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jimblejamblewritings · 1 month

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An Observation of Humankind [thinkpiece number: 1]

Every girlie (nonbinary, women and men of all orientations included) is a type of Marauder and their partners are marauder love interest — fandom version included.

James Girlies:

either like sports or play sports, especially soccer/football or rugby

bad eyesight

defends everyone

himbo and ditzy but we love them for that

fanfiction reader/sharer

have had several short-term but very intense crushes

surprisingly not always high school sweethearts (which yeah odd cause of Lily)

nature bros

calls their journal a diary with no shame

are always outside and can't sit their ass at home for too long

love bouquets

own at least one pair of converse

loves pop music and Hozier

have scaled a fence before

might be able to play the guitar

handwriting could be nicer if they tried

didn't get their drivers' license right away

take their coffee any way that isn't straight black coffee

definitely think all people are hot even if they don't swing that way (think lesbians love Thor)

loved Merlin the tv show

James Girlies love Regulus and Lily people, which means:

cold people, smart people, black cat people, painters, polite people, readers, homebody people, gothic people, hippie people, people with beautiful handwriting, black coffee drinkers, whisky lovers

Sirius Girlies:

dog people and cat people equally

doc martens

loves coffee and tea equally

fanfiction writer/reader

gorgeous handwriting, probably cursive

might know or has had an interest in calligraphy

an astrology and/or astronomy girl

speaks at least two languages

plays an instrument, any instrument... but their parents definitely suggested piano

leather jackets

denim jackets

wears way less black than people think

fantasy nerd and has played dungeons and dragons

was a superwholockian

usually the only child or older child

doesn't smoke but everyone thinks they might

cocktails or whiskey and beer, no in between

virgin till like freshman year of college or later, to everyone's shock

looks like a black cat but is actually a golden retriever

however they could kill you don't get it twisted

has trauma but won't trauma bond

crooked smile and not perfect teeth but gorgeous anyway

perfect hair that is deliberately messed with

motorcycles and vespas and small cars

listens to every genre of music

tattoos (even if just one small one)

journal person

can quote certain movies by heart

unfortunately turned on by sweater vests

fashion girlie

Sirius Girlies love Marlene, Remus, and other Sirius people, which means:

warm people, confident people, tall people, flirty people, musicians, readers, intellectual people, fancy people

Remus Girlies:

sweets lover

probably likes dark chocolate the most as well as hot chocolate

owns sweaters, probably vintage, some handmade by their Sirius girlies

plays chess

can draw

mismatched socks

waits till the last minute to do laundry

is more of a cat person but also loves dogs

didn't have strict parents and ended up giving themselves curfews and discipline and only late realized the reverse psychology

keeps a notebook about everything their partner likes

messy cook in the kitchen

loves tea a bit over coffee

is probably the actual smoker of the group

doesn't make their bed

good kissers

always carries a jacket or wears a shirt under their sweater so they can give it to their partner

can hold their liquor a bit too well perhaps

has trauma and might trauma bond

great fashion sense but will wear literally whatever is clean

Remus Girlies love Sirius, Pandora, and Dorcas (hear me out) people, which means:

black cat looks and golden retriever personality, weird people, people that pour their pain and emotions into their art whether music or painting or drawing, people that take time to care for themselves in the morning, witchy people, smiley people

Peter Girlies (pretend there was no betrayal):

underestimated

asks the most off-putting questions without realizing it

takes a camera everywhere

loves board games

tea drinker all day every day

baker

sends selfies at literally any angle because they don't care

always pays attention to everyone

loves breakfast food eaten not at breakfast

had a ukelele phase

cleanest of their friend group

Peter Girlies love Mary people, which means:

sunshine people, almost always happy, excitable people, pda lovers, carefree topeople

#mara #marauders #james potter #peter pettigrew x reader #sirius black #remus lupin #sirius black x reader #remus lupin x reader #james potter x reader #marauders fluff #peter pettigrew

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bulkhummus · 1 year

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i fucking love lubelles goal of being to explain everything and ruin the joy and wonder of what makes up the damn show. feels like a backhanded acknowledgment of old nv criticism (and honestly criscsim in sci-fi and fiction these days) where people used to say “okay but whats the point, whats the plot, why does the weird stuff happen with no consequence, i dont like that its not linear, how come this happens, theres no continuity wah” Baby it was never about the plot its never been about a plot its been about the magic and joy of fucking sitting there and listening to another world for 30 minutes from a man whose just has got a lot on his plate and has two braincells. Its commentary its jazz its free form fucking word poetry that sometimes stabs you in the gut. If thats not your cup of tea then thats completely and utterly fine but that doesnt automatically define it as bad. i know i joke a lot about them having no continuity but i dont care! Id listen to anything wtnv makes bc theyre playing in the space and breathing life into new stories and changing things because they want to and each episode feels like a weird thinkpiece on whatever’s going on in our world. Not everything needs an explanation or a grander purpose sometimes its just there for the joy of writing sometimes a story can be built from talking about everything but the thing that its talking about just how cecil palmer is defined by the people around him and we are never given a description of the guy. giving explanation destroys the beauty and wonder and dont u fucking get why i fucking LOVE LUBELLE and what this arc is doing and commenting on because above all else wtnv has been commentary even in the places its stumbled and failed dont u freaking see.. question why you’re asking what the point of something is question why you care so much about numbers and things lining up and working out perfectly. people are ugly and emotional and small towns are weird and stuff gets rehashed there over and over and over again dont you see the layers? Dont you see the fucking romance in a man who praises science above all else refusing to explain something to his husband to keep the magic alive? No No? In your quest to find the answer did you forget about the joy of the question?

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argumate · 3 months

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I was a fan of the once feminist blogger Sady Doyle back in the day, now still feminist but it's complicated blogger Jude Doyle, so I wrangle their words with only the kindest of wishes and I know they are perpetually Going Through It, but I still think they're being curiously oblivious in most of this post about erasure etc.

even just the narrative arc of "I was a feminist because traditional gender roles made me uncomfortable", like yes it's good to dig into the emotional underpinnings of your beliefs, and it can be an important part of figuring out what it is you "really" believe or what beliefs you end up settling on or converging to, but obviously something making you uncomfortable is often a terrible foundation on which to build a lifetime of political advocacy! and I don't even need to spell out the issues with that.

and yes lots of people are mad at them, of course, people are always mad at them and always will be even if the stated reasons may shift and vary, so this isn't exactly news, as distressing as it can be to witness, and of course you can't really base your politics on "people get mad at me on the internet", especially when your job is basically to make people mad on the internet, when it comes right down to it.

brief appreciation for "I obliquely subtweeted my mother," as a beautiful sequence of words.

they are of course obliged to state that "misandry" doesn't exist, but that stereotypes of men as predatory, hulking, and violent do exist, and thankfully must not lead to any kind of prejudice or negative outcomes that could be considered problematic; it's a strange assertion but a compulsory one.

they find that the writings of most cis male feminists are useless, but fail to identify why, and take them at face value instead of considering why there might be a supply of and a demand for such nonsense.

and of course, they still write in the same manner as they always have: of deriving general assertions from their specific experiences, which is arguably all that any of us can ever do and yet when expressed directly in thinkpiece form is still an intensely gendered, female-coded, way to write; when your topics are the socially constructed notions of "men" and "women" then you have to be aware of this!

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e-clv · 4 months

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Thankful that Hanif Abdurraqib exists for many reasons but chief among them is that he’s living proof that you can be an observant, incisive, emotional writer in 2024 who talks about contemporary culture and just…have that be it. His whole vibe throws in stark relief so many “writers” who twist themselves into pretzels doing some hollow influencer-twitter comedian-thinkpiece bilge rat combo and act like they have to do that because that’s just what culture is now. But they don’t. Because at least one talented guy is simply not doing that. Embarrassing for them and all the cooler for him!

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missilekids · 7 months

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im always going man i havent caught up with the mcr fandom in a couple days ill look at the tags! and then the posts are like

1. screenshot of an interview where gerard talks about being emotional captioned "and people DIDNT expect him to wear womens clothing?!"

2. random date circled on a calendar captioned "we popping the biggest bottles when mcr5 drops the day after tomorrow"

3. stolen joke

4. "emotional" thinkpiece that is only nominally not fanfiction, including no less than 4 different lies/incorrect assumptions

#i realize this is bcuz looking at popular posts on purpose is a rookie mistake. but its so funny this happens every single time

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arkus-rhapsode · 6 days

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When you see yourself in trash (Gachiakuta Discussion)

So with the positive reception of my recent thinkpiece, I wanted to make good on my promise that I’d post more. And this has kinda been one I’ve been wanting to do for a while. But due to the deeply personal nature of it, I wanted to really give it the time it deserved to come together.

This is going to be a post about Gachiakuta, which if my multiple posts on it haven’t been an indicator, I'm kinda a big fan. But what’s more, I really wanted to talk about why Gachiakuta speaks to me more in depth.

Background

So for those who don’t know, Gachiakuta is a weekly manga series by mangaka Kei Urana. Urana is a former assistant of the student of the Soul Eater and Fire Force creator, Atsushi Okubo. This series premiered shortly after Okubo’s Fire Force finished up, and stars a young boy named Rudo who lives in the slum area of a place called “The Sphere” (Or Heaven depending on the translation). Rudo has a habit of stealing from waste deposit sites and repairing broken items he finds. He lives with his adopted father Regeto after his biological father was sentenced to “The Abyss” for murder. The Abyss is a gaping chasm where all of the Sphere’s trash and prisoners are dumped.

Rudo is a somewhat surly child, and noticeably struggles with properly expressing his emotions despite the fact he is a highly emotional person. Smiling in particular is a struggle for him. Rudo one day comes to find Regto killed by a mysterious masked man, and blamed for this crime. Rudo is sentenced to the Abyss where he cries in anger he will return and kill everyone here. In the Abyss, Rudo is met by monsters made of trash and people devoted to fighting them, the Cleaners (Or Janitors depending on the translation). This fighting force of magic garbage men use the power of a “Giver” to empower items dear to them known as Jinki. With Rudo discovering that he can do the same with his gloves given to him by Regeto. Now he’ll work with the Cleaners killing trash monsters as he unravels the mystery of who killed his adoptive father and how he’ll escape the Abyss.

And it has been the newest manga series in the last four years that has not only made me feel hyped but await every chapter since its release.

Now if everything I said previously sounded like “well that sounds like a fairly straight forward if somewhat interestingly flavored revenge action manga. What makes it special?” Well then we’re going have to talk about Rudo.

Rudo

So Gachiakuta is a series with a lot of weirdos in it and some unconventional story structures to it (and we’ll touch on that later) but I think the character who embodies the core of this series is its MC, Rudo.

On the surface Rudo is a character that could feel at home with any number of shonen manga protags. Really expressive, yells a lot, spiky hair, and a power that’s kinda special amongst its power system. Basically, If Deku from MHA was a bit more angry and sleep deprived, you probably think he and Rudo were the same person on the surface. And for the most part, Rudo seemed to be that way, an angry kid out for revenge who treasured the last remaining gift he received from his foster father. Yet then we get to chapter 15 of Gachiakuta. A truly special chapter.

When Griss, Rudo’s teammate for this mission, was run through with claws by the villain, Jabber Wongar, Rudo seems to suffer some for of PTSD as the world goes hazy and he sees Griss as Regeto, stabbed and bleeding. We cut to Rudo as a child in Regto’s care and there, Rudo is banging his head against a wall to the point blood is coming out.

When Regto asks why Rudo would do this, the only thing Rudo can describe is how he has nothing. He has these feelings he doesn’t know how to describe yet he believes he’s nothing from the abuse he suffered at the hands of parents. All he has to really express it it this sort of frustration. While Rudo’s parents being murders may have been a lot for any child, Rudo carries literal scars given to him by his father. His hands peeled and scared and burnt black. The pain in his hands stops when he wears the gloves Regto gave him.

And when Regto wants Rudo to find something to focus his passion into, the thing that catches Rudo’s attention the most is a broken mannequin. Rudo cries letting out those feelings he said he couldn’t describe. Wanting to fix something and can’t believe it was tossed away because it was “a little broken.” At that moment, Regto realizes something about Rudo. He sees himself in those same objects that weren’t valued and tossed away.

So this is where I get to one of the things about Gachiakuta and Rudo in particular that speaks to me. Rudo, to me, is an example of a neurodivergent child and the text actually bothers to focus on how this affects his life. Now I know the moment I’ve said that there will be a lot of people who want me to explain, and the first thing is, no the manga doesn’t come out and say that Rudo is on the spectrum. But rather it lays a pretty explicit analogy to someone who may not be typical in some regard mentally or emotionally. I know in the space of neurodivergent individuals representation is… difficult. Not just to find in the media, but also represented in a way that isn’t just “they’re a super genius.” Because there are many many forms of neurodivergence and how the manifest can be different for many individuals. Someone with ADHD may have their life affected in ways different than someone diagnosed with Autism. This is where I think it's very important for me to say, I’m just one guy on the spectrum. I’m speaking from my personal experience but you shouldn’t take my opinion as gospel. This is just me and my experiences. And my personal reading of this

So when I say, a “mentally different character” in the media can be a tricky tightrope to walk, I mean it. Wanting there to be a positive representation for a community that may not get representation, but also not wanting to be like some monolithic depiction of what living with one of these conditions may be like. And there are plenty of ways where this could go very wrong (Anyone remember the time Aquaman cured Autism?). So when the text can’t just say “I am X” it's not uncommon for the readers to begin to see or relate to how a character may act. Speaking of how they act, in the case of anime and manga another “complication” can occur in the fact that many of these characters can act… well whacky and that’s treated as most acceptable in the universe. Whereas in real life, its likely anywhere from Gon to Goku would get side eye with their behavior. And thus you have the basis for plenty of head canons, one prominently being a character’s place on the spectrum.

Let's take any character, say Rill Boismortier from the series Black Clover. He’s a relatively second character in the series with an aptitude for art magic, who had locked himself in his room isolating himself from others till his butler reached him and now he’s a very eccentric, excitable, outgoing character. From the fact that he has a fixation on art to things like making sounds that could be read as vocal stimming, Rill could be read as an autistic character.

Or how about we look at one of the more memetic takes of the internet and all the jokes that Fern and Frieren from Frieren: Beyond the Journey’s End are autistic. This joke mainly comes from how in this world everything has a cool, somewhat mellow vibe with many people acting very muted. With Frieren herself struggling with making a distinction in the passage of time thanks to her elven aging and trying to understand the human condition. And Fern also a relatively reserved and subdued individual only really expresses her feeling a sensation of frustration or annoyance through “Kawaii pouting” puffing out her cheeks.

There are plenty more examples, but I wanted to illustrate that there are characters in manga and anime that I believe-yes, someone with neurodivergence could identify with, however, would I go as far as to say that this was the writer's original intention? Well choosing to err on the side of caution, I'm going to guess not likely. Someone could easily say, “you’re reading too much into it. There is nothing in the canon that outright says that. Rill is just a joke character, Frieren is a completely different species so it can’t really be neuro-atypical from a human standpoint, Fern’s pouting is just a gap moe trope.” And to be honest, I don’t necessarily think people holding these beliefs would be wrong. Nor do I wish to imply that if someone sees themselves in one of these characters that means they’re on the spectrum.

I'm saying there’s nothing wrong with either option. If you are someone neurodivergent and you see yourself in someone like Rill, that’s great. If you are someone who isn’t neurodivergent but still sees themselves in someone like Rill, that’s also great. The point I’m trying to make is that it may be unintentional, but a neurodivergent person seeing a neurodivergent story inside a specific character can happen and in many ways offer insights into the character.

And for someone like me who has spent a long time coming to grips with how my atypicality has affected my identity, Rudo’s story hit me. Hit me in a way I don’t think many series have. Rudo is a character who shows a fixation on trash, particularly broken pieces of trash. His old wounds he covers and just the feelings on this specific piece of clothing is able to make the feelings of his wounds go away. And just the way he described having emotion inside, but not being able to properly express it to the point he was doing self harm, it tore me up inside.

Made even more dramatic by the fact that Rudo is having this flashback being triggered by Griss being stabbed. Griss is a guy Rudo has known for a day who is shown to be a cool guy, but most importantly, when Rudo spent his welcome party sulking in a corner all tied up in his shell, only for Griss to ask him about his future. Rudo truly was feeling like he was losing a fatherly figure again in front of him

This was one of the moments that in my mind showed me the sort of direction this series wanted to go in with Rudo. Edgy, dark, cool, and stylistic revenge series in manga have existed for years. In fact, they’ll exist long after Gachiakuta and myself have expired. Many of these series can vary on the portrayal of their MC, conflicted, ready to embrace destruction, righteous in their pursuit, yet Gachiakuta has been unique for me, seeing Rudo have all the hallmarks for a vengeful story yet people always come to speak with him on his behavior.

Not in a sort of guidance counselor way, but more in a natural way of trying to make this kid who has had a life where he hasn’t had to properly think about/experience certain things life can throw at you and they want him to improve. From telling him it's okay to not know what he wants to do in the future, to letting him know it's okay to make mistakes, to learning how to properly have a conversation and connect with others. I think a lot of these moments can feel like sweet nothings, but for me I saw it as a part of growing up. Or rather something I wanted growing up. I’ve experienced many moments of my life where I felt lost not in small part to the fact it felt like no one could meet me on my ground. And something about Gachiakuta is the attempt that almost every character has made trying to reach Rudo and show him a form of empathy. And as the series has gone on that empathy has really changed. He went from a kid not understanding what was wrong about saying “I'm only working with you till fulfill my goal!,” demanding cooperation from others, to actively trying to ask for help when hears of an opportunity to come closer to his goal.

This sort of vulnerability I think was present in his moment screaming his revenge. He’s visibly crying. Despite all the bluster and crassness, there’s clearly a frustrated and overwhelmed boy who has been condemned by a society that brands him “unclean.” This is also where I should mention Urana is an absolute master with art and expressions. Making everyone feel so alive. Rudo’s faces are an absolute highlight. Despite a person who seems set up to have a chip on his shoulder, he may be one of the wackiest in just how big he can let his emotions go. Which ties into our next part.

Zodyl and the Watchman Series

Now I'm sure you’re wondering, “Arkus, you said that this manga hasn’t hard confirmed Rudo is actually neurodivergent, yet you say the text makes the analogy so does someone finally say it?” Well to answer that, I’m gonna need to talk about the main villain of this series and the tools he’s after, The Watchman series.

Our seemingly main antagonist of the series is a man named Zodyl Typhon, leader of the organization The Raiders (Or the Vandals depending on the translation) a group of evil givers who seem to be devoted to the destruction of The Sphere. As they living in a world where the natural order is simply that they are a people who have garbage raining down upon them. Polluting them, crushing them, and people of the Abyss have gradually become accustomed to it all. Zodyl wants to shock the system and he wishes to get his hands on all the various powerful Jink known as the “Watchman series.” So far it's known that only Rudo’s gloves, Amo’s boots, and Zodyl’s coat are part of this set.

Zodyl is depicted as an amoral, somewhat sociopathic person, with intense eyes, viewing people as experiments to test his theories, and showing practically no emotion. He describes each piece of the Watchman series as containing extremely powerful emotions in them. A normal person couldn’t use these items with going mad due to these emotions. Yet people like Rudo and Zodyl haven't gone mad. Well that’s being they’re not like others.

In one of the most painful visual analogies, Zodyl describes that in this world there are people born missing pieces that every other human is born with. This leaves them as something sort of empty. WIth Rudo knowing exactly what he’s talking about. This was already hinted at by Amo who says wearing her Watchman boots feels as though she’s a toy that had a new battery inside. Zodyl doesn’t think that missing something fundamental is a bad thing though, in his opinion not being born with it has made him a vessel for this power.

I once again cannot say with a hundred percent certainty that Kei Urana was intentionally channeling the experiences of those who may be told “they’re not like others because they were born atypical” but it's so hard for me to not read it that way. Especially the part where Zodyl rejects the idea that there’s anything wrong with this. He’s not wrong for how he’s born, look at all the cool stuff he can do now. While Rudo stands there and thinks about how isolated he felt from everyone else. It's easy to see these as two very valid responses to someone with a mental health diagnosis, lamenting how this puts you at odds with others and how being different in this way makes it harder for you to connect. While the other rejects needing the validation of others, there isn’t a problem.

Once again, no one just flat out says it, but so much of the subtext is basically there in your face in regards to Watchman and Zodyl’s speech. But the fact this power is only wielded by something that is described as a missing piece. With the image of a heart in pieces. To me, the emphasis placed on the value of one’s emotional and mental capacity as something that can be filled, like its just so out there how can I not see something there?

Well maybe its because I want to?

Artistic Interpretation

Look, I'm not gonna to give you a dry lecture on the value of artistic interpretation. I think we’re all mature enough that multiple people can have multiple different interpretations of a single world. With art being something that lends itself to being read in a variety of ways. I'm not making this post to delegitimize any interpretation.

Rather I wanted to come all the way back to the pin I put in when mentioning the unconventional story structures. Now it should come to no one’s surprise that the woman who was an assistant and student of the guy who made Soul Eater makes some bizarre choices. Not the least of which being the characters and tone.

No, rather I wanna touch on something that I find Urana and Okubo do better than a lot of people which is visual interpretation. Both utilize the visual aspect of this visual medium to make some points. But rather, both of them allow these visuals to hang out there and allow you the reader to come to your own interpretation of this.

This type of storytelling in my opinion can force the audience to actually engage with the work in a deeper meaningful way. While some would argue that it leaves things open in a way that may never truly be satisfying. I think in the case of Gachiakuta it has less of that tha an Okubo work, but there are plenty of things I do believe Urana leaves out there for you to read as you will.

When I see her going out of her way to make a doll with their heart missing and a man describing a feeling of them missing, Uruana is not expressly saying anything, but allowing us the audience to decide how we read it. I'm certain she has her own way of viewing this story, but I do appreciate that she’s allowed Gachiakuta to be a series where we are allowed some creative liberties. Especially in the fact this is a weekly shonen manga. A demographic I feel often can suffer from needing to make everything somewhat obvious in its meaning or intent.

But Urana really knows how to capture this sort of vibe. Allow the art to speak for itself and I find myself having to put some of myself in the series when I read and interact with it. So while I’m sure there will be people who think I have basically convinced them of nothing and that this might all be reading to deep, I do at least want to point out that Urana herself has at least allowed for me to make these connections on my own and I think that is worth something at least on her part as a creative.

Conclusion

So yeah what was that all about? Welp like I said this was to be a more personal thinkpiece. One where I wanted to work through my own feelings on why this series had me captivated. Also it's possibly my attempt to broaden the discussion of Gachiakuta.

Despite the fact many have made the prediction its gonna be a “big deal” it really isn’t. At least by pure sales wise. Nothing bad, but nothing remarkable at the time of writing this. Honestly its doing much better than a series that’s not on the extremely accessible SJ app. It’s a good series but it may just always be underground.

Every influencer wants to be on the ground floor, whether it's this, Red Hood, Kagurabachi, Nue’s Exorcist, Astro Royale, Mama Yuyu, Centuria, etc. I get that hype and memes are a powerful thing in this internet consumer world. But I do want a series that may be big or important one day to touch on things that make it good beyond hype and anticipation.

And for me that is what I got with Gachiakuta. There’s an element to it that I haven’t really felt in manga in other media. And the fact it could make me feel that… that’s special to me. I know I’ve talked about some heavy topics and I do hope I was as respectful as I possibly could be. Opening up like this was hard for me.

As I do truly love this series and hoped I could illustrate why it resonated with me, perhaps it resonated with a lot of people who can see themselves in this one trashy boy.

I hope everyone reading can have that sort of character they see themselves in, and if you enjoyed please like or reblog as it tells me you'd be interested in reading more

#discussion #manga #anime #gachiakuta #rudo #rudo surebrec #zodyl typhon #gachiakuta zodyl #autism #neurodivergent #interpretation #black clover #sousou no frieren #frieren: beyond journey's end #fern frieren #frieren #rill boismortier

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dukeofankh · 5 months

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Any time you build a social media bubble that pretty much just consists of one binaric gender you see these like...thinkpieces about how the other one thinks. And it always reminds me of how Aristotle believed women had fewer teeth than men. Nobody...asked? To check?

Like, I picture a bunch of stodgy women in togas and sandals hanging out in the Forum waving their arms round stoically yet dramatically and making a big hubbub, and someone with a name like thedoctorsolvedmywaywardson will loudly announce "cishet men do not feel love like women do. This is because of society." And everyone will nod and chatter animatedly, except expectopavulva, who will point dramatically from across the marble floor and yell "no! It's biological! Testosterone is a hate demon who lives in the blood!" And then the two groups will start squabbling.

And then you look out the window at the other building the next hill over and there's a crowd of men gathered around one at a podium named u/snarkwolf or something and you can hear his grumbly, droning voice saying "females, despite claiming to value sensitivity snd emotional intelligence, yearn for the domineering hand of the Chad." And everyone will nod sagely. One raises a hand and asks whether it might not be possible to simply kill them.

And the issue (aside from the murder) is not just that people believe incorrect things about the inner lives of people whose lived experience they don't share. The issue is also that if you isolate yourself from that other group, you create an environment where nobody who actually has the mentality being discussed can point out when an idea is absurd and wrong. It might be because they aren't around, or possibly because their perspective on their own motivations is seen as less trustworthy than an intuitive guess from people who are part of the more familiar group.

The result of that environment is naturally and always going to be people saying and believing fucking hilariously wrong things.

I would say "hey, so everyone just talk to each other and that'll fix it" but, you know. The "can we kill them" guy kinda...makes that tough to recommend as a realistic catchall fix. As a good stopgap, try this cool trick where if you, a person that doesn't actually have the lived experience of a gender, start writing something about how that gender thinks or feels internally? Their motivations and stuff like that? If you start writing a post about that then you can just delete it actually.

#me writing stuff

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eonars · 8 days

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calling university students protesting egregious human rights violations that WE ARE ALL PAYING FOR a bunch of spoiled brat college students making something their entire personality and trying to be "radikewl" is something you'd expect to hear from your friends conservative dad who doesn't think arabs are real people with thoughts and emotions but I guess most of the enlightened thinkpiece posters on here are just products of their weird conservative dads and never thought arabs were real people with human lives

#this might be shocking to certain parts of the userbase here but middle eastern people can in fact read #i took a break from my looney tunes life of being photographed crying in rubble to read some posts and im not thrilled w what we're #coming up with

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orcinus-veterinarius · 10 months

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https://aqua.org/stories/2023-06-26-sanctuary-state thoughts? I really don’t like this. THE National Aquarium has fully embraced the ARA rhetoric around dolphins in captivity, saying that their own dolphin exhibit is “patronizing” and “for human entertainment”, despite the fact that they’re a scientific aquarium that is clearly leaps and bounds better than any of those cheap tourist trap dolphin swim places. The “Whale Sanctuary Project” has clearly stated on its website that they want to put an end to all wildlife in captivity, so it honestly makes me sick that National is partnering with them. They’ve turned their backs on all their colleagues in the AZA that have dolphins and slandered them. I hope they lose their AZA accreditation over this.

Thank you for this ask. I read National's statement a few weeks ago, and it made me sick to my stomach. I didn't post about it because honestly I was unsure I would be able to speak on the issue without becoming overly emotional, but you have expressed basically everything I feel.

At this point, it isn't that National is moving their dolphins to a sea pen that bothers me. We've known this for seven years, and since they're an AZA facility, I had to at least have a little faith that this was for the animals' wellbeing. I've met several trainers and veterinarians who left the National Aquarium at least in part due to their handling of the dolphin situation, but I never imagined it was this bad until now. This world-renowned aquarium is repeating activist rhetoric pretty much verbatim. They're partnering with an anti-zoo organization that works against everything they stand for as an institution. They're publicly slandering their colleagues. If I didn't know better, I would think this was a thinkpiece by PETA and not an official statement from an AZA institution. I also find it incredibly disturbing that they claim the "success" of SEA LIFE's Beluga Whale Sanctuary (and the non-existent Whale Sanctuary Project??) serves as their example, when it has been... slightly less than successful.

If I could ask National's CEO one thing, it would be this: Are the other animals in your collection not entertainment? What makes them different? What makes them "education" but your dolphins "exploitation"? Elasmobranchs, for example, are a staple of public aquaria, but they present their own host of issues. Reproductive disease, nutritional imbalances, musculoskeletal deformities. Why are you giving up on your dolphins but not them? Will you let an activist group take them next?

I'm afraid I must agree with you... they do not deserve to remain in the AZA. Not if they're going to brazenly accuse their fellow members of animal abuse while allowing anti-zoo organizations to dictate their own animals' care. I'm really, really scared of where this is going, and I would love to see the other AZA aquariums housing cetaceans (Brookfield Zoo, Disney's Epcot, Georgia Aquarium, Indianapolis Zoo, Marineland Florida, Mystic Aquarium, Shedd Aquarium, Texas State Aquarium, the SeaWorld parks, and numerous international members) release a joint statement on the issue affirming their committment to ex situ conservation, research, and public outreach. And I deeply hope none of the "10 other dolphin-holding institutions" mentioned are AZA facilities.

I wish the best to Beau, Foster, Chesapeake, Bayley, Spirit, Jade, and their caregivers, who are losing the animals to whom they've devoted their lives to a situation in which they have no say.

I do also wish to share this statement from Jason Bruck's lab. Dr. Bruck is a PhD animal behaviorist specializing in dolphin communication and cognition both in the wild and in human care.

#dolphins #cetaceans #marine mammals #animal welfare #animal sanctuaries #national aquarium #aquariums #ara insanity #answered asks #judesaintfrncis

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mmaurysiek · 1 year

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JdV's narrative bias

unreliable narrators are generally made by the POV characters' emotional bias, not by lying.

see, when a lying character is lying - their POV comes with an awareness of how things they're saying are different from what they know to be truth.

and if they're not a POV character - then they're not quite a narrator, be it reliable or unreliable one. hmm.

the way i see it, such are the factors that make Jonny d'Ville an unreliable narrator:

1) the thing he remembers most vividly is how he felt

2) he's a time-blind immortal time-traveller, and has enough memories that similar ones blur together; he figures out the order of events by making a narrative sense out of them, retroactively; while at that, he's projecting his formative experiences on other experiences that happen to be similar;

3) he figures out what other people are like by imagining himself in their shoes; that leads to him assuming that they are more similar to him than they actually are; he projects what he feels / has felt onto other people;

4) he hates feeling vulnerable (trauma...) so much that he avoids feeling that even inside his mind, and will attempt to reframe what's happening to avoid feeling vulnerable

that gives him enough of a strong narrative bias to make him an unreliable narrator, and in a way that's fun to read

i'm cutting this thinkpiece at this point because related meta needs its own posts, separate posts for separate characters and their relationships, otherwise this one would get at least three times longer. also, i need to sleep sometime. i'm not sure if this text is still making any sense. hmm.

#the mechanisms #mechs headcanons #the mechs meta #jonny d'ville

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stillfruit · 3 months

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It takes me a long time to understand some things if they're not too obvious so I had a difficult time watching true detective a few years ago. Do you have any tips to rewatch it and maybe understand a little more? 👉👈

omg of course, i love to hear that you would want to rewatch true detective (applies to s1 only i haven't watched beyond that)!!

to base this a little, please don't worry over understanding and not understanding something too much. everyone thinks, experiences and processes media differently, and our understandings of what counts as 'understanding media' also differ (understanding in different contexts can mean an analytical understanding of the core themes identified through a specific framework, or an emotional reaction and a feeling of connection to the thing that's difficul to articulate, and so on and so forth). there's no universal objective level of 'understanding' and what you deem is enough for you is enough! being comfortable and confident enough to interpret things yourself while remaining receptive of other perspectives (including the perspectives of the story and its author) is what's most important in 'understanding' things. also secondly, not everything is for everyone and sometimes something just doesn't click because of that.

i'm not sure what aspects specifically you would want to understand more, but here are few things on how i approach the story:

there are overall themes i find interesting in true detective such as (toxic) masculinity (it's about men who are bad in specifc and systemic ways), narratives (internal as in how you construct yourself, like marty consistently justifying cheating on maggie; and external and institutional, like religion), power and autonomy (police and people with money have the power to do what they want), and existentialism (rust lacks overall meaning of why he is alive). they serve as lenses through which you interpret the story - kind of like picking an academic framework (theory) and looking at the data (story) through that.

there are many things that happen in the story and because s1 was so big back in 2014 there are numerous thinkpieces and video essays about it, all of them picking various aspects they see as central. because true detective is what it is (surface level edgy dudebro nihilist police man annihilates everyone around him by being so nihilist and cool show), some are very bad. i'm not that interested in the kind of analysis that looks super closely at the intertextual aspects of the story, for instance, or "the philosophy" of it (if that means looking at what rust says, taking that at face value, and connecting the story to existentialist philosophy based on that). just reflect on what interests you and see how the story looks and feels when examined through those perspectives.

a lot of the time i like looking at things through and by focusing on characters, and i think this is especially crucial when it comes to true detective (which is a heavily character driven story. sure it of course matters that they are police and that they are in louisiana and that there are murders etc but those things are not what the story is about). looking at a character contextualizes that character (what they say and do and represent) and rust is an excellent example of this. he talks in a cynical and pessimistic manner, looks down upon others, is very capable in terms of violence, is alienated and alienates other people, is obsessive, has issues with substance abuse, and his house is the definition of that one r/malelivingspace meme.

however, when you look at what he has been through and how he behaves (as well as how the narrative treats him) these things are contextualized not as 'behaviour you should look up to and which is good and correct from the perspective of the story, or at the very least is very cool and/or edgy, because he's the protagonist' (media analysis 101) but behavior of someone who struggles with ptsd, trauma and his own feelings of empathy in a world that has been very unkind to him since his childhood. when rust is saying things like 'time is a flat circle nothing can change' he's coping and trying to make himself believe it because he's incapable of processing, realizing, or externalizing any of the trauma he's been through or any of the care he feels in a healthy manner (which is quite explicit in, for example, how he empathizes so intensely with people who are dead). he's brilliant at rationalizing everything and it's terrible for him. the ways in which marty constantly lies to himself are quite explicit and rust is one of the people pointing them out, but rust is coping by creating his own narrative of his self and the reality all the same.

(better articulations of his character specifically are to be found eg here, here, and here)

so, maybe if i were to articulate the core thing for understanding true detective (or really any media) it would be looking at what happens on screen in the story in terms of actions and speech and then reflecting on how that relates to what's 'actually' going on, what kinds of things are being left unsaid, and why. there are various explicit examples of the theme of narratives and unreliable narrators as well that tell you that this is what's important (such as the interrogation narration of the ledoux confrontation and showing on screen what actually happened).

something i do when i watch or read media (that is engaging enough in a good or a bad sense to warrant this) is writing about it on my personal notes app (now obsidian so i can organize everything) in the same way i would talk about it to someone else. i also save interesting writings etc there so i remember and find them later, and write my own thoughts on those things there as well, having my own private discussion with them (which. is a lonely thing to do but shh).

few blogs who have written super interesting things about true detective which i highly recommend you check out (because seeing the perspectives of others is inherently one of the most enriching experiences and helps you understand so much) include @inkandcayenne and @sketiana. iirc there are some good video essays on youtube as well but i can't name any because it's been too many years since i watched any.

a central thing that makes true detective so meaningful to me personally is exactly the fact that many of the themes i care about in it are not super explicit or vocalized in obvious ways (saying 'i want to die because i'm sad' doesn't hit but describing death as a warm and welcoming substance does). i hope you have fun looking into where you find emotion and meaning <3

sorry this went a bit off track tldr have fun and be yourself, lmk how you feel about the story afterwards if you want!

#and to be clear another key is to enjoy stories for what they are and knowing you can find 'problematic media' compelling #true detective represents the kind of story that examines its themes largely through showing something and saying 'that's bad' and #the effectiveness of that as a tool for writing actually transformative narratives instead of contributions to the original things #you say you criticize is questionable. proven by everyone who watched s1 and went wow he's just like me fr the world needs bad men indeed #all of which is to say i fully understand why everyone doesn't like it or finds it boring. i got +5k words of notes out of it though #crystal ball #true detective

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