize the marginalized - that would create two classes of people, each of which has a different interaction with the gear. Creating unfair class structures is wrong!"

(Well, now I'm hearing this in her voice, so I'm going to inflict that on you too.)

"Hmm, what if we try using 'person first' language?"

(Says Yellow.)

"That's a simple rule that can be applied to everyone the same! I think we can agree 'the rich' are being just as dehumanized as 'the poor' when we don't call them people first!"

"You guys, I appreciate that you're all 'still a bit of a Nazi, but working on it,' but could you work on it someplace else? My house is not your 'holding space'!"

When cis people cry and scream about "cis" being a slur, they are buying into that same fantasy. They are refusing to see the height disparity or the fence. A "slur," if we must ignore the imbalance of power, is just a word that hurts. It's the same as calling someone "shithead" or "asshole" - I can tell by your language that you intend to cause pain, and that is wrong no matter who does it!

(Says Blue.)

"Cis" can be used (and, I will admit, not always fairly!) to shut someone down who is using the oxygen in the room to express their ignorant opinions. "You do not understand why trans people don't feel safe on your platform, Elon, because you are cis." B-but poor Elon built his whole identity and his brand around being the smartest guy in the room who knows everything. He can't be ignorant because of some aspect of his identity that he didn't choose and can't change. That hurts!

It doesn't hurt the same as when a Black woman hears someone call her the n-word on the subway, and suddenly doesn't know if that person is going to follow her off the train and harm her before she gets home. But Elon has no personal experiences like that to compare (because he's rich and white, and I'm assuming he doesn't like to hear those words in a negative context either).

Violence, and threats of violence, certainly do cause discomfort, but not all discomfort is violence (and not all violence is unjustified). If you'll recall my earlier post about the Right appropriating the language of the Left, zooming out too far is a way of corrupting the definition of a word, so it can't be used to call out bad behaviour. I feel uncomfortable when I have to break off singing along with Freddie Mercury for one lyric of "The March of the Black Queen," but a Black stranger hearing me belt out "a little n-word sugar" would feel unsafe. I see the fence, I acknowledge the height disparity (I'm not darker than a paper bag and I never will be), and I close my damn mouth.

Gatekeeping of marginalized spaces is a problem - and the Right will take advantage of it to get us to take each other out, so we do need to address it - but it's not on the same level as casual use of slurs. And "cis" without context, is neutral. Much like "the poor" you have to make a value judgment of what is being said before you call the language dehumanizing or unfair.

(It's a rainbow unicorn because it doesn't exist! It's not real!)

Human values evolve and change, they can be wrong, they're not always fair, and they cannot be bolted into a machine like a solid object. "Justice" is not a solid object, it's a human concept. A machine cannot crap out justice in the absence of human mercy and understanding. When we feed the actions of a human being into a machine without mercy or understanding, it can't crap out anything other than bullshit.

Value judgments are messy and imperfect, but they can be made. It's not wrong to think critically about a situation and adjust your response. If you're a human being with a human brain, you know trans people are not on top socially, and "cis" cannot be a threat in this context. You are then free to engage with it in a more nuanced way, instead of knee-jerking to the existence of a word that has meant the opposite of "trans" since Roman times. Is anyone being harmed? What's the nature of the harm? Who, if anyone, is being inconvenienced, and who, if anyone, is being threatened? Why?

The fence is real, and the height disparity is real. We can't fix it if we pretend it's not. Trying to build a rainbow unicorn is ultimately pointless and detrimental. You have to listen, and you need to look at where the words are coming from, and what effect they have. And if you screw up anyway, you apologize and try to do better. It's not perfect, but it doesn't have to be perfect. "Perfect" is the enemy of "better."

So kick the unicorn to the curb, and never stop using your brain. The fence isn't just going to go away. We have to take it apart. Every damn time.

"And that's why being an all-loving hero is freaking exhausting, folks!"

[Fore more like this, like and reblog. I am paying attention and trying to pick topics of mutual interest!]

#language #justice #fairness #cis people #brigitte empire #steven universe metaphors for politics #shared neoliberal delusions #long post #Youtube

4 notes · View notes

ramblings-of-a-mad-cat · 2 years

Note

Wtaf is going on in America? I swear it’s gone back like 50 years over there with Roe v Wade being overturned. Apparently they’re coming for interracial marriage, same sex marriage, voting rights & a lot more. It’s actually disgusting.

Because even though we got rid of Donald Trump, (for now, anyway. Technically, he can run again in 2024. There's no law that says he can't, and I'd bet my life it's what he's going to do.) the fact is, the damage was done.

I'm not just talking about how many people we lost in 2020, how much Covid was able to spread thanks to his neglect - though that is easily one of the worst examples. No, I'm talking about the influence. It all comes down to his slogan, "Make America great again." That tells you the whole story. Yes, anon, it is like we're going back in time fifty years, because that's exactly what the MAGAs want. They want the "good old days" when women "knew their place." and thanks to the Trump presidency, these bigots have more openly merged with the Republican Party. The fact is, America was never "great" and Trump was never trying to make it "great again." America was a work in progress. Slow progress perhaps, but not as swift as it ought to have been, but it was headed in the right direction. At least we weren't slaughtering the Native Americans anymore. At least we weren't enslaving Black people anymore. At least women were approaching something resembling equal rights, even if it was in baby steps. Again, a work in progress.

But then...Trump happened.

Trump. an unrepentant racist, misogynist, fact-denier...basically every horrible quality you can imagine in a person, he has them all. It would almost seem unrealistic. Like he was some sort of cartoon character. But he is very real, and any stories you might have heard about him...the genuine article is worse, a million times worse. In 2016, he talked his way into the White House...even though Clinton won the Popular Vote. The same thing happened to Al Gore back in the year 2000, which was how we got Bush and Iraq. See, in the United States, getting the most votes doesn't guarantee you the election, as ludicrous as it sounds. You have to win particular states, who, despite having fewer people, get more weight in the election. If you're wondering why, it's a system that was devised to compensate for the existence of slavery, and all of the slaves who were part of the population at the time but, obviously, were not voting. Which has led many people such as myself to recoil in disgust and point out how archaic and pointless that is now, but The Electoral College is still here. There are probably professionals who can explain this system better than me, but long story short, this is how we got Trump. Well, that, and it's also very likely that Russia had something to do with it, as it was confirmed that they interfered with the 2016 election, and we all know who Putin wanted to win.

Once Trump was in office, one of his new powers was that he was the only one who could nominate new members of The Supreme Court. Which is, as the name suggests, the highest level of Court we have. It stands on part with the Legislative (Congress) and Executive (The President) branches of government. Frankly, I've long held the opinion that the Supreme Court is the most powerful entity in this country, full stop. It's supposed to balance with Congress and the President, but assuming a case is brought to them, they can make any decision they want regarding it, and no one else gets a say. They can declare anything constitutional, or unconstitutional. And a Supreme Court Judge sits the job for life, by the way. There is no limit to how many "terms" they can stay. So they remain until they choose to retire (and considering how honored and prestigious the position is, many do not) or they die. This is why we took the loss of RBG so hard. The reason this is happening right now, is because Trump managed to fill three of the eight Supreme Court seats during his time in the White House. (One of which was Obama's to fill, by the way, but don't get me started on Mitch McConnell, we'll be here all day.)

To be clear, it's not as simple as saying that Trump is evil, and corrupted our country. No, it takes a village. In fact, thanks to his incompetence, Trump was almost a figurehead in a number of ways. A public figure who the bigots could rally behind. What it comes down to is that Trump's his has normalized many different types of bigotry, as well as a general denial of facts. Misogynists, homophobes, racists, they all feel comfortable coming out of the shadows now. When neo Nazis marched in Charlottesville, Trump said there were "fine people on both sides." During the 2020 Presidental debates, he refused to condemn the Proud Boys, and told them to "stand back and stand by." His presidency has caused all of these horrible people to come out of hiding - culminating in January 6th, when they were told that Trump would not be re-elected, and they tried to metamorphically throw the gameboard off the table. It's also given them the ammo they need to justify their existence - that being...nothing. This goes back to the whole "alternative facts" nonsense. Trump, and the Republican Party in general, no longer seem to feel the need to defend their decisions logically. They'll approve Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court at the eleventh hour, even though they played keep-away with a seat that rightfully should have gone to Merrick Garland, and that's just one example.

And my party, the Democrats, don't really know how to stop them, because facts don't work anymore. Pointing out the obvious, like how evil some of these stances are...that doesn't work anymore. They've hijacked the system, which was broken to begin with...and now they're breaking it down even more, to control the game. I guess you could say that the elected members of the Democratic Party are failing to win over the people, and I'm sure that's a part of it. But a not insignificant number of people simply are not voting, so that's a problem. The Republicans are also cheating. I realize that may sound kind of "whiny kid on the playground" but they are, in fact, cheating, and getting away with it. I recommend looking up the process of "gerrymandering" and seeing for yourself how they're rigging the elections. So the whole thing feels like we're helpless, but...there is one thing that Biden could do. He could stack the Court. Technically, there's no rule that says the Supreme Court has to be eight judges. He could choose to add more to level it out. I suspect he's hesitant to do this as it could backfire down the road, if and I understand that level of caution...but I'm still one of the people who thinks he should do it.

#Politics #Politics below #Roe V Wade #Donald Trump #The United States #Mitch Mcconnell #Amy Coney Barrett #Merrick Garland #Republican Party #Democratic Party #Proud Boys #Jan 6 Insurrection #2016 Election #2020 Election #The Supreme Court

26 notes · View notes

potted-dandelions · 1 year

Text

"And so, my fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you—ask what you can do for your country," is a bold admonishment, one which Americans have failed to live up to in the face of social pressure to elect those candidates who promise to give us the most free stuff.

Way back when JFK spoke those words, they were welcomed by patriotic Americans across the nation. People want to be useful, to contribute, to make a difference in the world, and the United States has traditionally been a place where that attitude is encouraged and even rewarded.

So don't ask why the USA lacks universal healthcare. Ask why do Americans uniquely donate so much more of their income to charity than the rest.

Partly it's because we're better paid, but largely it's to support our communities while maintaining our sense of individuality. Here's the thing: when the sovereign attempts to buy its citizens' loyalty, people discover that loyalty can be sold, and that insight is devastating to our inherent patriotism. Entitlement programs compel us to ask what our country can do for us, to reject JFK's admonition.

Americans have long understood that governments exist primarily to govern and secondarily to provide what social services only governments can. We begrudgingly accept government as a necessary evil while we work to provide for ourselves and take pride in our ability to do so. As young and pioneering as our culture is, we've acquired a frontier spirit that has worked so well for so long that we are loathe to abandon it. So we still look out for our neighbors in lieu of the dole, only applying for government services when better options are unavailable.

That's why Americans have the highest rate of individual charitable donations in the world. Charities let us provide for the needy and enjoin us to personally help our fellow citizens get back on their own two feet. But our own government cynically competes with us on that score.

I realize how jaded this sounds, but the government dole is a vote-buying scheme disguised as charity. Ideally, taxpayers would feel like they've contributed something useful to humanity for having paid their taxes, but instead it engenders a blithe have-the-maid-do-it mentality.

Truthfully, government welfare programs aren't that much more wasteful or less efficient than the average charity organization, but if a charity wastes revenue, we can always redirect our donations to another one or simply stop donating outright. Taxes by contrast are compulsory.

Americans are keen to wasteful government spending since we have no choice but to pay up, but since we're also human beings, we always want more government benefits for ourselves. Thus are more Americans becoming greedy socialists these days and it's killing our frontier spirit.

Alas, I fear the flame of our charity is threatening to snuff itself out in the face of socialist greed. Charitable giving is harder to fit into the household budget when the government takes so much and then uses it to buy our loyalty. Wealth redistribution is lethal to charity.

There ought to be a constitutional amendment which states that if the people can adequately provide for themselves and each other, the government cannot butt in and directly complete with any charity. Oh wait, there already is, and it (the 10th) was ratified over two centuries ago.

Our 'federal' government transformed itself into a national government so gradually that nobody has lived long enough to notice. Now, Uncle Sam has his hands in far too many domestic matters. Welfare, Medicare and social retirement funds are rightly matters for states to decide. States, after all, are far more accountable and accessible to 'We the People' than our distant and opaque federal government. We deserve more of a say in the dispensation of our tax dollars and far more transparency than federal entitlement programs provide.

As it is, most of us tend to just pay Uncle Sam and then leave him to his own devices, blindly trusting that he's got things under control, only checking in on him every two to four years. This have-the-maid-do-it attitude has an antidote: if you want it done right then do it yourself.

Unlike all federal entitlement programs, you can directly contribute your time, your diligence and your oversight to many charitable organizations by volunteering. You'll accomplish far more for your fellow man in that way than by simply paying your taxes and hoping for the best.

And you'll forget what the government owes you when you see your donations and your personal efforts make a real difference in your community. You'll embody John F. Kennedy's "Ask not what your country can do for you" mindset and you'll abolish socialism from your heart.

It's entirely possible to eliminate all federal entitlement programs and replace them with some combination of state entitlement programs, charitable organizations and a robust insurance industry. It's something we should do so our federal government can embrace federalism again.

It's long past time we stopped thinking of the government as our Uncle Samta Klaus come down the chimney with gifts of free healthcare, pensions, and family leave. He only wants your loyalty and he'll buy it with your own taxes. Give your loyalty instead to your fellow Americans.

Give more than your loyalty. Give also of your income, that which you can spare, and give of your free time as well and it will signify that your loyalty is not for sale because it already belongs to your community, your nation and your God. Blessings shared are blessings earned.

3 notes · View notes

mayoiayasep · 2 years

Note

Excuse me.

Sagami-sensei… Looks like he isn't here. Where on earth could that irresponsible teacher have gone off to?

Well, no matter. Transfer Student, we're here. Are you awake?

I'm going to slowly set you down on the bed now. If you get scared, just tell me. And… there we go.

Right. You should just rest here for the time being. Do you need anything?

…No reply.

Guess she's still unconscious. Girls really are so frail. Their bodies are so thin, and soft.

Did I really just try to drag a girl like this into a battlefield?

……

Transfer Student, you probably can't hear me since you're unconscious, but that doesn't matter. Just let me apologize.

I'm sorry...

For dragging you into this mess and forcing my expectations on you when you don't even know what's going on… But that's not all. I lied to you about something.

No, to put it more accurately, there's something I didn't tell you the truth about.

I just figured that you'd eventually found out on your own the more time you spent at this school.

No… I probably just didn't want to say anything bad, even if it was just for the moment, about the school that I attend.

I'm so pathetic, caring so much about keeping up appearances like this.

Earlier, I explained to you that this school is "a school for idols, made for idols, and by idols". But actually, that expression isn't very accurate.

In reality, this is "a school for good idols, made only for good idols, and by good idols".

The idols that aren't as good, in other words, underachievers like us, hardly get any attention.

That commotion we saw earlier is a representation of the state that Yumenosaki Academy is in right now.

Countless idols enroll in this school, full of dreams and ambitions.

With enough love, and effort made through blood, sweat, and tears, surely that blossoming dream can be obtained…

But, that dream won't come true.

Expectations are betrayed, studies are neglected, things like individuality or personal values are denied; everyone's made to conform to what the school defines as "the ideal idol".

It's true that this school has continued to produce outstanding idols.

But those idols barely seem human. They're more like genetically-engineered livestock being kept in a pigsty.

In a business sense, that's good enough. As long as they meet the requirements that the industry seeks, and they're obedient, making money isn't an issue. But what will happen to the dreams and free will that dwell in our hearts?

They'll just become food for the livestock. We're just weeds that are being trampled on and made into food for pigs. And no one even questions it.

No, even if we try to resist and go against it, we'd just be crushed, like what happened with that DreamFes earlier.

The unofficial stray matches are thoroughly subdued, and it's become the norm for official DreamFes to be rigged.

The only ones who ever win are the ones who are supposed to win.

The votes are predetermined before the stage curtain is even lifted; everything is orchestrated so that "the idols that are suitable for the school" can win.

With the DreamFes as they are now, only members on the Student Council Board, who hold overwhelming authority, or the unit that they're each a part of, can win.

The Student Council holds the highest authority in this school, and no one can disobey them. We're only allowed to exist as obedient servants that continue to vote for them.

If you go against the Student Council, you won't be able to survive in this school.

But then, what will happen to our free will? Why aren't we allowed to vote for what we genuinely think is "good"?

Are we not even allowed to be moved by our feelings? Are we only supposed to act according to what's written in our textbooks?

Is it not possible to sprout up once you've been labeled as an "underachiever"?

Not at this school. Everyone here can only be submissive, doing the same thing as everyone else, and bowing their heads to those in power.

There's nothing to be done about our dreams but let them rot away in our hearts.

That's why we want to break down the current state that Yumenosaki Academy is in, and bring about some change, but we still don't know what we can do yet…

nyx what is going on i just wanted to read the ! main story

wh. what the hell

#airi 🧋#inbox mail #hokke...girl....#enstars

3 notes · View notes

jim-fetter-illustrations · 4 days

Text

Can we survive a Nuclear War,... the government thinks so.....

Did ya know the CIA and other government agencies with names no one knows believe it is possible that the US could win a nuclear war. They believed that if the US launched a massive attack at the right time, there would be little chance of inflicting proportional damage on the US, and over 50% of Americans could survive the fallout from other nations as it circled the earth.

The fact that they are contemplating winning a nuclear war is astounding to say the least, not to mention writing-off HALF of the American people in this power play, and because they have the resources to play and survive the game, YOU DON'T.

These are real research projects done by our government, funded by you the taxpayer to establish if a nuclear war scenario is winnable............. I mean just look at the many government grants that are given to movies, documentaries and television series about what life might be like after a nuclear war happens , like it's just another tragedy that's bound to happen as the risk of nuclear war has increased dramatically in the past two years as the United States and Russia have abandoned long-standing nuclear arms control treaties, and then started to develop new kinds of nuclear weapons that could just kill biological units (people) and leave the structures alone so they could be re-occupied when the dust settles, saving billions in construction costs, and expanded the circumstances in which they might use nuclear and bio-weapons,........... like we're getting ready for it.

Hmmmm, now I'm thinking about the COVID virus, wonder why?!?!

Was that a test to see how a bio-weapon might work and spread?

Our intelligence community's know it's coming so they are paving the way to life after the nukes like it's a fucking tornado or tsunami that will just pass like every other tragedy that happens, and it will be survable??????

The world remains the closest it has ever been to the symbolic hour of the shit hitting the fan (apocalypse), with the Doomsday Clock set once again to 90 seconds to “midnight” for 2024, as Wars in the Middle East, Ukraine, a spiraling climate crisis and the rise of artificial intelligence are among the threats continuing to put human existence out-of-the-picture and let artificial intelligence do the driving for us,..........WTF!

The Doomsday Clock, which has been used for seven decades now, was created by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists in 1947 amid Cold War nuclear tensions — and is seen as “a universally recognized indicator of the world’s vulnerability to global catastrophe caused by man-made technologies.

Make no mistake: resetting the Clock at 90 seconds to midnight is not an indication that the world is stable. Quite the opposite.

"Will my cell phone still work after a nuclear war?"

That's the logic of the situation with most people, and we will know about it when we see that mushroom cloud in the sky........... because we keep voting for the same damn political parties that are interested in winning a nuclear war scenario, which are Republican and Democrats BOTH! But they won't tell you about it, and you won't hear about it in any campaign speeches,.....because if they did you would want to know "what's being done for your survival?",.....

I mean like the government has built massive underground facilities for their own people, but your not scheduled to go there in the event of a nuclear war,... Hell you're not on the schedule at all.

Just saying, government is looking out for government and you the taxpayer who pays for it all must take care of your own ass without the government's help, because dead people can't sue the government for negligence.....

Vote both parties out of office or dig a great big fucking hole in your backyard to live in for 6 months to wait for the fallout to fade.

......Yeah, I know,.... it's a little bit funny to some people to even talk about this crap,......... and I don't delude myself thinking that everyone is all-of-a-sudden going to vote for an independent humanitarian government that could avoid tragic events in our and our children's futures,........ I'm just saying it all starts with YOU, and then maybe someone else might see your wisdom and then maybe someone else and so on, and so on.

Because industry who started this ball rolling will oppose any efforts to vote out all Republicans and Democrats, because industry OWNS our political leaders with their financial support, and they would lose their grip on America if the American people take back their own government and tell industry what they can and can't do.

It's all up to you, and if you don't care, no one else is gonna care either.

See ya at the voting booth.

Comment

#Nuclear war scenario #vote out all republicans and democrats #day late and a dollar short scenario

0 notes

sudaca-swag · 4 years

Text

Australia's fires smoke have reached Uruguay, Chile and Argentina now. They even went over the whole fricking Andes.

We are exactly on the other side of the world, but climate change affects EVERYONE, its not a faraway problem that will only affect some of us once in a while, when we'll cry for a bit and then we'll carry on with our lives. This is a map of all the places which will disappear under water in 2050, exactly in tirthy years.

youtube

They're by far more than we thought just ten years ago, and this will afect 300 million people. The main perpetrators, according to investigations done by the United Nations, of this are only 100 businesses.....100 individuals in the whole world are destroying us in the name of their economical interests, interests that are completely made up at the end of the day

I'm not trying to make a doomsday post though, why? Becuse there is still time to change this:

Go to environmental manifestations, big numbers shock governments into changing policies, manifestations work, just look at a history book. Internet activism isn't all, actions are needed.

Demand your governments to take ecological measures, collect signatures and present them. Begin with small steps in your neighborhood and then go forward to bigger spaces.

Make Ethiopia our role model

Not everything needs money. Engage in social activities with others connected to the earth, most countries count with volunteer programs that tackle various issues at the same time and they are usually connected with cleaning neighborhoods, planting trees and vegetables. If it doesn't exist, then MAKE IT EXIST THIS IS WHAT ACTIVISM MEANS THINGS WILL NOT GET HANDED BY YOU BY GOVERNMENTS WHO DONT CARE ABOUT THE ENVIRONMENT , talk with your neighbors, classmates, families, people WANT to improve things and there are so many benefits of living in a green city you can't even begin to imagine.

While we're at the matter of goverments, DONT VOTE FOR PEOPLE CLEARLY AGAINST THE ENVIRONMENT. Do you believe voting is meaningless? It really isnt, this posture is completely invented by the same people who don't want you to vote because your vote actually means a difference in the world we live in.

Acknowledge your country's crimes against the environment. Europeans, Candians, Usamericans, protest against your countries dumping all their garbage and toxic waste in Asia and contaminating and exploiting latin american and african resosurces and our people. Protest this!!! You're at an advantageous place to do it because it can even mean death in some of our countries.

Help in all you can native people's fight for the environment, they have been vocal about this for decades and we've ignored them while they've been murdered by the governments and polluted lands and water. Donate to their official websites, sign their petitions, protest violation of sacred places, spread their messages but don't speak over them.

Inform yourselves about Circular Economy and how it can become a thing like tomorrow (turn on CC, its worth it)

youtube

Businesses only care about profits, so sabotage them if you're able to economically by not buying their products. While we are at it, if you're able to always try to choose national, small businesses products wheter it's food or other objects because it also means no money hoarding from the ones that are destroying us.

Although individual actions aren't the real cause for climate change, doing small things helps: instead of plastic bags use fabric ones (you can reuse the ones that come with clothes and shoes, theres no need to buy new ones) or if you're small like me, you can get a small, fabric shopping cart like this one.

Clothes made from animal products actually mean less contamination so if you're not a vegetarian and can afford it always choose them: most "vegan" fabric is just plastic, when you wash it and throw away the water it is full of minuscule plastic fibres that go directly to the sea and murder thousands of animals there. Also, they're by far cleaner, warmer and more durable so there's no surplus of thrown away flimsy, plastic clothes piling up on our lands. While we're at it, materials such as wool from any animal be it a sheep, an alpaca or anything, its not at all cruelty, trimming is actually what an animal needs or they will die.

And last of all: have faith that a change is possible, but we need to engage in activism all we can, especially outside of the Internet. If you can, protesting and marching is our biggest weapon, and millions of changes have been achieved through them. It is not pointless, movements mean something, they mean that we're tired, we are aware and we have power.

#Environment #Climate change #Australia fires #Politics

24 notes · View notes

reading-writing-revolution · 4 years

Text

From 2017...still true. America has a lot of problems, but right the President is the worst of them. He stands for nothing, believes in nothing, cares for no one. Solve the problem. #vote

"I feel the need to drop a little truth on y'all. So buckle up...I'm about to be politically incorrect.

We don't need to take America back. No one stole it. It's right here...you're sitting in it. Chillax.

Mexico isn't going to pay for the wall and we're not going to deport millions of people and break up families. If you think either one is a good idea, you're not smart and probably not a person I want to hang out with.

We don't live in a democracy. Technically we are a Federal Republic. But in reality we are ruled by an oligarchy. If you don't know what that is, look it up. Reading will do you good. You probably need to do more of it.

FoxNews, CNN, and MSNBC have an agenda and are not "fair and balanced" or in any way unbiased. I'll reiterate...read more. Read newspapers (even online ones). Read lots of opinions and sources and then (stay with me here), THINK! Form your own opinion based on as many facts as your can brain can tolerate.

Speaking of facts...there actually is a difference between facts, opinions, and propaganda. You should learn the difference. (Another opportunity to show off your mad reading skills.)

Science is real. We know things because of science. Don't be afraid of it. You have an iPhone and Facebook because of science. It's your friend.

Global warming or "climate change" as the cool kids call it IS REAL. Anyone who tells you it's not real is not a smart person and probably should not be dressing themselves or caring for children.

Racism exists. And you are probably a little racist and should work on that. Seriously.

American Christians are not under attack. We are not being persecuted. We wield so much power in this country that politicians pretend to be Christian just so we will vote for them. No one is trying to take your bible away from you. The gay people are not destroying our families—we don't need any help from them, thank you. We do a fine job of that by ourselves. So stop saying we are persecuted. You sound stupid.

Poor people need help. If you're not helping them but complaining about how the government helps them with your money you are not a nice person.

Be nice to the people who teach your children. Don't send them nasty emails or yell at them. Their job is 10,000 times harder than your stupid job. You are not a professional educator so just shut your mouth and be thankful someone is willing to teach your offspring.

You don't know what Common Core is. You think you do, but you don't unless you're a teacher. So stop complaining about math problem memes on Facebook. You can't do the math anyway.

ISIS is not an existential threat to the United States. We do not need to rebuild our military. Our military is the strongest, scariest, most badass killing machine the world has ever seen. So stop being afraid and stop letting politicians and pundits scare you.

Guns do in fact kill people. That's what they are designed to do. If you feel you need a gun to protect yourself in America, you are probably living in the wrong neighborhood and should move before you go out and buy a gun. There are like a billion places to live where you won't need a gun, or even need to lock your front door.

If you do own a gun, then make sure you know how to use it really, really, really well. Seriously...get some training because you still don't know how to record stuff with your DVR. Go to the gun range and shoot the thing a lot. Learn how to clean it properly and be able to disassemble it and reassemble it with your eyes closed. It's a freaking gun and it deserves that level of care, proficiency and respect. And for God's sake, keep it locked up and away from your kids.

If you are even a little bit crazy, sad, or pissed off...you shouldn't have a gun. And the Founding Fathers would totally agree with me.

Stop being suspicious of American Muslims. I guarantee the guy sitting next to you in the cubicle at work is probably more of a threat to you than any Muslim. He has to listen to your uninformed ranting day after day and has probably already imagined very colorful and creative ways to end you.

Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck, and all the rest are ENTERTAINERS! Stop getting your opinions from them. (Here's where that reading thing can really be an advantage.)

Stop sharing Facebook memes that tell me to share or else Jesus won't bless me with a laundry basket full of cash. That's not how prayer works. And I don't want money delivered (even from God) in a laundry basket. Nobody ever washes those things out and they just keep putting nasty dirty clothes in them. Yuck!

We are the United States of America and we can afford to house every homeless veteran, feed every child, and take in every refugee and still have money left over for Starbucks and a bucket of KFC.

Unless you can trace your family line back to someone who made deerskin pants look stylish and could field dress a buffalo, you are a descendent of an immigrant. Please stop saying that immigrants are ruining our country. Such comments are like a giant verbal burrito stuffed with historical ignorance, latent racism, and xenophobia all wrapped in a fascist tortilla.

That's all for now. I feel better."

LaMonte M. Fowler

3 notes · View notes

imagitory · 6 years

Note

If you were President of the U.S., what would you do? I would give the U.S. more economic freedom similar to most European countries (we're #17 for God's sakes), end the War On Drugs, end corporate welfare and lobbying, make victimless crimes a thing of the past, make our healthcare system similar to that of France, and millions more things that I can't mention XD Basically make our government smaller (not too small mind you) and try to mimic other countries like we should be doing.

Oh geez – pressure! Um…well, as I’ve said to you previously, I would never, ever want to be a politician, let alone president. I don’t have the expertise needed, and I don’t have the temperament for it either. But in a highly hypothetical scenario, my interests would be:

+Taxing corporations. Sorry, if they’re considered “people” according to the Supreme Court (and, believe me, if I had the power to shape the courts, I would deal with that ruling forth-with) and they can put so much money into our election process (which, again, I’d have something to say about), they need to pay taxes like people do. And closing loopholes to keep their profits in the U.S. would be a good idea too.

+Raising taxes on the 1%. No one should have as much money as those people do, when there are so many other people who can’t afford to make ends meet. Capitalism may be our system, but many of the people who have that much money didn’t earn it – they oftentimes inherited a good portion of it, meaning they didn’t put in the work needed to justify it. And our society needs the funds to take care of all of its citizens, the 1% included, and those 1% have the money needed to fund such projects – infrastructure, military spending, health care, national parks – those are things that help everyone. There’s no reason to squeeze blood out of a stone by trying to get our funding mainly through middle-class and working-class people…not when the wealthiest among us aren’t even paying tax rates close to what they were paying in the 1950′s (you know, when the middle class was booming?).

+Championing LGBT rights, most significantly adding LGBT protections to the Civil Rights Act so that it is a federal crime to show prejudice against someone for their sexual orientation or gender identity

+Tying the minimum wage country-wide to the cost of living, making it automatically rise to keep up with any changes to the economy. That way it doesn’t have to be voted on over and over and over and it doesn’t become outdated.

+Working with the Food and Drug Administration to develop new programs meant to better regulate pharmaceuticals and help fund professional, government-funded drug treatment centers, so as to put an end to for-profit drug rehab centers that require no certification.

+Working with the Department of Education to develop new programs specifically designed to help struggling college students with their finances: namely, to help reduce the amount of loans they’ll have to take out, give them a path toward paying them back effectively, assist with financial aid, and even provide complete learning materials online to save on the cost of expensive textbooks. Also, creating new federal standards for sex education in public schools, so as to help lower teen pregnancy rates.

+Creating a public option for health care, which would be the equivalent of our public school system: something both easily affordable and accessible that provides everything one needs to be healthy, while health care businesses pick up the slack with “plusher” options. This would make it so, like with our schooling, everyone has access to health care, no ifs, ands, or buts.

+Funding infrastructure and housing projects, which would not only help with creating jobs and boosting our economy, but would help us invest in our future.

+Providing a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants and Dreamers.

+Proposing an amendment abolishing the Electoral College, so that elections are only determined by the popular vote. The system is beyond outdated and it has been used several times now to give the loser of an election the presidency he didn’t earn.

+Advocating for term limits for Congressmen and Senators. If we need to check the president, we must also check people in Congress the same way. And while we’re on the subject, adjusting the privileges members of Congress receive. If the government is shut down, those members of Congress should not get paid, any more than other government employees do. They should receive no better health care benefits than their constituents – otherwise, how can they dare have a leg to stand on complaining about the practicality of government health care, when they’re all on government health care?

+Accept refugees from foreign countries seeking asylum, regardless of where they’re from.

+De-escalating our military endeavors and favoring a more diplomat-centric course for foreign policy. We have more than enough expenditures to take care of at home: a good chunk of our ridiculously sized military budget should be spent on dealing with issues at home. We can take care of security without wasting so much – we spend more on our military than China, Russia, the U.K., India, Saudi Arabia, Japan, and France, combined. No one country needs to waste that much money, particularly if we disentangle ourselves from many of the military conflicts we’ve crammed ourselves into. If we must use military force, we must do it intelligently and in conjunction with our foreign allies.

+Appointing a new task force within the VA specifically targeted on updating the system we use to keep track of veterans and their benefits.

+Regulating guns nation-wide. My ideal goal would be a licensing system not unlike what we have for cars, as well as regulation on who can legally sell firearms and what kind. NO ONE IN THIS COUNTRY NEEDS AN AK-47, I’m sorry.

+Working with the FEC on voting reforms, such as online voting, which would help working-class people (many of whom must work on federal holidays) vote more easily. I would also want to create new guidelines regarding felony disenfranchisement, making it so those convicted of non-violent felonies would be able to vote again once their sentence is completed, as well as investigate ways to help homeless Americans exercise their right to vote. I can speak from first-hand experience that when you’re homeless, voting is very difficult, because you don’t have an address that anyone can send ballots to. Many homeless people use the shelters they stay in as an address, but those shelters are only accessible to people who aren’t working: if you’re working and homeless, you’re basically stuck in this horrible no-man’s land where you make too much to live in a shelter, but are too poor to afford your own place. Because you have no address, you basically don’t exist to the government, and that means you have no one who will speak up for your interests, not only because your voice has been silenced, but because the world makes you think you don’t matter. This doesn’t even touch the issue of transportation that many homeless people face. It would definitely take some investigation into how to deal with this, but there are many people in this country who deserve to be able to speak for themselves that can’t, all because of their bad fortune.

+Offering statehood or (in the cases of those territories that we acquired through colonialism) national freedom to Washington, D.C., Guam, Puerto Rico, American Samoa, the Northern Mariana Islands, and the Virgin Islands. The second-class status they’re in is just not fair by any metric. They either deserve full representation in our government, or they deserve the ability to represent themselves. They deserve the right to vote for their leaders. They deserve a healthy economy. They deserve access to good health care and services, and they deserve to be treated as the U.S. citizens they are. If we can’t give them that, and/or those territories are done with waiting for us to give them that, then we don’t have any right to continue taking advantage of them. For D.C. in particular, the people who live there deserve a government outside of federal lawmakers to help them deal with local issues: a government with lawmakers they choose, rather than are foisted upon them.

Wow, that got longer than I expected…but a lot of things just came to mind. I would not have interest in making government smaller, exactly, but I would be very interested in bringing more people on board to not only introduce fresh ideas, but also to help us tackle the astounding workload we have to deal with regarding these issues. We need fresh minds and expert hands, ready to work hard. Naturally we wouldn’t want to completely put our heads in the sand in regards to foreign policy, but we would still want to put more focus on being the best country we can be, so that we can better help others. If our country is prosperous, then it gives us more leverage and power in promoting prosperity elsewhere. If we’re united, then we will more easily be able to stand against injustices abroad. If we take care of our own people, then we can more easily provide aid to other countries.

As I said, though, I have no interest in being a politician and I profess no great expertise in any of these matters, so one can take all of this with a grain of salt. This is just one American citizen’s flight of fancy in response to a friend’s question.

#ask me #excuse me politics coming through #oh boy here i go #opinion

14 notes · View notes

davidfurlongtheatre · 3 years

Text

David Furlong: "Now I have projects, not dreams"

Founder of the Exchange company, David Furlong is also an actor, director and translator. Many talents that have allowed him to find a place in the world of English theatre. (Alexis Gourret, 06.Jul.2021)

The theatre community is the one most affected by the pandemic. All companies have been forced to stop performing for a while and then adapt in order to survive. Exchange Theatre troupe is no exception. David Furlong, the creator of the company gave us an interview to review his career.

David Furlong is from Mauritius. Being from a former English colony, he spoke English as well as French all his life. A faculty that will become its greatest strength in the future. But before that, it was through France that he came to acting and studying theatre. “When I was 19, I played all year in a municipal classical company. But it wasn't very artistically interesting, not very deep and researched what I was doing. So I tried the auditions of national theatre schools in France. I had the one from Chaillot in Paris. But at that time I was very classic in my approach, a lot of Molière and Racine ". An approach that will evolve as he learns. “I was discovering a culture that is more global than French, more contemporary, more radical. Suddenly it was more art. " Despite a recognized training in the industry, David struggles to find work. “I realized that it will be more complicated for me because I am Mauritian. I realize that, at the time, it was more difficult for a man of color, even a pale one, to be an actor in France ". So in 2003 he decided to go to London, more open at the time to diversity, to move there in 2005. He landed his first work in a play by Rabindranath Tagore, an Indian symbolist, “it made a bit of noise. But that's also when we say to ourselves with Fanny Dulin, the co-founder of Exchange, "we can do it too".

Exchange, from English to French

They start from a very simple observation, in England, non-European texts are hardly known. “They don't know Pasolini here. They are unfamiliar with classics like Molière, whom they confuse with Italian comedy. When in fact, one is inspired by the other. England has a very strong culture. They have Shakespeare who is one of the greatest. So when you have such an author, why look elsewhere. I understand the bias that can create. And then England is an island, there they just voted on Brexit, there are things that are not totally surprising in this cultural identity that is a little withdrawn in itself." But it was precisely by taking advantage of this empty space that the Exchange was created, with the aim of translating French plays little known across the Channel and playing them. The first play translated and edited was Paul Claudel’s Exchange. This gave the company its name. “What is interesting about my career and the work of Exchange theatre is that we find ourselves gradually producing, then retouching a translation then doing one, then working on one with actors in a room, in short, we gradually added strings to our bow ”.

After their 4th show, Exchange was invited by the French Institute of the United Kingdom to work in residence for young bilingual children. “So we started to create shows for young audiences and we did 12 over 2 years. We wrote and produced all the time. It was a very, very good time. And at that time we also understood new things about bilingualism and working bilingually ”. So it was naturally at the end of these two years that they decided to create a show performed in both languages. “In 2013 we had all the original English audience, but we still have all this French-speaking following. So we decided we're going to do our next show in both languages. One play, two distributions, one in French and one in English and we alternated the evenings ”. A process which worked well, but which did not entirely satisfy David. The two shows were not the same since the French and English actors were different. A problem that the creator of Exchange will quickly solve.

The Covid hits hard

“In 2016 we made a Doctor in spite of himself on commission from the French high school (Lycée Francais). A single cast of completely bilingual people and we put on the same show one evening in English and the next day in French. It worked very well, but on top of that it brought us a lot of recognition, including a nomination for best staging at the Off West End awards. But in 2016, it is also the year of the Brexit vote and so at the same time we have the impression that the English were saying to us "welcome, do your job ”and at the same time the vote told us“ in fact we don't want you ”. Despite everything, the play is a hit and in large part thanks to the actors, who, being perfectly bilingual, can play with words and their modulation in one language and the other. "What's great is that when you want to put a more Latin intention in the French way, we can apply it, we bilingual actors, to English. And in the other direction too: if we want to put nuanced phrasing, the lightness of the English language in French, to better convey an intention, we can do that too. I don't have a preference between playing in French and in English, which is great is to nurture each other ".

In 2019-2020, the company and more particularly David Furlong, began to make a name for itself, a real place in the community, he worked at the Young Vic Theatre, various contracts were going to be signed, but unfortunately the covid arrived. “When everything stopped in March of last year, it was quite violent because we were on an upward slope in the company, we were more and more co-producer with other companies on bigger and bigger ones. shows. So these interruptions have been brutal, even in our personal careers. When it all stops it hurts". Past the frustration, the team had to find a way to continue to exist. And it was their decisions in the past that helped them survive. “Since 2007 we have opened theater classes for adults to support creation and also to create a community of theater enthusiasts. With the covid we continued our lessons on Zoom and our students followed us. We also started to broadcast some previous co-productions on the web. So our 2020 season has kind of taken place." The state also allowed them to survive. "We had an Arts Council grant in June 2020, Emergency funding, which allowed us to continue paying the rent for our rehearsal space. It saved us, because if we had lost this place, we wouldn't be talking to each other there, it would all be over."

IN Exchange was born

But to resist the ruthless theatre environment, you have to be visible and for that, Exchange has also found the solution. “A documentary team followed us on a creation two years ago. This documentary had never been released, He was there and ready, but we didn't know what to do with it, but all the same we said to ourselves that this might be an opportunity to show our work since can't exist on a set, at least people can find out on screen and say to themselves “that's great, it has to come back”. So it's called IN Exchange with all the symbolism that this title brings. It came out on June 15 and is a very beautiful document on the collective experience, on our vision of theater. Available on our site ”.

Besides this documentary another project is underway to continue to live as a company. “We have a show called Noor that already has commitment promises for the year 2021-22. We are thinking about our next creation and the Exchange also means that the collaborations with other companies and that will be really beneficial. We have a network of people who may be in the same difficulties as us, but if we do things together we will get there ”.

The Covid plus Brexit has taken its toll, but David Furlong refuses to give up and dream of coins. "You don't have to say it's a dream anymore if you're in it. Now I have plans, no more dreams ". A sort of mantra passed on to him by Jean Reno when they met while filming. So if you want to support his projects, don't hesitate to go take a look at his site and watch the documentary on the creation of the misanthrope "it's another dream / project that I realized.", Affirms David Furlong, actor, translator and director.

0 notes

losbella · 4 years

Text

0 notes

news-ase · 4 years

Text

0 notes

nokingsonlyfooles · 1 year

Text

youtube

Over an hour of pro-mutant content deserves another chance, and nobody's interested in voting on what I oughta talk about, so here we go again! Brigitte Empire could use your clicks, and I need inspiration for more deep dives - win-win!

So while I have your attention, let's talk about why Magneto and the whole of mutant-kind are more useless than one average protester with silly dyed hair and a brick...

You've seen the Pyramind Of Capitalist System around, but here's a refresher.

A funny thing about pyramids is that the bottom layer has the most bricks.

Thank you, Marsha, for demonstrating proper brick usage to us all. Rest in power.

And, like, it needs it to stay where it is, or else the whole thing comes crashing down. Humanity has crashed quite a few pyramids in its time, so everyone taking part in that broken system knows this, even if they want to pretend it'll never happen again.

So what does Everett Christensen mean when he calls the X-Men's ability to take up arms and fight back against injustice a "power fantasy"? We have that ability and we do it all the damn time. You, too, can move metal with your mind... and your hand and arm, and throw it at a cop. Hell, if you've got your friends with you, you can flip the damn cop car, and de-arrest each other, if it should come to that. You can get yourselves killed that way, but look at the pyramid. They can't kill all of us or they won't eat.

When it gets so bad that individuals stop seeing their individual lives and happiness as worth fighting for, they become willing to do things we do not want them to do, things that kill lots of people and make big changes. We know that. We like to pretend the people who founded our nations were the good guys and any violence they did was mild and justified, but you know that ain't how it is. So where does the "power fantasy" come in?

What I think he means, sadly, is that he's internalized the abuser's lie that if you get knocked down, it was your fault for standing up. The "fantasy" is that you'll be allowed to hit back and accomplish something. The cycle of progress and backlash that's scaring the hell out of us at the moment (we're still dealing with the backlash) can be parsed as "WHY ARE YOU MAKING ME HIT YOU??" If mutants use their power, they might hurt someone with it, and if it looks like minorities might hurt someone with their power, the majority will never stop hitting us. So mutants can't win. That is not something we can allow the minorities in our audience to see, because the majority will see it too, and beat the crap out of us. Progress is not a real option.

I would say that eternal victimhood is not what we're after either (and that sort of existence tends to produce people who DGAF anymore and hurt others anyway), and we could probably stand to see a few cautionary tales about minorities who perpetuate the cycle of abuse, just in case any of us happen to acquire a smidgen of power.

"Can't poor people just BUY housing?"

"Can't trans people just BUY rights?"

I would also say that you're probably not going to get the nuance and continuity to tell that sort of story well from a blockbuster Marvel product that has Disney clinging to its shoe like a turd. I don't know how Secret Empire - United shook out (long-running comics with dodgy continuity are not for me, and that's okay), but I'm guessing everything went back to normal or everything took place in an alternate timeline that we won't revisit unless another writer picks it up way later. 'Cos that's how shared universes roll.

Waaaay back in web 1.0 days, I ran a message board-based story with multiple writers in a shared universe, so believe me when I tell you: people do not like it when you tear up a world they are using. They're busy trying to tell their own stories and they expect things to stay approximately where they are. Everyone ends up doing a Hero's Journey where their characters return changed and the world stays right where it is. Character development can be slow and realistic (but not always in comics, where dueling writers may want to take the same character in totally different directions), but anything done to the world will be sharp and swift and involve as many characters as possible... Then it will get reset and forgotten.

How many post-Endgame plotlines needed the blip, or gave it more than a throwaway reference? And nobody mentions the stillborn god egg, because that movie didn't do well.

The X-Men and their Marvel friends live in a universe that's very close to ours, with more kinds of people in it. That's the baseline, and we need to get back there because the other writers can't be expected to put their plotlines on hold to deal with whatever shit Magneto crushed recently.

"A minority terrorist just destroyed the Golden Gate Bridge and led an all-minority attack on San Francisco? I'm sorry, but Ant-Man is having daddy-daughter time with Cassie and he will not lift even one tiny finger to help clean that up. And nobody else cares either!"

When you hear about the latest mass shooting, you hold your breath, cross your fingers and mutter, "White, male and uncomplicated... White, male and uncomplicated..." or something similar, don't you? You know if the bad guy belongs to any marginalized groups at all, there's gonna be a backlash. In the comics, that doesn't happen unless it's needed for a specific plot, and then it only lasts as long as that specific plot. There are only so many panels in an issue and Ant-Man's BAE doesn't have room to note anti-mutant sentiment is really high right now 'cos of what happened in Wolverinicon #47 or whatever, unless it has something to do with what Ant-Man is up to.

Ultimately, that is the real power fantasy you'll find in the comics, and it's never going away because it's a structural issue. You can push for change all you want, and suffer, and win small victories, and your friends can even die, and everything will stay basically the same and no one will care.

Oh, no! Jean Grey died again?! Well, I hope she comes back in time for our weekly Bridge game, because Colossus is a terrible partner!

Tony Stark can have more money and tech than God, and fly around in his little suit punching all the terrorists he wants, and have zero effect on global politics. Reed Richards can be the superest genius of all time, but if he actually fixed anything there wouldn't be any conflict or plot, so he builds cool toys instead of ending world hunger. Do you want all your problems solved or do you want an engaging narrative? You can't have both!

And that's why long-running comics are not for me! If I need a little nihilism in my life, I'll just watch The Big Lebowski again. At least it's funny.

Some people, and I think the author of the article I'm looking at might be one of them, equate the structural issues of shared universes to the systemic issues we have in real life. Well, the Arc of Justice is long, maybe too long for me to see it, or for anyone I care about to benefit from it in my lifetime. It doesn't need me to stand up and make sacrifices and maybe get my friends hurt or killed. The best I can do might be to keep my head down and try to survive.

Sometimes that is the best you can do, yes, but not always. Tellingly, Mr. Christensen's words are from 2017, before the summer of BLM. A whole lot of people got together, stood up, pushed, and yelled. And there was violence. And people got hurt and died. And the majority got real scared and started screaming and lashing out... But we got some motherfuckin' legislation out of it! You know how goddamn hard it is to cram anything meaningful through our broke-ass system these days, but look at how fast it offers us folks in the bottom tier some concessions when we unsettle the pyramid. And we're not done yet. "Defunding the police" is part of the conversation now, and no matter how much they yell and scream and distort what it means, it's not going away.

We go back and sanitize revolutions and revolutionaries. The fantasy that the good guys don't do violence takes hold, and when a real revolution takes place (near us, because I didn't see many conservatives in the States flipping out about the Arab Spring), even the people who would benefit from the changes are tempted to pull back and say, "No, you can't do it that way."

I remember reading an editorial from a Black mayor in the South, equivocating about her son's desire to participate in the BLM protests. Yes, intellectually, she knew the Civil Rights protests of the 50s and 60s were a thing, but there were buildings on fire and angry white people and her kid might get hurt. Maybe it wasn't going to make any difference and he didn't need to do that, ya know? But this is a mayor we're talking about, a person with enough authority to reign in that scary police presence and make things a little bit safer for her son and others like him. She could've used that editorial space to yell, "Hell yeah! Mess with my kid and you mess with ME!" But she saw violence, she got scared, and she thought it was more important to say, "I don't want this."

Violence isn't the answer. Violence isn't a solution. However, when violence happens, it snaps a lot of people out of their ignorant comas and makes then realize there is, in fact, a problem, and it affects them. Then they start groping around for a compromise, fast. Anything to make it stop, with the least upset possible, so those guys at the top of the pyramid don't fall off and the property and capital stops taking damage! PLEASE!

"Oh, God, come baaaack!"

Well, not anything. We've collapsed a lot of pyramids and there's a procedure. First, they offer concessions to some of the folks on the bottom. The good guys. The ones who just want to be normal. "Hey," say the folks at the endless dining table, waving a small bunch of carrots, "we know you guys don't like violence either. We'll let you be normal if you help us make this stop. Could you just hand us the bad guys? The freaks, losers and weirdos? The ones you don't like either? We'll clean them up for you and then we can all get back to our lives, okay?" And the stick, if they need it, is, "There's going to be a backlash and people are gonna get hurt. The longer this goes on, the worse it's gonna be!"

Oooh, boy, and we DO know who we're willing to throw under the bus for a carrot, don't we? The bottom of the pyramid has its own underclasses, which are meticulously maintained with the help of the folks on the higher tiers. Divided, we are much easier to control. After Stonewall, trans people, poor people, and minorities got kicked to the curb, so that Ellen could have the privilege of sitting next to George "War Crimes" Bush at a nice dinner, with smiles and tolerance. The Ellen-tier gays are still out there, kicking trans and minority folks in the face and saying "Get your shit off our flag!" And there are some trans and minority folks who are willing to aim a kick at the folks under them on the ladder too. (I'm multi-racial and nonbinary, and I know exactly what level of standing that gets me. If "real" trans minorities get a carrot, I'm toast!)

There are endless intersections and complexities and the State is doing violence that benefits all of us, though some more than others. If you use money and own property (or hope to) then the police are willing to shoot uppity people in the face to preserve that privilege for you. And they will present you with a bill, subtly addressed to your anonymous tax dollars. It doesn't matter if they would just as eagerly shoot you in the face on an individual basis; as a group, we are part of that pyramid. If we don't take it apart, we're helping to hold it up. Even if the goddamn thing is crushing us.

But if we do take it apart, people are gonna get hurt and die. The State gets an automatic pass on all its violence and its body count is so huge it's invisible. The good revolutions, the ones that existed in the past and are over, also get a pass. If you and your friends get together and fight back right now - inconveniencing people who just wanna buy a coffee and go to work - you're gonna get screaming, crying, pointing, and the blame for the inevitable backlash. Maybe history will clean up your revolution after you're dead, and maybe it won't. In the meantime, the upper classes are gonna play Deal or No Deal and keep upping the amount they're willing to offer you to give up your suitcase of progress. No matter what, people will eventually get tired and settle down, and then it's time to see what the backlash will grab away from you.

That's the reality. You have the power to fight back, and they have the power to offer whatever it takes to stop you from fighting back; you can't fight forever, and then they'll yank back whatever progress they can. Oh, and some of your friends will probably help them do it.

"Jean, for fuck's sake, we just want to live our lives in peace!"

That is why, despite so many well-documented collapses, we seem to keep rebuilding the same damn pyramid every time. It's frustrating, but it's entirely different from the endless resets needed to keep a shared story universe intact. We can change. The violence is not meaningless spectacle, it's part of the process. We real-world mutants can fight back, and win, and fuck each other over, and fuck up, and fight back some more, and still win.

However...

...when it happens, look to your left, look to your right, and make damn sure you're actually fighting for progress, not a reversion to an imaginary past where nothing needs to change ever again or even a safe space to eat your damn carrots. I know it hurts and you're tired, so don't waste your energy picking up a bucket and trying to help the tide go out. It's just gonna come back in again - bigger, stronger, and more disruptive than ever...

(It's a metaphor for the cycle of progress and backlash, Bill.)

...but that's how beaches are made.

#Youtube #x men #brigitte empire #long reads #deep dive #violence #systemic injustice #power fantasy #mutant and proud #is jean grey dead or not right now?#i can never keep track

4 notes · View notes