Dirah, they/them, 30something (affectionate) US-American (derogatory). Always and forever a bisexual socialist Steve Rogers blog, but lately mostly The Old Guard and her royal highness Nile Freeman. I write Book of Nile porn and political screeds and metas and silly ficlets and I adore asks and prompts! @nevermindirah on AO3, but not twitter, fuck twitter
I miss the old, good internet, but I don’t want to bring it back.
I want a new, good internet. One where users can’t be locked in because we make it legal to:
• reverse-engineer products and services, so you can leave a social media platform but still send and receive messages from the people you leave behind;
• jailbreak your devices so you can remove antifeatures like surveillance, ink-locking or repair-blocking;
• move your media and files out of the silo whence they originated and into any player you want.
I want a new, good internet where we constrain the conduct of tech companies, banning unfair labor practices, deceptive marketing, corporate hostage-taking and other forms of rent-extraction.
I want a new, good internet where it’s both illegal to impose bossware on your employees, and where those employees can legally hack the bossware their bosses shove down their throats.
I want a new, good internet where creative workers and their audiences can reliably connect with one another, where news reporting isn’t held hostage to extractive processes.
I want a new, good internet where we seize the means of computation so that the digital infrastructure that connects our romantic, personal, political, civic, economic, educational and family and social lives is operated by and for the people who use it.
-Enshitternet: The old, good internet deserves a new, good internet
Uncle Owen is not a grumpy old man who is more worried about his farm than what Luke wants.
Uncle Owen is not afraid Luke inherited the cruelty of his father. He doesn’t even know Anakin became Vader, he thinks Anakin got killed.
Uncle Owen doesn’t hate Obi-Wan because they had an argument or because something happened between them while Obi-Wan was on Tatooine.
Owen Lars was handled a tiny fragile baby to protect, and told that this baby’s father, who was always restless on Tatooine as a child, who loved speed and flying, who brought his starfighters into the most dangerous battles, to whom there was never enough excitement and adventure, has gotten himself killed in a war he was so eager to fight in, and which Owen never understood.
He watched over and raised this baby for 19 years. He is afraid. He is afraid when Luke becomes restless just like boy Anakin. He is afraid when Luke falls in love with flying, just like Anakin. He is afraid Obi-Wan will drag Luke off Tatooine, just like he dragged off Anakin.
He is afraid Luke will be like his father, never content to stay on their farm where it’s safe, but fly too fast, and fight too hard, and be too idealistic, and then get killed.
So when Owen says he’s afraid Luke has too much of his father’s in him, he is not worried Luke will be like Anakin, he is afraid Luke will die like Anakin.
reminder to worldbuilders: don't get caught up in things that aren't important to the story you're writing, like plot and characters! instead, try to focus on what readers actually care about: detailed plate tectonics