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justsomeantifas · 5 years

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its 11:59 its still technically tonight so

this is gonna be my reference point to questions abt venezuela, at least regarding things pre- May 19 2019. Its a bit scattered and it may get edited down along the road, but yeah.

short version that draws some similar conclusions: https://www.salon.com/2019/05/17/the-plot-to-kill-venezuela_partner/

one difference in scales that’s important to keep in mind: the lifespan of people is 2-7 decades. the lifespan of colonialism lasts centuries. the lifespan of media memory is a couple years, tops.

Most western narratives of venezuela start meaningfully at chavez, which is a mistake. The focus point in history around which the country flowed was the Caracazo. You probably already know about this, but a massive uprising took place in the heart of Caracas, against decades of dictatorship both formal and informal, after severe instability in the global oil market. The people were hungry, the riots were fiery, and the bullets bled. knows the death toll even now, but its estimated well into the thousands. This happened pre-chavez, and started a cascade of events which brought him into limelight that you can read about here. not gonna go into more venezuelan history, but i talk a bit more here

chavez was democratically elected, multiple times.

in 2002, after his first democratic election, he was kidnapped by US-backed troops and replaced by someone who threw out the 1999 constitution, which was as legitimate as any other made in venezuela’s colonial and violently capitalist history, seeing as it was the first (aka only, so far) of 26 constitutions actually approved by popular referendum. He was reinstated largely due to massive protests in support of him. Maduro however doesn’t really have as much of the charisma and support of chavez, which is creating problems - as well as exacerbating problems created by the economic crises ramping up just around chavez’s death. In 2015, there were elections to the National Assembly, which ended up with the Opposition winning a majority of the seats (which does show that there’s some degree of fairness in the elections, at least verifiably up til that point, yet that isnt rly accounted for when western media describes it as “undemocratic” - many of whom don’t apply the same scrutiny to their own country: such as this UN Human Rights councilor who also happens to be the crown prince of british-iraq, currently residing in the noted democracy of the Kingdom of Jordan, which has no vested interest or control over any particular export of Venezuela.).

This turnout showed most of all that maduro had alienated as many as 2 million of his supporters, who didnt end up voting (though many also voted against him - trying to act on their feeling that whatever they want, its “not this”). This decreasing support also accelerates whats known as “Everyday Sabotage” - people not trusting in the government, and look out for their own interests contra everyone else. This is a danger inherent to tying “Socialism” to a primarily state project.

However 1999 Constitution was never meant as an eternal document & it created mechanisms to call for new popular constitutional referendums to be held. That’s what the “Constituent Assembly” is about, which is what a lot of the western world is describing as him singlehandedly rewriting it (while also being “vague about its contents”), or “created by him”. Elections to the constituent assembly were boycotted by opposition, so that it would be government controlled & look like a sham in the eyes of the broader world. That being said, the assembly was called both as a reaction to losing election but also in response to intensifying crises - it was put forth (i don’t see any reason to believe in bad faith) as a way to come together and figure out how to address the needs that were driving people to protest - to address the desire for “not this”, but bc of the uncertainty, it was easily twistable by reactionaries by putting all emphasis on the former. Also timing corresponds with increasing fears of maduro straying from the path of chavez, the image of scrapping one of his strongest plays for smth unknown is risky - tho if there are other meaningful options given the situation im not sure. And the body’s got at least as much constitutional legitimacy as Guaido (Chapter III)

The 1999 constitution also enabled a recall election to be called against maduro in 2016, bc it was written with particular attention to holding public officials accountable - similar noble commitments helped to end the presidency of Rousseff & bring in Bolsonaro (who was also one of the people spurring on the investigations and whipping up a social base).

(speaking of guaido & bolsonaro)

on Guaido:

part of student group in 2007 protesting against non-renewal of coup-assisting network, who the CFR (one of the major think tanks of the cold war still playing a big role in foreign policy today) considered “most important network”

close friend of Leopoldo Lopez, the aforementioned coup plotter.

politician since 2010, won a couple small elections

Unknown to majority of general population until 2019, most venezuelans surveyed didnt know him

Plan Pais

plans to privatize state owned industry & allow investment from foreign oil companies

center-right neoliberal draped in platitudes of “stability”, “revitalization”, “security”, and “rescue” - a message seemingly deliberately targeted to become more and more resonant with increased sanctions.

/on Guaido

governing is about the expression of power. I wanna live in a world where that power isn’t expressed, but as long as the exploitation of the global working class continues unabated, id prefer some of that power be put towards helping the poor.

there is no such thing as a static state of affairs, there’s no “goldilocks zone” out in the political universe where we tweak things finely until we find whats best for everyone, only different rates of change in different dimensions. what we need to do is figure out how we can push that state of affairs in a direction so that everyday people have the power to take control of their lives. re

re: “constitutionality” - if the supreme court calls it constitutional then its constitutional. period. There’s no such thing as a supreme court as an “independent branch” of government, but there are different degrees of integration into the rest of it.

The Supreme Tribunal of Venezuela has 32 members, (a bit more than a dozen put in by the national assembly, while the PSUV held it), and the opposition holds abt 3 away from a supermajority. Each member of the court holds their spot for 12 years. If that’s “The Most Corrupt In The World” according to Transparency International, i wonder what world the 9-person lifetime-appointed US Supreme Court (2 of which appointed by trump, and save for pulling a Weekend At Ginsbergs, likely 3) is on. In fact, one of the tactics that the more radical circles of democrat voters are putting forward is to pack the Supreme Court. Because thats how shit actually gets done, or at the least how shit is prevented from being committed w the stamp of legality. FDR learned that lesson too, in trying to pass what is today known as “The New Deal”

My comparisons to trump are for specific end: these actions are exerted on levers of liberal democracy, and every single liberal democracy is susceptible to them in some ways.

whats a “dictator”? if hes unelected, the millions of people who participated in the elections dont seem to think so. if maduro is a dictator, then what is donald trump? the majority of ppl didnt vote for him yet hes still governing. macron’s popularity has at several points been less than 1/3, and the yellow vest protestors have been violently attacked - why is he not “a violent dictator with only the support of the military”? These terms are not neutral.

“their elections are highly flawed” So What? show me a country whose elections arent.

“opposition jailed” - ok but coup plotters don’t get off easy in any liberal democracy. If someone - say Bernie Sanders - said “enough is enough” and succeeded in overthrowing the current government with the help of a foreign government…. you think they’d let him go free? what if ten years later he was getting his supporters all riled up to do it again? how long you think he’d be in jail for (assuming he can survive well into his 100’s)? You think more than 13 years? Think he’d get house arrest? Some US states lock you up for posessing weed up to 10. If you stay long enough around this blog, youll find plenty of other examples of much more cruel and unusual punishments. Look at Chelsea Manning, look at Oscar Riviera… look at the US protestors saying Guaido is illegitimate

what we have to keep in mind most of all, is to show that the contradictions being exploited are inherent to Liberalism. Contradictions are just expressed most freely at the margins - the interstices

poor economic decisions happen everywhere - 2008/2009 still affecting the entire world there’s violence thats “natural”, and violence thats “intolerable”. The dividing line is whether we have anything to gain by changing things.

sanctions: started under obama, originally targeted specific individuals, used as precedent for more generalized. They’re indirect - they have a “squeezing effect”, takes already-existing problems & just makes them markedly worse. also doesn’t necessarily correlate with emigration, bc it takes a lot of money to start a new life somewhere else, and sanctions disproportionately affect the poor.

war wouldnt likely look like (many) US boots on the ground - we’ve got plenty of other places to be. It’d look like guns being smuggled to counter-protestors. It’d look like sending resources to neighboring countries like Colombia or Brazil who would then use their troops. Colombias ruling party is right wing populists - much of current president’s campaign was run on fearmongering abt venezuelan socialism - they’re raring to go. It’d look like drones https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caracas_drone_attack. Also means there likely won’t be a sudden trigger, its a gradually escalating stressful gradually-more-warlike situation.

If war does break out - where would the refugees go? In reality the majority would go to Colombia, but if anything significant breaks out there will be a stream of those looking to find shelter in the US, which has advertised itself as a beacon of hope - what would happen to them? some may get taken in as a gesture of showmanship, but nowhere close to the majority.

speaking of the US - imagine if trump and bolton manage to actually plot a winning coup. Do you think that that wont be his main bullwark against ppl like Bernie? you think the media and rest of the democratic party wont jump on that narrative and “begrudgingly” support a fascist because the alternative might mean supporting single payer and not-having-good-for-ratings-climate-apocalypse?

another term thrown around without regard is “once vibrant” - for whom?

most articles ive seen just take this as an axiom, and dont find any cognitive dissonance when also saying chavez reduced poverty hugely.

The answer to that rhetorical question: Citgo is venezuelan, before chavez none of the wealth went back to venezuela - thats what “vibrancy” means.

many similarities with BP (the-artist-formerly-known-as-the-anglo-iranian-oil-company)

in age of climate change & vocal ppl about phasing out oil, the more one’s livelihood is connected to oil, the more unstable ones country will be - either that, or the more instability ones country will cause.

“Oil exports fell by $2,200 per capita from 2012 to 2016, of which $1,500 was due to the decline in oil prices.”

The drop in price that affected the venezuelan economy so much in 2014 was largely by US shale fracking

in 1970’s Chile, copper was the main product of Chile - allende nationalized the mines, and in return wall street dropped the

(also worth noting that venezuela’s got non-insignificant untapped shale basins)

At least venezuela used the oil money to fund social programs instead of like, pad the pockets of Raytheon.

also oil price wars in africa highly correlated w oil (whose annual production doesn’t even combined total venezuelas)

a couple ppl have raised concerns abt my strong stance on equivocal dismissal - if there’s a difference, if there’s some way of reading your statement that says “X country that the State Dept wants to invade is an anomoly in the otherwise free world”, then that’s acting to push the discourse towards normalization & invasion. It’s not “whataboutism”, just basic consistency.

now more than ever, narratives are affected by people. They may not be ones we had a hand in forging, but the way that we propagate them actually does have measurable effects on the larger-scale political outcomes. Always look for the base assumptions, as well as the direction

sure denounce Chavez. sure denounce Maduro. denounce Kim, Xi, Castro, anyone. But if there’s no equally or proportionally loud denunciations of the horrors perpetrated by allies - the “assumed”, “natural” violence, then you’re acting to reinforce the narrative of exceptionalism.

Just make sure after you take a breath, you denounce Saudi Arabia & Yemen, Israel for Palestine, the conditions which brought Argentinian/Brazillian, Brazilian coup, the US for Puerto Rico, the conditions which have murdered dozens of journalists in Mexico per year…

what people want most of all is stability. “A debate over whether it is mismanagement and corruption by the Maduro government or the sanctions that are the author of the crisis is largely irrelevant. The point is that a combination of the reliance on oil revenues and the sanctions policy has crushed the policy space for any stability in the country.”

government’s errors and tensions

fixed exchange rate -> black market

took 5 years to address changing relation between dollar & BsF, all the room between those two curves left a huge room for intensifying crises, though since it also corresponds with the death of chavez, it sorta makes sense.

antidemocratic actions and remarks by maduro

scattered responses filled w half-solutions

diversification needed, but how do you diversify an economy filled with rampant poverty, malnutrition, illiteracy…

(nominally begrudging) support for mineral extraction 12.4% of territory opened to extraction - “Special Economic Zone” as a method of managing decay

this is also what much of the reality of “economic diversification” looks like

not enough socialism. (even fox agrees!) Venezuela shows the limits of Social Democracy in countries living outside of the Imperial Core - esp the dangers if you’re in the crosshairs already bc of oil

started out as populism, gradually grew as confronted more. shows shaping influence on political organs from actions of foreign actors - if you’ve survived a coup before, you’re gonna become paranoid about any more of them - especially when the coup plotters say “hey lets do more coups”

also shows the weakness of only having a small number of charasmatic faces representing the movement - if one dies and theres no clear and popular replacement, then you’ll lose ppl who were largely brought in by the charisma, weakening your political project, and creating cracks for reactionary forces to take advantage of - especially in times of transition.

bourgeoisie still control a majority of the economy. Capitalist businesses are internally unaccountable, and in this age of intensified global trade, one can punish countries for straying from the pack by moving business & focus away. If you’re looking for dictatorships, look at the thousands of private companies run as dictatorships daily

capital flight is a real effect, precisely because socialism is fundamentally and irreconcilably against the self-interest of the bourgeoisie. not necessarily against the interest of the humans-who-are-also-bourgeois, but of the impersonal self-sustaining force of capital.

Have you ever pulled something out of an electrical socket, and seen a quick spark? The reason that occurs is bc of what’s called an induction current, which is a fancy physics word for flowing electricity not liking to suddenly change its flow. If you accidentally touch that spark, you might feel it, but youll live to tell the tale. But if you only take the plug out halfway & touch it, that’s a different story. Capital flows similarly.

my country (lithuania) has been facing sky-high emigration since the collapse of the USSR (with an added boost after 08-09), we have also consistently had one of the highest suicide rates in the world (#7), a minimum wage of about 3 Euros an hour (after a recent increase), as well as one of the highest prison populations in Europe (discounting Russia & Belarus… which like….)

when are we gonna be invaded? when will the US media talk about our pain?

oh wait, they did. We cried all pretty for the TV cameras, then they got a bozo nobody really knew of to denounce the government, who they called dictatorial (though it was far from ideal, massive bureaucracies dont tend to mix well with single-person-decision-making). And to be fair, the fact that the government was unpopular wasnt entirely undeserved. But what was promised to us was the idea of “Freedom”, “Free Enterprise”; to “Get Rid of Corruption” and institute “Real” Democracy". They said we’d be integrated into the glorious capitalist west, and we understood that to mean that we’d be in the position of a Germany, or at least an Austria or smth. But they never meant to integrate us into the imperial Core, we have always been seen as part of the Periphery - the “assumed” violence that “naturally” happens.

Then we got to where we our today. Some of the stuffs more available, but expensive. Most of the bureaucracy’s still around, it just helps fewer people. We stand as an example of what to expect, in one of the best case scenarios, you would join our emigrees now making up a significant percentage of underpaid house-servants aka maids across the EU.

if we want the people of Venezuela to be healthy, safe, and fulfilled, then:

speak out and pointing to the effects of US sanctions is incredibly important. They’ve already killed 40,000 people in the last year, and 300,000 more are in extreme danger (and millions more in long-term risk).

what does it mean when you simultaneously sanction trade with a place but also demand they let you give them humanitarian aid?

if there is to be action taken by the international community, then the US has forfeited its right to speak. They threw it away once in 2002, and obama rhetorically picked it up and dusted it off so that trump could throw it in a bigger dumpster, thats also on fire. However we also still live in a world deeply shaped by US Hegemony, so the opinions of its close trade partners & closest-knit media buds should be seen as influenced as such. Doesn’t mean that theyre wrong on everything too, but they still feel the magnetic pull of the US economy and ecosystem (as well as their own potentially imperial interests) and the effect of that force cannot be discounted.

transitioning our economies away from oil & away from globalized neoliberalism which only values peripheral states by their exports - dissolves tensions of how to produce in unproductive terrain

socialize medicine in the US, so that drug companies run by dictatorships can’t control their lives & ours. healthcare is especially reliant on imports, sanctions affect especially strongly.

normalize the ideas of Socialism, without taking the easy way out of “oh no dont think of Venezuela, think of sweden or denmark”. None of them are Socialist, but to avoid the complexities of Venezuela is to imagine that US attempts at socialism wouldn’t involve significant capital flight. If we don’t consider that, if we don’t have solid actionable plans to deal with that, while also facing the inherent complexity of changing material conditions, then we’re gonna waste whatever shot we get.

redirect conversation normally centered around government towards support of the tens of thousands of small business co-operatives, where people live their daily lives in a democratic manner.

on The Communes:

“delegating responsibility throughout all members, and bringing important decisions to the whole to work through and find the best possible solution… They create “collective criteria” together; agreements stipulating whether individuals have power over certain decisions or whether it is up to the whole group. However, he assures that these “are not rigid, they can change at any moment.” The cooperative I lived with in Venezuela had regular organizational meetings where they informally came to agreement and were even able to come back to re-evaluate decisions that didn´t seem to be satisfactory for the whole group in this same way. Decisions and decision making, in this way, are viewed as a process not contained by meetings and discussions in board rooms, but are always being analyzed and made better by the process of putting them into action, and not only by thinking them out and writing them down.”

- the “Self Government of the Producers” - aka what it looks like for cooks to govern.

they have communal councils as well - neighborhood councils in the same vein that so many (rightfully) find inspiring in Kurdistan . They preexisted chavez, but they were able to proliferate and be given legal recognition through him. I understand that legal recognition can act to ‘name’ a body & pin it to smth that doesn’t match its requisite variety - how dynamic it is, but imo as its currently legislated it recognizes a good amount of the autonomy that they had already been excersizing. - liable to change government recognition of co-ops has drawbacks too, and correlates negatively with that coop’s success

"A good example of this intention is the de-emphasis that cooperatives in Venezuela put on advertising or “marketing” products, and instead push to find more people to become part of the cooperative, and choose the services or products they provide based on community decisions about what is needed. A cooperative I worked in […] was originally a family owned and operated theater group that traveled around the country performing theater pieces that highlighted social and environmental issues. When they joined the […] cooperative, the larger co-op did an analysis and decided they wanted a natural fruit juice concentrate producer and gave the group a loan to acquire capital and start producing. They have been doing this for only a couple of years now but have already paid back the loan to the larger cooperative and are bringing extra money in to support themselves, better their services, and supply extra funds to the larger cooperative for community projects such as the recently [2012] built community health center…

The cooperative services I experienced and learned about in Venezuela were health, dental, food, and a separate example of trash services. A dental cooperative […] provides quality dental services (I know because I used them) almost every day for affordable prices. You don´t have to be a member of the cooperative, and you don´t have to make an appointment. It takes only a couple of hours, and emergency situations are treated with urgency. The health center, built with funds provided by all the associated cooperatives[…], works the same way. Anyone can go there, the services are subsidized by the cooperative so they are affordable, the clinic and workspaces are clean and well taken care of, and the quality of the service is great. Worker-members of the cooperative receive health care at the facility without charge except for the massage and acupuncture services that they also provide at a really low price.

[…] food services are priced to provide more access to food for the community in which it exists. The original and persistent intention is to make the best situation for people on all ends of the process. The producers are part of the cooperative and are part of the group that decides the prices that growers get, as well as the prices that the food is sold for. This means that both farmers and workers at the market decide what to charge a person, which ultimately affects how much money the growers receive, as well as if the food is affordable for the people who need to eat who live in the city. In a normal capitalist market system these parties are separated and put up against each other, raising prices for consumers and lowering them for small producers, excluding those people from getting enough money to afford all the necessities that are typically only provided at a high price.

One communal council, a parallel governing organization of community members linked to investment funds from the national government, in the city of Merida, Venezuela organized themselves to get funds to buy a trash collection truck. The truck at the time was used for a specific waste removal project that removed waste from their community regularly but was not a traditional collection service. However, they did have plans to expand the project to start their own collection service, and this would be provided by the commal council, an anti-capitalist organization which does not require people to pay for the service. Although this is not a “co-operative” as some hardliner co-operative enthusiasts might point out, it is a horizontal anti-capitalist organization widening access of necessary services to the larger community run by community members; following cooperative values of equity, inclusion, and solidarity I believe this to be an example of cooperative economics and action. It appears to me that economic inclusion is much more likely to widen only when those who are being excluded are included in the process of organizing the services and are in control of the economy.“

until the communes, workers cooperatives, and the like are strong enough to rule themselves, having Maduro in power is the only option given to us which doesn’t trigger the control of reactionaries. People make their own history, but not in situations of their choosing - the exact outcome isn’t predetermined, but there’s only a limited number of poles - gravitational attractors - towards which that trajectory is heading at any particular time.

if maduro acts to squash the power of the communes, then thats a different situation. but until that point, we outside of the country must work to center any discussion on these bodies - they are the heart of the country and of whatever social revolution has occurred/is further possible. They are filled with lessons for us to learn from, and show how rich and dynamic the organized populace can be if they are allowed to control their communities. (ex of dealing with gang violence from @ 22:50)

This is all said with recognition that many chavistas have acted against communes, the bureaucratic machine acts to co-opt much of their energy, its linguistically obscured the concept of "ownership” with that of “control”, and that the state has changed its messages over time. But the heart of the communes is what’s a priority, and they have acted against the government overstepping its bounds & mis-identifying them. But whats important is that there’s a feedback process in the gvt to actually allow them to assert their autonomy. Liberals will do their utmost to close those channels.

If Guaido and the Popular Will take control of power, be assured that whatever gains made in organizing the everyday people of Venezuela will be at the top of the chopping block. How effective that suppression turns out to be is undetermined - it might turn out to strengthen the communes, but that outcome would be damage control, not something to try and bullseye.

Effective Propaganda knows that its more effective to control what’s left out than control what’s put in. Keep that in mind, and study trajectories and forces.

other links:

https://next.podbay.fm/podcast/1363342644/e/1551711604

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Voc08vh9cJY

https://www.counterpunch.org/2013/06/21/a-cowboy-in-caracas/

https://thenextrecession.wordpress.com/2017/08/03/the-tragedy-of-venezuela/

https://www.multpl.com/venezuela-gdp

https://www.jacobinmag.com/2014/04/fivethirtyeights-venezuela-problem

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/why-venezeulas-middle-class-is-taking-to-the-streets/

https://news.vice.com/en_us/article/bjkmq8/fiery-protest-leader-leopoldo-lopez-faces-13-year-sentence-in-venezuela

https://potent.media/minimum-sentencing-for-marijuana-possession

https://www.thoughtco.com/core-and-periphery-1435410

https://popularresistance.org/building-the-commune-radical-democracy-in-venezuela/

http://www.antiwar.com/regions/regions.php?c=Venezuela

#venezuela #reference #imperialism #chavez #maduro #socialism #capitalism #extraction #oil #war #emigrant #communes #cooperatives

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stylessemantics · 7 years

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11 Questions Tag

Rules:

1. Always post these rules. 2. Answer the questions given by the person who tagged you. 3. Write 11 questions of your own. 4. Tag 11 people.

I was tagged by 3 cuties and I’ll be answering all their questions. Under the cut cause it’s 33 questions. Also I’m reposting my same questions cause not a lot of people have answered them, and I want to tag different people and have them answer the same 11 questions I came up with the first time I was tagged so... Let’s go! :)

@fairylightsstyles aka T’s Questions :D

1. Who is the person you admire the most? I’m going to go with my mom. cliché I know but she’s amazing. I also admire Ed Sheeran, Harry Styles, Emma Watson, etc etc etc.

2. If you could be in any television series what would it be? The Flash. I want to have super powers lol. Or maybe Sherlock Holmes or some comedy sitcom.

3. Best childhood memory? I’m going to go with going to New York for the first time ever. It was a long flight for 9 year old me (assuming i was nine, i can’t remember. Have to ask around)

4. Favourite song at the moment? Escuela De Calor by Radio Futura. It’s old and I’ve loved it for a while but recently I made a Guitar Hero 4 playlist with all the songs I loved to play when my brother and I jammed out and I was reminded of this hit. Play it first when I go to take a shower or whatever and put on that playlist. It’s such a dance-able song I’m very in love and know every beat and drop to it and always dance it very sexily.

5. Where is the place you feel most at home? Home. I wish I had some awesome thing I can say like some tree house or some hill or whatever but we don’t do those things here or live close by to one. Also I was never a leave my house walking to go over to some hangout place with my friends type of person. No one in this country is really. Specially when young. So I’m saying home feels like home. In my room. I hate being home though. Also my cousin’s place in Miami feels a LOT like home. Second home it is really.

6. What is the country you want to travel to the most? *brain from pinky and the brain voice* Same as it’s been the past 11 years, lovely: England.

7. What plans do you have for the summer? Summer? What is that? I go to college, I study in the summer :P But the plans are hopefully London in June or July. The opportunity struck and I’m almost fainting at the thought.

8. 3 guilty pleasure songs? No Reason Boner - NSP (i know all of it i’m sorry. Any NSP song really is... god damn. Also Dan I love you.) Persona 5 OST. (my brother’s fault. Completely) Undertale OST. (specially metaton’s theme, Bonetrousle and asgore’s theme... Oh and Final Sans fight theme... SORRY THIS GAME IS GENIUS) whoops.

9. If you could say something to the whole world, what would you say? LOVE LOVE LOVE. SPREAD LOVE IT’S NOT THAT HARD AND IT MAKES THINGS SO MUCH EASIER!!! TREAT OTHERS HOW YOU WANT TO BE TREATED. ALSO STREAM SOTT AND BUY HARRY’S ALBUM.

10. What is the best meal you’ve ever eaten? OMG I don’t know if it’s the best meal but it was the one that popped up the quickest, and technically I didn’t eat it, it was my mom’s plate; but there’s Peruvian place here and UGH! Apparently Perú has like THE best cuisine (according to my parents that have travelled quite a lot) and jesus lord everything we have eaten there is so good. Mom had... this amazing Salmon in fucking PASSION FRUIT SAUCE OMG PASSION FRUIT SAUCE GOES WITH EVERYTHING GUYS UGH NOW IM CRAVING IT.

11. Do you believe in ghosts? yes and no. if they are for real well then i don’t think i’ve done something wrong to anyone enough for them to spook me, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to be moving into some “rumour has it this house is haunted” place. If they aren’t real then good, but I’m not gonna go testing the theory and getting myself into some dark magic/spirit shit or using some ***** board (I’m not even saying the name of it)

@cheshirepuddin‘s questions <3

1. Who’s your role model? My Mom, Harry, Ed, Emma Watson, My Cinematography Language teacher, My Concept Art teacher, My Art Direction teacher.

2. What’s something you want to accomplish in the short term? Is losing weight a short term thing? Let’s go with that or finally finishing some of the million and one fics I’ve got collecting dust in my files.

3. What would you like to ask Harry? WOW uhm... On the spot I can’t think of a good enough question. I would ask him to recommend me one thing for every branch of art. A book, a song or artist, a movie, a painter or painting, etc etc etc. I would also ask him if he’d like to hang out later on and teach me things. Get your heads out of the gutter I mean it in the sense of teaching me art, writing, something he loves, something he thinks is his expertise. To spread knowledge with me. If he’d allow me to be with him as a little grasshopper for a while.

4. If you could travel through time once and then come back, would you prefer to travel to the past or the future? Why? Neither. I have a lot of things I would love to change but I also am kind of a believer that every single decision, no matter how small, makes you who you are. And although I could be a lot better, this is my life and I guess it’s not half bad. Also seeing the future scares me and I would hate to spoil my own ending to myself. Based on that thing about decisions, today my future can be one thing but tomorrow, based on what I do, it could be another. Also FLASHPOINT PARADOX GUYS. LORD TIME IS SO INTERESTING. Is there even a past to go back to? You’re telling me the past is happening RIGHT NOW in some other time and I can go to it? Or the future? Then why isn’t it happening now? What defines past and why can or would we be able to travel to it?

5. Where’s your favourite place you’ve been to? None of the places I’ve been seems to catch my eye enough for me to call them anything close to a favourite. That’s so sad wow.

6. Would you like to get married and have kids someday? yes yes yes. Would love to marry. Would love to have (3?) kids. Would love for one of them to be adopted.

7. Do you have a motto you live by? I thought I didn’t but I like to think I go with the treat others how you wish to be treated thing. Also I’m always telling my friends that emotions demand to be felt. That’s like my line. Emotions demand to be felt; even bad ones. What I will not allow you is to feel the bad ones for any longer than you have to ;)

8. Have you ever been in love? Are you now? I don’t think so. Unless we consider Harry and even I - with all my hopes that maybe someday we will meet and he’ll find me interesting enough to keep me around - can’t call this love. I don’t know him to be able to love him like... proper love him. So I don’t think I have been, and I don’t think I am now.

9. Which song reminds you of some time/someone/something very important to you? Any old song that my mom has ever shown me reminds me of her, cause she has amazing taste in music. Same with my dad or my mom or my best friends. There’s a song that reminds me of something important that has yet to happen though. My wedding. There’s a few songs I know I NEED to have at my wedding, and when they come up they make me think of me dancing them on that amazing day if it ever happens.

10. Do you pay attention to fashion trends? yes and no. I’m not up to date with fashion in general. I just see something I like and would love to try and I try to do it. I never rock anything so I go back to what I already know and call my comfort zone. I pay attention to them to some degree. They look great on other people and I never quite get to try them or buy anything similar, and when I do I don’t rock it so I don’t keep trying.

11. If you could change anything about your life, what would it be? Everything. Goes against my travelling in time answer but lord would I change it all. whoops. I would change a lot of it. Not all of it. Specially bad things.

@legend-waitforit-harry aka J’s Questions :P

1. What’s the name of your autobiography if you write one? I think it’d be a guide on how to laugh at yourself both because you’re a pity and because you have to let go of things. And I’d call it something like “Do as I say, not as I do. A guide to living with your damn brain.”

2. One incident you will never forget. STORY TIME! When I was a kid, around 6 years old maybe less maybe a bit more, no more than 8, I used to take afternoon english classes at the same school I went to in the morning. After classes were over we would run around and play with the rest of the kids that were in tutoring or english classes that were also out of their class already and waiting to be picked up. There is of course a “no running in the hallways” policy in pretty much every school. While playing something silly like tag or something we were chasing someone and I took the empty hallways as route. I had sandals that were slippery and I was running very fast. Right as this guy Ivan - who is a year younger than me and the principal’s secretary’s son- walked out of the classroom he was at. I can still remember it went in slow motion. Me putting my arms out and trying to stop running, him looking at me and going wide-eyed. Both of us screaming. My feet slipping and being unable to stop. And then black. LITERALLY. BLACK! You could have added the little hit signs they add to cartoons when people crash into each other. I opened my eyes and my vision was blurry and a teacher was helping me up. I was ok. I don’t quite remember how or where I landed. Ivan was crying and in pain. He had fallen on the very edge of the little step that divided the cement hallway from the actual court where we could play. I only had a scratch, a bit of pain in my arm that I think was what collided with him. I was fine and wondering why Ivan didn’t get up and continued to cry out “ouch ouch please”.

Ivan had split the back of his head open on the step. Just a bit. I think he had 10 stitches total. His mom arrived short after; like really short after. I think she was on her way to pick him up when it happened and arrived to the school to find his child wallowing in pain on the ground and with a cracked skull bleeding out. I hid. God I hid. I was so scared of my parents finding out, of Ivan’s mother finding out, of my parents having to pay Ivan’s then seemingly difficult operation (i was like 6 I thought the guy would die cause of me)

Ivan knows I guess, and his mom is the absolute sweetest woman ever and she never resented me for it, if she knows it was me. If they know it was me; they never showed. To this day my parent’s don’t know. Or I think they don’t. Ivan and I get along good and we were friends while we were in school. Don’t know if he even remembers it was me who accidentally crashed into him. The next day at school all of the kids that were there that afternoon (we all went to the same school the ones who took classes in the afternoon there) were called to the principal’s office and I remember my principal asking “who crashed into him?” and the second grade teacher legit pulling my by the shoulder shoving me in front of the group and I was almost weeping. I don’t think I got any punishment other than a warning and an obvious lesson.

Do not run in the hallways.

3. Lyrics that means a lot to you. Que todo tiene su hora, debajo del sol naciente, ya viene tu amor bendito de nada vale ser impaciente. Juan Luis Guerra’s Todo Tiene Su Hora

You can’t bribe the door on your way to the sky. You look pretty good down here but you ain’t really good - Harry Styles’ Sign Of The Times

It’s alright to cry, [...] It’s alright to die cause death’s the only thing you haven’t tried [...] So live life like you’re giving up, cause you look like you are. - Ed Sheeran’s Even My Dad Does Sometimes.

4. You’re winning a Nobel Peace Prize. What’s the cause you worked for? Nothing lol I’m definitely not winning one of those. I’m thinking equality. Gender equality, race equality, culture equality, respect for human rights. That or some psychology topic I expressed in some book (NOT SELF HELP I HATE THOSE) in a way that makes it relatable and everyone laugh. Like why be happy when you can be normal? (that is an actual book)

5. If you are given all the money in the world but need to have a new identity, who are you and where are you? I’m still me and I live in England. Don’t ask.

6. Mountain or ocean? Both. Never been to a mountain tho but I want to go and I’m not sure it will mark a significant decision over these two. I’m always going to like something that is not staying home.

7. If you were asked to do something out of your comfort zone, what would it be? Definitely Model. Whatever it is, taking photos of me, my face, my body, my hands, my feet; whatever it is you could model... Just no. I’m terrified of the thought and I would be so uncomfortable knowing the results would be awful and everyone would hate them or that at least I would.

8. If you can kill anyone without any repercussions who would you kill and why? No one. I don’t think I will kill anyone. You can joke all you want about someone being very nasty and whatever but I would never. If you give me a repercussion-free bullet, I hope and pray I never have to use it. I only would in defence of my family and loved ones.

9. Any childhood nightmares? My parents suffering some accident in one of their many travels. To this day I think that’s the biggest nightmare.

10. A song that makes you cry. Even My Dad Does Sometimes - Ed Sheeran Fall - Jonas Brothers. Supermarket Flowers - Ed Sheeran Cuando Te Beso - Juan Luis Guerra.

11. Recommend me: a song, a book and a movie. (Sorry, Iv! Stole your question) YOU THIEF! No jk, it’s fine. Uhhh. A Song: look at my song rec tag I don’t think I have a good one right now. I love too many songs. Let’s go with Harry’s unreleased tracks. I recommend those. Also To Die For by the Bohicas cause it just came up.

A Book: My teenage-self is screaming at me to recommend you Elizabeth Scott’s Bloom, or Heather Brewer’s The Chronicles of Vladimir Tod (THAT I STILL HAVE TO FINISH, GOD DAMN)

A Movie: it’s sad to admit but I don’t have a good movie to recommend you. Maybe The Green Mile if you want to cry and have your life shaken up, watch it. It shattered me. That movie fucked me up. I still have flashbacks to it and fucking weep.

I’m tagging: (different people than i did the last time): @team-styles @honeyskins @moonchildstyles @stylesprimes @yeshaddy @weeklyfangirl @stylesunchained @a-butterfly-on-his-tummy @secret-rendezvous1d @cuddlemusclestyles @whoopsharrystyles

My questions: (once more):

Do you have a favourite pet name? What is it and why, and if you don’t have/don’t like pet names; why?

Tell me a Joke:

Are you a plant inside the house person? If yes; fake or real plants. if not: why?

Take me down memory lane and tell me a first. (first tattoo, first kiss, first time you saw the colour pink idc, just take me with you)

Pick one of Harry’s 8 unreleased songs and give me a prediction. What does it sound like? What is it about? Get creative and write a verse of the song if you want. Just for funsies!

You’ve just won a Grammy/Oscar/Emmy/IDK. Thank you speech? Go:

Fill in the blanks: I instantly smile when _____ because _____

Favourite Harry Trait? #AHarryLovePlatform.

What don’t you understand? (besides this question, come on, be creative) ((example: IDU how people don’t like Harry Styles))

If a sandwich was named after you, what would it be called (your name or something else)? What did you do to earn that honour? What’s in it? (taken from my 1 page at a time daily creative companion book)

Recommend me: a song, a book and a movie. (they can be Harry inspo or not. Just give me art!)

#11 questions challenge #11 questions tag #tag #i was tagged #tumblr shenanigans #tumblr shenanigans with people i love #I'm sorry #this is long #about me #personal

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