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aeoki · 3 months

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SS Finals - Crown: Chapter 26

Location: ES Dome Lobby Characters: Seiya & Gatekeeper

“Gatekeeper”: The “Apostle” who visited the Boss was most likely “Priest”. He approached the Boss by taking the form of “Apostle” – the man Boss loved the most.

I don’t know what he’s after. Maybe he wanted to make the Boss write a statement in his will to give him all of the inheritance the Boss had hidden in various places.

Or maybe “Priest” really lost his mind and thought he was actually “Apostle”.

Judging from the remaining diary entries, it might have been the latter. “Priest” wanted to be “Apostle” – the man who the Boss loved the most.

I also once had those same feelings, so I know.

Seiya: No one can replace Akehoshi-kun. Not even me.

“Gatekeeper”: Yeah. That’s why, “Priest” was a fool. He threw his arms about, whining like a child and saying he wanted this and that, but as a result, he just ended up destroying everything.

All without gaining a single thing he really wanted.

Seiya: …………

“Gatekeeper”: Well, I don’t pity him. Not only did he ruin the Boss’ inheritance, but he lost miserably.

He is a disgrace that shouldn’t be one of the Boss’ confidants – He brings nothing but shame to us.

At the very least, I’ll make him settle the errors he caused. With our way of doing things.

Seiya: How terrifying. Will you go back overseas once that’s done?

“Gatekeeper”: For now. Frankly, I didn’t want to spend the new year in this country – I don’t think I’d be able to greet the new year with positive feelings if I did.

Seiya: Please, feel free to hurry and return to your home country. No one will stop you.

But is that what you had wanted?

“Gatekeeper”: What do you mean?

Seiya: No, just something I wasn’t quite convinced about. You did something not fitting for a mafia and even made an appearance, actively taking action.

I think the risks far outweigh the benefits you can gain, though.

“Gatekeeper”: Hmph. In the beginning, I was greedy and thought about obtaining everything.

I even brought subordinates from my home country in order to do that. At the very least, the power structure of the underworld would change if I let them go on a rampage here and there.

That’s what I had intended in the beginning. It’s the same interest the current ES has.

To have the wealth and power to even influence the government…

It was clear they were capable of that, seeing as a mere idol music programme could even implement a “citizen voting” system.

I had intended on taking those enormous rights and interests. I’ll cut down the big tree called the idol industry, convert it into a huge profit and take it back to my home country.

If I could lose the things that stood near me, then I figured I could drag the foolish “Priest” out.

He’d poke his head out of his den in a panic and I'd kill him with a “bang!”

Seiya: That’s a rather violent plan.

“Gatekeeper”: Yeah. It was a plan that would allow me to make a profit if it succeeded. In the beginning, anyway.

But it appears the big tree called the idol industry is too much for me. If I touched it, the poison would spread to me too. There’s no need to go that far to obtain it.

We can do what we do best: Threaten idols and exploit them.

I had already made the preparations for that – I did a little experiment during the Qualifying Rounds and was able to verify that it was possible.

But idols will definitely fight back.

Things were already a pain in the neck with the heir to the largest conglomerate in the world – the Tenshouin Zaibatsu – in the picture. There are other nuisances all over the place too.

Actually, I’d like to know why those sorts of people are being idols. There are other things they should be doing,

Seiya: Well, I’m not the best person to ask. But most youngsters these days do it because they want to.

“Gatekeeper”: Is that right? Those guys would continue to fight back – It would be foolish to force yourself to keep a violent beast.

I don’t have a single interest in idols, so I wouldn’t even know how to take care of one.

You idols aren’t normal. You’re all insane. I know painfully well that it’s impossible to keep you lot using normal methods.

No, it reminded me of the fact that I hate idols. The Boss was the best idol, but I still couldn’t understand how he felt right until the very end.

So I’ll leave this country. I’ll take on the full power of that counterattack before the main part of my organisation starts to crumble.

Your counterattack has already begun. The ones from this country’s underworld – Oukawa or Mikejima – have already found my subordinates and are hunting them down.

I tried to tie them down using the “secret orders” to avoid this sort of situation, but it was pointless. Perhaps I had made an error.

This country’s ties with the underworld is weakening. But the overworld and underworld are both coming for an invader like me separately on their own despite that.

What a nuisance of a country. Fussing over this land with all pain but no gain and getting hurt in the process is idiotic.

I’ve already taken a kick to the face – I’ll retreat before I get hurt any further.

Seiya: A wise decision. It felt as though everything was going all too well for us, so I didn’t feel completely convinced.

Are you saying evil has perished, or perhaps left, and all’s well that ends well?

“Gatekeeper”: Why not? All the worldly desires will be driven away once the bell is rung on the New Year. That sort of custom or belief exists in this country, right?

The evil corrupting this country or the industry would have been purified and returned to its pure form when the New Year rolls in… Happy New Year, idols.

Seiya: It’s too early to say that.

“Gatekeeper”: Hmph. By the time it’s the New Year, the captured “Priest” and I would already be on a plane. So now is the perfect time to say it.

Seiya: You won’t watch “SS” until the very end?

“Gatekeeper”: Haha. How many times do I have to tell you – I have no interest in that.

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ← Previous Chapter ᠂ ⚘ ˚⊹˚ ⚘ ᠂ Next Chapter →

#ss finals

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rauthschild · 4 months

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There is no excuse, no lawful basis, no legal basis for what the Biden Administration is doing here in The United States of North America, in the Family of Nations, or abroad.

Let us make this abundantly clear: Joe Biden is the "President" of the "White House Office, Inc." and nothing else. He is the President of what remains of the Dutch East India Company, nothing else.

He is not the President of The United States. He is not the President of The United States of America.

He is a con artist, a phony, a fall guy, an actor. Literally. And the election process that elected him was phony, too, quite apart from any wrong-doing or voting machine hacking or mail-in ballot fraud. It was already a three-dollar bill.

No, the elections in this country have been tainted with fraud since the 1850's.

This is when the United States of America, Incorporated, the British Territorial Subcontractor, started holding "public private" elections, and poured tons of money into political parties and campaigns and talking up the importance of having the ability to "vote".

Little did the victims realize that the "enfranchisement" that these British Snake Oil Salesmen were selling was an undisclosed "opportunity" to give up their identity as free men and women and as Autochthonous Americans, for the privilege of adopting the second-class political status of a U.S. Citizen (human) voting in the private corporate elections of a bankrupt British Corporation, so that they could inherit its debts.

That wasn't ever disclosed to the Autochthonous American Public. Guess you can all see why.

That's how Lincoln got elected. And that is the Office he got elected to. The British Territorial corporation dba the United States of America, Inc. was on the verge of bankruptcy and did go bankrupt in 1863.

So, how did Lincoln get into the White House?

The White House belongs to the colluding Roman Catholic Municipal Government.

They let Lincoln occupy the White House, which in the minds of the gullible Autochthonous American Public, meant that Lincoln must be the right and only President.

And now, let us observe that it was the Roman Catholics with the emphasis on "Roman" who were seeking a new life in America, a place where religious tolerance would finally allow the Roman Pontiff room to exercise his priesthood.

The White House-- built in 1792 and the oldest government-related structure in the Federal Capitol, is named after Jesuit Father Andrew White, SJ, who reportedly said the first Mass in Maryland, which was, obviously, a Catholic Colony named after the Virgin Mary, or, not so obviously, after Mary Magdalene.

Now, it may not appear to be connected, but only seven years later, the Dutch East India Company (1602-1799) was finally taken over for good by the British East India Company.

Understand that the Union Dutch East India Company was chartered by the Government of the Netherlands in 1602, and was the first Transnational joint-stock company in the world.

Understand that the Union Dutch East India Company was one of the key players in the giant Insurance Fraud known as the Bottomry Bonds Scandal that accompanied Queen Anne to the British Throne -- and it was under the charter of Queen Anne's Brother-in-Law, William of Orange; this situation forced an uneasy collusion between the Union Dutch East India Company and the British East India Company that endured until a fourth lovers' quarrel (British Navy acting as privateers against the Dutch Commercial Fleet) resulted in the formal dissolution of the Dutch East India Company in 1799.

This was little more than a merger ending a collusive monopoly, to keep the peace and the gilders and the marks and the kroners supporting the British Pound Sterling.

And who was the British King during all this? None other than our former liege-lord, George III.

We have wandered around the block a bit, but the point is to demonstrate that collusive commercial monopolies engaged in shipping and colonization, supported by several Continental Monarchies and the British Monarchy, too, underlie the economies of modern Europe.

And the so-called Kings of Britain were already pre-sold out to the Pope.

Britain, the Company, took over the shipping and colonization and mercenary forces portion of the operation in 1799, leaving the Dutch to specialize in banking, overland trading, warehousing, and business capitalization. They were still working hand-in-hand and for the same people.

Now, we come to America and the American version of this same arrangement. Instead of the Dutch East India Company, we had the United States Trading Company. Instead of the British East India Company, we had the United States of America Trading Company.

And although these were all transnational joint-stock companies chartered by European Monarchies, they were all ultimately administered by the British King, and at the end of the day, owned by the Roman Catholic Pope.

We already went over how Henry the Eighth double-crossed the Anglican Church, and now, we shall hear how Charles the Second, a staunch Roman Catholic, ordered both of his daughters (and heirs) to be brought up as Protestants.

The British Kings make 40% of the lifetime estimated estate value of Protestants and nothing off Roman Catholics. So, of course, they were at pains to encourage Protestantism throughout their realm(s), even though they were working for the Pope the whole time and owed their crowns to him.

Then, and to this day, they make the bulk of their money selling the estates and labor assets of "lost" Protestants --- and of course, by controlling trade routes, war, privateering, colonies, and courts.

These are all British franchises, and they get a cut off all of it, though the Pope continued to receive his Lion's share.

They haven't been able to get a good war going for a long time -- or, at least a long time for them.

Between 1776 and 2024 this country, the cheapest and best source of mercenaries for the British, has been at peace for exactly 22 years out of 248. Think about it. Think hard.

The discovery of the betrayal of the British Anglican Church and all associated Protestant faiths is having an effect on the money train between Rome and London, so they have fallen back on their second most reliable income stream: war.

They are now desperate to start a war and to make money any way they can. They don't care if it's a fake civil war in America or a genocide in Gaza or a proxy war in Ukraine.

The rest of the world is slowly choking them off.

To make matters worse, the Americans are waking up, including the American military.

To be blunt, the Transnational Transexual worshipers of Baal, Mammon and Baphomet, had hoped to be out of here and safely away in "peaceful China" selling their wares by now.

They love war because they make money--- lots and lots of money --- off war, but they always plan to be somewhere safe themselves.

While the Brits are trying to set America ablaze and trying to provoke the Arab states throughout the Middle East, they are being forced to rely on American Manpower instead of Chinese.

Quite obviously, the Americans are on to them now and even if they survive in the Middle East, there is no place to come home to. Not even Britian. That, above all else, is why they have been trying to clear a path to a new era of Colonialism in Africa.

They've already lost China as their landing place.

Now they've lost Ukraine.

Russia sweet-talked and assisted all the targeted countries in Africa --- having been attacked by the Euro-scum and not for the first time, they are now all allied with Russia.

Read that -- most of Africa is now allied with Russia.

Russia is already allied with Iran, and if possible, will be allied with Turkey soon -- a Trifecta melding Russian muscle and production capability with Iranian technical and scientific excellence and local knowledge, all meshing with the ferocious and well-equipped million-man Turkish Army.

This note to the U.S. Military --- color your rumps gone, boys, if you are fools enough to be dragged into this one, and stop guarding your own home.

President Erdogan of Turkey is suddenly the Belle of the Ball, with Vladimir Putin putting in his visit just in time for the Eastern Orthodox Church money and the F-15 Fighter bribe to wear off.

Bear in mind, that if a Great-Grandma in Big Lake, Alaska, can see this at a glance, so can a lot of other people worldwide.

No doubt, Erdogan and his Ministers remember what the Brits did to the Ottoman Empire, even if nobody in America ever read the history. And that has to be a really good motive for revenge---especially with the perceived value of U.S. Treasuries sinking into the Mariana Trench and the long-term bond market following after.

It does no good to kill Biden, Pelosi, nor the whole crowd of Leftist tools. The anxious bankers backing the Brits and Israel (because if they don't, their own dirty laundry comes out) will have bought new candidates by morning and made it look like this was an attack on America instead of an attack on "the US".

No, no, no, no. It does no good to take out the puppets and addicts and perverts. It's the puppetmasters who have to go.

Nor does it pay us to talk good, common sense -- like Colonel MacGregor suggests -- tell Israel we don't support genocide, and if this continues in Gaza, we're pulling out.

That is, in fact, the only solution for us and them.

Continuing this insanity of attacking Iran means that Israel will be obliterated from the map.

Even if they somehow coerced or paid every able-bodied man in America to go over to the Middle East and be slaughtered for the White House Office, Inc. and a purloined flag, it would still mean the obliteration of Israel.

As Colonel MacGregor observes in the film clip below, the only chance that Israel has, is to quit the genocide in Gaza and do it now.

But Netanyahu, like King Henry the Eighth, has cut his deal. Obviously. That's why he is still alive. He will willingly betray Israel to its final end, while pretending to lead it to victory and riches.

Just as Henry VIII acted as Head of the Anglican Church, while selling all his Protestant Subjects into slavery. Netanyahu is working for the Pope.

The reason that Israelis will be misled and the reason that Netanyahu will betray them is to get rid of the Dome of the Rock and all the evidence that underlies Jerusalem, all the history, all the evidence.

The Dracos think its time to fold the tent and collapse all the world religions that were headquartered in Jerusalem.

Even though they participated in creating all these religions, and have used them as tools to divide and conquer, what they want now is to destroy the evidence. Clean the slate and start over.

Yes, we are chalk under a giant blackboard eraser to them, but then, the feeling is mutual.

What we need is a short, sweet multinational declaration concerning the sins of the British Empire against mankind, telling the Brits to stop being puppets of Rome and telling Rome to knock it off -- or else.

Consider it said, as of 1776. It's called The A Declaration of July 4th, 1776.

Those interested in saving their own lives should read it and confirm that all the evils that George III visited on the Colonists then have been visited on us again.

We are not the only ones who have noticed the way that Britain is always at the bottom of the dogpile. And we aren't the only ones who have tracked them back to their nest in Rome.

Pinpoint attacks on specific targets would disable the entire Maritime Commercial Banking System and put an end to the puppeteers, the phony Stock Exchange, and the whole bailiwick.

They know that. We know that.

They want us to take out Fleet Street and bomb Telaviv where the "New York Stock Exchange" resides. They want the BEAST-System computer in Texas destroyed. They want us to destroy the evidence of their crimes.

We all need to wake up from this bad dream and treat it for what it is: crime.

It's not about Israel. It's about money and control.

It's not about "America". It's about almost-300 year-old transnational commercial corporations that have been using us all, not just Americans, for sock puppets.

It's not about innocent civilians in Gaza. It's about oil that Israel needs but doesn't want to pay for, sitting right under the Gaza Strip.

Israel wants the oil wealth and energy source for its own growth and development. So they follow the Pied Piper and call their neighbors "animals" and murder them for their own selfish benefit.

The "American" oil companies, that aren't really American at all, want to drain every last drop out of the Middle East before opening up the vast American resources.

Of course, they don't want to pay us for that, either. Thus both Gaza and the Americans become targets.

You don't think that Joe Biden is an Oil Company Flunkie? Think again.

Just look at what Biden and his Administration have done to shut down domestic oil production using Theodore Roosevelt's same old cynical policy and cover story of "conservation" that benefits his cronies and nobody else?

No, this about oil, too. Lots of it.

So, we think that on the small scale, it's apparent what needs to be done. The CEO's of certain corporations need to be arrested. And if that is not enough, entire Boards of Directors.

For crimes against humanity.

Please check out these videos for a clear-eyed vision of the world situation right now.

Colonel MacGregor:

https://youtu.be/w9l7-JyXPp4?si=q3J3XqwfhCAEhSo6

"Mistakes Were Not Made" -- notice the bizarre floor show of nurses with needles and patients jumping on hospital beds that were showcased at the London Olympics. No mistake.

https://www.brighteon.com/26365e0a-347e-4b82-930c-9590a686aada

Before this ends, the role of the French and Swiss Governments will become apparent, too.

This is not a show, with a drama written in blood. It's a horse opera with Russian cowboys.

Remember: Russia, Iran, and Turkey. Doesn't really matter what the rest of the region does. Russia has already taken Ukraine and half of Africa.

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gamesthatwelove · 2 years

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What is Bitcoin Mining?

Bitcoin Mining is a process where data (bits) are aggregated to form a new unit known as a block. These blocks are then digitally signed, broadcast, and added to the blockchain, which provides a secure, auditable, public record of the data. Since the process requires both computational and data storage resources, Bitcoin miners are paid for providing their resources to secure the network.

How is the mining algorithm developed and tested?

Because of the open source nature of Bitcoin, its code and the development process is transparent. For more information, see The Bitcoin whitepaper and Bitcoin-source.org.

In 2009, developers were invited to participate in the open source development of Bitcoin. This process was done through the Bitcoin Improvement Proposals. Each BIP submitted to the core code was given a numeric score. By following a process for each BIP, the BIP was assigned a score. Then the average score was added to the score of each of the most popular BIPs that covered that area of the Bitcoin protocol. Once the total score reached a pre-set threshold, the BIP was adopted and then the threshold was removed.

As you can see from the above chart, the threshold was first reached with BIP 37 in 2009. The following chart is the same threshold for the past nine years, and each dot on the chart represents a new threshold.

The threshold chart above indicates that the highest average threshold until November 2013 was BIP 100, but in November 2013 the threshold reached a record low of BIP 1.

Once the threshold was met, the developers created a release version of the code that included the set of changes, and after receiving a majority of votes (more than 50 percent) from all of the nodes in the network, it became a part of the official Bitcoin protocol.

Does the system work only during a certain time of the day?

Bitcoin mining was designed so that it can be implemented on any server with access to the internet. It works on computers, because we use computers for the vast majority of our computing needs. It can be used by individuals, institutions and governments for many different purposes.

Bitcoin miners are rewarded for providing the computing power for the network, which enables the security, storage and transactions necessary for the network to operate. Bitcoin miners are rewarded on an ongoing basis for their work, so that the longer the network is used, the more computing power becomes available. Bitcoin transactions are executed on blocks, so that each block has to be solved by two or more computing units at the same time, thus, making it more difficult to perform double spending. The block size is fixed, so that the limit on the number of transactions that can be made every 10 minutes is not based on how many mining units are participating, but how many blocks can be created in a single 10 minute period.

How is the mining algorithm distributed and incentivized?

Bitcoin can be mined in any part of the world, but a lot of users choose to mine Bitcoin in countries with cheap electricity. This is because in those regions electricity is cheap, thus allowing Bitcoin mining to be inexpensive. In addition to electricity being cheap, many countries have laws which require that they sell power to their citizens, making Bitcoin mining available to those who may have some difficulty accessing electricity.

If you have a miner running, it generates a small number of bitcoins every day. You can access your miner by logging into your account at Bitcoin.com and clicking on the Account menu. If you want to check how many bitcoins you have in your wallet, you will find this information on the History tab.

If you wish to purchase more bitcoins, you can send bitcoin to your Bitcoin address at any time. However, you should keep in mind that your Bitcoins will be locked until your Bitcoins are sent to your wallet address.

#crypto #crypto mining #how to mine bitcoin

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gristol-liker · 2 years

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what is it about gristol that trips your trigger, so to speak?

What do I like about Gristol? A lot!

Firstly, his design. (This isn't that unique to him, as I love the designs of Psychonauts characters in general.) I like that he's so... ordinary. So many of the characters are so tall! (Why is Loboto 9 ft tall!?) And some of the characters are really thin. (Where does Milla keep her organs?) But Gristol has a gut (until he's dressed as the gzar🙁) and is balding, which kind of lulls you into a false sense of security. He doesn't look creepy or menacing like Loboto or Maligula. He's just a guy.

Then there's his voice, courtesy of Elijah Wood❤️ I really enjoyed his singing voice during "Grulovia, Grulovia," the sadness in his voice when he tells Raz that his dad died, and the goofy voice he has when brainless.

Which brings me to brainless Nick! Brainless Nick is very entertaining as he stumbles around the mail room. I especially enjoy picking him up with telekinesis and hearing him say "air mail?"

And his animation! (Again, not that unique to him, as I like the animation in general.) Look at the above gif for his floppy animation I adore so much. But I'm also a fan of expressive hand movement, such as he has here:

Side note: He opens that booth with a little flourish! He sure can be dramatic! Made his body a good fit for Helmut.😆

I also really like Gristol's duality. He can be adorable at times but then again he's equally sinister. Just look at how quickly he can switch between these! (And there's more of that hand animation I like.)

The other villains/antagonists in Psychonauts just don't have that same kind of duality, imo. Oleander has moments where he's sad (bowling alley) or having the time of his life (cruise ship), but he still seems like the same "drill sergeant" guy he's trying to be. Same with Loboto, who gets plenty of evil bits (turtle soup) and sad bits (not employee of the year), but again, most of his lines are still just "wacky dentist man." Lucy/Maligula is the one who I'd say comes closest to this duality, but Maligula is set up more as a separate personality and one she can't control, whereas Nick is a facade put on by Gristol and his switching between emotions is a conscious choice.

Real quick: I'm not hating on any of the other characters or actors who play them! I think they're all really great!

I guess the last thing I want to talk about is his backstory and personality. It's very easy to write him off as just a spoiled brat (I mean, yeah, he was spoiled and he probably was a brat as a child but stay with me), but I think if you look at things from his point of view, you can see that he is the way he is now because of his upbringing.

The conversations between Raz and Gristol when in Gristol's mind are quite revealing as to what Gristol sees as normal. Gristol tells Raz that he's homeless and Raz (rightfully) tells him the room isn't so bad. But Gristol lived in a palace before this. That's why the room feels like such a downgrade to him. Plus, he did have to leave his home! As someone who had to leave their home as a child, I can relate to how Gristol must feel about it. In the past, I've been upset with my mom for making us move so far away, though not nearly as strongly as he was with his dad.

He also seems to think the gzar is elected? No clue where that came from, but that means he thought his dad was a good enough ruler for people to pick him and that the protesters were a minority, and so he probably believes that the citizens would have voted for him if they hadn't left Grulovia. And he can't see Maligula as a villain because she saved him from being attacked by adults. (Why were the adults attacking a child anyway?)

Anyway, the point I'm making with the above three paragraphs is that I think there's some good arguments for saying that he's the way he is because he was raised to be like that; sheltered from reality and spoiled rotten. He even partially admits that he was wrong about some things. (Not a very sincere apology though). I do think that with some actual therapy - not a 10 year old just running around punching things - he could learn to be a decent person. I like the depth his character has.

Gifs made from these videos:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QhDFUZg2AqU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bexmvfob6to&t=2157s

#whew this got long #i didn't realize i had so much to say about him #gristol malik #nick johnsmith #psychonauts #had to make my own gifs since I couldn't find any #not top quality but whatever

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random-iz-stuff · 2 years

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How does height affect lower class citizens? People are respected based off of it and often get better or worse jobs depending on it, but if someone is short for a while and gets taller does their ranking improve? Like if you have a drone that somehow got pretty good height after a while? Unlikely, because you said height is tracked and doesn't USUALLY screw up, but has a lower class citizen ever become tallest? What would happen if that did happen?

If a drone class irken rises above a certain height, they are freed from drone work and placed in the next highest class, Working Class. From there it takes a mix of money, skills and more height to reach the Middle Class and eventually, higher ranking classes. Your height can help you completely escape drone class, but height alone won’t get you out of Working Class or anything higher. It will make you more likely for a better job within your current class though.

The height database is a (mostly) consistent way of telling how tall most irkens will become, but only members of the Tallest Class are allowed to see it. Plus, there are so many irkens in existence that looking at the projected heights of all of them would take just over a thousand years of reading a bunch of numbers and names off a computer, so its all given to the control brains to sort through and is only used by the Tallest Class to find out who’s going to be among the tallest irkens, either so they know who might become the next Tallest or for finding potential apprentices for the Royal Advisors. Using that database on every single irken to figure out how tall they’re going to be would be a massive waste of energy, resources and time, especially since the database isn’t 100% accurate and does screw up occasionally.

A lower class irken becoming Tallest is so rare that it only (almost) happened one time in recent history. A drone class irken went through a massive amount of growth spurts and ended up matching the height of the current Tallest at the time. An election started to decide who gets the empire and the former drone class almost won. Almost. The fact that the former drone was a former drone and didn’t have much experience outside drone class work was a major turn off for just about every middle and high class irken. They also vowed to make drone class and working class better paying, less dangerous and more respectable, which made them extremely popular among the lower class (which was a very good thing to achieve because the lower class contains a massive amount of irkens and every vote in a Tallest election is equal) but extremely unpopular among the higher classes and a controversial topic for the middle class (which is the largest class in the empire with the largest population of irkens). (Keep in mind here that treating lower class irkens as equals was considered a minor defect back then and still is now.)

They ended up losing the election and were given an existence evaluation trial because they were treating lower class irkens as equals despite being taller and slightly higher class and accidentally teaching others to do the same during the election with their speeches and promises, which is anti empire behaviour.

They would have been labeled as a low ranking defective (a defective that can be fixed through various means) no matter what, but the trial also found multiple high ranking defects and they were declared a high ranking defective (a defective that cannot be fixed) and deleted. They stand today as the tallest irken to ever be declared as a high ranking defective.

#invader zim #headcanons #asks

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robertreich · 4 years

Video

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6 Crucial Races That Will Flip the Senate

This November, we have an opportunity to harness your energy and momentum into political power and not just defeat Trump, but also flip the Senate. Here are six key races you should be paying attention to. 1. The first is North Carolina Republican senator Thom Tillis, notable for his “olympic gold” flip-flops. He voted to repeal the Affordable Care Act, then offered a loophole-filled replacement that excluded many with preexisting conditions. In 2014 Tillis took the position that climate change was “not a fact” and later urged Trump to withdraw from the Paris Climate Accord, before begrudgingly acknowledging the realities of climate change in 2018. And in 2019, although briefly opposing Trump’s emergency border wall declaration, he almost immediately caved to pressure. But Tillis’ real legacy is the restrictive 2013 voter suppression law he helped pass as Speaker of the North Carolina House. The federal judge who struck down the egregious law said its provisions “targeted African Americans with almost surgical precision.” Enter Democrat Cal Cunningham, who unlike his opponent, is taking no money from corporate PACs. Cunningham is a veteran who supports overturning the Supreme Court’s disastrous Citizens United decision, restoring the Voting Rights Act, and advancing other policies that would expand access to the ballot box. 2. Maine Senator Susan Collins, a self-proclaimed moderate whose unpopularity has made her especially vulnerable, once said that Trump was unworthy of the presidency. Unfortunately, she spent the last four years enabling his worst behavior. Collins voted to confirm Trump’s judges, including Brett Kavanaugh, and voted to acquit Trump in the impeachment trial, saying he had “learned his lesson” through the process alone. Rubbish. Collins’ opponent is Sara Gideon, speaker of the House in Maine. As Speaker, Gideon pushed Maine to adopt ambitious climate legislation, anti-poverty initiatives, and ranked choice voting. And unlike Collins, Gideon supports comprehensive democracy reforms to ensure politicians are accountable to the people, not billionaire donors. Another Collins term would be six more years of cowardly appeasement, no matter the cost to our democracy. 3. Down in South Carolina, Republican Senator Lindsey Graham is also vulnerable. Graham once said he’d “rather lose without Donald Trump than try to win with him.” But after refusing to vote for him in 2016, Graham spent the last four years becoming one of Trump’s most reliable enablers. Graham also introduced legislation to end birthright citizenship, lobbied for heavy restrictions on reproductive rights, and vigorously defended Brett Kavanaugh. Earlier this year, he said that pandemic relief benefits would only be renewed over his dead body. His opponent, Democrat Jaime Harrison, has brought the race into a dead heat with his bold vision for a “New South.” Harrison’s platform centers on expanding access to healthcare, enacting paid family and sick leave, and investing in climate resistant infrastructure. Graham once said that if the Republicans nominated Trump the party would “get destroyed,” and “deserve it.” We should heed his words, and help Jaime Harrison replace him in the Senate. 4. Let’s turn to Montana’s Senate race. The incumbent, Republican Steve Daines, has defended Trump’s racist tweets, thanked him for tear-gassing peaceful protestors, and parroted his push to reopen the country during the pandemic as early as May. Daine’s challenger is former Democratic Governor Steve Bullock. Bullock is proof that Democratic policies can actually gain support in supposedly red states because they benefit people, not the wealthy and corporations. During his two terms, he oversaw the expansion of Medicaid, prevented the passage of union-busting laws, and vetoed two extreme bills that restricted access to abortions.The choice here, once again, is a no-brainer.

5. In Iowa, like Montana, is a state full of surprises. After the state voted for Obama twice, Republican Joni Ernst won her Senate seat in 2014. Her win was a boon for her corporate backers, but has been a disaster for everyone else.

Ernst, a staunch Trump ally, holds a slew of fringe opinions. She pushed anti-abortion laws that would have outlawed most contraception, shared her belief that states can nullify federal laws, and has hinted that she wants to privatize or fundamentally alter social security “behind closed doors.” Her opponent, Democrat Theresa Greenfield, is a firm supporter of a strong social safety net because she knows its importance firsthand. Union and Social Security survivor benefits helped her rebuild her life after the tragic death of her spouse. With the crippling impact of coronavirus at the forefront of Americans’ minds, Greenfield would be a much needed advocate in the Senate. 6. In Arizona, incumbent Senate Republican Martha McSally is facing Democrat Mark Kelly. Two months after being defeated by Democrat Kyrsten SINema for Arizona’s other Senate seat, McSally was appointed to fill John McCain’s seat following his death. Since then, she’s used that seat to praise Trump and confirm industry lobbyists to agencies like the EPA, and keep cities from receiving additional funds to fight COVID-19. As she voted to block coronavirus relief funds, McSally even had the audacity to ask supporters to “fast a meal” to help support her campaign. Mark Kelly, a former astronaut and husband of Congresswoman Gabby Giffords, became a gun-control activist following the attempt on her life in 2011. His support of universal background checks and crucial policies on the climate crisis, reproductive health, and wealth inequality make him the clear choice. These are just a few of the important Senate races happening this year. In addition, the entire House of Representatives will be on the ballot, along with 86 state legislative chambers and thousands of local seats.

Winning the White House is absolutely crucial, but it’s just one piece of the fight to save our democracy and push a people’s agenda. Securing victories in state legislatures is essential to stopping the GOP’s plans to entrench minority rule through gerrymandered congressional districts and restrictive voting laws — and it’s often state-level policies that have the biggest impact on our everyday lives. Even small changes to the makeup of a body like the Texas Board of Education, which determines textbook content for much of the country, will make a huge difference. Plus, every school board member, state representative, and congressperson you elect can be pushed to enact policies that benefit the people, not just corporate donors. This is how you build a movement that lasts.

#video #videos #2020 election

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journalbynics · 2 years

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Long post ahead. This is political and turned out to be personal as well regarding the recent Election in the Philippines.

In 2020, at the beginning of the pandemic/ lockdown era, I was very vocal about making noises on Twitter criticizing our government because Filipinos had enough of the resiliency bullshit they are normalizing as a good trait. The downside of that trait is we settled for less over the years. Which we shouldn't be since we deserve better because we pay taxes while most politicians stay corrupt and unfair.

I suddenly stopped tweeting about political matters because there's a red-tagging threat for those who exercise our freedom of speech. I was scared because I'm just a student. If the threats are true, my future will be doomed. Also because I don't want to lose my account on Twitter which I mostly use as a platform to connect with my favorite artists and personalities in general.

Starting in 2020 until now, 2022. I've been incredibly focused and productive on growing as a person. I kept pursuing my passion. My relationship with God has been deeper than ever since I also started reading The Bible consistently during this period. With this habit, I've been at peace. I stopped engaging in political matters and just chose to focus on my personal life since I can't do much like others are dictating. "walang ambag kamo" bullshit

It's really easy to put rose-colored glasses in real life and overthink fictional characters' dilemmas instead but actually, those dilemmas are currently happening in our society as well that we choose to overlook and kinda treat as a media we just consume.

I may have been a very silent supporter of the candidate I rooted for but I stood up this election and exercised my right to vote for the right one. I figured this is the right time for me to speak up since we're getting closer to results.

To those who kept making noises and educating people in the most patient and respectful way they can be, I SALUTE Y'ALL.

Just trying to speak up is difficult enough but talking with people who have different beliefs from you is incredibly tougher.

I felt it when I only had a short conversation with my older sister who supports candidates with questionable backgrounds and I was offended by the way she mocked mine when her candidates are even worse.

I hate how she's blinded by fake news and disregards countless victims with proofs during the oppressive era of the Marcos Administration.

It hurts because I used to look up to her and I can't fathom how she's one of those people who invalidate the injustices suffered by others. Majority of the citizens here in my country rooted for a son's dictator as the president, an actor, and a bunch of corrupts as senators.

Anyway, it's also difficult being a Christian right now because I've realized that even after reading the bible, applying it, and keeping the faith, is a different feeling when you're in the situation. I thought my faith was already strong but then these things happened and I have shaken again. I begin to wonder questions like why? Do these bad things really need to happen? The injustices? Do we really need to experience things before we learned? It's just a shame for the people who put their life online back then who fought against the oppressors. Holding a grudge has been an idea that's been crossing my mind to all the people I knew who supported an unqualified candidate. I can't help but question their choice and how they lack empathy for all the victims of that family in the past.

When partial election results started to spread fast last night, it's maddening seeing how many people supported a candidate who doesn't even attend debates, denies history, is a thief, a liar, and a son of a dictator. It's clownery and also a sad reality.

I remembered Jesus who was crucified while a murderer like Barabbas was chosen by the people to be released. That's just ill-fated that the worse ones always win first.

It would be acceptable if the results are real but still, it seemed questionable when there were faulty and delayed voting machines during the election hour itself and it all suddenly became faster when partial results are coming in. All we want is transparency now and still hoping for a miracle that we'd win. 🙏

I salute and still support the Robredo family for all the goodness they radiated and shared with the Filipinos.

God Bless my country, the Philippines. 🇵🇭

When you try your best, but you don't succeed

When you feel so tired, but you can't sleep

Stuck in reverse

#philippines #philippine elections #election 2022 #robredo sisters #leni robredo #halalan2022 #pilipinas #journalbynics

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didanawisgi · 3 years

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Martin Luther King Jr., Guns, and a Book Everyone Should Read

BY JEREMY S. | JAN 15, 2018

“Martin Luther King Jr. would have been 89 years old today, were he not assassinated in 1968. On the third Monday in January we observe MLK Jr. Day and celebrate his achievements in advancing civil rights for African Americans and others. While Dr. King was a big advocate of peaceful assembly and protest, he wasn’t, at least for most of his life, against the use of firearms for self-defense. In fact, he employed them . . .

If it wasn’t for African Americans in the South, primarily, taking up arms almost without exception during the post-Civil War reconstruction and well into the civil rights movement, this country wouldn’t be what it is today.

By force and threat of arms African Americans protected themselves, their families, their homes, and their rights and won the attention and respect of the powers that be. In a lawless, post-Civil War South they stayed alive while faced with, at best, an indifferent government and, at worst, state-sponsored violence against them.

We know the Supreme Court’s Dred Scott decision of 1857 refused to recognize black people as citizens. Heck, they were deemed just three-fifths a person. Not often mentioned in school: some of that was due to gun rights. Namely, not wanting to give gun rights to blacks. Because if they were to recognize blacks as citizens, it…

“…would give to persons of the negro race . . . the right to enter every other State whenever they pleased, . . . and it would give them the full liberty of speech . . . ; to hold public meetings upon political affairs, and to keep and carry arms wherever they went.”

Ahha! So the Second Amendment was considered an individual right, protecting a citizen’s natural, inalienable right to keep and carry arms wherever they go. Then as now, gun control is rooted in racism.

During reconstruction, African Americans were legally citizens but were not always treated as such. Practically every African American home had a shotgun — or shotguns — and they needed it, too. Forget police protection, as those same officials were often in white robes during their time off.

Fast forward to the American civil rights movement and we learn, but again not at school, that Martin Luther King Jr. applied for a concealed carry permit. He (an upstanding minister, mind you) was denied.

Then as in many cases even now, especially in blue states uniquely and ironically so concerned about “fairness,” permitting was subjective (“may issue” rather than “shall issue”). The wealthy and politically connected receive their rights, but the poor, the uneducated, the undesired masses, not so much.

Up until late in his life, MLK Jr. chose to be protected by the Deacons for Defense. Though his home was also apparently a bit of an arsenal.

African Americans won their rights and protected their lives with pervasive firearms ownership. But we don’t learn about this. We don’t know about this. It has been unfortunately whitewashed from our history classes and our discourse.

Hidden, apparently, as part of an agreement (or at least an understanding) reached upon the conclusion of the civil rights movement.

Sure, the government is going to protect you now and help you and give you all of the rights you want, but you have to give up your guns. Turn them in. Create a culture of deference to the government. Be peaceable and non-threatening and harmless. And arm-less, as it were (and vote Democrat). African Americans did turn them in, physically and culturally.

That, at least, is an argument made late in Negroes and the Gun: the Black Tradition of Arms. It’s a fantastic book, teaching primarily through anecdotes of particular African American figures throughout history just how important firearms were to them. I learned so-freaking-much from this novel, and couldn’t recommend it more. If you have any interest in gun rights, civil rights, and/or African American history, it’s an absolute must-read.

Some text I highlighted on my Kindle Paperwhite when I read it in 2014:

But Southern blacks had to navigate the first generation of American arms-control laws, explicitly racist statutes starting as early as Virginia’s 1680 law, barring clubs, guns, or swords to both slaves and free blacks.

“…he who would be free, himself must strike the blow.”

In 1846, white abolitionist congressman Joshua Giddings of Ohio gave a speech on the floor of the House of Representatives, advocating distribution of arms to fugitive slaves.

Civil-rights activist James Forman would comment in the 1960s that blacks in the movement were widely armed and that there was hardly a black home in the South without its shotgun or rifle.

A letter from a teacher at a freedmen’s school in Maryland demonstrates one set of concerns. The letter contains the standard complaints about racist attacks on the school and then describes one strand of the local response. “Both the Mayor and the sheriff have warned the colored people to go armed to school, (which they do) [and] the superintendent of schools came down and brought me a revolver.”

Low black turnout resulted in a Democratic victory in the majority black Republican congressional district.

Other political violence of the Reconstruction era centered on official Negro state militias operating under radical Republican administrations.

“The Winchester rifle deserves a place of honor in every Black home.” So said Ida B. Wells.

Fortune responded with an essay titled “The Stand and Be Shot or Shoot and Stand Policy”: “We have no disposition to fan the coals of race discord,” Thomas explained, “but when colored men are assailed they have a perfect right to stand their ground. If they run away like cowards they will be regarded as inferior and worthy to be shot; but if they stand their ground manfully, and do their own a share of the shooting they will be respected and by doing so they will lessen the propensity of white roughs to incite to riot.”

He used state funds to provide guns and ammunition to people who were under threat of attack.

“Medgar was nonviolent, but he had six guns in the kitchen and living room.”

“The weapons that you have are not to kill people with — killing is wrong. Your guns are to protect your families — to stop them from being killed. Let the Klan ride, but if they try to do wrong against you, stop them. If we’re ever going to win this fight we got to have a clean record. Stay here, my friends, you are needed most here, stay and protect your homes.”

In 2008 and 2010, the NAACP filed amicus briefs to the United States Supreme Court, supporting blanket gun bans in Washington, DC, and Chicago. Losing those arguments, one of the association’s lawyers wrote in a prominent journal that recrafting the constitutional right to arms to allow targeted gun prohibition in black enclaves should be a core plank of the modern civil-rights agenda.

Wilkins viewed the failure to pursue black criminals as overt state malevolence and evidence of an attitude that “there’s one more Negro killed — the more of ’em dead, the less to bother us. Don’t spend too much money running down the killer — he may kill another.”

But it puts things in perspective to note that swimming pool accidents account for more deaths of minors than all forms of death by firearm (accident, homicide, and suicide).

The correlation of very high murder rates with low gun ownership in African American communities simply does not bear out the notion that disarming the populace as a whole will disarm and prevent murder by potential murderers.

Centers for Disease Control (CDC) estimated 1,900,000 annual episodes where someone in the home retrieved a firearm in response to a suspected illegal entry. There were roughly half a million instances where the armed householder confronted and chased off the intruder.

A study of active burglars found that one of the greatest risks faced by residential burglars is being injured or killed by occupants of a targeted dwelling. Many reported that this was their greatest fear and a far greater worry than being caught by police.48 The data bear out the instinct. Home invaders in the United States are more at risk of being shot in the act than of going to prison.49 Because burglars do not know which homes have a gun, people who do not own guns enjoy free-rider benefits because of the deterrent effect of others owning guns. In a survey of convicted felons conducted for the National Institute of Justice, 34 percent of them reported being “scared off, shot at, wounded or captured by an armed victim.” Nearly 40 percent had refrained from attempting a crime because they worried the target was armed. Fifty-six percent said that they would not attack someone they knew was armed and 74 percent agreed that “one reason burglars avoid houses where people are at home is that they fear being shot.”

In the period before Florida adopted its “shall issue” concealed-carry laws, the Orlando Police Department conducted a widely advertised program of firearms training for women. The program was started in response to reports that women in the city were buying guns at an increased rate after an uptick in sexual assaults. The program aimed to help women gun owners become safe and proficient. Over the next year, rape declined by 88 percent. Burglary fell by 25 percent. Nationally these rates were increasing and no other city with a population over 100,000 experienced similar decreases during the period.55 Rape increased by 7 percent nationally and by 5 percent elsewhere in Florida.

As you can see, Negroes and the Gun progresses more or less chronologically, spending the last portion of the book discussing modern-day gun control. It’s an invaluable source of ammunition (if you’ll pardon the expression) against the fallacies of the pro-gun-control platform. It sheds light on a little-known (if not purposefully obfuscated), critical factor in the history of African Americans: firearms.

On this Martin Luther King Jr. Day, I highly recommend you — yes, you — read Negroes and the Gun: the Black Tradition of Arms.

And I’ll wrap this up with a quote in a Huffington Post article given by Maj Toure of Black Guns Matter:

https://cdn0.thetruthaboutguns.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/huffpo-maj-toure.jpg”

#books #black history #history #american history #Guns #civil rights #constitution #supreme court #gun control #martin luther king jr.#dread scott #concealed carry #concealedcarry #everydaycarry #gun confiscation

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dwellordream · 3 years

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“…Now, if people are taught anything at all about medieval history it often is English medieval history. People with absolutely no other frame of reference can often tell you when the Norman Conquest of England took place, or the date of the signing of Magna Carta even if they don’t know exactly why these things are important. (TBH Magna Carta isn’t important unless you were a very rich dude at the time, sooooo.) If you ask people to name a medieval book they’ll probably say Beowulf even if they’ve never read it.

Here’s the thing though – England was a total backwater in terms of the way medieval people thought and was not particularly important at the time. How much of a backwater? Well, when Anne of Bohemia, daughter of my man Holy Roman Emperor Charles IV (RIP, mate. Mourn ya til I join ya.) married King Richard II of England in the fourteenth century there was uproar in Prague. How could a Bohemian imperial princess be sent to London? How would she survive in the hinterlands? The answer was she was sent along with an entire cadre of Bohemian ladies in waiting to give her people with whom she could have a sophisticated conversation.

This ended up completely changing fashion in England. Anne is the girl who introduced those sweet horned headdresses you think of when you think of medieval ladies, riding side-saddle, and the word “coach” to England, (from the Hungairan Kocs, where the cart she arrived at court the first time came from). Sweetening her transition to English life was the fact that she didn’t have to pay a dowry to get married. Instead, the English were allowed to trade freely with Bohemia and the Holy Roman Empire and allowed to be around a Czech lady. That was reward enough as far as the Empire was concerned. That’s how much England was not a thing. (The English took this insult very badly, and hated Anne at first, but since she was a G they got over it. Don’t worry.)

If England was unimportant why do we know about English medieval history and nothing else? Same reason you’re reading this blog in English right now, homes. I’m not sure if you know this, but in the modern period, the English got super super good at going around the world an enslaving anyone they met. When you’re busy not thinking about German imperial atrocities in the nineteenth century it’s because you’re busy thinking about British imperial atrocities, you feel me? So we all speak English now and if we harken back to historical things it gives us a grandiose idea of English history.

Say, then, you are trying to establish a curriculum for schools that bigs up English history, as is our want. Ask yourself – are you gonna want to dwell on an era where England was so unimportant that Czechs were flexing on it? Answer: no. You gonna gloss right over that and skip to the early modern era and the Tudors who I am absolutely sure you know all the fuck about. The second colonial-imperialist reason for not learning about medieval history is that medieval history doesn’t exactly aggrandise the colonial-imperialist system.

Yes, there are empires in medieval Europe. In addition to the Holy Roman Empire there’s the Eastern Roman Empire, aka the Byzantine Empire, whose downfall is often pointed to as one of several possible bookends to the medieval period. You also have opportunists like the Venetians who set up colonies around the Adriatic and Mediterranean, or the Normans who defo jump in boats and take over, well, anything they could get their hands on.

Notably, when these dudes got where they were going, they didn’t end up enslaving a bunch of people, committing genocide, and then funnelling all resources back to a theoretical homeland. The Normans settled down where they were eventually creating distinctive court cultures, and the Venetian colonies enjoyed a seriously high level of trade and quality of life without major disruption to local customs. Force was certainly used to take over at the outset, but it wasn’t something that resulted in the complete subjugation and deaths of millions halfway around the world from where the aggressors started.

No, the European middle ages are a lot more about local areas muddling along with smaller systems of rule. That’s why you have distinctive areas like say, Burgundy or Sicily calling their own shots and developing their own styles and fashions. Hell, even within imperial systems like the Holy Roman Empire Bavarians or Bohemians saw themselves as very much distinct peoples within an imperial system, not necessarily imperial subjects first and foremost.

You know where you would go to find some history that justifies huge imperial systems that require constant conquest and an army of slaves to keep them afloat? Ancient Rome. Remember how you got taught how great Rome was? How it was a democracy? How they had wonderful technology and underfloor heating, and oh isn’t that temple beautiful? Yeah, that’s because you were being inculcated to think that the ends of imperial violence justifies mass enslavement and disenfranchisement.

In reality, Rome wasn’t some sort of grand free democracy. Only a tiny percentage of Romans could actually vote. Women of any station certainly could not, and even men who were lucky enough to be free weren’t necessarily Roman citizens. Freedom here is particularly important because by the 1 century BCE 35 – 40% of the population of the Italian peninsula were slaves. Woo yeah democracy. I love it. And that’s not even taking into account all those times when an Emperor would suspend voting altogether.

Those slaves were busy building all the grand buildings your high school history teacher was dry jacking it about, stuffing the dormice that the rich people were reclining to eat, and basically keeping the joint running. Those slaves also necessitated the ridiculously huge army that Rome kept going because you had to get slaves from somewhere after all, so warfare had to be continuous. How uplifting.

Eagle-eyed readers will notice that this Roman nonsense is pretty much exactly what was going on during the modern colonial imperial age. You can say whatever the fuck you want about how free and revolutionary America was, for example. That doesn’t change the fact that only a handful of white property owning men could vote, and that the entire project required the mass enslavement of Africans and the genocide of Native Americans. That’s why you’ve been taught Rome is great. It helps you sleep well at night on stolen land because, really, haven’t all great societies done this? I mean without a forever war against anyone you can find, how will you keep a society going?

Our imperialist ideas about history lead to some weird historical takes. People love to tell you that no one bathed in the medieval period when medieval people had pretty much exactly the same sort of bathing culture as Romans. People laugh at medieval people believing in medical humoral theory despite the fact that Romans believed exactly the same thing and get a total pass on that front. The Roman ban on dissection is often taught as a medieval ban, shifting Roman superstition onto the shoulders of medieval people.

On-going Roman warfare is reported in glowing terms with emphasis on the “brilliance” of Roman military technique, while inter-kingdom warfare in the medieval period is portrayed as barbaric and ignorant. The Roman people who were encouraged to worship emperors as literal gods are used as an example of theoretical religion-free logical thinking, while medieval Christians are cast as ignorant for believing in God even when they are studiously working on the same philosophical queries as their predecessors. None of this makes any fucking sense.

But here’s the thing – it doesn’t need to. In a colonial imperialist society we have positioned Rome as a guiding light no matter what it’s actual practices and that’s not a mistake. It’s a design that helps to justify our own society. Further, this mindset requires us to castigate the medieval period when rule was more localised and systems of slavery had taken a precipitous dive. If only there had been more slavery, you know? Things might have been so much better.

Historical narratives and who controls them are always in flux. That old adage “history is written by the winners” comes to mind here, but that’s not exactly true. What the winners do is decide which histories are promoted, taught, and broadcasted. You can write all the history you want and if no one reads it, then it doesn’t really matter. That’s the gap that medieval history has fallen into. Colonial imperialism hasn’t figured out how to weaponise it yet, so it’s ignored. You could write this off as a “so what”, of course. Sure, maybe teaching the Roman Empire as a goal is a negative, but is ignoring medieval history really that bad a thing? You will be unsurprised to learn that I definitely think it is a bad thing, yes.

Ignorance about the medieval period is one of the things that is allowing the current swelling ranks of fascists to claim medieval Europe as some sort of “pure” white ideal. Spoiler: it was not. However, if you don’t know anything about medieval society how are you gonna argue with some chinless douche with a fake viking rune tattoo?History is always political. We use it to understand our world, but more than that we also use it to justify our world. Ignoring it helps us prop up our worst impulses, so let’s not.”

- Eleanor Janega, “On colonialism, imperialism, and ignoring medieval history.”

#colonialism #imperialism #history #medieval #eleanor janega

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renegadewangs · 3 years

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Van Zieks - the Examination, part 4

Warnings: SPOILERS for The Great Ace Attorney: Chronicles. Additional warning for racist sentiments uttered by fictional characters (and screencaps to show these sentiments).

Disclaimer: (see Part 1 for the more detailed disclaimer.) - These posts are not meant to be taken as fact. Everything I’m outlining stems from my own views and experiences. If you believe that I’ve missed or misinterpreted something, please let me know so I can edit the post accordingly. -The purpose of these posts is an analysis, nothing more. Please do not come into these posts expecting me to either defend Barok van Zieks from haters, nor expecting me to encourage the hatred. - I’m using the Western release of The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles for these posts, but may refer to the original Japanese dialogue of Dai Gyakuten Saiban if needed to compare what’s said. This also means I’m using the localized names and localized romanization of the names to stay consistent. -It doesn’t matter one bit to me whether you like Barok van Zieks or dislike him. However, I will ask that everyone who comments refrains from attacking real, actual people.

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

It’s time to take a close look at Episode 2 of the second game, The Memoirs of the Clouded Kokoro!

Episode 2-2: The Memoirs of the Clouded Kokoro

Remember how in the last episode we vaguely got Barok on our side near the end of the trial by proving Mrs. Garrideb was actually involved in the crime? … Yeah. Forget that progress. It's being undone. Case 2-2 is the first case of the second game which features Barok, which unfortunately means he needs to be 'reintroduced' to the audience and it takes him back several steps in his growth. It makes sense, I suppose, it would've been weird starting a new game with him already being lightly on Ryu's side. Even so, it's a bit insulting how this case acts as if the chronologically previous one accomplished nothing.

So anyway, this case flashbacks to something which supposedly happened right after the first game's fourth case. The day after Soseki's acquittal, even. Turns out, Soseki awoke to find one of the other tenants in his building dead and asked Ryu for help, but (S)Holmes tagged along. Gregson is at the crime scene, keeping an eye on the place and on Soseki in particular since he's suspicious. (Sure, Gregson. Sure. Has nothing to do with the Reaper's curse, probably.) After some investigation with (S)Holmes, Gregson has enough evidence to actually arrest Soseki, which definitely feels like a step backwards. A bit later, it turns out the victim is Not Actually Dead Yet. Again! The Great Ace Attorney really enjoys throwing us for a loop by pretending we're in for another murder case.

Anyway, during the course of the investigation, I found two mentions of Van Zieks. The first is when you investigate the broken glasses and bottles in the victim's room. Susato is immediately reminded of Lord van Zieks.

And when examining Garrideb's old army uniform, Susato points out it might suit Lord van Zieks.

Haha, as if his usual outfit isn't ostentatious enough already. So we learn that Susato doesn't have a very high opinion of him at all, and I should hope it's not still related to that time he called detective novels pathetic. It's fun of them to refer to him in an investigation that he's not involved in in any way, especially when they don't know yet that he's the prosecution again.

Speaking to Soseki in the gaol, we're once again told that he's had a dreadful time in England so far. He sees foreigners everywhere and he's sure they're all laughing at him. He's been so on edge the past year that he's moved 'more times than he can remember'. So once again, we're reminded that racial prejudice in 1900s England is a focal point of this game's story. Once the conversation is over, Gregson appears to let the gang know that the victim has regained consciousness and is accusing Soseki of poisoning him. We're going to trial for an attempted murder charge, y'all!

The next day, in the defendant's lobby, Susato comes bursting in with the dreadful news that Barok van Zieks has once again taken on the prosecution. It's definitely safe to assume now that either Ryu or Soseki is the reason he's taking on these not-really-murder trials when he normally wouldn't. As I mentioned before, this is his reintroduction in the second game and so the game feels compelled to remind the player of what went down in case 1-4:

He sure did! The game also once again reminds us what the Reaper's Curse entails, and that perhaps that's the reason why Soseki is on trial yet again. He's doomed, perhaps. Susato also informs us that (S)Holmes is running late, just as he was two days ago, and Ryu thinks that's a good thing because if the Great Detective were there, Ryu might come to rely on his help.

… I suppose? He already relies on Susato for help and I feel like that would warrant far more 'preying' from Van Zieks than relying on a male, adult British detective for help. Though knowing (S)Holmes, he'd end up stealing the show and taking the words from Ryu's mouth, but that doesn't seem to be what Ryu's worried about here. I suppose the main point to take away from this remark is that Ryu wants to do as much as he can by himself. He wants to appear strong in front of Van Zieks to avoid presenting an easy target, and I think this might actually be the first time we see a sentiment like that from him. Is he afraid of Van Zieks? Does he actually care about the man's opinion? Anyway, he swears to show Van Zieks what a Japanese lawyer can do.

Inside the courtroom, Van Zieks does the usual prosecutor spiel about how the defense needs to be ready for defeat. Ryu thinks to himself that Van Zieks has a particular animosity towards Japanese people for some reason.

Good thing we got a second game in the series, eh? So because the defendant was on trial only two days ago, the same jurors were chosen where possible. The only juror not returning is Mrs. Garrideb, who's too busy being in prison. Her spot is now taken by a very fancy lady we later learn to be the wife of the Altamont Gas Company's owner. She may as well be the CEO herself with how she's acting, though. Anyway, Van Zieks addresses the jurors directly.

“However, the innocent verdict afforded to this eccentric Nipponese before... has had dire consequences. Did the accused repent for his wrongdoing in that affair? Far from it. Instead, he used his freedom to perpetrate a most blood-curdling crime!”

Van Zieks makes record time by taking off his cloak immediately after this line. He's gone straight into overdrive. The witnesses summoned this time are Inspector Gregson and... Soseki? It's very irregular for the defendant to be testifying, especially this early in the trial and especially by the prosecution's request. I can't really make much of it. It feels like the only reason Soseki is testifying is for this joke:

Also found when examining the testimony is a remark from Van Zieks that I honestly found shocking in how ferocious and scummy it is.

Unnecessary, that remark. It didn't need to exist at all in my opinion. So after Ryu shatters the testimony and scatters Gregson's fish 'n chips, Van Zieks calmly pours himself a glass of wine. I have to be honest, by now whenever he does this I'm left wondering what he'll do next. Will he crush the chalice? Will he throw it? Will he actually take a sip? The versatility of the action and unpredictable nature of Van Zieks add a bit of suspense. Turns out, his mind wandered during the testimony.

And then he ends up crushing the glass in his hand anyway. Alas, poor chalice. We knew it. So after a bit of debating back and forth about whether Shamspeare drank the supposedly-poisoned-tea after Soseki left the room, Van Zieks suddenly falls silent. We get three different, consecutive frames of him going “......” and when the judge asks what's wrong, he says this:

Supersonic hearing, this one. That is, unless the carriage entered the courthouse and literally pulled up in the hallway outside the room? Haven't we learned our lesson from the last time a carriage was driven into the Old Bailey?! So Shamspeare was apparently subpoenaed by the prosecution and has shown up to testify (with his doctor's permission). Bad news for us, since he's the one accusing Soseki in the first place. There's also a second witness to support Shamspeare's insistence there were no other visitors to the room and therefore only Soseki could have poisoned him. After that testimony is over, Van Zieks gets his wish and all the jurors vote guilty.

Van Zieks really seems to think that Soseki is a terrible person deserving of justice, huh? He was right there during the previous trial, saw Ryu prove without a shadow of a doubt that Soseki was innocent and still insists that justice will be done “this time”. Calm the heck down man, you're the one who sided with us when Mrs. Garrideb needed to testify, remember? And here comes another example of the game pretending the previous trials didn't leave an impact; when the Summation Examination is brought up, it's with disdain and this remark:

Bro, we used the Summation Examination successfully like five times already. Sit your butt down and watch the show. The jurors once again give prejudiced reasons for their decisions:

And unfortunately, instead of changing their minds by proving Soseki is a morally upstanding, innocent citizen, Ryu instead gets through this Summation Examination by basically proving Shamspeare is a worse person than Soseki. That's... not the direction you should be taking here, narrative. After convincing four of the jurors that Shamspeare is a fishy liar, Van Zieks flings another chalice of wine in frustration. The judge still thinks he could technically pass a ruling on the trial, since the new information didn't exactly disprove that Soseki is the culprit, but the jurors have been influenced so thoroughly that they can't let this new info go ignored. Testimony from the Altamont Company is allowed! Van Zieks thinks it's a waste of time, of course, and if this were reality it would be. Since it's an Ace Attorney game, we know Shamspeare's gas thievery is bound to somehow be related to the incident. Van Zieks flings yet another chalice after hearing the testimony (how many has it been already? Five?) and very shortly after, he tosses the entire bottle over his shoulder. Susato points out that he seems to be in a violent mood. I feel like someone must've pissed in his oatmeal that morning, because I've got no real explanation for why his character regressed this badly in the course of what chronologically was only two days.

Van Zieks flings two more chalices as the testimony progresses to prove that Shamspeare made fake coins to fool the gas meter. At the end of it all, he supposedly 'throws his hand up in despair and happened to catch his hallowed bottle along the way', flinging yet another one of those into the gallery. I'm starting to feel very bad for the people seated behind him now. Is the game overdoing these quirky animations to compensate for his regressed attitude? Because I'm not sure it's working... Van Zieks continues to insist that the situation hasn't changed and only Soseki could have poisoned the victim, so he calls for immediate adjucation. The game gives Ryu the option to either object or wait and see, and I have to be honest, this gave me pause. After what happened with the penalties in case 1-4, I was sure Van Zieks might dish out more punishment for waiting and seeing. Turns out, he doesn't. Ryu points out that Shamspeare likely used the tea to make these fake frozen coins of his, meaning there's still tea left at the scene of the crime which can be tested for poison.

Head in my hands right now. Again, I get it, they basically had to reintroduce Van Zieks to newcomers of the game (however few there might've been) so they had to regress him a bit, but I really don't like this. He honestly felt like he'd grown at the end of 1-4 and the game's not only undone it, it feels like they've made him even more of a scumbag. This line and this gesture honestly doesn’t quite correspond with the character established in the previous game. Anyway, court adjourned till the next day so the police can test the tea for poison.

During the investigation segment, we get a conversation that I'd quite honestly forgotten even exists. Turns out, (S)Holmes and Van Zieks are acquainted! ...or are they? (S)Holmes says he 'must pass the time of day with Mr. Reaper again, as it's been too long' and when asked whether they're acquainted, (S)Holmes replies that there isn't a person in the world who doesn't know his name, expertly dodging the question. Naturally, a new conversation topic opens up about it, so we can still attempt to needle more details out of him.

He explains the history of the Reaper's curse a bit more. Previous defendants found not-guilty would 'disappear from the capital' by falling under a passing carriage, drowning in the Thames, succumbing to a sudden fever... Etc. Susato points out that if those rumors are true, then surely the obvious conclusion would be that they were killed by Van Zieks's own hand. (S)Holmes points out that's impossible, since Van Zieks was already investigated on the matter before and for every single incident, he had a solid alibi. (This... doesn't disprove Van Zieks had anything to do with it, but okay (S)Holmes. Sure.) (S)Holmes also rubs it in yet again that Van Zieks retired from the courts five years ago and didn't return until the day Naruhodo arrived. I honestly don't know why they keep bringing that 5 year hiatus up in every single case, because as far as I can recall it was never fully explained or relevant.

I love how “foul smell” is wedged in-between those two topics as if it's also related. Anyway the conversation continues when Ryu brings up that Van Zieks seems to have a particular disdain for Japanese people. Susato demands to know whether (S)Holmes knows a bit more about it and while he's silent at first, he relents and tells us a tale (which will apparently be forgotten by Ryu and Susato in case 1-5). Van Zieks “chose to enter the legal profession ten years ago, but before that time, the man's closest companion hailed from the empire of Japan”. Which is a wording that baffles me, because it implies that Van Zieks chose to enter the legal profession at the same moment that Japanese person betrayed him, which we know is not the case. He was already in training to be a prosecutor before that, otherwise how could he possibly have prosecuted the Professor trial? Ryu is shocked and asks to know more, but (S)Holmes says the veil on the events from the past will be lifted soon enough. I'll get back to the implications of what this means for Van Zieks's backstory when we hit this exact same reveal in case 1-5.

Van Zieks is mentioned very little in the rest of the investigation segments. We only learn that he tasked Gregson with finding new clues, much to Gregson's dismay, as there isn't much to be found. The Inspector does immediately leap at new information when we uncover it, which implies he's eager to either please Van Zieks or avoid being scolded by him. I'm assuming the latter, but it's also possible Gregson feels guilty over the whole Reaper thing and Klint's autopsy, and is now compensating by working his hardest to fulfill Van Zieks's requests.

At the very end of the investigation, when evening falls, (S)Holmes reminds us that “it'll be hard to escape the grip of our friend, Mr. Reaper”. The next day, in the defendant's lobby just before the trial begins, Ryu thinks to himself that he doesn't believe in the legend of the Reaper any more than he believes in the convict's curse Soseki keeps mentioning. What's interesting here is that Ryu isn't dreading the confrontation anymore. After the McGilded trial he seemed genuinely intimidated by the concept of going up against Van Zieks (not because of the racism but because of what happened to his first defendant), but now he's not so hesitant anymore. He's beginning to see that Van Zieks can be defeated, that the Reaper thing is nonsense and that protecting his client is a fight worth fighting.

Into the courtroom we go for day 2 of the trial! When the judge asks about the results of the tea test, Van Zieks is silent for a moment. He pours himself a glass of wine, asking for a moment to “savour a liquid of a more sanguine hue”, then refers to Gregson for the full report. Gregson confirms no poison was found in the tea remains, but the prosecution wouldn't be the prosecution (and the game would be pretty boring) if they didn't have a backup plan. When Ryu proclaims Soseki is innocent, Van Zieks accuses him of jumping to conclusions, “a typical Nipponese reaction”. It's also a typical prosecution reaction to be hypocritical, no surprises here. He throws his chalice (first one of the day) and summons Shamspeare back to the stand to testify about how Soseki's unpoisoned and undrank cup of tea had been used to make the ice coins.

There's some lines here that I thought I might as well include:

“Yet on occasion, tedium distracts me and I pour more times than I intended until the bottle is dry.”

You know, it occurs to me that this drink is pretty much confirmed to be wine. He's very extra when talking about it himself, but he had his silly little wine analogies in the previous case and Susato referred to his glasses as “wine glasses”. And you would think it's obvious that it's wine, but we know Ace Attorney's long history with 'grape juice'. Either way, this dialogue leaves a pretty harsh implication that Van Zieks drinks alcohol simply to distract himself from troublesome moods. Sure, he says “tedium”, but this is a stoic prosecutor in the year 1900. They referred to depression as “melancholia” back then, and since he doesn't appear to have any friends, I expect he experiences “tedium” quite often outside the courtroom. He apparently set a rule for himself not to fill his glass more than seven times during a trial which, in turn, implies he's aware any more would cause problems. All of this is moot, of course, since 80% of the wine he pours for himself ends up on the floor between shards of glass. Still, though... Zieks, are you okay?

I don't think he is, because he pulls a very dirty trick here. Ryu proves Soseki drank all his tea and therefore it couldn't possibly have been used, so Van Zieks insinuates to Shamspeare that perhaps he misremembered using the tea from Soseki's cup and instead used tea still left in the teapot. An excuse Shamspeare happily takes, of course. Not gonna lie, I got angry, not because it's a dirty trick but because it's inconsistent. This is the very same character who all but dragged Mrs. Garrideb down from the juror bench to testify when it became clear she likely threw a knife out the window. And now he's feeding slippery excuses to a man who's very clearly lying about all sorts of things? What??? And remember this incident, because I'm going to be referring back to it later.

He crushes another chalice, removes his cloak and continues to insist that we should believe this thieving liar at the witness stand. The jurors for some reason buy the baloney served to them on a tinfoil platter and even twist Ryu's sentiments around, with some bloke going as far as to interpret the situation as 'the lawyer lad believes anyone who steals gas deserves to be poisoned'. Summation Examination gets very funky this time around, with the outcome being that Shamspeare probably blew the gas pipes (s-snerk) and the poison was laced on the pipe.

Van Zieks pours himself a glass of wine and pretty much immediately flings it, saying these are all empty assertions without a shred of proof. When Ryu presents the picture with the skin prints, Van Zieks once again breaks the rule of the prosecution staying silent during Summation Examination to point out that skin prints cannot be used as evidence, since that method is not recognized by the court (yet). Aaand he crushes yet another chalice in his hand.

Susato claims it was never meant to be used as official evidence, it was only a tool to demonstrate a new possibility to the jury. Jumping through some loopholes here, we are, since the picture is clearly in our Court Record as evidence. But, well, the prosecution cheats too so what's the harm? Some jurors vote not-guilty, but there's still one more that needs convincing on order to keep the trial going. Ryu says he has a witness who's already testified that the pipe-blowing incident did indeed occur that night, as Soseki stated the other day before the court that his stove went out in the dead of night. (Hang on, is this why the narrative made him testify alongside Gregson?) With that the majority of the jury votes not-guilty and the trial has to continue, but Van Zieks is extra rattled now. (Another bottle goes soaring.)

He once again reminds the court that skin prints aren't admissible evidence and therefore, there is no real proof Shamspeare put his mouth to the pipes (ghghhh I'm sorry this is such a silly thing to have to type out). Ryu asks for an investigative team to test the mouth of the gas pipe for poison, but since it would've evaporated by now, that's a no-go. Also, Van Zieks says that “what appears to be simple is my Nipponese friend's mind” and that's a scumbag point. Ryu attempts to turn the trial around by claiming that Shamspeare attempted to kill Soseki, making the defendant the victim, but Van Zieks ain't having it. The aggrieved being the accused is an interesting notion, but doesn't change what actually happened. In fact, if anything, it establishes a motive for Soseki to lay a trap for Shamspeare. Because who else could have known about the gas pipe trickery and put the poison there, right? Why, the true culprit, of course.

Our man Van Zieks really doesn't like (S)Holmes, huh? A tidbit which the games will never bother to explain! Either way, Ryu raises the name of Olive Green, the victim of the previous case. And I gotta say, I do genuinely like the way they integrated these two Clouded Kokoro cases together. The chronology of everything that went down is very fun to decipher, but long story short, Olive Green was at Briar Road the day she was stabbed for a reason and knows more about the 'convict curse' Soseki and Garrideb kept mentioning, so let's drag her into court! Van Zieks agrees to subpoena Miss Green in order to 'see his Nipponese friend's farce through to its conclusion'.

So during intermission some more evidence is handed to Ryu and when trial resumes, Van Zieks continues to be his usual self.

“The prosecution has tried to extend every courtesy to this amateur newcomer from dubious Eastern shores.”

Ryu sweats bullets as he meekly thanks Van Zieks “(for his backhanded consideration)”, but once again the judge is the one to call Van Zieks out on his attitude.

Amazing. It's so refreshing to see a judge who actually disagrees with the prosecution's haughty attitude problems and acknowledges it has no place in a courtroom. Nothing against Udgey, because we all love Udgey (and his Canadian brother), but this man actually grows and learns. So Olive Green takes the stand alongside Shamspeare (maybe not the best idea since Ryu just accused her of trying to murder this man) for dual testimony. When Green brings up what a dreadful ordeal the knife to her back was, Van Zieks says this:

Hang on, empathy? He's giving her advice? This reeks of humanization! Green seems taken aback and thanks him for his words, so the sentiment was genuinely accepted. This in itself is a very nice scene to see in action, similar to Van Zieks allowing Roly Beate to keep his job. Unfortunately, Van Zieks's character is in a wild rollercoaster of moral inconsistency during this particular case which sours the experience somewhat. Case in point:

YOOOU hypocrite! This actively angered me, because at the very start of this same trial day he was personally feeding lies to Shamspeare. Now he's warning Green not to lie? It gets even worse a bit later on when Green gets cornered about stealing the note, she asks him whether it could all be some sort of misunderstanding, and he says:

ACTIVELY FEEDING SHAMSPEARE A LIE. THE VERY SAME DAY. I'm all for prosecutors using dirty tactics. It helps to juxtapose them further to the honest defense attorney we play as. However, it needs to be consistent. Either a prosecutor condones a witness's lies to help their case, or they feel that they're above it. The third, most used option is for them to start off condoning it, only to learn that truth takes priority over victory. This sloppy back-and-forth morality that Van Zieks has going on here is insanely frustrating, so it's no wonder some players end up disliking him. It honestly feels as if they rewrote this case so many times, they screwed up the exact growth trajectory Van Zieks has.

Anyway, it seems Van Zieks is suddenly fully on our side now to help Ryu prove that Green was in Shamspeare's room and laced the gas pipe with poison. And I mean help help. When the judge points out that if Green had laced the pipe the very same day she was stabbed, the attempted murder would have happened six days ago. Van Zieks is the one to say “Perhaps not, My Lord” and explain Briar Road was full of police at that time. At this point, Van Zieks and Ryu (and also Susato) actively start to take turns to explain the proper chronology of events. So the defense and the prosecution are in perfect sync right now, working together to explain the whodunnit. This is the ideal outcome to any trial, usually not seen until the last case of the game, so it's curious that this dynamic abruptly shows itself in a case like this. Van Zieks does still have one moment of gaslighting when he claims Ryu may have inhaled some dubious gas, causing his judgment to be clouded, since there's no motive behind Shamspeare's attempts on his fellow lodgers. A matter that's very easily resolved, of course. Once the name of Selden is brought up, Van Zieks continues our little game of back-and-forth-truth-reveal until (S)Holmes shows his face.

“Your usual haunts are the filthy backstreets of the capital, are they not?”

To which (S)Holmes replies that it's been too long, and Van Zieks's complexion has worsened since last they met. Alright, so Van Zieks and (S)Holmes definitely have met in person before, some undetermined amount of time ago. You'd think that going by (S)Holmes's friendly attitude they might've even been friends once, but our great detective is like that towards everyone. This is evidenced by an earlier encounter with Gregson where (S)Holmes insists they're friends and Gregson says that they're not friends, to which (S)Holmes quietly agrees. So really, this little exchange tells us nothing about the history between the great detective and the Reaper.

Some shenaniganry, a breakdown and admittance to guilt later, the court is finally ready to deem Soseki innocent. Van Zieks once again has some interesting lines here:

“And one I certainly didn't envisage walking... with you.”

Considering he attempted to trip us up for most of this walk up until the very last stretch, I don't like this remark very much. It feels very unearned. This is another one of those things that would've been more suitable in the last case of the game, but instead it's being crammed into a messy mid-game moment with the pretense that Van Zieks learned a lesson about being our ally.

In the defendant's lobby, the game basically gives the exact same dialogue as at the end of the original Clouded Kokoro case; that Soseki is returning to Japan and hopes to pen his own literature there, with the rest of the cast pointing out that the Reaper's Curse must factor into his decision to some degree. So we're still holding onto that question of whether Soseki will escape an untimely death or not. Anyone who's already played the last case of the first game will know the answer, of course.

So to summarize... I genuinely didn't enjoy Van Zieks's portrayal in this case. It really feels as if something went horribly wrong and they got some notes mixed up about where his character was already headed in the previous game. It's a crying shame. There was a lot of potential for a case set between 1-4 and 1-5, but they really dropped the ball when it comes to consistency and I've no doubt that it reflected badly on people's opinions of him. Though I think when we return to the first game for The Unspeakable Story, everything will right itself out again to some degree. Stay tuned!

#dgs #dgs spoilers #tgaa #tgaa spoilers #barok van zieks #MAN I got frustrated with this one #what happened here???

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nordleuchten · 3 years

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La Fayette - an American Citizen?

As promised, @msrandonstuff :-)

The question weather La Fayette was an American citizen had for quite a time been the subject of debates - both during La Fayette’s lifetime as well as long after his death. Not only La Fayette’s own status was up for debate but also the legal status of his descendants.

We start off with the fairly simple, La Fayette had been made an honorary American citizen on August 06, 2002 (that is the date where President George W. Bush signed the resolution, the bill however had been first introduced on April 24, 2001, you can find the timeline of the bill here.)

The Congress of the United States has a very detailed (and research-friendly) free online archive. You can read the wording of the original bill here and here you can see the amendments that were made. The speeches and procedures that accompany the bill the day it was passed in the House of Representatives are to be found here.

Here is the text of the resolution for everybody who has no interest or time to go through my jungle of links :-)

Joint Resolution

Conferring honorary citizenship of the United States posthumously on Marie Joseph Paul Yves Roche Gilbert du Motier, the Marquis de Lafayette.

Whereas the United States has conferred honorary citizenship on four other occasions in more than 200 years of its independence, and honorary citizenship is and should remain an extraordinary honor not lightly conferred nor frequently granted;

Whereas Marie Joseph Paul Yves Roche Gilbert du Motier, the Marquis de Lafayette or General Lafayette, voluntarily put forth his own money and risked his life for the freedom of Americans;

Whereas the Marquis de Lafayette, by an Act of Congress, was voted to the rank of Major General;

Whereas, during the Revolutionary War, General Lafayette was wounded at the Battle of Brandywine, demonstrating bravery that forever endeared him to the American soldiers;

Whereas the Marquis de Lafayette secured the help of France to aid the United States' colonists against Great Britain;

Whereas the Marquis de Lafayette was conferred the honor of honorary citizenship by the Commonwealth of Virginia and the State of Maryland;

Whereas the Marquis de Lafayette was the first foreign dignitary to address Congress, an honor which was accorded to him upon his return to the United States in 1824;

Whereas, upon his death, both the House of Representatives and the Senate draped their chambers in black as a demonstration of respect and gratitude for his contribution to the independence of the United States;

Whereas an American flag has flown over his grave in France since his death and has not been removed, even while France was occupied by Nazi Germany during World War II; and

Whereas the Marquis de Lafayette gave aid to the United States in her time of need and is forever a symbol of freedom: Now, therefore, be it

Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That Marie Joseph Paul Yves Roche Gilbert du Motier, the Marquis de Lafayette, is proclaimed posthumously to be an honorary citizen of the United States of America.

Now, this honorary citizenship does only involve La Fayette himself. His heirs have nothing to do with this act. It does however acknowledge that La Fayette had already been made a citizen by the state of Maryland and the Commonwealth of Virginia (they left out the, somewhat questionable, declarations by the State of Connecticut and the State of Massachusetts.) Let us therefor go back to the 18th century and have a look at both of these resolutions. First is Maryland:

The General Assembly of the state of Maryland passed the following resolution on December 28, 1784.

CHAP. XII.

An ACT to naturalize major-general the marquis de la Fayette and his heirs male for ever.

WHEREAS the general assembly of Maryland, anxious to perpetuate a name dear to the state, and to recognize the marquis de la Fayette for one of its citizens, who, at the age of nineteen, left his native country, and risked his life in the late revolution; who, on his joining the American army, after being appointed by congress to the rank of major-general, disinterestedly refused the usual rewards of command, and sought only to deserve what he attained, the character of patriot and soldier; who, when appointed to conduct an incursion into Canada, called forth by his prudence and extraordinary discretion the approbation of congress; who, at the head of an army in Virginia, baffled the manœuvres of a distinguished general, and excited the admiration of the oldest commanders; who early attracted the notice and obtained the friendship of the illustrious general Washington; and who laboured and succeeded in raising the honour and the name of the United States of America: Therefore,

II. Be it enacted, by the general assembly of Maryland, That the marquis de la Fayette, and his heirs male for ever, shall be, and they and each of them are hereby deemed, adjudged, and taken to be, natural born citizens of this state, and shall henceforth be entitled to all the immunities, rights and privileges, of natural born citizens thereof, they and every of them conforming to the constitution and laws of this state, in the enjoyment and exercise of such immunities, rights and privileges.

Interesting piece of legislature, we are now not only talking about La Fayette but also about “his male heirs forever” - keep that in mind for later. On to Virginia:

The Journal of the House of Delegates of the Commonwealth of Virginia, yr. 1781-1786 states for Thursday, December 16, 1784:

Ordered, That leave be given to bring in a bill “for the naturalisation of the Marquis De la Fayette;” and that Messr. Henry Lee, and Turberville, do prepare and bring in the same.

We can read for Monday, October 31, 1785:

Mr. Henry Lee presented, according to order, a bill, “for the naturalisation of the Marquis De la Fayette;” and the same was received and read a first time, and ordered to be read a second time.

We can further read on that day that:

A bill, "for the naturalization of the Marquis de la Fayette;" was read the second time, and ordered to be com- mitted to a committee of the whole House immediately. The House, accordingly, resolved itself into a committee of the whole House, on the said bill ; and after some time spent therein, Mr. Speaker resumed the chair, and Mr. Braxton reported, that the committee had, according to order, had the said bill under their consideration, and had gone through the same, and made several amendments thereto, which he read in his place, and afterwards delivered in at the clerk's table, where the same were again twice read, and agreed to by the House.

The next day, on Tuesday, November 1, 1785, we can read in the Journal:

An engrossed bill. “for the naturalization of the Marquis de la Fayette;" was read the third time.

Resolved, That the bill do pass; and that the title be, "an act, for the naturalization of the Marquis de la Fayette.'”

Ordered, That Mr. Henry Lee do carry the bill to the Senate, and desire their concurrence.

On Friday, November 11, 1785 we can read:

A message from the Senate by Mr. Harrison

Mr. Speaker, — The Senate have agreed to the bill (…) “for the naturalization of the Marquis de la Fayette;" (…) And then he withdrew

And finally on Saturday, January 7, 1786 we can read:

The Speaker signed the following enrolled bills: (…) “An act, for the naturalization of the Marquis de la Fayette."

At this point now we have two citizenships, one of them including his male heirs - so why was there any need for the honorary citizenship of 2002? I let Mr. Sensenbrenner, from the Committee on the Judiciary, who also submitted the amendments to the 2002 bill, explain it:

The Marquis de Lafayette was granted citizenship by the States of Maryland and Virginia before the Constitution was adopted. In 1935, a State Department letter addressed the question of whether the citizenship conferred by these States could be interpreted to have ultimately resulted in the Marquis de Lafayette being a United States citizen. Their determination was that it did not. The State Department provided an excerpt from the Journals of the Continental Congress in 1784 which stated in the Congress' farewell to the Marquis that ``as his uniform and unceasing attachment to this country has resembled that of a patriotic citizen of the United States . . . [emphasis added]'' as proof that the citizenship was not considered to have translated to a Federal level.

Simply speaking, a “state citizenship” does not equal a “real American citizenship”. Nevertheless, two decadents of La Fayette tried to obtain an American citizenship by using the Maryland resolution. Count René de Chambrun in 1932 and Count Edward Perrone di San Martino a few years later – I think the years was 1935 and he was the reason the State Department wrote their letter. As you all can very well imagine, both men were denied. Beside the rather obvious reason for their denial, the descendants were faced with even more legal obstacles. They had to rely solely on the Maryland resolution. That resolution was passed in 1784 under the Articles of Confederation. This set of laws was replaced on March 4, 1789 by the United States Constitution. Some people argue that La Fayette and all his male heirs born up until March 4, 1784 were made US citizens by the Maryland resolution but new citizenships could not be granted to any male heirs born after the Constitution became effective, because the Maryland resolution was passed under the Articles of Confederation and not under the Constitution. Some people argue however, that the Constitution still provides the same legal margin for a citizenships according to the Maryland resolution.

It furthermore has to be taken into consideration, that the term “and his heirs male forever” generally implies that there has to be an uninterrupted line of male decadents and heirs. From father to son to grand-son, great-grandson and so on and so forth. The problem is, that the male line of the La Fayette’s died out quite some time ago. La Fayette himself had one son, Georges Washington Louis Gilbert de La Fayette. He in turn had two sons of his own. Oscar Gilbert Lafayette and Edmond de La Fayette. None of them had any surviving male children of their own.

But these two incidents were not the only times that trouble and uncertainty arose from the States grant of citizenship - far from it. When La Fayette was arrested during the French Revolution by the Austrian troops, he tried to avoid imprisonment by declaring himself an American citizen. Neither the Austrians nor the Prussians bought into that and the Americans were also a bit uneasy about La Fayette’s claim. Later, when Adrienne send her son Georges Washington de La Fayette over to America, she wrote a very “subtle” letter, reminding the American people that her son was included in the resolution from Maryland. Meanwhile, James Monroe, the American ambassador to France at the time, had obtained passports for Adrienne and her two daughters to travel to America as well. The papers were for “Mrs. Motier of Hartford, Connecticut”. Here is the catch; the town of Hartford in Connecticut (not the state itself, only that single town) had declared La Fayette and his entire family as citizen. The passports were made on a very shaky legal ground and Monroe was fully aware of that - but he simple did not care, nor did anybody else. They wanted to help the family and if questionable passports were the way to go, so be it.

So there you have it. La Fayette was made a citizen of the United States only once, but he was made twice the citizen of different States.

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maries-gallery · 2 years

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tw : angry French politics ramblings ahead

I don’t talk politics often on here, simply because I like to keep this place peaceful and welcoming for all. But as a political sciences and law student I simply can’t shut up about this one.

So I don’t know if I have any French followers or if French politics interests you, but basically a quick summary of what is currently taking place in the country of “Freedom and human rights” :

A few days ago French folks casted their ballots for the first term of Presidential elections. An election that might be our last chance as a country to not only vote for someone with an ecologically friendly program, but also an opportunity to save our social and economic situation which has spiralled down over the last 5 years.

Sadly no left candidate made it to the second turn, and we are left with two options : Macron, a right wing candidate who’s been our president for the last 5 years, or Lepen, a far right candidate.

So no need to say that this is a disaster, but anyways, let’s look at those two candidates from up-close, shall we?

So Macron, our current president, who has no program for the elections and the coming 5 years, only pretty and empty promises. Macron who refused to partake in political debates during the presidential elections and thus ignored one of the very basic conditions of democracy : debate. Macron who’s been nothing but an ally for the rich and whose politics has done nothing but worsen an already precarious situation for many French people.

Macron who explicitly and publicly said that he “emmerdait” people who didn’t want to get the Covid vaccine. And while I won’t get into my political stance on Covid and how the French government dealt with it (I mean, our president went on holidays while we were all locked in) ; by proclaiming such words he violated the very first article of our Constitution : “France is an indivisible Republic, laic, democratic, and social. It ensures equality for all citizens.” and the principle that the president is the representant and care taker of all French people. And as much as France is the country of freedom of speech and every opinions are welcomed, as a President you simply cannot say such things publicly, for every media and citizens to hear.

Macron who’s made these last few years a living nightmare for students and only intends to make it worse.

Macron who claims to be the saviour of Ukraine when he sends the police to chase and destroy the tents of homeless people without giving them another place to live or spend the night.

Macron who, as an answer to unemployment, said “if you don’t have a job, find one.” Like, wow thanks dude, I hadn’t thought of that!

Anyways, I could continue to ramble about our French president, but let’s have a look at Lepen, now shall we?

So some people who voted left want to vote Lepen during the second turn? And like, please explain because how can you go French far left to far right in the blink of an eye kind of stuns me.

Like I get that you don’t want another 5 years of Macron, but he might be the lesser of two evils. It is far right we are talking about. And yeah you might say that Marine Lepen is not her father, but she’s still an extremist and she still stands for what he used to stand up for.

Racism, homophobia, transphobia, sexism (because yeah she might picture herself as a feminist candidate but where are women in her program? Where are equal rights? I am still searching).

Without mentioning the fact that none of these candidates talk about the environment in their program, something we simply can’t afford considering the last GIEC’s report.

So yeah, things aren’t looking too great.

And of course, I won’t tell you who to vote for, because this is your choice. But keep in mind that this is far from ideal.

But now that I’ve complained and rambled, what can we do to hopefully save things? Vote during the legislative, or in other words, vote for our Assemblée Nationale (half of the Parliament, or if you’d prefer, the people who vote and make the laws).

The objective here would be to have a left wing Assembly so that the deputes can act as a contre-pouvoir against Macron or Lepen by blocking some of their law propositions for instance. This would prevent our future president (male or female) to violate our Constitution or set up some anti-democratic laws.

How do you vote and when? The legislatives are in June and just like the Presidential elections, you only need to register on the lists, go to the urns and cast your ballot. A simple action that may just save our democracy.

#rambles #can you tell that I am angry?

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bitchesgetriches · 4 years

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Noble citizens of the aspirationally decadent Conglomerated Nation of Bitches Get Riches: let’s have a lil’ chat, shall we? It’s been a while since we chatted about our favorite topic: ourselves!

We hope you’ve enjoyed season two of the Bitches Get Riches podcast. Recording it was a bright spot for us during this dumpster fire of a year, so thank you all for listening.

As we wrap up another season, we had a few notes to share with you. Including some more personal reflections about how we’re doing, where we’re at, and what the future holds.

Let’s get into it!

Merch is back online

If you visited our Etsy shop in the last few months, you might’ve noticed the physical merch—tee shirts and coffee mugs and tote bags and such—wasn’t listed anymore. Basically, when lockdowns started, it caused a lot of disruption and delays on orders. Not wanting people to be stuck waiting for stuff, we decided to take it all offline, and only offer digital merch.

As of today, we’ve reactivated everything! But please keep in mind that there may still be delays, depending on what’s happening in the world! We appreciate your patience, if patience is indeed called for.

Visit Our Etsy Shop

Season one transcripts

Next, we wanted to let you guys know that we now have transcripts available for season one of the Bitches Get Riches podcast!

We’re committed to making BGR as accessible as we possibly can. We know that some people can’t hear, or struggle to absorb information aurally, so transcripts were something we’ve always wanted to offer.

… But, you know, at the end of the day, we’re just two people! Transcribing and editing audio is time- and labor-intensive work, and there just aren’t enough hours in the day for us to do it along with the fifteen million other things we have to do.

We were able to offer season one transcripts thanks entirely to A Purple Life, a peerlessly talented and wonderful fellow blogger who selflessly made it happen. (If you don’t already read her stuff, you’ve already disobeyed us, as we commanded you to in 10 Rad Black Money Experts to Follow Right the Hell Now. And for that, we’re strongly considering smiting you.)

We’re incredibly thankful to Purple for her hard work on this. But we also feel strongly that this DESERVES to be paid work! So the release of season two transcripts is dependent on getting more Patreon donors to offset funding it.

Season 1, Episode 1: “Should I Tell My Boss I’m Looking for Another Job?”

Season 1, Episode 2: “How Should I Behave on My First Day at Work?”

Season 1, Episode 3: “My Parents Have Bad Credit. Should I Help by Co-signing Their Mortgage?”

Season 1, Episode 4: “Capitalism Is Working for Me. So How Could I Hate It?”

Season 1, Episode 5: “I Don’t Love My Job, but It Pays Well. Should I Quit—or Tough It Out?”

Season 1, Episode 6: “I Lent My Boyfriend Money. He Took It to a Casino.”

Season 1, Episode 7: “I’m Terrible at Budgeting. Do I Suck It Up—Or Is There Another Way?”

Season 1, Episode 8: “My Mother Demands Information About My One-Night Stands.”

Season 1, Episode 9: “I’ve Given up on My Dream Career. Where Do I Go From Here?”

Season 1, Episode 10: “I Want a Pedigreed Dog. She Wants a Rescue Mutt. It Turned into a Fight… and the Fight Got Ugly.”

Season 1, Episode 11: “I Feel Cornered by a Friend Who Keeps Asking to Borrow Money.”

Season 1, Episode 12: “Should I Believe the Fear-Mongering about Another Recession?”

Bonus Episode: Merry Bitchmas! The 2019 Star-Studded Holiday Spectacular

For transcripts, scroll to the bottom of each episode and click “episode transcript.” Or read them directly in the podcast player of your choice!

Podcast reviews

We also super wanted to thank all the people who’ve etched their names in blood upon the dusty pages of our dark grimoire written reviews for the show on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, and other places!

We are beyond flattered by the kind things you guys have said about us. Like MoonPetalLily, who described us as “the snarky older sisters [they] wish [they] had.”

FunshineKelly said our “advice helped [them] land a $20k raise and a signing bonus without crying even a little bit.” GOOD! We don’t support tears in the workplace! Not even in the sanctity of your car parked way in the corner of the parking lot. Keep it together!

And God bless MelHubbs, who said, and I quote:

They’re prepared, and still relaxed; informative, and still light-hearted; comforting, and still sexual. It’s everything you could ever want in a podcast, in an internet personality, in your sisters-in-arms against the terrible war between capitalism and what humans actually need to survive & thrive. One of my favorite things about them is that they don’t have any corporate sponsors or ads, so you know what they’re saying is what they mean, not what their advertisers want them to say. If you’re able, support them on Patreon! If you’re not, listen to their podcast, take their advice to heart, reflect on your options, make your moves, then, with your newfound financial independence, become a patreon!

MelHubbs, you joyful sonnet!

Your review is so good that it reads suspiciously like something we paid you to write! But we’re too cheap for that—IT REAL!

Bitches Get Riches at the crossroads

All right. Time to level with you guys.

In keeping with 2020’s overarching theme (“everything is pure shit”), this year has become a real “shit or get off the pot” moment for the two of us.

Although I’m comfortable and doing fine, Piggy is still unemployed. And last week she received the last unemployment check she’s entitled to. It sucks. And it’s scary.

Being a partnership is awesome in almost every way. But one way that it sucks is that we have to earn double the amount of money to be truly profitable! (And no, before you ask, it’s not possible for us to only pay Piggy. Believe me, that was our original plan—but it turns out that’s not allowed in a 50/50 legal partnership. We must pay ourselves equally, or Uncle Sam will spank us. And he doesn’t do it in the sexy way—only the traumatic way!)

Piggy is doing okay for now. She has freelancing work, and an intact emergency fund. But understandably, anxiety and worry take their toll. She’s pushing through it, but it’s hard. Creativity and passion can’t thrive for long without some measure of safety and stability.

During these scary times, our Patreon community has been a lifeline. As more and more of you have joined us, it’s slowly crept up from grocery money to grocery and utility bill money! So thank you, thank you, from the bottom of our hearts thank you to those who’ve stepped up and joined.

But we’re kind of at a crossroads. Because of Piggy’s situation, we really need it to become “paying the mortgage” money. And it’s gotta get there pretty fast. Otherwise, it’s just not fair to ask Piggy to invest so much of her time in Bitches Get Riches, when she could be taking on higher paying freelancing work to keep herself afloat.

And trust me, you do not want a BGR that’s too Kitty-heavy. I am longwinded af, slowly losing my abilities to think and spell, and take every possible detour to inject disgusting sexual comments wherever they are least germane (although idk maybe you’re here for that).

Our new goal for ourselves, and you

With all of that in mind, we have a new goal: to produce season three of our podcast, we need 500 total Patreon donors.

Today we have… 294. So that’s, uhhhhh… a really ambitious goal!

It’s probably too ambitious. We’re probably gonna fail. Who cares, it’s 2020! The planet is on fire and god is already dead, so we have no reason not to give it our all!

We are leaving this in your hands. We—Piggy and I—believe that the world would be a better place if people could hear reliable, relatable financial wisdom funded by regular people, untainted by corporate sponsors with deep pockets who want us to push their capitalist crap upon you. And 294 of you have already demonstrated that you believe that too. Thank you, thank you, infinity thank yous to all of you who are already a part of our Patreon community. You are shining stars that smell faintly of vanilla.

For the rest of you: if you like what we do and you want us to keep doing it, please show us that you believe in it too. You can do that by joining us at the Bitches Get Riches Patreon.

We hope to be back soon for a third season. Until then, stay safe, stay sane, wear your masks, triple-check that you’re registered to vote, and save room for dessert. (What’s for dessert? So glad you asked—it’s the rich!)

For now, Bitches OUUUTTTTT!

Join the Bitches on Patreon

#etsy #merch #bitches get riches #patreon #donations #personal finance #financial advice #money #adulting #money advice #advice #adulting advice

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samwisethewitch · 4 years

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Samhain ritual to honor victims of COVID-19 and police brutality

This is an interfaith ritual that I created with the help of several friends, which we will be conducting as a public vigil this weekend. The ritual includes Wiccan, Religio Romana, Celtic, Norse, and Anglo-Catholic elements — but feel free to make any changes you see fit. Some parts of the ritual were adapted from books, and some were written by me. I originally wrote this ritual for a group, but in this post I’ve adjusted it for solitary practice.

Materials

Two black candles of the same size and shape

One white candle, about the same size as the black candles

Candle holders (optional, but recommended)

Appropriate offerings for any spirits you choose to invoke (For our ritual, we chose to use seasonal squashes and pumpkins as well as pomegranate juice.)

Ritual Outline

Begin be preparing your ritual space as you see fit. We prepared for our ritual by cleansing the space with incense and khernips (a sort of holy water used in Religio Romana). We chose not to create a Circle because our ritual was public and open to outsiders, but you might want to create one for your ritual. Include whatever other ritual preparations you feel are appropriate.

Opening Prayer (from Wicca: A Guide for the Solitary Practitioner by Scott Cunningham)

“May the powers of The One,

The source of all creation;

All-pervasive, omnipotent, eternal;

May the Goddess,

The lady of the Moon;

And the God,

Horned hunter of the Sun;

May the powers of the spirits of the stones,

Rulers of the elemental realms;

May the powers of the stars above and the earth below,

Bless this place, and this time, and I who am with you.”

At this point, invoke any spirits you want to call on in the ritual. I chose to call upon the Irish goddess the Morrigan and the Norse god Tyr; my friend who is a Roman pagan chose to call on Mercurius Interpres Divum and Ceres Legifera; our Christian friends chose to call on Archangel Raphael and St. Martin de Porres. You should call on deities or spirits you have a good working relationship with — you don’t have to invoke the ones I mentioned. Just remember to make appropriate offerings to whoever you invoke!

Next, recite the territory acknowledgement. You can visit https://native-land.ca/resources/territory-acknowledgement/ to find out who originally lived in your area and what the land is called in their language.

Territory Acknowledgement (adapted from Revolutionary Witchcraft by Sarah Lyons)

“I honor and acknowledge the land I stand on,

Which was once called [indigenous name for the land]

And is home to [name of indigenous group].

I acknowledge that this land was unjustly taken,

And that the mistreatment of its people continues to this day.

I honor this land and its original inhabitants.

Thank you for the many gifts you give us each day.

Thank you for allowing us to fight on, with, and for you.”

Next, recite the Samhain prayer.

Samhain prayer (adapted from Cunningham)

“On this night of Samhain,

I mark the passing of the sun,

Through the sunset into the Land of Night.

I mark also the passing of all who have gone before,

And all who will go after.

Oh Eternal Mother and Father

Who receive the fallen,

Teach me to know that in the time of greatest darkness,

There is the greatest potential for light.”

Now, light the first black candle. As you light it, recite the prayer for the victims of COVID-19.

Honoring Victims of the Pandemic:

“With the lighting of this candle,

I honor those who have died of COVID-19.

May they enjoy peaceful passage into the afterlife.

May their memory motivate us to seek a cure and vaccine,

And make healthcare available to all who need it.

May their names be remembered.”

Hold a moment of silence for the victims of the pandemic. You may choose to use this time to speak to or remember anyone you know who has died of COVID-19 or of a similar illness.

Now, light the second black candle. As you light it, recite the prayer for victims of police brutality.

Honoring Victims of Police Brutality

“With the lighting of this candle,

I honor the victims of police brutality.

May they enjoy peaceful passage into the afterlife.

May their memory motivate us to end police violence,

And create a safer nation for all citizens.

May their names be remembered.”

Hold a moment of silence for those who have been killed by police. You may choose to recite the names of any victims that you know of.

Finally, light the white candle. As you light it, recite the prayer for healing.

Prayer for Healing

“With the lighting of this candle,

I bring light and healing into the world.

May our bodies be healed.

May our minds and hearts be healed.

May the bonds between us be healed.

May we be made whole.”

Focus on the candle flame and allow your vision to go fuzzy. As you stare at the flame, visualize what a healed world would look like. Imagine a world without COVID-19, without police brutality, and without hatred. Hold that image in your mind for several moments as you continue to focus on the white candle.

When you have completed your visualization, repeat the final line of the Prayer for Healing: “May we be made whole.”

Let all three candles burn down completely. You can choose to continue to sit in the Circle and watch them burn, or end the ritual and simply let the candles continue to burn afterwards. Either way, when you are ready to end the ritual, use the following prayer.

Ending the Vigil

“I thank all the powers that have been with us tonight.

Go in peace.”

What next?

After the ritual, place all food offerings outdoors where they can biodegrade naturally. Pour out offerings of drinks onto the ground.

Remember that, although prayers, magic, and energy are great, they work best when they’re backed up by action. If you can, keep attending protests, raising awareness, and exercising your right to vote. If you can afford to, make donations to nonprofits that are working to help people during the pandemic and/or end police brutality.

Rituals of this kind can be intense, so don’t feel bad if you need to take a break afterwards. Make yourself a snack, cozy up under a blanket, or take a long, hot bath. Do something nice for yourself to replenish the energy you sent out during ritual.

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