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#Not enough info on HB to say much.
system-terror · 24 days
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On Eyepatch Vryche
if it's Holistic Blight
Edolon has seen at least one (1) picture of Holistic Blight
The eye and face covering is because of the rot
Him + young!Edolon haircut twinsies
If it's Edolon
He sustained some injury to his eye/face that has healed, or otherwise isn't visible
It was severe enough he or Clarud wanted it covered
(Or the face covering has another purpose)
Seems like a drastic change in fashion sense? Face injuries wouldn't warrant wearing elbow-length gloves.
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cidnangarlond · 11 days
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We have the names of 3 North Carolina representatives to put pressure on about the anti-mask bill! With enough support we can say them to vote no, so here's their contact information:
Representative Tim Reeder
919-733-5757
Representative Kristin Baker
919-733-5861
Representative Donny Lambeth
919-733-5747
You don't have to be from North Carolina to call or send an email by the way! Being from outside the state or even outside the country and putting pressure on them by saying you're not going to visit, cancel plans, etc. and that you're going to #BoycottNC is also how we got the bathroom bill killed. We don't have much time to keep putting pressure on them like this, so the sooner you contact them the better! Here is also a Google doc with a script at the bottom if you're someone who has trouble coming up with something to say (like me):
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fizzbot · 7 days
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I've been here forever trying to find other words to spell but i've got nothing, here's the rest of the questions i'd be interested in hearing your answers for :33 A B C D F H K M N R S T W X Z
SDKHSDJKSDFHLJK it was a noble effort, thank you babe!!!! o7
fandom ask game og post here!!
A - Ships that you currently like a lot. (They don’t have to be OTPs because not everyone has OTPs.) Friendships, pairings, threesomes, etc. are allowed. our textverse rp au has opened my eyes to so many amazing dynamics.....blitzker my babies <33333 even just their friendship is SO goddamn sweet, i love them <////3 (rewritten) stolitz has also taken up so much of my brain recently ofc since they are lterally so us for real :3 on a friendship note, rosie&striker??? probably my favorite duo weve come up with of all time, the lore is insane!!!!!! sjkdlfhsdjkf honestly ozzie&blitz has been unexpectedly SUPER sweet too, i love when they talk!!!!!! ROSIE X MIMZYYYY MY OLD WOMAN YURRIIIIII!!!!!!!!!! pen x baxter is still in the oven but. soon......
B - A pairing–platonic, romantic or sexual–that you initially didn’t consider, but someone changed your mind. i mean. rosie and striker. we spun a wheel for random character interactions and it changed our lives permanently. OH and romantically, huskerdust!!!!! i did not give a shit about them until you were like "i think we could fix them" one day and you were so right. we could. and we did :]
C - A ship you have never liked and probably never will. carmilla x velvet. velmilla they could never make me like you. OH AND CHERRISNAKE. get that woman a girlfriend stat!!!!!!!!!!!!
D - A pairing you wish you liked but just can’t. uhh. ksdfhksdf im not sure there are any?? MAYBE blitzfizz, but not in a "i hate this ship" way, in a "i just like their friendship more and find it more compelling" way
F - What’s the longest you’ve ever been in a fandom? i think it depends on whether or not it counts if we take breaks in between. like, some fandoms weve been into for like, months and months and months, and then we get out of it, and then we get back into it for EVEN MORE MONTHS........actually idk if it does, bc i think the answer either way is sam and max??? we were into that for like,,,,,,MOST of 2021/2022, werent we??? and we relapsed SEVERAL times!!!!!!!! fnaf might be a close second. unfortunately
H - What is your favorite source text for fandom stuff (e.g., TV shows, movies, books, anime, Western animation, etc.)? ooh,,,uhh,,,,it depends on a whole lot of things. i dont prefer media that is ongoing. so like, a series thats still running? i probably wont be able to get into it. which i know is hilarious since this is an hh and hb blog, both of which are ongoing. the LENGTH is also a big factor. like, id rather die than get into something like the simpsons, because i have a completionist in my brain that would mourn never being able to watch it all. for that same reason, i dont tend to like media thats episodic, like,,,,,spongebob is the best example i could think of jhksdfhjsd. i dont like shows/media that will do something as a gag, and then everything ""resets"" by the next episode. i need linear growth!!!!!!! books, depends on how long the series is. i like reading, but i just dont have the time to read huge series, and also its a bitch to find something if i need a specfic piece of info that i knew i read. like, the wfrr series is perfect, idk if i could do anything longer than that. movies are......ok??? theyre fine, i prefer movie SERIES tho, for more of that linear growth i was talkin about. and games ALSO fully depend on the length/what kind of game they are. i could never see myself getting into something like zelda, because theres SO much content with not enough consistency, but sam and max and monkey island hold a super special place in my heart. SDKFHJKSDFJHKSDF SORRY SORRY this answer was really really long winded. so im gonna say that my ideal media is a show thats short, finished, and maybe has some extra stuff like books or special features. like, gravity falls was my IDEAL fanom, not just for the nostalgia factor!!! it ticks all the boxes :]
K - What character has your favorite development arc/the best development arc? in our fix-verse, striker wins by a goddamn mile. rosie SAVED that man. in cannonnnn.....uhhh......holy shit, does any character have any arc at all???????????? JHKSDFHJKSDF HELLO???? WHY CANT I THINK OF ANY. fuck, i guess striker wins!!!!! congrats man!!!!!
M - Name a character that you’d like to have for a friend. im soooo obviously biased here but ive gotta give it to striker. we could complain about stolas together and i could tell him about the people who wronged me and hed be like 'want me to kill them for you?' and i could say yes. also i could pat his horsey on the head
N - Name three things you wish you saw more or in your main fandom (or a fandom of choice). women. just any women. give me a compelling arc for a woman that has no men getting their sticky hands on it. i have to think of two more things.....uhhh......i want more.....filler. especially in hazbin, i want the characters hanging out and bonding. we read the show bible ep pitches together and im still in mourning. charlie helpng baxter with his experiments??? huskerdust carnival date??? ROYAL PARTY???? MIMZY BECOMING A RESIDENT OF THE HOTEL??????? uhhh one more thinngggg......ummm......fat people. isnt it ridiculous that there are only TWO. FAT CHARACTERS. IN BOTH OF THESE SHOWS COMBINED. two!!!!! and one of them is a villain, and the other is meant to be disliked!!!!! i wonder if that says anything about vivziepop. /sarc
R - Which friendship/platonic relationship is your favorite in fandom? blitzker is up there, but right now the award goes to blitz/moxxie. they are SO. SO SPECIAL TO ME. and weve been sleeping on them all this time!!!!!!!!!! they are best friends in the whole world
S - Show us an example of your personal headcanon (prompts optional but encouraged) uhh. blitz ships appledash. i saw someone earlier say hed ship rarijack and it actually annoyed me a little HAHAHAJKHFJKLDSH come on, look at his goddamn horse ocs!!!!!! this man wants butch4butch horses sooo bad. he literally is rainbow dash. and he loves cowboys. uhhhh on a slightly more serious headcanon note, all members of i.m.p being at least a little trans is so so so incredibly important and special to me. t4t4t
T - Do you have any hard and fast headcanons that you will die defending? blitz is not a goddamn dom. stop making him the top in what is supposed to be loving stolitz art. he doesnt like it. he pretends to but hes lying. wheres that post thats like "when the character is putting on a persona in-universe and the audience falls for it". i have rambled about how much i hate this on this blog before and i will do it again
W - A trope which you are virtually certain to hate in any fandom. enemies/rivals to lovers.
X - A trope which you are almost certain to love in any fandom. friends to lovers!!!!!!!!! <3333333333333
Z - Just ramble about something fan-related, go go go! (Prompts optional but encouraged.) AUGHHHJHSKFHJKSD DONT PUT ME ON THE SPOTTTTTHSJKFHSDFJK!!!!!!! uhhhhhhh i hate vivziepop i hope she explodes but i hope she relases all the hb episodes first so we have something to riff on. the fact that full moon has been done for months and shes JUST now chosing to ""let it cook"" a little longer is driving me up a goddamn wall. she has been on VACATION. for WEEKS. and she gets back and is like "what if i delayed full moon even more :3". anyway if it drops on my birthday (the 29th) that Might be my last straw
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silverineontherun · 4 years
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I don't know what you mean exactly when you say "Keith prompts" but I have always had a soft spot for royal Keith or knight Keith (*-*) Anyway, HB to this beautiful boy, so precious, must protect him at all costs ♡
As usual, I don’t provide enough info, sorry 😂 I intended to write small pieces for Keith if people asked for something specific! Now, for Knight Keith, I have a snippet of a discarded fic I wrote a while ago, Knight Lance x Knight Keith. This was the part that inspired the whole thing, actually, I hope you like it!
***
Snippet from “The Heart of the Lotus” (Klance, Medieval/Fantasy AU, discontinued)
Sir Lance remembers to shut his mouth on time, clearing his throat and commanding his men to descend from their horses and form in front of the first set of stairs that lead to the entrance, where a line of soldiers and courtiers dressed in solid black and red are already waiting for them.
He checks on his company and corroborates they are standing in clean formation just as instructed, to his utmost relief. Proud, he feels his chest swelling as Coran hurries back to the princess’ carriage to help her descend from it. Lance walks in front of his people instead, facing the Thayserians who look at them like hawks. They look like servants and guards, and Lance is glad they are not being received directly by the king himself, feeling uncomfortable under his sweaty clothes. The trip was long and the entire contingent needs to refresh before the anticipated meeting…
That’s when, suddenly, the local soldiers break their formation in two, leaving some space right in the middle. The servants hurry to the sides, keeping their heads low, and a figure appears from behind them and walks resolutely to Lance’s encounter. 
He is dressed in black from head to toe, from his shiny boots to his elegant silk robe, a garment Lance hasn’t seen before, decorated in soft grey patterns that surround his wide torso like a painted canvas. Just like the Palace itself, the only ornament that adds some color to his outfit is a long red scarf, crossing his chest and dangling behind him, secured to his shoulders by two silver pins with the shape of flowers — flowers whose name escapes him right now, but are part of Thayserix royal family’s crest. The ends of the silky scarf flutter like a weightless cape behind him as he walks.
This time it’s not that easy to keep his jaw from slacking. The closer the man gets, the more Lance can appreciate his gorgeous features while feeling absolutely struck by them. 
So... what had Coran said about King Shiro? 
Dark hair, sharp eyes, high cheekbones…
Check, check, and check. The man’s pale face is framed by rebellious black hair that falls to his shoulders and suits him disturbingly well, despite its unkempt state. The rigid line of his mouth is not amicable, but Lance can’t stop staring at it, his head momentarily empty with only Coran’s voice resonating inside. 
‘Beauty can be a lethal distraction…’
Indeed, thinks the Altean First Royal Guard sweating a bit because, in that regal attitude and the way the man’s eyes scan the whole contingent and then settle on him as if measuring him, he can testify that ‘lethal’ and ‘beauty’ can absolutely go together, and the king of Thayserix is the living proof of that.
But he isn’t one to be intimidated by looks, no sir. He will let nothing distract him from his duties, and this is the best moment to show that. Sweeping his hair back and then taking his fist to his chest — ignoring how his feet seem to need some convincing before moving again—, he walks until he meets the king in the middle of the esplanade, and before they can lock eyes, he bends the knee and lowers his head, wishing to appear humble and obliging.
“Your Majesty,” he says loudly so his people can hear him too. “It is truly an honor to make your acquaintance. I am Sir Lance of Altea, and I speak on behalf of Princess Allura of Altea, deeply grateful for your welcome, and in hopes of being of service to you, as you may see fit.”
Silence. Lance is satisfied with his words for around three seconds until he notices the unnatural silence around him. He frowns, not daring to raise his face yet, a bit taken aback by the fact he doesn’t even get an answer, until, finally, a manly voice answers him.
“Welcome. Our king has been eagerly awaiting your arrival.”
A pause. Lance, stunned, raises his eyes slowly, and he finds the man’s eyes not looking at him, but at the people and the carriages. From this close, Lance notices a scar that crosses his right cheek, and also the long sword hanging from his side, as well as his gloved hands. 
If he wasn’t so dazzled by that first impression, he could have noticed before that the man has no crown and probably never will. He confirms it when he finally has the delicacy of introducing himself.
“I am Keith, King Shiro’s Shield Guardian. I am to lead you to your new chambers…” The man makes a pause, and his eyes settle on Lance again. With a smirk, he murmurs: “Your Majesty.”
And that’s when Lance feels the weight of the entire world dropping right over his head. Unable to turn back to his people, with his cheeks burning, he watches how the Thayserians hurry to help the Alteans with their luggage and horses, while this Lord Keith turns around with the ghost of a smile lingering on his lips. Pinned to the floor and humiliated, Lance’s mind fills with gibberish until he reconnects his brain to his limbs, and then, furious, adrenaline propels him forward, deaf to Coran’s call coming from behind. 
“Wait a moment! Hey!”
Lord Keith stops and looks back, curious. Lance struggles a bit to find his words. He doesn’t remember ever being this mad in his entire life.
“You— How— You!!” 
“Excuse me?” asks Keith, looking unimpressed. This irritating attitude is like oil to Lance’s already burning rage.
“You... How could you let me bend the knee in front of you instead of your king? Have you no shame?!” he fumes.
Keith makes a pause, staring at him with cold eyes. And Lance adds another unwanted discovery to his list: the knight’s irises are colored in a strange shade of violet, regarding him with an intensity that makes him feel they can see through him. His heart beats faster at this against his will, and he notices the heat creeping up from his neck up to his cheeks once more. Worse, when Keith smirks again, his gaze inevitably drops to his full lips instead.
“It was funny,” he says, shrugging. He smirks wider at Lance’s outraged expression, and turning around, he adds, “Your men are really loyal to you. Laudable, though I honestly feel for them.”
He starts walking again and Lance stays there letting his arms dangle foolishly by his sides, confused, until he hears Coran’s voice calling him and he turns around to find the group of Alteans and Thayserians catching up to them. The Alteans look at the tall ceiling and the splendidly illuminated corridor with curiosity, but the warden, followed closely by Allura, stomps his way like a pissed off yalmor.
“What was that, Sir Lance?! Do you intend to shame us in front of our hosts since day one?!” he nags in muffled but furious whispers.
“I-I’m sorry. I honestly thought— I mean, did you see him? You said— Uh...” stutters Lance, ashamed.
“Don’t be so hard on Sir Lance, Coran. Besides, you saw how the guards reacted, didn’t you?” says Allura, amused. It’s the first time Lance sees her smile sincerely in weeks. Coran sighs, shaking his head.
“What did they do?” Lance asks eyeing his men, uneasy. The least he needs right now is sabotaging his own leadership among them in alien territory, yet there he goes, blowing everything for hurrying too much like he promised he would never do again.
However, at that moment he catches sight of Hunk, just when Coran grumbles:
“They also kneeled down. So you looked less foolish, and we looked way more well behaved than we really are. Truly, nothing short of a miracle.”
But the miracle has a name for sure, and when Hunk gives Lance two thumbs up, the knight seriously considers running his way and asking for his hand in marriage right there. He has done enough damage to their first impression as it is, though, so he has to be content with putting his hands together and murmuring a teary ‘thank you’ while making a mental note to get his friend the finest ale or similar treat these lands can offer. The rest of the men don’t look too worried about it, luckily. Maybe they think that was the right protocol. Maybe they just want to save face.
Or maybe the Thayserians maids are also very pretty and very distracting, which explains their dumbfounded looks, though Lance has trouble worrying about that with Lord Keith’s hateful smirk imprinted in his memory, filling his stomach with nothing but pure liquid rage and uneasy, unwelcome tension.
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mollydollyjournals · 3 years
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Maybe I need to just like. Scream. Loudly. For a few hours.
My concentration is still so bad I'm barely getting anywhere with this same set of nails. Still. I'm trying to keep working on it but my mind is just not doing it because I feel constantly on edge. This is day 3. One set of nails! Jesus they're not that good. I take a long time to do most things but my mind is really just not functioning.
I'm feeling really particularly isolated again. I have nothing to say that might be of interest to anyone else. I dont really even know how to respond to the small amount of interaction I do get. A friend has started being more talkative in our group chat and sent me a message asking for some info on nail art techniques - maybe I'm being self centred but I feel like it could at least partially be an effort to get me talking. If so I appreciate it. But I still dont really have anything to say beyond quick surface responses.
My mum asked if I'm going to see her this weekend. I wouldn't on Sundays because she has a zoom call with relatives I dont want to talk to. It occurred to me that saturday is tomorrow. Part of me wants to go to hers and drink red wine and just connect with someone. The one person who's almost always had my back, or at least has never seriously intentionally opposed me. I want to go see my dog and my kitten and tell her that actually I'm doing pretty bad, I'll probably be divorced by xmas and sometimes I hear things that arent particularly confusing or distressing but they're definitely not real.
But that's not how it works in our dynamic. She had a serious psychotic episode when I was a teenager, and I took care of it all. My younger brother has ongoing psychosis. It's in our family. If I say I hear things she'll only panic. My doctor knows so it's not a secret - if theres one thing I learned from both of their cases, it's not to stay in denial. But theres no point telling her. And the divorce stuff? She'll internalise it. One of her children is dead, one is an ongoing psychiatric case with not much of a future because he's also actually a pretty terrible person, and the last one is me. She feels bad enough because her "marriage failed," which is a weird phrase her generation seem to use. She told me before not to date other people in case it hurts my "marriage." She'll think it's that, and start spiralling about her history with my dad and the one guy she's dated since they divorced. She won't believe me and hb were fine having other relationships and the issues arent to do with that, and I dont have the energy to talk through her stuff again.
Maybe it's getting to me more than I think. It's not like I didnt know this shitstorm was coming. But now it advances. Like I heard the forecast before, but now I can see it on the horizon. Now I have to really truly consider moving out of the house and splitting up the cats and whatever else. Thinking about it, maybe i should talk to my mum. Itll almost definitely be her I move in with if it all goes through. But then maybe I should only talk about it if I'm sure.
I dont know. I'm jealous of everyone with good parental relationships. I still havent even texted my dad for his birthday. I guess I should do that. I kind of miss when all 4 of us go back to my dad's house for drinks, us and my half brother. But that's not going to happen for a long time yet, for all kinds of reasons. Maybe it never will again. I'm catastrophising I guess. But it's hard not to with the current track record. I just feel like there isnt any evidence of positive things. Really, truly. The best thing that's happened to me recently is I sent the rented carpet cleaner off and then saw that my cat did a big healthy shit in the middle of the carpet. I have to be happy about that because it means hes not losing his guts to diarrhea and vomiting like he was before. But I still have to deal with a hygienic nightmare and probably a stressed cat picking up on my mental state. And I still have to gauge the whole situation based on a literal pile of shit.
I feel like thinking positive is just kidding myself and giving into my genetic tendency towards psychosis. If I'm going to convince myself of something that isnt real in order to make myself feel better, why not lose myself in a fantasy entirely? I should just build an entire world where everything is okay and lock myself away in it. Why stop at just telling myself that this one bad thing or another won't happen.
I try my best to stay grounded in reality to avoid ending up in that kind of mental state. But reality is fucking tiring. I know my life isnt the worst in the world by far, I dont mean that. But we're all going through some extra shit these past couple of years. I struggle not to take that on too. Not that it even helps. We had a mass shooting here today and I'm thinking about the people who thought they were safe because they live in England where firearms are extremely rare, the parents of the child who died, the people living in that area who will feel so unsafe now, and all the pro-gun lobbyists in the US who will use this as a reasoning that gun control doesn't work thus keeping millions of other people at risk as long as those laws dont change. But god. I would be dead many times over if guns were as easy to buy here as they are over there.
And then I think about all the people that have been lost to situations like that. I'm multiracial and have family in multiple different places - I was always raised with the idea that you dont stop caring about people just because they're not in the same country as you. And it's true, you shouldnt. But I've internalised a lot of it as fear and sorrow and idk what else. Just bad feelings. Feeling like the world is such a terrible place, that I cant deal with my own suffering, and that if I can't deal with that then what about the people who have it worse? What can I do??
What can I do for anyone when I cant even paint a single set of nails?
I'm sure of all kinds of bad things happening. I dont want to be. Some of them I couldnt prove, so maybe it's just my mind. Many look likely. I dont know how to deal. I am all the worst parts of each of my parents and this is the result. I wish therapy was more of a thing last century. They should never have had kids. My older brother got off easy by dying. Incidentally I have to somehow gather money for his gravestone soon as nobody else in my family ever offered to help my parents with it in all this time and it's only just been put up now when I said I'd help my mum with it. I never even fucking met him. My life is like a bad tv show. Not an interesting one, not a well written drama or tragedy, just bad.
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diyunho · 5 years
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The Joker x Reader - “Ghost” Part 1
Bane’s wife is a mystery to everyone, including her husband. Ghost also happens to be The Joker’s little obsession, not that she ever pays attention to him. Maybe that’s why The King of Gotham should stop messing around: when you push too much, you might get more than you bargained for.
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“Boss,” Frost makes his presence known in the VIP room. “Ghost is here.”
“Don’t make her wait,” The Clown growls and Jonny nods in acceptance, aware the woman’s infamous temper might create some unwanted trouble if she gets delayed from her schedule.
The Joker passes his fingers through the neon green hair, not that it needs fixing; he also unbuttons another button from his purple shirt, only two of them holding the garment together now. A quick glance to the other man present here: still on the couch facing the windows depicting the busy night at the club; earbuds in while listening to an important cell phone message received a few minutes ago.
Might as well take advantage of the situation.
You part the sparkly beads and enter the premises, immediately positioning yourself on the loveseat across from The Joker’s without any invitation.
“Hi Mister J,” you flatly greet without any trace of emotion.
“Hello Ghost,” The King of Gotham checks out the guest since he finds the creature totally fascinating.
I mean, why wouldn’t he be captivated? You have white hair shaved on the left side that’s meant to expose the skull tattoo you got after you’ve met your husband; smoky, dark red eyeshadow and glossy lips. You always wear black, tight skin leather suits and boots; not high heeled because it’s not your style: more like the heavy military kind, custom ordered to match your spouse’s.  
“I have a business proposal; name your price,” The Joker grins and you give him a cold stare.
“I’m listening.”
“I want you to kill Bane for me.”
“Why?” you tilt your head in annoyance.
“I can’t stand him,” the honest response prompts retaliation from the guy that finally realized you’re there and just took his earbuds off:
“Stop hitting on my wife!” Bane huffs, displeased with J’s nonsense.
You’re not a big fan of The Joker either, yet you attempt to avoid useless conflict.
“I’m going to get me a drink. HB, want one?” you address your husband and he signals for his favorite.
“Triple shot of whiskey, no ice.”
“Be right back,” you announce and prepare to leave but tonight’s host is not happy with the outcome:
“I want a drink too.”
“Ask your girlfriend,” you cut J off and he underlines:
“She’s not here yet.”
“Too bad and so sad,” Y/N grumbles while vanishing from the VIP room.
Bane can’t hold in a very amused chuckle and choses to start something for the heck of it:
“Imagine being with a strong minded woman that does what she wants.”
J is far from receptive about Bane’s insinuation, definitely mad you brushed him off:
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?!”
“Did you ever hear the expression: jerk to the world but not to your girl?” Bane’s distorted tone amplifies today’s advice. “You might want to apply that to your fragile relationships.”
“Spare me your wisdom, HB!” The Clown Prince of Crime emphasizes the initials, deciding to counterattack. “B is from Bane, obviously,” he thinks he found something to make fun of. “H Comes from… Herbert? Hugh? Hedwig?”
Your spouse would love to wipe out J’s almighty smirk with a punch; savoring the aftermath of telling him the truth is infinitely better:
“HB comes from Handsome Brute; my wife calls me that.”
The Joker doesn’t have time to comment though: Y/N returns with the drinks and positions herself on Bane’s knees, helping him taking off his mask so he can enjoy his whiskey.
“Hey Ghost, how come you don’t smile or laugh?” The King of Gotham continues to be obnoxious, still upset you didn’t indulge his request for a beverage.
“I do,” you reply and guzzle down half of your drink at once. “HB makes me laugh all the time; he’s hilarious.”
J glares at the couple with his mouth slightly open; it���s fair to say you are probably the most serious people he does business with. I mean, sometimes you have this expression on your face that could pass as a grin in disguise and your husband…well, the way he looks makes it impossible to imagine him cracking up about anything.
“Duly noted,” The Joker scoffs and Frost suddenly yells loud enough to be heard from outside the VIP room:
“Sir, the truck is here!”
J gets pumped up and rushes out, urging his companions to follow. “Come on, let’s see if it was worth the wait!”
But Y/N and her spouse don’t oblige: Bane finishes his drink in one sip and you place your glass on the small coffee table nearby, casually mentioning:
“I’m late.”
“No you’re not,” he’s fast to disagree while pointing at his wrist watch. “You’re always on time.”
You place his hand on your tummy and it clicks.
“Oooh,” Bane gulps and his wife has to add the necessary info:
“Just a little bit over a week, might be nothing. I’ll have to check it out.”
“Oh my God…” he zones out since the possibility of becoming a father sounds exciting and terrifying all at once. “We might have created a tiny Ghost.”
“Maybe, but I have to let you know I have no idea how to be a mom.”
“Me neither,” his witty answer makes you snort before bursting out laughing like crazy.
The Joker is on the hallway and stops, confused: he’s returning to the VIP section to see why you didn’t follow him, yet the contagious snickering coming from inside baffles his mind: are you two laughing?!
“Bane!! Ghost!! Are you coming or not?!” he shouts and the chuckle slowly dies out as you help your other half put on the mask. 
“Yeah, coming!” the pair joins The Clown towards the exit leading to the private parking lot behind the club.
“What were you talking about?” J curiously inquires.
“Personal stuff,” Bane gives an elusive explanation and opens the emergency door, firmly halting The Joker’s movement. “Ladies first!”
“For God’s sake,” J puffs and waits for you to pass by.
“Where are your manners, hm?” your husband scolds since he doesn’t approve of the host’s behavior.
“Would you give it a rest?!” The King of Gotham impatiently speeds up, fed up with Bane’s bickering.
As you walk towards the truck, you notice something you don’t like: the new muscle hired just a week ago is smoking without a care in the universe. You stomp towards him, yank the cigarette out of his fingers and step on it, aggravated:
“No smoking around my husband; you know the rule!!!”
The crew knows this is law simply because Bane has breathing problems but Lenox decides to mumble a thing or two to himself regarding the feisty woman. That’s too bad: your spouse doesn’t like it one bit. You don’t even have a chance to react to the observations since the goon is slammed against the nearest SUV by a very enraged husband.
“My wife’s a Goddess, you fucking asshole! You’re lucky if she blinks your way!”
The man is trying to escape the tight grip, the elbow forcefully pushing into his Adam’s apple not budging.
“I’m s-sorry boss,” Lenox struggles to speak and the noise of broken bone brings the quarrel to an end.
“You’re fired!” are the last words the henchman distinguishes as his limp body falls to the ground.    
The Joker’s girlfriend sneaks up and grabs his hand, uneasy about what she just witnessed.
“Elected to show up?!” J growls, instantaneously criticizing her lack of coordination. “I told you to be here at 7pm sharp!”
“Sorry baby, there was a lot of traffic on the freeway. What happened?”
”Ugggh,” The Clown scoffs, unwilling to describe the events. “Clean up the mess!” he orders and pushes her arm away since he’s not in the mood for cheap affection.
Kara sighs, upset she can’t squeeze any type of intimacy from him except for the instances when they sleep together. The Joker abandons her, more interested in Ghost because she’s already digging in some crates lowered from the truck, not even phased by Bane’s performance.
“Did you find items that strike your fancy?” he hovers over your boxes.
“Yeah, this gun, “ you show him the pistol decorated with skulls. “ Matches my motorcycle.”
“Very nice,” he praises your option and leans to whisper: “One of these days I would love to sink my teeth in you. I bet you taste good.”
Such an inappropriate remark would usually prompt a punch or a bullet from your part, yet you are dealing with the dreadful Joker: he’s not worth the trouble. Instead you lift your tight sleeve higher, exposing skin that you take directly to his lips.
“Go ahead then: take a bite, this way we can all go on with our lives.”
In the meantime, Bane is talking to his mercenaries, instructing them to load the merchandise he’ll pick in the trunks of the bigger cars.  
“Ghost!” he calls out. “I need you to lead the convoy afterwards!”
Apparently you have your hand up to The Joker’s mouth: did he blur out some crap again?! Definitely.
Yet you abandon your problem-project, waving at your husband.
Kara approaches also, not understanding what she saw from a distance.
“Hi Ghost,” the woman sadly acknowledges, jealous The Clown’s unwanted flirting might interfere with their already frail arrangement.  
“Hey,” you elegantly reject more dialogue, pretending to be immersed in your task.
“I’ll go see what else we received,” J groans and shamelessly discloses his thoughts with his girlfriend standing right there. “When you get bored with Bane, maybe you’ll allow me to make you my Queen.”
Kara’s heart sinks at his indifference regarding her hurt feelings; Ghost certainly has no patience for his shenanigans.
“I’m already someone’s Goddess and I’d rather die than settle for less!”
The Joker smirks, groping his girlfriend in the process. He hops in the truck, starting to search the containers, entirely ignoring Kara and your reply to his proposal.
She sniffles after the humiliation on having her man utter such aberrations straight under her nose.
“You have to keep him in a leash; he sure loves to bark a lot,” you feel the urge to add, irritated she’s such a pushover. “I’m not interested in his rubbish,” you take pity on her pathetic demeanor. “He’s totally howling at the wrong tree mostly to exasperate you and my husband.”
Kara nods a yes, unconvinced her boyfriend’s reasons are the same with the ones you’re illustrating; she tried to unsuccessfully befriend you for a while now, her desire linked to J’s twisted interest in another guy’s wife. Her logic is not the greatest: if you believe getting close to the woman your partner has a special attraction for will help your case, then you should recheck your priorities.
Ghost never gave a damn about becoming Kara’s buddy since she doesn’t tolerate people to begin with. Except Bane. He’s special.
“Mmm…” The Joker’s girl fusses with her minuscule purse,”do you happen to have a pad? I thought I had an extra one in here.”
“Nope, but my husband does,” you serenely admit.
“Huh?” she hums, completely baffled.
“HB!!!” you get his attention. “I need you for a sec!”
He comes to meet you at the end of the truck, lowering himself so you can reach his heavy vest. One of the many pockets contains the required product and you can’t help but soothe his disappointment:
“No worries, it’s not for me,” you wink and he exhales, relieved.
As soon as Bane returns by his side, The Joker has to say it:
“You often carry feminine hygiene articles inside your gear?”
“Ghost might need it,” your spouse marvels at J’s question. “You don’t do that for your girl?!”
J doesn’t like to be put on the spot, yet your spouse grills him on regular basis as a payback for The Clown’s numerous offenses.
“I have no space,” he wiggles his way out of it.
“You got pockets attached to your fancy suits, correct? I’m sure you have enough anatomy knowledge to understand such matters and how simple it is to improve your woman’s life with such a small thing.”
“Would you give me a break?!” J interrupts Bane. “Nobody cares to hear about how perfect you are.”
HB doesn’t appreciate the irony in The King’s tone:
“You’re so hopeless,” he justly deduces, raising a massive crate with ammo he finds useful for his team. “I’ll take half of everything,” Bane changes subject, actually bored with teasing The Joker.
**************
The convoy is exiting the parking lot following your lead: you usually ride your motorcycle in front of the vehicles, scouting ahead when necessary. You never know when there’s a road blockage or accident where cops will be patrolling the area; it’s wiser to steer clear of redundant trouble.
Your husband is driving the first truck behind you, followed by four more vans and six SUV’s. He wouldn’t have it any other way: Bane’s addicted to the nice view of seeing Ghost mounted on her customized Harley Davidson: skulls painted against a shiny, clear background to match her tattoo, a gift from him for your four year wedding anniversary.
“Your butt looks very nice on that bike,” he compliments and you giggle through the mike in your helmet. “I can’t wait to…”
“Boss,” Eric cuts in. “You forgot to switch the frequency to the other line; we can all hear you.”
“Goddamned jerks!” Bane groans and pushes the red button on his walkie-talkie, vexed he forgot to switch the channels.
Again.
You laugh at his frustration, finding it priceless this keeps on happening.
“Yes, I know you can’t wait to get home,” you snort and accelerate. “Me too; it’s been a long day and sex is bound to do the trick and wind us down.”
Watching Ghost’s long, white hair flying in the wind makes Bane even more impatient.
“We might need to pull over, not sure I can make it.”
“You have to,” his wife advices. “Otherwise we’ll be late and we might bump into traffic coming from 205 Southbound.”
“Shit…” he reckons you’re not wrong. “I’ll try my best but I can’t make any promises.”
************
After two hours
You ignore the first knock. The second and third also.  
“Jesus!” you moan, disappointed with the interference.
Bane continues to kiss your neck, making his way down your cleavage: he sure adores the red, skimpy little bra you’re wearing.
More knocking.
“You must be kidding me!” you grind your teeth and get off him, leaving a disappointed husband hanging by a thread.
“If it’s one of the boys I’ll bash their brains in!” he threatens and you tug on the door handle, prepared to lash out when the sight of Kara catches you by surprise.
“Yes?...” you roll of eyes at the unwelcomed visitor while wrapping the bathrobe around your frame.
“Hi Ghost,” she swallows her tears and you can see she is fighting to stay calm. “Is J here?”
“No.”
“He’s not answering his phone,” she gulps and nervously bundles in the thin coat she’s wearing, unconsciously attempting to cover her ripped skirt.
“Well, he’s not here,” you make it short but something about her strange behavior causes a small investigation. “What’s wrong?”
She chokes and suddenly bursts out crying, struggling to articulate the sentences. 
“J l-eft me at the c-club to wait for him and o-one…one of the bouncers tried to rape m-me.”
You’re silent for a few moments before inviting her in your home. No wonder security let her pass: they recognized The Joker’s girlfriend and assumed she was expected.
“This way,” you guide her towards the living room, gesturing for one of the chairs. “Sit!”
She can’t stop sobbing and you pour some bourbon in a glass, encouraging her to drink.
“Finish this!”
Kara sips the alcohol and her shaky hands almost drop the container.
You take a blanket from the sofa and cover her with it, immediately snatching your cell from the table.
You touch the screen and it rings just once.
“Hello there.”
He sure picked up right away.
“Why aren’t you answering your phone?!”
“I just did.”
“Your girlfriend is trying to reach you!” Ghost mutters, literally pissed at his conduct.
“I’m busy,” he takes the easy way out and you are instantly fired up:
“If you would pay attention to Kara instead of wasting your charms on a married woman maybe the idiots working for you wouldn’t assume they can take liberties without any type of consequences!!!!”
J is stunned you’re screaming like that, yet he wants to find out what’s going on.
“What do you mean?!”
“One of your bouncers at the club tried to rape her and you won’t even answer her calls!”
The King of Gotham is dumbfounded and speechless for once since someone would dare such an affront.
“Lemme talk to her,” he requires and you hand over the phone to the horrified girlfriend; she has a difficult time telling him the details of her scary experience and how she barely escaped the attack.
You keep on gazing at her, Kara’s misfortune striking a chord within your soul: her situation reminds you of your past, although the circumstances were quite different.
Five years ago, Y/N survived her faith; the man responsible for creating the Goddess she is today saved her and didn’t ask for anything in return, not even for a name.
Although she told him once.
And he decided there’s nothing better than a mysterious Ghost, except being loved by one.
Also read: MASTERLIST
diyunho(.)tumblr(.)com/post/153664676321/joker-x-reader-masterlist
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darksoulszine · 5 years
Text
Interview with Asrielle
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Today we interview Asrielle! One of our contributors in THE FIRST FLAME.
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Q: How did you get into making art and for how long have you been doing it?
My dad used to draw my favorite TV show characters for me as a kid, and it inspired me to start drawing too. I've been drawing since I was a toddler, but I only started taking it seriously in my teens, so it's been over a decade now that I've been studying and trying to improve, but over 20 years drawing for fun.
Q: What traditional media or digital program do you prefer to use and why?
I prefer to use a HB pencil and regular paper for most things I draw, and then if I really like a drawing, I'll move it into Adobe Photoshop or Clip Studio Paint. I've slowly started using those programs more for illustrations because of their brush capabilities, which are really fun to work with. I think I'll be using Clip Studio Paint a lot more in the future!
 Q: Do you mostly make fan art or are there original works you are also passionate about?
I mostly make fan art! It's so much fun talking about things that I love with other people, and I love seeing everyone else's fan art as well. I have original works that I care about, but I get wrapped up in my video games a little too often and draw even more fan art as a result, haha.
 Q: Is there any artist or art movement that inspires you? Which ones?
Ayami Kojima, who did a lot of art for the Castlevania games, is a big inspiration of mine! James Gurney is fantastic. He's my inspiration for playing with all sorts of lighting in my work. I love looking at art that features dramatic sunlight and shadow and perfectly replicates how light changes throughout the day.
 Q: What would you say to someone who is willing to dedicate their life to art, but doesn’t take that step because of the risks?
I can understand this. I took a lot of risks pursuing art, and I still wonder if it was worthwhile sometimes. It really depends on what you want out of creating art. If it's for money, I can respect that, but if you force yourself to do something, it will just make you hate it in the end. But if creating art makes you happy and leaves you with a sense of fulfillment, I think you should accept the risks. Life's too short to play it safe and wonder "what if?" Usually, I'll just tell myself "just do it" nowadays. Failure isn't failure if it can be turned into a learning experience. At least, that's what the Souls games taught me!
Q: What do you like about being an artist?
I have a really bad memory, so when I finish a drawing I'd spent a lot of time on and look back on it later, I can remember a lot of how I felt when I worked on it and the steps that led up to its creation. It's like putting a part of myself on paper, as cheesy as that sounds. It's the same with how photos can really capture a moment in time. The community is also really cool, since there are so many other artists who go through all the same struggles and you all can bond over the creative process and the results. I love that there are so many of us out there making really cool things that we can wake up to and get inspired by, and that I get to be part of that too.
  Q: Show us some of your favorite artworks that you made and tell us why.
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Solaire is such a fun and interesting character that really stands out in a dark game that's aptly named "Dark Souls." I love kind and supportive characters and I immediately said to myself "I must protect him at all costs." I drew him in all sorts of funny situations and turned a few of the drawings into stickers. People who saw them would get so excited and we'd chat about our favorite sunny boy, and it's honestly really fun!
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Bloodborne is near and dear to my heart and the sight of Yharnam is something that is so inspiring to me and I knew if I did any Bloodborne fan art, I would have to draw the city eventually. I want to draw it again!
Q: Where can we find more of your work? Are there any personal projects you would like to share?
You can find my work mostly on Twitter! (@asrikins) I post a lot of WIPs and general video game stuff, as well as conventions I'll be selling my artwork at. If you like anime conventions, you might find me there with a bunch of Soulsborne merch! I also plan on returning to Twitch, where I have streamed artwork as well as a playthrough of Dark Souls 3 in the past. I hope to open a sticker shop soon with Soulsborne merch, but that will be announced on my twitter at a later date. Right now you can find a few of my designs on Redbubble at www.redbubble.com/people/asrielle.
 Q: What order did you play the soulsborne games in? Which is your favorite?
I started with Bloodborne when it was free for PS+ members. It's my favorite. It took me a week to get through Central Yharnam because I was so terrified and I would have nightmares every night. I kept playing because I would get further than my husband (who almost quit because it was so difficult) and then he would try to catch up. When I beat Father Gascoigne on my first attempt after struggling and learning along the way to his arena, I realized how well-designed the game was and got extremely hooked. The high from winning a major fight is amazing! It taught me a lot about perseverance and learning through trial and error and affected how I approach a lot of things in real life as well.
After Bloodborne and its DLC, my husband and I immediately bought Dark Souls. Then Dark Souls 2, and Dark Souls 3. We beat all the DLC and got the platinum trophies in each game. We've met and bonded with so many Soulsborne fans and I regret not getting into the series sooner over fears of "not being good enough to play." Right now we're playing Demon's Souls and Sekiro and I love it! The series has taken over our lives, haha.
Q: When you got eaten by a mimic for the first time, what did you yell out loud?
I laughed! "Why are its legs so long??"
 Q: Any memorable Dark Souls gaming moments you'd like to share?
There are honestly so many memorable moments! One of my favorites is when my husband and I were playing with our friends on Dark Souls 2 and we got invaded. We were all standing there dual-wielding the Smelter Sword and Aged Smelter Sword on a narrow bridge. The invader saw this, and promptly ran away and knelt for forgiveness in a corner as the four of us engulfed him in huge red and blue flames and destroyed him in seconds. It was the most ridiculously over-the-top execution I'd ever seen of an invader in the series, haha.
Another favorite is in the first Dark Souls when my husband and I got really far into Anor Londo, just to get invaded. We were so sure we were going to lose our progress that my husband dropped all the money he had on the ground in an attempt to bribe the invader to leave while we backed away. It worked! He took the money, praised the sun, and left. We found each other on PSN later and started playing co-op later on as buddies!
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Get the zine at: 🔥 [ THE FIRST FLAME ] 🔥 info page
𝐅𝐨𝐥𝐥𝐨𝐰 𝐮𝐬 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐮𝐩𝐝𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐬 𝐨𝐧 𝐩𝐫𝐞-𝐨𝐫𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐬 & 𝐫𝐞𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐬𝐞:
on tumblr @darksoulszine
on insta @DarkSoulsFanZine
on twitter @SoulsFanZine
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afriendlypokealien · 3 years
Text
News and useful info on Point of Sale & POS Hardware.
This article was produced through the NPR NextGen/Texas Observer Print Scholars program, a new collaboration designed to offer mentorship and hands-on training to student journalists and recent graduates interested in a career in investigative journalism.
For Greyson’s safety, identifying details, locations, and recent photos of his face have been intentionally left out of this story. 
The lull between spring and fall semester was short-lived at the Rodriguez house. Lauren Rodriguez, a 37-year-old social worker, was busy managing a list of things that need to get done before her teenage son, Greyson Rodriguez, can start college in the fall. But before orientation and moving Greyson more than 1,000 miles away to begin his undergraduate career, the Rodriguez family needed to get through high school graduation.
Several boxes of supplies cluttered the dining room table, ready to be shipped to the school. Rodriguez checked on Greyson for the second time, warning the sleeping teen that he had a student advising appointment beginning in a few minutes. Greyson emerged, sluggish and silent, to sit on an oversized brown loveseat and stare at his phone. The neediest of their three dogs, Daisy, hopped into his lap to demand attention.
“He can be lazy sometimes, because that’s all teenagers,” Rodriguez says of Greyson. “But when he wants something, he’s very driven.”
Greyson has had to be driven. He graduated a year early to escape Texas, which he has mockingly nicknamed “the great state of hate.” Indeed, Texas is one of the most dangerous states in the country for a teen like Greyson.
At 13, Greyson came out as trans. He and his family faced abuse, cruelty, death threats, and aggression.  “While I never read them, I know that during the summer I got death threats when I was 13 from people in my neighborhood who were sending me mail telling me to kill myself and they wanted me to die,” Greyson says. He was forced to switch to an online school and the family eventually moved to the more progressive Austin area to get away from their conservative hometown. Texas ranks second in the U.S. in number of cases of fatal violence against transgender and gender non-conforming people since 2013, according to the Human Rights Campaign.
Since he came out, both he and his mother have become advocates for LGBTQ Texans, especially trans youth. In March, Lauren Rodriguez testified in front of the Texas House Committee on Criminal Jurisprudence in support of House Bill 73, which would have banned the use of the “gay/trans panic” defense. The panic defense, often cited by defendants in cases of violence directed at gay or trans people, argues that after an individual discovered someone was gay or trans, they panicked and assaulted or killed them.
“Currently in the state of Texas, a criminal penalty for a defendants’ violence, including murder, can be lessened or eliminated if the perpetrator claims that the victim’s gender identity or sexual orientation triggered a mental breakdown that resulted in their loss of self control and subsequent assault,” state Representative Gina Hinojosa, a Democrat who filed HB 73, said during the public hearing. 
In more than 100 criminal cases between 1970 and 2020 where defendants attempted to use the “gay/trans panic” defense, the highest concentration of cases took place in Texas, according to W. Carsten Andresen a professor at St. Edwards University in Austin and an expert on the topic.
But the 87th Texas Legislature failed to pass HB 73, signaling to LGBTQ Texans like Greyson Rodriguez and his family that the “gay/trans panic” defense is still an acceptable excuse for violence against vulnerable Texans. The bill was brought to a vote and rejected in the House committee, while the Senate companion never got a hearing. Despite the defense’s conflict with federal hate crime laws and a 2013 resolution from the American Bar Association calling for states to ban it, so far only 15 states and D.C. have passed legislation banning the use of the “gay/trans panic” defense, with bills proposed in Texas and 10 other states. 
*
In 2018, James Miller, a 69-year-old Austin man, was sentenced to six months in jail plus 10 years probation for stabbing his neighbor Daniel Spencer to death. Instead of a murder or manslaughter charge, Miller was convicted of the lesser offense of criminally negligent homicide after claiming that Spencer had made sexual advances and that he acted in self-defense. However, prosecutors called the self-defense claim “ludicrous,” saying Miller didn’t have “so much as a scratch on him.” LGBTQ rights advocates and experts like Andresen point to the light sentence in this case as an example of the “gay/trans panic” defense at work.
“‘Are they going to get away with murder?’ That’s the concern,” Greyson says. “It’s not a matter of if it’ll stop or to lower the rates that we’re being killed. It’s, if we do die at least justice is being served properly.”
During the public hearing, 11 people, including Rodriguez, testified in support of banning the defense and submitted a total of 15 pages of written statements supporting the bill. In contrast, only a lobbyist from Texas Values Action, a conservative think tank and evangelical Christian organization, testified against HB 73. 
“I think it’s not good public policy to include definitions of sexual orientation or gender identity because it forces us to determine what a person perceives,” said Jonathan Covey, the Texas Values Action lobbyist. “You easily run into issues of constitutional vagueness when you use this terminology.”
In 2009, the federal definition of a hate crime was expanded to include crimes motivated by gender identity and sexual orientation in federal cases, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. While Texas’s hate crime statute includes crimes motivated by sexual orientation, it does not include crimes motivated by gender identity.
During the public hearing on HB 73, Covey also said that his organization opposed the bill due to free speech concerns. “It’s typically a bad public policy to ban offensive speech,” Covey said. “Open discussion even in a courtroom is better than allowing supposed bias to fester in a type of subconscious realm.” 
“This is not a free speech bill,” state Representative Ann Johnson replied. “We are talking about the criminal context where it’s assaultive conduct. Right? So it’s not a speech.”
“I understand that,” Covey said. 
Johnson continued: “For example if a 16-year-old has sex with a 32-year-old, we would not allow the 32-year old to say, ‘but she consented.’ We have made a policy decision that there is no consent, correct?”
“I think I’m following what you’re saying,” Covey said. But, “we don’t create laws that hinge on someone’s perception of how much they weigh or create laws that hinge on someone’s perception of how tall they are.”
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Greyson Rodriguez poses with his maternal grandparents, who flew into Texas to attend his graduation.  Sadie Brown
Rodriguez says that this failure to support and affirm gay, trans, and gender diverse Texans at the state level exacerbates safety concerns for Greyson. “My son has to live in fear of someone finding out he is trans and hurting him,” Rodriguez said during her testimony.  
In nearly every social situation, Greyson has to consider how someone would react to him coming out as trans. At his first job as a host in a restaurant, Greyson says he “tested the waters” to gauge his coworkers’ acceptance of him by mentioning his long-time boyfriend; he didn’t tell them he was trans.
Rodriguez and her son have strict rules around dating, specifically about coming out to potential partners. Because LGBTQ people are at a much greater risk of intimate partner violence, Rodriguez and Greyson have agreed that the first few dates with a new person will always be in public and that Greyson will only come out if he decides it’s safe and wants to pursue a relationship. He says that conversation is also about mutual respect.
“If I think I want to have a relationship with you and you think you want to have a relationship with me, I still want that to be built on everything being out in the open,” he says. “Not built on your assumptions on what you think is going on, only for that to be thrown out the window and you having a crisis or not understanding what to do with this information.” 
*
On a humid day in early June, Greyson accepts his high school diploma during a socially distanced, in-person commencement ceremony. He’s difficult to spot in his emerald cap and gown with a black mask covering nearly his entire face. 
When his name is called, Greyson walks out onto the stage to shake hands with administrators, as his mother, father, and grandparents cheer from a section near the front of the room. Then he disappears again into the first few rows of seats filled with other teens leaving high school behind.
Greyson also plans to leave behind his activism, at least for a while. “Passing isn’t the goal,” Rodriguez says, but both she and Greyson describe the importance of his identity outside of being trans, and safety concerns around his visibility. 
“There’s some people who think every single person on the planet has a right to know,” Greyson says. “In my opinion it would be great if everyone had the ability to know and it wasn’t a threat. But the less random people who freaking know, the less risk there is.”
Greyson will start college in the fall, 1,200 miles away from his home and parents because he says he isn’t safe in “the great state of hate.” Inspired by the affirming care he has received from his medical team, Rodriguez says that he plans on studying nursing. Lauren had hoped that a bill banning the “gay/trans panic” defense would bring some peace of mind that would allow her family to remain close.
“If we pass this bill, my son may be able to feel safe enough to return to Texas and live as his authentic self,” Rodriguez said during her testimony. “And I would have my son closer to me.”
This program is made possible by gifts from Roxanne Elder in memory of her mother, journalist and journalism teacher Virginia Stephenson Elder, Vincent LoVoi in honor of Jim Marston and Annette LoVoi, and other generous donors.
This post was first provided here.
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afrolatinxsunited · 3 years
Text
News and useful info on Point of Sale & POS Hardware.
This article was produced through the NPR NextGen/Texas Observer Print Scholars program, a new collaboration designed to offer mentorship and hands-on training to student journalists and recent graduates interested in a career in investigative journalism.
For Greyson’s safety, identifying details, locations, and recent photos of his face have been intentionally left out of this story. 
The lull between spring and fall semester was short-lived at the Rodriguez house. Lauren Rodriguez, a 37-year-old social worker, was busy managing a list of things that need to get done before her teenage son, Greyson Rodriguez, can start college in the fall. But before orientation and moving Greyson more than 1,000 miles away to begin his undergraduate career, the Rodriguez family needed to get through high school graduation.
Several boxes of supplies cluttered the dining room table, ready to be shipped to the school. Rodriguez checked on Greyson for the second time, warning the sleeping teen that he had a student advising appointment beginning in a few minutes. Greyson emerged, sluggish and silent, to sit on an oversized brown loveseat and stare at his phone. The neediest of their three dogs, Daisy, hopped into his lap to demand attention.
“He can be lazy sometimes, because that’s all teenagers,” Rodriguez says of Greyson. “But when he wants something, he’s very driven.”
Greyson has had to be driven. He graduated a year early to escape Texas, which he has mockingly nicknamed “the great state of hate.” Indeed, Texas is one of the most dangerous states in the country for a teen like Greyson.
At 13, Greyson came out as trans. He and his family faced abuse, cruelty, death threats, and aggression.  “While I never read them, I know that during the summer I got death threats when I was 13 from people in my neighborhood who were sending me mail telling me to kill myself and they wanted me to die,” Greyson says. He was forced to switch to an online school and the family eventually moved to the more progressive Austin area to get away from their conservative hometown. Texas ranks second in the U.S. in number of cases of fatal violence against transgender and gender non-conforming people since 2013, according to the Human Rights Campaign.
Since he came out, both he and his mother have become advocates for LGBTQ Texans, especially trans youth. In March, Lauren Rodriguez testified in front of the Texas House Committee on Criminal Jurisprudence in support of House Bill 73, which would have banned the use of the “gay/trans panic” defense. The panic defense, often cited by defendants in cases of violence directed at gay or trans people, argues that after an individual discovered someone was gay or trans, they panicked and assaulted or killed them.
“Currently in the state of Texas, a criminal penalty for a defendants’ violence, including murder, can be lessened or eliminated if the perpetrator claims that the victim’s gender identity or sexual orientation triggered a mental breakdown that resulted in their loss of self control and subsequent assault,” state Representative Gina Hinojosa, a Democrat who filed HB 73, said during the public hearing. 
In more than 100 criminal cases between 1970 and 2020 where defendants attempted to use the “gay/trans panic” defense, the highest concentration of cases took place in Texas, according to W. Carsten Andresen a professor at St. Edwards University in Austin and an expert on the topic.
But the 87th Texas Legislature failed to pass HB 73, signaling to LGBTQ Texans like Greyson Rodriguez and his family that the “gay/trans panic” defense is still an acceptable excuse for violence against vulnerable Texans. The bill was brought to a vote and rejected in the House committee, while the Senate companion never got a hearing. Despite the defense’s conflict with federal hate crime laws and a 2013 resolution from the American Bar Association calling for states to ban it, so far only 15 states and D.C. have passed legislation banning the use of the “gay/trans panic” defense, with bills proposed in Texas and 10 other states. 
*
In 2018, James Miller, a 69-year-old Austin man, was sentenced to six months in jail plus 10 years probation for stabbing his neighbor Daniel Spencer to death. Instead of a murder or manslaughter charge, Miller was convicted of the lesser offense of criminally negligent homicide after claiming that Spencer had made sexual advances and that he acted in self-defense. However, prosecutors called the self-defense claim “ludicrous,” saying Miller didn’t have “so much as a scratch on him.” LGBTQ rights advocates and experts like Andresen point to the light sentence in this case as an example of the “gay/trans panic” defense at work.
“‘Are they going to get away with murder?’ That’s the concern,” Greyson says. “It’s not a matter of if it’ll stop or to lower the rates that we’re being killed. It’s, if we do die at least justice is being served properly.”
During the public hearing, 11 people, including Rodriguez, testified in support of banning the defense and submitted a total of 15 pages of written statements supporting the bill. In contrast, only a lobbyist from Texas Values Action, a conservative think tank and evangelical Christian organization, testified against HB 73. 
“I think it’s not good public policy to include definitions of sexual orientation or gender identity because it forces us to determine what a person perceives,” said Jonathan Covey, the Texas Values Action lobbyist. “You easily run into issues of constitutional vagueness when you use this terminology.”
In 2009, the federal definition of a hate crime was expanded to include crimes motivated by gender identity and sexual orientation in federal cases, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. While Texas’s hate crime statute includes crimes motivated by sexual orientation, it does not include crimes motivated by gender identity.
During the public hearing on HB 73, Covey also said that his organization opposed the bill due to free speech concerns. “It’s typically a bad public policy to ban offensive speech,” Covey said. “Open discussion even in a courtroom is better than allowing supposed bias to fester in a type of subconscious realm.” 
“This is not a free speech bill,” state Representative Ann Johnson replied. “We are talking about the criminal context where it’s assaultive conduct. Right? So it’s not a speech.”
“I understand that,” Covey said. 
Johnson continued: “For example if a 16-year-old has sex with a 32-year-old, we would not allow the 32-year old to say, ‘but she consented.’ We have made a policy decision that there is no consent, correct?”
“I think I’m following what you’re saying,” Covey said. But, “we don’t create laws that hinge on someone’s perception of how much they weigh or create laws that hinge on someone’s perception of how tall they are.”
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Greyson Rodriguez poses with his maternal grandparents, who flew into Texas to attend his graduation.  Sadie Brown
Rodriguez says that this failure to support and affirm gay, trans, and gender diverse Texans at the state level exacerbates safety concerns for Greyson. “My son has to live in fear of someone finding out he is trans and hurting him,” Rodriguez said during her testimony.  
In nearly every social situation, Greyson has to consider how someone would react to him coming out as trans. At his first job as a host in a restaurant, Greyson says he “tested the waters” to gauge his coworkers’ acceptance of him by mentioning his long-time boyfriend; he didn’t tell them he was trans.
Rodriguez and her son have strict rules around dating, specifically about coming out to potential partners. Because LGBTQ people are at a much greater risk of intimate partner violence, Rodriguez and Greyson have agreed that the first few dates with a new person will always be in public and that Greyson will only come out if he decides it’s safe and wants to pursue a relationship. He says that conversation is also about mutual respect.
“If I think I want to have a relationship with you and you think you want to have a relationship with me, I still want that to be built on everything being out in the open,” he says. “Not built on your assumptions on what you think is going on, only for that to be thrown out the window and you having a crisis or not understanding what to do with this information.” 
*
On a humid day in early June, Greyson accepts his high school diploma during a socially distanced, in-person commencement ceremony. He’s difficult to spot in his emerald cap and gown with a black mask covering nearly his entire face. 
When his name is called, Greyson walks out onto the stage to shake hands with administrators, as his mother, father, and grandparents cheer from a section near the front of the room. Then he disappears again into the first few rows of seats filled with other teens leaving high school behind.
Greyson also plans to leave behind his activism, at least for a while. “Passing isn’t the goal,” Rodriguez says, but both she and Greyson describe the importance of his identity outside of being trans, and safety concerns around his visibility. 
“There’s some people who think every single person on the planet has a right to know,” Greyson says. “In my opinion it would be great if everyone had the ability to know and it wasn’t a threat. But the less random people who freaking know, the less risk there is.”
Greyson will start college in the fall, 1,200 miles away from his home and parents because he says he isn’t safe in “the great state of hate.” Inspired by the affirming care he has received from his medical team, Rodriguez says that he plans on studying nursing. Lauren had hoped that a bill banning the “gay/trans panic” defense would bring some peace of mind that would allow her family to remain close.
“If we pass this bill, my son may be able to feel safe enough to return to Texas and live as his authentic self,” Rodriguez said during her testimony. “And I would have my son closer to me.”
This program is made possible by gifts from Roxanne Elder in memory of her mother, journalist and journalism teacher Virginia Stephenson Elder, Vincent LoVoi in honor of Jim Marston and Annette LoVoi, and other generous donors.
This post was first provided here.
We trust you found the above useful or interesting. You can find similar content on our blog here: southtxpointofsale.com Let me have your feedback in the comments section below. Let us know what topics we should cover for you in the future.
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afroavocadowitch · 3 years
Text
News and useful info on Point of Sale & POS Hardware.
This article was produced through the NPR NextGen/Texas Observer Print Scholars program, a new collaboration designed to offer mentorship and hands-on training to student journalists and recent graduates interested in a career in investigative journalism.
For Greyson’s safety, identifying details, locations, and recent photos of his face have been intentionally left out of this story. 
The lull between spring and fall semester was short-lived at the Rodriguez house. Lauren Rodriguez, a 37-year-old social worker, was busy managing a list of things that need to get done before her teenage son, Greyson Rodriguez, can start college in the fall. But before orientation and moving Greyson more than 1,000 miles away to begin his undergraduate career, the Rodriguez family needed to get through high school graduation.
Several boxes of supplies cluttered the dining room table, ready to be shipped to the school. Rodriguez checked on Greyson for the second time, warning the sleeping teen that he had a student advising appointment beginning in a few minutes. Greyson emerged, sluggish and silent, to sit on an oversized brown loveseat and stare at his phone. The neediest of their three dogs, Daisy, hopped into his lap to demand attention.
“He can be lazy sometimes, because that’s all teenagers,” Rodriguez says of Greyson. “But when he wants something, he’s very driven.”
Greyson has had to be driven. He graduated a year early to escape Texas, which he has mockingly nicknamed “the great state of hate.” Indeed, Texas is one of the most dangerous states in the country for a teen like Greyson.
At 13, Greyson came out as trans. He and his family faced abuse, cruelty, death threats, and aggression.  “While I never read them, I know that during the summer I got death threats when I was 13 from people in my neighborhood who were sending me mail telling me to kill myself and they wanted me to die,” Greyson says. He was forced to switch to an online school and the family eventually moved to the more progressive Austin area to get away from their conservative hometown. Texas ranks second in the U.S. in number of cases of fatal violence against transgender and gender non-conforming people since 2013, according to the Human Rights Campaign.
Since he came out, both he and his mother have become advocates for LGBTQ Texans, especially trans youth. In March, Lauren Rodriguez testified in front of the Texas House Committee on Criminal Jurisprudence in support of House Bill 73, which would have banned the use of the “gay/trans panic” defense. The panic defense, often cited by defendants in cases of violence directed at gay or trans people, argues that after an individual discovered someone was gay or trans, they panicked and assaulted or killed them.
“Currently in the state of Texas, a criminal penalty for a defendants’ violence, including murder, can be lessened or eliminated if the perpetrator claims that the victim’s gender identity or sexual orientation triggered a mental breakdown that resulted in their loss of self control and subsequent assault,” state Representative Gina Hinojosa, a Democrat who filed HB 73, said during the public hearing. 
In more than 100 criminal cases between 1970 and 2020 where defendants attempted to use the “gay/trans panic” defense, the highest concentration of cases took place in Texas, according to W. Carsten Andresen a professor at St. Edwards University in Austin and an expert on the topic.
But the 87th Texas Legislature failed to pass HB 73, signaling to LGBTQ Texans like Greyson Rodriguez and his family that the “gay/trans panic” defense is still an acceptable excuse for violence against vulnerable Texans. The bill was brought to a vote and rejected in the House committee, while the Senate companion never got a hearing. Despite the defense’s conflict with federal hate crime laws and a 2013 resolution from the American Bar Association calling for states to ban it, so far only 15 states and D.C. have passed legislation banning the use of the “gay/trans panic” defense, with bills proposed in Texas and 10 other states. 
*
In 2018, James Miller, a 69-year-old Austin man, was sentenced to six months in jail plus 10 years probation for stabbing his neighbor Daniel Spencer to death. Instead of a murder or manslaughter charge, Miller was convicted of the lesser offense of criminally negligent homicide after claiming that Spencer had made sexual advances and that he acted in self-defense. However, prosecutors called the self-defense claim “ludicrous,” saying Miller didn’t have “so much as a scratch on him.” LGBTQ rights advocates and experts like Andresen point to the light sentence in this case as an example of the “gay/trans panic” defense at work.
“‘Are they going to get away with murder?’ That’s the concern,” Greyson says. “It’s not a matter of if it’ll stop or to lower the rates that we’re being killed. It’s, if we do die at least justice is being served properly.”
During the public hearing, 11 people, including Rodriguez, testified in support of banning the defense and submitted a total of 15 pages of written statements supporting the bill. In contrast, only a lobbyist from Texas Values Action, a conservative think tank and evangelical Christian organization, testified against HB 73. 
“I think it’s not good public policy to include definitions of sexual orientation or gender identity because it forces us to determine what a person perceives,” said Jonathan Covey, the Texas Values Action lobbyist. “You easily run into issues of constitutional vagueness when you use this terminology.”
In 2009, the federal definition of a hate crime was expanded to include crimes motivated by gender identity and sexual orientation in federal cases, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. While Texas’s hate crime statute includes crimes motivated by sexual orientation, it does not include crimes motivated by gender identity.
During the public hearing on HB 73, Covey also said that his organization opposed the bill due to free speech concerns. “It’s typically a bad public policy to ban offensive speech,” Covey said. “Open discussion even in a courtroom is better than allowing supposed bias to fester in a type of subconscious realm.” 
“This is not a free speech bill,” state Representative Ann Johnson replied. “We are talking about the criminal context where it’s assaultive conduct. Right? So it’s not a speech.”
“I understand that,” Covey said. 
Johnson continued: “For example if a 16-year-old has sex with a 32-year-old, we would not allow the 32-year old to say, ‘but she consented.’ We have made a policy decision that there is no consent, correct?”
“I think I’m following what you’re saying,” Covey said. But, “we don’t create laws that hinge on someone’s perception of how much they weigh or create laws that hinge on someone’s perception of how tall they are.”
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Greyson Rodriguez poses with his maternal grandparents, who flew into Texas to attend his graduation.  Sadie Brown
Rodriguez says that this failure to support and affirm gay, trans, and gender diverse Texans at the state level exacerbates safety concerns for Greyson. “My son has to live in fear of someone finding out he is trans and hurting him,” Rodriguez said during her testimony.  
In nearly every social situation, Greyson has to consider how someone would react to him coming out as trans. At his first job as a host in a restaurant, Greyson says he “tested the waters” to gauge his coworkers’ acceptance of him by mentioning his long-time boyfriend; he didn’t tell them he was trans.
Rodriguez and her son have strict rules around dating, specifically about coming out to potential partners. Because LGBTQ people are at a much greater risk of intimate partner violence, Rodriguez and Greyson have agreed that the first few dates with a new person will always be in public and that Greyson will only come out if he decides it’s safe and wants to pursue a relationship. He says that conversation is also about mutual respect.
“If I think I want to have a relationship with you and you think you want to have a relationship with me, I still want that to be built on everything being out in the open,” he says. “Not built on your assumptions on what you think is going on, only for that to be thrown out the window and you having a crisis or not understanding what to do with this information.” 
*
On a humid day in early June, Greyson accepts his high school diploma during a socially distanced, in-person commencement ceremony. He’s difficult to spot in his emerald cap and gown with a black mask covering nearly his entire face. 
When his name is called, Greyson walks out onto the stage to shake hands with administrators, as his mother, father, and grandparents cheer from a section near the front of the room. Then he disappears again into the first few rows of seats filled with other teens leaving high school behind.
Greyson also plans to leave behind his activism, at least for a while. “Passing isn’t the goal,” Rodriguez says, but both she and Greyson describe the importance of his identity outside of being trans, and safety concerns around his visibility. 
“There’s some people who think every single person on the planet has a right to know,” Greyson says. “In my opinion it would be great if everyone had the ability to know and it wasn’t a threat. But the less random people who freaking know, the less risk there is.”
Greyson will start college in the fall, 1,200 miles away from his home and parents because he says he isn’t safe in “the great state of hate.” Inspired by the affirming care he has received from his medical team, Rodriguez says that he plans on studying nursing. Lauren had hoped that a bill banning the “gay/trans panic” defense would bring some peace of mind that would allow her family to remain close.
“If we pass this bill, my son may be able to feel safe enough to return to Texas and live as his authentic self,” Rodriguez said during her testimony. “And I would have my son closer to me.”
This program is made possible by gifts from Roxanne Elder in memory of her mother, journalist and journalism teacher Virginia Stephenson Elder, Vincent LoVoi in honor of Jim Marston and Annette LoVoi, and other generous donors.
This post was first provided here.
We trust you found the above useful or interesting. You can find similar content on our blog here: southtxpointofsale.com Let me have your feedback in the comments section below. Let us know what topics we should cover for you in the future.
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hardblazesong · 6 years
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25 Days and Nights of Holiday Films with HBS ~ Day 5 ~ How the Grinch Stole Christmas
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Just for you @flocklander who thinks herself a Grinch but is really rather a CindyLooWho in my eyes...
This is about the Live Action film, but here is the the wiki for the Suess info:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_the_Grinch_Stole_Christmas!
and here’s the one for the Film:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_the_Grinch_Stole_Christmas_(2018_film)
In the spirit of the season, first the Good:
If someone had to make a live action film of this, I’m glad it was Ron Howard and Imagine. They do quality work. They also got the fabulous Rik Baker to do the makeup. It’s phenomenal, as one would expect. Sir Anthony Hopkins is the narrator and I would listen to him read anything, so there’s that.
The expansion of the story is well done. Saving further comment on that for below. If you have kids around who are between say the ages of 6 and 10, and they haven’t seen it, I bet they will be enchanted with it. Soft PG warning on some of the language. 
There is one bit in this film that is snarky fun, it’s when the Grinch puts on his baseball cap and skewers his director. I’d forgotten that because I had seen it only once before.
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Now for the rest of what I think about it, the Bad:
This movie is an hour too long. Seriously, it’s an exercise in how much can we let Jim Carey get away with. It grates after a while, even though I really do think he was well cast. 
It’s not the animated version by far, and I miss Boris Karloff. I saw that the first time as wee tyke myself, and I loved it, still do. So, watch that one, then this one, if just haven’t gotten enough Grinch in your life. 
Here’s a bit of sentiment for you if you think that my heart is two sizes too small. My Sister Amy looked like Cindy Loo as a child, I still see her round sweet face with enormous blue eyes staring at our tree. So Amy, you will always be my favorite Christmas Who. 
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rorahkeepgoing · 7 years
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Think i’ve barely mentioned how the sisters accomplish their spy job, so here i’ll try to show it, exposing a little of the main connection between the whole thing i’ve been shitposting around and the mysteries behind XCX (hope you can catch the winks).
Backstory 
Special sis (p1)
Special sis (p2)
THE ELITE SPIES
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*click music while you read*...[for ambient(?)]
*or here if there’s nothing to do (?)*.
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They main propuse of the Shostakova’s sisters was to become spies, they born for it. All their life was specially dedicated to be the best. 
Their education was based on a current program called “the prodigy child” but taken even further in a 24/7 program. The study time for each subject was strictly controlled by the scientist, even with induction during sleep to keep the stimulation in the neuronal cells to linking more while activate them. It covered all types of a level university subjects from an early age following a detailed study of the reception and assimilation of info that could hold a child.
The food was also rigorously controlled according to their age, weight and the activities that were to exercise for the efficiency in the nutrients ingestion.
They learned everything in 7 basic languages.  Eventually became polyglot, understanding almost any idiom with the general basis around languages estructures. 
The main purpose of their educational development was to use it as a further tool in the work of spying, since they had to investigate, analyze, deduce, interact, move and even defend themselves or murder if circumstances became risk.
For the interaction part, they incidentally became actresses, generated by a method of facial, tonal and corporal mimesis. In a room full of mirrors and cameras, the girls faced endless social trials recognizing emotions, moods, people with high self-esteem and low. At the time that they advanced with their corporal extension to the answer to the society also they became experts of human reading, identifying all the perceptible factors they projected to the most susceptible candidates that could provide a better and more optimal collaborations.  A very useful tool to approach people and use them.
They also learned from these ancient methods based on the traditional ninjas. Women with these kind of training were called Kunoichi and their main method who distinguishing them from men was the use of seduction and the handling of poisons and substances with which they used to achieve their mission. In all, they were also highly efficient hush assassins.
Following these means, the girls resorted to paralyzers, poisons, drugs, even micro bacteria to control high-risk situations to get a job as clean as possible. They often were the responsible to make all their substances, the suppliers were often the managers who controlled the RKR although they could also take advantage of the chemicals they had at hand.
They needed to be painstaking when was about to kill. It as to be the minimum as possible, and in any case they had to resort to it was due to the circumstances they were found in. Their care into not leaving evidence was very meticulous, or nonetheless to ravel the evidence under the environment where were found, often making it appear the responsible were others. Killing had to be very clean, one silence shot, avoid bloodbaths as posible, fast and effective.
They were specially careful with their appearance, using from simple wigs or hair extensions, dyes, makeup, pupils to more sophisticated devices capable to generate the illusion of modifying facial features. Their special biological nature made them suitable for the use of substances that were just being tested for the modification of skin tone, hair and eyes. Something like a mimeosome,  But in an orthodox way to an organic being. That’s why they were a blank canvas: no freckles,no beauty points, no tattoos, no scars or any singular feature that describes them. These features can be added and removed easy with makeup, so that is what they used to use. Indeed, they had lot of scars only visibles in a low level frequency of light.
The purpose was obviously, to not be detected, not to allow traces for they to gave some type of whereabouts of them, their origin or the people in charge, none possibility for blackmailing and such. Practically their task were to be ghosts, with no trace of existence. Hence the use of a myriad of identities created or taken.
It is worth mentioning the technology and the ways of spy were mainly through the systems hacking and sometimes the penetration (convince to the personnel of the interior to collaborate), reason why to have people trained to act the old school with the ability to perform the previous two were doubly effective.
They were never rewarded with money for their work by the RKR part, who, despite the fact that they obtained great profits, were only concerned with providing them with necessary supplements such as clothing, places to stay, necessary articles and equipment for some missions, necessary makeup among other things for their identity transformation, false documentation, transport, weaponry, etc.
The food ran on their own, so Rox always used to master their skills and get the food for free, used to say for live the money wasn't necessary, just be smart and confidence. Generally, she had no interest in money more than the use of it and its purposes. Despite this, Roxanne had numerous bank accounts around the world with distant names where she accumulated large sums of money that she hacked from other bank accounts, many of them, so it was not a matter of being poor either. Much of the money was given to the RKR to continue with the investment (and that they didn't ask but were quite good with the extra wealth). What was left was used to generate alliances, in the end, the world was moving through money.
Since the beginning of the encroachment with Elma's arrival to Earth, Natasha and Roxanne's parents were involved in the matter getting information from the vessels called mimeosomes up to 2 years after the birth of the second test (Nat). From there it was not much of a problem for Matahari to get some of the remaining information about the purpose of Elma's intentions, unfortunately she died with the secret at being considered as a traitor to the RKR.
Roxanne had a real early participation to detect the nexus that was working for such a program, however just after the execution of their parents she was entrusted to be totally in command of her younger sister (time she took to forge valuable contacts around the world) to lead a more concentrated education that will help them to be more productive and discard less useful subjects such as art, dance, music, etc.
Rox did not consider any kind of matter as useless, yet she didn't have the time to pay so much attention on them. If through the time in any of their missions it was necessary to rely on such knowledge they would have to inquire into them.
This was the case when Natasha had her own separate missions to derive information from Sakuraba Industries through the girls she could contact, interested passionately for trending things like fashion, music and boys. Always researching the target was important to establish a successful contact with the "link-ppl" so she took the identity of a model and some backup dancer from some kind of artist to become their friend.
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Obtaining and generating their own mimeosomes had been easy for the RKR, but the process of the consciousness suspension was one of the last things they managed to do because of the setbacks caused by Roxanne, who had been commissioned to explain the origin of the purpose behind the salvation of the human race and steal the configuration codes for the consciousness preservation. Task she did and did not report, once again, causing another execution for betrayal.
Natasha was the one who ended up getting the materials, codes and, failing that, helping to recreate their own Lifehold-system since the world had only managed to manufacture three in total to sustain the life of the whole planet.
------
Throughout the spying process they also exposed all kinds of sub projects that were in an illegal way. Infinity of tests with artificial intelligence, or on trained soldiers, simple passers-by without any important skill, or bodies that remained in coma to carry out a way to over-exploit a mechanical body with more resistance to a certain type of exhaustion.
(and there’s more... with skells and the arcs, connections with some members like Lin’s parents, Irina and Lion, Gwin, Maurice, Vandham, HB, Doug, Hope, Nagi, Bozé, Lao, Yelv (when Natasha is In the art) and some NPCs like Justin along some criminals.... and don’t forget the winks around others corsses... im afraid i can show all that tho... is too much... and going to return to the comic thing SOON ENOUGH)
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tracelii · 7 years
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okay but i've been thinking about the ama/scp au for a bit and what if one of the students eventually developed an immunity to the amnesiacs, bc they get sent to detention for so long?? and they start uncovering what's actually going on beyond the school walls and how they're being experimented on/observed/controlled/etc. so 1. who would this student be and 2. would they immediately tell anyone or try to keep it on the down low (i don't blame them bc the school would be heavily monitored)
Ok lets take this a couple of people at a time- more amixture of ideas rather than just an answer to ur question bc I need adistraction in my sucky life lm ao: so here are a lot of ‘what ifs’. ‘what ifthis person was the only person to find out about the scientist, studying them andthe other kids in the school? What would this person do???’
If Jared (incubus) found out, he’d have to keep it low. Atfirst he appears to want to bring it up to his mother, oddly enough--- but he figureshis friends are in trouble, and his mother would hate how they were treating her son. But he brings up ahypothetical situation to her and is shut the hell down for ‘being foolish’, sohe ends up keeping quiet about it, and half thinks maybe he should ‘charm’ someof the students into wising up to the scheme.
If Satch (familiar) found out, he’d keep quiet because hedoesn’t tend to ask people of help, and of course, he’d want to know all thefacts. Tbh he’d probably get caught trying to use his Library clearance to digup some real info on the school and the people behind it.
It would be very difficult for PBG or Ian (vampire) to findout about it since their detentions (and testing and such) specifically takeplace during the day since that’s when they’re at their weakest (and Ian cansleep though anything I swear to god). I don’t see them finding out unlesssomeone specifically told them or someone really fucked up and sent them to adetention that started at night.
Jeff (alien) wouldn’t initially understand why this was…wrong, so to say. He enjoys science and actually could probably be coerced intohelping out (under the guise of appeasing his science appitite) without reallygetting the morals of it, unless he sees his friends being hurt or mistreated.Though he was told they were made to forget for their safety, He would probablybecome a little suspicious after too long, and would feel bad (and not knowwhy) that he was hiding this secret from his friends. He just wants to learn,ok!!!
Caddy (phoenix) would be mad as h el l ofc but I mean,splashing him with too much water makes him sick, it wouldn’t be much to keephim silent. In fact, he doesn’t find out. He’s too weakened already, so itseasy to forget whats happened to him. He always comes back from detention witha cold and he fucking hates it.
Wallid (fukin cryptid) cannot be studied. Believe me they’vetried. He doesn’t remember either. Its in his nature to be super unpredictableand unobservable. No info avalible on the wallid ok. He probablyunintentionally just remembers all of a sudden like theyre all sitting at atable and hes just like ‘wait a second guys when you guys were sent todetention did they do some weird stuff like… idk, try to study on you and allthat junk’ and hb just fucking stare at him like wh a t
Jimmy (pooka/fae) is another unfortunate person to manipulatewhat with iron and stuff. The scientist are extracareful to keep jimmy’s detentions to a minimum and erase as much of his memoryof it as possible bc the second he catches on its cuuuuurses for everybody!
If Luke were to find out about it, he’d be oddly quiet aboutit. He’s a frustrated boy with an outside smile as it is, he doesn’t want totrouble anyone with stuff he doesn’t understand (because as a siren he doesn’t understanda lot). He usually comes back from detention sick as heck (as does Caddy) withhis voice hoarse and dehydrated as shit
With the continue were-bois, they would all handle it differently,if they were ‘the one to find out the big secret’ but eventually come clean toeach other first. Paul would blab right away and probably get one of his boiskidnapped/an extra long detention bc of it, Nick would be more reserved, butwould soon start to worry about his friends and tell them, and Josh would holdonto the secret the longest, and start working behind the scenes to keep hisother continue bois from getting detention.
Jirard (dragon) wouldn’t quite understand, but if thescientists caught on that he knew, they would hold all of his friends againsthim, leaving him quite the moral dilemma wondering if he could ever tell anyoneelse. He would treat his friends, or especially any student who recently haddetention, super nicely and make themcookies and try to cheer them up though no one knows why. Of course Jirard justends up running himself ragged taking care of others, and even offers to thescientist for them to just take him instead of watching his friends like this(they don’t take that offer, but he wholeheartedly offers it)
Shane (muse) ofc wouldn’t say a damn thing but he’d be sour as fuck and everyone wouldknow it. There would be no relaxing aura about him, and no inspiration drawnfrom him. He’d wall himself up even more if he knew about the scientist. Beinga muse, his detentions usually deprive him of things that inspire him likenature, and a loving environment, so even if he doesn’t find out about thescientist, his detentions put him in a mood that lasts several days.
With Jon (harpy) he probably wouldn’t find out much, butwhenever he comes back from detention, his wings are very sore (as he hasn’t flown)and Jacques isn’t allowed to come with him (which don’t separate this bird andhis bird ok) so he’s usually sullen until he can see Jacques again.  
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mollydollyjournals · 3 years
Text
Monday 25th January; 156lbs
I didn't check my body composition today. I just stepped on the scales and left my phone in my bedroom, which means it doesn't send info to the app. So I know that I weigh a little less than the other day, but still way too much.
Toilet tmi again. Im still really constipated and it's actually just fucking painful. The biggest issue is it's not that I haven't been eating. I always try to eat reasonably high fiber (compared to my caloric intake anyway - 8-9g fiber a day isn't much for a normal 2000kcal diet, but it is for 800kcal) and if I need more then I have some particularly high fiber stuff like pulses. Fruit and veg is a good way to go. It's been 3-4 days now so I actually have been eating a bit more to try to make it happen, including higher fiber, but still nothing. I took some stimulant lax last night and still nothing. Had yogurt and coffee and still nothing.
I have this pain in my abdomen too. I suspected some internal bleeding last week or the week before so I'm sure something is up. Just I don't know what I should do about it. I don't want to go back to the doctor and ask them to investigate something else again. I think after my liver scan and blood tests came up fine they'll think I'm lying or exaggerating. I just don't know what's wrong with me. Is it an impaction? Do I have something constructing my intestines? An ulcer? I have really bad acid reflux too. It's like my digestive system is too full and it's just not emptying. My waist feels huge. It makes me actually scared to eat for physical reasons, because if it's not stimulating my gut to move like it should be, then all I'm doing is putting more pressure on my insides.
I'm currently drinking some osmotic lax, which is all I can do. It's what you're supposed to do for impaction. I bought it specifically because I've had these problems before and you're not meant to take stimulant lax, and sometimes it'll resolve itself but it can still be painful and also it'll take longer. Osmotic lax doesn't work fast though - you have to give it a few days. During those few days I'm just reabsorbing waste matter from my intestines. Its disgusting and unhealthy. And when it finally does work, I might have the opposite problem. In the past I've been reluctant to take lax for this because I've had instances where it acted kind of like...a plug. That once it's passed, everything else goes way too fast after it. Sorry that's gross. I guess if anyone wanted more motivation to eat properly it's so your digestive system doesn't get fucked up like this. I noticed a lot of mucus not long ago so maybe the regular mucus layer got stripped and hasn't replenished. Idk.
Other than that there is family drama happening with my brother who is currently in a psych ward and my stupid mother who thinks the sun shines directly out of his anus. My entire life she's treated him like her precious baby and I've just been secondary. Maybe because she associated him with my older brother who died. Who fucking knows. But they're stressing me the fuck out and pissing me off. I keep telling her what to do and what not to do, which I get from trying to properly research his conditions and others similar and from having dealt with her when she was in a psychotic episode, and she just doesn't. She thinks if she just talks nice and loves him enough he'll get better. As if that isn't the whole reason he's a spoiled piece of shit who thought he could take all the drugs with no consequences. This probably sounds very hypocritical from an alcoholic who has trouble not drinking even after physical health problems, but there's much more to it in my brother's case that I cba to go into.
The worst part is she gives him all the attention and understanding that I want and haven't had. I've spent the last few days feeling especially lonely and invisible. I've been talking about it a bit on social media and only a couple of friends responded. Hb came up to my room and saw me crying and basically acted like an awkward dad. Bf hasn't acknowledged much of what I've posted and we still haven't spoken directly. If not for those few friends I might have done something drastic. I don't know. I need to know if I'm actually liked loved and cared for. Missed at all. Lockdown has fucked with it so much and I already had trouble with it. I feel like I need to do something big to get attention. I could just be honest about my feeling like I want to kill myself and see who responds. But I've spoken about it before and people just kind of 'haha same' if that. I don't know if they realise that I'm genuinely close to doing something, or just don't care.
I do have borderline personality disorder and I'm so aware of the stigma. I don't want to be manipulative or abusive. I want people to want to be around me, not because I forced them. I'm so scared of being needy or annoying or overbearing or anything like that. And then if I do say something, I'm already feeling really bad and struggling a lot, so for it to be ignored hurts so much. That's why I end up drinking. I already have trouble seeing my friends post about their struggles and get so much support and love offered, when I get barely any. One of my best friends also has BPD but also everyone loves her. She has a successful small business doing what she loves, if I go anywhere with her strangers stop her and compliment her or ask to take her photo but pretend I don't exist or give me a passing smile. It's not that I don't think she deserves those things or love and support. It's just that I want it too. She's one of the few people who's reached out to me recently and I really appreciate it. I guess she knows how it feels. I just wish I wasn't so jealous.
So for my brother to start saying stuff in the family group chat and my mum to just start fawning over him and all that? Just the extra salt I really didn't need in my wounds. For one thing, I told her not to play into how he is because he'll feed off the drama. I know this because of who he is, that he really is an attention seeker, and that all 3 of us have a tendency to get caught up in things. My brother and I inherit our cluster B personality traits from her. I told her not to get into it and remain impartial. She didn't. I even messaged her and my dad separately and told them that I called the hospital and asked them to check on my brother, but she hasn't given me so much as a thank you.
She's up early for work and I sleep on Mars time, so my dad is still asleep. He'll probably say something when he gets up in a few hours. It all feels backwards. He was so abusive to me growing up. He was unnecessarily strict and horrible to me all the time and kicked me out and disowned me regularly. He tore down my entire sense of self and called me stupid and made sure I realised that if I wasn't doing well it was my own fault and I wasn't trying hard enough. But now he keeps a level head and we reconnected after years of not talking because my brother and mum both had a psychotic episode at the same time a few years ago. I hated him so much but now his approval and support is worth the most. But it's the same problem again - he seems to genuinely realise now that his overly authoritarian parenting was wrong. It's just how it is in a lot of African cultures, and his father was especially abusive, so he wasn't well equipped. He's doing things differently with my younger half brother. But why couldn't it have been me? Why didn't I get to have a nice dad who acknowledges his humanity? My half brother deserves it, but why couldn't I have that while I was growing up too?
It just makes me feel really abandoned. In every situation, there's always someone else who gets what I want, and I don't. I hate my brother so much. I feel like it'd be better if he was dead. But then my mum would spiral, and I'm not really that cold, so I phoned the hospital to talk to them and get them to check on him. Phone calls make me so nervous. I was shaking. Before the call, while I made the call, and for a long time afterwards. I didn't even get acknowledged.
I want a drink.
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afriendlypokealien · 3 years
Text
News and useful info on Point of Sale & POS Hardware.
This article was produced through the NPR NextGen/Texas Observer Print Scholars program, a new collaboration designed to offer mentorship and hands-on training to student journalists and recent graduates interested in a career in investigative journalism.
For Greyson’s safety, identifying details, locations, and recent photos of his face have been intentionally left out of this story. 
The lull between spring and fall semester was short-lived at the Rodriguez house. Lauren Rodriguez, a 37-year-old social worker, was busy managing a list of things that need to get done before her teenage son, Greyson Rodriguez, can start college in the fall. But before orientation and moving Greyson more than 1,000 miles away to begin his undergraduate career, the Rodriguez family needed to get through high school graduation.
Several boxes of supplies cluttered the dining room table, ready to be shipped to the school. Rodriguez checked on Greyson for the second time, warning the sleeping teen that he had a student advising appointment beginning in a few minutes. Greyson emerged, sluggish and silent, to sit on an oversized brown loveseat and stare at his phone. The neediest of their three dogs, Daisy, hopped into his lap to demand attention.
“He can be lazy sometimes, because that’s all teenagers,” Rodriguez says of Greyson. “But when he wants something, he’s very driven.”
Greyson has had to be driven. He graduated a year early to escape Texas, which he has mockingly nicknamed “the great state of hate.” Indeed, Texas is one of the most dangerous states in the country for a teen like Greyson.
At 13, Greyson came out as trans. He and his family faced abuse, cruelty, death threats, and aggression.  “While I never read them, I know that during the summer I got death threats when I was 13 from people in my neighborhood who were sending me mail telling me to kill myself and they wanted me to die,” Greyson says. He was forced to switch to an online school and the family eventually moved to the more progressive Austin area to get away from their conservative hometown. Texas ranks second in the U.S. in number of cases of fatal violence against transgender and gender non-conforming people since 2013, according to the Human Rights Campaign.
Since he came out, both he and his mother have become advocates for LGBTQ Texans, especially trans youth. In March, Lauren Rodriguez testified in front of the Texas House Committee on Criminal Jurisprudence in support of House Bill 73, which would have banned the use of the “gay/trans panic” defense. The panic defense, often cited by defendants in cases of violence directed at gay or trans people, argues that after an individual discovered someone was gay or trans, they panicked and assaulted or killed them.
“Currently in the state of Texas, a criminal penalty for a defendants’ violence, including murder, can be lessened or eliminated if the perpetrator claims that the victim’s gender identity or sexual orientation triggered a mental breakdown that resulted in their loss of self control and subsequent assault,” state Representative Gina Hinojosa, a Democrat who filed HB 73, said during the public hearing. 
In more than 100 criminal cases between 1970 and 2020 where defendants attempted to use the “gay/trans panic” defense, the highest concentration of cases took place in Texas, according to W. Carsten Andresen a professor at St. Edwards University in Austin and an expert on the topic.
But the 87th Texas Legislature failed to pass HB 73, signaling to LGBTQ Texans like Greyson Rodriguez and his family that the “gay/trans panic” defense is still an acceptable excuse for violence against vulnerable Texans. The bill was brought to a vote and rejected in the House committee, while the Senate companion never got a hearing. Despite the defense’s conflict with federal hate crime laws and a 2013 resolution from the American Bar Association calling for states to ban it, so far only 15 states and D.C. have passed legislation banning the use of the “gay/trans panic” defense, with bills proposed in Texas and 10 other states. 
*
In 2018, James Miller, a 69-year-old Austin man, was sentenced to six months in jail plus 10 years probation for stabbing his neighbor Daniel Spencer to death. Instead of a murder or manslaughter charge, Miller was convicted of the lesser offense of criminally negligent homicide after claiming that Spencer had made sexual advances and that he acted in self-defense. However, prosecutors called the self-defense claim “ludicrous,” saying Miller didn’t have “so much as a scratch on him.” LGBTQ rights advocates and experts like Andresen point to the light sentence in this case as an example of the “gay/trans panic” defense at work.
“‘Are they going to get away with murder?’ That’s the concern,” Greyson says. “It’s not a matter of if it’ll stop or to lower the rates that we’re being killed. It’s, if we do die at least justice is being served properly.”
During the public hearing, 11 people, including Rodriguez, testified in support of banning the defense and submitted a total of 15 pages of written statements supporting the bill. In contrast, only a lobbyist from Texas Values Action, a conservative think tank and evangelical Christian organization, testified against HB 73. 
“I think it’s not good public policy to include definitions of sexual orientation or gender identity because it forces us to determine what a person perceives,” said Jonathan Covey, the Texas Values Action lobbyist. “You easily run into issues of constitutional vagueness when you use this terminology.”
In 2009, the federal definition of a hate crime was expanded to include crimes motivated by gender identity and sexual orientation in federal cases, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. While Texas’s hate crime statute includes crimes motivated by sexual orientation, it does not include crimes motivated by gender identity.
During the public hearing on HB 73, Covey also said that his organization opposed the bill due to free speech concerns. “It’s typically a bad public policy to ban offensive speech,” Covey said. “Open discussion even in a courtroom is better than allowing supposed bias to fester in a type of subconscious realm.” 
“This is not a free speech bill,” state Representative Ann Johnson replied. “We are talking about the criminal context where it’s assaultive conduct. Right? So it’s not a speech.”
“I understand that,” Covey said. 
Johnson continued: “For example if a 16-year-old has sex with a 32-year-old, we would not allow the 32-year old to say, ‘but she consented.’ We have made a policy decision that there is no consent, correct?”
“I think I’m following what you’re saying,” Covey said. But, “we don’t create laws that hinge on someone’s perception of how much they weigh or create laws that hinge on someone’s perception of how tall they are.”
Tumblr media
Greyson Rodriguez poses with his maternal grandparents, who flew into Texas to attend his graduation.  Sadie Brown
Rodriguez says that this failure to support and affirm gay, trans, and gender diverse Texans at the state level exacerbates safety concerns for Greyson. “My son has to live in fear of someone finding out he is trans and hurting him,” Rodriguez said during her testimony.  
In nearly every social situation, Greyson has to consider how someone would react to him coming out as trans. At his first job as a host in a restaurant, Greyson says he “tested the waters” to gauge his coworkers’ acceptance of him by mentioning his long-time boyfriend; he didn’t tell them he was trans.
Rodriguez and her son have strict rules around dating, specifically about coming out to potential partners. Because LGBTQ people are at a much greater risk of intimate partner violence, Rodriguez and Greyson have agreed that the first few dates with a new person will always be in public and that Greyson will only come out if he decides it’s safe and wants to pursue a relationship. He says that conversation is also about mutual respect.
“If I think I want to have a relationship with you and you think you want to have a relationship with me, I still want that to be built on everything being out in the open,” he says. “Not built on your assumptions on what you think is going on, only for that to be thrown out the window and you having a crisis or not understanding what to do with this information.” 
*
On a humid day in early June, Greyson accepts his high school diploma during a socially distanced, in-person commencement ceremony. He’s difficult to spot in his emerald cap and gown with a black mask covering nearly his entire face. 
When his name is called, Greyson walks out onto the stage to shake hands with administrators, as his mother, father, and grandparents cheer from a section near the front of the room. Then he disappears again into the first few rows of seats filled with other teens leaving high school behind.
Greyson also plans to leave behind his activism, at least for a while. “Passing isn’t the goal,” Rodriguez says, but both she and Greyson describe the importance of his identity outside of being trans, and safety concerns around his visibility. 
“There’s some people who think every single person on the planet has a right to know,” Greyson says. “In my opinion it would be great if everyone had the ability to know and it wasn’t a threat. But the less random people who freaking know, the less risk there is.”
Greyson will start college in the fall, 1,200 miles away from his home and parents because he says he isn’t safe in “the great state of hate.” Inspired by the affirming care he has received from his medical team, Rodriguez says that he plans on studying nursing. Lauren had hoped that a bill banning the “gay/trans panic” defense would bring some peace of mind that would allow her family to remain close.
“If we pass this bill, my son may be able to feel safe enough to return to Texas and live as his authentic self,” Rodriguez said during her testimony. “And I would have my son closer to me.”
This program is made possible by gifts from Roxanne Elder in memory of her mother, journalist and journalism teacher Virginia Stephenson Elder, Vincent LoVoi in honor of Jim Marston and Annette LoVoi, and other generous donors.
This post was first provided here.
We trust you found the above useful or interesting. You can find similar content on our blog here: southtxpointofsale.com Let me have your feedback in the comments section below. Let us know what topics we should cover for you in the future.
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afrolatinxsunited · 3 years
Text
News and useful info on Point of Sale & POS Hardware.
This article was produced through the NPR NextGen/Texas Observer Print Scholars program, a new collaboration designed to offer mentorship and hands-on training to student journalists and recent graduates interested in a career in investigative journalism.
For Greyson’s safety, identifying details, locations, and recent photos of his face have been intentionally left out of this story. 
The lull between spring and fall semester was short-lived at the Rodriguez house. Lauren Rodriguez, a 37-year-old social worker, was busy managing a list of things that need to get done before her teenage son, Greyson Rodriguez, can start college in the fall. But before orientation and moving Greyson more than 1,000 miles away to begin his undergraduate career, the Rodriguez family needed to get through high school graduation.
Several boxes of supplies cluttered the dining room table, ready to be shipped to the school. Rodriguez checked on Greyson for the second time, warning the sleeping teen that he had a student advising appointment beginning in a few minutes. Greyson emerged, sluggish and silent, to sit on an oversized brown loveseat and stare at his phone. The neediest of their three dogs, Daisy, hopped into his lap to demand attention.
“He can be lazy sometimes, because that’s all teenagers,” Rodriguez says of Greyson. “But when he wants something, he’s very driven.”
Greyson has had to be driven. He graduated a year early to escape Texas, which he has mockingly nicknamed “the great state of hate.” Indeed, Texas is one of the most dangerous states in the country for a teen like Greyson.
At 13, Greyson came out as trans. He and his family faced abuse, cruelty, death threats, and aggression.  “While I never read them, I know that during the summer I got death threats when I was 13 from people in my neighborhood who were sending me mail telling me to kill myself and they wanted me to die,” Greyson says. He was forced to switch to an online school and the family eventually moved to the more progressive Austin area to get away from their conservative hometown. Texas ranks second in the U.S. in number of cases of fatal violence against transgender and gender non-conforming people since 2013, according to the Human Rights Campaign.
Since he came out, both he and his mother have become advocates for LGBTQ Texans, especially trans youth. In March, Lauren Rodriguez testified in front of the Texas House Committee on Criminal Jurisprudence in support of House Bill 73, which would have banned the use of the “gay/trans panic” defense. The panic defense, often cited by defendants in cases of violence directed at gay or trans people, argues that after an individual discovered someone was gay or trans, they panicked and assaulted or killed them.
“Currently in the state of Texas, a criminal penalty for a defendants’ violence, including murder, can be lessened or eliminated if the perpetrator claims that the victim’s gender identity or sexual orientation triggered a mental breakdown that resulted in their loss of self control and subsequent assault,” state Representative Gina Hinojosa, a Democrat who filed HB 73, said during the public hearing. 
In more than 100 criminal cases between 1970 and 2020 where defendants attempted to use the “gay/trans panic” defense, the highest concentration of cases took place in Texas, according to W. Carsten Andresen a professor at St. Edwards University in Austin and an expert on the topic.
But the 87th Texas Legislature failed to pass HB 73, signaling to LGBTQ Texans like Greyson Rodriguez and his family that the “gay/trans panic” defense is still an acceptable excuse for violence against vulnerable Texans. The bill was brought to a vote and rejected in the House committee, while the Senate companion never got a hearing. Despite the defense’s conflict with federal hate crime laws and a 2013 resolution from the American Bar Association calling for states to ban it, so far only 15 states and D.C. have passed legislation banning the use of the “gay/trans panic” defense, with bills proposed in Texas and 10 other states. 
*
In 2018, James Miller, a 69-year-old Austin man, was sentenced to six months in jail plus 10 years probation for stabbing his neighbor Daniel Spencer to death. Instead of a murder or manslaughter charge, Miller was convicted of the lesser offense of criminally negligent homicide after claiming that Spencer had made sexual advances and that he acted in self-defense. However, prosecutors called the self-defense claim “ludicrous,” saying Miller didn’t have “so much as a scratch on him.” LGBTQ rights advocates and experts like Andresen point to the light sentence in this case as an example of the “gay/trans panic” defense at work.
“‘Are they going to get away with murder?’ That’s the concern,” Greyson says. “It’s not a matter of if it’ll stop or to lower the rates that we’re being killed. It’s, if we do die at least justice is being served properly.”
During the public hearing, 11 people, including Rodriguez, testified in support of banning the defense and submitted a total of 15 pages of written statements supporting the bill. In contrast, only a lobbyist from Texas Values Action, a conservative think tank and evangelical Christian organization, testified against HB 73. 
“I think it’s not good public policy to include definitions of sexual orientation or gender identity because it forces us to determine what a person perceives,” said Jonathan Covey, the Texas Values Action lobbyist. “You easily run into issues of constitutional vagueness when you use this terminology.”
In 2009, the federal definition of a hate crime was expanded to include crimes motivated by gender identity and sexual orientation in federal cases, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. While Texas’s hate crime statute includes crimes motivated by sexual orientation, it does not include crimes motivated by gender identity.
During the public hearing on HB 73, Covey also said that his organization opposed the bill due to free speech concerns. “It’s typically a bad public policy to ban offensive speech,” Covey said. “Open discussion even in a courtroom is better than allowing supposed bias to fester in a type of subconscious realm.” 
“This is not a free speech bill,” state Representative Ann Johnson replied. “We are talking about the criminal context where it’s assaultive conduct. Right? So it’s not a speech.”
“I understand that,” Covey said. 
Johnson continued: “For example if a 16-year-old has sex with a 32-year-old, we would not allow the 32-year old to say, ‘but she consented.’ We have made a policy decision that there is no consent, correct?”
“I think I’m following what you’re saying,” Covey said. But, “we don’t create laws that hinge on someone’s perception of how much they weigh or create laws that hinge on someone’s perception of how tall they are.”
Tumblr media
Greyson Rodriguez poses with his maternal grandparents, who flew into Texas to attend his graduation.  Sadie Brown
Rodriguez says that this failure to support and affirm gay, trans, and gender diverse Texans at the state level exacerbates safety concerns for Greyson. “My son has to live in fear of someone finding out he is trans and hurting him,” Rodriguez said during her testimony.  
In nearly every social situation, Greyson has to consider how someone would react to him coming out as trans. At his first job as a host in a restaurant, Greyson says he “tested the waters” to gauge his coworkers’ acceptance of him by mentioning his long-time boyfriend; he didn’t tell them he was trans.
Rodriguez and her son have strict rules around dating, specifically about coming out to potential partners. Because LGBTQ people are at a much greater risk of intimate partner violence, Rodriguez and Greyson have agreed that the first few dates with a new person will always be in public and that Greyson will only come out if he decides it’s safe and wants to pursue a relationship. He says that conversation is also about mutual respect.
“If I think I want to have a relationship with you and you think you want to have a relationship with me, I still want that to be built on everything being out in the open,” he says. “Not built on your assumptions on what you think is going on, only for that to be thrown out the window and you having a crisis or not understanding what to do with this information.” 
*
On a humid day in early June, Greyson accepts his high school diploma during a socially distanced, in-person commencement ceremony. He’s difficult to spot in his emerald cap and gown with a black mask covering nearly his entire face. 
When his name is called, Greyson walks out onto the stage to shake hands with administrators, as his mother, father, and grandparents cheer from a section near the front of the room. Then he disappears again into the first few rows of seats filled with other teens leaving high school behind.
Greyson also plans to leave behind his activism, at least for a while. “Passing isn’t the goal,” Rodriguez says, but both she and Greyson describe the importance of his identity outside of being trans, and safety concerns around his visibility. 
“There’s some people who think every single person on the planet has a right to know,” Greyson says. “In my opinion it would be great if everyone had the ability to know and it wasn’t a threat. But the less random people who freaking know, the less risk there is.”
Greyson will start college in the fall, 1,200 miles away from his home and parents because he says he isn’t safe in “the great state of hate.” Inspired by the affirming care he has received from his medical team, Rodriguez says that he plans on studying nursing. Lauren had hoped that a bill banning the “gay/trans panic” defense would bring some peace of mind that would allow her family to remain close.
“If we pass this bill, my son may be able to feel safe enough to return to Texas and live as his authentic self,” Rodriguez said during her testimony. “And I would have my son closer to me.”
This program is made possible by gifts from Roxanne Elder in memory of her mother, journalist and journalism teacher Virginia Stephenson Elder, Vincent LoVoi in honor of Jim Marston and Annette LoVoi, and other generous donors.
This post was first provided here.
We trust you found the above useful or interesting. You can find similar content on our blog here: southtxpointofsale.com Let me have your feedback in the comments section below. Let us know what topics we should cover for you in the future.
youtube
0 notes