episode 32 / episode 38

translations from the empty movement website for comparison (i rearranged the ep 32 shots to match ep 38 shots)

“If a society puts half its children into short skirts and warns them not to move in ways that reveal their panties, while putting the other half into jeans and overalls and encouraging them to climb trees, play ball, and participate in other vigorous outdoor games; if later, during adolescence, the children who have been wearing trousers are urged to “eat like growing boys,” while the children in skirts are warned to watch their weight and not get fat; if the half in jeans runs around in sneakers or boots, while the half in skirts totters about on spike heels, then these two groups of people will be biologically as well as socially different. Their muscles will be different, as will their reflexes, posture, arms, legs and feet, hand-eye coordination, and so on. Similarly, people who spend eight hours a day in an office working at a typewriter or a visual display terminal will be biologically different from those who work on construction jobs. There is no way to sort the biological and social components that produce these differences. We cannot sort nature from nurture when we confront group differences in societies in which people from different races, classes, and sexes do not have equal access to resources and power, and therefore live in different environments. Sex-typed generalizations, such as that men are heavier, taller, or stronger than women, obscure the diversity among women and among men and the extensive overlaps between them… Most women and men fall within the same range of heights, weights, and strengths, three variables that depend a great deal on how we have grown up and live. We all know that first-generation Americans, on average, are taller than their immigrant parents and that men who do physical labor, on average, are stronger than male college professors. But we forget to look for the obvious reasons for differences when confronted with assertions like ‘Men are stronger than women.’ We should be asking: ‘Which men?’ and ‘What do they do?’ There may be biologically based average differences between women and men, but these are interwoven with a host of social differences from which we cannot disentangle them.”

— Ruth Hubbard, “The Political Nature of ‘Human Nature’“ (via gothhabiba)

Yes.

"She opened her eyes, lifted the lid from her coffin, sat up, and was alive again" (Grimm, 1857/2005)

My neighbor Keppi

When Touga is finally released from adult small talk, he finds Nanami and Anthy at the base of a tree, watching a single-file procession of ants. They’re both following the ants with their eyes, not saying a word. Touga’s not sure what to make of it, but Nanami jumps up to hug him as always, so he figures he shouldn’t worry about it. - In another world, Anthy, Touga and Nanami get along a little better as children than as teenagers.

thinking about the nanami-wakaba parallels

trans flag color picked from utena 👍

Everyone's favourite Least Offensive Guy on the student council

trying to get someone into sarazanmai is like. ok before i tell you what this anime is about, we have to discuss the role of the kappa in japanese folklore, and also shinto poop deities. and uh. a basic background in buddhism too. and a little bit about ikuhara's lesser known works like mawaru penguindrum and yuri kuma arashi, which necessarily leads us into the sankebetsu brown bear incident of 1915. anyway now that you've sat through all that, let's talk about yaoi crossdressing idols, catfishing your younger brother online, and bishie weed dealers

When I was younger and researching the autism diagnosis criteria and symptoms, I thought “oh I couldn’t POSSIBLY be autistic.” Because when I read “takes everything literally” I thought it literally meant EVERYTHING and I was like “I don’t take EVERYTHING literally, just most things!” And I just realized the other day that it didn’t actually mean EVERYTHING and that was an overstatement.

Whoever invented "open in app" links that redirect you to the app store instead of actually opening the app even when you already have the app installed on your phone should be involuntarily turned into a beanbag chair

Peculiar fish!

people tend to talk more about the doll iroh gives azula as a spoil of war that directly illustrates iroh’s attitude of colonial paternalism, but there’s something so fascinating to me about how iroh gives zuko a knife that says “made in earth kingdom” on one side and “never give up without a fight” on the other, reducing a call to action, direct resistance through any means necessary, into an abstract, inspirational quote. a weapon that symbolizes the strength of a nation of resist imperialist conquest/colonial occupation is put in the hands of a ten year old who has no way of truly understanding the implications of that slogan. of course, zuko eventually does come to understand, and he does refuse to give up without a fight, as does iroh, but at the time that iroh gives zuko the knife, he is perverting that symbol of revolutionary action & resistance into a colonial artifact, a mere child’s plaything, its blade dulled and its power denied through the act of gifting it to the sheltered prince of the nation against whom they are fighting. yes, zuko has his own fight, and must face his own struggles, and he is largely defined by his persistence, so it’s easy to forget what this knife means within its original cultural context: “made in earth kingdom” isn’t just a dismissive joke, it’s also a grave reminder of who iroh was, what his “gifts” represent, and where they came from.

toxic yuri lesbian flag color picked from juri and shiori from revolutionary girl utena

not a fan of when people claim that akio and anthy don't "really" love each other. like idk man have you considered that love and abuse are not mutually exclusive polar opposites and that this may be a pretty significant part of the show's themes. you can abuse someone because you love them, and you can love someone despite their abuse. this in fact happens often. would be nice if it was as simple as "bad people don't feel love because love is inherently good" like some people make it out to be but it's not