#physically its bc the birth control failed

[saintkevorkian]

‘we’re decent humans bc we don’t oppress’ statements -- where is sex. lol sex is certainly a mark for discrimination

female sex faces material and sometimes violent oppression not on account of silly cultural trappings but due to unfortunate biological mechanisms (ie length of gestation vs infant mortality in the ancient world required a high pregnancy rate, average 5-6 children per woman, and robust younger populations were necessary for non-nomadic groups to maintain control of a location (early settlements and even cities)...obviously this is no longer necessary, but the mentality has dovetailed into modern political philosophies and spiralled to the point where people in rich countries are very brainwashed about what ‘female’ does and doesn’t imply-- it exceeds a level of docility necessary for governance). not everything is physical, yet some purely physical examples can still be found in the modern world: being forced to sleep outside when bleeding, or being stoned to death for having a broken hymen. in the first world, the wage gap makes everything more difficult for women on average and its pattern probably has something to do with expectations of maternity leave in otherwise healthy-looking adults. the wage gap is especially detrimental in less socialised societies where charity welfare the dole &c are seen as shameful; people share when coexisting and nothing is entirely set down in the money books, so there may be some compensations, but in a society where sharing amongst strangers is regarded with hostility and suspicion this will obviously be less. a bit tangential to the point but to illustrate that there’s probably some underlying dogma at play, people study business and or economics at uni & never discuss the claim that men also would have more liquid resources if women were paid more

gender used to be a word people used when they didn’t want to say S-E-X in an official document, letter, speech, whatever

when you change the meaning of 'woman,’ the few protections which ostensibly existed for women become technically meaningless

^this might be deliberate, i dunno

women are the marked group, yet this is farce: there is no character trait that women have in common which does not apply to all humans. what women have in common are the impositions of biology. Even female socialisation affects women to varying degrees, and there will always be an exception to every ‘woman trait’ because the distinctions were made to defame and thereby control women, and some people are more difficult to control than others. There may be some patterns in the ways people react to being treated a certain way from the inception of memory, which frames one’s entire world, but there is no female personality. And yet the crux of a movement which says you can opt into a gender is to say: there is some metaphysical difference between men and women which tradition has failed to account for. This transparently upholds sexism.

in certain biological realities, certain increased risk factors, separate health concerns, and particular traps hidden under tailored social forms, women have things in common with other women. These things are experienced, but not wholly subjective. Yet according to modern standards of correctness this group can’t be grouped and is unmentionable by changing the meaning of the word everyone has known. ‘Birthing people’ is how men have perceived women since ages, but plenty of women never have sex with men so they won’t give birth. Oddly it appears there’s a group of women who are attracted to women and absolutely must include anyone who claims to be female in their dating pool or suffer quite a significant amount of annoying conversation, plus death or rape threats which somehow people find acceptable to catalyse social ‘change’-- I guess this is another nameless group. efforts to effect change, btw, should be targeted at legislation and institutions and not at individuals (even if you bloody a person up a bit and force them to submit to your ideologies youve done nothing to change the world; violence already exists since time immemorial). anyway it's evincing the most witless docility to simply agree that an individual’s personal feelings of ~identity or ~inclusion ought to supersede legal and medical definitions in these same spheres.

apart from those whom the state deems to have forfeited rights by violation of social contract (incarcerated women most importantly, about whom literally none of these faux-left ‘activist’ (talkativist) types care a jot), all people should have the right to live their lives and be as annoying as is legal. When delicate handling of personal feelings comes at the expense of hard-won legal rights of an unnameable group, it should not, according to any considered and rational opinion, be sanctioned by law

what one feels inside should be respected in contexts where sharing on that level is appropriate. what is and isn’t legal has to do with people living cooperatively together, and depends on a common conception of reality. the law has been used to oppress groups, but in some cases laws are also floodgates against popular oppression. (See the terrifying example of a world in which people are whatever gender they say they are, regardless of physical appearance, but women still experience employment bias. A company can hire exclusively men provided some claim to be women, and women are not a group so cannot seek redress.)

The entire gimmick plays on the american left’s fear of being called racist. The movement brings race up frequently, often at very inappropriate moments (ie to gain funny social credit, not out of interest for black rights). clearly the united states cherishes a lot of sub-surface racism, which is why this fraudulent tactic can ever be successful. (then again, if white people went around calling themselves black because they’d supposedly had ‘the black experience’ people would, hopefully, tell them to get a grip...) It is common now for women to allow their rights to be jeopardised, while wearing a stupid grin. This movement was funded by male billionaires, probably under the slogan, ‘Women getting too uppity? divide them & trick those fools into denying their own existence.’ Somehow it worked.

I suppose it could be a coincidence that the acronyms movement is based in the united states, which has the lowest educational standards in the ‘first world’ and a long history of thoughtlessness. Note: the US constitution’s fourteenth amendment, which is supposed to guarantee all persons due process and equal protection under law, has been said not to apply to women, because there is no legal precedent for women being full persons (Scalia, 2011)

#in loco parentis

[shiredded]

I wasn’t born to be forgotten

#shire screams #why was i born? #physically its bc the birth control failed #philosophically it doesnt matter #but goddam if I'm not going leave an impression on everyone i meet #im my own protagonist #im a side or background character in your story #but side characters are there because your life wouldn't be much of a story alone #I might make your story worse or better but as long as I'm breathing I'm not going to make it nothing #i always hope for better #but there's two stories in every chance encounter #and im here to keep mine alive and wild #you can come with me; if you want #all I ask is that you never stop me #it took me twenty years to take the first step and from then on I promised myself to fly

[antiloreolympus]

7 Anti LO Asks

1. regarding the latest chapter, it left a bitter taste in my mouth that the news reporters had english names. obviously it's a small detail and there were many more things wrong with the chapter, but this is what stood out to me.

2. i dont take issue with the idea LO wants there to be more than one story, but the issue is they really dont compliment each other nor really flow together either? like eros and psyche could have been a nice contrast and eventual meeting point, but RS messed it up by meshing it up with unrelated stories like apollo and daphne, persephone's AOW/assault, etc. like it cant balance it's main story, and it stumbles more trying to fit more and more in when it just distracts over blending together.

3. i feel like part of the reason the characterization of zeus sucks in lo is bc it makes no sense? like why would he give his brothers equal rank to him as kings if he demands to have all the power? why would he be against demeter AND hades and not pick a side? why would hera marry him and stay with him if she cheats on him anyway? how would he not have baggage after being raised since birth to take out his father? i get rachel wants him to be the bad guy, but it shouldnt be like this hogwash.

4. I think the reason LO's poor attempts at "diversity" suck all the more is because it's just rachel trying to claim she's progressive when she's not. like if she was just upfront LO is some dumb rich person fantasy then fine, but she wants to claim she's this progressive feminist icon and thus her attempts fails bc they're not genuine. it's like jkr claiming du/mbledore was gay or h/ermione was black, despite it never being put in the text. they want the brownie points without the actual work.

5. I really dislike how zeus is shown as though everything that happened during the war was his fault and that he's a terrible person who only thinks about himself without mentioning how much the war probably affected him mentally. The depiction of him not being affected because he wasn't physically injured just completely ignores the idea of trauma.

It's like Zeus isn't allowed to have the even some redeeming qualities or explanation for his behaviour for the sake of making him the bad guy

6. i think LO should have kept the earlier stylized look, tbh, bc the it could get away with more of the wonky anatomy and style choices. now that its trying to be anatomically accurate with still weird style choices just makes it look too uncanny valley versus interesting.

7. i dunno, maybe im biased, but i just cant buy this persephone as queen, especially right now. shes too immature, shes too childish, shes too lacking in actual leadership qualities or even a control of her powers that her being queen seems like a terrible idea, especially if its just to get her out of trouble and she barely knows hades. if this was accurate, wouldnt the post-honeymoon phase regret hit hard? because it all seems rushed and not truly what she wants nor what she needs.

#anti lo #anti lore olympus #lo critical #lore olympus critical

[simulacrumcfp]

CALL FOR PAPERS: MYTHS

Two mermaids, from Apocalypse, Prophecy of the Tiburtine Sibyl, Harley MS 4972 f. 20r, 1275-1325.

He placed one hand upon my shoulder and, holding me tight, bared my throat with the other, saying as he did so: “First, a little refreshment to reward my exertions. You may as well be quiet; it is not the first time, or the second, that your veins have appeased my thirst!” 

Lucy’s eyes were unclean […], instead of pure.

Poor Lucy finds herself tainted by the bite of Count Dracula, an aristocratic Transylvanian vampire that is thirsty for blood, out to export his barbaric ways to Victorian England. In his Dracula (1897), Bram Stoker utilises the myth of the vampire to warn the Victorian reader of the Eastern threat, by portraying Eastern Europe as a place of backwardness and barbaric – vampiristic – rituals. Myths about vampires have been around since the medieval period, when they were commonly linked to profanity. Stoker’s Dracula is the resurrection of a mythological figure, one that can be guided in all sorts of directions, for what was once the myth of the undead has come to represent the fears and threats of the time in which they are resurrected. 

Since ancient times, myths have spoken of the how’s and why’s located at the limits of human understanding, designating that place where intellect fails. There, where knowers stop knowing, we story. In The World of Myth (1990) David Leeming writes that ‘human beings have traditionally used stories to describe or explain things they could not otherwise,’ pointing to the timeless human tendency to grapple with the unknown through story. The myth functions as the means by which we relate to the unknown, embodying our wonderings of the worlds beyond human ratio. 

These stories are then conveyed through artworks, literature, history, or religion. Myths, however, do not just function as a source of inspiration for the arts, but often find their origin in art, spreading, evolving, and growing with different art forms and styles. The Venus Anadyomene, for example, first emerged from the sea in the Theogony – a poem by Hesiod from the 8th century BC. This specific depiction of Venus, daughter of Jupiter and Dione, as birthed by the sea was then made famous by the painting by Apelles (4th century BC). Although this painting has long been lost, it was described by Pliny in his Naturalis Historia (1st century AD), which served as an iconological guidebook for artists. From the orators who tell and retell their stories throughout generations, to the poets who write them down, to the sculptors who carve them out, stories are kept alive. To this day, Venus is most commonly known as the goddess who rose from the sea. 

In the Danish fairytale Den Lille Havfrue (1837) by Hans Christian Andersen, sea foam is not where love is born, but where love goes to die. In the Walt Disney adaptation of the fairytale, The Little Mermaid (1989), mermaid princess Ariel, daughter of king Triton, falls in love with a human prince and gives up her tail to be with him. In the original, quite grim, fairytale by Andersen, the little mermaid finds her prince lying with another. She refuses to stab the lovers to death, as her sisters urge her to, and as a result of her broken heart she dissolves in the foam of the waves. 

In Japan, ancient folklore is being retold to a modern audience through the films by Hayao Miyazaki. His Sen to Chihiro no Kamikakushi (Spirited Away, 2001) animates kami, spirits, washing themselves in a bathhouse as a result of pollution and human activity. This mirrors the Shinto belief that both gods and nature have to be respected and kept clean, and serves as a modern warning. Their demonic counterparts, the oni, take form in the character of Yubaba, who is based on the archetype of the mountain witch, or yumuaba. By taking Japanese mythology as a starting point, Miyazaki is able to create a fantasy-scape: a place where the unthinkable becomes possible. 

Perhaps our first association with mythology brings us back to Ancient Greece. But for them, μῦθος simply meant a story – whether a true or false one, gossip, a historical tale or one of faeries, even a dream. Mῦθος and λόγος, two seemingly opposite terms, fantasy and reason, come together in mythology: the analysing and explaining of stories. There are several ways in which a myth can be explained, and therefore one can also speak of several mythologies. In Creative Mythology (1968) for example, American mythologist Joseph Campbell describes how literary figures such as Thomas Mann or James Joyce managed to make themselves into “living myths,” by translating individual experiences through the correct signs. Shakespeare, with his plays, even managed to create myths around historical figures such as King Henry IV, attracting audiences that were eager to learn about history. History has made other figures into myths as well, such as Louis XIV, known as the Sun King, or Marie Antoinnete.  

In his Mythologies (1957) Roland Barthes explains the creation and circulation of myths through signs and language. According to Barthes, myths are a societal necessity created on the basis of contemporary social value systems, whereby myth formation should mainly be seen as a semiological process, partly as an ideological one. In the essay “Myth Today,” Barthes examines French bourgeois myths that are deeply rooted in society, yet often go unnoticed or taken as fact. By deconstructing modern myths that are spread through advertisements and propaganda, Barthes is able to get to the core of the societal value system of his time. Most famously, he deconstructs the myths around France’s two national products: steak frites and red wine. Both serve as metaphors for blood which, in French society, equals vitality and virility, which equals masculinity, which equals superiority. Equating France with steak frites and red wine then means equating France with virility, masculinity, superiority. 

In “The Double Standard of Aging” (1972), Susan Sontag tackles another modern myth that is deeply-rooted in society, concerning women and age. In the essay, she explains how and why women “of a certain age” are deemed physically undesirable, noting that this differentiates per country. She explains that urbanised societies allow two standards of male beauty, the man and the boy, but only one of female beauty: the girl. This societal judgement of beauty mirrors the evolutionary myth that the value of women is based on their ability for procreation. As a woman’s fertility decreases with age, so does her societal worth.

As the myth moves beyond the human, outside the world as we know it, it writes a strange universe.  It points to that which is not completely explainable according to our current structures for categorising the world. The enchanted world of the supernatural, with its gods, witches, and vampires, perhaps writes of a darker, less knowable reality. Their magic, spells, and strange rituals trouble the disenchanted story of Enlightenment, which tells of reason, control, and certainty – a myth in itself. But even though these supernatural entities tell of the incredible and unbelievable, they remain somewhat explainable. Vampires, gods, and witches, for example, are familiar figures based on a set of commonly understood fictions, differing ever so slightly from the human. ‘In many ways, a natural phenomenon such as a black hole is more weird than a vampire,’ writes Mark Fisher in The Weird and The Eerie (2016). We understand where to place and how to interpret the vampire as a fictional entity. A black hole actually exists, yet we do not understand its strange ways of bending space and time. Science Fiction balances on this thin line between fiction and reality. Perhaps the biggest myths, strangest entities, and weirdest monsters are not necessarily found within the fictional realm of the supernatural but right here in ‘the natural.’ 

‘Coral reefs are monsters.’ In the Arts of Living on a Damaged Planet (2017), Anna Tsing equates this natural phenomenon to the supernatural. Like the mythical chimeras of ancient Greece – beasts made up of the head of a lion, the body of a goat, and the tail of a snake – coral reefs are made of mismatched parts. They embody a strange species encounter as their polyps grow from both animal, plant, and more. Symbiosis, the interaction between two different organisms living in close physical association, might point to some monstrous truth essential to our current epoch of living with the world. In all our vulnerable entanglements with more than human life – we humans too are monsters. 

There are literary differences to be found between myths, fairy tales, sagas, lores, fables, and legends. Fairy tales, for example, often take place in a fantastical world, in which magical creatures roam, and battles between Good and Evil take place. Myths, on the other hand, often have a basis in religion and tell stories about gods or divine creators. Both contain supernatural elements, sometimes these have a basis in history, sometimes in religion, and sometimes in fantasy. For this issue of Simulacrum, we have therefore chosen to soften the boundaries between these ways of storytelling, in order to be open to multiple mythologies, their meanings, and interpretations.

Fancy yourself a modern mythologist? Write an article of 1.000, 1.400, or 1.800 words for our upcoming issue, Mythologies. The deadline for first drafts is the 15th of November, 2020. Would you rather write a column, an interview, fiction, poetry, or do you know an artist whose work fits with this theme? Email us at [email protected]. Please send articles as .doc or .docx and portfolio’s as PDF.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

CALL FOR PAPERS: Mythologieën

Hij legde een hand op mijn schouder, hield me stevig vast, ontblootte mijn keel met de andere en zei daarbij: ‘Eerst een beetje verfrissing om mijn inspanningen te belonen. U kunt net zo goed stil zijn; het is niet de eerste keer, of de tweede, dat je aderen mijn dorst hebben gestild!’

Lucy’s ogen waren onrein [...], in plaats van puur

Lucy wordt gebeten door de bloeddorstige Graaf Dracula, een aristocratische vampier uit Transsylvanië, die er op uit is om zijn zondige en barbaarse levensstijl naar Victoriaans Engeland over te brengen. In zijn roman Dracula (1897) zet Bram Stoker de mythische vampier in om de Victoriaanse lezers te waarschuwen voor de opkomende ‘dreiging van het Oosten’ door Oost-Europa af te schilderen als een plek van barbaarse – vampiristische – rituelen. Mythes over vampieren gaan al rond sinds de middeleeuwen en werden toen vooral gelinkt aan godslastering. Met Dracula wekt Stoker dit mythologische figuur op uit de dood en blaast deze nieuw leven in. De vampier, eens de mythe van de ondoden, vertegenwoordigt voortaan de angsten en bedreigingen van de tijd waarin ze herrijst.

Sinds de oudheid gaan mythen over het hoe en het waarom. Daarmee bevinden ze zich aan de grenzen van het menselijk begrip – daar waar het intellect faalt, wordt er verhaald. In The World of Myth (1990) schrijft David Leeming dat ‘mensen van oudsher verhalen hebben gebruikt om dingen te beschrijven of uit te leggen die ze zonder niet zouden kunnen,’ duidend op een tijdloze menselijke neiging om door middel van verhaal door het onbekende te navigeren. Zo functioneert de mythe als het middel waarmee we ons verhouden tot het onbekende, en belichaamt deze onze verwondering over de werelden buiten de menselijke ratio.

Deze verhalen leven vervolgens door via de kunst, literatuur, geschiedenis of religie. Mythen gelden echter niet alleen als inspiratiebron voor de kunsten, maar vinden ook vaak hun oorsprong in de kunst, en verspreiden, evolueren en groeien met verschillende kunstvormen en -stijlen mee. Zo verrees de Venus Anadyomene voor het eerst uit de zee in de Theogonie - een gedicht van Hesiodus uit de 8e eeuw BC. Deze specifieke weergave van Venus, dochter van Jupiter en Dione, als geboren uit de zee werd vervolgens beroemd gemaakt door het schilderij van Apelles (4e eeuw BC). Hoewel het schilderij verloren is geraakt, werd de Venus Anadyomene door Plinius beschreven in de Naturalis Historia (1e eeuw AD), dat diende als iconologische handboek voor volgende generaties kunstenaars. Van de redenaars die generaties lang hun verhalen vertellen, tot de dichters die ze opschrijven en de beeldhouwers die ze uithakken, worden verhalen levend gehouden. Zo staat Venus tot op de dag van vandaag bekend als de godin die uit de zee verrees.

In het Deense sprookje Den Lille Havfrue (1837) van Hans Christian Andersen is zeeschuim niet waar de liefde wordt geboren, maar waar liefde sterft. In de Walt Disney-bewerking van het sprookje, De Kleine Zeemeermin (1989), wordt zeemeermin prinses Ariel, dochter van koning Triton, verliefd op een menselijke prins en geeft ze haar schubben op om bij hem te zijn. In de originele, aanzienlijk grimmigere versie van Andersen treft de kleine zeemeermin haar beminde in bed bij een ander aan. Ze weigert de twee geliefden dood te steken, zoals haar zussen haar toe aanzetten, en als gevolg van haar gebroken hart lost ze op in het schuim van de golven.

In Japan wordt oude folklore voorgedragen aan een modern publiek door de films van Hayao Miyazaki. De geanimeerde Sen to Chihiro no kamikakushi (De reis van Chihiro, 2001) brengt kami, geesten, tot leven. Ten gevolge van menselijke vervuiling moeten de kami zich wassen in badhuizen om zichzelf weer schoon te krijgen. Deze moderne interpretatie weerspiegelt het Shinto-geloof dat zowel goden als de natuur moeten worden gerespecteerd door ze schoon te houden. De demonische tegenhangers, de oni, krijgen vorm in het karakter van Yubaba, die is gebaseerd op het archetype van de bergheks, de yumuaba. Door de Japanse mythologie als uitgangspunt te nemen, is Miyazaki in staat een ‘fantasyscape’ te creëren: een plek waar het ondenkbare mogelijk wordt.

Wellicht brengt een eerste associatie met mythologie ons terug naar de Klassieke Oudheid. Voor de Grieken betekende μῦθος echter simpelweg een verhaal – of dit nu een waar of een onwaar verhaal was; roddels, geschiedenis of een sprookje, zelfs dromen werden gezien als mythe. Mῦθος en λόγος, twee ogenschijnlijk tegengestelde termen, de fantasie en de rede, komen samen in de mythologie: het analyseren en verklaren van verhalen. Er zijn verschillende manieren waarop een mythe verklaard kan worden, en daarom kan er ook sprake zijn van meerdere mythologieën. In Creative Mythology (1968) beschrijft de Amerikaanse mytholoog Joseph Campbell bijvoorbeeld hoe literaire figuren als Thomas Mann of James Joyce erin slaagden om 'levende mythen' van zichzelf te maken door individuele ervaringen met de juiste tekens te vertalen. Shakespeare slaagde er met zijn toneelstukken in mythen te creëren rondom historische figuren zoals koning Hendrik IV, en trok daarmee een publiek aan dat graag over de geschiedenis wilde leren. Zo ook zijn andere figuren zoals Lodewijk XIV, beter bekend als de Zonnekoning, of Marie Antoinette, binnen de historie tot mythen geraakt.

In Mythologies (1975) analyseert Roland Barthes het ontstaan en de circulatie van mythen aan de hand van semiotiek en taal. Volgens Barthes zijn mythen onmisbaar in de maatschappij en baseren zij zich op hedendaagse sociale waardesystemen, waarbij de formatie van de mythe voornamelijk gezien moet worden als een semiologisch process en deels ideologisch. In het essay “Myth Today,” onderzoekt Barthes diepgewortelde Franse mythen die nochtans onopgemerkt blijven of als feit worden beschouwd. Door de deconstructie van moderne mythen, verspreid door reclame en propaganda, komt Barthes tot de kern van zijn eigentijdse sociale waardesysteem. Meest bekend is de deconstructie van de mythe rondom twee nationale Franse producten: biefstuk en rode wijn. Beide dienen als metafoor voor bloed, dat in de Franse maatschappij rijmt met vitaliteit en moed, die rijmen met mannelijkheid, dat rijmt met superioriteit. Het gelijkstellen van Frankrijk aan biefstuk en rode wijn betekent het gelijkstellen van Frankrijk aan moed, mannelijkheid en superioriteit.

In The Double Standard of Aging (1972) pakt Susan Sontag een andere diepgewortelde mythe aan, een omtrent vrouwen en leeftijd. In haar essay zet ze uit een hoe en waarom vrouwen vanaf een bepaalde leeftijd fysiek niet begeerbaar worden geacht, en merkt hierbij op dat dit per land verschilt. Ze legt uit dat verstedelijkte samenlevingen twee normen voor mannelijke schoonheid kennen, die van de man en die van de jongen, en maar een voor vrouwen, die van het meisje. Dit maatschappelijke schoonheidsoordeel weerspiegeld de evolutaire mythe die stelt dat de waarde van een vrouw gelijk staat aan haar voortplantingsvermogen. Net zoals de vruchtbaarheid van een vrouw  verminderd naarmate zij verjaard, verminderd ook haar maatschappelijke waarde. 

Naarmate de mythe de mens passeert, buiten de wereld zoals wij haar kennen treedt, schept ze een vreemd universum. Ze wijst naar dat wat we nog niet kunnen verklaren met onze huidige structuren voor het categoriseren van de wereld. Het betoverde rijk van het bovennatuurlijke, met haar goden, heksen en vampiers, schetst wellicht een donkerdere realiteit die zich minder goed laat kennen. Hun magie, spreuken en vreemde rituelen zetten zich af tegen het onttoverde narratief van de verlichting, welk van rede, controle en verstand spreekt – een mythe an sich. Maar hoewel deze bovennatuurlijke entiteiten verhalen vertellen over het ongelofelijke, blijven ze enigszins verklaarbaar. Vampiers, goden en heksen bijvoorbeeld, zijn vertrouwde figuren gebaseerd op een verzameling van collectieve fictie, die net afwijken van het menselijke. ‘In many ways, a natural phenomenon such as a black hole is more weird than a vampire,’ schreef Mark Fisher in The Weird and the Eerie (2016). We begrijpen hoe we vampiers als fictionele entiteit moeten plaatsen en interpreteren. Zwarte gaten bestaan echter wél, terwijl wij hun vreemde manieren in het buigen van tijd en ruimte niet bevatten. Science-fiction balanceert op deze dunne lijn tussen fictie en realiteit. Misschien zijn de grootste mythen, raarste entiteiten en meest vervreemdende monsters wel niet te vinden in het fictionele landschap van het bovennatuurlijke maar juist pal hier in het ‘natuurlijke.’

‘Coral reefs are monsters.’ In Arts of Living on a Dying Planet (2017), stelt Anna Tsing dit natuurlijke fenomeen gelijk aan het bovennatuurlijke. Zoals de mythische chimeras uit de Griekse oudheid – beesten met het hoofd van een leeuw, het lichaam van een geit en de staart van een slang – bestaan koraalriffen uit mismatched onderdelen. Met hun poliepen die zowel dierlijk als plantaardig kunnen zijn, belichamen ze een vreemde ontmoeting tussen de soorten. Symbiose, de interactie tussen twee verschillende organismen die in nauw contact met elkaar leven, wijzen ons wellicht naar een bepaalde, monsterlijke waarheid die essentieel is aan ons huidige tijdperk van leven met de aarde. In al onze kwetsbare verstrengelingen met meer dan menselijk leven, zijn ook wij mensen monsters.

Er zijn literaire verschillen te vinden tussen mythen, sprookjes, sagen, fabels en legenden. Sprookjes, bijvoorbeeld, vinden vaak plaats in een fantasiewereld, waar magische figuren rondzwerven en een strijd tussen goed en kwaad plaatsvindt. Mythes, aan de andere kant, vinden vaak hun oorsprong in religie en vertellen over goden en hemelse scheppers. Beiden bevatten bovennatuurlijke elementen. Soms ligt de basis daarvan in geschiedenis, soms in religie, soms in fantasie. Voor deze uitgave van Simulacrum hebben we er daarom voor gekozen de grenzen tussen deze literaire genres te vervagen, om ons open te stellen voor verschillende mythologieën, hun betekenissen en interpretaties.

Waan je jezelf een moderne mytholoog? Schrijf een artikel van 1.000, 1.400 of 1.800 woorden voor ons komende nummer Mythologieën. De deadline voor de eerste versies is op 15 november 2020. Schrijf je liever een column, interview, fictie of poëzie, of ken je een kunstenaar wiens werk in dit thema ligt? Email naar [email protected]. Voeg artikelen s.v.p. bij als .doc of .docx en portfolio’s als PDF.

#call for papers #myths

[wxldchxld]

An updated timeline:

So, I have reworked a couple of things in Beck’s history but I haven’t written them ON Beck’s history page yet bc that’s going to be a bear to deal with. I’m just going to post this as a hc for right now, and hopefully update the pages in a couple of days.

Look this is LONG and there are trigger warnings for suicide attempt mentions as well as abuse and animal cruelty. None of it is explicit. It’s even more vague than my current history has it. So I’m begging you, if you write with me or want to write with me, please look at this updated canon. But I will put it under a cut for the sake of triggers as well as the insane length that it got to.

Birth - 6

The daughter of a political marriage between the Wolf and the Fox clan leaders. Named Dahlia Adelaida Beck by birth. Born at the height of the winter solstice, marking her as a priestess among her people.

Nicknamed Dolly by her grandmother Alma.

Lives with her mother Élea, her father Oskar, her brother Fenris, and her grandparents Alma and Percy on their family owned land in Montana. She gets Ringo, her first familiar here and learns how to ride a horse, and some basic camping/fishing/farm skills from her father and grandfather. Her grandmother teaches her basic knitting/sewing/cooking. Her mother is, in large part, absent during this period of her life. She and Fenris are inseparable. 

At three Beck makes her first shift into a fox, marking her in the eyes of everyone as a feral witch. Whatever meager affection her mother had for her evaporated completely at that moment.

On her sixth birthday she is given a mare who her father has named Dawnbreaker.

Three months after her sixth birthday her father passes. Her mother takes them on a vacation back to her family home in Sweden that lasts the remainder of the year. They stay with her maternal grandparents, Linnéa and Stefan Tandy

7

A month after Beck’s seventh birthday, Linnéa and Elea have a falling out over the way Elea is treating her children. Elea consistently refuses to take care of Dahlia in particular, and she begins to learn to fend for herself, which is deeply concerning to her grandmother.

Her maternal grandparents ask for custody of both Dahlia and Fenris. Elea responds by taking both of her children back to the states to California where she resumes her master’s program.

Shortly after her mother reverts to her maiden name, and forces her children to do so as well. Dahlia, furious and still deeply grieving her father, declares that her name is Beck, and refuses to answer to anything else.

Elea’s abuse of her children gets worse. Fenris, who was a more passive child, rarely got physically punished like Beck, but he still suffers from severe emotional abuse and manipulation. Beck is, for the most part on her own. She stays out of the house as much as she can, sleeping in parks or other abandoned places, and learning to steal for her food, as there is little to hunt for in the city. This is embarrassing to her mother, and she’s frequently punished for it.

Beck meets Cora, an older witch ostracized by the local covens, who becomes Beck’s mentor in everything she can teach her.

Beck finds the city suffocating, and she frequently wanders out into the countryside when she can, and cries when she cannot. Elea finally consents to bringing the horse her father gave her to a stable outside of town, and lets Beck walk to the stable several times a week. In this time, Dawnbreaker becomes her second familiar.

Both Fenris and Beck are homeschooled by coven members at this time. Most of them are apathetic, some downright hostile to her. She is eventually diagnosed with dyslexia, but is given little help with it.

8-9

Beck is able to stand the city less and less. She begins disappearing for longer periods of time. At first days, then weeks, and eventually she begins to take Dawnbreaker away for months at a time.

Elea, who is using Fenris’ birthright to rule both her people and the Wolves, sends men after her. The fights between them grow even more violent and bitter, and Elea struggles to even cast the appearance that her house is in order. She begins to drive a wedge between Beck and Fen, who still loves his sister dearly. But this backfires, and gives Beck even less reason to return home. 

10

Beck’s mother finds her one final time. When they are brought to Elea this time, they are not taken to the family home in the city, but a secluded section of woods. Her mother proceeds to have her bound, and forces her to watch as Dawnbreaker is hanged from one of the old trees in an attempt to keep her from ever running again.

Several months of inconsolable grief, where she scarcely eats or leaves her bed at all, send her brother Fenris into a mad rage. He begins to plan his revenge in secret. At the next coven meet, he reveals her heinous crime and kills her. The witches absolve him of the murder of another witch in light of what Elea did, and they help cover up the crime.

Shortly after Beck moves in with Cora, but Fenris refuses. He tells her he was offered a chance to learn powerful magic from a coven member, a man Beck doesn’t trust. For the first time in their lives, they are truly separated. 

11-13

Fenris and Beck try repeatedly to mend their relationship and get back to where they were as children, but they fail every time. Beck grows more restless, more wild, by the day, and the magic and fear and anger are twisting Fen into someone she doesn’t know.

Before she can even turn twelve Cora’s loving support is no longer enough for Beck. She has no desire to stay in a house, among people, not even someone she loves. She and Ringo leave the safety of Cora’s home permanently, returning only for visits.

On her thirteenth birthday, Beck is attacked by a mountain lion. After a long battle, before the creature makes its killing blow, she catches the animal’s eye. Understanding sparks between the two of them, and this time when she tells it to go, it obeys. Both she and Ringo are nearly killed in the incident, but her familiar manages to limp to the nearest town and bring back help.

She is taken back to California and returned to her brother rather than Cora. Fenris has grown in power and status among the witches there. Her appearance strikes Fenris with a cold terror, and though he is extremely kind to her in helping her heal, Beck feels as if something is deeply wrong.

14-16

After a long recovery, Beck begins to get restless again. She yearns to return to the wilds. The city suffocates her more and more by the day, but her brother refuses to let her go. 

Tensions between Fenris and Beck reach a boiling point, and she is eventually confined to a room until she agrees to stay in the city with him. The change overtakes Fenris as the year drags on, and he’s not the sweet young boy she once knew. She feels as if she’s living with her enemy rather than her brother.

She is enrolled in a coven school, where they attempt to continue her educate while working around the fact she is almost completely illiterate. This is where she meets Harper, just two months after her 14th birthday.

Beck and Harper fall into a quick, extremely heated teenage passion. All of the grief and loneliness they feel slowly evaporates. Beck reconnects with some of her old friends at this time too. When she’s with them, she feels as happy as she can possibly feel living in a cage, but things only seem to get worse and worse every time she goes home.

 17

On her seventeenth birthday, Harper gives her a ring. Harper is anxious to leave home to move to New York, and asks Beck to marry her the second they’re both eighteen and to move away with her. Harper doesn’t know what’s going on between Fen and Beck. She doesn’t know about the healed bruises and the shouting and the threats. Beck refuses to take the ring without being able to tell Harper the real reason why. Even if Fen did let her leave, she would never survive New York. They don’t break up but Harper vows to leave for Juliard the second she can. With or without Beck.

Between life with her brother and the ever looming deadline of Harper leaving, Beck becomes increasingly fragile and hostile. She knows she cannot stay. 

Harper, older than Beck, leaves for New York a few months later, and without her protective presence, things at home get even worse. When she tells another coven witch, the woman either doesn’t believe her, or she’s too frightened to listen.

After several failed escape attempts, and Fenris’ control getting tighter and tighter, Beck eventually attempts suicide. She is taken to a hospital, a place she’d been a handful of times before because of her brother’s wrath, and a woman there offers her help. She accepts and is stolen away.

Beck is introduced to the Sisters of the Holy St. Marciana of Mauretania, a group of humans, witches, and other supernatural beings who masquerade as an order of nuns. They operate in secret under many names and in many places, helping those that no one else will help. After a brief recovery, Beck leaves them, but not without a promise to help if they call on her. 

18

Beck returns home to her family land, despite knowing her grandparents have long since abandoned it. She finds her father’s old VW bus still in (mostly) running order and begins to use it for travel. 

In the early spring, Beck returns to the wild herds of Montana, where Dawnbreaker lived in the months they were separated, and where she was born. She meets a golden stallion and instantly recognizes him as one of her foals. The stallion begins to follow her around tirelessly, and Beck tries again and again to send him away. But the stallion will not be shooed, and eventually Beck lets him remain with her. She calls him Grani, and soon after he joins her, he becomes her familiar.

Beck begins to do odd jobs and magical favors for people in order to gain certain magical objects, slowly building a steady collection in her bottomless bag.

Beck remains constantly on the run, knowing her brother’s men are only a breath behind her at any moment. She has the van enchanted so it can be easily concealed, can travel off-road, and can haul a horse trailer.

19-21

Beck mostly still lives in the wilds, but takes several jobs helping children and adults escape situations similar to hers. Victims of domestic abuse by powerful people that are beloved or feared by everyone else. These jobs are the only time she goes into cities, and often while she’s doing research and laying low, she steals from wealthy nearby homes and businesses.

During one of these thefts Beck steals a kitten after it follows her out of the mansion she’d just robbed. The kitten becomes her final familiar, and when she gains her sentience, she re-names herself Angrboda.

In the fall before her 22nd birthday Beck sees Harper jogging in Central Park while working on a job. Knowing it was a bad idea, she still approached her. Harper was different in almost every way, and yet some how she was still as hopelessly passionate and deeply furious as the day she’d left for New York.

22-24

Beck and Harper fall back into a relationship. Perhaps both of them knew it was a bad idea, or maybe it was only Beck, but dread grew alongside passion. Harper could scarcely stand her absences, and life in the city was hell on Beck.

They dated for two years. Harper even consented to moving out of the city center to a farm near Roxbury. Marriage was a frequent topic between them both, and yet it never happened.

Eventually even Harper’s power on the East Coast wasn’t enough to keep Fenris away, and the fear of the conflict that would ensue between the witch factions and fearing her brother and deeply missing her life on the road, Beck left. She couldn’t bring herself to say goodbye, and it has been her greatest regret.

24-present

Beck lives in the wilds with her familiars, constantly traveling, and for the most part very happy. There are people she misses, and places she knows she can never return to, but she’s free. Even on nights when she’s hungry or the weather is bitter and savage, she’s free. 

She’s mastered several other forms in this time, and I didn’t want to break down their discoveries by age, but they happened over the years, not just after she turned 25.

#hc

[superemeralds]

my sonic characters: a masterpost

I’ll add more whenever i get new info on characters and so on sakjsak

I used to have more but i gave some of them away so i dont feel like i should mention them here (even if those designs are not in use anymore)

[edit 4/20/2019 (haha) added nexus and links to character tags]

1) Saph the hedgehog

This is Saph. He’s a 18/19 year old disaster gay trans boy.

I change his shoe design literally every single time i draw him. :)

I’ll go in depth about his past later.

Saph is pretty much all over the place and forgets to be considerate of other peoples feelings sometimes. He might come off as very egoistic of self centered, but he does actually care in his own kind of way (even when its. kinda bad bc he gives off wrong signals sometimes and ends up hurting people hes close to)

He’s looked up to Sonic ever since he was small and he collects all of the Sonic comics and video games. His dream is to meet Sonic and win against him in a fight.

Shadow is his big idol in many things so he tries to be edgy sometimes or act tough but he fails miserably most of the time and makes a fool of himself; which he doesn’t really mind because he can take a lot of things with humour (sometimes too much). He also uses white eye liner to imitate shadows marks, and he dyes some parts of his fur white to make the marks he already has extend to look more like shadows.

Shadow was the person that taught him how to control his chaos powers, because he’d always just weakened himself in the past, because he is super unstable. (If it wasnt for Shadow he probably would have died by now.) Shadow also was the one that told Saph to go to Tails for help with the buckles on his wrists and the rings on his ankles. They are made of a material similar to shadows rings (tails tried his best to replicate them) so they would help keep the energy in Saph balanced. Due to his strong affiliation to Chaos Energy, he could technically even turn super; but his body would be unable to hold the immense amount of energy and begin to literally burn down to ash within a few minutes.

He is very gay and in a relationship with Ezra.

He’s on T and has not yet had top op. (his bobbies smol its all muscle >:3€ )

Old pic of him and his bf as humans uwu

2) Red the hedgehog

Red is 25/26 years old and works at GUN as special agent. Sometimes he and Rouge get drunk in her club at night and joke about tearing that organization down (or maybe they are not joking)

he’s pansexual and horny 24/7. He has a girlfriend and is in an open relationship. hes polyam if you didnt guess it askdsajh

he’s blind in the right eye and has a tattoo of a star on his chest

(here’s his gijinka because i just. hes hot. he used to be the one character that had like 30 fangirls on deviantart and each of them would comment “nosebleed” every time i uploaded)

ANYWAYS

Saph and Red. They are brothers.

*WARNING: abusive parents, transphobia, homophobia, violence

When red was a young lad and Saph was still a baby their father snapped and beat Red up with an iron bar, making him blind on his right eye. Red took Saph and ran away from home.(Their mother died at saphs birth)

They lived and still live in a city a litte farther off Empire City.

Red decided to go to an orphanage because he could not possibly take care of an infant. (granted his dad couldnt either but it seemed the best possible solution)

They lived in the orphanage for a few years, but saph very soon showed sighns of being trans and got bullied by the other kids. they would call him gay and tr*nny and kick him until he fell silent to endure his “punishment”.

Red couldn’t take it and decided to run away with Saph again. They lived on the street for a while, but Red was caught by GUN for stealing. Once they found out he had a form of chaos powers (even if weak) they decided to let him slide and hire him as Special Agent.

Red accepted this and uses the money he ears to make sure Saph has a good life. This kinda spoiled Saph a little, but he also deserved it lets be real here.

Red made sure to enable saph to get education (which he totally refuses to acknowledge and take seriously) and physical transition.

*WARNING END*

3) Ellectra “Ellie” the tenrec

[ pardon me being inconsequent with the design omg ]

Ellie is a 20 year old functional asexual demiromantic lesbian who is not interested in dumb boys and would rather talk about science with a pretty girl.

She can manipulate electricity and is called “Daughter of Zeus” by the townsfolk in her home island called Coral Island, which is located near the windsmil isles in Apotos.

She studies archeology and gaia mythology/ancient history, which makes it very convenient that she lives nearby an actual gaia temple. (She wants to be like lara croft one day)

At the 2005 black arms invasion her mother got heavily wounded when she tried to protect the town from the aliens and died from the aftermath.

Ever since then Ellie hates Shadow with a burning passion and holds him responsible, because she believed the government propaganda (provided by GUN ofc) that Shadow is One Of The Aliens. If she was ever to meet him she would be FURIOUS and ready to murder (she knows he cant die though).

She tried not to focus too much on that and just. do her cool ancient stuff.

Here are her parents Chion and... the mother i had still not found a good name for.

5) Chion the tenrec

This gentleman is 40+ years old and proud father of Ellie.

Hes also a het ace.

Chion is greek for snow (as far as google translate goes) and he was named that bc of his white nose lmao. its like a snowflake on his black body.

He doesn’t have any elemental powers, but he is naturally very strong and will punch anyone who comes close to his family. He can also use swords and is a skilled swordsman.

He inherited an olive farm from his family and he does keep it going. He makes his money selling olive products he does make himself.

6) Athena the hedgehog

Athena was the daughter of the “major” of the island that the family lived on (coral island), so she was expected to become the new major once he had to retire.

Due to the location of the island and the geographical landmarks on it, many raiders (and also eggman) have great interest in the ruins and mythological places. Athena is not one to give in easily and defended her people and the island from many intruders.

She possessed a less particular (than Ellie), but still fierce power of lightning manipulation. Having used her powers excessively, she sustained severe damage to her arms which showed as lighting shaped scars. She showed them with pride, because they meant she had fought hard to get where she was now.

She was bisexual and married to a tenrec called Chion. She was a year older than him.

The rings Ellie wears on her wrists were her mom’s.

7) Frost the snow leopard

Frost is a 15 year old demiboy who really just wants to have a good time. He hasnt really given his sexuality much thought.

He lives in a small village in Holoska; hes actually even met the werehog. Well he saw him. but he was too afraid to talk to him because holy shit its Sonic The Hedgehog!!!!!!!

He has ice powers!!!!

His insides are like -18°C and he cant eat anything that is hot. He has to eat cooked meals when they are room temperature, or even cooled down to fridge temperatures ( about 6°C).

He basically lives off ice cream and dry meat (if they get fancy food from the city he gets frozen pizza) He thinks of going to the UF for college, but he doesnt really know what he wants to do with his life yet so hes just having fun snowboarding.

8) Mitzu the Cheetah

Mitzu is 22 years old and owns a flower shop/chao garden combo where she takes care of chao, while taking care of flowers and breeding them. Her hydrokinesis powers are very helpful in that!

She loves nature and the outdoors and feeling the grass under her feet, so she doesn’t wear shoes/socks. Ever.

She generally is very free spirited and optimistic!

Shes a big sapphic but shes also okay w being single atm.

Her chao are like children to her and she loves the chao that get left in the garden as much as her own. (ppl leave their chao there when they cant watch over them anymore or if they go for a vacation and cant take them with them or smth)

9) Dan the red panda*

Dan is 17 years old and a big homo.

He has no special powers, except being able to eat and sleep more than the average person.

He’s from a very rich family, but his parents insisted in him finding a wife to like. pass down the heritage but he aint having none of that so his punk ass ran away from home to be his gay self and study art. 

He lives in a tree house a little off a small village in a more rural area in east UF, near station square. let the depression boy be happy...

10) Yoshi the siamese cat

Yoshi is a 20 year old enby kitty who wants to make the world a gayer place!

They are studying fashion design in hope to one day open their own fashion store for queer people! The clothes are made with body differences in mind and they also want to offer a free customization service to fit clothes to every single body type.

They don’t have any special powers as of now but i kinda want to give them a power that could be helpful with their goal Im still thinking about it ...

11) Joel “Spirit” the Husky

Spirit is fresh ripe 14 years old and Sonic the hedgehog is his big big idol. He wants to be JUST like him when he grows up.

It has come to my attention that he is basically the sonic universe Deku and I may or may not be planning to write a fanfiction for that...........

He doesn’t have any special offensive powers, but he has orange blood and he has the ability to read the Chaos Signature of anything he encounters. (called: Chaos Vision)

This means he will immediately know if a person he meets has super powers and he will also know what that power is. He can also guess the emotions of people because they are tied to the kind of chaos energy that surrounds a person.

12) Aurora the Husky

Spirit’s Sister!

Her name is Aurora and she also has Chaos Vision!

She was born blind, but she’s been able to see with her power, so that’s just what the world looks like to her: Darkness with many many colorful lights.

Over time through hard training she was able to perfect her vision and be able to distinguish between a lot of things and even see things that only have very little chaos energy in them!

13) Axel the Axolotl*

I don’t really have much info on them I made them pretty random one day bc i thought. hey. .... what if... axolotl sonic character.

14) Azul the cat

Azul is my sonicsona kinda. He was pmuch my persona b4 i was kin w shadow. 

He’s an edgelord and i guess he’s still technically me; or rather what i want to be. 

He’s already on T and has has top op and he does not crumble away under social anxiety like i do askjdsakjd.

15) ( UNKNWOWN) the Pangolin*

Similar to Axel I didn’t think much about him yet......  

he’s aroace and kinda goofy but he cares for his friends. He can roll up and do spin dashes and homing attacks like sonic, but he obviously doesnt have his super sonic speed.

16) Coal the hedgehog

Coal is one of the newest of my characters; but he’s also one of my oldest. 

You see, Coal is a revamp of a very old crappy fanchild i had back in like 2012.

for reference thats him

New Coal is 27 years old and a gay mess. He can turn into a cloud of smoke and control it at will. He is completely immune to physical attacks. try to stab/shoot him and u ded. hes coming for u.

he steals, but only from rich ppl. hes chaotic neutral tho bc he keeps that shit for himself safhsaljfha he generally just wants to chill and have his peace. 

he loves being an edge lord though he just wants that image for himself, even though he is kinda a softie... hes good at keeping up an act in dangerous situations though and that sometimes scares attackers off (also his powers)

Some gijinka doodles that make his age more justice than sonic style aksjfhaskj

17, 18, 19) The Crew On ARK

old bad art but i never really drew them, i did write about them in my fic about shadows past! (im excluding the black guy from the list because i didnt write him yet and i guess hes not really established yet since i got literally nothing on him)

from left to right

Nia, (that dude), Hikari, (gerald), Theodor

Nia is the daughter of a shamaran professor and a woman who owns a boulongerie in spagonia. She joined the ARK program in hope to make the world a more accepting place.

Hikari is is from an island near chun-nan (japan) and she also joined the program in hope to be able to help make a change for the better. she also enjoys biology and genetics a lot.

Theodor joined purely because of his joy in working on genetics and robotics that immitate life. He’s innitially from the GUN team but was assigned to work with Gerald.

20) Commander Jonathan Williams

old art again sorry sakjfhsakj. He is the father of the current GUN commander! He’s 52 and a total douchebag. He’s kinda mad with power and genuinely believes that putting shadow under pressure to become the ultimate and strongest weapon (stronger than an atomic bomb) was necessary to end the war that was going on at that time.

I cannot spoil too much on what happened to each of these people as it’s spoilers for my fanfic. 

If you want to know more, read here -> http://archiveofourown.org/works/10992156/chapters/24482199

21) Sidus “Nova” the black panther (and 22 Badass the Chao)

You see. The thing with nova is that i recycled him as human/demon character for a story sjkhfkafhsakj but he has shadow powers where he can use all shadows as portals into a shadow dimension that is entirely his own. he can travel through that but it makes him very tired. he likes to store capri suns in there and just take em out whenever he wants. He has a Chao called Badass (pictured below)

his new human/demon design is below

23) Blossom the horned Frog

She is new and I don’t have much info other than that she’s from a jungle area; perhaps in adabat.

She secrets a poisonous slime from her body; yet her spit has healing accelerating properties.

A gene defect lets her never lose her tail.

24) Nexus the demonic sheep hound

nexus is a demonic sheep hound mix?? idk i just didnt want to draw hooves aksfsakhfa

they can manipulate metal and bend it in any shape they want

however they cant make it float n shit like youd think of metal powers like magneto jsfhsakjf they can literally just. shape it like play-doh but with their mind

they wear those gold rings so when theyre in a pinch they can just make a bunch of cool knifes of a sword n be like SURPRISE BITCH IM NOT JUST PRETTY. IM PRETTY DEADLY!

#my characters #shadows logbook

[sunflowerchester]

please tell me what you thought!! I'm not worried about spoilers, i already know what happened, i'm gonna see it in a few days and i'm so psyched! tell me all your thoughts please!!!

I am so charged up about this movie I don’t even know where to fucking start!!! I guess I’ll start with my initial Twitter rant bc GODDDAAAAMMMMNNNN!

Here’s some non-spoilery things about the movie for those who don’t want to be spoiled:

Mother! is a horror movie for every woman whose pain was ever used & romanticized to further a man’s personal growth.

Mother! is a horror movie for women who have invested and fallen in love with a selfish man.

Mother! is a horror movie for women who feel the constant suffocating entitlement of the patriarchy.

Mother! is a horror movie for women who feel they’ve been constantly taken advantage of and are demonized for daring to speak up about it.

Mother! is a horror movie version of The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein. (And I said this BEFORE I saw this tweet by the director 😍)

Mother! is a horror movie for any woman who was only valued as a cure for a man’s pain instead of valued as a full, human person.

Mother! is a horror movie for women who were treated like IRL manic pixie dream girls and then tossed aside like garbage. 

Also I found it able to tap into horrors of being a woman that were subtle and specific in a slightly Get Out kind of way, imho. I felt very understood in many ways even as I was being horrified by what I was seeing. 

Below are some spoilery things:

The movie opens with a woman burning, a tear falling down her face, and then her turning to ash. Javier Bardem sets a gem stone on a stand and then a beautiful home surrounded by nature appears out of the ashes. I knew as soon as Javier Bardem’s character sat that gem on the mantel and the scene turned to Jennifer Lawrence appearing out of the ashes in bed that that is where the movie would end, and it would end with another girl in her place. 

AND IT DID. For a bit there at the end, I was wondering where it was headed because of the chaos, and I nearly forgot about the gem itself, but then we ended right where I expected. What I didn’t forsee was what the gem was made of: it was the last thing that Bardem’s character could squeeze out of his previous lover before she turned to ash, something beautiful that he could put on display before he started it all over again with someone new. 

GOD-FUCKING-DAMN

This movie is about a woman who gives all of herself (physically, literally, spiritually, emotionally, horrifically) to a man because she loves him, because it is expected, because she thinks he will view it as love, and it is never enough. He never stops taking from her, not even when there are literal mobs in their home tearing the physical house apart, stealing their belongings. At one point an actual war spills into their house and she barely escapes with the life of herself and the child she is about to give birth to. When she begs her husband to send these people away, he refuses because they stroke his ego. 

I don’t think the chaos of the previous 10 minutes of the film before she asks this question nor her struggle through them were literal but rather a representation of how it feels to be in her position, where she’s tried everything to be enough for this man for as long as she has been with him, rebuilt his house by hand, made it a home, served all his guests and fans without complaint, and even carried his child. She finally started believing with her pregnancy that she was going to win him over and be with just him, that this would be the key to finally meeting that standard of enough, but that was never who he was ever going to be for her, even as a father. And when she realizes, at 8 months pregnant, that his true love is still himself, his writing, and his fans, despite his child growing in her womb, she felt her world slip. The insanity of the the wars, the executions, the mobs in the house weren’t real but that’s how it felt. Her world was crumbling and she’d never regain any control again. 

In the end he even invites his fans to hold their baby and the baby ends up dying. It’s horrific and disgusting, and what does he say to her? He tells her that it can be something beautiful and encourages her to forgive, that there is nothing more beautiful than forgiveness, so they must. As if she doesn’t have rights to feeling ugliness in the face of losing her child. I felt suffocated myself by this immediately invalidation of even the most understandable and vulnerable of feelings. 

There are other moments like this throughout the movie where Jennifer Lawrence’s character is trying to speak up and voice her needs but it’s like shouting into a pillow as she asks politely and reasonably. No one listens or seems to care, especially not her husband. He seems to only placate her lovingly when he can tell she needs to feel he’s heard her, but he never really does or cares to try to actually listen to her. This last time, when she is weeping about her son being murdered by the people he allowed into their house, is the last straw and she calls the people around her what they are: MURDERERS. And because she finally yells and screams at them, they beat the everloving shit out of her and call her names like whore and bitch and cunt, etc etc. 

So she makes her way down to the furnace and burns the fucker down. GIRL YES BURN THAT BITCH TO THE GROUND.

And yet after the explosion that incinerates it all, guess who is intact and who is charred to the bone. Javier Barden, completely complete, carries Jennifer Lawrence, a burned, scaley version of herself, through the rubble of the house. She can’t understand how he is able to do this when she and everything she built is destroyed. 

She asks, “What are you?” He replies, “I am life.” She asks, ”What am I?” He replies, “You are home.”

You don’t have to be sexualized to still be objectified and if this isn’t exactly the damaging dynamic in so many male/female relationships, I don’t know what is. He is what life is and she is where he gets to live. Does she have her own life, her own plans, her own goals, her own space? It doesn’t matter, she exists to house him. 

She asks, “Where are you taking me?”He replies, “To the beginning.”

He lays her on the charred bed and tells her there is one more thing he needs from her. She says she has nothing left to give. He says that isn’t true, he wants her love. She relents. “Take it.” He digs physically into her abdomen and pulls something bloody and charred out. Jennifer Lawrence’s character turns to ash and the mess in Javier Bardem’s character’s hands turns into a gem. He marvels at how beautiful a thing it is, the only thing left of his lover. He doesn’t grieve that she is nothing but a pile of ash now, he sets the gem up where the old one once sat and the opening scene repeats with a new girl waking in their bed, signifying that this is what this man does to women and what he will continue to do. He doesn’t learn his lesson or change because he doesn’t value the women he is with enough to see their pain as destruction. Instead, he only sees it for how it can benefit him.

She is ash. He is whole. A parasite going from woman to woman. 

To me, one of the scariest elements of this movie is that Javier Bardem’s character himself isn’t really that scary, he’s not a horror. He’s even sweet sometimes, albeit neglectful af. What’s smart and unfortunately really relatbale about this is it makes him seem like (if not a good guy at least) an okay guy. He’s not evil. She doesn’t befall this horrible fate because he is malicious. It’s a Nice Guy who just wants to Create something Beautiful. But in the process he fucking destroys and sucks the entire life out of the woman he is supposed to love with no remorse at all. There are so many fucking men out there who do this very thing to every woman they are with, emotionally and mentally. Sometimes physically, too, but that’s easier to pinpoint. The horror of Javier Bardem in Mother! is that he could be and really kind of is many of the men we will come in contact with. 

(Bro I know I’ve fallen in love with and had this done to me by one ALREADY)

My thoughts on how this movie has been received:

What blows my MIND is that large groups of people DO NOT GET this movie and I think it’s because it is largely and almost exclusively a fundamental female experience. There are whole hot takes and think pieces trying to figure out HMMM WHAT IS THIS MOVIE ABOUT???? when like…to me, it was obvious and direct in my opinion. I’m not trying to be a bitch about it, like I’m smarter than everyone. I understand that I get it because it’s for me, it’s about a female perspective, but to say it’s about nothing is ASININE. Which many of them are saying. 

If you don’t like the way this movie told its story, that’s fine and fair. We all have different tastes. But if you don’t get the message and therefore want to criticize what it’s trying to say because you think it was pointless, maybe THINK AGAIN. It didn’t fail because you PERSONALLY don’t get it. It maybe just means that there are other experiences in this world and you’re lucky enough to have never had to understand what this movie is saying, the feelings it evokes in many viewers, or the horrors it represents for them. And most likely never will.  If the movie is just not for you I GET THAT bc damn it was rough, IT WAS HARD, it was awful. But it wasn’t about nothing. If you didn’t see the point, be thankful.

There were some think pieces analyzing it and coming to the conclusion that it was about global warming and the Catholic church, which there was definitely some imagery for but that for SURE was not the POINT. If you thought Mother! was just about taking on the Catholic Church while identifying the other ‘weird’ stuff in it as just ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ you MAY be ignoring the literal title character of the movie & her entire emotional journey throughout the whole thing. 

Which, SHOCKER, is like… the point of the entire movie. 

Good job I GUESS. But you still missed point by proving it. 

I mean, I get it, make it about whatever resonates with you, but it is undeniably about a fundamentally female experience. No wonder it’s being overlooked. "Gee what could this movie entitled ‘Mother!’ be about? Should we look at the mother character in the movie?? OR HOW ABOUT we just dive into the symbolism surrounding the woman instead while ignoring her completely.“ 👍🏻

To me it seemed any side-symbolism in that movie was to promote the dynamic of her giving all she was & him feeding off of it. Including any messianic imagery. As a smart, smart friend of mine said, “Men will of course deify themselves all the time.” That’s EXACTLY what the religious imagery was about, about Javier Bardem’s character living out his desire to be a god to his fans for his own ego, so deep that he let them devour his own child. It was about the church but it was only in service TO EMPHASIZE HOW HE CONSUMES HER AND WHAT SHE HAS GIVEN. Like… LORD help me. (No pun intended.)

I cannot believe a horror film about a female experience is so baffling for people to understand when we’re half the people out there. “WHAT IS IT ABOUT?????” It’s about what she’s showing you it’s about. PAY ATTENTION!! 

But how poetic (ew gross) that many people who don’t get it write it off. It’s the same reason so often women are not believed and their experiences are questioned. No wonder women feel LIKE NO ONE LISTENS.

It’s like there are people looking directly at this movie screen and seeing a blank black box for 75% of it. And here I am screaming into a pillow.

This is not to say that Mother! doesn’t take on many things, it does. There is a lot to unpack and it would be unfair of me to say there is only one way to read it. Of course there isn’t, and many parts are going to resonate with different people for different reasons. With that being said, though, to anyone trying to make the point of this movie about anything other than the experience of the female lead character, remember the gemstone and the burning woman at the beginning of the film, and then at the end. It is bookended this way for a reason. This is about the pattern of a man and how it affects the women he chooses to be with. This is about a woman who loves a selfish man who unapologetically lives selfishly and what it does to her to be in his life. 

It’s metaphors, it’s symbolism, obviously it’s hyperbolic, but it’s still REAL👏🏻AS👏🏻FUCK👏🏻.

#feminism #mother! #darren aronofsky #mother! film #mother! 2017 #javier bardem #jennifer lawrence #Anonymous #mother spoilers #woa notes

[signurture]

Kat Edison Personality/Zodiac Analysis

Ok, here we go: to the anon that asked why I think Kat is a scorpio

In all honesty tho you can relate to multiple signs if you really try.

Nonetheless, I think theres multiple aspects of Kat Edison’s personality that point towards her being a Scorpio. I’ll separate this into strengths, weaknesses, and “other personality traits” of scorpios and how Kat fits in w/ them. I’ll be providing examples from her relationship with her friends to her relationship with Adena.

Strengths

Bravery - Every episode we are told of how brave she is. From the very first episode where she wasn’t shy to speak up during a meeting when asking about the cancellation of the lesbian muslim article. In that same episode, Sutton calls her confident. In 1x04, at Adena’s gallery, Jane say’s she wishes she was as brave as Kat. You can just tell that she isn’t afraid to fight more what she wants and believes in.

Passionate/Determination - This one is pretty obvious. Kat is very passionate about her work. We can see that in every project she takes on. She went after the muslim story even after her boss said to drop it. She spoke out about the sexism in VR headsets and when she received backlash, she went out of her way to make an ad about cyberbullying. Kat is always giving all she has into what she does and doesn’t expect to fail. That same episode (1x03) where she walked out when giving a pitch to the board bc someone leaked her nude, remember she was ready to walk right back in bc she knew she could fix it.

Leadership - Kat is a leader. She is the Social Media Director for Scarlet. This one doesn't really need an explanation. She enjoys being in charge and takes that responsibility with ease. It comes natural to her.

Weaknesses

Obsessive - Ok, Kat has a very obsessive personality. I already touched on it a little earlier. we can see it in how she didn’t give up on Adena’s lesbian muslim story even though she was turned down by not only Jacq but Adena herself. In episode 3, we see her obsessing over her phone/twitter when she receives all the backlash. In episode 5, she’s obsessing over her impact on Adena and Coco’s relationship. She even admitted to stalking Coco’s Facebook(?) and we see her stop in the middle of the side walk to check Coco’s instagram. There’s other examples but you get the point.

Impulsive - Kat shows signs of this behavior a couple of times. A lot of the time she talks before she thinks and it gets her in trouble. We’ve seen it in the first episode in the subway when she snaps at Sutton. She does it when Adena gets detained and she almost starts a hashtag to free Adena until she’s stopped by Lauren. We really see it in episode 4 and 5. in 4, Kat was quick to punch the man that was being racist to Adena. In episode 5, she’s quick to call things off with Adena.

Jealousy - Now this one is a bit harder to notice. Episode 5 is where i believe we really see it. I think we might see it more in the next episode? Maybe, maybe not. But in 1x05, she is clearly jealous of Adena and Coco’s relationship. Despite Adena choosing her, she still envy’s how Coco and Adena had a deep history. We hear it when she talks about how Coco and Adena have done all these incredible things together and when she says “not all of them bad” referring to the 3 years Adena spent with Coco. This one is harder to dictate bc it has more so to do with relationships and we haven't seen Kat in one to even get jealous. I do think that her stalking Coco’s social media and telling Adena to go back to her “beautiful, successful, certified lesbian girlfriend” was partly jealousy. We’ll see how Kat reacts to Adena going back to Paris tho.

Other Aspects of Kat’s Personality (these don't really fit in the good/bad list)

Independence - It’s pretty clear Kat is an independent woman. She works alone, lives alone, and has never been in a relationship. So she enjoys her independence. In episode 3, she says herself that the only phone number she knows in Scarlet’s. She really doesn't seem to have any other friends other than Sutton and Jane. She doesn’t do relationships. It was hinted that her relationship with her family isn’t that close either.

Secretive/Emotional - Just like scorpios, Kat is very emotional but can hide it very well. She tries put on a mask to hide how she truly feels. In episode 3, she tries to act like the hate tweets don’t affect her at all. Multiple times in her interactions with Adena, she tries to hide how she really feels about her. Her emotions go to the extreme. I mean she goes from being confessing her feelings to Adena in the middle of the night to being completely cold, telling Adena to leave her workplace bc she can't do relationships then back to running to Adena’s apartment to tell her she wants to be in a relationship. Kat is all over the place lol. Understandably, considering her situation and personality.

Misunderstood - Funny how this lines up perfectly with Kat. I’ve researched scorpios and it always (!!!) comes back to this word multiple times. Scorpio’s are difficult to understand and always have more going on in their head/heart than they seem to express. This really doesn’t need any further explanation bc Kat literally sent Adena a picture of herself holding up a sign that says “Misunderstood”.

Sex - This one is easy. Its no secret that scorpios are the most sexually driven signs. Kat has said that she enjoys sex and sticks to just that when it comes to relationships. She enjoys and prefers a physical relationship. She's very comfortable with that part of herself.

Controlling/Protective - This one can go hand in hand with the leadership but here I’m magnifying her controlling nature with Adena. When I say controlling I don't mean it in a negative form. It’s more of a dominance. I’ll point out two instances. The first being in 1x04 where she punches the guy who insulted Adena. Her first reaction is to always protect Adena. as said before, she was impulsive in this act, admitting it in the taxi cab ride with Jacq. The second instance(s) is when she's kissing Adena. In both cases she's the one directing. She's the one in control. In the 1x04 Kat is the one that intensifies the kiss and moves Adena’s hand to her waist. In the 1x05 kiss, Kat is the one that holds the back of Adena’s neck. She always leading as far as we’ve seen.

That pretty much wraps it up. Do you think she’s a Scorpio? Did I just waste my time for no reason? Am I Kadena trash? Let me know :))))

**This is obviously all just speculation and opinion since we don't know Kat’s birth date. From what I analyzed, I’m getting Scorpio vibes all the way. Hopefully TBT creators follow horoscopes lol. Please let me know if I missed anything or you feel that something is inaccurate. Comments/discussion is always welcomed <3 If i could make gifs i would've to make it more interesting but I'm a talentless hoe**

#This took hours #and i had way too much fun doing this #kat edison #adena el amin #kadena #the bold type #wlw #zodiac #scorpio #horoscope #mine #analysis

[crimsonrevolt]

Congratulations Prince you’ve been accepted to Crimson Revolt as Amycus Carrow!

↳ please refer to our character checklist

There was so much obvious love and thought that you put into Amycus that your entire application was so beautiful to read through (although heartbreaking and terrifying at times too!) You crafted a villain who we can sympathize with, and gave Amycus a humanity that others might’ve failed at. We think that his relationship to his family, his father and Alecto in particular, was really well explored -- and you gave us a firm grasp on who Amycus is in a way that brought him to life before our eyes. We’re so happy you decided to apply and we can’t wait to see Amycus on the dash! *your faceclaim change to Ben Barnes has been accepted 

application beneath the cut ( tw: gore, torture, abuse, murder, etc.) 

OUT OF CHARACTER

INTRODUCTION

Prince 19 he/him

ACTIVITY

7/10 I work about half the day so I’m free early afternoon on/weekends.

TRIGGERS

*removed for privacy

HOW DID YOU FIND US?

the marauders rp tag, promo blog. was in this rp like, ~7-8 months ago??

WHAT HARRY POTTER CHARACTER DO YOU IDENTIFY WITH MOST?

I don’t remember much since it’s been such a long time since reading. I know I definitely always had a soft spot for Neville when reading the books though.

ANYTHING ELSE?

Here you can tell us everything else you have in mind like questions, concerns, notations or anything else you can think of

IN CHARACTER

DESIRED CHARACTER

Amycus Aldrich Carrow

Amycus; Amykos, Latinized as Amycus, in legend was the son of Poseidon and the Bithynian nymph Melia. He was a boxer and King of the Bebryces; killed ina boxing match.

Aldrich; A name meaning ‘a wise and aged ruler.’ With such a name, his family expects and predicts great things of their boy. He will one day be powerful, so very strong.

Carrow; “Carrow” in Norfolk, or “Carraw” in Northumberland. The first is assumed to have its name derived from the Old English word “carr”, meaning “rock”, and a word of Celtic origin; “hoh”, meaning “spur of a hill”.  

FACE CLAIM

Xavier Dolan, Ben Barnes, Mikkel Jensen

REASON FOR CHOSEN CHARACTER

I’ve played Amycus for, about a year’s worth, on and off, and I enjoy him because he’s his own person but also has the ‘dynamic’ of having a twin, and living/making decisions not only for himself but sometimes for the both of them, or having them being treated as ‘the same’ by others, because they are twins. Like, it’s interesting to have a character so closely linked to Amycus. And I love exploring his family dynamic bc he’s one of the characters that doesnt really have a ‘set’ past in canon, so there’s so many different ways he could end up because of what his life was like as he grew up.

—

Amycus could say his childhood had been. Interesting. Born the male of a pair of twins, he was favored, and it wasn’t hidden. He was given the love and attention his sister was denied, and the words that best described his as a toddler were ‘spoiled brat’. He grew up learning he could have whatever he wanted, and that ‘no’ didn’t really mean ‘no’, not to someone with power and money like him. Though his parents weren’t entirely interested in raising children. They wanted an heir to the family and had no time or patience to deal with a growing child, let alone two. A lot of Amycus’ childhood was spent playing his sister and hiding from his tutors and nannies.

Amycus was very young when he realized what the world was like. His father had never been a pleasant person, and the nights he would drink were the nights the whole family suffered by his hands. He and his sister learned the world was ‘dog eat dog’, and many dog eaters looked like humans. They learned to be vicious and bare their teeth at others. As they got older, they learned it wasn’t enough to look scary; you had to be scary. They must pit themselves against the world or die trying. Fear of his father and reality of the world drove Amycus to learn to defend himself, in anyway he should need to. Amycus learned to defend himself, he needed to be the monster he was afraid of, and very readily embraced it.

Amycus learned to be vicious, as did his sister, but didn’t learn to hide it behind polite smiles and good manners as she did. The words that best described him as a young teen were ‘cruel monster’. Amycus was mean, he was a sadistic monster that choked kids until their eyes pleaded with him for their lives, whose pranks turned from mean letters to disemboweled pets as Christmas presents. The voices that coo words to him in his head remind him what a monster he is. Sometimes, the voices are quiet, and Amycus is never sure whether he’s glad for the silence, or is afraid of it.

Amycus has dragged himself down into a rotten little hole now, which he knows will one day make his grave. His time in school in Slytherin house led to him to making friends with other ‘bad’ children, and is where he found his interest in the Dark Arts. Now working with the Death Eaters, Amycus has found a place where he feels more accepted, though he still garners dirty looks with his bloodied hands and maddened grins.

PREFERRED SHIPS // CHARACTER SEXUALITY // GENDER & PRONOUNS

Amycus will sleep with whomever says yes. He’s not picky by any means whatsoever. Sex is sex, after all. A means to an end. Amycus identifies loosely as a cis-male, and prefers he/him pronouns but also answers to they/them as he’s used to being addressed as a pair along side Alecto. If he had the information, he’d probably identify something closer to agender, but as that’s all very abstract and not widely shared information at this time, he’s simply content with being called a male.

CREATE ONE (OR MORE!) OF THE FOLLOWING FOR YOUR CHARACTER:

Quotes and lyrics: -  “When the Fox hears the Rabbit scream he comes a-runnin’; but not to help.” – Mason Verger - “Killing must feel good to God, too. He does it all the time. Are we not created in his image?” –Hannibal Lecter - “ I love you crookedly because my heart’s been unhinged from birth. The doctors gave me strict instructions not to fall in love: my fragile clockwork heart would never survive.  “ –Jack and the Cuckoo Clock Heart -“ In the end You dig yourself the hole you’re in” –Dig Your Own Hole -“  God, I pity the violins In glass coffins they keep coughing They’ve forgotten, forgotten how to sing ” –All The Rowboats

headcanons;

-Amycus is surprisingly good at memorizing spells, and knows quite a few charms and curses, more than the average students learned at Hogwarts. He’s had a few private tutors at the behest of his father, and read quite a few books on magic in his spare time. He’s very good at martial magics, and can sustain a Fiendfyre for quite a long time without losing it’s control. -Amycus is photosensitive, and often gets migraines from being in the light for too long. Thus, he prefers being a night owl, or at least avoiding being outside, especially if it’s a sunny or bright day. He likes keeping his room and as much of the house dark as he can, which makes the place look pretty gloomy. -Due to very little social interaction beyond his sister as a child, Amycus has a hard time understanding sarcasm, and often take’s other’s opinions in a very ‘black and white’ way. He thinks people either like him, or hate him, and there’s no in between. Also, people are either angry with him, or enjoy him; he has a hard time knowing if he’s upset people, and struggles to read into tone of voice and other social cues. -Amycus is rather paranoid about noise, and enjoys the quiet. He very often moves around to avoid noise, and is easily set off into distress or anger over loud noises. He’s most afraid of the sound of footsteps, as it reminds him of the sound of his parent’s coming down the halls of their home as a child. -It’s more likely than not Amycus lies somewhere on the Autism Spectrum, but his parents only considered him a fussy child. Even he doesn’t think he’s autistic, mainly because mental illness is stigmatized and not talked about, especially among wizarding communities. -Amycus has schizoaffective disorder, and cycles between intense depressions and manias. He suffers from auditory hallucinations that started to develop during his time in school, and soon after he started having visual hallucinations, though those are much more uncommon to him. -Amycus is a very physical person and enjoys being able to touch objects or other people, but understands personal boundaries. He won’t continually touch those who’ve expressed discomfort about it. When idle, he often likes having something to hold on hold onto, or to be held himself. He wears heavy jackets often, even in the heat, because the weight of it on his shoulders is comforting. -Amycus usually has his wand up one of his sleeves strapped his his forearms; mainly to his right as he’s a left handed person. He also often carries a switchblade on him. Amycus often wanders off into the Muggle parts of town, and fighting with a knife leaves less clues to point back to him than using magic against them. Though due to his temper, he’s been known to try and stab anyone who upsets him, even other wizards.

IN CHARACTER QUESTIONAIRE

♔ If you were able to invent one spell, potion, or charm, what would it do, what would you use it for or how would you use it? Feel free to name it:

“Some kind of…Weaker Cruciatus maybe. I mean, hey, a good Cruciatus is great. But sometimes you only need a little, something to push someone off the edge. You have to stop a Cruciatus to get people to talk. Something a little less strong, you could torture them and get ‘em to give up whatever you want. Wouldn’t that just, be great?”

♔ You have to venture deep into the Forbidden Forest one night. Pick one other character and one object (muggle or magical), besides your wand, that you’d want with you:

“Alecto, obviously. But it’d probably be her fault, why we’d be going into the Forest anyway. And bring. Well, besides my wand, how about Alecto’s wand? It doesn’t work the best, for me at least. But it’s something, isn’t it? And it’s not my wand so it’s not breaking the rules, huh? Twins don’t count.”

♔ What kinds of decisions are the most difficult for you to make?

“Very, puzzle like decisions. Where people want to trick you with their words. Saying one thing, meaning something that’s not what they said. People make things so much more complicated than they should be, almost all the time. Bullshit.”

♔ What is one thing you would never want said about you?

“That I’m the worse twin. Just look at Alecto. I’m even, better looking. There literally can’t be any way that I’m worse. I’m very obviously the better twin. Who would even think twice about it? Huh? Even Alecto knows, I’m the better one. Though she won’t admit it. Which makes her worse. She’s too up her own ass to see it, really. ”

WRITING SAMPLE

—Amycus hissed and withdrew his hands from the piano when it shocked him, looking over his shoulder at his father. “Start over.” Darius replied, leaving Amycus to quietly turn back to the piano and begin the piece again. The boy got tripped up at the same spot, and was shocked once more by the piano. He bit his tongue to keep from whimpering, and without being told started from the beginning. The third time he was able to play it, but only a few bars past made another mistake. He yelped when the shock hit him, and this time he turned to look at Darius. “Father.” The man stopped his pacing to stare at his son, and Amycus did his best not to let his voice falter, “Please, I-It’s very hard to continue learning the piece if I have to start again at every mistake. I w-won’t get good at the end if I only play the beginning, sir.”

“If you paid more attention to what you were doing, perhaps you wouldn’t have to begin again so many times.” Darius quipped back, leaving Amycus deflated. He bit his tongue again and gripped the piano bench tightly. After a few moments he turned back to the piano to continue playing. The nine year old could only endure the harsh treatment for so much longer, and after about another half hour Amycus stood abruptly after being shocked, the piano bench scraping across the ground. He stood with his hand balled into little fists, tears in his eyes and just beginning to tremble. “Sit down.” Darius warned with a hiss.

“No!” Amycus snapped back, glaring at his father with teary eyes, “I don’t wanna play anymore!” The boy began storming away to the door, and just before he reached for the handle he was thrown to the ground harshly, landing on his side. “I said sit down.” Darius had his wand raised and slowly moved to stand over his son. Amycus was crying by now, getting back to his feet slowly.

He stood there and hung his head, and just as his father began to speak again, Amycus shoved him as hard as he could and bolted out the door. Darius stumbled back a bit and almost fell in surprise, then snarled and yanked the door all the way open to storm into the hall. “Amycus!” He screamed at his son, who was just barely scrambling down the stairs out of sight. Amycus made it to the front hall, fumbling with the locks on the door. When he opened the door he only got one foot outside before he ran headfirst into his father who had Apparated in front of him.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Darius hissed. Amycus sobbed, crying out when he was dragged back to his feet by his arm, feebly attempting to pull himself from his father’s grip as he was dragged across the marble floor in the front hall. His feet scrambled for purchase as he tried to stop his father from dragging him, screaming and tossing himself around like a trapped animal. Amycus was close to hyperventilating now, body shaking with fear as he desperately tried to escape his father. His head turned at the creaking of a door and he saw her there; Alecto stood in the door way, expressionless and staring. Blank empty eyes looked into his own as he began pleading for Alecto to help him, but his pitiful cries seem to fall on deaf ears as the girl didn’t so much as blink as her brother was dragged through the basement’s door.

Amycus knew what an Unforgivable curse was before any of his friends.

—Amycus stormed past his mother as he walked through the front door of the Carrow Manor, dropping his suitcases with a harsh clatter and climbing the stairs two at a time, quickly making his way to his room. He slammed the door behind himself and moved to stand in the middle of the room. He shook with anger, his nails biting into his palm as he made white-knuckled fists. It’s not fair. Why couldn’t he stay? All of his friends got to stay at school over break, but he had to go home. Amycus stormed to his dresser and swept his arm across the top, knocking everything to the ground and letting anything glass shatter. It’s not fucking fair! Why the hell should he be home? He fucking hated it here, and both his parents knew it. The boy strode to his desk and threw the chair aside, throwing the journals and books to the ground and chucking the inkpot at a wall. Ever since he began attending Hogwarts, Amycus had loathed returning home for winter vacation, and especially for summer vacation. He never wanted to be home anymore. He never wanted to be around his father.  

“You’re upsetting your mother, if you insist on throwing a fucking tantrum like a child, I’ll-” Darius yelled as he swung the door open, and a picture frame very narrowly avoided his head and shattered against the wall behind him. “Fuck you!” Amycus screamed, grabbing a book from the shelves next to his desk to throw at his father as well. “You fucking wanted me home! I’m here! What the fuck did you expect, father?” the boy’s tone was mocking, and he shrieked with pain when hit with a Cruciatus Curse. The fourteen year old crumpled to the ground writhing in agony as white hot pain shot through him.

“Don’t you dare speak to me like that you ungrateful mongrel!” Darius snarled at his son. Amycus could only scream, the pain terribly overwhelming. The Cruciatus Curse was more powerful the more hatred the user felt. The pain made him want to black out. The teen laid on the floor struggling to breathe when the curse was lifted, making no move to get up when his door was slammed close. Amycus laid on the floor for another hour, his body aching too much to move.

One night soon after, Amycus waited until late to leave his room, to make his way down to the kitchen. He grabbed the biggest knife he could find and took the back door into the yard, walking across the wet lawn in the moonlight. He grimaced at the sting of the cold, only wearing his pajamas and socks in the freezing weather. It took most of his strength to push open the door to the stables, and it took no time to walk over to the stall. Amycus stared at the horse, looking at the medals that decorated the wall behind it. Father’s prized racing horse. The stall door was easy to open.

Amycus said nothing as his father walked into the dining hall, staring the man down as his father stopped dead in the doorway. He watched the color drain from the man’s face as he looked at the crudely butchered horse that was strewn across the entirety of the long table. He sat back in his father’s chair, giving his father a cold and hateful stare. “Merry Christmas, father.”

Amycus always got the best gifts at Christmas time.

#hp rp #amycus carrow #literate rp #mature rp #harry potter rp #accepted app

[aeroknot]

some thoughts on the latest wynonna plot twist

i’ve been working on this for a little while. 

i just want to explain a large part of my resistance to the wearp development of season 2. it is very personal (perhaps tmi) and reveals a deep bias infiltrating my ability to whole-heartedly accept or celebrate the plot line. I still think it’s worth expressing, though.

ok so like… i’ve felt a range of emotions regarding this pregnancy plotline, most of them negative and just varying in the degrees of pissy pessimism i can shift between, and at first i was really self-interrogating and just being like “are you being an insufferable asshole about this because of wyndolls?” and i thought about it and y’know, probably, like, I’ll be transparent bc who the fuck else am I gonna be real with about this show other than strangers on the internet? and yeah, 10% of it’s wyndolls-related dread, sure, but honestly??

the root of it is that I don’t like kids right now, especially infants, and this intensely combines with the fact that, as a 27 year old with shared qualities with her, I was projecting onto wynonna hard. a big specific fear we shared was where I constantly wonder about whether I truly have choices in my “fate” (mostly, re: am I doomed to repeat my parents’ mistakes? and also am I doomed by my depression? a deep and real limitation that really honestly does feel like its own kind of curse. and, would I pass this onto a child and doom them?) I was ecstatic to be connecting with her and key tenants of her personality, as well as her past traumas (such as but not limited to: child abuse from an alcoholic father, being institutionalized, and acting things out sexually with guys) that I found so relatable. a smaller part, but most relevant to this discussion, is that liked to think of her as a woman who, also, at this point in her life, was wholly uninterested in motherhood, for a whole shitton of reasons; many of which I could relate to, but particularly based in her family trauma/this curse/complicated relationships with men, and also her general attitude of prioritizing her needs above everyone else’s except maybe waverly’s and her partner(s)’. working on herself. and i loved that. it resonated with me.

a baby has really thrown a wrench in this experience, and this is largely because a not-so-insignficant emotional dufflebag that’s been chained to my ankle since my ex left is all the times he told me I’d be a terrible mother, and how i’ve been processing that and moving on from letting that hold any more weight in my life completely opposes being excited about a plot development like this.

after I finally picked myself up off the floor of my shame spiral into his evaluation of me, I rebuilt myself by asking: what right did he have to evaluate my worth based on an abstract, idealized, and hypothetical version of motherhood he imagined – specifically myself as a mother, when, might I add, neither of us were even close to being stable enough even as individuals to be ready for parenthood – (answer: no real fucking right). so: would it be liberating and healing to discover that I can be a woman without procreating? could I still find my worth in myself if it never happened for me? could I erase some of that disdain for my character away by moving the goalpost and allowing myself to say: I don’t need this to be a woman worth admiring and loving-- and I could remain someone a person would desire in a long-term romantic relationship? and did I even fucking want children? was it a good idea for me to have them? I don’t completely have a definitive answer and even if I did decide I didn’t want some, maybe if I met the right partner and i decided -- regardless of what my partner wanted -- that I wanted a baby more than I was afraid of a baby, it’d change, maybe. or I’ve thought about adoption later in life. but for now, and what’s feeding into my disappointment and discomfort with wynonna’s arc, is the fact that I have been experimenting with expressing disinterest in children, publicly and privately, and testing out how that makes me feel, and lately, I’ve felt pretty damn good thinking about a childless future, and after the pain I felt with ‘being inept at motherhood’ lorded over my head as a deep insult to my character, it’s very healing and empowering for me to be able to say “I could live without kids” or “having children is perhaps not in my path” and even go so far as to admit “I don’t think I even like children right now.” 

I don’t dislike children, per se (though I do resent I even feel the pressure to have to put that as a disclaimer!!). I’m nice to them. I love my young cousins. I think children are often hilarious and inquisitive and generally good-natured. but they’re…. they’re like how men are to me right now. the idealized ones are really neat; the fictional ones and the ones over there and the ones other people really love are really cool and I’m happy they make others happy and sometimes I get to spend some time with them too, but as a general practice I’d like to just not prioritize them in my life right now, and women are asked to prioritize both all the damn time or else believe there’s something wrong with them, and I’d like to create space and consume some more media where maybe we just… don’t allow that as much? I promise I’m not going around kicking kids nor am I telling other people to kick them. but I am letting myself feel what it’s like to admit that maybe I don’t think they’re the greatest thing on earth, which is what I feel pressured to say (oh god damn, especially in my Christian work environment, dear lort). I’m experimenting with allowing myself to say to someone who invasively inquires about the status of my reproductivity, “y’know, I don’t really like the idea of being responsible for a very sensitive, innocent, impressionable, and defenseless young soul who deserves a lot of time, energy, and self-sacrifice in order to care for and raise; emotional and physical and mental labor that I don’t feel like designating to anyone but myself right now.” basically, I just don’t find them as enthralling as I used to (I once worked at a daycare and wanted to be a teacher), and I’m even questioning now how much of my enchantment back then was authentic and how much of it was indoctrinated.

and a large part of what I’m realizing is the fact I’m made deeply uncomfortable and displeased by the idea of carving out parts of my identity and my life in order to create the large, large space a child deserves in order to fit one into my story. I don’t like the permanence of adding a child; I don’t like the irrevocable nature of such a huge undertaking that will impact every single facet of a person’s life from that point forward. maybe I’m selfish. maybe I’m just not ready. call me what you want, I’m still walking this path for now, though, and I’ll assert I deserve respect even if I don’t want kids.

so to watch this story that I was feeling so connected to for reasons really opposite of this whole storyline so quickly suddenly make room for a baby while I am resisting motherhood as a measure of a woman’s worth and also very freaked out by the permanence and weight of being responsible for your offspring? yeah. it’s a little disheartening to me. like dolls said, it changes everything. and it’s like…… any way they shake the story out, I think I’ll be upset, because I’m... not personally invested in the baby even sticking around, even though I know that sounds sort of horrible.

I admire the way they’ve done it so far in the aftermath of this reveal. I admire the dialogue. and I think admiring and respecting how they’re doing it while still not liking it is valid, and is also a testament to how well-executed it can be. but I’m still hesitant, skeptical, and resistant.

and this is all hard for me too because like… I think I WOULD think it’s awesome if post-broken-curse, older, perhaps in-a-loving-relationship-wynonna and forgiven-herself wynonna kicks down a door while pregnant, and asserts she can still be a hero while pregnant, and she’s still this or still that and not an invalid fragile incompetent person at her job, etc, etc….. demon-hunting mom who pisses off the PTA moms because all their kids think she’s so cool. but it... it’s sudden. it’s “too early” in my head. and of course I understand why that is. but I’m still grumbly about it.

i’ve also realized that I was a child who was somewhat unwanted. conceived between two people with an unhealthy relationship who did not want to be tethered together for the rest of their lives. and as a child in the middle of that stress, as an unplanned baby who MY MOM GOT PREGNANT WITH WHILE ON BIRTH CONTROL, I know what the downsides are to have that origin story. with this context, it makes sense this is a big hang up for me, something I’m recoiling from. and my mother made me her impetus for change and growth and when she failed at healing herself through me, it made me feel like the failure and a waste of space and “not worth it.” (it’s similar with my dad, but fatherhood’s not really the point here.) to be entirely both the source and motivation for your mother’s (and sometimes father’s) personal healing is a lot of pressure. and it feels suffocating. to be the only reason your mother works on herself when you live with her, but then devolves when you’re not with her-- it serves up some real emotional erosion. we can’t say for certain this is what wynonna would do, but even a whiff of this makes me want to run the other direction.

I’m also upset about the issue of consent in the pregnancy. her opportunity to choose was taken from her by the time demon, and that makes me uncomfortable. she’s doing amazing now, she’s so fucking strong, but I’m still upset. it was clever, but if you really look at it, it was another way she had no choice. &... I appreciate her anger about it! i really do! that is one of the things I do really respect: I appreciate her sadness being allowed time onscreen, and Melanie’s acting is uh-mazing regarding this.

see, I have a lot of conflicting emotions about this. I’m trying to articulate it as best I can.

so then I’m even further flabbergasted by all the ways my brain is trying to cope and trying to make the story cool, trying to patch it, trying to adapt it, trying to twist it, and trying to sneak in lighter and happier moments, and trying to find optimism in things like “oh well I love Jane the Virgin and that’s baby-heavy from the get-go.” .... though therein sorta lies the fundamental difference. you knew a baby was coming from the very first episode, the baby is literally the impetus for everything, and so even though there were consent issues even in Jane the Virgin, there was no real transition from Main Plot to Suddenly A Baby Gets To Be The Center of Everything..... but.... making this comparison also helps me to maybe trust a bit more. I love Jane the Virgin (but.... even still, I’ll be honest that I’ve kind of lost interest since Mateo was born and I haven’t been keeping up as regularly as I used to. I need to stop with that, but I feel it’s another example of just how much I’ve been disinterested in kids these days.)

anyway...

i’m trying to…. well…. respond to the prospect of this fictional baby the exact opposite of how I’ve been trying to react to real babies lately. and it’s just… it’s all a perfect storm, I guess.

BUT: it’s my own personal shit. and maybe I just need to set it aside. 

and maybe, even.... this take on motherhood onscreen, seeing wynonna, who I relate to so much, be a mother... perhaps it may even heal some of the wounds I’ve felt regarding the subject since the shame was first implanted by my ex, and reinforced by my own childhood and genetics and immaturity as an “adult.”

maybe. 

we will see.

#aero talks A LOT #this is about the pregnancy plot in wynonna earp #wynonna earp #wearp discussion #wynonna earp discussion #aero opinion time #relating to media in deeply personal ways #personal bias #somewhat negative #trying to be more objective but still warning you: somewhat negative ahead #personal shit #under a read more but sorry mobile users

[grimmvvitch-blog]

groans a lot bc apparently the pop-ups on my blog don’t fucking work but i can’t find the issue and i don’t have the patience to redo my whole fucking theme right now SO

i’m gonna put my about under the cut here, and my rules are basically the same thing as my other blog

FULL NAME: salem. NICKNAME: goddess. queen. ruler. my lady. her grace. AGE: ageless. BIRTH DATE: the beginning of time. ETHNICITY: none.</i> GENDER: female. ROMANTIC ORIENTATION: demiromantic. SEXUAL ORIENTATION: asexual. RELIGION: the gods of light and dark. SPOKEN LANGUAGE: omnilingual. CURRENT LIVING CONDITIONS: a fortress among the grimm spawning grounds. OCCUPATION: the unseen ruler of the world.

relationships

PARENTS: none. SIBLINGS: unknown. SIGNIFICANT OTHER: none. CHILDREN: the grimm.

physical traits

EYE COLOUR: red. HAIR COLOUR: white. HEIGHT: 5'4" BODY BUILD: thin, lithe, elegant figure. TATTOOS + PIERCINGS: a jewel embedded in the center of her forehead. NOTABLE PHYSICAL TRAITS: noticeable red-black veins along her skin.

phobias and disorders

PHOBIAS: ursurpment. MENTAL DISORDERS: megalomania. sociopathy. WHEN WAS THIS DIAGNOSED?: never, but always.

personality

INTELLIGENCE: extremely academically intelligent, seemingly vast and endless knowledge regarding myths and legends. LIKES: loyalty. destruction. despair. submission. DISLIKES: hope. betrayal. determination. DISPOSITION: cold, but with a soft and almost inviting voice. she tries to appear almost motherly, but her disposition is truly cold and malicious. she wants nothing more than to crush humanity beneath her feet.

biography

the gods of light and dark are some of the oldest deities in existence. originally brothers, the two were cursed with mortal lives. their powers were transferred to different vessels over the years, turning the mortal being into a godlike creature. the only rule: the hosts had to be perfectly compatible. when the gods weren't brothers or sisters, they were lovers, life-long rivals, best friends, parent and child.

the connection between ozpin and salem remains unknown. ozpin's attraction to oscar remains a mystery.

when salem was granted the powers of a goddess, she changed. her skin faded, her eins turned to poison, and her eyes became open to every secret the worl had to offer. she saw everything that was, is, and could be. and so she saw that humanity had failed her for the last time. the creation that she and her other half had made so lovingly all those years ago had become a disgusting burden.

it had to be destroyed.

she began with doctor watts, a brilliant mind whose intelligence was spurned. she assured him power, control--he accepted gladly, and became her right hand and advisor. then came tyrian, a child with big dreams and everything holding him back. she liberated him and raised him to be an obedient slave. his loyalty proved useful. then cinder, a poor girl with nowhere to turn who needed someone to be her hero. hazel, a man accused of crimes he didn't commit and torn from his family. he was tired. he just wanted to rest.

they would do nicely.

humanity will be crushed beneath her boot. the world will burn, and she will fertilize the roots of the new one with its ashes.

it's going to be beautiful.

#𝔼𝕃𝔻ℝ𝕀𝕋ℂℍ 𝕄𝕆𝕄 ℍ𝕆𝕃𝕐 𝔽𝕌ℂ𝕂. | ooc. #NOT IN THE MOOD TO REDO EVERYTHING TODAY

[spudmcloughlin]

people are also unaware of how physically and mentally damaging breastfeeding can be, women can get into serious depression trying to breastfeed because of societies pressure that 'if you dont breastfeed when you produce milk you're a shitty parent'. breastfeeding is HARD. its painful and there are so many factors to it. its really upsetting and sometimes just not worth the stress. a hungry baby and a stressed mom is no good for anyone. a full baby is a happy baby, and thats ALL that matters.

I had a whole answer typed out but tumblr deleted it bc I opened another app sigghhhhhh

In short there’s so many things that are hard when it comes to raising a child but you can’t always take the easy way like ????? Most times the mother chose to have the child (excluding rape, failed birth control, instances where the mother believes she made a mistake getting prego in the first place, etc) so she should commit to it. If she thinks she can take the easy way out when it comes to raising a child she shouldn’t have a child in the first place, especially if she can’t handle everything that comes with it.

[unsubstantiatedopinion]

Thinking about when I got my IUD. On the information trail of something else, saw a Quiz on a teen health site of which birth control is for you.

I had to work to get the answer I actually Use. Mind, the major change was "I am willing to go to a doc" and then it followed with the legit "I'm cool w my period getting heavier".

Mine started, and has settled back into being fairly light flow, long lasting, and like one day of cramps that are pretty easily managed.

But this quiz when I answers everything else,(thr first time, no clinic) offered me the Sponge on my list. Like yeah yeah condoms at the top of the list.

In 2016 on campus they were stocking both in the dorm bathrooms, external were more popular by a lot. But if you looked up success rates on Planned Parenthood, external had a higher efficacy rating. I figured that it was probably user error, but like, What? Then at a student health fair, I did ask the people at a sexual health table if they knew this, and if they knew why and they didn't. Though they also thought it was probably a familiarity w the device thing.

My sex Ed classes in 8th grade and HS did have us learn how to put a condom on a penis. (My 8th grade was taught by a lesbian and some outside person was brought in for part as well, but we did learn how to make a dam out of a condom as well. Didn't realize that was unusual knowledge.)

On the one hand, the external condom is the one birth control where the expectation is on the man to be dealing with it. And it has the wonderful qualities of being a in the moment sort of thing, very sweeping passionate much flirty. (And while *I* have never successfully done a seductive foreplay with a condom, there's some solid visual potential there.) And it is effective, one of the few things that is both birth control and STI control.

All that is wonderful.

The internal condom, by contrast, is a newer thing. So it hasn't come into the visual lexicon of "seeing this in the bedroom is normal". And tbh, popping it into place is harder to make into a teasing sensous thing. But i think there's more to it than that.

Unlike the other internal birth control methods. Even than the ring or what are some of those retro ones, sponge or diagphram. Once they are in place, they aren't Seen.

Most of the objects that are placed internally have a reputation of being for wives. Partially bc they are less effective(and the stakes of a pregnancy for a married woman are lower.) partially I think bc they are seen to 'break the mood', which you can get away with when you've seen intimately into the other's life, but when you are still in the dating sexy mystique phase culturally you aren't 'supposed to" do.

Which is also Bad.

If you do not feel like you could say to the other person, hey, can we pause or stop this? Don't fuck them.

But the modern methods of birth control, are mainly chemical (and not good vs STI) but their burden is entirely in the woman. Financially, emotionally, physically.

The optimistic version is that, this is women taking control of their bodies and lives.

But, 1. At what cost? And

2. So invisibly.

The unpopularity of the internal condom to me seems like a stroking of a man's ego. And falling into old hetero scripts.

Which is why I am using man and woman mainly here. Lesbians have less use for condoms generally (toys are washable, and gloves are better for hands). The accessabiltiy and flexibility of external condoms, makes them prefered for gay men. Sure the inner ring of an internal condom can be removed for anal sex, butt that is only one of many sex acts avalible to men outside of fanfiction.

But the Straight(tm) script has man pursue woman be innocent. And if she's not innocent, play innocent; otherwise this isn't a date on the good girls path to wedding. Basically if the woman is shown to be experienced it is mark against her, or specifically for the man's enjoyment. (See history of sex work, succubi as a concept, kink, and/or MILFs).

The pill, and even nexplenon or and IUD, are hidden. Sure they are pre-planned taking ones own reigns, but they aren't visible where the action is. (And the pill is way more popular anyhow, and has plausible deniability-its not cause I'm a slut it's for my cramps. Which is a legit use, but is not the Only reason it should be allowed). They also have that 'ready and avalible at any time' quality. Which, could be - unkindly- seen as making The Sex ready for the picking at any time.

By contrast, the internal condom can be a statment, it's a statment that at some point the woman said to herself, "I plan on getting Laid tonight". Probably when getting dressed and choosing a matching set of underwear. But unlike coordinated sets, its something that really is for her, and her protection. (Yes it's possible she is carrying an infection and doesn't want to pass it along.)

It's incredibly loud and enthusiastic consent.

Which, is not the Straight(tm) prefered narritive.

Obviously, it is the Best version of events. But consent is a whole other post.

The main reason I don't go for it myself, besides Covid, is the they are harder to find, more expensive and so it feels more like a waste of money if you don't fuck. And I haven't gone on many dinner dates that might lead to a rendezvous. And wouldn't want that nagging push. (on the other hand, totally see how this pressure is bad on men in Straight(tm) narritive. There lots of transaction happening in any relationship and we really don't think actively enough about it's influence as a culture).

In personal experience, the #1 reason I didn't want hormonal birth control was lack of research on its physical effects beyond not getting knocked up. The "it's not unusual for this to increase depression but also we are just now half a century later actually looking into this". Plus personally the arm stick was a bad fit with my dislike of needles and my need to pick at things. And there was no time of day in college where I would be able to reliably choose to take a pill. Probably 11am but then I'd need to remember to pack it with me and just, I wasn't here for that life.

Which is where we get to the IUD.

The scene, 2016. The context, I had had a condom break (intercrural, which I STRONGLY recommend) but it freaked the fellow out a bit. (He did not suggest an iud, and tbh I don't think I involved him in the decision at all. ) The other context was the 2016 election. And frankly, the Fear that was being drummed up. Not unwarranted, but, there was a spike in IUDs at that time bc people were worried about loosing access to other forms of birth control. And I doubt I was alone in worrying about loosing options in the event of a rape.

I am against abortion as a method of bieth control. But I think the way to not have abortions, is prevention. Abortions that remove a dead fetus or a dieing fetus that are protecting the mother, aren't birth control, that's sepsis management and tragic. Abortions that are only for the girl babies, are birth control and tbh the way to cut down on that animation is cultural change. It's my opinion that if a woman is going in for an abortion, something has Failed Her.

But, I was at a point where my getting pregnant would be really bad. My mental health was in a sketchy place. I was in school. And frankly not terribly employable since a science degree at a bachelor's is still all grunt work.

I looked into what options were avalible. I researched. My mother had, at some point offered to assist in getting a prescription for the pill, framed in the cramps story. Which for my sister IS why she's on it. I lucked out on not having a Catastrophe of a uterus. (Hyperbole but still).

I remember the process of going in.

I remember being Angry that in the pre-appoinment I was told that the policy was you need to get a pregnancy test up to like 2 days before or so. And I set it up so that I have a block to squeeze in this extra appointment on like the day before. I look up what to do before hand, PP recommend taking a painkiller before showing up so it has time to kick in.

I do all the steps. I go in alone. For myself, I don't want non-experts besides me involved. These are things between me, a doctor, and god and/or my/a/my understanding of amoral system.

The secretary was friendly and like, yeah Doc is doing a lot of these. Reassuring. They didn't give me any preprocedure instructions besides this test (and it was also a STI test I don't remember if that was required or I was like heck if I'm here might as well).

But the appointment happens and three plot twists. 1. They've got a better painkiller and would have preferred I hadn't taken an over the counter before. But it all worked out. And frankly the insertion was absolutely fine. Like yeah little pinch but as u recall it it was more like if you pinched a like big chunk of thigh than like finger in a door.

2. There was a med student/intern/person. I was asked if she could be in the room. Not shocking, University hospital is a teaching hospital and I'm totally chill with being a model. She seemed uncomfortable, wanted to go into pediatrics so not really relevant to her I think. Nothing hands on.

3. The thing that made me mad was that I had to take an additional pregnancy test before she would do the procedure. I took the previous test when the intake had suggested. At the same hospital. So it's all their records. And I hadn't had sex in the interim and even if I had, nothing would have had time to implant. Plus, while I recognize that technically IUD can in a few cases be an aborting procedure, by getting a copper iud, I was saying I plan on not having kids for up to the next 10 years. Thinking back on it, maaaaaayyyyybe maybe a test might have seen a pregnancy that might have been floating around to go etopic and all. But no, this felt controlling and paternalistic.

I didn't have a strategy for dealing with it. For demanding and asserting that I just did this. I did say it once, but that wasn't listened to.

And I know that this isn't an unusual or even particularly egregious example. But still.

After was lots of bleeding. I think I basically bled in some capacity for a month or two. Was on painkillers for long enough that i did get some like stomach pain or maybe just worried docs I don't remember except being told to switch to acetominiphine which I don't think works as well for me but resolved whatever the issue was. And I'm a pads person and did get a bit chapped.

After that resolved. I did have one terrifying Surprise Heavy period like a few months later. I bled through a pad. There was crying in the CVS bc there wasn't a absorbtion conversion between tampons and pads and this was all new and scary.

The next month leveled out. Though things were still heavier than pre-iud or now. But not terrible. And I've seen worse. I couldnt use my mom's strategy of the diva cup, which she got on early I think bc it's Wonderful for HEAVY flow. But between never having had success w a tampon and the potential suction removing the thing and ripping out an IUD. Not worth it.

But for the most part it settled out.

But I still think about it.

The good thing was the RELIEF of the Safety of not having to worry about ending up pregnant. Sure STIs are a risk. But back-alley or date rape transference is likely either way and at least I only have to deal with one issue instead if the moralized one. And in chosen partners, frankly they were either rather virginal. Or Defs gonna use a condom. Like, the bf in the IUD times, we still used a condom each time. (I don't know that he's done it, but he had also apperently been planning on getting a vasectomy asap, since like highschool.) The 'i never want kids' was one of the reasons we stopped dating. There were a few other reasons but like they all boiled down to 'want differnt things from the Future' which is why we are friends still.

But things will come up, and I'll remember, I've got a chunk of copper in me.

That knowledge weighs in my consideration of sense of self, and self identity. It feels representative, and significant.

I don't check for the strings as often as I should, and I think they've mostly stayed out of the way.

But this is a significant thing to me.

And a thing that I keep to myself a lot.

But I do Want to talk about it, because it is so Significant.

[ismael37olson]

YEAST NATION

New Line has produced only musicals over the years -- 84 so far, in fact -- but at the same time, we've told stories in so many different genres of storytelling, comedy, drama, film noir, crime drama, thriller, melodrama, allegory, fairy tale, fable, folk tale, science fiction, horror, documentary, sex farce, social satire, political satire, political drama, absurdism, expressionism, impressionism, religious drama, autobiography, confessional... But it occurred to me a while back we had never done a bio-historical musical. I don't know how we missed that, but we had! Luckily for us, Greg Kotis and Mark Hollmann, the mad geniuses behind Urinetown, have been nurturing and developing another wild, dark, comic show, and can you believe it, it's a bio-historical musical! I mean, what are the odds? "It is the year 3,000,458,000 BC. The Earth's surface is a molten mass of volcanic islands and undulating waves. The atmosphere is a choking fog lit by a dim red sun. And the mighty waters of the world are inhabited only by rocks, sand, salt, more rocks, a little silt, and the great society of salt-eating yeasts – yes, yeasts! – the world's very first life form! These single-cell salt-eaters are the only living creatures on earth, and they’re up against a food shortage, a strange new emotion called Love, and the oppression of a tyrannical Yeast King. But when the king’s son ventures out of the known yeastiverse, the yeasts’ story – and ours – is changed forever. " Now if that doesn't sound like a New Line show, what does? So we snatched up the rights and now we embark on yet another weird, uncharted adventure, though this time heading for the floor of the ocean three billion years ago. And all the actors will be playing yeasts. Single-celled yeasts, who can nevertheless sing and even dance a little. And Rob Lippert has to make our theatre look like the floor of the ocean. And Sarah Porter has to figure out what yeasts wear... As we often say, if it's not scary, where's the fun? Yeast Nation has been produced four times so far, at the Perseverance Theatre in Juneau, Alaska, in 2007; at the American Theater Company in Chicago in 2009; at the New York International Fringe Festival in 2011; and at the Ray of Light Theatre in San Francisco in 2014. We'll be Production #5, and they've been doing some further rewrites, so the writers hope to come see us.

When we produced Kotis and Hollmann's brilliant Urinetown back in 2007, I had been in email contact with the writers, and recognizing the freakishly intellectual underpinnings to their intensely silly but sociologically dense, Brechtian comedy, I had asked them for suggestions on reading material. They directed me to Thomas Robert Malthus and his 1798 book, An Essay on the Principle of Population, which predicted that human population would increase geometrically, doubling every twenty-five years, but food production would only grow arithmetically, and that would result in famine and starvation -- unless births were controlled. And yes, reading Malthus really did help me understand and focus the show. This time around, a couple weeks ago, I asked again, and this time, Kotis suggested two books by Jared Diamond, Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Socieites; and Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. I'm in the midst of the first, which is also a short documentary series, by the way. And then Kotis also suggested Antigone and Macbeth. Yes, you read that right. Antigone and Macbeth. I laughed when I read that in his email, until I remembered that I'd no doubt eventually realize he wan't joking. And sure enough, last week I watched Antigone (the brilliant production on video with Genevieve Bujold) and Macbeth (Patrick Stewart's version!), and then I re-read Yeast Nation. And guess what? Kotis wasn't kidding. I see big, clear, interesting parallels to both plays in this crazy musical. And seeing those parallels really will help me get at what Kotis and Hollmann are after. I love working on material these guys have written! One of the fundamental things most people don't get about Urinetown is also an important foundation of Yeast Nation, the idea of taking the characters and story so intensely, freakishly seriously that it's hilarious. Same style as Bat Boy, Spelling Bee, Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, and the granddaddy of all neo musical comedies, Little Shop of Horrors.

Compare the following. First, bookwriter-lyricist Howard Ashman's 1981 forward to his published script for Little Shop of Horrors:

Little Shop of Horrors satirizes many things: science fiction, B movies, musical comedy itself, and even the Faust legend. There will, therefore, be a temptation to play it for camp and low-comedy. This is a great and potentially fatal mistake. The script keeps its tongue firmly in cheek, so the actors should not. Instead, they should play with simplicity, honesty, and sweetness – even when events are at their most outlandish. The show’s individual “style” will evolve naturally from the words themselves and an approach to acting and singing them that is almost child-like in its sincerity and intensity. By way of example, Audrey poses like Fay Wray from time to time. But she does this because she’s in genuine fear and happens to see the world as her private B movie – not because she’s “commenting” to the audience on the silliness of her situation. Having directed the original New York production of Little Shop myself, and subsequently having seen it in many versions and even many languages, I can vouch for the fact that when Little Shop is at its most honest, it is also at its funniest and most enjoyable.

I remember first reading that -- after already having seen and loved the show off Broadway -- and it really had an impact on me. I became aware that the funniest comedies are always the most honest and the most straight-faced. Now, here's Greg Kotis' new author's notes to the Yeast Nation script:

Yeast Nation (the triumph of life) is a comedy, but what kind of comedy? There aren’t too many jokes, and it’s not all that witty. The script and score actually seem to take themselves rather seriously -- which is actually the key to how to attack the show. For the comedy (and therefore, the show) to succeed, the production must commit whole-heartedly to the grim, ominous, brutal, terrifying reality of the world of the play. This is a tragedy, apparently, a great epic saga, an origin story, and perhaps even a very important work of art (at least in the mind of the production). The comedy is character-based, meaning the performances must be heightened just enough to be funny, but not so much as to be overly-broad or ridiculous. Calibrating this energy is, as they say, the whole ballgame. No winking! No clowning! Play it straight, essentially, and you’ll find the tone. There’s also room for tenderness and sincerity here and there, which might offer a welcome break from the madness from time to time. The comedy is also context-based, meaning this is a harsh, punishing world where imminent destruction lurks everywhere. People are jumpy! They’re frightened! They’re desperate! They’re also ruthless and fierce and determined and, hopefully, completely present and alive! Seeing our heroes and villains (and everyone in between) struggle to survive and prevail in this unforgiving world is where the fun of the show lives.

I was lucky to see the original productions of both Urinetown and Bat Boy before we worked on them. Like other neo-musical comedies, each show has its own feel, its own style, its own visual and physical language, its own oddball, straight-faced humor, its own quirky set of rules. No other show operates quite like Little Shop or Bat Boy or Urinetown or Yeast Nation. They are all sui generis, and that's one of the coolest things about this new golden age for the art form that we're in. I'm lucky to have both seen and directed Urinetown, and written about it, before working on Yeast Nation. The two shows are pretty different in most ways, but I feel like I understand Kotis and Hollmann's writing now and I get what they're up to; plus Kotis is really terrific about explaining anything that's confusing. He knows he writes crazy, fucked-up musicals, and he wants us to understand them as best we can. I love that. Our rehearsal process starts Monday with learning the songs, so I don't have to block anything for a couple weeks. I'll use that time to sit in music rehearsals and soak it all up, let it percolate in the back of my head, let my ideas form, morph, solidify. I can already see in my head several moments in the show. This is going to be such fun to work on. Another wild adventure begins! Scott from The Bad Boy of Musical Theatre http://newlinetheatre.blogspot.com/2018/04/yeast-nation.html