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miirshroom · 2 months

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Mushroom Vision

I am going to attempt explaining how there is an entire vast segment of environmental storytelling in Elden Ring that is going unremarked upon. It isn't just about mushrooms. But that's where I first took notice, so that's where I will start in this post.

The above is the view from a mushroom on the entry ramp to Raya Lucaria, just above where the merchant is sitting. This was maybe my 3rd or 4th random stop back when I decided to appreciate the scenery from the point of view of the mushroom (for fun!). It is an example of perfect framing for elements in the far distance:

The North Liurnia Minor Erdtree

The Church of Vows

The Erdtree

But really, it's "perfect" framing of only the Erdtrees - the Church of Vows is blocked from view and hidden by a stone pillar with a quatrefoil symbol on it. This is a noticeable trend at many mushroom spots - it would be a great view...except there is a nearby tree or a piece of stone exactly in front of one element in the far distance. The perspectives seen from these mushrooms are missing the full picture. Rotating to the left on top of the same mushroom, there is also a perfectly clear view of the Bellum Gate in front of Mt. Gelmir.

Setting the scene a bit more, the ramp is heavily forested, populated by 4 packs of wolves (numbering 3, 3, 3, and 5 including the white wolf in the group lowest down the ramp), then the Isolated Merchant, a Trina's Lily, a corpse with 2 strips of white flesh, and right inside the impassible gate is a Bloodhound Knight guarding a corpse holding Celestial Dew. The sealed entry to the ramp is looking directly towards the Cathedral of Manus Celes.

Also, there is a second mushroom on the bridge which has a view of the Church of Vows restored, but instead this one is blocked from viewing Mt. Gelmir. The Church of Vows is directly aligned with Morgott/Mohg's Divine Tower. This mushroom is between the 2nd and 3rd wolf pack.

Paying attention to the mushrooms also calls attention to something else interesting. There are 4 stone viewing spots built into the ramp face - the two middle ones occurring at those two mushroom spots, one at the top of the ramp just before the 1st wolf pack, and one at the bottom of the ramp between the merchant and the bloodhound knight.

The lowest of these viewing points has a clear view at the Erdtree (nearest to the gate). Also from this vantage point the Liurnia North Minor Erdtree is in alignment with the withered Minor Erdtree in the Altus Plateau:

The highest viewing point near the top of the ramp has views of Mt. Gelmir, Bellum highway Gate, and the Wandering Mausoleums:

In the photos of the first mushroom (lower ramp) I placed more emphasis on the Erdtrees, as this is the view obtained by looking directly at the minor Erdtree. See below as rotated to face the pillar directly, which corrects for peripheral vision picking up certain distant objects that do not actually have direct sightline to the mushroom.

And like at the upper ramp mushroom, the transparency of the Erdtree is accounted for in what is visible from this vantage point. From the corrected viewpoint Rykard's Divine Tower is also completely obscured by the pillar and Morgott/Mohg's Divine Tower is not only behind the Erdtree, but also behind a conveniently placed rock spear. Rotating to the right, a clear view of Liurnia Divine Tower and just the top of the Isolated Divine Tower. Caelid Divine Tower is obscured by the Carian Study Hall, and Limgrave Divine Tower is exactly behind the steeple of a pillar.

So what does it matter exactly, that landmarks are blocked from certain locations? Good question! I am trying to understand this! It seems to me quite obvious from the framing of this one small corner of the map that care is being taken to craft these vistas in a certain way. Perhaps travelling up the ramp is telling a story in sequence. Perhaps there is one story told from the balcony spots while a second lens is placed on the story from the mushroom spots.

Overall, what I see are pieces of an environmental puzzle deliberately crafted at hundreds of locations. Just from mushrooms alone. But there is no reason to stop at mushrooms - I know that some people are already taking interest in the locations of Trina's Lilies and Miquella's Lilies, but has any attempt been made to really consider what is visible (or not visible) from their locations? The things that NPC's can see from their vantage points, the directions that corpses are looking and the items they hold, the view of the divine towers from rebirth monuments (previously discussed in a different post) all seem to be carefully planned. Rowa bushes are very frequently found in pairs, and at almost every location I've checked so far across Limgrave there will be something clearly visible from one bush that is just barely out of sight from the other.

For anyone wondering whether Elden Ring actually innovated on anything compared to Dark Souls? It's this. Literally - it's the depth of environmental storytelling.

#elden ring #environmental storytelling #mushroom vision #wandering around looking at stuff is more fun than making posts #but sometimes the findings need to be documented #this is basically the same skillset that I use for taking photos documenting site conditions for work lol

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primowishes · 6 months

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//So my thoughts on Dottore are a bit of a mess, but I wanted to try to organize it in a post. It influences a lot of how my muse for him views (and thus treats) Scaramouche.

Of course, it may need to be entirely reworked depending on what shows up in canon later.

I think there's a part of Dottore, which he would deny existing even to himself, that does desire companionship. But he believes himself to be superior to others, and it's a view that gets reinforced whenever others oppose his methods. He doesn't really make an attempt to connect with people and doesn't put any work into relationships and so it's his own fault if he is isolated as a result. He would think that a companion should be on his level, but relationships don't really work like that. He can't even stand his own segments, which should be equal because they're him, because it doesn't address his core issue in connecting with other people, in that he treats them poorly and he doesn't make the effort.

And, well, he's simply not going to change, and he's going to die like that, and not one person will be sorry he's gone--well, aside from those who've developed a toxic attachment to him, and will eventually be happier and healthier for that loss.

Moving on... Some hcs of his younger days, with the overlap between him getting run out of the village and his admission into the Akademiya, to when he was rejected from that, too.

So, it's not really supposed to be sympathetic backstory or anything, because it's a past that Dottore himself has discarded anyway, and it's just sort of just the situation that allowed bad tendencies to continue festering. But I've considered that, the way he grew up, was with one parent who died early, and another who essentially just... forgot he existed? Wouldn't acknowledge his existence? And it left him to his own devices. He was an intelligent child, and he found things to occupy his own time with. Felt disconnected from peers, probably partly because he was older than most children in the village, but mostly because of the same views that he continues to hold, that he is superior to them in some way because of how intelligent he is.

Enjoyed taking things apart, specific interest in machinery and such. The way he kept to himself and was clearly a smart child and was rather self-sufficient leads to, after the second parent dies and he sort of comes under the care of "the entire village", there's this mistaken view that it's a matter of mental maturity. He gets generally left to his own devices, his intelligence and eventual admission into the Akademiya early gets praised. The way he is, is good in the views of others.

Interest in machinery is broadened into viewing human bodies similar to machines. Viewing illness as something he can solve, and it's not for the good of others, but for the challenge of it. Children are the easiest of test subjects, because they're willing to trust him, and he himself has a level of trust among adults that leads to the child's initial view of him being positive because of that. In some cases he succeeds, and it takes several traumatized children to do it, and ends with him being run out of this home village.

In Dottore's view, nothing about himself changed. It was them who suddenly flipped and thought that his intellect and ability was now bad when they thought it good. Thus, their rejection of him was something defective with them, not him.

He would run up against the (arbitrary, unnecessary in his view) limitations of the Akademiya. Eventually he would get rejected from there too, after eventually murdering a colleague.

It's after this that his personality gets especially unhinged, because he gives up on acting charming, personable, social for the sake of convincing others. It didn't help all that much anyway, because he's been rejected twice now. He'd eventually regain that ability to maintain composure, but that's much later on.

After he's become a Harbinger, during a mission, he happens upon a puppet. You know the story there.

By pure construction, the puppet is special. It's just like him, you see, and humans don't like things that are special. But the miners do accept the puppet, unlike the rejections that Dottore has received. Oh, he's jealous of it, and he wants to destroy it, but it's a feeling he buries deep inside. He genuinely believes that, once the miners get what they want from the puppet, they will use and then reject it.

So it's fine if he simply hastens the process. An accelerated end. And if someone is to use the puppet, then it should be him the Fatui.

He's actually genuinely surprised that, to the very end, Niwa considers the puppet to be human, one of them.

And then the way he views the puppet, eventually Scaramouche...

Attaining knowledge should have no limits, in his view, and Scaramouche is a special test subject. He's intensely interested in his construction, and what he can learn from it. Though he's constantly dehumanizing Scaramouche, and views himself superior to him, he thinks that a puppet should be better than a human.

He hates the result of every test that reveals some similarity to humans. Any similar weakness to one shouldn't exist, because what's the point? He should be superior, those weaknesses should've been designed out. Dottore has a lot of expectations that he's unconsciously projected onto Scaramouche. He believes them to be similar, while simultaneously that he himself is superior. He doesn't recognize any humanity in Scaramouche, and in the end, his attempt at turning him into a god isn't even the culmination of Dottore's research. It's one step along the way to an even greater breakthrough.

And then he's rejected by Sumeru a third time, and again the puppet is accepted in a way that Dottore is not, though he himself discards Scaramouche. He collects only the still-useful research materials of the Electro Gnosis, and then the Dendro one as well. Scaramouche is not among the useful materials to get back. But of course, it's his own fault for being rejected, but he views it as a problem of others and not his own.

I think that's everything I have in mind rn. Really Dottore is arrogant and thinks himself above it all, it's how he treats others. He really only acts friendly if he thinks he will get something valuable out of it, and continues looking down on people and rejecting any possibility of connection with others. It's true that he lacks empathy (he's never even bothered to try and develop it), but it's not because he lacks empathy that he's like this, but that he's never even bothered to try and instead stoked his own thoughts of superiority and isolated himself. It's something he's allowed to fester within himself, and refused to accept limitations that would've otherwise allowed him to coexist with others, and views them only as what he can gain from them, regardless of whether that hurts them.

#ooc #m: dottore #dottore: cd tag #dehumanization tw #death tw #abuse tw #references to abuse of children tw #what a mess of a post sdlkfnlkewf #i'm trying really hard to emphasize that it's choices that he's made and not anything inherent to how he was born/raised #although they're contributing factors but he probably had plenty of chances to experience different viewpoints and willfully rejected them #he could've learned something from how kabukimono was treated by the miners but nah he just did not #and he just made excuses for his later treatment of him instead #and projected a LOT of his experiences and views onto him too

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alexcaldownapier · 2 years

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Advanced Documentary Practice - First Thoughts

Until I get the padlet set up for this module, I’m going to continue to post on this blog.

First post - some ideas for a subject for a documentary for this term.

George

George is my dad. Everyone makes documentaries about their parents. So, unoriginality aside, I’m going to explain what I’m thinking for this one.

George retired at the start of the summer. He has always put great importance on his work however, in the wake of his retirement, he has been spending a lot of time hiking, cycling and camping, out in nature. He meets up with friends more often, spends more time doing the things he enjoys.

So this film would be an observational film, displaying the things George does for fun. I picture it with minimal dialogue, perhaps just a little between him and my mother, maybe with a friend or over the phone with one of his kids. I’d want to journey through a hike with him, experiencing the peacefulness of nature before coming home and maybe giving some context for him while also showing his family and other things he enjoys at home: old records, a good dog, cooking something hearty and drinking dark beer. Individual pleasures not isolated from family and connection.

He also likes to take photographs on these trips so I could ask if I could use some of his photography to bring us into his point of view.

I’ve asked him if this would be okay and he seems pretty up for it. I’d be careful with not pushing him too far with any questions, but as it is intended to be an observational piece, I don’t think we’d make him feel uncomfortable in any way.

Here’s some inspiration/research stuff:

- George in the garden

“From up there you could see all that land... Birches clustered in sprays where the dried-up burns dipped into the streams... Flickers were coming off the loch and the massive sky seemed filled with a sparkling dust above those hot summer hills, fattened with plants and trees... I looked out at the landscape moving without any haste to no bidding at all. I yawned a big yawn.”

- Morvern Callar by Alan Warner

- George and Patricia

- Howl’s Moving Castle (2004), dir. by Hayao Miyazaki

youtube

- Helena Bonham Carter reading “Warning” by Jenny Joseph. (Her commentary after is lovely too)

- When Marnie Was There (2014), dir. by Hiromasa Yonebayashi

- Into The Wild (2007), dir. by Sean Penn

Next idea:

Living as a Statue

- Goldman vs Silverman (2020), dir. by the Safdie Brothers

Living as a statue seems like it would be very strange. This film would be a day in the life of a living statue, how they paint themselves, where they go, who they talk to and who they don’t talk to.

Again, observational, as I think this is the form I’m most drawn to, however, it might be best to add in some interview segments and also have the statue talk to the camera at points throughout their day.

I’d want to explore themes of performance and isolation and contrast the performance of the statue with the real personality of the subject. The image of a living statue in the midst of a crowd of normally dressed people creates quite an alienating feeling. So talking to the subject it would be interesting to see how they feel about themselves in relation to others and their thoughts on the job and performing for others but it doesn’t really matter if they feel isolated or feel the total opposite as there’s slight comedy and warmth in the contrast but also a lot of sadness in consistency.

I see less living statues about, even during the fringe, so it might be hard to find someone who works as a living statue, may have to be a former living statue, a dead statue. And then maybe ask if they would want to do it again and film that. I’ve posted in a couple of street performers facebook groups asking if anybody would want to get involved in filming a documentary. I’m still waiting on replies but if someone did want to be filmed they’d be quite enthusiastic so would be fun to film with them and could probably get some good footage and have a good relationship with our subject. I’ve left the post quite broad as I’d also be interested in exploring other types of street performances as the themes would be the same even if the visuals weren’t as immediately arresting.

Royalty

An evening with some drag kings and queens. Indulging in the pleasure of watching these performances and the satire of gender roles. The film would be as camp as the performances as we follow a group of performers before a show, talking us through their outfits and song choices. We’d have the drag acts address the camera and have fun with the whole format, use kitsch stylistic choices and heavy editing. It would mainly be an experiential piece that walks us through an evening with royalty, but then as we watch them perform along with the applauding audience, we would intercut with archive footage of gender performances without the irony - old hollywood blondes and masculine cowboys, etc.

This film would mainly be about the ideas behind drag - the exaggerated gender roles and camp fun of the performance. In the past few years, drag has become increasingly popular and I think a lot of people would respond to this film, not just a filming of a drag show, but taking the inspiration of drag into the filmmaking. Trying to break away from filmmaking conventions and steering into techniques that may not be technically “correct” but are fun and stylish and add to the feeling of the film.

Amidst the new popularity of drag acts, there are now a number of drag nights in Edinburgh - the one I have in mind is at The Doghouse every month which features a group of drag acts. I’m going to have a look and see if there’s any chance of filming there and if not there’s many other drag nights across Edinburgh and I know a few people who do drag who may be interested in filming, even if we’re not able to secure access to a whole venue.

This film does sound quite reminiscent of a Portrait of a Drag King, made by Katie Cox @katieqnmr, Natalia Baczynski @nbaczynskifilm , Rosie Playford @rplayford02 and Bethany Isles @dialbforbethany back in first year. Even down to the visual style, I think there’s lots to borrow. If any of you guys want to revisit this kind of subject matter please come join me in this group! But I think, what makes this not a total rip-off is trying to depict a show (which wasn’t possible at the time of that film) and highlighting the performance of the drag acts, less of a portrait, more of a showcase type of thing. Less personal but maybe more experiential.

Some inspiration/research:

(I wasn’t able to find the full film to link to)

- Portrait of a Drag King (2021), by Katie, Natalia, Rosie and Bethany

“Girls will be boys and boys will be girls / it’s a mixed up, muddled up, shook up world / except for Lola”

- “Lola” by The Kinks

- Noel Fielding putting makeup on

- A performance by Holden McGroin

#advanced documentary practice

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aguzziadventure · 11 months

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Day 11: A Bittersweet Farewell to the Alps

Today is my last day in the majestic Alps. Unexpected budget hits and impending poor weather have determined that after today, my journey must gradually start winding back towards home. But I am determined to make it a memorable one.

I start my day in a rustic Swiss wood cabin hotel in the village of Ueberrotten, situated just kilometers away from some of the most iconic Swiss alpine passes. They are the perfect stage for the grand finale of my alpine adventure.

First, I conquer the Furka Pass, a classic route immortalized by a car chase in Goldfinger. At 2429m, it's a testing ride. Thanks to a bit of misdirection and poor planning, I tackle it three times. With each ride, I grow more familiar with its steep switchbacks and slick snow-caked roads.

By the third round, I allow myself to get my head up, and take in in the breathtaking views. Its snow-blanketed peaks and endless hairpins make it a challenging yet rewarding ride that pushes my skills to their limits.

The next pass is the Nufenan Pass, the highest paved pass in Switzerland, nestled between the peaks of Pizzi Galino and Nufenenstock. It presents a stark and isolated landscape that offers an oddly wild riding experience. Afterward, I move on to Oberalp, known for being the source of the River Rhine.

Finally, I arrive at the Grimselpass, a route whose stunning images partially inspired this entire trip. It exceeds all my expectations. Grimsel is the embodiment of a Swiss alpine pass, a microcosm of the country's breathtaking natural scenery, squeezing in snow-capped mountains, tumbling waterfalls, forests blanketing verdant meadows, icy glacier lakes, and remarkable tunnels. Its road, a harmonious balance of relaxed sections and challenging bends, feel like the perfect bow on this segment of the journey.

At the summit, I take a moment to just breathe it all in. Deciding not to photograph anything on this journey, I've opted to imprint every vista into my memory. Staring out over the breathtaking landscape, I realize how much of an impression this part of the trip has left on me. It's a moment of fuzziness, where I’ll be leaving a little bit of myself behind in this landscape. It’s a quiet goodbye to the Alps that will occupy a special place in my heart.

This perfect moment is a stark contrast to my subsequent arrival in Lucerne, a vibrant city teeming with high fashion and travellers thronging towards the lake. Despite its popularity, I’m now sure that cities don’t interest me. I had intended to explore some cities on my return journey, but now, I decide to let them pass.

I find a campsite at the Lido on Lake Lucerne, and as I set up for the night, I can't help but feel a twinge of sadness. Tomorrow, I will be leaving Switzerland and its hefty price tag behind, heading northward on a slightly shortened route home.

It's been an incredible, emotional journey through the Alps, one that I wouldn't trade for anything. Tomorrow brings another day, another ride, but for tonight, I bask in the memories of the majestic Alps.

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fatedevour · 1 year

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♢ — Anonymous said: is there a part of your remaining humanity who feels betrayed by being outcasted by the akademiya for the research you did?

my muse must answer the next 10 asks truthfully: ACCEPTING [4 LEFT]

" My REMAINING humanity? “ Dottore tilts his head back and laughs, a deep sound the rumbles from deep within his chest like an earthquake beneath the mountains. “ And do tell me, what happened to the rest? I am the same as I have ever been, centuries ago and now. I’m afraid to inform you that I am not a case of tragedy or grief turned corruption. “

The question however does make him ponder for a moment. He’d never thought about the situation in that perspective. It was an INTERESTING view that was proposed. Betrayed? It was too strong of a word for what he felt.

“ As for your INTRIGUING question, I can’t say I ever have. Granted, I am an OLDER segment compared to that of Beta or Theta, but I do distinctly recall my thoughts even then. I was not SURPRISED. I have been outcast all my life. It was merely further DISAPPOINTMENT in the loss of resources and the FAILURE of the Akademiya to live up to its potential. “

Dottore’s hands unfold from where they’d been crossed in front of his chest to instead rest by his side. “ I figured out rather QUICKLY that even within my Darshan, which boasted of the motto that knowledge was everything , they would be appalled by my research and grand schemes. Hypocritical, to claim that knowledge came before all else yet remain SHACKLED by the constructs of society. They were not willing to truly live up to their own motto. “

He lifts one hand slightly as further elaboration leaves his lips. “ I had HOPED that such a place might finally accept me, this much was true. I was young, and believed the attitude and restraints of my village to be due to their isolation and the barrenness of the desert, a lack of proper scholarly perspective if you will. Unfortunately, I found this to not be true. But having been REJECTED all my life at that point, to face more rejection was merely further disappointment rather than betrayal. I had optimistic hope, but I was under no delusion that would make it a betrayal. “

“ It is a shame. “ Dottore sighs, his hand resting on his waist. “ Even all this time later and they’ve only gotten MORE restrained in their views. My homeland has never appreciated my gifts or research. But that is fine. I have all I need, I do not need, nor have I ever needed, their acceptance. “

#Anonymous #thank you for the question!#he was just disappointed :/#I don't think dottore's ever felt betrayed per se by anything #didnt have enough trust/faith in anything to earn that level #♢ — ❛ he whom ushers in your darkest hour ❜ ( ic )

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novantinuum · 5 years

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On the corrupted!Steven theory...

So, originally when I mused on this yesterday I was just playing around with random possibilities.

After combing the series for info about corruption, though, I’m mildly spooked at the increased potential for this to... perhaps be a thing? I’m not saying that this is what I for sure believe will happen- to be honest, I’m not even sure Crewniverse would go this direction at all- but just for funsies, let’s see what kind of “evidence” or “foreshadowing” exists that might support this potential story path in the context of canon.

(EDIT: 10/7/19

I honestly no longer think this creature is a worm at all whatsoever, it’s either more akin to a horned caterpillar or potentially has limbs. Either way we can see so little right now that it’s hard to tell. I’m not editing the rest of this post because I want it to exist in its original form- but do keep this in mind reading the rest! XP)

1) The design of this worm creature.

Let’s start simple. Let’s start tangible.

For future reference and simplicity, I will be henceforth be referring to this creature as... “Wormy Boi.”

So, let’s see what we’ve got here. I’m definitely not the first person to point out this fella’s pink nature, and the jarringly human-like nose they’ve got. (Compared to other corruptions, which have had distinctly non-humanoid features.) In the photo above, we also have Wormy Boi sporting glowing pink eyes, which then send out a flare of pink light/energy. So, seemingly a powerful entity.

If you watch the short segment before they sit upright, you’ll see that Wormy Boi is super, super big. They’re in the background, but BOY do they loom. The shadows cast upon them especially push that sense of size. They’ve also got a whole bunch of spikes on their back and framing their face.

So, then. What evidence could be made for this being a corrupted!Steven, as opposed to some other run-of-the-mill monster?

Steven Universe Future is a limited series, described as ‘tying up loose ends.” To me, as a viewer, it would make far more sense for the antagonists/conflicts to deal with big concepts that have already been established since there’s such a limited amount of time we have left with this world. Introducing a completely alien species in the last act of the show would feel offbeat from both a writing and a viewing perspective. Corruption- on the other hand- is something we don’t have full answers to yet.

We don’t see any gem, yes- but Steven’s gem is- of course- on his belly. If this theory were to be true, that would translate to the gem being on Wormy Boi’s underside, far out of our sight in this shot, due to how massive they are. As an addition to this, not showing the gem gives an air of mystery to this creature’s true nature- which makes it seem like there’s something surprising to discover here.

A corrupted diamond would surely be MASSIVE. Also, very powerful. The beam of pink light hints at Wormy Boi being quite a powerhouse.

The spikes on Wormy Boi’s back and around their face highly resemble rose thorns. We all know how much the Crewniverse loves their rose symbolism, and design wise, this aspect would make a lot of visual sense for a corrupted Steven. Running off of that:

The face/nose shape and the five horns on this creature’s head give off a very Steven-like silhouette.

The nose, of course. The face has a very Steven-like shape to it, overall- although noticeably more angular and sharp. The mouth is reminiscent of the Watermelon Stevens’ mouths. And as for the horns, there’s five of them positioned equidistant around their face, just as Steven’s hair is always formed from five lil’ bumps at the same positions.

Okay, moving on.

(Read more under the cut!)

2) We do not yet understand the true nature of corruption.

“I guess it’ll take more than a kiss to heal damage from the Diamonds…” -Pearl, Monster Reunion

Corruption is still- bafflingly- a huge mystery. The Gems we’ve watched the CGs bubble since season one have been healed, yes, but there are still many gaps in our understanding of it. With Steven Universe Future’s promise to address some lingering story threads, it would make sense if corruption was on the plate for further discussion. So, what DO we know?

We know it’s something the Diamonds can do. Interestingly, it doesn’t seem to require all four diamonds. Three of them together were able to cause all the damage to Earth. There’s also no statement made that more than one Diamond is required to cause effects like that.

In Legs From Here to Homeworld, Blue and Yellow Diamond weren’t actually aware the corruption was something they were capable of producing. They seemed to assume they obliterated the Gems on Earth. Corruption is then, even a mystery to them. That’s... odd, isn’t it?

Pearl states that it’s “something nearly impossible to describe.” Garnet goes further to say... “It’s sorta like... if MC Bear-Bear didn’t tear the fabric of his arm, but the fabric of his mind.”

"A sound… A song?” There’s a lot of association between corruption and music.

It causes Gems to lose touch with their usual forms, instead warping into a more outwardly "monstrous” version of themselves that appear to be “just a bundle of fight-or-flight reflexes and survival instincts.” As seen by Centipeetle in Monster Buddy and Monster Reunion, it appears as if corrupted Gems try to regenerate with their original forms if unbubbled, but are simply not in a state where they can maintain that.

As seen with Jasper in Earthlings, extreme emotional distress very much seems to speed up corruption’s effects. This is less of a stated fact and more of my read on that episode, but I believe it to be an important tidbit, especially since Garnet states that corruption’s damage is mental rather than physical, at least at its core. This can also be seen in Monster Reunion with how Centipeetle’s partial healing backfires when she remembers the trauma of being corrupted and reacts strongly.

Now, when it comes to healing corruption, Steven tries to heal Centipeetle himself, and does make some nice progress... helping her regain a hold on herself as he treats her with love and compassion and understanding... but it’s ultimately not a healing that can occur in isolation, helping her on his own. She needs more support before she can heal from this corruption to a state where she can truly be herself again.

And that eventually comes in the form of the other Diamonds. So, all four diamonds can help relieve the corruption if they help these Gems all together.

3) How could this theory potentially fit into the story anyways, you nutter?

Well, here’s the part of this post where I make some broad conjectures. I honestly am shooting fish into a barrel here because again- we know barely anything about how corruption actually happened initially, and my thoughts are very jumbled. Please forgive me.

"I don’t really know how the corruption works. It’s like they’re sick. They don’t remember who they used to be.” -Steven, Gem Hunt

So, corruption seems to be a mental ailment of Gemkind, turned manifest. It also seems to have a deep connection to a Gem’s emotions, with Centipeetle growing smaller and slightly calmer upon feeling more secure in Steven’s presence, and corruption speeding up as Jasper grew more and more emotionally overwrought and self-deriding about herself.

When it comes to the Diamonds and how they perhaps caused it originally- without fully realizing- we know that at least Blue and White have abilities focused on causing others to act in certain ways. Blue has sway over one’s emotions, and White has a knack for forcing her thoughts and self upon others. (I’m not sure how Yellow’s ability would play in here.) Mayhaps, mixed with their grief and guilt and anger, their power simply pressed all of that hurt emotion onto all the Gems on Earth in one whole fail swoop...? Tearing their minds in the process of it all?

The question I still have, though- is whether a single diamond could produce effects like this. And whether a diamond could turn that ability on themself.

Could Steven accidentally corrupt himself? Why might that happen?

Well, let’s look at our boy here.

He’s got a wide circle of support at this time in canon, but notably, he’s notorious for bottling up his emotion and not letting others in to help him- instead dropping everything to help them with their problems. Just to name a few examples (a few):

The Test. He feels betrayed and hurt at the Gems for a moment about the way they’re babying him with the rigged test, but instead of admitting the hurt he feels about the scenario, bottles that up to help them feel more like good guardians.

Joy Ride. He opens up to the Cool Kids about deep, incredibly troubling stuff that’s long been on his mind, but he’s never once talked about it with his family.

Mindful Education. The perils of bottling one’s emotions is literally the whole plot of the episode. The kid has a full out sobbing breakdown while he’s plunging to his death. Connie gets through to him a little here, but later episodes show that the resolution we see here is merely the tip of the iceberg when it comes to Steven’s internal issues.

Storm in the Room. Externally, Steven tries so hard to put on a guise of content and positivity, but once alone in Rose’s room feels safe enough to let the full brunt of his emotional trauma come out in an almost explosive manner. Geeze, get this kid some hugs.

Gemcation. Steven actually fails bitterly on putting on his customary smile in this episode, simply because the weight of his problems have become such an impossible burden to him. When the other Gems are trying to help him open up, he isn’t immediately responsive to their efforts.

What’s Your Problem? Amethyst spends the whole episode trying to cheer Steven up and find out how he’s doing, and instead Steven downplays his own feelings on the matter and ends up helping her sort out her own emotional issues.

So to sum: Many an Emotional Issue, a chronic tendency to avoid outwardly addressing said issues in favor of helping everyone else instead... and to avoid accepting other people’s help.

Even if he’s surrounded by all these people who love him, the fact of the matter is that Steven still feels as if he has to face his own inner demons alone.

Now, let’s look at the lil’ teasing synopsis that was given for Steven Universe Future:

“After saving the universe, Steven is still at it, tying up every loose end. But as he runs out of other people’s problems to solve, he’ll finally have to face his own.”

Blatantly sounds like we’re gonna finally get some addressing of Steven’s emotional state, now doesn’t it?

4) A concept on what could, theoretically happen

“Maybe… it IS a guy in a monster costume. I don’t mean literally, silly! What I mean is... there might be a conscious Gem still inside there, somewhere. What if the monster is turning back and forth into its original form? If it is, it might not be as corrupted as we think! There might still be a chance to save it!” -Steven, Gem Hunt

Suppose Steven- by some as-of-yet unknown means- ends up accidentally corrupting himself. His sorry emotional state only further amplifies the effects of this corruption, and makes it really hard to retain control. Wormy Boi as a form could be like... all his inner demons made manifest, a metaphoric mirror into his current mental state. But- as he is half-human- he’s not entirely unaware of what’s happening. Perhaps... as the quote above could be sneaky foreshadowing for... how he’s turning back and forth between this corrupted form and his normal form.

He likely wouldn’t want everyone to see him like this, doesn’t want everyone to visibly know the sheer depth of how much he’s hurting. But just like the corrupted Gems were only able to be helped in community, with the support of the CGs and the Diamonds in preparing the fountain, Steven can’t fix this on his own.

He can no longer face the dark alone.

At some point, everyone has to take a brave step. Reach out. Accept help.

Steven’s helped so many people, and surely he deserves that same love and care in return, too.

And perhaps, when he’s eventually healed from this- and has gotten the opportunity to be open with his family and friends about the hurt he’s facing- he’ll be left with “corruption scars” as well. I think it’s an important thing to address, that no one goes through experiences like these without lingering effects. Stuff stays with you. Healing is not always linear. But life is a continuous journey, and with the support of people who love you surrounding, you too can make a change... can continue to live to the fullest at every moment possible.

I think the above would be a lovely moral for Steven Universe to tackle in its last run of episodes, no matter how they approach it- daft corruption theory or not.

Now, in the end- a reiteration. This is just a wild theory. I’m not trying to be any authoritative voice saying that this is for sure what will happen, because in reality I have no idea what Crewniverse is cooking. However, I do think it’s fun speculation, and I am kinda spooked at how well things fit.

Whatever happens, I’m sure it will make me weep like a baby, though. Hoh boy. Grant me sanity in these coming months as we wait for answers.

#su #steven universe #su future #steven universe future #su theory #corrupted steven theory #my post stuff #long post #the mighty 500 #1K #2K #3K #4K #5K

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sepublic · 3 years

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WandaVision Finale!

Okay, that finale was AMAAAAAZING! Everything about it… Particularly, I love that with all of these references to American, black-and-white television shows, we got a bit straight out of what felt like The Twilight Zone! Let me tell you, when Dottie came up to Wanda and started begging to be with her daughter, bargaining, playing with the role and trying to appeal, even offering up her daughter for the antagonistic, demonized role of bully, just to be with her; That was INCREDIBLY messed-up and really shook me up, as did everyone else in that sequence! It was utterly wonderful, and really, the entire premise and set-up DOES seem like a Twilight Zone episode; Perhaps the final homage/allusion by this series?

The Vision battle was great, some much-needed action and usage of Vision’s powers that we needed. I love how Vision manages to talk down the White counterpart with logic and existential thought… The philosophical, almost deconstructive way Vision deals with stuff and life isn’t cold, but rather appreciative, like someone taking apart a clock and marveling in how its put together; They don’t rage at the clock for no longer upholding the undefinable illusion it used to have…

And of course, the idea of ‘illusion’ I feel applies to Westview as well. The difference being that Westview’s mechanisms are inherently immoral, but the way Vision gets down to the basics and fundamentals of things in his almost wondrous, childlike curiosity- It’s great. He’s questioning everything, but in anticipation and acceptance of an answer, he does not view the world with cold disdain the way someone like Ultron would.

The Theseus Ship paradox was a wonderful discussion, as was the suggested answer that either neither of them are the ship, or they both are! As is Vision’s constantly poetic talk of how the ship is more the experience and memories, so if they’re attached to either, then sure- They’re both the same! I love for a hypothetically cold android, this dude is so poetic and marveling at everything. He should be a writer, a poet… But that’s not happening anytime soon; But it doesn’t mean it won’t EVER happen, either! As Vision realized, they’ve said goodbye before, only to say hello again… I love his little way of looking through and exploring loopholes in apparent certainties, both at the end and with White Vision.

Not gonna lie though, I half-expected/anticipated for White Vision to emerge with Ultron’s mind, once Vision reawakened those memories, and I have to wonder where he is. I was kind of hoping both Visions would merge together to complete a true one, given how both acknowledge that the other has something that they don’t. White Vision is still out and about though; And I like the clever usage of color, with blue representing the cold and mechanical Ultron side of him, and yellow being the Mind Stone, but most importantly Vision. And I LOVE the idea that Scarlet Witch has the last remainder of an Infinity Stone within her, preserved like her love for Vision; Some things you can’t truly eradicate, Thanos!

That reference to the Darkhold from Agents of SHIELD was great, and I imagine it’ll come into play now that Wanda’s taken it from Agatha. How Agatha got it, I have to wonder; But that’s a story for another day, I presume. I guess she’s been brainwashed truly as Agnes and is doing her own thing in Westview, without anyone to realize she doesn’t quite belong; Or maybe they will? What a wonderfully poetic, vicious fate for her character- She faked it all, and now she gets to be real! The idea of playing a ‘part’ is just a fascinating motif in this show for me, and I’m sure there’s some philosophical stuff I could dredge up about that term, ‘stories’, from my Philosophy class.

Wish we got some more resolution with Darcy, and Hayward kind of just left; But I do appreciate how we could’ve gotten a bit of an all-out brawl, with the SWORD agents targeting Agatha and how she alludes to the Salem Witch Trials! Also the allusion to the Sorcerer Supreme, AKA Doctor Strange, was great- And things are still complicated with how Wanda more maturely vouches to save those agents, even if they’re also against her… She knows that people’s dislike and hostility is pretty valid. It’ll be interesting how she’ll own up to the ‘role’ of Scarlet Witch now, as a lot of her vilification came from her own actions, admittedly. I imagine she’s going to try and it do it on her own terms, see what loopholes in the requirements she can exploit- Much like her husband Vision would! Also, Tommy and Billy having to dissipate when Vision at least understands and accepts IS messed up, so I can see why Wanda feels the need to rescue her children, who definitely don’t deserve this.

I do have to wonder if that last scene is a hint that Wanda hasn’t fully moved on, or if she HAS, but of course Tommy and Billy don’t deserve to die just for her character development! Really that dilemma and sad ending was handled so well, I half-expected Wanda to isolate the Hex to just her house, or maybe focus all of the energy of the Hex into maintaining JUST Vision, Tommy, and Billy. Maybe she’s consulting her chapter in the Darkhold for info on that? Either way, I like how she’s prepared and kept all of her assets in place in case she ever needs them, such as Agatha, now Agnes! There’s a very spiteful and utilitarian way she handles herself now, reminiscent of a villain who keeps tabs on their friends and enemies; Wanda seems to be doing the typical steps of a villain, but hasn’t exactly committed to it; And maybe never will, again, it’ll be interesting how she exploits her role as Scarlet Witch. I love the callback to those runes, how a scene that could’ve been written off as magical world building foreshadowed and came back into play; Such a simple and obvious trick, but one I always fall for because I’m so invested and IN the world!

Also, I think that lake Wanda lives by, might be the one where Sokovia’s remains landed? If so, then that’s incredibly fitting; A watery grave for her home and memories, huh? I wonder if Pietro, the real one, is buried here- It makes sense, Agatha alludes to Pietro not being buried in North America (nor South America if you want to get into technicalities), so of course their home country, or what’s left of it, is ideal! The site where he died, lowkey; Although that was arguably several miles above, but still. This third-world country that everyone dismissed and ignored has now had a major legacy that is felt across the world… It’s been heard, huh? I’m not sure why Wanda’s maintaining that illusion of herself, is she just practicing, maybe creating a front in case anyone notices activity, checks out, and then assumes it’s ‘just’ some random lady?

I can only imagine how Doctor Strange will tie into this! Probably with the Nexus of All Realities and the Darkhold, and of course the Scarlet Witch’s role as a potential threat to the Sorcerer Supreme; And hopefully with what we’ve seen of Agatha making note of magic belonging to the ‘deserving’ and being able to take it from others… Baron Mordo, perhaps? Maybe he’ll make his return interrogating Agnes as he tries to track down the Scarlet Witch, seeing her as a threat… Dang, now Mordo’s reminding me of Emperor Belos from The Owl House, with the whole belief that after chaos and bloodshed, magic should instead be isolated to only the deserving who prove themselves, and whatnot! Now I’m even in MORE interested and hopeful for Mordo with this comparison!

Likewise, the allusion to the Nexus in that commercial made me wonder if New Jersey would be the location for the Nexus of All Realities in the MCU, but now that Wanda’s left, it’s possible she’ll track down its location to Louisiana, just in the comics! Still hoping for Man-Thing in the MCU, maybe we’ll get a setup for him! I’m telling you Feige, this is your chance to make a Frankenstein/Iron Giant type of film, a misunderstood monster story to incorporate into the MCU, what with your exploration of new genres beginning particularly in Wandavision! Also iirc the Darkhold has a corrupting influence on those who read it… But the last people who did were regular humans, is Scarlet Witch above such things? Or will the Darkhold mess with her, too- An external force that disrupts her character development by corrupting her? I’m just in even more anticipation for Multiverse of Madness to be trippy and horrifying.

Overall, what a WONDERFUL conclusion, and an incredibly satisfying finale to this series, while still paving the way for new stories! It seems Photon’s story has just begun, now that Nick Fury has sent a Skrull to invite her; Maybe for the Captain Marvel sequel? I’d assume the sequel deals with the fall of the Supreme Intelligence, which takes place before 2014; Nine years before Monica gets her powers! Something had to have happened to lead to the Kree’s peace treaties with everyone that angered Ronan…Well, we’ll see!

And White Vision, we’ll see what happens with him, what existential crisis he’ll get into, poor dude; He’s arguably the original Vision, except traumatized and questioning himself! I’m surprised Wanda didn’t go after him, did she assume he was destroyed? Or has she just moved on, focusing on her sons? We’ll have to see… Vision did allude to him reuniting with Wanda, so perhaps Wanda can use her powers to gather the Mind Stone’s scattered atoms within the fragment she holds, and reform an Infinity Stone to truly resurrect Vision, from his white template! Perhaps that’s how the Nexus will come into play, as a place to draw together such cosmic power that was once scattered by the Mad Titan…

Wish we got to see more of Darcy and Woo, as well as Fietro; Him being confirmed as Ralph was great, as was that little hilarious man-cave segment of his, fitting into what would’ve been his time period. I’m a bit disappointed he’s just some dude, but at least there’s the meta gag… I LOOOOVE Scarlet Witch’s new outfit, it’s such a stylish red dress/cape and crown, love how it’s repeatedly invoked as a symbol for her; Wanda finally gets to own her classic costume, her tiara! The bit where her ‘shirt’ meets the pants reminds me of fangs and the points on her tiara, I love that sharp and threatening visual cohesion! And with all that in mind, here’s hoping to The Falcon & Winter Soldier as our next installment into the MCU! And one day, we’ll finally get that Black Widow movie released… One day!

#wandavision #wandavision spoilers #spoilers #marvel #mcu #wanda maximoff #scarlet witch #vision #speculation #analysis #review

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bubbloquacious · 3 years

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Generalized Sides

This was inspired by a conversation in the new Mathblr Discord server, come join if it sounds like fun!

So a polygon is a 2-dimensional shape that has a certain, finite number of sides, right? These are the parts of the boundary of the shape that are straight line segments in the plane. It seems like intuitively there are more kinds of shapes that can be said to have a certain number of sides, though. The boundary of a Reuleaux triangle, for example, contains no straight line segments but it looks like it has three ‘sides’, for some definition thereof. You might even ask how many sides a circle has, or a teardrop shape. Let’s try to generalize.

The rest of this post is written in the online math typesetting format KaTeX, so viewing it on the Tumblr dashboard is not ideal. View the post in a browser on my Tumblr page to render the math properly.

A (planar) curve $C$ is a subset of $\R^2$ such that there is at least one continuous function $\gamma \colon S^1 \to \R^2$ such that $C$ is the image of $\gamma$, where $S^1$ is the unit circle in $\R^2$. We wish to define a notion of the amount of ‘sides’ and ‘vertices’ that this curve has.

The curve $C$ is called differentiable in the point $x \in C$ if there is some parametrisation of $C$ such that this parametrizing function can be linearly approximated near $x$. EDIT: if there is some homeomorphism from a real open interval to an open $C$-neighbourhood of $x$ that can be linearly approximated near $x$. The exact specifics are a little technical, and ultimately unnecessary; as long as you have an intuitive idea of what it means for a curve to be smooth at certain points it’s fine.

We will call a connected open subset $A \subset C$ a smooth segment of $C$ if for every $a \in A$ we have that $C$ is differentiable in $a$. $A$ is additionally called a side of $C$ if for every smooth segment $B$ we have that $A \subset B$ implies $A = B$. A vertex of $C$ is then a point not contained in the union of all sides of $C$.

The following three facts are true about sides and vertices:

1. If some $x \in C$ has a $C$-neighbourhood that is a smooth segment, then there is some side $E$ with $x \in E$.

2. Any two distinct sides are disjoint.

3. If the set of vertices is finite and non-empty, and there is a parametrisation $\gamma$ of $C$ that is injective, then the number of sides equals the number of vertices.

Proof. This is the longest proof I’ve written on this blog so far. If you’re ever lost, I’d recommend drawing your favourite $n$-sided polygon, marking its vertices, then drawing a circle with $n$ distinct points marked on it, and finally drawing a big arrow from the circle to the polygon labelled $\gamma$.

Let $C$ and $x \in C$ be such that $U$ is a smooth segment that contains $x$. Define $E(x) := \bigcup_{V \in \mathcal{V}} V$, where $\mathcal{V}$ is the collection of all smooth segments $V$ of $C$ such that $x \in V$.

We know that $U \subset E(x)$, so it is not empty. $E(x)$ is a union of open sets, so it is itself open. It is also a union of connected sets that each contain $x$, so $E(x)$ is connected. For every $a \in E(x)$ it holds that $a$ is contained in some smooth segment, so $C$ is differentiable in $a$. It follows that $E(x)$ is a smooth segment. Assume that $B$ is a smooth segment such that $E(x) \subset B$. Then $x \in B$, so $B \subset E(x)$. We conclude that $E(x)$ is a side of $C$. Let $A,B$ be sides of $C$ such that there is some $x \in A \cap B$. Then $A,B$ are smooth segments that contain $x$, so $A,B \subset E(x)$. Because $A$ and $B$ are sides, it follows that $A = E(x) = B$. We conclude that any two distinct sides of $C$ are disjoint. Let $V$ be the set of vertices, and $\mathcal{E}$ the set of sides. Assume that $C$ is such that $V$ is finite and non-empty, and let $\gamma \colon S^1 \to \R^2$ be an injective parametrisation of $C$. $C$ is precisely the image of $\gamma$, so there is an inverse mapping $\gamma^{-1} \colon C \to S^1$. Note that any continuous bijection from $S^1$ into a Hausdorff space is a homeomorphism, so $\gamma$ and $\gamma^{-1}$ are additionally open maps between $S^1$ and $C$. For the sake of notational brevity, whenever $x \in C$ or $A \subset C$, define $x_\circ := \gamma^{-1}(x)$ and $A_\circ := \gamma^{-1}(A)$ respectively. Any finite subset of $S^1$ is discrete, for every vertex $v \in V$ we have that $\{v_\circ\}$ is an isolated point. For every $v \in V$ there is some angle $\varepsilon(v) > 0$ such that $B_{\varepsilon(v)}(v_\circ) \cap V_\circ = \{v_\circ\}$, where the metric on $S^1$ is taken to be the smallest angle between two points. Let $f \colon V \to \mathcal{E}$ be given by

\[ f(v) = E \left( \gamma \left( v_\circ + \frac{\varepsilon(v)}{2} \right) \right), \]

where $+$ on $S^1$ is taken as counterclockwise addition of angles. First we need to show that $f$ is well-defined: we must show that $C$ is differentiable at $p := v_\circ + \varepsilon(v)/2$. Define $A := B_{\varepsilon(v)/2}(p)$. We know that $A \cap V_\circ = \emptyset$, and $A$ is connected, so $A \cap (S^1 \setminus V_\circ) = A$ is a connected open set containing $p$ that is itself contained in the inverse image of some smooth segment of $C$, hence $\gamma(A)$ is a connected open subset of $C$ containing $\gamma(p)$ on which $C$ is differentiable. We conclude that $f$ is well-defined. Now we prove that $f$ is bijective. $V$ is not empty, so let $v,w \in V$ be such that $f(v) = f(w)$. By definition of $f$ there is some connected subset $K \subset S^1 \setminus V_\circ$ such that $v_\circ + \varepsilon(v)/2$ and $w_\circ + \varepsilon(w)/2$ are both in $K$. We have that the counterclockwise open arcs $(v_\circ,v_\circ+\varepsilon(v)/2)$ and $(w_\circ,w_\circ+\varepsilon(w)/2)$ are subsets of $S^1 \setminus V_\circ$, so we have $w_\circ \notin (v_\circ, v_\circ + \varepsilon(v)/2)$ and $v_\circ \notin (w_\circ, w_\circ + \varepsilon(w)/2)$. Hence the two arcs are either disjoint or equal. If the two arcs are equal, then $v = w$ and we are done. If the arcs are disjoint, then there is no connected subset of $S^1$ that contains $v_\circ + \varepsilon(v)/2$ and $w_\circ + \varepsilon(w)/2$ but not one of $v_\circ$ and $w_\circ$. Because $K$ must satisfy this, it follows that $v = w$, so $f$ is injective. Now let $E \in \mathcal{E}$ be some side of $\gamma$. Because $E_\circ$ is a connected open subset of $S^1 \setminus V_\circ$, and $V_\circ$ is non-empty, it follows that $E_\circ = (a,b)$ for some (not necessarily distinct) $a,b \in S^1$, where $(a,b)$ is, again, the counterclockwise open arc from $a$ to $b$. We prove that $a,b \in V_\circ$. Assume that $a \notin V_\circ$. Then there is some $A \subset S^1$ containing $a$ such that $\gamma(A)$ is a smooth segment of $C$. Then $E \cup \gamma(A) = \gamma((a,b)) \cup \gamma(A)$ is a smooth segment strictly larger (because it contains $\gamma(a)$) than $E$, which is a contradiction. We conclude that $a \in V_\circ$. The proof for $b$ is exactly analogous. Then, because $a + \varepsilon(\gamma(a))/2 \in E$, it follows that $E = f(\gamma(a))$, and we conclude that $f$ is surjective, hence bijective. We have constructed a bijection between $V$ and $\mathcal{E}$, so the number of vertices equals the number of sides, QED.

Note that nowhere in this proof we actually used the definition of what it means for $C$ to be differentiable in some point $x$. In fact, if we were to replace differentiability with an arbitrary property $\Phi(x)$, these three facts we’ve just proven would still hold true. The only thing we need is that a ‘$\Phi$-side’ is connected, open, and is a maximal such set on which $\Phi(x)$ holds for all $x$.

However, if we wanted to determine what kinds of planar transformations preserve the number of sides and vertices, we would need to use the proper definition. It is my hope that a set being a side is preserved under a diffeomorphism of $C$, but this post is already way too long so I leave that to any curious readers :)

#math #mathblr #geometry #generalized sides #katex

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jewish-privilege · 4 years

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I want to talk about yesterday [June 27, 2020]. Yesterday a British newspaper (The Independent) printed an interview with an actor (Maxine Peake) that contained harmful conspiracy equating to modern day blood libel (the claim that Israel is inadvertently responsible for the murder of George Floyd) against a minority group (Jews). The segment in this interview was considered so irresponsible and dangerous that the leader of the Labour opposition in government (Keir Starmer) sacked one of his shadow cabinet ministers (Rebecca Long Bailey) for praising the article, while thankfully employing a zero tolerance stance. Yet many anti-racist social media warriors continued to promote, defend and post about this interview. Unimaginable, right? Sadly not. If you were to imagine any other oppressed group in this situation, the liberal left would not have carried on in their ignorance. Imagine them sharing, eg, a homophobic article after the fact? I don’t think so.

...Antisemitism is more painful to me on the Left, because I can demonise the Right. I almost expect it from the Right. It’s so visible on the Right. That doesn’t make it non-threatening but, you know, at least it’s clear as day. The Left, on the other hand, does a good job at masking it because of its overarching aim to satiate the community of the good. The Left is a place where I don’t feel scared of my many multitudes. On the Left I don’t feel as scared to be a woman. I don’t feel as scared to be queer. But there is one identity that gives me pause. I brace myself when I tell people that I’m Jewish because most of the antisemitism I have experienced in educational institutions, in work environments, in my peer groups has been on the Left. And so to tell people I’m also a Zionist? I don’t. That is the hardest ‘coming out’ of all.

The Left is a place where I don’t feel like I’m being asked to compromise my queerness to show allyship, or my feminism. But I do feel like I’m being asked to compromise my Jewish pride, and to turn a blind eye to the antisemitism I recognise because (I know this might sound like a shock) I have experienced it my whole life. This is not a new feeling. It’s been with me forever sadly, but it has become more insidious in the last few years and due to social media I have felt violated by having to witness the true colours of so many I work with or consider friends.

It’s harder for me to keep the lid on the box and just move cautiously past it. In the last month I’ve been told by friends that I am demi-cancelled; that I’m centering my own oppression at a tone deaf time because it’s less valid; that I should ignore the physical and verbal attacks towards Jewish symbols and physical bodies at this time because it’s not as harmful as the attacks on black bodies; that I’m plain wrong about what constitutes my own experience of prejudice and that this other jew over here (who may not usually even present as Jewish) shares their own view as a non-jew of what constitutes antisemitism, therefore it’s more correct than mine (how convenient, and also erroneous).

All of these things are entirely false. It’s an isolating time, sure. It always has been. In the past few weeks, it wasn’t reported by mainstream media that a Jewish man was stabbed in the head in Nevada as his attacker screamed Heil Hitler; a Rabbi was stabbed in a busy London high street and the BBC skirted reporting it as a hate crime; a crowd of protestors in France shouted “Sales juifs” (“dirty jews”) at the police; swastikas have been graffiti’d on elementary school buildings in America and at bus stops in places like Oregon (“Hitler did nothing wrong” was one tag)… and that’s just off the top of my head. The Hanukkah stabbings at a Rabbi’s house in New York City were just last year, and the Pittsburgh shooting at the Tree of Life synangogue just the year before.

I think I should make it clear that a lot of what I wanted to address here is for the attention of white allies, and also of Jewish people on the Left who don’t know how to engage. Whether you choose to read this or not (and I get it, you have a lot to catch up on right now learning wise), I have written this to try and let you understand that this hurt is real. It’s not my ego or a “distraction”. It’s also not just mine. It’s shared by many of us Jews committed to the Left. All of our commitment to anti-racism and allyship unfortunately is not short-hand work. It is not I who is distracting you from your work in Black Lives Matter. I am reacting to violations made by antisemites who create procrastinating rhetoric that is completely irrelevant to the cause. It is a web of lies that dates back through our historic oppression that has nothing to do with justice for the murders, and nothing to do with defunding state apparatus in America.

Anti-racism and allyship involves listening to intersectional conflict without dismissing it violently because it doesn’t fit the binary of right versus wrong, black versus white, or because it renders your leader flawed at best and bigoted at worst. If it were as simple as a binary we wouldn’t be struggling. My commitment to social justice is unwavering not because I’m a jew (though that’s part of it) but because I’m a human being. I must be accepted as both...

#antisemitism #antisemitism dressed as anti zionism #all jews are the same #erasure of jewish oppression #good jew versus bad jew #jews lie about antisemitism #gaslighting jews #goysplaining #long post #anti black racism

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sambinnie · 3 years

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1. On bank holiday Monday I woke two of the housemates at 4.15am, and we made a pan of hot chocolate and opened the door to hear the dawn chorus. One of them sensibly remained on a chair in the garden, insulated against the early May morning with a duvet and blanket and thick onesie; the other walked out with me, into the dark, and we tramped the streets together, along the silent pavements, towards the river and fields.

We discovered that a large ivy-covered tree is home to a bat colony, members of which flapped silently about our heads in their haste to return before full dawn. A cuckoo was audible across the water. A starling clicked its beak and jittered up and down the branch. The housemate called me a boomer.

Of all the odd things I miss from last year, it’s the silence of the roads that is the greatest loss. At 6 o’clock in the morning there would be almost no traffic at all; now the birds are almost drowned out by the constant roar, even some distance away. Whether it’s hormones or poor emotional processing or a rational reaction to a damaged world, I feel angry at the traffic. I’m not saying it would necessarily be a 100% smooth process, but I do wish the world could be run by peri-menopausal, menopausal and post-menopausal women for a year or two. Just to see.

2. I am still obsessed with Orlando Wood’s short book Lemon (I was banging on about it back in February), and am so grateful to have so many people in my life who care about those same ideas. We’re in a left-brain cycle of culture at the moment, he explains: the left brain has a tendency to “isolate parts from the whole and to see them in the abstract… It likes to break things up into smaller parts, to categorise, and therefore favours the familiar, consistency, repeatability and predictability”. It also “prefers to see things in terms of simple and linear cause and effect. It prizes utility, power and control, and its ability to abstract and isolate things from their context enables it to manipulate the world”. What’s that you say? Wider cultural discourse and rights of individual groups, inability to have dialogues about, you say? Mmm.

My favourite part of the book is when Wood breaks down two adverts: Heineken’s ‘Water in Majorca’ from 1985, and GoDaddy’s 2018 ‘Make Your Own Way’ ad. Remember that? No, me neither. ‘Make Your Own Way’ is full of colourful images, isolated people, or tiled with images of themselves to make a ‘conveyer belt’ effect, and clean-face words which could be applied to almost any product or company (watch it to cure your insomnia/trigger a panic attack); everything is buzzword-y, inspirational, keynote, statement, unilateral, and utterly, utterly devoid of humour, humanity, or engagement.

One of the most striking things about Wood’s ad breakdown is that, once you’ve read it, you can’t stop noticing how in, say, three ad breaks within an hour-long programme, there might be one advert at most which doesn’t fit this left-brain pattern. Adverts for products as diverse as cars, period reusables, white goods, clothing catalogues, insurance, snack food, and supermarkets all, to some extent or another, fit the mould: bright images, little human connection, bland Instagram visuals, large slogans, spoken-wordlessness (better for the global market), a vague puff of do-gooding, and absolutely no wit at all. The only one I’ve seen recently attempting anything different is Maltesers, about a breastfeeding mother and her mother-in-law, which I admired for the milk-leak and loathed for the Hahahaha, aren’t women awful to each other?.

It’s draining to imagine the flat meetings and endless audience segmentation that enabled this ad trend: this sector engages on social media in the evenings and this demographic prefers a friendly looking home and our audience here is more about food as a pleasure. I’m loathe to break it to them, but for all that laser-focused research you are all making the same ads. And as Wood exposes so brilliantly, those ad campaigns are costing more and more to receive less and less engagement. Congrats, lads.

3. Speaking of left- and right-brain world views, as so often happens this episode of Hidden Brain popped up serendipitously, with the wonderful host Shankar Vedantam interviewing Iain McGilchrist about his 2010 book The Master and His Emissary. It’s just over 45 minutes and is worth every second — McGilchrist is so clear and insightful about how to tell what type of brain is leading at any given time, what we lose in a left-brain society, and what we need to do about it. (I went back and checked and only then saw the book is in Lemon’s bibliography. Bliss.)

4. For various reasons, a small toilet room here has been stuffed with balloons for the last week. It’s absolutely staggering both how not one of us thought to remove the balloons, instead bobbling through them to reach the facilities at any given hour of night or day, and also how immensely relaxing it is to go in there since they’ve been removed and humanely destroyed (I assume). It’s A Squash and a Squeeze in action, a life philosophy I cling to pretty robustly and find pays dividends. A housemate pointed out recently that whenever they are travelling in my car, they play a game to see if they can ever see another car in worse condition, and they say they never, ever can. It’s the Squash and a Squeeze philosophy that, in part, enables me to drive the dented, rusting, bubbled, scratched, lichen-furred, beloved piece of garbage I do, having previously had no driving license for almost two years after my seizure. It’s such a delight to drive any car at all.

5. We’re rewatching Ghosts, which of course I recommend, and I suddenly realised that the Captain (Ben Willbond) is the speaker of possibly my favourite newspaper-based gag in the entire run of The Thick of It. Please watch all of Ghosts and all of The Thick of It, then perhaps The Death of Stalin? All thoroughly excellent, and the latter two contain my favourite kind of Muriel’s Wedding-type comedy, where I am tearfully wheezing with laughter one moment, then gaping with discomfited horror the next.

6. I made Nigel Slater’s cardamom-spiced rice pudding this weekend, (although I times everything by 1.5 except the rice, which I up to 200g) and it was as good as always, if I say so myself. Cardamom, like capers, coriander, and pistachios, is an ingredient I’ve only come to love as an adult — I often long to make cardamom buns but am in such an emotionally entangled relationship with my sourdough starter that I never have yeast in the house, so have to rely on my favourite local coffee shop for a hit every now and again. If someone wedges themselves against the fridge door this weekend, I might attempt these.

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skippyv20 · 4 years

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Dear Skippy, a riddle interpretation made with love and humour in celebration of MM Anon returning. So wonderful MM Anon, thank you. Skippy, Thank You for being your usual wonderful self, and keeping that door open. This interpretation contains no truth and only fun. LH Anon

doctor gone batty………

Actual Dr Jane Goodall interview

“My colleagues at the Royal Society for the Protection of Bats were delighted with the arrival of a rare male bat pup. Like all pups born at the Royal Society HQ, he was named after a member of the BRF, this one was dubbed Prince Harry.”

“Since his release into the wild, Prince Harry is finding life outside of the Royal Society challenging. He is sighted almost daily near the Royal Society HQ and doesn’t seem to have yet ‘flown the nest’ so to speak.”

“Night tracking indicates that there is a recently acquired spouse on the scene who has restricted his hunting abilities. We are concerned that he has lost weight.”

“The spouse displays desperate flirtation and attraction techniques but all indications to date show that Prince Harry does not want his offspring to grow up like that, in the wild.”

“We have to bring him back into the fold of the Royal Society for this rare breeding line to continue.”

LA for dummies ………

INTERNAL MEMO - Sunshine Sachs LA Office

Action with urgency

Contact Splash News, advise client has received parcel previously delayed in UK under non-essential freight notice. Call time on location 1100 hours.

Contact Meghans Mirror, advise client will be dressed in Dorias hand me down yoga-wear (details to come). Pitch as ‘recycling clothes’ and tell them to get A into G with sourcing designer samples, it has been months now.

Contact upmarket baby shop, advise client will return goods, including feature baby pacifier for full refund after images published.

Contact Archewell Foundation, advise client appearance fee from shop is to be publicised as donation following boom in sales

All invoices and timesheet hours are to include the job code reference ‘MM042 - Dummy for her dummy’

Doctors Within Borders ……… social insistence …………

Following the epic success of her voiceover in ‘Elephants Without Borders’, PH has been caught out again pitching his wife’s talent in the hopes of furthering her A List career. In a phone call to the BBC investigative branch he was insistent that her expertise and contacts could be used in the planned documentary ‘Doctors With no Borders’. The documentary, conceptualised by writers who hang out on certain Tumblr blogs, focuses on medical professionals who have been paid off to endorse medical fiction. In regards to the segment about surrogacy cover ups PH was to have said “Oh yeah, she’s invested. I mean interested.”

hugs not bugs………

“I was just cruising around, enjoying the musty odour of the building. I’m attracted to sparkly things so went to check out this headpiece, worst luck, it was cubic zirconia not real diamonds. Then it happened, I flew a little lower towards the face. I still have bad dreams about that close up view. I was trying to get away and she kept waving her hand around, it was like she was trying to catch and cuddle me against my wishes.”

Fly remembers the wedding of MM and PH

absolutely isolated

The new TV series, funded by O, features MM, a heavy-drinking, drug-abusing PR pawn who spends her time failing to lose weight and chasing bizarre fads in a desperate attempt to stay young and “hip”.

MM is joined by magazine fashion director JM, whose drug abuse, alcohol consumption and desperate promiscuity far eclipse MM’s.

MM is reliant upon the support of her half sister SM, an aspiring writer whose constant care of her immature sister has left her a bitter cynic.

The series also stars DR in a supporting role as MM’s dotty, sarcastic and often thieving mother who appears, usually in the background, in nearly all of the episodes.

Scooby as MM’s utterly brainless personal assistant also features in many of the episodes.

Only review

“I give this one star because it is real reality TV. I can’t give it anything more than that as the storyline is blatantly ripped off from Ab Fab. The title is a highly offensive play-on-words amid a global pandemic, but I guess it shows the same sensitivity as writing motivational messages on bananas for ladies of the night”

Kate. ……… “ not a whisper ma’am ……… St George’s chapel of course!!……………

Jeopardy MM Edition!?!

Answer: Kate

Question: Whose husband does MM most want?

Answer: Shout

Question: What initiative did MM try to hijack during her time in the BRF?

Answer: St George’s Chapel

Question: Where was MM when she realised that her game was up?

Oh thank you! Such fun! You are brilliant! We need the laughs for sure!😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂

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robin-blogs · 3 years

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Wednesday Lecture - David Blandy – 27.01.2021

This week’s Lecture was about David Blandy. I had personally never heard of him before. At the start of the lecture he started by playing a game called ‘Babel’ in which he read a story and rolled a dice. There was also a Jenga tower to represent the tower of Babel. The game reminded me of Dungeons and Dragons with the story and dice. The story is also about remembering your name as you forgot it when you wake up in the area described. The journey ended when babel fell. I found this to be a very interesting and intriguing way to start the lecture and as a result it made me feel immediately more engaged with his work. I have always loved board games and card games as it reminds me of times playing with my Nan or playing Dungeons and Dragons campaigns with friends after college. Although this segment of the lecture didn’t connect with my university practice; it definitely relates to my personal life and as a result made me want to see more about Blandy’s work and how he’s incorporated these themes and ideas into his work.

Blandy then went to talk about a recent project he had been working on called “World After” which creates a narrative world in which humans don’t exist on the plant as there aren’t any left. Instead of humans there are instead creatures such as lizard people and to be in place of humans. He also uses this removal of humans to comment on gender norms with an intersex character who changes gender each day. I feel this relates to both my personal life and work as I work with themes of gender and gender norms throughout my own work. I have recently been working on an outfit to show people the effects and events of the Stonewall Riots while also subverting gender norms by being a man in a dress wearing makeup. Blandy then went on to talk about how he has always been interested in role-play since he was young. He has had inspirations such as Akira; anime and manga cultures, Princess Mononoke, Zelda and Dungeons and Dragons. When he started to talk about his inspirations coming from the series of Zelda games, I felt immediately exited. For a long time now, I have adored The Legend of Zelda series; especially the latest one for the Nintendo Switch; Breath of The Wild. I have certainly been inspired by this series of games myself throughout my art, even if it isn’t visually apparent. Blandy goes to explain how all of the games in the series are all telling similar stories through different reality and through different timelines. This had a direct inspiration and impact on his game he is working on in a collaborative effort called “World After”. From his inspiration from the Zelda series and their use of a timeline, he then went on to create his own timeline for his own game in which he called it the “Cataclysm Timeline”. The choice of this wording made me create a link between the acts in Zelda and within Blandy’s game. Within the Zelda timeline the overarching threat is mainly centred on “The Great Calamity” and Gannon// Gannondorf in which the main protagonist ‘Link’ has to overcome. Although the timeline created for the series breaks up into three sections once the events of Ocarina of Time happens. The three timelines split into one where ‘The Hero is Defeated’ where Hyrule and the Hero decline. There is then a ‘Child’ and ‘Adult’ era for the remaining two timelines. In these two timelines, Link is sent back by Zelda to relive his childhood he didn’t get as a result of fighting the Calamity. The adult timeline is then where Link// The Hero of Time disappears where Gannondorf can rule free unopposed.

After the lecture ended, I wanted to connect more with his work and how he creates his concepts. Before the lecture ended he mentioned how he wanted to do a collaborative effort around Liverpool and have a new species or creature in the game based around the area. As a direct result of this I decided to connect more with his process through this idea. When I think of Liverpool I think a lot about industry mixed with areas of overgrowth where areas are knocked down; often sprouting weeds. I decided to start sketching out a concept around my vision of Liverpool, this made me realise the thought that had to go through the process of character creation. Although this isn’t the first time I have worked around making characters. I have created my own characters in the past with their own writing and basic timelines of events. I have yet to develop them more but as a result of creating them it gave me even more respect for those who do this as a profession, whether as writers or concept artists. When thinking and sketching out my concepts for the character based around Liverpool I found myself thinking deeper into the characters visuals and actions the more I developed them into a drawing. As seen in the picture below, I originally only had his concept as a human with a dandelion for a head. I then developed them more to incorporate more colours and lines as a contrast by adding the green leaves of dandelion weeds around the neck as a kind of collar. I then developed their body to incorporate a mix of broken and new buildings around my personal ideas of Liverpool. Overall, even though it was a smaller version of what Blandy does for his project, it felt rewarding and gave me a greater understanding of his process when I replicated it myself through my own ideas.

When talking more in depth about his game “World After” he talked about how it was about creating a narrative and change. Blandy created this game as a collaborative effort with other artists and writers. Throughout the previously mentioned timeline, it shows what happened// will happen over the next 75 years, based on real world science from what will happen to Earth 8000 years in the future. I found this to be an interesting way of showing and educating people on what could happen to our own planet in the future if things don’t change without it being apparently clear. After the main lecture had finished I decided to attend the Q&A to gain a greater insight to Blandy’s work and how he came to the creation of World After.

Q&A

Q: “Is the idea for World After a result of what would happen if we had to adapt to what we ((humans)) have done to the world?”

A: In a way it is, he explained how it’s like a ‘Deep Future’ in which its 8000 years in the future. It’s a way of reimagining the world after sea-rise and us adapting to different societies and whatever situation was in each ‘haven’ that we were hiding in. Its why each haven and society within them are so radically different since each one has been isolated as a large space for such a long amount of time. They all eventually come out of their havens and come to realise not everything is as they thought it was. They discover all of these different societies that they didn’t know where in the world. Blandy then goes on to explain how it’s a good way of making artistic licence for what could be created.

Q: “Were you inspired by Morrowind or Skyrim at all? A lot of it reminds me of that series.”

A: Blandy went on to say how he had never played Skyrim, he’s exploited it through film but has never played through it properly. He said he thinks it’s been inspired by the whole plethora of fantasy, and he wanted it to have that fantasy feeling. He then commented on the kinds of fantasy ideas around games such as Skyrim, Dungeons and Dragons and Wold of Warcraft and how a lot of their base characters are very racially coded. He comments on general Orc characters and how they are perceived as degenerate and thuggish and how it shows a really racist image of blackness. He wanted to create a fantasy space that didn’t have that ‘baggage’ in a sense and to take away from the alignment of people being naturally good and naturally evil. Blandy then went to talk about how he also wanted to use it as a way to connect with his children more and to get them away from their screens a little more. He enjoyed the feeling of everyone being in the same mental space to play a game together; especially with games over Zoom. He founds it’s been a way of him making a lot of friends and connecting with new people.

Q: “What are you intending with your work?”

A: To draw the viewer in through how it looks or sounds and through that you can then insert some idea that changes their view of the world. A wandering person looking for truth feels interesting to him such as with Final Fantasy VII and how in the end where is the self? He got into Philosophy and geopolitics and society throughout his work. What is the self? He didn’t really find an interest in VR when compared to the brain as he said the brain is one of the best renderers.

Q: Were you inspired by any specific Art Movements?

A: In a way it comes from performance and being interactive. It comes from 60’s performance and working with symbols and language and in an interactive way through that. To him it came like a set of instructions to perform which reminded him a lot of Dungeons And Dragons.

Overall, as a result of attending Blandy’s Q&A, I feel like I have connected a lot more with his work and I have gained a greater understanding of why he is creating it. I am personally very excited to see where his work with World After goes as it feels so refreshingly different from any other roleplaying online game I’ve seen before. His development of World After relates to me on a very personal level as I have always found a love of video games through the stories they tell such as with Zelda and Skyrim, so it makes me ecstatic to see where World After goes as it combines all of the story based elements of the games I love and adds in a level of acceptance and diversity. There are no human characters to remove the element of racism and gender issues which I’ve never seen from any games like this before. There is also a society of intersex people who change gender each day which I found to be an amazing edition. This can attract people of all genders and identities to help them feel more included and understood. As a trans man myself I loved this edition of diversity. Another part of his world of World After that intrigued me was his use of the timeline relating to real world events that are predicted to happen 8000 years in the future. As mentioned before, I think it’s a really intriguing and interesting way to indirectly show people of all ages the affects were having on our world such as with climate change.

In conclusion, this lecture and Q&A was by far my favourite of this year, and I thought it was the perfect lecture to start the second semester with. Although it’s taken me a while to get back into working from my mental health, I’m glad this is what I had to start with as it had many elements I loved and that relate to both my personal life and practice. I’d love to see more of Blandy’s work in the future.

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aalt-ctrl-del · 3 years

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there is a certain map that people are trying to pass around. I do want to talk about the material involved, without directing peoples attention to the map in question. I follow closely the numbers and data, and I believe in the integrity of the election - I also don’t want donald joke to get ahold of the map, because can you imagine this dumbass? With a map? He can’t read?

And rudy gilligan getting lost and not finding the friends he made along the journey? It’s such a shit storm.

ANYWAY. This map has to deal with tracking human behavior, and trends. Stuff that I love to get involved with. The problem though, the map is being misused. I did read a few articles about the application and I watched a tutorial on youtube, UNFORTUNATELY the individual explaining the map left out some very crucial details.

This algorithm that was being paraded around like a game changer, has a potential for failure. I wasn’t even testing for that. But this failure that can devalue the algorithm of the map, is telling. To indirectly paraphrase a segment, an external factor can deviate the data. In other words, this map which is based on human behavior and determining not great factors, can be disrupted by a force that was not anticipated. A deviation from the norm. I wonder what sort of deviation from the norm could have driven millions of people to vote in the 2020 election? It’s a mystery.

But I am not studying this material because I am looking for faults in its use, I am exploring the claims for the sake of validation. Also, it is very interesting. Also, very creepy that we follow patterns like this, and they can be used to track behavior. This isn’t news to me, as I use similar tools to track human behavior for my marketing studies.

This is a point of reference to review, and I talk a lot about how out of the ordinary this election is. How it has pressed people beyond their comfort zone, and how we have charts on our computers nearly every day to calculate cases and deaths. And the coping sites. They don’t help, but that’s a resource that is there.

But lemme go ahead and rant more about this map trump supporters have fallen in love with. One factor that does support it, is the fact that trump supporters are very easy to read. We know their behavior types, their VALs, and we know the colors they wear - literally. We knew from the beginning that despite a pandemic, trump supporters would go out on that day Nov 3, to vote for a racist, homophobe, that has no interest in assisting states with a national crisis. The numbers hold true, and outline who they are in a nice bow. There is no dispute here, that this map can follow the behavior patterns of a like minded group of people. No shock, sherlock.

Now let’s look at president-elect Biden, and his people. We are not all the same, we are not data that can be measured easily - we have conflicting views, many of us don’t even like President-elect Biden. We have varied ideals and interests, some of us even vote third party every election just to do it. Yet this time, we made a compromise, in large numbers. Thousands of young voters made certain to register for the first time in their lives, thousands of middle aged voters said, “too heck” and registered to vote, for the first time in their lives. Hundreds of us voted early, some of us voted absentee because there is a deadly pandemic on the loose, while others didn’t feel like risk losing their vote, and went out to vote that night November 3 despite fears.

There is also the Senate seats, that people always seem to forget. Yuck.

Alas, I am not saying that my rational is not indisputable, I am merely indicating a flaw in the mindset that the data is immovable or static. I went through the politico website scrutinizing the data for Pennsylvania there, the differences to President-elect Biden and trump. The statistics are very promising and within the margin of reason - I predominately check the results with Biden’s wins because those are the areas of.... distrust. How dare Biden get voters. How unsightly.

Anyway, I ran calculations between the votes both candidates (primarily in Pennsylvania because everyone hates that state rn for some reason) accumulated, and subtracted that from a population count of the county area. You know what I found? The differences between Biden and trump appear accurate and within the realm of belief - given that some people were minors and couldn’t register to vote, and others may have been non-citizens or didn’t register at all to vote. In some areas of Pennsylvania, there didn’t appear to be a great urgency to vote or no one gave a damn.

I thought to myself, “well, the census is outdated, maybe a lot of people... died?” Morbid as that is, it’s not an unrealistic mindset in 2020, is it? But no, I went back and checked the covid maps and evaluated the cases to death ratio here’s the link. Not a lot of cases given the documented population of 269K, from an estimated 68K and 66K between the two candidates - a rough 135K didn’t go out to vote. So that does describe an area of low morale for voting, no urgency.

However, there is a distinct trend in areas of high population, and the areas where covid has done harsh damage to the population. In these areas, the typical trend did see more vote turnout for President-elect Biden. It’s not always-always the case, but it does occur with high frequency. Metropolitan areas especially, saw a high turnout of voters supporting Biden. People that believe the virus is real, and acknowledge we need to do something other than wait for it to “go away.”

But the data supplemented to the map, are not conclusive or easy to support. The map has potential to fail, and it does so when there is an outside intervention which alters the typical behavior of a person or group of people. Yes, it can be used to detect crimes, and to follow the typical trends and patterns in human behavior, but it is difficult if not impossible to correlate the typical trends to a historic event which has affected millions at this point. How are we able to use malicious information and call our current climate natural? Nothing currently is natural, many of us are barely surviving, many of our people are unemployed, many of us have lost loved ones or have been isolated from family due to safety concerns.

Why is it people who support trump seem to come down to the mindset, everything is totally normal today? How are they able to function in normal society, and how many people have they slain in their negligence?

It is horrendous that people try to latch onto a data calculating map, and call it “very telling”, while the rest of the normal people are trying to decipher if todays a safe day to go shopping for groceries. It’s outlandish that people are out here insisting that the covid does not exist, and btw, why the hell did everyone decide to go out and vote this time? It’s weird. Nothing is right.

#maps #corona virus #coronavirus #rant below cut #map #trump #maga #the data shook me #then I read more about its purpose and use and went (why.... is this a big discovery?)#yes the map can tell a story) but someone stole the context from the map and everybody went nuts #im merely explaining why the data didnt match up I could be wrong #but i tend to trust that the people appointed by the county courts are not going to fucking dunk their job in the river #and i trust that the general population is struggling at this time and does not want to die due to horrible blood disease #this whole thing took two hours to go through #im sure the polling and software analysists already went through this but I didnt feel good

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gadgetuniverse · 4 years

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The all-new Redmi Earphones! But, are they worth it? Let’s find out!

1. Introduction

Recently, Xiaomi launched their Redmi earphones for the affordable price of 399 in India. These earphones are available in three exciting color choices, Black, Blue and Red. So, today let’s take a look at the black color variant of these Redmi Earphones and decide if they are worth the price. So, let’s get started with our review.

2. Unboxing

The box is a familiar Xiaomi box but instead of the typical Xiaomi’s white and orange color on the box, we get a red and white combination, which to my perspective looks much more better and gives an aggressive look to the product. There is a Hi-Res branding on the box and it say’s Redmi Earphones on the left, right as well as on the front side of the box. There are the specifications listed on the rear side of the box. The Xiaomi logo comes on the front of the box. There is also a scratch and check sticker on the bottom of the box to verify the authenticity of the earphones.

Inside the box, we get the earphones, and three pairs of soft silicone, anti-wax ( as they claim it to be ) ear tips of sizes, Small, Medium and Large. The medium ear tips come preinstalled on the earphones, but I have replaced them with the small ones.

3. Build Quality and Fit

Now, coming to the build quality of the earphones. The earphones are made with aluminum alloy and are super light-weight.

The wires are not braided, but decent, considering the price of the earphones. They are connected through a Y-shaped connector/junction in the middle of the wire, which is stable, as I accidently pulled the earphones too roughly but due to the Y-shaped connector midway, the wires are intact.

The fit is pretty nice but I should tell you that my ear canal is pretty small, so they fit nicely, but even with the smallest ear tip on, I faced a bit of problem with the fit. So, I mostly prefer headphones over earphones. But, anyways, if your ear canal is medium to large, these will perfectly fit you. I am just an exception.

The 3.5mm male AUX cable is tilted at an angle of 90 degrees, so that the wire is safe to use and also durable. That’s a very nice thing in a budget earphone.

One thing to note here is that, the earphones are not tilted, they are straight. It’s not a big deal for me, but if you want tilted earphones, then this could be a deal-breaker for you.

4. Ease of Use

The anti-wax ear tips do work. I mean, they don’t completely resist them but they don’t stick to them either.

The wire length is 1.25m which is enough for wired users, unless you are a sound engineer or artist.

There is decent noise isolation if they fit you perfectly. I mean, not like Sony WH-1000XM3s but good passive isolation.

The earphones are not magnetic. The magnetic earphones like those of Realme are not useful for wired earphones, but it would have been good if Xiaomi had managed to give make these earphones magnetic. But still, no big deal.

The earphones are very light-weight with the weight of 13 grams. But the wires are prone to tangling.

5. Sound Quality

Now, the most important part for any audio device, the sound quality. These earphones provide a very nice audio experience. The Hi-Res audio branding is not just for marketing purpose.

Trust me, I own a Hi-Res wireless headphone from Soundcore by Anker ( Not Sponsored ). They are priced at rupees 3000.( Around $40 )

These Redmi Earphones offer a very comparable sound to those headphones at such an affordable price.

The treble is really good, the mid and high frequencies are all there but the bass, like, it will not vibrate your head, but, if you hear them at a place with very less noise, you will feel them. As they don’t cover your ears or head, it will not produce vibrating bass. But, but, the bass is really awesome for budget earphones.

The loudness of the earphones is also very good. You will probably need to hear it with 25-50% volume depending upon your device.

Now, one major thing to note here is that, the audio quality of earphones doesn’t just depend upon your headphones/earphones or speakers but also upon the device you are using, example smartphones.

So, I have been using these earphones with Xiaomi’s Redmi Note 4 and Note 9 Pro. These devices have high-quality DACs built into them.

So, if you plan on buying these earphones, don’t forget to check your device’s sound output and quality.

Because, later on, if you don’t like them, don’t blame me.

Anyways, I also compared these earphones with the ever popular Ant Audio W56 but these Redmi earphones are better than those in all ways, be it, sound quality, built quality, weight, and even price. But the Ant Audio W56 has flat cables, so it wins in this category of wire quality.

6. Microphone Quality

The microphone on these earphones as Xiaomi claims them to be is of HD quality. You can listen to them and decide if you want them.

Sound test starting in 3, 2, 1:

The audio you are hearing now is coming from the Redmi earphones. The microphone test will end in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 and

7. Verdict

Now, my verdict on these earphones is that if you are on the lookout for best wired earphones under rupees 500 or even 400, these are the best in each and every segment.

These earphones are stylish, light-weight and even durable.

I would recommend these to all who want to listen to high-quality music, even to those who want these to view content, such as movies, videos and even for schooling purposes.

They are built well and trust me, if you buy them, you will not regret.

So, if you watched and listened carefully till the end, I thank you.

And if I could make you clear whether you should spend your hard-earned money on these earphones, then please consider subscribing to my channel.

Also, you are free to like and share this video, and also you can comment down below if you have any queries.

Thank You for reading and understanding!

I hope I will see you in my next post.

Till then, Take Care.

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letamreviews · 4 years

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Top of 2019

With 56 films watched and 27 favorited in 2019, I composed a list of my top. By pure happenstance, the list is almost an exact third (18) of the total films watched. Be aware that I don’t have as much to say about some of these because I took no notes after.

Because I’d be biased towards them, I don’t count the National Theatre Live plays.

Since the list is likely to be altered between now and the end of February (to accommodate for films missed), check the Lettboxd list later on to see an up to date listing, but be aware that it intentionally lacks the details provided here.

EDIT (01/04/20):

Woke up this morning religiously re-reading this and caught some grammar errors. It’s almost like staying consistently well-rested is actually beneficial. While I’m at it, Blind Rating (BR) is how worthwhile the film is watching “blind” (or knowing nothing). The scale is 1 (worth it) to 5 (you must). ‘Eh is essentially a 0.5.

1. Midsommar (USA)

Saw the original and Director's Cut in theatres and discussed them with a group immediately after both times. I’m somewhere between really liking it and loving it. Still unsure. Hell of an experience with a lot to notice, debate over, and pick up on during the second viewing. Don’t even get me started on the Christian/Dani matter. Dat tension, tho. Blind Rating: 4/5

2. Us (USA)

Saw in theatres and discussed with a group immediately after. I’m digging the allegories and the way (I think) it reflects on society. Dem reveals, tho. Blind Rating: 4/5

3. Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am (USA)

Saw in theatres and discussed with a group immediately after. Two things probably play a huge hand in this not being atleast 3 spots lower: my demographic and the fact that her older self constantly reminded me of my grandma and a certain middle school teacher. Regardless, it’s an entertaining, interesting, and lively documentary with its many personalities on-screen all giving their take on matters along with Ms. Morrison herself. Glad they managed to finish and release this 1.25 months before her death. Blind Rating: 0/5

4. When They See Us (USA)

Saw on Netflix over the course of a month. Y’all, this one hurt too much to watch again any time soon. Admittedly, part of the reason why it hit me so hard is because I could easily have been one of them. Dat ending, tho. Don’t forget to watch the Oprah followup When They See Us Now after. You’ll ball (again). Blind Rating: 3/5

5. Parasite (South Korea)

Saw an advance screening in theatres and watched a live post-film Q&A. I really like it. This hit me in such a way that it’s one of three films I’m writing an essay on. Planing on watching it a second time soon so I can finish with a sense of accuracy. This isn’t one that I would recommend looking at images for. There are some that will spoil the experience of the second half. Seriously, block the “Parasite” tag from your feed if you can. Blind Rating: 3/5

6. Luce (USA)

Saw in theatres and discussed with a group immediately after. This was is so~ good as a thriller and especially in regards to being Black in America. Wanted to watch it a second time but never managed to squeeze it in before it left theatres. Dem performances, tho. Dat tension, yo. Dat score, bro. Blind Rating: 1/5

7. Them That Follow (USA)

Saw in theatres and discussed with someone immediately after. I love it. Blind Rating: 1/5

A drama influenced thriller about a religious and somewhat self-isolating community that's effectively blanketing a realistic romance. (snip) —Letterboxd review

8. The Souvenir (United Kingdom)

Saw in theatres (partially because so many movie peeps were shitting on it). I love it, but I didn't fucking love it. Was tempted to see it again, but didn’t get the chance. Dat ending, tho. While it was a movie peep telling me the whole plot that caused me to gain so much interest in it [Cabin in the Woods (2011) all over again, amiright?], I must say that the less you know the better. It’ll make for... a more immersive experience. Blind Rating: 3/5

9. After the Wedding (USA)

Saw in theatres and discussed with a group immediately after. I thought I really liked it, but I love it. This was a trip down unexpected lane, le'me tell ya. The trailer is a spoilerful lie, but the Landmark's description is very accurate. People's experiences will have a heavy hand in how they react to it and feel about certain characters. The way they made this feel like a constant thriller was excellently done. Dat cinematography, tho. Go in knowing nothing more than what the previous link provides. Blind Rating: 1/5

10. Joker (USA)

Saw in theatres and discussed with a group immediately after. I really like it. Blind Rating: 1/5

(slight spoilers)

This was difficult to watch at times, but hella captivating throughout. Arthur's reasoning is believable, his sanity is questionable, and his life is indeed one hell of a joke. Like watching an extreme example of what happens when people on the lower end lose access to social programs. This can very easily be taken as a commentary on mental illness kept unchecked. More than that, it's a story about a guy who accepts his "crazy" and transcends poverty, circumstance, and societal bullshit... at everyone else's expense. (snip) —Letterboxd review

11. Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool (USA)

Saw in theatres and discussed with a group immediately after. I really like it. Captivating documentary in a very similar style to Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am, but with Mr. Davis never joining the “talking heads” (as people like to call it) and instead being heard as a constant narrator of his own biography. Regardless of how I feel about him on a personal level, this shit was a great watch and the ending hit hard. Still need to get his autobiography, though. There’s a nostalgic factor for me here since I was partially reminded of my grandpa while watching it. Blind Rating: 'eh

12. Queen & Slim (USA)

Saw in theatres and discussed with someone immediately after. Fuck yeah, I enjoyed this one. Dat soundtrack and cinematography, bruh? 👌🏿 The throwback soundtrack, main characters’ racial group, and fact that they went to New Orleans definitely play a hand in why this one’s not atleast 1 spot lower. Blind Rating: 1/5

13. Dwelling in the Fuchon Mountains (China)

Saw in theatres during festival and attended discussion days later. I really like it. Was long, but in a good way. Similar to Ash is Purest White (2018) in that I kept thinking "please end here," but would be glad it didn't later. It's beautifully slothy and has absurdly long tracking shots. The cinematography during walking conversations is notable. Dat trick, tho. Blind Rating: 'eh

14. A Girl Missing (Japan)

Saw in theatres during festival and discussed with a group immediately after. Bruh~, this is a hell of a personal trial. Didn’t expect it to go the places it did. Blind Rating: 1/5

15. Dutch Angle: Chas Gerretsen & Apocalypse Now (Netherlands)

Saw on MUBI on phone. I love it. This goes over his childhood (for 8 minutes), career paths, photography of 9/11/1973's Chilean coup d'etat, the 6 months he spent on-set photographing Apocalypse Now (1979), and him as a person. What I didn’t expect was how much he would get into the details of things happening during that film’s development. Along with those details are interesting photos presented excellently in a way that’s reminiscent of manga at times. I like the way the photos take center point and are treated like the foreground. It’s like the director and editor forced themselves to remain aware that the documentary was showcasing 15% of the total slides housed in the Nederlands Fotomuseum’s archives in Rotterdam and that most of his Apocalypse Now photos were never seen. Dat score, tho [Ex Machina (2014) vibes]. Blind Rating: 0/5

BTW, it had its official (Dutch national) release by EYE Filmmuseum on 12/19/19 in the Netherlands, so maybe it’ll come to the USA soon. 🤷🏿‍♂️ Forgot to mention it’s been added as a special feature to the 40th anniversary 4K blu-ray disc of Apocalypse Now: Final Cut (2019).

16. Receiver (Ireland)

Saw on MUBI on phone. I really like it. A very interesting short film in three odd segments. First was disturbing; second was about activism, protests, and politics; third was about the person I assume the film was made for. All compose what I took as a film about the importance of having reliable sound and hearing. Needs to be watched alone with good sound quality (for immersion). Blind Rating: 'eh

17. Bacurau (Brazil)

Saw in theatres during festival. I really like it. This was some Most Dangerous Game shit with a hell of an ending. The whole game is an allegory of civilized people's obsession with hunting wild animals for "sport". I really like the portrayal of history here and enjoyed the racial matters it lays bare. I can only imagine someone watching this without knowing a thing. Kinda wish I didn’t even read the description beforehand. Digging the soundtrack. Blind Rating: 1/5

18. Little Women (USA)

Saw on 35mm and discussed with others on separate occasions. I really like it. This was just warming and sad. I felt for the main characters and actually felt satisfied with the way it ended. Considering the type of film, there are handful of typical things for me to complain about. That being said, the movie earned its stars back. I mean, did you not see their attic performances? Shit was dope. Blind Rating: ‘eh

#2019 #top of #favorite films #i love it #i really like it #Ireland #Netherlands #Japan #China #Brazil #United Kingdom #USA

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