* blows a kiss to my computer * for JSTOR

WHY TWIST AND SHOUT IS TRASH.

I am writing this post, because I am sick and fed up of hearing about this story.  It has some socio-political issues that the writers trivialize in order to use them as a masturbatory tool.  Its all about ambience darling.  The book is going to be published.  Lets wait to gay men to get their hands on this things.  The insults are likely to fly. 

The summary of Twist and Shout is as follows: 

What begins as a transforming love between Dean Winchester and Castiel Novak in the summer of 1965 quickly derails into something far more tumultuous when Dean is drafted in the Vietnam War. Though the two both voice their relationship is one where saying goodbye is never a real truth, their story becomes fraught with the tragedy of circumstance. In an era where homosexuality was especially vulnerable, Twist and Shout is the story of the love transcending time, returning over and over in its many forms, as faithful as the sea.

This story is made from the usual destiel template complete with bad editing, and, like a typical destiel story, the focal point is Castiel, Misha's character.  To put it in a nutshell, local bad boy high school drop out  Dean, goes to Ellen's café or local teen haunt [cant remember] where the high schoolers are celebrating the last day of school.  Cas is a big academic achiever.  So high school fic.  That is the usual destiel template.  There is a reason why there are so many high school verses in destiel fanfiction.  There writers are kids and high school is all they know.  There is no real point for Cas being a big achiever.  He makes stupid decisions further on in the story.  They probably just wanted him to be important.   

Dean beelines to Cas [instead of the other way around, because Cas is apparently nerdishly irresistible] and they start talking.  Cas realizes that Dean is not a bad boy.  He had to sacrifice school so Sam could go.  Dad is a drunk or abusive or some such thing and we have another regular feature from the destiel template:  Bad John/abusive John/homophobic John - take your pick.  They can't make John good in their stories or meta, because their headcanons will fall apart. 

While Dean and Cas hit it off, war breaks out.  The two people who wrote this story should be ashamed of themselves.  Setting your masturbatory vehicle against the backdrop of the Vietnam war is in poor taste.  The war is not fictitious.  It is one of the bloodiest, more horrible battles in America's military history.  The USA didn't just lose the war.  They lose 58, 220 soldiers.  Those who returned were physically or psychologically damaged.  A further 9000 committed suicide.  Couldn't they make up a war, instead of leeching from history?  The day will come when 9/11 will become a backdrop with a slash fic.  The lack of good taste is in overdrive.  Why not just leave out war, and PTSD because these are not tropes.  But expecting good taste from destiel shippers is kind of difficult.  They can barely recognize canon. 

Dean gets drafted, and Cas is [as usual] too inadequate to be a soldier.  Dean returns from the war, damaged and hurts Cas because of PTSD.  So he leaves.  In real life, he would have killed himself but the sympathy focus would shift from Cas to him and we don't want that, do we?  Cas, the doormat, waits for him [for nine years, would you believe] but does a spot of drugging in the meantime to ''deal''.  Whilst, sharing a needle with Meg, he contracts HIV from her.  When his condition progresses, a mutual friend [Baltazar] runs into Dean and notifies him that Cas is dying.  Dean returns.  Cas dies.  The End.  Very sad.  Snot and tears. 

I don't know why the most intelligent boy at school was stupid enough to take drugs.  He didn't go to war.  He was not suffering from PTSD.  He just got dumped by his boyfriend.  And he waited two whole years before starting his drug taking adventure.  Its makes no sense.  But lets just throw it in there so it can facilitate Cas getting AIDS because of a needle.  Cancer is not dramatic enough, anyway.  Also, it will allow us to keep a shitload of the focus on Cas, because that is the whole point of reading a destiel story, right?  Why focus on Jensen when you can focus on Misha?  SMH.  Drugs are such a good trope to use too.  Its not like it kills anyone.  Even Cas, in this story, doesn't die from drug addiction.  He died from something else.  Stupidity.

A gay man who lived through the AIDs epidemic, will be insulted by this.  First of all, I don't think the writers are gay men.  And yet they want to write about gay characters and do it wrong.  Case in point is AIDS.  This disease was called GRID [gay related immune deficiency], gay plague and gay cancer.  Gay men were seen as the plague carrying rats, and were ostracized.  Movies and television often depicted gay men succumbing only to this disease.  The gay community had to fight to make them stop that because everyone gets AIDS, not just gay men.  And now, years later, here are a couple of thirsty girls flushing their efforts down the toilets, and apparently making money from it too, because there are talks to get this trash published.  First 50 shades and now this.  Publishing houses are apparently being run by apes with no taste or common sense.

Citation for suicide estimates: 

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/2343923

The ExHaler - make it yourself and vape with impunity! These are dark days for decency and light hearted puffers like the readers of our illustrious blog know it's hard to hold your head high and keep smiling. But through tough times, most cannabis aficionados are hard working folks who get on with life and double down when the going gets tough. But, enough with the gloom and doom! One sure fire way to pick up your dull day (wherever you are) is to have a puff of your favorite vapor. Me, I'm vaping a Regulator cartridge on my pen vape. Perhaps you are a JUUL aficionado. Whether it is nicotine or cannabinoids (along with their requisite flavorants and smoke enhancers), a little mid-day dose can boost your dreary day. So if you want to vape or JUUL without offending the people around you, here's a helping hand from an old friend, the Ex-Sailor brand ExHaler brought to you by Stoner Living. You can make it yourself for free with stuff you (probably) have around your home or office. The ExHaler The biggest concern of would-be puffer/vapers is fearing others will smell or see the vapor you create. This is where a lit-end cigarette or joint (or blunt) is NOT a good choice if keeping it stealthy is your primary goal. A lit cigarette or blunt or joint has sidestream smoke - as the lit cigarette burns, smoke continues to stream from the lit end even when the smoker is not puffing. With a vape unit, 'smoke' is only created when the device is puffed. The residual vapor will contain water vapor, CO2, flavorants and traces of the active ingredient, usually nicotine or cannabinoids. For the sake of subtlety, vaping beats smoking hands down. The best strategy to minimize the size of your vape cloud is to limit the size of your puff and to hold it in as long as possible before exhaling. With practice, a stealthy puffer may learn to 'zero' out the puffs through this strategy. But don't stop there - if you are vaping in the bathroom at work or university for instance - you need a second layer of protection. That is where your friend the Ex-Sailor Exhaler comes in to play. After taking your thoughtfully rationed pull on your vapo-device, and holding it in until you can't hold it any longer but at least 30 seconds, exhale slowly through your ExHaler which you have vented down into your clothing (down your shirt) or into a sweatshirt or duffle bag. This will deodorize what you exhale, but it will still look like vapor unless you blow it into something and you wait a minute before leaving the area. I learned the ExHaler technology from college friends who attended fancy prep boarding school on the East coast. From college dorms to Amtrak cabins of yore, the ExHaler (a simple card board tube from an empty roll of toilet paper stuffed with a few rumpled up dryer sheets) has served me well in pursuit of private puffing. The beauty of the exhaler it is that it smells like you are doing laundry - pretty innocuous in the grand scheme of things. Everything You Need to Make Your Own ExHaler Summarizing the Ex-Sailor's Exhaler: 0.) Make your ExHaler by stuffing an empty toilet paper tube w/ multiple crumpled dryer sheets, decorate as desired 1.) Limit your puff or vape size to a small to moderate amount 2.) Hold your puff or vape in for as long as possible, but at least 30 seconds 3.)Exhale your puff/vape through your ExHaler, but 4.)Vent your ExHaler by exhaling into own your shirt or into a sweatshirt 5.) Wait a while before leaving area (at least a minute) Remember that if you are following the system described above and hold in the vapor, you will probably absorb more of the active ingredients (whether it is cannabinoid or nicotine), so adjust your dosage accordingly. 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Baring a few adverse cardiovascular effects, nicotine does have some positive effects on attention and cognition, including this 2004 study that found nicotine gum improved handwriting in terms of faster and more fluid handwriting [reference = https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14668975]. If a JUUL lasts you a day and costs $4, that is a solid used car every 5 years or so (at $4/day, a 5 year habit costs $7,300 if you go through a pod a day). The Ex Sailor - Origins Back in 1999 I lived in an apartment building in Corvallis where I met my upstairs neighbor Serai and invited her over to hang out. My apartment had a cigarette smoking outside rule so when I pulled evening bong hits indoors while we got to know each other, it seemed polite to exhale through an ExHaler. I hung out with my new pal and exhaled all night through my lil frayed home-made device that made me imagine the neighbors thinking I did a lot of laundry. Then Serai pointed out that she was 'the neighbors'. The next day I came home from the lab to a nice wrapped present on my porch! I opened it up, and Serai delivered a thank you note and made me a shiny new Ex-Sailor complete with flame detailing. Imagining some poor sucker kicked out of the Navy for a bum pee test, Serai thought my flimsy invention was pretty cool but in need of an upgrade (Serai was not a cannabis person then or today). She heard Ex-Sailor, all night instead of 'exhaler' and I treasure the resulting Ex-Sailor she made me, along with our friendship, some 20 years after the fact. Serai has a popular cleaning business in the Corvallis area as of 2019 but I won't sully her image by linking to her cleaning service for homes and offices - but a shout out from SL all my love. Never try to vape on board an airline - any problem or funny stuff with the restroom smoke detectors can get your flight re-routed to the nearest airport big enough to land your aircraft. Think of the inconvenience you would cause so many people - the horror and shame (and probable criminal charges)! So never, ever on the plane. But if you are in the airport waiting interminably, well, it's not a good idea but at least you probably won't be re-routing planes. So we offer the Ex-Sailor branded ExHaler to you for your privacy and convenience. Don't get yourself in trouble - vaping should relax and enhance your life, not add stress and trouble. Be aware of local ordinances and respect them. Also consider the many years of experience your parents have before dismissing their opinions. Be good to yourselves and make sure you are treating yourself to a little break and not creating problems for yourselves. (C)2019 Stoner Living Blog www.stonerliving.com

My sister told me people should be looking out the window in trains, planes, buses instead of going on their phones. Her reason? “To realize how lucky you are compared to homeless people.” What the heck? I’m just sitting there going, “You can’t be serious right now,” in my head. You don’t need to stare out of a window to understand that idea. If you have things to do, people to talk to, or even if you’re just bored, by all means, use your phone when traveling. What’s the big deal? Before saying this, she accused me of “going on [my] phone” all the time, when 1) I don’t use my phone “all the time” 2) I check it for social media periodically 3) I use it when I eat because I’m able to multitask and I’m not going to waste thirty minutes to eat a meal when I could be reading or watching something at the same time as I eat. She basically came up with the lame excuse to look out the window to try to say I’m doing something wrong and terrible by using my phone sometimes. Some of the things she says are *such* a reach.

And, after I said we should be listening to nutrition Ph.D’s/scientists when it comes to nutrition facts, and that according to them, vegan sources of protein are good sources of protein despite the anti-vegan myth that they aren’t, she asked, “Why don’t you get a Ph.D then?” in a condescending tone, as if I think I’m a genius, even though I understand I don’t know everything. Um, yeah, I can go for a Ph.D in the future (after a Master’s degree) if I want to be on that path. Right now, I don’t want to though, and even if I don’t pursue further academics, I can still educate myself on nutrition using the resources that are widely available, such as nutrition research studies (Pubmed anyone?). Why is she so scathing? There was no reason for her to sound so rude.

It’s really clear to me that, whether or not she wants to admit it to herself, she has something against me for some reason. I’ve always felt uneasy around her. One time another driver exiting a bank’s parking lot almost ran into the car I was driving. She immediately started cursing at the other driver, including the f word, but I thought she was shouting at me. Also I’ve already written about this before - she’s shouted at me that I should be kicked out of the house, a house that isn’t even hers.

My point in all of this is that sometimes, being related to someone doesn’t automatically mean you’re going to have a good relationship with them. Sometimes it’s not you at all.