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#modern inheritance
modern-inheritance · 2 months
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For a future story
The elf picked at the grass by her knee. If Murtagh knew any better, he’d say she looked almost uncertain. “…They ask about you two, you know. Pretty often.”
“The elves?” Murtagh suppressed a snort. “I’m sure some of them would love to get their hands on us.”
“No.” Arya shook her head. “The Eldunarí.”
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weirdponytail · 26 days
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Working on bringing a new concept in with the Riders Signs. Not linked to the Riders really, but a method of reading and understanding body language that is ‘encoded’ in a way. I like to imagine that Brom, Arya and Glen spent years working on developing it between them, and once they had it down they spread it to a select few trusted members of the Varden and elves. For when even Riders Signs would be too obvious, in case of capture and oaths, it combines body language, small facial tics, muscle movements, and, most importantly, relies on the user having at least some previous experience with mental communication and direct eye contact.
It’s basically reading micro expressions but with more direct and specific words rather than involuntary emotions. When free to do so the sender can ‘pulse,’ sending a simplistic thought phrase that lingers like a ‘ghost’ due to the visual cues indicating the idea or thought pulsed out. It does not require lowering mental barriers for either on the message chain, though clarity is improved when the sender opens their barriers to send the pulse.
The pulse has a limited range, and thus is not a true requirement of this new method but it helps when the recipient or the sender are not completely comfortable with the method yet or when more complex things need to be communicated. Even with a pulse, these ghost messages and visual cues can only communicate a handful of words at a time, usually only one or two sentences.
At this point, Eragon (and Saphira) are unaware that Brom has been subtly teaching them this odd language without words. He didn’t want them having knowledge of what it really was just in case they were captured and Eragon’s mind was broken. This Eragon understands but has no idea how or why.
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Social Security is class war, not intergenerational conflict
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Today, Tor.com published my latest short story, "The Canadian Miracle," set in the world of my forthcoming (Nov 14) novel, The Lost Cause. I am serializing this one on my podcast! Here's part one.
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The very instant the Social Security Act was passed in 1935, American conservatives (in both parties) began lobbying to destroy it. After all, a reserve army of forelock-tugging plebs and family retainers won't voluntarily assemble themselves – they need to be goaded into it by the threat of slowly starving to death in their dotage.
They're at it again (again). The oligarch-thinktank industrial complex has unleashed a torrent of scare stories about Social Security's imminent insolvency, rehearsing the same shopworn doom predictions that they've been repeating since the Nixonite billionaire cabinet member Peter G Peterson created a "foundation" to peddle his disinformation in 2008:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I.O.U.S.A.
Peterson's go-to tactic is convincing young people that all the Social Security money they're paying into the system will be gobbled up by already-wealthy old people, leaving nothing behind for them. Conservatives have been peddling this ditty since the 1930s, and they're still at it – in the pages of the New York Times, no less:
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/26/opinion/social-security-medicare-aging.html
The Times has become a veritable mouthpiece for this nonsense, publishing misleading and nonsensical charts and data to support the idea that millennials are losing a generational war to boomers, who will leave the cupboard bare:
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/27/opinion/aging-medicare-social-security.html
As Robert Kuttner writes for The American Prospect, this latest rhetorical assault on Social Security is timed to coincide with the ascension of the GOP House's new Speaker, Mike Johnson, who makes no secret of his intention to destroy Social Security:
https://prospect.org/economy/2023-10-31-debunking-latest-attack-social-security/
The GOP says it wants to destroy Social Security for two reasons: first, to promote "choice" by letting us provide for our own retirement by flushing even more of our savings into the rigged casino that is the stock market; and second, because America doesn't have enough dollars to feed and house the elderly.
But for the New York Times' audience, they've figured out how to launder this far-right nonsense through the language of social justice. Rather than condemning the impecunious olds for their moral failing to lay the correct bets in the stock market, Social Security's opponents paint the elderly as a gerontocratic elite, flush with cash that rightfully belongs to the young.
To support this conclusion, they throw around statistics about how house-rich the Boomers are, and how much consumption they can afford. But as Kuttner points out, the Boomers' real-estate wealth comes not from aggressive house-flipping, but from merely owning a place to live. America's housing bubble means that younger people can't afford this basic human necessity, but the answer to that isn't making old people homeless – it's providing a lot more housing, and banning housing speculation:
https://pluralistic.net/2021/06/06/the-rents-too-damned-high/
It's true that older people are doing a lot of consumption spending – but the bulk of that spending isn't on cruises to Alaska to see the melting glaciers, it's on health care. Old people aren't luxuriating in their joint replacements and coronary bypasses. Calling this "consumption" is deliberately misleading.
But as Kuttner points out, there's another, more important point to be made about inequality in America – the most significant wealth gap in America is between workers and owners, not young people and old people. The "average" Boomer's net worth factors in the wealth of Warren Buffett and Donald Trump. Older renters are more rent-burdened and precarious than younger renters, and most older Americans have little to no retirement savings:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/teresaghilarducci/2023/10/28/the-new-york-times-greedy-geezer-myth/
Less than one percent of Social Security benefits go to millionaires – that's because the one percent constitute one percent of the population. It's right there in the name. The one percent are politically and economically important, but that's because they are low in numbers. Giving Social Security benefits to everyone over 65 will not result in a significant outlay to the ultra-wealthy, because there aren't many ultra-wealthy people in America. The problem of inequality isn't the expanding pool of rich people, it's the explosion of wealth for a contracting pool of rich people.
If conservatives were serious about limiting the grip of these "undeserving" Social Security recipients on our economy and its politics, they'd advocate for interitance taxes (which effectively don't exist in America), not the abolition of Social Security. The problem of wealth in America is that it is establishing permanent dynasties which are incompatible with social mobility. In other words, we have created a new hereditary aristocracy – and its corollary, a new hereditary peasantry:
https://pluralistic.net/2021/06/19/dynastic-wealth/#caste
Hereditary aristocracies are poisonous for lots of reasons, but one of the most pressing problems they present is political destabilization. American belief in democracy, the rule of law, and a national identity is q function of Americans' perception of fairness. If you think that your kids can't ever have a better life than you, if you think that the cops will lock you up for a crime for which a rich person would escape justice, then why obey the law? Why vote? Why not cheat and steal? Why not burn it all down?
The wealthy put a lot of energy into distracting us from this question. Just lately, they've cooked up a gigantic panic over a nonexistent wave of retail theft:
https://www.techdirt.com/2023/10/31/the-retail-theft-surge-that-isnt-report-says-crime-is-being-exaggerated-to-cover-up-other-retail-issues/
Meanwhile, the very real, non-imaginary, accelerating, multi-billion-dollar plague of wage theft is conspicuously missing from the public discourse, despite a total that dwarfs all retail theft in America by an order of magnitude:
https://fair.org/home/wage-theft-is-built-into-the-business-models-of-many-industries/
America does have a property crime crisis, but it's a crisis of wage-theft, not shoplifting. Likewise, America does have a retirement crisis: it's a crisis of inequality, not intergenerational conflict.
Social Security has been under sustained assault since its inception, and that's in large part due to a massive blunder on the part of FDR. Roosevelt believed that people would be more protective of Social Security if they thought it was funded by their taxes: "we bought it, it's ours." But – as FDR well knew – that's not how government spending works.
The US government can't run out of US dollars. The US government doesn't get its dollars for spending from your taxes. The US government spends money into existence and taxes it out of existence:
https://pluralistic.net/2020/12/14/situation-normal/#mmt
A moment's thought will reveal that it has to be this way. The US government (and its fiscal agents, chartered banks) are the only source of dollars. How can the US tax dollars away from earners unless it has first spent those dollars into the economy?
The point of taxation isn't to fund programs, it's to reduce the private sector's spending power so that there are things for sale to the public sector. If we only spent money into the economy but didn't take any out of the economy, the private sector would have so many dollars to spend that any time the government tried to buy something, there'd be a bidding war that would result in massive price spikes.
When a government runs a "balanced budget," that means that it has taxed as much out of the economy as it put into the economy at the start of the year. When a government runs a "surplus," that means it's left less money in the economy at the end of the year than there was at the beginning of the year. This is fine if the economy has contracted overall, but if the economy stayed constant or grew, that means there are fewer dollars chasing more goods and services, which leads to deflation and all kinds of toxic outcomes, like borrowing more bank-created money, which makes the finance sector richer and the real economy poorer.
Of course, most governments run "deficits" – which is another way of saying that they leave more dollars in the economy at the end of the year than there was at the start of the year, or, put another way, a deficit probably means that your economy got bigger, so it needed more dollars.
None of this means that governments can spend without limit. But it does mean that governments can buy anything that's for sale in their own currency. There are a lot of goods for sale in US dollars, both goods that are produced domestically and goods from abroad (this is why it's such a big deal that most of the world's oil is priced in dollars).
Governments do have to worry about getting into bidding wars with the private sector. To do that, governments come up with ways of reducing the private sector's spending power. One way to do that is taxes – just taking money away from us at the end of the year and annihilating it. Another way is to ration goods – think of WWII, or the direct economic interventions during the covid lockdowns. A third way is to sell bonds, which is just a roundabout way of getting us to promise not to spend some of our dollars for a while, in return for a smaller number of dollars in interest payments:
https://pluralistic.net/2021/04/08/howard-dino/#payfors
FDR knew all of this, but he still told the American people that their taxes were funding Social Security, thinking that this would protect the program. This backfired terribly. Today, Democrats have embraced the myth that taxes fund spending and join with their Republican counterparts in insisting that all spending must be accompanied by either taxes or cuts (AKA "payfors").
These Democrats voluntarily put their own policymaking powers in chains, refusing to take any action on behalf of the American people unless they can sell a tax increase or a budget cut. They insist that we can't have nice things until we make billionaires poor – which is the same as saying that we can't have nice things, period.
There are damned good reasons to make billionaires poor. The legitimacy of the American system is incompatible with the perception that wealth and power are fixed by birth, and that the rich and powerful don't have to play by the rules.
The capture of America's institutions – legislatures, courts, regulators – by the rich and powerful is a ghastly situation, and to reverse it, we'll need all the help we can get. Every hour that Americans spend worrying about their how they'll pay their rent, their medical bills, or their student loans is an hour lost to the fight against oligarchy and corruption.
In other words, it's not true that we can't have nice things until we get rid of billionaires – rather, we can't get rid of billionaires until we have nice things.
This is the premise of my next novel, The Lost Cause, which comes out on November 14; it's set in a world where care and solidarity have unleashed millions of people on the project of maintaining the habitability of our planet amidst the polycrisis:
https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250865939/the-lost-cause
It's a fundamentally hopeful book, and it's already won praise from Naomi Klein, Rebecca Solnit, Bill McKibben and Kim Stanley Robinson. I wrote it while thinking through and researching these issues. Conservatives want us to think that we can't do better than this, that – to quote Margaret Thatcher – "there is no alternative." Replacing that narrative is critical to the kinds of mass mobilizations that our very survival depends on.
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If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
https://pluralistic.net/2023/11/intergenerational-warfare/#five-pound-blocks-of-cheese
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This Saturday (Nov 4), I'm keynoting the Hackaday Supercon in Pasadena, CA.
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where-dreamers-go · 3 months
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“Here And There” Eragon x Reader
(A/N: Requested by the awesome @shewhobreathesfire for a clumsy Modern! Reader who has been made an ambassador for Alagaësia and sent out to Mount Arngor.
Warnings: Very minor angst. Mild language. Use of (Y/N).
Word Count: 1,706 words)
Ambassador of Alagaësia, appointed by Queen Nasuada herself, tasked with exchanging ideas of changes in the land through meetings with Mount Arngor’s leader, and follow protocol.
You found it all to be rushed decisions, really. Not that you would risk voicing that opinion out loud. You couldn’t afford to be foolish in that matter even if all of this was a new experience. You would rather live to tell the tale. Then again, you felt safer away from Alagaësia. From the endless list of laws and social norms.
Mount Arngor, or whichever of the handful of names you wished to call it, stood tall against a blue sky. Grassland stretched out all around it with water sources running close by. The new stronghold grew on one of the many peaks at the base of the mountain, looking extremely tiny in comparison.
At least you had found your way easily enough.
Roughly almost three weeks into walking in your new ambassador position left you questioning yourself. Not only in business matters, but how you were around others. Eragon in particular.
The Dragon Rider had evolved more than you imagined and exactly as you hoped. He had grown well as a leader, working within the community.
All out of Queen Nasuada’s reach. Or so you liked to tell yourself.
She would never see you running your foot into a table after Eragon complimented one of your suggestions for organizing storage. Unfortunately, a handful of dwarves and the other ambassador did. At least they never mentioned it.
I need to pull myself together, you thought as you descended the stairs. Went the wrong way again.
You could surely roll your eyes at yourself.
Barely a month and I have a crush on Eragon. Good job. Very predictable. Making a face, you continued on. Just more work for me. But is it really a new crush or from years of…
“Turned around?”
The sudden familiar voice and presence spooked you. A foot moving where it shouldn’t and you stumbled with a small gasp.
One hand reached out to steady yourself on the wall just as Eragon grabbed ahold of your other arm. His grip helped keep you on your feet and away from tumbling down stone steps.
A quiet curse left your lips as heat rose on your neck.
“Thank you,” you said, muscles remaining tense.
“You’re welcome.”
His hold disappeared once you found your footing.
What are the odds? At least I didn’t hurt myself this time. You exhaled slowly.
“Are you alright?” Eragon questioned, brown gaze trying to read your expression.
“Fine.”
Setting your sights forwards, you took the next steps down carefully.
“Just…questioning my navigation skills.” You added and then muttered. “And gravity, apparently.”
The Dragon Rider kept pace with you. Quiet only for a few moments.
“I’m relieved you’re alright. It would had been quite a fall.”
“Yeah,” you breathed out and finally relaxed as you found yourselves on flat stone.
Tapestries, lights, and rugs decorated the area. Much the same aesthetic as other sparse places in the grand building. They were truly making it into a home.
“Um.” You glanced over to Eragon. “Thank you again.”
“You’re welcome. Again,” he smiled.
His expression could had melted you on the spot.
“I hope you never find yourself in the same circumstance.”
“So do I.” Clasping your hands together, you took a step in another direction. “I’ll…be on my way.”
“All right. Take care.”
“Yup. You too.”
With a quick nod and smile, you scurried off. Your feet taking you anywhere but where you really wanted to be. For how could you spend more time with Eragon when your increasing feelings for him made your very being act out of sorts?
Great job, you thought sarcastically. You have officially turned into a clumsy, stumbling person under the title of ambassador. And always in front of him. Why? Am I doing a good job regardless? Maybe.
Eragon didn’t even know your full story of becoming an ambassador. You never got to the point, the beginning, of how you met Nasuada.
How would you even start the tale? Would he believe you?
Nasuada hardly did.
Yet look how far you had traveled since then.
Have you done all that Queen Nasuada had asked of you of your appointed position of ambassador? On paper, yes. In the way she probably wanted you to, nope.
There was only so much enthusiasm and professionalism you could show with the list she gave you to do.
Send updates? Sure, but you were living in a world where dragons, humans, Urgals, dwarves, and elves existed amongst others. There was so much to experience and a letter to the Queen wasn’t high on your list.
It’s weird how I got this job in the first place, you thought. If I met someone dressed odd, visually confused, and falling out of a portal then I’d keep them under observation and question them more than a few days rather than checking if they have magic. You sighed, your thoughts running off. Then again, I’m alive. Can’t complain there. Less danger here anyway.
* *
A calm, quiet night lightened any mood held with Mount Arngor. Groups of peoples talking beside a fire and others busied themselves with a personal hobby. It made the common area warm in more ways than one.
Sitting alone by a wall light was better than cooping yourself up in your room all night. You had been welcomed into a community after all, might as well see some of it. Plus you might see the handsome Dragon Rider.
All good things.
Your nose was buried in your notes and a focused curve framed your brow. You bothered no one. Content in your own task even without a desk.
Little did you know, that it intrigued a young man. One who decided to indulge in his curiosity.
Eragon took up a seat beside you. No pretenses. No greeting.
“Who’s language is that?” Eragon asked.
Your hand rose away from the parchment.
Awh, crap.
You scrambled to think of an answer that wouldn’t be a paragraph long explanation.
Peeking over from the corner of your eye, you answered, “Human.”
Perfect.
Eragon leaned over, entering your personal space.
Your eyes tracked his movements and you dared not move.
“I haven’t seen script as that before.”
“My handwriting isn’t that bad,” you joked lightly.
“What? No,” he sat back, “I didn’t mean—.” He paused once he saw your expression.
You smiled.
Narrowing his eyes playfully, he asked, “Do you have to write notes all day?”
“No. They’re mainly for me.” You gestured to the dried ink. “I don’t think Nas—uh. Queen Nasuada…. I don’t think she’d be interested in these notes. I hardly think she enjoys my letters.”
“Why would you think that?” He pressed, an edge of seriousness in his tone. “Does she not want to know everything you do here?”
Tilting your head back and forth a couple of times, you finally answered, “Because I was writing about the weather.”
Eyebrows rose, but Eragon said nothing.
“I’m serious.”
Studying you through his brown eyes was enough to make you a little self-conscious. In the very least, his gaze made you overly aware of the proximity between the pair of you.
“Why would you write about the weather?” His seriousness broke down into full perplexity.
“Because I’ve never visited a huge lonely mountain with a bunch of snow on top. What’s it like when it rains a lot? How many sets of stairs even are there? Can dough rise properly here? How are my sinuses doing lately? Important questions.”
A small smile curved the Rider’s lips.
He thinks this is funny or agrees? You wondered. So many darn questions. And he’s cute. GAH! Not now.
“You should see the mountain in the winter. The winds are strong and the cold bites.”
You hummed in thought, saying, “Perhaps I should inform her of the weather extensively.” You bit back a chuckle. “She kind of threw this job on me without much warning.”
“She trusts you.”
“That’s the thing.” You whispered. “She doesn’t know me well enough or long enough to trust me personally, but…I’m here as an ambassador and I have no idea if I’m doing it properly.”
A concerned frown crossed Eragon’s features.
You did not know where you were going with the conversation, but you needed to tell him something about yourself. Your situation. A hint of the truth.
“You’ve literally seen me trip over my own feet. I cross my fingers and hope I don’t fumble when addressing people, Eragon.”
“You’re new to the position. Not everything turns out as you expect.”
Exhaling, you glanced at your writing. More than simple notes of the weather.
“You’re doing well.” His words were soft. Genuine.
The words of encouragement sprung a lightness in your chest you could not acknowledge without tempting fate with a surge of clumsiness in yourself.
“Thank you, but…uh… I literally talk differently, spent well over a decade as a student, and I’m not from here. And yet she still sent me here.”
“What?”
“Exactly. What credibility do I have? Why me?”
Eragon turned in his seat to face you directly.
The change in his demeanor caused you to lose grip of your pen.
“Why does where you’re from matter about being named an ambassador?”
Immediately, you opened your mouth to respond with an answer about your true origins, however you said nothing. Mouth closed. You shrugged.
Eragon held your gaze in time of two breaths before speaking again.
“Is there something you can not tell me?”
“I’m not sure you’d believe me if I did, but,” you glanced over to where an Urgal sat down, “this place is very different from what I’m used to. Magic and all.”
“Will you tell me more about where you’re from one day? When you’re not writing about weather.”
“I might…if you help me find my pen.” You leaned over to check near your feet.
“Deal.” Eragon placed the pen atop of your notes.
“Thank you.”
“You’re always welcome, (Y/N).” His voice was warm, inviting.
A flutter in your stomach teased you.
Oh. Why’d he say my name LIKE THAT?
~~~
Best wishes and happy reading.)
(If you love my writings and want to support me, I have a Ko-Fi where you can buy me a coffee. I would be eternally grateful.
coffee
~~~~~
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prolibytherium · 2 months
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The assumption that modern (read: abstract) artists are all or mostly rich people whose wealth, free time, and social mobility is solely responsible for allowing them to paint Line On Canvas or etc and therefore the "I could do that" sentiment is like rooted in class struggle or whatever is funny to me
I don't disagree that part of the "I could do that" impulse is sometimes about seeing the (TINY minority) of that art that actually sells for more money than you make in a year, having the impression that it's low effort low skill garbage, and feeling frustration in that, but it's just not accurate to think modern (abstract, which is what people mean) art is Like That in any capacity that any other art form is not
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imminent-danger-came · 4 months
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Can we take a moment to appreciate how many hats SWK manages to keep crammed on his head in lmk?
That man was doomed by the narrative, is mourned by the narrative, is and was haunted by the narrative AND is haunting the narrative, all at the same time! And lmk isn’t his story, and he doesn’t think of it as his story, and he doesn’t want it to be his story, but it’s also exactly his story, just a little to the left, and he is trying to remove himself from this new story, but also can't escape it because this isn't his story but also it is, and he's taking steps to ensure this don’t end up like his story, and is accidentally contributing to problems that are making it like his story all over again as a result. What a character!
To quote Anne Carson,
"To live past the end of your myth is a perilous thing".
I think, strangely enough, most characters in Lego Monkie Kid are living past the end of their myth (jttw). You have Wukong who is the only original pilgrim still alive and around, you have Tang, Mei, Pigsy, and Sandy who are all reincarnations of the pilgrims (supposedly), and then you have all the antagonists who try and continue their stories in their own way. DBK was freed from under the mountain, almost killing his wife and son in his continued pursuit of world domination. LBD escaped her prison early, continuing her plan for a perfect world which ended in her defeat, her end. Spider Queen refused to accept the end of her empire, and ultimately was killed by LBD for it. Azure Lion had been sealed in the scroll, and after being released immediately tried to continue his rebellion, his hubris, martyrdom, and refusal to change becoming his downfall.
I think in Wukong's own way, he does something similar—falling into old habits and becoming his own undoing. His search for the samadhi fire was exactly what Macaque was upset about in the 4x11 argument:
"You're the one always running off! Searching for more power, or more sources of immortality: you're the one who wouldn't quit while we were ahead!"
MK earlier in the special makes the point "Why didn't he just stop, right here? He was already so much stronger than anyone ever needed to be." to which Macaque replies, "Wukong didn't think so, he always thought he had to be stronger—more immortal." And that's what he does in s2 isn't it? He still isn't strong enough. He can't defeat LBD, so he has to go find the power that will make him strong enough to do just that—and Wukong finds the samadhi fire. Which in turn leaves MK behind, and has him relive his life's story again.
Like, this dude is CRAZZZYYYY
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realasslesbian · 2 years
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My Amber Heard/Johnny Depp opinion as an actual lawyer is that on the exceedingly rare occasion that a prima facie case can be made for a woman's guilt of a violent crime the media always take it and run with it, while at the same time ignoring the far worse violent crimes men commit every day. Often this results in overly harsh punishments for the female defendant and, in a disturbingly high number of cases, straight up sentencing an actually innocent woman. I don't know if Amber Heard 'did it' and I have very little faith in the legal system to get to the bottom of it. But I'm fairly sure that, regardless of what is uncovered and who was at fault, Johnny Depp will be fine.
#for example#Australia's 'worst female serial killer'?#actually turns out her four kids that she 'murdered' all inherited the same generic condition which causes sudden death at a young age#that's been proven beyond a doubt by modern genetic testing of their exhumed skeletons#hundreds of scientists have endorsed the view that Kathleen Folbigg is innocent#and yet she's still in jail#which would be bad enough#except there was literally no evidence to convict her in the first place#they couldn't even say whether she suffocated the kids poisoned them or what#because they simply didn't know#they definitely didn't have evidence that proved murder 'beyond reasonable doubt'#which is the standard for a criminal conviction#unless apparently you're a woman and therefore subject to the overriding court of public opinion#or what about Lindy 'a dingo took my baby' Chamberlain?#all the 'evidence' against her incriminated her husband just as much#but he never set a foot inside a jail cell#meanwhile Chamberlain served four years of a life sentence before being 'pardoned'#which is legalese for being forgiven for a crime committed#except no crime had been committed#(and infact any evidence of such a crime had been fabricated by the police)#(for reasons)#but even to this day most people insist Chamberlain killed her daughter#and think it's a big ol joke#and this is just the go for every case regarding a woman being violent#so excuse me for acknowledging how unlikely it is for this heard/depp saga to end in actual justice#feminism#radblr#amber heard#johnny depp
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inheritance-cycles · 21 days
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Modern Inheritance Cycle AU || Arya
@weirdponytail [insert clever Arya quote from one of Ket’s fics]
Please don’t repost without permission.
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ilynpilled · 10 months
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modern au jaime would be unemployed his ass would not be doing anything
​jaimes story in canon is actually about the tragedy of a man that is forced to have a job
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just finished watching inherit the wind (for audition research purposes) and damn if this movie isn’t relevant in 2024
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ravenlaguz · 11 months
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one of the things that makes aleksis so fun is how fake everything is about him. dominant personality? fake, he'll fold easily. loved by the masses? absolutely not, he buys the crowds at his parties and is likely highly reviled by the general public because of all the bullshit he's pulled with his pharma company. eating people? nah, even if the fountain was actually made of meat it definitely wasnt human. he won't even drink anything but chocolate beer because his 'tastes' are so specific. i dont think he could handle eating raw meat. hes OBSESSED with presenting an image of masculinity and success when all he did was pay to win
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modern-inheritance · 1 year
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Modern Inheritance Cycle as Vines
Ignore the shitty quality. Have some Modern Inheritance Cycle as vines!
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weirdponytail · 1 year
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Hey, just wanted to let you know that I really enjoy your Modern Inheritance Cycle stuff. I haven't interacted with the fandom in literal years, and seeing your posts fill me with joy because of it.
I really should get back to the fandom one of these days, though I likely need to reread all the books lol (I still need to finish The Fork, the Witch, and the Worm lmao). I used to have a real soft spot for the Cycle, to the point my very first fic that I posted was a IC fic.
Now that I've gotten back into writing every day after a few months of intermittent writing, your MIC stuff has rekindled my love for the books. I'm already getting several ideas that I want to write down.
So, from the bottom of my heart, thank you.
Wow, thank you! This means a lot!
If you want more modern inheritance, I’ve got most of it moved over to @modern-inheritance now, with newer writing and other things posted over there.
It’s always great to see someone get back into the fandom. And I’ll let you in on a secret: I haven’t read The Fork, Witch and the Worm either. I read the first story and sort of got confused on what the heck was going on and then skimmed the rest. Waiting on some more solid content from Paolini before I pick it up again.
Again, thank you. This means so much to me to hear that people enjoy my writing and MIC in general. I hope it keeps your interest in the fandom going for quite a while!!
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Let's all preemptively pour one out for Mina and Jonathan for when the novel ends and Arthur Holmwood stops funding their existence.
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where-dreamers-go · 1 month
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"Unexpected And Appointed" Eragon x Modern! Reader
(A/N: A prologue to “Here And There” and an extended version of an Eragon Reaction with “Are you armed?” So back to clumsy Modern! Reader and their first signs of clumsiness, which wasn’t all physical. Warnings: Mild curse word and use of (Y/F/N) for Your/First/Name. Word Count: 1,048 words)
A light breeze granted you a delicate mercy as you walked. Easing some of your discomfort.
Your destination in your sights.
How could you stop to rest? You could give yourself the thought later.
Almost there. You could do it. No horse. No boat. Definitely no vehicle to aid you on the last trek of your journey.
Squinting your eyes against the midmorning sun, you could make out figures in fields. Trees adorning the area around.
You can do this. Remember, you thought, be as formal or friendly as possible. Use titles—please.
“Wah—.” You stumbled over a patch of grass.
Easy. Breathe. Just introduce yourself calmly. I’m the ambassador. Don’t blank out and freeze up on Ancient Language. Do your best. You smiled, attempting to encourage yourself as your pack weighed down on your shoulders.
Passing another cluster of trees, you felt odd. As if you were being watched.
Just breathe. Think of another song for goodness sake because if the dragons get in—
“Who are you?”
You quickly turned to the voice.
A tall young man stood three paces away from you with a long gardening tool at his side. The hair on his head was windswept and brown. A light shine to one of his palms.
You blinked as your fear tumbled into a fluttering mess.
The man was almost human.
Eragon.
“I asked: Who are you?” He voiced louder in the Ancient Language.
Clearing your throat, you answered with a round of dry coughs.
Sounding real confident, you thought sarcastically and swallowing. Don’t panic.
He did not move.
Standing in the shadow of a mountain, you held gazes with the Dragon Rider.
Eragon Shadeslayer did not know you, however you knew of him. Not that it helped much as he narrowed his brown eyes your way.
Standing in the shadow of a mountain, you held gazes with the Dragon Rider.
Eragon Shadeslayer did not know you, however you knew of him. Not that it helped much as he narrowed his brown eyes your way.
“Are you armed?”
Tilting your head, you did your best to translate the Ancient Language. Learning the language tied to the world took work. Practice in the face of it held a challenge.
Yet, you understood, you hoped and looked down to your arms in confusion. Then you glanced back to Eragon.
“. . . Yes. You can see them?” Your words were unsure. Doing your best in pronunciation.
His features skewed into his own doubt.
There was an obvious miscommunication no matter how small and it was up for debate who slipped up. Awkward when both were strangers.
For a split second, easily to be missed, the corner of the Dragon Rider’s lip curved up.
“Yes. I can.”
Perhaps you would be all right.
Why would he ask that? It—crap. No. I misheard a verb or something. Think. You sighed. Great. I’m all ready making myself look less capable.
Once more, you cleared your throat.
“Queen Nasuada…sent me…to look at the mountain.”
Realization sparked in his brown eyes. Shoulders relaxed and he took a couple of steps forward.
“My name is (Y/F/N).” You nodded. “The ambassador.”
Honestly, you had no idea what the greeting protocol was anymore nor were you inclined to bow after walking all morning.
So what if he was much closer and smiling slightly?
“Greetings. Welcome to Mount Arngor,” he gestured toward the snowy-capped mountain. “I am Eragon, Dragon Rider.”
I KNEW IT! You thought with a smile.
“It’s a pleasure to meet y— Oh.” You stopped yourself and continued in the Ancient Language to your best ability. “Good…to meet you, Dragon Rider.”
Eragon nodded in kind and responded, “And you. I was not expecting you for another week or more.”
“I…” You frowned.
How do you say walk? Crap it.
“I walk fast,” you finally answered in the common tongue. “Especially when I hear noises I don’t recognize.”
Leaning on the tool, Eragon mused with a smile, “It was for the best you arrived early. Safer still, a storm looks to be approaching for later in the day..”
“I’ve been doing my best to avoid thunderstorms and parties.” You added. “Being sick while traveling doesn’t help anything.”
“Parties?”
The confusion on his face nearly sent you into a laughing fit, you held strong to avoid doing so.
“Not a party per se. I may have met King Orik on my way to Hedarth.” You pulled on your bag’s strap and said, “I’m not sure if I rambled too much or if I somehow made a good impression. I almost didn’t catch a ship without giving a portion of my life story to him.”
Shaking his head with a smile, Eragon rested the gardening tool over his shoulder. He did not add commentary as he turned towards the mountain.
“You must be wary from your travels. I will show you inside.”
“Thank you.” You followed after the Dragon Rider
* *
Wind blew against Mount Arngor as the thunderstorm rolled in. Walls of stone held you and every one residing with the utmost protection.
You laid across a bed. Your new bed and room in the fortress. Safe quarters for the new ambassador. The second ambassador.
Stretching your legs only made you want to groan at more than one event.
One, being the awkwardness of introducing yourself to Queen Nasuada’s first ambassador outside of Alagaësia.
Two, having to recover from both traveling and ascending all the steps into the mountain.
If my legs weren’t fit enough before, you thought, they sure will be.
No one else seemed to be fazed by the stairs.
Tiredly, you took a breath and counted what you were grateful for. Among them and high on the list remained your survival.
Even knowing what a map of Alagaësia looked like, it took a great amount of will power to travel through it and come out in one piece.
Anything to get away from suspicious side glances and Alagaësia’s politics. You thought, and here I’ve been introduced to most people and have only gotten questionable looks from one person. Too bad it’s Eragon. But I expected nothing less when I’m the unplanned and newly appointed ambassador to the Queen. That and I seem to speak better Ancient Language to everyone else.
~~~
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Best wishes and happy reading.)
~~~~~
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mattodore · 11 months
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I would like to shamelessly and respectfully ask about the bed talk between Matthias and Theo.
your mind... yeah, i'll talk about this. slipping my reply under a readmore for this one bc i'm just going to speak candidly <3
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so on theo's part, he doesn't say much during sex. in the same way he has a lot of difficulty expressing his feelings inside his relationship with matthias, he also has a hard time expressing his desires. theo is... kind of mired down by shame and repression. like, even when theo is actively fucking men he's still repressing a lot of what he really wants and feels. it's interesting, though, because he definitely isn't shy about sex. it's just... he can't speak what he wants out loud, because then he might really get it, you know? and i think he's scared by how that would feel... like having it be that easy to get what he wants after all the years of shutting everything up inside his heart and burying it down so deep. honestly, theo has a hard time even making sounds during sex. he holds his breath, bites on matthias's arms, clenches his teeth... he's just always holding himself back. he can't help it, really.
matthias can sometimes get a few words out of theo if he's prompting them, though. he likes to make theo say please 🙄... and i think matthias will prod and ask theo if it's good, if he likes it, and theo will kind of nod and say yeah, yeah it's good... and i think during those first few times, that question makes theo flush real fast and get all teary. because it really does feel good... and i think theo needs that. and i think he probably... god, well... i think he sort of realizes that he's never really had anything as good in his life. not, like... not in a wow-matthias-is-a-sex-god way, but in a way where it's like, okay. theo is being treated well. time and care went into making sure he wasn't hurt. he's being listened to and matthias is carefully watching each of his reactions. when he says stop, matthias stops. and theo never had that before. so... it's very intense and it's probably both the hardest thing theo's ever had to say during sex while also being the easiest. the crying is an emotional release.
matthias, on the other hand... as you can probably already tell by, well... every other bit of information i've shared about this man... he's filthy. i do think matthias is more sweet with theo than he's ever been with any of his previous sexual partners, but nonetheless... he's still kind of nasty even with theo. i mean, one of his main character traits is his amorality and a complete lack of shame or guilt for anything he feels. so he's very uninhibited and you can definitely tell by the way he talks during sex. every word under the sun that you think is too perverse is probably going to be said while he's fucking someone. i think he really enjoys saying and doing things that society at large deem as Reprehensible... like, just in general. so. yeah, he gets off on saying/doing the things most would gasp and clutch their pearls at.
with that said, matthias does actually tone it down for theo's sake, because i think theo isn't necessarily comfortable with half of what matthias says lmao. but matthias still pushes theo sometimes, because he has this scary accurate sense of what theo needs, and he knows that theo desperately needs to have some of that shame razed from his skin... and what better a way to do it than by making theo realize the things he's so scared of can actually turn him on so bad it makes him shake? so... he talks a lot. it's sort of one-sided, but he's always asking rhetoricals anyway, so i think he's fine with that. however, he definitely doesn't like that theo doesn't make sounds often... tho that changes pretty fast when he starts having fun with it... 🙄 he sees it as a game, like, just where do i need to touch, how far do i push, what do i need to say, to make this little mouse squeak... HORRIBLE MAN.
but when matthias gets theo worked up enough that theo's too dazed to tamp the sounds down, matthias actually starts being incredibly sweet. lots of you're so lovelys and i'd never let anyone hurt yous (...) fall pretty fast from his lips. and he kisses theo alllllllll over. lots of cheek kisses in particular, because he really likes theo's cheeks. and, to clarify, it's not always dirty talk in the bedroom... sometimes it's just intimacy and matthias kissing theo and touching him and making him feel good. matthias's one redeeming quality is how well he takes care of theo, what can i say...
for specifics... hm. theo says: please. it's good. it's too much. more. harder. wait. keep going. switch. like, just little things to direct matthias, in a way... and he never says more than he needs to. he's very sharp and clipped.
matthias is harder to pinpoint specific dialogue for because he just says so fucking much....... like you can really tell that this man loves talking to himself by the way he talks dirty in theo's ear. but i'd say some common phrases are: do you want it? what're you gonna do for it? do you like that? hold still. open up. where are you going? feel that? go ahead and ask for it.
but waaaay down the line, when they've been together for a couple of years and theo's worked past a lot of his issues, i think theo actually becomes comfortable enough to do everything he wants. i think he starts to boss matthias around and take control more... and matthias has always liked when theo is mean, so theo kind of... plays with that a bit. i think he degrades matthias and matthias laps at the palm of his hand for it. matthias has always wanted to be challenged, so. later on, there's definitely a shift in their dynamic, sexually speaking.
#river dipping#asks#anonymous#theodore doe#matthias evanoff#a burning house to live in#echthroi#oc extras#nsft#my ask box starts working again and this is one of the first two messages i receive <3#so now here i am replying and posting this at four p.m. on a monday of all days............... lmao#took me forever to getting around to it i'm sawrry </3#that room is actually a veeeeeery early rough draft of theo's room later on in the story...#it's not his apartment either it's in one of matthias's homes... i'm thinking the chateau but i haven't decided#matthias has five homes four that he inherited and one he bought himself#it's either the chateau or the home he bought that theo moves into for a bit...#theo has a very different decoration style than matthias tho so the room would clash like crazyyy in the home matthias bought for himself#i think theo's emotional repression definitely shows even in his decoration style tho bc his apartment is like. maximalism.#but when he moves in with matthias for a bit it's just modern everything instead....#theo's actually a bit of a hoarder and has a ton of knickknacks and furniture he subconsciously views as an outward show of his personality#bc theo has a really hard time like. knowing who he is. so he uses objects to try and piece it all together for himself and for others#especially because he doesn't outwardly express himself often... so his things are like... well. they're him in a way.#but he still is soooo locked up that even when he temporarily is staying with matthias he doesn't actually Show Himself in that way#so it's all just items matthias bought for his room (that theo picked but... kind of at random) and a few things theo's brought from home#.....anyway.#hello everyone <333333
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