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dotthings · 3 years

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The gaslighting needs to stop. Systemic power imbalanced in the tv industry are real. Network interference is real. Erasure and unkindness towards marginalized characters is real.

I’m more on the canon analysis end of things personally, but I assure you the fans trying to figure out WTF happened here and account for stuff that objectively, even the people more skeptical acknowledge is weird and points back towards network interference, try to debunk their own theories. They are telling you that, they are transparent about their information, if you don’t feel like playing detailed murder wall, then don’t, but to deny there is a very very real power imbalance behind the scenes that hurt marginalized characters and fans, and hurt the story, is toxic. Stop it.

Things like the Spanish dub and people who have worked on the show coming out of the woodwork to support Destiel should be a clue. Latin America believes it’s a mutually requited love story, canon confirmed from both sides, because that is what aired on a big tv network there. And watch out for that US-centric thinking that somehow thinks this doesn’t count. (Also plot twist: the US is the restrictive market. Wake up).

My wheelhouse is more canon analysis so I’m going to say now that the gaslighting about canon, about aired canon, about confirmed canon, about implied canon, seems to me a whole lot of toxic detached-from-reality hand waving so hard to still, STILL!!--try to deny the validity of Destiel. I’m glad some of y’all think this is merely hilarious, and after not showing up and not being supportive and not sticking your neck out at all to protect Destiel shippers from bullying, you came back just to eat the popcorn because it amuses you and I’m supposed to think that’s pro-Destiel supportive or something, or it’s people who have no horse in the race who just want fandom entertainment so everything’s a joke while they reinforce the exact attitudes that let this kind of systemic oppression perpetuate and get away with erasing marginalized voices in the tv industry, in fandom, in stories. Nice work, people. Your holier-than-thou attitude is real convincing.

Then there’s the people trying to convince everyone it’s convincing to play false equivalency cha-cha and as if people only see this as canon due to a) 1 slash joke b) they stared at each other that one time c) drapes. Because old school fans are so proud that in their day, nobody wanted their queer ships to be canon and Destiel is just like *insert whatever slash ship of the past that had about 1/10th of the loud textual material and canon development Destiel has*. You want to try to argue against the epic nature of the text on Dean and Cas, hey give it your all, but it’s not going to hold up. If I started listing off the immensity, things that are textual plot points, it would be a 3,000 word essay. Stop playing false equivalency. Stop trying to artificially yank this back into the past because you can’t handle the textual validity of Destiel.

Deal with the fact that this is not an easily classifiable situation.

Even if in the end the same old systemic crap stifled its full due, and that’s the part that is tiresome, Dean and Cas deserve better than have their actual canon content demeaned.

After the story we have seen. After 12 seasons of deep-dive development. After Cas was finally openly confirmed as queer, and in love with Dean, in the final season, 2 episodes from the end, and Misha echoed it, and from Dean’s side, because full confirmation on Dean’s side is being held down, Jensen protected a romantic reading, protected people’s right to see Dean as in love with Cas not having a chance to speak his heart. Protected the right to that reading within the ambiguity that he knows is as far as the canon was able to take it. After the ship became canon confirmed as at least unrequited love story. Whether Jensen ships it or not, he has been very loudly and openly protective of fan readings and has been very openly excited about 15.18 and the handprint, he knows this is a great story and he’s been openly excited about how excited and joyful fans were about that episode.

But what we have seen on our screens, what the story told us, transcends the muzzles placed on it. What we have seen is a mutually requited love story. We already saw in action how Dean loves Cas. We are left with, in the end, the silencing of Dean Winchester. Gosh I wonder why the silencing of Dean Winchester. Why was it necessary. Why was he not even permitted to speak at all, to anyone, to confide about how he even felt about Cas’s love confession. Why did Jensen have to do the heavy lifting to meta it for us. Why did Cas have to be left fully out of the series finale on a show he was so key on for 12 seasons, as a 3rd lead. Why is that? Because the only thing the creative team would ever be allowed to do by corporate is friendzone it and they didn’t want to friendzone it.

So we are cursed with ambiguity from Dean’s side. And if the series finale had done better by Dean’s story, including his death, and by Cas’s story (instead of shoving him out of sight), if it hadn’t erased Eileen and Saileen, if it hadn’t failed Sam’s story, if it hadn’t been a regressive, awkward mess, most shippers would have accepted ambiguity if Dean and Cas has been given at least the respect of a reunion, if Dean had at least been given the chance to partially speak even if it couldn’t be removed from ambiguity. But the system was too scared of it. It had to be held down and muffled hard.

It was yanked out of the story artificially in ways that don’t match Destiel’s narrative importance before the series finale and don’t match 12 seasons of storytelling. It’s artificial. It is a silencing. And it shows.

That sudden silence was a scream.

"The writers” were for it. “The writers” wanted to tell that story even if network interference prevented it. Some of us were gaslighted and smeared and bashed just for pointing it out, and we turned out to be right.

DESTIEL IS CANON. And the parts where fans still have to rely on interpretation for have ample, AMPLE, story evidence and external evidence--that has nothing to do with deeper dive murder walls, it has to do with support shown, and confirmed information--all point to a mutually reciprocated love story.

How many more times do shippers have to be proven right before people stop this. I was bullied for several seasons just for saying Destiel was a purposefully crafted a valid textual reading, by my own lane. For asserting it was a love story designed to dodge under network radar. I was bullied for years before that by antis, who didn’t like seeing people love this ship too much, who didn’t like that I refused to get down on my knees and label myself as delusional just for seeing it, for refusing to bow down and say “it’s only about 2 brothers so I am wrong to say Destiel matters too.”

The unkindness in this fandom over all this continues to be overwhelming. Get your shit together. You worship your favorite actors and then they show you up every time by being kinder and more open and understanding than fans manage to be. Jensen and Misha are showing you how to roll and people are ignoring it in favor of continuing to try to silence and demean Destiel shippers.

For Destiel shippers, don’t let all this gaslighting and shaming nonsense and the systemic corporate nonsense that wants Destiel silenced knock you off from your reading of canon. It was valid. It was real. Thanks to the magic of bleedback effect, now it was always textual, the subtextual has been transformed retroactively, and it’s from both Dean and Cas’s end. If you still feel doubt on Dean’s side, because we didn’t get the same loud explicit confirmation, go back to the text itself. If you believed it already for Cas, if Cas’s confession to Dean only validated what you already knew, why can’t you see it for Dean, because it’s already there.

#Jensen Ackles #Misha Collins #Destiel #The 15 Year Show #Castiel #Dean Winchester #i'm not burying this behind a wank tag #i need people to pay attention and not dismiss it as mere 'fandom drama' please

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aoitrinity · 3 years

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The “Me Too”

DISCLAIMER: I am about to put forth further speculation about a major Destiel-related event from this season, specifically the confession scene in 15x18. This is 100% pure speculation and I do not claim to have any insider knowledge AT ALL. If you are not in a place to read such things, please go take care of yourself instead of reading this. Do not cause yourself any additional pain.

If you are here to be an asshole and call me delusional...uh...I mean, go for it, but like I really don’t get what that’s doing to make your life better? If shitting on people’s desire for understanding a TV show brings you joy then uh...that says more about you than it does about me?

With that out of the way...read below the cut for my theory about the “me too” line.

I know I just unloaded my theory about the finale on all of you the other day, and that I should probably give you all a break in between my bouts of theory-dumping, but I had to get this out here tonight.

If you somehow haven’t seen it yet these last few (painfully exhausting) days, there is a rumor going around of a cut in episode 15x18 of a specific line--a “me too” that Jensen supposedly recorded during the 15x18 sequence, which would have given us all textual validation not only that Cas is in love with Dean, but that Dean is in love with Cas. Various people have been trying to confirm or deny this rumor since it surfaced. We all figured it would have happened during the final scene, with Dean crying, alone. It would have been there in place of the crying, and we hypothesized that Jensen had to dub it over with AMR of his sobs. It was an interesting thought, but we had no real proof it ever happened. I, for my part, started to assume it was entirely false.

But then tonight, on the Latin American CW, we apparently discovered that in the Spanish-language dub of 15x18, they had taken Dean’s last line to Cas, “Don’t do this Cas,” and dubbed it as “yo a ti”--translated to “me too,” seemingly confirming to us that the line did exist!

I watched the clip of the dub excitedly, hoping for some secret new shot that we had been robbed of in the original episode, but the “me too” was simply dubbed over Dean’s line of “Don’t do this Cas,” which is definitely something Dean very clearly said in the original recording. That wasn’t a dub, Jensen said that line.

So what gives? Where the heck did the “me too” come from?

Well, as apparently I am wont to do recently...I talked @winchester-reload‘s ear off and was eventually hit with a stroke of realization.

I don’t think the “me too” went in the crying scene. I think Dean said it to Cas’s face, and we were robbed of it.

Before I go any further, I want to again remind you that this is PURE SPECULATION. PLEASE JUDGE FOR YOURSELF AND ALWAYS BE SKEPTICAL.

So.

The original end of the scene runs as follows:

Dean: Why does this sound like a goodbye?

Cas: Because it is. I love you.

Dean: Don’t do this, Cas.

*a longing exchange of looks, with Cas smiling through his tears even more broadly than he was earlier*

*the Empty appears and Dean starts to panic*

Cas: Goodbye Dean.

*Cas throws Dean out the way, smiles at him one last time, and is taken*

Now that always struck me as a sort of weird exchange because...I mean, Dean can tell Cas not to “do this,” but whatever he was going to do that would get his ass taken by the Empty, he had clearly already done. But I originally handwaved it as Dean begging Cas not to go and leave him again by dying, even though it was too late, because I was too entranced with the beauty of the scene and of the performances to imagine anything otherwise.

However, after this Spanish-language dub story broke this evening, I started to wonder if the exchange had initially gone a little bit differently.

What if the “don’t do this, Cas” was pulled from earlier in the scene?

I would have originally imagined that it actually went between the “Because it is” and the “I love you,” but in the leaked shots of script we got a few days ago, there doesn’t seem to be any line there--Cas goes straight from his “because it is” to the “I love you.” Thus I conclude one of two things: either the line it was adlibbed or added by Jensen on the spot, between the “because it is” and the “I love you,” or it was dialogue that originally came earlier in the scene.

Either way, what matters is that I think that line, “Don’t do this, Cas,” was moved to after Cas’s “I love you” in the final cut and replaced the “me too.” I think the initial episode probably followed the Latin American dub instead, and went like this (with the one line inserted where I feel it best fits, though again, it could have come from earlier):

Dean: Why does this sound like a goodbye?

Cas: Because it is.

(Dean: Don’t do this, Cas)

Cas: I love you.

Dean: ...me too.

*a longing exchange of looks, with Cas smiling through his tears even more broadly than he was earlier*

*the Empty appears and Dean starts to panic*

Cas: Goodbye Dean.

*Cas throws Dean out the way, smiles at him one last time, and is taken*

Well.

Doesn’t that all hit a bit differently now? Doesn’t it now make sense why, after Dean’s line, Cas starts smiling more broadly than he was during the entire rest of the scene? Doesn’t it make sense now that when Dean turns to look back at the Empty emerging, there are way more tears in his eyes than there were in the prior shot? Doesn’t Dean’s body language line up better between shots if we read it this way? Doesn’t it make Cas’s sacrifice hurt both more and less at the same time, because he could go to the Empty knowing he was loved in return? That he had the one thing he wanted most?

To me, at least, it does.

Unfortunately, I think that, similar to what I speculate happened with the finale...they were told by the network that they had to cut Dean’s reciprocation because the CW panicked about coming off as too gay at the last moment. You can read all about that in my other post.

Anyway, here’s more food for thought. Remember @oceaxe-ifdawn’s post about how she had spoken with a cast member about how the script for the finale was being frantically rewritten in March, the weekend after they finished shooting for 15x18? Why would they suddenly have to start tossing out their own ending in MARCH? TWO WEEKS before they were supposed to start filming the finale?

What if it was because that was the moment when the network started to pivot? If their contacts on set told them how very beautifully homosexually gay the scene was, and that was the moment that the CW decided that they couldn’t risk losing a very specific (conservative, heterosexual) part of their fanbase and needed to start toning down the gay before it got out of hand? And since they couldn’t obviously go back and reshoot anything for 15x18, given everyone then immediately went into quarantine for COVID, they had to remove Dean’s reciprocation from the script and replace it with another, earlier shot, that could have FEASIBLY gone in its place. But they couldn’t take Cas’s confession because it was entirely necessary to the whole plot of the season (and that, I think, was a fucking genius move by the writers to at least get us this much--god bless you, Bobo).

And this way, the CW could actually have their cake and eat it too--they could claim they were still being accepting of queer people (look, we let Cas confess his affection for Dean!) while avoiding the potential loss of their favorite cishet male audience (whom they really want to transition to Walker after all of this is over because MONEY) that they might suffer if that audience discovered that one of their two “traditionally masculine” lead characters was in love with another man this whole time.

The only reason they didn’t carry it all off is that, when they needed to send the script over to the Spanish-language dubbers for recording, there was some sort of screw-up. They somehow forgot to have the dialogue swapped out back in March and the lines were never replaced in the dub script.

And that is how we got the “me too” line from Dean in Latin America tonight, a line that we had heard rumors existed, but had no actual evidence of... until now.

I’m sorry to have pulled you guys into this theory with me, but... It just lines up too perfectly. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, yes, but sometimes that cigar is actually a dick. A big, beautiful, gay dick that your stupid homophobic TV network executives are censoring because they are afraid of the reactions of their more conservative viewership.

On the plus side, I think that this more than ever confirms that Destiel is and was always canon. Textually. Reciprocally. 110%.

And the CW fucking robbed us of it.

#supernatural season 15 #spn finale #destiel #destielgate #speculation #fuck the cw #trust the story #we were robbed #i hate that I keep having to sound like a fucking conspiracy theorist in order to make sense of what happened #god forbid they had just KEPT TO THE FUCKING PLAN THE WRITERS HAD SO BEAUTIFULLY SCRIPTED #that would have made too much fucking sense #and been too beautiful #and too perfect #no #we had to have some fucking executive fuckery #i hate it here

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bestworstcase · 3 years

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Hi, I really love your thoughts and analysis on tts so I wanted to ask if you have read The Vanishing Village Book? It made me really think about Eugene's character. I sorta disliked him in the book and felt his relationship with Rapunzel was different and strained. I guess my question is if you think Eugene is a good character? I feel that I am biased for liking the story and relationship between Cassandra and Rapunzel so perhaps I am not seeing him in a fair light but there's just factors that make me feel he might not be the best for Rapunzel. I love their relationship and value & dedication towards each other but their relationship can feel a bit stale sometimes and Eugene can come off as not understanding and dismissive towards Rapunzel sometimes so ig I'd like to be proven wrong and be reminded that Eugene is good for Rapunzel

i have read vanishing village (and i remember liking it better than lost lagoon) but i have to admit i don’t remember anything but the very broad strokes of the plot, so i don’t feel equipped to do any analysis of eugene based on it; that being said -

i do really like eugene as a character in the sense that he is. interesting / engaging / compelling, which yeah to my mind that’s what makes a “good character” but also has nothing to do with the, kind of, moral or personal question of but is he a good guy or is he likable or sympathetic or that kind of thing. and on that my feelings are more ambivalent kfjfjdhs

on the one hand i do find his relationship with rapunzel in tts to be fairly refreshing. it’s nice to see a fictional m/f couple that is just… comfortable with each other, friends with each other, able to talk about their problems collaboratively with each other. that is so rare in fiction, where the tendency is so often to rely on miscommunication to manufacture relationship drama or do the will they won’t they, on again off again nonsense which is just so tiresome - and it feels good to have a m/f couple that eschews that altogether. and it’s also imo really nice that the m/f relationship fades so much into the background vis a vis the wider plot, which i know is not necessarily a popular opinion [vague gestures at all the ‘eugene was sidelined’ discourse] but, like, i feel like i can count on one hand the number of stories i know where the female protagonist *has a male love interest* without the story being ABOUT him, and with the male love interest filling this supportive narrative role while quietly and subtly dealing with his own problems on the side? it’s so difficult to find stories where men aren’t centered and so i appreciate eugene and new dream a lot for that reason too.

but at the same time like - eugene def falls victim to the plot-driven writing just like every other character does and that frustrates me because i think ultimately having all these loose threads hanging with him means his character feels a bit stagnant, and that in turn makes his flaws more glaring because they’re never… worked on or addressed, they just sort of persist or silently fade away for the most part. (which again, is true of literally every character because the storytelling of tts is highly plot driven and episodic)

& that phenomenon can make character interpretation a little convoluted, because… well the intentions of the narrative are signaled pretty baldly (eugene grows out of his selfishness and becomes a compassionate hard working leader for corona, which he has embraced as his home) without having much if any on-screen development to back it up (indeed the premise of flynnposter involves eugene shirking his new responsibilities, and then it concludes with a commitment from him to take the captain gig seriously - but thereafter the only time we get to see this demonstrated through him encouraging project obsidian [which makes him look the opposite of compassionate or responsible given he is excitedly planning to extrajudicially murder cassandra] and then joining the fight against zhan tiri [which literally everyone in corona does]). so do we take what the textual development shows us and conclude that eugene is, at the end of the day, just another cop, or do we take the narrative signaling as a given and fill in the textual gaps with our own imaginations? i tend to fall heavier on the textual side but i do try to take intentions into consideration when they are signaled so clearly, because i understand the structural and corporate limitations on what the tts team were able to do with the story.

anyways - i also have some fraught feelings about new dream because, in the film, it’s not a relationship that i can buy into at all. rapunzel is 17, a few days shy of 18, when an adult man in his mid-twenties tumbles into her bedroom, hits on her, tries to take advantage of her naïveté so he can recover his stolen goods and screw her over because he’s spent his life cultivating an attitude of selfish disregard for anyone but himself, but she’s so sweet he decides to give emotional vulnerability a try and within three days they’re in love and then they get MARRIED?? and he’s literally the first person rapunzel has ever met who wasn’t her “mother”? excuse me???

and i get the impression the tts team was fully cognizant of that problem and made a real effort to address it, as much as they could within the context of the designated disney princess couple - that’s how we get things like the BEA proposal and rapunzel and eugene talking their feelings out afterwards and agreeing to take things slower, and that’s how we get things like rapunzel having cass and eugene having lance so they have lives and identities and relationships outside of each other, and it’s why eugene has a little arc of becoming less self-absorbed in the front half of s1 and why cassandra overtly criticizes his treatment of rapunzel in BEA and so on and so forth. like no one says it OUT LOUD in the series but rapunzel’s and eugene’s relationship is fraught with peril because of the way they met and came together, and it takes significant emotional work from both of them to navigate that to arrive at a healthy place, and i enjoy watching that play out.

so yeah eugene is sometimes too in his own head to notice when something is wrong with rapunzel, like how he misses how unhappy she is in BEA because *he’s* so jazzed about palace living, and sometimes they struggle to get on the same page with each other in general; but that’s just, kind of the gig where relationships are concerned. what matters to me is that whenever these hiccups happen we see, typically some confusion or distress from him or rapunzel or both, and then they reach out for each other and talk about it until they reach an understanding, which is the correct healthy way to manage this sort of conflict in a relationship. and of course through it all eugene is pretty unflagging in his absolute support of rapunzel - even if he doesn’t always *express it* in a good way, he is always very invested in rapunzel’s happiness and well-being. like even the BEA proposal, eugene’s fuck up lies in assuming that rapunzel felt the same way he did about everything and that proposing now would make her happy - there’s self-absorption there but not to the point where he isn’t concerned about her feelings, so when he upsets her he immediately realizes that he screwed up and shelves his own feelings to focus on hers, which is very Good Partner of him.

and then again on a metatextual level i do kind of hate that rapunzel’s arc is essentially, trapped in corona -> adventure! -> adventure is traumatic time to go home -> exact same circumstances she started in but she’s happy about it now. not to say i object to rapunzel embracing her role as a princess/queen per se, but in an ideal world i would like that to come from a place of rapunzel remaking her role to suit herself rather than just kind of… this ‘well got the wanderlust out of my system forever!’ vibe i get from plus est. this isn’t directly related to eugene at all but i think it does splash over onto him on account of him being so closely intertwined with her life in corona. if rapunzel were given an arc about tearing down institutions that stifled her in s1 and really rebuilding corona to be better (something that is lightly implied in canon but never quite makes its way to outright text) then of course eugene would have been her number one supporter - but she doesn’t get that arc and so eugene ends up just kind of being there while rapunzel settles into the role laid out for her. (the destiny narrative being played painfully straight in this regard doesn’t help either.)

this is all a bit of a ramble but i guess what i’m getting at is i think at the end of the day the thing that makes new dream feel a bit stale or stagnant is the series sticking to this aggressively pro-monarchy, status quo is good, mass market appeal narrative enforced by the reality of Disney Princess Show, and that’s not eugene’s fault or any character’s fault, it’s a corporate issue and writing issue.

oh and also personally i think eugene’s biggest flaw in the new dream relationship is he has a tendency to enable rapunzel’s worst impulses via unquestioning support - a little healthy skepticism can be very good for a relationship vs just being your partner’s yes man. so when i imagine a character trajectory for him post-series it involves eugene getting more comfortable pushing back when rapunzel is pursuing ideas that are bad in some way.

#rta #new dream #tldr complicated feelings but ultimately i do like him for rapunzel #and just wish the narrative hadn’t been SO disney princess show but it is what it is yknow?

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hamliet · 5 years

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after reading shigaraki's backstory and that he actulley killed his family do you still think he could be redeemed?

Japan has rather set ways of viewing children) where children are expected to be innocent and reliant upon adults to the point The fact that a kid could even be able to kill someone even in self defense seems to them as meaning they have essentially got the mindset of a cold blooded murderer which is why some people think shigaraki is irredeemable

Diff asks to be answered together.

I’ve answered whether he is redeemable here!

Also: the amount of redemption arcs in shonen makes me skeptical of this claim that this is how Horikoshi intends the culture to influence how his audience reads it. Actually without even the larger shonen content, it shows a lack of textual understanding.

I’m really not seeing why people think this changes anything than previous chapters. This... isn’t new information. I never doubted he killed his family. The only theory this seems to disprove is that AFO gave Shigaraki his quirk, but even so it’s clear AFO was watching Shigaraki so... it doesn’t change anything. If anything I think showing us the abuse he suffered makes it even more likely he will be redeemed; victims are often given redemption.

I’m really not surprised that people are like “see this proves he was always bad!” But I am disappointed. A child is NEVER responsible for this kind of crime; their brains physically cannot process consequences, empathy, and right and wrong like an adult’s can, or even like a teenager can. And honestly despite the questionable framing re BNHA’s other abuse case in Endeavor, Horikoshi’s depiction of abuse is raw, realistic, and deeply personal (this is not to speculate; please don’t do that). It’s incredibly relatable for many of us, and sympathetic towards the victims.

I also am a bit ???? As I said here about people taking a canonically mentally unstable villain’s words at face value. @linkspooky wrote a fantastic meta on this today. Granted BNHA is fairly straightforward, but I think the framing of Shigaraki’s sister, grandparents, and mother indicates that he has complex feelings for them rather than simple hatred as he claims. It’s a coping mechanism to tell himself he hates them; if he says that, then he doesn’t have to grapple with agony. This is also fairly normal for abuse victims, accurate and raw. How victims feel about people who are also trying to survive but don’t save you from your abuse is extremely complex. I know I felt sympathy but also extreme anger at times. I’m just really quite sad to see how people respond to an abused child who acts out and to the “but culture!” anon: Eri killed her dad too, remember? I will admit I’m personally biased due to my experiences though so take what I’m about to say with a grain of salt—or maybe given my experiences add weight to what I say, I don’t know.

It seems like people want to believe abuse doesn’t happen to good people, that people who are angry about abuse are less worthy victims or not even victims at all, and that’s a deeply troubling perspective. Also, while abuse is always wrong, abuse doesn’t always or even often have a perfect white to go with the black. Victims aren’t required to be perfect angels—this is an argument that defense lawyers use to discredit victims and yet I see many engaging in it without realizing that if you make this argument, that is precisely the dialogue you’re contributing to.

It’s one thing to make a textual argument, but the text doesn’t support “Shigaraki=bad; Deku=good” in a lot of ways, namely All Might, the moral compass of this series, stating that he wanted to save Shigaraki and flawed hero society (which Horikoshi does criticize with Endeavor, etc.) stopping him. And then Eri, as Link wrote about and I mentioned above. We already know that killing family doesn’t mean you should be written off as irredeemable via both Eri and Endeavor who as far as we know likely thinks his training killed or at the bare minimum severely injured Touya, drove his wife to insanity, and it still took him over a decade to even decide to try redeeming himself. Yet the manga is giving him this space but y’all want to believe it won’t give Shigaraki any redemption?

Also, like, Deku’s view of a hero is literally saving people. It’s not “destroy and PUT HIM DOWN.” The text literally says Deku becomes the #1 hero and I highly doubt he does it by giving up his ideal of saving people and murders his mentor’s mentor’s grandson instead. That doesn’t make sense, y’all. His saving people has never been framed as wrong. (Will he fail to save someone at some point? He very well might, I actually hope so, but like keep in mind it legit hasn’t happened yet which over 200 chapters in I think means that Horikoshi is not really into criticizing this ideal.)

#ask hamliet #bnha 236 #bnha meta #mha meta #shigaraki redemption #bnha theory #shigaraki tomura #shimura tenko #deku #izuku midoriya #abuse tw #Anonymous

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thelawyerthatwaspromised · 5 years

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We Really Need to Talk About the Forehead Kiss Scene

Consider this another iteration of the Sansa and Jon “Would that be so terrible?” scene that I covered a little while back.

For a lot of people that believe that Jonsa will happen, the scene on the battlements in ��The Winds of Winter”, the finale episode of the sixth season of Game of Thrones, is the starting point of that belief.

It’s unusually sweet, as Jon and Sansa scenes tend to be. It’s almost semi-unnecessary to the plot. It’s the last we see of Jon before it’s revealed that he is the son of Rhaegar Targaryen and Lyanna Stark, making this decidedly un-sibling like interaction with Sansa a bit less suspicious except upon rewatch. (Sidenote, imagine if this scene took place after we learned about R+L=J...)

But a lot of Jonsa skeptics (I’ll call them that though there are obviously varying degrees of this such as “venomous”) seem unable to understand why this particular scene feels so different from just about every single other scene on the show. To me, there are multiple factors that make this particular scene unique from any other on the show.

It’s an almost perfect example of a “romance setup” from multiple angles.

1.) It didn’t really advance the “plot”

For some reason, this scene was included among the 10 most crucial scenes of the series by HBO pre-season 7 buuuuut not a lot happened at face value.

Jon had just banished Melissandre for burning someone alive (inquisitive emoji) and was watching her leave on the battlements. He’s approached by Sansa. She says she’s sorry. He credits her for winning the battle. They say they need to trust each other. They leave. So why is a “recap of events” considered a crucial scene? Why was it on the show at all? Viewers wanted to know what Jon was going to do about Sansa arriving with the KotV and if they were going to have a conflict about it. Except that part took about 5 seconds. And the opposite happened.

Similar to the Littlefinger choke scene in season 7, this didn’t really directly affect the actions of the characters in any way. Even if a scene doesn’t advance “plot”, it’s meant to advance the “story”. What happens here between Jon and Sansa? It revealed something between the two of them that wasn’t revealed simply through the dialogue. It’s inclusion in the show at all should leave you wondering about its purpose, but the added layers of the length, framing, and use of reaction shots should make it fairly obvious that it’s a romantic scene.

2.) Both characters are pleasantly surprised by each other’s tenderness towards the other

I think to really grasp this scene, you have to get inside the heads of each character.

Normally, any surprise in Game of Thrones is a bad thing. The strange quality of the battlements scene is that it’s an inversion of the normal routine. We need to take a step back and evaluate the psychology of Jon and Sansa as they’re entering.

Jon has just banished the person who resurrected him. He’s just won a battle that he knows he should have lost. He’s clearly been quite introspective about Sansa and what she meant and her importance in winning the battle since he’s already preparing her chambers. Somehow, the tent scene is magnified in its intensity because this scene is its exact opposite and it’s where we last left off with Jon and Sansa.

Sansa pleaded with Jon to listen to her.

To be fair to Jon, it’s hard to understand what Sansa is saying but instead of trying to understand her more, he allows them to be dead locked and unable to finish their thoughts.

and it ends with Jon’s sad resignation that he desperately wants to win but he’s not sure if he can.

So this was the last time they spoke privately before the battle. Jon feels guilt for failing to listen. Sansa feels guilt for calling in Littlefinger, an option neither she nor Jon would have wanted.

Then - their relationship suddenly became stronger because of the weakness they revealed to each other. Instead of punishing each other, they forgive each other. Instead of gloating, Sansa reaches out and expresses to Jon that she never wanted it that way. Instead of holding it against Sansa, Jon reaches back and validates her importance in multiple ways.

The most rewarding part is how they each give wonderful gestures to each other in turn without being prompted.

He’s publicly affirmed her place as the Lady of Wintefell...

She objects but only because she thinks he should be seen as the head of the family...

Sansa tells him he should take it. Jon responds with a sad smile and says he’s not a Stark. And then Sansa gives Jon the most gentle but meaningful affirmation that he’s ever gotten on the show...

“You are to me.”

(I decided halfway through this to leave the text off the gifs because I want the focus on the micro expressions of the actors because...damn...)

What else could anyone say to Jon that would mean more to him at this point? His entire life has been marked by his non-Starkness. Sansa is working to undo the biggest source of his sadness without his ever asking for it.

Jon’s gift to Sansa is recognition and it comes in two parts;

1) “You’re the Lady of Winterfell.” He was right there as Lyanna Mormont referred to her as a Lannister and a Bolton. He was right there as Lord Glover looked right into her eyes and told her that House Stark is dead. No. Jon is determined that those statements are to be corrected.

2) “We’re standing here because of you.” He’s not just “gifting” her the position and the lord’s chamber. She’s earned it in his eyes. Her place is meant to be elevated above his at this point. This is before he was crowned as king. He was content for her to be in charge until he was thrust into the position of command.

So what does Sansa do? He’s just basically said “you were right” and she has a chance to respond. Does she gloat? Does she say “well yes I suppose I am the last remaining Stark (that we know of) and so I should rule our house...I also command the loyalty of the Vale”? None of that, she apologizes to him. She’s still expecting his anger and disappointment and feels she deserves it.

And it makes sense. Leave aside that it was absolutely necessary for Sansa to bring in the KotV and ask yourself “when was the last time Sansa was ever actually rewarded or treated gently by someone she thought she wronged?” She’s existed in a constant state of punishment since Littlefinger betrayed Ned in the throne room in season 1. Misery is her expectation. Her expression as Jon approaches confirms this exactly.

Part is her actual guilt, and I’m sure part of it is an expectation based on her experiences...and to her pretty obvious surprise, Jon does the exact opposite.

HA. You’ll have to wait for the kiss gifs because I want to change gears now.

The entire last section was explaining why this scene was so unexpected given the context of the setup. Both characters had reasons to treat the other harshly. Jon for his stubbornness. Sansa for not telling Jon about the Vale. All the components were there to reinforce an ongoing feud between the two. These were the factors commonly cited by those oh-so-brilliant Starkbowl predictions leading up to season 7.

Yet despite that tension, we didn’t get a shouting match and glares and future plotting. We got a moment of clarity for once...and a whole new set of questions about these two. The beauty of their quiet moment together was in its simplicity - but also in the way that the writers indicated that there was so much more going on than we could have ever known.

Yet all of this information is packed into a scene that’s so quiet and slow. It’s in the romantic pacing.

3.) The Pacing

Jon and Sansa have had always had a distinct strangeness to their scenes in that they’re almost all completely different from any other. Their reunion was a moment of triumph for any Stark fans as they were the first two reunited since the pilot episode. Their fireside chat started incredibly sweet and ended with the heightened stakes of Sansa attempting to convince Jon to re-take Winterfell. The Pink Letter scene is the realization that their little oasis was about to meet the realities of a harsh world that still viewed both of them as threats.

The cloak scene where Sansa gifts Jon a Stark cloak after Jon takes keen interest in Sansa’s new dress is another moment where each took the initiative to validate the other without any prompting.

They argued twice, while at the encampment and in the tent before the battle, but each scene was unique as Sansa indirectly criticized Jon’s decisions to follow Davos considering Stannis’ ultimate failure, and Jon mostly tried to tune Sansa’s arguments out - while the tent scene is where those complaints came into a direct collision.

Then they met on the battlements and it was equally emotional but in a total reverse of tone.

Simply put, this scene was about “Jon & Sansa” as an entity and not about “Jon” having a talk with “Sansa”. It’s all in the pacing and it’s all in the framing.

We already know the setup. Now comes the payoff. Jon has already told Sansa they need to trust each other. That would be the “plot” purpose of the scene. As far as things happening that affect the story directly, it could have ended right there. “It’s ok Sansa. We’re a team now.” Or, alternatively, Jon could have kissed Sansa’s forehead and THEN said they need to trust each other and the tone could be viewed entirely differently. Instead, the show disposed of the “textual” purpose of the scene and continued right through with the “subtext” (which also continued into season 7) which is: what exactly is the nature of Jon and Sansa’s relationship?

It’s not just the forehead kiss. It’s not just the romantic back drop. It’s not just the setup. It’s not just the micro expression of the actors. It’s not just that the whole scene is relatively unnecessary. It’s all of that mixed together.

This is where the pacing comes into play. Let’s recap the scene to this point...

Sansa gets about 13 seconds of an entrance before Jon tells her he’s having the lord’s chamber prepared for her.

Sansa waits 3 seconds before answering “mother and father’s room?”

Jon waits about 3 seconds before he says he’s not a Stark.

Sansa answers “you are to me” almost immediately.

Jon has roughly a 5 second reaction shot.

There’s about a 5 second pause after Jon gives Sansa credit for winning the battle before Sansa starts apologizing.

Sansa says sorry and Jon waits about 6 seconds before he even starts walking over to her.

There’s about 3 seconds between Jon saying they have enemies and him reaching up to kiss her.

Jon gets roughly 3 seconds to kiss Sansa and about 4 seconds of gazing at her (and her gazing at him). They make this moment last.

Then they transition into a micro expression that juuuuust says everything.

The second Jon closes his lips, he looks down and abruptly starts to walk away. But his mood has immediately turned almost melancholy or sort of a confusion. It’s not normal to kiss someone tenderly and then just turn around and leave. Even if it were entirely platonic. There’s something left unsaid...especially since the camera focuses on the post-kiss for almost 6 seconds altogether before Jon starts to leave. Viewers aren’t the only ones left a bit bewildered.

Sansa’s reaction tells the same story.

She stands in the same position, almost frozen. She’s internally probably as confused as Jon. She came to Jon to apologize (remember, she approached him) - which I’m assuming she would have been dreading. She got her apology, and he delivered his form of “there’s nothing to forgive” which would normally signal that her part here is over. Yet he initiates physical affection for her when positive physical affection is something that’s a very complicated subject for her.

And it stuns her. As he begins to leave, we see her expressing that she doesn’t want the moment to end.

It’s ridiculously beautiful. Sansa finding a reason for Jon to get one last look, right after he had turned away in sort of Byronic melancholy, only to have her call him back again is extremely romantic given what we know about both of these characters.

The immediacy of Jon’s response in turning back towards her and the utter-seriousness of his look again makes the end of this scene a twist of its own.

“Winter is here.” That phrase is of course a play off of “Winter is coming” the words of House Stark and the ominous warning of fear and looming destruction echoed throughout the entirety of the series. Those words should mean “fear”; real “fear”. (also take note of her deliberately deep breath as her eyes scan Jon again..)

And how do they react to this potentially terrifying threat? By being adorable again!?!?

Well of course they do. Because winter is here and they are home. Think about this. Being together (moments after entering a scene which they both began reluctantly) is enough to make them smile sweetly as they acknowledge the coming storm.

And the end really cements Jon’s view of Sansa as a noble lady.

And the pure joy Sansa feels as the scene concludes.

To wrap up...the scene didn’t have to happen in the first place. The setup made you wonder if there was going to be fracture. It was tender. It was warm. It’s pacing made you sit and take notice. It didn’t waste any time - it took its time.

We were meant to see not just the displays of forgiveness and validation by Jon and Sansa towards each other. We were meant to see them expecting the worst and getting something beautiful instead. We were meant to see them wrestling with the confusion of where the scene was heading. We were meant to see them completely comfortable in each other’s presence in this very moment - and we were meant to see a very subtle but also very unsubtle indication that the direction of their relationship is causing (and must cause) them inner conflict before it can truly provide them fulfillment.

They weren’t a royal couple in this scene but I’m fully confident that after the finale season has concluded, this scene will be the one everyone can point to and say “this is where Jon and Sansa ending as king and queen truly became possible.”

#jonsa #jon x sansa #king and queen in the north #jonsa is endgame #tltwp meta

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larapeteira · 4 years

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Unamuno & Picard II

Love and Pedagogy

So as only a casual watcher of Trek (mainly DS9 and Voyager, but some TNG reruns) as a youngling alongside an older sib, I am surprised to be interested in it now. I shouldn’t be, really. I love a good swashbuckle, sea-based narratives and philosophising about the nature of humanity.

I should also not be surprised that I can find a lot to think about - and enjoy - in it from the point of view of language, books, and identity. I did not expect to see Unamuno in Star Trek and, as I mentioned in this post, the translation angle just fascinates me: both internally to the narrative and Rios as a character, but also in terms of the meta-construction of the series. Arguably the existentialism isn’t interesting in and of itself, it’s how it gets applied to political philosophy, but that’s by-the-by here.

On the practical side of things, my default is to be skeptical with TV. The book could well just be a convenient shorthand to convey that Rios is a broody existential spaceman An Intellectual™. Still, I’d like to think that using a translation speaks to the creators’ having a certain amount of awareness of how the audience watches the show. In this regard, presenting the book in English opens up a reference which is likely otherwise unheard of to a primarily anglophone viewership. More than this though, it’s collaborative. Building in intertexts which can enrich the experience of watching the series, but aren’t impenetrable at face value, leaves the choice of how to interact with it up to the viewer.

Now, how to knit this into the universe of the show?

As I said before, I don’t remember a lot about Trek, so I have a lot of questions. What, culturally, survives into the 24th Century? How are books produced and distributed? If they’re being replicated, what records are these based on? (and, as a follow-up, are archivists and librarians venerated now as the absolute saints they are?) What does the standard educational syllabus contain these days? How does universal translation fit in to all of this? And language-learning in general? etc. etc. etc...

It’s entirely plausible that an English version is all Rios could get hold of. Or he was educated in English, so ¿qué más da? However, if I’m indulging my personal preferred flight-of-fancy: the guy’s an honest-to-goodness nerd, to the core.

I had decided before that he was reading Del Sentimiento Trágico in English for the translation, that he already knew the work. Now @cristobalrios’ comment gives me further excuse! Supposing for the moment that the Flitch translation is the edition in question, it would be well worth reading if one’s interested in Unamuno. The heavy involvement of the original author in a translation blurs the boundaries between translation and revision, particularly raising issues around what constitutes an ‘authoritative’ version. And thinking about a familiar subject from a new angle exposes new perspectives, as Unamuno himself states in the preface:

For just as a new friend enriches our spirit, not so much by what he gives us of himself, as by what he causes us to discover in our own selves, something which, if we had never known him, would have lain in us undeveloped, so it is with a new public.

Star Trek: Picard may not address Del Sentimiento Trágico textually, or even in passing again, nonetheless it bears interesting character implications for Rios. It fits with what we’ve seen of the man so far: someone who watches, triangulates his surroundings, and takes emotional soundings; who takes the time to understand why something remains closed.

A sailor, and a philosopher.

#star trek: picard #Miguel de Unamuno #unamuo picar(d)esque #translation #self-translation #cristóbal rios #storm-beaten captain free-hearted and bold #space king lear #except it's really Quijote Part II #Sorry-faced Knight Celestial

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kcwcommentary · 5 years

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VLD6x03 – “Monsters & Mana”

6x03 – “Monsters & Mana”

I love this episode.

This show has done several non-standard episodes, and they are at the bottom of the list of episodes for me. This one is the exception. This is my favorite episode since season two ended (though I do like 3x05 “The Journey”).

The episode is basically the Paladins sitting around playing Dungeons & Dragons, and it’s great. When I first watched this episode, it was part of my big marathon of seasons 3 through 7, and I had no idea this episode existed. When it first started, I instantly thought it seemed like D&D, so the more I realized that it was, the more excited I got about the episode.

We start with a monster pursuing Pidge and Hunk’s characters. Pidge’s character is geared up in heavy armor, and Hunk’s character seems to be a wizard, what with his casting a lightning bolt spell. That spell does next to nothing, and as they run away, Hunk’s character says that he’s “a healer, not a fighter,” so then how did he get access to a lightning bolt spell. I mean, he looks enough like a cleric that I thought he was one, but the lightning bolt spell made me think I must be wrong and he had to be a wizard. It doesn’t really matter.

The ogre (looked like an orc to me, but they eventually call it an ogre) continues to chase them, and he has an ocarina that he uses to make Hunk fall asleep. Pidge is immune to sleep because she’s playing a dwarf character (of course Pidge’s character would be immune to negative things). She uses a jump attack to smash the ocarina with her axe, giving Hunk a chance to cast some binding spell on the ogre. Pidge whacks the ogre sideways with her axe (can’t show a big giant wound like an axe would cause), and they defeat him. In a bit of cross-genre RPG content, the ogre poofs into a floating crystal more reminiscent of monster deaths in video games.

The crystal is one that neither Pidge nor Hunk have seen the likes of before, and Pidge proposes taking it to an innkeeper who for some reason she assumes will know more about it than the two of them do. I know the episode is setting up the innkeeper being the villain, and I know this episode can be looser with logic given its non-standard style of story, but that is an unexplained jump in logic for Pidge to make. Apparently, Hunk’s character’s village was turned to stone, so that’s his quest, to un-petrify them. Hunk’s character, anxious about travelling to wherever they’re going, says of his village, “I mean, they’re not really going anywhere.” That made me laugh.

They arrive at the inn, but apparently have no money for food. The animation changes to have a 16-bit RPG style as Pidge smashes some pots looking for coins. I have smashed a lot of pots in video games in my life, so I love that moment. They take the coin and Pidge orders a “greasy meat pile,” which the Coran-innkeeper calls a “health plate.” It kind of makes me go eew hearing Pidge specifically order it “greasy.”

Coran’s innkeeper NPC is something. Seriously tall, like giant-level height, super muscular, but hair that seems like more of a feminine style, but ever still Coran’s mustache. The innkeeper says the crystal is the type some evil wizard named Dakin uses. He’s, of course, located inside a dungeon.

As the innkeeper tells Pidge and Hunk where that dungeon is located (mirroring Lotor telling the group about both Oriande and the rift between realities, wherein they fight at the end of the season), Shiro’s character in a shadowy corner of the inn speaks up. I super love Shiro’s character. He’s a paladin! It’s really sad though knowing that the EPs thought they were mocking Shiro himself by having his character be a paladin concerned with protecting and helping people. It’s kind of infuriating that the EPs think there’s something wrong with a person just being a good person like Shiro is.

Anyway, Pidge and Hunk go over to talk to Shiro. Hunk says his character is named Block, and that he’s a sorcerer. I’m kind of confused now. Not that this episode is adhering to an actual game system, but with Block having earlier said that he was “a healer, not a fighter,” his being a sorcerer doesn’t feel right. Being a sorcerer matches the spells he’s cast though, so it was that particular “healer” line of dialog that is the dissonant element. Pidge’s character is named Meklavar, a fighter.

I love Shiro’s character wearing a shiny crown/horn in place of his white floof of hair. He gives the backstory of his character. He was chosen to be a paladin at a young age. He was raised in a monastery, but one day a leviathan-demon attacked, destroying the monastery, and killing his master. (He was educated at the Galaxy Garrison, and one day a Galra ship attacked, setting of his quest.) The master’s last words and immediate death is making fun of the cliché of so many stories having of a character dying as they say something important, and I laughed. And then the master is still alive just long enough to speak again and die again. And Shiro, recounting the tale while sitting in the inn, cries a big, long tear. The moment definitely plays with some tropes.

Hunk and Pidge’s characters get up and walk out of the inn. (Granted, they’re playing characters in a game, but it reflects their non-game character that they walk away from someone they’re supposedly friends with. Any decent friends playing a game together like this want their friends to feel included in the game, but that’s not their behavior here.) The sound of Shiro’s voice panicking, saying, “Where are you guys going?” as Block and Meklavar leave really gets to me.

Then Block says, “Man, that guy was so boring.” This is the voice of Joaquim Dos Santos and Lauren Montgomery talking about Shiro, not just Block talking about Shiro’s character in the game. This infuriates me. This is textual proof to go along with what they’ve said in interviews about how this episode is supposed to be mocking Shiro. JDS and LM always thought Shiro was boring. That’s why they resented being told they couldn’t kill off Shiro. One, if a character is boring, as head of the creative team, it’s your fault that that character is boring. Two, Shiro was never boring. That they think of him as boring tells us about how JDS and LM think about people. They think that someone who wants to serve and protect aren’t good people, that there’s something wrong with them being that way, and that they think no one could find value in a character who displays those qualities.

Shiro’s character refuses to stay behind and runs to join Block and Meklavar. Then a giant mouse attacks, eating Shiro. Cut to the table that Coran, Shiro, Hunk, and Pidge are playing at. One of the mice is chewing on Shiro’s character miniature. Shiro is mildly incredulous that Coran is declaring his character dead in the game just because the mouse jumped on the table.

Coran says, “Don’t worry, you can just make a new character.” There is a differential in people who play RPGs demonstrated here: Some players really don’t care about characters. As some people far more clever than I am have said, they’re the kind of players who roll play, not role play. Player characters for this style of player are little more than the numbers on the character sheet. For others of us, the character is a lot more than what’s printed on that sheet. We invest ourselves emotionally in our characters, think about their backstory, and can’t just discard them so easily when they die in game.

Shiro takes his mini and puts it back on the table, saying, “I’m going to be a paladin again.” Yes!

Coran says, “Come on now, do you really want to play a paladin?” and then lists a bunch of other classes.

Shiro counters, “I don’t know what’s more fulfilling than being a paladin.” I love it!

And Coran is animated angry and yells, “But you’re already a Paladin in real life!” Coran then growls. I’m sorry, but no. Coran getting angry here is unjustifiable. Why does it bother him if Shiro wants to play as a paladin in the game? (Because it bothers the show’s EPs and writers that they have to include Shiro as a Paladin in the show. The EPs wanted to get rid of Shiro so that they could have Keith as the Black Paladin, and so they’ve written their anger at not being able to into Coran’s dialog. Of course, they were eventually able to talk their way into completely sidelining Shiro in seasons 7 and 8 in order to get what they wanted in having Keith be Black Paladin.)

Also, this is technically the clone playing the game here, not the actual Shiro. The show eventually blatantly proclaims the clone to be an “evil thing.” But here we see the clone and subtextually here he’s telling us how much being a Paladin means to him. Here the clone is showing us through that subtext that he is not evil. He, as much as the real Shiro, cares about helping people, about serving and protecting. We saw that in 4x01 “Code of Honor” when he begged the Black Lion to let him help the other Paladins. But again, the EPs think that this makes a person “boring.”

Allura and Lance enter the room and see them playing. Allura is interested in joining them, though Lance is skeptical since it involves a book. He also freaks out over the idea of a d20. Lance asks if they don’t all have something more important to do (ignoring the fact that he himself isn’t doing anything important right now). Pidge and Hunk are waiting on diagnostic to run on some system of the Castle Ship.

Shiro responds, “And I’m trying to take a mental break. We’ve been going really hard lately.” Awe!! Let Shiro have some fun! (Especially since the show almost never writes him to have any moments like this.)

Lance is more interested in playing once he hears that Allura wants to play. Sigh.

We return to their game. Block, Meklavar, and Shiro’s character are walking through the woods. Allura’s character, an elven mystical archer, joins them. Lance is a cat-eared thief named Pike, which he says is not a thief but a ninja-assassin. He poofs around with smoke bombs, and loudly yells about his character “lurking in the shadows, silently watching!” The effect of having him yell so loudly about being silent is funny. And then they see him stealing money from a pouch. So yeah, thief.

Allura’s character summons a flying mount that they all then ride on to the dungeon.

I love Block asking, “Did anyone remember to bring torches.” Needing to see in dark environments is something RPG players are kind of notorious for forgetting, so Block’s comment is so very meta.

Shiro then says, “I really think my character would have remembered to bring a torch.” I do agree with him, and a good dungeon master, game master, or as Coran’s calling himself in this episode lore master wouldn’t be so strict as Coran is here. It reads more like Coran is again voicing the EPs’ dislike of Shiro. Allura realizes her character an make an arrow glow, so they have light.

They come to a dead-end in the dungeon. Lance says, “Maybe you just have to knock,” knocks on the wall, and they door is revealed. It totally references back to 1x01 “The New Alliance” where he gained access to the Blue Lion by knocking on its forcefield. So of course, I’m now thinking of how Blue valued Lance so much that she let him in just because he knocked, and then by moving Lance from Blue to Red, that bond he’s had with Blue from the beginning was senselessly taken from him.

The episode then goes meta again by having Lance’s character, as the thief, have to check for traps on the door. My experience suggests that the presence and use of traps in D&D is such that players rarely speak about the process in any in-character terms, only in terms of game mechanics. The way the dialog is written here totally matches that real way checking for traps is usually handled in games. So, Lance rolls low, the trap is triggered, and everyone plunges down a shaft/highly sloping tunnel. Once they fall out into the open, Block casts a spell that gives everyone a flying chicken to hold on to so that they don’t fall. The chickens are funny.

Then, there’s a montage of the group fighting various monsters, until they come upon a giant pile of gold and treasure. Allura gets a “quick draw quiver with a magical creature-summoning arrow.” Pidge gets “goves of transmutation,” the description of which kind of makes me think of Allura’s alchemy. Lance gets an invisibility cloak. Hunk gets a bowl of endless food because of course he does. (Sigh.) And Shiro gets a “blazing sword.” This makes me think of Voltron’s sword’s flaming version, and then I again think of how this show takes being the Black Paladin away from Shiro. As soon as his character lifts the sword, he’s super excited, and then he gets hit by black and red lightning and dies screaming, his hair-floof crown and the sword being the only things left behind. And how do the others’ characters react? Pidge says, “Ooo, he dropped a rare item.” They don’t care about Shiro.

The innkeeper is the villain. A silly, simplistic twist like this is okay since they’re playing a game here, but it does reflect on what the show is doing with Lotor. Like the innkeeper, he was brought in as an ally to the Paladins, providing them with information about where to go and what to do, and then, out of nowhere really, he’s suddenly not a good person but a villain. It’s a process that’s fine when they’re all sitting around here playing a game, but the main show itself needed to do way better than this.

Shiro’s new character arrives, teleporting into the dungeon. Shiro’s twin brother Jiro, “here to complete Shiro’s quest.” It has to be a meta reference to the clone story. And still, his new character, like the clone, is a good person, trying to help and protect people. Pidge responds, “A paladin again?” with a lot of derision, so this is more of the EPs’ dislike of Shiro being written into the meta-dialog of the characters. It doesn’t hurt anybody for Shiro to play whatever character he wants, so how about you shut up, Pidge.

Dakin talks about Block’s petrified village, saying, “I’ve already siphoned off their life force.” Clearly, this is a cryptic foreshadowing of Lotor’s colony and the Alteans there being the source of the unexpected quintessence. It almost feels like this is the show semi-consciously recognizing that how the rest of the season writes Lotor is super underdeveloped and shallow. Either the writers know they wrote Lotor’s end badly and just didn’t have the writing skills to do better or weren’t allowed by the EPs or something, or they actually think they’ve written Lotor well and are just mirroring it here, unaware that this reveals how shallow they wrote Lotor’s end.

Dakin blasts Jiro with flame, and his shield even generates some glowing forcefield-like energy to help deflect the blast. I love shields as tools and symbols, so I love that his character has one.

The episode changes animation style again to look like that of a video game while Allura’s character shoots enemies with arrows. The party takes damage, and Allura uses a “healing arrow,” complete with yelling the name of the ability as she does so – that’s meta. There is something odd, in a funny way, of shooting someone causing them to be healed.

Jiro then vows to avenge his twin. I wish with this show had Shiro care about the clone after it falls as much as Jiro cares about Shiro. If the EPs thought Shiro was a boring character, then how about writing him to want vengeance against Haggar for what she’s done to him and to all the clones the same way Jiro wants revenge here? It would have been a plot that would have let the show wrestle with the implications and significance of the clone story instead of just instantly forgetting any of it ever happened.

The shot from behind of Jiro running toward Dakin… yeah, that’s nice.

They keep fighting, Block casting “embiggen” on Meklavar, who grows giant and axes Dakin.

Jiro speaks, but with Shiro-the-player’s comments, “This game is so amazing. It requires problem-solving, teamwork, creativity. All the skills you want to imbue when doing team-building exercises.” I love Shiro going a little nerdy in the moment. I love seeing and hearing! him be excited about something. He’s clearly having fun. And it also reflects his character as a leader that he sees the game through that lens of leadership and teamwork. But remember, this guy is supposed to be an “evil thing.” Grr.

And Lance then yells at him, “Stop trying to ruin our fun with learning!” Stop trying to ruin Shiro’s fun, Lance. This show lets Shiro have such little fun as it is!

Surprise, Dakin isn’t dead. With the show using Dakin to foreshadow and mirror Lotor, his not being dead here could be read as further foreshadowing, a hint to the viewer that Lotor’s story isn’t over just because he dies at the end of the season. But it’s not.

Dakin is now a dragon. Block is hurt, and Allura shoots another healing arrow. Pidge gets smashed by a dragon tail. Shiro tries to draw the dragon’s attacks away from the rest of the characters, just like a tank character like the paladin class usually does in RPGs. Hunk realizes they need a plan, so he casts a “secret” spell, and the players huddle away from Coran to devise that plan.

Pike distracts the dragon with his quick speed and cloak of invisibility. Block throws out some food from his endless bowl. Meklavar transmutes the food into oil with her gloves. Allura summons what looks like a hippocampus, a creature from Greek mythology with a horse-like body, fish-like tail, and wings. Jiro mounts it, lights his sword on fire, and sets the oil on fire. The fire destroys the dragon.

Victory.

Pidge and Hunk have a breakthrough on what they’re working on on the Castle Ship. Lance reacts, saying, “Somehow I understand the fantasy words better than the science ones.” Is that the writers telling us that they know they don’t understand the science they try to write into this show?

Shiro says, “I can’t get over how great that game was!” It’s so nice. This man deserves to have fun!

Allura comments about how the fun of playing has made the time go by quickly, and Lance, of course, responds out of his attraction to Allura, “We have pretty good time together, don’t we?” She says, “We sure do,” and this feels like it’s setting up the idea that the problem is Allura just hasn’t realized the right guy for her (Lance) has been there all along, and that she’s wrong for having not been interested in him before. I really do not like this trope of romantic storytelling (and the ignorance it demonstrates some men to have about women).

Lotor contacts Allura to tell her the ship is ready to begin testing. Lance is instantly dejected, but I guess at least this jealous reaction isn’t one of anger and arrogance. Coran offers another round of playing, and Lance says sure.

Shiro says, “I want to be a paladin again.” So much meta on this line. It reflects how being a Paladin is so fundamental to Shiro’s character arc, and it makes that the show takes being a Paladin away from him infuriating. It also again reflects the goodness of the clone, and it makes the show declaring the clone to be an “evil thing” infuriating. And of course, Lance and Coran react like Shiro’s wanting to be a paladin (and thus the show/EPs/writers thinking Shiro being a Paladin) is somehow weird.

It amazes me that the EPs thought this episode would get viewers on their side in thinking Shiro was boring. And if I understand the broader audience reaction to this episode, that backfired on the EPs, as this episode just further reinforced for viewers why they like Shiro so much. At the least, it did so for me.

#voltron legendary defender #voltron #vld #voltron criticism #vld criticism #voltron critical #vld critical #vld season 6 #vld 6x03 #commentary

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bluewatsons · 4 years

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Dennis Patterson, Ludwig Wittgenstein, forthcoming in Encyclopedia of the Philosophy of Law and Social Philosophy (Ed. M.N.S. Sellers and Stephan Kirste, 2019)

I. Introduction

Many professional philosophers believe Ludwig Wittgenstein to be one of the most important philosophers of the twentieth century. Wittgenstein wrote mainly about language (e.g., issues involving linguistic meaning and the relationship of language to the world) but he also wrote about the philosophy of mathematics, certainty, rule-following and psychology, just to name a few topics. The trajectory of Wittgenstein’s thought and career is bounded by his Tractatus Logico Philosophicus, which he completed in an Italian prisoner of war camp at the end of World War I and his Philosophical Investigations, which was published after his death in 1951. Wittgenstein wrote almost nothing about the law. (Sources are collected in Langille 1992). Nevertheless, his ideas have played an important role academic legal scholarship.

II: Wittgenstein and Legal Theory

Wittgenstein’s thought has been put in the service of a number of diverse projects in legal theory (For a collection of papers see Patterson 2004). As we know, there is a skeptical reading of Wittgenstein’s remarks on rule-following, made infamous by Saul Kripke. (Kripke 1982) Mark Tushnet used the skeptical reading of Wittgenstein to critique leading theories of constitutional law, all in an effort to advance the so-called indeterminacy thesis. (Tushnet 1983). Gone are the heady days when CLS scholars declared the law to be fundamentally indeterminate, meaning that “a competent adjudicator can square a decision in favor of either side in any given lawsuit with the existing body of legal rules.” (Solum 1987: 462) At present, Kripke’s reading of Wittgenstein still attracts wide attention. The same cannot be said for the legal indeterminacy thesis.

The field of constitutional law provides an example of a scholar whose work shows distinct Wittgensteinian influence. Philip Bobbitt studied Wittgenstein with Richard Rorty while Bobbitt was an undergraduate at Princeton. Additionally, Bobbitt attended lectures by Elizabeth Anscombe at the University of Pennsylvania. These experiences seem to have shaped his approach to philosophy and constitutional theory. I shall briefly describe his seminal contributions to legal philosophy and constitutional law.

Bobbitt’s first book on constitutional law was Constitutional Fate (Bobbitt, 1982) In that book, Bobbitt advanced the argument that the debate over the legitimacy of judicial review was grounded in a false premise. All theories of judicial review judged its legitimacy from a vantage point outside the bounds of constitutional practice. Bobbitt argued that nothing legitimizes judicial review other than employment of the forms of argument (Bobbitt refers to them as “modalities”) for constitutional law. These modalities (textual, structural, prudential, doctrinal, historical and ethical) are the forms of constitutional argument: they are the ways in which propositions of constitutional law are shown to be true or false. The modalities are neither true nor false: they are the ways in which propositions of law are true or false.

Bobbitt’s approach to constitutional law was not well-understood when he first made his case in Constitutional Fate. An especially harsh review of the book appeared in the pages of the Harvard Law Review. (Gudridge 1983) The reviewer dismissed the book as a defense of tradition. (Gudridge 1981) His conclusion was that “Constitutional Fate excludes precisely the aspects of contemporary constitutional law that explain its notably fragmentary and conflicting quality - its status not simply as an environment for controversy, but an environment in controversy. (Gudridge 1983: 1981) Unhappily, the reviewer failed to notice any of the underlying philosophical motivations for Bobbitt’s position. Of course, the central idea is the idea of a practice, so familiar to readers of Wittgenstein’s Philosophical Investigations.

In his next book on constitutional law, Bobbitt was much more explicit about the philosophical inspiration for his position. (For elaboration, see Patterson 1993c) In the Preface to Constitutional Interpretation, (Bobbitt 1991) Bobbitt succinctly summarizes the argument of Constitutional Fate. With allusions to Cartesian geometry and gödel numbering, Bobbitt states explicitly that the forms of constitutional argument are “the way in which a proposition is true rather than the reason it is true . . .” (Bobbitt 1991: xiv) It is the operation of the forms of argument that maintains legitimacy. With citations to the literature on Realism and Anti- Realism, references to Rorty, Dummett, Wittgenstein and others, Bobbitt sharpens his position and leaves no doubt about the philosophical inspiration for his work. This paragraph sums it up nicely:

Law is something we do, not something we have as a consequence of something we do. Sometimes our activities in law—deciding, proposing, persuading—may link up with specific ideas we have at those moments; but often they do not, and it is never the case that this link must be made for the activities that are law to be law. Therefore the causal accounts of how these inner states come into being, accounts that lose their persuasiveness in contact with the abundance of the world, are really beside the point. If we want to understand the ideological and political commitments in law, we have to study the grammar of law, that system of logical constraints that the practices of legal activities have developed in our particular culture. (Bobbitt 1991: 24)

I once heard an American professor of constitutional law describe Bobbitt’s position as “idiosyncratic.” At the time (2002), that view was widely-shared. But time has shown that Bobbitt was on to something right from the start: eventually, his big idea caught on. The modalities identified by Bobbitt are now a staple of the leading casebooks on constitutional law. Every American law student learns them as the basic tools of constitutional discourse.

The second example of the influence of Wittgenstein’s thought in legal theory is Law and Truth. (Patterson 1996) That work took up a single question: “What does it mean to say that a proposition of law is true?” The book surveyed the answers on offer from the principal legal theories at the time and identified shortcomings in each. The book went on to make the claim that propositions of law are shown to be true by the argumentative standards of the practice of law. Integrating Wittgenstein’s analysis of truth, practices, rule-following and the nature of understanding, a fully practiced-based account of law was advanced.

Debates over the propositional character of law are often focused on the “truthmaker”: what makes a proposition of law is true (Dworkin 1986 uses the phrase “the grounds of law” for the truthmaker). Positivists ground the truth of legal propositions in social facts while philosophical realists (e.g., Dworkin) ground the truth of legal propositions in moral facts. Patterson argued that the truth of propositions of law is a matter of employing forms of legal argument for it is in virtue of these forms of argument (See Bobbitt 1991) that propositions of law are true and false.

Patterson bolstered his account of truth in law with an adaption of Stephen Toulmin’s framework for argumentative assessment. (Toulmin 1958). Patterson employed that framework to show both how the forms of argument are used to show the truth of legal propositions and to depict legal argument about the forms of argument themselves. One common form of dispute in law is debate over conflicting forms of argument. Law and Truth provides a solution to this problem, one grounded in Quinean holism. (Ullian and Quine 1970).

III: Wittgenstein and Law: A Sceptical View

A different form of skepticism concerns the very idea that Wittgenstein’s thought could illuminate problems in legal theory. Scott Hershowitz and Brian Bix have both argued that Wittgenstein has little to offer legal philosophers. Hershowitz claims that “[n]othing much can be learned about legal rules or legal interpretation by attending to Wittgenstein's remarks, because they were aimed at wholly different phenomena.” (Hershowitz 2002: 619) Similarly, Bix argues that Wittgenstein’s focus in the rule-following discussion was explanation of “the phenomenon of general agreement in practices regarding the simplest terms and mathematical concepts.”Bix :220) Bix even goes so far as to say that “[t]he first thing worth noting is the strangeness of applying Wittgenstein’s rule-following considerations to law at all.” (Bix 1993: 51)

Hershowitz and Bix share the view that because Wittgenstein directed his attention to mathematics and “simple rules,” nothing relevant to law could be gleaned from Wittgenstein’s thoughts about rule-following. Of course, if such a claim were true, it would be true of many other areas of academic endeavor (I am not aware of any commentator on Wittgenstein’s work who makes the claim made by Hershowitz and Bix, that is, that Wittgenstein’s remarks on rule- following are or should be limited to the specific examples he gave). As we shall see, this is not the case. Not only are there clear examples of the relevance of Wittgenstein’s comments on rule-following and interpretation to matters beyond those he addressed, his insights into the nature of normativity, rule-following, and interpretation are quite profound and in no way limited to the contexts in which he made his case.

Before turning to one example of the use of Wittgenstein’s insights to an unrelated field of endeavor, let me remind the reader of the object of Wittgenstein’s attention. Wittgenstein was keen to undermine the idea that understanding (of meaning) is a matter of (an act of) interpretation. That is, when we come to understand how to carry on a series of numbers, for example, we get to the correct answer through a process of interpretation. He stated it as a paradox:

This was our paradox: no course of action could be determined by a rule, because every course of action can be made out to accord with the rule. The answer was: if everything can be made out to accord with the rule, then it can also be made out to conflict with it. And so there would be neither accord nor conflict here.

It can be seen that there is a misunderstanding here from the mere fact that in the course of our argument we give one interpretation after another; as if each one contented us at least for a moment, until we thought of yet another standing behind it. What this shews is that there is a way of grasping a rule which is not an interpretation, but which is exhibited in what we call "obeying the rule" and "going against it" in actual cases.

Hence there is an inclination to say: every action according to the rule is an interpretation. But we ought to restrict the term "interpretation" to the substitution of one expression of the rule for another. (Wittgenstein 2010 at Sec. 201)

Wittgenstein is puzzled by the fact that a rule doesn’t seem to indicate what it would take to conform to its requirements. But if the rule does not tell us this, what does? One idea – a notion pervasive in many areas of thought – is that understanding is the product of interpretation. The idea is that in the move from signs (e.g., a rule, a number series, a law) to meaning (i.e., what it means to follow), interpretation does the work of understanding. That is, we come to understand when we interpret properly. But, Wittgenstein contends, interpretation is a non-starter. The answer must lie elsewhere.

Suppose we are interested in the meaning of “intentional” in the phrase “an intentional act.” How do we go about discerning its meaning? Wittgenstein would recommend surveying the various ways in which the law uses the word “intentional” to see its meaning across a variety of contexts. What we would be surveying are – literally – the uses to which the word is put. Those who take the view that we need first to interpret the word in order to understand it would require a theory of intentionality, one that could be brought to bear on how the word is employed in legal contexts. Wittgenstein cautions against such an approach, arguing that understanding is grounded in use and not in theory. Wittgenstein’s philosophical methodology is one that seeks a perspicuous survey of the uses (and, thus, meanings) of our words. A theory, he argues, will only serve to distort our understanding.

Wittgenstein develops his account of understanding in practices as a solution to the paradox of rule-following. Hershowitz and Bix deny that Wittgenstein’s account of understanding in practices can be extrapolated beyond the narrow contexts he used to make his points. This is manifestly untrue.

In an important and provocative essay, James Tully (Tully 2003) demonstrated how Wittgenstein’s remarks on rule-following undermined the rationality claims of Jurgen Habermas as well as Charles Taylor’s hermeneutical argument that all understanding requires interpretation. In fact, Tully’s essay was so persuasive, Taylor came to agree. Tully 2003: 228, n.70) More importantly, Tully made his case from the very texts that Hershowitz and Bix claim preclude such extrapolation.

Tully uses Wittgenstein’s remarks on rule-following and practices to make the point that “understanding is prior to and distinct from interpretation.” (Tully 2003:36) Through careful explication of Wittgenstein’s texts, Tully shows how the idea of all understanding as interpretation is a non-starter. This idea – which is pervasive in the human sciences and is the basis of Taylor’s hermeneutics – is unsustainable. He writes:

The attempt to construe conventional understanding as implicit interpretation misses the revolutionary point Wittgenstein is concerned to make. An interpretation is a reflection on a sign; an opinion or belief about how it should be taken. To interpret a sign is to take it as one expression rather than another. In contrast, to understand a sign is not to possess a sedimented opinion about it or to take it as something, but to be able to grasp it; that is, to act with it, using it in agreement with customary ways (section 241). If conventional understandings were implicit interpretations or beliefs about practice, rather than the actual abilities manifested in practice, they would not be conventional understandings, for all the reasons given above: "It is our acting, which lies at the bottom of the language-game." Conventional understanding does not involve implicit interpretations (or representations) to bridge the gap between thought and action, language and reality, because no such gap exists.” (Tully 2003:40)

Having shown how Wittgenstein’s rule-following considerations undercut both Habermas’ claims for the validity conditions of rational discourse and Taylor’s hermeneutical claims for the centrality of interpretation in understanding, Tully then makes the point that “Wittgenstein’s methods can be extended and deepened by adding historical applications to them, such as the work of Foucault and the historical approaches of Quentin Skinner and Charles Taylor . . . .” Tully 2003: 227, n. 68) Tully is not the only scholar who has successfully taken Wittgenstein’s insights and utilized them beyond their original contexts. (See Pitkin 1993) His work is a convincing demonstration – if one is needed – of the importance of Wittgenstein’s thought beyond the four corners of a group of texts.

IV. Conclusion

This short entry can mention only a few of the many examples of the influence of Wittgenstein’s thought in legal scholarship. Topics as diverse as metaphilosophy, methodology, the nature of truth and epistemology are all influenced by Wittgenstein’s approach to philosophy. Ronald Dworkin once said that debate in legal philosophy is, “at bottom, a debate within the philosophy of language and metaphysics.” (Dworkin 1977). He was right in this. Wittgenstein had much to say about language and metaphysics. It falls to legal philosophers to continue to use his insights to continue to address problems in legal theory.

References

Bix, Brian. 2005. ‘Cautions and Caveats for the Application of Wittgenstein to Legal Theory.” LAW AND SOCIAL JUSTICE, Campbell, O'Rourke & Shier, eds., MIT Press, pp. 217-229,

________1993. Law, Language, and Legal Determinacy 51 Bobbitt, Philip, Constitutional Fate (OUP, 1982). ____________, Constitutional Interpretation (1991)

Dworkin, Ronald. 1986 Law’s Empire (Harvard UP).

______________. 1977. “Introduction” to The Philosophy of Law (Dworkin, R. ed., Oxford)

Hershowitz, Scott. 2002. ‘Wittgenstein on Rules: The Phantom Menace,” Oxford Journal of Legal Studies, Vol. 22, No. 4 pp. 619-640.

Gudridge, Patrick O.1983. “False Peace and Constitutional Tradition,” 96 Harvard Law Review 1969

Kripke, Saul. 1982. Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language (Harvard UP)

Langille, B. 'Political World' in D. Patterson Wittgenstein and Legal Theory (Boulder: Westview, 1992) 233-47.

Patterson, Dennis. 2004. Wittgenstein and Law (Routledge)

________, 1996. Law and Truth (OUP).

_________ ,1993a. “The Poverty of Interpretive Universalism: Toward the Reconstruction of Legal Theory,” 72 Texas Law Review 1

_________,1993b. "You Made Me Do It: My Reply to Stanley Fish,” 72 Texas Law Review 67 _________,1993c. “Conscience and the Constitution,” 93 Columbia Law Review 270.

Pitkin, Hannah. 1993 Wittgenstein and Justice: On the Significance of Ludwig Wittgenstein for Social and Political Thought (University of California Press).

Solum, Lawrence B. 1987. ‘On the Indeterminacy Crisis: Critiquing Critical Dogma,’ 54 University of Chicago Law Review 462-503.

Toulmin, Stephen. 1958. The Uses of Argument (Cambridge UP).

Tully, James. 2003. “Wittgenstein and Political Philosophy: Understanding Practices of Critical Reflection,” in The Grammar of Politics: Wittgenstein and Political Philosophy (Cressida J. Heyes ed.).

Tushnet, Mark. 1983. ‘Following The Rules Laid Down,’ 96 Harvard Law Review 781-827 1983.

Ullian, J.S. & Quine, W.V. 1970. The Web of Belief (McGraw Hill)

Wittgenstein, Ludwig. 2010. Philosophical Investigations 2010 (GEM Anscombe, PMS Hacker and Joachim Schulte trs, 4th edition, John Wiley & Sons).

#ludwig wittgenstein #law #philosophy #jurisprudence #philosophy of law #legal theory #constitutional law #duty #general jurisprudence #law and philosophy

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head-and-heart · 6 years

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The 100 Highlights - “Damocles: Part 2″ (5x13)

Hey guysssssss.

I’m back to cover my final highlight recap for Season 5. After this, I’ll be going more in-depth on analysis/criticism of the overall season so enjoy this lighthearted blundering while you can. :)

To read other posts in this series, you can click here.

Tree is really out here (as always) doing his best work. The score during the opening sequence this episode was *kisses fingers*

I have to say that I did enjoy Bellamy protecting Madi in various ways throughout the finale. He promised Clarke that he would, and it feels like he’s living up to that promise. First by stepping in front of her to protect her from Octavia, and then later when he told her “we’ll be right beside you”, ensuring that he would have her back the entire time. And that he would be there to advise her whenever she needs his help.

“Now we win.” Lousy shot. Ha. Sorry, but that was hot.

“You’ll never know your daughter.” Good. Fucking. Riddance.

“We’ve been here before, Madi. We were the criminals. The 100.” I get weak for any reference to the original hundred what can i say i’m a starving woman

“You can execute them because they’re the enemy, or you can break the cycle. You can be better than them. You can be better than us.”

I do like the theme of Season 5 being about breaking the cycle. Let’s hope that the writers really do mean that when they say it.

I also enjoy the return of motivational speeches Bellamy. Madi may have been the figurehead throughout this episode, but it was really Bellamy leading the way. He may have changed, but he’s still the heart. He still inspires people, and I’m glad that he got to the be the one to have this moment where he changed the tide of the war. It felt like a nice wrap up of his journey over the course of “Book One”.

“We’ll wait as long as we can.” “Deja vu.” MONTY IS THE ONLY REAL ONE HERE. My first thought when Raven said that line was “oh ffs not this again”.

I did enjoy the parallel of Monty saving Murphy’s life like Murphy did in 4x13.

“First we save their lives. Then we let them prove they deserve it.” “The commanders told you that?” “No. Bellamy.” aksqinsks first lemme laugh at Clarke’s skepticism about the flame telling Madi to spare them because that bitch KNOWS that they would never be so noble lmao. Second lemme appreciate my crumbs.

I mean ... I guess we finally know how the radio calls were addressed???

Clarke’s hopeful little smile when Bellamy sat down next to her on the ship was really cute. She looks so guilty and nervous. Eliza raised millions for the Blarkes in this episode.

“THAT’S BRILLIANT!” Me, every single time Bellamy Blake speaks. Thank you for the enthusiasm, Clarkey G.

Bellamy and Clarke are so, so, so awkward in this scene between them but it kind of feels like ... the start of something? Like, they both have made huge mistakes and still found it in them to forgive each other despite it. And now they know how much the other cares for them. I have to hope that it means they’re going to move forward. For real, this time. How they’re supposed to.

“You’re not mad at me for leaving you in Polis?” “The commander told me not to be.” Anyway, Bellamy’s jokes still suck and Clarke still laughs at them so ... some things never change?

“I’ll meet you on the bridge.” That was a weighted fucking look, my dudes. I liked that Bellamy thought to include Clarke. It felt like an apology, in a way.

Also, WAS THAT THE S5 BELLARKE THEME I HEARD IN THAT SCENE. Cause if so, it’s fucking beautiful.

THAT LOOK BETWEEN THE BLAKES. BOB AND MARIE HAVE SO MUCH CHEMISTRY.

“Cheer up. I wasn’t invited either.” I LOVE A WOMAN

“Your mistake was liking it. Power. It’s the kiss of death. It’s okay. I liked it, too.” Ivana and Marie are both such compelling actresses and HEY LOOK THEY GOT CHEMISTRY. I honestly really enjoyed this short scene between the two of them. They were enemies and yet - no hard feelings. Because the war wasn’t personal to them. We didn’t get many scenes between Charmaine and Octavia this season (or obvious reasons) but I’m intrigued to see if we’ll get more in Season 6 because they work really naturally together. And they seem to understand something about each other (or, at least, Charmaine understands something about Octavia).

Bellamy and Clarke leading the meeting on the ship ... it felt like old times. I really loved that everyone looked to them for guidance in that scene, despite everything that happened throughout the rest of the season. Gives me hope that we might (finally !) get that co-leading dynamic back in Season 6, especially since they were the two that will be informing the others of Monty and Harper’s discovery.

Bellamy, in particular, gave me serious Chancellor vibes in that episode. He really stepped into his leadership boots this season, especially near the end there.

Dear god, please get rid of that goddamn flame as a viable form of leadership. If anyone from Eligius starts following it next season I’m calling B-U-L-L-S-H-I-T. Let Bellamy and Clarke lead, dammit!

Also ... Zeke looked to Bellamy for permission to speak. Not the Commander. So jot that down, honey’s.

“And Bob’s your uncle.” “I thought you hated that phrase.” “It’s growing on me.” STOP this was cute (and now i’m cryingggggg cause that was Monty and Raven’s last interaction ever)

Clarke taking the bindi off of Madi. 10/10 great scene, let’s burn it now.

Marie in that tank top ... ummmmmmmmmmmmmmm where’s the nearest bucket of holy water

“Kind of like closing the door in the floor.” “Kind of like that.” I liked this callback. Octavia is soft with Bellamy in this scene in a way we haven’t really seen all season. It’s ... oddly nice? Coming from someone who has never cared for Octavia.

“You’re my sister, and a part of me will always love you.” “Does the other part of you still wish I was dead?” “The other part wishes a part of you was. Yeah.”

OKAY. I really liked this scene for a couple of reasons. The first being that I think it clarifies the line from 5x12 where Bellamy tells O that he wishes she was dead A LOT. It basically confirms that Bellamy was referring to the part of Octavia that is blodreina, which doesn’t feel as out of character (whereas Bellamy wishing for his sister’s death did).

I also really like that, even though Octavia tells Bellamy that she loves him and he tells her that he loves her, too, he doesn’t forgive her. Bellamy and Octavia feel like they are finally on the road to establishing healthy boundaries and burying their dysfunctional relationship in place of building something new. I’ve always wanted this to be textual on the show and I never anticipated that we might actually get it. What they did with the Blakes this season is probably one of my favourite things to come out of the season.

And, as always, Marie and Bob are stunning together. This is a large part of the reason that I’m actually okay with Octavia surviving this season, because they work so damn well together.

I feel like Tree doesn’t get enough credit for his work so I have to mention, again, how beautiful the score was during that scene. He elevates the show so much with his music. In the scene where Clarke and Bellamy woke up, alone, it had such an eery feel to it. I really liked it.

Ngl, my FAVOURITE moment in this entire episode was Bellamy and Clarke’s soft-ass fucking smiles when Bellamy’s pod opened. Like, Clarke’s face when she was watching Bellamy wake up? A BITCH IS IN LOVE. And Bellamy was so soft too ughhhhhhhh Platonic Excellence

“Hey.” “Hey.” HEYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY

LISTEN. BELLAMY BLAKE DESERVES TO WAKE UP TO CLARKE LIKE THIS EVERY SINGLE MORNING FOR THE REST OF HIS LIFE OKAY? OKAY I’M GLAD WE’RE ON THE SAME PAGE

...

I’m a Big Fan. They’re so fucking cute. That was so domestic. How do I move on?

“Why is it just us?” I literally stood up and yelled “BECAUSE IT’S FATE DUMBASS”

“That’s the way mom and dad wanted it.” I stan my new Bellarke warrior

“Can I just say that - wow - I mean, I can’t tell you how good it is to finally meet you. Weird, but good. Great, actually.” WHY IS THIS LITERALLY ME WHEN I MET BOB AND ELIZA

ALSO JORDAN IDOLIZING BELLAMY AND CLARKE? RELATABLE. THIS WOULD 100% BE ME IF I GOT TO MEET THEM

“Who are you?” WHY THE FUCK AM I LAUGHING. Bellamy is so intense and he’s got his deep voice and he’s wearing his intimidation face and him and Clarke are both looking at Jordan like “what the actual fuck is going on” and then there’s Shannon Kook with his adorable fucking smile and his adorable fucking voice and he’s literally a bundle of sunshine and these two people are just glaring at him. BELLAMY, CLARKE, SWEETIES, PLAY NICE THAT IS YOUR GODSON YOU ARE TALKING TO

“My name. Right. I didn’t tell you my name. Sorry. I haven’t met anyone before, so clearly I suck at it.” Reason #2 for Jordan being the most relatable character ever. I, too, am the most horridly awkward human in the world. Step aside, Clarkey G, I think I’ve found my TRUE self-insert on this show.

Monty and Harper are just the loveliest couple on this show. I never anticipated how much I would love them when they hooked up in Season 3. Wow. It was really nice to get all of those shots of them in peacetime, just loving each other, on the ship - especially after how little screentime they got throughout the rest of the season. Also, I swear that Shannon has a mixture between Monty and Harper’s smiles. What is this sorcery?

“Smart like his father.” “Kind like his mum.” CAN YOU HEAR ME CRYING ALL THE WAY DOWN HERE ON EARTH

(Also ... sounds like my new damn favourite character.)

“Hey Bellamy ... hey Clarke.” WTF MY EYES ARE SWEATING

“Wait ... take care of our boy.” Listen, Jordan. Madi failed me. I’m counting on YOU to parent trap them. Okay? Okay.

But seriously, the fact that Monty and Harper trusted Bellamy and Clarke to take care of their kid, that they wanted it to be them ... is A Lot. I’m excited to see how that goes in Season 6.

When Jordan opened the window and the new planet appeared and the music started swelling I got fucking shivers. Holy hell. It was so beautiful. TREE WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO ME

“Can you see it? Is it beautiful? It is in my dreams. I hope we do better there. I hope Jasper was wrong and we aren’t the problem. I hope your lives there will be as happy as mine has been. Be the good guys. May we meet again.”

GUYS THOSE WORDS FROM MONTY ARE FUCKING EVERYTHING

LIKE, THESE ARE THE EMOTIONAL BEATS THAT THE REST OF SEASON 5 HAS BEEN MISSING

This is honestly the first real time where I’ve had hope that they might actually break the cycle. That they might build something new. Its the end of an era, but it feels like the start of something new. I genuinely cannot predict what is going to happen on that planet. Which is a new feeling. And I like it.

And of fucking course it would be Monty and Jasper (and Harper) who are responsible for breaking that cycle. Of course. This is the best thing they could have done with Jasper’s memory, is sending Monty on this mission to do better for the rest of humanity. And this is the best send-off I ever could have asked for for any character. Monty and Harper have been with us since the beginning. It just feels right that they should get this ending, that they should be the ones who usher in the next generation of The 100. Like. Wow. I’m speechless.

Also, that Bellarke side hug was er nice. That’s the most domestic they have ever looked. Idc. Bellamy staring at the Earth alone on the Ark in 4x13 and 5x01 vs him staring at the new planet with Clarke at his side is the ONLY parallel I claim.

The final shot of them through the window with the planet reflected around them was STUNNING. Honest to god the most beautiful shot I think this show has ever done.

“End Book One” on Bellamy and Clarke, together, staring at the new world and the new hope they will deliver to their people. Maybe that’s what the first five seasons were really about. Bringing them to this place, where they are staring at the future - side by side, as a unit, ready to face whatever comes next.

Fuck.

I have to say that I enjoyed the second half of that episode way more than the first half. I feel like it had a lot of emotional beats that I really wanted to see throughout the season (that we just weren’t getting) and it also teed up a lot for the next season. I’m so intrigued by what they’re going to find down on that planet, and I’m excited for the writers to really break the cycle and build something new - hopefully something that involves more character moments.

I still haven’t decided if I’m going to continue with this series in Season 6, but stay tuned! I hope you enjoyed reading all of my recaps throughout this season. It’s been a ride ahaha. See ya on the other side, folks.

#the 100 #the 100 highlights series #posts by moi #monty green #marper #harper mcintyre

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gascon-en-exil · 6 years

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I need to talk for a bit about fandom.

I was browsing through some of the tags for ships I follow but with which I do not actively engage when a question occurred to me: when did fandom spaces become so puritanical? The first fandom in which I noted the flagrant and widespread misuse of the term “pedophilia” was Voltron, maybe a little over a year ago, and while I’m aware that a phenomenon in one megafandom can indeed spread outward to show up in others (as happened with omegaverse AUs and Supernatural, or so I’ve read), this type of draconian - and often factually incorrect - moralizing and the corresponding culture of self-censorship and quick blocking have become so prevalent that it’s hard to imagine it beginning from a single source. I suppose I should be thankful that my current primary fandom has enough incest and other sketchy sexual stuff going on in its canon to largely ward off the “anti” culture.

Of course I’ve been in fandom spaces long enough to have a healthy degree of skepticism. For the first half year or so that I was on Tumblr I was involved in the Les Mis fandom during one of its revivals, the closest I’ve ever come to participating in a megafandom apart from some brief interactions with a BNF(?) in the Sherlock fandom. During that time I was on the periphery of a growing ship war between one M/M pairing and one M/F pairing, with some of the participants resorting to cries of misogyny over the former and queer erasure over the latter. Rather pointless given what these characters’ relationships (or lack thereof) are in canon, but nonetheless it was a quick education in how fans could appropriate the language of social justice for the sake of gaining some kind of moral high ground in ship wars - more progressive rhetoric than that of my earliest online fan culture days in the Harry Potter fandom in its heyday, but just about as prone to being disingenuous. Which, fine, use whatever tactics you see fit if it makes you feels like you’re winning an argument with little to no real stakes; amoral as I am I’ve little right to complain.

I can’t say that I’ve ever felt individually and directly attacked in fandom spaces. I’ve had a laugh or two over anons on other sites accusing my blog of being pretentious, or the culture from which I come and for which I occasionally speak of being unrelatable, or me of being misogynistic - apparently because I’ve been known to side-eye some portrayals of M/M sex and relationships produced by women - and getting a pass for it because I’m a cis gay man, but no substantive and credible attacks have ever been actually directed at me. I therefore feel a little like I just ought to roll my eyes and move on whenever I see someone confusing ephebophilia with pedophilia (or even more ludicrous, age gaps between legal adults with pedophilia), expressing sweeping generalizations about what is and is not a healthy relationship because of X dynamic, or quibbling pointlessly over who does and doesn’t belong in the queer community or, indeed, if the word “queer” is even appropriate or if it should be discarded as a slur. Hell, I’m turning 30 later this year and have spent the last four years in something that could be called a mutually exploitative relationship with a man in his mid 60s, while unbeknownst to him taking other sexual partners on the side according to my pleasure and practical needs. I am unapologetically problematic in all manner of ways, and I’d like to think that that’s kept me from having to deal with personal attacks on something as comparatively trivial as my shipping preferences.

But the moralizing....It’s hard to fathom that so much of the prudish vitriol spewing from fandom spaces these days is coming from people younger than me. Even if I can believe that a fair number of these people do not actually care about the causes they claim to support so long as they can appear to be in the right, does this mean that we’re going to have to look forward to even more of this in the future? I’m accustomed to pushing back against the opinions of the fanatical Protestants that persist on the edges of New Orleans society, spiritual descendants of the Puritans themselves whose conservatism especially with regards to anything involving sex is entirely expected and is for them practically a cultural mandate. But on Tumblr, an allegedly progressive online space frequently concerned with men (and less often women) fucking each other in various configurations that seems to eschew all theology-based morality and that of Christianity in particular? Where is it coming from, and why would anyone want to introduce such a thing in defiance of what ought to be an inclusive and welcoming atmosphere for fan content and community? It’s certainly not helping any ship arguments as far as I’m concerned, as I’ll take textual analysis and my personal sexual and romantic preferences over shipping something because the alternative is “problematic” any day. Unusual and unconventional dynamics make for better stories and better fan content in general, which now that I think of it was a big reason why slash became so disproportionately popular in online fandoms to begin with. Fandom trends come and go, and this is one I’ll personally be happy to see go sooner rather than later...though I somewhat doubt it’ll come as quickly as I would like.

#Pointless rambling #Fandom discourse #Fandom history #Ugh I sound like a fandom grandpa #Hmph...I'm not *that* old

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semirahrose · 6 years

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Have you ever stumbled upon a Sam hater's blog and sincerely questioned what show they're watching? Because I recently saw Sam described as manipulative, condescending, narcissistic, ungrateful, petty, hypocritical, entitled, only caring about himself, lacking empathy & compassion, demanding comfort while never showing any himself, playing the victim, guilt tripping those around him, being heartless, selfish, and apparently never taking responsibility for his mistakes. (1/2)

(2/2) I’ve just never been more confused. And when I see dozens and sometimes hundreds of people agreeing with these kinds of posts it makes me wonder if I’M the one misinterpreting Sam’s character. Are they right that Sam is supposedly this terrible or are they just demonizing him in order to prop up their own faves? Idk it’s just that Sam is one of my all time favorite fictional characters and these posts really get to me sometimes and make me feel like I’m losing it. Help Semirah!

Oh, dear. I have seen Sam described in exactly that same way, and I even read all the way through the “meta” that “supported” those assertions.

I absolutely get how you feel. I feel the same way sometimes. I wonder if I’ve tumbled so far into my love for Sam that I’m deluding myself and others into thinking that Sam is one of the nicest fictional characters ever to grace the SPN universe.

And then I question myself and decide for a while that I’m utterly useless and should Stop™, but whether or not that is true, I eventually come to the conclusion that if I’m right about one thing in this entire Chuck-forsaken universe, I am right about Sam. Okay, at least partially right—so maybe he doesn’t have the softest hair in the entire world; sue me.

The thing is, I question myself every time I stumble on that stuff. But then I take a deep breath and dive into it…

…and the lack of textual support is laughable. When Sam hate does come with “support”, it’s cherry-picked and stripped of context or supplied with a “context” that comes from fanon and is based on unsupported assumptions.

I may be critical of Dean in the SPN universe, but I try my best to be sensitive to the context of the story in which he acts.

Here’s the thing: so many Sam haters cite that scene in “When the Levee Breaks” as absolute, irrefutable proof that Sam is not only a selfish, evil, egotistical bastard, but also a murderous sociopath. They say that because Sam overpowered Dean and put his hands around his neck, he intended to murder him and is therefore The Actual Worst™.

And I’m gonna be real: that was not Sam’s most glorious moment, and I don’t support violence as a solution regardless of who wields it, and I can’t defend what Sam or Dean did in that scene. I can’t, and I won’t… but it was entirely understandable, and though anyone who knows me is aware that I am skeptical about a lot of things regarding Dean, that scene doesn’t even register.

(Cinematically/writing-wise, though, it was amazing, and long overdue. The tension and anger had been building THE WHOLE FREAKING SEASON, and if punches were not thrown and things not broken, I don’t know what would have happened.)

So yeah. Not anyone’s most shining moment. Not Dean’s either. But while people like the ones you mentioned defend Dean’s repeated pattern of violence to the ends of the earth because ~he’s sad THOUGH~ Sam does not get the same generosity of spirit.

That encounter was inevitable on both sides, but Sam was particularly aggrieved, and that is why, for the first time in the entire freaking show, Sam himself (not possessed by a demon or a ghost or whatever the heck the Winchesters have seen and been possessed by up to this point), Sam initiated a physical conflict for the first time in the entire show. At that point, Dean had punched Sam several times without response or retaliation on Sam’s part, but no. Sam finally snaps after four whole seasons and he’s ~evil.

And I’m not defending violence, but context is absolutely necessary to understanding the reasoning on both sides.

Sam had just been tricked by people he loved and trusted. He was forced into a detox that would have killed him. He was left alone and in pain. Before Dean locked him in without food, a toilet, or support, he called him “weak […] desperate, [and] pathetic.” He and Dean both believed (yes, even in that very episode) that killing Lilith was the right thing and the only thing to do. Dean said he’d kill her even though he didn’t have a plan and the last seals were about to be broken. Sam felt backed into the corner. He hallucinated Dean saying horrible things and wasn’t able to differentiate it from reality. He escaped and drank blood from Ruby. He was under its influence during the confrontation with Dean.

Whether they meant to or not, both brothers said things that got to the very heart of the other’s insecurities, and for the first time, Sam not only threw the first punch but actually came up as the victor in that ugly, painful fight.

I’ll accept that Sam was rash, emotional, hurt, angry—I will not accept that he is evil or cruel or egotistical or whatever the hell else people are trying to sell. There isn’t any support for it.

Context matters, and it shows a man pushed to his limits, a man who never acted in that way before and has never done so since.

contextmatters.

And even though I question myself every weekday and twice on Sundays, it doesn’t change the fact that all of the “evidence” of Sam’s evilness and selfishness and narcissism and sociopathy is cherrypicked (and naked of context) at best, and purposefully twisted and misinterpreted at worst.

Sam is flawed, perhaps more than I give him credit for. (Hey, I love him, and love makes us biased.) But he is one of the most faithful, selfless, kind, understanding, and compassionate characters in the show, and anyone who thinks otherwise is missing out.

So to the haters who try to paint Sam as evil, I say:

And to you, dearest anon, I say it’s 100% understandable that you feel the way you do, but with as much confidence as I have in me at any given moment, I can assure you that Sam is as well-intentioned, generous, faithful, badass, and loving fictional character as ever was crafted for this garbage fire of a show (and I say that in a loving way from my own dumpster), and I hope you can believe in that if in nothing else in this lengthy and rambling reply.

#dkjsalkajaldkj i am sorry this kinda got long and maybe it doesn't make sense i am sorry :O #spnsamwinchester #sam winchester #my meta #ish?????#sam hate not welcome #dean critical #spn critical #wank for ts #i guess?#fandom critical #anonymous #semirah replies

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faithfulnews · 4 years

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Is the text of the Bible we have today different from the originals?

Sherlock Holmes and John Watson: let’s take a look at the facts

I thought it might be a good idea to write something about whether the Bible is generally reliable as a historical document. Lots of people like to nitpick about things that are difficult to verify, but the strange thing is that even skeptical historians accept many of the core narratives found in the Bible. Let’s start with a Christian historian, then go to a non-Christian one.

First, let’s introduce New Testament scholar Daniel B. Wallace:

Daniel B. Wallace Senior Research Professor of New Testament Studies

BA, Biola University, 1975; ThM, Dallas Theological Seminary, 1979; PhD, 1995.

Dr. Wallace… is a member of the Society of New Testament Studies, the Institute for Biblical Research, the Society of Biblical Literature, the American Society of Papyrologists, and the Evangelical Theological Society (of which he was president in 2016). He has been a consultant for several Bible translations. He has written, edited, or contributed to more than three dozen books, and has published articles in New Testament Studies, Novum Testamentum, Biblica, Westminster Theological Journal, Bulletin of Biblical Review, the Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society, and several other peer-reviewed journals. His Exegetical Syntax of the New Testament is the standard intermediate Greek grammar and has been translated into more than a half-dozen languages.

Here is an article by Dr. Wallace that corrects misconceptions about the transmission and translation of the Testament.

He lists five in particular:

Myth 1: The Bible has been translated so many times we can’t possibly get back to the original.

Myth 2: Words in red indicate the exact words spoken by Jesus of Nazareth.

Myth 3: Heretics have severely corrupted the text.

Myth 4: Orthodox scribes have severely corrupted the text.

Myth 5: The deity of Christ was invented by emperor Constantine.

Let’s look at #4 in particular, where the argument is that the text of the New Testament is so riddled with errors that we can’t get back to the original text.

It says:

Myth 4: Orthodox scribes have severely corrupted the text.

This is the opposite of myth #3. It finds its most scholarly affirmation in the writings of Dr. Bart Ehrman, chiefly The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture and Misquoting Jesus. Others have followed in his train, but they have gone far beyond what even he claims. For example, a very popular book among British Muslims (The History of the Qur’anic Text from Revelation to Compilation: a Comparative Study with the Old and New Testaments by M. M. Al-Azami) makes this claim:

The Orthodox Church, being the sect which eventually established supremacy over all the others, stood in fervent opposition to various ideas ([a.k.a.] ‘heresies’) which were in circulation. These included Adoptionism (the notion that Jesus was not God, but a man); Docetism (the opposite view, that he was God and not man); and Separationism (that the divine and human elements of Jesus Christ were two separate beings). In each case this sect, the one that would rise to become the Orthodox Church, deliberately corrupted the Scriptures so as to reflect its own theological visions of Christ, while demolishing that of all rival sects.”

This is a gross misrepresentation of the facts. Even Ehrman admitted in the appendix to Misquoting Jesus, “Essential Christian beliefs are not affected by textual variants in the manuscript tradition of the New Testament.” The extent to which, the reasons for which, and the nature of which the orthodox scribes corrupted the New Testament has been overblown. And the fact that such readings can be detected by comparison with the readings of other ancient manuscripts indicates that the fingerprints of the original text are still to be seen in the extant manuscripts.

Here is the full quote from the appendix of Misquoting Jesus:

“Bruce Metzger is one of the great scholars of modern times, and I dedicated the book to him because he was both my inspiration for going into textual criticism and the person who trained me in the field. I have nothing but respect and admiration for him. And even though we may disagree on important religious questions – he is a firmly committed Christian and I am not – we are in complete agreement on a number of very important historical and textual questions. If he and I were put in a room and asked to hammer out a consensus statement on what we think the original text of the New Testament probably looked like, there would be very few points of disagreement – maybe one or two dozen places out of many thousands. The position I argue for in ‘Misquoting Jesus’ does not actually stand at odds with Prof. Metzger’s position that the essential Christian beliefs are not affected by textual variants in the manuscript tradition of the New Testament.”

Finally, I think that the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls shows us that religious texts don’t change as much as we think they do over time.

Look:

The Dead Sea Scrolls play a crucial role in assessing the accurate preservation of the Old Testament. With its hundreds of manuscripts from every book except Esther, detailed comparisons can be made with more recent texts.

The Old Testament that we use today is translated from what is called the Masoretic Text. The Masoretes were Jewish scholars who between A.D. 500 and 950 gave the Old Testament the form that we use today. Until the Dead Sea Scrolls were found in 1947, the oldest Hebrew text of the Old Testament was the Masoretic Aleppo Codex which dates to A.D. 935.{5}

With the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, we now had manuscripts that predated the Masoretic Text by about one thousand years. Scholars were anxious to see how the Dead Sea documents would match up with the Masoretic Text. If a significant amount of differences were found, we could conclude that our Old Testament Text had not been well preserved. Critics, along with religious groups such as Muslims and Mormons, often make the claim that the present day Old Testament has been corrupted and is not well preserved. According to these religious groups, this would explain the contradictions between the Old Testament and their religious teachings.

After years of careful study, it has been concluded that the Dead Sea Scrolls give substantial confirmation that our Old Testament has been accurately preserved. The scrolls were found to be almost identical with the Masoretic text. Hebrew Scholar Millar Burrows writes, “It is a matter of wonder that through something like one thousand years the text underwent so little alteration. As I said in my first article on the scroll, ‘Herein lies its chief importance, supporting the fidelity of the Masoretic tradition.'”{6}

A significant comparison study was conducted with the Isaiah Scroll written around 100 B.C. that was found among the Dead Sea documents and the book of Isaiah found in the Masoretic text. After much research, scholars found that the two texts were practically identical. Most variants were minor spelling differences, and none affected the meaning of the text.

One of the most respected Old Testament scholars, the late Gleason Archer, examined the two Isaiah scrolls found in Cave 1 and wrote, “Even though the two copies of Isaiah discovered in Qumran Cave 1 near the Dead Sea in 1947 were a thousand years earlier than the oldest dated manuscript previously known (A.D. 980), they proved to be word for word identical with our standard Hebrew Bible in more than 95 percent of the text. The five percent of variation consisted chiefly of obvious slips of the pen and variations in spelling.”{7}

Despite the thousand year gap, scholars found the Masoretic Text and Dead Sea Scrolls to be nearly identical. The Dead Sea Scrolls provide valuable evidence that the Old Testament had been accurately and carefully preserved.

I hope that this post will help those who think that we can’t get back to the text of the original New Testament documents.

Go to the article

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eppingnhqtfu078 · 4 years

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theaudiencegeek · 4 years

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Week 6

The act of watching basketball with my friends is one of those shared interests that is essential in maintaining our friendships as it enables us to spend quality time with each other. However, it has occurred to me that although we share a love for watching basketball, our motives for watching basketball differ from one another. The uses and gratifications approach attempts to explain this phenomenon as Sullivan (2013) states that this approach assumes that, “audience members actively choose media channels and content to suit their own needs at a particular moment” (p. 113). In other words, the audience uses media for their own purposes in order to satisfy their own personal needs. I watch basketball games for many personal reasons other than seeing it as an outlet to socialize with my friends. I have been playing basketball my whole life so watching professional basketball games helps me understand the game more as a player since I am able to pick up on playing styles, moves and plays. On the other hand, one of my friends watches basketball as it serves as a distraction from his routine life. He has never picked up a basketball in years but gets enjoyment from the games as it is a form of entertainment for him. A cousin of mine has a different motive for watching the games. He is in various competitive fantasy leagues that require buy ins. He watches basketball for the enjoyment he gets from watching his fantasy players earn him stats while also seeing the games as a long term investment since he is financially involved. All three of us watch the games for different reasons but enjoy watching them just the same. This is an example of how audiences utilize the same form of media for different uses in order to fulfill different desires which reflects the uses and gratifications approach to looking at audiences.

With the rise of the digital world, there are now other ways to attract audience members to engage with media texts because of the unique features that digitization provides. These new features of engagement generate new gratifications that are sought after by audiences. How audiences engage with digitized content has led to many observable advantages of having a specific ways of presenting information. As mentioned by Sundar and Limperos (2013) when looking at modality-based gratifications, “Research indicates that presenting information in multiple modalities is not simply convenient, but also perceptually and cognitively significant… the visual modality is more trusted than text, i.e., pictures cue the ‘realism heuristic’ leading us to quickly conclude that if something is photographed, then it must be more real than if it is simply written about in textual form” (p. 512). In other words, having more than one way of interpreting information such as the inclusion of written text as well as visuals is preferred by the average viewer. In fact, visuals have gained more power in terms of convincing audience members that something is true. I have also made this observation as I have noticed a trend in high school where some students would be obligated to send their parents a picture text of their surroundings in order to give their parents assurance that they are where they claim to be. Some have even taken it a step further by requesting that their child Facetime them instead of giving them a call. This shows how people can be skeptical when it comes to text but visuals such as picture are perceived to some as irrefutable. However, this can be problematic since pictures can easily be altered by photo editing software such as photoshop. Photo editing is also becoming more accessible to the public as we are seeing with the development of social media filters.

Therefore, it can be argued that the average audience member’s trust in visuals can be seen as a flaw since they can be prone to manipulation because of the ability for anyone to alter visuals in this digitized world. When we look at digital news articles, they are often paired with videos that explain the article. Media outlets are already starting to take advantage of including visuals. For example, news outlets often have the same material from article placed into a video format that is found within the same web page. This suggests that some viewers are expected to skip the text and watch the condensed form of information through a video that portrays the same message but with the inclusion of audio and visuals. Many have abandoned traditional news outlets entirely and rely on social media websites to display news posts with multiple modalities. As a result, during the last American election, fake news was heavily pushed on to social media platforms such as Facebook and this trust in visuals backfired as people were spreading and believing fake news as facts. It is clear that multiple modalities are helpful in sparking audience engagement but it also causes problems since using multiple modalities can be used to spread propaganda.

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