#council can elect to ignore it of you so choose

[nerevar-quote-and-star]

Look, we thought pairing my LDB up with freaking Yrsarald Thrice-Pierced instead of Ulfric would be funny.

It wasn't. It was just sad.

As I told my dear sweet @elder-dragon-reposes, it's one thing for one of Ulfric's followers clear across Skyrim to get heart eyes for Ulfric's girlfriendsword arm, but it's another matter entirely if it's one of his generals. In his own city.

Yrsarald remembers the Dragonborn from when she came to call Ulfric to the Greybeards' council. He remembers that she was soft-spoken and adamant about the World-Eater. She's hopeful and compassionate, and that stands out to him, even if she is an elf.

Ulfric doesn't seem to mind her ancestry, so Yrsarald elects to ignore it untilunless it becomes a problem.

News comes that Alduin has been banished, and the Dragonborn is about Skyrim, helping people. It's . . . nice that the foreign half-elf seems to care so much for the well-being of Skyrim and her people. Yrsarald keeps tabs on her through the informants and spy networks. It's a matter of security if the Dragonborn turns traitor to Skyrim and helps the blasted Thalmor. Galmar isn't keeping up with it, so for Ulfric and the Stormcloaks' sake, Yrsarald is.

But all he hears are good things. She wins admiration everywhere she goes, but she doesn't belong anywhere. Balgruuf the Greater is trying to tie the Dragonborn to Whiterun, but she's as flighty as Kyne's winds. Somewhere in there, Yrsarald learns her name is Leara Ormand and she's from HIgh Rock. She grew up on magic and chivalry. She probably sees life as a fairy tale. He may disdain her for it.

But then she comes to Windhelm. They've had troubles of their own, being stretched between the care of the city and fighting a war. And she solves problems. He hears she's investigating the serial killer in town . . .

. . .then finds the Butcher, and she's hurt? Ulfric is concerned, but Yrsarald finds himself livid. He cannot see his Jarl's worry for his own shame that their hero came to help them, and all she got in return was a bleeding wound and permafrost on her skin.

Imagine being so in love with an otherwise mythic figure, a celebrity, that you can't see that your friend, your brother, is also in love with her. How can you see it when you aren't ready to admit your own feelings?

Leara is renting a room at Candlehearth when Yrsarald decides he needs to pay his respects to her. She is surprised when he meets her near dinner. He has never seen a woman so precisely featured before. She's not in armor (he's only seen her in silver plate); her hair is down (curling in blood rose vines) and she's bundled in a cornflower blue dress (it's loose to accommodate her bandages). He wants to sit down and talk to her, but he doesn't. He thanks her, though, and she smiles. He stops by the counter later to make sure Elda sends her a dessert .

"But don't bother her with who it's from." "Well if that's how you choose to show your appreciation."

Yrsarald buys Leara sweets after that. She doesn't know it's him. She knows it's someone who appreciates her service and feels bad about her getting hurt, but Elda won't crack. Drat the woman.

Leara wonders if Ulfric is gifting her the sweets. She wants to hope it's Ulfric. She wants their past to be past and for her to appreciate everything she continues to do not for him, but to his benefit; she wasn't drawn in by his smile or anything. Who else would it be if not him? Ralof? He's not in town. General Stone-Fist didn't seem too bothered about her.

Leara's still healing. She's not bedridden or anything, but she's not fit to go beyond the city gates where there are bandits and dragons and necromancers (oh my!), so she decides that visiting the court wizard might be a fruitful investment of her time. She shuffles off to the Palace of the Kings. She runs into Jorleif right off and, on telling him she'd like to visit the court wizard, he's ready to take her to Wuunferth because she's been to see him before, and after all, she is the Dragonborn.

And this is that delightful moment when fate can swing either way because if Ulfric shows up and offers to walk Leara, that's all she wrote. Yrsarald's lost his chance because now that soft smile from Candlehearth is directed at the Jarl, not him, and Yrsarald will never get it back.

But maybe, just maybe, if Yrsarald gets to Leara before Ulfric does, if he captures her attention in conversation, maybe she'll look at him.

For a general commanding troops, it's terribly hard to be brave before a woman.

He would ask her how she's healing from the attack, and Leara would sigh, tired with herself but patient in her speech, because she's healing but she feels like she's letting the people down. And the tips of her ears might turn pink (Yrsarald didn't know elf ears did that) because Leara didn't mean to be that candid and trouble him – but Yrsarald is tripping over himself to tell her that she's done more for Skyrim than anyone (why is his neck red?) and it's reasonable for her to convalesce after an injury.

"Rest and eat apple tarts." ". . . how did you know I was eating apple tarts?"

Yrsarald coughs (he did not mean to tell her that). Leara is staring at him. They're at Wuunferth's quarters. She blinks at him before thanking him for guiding her through the palace. Then she's gone, and Yrsarald is kicking himself for being an idiot.

He's smitten.

Soon (too soon) Leara has healed from her injury and she's at the palace again, but this time she's offering to help Ulfric negotiate a permanent peace between both sides. Ulfric's seen Leara at the table, he knows what she can do. Galmar is more skeptical, but when Ulfric looks to Yrsarald for his opinion (and Leara's too-blue winter deep eyes follow) he says to let her have at it.

Leara needs to be brought up on the Stormcloaks holdings and Ulfric says he'll help her, but then Galmar needs him for something else and Yrsarald (does NOTdoes) jumps at the chance to help the Dragonborn. She's attentive and quiet, and asks the right questions about supplies and movements. And Yrsarald realizes as he's talking to her that Leara has been in a war before.

"Were you in the Great War?"

The stiffening of her shoulders is almost imperceptible. He'd have missed it if he weren't watching her so intently.

"Yes."

Her reply is measured. She does not lie.

"Legion?"

Because everyone was in the Legion then. Back when it fought for Skyrim. He wouldn't fault her if she was . . . why is her face sour? Her mouth is pinched.

"It doesn't matter–" "It does."

Why does it matter? He wonders, why is he pressing?

Her eyes are wide. So wide and too-blue.

Leara looks ill.

And then he knows.

He knew from the beginning she couldn't be trusted. She was an elf. All elves scurried back to the Thalmor in the end. She was here for that blasted Thalmor "ambassador" – she would betray Ulfric and the sons of Skyrim to their deaths!

There's a breathless scream.

Yrsarald doesn't realize until then that he has her on the ground. She's so small and too precisely featured. Her eyes are too blue. She's a traitor, a liar, a fraud–

The Dragonborn does not care for Skyrim.

"Yrsarald, please–"

Yrsarald growls.

Why is she crying? Doesn't she realize what she's doing to Skyrim? – Done to him? All this time and Yrsarald realizes he let Leara lure him into a fairy tale, only for her to shatter it with frigid reality when he thinks, when he thinks . . .

He might love her.

But elves can't love.

"You will rue the day you stepped foot in Skyrim, elf!"

She's sobbing. If she were really a true Dragonborn, she'd try and Shout him off, but Yrsarald wonders if she lied about that, too. High Elf illusions.

"Yrsa–" "What's going–?!"

Then Yrsarald is yanked back forcibly. Galmar is there. And Ralof. And Ulfric.

Ulfric is on the floor with her. Kneeling beside her as she gasps and tears turn her white gold face into wet porcelain. Kneeling beside her as if the elf wasn't going to sell Ulfric and everything they'd worked for to the Thalmor!

Yrsarald strains against Galmar and Ralof. He grits his teeth.

"She's Thalmor!"

Galmar stills. Ralof pales. Ulfric's head is bowed. She isn't making any noise but she struggles to breathe and it's tearing Yrsarald apart and enraging him all at once.

"I know."

And with those words, Yrsarald questions everything he ever knew about Ulfric Stormcloak. Ulfric knew she was a Thalmor spy? Was he coming to stop her – but . . .

Then Ulfric is lifting Leara from the ground, helping her to her feet, and it's too gentle for a King about to arrest an enemy.

Her hands are grasping Ulfric's arm, her eyes wide. Ulfric's face is drawn.

"We will discuss this later."

And he walks out with her. And the elf is free. And Yrsarald doesn't understand.

And then Galmar speaks:

"What in Oblivion did you do?!"

Yrsarald . . . doesn't know anymore.

What he learns later is more than he could stomach. Leara was a member of the Thalmor and she was a member of the Blades before that, and during the war, she smuggled information from the Dominion to the Blades intelligence networks and then defected while smuggling Ulfric Stormcloak from captivity.

He's nauseous when Ralof tells him this. Respectful Ralof – save this time there's steel in his eyes and disdain in his voice.

Yrsarald realizes he deserves that.

Later, when she finds him at Candlehearth, drinking his weight in ale, he realizes he does not deserve the understanding and forgiveness and the self-loathing in her face.

"I know why you did what you did. I can't fault you for it, not when I could've sold your Jarl and cause out to the Dominion. But I–"

Leara's eyes trail off.

"I'm sorry."

He chokes out the words. Her eyes slip back. She was far away.

"I think it's for the best if we're not alone together anymore."

Then she's gone.

Yrsarald buys another round.

The next day, Galmar says Ulfric wants him in the Pale. Far away from the Dragonborn goes unspoken between them.

Yrsarald goes. Ulfric's face is hard when he bids Yrsarald goodbye. The Jarl is not as easily forgiving as the Dragonborn.

Yrsarald is in the Pale when, a month later, news comes that the Dragonborn is handling an armistice in Whiterun. Skyrim divided. What was she thinking? She's thinking for Skyrim, Yrsarald realizes. That's all she's thought about this entire time.

It's a year before he returns to the Eastern capital of Windhelm, and only then, it's because the High King is getting married.

Yrsarald sees her. He doesn't stay long after that.

After all, Ulfric would protect her. Had protected her. Even from Yrsarald.

He could live with that.

#thrice pierced/roseblade hurts actually like i am LEGIT hurt #i mean i actually made my fren CRY 😭 #YRSARALD! SHE WAS ALMOST THERE AND THEN YOU THREW HER ON THE GROUND AND SCREAMED IN HER FACE #if he hadn't been an idiot they would've held hands #Or rather #his hand would've been on the table and she'd have put hers on his and done this cute quirky thing with her mouth and he'd have stared at i #skyrim #me at Yrsarald: Marny could've been YOUR SON! Kyneiren could've been YOUR DAUGHTER! You could've had ICE CREAM with Leara all the time! #BUT YOU HAD TO GO AND CHOKE HER ON THE FLOOR AND MAKE HER CRY #You could've bought her MORE apple tarts and she would've actually thanked YOU instead of thinking they came from some other guy! #but ulfric really said check mate and got the firl #yrsarald you dumb LOSER #anyway #rosecloak #FOREVER #oc: leara roseblade #ulfric stormcloak #yrsarald thrice pierced #windhelm #tes #the elder scrolls #ralof #galmar stone fist #last dragonborn #mod post #the ship name is very telling #pierced rose

[sarenth]

Reflecting on some of the posts that I have made and seen in the last couple of weeks, both here on Tumblr and on TikTok, I am increasingly suspicious of anybody that insists that voting is a useless or misdirected effort of energy. Not only have I seen innumerable cases in my state where this is simply not the case, entire sections of the federal government are effectively locked into right-wing positions because Trump won his election. He has entire sections of the appeals system and federal government more broadly aligned with him precisely because of how many nominations he's successfully put forward. Now, this does not mean that Biden or even the Democratic party more generally is going to ride to the rescue, however it speaks to the power that voting results wield.

Not voting is not an effective protest. All you are doing by not voting is saying hey someone else make this decision for me. By not voting you are not actually saying to the system "Hey I'm protesting against you!" At that point you have given the government system cart blanche to fucking ignore you.

I don't know who told you that not voting was anything other than giving up what little power you have to influence your government and therefore how your tax money and society operates on an everyday level. They lied to you. After a certain point there's no nice way to put this.

If you choose not to vote, that is a choice. I view it as an incredibly poor one. I also look at voting third party outside of elections where you know the candidate has no honest to the Gods shot to be a waste of time. You can vote however you want. If you want your vote to be effective then you're going to have to play with the system we've got until we can make a better one. These things take time. If we are being realistic, it is likely more than a few election cycles.

Another thing I have found intensely distasteful this entire election cycle has been from some leftists to sneer at harm reduction, as though opposing Republicans with Democratic candidates is just caving to fascism. Democrats and my State backed up unions and secured a woman's right to choose and secured bodily autonomy not only for women but forLGBTQIA+ folks. Republicans have fought against that.

"Oh but Manchin-" "Oh, but Sinema-"

Are not the whole of the Democratic Party. They were conservative holdouts in a largely center to center right coalition party whose younger constituents are far more left that the old guard. They fucked up some excellent legislation (or at least excellent opportunities) to put us in far better positions through helping to kill the Democrats' Build Back Better Plan and similar legislation.

Trying to punish the Democrats retroactively for not pushing Roe v Wade into law or not fulfilling all their campaign promises, by withholding your vote come the elections is short sighted, retrograde, and ultimately, harmful. It hands power to the Republicans without a fight, and allows them to set the boards for zoning, schools, city council, and so much more. It actively shoots your fellow citizens in the foot so you can feel moral superiority.

It reminds me of folks saying "Well I'm not filing because I am not gonna pay my taxes!" Unless your income is entirely under the table or illegal, or you intentionally changed your contributions, chances are that you were paying taxes this entire time and the only thing you're doing by not filing is potentially fucking yourself.

I get being angry, desperate, and despairing at the state of things, whether the political system, the world more broadly, or whatever issue you hold most dear to your heart. I'm not saying don't be angry, sad, depressed, or raging. I'm saying use it well. If you cannot summon up the give-a-shit on your own case, do it for those around you. Every bit we can do helps, and voting can make a lot of difference in our neighborhoods, and from there, the greater world.

Whether you are reading the missives from various pulpits or you're looking at project 2025, Christofascism is here. Folks have been warning about this for quite a long time, and it is here and it is in full swing. We cannot afford for the Republicans to take over. Heathens, Pagans, magical folks, none of us can afford a Republican victory at this point. Republicans have shown a deep willingness to use the apparatus of the state to harm queer and non-Christian people. They have shown a disdain for the separation of church and state. If you are on the right in this country you should be concerned if you're in any marginalized group. You will not be spared because you're "one of the good ones ".

Did you not see how they treated the Log Cabin Republicans? Did you not see that? Voting red will not save you, it will not make you more palatable. If the Republicans take power and get what they really want through their Christofascism and Project 2025, it does not matter how long you've been a Republican; if you are queer or Pagan you may as well not exist.

Believe me, I am not for a moment stating that Democrats are our saviors. They are a coalition center right political party that we can influence through our lobbying and votes. We can influence them through a variety of other means, including direct action is some have done. Some of you have failed to notice that your direct actions actually were useful! Kamala Harris came right out and said that they were pushing for a ceasefire, after so long of just leaving it off the table entirely. It is not that the narrative cannot be pushed, it is not that we cannot be heard, but you all need to recognize when you are heard and act accordingly without moving the fucking goal posts.

You demanded the administration work on a ceasefire and now they are. That is a victory! However, the Democrats cannot make the Israeli government and the Palestinian government come to a ceasefire. There is also only so much that we can do given the treaties and the alliances that we have. Yes, I know that America has a history of breaking it's treaties and why couldn't we just break this one? Well, because we're just not going to because it's been policy for almost the last 80 years. I just fervently wish the left more generally understood the political process better than it does and realize that we are doing quite a lot to move things along from where they could have been.

If you think for a second that Trump presidency would be better on any of these things you're wrong. That there are some leftists want to sink this project of American democracy simply because they didn't get what they want reminds me a lot of screaming fucking children who want a toy and are going to scream and shout when they don't get it. There's a sincere lack of understanding of the political process that I am seeing right now, especially given what I saw during the primary elections, and is sincere lack of understanding the political process with regards to our position with Israel. Again, I am not saying for a fucking moment don't be angry and don't do everything that you can't tell lobby for the Palestinian people. Engage in whatever diversity of tactics appeals the most to you. Part of having a diversity of tactics is including voting and on the ground diplomatic work. It isn't fun, it isn't sexy, but it's absolutely necessary in the meantime to get us to a place where we can be more effective. I would rather be more effective than being morally pure. I would rather be more effective and do what is possible than see everything around me fucking burn because it isn't just right.

I really do not hold with deontology. As a heathen my ethics are more centered in consequentialism. I care about how the tapestry looks after it's been woven, more than I care about how it has been woven. I will take an imperfect way of getting to the end of a tapestry then the tapestry never getting finished or being finished poor due to constantly unraveling it. There is no way that burning everything down is going to be helpful or effective for most folks. In any case, burning everything down with nothing to replace it leaves folks like me who rely on regular medications like insulin completely fucked. To be sure, the system fucks me and those in my position. It fucks the poor, the disabled, the marginalized. However, not having anything to replace it and just burning everything down, having no complex systems in place to slot into place will do immense, untold amounts of damage. Reforms are not sexy, and but they are how we can continue to live while we do the work needed to make things more equitable, more fair, more just.

I want change. We need to change as a society to become more just, equitable, fair, and to survive in the face of the challenges that we are facing. However, stepping away from the system as a whole, as though you're not going to be wrapped up in it as things go forward, that, to me, is giving up. It's not revolutionary. I would far rather see leftists and left-leaning Heathens and Pagans to flex their vote and their activism locally, to make the changes on the ground that we can where we live, how we live, with the Ginnreginn we live alongside.

#polytheism #animism #polytheist #animist #heathen #politics #us #us politics

[lemonhemlock]

Read your post about Rhaenys, and got an unsolicited opinion to offer :-D I have an impression after her own claim being denied she came to an opinion that in Westeros a woman wouldn't be accepted as a ruler (re: her talk with young Rhaenyra), so decided to ensure the best possible marriages for her daughter and then granddaughters. Like this, offering Laena to Vyserys makes sense - she would be queen and maybe regent. Same with Baela and Rhaena: should Rhaenyra be queen and Jace and Luke be the heirs to Iron Throne and Driftmark, Baela and Rhaena would be queen and Lady of Driftmark, respectively. Otherwise Baela (or Rhaena) wouldn't have any shot at the throne. Maybe she also hoped girls would be able to manipulate their husbands and thus have their own power. She seemed not too enthusiastic to support Rhaenyra though, so I have a feeling her going along was a mix of above and Corlys jumping into it. Well, idk how she really felt about the boys though, maybe not that bad? After all Laenor seemed to love them.

I do agree that Rhaenys has become bitter because of her being rejected by the Great Council of 101, hence imparting her pessimistic outlook to young Rhaenyra on the balcony. However, Andal Law was on her side and Westerosi people have respected that and accepted women rulers when Andal inheritance rights are followed. Lady Jeyne is one such example; her contesting cousins are rightfully considered usurpers. The reason Rhaenys didn't become Queen was because Jaehaerys held misogynistic beliefs and actively sabotaged her. Out of all Targaryen princesses in her chronological proximity, she is the one who had the best shot at becoming monarch and the one with the strongest legal claim against her male rivals and anyone else. But if you call a one-off council and give the lords the right to choose however they please, you're disregarding succession law and giving the nobles free reign. It's basically an election; they can vote because they liked the clothes Viserys was wearing, not because they carefully considered the points of law. There is also the possibility that the vote was rigged beforehand.

On the second point: Rhaenys is selling her granddaughters short. She should be pushing for Baela as Queen and Rhaena as Lady of Driftmark, with Luke as her consort. There is this prevailing notion that Rhaenyra is doing the Velaryons a favour by making Baela Queen. Not so. Baela is a noble, trueborn, pureblooded Valyrian girl with a dragon. Not many of those lying around. Rhaenyra should actively want Baela to be Jace's wife, regardless of the Driftmark situation. Rhaenys actually has bargaining powers here, but she's too much of a pushover to use them. She's making a mockery of her husband's house in the process + potentially alienating them & triggering a future defection (if the plot of the Dance had any logic behind it, that is).

As for how she feels about the Strong boys, she seems to mostly ignore them? She doesn't seem happy at all with Laenor's decision to be willingly cuckolded and she makes a point at Laena's funeral to only comfort her granddaughters.

#ask #anon #anti rhaenys targaryen #anti team black #house velaryon #asoiaf succession crises

[tiggymalvern]

I understand the sentiment, but I just want to let you know that your VOTE hashtag might be undermining your efforts. I think it’s great to demonstrate what the Biden administration HAS accomplished because it’s not being publicized and it’s helpful information to hear, but ending with a blunt VOTE is dismissive of where people’s anxieties and despair are coming from. Instead of leading with the conclusion you’ve drawn, I just ask you to consider changing the way you’re communicating with your audience so that they can get there with you. A lot of people who are saying “VOTE” are using it to ignore genuine critiques and while I think voting for Biden is still the best option, I think there are better ways to help people get to that understanding.

The VOTE hashtag on my posts means exactly that. Everything that I think about who people should vote for and why has been eloquently explained by the OP and in the additions. People are either going to read it and engage with it or they aren't, and one tag that I put on the bottom probably isn't going to change it.

The VOTE hashtag reflects my belief. I literally think everyone who is allowed to vote should turn up and vote. Even if, for whatever reason of your own, you feel you need to vote Republican or Alternative für Deutschland or National Rally, or whoever your local neo-fascists happen to be.

Throughout history, people have had to battle for the right to choose their government. There were monarchies or emperors, and nobody got to choose. Then in many countries only landowners were eligible to vote, and the people who worked the land were excluded. Then in various countries, all white men were allowed to vote, and women and people of colour might have all had to fight in their turn to get their right to vote.

Whatever category of human you are, some people somewhere marched and/or were arrested, jailed or killed so that YOU could have the chance to vote. My grandmother was nearly 30 when women in England were allowed to vote on the same terms as men. This is not ancient history. This is less than a hundred years ago. If you are eligible to vote, DO NOT waste it. Do not blithely toss aside the right that your grandparents risked everything for.

I have voted in every single election that I was eligible to vote in. There was one year when I was around 20 when the candidates for the three main parties in my local elections were all so awful that I couldn't vote for any of them. It was for the regional council, so there were no larger ramifications in the national voting block of the government. So I turned up and voted for the Monster Raving Loony Party as a protest vote. Doing that made it clear that I wasn't staying at home through apathy - not voting for any of the main candidates was an active choice, and it registered my vote as a rejection of all of them.

I have voted for the candidates I truly believe in. I have voted tactically, simply to make sure that the worst candidate didn't get chosen. But I have always, always voted, when I could. And I believe that everybody should, even if I also believe you're a misguided idiot in where you place your X.

I'm not allowed to vote in the US, where I currently live, because I'm not a US citizen. I also live in a blue state where I can guarantee that Dems will get elected without my vote, so I don't fret too much about being excluded. But I am excluded.

I believe that everybody should validate their ancestors' struggles and do their civic duty and show up at the polls if they're allowed. I also believe that you should educate yourself on the issues and the reasons before you do. So I reblog the posts about the issues and the reasons that I believe, in the hope that those candidates will be elected. But my tag VOTE isn't just to try and get Dems to turn out (although everyone knows that Dems win when turnout is high, because low turnout means fewer Dems, not so much fewer Republicans).

VOTE. Seriously. Everyone. Even, especially, if you live in a red state where arseholes in power are deliberately making it hard for you to vote. If Republicans ban you from mailing in your vote and make you stand in line for three hours at a polling station, that's all the more reason to do it - it's the same battle that has been fought before, and you damn well insist on your right to vote. It's inconvenient and miserable, but you're not being arrested or murdered for wanting to vote, the way other people before you have been.

Your rights have been hard won. Understand that, respect it, and vote.

#asks #VOTE #representation #history #human rights #civic duty

[axvoter]

Blatantly Partisan Party Review IV (Victoria 2022): Democratic Labour Party aka Labour DLP

Prior reviews: federal 2013, VIC 2014 (1 and 2), federal 2016, VIC 2018, federal 2019

What I said before: “They have some remnants of labour traditions in their concerns for workers’ rights. These are, however, overshadowed by very conservative and narrow social attitudes that evince little interest in letting people live the lives they want to lead. Avoid.” (federal 2019)

What I think this year: The Democratic Labour Party like to trick people who are trying to find the Australian Labor Party on the ballot. To this end, their registered abbreviation—the one you will see on ballots—is “Labour DLP”. I think this is dishonest and low, and it reflects poorly on a party that now has nothing to do with the labour movement, the left, or the interests of workers. If a voter is looking for Labor on the large Legislative Council ballot and accidentally marks 1 for Labour DLP above the line, this party exploits the anti-democratic Group Ticket Voting system to send that preference on to far-right parties such as Family First and Angry Victorians. If you or anyone you know is voting Labor, make sure they do not fall victim to this—and, as I have emphasised before, vote below the line.

Anyway, who is this party pulling such shenanigans? The DLP began in 1955 when a bunch of anti-communist Catholics and their fellow travellers split from the Labor Party. Its heartland is Victoria, and despite the original iteration collapsing in the late 1970s, they have refused to perish. Diehards ensured the DLP name lived on and a revived party has had representation in the Victorian state parliament and federal parliament at various periods since 2006. This has typically been from a very low proportion of the vote, gaming the anti-democratic system of Group Ticket Voting to their advantage.

The DLP’s identity is tied strongly to socially conservative strains of Catholic thought. So strong is its Catholic character that the Wikipedia article about the DLP goes out of its way to note which of its elected members were (gasp) Protestants! Despite its Labor origins, the DLP is no friend of the left and its raison d’être has been to block Labor governments. What limited concern it has for workers’ rights gets bound up in talk of “working families” and “family values” and all that guff, afraid that anyone might choose a different lifestyle or have any kind of fun that would cause a stuffy conservative parish priest to raise his eyebrow.

At the start of this year, the DLP had no parliamentary representation—now it does. Its headline candidates for this election are Bernie Finn and Adem Somyurek. If those names don’t make your skin crawl, presumably this means you are a fortunate person who has until now been blissfully ignorant of these two men. Somyurek, a former state Labor powerbroker, has been at the centre of numerous claims of corruption, branch-stacking, and bullying. Labor terminated his membership in 2020. Finn, by contrast, was a prominent member of the Liberal Party, and he is one of the reasons why its Victorian state branch is easily the party’s worst branch. But it turns out Finn was too toxic even for them: his rants against the LGBTIQ+ community, abortion, IVF, rape victims, and climate science culminated in the exact sort of Facebook bigotry and vitriol that you can imagine. After peddling bullshit from the US's worst conspiracymongers during lockdowns and comparing Daniel Andrews to Adolf Hitler, the Liberal Party gave him the boot.

Such is the disposition of the DLP that they readily gave Finn and Somyurek a home. Finn is now party leader and the lead candidate in Western Metropolitan; Somyurek is the lead candidate in Northern Metropolitan and he has harvested micro-party preferences particularly well so there is a risk we might be stuck with him after the election even if he only garners a few first preferences.

As far as actual policies go, the DLP has not updated their platform since the federal election; their website has very little about the state election at all. The real guide is the character of its candidates, and by that measure the party stands condemned.

My recommendation: Give the Democratic Labour Party a weak or no preference. Remember to vote below the line on the large ballot for the Legislative Council so that your preference goes where you want it to go; all ballots with 5 or more preferences marked below the line are valid votes.

If you vote in Northern Metropolitan, I strongly recommend you preference all the way below the line and place Adem Somyurek dead last. In Western Metropolitan you have an unpalatable choice for last between Bernie Finn and bigoted antivaxxer Catherine Cumming of AVP.

Website: https://dlp.org.au/

#auspol #springst #vicvotes #vicvotes22 #vicvotes2022 #Victorian election #Victoria #Election 2022 #Melbourne #Democratic Labour Party #DLP #Democratic Labor Party #Labour DLP #Bernie Finn #Adem Somyurek #weak or no preference #some parties you improve and Somyurek

[jiangwanyinscatmom]

I’m not ready for a live action for TGCF it became a comfort novel and Xie Lian is a comfort character, so i’m really scared to see his love downplayed by the drama..

When all is said and done, the live-actions aren't directly canon and are just a bit of glorified high budget fanfiction that we as fans can pull in to our circle of enjoyment. It doesn't change the purpose or themes that the original crafted for Xie Lian and is of no more importance for having actors. My hope is that maybe it can be given the love and understanding that Word of Honor had, even with censorship guidelines since Wenzhou does very much stand as a chaste romance on screen. Along with the direct respect given to MXTX's works that, unfortunately was not there for the Untamed.

It will still be another year or so before everything is greenlit for anything official and a lot can change in that time for what is a rough idea. And keep looking on the brightside that the TGCF donghua is another version that but a lot of respect into showing San Lang's. I can only say I have had several renditions of my literary loves made into LA's and my love of the characters still forever stands for plenty of them despite the butchered parts of LA's sometimes. We are all also here to rant away as a big fannish circle in case of a little needed comfort.

I hope you feel better anon. 💜

#don't mind me #council can elect to ignore it of you so choose #Nick Fury it all

[condorclaw]

Jimmy is an omen of death. He's never escaped this title, no matter how many worlds he's been born into.

His blood staining a sandy floor pushed fate into claiming the lives of thirteen others after his demise. They escaped its grasp, yet were recollected once more after Jimmy slipped from that roof, a sword through his gut.

The Cod Empire was supposed to be different, and for a while, it was.

-

He ignored the dread that stung his soul once the dragon was killed before all the rulers, turning his attention to the newly returned Codfather head. It wasn't his fault. It was Fwhip's fault for leading them all there.

Using Jimmy's head that he was careless enough to lose.

It was Fwhip's fault for leading them all there.

-

When crimson rose from the ground, coiling around the buildings that dotted across the land and trapping people within their homes, Jimmy wanted to be sick. Xornoth's laugh echoed in his dreams. This wasn't his fault. It had nothing to do with him.

Why is he so fixated on you. Could he know what you are,

It had nothing to do with him.

-

Pix was a great friend. He stood proudly by Jimmy's side no matter the challenge, and was always a good ear for the Codfather to confide in. Then one day he disappeared without a trace. The other rulers elected to not worry about his location, insisting that he'd return home one day. He never did. This wasn't Jimmy's fault. Pix had never told him where he was going.

He spent a lot of time around you.

Pix had never told him where he was going.

-

From the beginning, Sausage and Fwhip were two thorns in Jimmy's side. They'd laugh at the tricks they pulled, and revel in his misery. In any fantastical tale, simple jokes from bullies could lead to much more dastardly behavior. The destinies of the two must have already been penned into the scripture of fate, the same collection of words that demanded that Jimmy be something he feared.

Jimmy had slammed that book shut, instead choosing to extend a hand outwards.

And two more returned the gesture.

Jimmy ignored how he could feel the silently creeping futility of fate crawl up his spine.

-

There was the smell of burning flesh. He could feel pointed stones digging into his his body, his elbows scraped from where he collided with the pavement. Smoke clouded the sky, the remains of a once-beautiful unity. Jimmy could almost feel the sensations of the wind whispering as it passed by, taunting him. It was inevitable. What a naïve little boy. He’d still be here, if Jimmy never told him his struggles. It was all Jimmy’s fault.

He opened his mouth to scream, blood ringing in his ears.

"FWHIP!"

It was all Jimmy’s fault.

-

The world was dying, and Jimmy could only watch. There’s not much a single man can do against a flurry of natural disasters, no matter how hard he begged and pleaded for fate to take him instead. The universe had went easy on him in the death games, killing him off first and preventing him from witnessing the tragedy that befell all his loved ones.

He probably deserved this. He tried to cheat the pattern woven into his existence, only to get stung by a crueler punishment than any of his previous deaths. The council never returned his head. They must've known all along what blight he would bring upon the Cod Empire and his people, stealing away the head as punishment for what he had doomed his citizens to.

Only one option remained at this point: get out of here, and prevent the world from getting worse.

He had to go.

-

Jimmy stumbled through the mansion, Joel and Grian following close behind, clutching their weapons. Occasionally one of the two would yank him back, keeping him closer to them just in case something would leap out unexpectedly.

They had called him into this world to assist them with their raid, and Jimmy was ready to do his best. Besides, he was familiar with their usual pattern of him going in first as a meat shield. If anything was going to happen to the duo, it would happen to Jimmy first.

But the universe had seemingly thrived off of Jimmy's misery in his last home so much, they wanted seconds.

He wasn't even aware of Joel grabbing his arm and tugging him away from the oncoming pillagers, his eyes only staying on the bloody corpse and charred feathers of Grian before he was pulled out of view.

-

Jimmy could never escape his fate. Every chance at defying it only led to greater loss, for him and the people he tried to connect with. A bargain could never be made, a deal could never be solidified, Jimmy was simply a pawn to be toyed with by higher beings beyond his understanding.

And knowing that it would follow him for the rest of his life hurt more than any one of his many deaths ever could.

#empires smp #100 hours hardcore #100 hours smp #solidaritygaming #fwhip #grian #smallishbeans #tw death #my writing #my post #kegan's daily silly thought #this was literally supposed to be a small post about death omen jimmy in empires what happened here jfjfjf #if there's any more tags i should add let me know

[leportraitducadavre]

i'm sorry if you got this ask before but i don't get why konoha would say that it's its people when they're a literal oligarchy

No problem. The thing is, Konoha isn’t technically an oligarchy (in paper, we all know the truth), but we can’t exactly say their leader is elected by a democratic system either.

There’s a huge contradiction on how the system of Konoha works, during the foundation of the Hidden Village, we are to believe that Hashirama was elected Hokage by a “democratic” election -however, we don’t know how it worked, did the whole population of Konoha voted? Was it a decision made by just a selected group? How was that group composed? Only two instances of democracy were canonically shown/mentioned, one with Hashirama, the other one with Danzo. Furthermore, if we take the election in which Danzo was appointed Hokage as the prototypical model, then the Hokage gets “elected” by the votes of the Daimyo, the Civilian Council (the richests entrepreneurs of Hi no Kuni) whose weight in the election is held by the funds they provide to the Hidden Village, the Hokage’s former advisers, and some selected Shinobi who are at the head of an important department. The Daimyo is the one who ends up choosing the Hokage -it’s the job of the shinobi to present arguments in favor/against the candidates they present.

The actual population doesn’t have a say, it’s not as if they vote directly for the possible candidates that get presented to the Daimyo later on, nor that they vote the council representatives who will attend the Hokage election meeting. Those who go are selected by their ranks (ranks they obtained during the mandate of the Hokage who is currently leaving, which could make them support the candidate that their former leader chose), not by their political knowledge.

But that’s not it, because canonically, there’s no mention nor indication of an actual election with Tobirama, Hiruzen, Minato and perhaps Tsunade (although her case might be more similar to Danzo’s).

We don’t know how Tobirama got the seat, for all we know, Hashirama named him his successor, Hiruzen was named the Hokage by Tobirama (there was no election even if fans want to believe so -it wasn’t as if they came back to the village, called for a meeting and told the Daimyo about Tobirama’s wish, they were at war, and that situation happening is a fanon belief that has literally no mention in the manga), Minato was pointed out by Jiraiya who declined Hiruzen’s request to become the new leader, and after his death, Hiruzen re-claimed the position, and still, there was no mention of election. Tsunade might be a different case because:

The only other possible candidate declined (Jiraiya) and quite literally forced her into the equation without her approval.

There was a power vacuum that needed to be filled quickly -the possibility of another village jumping to seize the opportunity was too great to ignore.

They were economically devastated and needed a leader to gain the Daimyo’s aid.

Tsunade was threatened to come back to Konoha and become the leader.

Still, there was no mention of an election, if she returned she would almost immediately be crowned.

Even with those points taken into account, it isn’t to say she wasn’t valued over her relationship with the deceased leader: she used to be his student, she is one of the Sannin, and she is directly connected to both Hashirama and Tobirama -the possibility of a shinobi from outside that bubble of power becoming the new Hokage was never even mentioned.

When Jiraiya declined, he immediately presented a candidate with (what he considered) a same value, if not higher -given her familial relationship with previous Hokages. How come her political status is measured solely on her associations with former leaders, rather than her own capacities? She was away from Konoha for years, yet, she is still put above shinobi from her own village -the same goes for Jiraiya, powerful or not, relationship with Hiruzen and Minato or not, he lived outside the village for years -he knew absolutely nothing of its current situation.

But, let's allow Konoha to defend itself, let’s allow ourselves to believe that there was an election for each Hokage. How come the only ones who got the power were those candidates supported by their previous leader? Were there other candidates allowed to participate? When Hiruzen was appointed Hokage by Tobirama, there was no mention of any other nominees, the decision of Tobirama was final -therefore, the possibility of the “election” having more than one contender is basically null. It was the Hokage, and those around him (their advisors), the ones who selected the new leader -the only thing that they needed was to “make it legal” by calling a meeting and telling the Daimyo to vote for the person they wanted.

During Danzo’s election, Kakashi was nominated by Shikaku because he didn’t trust Danzo, however, that seems to be an isolated case and Danzo had no support from Tsunade (who couldn’t rule) -and we’ve seen how easily manipulated the Daimyo is, the only thing it takes is to convince him to vote for the person you want, and that’s it, they become the new leader of a powerful village -and no one can do anything to stop it. How is that a democratic election? Why is no one questioning such a system?

If the elections exist, because for some reason a large part of the fandom believe they do (although the only two instances canonically shown were the one where the first leader needed to be chosen -because Tobirama refused Madara to take the position-, and when Tsunade couldn’t choose her candidate, plus Danzo wanted the power -he didn’t interfere during Tsunade’s selection, which is why I can’t understand those who merely claim he always wanted to be Hokage) then they’re not democratic -I mentioned why they aren’t, so there’s still a problem in that. Defending it makes absolutely no sense.

#anti konoha #anti shinobi system #anti tobirama #anti hiruzen #anti hashirama #anti naruto fandom #anti tsunade #anti naruto #anti kakashi #anti minato #anti hiruzen sarutobi #anti tobirama fandom #anti tobirama senju #anti hashirama senju #anti minato namikaze #anti tsunade senju #anti naruto uzumaki #anti kakashi hatake #political review #anti konoha system

[gaeilgeoirgay]

Posadh Eagraithe

This was one of the most popular oneshots of my Pride series so I hope you enjoy it :)

Ao3 Link

Summary- Din's Council want him to get married. Except Din is aromantic and he's not interested. Enter Boba Fett. 

Din sighs as he settles himself in the council chambers. The throne is surprisingly comfortable, which he appreciates when the meetings drag on. The meeting today is about an offer they’ve received from the New Republic- namely, whether or not Mandalore as a whole will join them. He knows that they joined the Old Republic when the dar’manda New Mandalorians were in charge, but he doesn’t personally think it would be a good idea for the new Mandalore they are building. He serves his people though, and it will be their decision.

The Clan and House alor’e file into the room and take their designated places. Din had learned the hard way that seating had to be assigned carefully after the alor’e of Clan Onyo and Rau had started a fist fight with each other. Twice. In ten minutes.

Din straightens and waits for everyone to take their seats. The Armourer is at his right and he bows his head slightly. He may be Mand’alor but she is an Armourer. More importantly, she is the leader of his tribe. “Su cuy. I have given you a week to speak with your aliit about the New Republics offer. Today, we will decide what to do based on their answers. Alor be Skirata. What have you decided?” Din says, wasting no time. “Clan Skirata votes to not join them.” Kal Skirata says. Din nods and moves on to the next clan.

It appears his people share Din’s opinions. They’re overwhelmingly in favour of staying out of the New Republic. “Alright, we’re not joining the New Republic. What do you propose we do about them?”Ketsu Onyo asks and Din sighs again. He likes Ketsu but she has a knack for asking questions he doesn’t have an answer for. “I’m not sure yet, but we definitely shouldn’t slam the door in their faces. I’m open to ideas.” He replies anyways. “Like you said, Mand’alor, we should keep our options open. How about an alliance? As narudar, until the Empire is completely rooted out. Or for things like hyperspace lanes or goods we don’t already have access too.” Sabine Wren suggests. Din definitely likes Sabine. She’s whipsmart and always has good ideas that are actually relevant to the conversation. Unlike some people.

“The Republic is worth nothing to us! We have allies already- the Tattooinian lanes are open to us, Sorgan, Nevarro and Stewjon supply us with food and we can take care of the Empire ourselves.” Bo-Katan snaps. There it is. “Yes, we do, However, the New Republic is currently the largest political alliance in the galaxy. We have our own political alliance but it’s easier if they aren’t our enemies. There’s no point in making them turn against us, when they don’t generally affect us.” Din says patiently. He doesn’t know how he hasn’t started his own fistfight with Bo-Katan Kryze. He admires his self-restraint sometimes.

A gleam enters Bo-Katan’s eyes and Din pales beneath his helmet. She’s stopped trying to challenge him physically for the throne but he knows its only because the rest of the Mando’ade have sworn to him. “Well, how will the Republic trust us? Our Council isn’t elected and we technically live under an oligarchy. The Republic practices democracy and as far as they’re concerned, you’re ruling alone without any other Mando’ade having the same social and political power that you do.” She says smugly. Oh no.

The only person with the same status as the Mand’alor is the Rid’alor. Din is aromantic. He has never planned on finding a riddur, maybe just finding someone who would raise ade with him, but without a romantic relationship. If Bo-Katan suggests herself as rid’alor, then dignified king or not, Din will throw himself out the window.

Fenn Rau picks up on the implications too and traditional bastard that he is, decides it’s a great idea. Sabine and Retsu seem sympathetic but they’re outvoted. “Alor’e, I understand that we must appear balanced to the Republic but I am sol’karta. I have no need for a riddur.” Din says, a final objection. That softens a few alor’e but Bo-Katan remains unremoved. “You’ve got a week to pick someone, Djarin. Then the Council will choose. They have to be Mando’ade- we’re trying to show them we’re united.” She says, voice hard. Din ignores the technical disrespect and finally just agrees. If he can pick, maybe he can ask another sol’karta Mandalorian.

Suddenly he gets an idea and grins. He has the perfect person in mind.

Boba yawns behind his helmet as court finishes up. Ruling Tattooine is exhausting. His comm buzzes and he discreetly checks it. It’s Din so he motions Fennec to take the throne for a few minutes and leaves to answer it. “Hey Din. How’s ruling Manda’yaim going?” He asks. Din also seems exhausted. “Meh. How’s Tattooine?” Din replies in turn. “Same old. What’s the comm for?” Din and him chat often but this wasn’t expected. “You’re aromantic, right? Same as me.” Din asks and Boba blinks, taken aback. First of all, he didn’t know Din was aromantic and second of all, why ask?

“Yeah, I am. Why do you ask?” Boba says, genuinely curious. The smile spreading across Din’s uncovered face is downright wicked. “The Council, more specifically Kryze, want me to marry another Mandalorian to show a united front to the Republic. Pretty sure that Kryze is gunning for Rid’Alor if she can’t get Mand’alor. I’ve got a week to pick someone or else the Council chooses.” Din says, the smile turning slightly maniacal. “And you thought of me?” Boba double checks.

“Yep. You don’t have to agree but I thought it over. They cant disagree on the basis you’re not Mandalorian, because you are and the Republic knows that. You’re also a fellow king/ruler so it strengthens our alliances. Your buir and ba’buir were both Mand’alor at some point so it shows that I have the support of my predecessors allit. You’re also aro so I don’t have to worry about my spouse wanting a romantic relationship. We’re already good friends so it won’t change much and my son loves you. We actually like each other so its not an unhappy arranged marriage.” Din hesitates in his list before he quickly adds his next pro.

“If we want to add sex into it, I think you’re hot and I wouldn’t mind. That part depends on your opinion though. And possibly the best part- Bo-Katan is going to have a heart attack and Han Solo will have to pretend he doesn’t hate you at diplomatic functions because the Republic doesn’t want to make Mandalore mad.” He finishes. Boba’s surprise has turned to genuine mirth. Din has clearly thought this out, and it makes sense. Boba isn’t exactly averse to sleeping with Din either- he can admit that the beroya is very attractive. "I'll set my course for Manda'yaim then. See you soon, cyare.”

Din is completely right. Kryze looks like she's just eaten several lemons at their riddurok and her face lands itself a spot in Boba's cherished memories. Din is also very experienced when it comes to the bedroom and Boba enjoys himself thoroughly. The best part to their marriage, however, is at the Republic's ball to celebrate their new alliance with Mandalore.

Han Solo does a doubletake when he sees Boba and he spits out his drink. Leia Organa comes over to talk to Din and Solo looks like he’s barely restraining himself from shooting Boba in front of half the galaxy’s politicians. Boba makes sure to be a perfect gentleman, the very picture of a Rid’Alor and Solo’s veins nearly explode.

All in all, he thinks he likes this friends-with-benefits things. The benefits just happen to include pissing off Han Solo, pissing off Bo-Katan Kryze and most importantly, his and Din’s respective Court’s will never nag them about spouses again. Manda, Din is a genius. Even if marrying him means Boba occasionally has to coax a toddler off the ceiling.

#aromantic din djarin #aromantic boba fett #bobadin #the mandalorian #anti bo katan kryze #sort of #din definitely doesn't like her

[astradrifting]

About DoD parallels, I think the False Dawn could be something like the Year of the False Spring: a time of hope only for everything get worse later. After the war with the Others and with Aegon in the throne, everybody will think that Dawn finally come, the dreams of spring can became true until D@ny burn KL and ruin everything.

The rule of regents part is mostly ignored but it might refer to the period before Bran "election" where some people may act as temporary regents of Westeros while a great council is being prepared and held, all the great council before took months to be conclued and the kingdoms can't just be without a ruler for that amount of time specially after so many wars.

Ooh it’s possible anon, that’s definitely along the lines of what the original False Dawn was. Honestly I’d kind of love if D@ny landed in Westeros well after the Others have been dealt with and Aegon has been established on the throne, it’d emphasise even more that no one really wants her as a ruler.

I suspects she won’t be heavily involved against the Others anyway, she’s the Fire threat to their Ice and her digressing from seeking the Iron Throne to fight them muddles up that theme. It was only really good for hiding Dark!D@ny. Also if she doesn’t even have “I saved you all from the ice demons!” to support her claim against Aegon, there really is no reason for anyone to support her. It’ll probably be this total lack of support, even after she leaves them no other choice by killing Aegon, that will eventually make her angry and desperate enough to burn down KL after she’s already taken it, similar to how she burned it down in the show after the bells were rung.

Yeah I think the rule of regents could be foreshadowing both a Great Council that will choose Bran as king, possibly more symbolically than anything, and an actual council of the remaining leaders of Westeros who will rule before the council and for him. Unless GRRM is doing some major time skipping in TWOW and ADOS Bran will be at most 12 by the end of the series, so he’ll need a regent anyway, unless he’s considered such a genius that he doesn’t need one, like Daeron the Young Dragon (and even then that probably wasn’t a good idea considering he immediately decided to invade Dorne).

Thanks for the ask!

#asks #astra rambles #ados speculation #dark!dany

[deborahdeshoftim5779]

MYTH Human Rights Watch has proven Israel is an “apartheid” state. FACT In its longstanding campaign of demonization of Israel, Human Rights Watch (HRW) adopted a new tack in its latest report. Knowing the absurd and ineffective efforts of anti-Israel propagandists to compare Israel to Afrikaner South Africa, HRW decided to write a new definition of “apartheid” it could selectively apply to one state – the Jewish state. HRW relies on definitions that apply to the systematic oppression and domination by one racial group over any other racial group. Neither Jews nor Palestinians are racial groups so HRW expands the definition to include groups – actually only Palestinians – that share descent, national or ethnic origin. As Professor Gerald Steinberg noted, “Beyond South Africa, no other regime or government has been deemed to meet the international definition of apartheid, not even murderous and oppressive regimes practicing separation based on race, religion, and gender such as Saudi Arabia and China” (Gerald Steinberg, “Human Rights Watch demonizes Israel via propaganda of apartheid,” Jerusalem Post, April 27, 2021). “The report mocks the history of apartheid by using its hateful memory to describe a grab bag of policies that HRW happens to disagree with, and in many cases are not in effect, or were never in effect. Apartheid is not just a term for policies one dislikes,” the Kohelet Policy Forum wrote in its response to the report (“HRW Crosses the Threshold into Falsehoods and Anti-Semitic Propaganda,” KPF, April 26, 2021). For its part, the Biden administration wasted no time rejecting HRW’s conclusion: “It is not the view of this administration that Israel’s actions constitute apartheid,” a State Department spokesperson said (“US disagrees that Israel carrying out ‘apartheid,’” France24,” April 28, 2021). Too often, however, truth does not matter. When a human rights organization, even one with a long history of anti-Israel bias, makes an inflammatory accusation it is assured of attracting media coverage, as was the case with HRW’s report. Journalists rarely factcheck the material before quoting the report and its authors in stories with incendiary headlines. By the time the information is evaluated by third parties, it is too late because the original, unverified story has been transmitted around the world to become fodder for Israel’s detractors. Graphic courtesy Elder of Zion Thus, you are unlikely to see any quotes about the report from Judge Richard Goldstone, who was appointed to the Constitutional Court of South Africa by Nelson Mandela, played an important role in that country’s transition to democracy, and was appointed by the UN Human Rights Council to investigate alleged crimes committed during Israel’s operation in Gaza in 2009. In a New York Times essay, “Israel and the Apartheid Slander,” Goldstone wrote, “In Israel there is no apartheid. Nothing there comes close to the definition of apartheid under the 1998 Rome Statute” used by HRW in an effort to get around the specious comparison to South Africa (New York Times, October 31, 2011). In a rebuke to the equally fallacious claims made in the recent B’Tselem report, Goldstone noted, “there is no intent to maintain ‘an institutionalized regime of systematic oppression and domination by one racial group.’ This is a critical distinction, even if Israel acts oppressively toward Palestinians there. South Africa’s enforced racial separation was intended to permanently benefit the white minority, to the detriment of other races. By contrast, Israel has agreed in concept to the existence of a Palestinian state in Gaza and almost all of the West Bank, and is calling for the Palestinians to negotiate the parameters.” Presciently anticipating the similarly misguided argument of John Brennan, Goldstone notes, “until there is a two-state peace, or at least as long as Israel’s citizens remain under threat of attacks from the West Bank and Gaza, Israel will see roadblocks and similar measures as necessary for self-defense, even as Palestinians feel oppressed.” Speaking to those who demonize Israel while claiming to be interested in peace, Goldstone concluded, “The charge that Israel is an apartheid state is a false and malicious one that precludes, rather than promotes, peace and harmony.” Hirsh Goodman, another native South African, said HRW “is blind to fact and reality.” He called the report, “a disgrace to the memory of the millions who suffered under that policy in South Africa” (Hirsh Goodman, “I left apartheid South Africa. Applying the term to Israel is disingenuous,” Forward, April 27, 2021). Goodman noted that HRW is an advocate of discrimination against Jews, supporting the anti-Semitic BDS movement, and that the report came out as an Israeli Arab, a member of an Arab party in the Knesset, and an Islamist no less, had the potential to determine who would be Israel’s next prime minister. In the previous election, a coalition of Arab parties was the third largest faction in the Knesset. This is discrimination? What about Palestinians who are not Israeli citizens? They have the opportunity to vote for their leaders in Palestinian elections, which were last held in 2006 (the one scheduled for May was just cancelled because the president, serving the 16th year of his four-year term, is afraid of losing). HRW apparently has no problem with the fact that a Jew cannot vote in a Palestinian election even though the outcome will affect Israel or that a Palestinian who has acquired Israeli citizenship also cannot vote in the Palestinian Authority (Elder of Ziyon, “Another Double Standard: Palestinian Law Excludes Israelis From Voting,” Algemeiner, March 26, 2021). HRW condemns Israel for treating Palestinians in the disputed territories and Israeli citizens differently, but Israel has no obligation to treat them the same. In the Oslo Accords, Israel agreed the Palestinians should be responsible for their own lives in virtually all areas except security; hence, about 98 percent of Palestinians are governed by the Palestinian Authority and Hamas. The fact that both deny their own people civil and human rights goes unmentioned by HRW. HRW also ignores reality while applying a standard that would make nearly every country, including the United States, guilty of apartheid. Take, for example, the report’s criticism of the Law of Return. Yes, it grants automatic citizenship to Jews, but non-Jews are also eligible to become citizens under naturalization procedures similar to those in other countries. More than two million non-Jews are Israeli citizens and 21% of the population are Arabs who enjoy equal rights under the law with Jewish citizens. Meanwhile, Ireland has a law allowing immigrants of “Irish descent or Irish associations” to be exempt from ordinary naturalization rules while Bulgaria, Croatia, Germany and a number of other democratic states also have policies similar to Israel’s Law of Return and yet are not labeled by HRW as apartheid. HRW apparently has no problem with Arab nations that have laws that facilitate the naturalization of foreign Arabs, with the exception of Palestinians, or with Jordan’s “law of return that provides citizenship to all former residents of Palestine – except Jews. Graphic courtesy Elder of Zion For HRW it is a crime for Israelis to want a Jewish majority in the Jewish state. Are Muslim states equally guilty for not accepting a non-Muslim majority? The report castigates Israel for placing restrictions on the movement of Palestinians, ignoring that checkpoints and the security fence were created to protect Israeli citizens – Jews and non-Jews from terrorists. It accuses Israel of “Judaization” of Jerusalem, the Galilee and the Negev, implying that Jews should not be allowed to live in parts of Israel where there are “significant Palestinian populations” (which is not the case in the Negev), including its capital. Israel is also condemned for not agreeing to commit suicide by allowing the 5.7 million Palestinians UNRWA calls “refugees” to live in Israel. To refute the charge that Israel is therefore discriminating against Palestinians simply refer to the thousands of Palestinians who left the country and were allowed to return and become citizens (“Israel Claims 184,000 Palestinian Refugees have Returned since 1948,” Al Bawaba, January 1, 2001). Israel has also repeatedly offered to accept a limited number of Palestinians as part of a peace agreement (Gene Currivan, “ISRAEL TO ACCEPT 100,000 REFUGEES; Offer, to Go Into Effect When Peace Comes, Is Delivered to Arabs at Lausanne,” New York Times, July 30, 1949). Summarizing the absurdity of HRW’s argument, one writer tweeted: “Israel: The only country that’s shrinks when it colonizes, grows the population it’s genociding, fattens the people it starves and consistently increases quality of life and freedoms on every metric for the people it apartheids” (@TheMossadIL, April 29, 2021). Contrast Israel’s behavior with that of the Arab states which deny Palestinians living within their borders, sometimes for decades, the right to become citizens. The Lebanese government goes even further by denying Palestinians a host of rights and placing limits on where they can live and work (Lisa Khoury, “Palestinians in Lebanon: ‘It’s like living in a prison,’” Al Jazeera, December 16, 2017). If you want to talk about discrimination, consider that it is a crime for a Palestinian to sell land to a Jew and a fatwa was issued by the preacher of the Al-Aqsa Mosque, Sheikh Ikrimah Sabri, saying it is permitted to kill the seller (“Khatib Al-Aqsa issues a Sharia fatwa regarding the diversion or sale of real estate to settlement associations,” Sama News Agency, April 8, 2021). Ironically, the author of the HRW report, Omar Shakir, was happy to live in Israel (imagine a black person choosing to live under the Afrikaner regime) until the Supreme Court revoked his residency permit. He is an advocate of the BDS campaign, which raises the question, Why would HRW choose someone who objects to Israel’s existence as the arbiter of its behavior (Ben-Dror Yemini, “A most dangerous and mendacious report,” Ynet, April 27, 2021)? Highlighting HRW’s hypocrisy, the Jerusalem Post reported that one of the organization’s board members runs a venture-capital fund that invests in Israeli start-ups (Lahav Harkov, “Human Rights Watch chairman invests in Israel as he calls it ‘apartheid,’” Jerusalem Post, May 2, 2021). It is also worth remembering that HRW uses its anti-Israel record as a fundraising tool, as we learned when Sarah Leah Whitson, the director of HRW’s Middle East and North Africa division, went to Saudi Arabia to raise money by highlighting the group’s demonization of Israel (David Bernstein, “Human Rights Watch Goes to Saudi Arabia,” Wall Street Journal, July 15, 2009). The founder of HRW, Robert Bernstein, said in 2009 the organization had become devoted to “helping those who wish to turn Israel into a pariah state.” Contrasting Israel with the countries HRW once focused on, he noted it had “at least 80 human rights organizations, a vibrant free press, a democratically elected government, a judiciary that frequently rules against the government, a politically active academia, multiple political parties and, judging by the amount of news coverage, probably more journalists per capita than any other country in the world.” Writing in the context of a biased HRW investigation into Israeli actions in Gaza, Bernstein lamented that “Israel, the repeated victim of aggression, faces the brunt of Human Rights Watch’s criticism” (Robert L. Bernstein, “Rights Watchdog, Lost in the Mideast,” New York Times, (October 19, 2009). Israel’s government is not immune to criticism and many of its policies are subject to vigorous debate and, in some cases, harsh condemnation by Israelis. What distinguishes Israel from the countries HRW should be investigating is the internal democratic processes that lead to self-examination, more enlightened policies and, where legally warranted, punishment for criminal activity. Nevertheless, Israel’s detractors and anti-Semites will use the report to reinforce their existing prejudices and try to convince the uninformed of HRW’s alternative reality. It also feeds into the BDS narrative by arguing it is not just the “occupation” that is bad; Israel itself “is intrinsically racist and evil” and therefore should be dismantled (Herb Keinon, “The HRW apartheid report: Does it matter?” Jerusalem Post, April 27, 2021).

Jewish Virtual Library refutes the odious myths perpetrated by “Human Rights Watch” (except Jewish rights) in their latest edition of “Myths versus Facts”. 

#jewish virtual library #jewish #human rights watch #israel #israeli #stop bds #anti bds #jerusalem post #new york times #bias #pro israel #stand with israel #standwithus #i stand with israel #jumblr #zionism #zionist #palestinian #judea #samaria #jerusalem

[bleekay]

I discovered your SWT zukka au and I can not stop thinking about it!! Do you think Sokka would become chief and Zuko would be his husband? Would the SWT accept him or could there be some angst if they don’t want him there? Please share more!

thank you!! in all honesty, i do not know a whole lot about tribes and chiefdoms, although through some quick research i get the sense that they aren’t all the same and have different rules, so i don’t know if sokka would automatically be next in line for chief after hakoda’s death (or if he stepped down or something?) or if they have a council that might choose to elect/appoint someone as chief, so expanding on that aspect of the au wouldn’t be something i’d be confident doing. i don’t even remember if at any point in canon sokka spoke about becoming the next chief, if that was something he wanted or not. i’m gonna plead ignorance on it for now, but i’m open to suggestions on it if there’s someone who knows more than me and has an opinion on it  :)

i do think at some point if iroh fell ill or something and had to travel to the fire nation, they’d definitely have to have a discussion about their futures, though. iroh doesn’t have an heir to take the throne, so unless he dismantled the monarchy, or chose to pick a successor outside of the royal line, the options for the next fire lord would be either zuko or azula. even if zuko didn’t become fire lord, i’m sure the possibility of it happening would definitely be a difficult subject for them to breach. i of course choose to believe that azula gets the help she needs and eventually stabilizes, but i don’t know if that would necessarily translate into her being a good next fire lord. iroh is so easy-going, i think if both zuko and azula couldn’t or didn’t want to take up the throne, he would find someone suitable.

in any case, of course they’d get married. there might be some folks who don’t accept zuko (which is entirely understandable), but in all honesty i think sokka wouldn’t care, and hakoda would back his son. after spending years in the south pole, hopefully zuko would learn enough and be engaged enough in their culture and people that he wouldn’t be considered a threat or anything anymore, and certainly he would have tried to make up for his past actions, so maybe getting married wouldn’t be that big of an issue

#blee's SWT zukka au tag #zukka #anon #asks

[canyouhearthelight]

The Miys, Ch. 118

Winding down to the end of 2020, when there will be an announcement regarding the story. No worries: I’m not stopping at the end of the year!

First, thanks for this chapter go to: @zommbiebro for Jokul, @wildforestferret for Hannah, @baelpenrose for Alistair and being an amazing Beta Reader/writing partner, and @raven-fae for originally giving me the NERVE to start posting this so long ago.  I never imagined that a one-off response to a writing prompt would become so much!

Housekeeping stuff: I updated the Master List and the page links over the weekend (whew), and also finished all the chapters that will post through the end of the year! Much excite, so relief.

Rushing between appointments, I was trying to multitask by looking over one of the files for the cooking class volunteers.  Quiet beeps in the back of my mind should have reminded me to watch where I was going as I kept setting off proximity warnings in people I nearly ran into.  I was so focused on my task that I ignored the mutters around me of how rude I was being, until the alert suddenly started getting louder and louder, practically screaming before I snapped out of my trance and stopped walking.

In front of me was a familiar set of broad shoulders, and just past him was a wall that I nearly ran us both into. “Conor, what are you doing?” I asked, started to see him seemingly just staring at a wall and humming away.

He turned toward me with a grin, dropping a kiss on the top of my head in greeting. “I didn’t realize that was you,” he answered. “I heard someone coming, but figured they would either turn or rather run into me than the wall.”

“And why are you staring at the wall?”

“Wasn’t staring,” he corrected. “I was working on this.” He stepped aside with a flourish, revealing one of the wall-tanks set up throughout the Ark for Else. Soft yellow motes drifted in the tank, evidence of Else’s continued breakneck evolution. However, this tank had something new in it…

“You put snowflakes in there?” I asked, confused.

He ran a hand through his hair and laughed. “When Sam, Derek, and I started putting out the Insert Winter Holiday decorations this week, Else got curious and asked what we were doing.  Derek explained - he talks to them better than I do - and they wanted something in their habitat, too, like we have.”

“And you decided on snowflakes?”

“Else picked that, actually. They are very curious about snow, since they developed… well, here, where there is no weather…”

“I guess that is fair.” Suddenly, I felt rude for talking about Else like they weren’t present. I still hadn’t gotten in the habit of speaking directly to them. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to ignore you…” I cringed a little inside.

Is okay, Else replied. We are not offended. Will we see real snow one day?

I thought about it. “Probably? Von has atmosphere, and the nights are long enough that the temperature probably gets really cold. It may have the right conditions for snow.”

Many humans think snow is beautiful. We would like to see snow.

“You and me both, buddy,” I admitted. “I love it.”

Conor shuddered. “No thank you. You can keep your cold mush.” Checking his databand, he groaned. “I have to get going. See you later, Else.” He dropped another kiss on my head. “I’ll see you at dinner,” he promised.

“No bruises?”

“No bruises.”

I smiled before jumping to check the time myself. “Shit,” I swore softly. “Else, I gotta go, too. I have an appointment five minutes ago.”

Humans can time travel?

“I wish,” I muttered, practically running to get there on time. I prayed that Alistair kept Hannah busy while I raced to our interview.

I showed up breathless and dishevelled, but only ten minutes late. Great first impression you’re giving, I scolded myself as I tried to get my hair somewhat more tidy and catch my breath. Straightening, I scanned my datapad and entered my office.

Hannah was nodding seriously at something Alistair was saying, and all I could do was pray he wasn’t telling her some embarrassing story about me. Both of them looked up as I entered, and Hannah approached me to shake my hand. “Hello, Sophia! Or should I address you as Councillor. I’m not entirely sure…”

“Sophia is fine,” I reassured her.  “Did Alistair explain why I asked you to meet with me today?”

She shook her head. “No, we were just talking about Zachary’s work with Councilor Ranganathan.”

“That is part of it,” I agreed. “Zach is one of several people who Pranav is mentoring, hoping to build a pool of candidates to fill his position in the future. I asked you to meet with me to see if you would be interested in doing the same, with me?”

Her eyes widened. “You want me… to learn your job?”

“I assure you, it is much safer than I make it look.” I tried to sound confident, but was already bracing for her to reject the position.

“It’s not that - “ Wait, what? “I just. Do you really think I could?”

“You wouldn’t be here if I didn’t think you could do it,” I assured her, somewhat dumbfounded. Recovering quickly, I pushed on. “I want to be clear - this is an elected position, so there is no guarantee that you would be my successor. The goal of the mentorship is to help you decide if you even want to do it, at all, along with ensuring that the Ark has the opportunity to choose between people who definitely know how to do the job. And more importantly, want to do the job.”

Alistair picked up from there. “In the Before, if you remember, many elections were decisions based on which candidate would do the least harm, rather than the most good. The Council is trying to change that.”

She nodded in understanding. “So there would be other people you are mentoring?”

So far, so good. “Hopefully three, yes.”

“Will you be working with us at the same time?”

“If all three of you accept, I am hoping to work with each of you one day per week individually, and the rest collectively,” I confirmed. “More specific than that, I will meet with all of you to explain once I know who has accepted. But I wanted to extend the offer in person, so I can answer any questions you may have.”

Hannah nodded again. “Would we be working the same hours you do?”

I was very glad Alistair and I already thought that part through, along with Tyche’s input. “Initially, no. You would only work half of my shift, and what half would be at my discretion.  However, this would be considered your job allotment, so you would not have to worry about any schedule conflicts. The only reason I will be deciding which half of my shift you work is because it may change due to Council meetings that you may not be privy to, or if there is nothing beneficial to your learning happening during the other half.”

“Why only half?” She asked.

“Councilors generally work double shifts,” Alistair advised her. When her eyes widened again, he continued, “In my experience, as her assistant, she will never ask you to work as much as she does, but she is very insistent that if she is not working, neither are you.”

I shook my head at him. “What he isn’t explaining is that there are also often large gaps in my day when I have no appointments and no paperwork to go through. So being in the office for sixteen to twenty hours sounds grueling, but I am rarely here the entire time.  That’s just the window when people are allowed to set appointments, or when the Council can convene outside of emergencies.”

Her shoulders sagged with relief. “I was honestly about to walk out until you explained that a bit better.”

I leaned over to Alistair and hissed. “People skills!”

“Professionalism…” he murmured back.

Hannah smiled at our antics. “Another question: What exactly do you do?”

I groaned, and Alistair smirked at me. Jokul had been so right on that point that it wasn’t even funny. “Since Zach is shadowing Pranav, I’m going to assume you know how the parts about voting in Council sessions works, right?” She nodded. “Okay, so that’s the big part that most people know about. They vote on an issue, their votes go to their representative Councilor, who votes on their behalf, short version. On a day to day basis, each Councilor is responsible for heading up everything on the Ark in a certain field. For me, that’s any large scale events, staffing, or major adjustments to how people are able to live their day-to-day lives. I have one assistant,” I gestured to Alistair, “and an Administrator, my sister Tyche.  She handles all of the small staffing concerns, because she is amazing at it.”

“So… Insert Winter Holiday, the annual Food festival…?”

I nodded. “Along with the gravity changes, the day cycle changes, the proximity alerts, creating and maintaining quiet rooms, finding people to back fill gaps caused by large projects or initiatives, large scale announcements to the ship, et cetera.”

“That’s… a lot…” She bit her bottom lip in concern.

“Really, it’s a handful of major events each year, plus the daily stuff.  And I work really closely with the other Councilors, largely because once most projects are past a staffing point, it falls under their jurisdiction to execute.”

Slowly, she nodded. “Okay…” After a moment, she nodded much more firmly. “Okay, I’ll try it.”

One down, two to go, I cheered in my head as I resisted the urge to scream with joy.

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#the miys #found family #humans are weird #humans are space orcs #aliens #original science fiction #science fiction #scifi #apocalypse #learning to live #hfy #earth is space australia #original writing #my writing

[sammysdewysensitiveeyes]

"Look at these freaks. These are not my peers."

"Fair enough, but you probably shouldn't say that out loud in front of people," Pyro said, making another note on his clipboard. "It doesn't really play well with the voting public, so to speak."

"But I am better than them," Fabian insisted, his voice rising to a whine. "That's exactly why they would choose me to represent them on the Quiet Council! None of this 'ordinary Joseph' nonsense. You shouldn't choose an elected leader because you want to have a beer with him, you should choose an elected leader who is superior, in both mind and body! Shouldn't I emphasize that?"

"Oh yes," Pyro agreed. "But you've got to tone it down a bit. People like a bit of humility. Make sure they know how much you appreciate the 'little people.' Make yourself relatable. You might be a superior mutant who is fabulously wealthy, handsome and intelligent-" it took incredible self-control for Pyro not to retch or burst out laughing as he spoke, "-but you put your Dolce and Gabbana jeans on one leg at a time, just like anyone else."

"As if I would ever wear jeans," Fabian sniffed. "And Dolce and Gabbana is the poor man's luxury brand. Off the rack trash. But I suppose someone like you would have no way of knowing that. Anyway, what's next on the agenda?"

"You're giving a speech at the Green Lagoon bar tonight, I've got it all written up." Pyro passed over a type-written script, with helpful highlights and a brief summary up top of the main points.

"Yes, yes, I'll go over it later," Fabian said, flipping through disinterestedly. And hand it back at the last minute with multiple revisions to be made, no doubt.

"Aaaand," Pyro added. "I've got you set up to shoot a viral video with Wind Dancer. She's the new head of media outreach for X-Corp, so she knows what she's doing."

"Ugh, viral videos....so asinine and demeaning. Beneath me, really. Is this the best you can do? Why am I even paying you, Pyro?"

Because no one else was willing to take the job of Fabian Cortez's campaign manager in his bid for a seat on the Quiet Council. But Pyro couldn't exactly say that.

"Because I believe in you, Fabian!" Pyro somehow forced out with a straight face. "And I hope you can believe in me, too. I'm a newspaper man, I know how the right coverage can make or break a candidate. Social media's all the rage these days. Wind Dancer and Iceman have been telling me all about what the kids are into."

"So what will I be doing, exactly? Something that shows off my physique, I hope."

"Oh, yes," Pyro drawled. "You'll be doing something called a 'Fortnite Dance.' All the young people are into that."

"Well, I do have excellent dancing skills," Fabian mused.

"And it'll be very hip, and very sexy. All the ladies will love it!"

Fabian looked pleased.

"And then we can go over your speech for tonight. We'll be introducing you on stage with a song by Nickelback, they're an extremely popular band."

"As long as it's appropriate to my dignity. My position in life."

"Oh, it's most definitely appropriate." It would go well with Fabian's speech, which had lines lifted directly from speeches by Mussolini, and made several sexual innuendos at the expense of Jean, Storm and Emma.

(But not Mystique. Pyro wouldn't dare.)

"Well, perhaps I'll keep you employed another day," Fabian said.

"Very generous of you, boss."

And the salary was generous as well, Pyro had to admit. It was the reason he gave when most people asked him why on earth he would support Fabian's bid for power. "It's not like he's gonna win, anyway," was his go-to excuse.

But there was another reason for Pyro to take this position, known to only a few closest to him. Pyro loved money, but he was also a semi-patriotic citizen of Krakoa. And as such, he considered it his sworn duty to completely and totally tank Fabian's campaign beyond any hope of recovery.

Plus it was fun.

(OOC: Apparently I'm inspired to imagine Pyro as different people's campaign manager. I think I'm just frustrated because Marauders is completely and totally ignoring his skills as a writer/journalist.)

#pyro #st john allerdyce #fabian cortez

[lombredanslaeu]

pure devotion | johnny x reader

▸ werewolf! johnny x human reader [angst, fluff] + chapter two

▸ summary: every werewolf is destined with a soulmate. other werewolves have werewolf soulmates, while the others have human soulmates. when you found out that you’re soulmates with your long time best friend, who is also the next alpha, you start to rethink whether or not you want to be with him.

▸ hope you enjoy this one! let me know what you think. if you have any feedback or requests, my messages are always open. 

The existence of werewolves and vampires was not news in your town. In some strange way, everyone respected each other. Werewolves and vampires goes to school, malls, restaurants, and anywhere humans go to. These beings never harmed any humans unless they’re criminals who were deemed to be executed by the council. The council consists of three people - the mayor for the humans, the alpha for the werewolves, and the primus for the vampires. Everything was fine and dandy until you learned about your soulmate.

“I firmly believe in the idea that people who drinks latte have zero taste in everything.” Your best friend, Johnny, said beside you. It was finals week in your college and everyone’s mind has already melted into putty.

“Okay, first of all, you have 10 more pages of readings to study, and second, why?” You replied, looking up to him.

“Lattes are the worst type of coffee. I wish I could permanently erase the time I first drank one.” He complained before focusing on the readings in front of him.

Johnny has been your best friend since diapers. You are well aware of the fact that his father is the alpha - the most powerful wolf in their pack. As a human, you never fully understood the traditions and rules that apply to their community. Johnny often tells you stories about his pack. Almost everyone in his pack knew who you are - the alpha’s son’s best friend. There would be times when you cling onto his back as you speed through the woods as a wolf. You saw him grow from a small puppy from childhood to a huge wolf with the softest fur. Johnny was a beautiful man and his wolf did not disappoint. It was only last year that you knew that once the alpha have either died or resigned, their first born would be the next in line for the throne. As the son of the alpha, it was in Johnny’s nature to be a leader. He was headstrong, firm with his decisions, and never left anything unsolved. He also always knew the solution to almost any problem. You are a living evidence of this character of him as you two grew up together.

Johnny also told you about soulmates. The supreme deity that the werewolves worshiped was known as Fatuma. Once a werewolf is born, Fatuma will assign a soulmate to them and once they reach the age of 23, they will find whoever their soulmate is. According to the tales of the mated wolves, the first touch was like a rush of electricity to the whole body. It feels like the whole universe was in your veins. Some were friends with their soulmates since they were kids and it was only when they turned 23, do they feel the sparks of destiny. It was majority of the time that werewolves where soulmates with other werewolves but there are werewolves who are soulmates with humans. These wolves are deemed unfortunate by the community because humans would have to undergo the werewolf transition. Most of the time, the human body would not be able to take it and it shuts down, refusing the DNA the werewolf gave them. Only a few make it out successfully and that is only if Fatuma is on their side that night.

“You’re turning 23 next month.” You said to Johnny who was now scrolling through his phone and ignoring the stack of papers to be studied.

“Oh yeah, I completely forgot about that!” He said.

“Huh? How can you forget? Isn’t that the age that you meet your soulmate?” The words left a bitter taste on your tongue. You knew it was selfish of you to hate the idea of Johnny meeting his soulmate. You blame it on the fact that you might lose your best friend. Although you had other friends, Johnny was the only person who you knew will always have your back. You also blame it on the fact that you might be in love with him. You and Johnny were so comfortable with each other. You wouldn’t deny that there were nights filled with making out and any other thing you mother disapproves of. All of your firsts was with Johnny and it pains you to think that he will spend the rest of his life with someone else. You brush off your thoughts when he responded.

“Yeah, but you know, school is being hell and stuff.” He said nonchalantly. He quickly changed the topic when he saw it in your eyes that you still had some questions. Johnny could never leave you. He knew in himself that no matter who you both end up with, you will always still have each other. But he felt like there was a black hole in his stomach whenever he thinks about finding his soulmate. Maybe it was because of the pressure of being the next alpha or maybe because he really might forget you.

---

Dinner time at the Suh household came. Johnny forced himself to get up from his desk and have dinner with his parents. His mother never liked it when Johnny doesn’t at least sit with them during dinner. He loves his family more than anything but he knew that they were going to pester him with questions about his upcoming birthday.

“So, Jaehyun and Ten told me you want to have a party here.” His dad spoke. They were lenient with him because they know of his character and principles. Johnny loved partying and having fun like any other young adult out there. But he also knew when to get serious and get shit done. This is one character he learned from his father.

“Are you sure you don’t want a bonfire with the pack? I mean, this is the age you meet your soulmate, darling.” His mother adds.

 “No, it would be a hassle for the people if we do that. Besides, if we do the bonfire, my vampire friends wouldn’t want to come.” He said. Although the all beings respected each other, not everyone wants to attend the traditions or rituals of each other. He didn’t want the others to not come to his birthday.

 “Of course, John. I also need Kun’s help to prepare the dinner before your wild party.” His mother replied. Kun was a vampire who has the most exquisite taste in food. He knew how to make everything and he makes them extraordinary. “By the way, aren’t you excited about finding the one?”

 “I am surprisingly excited.” He replied. “I just hope it’s not a human.”

“You can always choose an unmated human, son.” His father adds.

It’s true. If the human doesn’t survive the transformation, the werewolf is free to choose another human to be their spouse. They will be gifted with the ability to determine whether a human is mated or not. The thought of finding his soulmate never scared him until his age came close to 23. That’s when he felt the pressure and the fear. Through sleepless nights he searched for the reason why he felt like he was not ready for the revelation and almost every time, the first reason was you. There are cases where werewolves eloped with their human lovers, leaving their true soulmate behind. But Johnny’s naturally kind nature would never bear it if he left his soulmate. Sure, you weren’t the greatest person alive. You had your flaws and quirks that Johnny hates. Whenever he felt like he couldn’t get you out of his head, he remembers all the petty fights between you two. But as if it’s an instinct, his mind remembers the joyful memories of both of you. The sleepovers, the drunken nights, the fast-food runs after school, and especially the silent times where you just sit beside each other. No talking was present during those times but the fleeting feeling of someone who would lasso the moon for you. Johnny prayed to Fatuma that his soulmate wasn’t a human but almost after every prayer, he wishes it was you. It was incredibly selfish of him to wish that you were his soulmate. To put you through the risk of death haunted his mind day by day. But to say that Johnny loves you is an understatement.

---

 It was only a week before Johnny’s 23rd birthday. He decided to spend a day with you. According to him it was because he needed new photos for his elective photography class. The truth is, he wanted to spend one final day before he lets go of whatever feelings he has for you.

“John, how much long till we reach your planned destination?” You complained. As a werewolf, he could go on and on and not be tired. But you, as a human, was the contrary.

“We’re almost there.” You rolled your eyes at his response. After a few more steps, you saw a cliff that gave the prettiest view of the sunset. Johnny has the gift of finding the most beautiful locations. He snapped a few pictures of you and you also did with him. After a while, you found yourselves sitting under a tree with the marbling colors of the sunset in front of you.

“Where do you see yourself 10 years from now?” He asked. You chuckled at the cheesy question. You didn’t mind having deep conversations with him. You’ve done that countless of times before.

“Hopefully I’m already a successful architect with my designs transforming this boring city to being extraordinary.” You replied. Your eyes lingering to the skyline in front of you.

You were so busy admiring the sunset that you didn’t realize that Johnny has been staring at you for quite some time now. He absorbed the details of your side profile. He grew up with you and he regrets that he never took the time to fully soak in your beauty. Sometimes he wish that fate didn’t have to be this way.

---

You were already tipsy from the concoction Taeyong has been giving you for the past hour. It’s Johnny’s 23rd birthday and somehow, he has never spoken once about the soulmate thing. You and your friends figured that maybe he didn’t want to talk about it since it stresses him so much.

You spotted him in the kitchen and decided to ask him if he already opened the present you got him. “Actually, I wanna open it with you.” He said and he leads both of you in his bedroom.

You watched up picked up the box. You decided to give him the vintage camera he saw on a shop a few weeks ago. You bought it immediately, in fear that he would be able to buy it first. He loves photography more than anything else and it pained you to see him so upset that his parents didn’t approve of him taking photography as his major in college.

“Oh my god, Y/N, this is incredible.” He said, his eyes never leaving the camera in front of him.

He approached you for a hug that you immediately welcomed and as your body collided with each other, that’s when the realization hit. Johnny felt like he was dreaming. In a state of shock, he wasn’t able to let go of you yet but his smile quickly faded. His eyes drifted to the wall clock of his bedroom. The clock struck at 10:34 pm - his exact time of birth. Werewolves find their soulmate the minute they turn 23. And his soulmate is you.

You felt like every nerve in your body was awake and functioning all at the same time. The haziness of alcohol disappeared as you realized what was happening. You are Johnny’s soulmate. A part of you was happy. You were over the moon at the fact that you were meant to be with the man that you have always loved. But the other part of you hit you with the fact that being soulmates with a werewolf would put you through the brink of life and death. You would risk it all for Johnny. You would do anything for him. But the thought of achieving your dreams would cloud your mind. The thought of finally being able to taste the fruit of your hardship, alive and healthy. You can’t help but be selfish.

You stared at him and you found no answers in his eyes. He was just as lost as you. You took a step back and you could have sworn you saw fear dominate his eyes. You wanted so bad to tell him that you just need time but you were too overwhelmed with mixed feelings that were drowning you at that very moment. So you just left and he just let you. He witnessed how your eyes shined when you talked about your dreams the other day. To think that you may never achieve that because of him, because of his nature, was like a stab to his chest. He loves you too much to do that to you.

You stared at the moon from your window. Your mother said there would be days where you think you know the answer but it would be only later you realize that you don’t. You always said to yourself how you would risk anything for Johnny. God knows the countless nights you prayed to let him be with you until the end of time. And it was granted. But somehow it didn’t feel right.

With one final sighed, you closed your eyes and wait for sleep to come. You wished that tomorrow you will have the answer.

fin.

a/n: hey! not too proud of this one but here u go, nevertheless. feedback is greatly appreciated!

#johnny suh #johnny seo #johnny imagines #johnny smut #johnny angst #johnny drabbles #johnny x reader #nct johnny x reader #nct au #nct imagines #nct johnny #seo youngho #nct x you #nct x reader #nct 127 #seo johnny #nct johnny suh #nct youngho #johnny x you

[ilguna]

Metanoia - Chapter Eighteen (f.o)

Summary: you will be crowned victor of the 75th hunger games.

Word Count; 2.4k

Warnings; swearing, meanery

NOTES: i give reader a last name to fit the world.

–

You pace in front of the windows, staring out into the city. Every now and then, you’ll stop because you forget what you were doing, but then you quickly make up for the lost time.

There’s nothing really peculiar about the city that you’re looking at. Just staring at the Capitol is enough to make you blank out.. With how their buildings are shaped, placed and constantly refurbished. You’d think that they would be done at some point, but they’re always implementing their newest technology.

Take the whole Tribute Center as an example.

You pause your movement again, placing your hand on the glass as you stare at the building. It’s the tallest, in the heart of the city. And it holds nothing but grievances. You wonder if Coin will bother to burn it down, or if she’ll keep it.

If she doesn’t burn it down, you will. Right along with all the other apartment complexes and houses that discomfort you. You’ll make the Capitol your home, one way or another. It all starts with getting rid of all those places that you’d had to visit in your teen years.

How will arson be for refurbishing?

“Miss Rosecelli, you can sit--”

You look over your shoulder at Coin, who’s staring right at you. The two of you take a moment, and there must be something about your emotionless gaze that makes her drop it. Because her eyes drift downwards, and eventually away from you.

“She’s just nervous about the conversation she’ll be having with Finnick later today.” Johanna says, clicking a pen on the table, “About whether or not they’re gonna be a couple.”

Peeta looks at Johanna, you roll your eyes, Annie shifts uncomfortably in her chair.

You cross your arms, pursing your lips, “You’re a fucking bitch.”

“Tell me something I don’t know.” Johanna mutters.

“I could, but Finnick isn’t here to strap you down like last time.”

“That’s really rich, coming from the person who lost it on a peacekeeper.” Johanna snorts.

“Maybe that’s enough.” Haymitch says.

“Maybe?” you ask, turning around to see Johanna. Your face puckers up when you realize her back is to you, and taking the opportunity of a lifetime, in one swift motion you slap the back of her head on your way to your seat, at the other end of the table.

“You fucking--” her chair teeters from how hard she’s gotten up.

The door opens, and you look up to see that it’s Finnick.

“Good.” Peeta says, “Control your mutts.”

You turn a harsh eye to Peeta next, since you haven’t even passed him yet. And with the maturity of a middle schooler, you crack your knuckles right in his face.

“That’s fucking hilarious, considering you’re a Capitol bitch, yourself.”

Haymitch has had enough, and he doesn’t wait to see what Peeta does. He reaches over with one arm, yanking you away from the end of the table that you’re not welcome on anymore, considering the people. Johanna, Annie and Peeta. The only reason why you belong on the other side is because Beetee tolerates you and Haymitch doesn’t give a shit.

Or so you thought.

“Knock it off.” he warns.

“Go back to drinking your vodka-infused tea.” you hiss, going for the chair next to Peeta.

“What did I walk in on?” Finnick asks.

“A war zone, apparently.” Beetee has his glasses in hand, he rubs his face tiredly.

Finnick looks at you for a real answer, “What happened?”

“Johanna.” is all you answer, yanking out the chair as you sit on it.

“All I said was--” Johanna’s batting her eyelashes innocently.

“No one gives a shit about what you said.” you cut her off, “Shut the fuck up already.”

She clenches her jaw, giving you a nasty look. However, she doesn’t bother trying again. Finnick just places his hand on the back of your chair, and begins to talk to Peeta as if you didn’t just say the shit you did to any of them.

You cross your legs, and then your arms as you sink in your chair. You bite the inside of your lip and cheek, trying not to say anything that might get you in a deeper hole than you already are.

Although, it’s not like you’ll have to speak to any of the morons ever again after this. This meeting was required, Coin will crown herself as the next dictator later this evening, and then you’re free to choose a place to live. Beetee will likely stay in the Capitol--as for all the others, they’ll likely scatter.

Except for Finnick. He’s going to negotiate an agreement with you.

You told him simply; either you’re living in the Capitol with the rest of the circus, or you’re living so far off the grid that they’ll have to hunt you down for months just to find you.

And Finnick wants to live back in District Four. It’s where he was raised, and he finds comfort there. You can’t really blame him for it. You’d be going for District two, yourself if it weren’t for everything that has happened there. Victor’s village is a ghost town, and you found out the other day that not only are you the only surviving victor from two--your childhood home was burnt down.

So, if you go back to District Two, you’ll have to deal with the reconstruction of the main town, and buy yourself a freshly painted, picket-white-fence house. Or you can go to your fucking victor house that reeks like rotten food and spoiled milk.

However, if you don’t choose there, you can certainly start all the fucking way over in the Capitol. The only thing that would even slightly suggest your background are those apartment complexes. And the more you think about it, the more you’re beginning to consider burning them down.

Of course, you can’t touch the mansion. But everything else can go. They’re not a vital part of your history, and they certainly don’t deserve to continue to stand anymore.

As you’re staring around the room, Johanna catches your eye again because she’s staring straight at you. You’re about to roll your eyes and look away, but she mouths something.

Your eyes narrow, “Say it aloud.”

Finnick’s words falter and he looks down at you, “What?”

You ignore him, “Go on, say it Johanna.”

“What? Can’t read lips?” Johanna says.

“You’re a pussy.” you tell her, “If you can’t say it out loud, you’re a fucking pussy.”

“Is that right?” she grins.

You sneer, “You can enjoy yourself now, but the moment we leave the room, I’m going to fucking kill you.”

She snorts, “Yeah, right.”

You stand, slamming your hands against the table as you lean forward, “You want to see me actually lose it? Because this time I’ll do a lot more than smash your head against a fucking rock!”

“(Y/n).” Coin’s looking at you with wide eyes, “For your sake, I hope that’s an empty threat.”

“It wasn’t.” Finnick tells her, and then his attention is turned, “If you think that I’m going to stop her, you’re wrong.”

“It’s cute how you pretend to care about her, when she clearly doesn’t care about you.”

“Say that to all the times she saved my life on the way here.” Finnick tells her, “Sit, (Y/n), please.”

“I swear to god, Johanna. Say shit one more time and I’ll settle for killing you in here.” you sit back in the chair, elbows on the table as you clench and unclench your hand.

Right after, the door opens again. Everyone turns their gaze to who’s joined you all.

“What’s this?”

“The remaining victors, won’t you join us?” Coin asks, motioning to the table and the one single chair that’s open for Katniss. It’s right between Peeta and Haymitch.

It takes a moment, but she slowly makes her way around the table, taking her spot. Everyone else follows her lead, taking a seat in their chairs and their different poses. 

You watch as Annie blankly stares at Finnick, until her eyes shift away once she realizes you’re watching.

“I have invited you all here for several reasons. But first, I have an announcement, I have taken the burden and the honor of declaring myself interim president of Panem.” Coin says.

Your eyes drag to her. You can’t say you’re surprised, you literally called it just a few minutes ago.

Haymitch coughs like he’s choking on his own spit, “Interim? Exactly, how long is that?”

“We have no way of knowing for certain. But it’s clear that the people are far too emotional right now to make a rational decision.”

“Maybe you should consider a council instead.” you suggest, but your voice is hollow, “Y’know, so you’re not taking this burden entirely?”

“We’ll plan an election when the time is right.” Coin says, indirectly answering your statement, “But I have called you all here for a far more important vote, a symbolic vote. This afternoon we will execute Snow. Hundreds of his accomplices also await their deaths, Capitol officials, peacekeepers, torturers, gamemakers.”

You bite the inside of your lip again, trying to bite your tongue. You want to criticize everything she says. There’s so many flaws, and the others have to see this too, right?

“But the danger is, once we begin the rebels won’t stop calling for retribution. Thirst for blood is a difficult urge to satisfy. So, I offer an alternative plan. Majority for may approve it, no one may abstain.” She says carefully, “My proposal is this; in lieu of these barbaric executions, we hold a symbolic hunger games.”

Haymitch slowly lowers his tea cup. 

Silence fills the room instantly after. As well as the looks on the other’s faces. Mainly the horror that Annie expresses, the little smirk forming on Johanna’s face, and the deadpan look that Katniss hasn’t lifted since she sat down in her chair.

Then, Johanna starts laughing, “You want to have another hunger games with the Capitol’s children?”

You dig your fingernails into the skin on your thumb.

“You’re joking.” Peeta says.

Coin shakes her head, “Not in the slightest.”

Haymitch scoffs, “Is this Plutarch’s idea?”

“It was mine.” Coin says.

Johanna clicks her pen once or twice, the smile on her face growing.

“It balances the need for revenge,” Coin reasons, “With the least loss of human life. You may cast your votes.”

“No.” Peeta nearly overlaps her speaking, “No, obviously not, this is crazy.”

Johanna leans forward, “I think it’s more than fair. Snow’s got a granddaughter. I say yes.” She looks at Peeta after, like she’s trying to strike a nerve.

“Johanna has a point.” you say, which makes a lot of heads turn, but your eyes are on Coin, “My vote is yes.”

“You guys, this way of thinking is what started the uprises.” Peeta says.

“I vote no, with Peeta.” Annie says.

“I vote no too.” Finnick says, and he looks at you, “After everything that happened to you? You really want to say yes?”

You lean towards him, “Some of those motherfuckers have sons and daughters. My vote stands.”

“No. We need to stop viewing each other as enemies.” Beetee says, you nearly forgot he was there because of how quiet he’s been.

It’s down to just Haymitch and Katniss. Katniss is staring right at Coin, “I get to kill Snow.”

“I expected no less of you.” Coin says, a smile hinting at her lips.

That rubs you the wrong way, and you can tell it does the same for Katniss, even if nothing physically changes. It’s the way Katniss pauses before speaking next, that gives it away, “Then I vote yes. For Prim.”

“Haymitch?” Coin asks, Katniss slowly turns her head to him.

They stare at each other for a moment before he decides his answer, “I’m with the mockingjay.”

“That carries the vote, excellent. We’ll announce the games tonight, after the execution.” Coin says, a smile is on her face.

You get up from the table, “Sounds good to me.”

Your eyes land on Finnick, eyebrows raised. He catches the drift and gets up from where he’s sitting.

“We’ll see you guys later.”

The two of you leave the room with no comments from anyone else. The moment that the door has shut behind Finnick, he’s on your ass.

“You seriously voted yes?”

“I’m out for blood.”

“I can tell.” Finnick says, he catches up with your pace, “I’ve been thinking about what you wanted.”

You slow a little, allowing him a chance to speak without it being rushed.

He takes this as a sign to keep talking, “Before you get mad, I know what you said, alright. You want a fresh start, away from people you know. District Four is like that.”

“Except for the fact that your ex-girlfriend is going to go back there too.”

“She isn’t.” he says.

You look over.

“She’s going to stay with Katniss’ mom or something. I talked to Annie last night to make sure I heard everything right. District Four is ours for the taking. It’s a fresh start to you, and it’s home for me.”

Finnick’s got a look on his face, and with the way that he’s already calmed you down immensely--he’s been getting better at it, lately--you can’t help but to be compliant.

“What happens when your neighbors hate me?” you ask, “Or we fight?”

“Easy, we get you a vacation house here.” Finnick’s proud of this one, he’s got a smile on his face, “You’ll be able to come here whenever you want. Live your life of luxury, and then come home.”

You stop walking now, “You’re sure you want me to go there, though? You want me around?”

Finnick laughs, coming closer. He’s gentle with the way he cups your jaw with one hand, looking down at you, “Honey, I’ve been chasing you around this entire time. I’m not going to stop now.”

You squint at him, “Honey?”

A smile appears on his face, and you can’t help but to smile too.

“Don’t let it get to your head.” Finnick says, running his thumb over your cheek.

“I let everything get to my head.”

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