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the-girl-who-sold-the-wxrld · 2 years

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I don't think we realize enough how rich the Loki series is in meaning and metaphor.

This is actually one of the reasons why I immediately wanted to watch all the episodes and loved this series. And I think it's a shame that not more people are talking about it.

For example, for me, extremely interesting points of the series are the way it portrays a totalitarian regime, and especially the people working for a totalitarian regime and dehumanization.

As someone who loves philosophy, geopolitics, psychology, and history, I've read quite a bit about these topics and was impressed with how the show used these themes intelligently. This tallied perfectly with the words of the philosophers and psychologists I read.

Let me explain: in films, when a totalitarian regime is invented, the people working for these totalitarian regimes are often depicted as monsters. I mean they are shown as horrible H24, with no good side, with 100% black personality, monsters being abominable every hour of the day. And while I understand why people do this, it's not realistic!

Philosophers have studied the question, and it is quite interesting. People working for totalitarian regimes, whether they are members of that regime out of cruelty, believing in it wholeheartedly, or brainwashed by manipulation and propaganda, are still human beings. Awful human beings, but human beings; to quote this text whose author I have forgotten, these people had friends with whom they were sympathetic and had a dog that they adored and with whom they were adorable. Yet they still did and thought abominable things.

We know it's different with the TVA because the people who work there have had their memories erased and have been completely manipulated. They didn't have much space to reflect and detach themselves from the ideas and actions of the TVA. it is therefore not exactly comparable with the real totalitarian regimes or with many of those created in fiction.

However, I love how the show gave these people a nice side despite what they're doing. I mean, Ravonna? She was a judge. She sent a lot of people to their deaths (I think the only ones she didn't convict were the ones she kept to work at the TVA. That's what trials really are for me) and did it without hesitation. Children, innocent people. And yet, when we see her in scenes with Mobius, she is... normal. Friendly. As if she was doing a regular job.

Same for Mobius. His role was to solve cases so people would be pruned. And we've seen him do horrible things on the show, like having Loki tortured. Yet apart from that, he is absolutely nice and funny.

Same for B-15 and even Casey. TVA workers suppress entire realities and cause the deaths of thousands of people, and are not depicted as abominable monsters with totally dark personalities. Crossing them at a barbecue (yes, that's the first thing that came to mind) you would never guess that they are capable of doing this kind of thing. You could never guess what their job is.

Antis will say that it is propaganda and apology of violence but antis have no critical skills so we will not give the slightest importance to that.

I think this series has done a very good job of portraying a totalitarian regime, not only with this depiction of propaganda and brainwashing, with this notion of "we do bad things for the greater good", but also by showing people who seem quite normal and nice to be part of a totalitarian regime. Seeing Mobius makes you really wonder how he could have done such horrible things. They were so brainwashed that they could do absolutely anything without asking questions.

I think it's interesting because not only does it tap into the theme of manipulation and propaganda perfectly, but it also taps into this rather tricky theme of people who've done horrible things aren't always just monsters . I love how nuanced this show is. TVA employees were doing horrible things without asking questions and yet they are far from being just heartless beings.

Which brings me to the other point: dehumanization. I've also read quite a bit on the subject, and the Loki series has managed to exploit this theme to perfection.

The way TVA members don't care about hurting variants, because they don't even see them as human beings.

Even Mobius didn't hesitate to have Loki tortured mentally and physically, nor would he have hesitated to have him killed had he not found out the truth. Is Mobius a monster? No. But TVA's propaganda is so deep and terrible that TVA employees no longer even see variants as beings with feelings and therefore don't care about hurting them, like you wouldn't care about hitting a stone, since it is not a being with a conscience. Many philosophers have wondered about this subject and I have the impression that the scriptwriters of Loki have read them all, really.

Mobius and B-15, for example, do not realize the horror of their actions until they are detached from the propaganda - when they are therefore free to realize that the variants are people like everyone else. This, too, is extremely realistic and well-written. Then, they take the road of redemption.

In summary, I love the way the TVA, its operation and its propaganda are portrayed. It's a great metaphor for totalitarian rule (and the like, but that's for another post) and propaganda. It managed to perfectly describe the fact that the propaganda and the brainwashing go so far that people who seem quite nice do horrible things, that the people who work for these regimes are not always soulless monsters, and succeeded in perfectly describing the process of dehumanization.

Please note: I am not comparing the TVA to the totalitarian regimes that exist and have really existed. I know very well that it's different, first because it's a science fiction concept, then because I absolutely don't want to compare this fictional concept to the horrors that happen and have happened in real life. I am in no way justifying any actions of people working for a totalitarian regime or saying that they were/are not bad people. Moreover, as I said, many factors make the TVA different: the fact that the employees were kidnapped and manipulated, the fact that their memories were erased, the fact that the TVA was built following a real threat (even if it does not change his horrible actions which had to stop) and not following an ideology and a desire to take power, etc. These differences make TVA employees much less horrible and allow us to bond with them and allow them to have redemption. I just want to point out how the show has managed to depict a totalitarian regime perfectly well in a completely fictional, sci-fi setting.

I also really like how everything is nuanced in this show. the notions of good and evil are approached with great complexity and nothing and no one is all black or all white - even more so than in other MCU projects. I find it brilliant.

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mariacallous · 9 months

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For Sander van der Linden, misinformation is personal.

As a child in the Netherlands, the University of Cambridge social psychologist discovered that almost all of his mother’s family had been executed by the Nazis during the Second World War. He became absorbed by the question of how so many people came to support the ideas of someone like Adolf Hitler, and how they might be taught to resist such influence.

While studying psychology at graduate school in the mid-2010s, van der Linden came across the work of American researcher William McGuire. In the 1960s, stories of brainwashed prisoners-of-war during the Korean War had captured the zeitgeist, and McGuire developed a theory of how such indoctrination might be prevented. He wondered whether exposing soldiers to a weaker form of propaganda might have equipped them to fight off a full attack once they’d been captured. In the same way that army drills prepared them for combat, a pre-exposure to an attack on their beliefs could have prepared them against mind control. It would work, McGuire argued, as a cognitive immunizing agent against propaganda—a vaccine against brainwashing.

Traditional vaccines protect us by feeding us a weaker dose of pathogen, enabling our bodies’ immune defenses to take note of its appearance so we’re better equipped to fight the real thing when we encounter it. A psychological vaccine works much the same way: Give the brain a weakened hit of a misinformation-shaped virus, and the next time it encounters it in fully-fledged form, its “mental antibodies” remember it and can launch a defense.

Van der Linden wanted to build on McGuire’s theories and test the idea of psychological inoculation in the real world. His first study looked at how to combat climate change misinformation. At the time, a bogus petition was circulating on Facebook claiming there wasn’t enough scientific evidence to conclude that global warming was human-made, and boasting the signatures of 30,000 American scientists (on closer inspection, fake signatories included Geri Halliwell and the cast of M*A*S*H). Van der Linden and his team took a group of participants and warned them that there were politically motivated actors trying to deceive them—the phony petition in this case. Then they gave them a detailed takedown of the claims of the petition; they pointed out, for example, Geri Halliwell’s appearance on the list. When the participants were later exposed to the petition, van der Linden and his group found that people knew not to believe it.

The approach hinges on the idea that by the time we’ve been exposed to misinformation, it’s too late for debunking and fact-checking to have any meaningful effect, so you have to prepare people in advance—what van der Linden calls “prebunking.” An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

When he published the findings in 2016, van der Linden hadn’t anticipated that his work would be landing in the era of Donald Trump’s election, fake news, and post-truth; attention on his research from the media and governments exploded. Everyone wanted to know, how do you scale this up?

Van der Linden worked with game developers to create an online choose-your-own-adventure game called Bad News, where players can try their hand at writing and spreading misinformation. Much like a broadly protective vaccine, if you show people the tactics used to spread fake news, it fortifies their inbuilt bullshit detectors.

But social media companies were still hesitant to get on board; correcting misinformation and being the arbiters of truth is not part of their core business model. Then people in China started getting sick with a mysterious flulike illness.

The coronavirus pandemic propelled the threat of misinformation to dizzying new heights. Van der Linden began working with the British government and bodies like the World Health Organization and the United Nations to create a more streamlined version of the game specifically revolving around Covid, which they called GoViral! They created more versions, including one for the 2020 US presidential election, and another to prevent extremist recruitment in the Middle East. Slowly, Silicon Valley came around.

A collaboration with Google has resulted in a campaign on YouTube in which the platform plays clips in the ad section before the video starts, warning viewers about misinformation tropes like scapegoating and false dichotomies and drawing examples from Family Guy and Star Wars. A study with 20,000 participants found that people who viewed the ads were better able to spot manipulation tactics; the feature is now being rolled out to hundreds of millions of people in Europe.

Van der Linden understands that working with social media companies, who have historically been reluctant to censor disinformation, is a double-edged sword. But, at the same time, they’re the de facto guardians of the online flow of information, he says, “and so if we’re going to scale the solution, we need their cooperation.” (A downside is that they often work in unpredictable ways. Elon Musk fired the entire team who was working on pre-bunking at Twitter when he became CEO, for instance.)

This year, van der Linden wrote a book on his research, titled Foolproof: Why We Fall for Misinformation and How to Build Immunity. Ultimately, he hopes this isn’t a tool that stays under the thumb of third-party companies; his dream is for people to inoculate one another. It could go like this: You see a false narrative gaining traction on social media, you then warn your parents or your neighbor about it, and they’ll be pre-bunked when they encounter it. “This should be a tool that’s for the people, by the people,” van der Linden says.

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inficetegodwottery · 30 days

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I have so many people telling me to play Helldivers 2, and yet every time I tell them I just don't like the vibes of it and I played the first game and didn't like the satire, I get told I'm just not media literate enough, and that I obviously don't just get satirical treatments of overwhelmingly evil ideologies.

I've been a 40k fan since I was eight, and I've had tons of great friends and cool people into warhammer my whole life. I have dealt with countless fucking dipshits who were either outright fascists or /pol/-ass cryptofascists. I have also dealt with countless people who assume being a fan of any warhammer property is a mark of being a cryptofascist. Both of which are exhausting douchebags.

I'm also a fan of Starship Troopers, specifically the movie version that's a direct fuck you to the original author, and all the deconstruction and exploration of political propaganda that franchise has been able to put out over the years, especially its satire of the U.S.'s involvement in the Vietnam and Iraq wars.

In both of those communities, we have to constantly deal with the fact that parody (or really any portrayal) of an authoritarian ideology inevitably attracts real life fuckwit brainwashed members of that exact ideology who are all-in gung ho enthusiastic about the fictional authoritarian ideology of the setting. I'd like to think we do a good job. I'd like to think for every pasty teenage asshole screaming slurs at Eldar players, we've got ten more rational and emotionally mature folks who understand it's fiction.

So for a while I was inclined to re-examine my experience of the first game, and potentially give this new one a shot with the same caution and "media literacy" I apply to Warhammer and other games where you actively play as the villains.

...but then I actually looked up discussions of the game, and it was truly astonishing the number of times I saw supposedly levelheaded fans of the game shouting slurs (like libcuck K***), saying shit like (This is just another gamer gate/SMH why are there no straight pride flags), and typing stuff like "Kite Yams Street" at people who dared expressing their concerns at how the community actively glorifies some of the stuff in the game.

What really fucking disappointed me is how many upvotes and people agreeing with them there were, even on the main Helldivers communities.

As an example, from just a handful of Steam threads. (AND THEY ARE ALL FUCKING LIKE THIS)

These are some of the least gross examples I could find.

Virtually any topic on Reddit, Steam, Twitter, or Discord that even mentioned fascism indirectly becomes an absolute shitstorm, with Helldivers fans actively arguing with both people who think the game fails as a parody, AND with people openly, unironically, and EXPLICITLY self-identifying as fascists.

Because saying this game about authoritarian dystopia is attracting authoritarians is stupid and bad. There are no authoritarians in our community.

But also remember to tell the authoritarians in our community that they're stupid and bad.

I have to conclude that the Helldivers community is just instinctually hostile and dismissive to people who are in any way uncomfortable with the premise or delivery of the satire or the state of the community. "Stop putting politics in our political parody game!" I guess.

If your fandom is actively in a pitched civil war with openly avowed fascists within your community, you are not "just a parody," and it's extremely immature and hypocritical of the Helldivers 2 community not to openly admit to this issue and address it without screaming invectives at people who are scared off by it the same way Warhammer, Star Wars, and Starship Troopers have been able to in the past.

So let's just say now I don't feel bad in the slightest for being completely uninterested in Helldivers 2 anymore.

If I wanted to get slurs yelled at me over voicechat by a bunch of 20-something MAGA CHUDs I'd just reinstall Mordhau or Call of Duty. That I'm used to.

But it's one of the most depressing things in the world to get yelled at by self-identified leftists just cause I said a mean thing about their funny new Not-Starship-Troopers game and how it might, possibly, have attracted some of the exact sort of people they supposedly oppose.

#Helldivers #Helldivers 2 #40k #media literacy #satire #it's fucking exhausting #and I'm just sick of dealing with it #cw transphobia #cw racism #cw slurs #cw authoritarianism #cw fascism #cw basically everything utterly rancid

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karlyuchka · 2 months

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ATLA isn't that great at showing the reality of war and you are ready for this conversation.

You can call me biased for this post, but whatever. I've been silent for too long.

It's certainly better than a lot of other shows, but fans often overestimate how good it actually is. It's excellent at showing more simple things like people getting hurt and traumatized because of war, but when it gets to more complicated things it's not that good.

In the show we got two people opposing to the fire nation. TWO. (Technically more because Jet wasn't alone, but you get what I'm saying). And they're BOTH antagonists. It's great to show that anger can blind you, but couldn't they make at least one character who wasn't somehow affiliated with Gaang who was against Fire nation and was in positive light? It kinda sucks. Also it doesn't make sense that Hama could actually attack military men and she just didn't. Why? She could attack civilians AND military and it could have been much better.

Then we get an entire arc to show that fire citizens aren't that bad, they're also people and they're also victims, blah, blah, blah... And the idea isn't entirely bad, but it was shown like they're just all innocent and can't affect what's happening in their kingdom? If the show authors wanted to show something positive about Fire citizens wouldn't it be better to show that there are some opposition to Fire Lord or something? But no, we get episodes about how the citizens are prohibited to show their true selfs because they can't breakdance and we get propaganda mentioned a little. Obviously it's a kids show and demanding to show 100% how war works is dumb, obviously the writers have to tone it down a little, but it still kinda sucked. This is actually why it's my least favourite season. Like, it looked like literally no one in Fire nation was against war? The opposition wasn't mentioned even in the comics? HUNDRED YEARS war and Fire citizens didn't even try to do anything? This fire school arc just made me despise Fire nation more because it looks like they just don't give a damn. (Don't start on "they're being brainwashed by propaganda". If propaganda is enough to convince you that killing is good than you were never good in the first place).

Jet was portraied extremely weird in Ba Ding Se too. Like... Fire nation is occupying Earth nation, killing and abusing civilians. Jet sees two fire benders in the most secured city. One of them was a war general who actually had this exact city under six hundred days siege. OBVIOUSLY he would try to arrest them. Who wouldn't? Who knows what they're doing there? Why would he believe that they don't want to do anything malicious? But show portraits it like some sort of obsession. Like he was crazy and in the wrong, like "they're not hurting anybody and he's nagging them and wants them arrested for no reason". Jet was being completely logical.

At the end of the show Iroh keeps his tea shop in Ba Sing Se??? What??? The same city he had under siege? And he names it "Jasmine dragon". DRAGON. The literal symbol of Fire nation. HUNDRED YEAR war just ended, I refuse to believe that citizens were completely fine with it.

And in "Legend of Korra" we find out that Fire nation still has an army? It got much smaller, but still it was pretty powerful? After hunder year war? How? WHY?

It's also extremely weird that in LOK they explored goddamn ANARCHISM, but not how Fire nation is treated after the war? It looked like nobody even remembers it. It was mentioned like three times in the series.

Also I read the comics and the creation of Republic city was weird af. Kuvira was terrible, but she was right at one thing: Republic city belongs to Earth kingdom. There was a lot of resistance. In comics this colony was still full of Earth civilians and culture. It wasn't completely mixed. And the argument to not returning the colony to Earth kingdom was literally "we've been colonizing this territory for so long that it can't be yours anymore" wich is dumb. It becomes even dumber when you remember it wasn't the only colony like that. It was mentioned that it was ONE OF THE OLDEST colonies. Which means there were colonies where fire culture was even more integrated. Then why weren't those colonies also turned into "something completely new"? And the resistance stopping resisting was really weird. They were extremely enthusiastic and determined and then just stopped because the Avatar came and told them "protect people, not borders"???

In conclusion: "Avatar" has a lot of flaws which are caused by "love everyone" mindset, wich isn't bad at it's core, but sometimes you gotta hate. And some flaws are caused by writers' inability to understand war and what comes after. The series are amazing, and comics too, but people tend too overlook a lot of mistakes.

Thanks for reading

(no one's reading allat💀)

Also if you disagree, it's completely fine, just know that I will not argue about it. It's my opinion that I thought about for a very long time and I will not change it.

#atla #avatar the last airbender #the legend of korra #war #rant #essay #probably #Ukrainian rage in this one is really strong #I'm sorry #I love atla #uncle iroh #republic city #atla rant #jet atla #fire nation #hama atla

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booktomoviebrawl · 8 months

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We are not judging how bad the movie is, we are judging which adapted the book the worst. There are good movies that are bad adaptions.

Propaganda below the cut (spoilers may apply)

Mortal Engines:

GIVE HESTER A DEFORMING SCAR YOU COWARDS. But in all seriousness, there was a lot wrong with the adaptation. The book was very cinematic to begin with, with lots of grandeur and intrigue as Tom starts to unpack all the brainwashing he's grown up with. Then the movie turned Hester into a generic girl boss, wiped out all of Tom's character growth to make him a useless sidekick, and took out a lot of the cool world building and political intrigue. Oh, and heaven forbid Hester, who had her face run into with a sword, be in anyway disfigured. Even though Hester being "ugly" was what made me love her so much as an insecure teen girl.

Joyless. Unwilling to actually give the female lead a decent facial scar which is just embarrasing. Shoved in a chosen one narrative where there didn't need to be. Changed the entire ending from tragic to saves the day style shit. Worst of all it's a really niche property and seeing it suck ass is all that most people are ever gonna see of it but the books are So Good. CGI does slap tho

The cool, severely scarred female character is replaced by a girl with a teensy little cut on her face. The robot ethics are removed and the humor is stupid

Stormbreaker:

GOD it sucks the og book series deals with the whole fact that if a 14 y/o schoolboy became a spy he’d have TRAUMA and MISERY and HATE IT AND THE GOVERNMENT TOO but then the movie is like. la de da this is so fun tee hee i love being a spy :))) i hate it. i hate it with the power of 1000 suns why are you trying to make this shit GLAMOROUS. especially i hate the us release poster what IS that

Gonna be honest I watched this years ago so I don't remember exactly what was different but it was different enough that I didn't like it and I LOVED the book series

The absolute slap stickery of a mess that movie made of the supposedly cool spy boy and his descent into darkness due to adults who only use him for their own means , ptsd symptoms rising be damned

#tournament poll #mortal engines #alex rider #stormbreaker

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adhdnojutsu · 5 months

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Identity wars & the Uchiha

I always wondered why Itachi haters hate him because he committed mass murder, but excuse Sasuke, Obito, and Madara, for doing/attempting the same. I finally managed to put my finger on why exactly this doesn't sit right with me, other than just being plain silly or using trauma or marginalisation as an excuse for just about anything. Look, I'm queer, doesn't mean I get to walk into a roomful of c*s folks and empty my clip.

Itachi weighs human life in absolute numbers. Anti-Itachi, pro-Uchiha fans weigh human life in identities.

To them, each marginalized life is worth a whole busload of non-marginalized lives. They forget that social justice is NOT revenge, ie marginalized people taking the whole cake and leaving the non-marginalized to starve, but to redistribute the cake so NO ONE goes hungry.

To them, anyone in Konoha other than the Uchiha are non-marginalized aka "the oppressor", so their lives carry not even half the weight of an Uchiha's.

Because clearly, when they defend Sasuke's planned mass murder, it's not just "Danzo and the elders", no, these people think "guilt by association" is the new social justice, so everyone "laughing" in Konoha, to use Sasuke's words from his unhinged rant, is guilty and deserving of retaliation, too. There are no "victims" or "innocents" in Konoha unless they have a ping pong bat on their shirts, it seems. Not even babies or elderly. They're all guilty of something only 3 living people are even aware of.

They don't realize they're justifying school shooters. Because yes, the boy was victimized by a handful of bullies and had every right to go after them, but what, pray tell, justifies shooting up the whole school? That's what Sasuke, Obito, and Madara are. Glorified mass shooters. They have righteous beef with an entity or handful of people, and they're happy to take everyone else down with them for sharing the enemy's zip code.

When lumping all Konoha residents/people everywhere in with "the oppressor", these people don't take into account:

-genuine ignorance of the administration's rotten tactics

-if aware, a lack of power to change anything

-repercussions of treason/desertion -rational thought, ie. not criminalizing someone for living in the only place they've ever known

-other forms of marginalisation existing within Konoha, as well as civilians and dissenters -cultural/propaganda impact, ie. drinking the kool

-aid not typically being an act of malice and thus not warranting a death sentence

-limited responsibility for elected leaders: you may not have voted for this leader, or your elected leader may not keep his promises

-various personal and societal struggles not leaving capacity to march for the marginalised; remember Konoha doesn't even pay decorated ninjas enough to have their sick children treated: Mukai Kohinata had to spy for an enemy village to pay his son's hospital bills, and Konoha sent Itachi to kill him for it

-Kage are not democratically elected, making people living under them even LESS responsible for their administration. The Kage administration is a dictatorship, making everyone living under a Kage oppressed and victims. This also adds not-so-voluntary pressure to the "voluntary" decision to serve as a ninja. Imagine saying no to a dictator with a huge standing army of brainwashed child soldiers.

-the public reaction to the genocide. If they hated Itachi that much for it, surely, they could have made good allies to the Uchiha if the latter had EVER bothered to share their concerns rather than simmer in silence!!

All they see is "Uchihas oppressed, so everyone else bad". So they don't mind that Sasuke or Madara or Obito kill a bunch of innocent and marginalized people along with "the oppressor". Collective punishment, guilt by association, all those things I thought we all agreed are ALWAYS bad, are suddenly excusable if committed in the name of justice (revenge) rather than power.

Itachi "looks bad" because he only killed oppressed people, under orders from the oppressor. Itachi haters don't even take into account that he did so in tears and hating his commander and only obeying because of the many INNOCENT lives he thought were at stake - many more than those 60 or so Uchihas. He didn't kill the clan "for the oppressor" (a government), he, from his POV, killed the clan for the people who didn't ask to live under this, or any government - after all, there is no opting out of "enabling injustice through citizenship" no matter where you go, so why fault anyone for existing where they do?

Is all of Konoha really "the oppressor" because of those 4 old people? Where could Konoha residents go in protest where they would not collaborate with some form of oppression, where is that utopia of innocence and justice? Fugaku sure wasn't gonna build it, since he would have to establish a new iron fist rule to keep people in line after *checks notes* kidnapping a leader who only ever showed them a loving face.

"Guilt by association" is not how to advocate for social justice. Not in the Narutoverse, not IRL. You just turn the aggressor-victim dynamic around, not eradicating oppression.

#itachi #naruto #itachi uchiha #itachi naruto #uchiha itachi #uchiha clan #uchiha massacre #uchiha #obito #madara #anti itachi #pro uchiha clan #anti konoha

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female-malice · 6 months

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(archive)

For Sander Van der Linden, misinformation is personal.

Van der Linden and his team took a group of participants and warned them that there were politically motivated actors trying to deceive them—the phony petition in this case. Then they gave them a detailed takedown of the claims of the petition; they pointed out, for example, Geri Halliwell’s appearance on the list. When the participants were later exposed to the petition, van der Linden and his group found that people knew not to believe it.

–

Everyone needs to play this game.

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moonlovesskunks · 6 months

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I would like to share a poem I wrote. It's a short one this time.

I want to hold your hand tight, but what would they think? I’d have to run circles in the night for that ever to be. ‘Cause I know what they’ll say. I’ve heard it all before. I’m a freak, with a deadly mental disease, and a body one should abhor.

I think it’s simply a fact of the world at this point, that there are people who domineer their stupid beliefs. They maintain what’s “right” and “wrong”, and everyone believes what they apoint. And say I infringe on them, as if they don’t do that such thing to me.

By wearing different clothes, I masquerade in pure masculinity. And I’m infringing on everyone, you say, because of whom I claim to be. I’m the most evil thing that this god-damn world has ever seen… Brainwashed by such propaganda as “love” and “respect”. All this filth in my heart just starts to project. I don’t know whom you are, but I know that in the story you made up, I’M the villain!! You don’t understand how long I’ve tried to erase this pain of mine, say I’m the bad guy just because my gender doesn’t fall into black-and-white. Hey, why don’t we just talk about our hurts and our heart, with not a fight? While we ignore what society tries to feed to us as “wrong” and “right”.

Every single bad guy has a tragic backstory, but you can just tangle it up and keep it all blurry, right? Just remember this, if for no one else, then for me and me only, when the storm and rain blow over, there will be a rainbow and it will shine.

By wearing different clothes, I have masqueraded in masculinity. Be the most evil thing that this god-damn world has ever seen! When I finally accept myself for whom I am, the bad guy, all this filth in my heart pours. You don’t know whom they are, but just know that in a stranger’s made-up story, YOU’RE the villain!!

#writing #poet #poem #poetry #writeblr #writer #story #art #gay #trans #lgbt #queer #lgbt pride #lgbtq community #lgbtqia #lgbtq #queer pride #transgender #transmasc #trans man #ftm

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who-do-i-know-this-man · 9 months

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Anti-propaganda for The Great Kate Weather Machine, or Kate Wetherall as she's really named! The Mysterious Benedict Society is a book about four autistic kids who are selected by the mysterious Mr. Benedict, through a series of tests and puzzles, to infiltrate the mysterious Learning Institute for the Very Enlightened and figure out what's going on with the coded messages that are being broadcast from there which are sending despair to the populace, as well as the mysterious disappearances. There's Reynie, the boy who seems very ordinary but has a knack for finding strange solutions to problems, and Sticky, the boy who remembers everything he reads (and he reads a LOT), and Constance, the very small and very stubborn girl, and then there's Kate! Kate was apparently abandoned by her loving father when she was very little, and ended up joining a circus, where she found acceptance as her weird self. She's very resourceful and always has bizarre strategies up her sleeve, and is never without her bucket of tools. She's the most likely to solve a puzzle by finding a way to essentially avoid it entirely. For example: A puzzle with the instructions to cross a room without setting foot on a square of a certain color (which most of the floor tiles were) - she did a handstand, and crossed the floor walking on her hands. A maze of identical rooms - she crawled through the vents. A girl who'd dropped her pencil in the storm drain (right before a test with explicit instructions to bring only one pencil) - she put a bit of glue on a string, stuck the string down in there, and pulled the girl's pencil back up. The other three characters also had interesting ways of solving the puzzles (such as: realizing that the floor tiles were rectangles not squares, solving the maze through brute-force trial and error, and defiantly bringing many many pencils) but this propaganda is about Kate so I won't ramble too long about that.

Now, onto spoiler territory in a few... So, one of the Society's mentors is this extremely morose man named Milligan, who is just the most sad and miserable person they've ever met. He was kidnapped and partially brainwashed by the Institute, and woke up handcuffed, with no memory, and holding a lockpick made from his own fingernails and toenails, which he'd bitten down to the quick. He used this to escape, and eventually joined Mr. Benedict in his efforts to take down the Institute, but remained in a constant state of depression and despair, and without his memories he couldn't explain why.

Well by the end of the book he begins to regain some memories... and it turns out that he's Kate's father. He didn't abandon his daughter - he was a secret agent and had been kidnapped! And his miserable state of mind was because he'd lost the person who'd mattered most to him as well as all his memories of her. But he and Kate are reunited, and from that point on he becomes the most happy and joyous man they've ever met.

Ok spoilers over.

In conclusion: Kate Wetherall is a wacky and wonderful character, and The Mysterious Benedict Society is an awesome book about oddball kids (and adults) whose weirdness gives them strength and allows them to solve problems that others couldn't, with a message about how the bad things in the world aren't certainties and hope will ultimately triumph over despair. While the book doesn't directly mention autism, I do think the main characters (and a good few others) are deliberately autistic coded, as they're all weird people and somewhat of outcasts, many with very specific interests or skills, and it's because of their weirdness that they're able to do the awesome things they do. I loved reading this book as a kid and I still think it's really good. :D

#asks #not blorbo poll #propaganda?#long post

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kyiratodoroki · 23 days

Text

An MHA AU where things go (a lot) more in the villains' favor, even if things start out a little rough for the 19-year-old Blue Flame. 😏 Dabi is living on the streets and struggling through the day-to-day need to survive, but things may soon take a turn that no one in Japan saw coming.

A title is in the works...

Edit: A title has been chosen...

🌒🌟🌘Transilience🌒🌟🌘

an abrupt change or variation

CW: Language - lots of bad language 😂 - violence in the future - things will probably get dark - I rarely write anything that isn't dark in some way

🌒🌟🌘

"This fucking sucks."

That's what Dabi thought as he hoisted himself over the windowsill and dropped to the ground. He swore under his breath as the full moon slipped from behind the clouds and flooded the alley with light as if determined to expose him. He hastened his pace, slipping into the shadow of the building next door as a siren erupted in the distance.

This had been his life for the last two - no, maybe it was three - years. He lost track somewhere between then and now. His primary focus revolved around survival. Food. Shelter. He spent most of his days figuring out how to keep himself alive and out of trouble. It was all in the hope that one day he'd be able to crumble the foundation of society and shatter the illusion of perfection the masses had been brainwashed into believing about the heroes they idolized.

Propaganda spewed by the Hero Public Safety Commission put the heroes on a pedestal, made it seem like the title came with a guarantee of virtue and honor, like somehow those who wore it were incapable of being assholes with the same flaws every other human being possessed. Lying. Cheating. Narcissism. Betrayal. Being a hero didn't make someone a good person, but being a hero did make most people look the other way when the "hero" did something *unheroic*.

That needed to change. One way or another, he was going to make sure it did, but it was a goal he couldn't fulfill from the inside of a prison cell.

Dabi dodged in and out of alleyways, cut through three empty lots, and scaled a chainlink fence. The sirens eventually died down, taking the edge off his nerves. When he felt confident no one was following, he doubled back and headed for the condemned piece-of-shit he'd been calling home since the beginning of summer. It sat on the outskirts of one of the worst neighborhoods in the city, which lowered the risk of being discovered by a random hero. They never came around the area unless it was unavoidable.

Thirty minutes later, he got "home" - for lack of a better word. The back door hung askew. It had a broken hinge and a large crack in the wood that had already extended a few inches since he'd found the place. Every window was boarded up except for the narrow one over the kitchen sink and one in the upstairs bathroom, which didn't close the whole way and had no screen. There was at least one hole in most of the floors, and the staircase had a busted step he had to remember to avoid. At least the roof kept everything dry when it rained. For now.

He pried the door open and stepped into the kitchen, scanning the tiny space for any sign of intruders. It was dark, save for the muted light filtering through the grime-caked window, so he probably wouldn't see shit unless someone was standing right in front of him. He sighed and tossed his bag on the counter before lighting a nearby candle with a fingertip. It didn't increase his visibility much, but it wouldn't draw attention either.

The wear and tear of life on the streets gnawed at the edges of his resolve. He'd never abandon his dream, but damn, the day-to-day left him feeling frayed. The phrase "ready to fall apart at the seams" came to mind, but in his case, the idiom was far too literal for comfort.

Dabi pushed down his exhaustion and frustration and tried to focus on the weeks to come. Winter was on the horizon, and his current residence left a lot to be desired even in the best weather. The cold wasn't an issue, but he didn't know exactly how sturdy the roof was. For all he knew, it might cave in under the first heavy snow.

"Late night?"

He didn't bother to turn towards the voice, pulling out three bowls and a few bottles of water. "The fuck do you want?"

"No need to get hostile. Do I need a reason to visit my buddy?"

Dabi barked out a laugh as he grabbed a plastic fork from the nearby box of silverware. "Buddy? That's a good one."

"Dabi -"

"Fuck you, bird. I'm nothing but your self-appointed charity project." He popped the lid off one of the bowls and threw it into a nearby garbage can - not like there was water to wash it - then stabbed the fork into something resembling rice and beef. Hopefully, the dark spots were seasoning and not mold this time. People needed to clean out their damn refrigerators more often. "Besides, I don't think all your little hero friends would approve of you hanging out here."

Dabi shoved a forkful of the leftovers into his mouth and scowled as he chewed. It wasn't moldy, but it tasted like shit. The rice was undercooked, and he suspected those dark spots were bits of burnt... something. It was impossible to tell. He swallowed anyhow and took another bite. He hadn't eaten since the previous day.

The silence went on for so long that Dabi finally turned around, half expecting to find himself alone, but Hawks was still standing in the kitchen doorway. Shadows obscured most of his face, making his expression hard to read, but Dabi swore he looked hurt. The light shifted, and then the hero was grinning.

*Gotta be my imagination.*

"Hey, I'm not the type to worry about what other people think." Hawks shrugged. His feathers rustled. He moved further into the room and gestured towards the table. "I brought some stuff."

Dabi choked down another mouthful of food and glanced at the table sitting next to a refrigerator with a missing freezer door. When he left, the surface was cluttered with bottles and cans and an overflowing ashtray. All of it had been cleared away and replaced with a case of water; a few cloth bags, which he assumed contained food; and a pillow and blanket.

He glared at the items, his grip on the bowl tightening. The hero had a lot of nerve showing up out of nowhere with his damn pity gifts. He was probably proud of himself for helping out the "less fortunate" or some shit; as if this one small act somehow made the world a better place.

It didn't change anything.

His eyes narrowed when he noticed a box tucked in between two of the bags. Even in the dim light, the bright white logo on its side was visible. Hinode Donuts The high-end pastry shop was located on the far side of Musutafu, and he'd only been there once It pissed him off even though his mouth watered at the sight.

During the previous winter, he'd taken up residence in a nice little house in Minami Ward to escape the bite of a particularly nasty cold snap that had settled over the city. The owners were on vacation, so he helped himself to a warm bed and a pantry filled with instant ramen amd chips.

One of the neighbors must have noticed his presence because the winged rookie showed up in the middle of the night about three days after he got there. Maybe Dabi should have been grateful it was the bird that answered the call. Hawks somehow figured out the nature of the situation and stayed cool even though Dabi attempted to instigate a fight. The hero offered to help him find a job and a place to stay. He wasn't stupid enough to fall for the bullshit kindness routine, but he did grudgingly allow Hawks to buy him a large coffee and half a dozen doughnuts before blowing off his warning to stay out of trouble in the future.

For the remainder of the season, Dabi stayed at a questionable hotel, earning his room and a few spare bucks by running errands he knew would make the bird regret letting him go. It's not like he had a choice, and he was used to the dirty work by that point. Morals didn't equal survival in the streets, and if he was anything, Dabi was a survivor.

"Why the hell do you keep showing up here?"

"I just can't resist the hospitality."

Dabi rolled his eyes as he tossed the bowl in the garbage, unable to stomach any more of the mystery leftovers. The bird was an idiot, putting them both at risk. Dabi meant it when he said the hero's friends wouldn't approve. If one of them caught on and followed him, Dabi knew he'd be royally fucked. A few of the jobs he'd done recently had gotten more attention than he liked. Hawks had to be aware of the situation, but here he was with that stupid cover-boy smile and his damn doughnuts.

"Look, Dabi, I know you think I'm -"

A loud bang from upstairs stopped him short. His eyes widened, and Dabi growled, his left hand bursting into flames. The flickering blue light sent an array of shadows twisting up the walls and across the ceiling as the crackle of fire filled the sudden silence.

This turn of events wasn't a complete surprise. Heroes weren't trustworthy. Some part of him - very deep inside - had begun to think maybe Hawks was different from the rest. He'd almost been willing to consider the possibility this hero had a genuine intention to help rather than try to trap him or fuel his own ego. Dabi ignored the pang of disappointment and focused on the sense of relief that came with the fact that he never let his guard drop completely.

"Should've cooked you when I first had the chance."

Hawks threw his hands up in surrender, shaking his head. "Whoa, wait! I don't have a clue what that was. I swear, I came alone."

"Not buying it, hero."

A crash erupted from the livingroom, followed by a series of thuds accented with curses that echoed through the house. The second intruder wasn't doing anything to hide their presence, and Dabi questioned whether the bird might be telling the truth after all. If he wasn't, his choice for backup sucked.

"After you." Dabi grinned, gesturing towards the doorway with the flames still dancing on his fingertips, eager for action. There's no way he was getting caught between the two.

Hawks hesitated before passing through the archway. Dabi followed, every muscle tensed in anticipation. The livingroom was darker than the kitchen. All the windows were covered in boards and newspaper, which allowed him to move around well enough during the day but made getting around damn near impossible once the sun set. He'd memorized the landscape of the space. Broken furniture littered the floor, and there was a two-foot hole near the massive bookcase that blocked the front door. He spent most of his time in the master bedroom on the second floor where he kept a small lamp and a futon and could move around a little more freely.

"Heeey, Dabi, did you know there's a step missing... Wait! What are you doing here?"

Dabi groaned when he recognized the voice and stepped around Hawks to confirm his suspicion. Sure enough, a black-clad figure at the bottom of the staircase was climbing to his feet as he rubbed his head. A mask hid his face, but his confusion was apparent as he stared at the winged hero.

"How the hell do you people keep finding me? You'd think I was advertising my fucking location on the internet!"

Dabi turned on a heel and extinguished his flame as he went back to the kitchen, leaving the other two in darkness.

#mha dabi #dabi #touya todoroki #mha fanfiction #mha fic #mha au #a twist of fate #a dance on the dark side #mha hawks #bnha hawks #bnha #keigo takami #a new beginning #mha villain au #villain supremacy

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bigfan-fanfic · 1 year

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Storytime (Male!Reader x Paladin Danse)

Requested by @iliumheightnights for Fic requests you say!? I got you friend! How about Paladin Danse cuddling with his boyfriend/husband who tells him about life before the war and what it was like?

A lot of being married to Danse involves, pun intended, general deprogramming.

Most of what Danse remembers is filled with Brotherhood of Steel propaganda and he needs those ideas broken.

With your settlements allowing ghouls and synths and not tolerating prejudices, Danse needs to work out his own trauma and fears.

And something helpful to him has been hearing of your stories.

Your life, so far in the past, before the world collapsed in nuclear fire, is something that can bring him something he realizes he's never really had before.

Truth.

There's an opportunity here for him to ask someone who was actually there for it, and dispel his brainwashing.

Because in ways, it was good. In more ways, it was bad. But it's different than what Danse has heard.

You tell him about your life before the war. Military service, having a son. You think about sanitizing it but then you know that's not what he needs.

You tell him about the prejudices in the war paranoia. The way people were exploited, the way costs would fluctuate, how Vault-Tec played on fears.

Danse does give the big questions at the start - how did the tech work back in the day, did it really affect people like the Brotherhood said?

And you're honest. In part, yes, but really, it was just people. Technology and information can help fuel the conflict, but really it's people who do this - the Brotherhood taking it away just blinds them from the knowledge that they're becoming the same.

Eventually he starts just asking about daily life. About you shopping for Shaun's crib and nursery. About your hopes for him.

He imagines white picket fences and crisp lawns. Bright paint and smiling neighbors, but that's not what intrigues him. Facade and metal is all well and good, but he likes the most hearing about your human experiences. Something that just shows that human or synth, old or new, all of us are the same.

You play with his hair, letting him rest his head in your lap, and you speak. His eyes always close, but you know he's listening. You barely register your own words, a story about just going to a school dance, but the smile that creeps across his face is just so beautiful.

Sure, things are different. Traditions and society that have changes so much over centuries, but there's that core of common experience that remains in it.

And soon, the positions reverse. Danse holds you, and when he thinks you've fallen asleep, he speaks.

Tells you of his thoughts. Of scenarios of meeting before the war's end, thoughts of meeting in the Brotherhood. A thousand different scenarios, little snippets of lives you could have lived in other universes, but always, he kisses your temple and whispers that he wouldn't change a thing.

That of all the innumerable possibilities, he's grateful that in this universe, he was able to meet you.

And that's how he knows he's real. Everything can be simulated, manufactured. But the love he feels for you? Nothing could imitate that.

Danse loves you. Not because you make him feel human, but because with you, he doesn't have to be anything other than himself.

#paladin danse x male reader #danse x male reader #fallout 4 x reader #fallout headcanons #headcanons #paladin danse x reader

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beevean · 6 months

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I remember when Surge was first announced as IDW's newest upcoming character. Everyone at the time was under the impression that she was intended to be a literal biological clone of Sonic, and then some people used it as "proof" that Sonic was trans... even though one of Sega's most well known writing mandates is that you can't give canon characters at least biological family members. And then Surge's revealed backstory makes headcanoning Surge herself as trans give off some pretty unintentionally nasty implications; falling into the whole fear mongering idea that being gay or trans is just a social contagion that you're groomed into being.

I remember 😂 everyone assumed they were clones of Sonic and Tails. That "this proves Sonic is trans" post was on the top of the tag for weeks. Although I'm pretty sure she was revealed to be a tenrec very early on... but hey, what's canon in the face of headcanons :^)

Surge being trans can have unfortunate implications no matter how you slice it. A trans girl? So you're headcanoning the violent, insane masculine delinquent as being assigned male at birth, as if that isn't a well known transphobe point. A trans boy? So you don't think girls can be masculine without identifying as another gender. Yeah, they might be seen in bad faith, but they're legit arguments one can make.

And as for Starline, friendly reminder that a gay man kidnapped two children and brainwashed them to "warp" and "corrupt" them :) because we like representation! Even if it looks straight out of 1960s propaganda!

#fans don't look #starline should have stayed a simp #at least gay simps are entertaining

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leastdatablebracket · 7 months

Text

ROUND 4, MATCH 8

Propaganda under the cut! (tw rape)

Alfani

Propaganda

He is also part of the Brothel route (he and Dorain Grey share it). He is a prostitute at the Oscar Wilde brothel, and he has absolutely no problem raping MC under his bosses orders, not letting her leave and overall assists his boss in turning MC into a brainwashed sex slave.

Cullen Rutherford

Propaganda

stupid racist cop creep whose fans cry about how hes "changed" and "you can't judge him he was addicted to magic drugs" nah he still chose to be a racist cop and abuse his power over innocent people and i hate him. the writers making him romanceable in da:i after how blatantly horrible he was in da:o and da:2 is baffling but i guess they had to appeal to the part of their audience who watch those "mafia boyfriend" videos on tiktok or whatever

He's creepy in origins, though still 100% willing to kill the female mage pc he's crushing on, as well as all the other mages trapped in the circle with him. He's the second-in-command in an even worse circle in 2, listening to and defending the increasingly obviously insane meredith until literally the end. He's one of the people still pushing for the circle system by inquisition, and yes he's going through withdrawals and working through the traumas of previous games. And to be brutally honest his was the first romance i took and while i don't remember much from it, its not worth all the girls going absolutely nuts over knockoff terrible alistair.

He's basically a cop who thinks being born a certain way can revoke personhood and by Inquisition still thinks mages are monsters to be controlled, not people. He gets a fairy tale cutesy romance that focuses on his personal struggles with addiction while showing absolutely no regard to the atrocities he committed and still thinks were justified. He can be romanced BY A MAGE and his actions and beliefs are just glossed over. He believes mages are 'not people like you (Hawke) and me', but if the Warden was a female mage he canonically had a crush on her and would deliberately hang around her despite the fact that he was her *jailer*. If that Warden romanced Leliana, there is war table dialogue in which he pesters Leliana for news of his 'former' crush despite her repeated statement that she doesn't want to talk to him about her. All this shitty behavior and lack of introspection gets swept under the rug by the game, not even giving the PC the chance to really challenge his beliefs. Like damn even Fenris could apologize when he lashed out due to past trauma with mages, and if anyone has a reason to hate mages it's Fenris. If you want an ex Templar hottie Alistair is RIGHT THERE. Tbh I know Cullen is a popular romance and I'm not here to tell anyone what they can or can't do or like in a video game, I'm just saying I think he is deeply undateable

Spends the first two games as an antagonist, fervently devoted to the cause of subjugating mages, then a bunch of "character development" happens off screen and the games treat him like he's completely reformed. However he's actions make it clear he still sees mages as dangerous and lesser. Not to mention if you romance him with an elf he doesn't pay your culture more than lip service respect like most of the devout characters

He was a total villain in the first two games who was violently prejudiced against mages and uses one single bad experience as an excuse for it (a bad experience that is pretty much exactly what he in his job subjected graduating apprentices to, mind you, but this is never brought up). Now he says he's changed, but his words and actions say otherwise. He still distrusts mages, sympathises with the rebel Templars trying to kill them, and he never owns up to the terrible stuff he did and helped others do in the past two games. He totally knew what Meredith was doing and says he doesn't, and he still tries to defend her intentions. And you have no option to call him out on it. If you romance him as a mage, he angsts about how he might have seen you as subhuman in the past but NOW you're one of the good ones, and when you ask him if he'll kill you if you get possessed, he dodges the question. And the PC is written as being almost sad that she's a mage? Like 'can you love me despite what I am??' Also if Leliana romanced a female mage PC in the first game who is still alive, he asks her creepy questions about their relationship. Fitting considering his original purpose was to be creepy to the female mage Warden.

I hate him and want to cause chaos. Plus his VA is an asshole.

Cop

I think you covered almost everything but don't forget that beautiful moment in DA2 - Act 2 where you find out some templars had a petition to lobotomize all mages and Meredith, THE HARDCORE TEMPLAR LEADER, rejects it, but Cullen says they got a point. Despite the fact that we just found out that those templars were using lobotomy (or the threat of) to rape people and get away with it. And then Cullen in DA:I is whining that anything that happened it's not his fault because Meredith kept the worse away form him so he didn't know, but also that anyway Meredith had a point and did what she had to do. Meredith does not go mad until Act 3, before she was of sound mind and Culllen was her second in command BECAUSE he hated mages as much as (or even more) than her. What the FUCK did she even hide from you, Cullen. Oh, but he changed! Because the writers make A VICTIM OF THE TEMPLARS say so. And anyway he only says so BECAUSE HE READS MINDS not because Cullen did anything to show it. Also the narrative wants to sympathise with Cullen for his drug problems while Cullen is openly attacking the only other character with the same problem for...having the same problem. And he's the antagonist, so there were OTHER things Cullen could be mad about. But he is mad about the drug problem. Also I'm not an expert on writing characters with addictions but he is an addict only when it's time to have a cut scene where you pity him. Otherwise it has zero impacts on everything else.

#round 4

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natendo-art · 1 year

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Genuinely shocked to see people hating on Mobius. But more importantly coming after him for his past mistakes as part of the tva.

The man was literally ripped from his own timeline and life, and then had his memories erased. And was literally brainwashed and reprogrammed to believe he was created for one purpose only.

We seen a small fraction of the tva propaganda within its walls. But we have no idea how extensive the brainwashing truly is. These people really do believe that their purpose is to serve and protect the sacred timeline. In their eyes they truly serve a higher purpose that they were created to carry out.

Also on more than a few occasions with hunters in particular we see tva workers treat people out on missions poorly. Acting with no empathy as they just see them as insignificant in the grand scheme of things. But even brainwashed mobius character comes through. His empathy and understanding is unmistakable.

And the crucial part to remember here, is that as soon as Mobius discovers the truth he turns his back on the tva.

No hesitation. Once he knows the truth he realises that he can no longer live by the tvas law. He won't allow more innocent people to suffer at his hand, or anyone else's if he can help it.

During his conversation with ravonna he is very clear that he believes in freewill. And not only that but he wants to turn the tva into something new, something that doesn't punish people for straying from their set path. That desire to help and atone for the tvas past mistakes is evident immediately.

So yeah. To try and make him sound like a monster or a bad guy, it's just simply so far from the truth.

Honestly hating Mobius is a straight up red flag to me. 😂

#mobius #mobius m mobius #loki series

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just-antithings · 1 year

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I think copaganda anon and lots of people who enjoy cop shows don't want to see it as propaganda, because Propaganda=Bad. At least in the US, propaganda was always framed as Something Fascists Did To Brainwash, so I can see the push-back someone might have at admiting a thing they like is propaganda. I remember one of my teachers when I was a kid taking time to talk about how a big part of the American Revolution was propaganda, to get people angry at the British and be more willing to fight, so "propaganda" to me was always a neutral term. I like lots of procedurals too and have fond memories of watching NCIS and CSI with my parents as a kid. But I also acknowledge that the shows often have cops (or forensics) break the law and invade privacy, but because Cop Intuition is always right, it's okay, because that person was bad anyway! One of my comfort book series pushes this too, where a PI is dating a cop, and the PI is often pissed off about all the red tape she'd needed to go through when she was a government employee and how she's glad she can just go off by her own intuition now that she's private. And because she's the protag, she's Always Right, and if she's not, she was still right about Suspect being a Bad Person, she was only wrong about how. I still love the books, and my dad and I read them together, but God I'd want her arrested and never be allowed to investigate even stolen candy bars ever again, if this was real life. But just like with me enjoying other types of fiction, it doesn't make me a bad person or suddenly supportive of cops to enjoy these books. But it also doesn't erase how these stories are propaganda.

This was probably way too long of a way for me to say that I agree with Mod Gatito.

Its okay I love you. But yea that in big part what i was trying to say. Propaganda as a thing is neutral Propaganda =/= bad. Propaganda can be used for bad but so can a lot of things, it ain't special. But thank you for understanding the point I've been trying to make.

#mod gatito #asks

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o-craven-canto · 4 months

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Tribalism 101

Our beliefs and policies should be judged according to Our best intentions. Their beliefs and policies should be judged according to Their worst outcomes. Similarly, Our slogans and symbols should be taken at face value; Their slogans and symbols should be scrutinized for any possible evil hidden meaning and embarassing associations.

If we are not as successful in our political and social enterprises as we'd wish, it's because we care too much about principles and truth to form any compromise, whereas They keep gaining ground because they are either hive-minded fanatics brainwashed with the same story, or because they are sociopathic opportunists without a single principle.

We act according to necessity and incentives; in the rare cases in which We did something bad, We were forced to by circumstances, and They provoked us in some way, and They hurt us first and did worse things anyway. They, on the other hand, do evil things because they chose to be evil for no reason.

We make essays and treatises in which we present arguments; They make screeds and propaganda in which they spout talking points. You have no need to take in consideration or even understand one of Their talking points, even to refute it; it's something that They would say, and that is enough to discount it.

If you read a story about one of Us doing something hideous, it's probably one of Them in disguise, or a meaningless random happenstance that They maliciously amplified, or a deranged madman acting without reason, and We can't be responsible for what deranged madmen do, can We? Actually, when you think about it, They are the ones to blame for exploiting such tragedies for their own gain.

If you read a story about one of Them doing something hideous, it's your duty to the cause to believe it and to accuse of treason anyone who doubts. The story clearly proves that every single one of Them is a dangerous maniac. It the culprit turns out to be a deranged madman with barely any connection to Them, well, you have to wonder what makes Them so attractive to deranged madmen. And if the story does turn out to be completely fabricated, it's really Their fault for acting in a way that made it believable in the first place.

If you see a contradiction between different statements or policies espoused by Them, don't waste time supposing there might be disagreements between individuals among Them, or that you might not understand in full Their beliefs. It's probably just because they are evil and stupid, so be sure to mock them loudly for believing contradictory X and Y, but don't bring too much attention to the fact that you believe not-X and/or not-Y, just in case those turn out to be contradictory as well.

We stand for empathy (except against bad people), safety (except for bad people), and freedom (except to do bad things). It follows, then, that They support cruelty, danger, and oppression, presumably because They are stupid and evil.

If someone both We and They agree to be evil praises one of Our ideas or policies, it's evidence they are good, because if even the Great Evil can see they're good, what excuse do you have? If the same praises one of Their ideas or policies, it's evidence they are bad, because what does it say about you if the Great Evil is on your side?

Only We are fully rounded human beings: if any of Them shares any interest or pastime with you, or if They seem to experience some of the common joys and sorrows of human life, it must be part of a devious plan to infiltrate communities of decent people and brainwash them into supporting Their horrible policies.

In fact, if looking among Our own ranks we find something truly indefensible, you may assume it was due to one of Them infiltrating Our movement to corrupt it from the inside. Just affirm how much you hate Them some more and you'll be sure never to fall in the same error.

Always remember: on every question, there are only two possible answers, one of which marks you as one of Us and the other as one of Them. If you are not maximally for Us, then you are maximally for Them. If you try to distance yourself from both extremes, it means you are a spineless fencesitting coward, which is exactly the same as being maximally for Them.

#tribalism #politics #discourse #tbc: I don't think discourse is completely symmetrical #there are many instances in which one side is right and the other is wrong

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